#ill fill the graveyards until i have you' | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

agent-cupcake · 9 months ago

Text

Flashbang

Chapter 6 - Howl

Spotify Playlist / All Chapters / Chapter 1 / Chapter 2 / Chapter 3 / Chapter 4 / Chapter 5 / Chapter 6 /Chapter 7/ Chapter 8 / Chapter 9 pt.1 / Chapter 9 pt.2 / Chapter 10 / Chapter 11 / Chapter 12

Pairing: One Piece Live Action Buggy x f! Reader

Synopsis: A night of several firsts.

Warnings: Explicit smut, violence/death, dub/noncon, consensual drug use

Word Count: 13.5k

Notes: What do you get when you cross a mentally ill reader with a society that abandons her and treats her like trash? I'll tell ya what you get! You get whatcha fuckin deserve [weird culty clown porn]

“Now I wait as love and fate Echo from your lungs Do you, do you, do you want me, babe?”

xxx

A blood red sun set upon the sea, shining a single golden spotlight across the water as pirates rallied for the Final Call. Not even the wind could cut through the kinetic mist of untapped aggression. The pirate ship was a powder keg of violent energy and artistic ego, pressure building and building for this very moment. The crew was ready and the tides were right and the prey was chosen. All they needed was for the curtain to raise.

When the bell finally rang, it would be a lit match into an oil drum.

Not that you stayed around to appreciate any of it. You were safely stowed below long before the first cannon was fired. Like everything else on the ship, the brig had once been a neat, utilitarian holding cell. Time had worn the wood and metal, lending it a creepy, haunted atmosphere, the cramped space a graveyard of abandoned props. The scent of rust and aging wood and thick salty stale rot was borderline suffocating, the air holding you in a shivering cold vice.

All you could do was pull your jacket closer, trying to get as comfortable as possible on top of one of the many prop chests. It was claustrophobically slotted between a barrel filled with batons and a drum that had a violent gash through the top, but it was one of the only places in the room where you couldn’t see your distorted reflection in the cracked funhouse mirror.

Even though everyone assured you it would be an easy victory, even though you had seen Captain Buggy’s Devil Fruit ability, and even though you had witnessed the chaos of the assault on Barley Village, you worried for the crew. You didn’t know how to pray, or even what higher power might protect pirates, but you closed your eyes and hoped very fervently that your new friends and your captain would be fine.

Anything else was unthinkable.

After that, there wasn’t anything to do other than hunker down and endure the night. You thought that since you had seen the violence in Barley Village, that you wouldn’t be as affected by it now, especially since you couldn’t see anything. You thought that you were ready for the shockwave impact of cannons. You thought that it would be okay because you were stronger now.

Maybe, on some level, that was true, but when you heard and felt that first boom your body responded with the unrestrained panic of a wild animal. If you hadn’t peed before you hid away, you would have pissed yourself in pure terror. All at once, your breathing became fast and shallow, your heart pounding in your chest, a cold sweat coating your body. Then there was another boom. And another BOOM and muscles you weren’t aware of until that moment began to tense and quiver, your lungs seizing as if in the throes of hysterical weeping, dragging in air only to regurgitate with a spasming violence.

It was fine. It was nothing like that day. It was fine. Why would you even think of it now? It was fine. It was entirely different. It was fine.

It was fine and yet your body curled up into a ball with your arms around your head and chin tucked against your knees, your eye wide yet dry, your mouth gaping, opening and closing in a desperate attempt to suck in some air. Your brain was on fire and the only thing you could think was that you were going to die. It was as if your body didn’t belong to you, like it had a will of its own, feelings of its own, because you couldn’t understand the reaction, it didn’t make sense.

As the assault above worked its way down, your lantern frantically swung back and forth in a smear of flame. The metal creaked unhappily, the ship complaining all around you like an unhappy beast. Part of the strategy, you knew, was to limit cannon fire. They didn’t want to destroy the ship they hoped to commandeer. But even after it seemed like all shots had been fired, your body refused to relax. Down here, you had no idea what was happening above. No idea if Captain Buggy was okay, or Crina, or Cabaji, or Pippa, or Marty. You wouldn’t know for a while. Possibly hours.

If it weren’t for your state of hyperarousal, you might not have noticed the sound from above. A noise, and a scuffling, and then something that might have been footsteps. Was that the hatch opening?

You held very still, listening intently. Those were footsteps. You weren’t alone. Why? It wouldn’t make sense for anybody to come down here. Not unless something happened. There were plenty of worst case scenarios that could bring somebody down here.

Covering your face with your arm to stem the ragged gasp of your body trying to get air, you checked to make sure you had the knife Marty had given to you safely in your pocket. You didn’t know what you would do with it, but having a weapon was better than nothing.

A man jumped down from the steep ladder with a grunt, landing hard. He stood in the shadows, making it hard to parse details, but you had a feeling. A very bad feeling.

Then, in a moment of true and genuine surrealism, he called your name. Your real name, the one you hadn’t heard since you boarded the ship. He picked his way over to the brig’s holding cell, but the door was too rusty to close, and the inside was filled with more props. You could see him in the funhouse mirror, his image distorted into a creepy facsimile of a human being, his face stretched out and limbs grotesquely skinny.

You didn’t move, half hoping you would be obscured by the amount of clutter that surrounded you.

He stepped back, looking around until his eyes met yours. And still, you didn’t move, you could hardly believe it was real.

“Easy now, I don’t wanna hurt you,” he said, stepping into the light with his hands up. “I’m looking for a girl. A hostage. Real short, one eye.”

You didn’t say anything, didn’t move, just looked up at him. Your mind screamed run, but your limbs locked up.

The man squinted, leaning forward to get a better look. “Holy shit, it’s you, isn’t it?”

A little spasm made your body jerk awkwardly, a burst of energy from the part of your mind that wanted to escape.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he said, holding up his hands to show that they were empty. “I’m here to save you from these freaks.” Your silence made him frown, some of the warmth fading from his voice. “We have to move fast, while they’re all distracted.” He came even closer, reaching out to grab you.

“No!” you cried, recoiling. “I’m not… I’m not going with you. I don’t need to be rescued.”

His eyes narrowed, you could practically hear the gears turning in his head. “You’re not their hostage, are you.”

“No,” you said, once again checking your pocket for the knife, squeezing it so tight that the metal indented your skin. “I won’t go.”

“Look,” he said, his voice hardening. “Your dad’s offering a lot of money for your safe return, so you’re going to come with me. Is that going to be a problem?”

“You can’t make me go with you, I won’t,” you said, shrinking back. You were essentially cornered, but you were also closer to the ladder than he was. If you could scramble up and close the hatch, you could find a place to hide.

“I want you to know that if it were up to me, I’d let it be,” he told you. “But you’ll have to figure that out with your dad.”

With a burst of energy you didn’t know you had, you sprung up and practically fell off of the chest, scrambling towards the ladder.

He swore, grabbing you by the arm to jerk you backwards before striking your face. With your momentum broken and then flipped, you couldn’t adjust, going down hard and hitting the floor without feeling much of anything, just the mindless, deafening fire burning up your entire face. You were blind, your right eye streaming, seeing nothing except dark. The man hauled you off of the floor, grabbing your arms to painfully twist them. Your left shoulder socket screamed with red hot pain. That soundly snuffed out any will you had to fight.

“I’m going to… To wrap you up. Try not to hyperventilate,” he advised, his words muffled beneath the sharp ringing in your ears. You realized that you weren’t blind, you had crashed into the light and shattered it when you fell. The man did as promised, covering you with a sheath of coarse fabric. It smelled dusty and a little rotten, it was probably one of the prop curtains. You didn’t have time to struggle before he threw you onto his shoulder, knocking the wind out of you all over again.

Blood rushed down into your pounding head, mixing with the potent disorientation of being struck. It pulsed against the burning flesh of your cheek, you could practically feel the swelling. You knew you needed to escape, but if he dropped you while climbing to the upper deck, you could seriously injure yourself. And what good would it do? There was no way you could escape, you would only invite more pain. Maybe some people got used to it. They could take beatings and bear the pain with their teeth grit, but that wasn’t you. Already your head hurt so bad you worried you were going to vomit, your face burned, your left shoulder screamed, and your breathing was dangerously unsteady, muffled and hot in the cocoon of dusty fabric. The pain you felt now was nothing compared to what it could be, you knew that profoundly, and you couldn’t handle that.

Think.

You had to think.

When you gingerly raised your right arm to check, you found that your knife had stayed in your pocket through the ordeal. You couldn’t be stupid about using it. The blade wasn’t long enough to do much damage, the most you could hope for was that it’d give you a chance.

Even muffled by the curtain and pierced by the sharp ringing in your ears, the sound of the battle was deafening when he reached the upper deck. Your final night in Barley Village had given you a hint of violence’s atonal song, but when the man carried you out of the hatch, it hit with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer. Screaming, shouting, clanging, popping shots, howling like animals.

Your kidnapper’s grip on you tightened, although you were less inclined than ever to struggle, your body seizing up in response to the cacophony, withering in fear. You wanted it to stop, you wanted to get out of the noise, to escape to where it was quiet. Not outside quiet, but the inside kind. You could feel it creeping up with its anesthetic-like haze, your mind’s best attempt to protect you from the fear and the pain and the horror.

