#i think some guy managing to rob people like it's nothing with a big build is actually the funniest thing ever

[battleslippers]

ABOUT 6 FEET TALL.

THERE'S JUST NO WAY 😭😭😭😭

[rowretro]

𝐍𝐎 𝐆𝐔𝐓𝐒 𝐍𝐎 𝐆𝐋𝐎𝐑𝐘

✧warnings: illegal activities, robbing a back, guns, blood, bomb blasts.

♡synopsis: Y/n and Nishimura Riki, are quite like Bonnie and Clyde, partners in crime with morals. The 2 are the youngest in Heeseung's gang, and had been assigned to rob a rather rich, immoral man's bank. Robbing the black money that he had robbed the country of, exposing his true colours. (Clearly inspired by Thunivu.)

✧♡✧♡𝕹𝕺 𝕲𝖀𝕿𝕾 𝕹𝕺 𝕲𝕷𝕺𝕽𝖄♡✧♡✧

Y/n smirked as Riki's gun pointed the air, bullets shoot at absolutely nothing as the bank workers and those who visited, cowered, finding safety where they could, all laying low. "THIS FUCKING HIEST IS MINE." Riki simply screamed as He chucked a gun at y/n who caught it, the girl immediately got to work, threatening the people, as she took their phones, purses etc.

"If you don't want to be harmed during this heists I advise you all lay low, let me take what I need and then I'll let you free." Riki simply advised as he played some music. Y/n checked all the restrooms and other areas, making sure no one was hiding before sitting on one of the desks, preventing any bankers from pressing the emergency red button.

"You guys... so fucking selfish, you think you'll be free with all the money you take from us?! of course you will you're kids after all." a 40 year old man complained as Riki and y/n turned to each other, the 2 bursting out into laughter. "Ah of course, you'd believe we're going to take the money and blow it on something useless?" The male asked as he turned to y/n. "You see sir... you'll see where this money'll go." she simply said as she pressed the big red emergency button herself.

Within minutes, police cars surrounded the bank building, as they remain cautious. There were bombs on the doors, heck they could even see that some bank workers were tied by the window, with bomb vests. "I take back what I said sir... please take this vest off of me!" the 40 year old begged as Riki snickerred. He pat the man's back with his gun "If you behave, I'll consider freeing you ".

All the while, y/n sat by the phone waiting on a call. "Wow these cops are really slow huh... So entitled they want us to call them instead. alright fine- we'll let them have it their way." she shrugged, dialling the number. "Hello? is this the police station?! there seems to be a heist taking place in XXX bank." The girl said, waiting upon a reply "What you don't think a woman can rob a bank? it's no wonder so many crimes happen in this country." She added, sounding a little annoyed.

Riki took the phone from her hold as she frowned at him, the male simply placed a soft kiss on her lips as he placed the phone by his ear. The police on the other line were just not having it. "Us robbing a bank? You see sir we aren't robbing the bank. we're simply taking back the amount this bank robbed from us." Riki said as the police officer was in disbelief. "All your doubts will be cleared.... can you put officer Jungwon on the line?" Riki said with an innocent smile.

Officer Jungwon, the said, innocent, brand new cop on the team, he was just a PC, the fear in his eyes evident as the Inspector glared at him handing the phone to him. "Officer Yang, we invite you through the backdoor to the bank. but.... you must bring 4 people..." Riki added as y/n nodded, hacking into as many news channels as possible, smirking as her eyes land on a certain news reporter. "Reporter Park" She simply said as Riki nodded.

"4 people. The bank owner. His father. The Manager and of course Reporter Park. The charming reporter with multiple cameras, trying to get the juicy drama, while charming a bunch of girls? his name card says Park Sunghoon? yeah that one." he described hanging up. The police new they were messing with the wrong gang, anyone knew Riki's voice. No one dared to mess with the Nishimura Riki, the only known gang mate in the ENHYPEN gang.

When the 4 were allowed in, Sunghoon set up the cameras as y/n tied the 3 men to 3 chairs, handing Jungwon a bat. Riki stood behind the camera with y/n. His focus on the people within the bank. "See here fellow bank workers and visitors... you're going to find out the real truth behind where your money, and my money went." Riki simply said as y/n shrugged, handing a contract to the three.

"what is this?!" The bank owner, Yeonjun asked as y/n smiled "It's simply a contract, a contract you will sign in front of this camera to allow us to interview you live~" the girl said, as Yeonjun signed it, not bothering to read it, he passed it onto his father, Mr Choi, the the Manager, Choi Soobin. After signing the contract, y/n took a seat. "Reporter Park, this is live right?" she asked as Sunghoon nodded.

With Jungwon in the back holding a bat, and Y/n sat right opposite the three men. "First question. Choi Yeonjun, the owner of this beautiful bank. Mind telling me how much you stole from us all together?" y/n asked as the man smiled at the camera "See darling I don't see what you're talking about... Why would I steal money when I'm already rich." He asked as y/n tutted "Officer Yang... if someone stole 100 million from your hard earned money, how would you feel?..." y/n asked.

"I'd break his hands for touching my money..." he answerred as the girl nodded. "Okay... well lets tone it down just a little, you may use the bat to hit Yeonjun everytime he lies." "WHAT? HIT ME??? SINCE WHEN WAS THAT ALLOWED?!" he asked as Riki chuckled. "In the contract Owner Choi." "What the fuck- but- the writting is so small i could barely read it!" he complained as Riki shrugged "It's the same font you used in your contracts." he simply said.

Jungwon started beating the man with the bat, as Riki then told him to stop. "This is ridiculous. I will not let you abuse my son like this!" Mr Choi complained as y/n nodded. "Okay sir then why don't you answer us? where did you store all the money you stole???" She asked as the man glared at her "I'm telling you we didn't steal any money!" The man lied as Soobin, the manager interrupted them. "Sir just tell them where the 500 million is or they...." Soobin stopped mid sentence noticing the Chois glare at him.

"500 million?.... wow you hear that world? XXX bank stole 500, million fucking dollars. Only 100 million from the infamous gang you all know... then that 400 million?... why don't I answer that for you?..." Y/n said, glaring at Yeonjun. "You stole that hard-earned money from all those civillians who worked their blood, sweat and tears, for that money, to pay off bills, school fees, hospital fucking bills. The so-called black money is actually red money. you have way more fucking blood on your hands than any gang ever had." She seethed.

The news airing abruptly came to an end, when Yeonjun managed to break out and stab a few wires, he immediately kicked y/n in the stomach, grabbing her by her hair and smashing her face into a glass table. However, Riki was quick to act, pulling her away, and hitting Yeonjun around the head with a gun. The Choi now knocked out called. "You alright princess?" Riki asked, his eyes widening at the little trickles of blood on your face. "M good sweetheart... it was nothing" she reassured as the man kissed her.

"Cork it love birds. only a matter of time before Yeonjun wakes up. Let's just take our 100 million and leave, the heli's here, the police can sort out that lot." Sunghoon said, throwing off the lanyard and unbuttoning the top, revealing the undershirt he wore beneath. "Fucking reporter uniform making me sweat like fuck." he groaned as Jungwon scoffed, throwing the bat aside as he dragged Yeonjun back to his chair, tying him down. "I actually look kinda fire in a cop's uniform to be honest." the man smirked as he followed y/n and Riki.

Y/n smirked, as she bombed the vault open, taking only the amount that the bank owed the gang, placing the money inside the helicopter. Riki dragged her cautiously, as they started to run until they were out of sight, the boys following behind. As they reached a safe spot, Heeseung picked them up. "huh, the police are at the bank now, and they're looking into the case.... and you're making out-" Sunghoon rolled his eyes, as Heeseung honked the car horn, in an attempt to stop them from eating eachothers' faces.

"Fuck it. they won't listen...." Heeseung groaned "they handled that bank issue without a lot of smooching, pet names, hugs, romance and all that bull crap... they'll be out of breath soon-" Sunghoon pointed out as Jungwon covered his ears.

✧♡✧♡𝕹𝕺 𝕲𝖀𝕿𝕾 𝕹𝕺 𝕲𝕷𝕺𝕽𝖄♡✧♡✧

[comically-callous]

Would you do a 1610 miles morales request where he and the reader became close at visions and she figures out he’s Spider-Man so he tends to go to hers when needing comfort/help so one night after patching him up, they end up sharing a bed cause he’s too hurt to go home and they’re both flustered and cute cause they clearly like each other?

Yurrrrrr

Miles Morales x Fem!Reader

Warnings: light swearing, mentions of pain/injury, reader and miles share a bed (NOTHING SPICY 😑)

A/n: First non-second person POV fic on here. As always, my requests are open 🥳

Tonight had been pretty rough for Miles. He had gotten in a pretty bad fight with some guys that were trying to rob a jewelry store. He had stopped them, which was good, but his entire body felt sore.

So, like always, he made his way over to her apartment.

This had become a sort of regular thing for him to do. His best friend, Y/n, was one of the only people who knew about his secret identity, and so, he went to her whenever he was in need of some quick first aid.

Miles swung over to the familiar apartment building and knocked on her bedroom window.

After a short moment, Y/n opened the window for him. She scanned his disheveled state while helping him climb through the window. "Wow, you look like shit." She commented.

"Thanks. Good to see you too." Miles replied as he pulled his mask off and let it fall to the ground.

She laid a towel on her bed before he sat down (Y/n was very serious about Miles not getting blood on her sheets) and grabbed the first aid kit that she kept in her room.

"Rough night?" She asked as she got out some of the medical supplies she'd be using.

"Yeah. I'm alright though."

She began disinfecting the wound and a comfortable silence fell over them. Miles always liked coming over to her place. Even though he was almost always injured or hurt when he came over. He liked how cozy her room was, he liked that she always had music playing, and he liked that she was always too focused on patching him up to notice him staring at her.

After about 30 minutes of tending to his wounds, she finished with a relieved sigh. "You're lucky I like you, dude. If anyone else asked me to do something like this I'd tell them to never talk to me again."

Miles chuckled and looked down at the floor. "Uh... Thanks?" He tried standing up, but winced.

"You alright?" Y/n asked, looking back at Miles as she put away the first aid kit.

"Yeah... Just a little sore." He said as he sat back down on her bed.

"You gonna be able to make it back home?'

Miles thought about it for a moment. He didn't think he had the strength to swing or even walk home right now. "Uh..."

"If you need to you can stay the night." She tells him

"Really?"

"Of course, man." She smiled softly. "It's not a big deal."

To Miles it was a big deal. Staying over at his crush's house? Huge deal.

But, he had to play it cool.

"Uh... Yeah, alright." He shrugged, trying to act nonchalant about the whole thing.

Y/n had given him some of her oversized clothes for him to sleep in.

There was a brief argument over the sleeping situation (Miles didn't want to kick Y/n out of her own room, but Y/n wasn't gonna make an injured Miles sleep on the couch) they decided to just share the bed.

No big deal. Two friends sharing a bed. Totally normal. No big deal.

Miles settled into her bed, back turned to her as he stared at the wall.

The two of you exchanged a brief 'good night' and then it was silent.

Miles was wide awake. The position he was laying in was uncomfortable, but he didn't dare move. The minutes passed by like hours and he wanted to look at the time, but he couldn't wake her up.

Little did he know, Y/n was feeling the exact same way. Wide awake, unable to move, and unable to speak.

Somehow, against all odds, after what was probably at least 2 hours of still, dead silence, they both managed to fall asleep.

If they thought falling asleep next to each other was awkward, then the dilemma of waking up cuddling each other was going to be absolutely unbearable.

[phantomoftheorpheum]

hi!! 😊 i liked that christian was a major red herring. it was nice to be validated even though i was expecting it. i like christian but i think he is a little too similar to tabby to be interesting as a love interest. they are the male and female versions of each other 🤣

johnny deserved better. although i think he was a little too understanding with imogen at times, he knew she was going through it and i respect him for that. the way she demanded to see his texts and look at his search history was such a red flag. of course i get it in this context but irl that would not be okay. maybe imogen need to be single for a while.

i don’t like jen. i will never like jen. she’s manipulative and a liar. i will never excuse how she deflected and made noa the bad guy in the conversation where noa attempted to confront her about robbing shawn’s house. how their shippers ignore that problematic behavior is beyond me. i’m sad that she will be in season 3. at least i’m not alone in this as i’ve seen a lot of people complaining about this ship in the pll original sin instagram comments. i hope the writers hear our complaints. it has made noa my least favorite liar when i used to love her.

Hi! I agree!

You are so right about Christian! I should have trusted my 2x01/2x02 gut that he was a red herring, but then I got so suspicious of the fact that no one was suspicious of him when they obviously should be. jksdhfksdf. I'm still baffled by how Tabby didn't think to put either Wes or Christian on their original suspect list, considering their love of horror and the masks stuff, but I'm just gonna have to learn to accept that. I'm glad Christian was good too, though. I never wanted him to be bad, just was very suspicious he might be. They definitely gave him some dialogue that pointed his way. But he was a good red herring! He worked until the finale when they started getting suspicious and then I knew it wasn't him.

I have said it once and I will say it again, Johnny is quite literally the chillest dude on the planet (😂 this will never stop being funny to me, I am sorry). I'm also glad that he's not bad because I think he's an enjoyable addition to the cast and I hope he is in next season (again, assuming they get a next season) because we still know almost nothing about him, so they could do a lot of fun things with his character. But I do think Imogen needs to take some time, regardless of the Johnny stuff (I mean, he really should NOT want to date her ever again because she nearly killed him??) because this was a mess. I also think all the girls (but particularly Imogen and Tabby) do still need mental healthcare, but obviously not with Dr. Sullivan.

Aaaaahhh, the Jen stuff. I just kept thinking there was going to be some sort of reveal/resolution that made the Jen stuff feel like it worked in the season and had a reason to be there. I had so many possible scenarios I was willing to accept. and yet, they managed to find one which was none of them??? I can't believe I sat through so much love triangle crap for literally no payout. I hate love triangles and the only redeeming quality is that they usually have a big blowout scene when it all comes out, but they didn't even give us that???? It will be interesting (assuming they get a season 3) to see if they respond to the criticism like they did with the Ezra thing, because a lot of people feel Noa's carelessness about the situation (and she was super, super manipulative towards Shawn throughout this, as well) ruined her character for them. Now, I think it's fine to tear a character down and need to build them back up, and I think it's good to see the Liars engage in flawed behavior, the problem I have here is... they (the show) have given no indication that they think they actually DID tear Noa's character down? Like, I am sorry, but her behavior was flat out cruel and she felt a tiny bit bad about it for like 2 seconds and faced absolutely 0 consequences, and that, not that she made some terrible decisions, is the real problem here. It's not "tearing a character down to build them back up" or even "giving a character flaws" if those things are never acknowledged as flaws and terrible behavior in the first place? Ugh. There was just so much potential with this storyline (literally so much!) and they just threw it all straight in the trash.

[wonderwomanfantasy]

oh shit! kisses!

oh zbops my beloved you spoil me. I fucking love himbo Sero

Sero x Reader

Warnings: nothing really

Word count: 1,000 (about)

Summary: Sero is just a good guy, he's a nice coworker and great to be around. he's also as stupid as he is hot but you wouldn't have him any other way.

“Hanta,” you whined, almost throwing yourself on his desk. Sero smiled and patted your back, he’d been having kind of a rough morning, he’d woken up late and rushed through his morning, got chewed out by his manager, and stuck with a bunch of mind-numbing paperwork, count on you to make things better.

“What’s wrong cupcake?” he asked.

“I need coffee,” you said. Hanta grinned and quirked an eyebrow up at you

“Well sweetheart you just missed the breakroom, it’s back that way,”

“The break room coffee sucks,” you huffed. It was true, the breakroom coffee was watery as hell.

“Go down the street with me to get coffee?” you asked.

“Why do you need me to go with your cupcake? You’re a grown-up aren’t you?” he teased,

“But you’re my coffee buddy, I can’t go without you!” you protested. It was a one-hit K.O. you were just too fucking cute for him to put up with. He pushed the sleeves of his button-down shirt up to his elbows and stuffed his hands in his pockets.

“Alright let's go, can’t leave my baby hanging,” he teased, offering his arm to you which you took. Before walking out of the office on an early lunch.

Some people might think your relationship was romantic in nature. The nicknames, the teasing, and touching. But it really wasn’t like that, you were just close work friends and you were a little touchy. Did it sometimes make Hanta blush when you ran your hands over his chest or nuzzled his neck? I mean sure. He was a red-blooded man and you were his hot, hot coworker. He’d be nuts not to be attracted to you. But Sero wasn’t a dick, so he was more than capable of brushing off your touchiness.

You ordered your coffee and Sero ordered his then you sat down together at a small iron grate table. You took one of his hands and pressed your palms together.

“Look how big your hands are Hanta! How do you even function with such long fingers?” you giggled. Sero curled his knuckles, the tops of his fingers bending over yours. His hand slipped and suddenly his fingers were laced together with yours. His first impulse was to pull away but you held him tight and he quickly relaxed. Your hand was soft, small in his, he smiled to himself.

“If you’d like I can show you how I use these big hands of mine,” he teased making you laugh. He wouldn’t mind showing you a good time, not that you were really interested in him but a guy could dream.

“Buy me dinner first,” you teased back.

“I’ve bought you coffee isn’t that close enough?” you laughed again before launching into a rant about your day and all the shit you still had to do. Sero listened then went on his own tirade.

“Sounds like we both have a lot to do huh?” you asked blowing out a huff of air.

“Yep. we should probably get back to work and get some of it done,” he sighed.

“Or we could get another cup of coffee,” you offered.

“Or we could get more coffee,” he agreed, squeezing your hand once before letting you go to get you both refills. It didn’t bother him to pay for you, he was your coffee buddy after all.

