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littlemisspascal · 4 years ago

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Death and an Angel part 14.5

Death!Din x Cupid F!Reader

Summary: And it’s unbelievable, truly, that he’s found someone who makes him feel as though he’s flying and falling simultaneously.

Rating: T

Word Count: 3,701

Warnings: angst, dialogue heavy, language, angst, Violence, plot plot plot, did I mention angst? Cuz it’s here

Author Note: Texas weather is no laughing matter and never have I hated snow more than these last few days. This is definitely more of a transition segment so I wrote shorter snippets as a result, but there is some serious plot development nevertheless. The response to last chapter was so amazing I can’t thank everyone enough for all the love and support 💖💖💖

Links to Part 1 and Part 14 and Part 15

Cross-posted on AO3.

Photo Inspiration:

Ahsoka hijacks the Razor Crest as soon as Din teleports her aboard the ship. She pushes Din out of the cockpit, refusing to let him so much as glimpse the coordinates of the destination she inputs into the nav computer. The Oracle hadn’t been kidding when she said she didn’t trust him going alone to rescue his soulmate.

Bo-Katan hadn’t been phased by Ahsoka’s arrival, adapting to her presence with the same ease as a duck to water. However, Din couldn’t help noticing the moment her mask of cool indifference slipped when Ahsoka asked the reaper to stay in the cockpit with her, claiming they had important matters to discuss.

Din climbs down the ladder into the hull, recognizing that the conversation about to ensue is not one he needs to be involved in. Fingers twitching restlessly, he commits himself to checking each of the weapons in his armory, sharpening his vibroblades and loading a set of whistling birds into his vambrace. He’d made a promise to Ahsoka against killing Moff Gideon, but he’d made no vow against scarring the Seraph beyond recognition.

When Din’s finished with him, Gideon will be a warning to the rest of the galaxy what happens if you steal from Death.

He stills at the thrum of satisfaction that runs through his body at the thought of pressing Gideon’s eyeballs out with his thumbs. The darkness within him has grown stronger since he killed Hess and it’s becoming an increasingly harder challenge denying its craving for bloodshed. If not for Ahsoka’s intervention, he would have reaped Xi’an’s soul, breaking another sacred rule. He should feel grateful, but the darkness expresses annoyance instead, upset to have been denied its kill.

There is a thought that has been plaguing the back of his mind, shackled in the same corner as his other doubts and regrets. He once had iron control over his powers and emotions, but now he’s holding onto his human façade by a mere thread. So slowly he hadn’t even been aware it was happening, his darkness has usurped his morality.

He’s meant to be a neutral entity, but when he looks at his reflection in the fresher mirror all he sees is a weapon.

Obsidian orbs have replaced brown eyes. Flawless tan skin has become dissected by lines of ink that once were blue veins.

Darkness is corrupting him from the inside out, making him a slave to the power he once mastered.

And he doesn’t have a fucking clue how to stop it.

Bo-Katan joins him in the hull an hour later. She doesn’t say anything , just leans against the wall across from him, and Din continues cleaning the barrel of his amban rifle as if he doesn’t see her.

The silence isn’t tense or uncomfortable, but he feels her gaze trying to penetrate his helmet. He knows the reaper well-enough to tell there is a question on her mind, but her hesitance to voice it unsettles him. Bo-Katan rarely holds her tongue around him, preferring blunt honesty over sugarcoating, which means whatever is on her mind must be serious.

He bites back a sigh when she starts restlessly shifting in place and pauses his task. “Ahsoka told you,” he says at last.

“That Moff Gideon fucked with our lives?” Bo-Katan snorts humorlessly. “Yeah, she showed me everything.”

“I’m sorry about your sister.”

“Me too. But it’s...good not being in the dark anymore. I needed to hear the truth,” she replies stoically, but the pointless adjustment of her headband betrays her internal strife. There is a moment of pause before she looks at him again. “I heard about your promise,” she says, and it’s not really a question, except that it is.

Din’s fingers tighten around the rifle. “Did she make you swear the same one?”

“No.” Bo-Katan shakes her head. “No, she didn’t.”

He’s not surprised by the answer. He actually thinks he should have expected it, considering the universe has always held him to a stricter standard than other entities.

“Ahsoka made it clear to me that this is something between you, Gideon, and your angel alone. I cannot interfere just like you cannot kill him.”

There is bitter resignation in her tone. He recognizes it because he felt the same when he made his promise to Ahsoka. No one likes being told no when they want something. But this—knowing with absolute certainty Gideon is the one responsible for hurting their loved ones and being told you can’t do anything to avenge them? This is the kind of pain that will linger for years to come as an ache in their bones and a scar over their hearts.

It isn’t fair. But Din’s lived long enough to know the universe never intended life to be that way.

“Can I ask you a favor?” Bo-Katan asks, pulling him out of his thoughts.

He blinks at her, realizing this is the question she’d been withholding since she came down the ladder. Never has she asked him a request before. “What is it?”

“You must separate Gideon from the Darksaber,” she answers, expression one of absolute seriousness. “The Armorer warned my people if the Lightsaber was ever mishandled, it would turn against the wielder by transforming into the Darksaber. Instead of empowering you, it deceives you. Fills your head with delusions until you lose your grip on reality entirely.”

“And you want to spare Gideon’s sanity?” Din asks slowly.

“Of course not. The son of a bitch deserves to be punished for his crimes. Even if I did want to,” her lips curl into a snarl at the thought, “there’s no way of undoing the damage done to his mind. What I want is for the weapon to be returned to the Armorer. She’s the only one who can properly dispose of it.”

“Right,” he agrees quietly. Anything that comes out of the Armorer’s forge is built to last the length of eternity. He could toss the Darksaber into the center of a sun and it’d remain whole and unaffected, waiting to twist the mind of the next wielder. Nodding his head, he assures her, “I’ll take care of it, even if I have to cut off his hands.”

“Good.”

Din paces the length of the hull, each thud of his boots making contact with the metal floor blends with the low hum of the engines. Usually he’d ignore the creaks and groans of his home, but the metallic symphony is the only thing capable of drowning out the thoughts in his head urging him to storm the cockpit and retake control from Ahsoka.

“Pacing isn’t going to make us arrive any quicker,” Bo-Katan tells him, not even bothering to open her eyes as she lounges atop one of his storage crates. “Ahsoka said it will be another hour at least.”

He has a retort ready on his tongue when a voice calls out his name from somewhere beyond the Razor Crest.

“Din!”

Din freezes in place as unexpected, heart-wrenching hope slices through his chest. He knows that voice. It’s his favorite in all the galaxy.

“Death?” Bo-Katan asks, concerned by his stillness. “What’s wrong?”

He tentatively reaches out towards the bond, giving it the slightest of tugs. When he feels the distant flicker of a reaction on the other end from his angel he nearly forgets how to breathe.

“The bond,” he murmurs, voice thick with awe and relief. “I can feel it again.”

Longing fills his chest where the hollowness used to reside now that the invisible block separating them is gone. It wraps around his heart, squeezing so tightly he nearly falls to his knees. Din pulls at the bond again on impulse, possessed by the all-consuming need to see her, to have her at his side where she’ll be safe.

The bond protests the harsh treatment, too weak to physically bring them together across the vast distance separating them. He snarls a curse under his breath, hating being helpless to protect her. It’s unfair, he finds himself thinking for a second time. Unfair how it hurts more now being able to feel her presence compared to when he couldn’t at all.

A paper airplane flickers into existence on the horizon of his mind, flying straight into his hand when he reaches out for it. I can’t leave this place. Not yet, the note says. The words themselves are unsettling, but it’s the strength of the emotions she’s attached that has him reeling with shock. For one crazy, electrifying moment he thinks he’s passed onto the afterlife.

Another note arrives. I miss you, Din. I want to see you so much it hurts. And it’s unbelievable, truly, that he’s found someone who makes him feel as though he’s flying and falling simultaneously.

As he sends a message of his own, never has he been more certain that if anyone can put an end to the darkness inside of him—it’s her.

“The Moff is an expert when it comes to defensive warding,” Ahsoka says as the three of them stand looking up at a canyon wall that extends in either direction as far as their eyes can see. “But even he can’t hide from my sight.”

Din scuffs at the salt-covered ground with his boot, still coming to terms with the fact all this time Gideon’s been hiding out on Crait of all planets. As much as he wants to believe Ahsoka’s right, his powers can’t detect even the barest hint of the Seraph’s presence.

Bo-Katan’s eyebrows arch with skepticism. “You’re sure this is the right place? It’s kind of remote.”

“Perfect for building an army,” Ahsoka replies without missing a beat.

Din exchanges a look with his reaper, realizing this is the first time either of them are hearing about this.

“Gideon has an army?” he asks. “Who—”

“Mercenaries,” she interrupts, turning around to face them. Her blue eyes are distant and cloudy, entranced by a vision. “When I break the warding, all but one will meet the end of their mortal lives attempting to overpower us.”

“All but one? I don’t think so.” Bo-Katan rests her hands deliberately on her blaster pistols. “Anyone who works for Gideon is an enemy in my book.”

“Migs Mayfeld is not to be harmed.” There is steel in Ahsoka’s voice as she blinks back into the present moment.

Din nudges Bo-Katan with his arm when it looks like she wants to continue arguing. The reaper huffs a quiet breath of annoyance, but eventually jerks her head in the tiniest nod of compliance.

Ahsoka grabs her twin sabers from her belt and ignites their blue blades. She handles her weapons with deadly grace, altering her appearance from peaceful Oracle to fierce and cunning warrior. Turning back to the canyon wall, her gaze trails over the red-brown rocks only to pause and narrow at seemingly random points.

Bo-Katan tries and fails to follow her line of vision. “What are you—”

The Oracle leaps into the air with surprising agility, lashing out with her sabers against the rock. Blinding light bursts forth from the point of collision followed by a flickering glimpse of a gigantic metal door.

“—looking at,” Bo-Katan finishes quietly, watching Ahsoka swing herself higher to attack another portion of the canyon wall where the next segment of warding is hidden.

There is something undeniably satisfying about seeing the door materialize as the wardings cloaking it are destroyed. Every precise strike of Ahsoka’s sabers brings Din one step closer to reuniting with his soulmate.

As if spurred by the mere thought of her, fear ripples across the bond like a gust of icy wind, stopping his heart cold. His angel is terrified. Din reaches out as far as the bond will allow in its fragile state, trying to get her attention by pulling at it and shouting her name, but none of his attempts breach the storm of panic.

“She needs me,” he mutters to himself, stepping forward with clenched fists. His vision narrows until all he can see is the door in front of him, an obstacle that must be dealt with. “She needs my help.”

“Wait,” Bo-Katan calls out, but her voice sounds as if it’s coming from thousands of miles away. “Ahsoka isn’t finished with the warding yet!”

If he were capable of rational thought in that moment, he would have heeded her warning. As it is, he summons his power into the palm of his hand, the darkness inside of him crowing in wicked delight. He winds his arm back, preparing to slam his fist against the door, only for a whipcord to wrap around his wrist with an audible zip.

He’s pulled backwards onto the ground, breath knocked from his lungs as he lands with a heavy thud. Bo-Katan appears not a second later and pins him in place by straddling his waist. The darkness is demanding he push her aside, knowing with absolute certainty the reaper is no match against him, and it takes all his strength to wrestle the urge under control.

“Are you out of your fucking mind?” She glares at him, eyes resembling green flames eager to incinerate him.

“I—” he rasps, breathing heavily. His hand starts trembling, a burning itch under his skin. “I can feel her fear. She needs me.”

Bo-Katan blows out a long, frustrated breath. “Well, shit.” She jostles him then, forcing his head to momentarily clear as his helmet smacks the ground. “Look, soulmates are soulmates for a reason, right? I heard it’s like being two halves of the same whole. So if your soulmate is anything like you, she’s not going to give up without a fight. You have to trust she can take care of herself right now. That she’ll be fine.”

Din bristles. Trust is not the issue here. There is no one he trusts more than his angel—not Bo-Katan, not Ahsoka, not even Kuiil. The issue is he’s being asked to deny the instinct to shield her from danger which is woven into every cell of his being.

“She’ll be fine.” The words come out sounding sharp around the edges, cutting his tongue like shrapnel. “Everything will be fine.”

Bo-Katan disconnects the whipcord and rises to full height, apparently satisfied by his agreement. Din pushes himself onto his feet at a slower pace, his hand still shaking as if it's electric. He looks down at it, noticing for the first time the flesh is gone, replaced entirely by shadow. His expression tightens as he observes the change, realizing the black tendrils are slowly creeping up towards his wrist.

An alarm rings out, reverberating off the canyon walls like an explosion. Din’s gaze snaps up just as Ahsoka lands on the ground in a defensive crouch. Now that it's been fully unveiled, the door bears a striking resemblance to ones he’s seen at military fortresses across the galaxy, ridiculously massive to intimidate enemies and impenetrable from outside attacks. It makes sense, he thinks with a scoff, someone as power-hungry as Gideon claiming an abandoned base as their lair. Without the wardings, Din is able to detect the massive number of souls gathering on the other side, resembling vermin crawling over one another in their haste to arm themselves.

He searches for his angel’s soul, even just a glimpse of her bright light, only for his powers to instead encounter a massive cloud of dark, negatively-charged energy within a distant corner of the underground tunnel system. It fills an entire room, prohibiting him from sensing if anyone is inside. There is something strangely familiar about the energy, like he’s encountered its essence before, but he can’t recall the specifics of when or where.

“It’s time.”

Ahsoka’s voice reels his focus back to his physical surroundings. He notices the way her grip on her sabers tightens in anticipation and out of the corner of his eye Bo-Katan withdraws her blasters from their holsters.

The bottom of the door begins to raise with an earsplitting groan, but the mercenaries only wait the minimum amount of time it takes to pass under without hitting their heads to start charging forward.

Every mortal has a beginning and an end just like everything else in the galaxy. These mercenaries are no exceptions, having long sealed their fates when they agreed to accept Gideon’s payment. So when Din’s shadowy hand phases through a man’s chest and tears his heart out of its cavity, staining the white salt under their feet crimson as blood bursts from the vacant hole, Din tells himself he’s simply fulfilling destiny.

He repeats it when he discharges an assault of whistling birds, each one puncturing the throats of each target they encounter with a shrill warcry. And also when he rips a devaronian’s horn out of his head, a fragment of skull and bits of brain matter still gruesomely attached.

Again and again, with each permanently silenced voice and every shattered fragile bone, destiny is fulfilled.

Din would be lying if he said he’s never wondered what it would be like to die. To pass on from this world into a new realm for him to explore. He’s imagined the idyllic afterlife mortals have written poems and novels about, describing it as a blissful safe haven where sorrow and tragedy have no definition because they do not exist. He’s familiar with their opinions of damnation’s appearance, too, as an infernal place of fire and brimstone and screaming.

They were wrong about that.

Damnation is not a distant hell. It is found in an underground lair on Crait.

Instead of flames and sulfur, a Cupid’s blood is split and a soulmate bond is snapped in half.

Instead of screaming, a madman laughs.

“I’ve waited so long for this moment,” Gideon says through his chuckles, hauling himself onto his feet. His voice is an abrasive rasp, as if he’s shredded his vocal cords by screaming. “I’ve had to be patient, wait to find your weakness so I could catch your attention. It’s a shame, really, she had to be the one you fell for. She was quite the little spitfire.”

Din stares at his soulmate’s motionless body, frozen in place. Please, he pulls at his severed half of the bond, resolutely ignoring how cold it feels. Open your eyes, angel. Don’t leave me. Please.

There is no response. Just heartbreaking silence.

“I sense your anger, your hurt, and grief. Those are mortal emotions.” The Seraph grimaces in disgust, then lets out a low hiss when he agitates the wounds on his face. “By living amongst their kind you’ve forgotten your true potential. You are not their equal, Death. You are their superior. Immortals are meant to be better than them. To rule over every aspect of their pitiful lives.”

“I don’t want to rule anyone,” Din says, dragging his eyes away from his angel to glare at Gideon. Both his hands begin to shake as his mind plunges into a gaping abyss of remorse and despair. “I just want a life with her.”

“Even dead, she continues to blind you.”

Din snarls viciously in response. His control is pushed closer to the brink, holding on by mere fingertips, and darkness engulfs the entire room as a result.

The glow of the Darksaber persists, reflecting off his beskar and Gideon’s armor. It reminds him of moonlight, and he thinks for all that Bo-Katan warned him about the weapon’s sinful qualities, she did not mention its beauty. Even Ahsoka’s vision had failed to truly capture its radiance, just as a holovid can never compete with a face-to-face conversation.

His powers are drawn to the Darksaber. The energy it emits matches the one encountered earlier when searching the tunnels for his angel’s aura. This close, there is no ignoring its familiarity, not when his brain feels seconds away from exploding.

“I used to believe love conquers all,” Gideon prattles on, seemingly oblivious to Din’s torment. “I chose it as the Cupid motto because I thought there was nothing mortals cared more about than the health and happiness of their loved ones. Only after our fateful encounter did the Lightsaber reveal to me the truth.”

Lightsaber? Din’s head jerks up to stare at him, biting back a wince when the throbbing in the back of his mind intensifies at the movement. Does Gideon not realize the weapon has transformed?

By connecting Ahsoka’s claim that Gideon didn’t fully understand the consequence of corrupting the Lightsaber with Bo-Katan’s explanation that the Darksaber deceives its wielder, the answer is an obvious one: he doesn’t.

Gideon mistakes Din’s confusion for interest and his lips slowly curl into a smile. “Mors aeterna. It means—”

“Death is eternal.” The translation slips unbiddenly from Din’s lips before he even realizes his mouth has opened.

“There is no one more feared or respected than you. But for what reason? What have you done to earn your reputation?” Gideon demands, spit flying as his anger flares. “You are no more than the universe’s favorite puppet. Mindlessly obedient to its every demand.”

Hearing the truth always hurts, but hearing it from Gideon is especially torturous. Din’s creed to the universe has dictated his actions the entirety of his existence. He never fought against its orders, never thought of his own desires as more important than what it wanted.

Until he matched with his soulmate. She changed his priorities and shifted the center of his entire world by revealing to him even Death could experience love.

There had been no hesitation when he broke his creed for her.

And he doesn’t hesitate breaking Ahsoka’s promise now.

“I just murdered your soulmate right in front of you and you do nothing. Did you ever love her at all?”

“I do.”

Din summons every trace of power and darkness he possesses and combines them together within his core—a volatile, pulsating mass of pure chaos. His beskar armor starts to crack and chip away, unable to withstand the increasing pressure.

He thinks of his angel’s smiling face, the sound of her laughter, how bright her soul shines, and he thinks all those things are gone now. Not even a chance to say goodbye.

“More than anything.”

And Death lets go.

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#death and an angel #my fic #Din Djarin #din x you #din x reader #din djarin x you #din djarin x reader #the mandalorian #the mandalorian x reader #pedro pascal character fanfiction

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fandom-strumpet · 4 years ago

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Blue Eyes

This fic was inspired by the song Emerald Eyes by Anson Seabra

Word Count: 1,527

It was a boring Saturday, you were in between bad guys and the rest was unusual but welcome. The Salvatore house was the ideal place to relax and hang out, it was much more spacious and some how more like home than your actual home. You had been listening to music through your earbuds on the couch, bouncing your foot to the beat. Kai sat across the living room, diving into one of the old books from Stefan's collection on the wall. After listening to Emerald Eyes you decided exactly what you wanted to do that night. Putting your earbuds away, you cross over to Kai and drum a little pattern on his knees. "Hey, Parker. I want to show you something cool tonight." Putting his book down slightly he looked up with a curious smile, his blue eyes gleaming in the sun beam streaming from the tall window. "What is it?" "I want to show you the state park, we'll have a picnic up in my favorite spot and look at the stars." You flashed him a cheesy smile and wiggled your eyebrows. Ugh, I am so bad at this flirting thing. "Sounds fun. It's about damn time we got out of the house. I'll get the picnic basket ready." Half an hour later and you were both packed up and ready to head out. Kai pulled his favorite blue car up to the front so you could both hop in. With a creak and a thud, you closed the passenger door and slid in close enough to where you could rest your head on his shoulder if you wanted. "Which way is the state park?" Kai asked, putting the car in gear as you started to roll onward. "Just follow the highway and you'll go straight to it." you tried to give a confident smile but you felt so nervous inside. Tonight is the night. The car ride was a blast, you found the rock and roll station and Kai turned the volume up. With windows rolled down, your hair blew wildly as the both of you sang along to the blaring music. Rolling hills turned into pine tree covered mountains, rocky cliffs started to appear here and there. The fresh forest air filled the cabin and you knew you were close to the entrance. “Right there.” you motioned and Kai slowed down to turn into the park. You turned the music down to hear him ask,“Which way now?” “Go left, the scenic view starts there.” you squirmed playfully, excited for the nights events about to unfold. Kai responded in turn by bumping his elbow against you with a smirk. The drive on the scenic view was surreal, not much needed to be said as you stared out the windows in wonder of nature’s artwork. Wildflowers were scattered here and there, the tall trees making a scene just for the two of you, showing off the fluttering leaves and the sound of the birds chirping away. About 10 minutes into the drive you reached the top of the mountains. There were wide, open spacious views of the surrounding mountains and hills. A green valley spread below while to the right it turned into a beautiful rocky canyon. Kai pulled the car to a stop in the mini parking space by the covered picnic area. He reached back to pull out the large picnic basket which looked to be filled to the brim with food. “Is here good?” Kai motioned to one of the large picnic tables. “Nope!” you shouted, still getting the blankets out of the backseat, “Go out to the big grassy area and find us a nice spot!” You bit your lip in excitement and Kai walked around in the grass trying to find just the right spot. He wanted this night to be perfect. He had never really gone on trips with just Y/N before and it was exciting, he was new to emotions but he always felt a different kind when he was with her. There was some emotion that he couldn’t describe, he tried to talk to Damon about how his stomach did flips like he was going to puke, his heart raced and he felt warm, he wanted to know what it meant but Damon just laughed and walked away. Maybe tonight he would find out. At last he found the perfect spot and just in time as Y/N came over with the thick blanket to lay down. “Mmmmmm I’m hungry! What did you pack?” your hand bumped into Kai’s as you both tried to open the basket.

“Ha..Let me get it out.” Kai winked at you.

You playfully rolled your eyes, used to Kai’s pretentious flirting. Did his cheeks turn pink? No. No way, you’re just imagining. You scoot back, giving him room to spread out the assortment of food he had packed.

“Damn- I didn’t know you could fit that much food in there. This looks amazing!”

Kai gave you a proud smile, “I’ve had time to practice my cooking.”

Digging into the food, your stomach had a taste of heaven. Kai closed his eyes and enjoyed the warmth of the sun on his skin. You allowed your eyes to wander over him as he sat back on his arms peacefully. He opened his eyes and you cleared your throat, looking away quickly to avoid his suspicion. Once you were both full, Kai packed up the basket and set it off to the side. The sun had almost finished setting, the orange, pink and purple streaks quickly fading. Kai and you both laid down onto your backs with a content sigh. A chill started to kick in as the temperature dropped and out of instinct you both moved closer together. Kai’s put his arms up above his head to relax, for some reason it was so attractive even though he didn’t mean for it to be. His muscles flexed through his shirts created butterflies in your stomach. You could only imagine what it would feel like to be held in his arms. Kai looked up to the night sky, he couldn’t help himself from looking over at you. The way you gazed up in wonder, and how your eyes sparkled from the reflection of the stars. Humming, he allowed one of his arms to droop around your shoulder. You pretended not to notice, not wanting to make a bigger deal out of it than you should. Your heart said otherwise.

“Look. Look right there at the colors changing!” you pointed, trying to show Kai the discovery you had made.

“I don’t see what you’re pointing to.” he furrowed his eyebrows.

You moved in closer trying again but he hummed a no in response. You made a risky decision but decided it would be worth it. You rolled on top of him, his chest pressed flush against your back and you held one if his arms against your stomach while pointing up to the sky with your other hand.

“Look,” you giggled, “do you see it now?” You leaned your head back so you could look at him.

“I see it- what is it?”

“I have no idea- but it’s beautiful.” you leaned your cheek against his to look back up.

Your smell was intoxicating to him, the rose aroma flooding his senses until all he could think about was you on top of him. He loved the feel of your body rising and falling against him.

Kai breathed into your ear, “Just like you.”

Your breath hitched, unsure if you really heard what you thought you did. Suddenly Kai’s hands moved to your waist to turn you over. He moved one hand to the middle of your back and drew lazy circles. The light breeze floated her hair into a halo, his breath caught at the sight and he moved his fingers through your hair. You loved the feel of his hand against you and felt a slight chill when the cold from his rings made contact with your bare skin. Even with the temperatures dropping, you didn’t feel the cold. You decided this was the moment.

“I love you.” you said softly, looking at the man who was your all and everything.

“You- love me?” his hand froze on your back and he rubbed your cheek with his thumb.

“More than life itself.” you responded without hesitating.

“I- um- sorry, I get nervous around such a pretty girl. You make my heart race, and the smell of you absolutely drives me wild.”

You looked down and blushed. Kai gently brought his fingers beneath your chin and lifted your eyes to meet his. “I love you too.”

Mind racing, his hand slid down to your throat. The cold of his silver rings gave you goosebumps and just like that- he pulled you towards him, lips colliding into a sweet and tender kiss. A kiss of passion that starry-eyed dreamers wait their whole lives for. The kiss between two people who have at long last found their soul mate. Time stood still, the universe paused to watch the epic moment of the beginning of a love story like no other.

@rome5683 @1-800-khaleesii

#kai parker #kai parker fanfiction #kai parker imagine #kai parker x reader #emerald eyes

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collecting-stories · 4 years ago

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Comfort - JJ Maybank

Request: hi!! i love your fanfic about obx and i was wondering if you could write something where the reader is struggling with her body image/self-confidence and the pogues don't know but JJ, her bf, somehow finds out and comforts her? i haven't been feeling very confident lately and i feel like this would help idk why. thank you <33 - @teaheeee

A/N: This was a tough one but here it is.

Outer Banks Masterlist

✰ ✰ ✰ ✰

“I’ll be like five seconds.” JJ swore, running up the stairs to your room where he’d left his wallet.

“JJ come on.” You groaned, falling back onto the couch. This was at least the fifth time he’d stalled the two of you from leaving the house. You were supposed to be meeting everyone at the beach and you hated being late.

“Hold on!” He shouted. He had dropped his wallet under the bed earlier and almost left without it when the two of you were leaving. While you waited downstairs, he grabbed the wallet, pausing when he noticed the ripped picture on the floor. Shredded by hand into pieces was your school picture, the one you’d just gotten last week.

JJ picked up the pieces, sifting through them for a moment until you called him again, reminding him that the task at hand was getting his wallet so you could get to the Wreck. He didn’t want to bring down the evening and he wasn’t sure what to say so he said nothing when he came down, only holding up his wallet to show you that he found it.

It was entirely possible that he was reading too much into things. That you had really just hated your senior portrait and thought it was awful. There was nothing wrong with that, school pictures were always cheesy. But ripping your picture to shreds wasn’t an isolated incident, not in his mind at least. You’d been avoiding any type of jean or tight all week. He was honestly surprised today to find you wearing a nice dress though he supposed that it was for everyone else’s benefit because you kept holding the hem like it was going to billow up.

You were fine at lunch. It was JJ that caught Kiara’s attention, seemingly more distant than she remembered seeing him before, she leaned over at one point to ask if everything was okay at home.

“What do you mean?” He asked, gaze straying to you as you pushed at the food on your plate.

“Are you okay? You seem really distracted.” She replied, keeping her voice down so no one else noticed.

JJ shook his head, “fine.” He didn’t want to tell Kiara that he was worried about you. If you hadn’t said anything to her, and you clearly hadn’t because she seemed oblivious to your behavior, then he didn’t want to draw attention to you.

