#i might have exaggerated with the description but like. i can see the background move | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

fang-wife · 4 years ago

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voyeur | m. izuku

➳ tags ;; sub!izuku, dom!reader, watching hentai together?, reader is mean and nice </3, quirkless college au!izuku, corruption kink/religious guilt, unprotected sex/creampies, established relationship, afab reader

➳ wc ;; 2.1k

➳ a /n ;; @/sems-diarie made a post abt this a while ago n my brain wouldn’t let it be so. here we are </3

➳ plot ;; izuku didn’t sneak you into your dorm to watch.. this with you. but he has a habit of letting you do what you like.

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This is embarassing.

He knows this is embarassing - more embarassing than he really cares to admit to. He should really know better by now then to let you do as you please. You’re always stringing him along with your schemes and plans and he loses sight of his morals. His standards.

Then again, he doesn’t have any at this point. The point of him paying for this single dorm was so that he could have space to focus. It wasn’t to sneak you in when his R.A. wasnt looking. Even more then that, it wasn’t to do.. whatever this was.

It’d be one thing if he was having sex. That’s a normal thing to do in college, to sneak your partner in and smash. But you’re you, and all you ever seem to have planned for him are hair-brained schemes. It’s what this feels like - when you sit on his twin size bed and pat the empty space next to you. The distrust in his expression makes you laugh.. He sighs and does what you’ve asked.

“What’re you doing?”

He sounds exasperated. You laugh - too pleasantly for him to be comfortable. You type something into the search bar. Green eyes widen, skin warm and blushing.

“Wh-what’re you doing?”

You laugh as you prop the computer on the bed. You grin at him, tucking yourself under his arm. The website mocks him, all black background and animated women with huge tits covering the screen edge to edge.

“You know something, after you’re done using incognito mode - you’re supposed to switch out to regular search, you know,” you explain. Your hand rests on his thigh. Deku freezes.

The sound of your voice has always been something of a vice. It gets a little raspy like this - sultry in a way that has him squirming. He doesn’t know what to do. He can feel the heat of your body.

“Would you know my surprise when I borrow your phone to look up when the convience store closes,” you inch closer, press further “only to see..”

He knows what you saw before you announce it. His skin feels like it’s on fire, tuning out whatever description you’ve been giving of what he chose to watch.

Maybe it was the way he was raised - but he always had such a specific sort of guilt towards pornography. Always told himself he shouldn’t watch things like that, shouldn’t touch himself. Izuku had always been a good, well-behaved boy. Done the right thing even when it was hard.

Meeting you had changed that, changed him. He found his body craving you when he couldn’t control it and he ended up here - watching porn and jerking off with his shirt in his mouth. It’s all come back to haunt him, really.

“I’m not mad, y’know,” ― and your tone goes soft - it’s assuring enough that Izuku can whimper out an okay, but you’re not done ― “I’m just curious. Can’t we watch it together?,”

“That’s ― !”

You flutter your lashes him.

“That’s?”

He has a million words that he can say. That he should say. Bad, wrong, immoral. Words that belong at the end of the sentence to describe what he’s doing with you and what he’s considering.

None of that comes out.

“That’s.. too much”

You grin at him.

“Do you not want too?”

“..I didn’t say that, it’s just -”

Your hand squeezes his thigh until your stiletto's dig into them. Your mouth trails his jaw with hot, open mouth kisses until your turning his head to face you. A hand splayed on his face, tongue deep in his mouth. French kissing makes him pant - hands twitching eagerly to touch you. He watches, dazed - the spit trail of saliva that stretches between you two.

He’s so easy, it’s cute. You press forward with a chaste kiss.

“Show me what you were watching, Izuku,”

His hand trembles as he leans forward. He remembers the title - doesn’t know if that’s good or bad. Within seconds, it shows up and he clicks. You lean forward too, observing the tags with a small smile on your face.

“Milf, NTR, Gangbang,”

“S-stop reading them!”

You giggle.

Without warning - you press play. Izuku finds himself frantic. Worried about the sound, the time, all of it - but you don’t seem to care. The AD comes on and you skip that too. It’s on. A familiar arousal blooms in his chest, the memory of what he’d seen appearing. You settle between his legs, your back pressed to his chest. You bring his hands around your waist.

“Let’s watch ~”

Izuku face twists with displeasure. The plot nothing to ride home about - a lonely housewife goes out to a club and finds someone to take care of her needs. At first it’s just one stranger at the club - then two, then she’s surrounded and its too much.

Izuku assumes you’re gonna find him disgusting, but when he looks at your face - you’re smiling, heart-beating in your chest. His eyes blow wide when you take his hand between your legs. You’re wet and you’re letting him touch you and he’s trying his hardest not to show how much he’s shaking.

A little sigh of pleasure leaves your mouth when Izuku very carefully rubs your clit. It throbs under the pressure of big fingers - you hold his wrist and moan. He can hear the porn in the background but it doesn’t serve to distract him from you.

“You want me to go n’ get fucked by a bunch of strangers, ‘zuku?”

He shakes his head furiously.

“Then you just like watching depraved shit, huh?”

Unable to argue with you or with the the way his cock twitches and jumps in his jeans, he opts to whine. You can feel his it against your lower-back, the little wet-spot that presses to your thin tshirt. He’s too turned onto think properly - watching the way your body jerks and twitches.

The woman on screen is stuffed to the brim with cock - it’s all over exaggerated he knows, but he thinks that’s why he likes it. Maybe he just likes the idea of fucking someone that stuffed fulled of cum, how it leaks and pours onto every surface and the way her cunt just seems to take it. And Izuku is such a good, well behaved boy - it’s never crossed his mind to think about doing it to you.

And no, he doesn’t really want to see you get fucked by so many men but if there were more than one of him he’d be more than inclined to let you. His chest feels tight forgetting to breath.

He thinks maybe you’re some kind of witch because you always seem to know what he wants before he does. The right way to push all of his buttons.

“Oh, I see’ ― and he’s afraid of whatever words come out of your mouth next ― “you wanna fuck me full of your cum, Izuku? Wanna know how it feels raw?”

He moans - loud and shameless and needy against your ear. A breathless laugh leaves your mouth because that’s exactly what he wants. He wants to fuck you full of cum, just picturing how good it might feel.

You sit up on your knees and bend over a little - pulling short-shorts beneath the curve of your ass and thickest parts of your thigh. Your panties are drenched, clinging to your folds. He inhales sharply, frozen till as you lean forward - pulling them to one side.

“Take your cock out ‘n fuck me then, baby” ― you challenge, dark and dangerous. Everything about you is so sinful and too tempting for him to ignore. His cock aches ― “Do your best”

His body moves before he has a proper chance to feel shame. Whatever devils been whispering in his ear (read: you) has won whatever leftover dignity he has left. Without a proper word, his cock stands to attention. His hands are fidgety but they mange to settle on your waist. He guides you down on his dick, bottom lipped pulled between his teeth hard enough to draw blood.

“Oh, fuck”

He’s going to cum right away if he doesn’t take a breather. This is the first time he’s feeling you, and it feels so much better than he could understand. The lingering thoughts of the dangerous act silence by how tight and how wet and how willing your pussy is for him. The way your walls twitch - ache shamelessly around his cock. He’s fucking sliding in and out of you - it feels like a special privilege he’s done nothing to earn.

He’s shivering, over and over. When he looks down, he’s not all the way in. He’s not sure if he’s praying to god for the right reason - for forgiveness. All he can think about is how good it feels to be inside and how he absolutely doesn’t want to do anything else.

“How’s it feel, Izuku?”

He groans at the sound of your voice, the way you clench down on him and stretch so tightly around his shaft. He’s too wrapped up in the feeling of your cunt - like heaven and silk.

“F-feels so, so good”

Part of you thinks you should ride him, but another part of you is more interested in seeing how he fucks you. You snap the laptop closed and push it to the other side of the bed, before flipping around and laying on your back. His cock slips out and he snaps into reality - the way you have your legs in the air and your arms out.

“I’ll let you fuck me as many times as you want today,” ― your legs reach and wrap around his waist, easily forcing his cock back inside ― “go on,”

Izuku is a mess, really. His pants are only half-way pulled down and he’s wearing a nerdy graphic t-shirt. He’s borderline in hysterics over how good your pussy feels and can’t do anything other than thank you repeatedly and fuck you with an animalistic need. It’s clumsy like you’d expect, but he makes up for it with sheer enthusiasm.

His cock is long and pretty - hits every spot you need it too. Izuku fucks you with shallow, sloppy thrusts - so needy and chasing his orgasm. Selfish and inexperienced. Every time he pushes forward, you can feel he’s throbbing. Aching to cum inside and unload.

You reach a hand between the two of you to finish on your own time - planning on cumming before him. He doesn’t seem to care.

“Ngh, ohh my god, feel’s’good”

“Yeah? Gonna cum inside me, handsome? Makin’ such a pretty face for me”

His stomach churns at the way you call him pretty. It sounds so sweet and adoring - but he knows that you’re a bully. He knows that about but fucks you with all his strength anyways - overly frustrated and fucked out of his mind by the feeling. Like a drug. He likes you so much he feels stupid over it.

“Yeah, yeah ‘m gonna”

Your own orgasm washes over you in a pleasant wave, squeezing his cock with force. He gasp and goes faster - all the thoughts washed away from his head. He needs to finish more than he needs anything. More than he needs to sleep for his 6am work-out and 8am class. More than he needs to be quiet because the walls of his dorm are paper thin. More than he needs to exercise self-control, he needs to cum so fuckin bad.

“Look at me,”

He follows your command, like always - and you look amused and fucked out just like he is. And Izuku has really never been this into anyone before so seeing you evokes feelings he can’t understand.

“Oh, fuuck“

Briefly he understands that he really just came by looking at you, but nothing really makes sense to him. His eyes are heavy and he’s drooling onto your shoulder, spasming and clinging to your body with the most needy little whimpers. It’s so lewd, how he can feel his cum spurt out and coat your insides and his cock. It’s all so sinful but it feels so good, he can’t bring himself to care.

“So,” ― you smile, full of mischief ― “if you want to be like that, we’ve got a few rounds to go”

Izuku splutters at your comment and you laugh. He knows you’re not joking and he whines. You really are a bad influence on him. But with the way his cock is twitching to life again..

He might not be any better.

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#deku x reader #bnha x reader #bnha x you #bnha x y/n #deku x y/n #deku x you #gonna post first w/o tags then add them in #knk ;; [ unprotected ]#sub!bnha #sub!izuku #knk ;; [ corruption ]

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lumina-rose · 3 years ago

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Tear You Apart

Chapter 3/4

AO3 Link:

https://archiveofourown.org/works/32168824/chapters/80048179

Pairing:

Laszlo x Reader

Summary:

Mere months after the conclusion of the Beecham case, Dr.Kreizler and his associates are asked once again to solve a new series of murders that plague the streets of New York. They are joined by the alienist’s new assistant, who’s presence soon unravels startling revelations. Not only within the case, but also within the mind of one of their own.

(This story is set between the events of Season 1 and Season 2)

Warnings:

Murder Mystery, Graphic Description of Corpses, slight dark!Laszlo (kinda. Think Will “This is my design” Graham), Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut (MINORS DNI), Minor Violence, Friends to Lovers,Assistant, Boss/Employee Relationship,Tension, Sexual Tension, Mutual Pining, Kidnapping, Sexual Assault, Implied/Referenced Abuse

(More Future Warnings TBD)

Notes:

Adding an extra warning for this chapter, just in case.

This chapter deals with themes of violence, kidnapping, captivity, non-consensual touching, non-consensual groping, and implied abuse.

Chapter 3: Lily

Dr. Kreizler was not a man who considered himself superstitious.

Ever since he was a boy, he clung to his curiosity, searching for answers through science rather than religion in order to understand the world around him, even if it left his reputation tarnished to the more traditionally-raised, God-fearing socialites of New York. Yet, even as a child, there had always been a darkness that surrounded him, drawing in trouble wherever he went. No, Laszlo was not superstitious, but there seemed no other term to describe himself other than cursed.

You had been missing for two days, and even logic and reason could not explain why history seemed destined to repeat itself.

Following your night at the opera, Kreizler had thought it odd that you had not appeared at the Institute the following day. You had not seemed unwell, during your outing- quite the opposite, actually- and yet the fact remained that your presence was notably absent. At first, the alienist pushed his worry aside. After all, you had spent what was supposed to be a night of rest by his side. He reasoned that perhaps you had simply drained yourself, driving yourself to exhaustion with both the investigation and the concern you had displayed for him. But what truthfully unsettled him was the lack of warning of your absence. It was unlike you.

Regardless, even with your absence, Kreizler quickly worked through the day's sessions and duties, leaving most of the day free to continue working on the investigation. Your theory the day before had intrigued him, and gave valuable insight into what the killer's motives and background could be. With a newfound momentum, Laszlo called for Stevie, sending the ward to gather his colleagues here at the Institute, in order to follow this new train of thought. He also instructed Stevie to find you, deciding that it would be best to check on you, if only to calm his own anxieties. With that, all that was left to do was wait.

Marcus and Lucius were the first to arrive, punctual as always. Not wishing to waste any time, the twins immediately went to discuss their new findings with the doctor, picking out bits of information that may be relevant to figuring out the killer's identity. Kreizler listened, drawing connections to their findings with the theory you had created. John was the next to arrive, quickly followed by Sara. The two had not had much to work with, in terms of narrowing down who the killer may be, but found a couple police reports and articles that had spoken about similar incidents. Laszlo nodded, giving his own opinions and comments occasionally, but his mind continued to drift elsewhere. He had pulled out his pocket watch, when he heard a new set of footsteps. Quickly, he looked up, only to see Stevie once again. Ushering the boy inside, he asked if he had found you.

"I tried, Dr. Kreizler, but I couldn't find her anywhere." Stevie explained. "Even went by the house a few times, but no one ever answered. Her door was locked, so I thought maybe she came back here."

Laszlo sighed, audibly upset by the news. "Right, thank you Stevie."

This caught the attention of everyone in the room. After the boy left the room, Sara turned to Laszlo.

"Has something happened?" She asked, sensing Laszlo's growing worry. "How long has she been missing?"

The alienist simply shook his head. "Since this morning. At first I thought I was simply overreacting, but now I'm not so sure..."

Saying his admission aloud, Laszlo realized how troubling the whole situation had seemed. He explained where you had been last night, and how Kreizler had made sure to get you home safely after the opera, only to find that you had not come to the Institute today. John stood up from his seat, sending a glance to Sara and the brothers. They stayed silent, throwing silent glances back and forth, as if talking through looks alone. Finally, Sara stepped forward.

"I believe we should go to her home, ourselves. If we find that she is safe, then we can continue our investigation."

"What're you saying?" Lucius interjected, stunned by Sara's proposal. "What would you have us do? Having the five of us show up unannounced to (y/n)'s home might be an overreaction, considering it hasn't even been a day."

"You may be right," Sara starts. "but I'd like to make sure nothing has happened to her. I won't be able to shed the guilt if the worst has come."

Laszlo's heart sank at her words, reminding him of the very same doubts and worries he had told you of the night before.

Moving quickly, Laszlo went to grab his jacket, placing it on as he spoke. "I'm going-"

Once more, Lucius was wary. "Dr. Kreizler-"

"-stay here if you must, Lucius." He turned, leaving no room for argument as he walked towards the exit.

Reluctantly, Lucius followed after Laszlo, with Marcus's hand on his shoulder. Sara and John were already standing, ready to leave with the doctor, the same memory of the Beecham case fresh in their mind. With that, it didn't take long for them to reach your home, a mere few blocks away from the Institute. It was a relatively small building, not like the towering apartments that surrounded it on either side. It was as though someone had taken a cottage from the countryside and placed it right on the streets of New York.

There were no lights on, by the windows. A fact that shouldn't have been strange, considering it was now late into the day. Even so, it caused a sense of looming dread to enter Laszlo's mind. It felt so similar when he had returned to his own home all those months ago, as though time was repeating itself. First with Mary, now with you. As the group called and knocked on your door, drawing the scrutinizing and curious stares of the people passing by, Laszlo concluded that he must have been cursed. How else could he explain the events unfolding? Truly, everyone that was drawn towards him seemed destined to either leave or be taken from him.

There had been one thing that gave him hope that it would be different.

With Mary, she had been a constant, comforting presence. What he felt towards her had not always been there, not until much later after their first interactions, but it had been a source of happiness and warmth. The feeling of being known so completely, without needing so much as a word being spoken. Mary had brought out a kindness in him that even he had feared he did not possess. It had been sweet and somewhat innocent love, regardless of the rather unusual dynamic.

With you, it was a similar feeling, but not entirely the same. Where his feelings for Mary were more subtle, there had always been an underlying want in his relationship with you. At first, it had simply been a need to understand you. How you could be so similar to him, sharing that same curiosity for the human mind, yet still be able to catch him by surprise with your insights. He wanted to know about you, every little detail. Learning what made you tick, what made you happy, and what parts of your mind you had not shown to anyone else. Yet, even that wasn't enough. It wasn't until much recently, had Laszlo deduced the source of this incessant need for you. Where his feelings for Mary had made him recognize the lighter side of him, you made him realize that perhaps the darkness there was deeper than he knew. But he welcomed that new feeling just as enthusiastically, after the events of the opera.

What he felt for Mary and for you were very different, but just as intense. He had hoped, foolishly, that those differences would change something. And yet it seemed as if history was playing out again, as it had before.

"Unlock the door."

Laszlo's words were met with hesitation by the group, before they noticed the clear distress in his expression. Marcus nodded, placing the bag he held down in front of the door, before crouching down to pick the lock. Once unlocked, Sara opened the door, leaning in through the frame to look inside. From what she could tell, the study and kitchen were empty, and she could hear no sounds of movement, even after she called your name. Slowly, one-by-one, the five of them entered your home.

"Marcus and I will check upstairs," Sara decided, earning a nod from the Isaacson brother. "I believe there are a few rooms further back."

As they split up inside the house, Laszlo found himself at a loss. Although he had stopped by a couple of times, he had never truly taken the time to examine the home. Outside of the paintings that decorated the walls and the furniture provided to you, the home was extremely bare. Only a handful of personal items were scattered about, as well as a couple of books he had given you to read. For each and every room the doctor passed, it dawned on him that you had not been exaggerating when you had told him you dropped everything to move to New York. He wondered just how much you had left behind.

"Dr. Kreizler!"

Marcus's voice called out, clearly alarmed, causing the air to still throughout the house. Rushing upstairs, John, Lucius, and Laszlo all went to join Marcus and Sara, only stopping once they saw the man exit what appeared to be your bedroom. A small bouquet of roses in his hands.

You awoke with your eyes closed. The only thing grounding you to reality was the steady, throbbing pulse in the back of your head, causing a dull ache to pass over you with every beat. With a low groan, you blinked, as you thought about how rough work at the Institute was going to be, if this headache was going to plague you. As you shot up from the bed, letting out a painful cry, you went to raise your hand to you head. Only for them to be pulled back harshly, by a binding pressure against your wrists.

You blinked, and suddenly the pain in your head was in the back of your mind. Your eyes shot to your hands, ignoring the sting of the sudden action. A bundle of knots bound you, as a rope dug into your skin, leashing you to the unfamiliar bed frame behind you.

No. no. no no no. You thought in a panic, realizing the gravity of your current situation.

You took in your surroundings, seated on a small bed in the center of a room. There were no windows, and only a small lamp by the door lit the small space. The walls were bare, save for the portrait of a young woman. The only exit was a wooden door, with cracks forming from the bottom. Your heart racing, you tried to recall your memory of the events last night. What had happened to you? Where were you? Who brought you here?

You remembered the opera, and your pleasant time with Laszlo there, and how he had escorted you back to your home. So why couldn't you remember falling asleep there? Why were you still wearing the same dress you had spent hours deciding on? You had watched the carriage ride far out of sight, Stevie at the reins. You had opened the door to your home, without the use of your key, as it had been unlocked already.

Unlocked. Despite having purposefully locked it before leaving for the night.

"Stupid." Your breath hitched, as you cursed yourself for not noticing such a mistake. You hadn't even realized. Too giddy and tired from the emotional events of the opera.

Your heart raced, as you grew more and more frustrated, causing you to tug at your bindings. But no luck came. You thought back to what you did after entering your home. You had placed a few things down, before retiring to your bedroom, in order to change into your night clothes and sleep. But you never made it that far. In a sudden moment of clarity, a memory returned to you. You had sat down in front of your vanity mirror, before noticing a flash of red in the mirror. A bouquet of roses. Perhaps it was the fear and shock of the realization that the killer they’d been hunting had been in your home that caused you to lose consciousness. However, the pain in your head suggested otherwise.

Whatever the case was, you were now trapped in a room, after being taken from your home by the very person you had spent months trying to find. But aside from the distressing predicament of your kidnapping, what unsettled you most was the sudden deviation in behavior. If you truly had been taken by the killer you were searching for, why were you still alive? Why did he take you? What did he plan to do to you?

You didn't want to wait to find out, but found that you had little choice in the matter. No matter how many times you tugged and pulled at your bindings, the restraint never weakened. You had tried untying the knots on the bed frame, in hopes that you may be able to escape, even if your hands were tied together. The knots however, were tight and overlapping each other, and no amount of strength that you possessed could undo them. In desperation, you looked at the wooden door, knowing that it was all that stood between you and freedom. If you only could unbind your hands. But even if you had escaped, you didn't know where you were, or who's home you were in.

The answer didn't come till what felt like hours later. You had sat yourself up into a more comfortable position on the bed, where the rope would not pull at your now-aching wrists, and jumped as the wooden door suddenly opened.

Your heart leapt to your throat, and all you could seem to do was stare at the figure in the doorway. You were shocked. Your were speechless. You wanted to deny it, to try and lie to yourself by saying that he couldn't be the one who took you. That his presence here was merely some miraculous coincidence. But you weren't that naive. Still, never had you thought the same man who would regularly stop by your house could potentially be a murderer.

"Mr. Arnett." You breathed out, finally.

"Good evening, my dear." He greeted, his tone just as casual as any other time you had spoken. As though it was normal, to have you tied up in a room against your will.

As he stepped into the room, you found yourself growing more and more anxious with each of his steps. He had asked you something, a question you couldn't recall. You couldn't even find it within you to respond, knowing that anything you said might make your situation worse. If Arnett truly was the same man who’d been killing the women of New York, then it’s likely he’d have no issue using that same violence against you. Although, he had already changed his behavior, choosing to attack you in your own home, rather than on the street. That alone revealed that he was unpredictable.

"What..what am I doing here?" You asked, fearfully. You wanted your tone to come off as more questioning, rather than upset. You knew that if Laszlo’s theory was correct, the only reason you weren’t dead yet was because the fantasy behind the murders relied on your acceptance of the man. Still unsure of his intentions with you, you shuddered at the thought of letting the man do whatever he wanted.

"I'm taking care of you."

The vagueness of the answer, and the emptiness in his tone, as he spoke sent a wave of fear over you. The man took a step towards you, right next to the bed you were tied to. You sat up, moving away from him, by instinct. You had hardly noticed the tray Arnett had been carrying, until he placed it down on the foot of the bed. A wide assortment of fruits, breads, and foods were placed onto the tray, along with a single red rose. Taking a seat next to you, he lifted something off of the item.

"A strawberry, from my garden." He explained, as though that was the cause of your nervous behavior.

You didn’t feel hungry, but felt a sense of relief at the act. Only because that meant he didn’t plan on harming you…yet. Once more, he placed the strawberry up to your lips.

Arnett's jaw tensed, as he spoke again. This time he sounded as though he were trying to restrain himself. "You don't need to be afraid of me."

Afraid to anger him, you took a bite, before attempting to distance yourself from him further, if that were even possible at this point. He praised you for the action, as an owner would praise a pet. Bitterness rose from your chest, creating a bad taste in your mouth. Whether it was the fruit he gave you, or the reaction you had to his words, you weren't sure.

"See, I knew you'd be good," He spoke, condescendingly. "just like my Lily."

You swallowed back a grimace. "Lily?"

Arnett blinked, as if confused for a moment, before giving a forced chuckle. His eyes turned to the portrait in the room, of the young woman. "I must apologize, it's rather rude of me to compare you to my wife- ex-wife. "

He quickly corrected himself, before looking back at you, his eyes falling to your wrists. More specifically, the red burns on them, from your previous attempts at escape. He reached out, without warning, before scolding you profusely. He spoke only about how should be more careful, as to not harm yourself further. In your upset state, you didn't even think before instinctively ripping your hands from his hold, not wanting him to so much as touch you.

Arnett's almost-caring expression fell in an instant, before revealing an angered scowl. He grabbed your arms again, only now his grip was harsh and painful. There was no doubt in your mind that you would have bruises later.

"Don't do that." He hissed. "Don't you ever do that!"

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" You gasped, shaking as you quickly apologized in an attempt to calm his sudden temper. Blinking, you searched for any excuse that might help you. "I'm sorry.. I.. It's inappropriate, I wasn't expecting you to.."

Once more, you cursed yourself for coming up with such a weak excuse. However, even as you closed your eyes, you felt the grip on your hand lose its hold. When you looked back at Arnett, his scowl had disappeared. He thought for a moment, before a slight smile crept over his lips.

"You don't need to worry about such things anymore, my dear." He sighed. "Now that you're here with me, you won't have to feign innocence for the sake of appearances. We can speak freely now."

As you stared into his eyes, you came to understand that in some twisted way, his mind had made up a lie: making him believe you held some form of silent connection with him. Twisting your interactions into subtle advances, when they had merely been polite conversations. Every small talk in the study of your home, he had taken it as a sign of reciprocated affections. Rather than what they were. And he truly believed that lie, which was what frightened you the most.

You were silent, as he ran a thumb over your injured hand. It was meant to be a comforting gesture, but you viewed it more as a threat. You knew that if you pulled your hands way, as you wanted to, you'd be met with more aggression. Eventually, his focus returned to the tray he had brought in, handing you the rose as he placed another fruit to your mouth. You were fighting back a mixture of emotions, as you attempted to process the situation. You wanted to snap, and tell him that he didn't need to feed you himself. You wanted kick and fight, if only to save your pride. But you knew that none of these actions would help you, and would more likely cause Arnett to harm you.

Instead, you tried to refocus your frustrations into questioning Arnett's plan for you.

"Mr. Arnett, I..I find myself at..at a loss as to why you've brought me here." You muttered, weakly. "Surely, it's not simply to 'speak freely', as you put it? I can't help but think there is another reason.."

The older man scoffed, as if surprised you even had to ask.

"Well, I've been left with no other choice, haven't I? You're forced to spend every day and night fretting over the little problems of a half-crazed alienist, who insists on keeping you by his side." He grit his teeth, looking around the room for a moment. "But that no longer matters. You won’t need to worry anymore about Kreizler taking his liberties with you, my dear."

The bruising grasp on your hand returned. His voice and expression reflected anger, though it didn't seem directed at you this time. His eyes were still staring off at nothing in particular, and it seemed as though he wasn't even aware of the venom in his tone. Ignoring your pain for a moment, you feared what he meant, upon mentioning Laszlo. Was he merely speaking his suspicions out of a jealous delusion? Or had he known- had he seen- your actions with Laszlo at the opera last night?

You let out another pained gasp, causing Arnett to release his hold on you. This time, he stood up, staring down at you with regret and fear. Almost dejectedly, he grabbed the tray once more, and made his way back towards the wooden door. But not without looking back at the portrait once more.

"Lily was as delicate as you."

A time passed before the door opened again.

You had fought to stay awake, in order to try and defend yourself against Arnett, even though you were essentially at his mercy. But the reality was that you were exhausted. Not only physically, but mentally and emotionally. The stress of the case, Laszlo, and your own current situation had left you utterly broken. As sleep came for you, your eyes fogged with tears, as you thought back to the happiness you felt just a night before.

When you finally awoke, you heard a loud thud, as though something had fallen somewhere in the building you were being kept in. Your heart pounded, half hopeful and half afraid. The wooden door to the dim room opened, your heart sinking as you faced Arnett once more, his face red with anger as he began yelling out, seething with every breath.

"He comes to my place of work, accusing me!"

Arnett raves, red in the face, as he circles around the room. His sentences slur together, his words coming out faster than you can understand them. You sit up quickly, bracing yourself, as it's all you can do in the moment. The man's eyes were wide and his gaze flicked from place to place, as if searching for something as he continued to ramble on. You noticed how his hands were clenched, his fingernails digging into his palms and his knuckles becoming a white color. Fearing what he may do, you kept your mouth shut, hoping in vain that he might forget that you're there.

"-Slandering my name and reputation!” He heaved out a heavy breath, before his stare finally finds its destination on you.

Whatever pleasant facade the man placed on for you before was gone now, overcome by his anger. He rushed forwards, pushing you back against the headboard of the bed, placing a hand on your face, pressing hard on your cheeks and jaw. Startled, you froze, unable to even move, except for the trembling throughout your body.

"Who is he to you?" He demanded, an accusatory glare cutting through you.

You choked out a reply, asking who or what he was talking about. That only made his grip stronger, squeezing against your bones enough to make them ache.

“That damned Kreizler!” He spat. “Is he truly so dependent on you, that he cannot go a single day without you?! Is your company so enjoyable that he cannot help himself?”

Arnett’s words were spiteful and insulting. Not only towards Laszlo, but yourself as well. It seemed that while Arnett did not seem to know the extent of your relationship to the alienist, the suspicion was enough to drive him over the edge. You only feared what would happen, should he learn what occurred at the opera. As your mind raced with your thoughts, you hadn't noticed how your captor now moved over you, trapping you under him. His spare hand trailed over you, his glare burning holes into you as he grabbed at your form. Your mind went blank, and all you could hear was the heartbeat that now pulsed in your ears. You twisted and turned, biting into your cheek as your body moved on its own, trying to do anything to get him off of you. A quick slap stunned you, causing you to recoil from the force.

Still, Arnett seemed lost to his ramblings. “He claims himself a gentleman! Tell me, do you enjoy the attention he gives you? Perhaps I’ve been mistreating you, perhaps you enjoy the way he takes advantage of you-“

Mistreatment was an understatement, but you dared not speak your mind in this moment. The feeling of his spare hand pushing a trail up your leg sent a wave of disgust and fear through you. Desperately, you spoke, saying anything that came to mind, hoping to calm the clearly unhinged man.

“No, no Mr. Arnett, please!”

You cried, gasping as your throat seemed to close off on its own.

“You’re- you’re right! He’s- He’s not a gentlemen, not like you. Louis-“

You barely registered what you were saying, only focusing on pleading for your life. You continued, speaking whatever you thought the man would want to hear. As soon as they left your mouth, you hated every lie you spoke about Laszlo. How you were catering to Mr. Arnett’s sick fantasy. It seemed to work, however, as the man paused his assault on you. His grip on your chin lifted your gaze up to him, making you stare through tears to look him in the eye.

Your voice shook as you spoke, going on and on about how you were being mistreated and how Arnett was a gentlemen, as much as it pained you to do so. You empathized the phrase, hoping it might somehow make him stop. His actions were abhorrent, yet he seemed to pride himself on being the gentleman he had tricked you into believing he was. You played into Arnett's fantasy, making yourself appear as some damsel in need of saving and that Arnett was the man who would do it. All you could do was hope your words satisfied him.

His hand released its hold on your leg, but you did not allow yourself to sigh in relief. The hold on your chin disappeared, as he gently placed his palm against your cheek. A soft smile met his lips, yet his eyes remained vacant and cold. His voice was distant once more, as if remembering something.

