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jinxedpanda4life · 4 years ago

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DamiRae Hospital AU?

No I am not writing one, if I could write well I would though! So here are some HCs for a hospital AU. If someone decides to write this then I’ll be your first reader. Also I am sort of basing things off of Grey’s Anatomy just a bit and my limited knowledge of the medical field.

- Starts of as 1st year residents, specialties may vary

- The “Titans” are residents and 1st years that show great promise, this doesn’t really play a role its just what people call them behind their backs

- Dr. Kori Anders is a OBGYN (women parts and birth) resident, a year or two away from finishing

- Dr. Richard “Dick” Grayson is is a surgery resident, trained by the hospital owner Bruce Wayne (who is a world renowned surgeon, has awards, etc), specifically general surgery

- Dr. Garfield Logan is pediatrician (kid doctor) res, bonds well with kids, but is considering going back to school to become a vet instead

- Dr. Jaime Reyes is an oncology (cancer doctor), having had cancer as a teen and is now forever trying to rid the world of it, works mostly with kids and teens

- Dr. Jonathan Kent is a physical therapist that works with pain management. Up beat guy and is always trying to brighten his patient’s lives.

- Dr. Damian Wayne is a surgical intern, blood thirsty little thing, hoping to become a neurosurgeon (brain, spine) (or cardiothoracic (heart, lungs) both are competitive)

- Dr. Raven Roth is an anesthesiologist (the drug person that knocks you out) and is starting her surgical internship (she wanted to do more than just help people get high essentially or whatever) has no current preference for any specific surgical field

- Add in characters:

-- Dr. Jason Todd, trauma surgeon (fits too well)

-- Dr. Timothy Drake diagnostician (medical detective basically)

-- Dr. Donna Troy gynecologist

-- Terra Markov is a nurse (i don’t like Terra but nurses are the actual best)

- Story stuff:

- Damian and Raven meet as they are put under the guidance of the same resident

-Damian has an automatic dislike for Raven because she knows everyone already and is equally, if not much more, knowledgable about surgery, the OR, the ER, protocol, etc He also thinks she is cold because she rarely shows emotion (pot kettle Damian)

- Raven can always be found in the medical archives researching old cases and studying new ones, Damian stumbles upon her when looking for an old cardiomegaly case (enlarged heart).

- Raven gets along with all of the past ‘Robins’ making her a go to intern

- Garfield can be seen whenever he is not needed trying to flirt with Nurse Markov and often goes to Raven to sulk

- Damian and Raven are always early to pre-rounds and are typically the first ones there (usually early in the morning, getting there before 500)

- Jon bumps into Damian more often than not and they start becoming friends (Damian is reluctant at first and is still you know Damian about everything), Damian even recommends patients to him

- Though Damian doesn’t want to really ��hang out’ with anyone he reluctantly hangs out with the Titans, because of Jon and Dick

- When in a large group when at a bar, club or whatever Damian tends to stay close to Raven because 1) they actually have things to talk about 2) she isn’t loud

- Raven & Damian are both assigned to a case that is frankly befuddling and have to start spending long nights and early mornings together to figure it out

- Over that period of time they learn things about each other:

-- Raven learns:

Damian has a dog (Titus) and cat (Alfred)

He is single (Kori told her) and lives in an apartment close to the hospital

He has lived in various countries

He is trained in multiple martial arts

He prefers his tea with brown sugar and a slice of lemon

His eyes are a true emerald color with a ring of gold and flecks scattered within

He may hide it well but when Raven compliments him he becomes flustered

He speaks to himself in Arabic when he curses, trying to remember something, doesn’t want anyone to know what he is saying

He isn’t always an asshole

When he actually smiles a true and genuine smile, she has heart palpitations

-- Damian learns:

Raven has two tattoos (neither are a bird), a gang tat (she is saving up to get it removed), and a mantra in Azarathian; Azarath Metrion Zinthos

She immigrated from Azarath when she was around 8

Her notes are in Azarathian

She actually feels a lot of emotion and knows how to control them

If she is not reading about a current or past case she is reading any book or file she can get her hands on, he has caught her reading in multiple different languages; Azarathian, English, French, Russian, Arabic, Dutch, Mandarin, (could be more or less)

She lives alone and has a cat, Nevermore, and thanks to Dick he already knew she was single

She likes all tea, no matter how prepared, but prefers the sweetener to be honey

Her hair is black but shines purple, especially under the ER lights

Her eyes are a purple that at first glance look blue, like Elizabeth Taylor, he realizes though her eyes are galaxies on their own

When she smiles the world actually stops moving, her eyes shine like stars and he never wants the world to start moving again

She always wears a necklace with a gold and ruby ring at all times (it was her mother’s wedding ring)

- When Damian starts having le feelings for Raven he considers actually seeking medical advice as this has never happened to him before

- Raven tries her best to contain her feelings when at work, going so far as one day a month staying home just to scream, cry and feel her feelings

- It does not help that new feelings towards Damian start popping up, especially since he starts bringing her tea and hanging out with her at work

- During the middle of their 2nd year of residency someone holds Raven hostage in the hospital to fix someone that person loves (this person had connections to Trigon and knew who Raven was)

- That was not a fun time for either Damian or Raven; Damian was outside the hospital pacing trying to figure something out with the other Titans trying to calm themselves and him down

- Shots are fired and when all is said and done, Raven gets shot in the abdomen and the hand (she was in ICU for a hot sec)

- Damian seemed to be there every time Raven woke up, he was always checking on her during rounds even though he wasn’t on her case

- Raven did have to have surgery on her hand and in her abdomen (idk where i’m not getting that specific), she hated being, in her words, coddled

- Even though Raven was right handed (the one that got shot) she learned how to do everything, writing, eating, going to the bathroom, etc. (many of the other residents are impressed since she keeps working on it after her other hand heals)

- Raven’s room also becomes a space for other residents to destress and just vent about their day. She listens and gives advice, all without looking up from whatever she was doing.

- During this time Raven becomes hooked on Pretty Pretty Pegasus

- Raven’s room is also full of cards, flowers, etc all from fellow staff and some from patients. When she leaves (she spends a couple weeks in thanks to multiple surgeries, recovery, and other minor injuries) all of the gifts litter her apartment, the cards end up in a box by her desk, she presses the flowers, and stuffed animals are donated to children’s shelter (she keeps some that she has grown attached to)

- During this time Damian is more of an ass than usual (people notice and tease him)

- Damian at some points keeps working without breaks/sleep for hours on end. Dick pulls him aside after noticing, scolds and forces him to sleep in one of the on call rooms. (He really wanted him to go home, but Damian wasn’t leaving)

- Once Raven was discharged Damian and Garfield help her back home (clothes + gifts + Raven w/a healing hand/other injuries = need help) the other Titans would have helped but were needed at the hospital

- Garfield leaves after dropping off Raven and Damian (and her stuff) as he is called in on a Peds case (could be fake, may not be) and Raven & Damian spend the rest of the time basically watching terrible movies. (with Nevermore sitting on both of them)

- That is the night Damian realizes that not only does he like Raven, but he like likes her. He starts devising plans on how to get her to date him.

- All his plans basically are thrown out the window because of one reason or another (he kept overthinking it)(poor guy)

- It is not until their 3rd year of residency that Raven realizes her feelings towards Damian (Have I made it clear she likes him? I can’t remember...)

- She realizes her feelings when she has to crash at his place for a night (because he lives ridiculously close to the hospital, like how expensive is that??) and he tries to make sure that she is as comfortable as possible

- She never realized how much he cared for her? Like she was always helping him out and there for him but she never realized he reciprocated that care? *Shocker*

- Raven becomes kind of a mess because of all her emotions that she is trying to bottle up. (all the corks are disintegrating and the jar is overflowing)

- Raven is during her Ortho rotation (bone surgeon people, they are cool, ik from experience) that she actually gets a good release for her emotions (setting peoples bones and drilling and hammering in pins is actually therapeutic)

- Raven thinks that may be the specialty she chooses

- Damian saw her as a mess and could not fathom why she was said mess, he figured it was about a romantic interest after someone made an offhand comment about her love life and she became a blubbering mess (very un-Raven like)

- After all of well *motions with hands* that Raven asks why Damian doesn’t have a s/o or someone

- He says there is only person that he has been meaning to ask out (looks pointedly at Raven)

- All Raven says is “Go for it.”

And that is where my HCs end. Now if anyone who happens upon this post decides to write a Medical AU with any of these please tag me, tell me, message me.

You do not have to give me credit, I just want to read it.

This took me a couple of days to write up, so if it is disjointed I apologize.

If anything needs to be corrected for any reason let me know!

I hope this fuels some imaginations!

-I may post more HC AU things if they come to mind, we will have to see.

#damirae #damian x raven #demonbirds #teen titans #raven #damian wayne #rachel roth #headcanon #medical au #au

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writerwrites · 5 years ago

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A Cruel Tide

Pairing: Steve Rogers (nomad!Steve) x Reader

Summary: A lost hero thinks she needs saving, but this divorcée’s needs were different, fleeting, and then full of attachment. Can they overcome the burdens on their shoulders and keep their word?

Word Count: 5.9k

Warnings: Smut 18+, specifically unprotected sex, soft Dom Steve (if you squint), some mentions of a divorce and criminal father and hints of winter holiday cheer.

A/N: *THIS IS A ONE SHOT* This is the Week 1 prompt to the Optimistic Captain Donut Challenge created by @captainchrisbaby @captain-a-rogerss , @optimistic-dinosaur-nacho , and @donutloverxo ... The Week 1 Prompt was based off of the moodboard below and “What Could Be as Lonely as Love” by Amber Run

“Please come back, Baby. It’s Christmas! Where are you going to go?” She heard her ex plead on the other end of the line as she stood soaking wet in the lobby of a cheap hotel. Even the weather had turned to shit on the first holiday since the divorce. “You didn’t even take your bag. What am I supposed to tell them when they come out of the kitchen with your favorite dessert?”

“The truth.” Her words were as cold as the sleet pelting the glass door by the empty concierge desk. A few taps on the phone screen and it was over, screen black. Silent. Merry Christmas, no more lies. Just as her hand went for the bell again a stranger cleared his throat. Hand snapping back to her side, her gaze caught the movement out of someone by the vending machines in her peripheral vision. It took a minute to place him, the grown out blonde hair seemed darker and his thick beard certainly changed the alter boy appearance that the world had made synonymous with his Captain America persona. Then it hit her like a ton of bricks: this was a wanted man. She could have pulled her phone back out, could’ve called for help or ignored him, but when her eyes met his, despite the long disheveled hair and thick beard, the softness to him was undeniable. The only thing she could muster was a simple, few hours too early, “Merry Christmas.”

“You just missed him, the manager. He left to get a good seat at midnight mass.” His blue eyes flitted to the window and back to you. It was like he was waiting for the woman to say something as he flipped a coin in his hand and tucked it back into one of his pockets. “You’ve got to be cold. No point in waiting around or paying for a room when I’ve got an extra bed.”

Even with his nod for the young woman to follow him she was reluctant, wondering why he had a second empty bed and why he wasn’t with someone for the holidays- even as a fugitive. She couldn’t remember all of their names, never really following all the ‘super terrorism’ headlines, but knew there was at least a half dozen of Stark’s former friends that had stood against him, were arrested, and went ‘missing’ from some prison facility she couldn’t recall the name of. Despite her mind trying to dredge up whatever fleeting bit of news she’d heard, her feet were still following him through the dim hallway until they made it to his door. “What were you doing in the lobby if you knew he wasn’t there?”

“Vending machine. No room service tonight… I’ll get you some clothes and head back over. Do you want anything?” The grit in his voice was familiar, the sound of exhaustion, and her eyes moved over his frame as he spoke to the door handle and then the closet rather than looking at her. Where had he been while the world was looking for him? She mused as she watched him dig through a duffle bag and pulled out some extra clothes. When he turned to give them to her, the Avenger’s eyebrows knit together. The look of concern made her shoulders turn in self-consciously. “You’re shaking.”

In the subtle exchange of a flannel button up and worn in sweatpants her hands brushed over his, finding them rough with soft and slightly raised scars at his knuckles. “Sorry.” She looked for the bathroom door and stepped around him, pausing before reaching for the handle, talking to her heels. “I’m sorry. Uhmm, no thank you, I had dinner. I’m just cold, wet… Thank you for being so nice to me.” She couldn’t do it, couldn’t pull her gaze off the floor, and with nowhere to go she couldn’t run. An apologetic smile found her lips and he saw it but gave her some space, leaving the room to go back to the vending machines before she walked into the bathroom and changed.

Steve stood at the vending machines, texting on his phone while he dropped money into the machine. His thoughts were on the phone call his superior hearing had overheard and the subsequent stammer in the young woman’s heartbeat. He knew the feeling of love lost too well, but to see it written on her face, to see even her dark skin pallor, it brought back a sorrow he’d thought he’d buried when Peggy died. By the time his ordered assortment of chips, cookies, and honeybuns had thunked to the bottom Natasha and Sam had joined him in the lobby. “I’m not sure she’s going to talk to me.” Steve started, only to be interrupted by Natasha.

“I told you that I should have gone in. You’re not as clever as you think you are, Rogers.” Nat smirked, leaning against the wall after catching a bag of chips he tossed at her. “We’re running out of time. The longer he’s out there…”

“It’s not that. She was on the phone when she came in and it wasn’t about her father. Something doesn’t add up. Why would she even make this trip?”

“Eavesdropping on phone calls? Step up your game. She’s been tapped for a week, we don’t need your ears, we need a conversation. You got this, brother. Do what you’ve got to do to get her to talk.” Sam gave him a smirk and clapped Natasha on the back. He heard Steve, but time was of the essence and with no one at the prison talking, their targets only connection to the outside world, that they knew of, was sitting in this hotel room and they needed answers. “If you can’t make it happen then send Nat a text and we can pretend she’s back for the other bed early.”

“Whatever it takes,” Nat crushed the empty bag in her palm and chucked it over the concierge desk and into a waste bin as Steve nodded and walked past his comrades, but the blonde grabbed his arm. It would have been an understatement to say she hadn’t taken the agreement to have Steve lead the interrogation felt a little personal, but she knew he could do it, perhaps just not as quickly as her. “Try and have a little fun while you’re at it, Cap.”

The jacket dripped into the tub as it hung over the shower curtain rod. It was on sale, a thoughtless gift from her father three years ago, but the only coat she owned with lining since the separation led to a move to Miami. The knee length silver dress was new and now ruined, tag discarded in the trash and the heels next to it over the vent. As she looked in the mirror, water running for what seemed like an hour before it reached lukewarm, she twisted her dark locks so that they were out of her face and less likely to frizz. The waxy soap doing little to rid her of the full face of make up which hadn’t budged in the fray of arriving at the one hotel in the small town that she could afford. Despite freshening up, her body was still shaking. The flannel’s too long sleeve flapped past her fingertips and the sweats kept riding down to the widest point of her hips, making her look like a tired college kid.

With both of the beds made, she couldn’t be sure which one to take and settled for the one nearest the bathroom. As soon as she collapsed onto it she could smell the same scent as the shirt she now wore. The distinct sweet woody smell of patchouli, slightly cloaked in a hint of fabric softener. Her teeth chattered as the door opened, but she didn’t bother to move outside of hiding her face. She felt the weight of his body slumping onto the mattress at her side, the sound of plastic raining down on the sheets was what made her peak her head out. “Oh, wow! Was there a malfunction in the machine?”

His steely blue eyes looked at the young woman with worry but it seemed to melt away in a blink or two. “No, I couldn’t decide and I remembered you said you’d had dinner but not dessert, so Merry Christmas.” Both of their fingers moved toward the honeybun and he laughed a little, “A deal? One of us gets the honeybun, the other gets to pick the movie?”

Her chin quivered, as she tried to smile while she reflected on the options. “No deal. We split the honeybun and agree on a movie.”

Taking her lip in her teeth to stop the chatter and anxiety, her sad eyes looked up at him. “All right, you win.” He got up and passed her the remote, taking his time to go back to the closet where he turned up with a stack of clothes under his arm and socks in his hand. “Here, I forgot these. I’m just gonna hop in the shower, maybe be five minutes. No stealing my half or starting a movie without me.”

By the time he emerged, warm steam poured out of the bathroom with him. Steve thought she would have warmed up and calmed down, the sound of her heartbeat and shivering no longer ringing in his ears. Instead, he found all of the food in a little pyramid on the nightstand and a black and white movie waiting for them on the television. “You can have the whole honeybun if we can watch this…”

The glimmer in her eyes and swollen red bottom lip, she could tell he knew she’d been chewing on it the whole time. He slumped back onto the bed next to her, his damp hair dripping down into his beard. His brow furrowed thinking she’d leaned in when it was just his weight on the cheap mattress sliding her in. She wasn’t sure why she hadn’t pulled away immediately and then she felt the shiver of his warm, minty breath on her skin. A wave of relief washed over her when his features warmed. “No deal, we split it and we’ll watch your movie.”

His words had been whispered and he didn’t pull his blue eyes from her face. She felt naked being looked at so seriously and her eyes moved down the slope of his nose to the beard. Reaching up, her small hands brushed the droplets of water out of it, surprised to find it softer than she could remember a beard being. Her thoughts immediately went to the last beard she touched, the last hotel room, the last person she wanted to think about and her thighs clenched together with want while her eyes pressed together to hold back the emotions she had been running from for a year and had literally sprinted from an hour ago. “It’s The Lemon Drop Kid… it’s the Silver Bells movie.”

Steve leaned his face into her palm and offered up a simple grunt of acknowledgement before he opened his eyes again. She watched him in shock, that little act of intimacy making her aware of how lonely she was in this world. He seemed to notice, covering her hand in his. “Your hands are still cold.” The tension between them, the unblinking gaze, the whispered words, both of their hearts were racing. Steve caved, giving her a choice. “Want me to stay? It would probably be easier to share snacks?”

Before she could stop herself she was nodding and he was leaning over her, taking the honeybun off the nightstand before collapsing back on the pillows. Steve watched her lick her lips but assumed it was a natural reaction to the honeybun passing her nose. With her hands pulled to her chest, she swallowed when his solid frame hung in front of her for that fleeting second and when it was gone her hands covered her mouth to stop herself from taking in a deep breath of the intoxicating smell of him. Her eyes stayed glued to the television as she blew shaky breaths onto her fingertips. The monologue in her mind about all the little anxieties of life that led her to the desperate place where she was okay sharing a hotel room with a fugitive stranger over Christmas was louder than the man opening the plastic, chewing, starting the movie, and then talking to her about her half of the honeybun. Her dark eyes blinked at him when his face was in front of her again, her thick lashes fluttering in confusion. “Hmm?”

Steve set the snack down and took her hands in his, rubbing them gently as his callouses brushed against her soft skin and his beard tickled her palms when he brought them to her full lips. He only let one hand go with a nod to the food before he continued on his little mission. She nibbled at the sticky treat and watched him, holding it out every bite or two for him to steal a bite for himself until it was gone. Nothing made sense to her anymore, she wasn’t a flirt and certainly never fell into the category of being overtly trusting. He picked up on the nerves, the expression of her being trapped in her thoughts, it reminded him of Bucky and a pang of guilt to his closest friend being in an icebox in Wakanda fleetingly hit him. Neither of them needed to be alone with their thoughts on a holiday, he decided, so he tried to get to work and strike up a conversation, “Why’d you pick this movie? Not trying to make me feel good by picking an oldie, are you?”

“I used to watch it with my dad… Everyone has a go to Christmas movie, I guess. I just didn’t think I’d see it on television. When it comes to holiday movies, I guess most channels play Miracle on 34th Street if they’re doing a classic… most do the newer films. Do you have a favorite?” She watched him settle in next to her once more, reaching for his hands as he pulled away and, to her surprise, he took it back in his and draped the other arm over her shoulders.

She grabbed a pack of cookies with her free hand and Steve’s blue eyes watched her more than the movie. The woman no longer shook or shrunk in on herself with a little bit of reassurance and comfort, again, reminding him of Bucky. “Why aren’t you with him this Christmas? Why aren’t you with anyone?”

The questions felt immediately too intrusive, despite the casual tone in his voice and her body tensed against his briefly before she decided they were totally normal questions. “I haven’t heard from him in two years. I don’t really have people… I gave up most of my friends over a relationship that ended a year ago.” Her gaze fell to her hand in his, the ring finger glaringly naked as the Avenger’s thumb brushed over her knuckles. “You have a lot of scars too.”

He was processing every word and micro-expression when his gaze followed hers to his hands, initially wondering if she’d heard something about his story. “Part of the job. I take a lick just fine though.”

She nodded, noting the present tense to his response before deciding she hadn’t meant just the scars on his hand. Though she didn’t really know the depth of it, there was some mutual sentiment she couldn’t put her thumb on with him. “Doesn’t make it right. There’s enough pain in the world to not need to carry the memory of it on our skin until the end of time.” Her own were hidden under the long sleeves of his flannel and she’d almost forgotten how she swam in it despite her curvy frame. “Have you seen this one before?”

“No, I missed out. I’m sure I’ll love it. I’ve always been a fan of film.” He stole a cookie, mulling over how to keep the conversation on her father, “I’m sorry you haven’t talked to your father. Have you thought about calling him tonight? Tis the season, right?”

“It’s easier said than done.” She sighed. “I don’t have a number to reach him and he doesn’t have mine. I… I don’t even know if he’s alive.” The words came out in such a broken way, at first rushed and full of closed off frustration- not at Steve but the situation. Then came the familiar burn of grief and the internal conflict of trying to determine how much information was too much information to share on the subject. “Sorry…”

“Don’t be,” He quickly interrupted her apology, but he felt the damage had been done. Steve pulled her to his chest in a slow but gentle hug and again she didn’t fight it. She rested her head against his chest, listening to his strong pulse beneath the hard muscles and her legs tangled in his as his sweats slipped lower on her hips. “For what it’s worth, I can’t get a hold of the person I’d like to spend the holiday with, too. Missed a lot of Christmases.” He swallowed down the knot in his throat, “Maybe we can just focus on being present and what we can change.”