It wasn’t any one thing. You couldn’t pinpoint the moment or the day, it wasn’t that you stepped on a scale and gained a few pounds. It wasn’t that your jeans felt a little too tight around the hips. Though now that you thought of it, you were feeling kind bloated lately. But it wasn’t just that. It was the sudden breakout of acne near your jawline and the way you felt like you just couldn’t quite ‘pull off’ the clothes you were wearing. It was the feeling of something being wrong but not being able to pinpoint it. That unsettling, unnerving feeling of looking in the mirror and knowing that it was all wrong. That you were all wrong. Your hair looked dull and lifeless, your skin was puffy and it didn’t glow the way the serum you bought said it would. You could name something from head to toe, there was list, sprawling inside your head of all the things that were wrong. Your posture, your nose, your waist, your legs, your eyes...everything had something wrong.

JJ waited until you were back at your house, sprawled out on the couch with you while you watched some rerun of a stupid show. Never good at confrontation that wasn’t with someone he didn’t like, JJ jumped right in, “Are you okay?”

It was a simple enough question. You could just say yes and he could be satistfied and everything could go back to normal. You could hope that you would eventually shake the awful feelings and be okay. Or you could tell him that you were just tired or just not feeling well or just whatever. It didn’t matter what you said, there were a million excuses and all you had to do was choose one.

But that was easier said than done and you found yourself floundering for a moment, trying to think of the most believeable way to say that you were fine and he didn’t have to worry. He had enougn on his plate, he didn’t have to be bothered with you too.

“Yeah.” You replied, voice a little shakier than you meant it to be and you grimaced slightly at your own voice.

“Are you sure?”

If he was asking the question than it meant that he probably knew the answer.

“Yeah, fine, good.” You nodded.

“I saw you ripped up your picture.” He admitted.

“I can explain-”

He nodded, “you know you’re awesome?” He asked, as if he was expecting some sort of response from you.

“Sometimes,” you shrugged, “I don’t know...I just feel like...it’s not worth it. Like I just want to stay in bed and under my covers because then no one has to look at me.”

“Well I like looking at you so I can’t say I’m a fan of that idea,” JJ replied, smiling when bit your bottom lip, “although if the bed’s big enough than that’s fine, we can hide together.”

“JJ,” you sat up more and so did he, “I’m being serious!”

“So am I,” JJ replied, “you think I’d hesitate to do anything you needed me too? You don’t have to believe me but that doesn’t mean I won’t remind you ever day how incredible you are.”

“You’re such a sap,” you tried to play off his words as if it didn’t make your heart race to hear him say those things to you.

“Eh,” he shrugged, pulling you against him and kissing the side of your head, “worth it. Now, you wanna tell me what’s the matter, really?”

“I told you.”

“More than that.” He stressed.

“I just feel gross I guess. I don’t know, it’s not any one thing it’s just like, every little thing that I see that I don’t like. It’s so easy to just...look at myself and see all the ways that I’m falling short. All the things I wish I could change about myself.”

“I don’t know how helpful it is to say it but, I wouldn’t change anything about you.” JJ admitted. “You’re my best friend, I mean...” he shrugged, almost as if he wasn’t entirely sure how to end that sentence. JJ wasn’t the best with words, he had always had trouble getting his thoughts. He could name every single thing that he loved about you, and the list was extensive, but saying the words felt like his throat was closing up on him.

It didn’t really matter though, you knew what he meant. The soft look and the kiss on your forehead that had you closing your eyes when his lips touched your skin. He wasn’t used to comforting, hadn’t ever had any example of it in his own life, but he was good at it. He was good at letting you know it would be alright. Even if he didn’t say it outright.

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forasecondtherewedwon · 3 years ago

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In the Arms of the Anus

Fandom: Spider-Man, Thor Pairing: Roger Harrington/Grandmaster Rating: T Word Count: 8883

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, @spiderman-homecomeme!!!

Summary: While people all over the world are finding their soulmates, Roger Harrington can barely find time to grab a sandwich. Clumsy, anxious, and stagnating in a mediocre marriage, it's a miracle that he still believes in love.

Today's the day the universe rewards that belief.

Three things about Roger Harrington: he’d just tripped on the sidewalk, he worried daily that he was developing a bald spot, and, at the age of 36, he felt he still believed in love as strongly as did the little girl in his building who’d made all the residents Valentine’s Day cards the year before.

The cards—which Roger had found endearing while his wife had been baffled to the point of annoyance—had been wedged into everyone’s mailbox sometime on the afternoon of last May 19th, and maybe that was why he thought of them today, exactly a year later.

It was helpful, he found, to consider love in markers of time passing, or just numbers. The anniversary of those Valentine’s cards would always be 271 days early, leap year or not. Roger had been married twice, longer the second time. He had zero children, and that was alright with him because he wasn’t totally sure that he did want kids and, anyway, he was too profoundly stressed about the welfare of the teenagers he taught at Midtown to comfortably imagine himself as a fulltime parent.

His wife was cool. Significantly cooler than he was. She drove out of the city to hike every other weekend (he had never joined her and hoped to never be called upon for woodsy companionship), had once performed an emergency tracheotomy on a friend at a dinner party, and had a tattoo on her hip that predated their relationship, which made it consequently, eternally, enigmatic, no matter how many times she told the objectively trite story of its acquisition. Also, she was a casual shoplifter, which made him very, very nervous in a way that he found difficult to differentiate from how he felt when he was turned on.

He was the kind of person who consistently forgot to take his glasses off before stepping into the shower. She was the kind of person who would run into and recognize a famous race car driver at Whole Foods (that had happened) or fake her own death (that had not happened—knock on wood!). Essentially, what and who his second wife was was the natural successor to his first wife (the reckless young bride to his insomniac young groom), who had in turn been the natural successor to the only other romantic encounter of his life worth mentioning: a kiss on the cheek at a birthday party on the day the Berlin Wall fell. Roger had been seven.

So his romantic history was speckled and, in two out of three cases, spoke a little too loudly of a need for legally-recognized codependence. So he didn’t feel like a man anyone would ever get a tattoo in honour of. So his wife had been a little unkind in the long pause before her negative when he’d asked her if she thought he was getting a bald spot. Roger still felt that love was going to happen for him. Hopefully sustained in his current marriage, but if not, there was always what Julius Dell had taken to (highly unscientifically) calling the Love Wave.

If Roger decided to be really delusional, he could pretend that the Love Wave was to blame for his stumble over uneven concrete on his way to grab lunch. That he was finally feeling its cosmic tug. Not that he would be the last to sense it—the inexplicable force that had lately begun guiding people the world over to their new partners—but every day that he didn’t, he feared his wife would feel it first and go careening out of their life together in a Thelma and Louise-style launch that somehow left her intact and him feeling like he’d plummeted to his death at the bottom of a canyon. Sometimes, when he thought about it, he imagined feeling that impulse to go to this destined soulmate and pictured it leading him home. Not in some metaphorical way, but literally home, to the apartment he shared with his wife, to find her arriving at the same time, the two of them matched up, the universe endorsing their marriage.

The reality was that he was a man with clumsy feet (and knees and elbows) who’d forgotten to pack himself a lunch and had just enough self-awareness (though probably not dignity) not to believe that eating in the cafeteria with his students was something he would be able to socially recover from.

He thought about a poorly-cut-out pink heart glued to a fold of red craft paper. He went to buy a sandwich.

At the deli, Roger waited in line and didn’t so much allow his mind to wander—like a dog off-leash in a dog park—as feel his mind jerk insistently away—like a dog on-leash, trying to snap a dropped slice of pizza off the sidewalk. He was violently not present as his thoughts migrated from Valentine’s Day cards to lesson plans to the anxiety he always felt over the fact of never seeming to have enough power to go with the tremendous sense of responsibility he felt for all situations in which he was even remotely involved. He would have, should have, continued to shuffle vacantly forward in line, except that the man ahead of him grumbled something that drew his focus.

What he grumbled was: “Even the Sorcerer Supreme should be able to spare a minute to decide what kind of sandwich he wants.”

Now, Roger Harrington was a man of science, but he was also a man who had previously enjoyed a close friendship with the Hulk (and if anyone challenged him on specific parameters within that assertion, Roger knew that he would cry). Aliens swarmed the sky like clouds of bees. There were compilation videos of Spider-Man nearly getting hit by city buses that could’ve been designed expressly to see how hard Roger could flinch. For a clumsy man with the unathletic, knock-kneed gait of Pippi Longstocking, Roger did his best to roll with the supernatural punches. Hey, this was how science worked too: just because there wasn’t a precedent yet didn’t mean there never would be. Just because he couldn’t explain something didn’t mean no one could. Sorcerers? Alright. There could be sorcerers.

“Sorcerers?” Roger blurted to the man, overeager to expel the word.

All other words had fled to the back of his mind, twitching in an agitated cluster, leaving just the one to be snatched frantically from the surface. Like fishing. (Roger had never been fishing. One of his greatest fears was having a live fish somehow jump into his shoe and stepping on it by accident.)

“Uhhh,” the man droned. He looked uneasy. If Roger knew how to make his eyes a little less wide in situations like these, he would’ve done it.

“No, yeah, sorcerers, sure,” Roger swiftly backpedaled. “I’m a teacher.”

As if being a teacher equaled knowledge of sorcerers. As if that were a normal unit of the high school curriculum. Roger’s understanding of sorcerers began and ended with Mickey Mouse in a blue wizard’s hat. He wondered if that was sort of the standard look.

The man did not appear reassured. Roger thrust his hand forward.

“Roger Harrington, Midtown Tech.”

Face still wary, his deli companion shook hands.

“Wong.”

“So, this sorcerer of yours didn’t pick a sandwich?” The line shuffled forward and, now in reach of the long glass case of food, Roger attempted to lean his elbow casually against it, misjudged the distance, and jerked back upright again before he could fall over.

“No… You heard that part too?”

“If I could hear the part about the sorcerer, why wouldn’t I be able to hear the rest?”

“I think most people would’ve been so fixated on the sorcerer thing that they wouldn’t really absorb the part about the sandwich.”

“Just got sandwiches on the brain, I guess,” Roger said.

God, if Wong knew a sorcerer, odds were that he was a sorcerer too. (Roger based this on being a teacher with almost exclusively teacher friends and acquaintances.) He was making it sound like he cared more about sandwiches, he knew he was. He stared silently at Wong for a few painful seconds and wondered if the man could tell that he had worked for a sandwich shop as a teenager—the role of wearing a full-body sandwich costume and standing on the sidewalk, trying to attract people into the shop.

But Wong surprised him by nodding.

“You could get one of everything,” Roger heard himself suggest.

He was not typically one to make suggestions, but rather one to panic when other people did and he was in the position of having to choose between them. He could never decide on a restaurant for he and his wife’s now few-and-far-between date nights, or provide straightforward feedback when she asked for his opinion on her clothing choices… which movie they should see… what they should buy for her friend’s sister’s housewarming gift...

Oh god, she was probably going to fake her own death and his biggest anxiety was knowing that someone would ask him to choose the casket!

“I have like…” Wong jingled his pockets and extracted a fistful of coins that, when he opened his hand, Roger saw belonged to several different currencies. “…six bucks.”

Like a mirror with a delay, Roger patted his own pockets to locate his wallet. He flipped it open to reveal something promising and terrifying: he’d forgotten to return the school credit card after the last field trip he’d chaperoned. He shouldn’t, but… sorcerer.

“I think this’ll cover it,” Roger said. “It’s for emergency expenses.”

“Like lunch?” Wong asked doubtfully.

“I could be very hungry.”

“They sell seventeen different types of sandwiches here.”

“I could be very, very hungry.”

Wong shrugged in evident acquiescence and Roger marvelled that it was so simple for him to accept this act of generosity. Roger couldn’t recall the last time someone had been as generous towards him. Wait, yes he could. The Valentine’s Day card. Well, handing over a credit card that wasn’t technically his didn’t exactly equate to presenting his ticket at the Love Wave gates (not that there were such things—not that he’d know), but he was hoping to trade this generosity up for a different magical experience in the near future.

When they reached the front of the line for service, Roger ordered a total of eighteen sandwiches. (And received an undisguised groan of complaint from the people still in line behind himself and Wong.) While they waited, Roger buzzed like the posterchild for over-caffeination, doing his best not to let his excitement translate into erratic movements.

Of course, once the sandwiches were presented and paid for, it only made sense for Roger to help Wong carry them all. His own ham-and-Swiss was stuffed into one of the three bags and they were all bulging, threatening to spill. If one of them ripped on Wong’s journey back to wherever he had to take them, who would be there to gather the sandwiches into their arms so that Wong wouldn’t have to leave them on the ground? Roger was clearly the best (only) person for the job.

And if they talked on the way? That would be natural. If Wong stared at him with abrupt, unyielding suspicion the instant Roger attempted to negotiate a visit with this ‘Sorcerer Supreme’ in exchange for buying his lunch? Yeah. Yeah that suspicion would be fair.

“Not for my sake!” Roger defended as Wong blinked back at him. “For the kids!”

“The Sorcerer Supreme isn’t a birthday party magician.”

“No, I would never imply that! These are bright kids. They’d be there to learn, respectfully. They’ve had their own traumatic encounter with Spider-Man already so there wouldn’t be any clambering to meet another person with superhuman powers!”

“What did Spider-Man do to traumatize them?”

Wong looked interested now, in an entertained sort of way. Meanwhile, Roger was having a flashback of his life flashing before his eyes inside the Washington Monument.

“Actually, he saved us,” Roger explained. “That’s not the point. It would be purely educational. You and the Sorcerer Supreme would call the shots. As long as it wasn’t anything dangerous.”

“Dangerous? We would never put children at risk!”

Roger was about to clarify that he hadn’t meant to imply that they would when he realized Wong seemed to be taking this as a reason to prove himself, or to make the other sorcerer prove what he’d just said.

“I would hope not,” Roger said carefully, “because not all of the children I’ve taken on field trips have come back alive and that haunts me.”

“Well, what haunts me is everything I’ve seen and learned from in order to become someone who could now guarantee a safe field trip environment.”

“Well, that would be great.”

“Well, good,” Wong concluded.

Roger looked down at the bag he was holding as he dug out his sandwich. His wrist twisted and he caught the time on his watch. Oh wow, oh no, his lunch break was almost over.

“Ok, deal,” he said quickly. “We’ll come by next Tuesday!”

“I’ll be out here to let you in!” Wong agreed with a parting wave.

Roger took off running in the direction of Midtown and when that got too awful, he wheezed like an asthmatic and waited at the closest bus stop.

—

Roger had expected Principal Morita to say there was no room in their budget for this trip. That they were nearing the end of the school year, that parents and guardians would be reluctant to sign another form for an excursion that Roger could only give a vague, stammering explanation of. At the very least, he’d anticipated the journey via school bus in lurching, stop-and-start traffic to take so long that the kids would revolt; Flash Thompson would lead the complaints that they could’ve walked to their destination faster than the ride took and Roger would feel the primal horror of a confrontation with a self-possessed teenager who wielded the kind of peer influence Roger could only have dreamed of when he’d been Flash’s age.

But no.

Highly improbably (Roger didn’t like to consider it miraculous), things went smoothly. The trip cleared the budget assessment on zero notice because, besides renting the single bus to transport the students, their outing didn’t actually have any costs. Permission slips came back signed. Traffic was light. And dear, dear Flash—who usually gave Roger so much anxiety—slapped the hand Roger raised to shield his eyes from the sun as his students disembarked from the bus, rewarding him with a surprise high-five for getting them out of the classroom on a Tuesday afternoon. It almost knocked Roger’s glasses off.

They were ushered inside by Wong, who was now laying the mystical solemnity on pretty thick. He certainly wasn’t talking about sandwiches or complaining about the Supreme Sorcerer under his breath.

Before Roger could feel too good about himself though, he realized he’d had time to run through his headcount of the students three times without interruption. Normally, something would happen partway through his first count and he’d be uneasy for the rest of the day, sure that one of the kids had fallen down a manhole or been stampeded by a dog-walker’s unruly canine swarm. The universe shoved teenagers into the path of bike couriers with one hand and paired up soulmates with the other. That was just how things went! However, inside this house (or, no, Sanctum, Wong had called it), the air was still and quiet.

“Do you think he’s gonna make himself appear out of thin air?” Roger heard Ned ask at a whisper. “Or out of a wardrobe, or a trapdoor, or one of those boxes people get in to get sawed in half?”

“Those are cheap tricks,” Wong said loudly. He stared unsympathetically at Roger’s motley group, hand closed around his opposite wrist to maintain a serious pose. “The man you’ll be meeting shortly has capabilities that far outstrip those of the kind of magician-for-hire you’d find in a phonebook.”

From behind him, Roger heard Peter ask Ned what a phonebook was.

“What kind of capabilities then?” Flash demanded.

Roger sighed and was turning to reprimand his student when Wong said, “Like this!”

The man faked a sneeze of horrific volume and range, doubling over and cupping his hand around his mouth and nose. When he straightened up and presented his open palm, there was a raspberry sitting in it.

Roger closed his eyes for a moment to collect himself and his teaching career played on a fast-forwarded film reel behind his lids. The Sorcerer Supreme was a no-show; all Roger had accomplished was taking the kids to a weird building to witness a man pretend to sneeze out a raspberry. Midtown Tech was going to fire him. His wife would recognize his unemployment as a reason to leave him. Depressingly, Roger was thinking about how that would almost be a relief—an end to his incessant worrying that they were really kind of a mismatch—and he was thinking it while he blankly watched Wong eat the raspberry he’d just feigned dislodging from his nasal cavity.

He was really unprepared for a different man to come sweeping down the stairs, motion with his hand, and have a red sheet come whizzing down after him to settle itself on his shoulders. Roger blinked. He heard the mixed noises of fright and appreciation from his students.

Then Flash piped up with, “That’s just a trick. It’s wires or something.”

Roger backed into the cluster of his charges and, without taking his eyes off the obvious Magical Guy in front of him, reached over and placed his hand across Flash’s mouth.

Unfortunately, his censorship seemed to be too late. The Sorcerer’s narrowed eyes zoned in on Flash.

“Oh yeah? How ’bout this? Is this just a trick?”

Fingers splayed, the man moved his hands in a precise, practiced way and a window opened up in the middle of the room. No, not a window, but Roger was having a tough time wrapping his head around it. What this non-window showed was something that wasn’t the room, that wasn’t a view of the street, that wasn’t anyplace in New York, if he had to guess.

“You can’t just do it like that,” Wong said wearily. Roger felt himself and his students look from one of the men to the other as though watching a tennis match. “There should be a little more finesse.”

“Look,” the Sorcerer told him. “You don’t get to spring this on me and then expect me to ham it up for the kids. This isn’t a David Blaine show.”

“Maybe you should watch one. You might learn something about showmanship.”

“So, it’s fake, right?” Flash checked.

Dammit, Roger had dropped his hand, distracted as he tried to make out what he was seeing through what he was becoming increasingly comfortable with calling a ‘magic portal’ in his thoughts. He scrambled to take hold of Flash’s shoulder—yanking him back would be bad, but dealing with the fallout of him pissing off somebody who could make magic portals would be much worse—but Flash dodged him, swaggering forward to inspect the Sorcerer’s work.

“What is it? Mirrors? Greenscreen? You buy your tech from Stark?”

“Stark?” the Sorcerer spat out derisively.

Overcome with the terrible feeling that he was about to find out what it looked like when a wizard put a curse on a child, Roger sprang forward. As he did, three things happened: the Sorcerer rotated his wrist slightly, the scene on the other side of the portal changed, and Flash turned to the side.

Without a student to grab onto and pull to safety, Roger’s momentum sent him hurtling through the gateway currently connecting Midtown to parts unknown.

Of all the times to trip, he thought.

—

The world was bright and fast and bad. Actually, Roger was almost positive that what he was seeing wasn’t the world at all, but he couldn’t put a name to where he was any more than he could think of better adjectives to describe it. Unless the Sorcerer Supreme owned a magical slip ’n’ slide that operated at speeds designed to train prospective astronauts for space travel, Roger was no longer in his building.

The colour of the tunnel of light surrounding him turned from something like the intestinal track of a unicorn who ate lightning and nebulas to a dangerous, broiling red. Roger kept waiting for his skin to bubble, his face to melt off. Maybe he was the fabled frog in the pot of boiling water and had failed to notice the heat steadily increasing. Because he didn’t feel hot. He couldn’t tell whether or not he felt cold either and before he could work it out, he finally landed.

It was rough.

He curled his arms up around his head, protecting his face. He hit and tumbled, hit and tumbled, banging his shins and elbows, setting off a series of metallic clangs and thwumps like his body was playing drums made of the contents of somebody’s recycling bin. Roger could see—once, shaking, he was able to lower his arms and open his eyes—that his imagination hadn’t been far from the mark: he was lying in a heap of trash.

Trembling like a baby deer, he got to his feet and assessed his surroundings. There were piles everywhere. Piles of stuff. Roger could identify some of the battered objects, but most were utterly alien to him. This was like the time he’d found his wife’s sex toys all over again.

“Hello?” he called out, because he seemed to be alone. “Hel—”

His throat closed off abruptly when he swiveled in place and noticed the sky. His mouth fell open. Was that what he had just come through? That furious-looking, billowing, volcanic, enormous… disturbance? Weather pattern? Entrance to hell, if hell were a mountain of trash?

Oh man. Where was Spider-Man this time? Roger didn’t know which would come first, but if something distinctly reassuring didn’t happen in the next 30 seconds, he was going to either burst into tears or pee his pants. His cool wife was going to be so bummed to have to declare him dead instead of faking her own death. And his students would be traumatized, having just witnessed their teacher disappear before their eyes. He spent a frantic 17 of his 30 seconds wondering if this were Jumanji and he’d started a game without realizing it; being sucked into a board game was another of his greatest fears, ever since he’d watched the chilling horror film Jumanji in his teens.

“Hello?” Roger croaked a final time.

Some other scientist—a Tony Stark type—would thrive in this scenario, Roger knew. They would scavenge the surrounding mounds of metal, collecting and assembling pieces into some sort of technology that would either get them home or enable communication with a rescue team. Would there be a rescue team for Roger Harrington? Would anyone even try to get him back?

The cry/pee conundrum was looking more like cry with each passing second until suddenly, amongst the broken things Roger was aggrieved to consider the lone sentinels of his demise, some kind of spacecraft touched down. Based on his recent luck, whoever was at the helm was likely here to kill him, but he immediately elected to throw himself on their mercy, whether that meant rescue or just a swifter snuffing out of his life than he would otherwise experience on this sad island of garbage as he died from dehydration, starvation, and exposure to that infernal gateway in the sky.

He mouthed the word “help�� more than said it as he staggered forward on legs he could hardly feel. A door in the side of the spacecraft slid smoothly open and party music blared out. Roger flinched back as though he had not heard the sounds of civilization in years.

A woman exited the craft. She wore an expression about as kind as the murderous upside-down mushroom cloud in the sky and when their eyes met, she barked, “Back!”

Roger executed an awkward reverse lunge, pleading hands raised. Ok, now that his time had come, he didn’t want a quick death. Put out of his misery? No, he would learn to live with his misery, the way he’d learned to live with his college roommates, or his wife’s collection of handmade bowls! With food and water to sustain him, he was suddenly confident that he could be successfully miserable for years if this intimidating woman would just leave him to his own pathetic devices.

But then, like a visitation from a tan, eye-liner-wearing angel of indeterminate age, a man in gold robes emerged from the vessel. He beamed like he had always been beaming, and always would be.

Just like that, Roger Harrington got it. He got what Hot Chocolate meant when they sang that they believed in miracles. He got the meaning of Kylie Jenner’s year of realizing stuff. He got why a child would send out Valentine’s Day cards in May and why his wife was so dedicated to her hiking group and why he was here.

“Now, what did I say about that before we left?” the angel seemed to be asking his companion, though he’d locked his eyes on Roger. “Did I say to harass our visitor or did I say to be nice?”

The woman narrowed her eyes at Roger, which he felt more than saw; it was possible that he was crying after all. Tears of joy.

“Harass,” she answered flatly.

The angel chuckled.

“You know, I do like having you around. Before you, I said to myself, ‘Next time, get an enforcer with a sense of humour.’” He sighed as his laughter dwindled. “But you can, uh, skedaddle back onto the ship now. That’ll be all.”

“What if you want to melt him?” she queried.

That was enough to tear Roger’s gaze away from the man and send it zipping nervously to the threatening almost-smile the woman was now directing his way. He’d preferred the murder face.

“Melt him!” the angel said, in a tone that implied her suggestion had been ridiculous. (Roger relaxed. A little.) “Topaz, don’t you realize who this is? Don’t you know?”

She shrugged.

“Trash.”

“No, he’s not trash! Do you think I would’ve left the Grand Arena to retrieve a new gladiator by hand? All those Scrappers don’t do my bidding just so I can dig through the garbage looking for fresh challengers for my champion! I wouldn’t even assign Scrapper 142 this task, and you know she’s my favourite!”

When the woman only grumbled, the man pressed, “You have an unbelievable poker face. Do you really not know why I flew all the way out here for this guy?”

“I’m his soulmate,” Roger blurted, because that was the one thing he did know.

He had no idea what a Scrapper was, or whether the man in front of him was more or less important than the ‘champion’ he’d mentioned, or how his homicidal sidekick planned to melt Roger, but he understood what was happening here. Forget the Love Wave—what had come for him had yanked him violently across solar systems, maybe galaxies. He’d been sucked under by the Love Riptide.

The angel pointed at him and proudly proclaimed, “Correctamundo!”

Then he strode forward and folded Roger into a hug. Roger thought this must be what it was like to be a piece of antique furniture, tenderly wrapped in gold leaf.

“I’m the Grandmaster,” he said.

“Roger Harrington,” Roger offered, feeling that his life was entirely surreal as he cautiously returned the hug.

“As soon as I felt you land on my humble little planet here, I came looking. My orgy guests were disappointed, naturally, but I had to put my interests first. What was I, elected? If they wanted a leader who would pretend to care about everyone equally, they should have organized themselves into a viable political party capable of rivalling my dictatorship, am I right?” He drew back slightly and laughed. “You should see your face! I’m kidding. I would’ve had anyone involved in such a thing put to death. Don’t you worry, Hairball.”

Roger cleared his throat. He’d learned so much in the last few sentences alone. Death. Dictator. Orgy. Any one of those things was a lot to confront and yet… he was calmed by the Grandmaster’s presence. He was alive and unmelted. He’d managed to find his soulmate—a man he’d been almost certain to never meet as things stood with Earth’s individually-impressive but cosmically-insignificant progress with space travel. At long last, the universe had smiled on Roger Harrington.

“Just Roger is good,” he said. If last names ever came up again, he would tactfully correct his soulmate, but with a name like ‘the Grandmaster,’ he doubted they ever would.

“Roger. Anything you say.” Gripping Roger’s shoulders, the Grandmaster leaned in and planted a sound kiss on his forehead with a loud, “Mmmwah!”

He asked Roger if he would like to go aboard his ship, apologizing that it wasn’t the one where he’d just been having the orgy and appearing to check Roger’s face for disappointment. Roger didn’t know what the Grandmaster saw in his expression, but he knew it wasn’t that.

Inside the spaceship, Roger looked around with huge eyes. He hadn’t felt this kind of wonder in a room jammed with so much beyond his understanding since the first time his mom had taken him to the New York Hall of Science as a kid. Everything was bright and white and immaculately clean, and Roger could concentrate on all of it because the Grandmaster had Topaz drop the volume of his party playlist until it was just a low pulse of background noise. Seemingly amused by his awe, the Grandmaster allowed him a peek at the controls before gently herding him into a chamber with seating arranged for socializing. A pneumatic hiss sealed them safely inside and away from the woman’s scowl.

“I really just wanna sit here and, uh, just look atcha, but that look on your face tells me you’ve got about a million questions.”