Hanta ended up pulling a late night. He was so distracted that he didn’t even notice that you never came to say goodbye to him. You always said goodbye to him before you left and almost always you gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. You were just affectionate like that.

Sero submitted his last form and rolled his chair back cracking his knuckles and groaning in satisfaction.

“Hanta what are you still doing here?” you asked peeking up at him from your own desk.

“Finishing up some stuff, what are you doing here?” he asked crossing over at you and peeking at your glowing computer screen, the only light in the room beside his own desk. You smiled tiredly at him.

“New project, I’ve been working later than normal the past couple of days,” you sighed. Sero set his jaw as he looked at what you were working on. It looked like a shit ton of math to him, you’d need a full week to teach him this shit.

“You’re the only one working on this?”

“No, but-”

“No buts, knowing you, you’ve already done more than you’re fair share, it’s late baby time to go home,” his tone left no room for argument. You sighed and saved your progress, and got ready to leave.

“Let me walk you,” he said. Grabbing his bag quickly as the two of you started for the exit.

“You don’t have to Hanta, I’ve got pepper spray,” you said pulling a little blue can from your bag and waving it at him. He hmmed.

“Still walking you,” he said putting his arm around your waist, his hand resting on your hip holding you close. You sighed and snuggled closer to him bracing yourself for the cold night air. It wasn’t so bad being this close to him.

“Just to the station though,” you amended.

“What are you trying to get yourself robbed?” he scoffed. It wasn’t like he didn’t know where you lived, you were just trying to be polite so he didn’t have to walk all the way to your apartment building then backtrack to his. Jokes on you though he wasn’t going to let anything happen to you tonight.

You stayed close to Sero on the nearly empty train and he walked you to your front door. It was the middle of the night, he was clearly tired you wanted to offer your home to him for the nice but you knew he wouldn’t accept.

“Thank you Hanta,”

“Don’t mention it, I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said turning to leave. You grabbed his arm stopping him and leaning up to kiss his cheek. Or at least, you were going to kiss his cheek. Sero whipped his head around to see what you needed from him and it was already too late, you ended up kissing his lips.

Sero felt awful for taking advantage of you like that. Sure maybe the kiss was an accident but when he kissed you back, cupping your face and pressing you against your door was definitely not.

He didn’t mean to, but he just couldn’t help himself. “Mhp,” you whimpered against his lips. Sero got a grip and pulled back.

“Fuck- I’m sorry cupcake, I didn’t mean to,” he said, you smiled.

“It’s okay Hanta, it was nice,” you muttered.

“Nice?” he asked.

“Yeah, Why wouldn’t I enjoy kissing you? I thought I made it pretty clear that I like you,” you said. Hanta felt lightheaded.

“Then would you mind if I kissed you again?”

[handsmotif]

The Queercoding of Pinky and the Brain

This originally was just me infodumping to my friends on discord, but I decided it might be interesting to some people on here, so I polished it up and made it an actual essay lmao

To start, we’re going to break this into 2 sections -- the relationship between the mice, and Pinky’s relationship with gender, because queercoding doesn’t just mean gay!

For a 90′s show, Pinky and the Brain (and its mother show, Animaniacs) was very progressive for its time! But there were still lots of things that they couldn’t slip by censors, and thus, that’s where we have to read between the lines. And that is something I wanted to clarify here before we dive in, the actual meaning of queercoding. It’s NOT the same as queerbaiting. Queerbaiting is when the people producing certain media purposefully dangle the possibility of queer representation to lure in audiences (most prominent examples are BBC Sherlock, Riverdale, and Supernatural I GUESS? who knows abt that last one anymore), but never follow through, purely for profit. Queercoding is when media producers WANT to write in queer representation, but can’t, usually because the censors won’t let them. So, they must resort to subtext. (example: the policemen from Gravity Falls) It could also be unintentional, simply assigning certain characteristics associated with the LGBT community to characters. (example: Bugs Bunny, many Disney villains) Either way, it heavily relies on the audience picking up subtext, but whether it’s malicious or not varies, depending on the media. Bugs Bunny is an example of positive accidental queercoding, while a lot of Disney villains are negative examples.

Now, to actually discuss the gay little mice! Pinky and the Brain, whether it be intentional or not (based off comments from Maurice LaMarche, Rob Paulsen, and Tom Ruegger, signs strongly point to intentional, but it’s never been explicitly confirmed), is an example of positive queercoding.

There are many moments that I could pick out to discuss here, but we’ll start with some VERY on the nose gay metaphors. 

Remember Romy? If you don’t, that’s their actual biological son! Romy came about due to a cloning accident, where their DNA got combined and spat him out. 

There’s SO many things I could say about Romy. Every appearance he makes has an overarching gay metaphor as the plot. His first appearance in the episode Brinky (yeah it’s literally titled their ship name), it deals with his dads (WHICH I ALSO WANT TO POINT OUT, he DOES call them both dad, and they do both call him their son) disapproving of the fact that he wants to leave home and not follow in their footsteps of taking over the world. Brain even goes as far as disowning him whenever he tells him, which is certainly something a lot of queer people can unfortunately relate to. Also seen a lot in this episode is Pinky and Brain arguing even more than a married couple than usual, which pushes Romy away even further. Later, when Romy eventually does leave, and Brain starts to regret chasing him away, he tries desperately to reach out to him, but Romy doesn’t want anything to do with him. They end up tracking him down to an apartment building, where Romy is now living with his human girlfriend. When questioned about their relationship, the girlfriend, named Bunny, goes off on a tangent about how people shouldn’t judge others based on labels or relationships (hello?), and that Brain needs to be more tolerant. Brain apologizes and Romy forgives him. Happy ending.

Romy’s only other appearance is in the comics. Essentially, the plot of this one is that Brain wants to become the president of the local high school’s PTA, but he needs Romy’s help to make it look like he has a normal home life. He also enlists the help of Billie, the obligatory Woman introduced to make sure Brain doesn’t look as gay as he actually is, that he has a crush on. She pretends to be his girlfriend, and Pinky pretends to be Romy’s uncle, while they make up the story that Romy’s actual mother was lost at sea. Because if the organization found out that Brain has a son with a MAN??? THINK of the controversy! Anyway, the plan works, and Brain actually manages to get elected as president. Throughout this though, Pinky gets WEIRDLY jealous that Brain keeps brushing him aside for Billie. To the point where during Brain’s inauguration, Pinky actually dresses up as the wife/mother lost at sea and storms into the room.

[ID: Comic panels of Pinky, Brain, and Romy on stage at the inauguration ceremony. Pinky busts into room wearing drag, saying, “Yoo hoo! I’m back from years lost at sea to be with my son and ungrateful husband! Narf!” He then hugs Romy, while glaring at Brain. He goes on to say, “I’ll stand by your side, even though you left me behind!” The people in the audience begin to question this, saying, “Oh great fuzzy bangs!”, “What’d she say?!”, “He deserted her to be with that other woman!”, “What kind of monster is he?!”. Brain then rips off Pinky’s wig and says, “This isn’t my wife! This isn’t even a woman! It’s my roommate, Pinky.” Pinky replies, “Well, yes... But Romy really is my son! Poit!” And Brain responds, “N-Nonsense! He’s my son!” More people in the audience angrily speak up, saying, “What’s that?”, “He lives with a guy who likes to dress up in women’s clothing and the both claim to be that kid’s father!”, “Grumble! Mutter!” /END ID]

Needless to say, this doesn’t end well for them. What we can conclude from this is that homophobia exists in the Pinky and the Brain universe, and our characters are directly affected by it.

Moving on, And-There-Was-Only-One-Bed is a pretty common occurrence with these two. Their cage is big, they have plenty of room for two beds, but? They choose to sleep together? Even in some times where this has been inconsistent and they DO have separate beds, they’re always RIGHT next to each other. (what if we put our minecraft beds together ❤😳)

I would like to mention the episode, You’ll Never Eat Food Pellets In This Town Again! This episode is interesting to say the least. Deals with a lot of the meta of the show. Anyway. In this episode, Brain has a nightmare that he’s in a loveless marriage with Billie. You know, the woman he’s supposed to have a crush on. In the end, he wakes up from the nightmare in the same bed as Pinky.

Speaking of female love interests, Pinky is seen having multiple relationships with characters of different species. Any time this is brought up by Brain, Pinky counters with Brain being too intolerant. An honorable mention with this is in Wakko’s Wish, when Pinky is with Pharfignewton, and Brain’s constant pestering about their relationship could be read as jealousy. Pinky needs a mousy date, after all!

Something else I would like to mention is in one episode (I forget what it’s called, I’ll try to look it up later and edit this), Brain is applying for a job. The employer asks Brain if he’s married, and Brain hesitates before saying he “has a roommate,” but that he’s occupied with his own things, which then cuts to a shot of Pinky applying lipstick.

Leading into part two of this essay, Pinky’s relationship with gender! Pinky has always been very gender nonconforming, and loves to wear dresses, do his makeup, and make himself look pretty. For the most part, this is played pretty straight, and not as a gag, like a lot of shows tend to do! It’s just a casual fact about him that he likes to present femininely sometimes.

This does play into their taking over the world plans pretty often, where Pinky wears drag, usually either to sneak into somewhere. Like in one of their earliest appearances on Animaniacs, Noah’s Lark, where they pose as a couple to board Noah’s, and I quote, “love boat.” After boarding, Noah says to himself, “Who am I to judge?” Okay. Yeah. Alright. Anyway.

I actually had less to say on this than I thought I did, but I wanted to make sure to emphasize that Pinky at the very least is coded as being Not Quite Cis, and that he’s played a key part in helping a lot of people watching the show figure out that they’re also Not Quite Cis. 

Wrapping this up because I’m hungry, but I want to throw in some more honorable mentions that I really do not see any type of cishet explanations for:

They literally go on a romantic date at a very fancy restaurant in Brain’s Night Off. This is played extremely casually, and the only remark from anyone that they receive is that they are “much smaller than the usual clients.”

Pinky, on at least one occasion, daydreams about him and Brain being a married couple, and wanting to be a housewife (the original malewife ❤)

There’s an issue in the comics where Pinky has a crush on another male mouse, and when Brain gets annoyed, Pinky reassures him that he thinks Brain is cute and quite the catch too

Brain attempting to kiss Pinky in the reboot??????

Brain actually did conquer the world once in the Halloween special, because Pinky made a deal with the devil for it, and thus Pinky got sent to hell! Brain actually went to hell and gave up the world to bring him back

Brain was extremely close to conquering the world once more in the Christmas special, but after reading what Pinky’s feelings for him were (nothing romantic, just Pinky basically just praising Brain for being so hardworking and an amazing mouse, and lamenting that he never gets anything for it), he gets so emotional that he sabotages himself and wishes everyone a Merry Christmas instead

TLDR; these mice are very queer and need therapy, and are probably the most heavily queercoded characters that I can think of in children’s media.

[kaijurakunsobs]

Seeds

remember guys! you can ask me to tag them on future updates

Summary: The idea of a soulmate is well known, they will come to you one day, either as a lover or a friend. A single bond made of invisible thread is what will let you feel their emotions, joys and worries, to experience their pain and for them to feel yours.

But beware, for not all blessed unions are meant to be, if you were to hate and push them away, a slow death shall consume them and a garden will bloom within their chest, the flowers will fight and push to feel the sun from the outside, a poetic dead of a broken lover. A beautiful dead for your hollow existence.

You know that your mother was never a good person, or so you have been told.

Miranda meet her when she came from the city to the village, four months pregnant and with the false story of being “sick”, her sickness? She decided to cheat on her rich husband and she wanted to have you away from prying eyes and possibly abandon you here. Your birth giver was upfront about how "Having a bastard could ruin my lifestyle!", Mother Miranda smiled sweetly and had Alcina give your mother refugee and help during the birth, the Lady agreed and housed the woman.

On the night of your birth, Alcina held you in her arms, begging Miranda to let her keep you, but she denied. You were hers and hers alone.

As for your mother? Only Miranda knows what happened to her, but you suspect, that her body is buried somewhere in the forest, alone and forgotten, you couldn’t care any less.

Miranda was the one to raise you, to love you, the one who would be there when you were sick, to kiss your tears away when nightmares woke you up. She was the one to break your body apart and scream in our face how much of a failure you were, just like Alcina or Donna or those pesky lycans running amok outside, but within your failure, she saw minimal success, you were quick to learn how to care for her experiments, which were the signs of cadou rejection and how to treat it, at least, you could be useful until she placed you in the mansion the villagers were building for you.

You have seen so many people been brought to the lab, so many lives being taken for a selfish reason, that you grew numb, there was no anger or pain, you felt no grief when the test subjects saw you and begged for help, you did nothing for there was nothing inside you.

You are surprised when Miranda begins to show interest in a kid, you know he was brought here years ago and somehow had managed to survive the horrors your mother put him through. Interest grew into an obsession and then into pride, hope, you will forever remember how hard Miranda screamed when her golden child came out a failure too, cursing at the skies and asking why? He had been so close to being her perfect little boy and he turned out to be yet another fuck up.

But she doesn’t throw him away, her favoritism shows when she moved him from the medical area into a room in her private chambers, never allowing you to go close to him, slapping you and kicking up a storm whenever she saw you too close to his door, even if you were passing by. But you never resent him, you can’t hate him or her, all you can do is nod and go away.

But curiosity is something hard to get rid of, and so you waited for days almost a month until Mother left to meet up with Alcina, using the moment to sneak into his room. A beautiful room, compared to yours, he had a big bed with a canopy, the thick curtains prevent you from seeing him, it feels like a fairy tale when you part the curtain to peer inside.

Truly like a fairy tale...a beautiful boy lays there, his golden hair is going gray, probably out of stress. He has a couple of scars on his face and some new ones on his arms. You feel like reaching inside and kiss him to break the spell, but it feels...wrong, like if you could tarnish him even further by touching him, like if your mother would appear and toss you aside for laying one of your dirty hands on his skin. No matter how bad you wish to be his Knight and save him, the terror you feel over defying Mother Miranda’s orders makes you stay still.

And then, it happened.

It began as an agonizing stab in your chest, it made you trip backwards painfully slamming your head against the wall, gasping for air when the pain as a needle began to pierce through you slowly making its way to your heart, a pitiful sob left your mouth, rendering you useless while your body overcomes the initial discomfort. It takes all of your willpower to get straight and look up at the ceiling through your tears, the light it's blinding and it leaves you dizzy, almost ready to empty your stomach.

Karl Heisenberg, age eleven, lays on his luxurious-looking bed, his entire body shakes painfully, breaking through his mouth, and the fever that's racking his body is the only thing keeping him from noticing that, his soulmate is standing a couple of steps away from his bed.

But how do you even know this?

Because Miranda told you about the concept of someone blindingly loving you for all eternity, who would be your other half and the missing piece to your broken existence, Dimitrescu once said that those stories were silly little fantasies, that love should be won over and one should prove to be the right person for someone else and not just have it “hand it over”.

You used to dream of the day you would feel the connection between yourself and another person, of being able to experience their joy when their eyes fell on you. But this is far from what you wanted, what you always wished for! All you can feel is pain, radiating from so many places in your body, rendering you useless, overwhelmed with anger, grief, sorrow for “yourself”.

Everything quickly piles up, so consumed by what Karl is feeling that you don’t hear the tray that falls and the porcelain plates that shatter, you vaguely register the sting of Miranda slapping you and the distant sound of her screams.

She drags you out of the room and into the cold world outside her home, across the heartless forest and you wonder...if you might end up like your mother, buried under some tree to be forgotten. But Miranda keeps walking until she throws you at the feet of Lady Dimitrescu, speaking to the tall woman and leaving you under her care, forever.

When you were younger, you used to fear the Lady. She was imposing and so strong, a self-made matriarch, but she's so careful when helping you up and guiding you through her beautiful home, her hands are so kind when she helps you to undress and sit in the tub filled with warm water, racking her fingers through your messy hair...so this is what a mother truly is like?

She only leaves you alone when she goes to fetch anything you could wear, looking displeased when she hands you a maid's uniform "We must send for the seamstress, I cannot have you wearing those shabby clothes" that, for some reason gets you to smile.

Later, her movements are soft as she runs a brush through your hair, the fire makes the wood crack and explode, filling the room with a nice warmth, something you never lacked off but that never truly permeated your body.

"Y/N, care to explain why mother Miranda was so angry, earlier?" you hear the concern in her voice, a bit of worry hidden in a stern tone.

Alcina can see you shrink a bit, as if ashamed of what you had done “I saw the kid mother keeps in her chambers” it comes out like a whisper, scared of Miranda appearing at that moment to slap you again “I think he’s my soul mate, Alcina!”

Lady Dimitrescu chuckles lightly and smiles when you turn around to look at her ”Your soul mate, some dirty man-thing? Oh my sweet girl I hope it isn’t real and you were just revolted by the sight of a man!”

“But I felt his pain and his emotions...it was scary, but maybe he will love me!”

“Just because you can feel what he feels, doesn’t mean everything will be alright. That’s why those romances are so volatile, darling! There’s no real reason for them to work beyond being stubborn and tell yourself that it will work out” the lady is classy and gracious in her movements as she poured herself another glass of wine “That the other person at the end of your bond will fall to their knees the moment they see you, but in reality, they might resent your sole existence and end up killing you!”

“Killing me?” that comes as a surprise, you have never heard of this.

“Yes...a cruel and unjust dead” Alcina brings you to her lap letting one of her hands spread over your small chest with a sorrowful look on her face “Your lungs will get infested with flowers, a bouquet of throe will bloom within your body, each day the garden will grow and fight to see the sun beyond your mouth and it will rob you of all air and kill you in no time”

She sees you wonder about it, a million questions that you wish to ask, everything falling apart when her curious daughters come into the room, moved by the rumors some maids had shared about their mother adopting another child. All too eager to know their new sister.

After that day, the topic is never brought up.