“You truly are just like my Lily.” He pressed his lips against you, holding you there. You didn’t move. When he finally parted, he gave a reassuring smile, something meant to comfort you, before saying: “He won’t mistreat you anymore, my dear. I’ll make sure of it.”

The older man stood up, smoothing a hand over his suit, before turning from you. Your heart sank at his words, leaving you in despair even as he left the room. Pulling your legs up to your chest, you cried into the wrinkled fabric of your dress, muffling the sound in order to keep Arnett from hearing you.

It felt like years, as another day passed. Your heart ached along with your shoulders and wrists, as you stared blankly at the wooden door. There were moments when you asked yourself if this barren room would be the last thing you saw. If the painted, empty eyes of Lily Arnett would be staring down at you, as you joined her in death. But there was hope.

Arnett’s outburst had been sudden and terrifying. But in his state, he’d given you the knowledge that Laszlo and the others were close, already questioning the man. Already suspecting the truth. You just needed to keep him satisfied, until your friends could figure out how to find you. If they found you.

When the wooden door opened once more, Arnett was bringing in another tray of food and water for you. As he came into the light of the lamp, your attention was drawn to the cut along the man's temple. Given your situation, this shouldn't have surprised you, but in all the time you've known the man you’d never seen the man with even a scratch on him, despite the violent attacks he had carried out. Before your abduction, you knew the man to be of good standing in the eyes of society. Someone obsessed with his reputation as a proper gentleman. Someone who’d never be caught up in a fight, not one that would cause such a wound.

You ask what happened, less out of concern and more out of curiosity, desperately wanting to learn what you could about the events playing out in the world outside of the small room. Your words seemed to fall on deaf ears however, as Arnett silently approached, not answering you. Instead, he lifted the food for you to eat. Slowly, you took a bite, not wanting to upset him further. After finishing the bits fruit and bread he initially offered, you found yourself growing more and more restless, due to his unsettling silence. As he lifted another fruit to you, you turned your head slowly, until eventually you found yourself looking up at the woman in the portrait.

Twice now he had mentioned his late wife…Lily. Some deep-rooted part of you felt as though her death had not been some random accident or illness, given how Arnett had consistently been comparing the two of you. No… By now, you suspected that perhaps the poor woman had shared your fate, falling victim to her husband's erratic behavior.

You opened your mouth, your throat dry as you carefully said: “I…I realize I never asked about your wife, before. If it is not too upsetting, tell me, how… how did she pass?”

Arnett blinked, as if snapped from his silence. A vacant expression crossed over his face, sending a frightening chill through you. It was identical to the one Laszlo had at the morgue, as the alienist was trying to gain insight into the killer’s mind. You had trusted Laszlo, but it was different now. Now you looked that very killer in the eye.

“I believe I told you. She was delicate." He paused, staring you down, before glancing away quickly. "Now eat.”

A horrible pit in your stomach grew, as your mind raced to create images of what you suspected befell the late Mrs. Arnett. If his lack of hesitation of using force against you was any indication…It was slowly becoming evident that perhaps she may have been the first. The catalyst that created the man you faced now. You swallow back the lump in your throat, speechless. In your shock, you had forgotten what Arnett had ordered you to do. It was too late to fix your mistake, as the man quickly took your silence as refusal. In an instant, the tray was shoved aside, slammed to the floor, as his form climbed over you.

"You ungrateful bitch!" His hands clamped down on your throat, using a strength that felt as though it would snap your life away at any second. You hands pulled down on the ropes, having enough length to allow you to claw at his grasp. “Do you know how much trouble you’ve caused me?"

You struggled for breath, your heartbeat becoming the only sound in your ears before a slam at the door snapped you from your panicked state. A voice- no, voices- spoke loudly. You didn’t process what was said, only that the weight of Arnett shifted. You found yourself placed between Arnett and the unknown parties, a sharp pressure against your neck. As you gathered your senses, you realized the pressure was a knife, one Arnett had kept hidden away. You weren't sure if he had it before, or if he had planned to use it against you before being interrupted.

John and Sara stood before you, the woman aiming a gun towards Arnett. Though, with you placed in between them, the weapon was also directed towards you. You wanted to scream. You wanted to cry. If you weren’t so focused on the knife’s weight against you, your heart surely would have leapt with happiness. They had found you! But the confrontation was not over.

"You have no right, breaking in here!” Arnett seethed. “I’ll have you arrested!”

Sara was quick to respond, not even flinching from his words. “Call them if you like, but I doubt the police would be interested with us, upon finding a woman unwillingly locked up on your property.”

Arnett shook his head, his breath coming out in heavy exhales. His voice was shaking. Out of anger, fear, and confusion. “No, you’re wrong! She..she wants to be here! Tell them!”

The knife pressed harder against you, as Arnett whispered unintelligible words against your ear. You gasped, closing your eyes, as if everything would disappear if you didn't watch. Another sound of footsteps grabbed your attention, forcing you to look up once more. A third figure emerged through the door, joining John and Sara. He stopped dead in his tracks, however, upon seeing the tense stand-off between them and Arnett. With you at the center.

“Laszlo!” You called, the name falling from your mouth before you could stop it.

A vice grip found the back of your neck, making you gasp in pain. His whisper was erratic but you could just make out: "How dare you say his name in front of me-"

The knife pressed harder, a small sting followed by a warm trickling feeling. His cheek pressed against your ear, speaking lowly. “Tell them you want to be here. With me.”Another pause of silence made him seethe. "Answer me, Lily!”

Arnett’s grip on reality, whatever remained, was slipping as the scene played out before you. Still, you refused. Laszlo was here, They were all here! You were so close to freedom that you couldn't bare the thought of him taking it away. Tears reached your eyes, as you glanced at the faces you've grown to know.

“There’s no where to go, Mr. Arnett.” Sara said, regaining your attention. She looked back at you, rather than your captor. She looked unsure, as she aimed her gun toward the two of you, in contrast to her confident words. “If you truly care for her, as I suspect you do, then let her go.”

“No, nonono..” Arnett’s breaths became erratic. “She belongs with me! Tell them, my dear, now.”

Still you remain silent, biting back a cry.

Arnett snapped, cursing you, as the knife lifted for a moment, before turning fully towards you, intended to pierce your throat. In that split moment, you heard the loud blast of gunfire, followed by the metallic smell of gunpowder. A ringing overtook your senses, followed closely by a burning in your shoulder.

Then...

thud

Your heartbeat signaled to you that you were alive, but you couldn't help yourself but think it was a trick. One last cruel joke for the entertainment of a higher power.

Your mind and vision seemed to blur, as each passing moment came by in flashes. You no longer felt Arnetts breath against your ear, yet the intense pain in your shoulder remained. You felt a pair of arms reach around you, as the restraining pull of ropes on your wrists disappeared. The cool breeze of air hit your face at some point, before the rest faded away to darkness.

#The Alienist #laszlo kreizler x reader #laszlo x reader #laszlo x you #Daniel Bruhl

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wisherbysharlight · 4 years ago

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My God if I could only say, I'm holding every breath for you

Description: Patton Hart has been pining for his best friend's twin brother and his boyfriends for as long as he can remember. Word Count: 3067 Ships: Patton/Remus/Janus/Virgil, background Logince, established Remus/Janus/Virgil Warnings: Remus being Remus, twins squabbling AO3 This is a gift fic for @sunshineandteddybears for the @sanderssidesgiftxchange. The “summer romance” piece kinda got away from me, but this is definitely found family! I hope you enjoy!

Patton was wiping down the counters, about 15 minutes after closing, sunset shining through the windows as he hummed along to the radio, a sense of peace radiating through the store.

Of course, that’s when chaos erupted.

“Pattycakes, you gotta save me!” Remus cried as he threw the door open so roughly the windchimes actually smacked against the window above the door before falling back down and jingling merrily to announce his presence. He ran behind the counter with no hesitation, gripping onto Patton’s waist. (Patton only shivered because of the burst of adrenaline. That was the only reason. No other possibilities. Nope.) Remus angled them both towards the doorway just as Roman came bursting in with the same amount of urgency, fire in his eyes and shirt dripping wet and seemingly tinted a particularly garish shade of greenish-brown.

“Remus, you can’t hide behind Patton forever, you bastard!” he seethed, and Logan, Janus, and Virgil came through the door behind him, much more calm, almost to the point where Patton would call them bemused. Logan took a seat at one of the small tables along the wall, pulling out his phone with a very evident intention to simply wait the whole debacle out, while Janus and Virgil both leaned up against the glass case in front of Patton. “Get out here and face me, you coward!” Roman bellowed again, clearly not giving up anytime soon.

Patton grabbed an empty paper towel roll from next to him and turned at the waist to whack Remus in the head with it, “Remus you cannot use me as a human shield, go answer for your crimes.” “Kinky. I’d much rather have you issue my punishment,” Remus joked with an eyebrow wiggle, then cackled when Patton made a strangled noise and shoved him back to the other side of the counter. However, as soon as he was in range, Roman grabbed hold of him and pulled him into a headlock and his laughter turned swiftly into a shriek of “Oh shit!”

They were 12 years old, tearing through the woods in a dual-friend-group game of manhunt the summer before 7th grade. Virgil was hot on everyone’s heels and adrenaline was coursing through their veins. Patton leapt over a log and turned a corner, hunting for a good place to hide.

He heard a curse of “Oh shit!” echo through the woods before the sound of three branches breaking in succession, a huge crash, and a subsequent groan. He quickly pivoted and went sprinting back towards the house, and the sound, easily finding Remus splayed across the forest floor even in the dim light of the moon.

“Why would you climb a tree, silly goose? Don’t you know the branches are weak that high? Scared me half to death!” he chided as he fell to his knees beside him, already pulling band-aids out of his wallet in his pocket.

Remus grinned impishly up at him, and Patton felt his breath catch in his throat, fumbling with the wallet briefly in a way he prayed the other boy didn’t notice. “What’s a lil fear in the face of a bunch of excitement, Patty?” he crooned, and Patton shoved a handful of band-aids at him with little delicacy in his haste to move past the tease. “Besides, I have the best nurse in the world to patch me up when my fun does go south, apparently.”

Patton flushed and turned away, positive Remus could tell even in the weak light, but he couldn’t keep the earnestness out of his voice, “I’ll always patch you up, Ree. Promise.”

Remus didn’t get a chance to respond before Virgil burst through the bushes and tapped them both on the shoulder to get them out and a loud, extended debate began about the validity of the “injury time out”.

Janus leaned on the counter in front of Patton, jolting him out of his reverie. He pointed at the menu, with three shiny new additions at the bottom, “You finally manage to find a flavor sweeter than you, sugar?”

Virgil shoved him out of the way with an eye roll and a fond grin, thankfully distracting from how Patton felt his cheeks would melt the freezers. “He can’t stop flirting even for two seconds, I swear.”

Janus gasped dramatically, swooning against the counter and batting his eyes at Virgil like a starlet in an old black and white, “Maybe if you and Remus gave me the attention I deserve I wouldn’t need to hunt it down in beautiful, endearing ice cream shop owners.”

Remus snorted despite the way he was currently trying to claw his way out of his brother’s hold while being noogied like they were still teenagers and not fully grown and employed adults, “We could give you all the attention in the world, Janny, it would never stop you from flirting with Patton.”

Janus sniffed derisively at them, then cocked his head to the side as the song changed and smiled softly, “Hey, I know this song.”

Patton smiled brightly back, “Yeah of course, have it on all the playlists for the shop!”

“Simp!” Remus called over just as brightly, and Patton glared back at him, assuming it was aimed at him.

“Ok, you look miserable,” Janus said, making Patton jump from where he was staring down at his water glass watching the liquid swirl around the glass as he moved it in little circles and maybe lamenting his singledom a little bit in the face of a dance floor full of sappy teenagers in fancy clothes enjoying the crisp June night and each other as their last hurrah before graduation.

Patton plastered on a smile, “Oh Jan, I am perfectly hap-”

Janus arched a brow at him, tsking lightly and just loud enough for Patton to hear and stop speaking. “Don’t try to lie to me, I know what you look like when you are actually happy, Patton. And also you’re a god-awful liar.”

“...yeah ok. I’m a little bit lonely, maybe, with Ro and Lo gettin their dance on for the romantic stuff. But I’m not mad, they’re in love, and I told them to go hang on their own. We’ll hang out at the beach house after!” He couldn’t help but glance at the dance floor, where Logan was leading Roman in a waltz that was perfectly on time with the music, lost in their own little world.

“Well Ree and V bailed for the beach early. Not exactly their style of music or dancing, or my vibe to make them do something they don’t enjoy just to get my feet stepped on. Why don’t we be miserable together?” The song changed, to a song with a more Latin-inspired beat that Patton knew only one of every 10 words to, and Janus smirked, “Maybe you and I can even make the most of it and I can score a salsa partner.” Janus ended his proposition with an exaggerated wink and bow, and Patton took his offered hand with a genuine grin.

Janus didn’t miss a beat, switching eye contact to Roman on a dime, “Hey, did you know Remus was the one who’s been screwing with your guitar’s tuning?”

“NONONO HE’S LYING,” Remus cried as Roman tightened his hold and doubled down on his attack, this time poking at his ribs and making Remus shriek in laughter.

As Janus watched Roman wrestle Remus down to the floor of the shop, clearly satisfied with the reaction he managed to get, Virgil nudged him over with his hip to take his place leaning across the counter and whisper conspiratorially, “I bet it was actually Logan. Bastard can get away with murder, I just know it.”

Patton couldn’t help but giggle, with Virgil’s playful smile and dancing eyes across from him, so open and trusting in a way he never was unless it was just the group of them. He smirked a bit, nibbled at his lip in consideration, then leaned in to say in an equally conspiratorial style, “Logan’s only involved to see how long it’ll be before anyone catches on. My record stands.”

“You are a trickster Patton Hart,” Virgil gasped in mock-scandal. He wagged his finger with his hand on his hip in a not-half-bad impression of Patton during a lecture, though he was unable to match his Patton-ted Disappointed Frown while he was grinning, “I’d never expect my partner in crime to be doing something like this without telling me, shame on you. You know I always have your back.”

It was their last weekend of freedom before they started high school, and as per usual both twins had both their friends sleeping over. Patton woke before Logan and Roman, also as per usual, and snuck out of Roman’s room down to the kitchen, only to jolt as he found the light already on and Virgil sitting on the kitchen counter.

“Whatcha doin?” Virgil asked, legs kicking in the air in front of the cabinets lazily.

“Gonna try to make pancakes! I’m positive I won’t burn them this time, I just know it,” Patton enthused, then squinted suspiciously at Virgil, “What’re you doing?”

“Oh just hanging around, keeping an eye out in case anyone tries to burn the house down again so I can help out. Figured they might need a partner in arson crime, ya know, and I could let them know I’ve got their back,” Virgil teased, nudging Patton’s leg with a sock clad foot. He looked so precious with his sleep mussed hair and eyeliner from the night before smudged under his eyes that Patton couldn’t even bring himself to argue that he really didn’t need a babysitter. Honestly, he couldn’t even begin to pretend he didn’t want the excuse to spend more time with him.

The twins’ argument grew more heated, finally managing to distract Patton from where he was a bit lost in the way Virgil’s eyes lit up when he was amused.

“You fucked up one of my favorite shirts!” Roman screeched as he attempted to give his brother a wet willy.

“You put red koolaid in my shampoo two weeks ago, you baby!” Remus cried back, shoving at his shoulder to try to get him off, and succeeding rolling them only for Roman to roll them straight back.

“I know you were the one who put my script out of order,” Roman fired back.

“You should have been off book anyway! And you broke bro code and told Virgil I was the one who deleted his X-Files off the DVR. You are just as bad as me.”

“You gave mom’s computer a porn virus and blamed it on me!” Roman protested, and everyone else seemed to simultaneously sigh as they descended into their usual back and forth of dredged-up pettiness.

“Oh you're still - you squashed my bug collection.”

“You left me stranded in the yard after Remy’s homecoming party senior year.”

“That was absolutely justified, you made me listen to you wax poetic about Logan’s fucking lips for 3 hours.”

“You made me listen to you wax poetic about Patton’s EVERYTHING for 13 YEARS”

Everyone in the shop simultaneously went silent in a blink of an eye. Virgil went white as a sheet and swung to look at the twins with wide eyes, Janus gripped the counter white-knuckled and looked at Patton with a similarly stunned expression, and Remus turned nearly as red as the sash on Roman’s favorite Prince Charming costume. He shoved Roman off of him for real, a more severe growl to his voice as he seemed to realize there was no way to play it cool, “You are such a fucking dick!”

Roman stammered for a moment, clearly trying to digest the change in tone and the weight of what he’d said, before waving his arms above his head in apparent bafflement, “It’s not like he didn’t know you all were into him!”

“Roman,” Logan spoke up suddenly, gesturing at Patton and what Patton knew had to be a completely shell-shocked expression.

Roman looked up and went just as wide-eyed as the others, “Pat… did... did you not know?”

“...all of you?” Patton asked, then winced as his voice cracked in shock. He watched Virgil flinch and seem to retreat into his hoodie out of the corner of his eye, and Janus’ face smoothed over into a perfect mask of calm in the blink of an eye. He felt his heart break just a little bit at the disappointment in both of their eyes at what he was sure they saw as a rejection.

Logan grabbed Roman’s arm and yanked him away roughly, though Roman followed easily, “You all clearly need to communicate. I will handle this one.”

“Don’t wanna know about you handling my brother, poindexter,” Remus joked hollowly, sounding almost like it was a reflex with none of his usual cackle behind it.

Logan rolled eyes and headed out the door, tugging behind him a Roman who was fervently whispering, just barely audibly, “He didn't know, how did he not know,” to himself over and over again.

There’s silence in the shop for a while, just the sound of the radio faintly playing over the loudspeakers echoing off the walls as they all just stare at each other, not knowing how to start. Then Janus took a deep breath and spoke first, “Patton, I refuse to speak for these two clowns, but I will absolutely tell you that I, at the very least, have had feelings for you for many years, feelings which i was unaware I was not making perfectly clear, or that there was a chance of any sort of reciprocation.”

“Around 7 years for me, give or take. That first morning we made pancakes together,” Virgil added quietly, fiddling with the zipper on his sleeve.

Remus averted his gaze, looking nervous in the way Patton had only seen the day before he confessed to Virgil and Janus in high school, and admitted in the quietest voice Patton’d ever heard him use, “I don’t know exactly when, Pattycakes. You’ve always been there and as far as I’m concerned I’ve loved you just as long. And-and I just assumed it wasn’t returned.”

Patton swallowed thickly, trying to push back tears because he knew these boys and knew they would take them for disappointment rather than the joy they were. He dove at Remus first, vaulting the counter the way he always scolded Roman against and sliding to his knees next to the other man on the floor before crushing him in a hug. He flailed back at Janus and Virgil with one hand to pull them in as well, “Come here, all of you, we’ve lost so much valuable cuddle time!”

Patton was pretty sure Janus broke the sound barrier with how quickly he was plastered to his side and burying his face in his hair, and Virgil wasn’t far behind, wrapping an arm around his waist and burying his face in the crease of his neck and shoulder. Patton took that moment to be a bit daring himself and press a kiss to the corner of Remus’ lips, then giggled brightly when Remus grabbed hold of his cardigan and used it to pull him back in to kiss him full on the mouth with just as much passion and impulsiveness and laughter as Patton had always imagined. His mustache tickled Patton’s nose a bit but he leaned into it, humming happily in the back of his throat and feeling like a puzzle piece clicked into place.

Virgil only gave them a minute before he untucked his face from Patton’s neck and grouched that he wanted a turn. Remus let Patton go with a very put-upon sigh that didn’t match his playful grin, flicking Virgil on the nose lightly. “You gotta give him his kisses or he’ll never shut the fuck up,” he fake-whispered.

Patton grinned and turned readily to Virgil, and his lips met Patton’s in a much gentler dance. His kiss was no less deep or passionate for its caution, and his hands cupped his face like he feared Patton would float away if he didn’t hold tight. His fingers curled and twitched upwards like they wanted to bury themselves in his hair but didn’t want to overstep, so Patton took the initiative to grip the back of his neck and tilt his own head to encourage Virgil to do what he wished.

Janus was more patient, waiting for them to part for breath a few minutes later before taking hold of Patton’s chin from Virgil without a word and gently but firmly turning Patton towards him. Janus’ kiss could only be described as a caress, light and teasing and peppered with soft nips to his bottom lip before building up to something more solid. His warm hands rubbed calmingly up and down Patton’s spine and over his shoulders like he couldn’t figure out where he wanted to touch first.

Remus soon demanded he get another shot, then Virgil wanted another, then Janus again, leaving Patton so beyond cloud 9 he could barely think any more. They spent at least 20 minutes there on the floor, lost in each other, rotating kisses that were long overdue, letting their actions make the confessions their words hid from for years, not daring to move and break the spell of the moment.

Then a camera shutter sounded, paired with a bright flash of light that made them all jolt and look up in surprise.

“I said communicate you know, not make out on the floor,” Logan sighed, digging through his wallet to pull a 20 out to hand to Roman, who was grinning victoriously.

“I’m sorry for being a dick, but I had to do something and I told Logan the “accidental slip” would work,” Roman said as he pressed a triumphant kiss to Logan’s cheek and pocketed the 20, “But you have to admit it was a pretty great performance on my part.”

“Can’t believe I was betrayed by my best friends, I don’t know whether I owe you a scolding or a fruit basket,” Patton lamented playfully, cheeks hurting from how wide he was smiling. Janus ruined what little remained of the facade even more as he shifted slightly and pulled him into his lap and Patton clung tight to Virgil and Remus’ hands, with no intention of disconnecting any time soon.

#IntruAnaMoCeit #patton/dark sides #patton/remus/janus/virgil #polyamsanders #ts fic #i had no idea how to tag this #all sides #remus mention

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concussed-to-pieces · 4 years ago

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Late July

Fandom: Kingsman: The Golden Circle

Pairing: Agent Whiskey [Jack Daniels]/Reader

Rating: Holy shit explicit.

Summary: Upon hearing about you from Tequila, Jack Daniels seeks you out with a full set of emotional baggage to work through. You happily oblige, helping him craft a scene that just might grant him some peace of mind. Enjoy!

Tag List: @huliabitch @wrestlingfae @cookiethewriter @culturalrebel @jackierey09 @crookedmoonsaultpunk @duker42 @agirllovespasta @nelba @pedrosbigdorkenergy @lestrange2703 @youmeanmybrain @luvley-shadow @theocatkov @miscellaneousjunkk @reluctantlyresponsibleadult @buttons-beads-lace @gooddaykate @lackofhonor

[!TRIGGER WARNING!: This installment contains consensual non-consent (surrender play), light domination, roleplay, unprotected sex, frank discussion of safe words, usage of safe words, dirty talk and light bondage. Remember that fanfictions are not research and that you should never engage in any activity if you do not trust your partner. Stay safe!]

There was just something about you that put people at ease, and Ginger Ale noticed during the interview process. "You have a gift!" She had praised you, her smile unexpected and bright. "I can see why Tequila recommended you for this position."

Granted, being the 'head of first impressions' at a distillery that was actually a front for a secret intelligence agency had its ups and downs, but you enjoyed the work and (if you were honest) the exciting interactions with the Statesman agents.

Tequila, of course, would practically drape himself across your desk as he regaled you with (hopefully) exaggerated tales of his heroics. The two of you were sexually involved but preferred to keep each other at arm's length out of the bedroom, neither party particularly keen on surrendering your freedom and committing to anything serious at this point of your lives. You admired his dedication to Statesman, and he in turn respected your desire to have a successful career. He also was blatantly mooning over a certain analyst.

Ginger Ale was quieter and sharper than Tequila, her dry humor a joy to witness. She was the one who had done your interview, and she had given you the full behind the scenes tour once your background check went through. She was beautiful, charismatic and smart as a whip. You hoped to one day be as self-assured as she was.

Champ tended to keep to himself for the most part, though you had encountered him several times in the past when he dozed off in a certain chair at the end of a sunlit hallway. The elderly man was like an old tomcat, you decided, able to prowl but more than willing to take it easy.

Whiskey was often away managing the affairs of their New York headquarters and as such, was the one that you interacted with the least. He would come breezing in at all hours, a slow smile and a wink directed your way before he would saunter past. The rare occasions that he engaged you in conversation were nerve-wracking, as you were a little starstruck due to the glowing accounts both Champ and Tequila had given of his prowess in the past.

Ginger Ale was a bit more down to earth, thankfully. "He's just a man who's lost a lot, and his reasons for wanting to change things for the better may not be entirely altruistic." She had informed you concisely when you queried about the origin of one Jack Daniels. You had picked up on the veiled sadness in his dark eyes, the age that seemed to weigh him down that wasn't entirely related to years.

So when the aforementioned Statesman agent had drunkenly expressed a certain desire to you at a company party, you couldn't hide a little spike of curiosity. Mainly because the two of you interacted so rarely. Hell, you wouldn't even call yourselves friends. Tequila must have told him about your side activities.

"Ever since I lost her, I can't fuckin' bring myself to raw anyone else." The confession had come out of left field, but you had done your best to play it off like it was normal. Lord knew you had done enough paperwork in your career at Statesman to understand that agents would just kind of…say things thoughtlessly if they believed they were in a safe environment. A hazard of the job.

"What do you mean, Mr. Daniels?"

"Call me Jack. Jesus, I ain't that old." He had hiccupped sharply, grimacing. "I just mean I...it's like a mental block. I wanna', I'm excited about it, and everything's fine until I try to come and boom. Python shrivels up like a damn salted slug and I'm left holdin' the bag tryin' to explain myself." He stared into his glass, looking pensive. "Real mood killer."

"Any idea why this might be?" You had prompted, leaning against the bar and idly scanning the throngs of people around you. It wasn't every day that so many of the company's rank and file rubbed elbows with the higher-ups, but you had to assume these economic mixers were what had kept the company (and intelligence agency) on such an even keel. It was a grounding experience, a way to remind the suits of their humble beginnings.

He scoffed out a breath. "Oh I know exactly why. When I lost her, I...we had only learned a little while before that she was havin' a baby. We'd been havin' a rocky time and we were actually thinkin' of breakin' up, but that news…" Jack had tilted his head to glance your way, his brown eyes distant. "If I hadn't gotten her pregnant, she wouldn't have been out shoppin' that day, y'know?" A sad smile had quirked his mouth beneath his mustache. "My fault."

At the time, you had made a noise of sympathy and gone to lay a hand on his arm before you could think better of it. He, instead of shrugging off your touch, actually ended up twining his fingers through your own and giving your hand a light squeeze.

Agent Whiskey's past was a shadowy affair in the Statesman organization. Though to be fair, no one really asked anything about anyone. Ginger Ale reasoned that the less people knew, the safer they and Statesman were in the event of a security breach.

Anything you learned from any of the agents, you tended to keep close to your heart. It was your nature to gather useful information and foster trust for a rainy day. That personality facet had served you well as you had climbed the ranks from intern to head of first impressions, and knowing that you were someone that could be counted on to hold your cards close put many people at ease.

Including one Agent Whiskey.

"Tequila said you were good at helpin'. I'd be much obliged if you'd consider takin' a crack at my sexual baggage."

...

"Alright so for your words, you've decided on 'sixth' as your 'yes I'm into this', followed by second for 'slow down but don't break character', first for 'slow down and do break character' and finally neutral for 'full stop'." You tapped the customary notepad on your lap, glancing over at the man across the table. The two of you were currently sitting in the kitchen of the vacation cabin that your parents had willed to you, the modest dwelling often your staging ground for affairs like this. The warm wooden decor tended to make your partners feel more at ease and less vulnerable. Perceived safety was, after all, incredibly important when crafting scenarios.

Jack nodded. "Gears are easy for me to remember. Simple."

"Got it. And no kissing on the mouth. Can I kiss you in other places, or would you prefer I didn't at all?"

"Kissin's fine." Jack allowed. "Whatever you wanna' do is fine, just not on my mouth." You jotted that down. "Hey, I uh...I just wanted you to know that I really appreciate you agreein' to help. I dunno' if this will work, but…" Whiskey rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. "Thanks. When Tequila mentioned your...extracurriculars, I figured he was jus' bein' outta' pocket again."

You grinned at that, giggling a little. "Does he get weird a lot?"

"I mean, he's uh...well, he's got his moments." Jack replied with a smile of his own.

"So," you hummed once you had checked your notes again, "after looking over all the information we've compiled, and the ideas you gave me an outline of, I'm thinking that you may want more of a 'surrender-play' kind of experience."

Jack raised an eyebrow. "Dare I ask how that's different from what I already suggested?"

"Look, you and I both know that I couldn't keep you from moving if you wanted to. Now, if we had a real working dynamic going on and I believed that you would listen and trust me implicitly so that you don't end up hurting yourself or me, then we might have something. But as we are right now, that's not gonna' happen." Whiskey inclined his head with a rueful chuckle, acknowledging the truth of your words. "So I propose that it's more of a scenario where all the agency is removed."

The agent leaned forward, folding his hands on the table. "Explain."

"You need a scenario where you aren't in control and there's not even a chance of you being in control, taking any responsibility or guilt from the equation." You elaborated. "Basically, you would surrender your control so that you can indulge guilt-free. A lot of people do this coupled with a roleplay aspect in order to test new things that may be out of character for them."

"You coulda' jus' said you wanted to tie me up, sugar." Jack drawled. "I'll show you some good knots."

"You don't have any issues with being secured to...I guess a chair, probably? We'll keep you upright. If we sprawl you out on a bed that might be a little too vulnerable." You reasoned, waiting for his nod before you wrote it down. "I know it sounds contradictory, but I want you to be comfortable in what we do. Should I leave your clothes on?"

"If you can stand to, I'd appreciate it." The man answered with a cheeky wink. "Bein' naked and restrained is a little too close to the job description." He sighed after a moment, tipping the chair backwards as he laced his fingers behind his head. "Now I warn you, if I'm supposed to be an unwillin' party, I may display a little less Southern hospitality and a little more Southern history with my language, if you catch my drift."

You pursed your lips, squinting at him. "...is that your way of saying you might use a naughty word or two?"

You received a lazy finger-gun in reply, "bingo, cherry pie. You got any names you ain't a fan of bein' called?"

"Oh! I mean, I've heard just about everything in the book." You straightened up as a thought occurred to you, and then pointed back at him sternly. "No slurs."

"Ma'am," Jack sounded aghast, "I am not that breed of Southern gentleman. My lingo can verge on the spicy, but I sure as hell wouldn't stoop to that level."

You narrowed your eyes to drive your point home. "I really hope not." The agent inclined his head once more, putting a hand over his heart in a display of sincerity.

The front legs of the chair met the floor with a soft clatter, once again putting him on stable footing. "Now, I been wrackin' my brain tryin' to drum up a good premise like you asked, but I ain't exactly big in the screenwritin' department. I figure it could be kinda' like I'd been kidnapped? Drawin' a blank on why my kidnapper would be rawdoggin' me, maybe you can come up with somethin'?" He queried hopefully.

You furrowed your brow in thought, going silent as you carefully considered the hodgepodge of contributing factors. "Oh, I think I can manage."

...

This deck had been rigged from the start. In theory, you knew that he knew that. Still, he was certainly acting like it stung his pride a bit that he'd fallen into your 'trap' so cleanly.

Everything was going according to plan.