The Grandmaster settled back into the bench seating, resting his long arms along the top of the seat. Across from him, Roger fidgeted, experiencing sensory overload. Soulmate. Spaceship. Alien planet. He found it hard to decide what to ask first. Was that even polite? Was the Grandmaster just saying that Roger could ask questions when he really wanted Roger to say or do something else? There was an awfully flirtatious look in his eye, the likes of which Roger hadn’t seen directed towards himself in several years.

“What is this place?” Roger asked before he could stop himself. “Where am I?”

“Oh! This is Sakaar! Are you saying you didn’t come here on purpose? I figured you weren’t aiming for a pile of trash, but you really didn’t know where you were going at all?”

Roger shook his head so hard that he had to nudge his slipping glasses back up his nose.

“It was an accident. I fell through a wizard’s—uh, I mean, a sorcerer’s—magic portal. That kind of clumsiness must sound pretty farfetched to someone who’s so obviously…” Roger motioned spastically towards his soulmate, the dictator, with both hands. “…in control of their life.”

The Grandmaster laughed, transparently pleased and preening.

“Oh, Roger, you flatter me.”

He stretched out his leg to playfully tap his shoe (gold) against Roger’s (plain, brown, frayed shoelace). Roger jumped, giddy from an alteration in sea level, possibly, plus life-changing events.

“But it really isn’t so uncommon for people, beings, things… to end up here without meaning to,” the Grandmaster went on. “A lot of junk passes through the Anus. Not that you’re junk, obviously.”

With a winning smile, Roger’s soulmate leaned forward and patted him on the knee. He was a touchy-feely guy, it seemed, and it made Roger cognizant of how very lonely he’d been in his marriage, in the last year especially. How skittish around strangers, how unaffectionate with his friends. This was what he needed, and the universe had understood that.

It took his brain a few seconds to catch up with what his soulmate had said, distracted by the comfort he was taking in his easy warmth.

“The Anus?” Roger asked in a choked voice.

“The Devil’s Anus, to be exact. That enormous, horrifying wormhole out there in the sky!” the Grandmaster explained, gleeful. “Best I can guess, it acts as a funnel for accidental travelers, like yourself. And boy, are we ever grateful for that thing. I’ve never had to post any ‘Help Wanted’ flyers, I’ll tell ya that. We need more people serving drinks? Boom. More entertainers? Boom. More lubricators for the orgies? Boom, the Anus provides, baby.”

Roger didn’t inquire what the duties of a person with the job title ‘orgy lubricator’ entailed; it seemed sleazily self-explanatory. He just nodded.

“And now,” his perfect, golden match continued, “the portal brings me my soulmate. I love that thing. It’s really somethin’, huh?”

“It’s really something,” Roger agreed. “Really, really something.”

“You’re looking just a little stunned there, Rodge. Can I offer you something to eat? A drink? I promise, I’m usually a much better host. I feel like I’m positively, uh, bumbling right now.” He beamed.

This man was so many things at once—possibly too many—but bumbling was so far from being one of them that Roger actually laughed weaky in his state of happy, semi-delirium. He accepted the cold glass that was pressed into his hand, the brush of the Grandmaster’s warm palm across his forehead. He had moved to sit right next to Roger.

“You can get used to this place at your own pace, within reason.” His soulmate chuckled. “Heck, we can stay right here a day or two. My plans are cancelled, and when I stop, the world stops. That’s how it is, being the Grandmaster, and that’s how it’s gonna be for you too. You can give all your worries a big, wet kiss goodbye, my love. You’re living a life of luxury now. A court of sycophants, fights to the death in the evening, orgies on a lazy afternoon. I’m talkin’ a life of pure class—”

“Class!”

“Yeah, baby, that’s what I said.” The Grandmaster was wearing a languid smile as he traced the back of his fingers along Roger’s jaw.

But Roger was suddenly too alert to be lulled by welcome caresses and delicious, exotic beverages.

“I was teaching a class before I fell through the portal,” he said. “I’m a teacher. My students are probably terrified. Some of them might be messed up for life after watching me disappear right in front of them. What have I done…”

“So you gave them a cool story to tell their friends! You don’t need to think about that anymore. Now that you’re living here—”

“I can’t live here!” Roger said, seizing the Grandmaster’s hands in his as he tried desperately to explain. “I have responsibilities as an educator! Jesus Christ, I’m married!”

“Roger. Rodge. Rodge. Hey,” his soulmate said, finally disrupting Roger’s spiral of panic. “That’s all in the past. Do you know how many creatures from just, uh, every darn corner of the universe I’ve made slaughter each other for my entertainment? Thousands, Roger, ok? Thousands. And it’s taught me oodles about life. What I’ve learned is that love is the only thing that matters. What all of those poor bastards scream for in the end is their mom, their partner, their best friend. Now, that doesn’t help them, but it helps us. It helps us understand that we’ve done it—we’ve achieved the one thing in our lives that was worth a damn to achieve. I’m not gonna, gonna now be parted from you, sweetheart. You are the point of me.”

Roger felt himself growing teary at the speech. Yes, this had been a whirlwind—they’d met no more than 15 minutes ago—but he was feeling something just as deep as the love the Grandmaster described. It was a fantasy in the best way, the life his soulmate pictured for them (most of it… maybe not the part about slaughter). But it was a fantasy in the worst way too, something so impossible that Roger felt sick for getting as attached to this man as he already had.

“I can’t,” he said softly. He let his head hang down, solaced when the Grandmaster guided it onto his shoulder and wrapped a protective arm around him.

“Can’t you? For me? Roger, if I put you on a ship and send you back through the Anus, we may never meet again.”

Roger squeezed his eyes shut. He wanted to be selfish, but there were people he couldn’t leave in the lurch. People who maybe didn’t care about him in a way that was equal to how he cared about them, but that was how any kind of relationship was, apart from soulmates. There were imbalances. He knew he might not be the most brilliant scientist, the most inspirational teacher, the husband a woman would prefer over the outdoorsy hunk in her hiking group, but he knew who he was: he was someone who couldn’t just walk away.

“We’ll be together again,” Roger said, clutching the Grandmaster’s robes. “After.”

Though he didn’t yet know what ‘after’ would mean.

—

It wasn’t as unexpected as it could have been—Roger had always had a feeling he’d die on a school bus.

The difference between his fears and reality was that he wasn’t departing this world in a fiery crash or zooming out of control between the steel trusses and into the East River. There was confusion, there was chaos, there were screams and the violent honking of horns, but there were elements he couldn’t have predicted. Primarily, the giant alien spacecraft hovering over the city. The ship immediately moved into first place of the most ominous rings in his life (he and his wife were not in a good place). Since its sighting, things had quickly spiraled out of control. Julius had radioed Roger from the other bus of students they were chaperoning to MoMA to report that Ned Leeds had ‘flipped his shit’ and Peter Parker was currently missing. Roger had nearly passed out. The only thing that had kept him conscious was his jittery concern for the rest of his students.

At Midtown Tech, they had drills for almost every eventuality. As of 2012, hostile outer space invasion was actually part of their repertoire, but it had always been assumed they would be at school when it happened, not out on a field trip. The most Roger had been able to think to do was get the kids to a secure location. Which meant getting the buses to a secure location. But the buses were on the bridge, and all over the bridge drivers were panicking, mindlessly stomping on the gas and attempting to swerve around the rest of the vehicles. Above the blood rushing in his ears, he’d heard crash after crash, until their bus was hemmed in and, through the smoking, crumpled hoods of their fellow commuters, the alien ship hung stationary in the sky. Disturbingly tranquil as New York City went to pieces to the tune of apocalyptic dissonance just below.

In the end, the spaceship hadn’t stayed put, but Roger had. The lanes around them were crowded with smashed cars. Glass from shattered windshields glittered on the pavement. Still, more vehicles surged forward as drivers attempted to use the bridge to flee the city; this wasn’t NYC’s first alien rodeo. He hadn’t attempted to force any of his students to remain on the bus—they were some of the smartest and the best of their generation, and he trusted their survival instincts far more than his own—but he did direct the ones who fled to first climb up onto the roof of the bus instead of dropping directly down onto the street and risking injury. Yes, he worried about minor cuts and bruises. Even now.

He thought that Flash was staying with him, and was touched. But then he realized Flash was just gripping his shoulder for leverage as he jumped and grabbed for the emergency roof hatch with his free hand. Roger knew the boy was somewhat neglected by his parents, and so, for the first time, he was happy go hear ‘Hotline Bling.’ It was Flash’s ringtone and it played incessantly as his phone rang and rang until the song, and the sound of Flash running, faded into the distance. Somebody wanted to see that he was safe. Somebody cared about him.

Alone, Roger hunkered down between the seats, knees bent in front of him. He scraped one hand anxiously through his hair and gripped his phone in the other.

He should call his wife. He knew he should. Only, he was afraid that she either wouldn’t pick up or she’d answer and be with the guy from her hiking group. Roger wasn’t even upset; he was glad she had someone, if this was it.

Ever since he’d returned from Sakaar, he’d been different, he was aware that he had. In the past, his wife had been largely responsible for the sundering of their marriage, but Roger knew that he was now pulling away too. It had begun inside him—the tear. He wanted to be with two people for two different reasons. In two places, on two worlds. Commitment clashed with longing. Logical rightness fought emotional rightness. He’d been weak, persuading himself daily to tough it out with his wife (even as he slept on the couch every night because lying beside her made him unhappy), when, for once in his damn life, he wanted to be fulfilled. Somewhere out in the stars, there was a man with blue eyeliner and an entire planet at his capricious command and he was the person for Roger.

If only, he thought, picturing the face he shouldn’t have been able to recall so clearly for the brevity of their encounter months ago. Roger shut his eyes to better remember the Grandmaster, and so he wouldn’t have to see his phone clatter to the bus’s dirty floor when the hand that held it turned to dust.

—

As with his life on regular, non-apocalypse days, not much happened to Roger. Despite his paralyzing breakdown on a school bus, he wasn’t among the billions scattered to the wind like sentient dandruff. He picked himself up and went home. Sure, he was shivering almost out of his skin from the shock, but he didn’t collapse into wracking, snotty sobs until he was safely in his living room, listening to his neighbours’ wails through the condo’s walls.

Roger’s wife wasn’t there, didn’t answer when he called her, and, three weeks later, still hadn’t made contact. It took another two months to hold her wake; the funeral business was booming. Never had so many words been spoken over so many vacant graves. Some members of his wife’s hiking group attended, some had even helped him select the right music and flowers beforehand. They knew her preferences. It felt surreal to be burying a person he couldn’t prove—in any meaningful way—that he’d really known.

With a queasy sense of being very lucky, he accepted that, apart from his marital status, his life hadn’t been upended. His windows weren’t broken, his car wasn’t stolen, the few family members he was out of touch with anyway had also survived. He went back to work before anybody called him in. There weren’t any students at first, just the echo of Roger’s clumsy footsteps tripping over the rug in the staffroom, half-solved equations on the whiteboards in the math classrooms, and the unholy stench of unwashed pinnies when he poked his head into the gym storage room to see if Coach Wilson was around. One day, Roger tipped back in the chair at the front of his own empty classroom and spotted a gigantic cobweb in the corner of the ceiling. It made him think of Spider-Man. He guessed that guy was gone too.

The most important thing for keeping sane was establishing a regimen. Work was a big part of that, but Roger also traveled daily into Manhattan to visit the Sorcerer’s place. It became a kind of pilgrimage. Early on, Wong would come out to say hello, but it was eventually less about commiseration and more of a perfunctory thing. Roger knew (assumed, hoped) that if the Sorcerer ever did return, Wong would let him know and welcome him inside. And then… a portal? And then the Grandmaster? He tried not to think about it too hard. Yearning took up a lot of energy and, when his students began to come back to school in distressingly low numbers, Roger needed to reserve that energy for teaching.

Everything was the same, every day, until it wasn’t.

For a reason he couldn’t rationally explain, Roger knocked on the Sorcerer’s door. While he was waiting—just a few seconds, he planned—a man materialized on the sidewalk right next to him. He tottered and Roger reflexively said, “Whoa!” and grabbed his shoulder to keep him on his feet. Before Roger could hypothesize or ask the man any questions, a teenage girl returned to existence a few feet away. Then a woman holding a toddler tightly in her arms. A little boy. A man with a dog. A bicycle-less bike cop, still wearing his helmet. Releasing the man, Roger spun and pounded against the door with his fist.

Still, no one answered.

Fighting the urge to show up at Midtown Tech, Roger made himself stay put, right there on the Sorcerer’s doorstep.

He waited a long time. As the sun set, New York City rose around him. He watched people hugging, running home down the middle of the street. He fielded unfinished questions as the newly returned began to ask him what had happened, what time it was, what year, before jogging away, more purposeful with every step they took. Roger’s foot began to bounce on the sidewalk and his clammy hands twisted fretfully. It was still another 12 hours before the door opened.

Roger fell backwards into Wong’s shins, delirious from the sickening seesaw between urgency and exhaustion. Everywhere, people were reconnecting. He scrambled to his feet because he wanted to be one of them.

“Is he here?” Roger demanded.

Wong narrowed his eyes slightly, holding the door so it couldn’t be pushed open further.

“Might I remind you that it’s me you’ve been seeing here the last five years.”

“Yeah,” Roger agreed, trying to see past.

“I thought we had developed a rapport.”

Finally, Roger met Wong’s eyes, his own pleading.

“No, yes, you’re right, we have,” he babbled.

“We’re friends.”

“Yes, of course, we are friends. Definitely.”

“So when is my birthday?”

Roger’s mouth hung open as he searched his brain for a piece of information he knew wasn’t in there. A few seconds later, Wong turned mirthful.

“Did you spend the Blip hiding under a rock where there are no jokes? Come inside. We just got back.”

None of the thousands of times he’d come to the door mattered—Roger hadn’t been inside the Sanctum since that first time. He hoped the Sorcerer remembered him.

When he saw the man, Roger’s steps stuttered. The Sorcerer appeared grim and wiped out. He was dirty and he looked older, though Wong whispered to Roger that the Sorcerer had been among the Snapped. Roger understood that, for something to go right and bring everyone back to life, something else had gone wrong. He could dwell on that and awkwardly bow his way back out of there, or he could convince himself that things had gone wrong for him too, and that he’d like them to be righted. He remembered that his soulmate was a dictator and tried to channel that sense of entitlement.

“What do you know about the Anus?”

The Sorcerer blinked.

“What.” The word came out perfectly flat.

“The Anus.”

“I wasn’t that kind of doctor.”

Roger strode eagerly towards him, hands gesturing before his words caught up.

“When I was here about, um, five and a half years ago, I fell through your magic portal—”

The Sorcerer snapped his fingers in recognition and turned to Wong.

“Oh, that’s who this is. I always wondered what happened to that guy.” He looked at Roger again. “How did you get back to Earth?”

Roger hadn’t been prepared to answer this question, just make his demands, and he began to explain what had happened to him, all out of order. The words ‘orgy ship’ had barely left his mouth when the Sorcerer was waving him into silence. His expression told Roger he was sorry he’d asked.

“So you went through the portal…” he prompted instead.

“That’s right! And for a while, I was just falling. I don’t know where I was.”

The Sorcerer stroked his chin.

“The connection must’ve been unstable. I know—one of your students distracted me.”

“That’d be Flash,” Roger said.

“Jesus. This is why I prefer not to be a field trip destination. Normally, the portal would allow you to pass cleanly through one place and into another.”

“And instead he passed cleanly through the Anus,” Wong summarized.

“…Yeah.”

Roger glanced from one man to the other.

“So,” he said, “could you do it again?”

The Sorcerer stared at him.

“The short answer is no. The long answer is also no, but it contains a great deal of vernacular to do with the Mystic Arts, so I’ll save us both some time.”

The last time Roger had defended his intellect and qualifications had been years ago, and he was out of practice. Anyway, he didn’t want a lengthy debate.

“Can’t you just open a portal and shove me through?”

“If you haven’t noticed, I’ve got a lot going on today. I’ve only entertained you this long because you and Wong seem to be friends. I’m not just going to mess around to humour you.”

“What if you had to do it?” Roger asked quickly, beginning to feel desperate and preparing to metaphorically jam one of his clumsy feet into the closing window of opportunity.

“Uh, let me think about that,” the Sorcerer droned disinterestedly. “No.”

“What if I attacked you and you opened a portal in self-defence?”

The Sorcerer squinted at him in disbelief and befuddlement.

“What?”

But Roger was already gracelessly throwing his weight into a wild, uncoordinated punch.

For once, he didn’t think critically of himself; he told himself that the Sorcerer’s portal sparked up between them because he was intimidated by Roger’s tenacity. And that it didn’t show a clear destination because the Sorcerer’s reaction speed was no match for Roger using the element of surprise. And that he dove purposely through the portal—on a mission for love and science and the unknown—instead of tumbling into it sideways because the momentum of his unpracticed punch had gotten the better of his balance. It didn’t matter. His feet went out from under him and he was on his way.

Roger had forgotten how intense the trip was, but he completely recalled the rough landing, bouncing down through a stack of the universe’s lost garbage. He shut his eyes to the whooshing and the brightness and braced himself (probably too early, but he didn’t think he could be too careful on this reckless endeavor).

He felt his body hit open air and gasped as he fell, trying to keep his limbs tucked in. The hat he’d been wearing was torn from his head. Didn’t matter; it wouldn’t have offered much protection anyway. At any moment, his poor elbows and knees would be battered by space junk. Between his velocity and his fear of the coming impact, Roger could hardly breathe.

Music. A familiar voice singing, It’s my soulmate! made his eyes fly open. Right in time to land on his back. Whatever was beneath Roger was soft, but he’d still had the wind knocked out of him and was struggling to fill his lungs. His eyes clamped shut as he began to cough.

“I have no idea how you survived that thing twice, but I sure am glad I caught ya.”

Finally sucking in a stronger breath, Roger opened his eyes and looked up. His glasses were askew. Above him was the opening in the ceiling of a hovering spacecraft, but closer than that, leaning over him, was the face of the Grandmaster. He was beaming.

“Any trouble with the Anus?” he asked.

Roger grabbed for the hand his soulmate had rested on his shoulder and moved it to his chest, right over his heart.

“The asshole who got me here will probably be thrilled to never see me again, but the Anus treated me just fine.”

“Ha!” the Grandmaster barked. His free hand lovingly patted Roger’s windblown hair back into place. “Welcome home.”

#my writing #MCU #spider-man #thor: ragnarok #Roger Harrington #En Dwi Gast (the Grandmaster)#their ship name is Mr. Master and they're what G deserves on her birthday

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ecrivant · 4 years ago

Text

to be known by you | reiner braun

(reiner braun x reader)

it had been the strangest summer of recent memory: the days were lingering and dilatory, and rife with inexplicable phenomena. when reiner meets a stranger he feels he recognizes, someone as ethereal and bizarre as the summer atmosphere itself, he cannot resist the beguiling nature of this newfound acquaintance and decides to accompany them for a night.

word count: 2.7k

It had been the strangest summer of recent memory. The days were lingering and dilatory and often seemed swathed in some turbid and ethereal atmosphere, augmented by an interminable humidity which each day lasted far past dusk. The sun would hang in the sky for longer than its allotted time, and at duskfall, all terrene happenings stilled and gave way to strange, supernal movements to which no living being bore witness. The beach house tenanted by the Brauns, which sat in the very center of this surreal environment and was not much more than a well-maintained shanty abutting the shore—the transition from sparse greenery to sand occurring directly beneath its raised foundation—was too pervaded by this sense of uncanny. The inside seemed impossibly large for the dimensions of its edifice, and doors within moved on their own, and one could easily lose himself, sitting in one place, for hours at a time, staring at the irregularities in the wood wall panels or the microcosmic topography of the popcorn ceilings or the addled patterns in the stained, grey carpets. Reiner liked to taunt Gabi and tell her the house was haunted, but it was something neither was completely disinclined to believe.

It had been the morning of third day that his mother mentioned the storage shed for the first and last time. Reiner, awake since sunrise on account of his prolonged restlessness, and Gabi, wanting to be with him, sat at the kitchen table, Reiner’s unfocused gaze resting on the view outside the window and Gabi’s on a spoon she mindlessly fingered. His mother’s words had drawn his eyes towards her—her stare, intense, eyes narrowed in questioning:

“Were you doing something in the storage shed last night?”

He shook his head ‘no’ and watched her interrogation move from him to Gabi.

“Gabi?”

“Mm?” Eyes not acknowledging her.

“Were you?”

“Was I what?”

“Doing something in the shed? The storage shed. Last night.”

“No.” Gabi finally looked up, not at her aunt but at Reiner, eyes wide and brows raised. Body turning, she met her aunt’s gaze. “Should I have been?”

“It was open this morning,” his mother finally clarified, turning and reaching for a glass as she spoke. “The door was just cracked, but it was open.”

“Maybe someone didn’t shut it all the way.”

“Maybe.”

Her response hung in the air, suspended by doubt, unconvinced of her son’s suggestion. She glanced out the window, towards the shed in question—its door long since closed and locked after her curious discovery that morning—and it seemed to stare back at her.

“It’s nothing.” Gabi’s remark interrupted her aunt’s staring contest with the building. Her tone was playfully dismissive.

“I think you just want to find something to worry about, Aunt Karina.”

“Maybe.”

There was no more mention of the shed after that day, but Reiner, usually awake before the rest of the house, would, without fail, hear his mother exit the house, creep into the backyard, and shut and lock the shed door each morning in the dim-blue dawn light.

Later that same week Reiner had convinced Gabi to camp in the backyard with him under the guise of fun activity, though he truly intended to observe the shed for the whole night. She had been excited at the prospect of staying awake into the morning and then promptly fell asleep before midnight, and for the rest of the time he simply sat, cross-legged and perspiring, under an ether rife with stars, eyes unwavering from that damn shed.

Apparently having dozed off, though, as he awoke to the sound of the back door and his mother’s soft footfalls and opened his eyes to see her locking the shed. Like every morning, a cyclical action of the damned in hell. He accepted the phenomenon as an unknowable and moved on.

—

Reiner could not remember how long they had been there; time moved differently in this place. He drove to explore and found that the main road stretched on forever, never bending or turning, and the area itself laid among an immutable scenery: an arrant wasteland of vacant beachfront housing, like some vast and spanning afterthought. Could you get lost on a road like this? A pavement belt, flanked by stark shrubbery and shallow gullies full of groundwater. Sometimes, the rare stretch of unsettled coastline with a view of the sea uninhibited by copy-pasted housing. There was something beautiful in the desolate and purgatorial landscape.

The road ended at a bridge, one with caving beams and a skeletal substructure which barely supported its own weight. He never dared explore it, or God forbid drive over it, but he often sat in his car, pulled off to the side of the road, and stared at it. Captivated by the disrepair, what it represented—nothing better elucidated the mortality and impermanence of humanity than infrastructural decay. The view would eventually become too unsettling, as if it watched him as well, and he would reverse the car and turn around and drive back towards the house. When he would arrive, his mother would sometimes report he had been gone for hours, sometimes thirty minutes.

—

“Why don’t you take Gabi to the farmers’ market today?”

He didn’t know there was a farmers’ market, much less even a place to host one. At his mother’s suggestion, though, he drove down that endless stretch of road with Gabi in tow, and miraculously came upon a densely populated park, filled with tents which did little to block the relentless heat. Gabi bounded towards the entrance, Reiner trailing behind, and they quickly ate through the two twenty-dollar bills unceremoniously handed to them before their departure that morning. Reiner was glad his mother hadn’t expected any money to be left.

The park itself held towering trees with sparse canopies which casted amorphous shadows on the dirt paths. So unlike any area found at a coast. Walking along, enveloped in shade and shielded from the sun, one could almost be comfortable. The main walkway was wide, easily fitting five people across, and flanked by densely packed tents. Each with their own smiling vendor. They were nice, maybe a little too nice, and each offered a too-wide smile at Gabi as she made off with their too-good products. He was uneased by the whole affair. In retrospect, he couldn’t remember the last time he actually saw people in the area, and he assumed it was because it was so sparely populated. Yet, with the sheer wall of bodies milling around the park, he felt he had accidently wandered into a city, the market itself some kind of microcosmic metropolis. Strange to have never noticed the park while driving; it was never there until it was, as if it materialized out of nothing.

He glanced around him, suddenly struck by Gabi’s absence. A warning call of her name, and at the lack of response, another, more frantic one. He spun around once, scanning the area, and continued to do so despite remarking how the crowd—a singular, ebbing mass of people—perfectly and wholly obscured her location. But she soon yelled his name and beckoned him over to a booth replete with floral bouquets and emitting an aroma so intense he had to pause before continuing into the miasma.

“Can we get some? For Aunt Karina?”

Her eyes pleaded with the potency of a mendicant’s—nothing but a scoundrel, he thought, who knows I cannot say no. He reached into his wallet and searched for bills and found none. He sheepishly asked the vendor, who was obscured by the perennial heaps before them, if they accepted cards. A soft ‘yes’ spurred Gabi on to grab at a bouquet of yarrow and roses, a perfumed, white and yellow amalgam; a movement which revealed the vendor’s face.

Reiner was struck immobile. You, once hidden, now revealed, were immediately alluring, aura imbued with such profound familiarity. As if you were already his lover. He stumbled through his transaction as you stared at him with eyes he felt he knew.

“Would you like to include a handwritten note?”

Gabi nodded furiously, as if possessed by some excitable demon. She dictated a note, childishly simple yet unequivocally kind, and you wrote it out on a notecard with a flourish. Wrapping the cluster of flowers in tissue paper and tulle and tucking the note in the center, ending the routine by handing it to Gabi. With a smile that was just right. She ran off again, and Reiner waited for a moment longer, as if he knew to wait to be handed that scribbled note which read, ‘Meet me at the bridge tonight.’

You felt so much like a memory. He could not shake the feeling he knew you, deeply and wholly.

—

Such vague wording, as if designed to make one second guess himself. He would have to trust his instinct about the time. In the moment he felt as if he knew you, but your thought process was unfamiliar to him—had you been struck by the same overwhelming feeling of familiarity? Assumed he would understand what ‘tonight’ meant? Or was this some omniscience taunting him and his implicit trust of a stranger?

He was at the bridge by sundown. Car idled. He waited. An hour, a minute. And suddenly you were there—he jumped when he saw you. You sat on the rotted and caving beams of the bridge, beckoning him with a gaze. He approached you and stood at the first interstice between road and bridge and after a pause, dumbly said:

“I think I know you.”

And you confirmed his sentiment with echoed words. He creeped onto the railing, supporting himself on rusted girders resembling steles erected to commemorate some bygone and lost epoch. The chapped wood on which he sat dug into his thighs, and when he looked down, his feet hung over a canyon which in the dark became some measureless void. Your sillage, floral and penetrative and everlasting. You seemed to fluoresce in the pitch.

“Have you ever been in love?”

Your timid venture—the question, just for him. He stared at you and thought for a moment and replied no, not that he could remember. You asked him if you could tell him of your first love, puerile and real. He nodded yes. And you began:

You spoke beautifully and openly about your childhood with a rawness, a candor, otherwise unshared between strangers. You spoke of how your memories were places and people, painted in golden hues. How your childhood room was always bright—in the morning, the rising sun would creep onto the bedroom wall and stay there as if resting in a lover’s embrace; and at sunset, the light would grow weary and slink away to make room for the night. How those walls saw many things: your great-grandfather’s paintings, your mother’s smiling face. And how it all smelled so distinct, even now, like old books and incense. How, as a child, you often felt like some unchanging cairn laid solely to watch the world move around you.

And as you spoke about the young boy you had once loved, Reiner thought of the way this intellection you so tenderly painted sounded like him: a child, tall, with a mess of blonde hair and hazel eyes that held an unusual intensity; a child with a tender voice, high-pitched and soft, and a lopsided smile. And you repeated the words, “I can so clearly remember him,” like some unspoken truism. You had shared your favorite places with this boy; your first kiss, and your hopes and fears; and the pain of aging and coming to know the dark and black and crushing void associated with it.

