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aquaticmercy · 5 days ago

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Waste a moment / Part 3

Summary : Bucky had always kept his distance, but seeing you get hurt on a mission changed everything. For the first time, he has a chance to start over with you.

Pairing : Bucky Barnes x avenger!reader (she/her)

Warnings/tags : Mentions of food. Cursing. Memory loss. Head injury. Reader used to work in a museum.

Requested by : @remoony

Word count : 2.5k

Note : I’ve got so many people requesting to be tagged and for that I love you all! Please let me know if you wanna be tagged! P.s. I am just about to watch Agatha and I’m so nervous and excited at the same time!

Series Masterlist

“The Wandering Man”

Tuesday night.

When you got to Bucky’s place, it was quiet.

Too quiet.

The lights were too dim, the air felt too still. The apartment had been waiting for something, or someone, to breathe life into it.

Bucky led you inside without saying much, only a few words of reassurance, and a few how are you holding up?s here and there.

He showed you to the guest room, small but comfortable and cosy. A soft bed was tucked into the corner under a window that overlooked the city lights. It felt both safe and strange, for reasons you could not quite comprehend yet.

You stood there, unsure of what to do with yourself. You didn’t know if you were supposed to feel relieved, maybe grateful? All you felt was confusion.

Before long, he returned with a familiar-smelling cup of tea. It was your favourite tea, even though you could not recall ever telling him before.

Bucky he set the cup on the table. His smile was soft, almost practised, as if he had rehearsed how to be gentle with you.

You stared at it for a moment, then back at him, before picking it up. The tea was hot in your hands, the steam curling in a way that should have felt comforting— but instead, the scent of it haunted you like a ghost haunted an abandoned house.

You took a sip. “You knew.”

“You always liked it.” Bucky offered a small, almost shy smile. “You used to make it for me when I had trouble sleeping.”

I wouldn’t accept it. I didn't think I deserved this, Bucky thought to himself, but he decided not to tell you. Yet.

“You should get some rest,” Bucky said, his voice gentle. “It’s been a long day.”

You nodded, but the moment you sat on the centre of the bed, you knew sleep wasn’t going to come easily. The gravity of everything—the missing years, the lost memories— pressed down on your shoulders, making your chest constrict.

Bucky's quiet support, staying with a friend, should have soothed you, but his kindness felt like an intrusion—a reminder that you were a stranger in your own life, occupying a space you no longer belonged in.

Wednesday.

The next morning, you woke to the scent of coffee.

Bucky knocked lightly on your door before stepping inside, holding a mug. His smile was hesitant as he handed it to you.

You accepted it with a quiet “thanks.”

“Everything can be as slow or as quick as you like. Some of the others want to see you, but you don’t have to unless you’re ready.” He paused for a second, before saying, “You can stay with me as long as you want.”

His voice was calm, steady, trying to keep your world from spinning too fast. You nodded, weighing his offer.

As you sipped the coffee, warmth spread through your chest. It was perfect. The perfect amount of milk. The perfect amount of sugar.

He knew.

—

The conversation unfolded slowly throughout the day, a gentle ebb and flow that mirrored the tentative trust being rebuilt between you and him.

At first, it was just small talk, safe topics that didn’t demand too much of either of you—things like the weather, the view from his apartment, the streets below. As the day wore on, the conversations grew a little deeper.

“You’ve lived here a while?” you asked, glancing around the living room, noting how sparsely decorated it was. There was a sense of calm in the simplicity, but with it a hint of reluctance to make this space feel truly like home.

“Yeah, a couple of years now,” Bucky replied. “It’s not much, but it’s quiet.”

You nodded, sensing the weight of his words. “Quiet can be good,” you chuckled, almost cathartic. “I guess I don’t really know what I need right now.”

His blue eyes were understanding, though you could tell there was something hidden behind them. “That’s okay.”

You offered a small, grateful smile.

The longer it stretched, the more peaceful the silence became. You were not friends yet, not really. Not him and this version of you.

But if you trusted him before— and your instincts told you that you did— he must be a good person.

So far, you enjoyed his company, and he did not demand friend out of you, not the same way Sam did.

He was not disappointed by your lack of acknowledgement. He just seemed to be happy you were there.

For now, you could just live in the present, as if standing at the edge of a doorway without needing to cross it just yet.

Then, after sensing your ease, he shared a memory, trying to fill the gaps that were left in your mind.

“Do you remember the time we went hiking outside the city? I think it was after Happy’s birthday party. Everyone else was hungover, but you dragged me out at the crack of dawn.”

You blinked, trying to pull the threads together, but nothing came. “I don’t... I don’t remember.”

“We got lost for hours.” Bucky smiled faintly, a touch of sadness in his eyes. “You swore you knew the way, so I didn’t bother questioning you. I just followed.”

“I-I’m sorry.” you said quietly, unsure of what the nature of the memory was.

“No, no.” He chuckled lightly. “We ended up finding this little stream. We just sat there for a while, didn’t talk much, just... listened.”

You tried to picture it, to feel that day as vividly as Bucky seemed to, but all you could grasp were shadows. “I wish I could remember.”

“You will. Or you won’t. Either way, it’s okay,” he said, his voice low and reassuring. But beneath the calm mask he put on, Bucky’s thoughts churned.

He had secretly loved that hike. But when you coaxed him out that day, he had been cold, distant, as always. He had criticised everything you did, grumbled when you got lost.

But you? You were calm that day, as you had been every other day. You were patient with him. You had seen that he needed to get out of his apartment, see the world that he inhabited for once.

You pulled him out of the darkness that day. Kept him sane.

God, I’m sorry... for everything you don’t remember. For everything I said and for everything I didn’t, he thought to himself.

He didn’t let it show, though, didn’t let his guilt fade into the background. Instead, he focused on the present, the small victories of connection that he made with you, hoping it would make up for all the distance he put there before.

—

Later, after ordering dinner and eating quietly, you sat together on the couch.

You mustered up all the courage you could find asked him something that had been on your mind. “What was I like?”

Bucky hesitated for a moment, knowing he needed to choose his words carefully. “Strong. Stubborn,” he told you. “Kind. You always saw the good in people.”

You stared at him, searching for any clues of insincerity and found none, though the tremble in his lips suggested there was more to his answer than he was letting on.

Still, it was hard to reconcile the person he described with the emptiness you felt now. Hearing him talk about you—about her—you began to understand why everyone seemed so hurt about losing who you became in the last four years.

You nodded, trying to imagine that version of yourself. “It’s hard to picture.”

Bucky glanced down. He found it hard to picture who he was before all this, too.

He had changed so much in the past few days. He had changed so drastically in the way he treated you, that he was torn between whether he should remind you of what he'd said before your mission.

His own words echoed in his head: ‘I feel like I can't breathe around you.’

Seeing you like this, disoriented and vulnerable, he questioned if you really needed to know how cruel he'd been before.

For now, the guilt of it now belonged to him alone.

He knew he would have trouble hiding the ache in his chest, knowing that he had hurt you, knowing that he had pushed you away when all you had ever offered was kindness.

But maybe that thrumming pain was worth it.

This was his second chance.

He could be better. He could finally be the friend you deserved, even if you never remembered what had happened between you.

He could be patient, he could be there for you, without the burden of the past hovering over every word. Bucky didn’t know if you would ever regain your memories, but for once, he didn’t need to fix things.

All he had to do was be there.

“You don’t have to picture it,” he said gently, “you’re still that person.”

As you spent the rest of the evening getting to know him, he realised how much he had missed this—your presence, your laughter, even the way you furrowed your brow when you were lost in thought. He had been so afraid of it before, afraid of getting too close.

Almost losing you had shaken him to his core. This time, he wasn’t sure he could survive pushing you away again.

So, he didn’t.

Thursday.

Bucky stood by the door of the medical bay, his posture tense. He watched carefully as the doctor completed the exam.

He had taken you back to the compound to see a doctor, to get you properly discharged. You did run out, after all.

You sat on the table, blinking against the harsh lights, your mind struggling to clear the fog that clung to your thoughts.

The doctor's explanation confirmed what Bucky had already suspected. The confusion, the disorientation—it was all normal after what you'd been through. He had said it was a good thing you were staying with a familiar face, though you didn't have the heart to tell him he wasn’t familiar to you.

Everyone around you just told you that he was.

When the doctor finished, Bucky gently helped you down from the table. He guided you through the sterile hallways, bringing you home to his apartment.

Friday.

Bucky’s bathroom was dimly lit, a faint glow from mirror nightlight casting uneasy shadows against the walls. You stood in front of the mirror, hesitating to look at the reflection that would greet you.

You’d avoided it until now, not wanting to confront the parts of yourself that didn’t make sense. The parts that didn’t look like it belonged. That didn’t look feel it belonged.

But today, after hours of consideration and glancing at your reflection, you dared to lift your eyes to meet the unfamiliar person staring back at you.

The image of your own face was uncanny.

The ends of your hair were frayed and split, the wear of weeks without proper care was evident.

There were the scars. Angry, jagged lines that trailed down the side of your face, ghosting over your cheekbone, one disappearing into your hairline. Those were the scars from the last mission, they had said. The head injury that cost you your memories.

Your eyes trailed down, seeing bruises scattered across your shoulders, deeper marks that told stories your mind couldn’t piece together.

You lifted your hand, making sure your reflection followed you. Making sure this was still you— and it was.

You didn’t recognize this person.

You didn’t recognize yourself.

The grief that you had been avoiding for days struck like lightning— the years stolen from you. The friends you couldn’t remember, the disconnect your soul felt from your body. Your chest tightened as tears spilled over, and you clutched the sink, knuckles hurting.

Keep yourself together.

You’re stronger than this, dammit.

The bathroom door was barely ajar, but it was just enough for Bucky to catch the muffled sound of your quiet sobs.

He knew how disorienting it was— how painful it could be, waking up and not recognizing your own life.

He stepped closer, knocking on the door before opening it. "You okay?"

You quickly wiped your eyes, straightening your posture. You tried to compose yourself before he could notice, but you didn’t know you were too late.

“Yeah,” you sniffled, forcing a shaky laugh. “It’s just… I think I need a trim. My hair’s a mess.”

Bucky nodded, the lines of his forehead softening. He knew that wasn’t why you were crying, but he didn’t pry, didn’t push. If you needed time to admit to him— or to yourself— how much you were hurting, he would wait, even if it meant waiting forever.

“I can help,” he offered quietly. "I trim my own hair. I’ve got the scissors for it."

You hesitated, biting your lip. “That would be good.”

Bucky left for a moment, returning with a small set of scissors and a comb. The nothingness between you was gentle, not awkward at all.

Bucky stood behind you, his touch careful as he gathered your hair, brushing through the tangled strands.

His hands, though large, moved with a delicacy that you didn’t realise he was capable of. He barely spoke as he worked on your hair, methodical and focused.

You couldn’t help but notice how close he was, the soft sound of his breath on your ears. His metal fingers occasionally grazed the back of your neck, sending a slight shiver through you.

"The scars and bruises," he said softly after a few moments, as if he could sense your tension. “They’re a part of you. Doesn’t mean they’re all of you.”

You wanted to believe him, but it was hard to see anything beyond the damage when you didn’t know where it came from.

It was hard to accept the version of yourself that had come out of that mission that had ruined your life, though you didn’t even remember how.

“I don’t even remember how I got them,” you whispered, your voice thick.

“But that doesn’t change who you are.” Bucky paused, his hands still in your hair for a brief moment. “It doesn’t change what you mean to me.”

Your breath hitched at the implication of his words, but you didn’t say anything.

He resumed trimming, the sound of the scissors snipping through the strands echoing in the room.

“You’ve got a lot of split ends,” he said. "I’ll take care of them."

You managed a soft laugh, despite the tears still burning at the corners of your eyes. “Thanks, Bucky.”

He continued working in silence until he finished.

“There,” he said, setting the scissors down and stepping back to admire his work. “I think you look beautiful.”

As you once again looked into the mirror, you looked a bit more familiar.

Bucky had trimmed your hair from memory, from what he remembered it looked like when you first joined the team, hoping it would help.

“Bucky?” You called after a moment of silence.

“Hm?” He replied.

“Do you think our friends can start visiting next week?”

-to be continued…

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seonghwaddict · 1 year ago

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say my name — song mingi

request by anon. "This is my first request to anyone ever so forgive me if this is..idk incoherent 😭. But lately I've been thinking about a short smut story where the reader (fem) being a backup dancer for ATEEZ and Mingi catching feelings for her over time and then end up fucking in the dressing room and maybe one of the members walks in idk have fun with it. 🤭"

idol!song mingi x backup dancer!reader. genre. smut. warnings. smut below the cut, explicit sexual content minors dni, fingering, some dirty talk, use of petnames (doll, baby), slight dom/sub dynamics, dom!mingi, swearing, intentional lowercase. please let me know if i missed anything. wc. 1.2k.

lilo's notes. i'm back!! this is the first request i've received, hopefully i did it justice. by the time i finished writing i forgot that anonie asked it it's possible for another member to walk in and join.... sorry about that. but anyways, i hope you all enjoyed this!!

listening to. perceive by doma cyno.

masterlist

“fuck, baby,” a hand swiped through your folds, gathering the almost embarrassing amount of arousal from your core. “you’re so wet.”

you like to think your day started off like every other day. you woke up at 7 am, ate breakfast, got ready for the day and arrived at kq two hours later. you went through some choreographies with the other backup dancers until 4 pm, left to run some errands, and then returned to practice some more on your own.

since your first day at the company only a few months ago, you’d always take a few hours after your shift to perfect your art more than you already have. sometimes you’d spend those hours with the other dancers who showed up for the same reason, but surprisingly, a lot of the time it was mingi who found himself practising his group’s or his own choreography alongside you.

the first few times felt awkward, to say the least.

you yourself weren’t really one to strike up conversations with random people, and considering he was part of the group you had to dance for, you were afraid of slipping up and losing your job. but, eventually, he talked to you. after that, things were easier—you’d joke around, take breaks to go eat something, help each other and sometimes even stop what you were working on to choreograph something together; just the two of you.

it was only a month or two later that you caught yourself looking at him in a less than friendly but rather heated way… and much to your surprise, you slowly started noticing his own lustful glances—lips red from biting them and hooded eyes tracking your every movement. but, alas, you weren’t one for first moves.

considering all of this, you weren’t surprised at the position you were currently in; on the floor of the practice room, legs hooked around his as you sat between them, mingi’s lips against the side of your neck, one arm around your waist and the other with his hand inside your panties (your shorts had been discarded long ago, along with his shirt) as he faced you to lthe mirror, forcing you to watch his every movement.

he swiped his middle finger through your folds, gathering some arousal and then slowly circling your swollen clit. a breathy whimper escaped your lips as you threw your head back on his shoulder. the combined sensation of his finger around your nub and his lips kissing and sucking on the sensitive skin of your neck sent another wave of wetness gushing out of you.

“eyes on the mirror, doll,” he moved his head up to whisper right into your ear with that husky voice of his, gently biting down on your earlobe. he removed his hand from your pussy for a moment, letting your legs down to slip your panties off before hooking them over his thighs again. you were practically dripping as he exposed you. “i want you to see what i’m doing, watch how your beautiful little body reacts to me.”

reluctantly, you nodded and pulled yourself off his shoulder, eyes zeroing in on the arousal smeared between your thighs. a moan escaped your lips as he gave your clit a particularly firm tug, his ring and middle finger pressed against the skin on either side of it and pinching gently. you tried holding back your following moans, but the quiver of your thighs gave you away. though, you felt better knowing you weren’t the only enjoying this so much, his erection strained against his pants and poked at your ass.

his movements against your heat were slow but precise, eliciting pretty little whimpers and moans from you. the hand wrapped around the front of your waist moved up, featherlight touches leaving a trail of goosebumps behind as he gently brushes his fingers over the fabric of your bra. then he nudge the straps down your shoulder and let the bra cups fall, his hand immediately going to tweak at your nipples.

“f-fuck…” you cursed quietly, trying your best to stop your eyes from fluttering shirt from all the pleasure and keep your eyes on the mirror as he asked.

two of his large fingers circled your entrance, massaging it before slowly pushing in. jaw slack at the stinging stretch, you watched as they disappeared into your vagina, breath stuttering when he curved them just enough to brush against the right spot. your hand snaked it’s way behind his head, tugging on his hair gently.

“oh, look, doll,” you heard him groan behind you, feeling his smirk against your neck, “look at how well you take my fingers…”

and with that he slowly began pumping his fingers in and out of you, digits firmly pressing against the spongey spot inside you each time, increasing his speed more and more as his thumb continue circling your clit. he watched your face in the mirror, analysing each twitch of your muscles and each flutter of your lashes to perfectly adjust his movements. in any other context, you perhaps would’ve appreciated how perceptive he was. but right now you wanted nothing more than to savour the feeling of his fingers, anticipating how his cock would feel in you.

before you knew it, the familiar knot of an orgasm began tightening in your abdomen, your body squirming.

“shit, mingi…” his name tumbled out of your mouth in a drawl and his movement stopped for a moment.l before he continued at a more rigorous pace. you could’ve sworn you felt his erection twitch behind you.

“say that again,” he growled, “say my name.”

the rough scratch of his voice made you impossibly wetter as you obeyed quickly. “mingi, o-oh…”

after that it didn’t take much longer for you to snap, coming down hard on his fingers, muscles jerking and back arching as his hand clamped over your mouth to muffle your noises.

“keep it down, baby, someone might walk in and see you at my mercy.”

he pulled his fingers out of you and caressed your thighs. it didn’t take to long for you to calm down from your high, chest heaving with deep breaths as he whispered praises in your ear. despite the fact you just had an orgasm, you knew you still wanted more.

“i-i need… i need you,” you tried, face flushed as you hinted the best you could.

“hm?” he chuckled. “and what exactly do you need of me?”

with a huff, you grinded yourself back against him, against his cock, but he moved his hands to grip your hips firmly and stop you.

“that won’t do,” he shook his head. “i want you to use your words, doll. can you do that for me, baby?”

a moment of silence passed between you. it was awkward or anything, a teasing grin on his face as he looked you in the eyes through the mirror, your brows furrowed before you sighed.

“god, mingi, i need your cock in me.”

he grinned, hands tugging your shirt and bra off before sitting back on his knees and turning you around. mingi leaned over you, cupping your chin before kissing you with a bruising hardness. once he broke the kiss, a malicious spark shined in his sharp eyes.

