#i don’t have hearing loss btw i can hear you perfectly

[glitter-soda]

As somebody with audio processing difficulties, I hate when neurotypical people act like I’m being stupid or difficult when I ask them to repeat something. Seriously, how hard is it to just say something again? Alternatively (and I’ve told people this, most either don’t remember or don’t care) you can just make sure you have my attention before telling me something or asking me a question, then you can usually skip repeating yourself.

[kiirotoao]

HEYY YOUR SO PRETTY BTW AND I LOVE YOUR BLOG

the ask :

so, i wanted to get ur opinion on s3 mike. such as, what he was going through and his internalized homophobia. things like that!

maybe some things w/ him and his relationship w/ el too!

THANKS FOR ANSWERING IF U DO ANSWER :D

I’m gonna pretend that I’m fine after weeks of getting flustered just staring at this in my inbox! Thank you, anon!!! 🥺🥺 You’re making me blush! But, uh, anyways! Let’s talk about Mike Wheeler! 💙

I think that Mike in season 3 is the most interesting version of himself in the entire show because of how hidden his story becomes. In all other seasons, Mike cries openly with other people and expresses his sadness and fears over Will and El.

In season 3, though? Besides the finale, the tearful goodbyes narrated by Hopper, we never see Mike truly cry and explicitly talk through why. Sure, it can be pretty readily implied that it’s because of the Byers leaving, but we don’t hear that aloud. We don’t see exactly who’s on Mike’s mind as those cars pull away. We're left with silent and unsure stares, looks of seeming regret or something else unknown.

Season 3 is truly a huge turning point for Mike, he’s losing his girlfriend and arguably his closest friend in the Party, and it's so easily overlooked because it all happens at the very end of the final episode. Whereas El goes through hell and fights to connect to Billy and save her friends, where Max also feels the weight of his loss, where Will gets his heartbreaking scene at Castle Byers - all the Party members who are very linked to Mike get their emotional moments that season, and we know exactly why they cry.

But Mike dances around his emotions all season long. In consulting Lucas to deal with breaking up and making up with El, in trying to tell El that he loves her without ever saying it, in fighting with Will because "it's not [his] fault [Will doesn't] like girls."

Oh, Mike. I really don't think that Mike was out to hurt Will when he said that. Rather, it's a culmination of heteronormativity and the poor relationship that he has with El and trying to compensate for it. I interpret the outburst as him saying, 'it's not my fault that I'm in a relationship and you're not, so you wouldn't get it.' And by extension, Will being in a relationship would require, normatively, being with a girl.

But at the same time, for a jab that deep - I can't help but question more.

Mike could have said, "it's not my fault you don't like anyone!" or "don't bring her into this!" or even as simple as, "you wouldn't understand!" But no. Mike takes the direct train to sexuality station and brings up the fact that El is a girl. So it seems to me that Mike is very likely harboring something in his heart about why El being a girl is important for him to argue.

But we never know for sure. This moment is never addressed again due to the Mind Flayer’s sudden return. And so it’s up to us as the audience to decide what we think of Mike’s statement. And personally, as I’m sure many of you believe, too, I think that Mike is projecting and trying to hide the fact that he doesn’t like girls onto Will, pushing away his problems to someone he trusts who’s more similar to himself than he realizes.

Tied to his inability to say to El’s face that he loves her, to the fact that they've - reportedly from Hopper - kissed all Summer long with no mention of meaningful conversation, to the very surface-level relational mending his makes by calling El’s outfit “cool” and giving her candy, to the very end of the season where Mike once again denies saying that he loved El just before an open-eyed kiss and a face like this:

Mike doesn’t need to say anything about that kiss for me to know that that’s not the reaction of someone who’s perfectly happy to be back together with his ex-girlfriend. So do I wish that we had a moment of vulnerability for Mike where he expressed his heart in season 3? Yes, but his nonverbals spoke volumes.

So, yeah, I think that in season 3, Mike is very much gay, but he he acts cautiously and self-preservingly because trauma is drowning everything out.

And what is this trauma? I know that I’m working backwards, but I need to bring up that Mike was separated from El for so long in the time of season 2, and I think that that makes him so attached to her in season 3. Think about what else he says in that scene when he admits his love: “I love her and I can’t lose her again.”

As sweet as it is to be reunited to El by the end of season 2, it’s not a clean reunion for Mike. He’s in shambles when he learns that Hopper was lying to him and not letting El even tell Mike that she’s okay.

Not to mention that this isn’t his first but second time almost losing her to the monster that season.

Because of this unstable connection, I think that Mike has built a protective relationship with El, one that focuses on keeping her rather than knowing her, and we see how that all unfolds with his superficial “superhero” complex he has of her in season 4. Season 3 was just the beginning.

And so I think that Mike in season 3 stands as a version of himself that’s confused protectiveness with love. Even though he arguably behaves with that same mindset all the time, it’s at its highest during season 3 because of his never-ending insistence to help El even if she’s capable to do things by herself. Mike isn’t just clingy, he’s worried. Worried for her life. There’s no time to worry about where the problems in their relationship arise, there’s only time to fix them and go back to how they were at equilibrium - when things were normal.

Thus, Mike behaves rather stubbornly. He’s insistent and defensive, not letting a single thing slip through the cracks and risk any more hurt. In doing so, his personality is left far under the surface and unexplored. He only acts to stir up emotions rather than reflect on them, because any pausing to think will only confuse him more. He’s looking ahead, looking at the light, holding onto everything good he has with all the propriety of a 13/14-year-old who has a heart bigger than his head.

Simply put, Mike is a bit of an anti-hero this season. And I think that it's because of this that he starts to get most controversial for the audience.

I’m clearly a Mike apologist, but I genuinely don’t think that he’s out to hurt anyone when he argues with others this season. He’s just stubborn and loud about it, which can definitely be to his fault at times. But in the end, when it comes down to who he loves, I think that season 3 is the era of change, and that ending scene with Hopper’s letter paints the perfect setup for the next seasons to reveal that Mike has a lot more going on under the surface that’s causing all of this. Maybe some regrets, things he wishes he could “turn back the clock” on, regarding, say, Will and El and how he treats them platonically and romantically? Just a thought.

The question of the day for Mike in season 3 stands: is he being selfish or selfless? And I think that it’s a mix of both, blended in with some heavy confusion due to role changing (not needing to protect El) and uncertain affections (not knowing how to figure out what he has with Will).

So, yeah. All in all, I think that Mike is really closeted in season 3 and doesn’t realize it until the final episode, and I honestly love him for it. As someone who’s gone through similar hurdles of internalized homophobia as a teen, it’s really heartwarming to see him grow and figure things out, even if the journey is far from perfect. It’s a humble origin story. And if he somehow ends up being straight and Byler isn’t endgame, well. I’ll be upset at the writers, but the impact still stands.

[raiinforestcafe]

ok hi I’ve seen a lot of people do flags headcanon posts so here’s mine.  warning these are absolutely deranged 

some of these come from @monstercard​ who sits on call with me 6 hours straight while we act unemployed as fuck making this shit up all god damn night

Pianoman

- has his own currency where everything is 100% perfectly indistinguishable from real money except his face is on it. he calls this “PianoBucks” 

- the value of Pianobucks varies from 3 bitcoin to 3 dogecoin based entirely on the like/dislike ratio of a comment he made on the CRYPTOLAND youtube video

- his house is the most insane place in the world it is outrageous opulence but it is ALSO busted he has shit like this massive chandelier except it's connected to a light switch that doesn’t work  unless you touch the wires together manually and therefore all the exposed wires are out

Doc 

- was a prolific serial killer in medical school.  terrorized his campus.  nobody suspected it was him, in fact a lot of his classmates worried for him because he probably couldn’t defend himself so they’d offer to walk him home from class only to be, for lack of a better word, TUSKed

- has given each of the flags at least one organ from the other ones.  each one of them thinks they are the only one this has not happened to 

- they made the human centipede based on a real thing he did

- actually gave verlaine the hardest time because of his ability 

- when he and albatross get married they have a naked wedding.  doc cranks the heat and it’s “strongly requested” that attendees don’t shower for 48 hours before the event.  ghastly

Iceman

- he/him butch lesbian I’ll fight you on this 

- born into a massively powerful mafia family in italy before a rival group took them all out at the same time.  he thought he was the only survivor but his older sister also lived.  

- chuuya took his eye.  that bitch EXPLODED

- autistic asf 

- died trying to get lippmann out of verlaine’s car. sorry

- chuuya gets compared to him the most I think

- the BEST cook of the whole group his food is DELICIOUS it’s made with love.  his cooking is the only thing the flags have all unanimously decided not to make fun of because if he ever stopped doing it for them it would be a huge loss.  albatross hears him say something that comes out in a heavy accent and reflexively goes i cooka da meetbol and that's too close to violating the rule and lippmann shoves a silk scarf in his mouth to shut him up

Lippmann

- he starred in a film that had him shooting in a very tight hole in the ground but actually got stuck and panicked, leaving him with severe claustrophobia 

- constantly taking TV bit roles where his character gets killed by the mafia because he thinks it’s really really funny

- mcdonalds did a Lippmann Meal once and all the flags piled into the clown car and ordered 10 of them.  nary a one failed to do this as obnoxiously as possible btw

Albatross

- GAY has been in love with Doc for uh.  forever

- can operate any vehicle ever created but he has exactly zero licenses and in fact the only one of these fucking people who has an actual non forged legal drivers license is iceman who for reasons nobody understands has a CDL

- he puts on horrible reality tv or like hey arnold while he and doc are fucking because doc thinks it’s hot that he has to compete for albatross’s attention 

[elliebell77]

ok ive given this some thought and am going to dump said thoughts here. Sorry if it doesnt make sense lol

—

The first thing I thought when I saw this post was actually of Deltarune, or specifically Asgore’s house.

Now of course, you can make the argument that the state of his house can be blamed on the fact that he’s poor cause nobody’s buying his flowers and he keeps giving them away for free, PLUS he’s divorced which could have added to his financial struggles.

And I’m not refuting that. I’m not! I think a lot of this can be blamed on his financial troubles. HOWEVER, even poor, his room is still a mess. Disorganized, no sheet on the bed, random shit and flower supplies everywhere, the wedding flowers (im coming back to that later btw). Not to mention the color scheme itself. Looking at the juxtaposition between the actual shop and his room, the contrast is obvious enough that I don’t think i need to point out the difference in mood and colors, though I WILL point out the only real color in Asgore’s room is the flowers. And while this could be because the storefront has to look nice and professional, I think it also represents something about his character: The happy face he puts on for everyone (or at the very least, his kids) and the actual, dimmer mental state he’s in once you peel back the curtains.

There’s also the fact that, like in Undertale (which I’m getting to soon, I promise), Asgore’s life is one marred by loss. Rudy, for example, his best friend, is in the hospital and possibly dying. His wife left him and his kids rarely see him anymore. He doesn’t really have anyone to talk to, other than his flowers. To put it shortly, Asgore is incredibly, incredibly lonely.

I have a lot more to say about deltarune but I’m gonna loop back to it later + i havent played deltarune in a long time so there’s a lot i’ve probably missed/misremember

—

Now for Undertale. This is an interesting one, and I have a lot more material to work with because I remember more of that game lmao.

(thank you random reddit user for making these maps so i can rip it off google images to steal for my character analysis post)

Oof. Where do I start with UT Asgore.

I guess I can start with his loneliness. “Loneliness?? What loneliness??? He’s super friendly and regularly chats with citizens!!” I hear you yelling angrily at your monitor as you read this. Well, hypothetical audience member, shut the fuck up.

Ok but seriously, I thought about this a lot and while yes, Asgore is super friendly and outgoing, does he actually have any… friends? Like really good, really close friends. Sure, he has Undyne, but Undyne seems to be more of a child/student to him. Yes, he HAD Rudy, but as stated in the alarm clock dialogue, he passed away long before the events of Undertale. Gerson seems to have been a companion of sorts (war buddy?? Friend? Hard to say), but again, it’s implied they grew apart when Toriel left

Gerson dialog I was referring to ^

This means that, again, Asgore is alone. The only family he has left (that he knows of) locked herself in the ruins to get away from him and seemingly hates him, and while yes, Asgore does go out and talk to his subjects on the regular, he’s not necessarily close with any of them for one reason or another.

Which brings me to my big, fat point and the biggest reason I wrote this whole essay in the first place:

Asgore clings to the past (as a form of escapism?)

I mean, it’s painfully obvious in both games, but especially so in Undertale. I mean, just look at his house. The fact that it imitate’s Toriel’s, the fact that he tries so hard to imitate her butterscotch and snail pie, the fact that his kids’ beds are still both in their room, perfectly made, with their possessions still inside, untouched. Hell, he still has the nose nuzzle champs thing from 1998, which had to have taken place more than a decade ago now.

Toriel, on the other hand, has moved on. The kids’ bedroom only has one bed. The chair is well worn. Her room is messy, but lived in, with a journal detailing her life. Yes, she has a yellow flower, yes you can make the argument that she, too, clings a little bit to her old life, she’s very clearly moved on and dealt with her grief in a much, much healthier way than Asgore has.

Asgore’s house, in contrast, is just a cheap imitation of Toriel’s. A hollow shell, lacking the soul, the worn yet lived-in charm that makes Toriel’s so comfortable and welcoming. Asgore has not moved on, and maybe he never will.

We also see this in Deltarune (HA see I DID circle back to it), though not quite as obvious. Remember the wedding flowers? (you better, cause I specifically said I was coming back to them. bitch.) Not to mention the fact that he’s STILL trying to get Toriel back despite her obvious rejections (i mean, the poor woman’s thrown away so many bouquets of flowers that the trash smells like flowers 24/7)

This is shown, too, in the color language of both houses. I’ll put em here so u dont have to scroll all the way back up to see what i mean

The only real color in the room is the flowers. The only thing that lights up the house is the past. In a dark, lonely life, the only light to keep him going is the good ol’ days. The way it once was, when his wife was still with him and he still had 2 loving children. And he so desperately wants to get all that back that he’ll build and maintain an entire house that he doesn’t even seem to really live in, just to get a cheap imitation of what his old life was like

—

Is this evidence of PTSD? Well… no, not really, but it’s definitely evidence of depression, or at least some kind of psychological/trauma-related issue that he’s trying to escape.

For science. For those of you who have played/watched Undertale, do you believe Asgore may be depressed or have some level of PTSD? If so do you think this influenced his choices and actions?

[tteokdoroki]

— “SHARING IS CARING + DABI/TOUYA TODOROKI.” ft. shoto todoroki.

author’s note(s): i havent written in days bc ive been working on other things but here’s this bc i am a whore. btw reader and shoto are third years/18 in this so hold onto your wigs lol.

warning(s): mdni, 18+. smut, dark content, dub-con, manipulation, cheating, choking, breath play, unprotected sex, exhibitionism, voyerism kinda, corruption!kink, virginity loss, degradation. characters aged up to 18. fem!reader.

touya todoroki has always been better than his brothers, at everything. praised from a young age for his powerful abilities, handsome face and charming smile— touya is the todoroki family’s prized gem. the favourite, prodigy son. the one who always gets what he wants. of course, until precious shoto todoroki arrives.

shoto, the undeniably gorgeous boy with dual chrome eyes and hair to match— an aloofness about him that draws everyone in, especially at school where he excels and wears himself at the top of his class in U.A academy. now; he’s everyone’s favourite boy, endeavour’s, his mother’s and yours. you, the sweet and innocent little girl who lives about two blocks away. the whole neighbourhood knows who you are, the apples of your cheeks stretched into a darling smile, that’s sometimes etched with an air of shyness when someone compliments you on how pretty you are.

you have doe eyes that watch shoto with such awe because you’re so impressed by what he can do, because you love how kindly he treats you and how he protects you from hungry stares belonging to others. touya finds your innocence annoying; the first time his younger brother brings you for dinner. the way you stutter over your words when speaking with rei or enji and how hide behind shoto whenever the eldest enters the room.

but you’re nice to look at, he can see why his pest of a younger sibling keeps you around. does shoto realise how far your skirt rides up over your ass whenever you bend over? how your thighs resembling pillows spill over the tops of your school socks? and how your lips are always so bitten and cherry red— everything about you is so fuckable.

and like i said, touya todoroki always gets what he wants.

“i’m better than him, aren’t i sweetness? you like the way this cock fucks you. c’mon, tell me how good i make you feel.”

touya doesn’t really need an answer, especially when it’s unlikely that he’ll get one from you. pretty little girl, sweet ass up in the air and raw from the onslaught of spanks he’d given you earlier. your cunt shines with a slickness he so proudly knows that he’s caused and your hole puckers around nothing— so eager to be filled by the eldest todoroki’s cock. “t-touya, need you. p-please...” you babble, clawing at his black linen sheets, already stained with nectar from your leaky cunny.

oh you’re so good, so nice for him when you’re fucked dumb and on the edge of frustration— you say just what he wants to hear, so eager to please that you’d beg him for days if it meant you’d get your pussy abused and used. “that’s right little girl, you need me, right? ‘cause lil sho can’t take you the way i do. you need me to show you what it’s like to feel good.”

touya lives for the way your hips jump back from just his dirty words alone, clit pushing deliciously against the tip of his length— you’re so cute when you want it. when you wanna be fucked by an older, more experienced dick. you know that touya has what shoto doesn’t. you know you can always rely on him to make you cum when shoto can’t.

any decent older brother would feel bad for taking advantage of his sibling’s girl, but touya has a point to prove. he’ll always be the better todoroki, he knows that, especially when his burning cock sinks into your tight hole— the one that welcomes him into your velvet walls, so perfectly carved into the shape of him.

a drawn out and gargled whine bubbles in the back of your throat, the stretch making your eyes roll so far back into your head touya would have thought you’d passed out, it wouldn’t have been the first time either.

oh no, he remembers the way he’d made your fleshy thighs quiver and your meek voice turn to screams when he’d taken you in the bathroom across the hall from shoto’s bedroom the first time you stayed the night. or the time that he’d cornered you in the kitchen while you made a study snack for you and your boyfriend, carelessly flipping your skirt up and creaming in your virgin cunt until all you could say were mindlessly repeats of his name. touya. his name always sounded so pretty against jumbled words that slid across your tongue.

that one time in the kitchen, touya had sent you back to shoto’s room with your pink lace panties full of his pungent seed and had listened to shoto fuck it deeper inside of you later that night when you let the younger take you for the first time. touya wonders if his little brother truly believes he was lucky enough to take your virginity or if he knows how much of a whore you are for the eldest, white haired sibling. possession flares in his chest at the very thought, making him plunge himself into the deepest parts of you while you quiver like a little bitch below him.

his piercings drag up and down your gummy walls, friction causing you to drool amongst the pillows that you drown in. touya’s large hand pushes down on the small of your back, shaping your body into an uncomfortable arch— you whimper but don’t complain. taking his dick like you should, accepting him like you should. his balls, oh so heavy with cum, slap against your cheeks while your juices paint his tummy from how much you leak and the lewd sounds fill the air so loud, there’s no doubt poor little shoto todoroki can hear it through the walls.

“sweetness, you’re so bad— sneaking off to let your boyfriend’s big brother make you scream. you’re just a slut for the todoroki dick...aren’t ya? you’d probably let nat in on it too...” touya slurs, drooling at the way your backside bounces with every slam of his hips into you.

“n-no-! no... ‘m not a slut...not a—!” you squeal pathetically, barely able to finish your sentence as touya shoves your face into the sheets harshly— deep chuckle reverberating in his chest as he presses it to your sweaty back.

you still yourself, taking all what he gives to you even if it means you can barely breathe. the eldest todoroki lifts a hand to knock on the thin walls separating him from his little brother; words coming out as breathless as he thrusts into you deeper, harder, faster— abusing your barely prepped hole. “ya’hear that sho, yur lil angel’s not as innocent as you think; she’d let all of us fuck her if we asked nicely...” the way he speaks about you is mean; it could make you cry but all you do in response is clamp down on the man above you and suck him in deeper, selfishly just like he’d taught you. he smirks with pride at how much your cunt lives for him, at how his little brother is getting the show of his life time— probably jerking off to the sounds of his girl getting railed but someone who isn’t him.

touya’s hips stutter and he cums inside you with a shout, thick ropes of his hot seed spraying against your walls and seeping between your puffy folds. ringed fingers find your clit, drawing circles into them until you tip over the edge and tumble into your own release, clamping down so hard that you draw blanks from your boyfriend’s older brother. the way you twitch after touya’s emptied himself inside you, letting him press down on the sweet bulge at your tummy so his cum leaks out— almost makes him want to brush the hair away from your face and kiss you, but he remains objective— treating you as proof that he will always be the superior sibling.

when he’s pulled out of you and helped you to shaky legs to leave— he watched the regret wash over your innocent features like it always does when he’s made a woman out of you. “tell my little brother i said; sharing is caring, sweetness.” touya asks of you oh-so-kindly, revelling in the way your bottom trembles and a fresh set of tears well in your bambi eyes.

what? he couldn’t lie and say he didn’t mean to make you cry, but that would defeat the purpose if he was telling the truth.

[jjacob]

all i want for christmas is you

❝ the school had started to take notice of you. lee juyeon, however, had always noticed. ❞

PAIRING ▸ lee juyeon x fem!reader (ft. best friend!lee minho)

GENRES ▸ fluff, high school au, sports au, best friends to lovers au

WARNINGS ▸ mild profanity but !! lots of !! fluff !! 