Whiskey struggled against the binds that secured him to the kitchen chair. His whip was safely confiscated. Lasso out of reach. Hat was still on his head. He had specifications, after all.

You left him to wriggle for almost half an hour while you got yourself ready. The man was a secret agent, after all. If he hadn't been restrained for much longer than that at any given point you would be very surprised.

You finally opened the bathroom door, sauntering out into the cabin's small kitchenette. "Miss me, love?" You crooned, committing to your role as villainous vamp stereotype number six. You had worn a plain set of underwear and an oversized white t-shirt, soft and see-through from the amount of times it had been washed. You got the feeling that if you went more elaborate, you might scare Whiskey off or make him too uncomfortable to really get into it. This scene was all about trust, and he hardly knew you. But he had sought you out for this. All you had to do was follow through.

"Was beginnin' to worry that you forgot about me, ma'am." The agent drawled back, his smile tightly sardonic and his low voice curling hot in your belly. "You fixin' to untie me yet?"

You clicked your tongue, the noise disappointed. "Whiskey, sweetheart, where's the fun in that? If I untie you, you'll just kill me."

"Can't blame a man for tryin'." Jack was absolutely in his element right now. He looked furious.

You ambled around behind him, slinging your arms around his neck and resting your weight on him briefly. "Remember," you murmured in his ear. "If you need me to slow down, or need to stop entirely, you say…?"

"Second, first and neutral." The agent replied readily. You patted his cheek.

"Good boy." You praised.

"Ain't my first rodeo." Whiskey's tongue darted out nervously to wet his lips and you wanted to reassure him, but you knew you had a job to do.

"Now, can I get you a light refreshment? Something to drink? Maybe some chips?" You offered, moving to the small refrigerator that you had stocked a little earlier in the day. Planning was imperative for engagements like this. "I have water, sweet tea, Coke…"

"Dammit woman, stop beatin' around the bush! Why the hell do you have me hogtied to this damn chair?!" Jack erupted.

"So rude." You chided him, removing a water for yourself and then leaning casually against the counter. "You really want to know, Mr. Whiskey?"

"Obviously." He scowled.

"Well be a patient boy and maybe I'll tell you." You hummed, not making eye contact as you unscrewed the cap on the water bottle. "It was more than enough trouble for me to get you here in the first place, big shot. Don't rush me."

"Listen, I'll be the first to tell you that I probably ain't who you're lookin' for." He said bluntly. "I'm just a simple liquor tycoon, nothin' more."

"Mr. Whiskey, if you continue to insult my intelligence maybe I will decide I've got the wrong man. And then I'll just get rid of you." You swirled the water in the bottle, fixing him with a thoughtful look.

"You're talkin' a mighty big game, woman." Jack grumbled.

You sloshed some of the water on your thin white shirt as if by accident, and began daubing at the gauzy fabric aimlessly. "Whiskey-"

"It's Jack." He spat.

"Oh, we're on a first name basis? How exciting!" You teased him, laughing when he muttered angrily under his breath. He was clearly enjoying the role of 'belligerent definitely-not-a-spy'. "Alright then, Jack. I won't beat around the bush, as you so tactfully put it."

"Hallelujah, some goddamn cooperation." He replied in a sulky tone.

"So, Jack, I need you to come inside me. Strictly so I can bypass Statesman's biomechanical security systems. It's nothing personal, I just assumed you would be the easiest target, you know?" You remarked with a shrug. "The flirty cowboy with the filthy mouth." He stared at you and you raised an eyebrow, half-convinced that his reaction was legitimate. "What? You do have a reputation."

"I hate to break it to ya', but you got the wrong beverage. You're lookin' for Tequila, ma'am." Jack retorted, his voice a little raspy. "You want...what?"

"I need you to come inside me so I can use the your genetic signature to bypass the security." Granted, you were pretty certain that Statesman used exclusively fingerprints, retina scans and time locks, but Whiskey had told you to weave a good story for the setup, not necessarily an accurate one.

Jack swallowed hard. "You've got bats in your fuckin' belfry, woman. You expect me to-"

"Oh no, that's the beauty of this arrangement." You interrupted him, still smiling. "I don't expect you to do anything aside from sit there and stay still while I ride you."

"Jesus fuck woman, you--shit, isn't there some other way to do this? I ain't keen on the prospect, but if there's literally any other way…"

"Sorry. This is the only solution that my superiors could get behind." You sighed, feigning regret. "And we might be here a while, from what I've heard." Jack's eyes darted to yours and he flushed, working his jaw. "Don't look so glum! I'm one of the best in my field. I'm sure I'll be able to compensate for your...lack of investment."

"You touch me and I swear to God-"

"Ah ah, naughty boys get gagged." You threatened gently, walking your fingers up the side of his face to stroke them back down his jawline. Jack glared at you, his dark gaze fairly luminous with fury and maybe just a touch of poorly-veiled interest. "Be a good boy and I'll let you talk as much as you want. Maybe I'll even let you play with my tits, hmm?" You asked, cupping your breasts through your still-damp shirt. "Would you like that, love?"

"I…" Jack trailed off, then snapped his eyes back up from your chest. "No!"

You tapped his nose, winking. "Oh I think you would. Don't be so stubborn, Jack." You cocked your head to the side. "No one from Statesman even knows you're gone. No one is coming to rescue you." You informed him, all the playfulness evaporated from your voice. "You're mine now, Jack. My own personal key-card."

"You won't get away with this." Jack snarled.

"I think I already have." You knelt between his legs, running your hands over the jeans that covered his thighs. He squirmed, trying to dislodge you, but you just moved with him. You dug your nails into his thighs. "You keep wiggling and I'm going to have to tighten the ropes, Jack. Is that what you want?"

"Oh you filthy fuckin' woman, you absolute bitch, let me go!"

"Hmm," you tapped your chin as he kept jerking and straining against the knots. "No."

Jack froze when your fingers unbuttoned the button at the top of his fly. "Now wait, wait just a damn minute, y-you can't--" he tried to plead.

"Oh I can. And I will." You looked up at him. "As long as we're in the right gear?"

"Sixth, sixth." He affirmed, flashing you a quick smile. You nodded and seamlessly resumed your play.

The zipper of his fly opened devastatingly slow, the agent exhaling raggedly when you pulled up his shirt and palmed his groin gently through the fabric of his boxer briefs. His cock was already half-hard, and you pointed that out with a mean little smirk on your face. "Oh no, looks like someone's interested." You crooned, rubbing your index finger over the head of his still-clothed dick.

"Fuck off, you...y-you-" he swore, rolling his shoulders as if he was testing his bonds. "You little bitch."

"Temper temper." You chided, ducking your head down to mouth over the fabric of his boxers. Jack gasped out another swear over your head, his hips twitching up to meet you before he slammed them back down. "Methinks someone doth protest too much." You snorted, splaying your fingers on the newly-revealed skin of his stomach. "We could make this so much simpler if you would just give in, Jack." You didn't miss the way his skin jumped at your touch, and you smiled against his boxers.

"You'll--you'll have to do better than that." Whiskey breathed. "You think just any ol' woman can get me up?"

You stood, leaning in close and pressing your mouth to his ear. His whole body flinched when you wrapped your fingers around his cock and gave him a nice, slow stroke. "Oh, poor thing. You must believe you're really special, hmm? God's gift to mankind every time you take someone to bed." You mocked, your teeth and tongue laving over his earlobe. "We're all so lucky to have you, Jack."

"Hhn-" Jack's shoulders went stiff, the man obviously biting his tongue.

"You don't have a choice, sweetheart. I'm going to get you hard. Then, I'm going to use your cock. And all you have to do, my lovely, handsome cowboy, is come inside me." You informed him, drawing a finger beneath his chin. "More than once, preferably."

"I'm not usually a man to voice my own shortcomin's, but I must warn you that this will be a futile-" Whiskey's words hitched in his throat when you stroked him again. "Fuck, no, don't touch me like that, you--"

"Stop playing hard to get, Jack." You murmured, slinking your free hand up the back of his neck to massage his scalp right beneath the band of his hat. "Give up."

"Never." He hissed even as his head lolled forward, granting you more access to rub his neck.

"Pity." You settled back down between his legs and wrapped your lips around his cock.

"No, no, dammit-" Whiskey growled, his hands clenching into fists at his sides. "Don't you fuckin'...no, no, don't use your tongue the-ah f-uck--" His protest died in a pitiful groan when his cock met the back of your throat. "Oh, you--fuckin'--you've got to be shittin' me woman, the whole-?" He grunted out haphazardly as you relaxed your throat and took him all the way down to the base. "You think y-you can take advantage of me jus' cuz' it's been a while since I got laid? Fuck you."

You hummed around his cock, wanting to giggle when he twitched and swore loudly. Your fingers dove past the hem of your underwear, and you moaned against him as you ran your index in slow, steady circles around your clit.

"I ain't fuckin' you, and I sure as shit am not gonna' come in your pussy." Jack snarled.

"Oh yes you are." You sang, rising to your feet and slipping your panties off. The white t-shirt came next, baring your breasts to the air-conditioned environment.

Jack seemed to forget that he was supposed to be vehemently against this yet again as he just...watched while you teased your nipples. You tugged at the taut peaks, rolling them between your fingers and making a show out of the whole bit.

"I can't wait to have you inside me, filling me up, just pumping me full of your come." You said with a smile, sauntering over until you would be in reach if his hands were free. Jack's tongue made a nervous reappearance and you tugged his chin upwards so you could see his eyes. "Are we still in gear? Or do we need to shift?" You asked. He seemed slightly dazed.

"Oh! Uh, sorry, s-sixth." He stammered. "Sixth, holy shit."

"Mm. Don't disappoint me and maybe I'll let you live." You remarked smoothly, swinging one leg over his lap and straddling him. Jack's shoulders were rigid again and you kneaded at them surreptitiously, trying your best to keep him in the scene and out of his own head.

You were well on your way to soaking wet with arousal. There was nothing better than when you had a partner that trusted you, regardless of whether you had truly earned that trust. Just the fact that they had blind faith in you to execute the endeavor that they needed...it was heady and sweet and you loved every second.

You rutted your pussy against the underside of Jack's cock, the man snapping his teeth at the sensation. "Too good?" You taunted, laughing when he swore again.

"I can't believe that you think I'm fuckin' enjoyin' th--look, any dick perks up at heavy pet-"

Cutting Whiskey off mid-sentence was quickly becoming a favorite pastime, you realized as you angled your hips and let the head of his cock push past your pussy lips. "In, just a little, give you a taste, sweetheart…" you sighed, rocking your hips forward and back but not allowing him to sink any deeper into you. "There, that's not so bad, is it?" You cajoled as he shuddered beneath you. "Just keep being good, my sweet cowboy, and this will all be over so much sooner."

"No, no-" He struggled to move, to do anything, but you had made certain to tie him exactly as he had specified. "Dammit, when I get free of here, I'll--"

"Shh, you think too much." You tapped your index finger to his lips, smoothing it over the bristle of his mustache. "Focus on your job right now, and everything will be fine."

Jack turned his face away, inadvertently presenting the thick column of his neck to you. And you, channeling your inner villain, leaped at the opportunity to lick and bite at the bared skin. He made a strange noise, a combination of a moan and a whine that had you raising an eyebrow.

"Is someone a little sensitive there?"

"No, I am not." He answered through gritted teeth. "I hate that you're touchin' me, that's all!"

"Hmm, it doesn't sound like you hate it." You mused, suckling gently at the spot where his jaw met his throat. You were very careful not to leave marks, as that had been another specification. Whiskey struggled underneath you again, only succeeding in pumping his cock up into you slightly.

"Don't, don't--" His voice actually cracked and you smiled, nuzzling your nose beneath his jawline and letting his dick settle deeper.

"Oh no, it seems like you do want to fuck me after all." You shrugged nonchalantly, leaning back and stroking over the base of his cock with two fingers. "Warming up to the idea of being my little fuck toy, Jack?" You teased, noting the way his knuckles whitened from his grip on the rope and his Adam's apple bobbed with the force of his convulsive swallow at your words. "I could just keep you here like this forever, you know. All tied up, helpless for me…" You squeezed the base of his cock and he gasped, trying to stifle the noise. "Soon, I'd have you trained so that you couldn't come from any other pussy aside from mine. Wouldn't that be fun?"

Without waiting for an answer, you let the last few inches of his dick enter you. You leaned back on his thighs, feeling the muscles coil and strain beneath your touch as you reached down and grazed your clit. You could feel the heat of his gaze on you, those brown eyes fixated on the motions of your fingers even as his cock split you open. You were grateful that he was secured, you weren't sure if you would have been able to take him otherwise. His cock curved thickly against your back wall, the engorged head throbbing back and forth over the area that made your whole body shudder in delight.

Whiskey's jaw was taut, his shoulders set in a rigid line that made you ache to get him to come undone in you.

"You're so quiet." You pouted, raising your hand and brushing your wet index finger over his slack lower lip. "Aren't you having a good time?"

His chest abruptly expanded, like he had forgotten to breathe for a moment or two. "Fuck you." Whiskey seethed, making you chuckle softly. "I ain't nobody's goddamn fuck toy."

"Sweetheart," you chided as you sat up. "That's not a very nice thing to say to the person warming your cock right now." You deliberately clenched down on him and Jack swore under his breath, shaking his head. "I can make you feel so good, Whiskey, if you just give me what I want." You insisted, cupping his face and pulling halfway off of his cock.

"N-N...No." He replied weakly.

You sighed, rolling your eyes and shaking out your shoulders. "Well, I tried." Your hands landed on his shoulders and you gripped down to steady yourself, your hips meeting his own with a wet slap! of skin. Jack's chest heaved, his eyes closed and head tilted back as you began to ride him roughly. "All I wanted was for you to come in me. I don't feel like that's asking for much!" You complained petulantly, rolling your hips against his when he was hilted in you with an agonizingly slow grind of your body.

Jack bit out a low "fuck," those tense shoulders trembling under your touch. You tucked your face into his neck to tease the sensitive area even more, your tongue tracing random patterns that made him squirm and writhe underneath you. "I don't--can't, can't, don't make me--" he tried to protest, his words fractured and pitiful.

"Yes you can, and you're going to." You snapped, taking a handful of hair at the nape of his neck so you could urge his head back further, leaving his throat at your mercy. "You're coming in me, Jack! Give up!"

...

"First!" He choked out, and you immediately slowed to a crawl. Your touch on him gentled significantly, no longer demanding but cradling, caressing.

"Easy, easy." You soothed, the unrelenting assault of your perfect hips gone to a slow and careful rhythm, back and forth like a porch swing in the summer heat. Your eyes searched his own, concern shining through.

Jack was speechless, his blind panic melting away at the sound of your regular voice. What the hell just happened? He licked his lips, only now realizing how dry they had gotten. "Sorry, I uh-"

"No apologies." You murmured. "You have nothing to be sorry for. Would you like to stop now?"

Whiskey took a long moment, running a mental check on his body. Nothing was sore, nothing seemed out of line. Everything was raring to go.

Everything aside from his brain, that is. The damn thing wouldn't stop conjuring up scenes of you pregnant and everything going to absolute fucking shit. It didn't matter that he had zero attachment to you, it didn't matter that you were on birth control. This was how it always was.

Every damn time things got serious with a new interest, "oh, let's start a family," Whiskey just wanted to curl up into a ball. Without fail, like clockwork, he would shut down.

And then the accusations would start, the distrust, "How come you can do it with protection but not without?" and it was disheartening, crushing to go through again and again. Explaining didn't seem to do a lick of good, it was always just that he was stringing people along, that he was a damn selfish prick, that he didn't care about what his partner wanted.

That couldn't be further from the truth, of course, but maybe that was his own fault for not dropping the bomb before getting attached to someone. He just couldn't ever seem to justify asking a person on their second or third date, "hey so what's your thoughts on having kids?" It felt manipulative, cheap, and if he was being honest, he knew for a fact that sometimes just the idea of having children was enough to scare a potential interest off.

You were the first person to try and help Jack really wrap his head around this whole issue. And yeah, that was the whole point in sussing you out, but…

Tequila didn't tell him that you actually gave a shit, or at least you were damn good at acting like you did. Whiskey bit his lip. "I'm okay." He said finally, trying for a smile.

"Anything chafing? Do you need some water?"

"I…" Jack trailed off. "Huh, I admit I am a bit parched. But that means you'd have to get up." He realized unhappily.

"Were you enjoying yourself?" You asked, sounding curious.

Whiskey got the hysterical idea in his head of you pulling out some sort of satisfaction survey at the end of your engagement, the notion making him smirk slightly. "God, yeah. I...yeah." He flushed a little bit. "Dunno' if I ever got this far after…after all my mental hangups and stuff. The fact that I don't have a say in the matter seems to be helpin', though."

"Okay, don't go anywhere. I'll get you some water." You patted his thigh, cautiously settling your feet on the floor and then going to stand with a quivery little gasp that absolutely stroked his ego.

Jack couldn't help his own groan at the loss of your heat, his eyes rolling into the back of his head. "Damn it woman, has anyone ever told you that your pussy is fuckin' perfect?" He muttered, his usual honeyed words suddenly clumsy in his mouth. "I mean, hell."

You laughed, bending over to dig in the small fridge for another water. Whiskey felt his entire body throb at the sight of you presenting yourself to him like that, and he sucked in a breath at your obvious teasing. Even in the soft light of the kitchen, he could see the glisten of the wetness between your legs. Hell yes, he found himself thinking stupidly as you turned back around.

"I'm just glad that you're doing alright. That's the most important part to me, after all." You assured him, unscrewing the cap on the water and tipping it to his lips.

Jack gulped greedily, feeling a few droplets escape his mouth and run down his neck to blot his collar. "I am. One hundred percent." He said firmly after he had slaked his thirst. "Let's keep goin'."

"If you're sure, absolutely." You acquiesced, smiling again. Placing the water bottle on the kitchen table, you then swung your leg over his thighs like you were vaulting back into the saddle. Jack held his breath, waiting for you to welcome his cock back into your body. And God he was so hard, he couldn't remember ever being this hard, what the hell--

But strangely, you didn't immediately resume from where you had left off. Instead, you put your arms around his neck and actually rested your forehead against his own, bumping his hat upwards.

Jack swallowed roughly, confused.

"Let me take this from you." You whispered. Whiskey felt pinned by your stare, he felt as if you could see every terrible thing he had ever done, every transgression laid bare under the weight of your gaze. "Let go of it. I have you. I won't let anything happen to you."

The words washed over him, soft and sweet. Your fingers slipped up into the hair at the nape of his neck to toy with the mussed ends that lurked there. The whole exchange was oddly intimate and Jack found himself at a loss yet again, simply grating out, "sixth," when he couldn't come up with anything else to say.

You reached down and stroked his cock, rubbing the head of it against your clit. And Jesus he could feel you, the difference in heat, the slick--

"Are you gonna' take it from me, sweet girl?" He hissed through his teeth like it wounded him to ask, trying desperately to cling to the illusion that he wasn't willing. "Take everythin' I've got?"

The blur between reality and this playdate was getting messier by the second. He wanted to fuck you, wanted to bury himself in you, spend every last drop inside the hot embrace of your quivering cunt. He wanted that. Jesus Christ, this wasn't part of the bargain.

This was a pantomime, specially designed pornography that existed only to coax a very specific reaction from his confused body. So why did he wish he had met you years ago? Why was he suddenly hoping and praying that the sounds you were making were legitimate instead of exclusively for his benefit, hoping that you were also enjoying this?

You angled your hips and sank back down on his lap, your hands going to your breasts where you proceeded to fondle and tease them until your nipples looked like they ached.

Whiskey fucking ached himself to wrap his lips around one pert little peak, swirl his tongue across the tip and make you come undone, rut his dick up into you until you cried out his name and soaked him--

Whoa cowboy, he chastised himself, a little startled by how sharp the longing was. You just kept fucking yourself on his cock, that hot, wet little pussy molded perfectly to every ridge of his member and he had never been this hard, this ready in his life. Despite the air conditioning in the cabin, your skin shone with sweat from all the work you were putting in and Whiskey couldn't recall a time where he had been more appreciative of someone else accomplishing a task within his field of vision.

Your hand slipped down, down, and Jack found himself following the trajectory until it delved between your legs and you started playing with yourself. "Jack," you crooned his name and it was like a prayer, reverent and soft, tender enough to coil itself around his lungs and choke him to death without a whisper of protest. You parted your legs even wider in his lap, exposing yourself to him so he could watch his cock slide in and out of you, so he could see himself fucking you open.

"Are you gonna' come for me, sweet girl?" He gasped, craning his neck and managing to tilt his head so he could mutter into your ear, "you just gonna' wrench one out for me, beautiful?"

"Mm, no, I'm not coming until after you come." You whimpered, still moving your hand. "But I'm so close, Jack. I want to come."

Your plaintive whine had him ablaze. God, he had never wanted to please someone so damn badly in his life. "I know you do, sweet girl." He murmured huskily, exhaling hot over the shell of your ear and loving the way you quivered in his lap. "You're so good, lettin' me blow my load before you get off--gonna' pump me dry when you come, aren't you? Just keep me inside you until that little pussy is all fucked out," he growled, barely aware of the words that tumbled from his mouth.

All he knew is that you were all a-tremble at his voice, your body as hot as late July against his chest, your eyes heavy with adoration that he did not deserve and God, he couldn't get used to that look even if it was fake. What if you stayed? he wondered absently. What if you stayed?

Oh fuck, he was about to come. Panic jabbed like the blade of a knife between his shoulder blades and Whiskey went silent, his teeth bearing down on his lower lip and his eyes slamming shut as he focused harder than he ever had in his life.

The smell of you, the sounds, the heat, the little spasms of your cunt around his cock…

Yes. Yes, God yes, he could do this--

"Come in me, sweetheart." Begging him, pleading, demanding, "Jack-!" You cried his name.

Whiskey groaned hoarsely, so low it was almost painful, and let go. He bucked his hips up against you as best as he could, minute little thrusts while he came harder than he had in years. "Oh," he snarled, gritting his teeth, "fuckin' Christ woman, I think you've ruined me, Jesus fuck."

Your hands threaded through the hair at the nape of his neck again and you held him, not tightly, but just enough to keep him steady, anchored. "There," you said abruptly, the snide, put-upon tone of your role contrasting wildly with the gentleness of your touch, "was that so difficult?"

Jack burst out laughing, not overly concerned with how strange of a reaction that was. Hell, was he relieved? "Jesus fuckin' Christ, you're great." He remarked breathlessly. "I don't even know what just happened."

"Oh?" You replied, raising an eyebrow. "The mess between my legs seems to allude to you possibly having an orgasm. Jury's still out though."

He grimaced apologetically, glancing down. "Sorry darlin'. It's been a while, y'know?" You rose up off of him again and he grunted as his cock slipped free from your body. Whiskey felt half-drunk, relief and release combining into a potent cocktail that left him boneless in the chair.

You quickly put your shirt back on and then crouched at his feet, beginning the arduous process of untying him. Jack just sat there, watching you drowsily. He couldn't do much else, really. "Any numbness or chafing?" You asked quietly, stirring him momentarily from his daze.

"Nah, nothin' yet." He replied, straightening his freed left leg and rotating his ankle in his boot. "A little stiff, but I've survived worse than that."

"And how do you feel?" You questioned, "physically and emotionally."

Jack gnawed at his lower lip, trying to force his sluggish brain past the haze of serotonin in order to give you a satisfactory answer. "...good." He said finally, scrambling to elaborate, "or uh, better, I guess. More okay than I've been in a fuckin' while." It wasn't a lie, he was surprised to discover. He hadn't actually put much stock into this endeavor, figuring it would be a fun little diversion that would end just like every other time. Of course, it didn't hurt that you were easy on the eyes, prettier than a peach if he was being honest with himself.

Your smile was bright and Jack's stomach knotted confusingly. "I'm glad."

His right leg was released and he shifted his weight in the seat, groaning happily when his hip popped. "Hey, wait." The agent belatedly realized, "you didn't-?"

"We were here for you." You reminded him. "Not me."

"Whoa now, that don't seem fair at all!" Whiskey protested, taken aback by your nonchalance. "You just put in all the work!"

Your laugh tripped down his spine like an aftershock. "Don't get bent out of shape! It's standard policy, Mr. Whiskey. Once the desired result of the scene has been acquired, the scene ends and I start with aftercare."

"B-But--you didn't get to get off though!"

"Me 'getting off' wasn't specified in our planning."

"I needed to specify that shit?! I figured you'd just kinda'..." His right arm was free now and Jack seized the opportunity to make a certain gesture, raising his eyebrows. "I mean, I was at your mercy!" He continued, bewildered. "You totally coulda' just kept goin'-"

"Yes, and that's exactly why when the desired result has been achieved, the scene ends." You interjected firmly. "Because you trusted me enough to let me take control, and I'm not about to break that trust by doing something selfish on a whim."

Jack exhaled hard, scooting his hat a little further back on his head so he could study you. You didn't look disappointed, or annoyed with him. He wondered how many times you had fielded ignorant questions like his own and he cringed at himself. "I'm...shit, I'm sorry. I don't have any right to be all shitty about it." He apologized as you moved out of his field of view to untie the rope securing him to the back of the chair. "I just feel like you worked so hard an' got nothin' out of your end of the bargain."

"It's sweet of you to be concerned about that, but don't take it personally, okay?" You assured him, "I do this because I enjoy it. The whole experience, not just the finale." The ropes around his chest sagged and Jack slid forward a bit in the seat, relaxing.

"Can I get that water again? Christ, I need a cigarette and a tumbler of the strong stuff after all that." He joked, clumsily tucking his cock back into his boxers. You pressed the bottle to his hands and he nearly dropped it, chuckling self-consciously. "Whups, sorry. I had my fists all bunched up so my fingers are stiff." Jack proceeded to down the rest of the bottle, wiping his mouth and mustache with the back of his hand after the fact. "So...what exactly is it you do for Tequila?" He queried nosily.

You laughed at him and God, God he loved the sound of your laugh. "That, Mr. Whiskey, is on a need-to-know basis. Just like this little soiree between the two of us." You chided, your eyes bright with good humor. "I would never violate a partner's trust in me."

Jack tipped the bottle in your direction, as if making a toast. "I'll drink to that, partner. What's next on the menu?"

"We'll talk out the scene and wind back down. Get cleaned up. I'll probably…" you paused, squinting at the clock over the sink. "You want some pizza? There's a joint not far from here that serves pies and chicken wings until midnight."

Jack groaned appreciatively, "I knew you were my kinda' gal. Lead the way to the debrief, ma'am."

It didn't really matter in the long run, he supposed. You obviously weren't interested in anything serious (if only because he figured that your flings with the stereotypical 'bad boy' Tequila would have become more regular in spite of the younger man's painful crush on Ginger Ale), and he could respect that. Still though, he couldn't help feeling a touch morose over the possibility of never engaging with you again.

He toyed with the idea of asking you for another 'appointment', but dismissed the thought almost as quickly as it arrived. Better to quit while he was ahead.

Or rather, he amended ruefully as he settled down across from you in the diner booth, his hair still damp and curling slightly beneath his hat from the quick wash he had indulged in at your cabin, better to quit now before I make even more of a fool of myself.

Part Two

#jack daniels #jack daniels x reader #agent whiskey #agent whiskey x reader #kingsman: the golden circle #Pedro Pascal #pedro pascal character #agent whiskey imagine #consensual noncon #whew where did this come from #enjoy!#working things out

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tsarisfanfiction · 4 years ago

Text

Long Way From Home: Chapter 13

Fandom: Thunderbirds Rating: Teen Genre: Family/Friendship Characters: Scott, Tracy Family

Look what’s back again! I’ve got another three chapters written now, so that’s approximately three weeks’ worth of content coming along (provided I remember to post!) Sorry for the delay on this one, TOS!Scott and TOS!Virgil decided to be rather tricksy, but I finally got them wrangled!

<<<Chapter 12

Other-Virgil was just leaving his room as they turned the corner, a sketchbook in hand.

“Oh, hello there,” he said. Scott didn’t miss how his eyes flicked to his brother for a moment. “Successful trip?”

Scott shrugged, spreading his arms slightly to show that he wasn’t wearing Other-Scott’s clothes any more. “Successful enough,” he said. “There’s more on order, but we managed to find some things to bring back with us now.”

Brown eyes, painfully familiar and just like Virgil’s, glanced over his outfit. He didn’t comment, but it was obvious that like Other-Scott, Other-Virgil found his idea of casual clothes to be different.

Well, at least it meant no-one was going to be muddling them up any time soon.

“That’s good to hear,” the man said, glancing towards his brother again. Scott glanced across as well, wondering if Other-Scott was sending him any cues. His doppelgänger seemed quite content to stay out of the conversation, although he likewise wasn’t leaving them to it and carrying on to the games room without Scott. “Tin-Tin said I should talk to you,” Other-Virgil continued. “She said something about appearances?”

His voice raised questioningly at the end and Scott recalled Other-Gordon making a similar suggestion back while the others had been out on the rescue.

“Appearances?” Other-Scott asked. “What does she mean by that?”

Scott sighed, realising that he hadn’t mentioned to the others about the different appearances yet, and rubbed his face with one hand.

“My brothers don’t look like yours,” he explained. “Not as much as we look alike, anyway.”

“They don’t?” Other-Scott asked. “That’s strange.”

“Tell me about it,” Scott agreed. “Gordon – your Gordon – suggested I talk to you about it,” he continued, nodding at Other-Virgil. “I guess Tin-Tin got there first.”

“Not ‘our’ Tin-Tin?” Other-Scott jumped in. “You differentiate the fellas, but not her?”

Scott shrugged. “I don’t call mine ‘Tin-Tin’,” he explained. “We call mine Kayo.”

“Kayo?” Other-Virgil asked. “That’s a mighty strange name.”

“You’d think her a strange woman,” Scott replied. “I wouldn’t say she’s nothing like Tin-Tin, but the similarities are a lot more subtle than between you guys and my brothers.”

“Interesting,” Other-Scott commented. “You’ll have to tell us about her.”

Scott chuckled, remembering Tin-Tin’s reaction to his attempts at describing his sister. The men were likely to be even more horrified. “At some point.” He turned back to Other-Virgil. “So, did you want to do this now?”

“Whenever works for you,” Other-Virgil said. “If you’re busy with Scott now, we can do it later.”

“He was just coming to watch me remind Gordon which one of us is the billiards champion,” Other-Scott said. “You’re welcome to join us if it won’t disturb your concentration.”

“I think I can draw with you two in the room.” Other-Virgil rolled his eyes. “It wouldn’t be the first time, if that’s okay with Scott?”

He found himself pinned with both blue and brown eyes and wondered if this was how Gordon and Alan felt when they were on the receiving end of him and Virgil. “Sounds good,” he agreed. The idea of staying in the vicinity of Other-Gordon for a while longer, as he found his feet properly with the rest of this universe’s Tracy brothers, was a comforting one now that the younger man had fully proven himself on their semi-disaster of a shopping trip. He wondered if Other-Scott suspected that – whether or not he did likely depended on what, exactly, Other-Gordon had told him down in the hangar.

“Come on, then,” Other-Scott said, leading the way along the hallways – Scott once again finding himself passing the door to the lounge and hoping Not-Dad wasn’t going to appear – and down the stairs. “Laundry room’s here,” he said, pausing and sliding open a door. “You can just put them in here and Kyrano or Grandma will deal with them.”