“anything for my doll.”

network. @cromernet

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satoruhour · 1 year ago

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hello!! ive been lurking on your acc for a little bit and i absolutely adore your writing like omg!! but earlier i got to thinkin about toji (as we all do) and i was thinking about how vulgar i imagine him to be in a sexual context and it makes me like soo shy and im not shy 🙄 im just obsessed with the idea of him saying really filthy shit to us and then practicing what he preaches yk

PRACTISE WHAT YOU PREACH

a/n: i keep falling asleep on the couch writing. and thank u for the inspiration for the name LOL

wc: 2.4k

warnings: reader has the same bite to her as toji does but gets shy when said man says filthy things, dom!toji, implication of sex in parts of the drabble, (public) dirty talk, pet names, he calls you ‘whore’ and ‘slut‘, toji calls you ‘mama’ once, oral (m receiving), deepthroating, spitting (on hand and in mouth), p -> v penetration, clit stimulation, unprotected sex, riidng, praise, degradation, daddy kink at the end, creampie / breeding kink, brief oral / cunnilingus @ the end, n*sfw under the cut

fushiguro toji is a vulgar man inside and out. It’s obvious when he tells the teenage boys to go fuck themselves when he catches them looking at you and you have to slap his bicep, or perhaps grabbing a piece of your ass while waiting in line to pay for groceries and all you can do is send him a nasty glare and a strong nudge of your elbow.

he doesn’t mind his baby fighting back, especially with how easily he can overturn the tables and have you squirming and breathing heavily whenever he gets you under him in the bedroom.

it comes to light first when you’re talking with a co-worker at a company party, talking casually with them before toji comes over with both your drinks. he’s tamer, then, sucking up to your insufferable colleagues even if they didn’t know what they were saying. this dude was clearly eyeing you, too, despite knowing toji was your plus one, and at that point the poor man has had enough.

“how ’bout you invite him back to our hotel and let him watch as i fuck you? maybe then he would stop fucking starin’.” toji passes you your drink as he whispers it, albeit the last part filled with mild bitterness, not entirely as secretive as he would like to be because the colleague’s eyes are widening immediately. he swallows his saliva at the large stature of your boyfriend’s and you just know he did it on purpose. but when you don’t reply and bark back at him with annoyance, toji’s lips curl in a smile, a light bulb going off in his head at his discovery and he’s been incessant since.

“yeah? how ’bout you clean a bathroom for once, fucker,” you roll your eyes, throwing a rag into the bathroom sink, disgruntled at how your boyfriend couldn’t even clean his own sink. it was beyond him to clean the place where water flowed everyday but when he told you that all you could muster was a look of disgust.

you were in no mood for him when you saw him creep in behind you in the mirror, eyes trained on the male who just mutters apologies into your neck, kissing the skin there like a tease and resist the urge to shiver, keeping up your angered expression.

until his words hit. “’m sorry baby, shoulda known better than to say stupid shit like that. how ’bout i make it up to you?”

“like what, toji? you gonna get on your hands and knees and scrub the floors yourself? cause i’d like th—”

“i’ll do it,” but not for the reason you think, “i’ll do it if i get to eat my pretty girl’s pussy out. and then let me pound her while she watches how good i make her feel.”

needless to say, your panties were thrown in the washing machine immediately as he made your moans echo in that squeezy bathroom, and the sink ended up being squeaky clean for the next few weeks.

it’s the best way to get you to shut up and sometimes the way your lips move as you’re rambling about something or how your figure looks as you’re reaching for the tv remote and spouting profanities is just so hypnotising. he’s obsessed with you.

toji stares blankly at you while you’re explaining the way to work the air fryer for the third time that day, and it’s not his fault you’re currently in a camisole. it’s accentuating your tits and the home shorts you’re in isn’t helping either, because he can easily swipe it to the side to fuck into you.

you snap your fingers in front of his face, “wha—? listen to me when i’m talking to you, babe.”

toji just rolls his eyes, something he knows you hate, and he watches your outburst with a lovestruck smile. he catches your snapping hand with ease, switching to holding it. “hey! what did i say about rolling eyes?”

he leans forward, placing his other hand dangerously close to your ass, but the forehead peck distracts you. “i heard you the first time, darling.”

“you—!” toji just laughs at your surprise. sure, he was old as fuck but he wasn’t entirely clueless about the air fryer, but he let you explain and drone on about the settings, knowing you’d be focused on the device. that way, his eyes could travel unforgivingly and just like that, the playful moment is overcome by his vulgar disposition again, the act of his body craving yours before his words made you freeze on the spot.

“but enough about air fryers, hm?” the sight of toji’s hand almost covering yours was enough to send you reeling, but it’s increased when he drags your hand down the hardness of his front. you can feel the ridges of his abs, down, down, down until his bulge. he guides you to squeeze his dick, a guttural groan making its way to the front of his throat. “how ’bout you show me how much your eyes can roll back as my cock disappears into you, huh?”

your breath hitches at the proposition and toji’s smile spreads into a grin at your reaction because it’s like this every. single. time. unconsciously your hands start to undo the knot of his sweatpants, pulling it under his hardened shaft, the other sighing when your hand finally wraps around it. it aches so much that he finds himself thrusting into your hand briefly before you start stroking.

toji gathers a blob of spit on his tongue and maintains eye contact, spitting directly onto his cock for some lubrication and you take a deep breath, slick noises sounding out throughout the house. he makes sure to do it again later. “getting it ready for your pretty little cunt, aren’t you? filthy girl— f-fuck…”

the words make you rub your thighs together, stepping closer to him while you continue stroking, up, down and up, down, determined to give him a taste of his own medicine. pushing him until you’re out of the kitchen, he lets you shove him onto the couch, a loud groan leaving his lips when you descend to your knees and your mouth closes around his cock.

“s’big,” you whimper, swirling your tongue around his angry tip and going back to deepthroating him, desperate to feel his dick down your throat.

“oh— s-shit, baby,” toji pulls back the hair from your head, seeing your eyes barely being able to focus as it hits the back of your throat, “that’s it… suck it like the dirty whore you are.”

the degradation is reason enough for you to bob your head quickly, moaning around his length as your mouth drips drool mixed with the pre-cum from his tip. toji chokes out your name, hips bucking into your warm mouth while your hands find purchase on his thick thighs, taking him down your throat until your nose meets his pelvis. soon he‘s cumming down your throat with grunts, feeling the hot semen rush into your cavern.

“stay there, good fuckin’ girl,” the other groans out when your eyes shift to him, swallowing bits of his cum with a small stream of tears filling your lash line that threaten to fall. he notices your hand sneaking into your panties and he smirks, bringing you off his cock to catch your breath. you sputter and gasp, hand still lightly wrapped around him. he’s still hard after cumming, but he’s also more sensitive.

“can i ride you now?” you ask like it’s any other question, shimmying out of your underwear before wasting no time to straddle him. his tip pokes your pussy and you grab him, dragging him up and down your folds to collect your slick. before long, you’re grinding on the bottom of his shaft, your labia spread along his dick and toji is charmed by how you move on him with needy moans and two hands on his torso.

“sure ya can, doll, but…” you can tell toji’s impatient, as with you, so with a roll of your eyes (toji mumbles under his breath that you’re a hypocrite), you sink down slowly on him, the arousal of your cunt wet enough to take him without prep. inch by inch you take him deep, head thrown back as toji enjoys the view — the curve of your body, how your nipples poke through your camisole — and he smiles as his baby calls out his name from being so full.

“o-oh my god… toji—” the last bits of his name fades out when he moves his hips experimentally, the pain soon fading into pleasure and the feel of his cock in you causes you to lean forward.

“yes?” he grins, body now propped up with his elbows, meeting you halfway, “is my princess tired already?”

“n-no, i can do it,” you mewl when your hips start to bounce, the stretch of his dick feeling so good. he’s reaching places in you that you can’t even fathom, “i can take you…”

toji groans softly at your declaration, body twisted in such pleasure as you soon find a rhythm on him, relishing in the way toji watches you with lust in his eyes. he helps you with a hand on your hips, but the other pushes your top past your tits, mouth latching onto your nipple and taking one into his mouth and the gesture halts your movement for a bit. a chill runs through your body as he swirls his tongue around your bud, a breathless moan leaving you as toji looks up at you through hooded eyes.

it’s got you clenching, and toji hums into your chest, moving to your other nipple before releasing it with a pop! “tired?”

you make a small sound of agreement, the sensations of his thick cock in you paired with his lips on your tits and the burn of your thighs too much for you. he happily indulges you, bringing your body close to him before he plants his feet on the sofa and fucks up into you, a choked moan leaving you. that one thrust was just to tease you, limping into his embrace as he hears the slap of his balls onto your ass.

“you’re taking me alright,” toji laughs, cut off by a moan when he continues his ministrations, entranced by how you’re so wet you manage to leak down his length. with how your pussy is drooling, he rams into you easily, obscene noises of your sopping cunt against his pelvis as your sounds of pleasure comes out in little breaths.

“so wet,” toji comments softly, cock twitching from how your boobs felt against him and how your pussy feels so damn tight. it hugs him so snugly he has to will himself not to cum, but you’re making it difficult by how you call out his name in whines. “don’t tell me she was wet earlier already?”

you can hardly focus on his questions as he bullies his cock into you, body rocking from his relentless hips and the friction of your clit against his skin, but you mutter out a yes, a high-pitched one that’s got toji chuckling.

“my baby loves it when i talk dirty, huh?” you whine into his neck, arms tightening around his neck, “she loves it when i tell her how much i want to slam my cock into her pussy, yeah?” toji is ruthless, continuing to thrust while his words have very much the same effect. “or maybe she wants me to say how i want to cum deep in her cunt, filling her to the brim. shit… does she want me to fuck a baby into her?”

you clamp down around his cock with a loud moan and he stutters, “gotta stop clenching around me, darlin’, f-fuck.”

“y-yeah… wan’ that…” you pull away from your hiding place to babble out, eyes close to closing and drool dripping down the sides of your mouth. “wan’ all your cum, daddy.”

toji sucks in a breath at the name drop and in a second, he’s switching the positions. he admires the sweat on your skin and your heaving chest, and for the first time he’s able to see just how soaking wet you are, along with the stretch of your pussy on him.

“wan’ you to make me a mommy…” you mewl softly, and that’s all it takes for the other to start moving again because if it’s anything he loves more than seeing you crumble at his words, it’s how you tell him what you want.

you can feel toji twitch in you at that, but you have close to no strength, letting him thrust into you with vigour that’s running out too — he’s too besotted with your moans and face that’s morphed into pleasure, along with your whiny pleas.

“c’mon, open your mouth, mama,” toji pulls on your bottom lip with his thumb, “stick out ya tongue.”

you obey, hand squeezing his bicep as he gathers saliva in his mouth again, thrusts stopping briefly. he can feel your hips move, but you’re still focused on how toji purses his lips and how the spit leaves his lips — the long line of spit that descends slowly onto your tongue and the tension that surrounds it tells him you love it.

“attagirl,” he grins, wiping the corners of your cavern as the pace starts up again, and it’s so sudden you already feel like cumming.

“g’nna cum, daddy,” you mutter out, legs closing around him when you feel the familiar coil of your abdomen and toji just holds you closer, intoxicated with the moment that he wants it to last. “gonna—”

your eyes are blown wide when toji secretly reaches down to press a thumb into your clit, drawing lazy circles. that’s enough for your orgasm to come crashing down on you, pussy clenching hard on the other.

“daddy— oh my god!” toji still continues to rail into you, whimpers of his name spurring him on until you’re moaning out again as his cock spurts his cum deep in your cunt, filling you with his load until it spills out.

toji immediately drops down and starts to lap at your clit, a first class seat to his cum leaking from your pussy, laughing when you hardly care about it staining the sofa, too cockdrunk to care about reprimanding him.

“so pliant,” toji uses a finger to push his cum into you, “maybe i should get you like this more often, heh.”

#jujutsu kaisen x reader #jujutsu kaisen headcanons #jujutsu kaisen smut #jujutsu kaisen x you #jujutsu kaisen toji #fushiguro toji smut #fushiguro toji x reader #toji smut #toji x reader #jjk headcanons #jjk x reader #toji x you #toji fushiguro smut #jjk toji #toji fushiguro #fushiguro toji x you #jjk scenarios #jjk smut #jjk drabbles

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yjhariani · 2 years ago

Text

“Sit down, Simon,” you instructed.

Simon sat on the chair you placed in front of the mirror. You, then, sat on his lap.

“Put your arms around me and make yourself comfortable,” you continued.

Simon put his arms around you from the back, at first around your waist. He buried half his face on your neck, tickling it somehow and making you tip your head to your shoulder as a giggle came out of your lips.

“Tickles,” you said.

“How ‘bout you sit facing the other side?” Simon suggested.

You got off his lap and sat on it again, this time sideways.

“Like this?” you asked.

“Yeah,” Simon confirmed.

With so, Simon locked his arms around you again. One went around your back with the hand resting on your far shoulder. The other went around your waist.

Simon pressed the side of his face against your free shoulder. That way you could put your cheek on his head. You repositioned a few things. Maybe your legs or your arms or Simon’s.

The two of you stayed like that for some time, looking at yourselves in the mirror afterwards.

“That looks good?” you asked, looking at him next to you.

“I think so, yeah,” Simon answered.

“Alright. We’ll be here for a few hours, let me know if your legs are asleep,” you said.

With that, you started sketching your media of drawing or painting of your choice whilst Simon watched.

“Can’t you just take a picture of us like this and draw from the picture?” Simon asked.

“How are we supposed to be spending time together, then?” you asked back.

“That’s your excuse?” Simon challenged. “Well, it’s a good one.”

“I know,” you smiled.

Simon reached his hand into his pocket and took out his phone.

“Put your hand back where it belongs,” you warned.

“Just a second,” Simon said, opening the camera on his phone.

Simon put the phone ahead to the mirror and took a few snap of photos.

“What’s that for?” you asked.

“You don’t wanna take pictures, it’s fine, but I do,” Simon said.

Simon soon put his phone away and returned his hand on you. He went back to watch you do your magic.

You occasionally looked in the mirror, getting back to your pose with Simon before going back into your art.

“You’re pretty good at this,” Simon said. “Very talented.”

“Well, thank you, I’ve practised,” you replied.

“Can’t believe my love is gorgeous as they are talented,” Simon hummed.

You stopped your creation for a second and looked at him with a smile that just showed up on your face.

“If you keep flattering me, I might have to draw you shirtless,” you said.

“You want me to take my shirt off now?” Simon asked.

“Maybe for the next one?” you replied.

“The next one?” Simon repeated.

“You don’t think this is just a one time thing, do you?” you questioned.

“Well, you’re lucky I got plenty of time,” Simon said.

“Good,” you chuckled before continuing your art.

Shoutout to the fanartist and people who know how to draw because they're fucking amazing.

#simon riley x reader #simon ghost riley x reader #simon ghost riley #simon riley #ghost #ghost x reader

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haikyu-mp4 · 7 months ago

Text

Paradise

word count; 550 – f!reader

You just finished feeding your baby in the nursery before heading down the hallway to check in where your husband was responsible for getting your daughter ready for her first day in school. As you hear him talk, you stop behind the wall, silently leaning against it to take in the slow moment of the morning and listen to two of the three most precious people in your life.

“What do you want for your hair, princess? I was thinking this, maybe?” Tendo said, and you could just imagine him holding up the accessories he thought she looked the cutest with. Your husband might have seemed excited to help her get ready, but you knew him well enough to hear the nervousness behind it. It’s her first day at school and Tendo never had the most luck making friends when he was her age. How unlucky his daughter was to inherit so much of him, he thought sometimes. Curse his insecure thoughts, but he worried for her. “This bow suits your hair colour.” Her fiery red hair.

“Can you do the ballerina bun with the bow, s'il vous plait?” she asked, ever so politely practising her French.

“I can try, but it might not be as good as when your mom does it.” he said with a soft chuckle, already getting the hair gel and proper brush from the cupboard. Your daughter hummed her little songs, reminding you so much of your husband who somehow could follow along with her made-up lyrics.

Satori carefully distributed the tiniest amount of gel he would need throughout her hair and brushed it back, muttering small sorries when it looked like he pulled on some hair he didn’t mean to. After finally getting it in a hair tie, he had to stop and actually breathe. That’s when he noticed a small bump or two on one side, but he knew you could fix that later so he got started on the bun. The final product was nothing short of pretty good.

Your daughter carefully turned around on the step she stood on in front of the sink. “Up, up!” Satori lifted her and spun her around once when she made grabby hands for him to pick her up. Her giggles were such a joy that always filled your house with love. Satori was already thinking that they needed to take lots of pictures before you all left, but then his daughter's arms blocked his vision of the mirror. She was less carefully placing a matching bow in his hair, which the hair clip could barely hold on to at this length. It had grown out a bit since he shaved it last, so the clip held on for now. Pulling her hands back, she smiled at him and clapped. “It suits our hair colour, daddy!”

And when he looked at his beautiful daughter, he didn’t just see what he used to dislike about himself. He also saw so much of you. Your nose, your smile, your love. His daughter is really the most perfect thing he ever laid his eyes on, except maybe you.

Maybe he should trust that the universe has a plan for her, just like it gifted him with this family. His paradise.

“Let’s go make some new friends, miracle girl.”

masterlist

#tendou x you #haikyuu #haikyu #tendou satori #tendou x reader #tendo satori #tendo x reader #haikyuu tendou #haikyuu fluff #haikyu x reader #haikyuu x reader #hq x reader #hq #fanfiction

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reiden · 9 months ago

Text

i wanna hold the hand inside you | r.itoshi

You think of Itoshi Rin, your first love, often; the one who never was and the one who got away. Unexpectedly, you find yourself reuniting with the boy you once knew right in front of your apartment.

cw: f!reader, reader has a habit of skin-picking, soft angst w/ happy ending, suggestive, slight hand obsession?

— ✦

You always feel uglier after you pick at your skin. Which defeats the purpose because you do it to rid yourself of an imperfection you've stumbled upon. And yet, after all is said and done and the skin has grown irritated, all you can think about is how you've only gotten uglier.

You used to pick at your face, scratching at any bumps or texture you spot in the mirror, but you've gotten better about it now. You've stopped doing it on your face altogether. It was one too many people who thought they were close enough with you to inadvertently call you ugly. You're pretty sure the first to do it had been Itoshi Sae, your neighbour two houses down. Back then, when you were only eight, you hadn't cared that he thought your habit was unbecoming. It didn't matter what Sae thought — you had Rin.

One day, you realised you didn't really have Rin either.

Since then, you've moved onto your hands.

Your face is the important part, no one ever really looks at hands. You might think about it if you were to give a handshake, but when you think of that person from memory later that day, you'll think of their face. As long as your face is left alone, it doesn't matter what happens to the skin around your nails.

But you like looking at hands. They reveal so much about someone. Whether or not they clean their nails, if they paint them, if their hands are soft or calloused — all of these things are like clues that fit together to form the bigger picture of their life. Your own hands must give away the parts of you that you would prefer to stay hidden — like the fact that you pick at your skin. Itoshi Rin has beautiful hands. His hands were pretty enough that you were glad he played a sport that relied on his legs and feet instead. You never told him that you thought so; he probably would have called you strange should he have found out.

He never seemed to value you in the same way you valued him.

You pull at your skin again, pushing it down with the edge of your nail just until you feel the sharp sting of it having gone too far. It's boring at your job, nothing much to do or see. You sit on an ergonomic moving chair behind a large wooden desk, adjusting calendars and making appointments. There isn't much mystique to your job, nothing to write home about, but it gets you through life just fine. Glancing over at the time, you decide to click through and answer a few more emails in time for lunch to roll around.

In junior high, you had wanted to be an artist. You joined the art club and begged your family to let you participate in painting and sketching classes. You kept sketchbook after sketchbook filled with doodles and things — mostly of hands. It's been a long running obsession of yours. You used to draw faces but ever since you stopped messing with your face, your drawings of them phased out too.