You spoke of how the young boy suddenly died, without explanation. How the last time you saw him, there was such a pervasive sadness in his gaze. How you despised this was the way you remembered him—with mournful and darkened eyes. You had asked what was wrong, and he had not been sure. Instead, the two of you clasped hands and sat in silence for a last time.

“I just remember the chaos.” A whisper, spoken more to yourself.

“I remember waking up to blue lights on my ceiling. It was a cold blue light, a crude perversion of the warmness of the rising sun. I looked out the window, and cars were crowded under the flickering streetlamp below, and I heard the wailing through my window. I knew. I knew, but I just climbed in my bed and pulled the covers over my head, as if they would drown out the light and the shouts of a broken mother, and squeezed my eyes shut and saw his eyes and cowlicked hair and a toothy, lopsided grin.”

You asserted that part of you died with him. A pause.

“It felt odd to be in love with someone who was already dead.”

And then you were finished. You took a deep breath, as if the story had been spoken with one, single inhalation. Reiner blinked hard and processed the words and tried to think of something to say. ‘Sorry’ seemed so blithe.

“What was his name?”

You shrugged your shoulders.

“I can’t remember.”

He stared at you, incredulous, half-expecting you to be joking. How could one possibly—

“Sometimes I think he didn’t have one.”

Your whispered voice, as if about to shatter: “You remind me of him. That’s why you’re here.”

Effervescent words that dissolved in the air. Something nagging at the back of his mind. He wrapped you in an embrace and held you there, and he thought not of you as a stranger. A hand on your back and the other in your hair. Breathing your exhalations. An intimacy impossible between two unfamiliar people. He swore he knew you.

He felt your lips on his neck, testing, inquisitive. He pulled back, meeting your gaze, eyes melancholic and wistful and searching for something intangible, possibly nonexistent. You had the eyes of someone who was never anything but lost, and despite your shared unfamiliarity, he hoped you would find something within him as he leaned to press his lips to yours. This kiss begot another and another, and his hand was on your cheek, and your skin was warm beneath his fingers, betraying your spectral nature. He thought he heard you whisper his name, though it was something you couldn’t have known.

He held you, again, with no desire to do more; this chaste intimacy was so much more potent. He savored your embrace and felt he could stay here, in your presence, with your touch, until he aged and crumbled like the disintegrating bridge on which they sat. A moment of abject redamancy. Time moved differently here, with you.

He was then inexplicably struck with the feeling that he missed you, as if he had finally found that which he had gone years without.

You pulled away and stood. Without warning.

“Can I see you again?” His plea, desperate, closing.

“I’m not certain.”

And with that, you asked him to leave. He somehow knew he was meant to comply without question.

As he departed, and behind him the road and the bridge and you faded into blackness, he was reminded of the first time he moved homes—that unsettling and melancholic feeling of abandoning something familiar. He drove and drove and missed his street, and instead of turning around, he surrendered to the compulsion to keep driving, and he drove some more. He thought of you the entire time, oblivious his own existence. He then thought of himself, and when reflecting on his childhood, he could not remember it; he only saw himself in the presence of a young child who looked like you, a shared heart between you. He drove through the sunrise and another sunset, and he stopped to fill up his car with gas and kept driving. He wasn’t sure how, but he eventually found his way back to the beach.

He arrived at the house and quietly climbed into bed. He imagined you dissolving into the landscape; the canyon beneath the bridge widening like an open mouth and swallowing you. Purloined by the purgatory which begot you.

He suddenly could not remember your face.

A thought, lost, just as he heard his mother closing and locking the shed door outside.

—

thank you again to @casualityrantfun for suggesting a reiner piece! it was very sweet of you to request something, and i hope you enjoy it. also, thank you to everyone who has been reading/liking/reblogging my stuff! it means the world to me, and i really love being able to write creatively for something i enjoy!

part of me wants to make this a long-form piece, but i don’t think i have the patience or the talent to do so. maybe later down the line, though, we’ll see. also, this piece is inspired by @dappermouth’s art, specifically this piece, which has literally captivated me for years, as well as the campfire scene from my own private idaho, which i watched the day before yesterday and fell in love with. go hold someone you love, xoxo

masterlist

taglist: @flam3bird

#attack on titan #shingeki no kyojin #aot #snk #attack on titan x reader #attack on titan imagine #aot imagines #aot x reader #reiner braun #reiner braun x reader #reiner braun x you #reiner braun imagine #reiner x reader #writing!

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jasontoddiefor · 4 years ago

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Title: threads spun

Summary: In another life, Obi-Wan Kenobi would have fought plenty of other Jedi Masters for the right to train little Luke Skywalker. In this one, Luke is 19 and just lost his family when Obi-Wan teaches him how to do a proper Padawan braid.

AN: I’M BACK FROM NANO WITH NEW FANFICS.

The boy just lost his whole world, and he clings to Obi-Wan's robes with shaky hands. His eyes are bright blue, his hair a fair gold color, and for just one short moment, Obi-Wan isn't sure whether the child in front of him is nine or nineteen, whether his name is Anakin or Luke.

It is the reason he gave Luke to his family in the end, even when the Force and all his selfish desires were screaming at him not to. The newborn, the son of his Padawan, the child that was Luke Skywalker, had deserved better than a broken man who didn't even know who he was without a thousand lights illuminating him. A man who'd risk forgetting that he was not holding the child he had raised, the child he had left to burn.

Obi-Wan closes his eyes and the moment passes.

He doesn't ask the boy if he's alright because it is obvious that Luke is not and it would be cruel to demand an honest answer. Luke can't be standing straight after he experienced such tremendous loss for the first time, nobody would, and Obi-Wan is saddened that he can't give Luke the time to grieve.

Despite all this pain, Obi-Wan still dares to hope for light and life.

He is relieved to see that Luke doesn't take all the hurt and anger to hide it within himself. Obi-Wan has never taught Luke a single lesson about Jedi philosophy, the way they grieve and handle all the emotions that are too large for this world, those that are capable of tearing the galaxy apart. And yet Luke controls his feelings exactly as a temple-raised youngling would, not pushing them aside or letting them overtake him. He takes timed breaths, centers himself on the world surrounding him and not on his anxieties. Pride fills Obi-Wan's heart as he watches peace and balance return to Luke's mind.

In another life, Obi-Wan would have fought plenty of other Jedi Masters for the right to train him.

He can almost hear his family laugh at him, playful jabs about him being so eager to train yet another Skywalker and see what colors they could draw nebulas in. It isn't Obi-Wan's fault; he has always loved a challenge, and Luke, racing in Beggar's Canyon at an age no boy should step into that death trap, would have certainly been a joy to teach and guide.

He could have taught him so much, so much he still needs to teach him, but the clock is ticking and time has always been a cruel mistress. Not purposefully, she wouldn't dare, but she is absolute and eternal, and like death, she takes.

Obi-Wan silently wonders how much time he has left. He knows exactly where they are heading and despite the legends he has wrapped around himself in his exile, he's neither crazy nor a fool. They are attempting to pull off a plan that they wouldn't even have dared to suggest during the Clone Wars, not with so many untrained people. He's been called reckless plenty of times, his ability to talk himself out of seeming like an adrenaline junkie being his only saving grace. Still, Obi-Wan is acutely aware of the danger they are in.

But they have no other choice. They may have the Death Star plans in their hands – and wasn't it utterly predictable that it would be Artoo to carry the plans for a weapon of mass destruction? – but Leia can't stay in the Empire's hands.

Luke and she were so strong in the Force at their birth already. While Obi-Wan is convinced that Bail must have taught Leia at least some shielding techniques, half-trained children can't withstand a Sith Lord for long. Should Vader or worse, Palpatine, learn what Leia could become capable of, they would have so much more to worry about in the future.

The Rebellion might as well be lost.

"You have grown into a fine young man, Luke," Obi-Wan tells Anakin's son instead.

"I have?" Luke echoes, curiosity coloring his voice, highlighting a cadence similar to Padmé's despite his heavy Outer Rim accent.

"I brought you to Tatooine," Obi-Wan tells him. The journey hadn't been an easy one. They had to change ships multiple times and every time somebody had mistaken Obi-Wan for Luke's father, he had wanted to stop and cry like the infant in his arms. "You were a very sweet baby."

"Oh." Luke falls silent again, but his hands have stopped shaking. In his dirty white robes, he reminds Obi-Wan just a bit of a messy Padawan. He wears Anakin's lightsaber well, even if he doesn't know how to execute even the simplest of lightsaber forms. Frankly speaking, it is a bit terrifying to see how quickly he picked up the weapon and had gotten comfortable with it. The Force curled around Luke's every movement, guiding him like a beloved teacher.

Luke will need a teacher if he is to face the darkness that would catch up to them soon.

Obi-Wan feels much older than he actually is. The fault lies partially with the harsh marks that Tatooine has left on his body, but also with the life he has led. He isn't sure if he can teach another student, no matter how much he wants to, but he has to try at least for Luke's sake. That is, if the boy truly intends to follow the path of the Jedi.

"Luke," Obi-Wan says seriously, thinking of the one who gives life, the name granted to such a young child, "Do you truly want to become a Jedi?"

"Yes." There is no hesitation in Luke's reply. "I want to follow my father's footsteps."

No, Obi-Wan wants to weep. You don't. You can't ask me to cut you down as well; I couldn't bear it.

"It is admirable to want to follow the path of someone you respect," Obi-wan starts carefully instead. He can't tell Luke what became of Anakin Skywalker. The child deserves better. "But I am asking about your own inclinations. The path of a Jedi is not an easy one, and you have to follow it for your own sake if you want to succeed."

Now Luke does hesitate. He looks down at his hands, curls them into fists and relaxes them again.

"Yes," Luke finally replied. "Yes, I want to be a Jedi."

"Then I'll hope you'll give me the honor of teaching you. I'd like to take you as my Padawan."

Obi-Wan had said these words over three decades ago to another lost blond boy, the language a little different, their surroundings certainly more peaceful than the ship of a smuggler. He tries to banish the image from his mind.

"Padawan," Luke repeats slowly. "What does it mean?"

You should know, Obi-Wan thinks. You should know what it means and be overjoyed and celebrate this day.

He can't hold it against this boy, not even against himself or, dare he think it, Anakin because choices had been made, but away from it all, Obi-Wan can only blame the Sith who ruined them, continues to hurt them.

"It means that I want you as my student, teach you all I know so that you may surpass me someday."

Bring us back to the light, rebuilt all that we lost. Obi-Wan is asking him for so much when just days ago it would have been enough for him to someday see Luke marry that boy he's been crushing on for years and live the rest of his days happily, far away from the war.

And now he dreams of home again, the rooms full of plants and droid parts, poetry collections, board games, and warmth so kind and all-compassing that no nightmares can haunt you.

"You'd really teach me?" Luke asks as if he'd be honored and the right to be taught not already something he possessed since his birth.

"Of course."

"I'd be honored to accept," Luke replies with a shy smile.

Obi-Wan returns his smile and reassuringly squeezes his shoulder once. Luke leans into the touch and so Obi-Wan lets his arm linger around the boy's shoulders as he continues to explain traditions long lost. "Traditionally, we would now braid your hair and put in the first bead."

"Braid my hair?"

Obi-wan nods and thinks of all the times his Master ran his fingers through Obi-Wan's hair, tugging at his braid and saying one thing or another he hadn't paid any attention to because he'd been too awestruck by the fact that he had a Master at all. "Yes, all Padawans of the Jedi Order have a braid. It shows your dedication to your studies and how serious you are about them. It means that you know that this is not an easy task or an easy path to take, but that you are willing to walk it anyway."

Luke thoughtfully looks at Obi-Wan, then he reaches up with his hand, putting a strand of hair behind his ear.

"My hair is not long enough to braid it properly," Luke mutters, dismayed.

He's pouting more than he is actually hurt by the thought. Nevertheless, if he lingers on it, he might ask more questions about what other chances life has denied him and because of it, Obi-Wan wants to distract him quickly.

The distraction comes at the price of remembrance, a fourteen-year-old Padawan clinging to what remained of his braid, burying his head in his Master's chest, and crying after enduring days of torment. Obi-Wan had fixed Anakin's hair then as well so he wouldn't have to deal with too many looks once they were back at the Temple. His braid had been short, but it had been there. For a moment, Obi-Wan tries to recall who had assigned that mission to them, whether Sidious had already sown his seeds of discord then.

He lets the moment go. "Don't worry, I can help you."

He had done plenty of braids during his as a Padawan and later as a Master. When the war had been going on, he had helped frenzied Padawans countless times with their braids.

There was an almost meditative process to the act of braiding and letting others braid your hair. It had soothed innumerous over the centuries and now it will once more calm another. Luke sits still when Obi-Wan begins to part the stray strands of hair on the left side of his head into three. Luke's hair really isn't all that long, but it is definitely more than enough to work with. Slowly and withs steady fingers, Obi-Wan braids another bond with his second Padawan. Luke is a kind child and this war will hurt him incredibly. Obi-Wan can only hope that what he will pass onto him will be enough to have him keep his path, to wander in the light even when the darkness reaches for him with the intent to consume.

Once Obi-Wan is finished with the braid, he reaches for his belt, takes an old leather cord from there, and wraps it around the tip of Luke's hair.

"And finished," Obi-Wan announces.

Luke, who had closed his eyes, opens them and immediately reaches for the hair, twirling it between his two fingers in a fashion reminiscent of Obi-Wan in his youth. He had only managed to get rid of that nervous habit after his won braid hat been cut. Whether Luke would act similar, Obi-Wan doesn't know, but the thought of seeing Luke ascend to the rank of Knight of the Order, no matter how small, splintered and broken it is right now, it makes his heart beat a bit quicker.

"How does it look?" Luke asks.

"As it is supposed to," Obi-Wan replies. "I believe Mr. Solo has a mirror in his fresher if you want to take a look."

Luke races off before Obi-Wan can say anymore. He returns a few minutes later, already with more color in his face than he had in the hours before.

"Thank you. Master." Luke tags on the honorific only belatedly, unsure whether it fits and it is all the convincing Obi-Wan could ever need.

"You are welcome, Padawan."

Obi-Wan Kenobi has a student once more and he will not fail him.

#star wars #obi wan kenobi #Luke Skywalker #jedi #original trilogy #fanfic

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babbushka · 4 years ago

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Biting Dust - ch.4

Life ain’t too easy for a woman, ‘specially not a woman on the run like you. With a bounty on your head and gunpowder in your nose, you’ve grown adjusted to a life of solitude away from the hustle and bustle of civilization. That is, until you meet one particular man who’s got a face you’d only ever seen in your dreams – or on wanted posters. And when he offers you a proposition that sounds too good to be true, well. You don’t think your life will ever be the same again…

Outlaw!Kylo Ren x Reader

Tumblr Masterlist | Available on AO3

7k; cw Graphic descriptions of violence/gun violence/blood & injury

-----------------------

There’s a distinct energy in the air, gettin’ on up in the morning. Still surprised he ain’t shoot you dead yet, you give Kylo nothing more than a nod of acknowledgment, before goin’ about your business, wadin’ ankle-deep into the water. The water, crystalline and deep, light sparkling off the meandering currents like diamonds, you’re reminded of the way Kylo looked, when he was lookin’ at you.

Shaking your head, you sigh. Whatever had happened yesterday had happened, and it was in the past. Had you dreamed about it? About him? Had your visions been plagued with the look on his face as he came across your stomach? As he nearly sobbed for you, lickin’ at your pulse like some wild thing?

Of course.

Of course, but as much as you wanted to ride on that high of victory, that first test, that first challenge of trust, you knew that his turn would be a’comin’ real soon. You tip your face up to the sky, let the crisp blue of Arizona shine down on your closed eyes, seepin’ up the warmth.

You splash the sleep out of your face, and if Kylo’s watchin’ you real careful like, if somethin’s on his mind, he’s got the smarts to keep it to himself.

It’s silent, for a good part of the ride. Y’all had skipped breakfast, forgoin’ the previous day’s precedent of boiled coffee and a cigarette, instead wanting to keep moving. Always on the move, you were. It wasn’t always that way, but well, that’d been the way for so damn long now, that the time before feels like a dream. Feels like someone else’s memories playin’ in your head.

If only that was the case, you think dryly.

Kylo’s contemplative on his horse, for a real long while. You wonder what he might be thinkin’ about, if he’s thinkin’ about you. You had tried wakin’ up before him today, but it was to no avail. Did the man ever sleep? Surely he must’ve, he was only human after all. You catch his eye awkwardly, the both of y’all looking at each other and then looking away, embarrassed at bein’ caught.

It would seem as though that mutual embarrassment was Kylo’s sign to say something finally, breaking whatever tense mood this had become.

“So Cousin,” Kylo’s voice shocks you for some reason, almost like you had forgotten how deep it was, almost like you’d forgotten that another person could speak so clearly, so confidently to you. “What’s your name?”

He’s referring to the cover story, of course. You remember the way he so sharply denied answering for his age – or maybe was it bein’ a brother that he objected to? Either way, the venom that had stung still lingers in the back of your mind, so you find it best not to press the subject, and answer with the moniker you’ve come to use;

“Mary Elizabeth Sampson.” The words just sound right, rollin’ off the tongue. It was a normal name, nothin’ so outlandish like Angel Eyes. No, Miss Mary Elizabeth Sampson was a proper name, could be found in just about any school house – you immediately cut that train of thought off, instead deflecting, “What’s yours?”

“Benjamin Whitlocke.” Kylo tips his hat, and gives you a real cheeky smile, the kind that shows off his dimples and them crooked teeth as he winks, “But you can call me Benji.”

Sonofabitch is charming, you’ll give him that.

The ease at which Kylo spills the name from his lips relieves you. He was just like you, wasn’t he? On the run and undercover in more ways than one, always another name, another identity in his back pocket. Not that anyone would believe him if he went around introducin’ himself as Kylo Ren – that man was a legend.

This man is…well.

He’s charming.

You commit the name to memory, not that anyone is likely to ask. Folks tended to not ask about things like that, things like the who the when where why how, usually only the what. Still, it’s good to know, good to make sure y’all are on the same page, so you don’t go gettin’ yourselves shot on accident.

“Alright Benji, where’re we from?” You keep your face turned towards the horizon, towards the little town that you’ll be passin’ through. It’s coming up, just out there, just around the canyons. “And where’re goin’?”

“Genoa, Nevada. Right near the Carson River Valley, just shy of Reno.” Kylo’s quick with this one too, and you accept it as an acceptable answer. You had no problem adopting his story, somethin’ about it made you feel more at ease. You could trust yourself to not fuck it up – but trustin’ someone else? Not likely. Especially when Kylo gives you a glance with his good eye and asks, “And well, best to tell the truth ain’t it? Colorado?”

You had told that kind woman back at the inn that you’d be headin’ to Colorado, it didn’t seem worth it to lie once you’ve already told the truth. The truth is easy, don’t got nothin’ to hide if you’re tellin’ the truth.

“Sure is.” You eventually respond. When you ask the next question, you ain’t askin’ for any other reason than your own edification, “What’s the name of this lil’ town you’re sayin’ we’re comin’ up on?”

Kylo shrugs at that, and you shoot him a dirty glare. Immediately he puts his hands up to prevent you from throwin’ a fit about not knowin’ where the hell he’s taking you.

“Well I ain’t so sure what they call themselves on the map, but everyone I ever spoke to only knows it as Ragrock.” He explains, and you sigh, not likin’ that answer one bit.

“Ain’t never heard of Ragrock, are you sure it’ll be there?” You don’t recall such a name bein’ written on that map you’d taken, as a matter of fact you don’t recall a town bein’ out here this way anyway.

Don’t jump to conclusions, you think, as your finger itches for the trigger of your six-shooter that you’ve got right on your hip. Don’t jump, he could be telling the truth, he hasn’t done you wrong yet.

“I’m sure. It’s mighty small but it’s got what we need.” Kylo speaks confidently, making you raise an eyebrow at him.

“Oh yeah? And what exactly is it that we need?”

“Well now I don’t know about you, but I sure would like to stock up on some essential supplies,” Kylo licks across his teeth, breath still sour from morning. “Namely bullets. Some food and a good drink too while we’re at it, but mostly bullets.”

“How much shootin’ have you been doin’ to be fresh out?” You frown, and he rolls his eyes. For a second there, you think he’s about to laugh, but the most you get is a sharp huff out of his nose.

“Angel I’m never fresh out, believe me.” Patting his hip, you hear the telltale jangle of rounds secured to his belt. “I just don’t like gettin’ low, that’s all. And besides, I have a feelin’ we’re gonna need ‘em. We’ll keep a low profile and all, but Ragrock has a habit of bein’ a bitch sometimes.”

“Yesterday you said there were only three public buildings.” You point out, how much of a bitch could a small town like that be?

“I sure did.” He misses the point, “Bar, drug store, and jail.”

“Damn.” The word is out of your mouth before you even think it, and you immediately kick yourself.

Kylo does smile then, gives you a big knowing smile, and something about it soothes you just as much as it unnerves you. You had been half-jokin’ when you told him your name was Angel Eyes, and you had hoped he’d be inclined to accept it as a joke. No one had ever seen you, your face was never done right on the wanted posters, to him you had hoped you were just another woman out in the west.

But when he smiles at you like that, it makes you think he knows.

“Closest bank’s not gonna be until we cross over the border into Utah.” Kylo says real quiet, and you give yourself away by snappin’ your teeth shut, shootin’ him the dirtiest look you can muster.

“What do I care about banks for?” You’re too defensive, and you know that, but dammit you’re defensive anyway – especially because you are Angel Eyes and what if he’s a bounty hunter of some kind? What if he poses as Kylo Ren to get close to outlaws just like you and rake in the big bucks? What if -- ?

“Didn’t say that you did,” Kylo shrugs again, “Was just makin’ conversation is all. Anyway, we won’t be needin’ to worry about banks for a little while. I’ve got enough money on me.”

You have half a mind to halt Agnes right then and there, surprise taking the place of any paranoia.

“You do?” Frowning, you watch as he rifles through a little purse that he pulls out of a small pocket in his waistcoat.

“Yep.” He shows you, lets you peer inside at the many bills folded neatly together, “Just about a hundred dollars between it all.”

You do stop Agnes then, halting her reins sharply in a way that makes her whinny in protest. Kylo stops Sam too, already confused about what he did wrong, about why you might be angry with him. That only makes you a little angrier.

“Where the fuck did you get that kind of money?” You demand, wondering why the hell he hadn’t said something before, why he had so little on his person if he had the money to afford better.

“Does it matter?” Kylo shrugs and you sigh with an exasperated roll of your eyes.

“Yeah it sure as shit matters! We can’t go ridin’ into a small town with that much money lookin’ like we do. They’ll suspect us straight off.” You groan.

You’re in your riding clothes once again, but you know that even when you change into your blue dress, neither of you will look rich enough to be carrying around one-hundred dollars. That was a very special class of person, a class of person neither of y’all happen to be. Anyone who saw would immediately peg y’all as thieves.

“Well it ain’t like I’m gonna walk in and flash some bills in everyone’s face.” Kylo mutters, expression souring, “Maybe I’m a gambler and got lucky over a deck of cards, they don’t need to know where it came from.”

The thought fills you with panic, with dread.

“Are you?” You’re askin’ before you even know that you’re doing it, voice gone hoarse from the memory of a long time ago, the memory of a poker table endin’ badly, the memory of a card game lost, fire and screaming and --

“No.” Kylo answers with enough passion and angry heat that you think maybe he’s got some bad memories too. You and Kylo stare real hard at one another, and eventually he puts the purse back in his little pocket and says real soft, “My daddy was, and that’s enough for me to never want to bet so much as a dime.”

As much as you hate admittin’ it – and though you’d never say it to his face – you find yourself likin’ Kylo a little bit more now. He nudges Sam with the heel of his boot, thinking that now that this face off has met its end, you can continue down towards the town.

-----------------------

Squinting against the rippling heat waves of the summer sun, you notice that the town’s buildings are starting to appear as small pricks on the horizon, way out in the distance, shimmering like a mirage. Now’s as good a time as any, you figure, because if you get any closer they might send scouts to come investigate, and you’re not in any mood for an investigation.

“Hold on.” You say, and Kylo stops immediately. Sam huffs out a little chuff of annoyance, but Kylo ignores her.

“What’s the matter?” He’s got a sharp edge to his voice, his good eye immediately scanning around and around for danger.

“Ain’t nothin’ the matter, I just have to change, that’s all.” You explain, and it’s almost funny the way that Kylo’s shoulders drop, tension saggin’ away from them.

You hop off of Agnes altogether. Looking around, you realize very quickly that there’s nothing to change behind, nothing to give you cover. But then you wonder if it really matters, Kylo’s already seen you naked after all. You wonder if he’ll want to look again, if he’ll get his eyeful of you the way he had yesterday, but you find that as you start undressing, he’s got his eye trained just off to your right, respectful.

“Into that blue dress of yours, right?” He clears his throat, busying himself by fiddling with some tobacco and a piece of paper, rollin’ up a cigarette.

“One of us has to look civilized.” You tease him, “Make yourself useful and keep a lookout.”

He does something then, that makes you wonder just what the hell he’s playin’ at. Kylo guides Sam to come stand beside you, effectively sandwiching you between your horse and his, creatin’ a barrier from the outside world, a shield of sorts. You never would have expected such gentlemanly behavior from him – from anyone.

But here he is, protectin’ you from the hungry gaze of the sun and the sand, as you step out of the calf-tall boots you wear, unsnap the buckles of your suspenders which hold up the worn linen trousers that once were a rich black, but now have sun-bleached to an off-blue grey. You unbutton your shirt, long sleeves slippin’ off your arms and exposing your skin to the harsh rays of the sun for a few moments, and all the while, Kylo doesn’t look.

You’re wearin’ nothin’ but your corset and smock, and he doesn’t look.

“You know, when we cross into Utah, we’ll have to pass through Ruby City.” Kylo says instead of starin’ at your body, instead of tryin’ to get a glimpse. “That there’s a proper city, has a train station runnin’ through it and everything. It’s got all sorts of stores and things like that. Maybe you could let me buy you a new dress, let that blue one retire for a while.”

Switching your corset from the sturdy riding support-piece that you wear for something more fashionably structured, still he doesn’t look. The smock sits nicely off your shoulders, your decolletage and cleavage on full display as you snap the hooks and eyes of the corset into place, steppin’ into the petticoat that you’d just cleaned by the river.

“No.” You say easily, echoin’ a sentiment you’d give him before, “I don’t need you doin’ anything for me, I told you already – ”

You struggle for a minute, pullin’ the dress over your head. When it’s freshly washed like this sometimes it was a little stiff from dryin’ in the sun, and you have to wriggle it around to get it to sit properly.

“Well what if it ain’t a need but a want to do it?” Kylo’s hands startle you for a minute, as he leans down and helps set the seam of the yoke on your shoulders properly, “A gift from me to you.”

You tense up immediately, and he drops his hands, not wanting to offend or upset you.

“Ain’t never been a man who gives a gift without expectin’ somethin’ in return.” You reply quietly, a resolute shake of your head.

He’s quiet about that for a while, watching you now that you’re all covered up, watching as you do up all those buttons on your front, as you step into boots that are a little more lady-like, even though you despise that term.

He watches as you trade your wide brimmed hat for a bonnet, hair tucked neatly away instead of the way you usually let it be exposed and free.

“I’m not like them,” Kylo appraises you, fixes your bonnet a little so it ain’t crooked as you tie the ribbon underneath your chin, “Whoever it is that done hurt you so bad.”

“I don’t know that.” You point out, swingin’ your leg up over Agnes’ sadle and rollin’ the stiff joints of your shoulders. Your tone is light, not wantin’ to get into too much heavy right before headin’ into the town, “For all I know, you could be worse.”

“I’ll prove it to you, you’ll see.” Kylo smiles, and you almost want to accept that as a challenge, almost want to dare him, just to see if he would.