Scott padded into the room, glancing around at the contraptions that had to be washing machines, although just like everything else, they didn’t look much like the technology Scott was used to. What was at least somewhat familiar was the splash of blue in an open wicker basket – while not identical to his own uniform, it was clearly this universe’s IR blue. It was also smeared with dirt and clearly waiting to be washed, so he dropped Other-Scott’s borrowed clothes on top, fighting the inquisitive desire to get a closer look at the uniform.

Making sure that this universe’s International Rescue knew what they were looking for if any of his brothers had somehow also fallen through trumped his own curiosity and he retreated back into the hallway where Other-Scott and Other-Virgil were waiting for him, before they all entered the games room.

“I was beginning to think you weren’t coming,” Other-Gordon commented as the door slid open. He had his back to them and seemed to be poking around with the balls. “What took you so long?”

“I thought we’d like an audience,” Other-Scott shrugged, and Other-Gordon spun around.

“What did you do to prompt all this?” Other-Virgil asked him. “You’ve not even been on the island for several hours.”

“Precisely,” Other-Scott said, striding forwards and selecting a cue from the wall, which he inspected carefully. “Gordon, off the island for several hours and more or less unsupervised.”

“Not entirely unsupervised,” Other-Gordon protested, as Other-Virgil moved further into the room and settled in a chair by the chess set. Taking the cue, Scott followed and sat himself in the other. “If we didn’t already have Brains and John’s word that he’s you from another universe, I’d be suggesting it myself after that trip.”

Scott thought that was a bit of an exaggeration, considering how off-centre he’d been the entire time, but he appreciated the words regardless.

“Another me or not, that didn’t stop you telling the world you could – and did – beat me at billiards,” Other-Scott pointed out. Other-Virgil choked back a laugh that showed just how unlikely that scenario was in reality.

Other-Gordon seemed entirely unrepentant about that, which didn’t surprise Scott in the slightest. “We can always make that true now,” he said. “Ready to play?”

In answer, Other-Scott headed for the table and scrutinised the balls his brother had been poking at. Scott suspected he was checking for sabotage.

Other-Virgil rested his sketchbook on the table, drawing Scott’s attention away from the billiards table and towards the blank paper.

“How about age order?” the brown-haired man suggested. “Should we start with John?”

“Might as well,” Scott agreed, staring at the blank page and trying to find the words to explain just how his John differed from Other-John. Without another word, Other-Virgil started to sketch. Scott blinked, not expecting him to begin before he’d started describing his brother, but it didn’t take long for him to realise that it was a sketch of Other-John that was forming on the paper, rough and ready to be amended.

Watching him was oddly relaxing – Scott had never been an artist himself, but he had memories of watching both parents and Virgil sketching throughout his life. The sight and sound of graphite over artist’s paper was familiar, homey, and Scott propped his head on his palm and tried to focus more on what was being drawn than the emotions it was drawing up.

The background clack of ball hitting ball, and smug brotherly noises as Other-Scott presumably made good on his promise to teach Other-Gordon a lesson, helped him keep his mind in the present. He glanced away from the rough sketch of Other-John to see Other-Scott grinning triumphantly at Other-Gordon as the two brothers set up a new game. One victory for Other-Scott, it seemed.

“I thought it would be easier to start with a base,” Other-Virgil said suddenly, snapping Scott’s attention back to the now-complete sketch. “Tin-Tin’s recounts of your descriptions suggest you’re just as bad as our Scott in that regard.”

“I have you for anything to do with art!” Other-Scott called over, and Scott grinned ruefully in agreement.

“He’s not wrong,” he shrugged.

Other-Virgil shook his head, and tapped the paper with a finger. “We’ll get to colour later,” he said, “but what changes do I need to make to the sketch?” He spun it around until Scott was looking at the sketch the right way up, and he squinted at it.

It was clearly John, but at the same time not. The challenge was picking out what made it different to his brother, exactly.

“What do you mean, colour?” Other-Scott called across.

“I thought you were teaching Gordon a lesson?” Other-Virgil retorted. “Keep getting distracted and he might be the one teaching you a lesson.”

Other-Scott chuckled, and then there was another clack as they started playing again.

“John’s… younger,” Scott settled on. “Slightly less angular, maybe?”

Other-Virgil whisked the paper back around to face him and started changing lines. “How old?”

“Twenty-five,” Scott said, watching as the sharpest edges to the sketch were smoothed out slightly. It was a good thing Other-Virgil, just like Virgil, was so artistically adept, because Scott knew his descriptions left a lot to be desired. He really wasn’t an artist.

It was a long process, as Scott frowned at lines and Other-Virgil redrew and redrew them again. He knew exactly what his immediate brother looked like, of course, but descriptions had never been his strong point. Thankfully, Other-Virgil was patient and seemed to have expected Scott to be pretty terrible at them.

In the background, the clacking of balls hitting balls continued, complete with commentary and occasional brotherly snipes. Scott wasn’t sure how many times they’d played by the time Other-Virgil finished his latest redraw of a line of John’s hair, and a lump formed suddenly in his throat.

“That’s him,” he said around it, trying to swallow it down before any of the other men in the room noticed. “That’s John.” Still in the grey and white of a sketch, his genius of a brother stared out of the paper at something in the distance, intent and determined. It was a painfully familiar expression, one Scott saw most often on rescues, when his brother was amassing more data even as he talked him through what he already had.

A hand slammed down to cover the sketch and Scott blinked.

“Gee, really, Virg?” Other-Gordon quibbled from where he’d suddenly materialised right next to Scott. Next to him, and peering over Other-Virgil’s shoulder, was Other-Scott.

“You fellas can see it once it’s coloured,” the artist said firmly. “And not one moment before. Go back to your game.”

Both brothers grumbled good-naturedly, but did as they were told and retreated back to the billiards table. Other-Virgil pulled his hand back and looked up at him.

“I don’t have my colours here, so what do you say about doing all the sketches now, and then we’ll go to my room to sort out colours later?” he suggested.

Once again caught by the sketch of his brother, fiercely determined and no doubt wearing that exact face right now, wherever he was, Scott just nodded numbly.

It was gently tugged out of sight as Other-Virgil turned to a fresh page in his sketchbook and started drawing again. This time, Scott was anticipating the appearance of Other-Virgil in graphite so it wasn’t a surprise when he formed out of lines of graphite on paper. The artist was clearly used to self-portraiture as the sketch was just as flawless as Other-John’s had been; it was almost a shame that he’d have to completely alter the hairstyle this time – Other-John’s wasn’t all too dissimilar to John’s, but the two Virgils appeared to have markedly different ideas on hairstyle.

Even before the sketch was presented to him, Scott reached across and tapped the brow. “Same scar,” he said, noticing that Other-Virgil hadn’t bothered to add that in, presumably because he hadn’t expected something like a scar to carry across universes. It was a fair assumption, especially as Other-Gordon had already made an observation about how his own scars differed from Other-Scott’s, but in this particular case a wrong one. Scott wondered if, like the hydrofoil, the cause was also the same.

Other-Virgil’s eyebrows raised, showing off his scar particularly well, but he dutifully added it in.

“Also younger?” he asked, and Scott eyed the paper critically. The sketch was spun around so he could see it better, and he nodded his thanks.

“Twenty-three,” he confirmed. “But don’t soften the cheekbones much.” Other-Virgil made a noise of comprehension and took the paper back to begin the long process of amending it to Scott’s awkward specifications. “And you might as well scrap the hair entirely,” he added. Other-Virgil paused and gave him an incredulous look.

“There’s no similarity there at all?” he asked. Scott shrugged and peered again.

“Maybe the hairline,” he allowed. “But completely different hairstyle.”

He got a contemplative noise for that, but Other-Virgil dutifully erased most of the hair, leaving just enough to keep the head shape obvious, before following Scott’s instructions to amend the face shape until he was happy it was his Virgil, and not Other-Virgil looking out of the paper.

“However does he keep his hair like that?” Other-Virgil commented when they finally reached the hairstyle, the sweeping peak taking shape on the paper after several amendments as Scott tried to get it just right.

“By stealing my hair gel,” he replied dryly, “and short circuiting the entire island’s power with his hairdryer.” Gordon was not the only one who remembered that incident well, even if Scott usually refrained from mentioning it – it wasn’t like he needed to, what with the squid bringing it up at every opportunity. One day Virgil was going to make minced squid out of their brother, and it was probably going to have something to do with that incident. Probably.

Other-Scott chuckled, proving that he was still eavesdropping even as he continued to thrash Other-Gordon at billiards. The younger man sounded like he was getting quite tired of being defeated, although he hadn’t yet begged off entirely. Then again, Scott suspected Other-Scott wasn’t the only one using the game as a pretence in order to listen in.

Other-Virgil ignored them as he once again redid a line in Virgil’s hair, and Scott did likewise, although in his case it was mostly because Other-Virgil had once again taken his breath away with a likeness of one of his brothers. Unlike John, Virgil was looking straight at him, greyscale eyes still warm and the slightest bit concerned, mirrored in the set of his jaws. It was another painfully familiar expression that Scott had found himself on the receiving end of many times.

“That’s him,” he said after a moment, once his lungs remembered what to do. Other-Virgil hummed and flicked the page over before the other two could make it over.

“Aww,” Other-Gordon protested when he realised. “Not even one peek, Virg?”

“Once they’re coloured,” his brother said firmly, “and not one moment before.”

“But it’s his version of me next, right?” Other-Gordon whined. “You gotta let me see that one, Virg!”

“Once they’re coloured,” Other-Virgil repeated. “If it’s too much of a trial for you, I’m sure you can leave. Aren’t you tired of losing yet?”

Other-Scott laughed again from where he seemed to be setting up another game. “He still thinks he can beat me if we play enough times.”

“I will beat you,” Other-Gordon vowed, heading over to the table again. “My turn to start.”

Other-Virgil rolled his eyes once the ginger had his back to them. “Say, how about we skip Gordon and come back to him later?” he suggested, a gleam in his eyes that was all-too familiar.

“Virg!” came the complaint from the brother in question, and despite himself, Scott found himself grinning just a little, even if the familiarity of the banter ached.

“We can do Alan next,” he agreed, although something heavy and unpleasant settled in his stomach as he realised he wouldn’t be able to dodge just how young his Alan was for much longer.

Despite the words, it was still Other-Gordon that appeared from Other-Virgil’s pencil, and the artist grinned at him conspiratorially. Scott returned it, although he was fairly sure it was weaker than it would normally be. Other-Virgil didn’t comment, or even raise a concerned eyebrow, however, so he assumed he’d got away with it.

“Younger again?” Other-Virgil asked, and Scott nodded. “Squarer jaw, but don’t soften the face,” he said. “He’s all angles.” Sharp cheekbones, sharp jaw, sharp wit. There was a lot of sharpness with Gordon, although like all of them he was soft where it counted. Squinting at the sketch as Other-Virgil made the amendments, Scott realised that while their eye colour was identical, one of the biggest differences to their faces was in fact the eye shape.

As with everything else, describing that was difficult, and Other-Virgil had to erase the same lines over and over again as between them, they tried to get it right. Then, of course, it was the hair, and it was quickly apparent that Gordon – and Alan, when they got there – had a hairstyle that Other-Virgil struggled to even conceptualise in his head. In this universe, it seemed that bangs always flopped down, not out.

“More hair gel?” the man asked, resigned, as he erased the lines of Gordon’s bangs for the umpteenth time.

“More hair gel,” Scott confirmed. “The other one is similar, by the way.”

“I will get this,” Other-Virgil said, low and determined. The stubbornness was just as familiar as everything else about his mannerisms. So far, Scott was getting the impression that while he might be a little quieter than Virgil, Other-Virgil was otherwise almost the same in temperament.

“His Alan giving you trouble?” Other-Gordon called across. Other-Virgil ignored him as, with a set jaw, he once again amended his lines.

“Almost,” Scott encouraged. “That’s close.”

“I’m not settling for ‘close’,” Other-Virgil told him firmly. “What’s still wrong?”

Scott surveyed the art critically, before pointing at a line. “Here,” he said. “Maybe loosen it up a little?”

Other-Virgil erased it and drew it again, and Scott found a familiar, fond smile creep onto his face. “That’s him.”

Like Virgil, Gordon was looking straight out of the paper at them, full of mirth and a little cheeky, like he’d just set a prank and was waiting for someone to fall into it. Unlike John and Virgil, who had both ended up drawn wearing expressions they’d wear on a mission, Gordon was all home comfort.

Scott decided not to think to hard about what their resulting expressions implied about his mental state.

Other-Virgil eyed it triumphantly for a moment, clearly basking in his success of finally nailing the unfamiliar hairstyle, before turning the page and starting to sketch out Other-Alan.

“Last one,” he said. “He has a similar hairstyle to your Gordon, you say?”

“What?” Other-Gordon demanded from over by the table. There hadn’t been any clacking of balls for some time, Scott realised, and he glanced over to see both brothers were leaning against the table, watching the pair of them from a distance. “You mean that was your Gordon you just finished?”

Other-Virgil grinned at him. “I’m doing his Alan now,” he said, and Other-Gordon whined dramatically. Other-Scott shifted his weight against the table slightly and rolled his eyes fondly.

“You should have known Virg would do that,” he said. “And aren’t you the one that keeps saying Scott’s just like me?”

Other-Gordon grumbled.

“I didn’t expect that to mean he’d be able to fall in so seamlessly with one of Virgil’s schemes,” he huffed.

“Sorry,” Scott shrugged, entirely unrepentant. Other-Gordon had spent enough time analysing him that catching him out felt a lot like a victory. From the way amber eyes narrowed, the younger man was well aware of that.

“So,” Other-Virgil said, offering him a rough sketch of Other-Alan. “How much younger do I need to go?”

Scott swallowed. “Fifteen,” he said, and was entirely unsurprised when he saw Other-Scott jerk out of the corner of his eye. “And you might want to make him a little more… smiley.” Other-Virgil had drawn a neutral expression, which was at least less antagonistic than Scott had actually seen Other-Alan wearing so far, but for his Alan it just felt wrong.

“Younger and happier,” Other-Virgil repeated, taking the eraser to the sketch and all but redoing the entire outline. “And with a Gordon-like hairstyle.”

What came out of his pencil the second time looked a lot closer, more like a base that Scott could make minor adjustments to than the initial sketch had done.

“He’s fifteen?” Other-Scott asked, and Scott braced himself for the upcoming explosion. “He’s not a part of International Rescue yet, I assume.”

Scott didn’t answer him, watching Other-Virgil tidy up the sketch before pointing out a line that needed amending.

“He’s not part of International Rescue?” Other-Scott repeated after a few moments, disbelief colouring his voice. “At fifteen? He oughtn’t even have all the licenses by fifteen, surely?”

Scott sighed, and pointed out another line that needed changing. “Alan’s been a fully fledged member of IR for a year,” he admitted. “He’s got all the licenses he needs.”

“He’s what?” Other-Scott demanded. Other-Virgil’s pencil stopped, and Scott found himself scrutinised by three pairs of eyes. “But- how does a fourteen year old get an astronaut’s license? You’re not telling me he’s Thunderbird Three’s primary pilot in your universe?”

“Youngest astronaut in history,” Scott said, letting the pride he always felt whenever he remembered that fact bleed into his voice and carefully keeping the accompanying panic back. “John was primary pilot for a while, but he’s always been happiest in Thunderbird Five, and Thunderbird Five really needed a monitor. Alan proved himself on the sims and we needed a pilot for Thunderbird Three.”

“You couldn’t do it?” Other-Scott asked.

Scott chuckled humourlessly, remembering the hollow guilt that had welled up inside whenever he’d even considered going to space without any of his brothers. That didn’t bear mentioning, however, and there was another, stricter, reason why it hadn’t been possible. “I’m Alan’s legal guardian. I couldn’t leave him to go off into space for days or weeks on rescues.” Or an unknown amount of time in another universe, but he hadn’t had a choice on that front.

“So your solution was to send him off into space?” Other-Virgil asked dubiously, inadvertently cutting off what Scott suspected was about to be a too-accurate remark from Other-Gordon. Scott shrugged.

“If he’s in orbit, it’s only a day and he’s in range of Thunderbird Five,” he said. “If he’s leaving orbit, someone – usually me – goes with him.”

“Gee,” Other-Gordon whistled, apparently deciding to keep whatever observation he’d made to himself after all. “Our Alan’s young enough to send out there. I can’t imagine him piloting Thunderbird Three as a teenager.”

“He’s a natural,” Scott said, glancing down at the half-finished sketch, currently sitting somewhere between Alan and Other-Alan in appearance. “If he couldn’t do it, I wouldn’t let him, no matter how old he was.”

“I don’t doubt that,” Other-Gordon said, emphatically enough that his brothers looked at him in surprise. Other-Gordon didn’t acknowledge them, however, and Scott found himself under another heavy yet understanding look. No doubt the other man was remembering their conversation in the car about limits. “I said it before: I bet you’re just as much of a smother hen as this fella is.” He jabbed a thumb in Other-Scott’s direction and got a lacklustre hey! of protest. “I’m sure you do a swell job of looking after him.”

A hand landed on his shoulder and he jumped a little. It was Other-Virgil, who was looking at him in some concern. “Do you want to take five?” the man asked, gesturing at the half-finished sketch. Scott shook his head.

“I’m good,” he said, peering at the paper again. Other-Gordon made an aborted noise that could well have been resigned disapproval. “His bangs go the other way.”

“You fellas have mighty different hairstyles,” Other-Virgil muttered, but dutifully began erasing the lines before pausing to shoo away his inquisitive brothers. “Are you done teaching Gordon a lesson already, Scott?”

“Not at all,” the older man said. “Come on, Gordon, if you still think you can win.”

“One day,” the ginger mumbled rebelliously, before moving back to the table to set up another game. Both his brothers laughed, and Scott found himself joining in.

Alan proved almost as difficult as Gordon to get right, with Other-Virgil again finding the hair the most complicated to get right, but a couple more games behind them later, Scott’s youngest brother was beaming out of the paper at him, wide-eyed in adoration and looking even younger than he was. It wasn’t the best expression for supporting his case that Alan was perfectly capable of handling a rocket and the responsibilities that came along with that, but it was quintessentially Alan in its essence nonetheless.

“That’s him,” he confirmed, and Other-Virgil surveyed the sketch for several moments in silence before his brothers once again tried their luck at seeing a completed sketch.

“I told you fellas,” Other-Virgil said firmly, closing the sketchbook against their curious glances. “Not until they’re coloured.”

“Whatever you fellas are up to will have to wait.” Scott’s eyes snapped to the doorway, where Other-Alan was standing, arms crossed and looking just as displeased as he had in every encounter he’d had with the young man so far. “Kyrano’s finished making dinner, so it’s time to wash up.”

“Right you are, then,” Other-Virgil said. “I’ll get these stowed in my room and we can finish after dinner?” He offered the suggestion as a question to Scott, who saw no reason to disagree and nodded.

“Sounds good to me,” he said.

“What are you fellas doing, anyway?” Other-Alan asked suspiciously.

“It seems that we don’t look like his brothers, even though he might as well be Scott’s twin,” Other-Gordon explained, putting his cue in the wall holder. Other-Scott did the same, before stashing the balls away as well. “Virgil’s drawing them for us so we know what we’re looking for just in case they fell through somewhere.”

“Didn’t John say they’d come through here if anywhere?” Other-Alan pointed out, still standing in the doorway and watching as his brothers tidied up. Scott found his way to his feet and waited for them to finish.

“Yes, but this is an unprecedented event, Alan,” Other-Virgil replied, walking over to him. Scott followed. “John’s still got Thunderbird Five looking out for them in case he’s wrong, and we’ll all be looking out as well. It stands to reason we should know exactly who we’re looking for.”

“Well, I suppose,” the blond said. Other-Virgil patted him on the shoulder a couple of times.

“Well, I’m off to put this in my room,” he said. “I’ll be down for dinner in one minute.” Then he left, leaving Scott standing with Other-Alan by the doorway, waiting for Other-Scott and Other-Gordon to finish packing up their game.

“So, what are you going to be doing until Brains and John find a way to get you home?” Other-Alan asked him. “Are you just going to laze about the villa?”

Scott raised an eyebrow at him. “Not if I have any say in the matter,” he said bluntly. “I’m not a fan of lazing around.”

Other-Gordon choked back a laugh at that, and Scott narrowed his eyes at him.

“Use your head, Al,” the ginger interjected. “We’ve got some of the best planes in the world here; you think the fella’s going to be content keeping his feet on the ground? He took a fancy to your Tiger Moth down in the hangars ‘til I told him Scott’s not allowed to touch it.”

“I haven’t seen a Tiger Moth in years,” Scott defended himself.

“Yeah, well, you’re not touching her either,” Other-Alan told him firmly. “No Scotts are getting their hands on that baby.”

“We hear you, Alan,” Other-Scott said. “Now, come along, fellas. I, for one, don’t plan on being late to one of Kyrano’s feasts.” He pushed past them and headed into the hallway. His brothers and Scott followed, ducking into a small washroom to clean their hands before trailing through the kitchen to where the dining table was set up.

Chapter 14>>>

#thunderbirds are go #thunderbirds are go fanfiction #thunderbirds #thunderbirds fanfiction #tsari writes fanfiction #scott tracy #long way from home #virgil tracy #gordon tracy #alan tracy

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yourfinalbow · 4 years ago

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Ack anon I'm sorry. Tumblr ate your ask and I'm 🔪 But I saved your ask to put on the Google Doc so don't fret! I have it!

“Hi Ghastie Ghast, I wanted to share a prompt with you lol. I decided to go more holiday theme’d because it’s never too early to get into the holiday spirit.

“Your favorite winter drink was back on the menu, so I decided to surprise you with it.”

Please enjoy this prompt lmao”

The nickname made me -_- but hi Little Gray Circle Dude With Sunglasses! Thank you for sending me this! I had fun writing it. I'm assuming you wanted a Destiel fic, so that's what I wrote! (Also bonus points for Saileen as a background ship?) I sort of strayed a little from the prompt and the tone gets heavier as it goes on… 👀 I also accidentally wrote more than intended, so you can read it on Ao3 if that's easier. (And maybe give it a kudos because you’re the best?)

Title: Black Coffee Derangement Syndrome

Ship(s): Dean Winchester/Castiel, Sam Winchester/Eileen Leahy.

(Basic) Tags: Fluff, Slight Angst, Domesticity in the Men of Letters Bunker, Established Dean/Cas, Established Sam/Eileen, Using black coffee as a metaphor for hypermasculinity, With a whip cream style topping of internalized homophobia. *Finger guns.*

Warnings: Coffee gatekeeping and small sections of fluff that are as sweet as Cas’s Starbucks order. Also I’ve been to Starbucks once. Maybe twice? (Also a single mention of a drug that's commonly found as white powder, the non-descriptive comparison of Sam’s stupid health stuff with emesis, and use of the name that the figurehead for Germany in WW2 bore, just to be safe.)

Rating: T? Maybe? For language?

Word Count: 9k+

Quick thanks to my awesome beta @walksinstarllight! They are a poet and a writing sorcerer (wizard without a hat), and the only reason this fic even makes sense so please go shower them in kudos. (You can find their work here.)

Another thanks to @internetintroverts, who described a peppermint mocha to me in like 300 words because I drink black coffee and know nothing of anything ever. You can find their work here! (There's an Easter egg of one of their fics in this one hehe.)

The first thing Dean did when Cas got back from the Empty was give him coffee.

Okay no.

The first thing he did was fall into Cas’s arms and grip that stupid trenchcoat until his knuckles turned white. Shaking and laughing with hot tears streaming out of his eyes, he told him he was an asshole for leaving him like that. And to never, ever do it again. With blurry eyes and all other thoughts hazy, he told Cas he could have it, he could have what he wanted. Whatever he wanted. He told Cas he loved him too.

But then the next thing was coffee.

Caffeine is a hunter’s number one best friend, and since Cas was human again, Dean knew Sam was going to come at him with his stupid green health drinks and herbal tea. As Cas’s knight in shining armour, (a title used by Dean and Dean only), it was his duty to protect him from the disgustingly liquified rabbit food.

Now he expected Cas to like black coffee, you know, like a normal person.

But no, oh no. Apparently, he was dating a heathen.

Dean had to actually rub his eyes the first time he watched Cas fix his own coffee. He stood in the doorway of the kitchen, mouth agape.

Cas was leaning on the counter, humming some song that Dean could neither recognize, nor would he approve of, thank-you-very-much.

(Ok it was Champagne Problems by Taylor Swift and it's entirely possible he's listened to it once or twice but he still doesn't approve of it, thank-you-very-much.)

He held his yellow and black striped, bee-themed ceramic mug Eileen had bought him in one hand, and the entire five-pound bag of cane sugar in the other. And there he stood, happy as can be, pouring it directly into his mug.

Dean rubbed his eyes again.

And not even like, a normal amount either.

He just kept pouring, and pouring, and Oh my god he’s still pouring. Dean thought. It would honestly be more believable if it wasn’t sugar at all, and instead was in fact Cas’s secret stash of cocaine.

Dean might actually have to put sugar on the grocery list after he was finished.

His thoughts traveled back to Ishim doing the same thing with his coffee, in the tiny little diner Cas had set up as a meeting place. Dean had barged in that day, not thinking of his brother mocking him, or the possibility of danger inside. His vision was as tunneled as his thoughts focused only on Cas, not caring about anything else.

By that time the following day, Dean thought they were both going to die. The bloody and uneven sigil on the wall, Cas no more than ten feet away. Not quite within a comforting reach. The room was spinning from the blow to his head, and he could barely make out the words being spat from Ishim’s mouth.

“You blast me away, you’ll blast away every angel in the room. I’ll survive. Castiel, on the other hand, he’s hurt. He might live, or he might just end up a bloody smear on the wall.”

He almost lost Cas that day.

The blood rushed to his ears as his instincts sought out the mark on the wall. Ishim had told him to roll the dice, but in his head he couldn’t look past the chance of rolling a one. Watching the acrylic cube bounce until it decided Cas’s fate. There was no dilemma, there wasn’t even a decision to be made. He would always choose Cas over himself. Silent acts of care he could never vocalize.

An inability to speak formed from fear and cowardice. Like a lion in his stomach scratching at the words until they fell back down his throat.

And it was that inability to speak that led Cas to think he was nothing more than a tool for the Winchester’s to use.

He almost let Cas believe he meant nothing to him.

Dean cleared his throat. “Mornin’ Sunshine.”

Cas set down the bag of sugar and picked up the pot, the glass making a small clink as it hit the top of the coffee maker. “Goodmorning Dean. Would you like any coffee?” He greeted cheerfully, turning around like he hadn't just put enough sugar to make a pound cake in his coffee.

“Uh.” Dean was still caught off-guard by Willie Wonka over there. “Sure Cas.” He took the coffee pot from his hand and muttered a thank you.

“So,” Cas started while Dean reached into the cabinet for his own mug. “What ingredient do you suggest I put in my coffee this morning?”

“Uh...I don't know man. I drink my coffee black.”

“Yes I know you’re boring Dean, but you can still help me not be.”

“Black coffee isn't boring it's-”

“Dean, if you say ‘manly,’ I will sit you down and make you eat only spinach and kale for a week.” Sam said, walking into the kitchen, hair still spiked up from sleep. He used one hand to sign the words, his other one occupied by Eileen, who was sleepily shuffling closely behind.

Dean looked aghast. “I would starve.” He attempted to sign his indignant response, hands moving sloppily while holding both his mug and the coffee pot.

“I think that's the point.” Eileen said, laughing. She looked at Cas. “Is Dean gatekeeping your coffee aspirations again?”

“Yes.” He answered, ignoring Sam’s laugh and Dean’s huff of exaggerated outrage.

“Have you tried cinnamon?” Sam suggested. “You like Dean’s apple pie, and that has cinnamon in it.”

“I’m not so sure about that, Sam. Dean told me not to ever take cooking advice from you.“

“And I stand by that.” Dean interjected suddenly.

“I can cook!”

“Ehhh…” Eileen’s comment bought her a look of betrayal. “Though Sam may be right on this one, you might like it.” She shrugged.

“See.”

Cas pondered the thought for a moment. “Perhaps I will then.”

“Do we have nutmeg?” Eileen said, breaking away from Sam’s grip to check one of the cabinets. He walked to the other side of the kitchen, intending to look through the spice rack, knowing exactly what his girlfriend was getting at.

“You better not mess up my damn kitchen.” He said quickly. “Or you're organising them all next time.”

Sam rolled his eyes, knowing full well Dean would never let him organise the kitchen. Eileen looked through them, carefully turning the bottles around until the labels faced her. She pulled out the cinnamon and clove while she was looking for the nutmeg.

“Found it.” Sam called from the other side of the kitchen, walking over and putting a hand on Eileen’s shoulder.

“Thank you.” She said with a smile, grabbing the plastic spice jars.

She individually tossed each one to Cas. “Use these, it will taste like a pumpkin spice latte.”

“And don't forget the milk.” Sam added.

Cas scrambled to catch the spices, successfully grabbing two of them out of the air, the third one intercepted by Dean.

“What’s a pumpkin spice latte?” He looked at Eileen before snatching the bottle of cinnamon from Dean.

“It's a famous drink you can get at Starbucks.” Sam answered.

Cas tilted his head to the side and squinted at him. “What's a Starbucks?”

“You know, the coffee shop Alex and Patience drag Jody to all the time.” Dean said.

“I’m pretty sure Donna drags her there too.” Sam added. “Something about girl’s date night out.”

“The one Claire says is for ‘basic bitches’?” He lifted his hands, forming air quotes as he spoke.

“Yeah.” Dean answered, quietly laughing. “That's the one. She’s probably right, too.”

Cas carefully put the different spices in his coffee, eyeing the mug warily. His light brown coffee now had specs of...stuff in it.

(And unbeknownst to him, there was also a small pile of sugar at the bottom, the coffee so saturated it wouldn't dissolve any more.)

Eileen laughed at the look on his face. “It's good, I promise.”

Sam turned to look at her. “How would you know? Most of the time you get hot chocolate and spike it with bourbon.”

“You’re the one who gets a Pink Drink.”

Dean choked on his coffee. “What?”

“It's strawberry and coconut milk, and it's delicious.”

“Sure it is Sam.” Eileen jabbed.

“So what I'm getting here is that not only have you two been to Starbucks often enough to have a regular order, but Sam gets something called a ‘Pink Drink’?”

“No…” Sam started, trying to find a way to defend them. “Sometimes we…”

“...Make our own drinks.” Eileen snapped her fingers as she finished for him, attempting to save them from the endless stream of good-natured insults Dean would throw at them otherwise.

“Well you two are a real Martha Stewart, aren't you?”

“Yeah, except she's a convicted criminal.” Sam attempted to snark back.

“So are you!”

Before either of them could respond, Cas shoved his mug into Dean's face. “You have to try this, Dean. It tastes like pumpkin pie.”

Dean carefully grabbed the hot mug from Cas and took a sip. He was right, it did taste kinda like pumpkin pie. He took another sip, letting the pleasant flavor sit on his tongue. The different spices mixed perfectly together.

“I mean it's… okay.” He lied.

Dean contemplated his pumpkin themed food options. “Though I would rather just have pumpkin pie.”

Cas took his mug back. “Fine. More for me.” He said with a smirk, mimicking the look Dean gives him every time Cas says he doesn't want anymore bacon, before taking another sip of the makeshift pumpkin spice coffee.

Dean smiled at him, setting his own mug down and moving Cas’s out of the way to pull him into a kiss. He could smell the nutmeg almost as much as he could taste the cinnamon on his lips.

“Mmm we should bake pumpkin pie tonight.” He said, pulling away just enough so he could talk.