In senior high, a teacher told you that artists don't make money from drawing hands all day. It irked you enough that you let go of that dream. You wanted to become a nail technician, you decided. The day you changed your dream, you went to tell the only person you considered close enough to tell; you went to tell Rin. It was that day that you had to come to the startling realisation that your best friend didn't seem to consider you much of a friend anymore. You spent all of your lunch break looking for him, only to find him practising at the field behind your school. When you called out to him, he ignored you. He stopped answering your texts too. You discarded the sliver of hope you had kept safe within your chest — the very thing that made you believe you would get Rin back soon. Something had changed in him and you didn't know what because he never told you.

(Because he never seemed to value you in the same way you valued him.)

You found other friends. Rin always seemed to be alone. He pulled out of school for a football program a week later, and you decided to give up on becoming a nail technician.

There's a soft beep that rings out from your phone — just one singular chime at the lowest volume you set on your first day on the job — when it's time for your lunch break. You always take it at the same tonkatsu shop seven minutes away from your place of work.

Today, it takes you ten minutes to get there because the heels you've chosen to wear are new ones; you haven't broken them in yet. You bought them for a date that you never ended up going to. Guilt over standing them up had consumed you but you just couldn't muster up the courage to go. You were all too aware of the fact that some pathetic part of you was still clinging onto a boy you haven't seen for a long time.

You remember the brush of the wind through his fringe, the sharp determined glint in his emerald eyes. You still hold onto the way his name once had a home at the tip of your tongue. Even as the years pass, Itoshi Rin digs his teeth into your skin and remains with you; parasitic and tormenting.

You ease yourself into the table in the corner and make your order, scrolling through your phone while you wait. Your feed is full of recent news, some things you understand and others you're not quite sure you get. Rin is there too, mixed in between all the posts about celebrities and new dramas. You were always bad at watching football. You were bad with most sports, they could never keep your interest for long, but you tried for Rin's sake. When the both of you were younger, you'd sit on the grass at the park and watch Rin run through the drills he'd seen his brother do earlier.

As you stare at the pictures of him standing on the pitch, stadium lights spilling down on him, you can't help but feel proud. Sweat glistens along his hairline, his hair still cut in the same way he used to have it when you knew him. The captain's armband is stretched tight around his bicep as his arm curls to hold up a trophy.

The swell in your chest comes with an ache you've never learned to get rid of. This ache that's ever-present, always there like a guest you can't seem to send home. It had only been a small sting when your friendship with Rin fully fell apart, but it grew tenfold when you realised you were in love with him. You pick at your skin again, the same place from earlier. Pain blooms at your fingertip but you choose to ignore it as you scroll past the pictures; your heart squeezes and shudders against your will, even after all these years.

The day inches past, sweat gathers along the nape of your neck. You leave the building at five precisely, stagger into the subway station at half past five, and sink into a navy blue seat at a quarter to six. The backs of your brand new heels dig into your ankles and you're certain there will be blisters when you yank them off at home.

Even still, your day has been a good one. Despite the fact that your mother had called and urged you to visit home; despite today marking the anniversary you first met Itoshi Rin; despite the way your heart always sinks at the realisation that you still remember the significance of what should be another meaningless day. Despite it all, it had been good and you stare at the passerby walking along the platform, head pressed against the cool window.

(You wonder about Rin once more, like you always do. You wonder if he's walking amongst a crowd this evening, perhaps something fried in his hand, keeping his palm warm. Maybe he's holding a drink instead — lukewarm green tea. In another world, it might have been your hand.)

The train shakes to a start, rocking you from side to side and it becomes impossible to keep yourself awake. You drift off to the memory of a boy you once knew.

You're sure you're bleeding. The skin around your index nail is irritated, throbbing with a dull pain. Similarly, there's a sting — a quick flash of something white hot up your left calf — whenever you take a step. Your blister must have turned into a cut.

Your soles scrape against the road, shoulders loose and hunched forward as you meander your way home. The sun has set, disappearing into the skyline in the distance as the sky grows darker and the wind picks up. Streetlights have flickered to life and you pass by a salon still packed with customers, women resting against soft cushions as they converse. You roll your neck from side to side, attempting to release some of the tension that has gathered along your muscles from staying seated almost all day, fingers loosely wrapped around the straps of your bag.

Eyes trained on the fading white marks beneath your feet, you turn the corner into the alleyway you apartment building sits in. There's a crunch of someone taking a step towards you, and then — the call of your name, familiar, wrapped up in the gravelly tone of a voice too rough to belong to the boy you once knew. But you know it's him, anyway.

"Rin?" you tilt your head to the side, scanning over his features as he stands against the sunlight, soft shadows marking his pale skin. He remains silent, almost stunned as he stands across from you, so you speak again, "It's been a while."

He doesn’t smile, but the corners of his mouth twitch in a way that suggests one. Rin is wearing a dark windbreaker, hands stuffed into its pockets. There's a loose thread hanging off the cuff around his wrist, a tiny rip of the outer fabric revealing the slight grey beneath. He clears his throat, "Yes, it has been." There's a pause then, neither of you willing to bridge the gap in conversation as the exhaust fans whir quietly.

"How have you been?" Rin asks, taking a step towards you. You can smell him now, flowery and sweet; its lavender, which is what you had remembered him as. In a way, it comforts you — some things will stay the same and stand the test of time, no matter how many years have inched by.

“I’ve been good,” you hum. Truthfully, you haven’t quite been good in a long time. You’ve been alright, you’ve made it from day to day, you pay your bills on time and you see your friends every other weekend; but it’s not good — it's just alright. You don’t think Rin needs to hear that, not after how long it has been since you last heard his voice following after your own.

It's strange to think about how his mother knows your name and your face, knows that you like lemonade with some raspberry in it; how Rin was there to witness the way you got every fading scar on your arms and legs. Standing before him now, you don't even know what his apartment might look like. Your lives, which were once so intricately intertwined, have unravelled and diverged to the point of obscurity.

You've given him the room to say something, continue the conversation or choose to end it, but Rin is quiet as he takes you in. His brows are furrowed, just a shaky line above his dark eyes as watches you fidget and begin to grow uncomfortable under the weight of stare.

This silence is far too heavy of a burden for you to shoulder, so you cut through with a question that seems a bit out of place now. "What are you doing here?"

Your voice seems to snap him out of whatever trance he was previously in, "I was out on a walk — wandering around, I guess." Rin shuffles even closer and the wind billows, rustling the fabric of his windbreaker. You watch his hair flutter and fall against his forehead.

"I would have thought that you'd be busy all the time, seeing as you're a celebrity now," you say with a soft laugh, twisting the ends of your coat between your fingers while your bag swings gently from side to side in your other hand.

He doesn't seem to like that, gaze sharpening just a bit as his mouth curves into a frown. You chew on your bottom lip, feeling a bottomless pit open up inside of your stomach at the realisation that it's become so much harder to talk to the boy who used to be your best friend. (To talk to the boy who you used to love — who you are willing to love once again.)

It's getting colder as the remaining tendrils of sun slowly disappear, hiding away to make room for the moon to shine. You nod at your apartment, "Would you...like to come inside?" You expect him to say no, after all, the two of you are no longer the people you remember each other to be.

Surprisingly, Rin perks up at your question, firmly nodding once. He follows after you as you walk over to your front door, fishing around the front pocket of your bag for your keys. Rin stands a hair's width away from you, his warm breath fanning over the back of your neck and goosebumps ripple down your arms.

You watch him study your home, scrutinising your choice of decor — the small pictures framed on the walls, magazines and books strewn about — as he takes off his shoes. He seems to be drawn to the picture resting on one of your shelves: it's of you and him, years ago, standing next to each other with smiles full of missing teeth that look more like grimaces. You were hoping he wouldn't notice that one, one of the only pictures you've kept of and from your childhood, but you can't blame him for it either. Had it been you, that picture would have been the first one you noticed too.

"You kept this?" he's nearly whispering as he gently takes the ageing framed photo in his hands.

You rest your bag on the floor, "Yeah. Mom gave it to me right before I moved out." He turns back to look at you and his next words are unspoken, but still so loud.

You hadn't just kept it — you framed it, placed it in your living room for everyone to see. His expression crumbles momentarily, a quiet admission of guilt that settles in the short distance between you. Rin must not have kept much of you with him. He never says it outright, but you know better. Maybe that should leave you feeling bitter but it's somehow exactly what you expected of him.

Has Itoshi Rin changed at all from the last time you saw him? Do you just know him too well?

Dusting off your clothes, you take a deep breath, "It's getting late. Want dinner?"

Rin agrees. Like you were expecting him to.

You've never liked beer.

But you find yourself peering into a glass full of it as Rin settles in across from you. You're still in your work attire, the waistband of your skirt digging into your stomach after your full meal. Rin's left his windbreaker in a crumpled heap of fabric beside his chair, the tip of his finger drawing lines in the condensation forming on his glass. His nails are well-groomed, cut short and clean. They might be better than yours, but that’s because Rin doesn’t pick at his skin like you do. You stare until you think you shouldn’t anymore.

He hasn't gotten up to leave. You haven't kicked him out.

Resting your cheek against your fist, you push yourself forward, closer to him. Your slight movement draws his attention away from the glass, Rin looks up at you as his frown eases up.

"It's strange seeing you," you admit, more open to honesty thanks to your slight state of inebriation. "Strange seeing you after so many years."

"You have that picture," he scoffs, jerking his head in the vague direction of the picture of the two of you as kids.

Scrunching up your nose, you lean back against the chair, "Yeah, but you don't look like that anymore. You're taller and you have too many teeth." You take a sip of your beer, feeling it fizz against your top lip, "And you're probably meaner now."

He startles, looks offended when he throws back whatever's left in his glass. "I'm not mean."

You raise a brow, "You were already pretty mean when you left me." You shock yourself at how easily the words slipped past your lips, how little hesitation there was. How you still sounded so hurt over it all despite having spent years convincing yourself that you didn't miss him. The treacherous muscle beating within your ribcage twists and shakes. It only takes a moment for understanding to soften the glare Rin is giving you. Reaching over, you grab the can of beer to refill his glass, cursing under your breath when you realise it's empty. "I'll get some more — just wait."

You dig around in your refrigerator and you can feel Rin watching. "You're bleeding," he says.

"It's nothing," you wave him off, returning with another cold can.

He shakes his head, "Do you have bandages?"

And so you find yourself with your chest pressed against the cushions of your couch, ankles hanging off the edge. You spare Rin a glance over your shoulder, awkwardness leaving you silent and rigid. He's kneeling beside you, holding two bandages he insisted he get for you from the years old first aid kit stashed away in your medicine cabinet.

"You don't have to do this you know," you mumble, pinching at the inside of your cheek with your teeth. "I could have done it myself."

Rin gently grabs your ankle, his fingers are cold enough to make you jolt. "It's fine," he brushes off your words with nothing more than a grumble. "This could get infected," he adds on as he places the band-aid over the cut.

His hands are on you, fingers wrapped around your ankle almost completely. He skims them over your skin and you suppress a shiver. You think you should tell him that his hands are pretty — that they have always been pretty — but you bite your tongue.

Your cuts don't hurt as much as they had earlier, and the blood surrounding them has dried down. You're sure nothing would have come of it being left uncovered, but Rin seems adamant on doing this simple task for you. You wonder if part of it has anything to do with being labelled as "mean."

He shuffles over to your other ankle, jeans brushing against your rug, as does the same thing. It's been too long since you've been taken care of like this — the feeling has become wholly foreign and you struggle to sit still while Rin smooths out the band-aid over your skin. When he stands up, you twist around and slouch your back against the couch, facing him.

Rin looms over you. He brushes some hair out of his eyes and sits down next to you. "I'm on a break — I'll be around a lot more."

You glance at him from the corner of your eye, "Around to see me?"

And perhaps, you're imagining it, the way he moves closer so that his thigh is pushed up against it. Perhaps, you're imagining how he's leaned into you. Rin's temple makes contact with your shoulder and you exhale.

"Yes," he whispers, looking up at you through his lashes." To see you." You can recognise the guilt swimming in his gaze, leftover from earlier in the evening.

You wish he would just say it — say sorry — but your heart yearns for him regardless of what he's said and what he should have said. It's ridiculous; it was years ago and you should have moved on. (And you know that the only reason it hurt as badly as it did was the fact that you had loved him twice as much when things soured.) You're motivated by the ache you've grown accustomed to when you bring your hand to his hair, digging your fingers in, scratching at his scalp. Much like a cat, Rin goes limp against you and you trace the side of his face with the pad of your thumb.

You try to hide your other hand, feeling somewhat self-conscious about the way you’ve torn it up. Rin reaches for it without a second thought, lacing his fingers together with your own, oblivious to all the rough parts you’ve left behind with your habit.

"What if I don't want to see you?" you question. You don't really mean it — you hope he knows.

You can feel his breath, feel the rise and fall of his chest as he speaks, "I would wait until you said you wanted to."

"Even if that took years?" You pause your movements, hand still in his hair. Rin draws a gasp out from you when he presses a fluttering kiss against your wrist — a nervous kiss, one that tests the waters.

"Even then," he says.

You don't know who leans in first, you want to say it's Rin but you, with your years of yearning, are not to be trusted either. His cold palms cup your face, lips parting against your own, his tongue meeting yours. He kisses you hungrily, eagerly, desperate to make up for years of lost time and memories that were meant to be shared by two but left to be held by just one instead. It almost hurts — when his teeth sink into your lip and you whimper, Rin snaps his eyes open. He licks over where he bit, fingers digging into your cheeks.

You like the feeling of his hands on you. You want them everywhere, you decide. Rin tugs at your collar, unbuttons your shirt quickly, his hands splayed out over your sides and just grazing your bra. It's only then that you pull away, chest heaving as you stare up at him.

"Will you discard me again?" Your voice sounds almost meek in a way; you're afraid of what he might say and of what you might see. Too scared to see him hesitate, too scared to meet his eyes and not see yourself reflected in them.

But Rin's answer is instantaneous. His gaze has darkened some, lust-blown and riddled with the yearning that's been growing in your chest for years. His palm encircles your wrist, the other wraps around your waist chasing purchase. "Never," he says with a kind of conviction that leaves butterflies erupting at your fingertips.

While his hand travels up your back, he kisses you again and this time it feels different. He moves up your wrist, intertwining your fingers once more. You know you have him in all the ways that he has you.

#itoshi rin x reader #rin x reader #rin itoshi x reader #blue lock x reader #wr.iting

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ilovedilfs-444 · 7 months ago

Text

Lingerie 🎀

word count: 1.5k

୨♡୧

All day you had been thinking about the Victoria's Secret bag hidden away in the back of your closet, stashed behind one of your thick fur winter coats where you were sure Frank would not go looking.

Inside the striped bag, was a sexy lace thong and bra set in Frank's favourite colour, black. Baby pink bows adorned the two garments, adding your own personal touch to them.

Frank had been away on a work thing for the past few days, and the loneliness was killing you. Every time he went away on a job, he got a new burner phone, which you were only allowed to contact in case of an emergency, no exceptions.

But tonight was the night he was due home. All you wanted to do right now was order in your favourite takeaway, watch a movie with your boyfriend and then have hot dirty sex all night long.

The more you thought about Frank the more your mind drifted off to that pink striped bag stashed away in your closet. The angel on your shoulder was telling you the outfit you were wearing right now, grey sweatpants and a black crop top, was better and comfier than the sexy underwear set. However, the devil was telling you to go put that set on, add the white heels you knew Frank loved so much and surprise him as he walked in that front door.

You bite your lip just thinking about surprising Frank, having long steamy sex and then lounging around with takeaway food and movies for the rest of the night. The devil on your shoulder had just stomped on the angel's speech as you jumped up from the sofa excitedly and sped off to your bedroom.

You threw off your clothes into a pile in the corner of your bedroom, shoving the rows of shoes away to reveal the bag of goods. Grabbing it and pulling away the tissue paper at the top, you pull out the thong and bra and throw them onto your bed.

Pulling off your own panties, you watch yourself in your mirror, practising your seductive moves in preparation for your boyfriend. After putting on the lacy set, you felt nothing but the definition of sexy.

The white heels you had planned on wearing were suddenly outshone by the platform black heels sitting beside them.

"Hm, eenie meenie mynie... mo!" you point your finger at the black heels and stalk over to them, stepping into them and turning around to see yourself in the wall length mirror.

As your admiring yourself in the mirror, the sound of the old front door creaking open echoes throughout the apartment. You quickly grab the black silk robe hanging in the closet just as you hear Frank call out, "Y/n?"

You use your foot to open the bedroom door, leaning against the frame. You hadn't tied the robe fully, so your sexy underwear set was still on full show for Frank.

He had his back to you when you first saw him, but the squeak from the bedroom door caught his attention. As his eyes met yours, you could practically see the lust spilling out of them.

"Holy..." he mumbles as he pulls his black hoodie off his body. His t-shirt lifted up with the hoodie and you could see his defined abs in the dim living room lighting.

You stalked towards him, dragging your finger up your thigh and pulling up the bottom of your robe slightly. Your hair still lightly curled from the previous day.

"Like what you see?" you smile and stop a few feet in front of him as his eyes roam every inch of your body as if it were his first time seeing you.

"Fuck me.. I... You're so.." he fumbles over his words as he walks towards you, eyes not leaving your body. His brown eyes finally look into yours as he combs his fingers through your hair, tucking a strand behind your ear.

"I love you so much," he mumbles as his hands caress their way down your body until they meet your hips, pulling you closer to him. You can feel his boner through his jeans, desperate to be let free.

You grab his hand and lead him towards the bedroom. He follows behind, no doubt staring at your ass or legs, oh how he loves your legs. You push him down onto the edge of the bed, standing in between his muscly thighs.

"And I love you too, Castle." You kiss his lips, softly at first until his hands tug at the shoulders of your robe, dragging it down your body and off your arms. He kisses your neck and chest, his hand groping your boobs. You let out a few soft moans as he kisses further down your chest and stomach. You could now clearly see the outline of his hard cock through his jeans, and decided to help him out.

You drop down to you knees so your face is in-front of his crotch, peering up at him with innocent eyes. You unbutton his jeans and teasingly slow begin to pull his zipper down, holding eye contact the entire time. He lifts his hips for you to pull the jeans down his legs further, and his cock was now tenting his boxers.

You kiss his boner through the thin black material, as your fingers tease at pulling down the band. He lets out quiet grunts as you kiss him, his eyes watching you the entire time. Finally, satisfied with your reading you pull his boxers down his legs and grab his cock. Your hands must've been cold as he jumped slightly when you grabbed him. Your tongue licks up the length of his dick, circling around the tip before taking his whole length in your mouth. When you come back up Frank's head is bent backwards in ecstasy. You repeat this several times until your eyes are full of tears and are sure your mascara is running down your cheeks from the length of him.

You stand back up to your full height and straddle Frank, wrapping your arms around his neck to stable yourself. He places his big hands on your waist and snaps one of the strings of your thong against your skin, a smirk playing on his face.

You move your thong to the side and lower yourself onto his cock, rubbing the head against your clit a few times before Frank guides himself inside of you. You lean your forehead against his as he fills you up, sending butterflies to your stomach. He waits a minute and kisses your lips sensually as you get use to his length, before beginning to bounce up and down on his cock. You moan loudly, not caring if the old woman who loves to make noise complaints about you and Frank, or if anyone walking by the apartment could hear. You were happy right now, and nobody could ruin that for you.