No, you couldn’t withdraw. You had to be brave. You would not let him take you back to your dad. You could not let him take you away from Captain Buggy.

Figuring out where you were was too difficult when there was so much noise and activity. He would be taking you to the Jolly Boats, wouldn’t he? That was the only way to escape. You needed to act while you were around people, where you could escape into the chaos. Better to take your chances amidst a brawl than let him get you onto that boat.

Slowly, you reached into your pocket and found the knife. Moving as little as possible, you worked your arm back down to hang forward. Fumbling blindly, you felt for the notch to flip the blade out, nearly dropping the weapon in the process. But you got it, readjusting the handle to hold it in your fist. Wrapped up like you were, there wasn’t much space for you to get good leverage or hit especially hard, but it was all you had. Biting into the loose fabric of your jacket to keep yourself from vomiting, you slammed your fist into your kidnapper’s back blade first. You imagined Buggy behind you, pulling your hand out to thrust it back in, helping you just like he had on that day. Once, twice, three times and then the man practically threw you off of him with some expletive that you were pretty sure ended in bitch.

For a second you were falling blindly, wrapped in a suffocating shroud. Then the deck caught the bend of your spine, your momentum rolling you away into a painful sprawl. You fought wildly to free yourself of the fabric, your panicked limbs thrashing desperately.

“You fucking—you stabbed me?” The man shouted incredulously. You shucked off the dusty cocoon finally, sour bile dribbling out of your mouth as your body finally relented to the stress. You choked and coughed it out, unable to do anything else with the massive jolt of sensory overload. You thought the fighting was loud and frightening from within your curtain cocoon, but it was nothing compared to finding yourself on the deck in the midst of a true hostile takeover.

The man was right above you when he stopped in his tracks, something emerging from his chest. He looked down at it in surprise, but the blade pulled out just as quickly. He pressed his hand against the stab wound as blood began to gush out, looking more like ink than anything else.

Before he could do anything, he was stabbed again, the sword sticking through his chest and out the back of his hand. When it pulled up and out, his body followed it. He hit the deck with a heavy thump, his body spasming as it tried to expel the blood in his lungs. Behind him stood your vengeful guardian angel. Cabaji lowered his sword, his expression unchanged as he stalked past your would-be kidnapper.

“Are you alright?” he asked when he was close enough for you to hear him. You stared up at him blankly, unable to comprehend the question.

The man on deck in front of you wasn’t dead. Even as he choked on his own blood, he went for his weapon. Scowling, Cabaji pushed him down with his foot and finished him off, carving a bright red smile across his neck. The man dropped, his eyes open and empty.

Cabaji sheathed his sword and offered you a hand. You took it and stood weightlessly, your head as light as a balloon. The world spun, blinking out of reality before it slammed back into you all over again, you were made of lead. Were you crying? Or just sobbing? You realized right then that your hands were shaking violently. The entire world shook and trembled.

“You can’t stay up here,” Cabaji told you.

You nodded, agreeing because you knew you should.

“Stay close to me,” Cabaji told you. You nodded again, clinging to his back. Cabaji didn’t stop you from holding onto his scarf, practically burying your face in it, ignoring everything else as he guided you across the deck. Every muscle in your body strained with tension, the scent of blood and smoke and gunpowder choking you, the howling of men and explosions and steel only barely piercing past the ringing in your ears.

From what it looked like when you dared to look, the fight was very one-sided. The Buggy Pirates had overwhelmed the other ship with their noise and number. You passed beneath a screaming, thrashing woman who hung from the rigging, it looked like she had climbed up in an attempt to escape and gotten tangled up. Somebody had thrown one of the powder bombs at her, painting her in red. Richie the lion had joined the fray, looking every bit the beast you feared. Bodies littered the deck, their inky blood reflecting the colors flashing in the sky. And the pirates, people you knew, rejoiced in it, cackling and dancing and killing with a reckless joyousness you couldn’t fathom.

A surprise party. As in, the other ship must have been surprised by the vicious crowd of circus performers throwing a party on their ship.

It was grotesque. Unnatural. You didn’t belong here, it didn’t make any sense that you were. It didn’t make sense.

When Cabaji stopped at the quarterdeck hatch leading down the officer’s quarters, you nearly fell against him. He opened it up, stepping aside to usher you through. It was on unsteady feet that you stepped down onto the ladder, and with clumsier hands that fumbled. You hit the floor hard on your tailbone. There was no pain. Cabaji jumped down next to you, once again holding out a hand to hoist you back onto your feet.

“Go into the captain’s cabin and lock the door.”

With the battle muffled, your deafening heartbeat took its place. You nodded, swallowing hard to pop your ears. “Yes,” you said. “Yes, sir.”

Before he could ascend the ladder again, you grabbed his hand, looking him in the eye with a sudden, vivid flash of hyper reality, every detail of the ship and the man in front of you viscerally present.

“Thank you, Cabaji.”

Although his severe expression remained, you thought you felt him squeeze your hand in passing reassurance before swinging around to rejoin the chaos above.

The trip back to the captain’s cabin was just that—a trip. After locking the door, you stumbled your way past the antechamber where you would normally wait and into Captain Buggy’s bedroom. For a long moment, you stood there looking at Buggy’s bed which you had neatly made earlier that day. His desk, littered with a familiar mess.

This was real. All of it.

Doubling over with a hard punch of nausea, you rushed to the bathroom, barely getting the lid up before you threw up everything in your stomach. Supper had been a while ago, there wasn’t much to expel other than acid, but your body violently convulsed in rounds as if to get rid of something more, something worse. Trying to rid itself of the sickness that nestled right into your bloody, corrupted insides, desperate to cleanse itself of the sticky rot that thickened your blood and made your head ache.

But that relief never came.

When you were so emptied out inside that your body couldn’t justify even dry heaving, you stood up and flushed the toilet. Moving slowly, lethargically, you grabbed the nearest liquid—a bottle of disinfecting alcohol Buggy used to wash his pierced ear—to rinse your mouth. It tasted foul and felt worse, but it removed the taste of vomit from your tongue.

With slow, stumbling steps, you went into the bedroom and poured yourself a cup of water, drinking until you couldn’t take any more and then-

And then what?

You stared at the worn down edge of his desk and even though you weren’t moving, couldn’t even feel yourself shaking anymore, the world was collapsing around you. It felt like that one time you fell out of one of the buildings northside, that hook like drag from behind your bellybutton as gravity got a hold of you, the terror that came moments before the agony of crashing onto the ground.

Not knowing what else to do, you huddled in the corner. Not on the bed, but behind it. Hiding.

You wanted to shut it all off, to retreat into the inside quiet like usual, to go where the world couldn’t touch you. There was too much pain and horror. Too many thoughts you couldn’t stop yourself from thinking. You did not belong here. You wanted to go home.

That pathetic thought broke through the fragile composure you’d maintained and you curled up into yourself, crying openly. You didn’t want to be here anymore, it was scary and violent and loud. You wanted to go home.

Pressing a clammy, trembling hand to your cheek, you could almost feel your dad’s touch imprinted on the skin, burned there as surely as a brand.

You closed your eye and it was as if you were in the familiar old sitting room with the overstuffed upholstery and fire that burned so brightly yet never seemed to put off any heat. That night, the last night before he left, dad called you to sit at his feet, appraising you with tired, bleary eyes. At the height of his fury, he looked more vicious god than man, towering above you with lightless pupils and a blank expression. Now he looked old and worn out. His days at sea had carved a million little creases into his face, the leathery flesh sagging off the bone from one too many emptied liquor bottles.

“I didn’t want to hurt you,” he said as he stroked your cheek. “I don’t ever want to hurt you.”

“I know, daddy.”

“My sweet little girl.” His words slurred together like they always did when he was in an affectionate mood. “You are, aren’t you?”

“Yes, daddy.”

“You’ll be good now, won’t you? You won’t misbehave while I’m gone?”

What you wanted to remember was agreement. A bland ‘yes’ that you didn’t mean because of course you were going to run away. But that’s not what happened. That’s not what you said that night.

“Please don’t go,” you begged. That part of the memory was the most important because you understood it now. If he had stayed, you wouldn’t have left. You would have died in that house if he was there to keep you with him. Because you didn’t want to leave, not really. But you knew you couldn’t stay, either. You had to at least try to get out. But dad stroked your cheek and told you he would be back in a blink, that you wouldn’t have time to miss him.

You saw him off the next morning, your shoulders heavy with the knowledge of what you were about to do. What you had to do.

Destiny, fate, a bad joke—you didn’t know what to call it. Inevitability, maybe. Now you were here.

Your own hand dropped from your cheek, falling limp to the floor beside you as that memory fell away, replaced with another.

“If he doesn’t kill you, your dad will. Do you really think you’ll ever be able to hide from him?” Randall said that right before you cut him—cut him a huge red smile—and he was right. That’s what this was.

What happened tonight had been a deliberate attempt to kidnap you, to get away while everybody was distracted by the raid. Maybe your dad would be able to guess which merchant ships the Buggy Pirates would raid based on the stolen maps. Maybe he sent messages out to a few mercenary types, people who would be on board to protect the goods anyway, people who wouldn’t mind abandoning their crew for a bigger payout. Maybe this was just the most rotten confluence of bad luck and coincidence.

The execution was overshadowed by the far more intimidating message of it all. He would never let you go, not you, not his sweet little girl.