Resting her chin on his chest, she looked up at him, “If you want to talk about it, you can. I’m a better listener than a talker.” It was true, after a year of keeping a massive secret about an ended marriage full of them, she became a master of doing as she was told.

Steve moved his hands up her back, inadvertently sighing when she pressed herself closer. They were both touch starved and though he thought he should keep his guard up, that this was work, the way she looked at him made his new hard exterior feel like a facade. Looking at her through his long lashes, he felt torn for the first time between the job and physical needs, his thoughts trying to just find some balance. His palm brushed against the skin peaking out at her lower back, “I don’t really have much to say about him. My best friend, he’s getting some help and I can’t be with him while he’s doing it. I feel helpless about it and then a bit torn up about missing more time with him. It’s a complicated relationship and complicated circumstances.”

Reaching up, she scratched her fingers through his beard, “But does he know that you’d be there supporting him if you could?” Steve nodded and she offered up a small smile and a few more words, “Then that’s all that really matters. You’ll be there for him once you can. I may not know anything about you outside of this room or by any names except ‘Steve’ or ‘Captain America’, but I can tell the news read you wrong.”

Her dark eyes searched his as she chewed on her bottom lip. Though she’d never thought of herself as a good judge of character and had certainly found good in horrible people, the man’s little gestures and something in those blue eyes told her that she didn’t need to be afraid of him. His hands moved up her back, under the flannel shirt massaging the soft expanse of her supple curves. Just as slowly, she untangled her legs from his, the sweatpants slipping down her thick thighs with the traction. She left them there, climbing onto his lap with little regard to the fact that she was now in her silky knickers on a soldier’s lap, fingertips still pawing at his beard. Steve’s hands moved over her waist, her body as pliable as his wasn’t and he watched her throat and savored the hiccup in her pulse every time his hands brushed over a new part of her skin. “We should probably…”

With a nervous laugh she agreed, but her hips were still rocking against him and his mouth was still inching closer to hers. “…or we could ju-”

Steve wouldn’t be able to explain why he’d crossed this line later when Nat and Sam asked him about the lack of intel. A part of him didn’t care. Her full lips were soft against his and the way her wanton whimpers poured into his mouth when his tongue drew across them made his cock twitch. Every little sound and taste of her made his body react. Steve’s hands reached up her full frame, opening the buttons of his shirt and discarding it until the curvy young woman was on his lap in nothing but her bra and panties. His bright blue eyes were alight as they gleaned over her frame. His sex life wasn’t anything to write home about, chaste in comparison to Sam, Nat, and even Bucky; it also happened to revolve around work- agents in peak shape. He ached for her, a natural beauty with soft edges. Steve palmed up her back and she followed his fingers, helping him undo the clasp before helping the silky number join his shirt somewhere over the edge of the bed. Her eyes were on his throat, Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed at the dry knot there, as she continued rolling her hips against his. The woman’s were cheeks pink with embarrassment at her level of exposure in the warm light of the room, the tips of her fingers slowly plucking at his own clothes before Steve leaned in and pulled her mouth back to his. “You’re beautiful.”

The sweet words pouring from his lips just before they latched onto her breasts made her laugh and then gasp for air. His tongue drew circles around her nippled before he nipped at them and his hands caressed the soft flesh. As he marked her with three wine stained blemishes on her chest, she finished removing his shirt, only laughing again at the contrast of his toned body to her swelling curves. Her laughter filled the room as he smiled against her skin and she responded by reaching into his pants and stroking him until he was completely hard in her hand. She couldn’t help herself, panties soaked from every touch. She pulled them to the side, rubbing her wet slit against his length. Like animals they both pawed and groaned over the new friction. “Do you want me?” Her nervous whispered words brushed against his ear and Steve lifted her off his lap just enough to pull shimmy off his pants and line himself up to her entrance. Pulling his mouth to hers she kissed him softly, slowly lowering herself onto him despite his firm grip on her waist a clear bruising plea for more. “Be gentle with me.”

Steve groaned as he filled her slowly and completely, her warm wet cunt milking him as she gasped into the curve of his neck. His lips ghosted across every inch of her skin as he stretched her out, hardly moving or encouraging her to move, simply appreciating how good it felt to be inside her. When her breathing steadied, Steve palmed over her ass and pulled on the silky fabric of her panties like they were reins. Her back arched and she started to grind on his cock, her clit taut against the fabric and his pelvis only causing her to moan loader as she gripped the soldier’s broad shoulders. With a firm clap and squeeze to the round soft skin of her cheeks she picked up her pace, eyes closing with satisfaction as his thick cock filled her and stroked her walls again and again. “Good girl.” He groaned, his hands moving down her thick thighs, the veins in his arms prominent as he helped lift and drop her down on his length. Steve’s blue hues settled on the view of her dripping down his length, so wet for him. How long had it been since he gave in to just wanting someone? His thoughts were fleeting, drawn back to the reality of the stranger riding him like she hadn’t been satisfied in her entire life, now her fingers pulling his mouth to her, but he nibbled on her lip and pushed her back, his mouth drawn back to her full breasts.

With here hands clutching the bedsheets behind her, back arched as she rode his slow deep thrusts into her, she couldn’t help but tighten around him, watching him hold her was one thing… a simple delight she’d not had in a year. It was listening to him grunt and growl when her pussy throbbed around him because of the little delights. As he sucked on her breasts and he squeezed her ass holding her down on his thick cock with every thrust, she felt him hit her sweet spot, sending little heat waves through her core until she was begging. “I’m so close. I need you, Steve. Please, please make me cum.”

Steve obliged, easily laying her back on the bed and tangling his legs in hers as he lowered his weight onto her small frame. His hips rutted against her and he grunted against her mouth between greedy kisses while his hands, which had been pinning her to the bed spread her legs further apart, giving him complete access to push her over the edge. She bit her finger on one hand as the other pulled at his thighs, muffling her pleas for release, “Come on, sweetheart. Let me hear you. Let me hear that beautiful voice say my name.”

His thumb brushed over her clit in teasing flits, back and forth and her hand left her swollen lips, clutching his wrist as he continued to rub her sensitive bud through her release. “Steve! Please. I…” Her orgasm came hard, pouring her juices over his cock he kept warm and deep inside of her, savoring that tight pussy now clutching him like she’d never let go and all the subsequent little earthquakes from his ministrations on her clit. Her thighs shook and she laughed and purred and pleaded, but he gave it to her and when she was undone on the bed, his hard length still deep inside he laid down next to her, and rubbed her back. “Don’t stop.” She whispered after a tired soft kiss up his neck to the scruff of his beard at his jaw. Her leg slid over his hip and, again, he abided her request, his hand moving down that leg and back until he was sure she was ready. Her soft kisses confirmation as he began to rock into her once more.

This wasn’t just a fuck, it was slow and sensitive, pleading. He worshiped every inch of her as he felt her soak his cock two more times from the slow, deep grinding and nipple play. Each time he marked her skin with another hickey, groaning into her neck and shoulder and mouth about how sexy listening to her cum was, how good she felt around him, how perfect her soft curves were. The praise made her throb around him and he pulled her onto his chest, asking her where she wanted him to finish. Her pleading to stay inside her, the purrs of how much she loved being full of him set him off. She rested her body gently against him and, cradled there, he claimed her in broken and hungry thrusts, his coarse hands holding her tightly to his frame as a final thrust to the hilt and he poured hot spurts of his seed into her. Her lips brushed across his salted skin before she let out a satisfied sigh. His blue eyes closed, a sleepy laugh passing his lips, “It doesn’t get better than this does it?”

Her tired eyes peaked open at him and she giggled as his hands flopped to their sides, only his finger tips tickling her tired thighs. “I’ve never had better.”

A peaked ‘hmm’ passed his lips as if to ask, is that so, but neither of them had energy to spare for conversation. Steve managed to tuck one arm under his head, his heavy eyes watching her slowly fall asleep, the unprofessionalism of his decision to sleep with her now sinking in as the charm of her melted into a warm, silent comfort. In bittersweet introspection he thought of how to rectify the interrogation that needed to happen. Knowing she wasn’t from this city and likely to go home under the circumstances, he settled on making plans to find her in a week. Nat and Sam wouldn’t be happy, but he’d find a way to keep them busy with other leads until he could talk to her again. Silver Bells echoed through the room and Steve fell asleep, just for a little while, basking in the comfort of being adored and held rather than objectified or idolized. For the first time, he dreamt of a dance with a partner that wasn’t Peggy.

The familiar quiet buzz of her phone woke her up with a cat-like stretch and sigh, momentarily forgetting where she was. Clumsily smacking her hand around in the direction of the sound she quickly hit the wall of muscle at her side. “Good Christmas morning. You’re up early.” He smiled with a quiet laugh on his lips. “I plugged your phone in when mine stopped charging. I think all your messages are coming in.”

Her eyes sheepishly looked up from the pillow at him, processing the fact that the night hadn’t been a dream. “Merry Christmas morning, Sir. You’ve been up long?”

With a shrug, he let her process the fact that he was in dark tactical gear. He broke her thought process with the soft whisper of her name, waking her up with delightful surprise and curiosity as his expression looked hopeful. “What are you doing New Years Eve?”

She bit her lip and rolled onto her back, staring at the ceiling with no desire to look at her phone or confess how dull. “Home alone, I guess.”

“Don’t have to be if you don’t want to.” Steve set his phone next to hers and slid down next to her, “All you have to do is ask.”

Her heart raced and she felt like she was still dreaming, but he reached out and brushed her dark hair from her eyes and met his gaze as Steve waited for her answer. “Find me in Miami and kiss me at midnight?”

With a satisfied hum, he closed the space between them. Steve hovered over her, craning his neck down for a quick peck when she shyly pressed her lips together. “That explains the coat.” He laughed, unpinning her so she could get out of bed, watching her as she slipped out of bed and picked up clothes from the floor as she tiptoed to the bathroom. Though she hadn’t gotten the door closed, she already saw her things neatly folded on the edge of the sink, a little travel kit set atop it all. As if he could see her smile, he hollered toward the door. “I hope you don’t mind that I spoke to the manager when they came in this morning about needing some basics.”

The rest of the morning went by too quickly for either of their liking. He didn’t join her in the shower, distracted by a disagreement in a group text with Nat, Sam, and the other nomads about trying to interrogate her again in a week. Meanwhile, she was glad for the privacy to do her hair and clean the night from her brown skin, the only reminders left were the tender aches and the plum bruises. Just thinking about it made her wet again and, despite the work related distraction in his hands his superior hearing made him hear her moan more than once, making his twitching cock semi-hard in his tac suit. He sat with her while she waited for her ride, he took her number, and when he kissed her goodbye, his flannel shirt tucked into her purse, both of them found a slice of happiness in a lonely holiday.

The loft apartment felt vacuous compared to the cheap hotel room, but she managed to make the most of the long week. Decorating the place with a small tree draped in tinsel and silver bell ornaments, draping the window sills and counters in twinkling garland, and counting down the days to New Years Eve. Each day felt like a month, trying to reconnect with her father while juggling her meaningless job. Each night she pulled on his shirt and her hands slipped between her thighs until she fell asleep blissed out in the memory of their night together. There hadn’t been a single word from the nomadic Captain until a dozen roses waited for her on the doorstep of her apartment, a small card with silver bells detailing the corners that simply read: One more day, doll. - S.

Though Steve thought a week’s wait to see her again would have been painless compared to the lifetime he’d missed in ice or the subsequent years he’d spent mindlessly droning on until he joined the Avengers, but the task had been anything but speedy for an unexpected reason. Sharing the limited information he’d gathered, Nat and Sam took new perspectives on getting the answers they needed for their mission, all three of them tasked with finding people connected to the family. All the digging, shared intel, pointed to an intricately planned prison escape gone wrong. While Nat and Sam thought his worries for their target’s daughter were unfounded due to estrangement, Steve had every intention of keeping his word, simply too busy moving and looking for answers to engage in the formalities of modern flirtation. Every day was busy with work and every night, surrounded by pictures and papers, he’d wonder if she was drowning in thoughts of him too. The roses were his way of making it up to her, his confession, and every detail was carefully thought over.

As she sat in the twinkling holiday lights, the sun long since set. She clicked on the television to a channel showing the Ball Drop in New York, muting it to play her own playlist of holiday songs. To be fair, Steve hadn’t given her a time he’d show up. Cracking open the red wine, she danced alone in the shimmering silver dress that ghosted across her knees and hugged her hips, time slipping by mildly unnoticed with each sip and song. Just as she’d descended into the cushions the door to the apartment opened, startling her and causing her wine to spill across the cushions. It was the broad shoulders filling the doorway that made her hold in her scream. The familiar silhouette stood speechless and her mouth bobbed open and closed like a fish when they closed the space between the living room and front door. Her eyes moved to the television, expecting to see some sort of red tape Breaking News alert that pigs could now fly. Instead, her eyes fell on the time, bright white in the corner and reading seven minutes past midnight. She ran her tongue across her painted lips, closed her eyes, and laughed. Fate, she decided, had little regard for New Year promises.

Taglist: @caplanbuckybarnes

#captainsweeklychallenge #steve rogers x reader #steve x reader #steve rogers x you #fic: steve rogers #writer: writerwrites

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imagines-to-quench-thirst · 5 years ago

Text

Dating a tattoo artist

Imagine: being a tattoo artist and your boyfriend being part of it

This was a fun idea I had. I hope you like it. Enjoy ❤️

Victor Creed

-he is here for it

-since his loooooonnnnggg life is well long he loves to tells stories of tattoo artists he met Japan, Brazil, New York, New Zeland...

-and you can bet that he will have the most elaborate tattoo you can think of since he said so

'You want a tattoo? From me?'

'Yes, I trust you.'

'That's the problem, Vic, you could end up with a dolphin tattoo on your arm.'

'.... Well... I still trust you?'

-after that, he was a little bug just to be on your good side which you took full advantage of

Being on top, commanding him? Sure

Handing you the remote even though it's next to you? Of course

Helping you choose an outfit even though you are indecisive and he has a short fuse? Hell yeah.

-when the day came you tattooed him a small quote that described him

"Tough times never last but tough people do"

(Robert H. Shuller)

'I love it. Thank you kitten.'

Loki Laufeyson

-Since he was in the cell for most of his life (in my universe that's the worst thing happening for him, he didn't die nor his mother) he doesn't know what a tattoo artist is he thinks that's an alternative art form he is supportive

-after you talk to him describing the definition of tattoos and the art behind it he is very much perplexed

'So mortals pay you to pierce their skin with black ink to paint...something????'

'Tattoo something on their skin and yes.'

'With pain in mind?????'

'Yes, and it looks awesome.'

-when he heard the story of your tattoo shop he decided to tag along to see the magic

-he saw how men and women tattooed others while they squirmed in their seats he chuckled at the sight of it

'Darling you could have told me.'

'What?'

'You torture people with the needle machines and coax them into paying you. Brilliant.'

'Suree~~~~'

-he stayed with you to help you with the pain giving without a medical license

'I'm a God. I'm above it.'

'No one is above the Inspection.'

Thor Odinson

-since his depression and weight gain he is very much informed of the world of MTV tattoo show "How far is tattoo far?"

-so he very much thinks that tattoos are a stamp of disgrace

-and keeping that in mind he is frazzled why are you doing a job like that

'You are a shame barer?'

'Shame-what...? Thor! I'm not. The show is a disgrace to the tattoo world.'

'Shame~~barer~~~'

'Just come with me and spend one day and see it for yourself.'

-Thor is reluctant much to his words but still, you sat him down in the waiting lobby he chats up the customers a.k.a big muscular dudes that are already tattooed from the neck down

'So... what is your shame? What horrible deed have you done to come here?'

'Excuse me!?'

'You must be here to condemn your shame by immortalizing it with a flesh sticker.'

-at this point, the muscle dude stood up ready to attack Thor but you intervene quickly

'Marc, stop!'

-the man turned around hiding his tight fist behind his back

'Y/n, already done? That's fast.'

'Marc, you know that you were released 7 months ago and you are still on parole. Come on. Stop it.'

'He insulted me and-and my tattoos. Your tattoos. You know how am about your work.'

-Thor hears that as stands up grabbing Marc's arm examining the tattoos in amazement

'My darling, I want that felsh sticker as he has.'

'.......... Sure........ Wait here. Let's go, Marc. I need to vent.'

Steve Rogers

-Steve knows what tattoos are since he has seen the stick and poke of his fellow soldiers but never a photorealistic tattoo in your portfolio

-he is very much intrigued how you made that look like a real person on someone's skin knowing very well there is no eraser

-loves to ask how do you achieve such colors that simply jump out or how you make a fabric that of a shirt or some patterns, he is armed with questions

-and since he is an art wizard himself he loves to have a painting duel with you, you paint on his skin with watercolors and he paints on the canvas

-that's one of his favorite moments

'What did you draw?'

'A dolphin kissing a penguin.'

'What?!'

'Just kidding I painted the building in Brooklyn where you lived.'

'Did I tell you how much I love you?'

Bucky Barnes

-this man thrives to see you fulfill your dream and passion

-especially when he picks you up, he parks the car exiting it and walking in seeing you talk to your employees and customers exchanging stories and laughs even though in the near distance is the buzzing sounds of the machine guns

-you see him and grab his hand giving him a peck on his lips as a cheeky grin is stuck on his face

-as you talk about your day he always asks the question

'Were there any wusses?'

-alluding to men who cried out form the stinging pain, eventually tapping out to take a break

'Yes, a big dude Marc. Ordered a neck tattoo with details. Tapped out in 15 minutes.'

'I knew it!'

-he enjoys in the hilarious stories you can make up... I mean tell

Bruce Wayne

-you already know the drill he has money he will give it to you but politely delined

-he tried to help with purest of heart but still, the answer was no

-he loved to see your shop filled with many customers as he walked incognito, sunglasses and a cap saying he wasn't a private appointment with the head tattooer

-Let's just say you were pretty much in tears of laughter as he reveled his face

'At least you tried, Bruce.'

-he loves to talk about tattoos and the process of healing if it's on top of a scar

-you are hooked on the conversation and even make him some sketches

'A huge dragon on your back with black and gold lining.'

'Okay but how about initials of my parents?'

'That sounds... Better much much better.'

-so the day of his tattooing comes you tattoo in his inner arm putting the letter T. & M. W.

'Thank you Princess.'

Clark Kent

-Clark loves to see the vast tattoos so much that he wants one but he knows that his body will "absorb" the tattoo too fast making it disappear in a few months maybe weeks

-but still, he loves to see how your gaze is sharp focused on the tattooing even when HE walks that is how much you are focused

'Alrighty, Marc you are done.'

'Thanks, Y/n, you are the best.'

-Clark also loves to hear the influx of comments of your artistry even if he's a little jealous

-he loves to see just how much you are happier to follow this insane passion

'You are an inspiration Y/n.'

'Why?'

'Because... You just are.'

Arthur Curry

-you already know that Fishman is tatted to perfection and he is here for a tattoo lover as well

-if you ever have someone asking for a Maori style tattoo Arthur will be a fair judge, that's what he says

Case#1

'Why do you want a Maori tattoo?'

'Um, sir beca-'

'It's Mr. Aquaman. Continue.'

'Oh, sorry. Mr. Aquaman, I want it because I find them cool.'

'Just cool? Do you think that the abundant culture of Maori people is cool? Go home boy.

Case #2

'You want a Ta Moko? Do you what that is?'

'Sur-sure, it's a tattoo of the Maori people.'

'Ufff... Do you know how much of a meaning Ta Moko carries? Why don't you go to the Yakuzas and get a tebori.'

'They would kill me.'

'Of course, and I'll whoop your uncultured ass with my two hands.'

-you turned to the now pale boy

'Run.'

-the man ran like the wind as the Aquaman caught him easily giving him a cultural lesson of Ta Moko

Orm Marius

-he kinda has a small soft spot for tattoos especially those with a loving meaning lover, family...

-and he likes to "inform himself" about it so he asks a ton of questions even asking what kind of tattoo would suit him

'I think a small red tattoo would suit your taste.'

'I like the tattoos who can hold audios.'

-with that sentence, he left you frazzled as you google and got the special ink kit gifting it to Orm as a present for being a nice guy and not killing anyone

-he immediately records his audio in secrecy and handing you the ink

-after you tattoo the ink you hand him your phone with the app to scan the audio

'Hey, Orm. I'm just reminding you that I love you. So much. It's Y/n if you forget... Somehow.'

-later that day you doused him with kisses

Joker

-that man oozes with tattoos *cough*damaged*cough*

-and you can bet that he wants more of them he brings into your home the whole tattoo parlor just so he can have a private session with sex mixed in

-you gladly tattoo him patching up some of his tattoos he has outgrown them

'Why did you tattoo Kick Me on your back?'

'I won a bet.'

'Are you sure you won?'

'For sake of this question I did.'

-you cover the kick me tattoo with a large red dragon with green eyes

-he stands up looking at the tattoo in the mirror

'Sweets, you just got a huge tip.'

Duncan Vizla

-for him, tattoo nowadays are dumb in his time tattoos were means of solidarity with people who are bounded by the same ink and gun

-but keeps his mouth shut about it not to offend your dream even if it's tattooing dancing hotdogs

-he loves to pass your parlor when he finishes grocery shopping just to see you in action

-he loves to arrive at the parlor if you are doing a night shift just to keep you safe and in good company

-he loves to bring you lunch and watch you eat it with such content and happiness

-it melts his heart and just wants to make you more food

-but as he is present for the good he is here for the bad

-if he is somewhere anywhere you just need to call him and he is there in a minute be it a drunken person not wanting to exit or an aggressive man trying to grope someone in the shop

-he is ready to kill them if you say so

'You okay sweetheart?'