SUMMARY ▸ the bet was simple: find a date to the winter ball. the only problem was that juyeon didn’t want just any girl. he wanted you.

PLAYLIST ▸ all i want for christmas is you by mariah carey

WORD COUNT ▸ 5055 words

AUTHOR’S NOTE ▸ merry christmas! this is a gift for addy @honeyju​ the biggest juyeon simp ik !! ily addy i am excited/scared/not emotionally ready to read the minho one which ! btw y’all should read here bc our stories are loosely connected! also disclaimer: i know jack shit ab football but i tried

LEE JUYEON TENDED TO REGRET HALF THE THINGS HE SAID SOMETIMES. 

In eighth grade, Juyeon’s sense of humor was largely self-deprecating and consisted of saying he wanted to die at the slightest inconvenience. But, with his spectacular timing, he let the joke slip in front of a teacher once and froze up upon seeing her concerned expression. Juyeon later received a note from the counselor’s office and had to convince them that he was perfectly fine.

In tenth grade, Juyeon had grown past his phase of dark humor and moved onto high school football. He made the cut for the team the previous year, and managed to make it on the varsity team by the time he was a sophomore. In the beginning of the season, they asked who wanted to be captain the next year, and Juyeon boldly declared that he did. Thus, he was ridiculed and sentenced to pick up balls and clean up the gym after every practice from then on.

Now, as a high school junior in the varsity football team, Juyeon had screwed himself over by making a stupid bet with his best friend, Lee Minho.

Lee Minho was, in short, a conniving bastard. Juyeon never should have trusted him and gone along with his antics. The mere thought of what he had gotten himself into was enough to send his heart into overdrive.

The bet sounded simple enough: find a date to the Winter Ball.

Of course, it was easier said than done, but Juyeon was a star athlete and had girls sliding in his DMs left and right. He could easily find a date if he wanted to, and, honestly, Juyeon only needed to send a few texts and he would probably be secured for the dance. The problem was, however, that Juyeon only wanted you.

Minho was well aware of Juyeon’s pitiful, unrequited love towards you. It was probably the reason he suggested the bet; his best friend either wanted to see him miserable or see him score a chance with you. Either way, Juyeon wasn’t sure his heart was ready to shoot his shot.

Juyeon had crushed on you ever since you sat next to him in the seventh grade and let him borrow your pencil. It was such a silly start to his admiration for you, but his feelings grew stronger when the both of you actually became friends. You were so bright when you laughed, so sweet when you spoke, and so adorable when you smiled. Juyeon had never felt this way about anyone else and always got butterflies when he saw you. Juyeon was never one to chase after girls but he would find himself constantly thinking about what you were up to and having several internal dilemmas over whether he should ask you to hang out or not.

Five years later and Juyeon still harbored feelings for you. Now, they had matured into something deeper, but you still racked his brain nevertheless. It didn’t help that you had a major glow-up in high school and were probably the most beautiful person Juyeon had ever seen.

The school started to take notice of you.

Juyeon, on the other hand, had always noticed.

“Are you sure we can finish a medium before practice?” Minho asked Juyeon, setting a box of pizza on the table in front of him. “Also, I saw Y/N by the gym earlier.”

Juyeon perked up. “Y/N?”

“Yeah,” Minho replied, grabbing a slice of pepperoni pizza for himself. “You know what day it is, right?”

Minho took a bite out of his pizza, observing Juyeon with a raised brow. His best friend was on the baseball team but treating themselves to pizza had become a monthly ritual. Despite being on different teams, he was closer to Minho than his football teammates.

“Thursday?”

“And that means?”

Right.

Juyeon had formulated an elaborate plan to ask you out during the football game today, but, of course, it all depended on whether their team won or not. It would have been kind of ridiculous to propose after a loss. On the bright side, he knew he could count on the fact that you’d actually be present considering you were a cheerleader.

But what if you already had a date? You surely hadn’t mentioned it to him or posted about it on social media, so he was riding on an assumption that you haven’t been asked. That was bizarre to Juyeon, though, because you were the prettiest person he had ever seen. However, it was true that you were gradually getting popular, and that made Juyeon a touch nervous.

“I ask her out tomorrow,” Juyeon breathed out. “Am I ready for this?”

Minho scoffed lightly. “Are you ever?”

Juyeon frowned at his best friend, scrunching up his nose at his distasteful comment. “What about you? Have you gotten a date?”

“That’s for me to know and you to find out.”

Juyeon sighed. That was probably all he would get out of Lee Minho today. Once Minho set his mind on something, he carried it out diligently until the end. Juyeon honestly had no idea who he wanted to bring since Minho didn’t like talking about girls he was interested in, but he supposed it wasn’t that big of a deal as long as his best friend was happy.

It wasn’t like Juyeon was never going to hear about his friend’s endeavors. After all, he did pick up on Minho’s slow descent from an apathetic individual to a whipped ball of fluff. If Juyeon mentioned that to his best friend, however, he would probably be ridiculed for consistently being whipped for you since the seventh grade.

Juyeon nearly jumped out of his seat at the sound of his ringer going off. He scrambled to pull his phone out of his pocket, ignoring Minho’s teasing smirk at the sight of his frazzled self.

y/n: hey :) i’m gonna drop off some gingerbread cookies my mom made after practice so lmk when i can come over

Juyeon must have saved a country in a past life for this kind of luck.

juyeon: i love your mom’s cookies. you can come over whenever you’d like

y/n: how about we walk home together after practice?

juyeon: sounds good to me

Now, the pizza was starting to make his mouth water, but if you were walking home with him, Juyeon was ready to drop it and run to see you even though he loved pizza. But Juyeon loved you more than he loved pizza, and he believed that was true love.

“She made me cookies,” Juyeon announced.

“She made you cookies,” Minho repeated, leaning forward in surprise.

“Well, her mom did, but yeah.”

Minho turned his attention back to his pizza. “So this is about your mommy kink again.”

“I don’t have a fucking mommy—why would you say that?” Juyeon cried out, kicking his friend’s shin under the table.

“You don’t? Last time I checked, she was making dinner in the kitchen when I came over yesterday.”

“I’m talking about the kink!”

Yet, even a silly back-and-forth with Minho couldn’t get Juyeon down from his high over you. He was still processing the fact that you were going to walk home with him and, if Juyeon played his cards right, maybe he could get a feel of how comfortable you would be if he asked you out during the game tomorrow.

Minho snickered. “You look happy.”

Juyeon couldn’t even mask his lovesick smile and flushed cheeks. He folded his arms on the table in front of him and buried his face in them, his head spinning at the thought of you.

“Shut up, Minho.”

The only problem with you being on the cheerleading team was that you were extremely distracting.

Juyeon was the star quarterback and frankly, it was kind of pathetic that the one thing that kicked him in the ass was seeing you in the knee socks and pom-poms. It didn’t help that you were a flyer so Juyeon’s stomach pitted with anxiety whenever he saw you being thrown up and whenever he heard a scream coming from the direction of the cheerleaders.

Today was different, though. Juyeon could care less about the screams and falls from the corner of the field. All he could think about was you and how he was going to ask you out. If his plan was going to work, it was going to draw a lot of attention and be quite embarrassing if it failed.

All of his confidence got knocked down with a single sweep when he saw someone asked you to the dance.

One of the cheerleaders broke into a fit of giggles at the sight, clasping a hand over her mouth. “Oh my god!”

You were frozen stiff, an awkward smile on your face as the guy walked onto the field with a sign and about a dozen roses. Juyeon could feel his heart sinking to the ground with each step the guy took, with each second his smile grew brighter.

“Is he seriously confessing during practice?” Sohn Youngjae asked, brows furrowed as he rested his arm on Juyeon’s shoulder. “That’s real brave.”

“What’s his deal doing it here? He isn’t even on the team,” Juyeon said, coming off more bitter than he had expected.

Younghoon scoffed. “It’s a bold move. He must be confident that Y/N’s going to say yes.”

Juyeon squared his shoulders. He was conflicted with the swell of anger and deflation of you possibly being taken, but nevertheless, all he could do was watch helplessly as you were being asked out. From where they were on the field, Juyeon couldn’t hear much, but he could see your reactions quite well. The wolf-whistles and cheers were pissing him off, but he was fixed on you.

He turned to look towards Minho, who was practicing on the field adjacent to theirs. His best friend met his gaze immediately like they had some form of exclusive telepathic communication. Minho nodded towards you and raised a brow, as if nudging Juyeon to go interrupt them. That, however, was something he was far too cowardly to bring himself to do.

Your voice resounded clearer than Juyeon had expected.

“I’m really sorry,” you apologized sincerely, ducking your head and keeping your hands entwined behind you. “I’m not interested, but I do appreciate the gesture.”

Juyeon felt a weight lift off of his chest. He wasn’t sure if he should’ve felt relieved that you shot him down or nervous that you rejected an attractive, confident guy who clearly liked you. However, he soon had no time to mull over that when the guy’s reaction was getting more aggressive than crestfallen.

“Y/N, I asked you out in front of all these people,” he said with a distasteful laugh. “Are you seriously rejecting me right now?”

“Sorry, I just don’t want to go with you,” you replied firmly, voice dropping as you became more conscious of your surroundings. “I’m sorry it had to be public but you didn’t really give me a choice.”

For a split second, Juyeon wondered how he could still hear you when you were practically muttering at this point, and then he realized that he started walking to you without even realizing. His feet carried him unknowingly, hand balled at his side and eyes stony and trained on the guy.

“You could’ve just accepted it and told me later that you didn’t want to go with me,” he said with a scoff. “It’s like you enjoy humiliating others publicly.”

Your teammates rushed forward to argue and fend him off while you opened your mouth to protest, but Juyeon was faster, moving in front of you so he was head-to-head with the guy.

“She said she’s not interested,” he said with a threatening undertone, wondering where he managed to muster up the courage to be this assertive.

You were visibly shocked by Juyeon’s actions, and he couldn’t even blame you because he was equally just as surprised as you were. Yet, all he could do was glare daggers down at the other guy with steely eyes and frown until he backed off.

“Thanks,” you said softly once the guy had left.

Juyeon was flustered by all the girls giggling behind you but was amazed by how cool and collected you remained despite that. He turned to you, eyes softening and shoulders relaxing. He knew he was getting an earful about this from his teammates after practice and most definitely from Minho as well.

“No problem,” Juyeon replied, cheeks red. “He was bothering you. I couldn’t just ignore it.”

“That was really sweet of you, Juyeon.” You bit back a smile and suggested, “Meet you at the front gates after practice?”

“See you then.”

Even though Juyeon could’ve spent the rest of practice talking to you, he sprinted back as fast as he could because his cheeks were only getting redder as the cheerleaders gushed about what he did for you. He could hear their gossip and whispering even as he was running back to his team. Juyeon was positive he wouldn’t escape the embarrassment, though, because Lee Jaehyun was smirking at him when he got back.

“You’re blushing, dude.”

Juyeon shoved him.

There was a universal law that was newly decreed. It read: Lee Minho shall never text, call, or speak to Lee Juyeon whenever Y/N was around.

The reason for that being the fact that Juyeon was easily embarrassed and Minho’s texts were not helping his case. He felt it was rude enough to check his phone while he was walking with you, but every time he saw a notification flash, his eyes widened with sheer distress over Minho’s texts.

minho: like three people asked me if you and y/n are fucking bc of what you pulled during practice today

minho: wait are y’all fucking and just not telling me

minho: i knew it was sus that she was coming over to your house

juyeon: fake news!! stop making me feel shy :(

Juyeon decided he had enough Lee Minho for today and turned off his phone.

“That was honestly the coolest thing I’ve ever seen you do,” you gushed to Juyeon as you walked home with him, fingers looped around the straps of your backpack. “Way cooler than you punting footballs.”

“No need to flatter me,” Juyeon replied coolly but his shy smile and red-tipped ears said otherwise. “That guy was being unnecessarily aggressive.”

“His proposal was out of nowhere!” you exclaimed. “I don’t get what he expected me to do.”

Juyeon smiled through the pain. Lord, give me strength, he prayed to whatever divine power was out there.

“Are you not interested in having a date to the dance then?” Juyeon asked, looking down at you curiously.

You paused for a moment and Juyeon thought his heart would stop in anticipation for your answer. Come to think of it, he had never seen you go to a school dance with a date before. You were always with your friend group. It wouldn’t be out of the ordinary to see you stick with them, but Juyeon was hoping he could change that.

“Well,” you started, “if the right person asked me then I wouldn’t be opposed.”

Juyeon couldn’t exactly read your smile but it made him want to faint. The rest of the walk back home was spent talking about school and football, but Juyeon couldn’t get your answer to his question out of his head. He even walked past his house because his head was so full of you, resulting in you needing to stop him and tell him that they had already reached his place.

“Y/N! It’s so good to see you!” Juyeon’s mom chirped with a good-natured smile. “How has your mom been?”

Juyeon’s eyes widened upon the realization that they never stopped by at your place first to get the cookies. He opened his mouth to interject but you went on to answer.

“She’s been great, Mrs. Lee,” you replied, smiling just as big, and pulled out a box of cookies from your bag. “She wanted me to give these to you.”

“That’s so sweet! Give her my thanks,” his mom replied and opened the door wider once she accepted the cookies. “Come in for some tea, will you?”

Juyeon was practically frozen at the doorway while you were taking off your shoes and walking inside. If you had the cookies with you this entire time, then why didn’t you just give them to him to take home himself? Unless you were worried about the courtesy, it was a bit out of your way to take the time to walk home with Juyeon to deliver them.

“Juyeon, what are you doing out there?” his mom asked. “Come inside. It’s cold.”

“Right.”

Having you over at his house wasn’t exactly the sparkly fantasy that Juyeon thought it would be.

He was getting quite jealous of your mom hogging all of your attention. It wasn’t like you and Juyeon drifted apart during high school, so he wasn’t sure why his mom had to pull you away from him and have her own conversation with you. The worst part was that Juyeon couldn’t even join in on the conversation. He had no idea what they were even talking about.

That is, until his mom brought up the dance.

“Do you have a date, Y/N?” Juyeon’s mom asked.

“I don’t,” she replied. “I usually just go with my friends.”

“You’re so pretty, though,” Mrs. Lee tutted. “I’m sure someone must’ve asked you out.”

“Actually, someone asked me today,” you said. There was a moment of silence as you looked over at Juyeon while his gaze bore into yours. For a moment, you were struggling for what to say, mouthing words that weren’t being processed. Juyeon rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly once you regained your composure. “Juyeon actually helped me out.”

Mrs. Lee straightened up. “My son did?” She looked amused as she turned to Juyeon.

“Yeah,” you answered, grinning. “He was really cool.”

Juyeon blushed darkly once their eyes were on him. “W-what? I couldn’t ignore it. I wasn’t even doing that much. I was just helping out. You know, being a decent person,” he rambled and stood up. “Anyways, isn’t it getting late? Mom, Y/N has to go home soon and it’s gonna be pitch black outside if you keep her here.”

“Oh, you’re right.” Mrs. Lee frowned as she peered out the window. “Juyeon, you walk her home then.”

“What?” he sputtered out, looking between you and his mom before he caved, muttering, “I’ll go get my jacket.”

After an exchange of goodbyes, you had stepped out of the house and waited while Juyeon was slipping his shoes on. There was a moment of struggle where he had tied his laces too tight and couldn’t get the shoe on but he managed to slip it on after a few seconds of internal screaming. Juyeon zipped up his jacket the moment he stepped outside, the brisk coldness making his goosebumps rise.

“You really don’t have to walk me back,” you told Juyeon. “It’s cold outside.”

“It’s really late,” Juyeon replied, rubbing his hands together in hopes that the friction would provide some heat. “You shouldn’t be walking home by yourself, and I really don’t mind.”

“Thanks,” you mumbled, ducking your face. “For this, for what you did during practice—everything.”

Juyeon was glad that you weren’t looking at him because his mouth was opening and closing over and over again like a fish. He was also thankful for the fact that he could blame the dust of pink across his cheeks on the cold winter bite. Unfortunately, you lived close by so Juyeon didn’t have time to come up with a cool response and he didn’t want to leave things like this. There was a good vibe going on and he was upset that he couldn’t act upon it; when it came to you, Lee Juyeon was a coward.

“Um, we’re here so…” Juyeon trailed off when he turned to you, sort of thrown off by how beautiful you looked with your windswept hair and flushed cheeks. Dazed, he reached forward and moved a strand of your hair out of your face. “It’s good I walked you home and you’re not like, lost or… something—I’ll shut up now.”

You laughed, and it was an octave higher as if you were rattled from him touching your hair. “Ah, yes, a few streets down can be a harrowing trek.”

Juyeon laughed with you before his eyes settled on you. Your hands were crossed, rubbing your arms that were prickled with goosebumps. A wave of guilt washed through Juyeon and led him to strip his jacket off immediately. He ignored the piercing chill and put his jacket around your shoulders, making sure they covered your bare arms.

“My house is right here,” you argued. “You’re going to be cold.”

“Keep it on. I have something to tell you after the game,” Juyeon said firmly. It was his second burst of courage for you today and he was a little too amped up for his own good. “If you don’t like it then give me back my jacket tomorrow.”

Before you could respond, Juyeon turned on his heel and bolted home, the biggest grin across his face because he was head-over-heels for you.

Juyeon had never been so nervous in his life.

The game was underway, Juyeon’s leg bouncing as he eyeballed the scoreboard. His team was strong in the first two quarters, cutting it close by the third, but now they were neck-to-neck. They had ended with a tie and now they decided to go into overtime for the sake of choosing a winner for the game. It was a sudden death round so whoever scored first would win the game. Juyeon, however, found it difficult to concentrate.

Especially with Lee Minho breathing down his back.

“Are you ready?” his best friend asked.

“Yes—well, no, but I don’t really have a choice.”

“That’s true.”

“I already made the sign and told the team and everything,” Juyeon whined. “I really screwed myself over, Minho.”

Minho pushed at the back of his head. “Dude, I’m talking about the game.”

“Oh, that—that’s fine,” Juyeon stammered. “Fifteen minutes—we just have to win, and then I have to ask out the most amazing person I’ve ever met.”

“You could chicken out,” Minho suggested, “but that also comes with me never letting you live it down.”

“You see, I kind of already implied that I’m going to tell her something important.”

“You did?” Minho’s voice was somewhere between shocked and impressed.

“Shit, I gotta go,” Juyeon muttered, pushing himself off the bench. “Keep the poster safe for me!”

“Good luck, champ!”

Juyeon, sweaty and bangs sticking to his forehead, had to ignore every distraction and think about winning the game before his stomach threw itself into a pool of anxiety over asking you out. He got in a huddle with his team in the remaining fifteen seconds they had before they had to get in formation and lowered the facemask of his helmet. It was up to this one last play to determine whether they would win the game or not.

“Just like we practiced, alright?” Juyeon told them. “Double-wing power pass. We get them to bite thinking it’s a run play and then open up a passing lane.”

“Alright, let’s go,” Jaehyun cheered, and the rest of them put in their mouth guards and lowered their facemasks.

Juyeon took a shaky breath as he got in formation at the line of scrimmage. His heart was racing but he wasn’t sure it was about the game. Nevertheless, he steeled his nerves and held his ground. The whistle blew and the crowd was silent, observing the tension on the field carefully.

“Silver-80! Silver-80! Hut! Hut! Hike!” Juyeon yelled, and the center, Sangyeon, snapped the ball to him.

Juyeon faked a handoff to Jaehyun, the fullback, and spun around, rolling to his right. Changmin sped up in front of Juyeon to defend him. A smile tugged at Juyeon’s lips. Their plan was working just as he intended, but there was a problem: they couldn’t open up a passing lane for the running backs like he thought they would. The play was too rushed, so it wasn’t ever a guarantee.

So Juyeon had to do what he would normally deem crazy.

He spun at the sight of the other team coming to tackle him and skirted around the field, belting down the field. He dodged past another linebacker that tried to body him. His primary motivation was that he didn’t want a concussion before he confessed to you, but he assumed it was okay to admit that to himself as long as he didn’t throw the game.

Juyeon felt a hand grab him but he pushed forward, running across the goal line and into the end zone. He threw the ball down and cried out in joy as he scored a touchdown. The whistle blew and the scoreboard flipped. They won.

He did it.

Juyeon’s team ran to him, cheering at the top of their lungs. He was lifted up on Jaehyun and Younghoon’s shoulders, grinning happily before his heart sunk back down. The cheerleaders ran to the field, cheering and tossing their pom poms up. The crowd was roaring. Juyeon was realizing that he had to do the scariest thing that a heterosexual teenage boy ever had to experience.

“Jaehyun, Jaehyun,” Juyeon tapped his shoulder quickly. “We have no time. I have to do it now.”

“Oh shit.”

Jaehyun and Younghoon dropped Juyeon onto the turf. Juyeon winced at the sudden impact, gathering himself back to his feet and hoping you didn’t witness that. Jaehyun gave him a half-assed apology and pushed him forward to run and get his poster and flowers from Minho. Jaehyun then grabbed Changmin by the shoulders, urging him to go to the announcer’s booth.

Juyeon sprinted over to Minho, waving his hands dramatically. “Give, give, give,” he demanded amongst all the cheering.

Minho didn’t waste any time and pushed the poster and bouquet into Juyeon’s hands. “Break a leg, tiger.”

“Trust me, I nearly did.”

Juyeon jogged back onto the field, cheeks hot and head a little dizzy for what was about to come. He didn’t even tell his mom he was going to ask you out and she had to watch her son ask his best friend out to the dance. This was probably going to be a moment of utter humiliation but once Juyeon saw you in your high ponytail with a bright smile on your face, all that fear faded away and it was just you and him.