-----------------------

Kylo wasn’t lying when he said the town was small. There it was, the single street town, in all its glory. Looking to the left, you can see the way the canyons split and wind alongside the river, houses and homesteads and farms dottin’ the red red earth. Looking to the right, you can see more houses still, but farther apart, nothin’ but cacti and tumbleweeds between them.

Along this single road are actually five buildings; the drugstore and a jail to the left, the saloon and a big fancy house to the right, and a church right down at the end of the road. Well, it wasn’t so much a road as it was a dirt path, but still. And because of how little there was, it was all spread out, takin’ up as much space as possible.

No one was around, but if all the noise from the saloon were anythin’ to go by, you’d reckon that the entire town of Ragrock had gathered there.

Given the placement of the sun up in the powder blue sky, it was fixin’ to be about lunchtime. And considerin’ neither you nor Kylo had had anythin’ to eat today, you’re just glad that the ovens would hopefully be workin’, and that you might use some of Kylo’s money for somethin’ hot and fresh.

“I’m going to pick up some things from the pharmacy, why don’t you go get us a table?” Kylo’s thinkin’ the same thing, and you shoot him a wary eyebrow.

“Do you think they’ll let me in?” You knew that in most places, women weren’t actually allowed inside saloons unless they were whores or ‘Shady Ladies’. And while you were certainly a Shady Lady, you didn’t need nobody knowin’ that.

“In a town this small, impropriety extends to the womenfolk, no need for worry.” Kylo waves your concern off, and you wonder whether to believe him or not.

“What’ll you have to drink?” You decide on takin’ him at face value, it hadn’t steered you wrong yet. Kylo lets out a little laugh at the question, and you roll your eyes, hatin’ how damn cocky he gets when he gets his way.

“Doubt there’ll be much of a choice, but if rum’s on the menu, you sign me up for a glass of that.” He licks across his teeth again, and you part ways for the time being.

There’s only one place to hitch the horses, and that’s damn near the other end of the town by the church. Must not be Sunday, you figure, since the building is empty. Keeping track of the days of the week was somethin’ that had been gettin’ harder and harder, and usually it was only times like these when you’re in a town, that you’re able to figure out when the hell on the calendar you are.

Bein’ that it ain’t Sunday, your earlier suspicion is correct – everyone in the town is in this saloon. From the town elders to the children, boys and girls alike, everyone’s gathered together in the shade of the big wooden building. It’s only one story you notice, which means that there ain’t an inn or a place to sleep above it, which could pose somethin’ of a problem for you. You resolve to get chummy with the boss and see if he can’t suggest somewhere that you and Kylo might be able to rest your heads later on in the evening when the time comes.

The bar is nearly full up with customers laughin’ and talkin’ to one another, card game tables are set up on the floor, some folks winnin’ and some folks losing. There’s a three-person band up against the wall, a pianist a harmonica player, and a fiddle player, and the music instantly lets you know that this is an Irish town.

No rum then, sorry Kylo, you think with a bit of apprehension as you step foot through the swingin’ café doors. Unlike the saloon in the other town, no one pays you a lick of attention here. It ain’t until you make your way up to the bar as a matter of fact, that you start gettin’ eyes.

“Well hell-llo there honey.” A large portly man with a great big gold tooth right in the middle of his face gives you the once-over, “Are you lost?”

Your eye twitches ever so slightly at the petname, but you put on a cool face and bat your lashes, knowin’ just how to play this particular game.

“No sir, my cousin and I are just passin’ through.” You explain, lookin’ for someone who works there, “Might there be a spot open for us to have a drink and crust of bread?”

“For a face like that, you bet your ass there is.” The bartender, a man with slim sharp features stands up from wherever he was crouchin’ behind the bar counter. He wipes the counter with a fresh cloth before slingin’ the thing over his shoulder.

The bartender puts a plate of food in front of you, some buttered bread and nuts that you happily crunch down.

“Watch your fuckin’ mouth, that there’s a lady.” The portly man with the gold tooth points a finger in the bartender’s direction, makin’ you chuckle.

“Naw it’s alright, I ain’t so proper that a couple cuss words will do me any offense.” You wink at him, watchin’ as he gets off his stool at the bar, and offers it to you.

You sit on the stool in his place, and he leans up against his elbow on the counter. You try not to wrinkle your nose at how bad his breath smells, keepin’ up that pleasant smile.

“I’m Amos, why don’t you let me buy you a drink?” He asks, and your eyes flick to the doors with hesitation.

“That’d be mighty kind of you, thank you Amos.” Knowing to never ever refuse a drink or else risk gettin’ branded as disrespectful, you chew on your lip, “Although, I should probably wait for my cousin. He’s just over yonder at the drug store, but he’ll be right back when he’s done.”

“Well when he comes on in I’ll buy him a drink too!” Amos lets out a hearty laugh, slaps a couple coins down on the counter.

“I speak for the both of us when I say we appreciate the generosity immensely.” You smile, wondering what the fuck is taking Kylo so long.

“What’ll you have?” The bartender accepts the coins, pulls a big glass out from behind the counter and gestures to the three different barrel taps he’s got on hand.

“I ain’t picky.” You shake your head, not wantin’ to be fussy.

You’d had a taste of just about every kind of alcohol there was, from Pabst and Budweiser to home-distilled ‘shine. There wasn’t nothin’ you couldn’t swallow, even if you did prefer water above all else. The bartender fills up the glass with the frothy gold of some home brew, and knowin’ the norms, knowin’ how it’d be a sign of weakness to sip your drink, you throw back a big gulp, wipin’ a droplet or two away from your chin with the back of your hand, much to the cheers and applause around you.

“Damn! A woman who can hold her liquor deserves it, don’t you think, ‘Tidge?” Amos slaps the bar top, regardin’ you with another hearty chuckle.

“I sure do.” The bartender, ‘Tidge, gives you a freckled smile.

You look over your shoulder once again, and still no sign of Kylo.

Well, you think to yourself, if he’s going to take his sweet fuckin’ time, then you might as well get comfortable. Besides, couldn’t hurt to get on the town’s sweet side, in case you ever need to come moseying back through this way.

“I like that name, is it short for somethin’?” You turn your attention back towards the bartender, admiring his features.

He’s handsome, in a gangly sort of way. Those cheekbones could cut a man from how sharp they were, everything about him angular and severe, right down to his eyes, a swirling blue-green-grey that you couldn’t quite place. And then of course his hair, a bright orange with more yellow than red in it, you’re sure you’d be able to spot this man from just about anywhere in the town – maybe that’s why he was bartender.

“Armitage, but ain’t nobody calls me that unless I’m in trouble for somethin’, ya see.” He winks at you, his accent lilting and even as he wipes wipes wipes the counter and nonchalantly asks, “What might your name be?”

“Mary, and my cousin’s Benjamin.” You lie straight through your smiling teeth, and he smiles back.

He’s about to open his mouth to say something else, when another employee, a server of some kind, sticks his head out from a side door behind the counter and whistles for Armitage’s attention.

“Hey boss!” The server calls, “There’s a man out here askin’ about some cattle, says he wants to talk to you.”

At that, Armitage throws the towel down and groans, checkin’ the pocket-watch he pulls out of his vest.

“Aw shit,” He mutters to himself, callin’ back, “Tell Joey I’ll be right out! Pardon me Miss Mary, but business is business.”

You only nod, liftin’ your glass of half-drunk whiskey in response, and Armitage leaves.

The swingin’ doors of the saloon give way once again, and this time, finally, Kylo arrives. You can see him through the reflection of the tarnished silver mirror that sits up on the wall behind the bar, likely for reasons like this; so even the regulars at the bar can get a looksee at whoever happens to be comin’ and goin’.

You take another swig of your drink, watch through the silver as Kylo is stopped by a gentleman by the door.

“Hold on there partner, check your guns in.” The gentleman says, a hand on Kylo’s massive chest, stoppin’ him from walking in any further. “Thems the rules.”

You try to hide your grin at the fact that you had been so underestimated to not be stopped, but then again, Kylo was really askin’ for trouble just by walkin’ in, what with his naturally intimidating demeanor. You wonder if he’s going to fight the old man on that, but shockingly, he hands his pistol over without any hesitation.

“Whatever you say, sir.” Kylo gives a nod, before searching for you with a tentative, “Mary?”

“Over here Benji.” At the sound of your ‘name’, you turn and throw a hand up for Kylo to see.

“So this is the cousin, eh?” Amos slurps his beer loudly, as if sizing Kylo up and down, trying to figure out if that’s a fight he would win.

“Yep.” You reply, tryin’ your damn best to not regard Kylo with anything more than platonic interest as he weaves his way through the saloon.

Heat burns in your cheeks from how he doesn’t take his eyes off of you, even in that menacing scowl he’s got plastered to his face, he doesn’t once look away. To him, you could have been the only woman in the entire saloon, and for all he knew, you might as well be. Even without his gun, Kylo still looks like the most deadly man in the entire bar, just from sheer stature and attitude.

It’s a good look, not that you’d tell him that.

You don’t get a chance to tell him anything, because as soon as he comes and sidles up next to you, he slips an arm around your waist, protective – possessive, sizin’ Amos up and down in reutnr, a challenge of his own.

“We were startin’ to think you didn’t exist.” Amos grunts into his glass.

“Here I am, in the flesh.” Kylo’s voice is deep, deadly. It sends a shiver up your spine, you can feel the crackle of tension radiating off of him, so to mitigate any potential disaster, you push a full glass of whiskey into his hand, makin’ Kylo smile softly at you and asking, “How much for the drinks…?”

“This kind gentleman here took care of them for us.” You nod carefully towards Amos, who is lookin’ a lot less friendly right about now, now that he’s got his eye on the way Kylo pulls your body a little closer to his.

“Oh, well in that case, your next one’s on me.” Kylo pulls out a coin, balances it on his thumb and flicks it up into the air.

Amos catches it with ease, and grunts out something that you think might be a thank you.

“Benji, is it?” Another man’s voice sounds from just behind the two of you, and both you and Kylo freeze up for a split second, before quickly recovering and tryin’ your best to act natural.

“Depends on who’s askin’.” Kylo responds, turnin’ to see who might be inquiring about him.

There’s a table just off to the side, four chairs, only three of them filled. A gruff lookin’ man with ruddy red hair and a freckled face cracks his knuckles, gestures to the empty chair across from him. You swallow, lookin’ at the pile of cards that have been left abandoned on the table.

“We’ve just lost a player, if you’d care to join.” The man says.

You knew enough to know that when a man offers somethin’ like that, it’s more of a dare. And there ain’t no faster way to get into a fight, than by shyin’ away from a dare. Kylo knows this too, and despite the conversation y’all had earlier about him not bein’ a gambler, he knows he can’t not play at least one hand.

“Alright, but just once.” He says as much, using your presence as an excuse, “Wouldn’t do to go leavin’ my cousin all by her lonesome.”

Giving him a very cautious look, you will him not to do anything stupid. Armitage will be back soon and hopefully he’ll bring some protein with him, and you can enjoy a proper lunch and inquire about a possible place to stay for the night. It would be bad, for anything to happen now.

Kylo walks over to the table, takes the seat.

“What’s this?” He points to the little pile of cards, and you get the uneasy feeling that something bad is going to happen anyway, despite your silent pleas.

“That’s the hand he left behind.” The gruff man smokes on a fat cigar, blows smoke out of his nose, sucks across blackened teeth.

Curiously, Kylo lifts the cards just enough to see somethin’ that he don’t like, and he immediately puts them back down on the table.

“I’d rather not take ‘em, if that’s alright. Deal me a new hand.” Kylo requests, and that, it would seem, was the wrong move to make.

You hold your breath, eyes boring into the back of Kylo’s skull, hand itchin’ for the gun you’ve got hidden on your person, the gun that you’d be willin’ to throw Kylo at a moment’s notice, should he need it.

“It ain’t alright.” The gruff man shakes his head, his eyes grey like steel as he regards the pile, “You seen ‘em, you play ‘em.”

“That don’t seem fair.” Kylo points out, crossing his arms over his chest.

“I don’t give a shit about fair.” The man is unmoving, unwavering, not once breaking eye contact with him as he repeats, “You seen ‘em, you play ‘em.”

“And if’n I don’t?” Kylo asks.

The clinking sound of a holster buckle is what captures everyone’s attention, every single person in the saloon.

Amos, the card table, all the women and children, hell even that three-man band stop playin’, and all turn to look at him, at Kylo, who is now standin’ on the other side of the table, starin’ down the barrel of a gun.

The gruff man stands too, holds the gun level in one hand, holds the cigar in his other.

You itch to throw your gun to Kylo, itch to shoot the man dead yourself, but you don’t move a muscle.

Nobody in the entire saloon moves a single muscle.

“Now I don’t want this to get ugly, particularly not in front of my sweet cousin right over there, so I’m gonna give you a chance.” Kylo has the nerve to say, as he puts his hands up in good faith. He speaks lowly, quietly, so low that the saloon goes silent to hear him. “I’ll give you three seconds to go on over to that there desk and deposit your gun with the clerk at the door, which you shoulda done upon entering as is part of the rules of this here establishment.”

In response, the gruff man only pulls back the trigger, a mockin’ tone to his voice when he echoes Kylo’s earlier words of, “And if’n I don’t?”

You’re just about to lunge in and help him, when all of a sudden, Kylo lifts his leg and slams his boot down on the table, and before you can even shout to ask what the fuck he’s doing, you realize that the long wooden plank wasn’t secured down enough to be stable, and by kicking down on his end, the other end of the plank flies straight up, knockin’ the man’s hand upward, the barrel of the gun pointed right at his chin, the jolt of movement firin’ the trigger, bullet shootin’ straight up through the man’s head.

The crowd is stunned, speechless, watching in shock as the plank levels out on the table again, as Kylo kicks it down down down again, three more bullets flyin’ up through the man’s skull, blood spattering spraying onto the faces of the people in the general vicinity, screams and gasps at the hot hiss of red landin’ on their clothes.

Everyone is frozen, watches as the man’s body finally gives way to death, and thuds and thunks down to the floor.

The top of this man’s head is completely blown out, and Kylo doesn’t even so much as blink an eye, even now that he’s got blood on his own clothes.

“Y’all saw how I warned him?” Kylo barks out to the crowd, and they recoil more from this than they did from the shooting.

“We saw.” They reply nearly in unison.

“Anybody got anything they want to say about it?” Kylo dares, but when no response comes, “Good. Now where’s the fuckin’ bartender when you need him?”

Almost as if on cue, Armitage comes back through the side door, clapping away dirt from his palms.

All eyes shift to him, and Armitage has a look of confusion on his face for one second, one split second, before it morphs through devastation, to rage.

“Brian!” He calls out with the sort of anguish that makes you think Kylo picked the wrong gambler to kill.

“Oh shit.” You mutter under your breath, especially as Armitage jumps over the bar and rushes to the fallen man’s side.

“Which one of you sons of bitches killed my brother??” Armitage screams, so red in the face that you’re afraid he’s going to burst.

It’s then, that Armitage whirls around and gets an eyeful of Kylo – the kind of eyeful that means he knows that ain’t no Benjamin.

“Oh shit!” You hiss, hand slowly, carefully, creepin’ towards your gun.

“You!” Armitage seethes, leveling a bloodied finger in Kylo’s direction as he races back to the bar to grab a rifle, checks the chamber to make sure she’s fully loaded, and immediately fires a shot that blast through the wood of the table, sending the crowd shouting and screaming, racing out of the saloon to avoid bein’ struck. “I thought I told you to never step foot into this goddamn place again!”

Kylo makes a mad dash for you then, grabs you by the arm and yanks you back back back as Armitage reloads his double barrel.

“Why the fuck didn’t you tell me you knew him?” You seethe, smacking at him, wanting to punch his fucking teeth out, wondering why he led you into the belly of a hornet’s nest.

The blast of bullets shatters the window above you, and you both duck your heads so as to not get struck by the falling glass.

“No time to explain, on my count, you make a run for the door and get the horses.” Kylo mutters, entirely too calm and collected, making you want to punch him even harder.

“Here take my gun – ” You offer him, but as another explosion sounds off a little too close to you this time, Kylo unveils two more guns of his own.

“Don’t need it,” Kylo grins, and for the first time, you see a sparkle in that blind eye of his. He scoffs, “What, you didn’t think I’d hand them all over, did you?”

You just widen your eyes at him, incredulous.

“Three, two -- run!” Kylo shouts, popping up over the makeshift barrier he’s yanked you behind, and immediately starts shooting, giving you the cover you need to make a bolt for it.

The band strikes up again, piano and fiddle and harmonica filling the emptiness of silence, punctuated by the sounds of struggle as a great big fights breaks out among the drunks and gamblers that Kylo has so offended.

It feels like a battleground, the way you dodge the bullets that zip past you. If you had made any friends in the time sittin’ at that bar, you’ve lost ‘em now, that much is clear. Amos has no reservation aimin’ straight for your heart, but your quick fingers pull your trigger before he can even manage, his dead body stumbling and tumbling like a bowling ball, knockin’ down the pins of his friends as they try to pin you with bullets of their own.

Run run running, you try to shove your way through the panic of the crowd who keeps scramblin’ like chickens with their heads cut off, screaming and hollerin’ from the way that bullets keep hittin’ and springin’ off metal and blasting into wood, holes riddlin’ the walls, lettin’ streams of sunlight in.

You shoot and shoot, punching and kicking your way through the crowd, knowing that behind you, Kylo can’t be too far.

You can tell because you can hear his grunting shouts, his adrenaline filled calls of rage as he too blasts bullets into the bodies of men, overturning barrels and tables, crashes and explosions going off behind you.

On the single street, you can see some of the townsfolk racing to the jail, and that sends a spike of terror down your back.

The jail meant one thing, and one thing only – the Sheriff.

Panic simmers and bubbles up through you, and you keep running, running towards the church where your horses have been passively entertaining themselves with a trough of water and a bucket of feed.

“Aggie! Sam!” You whistle for their attention, and at once, they turn their big heads to look at you.

Agnes braces herself for you to hoist yourself up onto her saddle, and you frantically undo the tie of their reins around the posts that they’ve been good enough to not wander away from. Holding Sam’s reins in your hands, you kick your heels into Agnes’ side, and great big plumes of dust and dirt kick up under the horses’ hooves as the great beasts immediately break into fast fast fast gallop.

Racing closer closer closer to the saloon, you can still see them fighting and shooting at one another on the inside.

“Come on, come on!” You’re screaming at Kylo from down the road, demanding that he hear you, that he get outside already, because you can’t slow these horses down once they’ve gotten like this, and you can’t turn back once you’ve passed the saloon, not with the commotion from behind, not with the way the Sheriff is now shootin’ at you, at your horses.

“God dammit get out here!” You scream again, lookin’ behind you, takin’ aim and shootin’ the Sheriff clean at the wrist, blowin’ his hand off, the gun explodin’ off with it, bullet ricocheting off one of the hangin’ signs, bouncin’ back and hittin’ the Sheriff in the chest.

You’re almost at the saloon, almost there, and Kylo still ain’t out front, heartbeat pounding pounding pounding in your chest as you approach the doors closer and closer, as you can hear the sound of gunfire and broken glass from inside – but then -- !

Then there he is!

You see him running through the saloon towards the front doors, and somehow, impossibly somehow, as you pass the doors, you throw Sam’s reins, and Kylo catches them, his long legs running alongside Sam’s breakneck pace, jumping up onto her without her slowing down one bit.

“Yes!!” You let out a triumphant shout of adrenaline, before whipping Agnes’s reins and urging her ever faster.

You and Kylo grin at one another, victors in this chance game with death, cheatin’ your lives once again, as you ride ride ride out into the desert, not lookin’ back to see if anyone follows.

#kylo ren x reader #kylo ren/reader #kylo ren x you #kylo ren/you #kylo ren reader insert #kylo ren fanfiction #kylo ren au #outlaw au #wild west au #my writing #adam driver fanfiction #adcu #biting dust

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oloreaa · 4 years ago

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Vencuyanir Ch.2 - The Sandcrawler

vencuyanir [ven-COO-yah-neer]: sustain, keep alive, preserve

Summary: Many things happen on their way to the Mandalorian's ship. Bean is unfazed and trying to be helpful, Elana… not so much

Words: 6.2k oof

Notes: Thank you for your lovely comments and reblogs, they mean so much to me🥺

Warnings: canon-typical violence (gore/blood, gun violence), hostages

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……………

The next morning, Elana was woken by the Mandalorian.

"Get up," he said, standing right in front of her, staring down. She startled awake, squinted up, brows furrowed and dark hair unruly. Then, she looked at the pram, seeing green ears peeking out of the pod. Not even a second later, dark eyes followed, peering at her. He cooed and stretched a hand out to her, smiling widely. The Mandalorian got close and uncuffed her without a word before retreating away again.

Elana got up, combing her hair with her fingers before putting it into a low braid while walking over to Bean, greeting him with a quiet "Good morning".

"We have to move," the Mandalorian said, strapping his rifle across his shoulder, walking a few paces before he stopped again, looking up at the canyon walls.

Taking notice of the filled water bottle, she put the moisture bead away and got the ration packs out. Offering one to Bean, she broke it in half in order for him to hold more easily. He started to gnaw on them, but his little face told her everything about what he thought of the taste.

"Yeah, honey, I know," she murmured, stroking his ears, "they're not tasty. We can get you something better later on." Bean pointed to the Mandalorian, and made a questioning sound. Elana could not control the face she made, and shook her head slightly.

"We're not asking him for food," she said so quietly that the bounty hunter would not be able to pick it up, "also he probably doesn't have anything better anyways."

Bean frowned, mouth turning downwards. She had to smile at his disgruntled face, and with a last boop on his nose, she straightened up and started to pack the things away into her backpack before walking towards the Mandalorian.

He had been waiting patiently, allowing them a short time to properly wake up and prepare for the day, for which she was grateful.

The Mandalorian held out the cuffs then, and with a clenched jaw she let him attach those to her wrists. He tilted his head towards her in a slight nod, then set off again, Bean's pram floating with him. Watching how his tattered cape swung across his broad back, Elana held back a sigh and started to trail after him.

It was much more difficult to walk in comparison to yesterday, since her legs ached with the effort, muscles unused to so much exercise and climbing across the rocky terrain. But taking step after step, setting one foot in front of the other, the ache slowly dwindled to an amount where it was annoying but not actually bothering her too much. They walked for at least an hour, the pace less gruelling than the day before, but it was still exhausting after a while.

The canyon walls decreased in height around them, and the path they walked on was getting lighter and lighter, both due to the fact that the edges of the cliff were lower and let more daylight in, and the sun rising higher in the sky. The rock formation curled above them, giving them some semblance of protection even if the canyon itself was becoming more shallow.

Where yesterday the surface was bare and devoid of life, down in the canyon there were lizards scuttling around. Across the bond she could feel Bean watching those with big eyes and rising interest, leaning over the edge of the pod to peek out. The Mandalorian kept walking, stride purposeful, unbothered by the reptiles.

More lizards appeared again, and Bean leaned out even more, squeaking quietly, eyes growing huge. Elana watched him, glad that he seemed to be entertained by them even though he could not get out and play. Crossing over a small trickling stream, they continued walking without a break. The packed earth beneath their feet was not bone dry anymore, but had occasional patches of wet mud here and there, making the walk more difficult.

Some of them were actually mud puddles and Elana was suddenly glad that Bean was sitting properly in his pram because he would have definitely tried to play in them and make a mess of himself. And she would probably have let him, giving him an hour to tire himself out so he would sleep better at night.

"Mrah," Bean said quietly, eyes wide as he tried to get a better look.

The lizards that tailed them were approaching fast, a group of them gathering around them. Elana looked at the ground, keeping an eye on them. Are they venomous?, she suddenly asked herself, anxiety spiking, and inched closer to the pram. But before she could open her mouth to ask the bounty hunter, they scattered in a matter of milliseconds.

The Mandalorian stopped walking.

Elana held her breath automatically as he stood still as a statue, the only sound she could hear for the moment the wind whistling.

A shadow passed over them, too quickly for Elana to see the source behind it as she whipped her head around. The Mandalorian turned his torso, slowly looking around.

"What is--" Elana started to ask quietly, but he held a hand up sharply, effectively shutting her up. His leather gloves creaked as his hand wrapped around a blaster.

Elana jumped when a figure, a Trandoshan dropped down from the top of the canyon with a roar, stumbling back as fast as she could, getting away from them.

They knocked against the Mandalorian's rifle, and with a fast movement, he pushed Bean's pram backwards. A sharp rapid beeping filled the air, and she stumbled backwards as fast as she could, placing herself in front of Bean. Her heart beat fast in her chest as the Trandoshan advanced on the Mandalorian, sparks flying as he hit his armour. Getting the upper hand, the Mandalorian knocked him down, only to whirl around when another one dropped down. While he deflected a hit, a third one appeared, getting involved in the fight as well.

The Mandalorian held himself against three opponents easily, blocking hits and kicking out, every slice that broke through his defence sliding harmlessly off his armour. Using the end of his rifle, he stabbed at one of them, blue electricity crackling, knocking the Trandoshan back a couple of paces.

Seizing the opportunity of the distracted bounty hunter, one of them ran towards Elana and Bean, the former shielding the pram protectively with her body. She squared her shoulders, preparing to defend Bean with her life even while cuffed, but before that could happen, the hunter vanished into thin air.

Eyes wide, she stared at the golden sparks floating around them, her gaze dropping to the pile of fabric at her feet that had not been there before.

The hunter had disintegrated.

Her heart dropped into her stomach, and she had to gulp. The Mandalorian still had his rifle raised, pointing directly at them. A moment passed, not one word was said. Breathing hard, the visor of the Mandalorian was trained right on Bean, and the child was staring back. Elana was wide eyed, looking rapidly between them, unable to decide whether she should check upon Bean first or rip into the bounty hunter for firing a weapon right when Bean was in range.

She turned and crossed the short distance to the pram, wishing she could take him out of the pram and press him to her, but it was impossible with the cuffs. "What is wrong with you," she got out, voice shaking and hands trembling, overwhelmed with the need to feel Bean. Him, alive, in her arms, "You could have hit him!" Chest heaving, she glared at the Mandalorian, heart beating fast in her chest, every possible scenario that could have played out making it seize up.

"Good thing I didn't," he replied, before taking the beeping fob and crushing it with his boot. His helmet turned around to her, "We're being followed."

The statement hung in the air.

They looked at each other, the impassive shield of the beskar mask making it impossible to gauge what was going on in his mind. "Why do they want him?" he asked, sounding tense.

She swallowed the lump in her throat. "I don't know," she said, shoulders hunching. It was not a complete lie. She had some ideas as to why anyone wanted Bean, starting with what the little one could do, but actually knowing? How could the people who wanted Bean know that he could make things float? How could they know about the bond?

"We need to move if we don't want to get ambushed again," the Mandalorian said, and turned around, taking off again.

Elana stared after him, worry lingering in her chest. She knew that there were many bounty hunters coming to Arvala-7, and she knew that they had tried and failed many times to get Bean. This was the first time that someone had come so far in actually getting them.

Now, the other hunters would have easy picking with them out in the open, especially considering how close it just was, how easily they should have overpowered the Mandalorian.

Elana did not even dare to think what would have happened to Bean if the Mandalorian had not quickly pushed the pram away from the scuffle, and silently thanked the Maker for his reflexes. Starting to walk again, trailing after the Mandalorian and the floating pram, she was left alone with her thoughts, running at hyperspace speed. She suddenly noticed the cut on the Mandalorian's arm, the sun reflecting the glistening of blood.

"You're hurt!" Elana exclaimed, not thinking as she went to inspect it, some kind of instinct taking over. She was stopped though, by an arm pushing her away when she got too close, and the bounty hunter stared her down.

"Don't touch me," he threatened quietly, and Elana instantly shrank back, heart pounding. Feeling a flush rise up in her face because of how foolish she felt, she just held up her palms a little awkwardly because of the cuffs, trying to placate him.

He simply turned around, and ignored her timid "I'm sorry".