'Um-yeah...Thank you Donut.'

'Nonsense. That's my duty.'

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panharmonium · 5 years ago

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Hey, do you ship merthur? I have conflicted feelings about it because Merlin does love Arthur but also their relationship is kinda shitty.

short answer: i do not

longer answer: i might not be the right person to ask about this, because i don’t really “ship” anything? it’s not how i engage with fandom. (disclaimer: this is not a value judgment of folks who do engage with fandom that way. just an explanation of how my own brain works.)

extra long answer: under the cut, because i suppose it was only a matter of time before someone asked me about merlin/arthur, and i might as well put my entire response in one place so that next time, i can just link to it.

questions like this are a little tough for me to answer, because i am completely uninterested in romance as a premise. if it’s not there, i don’t care. if it is there, i often wish it weren’t, because it’s almost never developed in a way that lives up to my standards. i don’t always mind if something contains romantic relationships (provided they’re written well), but i don’t want them to be the point of a story. i honestly cannot think of anything less interesting to me than a story that has as its main plotline “x character falls in love with y character.” for me, in my brain, it’s like, “okay...that’s it? do you have anything else to say?” there is literally nothing about that that i care about.

this can be a little difficult to navigate in fandom, because one of the oft-heard commendations of “fandom” is ‘gosh, fandom is so wonderful, we can watch the same two characters fall in love again and again and again in a million different scenarios!’ which is true, for the people who care about that sort of thing, but that’s not actually ‘fandom.’ that’s shipping. and there’s nothing wrong with shipping, but shipping and fandom are not the same thing, and they’ve become so conflated that it can be very difficult to engage in the latter without being absolutely swamped by the former.

many times, for me, fandom can feel synonymous with shipping. there was a post i reblogged recently whose tags described shipping as often feeling like a prerequisite to engaging with fandom, and that is often what it feels like to me, particularly in fandoms where one ship is so ubiquitous that any and all other material is utterly dwarfed by it in scale. (for me, my last two major fandoms have been merlin and teen wolf, so - i’m sure you see my dilemma, heh.)

all of that said, in terms of arthur and merlin specifically...

disclaimer: everything i say here is relevant to me only. these are my own feelings. i am making this post on my own blog, in my own space, in response to a question about my own thoughts. i do not want, expect, or need anyone else to share these thoughts. any commentary i make about fandom trends is not equivalent to condemnations of individual people’s opinions or shipping habits. i do not mind or take issue with folks who ship these two characters. i am glad you are having fun. please do not @ me about something you disagree with. i promise you it is not necessary.

okay. with that out of the way.

part of me is reluctant to expound further on this question, because my personal philosophy is that merlin and arthur as a ship have had more than enough time and space devoted to them in this fandom (way more than their share, frankly) and i generally prefer to focus on merlin and the other people in his life, as a deliberate counter to that. but, since you asked, and because i have been experiencing the “i’m tired of romance” bug more strongly lately, here is the long-form version.

the number one reason why i don’t ship arthur and merlin is what i already outlined above: i don’t really “ship” anything. i have never looked at two characters who were not already together/on an obvious potential path to being together and said “i want them to fall in love.” that has just never happened to me. (again - it’s not a BAD thing to have this happen, it’s just not something that’s ever happened to me. i can’t relate to the experience.)

therefore, when i do appreciate a romantic relationship, it’s pretty much always because canon has shown me something romantic (or clearly pre-romantic) that i find to be well-written and compelling. (it’s rare - as i outlined before, i would usually rather not deal with romance at all - but it happens.)

arthur and merlin, then, never had that effect on me, because arthur and merlin, as depicted in the canon, are not in love.

[to anybody reading this who just snatched up their keyboard and started furiously typing, i beg you - please go back and re-read my disclaimer.]

they’re not in love. the truth about these two is that if i had watched this show without having grown up in fandom as a culture (and without knowing exactly what kind of ships fandom immediately sees EVERYWHERE) the idea of anybody shipping these two together would never have even entered my mind.

(and like. because i DID grow up in fandom, and i DO know exactly what kind of ships fandom sees everywhere, i knew before i even started this show that arthur/merlin was going to be an inescapable thing. but that would not have been the case, if i had watched the series in a world where i didn’t know what fandom was.)

arthur and merlin, in canon, are not in love. the show never does anything to give me an inkling that either of them are harboring romantic feelings for each other. that is never what is happening onscreen. literally the last thing on merlin’s agenda is romantic attachment, ever, and arthur is never, ever shown to be in love with anyone who isn’t gwen. the show, onscreen, never tricks me, teases me, or leads me on. i was never under the impression that merlin and arthur were in love with each other, because they weren’t.

but that DOES NOT MEAN their relationship matters less. just because they aren’t IN love with each other doesn’t mean they don’t love each other, and one of those things is not bigger or better or more powerful than the other.

i struggle a lot in fandom (all fandom, not just merlin) with the persistent idea that romantic attachment is the peak, the natural endpoint on a scale of “how deep is your love?” i am constantly running up against posts where the commonly accepted structure is to cite a moment of devotion or caring or some instance of basic connection between two characters, and then add a caption or tag saying ‘because they are JUST FRIENDS, right?’ or ‘^^totally platonic interaction between characters who are not at all in love, sure jan.’

and honestly? i hate that. that is one of my least favorite things about fandom. it makes me so tired.

i am completely disconnected from this idea that there are like...things you can do that are too caring to count as friendship. like - that there is too much devotion you can show, and if you go over the limit, then it’s laughable that you would do those things for “just” a friend. that’s so unpleasant to me.

(and i do think [when it comes to non-canon queer ships, anyway - straight ships unfortunately have no excuse, sorry y’all] that part of this probably has its roots in pushback at the tendency of people who try to “gal pal” actual queer ships (or literal real life relationships), so this, at least, is something i can understand. i’m queer myself; i get that. and that is why i will never like - attach myself to someone’s post and start complaining. people can vent however they want.)

it doesn’t change my own feelings, though. i hate seeing every meaningful friendship i’ve ever been invested in talked about like it’s just a romance in disguise.

other things: i am uninterested in romance as a motivator.

truly, from the bottom of my heart, i don’t care.

we are, at least in my corner of the world, oversaturated with romance, to the point where any piece of media that doesn’t include it in some fashion is shockingly bizarre. it is EVERYWHERE. it is in EVERYTHING. i cannot pick up a book without running into a romantic plotline. i cannot watch a movie or a tv show without being forced into multiple romances that i don’t care about. (rare exceptions apply, as always, but i’m speaking generally.)

this oversaturation, for me, means that romance as a storyline no longer holds any meaning for me. i see it EVERYWHERE. it is in literally EVERYTHING. making merlin into a “love story,” for me, makes the show so much less interesting, because there are billions of love stories out there. love stories are practically the only kind of story our media remembers how to tell! why would i take a story that is so unique in its exploration of deep friendship (that isn’t even quite friendship, because it’s not real, but merlin wants it to be real, but making it real would also destroy it) and loyalty (that isn’t necessarily deserved, but is still offered, but is damaging to the person offering it) and love (that exists in spite of arthur’s position as the oppressor, but still cannot erase merlin’s oppression, and is patently not a magical fix for the very real problems merlin is facing), and then want to water it down to “and then they fell in love”???

merlin bbc has so much to say about the transformative, redemptive power of love (not just romance), and the bonds we form with each other despite the fact that we don’t always deserve each other, and what we can do to make ourselves better, and how do we make amends for the ways in which we hurt the people we care about, and it is so complicated and there is so much beauty there and i adore it specifically because it is one of the rare pieces of media out there that doesn’t prop up romantic love as the most important and powerful force in the universe. romantic love is not what moves the story. merlin’s love for the people around him is based on compassion. it’s bigger than the familiar and overused ‘i am desperately in love with this one individual person and that’s what drives my actions,” which is a premise all of us know has been done to death. merlin’s love is not about romantic attachment. it’s a deep, abiding love for humanity. it’s based on hope, and faith, and the inherent belief that everybody matters, even in their worst moments.

condensing that kind of story into “and then they fell in love” erases its meaning for me. it makes it trite. uninteresting. i have seen “and then they fell in love” fully sixty thousand times. “and then they fell in love” has been done so often that it is utterly devoid of power for me. boring. i literally do not care.

other people might feel differently, and find a romantic love story compelling. i don’t.

i’m guessing the message that prompted this essay is asking me to evaluate how i feel about the “goodness” of the merlin/arthur ship, aka whether it’s worthwhile to ship it or not based on how healthy/unhealthy it is, which i definitely can’t answer, because i don’t think whether it’s “good” or not really matters. i am definitely too old to be riding the newer wave of, uh...idk, purity culture type stuff that is so oft-debated on here, lately.

but you’re absolutely right, anon - merlin and arthur’s relationship IS kinda shitty! it 100% is. it doesn’t mean you can’t ship them, though, if you want; otherwise i wouldn’t be invested in any aspect of their friendship, either.

the fact that merlin and arthur’s relationship is kinda shitty is an essential element of the show; it’s the microcosmic representation of the macrocosmic problem merlin is trying to solve, and even with that being the case, we can see clearly that this also doesn’t preclude them from having real moments of connection and care and love. this is the contradiction i have to keep in mind whenever i engage with them in the friendship sense - merlin has been wronged by arthur in so many ways, and yet he still loves him and believes arthur can do better, and yet his dedication to arthur really does destroy his life piece by piece, and you really have to walk a line between those extremes and be thinking: in what ways was this a noble, honorable path for merlin to take and in what ways was this damaging, and was it all worth it in the end?

we probably wouldn’t still be watching this show if we didn’t ultimately think the answer to that last question was yes. but there are also equally valid ways in which the answer is, truthfully, no, and i think really the only important thing when dealing with merlin and arthur’s relationship (in whatever capacity you prefer) is to keep that dissonance in mind.

so, to more directly address your question, when it comes to my interaction with the source material, i don’t ship merlin and arthur romantically because i don’t see romance when they interact in canon, and i don’t think their relationship could be improved or made more interesting/more meaningful by adding extra-canonical romance into the mix. that’s really it.

but the other side of things is this: even if i were granted someone else’s ship-goggles to somehow see romance between these two (eg, once, in the distant past i read a harry potter fic that was so well-constructed it sold me on a relationship i didn’t [and still don’t] actually see in canon), i still wouldn’t choose to ship merlin and arthur, and it’s not because they’re a “bad” ship (no such thing, folks - tag your stuff and let people live their lives, thank you), it’s because this fandom has already been swallowed by them and i cannot bring myself to make that imbalance worse.

trying to be in the merlin fandom without shipping merlin and arthur is just...a little bit difficult sometimes. i think probably even people who do ship merlin/arthur are aware of that. sometimes it can feel like merlin/arthur is a given in this fandom, not one of many options - as if you’re not in the merlin fandom, but rather the merthur fandom, and you know you really, really do not belong there.

and it’s not even a canonical ship! it’s not even real. and yet if you like this show, and you want to engage in the fandom, your experience is, without exception, going to be chock full of merlin/arthur content by default.

essentially, my struggle with the merlin/arthur dynamic in fandom is two-fold:

1) the strikingly imbalanced content distribution

the merlin fandom, in terms of content distribution, is a pretty accurate mirror of merlin’s own existence, to be honest, in that pretty much every aspect of it is eventually taken over by arthur pendragon, and in that there’s a reasonable debate to be had about whether or not that’s a good thing.

(spoiler alert: it’s not.)

even so, it is what it is, and as i said before, me commenting on fandom trends is not meant as a condemnation of individual preferences. people like what they like! that’s just how things are. shipping arthur and merlin isn’t a Bad thing to do, by any means, and the fact that so many people do is just, you know, bad luck for me, lol. but at the same time, the wildly unbalanced distribution of content does make it more difficult for folks who don’t ship merlin/arthur to engage in fandom with quite the same level of ease, and even though it’s nobody’s fault, it is still perfectly reasonable for people who don’t ship merlin/arthur to be frustrated about that.

fanfic is a pretty good case study for how this plays out. i saw a post a while back that was titled something like ‘merlin bbc gothic,’ and the first bullet point was “canon ships are rarepairs,” and HOO BOY, that is true. stats-wise, merlin/arthur makes up ⅔ of the merlin fic on AO3. ~25,000 fics. the next most popular tag after merlin/arthur is arthur/gwen, but arthur/gwen have ~2,900 fics in their tag. and when you remember to exclude any instance of merlin/arthur from the arthur/gwen tag, that number drops by another thousand, to ~1,940.

that’s buckwild. come on. merlin/arthur has twenty-three THOUSAND more fics than the next most popular (and CANONICAL, i might add) ship? and every other ship’s numbers are even lower than that?*

and if you don’t want to read shippy stuff in the first place, like me - the merlin “gen” tag has less than 8000 fics in it, by comparison, and then you STILL have to filter merlin/arthur out of the gen fics, leaving you with about 6300 - which number has to be filtered down further to remove OTHER ships that still make it past the gen filter.

in comparison to 25,000.

like. i’ve been in fandom long enough that i’m not surprised - mean, i came into merlin directly off a teen wolf phase, and boy, that’s a whole other bowl of noodles right there, with added squick factors that are irrelevant here - but i’m still just...man.

it still makes my head spin. and it is still frustrating, every time.

*(there is a lot more to be said about how gwen fits into all of this, and i know it has been discussed more thoroughly in other places, but yes, another reason i am leery of arthur/merlin as a thing is that i’m just...not super comfortable with what that implies for gwen and her position in the story. even if i personally am slightly more compelled by gwen/lancelot, technically - i still don’t quite feel comfortable taking gwen out of her canonical place. she belongs at the top. she deserves to be the love interest and she deserves to be the queen. and like - people can say that her relationship with arthur isn’t “developed” or “convincing” enough to warrant retaining in fic, and i get it, the show really did fail gwen in S5 - but i still don’t buy that argument. people literally INVENTED a romantic relationship for themselves and put 25,000 fics worth of effort into building it up; there is no reason why an “underdeveloped” canon romance couldn’t have gotten the same treatment. except, of course, for the fact that one [Black, female] character was being shoved aside to make way for yet another two white dudes.)

(and i’m not saying that everyone is doing this deliberately or maliciously. but we all know this is a cross-fandom trend. there is literally no reason for the gap in content to be THAT wide. a canon relationship with twenty-three thousand fewer fics than an invented ship? just...that is a stat that bears thinking about. it doesn’t mean that merlin/arthur is a “bad” ship, or that you can’t prefer lancelot/gwen, but it IS still important to recognize these patterns where they occur, across fandoms, and to really think about what they mean.)

2) the arthur-goggles

my second struggle with merlin/arthur in fandom is the ubiquitousness of the arthur-goggles, aka: the tendency in fandom, as in canon, to make everything in merlin’s life about arthur, and everything in the show about merthur.

this one specifically really gets to me. i am very committed to the idea that merlin is a complete individual, whether arthur is there or not. i write a LOT of meta about merlin being a whole person, specifically pushing back on the idea that merlin was “born” for arthur’s benefit - my motto is basically that “merlin’s life does not revolve around arthur pendragon,” and the way his life begins to revolve around arthur pendragon in later seasons is not in fact touching or romantic or beautiful; it’s a tragedy. merlin does not exist only in the context of his relationship with arthur; he possesses worth outside of his mission to save the prince of camelot, and he was already a complete person before he ever met the prince of camelot, and one of the many issues we have to think about when dealing with arthur and merlin in any capacity is how merlin is told from the get-go that he is supposed to devote his whole life to arthur, but arthur is never given any such reciprocal responsibility.

merlin and arthur’s relationship, just like the distribution of content in this fandom, is wildly imbalanced. merlin spends all of his spare time thinking about arthur’s life; he ties himself in knots trying to help arthur develop as a person. he is constantly working to keep arthur safe and happy. but arthur, at the end of a long day, doesn’t spend his nights agonizing over how he can improve merlin’s life. he just goes home and goes to bed. he never once thinks, ‘my purpose on this earth is to serve and support my friend merlin.’ he is never told his life isn’t his own, that he is supposed to be one half of some two-sided coin. only merlin is told that his entire existence is earmarked for someone else, that his life’s purpose is to be someone else’s better half. only merlin is expected to devote his entire being to someone else’s betterment. only merlin is expected to say demeaning, self-abnegating things like “i was born to serve you.”

arthur, by contrast, is allowed to have a life of his own. he is allowed to exist on his own terms. he is never told that his worth is dependent on how well he can prop someone else up. and while fic might like to imagine merlin being the most important thing in arthur’s life, in canon that is just not the case.

merlin exists on his own merits, and the idea that he does everything he does just because “he’s in love with arthur” will never sit right with me, because it’s simply not true. merlin and arthur’s relationship is important to both of them, yes, and of course it is undergirded by deep love and care, but it is also way more complicated than that. merlin’s investment in arthur’s life - and his grief at arthur’s death - are NOT solely driven by his love for arthur as an individual; they are inextricably bound up with a sense of obligation and duty and self-worth and, eventually, failure, because he’s been told that protecting arthur is a) the only thing that matters about his own life and b) the only way to free his people and save an entire kingdom. and i think ignoring this very real complexity in favor of “merlin does what he does and feels what he feels because he’s in love with arthur” cheapens the depth of the story and flattens merlin’s character.

arthur-goggles automatically make everything about merlin/arthur, though. so the difficulty, for me, with merlin/arthur as a ship, is that it can be hard to make/find things about merlin that people don’t instantly, always try to link back to arthur in some way. merlin is not allowed to have things that are just his, and he can’t exist in a state where arthur doesn’t somehow factor in - no matter how unrelated to arthur something is, or how non-shippy it’s meant to be - there’s someone out there who’s going to loop it back to merthur in some way.

just like - scattered examples of things I’ve encountered:

all of merlin’s non-arthur love interests on AO3 having massive chunks of their ship tags actually being merthur fics, with the non-arthur ship serving solely as a stepping stone on the way to getting merlin and arthur together

readers, on fics that are specifically designated as focusing on merlin+someone else and in which arthur does not appear, leaving comments asking “so how long until arthur shows up,” “can’t wait to see arthur,” etc

meta about how ‘merlin’s time in camelot was actually really bad for him as a person’ being reblogged and modified by someone else with an addition like “but merlin doesn’t regret a second of it because he wouldn’t have known arthur if he were anywhere else,” and the OP having to reblog their own post and explain that this is literally the exact problem they were trying to critique

in fic, merlin’s friends being utilized only as vessels with whom he can have discussions about his developing relationship with arthur

etc etc

it’s not always huge egregious things, but wearing arthur-goggles means EVERYTHING comes back to merthur in some way, which for me is just...really insulting to other characters, and really limiting in terms of story analysis.

so, for example - this is a VERY specific example that few will relate to, because i am probably the only person on here who has ever tried to search the tag for merlin’s friend will from ealdor (a niche fave of mine) - but with him, especially, it is very hard to avoid bumping into a lot of people wearing arthur-goggles, because everybody seems to imagine him as merlin’s ex, who is only upset about what’s going on in 1.10 because he’s jealous about arthur appearing alongside merlin, never mind that will and merlin have known each other since birth and have a relationship that LITERALLY predates arthur by two decades.

so with him, as an example - the other day, i saw some post in the tag that was like “will gets teary when arthur makes his inspirational speech in ealdor because he finally understands what merlin sees in arthur and he can’t be mad anymore”

and that is just patently untrue. it is not even remotely close to a legitimate interpretation of what is happening in that scene. will hasn’t come around to arthur’s way of thinking yet; he literally still packs his things and leaves after this happens, and he is - i mean, first of all, he’s not crying, lol, and he stalks out of that scene weary, angry, and fed up, because he thinks the village is delusional and all of his neighbors are going to get killed in the morning. his arc - his dissatisfaction with what is going on, his anger at the ignorance arthur wields as a nobleman with all of that wealth and privilege, his resistance to the big “let’s fight kanen’s men with sticks” plan - that is about him and his history and who he is. it is not about an (imaginary) merlin/arthur love story.

but when the arthur-goggles are on, all roads lead to merthur. even when the other characters in question (*coughWILLIAMcough*) would be beyond mortified to have merthur, of all things, assigned as their motivation.

SO. now that i’ve gone over both the canon and fandom aspects of my reasoning, the succinct summary in response to your question is just that no, i don’t personally ship merlin/arthur. because:

a) i don’t see it b) the fandom is already trying to drown me with it and i choose to center other characters out of spite c) i just think merlin deserves better lol

however, as i said in my disclaimer - that doesn’t mean other people shouldn’t ship and enjoy it! merlin/arthur is very much not my cup of tea, but that’s no reason why other folks can’t have fun with it. i think the best portrayals of it, probably, will be those that keep in mind exactly what you said - that merlin and arthur’s relationship is “kinda shitty” - but this is fandom, so if what folks really want to write is just lots of happy AU’s with no issues, then they should go for it! the point of fandom is to have fun connecting with people over a shared love of something, so i am happy to let others have fun doing their thing, and i will just be over here doing mine. 🙂

#thanks for the question!#hope this is helpful #fyi to everyone else; this is the most space i will EVER devote to this subject so #wave goodbye as it flies past!#XD #the once and future slowburn #meta #(sort of? fandom analysis? idk)

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dandylion240 · 5 years ago

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✧ Founders CAS Challenge by @volcano-pasta ✧

Tagged by @simmeronnie Thank you so much. I decided to use this as an excuse to create my founders of my ts3 legacies in ts4.

Rules: Post all of your founders together to compare and contrast them! Share some details to see how similar or different they are. This can be done in CAS, or you can jump in game, or you can share old screenshots!

1) The Van Winkle Legacy - Founder Peter Van Winkle

Just the average absentminded scientist.

He is immortal due to being tricked by Emit Relevart.

He was married twice.