You can feel your thighs beginning to ache and Frank notices too, using his hands to guide you up and down his cock before he grabs hold of you and throws you onto the bed. He kicks off his jeans and boxers that had been around his ankles for the past few minutes.

He stands at the end of the bed and grabs hold of your waist, pulling you down so his cock is rubbing against your clothed pussy. With one swift movement, he grabs hold of the side of your thong and pulls it clean off, earning a gasp from you.

"Frank!" you say in shock but with a smile on your face.

"That's better," he mumbles before placing his hands under your back and unhooking your bra, pulling it away from your body. You sit up on your elbows as he takes in your body. Your beautiful, sexy body.

He grabs your hips and dips his head between your legs, grabbing one of your legs and throwing it over his shoulder. He licks a long stripe up your pussy, sending shock waves through your body when he his hot tongue came in contact with your clit.

"Fuck, Frank," you moan and place your hand on the back of his head. He looks up at you as he latches onto your clit, sucking and flicking his tongue across it. It doesn't take long before you can feel your orgasm forming in your stomach. Your grip on Frank's short hair tightens as your knees instinctively try to close the closer you come to your orgasm.

Frank uses his hand to hold down your leg and uses the other hand to finger fuck you. His thick fingers were something you could never get tired of.

"Frank I'm gonna... I'm," you try to mumble out the sentence but he speeds up his fingers and your orgasm untangles through your body, sending waves of pleasure through every inch of you.

Frank climbs further up the bed, using his knee to keep your legs open and lays his arms over your head, trapping you beneath him. His hot breath tickles your ear, sending butterflies straight to your stomach, "Ready for round two?"

#frank castle x reader #frank castle #the punisher

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so-fuck-what-im-dreaming · 10 months ago

Text

Date Night | Damiano David

Pairing : Damiano David x Reader

Prompt : A post I saw a while ago where someone was talking about a speakeasy they had been to that also doubled as a tattoo parlour and I couldn't stop thinking about it...

Warnings: Poor Italian translations, bad tattooing process and aftercare, not proof-read

Word Count: 2527

“Are you ready to go Amore?” He asks, walking back into your shared bedroom and standing behind you as you looked in the mirror, slipping your earrings in. “Though I don’t really know why I’m asking, considering I have absolutely no Idea where you’re taking me,” He says with a soft laugh as he places his hands on your hips, pulling you into him.

“I promise you’ll love it,” You assure him as you lean back, resting your head on his chest.

“I’m sure I will,” He says as he starts to kiss your neck. The warm Rome air was flowing through the apartment, all the windows and doors open creating a nice breeze. This was your happy place, here with him. “Mmh…let's get going,” He teases, pulling away from you.

“You just don’t like surprises do you?” You ask him as you put your sandals on, buckling them at your ankle.

“You know I don’t” He says with a grin as He spritzes himself with his cologne.

You left the apartment hand-in-hand as you walked towards the metro station, it was only a few stops away so you were quickly off again. You double checked the distance when you got out and it was only a five minute walk. You passed the Circo Massimo and you reminisced about when Damiano played there a few years ago. You had only been dating around a year when He begged you to come, guaranteeing you it would be the best night of your life and He had definitely not been lying.

You had heard the band practising before, even having sat in on some recording sessions…but there was something different about seeing them perform, seeing Him perform. Damiano was almost a different person. He was raw, unapologetic and very fucking hot. Not that He wasn’t anyway but somehow it had been taken to a whole new level.

“It should be just here…” You say looking down at the map on your phone.

“Are you sure Amore? I think your map might be wrong…” He says looking around. You spot what you’re looking for. A dark wooden door with a golden ‘T’ and matching knocker.

“Follow me,” You say with a wide smile on your face as you pull Damiano with you. You knock on the door three times followed by saying the word ‘Sfizio’. A moment passes before you hear it unlocking and the door swinging open.

“Benvenuti Signore e Signora,” The Doorman says, nodding in your direction as you walk past him.

“Welcome to temptazione,” You say quietly to Damiano as you both take a moment to soak in the atmosphere. There’s a light haze of cigarette smoke and the smell of expensive cologne filling the air as you’re silently led to a booth in the corner..

“Wow…where did you find this place?” He asks, both of you sliding into the dark green leather lined booth.

“Friend of a friend is one of the owners…it opened up a few weeks ago and as soon as I heard about it I knew I had to bring you,” You say, not wanting to give up the biggest secret yet.

The lady who had sat you left a menu card and a small piece of paper. ‘you’ll be seen at 11’

“What's that?” He asks as you look at the paper.

“The second surprise of the night…but it looks like you’ll have to wait,” You tease him

“You just can’t help yourself can you?” He asks and you just shake your head. You had just over an hour to kill until it was your turn so Damiano offers to grab the first round of drinks. By half past you were two drinks in, Damiano’s arm wrapped around your shoulders as you alternated between slowly kissing and quietly talking. The next half an hour seemed to go pretty quickly and soon enough you were being escorted down a dark hallway, your boyfriends fingers laced into yours as you followed,

“Leo will be your artist tonight, godere,” She says before leaving you. You turn to Damiano and you can see all the pieces starting to click into place.

“Is this what I think it is?” He asks and you nod, a smile spreading across your face. You had gotten a few tattoos in the past, nowhere near as many as He had and you had been saying for years that you wanted to get them done together some day. “-and you want to?” He asks and you nod again. When he sees your reaction you're pulled into his chest, lips colliding with his. “You’re perfect” He whispers before you're interrupted by the sound of footsteps coming down the hallway.

“11 O’Clock?” A guy asks as he comes into the room.

“Yes,” You answer and He pulls back a curtain revealing a large leather chair and a tattoo station.

“Do you know what you want?” He asks and you look over at Damiano.

“I was wondering if we chose for each other,” You suggest, and Damiano’s wide smile was a good enough answer.

“Do you want to leave it as a surprise?” Leo asks, opening a drawer and pulling out a black silk blindfold. You were definitely not a stranger to a silk blindfold. “ I can wrap it up for you so you can wait until you get home to see it? Quite a few of our couples do,” He offers and you both like the sound of that.

You were always slightly nervous before a new tattoo and Damiano knew that. “Let me go first, Amore,” He says, kissing your forehead. “Where do you want it?” He asks.

“Where have you got space is probably a better question,” You reply with a smile and He starts to unbutton his shirt. He shrugs it off and hangs it up on the hook behind the door. As he looks at himself in the mirror trying to see where you could put it you can’t help but admire him. A soft smile rested upon your lips as you let your eyes roam over his body.

“Up here Amore,” He says, directing your gaze back up his chest. “Either the top of my ribcage or just above my waistband?” He suggests, pointing out the two areas.

“I think here should be perfect,” You say, brushing your hand over the top of his ribcage. Damiano heads over to the chair and lays down.

“Do you know what you’d like Signora?” Leo asks.

“I do, can I have a pen and paper…wouldn’t want to give anything away,” You say smiling up at your boyfriend. He quickly hands them to you and you draw out your design. “If you can do it as close to that as you can, that would be amazing,” You say and he nods. Leo hands you the silk blindfold before leaving the room to make a template of your design.

You moved towards Damiano, walking around the chair so you were looking down at him. He sits his head up slightly so you could tie the blindfold around his eyes.

“Oh how the tables have turned,” You say quietly, moving to sit on the edge of the seat. You slowly run your hand over his chest, paying special attention where his new tattoo will be. You lean down to press your lips to the base of his neck, slowly kissing your way up towards his jawline.

“Per favore…Amore,” He says but you’re interrupted again. Leo pays no mind to the position he found you in as he showed you the template.

“It's perfect,” You say with a smile, getting up and moving to sit in the chair on the other side. Damiano turns onto his side so Leo can reach his ribcage. The tattoo takes about five minutes, maybe not even that. He moisturises the area and covers it up so it’s hidden from prying eyes.

“That means it’s your turn, Amore,” Damiano says, pulling the blindfold from his face and smiling at you.

“I guess it is…how do you want me Signore David?” You ask with a grin as He stands up and walks you over towards the mirror.

“May I?” He asks and you nod, before taking the back zip of your dress in between his fingers and pulling it down slightly. The dress hung around your waist, revealing the laced bra you wore underneath it. He moved his hand onto your stomach, dragging one of his fingers along the area where your skin disappeared under the lace. “What about here?” He asks.

“I like it,” You say with a smile and He seems pleased with his decision. You look down and see Damiano pulling the black silk out of his pocket.

“Your turn,” He says as he ties it around your eyes. You feel his fingers lace into yours as he leads you over towards the chair, you carefully sit down, making sure your dress doesn't fall any further.

“Signore? Your design?” Leo asks Dami, who asks to speak to him away from me. Leo leaves the room and I can feel Damiano coming back over to me.

“Leo’s just gone to make the template…he’ll be back in a moment,” He says quietly, only a few inches from my ear. “I think it’s going to look beautiful Amore,” He says, tracing the area again with his finger…then something else…you can feel his breath on your stomach so it must be his tongue.

“Dami…” You moan softly but he stops…drying the area so nobody would know.

“Later, I promise,” He says, gently squeezing your thigh as He sits up…Leo having come back into the room.

“Signora…do you mind taking off your bra…I think the fabric might get in the way,” He asks and you sit up, a guy's hands, who you know for a fact are Damiano’s wrap around you, unhooking the bra and moving it away. Your nipples peak at the sudden cold air, then an alcohol wipe to disinfect the area is gently brushed over the area before the design is transferred onto your skin.

“Just stay nice and still for us Amore,” Damiano says, relieving you of any worry or concern you had.

“Signore…would you like to do it?” Leo asks and there's a moment of silence.

“That's not up to me…Amore?” He asks and you quickly agree.

“Yes, of course,” You say, butterflies erupting in your stomach at the thought of Damiano tattooing something that would be on your body forever. You could still hear the music from the bar as they concentrated, the only other sound being that of the tattoo gun. You didn’t find it particularly painful and before you knew it, it was done. Damiano followed the same routine that Leo did with the aftercare before wrapping it up.

“You did so good,” Damiano says as He kisses your forehead. The silk blindfold is untied, left to drop into your lap.

“I’ll leave you two to get dressed…the charge has been added to your bill. It was a pleasure working with you Signore e Signora,” Leo says with a smile before quickly leaving the room. You loosen your bra slightly so it doesn’t affect the dressing before you pull your dress back up, over your shoulders. Damiano had already buttoned up his shirt by the time his hands reached for the zipper again, gently tugging it up.

“That was amazing Amore, thank you so much,” He says, kissing your shoulder blade.

“Thank you for tattooing me,” You say with a slight laugh. Damiano would later tell you that Leo had been following him on social media so had seen that He had tattooed before, so the whole ‘would you like to’ was a farce.

It was nearing midnight by the time you got back to the bar, both of you deciding to finish your drinks before heading home. Damiano’s jacket was draped over your shoulders as the cool air settled in on your journey home. The metro was quiet and the streets near your apartment were even quieter.

You had decided that you would both wait a week till revealing your new tattoos, wanting to give them time to heal before seeing them for the first time.

..................

The next week flew by, Damiano back in the studio, You were back in the office. It was a pretty unremarkable week that was all counting down towards the day you would finally see your tattoo. Damiano had ordered your favourite food for delivery, you had eaten whilst watching a movie you both wanted to see, a very nice bottle of red wine had been cracked open but both of you knew what the other was waiting for.

“I think it’s time,” You say to him as the film finishes.

“I think so too,” He says, getting up from the couch and taking you by the hand. He led you into your bedroom and towards the mirror. He pulled your shirt off of you whilst you unbuttoned his. Dropping both onto the floor in a crumpled heap. You watched as He moved to his bedside table, pulling out a very familiar black silk blindfold. “I’m going to clean it up before you see it, ok?” He asks, tying the silk around your head for the second time. He takes your bra off and can feel him peeling away the adhesive dressing. He headed into the bathroom and grabbed a damp towel, gently brushing it over the tattoo making sure it was clean and healing properly.

He positioned you in front of the mirror.

“Ready,” He asks and you nod, he removes the blindfold and you look down at your left breast. The dark black inked words cupping it. ‘Il Ballo Della Vita’ Curved around, identical to his, but this time in his handwriting, done by his hand.

“I…I love it,” You say, slightly lost for words. “It’s perfect Dami,” You say, unable to take your eyes off of it. You finally managed to tear your eyes away from it to turn around, pulling him down into a long and drawn out kiss. “Thank you,” You whisper with a wide smile on your face.

The silk is wrapped around his eyes now, damp towel gently wiping at the tattoo before letting him see. You were very impressed at how much it looked like your handwriting…Leo had done a very good job. You untied the blindfold, throwing it behind you and onto the bed as Damiano’s eyes travelled down his own body, locking onto the written words. ‘Sarò ciò che respiri’ Your favourite line from the song He wrote about you.

“You are what I breathe…” You say quietly, now it was his turn to be unable to tear his eyes away. It was very rare that Damiano was speechless…his whole job was putting his emotions into words…but this had stumped him.

“I…” He tries to say but to no luck. You smile to yourself…you definitely won. “It's perfect…you’re perfect…fuck, I love you so much Amore,” He says pulling you into his arms. “How about we put that blindfold to another use?” He asks quietly against the shell of your ear.

finite

#maneskin #damiano #damiano david #damiano david x reader #maneskin x reader #thomas raggi #vic de angelis #ethan torchio

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rowanthestrange · 5 months ago

Text

The Media Overanalysis (O)Mega Essay: Why Rogue Is The Bad Guy. Duh.

Code Mauve. Sorry, you’re a mutual and directly responded, so now you get The Post. It was bound to be someone eventually, and it was you. It’s nothing personal. You were just the first to dare my parapet.

@icantleave replied: rogue definitely isn't the master because the master is simply incapable of cosplaying someone this genuine and unlike himself, his disguises are always essentially very him with a few traits hidden or amplified.

Either there is a psy-op and Disney aired a different version of this or a solid quarter of you got brain broken by American Mr Darcy- no don’t try and run, get back here. The only running you’re doing is this essay equivalent of a 10k.

You are intelligent. All of you. And yet what the hell does this mean? “rogue definitely isn't the master because the master is simply incapable of cosplaying someone this genuine and unlike himself”

We’re going through this episode. All of it. This is not actually an ‘it is the Master’ post, it is a ‘but at the very least he sure acts like the Master would’ post, which is the above premise. But also just in general that Rogue is The Bad Guy.

Take it as the Master cosplaying Jack; a Pantheon member whose theme is Roleplay who like the others has watched the show and is deliberately filling the void daddy created and getting in by cosplaying the Master cosplaying Jack (has to be doing both to be skilled at Roleplay ala Maestro and the Toymaker’s skills in their areas, else he’d just be shittily cosplaying Jack); or literally he is just baddie Chuldur #6 fanboy who wants to bang the Doctor he saw on TV cus he’s sexy and they get Doctor Who out there as well as Bridgerton. All the concepts are adjacent:

Baddie fanboy roleplaying as Jack to fuck-slash-fuck-with the Doctor.

Places people. Let’s take it from the top:

-We start with a scene showing someone (Chuldur #2) who wants to roleplay as the bad guy because that would be fun.

-(Bonus: the writers talking about themselves - “Wonderful party, your Grace.” “Some are saying best of the season. A triumph. A new standard set. And I, of course, could not comment. But I think the real estimation of an evening is in the matches made.” I quite agree.)

-(We are also in Tredegar House, which you may recognise from The End Of Time, Spyfall, and other times in New Who. We like this place.

-There is electronic interference in Ruby’s earpiece. The Doctor scans this and finds it’s coming from Rogue. The Master is a frequent user of manipulative electronics both towards other people and to disguise himself. Put a pin in this, it’ll come up at the end. ✅

-The Doctor meets Rogue to the backing of hit pop song, Billie Eilish’s “I’m The Bad Guy”. The Master is a famous lover of fun pop, and being obvious to an oblivious Doctor. ✅✅

I wrestled with iMovie at midnight to put the lyric subtitles to this video and you are going to watch and appreciate it:

[If at any point you want out of this essay, all you have to do is come back to here and watch this video again while singing in your head along with the lyrics to receive a passing grade.]

-They deliberately work the lines around the music, not just thematically but so you can clearly hear what the backing song is. And made sure they kept the scene going long enough all the way into the next section just so they could keep the line: “I like it when you take control, even if you know that you don't, own me, I'll let you play the role, I'll be your animal.” Fuck’s sake. Most Thoschei song. Interchangeable freaks.

-Rogue is critiqued by the Doctor for not acting appropriately broody enough. The Master well known for being a fairly shit actor. ✅

-That is an American accent. This is a red flag for either being a Pantheon member, or the Master Dressing For The Occasion (which Rogue certainly has).

-“Do you practise in a mirror?” - him roleplaying would mean literally yes.

-“I didn’t know the Duchess employs a court jester.” - Alexa please search every time the Master has called the Doctor some derivation of clown. ✅

-“O…Kay…Rude. Lord-?” “Not a Lord.” Our last outing with the Master was all about his psyche-destroying discovery of being made from the Not-A-Time Lord Doctor; and if he is Pantheon The Rogue roleplaying as the Master, then just chef’s kiss line. But I will be magnanimous this early in proceedings, and let you go ‘technically a valid meta read is saying that conforms he’s not a Time Lord’. But the paragraph stands.

-He calls himself Rogue:

1. noun: a dishonest or unprincipled person. "You are a rogue and an embezzler" Similar: scoundrel, villain, reprobate. 2. noun: an elephant or other large wild animal living apart from the herd and having savage or destructive tendencies. "a rogue elephant"

If it’s the Master then straight up naming himself “The Bad Guy” is on brand. The Master is a Rogue Time Lord. That is what fandom has long called them - ‘Rogues and Renegades’. The Master is shite at names, if you haven’t had the pleasure of the Third Doctor’s company yet. Shitty anagrams, tenuous links to goals and character aspects, and crappy puns are the standard ✅. If Pantheon, then his choice in lifestyle that’s more about personally having fun (ultimately still Doctor compatible), with a group, in a non-competitive game which has no win condition other than enjoying the game, though rip to the NPC’s being played with as character, would definitely put him somewhat apart from the wreaking havoc on the universe others. If a Pantheon member, he literally did choose his own name from D&D.

-Just generalised throughout: Rogue is not actually suave. Some people find his secret awkwardness under the posh gear charming. The Master is not suave and is awkward, but desperately tries to style it out like he is anyway, that’s just his character. ✅

-We kinda feel like we’re going into some Karny Shobogony kind of cave area, we’re not, but just for the hitting home that this is another Upper Class Gallifrey mirror for the season. You don’t need to think the Master’s involved for this, don’t worry, wasn’t in Dot And Bubble was he, but that was a clear enough mirror. A person appearing as a servant forces their way up the social ladder. If you like some mirror play and are really deep in your TC ‘what kind of person would name themselves Master’, you’re having fun. Also I can’t see that type of death lightning without thinking of Simm!Master. Costly effect, but we went with it, and it does add some panache.