The day was crawling by at a snail's pace, and they only stopped for water and food. If Elana had thought that she felt disgusting yesterday, she was not prepared for today. Her entire body was sticky with sweat and dust, and when she rubbed across her arms dirt clung to her, baked into her skin. Her hair was a tangled mess, the only saving grace was that it was in a braid and could not get much dirtier. She longed for a water shower where she could scrub her entire body raw, some soap to wash off the grease on her face and her scalp, and clean, dry clothes that she could put on afterwards. Elana might have actually cried if that opportunity arose. Thank the Maker that Bean was not a sweaty baby, and with his pram he was the cleanest of them all.

Despite all this, she pitied the Mandalorian, who must have been sweating buckets underneath that coarse weave and the durasteel armour, not to mention the cape he was trailing behind him. Was it only for the aesthetic, to look even more menacing, or did it serve some purpose? It looked like a good emergency blanket for cool nights, though.

When night finally fell again after a gruelling day underneath the sun, they made camp outside the canyon, on the edge, where they would continue towards the Mandalorian’s ship the next day.

The Mandalorian took out a small heater lamp while Elana gave Bean water, turned on the moisture bead after he was finished, and fed him his ration packet. Unhappy with the consistency, it took longer than usual for Elana to get Bean to eat, the baby whining and frowning at her every time he had to take another bite.

"I know it doesn't taste good," Elana said, holding the packet with a stern face, "But it's all we have right now."

The Mandalorian was inspecting the wound on his arm, hissing lowly in pain when he must have grabbed it too hard, and then took out a device from one of the pockets on his thighs. Watching the Mandalorian settle down, Elana pulled her knees to her chest, scooting closer to the rock behind her, once again scolding herself for her moment of weakness before. Why did she want to help him? Why did she constantly offer him help, water, food when he would not hesitate to let them die?

Why was she like this, giving away precious resources that could go to Bean to their captor?

He did not spare her a glance as he shuffled around on his seat, and pressed the device in his hand to the cut on his arm. Horrified, Elana gasped as it flared bright red, and the flesh sizzled. "What are you doing?" It escaped her before she thought about it, "Is that a cauterizer?"

"Yes," was the only thing he said, before pressing it to the cut again.

The sound was gruelling, and when the Mandalorian gave a low groan at the pain, goosebumps spread over her whole body. "Stop that," she demanded, chest seizing up at the smell of burnt flesh, "You're hurting yourself."

"It'll get infected," he explained, infuriatingly calm, as if she were a child.

She huffed. "Doesn't that increase the likelihood of infection? With the inflammation--"

"I don't have time for that," the Mandalorian interrupted her.

"Fine," she rolled her eyes. Get septicaemia for all I care.

He continued holding the cauterizer to his wound, sizzling filling the air, and Elana did her best to ignore the pained grunts and heavy breathing the Mandalorian let out, trying to stave off the nausea from the thought of someone doing something like that to themselves. Suddenly, Bean appeared right next to the Mandalorian, stretching his hand out, reaching up. Elana had not even noticed that he had left his pram. Grimacing at the strain, Bean stretched his hand out some more.

Before she could say or do anything, the Mandalorian softly pushed him away with his hand, and took Bean under his armpits, lifting him back into his pram in a matter of seconds, Bean making a disgruntled coo at the manhandling. She would have made a sound of protest if he had not been so... gentle with Bean. Staring at him, wide eyed, Elana felt something akin to hope fluttering in her chest.

Since she had started to care for Bean, she had noted that she could make many assumptions about a person, and be proven correct most of the time, simply by the way they treated the little one.

The Niktos had shown a full range of possibilities on how to gauge personalities. Those that did not spare him a glance veered towards the spectrum of untrustworthy, and those that cared enough to check up on him once in a while were the ones that Elana could go to if there was a problem. There were many impatient ones she did not care for in the slightest, since they had punished the baby for the smallest of things. But overall, the Niktos had been neutral to Bean, guarding him like they were hired to, but nothing more. And based on how the Mandalorian treated Bean, there was hope that he could be convinced to not hand them over to those that put a bounty on his head. It was basically impossible not to fall in love with Bean upon sight, anyways.

The Mandalorian started to repair his chest plate after sitting down, fixing something on it, the circuitry making violent sparks fly. Something clicked, and the chest plate gave a whirring sound, the Mandalorian exhaling in relief as it booted up.

Elana had a sharp eye on Bean now, quietly observing what he was trying to do. After jumping out of the pram, landing lightly, he waddled towards the Mandalorian, and stretched out his hand again, whining slightly. A choked off sound that came from the Mandalorian as he noticed Bean made the little child warble even more, his voice almost scolding. If it was not so bizarre, Elana would have laughed.

After a short glance towards her, the bounty hunter stood up, bent over, carefully picked Bean up again, and set him down in the pram. Bean looked up at him, big eyes questioning, ears perked up, cooing at him. The Mandalorian hesitated before he pushed a button on his vambrace and the lid closed with a hiss.

The man looked at her, visor menacingly tilted down. "What did he want?" he asked, still a bit breathless, chest probably heaving from the brutal way he had used the cauterizer on himself.

Elana looked up, and could not help but feel proud of Bean. "That, Mandalorian," she said quietly, "was him trying to help you."

His body language was incredulous. "Why would he do that?"

She glared up at him, straightening up. "Because you were in pain."

The Mandalorian scoffed slightly. "He should not care," he said stiffly, which made Elana scoff as well.

"Do you think he understands that?" she snapped, brows furrowed at the bounty hunter, "The only thing he could see was that you were cauterizing your cut with that kriffing atrocious thing."

He said nothing, just turned his head to the pram, watching it quietly. Then, with a sigh, he returned to fiddling with his chest plate, not sparing her another glance.

She made a face at him, before turning around and laying on the cold floor, pulling the threadbare blanket around her shoulders. Keeping her back firmly to the rock formation behind her, she fell asleep with the light of the lamp illuminating their makeshift campsite.

The next morning, she woke before the Mandalorian did, sunrise announcing itself through the pink and purple swirls in the sky. Watching as it turned gold, she tucked her hair neatly into braids, and finished as the Mandalorian gave a start and sat up.

Looking at the pram first, then at her, he started packing the lamp and other supplies away while she folded the blanket and put it into her backpack. Frowning at the leather straps, discoloured from sweat, she sighed. When they arrived at some place with water she would try to clean it up some. Button pressed, the pram opened, and Bean sat up sluggishly, blinking, still half asleep.

Whining slightly, he held his arms up, wanting to be taken, and Elana quickly put her backpack on, scrambled up and hoisted him into her arms. He snuggled into her, and gave a slight snore, evidently falling asleep again. Taking a look at the Mandalorian, already finished with packing and waiting for them, cuff in his hand. Elana held Bean closer, sending him a glare. The Mandalorian only sighed, and packed the cuff away for now.

They took off, Bean still in her arms until he was fully asleep again, and Elana put him back into the pram once the bond let her know that he was drifting into dreams, letting him snooze a bit. As if he had been waiting for Elana to have her arms free to use again, the Mandalorian was quick in securing her the moment Bean was in the pod.

The sun rose behind them, elongating their shadows in front of them, and they worked their way up a steep hill. She was glad when they went over the ledge, and the ground evened out to a flat, which went on for some kilometers all around.

"We're not far now," the Mandalorian said suddenly, and she could not help but to tense up.

"Where are you taking us?" Elana asked.

He exhaled with a crackle of the modulator in his helmet. "To my ship," he said. She scoffed.

"Ha, ha, very funny, I did not gather that," Elana muttered, "Where are we going?"

"To a client."

"And they are?"

"Confidential."

She looked at him, face deadpan, and opened her mouth for a retort before she thought better of it. If he did not want to talk, fine. It was unlikely that he would give any more information to her. And she did not even know what information could help her in some way.

They walked for at least half an hour before something blinked a kilometer away, reflecting the sunlight. Based on the relieved slump in the Mandalorian's shoulders, even though he did not make a sound, she gathered that it must be his ship.

The countdown started, she thought grimly to herself, and felt herself tensing up. No way back. She took back everything she had thought the last two days, every sullen complaint that she ached, that she wanted to be out of the sun, that she was tired and thirsty, because the complete fear she felt made her long for the moments where the end was not as apparent.

In a few hours Bean would be handed over to some client of the Mandalorian, and Maker knows what they wanted with her child.

They had to take a longer route around though, since a canyon was cutting straight through the more direct path, and soon the glinting disappeared. Making their way towards the ship from another angle, it steadily came closer with every step they took. A spark of hope grew in her heart as she heard some noises, carried over by the wind.

It sounded like Jawas, her mind supplied, and the Mandalorian must have come to the same conclusion, for he increased his pace. They walked over the rocky stone edge, shouting filling the air as the bounty hunter became more and more tense with every step. When they finally arrived at the overhang, there was a huge Sandcrawler next to a silver ship, the smaller one half disassembled.

The Jawas were whooping in joy and talking amongst themselves as they manhandled the pieces to their Sandcrawler.

The Mandalorian took off his rifle in a smooth motion, yanked the end piece off and held it to his visor, and Elana realized that it must have been some scope. He then lifted his rifle, it gave a click under a practised flip and started whirring in a foreboding manner. He fired.

A Jawa disintegrated.

She flinched at that, the knowledge of the Mandalorian having such a weapon still making her nauseous.

Bean leaned forward, interest suddenly spiking along their bond. The Jawas started to flee, running into their Sandcrawler, but the Mandalorian got another shot in, and reloaded his rifle. The little child watched the Mandalorian take out several Jawas, ears perked high, and Elana grimaced at the fact that Bean was exposed to this much violence in the span of only a few days. It would be a marvel if he did not have any sort of nightmares afterwards.

The huge structure started to move, and the Mandalorian was quick to give chase, the pram floating along.

"Hey!" Elana yelled, scrambling to get behind them, "hey!"

The Mandalorian was wickedly fast, gaining speed quickly while she struggled with jumping down the rocky terrain without breaking an ankle, especially with no free hands to catch herself if she fell. She caught up somewhat when the bounty hunter dropped to his knee, Bean’s pod right beside him, and fired at the machinery in the back of the Sandcrawler. He then ran behind it again, his frame becoming smaller and smaller in comparison to the looming structure, before he jumped up, pulling himself onto the fast moving thing.

He is crazy, Elana thought, running behind them, not knowing what else to do. Stay? Then she would be left alone while he was doing who knows what, and since Bean was attached to him, his pod swerving safely around any obstacles, she had to go after them. Even if she could not keep up with the running or the speed for long, she had to stay with them, so she could at least follow what was happening with her eyes.

The Mandalorian was trying to climb up the Sandcrawler using the ladder, and the Jawas veered to the side, trying to scrape him off on a rock, but he somehow managed to stay on top of the ledge he was positioned on.

She could see how the Jawas started to throw parts at him, doing their best to slow him down, but the bounty hunter was still unerringly trying to get to the Jawas, climbing with visible effort.

Elana could not follow everything while she was running behind them, for the parts that the Jawas had thrown to slow down the Mandalorian succeeded in slowing her down. Having to watch her step carefully so she would not skewer her foot by stepping on some rusty pipe or stumbling over a Jawa corpse, she missed the point where he launched a rope from his armour, using that to pull himself up.

He's crazy, she thought, breathing hard as she ran as fast as she could, switching her focus between small white pram floating behind the Mandalorian, and the Mandalorian himself, He’s lost it.

How did he think that he had the slightest chance against the whole Sandcrawler and the tribe inside? Completely nuts.

Elana could not believe her eyes when he actually reached the top after some struggle, his frame now tiny because of the distance, but the begrudging respect that budded was quickly replaced with dread as the Jawas electrocuted him.

She could see him swaying slightly before falling down, the moments seeming endless. Wincing at how hard he hit the ground, Elana tried to increase her speed, but it still took too long until she was near enough, the speed of the Sandcrawler putting a decent distance between them.

Arriving at the fallen Mandalorian, wheezing in exhaustion and heart beating fast from the run, it took everything in her to not just collapse on the spot. Placing her hands on her knees and taking a few moments to suffer, Elana gasped for air, feeling her sides burn.

The Mandalorian was sprawled out across the ground, completely still, but his stomach continued to move up and down.

"He's breathing," she told Bean, who was watching with worried eyes, soft coos coming from the small creature, and she straightened up, breathing deeply, "He is probably alive."

Elana really hoped that he was. Not necessarily because she liked him, quite the opposite, out of necessity. If he died, she and Bean would be kilometers away from any kind of civilization, in the middle of the desert, food and water, even with the moisture bead, scarce. And if the hunters from yesterday were any indication, they were probably wanted by even more people.

She would rather take her chances with the Mandalorian, who had not hit them when he fancied it in the last two days, who treated Bean gently, and had not made a pass at her, knowing that she could not properly defend herself.

It was not the highest of standards, Elana had to concede, but it was unlikely that other hunters would be as 'pleasant' as the Mandalorian was.

Getting closer to the sprawled out Mandalorian, she peered down at him, brows raised. Then, she looked back at Bean who was watching them. Then back to the Mandalorian again.

She nudged his leg slightly with her foot. "... Mandalorian?" she asked, tilting her head as she nudged him again, this time against his side.

He did not stir.

Feeling worried now, she dropped to her knees, and poked him, instantly withdrawing in case the Mandalorian woke up and took her finger off without a warning. Bean sent something that she could interpret as worry, and a picture of blue sparks and a fuzzy feeling flooded the bond. He was showing her what happened, Elana realized, and looked at the Mandalorian again.

She honestly did not know what to do. Should she take his armour off to check for injuries? The way he fell, he could have sustained some heavy damage. Broken bones? Concussions? Maker, spinal injuries?

Could he have split his head open and Elana would not notice? Was he bleeding out somewhere beneath the armour? Hesitant fingers hovered above his armour, before settling on his chest plate, giving him a tentative shake.

Nothing.

Elana bit her lip, feeling conflicted. She knew that there was something about a Mandalorian's helmet, that it should not be removed by others, or was it that only they could remove it? And he had only taken it off to drink or eat when she was tied up against the pram. For a short second she thought about manipulating the bounty hunter's arms in a way to take off his own helmet but discarded that thought just as quickly as it had appeared in her head.

"What do you think, Bean? What should I do?" Elana asked, looking to the baby as if he could give her an answer.

Bean cooed, tilting his head to the side.

"I don't want to disrespect the guy's culture, if you get me?"

Bean nodded gravely, as if to say 'yeah, I get you'.

Elana exhaled a breath, lips pursing, contemplating what to do. She really did not want to take off his armour and maybe do something culturally insensitive, but what if he had an injury that she could treat? She did not have many medical supplies, but if there was a small wound? What if he needed to sit up? What if there was something that needed instant medical attention?

Elana shifted on her knees, and leaned over the Mandalorian, taking notice of how he was breathing. Still breathing?

"Oh Maker," she huffed in despair, "Maker above."

She settled her fingers slightly around his helmet, and tried to gather enough courage to pull it up, heart beating fast in her chest.

"I'm sorry, Mandalorian, if this is something extremely taboo that I'm doing here, but honestly--" Elana gave a short nervous laugh, "Yeah, I'm sorry. Please don't kill me afterwards, that would be very much appreciated." She tried to lift it, not even raising it half a centimeter before his hand wrapped tight around her wrist, almost giving her a heart attack.

The world suddenly went flying and she found herself pinned under the Mandalorian, his hand curling around her throat, the other pressing her into the ground. She gasped, both in shock and at the force with which he had slammed her into the ground, and clawed at his hand, scrabbling underneath him.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," she got out, "Thought you were injured, tried to help--"

The words grew more panicked as she tried to speak around the pressure on her windpipe. Elana could faintly hear Bean squeaking in alarm.

"It is forbidden," he snarled at her, voice impossibly rough, before letting up, leaving her gasping and floundering on the floor.

"I'm sorry," she repeated, tears in her eyes, coughing from the steel grip that had only just been on her throat. Rubbing against it, she winced. Would that leave a bruise? She hoped not.

The Mandalorian's breath was ragged as he clumsily stood up, chest heaving as he stood above her. "I should kill you for that."

Elana swallowed thickly, staring up at him with watering eyes, trying to hold back the cough building in her throat. "I did not know it was forbidden, I swear," she tried to explain herself, "I know that Mandalorians don't take their helmets off but I assumed, with injuries--"

"Yeah, you assumed," he interrupted her, sounding angry, hand twitching towards his blaster. She flinched back, and apologised again, staring at the ground, blood rushing in her ears. Bean was squeaking indignantly in his pram, a frown on his face.

"I only wanted to check for injuries, I swear," she whispered, hoping the Mandalorian would believe her.

He turned around, and looked after the huge trail the Sandcrawler had left, before letting out a huge sigh. Elana stood up, discreetly patting down the dust on her clothes and checking up on Bean, who was making questioning sounds at her, his ears hanging low. I'm okay, she sent to him, along with a smile.

The Mandalorian looked back to them, his shoulders dropping again. "Just this once, caretaker," he said, towering above her as he stared her down. She nodded quickly, shrinking back in fear. With that threat, he stalked past her, whole body tense, and started to walk back the way they had come.

She stared after him, heart beating fast in her chest, mind reeling. Bean's pram floated past her, and he cooed at her, hand stretched out as if he was urging her to follow.

Elana might not have understood the scale of what had just happened, but she knew that the Mandalorian would not have hesitated to shoot her. Or snap her neck. There were several times when she wanted to open her mouth and ask whether or not he was all right, he did fall from an incredibly dangerous height onto his back, but she was too scared of him going off at her again. They walked back in silence, the Sandcrawler having left an unmistakable path they could easily follow. Looking up into the sky, she noticed that it would not be long until the sun set. The Mandalorian walked with a straight back, but his step was slower than before. She contemplated asking if he was injured again, but thought better of it.

It took a while until they arrived at the Mandalorian's ship, various pieces of it lying on the ground around it. The ship was stripped, pieces on the side missing, and from what she could spot the engine was basically gutted. There was no way that the ship could make it into space.

The Mandalorian let out a string of curses that crackled through the modulator, and pointed a finger at her. "You stay here," he commanded, body tense, and he pressed the button on his vambrace so Bean's pram did not follow him, inching it towards her with a motion of his arm before whipping around, starting to examine what was left of the ship.

It was large, unpainted and silver except for some faded designs on the sides, and a model that was older than herself. Scratch that, it could very well be from the time before the Empire. Elana wondered how well it was holding up before the Jawas got to it.

Seeing this as a good moment to rest her legs, she sat down on the ground, Bean's pram next to her, and she took out the water bottle. First giving Bean something, the little one drinking in big gulps, obviously thirsty, and then took sips herself.

She heard a loud bang from inside the ship, and exchanged a glance with Bean. "Someone's angry," she said to Bean, and he cooed in agreement.

A movement from the cockpit drew her eye, and she could see a glint through the viewport, which was probably the helmet of the Mandalorian. Shortly after, the ship started whirring, and the left repulsor gave a huff before shutting down. Then, the right one did the same.

"The ship can't fly, you see, Bean?" Elana could not help but smile, feeling exceedingly petty. Bean nodded in agreement, ears perking up as he babbled to her. She reached a hand into the pram, and he grasped at her fingers, holding them tightly. He held out his other hand, and beckoned for her to pick him up. Elana did, and put him in her lap.

Bean frowned at her, and wriggled. She frowned right back. "You don't want to be held?" Something creeped across their bond, and she could not help but raise an eyebrow at what he wanted.

"The Mandalorian? Are you sure?"

He pointed towards the ship, and started wriggling again. Setting him down, he started to waddle directly to it, and a tug across their bond made her follow him. Bean struggled across the packed ground, and then up the ramp into the ship. She was right behind him, watching the small one like a hawk so if he stumbled or fell she could instantly get to him.

Bean reached the top, and chirped loudly into the ship, ears high and reaching his arms inside.

"Where is your caretaker?" The Mandalorian asked Bean, voice rough. She poked her head into the ship, and gave a tiny, only slightly sarcastic wave. He sighed, before pushing himself up from the cub he had been leaning against.

"Shouldn't you know better than to let him wander?" He accused, tilting his head at her.

Elana shrugged instead of answering, eyes narrowed. How dare he try to tell her how to handle Bean?

The Mandalorian pushed past her, his steps ringing loudly on the durasteel floor of his ship. "Come," he said, and started off walking again.

Elana rolled her eyes, and scooped Bean up, who protested with a whine.

"Where are we going?" she asked, almost afraid of an answer.

"Somewhere safer than here."

……………

Thank you for reading! I hope you liked it!

@mndalorians Cass YOURE the GOAT even though youre a little crabby lmao. Ilysm its unreal

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#the mandalorian #star wars #din djarin #din djarin x oc #pedro pascal #oloreaa writes #vencuyanir

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delldarling · 4 years ago

Text

offering | warren

This was April’s story of the month over on Patreon! April was.. a very hard month for me, which makes me extra fond of Warren and his gentle nature. Enjoy!

male vampire x gender/body neutral reader 6.8k words lemon | biting, orgasm due to biting, pot usage (on Warren's part!), inebriated feeling due to bite (on readers part)

You’ve been walking long enough, up hill no less, that your limbs have become languid and too-warm. You’re not quite out of breath, though you are breathing deep, enjoying the scent of fresh greenery spilling down the hills and over the edges of the cracked road. The grass and fast cooling air still carries that sweet tinge of early Spring - but it’s starting to get dark. The sun has just set, and the sky is cast green-grey ahead of you, all the way down to the horizon behind the treeline. If you turn around, you know it’ll fade into dark blue somewhere above your head, scattered over with salty looking stars. You pause, taking a moment to follow the arch of them over your shoulder, half feeling like you should brush the crumbs of them away, or remind the deity that spilled them to take a pinch of them back, for luck.

You wrinkle your nose, sparing the sky a smile, and then continue on your way. If you want to reach the edge of the little canyon before full dark, you’re going to have to hurry.

So far, the road ahead of you has been empty, as it’s only the middle of Spring. Most people don’t come to visit the canyon - the Chasm, it’s called affectionately, though everyone can see all the way down to the bottom - not until the height of summer. They haul trailers or tents along with them, ice chests filled to the brim with beer and bottled liquor. You’ve heard nothing but cricket song and the fast fading conversation of birds nesting for the evening, so you’d assumed that the rest of the road, and the Chasm itself, would house no one but you for a few hours.

There’s a beat up truck just over the crest of the hill you’re on though, half parked over the edge of the embankment. It’s a pale blue, or it used to be. It’s faded and patched in places, scuffed gray and silver on the doors and the back fender. The cream camper shell on the back is old too, the windows in it all spray painted black from the inside and taped heavily with duct tape - probably to try and keep them airtight.

Music sounds like it’s drifting towards you from the cab - or maybe someone is playing it on a boombox inside the camper, nevertheless, the closer you get, the more you think you recognize the song.

You suppose you shouldn’t be surprised by their presence. It is the perfect spot to drop the tailgate or roll down the window and peek out at the stars. Especially if you’re avoiding a crowd. Maybe they’d expected one, had somehow mistaken the day and parked early in their usual spot, just to be safe. It’s close enough to the Chasm that it makes sense, and it’s far enough away from the main parking area that they wouldn’t be caught in the rush of traffic when everyone tries to leave at once.

They’re listening to Dolly Parton’s Jolene, you realize. Not a cover version though, it’s the original, a bit fast paced, full of the frantic energy of a woman pacing back and forth, pleading hurriedly with Jolene to stay away from her lover. As you approach, you cross to the other side of the road. No need to intrude on them if they’re not alone, and you don’t want to risk being hit by a suddenly opening door. It’s then that you see their window is rolled down though, feet hanging out the metal frame, wearing a pair of black, worn down men’s ankle boots. Smoke billows out the window as you get closer, heavy and mildly skunky, and you expect you’ll be able to pass by them without a word. They’ve probably been smoking for a while, way out in the middle of nowhere.

You kick at a small pebble, smiling and shaking your head as you start to pass, and then jump when the man bolts into a sitting position. The guitar in the song seems to speed, like the tape is running a bit too fast, and that’s when you see his face. His pupils are blown wide in pale brown eyes, his face is a milky white, save for twin splotches of the faintest pink on his cheeks. His lips are dry and bitten. He has stubble, too-thick on his chin and upper lip, like he typically lets it grow, and what looks like small sideburns under his ragged mop of wavy brown hair. The cherry of the blunt in his hand is still bright, still in the process of paling- and then he’s choking, coughing up a storm as small puffs of smoke drift out of the window, immediately caught and carried away by the soft breeze.

You wait for him to stop coughing, because it only seems polite, though you don’t move from your spot on the other side of the road. He flaps his hand at you, as if he’s asking for you to wait, and that’s when you notice that he’s missing the tip of his right ring finger, rounded smooth just above the first knuckle.

“Hi?” You offer, when he turns to scrounge in his cab, bent awkwardly at the waist as he hurriedly sucks at the remnants of a drink in a fast food paper cup. “You all right over there?”

He scrambles to pull his legs back in through the window, looking harried as he sets his blunt and drink down. He brushes awkwardly at his shirt and coat, like there might be lingering crumbs hiding on the lapels. “Yes,” he says quietly, roughly, still adjusting his jacket, “yes, m’alright!” He says a bit louder, and then crosses his arms, leaning his elbows on the window frame and then his chin on his forearms. His grin is lopsided and strange-looking and- he is most definitely high. “And you?” He asks, blinking repeatedly to focus better upon your face. He rubs his chin against his forearm, a bit of hair sticking to his lower lip, but doesn’t seem to care that you’ve watched him make a fool of himself.

“I’m well, thanks,” you tell him, trying not to smile too widely. He seems to be trying to match it, slight dimples appearing in the middle of each cheek, gaze still slightly unfocused. “Visiting the Chasm?” You ask, continuing on in the vein of manners. You don’t mention the smoke. Some people are terribly quick to offer a puff, which is kind, but you don’t know the guy and.. You blink. There seems to be something off about his teeth - or maybe it’s just the way he’s leaning on his arms?

“It’s tradition,” he confesses, and then tilts his head, pursing his lips as if he’s realized he just forgot something. There’s a mild bit of guilt written in the curl of his mouth. “Coming out here, I mean. I do it every Spring, if I can manage it. It’s what- what I’ve always done.”

“It is lovely this time of year,” you agree, licking your lower lip before you turn your eyes to the cracked road still stretching out ahead of you. There’s still another 15 minutes or so until you reach the Chasm proper, but you can chat for just a bit longer before you should leave.

“Isn’t it just? The stars,” he says with a soft sigh, his teeth catching your eye again. Something about the tone, the longing in his words makes you shiver. “You a local?” The man asks, blowing awkwardly at the hair stuck to his lip. He gives up after two tries, brushing it away with the edge of his thumb and then shrugging when he notices you watching. He doesn’t even attempt to act contrite - apparently, he doesn’t mind looking a bit silly.

“It’s a favorite haunt,” you say in answer, tipping your head towards the road. “I used to spend a lot of time here during the summer, though I doubt I’ll get the chance this year. Was trying to catch a glimpse now, to make up for it.”

He leans forward a little farther, glancing up and down the empty road. “Bit of a walk for just a glimpse,” he teases and then his eyebrows raise. Dolly Parton’s Jolene comes to a close as he opens up his passenger door with a creak. The hinges sound like they desperately need oil and both of you cringe in tandem when the noise finally ceases. He clears his throat as he gets out of the truck cab, bowing awkwardly, like he's trying to be charming while he nearly tangles himself up in his jacket. He smiles brightly once more. “Perhaps you’d like a ride?” He asks smoothly, and then his smile falters when he sees the way you’re staring at his mouth.

“Are- are you wearing Halloween fangs?” You can’t help but ask, taking a few steps closer to examine them. They're pearly white and even, and they look way more natural than the caps you've seen sold on Halloween. Then he closes his mouth, lips pressed tight together to hide them from view and hums.

For a moment, he rocks back and forth on the heels of his boots, wrapping his hands around the edges of his jacket, torn with indecision.