First wife Valari - their marriage ended in divorce

They had 4 children together

Second wife Jean - she died of old age

They had 4 children together

Valari was killed in a fire she set herself to kill Peter in after luring him into her trap by kidnapping his son.

Peter is now moving on from having lost Jean and is dating River. When Gen 6 starts we’ll see if she becomes wife number 3

Gen 6 currently on hiatus but I am working on it

More under the cut. It got really long, Plus evidently I write a lot.

2) Not So Ordinary Life - Founder William Bennett and his wife Jessica

This legacy started because William kept getting abducted by aliens. I asked myself one little question...what if the aliens weren’t as friendly as the game made them out to be? What if they had an agenda all their own? Thus the Bennett saga began.

Why Bennett? Because I gave him the same last name of my favorite character Elizabeth Bennett from Pride and Prejudice

William was abducted 4 or 5 times. I don’t honestly remember. It did result in two pregnancies.

The alien experiments done on him unfortunately had lasting side effects on his wife. She became prone to fits of anger, jealousy, uncontrollable sexual urges that resulted in multiple children she was unable to take care nor any desire to do so. Also resulted in an affair and a child from that relationship as well. Until she completely lost it and tried to kill her entire family.

William stuck by her because he felt guilty because of what the aliens had done to him.

He also lost his oldest child Sydney in a tragic house fire. She later came back to life through a science experiment but that’s another story.

Gen 6 currently on hiatus but being worked on

3) Not So Peaceful Life (a side legacy of NSOL) - Evelyn Bennett and her husband Shon Olivia

Evelyn is William’s alien daughter.

She married her older sisters boyfriend after meeting him again once she went away to University.

They were reluctant to move their relationship from friends to something more.

Shon’s estranged father hated her and on more than one occasion tried to kill her. He had been abducted by aliens that drove him to drinking.

Shon and Evelyn also took in his children from a previous relationship before he was sent to live with his Aunt. He didn’t even know about them until a case he was working on in Bridgeport let him to his ex girlfriends door.

Shon had two kids with Evelyn and two with his ex.

4th gen is on hiatus.

4) Not So Quiet Life (a side legacy of NSOL) Casey Bennett and his wife Lynn

Casey is the 3rd child of William and Jessica

Sydney sacrificed herself to save him in the fire that took her life.

Casey and his younger brother Gene never really got along until years later when Casey had his own breakdown and developed a drinking problem. Gene helped him through it.

Casey got a girl pregnant while he was at University and they lived together for the sake of their son Eddie.

He came home from work one day to find her gone and his son alone crying in his crib.

Through the help of is older brother Robert he was able to find a suitable nanny for his son.

He later married his son’s nanny.

Casey had two kids with Lynn besides Eddie.

Glitter is the continuation of his legacy with Hannah, Benjamin and Christopher Bennett.

5) Not So Reckless Life (a side legacy of NSOL) Gene Bennett and his wife Aimee.

Gene had emotional problems that developed after the death of this older sister Sydney. He felt responsible for the fire because he took out the batteries from the smoke alarm to operate a toy.

He got into drugs and drinking as a teenager but nothing really helped with the guilt he felt.

He became suicidal.

He became a target of his mother’s to vent her anger and unreasonable hatred on not helping with his own emotional problems.

Things started to turn around when he met his girlfriend (can’t remember her name) They lived together until he decided to sign up Sim Star Idol

Everyone was against him joining the show afraid that the pressure would be too much for him and he’d start drinking again.

If it weren’t for his brother Robert’s firm belief in him that he could do it that he did the show.

He didn’t win but he did meet the love of his life Aimee Vera.

Aimee’s parents were less than thrilled with her choice in men and did everything they could to break them up.

Aimee gave into their demands when Gene found out he was the father of twins from his previous relationship and she had died in child birth leaving him twin girls to raise.

He had a total of 7 kids.

Knights of Hope is the current gen and will continue once Glitter concludes. Currently on Hiatus

6) Bring Me Back To Live (a side legacy of NSOL) Sydney Bennett and her husband Tain Sugihara.

Sydney died in a tragic house fire as a teenager.

She was brought back to life by a highly experimental procedure

The scientists wanted to generate good will and funding for their experiment so they insisted she marry and they hosted a BC for her.

Tain Sugihara was the lucky winner

The experiment that brought her back to life led to her death five years later.

She had triplets but it was her son Jackson who developed the genetic degradation that would eventually lead to his early death.

The scientists wanted to continue the experiments in the hopes of perfecting or even duplicating their one and only successful resurrection.

Made to almost the end of gen 5 - indefinite hiatus

7) My lil Reagan’s Robin Fairchild and Dominick Reagan started it all.

I will one day post their story.

It is written but I want to fit it in so that it makes sense with where I’m at with my Reagan stories.

These two would be the grandparents or Jonah, Jayden, Raelyn and Sage.

Sage’s purple hair comes from Dominick

Dominick is a ghost now living with his elderly husband in their youngest son’s home.

My TS4 game play consists of mostly their descendants

8) Island Living Game play - Octavia Griggs and Wilson McCabe

I’ll probably just play them until the kids age up.

You may see their kids married to other sims later on

It was started to test out Island Living

9) 4x4 Challenge and game play - Reo Carmichael and Kasen Rocca

Reo is a well known actor

Kasen is an up and coming artist

The challenge was to start off with a 4x4 house and every 10,000 dollars they make they can add on another 4x4 room. They have to spend all but 500 dollars in the renovation.

Once the upstairs is complete and their kids are aged this challenge will end.

I have plans for their only son He will have his own challenge to accomplish

Hmm that’s a lot but the majority of my TS3 stories are on hiatus but will be coming back. I just want to have stuff written in advance. I do see I get obsessed with families mainly my Bennett’s and Reagan’s. I love my Van Winkle’s too but I tried to keep all the stories in together since they tell the same overall story.

Sorry I got a little long winded but I do love to talk about my stories and this helped me realize what I lived about them. Also why I struggle to let any of them even BMBTL.

Tagging: @fataleromeo @cillaben @izayoichan @ohsimtastic @amuhav @wannabecatwriter @justasimthing @cawthorntales and anyone else who wants to do this. Feel free to ignore if you want.

#founders cas challenge

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danwhobrowses · 4 years ago

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General Discussions: All Elite Wrestling (AEW)

So with All Out happening tonight (or well, tomorrow morning for me) I’m in the mood to get a lot of AEW talk off my chest. The difference between this and previous talks ‘In (Slight) Defense of AEW’s Women’s Division’ and ‘Are AEW Planning a Second Show?’ - the latter of which seems to have been confirmed - I don’t want to talk about one sole thing, I have multiple things I wanna talk about: Criticisms, Hindsight, Signing Suggestions, Predictions and whatnot. I’m also gonna split this into two at least, we’re gonna start with some critiques (positive and negative criticism) and some hindsight talk.

Critiques So AEW has been running officially since May 2019. Meaning that half of their lifespan has happened during COVID 19′s pandemic, before I go into positive and negative criticisms I’d like this point to at least commend AEW on their action and sustainability during this time; several other brands have had to sadly close or cease programming for a long time, with ROH only just returning. AEW has done a stellar job being safe as well, only one confirmed case in QT Marshall (Moxley quarantining because of Renee’s positive case), frequent tests and having small amount of fans in the arena, this is on top of the fact that Jacksonville is also a hotspot, so currently well done on that. But AEW is far from a perfect company, no company can be. However, not all criticism is fair and I wanna vent some of that. Fair Criticism towards AEW First I wanna point out that there are things even I don’t like about AEW, because I know people will paint me as an apologist, I’d also wanna preface that there are parts of WWE I like too, and parts I don’t like. On AEW’s part though I think the fairest criticism for it is that a lot of talent slip through the cracks, COVID doesn’t help of course but talent had been kept away from the main show or not getting their due; Santana and Ortiz and the Lucha Bros should be tag champions by now, Scorpio Sky would’ve been a great TNT champion, Jurassic Express despite their popularity often seem to be on the losing end of feuds, Private Party have fell into the undercard of the tag division, Joey Janela and Sonny Kiss are sadly purposeless and Lance Archer is just floating around, Nyla and Vickie’s partnership hasn’t really gone anywhere either as of yet and Abadon has been kept from the title picture. There’s also the flip-flop booking of Shawn Spears, Jake Hager, Mel, Luther, Penelope Ford, TH2 and others. While I am gonna track back on the Women’s Division complaint it would bode better for AEW if they had more storylines, and their title was better. I mean the design is fine, it just needs to be bigger. The Picture with Shida and Cody swapping belts really sells that. Belt designs have been very up and down too, the TNT title is not good, the FTW title is a bit iffy but even that is a better design. So far only ‘Big Platinum’ and the Tag Titles are original designs without complaints. Unfair Criticism towards AEW Since a lot of people compare AEW to WWE, there will be times where people will treat them as the same, and that’s not really too fair. Case in point, big one out of the way, The Women’s Division. Wanting more from the women is fair but as I detailed they are pretty handicapped right now since many of their wrestlers are overseas, but when they make moves in a positive light they’re still criticised. Thunder Rosa (fka Kobra Moon of Lucha Underground) is great and we have a much hyped match for that. The criticisms reared its head more with the Deadly Draw and the Tooth and Nail match being in the Buy In. I’ve already discussed the benefits of the Deadly Draw in a prior post so I’m gonna focus on Swole/Baker. Now on the Main Card anyway thanks to fan response, it shouldn’t have been treated like AEW pre-shows are like WWE’s, there’s a Number 1 Contendership Battle Royale on that same Buy In, Khan has been clear that he wants people invested enough to ‘Buy in to the PPV’ so it shouldn’t be treated as a disservice.

I’d also like to segue this into a WWE comparison, because whenever AEW is on you have people tracking how many women’s segments there are. So let me run down WWE for a bit

Smackdown had 3 Women’s Bits last night (4th Sept): the Tag Match that led to FINALLY the Banks/Bayley schism, a cryptic hint towards a woman returning (rumors of Eva Marie I hope are false, maybe it’s Carmella?) and a small backstage segment between Bliss and Bayley

NXT on ‘Super Tuesday Part 1′ had 1 very short match building to the Candice/Tegan feud and a package for Ripley vs Mercedes

Raw had 2 matches and 3 segments which included a Payback rematch

Payback had 2 matches, one on the Pre-Show, both of these matches would later be rematched in the following week

Summerslam had 3 matches, only one of them not a title match and one of them being rematched on the following Raw

NXT TakeOver 30 had 1 match, a title match, including the Pre-Show

For all the criticism AEW gets for having 2-3 bits on Dynamite (which is an hour less than Raw might I add and Dark hosts consistently 3 women’s bits that nobody acknowledges simply because the matches are squashes) I never see WWE criticised in that same vein, and that’s unfair, criticise both. The main difference is that AEW do not have the ‘seasoned big star’ because they’re not that old, Mickie James, Asuka, Bliss and the Four Horsewomen didn’t just get this popular overnight, they spent years honing this craft to this audience. Would it be great for AEW to have a megastar type? Sure but business is not all that easy, who do you take? Tessa’s attitude isn’t exactly positive for business, time is what they need and it’s something people are not giving. Of the other unfair criticisms the quick and easy one is the ‘AEW is TNA 2.0′ - newsflash, most wrestlers will go through the WWE machine in some shape or form, if you complain that AEW lacks female stars because nobody is well known but criticise the men’s division for using well-known ex-WWE talent then you have to see the contradiction. Moxley has been great, Jericho has been great, Brodie has been great, it’s not like AEW aren’t promoting others either. And also the ‘VP is becoming like the McMahons’ - people think that because a wrestler is a booker that they’ll only book themselves strong, but Cody let himself get squashed by Brodie, Kenny passed out to PAC and lost to Moxley, the Bucks haven’t been tag champions and Brandi hasn’t inserted herself in any title match. Just because we’re burned by WWE doesn’t mean that AEW are the same. I am all for constructive criticism with the brand because there are certainly places where it can improve, but it keeps circling around to the fact that we put WWE as the negative standard we compare AEW to, as if WWE are literally the Simpsons of Wrestling, there’s not gonna be much they haven’t done. Hindsight Talk So with the critiques out of the way now we can talk about some missed opportunities, since it kinda pairs together with that. Nearly a year and a half and AEW is still quite different to how it started, there are some things though we could still look back in regret. The easy one is doing a more thorough background check. The SpeakingOut movement affected all of wrestling and led to the departure of Jimmy Havoc, likewise it also led to the Elite cutting ties with Joey Ryan and distancing from Marty Scurll, of course until people spoke out it would’ve been impossible to know but knowing now does make parts of All In and AEW’s history come with a sense of bitterness. A further stressing of variety would’ve helped AEW, there’s a lot of criticism when people don’t understand that things are different for a reason, comedy has a place in Wrestling, we just need a reminder. The ranking system and tag rules could still be clearer. There’s also the sooner dropping of aspects like the Nightmare Family faction with Mel and Luther with Brandi, as well as some other dropped plots like Brandi’s mental break, Allie’s affiliation with the Butcher and Blade (the latter being her irl husband) as ‘the Bunny’, Christopher Daniels’ feuds with Pentagon and the Dark Order, the initial presentation of the Dark Order, not debuting Sadie Gibbs earlier and maybe pushing Intergender wrestling a bit sooner. AEW were reluctant and a Kip/Penelope vs Kenny/Riho feud was in the works to some solid appeal, but it sadly went nowhere. The Deadly Draw could’ve been longer, but I stand by the decision to put it on Youtube. I think the TNT title tournament could’ve been longer too. The bigger regrets I personally wished from AEW are that the Lucha Bros didn’t win the tag titles first, SCU are great but Lucha Bros are next level wrestlers who are monstrously talented, given Hangman and Kenny’s blockbuster match with the Lucha Bros, it’s a shame that we didn’t have a bigger feud where the Lucha Bros took their Young Bucks feud momentum to win the whole tournament. Not signing Mercedes Martinez, Deonna Purrazo or pushing a Kong vs Kong match would also be a missed opportunity too. Hindsight is of course 2020 so we can’t be too hard on AEW, as we’ll move onto in Part 2, when we’ll talk about All Out Predictions and positive hopes for AEW’s future

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thisisthepartwhereyou · 5 years ago

Text

BEASTARS MINI-STORY #8: “Shower me with Insights” by JCL

---

TEXTBOX: Somewhere in the ghetto, not far from the Back Alley market.

We find ourselves in a neighborhood somewhere in the ghetto, which is mainly composed of poor-looking apartment buildings that stand in close proximity to each other. We are a few stories up, the air between them criss-crossed by old wires and clothing lines heavy with clothes that’s been hung out to dry.

One of these lines is moving, as its content is getting pulled towards an open window. In it we can see Cosmo, the okapi-stripper whose life Louis and the Shishigumi once saved. She is removing the clothes from the line one by one, presumably to feed a basket next to her.

Suddenly, a swift shadow moves across her, as if something is passing over her in the air above. Her ears twitch and she looks up.

COSMO: "Huh?"

She can't see anything except more lines and the outlined roofs of the buildings around her, which are about two stories above from where she is. As she can’t see anything strange or out of order, she lowers her head and continues.

COSMO: "..." (Must've been my imagination)

Pulling off a bra and a Lil Bomber t-shirt, her eyes widen as another shadow moves across her. T-shirt still in hand, she looks up again with a mildly annoyed look.

COSMO: (No, there's definitely something moving up there. What is it, birds playing tag?)

She continues to look up, dead set on finding out what it is. Then, after a short while, she is given an answer:

It is Legosi, who is leaping from the roof above Cosmo. He seems unaware of being seen by anyone as he makes it across and disappears over the roof of the opposite building.

Cosmo drops her t-shirt, stunned by what she just saw.

COSMO: "WHAT THE FU-"

---

We go up and over the roofs, where we can clearly see Legosi chasing Kyuu.

The female rabbit runs and makes short but frequent leaps across the rooftops parkour-style. Peaking over her shoulder, she is looking back at the wolf. He struggles to keep up with her, as the distance between them keeps growing between them.

KYUU: "You're never going to catch me like that!"

Legosi, panting and sweating, realizes that she is right.

LEGOSI: (IMAGINARY CHIMERA)

The blurry image of Legosi's Imaginary Chimera-self manifests over him. While being just an optical illustration, the effect of the technique is clear: The wolf's standard running-style, which is quite rough and wide-stroked, turns more rapid and graceful. It's like comparing a spear thrown by hand suddenly moving like an arrow that has been launched from a bow.

---

We cut to the street down below, where we see a female tiger with her five-year-old son standing by a pedestrian crossing. She has her phone in one hand and her son's hand in the other; the two of them waiting for a traffic light to turn green.

The cub has an ice cream cone in his free hand, which he is licking profusely. Looking up with a bored expression, the cub's eyes suddenly widen as he spots Kyuu getting chased by Legosi from rooftop to rooftop. He turns to look at his mother.

TIGER CUB: "Momma, do bunnies and wolves fly?"

The mother, preoccupied with her phone, replies without looking up.

TIGER MOMMA: "Sure they do sweetie, all the time."

---

Going back to Legosi, we can see that the wolf is now catching up to Kyuu at a steady pace.

LEGOSI: (That's it! Just one more rooftop and I'll catch up!)

Kyuu makes a longer than average jump over to the next building, which is about a story lower than the one she jumped from. She lands on a scaffolding, makes an extra jump over to the roof and runs across it.

Right behind her, Legosi makes the jump as well. But on account of his larger and much stronger legs, his leap allows him to soar straight over the scaffolding. He is still in the air as he homes in on Kyuu like a triumphant-looking rocket!

LEGOSI: (NOW I GOT HER!)

However, Kyuu suddenly spins around. She has pulled out six throwing knives out of her ears, holding three each in-between her fingers. She proceeds to throw them at him in two simultaneous sweeps.

Legosi looks shocked. Having not landed yet, he’s unable to dodge! Out of alternatives, he stretches his arms out in front of him.

He then lands on the roof in front of Kyuu, bending over like he's hurt. But then he stands up. We can see that he is unharmed and has actually managed to catch all the knives between his own fingers.

Kyuu turns around and tries to continue her flight. Her eyes widen though, as she finds herself unable to move.

Legosi stands on one knee, leaning over Kyuu. Zooming out, we can see that he has grabbed her by her lower body. His hand is so big compared to her that his fingers have reached over her back and gripped her around her abdomen.

LEGOSI: "Tag."

His tail is wagging, showcasing that he has taken an instinctive canine delight in catching her. Kyuu on the other hand looks annoyed.

KYUU: "Okay, you won. Take your hand off or lose it."

---

We skip ahead a little, to where the two have returned to the roof of the abandoned breeding house where Kyuu, San and Louis were originally raised for meat-eating purposes.

LEGOSI: "You didn't say anything about having to defend myself while chasing you."

Kyuu, who is fiddling with the knives in her right ear, glances at Legosi.

KYUU: "It'd be very little purpose to train you to deal with surprise attacks if they're not a surprise."

She takes one of the knives out, holding it up so that she may inspect it.

KYUU: "Besides, you would have been fine anyway. These are totally dulled down. At most they would have cracked a rib or two."

Legosi sweat drops at this.

LEGOSI: (Yeah well that would've been a lot better...!)

Kyuu continues to inspect her knife. The edges of it gleams in the light of the sun.

KYUU: "Your defense has improved greatly, but you still show little initiative with your offense. For instance, if I had been an unfamiliar opponent, I could've misread you hunching over as having succeeded in fatally wounding you. My guard would've been down as I had moved in for the finishing blow, during which you could have either taken the opportunity to punch my head off or turn me into chop suey with my own knives."

Legosi grimaces at these ideas and leans back against an air vent. He raises his left hand and wipes some sweat off his brow.

LEGOSI: "I am really not good at forming such dark thoughts...!"

Kyuu lowers the knife and gives him an impatient look.

KYUU: "Mastering parries and dodges without any attacks doesn't make you a great fighter, just an exceptionally skilled coward. I've seen you at your fiercest. If you can master that instead of just using it as a last resort, you might have something. Otherwise you'll remain as half-assed as you are."

Legosi's left ear flickers at this.

LEGOSI: "Half-assed? I think I'm doing pretty good... Didn't I tell you about the buffalo?"

He refers to his fight with Mongo the caped buffalo in The Horny Horror Picture Show. Kyuu doesn't look overly impressed by said feat though.

KYUU: "You mean the muscle bound retard from Old Town?"

Legosi cringes at Kyuu's politically incorrect choice of words, which Kyuu ignores as she looks at him scoldingly.

KYUU: "Don't get me wrong, you are clearly above average, but you NEED to be more than that. You've done well so far, but with your current profession you'll eventually face opponents who are more formidable than you because they have one thing that you lack: a killer's instinct. That's the one thing that separates you from elite-fighters like that horse's ass of a Beastar you answer to. The only time I've seen you really use it is when you're cornered and there's no other way out... If you intend to continue doing this without getting yourself killed, you'll have to be able to whip it out like a switchblade!"

Legosi looks down. He has a melancholic and reluctant look on his face. Seeing this, Kyuu's expression softens a bit.

KYUU: "Speaking of which... Have you thought about what I told you back at that board game place?"

Legosi meets her look, remembering the time from a while back when the two of them talked with each at Yanni's, in Everybody Play the Game.

LEGOSI: "Yes."

KYUU: "And my little proposition in light of that?"

LEGOSI: "Yes."

KYUU: ".... And?"

LEGOSI: "I don't like it."

KYUU: "Like it or hate it, it is the most sensible option. Not everyone of your enemies will go straight to you in order to take you out of the equation. Some will go for where you are the most vulnerable. And in your case..."

---

We shift over to a collage featuring key-people in Legosi's life.

KYUU: "... It's your loved ones. Your former roommates, the members of the drama club, the tenants of the hidden condo and that girlfriend of yours. You can't protect them at all times from where you are now."