More importantly, you were wearing his jacket over your uniform and Juyeon felt like he was going to combust from the cuteness.

“Guys, guys,” Jaehyun called to the team. “Surround Juyeon. Make sure Y/N doesn’t see him.”

Juyeon’s heart was beating a hundred miles per second. He was glad he was running on the adrenaline from winning the game because otherwise, he would be cowering in fear and sweating buckets right now.

“Everyone, listen up!” Changmin spoke over the intercom. “First of all, the football team scored a major dub today—ow! Sunwoo, cut it out—alright, I’ll get to it!” Changmin broke from the mic and started bickering with Sunwoo.

There was a pause, and Juyeon was surprised to hear Minho’s voice fill the speakers, “Anyways, my buddy and our star quarterback, Juyeon, has something to say for a special someone.”

The crowd fell silent, a couple cheers and wolf-whistles as it was pretty obvious that a confession was about to happen.

“This is so fucking fluffy,” Sunwoo mumbled.

“Shut up, Sunwoo,” Juyeon replied, nudging him with his elbow.

The football team moved out of the way so that they weren’t huddled around Juyeon anymore. Juyeon’s breath caught in his throat as he walked forward to the middle of the field, holding up his sign, reading: Will you be my sunshine?

“Y/N,” he called out loudly, “honestly this confession is long overdue, but will you go to Winter Ball with me tonight and be my sunshine?”

The crowd started cheering and whistling again, and Juyeon wanted to die. She hadn’t even given him her answer yet and everyone was acting like she had agreed and they eloped. The cheerleaders pushed Y/N forward and she approached Juyeon, looking like a deer in headlights.

Juyeon took another shaky breath and continued, “I’ve been in love with you for so long so it would be an honor if I could take you to the dance,” he said and his voice dropped to a whisper. “I’m sorry if this is uncomfortable for you.”

You bit your lip but that wasn’t enough to contain the happiness that showed on your face. You zipped up Juyeon’s jacket and threw yourself into his arms. Everyone practically exploded but Juyeon was sure his heartbeat was louder. He wrapped his arms around you and buried his face into your shoulder.

Was this what people called a Christmas miracle?

“Oh shit!” Changmin screamed over the intercom. (“Shut up, they’re having a moment,” Minho’s faint voice was picked up in the background).

“Oh my god, you just made me the happiest man alive,” he mumbled.

You pulled back and reached forward to move his damp bangs off of his forehead. “Took you long enough.”

“Wait, did you—did you like me?” Juyeon choked out.

You laughed and cupped his face in your hands. There was a shaky inhale and exhale of breaths when his lips brushed against yours, and Juyeon closed the distance, kissing you like he was starved of your touch. His hold tightened on you as you melted into him, and then you both pulled away, smiling and dazed and lovesick.

You giggled. “Does that answer your question?”

“Yes,” he breathed out, grinning as he brushed his nose against yours.

Juyeon could care less about all the presents and holiday cheer because he had you and you were all he wanted.

[2dmenenthusiast]

Grounded - Levi Ackerman x Reader

I had this whole thing typed out but it all got deleted cuz im an idiot so all I’ll say is that writing for Levi is hella difficicult, I hate the ending, and I hope you all enjoy. also yes there is a line from TWD in here but it fit so perfectly and it was too good to pass up okay? and I gave Hange they/them pronouns btw

(also one of my favorite fanfic writers @phen0l​ followed me and uhh I just wanna say that I’m honored?? They write amazing Levi fics and fics for other fandoms, so make sure to go check them out)

Summary: The Scouts are getting ready for the 57th expedition outside the walls, and you can’t help but let Levi know how worried you feel about the possible outcome of the mission

Word count: 6.8k

Warnings/other info: swearing, angst, death, spoilers for AOT season 1, reader has possible anxiety, reader is kept gender nuetral

No matter how many times you face them, no matter how many times you find yourself suspended in mid-air right over their gaping mouths, ready to swallow you whole, you will always have nightmares about that one fateful day in Shiganshina. The day the Colossal Titan kicked in Wall Maria and let his friends feast on the people in your district. Your friends, family, all destined to be one thing at that moment. Titan fodder. You still wonder how you made it out sometimes. How through all the commotion, a titan didn’t target you and scoop you into its mouth, effectively sealing your fate just like everyone around you. You chalked it up to luck at first before telling yourself that was bullshit. Luck didn’t have anything to do with it. Shit just happens, and there’s nothing you can do about it besides roll with the punches and try your best to survive.

The sight of your sister and father being eaten by those beasts was permanently engraved behind your eyelids, seeing flashes of their thrashing, screaming bodies whenever you close your eyes to go to sleep. In those moments, you always wondered why you survived rather than them. Your sister… she was the sweetest little thing, lighting up a room whenever she smiled and constantly greeting you at the door with a hug whenever you came back from shopping in town. You swore her laugh was all you needed to take you right out of a bad mood, reminding you that things weren’t so bad if you had someone so full of joy in your life. And your father, while he was stubborn, he made sure to take care of his family the best he could, and you were forever grateful for that. He raised you to be strong and rely on yourself because in the end, the only person you truly had on your side was you.

No one really knew about your past. Well, besides your superiors who needed to know, but other than them, your fellow cadets knew the bare minimum about your private life. Although, when they found out you were from Shiganshina, they all just automatically assumed you suffered a great loss of some kind, whether it be your family or your home. In your case, it was both. Of course, you were close with some of the other soldiers. Eld and Petra were people you considered to be good friends with, along with the rest of your captain’s squad. Though, that didn’t stop you from wanting to deck Oluo in the face whenever he got too cocky, throwing his arm around your shoulders during lunch before immediately removing it when you would elbow him in the ribs.

“Jeez, Oluo. You think you’d learn by now. What is this, the fifth, sixth time?” Petra asked, pushing a stray hand of hair behind her ear.

“Seventh,” you chimed as you brought a spoonful of soup up to your mouth.

“Aw, you’ve been keeping count. That must mean you actually like me.”

You raised an eyebrow as you looked over at him, placing the spoon back in your bowl before licking the remaining soup off of your lips. “You know this food is still steaming. Don’t make me throw it at your old ass face.”

He let out a noise of protest while the rest of the table laughed, and you snickered to yourself before shifting your gaze to meet Levi’s, his steely eyes almost piercing through you before he looked down into his cup and tuned back into the conversation his commander and squad leader Hange were having, watching as the dark liquid swirled around.

You always knew Levi to be a man of few words, but a strong sense of purpose. He wasn’t one to waste time on trivial things, always wanting to get straight to the point. He didn’t seem to be the type to waste time on feelings either, but you guessed it wasn’t any of your business. You knew he felt things. Experienced emotions and all that. You’d be stupid to think he didn’t. During training, when he’d survey your group to see how things were going, there would always be gossip when he left, your peers saying how he was cold and emotionless, but you disagreed. You had already heard the rumors of the captain being some type of underground gangster at that point, so when you really thought about it, it wasn’t unusual or weird for him to act the way he did. Something, someone, had made him that way, and that was okay. Something had affected all of you too. The world you all lived in didn’t have the time to spare you from grief or trauma.

“Cadet l/n.”

You jumped slightly at the sudden mention of your name, lifting your head to see your captain entering the mess hall with a signature cup of tea in his hand, and you gave him a lazy smile before looking back down at your own cup, the liquid having gone cold over the time you had been sitting there. Levi didn’t reprimand you for not saluting him, just silently walked over and occupied the seat across from you, looking at you with that stern gaze of his.

“You should be asleep. I won’t make training any easier for you tomorrow just because you’re tired.”

“This isn’t unusual for me, captain. Just needed something else to look at that wasn’t my bedroom wall,” you said, your voice quiet.

He slightly tilted his head as he studied you, lifting his hand to gesture around the room. “And you thought an empty mess hall would be better?”

You let out a scoff, meeting his eyes for a moment before sipping at your drink and immediately grimacing at the taste of it. “It’s better than the alternative. For now, at least.”

He didn’t respond at first, simply staring off into the distance as he let your words sink in before setting down his cup with a soft ‘clink.’ You thought that maybe if you weren’t so over everything at the moment, you wouldn’t be acting so casual with your superior, but he didn’t seem to be bothered by it. Hopefully this wouldn’t bite you in the ass later

“You’re not the first one here to experience nightmares, you know.”

“Oh, so you have this talk with all of the cadets in the middle of the night?”

“No,” he answered simply, taking another sip of his drink.

You didn’t know why, but that simple interaction had been the best one you had with another person in months. Sure, you loved the company of your friends, but talking to Levi was just so… different. Almost liberating in a way. There were things you had told him that you never told anyone else during your late-night meetings, and it got to the point where you had found yourself looking forward to talking with him. Because you knew that behind his gaze was a man that felt so much, and you knew what that was like.

“You know… I only really made it out because they were too busy eating my family.”

Levi paused at that, eyebrows slightly raised as he looked at you over his cup that was pressed to his lips. He didn’t speak at first, taking his time as he leisurely drank his tea, and you could practically feel the depth of the silence looming over the both of you like it was its own presence.

“Shit, maybe I should’ve just kept my mouth shut,” you thought, teeth digging into your bottom lip as you anxiously waited for Levi’s response.

You didn’t want him to pity you. That was never your intention. You guessed you just.... wanted someone to know what you were thinking and feeling, tired of constantly keeping it to yourself. If you got eaten by a titan one day, you’d at least want someone to know who you were. Who you really were.

“Sorry, I um…” you looked around at everything besides the man sitting in front of you, trying to find a way to fill the silence. “You probably don’t wanna hear some sob story from some cadet, I-”

“‘Some cadet?’”

Your eyes snapped over to his, mouth slightly agape before swallowing thickly. “I… Well I mean-”

“Talking like that about yourself isn’t going to change anything or make anything better. You’re not just some cadet, and I’m even willing to say that you’re not as bad as some of the shit-for-brains we have here. You came here to do the same thing everyone else is here to do. Fight for humanity. Whether your end goal is selfish or to try and relieve yourself of some guilt from the past, it doesn’t matter.” He leaned closer to you, elbows placed on the table as he pinned you with his gaze. “Every life sacrificed out there matters. So does yours, even if you don’t think it does. And it’s our job to make sure those soldiers don’t die in vain. 

You didn’t know what to say. No one had ever really talked to you like this, so how could you know how to respond? Luckily, he started speaking again so that you didn’t have to.

“Your family…  it’s a shame what happened to them. What you had to go through. But, their deaths will be avenged, and I will make damn sure of it.”

That night was the first time you cried in probably months. You thought Levi would think of you as some pathetic little soldier, trying to gain the sympathy of their captain, but he didn’t. He just placed a hand over yours and let you cry, and you remembered how you were sort of surprised by how warm he was. You remember that talk like it was only yesterday when in reality it was years ago. You and Levi didn’t talk as much as you used to, considering the fact that he was constantly busy with helping the titan shifter cadet, Eren Jaeger, and you had been recruited to squad leader, so you had your own people to deal with. But that didn’t mean you two never spoke. Whenever your paths crossed, you’d make sure to give him a little greeting, whether it was a simple wave or a “hello.” And occasionally, when you couldn’t sleep and you’d come down to the mess hall, he was there, a steaming cup of tea in front of him, and you’d talk for a few hours until you both agreed it was time to try and catch some sleep.

Now, the soldiers were getting ready for the 57th expedition, and you couldn’t shake off the bad feeling you got whenever you thought about it. Of course, every expedition was dangerous. More often than not, the scouts would come back from outside the walls with more than a few dead, and on bad days, their numbers would be cut in half. Eren was making progress, and you hoped he would be useful, but a part of you was still doubtful.

“I’m worried,” you stated, arms crossed over your chest as you stood next to Levi, watching the cadets train vigorously.

“You always worry.”

You glanced over at the man and huffed, seeing him completely focused on the soldiers before you lightly kicked your boot into the dirt. “I guess that’s kinda my thing, isn’t it? Can you blame me though? We’ve seen what Eren can do, but… he hardly has it under control. And this isn’t exactly a normal expedition.”

“Things will turn out the way they turn out. There’s nothing we can do except make sure things go the best way they can.”

You sighed. Levi was able to reassure you most of the time, but other times he did nothing to calm your nerves. It wasn’t his job to, though. His responses were straightforward, and if you didn’t like it then that was just something you had to deal with.

“Ever the optimist, Levi,” you said, a sarcastic lilt to your voice, and you smiled when he glanced at you before shaking his head.

“Hey! You’re not here to slack off. Pick up the pace before I make you all train through dinner.”

You were used to Levi giving out orders. Hell, he gave them to you all the time, but his commanding voice sent shivers down your spine at that moment.

“He’s a freaking tiny tyrant, I swear,” you heard one of the cadets mutter, and you couldn’t help but snicker as you turned your head away from your captain, covering your mouth to conceal your smile.

“Find something funny?”

You cleared your throat as you shook your head, turning to Levi with a grin and shrugging your shoulders. “Not at all, captain. Just have a little cough is all.”

“Mhm. Maybe I should make you run it off then.”

“Aw c’mon, Levi. Have a little laugh. We all need one once in a while, especially considering the day you’re all going to have tomorrow.”

He just let out a hum, and your smile slowly dropped as you looked out at the horizon, the sky painted in beautiful strokes of orange and pink. Yes, you were right, you all needed those small moments of joy in this fucked up world you lived in, but you weren’t stupid enough to believe that those moments could last forever. Sometimes you just had to face the reality of the situation you were all in, and you couldn’t help the feeling of dread that filled you as you thought about tomorrow.

“You’re overthinking. Stop it,” Levi said, snapping you out of your thoughts.

You shook your head and gave him a smile that felt bittersweet. “I can’t help it sometimes. I wish I could go with you.”

“We have enough force and skill in the recruits we have for the expedition. It would be a waste to put you and your squad into it and leave you hanging with no real job to do.”

“No real job? We’d be doing what everyone else would be; killing titans and keeping Eren safe! How would we not be useful? You know for a fact that my squad and I are plenty skilled and-”

“We can’t risk more sacrifices by putting you out there. We have enough people to hopefully accomplish what we need to.”

“Then why wasn’t my squad a first choice to go beyond the walls this time? We’re more capable than most of the people here and you know it. Maybe if I talk to Erwin he’ll-”

“This wasn’t just Erwin’s decision, it was mine. And your insubordination is starting to get irritating, so I suggest you take a walk.”

You looked at Levi with widened eyes, disbelief clear on your face, and you swallowed down what you actually wanted to say before letting out a deep breath.

“Levi, I-”

“Take a walk, l/n. I don’t wanna hear about it.”

You simply blinked at him a few times, clearly upset by the way he addressed you, before letting out a scoff and walking away, your jaw and fists clenched tightly. Yes, maybe you were being a bit childish, but you refused to acknowledge that when you felt so pissed at the moment.

“I mean, how can he just treat me like that?! Just completely dismiss me and not even give me a reasonable answer! He’s so… He’s just so… Ugh!”

You groaned and rested your head in your hands as you sat across from Hange, your friend looking at you with raised brows as they idly tapped their fingers against the table.

“I mean, he is your superior, y/n.”

“But that’s not the point! Like, yeah okay, I know he’s my captain and all that, but… We’ve always just been casual with each other. We’ve never seen each other as our ranks. I still respect him and follow his orders when he gives them but…” You let out a noise of frustration and slammed your fists down on the table. “That doesn’t give him the right to just pull out the superiority card whenever it benefits him!”

Hange blinked a few times before letting out a sigh, brushing a piece of stray hair out of their face as they leaned back in their chair, shrugging their shoulders. “I mean, he said it was also his decision, right? So maybe… he’s trying to keep you safe?”

Your eyes widened almost comically, feeling heat travel up the back of your neck at the mention of the possibility that Levi was concerned about your safety. “I-I… I mean he- um.”

“Oh my, are you getting flustered, y/n? Does the thought of Levi caring about you make your heart race?” Hange asked, a playful smirk on their face.

“Stop! For the love of everything, please stop,” you whined, waving your hands in front of you as you tried to ignore how embarrassed you felt. 

Hange just laughed at you, continuing to poke fun until you threatened to not be a part of their crazy experiments anymore, to which they quickly backed off. You thought talking with Hange might make you feel better, but hours later when you were pacing in front of the door to Levi’s office, you still wanted to rip your hair out as you thought of what to say to him. Letting out a huff and straightening your posture, trying to gain some nerve, you raised your hand to knock on the door, only for it to suddenly open and reveal your captain, his cravat having come off and the first few buttons of his shirt undone.

“Your incessant pacing is driving me up the wall. What do you want?”

Oh, so he had heard you. You avoided eye-contact, reaching a hand up to rub at the back of your neck before clearing your throat to try and relieve some of the awkwardness you felt.

“Um… can I come in?”

You both stood there for a moment, Levi’s gaze traveling up and down your body before stepping aside to let you in, and you gave him a small, appreciative nod as you walked inside his office. The tension in your shoulders was almost painful, your whole body almost stiff as Levi walked in front of you to sit on the edge of his desk, crossing his arms over his chest. You didn’t know why you felt so nervous. It was only Levi, a man you had come to know for years. And while you didn’t know everything about him, you still considered you both to be somewhat close. So why were you feeling so weird right now?

“Uh… I wanted to talk about this afternoon,” you said, mindlessly fidgeting with your fingers.

Levi raised a curious brow, letting you linger in silence for a moment before letting out a soft hum. “Not sure it’s something worth talking about.”

Lips curving into a small frown, you mimicked his posture and crossed your arms, shifting your weight onto one foot. “Well, I think we left some things… unaddressed back there, and I wanna talk about it.”

He didn’t say anything, and you were starting to get pissed, your fuse short enough as it is. Your frustration finally hit its peak when he grabbed the cup of tea next to him and wordlessly took a sip, and you swore at that moment you wanted to take the cup and smash it against his head.

“Goddammit, would you stop drinking your stupid fucking tea and listen to me?!” you yelled, and you could see a flash of shock in his eyes at your outburst before he glared at you, setting his cup down.

“You wanna repeat that?”

“Oh, don’t get all fucking ‘Captain Levi’ on me. You know exactly what all of this is about. You didn’t even try to give me a reasonable explanation earlier, and I feel like I deserve one.”

“Do you? You think you deserve something for acting like this?”

“I’m not a child!”

“But I am your superior, which you seem to forget quite a lot.”

“That is such bullshit! Since when have you given two fucks about ranks when it comes to us? I follow your orders when I have to, not when you use your superiority when it’s most convenient for you.” 

Levi clicked his tongue as he got off of his desk, rounding it to sit in his chair, and your fists were clenched so tightly it was becoming almost painful, your nails digging into your palms.

“You know, you say you’re not a child, yet you constantly act like one. Throwing a fit when you don’t get your way. Sometimes I wonder why Erwin made the decision to promote you.”

Your eyes widened as you softly gasped, questioning if you heard Levi correctly, but you know you did. There was no mistaking it. You always believed that Levi knew that you were capable, that you could protect yourself. But now he made you question if he really thought those things. Did he even respect you as a soldier? After countless nights of spilling your guts to him and him reassuring you… did he think of you as just some simple-minded cadet? You felt like your heart was in your throat and tears were threatening to spill, but you just swallowed everything down and turned your head away.

“Good luck on the expedition tomorrow,” you muttered, and you were quick to leave his office and rush back to your room, tears spilling down your cheeks.

______________

When it came time for your fellow scouts to leave for the expedition in the morning, you were a bit reluctant to watch them, knowing that you’d end up automatically spotting Levi in the crowd, and the petty side of you wanted to ignore him at all costs. However, the rational side of you remembered that it wasn’t just Levi going out there, it was other soldiers as well, most of them you knew personally, and you’d be damned if you didn’t give them a proper send-off, knowing the likelihood of some of them not making it back. So, you dragged yourself out of bed and made yourself presentable, slipping on your jacket as you stepped out of your room.

“Y/n!”

You turned at the shout of your name, seeing Hange waving excitedly at you as they jogged down the hall, slowing down to walk with you.

“So? How did it go with Captain Shorty?”

You groaned and rolled your eyes, bringing your fingers up to rub at your temples to try and cease the headache you already felt coming. “I don’t even wanna talk about it.”

“Dang, that bad, huh?” Hange grimaced.

“You have no idea. I just wanna forget about it”

Hange didn’t say anything more on the topic after that, simply talking about random things with you as you walked outside to the stables. You had a bad feeling settled in your stomach ever since you woke up, but as more time passed it just got worse.

“Hange,” you muttered, the squad leader turning towards you with raised eyebrows as they held the reins to their horse.

“Uh… Please be careful out there, okay?”

Hange looked shocked for a moment before their mouth split into a wide grin, and they quickly pulled you into a tight hug, which you immediately reciprocated.

“Aw, y/n! Don’t worry about me, I’m always careful!”

“That is such a lie, but I’ll believe you anyway,” you chuckled.

Pulling away from each other, Hange mounted their horse and joined the rest of the scouts at the gate, and you went to stand at the sidelines with the rest of your peers to watch them. Your eyes immediately caught sight of a head of familiar black hair, and you felt your heart grow heavy and your chest tighten, almost wishing he would feel your gaze and look over at you. But he didn’t and with Erwin’s war-cry, they charged through the open gate, the horses kicking up dirt and dust, and you only got a glance at their retreating figures before the gate was closed again.