There was no quiet, not inside or out. The thrashing, raving thing within you screamed, and you did too. A ragged and terrible scream that ripped up the inside of your throat. It was pathetic and ugly. More than anything, it hurt.

Even if you went back to him, he would know what you had done. He would know that you weren’t his little girl anymore, that you were tarnished. One life burned for another you could never have. No matter what you thought or told yourself, you weren’t a pirate. You were a fake. A coward.

And there was nothing you could do. Not now, not anymore. Nowhere to go. Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide.

For the first time since boarding the ship, you thought about what led you to this point. Really thought about it. The sneaking, the hiding, being strung up and threatened, the cage. Standing behind Randall with a stranger at your back, a knife in your hand, a blade to the neck of a man you had loved nearly all of your life, a man who never loved you. Screaming. Blood dripping down your wrist.

Murderer.

There were moments in your life that you thought were too much. You stopped crying, stopped shaking, stopped breathing, and knew, knew with absolute certainty, that you could not handle any more. Then time continued to march on, pulling you right along with it, and there was nothing other than your suffering, it was without end, and you wanted to die—more, you wanted to never have existed in the first place.

Those moments didn’t come when dad beat you, or when he screamed at you, or after losing mom, or because of what happened to your eye, or seeing Randall marry another girl. Pain and fear and sadness were immediate. Pain and fear and sadness, no matter how intolerable, made sense. At least you weren’t alone, at least you had a tether—even one that was barbed and electrified.

True misery, the kind that made you want to claw your way out of your skin and rip out your still-beating heart, was a solitary experience. It came when the cellar door closed and you heard the lock turn. When your desperate pleas and apologies and cries were met with silence because nobody was close enough to hear them. Those dark hours you spent curled up on the stone floor shivering, listening to your wheezing breath shudder in and out of your lungs. When the quiet didn’t come and you realized the enormity of imprisonment. It wasn’t that you were trapped in the dark, dank cellar with rats, or in a house with your angry dad, or in a town where everybody thought you were a freak. Hell was realizing that you were trapped within yourself, with the monstrous creature who lived in your head, the one that hated you so bitterly. Was that you? You without any mask at all, exposed and plain and wretched and a murderer.

It was too much. You could not handle it.

But there was nothing else. No one else. And you only had yourself to blame.

There was something Randall used to tell you. He’d laugh good-naturedly and say you’ve really stepped in it now. You could hear him now, as clearly as if he were right next to you.

You’ve really stepped in it now.

You heard the door unlock and open from the other room. The sound jolted you stiff, a gasp leaving your sore throat.

“Honey, I’m hoooome,” Buggy called, shutting the door. Hearing that it was him made your shoulders relax a little. Did that mean the fighting was over? “Babydoll, are you here? Cabaji told me you were naughty and he had to put you in time out.”

“I’m back here,” you called on autopilot, your voice cracking.

You had no idea what happened now, or what you were meant to do. There was nothing you could do to hide the fact that you had been crying, no matter how much you wiped your face. Bracing yourself for anything, you got to your feet. Standing up so fast made you dizzy, and suddenly you felt quite aware of how ridiculous it all was. Pathetic. A pirate wouldn’t cower in the corner of a room crying like a child. A grown woman wouldn’t do that.

You reached up to pull down your bandana, only to poke your left eye. It must have come undone sometime during the attempted kidnapping. You lost your knife too. That hurt worse than losing your bandana, nearly prompting you to start crying all over again.

“Where oh where has my baby gone,” Buggy began to sing as he walked through the other room. “Oh, where, oh, where can she be? She whines so sweet, like a bitch in heat—” He reached the open doorway, smiling as soon as he saw you. “Oh, there you are. I didn’t wake you up, did I?”

“No, sir,” you said, your head bowed to hide your splotchy red face.

“What were you doing?”

You sniffled. “Nothing, sir.”

“Aw, did the big scawy fight make you cwy?” Buggy asked. You shook your head fast, unwilling to trust that your voice wouldn’t break if you spoke. “Don’t be embarrassed. It’s okay to be scared your first time. Even I was a little freaked out during my first big raid.”

You dared to look up, your eyebrows furrowed. “Really?”

“No,” he said, laughing as if the thought itself were too ridiculous to entertain. “Can you imagine me being scared?”

He took his gloves off, tossing them aside. Buggy had lost his hat and coat and his clothes were splattered with blood and colorful powder and who knows what else, but he wasn’t wounded. He was fine, and he was in good spirits. That was good.

“You know,” Buggy finally said to break the silence, “if you want me to keep you around, you’re gonna have to suck it up and put on your big girl pants. Nobody likes a crybaby.”

“I know,” you said softly, self loathing making your chest swell, sitting heavily on your heart and lungs like a tumor. “I’m sorry, sir.”

“God, you’re so… so pitiful,” Buggy said. “Yeah, no. That’s not gonna do it for me tonight. We’re drinking.”

You side-eyed his collection of bottles. The sweet liquor he had shared that first night was an outlier, most of what Buggy drank was much harder and more abrasive. Even the smell made your stomach turn, you had no idea how he could handle it. “I’m okay,” you said, wiping your eye again.

“Oh, right. Poor little baby can’t handle her liquor. Don’t worry, Captain Buggy has just what you need. I scored this a month ago at a club owned by this Saydon guy.” He walked over to the armoire, shuffling around the clutter before finding a bottle. “He’s a thieving sack of shit without an original bone in his body, but I had a good time fleecing his stupid customers. This,” he held up the bottle as he turned and approached you, “is the good shit, straight from some rich guy’s personal stash. I was going to sell it, but I’m willing to sacrifice a few berry to cheer up my pathetic little charity case.”

You swallowed hard at the offer, looking from his smile to the bottle. Thick red glass and a real paper label, although the text was illegible.

“Let me pour you some so we can skip to the part where you’re not making me miserable and we can celebrate my brave and triumphant victory.”

“Okay,” you said. It was fine, probably some type of opiate. Your dad had given you that sort of thing to help you stave off the hysteria before. It would be nicer than feeling like this, wrung out and hiccupping in the pitiful clutches of despair.

“Gotta be careful not to overdo it. Hey, you wanna eyeball this for me?” Buggy asked, laughing as he measured out the tincture and added some water. Seeing your lack of smile as he handed you the cup, he sighed dramatically and grabbed one of the bottles from his desk. “A toast to the flawless victory won tonight by the most fearsome captain in all of the East Blue.”

“To Captain Buggy,” you said. Buggy drew back the bottle, giving you a sharp look. Sluggish as your brain was, it took an excruciatingly long few seconds to realize what he wanted. “To Captain Buggy, the future King of the Pirates... and-and the best man I’ve ever known,” you tried again.

“Eh… I’ll take it,” he allowed with a shrug, tapping his bottle to your cup.

The drink was as terrible as you expected, but the taste of bitter medicine was still better than hard liquor. Buggy clearly didn’t feel the same, downing a mouthful without even wincing before unceremoniously collapsing onto the end of his bed. You ran a hand over your face. Red, hot, and a little swollen. You knew you looked rough, probably about as bad as you felt.

“You weren’t this weepy last time,” Buggy said. “You weren’t worried about me, were you?”

“Of course I was,” you said, frowning. “I was worried about all of you. I… I don’t know what I would do without you, Captain Buggy. I’m sorry, I’m…” You shook your head, trying to clear it somewhat. “It’s silly.”

“Yeah it is. Those idiots wouldn’t be able to hurt me even if I was doused in seawater and blindfolded,” Buggy said, rolling his eyes and leaning back on his elbows. “It was so easy, barely even worth bragging about. After I killed like ten of his men, the captain came out with this huge sword—clearly compensating for something. I let him get a good swing in right through the middle, and you should have seen his eyes when I put myself back together. His reaction was even better than yours. I’m pretty sure he shit himself.”

“And everyone else?” you asked.

“Yeah, they did fine too,” he said flippantly. “Frankly, it was boring. For me, at least. I could probably have taken them down all by myself.” He sighed dramatically. “But, hey, it was a good learning experience for my freaks.”

You nodded, dropping down to your knees to take his boots like always.

Buggy capped the bottle and buried it in the sheets, pulling something out of his pants pocket. You glanced up to see him messing with something wrapped in thin foil wrapping before forcing yourself to focus on the nightly ritual of wrestling his boots off. They were splattered in blood, a fact you only realized when some of it smeared onto your hands.

“I found these in his office,” Buggy said after you got the first boot off. “Salted caramels. They’re a bitch to get out of your teeth, but-” Buggy popped one in his mouth, moaning loudly at the taste, “sooo good. Want one?”

You were more concerned with the unabashedly vulgar moan than you were with the candy, it took you a second to remember the question.

“Oh, um. Yes,” you finally said. “Yes, please.”

“Okay, but don’t tell anyone that I’m playing favorites,” Buggy said as he unwrapped another, sitting up to hold it out. When you tried to take it, he pulled away. “Ah, ah, ah. Open wide, babydoll.”

You frowned, realizing that he meant to feed it to you. “Why?”

“Look at your hands! Have you got any idea how nasty blood is? Come on, say ahhh.”

You sat up to take it with your mouth, he pulled it back at the last second, your lips closing around empty air.

“Oh, you almost got it,” Buggy teased. “Try again.”

Your eyebrows furrowed. “Captain Buggy, why…?”