You grow and learn everything under Alcina’s guidance, the woman is hellbent on making a lady out of you. She teaches you how to read and write, about math and how to sing, applauding when you show her the gift the cadou in your stomach gave you, Midas' touch.

Her daughters and your self-appointed sisters, all laugh and joke around you, treat you like if you were another human when you are no different from their mother, another failed creation, a remainder that Miranda was cursed to not have what she wants. But the love of your little family drowns those thoughts, leaving the happiness of your existence in a nice home and the ever-presence of pain and resentment in the back of your head.

As you grow you notice, each cut and wound that leaves a scar on your skin turns to gold when made by you, but looks as pale lines when made by Heisenberg. You can’t help but laugh when the idea of being a piece of pottery repaired via kintsugi pops in your head, and for a moment you ask yourself if Heisenberg also has golden scars to match yours?

You cry the day when you finally leave the castle, trying hard to convey your love for your mother and sisters with hugs and kisses, in low whispers, promises of coming over as much as you can. The Lady kisses your forehead and sends you off with some final words of advice.

"Never lower your head and always do your best, remember you have us and we would never let you fall"

You are eighteen when you become the miracle worker of the village, crafting medicines with alchemy, signing at the church when the congregation asks you to, turning anything into gold with your touch, smiling with grace, and claiming to have been blessed with a precious gift by Mother Miranda to help the poor and keep the village off absolute agony. In the end, everything tastes like vile and ash, the forced smiles and the sweet tone of your voice make you gang behind the long veil that covers your face.

The days when you sing at the church, are the only ones when you can feel all his hatred directed at you, each painful stab making your eyes tear, yet you keep on making the people happy with hymns crafted before you were even born. If you could let him feel how similar your anger for Miranda is, perhaps the pain in your chest would dissipate, but you can't because you are hollow.

Among the villagers you are Lady Y/N L/N, the golden touch child, you are adored and blindly loved, Miranda smiles radiantly whenever she hears nothing but good words from her cattle, how much they dote on you, ready to serve without a thought, the eagerness to work under you. You may have been a failed vessel but you are a success as a flycatcher, bringing the sheep down to the slaughterhouse to be sent to the other Lords.

On meeting day, the pain and emotions that you feel seem to amplify the closer you are to Heisenberg.

As you sit beside your adoptive mother, your smaller hand in hers, while Mother Miranda speaks and praises each one of her children, lingering a bit too much on her golden child. The pressure in your chest grows, it feels like when you submerge in the tub as if your lungs were being crushed under an invisible force, ready to cough and gasp for air.

Across from you, he sits, posture closed and annoyed beyond belief when Miranda asks him to stay a bit longer after the meeting is done, you feel relief when Lady Dimitrescu gets up, opting to ignore Heisenberg in favor of bringing you back to the castle for your scheduled visit.

You two aren't even halfway through your journey back when you notice you are missing something, a small gift for today's reunion, a bag of fine jasmine tea.

"Mother, I need to get back. It seems I misplaced something, you go ahead!"

There's no time for Alcina to respond before you volt back to the church, the soft lace of your veil beautifully flying behind your hurried steps, slowly dropping your speed the closer you get to the entrance of the building, from it you can see Miranda, she as shed her mask off and is touching Heisenberg's face the way you have seen brides or wives touch their husbands' faces.

A pulse of repugnance and despise make you stumble back, pressing your back against the outer wall, it feels like the first time you met him, it's blinding and leaves you disoriented for a second, a hand flies up to your mouth when a wave of nausea hits you. He's not only pissed, he feels filthy and is suppressing a murderous intent behind a mask of indifference.

The sensation grows and grows until it's crushing you. One look up and you see him standing before you, a hand caging you between him and pillar.

"What are you doing here, freak? The tall bitch sent you to spy on me? tell her to fuck off" this isn't the first time you hear his voice, but it feels like it, even if his words are filled with malice, they taste like bitter wine for you.

"NO!...I mean...no, Lord Heisenberg. I came back because I lost something, a small bag"

"So you are afraid the dog stole from you, are you calling me a thief?" your mouth opens to explain to him once more, but the burly man only growls and steps away "Think whatever you want, I can't care any less for whatever the scum thinks of me"

Later, in the solitude of your home, you will call yourself an idiot, asking yourself why you reached for his empty hand when he turned around ready to leave, why you didn't revealed who you were, why you didn't cried when the man slammed your body against the wall.

"DON'T YOU DARE TO TOUCH ME, BITCH!" Heisenberg's tobacco infused breath hits your face, the painful stab of hatred felt like if your body were being torn apart "I CAN'T STAND PEOPLE LIKE YOU, YOU MAKE SICK!"

This time, when he turns around to leave, you don't reach out, you stay there, gasping for hair and coughing like if you were drowning, a slick sensation in your throat makes you gag and cough harder than before, both of your hands are cupped over your mouth, scared at the idea of throwing up.

Thank God you don't.

The moment passes and your body calms down, but your eyes grow wide when you see what made you gag.

A single yellow carnation petal covered in spit rests between your hands.

-----

Yelow Carnation: rejection and disdain

tag list: @happygalaxymilkshake @mightybeeb @kittyb2000

[lalainajanes]

For klarosummerbingo, my “mango lassi” square! Did I order Indian food for dinner? Yes, yes I did.

Masks Off

When she notices the goon tailing her – shaved head, seasonally inappropriate leather jacket, neck tattoos – Caroline’s pissed off.

And exhausted.

She’d spent all day cooped up in the boardroom at Forbes Industries, listening to men twice her age complain about dividends and try to suggest that workers didn’t really need a raise subtly.

It had been a tedious and pointless exercise, one she suffers quarterly. Caroline holds 51% of the company’s shares and can easily wrangle another block of shareholders into voting with her. Her parent’s wills, read out fourteen years ago, had bequeathed a stake in FI to several loyal employees. People they’d loved, who’d stepped in to help raise Caroline after they’d passed.

The board knows she has the final say, and it kills them. They think she’s an idiot, that she’d bought her degrees and can’t comprehend the financial statements. They try to ply her with compliments and flattery, attempt unsubtle fibs – Caroline plays dumb and tolerates the bullshit because she knows she can control them. Another board might not be so easy to manipulate.

She’d had a headache by the time the meeting had wrapped, had been so grateful to see Enzo waiting at the curb. She’d practically dived into the backseat of the town car, had rolled the partition down, and enjoyed a satisfying debrief and bitch session on the drive back to her apartment. Enzo had offered to grab her dinner before he went off the clock, but Caroline knew he had a date night planned. She’d shoed him away, told him she’d order in.

Once safely tucked away in her place Caroline had gotten restless.

She’d changed out of her boring suit, pulled out the pins in her hair, and loosely braided it back. After changing into a pale blue cotton dress and pair of oversized sunglasses, then selecting a few Forbes Industries prototypes, Caroline had headed out for sustenance.

She hadn’t bothered to let her security detail know. She’s adept at sneaking away under their noses. The detail is mostly for show, to make sure no one connects Caroline Forbes, wild child heiress, to the vigilante who’s working on tidying up the city streets.

She’ll slip into the leather ensemble she’d commissioned once night falls and load up with weapons. Then she’ll head to the garage where she keeps her armored vehicles and larger toys.

There’s a new villain who’s been popping up more and more frequently on her patrols. She hasn’t caught him doing anything untoward just yet, and he’s yet to make the papers and have a ridiculous name bestowed upon him. She’s scoured papers from England, then the rest of Europe, checking to see if there was a reputation that preceded him. So far, she’s found nothing, but  Caroline knows he must be working on something big.

Why else would he be so determined to attract her attention? He must have some kind of plan cooking up, wants her looking in another direction when he enacts it.

The walk to the restaurant had been uneventful. Caroline had to wait a few minutes for her order to be ready, but passing the time on a bench outside, unnoticed, her people-watching undisturbed, had been a nice change from how she’d spent the rest of the day.

It promised to be a hot evening, even though the sun would be setting shortly. Sweat had begun gathering near her hairline, forcing curls out of her braid. Caroline had added a mango lassi to her order and collected her dinner, inhaled appreciatively at the warm, spicy scent emanating from the paper bag.

She’d begun her walk home, sipping her drink contentedly, weaving through the growing number of pedestrians who were venturing out for the evening.

She’d noted the guy shadowing her about three blocks from her building, had heaved a dramatic sigh that had the guy waiting for the walk light with her edging away.

She’d just wanted to stuff herself with naan, biryani, and saag paneer and become one with her couch for a few hours before she went out to take out her frustrations on some bad guys. Was that too much to ask?

Caroline takes a turn, heading east to where there should be fewer people, reaching into her bag to slide her fingers into the modified brass knuckles (not actually brass but a proprietary FI compound) and grasping the extendable baton.

She takes another turn to check that she’s not paranoid, but the goon mirrors it.

As does another person.

Caroline pretends to adjust the strap of her dress, twisting her head to get a better look at her second pursuer. It’s an impressively muscular woman, her considerable height only enhanced by her spiked hair, dressed in skin-tight shorts and a mesh crop top.

She doesn’t seem to mind that Caroline’s spotted her, wiggling her fingers and offering a challenging smile.

There are two possibilities. Either the people following her are cocky and stupid – really the ideal scenario – or they’re cocky because they’ve got a solid plan and some big guns.

When a hand grabs her upper arm and yanks her into an alley, spilling the mango lassi and staining her dress, Caroline suspects it might be the latter. She’s thrown against a wall, just managing to get her hands up to save her face from being smashed into the brick.

She hears footsteps pounding against concrete, and the two pursuers she’s noticed join the man who’d yanked her into the alley. Regretfully, Caroline drops her takeout and her bag and backs away, hiding her weapons in the folds out of the skirt. She forces a quaver into her voice, “What do you want?”

It’s unlikely that three people who seem to have stepped right out of the goon for hire catalog have just decided to rob her. Caroline doesn’t want to assume there’s a larger plot. She’s hoping this won’t turn into a big thing, and she’s out of luck if people are planning to kidnap Caroline Forbes for ransom.

But it’ll be even messier if a bad guy’s clocked her extracurricular activities.

The spiky-haired woman takes the lead, stalking towards Caroline. She’s got a knife in her hand now, “What do I want? Twenty million dollars, to start with.”

Oh good. It’s just a kidnapping.

Honestly, kind of an insulting one. She won’t even have to liquate any assets to come up with the twenty million. Caroline stops moving, straightens her spine. “Done!” she chirps brightly. “Wire transfer, or cheque? I can do cash too, but that’s like ten briefcases. What are you going to do with them after?”

She’s been hoping to catch her attempted kidnapper off guard, but the woman doesn’t falter. She snorts, “You’re funny. I didn’t expect that.”

“Thanks, I get that a lot. I’m chock full of surprises.”

Spike lunges forward, and Caroline dodges, stepping past her and whipping her arm out, until her weapon lengthens fully. She crouches, extending her leg and spinning while slashing with her baton. Caroline lands a brutal strike on Spike’s kidneys. Spikes grunts, stumbles forward, arm banding over her stomach protectively. Caroline completes her spin and rises, catching Spike with a punch before she pauses, poised on the balls of her feet, back to a wall.

Her would-be kidnappers no longer look as confident. Spikes spits blood, expression enraged. The other two watch Caroline with calculative gazes.

“Girls gotta keep in shape, right? The tabloids are brutal. It turns out the elliptical is super boring, so I had to find something a little more fun.” Caroline leaps forward, tucking into a roll, snagging a brick from the ground and using her momentum to throw it into Leather Jacket’s face.

The brick makes contact with a gross crunch of blood, bone, tissue, and teeth. Leather Jacket howls, his hand coming up to cover his head. She jumps again, thighs locking around his neck, spinning to bring him to the ground. She digs her knee into his spine, gripping his head and slamming it into the ground for good measure until he goes limp underneath her.

Caroline stands, wiping her hand on her already ruined dress. “One down,” she says.

Only to instantly regret the proclamation. Bonnie says she needs to lay off on the monologuing, and maybe she’s got a point.

She senses movement behind her, near the mouth of the alley. Caroline turns warily, head swiveling between her two attackers and the men who are now freaking rappelling from the rooftops. Six of them. In black tactical gear, strapped with weapons and wearing black ski masks.

Well, crap.

If she’d been on patrol, with her protective suit and gadgets, she might have been able to take them. Now, in flats and a sundress, with two flimsy weapons and no backup, she doesn’t like her odds.

Caroline tosses the baton aside, pastes on the smile she uses when she has to ignore paparazzi shouting rude questions about her sex life at her. She lifts her hands slowly, palms open. “So, I’m guessing you don’t only want cash, huh?”

“Funny and smart,” Spikes says spitefully, coming up behind Caroline and yanking her hair. “What a rosy life you must lead.”

She feels a sharp sting in the side of her neck, then a flood of wooziness. Brief pain when she collapses.

She’s vaguely aware of being heaved up and over someone’s shoulder, of being alarmed by how her limbs won’t cooperate when she tries to fight back. She’s tossed in a trunk, encased in blackness.

Caroline fights it, the tiredness, her thoughts growing meandering and disorganized. When the engine rumbles to life underneath her, Caroline loses consciousness.

* * * * *

Caroline realizes she’s tied to a chair as soon as awareness returns.

She can hear voices murmuring, too soft for her to make out any words even when she strains. Caroline’s slumped over, pulling against the ropes. She’s definitely going to have some fun bruises tomorrow. Her head’s resting limply against her chest, and she stays as still as she can, barely opening her eyes while trying to get a good look at her surroundings.

Unfortunately, she seems to be in a pretty generic warehouse—grimy, smelly, cavernous, decorated with random overlapping graffiti.

She spots a tray of shiny, sharp medical instruments to her right.

Which is not ideal.

Caroline tests her bonds slowly, checking for any give or weakness. Any kind of opportunity. One of her captors has eagle eyes and notices her movements. She flinches when his voice booms out, “Sleeping beauty awakes!”

Damn it.

Caroline lifts her head, rolling her neck to work out the cramp that’s developed. “I prefer the modern Disney princesses, thank you.” She’s not the type to wait around for a handsome prince to come to her rescue.

She studies the guy who’d spoken. He’s got steel-grey hair and tanned skin, thick biceps. His face doesn’t show even a hint of emotion, and he doesn’t acknowledge she’d spoken. She’d guess he’s a pro, probably some variety of ex-military, likely expensive. Caroline hears the clomp of heavy boots and twists her head to see some familiar faces joining the party.

Moderately damaged familiar faces, but she’s not sorry about that.

“So about that ransom,” Caroline begins hopefully. “Twenty-five million, was it?”

The guy who’d taken a brick to the face grunts, “Thirty now. For our trouble.”

Caroline can admit that’s fair.

“I get it. Plastic surgery’s not cheap. Not that I’ve had any work done, despite what the tabloids might claim. I’m only twenty-seven. Of course my boobs look fantastic in a bikini.”

No one even cracks a smile.

“Okay, so you’re not interested in jokes. We could discuss the fact that it’s super gross that people follow me around the world and stalk me with long-lens cameras. Am I not entitled to take a vacation?”

No response.

Caroline sighs, shifting in her chair in an attempt to get more comfortable. “Tough crowd.”

Spike drags a second chair over, sitting down and resting a booted foot on her opposite knee. “Thirty million dollars. I have a list of six prisoners that I need to be released from the Super Max. And I want something from the Forbes Industries Vault. The subterranean one that most of your employees don’t know about.”

Caroline tips her head back, considering. Thirty million dollars, no big deal. The prisoners might be hard to arrange, but she’s got connections. She knows exactly who she’d need to bribe. She can always scoop them up later, wrap ‘em in a pretty little bow and leave them on the steps of city hall.

The Vault though? That’s not happening. She’s going to have to figure out how they even know about it, who else might have bought the info, but that’s a problem for later.

“How about fifty million dollars and a couple of extra prisoners? Maybe someone from the asylum?”

Spike leans over, her hand drifting over the tray of instruments. She plucks up one with a serrated edge, twirling it through her fingers. “I know you’re used to snapping your fingers and getting everything your little heart desires, but this isn’t a negotiation.”

She leans forward, resting the blade against the dip between Caroline’s collarbones. She taps it against Caroline’s skin with each carefully enunciated word, “Money. Prisoners. Vault.” She pulls back, gives the instrument another spin. “That’s my only offer. You can say yes, and we’ll give you a phone, so you’re servants can start arranging things. Or, we can do this the hard way.”

She doesn’t insult Caroline’s intelligence by spelling out what the hard way would entail.

Caroline swallows, straightens her spine. “No one gets in my vault.”

Spike sighs in faux disappointment, her eyes gleaming with anticipation. “The hard way it is, then.”

Caroline closes her eyes, holds her breath, waits for the first cut to come.

It doesn’t come from where she’d expected.

Glass shatters from high above, showering down, leaving dozens of tiny nicks across her bare shoulders. She feels a rush of air before a body landing in front of her, knees bent.

A familiar man, one who’s been taking up way too much of Caroline’s free time, smirks at her, “Hello, love.”

Caroline gapes at him, and he pivots, backing up until her bent knees brush the back of his calves. She sees few bright flashes, but his back obscures her view of what’s happening. Whatever he’s doing, it’s painfully loud. Popping sounds interrupt shouts and screams of pain, and heavy thuds ring out. Caroline cringes, tucking her ear against her shoulder in an attempt to muffle the cacophony.

Silence, when it comes, scant moments after the chaos began, is jarring. Caroline leans as far to the side as she can, eyes widening when she spots the pile of bodies. She watches as the man, who she doesn’t know if she can call her rescuer since at this point he might also be planning on ransoming her, yanks a handful of zip cuffs from his pocket.

