#ignore the jerky pacing

[saym0-0]

hi hello heres a wip animatic of my esmp jimmy never forgot au im brewing :33

rambles about the au under the cut vv

basically, the idea of it is that while lizzie went on land as in canon and forgot, when jimmy followed her he just. didnt forget. somehow. the curse thing just passed right on over him.

so basically hes just an immortal fish god woo! he spends most of his time up until esmp s1 disguised as a human, or another regular hybrid, and then in empires he still realises that lizzies his sister and he just never recognised her (not blue skin + a name she didnt have last time they saw each other + a long ass time does not usually equal recognition lawl)

post rapture he sticks with joel, and helps him achieve immortality and godhood, where he'll eventually become god joel of stratos.

the toy joke/relentless teasing is like. the sibling dynamic where you can bully and tease each other relentlessly but at the end of the day, if its a serious moment then they have each others backs. they've stuck together for a thousand years after all!

i have SO much to say about joel in this au but i'll probably save that for another post or maybe a reblog

[ckret2]

Chapter 49 of human Bill Cipher being such a miserable prisoner even the Pines are starting to feel bad for him: The Eclipse: Epilogue.

####

"The heck did you do to that poor woman?" Tate asked, staring out the window. Bill was sitting on the pier, legs dangling in the water, staring blankly into the depths. He was still muddy and trembling. "She looks more traumatized than when y'all left."

Ford couldn't meet Tate's gaze under the brim of his hat, but he could feel Tate raising a brow when he spotted Dipper pacing back and forth on the pier behind Bill, muttering furiously.

"We've had a very bad day," Ford said. 

"Uh-huh."

"Could I borrow your phone to call my brother?"

Outside, Dipper was oblivious to everything except the one line he'd managed to remember from the Axolotl, the words he'd picked out as they crossed the lake. "'Sixty degrees that come in threes,'" Dipper murmured. He knew that much. It was a poem. It was a rhyme. He couldn't remember the rest. What did it mean? He murmured it over and over to himself as he walked, trying to remember the next line, "'Sixty degrees that come in threes,' 'sixty degrees that come in threes'... breeze, freeze, ease, lease, knees—" He couldn't remember the rhyme.

Bill was considering grabbing Dipper by the ankle and dragging him off the pier just to shut him up when whatsisname, the younger McGucket came out of the shop. "Hello there? Miss Goldie?"

Human. Strange human. Human that Bill could get on his side. Be charming. He tried to remember how to be charming. He offered a feeble smile. "Yello?"

"I wanted to make sure you're all right," Tate said. "You look like you, uh... you've had a hard time."

Bill laughed ruefully. "Well, I've been dragged all over the mountain, I'm hungry, exhausted, and half-drowned, and I can barely walk—but I'm not currently dead. Allegedly. I'll take what I can get."

The corners of Tate's mouth twitched down in a concerned frown. "Is there anything you need? A..." He floundered for a moment, "A water, or...?"

"I've had enough water to last me a lifetime." He wondered idly whether he could claim he was too exhausted to make it all the way home—there was a sofa in the staff room, Tate would probably let the poor bedraggled "woman" take a nap, if Bill got that bit of distance between himself and the Pines maybe he could... maybe he could... do something with it? But he couldn't think of anything more definite than that and now Ford was coming back and the window of opportunity closed. He shrugged wearily. "Just need to get back to the shack. Thanks." He half heartedly used the lake water to wash the drying mud off his lower legs and knees.

"Stan will be here in about twenty minutes," Ford said, and tried to ignore the dirty look Tate gave him. 

"I'll be just inside if you need anything else," Tate said. "Watching." He headed inside—and then, indeed, stood at the shop window and watched.

Ford was never going to get on Tate's good side. He suspected Tate would be a little less sympathetic to the poor woman on the pier if he knew who he really was; but it certainly wouldn't make Tate like Ford any better for keeping him around.

"Nothing to do now but wait." Ford unloaded the rest of their supplies from the borrowed motor boat. He dropped Soos's Monster-Mon backpack beside Bill—it was heavy, Bill must have just shoved his clothes and bedsheet straight in without bothering to wring out the water—and the plastic bag of snacks Dipper had bought. "You ought to eat more while we wait." Ford nudged the snack bag.

Bill sneered at it. "I don't want that trash."

"What?" Ford examined the bag's contents. Jerky, chips, candy, cups of marshmallow cereal... "This is ninety percent of what you eat."

"Ninety percent of what I eat is what I can scavenge from the counters."

Ford looked through the bag again. Ah. Right. So it was. "If you want something else, you know you can ask us to..."

"Mac and cheese."

Maybe Ford had better stop talking. He sighed and glanced at Dipper to see how he was doing.

It didn't look like Dipper had even registered Ford's return, too busy pacing and muttering to himself. Ford frowned. "Dipper?"

"Axolotl," Bill explained. "He's obsessing over him. Didn't I tell you that meeting that thing would drive him insane?" He tilted his head toward Dipper. "Look at that, he's already mumbling to himself. Don't suppose you have his therapist's number, do you? I doubt that would save him, but it might slow the process—"

Ford shushed him.

Dipper had briefly tuned back into the conversation when he heard Bill say Axolotl; and now he grit his teeth and stubbornly tuned it back out. No. He was not going insane. Dipper would figure this out. If he just remembered the rest he'd be fine. He tried to go through all the potential rhymes alphabetically, "—bees, cease, d—deez?" That wasn't a word. "Fees, geese, he's..." and on and on, "seas, tees, uh... vees? Wheeze..."

"I've had enough of you trying to convince that boy he's about to go mad," Ford muttered to Bill. "What do you get out of saying that? Even if you do convince him he's insane, it won't make him start trusting anything else you say."

"I'm not lying," Bill said heatedly. "You ought to know that, you've been in the multiverse, you've seen plenty of maddening sights. You saw them before you even left the Nightmare Realm."

Ford hesitated before responding; was Bill trying to persuade Ford he was insane? But he could still remember those first few moments of terror in the Nightmare Realm: the creatures that had seemed to move and shift in impossible ways as they swam in and out of dimensions Ford couldn't see, the lights and colors that throbbed like an inverted migraine, Bill himself seemingly suspended a million light years away and a foot in front of Ford's face at the same time. Until Ford had latched onto his quest to destroy Bill and let that focus him, his mind had felt like an unraveling sock. "You were chief among those maddening sights."

"I was," Bill acknowledged neutrally.

"But I didn't go insane."

"Because you knew when to look away." He cast a sideways glance at Dipper, an implicit unlike him. "I know you used to read cosmic horror. Do you know why the narrator always goes mad just from looking at some giant beast? It's not because it's too ugly to take. It's because once you meet something, you try to understand it; but if you want to understand the reality something like that comes from," he rolled an eye up toward where the invisible Axolotl had hung in the sky, "you have to lose your understanding of your own reality. They're incompatible. Like the lunatics who escaped Plato's cave and came back ranting about nonsense like sunlight and colors."

It was a twisted interpretation of the cave allegory. Plato had meant it as a metaphor for education: that learning about the true nature of reality was enlightening, but alienated you from your peers.

Perhaps to Bill, enlightenment and insanity were the same thing.

Ford murmured, "Once your eyes have been too dazzled by the sunlight to see the dim shadows, you'll never be awed by a candle again."

"You have been there before."

Ford didn't answer.

"Once you've seen something like that, if you let yourself dwell on the significance of it all, you're doomed. Better to tell yourself it's unimportant and try to forget it ever happened."

Ford thought of Fiddleford.

Bill twisted around to snap tiredly at Dipper, "So stop staring at the sun before you go blind, moron."

"Shut up." Dipper had been trying to mentally drown out Bill's dire predictions by grasping for more rhymes—"disease, unease, Socrates"—but enough filtered through to make his stomach churn with nervousness. What if Bill was right? What if he never remembered what the Axolotl told him—what if he drove himself mad trying? What if this turned into a lifelong obsession—but he'd be fine and could let it go once he remembered—was that the trap? Was whatever it had told him impossible for a human to remember? Was it something so incomprehensible a human couldn't remember it without going crazy?

But he'd seen plenty of stuff last summer that was supposed to make humans go "insane." Bill had to be messing with him. He remembered the first line—surely that meant he could remember the rest—but was that part of the trap? "'Sixty degrees that come in threes'... come on, there's something else, I know it, what is it? 'Sixty degrees that come in threes'—"

Bill sighed irritably. "'Watches through the eyes in trees.'"

Dipper stopped pacing. He hadn't realized he'd raised his voice enough to be audible. "What?"

"What?" Bill said.

"What's the rest of it?"

"What rest of it? It's a couplet. That's all," Bill said. "Is that what he told you? He gets rhymey when he feels self-important, it's no big deal. Maybe you're lucky. Put it out of your head and you'll be fine."

Dipper turned the words over in his head. Sixty degrees that come in threes, watches through the eyes in trees... "That's not exactly right," he said slowly. "It was 'watches from within birch trees.'"

"Is that how he translated it? I've never heard it in English before. I got close, though, I knew it'd rhyme."

Ford echoed, "'Sixty degrees that come in threes.' Like a triangle?"

Dipper gave him a perplexed look. "What?"

"You're taking geometry next year, aren't you? The inner angles of polygons always have the same number of degrees; and a triangle has a hundred and eighty degrees. Three angles of sixty degrees forms... an equilateral triangle."

Dipper and Ford stared at Bill.

Bill gave them a tired, unreadable look. "What?" he said. "Don't look at me. I'm not the only equilateral triangle in the universe."

Well, now Dipper was sure there was more to the poem than just a couplet. "How many other equilateral triangles spy on people through birch trees?"

"Lay off," Bill said crabbily. "I didn't have to tell you that line. Don't make me regret it." He planted his elbows on his knees, laced his hands together, pressed his forehead to them, and massaged his eyelids with his thumbs.

He tilted slightly to the right, keeping the weight of his head off his left arm.

####

"Nice shirt," Stan said, eyeing Ford's anger management t-shirt.

"If you like it, you can have it."

"What happened to your coat?"

"Somewhere at the bottom of the lake," Ford sighed.

"How...?"

"I'll fill you in later."

Bill's trembling was almost unnoticeable by the time Stan arrived. Or, at least, it was slight enough that he could stand and make the short walk from the pier to the car without an obvious struggle. 

He climbed into the back seat, slid across the bench, leaned against the door, wrapped his arms around his Monster-Mon backpack, fell asleep, and didn't wake up for the entire drive home.

Dipper and Ford fell silent when they noticed; and, sensing the heavy atmosphere, Stan followed suit.

####

The event organizers for Higher Dimensional Gate had arranged for the Magister Mentium's audience to surround him in a circle with as large a circumference as possible, so that as many shapes as possible could pack into the first few rows where they could see him. Even so, the crowd was much too large for everyone to be in the first few rows. Speakers had to be planted throughout the crowd so that they'd all be able to hear the Magister speak. Most of his audience couldn't see him.

But he, with his all-seeing eye, could see all of them.

The crowd extended back, row after row after row, in every direction like flecks of multicolor confetti filling the air all the way to the horizon. He'd never spoken to such a large crowd before. He didn't think he'd ever seen such a large crowd before.

Not all of them were his worshipers. He didn't have that many worshipers. The rest were drawn in by his boast—to be the first shape outside of legends to predict an eclipse, over six months ahead of schedule. They were here for a spectacle. He meant to give them one.

If he succeeded, all these spectators would become his worshipers, he was sure of it. If he didn't succeed, he lost everything. The whole nation knew about his bet. He'd be financially ruined. His worshipers would abandon him. There would be no fleeing to a new town and starting over; everyone everywhere knew who he was. His life would be over.

This would be only the third eclipse he could recall. There's no way to neatly map shape ages onto human ages. Different year lengths, different aging speeds, different mental and physical milestones. But approximately, compared to a human, he was scarcely over fifteen years old. 

But he wouldn't fail. He pushed all his fears aside. He didn't even want to think about them. He wouldn't, because he couldn't, because he could see what nobody else saw. He could see the eclipse's approach.

It was traveling across the vast empty gulf outside the world.

The only other third dimensional objects he'd ever seen were the sun—which looked to him like a circle—and the stars—which seemed to be mere points. He assumed all third dimensional objects were fundamentally just second dimensional objects, moving on a strange plane. He had no capacity to model a 3D object in his mind.

But the eclipse was a beast that twirled and gyrated around impossible axes, moving and rotating in ways his eye couldn't even comprehend. To him, it looked as though the living creature—he assumed it was a living creature, sometimes it manifested a couple of limbs or an eye—was constantly shapeshifting, its perimeter moving and altering. Its uncanny undulations had haunted his nightmares for months after he first watched it, so young he'd barely started school. It wasn't any less nightmarish now.

But as incomprehensible and terrifying as it was, he could see it, and nobody else here could, and that was all that mattered. He could watch it on the horizon and publicly announce that it would cross the sun in two weeks—and then in about three days—and then, to his humiliation, not tomorrow but today, guaranteed, as the creature sped up and threw off his estimate. His worshipers and bemused spectators had taken over the square to while away the time. They'd quickly gathered around him to wait after he'd declared it would arrive within the hour

That had been almost an hour and a half ago. The stupid thing had slowed down.

The triangle was terrified.

In every direction, shapes were staring at him. Waiting. His father was watching him—his stare seemed to grow heavier by the minute. He could see reporters in the crowd taking notes.

He had to fight not to pace, not to cringe, not to show any nerves in front of the hundreds of eyes.

Now. It had to be now. It was so close. Please don't let him be wrong. Every cord in his body quivered in terror as he grabbed his microphone and announced: "Lines, bis, tris—quads, quints, and more! My dear students and beloved believers, and my—" he cut off the urge to say something nastier, "—curious visitors, who I hope will join our quest for enlightenment. This is the moment you've been waiting for! The eclipse is upon us! In less than a minute, it will begin!" He had to keep his gaze forward as he spoke, looking at his audience. (His mother had always said the way his eye went white when he was looking at the third dimension unnerved people.) "Soon—you won't have to take all my claims about the third dimension on faith. You'll be able to see for yourself the effect of the third dimension on the plane."

The crowd murmured excitedly. He could see his father relax. He stared up-but-not-north, gnawing nervously on his eyelid until he caught himself. The beast above glowed a warm pink in the light of the nearby sun.

And the stupid thing. Slowed. Again.

He stared in disbelief.

"Sixty seconds," his father whispered, out of range of the microphone.

His stomach flopped. He was dead.

"One minute, fifteen seconds. What's going—?"

He held his microphone away and hissed, "The eclipse decided to zigzag."

"Eclipses can zigzag?"

"Shhh!" He'd already failed. He'd already shown everyone he was wrong. He could hear the murmurs. His eye hurt from staring at the sun and from straining for so long to turn so far upward-not-northward, go faster faster faster—

There! The snout of the eclipse was this close to kissing the perimeter of the sun. He cried triumphantly, "Now!"

The wretched beast did a loop-the-loop around the sun and missed it entirely.

The triangle felt the last strands of his fraying self-composure snap.

He howled in rage.

He could hear laughs from the crowd. They felt like daggers in his sides.

"ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!" He was bellowing into outer space as if he thought it might hear him, "Do your think this is a game?! Is this funny?! Are you trying to humiliate me in front of the whole world!" His father put a hand on his arm; the triangle shoved him away. "Get back here right now! You thick, brainless, blobby, pink, feeler-faced two-eyed freak of nature! GET BACK HERE and LOOK ME IN THE EYE!" He was a lunatic, everyone would know it, their leader raving in a direction no one could actually see about some big pink delusion, what did he care, no one would ever take him seriously again anyway—

And the thing in the sky.

Stopped.

And looped back.

And came closer, and closer, and bigger, and bigger—it just kept getting bigger, how far away had it been before, how large was it, how large was the sun?

He hardly noticed the crowd's gasp as the creature twirled between them and the sun—the light shone through its body, pink with blood—and then out of the way, and then in again, and out—until finally it was so close that its perimeter completely engulfed the sun. He'd taken a field trip to the planet's surface once—an enormous solid mass of stone and crystal. Until now, he'd never seen another solid objects so large. To his limited understanding of 3D objects, it looked as though there were no organs inside its perimeter—just a layer of solid, uninterrupted flesh. He didn't know how it could even move.