-Chuldur #5 is roleplaying Emily (this is used both in her disguise and out - potentially playing the same ‘character’. We’ll come back to this too, explore more later), who will be something of our Master this evening in the Gallifrey mirror if you’re going in for it. Also coincidentally is half the mirror pair with Ruby to the Doctor and Rogue. “Emily, please-” “But you consume me sir. I think of you every waking hour and I hate myself for it!” yeah we know babe… Anyone else hearing Dhawan!Master’s “I cannot bear that”?

-“I love these old skies” - all the stars makes it arguably sound more like a Flux reference rather than just light pollution. And we all know what event by who triggered that off.

-Finally we get more lines from Rogue, this has all been very one-sided. “Do you never stop chattering?” - a frequent refrain of the Master, who, fun fact has told the Doctor to shut up in every incarnation in New Who (and probably Old but this is the trivia I have) ✅

-If Rogue is supposedly wanting to stop the bad birdies, real weird he doesn’t give an appropriately flying fuck about the mysterious lone shoe. And simply says “I suggest look for the other shoe” like it doesn’t matter with a shrug. Because the Master is stupid and shite at keeping in-character. ✅ Makes sense if he’s on the bad guy’s team though. Also Cinderella. Noticing themes in today’s mirror subtext.

-They find it plus corpse. “And you knew. You didn’t even flinch.” Actually wrong, the Doctor can’t see behind him but we can. Rogue doesn’t flinch at the shoe, or coming up to the body, but when the Doctor says it’s the Duchess, Rogue does a slight ‘oh’ lean back, and then a sigh with a bit of a slump. To me this reads as a ‘oh you fucking idiots’ for doing it this blatantly, but I won’t mark it, cus you could argue that ultimately maybe a bounty hunter might care more about the death of the duchess in particular and sigh about it etc. (Or he is Pantheon roleplayer getting annoyed his gang can’t stick to a character and risking the outline going off-track and more bodycounty). “And you knew” - Rogue doesn’t keep eye contact but closes his eyes, opens them immediately up and a little to the side, thinking of what to say next style. ((This specific circumstance he couldn’t have known about prior, cus the murder happens while he’s inside))

-“This is a murder far beyond the technologies of planet Earth. It could only be done by someone brilliant.” “And monstrous.” [-horny flirting tone looking him up and down] “And ruthless.” “And contemptible.” Both: “You.” He is the Master and in with the bird gang. No bounty hunter with a heart of gold is calling the murderer brilliant because also, may have been easy to miss, but the Doctor hasn’t done anything brilliant yet unless you include owning a scanner and briefly infodumping about constellations. That is a Master talking about himself kinda line. ✅

-The Doctor thought Rogue was a murderer who was calling himself brilliant, and it only made him more horny, and proceeded to dance along with that little two-step. If I’m Master-brained, what’s he? Cus he’s usually only into one murderer. If that guy had snogged him instead of pulling the gun they’d have fucked right then and there, that scene has so much sexual tension that should not be there.

-Edit - courtesy of @katoska: “#though dimensionally transcendental pockets would explain where he'd hidden that big gun in that form fitting outfit.” - And why wouldn’t you have given him one of Jack’s guns, they’re all smaller? But they made Rogue a huge one.

-“So who do you think I am?” “I know you’re a Chuldur.” “The shapeshifters? Ha, I’ve heard of them. I’ve never met one,” *tilting head back towards Rogue and smiling* “Unless I have.” Please, if nothing else, come out of this thinking at minimum he is bad birdie Chuldur #6. Maybe we’re rewriting Frobisher. Heavily, heavily rewriting.

-“[his ship] cloaked behind that shed.” Calling the TARDIS a shed. It was Three that technically said it but the Master has repeatedly expressed his disdain for our beautiful police box before so that’s a Master-fitting line, be it intentional disdain or not yet. ✅

-Won’t call it a point, but he tells us he is a bounty hunter sent here to find them for the money. (Note: not kill - at the very least a bounty hunter would be bringing back the body to get, you know, the bounty). Aside from being a cheap and easy backstory it’s evidently morally bad, for all the Doctor literally goes ‘that is so…cool’ - which is absolutely not his usual position on bounty hunters.

-The thing he uncloaks the ship with? Same thing that controls the traps. How multitool. How sonic screwdriver. Or Laser screwdriver TCE as you prefer.

-His ship is a bird. It has wings, two eyes, and a beak. He is with the birds. He is The Bad Guy ✅. He is using and familiar with the bird ship; or at the insane alternative a TARDIS that completely disguised itself both outside and inside as neighbouring bird ship. There is no good guy answer for why he is in a bird ship. We never ask how the birds got here. But it was probably the bird ship. Bird ship.

-Meta so I can’t give it a point cus it’s beyond our scope but: “Oh you’re the Duchess! Of course, I should have scented you.” Not immediately recognising one of your own species when you should have sensed them thank god that’s not a mirror.

-His ship has an angular console in the middle of it with mirroring angular shape above it, the same taste in decor as the Master does with a TARDIS, like it’s almost designed to put you in mind of one, cute. ✅

-“This place is a mess.” Dhawan!Master’s TARDIS house and console room proper were a massive mess, these guys share housekeeping habits too. ✅

-“I live alone.” The Doctor notes this sort of ship would be piloted by two. Aw sad. Except he’s lying, he’s obviously lying, because he has dice on the table and he’s not playing D&D in his bird-shaped ship alone or with only two fucking people, is he? You need a group. Maybe of Bird roleplaying enthusiasts. Liar. Bad conduct. And failed to remove the evidence that contradicted the lie - dumbass Master behaviour. ✅

-Rogue declares “You’re a killer.” And the Doctor goes “Oh well,” before trying to sonic himself out of the situation, without actually defending himself against the charges. Maybe doesn’t feel the need to. For some reason.

-“What do those things do?” “It’s a trap. Triform on.” Now that could easily be a Master when he’s being sexier line, complete with his classic dumbass behaviour of declaring to the Doctor that something’s a trap before actually springing it. ✅

-He says he is going to send the Doctor to the incinerator. Why? ‘Uh he’s a bounty hunter’ Yeah. So why would he burn the evidence that would get him the money? Can’t just rock up and say ‘I dealt with it I pinkie-promise’.

-The Doctor attempts to sonic his way out of the trap before it finishes charging. Rogue says immediately that it’s deadlocked. The one thing that stops a sonic screwdriver. You can’t deny, that is the level of forethought the Master would manage to scrounge together. ✅

-Rogue scans the Doctor’s gadget, allowed in cus it doesn’t recognise it as dangerous device (oh the old ‘temporal grace field’ in the TARDIS, that’s a nice little mirror), and apparently the scans say it’s a screwdriver. I can’t prove this is a lie, but even we don’t think it’s a screwdriver, the last one with 14 literally was so much not a screwdriver it couldn’t unscrew screws, so unless it connects to the system with the name 15_screwdriver_1 again, feels too convenient. But a toxic Doctor fanboy would be able to identify what it was.

-I don’t know why we have a Sonic Monocular scene that cost us money and effort to produce when we could have just glanced across the table, but since all things that cost money in production have a reason, maybe the laser screwdriver style object we pan over? Point of interest but not a countable one, and either way the main argument is aligning character traits not convincing you he literally is the Master.

-“Roll for insight”, he cracked a smile, so surprising it uncloaked the Doctor’s full Scottish accent. This is the first positive character trait we have seen. We are just shy of halfway through the story.

-Telling the Doctor to “Roll for insight” after he sees the dice, is a dungeon Master’s instruction.

-of course he likes D&D, he plays it with the birds on the bird ship, he’s sent the birds he plays it with off out to continue the game in Bridgerton, he’s being their dungeon Master in real life too

-Seriously if you think Rogue is genuinely just a good guy bounty hunter and we should believe that uncritically, why would they tell us he likes roleplaying in D&D so much he picked his name from it? He roleplays. That’s one of the very few things we know about him. Why not chess? Or Minecraft? He could have liked Tetris? Why would he like roleplaying in the episode about roleplaying if him roleplaying isn’t relevant?

-The Master too adores roleplaying while also not being that great at it. Just putting that out there.

-“And it says that you’re wired for sound!” *sonics* ‘I Just Can’t Get You Out Of My Head’ by Kylie Minogue plays. *Rogue looks up in full wide-eyed uh-oh then turns to the Doctor* “Now this is a surprise.” - I mean, yeah, it is actually. I mean why would there be such anachronistic music playing in a ship owned by a guy from…well funny I guess he never said and the Doctor never asked. Well from a species like…well alright uh guess we didn’t do that either. Said ‘planet Earth’ that’s a pretty alien way of phrasing it. “Hey but in the Whoniverse Britney Spears’ Toxic is a traditional Earth ballad”, and maybe usually I’d let it go, but this is the second anachronistic bit of music we’ve heard, and the third we hear later is even more pointed to draw your attention to it. No. It’s weird. You know who it wouldn’t be weird to though? Our pop loving Master! And that’s the most Thoschei Thesis Statement song in Kylie’s repertoire! ✅ (Or Pantheon sharing daddy’s Spice Girls thing for 90’s pop). The Master would also absolutely have forgotten to delete his playback history before all this and pull an ‘oh shit’ face not from embarrassment but cus he knows this looks fucky because he doesn’t have a poker face he’s an idiot that panics the second anything in his plans ever goes wrong. ✅

-The Doctor mouthing: “Boy your loving is all I think about.” A sentiment that’s cropped up multiple times now this episode. Also in a Master mirror. Mhm. It’s a sickness babes.

-But hey we’re up to two positive character traits for Rogue so far - likes D&D and Kylie (both anachronisticly).The Doctor was willing to follow him out and blow him in the shrubbery for less, and honestly, respectable. “I just have a crush on prettyboy American Mr Darcy” is a defence, not a good one, but still.

-The Doctor and Master with one turning the music on and the other trying to turn it off would be a scene, you can imagine it, don’t lie, you’re imagining Missy and Twelve right now. (I think for annoyer-and-annoyed Three and Delgado could go either way depending on the episode. How appropriate for them.) ✅

-Also Rogue attempting to snatch the sonic screwdriver from the taller Doctor’s hand as he plays keep-away. Bitchy, gay, very character-breaking with the rest of the episode, deeply funny. The Master would. ✅ Then gathering himself, putting on the I’m In Charge voice and holding out his hand for the Doctor to hand it over and he does. (Huh, have you guys as a whole watched Delgado? Is this what creates the ‘the Master would never’? Cus actually if you’ve not seen these two just be a bit silly with each other and think that’s just fan characterisation that would actually explain a lot. Eh, but Missy and Twelve(/Clara) have some silly too, if not Three and Delgado level. Hm, to ponder).

-Psychic paper would also not work on the Master and he would say “it says ‘you’re hot’” to fluster the Doctor. Also we know he’s lying about it saying that, because he’s the one saying he’s seen it written, yet immediately follows up as the Doctor babbles with, Rogue: “Is it ‘you’re hot’, or I’m hot’?” Rogue would know which word was written the funny ambiguity is only from the non-seer’s side on hearing the other person say ‘you’re’. ✅

-“Suits you, flustered, it’s a good look for you.” Finally we get some fun confidence - which only appears the second he actually gets an upper hand with the Doctor on the back foot. Like someone else we know. Also yet again we have the phrase “a good look” for you in this episode all about shapeshifting. The phrase is applied to Rogue by the Doctor, to the Doctor from Rogue, and among the birds to each other. It establishes an equivalence between them, which is odd if Rogue is supposedly the only one not shapeshifting and roleplaying.

-The boss thing, callback to the Meep. Again this isn’t a ‘convince you it really is the Master’ thing, it’s character analysis that their traits overlap and he is a bad guy. But since we’re here, the Master is often technically working for someone else he intends to double-cross while thinking he’s ahead of them (nearly every time incorrectly), and we know he is/will be involved with the Pantheon — given this guy is a dice rolling gameplayer, the Master gambling and losing to the Toymaker, just vibes like it’d be out of order and future toothening imo — while there’s nothing to say our hidden ‘The Boss’ is Pantheon, I’m gonna Occam’s Razor and assume both those plot threads tie together, and for now that’s a reasonable way to explain how the Master got involved with the Toymaker at all.

-“I’m just so trigger happy.” Literally a Master line, and one we just had: “Oh, shoot. I should've said, somebody needs to cut you down to size, then zapped you. I was just trigger-happy. I'll use it next time.” ✅

-Floating Doctor heads literally the Master’s nightmare. Literally literally but I can’t remember where from and ‘master nightmare floating head doctor who’ gets you about as useless information as you’d imagine.

-Look. Rogue goes from confidently being about to kill the Doctor. The Doctor forces the scanner to show some other of his faces with the psychic paper, does his whole speech saying he’s “not a Chuldur. I’m something much older and far more powerful. A Lord of Time from the lost and fallen planet of Gallifrey” (this is a special surprise that will help us later) “Now, let me go, bounty hunter. We have work to do.” It is cringe, it is up himself and lording over others which is nearly always punished, the Doctor uses his special Deep And Majestic voice, and our stoic confident Rogue is suddenly wide-and-starry-eyed and breathily says, “Wow.” In the fakest response I have ever seen. Sadly I am not allowed more than one video. But oh my God, if you need a refresher it’s 18:14. And if you think it isn’t fake, yes you need the refresher.

You can’t be buying that OwO “Wow”. You think that was the turning point? I know I’m supposed to provide better analysis, but the writing is cringe, the acting is completely counter to what it was a moment ago for both parties, is over the top, and you think a bounty hunter would do a 180 from that?? Why?? ‘Oh you’re showing me the faces you’ve been before, yeah, I know, you’re a shapeshifter’. Nothing in the scanner says he’s a Time Lord, just the words from his mouth, why would he not be lying to save his own skin? And again, what would a Time Lord mean in the universe now? Who gives a shit, if you know what they are you know they’re all dead and reasonable shot you’re happy about that. Failing even that, Rogue is working for the same Boss as the Meep - if the word Time Lord rang a bell it’d be cus Fourteen caused problems last time ‘bring him to me’, surely. “Wow” uwu so cool! Really??? Nothing, not a thing Rogue has done so far, indicates he would be “Wow” to that. Not a damn thing.

Fakest response I’ve ever seen - Groff is actually a good actor so it’s supposed to be fake, at least one of the writers is award winning and may well be both, and Ncuti went out of his way to make it look like unnatural arrogance that doesn’t fit with the previous acting choices either in this scene or the whole show so far. So either all these people were crap at their jobs, or, it’s supposed to smell like bullshit. Would the Master look exactly as fake going “wow” because his character needs to have the heel-turn now? Yes ✅. And that you pulled this speech in front of him would complete its vast circle of cringe and roleplaying.

And what happens next? We cut straight to Ruby and Cosplaying Chuldur #5: [Giggling] “We can’t keep hiding like this!” You guys are smart, don’t pretend you’re not smart, if you follow me you know how good writing works, and are choosing to ignore the meta and mirrors and themes of the episode in a way you wouldn’t with a normal Rusty-written one that you’d sit and deeply analyse. Different writers yes, but smart and capable and award winning ones. These aren’t two disparate stories smushed together, they’re the same story in different keys, that’s the Rule One here.

Continuing, Ruby tries to convince High Society Lord- Lady that she doesn’t have to marry another Lord but could be a normal person, and then the Lady says “I’ll marry someone lesser, and smaller…it may not be love but perhaps a kindly smile at dinner…and then a shared grave” cus she doesn’t want a normal person, that’s what Ruby wants her to want, she wants to marry her kinda shitty Lord. Because that’s what this fantasy roleplay is all about.

Okay essay portion over we got out of hand, bullet points, re-engage.

-A motherfucking owl hoots, with the subtitle “owl hoots”, while Rogue recloaks the giant bird ship, giving us a second look at it again, making sure we get the full distance shot and shimmery cloaking effect to highlight the wings if they get lost in the shadows. Rogue. Is with. The birds. It’s a bird ship. There is no good guy explanation for the bird ship and its D&D equipment that can only be used by multiple people in our episode about obsessive-roleplaying birds.

-Rogue has now packed. ‘What?’ Rogue has now packed. He is now carrying a small bag, cross-body strap over his shoulder. We will not use anything from this bag or see him access it or acknowledge it at all. He’s just brought it with him. Perhaps like he knows he’s not going to be going back to the ship again. Curious.

Dice Bag propoganda post

-“You ready for this?” [low tone] “It’s not my first shed.” - woah woah woah, where’s all the sparkle of a minute ago babes, I thought you were ‘OwO wow’, if you know what a Time Lord is you know what a TARDIS is, but you’re not excited no mo? Or he’s doing it to deliberately make the TARDIS inside reveal cooler in contrast because he knows how much the Doctor likes this moment.

-“O my God” - haha namedrop. This happens to be Mastery behaviour cus this is just the Dhawan!Master pretending to be O entering the TARDIS scene. You were catfished by this before, come on babes. ✅

-“Come with me, and we’ll be, in a world of pure imagination…” - what are you imagining babes? Are ya roleplaying son? Cosplaying? Engaging in a bit of the old fantasy right now. No? He’s just feeling in a chocolatey kind of mood? Uhuh.

-“I’m in love!” - Now isn’t this a 180 on the character? From so reticent and ‘most serious man on earth’ to loudly declaring his love for the ship. Which just so happens to be the Doctor’s number one kink. And what does the TARDIS do in response? She growls. Rule one basic storytelling - the new boyfriend is evil, we knew cus the beloved dog growls at him. Rogue said he was in love and she growled. Gave Jack a bar, an ensuite, and let him tinker with her insides. But to Rogue she growls. Baddie. ✅

-The TARDIS lights are in a red-and-white checkerboard pattern. Our dimensionally transcendental TARDIS is literally a 5d chessboard. I won’t count it, but come on.

-Speaking of dimensionally transcendental, that’s exactly what Rogue called her. Yet didn’t anticipate a TARDIS thirty seconds ago. It takes work to argue he knows about dimensionally transcendental spacetime ships but not know of TARDISes that Time Lords travel in, but does know enough about Time Lords to be dazzled by them when he clearly isn’t of earthly Lords. Much easier to go ‘eh’ keeping the story straight when you’ve got extra knowledge you’re pretending you don’t have, but also need to come across as intelligent, is hard. We’ve all played D&D or at least Let’s Pretend. It’s hard. Lying is hard.

-After a quick “and so clean” back-and-forth, Rogue runs up the stairs, hand on the bannister and leans on the railing. The TARDIS growls again, louder, like a whale. Like she did in the episode with the Not-Things, and with The Maestro. (Arguably her ‘Pantheon’ noise?) Both of them notice. Rogue’s expression immediately turns from an awed open-mouthed smile to blankness, with a head tilt and turn, slowly coming back. “What was that?” The Doctor claims indigestion and she doesn’t like bounty hunters. Not true of the ones with hearts of gold. We’ve seen her with Jack, and River, and she adores them. “It’s the moral void - no offence.” So you’re admitting it. Stating it directly. He’s not got a heart of gold, the omnipotent spacetime ship can see that he’s a moral void. That is what you have said. ✅

-“And this, from the ancient and fallen world of Gallifrey…Where the hell is that?” *buzzer* Wrong. You tried to be clever and aren’t - that wasn’t the line. The line was ‘lost and fallen’ not ‘ancient and fallen’. Oh but Gallifrey is ancient though- *buzzer* He says in the same sentence he doesn’t know of Gallifrey. And yet, he got all wide and starry-eyed over a Time Lord, when he is saying he knows nothing about them. Why? Because he can’t keep his character straight pun intended, which is a character trait of another undercover ex-agent we know. ✅

-“Well I might take you one day.” - bananas response by the Doctor for multiple reasons. ‘I’ll take you to my lost and fallen homeworld’ ok what? Second, Fifteen has for once been very open about his loss in this regard, said repeatedly that it’s gone, and how much it hurts him. Said it to Ruby, to Carla, to complete strangers. But here he’s out of character. Why? Maybe he’s roleplaying one that doesn’t hurt. Maybe because he thinks it’s the Master and is fucking with him. But I’m going with the roleplaying and saying what this character feels. Fucky from the Doctor rather than Rogue.