He moves swiftly and with grace, seemingly very at home his body and aware of its capabilities. Caroline’s eyes narrow, mind whirling as he secures her attackers, and she tries to assimilate this new information. He pulls off his leather gloves when he’s done, returning to her side. His expression grows regretful, and his fingertips brush her shoulders, skimming over the cuts and scrapes there. “Sorry about these. The skylight was the best entry point. Make sure you clean them up, hmm?”

He steps passed her, and Caroline feels him make quick work of her handcuffs. She hears the snick of a knife unsheathing and stiffens, but he only uses it on the ropes that bind her legs and torso. Caroline shakes them off, stands hesitantly.

“Okay,” she says, crossing her arms and turning until they’re once more face to face, separated by the metal chair. “What exactly is happening here? Who are you?”

“I’m afraid I’m not yet ready for you to know my identity. In due time, I promise.”

Caroline sucks in a sharp breath, her teeth grinding together. “Um, how about no?”

He blinks, and Caroline steps a little closer. They’ve always met in the dark, and he’d purposely stuck to the shadows as he’d teased and tossed questions at her. She’s never been this close to him. His eyes are blue, his lashes annoyingly long in a way men never appropriately appreciate. He wears a black mask, covering from the top of his forehead to his upper lip. His hair is slicked back, but she thinks it might be on the lighter side, given the shade of his stubble.

He clears his throat and shifts his weight, but he doesn’t step back or shy away. “I… I beg your pardon?”

“I have had a garbage day. It was long, it was boring, I had to argue over things I know I’m right about, with people who think I’m a bimbo and spend way too much time trying to look down my tops. My dinner got tossed aside when goons r us scooped me up. I love this dress, and it’s ruined. I’m bleeding. I don’t know where my shoes are. I’m hungry, I’m tired, and I want to go home!” she’s shouting when she’s done ranting, out of breath.

“Right.” Her rescuer, she’s decided on the term now, shoves the chair aside. He steps forward until his feet bracket hers, wraps his arm around her waist. Caroline grips his biceps, too shocked to admonish this rude invasion of her space. “Hold on. Step up onto my feet.”

She throws her hands up in frustration, “Hello? Did anything I just said sink in?”

His lips, which she’s now noticing are very nice, full and soft looking, compress. She’s pretty sure he’s trying to swallow a laugh. “I heard every word. I’m trying to assist in getting you home. In service of that, if you could please step up onto my feet and hold on.”

His right arm rises, and Caroline recognizes the device in his hand. She’s about to ask him if he’s seriously rescuing her with a device he’d stolen from her but thinks better of it.

He’d stolen the grappling hook from a vigilante who rocks a rose pink leather catsuit, not from Caroline Forbes. It would have been a monster slip, a true testament to how rattled she is from the day’s events that she’d almost blurted out her secret identity to a guy with questionable motives and an unknown name.

Instead, she smiles tightly, loops her arms around his neck, and gingerly steps onto his heavy boots. “For future reference,” she says sweetly, “I generally only like following orders in the bedroom.”

The strangled choking noise he makes as they hurtle upward is immensely satisfying.

* * * * *

Two days later, Caroline’s on her couch watching news footage of a gala she’d been supposed to attend. She’d had a great dress, red and scandalous, all ready to go, but trying to cover her scabby shoulders with makeup had made her look like she’d contracted some kind of infectious skin issue.

She’d sent her regrets and a fat check, resigned herself to a solo evening in her comfy sweats. On her TV, a society reporter’s chattering away about the guest she’d just finished talking to, a lech who’s at least smart enough to hire a publicist good enough to hide his dealings with loan sharks. She trails off in the middle of a sentence, fingertips coming up to press at her earpiece.

The reporter looks right at the camera, excitement on her face. “I’ve just been given some breaking news! A surprise guest has arrived, all the way from the UK. Klaus Mikaelson has shied away from public life since his messy exit from his father’s corporation five years ago. He’s built his own tech firm from the ground up. Buzz had been building since they announced their intention to go public. Let’s see if we can get a few words.”

Bored with the fawning, Caroline’s just about to switch channels. She knows all about Klaus’ Mikaelson’s company. Blurbs about it have been showing up in the intelligence reports she has complied since he’d lured a pair of promising engineers from FI’s Paris offices.

She’s planning on investing in his IPO because he might have scummy HR policies, but his business is sound.

There haven’t been many pictures of him available; apparently, he’d hardly been a social butterfly even when he’d been welcome in the family fold. He couldn’t have been more than sixteen or so in the ones Caroline’s seen, in which he’d been gangly and angular and sporting a terrible haircut.

The image changes, swinging to the red carpet before Caroline can grab the remote. She pauses, impressed because Klaus Mikaelson has grown up nicely. She might be distracted by the flawless fit of his tux, which Caroline knows can cover a world of sins, so she leans closer as the camera pans up to his face.

And promptly drops her wine class.

The blue eyes. That smile, the dimple it carves into his stubbled cheek. She’d brushed her lips over that cheek barely more than forty-eight hours ago when she’d thanked him for what he’d done for her.

Klaus Mikaelson had accompanied her home the other night, had neatly deflected her probing questions, his amusement never turning to exasperation at Caroline’s dogged persistence.

She’d seriously considered inviting him into her home. She’d told herself it was only in search of more information, but a tiny part of her, the one that was unfailingly honest and sometimes gets her in trouble, had admitted her rescuer intrigued her, even without a name.

Well. Now she has one. A plan forms rapidly, and Caroline scrambles for her phone, digging it out of her couch cushions. She taps the screen, connecting a call to Bonnie. “Bon? Sorry to bug you when you’re off the clock. But I need you to find someone for me.”

She stands, walking into her bedroom as she explains what she needs.

Bonnie’s a genius, well worth the exorbitant salary Caroline pays her. She gets the address within an hour.

* * * * *

Caroline drops a rope onto the terrace of Klaus’ apartment, slips down with barely a whisper of sound, landing lightly. She hugs the side of the building, inching over to the open French doors. She’s fully suited up, hair tightly controlled, and mask on. She eases her foot over the threshold, eyes darting around.

Ugh, of course, he has excellent taste.

Caroline likes light and airy, fun patterns and textures. But she can appreciate the sumptuousness of Klaus’ living room. It’s done up in burgundies and neutrals, hints of gold. There’s a buttery leather sofa facing a fireplace, thick carpets that muffle the sounds of her boots as she walks further in. She can imagine a pleasant night in front of a crackling fire, curled up on the couch when the weather turns cold.

But she’s getting ahead of herself.

Her nose twitches, picking up the smell of curry, cardamom, and turmeric.

She hears a door click shut, whirls to find Klaus, barefoot and still dressed up from The Gala, though he’s ditched the jacket and tie. He leans against the now-closed doors to the terrace. He smiles at her warmly, “Hello, Caroline.”

Which answers one of her most pressing questions.

Caroline yanks her mask off, tossing it aside. “I realize this is going to give you déjà vu, but what exactly is happening here?”

Klaus pushes off from the door, ambles towards her, studying her reaction carefully. Caroline doesn’t flinch away or retreat. “I have a proposition for you. And I have dinner. Takeaway from that place you visited the other day when your evening plans were… interrupted. I even got the mango lassi.”

Caroline narrows her eyes, “I have weapons, you know. Way more than you’d think, given how tight this outfit is.”

He laughs, a low husky sound that Caroline knows would be easy to get addicted to. “I’m sure you do. I’m not worried about you using them on me. I only want you to hear out my proposal. You can leave anytime you wish.”

She wonders if it’s stupid to believe him, but she does. He’d had the upper hand two days ago, had no trouble dispatching the group that had taken her. If he had nefarious intentions, he could have picked up right where they left off with the torture.

Caroline’s learned to trust her instincts. They’re telling her she’s safe.

She tugs her hair out of its elastic, loosens her collar slightly, pulling the zipper down a few inches. “Mind lending me something to wear? This totally isn’t designed for sitting for long periods.”

Klaus directs her to a guestroom, gathers a few things of his for her to wear. When she gets to the dining room, she finds he’s arranged the food on gleaming platters and lit candles. Her mango lassi, in its plastic cup, looks wildly out of place.

Caroline refuses to find it endearing.

At least until she’s confirmed that her instincts are correct.

[little-mad]

Downsides of Thievery Pt. 10

~ Previous Part ~ Next Part ~

What was going on around Gavin was essentially up to his imagination due to the fact that Rael wouldn’t move his damn hands. While he wasn’t really eager to encounter any more alteons, Gavin was beginning to feel claustrophobic with parts of Rael’s body surrounding him on all sides.

After the interaction with the guard at the entrance, Gavin heard Rael exchange a few more brief greetings as he made his way through the palace. It was bizarre, being so near to other people but being unnoticed or otherwise unacknowledged.

Gavin found it kind of odd that no one had even commented on the weird way Rael’s hands were situated. Surely at least some of them had noticed, right? So why didn’t they mention it? Maybe minding one’s own business was a big staple of alteon culture or something…

The din of voices, rummaging around, and clanging dishes that had been present ever since entering the building began to fade. Only once everything had fallen silent did Rael speak up. “I’m going to remove my hand now,” he stated.

Before Gavin could get the chance to try to prepare himself, he suddenly found himself bombarded with light. “Ah, god,” he complained as he blinked away the spots in his eyes.

Once his vision had recovered from the initial assault, Gavin carefully opened his eyes all the way. The sight he was met with took his breath away. Sure it may have just been a hallway, but it was the most stunning hallway he had ever been in!

The walls were made of smooth gray stone that rose up into arches in the ceiling. Banners of a rich blue color, decorated with a complex emblem hung from the walls on either side. Floor candelabras that looked to be made out of some kind of dark metal stood every few feet along the sides of the hallway--it was impressive how well candles managed to light the area.

The centerpiece of the room was the tall door that Rael stood directly in front of. The thing was made of dark wood that had been carved with intricate designs. It looked as though it would weigh a ton, even to someone Rael’s size.

Gavin had been in a lot of fancy places in his day--it had usually been while he was breaking and entering, but that was besides the point. The point was, none of those places matched the grandiose nature this literal castle possessed. “Think of all the riches I could find here…” Gavin’s thief brain was kicking in and he very nearly smacked himself as a result. “Yeah, like I haven’t gotten in enough trouble for stealing from alteons,” the more rational section of his mind countered.

“Hey, are you listening?” Gavin was abruptly jerked out of his own mental argument by the sound of Rael’s voice, which he only now realized had been going off in the background for the past few seconds.

“Uh--sorry, what did you say?” Gavin asked sheepishly as he leaned back to look up at the alteon’s face.

Rael blew out an impatient sigh. “I said, this door leads to the central part of the palace,” he summarized. “I also said that I’m going to keep you uncovered from now on.”

Gavin wasn’t really sure whether to be pleased or upset by this news. On one hand, he was eager to not be stuck in the oppressive dark. However, on the other hand, being out in the open meant getting ogled at by giants. Plus there was the risk of someone snatching him again… “No one's gonna try and grab me, are they?” He voiced his concern.

Rael’s expression softened so slightly Gavin barely even managed to detect it. “No, the palace is the most secure location in the world, you’ll be fine,” the dark haired giant assured him.

Satisfied with the response, Gavin gave a nod. He relaxed just a bit. Despite the many ups and downs they’d had together, Gavin trusted Rael’s judgement as well as his ability to protect him. Though the giant had managed to handle the Kaydin situation with words rather than violence, Gavin didn’t doubt that the guy would kick ass in a fight--if the definition in the guy’s biceps were anything to go by anyways.

-

To be honest, Rael would have preferred to keep Gavin hidden until the moment he delivered him to the Emperor. However, he knew that while the servants he’d passed by already had known better than to intrude upon a soldier’s business, most of the people in the central part of the palace would have no qualms in doing so. If he were to walk in, clearly hiding something, he would no doubt get stopped at least several times. At least with Gavin on display, everyone would instantly know the situation. Of course that may not prevent them from interfering, but Rael could only hope for minimal interaction.

After a quick glance downwards to ensure his passenger was secure, Rael pulled open the large door that separated the servant’s section from the rest of the palace.

The decor and architecture in this area, while similar to that of the previous section, was far grander and more extravagant. Rael didn’t even have to look to know Gavin was stunned by the sight. He took a small bit of pride in knowing the human was impressed by alteon craftsmanship.

The room they were in was the front entryway, it was where most visitors would first enter the palace. A handful of guards dotted the room, and of course, as soon as they all spotted Gavin, their eyes were glued to the little man.

Rael could feel Gavin fidgeting nervously in his hand, and honestly, the feeling was somewhat mutual. While Rael wasn’t the focus of anyone’s stares, he was still getting far more attention than he would prefer. Imagining what they could all be thinking about him made Rael feel sick to his stomach.

“Just...try to ignore them,” he advised himself as he began to walk further into the entryway. Avoiding making eye contact with anyone, he made his way towards the grand staircase that was the focal point of the room.

After ascending the steps, Rael was met with the enormous doors that would lead into the throne room. Rather than going through them, he made a right down the hallway that would take him to the Emperor’s office. The throne room was only used for official, large scale events. The Emperor was far more likely to be working in his office at this hour.

Unfortunately, there was no shortage of people milling around, and while so far everyone had refrained from approaching Rael, that streak was about to come to an end. “Ah, so this must be the human who attempted to rob Lady Elyth,” remarked a woman he recognized as being one of the Emperor’s scribes.

The scribe stood in front of Rael, effectively blocking his path. He sighed internally. Despite having no actual title, the Emperor’s scribes were well respected around the palace, and as close servants of the Emperor, soldiers like Rael were expected to defer to them. This meant he would be forced to humor this woman.

“Yes, I’m on my way to bring him to the Emperor now,” Rael stated, hoping the scribe would want to avoid getting in the way of Imperial orders.

Rael had to fight the urge to look down when he felt Gavin inching backwards on his palm. The little guy seemed to be trying to put some distance between himself at the unfamiliar alteon that was currently staring at him.

The woman gave a nod of understanding but still didn’t move. “This one certainly appears younger than the other ones I’ve seen,” she commented as she leaned in for a closer look.

Rather than jerking backwards as he reflexively wanted to, Rael remained still. He glanced down to see that Gavin had retreated all the way towards his chest. It was evident he was trying to keep a calm expression on his face, but it was easy to tell the man was highly uncomfortable. “Just hang in there,” Rael thought, wishing he could mentally send the message to the human.

Finally, after several long moments of ogling, the scribe pulled back and straightened up. “The Emperor is currently meeting with one of his advisors in his office, so you’ll have to wait until he’s finished” she informed him. “Anyways, enjoy the rest of your day, soldier.”

“And you as well, miss,” Rael replied. He waited until the woman had walked past him and out of sight before he started forward once again.

Gavin let out a deep sigh of relief, but otherwise kept quiet, which was for the best considering there were still guards about. Rael didn’t fail to notice that the human hadn’t moved away from his body. Even through his clothes, Rael could feel the slight movements that brushed against his chest. Were he not a man of fortitude, he may have reacted to the ticklish sensation.

After turning a corner, Rael made it to the more secluded area of the palace that housed the Emperor’s personal office. He was surprised to find the small sitting area outside the office completely vacant. Typically, there was at least one guard stationed outside the door so long as the Emperor was inside.

Rael furrowed his brows. Had the scribe not confirmed that the Emperor was indeed in his office, he might have suspected the ruler was elsewhere. But, since Rael couldn’t risk potentially barging in on a private meeting, he wouldn’t be able to check to be certain. “We’re going to have to wait,” he told Gavin in a low voice.

“Okay, yeah..good,” the human replied, not bothering to hide his relief at getting to postpone his impending judgement.

Being sure to keep Gavin steady, Rael took a seat on the stone bench across from the door to the Emperor’s office. It was only once he was seated that he realized how cramped the hand that was holding Gavin was. For quite awhile now he’d been making a concentrated effort to keep the appendage still so as to not accidentally exacerbate the human’s injuries.

“I’m going to set you down beside me, alright?” Rael waited for Gavin’s nod of confirmation before carefully relocating him onto the bench. Once the human was safely settled on his own two feet, Rael gratefully shook out his aching hand.

“Nothing like a giant castle to make a guy feel small,” Gavin remarked with a nervous chuckle as he sat down.

Rael glanced down at the human thoughtfully. Sometimes he forgot that in Gavin’s eyes, humans weren’t unusually tiny and weak creatures. To him, humans were normal sized--therefore he perceived alteons as giants. It was strange for Rael to imagine, because he couldn’t help but see Gavin as anything but tiny. “It’s quite large even to us alteons, if that’s any consolation,” he said honestly. “Anyone unfamiliar with the layout is bound to get lost.”

It had taken a good few weeks after beginning work at the palace for Rael to get a hang of navigating the expansive property. The winding hallways and innumerable doors made the place a virtual maze. He could only imagine how daunting it must be for someone of Gavin’s size. It would be effortless for the little guy to get hopelessly lost.

Just then, Rael’s attention was drawn to the office door, which had begun opening. The person who exited was familiar--he was a fellow member of the Imperial Guard. Rael quickly realized that he must have been the one who was meant to be on duty outside the office, though that didn’t explain what he’d been doing inside the room.

“Rael, there you are,” Ashryn greeted as he swiftly shut the door behind him before Rael could even get a glimpse inside the office. “I was wondering when you would arrive.”

Ashryn was tall and well muscled. His skin was a touch lighter than Rael’s and his braided hair was of a chestnut brown color. Judging by his broad shoulders and sharp jawline, the guy would undoubtedly make for an intimidating adversary.

“The Emperor just asked me for some insight on a few matters,” Ashryn explained, gesturing back towards the office. Rael suppressed a look of confusion. He had never really heard of a guard of Ashryn’s rank being asked for input from the Emperor himself. “But enough about that,” Ashryn declared, interrupting Rael’s contemplation. “I’m eager to meet this human criminal.” In an instant his gaze was upon Gavin. A sly smile tugged at the corner of his lips, and there was a glint in those pale green eyes of his that Rael didn’t like in the slightest.