______________

Every minute that ticked by felt like hours. You didn’t know how long they would be gone, the time usually spent outside the walls ranging from a few hours to a few days. You hoped it was the former, knowing that the longer they were out there, the more likely they were to get killed. You knew your comrades were skilled, having been outside the walls with them and seen their skills up close, but that didn’t stop you from worrying. Now with the Eren being a titan shifter and a traitor in your midst, anything could happen.

You almost didn’t acknowledge the shouting of your fellow soldiers that afternoon, too focused on taking care of some of the horses in the stables. But when you finally heard it, you quickly stopped what you were doing and ran to the gate. They were back. Adrenaline coursed through you as your heart pounded like a drum against your chest, and when you finally caught sight of the returning scouts, you immediately stopped in your tracks. The look on their faces was one of defeat, and you could already tell just by looking at them that not all of them made it back. When you spotted Hange, you felt some relief wash over you and you quickly made your way over to them, walking beside their horse.

“Hange, what happened? Was the mission successful?”

Hange didn’t answer, a blank look on their face, which was identical to the expressions on all of the other soldier’s faces. It was a bad day, that much you could tell, and you made brief eye-contact with Levi before looking for your friends. Only… you couldn’t see them. Turning around frantically, you spotted Eren laying in a cart and ran over, jumping in beside him as you glanced at his hand clutching Mikasa’s. He looked even worse than everyone else did. No, loss was never easy, but Eren was just a kid, and experiencing so much of it at his age must have been devastating for him, especially when he was so passionate about saving humanity.

“Eren, tell me what happened. Who… Who did we lose?” you asked.

You didn’t even know if you wanted to know the answer, seeing Eren so broken and torn up already told you that what happened out there wasn’t good, but when was it ever? The boy had tears falling down his cheeks, trying to keep his sobs quiet, and Mikasa just looked at you with narrowed eyes.

“Y/n, I don’t think right now’s a good time-”

“Please!” You gripped the cape that was laid over top of Eren, eyes focussed on the blue and white wings embroidered on the back and you sniffled as you tried to hold back the tears that were desperately trying to come out. “I… I need to know. Please, Eren…”

He stared at you with wide eyes, Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed before letting out a shuddered breath. “They… We were after the female titan and she… I couldn’t save them, y/n. They died protecting me!”

Your face seemed void of any emotion as Eren’s words sunk in, piercing your heart like a million knives, and all you did was nod silently before jumping out of the cart, your mind going on autopilot as you walked. You didn’t need him to explain who he was talking about for you to already put the pieces together. Levi had told you that Eren was going to be a part of his squad so that he could keep an eye on him, and his squad was in charge of protecting him. He had become humanity’s number one asset after all. Civilians were shouting at all of you, cursing at you and hurling insults at your face. You weren’t even one of the scouts on the expedition, but that didn’t matter. As long as you wore the wings of freedom on your back, you were a bastard like the rest of them. No more, no less.

You had stumbled too close to the crowd, too preoccupied with your thoughts to even notice, until a large man gripped your shoulders and pushed you in front of the horses, your body landing harshly in the dirt as some of the people laughed at you. You heard someone shout your name, but it sounded distant to you, everyone’s drowned out underneath the roaring of your thoughts. You shifted yourself onto your hands and knees, only to look up and see Hange crouched down in front of you, a concerned expression on their face.

“Y/n, are you okay? Can you hear me?”

There was a ringing in your ears as you looked at them, trying desperately to just get a grip.

The dirt under my hands, the dryness in my mouth, the shouts of the citizens, the musty smell of the horses… Hange right in front of me.

“I’m fine. I… I’m fine.”

The single tear slipping down your cheek went unnoticed by you, but it was one of the things that let Hange know that you were lying. That you weren’t fine. Reaching out to wipe the tear away Hange shook their head.

“Y/n-”

“I’ll see you later, okay?”

Giving Hange a tight-lipped smile, you picked yourself up off the ground and made your way back to the Scout’s headquarters, feeling everyone’s eyes on your back, and you couldn’t help but wonder if Levi was watching you too.

______________

You didn’t keep track of how long you cried that day, keeping yourself locked in your room and sobbing until your body physically couldn’t produce any more tears. The last time you cried this much was when your family died, same thing could be said when you thought about the last time you felt this way. Like all hope was lost. You found yourself questioning what the point of all of this was for a moment before you quickly slapped yourself out of that thought. You knew why you had to do this, why the Survey Corps was important. But shit, all this loss? You didn’t know how much more you could take. Especially if days like today became more frequent.

Then you got to thinking about Levi and the stupid argument you had yesterday. At the time, you felt like your feelings were justified, and maybe they were, but now you felt like a complete idiot for arguing with him, especially the day before an expedition where it was one hundred percent possible that he could’ve died out there. The thought of your last interaction being some petty argument made more tears fall, and you gripped the sheets of your bed so tightly that you thought they might rip. Did he even want to speak to you now? Maybe he realized that you were just some immature little soldier and wanted nothing to do with you.

No, you couldn’t accept that. You wouldn’t. Standing from your bed, you harshly wiped at your eyes and sniffled, trying to look like you weren’t crying for hours on end - even though it was pointless, you knew Levi would be able to tell immediately - and exited your room to start making your way to Levi’s office. Your nerves were kicked into high gear, but you refused to let this man intimidate you. You were going to let him know how you felt and he was going to listen. Of course, your confidence immediately deflated when you found yourself standing in front of his door, but you swallowed down your nerves and knocked, taking a deep breath.

Levi’s muffled voice came from the other side of the door, telling you to come in, and you let out a small huff as you gripped the doorknob and let yourself in. He didn’t even look up from the paperwork in front of him when you walked in, and as the door closed behind you and you moved to stand in front of his desk with your hands held behind your back, you lightly cleared your throat to get his attention. His eyes flickered up to meet yours, and you could feel yourself shrink under his gaze. There was no doubt he saw what happened earlier today when they came back, and from the way he was examining you, you knew he could easily tell that you had been crying.

“Did you need me?” he asked, and you sharply inhaled at the sound of his voice. It felt like forever since he talked to you last, and hearing him speak made your stomach do flips.

“Uh… I don’t know, honestly. I didn’t really practice what I was going to say before I came in here.”

He raised a brow at you. “‘Practice?’”

“I mean, it’s kinda hard to talk to you. Not that that’s a bad thing, it’s just… Ah shit, I don’t know. It might just be me. I’m not the best at articulating, you know?”

He hummed and grabbed his cup as you let out a sigh, taking a seat in one of the chairs in front of his desk and leaning your elbows on your knees, bouncing your leg. Taking your bottom lip between your teeth, you wordlessly gazed at him for a moment, a made-up image of his death flashing in your mind before you shook your head and ran your hand down your face.

“Look, um… I just wanted to say that I’m sorry for yesterday. For questioning your judgment when I should’ve just dealt with it. You’re my superior and I disrespected you so… Again, I’m sorry.”

Silence fell between you for a moment before he let out a sigh, setting down his cup before leaning his chin against his propped up hand. “Don’t apologize. You were right.”

Your eyes widened. Did you hear that correctly? “Uh, I’m sorry?”

Getting up from his seat, he rounded his desk to stand in front of you, and you were even more confused. You swore he would’ve been done with you by now.

“You said you and your squad were more than capable of handling the mission. You were right. Or at least, you were right at the time. The female titan would’ve wiped us all out if she wanted to, just like she did my squad. I don’t doubt that if you went after her, you’d be dead right now too.”

You stiffened slightly at his words, fingers gripping your knees as you let out the breath you didn’t realize you had been holding in. “Oh.”

“As captain, I’m supposed to remain unbiased. My decisions should be based on the greater good of humanity and my comrades. If my judgment is wrong, then that’s something I have to live with. Making my squad protect Eren was my decision, and they died.” He let out a long breath. “When Erwin decided to not bring you on the expedition, I was opposed to it at first. I knew that you and your squad would be able to aid us greatly, but I couldn’t sway him. However, now that I think about it, I’m glad you weren’t there.”

You were at a loss for words. When Hange had joked the other day about Levi caring about you, you didn’t take it seriously. But now that you were hearing all of this… Did he care for you? Or was it just your wishful thinking that was causing you to interpret things wrong? Slowly standing up, you briefly met his gaze before walking over to the window and looking out at the night sky, the sun having gone down a while ago, and you wrapped your arms around yourself as you tried to piece together what you wanted to say to him.

“Even if you think I was right, I’m still sorry. I don’t like arguing, especially with you. And the fact that you had to go on an expedition the next day…” You swallowed thickly. “I was scared. I know you say that there’s no use regretting the decisions we’ve made, but if you died out there today and a stupid argument was the last interaction we ever had, I would’ve regretted it every day of my life.” You turned to face him, eyes glossing over. “I would’ve beat myself up when I know you’d want me to continue to be strong. But I feel like I can’t do that without you, and I feel so weak and stupid for saying that. For feeling like the only thing that gives me hope in this godforsaken world is you.”

Levi remained silent, not that you expected him to say anything, and you sniffled as you reached up to wipe at your teary eyes before sighing and giving him a sad smile.

“I’m sorry. I know you don’t wanna hear some silly confession. I’ll let you get back to your business,” you said, walking past Levi to get to the door, but you didn’t make it that far when his hand suddenly shot out and gripped your arm, causing you to turn back and look at him.

“Why do you always do that?”

Your brows furrowed. “What do you mean?”

“You never take yourself seriously and act like the people around you don’t either. You’re self-deprecating. You did the same thing when I found you in the mess hall years ago. Why?”

“I… I don’t know, I guess I just get nervous around you.”

“Why?”

Your mouth felt dry suddenly, and your heart was racing as Levi’s grip on your arm tightened and he pulled you closer. “Because… I want to be strong in front of you. I don’t want you to see me as someone immature and incapable, and I’m scared of embarrassing myself in front of you.”

“Did you find your confession embarrassing? Do you want me to forget about it?”

“If you want to.”

“Mm. And what if I don’t?”

You let out a shuddered breath, eyes flitting down to his lips for a moment. “Then what will you do about it?”

Neither of you moved at first, your gaze not leaving one another, and you felt like your heart was about to beat out of your chest, it was going so fast. You wondered if Levi was experiencing the same feeling. Wondered if underneath that stoic, calm expression, his blood was pumping in his ears and his pulse was going crazy. You were waiting for him to do something, anything, as he stared at you with an almost challenging look. It made anger flare up in you for some reason, and you clenched your jaw as you narrowed your eyes. 

No, I won’t let this get away from me.

Reaching up, your hand grabbed at his cravat, yanking him forward into an almost desperate kiss that had your mind reeling. His brows were scrunched up, body tense, before finally relaxing, and you could feel him almost melt into you as he brought both of his hands up to hold your face, eagerly responding. Your frustration had been building up ever since your fight, and you felt like you were both letting it all out now, each kiss hungry and rushed, barely able to pull your faces away before one of you was pulling the other one in again.

“Fuck, I can’t stand you sometimes,” you breathed out between kisses, fingers weaving into Levi’s dark locks and lightly tugging, causing him to let out a soft groan against your lips.

“Stop talking.”

You don’t know when the anxiety started bubbling in your stomach or why your heart felt like it was about to jump out of your throat, all you knew was that every sensation was suddenly overwhelming. Levi’s hands, his lips, his breath against your face, it was all too much. You were suddenly pushing him away, tears quickly building up behind your eyes as you panted for breath. Whether it be from the desperateness of your kisses, or the constricting of your chest, you didn’t know. You just knew that everything was suddenly hitting you at once, and you couldn't get a grasp on how to deal with it.

“Y/n…”

Right, Levi was still here, and he looked at you with a hand slightly reached out, waiting for you to meet him halfway. You hesitated, staring at his hand like you were trying to see through it, before eventually grabbing it, and he slowly pulled you into his chest. Your arms were limp at your sides, silent tears streaming down your face as Levi held you.

“They’d be proud of you, y/n. You know that.”

You felt like you had been falling all of your life, nothing to stop you, nothing to hold onto as you plummeted through an endless abyss. But now, as you brought your hands up to grip the back of Levi’s jacket and sobbed into his shoulder, for once, you felt like your feet had finally found the ground.

[falloutjay]

Christophe x childhood friend reader x Kenny, Christophe, Gregory and reader have been friends since gradeschool. Reader was a very emotional person who cared about everyone. She was very sweet yet still helped the boys assassinating people. Reader had always had an obvious crush on Christophe but she never seems get to an direct answer and it really starts to bum her out. So she starts trying to stop showing her feelings to him. It worries people because she starts being more quieter than her normal self. When asked, all she can say ' I just realized that there's something I could never have' and nothing else. It's until reader's parents (who are bakers) get a job opportunity in a town named South Park. It's a very awkward goodbye (with Christophe, it's sad af with Gregory) and she leaves.

As if a switch was pulled, reader goes back to being a sweet and emotional girl (much to her parents delight/relief). We makes lot of new friends and gets a new crush too, Kenny McCormick. She's shy around him at first, much to her friends: Bebe, Wendy, and Nicole's confusion. She confides in them and tells her past troubles with love. They comfort her and tell that it's sure to be different. So reader lightens up around Kenny and they begin a beautiful relationship.

Yet we hit a rough patch when Kenny's womanizing way Catches up with him (Kelly, Tammy, etc) so we naturally get defensive (not to how we were with Christophe but still pretty strained). But worry not, reader (and her friends) win their class a trip to London (they sold 7,777 cookies!!!). Reader is nervous but doesn't stress to hard, it's not like Christophe is still leaving there right? Well after settling into their hotel, Reader and Gregory run into each other and have a heartfelt reunion then reader reunites with Christophe and it's really awkward. So Gregory and Christophe decide to join them on their trip, but something wrong. Christophe seems a lot more open with reader, which confuses reader and Kenny, having connected the dots, tries keeping reader for himself. And poor reader's in a blushy confusing emotional spiral.

I had such a blast writing this. Writing Christophe is mad fun.

Btw, I implied that the events of the movie never happened here, so Wendy and the others never met Gregory or Christophe.

Kenny and Christophe are also pretty mean girls basically but I loved it so much, I couldn't help myself. ^^

(EXCUSE MY BAD FRENCH; IT HAS BEEN YEARS SINCE MY LAST FRENCH LESSONS AND I WAS PRETTY BAD AT IT)

Warnings: Kenny and Christophe are a little OOC I think, swearing, French, Bad French.

____________________________

Christophe x Childhood friend!Reader x Kenny

You hummed as you waited for your best friends in the whole wide world. You had prepared a nice little lunch with self-made sandwiches, lemonade, and brownies.

Your excitement went through the roof, once you heard the door to your secret hideout open. Gregory was the first to come in. “Ah, Y/N, what a lovely surprise!” He said gleamingly and admired the beautifully set table. He put down his backpack and as he did so, your longtime crush strolled in. Cigarette in mouth, dirty all over him and an annoyed expression painted on his face, Christophe.

“Hey, how was the job?” You asked sweetly, as Gregory sat down, and Christophe did so too after a short hesitation. “It went well unti-” “Until zat fucking dumb kid made the wrong zound and made me mess up the whole time plan. Why does no one know what a dying giraffe sounds like?” He ranted, hands moving around hastily, while you and Gregory chuckled. “It’s not funny!” The dark-haired protested while he lit his cigarette. You just smiled.

Despite Christophe’s mean demeanor, you had a huge soft spot for him. “Hey, Christophe?” You asked, demanding his attention, which he gave you, while also taking a bite of a sandwich. “Would you maybe like to hang out sometime?” Gregory pretended to not exist and focused on the suddenly very interesting drink in his hand. He knew you liked their friend. But he also knew Christophe better than anyone else. And the blond knew this couldn’t end well.

“Ah, excuse moi, mais…I just don’t have the time currently.” You nodded, trying your best to not show how disappointed you were. It pained Gregory to see you like this. He loved you like a sister and seeing how Christophe was constantly breaking your little heart made him sad.

To his demise, you only grew quieter with time. When Gregory pressed you on the matter, asking what’s wrong, all you managed to mumble was: “I guess… I just realized that there's something I could never have”. It made him worry. You were such a sweet girl but recently you had become a husk of yourself and today was no different.

They had just come back from another job but this time you didn’t even greet them, just passed the folders in which you listed the new jobs they could take. “Here. I am afraid I have some bad news though.” You mumbled as you pressed the papers in their hands. Gregory looked at you with worry on his face. “What’s wrong, dear?” He asked and noticed how close you were to crying.

“My parents got a really good job over in Colorado. We will move next week.” You mumbled. Gregory threw the papers across the room, before storming to hug you. You held him close, feeling sad, that you would never again drink tea with your favorite English gentleman, and that deeply saddened you.

Your eyes wandered over to Christophe, who looked somewhat sad but made no move to express this. “I can't believe it. You’re THE most important part of this organization and you will be gone by next week?! Who is gonna help me with all the papers?” Gregory held you so close, you almost had trouble breathing.

“I gotta go early today since I have to start packing. I will miss you two so much.” You said, not being able to stop the tears from flowing down your cheeks. “Yeah, sure, take your time. If you need any help, you know you can always count on me.” Gregory said, finally letting go of you. You nodded and walked up to Christophe.

“I guess that’s it huh?” You muttered. “Oui. You will be a great loss to zis organization.” Awkwardly you nodded. Was this really everything he had to say? You didn’t see Gregory in the background, wildly gesticulating for him to say more. The dark-haired raised an eyebrow until he finally got what his partner tried to say.

“We will miss you.” He thought this was a perfectly fine answer, but didn’t catch how much that hurt you. “Yeah, me you too.” You said and walked towards the exit. “See you guys!” You called out before you vanished.

“Great job making her feel like shit.” “What waz I supposed to say?”

“My God, Y/N, you have been here for over half a year now! Just tell him already!” Bebe commented and you blushed profusely. “N-no! He doesn’t even like me that much!” You protested, your cheeks colored in a deep red. “There is no point in denying sweetheart. You both are head over heels for each other. Trust me, Stan told me how much Kenny talks about you.” Wendy reassured you. She pointed with her fork over to the table the boys were seated on and sure enough, the blond boy you were talking about was looking over, waving even when he spotted you looking at him. You shyly waved back, before hiding in your sweater.

“Okay, Y/N, what the fuck happened when you lived in England? I can’t imagine you always behave like this around someone you like.” Nicole looked sternly at you, and you let out a deep sigh. “Well, fine, yeah, there was a guy before Kenny that I liked.”

The girls all pushed their food trays to the side, to stick their heads closer together. “In England, I was close friends with two guys.” “Ohh, a three-way?” “Bebe!” Wendy hissed before they let you continue. “They are assassins and I helped them with everything behind the scenes, like contacting clients, paperwork, and all that. Gregory was my best friend, and the other guy is a French, god-hating, foul-mouthed idiot named Christophe. And I really had a thing for him, but he was always super cold and just not that interested in me.” You rambled and the girls listened attentively. “Okay, okay, Y/N, hear me out on this one…” Bebe began, and you looked at her. “Have you maybe thought about the fact that that Christophe guy was just an idiot? You’re great and Kenny sooo has a thing for you. Just go for it!” Nicole and Wendy nodded. “Yeah, you gotta make new experiences, real experiences.” Nicole agreed and Wendy gave it a thumbs up.

Before they could talk any further, you felt a tap on your shoulder and turned around. Kenny stood there, smiling warmly. “Hey, Y/n, I just wanted to ask if you maybe wanna go to the mall with me on Saturday and maybe get a smoothie or something?” You felt your face heat up and heard the girls squeal quietly. You nodded. “Yeah, that would great!” You answered and he shot you a flashy smile. “Great. I’ll come to pick you up, yeah?” You nodded excitingly and he walked back to the boy’s table. “Ahh, you got a date!” Nicole beamed and so did the other two. A big smile was glued to your face, and you only managed to nod. “We will so come over on Friday and get you ready! Girls’ night!” Bebe planed and you happily agreed.

Being with Kenny was great. He was loving, always looked out for you, loved listening to you, and yet, you hated his guts just now. You wanted to strangle those stupid sluts that constantly clung to his side like their life depended on it. Yeah, you knew Tammy and he had history, as did Kelly, but did he really have to talk to them that much? Didn’t he see how much you hated it? “Hey, babe!” He whispered into your ear, and you moved away. “Hey, Kenny.” You said coldly. You waited for Mister Garrison to finally let you in the hotel. You and the girls managed to win the school competition for a trip to London, by selling 7,777 packages of cookies, totally legally, by the way, nothing to see here, so now your class was in London and after you sat with the girls in the bus Kenny had sneaked up to you. You were kind of nervous, fearing that you could maybe run into…him… but there was no chance he still lives here, right? Right?

You didn’t know why, but since Kenny had started to talk to his bitches, as you called them, again you distanced yourself from him. You were afraid of being hurt again, so distancing yourself was an automatic reaction.

Once you got settled in your room, the girls proposed discovering the town, since you guys had no events for the day. You happily greed and once in the corridor, you spotted Stans gang down the hall. Wendy asked them to join, much to your demise. You wanted girl time, not being secretly annoyed with Kenny time.

You, Wendy, Bebe, Stan, Kyle, and Kenny wandered the streets, taking in the new scenery. “It’s pretty nice here, isn’t it?” Wendy asked as she put the sweets she bought in her bag. “Yeah!” You agreed and sipped on the tea you ordered.

You guys had sat down at a café to just watch the bussing streets and enjoy some British tea. Kyle was talking to Stan about Cartman, and what prank they’d play on him tonight. Kenny was chatting with Bebe and Wendy about Tammy and Kelly, much to your demise and you just looked around. Your eyes wandered and you watched the other patrons when you stopped at a familiar seeming one. Your mouth was agape, there’s no way your eyes weren’t tricking you right now?!