It stopped straight over him.

He was sure the two black circles embedded inside its body must be its eyes. His whole life he'd heard psychic powers—psychic powers like his own—described as having an "inner eye." But he'd thought the phrase was just a metaphor. An eye on the inside of a body instead of on its perimeter would be useless to most people. He'd never seen a creature with an eye literally on the inside of its body. But the eclipse had two.

And they were looking at him.

A giant ever-shapeshifting cosmic horror from outside of reality, staring through the veil separating the sane world from outerplanar space, and it was looking—at—him.

He was terrified.

He heard an alien voice in his head, vast and deep and slow as distant whale song:

"Hello there!" It was overjoyed. It was tickled pink. "I've never been spoken to by a shape on the wall before. I didn't know you could see off of it!"

Weakly, the triangle repeated, "'A shape on the'...?"

"Yes, this wall of yours." The eclipse gestured with its tail at—everything. A single sweep that took in an entire dimension. "I've probably commuted past this wall billions of times, and nothing's ever called to me before. I didn't know shadows could do that!"

"'Shadows'?" the triangle echoed again. That was all they were? An eclipse's shadows?

"I'm absolutely delighted," the eclipse said. "First contact from a lower-dimensional species! I've watched you for eons and never imagined. Isn't this exciting! How charming of you! Tell me who you are."

Him? "Me?"

"Of course. Who else?" It stared at him. Only him. A shapeshifting force of nature the size of a planet with two inner eyes, an eclipse that saw him as a shadow—and it was looking only at him.

Weakly, he said, "I'm... the Magister Mentium."

The eclipse thought that over. Its tone was a tad dubious and not terribly impressed (why should it be impressed? he was embarrassed at himself for giving his silly puffed-up title)—but it said, "Yes, I suppose that's true. I am the Axolotl. It's been a pleasure meeting you." It began to shapeshift again—its eyes slid sideways through its body, until one reached its perimeter and disappeared.

It dawned on the triangle, in its first immature understanding of third dimensional objects, that its eye had disappeared because the Axolotl was turning away. "Wait!" he cried. "Why..." Why answer him? Why focused on him so completely, if he was just a shadow? Why ask who he was like he mattered? He didn't even know how to put those questions to words in his own mind, much less out loud. "Why are you here so early?"

The Axolotl turned back to the triangle. "Oh! I had to go back for some documents I forgot at the office. Big case in the morning," it said. "You shadows know my schedule?"

"You... pass in front of the sun."

The Axolotl turned away, eyes disappearing and frills fluttering, to look at the sun. "So I do! How funny." It turned toward the triangle and gave him a strange, grotesque look that—by the tone of its psychic voice—he suspected was a smile. "I must get going. I'll be heading into the office a few hours late tomorrow, but perhaps I'll see you again then." And it turned away. It felt like it took forever for the enormous body to sail over-not-north-of the triangle—and pass, at last, out of the sun's path.

The triangle didn't look down-but-not-south until someone shook his side—his father. He lowered his dazed gaze to the crowd—the cheering, applauding crowd. Ma-gi-ster, Ma-gi-ster. A sea of multicolor confetti shapes that filled the air to the horizon.

Shadows.

His father shook him again—"Go on, say something. They're waiting"—and the triangle held up his mic as though he were in a dream. He tried to remember what he was supposed to say. "I was right," he said flatly. "Just like I always told you. I can see the third dimension. The realm of dreams—of colors, of light, and..." The lies left a sick taste in the back of his eye. He couldn't say them. Points of light in darkness and pink nightmares.

"I'm s— You'll all have to excuse me," he said, his voice childish and small. "I can't—I've had a... a... profound... spiritual experience. I must meditate on the revelations I've received." The words felt like woo-woo mumbo-jumbo. "The next eclipse will be a few months after the new year." It seemed important, for some reason, to pass that information on. Wasn't that what he always said he did? Share the wisdom of third dimensional spirits with his followers? "I... have to go now."

His father took his elbow. "This is your moment," he whispered. "Come on, son—you don't want to lose your chance to speak directly to them, do you?"

He shoved the microphone in his father's side. "You speak to them."

"But—"

"I can't," he said. "I can't."

He cut through the crowd as fast as it would part for him—if they were any slower, he'd have started stabbing his way through—haunted the whole way by their applause.

####

And that was it.

From the Axolotl's perspective, he had just had a brief pleasant exchange with a precocious tadpole in a sidewalk puddle.

From the triangle's perspective, he might as well have been standing on the boat deck watching as Cthulhu rose from his millennia of dead slumber at the bottom of the ocean, turned to the fragile vessel bobbing on the waves, and said, "Good morning! Glorious weather we're having, isn't it?"

And from the perspective of the Higher Dimensional Gate, their Magister Mentium had predicted an eclipse, been rightfully insulted when it didn't come the exact second he ordered it, and furiously summoned down an eclipse darker and swifter and longer than any in recorded history.

Up until then, he had been seen as, at best, an oracle. A prophet. A messenger to share the secrets of the third dimension, but that was all he could do. But now, he had commanded forces in an unseen dimension, creating an eclipse months before it was natural. He had made it flicker on and off like he had his finger on the sun's light switch. News reports and the most unimpeachable scientific authorities reported that the eclipse had centered on the location of the Higher Dimensional Gate rally, narrowed down to an inexplicably small radius around that point, and then remained unchanged for several long minutes, long enough for anyone in its shadow to grow fatigued from the missing sunshine. Nothing like that had ever happened before. It defied every known fact about the science of eclipses.

People around the gathering—even people who had known nothing about the Higher Dimensional Gate rally—reported that during the eclipse, they'd become inexplicably disoriented, unable to tell compass directions, and had felt themselves fall toward the darkness—as if gravity's pull had suddenly moved from the south to the epicenter of the eclipse. Public building inspections confirmed that somehow the entire town had shifted, ever so slightly, closer to the epicenter. Closer to the Magister.

Never mind prophecy; as far as the Magister's rapidly-increasing followers were concerned, he might have been a god.

It was the greatest triumph a baby cult leader could ask for.

He barely noticed.

####

For days, he could hardly sleep, speak, or think. He kept losing track of conversations to stare into space. Now, it awed his followers when his eye turned an empty white—he must have been communing with something in a higher dimension.

He didn't argue. It was better than letting them know he was losing his mind.

He spent his time alone locked in his room, pacing back and forth, trying not to look up-but-not-north and failing. Dwelling on the significance of it all. Feeling like he'd never figure it out.

He used to love cosmic horror stories, back when he had time to read. They followed a reliable pattern: the hero travels farther than any rational shape ever should, meets something big, and goes mad from the realization.

And what was it that the hero always realized? That he was a dust fleck in the firmament. That he was insignificant. That he didn't matter. That there were things out there he'd never seen before and would never truly understand, and that they cared not for mere shadows on the wall like him, and that in the grand scheme of the cosmos he was nothing. That he was utterly unimportant.

In moments of what felt like lucidity in between the shivering horror, the triangle  wryly acknowledged that it was no surprise he'd ended up in a cosmic horror story. He could see into another dimension. In the stories he'd read, that made it all but inevitable.

But all the authors had gotten the maddening revelation wrong. He could have handled knowing he was nothing. It almost would have been a relief. 

True horror was knowing he mattered.

He'd spent the majority of his young life selling the idea that he was oh-so-important, as part of a big con to trick gullible idiots into liking him and flinging cash at his rotten undeserving family—and he'd only been able to do it because when the guilt got to him, when his conscience asked what would become of the shapes forking over their life savings on false promises of divine secrets, he could look out into bleak black space and tell himself that nothing really mattered, nothing was important, nothing he'd ever do would really make a difference, and the people he manipulated didn't matter any more than he did. He meant everything to his worshipers, and nothing to the universe. He could do anything and it didn't matter.

For a moment, a vast mind-melting shape-shifting incomprehensible eldritch god had focused its full attention on him—of all the universe, of all the dimensions beyond the known universe, it had looked at him and only him—a mere shadow on the wall, and yet in that moment, it found him interesting. It found him worthy of notice. He had screamed into the cold uncaring void, and the void had cared. For a moment, he'd held cosmic importance. He mattered. His actions mattered.

He'd felt it see him as important, but why? What was so important about him? There had to have been something significant he'd done, something he showed it, something in what he said. He replayed their conversation in his mind over and over and over and over, trying to remember what he'd done that proved he mattered.

He didn't know what it was. He couldn't find it. All he could remember was just... being.

The writers were wrong. Cosmic horror wasn't when an elder god's eyes slid past you without noticing you existed. It was when the elder god gazed down at you at your lowest and bleakest, during your most petty and selfish act of mass swindling, from a dimension where not even slamming the door and shutting your eye could shield you from its gaze—and it decided you were worth caring about. Cosmic horror was when you encountered a colossal alien that planted the incomprehensibly alien idea in your head that you had an inherent worth just because you existed. Cosmic horror was when a force of nature asked the name of a shadow on the wall.

If it was true... if it all mattered... then what was he doing? How could he? What had he done?

####

He was lucky—he was lucky that his parents had raised him to think so clearly about issues like morality and money and easy marks. His only saving grace was that he was too rational to seriously entertain the Axolotl's mad ideas.

And yet, his mind boiled with mad regret. It blazed with insane guilt. The heat of it could burn him out. It was months before he could continue his public sermons without feeling sick—and even once he did, he could still feel the delusion that what he did mattered, festering in his mind.

It would fester for the next trillion years.

####

(And that concludes this plot arc! I hope y'all enjoyed it!! I'd love to hear what y'all thought of the whole thing—especially now that we've looped back to the original eclipse. 😁)

[saintsanddevils]

Never Alone - pt 3

Aaric Graycastle x Fem!Reader

Summary: Since Aaric tried to make you leave Basgiath, you’re not speaking to him. So, you decide to take out your frustration on the mat.

Warnings: Iron Flame spoilers, violence, swearing, Mr. Darcy’s School of Yearning, ANGST

Author’s Note: I’m basically ignoring the entirety of the canon plot-line of Iron Flame so…

Word Count: 4K

Part Two | Part Four

————

-Assessment Day-

(Reader POV)

Anxiety and anticipation run rampant amongst the cadets as we stand around the edge of the large mat in the quadrant’s gym.

Professor Emetterio stands on the sidelines of the mat, parchment in hand as he reads out the rules and pairings for each session.

As he lists names, I feel a heavy, pleading gaze on the side of my face. Like I’ve done all morning, I ignore it. I never look, never meet those green eyes, and continue on with my day. Thank the gods I had chores this morning and I didn’t have to be anywhere near him. It’s hard enough knowing he thinks I can’t survive here. That I’m fragile.

“I can’t watch you die.”

His words from last night slam into me, stealing my breath. Burning fills my eyes and I quickly close them, counting each rise and fall of my chest to keep any tears at bay.

I’m not going to cry in class. I’m not.

I pinch my nails into my palm, ignoring the sudden awareness to the scar on my skin that matches his. The memory of our pricked skin, our promises, makes the burning in my eyes so much worse. Fuck.

Stop it, I chastise myself. Don’t waste your tears on him. Get a grip already. Focus.

I allow that festering anger from earlier to rise again. I quickly latch onto it, opening my eyes and holding firm to that anger to keep me from meeting Aaric’s stare.

“Sloane Mairi and Aaric Graycastle,” Emetterio suddenly calls out, dragging me away from my thoughts.

I ignore the burning need to look at Aaric as he approaches the middle of the mat. I catch him rolling his shoulders in my peripheral and I try not to snort at the absurdity. He’s had private tutors all of his life. Lessons on combat were one of his favorites and he insisted on extra lessons. He’s going to wipe the floor with every single person here.

I smirk. Except for me.

The blonde girl who slept in the cot next to mine in the dorms strides across the mat. This is an awful pairing; it’s obvious already. She’s shorter than Aaric and lacks awareness of her limbs as she begins to pace around him. Her movements are jerky and unsure. Aaric’s are swift and calculated. I can’t help but allow myself to finally look at him, watching for his tells. From the way his eyes snap to hers, I can see he’s already found her weaknesses. If you blink, one would miss how he quickly sweeps her legs out from under her, holding her legs down with his as he wraps an arm around her neck, squeezing till she immediately taps out. It’s over in under a minute, and everyone stands in bewilderment.

I roll my eyes. Fucking show-off.

“Again!” Emetterio yells from the sidelines.

I feel someone slide up next to me.

“Hey,” Violet greets quietly, as to not draw attention to us. “Still ignoring him?”

I try to ignore the distant sound of Aaric slamming Sloane into the mat, her groans echoing in the gym.

“Again!”

This is just unfair to Sloane.

I turn to Violet, sighing. “The prick deserves it. So does Dain, that nosey son of a bitch,” I glare in Dain’s direction, where he catches my eye and shrinks back a bit from my lethal stare. Good.

Violet huffs a laugh. “Yeah, Dain deserves that. He’s not on my good side right now either, if that keeps me in your good graces,” she winks.

I bite my lip to keep from smiling as I shove her playfully, ignoring the open stares from Violet’s friends across the mat. Gods, I’ve missed her. And Dain, when he’s not being so self-righteous. When we were little, we all used to play tag in the palace gardens. As young teens, we mock-played being riders and flying dragons before accidentally crashing into some precious heirloom and running away, making Cam’s twin older brothers, Halden and Alic, take the fall for it.

A bitterness fills me as I remember Alic. It’s been three years since he was killed, and the memory of Cam’s fury upon receiving the news is enough to make me want to look at him right now. Remembering how he tried not to cry when receiving the devastating news, even when Alic was a complete asshole as an adult. It didn’t matter. He was still his brother, his blood.

My thoughts force me to chance a glance at Aaric. He has Sloane on her knees, gasping for air as she quickly taps out. Emetterio’s mouth is in a permanent frown as he assesses them. At this rate, Sloane’s going to end up black and blue if that swollen eye is anything to go by.

When she heaves for air, standing to face Aaric again, I can’t stand it anymore.

“I’ll take him!” I shout, louder than I should since every single person whips around to look at me. I make the mistake of catching Aaric’s gaze. His eyes widen as I step forward.

“No,” Aaric refutes, but it’s not loud enough for Emetterio to hear.

“Fine by me,” the professor nods to Sloane. “Take a breather. Hopefully, you’ll learn something from this.”

I wince watching Sloane limp her way to the sidelines.

“You sure about this?” Violet asks.

I nod before saying under my breath, “I’ve fought him before.”

“Enough to beat him?”

I smile at her.

Violet whistles, low enough for only me to hear. “Good luck. Kick his ass.”

Striding across the room, I can feel the frustration rising in Aaric. His stare is intense when I finally face him. His green eyes smoldering with annoyance as I take a fighting stance. With the cold fury I felt last night from being controlled by him, I let it consume me, bolstering me as I raise my fists in preparation.

At Emetterio’s order, we begin.

Aaric’s taller and broader than me, muscles defining his arms and legs from years of severe training, but I know I’m his match. I’m smaller and lithe, able to maneuver around him like a snake in tall grass.

We begin our dance like we’ve done many times before. Only this time, everyone in the room fades away. It’s just us, our bitterness, and unresolved issues. What could go wrong?

Knowing Aaric, he won’t make the first move, not with me. He’ll wait, like a patient predator. I give in, attacking him head-on with a punch that he slides through, catching my wrist and twisting me so my back slams into his chest. His arms cage me as he holds me against him, locking my limbs in place with his iron grip.

“You can’t keep avoiding me,” he whispers in my ear.

I knock my head back, but he knew it was coming, his head swerving out of the way as he wraps his arm around my neck, immobilizing me. He doesn’t squeeze or press into me like he did with Sloane. He’s going easy on me, the bastard.

I pull a cheap move and stomp on his foot with my heel, pushing backwards to make him stumble. He catches himself before locking me to him again, this time I’m facing him.

Green eyes with flecks of gold fill with concern as he stares at me. It must look as if we’re glaring with the way our arms are locked, pushing for dominance, but I’m entirely caught in his gaze. My heart begins to soften at his obvious concern, longing filling me to talk to my best friend, but the raging bitch inside me, the one who helped me cross the parapet, yells at me not to give in. Even if he’s pretty.