“I’m teaching you a valuable lesson. If you really want something, you have to work for it.” He held the chunk of caramel up again, within reach. Once again, you tried to eat it, but he pulled it away again. “So close,” he taunted. Every time you leaned closer, Buggy pulled it away, scooting further up the bed to keep it just out of reach, laughing the whole time. It forced you to crawl up, bracing yourself on the edge of the bed to chase the prize. Once you thought you really had it, uncomfortably hovering above him, he looked you in the eye and popped the candy into his mouth. “Guess you didn’t want it that bad,” Buggy said with a big grin, the words gummed up as he chewed.

Flushing with embarrassment, you sat back onto your knees.

“You know,” Buggy said, sitting up. “I had a dog once that did the exact same trick. It wasn’t as good as when you do it, although he was a lot better at actually getting the treat.” Foil crinkled and, this time, he pressed the caramel directly against your lips, pushing until you accepted it. You were too caught off guard by the way he’d put it into your mouth to do anything other than automatically chew and swallow, barely tasting anything. “See?” he asked. “Delicious, right?”

“Yeah,” you belatedly agreed, the word coming out on autopilot.

“I can’t stand having sticky fingers,” Buggy said, tapping his tacky fingertips together with a frown. “Be a good little puppy and lick them clean for me.”

You blinked, laughing dizzily in disbelief before you fully comprehended what he said. “What?”

“It’s what dogs do, isn’t it?” Buggy asked, wagging his fingers in front of your face.

“You mean it?” you asked, hoping that he was just playing with you.

“Yes, I do,” he said slowly, condescendingly. “It can’t be that much more embarrassing than doing tricks, right?”

So it was just another game. An embarrassing one. It felt dirty, like something you shouldn’t have been doing. But maybe that was in your head. Maybe Buggy didn’t see it that way. It was fine. Avoiding looking up, you opened your mouth for him. He said to lick them clean, but it was more practical to close your lips and suck until there were no more traces of caramel stickiness on his skin.

“And Cabaji says you’re dead weight,” Buggy said, satisfied. Pulling his fingers out of your mouth with a slick pop, he leaned back again, grabbing the bottle from the sheets to take another drink.

“Cabaji says that?” you asked, confused. You and Cabaji were, well, not friends. But he saved you. When you thanked him, he squeezed your hand. Hadn’t he? When you tried to think of it, the whole night floated somewhere distant, far beyond the warm bubble of this room, there was a chance you made that part up.

“Are you ever gonna finish up down there?” Buggy asked as if he hadn’t heard you, raising his remaining boot. Somehow, you’d forgotten that removing his boots was the reason you were on the floor to begin with. Trying to shake your head clear, you braced yourself to get his boot off. It took more effort than it probably should have. Your limbs had loosened, your head light like a balloon. When it came free, you tipped backwards, thumping down on the floor. There was no pain.

Buggy laughed. Surprised at first, then louder, a big belly laugh.

You sat up, dazed and frowning. Your expression only made him laugh harder. When his amusement settled somewhat, he managed to speak. “You okay?”

“It’s not that funny,” you said.

“You know when you see a kid trying their little heart out to do something, but they keep failing because they’re so small and stupid? It’s like that,” Buggy said. “Watching you struggle with everything you try to do is half the reason I keep you around.”

Frowning with all of the indignant strength you could muster, you got your legs beneath yourself, using the edge of his desk to stand. Although it had probably been more of a gradual process you were simply unaware of—that would explain your lack of concern with his antics—it was only when you were upright that you fully realized the impact of the medicine.

Woah.

Breathing deeply, you followed the motions of getting a rag to clean up your hands, surprised at how lethargically you moved, how warm your skin felt. Annoyed, you pushed off your jacket, relaxing when its weight was gone from your shoulders.

You mumbled an apology, something about the room being too warm, turning to look at Buggy. The air felt so nice brushing against your bare skin, like warm little whispers all over your arms and legs.

“Hey, kiddo, you’re lookin’ kinda flushed,” Buggy said. “I didn’t give you too much, did I?”

You blinked slowly, caught off guard by the way his pale skin glowed in the warm lamplight, the way it highlighted the shadows beneath his cheekbones. “What?”

“Come here,” he said, holding his hand out to you.

It wasn’t a long distance, a few feet at most, but your legs weren’t steady at all. You let go of the desk and almost immediately tipped forward.

“Sheesh,” Buggy said with a laugh, catching you before you fell. “I didn’t expect you to throw yourself at me.”

“Sorry,” you said distantly, trying to get your bearings. The melty lightheaded feeling had your head spinning, reality shifting on its axis before snapping back into place.

“It’s not like it's the first time,” Buggy joked, grinning. Standing like this, your hands on his shoulders, you were so close. His breath smelled like whiskey and caramel and his makeup had faded and smeared after the fight. You wanted to be closer, to feel his bare skin against yours. That would be so nice, wouldn’t it? He was warm and solid and-

You looked around, overcome with the absurdity of the situation. How long had you been in here? The air was warm and too close, and your bandana was gone when you nervously tried to pull it down.

“Sorry, um… What?” you asked with a confused smile, trying to focus your thoughts. “I… can’t think…”

“It’s not like I keep you around for your brains,” Buggy told you. He sounded a little drunk, smiling that boyish grin you usually only saw in the morning. “Why don’t you sit down? We’re still celebrating.”

“What about your… your makeup?” you asked, trying to find a familiar point to tether yourself with.

“What about yours?” Buggy asked, running his thumb over your cheek. “It’s smeared all over your face. You look like a one-eyed racoon.”

“Oh, I… I forgot,” you said, running a finger under your eye. It came away smeared with black makeup. “I’m sorry.”

“I don’t mind it,” Buggy said, “Actually, you look kinda cute like this—all cried out and red and pathetic. I don’t know why, but there’s something about that sad look you get that really turns me on. Is that weird?”

A beat too late, your eye widened in surprise, your shoulders raising defensively. “You can’t say that.”

“Why not?”

“Because…” You floundered, searching for the right words. The other night when you were drunk, the alcohol made your thoughts scatter, difficult to interpret. This drug was different, it eased away the edges. Too many words and a very soft world in which to speak them. That was confusing, just for a different reason. “Because it’s not true,” you finally said, almost proud to have remembered what you meant to say. “You’re just trying to embarrass me.”

Buggy laughed. “I don’t have to make shit up to embarrass you. Half the time you spare me the trouble and do it yourself.”

You frowned, your eyebrows furrowing.

“Don’t worry,” he said soothingly, “I’m into it.”

You looked at him for a second before laughing nervously, a little tremor working down your spine. “Captain Buggy, I, um…”

“Don’t you trust me?” he cooed in an overly saccharine tone.

“Yes, I do.”

“You’re not afraid I’m trying to pressure you into something, are you? It’s not like there’s anything wrong with sitting together. I bet you sat on your dad’s lap all the time,” Buggy said as he pulled you towards him, scooting back to make more room for you to sit.

“Not… like this,” you said, your nervous smile straining as you tried to twist sideways to sit with your legs across his lap because that was the normal, safe way. Sitting with your legs straddling his hips was entirely different and wrong. “Isn’t this… awkward for you?”

“Not at all. Make yourself comfortable.” You tried to hold your weight off of him, one foot on the floor, but he reached around to hook a hand around your thigh, forcing you fully onto the bed and onto his lap. “Yeah, just like-” Buggy’s words cut off with a groan when you tilted forward, a sound that made you tense up, very, very aware of his hips between your thighs.

“I’m sorry,” you said, trying to squirm away. “Did I hurt you? I can… move…”

“No, don’t,” Buggy said, his hold on your hips tightening. “It’s, uh…” He exhaled harshly. “Fuck. I swear I never even thought this sorta thing was hot before now… Like, sure, I guess it’s a little charming when girls get coy and act like they’re innocent, but, I don’t know, it’s so played out. But then the real deal comes around and suddenly I get the appeal. I really get it.”

You giggled at that. It wasn’t funny, you weren’t sure why you would find it amusing. “Shhh,” you said as seriously as you could. “Don’t say that.”

“Why not? It’s true, isn’t it?” Buggy asked, raising his eyebrows. “Have you ever even kissed anybody?”

Your eyebrows furrowed. “Yes, I have.”

“Riiiight, that shithead from the other day. But he abandoned you, didn’t he? Broke your poor little heart all because he couldn’t imagine looking at your busted eye while fucking you.” Buggy’s hand raised to cradle your head, his thumb tracing the scar beneath your left eye. “Well, personally, I think it’s hot that you’re just as damaged on the outside as you are on the inside.”

“No,” you told him, shaking your head with more vigor than was warranted when you weren’t sure what, exactly, you were protesting.

“Between you and me,” Buggy continued, leaning even closer to speak in a conspiratorial tone, “last time I was jacking off, all I could think about was how adorable it is. Your eyes just scream ‘rape me’ which is weird because only one of them works, and believe me, it makes it pretty damn difficult when you spend so much time on your knees. God, would you even know what was going on if I popped a boner while you were down there? I’m chubbed up half the time and you don’t seem to get it.”

That crossed a line you hadn’t been aware of, and he said it so easily. So casually. The words dripped hot poison into your core, pulling a dark shiver down your spine and an unexpected sound from your mouth. You didn’t mean it, you never really did, but your mind was drifting above the clouds, leaving your body to try and sort out the feelings he so effortlessly dragged out of you. As soon as your reaction registered, you clasped both hands over your mouth with enough force to almost send you tumbling backwards, but Buggy pulled you back, laughing.