[britishassistant]

hahahaha, lol how about the town having a shipping war?, lol the MalleYuu stans are happy they now have canonical proof their ship is sailing, while the rest are trying to set up their favorite villain with yuu. so which one of them would rise to villain levels of insane just to be a match maker for their ship? hahaha lol match making and wingmanning instead of being scared is funny

I don’t think the town would have a shipping war among the civilians, per say, but there’d definitely be a few debates, and tv channels and magicam accounts would profit off of the scandal for a few days. Yuu is shipped with everyone they’ve ever interacted with, regardless of compatibility or length of interaction, much to their dismay.

They’re mostly pretty tame arguments, something you bicker about with your friends that may cause a fight for a few days, but nothing that anyone’s going to throw any punches or break up a relationship over.

The closest people ever come to “war” like behavior is the conflict between Yuu x Hero and Yuu x Villain fans. The Yuu x Hero fans say the villains are too “dangerous” or “unstable” to be in a healthy relationship with Yuu, while the Yuu x Villain fans point out that some of the heroes are kind of the same, when it comes down to it. At least Yuu looks like they’re enjoying themselves when they’re with the villains, rather than running away from the heroes.

The minions at least know better than to get involved, as their bosses become unpredictable and vindictive when jealous or flustered (as they often are by this kind of talk) and some of them are also in the running. It’s quickly understood that it makes for a better work environment to leave that stuff at the door.

Yuu has to hide their face when they go out, just to avoid the swarms of people pestering them over who they’re attracted to. It’s basically Magicam Monsters on a very personal scale. Yuuken tries to help out as much as he can, but he’s just one guy. The RSA are no help, making token protests, but not actually doing anything to stop it.

Jamil works out first that the best way to get into Yuu’s good books is to avoid talking about it unless they want to bring it up, and Snake Whisper’ing anyone who tries to harass them during his kidnapping attempts. When Yuu sees him rolling his eyes at the news and scoffing that don’t people have anything better to do with their lives, it gets him a smile and a chuckle at least, though they still have that hunted look in their eye.

So he tries to pull off his biggest, most bombastic scheme yet: stealing the entire office building of the Asim business after clearing out the workers, and replacing all of the company logos with his Supervillain symbol and decor, claiming it as an extension of his evil lair. All the discarded logos get dumped outside the RSA headquarters.

That gets people abuzz for a few days, but then the talk begins to die down—

Leona somehow alters everything that the Kingscholar Incorporated name appears on in the city so it now reads “Long Live The King” and steals Farena’s super suit.

Royal Flush tries to steal the victory for the Botanical Center’s “Best Rose” award by infesting the city with roses as large as houses that eat the competition (the other roses, I mean, not the people growing them).

Poison Queen kidnaps and holds all the manufacturers and promoters of shoddy makeup and clothing lines hostage, with the aim of keeping them captive until they learn how to make better products and stop profiting off a certain scandal.

Octo Dealer makes enough deals with people that are violated by talking or hearing talk about shipping Yuu that Leviathan can afford a whole host of unwilling volunteers to help him rob the city’s highest priced restaurants and galleries.

Charon just hacks into people’s phones to brainwash them into loving Zombie Girl Saga over Love Live! The fact that his hacking causes anything mentioning shipping to get deleted/freeze up/release malware is just an unexpected side effect.

Tsunotaro almost manages to trap entire RSA legion of heroes in their headquarters by surrounding the building with thorns that force people to take a nap every time they’re pricked by them. It’s only thanks to a few heroes that were outside at the time receiving the aid of the Prefect that the city wasn’t deprived of its defenders.

And so, the city moves on to the next big scandal.

And while what happened to Yuu doesn’t ever completely go away, they can at least walk around outside now and cover other news stories without getting stopped and questioned every five steps.

[ga-yuu]

Killer Reality Show #April Fools Day Special

Something they did for April fools' days, again!

All the 13 male leads are in Kamakura Shogunate for some reason and are fighting for your love-----

Let's see what our candidates have to share about the fun show.

Candidates list:

No. 1: Minamoto no Yoritomo

Yoritomo: "I think the most memorable competition for me was the 'Battleship'. A game where we're divided into pairs and each pair have to compete with each other on separate boats and the one who manages to sink the other person's boat wins. What? Who was I paired with, you ask!? Who else, Yoshitsune, of course. He looked kinda happy too."

No. 2: Kajiwara Kagetoki

"Martial arts, music etc...there were many exciting categories. But the knowledge-based competition was a walk in the park for me. Although I was stunned to see Morinaga, who was seated next to me, scribbling something on his answer sheet, Yoritomo-sama saw that and laughed out loud. Thanks to that he got distracted so it was a win-win situation for me."

No. 3: Adachi Morinaga

"As a sign of masculinity, we decided to compete in camping skills such as building ships, fishing, making campfire...etc. Then a storm came, we scattered and took shelter and I bumped into Sueharu in a cave. I said "I knew we were kindred spirits" and he got very angry."

No 4: Taira no Shigehira

"We also competed in a drawing competition. Yeah, we all drew her portrait. Well...I think I did quite a good job, but then Yoichi-san was smirking at me for no reason. Frustratingly, when asked what he wanted? he said "All your embarrassing feelings in your heart are expressed well in your drawing. Also, stop making that face."

No. 5: Minamoto no Yoshitsune

"I saw Yoritomo planning on inviting her on a date just to tease her. When I consulted this issue with his Majesty, he suggested that I should finish him in the dark. But that is a cowardly move, so sent him a letter in her name. His reply was "Oh, you're inviting me to the beach at night? I see finally you've grown up to make such a bold request." Isn't she already a grown woman?"

No. 6: Mushashibo Benkei

"I was planning to make dinner for her, but all the hungry guys came rushing into the kitchen and I had to prepare dinner for all of them. I knew half of them were just there to sabotage me, but I let them off the hook since the dinner party was fun."

No. 7: Nasu no Yoichi

"Another competition was where we had to send love letters to her using bows and arrows....I mean, why can't we give it to her just like that? Also, I peeked at Yasuchika-dono's letter and it had some kinds of complicated letters and spells written in them. It's creepy but nothing less expected from a creepy Onmyoji."

No. 8: Tamamo

"Don't tell this to anyone, but I'm actually planning on recording everyone's sleeping posture the day after tomorrow. Everyone's hilarious sleeping pattern will make up for a good embarrassing bedtime story discussion. I'm most curious about Benkei, though. Am I the only one who wants to see the unexpected side of a man with a one-track mind?"

No. 9: Kurama

"I bought the sake which I robbed from the Kamakura's brewery to Tamamo's room, so we both could have a drinking contest. Ibuki barged in out of nowhere without the care in the world, so I tried to fight him off. But for some reason, I was kicked out as well. Tamamo told me not to disturb and closed the door....I don't understand at all!"

No. 10: Abe no Yasuchika

"I was busy setting traps for everyone with my oh-so-awesome Onmyoji magic, but Kage-san caught me and I got into big trouble. The Shogunate really is scary! For now, I won't tell anyone that I created hot springs in the garden...."

No. 11: Kitsuji Sueharu

"The gathering of eccentric peoples and demons went on all night till morning and the laughter never died. What? No no, we didn't forget about the competition. Also, don't tell anyone, I paid the judges for...you know what!"

No. 12: Ibuki

"There is this dog named Azukichi or something that ate all the cat food I put in the yard this morning. I had no choice but to pet him instead, but it's not the same as petting a cat. The softness is different. Then from the corner of my eye, I saw Shigehira glaring at me enviously....what's up with him?"

No. 13: Sutokuin/Akihito

"Kurama went on a rampage and destroyed the Imperial palace so, we all gathered our beds and slept in the main hall. What did we talk about? Well, we were all talking about something but then the topic changed to a talk about our favorite girl. Of course, everyone got jealous of each other and we had a fun pillow fight."

Next up is rare footage of the competition starring: Morinaga, Shigehira, Ibuki, and Sueharu.

[drabbles-mc]

Closing Time

Obispo “Bishop” Losa x Reader

Warnings: language, violence, unwanted physical contact

Word Count: 3k

A/N: Thank you so much to @masterlistforimagines​ for trusting me with this prompt. I hope I gave you what you were looking for! Love some worked up, protective Bish ❤

Things were finally starting to calm down a little bit. The final rush of people had come and gone for the most part—there were just a couple stragglers, a few couples, and a small group of men left in the café. You had a little more than an hour before you had to close, so you couldn’t quite try prompting people to leave yet. Technically even if it was trickling past closing time you couldn’t really do anything, which was frustrating.

You and the other barista on shift with you were keeping yourselves busy. The more you cleaned up and put away now, the quicker you could take off once everyone left. Both of you thought that it wasn’t quite fair that your manager got to leave you there alone for the last chunk of the day, but there wasn’t much you could do besides roll your eyes as they left.

Your mind flashed back to the conversation you had had with Bishop a couple weeks ago when you had told him about how your manager had started leaving two staff on their own for the last part of the day. He had scoffed and shook his head.

“They shouldn’t be able to do that, Querida.”

You shrugged, knowing he was right but also knowing that you couldn’t do anything to change it, “I know. I just don’t get how they can be there all day and then they decide the last two hours is too much?”

“What if something happens? What if you need them and they aren’t there?”

You hate that shrugging is the only response that you can think of, “I guess we have to call them back? Or the cops? Depends on the situation. I have no idea.”

“Call me before you call the cops,” his tone was serious.

You smiled, shaking your head, “Gonna roll up with the guys if someone is trying to rob us?”

“I won’t even need the guys,” he waited for you to meet his eyes, “I’m serious. Anything happens that doesn’t sit right with you, call me. I’ll be there in a heartbeat.”

“Yes sir,” you kissed him lightly on the lips to get the serious expression on his face to go away. It worked—you were rewarded with a smile as he pulled you closer to him.

You were snapped back to the present when you heard someone trying to get your attention so they could pay their check and leave. You cashed them out as quickly as you could without making it seem like you were trying to rush them out. You flashed them a smile and a wave as they left, immediately going to clean off their table so it would be one less thing to do later.

You felt someone staring at you. As you glanced around, you saw one of the men at the table of three was watching you intently, a smile on his face. You averted your eyes quickly, not wanting to feed into whatever he was playing at. You hoped if you ignored it enough, he’d get the hint and they would just leave without giving the two of you any trouble.

The other barista came walking out of the back room, a worried look on her face, “Hey, Y/N, can I ask you for a huge favor?”

“What’s up?”

“I just got off the phone with my mom. My brother got into some kind of shit, and I need to go pick him up from the station,” she sighed, “Would you be alright closing up? There’s only like forty minutes until we close anyway.”

“By myself?” your stomach was already in knots and that was when you had someone there with you, “If it’s only forty minutes can’t you just wait to go get him? He’s at the station he’s not going anywhere.”

“My mom sounded really freaked out.”

You made sure your voice was hushed, “I’m freaked out. I don’t wanna be alone with all these people. Not when they know I’m alone.”

“Almost everyone is gone. There’s only like five people left.”

You looked around and saw that she was right. There was one couple left and the table of three men.

“Please,” she snapped you out of your thoughts, “I’ll owe you big-time.”

You sighed, knowing you weren’t really going to be able to talk her out of leaving, “Yea, you will.”

She hugged you and said a quick goodbye before going and grabbing her purse and heading out the door. You sighed as it shut behind her, not looking forward to the rest of your time alone in the café. You stayed behind the counter, wanting to keep constant surveillance on everything that was happening around you. You didn’t like to think of yourself as a paranoid person, but this situation was playing out in a million different terrible ways in your mind.

You instinctively reached to your pocket to grab your phone. You wanted to call Bishop so badly, but nothing had even really happened, so you didn’t want to call him for what might turn out to be a perfectly easy closing shift. You took a deep breath to try and calm your nerves.

The last couple came up to you to pay their check. You smiled and thanked them as they tucked a few bills into the tip jar on the counter. With grins and “We’ll be back soon’s” they were out the door, leaving you alone with the three men who seemed to have no intention of getting up and leaving any time soon. Your hands were fidgeting and you tried to hide it behind the counter so they wouldn’t be able to see how nervous you were.

Normally you didn’t try to force people out, but it was twenty minutes away from closing time and it wasn’t like any of the men at the table had any intention of ordering more food or drinks. And, even if they wanted to, everything was shut down for the night. You had tried to make a not-so-subtle show of yourself shutting everything off to try and prompt other customers to leave. Most of them took the hint, but not these guys.

You took another deep breath as you got yourself psyched up enough to approach their table. It was in that moment that you regretted not letting Bishop teach you some very simple, but very effective, take-down and self-defense techniques. You made a mental note to take him up on that immediately when this was all over with.

You approached their table, clearing your throat, “Are you gentlemen paying together or separately?” you wanted to give them two options that both resulted in them paying up and leaving.

The man who had been staring at you earlier smiled at you, “Kicking us out already, sweetheart?”

The word sweetheart made your skin crawl. You tried your hardest to seem unfazed, “I didn’t say anything about kicking you out. I just asked how you gentlemen are planning to pay this evening, that’s all.”

“We aren’t ready yet,” another one of the men spoke up, his tone not coated in false kindness like the previous man’s had been.

You nodded, “I’ll give you a couple more minutes to decide, then.”

As you went to talk back behind the counter, the first man grabbed your forearm. It wasn’t hard, he wasn’t doing it to cause physical pain, but the touch of his hand felt like it was burning your skin. You yanked your arm quickly out of his grip, covering where his hand had been with your own like you were soothing a burn.

“Could you be a doll and get me a glass of water?” his smile made you want to punch his teeth in.

“Sure,” your jaw was clenched but you were trying to hide the trembling in your hands. You walked back behind the counter, grabbing a plastic cup and filling it with water and ice. You tried to take a deep breath so you could carry it back to the table without the men seeing that your hands were shaking. You couldn’t give them that kind of satisfaction.

You set the cup of water down without comment. When you turned to walk away, you felt the man’s hand graze along the small of your back, “Thanks, sweetheart.”

Your bottom lip began to tremble as you stepped just into the back room. You could still see them but they couldn’t really see you. You took your phone out and immediately dialed Bishop.

He answered on the second ring, his voice as calm as ever, “Mi vida, done with work?”

“Um, I,” your voice was shaking and you couldn’t even force a sentence out.

“What’s wrong?” his tone shifted immediately shifted.

“You, you said…you said to call,” it was hard to organize your thoughts as you peered through the window at the table of men, “if something didn’t feel right. There’s these guys here and they won’t leave and I ju—”

He didn’t let you finish your thought, “I’m on my way. Be there in less than ten minutes, Y/N. Be safe.”

You let out a shaky sigh as you hung up and put the phone in your pocket. Bishop didn’t live very far from where you worked—that was how you two had ended up meeting in the first place. If he was riding fast, which you knew he would be, he could easily cut the time in half that it would take to get there. You prayed he would show up before anything else happened.

You entered back into the main expanse of the café, but stayed behind the counter. You wanted as much space as possible between you and those creeps. You looked at them out of the corner of your eye, afraid that direct eye contact would invite conversation, or worse, make them approach you.

A few minutes later, you heard the sound of Bishop’s bike as he rolled into the lot. You let out a breath that you had been holding for what felt like an eternity. Knowing that he was going to be walking inside in a moment, and that it was officially past closing time, you walked up to the table again to ask them to pay their checks.

“Together or separate, gentlemen?” you hated that you still felt pressured to be polite.

The same man reached out and touched your hand again, “Together sounds good to me,” he looked at the two men sitting with him, “Sound good to you boys?”

You were trying not to think about the tears that were stinging at the edges of your eyes as you pulled your hand back. You inhaled slowly through your nose, feeling a sob building up in your throat when you heard the chimes on the door as Bishop walked in, still wearing his kutte.

“It’s past closing time, buddy,” the man who had been silent up until that point spoke up.

Bishop’s face was expressionless and his tone was frigid, “I’m here by request.”

You felt like your feet were glued to the ground as you felt the three men staring at you, and Bishop staring at them. “Querida,” his eyes were still locked on the table of men but you could hear the small shift in his tone as he addressed you, “Come over here, please.”

The man who had been touching you all night scoffed, “Leave the lady alone. No one is getting hurt here. Why don’t you run along with your glorified bicycle, huh?”

Bishop was a lot of things, but insecure wasn’t one of them. He wasn’t one that was easily baited into doing volatile or stupid things. The man’s comment didn’t rile him up, but you knew that if you weren’t able to make yourself move within the next five seconds things were going to get ugly very quickly. But you were frozen.

Your eyes darted back and forth between all four men. Bishop could see it on your face that as much as you wanted to, you couldn’t force yourself to move. He stepped forward and went to wedge himself between you and the table of men. The man stood up and went to grab your arm again but Bishop quickly grabbed his arm, spun him around, and pinned him face-down onto the table. Bishop didn’t push you out of the way, but the commotion was enough to get you to force yourself to take a few steps back.

“Don’t even fucking think about it,” he wasn’t yelling, but he didn’t have to.

The other two men stood up immediately, ready to fight. The fact that none of them reached for weapons made both you and Bishop assume that they weren’t carrying any. For a moment you forgot that not every single person carried at least one firearm on themselves at all times—the club gave you a skewed view of things like that.

“Why don’t you just pay your check and get out,” Bishop was still pinning the one man down on the table, the and that wasn’t holding his arm was gripping the back of the man’s neck.

“Get your fucking hands off me,” the man spat out against the table.

Bishop pushed his face down harder, “Keep your fucking hands off of women.”

“What’s your problem?” his voice was muffled from the force Bishop was applying to keep him pinned against the table.

Bishop kept his grip as he lifted the man off the table and shoved him towards the other two towards the door. “Get out.”