The in leather gloved hands, the orange button-up shirt, that thick golden hair… A book rested in his left hand, while the other held the tea with an extended pinky. It was him. Gregory. He must have noticed you staring as he looked up and recognized you as well. A big smile appeared on his face, and he quickly put the book in his leather messenger bag. You got up, ignoring the questions from the others, while you ran into Gregory’s extended arms.

“Y/N my dear! I would have never guessed to see you again!” Gregory proclaimed, spinning you around. Neither of you cared that everyone was watching. “I’m so happy to see you. It has been ages!” You mumbled, still hugging your long-lost friend tightly. You only lost contact because you lost your phone during the move, so you had no way of contacting them. Before you two could talk, Kenny appeared by your side.

“Hey, babe, who is this guy?” He asked and as you turned around you saw the questioning looks of everyone. “Oh sorry. Guys, this is my old friend Gregory, we have been friends since we were little. Gregory, these are my friends from America, Wendy, Bebe, Kyle, Stan, and my boyfriend Kenny.”

Gregory properly introduced himself and moved to sit with you guys. He talked with your new friends, and you immediately saw how Wendy and Bebe hung to his lips. You understood that. Gregory was a really good-looking young man by now. You chuckled when you spotted how jealous Stan became with each passing second. Soon Gregory’s phone rang, and he excused himself to take the call.

“Oh my god! That’s the Gregory, you told us about, Y/N? Why did you hide that he’s a British snack!” Bebe exclaimed and you chuckled. Soon Gregory sat back down and that devious smile on his lips made you wonder.

“Ze Mole is coming.” He just said, knowing you wanted to question his smile. You felt the blood in your veins freeze for a second.

“He is still here?” You asked and Gregory nodded. “Why wouldn’t he? We kept the organization running. And there is always a spot for you if you ever want to come back.” The blond spotted the longing in your eyes at an instant. Kenny watched it happening quietly, carefully watching you. Soon enough, a certain someone arrived, pulling another chair to your table, and sitting on it backward, so that he was leaning on the backrest.

Your heart was beating like you had just run a marathon as you inspected every detail about him. His dark messy hair was roughly still the same and his trademark cigarette his only accessory. The tight-fitting dark green shirt fit him perfectly you thought and the tactical belt around his torso was still there. He also still wore fingerless gloves. The two really didn’t change much, apart from becoming older.

“Well, Christophe, these are Y/Ns friends from America.” Gregory introduced them and the dark-haired male lazily gifted him a wave. Wendy and Bebe noticed how you were obviously checking him out and laughed.

“I see you got a thing for baddies.” Bebe whispered into your ear, and you wanted to protest, but got interrupted by Stan.

“Well, I like this sort of reunion, but don’t wanna want to continue or sightseeing?” Gregory smiled warmly, as he offered to play tour guide for you. Your friends happily agreed to his proposition, feeling glad to have a real British tour guide. So, you guys paid for your orders and started walking.

To your surprise, instead of walking up front with Gregory, Christophe walked next to you, eyeing you curiously. “It’s nice to ze you again, mon chéri.” He said you felt your face heat up. Did he seriously just call you that? Did he actually say he’s happy to see you again?

“Well, it has been a while, hasn’t it?” You mumbled and Christophe had a pleasant smile resting on his face. That was a new thing, you thought. While Christophe walked next to you on your right, Kenny was on your left and eyeing the French with jealous eyes. He was an expert at reading people and he spotted Christophe’s attraction to HIS girlfriend miles go and he wasn’t blind to your body language either. You two had history. That much was clear.

Gregory led the group down to a nice spot near the riverbanks of the Thames where the girls took pictures together. Kyle and Gregory switched taking the group photos, while Kenny stood next to Christophe, both looking at the others.

Everyone felt the obvious tension between the two. “Don’t even think about, frog eater.” Kenny said, which made Christophe chuckle.

“Ahh, you Américains are so funny. You think everything belongs to you, when in reality she was already mine, once I sat down at ze table.” Christophe took the last puff of his cigarette, before stomping on it on the ground. Kenny averted his gaze and looked at his newfound rival.

“Yours?” He questioned but didn’t Christoph didn’t reward him with an answer. He only chuckled and put a new unlit cigarette in his mouth.

“Écoutez-Vous. You sound so funny.” The girl the two were fighting about returned with Bebe and Wendy and they all obviously felt the tension between the two.

“Ken, come over. Group pics!” Kyle called out to him and somewhat annoyed, Kenny jogged over. So you and your two friends were left with the French man.

“I just wanted to say, you look formidable, ma briquette.” Wendy and Bebe quietly squealed, as Christoph took your hand to press a kiss on your knuckles. You blushed a deep red. What had happened to him? He never behaved like that, but you couldn’t deny how he made your knees weak.

“Hey, Hey, Hey!” Kenny called out and quickly came stomping back. “I just told you to back off.” Kenny said. “Ah sorry, my English is pretty bad, I must have misunderstood.” Christophe shrugged. Kenny wrapped his arms around you and held you close.

“I’ll fuck you up if you don’t keep yourself in check.” Kenny spat and you broke free of his forced hug. “Ken, what the hell?” You questioned his sudden aggression, but you were quickly shoved away by Christophe, who now got all up in Kenny’s face.

“Oh, zen pray to whatever hate-filled God you believe in, and I hope for you he’z real because nothing will be as real as your fucked up face once I am done.” “Oh, I don’t believe in Gods. Not when I already know what hell looks like and so will you when I get started.”There was no point in denying that you, Wendy, and Bebe were super interested in this showdown. It was interesting to see two guys who were obviously fighting over you get so riled up.

Bebe leaned over and whispered: “Damn Y/N, you really got the hot guys fighting over you.” You had a faint pink tone on your cheeks. The two guys you liked were ready to basically kill each other over you. It was kind of flattering. Stan and Kyle tried getting the two to calm down, but to no avail, as they just kept going with their petty insults.

Gregory walked up next to you, leaning down to talk. “You are the only one who can get them to stop, you know that right?” He questioned.

“Yeah. But you must admit, this is kinda entertaining.” He laughed and nodded. “You’re right.” “Give me a minute Gregory. I never had someone fight for me.” You whispered with a hot face, watching as Kyle and Stan tried to pull the two away from each other.

Your heart was confused, seeing Christophe again and how he now behaved towards you awakened feelings you thought weren’t there anymore, but you also loved how Kenny was ready to fight for you. How could anyone not find this super interesting?

[myjjbaby]

Can I get a jj imagine where you've been dating for a while (you're a pogue and been one forever) and you make a bet with him to see who can go the longest without sex? Who would cave first bc i feel like even being as stubborn as he is JJ wouldn't be able to take it that long lol smut is 100% okay with me if you're comfortable btw😜 ~N

won’t last | the bet (part ii)

author’s note - hi alright this is a tad different than the request bc i thought itd be cute to have a different bet for part 2 of the bet bc people wanted that :))

synopsis - requested by anon! you make a bet with your boyfriend and JJ’s really bad at winning them

warnings - 2.6k of smut, filth, sex, whatever you want to call it :)) edging, oral (f!receiving), unprotected (wrap before you tap folks). also if you aren’t legal i highly suggest you don’t read this and enjoy some time outside like children should. 18+ folks!! also i am allowed to post this cause i am 19 so anons don’t even try :))

“Wait, so you’re trying to tell me that y’all made a bet about me and JJ?”

You were currently sitting between your boyfriend’s legs at the driver seat of the ‘HMS POGUE,’ which had become a common occurrence over the summer ever since Sarah introduced you to the crew. JJ’s hand would slip off of the wheel and knead at the skin of your waist, a playful smirk on his face as he looked out onto the marsh.

“Yeah, if JJ didn’t fall in love with you by the end of the summer, he’d get a new bike.”

“I don’t need a new bike anyway.”

You smiled at the blonde’s confession and leaned up to kiss the underside of his jaw. He shifted his head so he could look down at you fully before pressing his lips sloppily against your cheek.

“M’ sorry, bub,” he gave you a confused look, “about not getting a bike.”

“Don’t need one if I got you, baby.”

You rolled your eyes before slipping out of his arms and meandering to the bow of the old boat. JJ whining at the loss of contact, watching your figure bend over as you grabbed something out of his bag.

“So,” the blonde nearly jumped out of his skin when Sarah snuck up on him, “wanna do another bet?”

“What do you have in mind, Cameron?”

“We need Y/N for this one, gimme a sec.”

JJ watched as the older girl walked over to you, pulling his fresh blunt from your lips. He smiled as you approached him and once again wrapped you into his warm embrace. The blue-eyed boy smiling when he felt your lips pressed to his exposed shoulder. JJ chuckled at your squeal when he placed you on his lap, kissing your temple whispering sweet nothings.

You blushed like crazy once you noticed all of the Pogues standing around you, hiding further in JJ’s neck.

“You ready for this, Maybank?”

“Born ready.”

You raised a perfectly shaped eyebrow at your boyfriend, questioning his antics which he just ignored and kissed your cheek again.

“I wanna see how long JJ can go without sex.”

“You mean like-”

“Any interaction, JJ.”

You giggled as he let out a groan into your neck.

“This is torture.”

“And,” Sarah smirked, “if you surpass a week, I’ll get you that bike.”

Smiling at the cute boy sitting beneath you, you slid off his lap and headed back towards the bow of the boat. JJ frowned as you stepped farther away from him, telling Pope to take the wheel, he grabbed your wrist and pulled you back to his bare tanned chest.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“Mm,” you hummed into his warm chest, goosebumps shooting up his back, “don’t wanna tempt you.”

“You always do, baby.”

His arms wrapped around your neck as you found the small of his waist. Blocking out the sun with his biceps, you looked up at his soft features without having to squint, appreciating the little sun spots littered across his face.

“Gotta last a week, then you can have me and your new bike.”

“Jus’ want you, baby, only you.”

“Yeah, okay. Tell that to your bike magazines under the bed.”

“Shut up.”

You giggled at his reddened cheeks and went up onto your tiptoes, sweetly kissing his chin. You sent him one last smile that left him breathless and sat down next to Sarah, who was cheekily grinning at JJ’s fluster.

Seven days. Your boyfriend was sure he could last that long. Seven day, a week. That’s nothing, right?

He was three days in when everything fell apart. You were sitting on his lap while the Pogues were gathered on the porch of John B’s infamous chateau. JJ’s rough fingertips slipped under your shirt and started stroking up and down your sides. Feeling his needy movements, you were quick to catch his hands in your grip.

“Baby…”

“J, no.”

“I wanna feel you.”

“Four days left.”

You felt his soft waves of hair brush against your back as his head rested between your shoulder blades. He grumbles incoherently into the fabric of your top, hands slipping out of your own.

You thought he was going to behave until his warm palms pulled out of your shirt and resettled on your thighs. JJ’s thumb prodded at the fading marks on the inside of your left leg, the purple marks left by his lips days ago still sensitive as they healed. You halfheartedly grabbed his wrists a second time when you felt waves of pleasure shoot straight through your body.

“J.”

“Let me make you feel good.”

“Sure thing,” you felt him grin into your skin, “in four days.”

His smile slipped down into a pout, hands continuing their teasing movements against your skin. You bit at your lower lip as a soft whimper nearly escaped your throat.

“You’re such a tease, baby, have been all week.”

“It’s been three days, JJ.”

You felt his body shift against you as he planted wet kisses up your spine, nipping lightly at your flushed skin. You attempt to suppress the gasp on the tip of your tongue as he continued to travel around your exposed skin.

Your hands loosened from around his wrists, instead pulling at the loose curls at the base of his head. JJ let out a soft growl as you grounded your hips down onto his lap, his arms tightening around your waist to keep you still.

The blonde’s lips found your skin again, lapping at the tortured skin of your neck as you whimpered lightly. You had never been more grateful that the Pogues had dispersed, then at this moment with his flaming touch pulling moans from your body, his name sounding like a prayer from your lips.

“Fuck, JJ.”

He groaned into your skin as you pressed harder against him, both of you growing needier by the second. Everything about his movements made you eager and he knew just how lust driven he was making you feel.

“Y/N? Can you come help me with something?”

And just like that you pulled yourself out of his arms, his hands desperately gripping at your waist, trying to get some kind of relief

“Yeah, I’m coming.”

JJ groaned at your word choice making you giggle, you weren’t used to your boyfriend being so clingy.

“Come with me, J?”

“So funny, Y/N, really.”

“You did this to yourself.”

“M ‘sorry, I just want you.”

“Four days.”

Just like that you were strolling off the screen porch, fixing your shirt which had rolled up significantly by JJ’s hands. You left him a whimpering mess as he stared down at the tent in his swim shorts, twitching from the quick loss of friction. He felt like he could cry from being edged so well only to be stuck in a daze and really, really turned on.

It was two days later when he was pressed up against your backside, so hard it was starting to hurt.

“Babe?”

JJ groaned, hearing you feign an innocent tone when you both know you can feel his hard-on pressed against your butt. You smiled at the soft noises he makes as you pull away, grabbing his hand to pull him towards the hammocks closer to the shore. He follows you like an addict, absolutely fucked for you when you press a soft kiss to his cheek before pushing him to sit on the hammock.

“Baby, please.”

“It’s Thursday, two more days and I’m all yours.”

“Fuck, I need you so bad.”

“I know,” you smile at him, pressing your lips to his nose as you straddle him, “I know. Smoke with me? It’ll make you relax, yeah?”

JJ nodded as you placed the paper between his lips. You leaned over him, your bikini covered chest brushing against his reddened skin. Smiling as he grabbed one of your nipples through the fabric, you lit the spliff with the silver lighter engraved with ‘JJ’ and watched him inhale deeply. You admired how his cheekbones became more defined as he sucked in the smoke.

You watched as the harsh furrow in his brow settled as the drug rushed in and out of his body, pressing a kiss to the relaxed skin and noting the unfaltered bulge pressed against your ripped jean shorts. JJ ruts his hips up to meet your warmth, desperate to be touched and finally release the growing tension in his body.

Pulling away slightly, you take the lit joint between your finger and slip the object into your mouth. The blonde boy watched as your pretty lips wrapped around it like second nature and his mind wandered to you finally being wrapped around him. He moaned into your mouth when you kissed him softly, roughly sucking against your bottom lip as you blew the puff of smoke out of your lungs and into him.

“Fuck, that was really hot.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, baby, look so pretty.”

You flush under his heated gaze and rewarded his compliments with kisses across his skin. Your mind went blank as JJ slid his warm palms down the length of your body, squeezing your knees before brushing along the tops of your thighs and stopping at your belt loops.

“J.”

Your voice was breathy against his throat as he grinded against your core, turned on by your sultry tone. You forgot about your sister’s stupid bet as soon as JJ’s long fingers dipped into your shorts and started playing with your pantyline. His hands slip out making you whimper against him, his grip relocating to your hips.

“I know, baby,” his thigh came up between yours, flipping you over and making the hammock swing, “fuck, I didn’t think about that.”

You threw your head back giggling and JJ stopped to admire you for a moment before he was reminded of the pain shooting through him for being so turned on. His mouth finds your sweet spot below your jaw in no time, so familiar with the nooks and crannies of your skin. He sucked against the warm skin before continuing his assault down your body while his hands played with the strings of your bikini.

You desperately try to hold back your noises, knowing the Pogues would hear you, even if you knew JJ wouldn’t mind losing the bet if he was busy focusing on you. You feel his familiar smirk against your collarbone as your top slips from your chest, his hands sliding to the underside of your breasts as he encircles your nipple in his mouth. He leaves matching bruises to the ones on your neck and the faded ones lining your thighs, your body feels like it’s on fire like the blunt between your fingers.

“JJ.”

Your boyfriend hums against your bare waist, sending shocks of pleasure straight between your legs.

“Your new bike, JJ.”

You remind him why he should stop, begging in your mind that he’ll keep his lips close to you.

“Don’t need it.”

“J.”

“Baby, I don’t care.”

And like that, he slips your shorts and bikini bottoms off in one pull, his lips following behind and trailing kisses down your legs. You stamp out the spliff quickly, roughly gripping his blonde waves instead. JJ groans as you buck your body up to get closer to his hot breath that’s breathing over you. You nearly cry out as you feel him lick directly on your bundle of nerves, lips pressed against your mounds as he suckles on your clit.

“Fuck, I’ve missed you.”

He smiles watching you clamp around nothing when he pulls back, he starts to tongue at your weeping entrance, smiling as a wave of your sweetness slips out onto his chin with your first orgasm leaving you gasping for air.

“So wet, pretty girl.”

“God, J.”

You grip at his curls as he pushes you again until you can barely take anymore against your sensitive bud. JJ growls against your pink skin when you tug at his hair, pulling you up to meet his lips in a scorching kiss. You taste yourself on his tongue and feel the wetness on his chin, his thumbs circling movement nearly making you cum.

“J.”

“What baby? Tell me what you want.”

“Need you.”

He pushes two fingers into you hard and you bite his lips to hold back your scream of pleasure.

“Need me how, baby? Gotta tell me.”

“I need your cock, J, need you to fuck me.”

“Good girl.”

JJ’s swim trunks drop to the ground as soon as he kicks them off, the hammock swaying as you grip his shoulders, praying you wouldn’t fall off. Once the hammock settles, you let your legs fall open, feeling the blue-eyed boy’s hands against the underside of your thighs. You wrap your legs around him and feel him shuffle above you. You gasp when he presses against you, he’s so incredibly hard and you can feel his precum dribble from his swollen tip.

“JJ, please.”

“Patient, sweet girl.”

You both let out loud moans as he pushes himself into you, seeing stars when he fills you to the brim. You grip his soft locks, bated breathing escaping your lungs when he slowly pulls out only to ram back into you. JJ buried his face into the sweat covered skin of your neck when he felt his high coming on. It didn’t shock you as his hips jerked desperately against your body, especially after he’s been on edge for days.

“Fuck, I’m gonna cum, baby.”

“M ‘so close, J.”

“Okay, okay.”

He rams harder into your dripping center, your heart pounding in your chest as your overstimulated core was pushed closer to cumming a second time. You wrapped your legs around his waist, whimpering as he reached deeper into you until you cried out with your orgasm, JJ following behind you.

“J.”

“I got you, you’re okay.”

“Fuck.”

He kisses your skin as you come down for your staggering high, eyebrows pulled together and your eyes remaining tightly shut. JJ’s body goes limp against yours, tired out from such a strong orgasm. His hand leaves your body to reach under the hammock to grab the blanket stored there. The two of you lay, naked, in each other's arms as the sea breeze rustles over you and your slight haze fades away. Your boyfriend mumbles loving words as you slip into a quiet sleep.

“So, no bike for you?”

Is the first thing you hear as the sun shines onto your closed eyelids, JJ’s warm, bare body still pressed sweetly to yours. You glance over to see the Pogues smirking at you and the blonde wrapped around you.

“Fuck off, Cameron.”

[whumpersdump]

Project Rebirth - CH3: Storage

This chapter is heavily inspired by The Machine from @just-a-whumping-racoon-with-wifi (which is awesome, btw. Whumperflies each time I’ve read it). There is also a brief implication that such a thing exists in this work’s universe.

Also I should mention beforehand, the whumpee’s “youth” is mentioned by whumper, but they are not a minor.

[ Previous ] -- [ Masterlist ]

TW: forced intubation / loss of bodily autonomy /restraints / muzzle / blindfold / pet whump (institutionalized) / dehumanization / drugging (brief, though on the graphic side. Two sentences) / sensory deprivation / starvation (mentioned, non-graphic) / intimate whumper (I think?)

Subject One / Whumpee’s POV. Whumper and his staff need time to prepare the program based on the evaluation. During the short second stage of the Project, the pet has to be stored away. Of course, with pets, no time can be wasted. So, Whumper has found a use for it. Instead of being locked in cage for days, Subject One will be locked in their mind.

Whumpee trashed against the restraints as whumper pushed them through the hall. The jacket was looser now, they basked in the extra breathing room. Toby had given them something that made their muscles all weak, but they fought that like they fought everything else.

They hadn’t found a way out yet, but it wouldn’t take long. They were used to straitjackets and restraints. Drugs, not so much. Most trainers didn’t have the budget. Most trainers had never seen someone like them. Whumper thought he he could break them, but whatever horrors he inflicted, Whumpee would find a way to let it fuel their rage instead.

When Toby split off into another hall, that only became easier. Now they wouldn’t have to listen to the feigned concern in his voice. And the name. Subject One. They had many names over the years. It was the only thing they submitted to. They didn’t have their own anyway. Not that they remembered. This one sucked the most. It wasn’t even a name. Toby never lied, he was too much of a goody-two-shoes for that. They were getting a new one.

Whumper opened a door to a white room. He clicked Whumpee in place and looked down on them. “This’ll only be for a few days, so we won’t bother with food. Use your time wisely,” he warned. “Thoughts can help the learning process a lot.”

He leaned down and began re-tightening all the restraints and the jacket. They were tighter than before. Whumpee couldn’t move at all anymore when Whumper was finished. They’d still come out on top, though. Just watch. 30 escapes, they could make 31.

Whumper turned on a camera. “Don’t mind this,” he said. “You are a test subject after all.” He cleared his throat and faced the camera. “Welcome to stage 2,” he told it. He went on about the specifics and all the reasons he wasn’t talking about them for ages, before turning back to Whumpee.