-“In a few minutes it will no longer be a deathtrap, you are welcome.” [Rogue casually] “Why, what does it do now?” This is all important but also pause to reflect for a moment on whether the character we saw up to this point would have handed his essential survival and work gear to a shapeshifter who claimed to be a Time Lord with zero proof and let him just modify it however. ‘He’s just a very trusting bounty hunter, is all.’ I mean he wasn’t at the start of all this though, was he.

-Doctor boundaries: I can’t let you kill it, “So instead we will transport it to a random barren dimension, no-one to hurt, no way back.” Passing over the obvious, the Doctor is the one programming this. We agree we’re probably not literally installing a randomiser onto the device, we’re just randomly picking one and assigning those coordinates. How do you know it’s barren? Oh the TARDIS is dimensionally transcendental we just reminded people, so she can probably see, she’s picking it. Ok. …So there’s no reason she wouldn’t have a record of what she set it to. That’s information we should have. Ok. Which are the letters Rogue says. Ok. What about your bounty job? Not even a response to the no-killing? Or that this seems worse if anything? No. Just ok. We’re saying that a lot in this episode. Ok. Just going along with things. Ok. I know what that word means. Ok.

-“Who did you lose?” “How do you know?” “Cus I know.” Cus we covered this earlier actually when he mentioned the usually two-person’s for captaining an asteroid hopper. Forgot? No worries Rogue, been a long ten minutes. No attempt to make a proper backstory just stares at the Doctor like a cow looking at an oncoming train and goes, “There was- …Yeah. We travelled together, we had fun, you know. And then a day came along, and at the end of that day…I lost them.” Now if this was the Master you’d be saying no shit he can’t provide details and only parrot what the Doctor always says in these situations, he is a moral void, bro has one friend and only knows what it’s like to love that one friend obsessively, he can’t even empathise enough to improvise a backstory that feels realistic. Maybe only lies have details but you can argue my guy didn’t even commit to a gender. It’s also a valid read to assume he’s just short on words at losing his fellow they/them bounty-hunter crook friend. Maybe the OwO Time Lord thing is enough to make him open up a little even if the Doctor’s done nothing to earn that trust yet. But both work just fine, if it was the Master it’d be how he’d do it. ✅

-“What about you?” The Doctor’s expression hardens here. Maybe cus it just hurts. Maybe for other reasons. [coldly, we linger on him] “I lost everyone.” Rogue still with too-wide-cow-train eyes . “But at the party I saw you with that woman...” That tone. And how we immediately wave his ‘Best Friend’ aside. Look, again it’s a watch the scene. These two are good actors, they’re excellent. And down to the ‘huh’ head tilt before Groff’s line with every microexpression he is radiating a guy playing a role while still trying to poke his roleplaymate in his open wound with a stick. There has never been just one layer in anything in the show so far why would it start now in the episode about cosplaying people to death do you part, why? Why?? The one mirror everyone can accept is Captain Jack and he was literally a con man. This is a con man you are being conned. If you look at his face and think he’s being earnest you are extra weak to con men do not give strangers your credit card details. Didn’t you have jerk friends? We all had jerk friends. That is the expression the jerk friend made when they were just asking questions *blink* *blink* don’t get upset. Or Groff is a garbage actor. But he isn’t. Just the character he’s playing is crap at acting. Go back and watch O, the cow-eyes are textbook liar, any liar, but especially the Master ✅. They’re doing a scene, it is diegetic. The acting is diegetic.

-“You don’t have to stay a bounty hunter, [beat pause] Rogue.” You can say it’s just cus he knows Rogue isn’t his real name but the Doctor’s usually fine with that sort of thing. “You could travel with me[…]the worlds I could show you…” “And what if I like what I do? Would you travel with me?” “That is quite an argument. ((No it isn’t he doesn’t like bounty hunters)) I’ll tell you what, when we both get out of this, let’s argue across the stars.” This is the Doctor and Master scene, we do these scenes every incarnation all the way since half-share in the universe, you don’t have to think he’s the Master but we know these lines damn well are. ✅

-They nearly kiss but the TARDIS cockblocks them with a beep of being finished with the rewiring, because again, she doesn’t like the moral void, and does not want the Doctor to stick his dick in it. And what does the Doctor say as he steps back from their almost kiss? “The trap is ready.”

-[Rogue is sans new bag for the indoor scenes here, I believe this is just a costuming error that happened from them probably reshooting the dancing a bajillion times, it will come back when they’re back outside again and in every subsequent scene onwards]

-They meet back up with Rubes and Roleplaying Chuldur #5. Ruby asks a very good question. “Ok, but what does anyone get out of killing these people? I mean I know they’re posh nobs and all that, but we found the housekeeper dead. I mean why would anybody do that?” And the Doctor, instead of saying ‘it’s how they steal their bodies they’re shapeshifters’ says the meta-important answer first. “The dance. The drama. The emotion.” THIS IS ABOUT GALLIFREY. High society here is a mirror for the aforementioned fallen Gallifrey. The Master didn’t just genocide the Time Lords, he killed every Shobogon/lay-Gallifreyan without Child-stolen regenerations, he killed every TARDIS, every living thing on the planet. Why? The drama.

-“It’s cosplay. All of this is cosplay.”

-The Doctor turns to a non-plussed looking Rogue and says: “You said that a Chuldur comes to a planet and tries on people like outfits just for the fun of it.” …Wh- when? When did he say that?? (I’m being facetious - he doesn’t). Also does that seem rich coming from the ‘multiple costume changes per episode’ Doctor? Mirrors.

-(If the background music here is Vitamin String Quartet I don’t recognise it unfortunately. Fun Fact, I used them exclusively as background music for my own wedding, cus I thought it’d be fun for people to try and guess the songs if things got boring and it’d be a conversation starter. Ate my wedding cake to Poker Face. We like resonating with the universe here.)

-“Those TV signals beam out across the stars.” “What are these T-V signals?” I can’t add more than one video, so if you’re not willing to take the description on faith it’s 24:45. But watch Rogue here. He slightly turns to her with a little glare and that exact same frustrated little sigh he did with the Duchess corpse earlier. Dungeon Master’s stupidest soldier? Cus you’d think if he was annoyed she was being anachronismatised (real word), he’d have given the Doctor the shut up glare but doesn’t give him bother for it at all. Maybe he’s just a conflict averse bounty hunter. But that’s what the Master would have done, he has low lackey/idiot friend tolerance. Both reads valid. ✅

-The Doctor dances, we know what that’s a metaphor for and what episode it’s from. Good thing Rogue knows all the moves ahead of time.

-Just putting the reminder here cus there’s no clear place - I go with Master because Dungeon Master, I’m A Bad Guy, the mirrors *gestures at everything above* etc. but mostly because this is a deliberate attempt to cosplay Jack. Thus it requires someone who has watched the show. The Pantheon, the Master seems like a good bet, however, could admittedly be Chulder #6 (and they’re just supposed to be a very strong but purely mirror for the Master) and because of their different dimension-ness has watched the show on TV and has figured out how their self-insert is gonna bang the Doctor. But one way or the other, our baddie here has seen Doctor Who The TV Show in the same way the birds watched Bridgerton and this is an intrinsic part of this that shouldn’t be separated. That we have a fanboy who is deliberately cosplaying Jack and invoking him and references to that episode is important.

-Rogue: “So what is this ancient Earth tradition of cosplay?” No-one said it was ancient (twice now), no-one said it was Earth, no-one said it was tradition, even Ruby had to clarify ‘so you mean it’s literally dressing up and playing at Bridgerton?’ Rogue almost certainly already knows what it means. And we know the birds do. This is our baddie having fun. Because as the Doctor says next: “Oh, Rogue. It’s when fans dress up as characters that they like.” (Point to Pantheon, because roleplaying the Master would be dressing up as a character from Doctor Who that they like).

-General note again: both prior to but especially 13’s era really spent some subtext time building up the whole ‘The Doctor’ and ‘The Master’ are roles they play. If you know you know. We’ve been continuing on Chibs’s themes. Just reminding.

-The Doctor takes the male i.e. leading position judging by the other couples visible. As per traditional Thoschei.

-Lights dim in our usual diegetic/non-diegetic playing that we’ve been doing. Soft point to Pantheon - remember if The Rogue’s theme is Roleplaying it must be a double bluff for him to actually be being skilled at it, and he is cosplaying the Master cosplaying the Doctor, with the conceit that the Doctor gets this but not that it’s someone cosplaying the Master, thus he’s winning. If he is Pantheon this is the only potential evidence of fuckery besides having brought non-native-dimensional creatures into ours, which we do have other explanations for.

-“We need to have a big fight so one of us can storm out and the Duchess follow us.” “The Chuldur cosplay, not me.” Mhmm. You had D&D dice. But regardless if you buy that, we have now spontaneously swapped from engaging starry-eyed Personality B, back to Personality A: strong and silent.

-“How dare you my Lord! You would ask me to give up my title? My fortune? But what future can you promise me? *Rogue shaking his head, not good at deviations from the script, nor is the Master fwiw* ✅ “You cad! Tell me what your heart wants, or I shall turn my back forever!” “I…” Fifteen whispers, “Say anything.” If you are not internally writing the pre-show Doctor/Master fanfiction I cannot help you. Jo describing the Master like a jilted lover or whatever the hell it was. But at least here, with admittedly a little open-mouthed smirky smile, Rogue gets down on one knee and offers his ring. (From non-marriage hand, 4th finger, don’t completely see him pull it off but he was wearing it in the dance scene). If we are re-writing history with this cosplay, which given the Doctor’s reaction he certainly seems to consider it meaningful, that’s definitely what the Master would do here. ‘This is what I wanted you to do back then.’ ✅

-Obviously the Master has used that sort of flat-topped large round ring before, we’ve had the callback to it with the red-nailed woman and the tooth just recently. The insignia is not entirely decipherable. Most default I’ve seen is an angel (Master coding, especially if we’re wearing it upside-down hoo), I’ve also seen a ‘rod of asclepius with 3d coiling tails’ (A Doctor fanboy who has come prepared for this moment), and just plain bird of some kind given the little wings.

-The Doctor says a very genuine “Sorry I can’t- …I ca-” and runs off. (Which definitely happened the first time). This almost certainly isn’t River trauma, Twelve wore the implied wedding ring until it fell off when he regenerated. And we’re just supposed to be making a scene and this is an obvious way to do it - he’s already nearly kissed him and invited him, the Doctor put relationship on the cards, and could easily still be haha fun joke but you are still coming right? If it was just Yaz Making Everything Feel Like Touching A Hot Mind Stove then the near kiss feels like that would have been included in the trauma reaction. So presumably engagement based triggering specifically. Probably not from Cameca either. That had cocoa involved.

-Rogue seems a little surprised at this reaction. Fair all round, the Master might not have expected it either, but also the sort of thing a fanboy might not have been able to pre-empt - it wasn’t in the show after all.

-They actually join back together almost immediately and they run outside, so it wasn’t that overwhelming.

-“Oh, we must play them!” - no ‘aha’s’ from the peanut gallery, we already saw the birds can potentially not recognise each other in costume, and in the baddie camp (bird ship, he’s in a bird ship) we can be pretty sure that Rogue didn’t arrive here looking like Mr Darcy since none of the others were pre-costumed and just nicked people when they got here. (number 2 shows they didn’t pre-organise characters - “nice costume”). If Chulder #6 - nicked a guy. If Pantheon - conjured himself a bespoke Darcy form. If the Master potentially still body-stealing or simply we’re cloaked - remember the electronic interference from the start that pointed the Doctor to him specifically rather than the Chuldur? Dhawan!Master previously cloaked himself, plenty of scope there. (Why would the Master need to cloak? If the Doctor’s already familiar with his form. Either from other plans or the fact that, well, there’s a world where this could literally still be Dhawan!Master.)

-The Master nicks bodies by the way, for New Who-onlys. We haven’t actually done it for a while, and for earring interference reasons I don’t believe we’re doing it now, but it’s actually a Classic Who staple.

-“Now keep the Duchess talking, a Chuldur is strong, and if she starts to change you it won’t stop.” First, now that’s a meta, second, do we want to add a sketchy point for the gendering of the Chuldur? Cus we’ve seen one of them explicitly say they’re fine with different bodies (‘oh I wanted to be the Duchess’)? Hm. It’s an assumption on thin ice but I’ll allow it. We don’t ask Rogue why he knows so much about the Chuldurs considering they’re different dimension beings. There are non-problematic options there to be sure. But will say that Dhawan!Master was previously messing around with different dimension beings hoping to find out if they were what the Doctor was, got trapped in their dimension at the end, and these ones are literal shapeshifters. If it is the Master, he has plenty of reason to be here with them and know a lot about them. ✅ If he is a Chuldur, well, obvious reason.

-[Rogue now has his bag back on. This is why I believe it’s a costuming error it wasn’t on indoors just then - the TARDIS and real outdoor areas were obviously filmed in very different times and places, the fact the bag travelled to both is suggestive that it was clearly supposed to be a part of his outfit at this point. BTS: the indoor and outdoor scenes were obviously filmed at different times, (3 weeks of night shoots oof) they’re not actually walking in and out of the building. But it’s also a deliberate costuming addition after the ship because he wasn’t wearing it in the night scenes where he’s holding the Doctor at gunpoint or anything. Tl;dr - no bag before the “Wow” heelturn in the ship, carries bag after.]

-There’s not one but multiple of the Chuldur shapeshifters. A ‘family’ according to Rogue. (Who are playing two characters that are getting married. Oh Doctor-Master mirrors, never change). Something you’d think would be on the bounty hunter note - are you just getting paid for the first one? Can you claim extra if you make multiple runs? These are important questions. Or not.

-“I want to be the Doctor.” …How does she know it’s the Doctor? ‘Uh, the Duchess was introduced to him earlier.’ Yeah. The Duchess. Who died. Childur 1 was still the housekeeper when that happened. She knows who the Doctor is.

-Doctor-Master inverting with the “Run.” “I’m the one who usually says that.” Our beloved theme returns to us. Of course maybe it’s just the cosplaying self-inserting whatever could be any baddie by which i mean really only Pantheon or Chulder #6. Bird ship. The Master was literally cosplaying as the Doctor the last time we saw him, like physically in the Doctors clothes. And probably underwear. Does anyone in this essay smoke weed?

-“Breaking spines! Removing tonsils! Live vivisection!” Gallifrey Time Lords mirror previously engaged, re-engage plus Timeless Child. But we uh haven’t had them do any of that stuff yet and they already suck people dry (don’t. I think it’s meant to be a kind of bolus, if you know your birds of prey) so I don’t know why this line is here. Actually maybe I do - now they’re roleplaying playing scary beasts hunting prey, doesn’t mean they’re actually going to do any of those things. Removing tonsils stands out. …We have a rogue (can’t say that now. Odd?) line from Ruby at the beginning about falling over in front of a fit dentist, the Master’s in the Toymaker’s gold tooth, tonsils feel adjacent, it’s almost certainly just funny, and it is, but if that bangs any bricks together in someone’s head go to town.

-I think the “breaking spines! removing tonsils! live vivisection” line is there to showcase that they are roleplaying Baddies. Because while murdering, they have done literally nothing like that, and it’s the sort of silly thing a child would say when playing a monster trying to think of the nastiest things a monster could do). “We still have the big finale wedding to come. And then… London. We can play our games on a magnificent scale. Parliament first, then royalty. I can be King. And we can start wars with the French and the Spanish and the Portuguese, and everyone who doesn’t look British.” This is their spitballing Season Two. As another point to all being one character and that them being Secret Monsters may be accounted for in the game - Emily is always called Emily whether humanning or in bird form.

-The Doctor and Rogue hide in the carriages. (Matilda style). If you’re building that pre-show Thoschei story, hiding from Time Lords in a TARDIS was probably already there, but if it wasn’t, now it is. Or hurr durr hiding in a carriage is funny I don’t know.

-“Back to the house. We must advance with the wedding! That should get them out of hiding.” …Bestie? What does that mean? Why would that get what we were led to believe that you believe are ‘two random interesting people one introduced to you earlier as the Doctor’ out of hiding? They have skedaddled so as not to be eaten by birds, right? They’re gone, lassie, why would they come back? …Unless she already knew who a character called the Doctor was before they were introduced? And that the Doctor’s M.O. will bring him back? Cus they’ve been watching more than one show.

-We modify the transporter: “I can make this transport gate carry four.” “What if there’s more?” “Right…Six. Six maximum.” How convenient. Personally don’t feel that worry is realistic for the character to have (while acceptable to write), and that if Rogue was as he was originally portrayed, he would be saying “Worst comes to worst, I could always…” *lifts jacket* *Doctor has brief moment of distracted horniness* “Nobody is going to be shooting anybody.” But he’s so perfect pacifist for the Doctor so quickly, I guess he just never would. Of course if he’s on their side, especially if also a Chuldur, he’s not wanting to kill any of them.

-Also feels like a Dungeon Master-whisper in the ear the Doctor just goes with: What if there’s more birds? *sets it to 4* What if there were more. *immediately sets it to 6 skipping 5 entirely*. (We talked about Missy’s comment of there always being a way out being potentially meaningful re: the Master’s traps for the Doctor; and counterbalancing the Doctor giving them a way out ‘come with me don’t be evil’. This would be a fun thing to do with that. Trying to create and order a good story and satisfying conclusion based on the Doctor and other players’ choices - pure DMing work at its finest.).

-“And I thought I was interesting. A bookish little wallflower risking it all for a secret love… But you. You are wild, and brave, and rude, living a life of adventure” again you don’t have to be team Master to enjoy the Gallifrey mirror. The potential in these mirrors for the Master is mmm gorgeous and I’m so here for it. Going back in time to when One ran away with Susan and slapping him for not proposing because he would have come with you, we could fix the universe, we-

-Question, cus I’m bored and this has become sort of a general analysis essay: When the birds transformed there were at least some people inside who screamed, you hear them. …Why is the party still here and going on and everyone’s chilling. Eh maybe Dot And Bubble explained that. Or maybe it was delayed screaming at seeing the gays. That’d be a Time Lord mirror. A marriage proposal probably gets you arrested for public indecency.

-The birds speak English, French, and German. Or at least a few words thereof. Multidimensional telly and I’m surprised it’s got foreign channels? How anglocentric of me. *shakes head*.