I want to scratch his eyes out, remembering how he stared at me last night. So full of desperation to get me to leave. His look bordered on pity when I fought for my right to be here, and it bothered me to no end. If I wasn’t so attracted to him and worried about his stupid face scarring, scratching him to death wouldn’t be a fucking issue.

I shove my elbow into the curve of his arm, disarming his hold on me. Dancing away from him, I use the distraction to throw a solid punch at his solar plexus. The impact makes him stagger, but he comes back at me swinging. I easily dodge the punches.

“Stop fucking around and fight me,” I growl.

Aaric subtly shakes his head, his jaw clenching.

“You’re a coward,” I hiss at him, low enough so no one around us can hear. “And a hypocrite.”

His face shutters, as if the words slashed through his defenses. Good. I hope they do. I throw a punch that he easily blocks, but use it to distract him from my leg rising to kick the back of his leg. He folds, trying to catch himself, but I use my momentum to tackle him to the ground. We’re a mess of limbs as I try to pin him, but he uses his weight and strength against me.

He slams me to the ground, knocking the breath from my lungs momentarily. I let out a gasping wheeze, and Aaric suddenly falters. His hands loosen.

“Y/N, I’m so sorry—“

I slam my head into his, bone crunching from the impact. Blood streams from his broken nose as my head throbs, leaving me momentarily disoriented. On instinct, his hand comes up to his nose to stop the bleeding, and I take my shot. I elbow his stomach and knee him in the groin at the same time.

Aaric groans, but I’m not finished. I leap upwards at him, throwing him to the mat. Using my weight, I pin his legs with mine and hold my elbow over his throat, digging to stop his airway. He chokes and gags. I press harder, uncaring, unfeeling. All I am is rage.

When his eyes meet mine, the anger that’s coursing through me suddenly dies like a flame in the wind. I’m left shaking and gasping, staring down at him in shock over what I’ve just done.

His eyes catch it. That momentary slip on my face. With anyone else, they’d use it to their advantage. Throw me over and take me down. But not Aaric. Not Cam.

“I yield,” he gasps from under my hold, but his voice is strong, sure. And Emetterio hears him, stopping the fight.

Gasps from our onlookers bring me back to the present. I shove myself off of Aaric, stepping out of his reach as he’s slow to stand.

I try to ignore the pang of guilt that stings me from seeing the blood still gushing down his chin, staining his skin. The slight pain in my arms and legs is nothing compared to the ache in my gut.

I miss my best friend. Every cell in my body yearns to confide in him like I always do. To seek his comfort. He knows everything about me, having seen almost every tear I’ve shed. Can’t he understand why I’m here? Why I followed him, to become a rider? Maybe I did come here to try and save him, but maybe I can prove to him that I’m more than just the girl who hung on his every word, following him around the palace like a dog. I crossed the parapet. I beat his ass on the mat. I can fight my way through this place and live.

Even if he doesn’t believe I can.

I shake my head, moving away from the mats and towards the exit. I hear a shout of my name far behind me, but I don’t look back.

————

(Aaric POV)

The spoon in his hand begins to bend as Aaric grips it tighter and tighter.

“Uh, you okay, Graycastle?”

She won’t look at me, let alone talk to me. It’s been weeks. I can’t sleep. This is starting to get fucking ridiculous.

A glance at the cadet who’s speaking to him has him grinding his teeth.

“Yeah, I’m just… not very hungry.”

Aaric ignores him once more and continues glaring across the room at Y/N. Weeks have gone by, and she’s completely blocked him from her life. Acting as if they’re strangers. The only time he has any claim on her attention is on the mat. Emetterio has been rotating everyone to test their strengths and learn from their weaknesses, but every time Aaric faces Y/N, she’s cold and lethal, like the glaciers of the north. At least she’ll meet his eye when they fight.

Training with her brings back too many fond memories. It was only a couple of months ago that their training diverted to private sessions. For the last year, they were partners, taking turns beating the other up. They’d discuss weak points and show one another different moves. Laugh when the other took a misstep and landed in the mud. Joke and tease when accidentally knocking the other off their feet. It was fun when he was able to train with her.

This time? Not so much.

For the last few weeks, when he trained with her on the mat, he met her calculated rage. This was far different from the Y/N he knew back home. The one who gave him carefree smiles and stole slices of cake from the kitchen to bring him out of his gloomy mood. The way she would endear herself to him when she talked non-stop about the newest edition of a book series she adored, just to distract from how much his father pissed him off that day.

Y/N laughs at her table, stopping Aaric’s heart and his train of thought as he watches her talk with Sloane. He wishes he were sitting next to her, hearing whatever it is she’s laughing about. It’s been a while since he’s seen her resemble her old self. He’s caught her reading in the quadrant’s library, curled up in a chair, a few times. Or even basking in the sun with her eyes closed as the cadets wait outside for their chance to practice the gauntlet. Those few moments have reminded him so much of his best friend, he would momentarily forget she wasn’t speaking to him. He’d almost try to talk to her if her glares didn’t solidify where they stand now.

But he plans to fix that.

When she gets up from her table, so does he. Following behind as she makes her way to Battle Brief. Just as she turns a corner, he grabs her by the elbow and shoves her through the first door he opens.

Y/N stumbles into the empty classroom as Aaric locks the door behind him.

“Kidnapping attempt number three,” she shakes her head, leaning against a desk. “I’m more shocked this didn’t happen sooner.” Her eyes skate around the room, never meeting his. Still avoiding him. “Going to put me on Dain’s dragon, kicking and screaming? Strap me down and throw me out this time?”

Aaric’s gut clenches. “Of course not.”

She rolls her eyes before examining a chart on the wall to the left of him.

Look at me, he begs. His fists clench to keep himself from walking over and grabbing her chin to force her to look him in the eye. He can’t stand this distance between them. It’s eating him alive.

He misses his best friend.

“Y/N, I’m so sorry,” the words strike out with desperation, sounding like a plea. He notices her eye twitch, but she doesn’t look at him. “It wasn’t my right to force you to leave. But,” he softens his tone. “Please understand why I tried to find a way out of here for you. This place is a death trap. I only want to protect you.”

She closes her eyes for a second, breathing deeply. He can tell by her stiff shoulders she’s holding back from yelling at him again. He wants her to yell at him if it means she’ll talk to him, stay near him, maybe forgive him.

“I can’t watch you die.”

“Then don’t look.”

The memory of their last conversation comes unbidden, leaving a sharp sting in his ribs. That night, after she left him alone in the dark hall, she never saw how he stumbled back against the wall, staring in pleading horror at the girl’s dormitory door. His eyes had burned, and the burning didn’t stop as he stormed away, disappearing into the night.

Since then, fear has been choking him, consuming him as days turned into weeks. Every night, he wakes with gasping, heaving breaths as nightmares plague him. Lingering dreams of someone snapping her neck on the mat, or being pushed off the parapet, or even finding her dead body in the hallway haunt him.

Aaric now knows what true fear is. It’s driving him insane.

“It’s not your decision to decide what’s best for me,” her voice cuts through the room, silencing his raging thoughts. “I’m capable of knowing what I can and cannot handle.”

“I know—“

“Do you?” She finally, finally, meets his eyes, coldness solidifying in her gaze. It takes everything in him not to shrink back. “It’s been almost a month since parapet, and all I’ve done is survive. You can pity me all you want, think me weak and fragile, but I chose to be here, same as you. Unlike yourself, I don’t have a death wish or a hero complex. I’m not trying to save the world, I’m trying to save you.”

Silence falls heavily upon the room as something cracks inside his chest. Something undeniably broken that almost sends him to his knees.

Tears fill her eyes, and the sight sends him jerking forward, desperate to hold her. But he stops, unsure. It’s that uncertainty that kills him.

Before coming to Basgiath, back at home, he wouldn’t have hesitated. Not with her. Never when she needed him. He’d have wrapped her fully in his arms, breathing her in, as she cried into his chest. That same instinct courses through his veins even now. Even when she despises him.

Yep. He’s severely fucked things up between them.

Y/N gives an exasperated breath, closing her eyes. A single tear falls down her cheek. “I’m so tired of this, Cam.”

Aaric softens and takes two daring steps forward to stand inches away from her. “I’m truly sorry,” he ensures his voice is gentle, calming. “I’ve never wanted you to believe that I think you’re weak or fragile. I’ve known you for so long that I know that’s not true in the slightest. You tore across the country just to kick my ass and tell me how much of an idiot I am. I’d say that’s a level of bravery I’ll never be able to reach,” he smiles softly, catching the slight blush that rises to her cheeks at the compliment.

“Not only are you brave, you’re also incredibly selfless and stubborn,” he ignores the slight narrowing of her eyes. “I truly wish you weren’t so you’d be far from here, reading by the fire as you wait to hear from me.”

She scoffs. “I can’t believe you’d think I’d just sit by—“

Aaric shakes his head. “You wouldn’t. You’re too good, too strong, and way too loyal of a friend to leave me. I should’ve known better.” He tilts his head to meet her glistening eyes, fingers burning to hold the skin of her cheek. “I know better now.”

Her shoulders drop at the confession, another tear falling from her eyes. The sight wounds him deeply.

“What can I do?” Aaric’s green eyes bounce between hers, desperately clinging to the fact that she’s still here, she hasn’t attempted to leave the room. He has to think that’s a good sign. “Please, tell me what I can do to fix this. I—“ he swallows, muscle jumping in his jaw as he clenches his fists to keep from reaching out and pulling her to him. “I miss you so much.”

His eyes suddenly drop to her lips. “So, so much.”

A heavy stillness coats the space between them. The moment feels suspended in time before she gives a small intake of air, a gasp, before she surges forward. She crashes into him, practically throwing him off his feet before he catches himself and finds she’s hugging him. Relief courses through him as he immediately wraps his arms around her frame. Breathing in her scent of lilac and citrus, a sense of rightness settles in his bones.

“I’ve missed you too,” she whispers against him.

They cling to one another, uncaring how long they’ve been hiding in an empty classroom as voices come and go in the hall. The feel of each other is so familiar, it echoes with memories they can never forget. Instead of being in Basgiath, they’re transported home.

If Aaric closes his eyes, he can practically imagine holding her in the palace library, as he’s done before. But the far-distant roar of a dragon brings him back to the present. Reality crashing through the quiet.

Using his fingers to find and tilt her chin up to meet his eye, he smiles at her. “Let’s start over, shall we?”

He reluctantly lets go of her, stepping back to extend a calloused hand between them. “Hi, I’m Aaric Graycastle, and I have a severe case of suicidal hero complex.”

The laugh that bursts from her lips has his heart soaring.

She smiles as she slides her hand into his. A tingle shoots up his arm from her touch. He tries to resist pulling her back into him to hold her again.

“I’m Y/N Thorne, and I’m far too stubborn to let my best friend get himself killed.”

His eyes sparkle as he purses his lips. “He sounds like a total prick.”

She laughs again. “He is.”

“You should beat his ass,” he winks.

She shakes her head. “I already have.”

Aaric holds his ribs as a laugh escapes him. Gods, he missed her.

“C’mon, let’s get to class, or we’ll be late,” she sidesteps him and raises a brow in obvious mockery. “Graycastle.”

He smirks. “Haven’t you heard? A prince is never late, Thorne.”

She raises a brow in mockery. “Oh? Do you see one? All I see is a pompous ass.”

Aaric rolls his eyes before nudging her as he opens the door for her. “After you, my stubborn wench.”

“Say that again and we’ll see how long our friendship lasts,” she glares.

He chuckles, stepping close to her. “I thought you were friends with me cause of my charming personality.”

She rolls her eyes. “Don’t make me break your nose again.”

“If that means you’ll touch me, I’m all for it,” he winks.

His focus is entirely on the way her cheeks flush, making her hide her face beneath a sheet of her hair. Pride swells in him at the sight.

“Idiot,” she murmurs under her breath.

Once in the hall, his grin is stupidly wide as he slips her book bag from her shoulder. She tries to fight him for it, but gives up as he races ahead of her. She chases him, before clinging to his side as they make their way to Battle Brief.

There’s a spring in his step as they walk, a lightness he hasn’t felt in weeks that makes him giddy. He looks down at his best friend, who gives him the carefree smile he’s missed, and everything feels so incredibly good, he hopes that together, they can survive this place and accomplish what he came here to do.

With her by his side, he knows he can do anything.

[b1eedthefreak]

Cooler Than Me

daryl x maneater!reader

warnings: none other than probably bad writing..

a/n i tried so hard to make this as good as possible but i don’t think i can write a badass cool reader like i cannot… I TRIED MY BEST IF THIS IS BAD IM SORRY

this was requested :3

⸻

Daryl had two problems.

One, he was very bad at talking to people (let alone a women).

Two, you were very good at making him forget that.

The moment you arrived at the prison, it was like someone dropped a match into a puddle of gasoline. Men started standing straighter. Women glared with quiet jealousy. You had that walk… slow, unbothered, like nothing scared you. Hair wild, grin wicked, eyes sharp. You’d laugh in a walker’s face and wink at it while stabbing it in the skull.

You didn’t try to be intimidating. You just were.

And Daryl? Daryl was doomed.

He told himself he didn’t care. Said it a dozen times in his head every time you passed him, brushing your fingers along his arm or flashing him a smile that made him forget how to breathe.

He was a hunter, a tracker, a killer. Not some idiot tripping over his own feet because a girl was pretty.

Except now he was staring at you across the yard, holding a wildflower in his hand like a total fool, trying to figure out how to give it to you without dying of shame.

Carol saw him first.

“Oh no,” she muttered, elbowing Beth. “He’s doing it again.”

Beth looked up from the laundry and squinted. “Oh my God. Is that a flower?”

Carol sighed. “It’s worse than the time he gave her squirrel jerky.”

Beth cackled. “He’s so awkward. Like…painfully awkward.”

“Poor thing.”

“I mean… no offense,” Beth added with a shrug, “but she’s way too cool for him. She’s like—leather jacket, killer smile, ‘I’ll ruin your life’ energy. And he’s just… flannel and trauma.”

Carol snorted. “He’s gonna do it. He’s gonna walk over.”

Beth leaned forward, giddy. “Oh my God… he’s walking over.”

You were sitting on the hood of an old car, sharpening a knife, when Daryl finally approached, wildflower clutched awkwardly in his fist like he wanted to throw it or eat it.

He cleared his throat.

You looked up, slow and lazy. “Well, well.”

He froze. “Uh.”

Your lips curved. “That for me?”

He shoved the flower forward. “Yeah. Found it. Thought it was… I dunno. Pretty.”

You took it, twirling it between your fingers, then looked up at him with a soft smirk. “Mm. Thought you’d have to try harder than this.”

Daryl blinked. “Huh?”

You leaned back on your elbows. “To impress me, Dixon. C’mon. A flower? What is this, summer camp?”

He turned red immediately. “I—shit. I ain’t tryna—forget it.”

You caught his arm before he could bolt.

“Relax,” you murmured, tugging him close. “I like summer camp.”

He swallowed thickly. “Y���don’t make any damn sense.”

You grinned up at him. “That’s the fun part.”

Later that night, you found him pacing outside the prison, mumbling to himself like he was trying to convince himself to stay away.

Too bad.

You cornered him without a word, hands on his chest, fingers curling into his shirt.

“You’re cute when you’re nervous,” you whispered.

“Ain’t nervous.”

“You’re sweating, Dixon.”

“I was walkin’.”

You leaned up, brushing your lips along his jaw. “You don’t have to impress me, you know.”

He stiffened.

“You already did that the first time you ignored me,” you purred. “Only man who ever didn’t try to flirt back. Drove me crazy.”

He looked at you then, all rough-edged confusion. “Thought you were outta my league.”

You smiled. “That’s what makes it fun.”

Your mouth met his, hot and sudden. He growled, deep and low, hands finding your hips, fingers digging in like he couldn’t believe you were real.

You whispered against his lips, “Wanna keep impressing me?”

“Yeah.”

“Then touch me.”

—

my mid terms are over so i can finally write again send requests everybody :3

[rae-writes]

Literally obsessed with how you write Levi, so if we could pretty please get some more NSFW of him I'd be in your debt.

Levi Levi Levi- we love our whiny, secretive-degenerate snake slut

"M-mc! You k-know I can't- oh- can't be quiet..w-w-we can't do this here— a-ah! Ngh...mmm..mm!"