“I would like that.” Cas answered. “All four of us could make pie. According to the 'mom blogs', as you call them, it would be a good family bonding exercise.”

“That’s right. And if they want any pie, they gotta help make it. That means more for us if they refuse.” He grinned.

“A win-win situation, really.” Cas smiled before tugging Dean close so their lips met again.

“I love you.” Dean muttered.

“I love you too.” Cas said softly.

Behind their backs Sam and Eileen were fake-gagging at their sickly sweet interaction, but secretly just glad the two of them had finally gotten over their stubborn (and oblivious) selves.

Sam was honestly overjoyed to see his brother finally happy. He would even go as far as saying finally willing to be himself, too. (Not that he would ever say this outloud. Sam can practically see Dean’s eyes roll farther back into his head than should be possible at the words.) All four of them had gone through more shit in the last few months than any normal person would in their entire life. They were all just lucky to be alive, and with that, learning how to savour the little moments of overly sweet normalcy.

(And the pumpkin spice-life Dean had secretly been longing for since they were little kids.)

So of course they were going to help bake pie.

---

“I want to try Starbucks.” Cas said the next morning, both of them still in bed.

Dean groaned, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. “Can I ask why, or is this one of those, 'I'll tell you later’ disasters like with the slime ingredients?”

“I want to try all the human things that I didn't get to try last time.” He said offhandedly.

Dean pictured Cas’s hurt face when he had told him he couldn’t stay, smile broken as Dean’s own heart shattered from the look the newly-human angel was giving him.

He wanted to tell him it was going to be okay, that Cas himself wasn’t the reason, but the lion in his stomach clawed the words down faster than even the thought of ruining Sam’s chances at survival could.

With a pang of guilt from the memory, Dean pulled himself closer to Cas and rested his head on the other man’s chest. He wrapped his arms around him, trying to preserve as much warmth and comfort as he could until they had to inevitably get out of bed. “Only if you let me sleep like this for thirty more minutes.”

Cas smiled. “Oh, are we making deals now?”

“I’d sell my soul for you.” Dean said cheekily, which earned a glare from Cas. “Believe me, I know.”

After a beat he went on. “Fine, you have a deal.” Before Dean could celebrate by tugging the covers over their bodies, Cas added another clause to their agreement. “But... in true Crowley fashion, you have to seal the deal with a kiss.”

Dean lazily threw his arms into the air. “Victory.”

He turned over, pulling himself upwards until he was just inches from Cas. Cradling the angel-turned-Winchester’s head in his hands, Dean placed his lips on Cas’s, melting into the touch as he felt the other man’s arms wrap around his torso.

When he broke away from the kiss, Dean found himself face to face with the most beautiful smile he had ever laid eyes on, one born from adoration and love. Cas’s eyebrows were slightly scrunched up, but for once it wasn’t a sign of confusion when met with some obscure eighties rock reference. It was a tiny expression of care, and it was one that was truly Cas. Not Jimmy’s, not even one Cas had picked up from him or Sam. It was completely and wholly Cas, and a completely and wholly human thing to do.

He realized Cas had been doing that long before the Empty stole his grace.

Dean smiled back at him, relaxed. Like taking in a deep breath after being under murky water for forty years. He brushed a loose strand of soft, brown hair into its place, before falling back into his spot and closing his eyes. “Crowley would be proud.” He whispered with a soft laugh, smile deepening as Cas joined him.

When their quiet laughter died out, there was a pause, air stagnant and in its own sleepy haze

“Oh and Dean?”

“Hm?” Dean turned his head to look at him, eyes not failing to glow with their unusually bright, green pigment. He took a deep breath, the lids of his eyes already started to slowly fall back down again.

“The slime wasn't a disaster. You enjoyed it.”

“I did.” He muttered sleepily, a loose smile forming on his lips as he drifted off to sleep. Cas laid there, running his fingers through the other man’s hair, contentment and admiration showing itself in every feature on his face.

This was more than he could have ever wanted.

---

“Dean. Dean wake up.” Cas was excitedly whisper-shouting in his ear like a kid on Christmas morning. It was exactly thirty minutes later, (he had counted), and Cas was ready to get moving.

“No.” He answered back, mimicking Cas’s tone.

“But you’re like a cat.” He teased. “You're on me and I can't get up.”

Dean sighed. “I can't believe I let you talk me into this.”

“It didn't take much convincing.”

Dean rolled over to give Cas a playful glare, but was met with the saddest puppy dog eyes he had ever seen, completely throwing him off his guard.

“I'm going to kill Sam for teaching you that.”

Cas just continued to give him that look.

“Fine.” Dean relented, sitting up with a yawn and thinking about how he will now never be able to win another argument.

“Get dressed.” Cas said excitedly. “We're going to Starbucks.”

“Hooray.” He gave a sarcastic laugh, but a smile creeped on his lips.

They walked out of their room together, heading towards the bunker’s library. Dean slid in one of the chairs, turning Sam’s still-open laptop around and waking it up.

Cas, meanwhile, turned to a random page of the lore book resting on the table and started reading in an attempt to pass the time.

The sound of Dean typing filled the air. “So, I just looked it up, and do we have to go to Starbucks?”

“Yes.” Cas said simply, not looking up from the book.

Dean groaned. “Cas there isn't one in the county, let alone Lebanon. That's probably why Sam and Eileen make their own.”

“Where's the closest one?” Cas asked, his blinding, blue eyes glaring at the back of Sam’s computer like he was trying to will the coffee shop to be near.

“I thought it was across state lines and in Nebraska at first, but it looks like there's a small one in a town called Washington. It's about 80 miles from here.”

“Let's go!” Cas excitedly straightened his trenchcoat and headed towards the door.

“Or, we could leave Starbucks to the fourteen year old girls.”

Cas turned back around and rolled his eyes. “Yes, I’m sure their entire demographic is fourteen year old girls, staff included.”

Alright, smartass. Dean thought, struggling to hide a smile.

Cas walked out the door, expecting Dean to follow.

“It takes an hour to get there, our coffee’s going to be cold by the time we get home, and it's freezing outside.” Dean muttered under his breath, but he grabbed his keys off the table and stood up, willing to follow Cas to the ends of the earth if it meant he would stay with him.

Not that he was going to enjoy this trip. In fact, he was currently doing the opposite of enjoying, and they hadn’t even gotten into the car yet. Starbucks. Starbucks. Really, Cas? Of all the places he wanted to go, it had to be Starbucks. He couldn’t want to explore humanity through Target or something?

Even Claire wouldn’t be caught dead in that place, with all the frou-frou toppings, elaborate drink mixes, and colourful, drizzled syrup. The people who go to Starbucks are the kind of people who like coffee that doesn’t taste like coffee. Teenage girls who might as well just be drinking whip cream, and that was without considering the seasonal drinks they fawn over.

Seasonal drinks that shouldn’t legally be allowed to be referred to as coffee.

Dean couldn’t believe he ever agreed to this, but still, he begrudgingly followed.

---

Using the GPS on Cas’s phone, (Dean said his insane directional skills helped out too), they found the Starbucks relatively easily once they were in the little town.

They parked the Impala, and Dean looked at the modern building. The green lettering contrasted with the tan plaster walls, spelling “Starbucks.”

He heard Cas get out, his feet making a crunching noise as they hit the gravel, and watched from across the top of the car as he started towards the coffee shop. Dean looked at the building warily, reluctance painted on his face.

Cas was telling him some random fact about a bird he saw, but Dean could only think about his reputation that was about to shatter like a vase dropping on tile floor.

Reputation with who? He didn't know.

Well, he had a vague idea, but chose not to let his thoughts wander that far.

It was okay. This was fine. He could swallow his pride and-

“Ooh. The peppermint mocha looks good.” Cas was reading the limited edition drinks on the drive-thru menu as they traveled across the parking lot.

Dean was going to barf.

They walked into the building, immediately hit with the overwhelming smell of excessive amounts of flavoured syrup indoused coffee. Dean glanced around the well-lit building, taking note of the many different people there.

(He wasn’t about to have any black-eyed minions reporting his Starbucks order to a very judgmental Queen of Hell.)

Cas pushed Dean’s protesting body into the line, looking pleased with the many different options written on the menu overhead.

He enjoyed the small touch of Cas’s hands on his back, moving him forwards to the line, but was grateful Cas was careful not to let them linger there too long.

He was still wary about doing… this, in public.

He knew Cas was patiently waiting for him to be ready, so he didn't know how to tell him that he might never be.

The teenager working the cash register interrupted his train of thought. “What will it be for ya?”

“I would like a peppermint mocha please.”

“Alrighty. And you?”

“I'll take just a black coffee.”

The barista looked unimpressed. “And your names?”

Dean grinned. “John and John.”

“No relation.” Cas added.

The barista just sighed. “How do you want me to differentiate the two of ‘em then?”

“Oh you can put ‘John Bonham’ on mine.” Dean replied.

“Comin’ right up.” Their tone didn't change, still just full of apathy that could only be perfected by the work of a burnt-out teenager.

Dean and Cas walked down to the end of the counter and towards the pickup section. “Now tell me, Castiel.” He stressed his partner’s name. “Who’s John Bonham?”

Cas sighed, but the corner of his mouth upturned in a grin. “John Henry Bohnham, affectionately referred to as ‘Bonzo’, born in 1948 and was most well known for being the drummer of the rock band ‘Led Zeppelin’.”

“Mmm very close, but unfortunately you forgot the word ‘best’ in front of ‘rock band.’” Dean smirked before leaning in for a chaste kiss.

“You should have said I was ‘John Bon Jovi.’” Cas said, smiling.

“Why? Because you’re only good at this sometimes?” Dean closed the gap between them.

As soon as their lips met, Dean pulled away instinctively, realization hitting him like a hunter with a bat as his eyes widened in terror. “I-I'm sorry, I didn’t...” His words faltered as he looked around at the people sitting in the coffee shop, all of which were paying no mind to them.

He felt sick, guilt gnawing at him from a pit in his stomach.

“Hey, it's okay Dean. You know I'm perfectly fine with public displays of affection, and no one else even saw us. There's no need to apologize.”

“Yeah-h.” He said shakily. Before he could figure out who he was apologizing to, a voice from behind the counter called.

“I have an order for a mister ‘John’ and ‘John Bonham’.”

“That's us.” Dean spat the words out quickly, turning around to take them from the barista’s hand. He rushed out of the door, the small tinkling sound of the welcome bell and the blood rushing to his ears drowning out the sound of Cas’s call from behind.

He sat in the front seat of Baby, knowing he was being childish. Dean took a shaky breath and tried not to think about it.

About what the hell he was thinking, kissing Cas out in public like that. The judgemental eyes- black or not- that were watching. He thought about what his father would say, mind instantly going back to a moment in his childhood he has tried to forget since it happened, wondering where he went wrong.

About the time John had caught him and Lee, ignoring the weak excuses Dean was stuttering out. Skipping town faster than they had done in years.

About how the left side of his face had been a yellow-ish purple for weeks following, and the sore spot on his arm from where he caught the pavement as he flew towards it.

About how he had told Sam he just fell on a hunt. “Don't worry kid, you should have seen the vamp when I was done with him.” He swung his fist around in slow motion, pretending to punch an invisible enemy as his little brother giggled in childish bliss.

About how John never looked at him the same. The disgust in his eyes, harsh words on his lips.

About how he vowed to never disappoint his father like that again, and their joint hatred for that part of him. Sometimes it felt like the only thing they could agree on.

About how somewhere, somehow, he had decided Cas was different. That he somehow didn’t count, and that losing him hurt so much, was such an egregious pain, he wanted as much of Cas as he was allowed to have. And how that was something insurmountable stronger than the twisted, sick feeling John had placed in his gut.

He remembered something Cas had told him once: “Hatred isn’t a natural trait, Dean, it’s a learned one. A baby isn’t born with the ability to hate, it’s passed on from one broken soul to another. Love, love however. That’s something different altogether.”

Cas’s hand on his shoulder pulled Dean out of his thoughts. “Hey.” He said softly.

“Hey Cas.”

“I love you.” He got in the passenger's seat, taking his coffee from Dean’s still frozen hand.

“I love you too.” He whispered absentmindedly, staring straight ahead and seeing nothing but thoughts from the past. His mind fighting an internal battle, logic telling him that what he had with Cas wasn’t wrong, and even though everything from fate to God had tried to wedge itself between them, it was still the most right thing he had. And he knew that, but his dad’s drunken, booming voice echoed throughout his head, telling him that he was dirty. Telling him the Winchester men had no place for someone like him.

“You better stop that now, boy. Bad things happen to you when you’re weak.”

At the time he had taken that as a warning, rather than a threat. But now Dean wasn’t so sure.

It’s not even that his Dad was particularly religious. He wasn’t told that it was a sin, or that he was going to Hell. Though it’s not like that particular statement would have been wrong. He thought with a bitter laugh.

While the thoughts in his head were screaming mercilessly, the drive home was in a simple silence. The only noise being Cas’s occasional sip, and the sound of soft fabric rubbing against skin as Cas moved his hand in small, comforting motions against Dean's back.

When they got to the bunker, Cas, who was genuinely impressed that Dean managed to drive them home without crashing into a tree, pulled Dean out of the car and gently shook him out of his self-imposed stupor.

“Your coffee's cold.” Cas said with a laugh.

Dean blinked a couple times, clearing the fog from his mind, before laughing along with him. “And who’s fault is that? You were the one who insisted on traveling across the state to get it.”

“Do you want some of mine?” Cas asked. “There's a little bit left, and I held it next to the heater. It should still be lukewarm.”

“No thanks, Cas. I can go make some in the kitchen.”

“But what if I want you to try it?” Dean glared at him. “Don't make me do Sam’s ‘puppy dog eyes’ again.”

“Okay, okay. You win.” He put his hands up, mimicking a surrender. “I'll try some of your stupid, Christmas cookie, candy-cane flavoured coffee thing or whatever.” They started walking towards the entrance to the bunker.

“Peppermint mocha?”

“That's the one.”

Cas laughed at him.

“Oh just, give it here.” Dean said. He took a long sip from the disposable cup. He could taste a vague hint of whipped cream mixed in with the coffee, its light fluffy texture sticking to the last swallow of smooth liquid in the bottom of the cup. The chocolate and espresso rested on his tongue, and the peppermint was strong and refreshing. He took another sip.

“Does that face mean you like it?”

Dean looked at him guiltily. “No.” He opened the bunker’s door and started walking down the metal stairs.

“Yes you do.”

“No, I don't.”

“You took a second sip.”

Dean reached the bottom of the stairs first, and walked over to the War Room table to set both coffee cups and his keys down.

“So? I was trying to make sure I properly understood the flavour. Since when is that a crime?”

“You wanted to properly understand a flavour you didn't like?” Cas walked up to Dean and pulled the nearest chair out to sit down.

“What are you two arguing about this time?” Eileen asked from the library.

Cas clenched both of his hands into fists, putting the right one on top of the other. He made small, circular, stirring motions with his right hand. “Coffee.” He signed swiftly, movements fluid.

“Ah. That makes sense.” She spoke the words.

“What makes sense?” Sam asked, walking in from one of the hallways, making sure Eileen could see his lips before speaking.

“They're arguing over coffee again.”

Sam glanced at both of them, before his eyes reached the two cups on the War Room table.

“Wait a second… Dean?” He looked at his brother, before turning to face his best friend. “Cas?”

“Yes, Sam?” Cas answered.

“Did you two go to Starbucks?”

“I don't want to talk about it.” Dean grumbled.

“Yes, we did!” Cas sounded way too excited to be referring to coffee. “I got a peppermint mocha, and Dean tried some and liked it.”

“I did not.”

“I don't care what coffee you like, Dean. What I do care about is that you went all the way to Starbucks, and didn't bother to ask if we wanted to come.”

“Not cool Dean.” Eileen walked in, shaking her head and hiding a smile.

“I might have thought about buying you two drinks, but there was no way I was ordering yours with a straight face.” He looked at Sam. “And it's an hour away, they wouldn't have been hot or cold or whatever they're supposed to be by the time we got here.”

“Well then we'll just have to go back, all four of us.” Eileen put simply.

“It's an hour away.”

“We know.” Sam added.

“Let me say that again, in case you weren’t listening. It's an hour away. For coffee. That isn't even that good.”

“I beg to differ, Dean.” Cas said.

“Yeah I'm definitely with Cas on this one.” Eileen agreed while Sam nodded along.

“No. There's no way I'm getting back in Baby to drive all the way to Starbucks again.”

“Fine. We’ll go get our own.”

“With what car?” Dean said, very sure of himself.

Sam snatched Baby’s keys off the war room table, which in hindsight was probably something Dean should have expected.

“Let's hope Sam doesn't have too many shots of espresso.” Eileen said, faking concern. “I would hate for your baby to pay the price.”

“Fine. I'll drive you.” Dean grumbled while Eileen double fist-pumped her win.

Cas looked very pleased with the thought of getting to try more coffee.

---

They left shortly after, the drive over painful for everyone except Dean, who listened to the same four songs on repeat the entire hour.

(It’s their own fault, really.)

---

“Can we please listen to something other than Bob Seger on the trip home?” Sam complained as he slammed shut the door to Baby’s backseat.

“You’re just mad you didn’t get shotgun.” Dean said, closing his own door. “Besides, driver picks the music, everyone else shuts their cakehole.” Sam mouthed the words along with Dean, having heard the speech a million times before.

Eileen and Cas got out, neither one of them had any desire to input on their squabble, and were instead engaged in their own, quieter discussion.

Both brothers continued to argue until they walked into the Starbucks.

“Ah. There's the scent of overpriced coffee I missed.” Eileen joked as she took her first breath inside the building, using her hand to waft the smell towards her.

“What are you getting?” Cas asked Sam.

“I want my usual, and Eileen, what are you having?”

“Hot chocolate with espresso shots please. This place doesn't sell liquor.” She shook her head sadly and Sam laughed. “Good thing I brought my own.” She winked at them, opening her jacket just enough so they could see the inside pocket and showing off her flask.

“Oh, now that would be a Starbucks I would go to.” Dean said.

“You two wait in line.” Sam pointed to Cas and Dean. “We’ll save a table.”

Dean looked like he wanted to protest, but they walked away before he had the chance. Cas leaned over towards him. “Don't worry. I'll order Sam’s.” He very conspicuously winked.

Dean smiled at his attempts of regular human interaction, before over-the-top winking himself.

“Can you order for us? I need to talk to Sam about something.”

“Sure thing…” Cas had to think before finishing his sentence. “...buckaroo.”

Dean outwardly cringed. “Keep trying, you'll get there eventually.” He patted Cas on the back, which was slightly moving in a chuckle.

It was good to see Cas filled with so much simple joy. Face creased from laughter rather than stress, he seemed so much lighter. Happier. It was only a small sliver of what he deserved, but it was something. Maybe he could live with driving an hour to get what he assumed was half-decent coffee.

“What would you like?” Cas asked him, eyes still filled with a sparkle that only comes from gaining something you thought you lost.

“Uh.” He thought about it for a moment, almost considering branching out into the unexplored terrain that was the dark green menu with small, white text, before shuddering at the thought.

“I think I'll take that expensive black coffee I didn't get earlier.”

Dean was not going to turn into one of those people, if he had any say about it.

Cas walked into the line, leaving Dean to scan the room, furiously waving Sam over when his eyes found their booth.

“Sam.” He sounded like he was trying to whisper, but his volume raised far higher than that. The patron closest to Dean gave him a look before turning back to their work.

“Sam, come here, it's urgent.” His brother turned to look at him, rolling his eyes before getting out of the booth.

“What do you want?” He said once he reached Dean.

“Sam. Help. What do I do?”

“About what?”

“About what kind of coffee Cas is having.”

“Oh god, Dean let it go. He's not going to only ever drink black coffee. Contrary to popular belief, former angels do actually have souls.”

Dean ignored the implications that he didn't have a soul, too distracted by Cas. “But look.” He motioned his head towards where Cas was standing, next in line to order. “He’s eyeing the weird fruity drinks.”

“Dean. It's Cas. The man’s favorite food is PB&J. What did you expect him to have, taste?”

“Alright that's rich coming from mister Pinkity Drinkity or whatever the fuck.”

“You walked into a Starbucks and ordered black coffee, I don't think I'm the wrong one here.”

“Wait, wait. Shut up. Quiet.” He hit Sam on the shoulder in a childish attempt at getting him to stop talking so he could listen.

“Ow. That hurt.” Sam muttered, before turning to watch Cas, which Dean was already doing.

“I would like to try a…” Cas methodically scanned the menu again. “A ‘Passion Tango Iced Tea,’ please.” The barista took no mind to the excessive air quotes.

“It's not even coffee.” Dean said to Sam, clearly distraught. He turned to look back at Cas.

“And your name sir?”

“Lizzo.”

Dean threw his arms up into the air. “I can't believe this is the man I love.” His voice cracked like he was holding in tears of anguish from listening to Cas order.

Sam just rolled his eyes at the theatrics. Right, and he’s the dramatic one.

“Aw. You're in love.” Sam held his hands up, forming a heart and mocking his brother.

“Oh shut up. What are you, seven?”

“Is Cas your gay thing?”

“You shut your mo-”

“What are we gossiping about?” Eileen whispered, cutting Dean off and causing them both to jump.

“We're not gossiping.” Sam said indignantly.

“Sam started it.”

“Jerk.”

“Bitch.”

“This is where I call you two ‘asshats’, right?”

“It's ‘assbutt.’” Cas said, walking up to them and catching the tail end of their conversation. “And that's my line.”

Cas handed them each their drinks, before excitedly trying his own. He put the plastic cup up to his mouth, almost missing the straw. When he swallowed the cranberry-colored liquid, his face relaxed in pleasure.

“I know this one isn't coffee, but it's really good.”

“We didn't get coffee either.” Eileen said. “So don't worry, Dean's the odd man out here.”

Dean glared at her before trying his own coffee, and well, it was coffee. The point of buying expensive caffeine still went straight over his head.

The four of them went over to their thankfully-still-available booth and sat down. Dean and Cas sat on one side, both instinctively choosing the side that faced the door, with Sam and Eileen sliding into the seats directly across from them. They sat there, talking about nothing in particular, and certainly nothing of importance, before falling into the natural art of storytelling.

Aside from killing monsters, that’s what hunters did best. Sitting around and sharing stories. As tiring and dangerous as their lives were, some hunts were worth sharing exaggerated and hyperbolic versions of, especially over drinks.

Sam’s favourite story to tell changed every time, and one would almost be inclined to believe that most of it wasn't real, but the wildest parts also caused the most merriment. (Dean pretended he hadn’t witnessed the whole thing, sparing Sam by not telling the other two how it actually went down.)

Eileen shared of her time in Ireland. “Foreign country, foreign monsters.” She said with a wink, telling of creatures neither Sam nor Dean had even read about.

Dean’s favourite story to tell, aside from the fact that he killed Hitler, was the time he got to solve a mystery with everyone’s favorite talking dog. And yeah, all three of the people that sat at the table had heard both many times before, but that didn't matter, it was still enrapturing to hear them again.

Cas had millenniums to choose from, but always found the most interesting hunts to be the ones with the Winchesters. He also had many hilarious stories about his adventures with Crowley, but he was less fond of those.

“I remember once, Dean went on a hunt with Dad.” Sam started. “Nasty vampire, it got a hit or two on Dean. I think you guys went with another hunter. Young. About your age, actually. Uh…”

He snapped his fingers, trying to recall the name. “Lee. That's it.” Dean looked up from the coffee right as Sam said it. “Do you remember him?”

Something flashed in Dean’s eyes, but his brother didn't seem to notice.

Cas, who was used to admiring every minute detail of Dean's expression and posture, didn't miss the ever so slight, yet sharp, inhale. Or the way he swallowed before speaking, trying to clear the small lump from his throat.

Dean noticed too, internally rolling his eyes at his own reaction.

“Yeah it's been a while, but I remember him.” Dean was blatantly ignoring Cas’s burning stare from beside him, and the fact that he had stabbed Lee through the chest just last year.

Cas made sure no one was watching before gently placing a hand on Dean’s thigh. Knowing it would comfort him from both intuition and experience. Dean stiffened under the touch, but after realizing no one could see where Cas’s hand was, he visibly relaxed.

“What happened to him?” Eileen asked innocently.

“Oh uh, a hunt I think. Most of us go that way, I assume he was no different.” Technically Dean dealt the final blow, but it was the entrancing call of the monster, greed, and the life Lee and Dean had both secretly wanted, that caused his former-friend’s downfall in the end.

“Yeah.” Sam said solemnly, suddenly lost in his own thoughts, most of which were riddled with grief.

They sat in silence for a few minutes, letting the weight of their many losses wash over them like a tidal wave.

One made of espresso and milk rather than the rough waters of the sea.

---

The ride back was more manageable, Dean allowing them one song choice each, complete with a warning to pick wisely.

(They all very cheekily chose the songs they knew would bother Dean the most.)

---

Full on coffee, cookies Dean bought for them at Starbucks, and brimming with contentment, (as well as the fact that they spent half the day in the car), Cas suggested to Dean that they “hit the hay” as they stepped back into the bunker.

They laid there in silence, breathing in scents of comfort, coffee, and each other, until Cas eventually drifted off to sleep.

Dean, however, continued to lay there. Thinking.

He remembered the first solo case John sent him on.

Something curled inside his gut.

They had been two nuns, their fate a product of hate crime. Put to death for simply being themselves.

Dean didn't blame them for coming back as ghosts.

He remembered the words - ones he would soon learn were slurs - that John would spit out like acid.

Or offhandedly toss like they didn't bear enough weight to shatter the window of a person's self-image.

It had taken him almost forty years to realize that very same window inside of him was in sharp, jagged pieces. Cutting anyone and everyone who came near.

It had taken Cas dying to start picking them up again.

He turned to look at the man next to him, relaxed and blissfully sleeping. His chest moved up and down rhythmically, and Dean slowed his breath to match until he fell into a surprisingly peaceful slumber.

---

When Dean woke up, the other side of his bed was cold.

He didn't panic, knowing full well that Cas probably ran to the bathroom, or was pouring another mountain of sugar in his coffee.

Losing Cas again to the Empty had ripped him apart, but months of spending every night with his partner left him with less nightmares and waking in cold sweats then he had since before Hell.

Dean also learned that his own presence was enough to fight off the demons of solid, black goo that plagued Cas’s head at night.

He was finally starting to understand why life seemed to lose all meaning when Cas was gone, and from there he could slowly start to rebuild both of them.

Dean heard soft padding noises as socked feet walked down the hall, and there was a knock on the bedroom door. "S'your room too, Cas. You don't have to knock." He laughed, words slightly slurred from just waking up

Cas walked in, wielding two mugs of coffee and a proud look shining in his eyes. “I made us coffee.” He said triumphantly, handing one of the mugs to Dean.

“I put chocolate and peppermint in your coffee.”

Dean fake-gasped. “You monster. Ruining the integrity of my drink like that.”

“I'm a human, you ass.” Cas responded, a smile tugging at his lips. “Besides, I know you liked mine yesterday.”

“I did not.” He said, discontentedly crossing his arms. “I only drink coffee that's as black as my soul. Darker than the night sky. Hotter than the bunker’s computer when it overheats. As manly as-”

“Oh, just drink your damn coffee.”

“Fine.” He groused. “But I'm not enjoying it.”

Cas raised an eyebrow at him, before setting his mug on the bedside table and sitting down behind Dean. The bed creaked underneath him as he leaned forward and wrapped his arms around Dean’s waist. “Is this why you and Sam never use umbrellas?” He joked.

Dean laughed.

Cas rested his head on the crook of Dean’s neck and whispered. “You know you don't have to pretend.”

“Pretend what?�� Dean asked softly.

“You know.”

“That I don’t like flavoured coffee?” He said with a snort.

“Sort of.” Cas hugged him tighter. “No one’s going to think any less of you Dean. You’re allowed to like the things you like.”

“I know.” He resigned.

“John isn't here anymore.”

“I know.”

“I love you.”

“I know.” The words barely came out as a whisper, hot tears betraying Dean’s eyes as they silently leaked out and ran down his cheeks.

He tried to wipe the tears away, hearing his Dad’s voice in his head and knowing he was being stupid.

Dean couldn't help but think of himself as a small, living-room window, from an old, dilapidated house. Stained yellow with age. Cracking from wear.

He let the drumming of his Dad’s words in his head be drowned out by Cas’s voice.

He couldn't unwrap the fuzz from around him, so he didn't know what Cas was saying, ears seemingly filled with cotton. It was just the knowledge alone that he was there. That he was holding him and whispering comforting words into his ear. That even as a human he could heal Dean at his lowest points, and still see him as the brightest, strongest, soul.

You don't really know what a picture is going to be until it's done.

Maybe that window is a beautiful stained-glass portrait.

“Uh.” Dean cleared his throat. “What-what do you have?” He indicated Cas’s coffee by angling his head towards where it sat on the nightstand.

“I made iced coffee.”

Dean just looked at him, astounded, eyes widening. “You mean it’s not hot?”

“Yes, that's where the ‘iced’ in ‘iced coffee’ comes from.” He said very seriously.

They both sat in silence for the next hour, peacefully drinking their coffee and enjoying the presence of one another.

---

When they got out of bed and ventured into the rest of the bunker, they found Sam and Eileen in the library.

They were sitting in adjacent chairs, with Eileen laying her head on Sam’s shoulder and reaching for her water bottle on the table. They were reading a book together, but Eileen shook Sam indicating she had seen them walk in.

“Goodmorning.” She greeted cheerfully.

“Mornin’.” Dean pulled up a chair across from them, and watched as Cas did the same.

“What are you two reading?” Cas asked.

“The Men of Letters’s Bestiary.” Sam said.

Dean snorted. “Ah. Doing a little light reading are we?”

“We're thinking about filling in some of the pages.” Eileen added.

“Yeah, for all of the stuff they have here, it's surprisingly empty.” Sam continued flipping through some of the pages, most of which were blank.

“Heh. I should put you in that thing, Cas.”

Cas let out a laugh. “Right. Because I’m a good example of an angel.” The sarcasm was masking something else in his voice.

“If it makes you feel any better, you’ve always been my favourite angel.” Dean only realised how sappy he sounded after it came out of his mouth.

“Yeah, I’ve heard the rest of them are dicks.” Eileen added.

Cas smiled at that, seemingly back to normal.

“Right, well you three can do that, I'm off to the Dean Cave.”

“Or…” Sam started.

“We could go back to Starbucks.” Cas finished, nodding his head enthusiastically.

“Yeah... that's not where I was going with that, but I like where your head’s at, Cas. We should definitely go back.”

“Eileen?” He asked.

“Hell yeah.”

“Dean?”

Dean pressed his mouth into a thin line and glared at him. “Yes, sure, fine. But we're not making this a daily thing.”

“That's fair.” Cas agreed. “It's probably not very healthy.”

He went to grab his wallet and keys before Sam could start his speech on the nutritional value of green things, and Eileen snatched her water bottle off the library table as they all got up to leave.

---

Dean gave up on letting them choose the music after snickering and requesting “Friday” by Rebecca Black for the third time in a row.

(It wasn't even Friday?)

---

Dean stepped out and closed Baby’s door in the parking lot of Starbucks an hour later, kicking the loose pieces of gravel on the asphalt for the third time in two days.

“We might as well just live here.” He said, tone dripping with sarcasm.

“I wouldn't make that offer if I were you, Cas looks like he’d be totally on board.” Sam laughed.