One of the other men stepped forward, “At least let us pay the lady,” there was an evil smile on his face.

“Don’t come any closer,” Bishop was fully blocking your body with his, “if you all want to leave here with your hands fully intact.”

He stepped forward again, closing the gap between he and Bishop. You knew this wasn’t going to be pretty. The man cocked his arm back for an obvious right hook that Bishop was able to dodge. He countered but instead of punching, he shoved his hand into the man’s throat, hard, causing him to gasp and sputter as he tumbled backwards. While he was coughing, that’s when Bishop landed a punch clean to the man’s jaw. They should’ve been counting their lucky stars that Bishop didn’t wear rings on every finger like some of the other guys in the club. It still hurt, but it wouldn’t slice their faces up nearly as bad.

“If you aren’t gonna pay or apologize, then get the fuck out,” he stood there, watching the man he had just punched retreat slightly.

The only one left who hadn’t been accosted by Bishop in some way stepped forward. You were thankful that they weren’t smart enough to try and team up on him all at once. You wondered why they wouldn’t just leave but you knew that at this point it was no longer about you, it was purely about their egos.

“Just go home,” Bishop sounded over it.

“After you, old man.”

Bishop didn’t even wait for the man to advance. It happened so fast that you didn’t register exactly how it went down, but it somehow ended with Bishop pinning one of the man’s hands to the table as he took his gun out. Everyone’s eyes, including yours, went wide at the sight of Bishop’s gun. You wanted to believe he wasn’t going to fire it off where you worked but you couldn’t be certain. You felt like you were stuck watching everything happening around you.

“Bish…” your voice was soft.

Before you could say anything else, he brought the butt of his gun down hard on the man’s hand. There was a loud cracking sound and the man let out a yell. Bishop shoved him towards the door as he tucked the gun away again.

“I told you to leave if you wanted your fucking hands. Now get out.”

The three of them scampered out the door to lick their wounds somewhere far away. You were stuck in place, your whole body trembling. You hadn’t expected it to go that way. You hoped that he could just show up and his presence would be enough to get them to leave. You felt sorry for dragging him into such a mess.

“Did they hurt you?” his voice was soft—he sounded like a completely different Bishop than who he had just been not even a minute before.

You shook your head, needing a moment to force words out, “No. I, I’m so sorry, Obispo. I dragged you into this I didn’t mean—”

He wrapped you in a hug, pulling you tight up against his chest, “Don’t apologize. You never should’ve been here alone. I’m sorry I couldn’t get here sooner.”

You finally let the tears fall from your eyes after holding them in all night. There were a million emotions coursing through your body and you trembled as Bishop held you, gently running his fingers through your hair.

“You’re safe,” his voice was just above a whisper.

Your body had finally stopped shaking. You spoke up, your voice soft, “I love you.”

He kissed the top of you head, “I love you too,” he pulled back so he could look into your eyes, “Want to ride home with me?”

You nodded, “Please. As long as you don’t mind bringing me to work tomorrow?”

He shook his head, “Not at all. I’m gonna be here first thing in the morning,” he looped his arm around your shoulder and walked towards the door with you. He waited as you shut off the last of the lights and locked the doors, “Gonna talk to your fucking manager, too.”

You smiled for the first time all night, “Oh are you?”

“Yea. I’ll break their hands too if I have to.”

You laughed despite the tension that was still trying to leave your body, “I love you so much.”

“Mmm,” he pulled you close and kissed your temple as you made your way towards his bike, “I love you too.”

[a-n-conrad]

Coffee Shop (Spencer Reid x Reader)

[Summary: After a new Coffee shop opened up near the FBI headquarters, Spencer found a new favorite place to pick up his coffee on the way to work. And after making friends with the owner of the little shop, he was even more motivated to spend time there. (They/Them pronouns)

Warnings: Not proofread, Maybe swearing (I don’t remember)

Request:From my Request Survey(https://forms.gle/D9rsJtkERoBPaKvv8)]

It took you a few years to save up the money you needed to open your coffee shop. You managed to secure a little shop not too far from the FBI headquarters, meaning a good portion of your customer base was FBI agents. It was kind of nice to not have to worry about your security too much. With the amount of federal agents in your shop at any given time, it’d be stupid to try to rob you. 

One of your favorite customers came in a few weeks after you first opened. He was dressed a bit better than most of your other customers, or at least more creatively. You were getting a little bored with black and white, so his purple tie and button-up was a welcome change, and his hair looked just fluffy enough that you kind of wanted to pat his head.

“I heard a new coffee shop opened nearby, but I wasn’t expecting you to have quite this nice of a collection of classic books,” He motioned to the tall bookshelves that wrapped around your shop.

“Thank you. It took me quite a while to get this many. You’re free to borrow any of them that you’d like, though, just make sure you give me your name and number, so I can keep tabs on my books,” You say, a smile on your face. You always appreciated when people recognized the effort you put into the books, “Is there something I can get you?”

“Oh, uh, just a large salted caramel mocha,” He replied sheepishly.

“For here or to go?” You already knew the answer. You had seen his FBI badge, so you were already reaching for the travel cup. But it was always better to ask than assume.

“To go,” He was still looking at one of the book shelves when he responded, “Is that in french?”

He was pointing to one of your favorite books. It rarely drew much attention, because it was old and worn out, and the attention it did get was normally driven off by the fact that it was, in fact, in french.

“Yes, it is,” You reply, starting to make his drink, “It’s one of the original prints of that book, so it’s a little worn out.”

“I think I’ll borrow it, if you don’t mind. I’ve been looking for a french version of this book for a while,” He said. He walked over for a moment to carefully pull the book from the shelf. Somehow, even with his tall, slightly lanky build, he managed to look graceful and at home among the book shelves.

“Alright, your name and phone number, please?” You set his completed drink down on the counter and pulled out a ledger that you were using to keep track of the people borrowing your books.

“Spencer Reid,” He said, “(702)-555-0103”

- - - - -

Spencer came back the next day to return the book. And just about every day after that. He borrowed books and read through them quicker than you thought was humanly possible. And eventually you stopped keeping track of the books that he was borrowing. You trusted that he’d return them. You had even started to get his order ready before he got there to pick it up, checking that he would actually be there with the number that he gave you when he first checked out a book.

You had started talking regularly, too. Whether it be about books, or coffee, or his work. Though, he did try to keep most of his work to himself. Eventually, you started keeping the shop open late on the nights that he told you he’d be coming home from a case, and he’d stop by. If it was a rough one, you’d make some calming drinks and sit with him for a little while. You knew better than to try to make him talk about the bad cases, but he seemed to appreciate the company. 

You came to know him as a very good friend, and you hoped that he thought of you the same way. Well, sort of. While you’d only ever admit to thinking of him as a friend, you held a bit more affection for the good doctor than you originally expected to. 

He was obviously smart, and a little awkward, but when you got him onto a topic that he liked, he could talk nonstop. While some people may have thought it could get annoying, you admired his passion, and liked to listen to him talk. And you’d be lying if you said you didn’t find him a little cute when he rambled. You were proud to call him your friend.

And when he invited you to come to one of the outings his team was having, that feeling of pride almost overwhelmed you. His team was a big part of his life, and the fact that he wanted to introduce you to them, made your heart melt.

- - - - -

You were nervous when you showed up at the sushi bar that Spencer had told you to meet at. Were you at the right place? Was it the right time? Did you dress alright? You wanted to impress Spencer’s team. You felt the way you felt in highschool, meeting your highschool boyfriend’s family. But that was ridiculous, right? You two were just friends, so you really had nothing to worry about. Plenty of people had friends that didn’t always get along with their other friends.

“Hey, you don’t have to be so nervous,” You nearly jumped at his voice, “You’re going to hurt yourself if you keep picking at your nails like that.”

“Oh, uh, hey,” You respond sheepishly. Normally you’d be embarrassed by the awkward response, but you knew that your favorite FBI agent wouldn’t mind all that much, “Sorry, I’m just a little nervous to meet your other friends, Spence.”

“Don’t be,” He responded. His smile was sweet and you felt your face start to heat up just a little. You hoped that he didn’t notice, “I’m sure they’ll love you.”

You nod, and take a deep breath. You were still quite anxious, but you hoped that walking in with Spencer would help you feel a little more confident. Something about standing right next to him as you walked through the door made you feel like nothing could possibly go wrong.

“Woah, hey,” You heard a deep voice whoop as Spencer lead you towards a table. You figured that his team must have gone there pretty frequently, “Looks like pretty boy brought a guest. You gonna introduce them to us or what?”

Spencer sighed a bit at the sight of the man that had called out for him. It seemed as though his friends had already ordered a couple of drinks, “(Y/n), this is Derek Morgan,” He motioned to the man, before introducing the rest of the team, “Guys, this is (Y/n). They’re my friend that owns that coffee shop that I told you about.”

“The one that you keep borrowing books from,” The woman that was introduced as Penelope Garcia asked, “They must have quite the collection.”

You spent a little while talking about your shop. And then a little more talking about Spencer. And the longer you talked with his friends, joking and laughing, the surer you were that you were completely head over heels for this man. While they were impressed by his genius, they didn’t seem to admire him in anywhere near the way that you did. And none of them seemed to like his rambling like you. You didn’t just admire his genius or think of him as a really good friend like you sort of hoped. You were genuinely and completely in love with him. And you had a feeling that his friends could tell.

It was on your way back from a trip to the restroom that you had that worry confirmed.

“Oh, come on, Spence, you’re a profiler. Don’t tell me that you really didn’t notice how big of a crush they have on you,” JJ sounded exhausted as she said it. Like she had been trying to explain flirting to him for weeks, and he still just wasn’t getting it. “So what? What if I did notice?” Spencer asked in return. His tone was that of a teenage boy whose parents had been nagging him about his crushes for months. 

“Do you not have feelings for them?” Morgan was the one to ask next, “You go to their shop enough, even when you don’t actually want coffee. And you brought them along here when you’ve never done that with anyone before. It’s alright if you don’t wanna date them, but if I’m getting mixed signals, I’m sure they are too.”

You chose that moment to make your appearance. You really didn’t want to hear that response. You were fine with mixed signals. You were fine not knowing. Because not knowing wasn’t rejection. And you rather not know than be rejected.

“What were you guys talking about,” You ask as you sit back down. You hoped that your acting skills were good enough to fool the profilers around you. Maybe they weren’t paying that much attention to you.

“Nothing super important,” Spencer answered before anyone else did, “I should get going pretty soon. I have to check in on my mom.”

You followed as he stood up, not wanting to be left alone with his friends. Especially knowing that they knew about your crush on their coworker. Not to mention, you had taken a cab there, and really didn’t want to take one back, “Do you mind giving me a ride home? I can grab a cab if you want, but if you don’t mind, I’d love a ride.”

“Oh, sure.”

- - - - -

The ride started out pretty awkward. Just you giving Spencer directions to your house between longs gaps of cold silence. The tenson was thick, and you felt like maybe you were wrong. Maybe not knowing wasn’t better than rejection. Maybe rejection was much better than this.

“How much of the conversation did you actually hear before you walked up,” Spencer eventually asked. You could hear the same tension in his tone that you felt in the pit of your gut.

You weren’t sure how to respond. You knew this conversation was going to bring your pining to an end. You just weren’t quite sure how it would end exactly. But you were pretty sure that it would hurt. 

Spencer was too good for you. He was a successful FBI agent with multiple doctorates. He was charming and handsome and could probably get any partner he wanted. And you were what? A glorified barista with a book collection? 

“Just a little. You really don’t have to worry about it,” You said, trying a last ditch effort to get this to hurt you less. 

“(Y/n),” He sounded like he was scolding you a little, “You know that I know you have feelings for me, don’t you.”

God, why’d he have to say it like that? Why’d he have to say it like he was about to lecture you? You were stuck in this car. You had to sit through this conversation wherever it went. And you were sure that you weren’t going to like it.

“Look, Spence, you don’t have to do this. We really could just not talk about it,” You try again, desperate to at least push the conversation back.

“So you do actually have feelings for me?”

“I-” You really should know better than to deny it. He’d see through you. He always knew when you were lying, “Yes.”

You felt the tension drain out of his shoulders. You couldn’t understand why. You didn’t say anything that he didn’t already know, so there’s no reason for him to feel relieved. Especially if he didn’t feel the same way. Why would he be relieved that he has to reject you?

“This make this a lot less awkward,” He said, pulling the car up to your house, “Would you like to go on a date with me next Friday? After you close up the shop?

You froze. That wasn’t what you expected the response to be, “I-, uh, yes! Of course!”

It was then that he got a little red in the face, his blush matching your own, and he sheepishly asked, “Could I kiss you?”

Your body answered before your brain could, and before you knew it, your lips were on his. 

[A/N: Sorry if this is really bad. I’ve been dying from the writer’s block recently. Please, feel free to take the quiz if you liked it, though.]

[youreacowgirllikeme]

Time Will Tell: Part Two

note: alright, here is part two of @peppermintschnappss request (if you haven’t yet, you can read part one HERE) this one’s a bit smuttier and fluffier, I hope you like it

words: 4.1 k

warnings: swearing, smut (fingering, unprotected sex)

enjoy :)

 

(New York City, six years later)

 “Alright, here we are, welcome to your new office, Ms. Y/L/N.”

 “Wow, its bigger than I imagined. Nice change from the cubicle back at my old firm.” You joked, looking around the room. It was modest, but it was your own, a fact that filled you with immense pride.

 “Well, you’re a senior associate now.” Your new boss replied, “Get used to it.”

 +++

After your boss had left, you used the short moment of quiet to set up some personal items on your desk before the real work started.

 There was one framed picture of you and your best friends, taken when you all graduated from Georgetown Law, arms around each other, smiling at the camera. The next one showed you and your parents, you had just passed the bar exam and your mum was looking like she had been crying just moments before the photo was taken. The last one was a collage the colleagues from your old law firm in DC had given to you as a good-bye-gift.

You had worked there for over two years and had loved it, but when you got the opportunity to work for one of the countries most renowned law firms, you had packed your bags and moved to New York City without a second thought.

The city was still a bit overwhelming, but this job was the career launch pad you had waited for, and you were excited to finally get started.

 There was a knock on the door of your office, pulling you out of your thoughts. A friendly looking young man appeared, quickly introducing himself as one of the firms’ paralegals.

 “We all gather for the morning meeting in the conference room in five minutes. The boss will introduce you and maybe already set you up with your first tasks.” he told you, “Just follow me, I’ll show you the way.”

The meeting room was already packed with people, and of course everyone was looking at you, the newcomer. You tried to appear confident, smiling at the new faces even though your heart was almost jumping out of your chest.

The boss introduced you to the other employees and started to go through the current cases. There was a lot of financial law, mergers and stuff, but the firm had a very broad operation field, and you hoped to be assigned to an environmental or human rights case sooner or later.

When the meeting was over, the boss asked you to stay behind.

 “You’re new here, Ms. Y/N, so I’m going to assign you a pro-bono case first. This is how we operate at our firm.”

You nodded in agreement, this was standard practice.

 “One of our other senior associates has already been assigned to this one, but its more work than we expected, so I figured he could use some help. That way you can familiarize yourself with how we work here, and your next case will be your own. Understood?”

 “Yes Sir.” You replied, trying not to be disappointed. You were eager to work with your own client, but getting some help from a colleague maybe wasn’t the worst idea. Also you could use a friend at this new place, and nothing was better for that than working on tough case together.

“So, who will I be working with?”

 Your boss looked around the people still filtering out of the conference room with a scowl on his face.

“Technically, he should be around here somewhere. I bet he’s late again, always the same shit. If he wasn’t so good at his job, I would have fired him ages ago.”

“Apologies, boss, I wish I could say that it won’t happen again.” A loud voice called out from behind you.

You felt like someone had slapped you in the face. You would recognize this arrogant tone everywhere.

 You whirled around and came face to face with Chris Cuomo.

 +++

“You?” The both of you said simultaneously, voices full of disbelief.

He looked different, the boyish features were gone, his jawline was sharper and his hair shorter. What was still there was his damn arrogant stance, the way he had strutted in here almost an hour to late and got away with a cocky reply told you everything you needed to know. This was still the same insolent guy who, for some reason, still got admired by everyone. How could fate screw you over like that?

“Oh, you already know each other, splendid.” Your boss exclaimed, “Christopher, Ms. Y/L/N is our newest senior associate. I assigned her to help you with your current case, show her how we work around here, would you?”

You had to give it to Chris, he didn’t even flinch. “Absolutely, Sir. Follow me.” He said, directed at you. He left so fast, you had to hurry to keep up with his big strides.

“Could you maybe wait a second.” You called after him, but he totally ignored you, walking towards a door at the end of the hallway.

 You followed him into what you supposed was his office. It was a bit larger than yours, with a view over the skyline instead of the alley behind the building.

Once you were inside the room, Chris slammed the door shut behind you.

 “What the hell are you doing here?” he hissed, looking incredibly annoyed now.

“What do you mean? I’m working here, Cuomo, I started today.”

 Chris ran his hand over his face and fell into the chair behind his desk.

 “Look, this won’t work. I’ve been on this case for weeks now, and I won’t let you interfere with it.”

 You stopped for a moment. Chris Cuomo, working on a pro bono case for weeks?

 “Why are you being so difficult about this? It’s a pro bono. Why don’t trust you with a real client anyway?” you asked, and were surprised how superficial and mean that sounded even to your own ears. How did he still bring out the worst side of you, even after you hadn’t seen him for years?

 “Not that it’s any of your concern, but they want to make me a junior partner soon. I’ve been here for four years, they hired me right out of law school. I’m one of the best attorneys employed here and I specifically asked for this case because I care about the people involved. So you can either help me and give those clients the attention and energy they deserve or I’ll have your ass out of here in less than a week.” he was almost yelling by now, fists clenched on his desk and you took a step back in face of his anger.