This collage feature images of his fellow-701s (Jack, Collot, Voss, Durham and Miguno), members of the drama club (Bill, Juno, Aoba, Kai and Els), his neighbors in the hidden condo (Sebun, Zaguan, Ebisu, Mugi, Raika and Fina) and finally his girlfriend, Haru.

---

The collage sequence ends and we return to Kyuu and Legosi.

KYUU: "Didn't you say you had a grandfather too? He might become a target as well."

The corner of Legosi’s mouth twitches as he thinks about Gosha, his badass komodo dragon-grandpa.

LEGOSI: "I pity whoever tries to go after my grandpa.”

Then his ears go down though as he thinks about his friends and loved ones.

LEGOSI: “But I am concerned about the rest. Most of them have no idea...! Still, it'd feel manipulative to do this without telling anyone about it, especially Haru. She if anyone should know if she's in danger."

Kyuu crosses her arms and gives him a skeptical look.

KYUU: "There are a lot of things that have happened since last Rexmas which you most likely haven't told her. What is another secret on top of that?"

Legosi's ears go even lower. You can tell that he feels really guilty.

LEGOSI: "Another addition to the pile of things I feel bad about... She still thinks I work at the Udon restaurant. I want to hell her the full truth... I am just not sure how she's gonna take it."

KYUU: "Look, I don't know squat about relationships, but if you can live through getting shredded by a psychopathic hybrid, surely you can survive getting yelled at by your girlfriend?"

Legosi turns to look at Kyuu. He is smiling.

LEGOSI: "You haven't met Haru. She can make me feel powerless in a completely different way... It's a kind of power you can't really fight."

Kyuu looks down. Feeling powerless when facing someone you're fond of is not unfamiliar to her, as we can see her think back to her savior and former teacher, Gouhin. Looking up at Legosi again, Kyuu suddenly wrinkles her nose.

KYUU: "...You stink of sweat. My nose is not as strong as yours, but even I can tell that you reek."

Legosi look surprised by the sporadic turn of this conversation. He then rubs the back of his head (which also happens to be drenched in sweat) with an apologetic look.

LEGOSI: "I'm sorry. It's unusually hot for this time of year."

KYUU: "We'll call it quits for today. Just go down and take a shower."

LEGOSI: "You have showers here?"

KYUU: "It's on the third floor, behind the orange door with two-three-seven written on it. There should be some soap and towels in there for you to use."

Legosi stands up with a grateful expression.

LEGOSI: "Thanks Kyuu-chan!"

Being called 'chan' earns him an annoyed glare from Kyuu.

KYUU: "Don't call me 'chan'. It makes me sound like I'm a little kid or something! Just 'Kyuu' or 'Kyuu-san' will be fine! You don't hear me calling you 'kun' do you?"

Legosi scratches his cheek.

LEGOSI: "Well no... But, considering my position... Shouldn't you call me 'aniki' or something?"

SHINK!

Legosi looks down. The knife which Kyuu had previously been holding has now been launched and embedded in between his legs, a few centimeters below his crotch.

He looks up and sees that the mere suggestion of having to call a dumbass, five-year junior wolf 'aniki' has led to Kyuu adopting an exceptionally pissed off look and summoning her own, monstrous-looking Imaginary Chimera, which is standing behind her like a rage-filled demon.

Realizing he may have overstepped his boundaries, Legosi gives off a nervous smile, raises his leg and steps over the knife.

LEGOSI: "Then again, I don't like to be pedantic. Just 'Legosi' is fine!"

KYUU: "Just head to the showers...!"

Legosi does as he is told and runs down the stairs.

---

Legosi manages to find the door on the third floor. Walking through it, he finds himself in what appears to be a changing room-like area with tiled floor and walls. Like the rest of the building it has the appearance of being degraded by time and disuse, with several of the tiles sporting cracks and ingrained dirt. The area is composed of two sections; the small square section that Legosi just entered, with benches and coat hangers along the walls around him.

The next section is longer and rectangular, with about a dozen long showerheads poking in from both sides of the long walls.

Legosi spots a couple of towels and a bar of soap lying on a bench nearby, as well as a few scrubbing brushes and an old raincoat dangling off one of the hooks.

LEGOSI: (I wonder why they would need showers in a place like this)

He then sees something alarming underneath the bench: a long chain with shackles. He looks disturbed.

LEGOSI: "...!" (I don't think I want to know)

He starts to undress, pulling his shirt over his head.

---

A few moments later, Legosi walks into the showers with the soap in his hand. He goes to the middle of the room and turns the closest tap. As he does, the showerhead gives off a strained, metallic sound before spitting out a stream of water that hits Legosi. The wolf shivers.

LEGOSI: "Ugh!" (FREEZING!)

Soon enough though, the water heats up and he becomes more relaxed. He rubs the soap in his hands, making it bubble and foam. As he does, he thinks back on Kyuu's words to him earlier, her face being visible in his background.

KYUU: “If you intend to continue doing this without getting yourself killed, you'll have to be able to whip it out like a switchblade!"

He sighs and closes his eyes as he washes his head and body.

LEGOSI: (Continue... I guess I have to continue, but I didn't get into this line of work because I wanted it... It just happened)

???: "Will you pass the soap?"

The wolf's eyes open wide and he turns to look at his side. He now sees that he is not alone in the showers. Next him stands San, the alpaca. He is naked and taking a shower as well.

Legosi looks surprised and instinctively takes a step back.

LEGOSI: "HUAH?! Where did you come from?"

SAN: "I came in right after you... Man, Kyuu really must drive you hard if you're so exhausted that you can't even notice a naked herbivore approaching you in the shower."

As he talks, Legosi can't help but to look at the alpacas's body. To his great shock, San is extremely skinny... Kind of like Christian Bale's character in The Machinist (2004).

The alpaca extends an open hand to him and raises his eyebrows.

SAN: "Now, if you’re finished with that soap...?"

Legosi politely puts the soap in the alpaca’s hand.

LEGOSI: "Here..." (I can practically see all the little bones in his torso! Is he ill or something?)

SAN: "Thank you."

San takes the soap and proceeds to wash his own body, taking special care of his long and fuzzy neck.

Trying not to look at San, Legosi continues to wash himself. As he does though, he notices that the alpaca is looking at him... Quite unabashedly.

LEGOSI: "..." (Why is he staring at me? He's not even trying to hide the fact that he's looking... Is it because he noticed me looking at his body?)

Legosi gulps and blushes as a thought crosses his mind.

LEGOSI: (Maybe he is into males?)

He turns his head to San with a civil expression.

LEGOSI: (Perhaps he'll stop if I show that I know he's looking) "Did you want something?"

The alpaca appears to be completely unmoved by Legosi's awareness.

SAN: "No, just looking."

LEGOSI: (It didn't work at all!)

Legosi grimaces, thinking back to moments when San has been around as he has trained with Kyuu.

---

We enter a brief flashback, which shows us one of Legosi and Kyuu's previous sessions. This one is special, as he is dodging an oncoming assault from the rabbit, who is wielding a chain sickle.

LEGOSI: (Now that I think about it, I know very little about San...)

We can see that unlike Kyuu, San doesn't physically partake in the training. Instead he sits down on a wooden box in the background, watching the two as they train.

LEGOSI: (He is sometimes around when Kyuu trains me, giving little advice here and there, but most of the time he's not around)

---

We return to the present, where Legosi is still thinking about this.

LEGOSI: (Though with a frail body like that, I wouldn't be surprised if he’s unable to do any physical training)

SAN: "You are a very good-looking animal."

Legosi turns and arches his head back.

LEGOSI: "HUH?!"

SAN: "Your body. Your muscles. They speak of an animal in great health... Do you exercise outside your training?"

LEGOSI: "Not really... I mean had gym class at school and I did some training with Gouhin, but I've never really gone to a gym or anything."

SAN: "Hm, I guess that kind of physique could be pretty average for male wolves then... I haven't showered with one before so I can't really tell."

He then points straight at the wolf's groin.

SAN: "Speaking of which, is THAT considered average by wolf-standards?"

Legosi crosses his legs and covers his junk with his hands. He feels targeted.

LEGOSI: "I ASSUME IT VARIES!"

San gives the wolf an amused expression.

SAN: "Ahaha, so that is the case! I am sorry, am I making you uncomfortable?"

LEGOSI: "YES."

San turns his head and looks ahead, proceeding to soap up and wash the spot between his ears.

SAN: "Sorry, old habits die hard. Checking out the anatomy of others is kind of my thing... Has been so as far back as I can remember… Did you know that our carnivore captors would take us when we were little? If you saw the chains, then you may have already guessed it."

---

We enter a flashback, in which we see a group of herbivore-children between ages three and five lined up in very same showers. They have no clothes and are linked together by shackles that go from ankle to ankle, with a long chain running through them.

SAN: "We would get cleaned, trimmed and deloused. Probably the most care that was ever shown to us."

The showers are running, and the children are all getting cleaned by carnivores in raincoats, who are roughly scrubbing them with brushes.

SAN: "Not that there was any real affection behind it though, it was just business. I mean who would want to eat meat with a side order of typhus?"

In the middle of the chain we see the young San, Louis and Kyuu standing in a row next to each other. San is getting the fur of his neck trimmed with a thinning scissor, Louis gets scrubbed behind his ears and Kyuu gets applied DDT through a large spray pump. The powdered cloud of insecticide causes her to cough.

---

The flashback ends. Despite the dark subject matter, San has maintained a jovial expression.

SAN: "At that time they would also take the chance to check us, to make sure our bodies had just the right amount of produce... It was probably there that I picked up the habit of checking the bodies of others, cause I knew that if I saw someone who looked particularly nice and healthy..."

San’s eyes go down to Legosi’s muscular and scarred torso, rising slowly up to his face. Something in his stare causes the wolf to look increasingly uncomfortable.

SAN: "... He or she would soon be gone."

Suddenly, the soap slips out of San's grip and slides across the floor.

SAN: "Whoops!"

San goes over to where the soap is and kneels down in order to pick it up, water dripping off his fur and forming a pool around his feet. We can see it even clearer from his back that he is alarmingly malnourished, with vertebrae, ribs and shoulder blades sticking out like the detachable appendages of a Mr. Potato-doll.

SAN: "What an upturned world, when being healthy seals your fate… Makes me glad I've always been quite skinny. I mean... Would you really want to take a bite out of this pitiful body?"

San glances back at Legosi with a grim look.

SAN: "Still, if I was cooked well enough, one could probably suck the meat off my bones the same way you'd lick the batter off a spoon..."

Legosi stares at him with an unreadable expression.

San purses his lips, looking kind of disappointed that he's not getting any interesting reaction out of Legosi. The alpaca then tries to stand up, but appears to slip and fall over, his knee hitting the tiled floor hard. He gives off a pained groan.

This prompts a look of concern from Legosi. He rushes over and kneels down next to San.

LEGOSI: "Are you okay? You’re not injured are you?"

San spins around, using a pool of water on the floor as a lubricant to move with a remarkable speed. He then makes a whipping motion with his forearm which launches a splash that is aimed straight at Legosi's eyes.

Legosi instinctively pulls back and raises a hand up to his face, managing to protect his right eye in the last second. The rest of the water hits his unprotected eye though, which he closes tightly. Apparently the soap in it really stings!

San's right hand shoots out at him, aiming at the left side of his chest. Legosi manages to block this blow with his left hand, holding San's bony hand back by his wrist. The wolf grits his teeth at him.

LEGOSI: "Stop! What are you-"

San's free hand shoots up and he pushes Legosi's left shoulder with two fingers.

Legosi's eyes widens. With his hand still around the San’s wrist, he throws alpaca away from him.

San stumbles back. He meets the wolf's shocked look and smiles.

SAN: "She HAS trained you well."

He then puts one of his hands over his other hand in a respectful, Bao Quan Li-gesture.

SAN: "Sorry about that, but I heard you were being tutored in surprise attacks today, so I felt obliged to contribute. I have to say you performed well, pulling a good, though imperfect, block as I splashed at your eyes. If I had managed to hit BOTH of your eyes, you would've been in serious trouble right about now."

Legosi doesn’t seem to hear this though, as his attention is entirely focused on his left arm, which hangs down and looks completely limp!

LEGOSI: "My arm... What did you do to my arm?!"

San raises two fingers and waves them at the wolf in a playful fashion.

SAN: "I hit a pressure point which rendered your arm numb and useless. I know it's a bit of a cliche to use in martial arts, but it's really useful if you ever get caught in and can't get loose. Don't worry, it's an easy fix though."

San walks up to Legosi and uses these fingers to hit the same spot on Legosi's shoulder as before.

SAN: “Boop!”

Legosi twitches. He then blinks, and slowly raises his formerly limp arm. Inspecting it with a confused look, he then uses it to wipe his closed eye. He has San fixed with an open, wary eye.

San scratches his chin and watches Legosi with a sense of intrigue.

SAN: "... Tell me though, did you try and cover your eyes on instinct, or did something tip you off to my intent?"

Legosi lowers his arm. Both of his eyes are open now, though his left has turned pink and bloodshot from the soap water.

LEGOSI: "By the time I knelt down I felt a nagging suspicion. You may look sickly, but as I recall you managed to immobilize Louis in just a few moves the first time we met, so I figured that you couldn't be as frail as you look... At first I thought you were looking at me because you liked males, but now I think you were taking a better look in order to further map out my physical weaknesses… You were baiting me."

SAN: "Exactly."

San gives off a jolly smile again, as if what had just transpired hadn't transpired at all! He then adopts an explanatory pose with his hand raised, as if he’s about to give a lecture.

SAN: "It’s called Deceptive Display: an old technique developed by herbivores that is meant to draw carnivores to you."

We see an illustrative scene playing out in San's background, featuring an old and limping wildebeest with crutches surrounded by the shadows of ill-willing carnivores with their eyes gleaming and tongues sticking out.

SAN: " See, for the average carnivore who is on the hunt, the notions of easy prey is irresistible. This instinctively draws them to the weak and injured before the strong and healthy. Deceptive Display exploits this, taking advantage of their dropped guard."

The illustrative scene fades away. San maintains his friendly smile, but his eyes have adopted more of an edge.

SAN: "However, you're not that average, are you? I had to act out a bit more, drawing you in by your unnatural sense of concern rather than your natural instinct to devour me."

Legosi stares at San, seeing the alpaca in a different light from before.

LEGOSI: (Kyuu-san is a tougher fighter than San, but San has more of a devious vibe to him…! Knowing he's been hiding such techniques this whole time behind such a lax and friendly face…)

His tail bristles and wraps around his leg.

LEGOSI: (It makes my skin crawl!)

KYUU: "Personally I think it's a one-noted fighting style."

Legosi blinks. He slowly turns to look down his right and discovers that Kyuu is standing next to him, stark naked and turning the tap of the shower head next to him.

The wolf's jaw drops, but Kyuu doesn't seem to be embarrassed in the least.

KYUU: "Trickery and deceptive tactics are invaluable if used sparingly, but are altogether too predictable for someone to fully rely on. If an opponent calls your bluff and you don't have anything else up your sleeve, you’re screwed."

She adopts an annoyed frown as no water comes out of her shower head.

KYUU: "Damn pipes...!"

San nods in admittance.

SAN: "Sadly enough, she has a point. I couldn't really fight in underground pits anymore after my opponents figured out how my technique worked."

Kyuu and San turn to look at Legosi, only to discover that the wolf has disappeared from where he was a second ago, leaving a Legosi-shaped imprint in the still flowing showerwater. Kyuu and San turn their heads to look at the way out, deducing from a series of wet footprints on the floor that Legosi has left.

SAN: "... What flew into him?"

KYUU: "Female nudity must embarrass him."

SAN: "Huh, how strange."

Kyuu takes Legoshi's place in the still running shower, and San goes to take his original place in the shower next to her.

KYUU: "I know, right? Males and females only differ in a few fleshy appendages left and right... What is there to be embarrassed about?"

Kyuu rubs her hands over her head, getting accustomed to the temperature.

KYUU: "Then again, he wasn't forced into shared showers when he was a kid. The differences between genders must be a big deal to him because he hasn't been exposed to them to the point of indifference."

Now being completely wet, the rabbit turns to the alpaca and extends an open hand.

KYUU: "If you're finished, hand me that soap."

SAN: "Sure thing."

San begins to hand over the soap, but his fingers pinch it, causing it to slip out of his hand and land on the floor behind Kyuu.

SAN: "Whoops."

Kyuu looks over at the dropped soap with slight annoyance. She turns around, bends over and reaches for it.

KYUU: "Still using the dropped soap-trick, even after my little speech about fleshy appendages and indifference? You're so transparent it makes me want to throw up."

SAN: "What can I say Kyuu-san? I'm male, you're a female. You may be embarrassed by your female drives..."

As she bends over, San can't help but to stare at the bunny's curvaceous backside. We can see that she has a few scars across her back; most likely from previous fights.

SAN: "... But I quite enjoy stimulating my male ones."

Getting up with the soap in hand, Kyuu proceeds to use it as she washes her armpits, her ears and her tail.

KYUU: "Giving into your urges so easily is one of the things that make you so predictable... It was no wonder Legosi could read you right away."

SAN: "Should you really be the one lecturing me on that? I wasn't the one who tried to proposition myself to that wolf the same night we met."

Kyuu’s deadpan expression breaks somewhat. She turns to give the alpaca an unamused glare.

KYUU: "I didn't proposition myself. It was part of his training."

San laughs.

SAN: "Yeah right, I bet that's all it was... I guess I would be way off for thinking you just wanted a taste of that desirable carnivore-strength through the raw, sexual onslaught of his HUGE-"

FWUP!

San looks stunned as the bar of soap gets launched into his mouth. He gags and spits it out. As he starts to cough up bubbles, Kyuu starts to whistle the Bubble Bobble (1986) theme song while she wrings the water out of her ears.

---

We skip over to when Kyuu and San have finished in the showers and are putting their clothes back on. San, now with his pants on, has taken a seat on one of the benches. He has his hand over his mouth and looks sick.

SAN: "My mouth still tastes like soap...!"

Meanwhile, on the other side of the room, Kyuu puts her own pants on.

KYUU: "Be glad that's all I did, considering your little street fight in the showers."

San looks up at her with a skeptical look.

SAN: "... What, you didn't like it? I just added a bit of extension to your lesson today. Considering surprises are my speciality, it’d be criminal if I just stood on the sidelines and did nothing to contribute."

KYUU: "There's a big difference between throwing a knife a dull knife at his face which you know he can catch and poisoning him and expect him to build up immunity to it on the fly."

The alpaca adopts a confused look.

SAN: "What are you talking about?"

KYUU: "Don't play coy."

Kyuu puts on her t-shirt and then her red training jacket over it.

KYUU: "I saw the whole thing. You tried to hit the pressure points on the left side below his ribs, which would've affected his heart and liver."

Kyuu turns around. Her deadpan eyes have become sharp and her lip has turned up to form an angry sneer.

KYUU: "If you had made a successful hit, he could’ve gone into cardiac arrest, putting his life in danger!"

San looks unaffected by Kyuu’s accusation. He leans forward, cups his chin in his hand and stares at her.

SAN: "... Why are you so upset? You mean to tell me you don't endanger his life during your training?"

KYUU: "I don’t throw lethal techniques at him before I'm confident he can handle them! He's not ready for what you're trying to pull… He probably doesn't even know that pressing pressure points is a real-life thing! You'll end up killing him if you pull more of that crap. And that’s not the only reason I’m upset."

Kyuu proceeds to pull something out of her pants pocket: one of the throwing knives she used earlier.

KYUU: “I took these for the training knowing they were dulle... But guess what I discovered just a little while ago?”

She then throws it across the room, aiming at a raincoat that dangles next to San. The knife pierces through the coat and becomes embedded into the tile on the wall behind it.

San turns to look at the knife. Meanwhile, Kyuu glares at him.

KYUU: “They had been sharpened. Sharpened to the point that I could penetrate the aluminum of an air vent! I sure as hell didn’t sharpen them, so it couldn't have been anyone except you! If I had hit Legosi with even one of them…!”

SAN: "If he would’ve died, he would’ve died.”

Kyuu looks a little shocked as she hears this from San. The alpaca turns back to give her a cold look.

SAN: “Survival of the fittest Kyuu, that’s the rule of the back alley market. If someone isn’t strong enough, fast enough or clever enough to keep the death at bay, then why should he amount to anything more than chopped liver? Isn’t that the exact words you’ve used in the past?"

Hearing this, Kyuu looks down and thinks back to the moment when Legosi asked her to command him to 'stay' in preparation for his fight with Melon; seeing that very memory play out in her background.

KYUU: "That was before..."

SAN: “I’ve been keeping watch you know. The training sessions you’re giving him now are freaking filler compared to when you started. You’re not acting like someone who wants to further him as a fighter. I don’t see a trainer teaching a pupil, but a girl who is enjoying a males company.”

Kyuu starts to look increasingly irritated (and quite possibly a bit embarrassed) by what the alpaca is suggesting.

KYUU: “Watch it...!”

San stretches his arm out and pulls the knife out of the wall. He looks down at it with a sneer.

SAN: “Just admit it already: You’re soft for him, otherwise he wouldn’t have caught back on that roof.”

---

We enter a flashback, at which we can see San standing on the roof of the building. Looking through a pair of binoculars, he spies on Legosi and Kyuu from a long distance.

SAN: “I could see your face.”

He witnesses the moment right after Kyuu has thrown the knives at Legosi. As Legosi bends over, San can see Kyuu’s face clearly.

She looks concerned.

SAN: “You looked concerned for him.”

Going back to San, we see him lowering the binoculars with a grim look.

SAN: “It distracted you, made you hesitate. It wasn’t because he was better that he caught you, but because your concern for him delayed your reaction.”

---

Returning to the present, we see Kyuu looking at San with a pair of big eyes. That look though is enough for San though as confirmation that his statement is true.

SAN: “You ARE soft for him… And because I am not, one can say I am a far more impartial teacher than you are being right now.”