“That wasn’t long at all, was it?” He sighs, following it with a drafty sounding laugh, not quite meeting your eyes. You’re fairly sure he’s talking to himself, rather than you. After another huff of a breath he straightens up, grinning widely again, displaying his sharp edged canines. “Didn’t even get the chance to introduce myself before you found out I was a vampire! I’ve always been rotten at it though. ‘M Warren." He crosses the road until there's only a few feet between you, offering his hand like he fully believes you'll shake it.

All you can do is stare.

"You're a vampire," you say, testing the words out, wondering if you've brought this strangeness on yourself. You were only trying to be polite, and now-

"Mhmm," Warren agrees, wiggling his fingers, like he thinks the reminder will tantalize you into shaking his hand. "You're at little risk from me," he adds, hand dipping, but not dropping completely. "We're not exactly like the stories," he shares in a low voice, like it’s a secret. Like there might even be a chance of someone lurking about to hear him say it.

Your heart jumps into an unsteady gallop of rhythm, and you can't deny that you're nervous now. Vampire! This guy is either fucking with you, or he's.. Maybe he's been doing harder drugs than just the pot.

"I see," you say, not seeing at all. You bite your lower lip and try not to worry at the tender flesh. Warren wrinkles his nose, like he can scent the lie, and then he jumps when you shake his hand. You're doing it to be obstinate, really. To gauge his temperature and then maybe you'll be on your way. But his hand is terribly cold. Much colder than it should be, unless he's been sitting in front of his air conditioner, running it at full blast, or he has some kind of blood circulation problem. Though- though you’re not entirely sure an air conditioner could make someone feel so strange.

Your eyes dart to the truck, half expecting to hear the thrum of the air conditioning under the still-playing tape, but- no. It isn't on. The key is in the ignition, keeping the music going, but otherwise the truck is off. His skin is cold, he’s wearing- He has fangs? And he’s out in the middle of nowhere smoking who knows what.

You drop his hand, trying not to let the strain show in your smile. “So if vampires aren’t exactly like the stories, what are you like? No.. drinking blood or turning into bats?”

Warren laughs. “No bats for me! Screechy little suckers-” Warren clamps his mouth shut, nose wrinkling, lips trembling and then forcibly clears his throat. “Pardon the pun,” he chokes out, trying to hold back another round of laughter. “Blood drinking is true-” he starts, but the laughter fades as soon as he notices the wariness in your eyes, in the way you hold yourself. Shoulders back, hands starting to fidget. “We don’t need it,” he says, tone gentle, raising his hands to either side. It’s a clear gesture of harmlessness, and truth be told, you don’t have any reason to.. disbelieve him.

“Let me guess,” you say, forcing yourself to laugh, “you drink animal blood?” This is fine. Really. He’s being conscious of personal space and sure, maybe he’s.. He’s weird, but Warren is keeping back and isn’t pressing you to believe him or insisting on giving you that ride.

Warren grimaces. “Noo,” he murmurs, drawing out the word, staring down at the ground like he’s- like he’s disappointed, or maybe ashamed would be a better descriptor. The negative feeling seems to be directed at himself. “Humans are all we can drink. Like I said though, we don’t need it. We’ll live just fine without it.” He’s rubbing awkwardly at his arm, still staring at the ground, like he’s afraid to meet your eyes now.

“Vampires.. Can live without blood?” You ask, eyebrows raising. You should probably just walk away. It’s not like he’s trying to keep you here any longer, and you’re fairly sure he wouldn’t lift a hand to stop you if you did. And then, then there are the things he’s claiming. “Alright. Listen, the cell service might not be the best out here, but should I, uh, call someone, or-?” You take your eyes off of him, just for a second, to fish about in your pocket for your phone. When you glance back up he seems momentarily frozen, expression vacant.

Warren’s shoulders slump, but he finally lifts his gaze away from the road, flashing you a smile that’s awkward at best as he shakes his head. “No need,” he tells you. “Anyway, the Chasm! Can still offer you a lift, if you’d like, but if not, be careful on the edge, yeah?” He turns away, footsteps slow.

You don’t believe him and.. And that fact alone seems to have hurt his feelings. You can see that he regrets that he said it, even though he’s still not attempting to dispute it. It’s just- he’s high as a kite, thinking he’s a vampire of all things. Or maybe he made a stupid decision and got some kind of mod done to his teeth and he’s embarrassed about it. Your brain seizes onto that thought with all the metaphorical strength it can. People are weird, and things like that are totally within the realm of possibility, aren’t they?

“You know what?” You call out before he can reach his truck. “Yeah, I will take that ride.” You smile brightly when he glances at you over his shoulder, confusion written clearly in the arch of his eyebrow. If he’s manipulating you in any way? You can just push him over the chasm edge and call the cops. There’s a shelf that won’t let him fall too far and... your smile turns a little wry. And if he is a vampire of any kind - and you can barely believe you spare that a second of thought - he’ll be absolutely fine.

“Of.. Of course,” Warren says, still sporting wide eyes and a concerned arch to his brow. He bobs his head, decision made, before waving you closer, leaving the rickety passenger door to you as he circles the truck cab. The driver’s side door is just as creaky as the other, though this time he tries to dampen his wincing with a very put upon smile. As soon as you’re both inside, buckling up the ancient seatbelts, Warren is fiddling about with the radio dials. He’s still sporting a tape player, but the surrounding machinery has been upgraded and all it takes is a quick twist before the tape is rewinding. Your attention turns to the floorboards, which are… Mostly clean. There’s a small, rickety looking cup holder coming out from underneath the front seat, housing the paper cup he’d been drinking out of. Part of you is highly tempted to tease him, to ask if the cup is full of blood, as it does house something dark - but… You’ve no desire to be cruel.

His blunt, just barely leaking any smoke now, is laying carefully in the ashtray, filling the cab with the heavy scent of pot. He doesn’t seem to notice though. Or it might just be that he’s trying to stay focused, to keep from making you uncomfortable. He still hasn’t denied that he’s a vampire though, hasn’t interrupted the quiet to tell you that he was joking.

“You said that visiting the Chasm is tradition?” You ask as he starts up the truck. Unlike the doors, there’s only a very small splutter before it shifts smoothly into gear, rumbling under your feet. The tape clicks and starts playing, Susie Q filling the small space, a fine layer of static mulling some of the words. It’s a mixtape then and- Your eyes trace his profile, the way he nervously licks at his lips, eyes focused on the rearview mirror as he backs up off of the embankment. His teeth catch your eye again when he opens his mouth to speak, but now that you know they’re there, you doubt you’ll be able to look away. Give him a pair of bell bottoms and he’d look like he was from the 70s. Maybe a little more trimmed up though, his sideburns aren’t quite that prominent.

“Yeah,” Warren agrees, a bit of brightness filling his eyes back up. “Every spring, me, Maria Hargrove, and at least two of her brothers - usually Daniel and-” His gaze darts to you and then his mouth snaps shut for a few seconds. He looks startled, like he hadn’t really considered sharing the information in the first place. “We- we used to come out here and smoke. Listen to some music for a bit.”

“Maria and Daniel are.. busy?” You ask, though you have the feeling that you probably shouldn’t. That’s pretty much prying, and you’ve done your best to sidestep any truly personal questions he’s asked you. “Sorry, that’s none of my-”

“S’ok,” he tells you, shrugging one shoulder. “Uh, no, not busy. They’ve.. They’ve been gone for a while. Accident,” he confesses, hand flexing on the steering wheel, drawing your attention to the tip of his missing finger. You open your mouth to apologize, but he makes a strange little hum of a noise and it takes you a moment to realize he’s trying to harmonize with Susie Q before he starts quietly singing along. For as lovely as his speaking voice is, his singing voice is rough from disuse. It’s not bad - not at all, but his tone sounds a little off. You willingly let him change the subject with his little sing-along, knowing it’s all to avoid an uncomfortable conversation about loss. Maybe Maria and Daniel have something to do with his claims of vampirism. He clears his throat after a moment, the truck still trundling down the road. The Chasm is almost within sight though, road turning from cracked asphalt to gravel and dirt, widening out as the trees start to thin. He grins, dimples appearing. “A singer I am not,” he tells you. “Luckily, the Chasm is in view and you won’t have to suffer much longer.”

“I wasn’t suffering,” you insist, clutching at the door handle when the truck comes to a noisy stop. “Your breaks sound like they are though. Do you usually work on it, or-”

“I should,” he mumbles. “I have the time, don’t I?” Warren puts it in park and then reaches out for the blunt still sitting in the ashtray. “Ah, did you want some?” He offers it to you with his right hand, patting at the pockets on his left for a lighter.

As harmless as he still seems, you’re not sure what all he’s been smoking still. You decline, though he doesn’t take offense, staying buckled up in the cab to smoke as you get out of it.

“You can sit on the hood if you want,” Warren chokes out before you can step away, eyes blinking rapidly to keep from breathing out before he’s ready. Part of you thinks you should decline, that you should go park yourself on the Chasm edge and lay back to watch the stars, but- he’s not bad company. Warren just has issues, and the soft music still coming from his truck is a nice accompaniment to the wheeling stars overhead.

“If you don’t mind the company?” You ask, pausing with your feet just outside the door. He bobs his head and gives you a thumbs up, so you close the passenger door before you clamber up onto the hood. It’s warm under your hands, but warmer under your thighs and as soon as you’re comfortable, leaning gently back against the cool windshield, Warren is getting out of his truck to join you. He stays on the opposite side, not wanting to encroach on your personal space still, and finally breathes out, watching the wisps of smoke vanish on the breeze. You can’t quite keep your mouth shut, it seems. “So humans are all you can drink. But you don’t need it?”

Warren’s fingers spasm where they’re resting on his middle and his eyes dart to your face. With the fast fading sunset, his eyes are dark now, the pale brown of them only a memory. He looks terribly surprised by your question and stares for a few more moments until he seems sure you meant to ask. “It.. it erases the pain,” he finally says, hand stealing up to brush over his chest. If it wouldn’t cross a line, you’d be tempted to reach over and feel for a heart beat, just because he seems so damnably sure about all of this.

“...human pain?” You ask, confused by the statement.

“Ah, n- sort of? Taking blood from a human shouldn’t hurt. If you do it right, it should feel good,” he says, and his eyes drift to your wrist and then dart away. “Or at least, uh, numbing? I- I’ve only been on the receiving end of teeth the once, so.. Pain! We were, uh, talking about it erasing pain.” His fingers dig into his shirt, though his eyes stay on the stars overhead.

“We- vampires,” he corrects, absently, “are frozen. We’re cold, our bodies- it’s all dry, aching muscles and a vast emptiness in our chest. With fresh blood? We can feel again. More than pain,” he adds on. “It’s thawing, like a hot drink after your bones are aching from the cold.”

“And if you can’t get any?” What he says is fairly mesmerizing. You’ve never heard a take on vampires that sounds quite like this, at least, not that you can recall. Whatever Warren’s issues are, he can sure spin a story.

“If I can’t get any, if it isn’t being given willingly, then I smoke. I can eat food, but that’s like- like eating oyster crackers to stave off the hunger pangs while you wait. It doesn’t really fill me up.” He sighs, breathing out the tension that’s been sitting heavy on his shoulders since you rejected his claims earlier. “Drugs are the easiest choice, really. Killing is- is much harder than many imagine it to be, even if you have the strength to do so. It’s such a ripoff, isn’t it?” He asks, though not like he actually thinks you’ll have a solid answer. ”Stay pretty, supposedly, give what humans you trust pleasure with the bite, but-” He grunts, shoulders slumping. “It’s all worse than dry mouth,” he tells you with a sigh.

You just barely keep from scoffing. Dry mouth? That’s what he’s comparing vampirism to? “And the stories of vampires that most people grow up on?”

Warren glances at you, frowning, like he wishes you hadn’t asked. “If you’re emotionally strung out about it, you won’t get far. Not everyone has the same kind of physical pain tolerance either, and depending on how they try and manage it?” He grimaces.

You hope you’ll live to regret this. You suck in a breath, trying to keep your expression serious, but open and then you sit up to offer him your wrist. “If you’re hungry,” you start, getting ready to offer in words as well. Warren bolts upright though, hair a mess around his startled face.

“You don’t have to believe me,” he says sharply, looking a little frightened at your potential suggestion. “And I’m not- I’ve been smoking. I’m not a danger to you, or- or anyone else.”

“Did I say that?” You ask, because he seems to be gearing up for a long explanation about how he doesn’t need it all over again. “I won’t press if you really don’t want it, but you said it eases pain, and if you’re in pain and you’re actually a vampire then- well, it’s supposed to feel good on both sides, or numbing, if you do it correctly, right?” Your offer isn’t completely altruistic. If he’s just high, you’re fairly certain he’s going to back off, or maybe bite you for a handful of seconds without breaking the skin. If he’s a vampire? Well, then he was telling the truth this entire time and you’ve.. Kind of been pushy about this. Truth be told, you’re not entirely certain what you’re going to do if he is telling the truth, but you do want to know.

Cautiously, like you’re made of fragile glass, Warren takes your hand in both of his. Even now, his hands are still that strange, overwhelming cold. His hand starts to shake when his thumb traces over the fine veins at your wrist. “If you don’t like it,” he starts, licking at his dry lips, “tell me. I’ll stop. I don’t want- I’ve never been in the business of scaring people.” That, at least, feels absolutely certain.

“Go ahead,” you tell him, unwilling to look away, even though he’s obviously nervous. He opens his mouth, lifting your wrist and then takes a deep breath, like he can taste you before his lips have even brushed your skin. And then his teeth graze over your pulse.

You’d thought his hands were cold, but that is as nothing compared to the crackle of ice that seems to zip down your wrist. You can see that his lips are pressed over whatever small wound he might have made, slightly rough from dryness, but then you blink, and you feel almost as inebriated as you’ve imagined he must be. The cold fades, and then your ears and extremities all grow warm, a soft, fuzzy feeling traveling from your wrist, out to your fingers and up to your elbow. It isn’t sexual - not now, though you’ve no doubt it could be, but a giddy pleasure leaves you light headed and smiling. You feel like you could lounge out here the rest of the night and never grow cold. Warren sucks then, lighting every synapse in your brain on fire, tracing whatever wound he made with his tongue and then he pulls away. You have to bite your lower lip to keep from asking him to keep going.

Even in the dim light of the stars, you can see that he’s changed. He still has messy hair and a goofy smile, but his cheeks are flushed healthily and his lips are no longer dry. Even the tip of his nose is a fair bit darker and when his thumb rubs against your wrist, he now feels… Almost warm. Not normal, not really, but that biting cold is gone from his fingertips.

“That- that couldn’t have been much?” You mutter, shaking your head to try and throw off the fog in the back of your brain. You feel good, but you’re not sure you can stand up, not just yet, and you know that realization should be a little worrying.

“No,” Warren says and he looks offended. He lets go of your wrist, placing both hands in his lap, dragging his hands up and down his thighs. “You’ve never been bitten before! I’d already sprung the knowledge that vampires exist on you a bit early, I wouldn’t-”

You can’t help it, you start laughing. Partly because of the buoyant feeling floating through your system, but mostly because Warren had been telling the truth, in all things. He definitely wasn’t in the business of scaring people, and he’s a vampire. “Vampires are real,” you breathe out, flopping back against the windshield a little hard. It doesn’t crack, but the sudden motion is startling enough to make you wheeze. Warren immediately reaches out, but then freezes, hands hovering over your shoulders before he decides to keep his touch to himself. “Is Keanu Reeves a vampire?” You demand, laughing again when Warren stares at you blankly and then sighs.

“Why would I know?” He asks, mirroring the way you’re laying back. “I’m from the middle of nowhere - I don’t exactly have any claim to fame.”

“So vampires don’t all know each other?”

Warren looks terribly disappointed in this line of questioning, so you leave off with a shake of your head, still smiling. The light headed feeling is fading away though, relief settling into your bones. You just happened to meet a vampire with chronic pain on a backwoods road at sunset and he’s ridiculous and.. Kind of sweet.

“I’ve missed coming out here,” you say, willing to change the subject. You nod your head towards the chasm, towards the space on either side that’s usually filled with cars. “It’s always such a nice spot.”

Warren hums again, tapping his fingers against his knees. “It is. Coming back here, even after- The Chasm has always held good memories for me.”

It takes everything you have not to blurt out Maria and Daniel? when he says that, still teetering on the edge of bite inebriation. You must make some kind of motion though, because Warren turns to you, smiling, teeth catching what faint light there is and drawing your eye.

“Time always kind of.. Presses in on me. This is one of the few spaces that the pressure of it, the layers of memories, are all good ones. With Maria, Daniel and Christopher. With Kara a few years after this happened. With- with you, now,” he teases, very, very gently elbowing you in the side.

“Have you been flirting?” You ask suddenly, thinking back over the goofy looking smile he’d first given you, the awkward little bow when he’d gotten out of his truck. You close your mouth as soon as you say it, heat crawling up your throat - though this time it isn’t accompanied by the floaty feeling he’d given you with the bite. This time it’s all embarrassment.

Warren clears his throat, and that silly-looking, dimpled smile he’d first given you returns. “Not very well, apparently,” he says. “I blurted out my deepest, darkest secret moments after we met, didn’t I?”

“It’s a wonder you’ve escaped the media,” you tease, settling back to watch the stars. Slowly, the hours start to slip by. You half expect this all to be some kind of fever dream, to have walked through an area with leaking gas and to wake up in the morning having hallucinated the whole thing. You lift your wrist more than once to glance at the spot where puncture marks should be - but there are only the faintest pin pricks, hardly visible in the low light, barely tender to the touch and all throughout the evening, quiet music plays from the truck cab. Popular tunes from the 70’s, Warren tells you when you ask and then pops up, concern in his eyes.

“Everything alright?” You ask, sitting up and groaning. Your legs and lower back are sore - laying on the hood of a truck isn’t exactly the nicest place to sit, and now that you don’t have the leftover buzz from his bite, you’ve grown cold.

“Leave the radio playing too long and the battery will go dead,” he murmurs, jumping off the hood and darting into the cab to turn the key in the ignition. The trucks rumbles back to life and you just barely catch sight of Warren’s guilty smile through the windshield before he’s backing out of his truck and stretching. “I, uh, don’t mind the company, of course, but I can stay out here all night without any issues. Do you need a ride back to town, or were you planning on, uh-” Warren glances over you and your obviously empty hands.

“It was kind of a spur of the moment thing,” you confide, shrugging when he raises an eyebrow. "I'm not in any hurry to leave though, unless you're looking to be alone for a while. I have intruded a fair bit already."

Warren shakes his head, leaning his elbows on the hood. “If you want to stay, I- well, I’d welcome it,” he tells you honestly, earnestly, and if you were just a bit closer you would have reached over to tug on one of the long locks of his wavy hair.

“Still hungry?” You tease, hesitant to push, but wanting the subject to remain open. You won’t press for details about his lost loved ones if he doesn’t want to share in the first place, and you’re kind of ashamed you had, but- it’s kind of hard to ignore the knowledge he’s shared with you, and you'd rather it remain on the lighter hearted side.

If he had the blood volume to blush again, you're fairly sure he would have. Warren laughs awkwardly, not quite looking you in the eye and scrubs his hand through his hair.

"I- we're always hungry," he says, a little too fast. "Or, mostly, we are, and if- I'm not saying I need anything- But if you’re truly offering-"

"If you are, I'm not opposed," you explain, a little flustered yourself. You have to force yourself not to fidget or let another awkward smile take over, to keep looking at his eyes, rather than his mouth.

Warren is back on the truck hood in barely a blink, hardly making a whisper of a noise, kneeling in his previous spot. For the first time, your heart truly speeds up in surprise. You hadn’t even seen him move. Reflexively, unwillingly, you flinch and then he’s pulling his hand away.

“No, wait, I wasn’t-” You snag his hand, but only because he lets you. After that little display, you know that he can move faster than the eye can see and your words trail away like smoke. The tension in Warren’s shoulders slowly eases, another one of those silly little smiles playing at the corners of his mouth.

“I very much doubt I could turn down such a lovely offer and not regret it,” he confesses, sitting carefully next to you, kneecaps brushing against your thighs. He’s moving slow now, still a little embarrassed by his eagerness. His hand isn’t quite warm any longer, but it’s still not as chilled as it was a few hours ago, the rounded knuckle of his pointer finger trailing over your left hand. Like earlier, Warren wraps his fingers around your wrist, delicate with his touch, but pauses just before he touches his lips to your skin. You lift your eyes from his mouth, startled again to find him so close even though he hasn’t moved from where he’d settled next to you. His eyes look black now, with such little light in the sky. If he tilted his head back, you’re fairly sure they could clearly reflect the stars overhead, and his mouth- “Are you.. Only offering your wrist?” He asks quietly, voice such a soft whisper that his words are nearly carried away by the breeze. You’re fairly sure they only make sense because you’d been staring.

You haven’t known him for more than an evening, but you get it now. All the widespread stories of vampires, soothed only fractionally by blood, strung out on their emotions and aching with pain. It’s no wonder that those are the ones most people remember, that people laugh them off when reading horror novels or watching movies in the theatre. You hear hints of the softer side of things, of seduction, but half of those stories still end in bloodshed. Vampires like Warren though? Soft eyed and awkward, trying to flirt for their dinner and then move on through life, quietly hiding their aches and pains? You think of the people you’ve known for years, the ones that always have the best stories, that yammer because they’ve been smoking too much… You wonder how many of them have been turned. You kiss him, then. It almost starts because of that thread of guilt wrapped twice over around your thoughts. Because you’d doubted him, even though he hadn’t given you a reason to. Warren’s fingers curl gently around the back of your neck, his thumb stroking over the pulse in your throat, lips opening so his tongue can trace your mouth. He hums again, that lilting noise he’d made earlier, like he’s attempting to tune himself to the soft sigh you breathe out against him. He doesn’t speed up, doesn’t tear his mouth from yours to rush things along, he just keeps kissing you, his long hair brushing against your cheeks as he tilts back your head, inching closer. His fangs brush against your lower lip and that zip of chill rockets through your mouth, across the tip of your tongue and down until you feel like you’ve broken out in goosebumps. Warren tilts his head and what little blood there might have been on your lip is gone. Warmth spreads, leaving you light headed and tingling and leaning in- and only then does Warren take his mouth from yours. He trails soft kisses along your jaw and up to your earlobe, barely brushing it with his normal teeth and then moves back down. By the time Warren bites you, sharp fangs pressing right over the pulsing artery in your neck, you’ve all but draped yourself over him.

His right hand, still curled around the back of your neck, adjusts so he won’t strain you and then his left hand is trailing over your chest. He doesn’t dip under clothing or fondle roughly, he’s slow, as steady as the intoxicating pull of his mouth over your pulse. Every touch though, every stroke of fingers or caress through your shirt, brings that feeling of euphoria higher. You’re not sure you’re ever going to laugh over the thought of seductive vampires again, not after knowing what it feels like to have them bite you. Not after knowing what it sounds like when he moans against your skin. For just a moment, that sharp edged feeling returns, and the smallest thread of pleasure-pain has you tensing, thighs starting to shake. Warren’s left hand strokes over your thigh and then all he does is squeeze your knee.

The orgasm is near blinding, spiraling through you for far longer than you’ve ever held one on the edge and even after Warren pulls his teeth away, after his mouth is nothing more than lips, soft and warm against your skin, you’re not quite sure that you’re coming down from it. You realize, after a moment, that you’re starting to wheeze, because everything feels ridiculously, wonderfully good but-

“How do people walk after that?” You gasp, blinking rapidly as Warren laughs against your shoulder.

“Practice,” he murmurs, and his cheeks have heat now too. You press one of your palms to his chest, smiling when you feel an achingly slow beat against your skin.

“I would think practice might kill people first. Are you- are you sure it isn’t hard for-”

Warren presses a soft kiss to your jaw, leaning back so he can look you in the face. “If a vampire ever claimed that they’d lost their humanity, it’s very likely that they didn’t have it in the first place.” It’s the only time he’s ever sounded serious, sure of his words. Not nervous or-

“Well,” you tell him, clearing your throat and trying to straighten your shoulders. “I would like to put in another round of practice sometime then.”

Warren looks- soft eyed and kind of dopey, smiling at you, but the nerves are back as well. “Not just biting, I hope?”

Your eyes dart down to his lap and you can’t help but grin. “If you’re truly offering, I might be convinced.”

#exophilia #vampire boyfriend #monster boyfriend #male vampire x reader #d.darling writes

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collecting-stories · 4 years ago

Text

Bitch - t. 05 - Sarah Cameron

Summary: Sarah sees a video of John B and makes a final decision about the mess she’s in.

7 Scenes from the Same Summer Masterlist | Outer Banks Masterlist

✰ ✰ ✰ ✰

✰I've heard from everybody else, that you're so much better without me✰

She wasn’t sure exactly what she was feeling. Kiara had texted her, as if it mattered, as if she was still on the fence, telling her to watch John B’s story on Instagram. And there it was, a game of beer pong at someone’s house, she didn’t recognize it, though she spent several loops of the video just staring at the wall behind her maybe ex-boyfriend's head, and John B, kissing some girl.

She had committed the video to memory, sitting on the oversized chair in your bedroom trying to decide what she was supposed to do with this. It all boiled down to the most basic of details. He’d kissed another girl, a different girl, and maybe Kiara felt like that was some sort of offence or maybe she was rubbing it in Sarah’s face, either way...what was there to say?

All she felt was annoyed that Kiara would send her that video in the first place, that John B would take the opportunity of being on the island to monopolize her friends.

“What are you looking at?” You asked, coming in to the room, toweling off from the shower. Sarah’s eyes were glued to the phone and all you could hear was the sound of cheering and laughter coming from the speakers.

“I don’t even know.” She held the phone out to you and you watched it replay once again. John B sinking a ball on Pope’s side of the table before cheering, a little too excitedly for your taste though you couldn’t think of a single thing, other than Sarah, that you and John B agreed on. He cheered and then he kissed the girl next to him. Wrapped his arms around her and kissed her.

Sarah took the phone away after the second loop and opened her texts again, sending a single question mark to Kiara.

“Who sent it to you?” You asked, unsure where you were supposed to be stepping right now. Where you the concerned friend because you certainly hadn’t been yesterday.

“Kiara.” Sarah replied, “he’s calling me like twenty times a day and begging for me to hear him out and swearing that we’re still in love but all the sudden he’s macking on some random girl. Good for you John B, what the fuck am I supposed to do with that?”

“So you don’t wanna cry in a pint of ice cream or talk about how annoying that girl’s laugh is?” You asked, pulling your t-shirt over your head and wedging yourself onto the seat with Sarah.

“I thought I would. Like I watched it the first time and I was sitting there like, okay, feel sad. But nothing happened.” Sarah replied. “I meant what I said yesterday. It wasn’t some mind game to make you feel like I liked you. I’m not running back to John B or calling him and begging him to take me back. I don’t give two shits who he kisses. Like. I just want to be done with it.”

“I’m just a little cautious of that feeling, cause it wasn’t that long ago that you told me you didn’t know how you felt.” You replied honestly. You wanted to believe Sarah every single time she kissed you and told you that she liked you. But you were trying so hard to be cautious of what this was and wasn’t.

“Yeah, I know.” Sarah chewed on her bottom lip as she checked her phone, a response from Kiara. Wasn’t she pissed or anything? “I thought I was confused...I thought I needed this summer to just have some time away from John B and then we could figure things out. But the longer I’m with you the less I care about him.”

“But this is such a controlled environment.”

“It’s not rehab, babe.”

“You know what I mean. What if you don’t feel the same when we head back down to North Carolina? What if you get down there and John B is there...I don’t want to sound selfish but I don’t want this to end.” You admitted. Being a good friend, be damned. You loved Sarah and that kind of heart break was terrifying.

“Do you really think that’ll happen?” Sarah asked, shifting to face you, legs draping over your lap.

Your eyes met hers and you bit at your bottom lip, shaking your head, “no.”