“What was that?”

“I… didn’t mean to,” you said, but he probably couldn’t hear through your hands.

“No, seriously. Do you practice these sounds ahead of time, or do they just happen?”

“I’m sorry,” you said, releasing your mouth. “I…” When you squirmed in discomfort, his hips rolled to meet it, grinding directly between your legs. You squeezed your eye shut, just trying to breathe. The drug made your body relax, but it relaxed too much, dragging you down with the heaviness of your flesh. A bubble of sound left you, something like a sob or a laugh or a hiccup. “Why are you doing this?”

“Because it’s fun and, more importantly, because I want to,” Buggy said in a matter-of-fact way. “Do you want me to stop?”

You shook your head again, refusing to look at him as if that would buy you some time so you could find an answer.

“Hey, your captain asked you a question.”

“I… don’t know…” you told him, fleetingly meeting his eye in an attempt to convey your inner conflict, to make him understand what you felt.

Buggy made a harsh sound of frustration, his eyes rolling up to stare at the ceiling. “Yeah, that’s not really an answer. The last thing I need right now is you waking up tomorrow and crying molestation or some bullshit.”

“I wouldn’t,” you told him. “I don’t want you to-to stop, but… I-I don’t know what… or-or how, I…”

“Ah, I’m doing this all wrong, aren’t I?” he said in a softer tone, looking back down to meet your eye, smiling and petting your hair. “I mean what is the first rule of storytelling?”

You frowned, your eyebrows furrowing in confusion.

“Show,” Buggy answered for you, his hand sneaking around to hold the back of your head, “don’t tell.”

It wasn’t a kiss, not at first. At first it was just hot and wet because you didn’t understand what was going on. You knew you were supposed to open your mouth, so you did, but you couldn’t comprehend anything other than the vulgar assault of tongue and teeth. He tasted like salt and caramel and liquor and greasepaint. It was strange to feel his nose pressing against your cheek and the drag of his stubble against your skin.

Then something clicked, your body taking over while your mind faltered behind. With the drug swimming in your system, everything felt at least a little good. The heaviness inside of you was also raw, stimulating warmth, a sort of buzzing wherever the two of you touched. Kissing Buggy felt even better. Being kissed, letting him guide you. It was filthy and messy and a little gross to feel his tongue in your mouth, but it was animalistically hot.

When his hand pushed under your shirt, it tickled enough to make you laugh, squirming in his lap. He groaned hungrily right into your mouth, his hips grinding up against you. With one arm wrapped around you to keep your head in place, the other pushed your undershirt up and out of the way to palm your breasts. The limited exploration you had done with your body had given you the impression that you were indifferent to feeling anything other than disgust and shame, but the sensation of him rolling your nipple between two rough fingers zipped down your spine like electricity.

Even muffled by his mouth, you couldn’t stop yourself from moaning and whimpering, from helplessly pressing yourself against him for more. He said you hadn’t noticed when he was hard before, but you were pretty sure that’s what you were feeling right then, that it was his erection hot and hard between your legs.

Leaving both nipples hard and painfully sensitive, his hand slipped down to wiggle under the waistband of your shorts. Bad. Bad. Wrong. Very wrong. You pulled away with a harsh gasp, trying to squirm away from that hand.

“Hey, no, it’s okay. I’m just gonna check real quick to see if you’re wet,” Buggy said to console you. His makeup was smeared from the kiss, and his eyes were round and excited. “It’s not weird, I’m just trying to figure out where we’re at with the whole consent thing, okay?”

“Okay,” you mumbled, even if you had no idea what one had to do with the other. The angle was awkward, especially when he had to navigate beneath the confines of your shorts, but his searching fingers found your clothed pussy pretty quickly. His touch shocked you as physically as a jolt of electricity. Even through your panties, there was a foreign intensity to the pressure. More intense, maybe, was the look in his eyes. You expected amusement, but there was none. Stripped of the jokes and the teasing and the smile and the crass comments, he was somebody who wanted. Wanted you.

“You have got to be kidding me,” Buggy said, his fingers curling, pushing the fabric of your panties between your folds, and you choked back an embarrassing whimper, your hips unintentionally bucking forward.

“I don’t think this is… I’m really, really sorry, I…” you stammered out, stumbling over your excuses and apologies and anything at all that would get you out of this. “I mean, we shouldn’t, it’s probably not-”

“Shut up,” Buggy told you sharply. “Here I thought I should take things slow so you didn’t feel too bad about it afterwards, but you’re fuckin’ soaked.”

“No, it… ‘s not-”

“No?” he cut in, easily shutting you up with another curl of his fingers. “So what am I feeling right now. Did’ya piss yourself or something?”

“I didn’t! It’s just…” Hard to think. Hard to talk. Hard to figure out what you wanted. Hard to know what was happening, what he expected. You laughed a little, hoping that he would too, and that this would be a joke, but he didn’t. You broke, shaking your head and whining. “It’s too… too embarrassing.”

“For you, maybe. I mean, jeez, talk about desperate. You really want me, huh?”

“I… I don’t know if… I shouldn’t.”

“God, it’s like pulling teeth,” Buggy said, pulling his hand out from between your legs. “Wait, there’s an idea. Should I go get the pliers? Will that get me a straight answer out of you?”

You swallowed hard, trying to focus on anything other than the zapping memory of his hand down your shorts. If you didn’t want something, you already would have left, your body wouldn’t be singing and surging to get more of his touch. But you couldn’t say that you wanted to go further either because you could not imagine or conceptualize that happening. More than anything, you didn’t want to be alone. You didn’t want to disappoint him. The idea of being touched drove you wild, but there was a sickness in your stomach that was only getting worse.

“Listen, babydoll,” Buggy told you, his voice lowering, steady like he was talking to a frightened animal. “I’m not going to force you to do anything you don’t want to do, but I’m really hard right now so I’m gonna come. You can either stay here and come with me or get the hell out of here.” As much as you could feel Buggy trying to maintain composure, it wasn’t working.

You closed your eye, trying to think, just to scrape together a single coherent thought that would help you figure out what to do, but instead you thought of the warehouse. The air stank of wet rot and ocean air and old metal. “New girl,” Buggy had called, snapping to beckon you closer. Randall knelt on the ground. Pathetic and powerless, groaning in pain. You obliged then, rushing to Buggy’s side, your feet crunching on the broken glass and chunks of old building. Buggy didn’t look angry, not like you feared he would. Instead, he smiled. It was a mean smile, a frightening one. But a smile all the same, a gruesome expression meant to set you at ease, and maybe to keep himself composed. “Are you ready for your big moment?”

“So, uh,” Buggy, the real one, the one sitting beneath you watching with expectant eyes, said, licking his lips, “which is it?”

There was only one answer, there had only ever been one. You didn’t know. These things, your choices, weren’t for you to make. So you didn’t know. Not then and not now. Instead, you took the knife he offered and asked for him to show you how. Instead, you pressed yourself closer to him, hoping that he would decide, desperate for him to choose for you. Buggy moaned, his hips rolling upward to meet yours. He caught himself quickly, practically growling in frustration.

“Fuck… Stop,” Buggy told you in a rough voice, grabbing you by the back of the hair to force you still. “I need you to tell me what you want. Out loud. Right now, so it's on the record.”

“I want,” you told him in a weak voice, stopping there as you tried to find the right words.

“Yeah?” He prompted you.

“I want…” The words sounded so far away, like it wasn’t really you speaking them at all, as if you were trying to guess the right answer. “I want you, Captain Buggy. Anything you want, I’m yours.”

“Finally!” Buggy said with a hoarse laugh, shaking you back and forth. “See how easy it is when you allow yourself to be honest?”

Easy. It was easy, of course it was easy, of course you wanted to give him whatever he wanted, especially if it was you. Anything, anything, everything. Buggy grabbed you by the hips to spin you around, dropping you onto the bed. You landed on your back and bounced twice, dizzy from the sudden shift. Buggy was already kneeling between your legs by the time you blinked your vision clear, roughly getting out of his pants.

“Since we’re being honest now, I’ll tell you something too—I’m glad this is your first time,” Buggy told you, flinging off his shirt before getting you out of yours. He didn’t undress you with any grace, pulling your shirt and undershirt off in a twisted bundle of fabric, leaving you half naked to his manic, hungry eyes. “Opening night is special,” he continued, licking his lips. “It’s something that nobody has ever seen before. Sure, it lacks the polish of later shows, but there’s beauty in that. It’s real, it’s raw. This, right now, is your debut, babydoll. I wanna see you come. Once, maybe twice just to start because then I’m going to fuck you and that…” Buggy laughed, pulling off one boot and tossing it behind himself with a thump before taking the other. You sat up, trying to cover your chest, only to be knocked back down when he grabbed the waistband of your shorts and underwear to pull them down your thighs, curling your legs up to shake you out of them. “It might hurt, after all of this teasing I don’t think I’ll be able to hold myself back. But that’s good. You want it to hurt, it should hurt—pain is how good art is made.”

Before you could respond to that, he descended upon you. Not a kiss this time. At least, not a kiss on the lips. While his fingers trailed up your thigh, his mouth latched on your neck. The same moment he found your entrance, his teeth dug into your sensitive skin. When he began to suck, his fingers trailed upward to land on your clit.