Levi was such a pretty sight, neck bared as his head tipped back to rest on the chair he was slumped in, chest heaving and hips bucking up into your hand.

And your hand, palming teasingly at the aching hard on in his pants, ignored his pitiful try at a plea, slipping past his waistband to grip at his cock.

"O-oh, ff-uck! M-m-mc....hnn, s-stroke me faster, please..p-please!" His body writhed in the chair, knees knocking against the underside of the desk as he tried to get more.

"Yeah? Like this?" The pace you jerked him off at was almost brutal, fingers curled tightly around him while the thumb- occasionally- swiped at the head and dug into his slit, just like he liked. "I thought we couldn't here, Levi? Thought you were scared of being caught?"

He was- he'd be mortified if anyone walked in this very not locked and free-to-use classroom, but that thought had been melted away by the feel of your hand, replaced by a need that made him think he'd go crazy if you didn't give it to him.

"I-I don't care!" His moans had gotten louder, higher pitched, unrestrained. His lower half was raised completely off the chair as he practically fucked your fist, movements jerky and desperate.

"D-d-don't care, please, Mc, j-just keep playing with me! 'M s-so close...W-wanna be good f'you, lemme be good for you, g-give you my cum! Please!"

[redflagshipwriter]

Red Hot Ghouls 14 part 1/2

masterpost

“Hey, what’s up? Just checking in. Any luck so far? I finished my books!” Danny read mockingly off the burner phone with only one contact. He felt his eyebrow twitch. “What is this guy’s problem?” He got up in a jerky motion and started pacing around his one room apartment like the world’s most broke-ass tiger. It took three steps to get off the rug and onto the 3 tiles in front of his front door. He wheeled on his heel and did it again, and again, and then he forcibly collapsed back onto his couch in a huff. “What a bitch,” Danny complained. He kicked at the cushion. “Where does he get off talking to me like he doesn’t know…”

His voice trailed off as he accidentally had a thought. The thought happened to him entirely against his will. He really hated the thought.

Like. What if, just as a guess. What if he supposed that Jason the hapless performance-art biker tough guy rough guy had not found his secret identity? What if he had just like, gone out to a dark coffeeshop to read a new book? And from his perspective, some weird guy had yelled at him and made a funny face like a pissy toddler?

Shit. Shit, fuck, and damn. Danny groaned. Was Jason just a local??? Had he walked into that place by chance- oh. Holy fucking shit.

“I am the dumbest engineer I know,” Danny marveled. He looked up at the ceiling and sort of wished it would fall in and kill him instantly. “Jeremy is in Arkham. That implies he committed this crime in Gotham. That would imply his victim was from Gotham.”

Honestly… He had kinda just thought that Jeremy was in Arkham because it was convenient for him. But of course not. No one knew he was in Gotham. If Jeremy knew that Danny Phantom was on Gotham he would have been taking out creepy billboards to beg for his attention and damnation or something.

‘So Jason just thinks I am a total weirdo.’

Pain. Pain. Psychic damage. Danny threw his arm over his face and muffled a scream into his forearm, fucking mortified. Why was he so embarrassing? 

‘I don’t actually know that this happened in Gotham; Jeremy could have gone outside of city limits for his little ritual. Jason didn’t ask me to take him to Gotham from the GZ,’ Danny clung to in faint hope. ‘Maybe he really did hunt me down. Or maybe he looked up ectobiologists, learned about my family, and just sought out the geographically closest Fenton.’ 

…Get real. Come on. Jason wasn’t a detective. The straightest line between two points was the most likely path of events.

He unlocked his phone with numb fingers and started searching for any proof that this guy was a Gothamite. 

Jason Gotham

A bunch of Linked in profiles, a bunch of articles about rich people, and a flood of bookface profiles. It was a common name.

“That figures,” Danny huffed, feeling a little stupid for thinking that would work. He blew out a long breath. “It’s not like there’s ever just one guy in the world. There’s a billion Dannys out there for chrissake. There’s a Danny in my Econ class.”

Jason Gotham big strong guy

There was a wrestler from Gotham whose agent was named Jason. Danny clicked through the article to look at the photos just in case. No dice. His Jason was built prettier than the agent or the wrestler, Danny thought absently. Oh. He did have something that a wrestler didn’t, though.

Jason Gotham guns

Weirdly, the Linked-in profiles came back up. Danny was baffled and curious enough to read through a couple. “Gotham is such a goddamn place,” he marveled, eyebrows traveling up. “I thought you weren’t supposed to talk about things like…” Then the penny dropped. “Henchmen get hired off Linked-in?” He sat up explicitly so that he could shake his head in disbelief at the state of this city. “Wild.”

Well. The mission was not a success. Danny buried his face in his hands and accidentally smacked himself with the phone still in his hand. He ignored the stinging of his cheekbone to wallow in self-pity. It would heal up fast anyway.

“I think I need to answer his message,” Danny said. He felt real low. He felt like such a silly bastard. “I have to be smart and feel out if he knows I’m Danny.” He paused. “Danny Fenton, not Danny Phantom. Because I introduced myself as Danny Phantom.” Danny groaned. That seemed like an unnecessary clue, now that he really thought about it.

‘I need to avoid Jazz,’ Danny thought grimly. ‘If she sees me, she is going to sense weakness and find out what I did.’

He mulled over his options for a bit, trying to plot a response that would reveal all of Jason’s secrets and also make sense in conversation.

He failed. “I’m not a smart man,” Danny said conversationally, and sent,

You finished all those books already?? You unemployed, dude???

Jason must have been waiting on him. His response was pretty fast. 

Self-employed, actually. 

[gildui]

crimson

wc: 1.3k | simon riley x f!reader | 18+ dddne implied coercion . cumplay . unreliable narrator . breeding kink-ish . the concept of welding things to skin (man i was horny idk) . spanking . toxic relationships . idgaf!ghost . mean!ghost . inner monologue!ghost . reader dresses in a skirt, has afab parts, and paints their nails but is otherwise featureless

Simon Riley’s bird was gone. 

Fled his nest while he was out fighting for his country.

Shameless, really. 

 Left him with nothing but a handwritten note, a few bits and bobs forgotten around his house, and a pair of forgotten used knickers beneath his bed. 

The gusset was crusted, dried with past slick, long forgotten during one of the many nights that Simon would fuck you hard enough to leave the drywall behind your headboard indented. Simon hadn’t cared about fixing it then. Still didn’t care about it now as he stood before the full length mirror in front of your bed in his travel gear, covered in grime and foreign gunk, his boots impeccably laced, his hoodie too small to contain his frame, thighs near bursting from his worn jeans, duffle bag clutched in his free hand. 

They smelled like you too. 

A slip of red fabric, too rich in colour to remind him of blood, yet still reminded him of the hue you’d been painting your toes when he left weeks prior. Satiny fabric, intricately printed lace across the front with one of those teeny, tiny bows at the waistband that did not untie anything despite how much you had reprimanded him to stop trying to unknot it, Simon. 

At some point the bag dropped from his hand. His gloves discarded, left in small piles at his feet. His mask rucked up above his nose, knickers pressed flat against his face inhaling as he angrily fisted his weeping cock in front of the mirror. His forehead knocked against the pristine glass, smudging the pane in a way that would usually result in you yelling at him for leaving prints against what you’d just washed. 

You’d tear him to shreds over it, yowl in his ear on and on about mucking it up, and he’d love every moment of it. The way your teeth would set back in a snarl, upper lip curled. Your right eyebrow always went higher than your left when you were annoyed. Your nose always crinkled in distaste like a mutt primed to bite. The way your voice went shrill after he'd said he would help around the house whilst you were off to work, and yet, every time, the chores went on untouched and he remained on the couch as you stepped through the door. 

He would do anything for it. To see that snarl, to watch the anger light up your eyes, your jagged, jerky movements—lacking in any sort of grace, reminding him of a fawn just learning to stand—as you paced, hands pumping at your sides as you yelled and cried and spat and whined and pestered until he got fed up with it. 

Then, and only when you were about to fragment, break into a million pieces, desperate enough to hurl something at his head, to do harm, did he acknowledge your existence. Half-lidded brown eyes would examine your figure. Leering over you. Objectfying. Undressing you with his beady gaze. Somehow, all at the same time, he managed to make you feel as if he were slightly disgusted by your presence.

He’d huff, like he were the one incensed and you were the inconvenience. Then, he’d bend you over the table. Yank up your skirt, ignore the way your crimson nails swiped at his forearms—”beasty,” he’d coo with that infuriating chuckle of his—and when your nails connect with his skin.

Oh, how he’d be waiting for that, returning fire with a scorching handprint across your asscheek. Imprinting himself into you. Holding you down by the scruff of your neck, your face pressed against the wooden grain of your table as he rutted his cock between your thighs, never quite allowing you the satisfying fullness you’d keen for.

 Punishment. 

Cumming on your clothes—your pretty floral skirt, your expensive jumper—spreading it across your knickers, ruining the fabric, labelling everything that is yours as his, and only after, he’d fuck you in bed, leave you a blubbering mess afterwards. Too drunk on his cock, too full of his seed, orifices leaking his slimy, accursed essence. 

Anything to get you to shut the fuck up, really. 

His cock wept as his textured hand tugged on it. Using the precum as lubricant, his thumb notched back his foreskin, thumbpad rubbing against his ruddy cockhead, flicking at it with his blunt nail. Simon inhaled your knickers again, ran a hot stripe across the fabric as if he could rehydrate the fabric enough to suck your taste from it. 

It wasn’t enough. Nothing was ever enough. Knickers in his hand, Simon slammed his open palm against the wall, rattling the mirror, knocking down a picture frame you’d hung ages ago. The glass shattered along the flooring, yet, Simon only dropped that hand to his groin. More delicate than he’d ever handled your body, he wrapped the fabric around his shaft. Carefully made sure the gusset—the closest thing to you he had left, bleached, stained, worn far too many times to be considered part of your ‘sexy clothes’—was lined up with his slit. 

Simon’s hand squeezed tightly as he rutted into the fabric, aiming to fuck his hand with enough vigor that he’d forget it all. The small fact that you were gone. Brown eyes set in weary, pale skin and sodden with eyeblack remained open, vigilant in his watch, as the fabric darkened from scarlet to maroon. As he staked his claim into the final things of yours he had left. His breaths fogged the glass, his cock smudged against it, leaving prints each time he thrust too far into his hand. So close, yet not close enough. 

You had been wearing red the first night he met you. A scarf around your neck that had him thinking about how pretty you’d look with a collar—his name carved across it—of the same colour forever welded against your skin. You’d looked pretty wrapped around another man’s arm, huddled from the wind, Simon was enamoured then. Now, he was obsessed. 

His final few thrusts were sloppy. The burning that had started at the base of his spine spread like wildfire as quiet grunts escaped his gritted teeth. Simon shut his eyes against the onslaught, pretending it was your cunt he was spurting long, heated strings of semen into—as if it was your sticky womb he was once more filling, overfilling—instead of the cold, stiff mirror. 

It was your complaints about the bedsheets being gross because he’d refused to wear a condom—”cunt squeezes me so good we don’t need one, beasty” he’d reason only when he knew you were too focused on the rumble of his voice box against your hardened nipples as he peppered kisses along your skin—instead of the roaring silence of an empty house, tinnitus ringing without the blanket of gunfire or of a Scotsman yapping for too long in his ear. 

Simon didn’t bother wiping down the mirror, tossed the knickers back under the bed, stepped over the broken glass, as he headed for the dining room. He paused long enough at the table to scoop up your note, reading the delicate, dainty curves of your handwriting whilst his feet moved instinctively to the couch. 

Off on a work trip.  Call when you get home.                                           xx,                           your beasty

He was watching football when you got home. Ignored you as you stepped through the front door, greeting him with a kiss to the crown of his head when you passed by to make your way into the bedroom. He counted to five before you came storming back out.

“What the fuck did you do to the mirror, Simon?! What the fuckin’ hell?!”

At least, this time, he swept the broken glass out of the main entryway and toward your side of the bed. To be found and stepped on later when the two of you went to bed.

Wouldn’t want you to spill that pretty red blood before he could lap it up. 

[shanastoryteller]

Happy Pride! Untamed please!

a continuation of 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46

 Lan Wangji is standing next to his brother as he makes small talk with Nie Mingjue – their closeness had never really recovered after the war, despite Xichen’s best efforts and Jin Guangyao’s lukewarm ones – when a Jin servant steps to his side and whispers, “Your wife is requesting your presence in Lady Jiang’s sitting room.”

Even as quietly as he’d spoken, Xichen and Nie Mingjue had obviously heard him. Xichen frowns. “Is she alright?”

Her injuries had been superficial and mostly healed. But Lan Wangji had seen the exhaustion that she didn’t want to admit to and said nothing, because they’d already gotten into one fight today and he understood pride well enough. Perhaps he should have insisted.

The servant lowers his eyes. “Apologies, Sect Leader Lan. I have only been instructed to escort Master Lan.”

“Excuse me,” he says, dipping his head to Nie Mingjue and falling into step with the servant. His pace is unhurried, which Lan Wangji tries to find reassuring. If something was wrong, surely they would be moving with more urgency.

He sees Jiang Cheng first and has to keep his lip from curling back in distaste. He’s ducked his head to speak with Jiang Yanli, the two of them standing outside of her rooms, but they both cut off their conversation when they see him. He bows shallowly to Jiang Yanli, ignoring Jiang Cheng completely. “Madame Jin. Is-“

“She’s fine,” she says, but the tension around her eyes and the strain in her smile tells a different story. “Please go in, Lan Wangji.”

He pushes the door open, closing it behind him, and at least he doesn’t have to look far for her. “Are you hurt?”

Xuanyu looks up at him, a faint redness in her eyes that speaks of tears. She’s dressed much like she was when he first met her, back in the Jin gold and cream and her hair turned sleek and pulled in hairstyle that’s half up in a braided bun on top of head and the rest of her hair flowing freely. It’s a Jiang hairstyle, one that Jiang Yanli used to wear when they were younger. The hair ornament in Xuanyu’s hair is Jiang Yanli’s as well.

The only Lan thing on her is her forehead ribbon, and it startles him with how out of place it looks, while Jiang and Jin seem to blend seamlessly. It causes something to twist uncomfortably in his chest, but he ignores it to repeat, “Are you hurt?”

“Sit down,” she says, gesturing to the place at the table across from her. He takes the seat next to her instead, looking her over for some sort of new injury or pain, but he can’t find anything amiss. “Ah, okay. Okay. So.”

He waits, but she just twists her hands together, occasionally reaching up to touch her hair and then realizing that with this new hair style it’s not where she expects it, and lowers her hands.

“Did something happen?” he asks.

She starts to shake her head then gives a jerky nod. “I – I – I’m. Yanli-jie’s healer came to see me.”

The stab of worry is almost becoming familiar when it comes to Xuanyu, but that doesn’t make it any more comfortable. “Are you ill? Have your injuries worsened?”

She shakes her head, and it should be a relief, but instead his worry just deepens. “No, no. It’s. Um. Not – I. It’s just that – well. You know. In the cold spring. And then the wall. And the bed.”

It takes him a moment but then heat flushes his cheeks. She is referring to when he became inebriated and took her. “Did I hurt you?”

She had said that it was not the type of hurt that was unwelcome or lingered and she’d never flinched away from him. But it was a first time for both of them and he barely remembers what he did and at the time he was significantly stronger than her and she was still injured from their spar. It’s entirely possible he harmed her in some way.

“No!” She bites her lip, staring at him with an intensity that he doesn’t understand. “Wangji, dammit, are you really going to make me say it?”

“If you wish me to understand, then you’re going to have to,” he says, worry and guilt pushing him to his own frustration.

Xuanyu blinks several times, and he’s about to apologize, but then she says, “I’m pregnant.”

He stares.

“From when we – you know – obviously,” she says. “So. Yeah.”

His eyes drop to her stomach. Several things snap into place at once but he can’t focus on any of them beyond the roar in his ears and the acid churning in his stomach.

He is no better than his father.

Xuanyu is his wife not by choice but circumstances out of her control and she had never wanted him and even if she enjoyed that night, he had lost his senses and demanded what she hadn’t offered freely, not even doing her the courtesy of taking the care to spill outside of her. Now his child grows inside her, pinning her in place and shackling her as his mother was shackled.