Kyuu looks down. She seems to struggle at coming up with an appropriate response.

SAN: “... Let me ask you something, what is it about him that makes you THAT concerned about him?"

Kyuu grits her teeth at him, the question clearly irritates her.

KYUU: "... Louis and Gouhin trust in him. Isn’t that enough?"

San shakes his head at this.

SAN: "Louis and Gouhin also trust the Shishigumi, but I don’t see you hanging out with any of them in your spare time, acting all playful."

Kyuu blinks. Then she crosses her arms, fixing the alpaca a squinted look.

SAN: “Then again, maybe you would. With all that friendliness you are showing that wolf, maybe you would like a lion or two for the sake of variation. Maybe teach them an Imaginary Chimera or two while you’re at it?”

KYUU: “... Is that the core of your issue? Me being friendly with carnivores?”

SAN: “That tone in your voice makes it sound like I’m being petty. Don’t treat it like it's a small thing…! It’s when herbivores and carnivores kid themselves that they can co-exist as friends that they set themselves up for misery and bloodshed, with the herbivores getting maimed and carnivores weeping over their bloodied corpses."

San bends over and grabs a hold of the chain under it.

SAN: “You and Louis and this whole damn society is heading to that place because you forget one important thing:”

He throws the chain over to the floor in front of Kyuu.

SAN: “Every carnivore is the enemy of a herbivore. Remembering that is what keeps us alive!”

Things go quiet between them. Kyuu looks down at the chain... Two of it’s shackles are open and almost look like they're reaching out to bite her.

KYUU: "... Before Gouhin freed us, either of us were not seen as people. We were just consumable items… Meat to be eaten.”

Her arms go from being crossed to reaching further around her body and hugging herself, reservedly displaying a rare case of vulnerability.

KYUU: “Afterwards, each of the numbers went their separate ways… Found homes and families and what-not. The only ones who stayed here were you and me… We’ve spent our whole lives together… You’re my closest friend San, and because of that, you see me exactly as I am: A weak and self-serving turncoat... You may not say it aloud, but you KNOW IT. You don't judge me for it, and you’re my friend despite that... I am grateful, but I’ve also come to realize that that’s part of the problem.”

San stares at her, looking confused as to where she’s going with this.

KYUU: “My point is that I have never been seen as more than what I am… EXCEPT by that stupid wolf. For some reason, he thinks MORE of me, even after knowing what an ungrateful affair that has been to him! I still have no idea why he trusts me so whole-heartedly... Or why he doesn’t just see me as the gutter-filth who sold him out for money!”

She looks increasingly angry and frustrated the more she talks about this.

KYUU: “The Kyuu inside his head must be so far attached from the real thing that it’s laughable...! HE’S SUCH A FUCKING MORON I SOMETIMES WANT TO PUNCH HIM! And yet..."

Kyuu's imagination paints up a picture of Legosi's friendly face from before, as he thanks her and calls her ‘Kyuu-chan.’ This appears to melt her anger, making her adopt a calmer expression.

KYUU: "He’s made me realize that I want more out of this life… Not just possession-vice, but to be more as a person. Because of him… I want to be less like the Kyuu I am and more like the Kyuu he believes in."

San stares at her for the longest time after she says this. He then snorts and grins at her.

SAN: “Sorry, but… What a load of bull!”

Kyuu’s eyes widen and her arms go down on her sides.

SAN: “I know you. You want to be close to Legosi, and Gouhin if I remember things right, not because you think either will make you a better person, but because you HATE other herbivores.”

Kyuu tightens her fist and grits her teeth as San continues his talk.

SAN: “You hate us, thinking our line of thought and sense of self-preservation is what is holding animals like you down. Socializing with carnivores is just a way of catering to your envy of them… To make you feel more like one of them than one of us.”

Kyuu looks so angry at this moment that she appears unable to talk. But then, her fist loosens and her face relaxes. She closes her eyes, sighs through her nose and opens her eyes to meet San’s look.

KYUU: “Believe what you will… But consider the fact that you may not know me as well as you think.”

Kyuu turns and walks off to the door and opens it. She stops in the doorway and looks back at San over her shoulder.

KYUU: “I don’t hate other herbivores... But just because I am one, doesn’t mean I am required to love them.”

Her eyes turn sharp and bitter.

KYUU: “Carnivores may have kept us, carnivores may have wanted to eat us, but it was herbivores who sold us to them to begin with!”

She then walks out and slams the door after her, leaving the alpaca by himself.

---

Kyuu walks back to her room. Passing a staircase on the way, she stops to look down like she's noticed something.

We see that Legosi is still around, sitting at the bottom of the stairs.

KYUU: "You're still here?"

Legosi looks over his shoulder as he hears Kyuu. We see that he is still quite wet, with patches of water soaking through parts of his shirt (as he was in such a hurry to get away from the showers that he didn't stop to dry his fur off). He rubs the back of his head.

LEGOSI: "Ah... Well... I figured it would be rude to leave without saying goodbye, so I waited until you were done."

Kyuu gives him an incredulous grimace.

KYUU: "... What the hell? You don't have to be so polite. If you were gone, I would have just assumed you left."

LEGOSI: "Still, it wouldn't have felt right..."

Kyuu shakes her head at this, like she's thinking 'he's unimprovable'.

Legosi then stands up and gives Kyuu a more serious look.

LEGOSI: "I also wanted to tell you I've thought more about your suggestion... And I’ve decided on something."

KYUU: “Oh?”

LEGOSI: "I want to tell Haru first, before I say yes or no."

Kyuu blinks. Then she sighs, goes down the stairs and sits down in front of Legosi.

KYUU: "Very well then... When will you tell her?"

LEGOSI: "Golden week."

Kyuu raises an eyebrow.

KYUU: "... That's in like two weeks, why not right away?"

LEGOSI: "There are other things I want to tell her in the meantime... Some of which I think are better told as she meets someone very special to me. Golden week is the best time for that."

KYUU: "How very ceremonious of you. Personally I think the sooner the better but whatever, I’m not your fucking nanny. Do what you think is best.”

Legosi nods.

LEGOSI: “Thank you Kyuu-cha- I mean Kyuu-san. Oh, and thank San for the lesson too... It was very educational.”

Kyuu tilts her head in a questioning manner, like she’s not exactly sure whether the wolf is serious about appreciating San’s dangerous lesson or if he’s just being sarcastic.

Legosi turns around, looking like he’s about to leave. But then, he pauses and turns back to face Kyuu. He looks like he wants something.

LEGOSI: “Um...”

KYUU: “What now?”

LEGOSI: "Well, before I go… You know those swiping moves you made with the throwing knives... What do you call that?"

Kyuu gives the wolf a confused look.

KYUU: "Call?"

LEGOSI: "I mean, what is the name of the attack? What would you cry out while doing it?"

Kyuu gives him an incredulous look.

KYUU: "Cry out... What do you think this is, KAMEN RIDER?! What would be the damn point to cry out the name of a technique for the whole world to hear?!"

Legosi holds his arms out in an urging gesture.

LEGOSI: "Cause it'd be cool! You know, people would be like 'oh no, Kyuu's about to do her famous KNIFE SPLASH!'"

Kyuu stares at him with an open mouth, like she can't even compute the nonsense she is hearing.

KYUU: "... Knife splash?"

LEGOSI: "You know, cause the way it spreads is like water splashing... And it kind of sounds like 'knife slash'."

She continues to stare at him.

KYUU: "... Knife splash."

The rabbit smacks her mouth with an odd look, like she's trying to taste the word and it's turned out to be an acquired taste.

KYUU: "Knife splash... You'd like me to yell KNIFE SPLASH on the top of my lungs whilst doing it?! You don't do anything like with any of your attacks!"

LEGOSI: "Well not externally anyway."

KYUU: "Why Gouhin took you under his wing I'll never understand...!"

As they continue their banter, we go up the stairs and see that San is standing leaned up against the wall just out of sight. He is listening in on the conversation with an unreadable expression.

THE END... FOR NOW.

---

#beastars #jcl #2020 #legosi #kyuu #san #grey wolf #rabbit #alpaca #training session #fight #fanfiction #script style #mini story #shower me with insights

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timelordthirteen · 5 years ago

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Killing Time 17/?

Detective Weaver/Belle French, Explicit

Summary: A Woven Beauty Law & Order-ish AU. Written for Writer’s Month 2019.

Chapter Summary: Weaver and Belle's frustration with the case and their feelings reaches a tipping point.

Notes: Okay, two things. 1. Please don't hate me. 2. I'm sorry this took so fucking long to get done. Work has been...special, and my health has been shitty. The next chapter is already 50% done so hopefully it won't be long before I can post more.

Warnings: Please see AO3 for complete warnings and tags.

[AO3] Previous: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16]

The days had become routine.

They worked in Belle’s office during the day, struggling to piece together the identity and history of a woman who seemed not to exist, and to find who killed her and buried her in a vacant lot. The latter they were certain they already knew, though it was hard to tie either Branson brother to Eloise Gardener in spite of the gut feeling everyone had and the fact that Nick had all but lead them to the body. They had reached out to every agency they could think of, and spent a dusty afternoon at the county records office. It was frustrating to know a connection was there, but not be able to prove it.

All that, combined with their current living situation, had put Weaver on a tenuous edge. Belle was sleeping better, and had only had one short lived nightmare. She seemed to be moving past what happened, though she had not gone back to her apartment for longer than it took to collect more clothes or personal items. Weaver’s apartment was full of them now. Her suitcase was a near permanent fixture in the bedroom, and several of her suits were hanging in the closet.

Every day for the last two weeks, they worked together and went home together. Together, except not; not in the way he wanted them to be. A couple of nights he slept on the sofa, but most of the time he lay next to her, in the bed that used to be theirs, torn between wanting to be there for her in whatever way she needed and wanting to demand answers as to where he stood.

Weaver sighed as he pulled open the door to the apartment, the rolling of the metal loud in the corridor. He wanted to sink into the sofa with a glass of scotch and zone out to whatever was on TV, alone with his thoughts. But there was Belle, following him inside, and while he was more than happy to have her there, he couldn’t think about things with her so close.

“Hungry?” she asked as he slid the door closed and flipped the lock. “There’s leftover fried rice, and some chicken from last night.”

“Whatever’s fine,” he muttered, dropping his leather jacket over the back of a bar stool.

She shrugged and went around the island on her way to the fridge, pulling it open to peek inside. “You can have first pick, I don’t care.”

“Just...whatever you want, okay?” He huffed and ran a hand through his hair. Space and time was what he needed, but it was in short supply. “I’m gonna shower.”

Belle frowned at his back as he cut across the living room and then shut the bathroom door hard. She startled a bit at the sound, almost dropping the takeout container as she pulled it out of the fridge. Catching it with her other hand, she sighed and set it on the counter, pausing to lean over it. Something was wrong with Weaver, but she didn’t know what.

They’d both expressed a feeling of irritation at not being able to progress the case, or solve the riddle of the identity of Ms. Gardener. She’d vented it earlier in the afternoon rather childishly, flinging a dry erase marker in his direction after he made a snide remark, but that was hardly the kind of thing that would make him upset enough to want to be away from her.

She popped the container in the microwave, and blew out a breath. The sound of the water running in the shower mixed with the hum of her dinner reheating, and she zoned out for a minute, startling again when the beep sounded out. She shook her head and pulled the container out carefully, blowing across the top before she set it down. Normally she loved leftover fried rice, especially the good stuff from Chen’s, but her appetite was nil now that she’d started over analyzing Weaver’s mood. With a sigh, she slid onto one of the bar stools and poke at the rice with a fork halfheartedly.

Weaver rubbed the towel over his hair, avoiding giving his reflection more than a passing glance in the mirror. He’d started to feel so much older in the last couple of years, his hair far more gray than brown now, and the lines around his eyes less from laughter and more from the weight of everything.

The shower had been as hot as he could stand, but he didn’t feel any better. He did feel resolved to confront the situation with Belle, however, but he wasn’t sure when or how. Not talking, not addressing his concerns and feelings had done him no favors in their marriage, and it had caused nothing but turmoil in the last few weeks. His neck was stiff from all the tension he was holding in his body, from every time he forced himself away from her in an effort to remain suitably distant.

Dropping the towel in the hamper, he nearly walked out into the apartment stark naked, before catching himself and retrieving it to wrap around his waist. Belle was sitting at the counter when he came out of the bathroom, and he paused for a long moment to watch her idly picking at her food. Her shoulders were slumped, her head was propped on her hand, and her whole body seemed so...defeated.

Closing his eyes, he resisted the urge to cross the space and start rubbing at her shoulders, her neck, to offer her whatever comfort he could because it pained him to see her like this. Instead, he hurried into the bedroom and put on fresh clothes.

Belle turned around as Weaver came out of the bedroom, and gave him a small smile. He was wearing a soft black t-shirt and his favorite jeans, the ones he couldn’t wear to work anymore, or really anywhere outside of the apartment. The cuffs were frayed, a seem pulled across the left knee, and a hole in one of the back pockets. He looked so comfortable, and she bit her lip as she looked away, sliding off the bar stool to dispose of what was left of her dinner.

He moved around the other end of the island and pulled open the door to the fridge with a loud exhale.

“Hey,” she said tentatively. “Feeling better?”

Weaver sighed and removed a small tupperware of deli meat from the fridge, setting on the counter to the side. He kept his back to Belle as she proceeded to ask him if he was hungry, if she could help. She was rambling, a usually endearing trait that happened when she was nervous, but he was already on edge and in danger of snapping at her.

“I’m fine,” he muttered, fumbling in the drawer for a butter knife.

“Hey.” She came around to stand near him, one hand on her hip. “Would you at least look at me?”

He huffed and turned around, his eyebrows lifted in annoyance.

“What’s wrong?” she asked. “You’ve been weird since we left the office.”

He swallowed and ran a hand through his damp hair, reluctant to have this conversation now, despite its necessity in the long run. “I’m not - I’m...” He shook his head. “I’m fine.”

“Ian...” He could hear the irritation in her voice, and his jaw clenched. “Talk to me. Is it the case? Is it Rogers?”

It was all happening against his will and his better judgement. “No, it’s not - just - just leave it alone.”

Belle bit her lip and stepped closer. “Is it - is it me?”

He shook his head and moved away as she reached for him. “You have to decide,” he managed, his throat suddenly tight. “You have to decide what you want, Belle.”

She blinked and frowned at him, feeling like she’d missed a whole other part of the conversation. “What?”

“I can’t keep doing this.” He sighed as her fingertips brushed his arm, fighting the urge to take her hand. “Not - not every night. Not after everything.”

She pulled back her hand, confusion giving way to surprise, tinged with anger. “So, two weeks ago I could stay here as long as I liked, and now you want me to go?”

Weaver turned, and she drew away from him, her arms folding over her middle. “No - no that’s not - that’s not what I’m saying.”

He sighed and leaned back against the counter. His thoughts were too jumbled to come out properly, and seeing the way her face fell pulled at emotions that were too raw. He didn’t want her to go, ever, but he needed answers, even if that made her leave in the end. Maybe it was better if she did.

“Belle,” he continued, “I - I would hold you every night. For the rest of my life if you’d let me. But not like this, not when I don’t know how you feel, or where we stand.”

She let out a humorless laugh and looked away, her eyes settling on the clock on the oven for a moment. It was strange to have her words repeated back to her, especially after so much time. It had been in a moment almost exactly like this, a quiet, rainless night after weeks of uncertainty.

“I think I said that to you once,” she said softly. “About two years and eight months ago.”

Weaver rolled his eyes. Somehow he’d know it would go this way. It always did. “Oh, here we go,” he lamented. “Yeah, turn it around on me.”

Belle whirled on him. “I am not turning it around on you! You weren’t there!”

His eyes went wide. “What? You were the one who left. One last shag and then you packed your things!”

Her mouth flattened as she glared at him. “I asked you not to go that night. I - I needed you!”

He blew out a breath and put some distance between them, moving to the far side of the island. “There was a bloody body at pier five! What the hell was I supposed to do?”

Belle’s eyelids closed for a moment, and she shook her head. His bitter mood was making her angry, and she could feel a sharp pain in her chest as old wounds reopened themselves. Her face felt hot and her skin itched. She swore she could feel something on the inside of her leg, and she feared that if she looked down she’d see blood again, trickling down her leg, puddling menacingly on the floor.

“Last I checked,” she snapped, “James Rogers, was not only a decorated detective, but also a grown ass adult who can probably handle yet another dead body washing up on a pier!”

“I was on call!”

Her teeth clenched as she stalked towards him. “You. Weren’t. There!”

Her palm swatted at his arm on the last word, hitting him hard. He hissed in pain and stepped away from her, but she didn’t care. The trousers she’d worn to work, her underwear, her blouse, all felt sticky and wet to her, stained red in her memory. She blinked and her eyes stung as tears spilled over her cheeks.

“I lost our baby!” She screamed. “And you weren’t there!”

He couldn’t do this. She was angrier than he’d ever seen, her eyes wild and her face flushed, hair sticking to her face where it was wet. His body physically hurt, head to toe, as he forced himself to back away and not reach for her like he wanted to. He wished he could hold her and make it all go away, take back all the bad decisions and wrong choices, but they would probably have ended up here anyway. He turned and snatched his jacket off the back of the bar stool, flipping it around as he moved, and shoving his arms in the sleeves.

Belle swiped her hands over her face and followed him as he moved towards the door. “What are you doing?”

He paused and looked back at her, his voice resigned. “Leaving.”

She scoffed, her arm rising and falling, letting her palm slap against her thigh. “Right, of course you are. Running away when shit gets hard.”

Weaver’s mouth opened, ready with a biting retort, but then he sagged and pressed his lips together. “Yeah, whatever.”

He stopped, facing away from her, and she made herself stay put, resisting the desire to fling something at him. This was how it had gone before. She pushed, he pulled, and when things got bad he shut down and ran.

She crossed her arms, watching as he picked up his wallet and keys from the table by the door. “Just like your father after all. Things get tough, and you cut corners, you bend the rules, and you run away!”

He turned slowly, his face twisted in a mix of pain and rage like she’d never seen, not even when he hauled off and punched Nick Branson in the face. His eyes were bright, shining and dark, and she immediately clamped a hand over her mouth, as he yanked the door to the apartment open.

“Fuck...” she breathed, scrambling to close the distance between them. “Ian, no, please! I'm sorry I didn't mean that.”

Weaver stopped, his gaze turning dark as he flashed his teeth at her. “Oh, I think you did.”

The harsh slam of the door echoed off the high ceilings, and Belle startled. She stumbled back, her hand going out to catch herself and finding the back of the sofa. A gasping sob slipped out from between her fingers as she pressed her hand to her lips, her body shaking. The last few minutes had been like a terrible nightmare, one she’d had often after their divorce, but somehow the reality of it was so much worse. A strange cry escaped her as she made her way around the couch, all but collapsing onto it, her head in her hands and her palms wet with tears.

#rumbelle #rumbelle fic #woven beauty #woven beauty fic #killing time #fic #my woven beauty fic

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neshabeingchildish · 5 years ago

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Poly Wanna? Ch.5

Doing confession in bold to see how this goes. I may not set chapters up in "reality TV format" but I had a couple of things that I wanted to do in that style just to see. I be trying out stuff sometimes. Forgive me for being a whole trash can.

Lemme know if I need to take you off the tag. Idk who’s actually reading because I’ve only heard from a couple of people, so idk if y’all still interested (or if y’all’ll be after this MESSY shiz in this chapter.

@adorkable-blackgirl @chenoahchantel @ciara-knightly @cactus-con @up-the-tube @riebellion @itsyaapollochild@oof–musicals @lesbian-so-what @woahjusttakeiteasy-man @meadowstryingtobepretty @imma-sensitive-btch @okaygal21 @midernacht @divinereign4ever @xoxoemille

Here is the song from the bar: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6iibMNsSRCE

And, the Drama Begins

Jasper wanted to have one more Girls Day with the Hartbroken Club before filming started, but the production team felt like that was actually a perfect place to begin recording him. Of course, he couldn't see it in progress. The thought of doing things for six months then having to wait another six months before even seeing it and probably being a completely different person in another year… that was a little terrifying.

But, the team had made a filming schedule and decided to start out with Jasper for the beginning of the show for a few reasons: 1. He was the longest friendship that Henry Hart has ever had. 2. He was the most likable person that they currently had on the cast. And 3. They weren't convinced that he and Henry were over each other and felt like establishing that on camera, early on would be a wonderful bang to begin with.

Henry hadn't been in a serious relationship since he and Jasper broke up a few years prior and there must've been a reason that it also took Jasper a long time to move on and when he did, it was with Henry's ex. They were pretty much convinced that either the relationship was a ruse to get to Henry, or one or both of them were lying to themselves about how one another felt.

Also, unknown to Jasper, they had reasons that they wanted to see Charlotte face to face with Bianca and Chloe. If the cast members weren't telling each other certain things, that was fine for the production team. They had a feeling that they knew how to start with a hefty dosage of mess from something that Charlotte had admitted in her interview when asked how she felt about being on screen with Henry's other exes. They had a feeling that Jasper didn't know this little piece of information. It would bring in good ratings at the start of the program...

Jasper's confession/testimony room was in his bedroom, where he interviewed, but with a much better camera set up. They gave Jasper a list of things that they wanted him to share with the confession camera: Why do you go to these outings with Chloe and Bianca? Is all of this because of your connection to Henry? How does Charlotte feel about it?

He sighed and set the paper down. "Those don't have to be recorded right now," Grumpy Cat said. "But, I'd say maybe do a short introduction for your first voiceover."

"Can it not be the stuff from the interview? Because I can guarantee you that whatever I said then is all that I'll come up with if I sit in that chair."

"Sure. I don't care." He rolled his eyes and walked off.