You might have wailed, if only you had enough air in your lungs to do so. He only got a sharp, pathetic whine and more nervous giggling, your hips jumping up into his hand. Somewhere inside of your swimming mind, there was a thought. A spark of one, a bit of consciousness that had no real conclusion before it bubbled out of your mouth in a string of stuttered “I…I…I…” while your hands gripped desperately at his shoulders. He kept rubbing your clit and you knew, logically, that it would feel better if you stayed still, but you couldn’t.

Buggy pulled away from your neck with a slick pop. “Can you…fuckin’...can you settle down? I can’t do this with you trying to buck me off.”

You meant to tell him that it wasn’t your fault, that you couldn’t keep still, but the only response your drugged brain could manage was a nervous smile and hiccup. Making a sound of frustration, Buggy sat up and grabbed you by the waist to pull you down, his forearm settling across your pelvis to keep your hips flat. With his weight pinning down one leg and your other shoved aside by a not so gentle slap, you couldn’t go anywhere. So you whined, giving up and covering your face with your hands instead.

Buggy laughed. “Don’t act so pathetic, I know you love this. You're sooo sensitive," he said, lazily pushing a finger into your pussy before dragging it out. Letting his fingers glide between your folds with an agonizingly light touch, drawing little circles over your swollen clit. Again and again and again and- "I’m barely doing anything and you're practically having a seizure down there."

You whimpered, squirming beneath him to no avail. He had your hips completely immobilized. Buggy laughed again, slowly sinking his fingers into your pussy. Two of them now. Two calloused fingers to press deep into you, to seek out the spongy spot as they curled and thrust in and out. Slow, painfully slow. There was nothing you could do about it. Push at his shoulders with shaking hands, arch your back to nowhere, shake your head back and forth like it mattered, like he cared. You tried to laugh like he did, needed to diffuse some of the scorching tension, but the sound was breathy and high pitched and it wasn’t funny, it was torture.

Buggy’s fingers finally broke the slow pace to practically slam into you, and it sounded disgusting. Wet, harsh. You couldn’t stop shaking, and there wasn’t enough air, your lungs were being collapsed by the weight of the drug. Despite that, despite everything, your pussy squeezed his fingers, only getting wetter the rougher he got. The noises you made, the mewling and the whining and the moaning, were practically innocent compared to the loud squelching of each thrust.

“It sounds like I’m plunging a fuckin’ toilet,” Buggy said, laughing.

You pressed your palms against your eyes as if that would hide you, caught between humiliation and need. “I’m s-ss-sorry,” you babbled. “It’s… gross… I’m sorry, please just… Stop, it’s—”

“Stop?” he repeated. “Is that what you just said? You’re giving me orders now?” He slowed down, only to add another finger. The frantic rise of tension had your heels digging into his bed, your hands unable to decide if you wanted to cover your face or claw at the sheets.

“No! No, no no—” What were you even denying at this point? It was all incoherent anyway, and you knew you didn’t actually mean it.

“Do you know when I’m gonna stop?” Buggy asked. “After you come all over my hand. So quit yer yappin’ and hurry it up.”

Your whimper was barely audible, but it was one of resignation. He was right, the slick squelching sounds really did conjure the worst imagery. But, somehow, not even that killed your building orgasm. Neither did the musky smell, or the gross feeling of your sweat soaking into his bedding. It was all just sex and, right then, it was hot. You couldn’t focus on anything other than the tightening coil in your core, not even the man fucking you with three fingers, going hard enough to hurt, hooking and curling with each thrust to grind them against the spongy spot inside of you. The only thing that mattered was the pleasure that sat on the very tip of your tongue and how badly you needed it. To please him, to end this embarrassing torment, to stop inconveniencing him. You had no idea if it was what you wanted but, one way or another, your body would expel the foam in your head, the need in your belly. Come or throw up or scream.

With a choked yelp, you came. Your back arched, your body fighting against Buggy’s hold. You had one hand across your face while the other desperately clawed at the sheets and you wanted to fuck yourself on his fingers, to meet them with each thrust, but you couldn’t move your hips. All you could do was take what you were given, endure the helplessness, the sticky waves of pleasure.

And then it was over, just hot air and sweat.

There was a sense that you were not yourself, like you had been unbound from your existence as a person. But also one that stitched you into your hot, heavy skin so tightly that you knew you could not ever be somebody else. The lucidity of the feeling killed your desire, you needed a break. You needed to breathe.

“No more,” you told him, trying to squirm away, to grab his hand. “Please, I… Please, no more.”

“That was it? Seriously?” Buggy asked, incredulously amused. His fingers did slow down, stroking your g-spot in a way that made you twitch uncontrollably. “You just came?”

“I’m sorry,” you said breathlessly, covering your face with your trembling hands.

Buggy laughed in delight. “No, it was,” he said, finally pulling his fingers out and taking his weight off of you, “weirdly adorable. I was just joking about the puppy thing earlier, but you’re kind of proving my point. Girls usually, you know, moan. Or scream or something, I don’t know. What is it, do you think? The daddy issues? Or is it ‘cause I’m the first guy to make you come? Don’t get me wrong, I liked it, it was fuckin’ hot, but now I’m curious. Do you think you can moan like a normal girl at all, or are you just gonna keep whining the whole time?”

“I, um… I-I don’t,” were the only words you could muster as you stared at him, completely still. For a couple of seconds you had fooled yourself into thinking you had escaped the red stained-glass fog of the drug, but the vulgarity drew you right back in, enveloping you in its humid dusk.

Buggy grinned, a mad expression. “Guess we’ll find out.”

When he pulled off his underwear, you didn’t know if it was okay for you to look or not, your eye flicking nervously from his smile to the pale expanse of his torso, following the trail of hair that led down, and down. His cock bobbed up the moment it was free. It was more intimidating of a sight than you thought it would be, giving you that uncanny sense of vertigo, like staring down a very high cliff into some unknown abyss. This was wrong. Buggy clearly had no such reservations, spitting into his hand to stroke his dick as he loomed above you.

“You’ve got me in a romantic mood, you can stay just like that,” Buggy said as he crowded you further up the bed. You stared up at him, stiff and too nervous to move. He frowned. “Okay, well I didn’t mean literally just like that, you’re gonna have to make some room for me.” He gave you a second before huffing in irritation, rolling his eyes. “Fuckin’ virgins.”

Buggy grabbed you, hauling you up the bed to drop you unceremoniously into the pillows. You squeaked, trying to hold onto him while he hiked your legs up his waist. Breathing was difficult, all of the air smelled like Buggy and sex and you were so, so aware of the way it pressed slowly out of your chest. He released your right leg to grab his cock, slicking it between your folds. That made you gasp sharply, your fingers digging into his back.

“Are you trying to scratch me?” Buggy asked, amused but distracted as kept nudging his dick between your folds, his hips rolling forward when it caught on your entrance.

“I… I’m… No-hh—I-I-” Any part of your mind that was still functioning was focused entirely on the pressure of his cock as he pushed forward again, pressing it a little deeper.

“I don’t mind it,” Buggy told you, “but fair’s fair.” He punctuated that word with a harder thrust, pushing his cock past the initial resistance of your entrance. Your eye widened, a sound of surprise practically punched out of your body with the shock of it. His fingers had not at all prepared you for what it would feel like. The insistence. The weight. Buggy smiled, watching your face as his hips rolled forward.

This time, you whined, squeezing your eye shut and digging your fingers into his back, your pussy unintentionally tightening around him which only made the discomfort that much worse, but you couldn’t force your body to relax and you honestly didn’t know if you were trying to push him out or pull him deeper.

“No, look—look at me,” Buggy demanded hoarsely, hiking your right leg back up his waist, not moving until you met his demand. You let out a shuddering breath and opened your eye, looking up at him through tear coated lashes. His eyes were familiar to you, but not like this. In the dim light, all that remained was their devious sparkle, his hunger, his all-consuming lust. You tried to keep your expression composed, to hide your embarrassing reactions, but it was all in vain. The leverage made it easier for him to rock his hips forward, his cock driving deeper, and your expression crumpled as you cried out, you couldn’t help yourself.

The intimacy Buggy demanded of you while splitting you apart became intolerable. You tried to rear back, your back arching beneath him, but Buggy grabbed your jaw to keep you from looking away, to keep you from hiding. You tried to tell him that it was too much, too heavy, too big, too overwhelming, but you couldn’t find the words before he was already thrusting forward again, filling you more and more, his entire body covering yours, his eyes devouring your reactions. He watched with parted lips, his eyebrows raised in some sort of needful appeal. It felt so cruel, but Buggy didn’t look at you cruelly.

It was too much to bear, let alone understand. Giving up on begging him to slow down, you tried to push at his abdomen. Buggy wasn't bothered by it, or by the scrape of your nails along his back, it was like he didn’t even notice.

“Cap-tain,” you whined, the word broken in your mouth, squished from the grip he had on your jaw. When he moved, you could feel how you were shaking beneath him, around him, your heartbeat thumping hot blood between your legs. The pressure was intense, unfamiliar. You whimpered, your back restlessly arching, your free hand clawing at his shoulder. “I… It's… Too much…”

“Yeah?” Buggy asked, managing a smile before that became another moan. “You’re so fuckin’... Fuck.”