“Alright, I am sorry, no need to be so hostile.” You murmured. “Give me an overview and we can get started.”

 +++

The case was about two young men from Queens who were accused of robbing a drugstore. Chris insisted that they were victims of racial profiling and weren’t guilty of the charges, they had just been in the wrong place at the wrong time.

 “They are telling the truth, I just know it.” Chris replied when you asked him how he could be so sure, and the tone of his voice made you refrain from questioning him any further.

He had given you a short, clipped outline of the case and now there were tons of files you had to read to get up to date.

 After about two hours of working next to each other in tense silence, you decided to extend an olive branch to Chris.

 “So, how have you been, Cuomo? Never heard from you again after Yale.”

 Chris looked up from the file he was reading, shooting you a wary glance across the table.

 “I went to Fordham, got my JD, passed the bar and started working here. I didn’t think you’d ever want to hear from me again. I’m not sure if you remember, but we didn’t exactly get along.” He replied, his voice was hard and his posture rigid, as if it made him extremely uncomfortable to even talk to you.

You sighted, debating what to say next.

“We didn’t, I hated you, in fact.”

Chris face gave the tiniest flinch and you mentally slapped yourself. Why had you just said that?

“Sorry, that was totally insensitive. I don’t hate you, not anymore. We were almost kids back then, and I was self-righteous so many times. I’m sorry for that, I just hope we can act like professionals now and try to get along, for the sake of the clients.”

 “I can manage that if you do.” Chris mumbled, and got back to reading the files, effectively ending the conversation.

 +++

 Working alongside Chris went better than expected, even if it often was hard work to engage him in conversation. You had always assumed that he was one of the most self-centered people ever, but he spent most of his time at the office, pouring all of his energy into a pro bono case, so maybe that wasn’t true after all.

A paralegal had revealed to you that the two men you were defending were from the neighborhood Chris was raised in and knowing that made you more sympathetic towards him.

 You had thought about him from time to time during the past years, but always pictured him as one of those attorneys without morals who would walk over dead bodies to win a case. But he wasn’t. He was relentless, yes, but for the right reasons, and you started to admire him for his dedication to the cause.

 +++

In the following weeks, the initial icy atmosphere between the two of you had thawed and Chris became more approachable.

He was still arrogant and insufferable, but had matured in a way that really surprised you. By now you were even having private conversations during your short lunch breaks, bantering back and forth, but in a friendly way.

Right now, he was ranting about the current season of the Mets. You had no clue about baseball, but the way his eyes lit up when he was explaining something he was passionate about was mesmerizing.

 “You look like a fish, Y/N, don’t pretend you know anything about baseball, I can see right through you.” Chris chuckled, yanking you out of your daydreams. You blushed a bit, he had caught you staring at him.

 “I was actually thinking about the case, Cuomo, we can’t all do sports talk the entire day.”

 “I see.” He winked at you, and you tried your best to ignore how handsome he was. “Back to work then, let’s get after it.”

 +++

 It was another late night at the office, you and Chris had been hunched over case files for hours after a whole day of running around and taking statements from various people associated with the case. You were incredibly tired, but the court date was approaching and there was still a lot of work to be done.

 Across from you, Chris yawned, stretching his arms over his head. He had discarded his suit jacket, and his white dress shirt was tight enough for you to ogle his muscled arms.

You had given up on trying not to stare some time ago, he was good looking, and there was no hurt in admiring what was right in front of you.

Lately though, you had started to develop some more confusing feelings about the man. But those were carefully bottled up and you intended to keep them that way.

“Do you want another coffee?” you asked, getting up from your chair.

“Please, I’m dying here. Bring me the biggest cup we have.”

You made your way back from the kitchen, balancing two steaming mugs of coffee in your hand. You stopped next to Chris chair and put down his coffee in front of him. Your arm softly brushed against his, and he turned his head to face you. Suddenly, your faces were only inches apart from each other, he was so close that you could feel his breath on your skin as he spoke.

 “You have a lash, right there. Stay still.” he reached out to pick the small hair up from right under your eye. The touch of his finger left a burning feeling on your skin.

 “Thank you.” You whispered, and for a moment, no one was speaking, you were just staring into each other’s eyes. You felt your face starting to tingle, but you couldn’t look away, not when Chris eyes were open and warm in a way you had never seen them before.

You noticed a small scar on his jaw, and you carefully reached out to trace it with a finger.

“Where is this from?”

 Chris tensed under your touch but didn’t move or slap your hand away.

“College, Senior year. I got into a nasty brawl with someone after that last party before graduation. I was wasted and angry, it was my fault, no biggie.” He murmured, and you quickly moved your hand away, worried that you were making him uncomfortable.

Your mind rushed back to that night, and the row you had with Chris. Even after all these years, the encounter was still very present and the thought that he had gotten into a fight because you had riled him up made you feel incredibly guilty.

 “I’m so sorry.” You replied in a stained voice. “Were you angry because of me?”

 Chris eyes hardened.

“That was years ago, Y/N, how about we let stuff from the past stay there.” he replied brusquely and got up from his chair. “I need to get some more files.”

 When he didn’t return after an hour, you just went home.

 +++

 After that night, things between you went back to being tense and awkward. You weren’t sure if he was mad at you and were too afraid to bring it up. You had actually enjoyed the tentative friendship that had formed between you and missed the easy banter during lunch breaks or brooding over case files in comfortable silence. Why was the man so fucking stubborn when you had been nothing but civil to him since your first day?

After a week of little to no conversation, you were close to freaking out. It was another late-night work session, and you were tired and fed up with the situation.

 “Alright, enough with that shit.” You snapped, slamming down the file you were working on onto the desk. Chris glanced up from his papers and shot you a dirty look.

 “What’s your problem, huh?” he snarled back.

 “You are my problem, Cuomo. I thought we were making progress and could at least be friendly with each other. But since last week, you’re totally shutting me out. You don’t talk to me, not even when its necessary for the case. I don’t know what I did to offend you, but you either tell me now or suck it up, because the silent treatment is bullshit.” you were getting louder with each sentence and had started pacing around the small office, the familiar flush creeping up your neck.

The sound of Chris’ laughing made you stop in your tracks.

 “Oh my God, you look just like during one of those discussions back in college.” He chuckled before he got serious again.

 “Look, I’m sorry. I was confronted with a lot of uncomfortable memories last week. Yes, back then I was angry because of the fight we had, and yes I got drunk and punched this guy because of it.” He paused for a moment, running his hand through his hair before speaking again. “He reported me to the police, you know. I had to do a whole summer of community service, and almost lost my Law School spot. I blamed you for a long time, even if it wasn’t your fault at all.”

You were shocked by that admission.

“Chris, I had no idea. I am so sorry, that was never my intention.”

He just stared back at you with an unreadable expression on his face.

“That right now was the first time you ever called me Chris.” He said, sounding oddly emotional. He got up from his chair and walked around the small table to where you stood.

 Your heart started racing in your chest like crazy as he approached you.

“You just…Jesus, Y/N, you just unsettle me, you did back at Yale, and you still do.”

“What are you even talking about?” you whispered, “You used to hate me.”

“You really have no idea, don’t you?” he replied. He was standing right in front of you now, and the only thing you could focus on was how big and strong his body looked, and how good his cologne smelled. Your brain couldn’t handle having him in such close proximity, and when his hand reached out to cup your jaw, you could barely suppress a gasp.

 “I never hated you.” He murmured, before pressing his lips to yours.

After a moment, your brain caught up with your body. You were just kissing Chris Cuomo, the plague of your college years, the most cocky, arrogant, intriguing person you had ever met, and it was fucking perfect.

 You melted against him, his body was solid and warm and you never wanted to stop kissing him. Your hands flew around his neck, pulling him down to deepen the kiss. He tangled his hand into your hair, tilting your head back, and when he softly bit your bottom lip, you groaned against his mouth and pressed your body even closer to his.

 With a deep breath, Chris broke the kiss and looked down at you, his pupils were blown and there was a slight blush on his cheeks.

“Do you know how often I wanted to shut you up like this?”

 “Took you long enough, Cuomo.” You chuckled, and kissed him again, it felt too good to just stop now. His huge hands were on your back now, wandering lower until they landed on your ass, squeezing the soft flesh. By now, you could barely think straight anymore.

You had fantasized about this moment before, but no fantasy could compare to the feeling of his hands all over your body, dipping under your shirt to slide over the soft, bare skin of your back.

 With your last shred of restraint, you broke the kiss again.

 “We can’t do this here, Chris.” You mumbled, suddenly feeling a bit shy.

 “There is no one else here, Y/N, its after midnight. We can do whatever the hell we want.” He replied, using the hand that was still on your back to pull you to his chest, there was a noticeable bulge pressing against you and your mind went blank again.

Your last resolve crumbled when Chris whispered a deep “I need to have you, now.” right against your ear. You succumbed to his touches as he picked you up and placed you on the edge of the desk, right on top of the important case files, but you didn’t give a damn.

 Everything you cared about right now was the feeling of Chris palms sliding up your bare legs, hitching up your skirt and softly skimming over your panty-covered core. You inhaled through clenched teeth as his hand found its way inside your underwear, you were already slick with need and grinded your pussy against his fingers.

 “You have no idea how often I thought about this.” Chris groaned. “Just you, squirming and wet under me. God, you are soaked.”

 “Stop talking and do something, Cuomo.” You whimpered, his light touches were nowhere near enough.

 “You asked for this, sweetheart.” Chris growled and plunged two of his thick fingers inside you without warning. The moan spilling out of you was so loud that he slapped his other palm over your mouth to muffle your needy sounds.

“Shh, we might be alone, but we don’t want to alarm the whole building.” He chuckled darkly as he started to move his hand, curling his digits inside you until you saw stars.

 You groaned his name against his palm as he started to circle your clit with his thumb, applying more and more pressure until you came against his hand with a strangled cry.

 Chris removed his hands and looked down at where you were lying on the desk, breathing heavily.

“Say it, Y/N. What do you want me to do?”

 You could see the way his erection was tenting the fabric of his suit trousers and unconsciously licked your lips.

“Get rid of those trousers and fuck me.” You whispered, your voice still a bit breathy from your climax moments ago.

 Without hesitation, Chris undid the buckle of his belt and pulled down his pants along with his underwear. When his cock spring free, you let out an audible gasp.

Chris snorted our a small, smug laugh, a flicker of his familiar arrogance showing. Usually, this would’ve annoyed you to no ends, but right now your only concern was getting him inside of you as fast as possible.

 When he finally stepped between your legs, his strong hands grabbed the hem of your panties and just tore the thin lace apart. He grabbed your thighs and spread them, leaving you exposed to his hungry gaze. The feeling of his cock teasing your entrance almost made you lose patience.

 “Stop the fucking teasing, Chris”

 Without a warning, he grabbed your hips and slammed into you with one harsh thrust. You had to cover your mouth with your own hand again to silence your cry, the feeling of his thick length was almost too much.

“Shit, Y/N.” he hissed as he bottomed out. “You’re so tight.”

You couldn’t do anything more than grab the edges of the desk as he started to fuck you with a relentless pace, the slap of his skin against yours sounding through the empty office.

 Your let your head roll to the side and closed your eyes, completely overwhelmed by the burning arousal spreading through your whole body.

 Suddenly, a hand grabbed your hair and yanked your head around so you were staring directly into Chris dark, burning eyes.

 “I want you to look at me while I fuck you.” He snarled. “Want you to see who makes you feel like this.”
His voice was slightly breathless, and there was a thin layer of sweat covering his forehead as he continued to slam into you, hitting a spot deep inside you and sending you closer to your climax with each hard stroke.

His words were like a drug and you couldn’t tear your eyes away from his face anymore. When he delivered his next sharp thrust, you could feel yourself tumbling over the edge, your orgasm washing over you and making you trash and squirm under Chris, your walls clenching around his cock.

His grasp on your hips tightened to an almost painful degree, pulling your pelvis flush against his as he spilled inside you with a growl.

As you laid on the desk, your brain was trying to come to terms with what just happened through the haze of your climax.

Chris carefully pulled out and readjusted his trousers before slumping back into an office chair.

 “Well, that was a surprise.” You said awkwardly, getting up and pulling down your shirt to restore some sense of dignity. In an attempt to ease some of the tension that had suddenly settled over the room, you added “Next time we should try it without all the clothes, and maybe on a bed instead of a desk filled with super important case files.”

Instead of making a dirty joke, Chris looked surprised.

“There is going to be a next time?” He asked, sounding almost hopeful.

 With a soft chuckle, you approached him and sat down onto his lap.

 “You can’t screw me like this and not expect me to come back for seconds.” You pressed a kiss to his lips. “If you’re up to it, I’d maybe even agree to a third, fourth and fifth time.”

 Chris puffed out his chest a little bit. “Sweetheart, I’m always up to it.”

 +++

 With a slam, the doors of the courtroom closed behind you. Chris turned around to face you, and the smile on his face was bright enough to light up the entire hallway.

 “We won, Y/N, we really did it.” he cheered, picking you up to spin you around. You just giggled, full of joy and relief that you were able to win this important case and keep your clients out of jail.

When Chris sat you down again, you reached up to put his face between your hands.“I am so incredibly proud of you.” You said, your voice heavy with emotion. “You were on fire in there.”

It was true, seeing Chris in court had been like a revelation to you. He had been relentless, tough and razor sharp in his defense, all while wielding his charm and charisma to win the jury over. Everything you had held against him for all those years, his audacity, his stubbornness, they had been invaluable strengths during the trial.

But when Chris leaned down to press a kiss to your mouth, all thoughts stopped. It still was so fresh and every touch of him brought you out of balance. The fact that he had just kissed you in public made you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. You hadn’t made your relationship public yet, or even talked about if you were an item, but this made you hope.

Chris broke the kiss, still beaming at you.

“I could have never done this without your help. This is our success. And now we have to celebrate. Please, let me take you to dinner.” Chris said, wrapping his arms around your hips to pull you against him. By now, you couldn’t care less about all the people looking at you.

“Took you long enough to properly ask me out.” you joked, “And of course, I’d love to.”

Immediately, Chris started rambling about how he knew the perfect restaurant that would blow your mind and how they were always booked out several weeks in advance, but he could get you a table anyway, and you just smiled to yourself.

He was still a cocky, smug idiot, but he was your idiot now.

[gyllenhaalstories]

SOUTHPAW, PART 1: HEADCANONS.

notes: dear anon: thank you for making me appreciate jake the rapper! also i know nothing about rap, so i’m sorry if this is pure trash! i never finished watching southpaw because it was too dark for me, but i took some very loose inspiration from it. warnings: mentions of dark past, mentions of sexual content... this got really long (2k words). gifs credits: alphalewolf. extras: if you want more informations about rapper!jake, please scroll through my blog. i have edited some older posts with the tag: topic: rapper!jake, so check it out if you’re interested. i have taken some ideas and put them in this list. (at the end of the list i provided some goodies!)

PART TWO WILL BE UPLOADED SOON, KEEP AN EYE OUT FOR IT!

attention, attention! please note i know absolutely nothing about rap. i very rarely enjoy listening to rap music, it’s simply not for me. this might be inaccurate and off compared to the actual world of hip hop and other similar genres. i apologize for my lack of knowledge! this is an au in which jake is not an actor or a producer or anything of the sort. his fame, he built it with his music. you must keep that in mind while reading these headcanons or else it will get confusing. also, i’ve taken some loose inspiration from jake’s actual work, but that’s just for the sake of backstory. are you ready to dive in this twisted fantasy?

Jake Gyllenhaal. Known as Hall. He exploded the charts after being picked up by one of the biggest record companies for his first album: Hall of Fame. He was a rookie, yet he was older than most of the rappers you can think of today. He worked his way up undercover. He started participating in poetry and slam nights at local cafés. He became a songwriter, through connections. He sold some songs that are absolute classics today, but he does not care. He did not feel like they fit him anyway.

Growing up, Jake had it rough. There was a lot of fighting at home. His older sister was the perfect angel and him? The absolute disaster child. It was not like he ran after danger and trouble, he seemed to always be at the wrong place in the wrong time, he hung out with the wrong crowd. He managed to avoid juvie on some miracle. What was the miracle, you might ask? He was caught robbing some local bank with his “friends” and the cops, at first, did not believe he was innocent. While his friends were screaming and threatening the innocent clients of the bank, Jake actually tried to help them out of the building safely. The cops arrived at the same moment and thought he was keeping the strangers hostage. He was arrested on the spot. The other guys played the victims, blamed it all on Jake but it was only when Jake wrote the whole story, from the beginning where his friends manipulated him and made of him their puppet to when he felt this adrenaline rush telling him he needed to save the strangers that night. His writing was too sincere, too raw to be a web of lies. The police released him, but they kept an eye on him.

His escape were writing and music. He impressed all of his teachers at school. Talented, gifted, magical. That was how they described Jake at every parent and teacher meeting. Writing dumb sentences that made very little sense and playing with a guitar after school, that did not make his parents very proud compared to his sister who was on top of all of her classes and working hard for a future of wealth and success.

Music was his entire life. He would come home from school and blast music until he was called out for dinner. Led Zeppelin, Aerosmith, Black Sabbath, Heart, Pink Floyd, Metallica, name it. He liked it loud. He liked it weird. He liked it with a deeper message, with double meaning.

He worked all types of jobs, some legal and some not so much. He was saving money for college. He applied. He got in. He started his classes. He had big dreams, too, he had ambitions. Maybe he could his talent to good use? He wanted to study philosophy, literature, music, creative writing... Anything that required thought and depth. He made friends, there. He befriended the edgy punk guy, he had tattoos everywhere, he listened to the same bands, he was quiet but his essays spoke volumes.