Cas went and stood beside Dean as they started walking towards the building, smiling.

“What?” Dean asked, question genuine and free of all malice.

“Nothing.” Cas answered, smile not faltering.

His eyes revealed nothing but pure devotion for the man he was staring at. A silent promise, one without pressure, that he would be standing there, and Dean could take the leap anytime he wanted.

Dean was slowly inching towards the end of the diving board.

---

“I think I'll just drink my water.”

“Oh that's exciting.” Sam joked. “If I got you a lemon to go with it, would you be able to handle that?”

“Don't talk to me about my drink, when yours is a vivid green puke colour.”

“Hey, at least it actually has a colour. And a flavour at that.”

Dean couldn’t believe those words were coming from the same man who drinks exactly a hundred and one ounces of water a day. (Which, according to Sam, is the recommended amount for males, as stated by the Institute of Medicine.)

(Dean didn’t care.)

“Fine then.” She turned to look at Dean. “Get me the strongest thing on the menu.”

Dean laughed before turning to Cas. “Let's just go get in line before we suffer at the hands of the Leahy like Sam.”

Sam and Eileen went to look for a place where they could all sit again, playfully bickering the entire way.

While he was standing in line with Cas, Dean looked over at his brother, and found him and Eileen sitting at a small table in the corner.

Cas was still helping him learn ASL, so he caught parts of their conversation.

“If Jack is in every drop of rain, do you think he's in your water?” Sam signed, trying to contain his laughter.

Eileen pushed her water away with a look of disgust. “You’re lucky I love you.” She answered back.

“I know I am.”

He watched her silently laugh before turning back to look at Cas.

They really did have it good, didn't they?

“What are you ordering, Dean?”

Dean stood there silently, contemplating. He internally weighed his pros and cons, mind leaving the menu entirely. While there was still a lot of shit he had to work through, (shit he had been actively not working out his entire life), there wasn’t much of a decision to be made.

He would always choose Cas.

“You know what?” He reached out and grasped Cas’s hand firmly. “I was thinking about being less boring. What ingredients do you suggest I try?”

Cas smiled warmly, reaching the crinkled corners of his eyes. “They have a cinnamon flavoured one. That’ll be almost like apple pie.”

“Will it really?” Dean’s tone was dismissive, but there was a smile on his face.

“Yes, Sam told me.“

“Not that I trust Sam’s judgment, but okay, I think I’ll take one of those.”

“I'm going to have a real pumpkin spice latte this time.” Cas seemed very pleased with the aspect of buying something they could make it home, but Dean wasn't going to fault him for it.

The patron in front of them finished ordering, clearing the way for Cas and Dean. The barista from the first time they went caught sight of them and made a face. “Wait a minute. I think I know you two.”

“Yes, we came here yesterday.” Cas helped. “Well, we actually visited twice, but you weren't working the second time.”

“Right... John and John, how could I forget?”

“This time we're ordering for four though.”

“I would like a…” Dean squinted at the menu, looking for the cinnamon flavoured coffee. “‘Cinnamon Dolce Latte.’ And my devilishly handsome friend here will take the pumpkin spice version.”

“And what are the other two drinks and names?”

Dean whispered something in Cas’s ear. “I'll drink the coffee, but I won't budge on this one.”

“That's okay Dean, you’ll get there eventually.” He whispered back.

The barista looked unimpressed with them. Again.

Dean cleared his throat. “Ahem, sorry. The tall one with the stupidly long hair,” he pointed towards Sam, “is getting…” he trailed off before looking to Cas for help.

“I don't know, man. It was something sickly looking. Cold? Green? Possibly tea?”

“And Iced Green Tea Latte?” The barista suggested.

“That's the one. His name is Jimmy.”

“And the lovely lady sitting next to him would like the strongest drink you have. Her name is Robert.”

“Her name is Robert…?” He slowly pointed towards Eileen, sounding unsure of himself.

Or them.

“Yup.” Cas said.

Eileen gave a little wave from across the room.

He gritted his teeth in a very clearly fake smile. “Coming right up.”

They paid for their coffee and picked it up, taking the travel cups across the room and towards Sam and Eileen.

Cas took a sip from his pumpkin spice latte, gleefully smiling. “As much as I like trying different drinks, I think I might start just getting this one. It's my favourite.”

Sam leaned over to Dean, neither one taking their eyes off of Cas. “Should we tell him the drink is seasonal?” He glanced at Sam, before staring back at his partner, whose face was beaming like a literal ray of sunshine.

Dean’s face softened. “Nah. Let’s not ruin his moment.” He took a sip of his cinnamon coffee and damn, it was delicious.

Nothing at all like apple pie, but still delicious.

Cas walked over to him, making eye contact in a silent question. Dean nodded with a small smile, and Cas took his hand.

“I love you.” Cas whispered.

“I love you too.” He whispered back.

They didn’t whisper to hide, and it wasn't because he was ashamed. It was because that exchange was just for them.

Dean leaned in and softly kissed Cas.

Now that was to tell everyone in the shop that his devilishly handsome friend was spoken for.

Slowly, the sun would come out and shine through the stained-glass window, shadow portraying the picture of an angel.

And alright, fine, Dean could admit that he enjoyed the peppermint mocha.

He thought about it for a moment, before giving a light chuckle, realising something.

“What?” Cas asked, turning to look at him with a soft smile resting on his face.

“Nothing.” Dean whispered, squeezing Cas’s hand in his. He took a sip from his coffee, relishing in the warm and cozy flavour enrapturing his tongue.

He was only thinking that maybe, just maybe,

Cas had changed him too.

---

Bonus Epilogue:

Dean held the glass door open for the other three, and they all walked out onto the asphalt, laughing, and making their way towards Baby.

The street lamp overhead flickered, and all four of them froze.

“Did anyone happen to get the salted caramel macchiato?” Dean whispered.

---

-This fic on Ao3 (Kudos and comments would be greatly appreciated.)

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little-red-toyota · 3 years ago

Text

Final good bye to the fandom

TW//Trauma, triggers, nsfw, sexual themes, rape, domestic abuse e.g.

This is gonna be a long ass post…

It has taken me a while to get emotionally strong enough to do this, as I will have to think back at some traumatic events from my past to address some of these things. That's why I waited until I got home from vacation with my family, as it will seriously affect my mood and mental health, and I want to be near my doctor and therapist, just in case.

And also, I know that the majority of those reading this will invalidate me and tell me I am making things up to clear my name. So, I literally have to torment myself to write a blog post people will just brush off as bogus anyway. But I will do it now that I am in safe surroundings. Then it will be off my chest, and I can finally move on. If people will continue stirring up the past, it will be their problem, not mine.

I think I should write one last blog post where I address everything. I have left the TTTE-fandom, but I will write that one as my final goodbye to the fandom. I just have to find out everything I've been accused of so I can properly address them all in order. I might leave out details of my life that is too hard for me to open up about. I know most of you will just invalidate me anyway.

1. The Stepney fic and glorifying rape.

2. My mafia-AU.

3. The Darin incident.

4. Being a pedophile. (Where do they get this from anyway??)

5. Running the NSFW-blog.

6. Drawing penises/boobs on trains. Drawing age-regression art.

Is there more?

Ah... yes! Faking my own suicide, of course!

7. "Faking" being suicidal.

8. Having the audacity to survive and go on living.

9. "Making up" my past trauma to justify writing fics to cope with it.

10. Being a nazi for being interested in WW2 history and for being Norwegian and having so-called nazi-letters in my last name (actual letters of the Norwegian alphabet).

11. Putting a white-supremacist flag (the actual flag of Norway) on my porch on family birthdays and our national day.

12. Being a danger to my daughter.

Anything else that needs to be addressed? What else am I being accused of? Send me a dm and I will add it to the post.

Okay, I will bump the Stepney fic down a bit as it is the most traumatic thing for me to address, I will save that one for last.

2 and 3. The dark au/mafia au where I gave some TTTE characters some rather dark and unpleasant character traits, and the whole incident with Darin and the pedo-Salty was addressed in this blog post written by my husband last year, so I am not opening that can of worms again: https://little-red-toyota.tumblr.com/post/623743183795470336/in-light-of-recent-events

Even the thing about Toby cheating on Henrietta is addressed there.

As for the au, I never fully explored it as I started losing interest in TTTE around the same time. I found other things to enjoy and TTTE faded into the background and the au was dropped before I even wrote any stories, apart from the one about Toby and Henrietta.

Some people claim, like this lovely individual, that most of the characters were rapists and pedos. No, not most. Only one of each. And I did not write more than one story about rape and suicide. Where does this person even get that from? Someone who told someone who had heard from someone who might have heard….?

Don't spread rumors unless you are sure that they are true.

Anyway, it's all addressed in that blog post in that link. I don't see how this mafia au is any worse than other dark post-apocalyptic or violent aus. It mostly was about the diesel mafia and their illegal businesses, not about sex, even if it did occur now and then. I find the substance abuse in it to be more problematic tbh…

4. Being a pedophile.

I don't even know how to defend myself against this one, as I don't even know why people think I am pedophile. They only throw the accusation out with no backing evidence, so I have no idea where it comes from or what it is that makes people think I am one.

Apart from one claim that I had faved "porn" alongside "strangers'" baby photos on DA. I addressed that earlier though. As DeviantArt doesn't sort what you click "like" on, it all ends up in the same folder unless you actively go through it and sort it into categories, which I don't bother most of the time. It also doesn't say WHEN it was added to your faves. So, I can have faved an artistic nude on Saturday, and then faved my friend's family photo on Thursday. It's not like I actively search for porn, get all steamed up and then look at pictures of children. WTF.

The few children I have faved are not from complete strangers, but long-term friends of mine. Yes, it is possible to have friends on the same website. I have actually met a lot of my RL friends through DeviantArt. I posted photos of my daughter when she was a baby, they would fave it and congratulate me. So, I did the same when they had a baby. As simple as that. Nothing weird or perverted about it. Due to people doxxing me last year however, I deleted the photos of me, my husband and my daughter from DeviantArt, so it's no longer there.

Porn isn't allowed on DeviantArt anyway. The nudes there are so-called artistic nudes, and for the most part I use them as pose-references when I draw as it is easier to draw a pose using a nude base and then dress them up once you got the pose right.

"The very naked" centaurs I have faved. Well, I like the mythological creature Centaur. And as far as I know… they do not wear clothes, so how are they NOT nude? Look it up, it's a horse body with a human torso instead of horse head. I don't see them as sexual, but what do I know? Maybe YOU do?

I have no sexual interest in children whatsoever.

5. Running the NSFW-blog on Tumblr and Twitter.

Yes. I was one of six people modding that blog. ONE of six, so I refuse to take the full blame here.

MerciResolution has openly admitted to being the founder, and she recruited me and some others to modify as the confession load became too heavy for one person to handle alone.

The original blog on Tumblr worked as follows: People would anonymously send a confession to our askbox, we would add a picture (sometimes photoshopped) to the text and post it on the blog. Always tagged as NSFW and with proper trigger warnings if necessary! The blog itself was also marked as explicit, so it didn't appear in searches and such.

For us, this blog was nothing but a joke. We did it for shits and giggles. If anyone took it seriously and thought we got off to the stuff that was posted, we apologize for that, but to us it was just for laughs. And we DID laugh a lot, you guys should have seen the weird shit people sent us sometimes!

We had fun and we never thought anyone would take it seriously, so we never thought of writing "joke" in the description or anything. It never occurred to us that it could be anything but a joke.

We also made a Twitter account for it, also locked for minors. But it was quickly hacked, and someone changed the password so we could no longer access it. We made another account and forgot about the old one…

After a while, the original mods started losing interest and the blog (both on Tumblr and Twitter) became less active. That's when a person I had known for years, and wrongfully trusted, came forward and wanted to take over ownership. So, the ownership was handed over to Russalita/Charlie.

That turned out to be huge mistake!

Me and the other mods had more or less forgotten that the blogs existed, when suddenly someone started bashing me and getting up in my arms over it. I got seriously confused as I hadn't been active on it in almost a year. But as it turned out, Russalita had removed the mature filters and made the accounts open for all the see. Even minors.

And as people knew I was one of the mods, they fired their guns at me. I can see why though, so I'm not pointing any fingers here.

I tried contacting her by phone, asking her to lock the accounts again, but she gave me a less than polite response, hung up and then blocked my number…

So, I decided to try to shut the blogs down on my own, trying the old passwords. It worked on the Tumblr-account, and I managed to password protect it, for some reason it couldn't be fully deleted. But the Twitter account had gotten its password changed by Russalita. I was however able to get a new password by logging into the e-mail we had used to create it. I deleted the Twitter blog fully. It can't be re-activated even if we wanted to. It's gone.

But it turns out the old, hacked one is still up and now open for everyone. And this one poses a huge problem as we have no way of getting into it to delete it. Only thing we have been able to do so far is reporting it and hope it will be removed by Twitter. So I only have one thing to say about it: report it.

I am no longer running any NSFW TTTE blog anywhere, nor do I have interest in doing so. So, if you come across one, claiming to be me or any of the other mods, it is false.

6. Drawing penises/boobs on trains. Drawing age-regression art.

People seem to believe I have drawn genitals on trains. I have never done such. Any art on the NSFW-blog with genitalia on the trains were sent in by confessors and was not drawn by me. Most of them seems to have been drawn by someone who goes by the name "The Lance".

I HAVE drawn things for the NSFW blog, but there were no genitalia in those drawings. I drew Frank of Arlesdale looking grossed out by (I don't know what the part is named in English, but it is connected to the brakes of the engine) that stick-like thing on his bufferbeam being wet from whatever the confessor did to him. I drew an over-exaggerated comical pic of a horrified Peter Sam getting his face licked by his driver, who had an enormous tongue. I also did a couple of manips. Mostly maniping engine faces on humans, like the one where Gordon's face is on a less than fit guy flailing his shirt around, and the Arlesdale smallies' faces on a movie poster from Magic Mike. One with Mr.Conductor in a giant bun while Pinchy is applying ketchup on him, for a confession about eating him, I think? I've done some more, but I forgot what it was, I only know I loved making them comical rather than erotic, as I saw the blog as a joke overall.

I HAVE also drawn aheago faces on engines because it looks hilarious. Though I have only drawn them on my OCs and the NRS engines, not TTTE characters.

Point is I have never drawn genitalia on trains. Ever. And I likely never will. It's not THAT much fun drawing NSFW stuff.

I see from this screenshot that a certain MK-Instrumentalist claim that all my personal art is age-regression art and infantilism…

Whose art have you been looking at? Because it's definitely not mine. I have drawn a couple of baby/chibi diesels… But claiming that all of my 700 or so artworks are depicting infantilism and age-regression stuff? I suggest people go have a look for themselves. I haven't drawn that. That MK-guy has been desperately trying to cancel me for ages for reasons only himself know. I don't even know the guy, and he doesn't know me, yet he wants to see me beheaded. Go figure.

I was for a long time bothered by some age-regressor on Tumblr who just wouldn't leave me alone with their weird asks, who tried to force themselves on me and some other artists here. They claim age-regression isn't a fetish, but the shit they sent to my askbox certainly looked like a fetish to me.

I don't want anything to do with that stuff. It weirds me out.

And no. I have never drawn pedophilia or rape art either. This guy can't even make up his mind on which one to accuse me of.

7 and 8. Faking suicide and having the audacity to survive and go on living.

As many know, after the intense shitstorm against me last summer, thanks to Darin, I attempted suicide. I didn't succeed as my husband came home early. I was gone for a few days but returned when a young boy reached out to me for help as he was being groomed and didn't know who else to turn to.

Recently I saw a screenshot where someone claimed me to have faked suicide, and that I just came back after a few days when everything had died down.

Wow.

I am truly sorry I survived.

I don't remember much from those days to be honest, but as the load became too heavy and the bullying too intense, piling up on 30 years of old trauma… I decided to end it. I must warn you guys who might get triggered now; there are detailed descriptions of a suicide attempt. Proceed with caution. People told me I was a bad mother among other things, having had those same thoughts myself (according to my husband, I am a good mom) and people just confirming them, I thought that my daughter would be better off growing up without me. I could have chosen a more effective suicide method, but I was afraid my daughter would be the first to find me, so I wanted it to be clean and look like I was just sleeping. That way it could be explained as natural causes.

So, I decided to overdose on pills. I downed all pills I could find in the house that had a warning triangle on it (strong pain meds etc.) and then went to my computer to delete my online existence, especially the personal data.

As a former paramedic, I should have known better. Because after half an hour, my body started reacting. But not the way I had hoped and wanted. I started retching and almost vomiting. That's when my husband came home from work and found me. He immediately saw the empty packages and knowing my past suicidal tendencies, he reacted instinctively. He put his fingers down my throat and had me puke everything up, then he called an ambulance and had me admitted to the hospital.

I don't remember anything from the days I spent there. But I have been told they emptied my stomach and gave me lots of fluids. I was then assigned a psychiatrist which I am still seeing today.

I was gone for those days because I was in hospital, not because I was pulling some kind of trick and pretending to have ended myself.

So… I am sorry I "faked" my suicide.

I'm sorry my husband saved me. I am sorry the medics and doctors succeeded in saving my life.

I am sorry I survived and proceeded to live on. If I ever make another attempt, I promise to do better.

Why are you guys so persistent in trying to push people to suicide anyway? Do you get a kick out of it? Why do people have to be pushed to that point before you care?

What did we tell our daughter? Simply that I got sick and had to go to the hospital. She took that well.

I've seen a lot of people wonder why I am still around. Why shouldn't I? Does my daughter deserve to lose her mother over some online crap she doesn't even know about? I owe her to live and watch her grow up, to help her with her homework and whatever else a parent needs to do. I also owe my husband to stay by his side, like I promised him the day we got married. Even if I do not wish to live.

I'm sorry I survived, guys. Really, I am.

9. "Making up" my past trauma to justify writing fics to cope with it. And 1. The Stepney fic and glorifying rape.

First… why would anyone make up trauma? It's not like it's a competition to have the worst life, is it?

Sadly, I don't have to make up anything. My life HAS been rocky up until the birth of my daughter. I have been through so much trauma I couldn't even fathom it myself before my therapist listed it all up to me. Until then, I had just been casually talking to her about it, like I would talk about the weather. I didn't cry or get in touch with my emotions even once while telling everything, because I was taught from an early age to never complain, to suck it up and go on. So, no matter what people did to me, I would just smile and go on, even if it killed me inside. I did not want to show any sign of weakness, because then they would attack me. A habit I developed through years of being bullied in school. Never show feelings, just pretend nothing could hurt you, then they would eventually grow tired of it and stop.

Except they never did. They kept going through all my years at school. To such an extent, my boyfriend didn't dare to show himself hanging out with me out of fear of being bullied himself… And as we grew older, he would start cheating on me too. And I kept smiling…

My next boyfriend was a bit older than me, and while that didn't bother me, as we were both well over legal age, it bothered him. We only lasted one year before he bailed out and ditched me out of the blue via an sms.

The next guy… was the one who scarred me for life. Both physically and mentally. A charmer at first of course, until I was trapped. He was unemployed, so he moved in with me, and I paid for everything from food to phone bills. All while he was dating several women behind my back, calling various pay-phone services and in general acted like a manwhore. As I worked as an electrician (also being subject to massive bullying and sexual harassment at work), he would be jealous of all my co-workers and if I ever came home late or worked overtime, he accused me of cheating and was extremely violent about it. He would also isolate me from my friends and family, making me think I couldn't get any other than him. If any of my male friends (almost all my friends are male…) came over, he would give me such hell afterwards, it was easier just to tell them it was a bad time to visit. And after a while, they stopped asking. This guy also demanded sex. Every single day. If I refused, he would punish me, mostly by flogging me with lampcords, belts or whatever else he had at hand. My back is a criss cross map of old, faded scars even now nearly 20 years later. I would have shown you a photo, but I am so self-concious about my body after all the bullying, I hardly even show my face in photos. Maybe one day… but I certainly need more therapy before being able to show naked skin to strangers, even if it's just my back. So I had non-consensual sex with him more often than consensual. It has taken me hours in therapy to even take the word in my mouth and call it by its proper name: rape. I was raped, almost every single day for little over a year, before I found the strength to break out of the relationship and finally throw him out of my house. It all ended when I found some revealing texts on his cellphone, which he was extremely protective of… Texts that revealed that he had engaged in a relationship with a 12 year old girl, and it had been going on for a while. Not only was he cheating on me, but he was a pedophile too. Needless to say, I didn't even let him pack his stuff before I fetched my shotgun and chased him out of the house. I don't know where I got the courage and strength from… but I was furious.

I thought I had gotten rid of him, but no. He started stalking me in public. Hiding behind shelves when I was shopping, his car following mine everywhere I went. I received weird letters in the mail with cut-out letters from newspapers, glued together. On top of all, his creepy, old uncle called me with some rather disgusting suggestions and tried to come on to me really hard. I had to change my phone number, and after coming home to my house and finding out someone had entered my home using a key, only to empty the drawer of my night table, I also had to change the locks of my doors as he had clearly copied the key.

He didn't stop until I got the police involved.

So, when I finally met the guy who would become my husband (or rather, we found out we were made for each other, we had known each other since we were 11 years old), I had major trust issues towards men especially and it took him endless patience and love to break me out of that shell.

But the trauma doesn't stop… or start there.

In the year 2000, on January 4th, I would experience something that made me unable to even look at a train for over 10 years. The Åsta accident (google it). I was a volunteer in the Norwegian Red Cross then, and a paramedic in training. Back then, you were allowed to start training the year you would turn 16. So, I was still 15 when I witnessed the most traumatic event of my life. The day started out calm, we were stocking up the ambulance after delivering a patient to the hospital when we got a call with the code "500", which means "catastrophe". Normally when we get that code it is a rehearsal… so we drove towards the coordinates with the thoughts that this was just an exercise, nothing real… we didn't prepare ourselves mentally… And we ended up in the closest thing to hell I have ever been… The sight of the burning trains, the smells, the sounds, the screaming… I still wake up by nightmares to this day. Though the moment that haunts me the most is when the screaming stopped… because we all knew why… I don't want to go into details, but 19 people died that day. But we also saved 67 people. I try to hold on to that thought. The age limit for starting paramedic training was raised after this, as I wasn't the only one who was too young for an accident of that scale. Today it is 18. A memorial stone has been placed on the site, but I still haven't been able to bring myself to visit it, even if we drive past the site every year on our way to visit family further north in the country. I needed hours of therapy to even be able to ride a train after this. To have gotten to the point where I now volunteer at a heritage railway and is in training to become a driver, is a HUGE step for me. My next goal is to visit the site of the accident.

On to next trauma… A previous employer, a rather large electric company in Norway, whom I worked for 8 years. The first five years were great, we were a close-knit bunch of electricians, and we had a great relationship with the bosses and higher-ups. Our labor union was strong.

It all started changing in 2009 when we got new leaders… and those decided to get rid of everyone who were a member of the union. One by one, they started harassing workers in various ways, trying to get them to quit. In Norway, they need a legal reason to fire you, it's not enough to not like someone. There has to be a good reason to fire someone e.g. theft, neglecting work… Since they didn't have any reasons to fire us, they started making our work lives gradually harder and harder until we would break and find another job. Sadly, one of my co-workers couldn't stand the pressure… He bid us all farewell as normal one Friday and hung himself the following day.. But as I was a girl in a male-dominated profession, I had been taught at an early stage to ignore anything that would hurt me emotionally, just arch my neck and plow through. I kept doing that, despite starting to feel more and more mental and physical pains… even my co-workers pointed out how I was being mistreated before I acknowledged it myself. I tried to tell my boss, but he reacted by treating me worse. So, I went to his boss… and that's when things went to hell. Instead of doing his job and listen, he started harassing me too. He deemed my over-weight a problem, and he started demanding I gave him detailed lists of what I ate and how much I worked out… Completely illegal of course, but by this point I was broken down to the point I thought I was useless and couldn't get another job… so I accepted. He started accusing me of lying about my exercise, so I started training at the gym in the basement at work instead. One day, while I was there, he locked the doors and turned the lights off. There were no windows, no cellphone reception and hardly anyone walking by in that part of the building… I sat there in the pitch dark for 3 hours before I was let back out. I still get badly triggered by narrow, dark rooms and rooms with no windows. To such an extent, I jumped out of a small window on the second floor of a gym when I was in boot camp. I was allowed to train downstairs in the bigger gym with windows on all walls after that incident…

The harassment at work went on for years until I finally snapped, ended up at the hospital and got into therapy for the first time. I don't want to go into depth about what more happened, I just can't… I can't bring myself to write it all. Luckily, I had gotten more education while working, so when I graduated, another company called and gave me an offer I just couldn't refuse. So, I quit my job and never looked back, even if the traumas I suffered there still haunts me to this day.

Sadly, even after switching jobs, now getting a safe job with sane leaders… I started to relax, and that's when all my past trauma came washing over me. And one day, on while driving to work, I had my first serious panic attack. It started as this feeling I used to have at the old company; getting sick to my stomach and having the sense of someone being out to get me… then it developed to breathing problems… and I had to pull the car over. I broke into tears, struggling to breathe, stumbling out of the car to read the logo on its side just to reassure my body and brain that I worked for a different company now and there was no reason for panic. I called my boss and let him know, because he also was a "refugee" from that other company, so he knew what me and several others had gone through. He managed to talk me down enough for me to come to the office to talk to him. That helped.

I got back into therapy. A better therapist this time. But sadly, it got apparent that I could no longer work as an electrician as there was too many triggers. I was diagnosed with PTSD, severe depression, and social anxiety. I'm still working on these and get better slowly.

I have been in therapy for a long time now, and it was my therapist that suggested I wrote fics to cope and "write it out". I tried to make up my own characters for this, but never felt any connection. I was by this time in the TTTE fandom and had met people with similar trauma and pasts like myself, and I started roleplaying with some of them. Me and a girl from UK then agreed to try to rp/co-write a fic to cope with our trauma. We both found it easier to write about pre-established characters we had a connection to, even if it was an au that made it barely recognizable from the original source material. Only the names and some minor things were similar.

That fic was Stepney's Virginity Gets Lost.

Do we regret writing it? No. It helped us write out our traumas and helped us overcome some mental obstacles in out therapy process. Our therapists cheering us on, because we finally managed to break through the hard shell surrounding us. We both cried for the first time in years while writing it, some of it through roleplay, because some parts were extremely graphic and brutal and very mentally exhausting. We had to take long breaks between each writing session, so the fic wasn't written in just a weekend. But we got a lot of darkness out of our minds by writing all this. And we were definitely NOT aroused by it, like this pervert here claims.

It's when you dare to touch and feel the difficult and dark emotions, you can finally move along in the grieving process.

Should it have been posted online?

In retrospect, no. But at the time, we thought it might help other trauma victims, as we also found reading about other people's experiences and fictions touching painful subjects helpful to ourselves. So, we posted it, never expecting it to cause such a controversy 3 years later. In fact, we had more or less forgotten about it until it came back to bit us in the ass. Or rather, bite ME in the ass, as I am getting the full blame alone.

Also, despite what people claim, it was not posted openly for children to read. It was tagged properly and hidden behind mature content walls. If a minor chooses to break that wall, that's not the author's fault. It's the same as watching a movie with an age restriction way above your age, not the filmmaker's fault.

I think MerciResolution puts it nicely here:

"If your problem lies with you KNOWINGLY entering adult spaces when you’re a minor, ignoring all mature warnings that are literally SCREAMING at you “hey, this is what you’re getting into. Are you sure you want to proceed?”

That’s ENTIRELY on you. YOU are the fucking problem.

We’re marking mature things as best as we properly can. If you decide to ignore them, that’s your own damn fault. We’re not your fucking babysitters."

Also, I never posted the story on Wattpad, so if anyone has done that, it's not me. I posted the story on Fanfiction.net, DeviantArt and AO3, that's all. If it's posted anywhere else, it's not done by me.

I had honestly moved on from it when people pulled me back into it.

Other people who have done questionable shit in that fandom are easily forgiven because "they have moved on" or "changed". Yet, nobody believes I can move on or change…?

I had moved on; my interests had changed. But people won't let me, so here I am… Having to defend some crap I did years ago. A fic I no longer have any interest in.

I'm not even interested in TTTE anymore. I have moved on with my own book project now and I would like to focus on that.

So, deleting my TTTE content, whether it was the SFW or NSFW stuff, didn't cost me a penny. It actually felt like a relief. The only downside with it is that people now can't read it and make up their own opinion about it, but will solely believe in what others say, and those things are often seriously bent out of shape and blown out of proportions to such an extent it's barely recognizable.

If people claim that Arry and Bert rape Stepney in the fic, they have never seen it or read it. That's not what happens. That's just an assumption made by looking at the title and knowing there is a rape/torture scene in it. But I'm not gonna tell who the victim is or who performed it, because this is the only way I am able to tell who has actually read the fic or not, who is just trying to spread bullshit and who is actually telling the truth. The person in that screenshot, has no idea what he's talking about.

Does SVGL romanticize rape and abuse?

No, not in the least. It's described as the horrible, heinous acts it is and is in no way meant to be cute or romantic and definitely NOT something anyone should get off to. If anyone finds it sexy, that's their problem, not the authors'. If anything, SVGL might romanticize suicide, because one of the characters isn't able to cope with his trauma and chooses to end their life. Which is something I considered doing myself when I was in the darkest pit of depression. So, I apologize for maybe romanticizing suicide. The following chapters describe how friends and family handle the loss and grief.

It also describes a toxic relationship, where one of the parts struggles to get out of it. They eventually manage to break free, but it is not easy. This can easily be translated to my previously mentioned relationship, as it was my way of writing out my experience about how hard it is to break out of a relation when your partner has broken you down to the point where you no longer believe in yourself and your self-worth.

The last chapters start to gradually become brighter, as both our lives started getting better too. But we never really wrote the end because we both lost interest in writing TTTE content by that time and just left it hanging.

I'm not the only one who has written NSFW TTTE fanfics out there. But it seems like violence and murder is more acceptable than sexual things? I do wonder how brutally mutilating children's show characters are more tolerable than sexually abusing them. Neither should be okay.

Some content creators hide behind "it was a joke". I have been told that such topics that SVGL touches upon shouldn't be joked about… so I didn't do that, and yet it was wrong? So how should such topics be treated? Be hidden like it's a shame, like in the old days when rape victims were told to suck things up and keep it to themselves? When those subject to abuse didn't dare to speak up because people would judge them?

I think it is important to talk about these subjects and why they are so problematic. Victims shouldn't have to hide their trauma; they should be allowed to talk openly about it without fearing judgement.

Some of you claim that writing isn't a good way to cope… You're trying to dictate how trauma victims deal with their trauma, and that's a dangerous path to walk down. Nobody handles trauma the same way. You might have your thoughts on how you would react, but you'll never know until trauma hits you… and you might not react the way you had expected or planned. Trauma messes with your head and you won't be able to think clearly. It makes you do thinks you normally wouldn't have done and can make you act out of character. So, do not judge people without having been in the same situation yourself. Ever.

Someone wrote that I have "more problems that just a rape".

Read that again.

Just a rape.

This person does not know how damaging a rape can be. And if you made it this far in this post, you know I didn't only go through one, but several. Not just by my ex, but also being ambushed while I was walking home from a party, and later; a co-worker forcing himself onto me at a building site. I can't go into depth about them all, I just can't.