It was impossible to not respond to the overt sound of his pleasure, your pussy clenching around him, soaking his cock. It sounded filthy. You opened your mouth to say something and, like he’d been waiting for it, Buggy released your jaw, his hand resting beneath your chin to push your face up so he could kiss you instead. His tongue in your mouth was just as invasive as his cock in your pussy, it felt more like he was trying to eat you, to devour you, leaving you no space to breathe or think or react. You could feel every grunt and groan, feel the way he reacted to every little sound you made.

There was no refinement to it, no mercy, no thought given to anything other than animal instinct and need. Buggy was barely even pulling out, grinding himself into you as deep as possible over and over and over and it was maddening because he wasn’t slamming his cock into you the way he had with his fingers and that should have been easier to take, but there was no release, just more and again.

When he pulled away from the kiss, giving you a few moments to catch your breath, you threw your head back to keep him from kissing you again, worried that you’d pass out from the lack of air. Buggy groaned in irritation, punishing you with a hard thrust. And then another, and another. Skin slapping and squelching and your confused yelps of pleasure or pain.

“I-I—I can’t, I…” Your nails dug into his back, his shoulders, not to make him stop or even slow down, but because you had no other way to express what you felt. “Too much, i’ss—”

Buggy grunted, grabbing your legs again to pull them back up, changing the angle. The surprise zip of pleasure struck hard, making you moan loudly and openly, your wide eye meeting his. Buggy’s lips twitched almost like a smile, a little look of victory at getting such an unabashedly slutty reaction from you. You couldn’t take it back, and he knew he had an advantage, exploiting it with every thrust.

“Come on,” Buggy said, his voice labored and heavy. “Admit it… You love this. You wanted me to fuck you from… from the day we met. You’re a freak.”

“Captain… Buggy please,” you begged, whining his name desperately in a voice that sounded so unlike your own. None of you really felt familiar, not your voice or your body or the sensations. Maybe it was someone else and you were only along for the ride, that would explain why you lacked any and all control over your body, why you could feel the torturous build of pleasure in your core in spite of the discomfort or fear or uncertainty, why you had been driven to true delirium from the way his cock ground against your walls like his fingers had, another point of excess stimulation on top of the overwhelming fullness. You could feel your pussy squeeze around him, feel the fresh wave of slick arousal that coated his cock, spilling out around the seams. You had no control, there was nothing for you to do but hang on and accept what had become helplessness in its purest form.

Buggy laughed, a hoarse, mean sound that stuttered with each thrust before leveling into a moan. You couldn’t help but whimper in turn, your hips moving to meet each rocking thrust, your thighs trembling with how hard they were clamped around his waist. If you let go, you worried that you’d never stop falling, that you would be lost because there was nothing else.

“Buggy,” you whined. “Buggy, I…”

He groaned low, grabbing your hand to hold it with your fingers entwined, pinning it by your head. By now you were chest to chest, both of you sweaty enough to be slick, your breathing dangerously unsteady, lungs puffing the sweltering air. He was kissing you, but every part of your functional mind that still worked was focused on coming. Buggy didn’t seem to mind your preoccupation, content to kiss your open mouth, content to swallow all of your moans. You didn’t think it was physically possible to be closer to another human being, you could feel his heart beating within your own heavy ribcage, feel the rush of his blood through your veins. There was nothing left of you without him.

So, then, you couldn’t do anything else, there was no choice, just that anxious need, some wild feeling that you’d scream if you couldn’t come. After teetering so close for a frightening few seconds, that was the thought that tipped you over the edge, your body tensing and seizing beneath him, disturbing your synchronization as your pussy spasmed around him, your hands holding onto his back in a death grip, pleasure rippling through you, stoked over and over again by the relentless weight of his cock. When you were done whimpering and whining and writhing your way through your orgasm, your body going limp beneath him, Buggy released you from the kiss. You saw a thick strand of saliva pop between you as he pulled away.

“Did you just… come?” he asked breathlessly, incredulously.

You nodded, gasping for air, your glassy eye swirling with moving colors, your hazy mind unable to focus on anything while he was still inside you.

“Guess that answers that question then,” Buggy muttered. Laughing as he began fucking you again, laughing and then moaning, his thrusts less targeted and more indulgent. All he had to do was get his hand on your jaw to remind you to look at his eyes. It made you choke, whimpering as the wake of your orgasm faded into overstimulation all over again. The intensity of too much combined with the trembling pleasure-pain, all of it twisted and hazy red, a world filtered and scattered, intangibly delicious but also anxious and frightening.

Buggy fucked into you selfishly now, his hands digging bruises into your thighs, his thrusts jarringly rough and without any rhythm you understood. But the sounds he made, you liked those. They were almost pained, rising in pitch as he got closer. Lustful appetite in its most crude and feverish form.

“Buggy,” you whined, scrambling to hold onto him, to mitigate the violence of his desire. “Buggy, please-”

He moaned loudly, crushing you, claiming you with his open mouth on yours, all teeth and tongue and hunger. Using you, sparing you no soft affection when he came, burying his cock as deep as possible for those final few sporadic thrusts.

You thought you could feel it, feel his cock twitch inside of you, but maybe it was just your imagination. How could you feel anything other than the steady throbbing between your legs?

Buggy groaned, breathing hard. A second later, he pulled out and flopping onto his back beside you, either missing or ignoring your wince of pain. You covered your face with your hands, willing the world to fall away. You couldn’t understand it anyway, what was the point?

“I was thinking of a more appropriate title for your job,” Buggy said between ragged breaths. “I get worried that-that people might expect too much from you. So I was thinking something like Buggy the Clown’s Cocksleeve or—or the Flashy Fool’s Fucktoy. But just now, it came to me-” He snapped his fingers. “Captain Buggy’s Cock Puppet.” He turned his head to look at you, grinning. “Eh?”

A hard shiver worked down your spine. “That’s gross,” you muttered.

He huffed, annoyed by your answer. “It’s pretty bold to act like a prude when you were creaming all over my dick a couple minutes ago.”

You groaned, covering your face again.

“We’ll work on that,” Buggy said, sitting up. You opened your eye, watching him roll his neck and arms, his shoulders popping. His hair was a mess, a lot of it had come loose, he had to fight against the hair tie to get it out, swearing at it before the thing snapped and he threw it somewhere to the side. You were too sleepy and dazed to care that you were staring at him, admiring him. You did admire him, even if he said things you wished he wouldn’t, or did things you didn’t like. You admired him as your captain. And he was beautiful.

Buggy rolled off the bed. He wore his nudity without a shred of shame. You watched as he poured himself a big cup of water from the jug, downing it all in a steady stream of gulps.

“Thirsty?” he asked, shooting you a look over his shoulder.

You pushed your hair off of your sweaty face, the world spinning spectacularly as you sat up, and nodded. He filled the cup again as you crawled to the edge of the bed, wincing at the sharp pain between your legs, the wet mess coating your thighs.

“Drink up, you were leaking pretty bad from both ends tonight,” Buggy joked as he helped hold the cup steady in your shaking hands. You hummed, not really caring about his words because the water was the best thing you had ever tasted in your entire life, and it felt even better on your dry tongue and throat. He took it when you were done and you wiped your mouth, an anxious question forming in your mind. You weren’t sure if you were supposed to leave or not.

But you weren’t sure if you could move, either. Maybe you would just stay there forever. That didn’t sound too bad.

Buggy turned off the lights and threw himself onto the bed, uncaring that he was lying in the mess the two of you had made or that he was sweaty and grimy.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

What were you doing? Why were you here? What had you done? “I… um-”

“Yeah, I don’t actually care,” Buggy said through a yawn. “It’s been a long day and I’m wiped. Get up here.”

It took a moment for you to follow the simple order, but you managed to crawl up the bed. Rather than suffer your nervous attempts to find a spot that wouldn’t disturb him, Buggy grabbed you, pulling you against him like a child with a toy. He was hot and sweaty and the amount of weight he put on you wasn’t exactly comfortable, but you didn’t dare move—you didn’t want to move. His skin smelled like greasepaint and musk and sweat and gunpowder and leather and you drank it in, accepting your discomfort because it was Buggy.

In the swampish dark left behind in the red heat of passion, and especially in his arms, you thought about the affection you felt when you looked at him. It was only natural that you would love Buggy. Not as a lover, but as anybody would love their captain. To serve him as you had sworn, your love had to be absolute. But then you wondered what he felt for you. It would be too much and much too soon to ask for love, but surely there was something.

You, with a shocking amount of clarity given the fogged state of your mind, decided that you would ask him and accept whatever answer he gave. Emboldened by that resolution, you looked at him.

Buggy was already asleep.

#opla buggy #opla buggy x reader #buggy x reader #one piece live action #buggy the clown #buggy the clown x reader #my writing #flashbang #tw.dubcon #not sfw

73 notes · View notes

sapphic-moon-child · 1 year ago

Text

Bumps Along the way

Chapter 2: Finding a way ahead

Larissa x Shapeshifter!Reader Pregnant!Reader Pregnant!Larissa

Warnings: Pregnancy struggles, Pregnancy/childbirth, Miscarriages, Mental illness, Swears or curses, Infant Death, Stillborn, PTSD, Panic attacks

A/N: This story is going to be heavy, it deals with real life situations that most don’t understand the pain of. 1 in 4 women will experience this in their lifetime, remember you don’t know everyone's history.