“Wangji?” she asks, voice concerningly high pitched. “Say something.”

“I’m sorry.”

She goes perfectly still except for where she’s gripping her robe above her knees. “Oh.”

“I never intended,” he starts but the lump in his throat makes it difficult to get anything else out. Instead he gets to his feet, bows to her, and is pushing out of the room as quickly as his feet can carry him.

Everything is too hot and too close and he can’t breathe. He needs to get outside. He needs to think.

“Hey!” Jiang Cheng shouts as he rushes past, but his voice softens as he says, “Oh, shit.”

It’s too bright and too close and too loud and he has no patience for Jiang Cheng even at his best and he just needs – he needs –

“Wangji?” Xichen grabs his elbow as he’s headed for the exit, eyes wide and concerned. “Is she – what’s wrong with Lady Xuanyu?”

“I,” he starts, and still can’t make himself speak. He pulls himself out of his grip and continues for the door. He hears his brother make his apologies to whoever he’d been speaking to and then his presense at his back, following him out.

He’ll probably be grateful for that when his head clears, but for now it’s too full of panic and shame and a bitter self hatred he hasn’t felt this intently since he’d lost Wei Wuxian.

“I know somewhere private,” Xichen says softly as soon as they’re outside, the lungful of fresh air not nearly as clarifying as he’d hoped it’d be. “Come.”

He follows his brother, focuses on breathing, and not why it feels like he can’t get enough air despite how greedily he sucks it in.

[gigglesandfreckles-hp]

I AM HERE FOR THE TEENAGE JILY ANGST

So just to be a little more evil to them can you please do "Can we talk?" and "I think we've all said what we wanted to say." 😈😈😈

lily got her drama moment, so it's james's turn because i am nothing if not fair and magnanimous.

from this prompt list

Lily liked it better when she didn’t know all his secrets, didn’t know there was nowhere in this bloody castle she could hide because he has a map. It’s why she’s only startled, not surprised when she turns the corner headed down toward Potions and runs into him on the fifth floor.

“No,” she says, immediately picking up her pace to walk past him.

His long legs meet her stride easily. “Stop running away from me, Lil. Just—”

“I’m late for Potions.”

“Fuck Potions, Evans. I need to talk to you.”

“It can wait.”

“It can’t,” he insists.

“I don’t want—” But her defence is intercepted by a tight grip on her forearm as he grabs her and tugs her straight out of the main traffic of the corridor, ignoring her protests as he pushes past a tapestry and stops them in the secluded alcove just on the other side.

The jerky movement loosens several strands from her plait, which simply won’t do for Potions. As soon as he releases her arm, she reaches up to pull the elastic from her hair, intending to redo it quickly.

Before she can grab a section of hair, James’s hand darts out, snatching the elastic from her fingers and stuffing it into the front pocket of his trousers.

“What are you—”

“Can we talk?” he asks earnestly, leaning toward her.

He smells good. That annoying boy smell that isn’t something Lily would ever want in a bottle of fragrance for herself, but somehow she knows she wouldn’t mind bathing in it, sleeping next to it, living in a house full of it forever.

She chooses her words carefully. “I think we’ve both said what we wanted to say.”

“When exactly did that happen? Because I seem to remember you disappearing as soon as we stopped—”

“Okay,” she says, putting up a hand between them, because she can’t hear him say it. She can’t handle hearing evidence that what they did last night actually happened, outside of her dreams.

They kissed, actually kissed, and Lily thinks she’s going to black out if she doesn’t put some distance between the two of them right now.

“Okay what?” he presses, stepping closer. “This isn't fair. Don’t shut me out just because—”

“I’m not trying to shut you out,” she promises, feeling overwhelmed by his closeness, his intensity. “I just…I don’t know what happened, okay? It—we were caught up in the moment. And—”

“Are you being serious right now?”

She flushes under the harshness of his tone. “Wh-what?”

“Is that the position you want to take? Because that’s fine, Evans. I’m not going to force you to admit that what happened between us was good and a long bloody time coming at that. Whatever. Be delusional. But don’t—don’t act like we were caught up in the moment. What the fuck is that? I care about you. You know that, Lily, and—”

She shakes her head and steps away from them, her back hitting the wall. “I can’t handle this right now. I just…I can’t, James.”

He watches her silently, his expression a mixture of pain and resignation. Then, with a heavy sigh, he speaks again. “So that’s it?”

“What do you mean?” she asks, quietly.

“Maybe you can act like it didn’t happen…but I can’t. I don’t want to. So if you really…if this is how you feel,” a crease appears across his forehead and Lily wants to reach across and smooth it out more than anything, “then we’re done.”

Lily’s heart lurches in her chest. “What do you—”

“I can’t be your friend anymore, Evans,” he says, sounding so wretched Lily wants to cry. “So I’m going to ask you again. But when we walk out from behind that tapestry, no matter what your answer is—there’s no going backward. I can’t…I can’t do that. It’s killing me.”

Lily's heart feels like it's being squeezed in a vice. She swallows hard, trying to compose herself. "James," she murmurs.

He shuts his eyes tight and pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose, then opens them and looks down at her. “Can we talk?” he asks again, his voice strained with emotion. “And that means we don’t leave here until we’ve both been honest. I want to be with you, Evans. You know that. Just…" Something a little desperate seeps into his tone. "Don’t you want to be happy together?”

Her lip quivers, and she feels tears threatening to spill over. "I…" she begins, but the words catch in her throat.

“Answer me, Lily."

“James, I can’t,” she whispers, her voice breaking off. “But it’s only—”

James's shoulders slump, and he takes a step back, his gaze dropping from her to the floor for a moment. Without another word, he turns away from her, his footsteps echoing softly on the stone floor as he pushes through the tapestry and moves back into the corridor, leaving Lily alone.

[le-chevalier-au-lion]

the greatest thing we've lost: santimarc [e]

“I missed you,” Marc manages to say, mouth slack and wanting, eyes bright on the half light.

Santi flattens his free palm against the cradle of Marc’s ribcage. Feels him breathe, the sharp staccato of it, and the heat of his skin. His tongue is leaden—clumsy. There’s too much to say, he thinks. Or maybe he’s being too emotional.

He kisses Marc’s collarbone, the jut of bone there. Then his arm—the bad one, the one that he’s spent years losing sleep about. His scars are raised and rough under his lips. Marc jolts, a sound caught in his throat, wet, needy. Jolts again when Santi realizes he’s distracted and crooks his fingers inside him. He throws his head back, sweat pooling on his hairline, casting him on a silvery sheen.

The night flies by him in jerky flashes. Dinner, too fast—though Santi knows they spent hours in that restaurant, laughing, too full of good food, though technically this must breach at least one contract. The track to Marc’s hotel room is a meaningless blur.

But this—

Santi has this moment in excruciating detail, punishingly so. Marc at the door, king-of-the-world reckless— how about one more drink? Which had lasted for three seconds flat, and then his mouth was on Santi’s, insistent, demanding. A hand under his shirt, and the other on his belt, blundering, inelegant, all want. He'd been thinking about kissing him for what felt like days, staring at the stain of rosé wine on his lips.

“Santi,” Marc bites out, urgent, his eyes fever bright and wide. He’s pretty like a heart attack like this.

“I’m here.”

“Another—why don’t you give me another?” He sounds frustrated, cleaved open, voice catching on a whine.

Santi rests his forehead against Marc’s sweat slippery thigh, panting wetly into the crease of his hip. Sinks his teeth into the flesh there, the imprint of his mouth red and mean. Marc jerks, sighs, goes slack at the pain.

He doesn’t say take it easy . “You’re something else.”

It comes out sickeningly, predictably fond. Same old. Marc puts his hand on Santi’s nape, tugs at the curls growing there. A laugh bubbles out of them both. Something giddy and light tangles in Santi’s chest—a champagne frizz under the podium, just tossing the data away and marveling at the show.

Santi would do anything for him. To him. That realization rakes its nails over his nerves, makes him buck against the bed.

Marc goes up on his elbows to look at him. There’s a flush on his cheeks, pink, precious, and an open-mouthed, reckless smile. His cock smears silver-shiny streaks of pre-come on his abs. Unfair. Troublesome . Even more when he smells the weakness Santi can feel breaking out on his own expression and does what he always will—latches on.

“I missed you,” Marc says again, dogged, unrelenting, painfully adoring.

And he clenches in convulsive, little spasms around his fingers. Santi has to bite on his tongue hard. Count back on every corner where the Honda is slow.

It’s fucking—insane.

“Me too.” But he keeps the same pace, only two fingers, scissoring them gently, not quite skimming against Marc’s prostate, not quite ignoring it.

Marc moans, wretched, wanting. It’s the mind-fuck of Santi’s life .

He hadn’t thought about this. It wasn’t ever like that, except in the odd stretch of time between 2018 and 2019, with Marc crystal-fragile and carrying a fiery streak of the divine anyway. You and me, Santi, just us, we’re the best, can you believe this ? As if he had ever doubted.

As if anyone could ever doubt, with Marc tucked against their side, champagne-slack, bright like gold.

But it wasn’t serious . Not when he had Marc’s data, and his wins, and his safety on his hands. Now he has this—the bruise on Marc’s collarbones, and his lube-shiny hole stretching wide, and the way his lashes fall over his cheeks.

If he could burn that image in his mind forever, he would. Thinks he already has.

Santi must be going too slow again. Marc makes a noise, one hand bunched on the sheets, the other digging into his shoulder. The thought of carrying Marc’s bruises comes like a knife to the guts sort of realization about himself.

“Can’t you just fuck me?” He bites out. Mouthy, still halfway to a plea anyway.

And he goes vice-tight again. The squelch of lube becomes deafening, obscene. Christ on the cross .

“Marc,” Santi chides, his voice gravelly, strained. He’s thinking about it—just slipping inside him already, God fucking damn it all.

“Hm?” His eyes are hazy. His hips work in small, tortuous circles when Santi freezes.

He would like it, is the thing. Another Marc-ism to add to the list— fastmeanrough here too. Santi tucks a laugh against the slippery crook of his neck, slows down his fingers, presses down against a smooth, trembling thigh to keep him in place when he bucks against his hand. He’s so hard his vision starts to blur around the edges, cock throbbing like a sucker punch between his legs.

But it’s his job to worry. Always has.

“Marc, are you happy?”

Marc’s lashes flutter over his cheeks. He’s pretty—pretty and wired and flushed pink, eyes round and wide, his bottom lip wobbling. “ Yes ,” he groans, grabs Santi’s wrist. His nails scramble against the delicate skin there. Mean, greedy. “Yes, but I wish things hadn’t—that we were still—”

His heart is three sizes too big for his chest. Also, his underwear feels gross, sticky, where he’s been leaking all over himself. Through that outpour of fondness, of need, Santi leans in to nuzzle Marc’s forehead.

It isn’t—it isn’t what they thought they’d always be. Honda forever, Marc had blurted out at—one of the Sachsenrings, he thinks, both of them drunk out of their asses, delirious with joy, with the fever pitch of king of the Ring .

And if not that, a team forever. It isn’t Santi going through ten hail marys over quali, over a divine save, and Marc dragging him up the podium after that, glued together from calf to shoulder.

“You’re gonna be just fine, babychamp,” he whispers.

Marc nods sharply. He’s fever-hot on his fingers, restless, feet digging uselessly into the sweat-damp mattress. “If I could I’d have never—”

Santi knows. Tries to shush him because he knows , but hearing it might unlodge that sharp piece of loss stuck somewhere around his ribs. Might unlodge that I wish you hadn’t, and you were the best thing I ever held, and I thought that without me you wouldn’t have done it that burns in his throat.

But Marc has clearly been working himself towards something. His gaze goes flinty, cutting—clear visor on a left-hander track, laser-focused.

His legs wrap around Santi’s waist. Suddenly he’s on back, scrambling for breath, wrangled like Marc’s bike when it tried to buck him off. Marc is there, everywhere, above him, boyish curls casting shadows on his determination, on his furrowed brows.

Santi blinks hard to the ceiling. He feels light, untethered, mustang wild—fourteen years later is either the most singularly stupid moment to do this or the only one that works.

“Sometimes,” he says, harsh, yearning, “I want to say fuck Ducati, fuck Gresini, fuck Frankie and hand you my data. Get you to tell me what I’m doing wrong.”

Santi laughs. Tries to. What comes out is a reedy noise he doesn’t recognize as human—Marc eviscerates him and reaches behind himself to get Santi’s cock out of his underwear. His hand is iron-hot, calloused from the brakes. He can see where this is going, but his head might be stuffed with cotton, slow on the uptake, stuck on a syrupy wave of want.

“Should I talk you through a lap in Motegi?”

“No.” He goes crinkly-eyed, mischievous. Brno 2019 levels of bad for Santi’s blood pressure. It’s not any less devastating from up close. “I know you’re going to complain about my braking.”

“You eat too much ty—”

Marc smiles, shark-like, and drops down on his cock, mouth going wanton and slack.

It’s just the tip, because Santi grabs his waist and holds tight to keep him in place. Stops him from fucking himself in one single, ruinous stroke. A whine knocks its way past his teeth, searing, almost inaudible through the pound of his heartbeat in his ears. Marc looks smug, hungry—unfortunately, unflatteringly attractive.

“Be careful,” Santi hisses, nowhere near as authoritative as he aimed for. It comes out choked, a plea. It's not like that warning has ever worked.

Marc smells blood on the water. Grins, shiv-quick, a flash of white teeth and his tongue sweeping over them. You you you you you you , Santi thinks, or chants, snapping his hips to fuck into Marc.

It’s—surreal. Marc flattens his hands over Santi’s shoulders, stuttering through his next breath. That little noise is almost as good as winning with him.

[lulublack90]

Prompt 17 - Dawn

@jegulus-microfic August 17, Word count 766

Previous part First Wolfstar part

He followed James through the wooden entrance doors and then left down the steps towards the dungeons. He kept close to James and tried to match his footsteps, so the echoing corridors didn’t give him away. 

They stopped before the blank expanse of wall that served as the secret entrance to the Slytherin dorms.

“Oxyuranus microlepidotus,” James recited, and the wall began to shudder. A door with intricate silver filigree adorning it appeared in the previously empty wall. James hesitantly reached for the handle and swung it open. 

The Slytherin Common room was exactly as he remembered it. Dark, with black leather chairs and sofas, sparsely illuminated by a few candles dotted about, helped by the small amount of light that drifted in through the waters of the black lake, but right now, with it being dark outside, the windows that made up the far wall were as dark and cold as obsidian. 

“Hi, erm, Mr Slytherin sir,” Regulus’s head snapped in the direction of James’s voice. He’d moved to stand in front of the portrait and was trying to get its attention. “Hi, sorry, I was wondering if I could ask you a couple of questions?” James continued. Salazar ignored him, looking out of the side of the frame away from James. Regulus felt a surge of anger swell in his stomach. He ripped the cloak off and stormed across the Common room. 

“Oh, it’s you,” Salazar sneered as Regulus came to a stop beside James. 

“Oh, he talks,” Regulus shot back rudely, balling his hands into fists. 

“I do to students I recognise. This one I do not.” Salazar peered closely at James. “He looks decidedly Gryffindor to me,” 

“James Potter, a pleasure to meet you, sir,” James forced a smile on his face and Regulus caught the jerky movement of his arm, realising James had been about to offer his hand to the painting. 

“Hmmm,” Salazar replied. “And why are you darkening our doors again, Mr Black?” Regulus rolled his eyes before retrieving the locket from his pocket. 

“Look familiar?” He said, letting it swing to and fro on its chain. 

Salazar lunged out of his chair and got as close to them as the confines of his canvas would allow. 

“Where did you get that?!” He spluttered. 

“In a god-awful cave surrounded by inferi,” Regulus answered, letting the locket rest in the flat of his hand, the chain pooling around it.  

“It is wrong,” Salazar murmured, as he moved his head trying to get a better look. Regulus took a step towards him, holding it aloft. "What has been done to my locket?" He furrowed his brow as he continued to examine it.  

“We believe that a man who calls himself Lord Voldemort has turned it into a Horcrux,” Regulus told him.