“Now, usually we don’t put subjects as young as Subject One on tier 3. Normally younger pets respond well enough to the large amount of restraints, and the impressiveness of this operation. It’s not my favorite method, but it’s rather easy to replace their youthful defiance with fear.”

Stupid to think the two can’t exist at the same time, Whumpee thought.

Whumper continued. “With this one, that would cause the opposite effect. This one we’re cutting slack. For the duration of their storage here they can fight as much as they like. We’re prepared for it. No punishments, no threats. This one will need to get worse before they can get better.”

He pushed a button on the wall.

Whumpee’s pulse skyrocketed as they began to tilt backward. “First, the earpieces.” He pushed two blobs into Whumpee’s ears that—despite their small size—blocked any and all sound. Then, he removed the muzzle.

Bad choice. Whumpee screamed and cursed as loud as they could. Sure, Whumper wanted them to. They didn’t care. They always fought. That way they could never be tricked into doing the opposite. They never heard themselves struggle, but Whumper did. That didn’t stop him though. He smiled, turned to the camera and continued speaking until he turned back around holding a small tube.

Whumpee shuddered, understanding what was about to happen. What was about to be taken.

It wasn’t the first time they would be trapped like this. With their chest rising and falling at someone else’s commands. There was a trainer once. A private one. Like all the others, it didn’t work. Or… it didn’t last. They’d been trapped for months, multiple times. No wonder they almost broke. They had a talent, though. They could build themselves back up. It only took them a week last time. They could do it again.

The intrusion came through their nose, first. They fought it. The foreign object whumper plunged down. Every second of it they gagged, and chocked, and pushed against it. It didn’t budge, they knew it wouldn’t. When was in, Whumper squeezed their cheek and reached for a small device Whumpee didn’t recognize. It pricked into their neck, and fastened like their collar did.

Whumpee couldn’t move their head because of all the straps, but they still caught a glimpse of the clear liquid that sunk through small tubes, toward their neck. Their body went limp, for the second tube. Whumpee couldn’t fight it. The flow toward their neck had stopped already, but it hadn’t worn off yet. Whumper pushed it down their throat effortlessly. But the air didn’t come yet. Whumpee had to live off tiny breaths for what felt like eternity.

Whumper held the tube up and picked a strange muzzle off a table. It had two straps at the back, and and two holes in the middle. The edges were lined with a soft plastic. Whumper weaved the largest tube through one of the holes, followed by the smaller one in their nose, and pushed the muzzle against whumpees face. He buckled the two straps. One around the back of their head, and one over the top.

Their breath returned, no thanks to their own efforts. Whumpee’s chest moved up and down, along with the rhythm the object in their throat demanded. There was no defying it. They tried. All they managed to do was tire themselves. Nonetheless, they kept fighting. Even if it didn’t work, they would never be so weak as to stop. They didn’t care Whumper didn’t mind. They fought. They always did.

Whumper leaned over them with a mask. It had a pre-shaped top—that would go over their head—and a strap at the bottom. The last part, Whumpee read of his lips. Which was likely the reason for said mask. The tried to turn their head, but they were stuck. Stuck under the restraints, the foreign rhythm in their breath. Whumper’s lips shushed them, though Whumpee couldn’t hear the sound.

The mask went over their eyes, perfectly molded to their face. It forced them shut with a dull pressure. Even blinded by the mask itself, they couldn’t open them. The top of the mask fit perfectly on top of their head. It couldn’t shift down. The bottom strap clicked to the other ones that lied in their neck. It couldn’t shift at all.

They couldn’t see, hear, feel. They didn’t have to worry about breathing. Thoughts, Whumper had talked about. No. They wouldn’t be alone with their thoughts. They were stronger than that. Breathing. Resisting. That was what they did.

They fell asleep. That was their mistake. Whumper had kept them up for days at a time with all the tests and questions. Now they fell asleep, and their breath complied. With Whumper. They fought. Until every muscle went sore, they fought. Until everything hurt, they fought. They lost their breath for a second when they shifted the tube. Over and over. Until a pressure on the muzzle pushed it in the right position, and they couldn’t fight it again.

Even worse, their stomach rumbled. They hadn’t eaten in days even before this situation, and this didn’t help. They fought against the feeling like they fought everything else, but it didn’t end. So they ignored it. This was temporary. Whatever the real procedures behind this program of Whumper’s were, they would find a way to come out on top.

Though Whumpee had no way to track the time, their stomach told them they had been there for a while, after they woke up for the second time. Memories floated through their head. Memories the trainers had tried so desperately to extinguish. Memories Whumpee had tried so desperately to extinguish. Memories that made them shake even if their entire outfit was designed to prohibit it.

They couldn’t feel anything other than the fabric of the jacket over their body. Even that feeling faded. Touch. That was what had made Toby so annoying. He kept touching them. Little squeezes, or a stroke over their head. Whumpee wanted to gag at the thought, but in the past month they’d gotten used to it. Now, they missed it.

The silence made it worse. They cried, they whimpered, they sobbed. But heard none of it. They’d never hidden their fears. Never had to. They chose fight. Always. No matter what happened, they would fight. They would always end back up into someone’s hands, but still, they fought. This though, was getting harder and harder to fight with each second that passed.

They were tired, full in their head. Their mind was loud, their body rigid and tense. They needed calm, they wanted calm. They craved calm.

“Subject One,” a voice in their head said. No, that wasn’t right. It was in their ears. The earpieces. The voice came through again, freeing them from days of utter and complete silence. “Tonight is your turn to be Reborn.”

Whumpee shuddered, then fought.

~

Taglist, I guess?

@suspicious-whumping-egg @just-a-whumping-racoon-with-wifi

[slowly-writing]

Alone

Natasha Romanoff x Daughter!Reader

Requested by anon: hey, could you write a natasha x daughter!reader where the daughter is really depressed and maybe she ods on pills or something and after the daughter ends up telling nat about her feelings (if that doesn’t make you feel uncomfy) thanks! i love your writing btw😁

Word count: 3.1k (longest one yet)

Trigger Warning: mentions of depression and suicide attempts. Please do not read this if it will trigger you

You trudge through the school hallway before first period, rubbing your eyes and trying your best to shut out the world. All you can see are the smiling faces of your classmates and it makes your heart sink even further down in your chest. All you want is to be happy like them, but all you have is forced laughs and fake smiles. You’re tired. Tired of pretending to be okay. Tired of feeling the way you do. Tired of being here. Nobody notices that though, you know how to hide your emotions well, maybe too well. You learned from the best, you don’t think you’ve ever seen your mom cry, so you won’t let anyone see you cry either.

You tug on the sleeves of your hoodie for what has to be the tenth time in as many minutes, pulling them down over your hands and not daring to let your wrists be seen. You let yourself be absorbed in the music blasting through your headphones as you get your books from your locker. A tapping on your shoulder pulls you back into reality. When you turn around Peter is standing behind you smiling, and you feel a small bit of joy and the sight of the sweet boy.

“Hey, y/n! What’s up? Are you doing okay?” Peter asks in that happy tone he always seems to have.

“Nothing much, and yeah. I’m good,” you say with a shrug, shoving the last of your books in your bag as the two of you head off towards class.

“Are you sure? You seem sad,” Peter says, softer this time. His smile is still there and you think maybe you could talk to him, but decide against it as you meet his eyes. His eyes, while full of joy, also show how tired he is. He’s living with his own secrets, and you won’t burden him with yours as well.

“Yeah Pete, I’m good. I just stayed up late studying,” you brush off his concern with a lie, not thinking much of it, it seems lying is all you do these days.

xxxxx

“Hey kid, how was school?” Tony’s voice startles you as you walk into the kitchen. You expected everyone to be off training but when you glance to your right you see half the team sitting at the table.

“Uh, it was fine,” you mumble, forcing a smile onto your face and walking to the fridge to avoid eye contact. The conversation behind you picks up again and you let out a sigh of relief, exhausted at the mere thought of putting on an act.

“Do you want to do something? We were saying it’s been a while since we’ve had a family day,” Steve says and you can tell he’s smiling before you even turn around.

“We were thinking about having a movie night,” your mom suggests and you take a breath, knowing she’ll see even the tiniest hint of a lie if you’re not careful.

“I can’t. I have a big test Monday, I’m going to be studying most of the weekend,” you tell them and you see the wheels turning in your mom’s head.

“I thought you had a big test this week?” Clint questions and you momentarily panic, you’ll need a new excuse soon.

“It’s Junior year, I guess they’re all big tests,” you shrug, seeing your escape and making your way towards the door, “have fun with your movie night.”

xxxxx

You’re sitting in your room a while later staring at nothing in particular when there’s a knock on your door. You snap out of your daze, calling for the person to come in.

“Hey, I didn’t see you in class today. I just wanted to check in,” Wanda says as she sits on your bed next to you, but leaving enough space to make sure you don’t feel cornered, she knows how nervous it makes you.

“Oh yeah, I wasn’t feeling chemistry today. I hid out in the library,” you say and she nods. You think the conversation is over but when you look over at her she has her brows furrowed.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” you go to brush her off again but she stops you, “don’t lie and say you’re fine, I know you’re not. These last few days, few months really, you’ve got this cloud around you. I can tell you’re sad, and so little of the old y/n shines through. Your emotions, the things you’re feeling, I feel it all and it’s like you’re screaming at me to help you. It’s like you’re disappearing right before my eyes, and I’m the only one who can see it. I just don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to help.”

You stop for a moment. You’ve stumbled into another perfect opportunity. Wanda is sitting next to you, practically begging you to open up to her, and you almost do. Then you remember everything she’s been through. You remember the way she acted when she first moved in. She was barely a shell of a girl, her eyes held a sadness nobody should have to endure and she was so scared. She’s finally begun to be happy here, and you won’t be the one to drag her down again.

“It’s just school. I’ve got college applications coming up, I guess it’s stressing me out. You don’t have to worry about it, I’ll be okay,” you plaster a smile across your face and she sighs. She glances around your room, looking for an excuse to stay when she spots your guitar.

“You know I’ve always wanted to learn to play. Maybe you can teach me sometime?” you follow her gaze and pick up the instrument, brushing off the dust it’s collected from sitting untouched for months.

“Take it,” you hold it out towards her and she shakes her head.

“Y/n, I couldn’t-”

“Just take it. Someone should play it,” she stares at you and you nod. She gently takes it from your hand and you smile at her.

“You’ll talk to me, if you need me. Right?” Wanda pauses at your door.

“I’ll be okay,” you say, not quite lying but it seems to satisfy her and she gently closes the door behind her.

xxxxx

You look at the stack of papers on your desk, a list of everyone you’d want to say goodbye to. There’s almost a dozen notes all addressed to different members of your family, apologizing to them and explaining why you’re doing what you’re doing. You started out looking for a reason to stay but the more you stare at the notes the more you see how everyone has someone. Everyone except you.  

Steve finally got Bucky back, and they understand each other in ways you could never dream of. All you could ever be to them was an annoyance. Some kid from a time they didn’t understand.

Bruce and Tony, the science bros as you’ve been calling them since you were little, will keep on experimenting and inventing. They don’t need you wandering in and screwing up their lab equipment.

Thor has Valkyrie, and they’ve both been off-world for months anyway. They have their own people to watch over. They don’t need to worry about you too.

Wanda and Peter will take care of each other. Neither of them are strangers to loss, and they’ll pull each other through. All the great friendships come in pairs anyway, you’d just be a glorified third wheel.

Clint has a whole family to watch out for, and you’re nothing but a bad influence for his kids. A cautionary tale about paths not to go down. You know he’ll take care of your mom, they were family long before you came along. She’ll be better off without you to look out for. She’s the world’s greatest spy, she doesn’t need to be distracted trying to make sure you don’t screw up.

Everyone here will be fine without you, you can hear them all laughing in the common room right now, and you nod to yourself. It’s time.

You leave the light in your bedroom on as you step into the hallway. You close the door silently and glance to your right. The couches are crammed with everyone laughing and smiling in the dimly lit room. They fit perfectly, they don’t have room for one more. So you turn to your left, you can’t sneak into the elevator without one of them noticing you, so you take the stairs up one floor to the med wing.

You enter the room that held all the medicines, they never locked anything up here. You wonder if they’ll regret that as you look through the bottles of pills. You grab a bottle that’s labeled Benzo-something and decide it will work. You grab a bottle of water from the fridge, and make your way to the elevators. You tell Jarvis to take you to the roof and step out into the cool evening air a few moments later.

You take one last look at the New York skyline. You’ve always loved this view. You take off your jacket, and for the first time in months feel the cool breeze on your scarred arms. After a few moments you step back, sitting criss cross on the floor and opening the pill bottle. You pour a few tablets into your hand, silently wondering how many it will take to do the job. You tip the bottle again, pouring until your hand is nearly full, and decide that’ll be enough.

You’re calmer than you thought you’d be as you bring your hand to your mouth. You expected to cry, to feel scared, but you don’t. All you feel is the slight discomfort as you force the pills down your throat, then you just feel numb.

xxxxx

“Do you think we could convince y/n to join us?” Bucky wonders aloud as Steve pauses the movie.

“She’s been really down lately, it’s starting to worry me,” Tony says softly, that tone of voice is rare for him, and everyone agrees.

“She always wears these giant hoodies at school, even though it’s almost summer, like she’s trying to hide. She flinches away if you try to touch her arms. Whenever I ask if she’s okay she just makes up some lame excuse, I never want to push but I think maybe I should,” Peter joins in and a heavy silence falls over the room.

“I’m gonna go try and talk to her,” Nat says softly as she walks the few yards to your room. They all watch as she knocks a few times, entering when she hears no reply. There’s a few beats of silence before anything happens. “No no no.”

Your mom’s voice is barely above a whisper but they all know it’s bad. When she steps back out she’s holding a stack of papers. The look on her face is one that none of them have seen before, pure terror.

“What is that?” Steve asks as everyone jumps into action rushing to her side, but she can’t even form the words to tell them. Clint gently pulls the papers from her hands and skims through them. He swallows hard, trying to choke down the bile rising in his throat as everyone stares at him, waiting for an answer as to what could be found in a 16 year old’s room that scared the Black Widow.

“They’re suicide notes. There’s one addressed to each of us,” Clint says softly as Natasha grabs them back, rereading the words she knows will haunt her for the rest of her life. There’s a moment of silence before everyone starts talking at once.

“Where did she even go?” Wanda is the first to speak up, tears already streaming down her face.

“It’s a secure facility, she didn’t just disappear!” Tony says quickly, staring off into the distance as he runs through the short list of places you could be hiding.

“Everyone spread out and start looking!” Steve snaps everyone into action and they all scatter.

Nat is left alone, still frozen in front of your bedroom door as everyone fans out. She stares at the papers in her hands before she realizes where you are. She drops the papers, letting them flutter to the floor as she takes off towards the staircase. She takes the steps two at a time, making it to the roof in record time. You flinch as the door slams open and lazily roll over from where you’ve laid on the floor to look towards the sound.

“Oh, hi mom,” you flail your arm towards her in an attempted wave and she gasps at the state you’re in. Both the angry red marks covering your arms and the fact that you’re barely conscious scare her more than she thought possible. She can hear your breathing, ragged and slow and she feels more tears fall from her eyes.

“Y/n what did you do?” she yells, running towards you and picking up the mostly empty bottle of medicine.

“I want to go away,” you mumble, eyes drooping closed.

“No no no, you’re not going anywhere. Stay with me, love. I’ve got you, mommy’s here,” Natasha says as she lifts you into her arms. You groan as she jostles you, but you don’t protest anymore as you slowly drift off.

xxxxx

You hear a steady beeping and whispers as you wake up. You blink your eyes open and see a room packed full of people, all in various states of distress.

“Why would she do that? Why would…” Peter trails off. He has tear tracks down his face and his eyes are red. Tony’s sitting on his left with his arm around Peter.

“I don’t know kid,” he says softly, sniffling a bit.

“I knew she wasn’t okay. I should’ve done more,” Wanda’s eyes are trained on the floor and her face is emotionless as she sits on Peter’s right, gripping his hand tightly.

“You couldn’t have known-” Steve tries to reassure her but she cuts him off, standing up quickly and drawing all attention to her.

“I did know! I could feel how sad she was! What good are these stupid powers if I can’t do a fucking thing to help my best friend? I failed her,” Wanda now has tears streaming down her face and you can feel yourself tearing up.

“I didn’t want your help,” your voice is soft and scratchy, but everyone hears you and all eyes in the room quickly turn to you. “I didn’t want you to know that I was struggling. I didn’t want anyone to know. It’s not your job to take care of me.”

“Yes it is,” your mom says quickly. You try to argue but she raises a hand, causing you to stop. “I know you want to be independent but we’re your family. Of course it’s our job to take care of you. Everyone needs some help sometimes and you have every right to ask for it.”

“I’m not worth it. You don’t need me here,” you say with a shrug, wiping the tears of frustration from your eyes. You ball your hands into fists and stare down at them, refusing to look at your family.

“Yes we do. We all need you here and don’t think for a single fucking second that we don’t,” your moms voice cracks and you finally look up at her, seeing the tears streaming down her face.

“We all need you. Who else is gonna come remind me that sleep is a thing when I’ve been down in the lab for 28 hours straight?” Tony asks with a small smile.

“Yeah! And without you I would’ve flunked Calculus last semester, May would’ve killed me,” Peter says and immediately winces at his choice of words.

“She really would have,” you say, smiling a bit at his attempt to cheer you up.

“We all need you, y/n. You’re my best friend, the person I love most in this world. You’re all I have left, I don't know what I would do without you. You’re the only reason I made it through Pietro’s death. I never thought I’d be okay but you made sure I was. I’m sorry I couldn’t do the same for you,” Wanda sits on your left side, gently taking your hand.

“I’m sorry,” you whisper as the tears start rolling down your face. You look towards your mom again, hoping if she understands why you did it, she’ll forgive you. “I thought it’d be better for you all if I was gone. I’m just so sad all the time. Nothing I used to like is fun anymore and I just want everything to stop. It’s too much. I kept pushing through, but every reason to keep living just kept going away. You all have someone more important to you than me, so why should I stay? You’d all be okay.”

Your mom lets out a shaky breath as she brushes the hair out of your eyes, resting her hand against your cheek, “love, I would never be okay without you. When I brought you home all those years ago, you changed my life. I have never loved anyone as much as I love you, and I’m so sorry I didn’t show you that. I will always be here for you, everyone in this room is always here for you. Please, please tell us next time you need help.”

You’re both sobbing at this point and you throw yourself into her arms, apologizing over and over and begging her to forgive you.

“I’m so sorry. I-I didn’t mean to hurt you. I didn’t think anyone would care. I’m sorry,” your words draw tears from everyone in the room.

“I know you didn’t want to hurt us, love. It’s gonna be okay. We’re gonna get you some help, okay?” your mom reassures you and you nod, burrowing deeper into her arms. Your whole family watches the interaction silently, wiping tears from their eyes and vowing to never let you feel this alone again.

tag list: @rvgrsbrns @rororo06 @prizmix-and-friends @m19friend @worlds-in-words @5aftermidnight @riotmaximoff

[bnhablessings]

okay how about a bakugou angst scenario where his s/o gets hurt in training. he’s either very angry (more than usual) or just quiet because of how distraught he is. could you even write the reaction of him visiting his s/o at the hospital?

I may have cried writing this. I was in such a downer mood that it played perfectly into my writing. This definitely turned into a one-shot btw. I hope you enjoy this, Lovely!

I totally was thinking of Avatar the last air bender when I thought of what quirk she could have btw

Bakugou Katsuki x Female!Reader

Warnings: Angst (so much angst- like grab a tub of ice-cream, but I am a baby so idk), fluffy ending, mentions of blood/violence, talks of death, grammar mistakes probably

Words: 2,440

 Everyone knew that you trained frequently with Todoroki and Midoriya. It was how you became stronger and Todoroki didn’t mind helping you out (after Izuku talked him into it). You were grateful for every opportunity you had to train with them. It worked well as Midoriya always managed to help you work on your quirk.

Your quirk was a rather simple one. It was Earth Manipulation. It’s just as the quirk name suggests, you can manipulate the Earth. The only condition was that your feet had to be bare in order to feel the Earth under you.

It made it a challenge for the two who constantly trained with you and vice versa. The only downside was your boyfriend, Bakugou, who hated the idea of you training with them. Of course, he couldn’t stop you.

Which eventually leads to a dreadful night that will forever be etched into his brain.

~*~

For once, Bakugou can’t go to sleep no matter how hard he tried. He can’t figure out why. His hand rests against his phone and his body starts to fill with anxiety and anger since he has no idea why he’s feeling like this.

Eventually, it hits him. He checks his phone and to his very strong annoyance, it’s past 9:30. He should be asleep right now and you usually would’ve given him one of your annoying (but lovely) goodnight texts. That’s why he couldn’t sleep. You didn’t say goodnight.

Could you possibly still be training?

The thought made him angrier. He told you numerous amounts of times that sleep is important (his sleep). It pissed him off that you were spending so much time with Icy-Hot and fucking Deku. Just the idea of them with you right now is sending his blood boiling, more than usual, anyway.

He’ll have to give you a piece of his mind later is what he is thinking. Anything to get rid of the annoying worry that seems to bubble up in the pit of his stomach.

He makes it close to the training grounds. It feels rather cold but he brushes it off, feeling even more concerned for you now. When he is near, he is surprised to not hear any sounds of fighting. His ears instead pick up concerned hushed voices.