Just a rape…

"Just" the feeling of not being in control of your own body and your own decisions. "Just" being robbed off your dignity and self-worth. "Just" having someone intrude into your private zone, tear your clothes off and claim your body against your will. "Just" feeling how your life force leave you as you realize that fighting against it won't help you, and you silently give up and just lay down waiting for it all to be over. "Just" spending hours in the shower, scrubbing your skin until you bleed because you can't wash the filth away and you keep feeling dirty no matter how much you clean yourself. "Just" waking up at night, after having relived the scene again in a nightmare. "Just" looking over your shoulder wherever you walk because you heard something or thought you saw something or simply because someone is walking behind you. "Just" the fact that you'll never feel comfortable walking alone at night again or have someone walk behind you. "Just" never being able to relax because your body constantly think you're in grave danger. "Just" a rape…

That's such a neck-beard thing to say. Someone who clearly think of other people's bodies as property or things. Not taking into consideration that we are living, breathing individuals with feelings. And that having another person violate us isn't something we like or that we'll easily get over. We want to choose who we give ourselves to, nobody should be forced. We didn't ask to be raped. We didn't want it. We didn't like it.

Rape is trauma.

Yes, we should have chosen other characters for the story, but we did what we did, and it cannot be undone now. So, if the only thing I will be remembered for in the fandom is that ONE fic, instead of all my other content, that's what it will be. That's what people chose to. I'm moving on.

10. Being a nazi for being interested in WW2 history and for being Norwegian and having so-called nazi-letters in my last name (actual letters of the Norwegian alphabet).

*sigh*

This is something that could only happen in America, isn't it?

Some people don't bother educating themselves. The "nazi-letters" you guys are talking about is actually part of the Norwegian alphabet and has nothing to do with Nazism or white-supremacy to do at all. The Norwegian alphabet has 29 letters, the three extra is æ,ø,å or in capital letters: Æ,Ø,Å.

We can't help it if some morons over in the US abuse these letters as symbol of their twisted mindset.

Yes, my name contains one of those letters. It is my name… and I didn't choose it. It is a common Norwegian name.

As for me being a Nazi?

Those who knows me knows that I am as far from a Nazi as one can get. I despise Nazism with all my heart.

But the reason some people choose to believe so… was that some guy who has no hobbies or life went through every single fave I've made on DeviantArt since I joined the site in 2006, which is well over 20000 faves. And he found a few Nazi-characters from a web series I was following about ten years ago. I am very interested in history and especially WW2-history, so I found that particular web-series interesting and faved some artwork related to it. What this guy failed to notice is that I also faved the Allied characters… That's ALL there is to that story.

I has also faved a pic someone made of Joseph Goebbels (I think it was?) as a Pixar Car. That's not because I have any nazi-sympathies, but I simply found the concept of turning historical persons, both good and bad, into Cars as an interesting project. I would have faved any other historical Carsified person as well.

As for me being a Norwegian and have a natural pale complexion, that's not something I can help. That's nothing I choose. And it doesn't make me racist or Nazi. Period.

11. Putting a white-supremacist flag (the actual flag of Norway) on my porch on family birthdays and our national day.

Again. Get educated.

This flag… is the actual flag of my country. The Kingdom of Norway.

There is nothing Nazi about it. It is not a symbol of white-supremacy. IT IS THE FLAG OF NORWAY.

During WW2 it was even illegal, so people would paint it everywhere in a protest against the Nazi-occpation and the SS. We even decorated our Christmas trees with it, and that is a tradition that has followed us into the modern day.

Again, if some idiots in the US choose to use it as a symbol for their disgusting logic, it is not Norway or the Norwegians' fault.

12. Being a danger to my daughter.

I need people to elaborate here.

What exactly do you think I do to my daughter? What is the cause of your concern here?

The fact that I have made NSFW content? How is that harmful to her as long as I keep it away from her? You DO realize that even authors, pornstars and moviemakers have children and that they can be good parents, right?

Do you think I read pornographic content for her as bedtime stories? Or show her porn instead of kids TV? How sick are you guys, really…?

Some people even wanted CPS to take my child away from me… Have a look at these screenshots…

You want a happy, healthy, innocent child to be taken away from a stable, safe home with loving parents just because you don't like the content the mother made? You want her to be placed in foster care, where there is no guarantee that she will have a happy upbringing rather than have her stay with her parents who love her and care for her, for reasons she'll never understand and wasn't even aware of?

"Think of the children!" a lot of you say when it comes to my content. May I ask why this doesn't apply to my daughter?

Why do some of you go as far as to wishing her dead or wanting her to be removed from the home she feels safe and loved in? How is that thinking of the children?

As for the douchebag in that screenshot. You claim that if your mother did something like that you would want nothing to do with her… I have a question: Do you know EVERYTHING your mother do? Does she include you in each aspect of her life? Even her sexual life? No?

How do you know she doesn't do thing you don't approve of when you're not around? She could be a rabid pornmag reader for all you know. But stuff like that is something adults hide from their kids. So, you wouldn't know, unless you go snooping around in her business.

Everyone is entitled to privacy. What I and my husband do when our kid is not around is our business, not hers, and certainly not yours.

Porn and parenting are to be kept separate from each other. Period.

And we do.

There is absolutely no reason to be worried about my daughter. She is a happy, healthy child in a safe, stable home with family that loves her and cares for her. Not just me and my husband, but also grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins.

If you want to remove her from that over a stupid fanfic behind a mature content wall, you're the deranged person, not me.

This is all I have to say about all this and my time in the TTTE fandom. I have left by my own, free will. Yes, I am aware that many people don't want me there. That's fine. I don't want to be there.

I am a bit disappointed in those people who just blindly unfollowed me and unfriended me without any questions asked, just followed the leader. Big users tend to dictate who and what is worth following in that fandom. They will even protect real predators, but I'm not going to open that can of worms now. I'm done with the fandom.

Some of those people, I have been talking to regularly, even supported when they faced hardships in the fandom themselves. But when I got in trouble, they ditched me without a word…

If anything, this whole ordeal showed me who to trust and not, and who were true to their word when it came to how deep our friendship was. True friends at least give you the chance to explain before they drop you. I hold no ill feelings to those who did, at least they asked me before judging.

And those who still stayed with me, are the ones who truly know me and who I really am.

Some of the worst libels posted about me might be reported to the police, but I haven't made up my mind yet. I am not mentally strong at the moment, so I don't know if I have the strength to legally follow it all up. I will ask the cops at work for advice on the matter.

All I ask for now is some peace.

You don't have to like me. You don't have to follow me. You don't have to like my content. Feel free to invalidate me, I know a lot of you will.

But please, stop bullying me and my family.

Please stop sending me horrid messages and death threats.

Please stop doxxing me and calling me.

Please leave my family alone. If you don't care about me, at least care about them.

Please just ignore me. I have already left the fandom, there is no reason to keep hunting me.

I just want to move on and go on with my life and the content I am currently working on. After years in therapy, my life has gotten better, and I want to move on.

Please let me.

#good bye to ttte #tw//suicide #tw//rape #tw// bullying #tw//depression #tw//ptsd #tw//ttte #tw//sex #tw//abuse #tw//domestic abuse #I'm done

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scientific-tricorder · 3 years ago

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"If Wishes Were Horses" through an aromantic/a-spec Bashir lens because it works out surprisingly well for an episode for which Bashir's legacy is having his sexual fantasy come to life for everyone to see.

So this is the one where everyone's imaginations come to life by aliens essentially playacting (to explore the concept of imagination and make first contact or something). Bashir's imagination-turned-to-life is a version of Dax utterly besotted with him. Which sure sounds like he is very romantically/sexually interested in Dax, if this version of her is being pulled from straight from his imagination. But I argue that that isn't what's actually happening.

One key point for this is the idea that the manifestations don't come straight from our character's imagination, but rather what they say/other things outside of the characters' minds that the aliens can access (namely computer records; Sisko even explicitly says that's where the aliens' info might have come from). O'Brien summons Rumplestiltskin - when he is explicitly telling Molly a story about Rumplestiltskin, so the alien playing the role just goes off of the story. Jake Sisko summons Buck Bokai, a long dead baseball player, who starts as a character on the holodeck and has memories and knowledge programmed into the hologram character. The thoron emissions and corresponding scientific catastrophe seems to start from Dax theorizing about ship traffic and then everyone building on with theories. We don't know who the Promenade ones that Odo tries herding come from. Quark summons a pair of scantily-clad ladies (who at one point disappear only to reappear once he describes them), Odo summons Quark in a security cell, and Kira summons a horrifying vision of someone burning to death in a fire (one of these things is not like the others, but that's a different discussion). We don't explicitly see these characters talking about what they summon before they appear, but it's still possible that it happened off screen or that it comes from accessing computer files.

With that concept as background, let's look at Bashir's interactions with his summoned fantasy.

The teaser features Bashir trying to flirt with Dax and initiate a romantic relationship over dinner, with her politely refusing and pointing out his recent pursuit of two other women. So here we have Bashir speaking aloud what he ends up summoning: a Dax interested in him as a romantic partner. As well as this going after any woman thing, which under this reading is the usual over-exaggerated playacting of romantic interests.

When this imaginary Dax (Dax #2) does appear, it's while Bashir is sleeping (looks like he just fell asleep when studying given the padd and him being in full uniform). The moment he wakes up, he is, well, not at all interested, and pointedly constantly leaning away from her advances. She keeps trying to kiss him, and instead of reciprocating, he talks to avoid it (can't reach lips if they're constantly moving) and pulls out his tricorder as an excuse to completely pull away, sometimes physically pushing Dax #2 away from him. He only reciprocates after she asks why he's fighting this, he asks himself the same question twice, and can't come up with a good answer. And as soon as Kira calls senior officers to ops, he immediately breaks it off and deflects the whole thing by calling it a joke.

Once they're in ops, Bashir appears distinctly uninterested in and uncomfortable around Dax #2. And when she says that she must have come out of his imagination? A confused look, almost as if a Dax besotted with him isn't anything he had been imagining.

[Image description: Screenshot from the episode, showing Dax and Bashir in profile from the shoulders up, looking at each other, with ops in the background. Dax, who is on the left, has a hand on Bashir's shoulder and is smiling at him. Bashir, on the right, has his mouth slightly open and eyebrows down, as if confused.]

(That screenshot is immediately followed by a shocked Bashir when Dax #2 goes in for a kiss)

And this discomfort and disinterest continues throughout almost the entire rest of the episode. The one time he isn't? At the end when Dax #2 is injured and becomes a patient, and he goes into Doctor Mode.

Admittedly, most of Bashir's avoidance behavior could be explained by him not wanting to play out sexual fantasies in front of his coworkers, embarrassment and humiliation that that is what his imagination conjured, and not wanting to take advantage of a Dax clearly behaving abnormally, but wouldn't someone genuinely interested in pursuing a romantic relationship have a bit more positive of a reaction? At some point, other than the one time when he tries to come up with a reason why not and can't? I mean, if one wants something, why would they be starting from a default position of refusing it and need to think and convince themselves that they don't have a good enough reason to refuse? And at that point he believes her to be Dax, supposedly a literal dream come true, and since it occurs right after waking up, for all he knows, it is an actual dream.

Now, this is definitely not the intended reading because the writers absolutely meant this to be direct imagination coming to life story and show a Bashir obsessed with Dax. But since when do we have to limit ourselves to the intended reading.

#Star Trek #DS9 #If Wishes Were Horses #Julian Bashir #Bashir #Queer!Bashir #a-spec!Bashir #analysis #Disclaimer that for me being aro is not understanding what romantic attraction even is and am thus conflating split attractions here #And reading facial expressions is definitely not my forte #I am rather a fan of the a-spec Bashir headcanon because #A. Projection (we always like to think of our favorite characters as being similar to ourselves)#B. I think it does work well with some of Bashir's later storylines (you know what I'm talking about if you've watched through DS9)#C. It helps explain all his creepy behavior towards women early on in the series (although still not justifying it)#I've also become weirdly interested in looking at all these early episodes with hindsight about what we learn about the characters later on #and seeing what the writers turned into accidental foreshadowing (which was a thing they did) and what they ignored/forgot about #Tricorder log

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whitehotharlots · 4 years ago

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...About that CJR piece that said we need more censorship

A few days ago, I wrote a review of a Columbia Journalism Review piece that called for greater censorship of the Substack platform. I don’t think I quite articulated what I was going for. The CJR article disturbed me greatly, and since it’s still getting praised--sometimes even from writers I respect--I feel it’s worth discussing a bit more.

The CJR piece was not disturbing because of its conclusions. As I noted, those were entirely predictable. It was upsetting instead because of its form and its author. It was not written by a liberal Biden apologist. Its author is Clio Chang, a strong writer with a history of pieces that support the Sanders campaign and left-material goals such as Medicare for All. The fact that someone of this pedigree could receive near-universal praise for a piece such as this should terrify you.

The form of the piece is now commonplace among leftist writing. It inverts older essay forms by using a (correct) diagnosis of structural issues as a narrative framing device, while the actual analysis and its pursuant suggestions for remediation come from a myopic focus upon individual experience. This gives the piece a general feeling of left-materialism while in effect it’s nothing more than a personal narrative.

In this case, the structural narrative device is a description of the terrifying state of writing and journalism in an age of speculative capital. The media landscape looks bleak, and with the passage of Proposition 22 (supported strongly by Kamala Harris’ brother in law) making it even easier for tech companies to classify workers as “contractors,” the future looks even bleaker. This is a very important and correct reading of our current moment. Crucially, however, Chang does not translate this reading into analysis. The actionable aspects of her essay come instead from an in-depth profile of a single Substack newsletter called Coronavirus News For Black Folks (CNFBF). And it’s within this analysis that we can suss out the insidiousness of this form of new leftist writing.

Chang is hugely sympathetic toward CNFBF and its founder, Patrice Peck. She describes Peck’s long, stressful workweeks and personal sacrifices, and implies some sort of scandal to the fact that the newsletter is not among one of the very highest earners on the platform. This obscures the fact that, at least by the details provided in this piece, CNFBF appears to be successful. Chang mentions that the newsletter had achieved over 2000 subscribers within its first few months--translated at 5 dollars per reader per month, that’s a pretty impressive amount of money for someone’s newly founded passion project. Chang, however, fails to mention whether or not the subscribers are paying, and she doesn’t provide more recent information in regards to the newsletter’s readership figures. This is an intentional move. New left writing is marked by an obscurantist tendency that encourages exaggerated statements of harm at the individual level against a mere background of structural critique, implying illogically that the latter must be addressed primarily at the level of the former.

Centering the analytical frame at the individual level guarantees that pressing social problems will always be misdiagnosed, which in turn guarantees that no efforts will be undertaken that might actually reform these horrible structures. This type of dishonest obscurantism has been so widely adopted because it has to be, as it’s the only way to make contemporary identity politics (or intersectionality) appear politically viable. Since failing to make perfunctory nods toward identity politics can get a person labeled a racist (or a sexist, or a bro) and render them unpublishable, this type of writing is now all but mandatory. Unless, of course, writers step outside the editorial process and publish somewhere like, say, Substack... and, ahh, here’s the problem.

Chang’s piece removes her readers’ focus from structural problems such as media consolidation, the perverse valuation systems inherent in speculative capital, and the fact that our one supposedly “liberal” party is 100% in the pocket of Silicon Valley cocksuckers. These issues are gestured toward in the piece, but ultimately ignored. The problem that we must address instead is the fact that one particular newsletter, though successful, isn’t successful enough. Chang implies (again, part of the obscurantism--these solutions are always implied, because stating them directly makes their absurdity too apparent) that the reason this particular crisis exists is due to the platform publishing too many conservatives and white male leftists. Their presence on the platform [might] make creators and readers of color feel unsafe, which is why they are not the very most successful newsletters, which is why Substack faces a duty more to heavily police what these writers say--perhaps even banning the ones whose opinions are severely incorrect.

This approach to “left” analysis is impotent to the point of revanchism. It is based on an understanding of social forces that is as petty as it is logically indefensible. The only suggestions for reform that can ever be countenanced within this frame are the elimination of evil forces. The greater diversity of identity markers will lead to a perfect uniformity of ideology which will in turn lead, magically, to things getting better. Only, of course, they won’t actually get better. A dull child could suss that out. And that is why those who write in this manner must wrap their actual analysis and arguments in a paper thin cloak of leftish materialism; it’s why their demands that everyone else subscribe to their brand of impotence are made with such shrill and dishonest intensity.

Here we see the sad reality of the post-Sanders left. Intersectionality, with all its baggage of ineffectiveness and alienation obscured behind empty gestures toward materialism, has so completely burrowed its way into the heads of supposed leftists that no one has the capacity to interrogate it, let lone push back against it. Younger writers have more of a social conscience than previous generations--they’re more aware of the brutalities of this country, of their being denied the opportunities and comforts of the past, of the terrifying future of climate collapse being overseen by a combination of Silicon Valley surveillance and militarized, sociopathic police. But they have fully absorbed a worldview that prevents all hope of engaging with any of these issues productively.

Wokeness has triumphed absolutely. The goal of this social/ideological movement has always been to convince young people that they face a moral duty to perpetuate the worst aspects of the existing order. That’s why you see the left pressing for greater corporate control over speech. That’s why people think the only path to solidarity is to shunt away and ruin the lives of anyone who upsets them. That’s how creeps and freaks can bleat about the “radical safety” they feel during riots while simultaneously celebrating the murder of two black children who attempted to steal a car.

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jmtorres · 4 years ago

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writing meme! 7: What are you most proud of? 8: What is your biggest challenge? 11: Which character do you have the most in common with? 12: Which character do you have the least in common with? 19: Post a picture or gif that describes your WIP.

7. agh making me brag again??? umm, taking people on feels journeys? especially writing concepts or headcanons that people are like "I didn't think so but i can't unsee it now" 11. hmmmmmmm i once wrote a thing about how will brandt from recent Missions Impossible was a representation of functioning with depression that I related to. I'm trying to think, like, most characters are bigger and more ambitious and Do More Things than I am capable of, and I'm trying to think of what characters I might know that have... smaller more realistic lives. or whose adventures map to things I recognize. *scrolling through things I have written* you know what? Howl from Howl's moving castle. imaginative, creative, vain, impulsive, smart but "lazy", would happily adopt all my friends into my household, overextended, avoidant of my responsibilities, trying to deal with things in the background at the last minute instead of facing them head on, not entirely belonging to the world I inhabit, dyeing my hair and clothes frequently, found my life partner entirely by accident 12. lol idk see this is the thing *most* characters are much more driven than I am, that's what i was saying before. let's go with.... because she's currently onscreen as I'm watching FMB--Olivier Armstrong. she's WAYYY more high femme than I am, she's completely ruthless where I am a marshmallow, she holds grudges in a way I never could, she's a natural commander and I definitely am not. 19. i have been scrolling though knowyourmeme for FMA and i now have a selection:

[image description: screenshot of a tumblr entry with two images from Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood: Roy Mustang answering the phone "What do you want, Hughes? I'm working" and Hughes replying "Hi Working, I'm Dead" with commentary from three users saying: "which is worse: dad jokes or dead jokes?", "Dead dad jokes," and "I hate that i love this joke so much"]

for Bathtub Body

[image description: screenshot of Ed Elric and Roy Mustang with exaggerated/unrealistic angry expressions and sharp teeth (the anime sometimes draws characters in a simplified over the top form to show emotional reactions)]

Roy being forced to learn Ed's love language is yelling

[image description: fanart of Winry as Rosie the Riveter with the text: "Rockbell Automail. We can rebuild you, better, stronger, faster." artist signature texasuberalles on deviantart]

[image description: screenshot of Edward Elric, looking shocked with enormous eyes, in the middle of biting a sandwich, with the fake/added subtitle "*fullmetal boner*"]

Automale.

#wips #writing #fanfiction #FMAB

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coppicefics · 4 years ago

Photo

Masked Omens: Prologue

Read the fic here!

[Image Description: Image 1 - A simple rendition of the Masked Singer UK logo, a golden mask with colourful fragments flying off of it. The mask has a golden halo and a golden devil tail protruding from either side. Below, gold text reads 'Masked Omens'.

Image 2 - A scrapbook with two newspaper cuttings pasted in. Each has a date handwritten by it; the first reads ‘Tadfield Gazette, 24th July 2009′. The second reads ‘Toffley Courier, 10th August, 2009′. Full text transcription below cut. End ID.]

Tadfield Gazette, 24th July 2009

HIDDEN GEM: O’LEARY’S LATEST STUNS CRITICS Masterful casting highlights themes of innocence and fear against a background of domestic drama. [”What do you care, David? Maybe I’d rather he dream of monsters than wake alone, like me.” ~ Jane Winsome, Act 2, Scene 3] RUMOURS OF Colleen O’Leary’s retirement have been greatly exaggerated. While it’s true that in recent years her name has been conspicuously absent from the glossy playbills and bright posters of the West End, the Dublin-born playwright still has plenty to say. Her latest offering, Hidden, is on the surface a simple domestic drama about an upper middle class family with a young son. It follows their trials and tribulations through a single fraught year as ten year old Matthew (played by the talented young team of Warlock Dowling, Gert Johnson and Adam Young in rotation) questions his relationship with his parents, his nightmares, and ultimately the world around him. Anita Lovett is both adoring and adorable in her role as Matthew's mother Jane, while Oscar Williams fulfils the role of a baffled, slightly distant father as David Winsome. The cast is rounded out by Anthony Crowley, making a return to acting in the role of Ashton Storeth, Matthew's babysitter. What might have been a fairly pedestrian premise – a child becomes unsettled as his parents fail to find time for him – is elevated to new and sinister levels by Crowley's double role as both minder and monster; Matthew is plagued by nightmares of a dark creature that dwells beneath his bed, a creature that seems to have a lot in common with the mysterious Storeth. As Matthew's nightmares increase in both frequency and severity, strange events unfolding in the household lead the audience to question just how much of what they're seeing on stage is real. The script seems to demand introspection of its audience; how much can we ever really know about the world we live in or the people we invite into our homes, even trusting them with our most precious treasures, our children? And yet, ultimately, Storeth and the Nightmare have more meaningful interactions with young Matthew than either of his parents. It's a thought-provoking piece with an ending that must be seen and not spoiled. All in all, a triumphant return to the stage for both O'Leary and Crowley, who seem to have come determined to prove themselves and done so admirably. Hidden is now booking until September 30th this year; for venue information and to book tickets, visit www.hiddenuktour.com.

Lots Donated To Charity Fundraiser WITH PREPARATIONS well underway for the Anna and Eve Foundation’s upcoming auction, it seems there are still more celebrities prepared to offer up their most prized possessions for a good cause. The latest announcement of items going under the hammer includes: The upright piano played in the drawing room scene in The Grasswater Affair, kindly donated by Celestireel A flaming sword used in the original magic act of The Amazing Mr Fell, as seen on last year's Royal Variety Performance, with personal instruction in its use from the magician himself A signed drumskin and drumsticks used by Queen drummer, Roger Taylor A Nike Total 90 Omni football signed by every member of this year’s league-topping Tadfield FC squad The stunning faux-diamond necklace worn by Angela Crowley in the 2003 film More than a Memory, contributed by Pace Productions (newspaper cuts off here)

An advert for the Four Horse Inn is also cut off at the bottom of the cutting.

Toffley Courier, 10th August 2009

Toffley Gate Protests Planned [Uriel Scrolle, Reporter] When Lawrence Richmond was elected as MP for Toffley South, it was partly on the strength of his campaign promise to invest in building affordable housing for local people. Sure enough, within a year of his election, his flagship development had been completed. Having opened its doors in 2006, Toffley Gate is a towering edifice of concrete and glass, boasting over 300 individual homes, most of which are luxury apartments – but many of them still stand empty. Now local housing campaigners are calling for lower rents to be imposed on these unoccupied units in a bid to open them up to local people who cannot afford the current rates. (Continued below.) [Image: A large, modern block of flats in yellowed black-and-white newsprint. End ID.] [Caption] The Toffley Gate development, pictured shortly after completion. Local housing activists say the affordable housing they were promised has never been provided. Photo: Daniel Brubaker on Unsplash. [End caption.]

Local Theatre Reports Record Sales for O'Leary's 'Hidden' Masterpiece: Former 'Kilcridhe' star steals show with moving performance [Citron Deux-Cheval, Arts Critic] Greater Deville’s Inferion Theatre has long struggled to fill seats as the rise of commuting in the town has left residents with far les [sic] time and money to spend on the town’s recreational offerings. It relies, therefore, on the continued patronage of those who are able to attend regularly, and on the rare piece of theatre that causes its audiences to insist friends and family go along and watch, too. This week, it reported its highest ticket sales for a single show in over ten years for the Saturday night showing of Hidden, a new play from veteran playwright Colleen O’Leary. Naturally, I had to go along and see what all the fuss was about, and I was glad I did. Hidden is a deep, dark exploration of the psyche masquarading [sic] as a simple drama about two unhappily married parents and their neglected child. While the story of David and Jane Winsome (Oscar Williams and Anita Lovett respectively) and their strained marriage is compelling, with painful betrayals and soft, poignant moments aplenty, it’s their son Matthew who steals the show, along with his au pair, Ashton Storeth, played to perfection by Anthony Crowley (once a familiar face on our television screens as heart-throb Father Jacob MacCleod in Kilcridhe). On the night I attended, Matthew Winsome was portrayed by eleven year-old Gert Johnson, one of three children who take turns in the role. For such a young boy to take on such a complex role is a very tall order, but Johnson more than rose to the challenge, demonstrating a thorough understanding of the mix of fear and adoration with which Matthew regards Ashton. In scenes with his mother and father, Matthew is quiet and respectful, almost withdrwan - but opposite Crowley, who plays the double roles of Ashton and The Nightmare, he becomes expressive and unspoken, loud in his anger, his fear and, yes, his love. Crowley, too, gives an incredible double-edged performance as warm, gentle Ashton and the silent, sinister presence that lurks beneath his charge’s bed - perhaps drawing on his own inner demons to lend authenticity to the role. Hidden is a play that leaves much open to interpretation: whether The Nightmare is real or imagined, what, if anything, it has to do with Ashton, and what the surprising ending means for the family. It’s a play to get you thinking, and I highly recommend you go along. Hidden is playing at the Infernion until August 15th. Contact the Box Office on 01632 496055 to book.

#masked omens #good omens fic #image transcription #fanfiction #transcript #very much fake news #fanart #MO prologue

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ladyseaheart1668 · 4 years ago

Text

Endless Summer Book 4: Daughter of Vaanu (Chapter 52)

Description: As Alodia and Diego flee toward Northbridge, Zahra makes an astonishing discovery

Tagging: @endlesshero1122 @mysteli @feartheendlesssummer @whatmcsaid @xo-endlessmayhem-xo @tigerbryn11

Chapter 52: Stranded

Zahra

“...The Hydra is a myth. Look for the triumvirate. Crassus has betrayed Caesar and Pompey. ...JAKE!”

“You listening to that recording again?” Craig's voice is languid with sleep. I don't need to look up from the computer to know that he's in his boxers in the doorway with his hair adorably tousled with sleep, because that's how I left him.

“I've got it on in the background.”

“The background of what?”

“Iris and I are looking into the background of that plane Lundgren used to get Jake and Sean and Michelle to the island.”

He wanders over to stand behind my chair and absently massage my shoulders as I click and clack away at the keyboard. “I thought the cops or whatever had already looked into that?”

“They have. But all they've told us is that it wasn't one of ours. They didn't say anything about who it was actually registered to.”

“Maybe they're still trying to figure that out.”

“Yeah, I'm guessing they are, assuming they're not actually actively hiding something. Either way, I'm not inclined to wait for them to decide what we should know.”

I have the numbers I need. The tail number, and serial numbers for various parts on the plane. Now I just need to get out without a trace, and into another database where I can plug those numbers in to find their matches. Even if the plane was cobbled together from stolen parts—if that's even possible—I can trace the parts' histories and their last legal location. Hopefully, there is enough consistency to pin down a location where the plane was most likely assembled. Or where it was stolen from. Craig sits down in the chair beside me. I reach over to rub his shoulder appreciatively before returning to the task at hand.

I won't admit out loud that this chasing after airplane parts is mostly to occupy myself and make me feel like I'm doing something now that my progress with the Galatea recording has stalled. I've gone over it from every angle I can think of. But now I feel like I just need to step back and work on something else for awhile. Look at it with fresh eyes after a relatively simple task like tracking down the owner of a possibly stolen plane.

Craig nestles his head in his arms on the desk beside the computer while the numbers flash over the screen. He starts to snore softly. When Iris' hologram flickers to life and floods the room with blue light, Craig grunts and mumbles something unintelligible.

“Zahra,” Iris says, “I have found something that I believe you need to see.”

“Yeah? What is it?”

“I believe the plane was not assembled from stolen parts. ...However...if you will observe the information on the screen...”

I turn to look at the screen. I squint as I scan what Iris has projected there for me. Then I feel my eyes go wide.

“...Holy shit...”

Diego

We change drivers about an hour into the trip when we stop to refuel. After another hour, we change again. Conversation ebbs and flows as we speed along a dark and empty stretch of road that runs through what must be a forest preserve. When we speak, it's mostly about where we should go when we reach Northbridge. Estela and Quinn first, we decide. We don't know whether Michelle and Sean made it back from their honeymoon or not, or they would be our first stop. Actually, as Allie points out, if Jake was taken prisoner at the same time we were, it's possible Sean and Michelle were taken, too. Even more reason to try someone else first. If Estela and Quinn can't be reached, we'll seek out Aleister and Grace, then Zahra and Craig, then Tahira. The important thing is that we get Allie someplace safe while we try to get a handle on what's happened to Jake and if he can be located.

“Midwife said the wouldn't kill him as long as he could still be used against me,” she says softly. “...But...when they find out I've escaped...”

“He'll be that much more valuable,” I assure her. “And they'll want to use him to lure you out, which will probably make it that much easier to find him.”

“...What if they hurt him to punish me for escaping?”

My heart squeezes at her question. I can't say they won't. I can't ignore the possibility. But I also can't let her think escaping was a mistake.

“Allie...as soon as you're safe, my priority and everyone else's is going to be to get him safe. You know that, right?”

She nods. “I know. But it's not like not worrying is really an option...”

“Hey, I get it. But let me tell you something. When we first got back after the island, Jake was arrested almost the moment we set foot on American soil. ...We had him out in four months. And that was while we were trying to make up a semester's worth of college work.”

“...You're exaggerating.”

“Nope. Cross my heart, it's true. You can ask him yourself when you see him again. Which, by the way, is going to be before you give birth to his kid.”

“Well...it's certainly hard not to trust confidence like...” She trails off so suddenly that I can't help but feel a quick, hot flash of dread. I glance over to see her frowning.

“What?”

“Are...you messing with the light level on the dashboard?”

“What? I don't think...” I feel my stomach lurch as I get a good look at the dashboard and see what she means. The panel has gone dim. So dim that I can barely read the time on the clock, much less the GPS screen. The headlights aren't looking their brightest, either. My gut tells me to pull over. A worn dirt road just ahead of me drifts off the main road. The dimming headlights are just bright enough to illuminate it, and I just manage to pull off as the car abruptly stalls and dies, slowing to a stop. It's only once we've actually stopped that I realize my heart is pounding and my knuckles have gone white on the steering wheel. I carefully peel my fingers off the wheel and feel the tremors racing through my body as I put the gear shift in park. I look over at Allie. It's dark, without street lamps along the quiet road, but what little moonlight there is reflects off her pale face and shows me a stunned expression.

“Are you all right?”

“W-what happened?”