“OUTRAGEOUS!!!” The portrait bellowed, the frame around it coming away from the wall with the force of his emotion. “HOW DARE HE!!! THAT DESPICABLE EXCUSE FOR AN HEIR!!!” Salazar paced around his small area, his snake coiling itself under his ornate chair to avoid his stomping feet. “Curse that Tom Riddle!” Salazar continued his tirade. He spun to look at them again. “What do you need?” He asked with determination in his eyes.

“We need to know how to open it so we can destroy it and in turn destroy Voldemort,” Regulus told him, being totally honest. 

“Who’s Tom Riddle?” James butted in. Regulus, too, wanted to know he’d never heard that name before.

“They are one and the same,” Salazar said, sitting down in his chair, tired from his outburst, and retrieved his snake from under his chair, hissing what Regulus guessed were soothing words to it. “A childish nickname he made up for himself now his only name,” Salazar looked up from his snake. “Tom Riddle is Lord Voldemort,” Regulus and James looked at each other. This was new information. Something no one else knew. 

“Now about my locket…”

By the time Salazar had given them as much information as he could, the pinks and golds of dawn were peeking above the horizon. Regulus was exhausted, his mind swirling with too much information, and all he wanted was to slip into James’s comfy bed and snuggle into the man beside him, but first he had to follow James up to Dumbledore’s office. He yawned under the cloak as James spoke the password and followed him up the stairs behind the stone gargoyle.

“Ah, James, good morning,” Professor Dumbledore welcomed him the second they stepped into the office. “Please, sit down, we have a lot to discuss. Sherbet Lemon?” 

Next part

[sukunatoes]

Sanguine

Chapter 6: Inconvenience

True Form Sukuna x Reader

18+ ONLY, MDNI

CW: Tobacco Usage, Very Brief Violence, Broken Bones

It was unbearably bright, as not a single cloud graced the azure sky. The breeze carried a slight chill, although it was still a good bit warmer than it had been days prior. Soft tendrils of smoke gently drifted upwards from your mouth with each drag of your cigarette. Somewhere behind you, you could hear the sound of the brittle winter blades of grass crunching beneath Sukuna’s feet.

The shrine you both just visited was yet another dead end. Not a single clue to help aid you in the search for the divine weapons. It had been just three days since your battle with the cursed spirit. The following morning when you awoke, your cursed energy had been almost fully replenished, and the two of you set out almost immediately. Since departing the temple ruins, you had managed to investigate four more sites along the northern coast. That brought the total of places you’ve now searched to six.

You continued your leisurely pace throughout the meadow until a small boulder appeared in your line of sight. Walking over to it, you sat on top of it and stretched your aching legs straight out.

Whenever you had originally planned this excursion, you envisioned it going a lot differently. Sukuna tagging along put a damper on things. He had often insisted on only visiting one location per day before making camp and settling down for the evening. Only once did you visit two places in the same day, and that followed a brief argument between the two of you. Ideally, you needed to visit three to four locations daily. Otherwise, you’d be spending months on your search.

Besides the fact he was slowing you down majorly, he was also why you had to sleep out in the elements. For whatever reason, the majority of Kenjaku’s spirits stayed south of Tokyo. As the southern parts of the country are being overrun, many citizens have been evacuating north. Cities, towns, and even smaller inconspicuous farming villages were being filled to the brim with refugees. Visiting any sort of inn was off the table as long as he was involved.

“I’m not surprised that you’ve led us to yet another dead end.” Sukuna’s mocking tone echoed throughout the meadow as he approached you, casting a shadow as he grew closer to the rock where you sat. “It’s quite pathetic, actually.”

Sukuna had been speaking to you a lot more since he and Uraume parted ways. However, it was mostly just him complaining or mocking you. You ignored him most of the time, only offering the occasional response if he began to show signs of annoyance.

It was strange. You knew it was due to him being bound by a mutual vow not to harm you, but regardless, as of right now you viewed him as more of a nuisance than anything else. Though he probably thought of you much the same.

“Brat, I’m speaking to you.” He kicked his right foot out, colliding with the boulder. It wasn’t strong enough to move or crack it, just enough to attempt to gain your attention.

You cut your eyes to him. His face was twisted into its usual scowl, and his cursed energy was slowly beginning to spike as he grew annoyed with you. One thing you had learned about him is that he hated being ignored. You assumed it was due to the fact that he chalked it up to a mere weak human daring to disrespect a being such as him. In fact, if it weren’t for your vow, he’d likely punish you for such a thing.

“So far, I’ve searched six places in total and found one clue. Considering how well hidden they are, those aren’t bad numbers,” you quipped.

You crossed your right leg over your left, allowing you to extinguish your cigarette on the sole of your boot. After sliding the butt into one of your pockets, you pulled your backpack forward to unzip it.

“We’re not going to get anywhere at this pace,” he growled.

“On that, we can agree,” you mumbled as you fished out a package of beef jerky.

That was another thing. You had hardly eaten at all since this journey began. With the exception of three salmon and mayo onigiri you purchased from a convenience store during a stop for gas, you’ve been living off of protein bars and jerky. Something as simple as going to a restaurant was impossible with him, so it was nothing but gas station food for the time being. Plus, with you camping, they had to be non-perishable. It was an annoyance.

You popped open the bag and reached in your fingers, but before you could even grab on to a piece, Sukuna stuck out one of his hands and ripped it from your grasp.

“Hey, I was eating that!”

He immediately plopped down on the ground in front of you with a huff. Leaning back on both of his left arms, he slid two fingers from one of his right hands into the bag. Pulling out a piece of the jerky, he shoved it in its entirety into his open mouth.

“I watched you pack another in your bag,” he said between his loud, obnoxious chews. He returned his fingers back into the pouch and pulled out two more pieces. Holding them in front of his face, he maneuvered the chunks of jerky around, examining them. “This food is one of the better ones I’ve had since reincarnating.”

“It’s dried meat, of course you’d like it,” you said with an exasperated sigh as you dug for the second pack. “After we leave here, I’d like to drive back to my apartment in Tokyo. We can stay there for a couple of days while I reevaluate our search. Also, that’ll allow me to clean up and gather more supplies.”

Your apartment building was in one of the wards completely overrun by cursed spirits. The entire neighborhood evacuated and was now considered abandoned. Taking Sukuna there for a few days should pose no risk to civilians.

He offered nothing more than a grunt in acknowledgement of your statement. With no opposition from him, as soon as you both finished eating, you’d head back to your car and be on the way. The thought of a bath and a warm meal was enough to bring a small smile to your face. You popped open the second package of jerky and began dipping your fingers in.

“On your feet,” Sukuna’s sudden command boomed out. Its loudness caused you to flinch. You glanced up to see him now pushing himself to his feet.

Now what?

“We’ll leave when I finish eating.”

“We’re not leaving.” He reached down and snagged the bag from your hands yet again before dropping it on the ground next to him. “On your feet now.”

Seriously?

With a click of the tongue, you reluctantly indulged him and followed suit. Rising to your feet in front of him, you crossed your arms as you stared back, awaiting his explanation.

“You’re going to use your cursed technique on me.” He extended his lower right arm towards you, urging you to make contact.

“And why would I do that?”

Sukuna gave no answer to your query but instead grabbed onto your right hand, forcing you to make contact with him. Your palm collided into his wrist and was absolutely swallowed by its sheer size. You’d probably be unable to fully wrap your hand around it if you tried.

“You need to learn the concept of personal space.” You attempted to pull your hand from his arm, but within an instant he caught it, forcing you to maintain your contact.

“Now.” His tone was far more stern. He was growing annoyed again — you could feel his cursed energy wanting to spike.

Despite your cursed energy being replenished, you frankly had no desire to provoke him. Especially considering it would likely end with you following his order at some point anyways.

You sighed as you tightened your grip on him and began sending cursed energy out from the tips of your fingers. His stare was analytical as he focused on the blue aura seeping out from your hand and into his body.

It suddenly clicked. He was attempting to figure out the mechanics behind your cursed technique.

“Ryomen Sukuna.” His eyes cut up to yours at the sound of his name bouncing from your tongue. “If you release yourself from my grip, your arm will break.”

“You only know one trick, is that it?” A smirk grew on his face to accompany his taunting tone.

You fought the urge to roll your eyes. “More like this isn’t worth putting any effort into.”

He ripped his arm back from your grasp, and the second the contact broke, your energy began to go to work. The both of you stared as his arm began twisting and contorting. The noise was disgusting, and it took everything in you to suppress a shudder at the sounds of his bones snapping. Sukuna, on the other hand, seemed completely unbothered by the situation. His face never once betrayed any sign of pain.

“I thought as much, but wanted to confirm it. It’s your own cursed energy that you’re manipulating. The reason you have to make physical contact is to transfer it to the person or object. So that contact isn’t negotiable,” he said as he rotated his injured arm, studying every inch of it. Suddenly he cut all four eyes up to you. “However, if that’s the case, you should be able to transfer energy from any point on your body, not just your hands.”

Shit.

The fact that you could use the rest of your body to transfer cursed energy was something you didn’t want him to discover. It was one thing you had to keep up your sleeve to help level the playing field between the two of you.

If you outright refused to respond to his statement, it’d be a dead giveaway. However, if you vehemently denied it, it’d also clue him in.

“In theory, I should be able to,” you began, carefully choosing your words. You kept your voice steady. “However, I’ve never done it. I’ve always just used my hands.”

The lie you offered up seemed reasonable enough to believe.

Instead, a snort immediately escaped him. “You’re the worst fucking liar I’ve ever met.”

Your face immediately dropped. You knew you weren’t a terrible liar, so how could he always tell? Deceit and manipulation were a part of the specialized training you had received all those years ago.

Your upbringing as a sorcerer was far from a normal one. While others trained solely to hone their cursed techniques and fight cursed spirits, you were forced to expand your skill set in unusual ways. Deceiving others was something you excelled at.

“That crater I dragged you out of was a perfect circle. That’s an incredibly rare feat.” A faint white glow began emitting from his injured arm. “It’s unlikely that you did that from hitting the ground in one spot, and the easiest way to allow your cursed energy to infiltrate the ground in that pattern would be through your feet.”

“Astute as always, I see.” You watched as the bones in his arm slowly started moving back into place. “You’re correct. I can use other parts of my body for my technique, but it drains my cursed energy significantly faster, so I can’t fight nearly as long.”

You reached down and grabbed the bag of jerky you had just opened that lay next to Sukuna’s feet before turning around to store it and his empty one in your backpack. “I have a significantly lower cursed energy output than most special grade sorcerers. In fact, it’s likely on par with that of a first or even second grade. It’s both my technique and what I’ve accomplished in my line of work as a sorcerer that rank me so high.”

Turning back around, you notice his arm was now fully healed, like it had never been touched by you at all. As you raised your gaze back to his, you noticed he had never taken his eyes off of you.

“It’s a shame,” Sukuna drawled, leaning down until he was eye level with you. “Such a remarkable technique was wasted on such an insignificant pest like yourself.”

You offered nothing more than a grunt in response as you turned back around. Snagging up your backpack, you began your trek towards the car. Sukuna’s pestering could wait until after you ate an actual meal.

You heard a huff from behind immediately followed by his footsteps trailing you. Reaching into your bag, you pulled out another cigarette. As you went to light it, a shadow was cast over you from behind, completely engulfing your body.

You spun around, and a hand reached out, catching your shoulder and holding you in place. Sukuna was now towering over you, an almost unsettling look gracing his face.

“You’d do well to remember that you and I are not the same. At no point have you or will you hold the upper hand against me, sorcerer. Your secrets will not save you.”

With that, he removed his hand from your shoulder and walked ahead of you, disappearing through thick foliage on the opposite side of the meadow you two were traversing while you stood firmly in place.

What the hell was he even talking about?

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[anniesocsandgeneralstore]

the power of suffering | gally x oc

Summary: Joan and Gally go to The Last City to spy on WCKD. But when he spots an old friend from his maze inside the building, working for the people that tortured them and erased their memories, they discover more than they bargained for. (wc: 3737)

Warnings: language, some sort of confession, a smooch

✎……PREVIOUS CHAPTER || MASTERLIST || NEXT CHAPTER

Joan changed out of her usual skirt into a pair of sturdy canvas pants. As much as she loved the billowing fabric, she had to admit the pants were far more practical. Especially for all the sneaky and running she was about to be doing.

Packing a few strips of homemade jerky, water, and a book just in case she got bored, she set out from her room to meet Gally at the entrance to the tunnels. A manhole cover at the very back of the parking garage that Jensen had discovered pretty early on led to the still operational subway tunnels 

The Last City loomed over their base like an omen. A towering, glittering reminder of all humanity was willing to do to survive. Putting up walls that high and thick, keeping out all but a select few who could afford it, leaving the rest to squaller. Torturing and killing an entire generation to save humanity. Joan touched the scar that cut through her jaw. Given by a friend who got stung by one of those monsters in the maze.

She knew what the Flare could do. She saw it slowly destroy people until Lawrence ordered for them to be taken out into the waste and shot. All she could do was watch as they forgot who they were. As they became more and more violent. As black infection poured from their mouths. She remembered on so many occasions, as she refilled Lawrence’s serum, begging for him to let her use it on someone else. But he always said no. Said it would cause pandemonium. And he was probably right.

But it was those days he would deny her that she pondered if WCKD was right. If a cure was really worth all that they did to get it. But then she remembered Nellie. Ethel. Gwen. Marie. Jane.

Most days, she could tamp down that white hot feeling in her chest. Focus on the people who needed her help. But it was hard to ignore when she was stepping into the heart of the beast that took everything from her.

Well, not everything.

Gally stood waiting by the manhole cover, the metal lid already set aside. Hands stuffed into the pockets of his jacket. He looked deep in thought. Brows furrowed and lips pursed as he stared down into the hole.

No. They hadn’t taken everything. Not yet.

He seemed to snap out of it when he heard her approach. Grabbing the ladder, he began to lower it into the manhole.

“Last chance to back out,” Gally said, looking up at her from his spot squatting on the floor.

Joan snorted. “Youre the one who asked me to come.”

“Well, are you?”

“I’m not backing out if that’s what you mean.”

A small smile ticked the corner of his mouth, a beam of light shining across his eyes making them sparkle like gemstones. “Good.”

Gally went down the ladder first, landing with an echoing thud at the bottom. Joan followed soon after. When she reached the tunnel with a small splash in the filthy water that trickled through it, the lights were already on. And a hand was pressed gently into her lower back in case she fell. It made some heat tingle all over her body when she looked over her shoulder to thank him, only to see him standing so close with that same corner of his mouth quirked in a grin. He nodded because he knew what she was going to say. She didn’t have to speak.

They started off down the sewer, following the lights that Lawrence rigged up years ago, at a elasurely pace. The calm before having to sprint through the train tunnel and the always stressful walk through the city. Despite the smell, there was some beauty in that sewer. The quiet. The light bouncing off the water like glitter. The tightly packed brick from a bygone era. Gally’s hand brushing against her own.

“That kid in the infirmary, he gonna be okay?” he questioned so quietly his voice barely bounced off the walls.

Joan looked down at teh ripples her boots made with each step. “It’s hard to say. He’s got some kind of upper respiratory infection, but…There’s not much I can do about that.” 

“Still can’t believe those shanks used up all those meds we found.”

There was some unspoken anger in that — though it seemed to radiate off of his skin and the downturn of his mouth. Some unspoken words that she knew by heart. All those meds Vince died for. They used them all like there was no sacrifice attached. Like it wasn’t that big of a deal. Like there would be more. It was hard for Joan to get it through the other medics' skulls that there probably wasn’t anymore. That the Last city had stopped sending aid packages months ago. That it was probably some sign of the end of days to what they were doing there with the Right Arm. 

As if the end of days hadn’t already come.

“Not much we can do about it now,” she sighed. 

All of the yelling had been done. The angry pacing. The tears burned the backs of her eyes as she rippled with righteous fury in front of her medics. They had all looked ashamed, some realization passing over their faces once they figured out that help wasn’t coming. When Gally found out he had wanted to do it all over again. But Joan was right. There wasn’t anything to be done. Not now.

They reached the end of the sewer that let out into othe subway tunnel. Gally helped her down from the hole onto the gravel lined track. It was quiet, drops of water echoed off the concrete walls, but a train was sure to be coming soon. There was no time to dilly dally. The service door that provided them an entrance into the city was a few yards away. So they set off at a jog down the tunnel. One right after the other.