As soon as he steps foot in the training ground his whole body freezes at what he sees. The scene before him sends his heart racing in the worst way possible. His blood feels like it froze, at his anger almost dissipates.

Why are you on the ground?

Why is Recovery Girl here?

Everything feels like it’s going in slow-motion as he tries to make his suddenly heavy feet move. Aizawa is the first person to notice his presence. He is quick to make the two boys who were training with you go to him.

The last thing he needs is for Bakugou to see you in such a… state like this.

“Kaachan- I- She-“ Midoriya is cut off from Bakugou’s harsh glare as he suddenly tries to look past his two classmates.

“What the fuck happened?!” He shouts.

The concern is so obvious in his voice and it almost makes Midoriya want to cry.  He tries to explain again after taking a deep breath.

“(Name), had a serious accident-“

Midoriya is pushed out of the way as soon as those words leave his lips. Todoroki is quick to try and stop him from venturing further but it was futile once the ash-blond heard your name and accident. Midoriya and Todoroki trail after the angry boy in hopes they’ll stop him but it’s too late.

He sees your body on the ground. Your eyes are closed. Blood is oozing out of the back of your head. Your whole body is limp. Recovery Girl looks saddened. It feels like he can’t breathe. Why? What happened? Why are you like that?

“Bakugou, Todoroki, Midoriya, head back to the dorms,” Aizawa demands.

“Fuck that- Like I’m going back. Tell me what happened right now! Why aren’t you helping her?!” Bakugou is shouting at this point.

Before Aizawa can explain or command him yet again to leave. A new voice filled with sympathy speaks.

“Young Bakugou, now is not the time to be shouting. I’m escorting Young (Name) to the hospital with Recovery Girl. Listen to Aizawa. We’ll keep you and your class updated as needed,” All Might says.

He and Aizawa don’t allow Bakugou to think about it. They are quick to make sure you are securely in All Might’s arms with Recovery Girl. Just like that, he was gone.

Bakugou’s mind goes blank before the anger hits him out of nowhere. He turns around and glares at your training comrades. Aizawa, thankfully, predicted this would happen and ends up subduing the poor angry boy.

~*~

The first day without your presence makes everyone wary. The whole atmosphere is tense and fragile. The wrong word or action feels like it could make the one who is causing the tension explode. Class 1-A is at a loss on how to approach him.

It’s obvious that since your… incident… last evening, that he has not been in a great mood. Scratch that, it is obvious that he is in the worst mood possible. It even has Aizawa and the other teachers more concerned than usual. The class has no idea what happened. All they do know is that you simply went to your usual training session with Todoroki and Midoriya. They decide to keep their distance and give him time the first day.

The second day has everyone on edge. Bakugou hasn’t said a single word but the distinct popping sounds from his quirk are heard every now and then throughout the day.

The third day someone finally speaks to him. It was a simple question but one that made the popping sounds grow and Bakugou’s expression to become mixed.

“Bakubro, what happened with (Name)?” It was Kirishima who asked.

Of course, fucking Deku and Icy-Hot explained to him what happened and god… Just imagining what happened the way they described it is killing him. The crackling noises from his palms cease to be and he says absolutely nothing.

He focuses his stare as he thinks about you. Allowing what he did not witness to fill his head. That is until he hears Midoriya and Todoroki speak up in what they call a “whisper”. He almost scoffs but he doesn’t. He doesn’t have the energy to. Instead, the images in his head become more vivid from their words.

“We were training but (Name) wanted to go a little longer than usual, which was odd,” Todoroki murmurs.

Midoriya nods and continues, “We can tell she was getting tired but she kept pushing and begging so we continued. Aizawa, of course, was there ready to kick us out when she unleashed one of her new moves.”

“It appeared it didn’t go to plan. One of the huge boulders she produced from the Earth didn’t go the way she wanted- And well, (Name) started to panic,” Todoroki states his eyes falling down as he recalls the memory.

Midoriya nods his head and frowns. “I- Uh, I don’t know exactly what happened but within her panic, she lost control of her quirk? There were rubble and stone everywhere coming from the ground but… Then we just saw her on the ground. A large piece of stone seemed to land on her… We should’ve stopped her. Told her to wait until she had enough strength to try that move,” Midoriya says his voice cracking a few times from the guilt.

Bakugou stands abruptly. The desk is pushed away and the chair fell to the ground. His breathing is heavy but he says absolutely nothing as he walks out of the room. He knows it’s not their fault. He knows this but it’s so hard not to blame them. Not to blame you.

He wishes he could just yell at you. Call you a dumbass and see your embarrassed expression from that or hear a snarky retort back. Just anything. He didn’t think he can love someone as much as he does you but it is certainly hitting him hard right now.

“Young Bakugou, I- You have been granted permission to see Young (Name). Would you like to come with Mr. Aizawa and myself?” All Might asks.

What a dumb fucking question Bakugou thinks to himself.

~*~

“I have to warn you. The doctor-“ Bakugou doesn’t allow All Might to speak as he opens the door.

It slams against the wall and immediately Aizawa is glaring at the male. However, it softens upon seeing Bakugou trying to fight any emotions on his face. The only give-away to Bakugou’s grief is the small tremble of his lip.

He goes to take a seat beside your laying figure. His hand immediately reaching for your rather limp one. It feels slightly cold to him and that bothers him greatly.

“Young Bakugou, as I was saying before. This may be terrible to look at since it appears she is sleeping but as I explained in the car she is in a coma. The doctor said they managed to get the swelling from the brain trauma down but because she is in a coma there is a chance that she may not wake up,” All Might finally says what he’s been meaning to.

Bakugou’s hand grips yours even tighter but in a firm voice he states, “She’s going to wake up.”

If you don’t, he won’t know what to do.

~*~

Day by day got harder as you showed no signs of waking up. He kept to himself as always but his shouting has been to a low minimum. Only glares, small growls, and the popping sound of his quirk indicate his low mood, which happened to be all the time now.

Each day he would get with one of the teachers to visit you at the hospital. They allowed him a small time to have some privacy with you and every time he would allow his strong façade to drop. Only in front of your unmoving body as he begs you to wake up or keep staying strong.

The one day he nearly had a heart attack visiting you was the day he caught Midoriya and Todorki visiting you. They had flowers and a card with them and looked dressed up but that seemed to piss him off more. He ignored every logical thought in his head as he hurled towards the two before they can dare open the door to your room.

Aizawa who escorted Bakugou this time got lucky he reacted just as fast and erased Bakugou’s quirk as his hand neared the boys’ faces.

When nothing happened, the two look surprised and glance at their teacher.

“Bakugou, if you are going to act like that you will no longer be allowed to visit (Last Name).”

Just the thought kills him. He bites his tongue as he glares at the two who figured out why he is so angry. Why he finally broke and nearly exploded their faces off. However, none of them had time to bring it up as a loud and fast beeping sound comes from your room.

A few nurses push through to the room and a doctor comes inside and Aizawa knowing the drill forces all of the boys to leave to the waiting room.

Bakugou hates the waiting as his heart beats incredibly fast.

“We do feel guilty but we aren’t the ones that caused her harm. It was an accident from her pushing too hard,” Todoroki broke the silence.

Midoriya can only nod.

That was the only day he couldn’t see you do to the fact you stopped breathing for a few minutes.

~*~

“(Name), it’s been a whole month without you. You gotta wake up soon. I don’t know how much longer I can fucking handle this shit,” Bakugou whispers into the skin of your forehead before placing a kiss on it.

He continues to vent to you as this has been his only outlet.

“I know I don’t say it a lot. I know I can be a complete dick but I do love you. This hurts and you’re the only one I can truly rely on. The other idiots can never take your place. I need my dumbass.”

He stops talking to take in much needed shaky breath before placing another kiss on your forehead.

The door opens and All Might and Aizawa walk in. “Ready to go Young Bakugou?”

No. He’s really not. He never wants to leave. It’s been an absolute nightmare. His heart aches whenever he sees you in this damn bed but he doesn’t voice it to anyone. He hates it when his lip trembles but it always seems to when he tries to show how he’s not feeling about you.

He stands up being careful with your hand, ready to place it at your side, and just as he’s ready to let go of it, you squeeze it. Bakugou stops. It was the lightest squeeze ever but it was the first time you have done it.

The teachers notice the sudden change in him and watch with alertness. Bakugou stares down at you and sits back down as soon as your eyes open.

“I’m going to get the doctor,” All Might quickly states as Aizawa goes to your other side.

You are staring straight up and trying to speak when Aizawa shushes you. The doctor comes in just in time to say, “Miss (Last Name), try not to worry-“

Bakugou blocks it out as he can no longer fight the tears. You’re awake.

~*~

This time Bakugou heads towards the hospital without a scowl. A teacher should already be there helping with physical therapy and such but by the time he gets there, you should be done.

He’s on time as Midnight helps you gently lay down on the bed. She nods at Bakugou before leaving to give you both a few minutes of privacy.

Ever since you woke up, Bakugou has been more affectionate. It’s odd but you can sense the constant worry he has for you. A smile appears on your face and without thinking you say, “I love you too.”

He pauses and looks puzzled.

“I don’t remember much but I heard you. I heard you constantly telling me that I will wake up, that you love me, that I’m your dumbass,” You say gently.

His lips tremble once more and all he can manage to say is, “I need you more than you know, Dumbass.”

[hermannsthumb]

star crossed lovers and curses? TYSM for writing these btw I love your writing

64. Star Crossed Lovers & 98. Curses

from fanfiction trope mashup here

ANOTHER 2 YR OLD PROMPT….this concept seems sufficiently fairy tale enough for a little Mermay, perhaps 👁👁

so like. this got a lot longer than I intended because I was having so much fun with it. OH WELL

———————-

It was a real slap in the face–Newt has to admit–for the institute to deny him funding for this one. Ten years of thorough, groundbreaking, devoted research–ten years of PhD after PhD–ten years of no vacations, or weekends off, or even dating–Newt just assumed all he’d have to do was waltz into his supervisor’s office and they’d shell out however much he requested, no questions asked. That’s how it’s always been.

And yet here he is now, solo-manning a rented skipper with rented diving gear and a backpack full of disposable waterproof cameras, sunburned and dehydrated and miserable, all just because–

(“It’s stupid?” he said. “You think my idea is stupid?”

“With all due respect, Dr. Geiszler,” his supervisor said, not even pretending to be apologetic about it, “yes. We’re not going to pay for you to chase after the Loch Ness Monster.”

“That’s in Scotland!” Newt shouted, and then Newt started shouting some more, and he maybe had to be escorted back to his lab, but he wasn’t fired, at least, and the next day he cashed in ten years’ worth of hard-earned vacation and declared he’d be fucking off to the coast to pursue a completely legitimate doctorate in crypto-marine-zoology. Or whatever it’s called. He’ll worry about the name once he gets it.)

Two weeks into his spite-fueled expedition in the middle of the fucking ocean, Newt begins to wonder if this isn’t a mistake. He’s running low on food, for one thing, and what little fishing he learned as a Boy Scout can only take him so far. For another, it’s really hard to do this sort of work by himself. Though Newt usually goes solo for shorter expeditions, he’s used to having an intern or two tag along to help him take pictures on longer ones like this–or at the very least, provide enough conversation to keep him from going nuts.

But the biggest indicator so far that this is one giant waste of time is the fact that in the course of those two weeks at sea, Newt hasn’t found one single, solitary shred of evidence. No giant squid tentacles. No sea monster humps rising from the waves. No mermaid tails. He hasn’t even seen a shark fin, for God’s sake. Just endless, deep, blue.

Starting to thing this might be career suicide, Newt writes in his field journal on the fifteenth day. 

And then his boat is capsized.

Well, not really. His boat is almost capsized. Low in the list of Newt’s priorities for trip preparation–so low, in fact, it came in after pack razors and do laundry–was check weather report. It just didn’t seem important at the time, you know? He had other shit on his mind. It’s why the storm takes him by complete surprise.

Newt woke at dawn today to the sound of rain tapping lightly on the roof above his cramped quarters. The drizzle quickly became a thunderstorm. The thunderstorm quickly became–well, whatever this is. Waves smacking against the sides of the boat. Water sloshing onto the deck. A perfectly good cup of French press coffee upended all over Newt’s only map. 

His boat isn’t capsized, but it gives a great, shuddering jerk that sends Newt sprawling to the wood planks and grasping for anything to steady himself–his bedposts, the ruined map, a chair leg–and a great flood of water rushing in. Newt manages to scramble up in time for his jeans to spare being soaked. (He probably should’ve packed more than one pair.)

It’s at this moment Newt finally allows himself to panic a little.

“Fuck,” he hisses. “Shit. Okay, fuck. This is–” Another shuddering, wood-creaking jerk of his boat. Newt takes a few sloshing to the door and forces it open against the wind.

Iron-grey sea to his left; to his right; behind him; in front of him. The waves are angrier than anything Newt remembers from Boy Scouts. He flips up the hood of his rain jacket and stumbles out into the gale to lower the sails, or weigh down the ship, or something, anything to just–

There’s something pale bobbing out in the ocean some thirty feet away from his boat. A head, Newt realizes, a human head, a human head attached to shoulders, and his shock mingles with horror because oh, God, it’s a person! Their boat must’ve been wrecked by the storm–or they must’ve been thrown overboard–or both, Newt has to do something.

He cups his hands around his mouth and bellows in the direction of the mysterious bobbing head. “Do you need help?!”

Nothing. 

“Hello!” Newt shouts.

Whoever it is suddenly disappears under the water; without thinking, with nothing on his mind but saving the drowning stranger, Newt shucks off his leather jacket and dives under.

At least this time, he knows it’s a mistake.

Newt is warm when he wakes up. Warm, and dry. The sun is shining overhead; the boat is still; the waves are calm. There’s someone touching his neck–a hand, damp, and oddly chilly.

“Stop,” he mumbles, and swats them away. He’s trying to sleep.

The hand returns. “Stop,” Newt says, and swats again, more. viciously this time.

He hears a small, offended huff. The hand retracts, though not before depositing his glasses on the bridge of his nose and swatting back in return. “Well, I’m terribly sorry for attempting to return these,” someone says.

Newt’s eyes shoot open.

There’s a man above him–sharp-cheeked, brown-eyed, shirtless and pale, his short, dark hair plastered to his head like he’s just gone swimming. He’s scowling at Newt. There’s something familiar about him that Newt can’t quite put his finger on–until he does. “You were in the water!” he says, sitting straight up. “You were drowning!” He wracks his brains for the memory of that morning: a head bobbing in the water, Newt going overboard, the cold, dark rush of the ocean, his frantic, wheeling arms– “I saved you!”

“Not exactly,” the man says.

No, that’s not right. There was the dark rush of the ocean, his wheeling arms, and then two cold, sturdy hands pulling him up, onto his boat, pressing down on his chest, a cold, wide mouth breathing air into his lungs. “Holy shit,” Newt says. “You saved me! What were you even doing out here, dude? It’s–”

Then Newt looks down.

The head leads to shoulders, which leads to a torso, but below that– “Holy shit,” Newt squeaks again, and then, at a loss for anything else to say, “Can I take a picture of you for my field journal?”

Where there should be hips and thighs and calves below the waist is nothing but a long fish tail, curving and shimmering and brightly-hued enough to make Newt’s eyes sting. It tapers into two large, translucent, fanning fins, the left of which is misshapen, almost as if it were wounded somehow. The overall effect is gorgeous, frankly. Newt’s never seen anything so gorgeous in his entire life.

“No,” the man–merman–says. “Goodbye.”

He begins to wriggle to the edge of the boat. Newt reaches for him frantically. “Wait, wait!” he says. “Don’t go! I want to talk to you, please!”

A foot from the edge of the boat, one hand on the railing, the merman turns back to Newt. His eyes are narrowed. “What do you want to talk about?”

“Well,” Newt says. “You, obviously. You’re–” He sweeps his hand in a broad gesture across the merman. “You’re not human.”

“Yes,” the merman says.

“And you saved my life,” Newt says.

Another scowl. “Yes. You’re bloody lucky I was passing by,” the merman snaps. “What on Earth were you doing out here in the middle of a storm like that? You could’ve gotten yourself killed.”

Newt shoves his glasses up higher and scoots closer to the merman. “I’m a scientist. A marine biologist, technically.” And, if you were to get even more technical, only a fifth marine biologist. Newt tended to look at his doctorates in a glass-half-full way. “I was, uh, gathering research.” Suddenly it occurs to Newt that he and the merman might have cultural differences he never even dreamed of, and he flushes with embarrassment. “Wait, do you know what a scientist is?”

“Yes,” the merman snaps again.

“Right,” Newt says. He coughs. The merman’s scowl hardens. Frankly, legends of sirens luring sailors to their deaths aside, Newt didn’t expect merpeople to be quite so…bitchy. Maybe he just got stuck with the most foul-tempered one in existence–it’d be just his luck. “Well. Uh. My name is Newt. It’s nice to meet you?” He holds out his hand, and then remembers himself. “Uh, this is how humans greet people. You shake it.”

“I know,” the merman says, and then (in a way Newt can’t help but feel as somewhat condescending) shakes Newt���s hand with a firm “Hermann.”

Newt snorts before he can help himself. Hermann pulls away. “Hermann,” he echoes. “You know–”

“I know,” Hermann says again.

“It kinda sounds–”

“I know,” Hermann says.

“It’s just kinda funny,” Newt says, and begins to snicker.

“So is ‘Newt’,” Hermann huffs, and then, before Newt can stop him, he dives back into the ocean with a splash and a flick of his shimmering tail.

Newt rushes to the railing and peers into the murky depths below, but it’s no use. Hermann’s long gone. His first real, solid evidence of crypto-marine biology, and he couldn’t stop being himself long enough to ask a few simple questions.

“Shit,” he sighs. He makes note of the meeting in his journal anyway.

He sees Hermann again four days later. It’s a bright, sunny day, not a cloud in the sky, and–in a better mood than he’s been since he started out–Newt decides to take the opportunity to do some maintenance around the boat. Turns out Doc Martens don’t offer the most amazing traction on slippery decks, especially when you’ve somehow managed to wrap ropes from the sails around yourself and lose the ability to move your arms. Newt learns this the hard way.

Luckily, Hermann is there to catch him.

“You are a bloody menace,” he scolds, as a half-soaked–but safe–Newt blinks dumbly at him in the safety of his surprisingly sturdy arms. “What were you even attempting to do?”

“Uh,” Newt says. “Fix the sails?”

Hermann rips the ropes off of him effortlessly, then lifts him higher. Newt stays still, blinking, before he realizes he’s supposed to be climbing onto the deck, and then scrambles up over the railing. “There we are,” Hermann says, sounding equal parts smug and satisfied.

“Thanks, dude,” Newt says. “If you hadn’t been here–” He frowns. “Wait, what were you doing here?”

“Nothing,” Hermann says, too fast, and Newt grins.

“You were totally spying on me!”

“I was not,” Hermann snaps. “I was merely passing by. You’re awfully hard to miss. So–noisy.”

“Uh-huh,” Newt says. “Well, lucky coincidence. Can I interview you for my journal now?”

For a moment Newt expects Hermann to dip back beneath the waves, but–glowering up at Newt–he folds his arms and rests them against the side of the boat. “What would you like to know?”

Newt digs his tape recorder from his pocket and switches it on. “Everything.”

Hermann is a begrudging interviewee, but he’s an interviewee none the less, and answers each of Newt’s questions with only a small dose of sarcasm. He eats fish, like some larger fish might. He speaks English, like most fish don’t. He lives in a city populated with other merpeople, who have jobs and families and houses, though significantly different from the jobs and families and houses humans have. “Technically,” Hermann says, with a strange, furtive glance around, “I shouldn’t even be telling you these sort of things. Interacting with humans is considered highly taboo in my society.”

“Oh, shit,” Newt says, and inches forward. “Seriously?”

Immediately, Newt’s brain works overtime to concoct an exciting, Little Mermaid-esque scenario: Hermann’s dad as the strict king of the ocean, wary of humans because of some ancient feud, Hermann longing for freedom, Newt–well, Newt would be down with kissing Hermann to help him get rid of that fin. He’d be down with kissing Hermann regardless. Newt’s scientific interest in him aside, Hermann is pretty good-looking. And–well. The forbidden, star-crossed aspect of it all is kinda exciting.

“Yes,” Hermann says. “Humans have hunted merpeople for centuries. Or so I’ve been told. But…” His face twists strangely–the corners of his eyes crinkling, his teeth flashing into view–and Newt realizes he’s smiling. Awkward, and shy, and unpracticed, but smiling. “You seemed different. I took a gamble.”

Newt blushes, just a little. “Hunted,” he echoes. “Is that what happened to your fin?”

“My fin?”

“It’s injured on the left side,” Newt says. “Like something attacked you. Did a human do that? Or another predator, like a shark or something?” Do merpeople have to worry about sharks? Maybe they keep them as pets. That’d be cool. If Newt was a merman, he would have three pet sharks.

“Oh,” Hermann says. “Oh, no, nothing so dramatic. That happened when I was human.”

Newt drops his tape recorder. It narrowly avoids bouncing overboard. “When you were what?”

“When I was human,” Hermann repeats. “Did I not mention I used to be human?”

“Uh, no,” Newt says.

“Ah, well,” Hermann says, “yes, it was some time ago. Perhaps a hundred years.”

“You look good for a hundred,” Newt says, because Hermann can’t have more than a couple years on Newt’s thirty-five. To his surprise, Hermann snorts.