Jasper waited until he was gone to start his confession. "My name is Jasper Dunlop. I'm 28, he/him/his pronouns, cis, but not het. Ummm… Bisexual, not entirely sure of what it means to be pan, so I don't absorb that title. I have a beautiful girlfriend of about 7 months now. We live together and decided to take this weird journey with our ex-best friend and mutual ex boyfriend.." That probably sounds like we dated him at the same time, which technically… I mean, depending on how you look at it… Henry was definitely still in love with Charlotte when he and Jasper… Jasper looked at the paper then at the camera again.

"I go to these outings with Chloe and Bianca, who also dated Henry because when we broke up, it was my chance to vent, but now I just love having spa days. That's good stuff. This time, we're bringing Charlotte along. She wants to go for spa stuff. She couldn't really care about the whole Henry angle. She got over him better than any of us did, I think, especially considering that theirs was a much more serious relationship… Honestly, Char just deserves a good relaxing day. She hasn't had a great year."

Charlotte and Jasper came to the spa and Chloe and Bianca were waiting inside. "Hi!" Both girls cheered. Charlotte smiled, but didn't rush to hug them like Jasper had. They came to hug her, though. She smiled a little. "My God, you look amazing! What do you do for your skin? Your hair is divine! Omg, this dress is so cute! You smell great…" Her smile tensed up with all the overdoing going on here.

But, she had given a confession that would surely be used when this was aired…

"I don't know if Bianca and Chloe know that I know that they're two of the women who Henry was paying attention to behind my back. I don't know if they know that I know that pix were sent and that a threesome was discussed. But I know that I know, and both those girls better watch how they handle me."

In the spa, Charlotte said, "Okay! I'm not a collectible doll and neither of you are at a petting zoo." She bumped past them and asked for a price list, which she took to studying as Jasper confusedly resumed speaking to the girls about their usual plan.

She wondered, to the woman at the counter, "Just wondering about this Henry Hartbreak Plan… I think I want it, but is there a way to take off certain services for a discounted price? For instance… I don't do tanning beds…"

"Are you Charlotte?" The woman asked. Now, the whole group was paying attention. Charlotte raised an eyebrow, reluctant to answer, "I've got whatever your services are covered."

"What? Why?" Charlotte asked suspiciously. She had been broke for a few years and nobody ever gave her anything for free in her life.

"We have card information and instructions to let you whatever you need, if you are."

"What card information?"

"Dr. Henry Hart." Charlotte almost refused, but you know what? Eff it. He owed her at least one spa day, and the looks on both Bianca and Chloe's faces were worth it as the girl behind the counter read, "Charlotte Page. Special instructions. Whatever she orders, charge it to this card." The woman looked worried, like she'd said something wrong.

"Okay then, but can I still skip the tanning bed? I like to tan like nature intended, basking in the sun…"

Jasper spoke to the confession camera about this, "It was troubling to me that Henry was paying for Charlotte's way, but a little more troubling that she accepted. Because, I'd offered her and she declined. But he offered and..." he shrugged his shoulders, but his eyes were stressed.

Charlotte had a wonderful time, but avoided the girls and by association, Jasper most of the time. It wasn't really his fault, but she just preferred to focus on her experience there. "Honestly, I didn't go there to bond with Chloe or Bianca and I didn't go there to confront them about old stuff. I went for a spa day. They had their little girl's day. Charlotte had her spa day, AND it was free." On the way home, she reclined the seat and said, "I'm probably gonna sleep."

"Are you tired from all the energy it must've taken you to ignore everybody all day?" He said, jokingly.

"Nope. It took none. It was as natural as breathing. That's an awesome spa! My skin feels glorious." She said. "I loved those lavender lemonade spritzers."

"Too rich for my blood," he muttered.

"Should've told me. I'd have gotten you some on Henry's dime." Jasper took a deep breath. "You okay, Jasper?" She poked him a little in the side, playfully, trying to get him to look at her.

"I don't feel comfortable with what happened today."

"Why? I got a free spa day and you got your day with your little friends. Everybody won."

"For one, they were trying to be nice and you were kind of rude to them, then you refused to interact with any of us. Why did you come when we did and not some other time if you didn't want to be there with us?"

"Next time I won't. Sorry for how it affected you," she said and rubbed his shoulder.

He sighed. He wanted to say it was no big deal and move on, but that was the kind of stuff that got his heart in trouble with Henry. "Now, I feel like you're dismissing it."

"I am, because you're wrong, but if it's how you feel, who are me to judge?" She laughed to herself about her silly reference. He didn't get it. He looked stressed and she didn't want that at all. She honestly didn't think it would matter to him that she stayed to herself, because they were both pretty independent in this relationship. He seemed like he was upset, so she added, "I wasn't trying to ignore you. I thought that was better than me being bitchy towards those girls. I won't mess up your next date with them, as long as you aren't talking playfully or otherwise about having a threesome with them."

"Why would I be?"

She shrugged her shoulders, "Henry did." Jasper squinted and looked at her sideways.

"What?"

"This story never got back to you?" He shook his head. "Okay. Wow. Well, whenever Henry and I had our last little blow up, one of the contention sources was his group chat with Bianca and Chloe and very inappropriate things being said and done there, one of which quote unquote just joking about having a threesome with them."

"I… did not know that. Henry didn't really ever want to say much about what happened between you and him. Just that it was his fault and that you left him."

"And in the past year or so you've been hanging with them they never mentioned it?"

"They mentioned that something happened after you two broke up, but nothing about causing it."

"Wait, something happened, like what? Like the threesome?"

"I mean… would it matter at this point? Are you still hurt?"

"To be honest, I didn't really deal with my heartbreaking. I just moved along, focused on school until I was ready to see other people socially, and I guess in the anger and blocking and stuff… maybe I am still hurt…"

"I don't know. But whether or not I am, I didn't like how they approached me either, so I still wouldn't have been interested, even if I didn't have those being my last memories of them."

"Why didn't you tell me this before? Like.. why come to this and then tell me afterwards?"

"I thought it would be petty to bring it up to you, at all. But, just now, you looked upset and I hate seeing you upset. I wanted to explain myself. I didn't think I'd be as dismissive of them when I got there as I was. I'm sorry."

He pulled over and gave her a hug. "I'm sorry. That's really messed up that you went through that. That would never happen with me."

"I'm Charlotte. Part science whiz, part art hoe, part witchy bitch, sarcastic, realistic, and just passionate about the things that I'm into. I came here for no other reason than for people to be able to see sides of me that I don't necessarily talk about. I know that this is about Henry, but that's not why I'm here." Charlotte was doing yoga in the living room, then made some juice and went outside to watch the sunrise.

Whenever Jasper saw her do it for the first time, he waited for her to come back in and asked, "Is that a you and Henry thing?"

"Nothing is a me and Henry thing," she said, laughing. Jasper had stepped out onto the balcony with Henry before and Henry asked him not to interrupt that time. It was his special alone time with the sun. Jasper thought it was weird, but gave him the space. So, seeing Charlotte do the very same thing had been deja vu. But, instead of being hard on him, she'd asked, "You ever wanna join me? I know you're not usually up so early…"

"I'd love to!" He said, then never woke up for it. Sometimes, if he left the bar super late, he'd still be awake when she got up. To be perfectly honest, watching her do yoga was more interesting to him than watching the sunrise, but there was something in how she watched it, something in how Henry had watched it that made Jasper feel like he understood them both better now. He didn't. He couldn't put his finger on it. But, he was just… kinda really fond of them in some of the same ways.

"You know, Henry does this every morning, too. That was why I'd asked if it was a you and him thing."

"It's a me thing that rubbed off on him."

"There was a lot, I think. I didn't realize that was your influence, but living with you after living with him…"

She smiled a little, "Well, he and I have to have both changed enough to where I don't remind you too much of him?"

"Yeah, there's a lot of very clear differences. Like, the bathroom! He keeps all his bathroom stuff in a bag and puts it out when he's in there and puts it away when he leaves."

"Yeah, because if he has to get out and go, he needs those things to go with him. He and Ray went on a… business trip suddenly and we're there for over a week. He came back and kept insisting his skin was in shambles." She laughed. "He was so ashy! I didn't even know that could happen to him, but he's got a kinda dark white complexion, so I guess." Jasper laughed too, recalling that. THAT was why he did that?

"Of course, you don't even care. You just spread your things all over my bathroom before you ever even moved in! I'd go in to find my toothpaste and there's women's stuff, beauty stuff, all those oils and stuff.."

"You're welcome. Don't think I don't notice you using my stuff."

"It's high quality stuff!"

"I have something for you!" She rushed to get a pretty bottle, that looked sort of like a genie bottle and handed it to him. "I blended this juice especially for you."

He tried some and shrugged. "Pretty good."

"It will help with some things…" she smiled and kissed him on the cheek.

"Don't leave me in suspense. What things?"

"Jasper has bruh… I don't know how else to say it… very off-putting semen. It's super bitter - WAY more tart than it should be. I know that his diet is part of the problem, but I can't really, you know… change his diet for him. This is one of the things that I do, though. Juices, herbs, soaks, whatever… we can get him tasting right. I'm not gonna keep trying to figure out what to do with that swamp gunk!"

Charlotte answered, "Your output. This will help with it."

"I have no idea what that means."

"I'll LOVE it, okay?"

"Good enough for me." She gave him a peck on the lips, then went to go get cleaned up for the rest of her day. *Shows off the bottle "Look at how gorgeous this thing is. I don't even know what it's made out of, but it's beautiful and the juice tastes magical."

Jasper showed up while Henry was watering plants. He'd left the door open. "Heyyy!" Henry cheered. "Jasper's here, ladies," he said to a group of flowers.

"Yo. Oh! Is it still watering time?" He backed away, getting ready to leave the place, in peace.

"Yeah, it's all good." Jasper raised an eyebrow. "Things have changed, Jasp. I'm not as mean as before… or as abusive." His eyes fell and he shook his head. He was honestly horrible to Jasper.

"I wouldn't call it abusive. You just were snappy about your boundaries."

"Yeah, but when you have so many boundaries…"

"Speaking of, sometimes I watch the sunrise with Char. She told me that you got that from her."

Henry smiled sadly, "Keep living. She'll put things on you too."

"Yeah! She makes me special juice and puts it in this beautiful bottle for me!" He held out the bottle to Henry.

"What's in it?"

Jasper took a swig, "Like.. bananas, something tropical, citrusy.." he took another, "Different flavors. My palate is getting a lot."

"May I?" Jasper reluctantly handed it over and Henry beautifully took a sip. How was he so damn hot, just drinking from a bottle? He swished it in his mouth, swallowed, smacked his lips and said, "I've got papaya, cinnamon, peppermint… celery…" He snapped his fingers, "This is for your semen." He handed the bottle back. "To help it taste better for her."

"What?" Jasper hugged the bottle close to himself, scandalized.

"I mean, sure those things have other properties, so it could be anything, but my vote is on semen, because yours was always super strong tasting and she doesn't like flavors like that. Knowing her, she'd give you something to help without straight up saying, this is for this problem that I've noticed… Because, she feels like we ignore her when she does that."

"My output!" Jasper said, embarrassed.

Henry laughed, then apologized. "I remember her telling me, I got you something! Then showing me my very first konjac sponge. Apparently, I needed to exfoliate, especially my lips, which got really dry and licking them only wet them, not moisturized them." Henry laughed. "I do a routine flush to keep that down below good to go, though, especially if I'm expecting to engage. You let her down there with...just whatever? DId you not notice her wince or anything?"

"I don't wanna talk sex with Charlotte with you, Henry. You understand."

"Sure. Well, you ready to run?"

"No! But I agreed to it, so…""Charlotte is super healthy. Henry is super healthy. Henry is gonna be around because we're doing this show, so… I want to look better than I've been looking. I look great! Don't think I'm self conscious. I just know that I could stand to try to be in better shape, especially with the weirdness of Charlotte and Henry and me. Henry said that I could come with him on his morning runs. I hate running, but I've gotta start somewhere, I guess." The two of them were lightly jogging. Jasper fell behind a few times and told Henry not to worry, but he'd slow down every time.

"Jasper running is kinda comical, kinda adorable. He seems like he might die and that's sad, but his facial expressions and the stuff he yells out just make it hard not to smile."

"Running is what they get you to do when you wake up in Hell!" Jasper toppled over. Jasper poured a jug of water down his shirt. Jasper nearly collapsed. "Why would people choose to do this any time after like, age 6?" Jasper rested his hands on his knees, then fell forward, then lied down in the grass. "You should go on without me. I've been out here too long." Henry jogged next to him as he caught his breath. Henry checked his watch. "Okay, Buddy. It's been like 8 minutes…"

"PERIOD?" "Jasper is not a runner."

Henry made a mental note to simply work out later. After 20 minutes, Jasper was ready to die. "Come on. I'll get you something to eat and we can sit down for a while." Henry placed Jasper on his shoulder and said, "Maybe a gym. A treadmill? You could better control the volume and speed. We'll look into that."

"Henry and I used to work out all the time. I started going to the gym with him when he and Charlotte broke up. He would go more frequently, trying to blow off stress I think and I went along because he was mentally in a bad spot and I didn't want him to be alone. I got a membership back then and we went and talked and worked out and I was in my best shape at that time. I was hot. Ouch!"

Charlotte wasn't home whenever Jasper got back, but he texted her about spending the afternoon with Henry. Once they were out and about again, they just flowed well. And, they'd spent time together before he and Charlotte, so they would likely do so again. He looked at the countertop in the kitchen and Charlotte had left him this cute jumbo organza bag with a drawstring and a note, "Put together a blend of oatmeal, epsom salts, fragrances, flowers, herbs and essential oils for the soreness that you'll surely have when you get home. Love you!" Jasper held his heart over his chest, "She's honestly so thoughtful. Like… She talks to you mean, but literally nobody in my life has ever anticipated that I might be sore and made me a bath soak for it." He was blushing, uncontrollably.

Henry pulled out all the 'Steal Yo Girl' stops for his visit to the lounge that Jasper and Charlotte were working at. Neither of them were expecting him, but he knew where they worked and decided that he would go to socialize and smize at them. He had on a button down shirt, with the buttons open at the top, a floral jacket, silk to be exact, his eyebrows, hairdo, skin and teeth groomed to perfection. Jasper had spent a lot of time with him earlier. They had brunch and found a gym to join together and Henry was able to finish up his run on the treadmill, while Jasper preferred a comfortable walk on the one next to it. They had a good time. Henry felt good about them, but Charlotte was still out of his reach.

He came in and saw a little flier that said that Charlotte was singing tonight. He didn't even know that she sung here. He thought she said she was a waitress. He headed for the bar to order a drink and this music started and a sweet singing voice that made him turn around and stare. She was just in a silhouette, but he knew her form, even holding a guitar. "When we first collided -The timing wasn't right. I showed you the signs. You disappeared into the shadows. Now you're back again, Telling me you do. You do…" She came from the darkness into the dim light of the room, continuing. He was transfixed, but everyone was.

Charlotte wore a figure hugging shimmering gold dress that showcased her gorgeous legs, strap up shoes, and her hair pulled up, adorned with gold accents and some extensions that made her kinda look like that suitoress in Coming to America. She kicked her leg up when she got to the chorus, "I've been to the moon. Don't tempt me. I've been where you are. God help me…" Jasper and Charlotte seemed to both notice Henry at the same time, or maybe Jasper noticed him after she focused in on someone in the audience… "I've been to the moon and stars for you, and now it's your turn to go for me too…" Henry was drawing closer to the stage when he felt a hand squeeze his shoulder and broke his trance. Jasper.

"Hey.. you didn't tell me that Char was singing tonight!"

"I didn't expect to see you here, so I'm not sure why I would've. She has good vocals and can play guitar, so sometimes she does this for extra cash when they can't book anybody." Jasper smiled and folded his arms, trying not to look Henry over and failing. "What are you doing here?"

"Wanted to have a few drinks." They headed for the bar and Jasper was ready to serve. "What's this song she's singing?"

"Ummm.. it's Corinne Bailey Rae, I think. She's doing some of that tonight and some Esperanza Spalding, Marsha Ambrosious… You know…"

"Charshit," they both said at the same time. Henry ordered his drink then stared at her some more before Jasper interrupted, "If I didn't know any better, I'd think you still wanted her." Henry blinked out of it and turned in his seat towards Jasper with a soft smile. "I want her not to hate me. We never got a chance to get to that point. She crossed me off and didn't look back. I spent years trying to get over that."

"Over the fact that someone was strong enough to leave you?" Jasper teased

Henry studied his glass for a while, before admitting, "Over the fact that the one person I always thought would never, had."

"The one person…" Jasper reeled in his sympathy to say, "Well when you're planning threesomes with your exes while you're dating, executing aforementioned threesome when you break up, and then inviting all of them to your shit show, I'm not sure how you expect her to forgive you any time soon."

Henry rubbed the temples of his head, shot the rest of his drink, and gestured for another. Jasper rolled his eyes at the fact that he went silent when called on his BS. Earlier today, he thought he'd changed. When he set down Henry's drink, Henry said, "I want everything out of the way. All the dirt dealt with… everything drudged up and maybe we can put all the shit behind us."

"Says the shit starter," Jasper said. He leaned on the bar, kinda close to Henry's face, "If that's what you want, just say it. Stop playing games."

Henry smiled and said, "I feel like that's going to be used completely out of context when this airs." He booped his nose, laughed, and turned away from Jasper to watch Charlotte finish her set and nurse his drink. "Charlotte said everything that she needed to say to me whenever she left me. She had some valid reasons. She was well within her right and it was the best thing for her to do for her. I always thought that whenever somebody messes up, you work on it, forgive, maybe even forget. My parents have been together for like 30 years and I know that there's been infidelity and other troubles, but they never leave each other and they've never even considered a divorce, and I guess that I thought that when you love someone, there's a lot of room to make mistakes. That… wasn't what I believed after that break up and I felt like I had an epiphany that I was never going to have any great love, because I had one and I messed up."

Charlotte came off of the stage and looked Henry up and down then said, very firmly, cutting off whatever cheery compliments that he was about to give her, "Listen. If you're gonna go after my man, all up in my face, I should tell you that you're not the only one with some fight training."

Henry scoffed and Jasper handed her a drink, "He's not, Babe."

"Don't come up in here trying to look like a meal and getting all up on Jasper, smiling and booping his nose and shit!" She snapped at Henry.

"Wow. You misread all of that," Henry said.

"You misread!" She snapped. "Jasper is a nice person and he has a hard time telling people to shove off. I don't. He doesn't want you anymore, Hen, You messed that up."

"I know that," Henry said, shot the rest of his current drink and threw some money on the counter, "Sorry for the misunderstanding. We still on for the gym?"

"Uhh... " Jasper looked at Charlotte, tapping her foot angrily and clenching her glass in her fingers. "I don't know. I'll call you in the morning." He rubbed Charlotte's shoulder and said, "He wasn't flirting with me."

"I know. You were flirting with him," She said and drank her drink.

"No, I wasn't. I was confronting him about the way that he was looking at you!"

"You had to be nose to nose with him to do so?" She slammed her glass down and said, "Jasper… I'm not going to be any man's fool."

"I would never. I'm tired of you not trusting me."

"Should we take a break? You're certainly not tired of Henry. You were with him all day and now he's here tonight?"

"He just showed up!"

"And you decided to fawn all over him right in my goddamn face, Jasper!"

"I noticed that he looked nice, but I wasn't… I don't want Henry, and hell no I don't want to take a break!"

Henry bit his lip and looked at the camera. "I think that I started a fight between them.." He left the bar, stifling a chuckle. It wasn't funny, but he couldn't help it. He actually had not meant to do that, at all. He didn't know how he was gonna fix it, but probably invite them both over for dinner to clarify what he was doing there.

#Poly Wanna #Nesha HD Fics #henry danger #henry hart #charlotte page #jasper dunlop #hd ot3

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mystrangeaddiction-petra-venj · 6 years ago

Text

Serenity Vidaj

(I finally competed something)

Awoken- Hunter- Nightstalker

Resurrected - Right after the Last City was founded- Exact date unknown due to ghost

Ghost - Critical Failure(just Fail or Critical is fine though)Has a split personality like Failsafe and refers to her guardian as Captain.(She acts like Failsafe because she spent a lot of time on Nessus searching for Serenity and picked up Failsafe’s personalities)

Affiliation - The Vanguard, Fireteam Eleven, FWC, Sentinels of Dying Light

Status - Active Hunter Veteran

Voiceclaim - Idina Menzel

Sexuality - Pansexual

Noteworthy Physical Traits - Has a snake tattoo running up the length of her right arm

Background - Serenity was revived by Critical on the Tangled Shore because she was a foot soldier in the Awoken military and died along with the rest of her unit. Her ghost proceeded to revive her and then right after, nearly die on her because it only had enough light in it to find and revive her. This led to Serenity being stuck on the Shore for a couple years not really knowing she was a guardian because she had practically no light. She eventually cobbled together a ship and got a far as the Cosmodrome on Earth, where her craft crashed. Serenity was amazed to find out that she was in fact, still alive. This was the moment her ghost told her she was a guardian and connected her to the light. Got through the Cosmodrome and had to drive a sparrow all the way back to the Last City.

Participated in the building of the wall, and also guided survivors to the Last City. She met the rest of Fireteam Eleven accidentally when they were protecting a group of survivors. They continued to run into each other in things and be paired together in things like strikes, crucible, and patrols, so they just decided to stay together.

Was still stuck on the Reef during the Battle of Six Fronts, but participated in the Battle at Twilight Gap. After The Guardian was risen, she and her fireteam watched over them for a time because the vanguard ordered her team to do so. She was proud of them for killing Crota, and finding the Black Garden. Serenity and team would later be called upon by Petra to help her beat the House of Wolves. Their job was mostly going after other Fallen houses, and even though she wanted to go after Skolas, Petra informed her that another guardian took him down. When Oryx came, and after the Awoken fleet was destroyed, Petra called upon Fireteam Eleven and friends to take the fight to the Taken. She was overjoyed when Oryx was killed and the Vanguard had her set up scouting stations on the Dreadnaught. She was a good friend for Petra to lean on when Petra took up the Regent mantle. Serenity and team would also go to fight Siva and after doing so, would be a part of the new wave of Iron Lords.