-“This is the endgame, Chuldur’s leave no witnesses ((yes they do they just abandoned bodies everywhere)), they’ll slaughter everyone.” If he’s not a bad guy then why, why the fuck, did he spend about fifteen minutes fucking around and not shouting “If we don’t stop the Chuldur they’re going to massacre everybody the second they stop having fun! Yeah, I’m bringing the gun!” like you mention this now??? Of course he mentions it now, he’s building dramatic tension because he is like our favourite dramatic bitch. ✅

-R:“I’m sorry.” 15:“They got her.” Ruby cosplaying as a Chuldur cosplaying as Ruby (see you thought my Pantheon cosplaying as the Master cosplaying as Jack was too much - we did double-layering in the episode itself) enters the room. Rogue gives his line but immediately turns away and watches only the Doctor and his reaction (who stares for a moment then gets up and walks away). Autism collective that we all are, this:

is not an expression of someone whose heart is breaking for his new friend. Just so we’re clear. Which is an odd choice for a new love interest - no sympathetic pain, eyes closing, not even a pat on the arm. He’s just observing what the Doctor does, and then gets up and follows the Doctor out. ✅ If he’s a good guy (he’s not, bird ship) you’re not selling him well. And if he’s a bad guy turning noble, he doesn’t have that part down yet. (Also Rogue said he’d tried looking for Ruby but they’d locked the doors. They manage to get through the section they’re in just fine. YMMV. Not enough on its own imo).

-“Madam. Your Grace …Your Birdiness. I cannot sanction wedlocke…between creatures from Hell.” They let the vicar be the one with the banger line, damn. Only one with a spine. Dead obviously but getting a high-five from some angel out there. (Me turning that into a vicar’s reaction to being asked to wed the Doctor and Master, whatever the fuck they are.)

-Speaking of which, here we explicitly see a Chuldur kill a man and copy his outfit but not his face. The Chuldur. Have no difference. Between body. And clothing. *flashback the Not-Things, and Fourteen regenerating* If you weren’t sure they were mirrors, you should be now.

-“How long do they live for?” “Chuldur?” “Mhm.” *Rogue comes up from behind to stand alongside him where he can see him.* “They have a lifespan of about six-hundred years.” “Good, good. That’s a long time to suffer.” A slight negative in ‘this can be validly read as the Master’ behaviour, because this yields only a tiny expression change of a slight raise of eyebrows, not a wild-eyed smile, and I don’t think the Master’s been able to restrain himself that well since he was Delgado. God what that man could convey with an eyebrow. Also we’ve all agreed that the funniest thing is that the plan doesn’t even change, he just knows how long their torment will last now and is happy about it, and if you ever need to explain the horror underpinning the Doctor it’s that.

-Now this is a hell of a thing to reveal about yourself to your brand new love interest and companion. That you’re down for some serious torture. Thirteen went well out of her way to be a monster only when they couldn’t see her. (Works nicely as a soft threat though. ‘If you’re involved with killing mine, I will torture you til you die or the sun does’. Good to have boundaries in a relationship.)

-“Taste his inhuman scent.” - A) Nice double-meaning line considering *gestures above*, B) Confirmation she knew earlier the Doctor wasn’t human, and so combining that with the belief he would come back if they started the wedding…

-“And I am one of a kind.” “He is quite unique…” Hold this in your mind we’ll be back to it in just a minute. *

-The birds immediately recognise the transport trap, by name, and that there’s only one third of it. Which would make a lot of sense if Rogue and the birds’ ship are the same bird ship so they’ve seen it before. Can’t be that they’ve encountered Just A Bounty Hunter Rogue before - he ‘didn’t know’ there was more than one, there’s no visual recognition, and previously it led to an incinerator not something escapable from.

-That we don’t see presumably Rogue placing the other traps, not even a glimpse of someone shuffling in the background, is to me extremely interesting. Not only like with the Carla flashback scene, playing with the unseen, but perhaps critically that this certain someone might know where the cameras are…

-Were you going “why don’t they just take their shoes off” when they got stuck in the triform? Well makes sense that they didn’t now, right?! Cus we know now there’s no difference to them between their clothing and their skin! …Admittedly Ruby…hopefully is fine and as human…well maybe not human…hopefully she’s whatever she was at the start of the episode. I, uh, maybe would mark that down as a concern though.

-Ruby’s chemistry with Lady roleplaying #5 was rewarded by attempted murder as Emily sought to turn into her. That happens a lot here. Let’s not worry about them as the partner mirror for Doctor-Rogue. Or what just happened with Dhawan!Master and 13. If you consider ‘Poker Face’ to be obviously meta-relevant here but ‘I’m The Bad Guy’ not earlier, question yourself.

-* I told you we’d be back. “She smells like a Chuldur.” “Idiot! It’s a false scent from that cheap psychic jewellery!” - The Doctor smells unique but this doesn’t mean they aren’t palling around with the Master. We’re specifically given a reason for this to not be an issue and well, I guess that would explain why she gets earring interference when Rogue’s around huh? If they’re using the same technology. (Same goes for a Chuldur faking being a human etc.)

-Do I believe the Master could perform a fireman’s lift to yeet #5, yes surprisingly, he is actually physically strong, a fencer, rower, and it’s been noted before. (Ainley’s six pack haunts me still). Dhawan!Master in particular has lugged corpses. It’s only running he doesn’t do/have stamina for. However, do I think he would risk it in-situ just for cool points? Don’t know. However, for this free bit of mental torture to work, the final bird has got to be in the enclosure. If it’s not all or nothing, then of course the Doctor would release Ruby. To get the Doctor to have to choose either to kill his companion or the world? He would carry the earth like Atlas. ✅

And that’s what he immediately proceeds to do with no hesitation. ✅

“Doctor, press send. We’ve only got one chance.” “I can’t.” “Press. The button.” *The Doctor openly, loudly panicking* “It will send Ruby!” “No, Doctor, it’s fine.” “NO! No! No! No!” “If you don’t press send, the Chuldur will escape and Ruby dies anyway.”

The Rogue that you think is real is not doing this. Is not convincing the Doctor to kill his companion. He is taking out his gun, and shooting the struggling birds while they are still stuck to the glue trap. It’s not a nice thing. But it is the Heart Of Gold thing. But he’s not that. He’s just The Bad Guy. ✅

“They’ll kill us. Then this house. Then London. Then the world. You know that. You absolutely know it.”

He doesn’t. The Doctor doesn’t know a thing about the Chuldur other than that they are shapeshifters and what he’s seen. How does he even know what London is?? And he wasn’t there for the scene where the Chuldur said it themselves.

He can’t have logicked that out. There were a few deaths sure, but one housekeeper and a duchess not only isn’t ‘these are extremely dangerous and fast killing machines’-worthy, that leap doesn’t make sense.

It’s not even true in their possibly-just-roleplay Baddie Plan. ‘And we’ll start wars with x y and z and everyone who isn’t British! Bloodshed, cannons, gunpowder!’, like that is a lonnnnnnng plan. Like I said before this situation is no ‘we don’t have time to run away and regroup’ thing, they’re slow killers, and especially with Ruby with battle mode engaged she at least would be fine. But it’s that taking over London bit. Very specifically. He claims he hasn’t met them, doesn’t know how many there are, he’s not admitting to any prior knowledge of these guys. So the only way he comes up with that line is if he already knew what they wanted out of their campaign in the first place.

They have not yet proven any more dangerous than any human gunman, in fact less, they clearly can’t spray bullets, they kill one at a time and so far only people they’ve wanted the appearance of in some way. They have been in rooms crammed with people who survived the encounter. Are you going to have to leg it to the TARDIS to regroup? Yes. Would people die? Sure. But probably not her, she’s fast and has a battle bot controlling her movements. Multiple posh nobs have died already and we only got a little sad over the housekeeper. Our hearts will survive. The one putting the pressure on the situation is not the Chuldur. It’s Rogue. There is no time limit. No rush. It’s waiting for you to press the button on the Laser TCE- I mean control stick. But Rogue is not giving him a second to think. ✅

*Rogue approaches, step by step.*

“So can you do it?”

GUYS, your supposed hero is TORTURING the Doctor, who is fucking ugly crying his two broken little hearts out. ✅

“Can you lose your friend to save the world.”

‘I am very sane and staring at you in a normal way the normal amount. Choose to kill your friend yourself, or choose to allow the genocide of every person on this planet including her. I want to see you choose, choose, choose.’

“Ok, but what does anyone get out of killing these people? I mean I know they’re posh nobs and all that, but we found the housekeeper dead. I mean why would anybody do that?”

“Remember how we used to run through those streets as children? The alleys where we'd hide from Borusa as we skipped classes? All gone now. Come on, ask me why I did this.”

*Sobbing Doctor shakes his head, making his decision* [quietly] “No.”

*Rogue with hitherto unseen tenderness, wiping one of his tear away* “I know.”

No, he doesn’t! If he is a random fucking bounty hunter he does not in fact know that. He knows because he already knows the Doctor. From real life or from being a bad guy who just kind of likes to watch TV - which actually I guess does describe the Master✅✅

*Rogue kisses him. Because a tortured ugly crying Doctor is hot to him.* ✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅✅

(If I need to explain why the Master snogging the Doctor here, or the fact that he genuinely loves him in his own twisted way, you can’t be helped, or maybe were just a Ten viewer when you were 8 so missed stuff, and have watched nothing else in the show and just stumbled back in here - go watch Twelve there’s Simm!Master in it for you, and Thirteen’s second series onwards).

Live ‘About To Be Ripped Apart By Murderous Birds In Another Dimension If She Even Physically Survives The Trip’ Slug Reaction. Ruby straight up like ‘well at least he won’t be alone’, babes we’re gonna get you some sertraline, a psychologist, it’s gonna be ok, you’re worthy of life, we’re gonna get you help, we have a therapy circle.

The grin and hoppidy-skip jump Rogue does here when they break for air and he’s holding the Laser TCE/controller is a level of happiness we have yet to see from Rogue. A still cannot do it justice. (40:17 - though if you’re going, may as well watch the whole torturing scene from 39:00). It’s a bit more than a wee smile.

Then Rogue leaps over and knocks Ruby out of the triangle! Something he could apparently have done at literally any time before or during torturing the Doctor to his breaking point!

Why can he do this when she is molecularly bonded to the floor? We don’t know! It’s not explained! But he clearly knows his fucking device doesn’t he?! Why didn’t he tell the Doctor at any point that it would be possible to get Ruby out with a thing called a matter exchange? Who knows?! Maybe it slipped his mind til the last moment? The Doctor being the one to take her place would sure have been an answer, but oh well!

‘Maybe he didn’t want to risk his life for Ruby’s unless he really had to.’ - Then that’s shit hero and love interest behaviour isn’t it! But since it says “Matter Exchange” I’m pretty sure he could also have knocked Ruby out of the triangle using that vicar corpse on the floor a few feet away, then neither would have to die! So he must be real sure he’s gonna be ok! ✅

He’s so happy and chill. The music is happy too. Rogue jauntily throws the bouquet - ahh look who’s next to be married *wink*. This is the happiest and funnest and most genuine he’s looked the entire episode. Almost like he got exactly what he wanted! ✅

“Find me.” *click*

Ruby you’re such a dick, why couldn’t you be as happy as him? If you’d trusted the Doctor to find you instead of you die by bird and/or dimensional anomaly before he got there this could have been such a peppy scene the whole time. It’s almost like Rogue is absolutely certain he’s not going to die doing this. You know I know a character who’s been transported to a different dimension at the end of his episode before and got out of that just fine! ✅

Almost like this was the end of a live D&D session he was hosting. That’s a wrap everyone, great job. Just imagine what I’ve got in store for us next week. Good thing the car transports all six of us together! Well done for not panicking, screaming, or interrupting what I had going on with the Doctor at the end, and trusting this wasn’t going to teleport you into an incinerator. Thanks for playing along, excellent improv as always, I’ll be marking your RP points highly.

And then the Doctor screamed “I’ll find you! I promise I’ll find you!” it was very romantic, and then he got out the sonic and started scanning everything for traces, anything, he was still upset and panicky of course, I mean his new love interest had just snogged him and given his own life to save Ruby’s. But Rogue had believed in him to do this impossible impossible task so he would. So he and Ruby ran back to the TARDIS as fast as they could, maybe she’d picked something up or *gasp* she was the one who configured the trap in the first place so maybe there would be a record of what random dimension she chose! Except she wouldn’t let them access it for some reason and she kept growling and the Doctor was crying with anger and-

No wait, none of that happened, sorry, not sure why I thought it did.

Actually the Doctor went to comfort Ruby and her comfort him, sombrely put the bouquet down where Rogue was. (And left the trap technology behind. So got engaged and invented a glue/tarmac trap.) The Doctor remotely sent the Bird Ship to orbit around the moon, “so it can wait…as long as it takes”. In the 19th century. …Babe, you know they can see the moon, right? They have telescopes. This is a mavity waiting to happen.

(Genuinely choosing not to think about how we last left Dhawan!Master messing about with the two moons in the 1900’s, I’mma be real, I don’t know what was going on and when there, hope it doesn’t fit in actually because I’m not gonna get it. If he’s the Master he turns up, that’s all I ever need to know.)

-“Can’t we use the TARDIS and go find him?” Ruby asks. Good question. If the TARDIS can determine whether a dimension is uninhabited or not that’s definitely gonna narrow it down. Maybe she could outright search for him? If she, you know, didn’t hate his moral void.

-“There are as many dimensions as there are atoms in the universe.” *Ruby arm cuddles* “Anyway! It is what it is, so onwards, fine, next.” So is it ‘as long as it takes’ or are you not even going to try and find him? That and the bouquet really feels like you’re giving him up for dead and just hoping he finds his way back himself some day. It’s not what you were told to do. You can wear that ring and salute the sky with a smile all you like. He said “Find him.” Bad fiancé behaviour.

Cus the thing is, here is the ‘uwu small bean Rogue’ paradox. If this is just a normal guy, he’s not making it back on his own. He’s dying to the birds. The Doctor isn’t looking for him, and Rogue clearly didn’t think he could return on his own - he says “Find me” not “I’ll be back”. So if you believe we’re going to see Rogue again…he’s going to not be a normal guy, but be the type who can survive and make his own way back from a wrong dimension surrounded by free murderous birds. *piano rendition of The Cat Came Back starts playing* ✅

But luckily he’s not normal. He’s a man/bird with so much forethought he knew he wasn’t going to be coming back to his bird ship and took whatever it was that can save him from a teleport trap from the spaceship with him in that bag. Always have a getaway plan. That’s Masterful thinking. Unless you just think he wanted his wallet and keys on him ✅ (Point against Pantheon though - pretty sure being able to move reality around doesn’t require props. But then D&D. Maybe he just likes props.)

-“Doctor, you don’t have to be like this.” “I have to be like this because this is what I’m like.” And in our story about roleplaying, shouting out our longtime theme of the most important roleplaying of all, that we follow a character who’d rather be called Lulubelle playing The Doctor™. Doctor Who is a show.

-The fires whole and reflected and internal everywhere, like our Gallifrey mirror is on fire.

-Final additional literal-meta that may be of interest: the costume designer said Ncuti’s outfit is designed as a nod to Three - the original Thoschei pairing origin. We canonise Shalka!Doctor - famously and frankly exclusively known as ‘that animated one who made a robot boyfriend Master to be his Companion’, with lines in the episode Cornell said was indeed intended to suggest a relationship there and would have continued had that pilot been picked up. Relevant or not we’ll see.

And to all those who read that and yet still think that I am just very cynical and mean, and he really does have a single heart of gold, he’s just got flat affect and is socially awkward and autistic maybe and-

His ship IS A FUCKING BIRD. OWL HOOTS.

🎉 You did it! You read the full analysis! Great job! You passed Media Overanalysis, Rogue Edition. I told you it was a 10K. Look at how much you just read that had already been effectively covered in the first minute with just one thing.

“I’m The Bad Guy. Duh.”

(‘I am now convinced, but do you have a blessedly far shorter essay about why a Chuldur/Pantheon The Rogue perfectly cosplaying the Master cosplaying Jack would be the way to go?’ Why yes I do, strawman.)

Assorted later Additions:

Pantheon!Rogue: Why the bird ship?

Maybe that’s why the ship’s so fucky actually, DM’s love their props, this is about playing D&D In The Real World, so maybe he got one originally, short hop standard Asteroid Hopper. but now they’ve just kept (perhaps Pantheon-magically) editing it over time as the campaign and rule of cool needed. Appearance, better space travel, time travel etc. “It should look like a bird!” “…Yeah! It should look like a bird! Great idea Emily, we’ll work that in!” Of course if he’s a Chuldur this is just…their ship. Maybe classicly upgraded.

What might Rogue’s original plan for the Chuldur’s live D&D Session supposed to have been:

We know they were going to have a big wedding, but maybe that they’re also Baddies going to take over the world muhahaha! Cus they went into that monster-playing real quick and also they said that the panicking and screaming is their favourite bit - so there must have been a plan to include that after the wedding part of the game! They thought the wedding would lure The Doctor out so there must have been nefariousness in it or else why would The Doctor be drawn out? They were playing Baddies! So, thinking like what our lead bird would want for a moment, if you were to DM that, maybe he’s both playing the bounty hunter sent to catch them …But maybe also was going to do an “I Object!” scene too. Their faces in that scene, they’re so excited. Let’s say Rogue doesn’t know the Doctor was coming in advance. He’s already got ‘I’m The Bad Guy’ playing if this wasn’t a live magical edit on seeing him. Oh, maybe that’s why he chose to look like Mr Darcy. Maybe he was going to woo one of them - a good reason to already have the ring. Cus a big wedding can’t go right, that’s not drama, that’s boring. We know he’s probably cloaked - not only do they not recognise him but we have Ruby’s earring interference pointed directly at him (same tech frequency problems?) and even mention the psychic jewellery’s ability to mask a scent with a false one. So he was an NPC just meant to turn up and add some of their beloved drama. So he’d woo a Chuldur, he’ll object and then he would reveal himself as a bounty hunter with his Big Glowy Gun and trap! It was a dastardly trick! You knew he was a Rogue and a cad all along, you just let yourself fall for his deceit! *teleports to ship rather than incinerator* BRO. Even the bird’s D&D plot would naturally be the ‘I was tricking you and am actually your enemy’ twist!

Post-Empire, The case for the Chuldur Phoenix: Rogue being (unbeknownst to himself) the Master cosplaying a Chuldur cosplaying the Master.

#meta #mine #rogue #pantheon rogue #cosplaying til death do we part #longpost #i mean it #you won’t open it twice #this is a full episode breakdown barring what i missed or forgot #your rebuttal papers on why he’s not a bad guy will only be accepted with:#-a paragraph on “I’m A Bad Guy” and your position on its relevance #-full explanation for his bird ship and d&d equipment in need of a group #and why it does not relate to the roleplaying bird group #or rogue himself roleplaying #-an alternative and whole-episode spanning reasoning #of what the ‘real’ link between both halves of the plot are #if it is not ‘both these groups are cosplaying’#‘in pursuit of a wedding’#-and a short creative writing piece where you detail #rogue’s thoughts during the entire torture scene from fireman’s lift to *click*#-and most importantly the esquivalienced misspelled codeword #in the ‘i’m the bad guy’ lyric video

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itsscromp · 1 year ago

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I have a cute idea! Insomniac Peter and Miles with a Reader who's 15 (so like the age most spiders start their crime fighting) and because their so new to fighting they're a ball of sunshine, but unfortunately bad at smack talk? Like they'll be fighting someone and the criminal will give a hurtful insult and they'll just be all 'yeah? Well you're dumb! 😡'

Peter parker and Miles Morales x reader

Definitely didn't look up youtube video compilations of all their quips for fun of it after you made this request >D lol, also apologies for the delay. Word count:660

Being the Spider-Hero was the most rewarding and challenging experience you had ever faced in your 15 years of being on this planet. But your mentors Peter and Miles helped you learn and master your powers in no time at all. But the one thing that they didn't help you with... was smack talk.