“Yes, see, I was involved with a man,” he says, “and–well, he wasn’t pleased when I wanted to put an end to things, move on, you know, pursue other relationships. Only there were a number of things I didn’t know about him. He practiced–mastered, really–a strange kind of magic. He cursed me. I’ve been stuck this way–half-human, never aging another day–ever since.”

Merpeople, magic, curses–this is too fucking good. No one is ever going to believe Newt if he publishes this paper. “What kind of curse?” Newt says. “Like, one that can be broken?”

“Presumably,” Hermann says.

“Do you have to learn a lesson?” Newt says. He pushes up his glasses and leans closer. “Does someone have to kiss you? Like a true love’s kiss?” Newt was never one for reading fairy tales as a kid–having preferred the much more interesting alternatives of poking slugs with sticks and rolling around in the dirt–but he knows that’s a pretty big deal in those kind of stories. Frog princes and shit.

“I don’t know,” Hermann says. “All I know is that this has been very irritating. I had a laboratory, you know, with all sorts of fascinating equipment. I was a scientist. And now–”

“Can I try kissing you?” Newt interrupts.

Hermann flushes and shuts his mouth. “Ah,” he stammers, “I–I’ve got to–”

He disappears, in another splash and glint of fin. It was worth a shot.

Hermann comes back a few days later, and he comes back after that, and after that. Sometimes Newt asks him questions about being a merman. Sometimes Newt asks him questions about his previous life as a human. Hermann seems to like talking about being a human more, for reasons that aren’t very hard for Newt to guess. He was born in Germany, like Newt, though was schooled somewhat prestigiously in England (which explains the stuffy accent). He walked with a cane and a slight limp. He owned a very nice and very expensive telescope, which he misses, and worries about the well-being of, constantly. Sometimes Newt tells him things about himself, too: about his myriad of tattoos, his studies, how the human world has changed since Hermann’s time.

One day, as Hermann watches Newt eat potato chips and transcribe one of his numerous interviews from audio to pen, he suddenly reaches out and touches the corner of Newt’s notebook. “May I read this?” he says.

“Sure,” Newt says, hoping that Hermann doesn’t flip back to last week and read Newt’s entry where he described, in great detail, his attraction to Hermann, and the incredibly steamy dream he had about him as a result of that attraction.

Hermann skims Newt’s notes quickly, politely ignoring the grease stains Newt left behind, then pushes the book back towards him. He didn’t read about the dream. Thank God. “You called me a specimen,” Hermann says. His eyes crinkle in amusement. “How impersonal.”

“Yeah, well,” Newt says, heart pounding a little, because if he didn’t know any better he’d say Hermann is being flirty, “can’t let my institution know I’m on a first name basis with my subject. Conflict of interests.”

“Now, tell me,” Hermann says, “what do you plan to do with the information you’ve gathered when you return home? A book? An article? An exhibition? If you’re going to ask to put me on display, my answer is a definite no.”

“Nah, nothing like that,” Newt says. The truth is that Newt has no idea what he’s going to do with his significant compilation of research about Hermann. It’d be one thing if he found evidence of Hermann’s whole colony, or even a merperson besides Hermann, but to go zooming back off to his superiors with nothing three weeks’ worth of tapes and maybe a photograph or two–and after that tantrum he threw last month–he has a feeling no one is going to buy a single bit of it. Maybe he’d have a chance if he took Hermann back with him and did display him, but throwing his friend on the mercy of a society that would gladly dissect him without a second thought is completely out of the question. Maybe he’ll just write a weirdly detailed children’s book. “I might just keep it for myself, actually.”

The answer seems to please Hermann. He toys with Newt’s chip bag for a few seconds before–cheeks going a shade pinker–he says “I feel I ought to confess something.”

“Be my guest, dude.”

“I was following you the other day,” Hermann says. “I was following you that first day, too. And–” His eyes dart down, away from Newt’s. “Before then, even. You intrigued me, and I wanted to know what you were doing all the way out here.”

Newt grins. “I intrigued you. Ha! Cool. Well, now we’re even.”

Hermann smiles at him.

The last Friday before Newt is due to turn back and set course for home, he finally gets his first sign of other human life out here in the middle of the ocean: a fishing rig, at least twice the size of Newt’s tiny little rental, motors up not too far away from him and begins to cast its nets. Newt, an extrovert at heart and only mostly sustained by conversations with Hermann (who has a tendency to disappear for days at a time), is so starved for social interaction that he bolts out from his cabin when he spots it and begins waving frantically at the crew.

“Hi!” he shouts. “Beautiful out here, isn’t it?!”

He gets a friendly wave back. Newt expects he looks half-crazed, from his wild hair, to his unshaven scruff, to the explosion of freckles across his cheeks and neck, so he can’t really blame any of the crew for their hesitance.

“How are the fish?” he continues to shout.

A thumbs up.

“Cool!”

A net is drawn up; it’s a decent catch, but nothing too impressive. Earlier in the week, Hermann explained to Newt that, this close to mer-territory, anyone would be hard-pressed to find anything but smaller fish. Merpeople are much better hunters than some humans with a boat could ever dream of being. “I’ve been out here for over a month,” Newt continues his one-sided conversation. “I was looking for sea monsters. Have you ever caught anything like that before?”

No, they haven’t. The net is thrown back into the ocean.

“Okay!” Newt says. “Just wondering!”

The faint sound of groaning wood makes him stop in his tracks as he turns to head back into his cabin. Groaning wood, and splashing. Loud splashing. Excited shouts. It looks like the fishing rig netted something big.

Newt–determined, still, to be sociable–cups his hands around his mouth to call his encouragement over, but the words die on his tongue almost instantly. There, tangled up and flopping around in the rig’s netting, is a very familiar glimmering tail with a very familiar tattered left fin. “Hey,” Newt shouts, “stop! You’re–that’s my friend, you have my–!”

For the second time, Newt dives into the sea for Hermann.

He closes the distance between the two boats in no time at all, and–powered by pure adrenaline, ignoring the yells of surprise and anger above him–begins hacking blindly at the net with his pocketknife. A few more pieces–a few more strands–

It spills open. Newt feels a Hermann-sized shape graze past him, and a moment later, Hermann breaches the surface of the water. He doesn’t look very happy. “They caught me in their net,” he spits. “As if I were–!”

Newt hugs him. It’s not very graceful, considering the circumstances, but it’s something he’s wanted to do for a while, and he’s too happy that Hermann won’t be dissected or stuffed or something to care. “You caught my friend in your net while he was swimming,” he tells the fishermen over Hermann’s shoulder, now moderately more calmly. “I thought he was–uh–going to drown.”

The fishermen are profusely apologetic, to the point where Newt actually feels kind of bad for them, and it takes him waving them off with assurances they won’t sue or anything for them to hastily speed away. Hermann doesn’t look away from Newt once the whole time, his expression soft and just a touch unreadable. “You came to my rescue,” he says.

“Well,” Newt says, puffing out his chest, “a little bit, yeah.”

Hermann kisses him. Newt responds enthusiastically.

He’s so worked up over it all–grabbing Hermann’s hair, biting his weird frog mouth–that he doesn’t notice that the gentle fanning of Hermann’s tail against him has become the slide of skin against denim until Hermann suddenly grips at his arms. “Newt,” he says, eyes widening, “Newt.”

Well, even then it takes a bit. Newt kind of has a one-track mind when it comes to this sort of stuff. “Mm, yeah, Hermann,” he groans happily. He goes back in for another kiss, but Hermann dodges it.

“No,” he says, “I’m–” He gives a little kick.

Oh. “Oh, holy shit!” Newt exclaims, and laughs in delight. “Legs! You have legs!” Naked legs, in fact. Long naked legs–of course he’s taller than Newt. Hopefully he has some clothing that’ll fit the guy.

“Legs which don’t swim very well, I’m afraid,” Hermann says. He’s giving Newt another broad, awkward smile. “Do you mind?”

“Not at all,” Newt says.

There goes Newt’s paper, he guesses, but–strangely–he can’t really bring himself to care.

[iliveinprocrasti-nation]

Hi! Wanna share your research on cannibalism? I literally know nothing on the subject. So if you have time, I’d love to learn more.

hi!!! i absolutely do want to share my research because this has been fascinating me for days. this is also likely not edited and just comes from my brain, so if something is confusing/incomprehensible/incorrect please tell me and i’ll do my best to fix it

to anyone who might see this: please don’t hesitate to tell me if you want a tag or another trigger warning on this post or the other (although i might end up making a blog for this type of stuff? my friends can only hear so much about epidemiology and cannibalism science and all that so tell me what you think about me making a sideblog for my interests). trigger warning for cannibalism, death, sickness, ulcers, necrosis, pus

The biggest issue with cannibalism come in the form of prions. Prions are made of a protein called PrP, which is found in perfectly healthy people. PrP^C is the normal protein that’s found in cell membranes (we don’t really know what PrP does, but it might have to do with the brain’s cell to cell communication). The infectious form of PrP is PrP^Sc (called a prion). Prions happen when PrP proteins fold over themselves, which messes up how the proteins connect to each other. Usually, your body will use enzymes to break down proteins, which would fix this problem, but prions are very much resistant to them. Prions also don’t have nucleic acid (DNA/RNA). Prion diseases can be hereditary, infectious, or sporadic (so they can run in the family, or you can contract them, or your PrP just decides one day to fold itself into a prion).

Cannibalism has to do more with the infectious prions. Prions, once they happen, start affecting other proteins like some really messed up game of group tag, causing them to fold and become prions as well, causing clumps of misfolded proteins in your brain (remember how I said they might have to do with brain communication? what we do know is that prion diseases really mess up your brain. i think prions can also be found in the nervous system as well so do with that what you will). From what I remember, these prion clumps can also damage and/or kill nerve cells, which leads to your brain getting these small holes, and becomes somewhat akin to a sponge when looked at under a microscope (prion diseases are also known as “spongiform encephalopathies” for a reason). The thing is, spongy brains with holes in them also means majour brain damage, which is seen in the symptoms. 

Speaking of prion disease symptoms, they are very much not fun (i looked these up btw, i haven’t memorised the specific symptoms yet). They progress, starting smaller and creating minor inconveniences, to progressing enough to be debilitating. There are:

Memory issues and dementia

Difficulty walking/balancing

Behaviour/psychological changes

Hallucinations

Muscle stiffness/loss of muscle control

Seizures

Vision problems

Confusion

Fatigue

Insomnia

Difficulty speaking/swallowing

I know what you might be thinking. “I want a specific example of a time cannibalism lead a prion disease enough to be an epidemic like you said in one of your other answers to an ask.” Well, welcome to kuru (which means “to shake” in the Fore language), a disease that ravaged through the Fore people of Papua New Guinea (who had a cultural practice of funerary cannibalism) and their neighbours. This epidemic peaked in the 1950s, when 2% of all Fore deaths were because of kuru (hitting women and children the hardest). At this time, it was the leading cause of death among women in the Fore. The fact it was only 2% of all deaths makes it seem small, but some villages “became almost devoid of women” (this quote is from an article from medical news today that i used to get the kuru symptoms and information, and it’s a really interesting read! https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/311277#Symptoms-of-kuru). The reason it hit women and children the hardest was because they were the ones who would prepare the bodies; also, men believed that, during conflict, eating human meat could weaken them, so they consumed less than women and children. Kuru has a pretty long asymptomatic period that lasts years, but once symptoms present themselves they progress much faster and can kill in only a couple months (symptoms can be present for up to two years before death, although that’s still less than half the time of the incubation period, if not 1/10 of the time). Once symptoms appear, there are three stages of symptom progression a person goes through. 

1. When symptoms are inconveniences:

Headaches

Joint pain

Shaking

Loss of balance

Speech deterioration

Loss of muscle control

2. When symptoms have bigger effects:

Inability to walk

Loss of muscle coordination

Severe tremors

Emotional instability (depression with outbursts of uncontrollable laughter)

3. When symptoms become severe

Inability to sit without support

Little to no muscle coordination

Inability to speak

Difficulty swallowing

Unresponsive to surroundings

Ulcerations (which will have necrosis, which is tissue death, and pus)

Symptoms lead to death, though the cause of death is usually pneumonia or severely infected pressures. This is no longer an issue for the Fore people, as the the practice was reduced. Kuru is likely extinct, and the last person is thought to have died from it in 2005.

So prion diseases have only had one epidemic, and they’re relatively rare, so why are they an issue? It’s because they can’t be cured, and (at this point in time) will always be fatal. They can be slowed, but symptoms will continue to progress. Remember how prions don’t have nucleic acid? This means they’re also resistant to radiation that would normally destroy/inactivate these types of things when enzymes might not be able to. There are usually about 350 new cases of prion diseases every year, so all things considered, they’re not common. However, cannibalism would almost certainly up the numbers. Cannibalism being a cultural practice is of course a more difficult subject, but I’m more here for the science. 

Note to people who might read this and might want to comment about how “cannibalism would fix overpopulation tho” or “oh cannibalism is so horrible and bad how could someone do that”: personally, the morality behind whether or not cannibalism is “good” or “bad” doesn’t especially matter to me since science has shown negative effects, so please don’t bring any of that onto this post.

[gra-sonas]

Thank you for that lovely answer to the last nonnie you had. I think that's the first post I've seen that made me feel I was allowed to be upset myself about what's happening in the fandom right now.

I’m glad to hear that, nonnie. ❤️

Contrary to popular belief, it is 100% acceptable to feel upset. I understand that it can be exhausting for those who enjoy a show as it is, to see a lot of people being critical or unhappy with it. It’s equally exhausting to constantly being told that if you’re critical of it, or don’t enjoy a show as it is, you better stop watching and leave the fandom, though.

My take on it is this: allow yourself to be upset, find like-minded people and talk to them and hopefully find a way to feel better, allow yourself to not like something. BE SALTY. We can’t always like everything 100% and it doesn’t make you a ‘bad fan’ if you struggle with aspects of the media you consume. It’s perfectly fine to criticize and wish for things to be different.

Just, and this is the important part, DON’T BE AN ASS ABOUT IT. Rant on your own blog, don’t post hate in the main tags, be mindful of those who enjoy what you don’t like. Tag your shit properly, or just stay out of the tags entirely. Don’t harass people and tell them it’s wrong to like the thing you hate.

Same goes for people who don’t want to see negativity btw. Unfollow, blacklist, mute, block - use tools like xKit and TumblrSavior to filter things or people you don’t want to see on your dash. These tools allow you to tailor your fandom experience. Don’t be an ass and tell people who are upset or triggered they are wrong, or that they should stop watching. No one’s getting brownie points for liking a show ‘more’, or being (mostly) uncritical of it.

Dismissing other people’s experiences, emotions, reactions, or their way of doing fandom is not okay, no matter from which side you’re coming.

That being said, I’m trying hard to keep things fairly positive on my blog. I’m not always good at it (sorry), but I’m doing what I can to keep things on the side of ‘salty but not over-salty’.

I mean, you should see the number of answers to asks in my drafts I’ve never published. There are +1K words essays I ultimately decided not to post bc I felt my take on things would be too negative (it helped me writing those posts tho, getting it aaaaall out), and I’d rather share happy things.

I don’t answer every ask (sorry if it's one of yours, sometimes I just can’t, or I think it would just fuel negativity), and I always try to find things I still enjoy, like making a silly gif set or post a Tyler picspam (THIS MAN, I SWEAR, HE MAKES EVERYTHING BETTER).

Ngl, it was rather difficult after 2x06. That hit me really hard, and I cried more than once bc right after I felt like I had to say goodbye to the show for good . And yes, me, a grown ass woman, cried over the possible ‘loss’ of it’s just a TV show. That’s how I roll, and honestly, it felt good (afterwards, not while I cried, that hurt a lot). To let it all out, to grieve.

This show’s been a big part of my life since January 2019, I love the cast, I still love many aspects of the show, I love my corner of this fandom, and I love the characters! Alex in particular, and Malex as an OTP. And the thought of having to give that up hurt.

I’m not still here because I hate the show. I’m still here because there are so many things I still love about it, and I'm not ready to give that up. I gave myself the time to work through a set of very complicated emotions after 2x06 tho, and I’m not done yet. Like I said in the other post, I’m taking things day by day.

Surprisingly, humans are crazy capable of feeling more than one emotion at a time. We can be angry at aspects of a thing while still LOVING IT A LOT. That’s how we roll. So, feeling upset about the show/fandom while still loving many things about it? Not a contradiction.

I hope, you (and everyone who’s feeling upset atm), have or can find people to hang out with, that you have fic you find comfort in reading or pretty gifs to look at, that you find something to focus on that you still love, and I hope it’ll make you feel a little better.

Just know, you’re not alone. ✨💚👽

[rhaenyratargayen]

May I request any writing along the lines of #32 from prompt list 1 for Jason Todd? Btw, I absolutely love your work!

thank you !! thank you for requesting, I apologize for being late, but I hope you enjoy this :)

#32 from this prompt list: “You’re blushing.”

-

Jason is a pain in the ass. To everyone and everbody agrees. But to make matters worse, he’s an expert pain in the ass.

Jason knows how to mess with who and at what time.

Sometimes he uses his weight to piss off his brothers during training. He talks endlessly while Babs is working. With Steph, they alternate between who’s annoying who.

But with you, Jason teases. You hate it, he loves it.

You’re a very focused person in all aspects of your life. Wether it be during your job or on patrol. It’s unlikely that you ever slip up... unless Jason is involved.

Jason adores the fact that he is the only person that can throw you off. The fact that he can see right through your poker face.

He takes advantage of that at any opportunity he gets - specifically, his favorite, during training.

You’ll be isolated, headphones in and adrenaline high, obliterating the punching bag in the corner of the room.

Despite the fuming veins in your arms and the violently encouraging beats flowing in through your headphones, this time of the day was actually your most centered.

It was a time to gather all your thoughts while doing relatively no thinking at all. You exhaled all your stress from the day through your muscles. And best of all, no one bothered you while doing it.

You created a healthy routine for yourself. One that was efficient and easy, uninterruptable until - Jason.

Your head was somewhere other than that moment, perfectly content being elsewhere until the large hand gliding across your back snapped you back at an unreasonable speed.

His hands felt cool against your hot skin. A calm contrast to the fire you had worked up. And while you wanted to be angry, it was almost like with that touch, he had obliterated any flame you had left.

When his hand left a second that felt like hours later, you turned to face him and yanked out one of your headphones.

He reached for the water bottle, your water bottle, on the bench beside you and took a gulp.

It was completely uncalled for, his method of motion. There was an atmosphere behind you, plenty of room to get to said bench without any touching.

But, your eyes wandered to the single few droplets of water that danced along his chin, down his jawline.

“Ridiculous.” You muttered.

Jason quirked a brow at you.

You rolled your eyes.

He set the bottle down, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and positioned himself comfortably on the bench, as if he was waiting for you to continue.

You scoffed, “What do you want, Todd?”

“You” he replied cheekily, without missing a beat.

You laughed.

You unwrapped your fists and removed the remaining earbud your ear.

Picking up the empty water bottle, you trudged across the floor to fill it back up.

Jason followed after you.

“Aw, come on, I coulda did that for you.” You could practically hear the smile on his face.

You hummed, “How do I know you wouldn’t have drank it all before it got back to me?”

He chuckled in response.

You walked for a few moments without speaking. Jason trailed at your side, glancing down at you every few moments.

“Why’d you stop?” Jason broke the silence.

“I didn’t want an audience.”

“It wasn’t an audience... it was just me.” He grinned.

“You’re dumb, Jay, have I ever told you that?” You mirrored his grin.

You both had finally arrived at the water fountain. Jason took the bottle from your hand and began filling it up.

“Thank you.” You chuckled.

He winked, “Anything for you.”

You didn’t reply. Only shook your head with a smile on your face.

Again, silence passed. The rising bubble of the filling bottle was the only source of sound.

He pulled the bottle away as it filled. The machine let out a low hum as he screwed the top of the bottle on and handed it to you.

You took it from his hand and gulped down a few sips.

“You know I mean that, right?” He didn’t wink this time.

The rather serious tone of Jason’s tease was not something you’d seen before. It was new, nice, but you were left a little caught off guard.

Closing the lid to your bottle, you forced out a small laugh.

“No you don’t.” You attempted to lift the humor back up with your bare hands.

He nodded, “Yes I do.”

He looked a bit surprised as a reaction to your humorous expression. Uncomfortable, you began playing with the stickers lopsidedly applied to the bottle.

He regained your gaze when he took a step closer, “Why don’t you think I’m serious?”

You tossed your hands as a temporary answer, “Jason Todd, you have never been serious with me in your life.”

He didn’t say anything back.

Your back was against the wall. Jason came closer, placed a hand beside your head so that he was facing you, and merely inches from your face.

He lifted his other hand to brush his pointer finger under your chin, “Maybe I’m trying to be now.”

You were left unable to speak. Completely oblivious to everything but that moment.

Your heart was practically sprinting out of your rib cage. But your mind was surprisingly at a calm. Drowning, subdued in the proximity so close to him.

The side of his mouth titled in a smile, “You’re blushing.”

And your mind fell.

Your loss for words only made his boyish grin wider while simultaneously making you more frustrated.

“I’m not.” You managed to speak.

To any nearby stranger, surely they would’ve noticed the absence of fault in your voice, the lack of anticipation in your body.

But you knew that Jason knew better. He saw right through the exterior just like always.

“You’re cute.” He pushed himself off the wall and bent down to place a quick kiss to your forehead.

He then grabbed the bottle from your hand, took a gulp, and left you still against the wall.