“The car kind of...lost power. And I think...” I experimentally turn the key, but nothing happens. I try again. I flick a few switches, try the key a third time. “...I've had this happen before. It's probably a bad alternator.”

“...What do we do? How do we make it start again?”

“...There's...there's a portable jump-starter in the back with the gas cans,” I offer, but the knot in my stomach doesn't loosen. “We don't need another car to jump-start with one of those, but...if I'm right and it's the alternator, it might not do any good.”

“It's worth a try...”

I nod, grabbing the flashlight that we found in the glove compartment the first time we stopped to refuel. I pop the hood and get out of the car, shivering at the blast of bitingly cold air that hits me. I rub my arms vigorously as I make my way around to the hatch at the back of the jeep. I'm not dressed for this weather. Maybe a native northeasterner wouldn't feel the cold so badly dressed in a sweatsuit, but I'm from southern California, and I don't stop hopping as I fetch the portable jump-starter and hook it up to the car battery, the flashlight's beam shuddering over the maze of parts and wires under the hood. Unfortunately, I'm proven right about the effectiveness of the power pack. The car stays stubbornly dead. I groan, pressing my forehead to the steering wheel.

“Cell phones,” I mutter. “We should have asked Midwife for cell phones...”

“I've already groped around the glove compartment for one,” Allie says apologetically. “Granted, the light in there is out, too. I could take another look with the flashlight, but...”

“It's worth a try,” I echo ruefully, and pass her the flashlight. I'm not surprised when it turns out she didn't miss anything. “...Shit. What now?”

“I guess we need to get out and walk.”

“Walk?” I repeat incredulously. “Walk where?”

“Follow the road we're on. Or the main road. The forest preserve can't be so big that we won't hit civilization after an hour or two.”

“But it's night. In the northeast. In late March. We're really not dressed for it.”

“There's the tarp that was over the gas cans. We can wrap up in that. Beside, the heat won't last in here if we can't keep the car going.”

“But we will be a little better shielded from the elements. We could wrap up in the tarp and wait until morning. At least the sun will keep us warmer.”

“But we'll lose our head start. We're only about two-and-a-half hours from where we escaped from. Granted, we'll be slower on foot, but at least we'll be moving. Come on, it's not like it's likely to be a lot more walking than we ever did on the island, right?”

“You weren't nine months pregnant on the island,” I can't help pointing out.

“...Yeah, I know. Not saying that won't make it harder. But when you weigh the options...I gotta say, I think we'll both be safer if we keep moving.”

“I guess splitting up isn't an option...”

“No way in hell.”

“Yeah,” I agree with a rueful smile. “I wasn't keen on that either. Just thought I should make sure we didn't ignore any options. Guess we're walking then.”

* * *

We opt to follow the main road, but stick to the shelter of the forest preserve to avoid being seen by anyone who might be on the road searching for us with hostile intent. Getting into the trees proved a challenge, as the incline up into the forest from the dirt road we stopped on was steeper and higher than we anticipated. With a little bit of help, and a little bit more panic from me, Allie made it up onto relatively level ground, but the going is till tough. The path is uneven, and everything outside the beam of the flashlight is a mess of black shadows with patches of navy blue.

Huddled under the tarp, pressed close together, the cold night air is at least a little more bearable. Still, my fingers, my toes inside my worn sneakers, the tips of my ears, and my running nose are all numb. I dab at the mucus trickling from my nose with the tarp draped over my forearm and sniff forcefully, hoping give myself at least a moment of relief. It doesn't really work. My breath is short with the exertion of trying to navigate an uneven terrain while pressed close to another person, and the cold, dry late winter air is like gaseous fire in my lungs. My throat is starting to itch. I don't even know how long we've been walking.

“Allie? You holding u—hpp!” Okay, clearly trying to talk was a mistake. The itching in my dry throat is suddenly unbearable, and I have to cough. And once I get started, it doesn't stop. I double over, hacking and coughing like a 20-year chain-smoker. I only vaguely feel Allie guiding me to the edge of the path to sit down against a tree and catch my breath. I collapse on my butt in the cold dirt and lean back against the rough bark as I draw in wheezing breaths and release them in another round of explosive coughing. She crouches down in a slightly awkward motion, and I feel her cold hand rest gently on the back of my neck as she places the plastic rim of a bottle to my lips.

“Here. Take a couple sips. Slowly.” I do as she tells me. Cool water flows soothingly down my throat, and I start to breathe a little easier.

“W-water bottle?” I question hoarsely when I think I can speak again without starting the whole ordeal over again.

“Found it behind the gas cans. Not a big one, but I thought I should bring it along. Been carrying it in my pant leg.”

I nod as she takes a sip herself. I can believe that the baggy sweatpants with their tight cuffs made a pretty nice pouch for what I can just about make out as a 20-ounce water bottle.

“Must have been cold holding it there, though.” I sense her shrug more than I see it in the swimming darkness.

“The heater in the car had warmed it up enough. And the heat from my body kept it at a bearable temperature. You feeling good enough to press on?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I'm okay now.”

“Good. But...actually, take a couple more minutes. I need to...um...well...squat.”

I laugh, which almost makes me cough again. “Say no more. Take the flashlight and yell if you need anything.”

* * *

Once we get moving again, I'm not sure how much more time passes before I first start to notice the space around us turning the slightest bit grayer as the first hints of light start to wink at a horizon obscured by foliage. I don't remember what time we started out on foot, but I can guess now that it's pushing six in the morning. I have no idea of the date or the day of the week. Hopefully civilization isn't much further. And hopefully it's a work day. More likely that people will be up and about at the buttcrack of dawn. By now, the exertion has warmed us up enough that we aren't huddled so close together, though we keep our hands clasped firmly to keep from losing each other. I think I can see a bit of a break in the trees ahead. I gently steer us toward it, and Allie follows my lead.

What happens next happens so fast that I'm not sure what happens first. One second, Allie is right beside me, her hand curled in mine. The next, I hear the sound of loose earth shifting, pebbles tumbling over each other. I feel a tug, our hands pulling sharply apart. I hear a human body hitting the ground, and my best friend's strangled cry of pain. I turn to see empty gray air beside me where she had been standing.

“Allie!”

I just manage to stop myself from diving into the space where she was. A good thing, too, as I realize when I swing my flashlight towards the sound of her whimpering and catch a flash of golden hair in the beam. She's lying on her side halfway down the inclined bank of what looks like a dry creek bed. From her position and mine, it looks like she put her food down on the edge of the incline and lost her balance.

“Diego!” she groans through clenched teeth. “Stay back, okay? It's really steep here!”

She's right. There is at least three feet of distance between us, but at least she seems to be at least somewhat anchored where she is.

“Are you okay? Are you hurt?”

“...Yeah...” she admits, her voice a croak. My heart drops into my stomach with a sickening splash.

“What? How? Where? How bad?”

“Not entirely sure. I need to get up.”

“Right. Rightrightright, okay...” I look around frantically, spotting a solid looking tree that appears to be in a good position. “Allie? I'm gonna wrap the tarp around this tree and feed it down to you. Grab on, and then you've got something solid to hold onto if our hands slip.”

Between me and the tarp, we slowly and laboriously manage to get Allie back on level ground. She curls up on her side, gasping, her face twisted in a grimace. I rub her shoulder and brush stray wisps of hair off her forehead.

“Where does it hurt? Can you stand?” Fear seizes me afresh as a horrible thought worms its way into my head. “Is it the baby?”

“Baby's fine...” she manages to croak, though it sounds like it takes a lot of effort. “She's squirming away in there. It's my back, Diego. My lower back. I got cut by something...”

“Shit...”

I move to kneel on her other side and shine the flashlight at her lower back and shudder at what I find, my veins fizzing with anxiety. A long, jagged wound oozing blood in the fleshy part of her lower back, running from above her hip bone almost up to her last rib. As gently as I can, I put my thumb to the edge of the wound and lift just enough to see if I can tell how deep it is. Allie gasps sharply, letting out a whimper as she exhales.

“It...doesn't look very deep...but it's deep enough to be bleeding pretty badly.” I run my fingers through my hair, grabbing a fistful. The pain in my scalp feels somehow steadying. “I'm going to use the tarp to put pressure on it.”

“The tarp is filthy,” she protests weakly.

“I know. But it's all we've got right now.”

“We don't have time to stop. We have to keep going.”

“If you drip blood, that's just going to make it easier for them to track us.”

When she doesn't protest further, I help her sit up carefully. Quickly as I can, I find a relatively clean section of the tarp and press it to what looks like the deepest part of the wound. I fold and wrap and tuck until it feels like I have a sufficient enough bandage to last a little while. Allie doesn't protest when I pass her the flashlight and tuck myself under her arm to help her get to her feet.

“You're going to have to be in charge of the flashlight. I'm not letting you get away from me again.”

She laughs weakly, mirthlessly. “Wasn't actually trying to. Promise. ...Anyway, I don't think we have a lot farther to go. I think I can see a building up ahead.”

Alodia

The building that I see in the distance was probably at one time a cute little ranch-style house. With a brown-brick-and-stucco facade, gray-shingled hip roof with wide eaves, and a front-facing bay window overlooking the porch swing, it must have been like a fairy-tale cottage on the edge of the forest preserve. But as we get closer, and the sun lifts over the horizon, I realize it has probably been abandoned for at least a decade, if not longer. The rows of shingles have gaps in them like missing teeth. The windows that aren't cracked or broken are layered with grime. The facade is crumbling in places. But it's shelter.

There's a stabbing pain in the arch of my left foot. My legs and thighs throb with exhaustion. I have to pee again, and the wound in my back is burning. That's not to mention hunger and thirst.

“We have to get inside...” I croak weakly. “I need to rest.”

Diego hesitates for just a moment before nodding. He needs rest, too. And now that the sun is coming up, I think he's just as inclined to get out of the open as I am. We shamble up to the front door, and Diego knocks experimentally. When I look quizzically at him, he shrugs.

“Don't just want to barge in if someone's squatting here.”

But no one seems to answer. When Diego tries the door, it opens easily. We cross the threshold into a small foyer with cracked, filthy linoleum and peeling wallpaper patterned with strawberries that probably looked cute and cheery in its prime. The archway to our left opens into the kitchen. Just ahead is what looks like it used to be the living area. And then to our right is a hall that leads to the bedrooms. I'm not sure what I was expecting it to smell like, but it smells better than I would have expected. Dust, mothballs, earth, and just a hint of mold, but it's nothing overpowering, even with my sense of smell still heightened by pregnancy. Diego guides me into the living room, and eases me onto the dingy carpet.

“Here. At least you can lie on something a little more comfortable than tile while I look around.”

“What are you looking for?”

“Just...wanna see what we're dealing with...”

I don't miss the tremor in his voice, and I can guess what's worrying him. I reach out to grasp his wrist. “You shouldn't go alone.”

He shakes his head. “You're hurt. And exhausted. It's better if you stay here and rest for a moment.”

“At least don't go completely unarmed.” I glance around, and I catch a glimpse of the fireplace on the far wall. It looks like it was an old-fashioned wood-burning fireplace, rather than gas, unless the fireplace stand on the hearth is just for decoration. “Take the poker. For my peace of mind.”

“Twist my arm, why don't you,” he quips. “Lie down for a few minutes, Allie. You need some rest.”

I don't lie down until he actually takes hold of the poker. Even then, I take the water bottle out of my pant leg first so I can take a swallow. But once I am horizontal, whatever kept me going through our slow slog through the forest drains right out of me. My lower back is on fire, and the worn, ragged carpet feels coarse and greasy against my cheek. But I am so damn tired. The abandoned room around me fades into a gray fog populated by dancing ghosts.

I looked out the window, and I couldn't see. It wasn't too dark, it was just too foggy.

The voice is distant, buried inside my head, but it sounds like a child. I can almost see a child, too, cooing in a sing-song voice at a toy that they walk across the carpet. And a smaller sibling, naked except for a diaper, shrieking with delight as their parent chases them with a pair of footie pajamas.

“Allie?” Diego's voice draws me back from the warm, happy fog, and reality crashes over me in a chilly wave. I feel a shiver race down my spine as I force my eyes to open and look up at him. It's a good deal brighter than when we came in, and the light hurts my eyes enough that I can't fully focus. But there's still something in his voice and his grip on my shoulder that alarms me.

“What's wrong?”

“I think there is someone living here after all,” he says grimly. “There's no one here at this exact moment, but I found definite signs of life. Including generators, a mini fridge, a hot plate, and a Porta Potty. There are also mattresses in the bedrooms. And blankets. And I found a first aid kit in the bathroom.”

“Is it stocked?”

“Fortunately, yes. Here's my plan: I get you into the bedroom. We set ourselves up in there with some food and water and blankets and stuff. Then we lock the door and hole up in there until nightfall. We can get some rest, and if the original squatters come back, there's a desk under the window inside, and an HVAC unit outside. It wouldn't be the easiest escape, but we could get out.”

“Or we could leave as soon as this cut on my back is cleaned and bandaged.”

“Look me in the eye and tell me you're up for that, and that's what we'll do.” But of course, I can't. I can barely even get my eyes to focus on his face. I need rest, and so does he. I exhale slowly, closing my eyes as my answer. “Yeah, that's what I thought. Come on. I'll help you up.”

I lean heavily on Diego as he walks me down the hall. I don't mean to give him so much of my weight, but if I'm honest with myself, I don't feel steady at all. The sight of a mattress on the bedroom floor, complete with pillows and blankets is truly a welcome one. Even if when I lie down, I discover that the mattress is far from new and that it smells faintly of stale sweat. A lamp clicking on behind me sprays the wall in front of me with harsh white light that crests over my dark, crisp-edged shadow. Diego helps me sit up just long enough to untangle myself from the tarp before I let my head drop back onto the pillow.

“...I still can't quite reach Varyyn,” I murmur softly as Diego gently lifts my sweatshirt away from the wound.

“Midwife did say it would take awhile. ...Seems like it stopped bleeding. ...But it also looks like it's a little deeper than I thought...”

I hear him rattling around with the first aid kit. Tears start to well in my eyes, whether in anticipation of the pain, or...everything else, I'm not sure. Maybe it's both. Probably. Last time I was in a similar position, Jake was with me. Everyone who matters was with me. Well...everyone except the baby in my belly. I think I felt stronger then, though. Sure, I was in pain and scared of everything happening around me. But somehow, the Celestial felt smaller and more intimate than this tiny abandoned ranch house. And the faceless enemy whose purpose at the time was still unknown didn't feel as close and threatening as the former Arachnid goons hunting me now.

A flicker of movement at the edge of my vision makes me suck in my breath. Diego has stuck his hand over my shoulder, fingers splayed in an invitation. I lift my hand to his and squeeze it firmly. I start to draw it back, but he gently tightens his grip.

“It's okay. I gotcha. I can do the cleaning one-handed.”

“Thanks,” I murmur.

“You ready?”

“Go for it,” I reply tightly, screwing my eyes shut. “Let's get it over with.”

I manage not to flinch or cry out, but I kind of fail at breathing slowly and deeply like they've been teaching me in my birthing classes. My breath hitches in my throat, and I'm crying by the time Diego sticks a few piles of gauze pads to my back with first aid tape. Diego is quiet as he strokes my hair comfortingly.

“...Thanks,” I say at last, my voice hoarse. “Thanks for doing that.”

His hand pauses on my head. “...You protect me, Allie,” he says softly. “It's what you do. It's what you've done all our lives. But we both know you can't be the strong one all the time. I know I'm not a naturally brave person, but I'm always going to protect you when you need me to.”

“You're braver than you think you are,” I whisper, squeezing his hand.

“You just get some rest, okay? I'll fix us something to eat.”

Zahra

As usual, I'm already at the office by the time Aleister comes in at eight in the morning. He's maybe a little surprised to find me in his office instead of mine, but he doesn't show it with more than a raised eyebrow.

“Good morning, Zahra,” he says as he closes the door. “What's going on?”

I flash the file folder in my hand. A paperclip keeps the pages inside secured to the flap. “I had a feeling the cops were hiding something from us with regards to the plane that took our friends to the island. I was right.”

“I see.” He sits down at his desk. “Do we know who owns it?”

“Yeah. But that's kind of the least of our worries. I ran the tail number, serial numbers on the parts, everything they had that I could think of. They all came up attached to a single plane. ...A plane that is currently in pieces in the custody of the NTSB. And what pieces aren't in their custody are at the bottom of the ocean.” I push the folder across the desk toward him. “...All the numbers match a certain plane that crashed in 1996. ...The same one that Alodia's parents were on when they died.”

Aleister flips open the folder and scans the pages inside, his eyes alternately widening and narrowing as he takes in the information.

“...I would say that's impossible,” he says slowly, “...but I think we both know that's not true. Even if the how escapes us.”

“I'm a little more concerned with the why. Why use that plane specifically? If they didn't want to use a currently existing plane, why use the one that killed Alodia's parents? Why not a different plane from the past?”

“Perhaps they needed one with a connection to Vaanu. The one that killed his human form perhaps has more of the energy they need.”

“Yeah, I guess. ...I mean, it's all speculation at this point.”

“Did you relay this information to Jake and the others?”

“Nah. I mean, Craig knows because I tell him pretty much everything, but it doesn't seem like this is gonna do much to help actually find Alodia here and now. I feel like this tidbit can wait until they're done with their part.”

“Hmm. I suppose there is wisdom in not throwing them any potential red herrings when time is of the essence. What about the recording? Have you gotten anywhere with that?”

“I'm stuck,” I admit. “I figured out that the recording was mostly spliced, but then there was that cry for help that wasn't spliced...but where do I go from there? I mean, I guess I could isolate the background audio for any potential sound signatures that could give me an indication of where the recording was made...but that's kind of a long shot, even with Iris to help.”

“Truthfully, I am a little more interested in the coded message before that.”

I shrug. “Seems to be a code in keeping with your dad's Greco-Roman obsession. I looked up the First Triumvirate on Wikipedia, but didn't get much that was useful.”

“The relationships between the key players certainly don't seem to reflect history if Crassus is betraying Caesar and Pompey. Crassus and Caesar were steadfast allies. Historically, Pompey was the odd man out.” He sighs. “Ironically, I expect Alodia would be very helpful in figuring out the message.”

“She is our resident history buff,” I agree. “...But...maybe history isn't what's important here.”

“I expect not,” I agree. “But you sound like you're thinking of something specifically.”

“Your old man's a megalomaniac. He's interested in building himself up as a god. Maybe we should be focusing on mythology rather than history.”

Aleister frowns thoughtfully. “I don't disagree with your assessment of my father. But if the message is from Alodia, wouldn't history make more sense?”

“You're assuming it is from Alodia? If that's the case, why go through the trouble of splicing her voice together?”

“Perhaps as a distraction to anyone else who might be tracking her? If nothing else, the fact that her cry for help was not spliced suggests she knew the recording would somehow reach Jake.”

I'm still not sold on the idea, but whether Alodia sent the message or not is not my point. “Even assuming the message is from Alodia, that doesn't necessarily make what I said wrong. Don't forget she was the Endless. She succeeded in making a god of herself to the Vaanti. She knows how to build a mythology.”

“...She knows how to build a mythology from facts,” he says slowly. “...She knew what my father was planning. She knew he could be stopped if we had the Vaanti's help, and she knew that she needed to change the Vaanti to protect us.”

I raise an eyebrow. “Now you're the one who sounds like you're onto something.”

“As the Endless, Alodia built her mythology around what she knew would happen in the future. It's hardly an uncommon scenario to play out when one imagines traveling to the past, is it?”

I shrug. “Probably not. People imagine a lot of things when they imagine time travel.”

“Right. What if this message is the same sort of thing in reverse?”

“...In reverse? Like, building facts from mythology?”

He frowns, shaking his head like he's trying to dislodge a bug from his hair. “No...not quite. Or perhaps.” He blows upward, briefly lifting a few strands of pale hair from his forehead. “I think the metaphors are rather getting tangled up in themselves.”

“Yeah, probably,” I agree slowly. “But I think we're ultimately ending up on the same page. ...It's not history or mythology that's important here, but both together, right?”

“Yes! Precisely!” He snaps his fingers. “Ancient Rome's history is littered with apocrypha, especially about high-profile figures like Caesar and Pompey and Crassus. History and myth are already difficult to distinguish.”

“Okay, so what do we have to go on? I guess we can assume that Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus represent three different people. Or...factions. Seems likely one of them is Rourke.”

He nods. “I would put money on Silas Prescott also being represented. Given their long-standing rivalry, I would have considered him and Father to be shoe-ins for Pompey and Crassus...but the message states that Crassus has betrayed Caesar and Pompey, and based on what Grayson told us about his holiday encounter with his father, I think it's more likely that Father and Prescott are working together.”

“Right. If Grayson's suspicions were right, and we're right about what Rourke is ultimately planning, then Prescott has probably gotten in on the Janus Project somehow. From what Tahira said about their showdown, it seems like all Prescott wants is his wife back.”

“And if Father is to be believed, he can deliver that.”

“So, if Rourke and Prescott are Caesar and Pompey, who is Crassus? Who betrayed them?”

Aleister sighs, slumping back in his chair. “That is the question, isn't it. The possibility that we have an ally out there is tantalizing.”

“They might not actually be an ally,” I warn. “We might have a common enemy, but that doesn't necessarily mean they're on our side.”

“I suppose not. ...But returning to Caesar and Pompey for a minute, I think I might have an inkling which is which.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Caesar was the one who made himself dictator. He's primarily remembered as the politician, while Pompey is primarily known as the general.”

I snort. “I think I see where you're going with this. Your old man's Caesar, right?”

He smirks. “Precisely. And when you consider their respective foils, it makes even more sense. Alodia is my father's foil, both as herself and as the Endless. Especially as the Endless. The Endless succeeded in building herself up as a god, and thus prevented him from doing the same. Meanwhile, Prescott's foil is Tahira. He raised an army of criminals to take down her band of superhumans. All in all, they project a more militaristic image than the Endless and my father manipulating and influencing to gain power over each other.”

“Which is pretty much what the First Triumvirate did, isn't it? Manipulate and influence and all that?”

“That's pretty much what Romans did.” He chuckles, but there's enough of a pause beforehand that I don't think he's chuckling at the comment he just made.

“What?”

“Julius Caesar had two known children, a son and a daughter. And a few illegitimate children who were suspected to be his, but two that are widely accepted as his: a daughter, Julia, by his first wife, and a son by Cleopatra called Caesarion.”

“As in the Cleopatra?”

“The very same.”

I can't help myself. “Which kid do you think you are?” I ask with a smirk.

He laughs. “Oh, without a doubt, I am Julia. Born to his wife, but ultimately useless to him. No doubt he considers Estela his Caesarion.”

“Even though you both rejected him in the end.”

“Well, it's hardly a perfect parallel. Caesar never even publicly acknowledged Caesarion was his, and Olivia Montoya hardly shares my father's ambition. For another thing, Julia was married to Pompey in order to cement the alliance with her father.”

I snort. “Now that seriously tangles the metaphor. We'd have to rethink every...” I trail off as I realize that Aleister is suddenly sitting ramrod straight, his eyes wide. “...Uh...Aleister? You okay there?”

His eyes lock with mine. “...Blair. Blair Hall. ...Blair Hall is Crassus.”

Michelle

I check Tahira's wound every time we stop the car to refuel and eat. I have found her to be a very easy and relaxed patient, in spite of the rough environment. Clearly, she doesn't share her cousin's fear of medical procedure. She stretches out in the backseat of a car as I press gently around the edges of the wound with vinyl-clad hands.

“You're healing nicely,” I tell her. “Not quite ready to have those stitches out yet, I think, but it won't be long. Any pain?”

“Not anymore. I just need to be ready to fight by the time we find Alodia.”

I carefully peel off my gloves, discarding them in a portable biohazard box. “I can't make any promises. Particularly because I don't know how long it's going to take us to find her. But you are healing faster than an ordinary human being would.”

“Guess that's all I can hope for. ...I tested my powers at the last rest stop. I managed to fly and tear a branch off a tree with my bare hands, so I think we can safely assume those are intact.”

I pause for a moment. “...If this is too personal a question, feel free to tell me off. But if you did lose your powers...do you think you'd be okay?”

“Ultimately? ...Yeah. Probably. Frankly the worst part would be feeling helpless. I mean...before I got my powers, I was a business woman. I did some volunteer work in my spare time, and I worked out, but I never felt like I could really protect people from anyone who wanted to hurt them. Honestly, that's something I admire about Alodia. By all accounts, she's been a fighter all her life. The type of person who wouldn't hesitate to face down a criminal or a bully, with or without superpowers. On the night I got my powers, my friends and coworkers and a hundred innocent people were threatened by armed robbers, and my instinct was to comply with their demands so that they wouldn't hurt anyone.”

“That is a very sensible reaction,” I say firmly.

“Yeah, I know. And it's still the advice I would give anyone in a similar situation. But it's still nice to feel like I don't have to take that advice myself anymore.”

“I get that,” I concede and smile wryly. “And I certainly don't mean to imply that Alodia's courage shouldn't be admired. Actually, she's usually very good about recognizing her limits. But she won't hesitate to risk everything if she thinks there's half a chance of protecting her loved ones. ...Right now, she's a prisoner, and most likely, her best friend is with her. ...I don't know whether her being pregnant makes me more or less worried about that.”

Tahira sits up carefully, raising an eyebrow. “More, I should think. Right?”

“Well...in most ways, yes. Her being pregnant makes her situation a lot scarier to imagine. But I'm at least reasonably sure she's not going to take any undue risks when her baby depends on her to be healthy. Still...if they try to control her by threatening Diego...there are a few ways that could go. One, we find Diego hurt very badly. Two, she submits to protect him, but the stress has other ill effects on her health. Three...she fights back...”

Tahira puts a hand on my shoulder. “Michelle, I may not know her as well as you guys do, but I know her well enough to know how much that child means to her. She's not going to be reckless.”

I nod. “You're probably right. If I am honest with myself, it's the second option that seems most likely. The problem is that stress could negatively affect her baby as much as her. There is no safe way to keep a pregnant woman prisoner...”

Tahira squeezes my shoulder, grinning. “Well. Then it's lucky we're coming to rescue her, isn't it.”

Alodia

I'm dying. I can feel my body going cold as the blood drains out of me from the hole the bullet tore in my side. Jake's face swims above me, and I am vaguely aware of his hands on my face and hair.

“Come on, Princess, stay with me.” Agony flairs as the world tilts sickeningly around me, and I hear myself cry out. “Shhh. I'm here. I gotcha. I know it hurts. I'm right here.”

“Entry and exit wounds,” I hear Michelle say. “Straight through. Shit, I really hope this works...”

Darkness is creeping in at the edges of my vision. Suddenly, I feel myself growing warmer, and the pain starts to dull, replaced by a pleasant tingling sensation. The darkness recedes and the world reasserts itself. Jake has me cradled in his arms, and Michelle is beside us with one hand on my belly and the other on my back. A healing leaf under each palm repairs my torn flesh. Within ten minutes, I am breathing painlessly. Jake smiles down at me, tears still shimmering on his cheeks and eyelashes.

“There she is. Welcome back, Princess.”

“Hey,” I croak.

“How're you feeling?” Michelle asks.

“...Probably not up to running a marathon. But probably not dying, either.”

“Yeah, I bet. You've lost a lot of blood, so you'll need to take it easy. Unfortunately, I don't think a transfusion is possible. But at least what you've got left is staying on the inside.”

Jake eases me upright, and that's when I see that I'm not the only one injured. I frown.

“Michelle, you're bleeding...”

Michelle glances down at the deep gash on her lower leg and winces. “Yeah. Looks worse than it is, though.”

“It could still probably use a healing leaf.”

“Unfortunately, those were the last ones.” She shrugs dismissively. “I'll wrap it up. That should hold it until we get back to Elyys'tel.”

“...It isn't going to.” As I say it, I realize with terrible certainty that I am all too right. This is a memory. I have lived this before. I know what happens. Over the next two days as we journey to Elyys'tel, that wound will fester...

“Don't,” Michelle says firmly. “Don't linger here, Alodia. Don't think twice.”

“About what?”

“You're going to figure out soon what you're remembering. It's going to be used against you. ...You know what you are to us. What you were made to be. Let that be your strength. Not your sorrow.”

“Michelle...”

“Come on, Alodia. We need you.”

Diego

I found a couple pots in the kitchen. I used them and some of the bottled water supply to make us some ramen on the hot plate. We cleaned our hands with alcohol wipes from the first aid kit and ate with our fingers straight from the pot. Then while Allie slept, I went through the house and locked every door and window. The front door wouldn't lock, but I stacked up a pyramid of canned goods behind it to give us a warning if someone decides to come in. Only then did I lie down on the mattress beside Allie to get some rest myself.

The space heater I found isn't very big, but with the door and windows closed it's enough to bring the air to a tolerable temperature, and its hum is soothing. Exhaustion takes over, and I drift off almost immediately. I'm not sure what time it is when I wake up, but it's dark again. I find the flashlight beside me and ease myself out from under the blanket. I won't disturb Allie just yet, but we should probably get moving soon. But first, I want to make sure we can go out the door. I'm not going to make my injured, pregnant friend climb out the window if she doesn't have to. I grab the fireplace poker from beside the door and creep out into the hall with my flashlight shining.

I'm painfully aware of how much I'm shaking as I creep through the house, thoroughly checking every room. My breath is shallow with anxiety, my throat tight. I swear my heart is about to hammer out of my chest, especially when I have to creep into the cobweb-infested basement. But every room is empty. The cans behind the door are undisturbed. Relief floods through me as I return to the bedroom. I lock the door again when I get back in. No good letting our guard down. We're safe now, but that could change pretty quickly.

“Allie? Are you awake?” She makes a noise that's a cross between a moan and a whimper, like she just woke up from a bad dream. “It's okay. It's just me.”

“...Diego...?”

“Yeah. I'm gonna turn the lamp on, okay? It's dark out.”

“...We escaped. We hid in an abandoned house.”

“Yeah.” I flip on the lamp. Her back is to me, but I still see her flinch as the light floods the room. “How're you feeling? We should probably move on before either the original squatters come back or Fiddler and her goons show up.”

“...I don't feel right...” Her voice comes out in a weak whimper. Something cold trickles down my spine.

“Allie...?” I make my way around to the other side of the mattress and feel my breath catch in my throat. Allie's face is ashen in the harsh light of the lamp. Tiny beads of sweat glisten on her forehead.

Oh, no...oh, please God, no...

The thought comes before I consciously realize what's happening, but deep down, I know. I drop to my knees beside her and reach out to press the back of my hand to her brow. I almost yank it back when I feel the heat coming off her skin.

“Shit! Allie, you're burning up!”

“...I'm cold...”

“It's chills. You have a fever.” I leap up to move to the other side of the mattress again. “I'm just going to check your wound. I'm gonna have to move the blanket.”

She moans, but she doesn't protest, though she does shudder violently as I expose her back. I carefully peel back the pile of gauze and first aid tape. I can't help sucking in a sharp breath. The skin around the wound is swollen, glowing an angry shade of red. I cautiously press the skin with my fingertip. It's hotter than her forehead, and she flinches at my touch, whimpering.

“Oh, God...Allie, hang on, okay? I'm gonna clean the wound again...”

I fumble for the first aid kit, pulling out an alcohol pad and a tube of antibiotic cream as I try to swallow my fear and doubt. Keep going, Diego. Just take care of her. Keep her safe.

But she's not safe. We're not safe. And now our situation is worse.

God help us. What are we going to do now?

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