As they neared the door, a red light began to glow in the dim. The exit sign. But behind them, the sound of a train speeding along the tracks began to rumble. 

“Come on!” Gally called from ahead as he picked up his pace to a full sprint.

Joan was quick to follow. Running as fast as her body would take her in order to out run that train. The red glow came closer and closer — but so did the rumble. She looked over her shoulder and she could see the bright light from the train just beginning to round the corner.

“Don’t look back!” Gally yelled. 

Joan pumped her legs harder, faster. Gravel crunched under her feet and her bag bounced against her back. Hadn’t she done this before? Hadn’t she run for her life with a bag on her back full of provisions? For a moment, she saw Nellie, curls bounding and fear in her eyes running ahead of her. What a stupid way to die — after all they had been through. Run over by a train. But the exit sign wsa shining bright and beautiful up ahead. They were so close. What a stupid way to die. Nellie died for nothing — Joan was going to join her anyway. It was all for nothing.

Gally reached the door first. Hand poised on the handle, he waited for her. 

He gestured for her as if that would make her go any faster. She wished that it would as the power of the train rumbled beneath her feet. What felt like an eternity later, the rumble and light right at her heels, Joan reached him. Gally pushed open the door and she practically fell through right into the heart of the city.

The hardest part of the whole ordeal was having to act like she wasn’t just running for her life. Once she was through the door, she was in a sea of people all dressed in nice, clean clothes. Suits and pencil skirts with hair perfectly done and holding briefcases. They were all walking this way and that, to where Joan wasn’t entirely sure. Home, maybe? It was a memory at the edge of her brain of herself wearing something similar. 

Controlling her breathing as best she could, she allowed Gally to take hold of her hand and start leading her through the crowd. He seemed completely unaffected by their sprint to outrun a train, except for a smattering of sweat on his brow. A few people glanced at them as they walked through the city like they had seen it all before. Which they had, but only a handful of times. Even less for Joan, who tried not to look for too long at the lights from the buildings way up high or the heeled shoes the women were wearing. 

Not wanting to take any more risks, Gally took them along the path that didn’t go straight through the main square of the Last City. Instead, he led her through the outskirts and back alleys, along the edge of the wall that hedged them in. After they got over a few ledges and climbed some long forgotten staircases, they made it to the balcony on the wall. 

An alcove in solid rock and steel with a metal railing and a door that led inside. No one ever came out of that door, but just in case, Gally hid the telescope he used to spy on WCKD beneath an old tarp and a collapsed crate. Over five years, no one had ever touched it. Joan was convinced no one else had ever even been there since the wall went up. But Gally was ever cautious and rightfully so. WCKD would do anything to get what they wanted. 

And part of what they wanted was them. Immunes. Lawrence had said once he was surprised they hadn’t taken her and Gally back by now. It made a shiver go down her spine. To think that she could still be found and taken by them. Put back into some maze or turned into a blood bag for serum harvesting. And she never felt as close to being back in WCKD’s clutches as she did when she was inside the Last City.

“How long did you wanna be here tonight?” Joan asked as she took off her bag and set it on the ground.

“Not long.” Gally set up the telescope and looked at her with furrowed brows. “Why?”

“This place always makes me uneasy,” she replied, still trying to catch her breath.

Understanding passed over his face. “I won’t let anything happen.”

To you. Unspoken but heard. Joan nodded as she pulled out her water bottle and took a sip from it. Gally hunched over the railing and began looking through the telescope. Moving this way and that as he searched for something. Anything. Joan sat down on the still intact crate, her heart finally beginning to slow. 

There weren’t many people left out on the streets. It seemed that in the Last City, once work was over, people got to their homes as soon as they could. No night life, no going out to dinner, no movies. Joan knew what these things were. Clubs, dancing, silverware wrapped up in cloth napkins, buttery popcorn and massive sodas. But she couldn’t remember doing any of those things. She couldn’t remember any music besides the kind Lawrence liked to play or the drum beats Gwen would play in the Pairie. How much of that had she even enjoyed before WCKD took her away? 

Or was it before her parents gave her up?

She met a mother once. In the infirmary. With a sorrow on her face Joan had never seen before — eyes hollow and face gaunt. She gave her child to WCKD to see if he was immune. She thought she would get to see him. She thought she was saving him from the cruel realities of the world. But she never saw him again. And in some ways the maze was a worse fate than what was happening out here. Joan didn’t tell her that she was one of those kids too. Didn’t tell her about the maze or her dead friends. But she took extra care with that woman. Gave her the best she could and sent her on her way with a scarf from around her own neck and tears in her eyes.

Had her own mother done the same and had to live with what she had done?

“Holy shit,” Gally suddenly muttered as he pulled away from the telescope for a second and then dove back in to get another look.

“What?” she asked, standing up from the crate.

He just repeated himself, attempting to zoom in on the WCKD building more but finding he had maxed out the telescope's range. Then he backed away from the lens and mumbled under his breath, eyes lost somewhere else: “It’s her.” 

Joan narrowed her eyes up at him as he began to pace slowly. “Who?”

Gally didn’t respond. Only leaned against the railing with his brow pinched and lips pursed. Deep in thought. Taking the telescope in hand to make sure it didn’t move, Joan put her eye up to the lens. 

It was a woman. Light skinned, long dark hair perfectly curled; she wore a lab coat. She was at some sort of work station. Viles and tubes of some blue liquid and what could only be assumed to be blood. She was pretty, even from that distance. Full pink lips pursed in thought and thin hands working delicately at a notebook. 

Something ugly and sour rose in Joan’s gut. Something she couldn’t explain. She backed away from the telescope and sat back down on the crate, feeling nauseous. Looking down at her hands, she now hated how sturdy they looked — all those calluses and scars. She ran her hands up her bare, tan, arms. Her fingers carded through her blonde locks, tangled from her run through the tunnel. 

She was nothing like that girl inside WCKD. 

Nothing like what Gally wanted.

That ugly and sour thing climbed up her throat like bile. Made her grimace and turn to look down at her shoes. He wanted someone like that girl. Smart, elegant, clean, beautiful. Not someone like her. Not someone with grime caked in, too many scars to count, and so…Plain. It twisted in her chest. Did she want him to want her like that? For five years it had always been them, together. Something between them, some care and affection that no one could ever put a finger on. A natural draw. A connection forged by similar traumas. But what if it really was only one way? What if he really was just using her as an emotional sponge — and Jensen was right — there to pick up his pieces but never pick up hers in return? 

Joan looked up at him, still leaning against the railing and staring out into the city. Illuminated by its glow, neon and florescents. That boy who tore himself apart and put himself back together. That boy who fought and clawed and dug his way out of his own grave. Who lost everything he knew and kept on going. Who just wanted the people he cared about to be safe and happy. 

A tear slipped down her cheek. 

How did it take this long to realise he was her moon and stars?

“She could’ve been our way in,” Gally suddenly said.

Joan’s lip quivered as her brow furrowed. “W-What?”

“She’s from my maze,” he explained and it didn’t make her feel any better. “Showed up a week before everything went to shit.” 

There had been a girl in his maze. Right. He’d mentioned that before. No boys had ever come to hers. It had been just girls for years and years. Her throat tightened as another tear broke through.

Gally went on: “If only Thomas was here. She’d listen to — You okay?” 

Joan snapped her head up to look at him. He was already looking down at her. Face crumpled in concern. And when he got a full view of her tear stained face and puffy cheeks, he quickly moved to kneel next to her. He took her shoulder in his hand to search her for injury.

“What’s wrong?” he asked quietly, thumb confidently but gently, like a whisper of wind against her skin, wiping the tear from her cheek.

She immediately shook her head. “It’s nothing…It’s stupid.” 

“Like I’m gonna believe that.” He leveled her with a look that made her crack a smile.

He always had been good at that. Making her smile. Sometimes she even noticed that he was doing it intentionally, with the way he would smile and laugh after with his arms crossed. It always made some blush she understood but ignored burn her cheeks.

After a while, Joan finally sniffed and looked over at the telescope. “She’s pretty.”

Gally’s face instantly scrunched up — almost like disgust. He glanced over at the telescope too then back at her in confusion. “I guess? She’s not really…I always thought she was kind of a bitch.”

“W-What? You…You don’t…?” Embarrassment flashed hot in her face as she scrambled for words.

He didn’t think she was pretty. She wasn’t what he wanted. There was relief and guilt and hope rising inside her as she desperately tried to avoid eye contact with him. This was Gally. She had never shied away from him a day in her life. Not since she felt his weak pulse beneath her fingertips. Not since she put her hands to his heart and saved him from death. Not since she stayed up three days straight in order to make sure he lived. 

When he finally caught her eye, those crystal blues reflecting neon in the distance, she couldn’t look away. Never had been capable. But she nearly did when that smirk began to lift the corner of his mouth. 

“Were you jealous?” he asked bluntly.

“No!” was her instant, and loud, reply.

He didn’t believe her, so he asked again, smile gone and a seriousness in him that only came out when he was on mission or talking about his past: “Were you jealous?”

“I — I — I don’t…” 

Joan scrambled for some sort of explanation for her reaction. Was jealousy what that sour feeling in her gut was? Was that what it meant to compare herself to that girl she didn’t even know and wish she was in her place?

Gally inched closer to her, slotting himself between her legs — his grip on her jaw and cheek tightening. She had nearly forgotten he was holding her face. It was so natural for him to do so — for him to touch her. As natural as the sun or rain or the moon and its cycles. But she didn’t dare touch him back. Not now. Not when they were on the brink of some revelation that she didn’t even know she had been afraid of since their meeting. 

“Just tell me,” he muttered.

“Yes,” she finally said, in the faintest whisper, eyes searching his face for a reaction. “I was…I was jealous.” 

Seeming to crumble, Gally’s face softened as he pressed his forehead to her own. Then he breathed her name, gentle and sweet. His other hand skimmed up her leg to rest at her thigh. His grip soft and desparate. Joan nearly gasped. He had never touched her there before. Maybe to get her attention or reassuringly, but never like this. Never like he was trying to tell her all he couldn’t say through his touch. Never like she was about to slip away from him. Never like this. 

Oh. Oh. 

A bright and warm thing filled her insides like sunlight. Made her smile and lean into his touch and touch for herself. He wanted someone like her. Someone with grime caked in, too many scars to count, and plain. It twisted in her chest and made her nearly laugh. For five years it had always been them, together. Something between them, some care and affection that no one could ever put a finger on — but no she could. A natural draw. A connection forged by similar traumas. It went both ways. They were there to pick each other up. 

She didn’t know what to say. She found her tongue tied and heavy in her mouth. Her heart too big for her words. None of them would do what was between them justice. None. She tried. She whispered his name and pulled herself ever closer and said his name again. And he just smiled. Chuckled. Ran his thumb over her cheek over and over. 

Why put words to something they both knew was there? 

So Joan kissed him instead. She didn’t even know where she got the urge. But before she knew what was happening she had tilted her chin and pressed her lips to his. Gally seemed surprised for a moment, going slightly stiff beneath her touch. But then he reacted in kind. Returning the kiss with fervor as his hand slipped into her hair. It was a new sensation, but a good one. It made something tingle deep in her belly as she tried to get closer to him, hands cupping his cheeks as she tried to put everything she felt into that kiss. 

Gally was the first one to pull away. Breathless and not without a few more short kisses given. He smiled as he tucked her hair behind her ear. A laugh bubbled up in each of their throats. 

“I um…Lawrence wanted me to — to find something before we left. Just a few more minutes, okay?” he asked quietly. 

“Okay,” she replied, breathless. 

He pressed one more chaste kiss to her lips before he got up and went back to the telescope. “Could you read for us?”

She nodded despite him already turned away from her. Her heart felt lighter than air, her body like it might float away at any second. But it didn’t even matter. It didn’t matter that it was still unspoken. All that mattered was that it was good and it was them. 

So she pulled out the book she brought and began to read: 

“There was once a young man who wished to gain his Heart’s Desire.”

i no longer have a taglist please follow @anniesocsandlibrary

[dishoneykisses]

And more to be added!

Wrap Me Up In New Fixations by Sirmoulin (E, Complete, 25,827K)

Relationships:

Poly141 - Relationship, Kyle "Gaz" Garrick/John "Soap" MacTavish/John Price/Simon "Ghost" Riley

Tags:

Scent Kink, Polyamory, Hand Jobs, Anal Sex, Oral Sex, Fluff and Smut, Double Penetration, Multiple Orgasms, Overstimulation, Creampies, Aftercare

Summary:

Taking care of curly hair was a process, a pain in the ass really. But at least the shampoo smells nice.

Four chapters of Gaz getting dicked down because the 141 thinks his hair smells good.

Ghost is annoyed (Thread) by Arson (E, Short Thread)

Relationships:

Ghost/Konig

Tags:

Summary:

Ghost is annoyed that König's dick is bigger than his, so he makes it his business to show the taller man that it can't possibly be better than his own.

Trans man Soap (Thread) by iammadeofpages (E, Short Thread)

Relationships:

Ghost/Soap

Tags:

dysphoria, self deprecation, lots of pussy talk, cunnilingus.

Summary:

People say it's not a problem. They always fucking do. As if the lie won't have to come out at some point? Like ignoring it works.

Ghost being so /done/ (Thread) by Raven (E, Short Thread)

Relationships:

Price/Soap, Ghost/Soap

Tags:

overstimulation, trans!soap, brat tamer!Price.

Summary:

Thinking of Ghost being so /done/ with bratty Soap that he just sends him to Price so that the Captain can bend him over his knee and wreck him.

Edge (Thread) by Bailiah (E, Short Thread)

Relationships:

Ghost/Soap

Tags:

Summary:

Ghost being more turned on than ever, and Soap absolutely not helping

i'm afraid i'll go to heaven by casiferfans (E, Complete -multiple parts -, 7,787K)

Relationships:

John "Soap" MacTavish/Simon "Ghost" Riley

Tags:

Mutual Pining, Sexual Tension, Resolved Sexual Tension, Accidental Voyeurism, Rough Sex, Possessive Behavior, Top Simon "Ghost" Riley, Bottom John "Soap" MacTavish, Banter, Blackmail, Protectiveness, Biting

Summary:

"It’s information,” Price spit out, beginning to pace back and forth. He tacked on, “Information on us," as if his original anger and statement didn’t make that obvious.

“So blackmail,” Ghost supplied. Price gave a jerky nod in affirmation. “Okay. What in the fresh hell does it have to do with me?”

It's Tactical by WhisperedWords12 (E, Complete - part of short series, Stand alone - 1, 979K)

Relationships:

Rodolfo Parra/Alejandro VargasJohn "Soap" MacTavish/Simon "Ghost" Riley

Tags:

Hand JobsBlow Jobs, Teasing, Dirty Talk, One Shot, Stand Alone, Voyeurism, Past Accidental Voyeurism

Summary:

“I’d advise you not to look,” Ghost said.

A thud against the car, the vehicle swaying slightly.

“What in the bloody hell—“ Soap cursed, hand on his weapon, looking to the side mirror. Alejandro had Rudy pinned against the car by his hips, was biting hungrily at his bottom lip.

“Told you not to look,” Ghost mumbled. “Unless that’s your thing. I won’t judge.”

Backseat Driver by WhisperedWords12 (E, Complete, - part of series, stand alone - 5,249K)

Relationships:

John "Soap" MacTavish/Simon "Ghost" Riley, Rodolfo Parra/Alejandro Vargas, John "Soap" MacTavish/Rodolfo Parra/Simon "Ghost" Riley/Alejandro Vargas

Tags:

Foursome - M/M/M/M, Car Sex, Established Relationship, Overstimulation, Multiple Orgasms, Hand Jobs, Anal Sex, Anal Fingering, Fingerfucking, Praise Kink, Voyeurism, Explicit Sexual Content, Bottom John "Soap" MacTavishTop Simon "Ghost" RileySwitch Alejandro Vargas, Switch Rodolfo ParraPlot What Plot/Porn Without Plot

Summary:

Ghost gave Soap a look that was dark and just a little bit hungry. “Get into the back seat,” he said, his voice low.