When Ghaul and the Red Legion came, she nearly died because she chose to stay behind in the city and rescue Mjoll who was stranded and without light saving survivors. After weeks of being unable to find Mjoll she made the hard decision and chose to leave. That decision broke her heart and sent her into a long depression. Later, she would stumble across Mjoll and her group of survivors and they would reunite with Equinox shortly after. They would make a small refugee camp in Widows Court. After The Guardian killed Ghaul and the Light returned, they led their refugees back and went on a rampage against the Cabal.

During the Pantopses crisis, she went with Seraphina to find him because she wasn’t going to let her bestie go at it alone. She was confused as to why Seraphina seemed to know Sagira and Osiris. She heard about the final battle from Seraphina after it was over.

She only heard about the events on Mars after Equinox came to her and asked for the teams help in killing Xol. She was mad for a short time at Equinox for not telling her about Rasputin and Ana, but she got over it. She, along with Mjoll, Seraphina, Lilith, Regina, Solar Flare, Aaron, Muerto, Finnegan, Roland, and Kingsman, all joined in helping Equinox kill Xol.

Serenity was never close with Cayde, despite being a hunter. She actually never particularly cared for him, but when she saw what his death did to Petra, Ikora, Zavala, Amanda, and most guardians, something inside her snapped. She, and her 11 friends, all joined in on the barons hunt. Together, they stormed the Shore and took down the Barons with some other Guardians. When it came time to fight Uldren, Petra asked her to come with her and help her through it. She agreed and, along with Petra, killed Uldren. She actively fights the curse in the Dreaming City and is excited to fight alongside her cousin, Petra. The curse doesn’t drain her as much as it seems to do others, but she does get these bouts of depression every once in a while when she realizes that they haven’t beaten it, but as long as Petra is in, she’s in.

She participated in the reforging of the Black Armory forges with her friend Mjoll because Mjoll really likes blacksmithing. However, she was mainly interested in helping Ada-1 remember herself. She’s very reluctant to do anything with Gambit or the Drifter because she’s a devoted guardian. However, if Equinox asked her to accompany her into Gambit, she would do so in a heartbeat. She hates the Menagerie and anything that has to do with Calus because she finds him to be extremely creepy. She only goes if one of her friends asks her to tag along, otherwise, you’ll find her as far away from Calus as she can get.

Family, Friends, (and boyfriend)- 200 years before The Guardian was revived, she met another one of her best friends, the warlock Seraphina. Serenity met Seraphina after she tried to murder her because she believed Seraphina was a Fallen due to her armor. Serenity then led Seraphina to the City and they just decided to remain friends. A little after she led Seraphina back, Serenity and team would meet fireteam If I Had To Pick A Dude and its members Solar Flare-17, Muerto Rios, and Aaron Laufy(or dumbass if you ask Serenity). Further down the years, she would meet the rest of Sraphina’s fireteam, the titan Regina and the hunter Lilith, and their male friends, Roland the titan, Finnegan the warlock, and Kingsman the hunter. When the Awoken Queen also sent out her emissary, she became fast friends with Petra Venj.

Mjoll and Equinox became her fireteam when the walls were still being built. They rescued survivors together and defended the new city together. They just decided to remain a team, and eventually, that comradery led them to forging a sisterhood with one another. They consider each other family and wouldn’t have it any other way.

When Serenity first heard Petra’s voice, a brief memory came to her, and then she swore up and down that she knew Petra. She always tried bringing up the conversation with Petra, but the emissary would quickly change the subject. Petra didn’t acknowledge Serenity as her cousin because it would be going against the Vanguard if she were to do so. Not telling Serenity hurt Petra because she practically brought Serenity up. As the Wolves came, and the outpost became open to guardians, she spent a lot more time in the Reef and with Petra. Also during this time, Serenity got more and more memories of her Petra doing family things together like walks through parks, playing games like hide and go seek together, and just general family things. She also remembers the day she graduated from the army academy and Petra beaming at her from the family section. She keeps getting these memories until towards the end of the Wolf campaign, when she gets her final memory, and that is Petra moming over her about her upcoming assignment and Serenity assuring her that she would be fine. That memory ends with them hugging and Petra saying “stay safe out there cousin” and Serenity jokingly replying “I always am”. Serenity’s death hurt Petra, and what harmed her even more was there not being a body to bury, so Serenity was another one on Petra’s list of lost family. When Serenity went back to the Reef, she approached Petra with such a serious demeanor, that Petra thought she had done something wrong. She wrapped Petra in a tight hug and began to cry saying that she remembered and that she was sorry that she left her alone for so many years. Petra realizes what’s going on and returns her hug to the shorter hunter and says that it’s okay because she’s back now. Meanwhile, the corsairs around them are like “WTF? Why is this rando guardian hugging the Queen’s Wrath and crying?” After Serenity remembered, she and Petra would constantly talk, vent, and keep each other updated about their lives. Serenity tried to support Petra during her regency, but finds it to be difficult because of the lack of time.

When Serenity first really met Aaron, he was talking to Petra and trying to get her to date him. She said no. He understood, and proceeded to walk away, but stopped when he saw Serenity. He was immediately entranced by her because he had just heard her laugh at something Petra had said. Petra took notice, but said nothing to Serenity. The next time he came around, Petra began to question him about her, and he immediately told her, that yeah, he had a significant crush on her. Petra then called and involved Mjoll, Equinox, and Seraphina. With their coaching and pushing, Aaron eventually asked her out. It was a very awkward asking if you ask anyone who saw it. It was funny to their friends to see the normally calm, collected hunter and the suave, flirty hunter both dilute into blushy, happy messed.

Personality - Her name speaks volumes as to who she is. She’s a very calm and collected person who is great at keeping the peace. She doesn’t get visibly angry, but she does this silent fury kind of thing. She’s a patient person who is more than willing to guide others. If you need someone to talk to, she’s usually available and can give some good advice. If you ask her to do something, she’ll make the time to do so, and will never put anything off. She’s also sort of like a resident therapist because she’s good at helping people asses and control their feelings. Overall, she’s a serious, but caring person who just wants to help the people.

Fun Facts -

She’s actually blood related to Petra, they’re cousins

She has an older brother and sister that don’t know she’s alive again and she’s okay with that

Has a pet wolf that she stole from the Iron Temple

Like climbing on things, weather it be trees or tall buildings

Loves to sparrow race and was pretty good at it (usually got podium finishes)

Loves to drink black tea with zero added sweeteners

Tyra is the cryptarch that she usually goes to just because she wants to know how she’s doing

Loves to do yoga

Loves to ice skate, and she would consider that an ideal hangout or date

She’s a realist

She loves taking kinderguardians under her wing because they can do some stupid things that make her laugh

Is moderate at the crucible, but would rather fight enemies instead

Her favorite planet is either Nessus or Venus

She looked up to Tallulah Fairwind and was crushed by her death

Thinks Shiro-4 should be the next hunter vanguard

Likes to draw maps and explore new locations

Her original Awoken name was Seren and Serenity is actually her nickname

#serenity vidaj #my ocs #my guardians #character bio

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kenzieam · 6 years ago

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Surrender to the Call - Chapter Three (Bucky X Lev)

Rating: M (language, violence, mentions of torture and abuse, eventual smut, angst)

Genre: Drama/Angst

@captstefanbrandt @iammarylastar @kiiiimberlyriiiicker1995 @notimetoblog @captain-ariel-barnes @jaamesbbarnes @lancefvcker @bitsandbobsandstuff @softlybarnes @lovelybbarnes @buckitybarnes @bucky-plums-barnes @moonbeambucky @badassbaker @citylights221 @empress-of-boujee @tbetz0341 @chook007 @shynara51 @diinofayce @casestudy-mw @jewels2876 @damnaged-princess @everythingisoverrated @allmyfanficfaves @melgoodwin @clarabella960 @curvybihufflepuff @plaidcat4815 @angryschnauzer @wowspideyholland @sergeantwhitewolf@smilexcaptainx @shirukitsune

If I missed any tag requests, I apologize!!

*IF YOU WANT TO BE ADDED OR DELETED FROM THIS LIST, DM ME*

**Potential Triggers, please read with caution**

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Alright, this chapter is pure angst, no redeeming factors at all....

Poor Buck-Buck gets put through the ringer..............

All dialogue in BOLD is Russian.

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“Take your sniveling elsewhere, you shame our masters.”

Breathing hard, Bucky just stared at Lev for a long moment, unable to reconcile this... monster with his Lev; in a way, this side of her was worse than the raging beast, this showed cruel intelligence, a psychopathic streak of callous, sadistic evil.

Bucky turned and fled, fighting to control his racing heart.

Steve found him later, sitting silently in the common room, the TV playing, but Bucky’s mind a million miles away. With a sigh the blond man sat beside him, leaning back into the couch.

“I talked to Shuri, she apologizes for not seeing my message sooner, her research’s taking off, she said she hardly has the time to sleep anymore.” He paused, but Bucky remained silent.

“She said she’d do all she could to help, would drop everything to devote her full time to this.”

Bucky finally managed a half-hearted smile, the edges stained with heartache.

“We can go anytime you’re ready... if you’re coming with us?”

Bucky exhaled, finally turning his haunted gaze to Steve. “I... I don’t know. I mean... this is Lev, but it’s not. She’s so... cruel, and she knows exactly what to say to cut me the deepest. I want to be there for her but... it hurts so bad.”

Steve nodded silently then exhaled loudly, rubbing at his scalp. “I understand Buck, whichever you decide, I understand. We’ll be flying out as soon as we can figure out the best way to subdue Lev. I mean, right now, you can’t trust her, we have to restrain her.”

Bucky nodded. “I wouldn’t trust her either right now”

“Bruce is thinking a concentrated dose of sedation fog through the vents, it’ll have to be a hell of a dose and it won’t work for very long, but it’ll give us time to restrain her... we might even need the collar.” He shuddered.

The collar was an invention of Tony’s that he kept locked behind many doors. It was a last resort type of deal, a metal collar that delivered an incapacitating electric shock if the wearer violated the preset limits. Most anything could be input by way of restriction and limitation, but the easiest and most effective was motion detection. If the wearer moved too much, past a certain number of degrees, the collar shocked, anything from the barest tickle to a lethal level. Tony had considered ‘uninventing’ the collar at one point, but it unfortunately had come in handy a few times for detainees who couldn’t be reasoned with any other way.

The thought of using it on Lev was agonizing, but it was going to be necessary; this wasn’t Lev they were dealing with right now, they had to remember that.

Steve’s phone beeped suddenly, a caustic, grinding tone that instantly set Bucky’s nerves on edge. Steve grimaced as he hurried to silence it, his face growing grave as he read the message. Bucky felt the beginnings of anxiety start to pierce his miserable bubble.

“The President’s launching one last all-out attack on HYDRA, she’s requesting the Avenger’s participation.”

“I can’t-”

“No Buck, not you. Everyone else.” Steve cut a quick, knowing glance at him. “She doesn’t trust you either, it seems.”

A curious mix of relief and disappointment filled Bucky, he’d come back from being the Winter Soldier, he’d fought as an Avenger for this goddamn country, and now suddenly he wasn’t to be trusted?

“It’s just the timing, man.” Steve continued. “She’s sore with the attacks and Lev’s performance back there, this is our chance to crush those pricks once and for all, and it frees you up to take Lev to Shuri; it wouldn’t hurt for you to spend some time decompressing in Wakanda either.”

Bucky was about to protest, but Steve continued, correctly interpreting Bucky’s reluctance and seeking to head it off. “I know it’s far from ideal, but there’s no one else. We have to respond to this request, ‘cause you and both know it’s anything but a friendly invitation. If we succeed, it will secure Lev’s safety from prosecution-”

“But, if Shuri can’t reverse it, remember that fucktard agent said-”

“It will. Shuri helped her once, she’ll do it again. I’m sorry it has to be you taking her there, but maybe it’s for the best, you’ll be right there when the real Lev wakes up.”

“If the real Levi wakes up.” Bucky couldn’t stop his voice from breaking.

“Shit Buck,” Steve murmured. “We can’t think like that.”

*********************************************************************************************

Bucky flexed his hands, regripped the controls with a grimace. He’d been holding onto them so hard his joints popped and protested angrily.

Lev’s sedation and capture had been far from pretty. When the sedation fog had first been pumped in; they’d decided, somewhat reluctantly to not ask Lev first if she would be willing to just cooperate, it wasn’t worth the potential trouble of giving her a heads-up of what they were planning; she’d fought with an almost desperate edge, as if this were bringing back horrible memories. She’d gasped and struggled, flipping back and forth between vicious, indignant rage at being tricked, and desperate, pleading panic, clawing wilding at her throat as she choked and gasped.

Bucky’d had to turn away before he’d snapped and ripped the door open to pull Lev free, instinctively rescue her and soothe her, take away the agony making her scream. As she’d finally slowed in her struggles, as the sedation took effect, he’d turned back as she’d convulsively twisted to face the glass, and the look of betrayal in her eyes had cut him to the quick.

She’d already been stirring by the time they’d secured her restraints; specialized lightweight chains rated to withstand even the Hulk’s strength and the snap of the collar had woken her up completely. Murder in her eyes, she’d leapt to attack, heedless of the restraints, only to go rigid with a strangled scream as the collar shocked her for moving too far. She’d tried again, snarling like a rabid dog, only to be stopped again. The collar was set to deliver a stronger shock with every additional violation, had already been set to a punishing level, and the second hit actually knocked her semi-conscious for a few seconds.

Bucky was half-hysterical by the time they’d loaded her into the quinjet and the take-off had been delayed for a few extra minutes while Steve calmed him back down.

Then the team had departed, leaving reluctantly to attack HYDRA and Bucky had been alone with Lev in the quinjet. He was the first to admit that this was a bad idea, but there were precious few options available to them. HYDRA needed to be stopped, and this was looking like the best and only chance.

Lev had been silent so far, alternating between glaring daggers at Bucky’s back and wracking her brains for a way to escape. She was loathed to admit that she was indeed trapped, the chains unbreakable and, even if she managed to slip them, the collar was another matter entirely. She’d tested it a third time during take-off, when Bucky had been distracted, and the pain had been enough to convince her to stop. Her best chance was waiting, until when they were off-loading her. Maybe everyone would be incompetent, she’d never heard of this Wakanda before, but she could hope they weren’t fully prepared for what she was capable of delivering.

Bucky glanced in his mirror, catching sight of Lev staring at him unblinkingly and he looked forward again, unnerved. There was no trace of his Lev in those cold, reptilian eyes. Calculating, cunning eyes that slashed deep down into your very soul and pried loose your deepest fears and secrets.

“Where are we going, Asset?” It was the first time she’d spoken since they’d taken off.

“To someone who can help you.”

“No one can help me.” There was an edge to Lev’s voice and Bucky had to clamp down hard on the sudden impulse to flip the auto-pilot switch and scramble back to Lev’s side, pull her to him and comfort her, soothe away the desolation he’d heard in her stark declaration. He flinched involuntarily, this could be... probably was a trick, an attempt to lure Bucky towards her, soften him and distract him further than he already was, capitalize on it in some way. He wouldn’t put it past her right now to simply try to incapacitate or hurt him somehow, then let the quinjet drift until it could no longer, and they crashed to their death. It was a morbid, cynical thought, but this was HYDRA at their worst, or best, depending on your viewpoint.

“HYDRA succeeded this time. Your woman is gone. I am all that remains.”

Bucky flinched again, harder this time. No, it can’t be true, she’s just messing with you again.

“It hurt, I remember that,” she continued, stubbornly, or perhaps, calculatingly, keeping to Russian despite revealing earlier that she still was capable of English. "The pain was something she’d never felt before, torment without end. But, when the agents all decided to take a turn with her, soon she was moaning like a whore-”

“SHUT UP!” Bucky screamed, the jet jolting as he ripped at the controls. Lev, although secured to a bulk-head, was jerked to the side and went rigid with a screech as the collar activated again. Eyes half-open but unseeing, her unconscious body fell back against the side of the jet and her verbal torture fell silent.

Bucky panted, tears streaming down his cheeks, crying hysterically, only through sheer will did he keep the jet from barrel-rolling while he half-convulsed with agony in the seat, hands gripping the controls hard enough to bite into his flesh and draw blood. He’d hadn’t intended to throw Lev around like that, hadn’t been thinking of using the collar’s restrictions to his advantage, had only been reacting to her horrible words and the anguish they filled him with, but it had worked. The monster in Lev’s skin had fallen silent, at least for now, and Bucky could try to regain his sanity.

He trembled as her words replayed in his head, ‘when the agents all decided to take a turn’ and he dry-heaved, shuddering. God, baby. What did they do to you?”

Lev remained silent throughout the rest of the flight, but she watched Bucky the whole time, a sick little smile on her face as she saw the unending trickle of tears on his pale face.

Shuri, T’Challa and Okoye were waiting as Bucky guided the jet down and he took a deep breath, knowing the royal siblings and their beautifully dangerous head of the Dora Milaje would be able to see right through any façade he could try to put up. He’d spent time with all of them recovering from his own HYDRA indoctrination and again later, the first time Lev had been here and they’d become friends. He trusted Shuri completely, but he wasn‘t ready for T’Challa’s frighteningly accurate observations, his quiet, wise words. Hopefully Okoye, silent and deeply intelligent, would stay silent.

Without meeting Lev’s eyes Bucky walked past her and down the ramp, wanting to speak to their hosts out of her range. All three Wakandians were more than capable of handling themselves, and could easily handle anything Lev could currently dish out physically, restrained as she was, but her mouth and cruel cunning were a different matter entirely.

Mingled sympathy and shock flashed in the royal sibling’s eyes as they took in Bucky’s appearance before pulling him into tight embraces. Okoye nodded to him, gifting him with the tiniest encouraging smile.

“I will not ask how you are feeling; your face and eyes are answer enough” T’Challa rumbled quietly.

Bucky nodded in appreciation then took a deep, steadying breath. “Like we’ve already said, HYDRA has completely corrupted her, worse than before.” He glanced at Shuri, who frowned in concern. “But there’s more, she’s... cruel, she‘s going out of her way to... say things, it’s like she’s trying to...” he broke off, looking away for a minute before gathering the strength to finish his sentence. “It’s like her only goal is to drive me crazy with reminders of how much she suffered, how badly I failed her.”

T’Challa nodded in grim understanding. “Psychological, go for your basest, most primal emotions; protection and care of your mate. Cruel indeed.” He reached suddenly, planting a strong hand on Bucky’s shoulder. “You did not fail her.”

Bucky inhaled sharply and looked away, blinking rapidly. Giving him a moment, T’Challa glanced to his sister. “You will still be able to help?”

Shuri frowned thoughtfully for a moment. “I can’t say for sure without going inside her mind, it will certainly take longer though.”

T’Challa nodded. “Take all the time you need,” he looked back towards Bucky. “You need to rest as well, for as long as this will take. Your previous quarters are waiting for you.”

Bucky hesitated, the thought of familiar surroundings, the quiet peace that permeated the air here was a siren song to his raw nerves; but he needed to help contain Lev first, if only to be the target of her harsh words and save the Wakandians from the brunt of her malice.

T’Challa understood. “Let’s get Levka settled first.”

*********************************************************************************************

Bucky collapsed into the blankets with a pitiful groan. His body ached and throbbed, but that was nothing compared to the raw agony of his emotions.

Understanding what they intended, and not willing to cooperate in the slightest, Lev had been ruthless, realizing quickly that she was currently overwhelmed physically and instead going for Bucky’s figurative throat. If she couldn’t break away from the restraints, she could at least inflict this damage. She’d learned the spatial limits of the collar, keeping eerily still as the poison had spewed from her mouth; horrible descriptions of the agonies Lev endured as she fought to maintain her own mind and thoughts, the panic in her amethyst eyes as each successive round in the machine eroded her memories and personality more and more, the way she’d whimpered Bucky’s name at the end, her eyes unfocused and hazy. There was no way Lev could know what she’d looked like at the time; HYDRA must have either described it or, more likely, shown her footage of her own torture and conversion when she was finally pliant and docile, all traces of Lev gone.

It had taken all of Bucky’s strength to not flee, cover his ears and run away and only Okoye’s threat of cutting out Lev’s traitorous tongue finally silenced her, the warrior swinging her spear-head dangerously close to the corrupted woman who glared daggers in return, her violet, violent eyes promising retribution.

Fury had flared, white hot, in Lev’s eyes as the cryo procedure began but, as the arctic cold air had swept up her straining body a different emotion took over and the final tattered remains of Bucky’s heart bled anew as Levi looked over at him with wide, panicked eyes. For the briefest second it was truly her, truly Levi, and she was terrified of the cold, the dark, the silence that she realized was coming. Her first cryofreeze at HYDRA’s hands had been an abject failure, and the young Levi, known then as Nika, had spent four years in suspended hell, a purgatory that ruined her for any of HYDRA’s eventual plans with her. She was reliving that terror now.

As the cold had curled further up her body, licking at her throat Lev had opened her mouth, and the word please had fallen from her lips, a desperate plea to Bucky to save her.

It had crushed what was left of his shattered heart and he’d been unable to listen as Shuri tried to explain what she was about to try, and T’Challa himself had escorted the broken man to his hut, watching with sad, sympathetic eyes as the former HYDRA assassin shuffled like an old man towards his blankets.

Giving into the threatening darkness, Bucky closed his eyes, rigid body sagging into the blankets and, for a long time, he knew no more.

#bucky barnes #bucky barnes fanfiction #bucky and lev #bucky and nika

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