It was one of the things that made Peter and Miles who they were and roll with the punches. Like today when they have gotten a tip-off of a potential hunter base. The three of you then swung into action.

"Morning fella's, who's ready for there fresh cup of bodily harm ??" Peter called out to them.

"Don't let the spiders escape !!" One hunter shouted and the fight began.

"Is really the best time to do smack talk ??" You told peter as you fought your group of hunters.

"It's pretty much a part of the job !!" You could tell he was smiling under his mask.

Miles was blaring out his own smack talk as well.

"If you guys tried this at a real job, you wouldn't need to be hunters"

You were so baffled but amazed at the same time how they could be able to do this and maintain focus into the fights.

When one hunter was facing you, you prepared for yours...

"You really think, That an incompetent child playing dress up can stop me ??!!" He readied his swords.

"Oh yeah... well... Your just dumb !!" You blurted out as the hunter then lunged at you.

Peter and Miles heard your quip and couldn't help but slightly cringe at that, You really needed some help with your quips and smack talk. So once you were done with dealing with the hunters, Peter and Miles then guided you to a nearby building and then took off their masks.

"What's wrong ??, did I not do good ??" You asked slightly concerned as you took off your mask.

"No no not at all, You did amazing y/n, Your training has paid off. It's just... Your smack talk maaaaay need some work." Peter told you.

"Oh... that..." You looked down embarrassingly.

"Hey It's ok" He smiled softly as he wrapped his arm around you. "Like anything Miles and I will help you."

"Yeah, Look sometimes I still have trouble with my smack talk even if I've done this for nearly a year" Miles pitched in.

"Ok... thank you guys" You smiled.

So over the next week, they began to help you with your smack talk, Slow and steadily they helped you go over different situations and picked perfect moments to bring it out

"Hey... I'm gonna put some dirt in your eye..., Is that good ??" You asked.

"Close... but you really gotta feel the passion and motivation when it comes with it." Miles helped you.

So even when you went home, you practised in the mirror your smack talk and got better and better over time, even coming up with some original lines of your own.

Until one day you were ready to show the two your amazing new quips and puns. You found another hunter base and one of the hunters recognised you and growled.

"After all this time, your still just an ignorant child" He snarled at you.

You smirked under your mask as he said that.

"True, but that's just apart of my charm isn't it ??"

Peter and Miles were surprised and happy when they heard that. Your practice really paid off. And as you continued to fight the hunters, you showed off your new vocabularies.

"You and the other spiders will be crushed by Kraven's hands !!!"

"Awww you can't fool me Mr gruff exterior I know ya love me, and I love ya too !!"

Peter and Miles were so proud of you, once they finished the fight, they congratulated you on graduating into a full Spider-Hero now !!, You couldn't be more proud of yourself.

Taglist: @callofdudes @fun-k-board

#platonic #reader insert #insomniac spider man #insomniac games peter parker #insomniac games #Insomniac games miles morales #insomniac miles morales #insomniac peter parker #peter parker x reader #miles morales x reader #Miles Morales #peter parker #Spider-man x reader

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babytarttdoodoo · 1 year ago

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Jamie’s afraid of making a big deal out of being hurt after everything that happened in season 1 - he doesn’t want everyone to think he’s being a prick again. But then one day either in season 2 or 3 he actually is genuinely hurt badly (the reason is up to you) but doesn’t tell anyone and shows up to practice anyway. It’s bad enough that he collapses on the field and that’s when everyone finds out.

I could have made this so much easier on myself and literally just written the conversation at the end. As it is, I started hating this about a third of the way through.

I hope that's just hyper-criticism of my own work and that this is still an enjoyable request fill.

---

It wasn’t like he’d done it on purpose.

A lack of sleep, a dark hallway, and a half-forgotten set of steps had all converged into a little tumble in the middle of the night. That was all.

A bruised side. A knock on the head. No big deal.

That’s what Jamie had told himself as he’d inspected the damage in the mirror. He would be fine. He could put his kit on at home and wear a beanie to cover up the dark smudge of skin at his temple.

No one would notice. No one needed to know. It would be fine. Hardly the first time he’d pushed through an injury to stay in the game, was it?

He didn’t need to miss training. He didn’t need to turn up at Nelson Road and tell Ted he couldn’t play. Just the thought of trying to do so sent a thrill of unease through Jamie that he wasn’t keen to examine too closely.

So he took some ibuprofen, slowly and stiffly got changed into his Richmond gear, and called a taxi to get himself to the training ground late enough that no one had time to question his appearance.

(Driving was out of the question. He could admit that.)

Roy all but sneered at him when he stumbled in - that wasn’t anything to write home about, though. He caught a few looks from the others and had to wave Dani off on their way out to the pitch but, otherwise, Jamie was able to keep his head down and not draw attention to himself.

Drills were awful. Just stretching out his legs had him biting his tongue against making any pained sounds. When they started lunging, the hot-sick pain in his side necessitated swallowing down bile.

Sprints weren’t the worst, though Isaac definitely noticed he wasn’t starting from a crouch as he normally would. Then Nate had them doing a coordination exercise, hopping sideways and throwing balls between each other.

Lifting his arms was bad enough. Then each hop jolted Jamie’s whole body and made his head throb.

He managed, somehow, but Jamie wasn’t sure how much more he could take. He was being slow and clumsy. He was being useless. Fuck.

Panting, sweating, and trying not to throw up, he hovered at the back of the group and prayed no one called him out. No such luck.

“You alright, mate?” Colin had sidled over while Ted called out their scrimmage teams. He was speaking quietly, which Jamie appreciated, but frowned at him with an unusual level of seriousness. Shit.

“Course I am.” Jamie forced himself to straighten up and smile. It felt wrong on his face. Too many teeth. “Just got a stitch. Didn’t drink enough.”

Colin looked doubtful, like he was about to question him further, but Jamie pushed forward to accept his yellow vest from Beard and positioned himself as far away from the Welshman as he could.

He was careful to stay in the formation they were practising, though. No sense in fucking up training for everyone more than he already had.

Roy hollered “WHISTLE!” from the side of the pitch and everyone lurched into action. Running around wasn’t so bad and Jamie soon lost himself in the game, following the movement of the ball and players with a preternatural instinct, ignoring any pain as the inconvenient distraction it was.

The few times the ball came his way, he took control of it as if by second nature, barely having to tell his feet what to do as he passed to Dani, then to Sam ten minutes later.

He was being a good teammate. He was playing like he was supposed to. And then he heard someone shout his name.

Jamie didn't need to look around to know that the ball would be sailing through the air towards him. He didn't need to deliberate about what to do. He would catch the ball on his chest and send it to Sam again before Richard could make it close enough to tackle. It was the only option to get it in the net.

He didn't need to think about it. He just did it.

And his sore, battered ribs only crossed his mind when he jumped up and twisted mid-air.

The yelp of pain was completely involuntary and Jamie would have been horrendously embarrassed by it if he hadn’t immediately crumpled into a heap on the pitch.

Something had grinded in his torso. It fucking hurt. It felt wrong.

He distantly registered the sound of an actual whistle over the rushing white noise in his ears as he lay gasping on the damp grass. A hand grasped his arm and Jamie realised Richard had skidded to his knees beside him, ball forgotten.

“Jamie? What’s wrong?” More hands were on him, trying to turn him over, but the slight pull sent another wave of sick pain through his side and he keened, curling up further to stave off the harm. “Merde, get the medics.”

“Colin’s already gone.” That was Isaac, a lot closer than he’d been less than five minutes ago, defending the box on the other end of the pitch. “He’ll need a stretcher if we can’t move him ourselves.”

“Fuck.” The notion of needing to be carried out of training brought Jamie back to himself. “I don’t need… Fuck it. I’m fine.”

“No, you are not.” Sam was standing over him as well, Jamie realised as he tried to force himself up to his knees at least. Most of the team were looming around, actually, and Ted broke through their little huddle right as a spike in pain brought up the vomit Jamie had been desperately holding back all morning.

“Hoo boy.” An American accent could really cut through the crowd, apparently, since Jamie had no problem hearing that low exclamation over twenty or so sounds of disgust.

Someone stopped him from pitching forward into his own sick and Jamie finally, limply, accepted help back upright onto his own shaky legs. Ted’s hands were one of the several pairs supporting him and Jamie could feel the humiliation and shame rising up in his gut like another bout of nausea.

“Sorry, coach,” he mumbled, even as he let Isaac put a secure arm around his waist. Sam tried to prop up his other side but Jamie shied away with an apologetic shake of the head. “Ribs. Don’t- Can’t lift me arm right now.”

He silently begged the younger player to understand, to not take it as yet another personal slight. Because Sam Obisanya was a much better person than Jamie would ever be, he only took a firm hold of Jamie’s elbow instead, face belying nothing but concern.

“Okay, folks, let’s give him some room.” Ted shooed gently at everyone not currently vital to keeping Jamie vertical. “You fellas got a good hold of him? We can get a stretcher out here, tout sweet.”

“Don’t want a fucking stretcher. I can walk.” Jamie bit out, choosing not to acknowledge how heavily he was still leaning on Isaac and Sam.

“Well, son, I’m not all too keen on taking your word for that right now.”

Ted’s tone didn’t change at all from the pleasant, practical way he’d just addressed the others. He didn’t raise his voice even a little. Jamie still felt the admonishment like a physical blow and hung his head with a wince.

“We’ve got him,” Sam spoke up. “Treatment room, right?”

They made an awkward threesome, hobbling off the pitch behind Ted and down the tunnel. Colin jogged out to meet them with a medic in tow and (surprise, surprise) Roy peeled off from the other coaches to join the entourage hustling Jamie towards the now-not-haunted medical suite.

Settled uncomfortably on the edge of the reclining bed, with a hovering audience whose eyes he couldn’t meet if he tried, Jamie numbly answered the medic’s questions about his pain level and location. He allowed her to gently remove his hat and examine the bruise underneath, went through the concussion tests without complaint, and was even honest about when he’d last eaten or drank anything.

When she pulled up his shirt, there was more than one sympathetic wince around the room. A quick look down confirmed that the bruise, though still quite small, had deepened in colour since he’d last poked at it and his skin looked oddly swollen around the area.

Even the barest methodical prodding with careful fingers made Jamie flinch and hiss through his teeth. The medic (Jennifer, Jamie vaguely recalled) hummed thoughtfully.

“Two are definitely broken. You’ll need to stay off the pitch for a few weeks, at least.”

The prognosis tightened Jamie’s throat like a hand was clamped around his neck.

“Weeks? Nah, fuck that,” he choked out. “I were playing fine until I took the chest ball. I can still score.”

“Are you actually thick?” Roy demanded, loud and angry as per usual. There was something wild in his expression as he stepped closer to the bed. “How fucking stupid do you have to be to try and play with broken fucking ribs.”

“Fuck off, you won’t even coach me,” Jamie snarled at him, all attempts at mending bridges forgotten in the wake of pain and frustration. “Don’t act like it matters if I play hurt or not. I’ve done it plenty times before.”

“Alright, alright!” Ted cut in between them before Roy could retort with whatever words had conjured up that twisted, outraged look on his face. Nothing good, Jamie was sure.

“Roy, why don’t you take five, okay? In fact, let’s clear the room. Y’all got things to do, I’ll stick with Jamie while the good doc here gets him set up with what he needs.”

Even with Ted partially blocking his view, Jamie could see Roy was about to argue. Surprisingly, it was Isaac’s hand on his shoulder that seemed to take the wind out of his sails.

“Fuck! Fine!” He shrugged the hand off and pointed damningly at Jamie’s face. “But you’re not putting a toe out on the grass until I say so, you bloody fuckwit.”

With that, Roy stormed out of the room, sending the door bouncing off the wall with the force of his exit. Jamie’s teammates followed much more sedately, all with looks back over their shoulders and quiet murmurs Jamie couldn’t discern.

“Here.” He jumped slightly when maybe-Jennifer reappeared at his side with a bundle of items. “Drink this and take two paracetamol. Hold the ice pack to your side for twenty minutes. If the swelling hasn’t gone down, I’ll send you home with a few extras, okay?”

“Thank you kindly, doc,” Ted answered for him. “I’ll make sure he stays put for a bit.”

“Not a doctor,” she corrected mildly but gave Ted a smile and nod. “I’ll need you to sign an incident report and there’s some insurance paperwork to go through. I’ll go get the ball rolling on that and check in later.”

Jamie didn’t really like the way they were talking around him, rather than to him. He liked the idea of being alone with Ted after having caused a scene and an extra load of work for him even less. Still, he couldn’t think of any reason for the medic to stay and just watched her walk away, gently closing the door in her wake.

“You should probably do as she says,” Ted said softly after a moment of quiet, indicating the bottle of water and packet of tablets. “Doesn’t strike me as the ‘take it or leave it’ kind of advice. Rarely is, from those of the medical persuasion, even if they don’t have a fancy title.”

Moving like he was underwater, braced for the other shoe to drop, Jamie silently went through the motions of taking the painkillers. He tried not to move in any way that would agitate his injury but his hands were still shaking by the time he reached for the ice pack.

“Oh, here, let me…” Ted stepped in closer, his own hands outstretched, and Jamie flinched violently. The sudden jolt caused his abused ribs to make themselves known all over again and a small shout fell from his mouth unbidden.

“Alright, okay, no touching, got that memo, loud and clear,” Ted rambled on while Jamie waited for his vision to clear from the haze of pain. When it did, he noticed his coach frozen in place, hands still hovering in midair and significantly less threatening than moments before.

“Sorry,” he croaked, embarrassment and discomfort robbing his voice. “Didn’t mean… I’m sorry.”

“Now, hey, no. That one’s on me.” Ted glanced around and pulled up a chair to sit near Jamie’s knees. “How’s about you get that ice where it needs to be and you and I have a little heart-to-heart, that sound okay?”

Jamie nodded and gingerly wrapped the frozen pouch in the towel provided before applying it to his side. The relief was almost immediate and he felt his shoulders relax from the tense position he hadn’t even registered amongst everything else.

Ted clearly noticed too, since he smiled up at Jamie. There was still a furrow between his eyebrows, though.

“Ain’t it great when stuff helps the way it’s supposed to?” he started and Jamie tried not to let the dread of what was coming show on his face. “You know, when you’re sure that, in theory, something should do you good but you’re not quite bought into the reality yet? It’s a damn good feeling when the bet pays off.

“Course, sometimes it goes the other way. The thing that’s supposed to help you doesn’t do anything at all. Or, hell, it just makes everything worse…”

“I’m sorry,” Jamie blurted out again in a panic. “I weren’t trying to do that. I swear, I know I’m not supposed to mess up training or nothing. I… I…”

“Whoa, whoa, Jamie!” Ted’s smile had dropped clean off his face. “I think we’ve got some wires all muddled up here, somewhere. I’m not fishing for an apology. Matter of fact, I’m kind of wriggling on the end of the hook, myself.”

Jamie really, honestly tried to wrap his head around that one. He failed. “What?”

“I’m sorry, Jamie,” Ted told him firmly. “We all knew something wasn’t right with you out there today and let you play on through anyway. That’s no bueno. If you can’t rely on your coach to help you out when you need it, well, then, that’s not a sign of a very good coach, is it?”

Jamie stared at him, dumbfounded. “But… I didn’t tell you I were hurt.”

“There is that,” Ted agreed easily, nodding and settling back in his chair. “And I’d sure like to hear how you got knocked around so good in the whole twelve hours you were out of our sight. Any particular reason you didn’t share that with the class this morning?”

“I…” The hand that wasn’t holding the ice pack to Jamie’s ribs started picking at the disposable paper sheet on the bed. “I fell. Down the stairs at me house. Last night. I. It didn’t hurt too bad, I thought.”

Ted hummed. “Well, you see? Accident like that, it ain’t anybody’s fault. And you felt okay after?”

The excuse hung there so temptingly that Jamie was almost inclined to think they were back to mind games. He could tell Ted that he’d been sore, but fine, up until he got out on the pitch. But that would be just another lie, wouldn’t it? And all lying had done for him today was drag more and more people into his shit.

So, instead of agreeing like he so desperately wanted to do, he shook his head slowly.

“No, no I weren’t okay.” He swallowed and looked down at his shoes, dangling just shy of the floor. “Couldn’t even drive myself in, could I? But I thought being here and acting normal was better than… better than saying I couldn’t train today. More important.”

“Oh. Now, that’s another thing to chalk up in the ‘no bueno’ category, I’m sorry to say.” Ted’s voice had softened again but Jamie couldn’t bring himself to look up. “Jamie, if you’re hurting, ever, practice or no, I’d really rather you say so. Nothing’s more important than that.”

“Team is,” Jamie objected quietly. “Being here is. I don’t got anywhere to get sent back to now, do I?”

That sullen admission hung in the air. Jamie heard Ted suck in a breath.

“Okay. Alright. Could you do me a favour and try to lift that handsome as all heck face of yours up, just a smidge? I’m getting the feeling eye contact is going to be real important here.”

With very few options of avoidance available to him, Jamie forced himself to meet Ted’s gaze. His expression bore a startling resemblance to Roy’s wild-eyed reaction before, which did nothing to set Jamie’s mind at ease.

“Jamie, when you turned up to practice last season and said you weren’t going to train, I assumed you were mad because I benched you. That sound about right?”

The player nodded, ready for the familiar prickle of shame that clawed through his chest at the memory.

“So you weren’t actually hurt? Or did I get that wrong?”

Jamie shook his head this time, then clarified: “Were being a prick.”

“Alright, that’s fine. Water under the bridge.” Ted scrubbed a hand over his face, looking relieved for some bizarre reason. “Can we agree, though, that there’s a difference between someone pretending to be hurt, for whatever reason, and someone actually being badly injured? That a middle ground we can settle on?”

“Yeah…” Jamie agreed cautiously.

“Outstanding.” Ted took a deep breath. “So, let’s just take a little hop, skip and jump from there to how things might’ve played out a little differently today than they did last year?”

“Oh.” Jamie blinked a few times, processing. Slotting that bit of logic into the missing gaps of the day. “You’re not angry at me for missing training?”

Ted’s face broke back into a genuine, if tired, smile. “No, sir, I am not angry at you for that. Or for any other reason, while we’re on the subject. I am… mighty disappointed that you didn’t feel like you could come to me, or even call when you took your little tumble. But I think maybe we can both agree to do a little better next time, how about that?”

He held out his hand for a shake - his left, in deference to Jamie’s occupied right. That small concession alone was enough for Jamie to wordlessly grasp Ted’s palm with his own in a firm hold.

“Alright. I’ll try.”

“I know, Jamie,” Ted assured him. “That’s all any of us can do.”

#someone tell me why this is 3k words #jamie tartt #ted lasso #my fic #afc richmond #fic prompts #roy kent

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