Jake was disappointed, his illusions were broken. He hated the format of his classes, the feeling like his opinion and his inspiration did not matter, it was always about meeting some stupid requirements to please a rich professor who did not care about passion, about talent, about originality. Jake dropped out, soon followed by his friend. His friend was hired at a tattoo parlor and Jake hung out there all the time. He would stay up until 5 am, 6, 7, all night and all day long. He loved the clients there. He would write and read his writing out loud to the clients when they were tortured by the needle shooting the ink in their skin. Talented and gifted, they all the same thing.

He started to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

He wrote, not just stories and opinion pieces. He started writing songs, melody and lyrics. He started playing them, he started writing his own poetry too. He was introduced to freestyle battles. And as he fought against other talented thinkers, he noticed he spoke with a tempo, with a rhythm. He was rapping and he did not even realize it.

His career sky rocketed from the moment a music producer attended one of the rap battles. He was famous, he got quite the thick wallet and the connections. Jake was introduced to legends of hip hop. They all influenced him as his career grew to become something overwhelming and terrifying, yet thrilling and addictive.

Hall had a style of his own, though. It was romantic, yet absolutely disgusting and dark. It was aggressive, yet vulnerable and philosophical. He spoke of his trauma, of his hatred, of his envy, of his fears... He used his songs as an escape. He was becoming his own escape.

And his own prison. His family did not care about him, he was a shame, even. Aside from his old college friend, he never built strong friendships. They were all after him for fame and cash. He slept around, guys and gals, threesomes, foursomes... He did not care, anything for some genuine connection, even if it lasted for a very lazy and messy fifteen minutes in the trashy bathroom of a concert hall. Rumour had it he was a great lover, but he was so bad at loving.

Now it gets interesting...

Hall rapped alongsides Eminem, Drake, Kendrick Lamar, Travis Scott... The biggest pop stars were fighting just to get him to rap a line in their songs. Rihanna wishes he was the one singing Love the way you lie, does that give you an idea? He appeared on duets. He wrote more solo albums, sold them instantly. He never left the top of the billboard in weeks, months, if not years. It never really got to his head. He was still that sensitive boy writing about knights and princesses in his bedroom with walls covered by band posters. Fans did not care about this side of him, they loved him for his lyrics about snorting coke, drinking his pain away and fucking whoever wore the tiniest skirt around.

His latest album, Southpaw, was an even bigger hit. Pure filth. Pure gold. Imagine 13 tracks, Cardi’s and Megan’s WAP but reversed. He does not rap about how good he fucks people. He raps about how good they feel. That’s some real depth here, no pun intended.

You met him at one of his concerts. Your friend won VIP passes, so you were standing in the front and got to take a picture with him. You did not understand the hype around taking a photo with this guy, he just stood there and looked absolutely emotionless.

You hated rap, or perhaps you loved it. You did not care much for Jake, that was for sure. You thought he was just another lame rapper who thought he was the real deal because his lyrics were so explicit, even the clean versions made angels cry. The truth was, you did not know much a bout him. You found him too commercial, like he was scared of becoming irrelevant.

You saw right through him already.

But him? He already cared too much about you. You caught his attention as he rapped his songs. He could not take his eyes off you. You weighted heavy on his mind, caused him to stutter and forget lyricvs. Fans laughed, they said he was probably too drunk or too high too focus. Drunk in love, that’s what it was.

There was something about you. Maybe it was the Black Sabbath shirt you wore. Maybe it was the unimpressed look on your face. Maybe it was your plump lips he wanted to kiss. Maybe it was the sight of you laughing with your friend that made his heart skip a beat. Maybe it was the fact you treated him like a normal person even if you had not spoken to him first.

So, you met backstage.

Your friend was beaming from ear to ear, showering Jake in compliments.

“Did you enjoy the show?” Jake asked you.

“For someone who shows no emotion, sound dead inside and look like they wish they were doing anything but making dozens of thousands of dollars by singing a couple of semi mediocre tracks, yeah, it was not that horrible.”

He was up for a challenge.

You two exchanged insults like it was a boxing match. Each round was getting more and more intense. It was no longer insults, it was straight up flirting. You noticed when your bodies were so close you could smell the scent of watermelon chewing gum that escaped from his warm breath. You could hear the way his raced even faster than yours.

You were snapped out of this fantasy by his bodyguard, indicating other fans waited for him.

He remembered the name your friend called out, saying he needed to bring you home before something bad happened.

It was the most beautiful name he had ever heard.

He hung out around that concert hall for the next couple of days. At the bar nearby, at Starbucks, at McDonald’s, anything for the sake of seeing your face again.

And he did.

You were walking out of the record store with a vinyl of Heart squeezed under your arm. You looked so happy. You had paint stains all over your clothes. You were erasing the memories of a terrible relationship by decorating your tiny apartment, and you needed to set the right ambiance. You needed guidance, you found it in the strong minds of the ladies behind Heart, in Joan Jett, in Stevie Nicks. You found your silver lining in music.

Jake ran behind you, he pretended he was out jogging and he mysteriously bumped into you. He grabbed your vinyl before it could fall on the ground.

“Nice pick.”

“We finally agree on something.”

Another round of flirty insults...

... That ended in the two of you fucking like animals on the floor of your apartment.

And fucking on the couch the next day.

On the kitchen counter the morning after.

And finally, on the bed. That was a really special one. Jake was the first person to be on your bed since the departure of your ex. He could feel that you were not in the mood for a rough battle for dominance.

That night, he made love to you.

For, quite possibly, the first time in his life, he expressed his love directly to somebody. “Princess, baby girl, beautiful, gorgeous, amazing”, he showered you in compliments, and praises. The slow movement of his hips, the intense passion in his eyes and love in his heart spoke louder than the music you were playing in the background to set the mood.

You were not just another trophee to hang on the wall. You were special.

He was special too.

He bought you every record that reminded him of you. He bought you collector items of your favourite bands. From the silliest decoration to a new car to replace your crappy one, passing by tickets to exclusive and sold-out shows, Jake had never felt more famous in his life than when he was with you.

His fans noticed the change in his songs, in his lyrics. They were just as explicit, just as rotten and just as corrupted. However, they came from a place of light and love, not of darkness and rage.

He sang about how good your felt when you climaxed around him. How drenched he was whenever he made you squirt. How he loved to taste himnself on your lips. How he was full of love and of lust for you. How he would quit everything if it meant he would live a normal life, for once, and with you.

You inspired so many songs that became massive world-wide hits.

You travelled the world with him on tour. You helped him design his new merch and you wore his t-shirts with pride. You attended concerts in your freetime. You loved staying up all night, painting and drawing while he was writing about this mirage of a goddess, blessing his existence with a smile and a sparkle in her eyes.

He was addicted to you.

He was crazy for you.

And he went crazy on you.

for research purposes and not because i wasted my time hearing eminem talk about stuff i don’t understand so i could stare at jake’s thighs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mP_cKP4OjsA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whV5oQDvVWE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGqC9URTJIQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5imXD1LPnwo

and finally, for good measure :

@gyll-yee-haw​ ily

[chayacat]

Devil’s Sweet Star (21)

Fandom: Dead by Daylight

Ghostface x Female Reader  

Rated M for Violence, Language and Smut  

***

Fear. Fear is something that has always been part of the human being. It's something that follows us everywhere and it's always the first thing you feel about the unknown. What will happen to me today, tomorrow or in the days, weeks, months to come? What future is for me? How long am I going to live? Will I find love? Is it the good one or the bad one, will it last or not? Should I do it or not? Should I say it or shut up... All these questions that we ask ourselves throughout our lives always plunges us into fear. Because we don't know what our choices will bring as consequences. The famous butterfly effect.  

Fear also manifests itself in dangerous situations, where death can strike at any moment, and when it is about to strike us, fear invades us. Moreover, it is the greatest fear of Man: to die. But some are not afraid of Death: it is even a friend who comes to relieve us of our suffering once and for all. And others believe that death is a simple passage from one life to another through time. Maybe it’s true, maybe it's wrong. Who can really know?

It was with this fear in your stomach that you woke up this morning. The cause? A simple, insignificant, small, piece of paper. How can a single piece of paper scare someone; you'll tell me... Maybe because it's not that insignificant. In fact, it's not the paper that scares you, it's what's written ON IT that scares you.

“He’s dead.”  

Those simple words made you react. These simple words frighten you. Because you know who wrote them, and who he's talking about. He did it. He really did. He has told you for a long time that he will. Yet inside, you feel relieved to know that McKellan won't be able to do anything to you, but that means you'll have to thank Ghostface. Once again. And if it happens like last time... You'd rather not think about it. Because the worst thing for you is that you liked it, deep down. But Jed's here now. And you know nothing can happen to you now. Right? My poor little girl... if you knew the truth... you left the door open. And the big bad wolf came home. Without knowing it, you’ve thrown yourself into the devil's arms.

While you were about to serve yourself a coffee, in order to chase away your dark ideas, someone knocked on the door. You put down your cup and you walk to the door. When you open it, you come face to face with Jed. But a Jed... quite different from usual. His Auburn hair was loose, wavy and cascading, he always wore his glasses, but his outfit was very different, a black t-shirt under an open denim shirt, grey jeans and black sneakers. But this face... and that angelic smile. It's something that will never change in him.

“Well... What happened to the real Jed last night? Have you been hit by the change fairy?” You said laughing.

“You can see it that way, yes. I thought you'd like it if... if I changed my look a little bit.” He responds laughing too.

“Just a little? I feel like you were kidnapped last night to change you or replace you with another. But... I don't mind. Because no matter what you look like... I know you'll always be you.”

You kissed him and he kiss you back, holding you in his arms. It was soft, smooth as always, a feeling that you never want to forget. Never. But Ghostface’s words brought you back to mind and made you tremble slightly. Certainly, Jed is the only one who agrees to write articles about him and that make him the "star" of Roseville. But knowing this sick man... He's capable of anything. Jed felt your concern, put an end to your kiss and recoiled his face to better observe you, passing his hand over your face to reassure you.

“Hey... What's wrong? You... Have you changed your mind?” He asks, worried.  

“No! Of course not! I love you, it’s just that... He... he killed him.” you said, looking elsewhere.

“What? Who kills who?”

“Ghostface. He killed McKellan. He left me that note last night. I know it's him and it's McKellan he's talking about. He told me for a long time that he would do it... I should have told you about it or called the police or...”

“Hey hey hey... Calm down. It's going to be alright, okay? Imagine if you'd told the police about this. He would have killed you. Or torture or worse. We don't know what this psycho can do. You saved your life in some way.

“I know. But I can't help but feel guilty, the cops must know that I had a conflict with him. When they find out his body... they will come to see me and I am afraid... I'm afraid of what's going to happen.” you replied with tears in your eyes.

“Hey, I am here. And as long as I'm here no one will come near you and hurt you. I lost Carla, there's no way I'm going to lose you, is that clear? Our relationship has just begun and I intend to do everything I can this time to make it last for the rest of my life.” He said holding you close to him.  

You both stand still for a few minutes without saying anything, enjoying the present moment. Nothing could ruin this moment. But one thing for you remains worrisome: the fact that you had a conflict with McKellan could put you on the suspect list. Even if Ghostface is the author, you may have problems. Maybe...

Maybe he did it on purpose? It's possible after all! Since you've known each other, he's been trying to push you to kill. He wanted to make you, his accomplice. And if, despite your categorical and repeated refusal to do so, he had taken the initiative? To drag you with him into the spiral of his massacres... And his madness.

“You don't have to worry, knowing Ghostface, he must have left a signature. He doesn't really have the kind to attribute the murder to someone else. So, there is no risk that the police will come to question you.” Replied Jed, backwards to better look at you: “I'm not working today, but I have to finish my article. I'm going to stay with you at the café, okay? And... If you ever need a helping hand, I could help you. Is that okay with you?”

“Say that way you can taste my cakes in secret .... You're going to end up with a nice round belly one day. But if you have to help me, you can bring the cakes for your colleagues. Let's go a little glutton. I'm going to end up being late.” You said, taking two boxes with cakes inside for the newspaper.

Jed smiles before kissing you and open the door. What a gentleman. All both, you're heading to Jed's van to get to work. The streets were quiet on this beautiful day and the cold weather of the last few days had disappeared. We will have to provide air conditioning otherwise the customers will melt ... and the cakes too. You were always worried about this paper but reassured by Jed's words. He is right, so far Ghostface has always signed his crimes. So, there is no reason to worry. Absolutely none. right?

“By the way, Melina... Melina told me for... You know, your family. It's really generous, you know. You... You could have kept it all to yourself. And you give up almost everything to your family. I'm sure your parents are proud of you up there.” Said Jed, breathing deeply without leave the road with your eyes.

“When...When my parents died, my uncles and aunts took care of me... I was in an emotional state... Deplorable. Even so, they've always been there for me. I owe them a lot. So, I think it's normal for me that some part of the inheritance goes back to them.” you respond looking at the road then at him.  

“What are you going to do with... Your share?”

“Keep it. As much as I could. I will try to live as much as possible with the coffee money. And then maybe one day I would live in a nice little country house, far from everything. With the sound of birds and the singing of the rooster to wake me up. Or I'll take a trip around the world. I've always dreamed of going to Norway or Sweden... These countries are beautiful...”

Jed smiles while parking in the newspaper’s parking lot. It's best not to get fined. And since you have cakes to deliver... You might as well give them in your own hand, don't you? And so, you can see the newspaper's premises. No sooner do you enter the building than you freeze on the spot. Who would have thought that a small newspaper like the Roseville Gazette could have so many people? And to think that Jed is one of them! There are even security guards! It's impressive! You give them the boxes and tell them to be careful that no cakes end up crushed. Then all two go back and open the café. It's time. Jed settled down at the table next to the counter. The start of the day went very well, customers were always flocking as delighted to come to see you. The lunch break came and you sit at Jed's table, slightly exhausted.

“Maybe you should hire someone to help you. You're going to get sick by putting so much pressure on yourself.” Said Jed smiling.

“I thought about it... but not yet. I want to be financially sure I can pay a salary. Are you getting away with your article?” you ask.

“Yes. Mike was such a rotten man. A drug dealer and a pedophile on top of the market. Apparently, he was wanted in other states for these facts. But he always managed to evade the police. Unfortunately for him he did not escape death. Even my boss is disgusted to know that he had such a criminal in his employees.” He answers.

“No one could have known... There are true masters of concealment. We think they're honest people and then one day they reveal their real faces. And on that day, it's already too late to do anything.” You replied sadly.

“That’s true. You know, I've been very concerned about how Ghostface works... Since I've been writing these articles, I've noticed two or three little things about how he operates. He went after people who... always do something wrong. Since he started these murders... all of his victims either committed robberies, assaults, or trafficked drugs.”

“It’s to believe that he wants to pretend to be a hero.”

“Or he gets rid of the competition. This guy's a narcissist. He doesn't seem to like being robbed of the limelight. If he gets rid of those who want to steal the show... Then he'll be the only criminal in all of Roseville and I'm sure he's not going to stop there. He'll go all over the country.” Said Jed, replacing his glasses on his nose.

“He wants to be the biggest criminal in the whole country. The question is... Why?” you said confused.

The break ends and you get back to work quickly. Jed is right about one thing: one day you will have to hire someone. You won't be able to hold the coffee forever on your own, and if you're ever thinking about expanding it, you'll need employees. During the afternoon, you receive a phone call from the police that made you panic. Have they found McKellan’s body? Do they already want to question you??

None of that. The policeman on the other end of the line simply summons you to have your statement in relation to your attacker. You almost forgot that one. You say that you would be available tomorrow during the day because you’re not working. To which he replied that everything was written down and that he would be waiting for you tomorrow in his office. You sigh with relief when you hang up the phone before explaining everything to Jed, who laughs slightly shaking his head.  

The rest of the afternoon went very well, and the time of closing arrived. After your usual little ritual, you and Jed go to eat something. For the first time a good burger and fries will be your meal tonight. After that, you head to your home. You greet Mr. Lawson, and go up to your apartments. But instead of leaving you, Jed kissed you while making you enter his house.

“What are you doing?” You said laughing.  

“I don't want to sleep alone tonight. So, I'm kidnapping you.” He said before kissing you again, lifting you by the waist, making you let go of a little squeak of surprise.

“Well, what a force...”

“And you haven't seen anything yet.” He replied, heading to his bedroom.  

He laid you down on his bed gently before putting himself above you. He removed his t-shirt, revealing his finely trimmed body, and with his wavy, cascading hair... he looks like a god. He kissed you again, began to slide his hands over your body, making you shudder slightly. But this time, it's a shudder of pleasure. He kissed every part of your body from head to stomach, then gently removed your top. He pushed his hair with a wave of his hand, revealing blue eyes piercing to fall out.

“It's... Maybe it's a little too soon. You may need a little time.” He said with a little smile.  

“I... I’m sorry, I didn't want to...” you said worried by his reaction.  

“It’s okay. I'll wait until you're ready. But on the other hand, that day ... I can't guarantee I'll control myself.”

“I can't wait to see that then.” you replied by getting up before being lying down again by Jed.

“I said I didn't want to sleep alone tonight.”

“I don't even have pyjamas for tonight!” you said laughing.

“Never mind... I'll lend you one.”

He put on a quick kiss before getting up and throwing a pyjama at you to change you. He undressed, wearing only his boxer before bed. Once changed, you join him in bed and you settle in his arms, passing your hand in his hair. You kiss one last time to wish you good night and fall asleep both. In his arms, all your fears fly away. All your worries disappear.  

Nothing can happen to you.  

Nothing scares you.

Not even Ghostface.

***

(I'm officially passing my code exam on April 9th! I can't wait! and I'm a little scared too XD But I've got a week to review so I should be fine! So, since we are confined for a month in France, the chapters will come out as planned, since I no longer go on vacation ... I hope you enjoy this chapter as much as the others! Good weekend to all! See ya!)