Soap swallowed, confused. “The back?” he asked. He had a very distinct problem that he was trying to hide. There was no way he was going to be getting into the back with the other two right there.

But Ghost nodded, eyes back on the road. A hand reached out from behind him on the door side, squeezing his bicep. It was Alejandro, leaning forwards in his seat. “Come here, Soap,” he said, tugging gently on Soap’s shirt.

When Soap looked into the backseat he saw that both Rudy and Alejandro wore a similar expression to Ghost’s

Soap finds out about dick piercings by Bob Mcee (E, Short Thread)

Relationships:

Ghost/Soap

Tags:

Summary:

Soap finds out about dick piercings and has a meltdown about it. Ghost has been pining for him since he first saw him and uses this to try and make a move on him.

TW: NON-CON Tempting Obsidian by WhisperedWords12 (E, Complete, 11,555K)

Relationships:

John "Soap" MacTavish/Simon "Ghost" RileyJohn "Soap" MacTavish/TentaclesJohn "Soap" MacTavish/Simon "Ghost" Riley/Tentacles

Tags:

hreesome - M/M/Other, Tentacles, Aphrodisiacs, Drugged Sex, Possessive Sex, Explicit Sexual Content, Rape/Non-con Elements, Extremely Dubious Consent, Medical Experimentation, Restraints, Choking, Prostate Massage, Oral Fixation, Non-Consensual Voyeurism, Overstimulation, Multiple Orgasms, Multiple Penetration, Asphyxiation, First Time Bottoming, Anal Sex, Canon-Typical Violence

Summary:

Soap falls in the field, only to wake up in some kind of medical facility.

And what are captured soldiers for, if not to be used in scientific experimentations? Unfortunately, this one’s side effects come as a surprise to everyone.

Uhhh (vagueing) by Mosser (E, Short Thread)

Relationships:

Ghost/Soap

Tags:

Summary:

Nsfw ghostsoap face riding

Quick by Bob Mcee (E, fluff, Short Thread)

Relationships:

Ghost/Soap

Tags:

Summary:

Ghost has a high libido and Soap is a raging asexual

Johnny, I swear by Dilf doney (E, Short Thread)

Relationships:

Ghost/Soap

Tags:

Summary:

“Johnny, I swear to go— hnn!” Ghost cuts off with a choked moan, pressing his forehead into the bed.

real slow and steady by bailish (E, Short thread)

Relationships:

Ghost/Price

Tags:

Summary:

Real slow and steady, luxuriating in it, all the while knowing exactly how the sound travels between where he is and Price’s office, knows damn well the captain can hear him

thoughts by Jae (E, short thread)

Relationships:

Ghost/Soap

Tags:

Summary:

Ghost who absolutely will not recieve during sex. Like anything, at all.

omegaverse by Limerence (E, Short Thread)

Relationships:

Soap/Ghost

Tags:

Summary:

Soap & Ghost are undercover in an omega brothel, when it happens.

[jumpywhumpywriter]

Spinoff Story Vampire & Vampire Hunter part 12

Warnings: human being Turned, traumatic past events, blood & gore, mention of death, alcohol

An anon awhile back asked to learn about Alex's traumatic past, so here it is! The very reason why Alex is so shady about his past as a human, and why he doesn't like talking about it/mentally blocked it out. This one's extra long, so enjoy!

He understood what Mallory meant now, more than his pride wanted to admit.

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

Flashback: How Alex was Turned (gives some insight into his traumatic past)

Alex was stumbling away in the dark of the night, laughing and joking with his two friends who had spent the night drinking and partying with him to celebrate his 26th birthday. It had been fun, but left everyone feeling spent and tired. A symptom of good times had by all.

"Thank you all, for giving me this," Alex laughed giddily, face flushed from alcohol. He wasn't usually a drinker, but tonight was special, so he'd allowed himself to get carried away.

"Of course! It's not every day you turn 26!" His redhead friend Jacob slurred chipperly. "You're almost getting too old for parties!" Alex gave him a playful shove, sending Jacob staggering with a laugh.

"Uh, guys? Who's that, and why do they look like some creepy king of darkness?" Austin suddenly spoke up.

Jacob and Alex stopped in their tracks and followed his gaze to see what he was looking at. There was a tall man wearing a dark cloak, the hood pulled up over his head and shrouding his face in darkness. But he was walking swiftly toward the group, his gait unnaturally twitchy and jerky. The streetlights were the only thing illuminating his figure as he approached, silent as a ghost.

"Think he's homeless?" Jacob whispered.

"Don't know, but I'd rather not stick around to find out," Alex whispered back. There had been a recent spike of murders happening around the area, and he wasn't interested in finding out if the stranger was the cause of them. Because the way he was walking was... unsettling. There was an aura of menacing energy that radiated from him.

"Guys, let's get out of here," Austin suggested shakily. None of them argued, hurriedly turning away from the man and picking up their pace. But when Alex glanced behind him, the man was following. Definitely intentional.

"I really don't like this," he hissed under his breath to Jacob.

"Just keep walking, don't look back," his friend replied nervously. "Only a few blocks to your house. Then we'll be safe."

Alex couldn't help another brief look behind, and ice raced up his spine when he saw there was nobody there. The man was gone. His head snapped forward when he heard Austin yelp in surprise, and the man was standing right there in front of them, as if he'd teleported. He pulled down his hood, revealing piercing silver eyes and... fangs. Sharp fangs.

"What is that thing?? What IS that?!" Jacob shouted.

The stranger's hand suddenly shot out, snatching Austin by the throat and pulling him close while he kicked and flailed uselessly.

"HEY! Let him go, creep!" Without thinking twice, Alex ran forward and shoved the man hard in the chest, intending to startle him into dropping his friend -- and he did drop Austin… to grab Alex instead. The man had a handful of the front of his shirt, keeping Alex from jerking away.

"Let go! LET GO!!" Alex shrieked, panicking. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see his two friends abandoning him to flee, staggering away and screaming in terror.

Alex punched and clawed at the stranger's face, but it was like the man couldn't feel pain at all, because he ignored the blows completely, tangling his free hand in Alex's hair and roughly jerking his head to the side.

"What're you--" Alex's voice turned into a bloodcurdling shriek of agony as fangs plunged deep into the side of his neck, tearing through skin and muscle like paper.

Vampire, he realized in horror. He'd heard stories about them, but never thought they were actually real!

"Sir, please!" Alex begged desperately. Ice-cold adrenaline flooded all his senses, and he could feel the blood being sucked out of him too fast to keep up with, pure terror consuming his thoughts, his entire being.

It was like nothing he expected, nothing like the movies or the books. He could feel flesh and veins tearing as the vampire drank his blood with a terrifying ferocity, the pain so excruciating his vision turned red.

"I don't want to die!" Alex wailed uselessly before screaming again. His legs turned to jelly as the blood flowed out of him, spots forming in his vision, a roaring sound rushing in his ears. And still the vampire fed, showing no signs of stopping.

Alex's gut twisted violently with dread, the panic clawing up his throat and choking him, the awful realization that he was dying right now. This is what dying felt like. He tried to lift his hands, to push the predator away, but even his panic quickly faded as he realized he was too weak. His sight was starting to fade, blurred by helpless tears.

And then the vampire finally stopped drinking, releasing his drained body to crumple in a boneless heap on the ground, Alex's head hitting the sidewalk with an awful crack.

"Thanks, human. I needed that," the stranger chuckled cruelly. Then he turned away without another word, walking off into the night and leaving Alex to die alone out in the cold. He'd simply been caught in the wrong place at the wrong time, in the path of a hungry, opportunistic predator.

Alex could barely breathe, his breaths coming ragged and shallow and uneven. He moaned in pain, barely conscious as the darkness came rushing in to pull him down into death. He was so, so cold, but didn't even have the energy left to shiver, his sluggish heartbeat slowing to a stuttering whisper as it struggled to pump blood that was no longer there.

What a way to end his 26th birthday, some part of him thought. Another murder to be eventually found and added to the growing list.

His mouth gaped open as he fought to keep drawing air, barely alive. He was distantly aware of a shadow falling over him, the air displacing nearby that told him someone was crouching down next to him.

"Poor human, looks like you have some seriously bad luck tonight," a voice rumbled above him.

Alex didn't respond, couldn't respond, his body failing to listen to him.

"You know... I can save you, if you'd like. Give you the gift of survival. I'm in a rather generous mood tonight after visiting an old friend of mine. Blink twice if you accept my offer."

Alex felt a flicker of desperate hope in his mind, and mustered every ounce of remaining strength in his dying body to blink.

Once, twice.

"Brave human," the voice laughed darkly. "My gift has many catches and strings attached, but you'll find that out on your own soon enough..."

Alex didn't have time to ponder the implication of those words before someone lifted his limp arm off the ground, and a stabbing pain pierced his wrist. He wanted to scream in pain as a fiery agony entered his veins, but was physically incapable of it at this point, the last of his energy seeping away. His eyes rolled back in his skull a moment later, and he gave himself up to the welcoming darkness unconsciousness had to offer.

He didn't expect to wake up again, but he did. Miraculously. And the memories all came rushing back to him. His eyes snapped open, and he realized he was still on the sidewalk, and it was still the middle of the night. He sucked in a huge gulping gasp of air, getting his bearings together before pushing himself to sit up.

There was blood -- his blood -- spattered and dried on the concrete. The stranger who had saved him was nowhere in sight.

Alex choked on a sob, dragging his shaky body to his feet and stumbling off, making his way home. His head thrummed and buzzed with pain the whole time, and he didn't even bother changing his bloody clothes before collapsing into his bed. He burrowed under a pile of blankets, but couldn't shake how devastatingly cold he felt, hollowed-out on the inside.

But maybe... maybe all this was just some awful nightmare, maybe he'd wake up tomorrow and find out this wasn't real, that none of this had happened.

It was real. It had happened. Because he looked in the mirror the next morning to see his pale face staring back at him, appearance disheveled and ragged.

But what was worse... was the exact moment he found out he had fangs. Because... he was a monster now too. He hadn’t realized that's what his rescuer had meant by 'saving him'.

Alex threw his head back and wailed, knowing his whole life would never be the same again. And he would live an eternity with his regrets, never to escape them. His own personal hell. Unable to truly live ever again.

The change was... difficult, especially without another vampire to guide him. He learned most things the hard way. Like how badly the sun burned if he got caught in it, that there were humans in this world whose entire jobs were killing creatures like him. He found a way to order animal blood to survive off of, but he didn't have much in the way of money, and eventually it wasn't enough to get him anywhere at all.

That's when he'd gone feral with hunger and killed his first human. It had been awful and satisfying at the same time. And that's when he first met Anisa, who had smelled the blood of his victim and come to investigate, finding him sobbing wretchedly on the floor in the aftermath. She'd taken him in and showed him how to be a proper vampire, how to feed and live the half-dead life of a bloodsucker. Even bought him his own mansion to stay at and offered him a safe shelter away from vampire hunters, and made sure he'd always have packaged blood available to stave off hunger. He owed her everything.

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

"Hello? Alex?"

Alex snapped out of it, blinking, the haunting memories retreating back to the corner of his mind he frequently banished them to to forget.

Mallory was staring at him with a confused expression. "Where did you go just now?" He breathed. "You were talking like normal and then suddenly looked... lost."

Alex grimaced. "Just... remembering some stuff. PTSD like you have, you know?"

"Doubt it's as bad as mine," Mallory scoffed.

"It's not. It's far worse." Alex didn't elaborate, and the hunter didn't press him on it, sitting in awkward silence with the predator, deeply lost in thought. But eventually the night chill was too much to bear, and Mallory stood up with a shiver, aiming to head back into the hunter base. He paused when a hand lightly grabbed his wrist, glaring at Alex, who cleared his throat.

“Mallory, for whatever it's worth… I truly am sorry for what I put you through.”

“I don't forgive you,” Mallory said evenly.

“I wasn't expecting you to. I just wanted to let you know.”

Mallory nodded, then let out a harsh breath. “I don't forgive you right now, and I might never…” he hesitated. “But… this is a good start.” he pulled his wrist out of Alex's hand and headed back inside without another word, leaving the bloodsucker alone to his thoughts.

⏪️ Back Next ⏩️

Masterlist

@scoundrelwithboba @lumpofsand @isikedmyself878 @iamheretohurt @fleur-a-whump

@ay5ksal @otterfrost @sausages-things @togzy @floral-comet-whump

@whump-till-ya-jump @cravesunconditionallove @whumpwritinglover222 @nevermore-ramblings @mj-or-say10

@tippytappytyping

[breannasfluff]

Twilight was being weird again. Ever since Wild’s encounter with the wolves, even though Twilight wasn’t present, he acted strange.

The rancher was intimidating; obviously well-traveled and well-balanced. He might have the least oddities in the group and his input was often taken by Time.

No one asked for Wild’s input but…that was probably for the best. The few times he suggests battle plans they are shot down as too risky, too many bombs; just asking to be smitten by the Goddesses.

Silly, really. He survived his adventure with his wits and unconventional approaches.

Twilight could always be counted on to be level-headed and keep the group together. Rather like a flock of sheep and Twilight circled the edges of the herd, making sure they stayed a cohesive unit.

Wild didn’t take well to being herded and hemmed in, but he put up with it on occasion because it seemed unconscious for the hero. Now, though, the level was taken to the extreme.

“Wild!” Twilight’s calling him from where he stopped to examine a mushroom. “Stick with the group!”

Grinding his teeth, Wild stares back and pointedly picks the mushroom first. He’s not familiar with it, but the slate will identify it for him later. Still sulking, he drags his feet to join the group. He was only a few feet away, for Hylia’s sake! What did Twilight expect, a monster to pop out of the bush and stab him?

Possibly, because 10 minutes later when Wild stops to pull a rock from his shoe, Twilight is circling back again.

“What are you doing? C’mon, stay with the group.” His body reads wary, nervous, annoyed.

Wild bares his teeth before remembering it’s a canine gesture and not a hylian one. ‘Rock in my shoe,’ he signs, hands jerky.

Twilight ignores it and nudges him to keep moving. “Got to stick together out here.”

Glaring, Wild moves, if only to avoid being poked again. He worms his way to the middle of the group and pointedly takes up a spot by Wind, who easily transfers his chatter from Four to him.

Being in the middle of the group and stuck on the trail chafes, but maybe Twilight will calm down.

By evening, Wild wants to scream, or kill a monster, or wrestle Wolfie until the buzzing in his head stops. Wolfie’s been missing since the wolves, though, and it’s his fault. If he hadn’t attacked his friend, lost in battle memories and confusion, the wolf wouldn’t stay away.

Every day that passes without him carves out a deeper hollow in his chest. Wolfie was one of the few Wild felt comfortable near—someone to count as more than a friend. A companion, for all he was an animal. Wolfie listened to his fears and helped in his own way. He provided a warm body to cuddle against when the touch of others drove him away.

Wolfie made sense, and Wild drove him away.

“Champion.” Time’s looking at him with a frown and he wanders over. “What are you thinking about?”

‘Have you seen Wolfie recently?’ Wild signs.

Their leader shakes his head, eyes glancing across the group and landing on Twilight for some reason. “I haven’t. Are you worried about him? He comes and goes as he pleases.”

True, but Wolfie is pack and pack sticks together. They keep each other safe. “I hurt him.” The words are hard to force out and his voice grinds like rocks in his throat. “I scared him.”

“I think Wolfie was scared for you, not of you, Wild.”

‘You weren’t there. You didn’t see him.’ The Champion turns to pace, unable to remain still with emotion buzzing through his muscles.

Time nods once. “I didn’t, but I heard about it from the others. Didn’t you and Wolfie make up?”

Yes, Wild apologized the best he could, but it wasn’t enough. It’s never enough. ‘He’s still gone,’ Wild points out. Pack doesn’t betray, and he did. He deserves the cold shoulder, but the thought of Wolfie leaving—

He cuts off the thought because it hasn’t happened yet. Maybe he’s just delayed somewhere.

Telegraphing his move, Time carefully rests a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t worry, cub, I’m sure he will show up soon.”

Wild looks away and moves to the edge of the camp, kicking rocks and picking up sticks for the fire. Behind him, Time moves to sit with Twilight. He can feel their eyes boring into his back and he sticks close to the camp. No need for Twilight to herd him further.

Read the rest here!