Fears and insecurities be damned, you knew Sarah. She wasn’t just some girl, some Victoria from Poly Sci. She was your best friend. You knew all the things that made her happy, that pissed her off, that made her scared. You knew her and whether you had wanted to let yourself believe it in the moment you knew that when she told you she loved you she meant it.

Sarah brushed damp hair away from your face and leaned forward, kissing you. For a brief moment something in the back of her mind told her that she should post this on her stories. John B thought he was so clever, so irresistible, that kiss over beer pong was nothing compared to this. But just as quickly as the thought came, she lost it. Occupied instead with hitching her leg over you so that she could straddle your lap, bringing herself as close to you as possibly.

“You know, we should really try actually going somewhere,” you teased, “we head back down soon.”

“What did you have in mind?” She asked, hands traveling under your shirt, trying to convince you to stay in. She didn’t care too much about the sights outside of your bedroom.

“We could go to the beach?” You offered, swatting her hands away.

Sarah pouted, “with other people?”

“It’ll be so fun. Promise.” You did your best to persuade her, “come on, you owe me a proper date then.”

“We went out like...three days ago.” Sarah replied, pouting at you as she slumped down in the chair.

“Yeah...” you said, drawing out each letter of the word, “but that was before...ya know.”

“I know?” She asked, a teasing tone in her voice as she sat up. She knew exactly what you were saying. This would be the first proper date since the other day when she told you that she loved you and since she seemed completely over John B. It wasn’t something you knew exactly how to put into words. You didn’t want to call her your girlfriend and have her freak out but you had been mulling the word over in your brain since the other day.

“Sarah.”

“Before I told you I loved you?” Sarah said. She had said it enough times since then that she was completely comfortable saying it. The words didn’t feel like a lie. She didn’t feel like she was just saying something to push away feelings that she had for John B. Sarah knew she meant them.

“Yes, before that.” You replied. You hadn’t said it yet, you weren’t sure you could. You knew you did, you had loved Sarah since September but saying it meant letting her know. It meant that you put yourself at the risk of being completely shattered by her and you didn’t have the nerve for that yet.

“Fine. The beach it is, but then we’re coming right back here.”

“How can you not want to go to the beach?” You asked, happy for the change in subject. “You practically live on one.”

“Exactly!” She stressed. “I want to spend time with you.”

“You spend time with me every day, all the time.” You replied, “you have been since August. That’s like, almost a year of being stuck with me.”

“Which has obviously worked out in both our favors cause now I’ve got this awesome girlfriend.” Sarah said, reaching out for you and pulling you back into the chair with her.

“Sarah,” you bit your lip.

“I am not rebounding or having some summer fling or whatever...I like you. Love you. And I want you to be my girlfriend and yeah, I’ve never had a girlfriend before and it’ll take some getting used to on my end but I like you so much and I wanna be with you.” She insisted.

“I wanna be with you to.” You replied. And I love you. But that part you didn’t say.

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#sarah cameron x reader #sarah cameron imagine #sarah cameron fanfiction #sarah cameron fanfic #sarah cameron fic #sarah cameron x you #sarah cameron x y/n #collecting stories imagine #7 scenes from the same summer series #ssftss series #seven scenes from the same summer series #outer banks imagine #outer banks fanfiction #outer banks fanfic #outer banks fic #obx fic #obx fanfic #obx fanfiction #obx imagine

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echo-three-one · 4 years ago

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Chapter 34

THE ROAD SO FAR

To the notable few people reading this. I hope you enjoy! Cheers!

High and Dry

"Alex"

MacTavish Residence, Glasgow, Scotland

Alex joined the commotion going on in the living room while he was on his way to get Samantha a cup of coffee before she woke up. The group consisted of Soap, Price, Jack and France facing a laptop.

He peeked for a while and saw Ghost, Roach and Maxine on the other end of the video call. He had no idea why they'd have to do that but proceeded to listen.

"So uh… we didn't find a single body on the ship. It's possible the waves already washed them somewhere. Guess I'll have to check on local news for more information. But what we do have are coordinates to a Site Hotel Bravo?" Ghost asked and the name didn't ring any bells.

Price and Jack's heads turned after hearing it and they slowly speculated before replying.

"I'll see what I can find." Price replied as their feed slowly lagged due to internet failure. Francine looked like she wanted to say anything to Max but the call ended abruptly.

"How could she just leave without telling me?" Francine complained while storming off.

"Maybe she had her reasons?" Soap followed her trying to calm her raging emotion. Alex nodded to Jack and Price who nodded back and went to the office. He felt like words weren't necessary to tell him that they'll be planning on their next move.

With everyone else gone, Alex made his way back to their room where Samantha was already awake and brushing her hair in front of the mirror.

Setting the cup of coffee by the drawer, a smile escaped his lips as their eyes met through the reflection, where she saw Alex slowly approach her and hug her back as they slowly swung sideways.

"Good Morning, Gorgeous." Alex muttered and kissed her on the cheek while Samantha giggled at the ticklish feeling of his moustache.

"Good Morning to you too, Handsome" she replied while her hands looked for him and intertwined them tightly.

"Any plans today?" She mused, tilting her head enough to meet his lips as they kissed intimately.

"Hmm. Your best friend somehow made it to London today…" he murmured after their kiss, as Samantha's eyes opened wide.

"Hm?" was all she could say as their heads parted farther.

"My best guess is that they went back to the ship. Probably to look for Alexandra… or what remains of her." he continued as Samantha showed a worried look.

"Roach is with her…" he added once more in an attempt to not make her worry.

"I see what you are doing, 3-1." She mused. Alex's eyes widened to the sound of her using his code, he somehow found it… sexy.

"So we're using code names now?" He turned to Samantha who sat on the bed, the worry on her face was still obvious.

"Hey now." Alex called, smiling at the moment their eyes met.

"She'll be alright. She's got two strong soldiers around her. Don't worry."

"I guess you're right…" she sighed in resignation as Alex leaned in closer for a hug. The said hug meant to assure her that everything will be alright.

Alex spent most of the day with Samantha, judging on how busy Jack and Price were, he assumed they're going to be back on the field again, and that means that she'd be left all alone and worried.

They caught Soap and France doing the same too, but since they're both soldiers, they won't be separating from each other.

"I like to believe something's already going on with them." Samantha leaned in to Alex at the sofa, as the two watched Soap and France arguing at each other in the kitchen. It looked like they were seeing who gets to assemble a pistol first, but the bickering was longer than the actual game.

"Yeah? You should've seen them kiss back at the Gulag. That was uhh… a sight to behold?" Alex chuckled.

"Ohh they already did? I knew it. Even back at the infirmary, I could feel the both of them trying to vibe." Samantha mused and laughed and just after that statement. The two competitors already found themselves in a concerning situation. Soap was already on her back, his hands helped guide France's on the pistol, their faces were so close to each other, one slight turn could already be a potential time to kiss.

And that they did, Alex and Samantha saw France ask a question to which Soap answered by slowly tilting his head to her face. What happened next was that their eyes both closed and their lips met slowly at first then progressed into a more intimate session.

Samantha covered Alex's eyes and giggled as Alex did the same, laughing so hard that they were lying on the sofa.

After that, Price and Jack quickly announced that they'll be visiting Shepherd in Afghanistan. The two couples exchanged looks, where Samantha frowned as she realized that Alex would once again be placed in danger.

AFGHANISTAN

Alex didn't expect that they're going to visit Shepherd with full gear. It looked like Price and Jack made some negotiations to make this possible considering how the weapons looked expensive. Maybe earning favors was a good thing after all.

The rest of the team easily regrouped in Scotland, where Maxine and Samantha kind of got the whole MacTavish Estate to themselves. It's the safest idea aside from sending her back to her Dad.

Now, the rest of the squad is flying discreetly above Afghan borders on their way to Site Hotel Bravo. Intel suggests it's a hidden cave network which housed Shepherd's Elite troops called the Shadow Company, which the group already acquainted with back in London.

The plan is to stop Shepherd from finishing his EMP Nuke and attempt to destroy any trace of it from being rebuilt again. If possible, they could also use this opportunity to get intel on Nero.

"Da. There it is. The exact location of your coordinates." Nikolai announced over the comms. The rest of the team looked down on a barren canyon, no sign of anything that said "Camp".

"For a military base, this one looks pretty empty." Roach commented.

"Well, if intel's correct then whatever is below that would be the one we're looking for." Ghost said, putting on his new and improved mask.

"Prepare for dropoff." Price signaled as everyone quickly attached themselves to the hook, as they descended after Price's signal.

"Let's get evil!" He cheered as his foot landed on the ground, dust quickly blowing on the wind.

They all raised their suppressed weapons and hid on the nearest covers.

"Sandstorms brewing up. We'll use them for cover." Price announced as he and Jack crouched forward, hooking to a rappel slid down the ropes, as they stealthily took down two guards by the elevated area.

As soon as the coast was clear, the group now gathered by the entrance of the cave and began to split up.

Alex and Jack were to locate and plant charges on the Nuke, permanently erasing such weaponry off the face of the Earth. Soap, France and Ghost's task was to locate any intel regarding Nero while Price and Roach will try to find Shepherd and beat the truth out of him.

"All-righty, kiddo. Let's get a move on." Jack nodded as Alex followed his former CO inside the cave. The scenery turned darker as the rest of the team split up to cover more ground.

"It's almost pitch black in here…" Jack whispered as he toggled his flashlight.

"You're not using a flashlight? Can you see in the dark, Alex?" He asked with amusement in his voice.

"Not really. But I eat a lot of carrots." He joked, turning on his lights and pushing forward to the dark tunnel. As expected, Jack wouldn't get the joke. Alex knew that some things would never change.

"You hear that?" Alex mumbled as sounds of footsteps echoed on the narrow walls, causing the two to lean close to the wall and turn off their lights. With his eyes beamed on the light at the end of the tunnel. People in lab coats shuffled across the halls, making their path correct.

"This is the right way." Alex affirmed as they slowly pushed their way to the Lab in stealth.

Jack followed, guarding Alex's six, as they reached the main hall of the laboratory.

"This is Echo Three One, we already made it to the lab. Proceeding to locate the Nuke and plant the charges." Alex informed as they took cover behind corners, eyeing out for possible hostiles.

"Copy that three one, we're still on the lookout for Shepherd." Price reported.

"Uh.. Ghost kinda left us alone. He said he was going to cover our six but he's gone. This place is huge, we're still on the lookout for possible intel rooms." Soap muttered as Alex and Jack maneuvered the Laboratory as stealthily as possible.

When a small group of babbling scientists were heard from the halls, Alex and Jack quickly hid in the nearest room they could find, accidentally stumbling on the blueprints of the nuke.

The whole wall was filled with blue paper depicting an almost scale model of a rocketship. If this was the nuke Shepherd wanted, it was obvious why he desperately needed the money.

Jack's camera shuttered as he took a photo of the thing to report back to Price.

"So, how do we get rid of this?" he asked.

"More importantly, how is our charge going to set off that huge thing?" Alex asked and looked at the blueprints carefully.

"The engine." They both said, as they traced the engine.

"It's their final piece of the puzzle." Jack theorized.

"And we're lucky enough they haven't placed the thing yet." Alex continued.

The further they traversed into the lab, the more crowded it got. It was expected as they were building a huge EMP rocket nuke, and it was getting harder for Alex and Jack to advance further. Right now, their best option was to lock themselves in a comfort room.

"We need a diversion." Alex planned as Jack leaned by the sink, checking out his greying beard in the mirror.

"We'll wait for the others to alert the whole base." he replied. It was a risky move, but it would work. If they were to create their distraction in the lab, everyone would go here and make it much harder to set the charge.

"This is Echo Three One does anyone copy?" Alex's tone was annoyed.

"I guess they jammed this place up, kid. We're on our own." He said calmly as Alex clicked his tongue. Jack was right, they just have to wait.

But the anticipation of not knowing anything outside was worrying him. What if the nuke was already launched? What if the team already did their plans and they're still inside the damn comfort room?

Alex's mind was clouded with thoughts of failing. He was not used to this way of thinking, but ever since he met Samantha once again, he became more concerned of the safety of the group, more specifically, his safety. Back then, he was fine with sustaining injuries and being reckless, but now he wanted to get home from missions in one piece. Losing his leg was the last line he was willing to draw.

Then, the alarm systems blared, it was requesting every scientist to report to the bunker.

"See? All you need to have is a little faith." Jack smiled and readied his weapon, leaning closely by the door.

"After you kid, I always got your back." He said as Alex slowly flicked the lock open, his hand grabbed the door knob and slowly pushed it open.

Next Chapter : Red

Notification Squad my Beloved

@bumblingbee1 @enderio @smokeywhalee @samatedeansbroccoli @whimsywispsblog @ricinbach

#horrayfic #john soap mactavish #alex echo 3 1 #codmw #john price #gary roach sanderson #simon ghost riley #whateverittakes

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itsnsfwalways · 4 years ago

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Canyon Moon

A/N: WELCOME TO THE CANYON MOON FIC ! The chapters have to be split up and cut a lot shorter bc of sizing limits but I’m hoping you guys will still like it.

FIC MASTERLIST

WARNINGS FOR CHP. 1: swearing, mild drug use (weed)

CHAPTER ONE: the world’s happy waiting

The ocean has always been a calming place for you. Any body of water, really. The lapping of thewaves, the smell of salt, the course feeling of sand between your toes. It felt like home. So when you moved to Malibu, you found yourself lying on the beach until 4 am most nights, sometimes sleeping, but more often than not listening to music and writing.

Working as a songwriter for mostly just your friends, or as a fill in whenever someone wasn’t there, you were constantly writing. It was a lot easier to get deeper that way for you, not having to worry about sharing your secrets, and being able to mask it in other people’s voices. That being said, you had journals upon journals of your own songs. They were just for you, and occasionally your best friends, but it was something you were really proud of. After writing for the past 6 years, you’d like to think they were pretty good.

You’d gotten to your little spot around an hour ago, parking your pride and joy, an orange and yellow remodeled VW bus, which also functioned as your room most nights when you wanted to be out here, next to the sand.

The vibrant sunset had since dulled into a deep purple color, but it was still fairly light out. A small bonfire was lit in front of your blanket, keeping you a little extra warm even though it was still 70°.

Strumming your guitar, you moved away from the rock you were leaning against, a car’s headlights snapping you out of the haze you always got when you were out here. And also those two joints you had smoked already.

You raise your eyebrows at the fucking bright yellow Ferrari, hoping they were just stopping for a second.

Your prayers were ignored as a guy stepped out, a hoodie pulled over his head.

Shrugging your shoulders, you continue to play mindlessly, making up different melodies before creating a new one on top it.

Mr. Ferrari starts making his way over to you, which sends a flutter through your chest.

“Hey, just so you know, if you’re going to kill me, I’ve always wanted to die listening to Landslide by Fleetwood Mac,” you yell, grabbing your phone from your bag just in case.

The guy stops for a second and lets out a laugh.

“Definitely not trying to kill you,” he chuckles, and, oh, he’s British.

He comes closer and you come face to face with one of the prettiest people you’ve ever seen. Wearing a black hoodie with the words “Treat People With Kindness” embroidered on it, that’s cute, a pair of grey slacks, which you wouldn’t necessarily think of for beach attire, but he makes up for it by completing the look with no shoes.

“Do y’have a lighter I could borrow? Damn thing ran out and the gas station is just far away enough for it to be annoying.”

You laugh at that and nod, tossing him a random one from your bag.

“I feel that. I’m Y/N. Where you from?” You bluntly ask, because hey, he’s cute.

“Manchester, originally. Live near here now. You mind?” He asks, and you nod, scooting over to let him sit.

You’re hit with the smell of vanilla, leather, and just rich as he plops himself down, leaning against a rock a few feet away from you.

He points to your guitar, lips curled around the joint for a second before he inhales and asks,

“How long you been playing? Liked what you were doing earlier.”

You blush at this, barely remembering what you were doing.

“I have no fuckin clue. 14 years? Got my first guitar at 8 and fell in love.” You over exaggerated hugging your guitar, getting another laugh out of him, before you spit out,

“Oh, and thank you! I don’t really remember what I was doing to be honest. Just get in the zone sometimes. Do you play?”

He looks surprised at this, looking at you closely for a second.

“Uh, yeah, little bit. Been trying to learn more recently and kind of get my skills up.”

“Good for you! If you ever wanna play together, I’m literally always here. You sharing?” You smile, looking at his face in the orange light. His cheekbones are illuminated perfectly and you feel your throat go dry.

He nods and hands it to you, watching as you press the filter to your lips.

“What did you say your name was again?” You rack your brain and cannot remember him introducing himself.

“Didn’t. Harry, sorry that was a bit rude,” He mumbles, and you look at him funny.

“Are you like an FBI agent, Harry? Why so secret? And harassing young girls on the beach at night? With a fucking Ferrari? Come on, man, what’s your secret?” You tease, bumping your elbow into his side.

He laughs, shoving you with his shoulder lightly.

“Only harassing that’s going on is you interrogating me. But if I’m making you uncomfortable, I’ll leave right now. I should probably go, actually.” He rants, suddenly moving to get up. You turn your body quickly and lay your legs in his lap so he can’t move.

“You’re dumb. Secret, please?” You smile, blinking up at him.

He scoffs, shaking his head with a small smile, and pauses to run a hand through his hair. He takes a deep breath in before saying,

“I’m a musician, so that’s where the car and secret beach trips come in. I’m actually just starting to write for my next album, and I’m hitting a rut.”

“Oh shit, that’s what’s up! You’ll have to show me your stuff sometime. Sorry that I don’t know you, I’ve been living on the road for awhile so I listen to a lot of oldies. Plus, with hippie parents you don’t hear a lot of new music,” You explain, gesturing to your van.

He looks at you for a second before shaking his head, smiling to himself.

“What?” You grin, shoving his knee with your foot.

“You’re something else, s’all.”

“So I’ve been told.” A giggle falls from your lips as you lay down on the blanket, legs still in his lap, guitar now discarded to the side.

Looking up at the stars starting to form, you feel his gaze on you. Trying to figure out who this chick was, what stories she had, what witty remark was just past her lips.

“Question.” You say, propping your head up. Your hand finds it’s way on the back of your skull and you feel the blanket shift slightly underneath your elbow.

“Answer,” He responds with the same tone, tapping your knees with his fingertips.

“Would you wanna come with me so I can get a tattoo?”

He stops for a second and stares at you.

“Like, right now? You got an appointment?”

You grin and move off of him, ruffling his hair.

“Even better. I got cool friends.”

He takes his time packing up all your stuff, being as cautious enough to remind you not to cover the fire with sand in case someone stepped on it.

“This is my beach, Ferrari. No one comes here. Except handsome British guys, apparently.”

He looks up from the ground, where he’s stuffing your towel into your bag, and throws you a smirk.

“Thanks, baby. You’re gorgeous as well,”

“Blegh. Let me come introduce you to Sunflower,” you fake shudder at the pet name and he grins, pinching your side so he can laugh at your little jump.

You lead him over to your van, opening up the side door to show off your renovated home.

The entire thing was orange with white trim, big yellow sunflowers painted on the sides. The ceiling inside was painted a dark blue, the walls painted yellow.

A meditation rug was lying on the floor, a light brown wood flooring that matched the cabinets attached to the ceiling.

Your bed was all the way in the back, a simple white comforter on it. A mirror hung next to it, attached to the bathroom door. There was a small kitchen counter complete with a sink and a stovetop next to it. A small table folded out behind the drivers seat where a lounge area was located, orange cushions and fairy lights decorating the little couch.

All in all, it was a tiny fucking house in a car and you treated it like your baby.

“This is fucking sick,” he says, looking at the different artwork, posters, and decorations hanging all over the walls and cabinets.

“Thanks! Did it myself. Spent all summer working on it a few years back, I’m damn proud of it.”

There’s a pause for a second, trying to figure out how to best work this out.

“I’m cool to just leave my car here if you’re down to drive me. We’re going to one of my guy friends’ studio about thirty minutes from here,” you suggest, having a feeling Harry wouldn’t be down to leave his car here, no matter how secluded it was.

“Uh, okay. Should I be worried? Who knows what scoundrels you hang out with?” He teases, watching you go into the van to grab some things.

You glance back at him, laughing, before your breath catches in your throat. He’s since removed his hoodie and is left in a white tank top with small black print on the rib cage. Making a mental note to figure out what it says later, your eyes can’t help but drift to his arms. Illuminated in the car light, his biceps bulge as he rests his hands on the roof, leaning forward slightly into the car.

His tongue traces along his teeth, landing itself in his cheek as he watches you check him out.

“See something you like?” He asks, raising his eyebrows like he’s genuinely curious.

Your eyes flick back to his smirking face and you blink for a second, before responding with,

“Yeah, was trying to figure out what asshole uses a word like ‘scoundrel’ in 2018, what the fuck, Harry?”

He barks out a laugh and brings his fist up to his mouth to cover it, the other one coming down to hold his stomach.

“When you are done appreciating my humor, I need to change real quick. Spin around, please,” You come up from your squat and pull off your sweatshirt, not waiting for him to do that.

“Jesus, Y/N,” He exhales, spinning around and looking up at the sky.

“What? I gave you a warning,” you giggle, sliding your sweatpants down to slip into a pair of black volleyball shorts.

“By about half a second!” Harry exclaims. “You’re killing me.”

“Sorry, superstar, nobody is exempt from special treatment here.” You roll your eyes at yourself, what the fuck are you even saying.

“Mkay, you’re good.”

Harry spins around, eyes taking in your new outfit.

On top of your shorts was a giant Stevie Nicks shirt, one from her White Winged Dove tour.

“Shit, you might be a bigger Stevie fan than I am, and that’s saying a lot.”

“Fuck, you have no idea. My dad went to the fucking final show of this tour and met my mom in the crowd during Dreams. My mom made him play it when I was born because she swore Stevie brought me to them.”

You catch him staring at you and turn your head away, cheeks burning because you’re rambling and need to shut the fuck up.

He clears his throat and takes a breath before starting.

“Promise not to kill me when I tell you this?”

Holding your hand to your burning cheeks, you murmur,

“No.”

“Y/N!” Harry exclaims, finally coming in the van to tickle you.

“Okay, okay, I promise not to kill you,” You mock, waving your hands around.

“I was lucky enough to sing one of my songs with her along with Landslide and Leather and Lace.”

You drop your bag onto the ground as your jaw drops.

“Shut up. I don’t believe you.” You cross your arms over chest. “I don’t know if I’d be angrier if you’re lying or if it actually happened. Holy shit am I jealous.”

“Oh, I was crying onstage, losing my shit. She is, everything. Dreams was the first song I learned the words to, yknow? She truly is a magical being.”

“God. I’m definitely looking you up later because who the fuck sings one of THEIR songs with Stevie Nicks.” You sigh, leaning over to grab your bag and Doc Martens.

“Oh god.” Harry laughs, running a hand through his hair again, looking at you really intensely for a second.

“Not to sound like a dick, but do you really not know who I am?”

“I mean if you need your ego boosted I can lie?” You offer, before dropping the witty responses.

“But no, sorry. Like I said, I just.... don’t really listen to new music, and if I do it’s always my friends or some indie shit with an overused beat.” Harry laughs at that and you smile, yes, he’s not weirded out.

“Don’t apologize, please. I just, can’t be too sure, yknow? People like to use you, especially here. And you’re just a little too perfect to be true,” he sighs, pulling you closer to him by your waist.

Placing you hands on his chest, you look at him for a second before leaning forward and whisper in his ear,

“My tattoo awaits me, baby. Let’s go.”

He groans and leans his head on your shoulder, before letting you go and grabbing your bag for you.

Such a gentleman, you think to yourself, locking up Sunflower.

“Does your car have a cool name?” You ask, after buckling you, fingertips appreciating the rich black leather seat.

“Nope, but I’m good at nicknames. I’m gonna take a wild guess and say normal terms of endearment aren’t your thing?” He asks, making eye contact with you for a quick second as he puts his arm behind your seat before stretching slightly to look behind him as he pulls puts the car in reverse.

Looking up for a quick second, you remind yourself to breathe.

“You would be correct. Gotta use your brain if you wanna get me all jittery,” you tease, fanning yourself over exaggeratedly.

He gives you a side eye and smirks at you, popping a piece of gum in his mouth and raising his eyebrows, as if to say, game on.

“So where am I going?” He asks, starting to drive away from your special spot.

“Let us ask the oracle!” You hold out your phone like a trophy, before laughing to yourself and bringing up Google Maps.

Propping your phone up in the cupholder, you sit cross legged in just your socks in his seat, fidgeting with your hands for a second.

“I’m kind of intrigued on who you are now. What’s your story?” You ask, turning your head to look at him.

Harry glances over at you, eyes drifting to your bare legs for a second.

“Well, the short version, I guess, is I grew up in a little town in England with my mum and my sister, applied to X-Factor when I was 16, got put into a band called One Direction with four other lads, released couple albums with them until end of 2015. Then did a movie called Dunkirk, wrote and released my first solo album, and toured it. Just got back from tour about a month ago, actually.”

You look at him blankly for a second, and he shifts in his seat, removing one of his hands from the wheel to place it on the armrest.

“Holy SHIT am I unaccomplished,” you exclaim, hitting him in the chest.

“Hey!” he yells, but you cut him off.

“How many fucking albums is a couple? And how old are you, my god. That is impressive.”

“I’m 24, that probably should’ve been said before we’re alone in a car together. And 5 albums, in 5 years. Nearly killed us.”

“I’m 22. Damn, dude, that’s insane. It sounds like they horribly overworked you and I am hoping you were generously compensated and had a bit of musical freedom. I know how the music industry can be with boy bands.”

He nods for a second, licking his lips slightly, trying to figure out how to phrase his response.

“I’m not going to lie, there are some definite perks and I am so incredibly lucky to just be able to do what I love as my job.” His fingers find their way to his bottom lip, pinching it slightly. “It was fun, I mean, you throw a bunch of teenagers together and give them celebrity status? We were insane, and I enjoyed it. But.... it felt like I wasn’t a person anymore. I was just ‘Harry Styles from the boyband One Direction’.”

“I don’t necessarily understand but I think the fact that you came out this respectful and real says something. You seem to have your shit properly together, and, even if you don’t, you got back from tour two months ago! You deserve some relaxation. The world’s happy to wait for you to find yourself a little.”

Pausing for a second, you place your hand on his arm, squeezing it lightly before swearing,

“I hope you know I’m being genuine about not knowing you and latching on for fame. I’ll let your parents know my intentions with their son are all very pure.”

He laughs at that, glancing at you again,

“I appreciate you saying that. This life is wonderful, like I said, but it’s very stressful and puts pressure on every relationship. There’s always going to be stories or photos and rumors spread like wildfire.”

You shift in your seat, understanding that this was a very serious issue for him.

“Listen, I’ll let you know up front that that doesn’t bother me. I’ve dated musicians and know the life, I get it. I think you’re cool and that we could have a fun time experiencing real life together. But before we do that, you need to have fun and let everything the fuck GO. I’ll promise you right now, if you let me stick around, you’ll experience what life is. No fame or pining for success bullshit, no offense, but there’s no need for it. If you’re happy doing what you’re doing, no one can tell you you’re not successful.” Harry stops the car at a red light and fully turns to look at you.

He exhales harshly before grinning. “You are a breath of fresh fucking air, Y/N. I think you’re going to change my life, if I’m being honest here.”

“Here’s hoping,” you grin.

A/N: THE OFFICIAL FIRST CHAPTER IS UP !!! I’m hoping you guys will come to love this fic as much as I do. I’ll try to find a writing schedule that works with you guys and my work schedule, so sorry if chapters take a little bit to come up. This is going to be a looooong fic, so buckle up, turn that old lover’s hippie music on, and enjoy !!

- lana <3

#harry styles x reader #harry styles #harry styles fic #canyon moon #sunflower vol 6 #multi chapter fic #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles smut #dom harry styles

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