Chapter 2 : Finding a way ahead

A month had gone by, thirty-one whole days. You hadn’t left your bed much, and Larissa worked from home most days so she could lay in bed and comfort you when you needed her. She had hired a temporary assistant to take the majority of her workload for a bit.

You felt bad, most days you snapped at her and used a tone that in your years of being together you never had before. Larissa knew this was your grief though, she would hold you silently and eventually you would give up and just cry. You have visited the graveyard twice now.

It hurt too much in this moment to go anymore than you had. All you could think of was the tiny fingers, and tiny nose, and wisps of white hair like Larissa’s. You had decided on a name and it was engraved in a stone memory. Angelica Brienne Weems.

The nurses made you a small heart mold with her hand and foot prints, it had stayed on your nightstand. Slowly but surely you were coming around more to life again, it wasn’t easy and the nursery door had stayed shut. But you were determined to come back to life again, you didn’t know how but you would.

*Time skip six months*

You and Larissa had decided to have a lazy Saturday, you both went back to work full time, and thankfully admired your students for not asking questions. “Rissa?” your voice was soft and muffled into her neck. “Yes my love?” She replied, moving a stand of hair behind your ear. “Make me feel alive again…Please…”

The sexual tension had been rough on both of you, but you couldn’t force yourself to care until now. It had been almost 7 months since your wife touched your body like that. Larissa nodded and slowly unbuttoned your night shirt, leaving soft kisses across every inch of exposed skin. She slowly slid down and removed your sleep shorts, a smile drifting across her face as she realized you didn’t have panties on.

Once again she continued to pepper kisses against your skin, being slow and gentle, taking her time. Larissa kissed both of your thighs and down your stomach, settling between your legs and locking her fingers with yours. She slowly started to pleasure you, hearing soft moans with every drag of her tongue. She took her time and filled your head with nothing but soft love and pleasure.

After a few more moments Larissa picked up her pace and added two fingers to your burning core. “Just let go, darling.” She said gently before helping you let go fully and quiver under her. You saw stars as you screamed Larissa’s name, letting your body shake and release all its tension. Soon though you wanted more and as soon as Larissa climbed back up to you, you flipped her over and ravaged her with a passionate kiss. You stripped her of the clothes she was wearing and intended to repay her tenfold.

Lining kisses down her body you quickly licked a stripe down her clit and heard a breathy moan, you knew what she wanted. While she was distracted by your mouth you shifted and kissed back up her body locking your lips with hers you teased her entrance with your shifted cock and her breath hitched as you slid yourself into her tight walls.

A strangled moan slipped from her lips and you set a relentless pace. Larissa was in utter bliss, you could feel she was close and so were you. You went to start to slide out of her and finish her with your fingers as she wrapped her legs around your waist. “No! I want you!” She breathlessly moaned and pulled you in a crushing kiss. It didn’t take either of you long, cumming together and completely spent.

“Rissa?” You asked after taking a few breaths. “Hmm?” you chuckled at the blissed out reply. “I didn’t use a condom…” You looked up at her fear in your eyes. “I know, and I'm perfectly fine with that.” You thought your jaw hit the floor. “But you said you didn’t want to get pregnant? What changed?” “You… When I saw you pregnant, I started wondering if I had made an error in judgment. But you were so happy so I never said anything. But if it happens to either of us, it happens and we try again.”

Larissa’s hand came up to your cheek and wiped away the stray tear. “No crying my sweet, we will have a lovely family however they come to us. And if that means they come from you, me, or someone else they will be no less loved or wanted.” You snuggled yourself into Larissa’s embrace, and nodded into her chest.

“Thank you my love… I..I don’t know if I want to try again, myself I mean.” Your chest hurt as soon as you said the words out loud, but also felt the relief of letting those words out. “That's okay my love, why don’t you let me take the reins for a little while?” You nodded once again, and were happy with that answer. As much as you loved being pregnant, you needed time to heal before trying to go down that road again. Well that and secretly you would love to see your wife pregnant, she would be an absolute angel and the glow would suit her so well.

#larissa weems #gwendoline christie #gwendolineuniverse #larissa weems x reader #larissa x y/n #principal weems #wednesday #larissa x wife!reader

82 notes · View notes

sweetainwen · 1 year ago

Text

ᴍᴀʟᴇᴅɪᴄᴛᴜᴍ [JJK]

Summary: trying to break free from a witch's curse was daunting, especially if it was a charade that would last until he had her to himself, but nothing was left unpunished by the rampage of a true walking curse, for every sin had to be atoned for.

Pairings: yandere duke witch hunter!Jungkook x fem!witch hunter?OC (you can think of her as Y/N)

Genre: made up world!au, supernatural!au, witch!au, yandere!au, smut

Disclaimer: this story is fictional, so each character is not as described in it.

Warnings: slight age gap (Jungkook 22 OC 26), obsession, manipulation, violence, blood, supernatural themes, burning at stake, major character death, murders, unprotected sex, fingering

Word count: 7.2+k

A/N: happy Halloween!

Tragic was life, bringing with it unexpected events that no one could prevent. The injustice of this filled hearts with sadness and helplessness, eyes that wanted to express them with tears but it was now useless.

Like her now gazing at the coffin of her third and brave husband being buried, passed away shortly after their wedding. People around her paying their condolences for the ill-fated event.

But she knew, knew how fear and judgments were hidden beneath them. She knew of the derogatory epithet that had been hung on her.

Their voices were loud, their looks piercing, their gestures blatant.

“She doesn't even shed a tear.”

“I wonder how it happened this time.”

“What a curse.”

The abyss dragged her down, shrouding her with its darkness.

However, his gentle hands brought her back up, firm and decisive, cutting that black thread that twisted overbearingly and undisturbed around her body.

As soon as she looked up, Jungkook’s tender smile calmed the turmoil that was taking over her, a hand squeezing her shoulder in comfort while the other was outstretched towards her.

“Let's get going, Minji. The air is getting very cold.”

She returned his smile with a more faint one and a slight nod of her head, resting her hand on his and letting him guide her out of the graveyard and to their carriage.

Her desire was only to marry and live happily, an accomplishment of almost every woman. She coveted that love as special as it was magical, for she had been deprived of it from an early age.

However, something prevented her from doing so.

The death of her first husband had been considered an accident, but that of her second husband a suspicion, and that of her third a confirmation.

Harbinger of misfortune, one glance was enough to cloud the poor unfortunate man's rationality, who acted rashly with a marriage proposal.

Whereupon those who fell victim to her beauty were cursed and perished.

The cursed woman.

That was what she was called by the townspeople, for there was a witch's hand in all these nefarious events.

A certainty due to the trails of magic found at the murder scene of her third husband.

“I am truly dismayed that you have been involved in this reprisal, my dear. We should have foreseen such an action.” The middle-aged man's sad voice reached her ears after they entered their mansion, being helped by the maids in freeing themselves of their coats.

“Do not blame yourself for this, my dear cousin,” she reassured, her palm brushing against his arm. “We are aware of who is really guilty. And I am confident that we will be able to find them, given our hunting abilities. The witches will not be able to escape for long.” Her hand rested gently on the cheek of the younger man beside her, whose doe-like eyes looked at her with concern and affection, before a sigh escaped her lips, “Now if you will excuse me, I shall retire to my chamber. I... need to be alone for a moment.”

The two men watched her as she made her way to the stairs, lifting her dress with her hands to prevent it from getting in the way of her steps, until she disappeared from their sight and they heard the door open and close.

The oldest cursed in a low voice, gritting his teeth, “Damn witches! If I could I would kill them all in one shot!” His gaze fell upon Jungkook, whose lips were pressed together. “Do everything to track down who it is.”

“Yes, father.”

“Just focus on hunting down these bastards, I will take care of the other family business.”

Jungkook nodded and before he began his task, his eyes drifted to the spot where his cousin had disappeared, and a sigh came out, his heart tightened with anguish at the memory of her worn-out appearance.

The fierce fury against her was personal, dictated by revenge in wanting to afflict of the same pain of losing comrades to the witch hunters.

What better way than to have a member of the Jeon, main duchy of the witch hunters' organization, as a victim?

And they had achieved their goal, with Minji pressing her lips together and tightening her grip on the reins of her horse at yet another shake of the head by one of their best hunters, Jin.

She could well hear the taunting giggles of those beings echoing through the forest even though they were concealed from their eyes, driving her frustration and anger almost to the edge. She was getting weary of the whole situation. And if she had to resort to different help, she would, even though she was reluctant.

She exhaled, "We will continue tomorrow. Going any further now will not yield any success. We will try another method."

Jungkook had not looked away from her for a second until he saw her pull the reins to turn around, followed by their second-best hunter, Namjoon.

"I knew they would curse us someday, but not that they would only come after one person,” Taehyung’s voice, another hunter, and the sound of the hooves of his horse on the ground to his left caught his attention, “They seem quite interested in your father’s cousin.”

Jungkook's gaze ended on her again, a knowing smile on his face, “They should never play with fire. It will burn them to death.”

Despite saying those words, hoping they would be heard by the tormentors, they were not getting their way, for the following days were a continuous search for them without success. And the one who suffered the most was Minji.

The frustration that was being shown on her face was not at all concealed, even if she tried to not let it get under her skin.

Her eyes that were slowly losing their vitality worried the most, for it was they that most captured people, that captured him as the first time he had seen her.

“This is Jeon Minji, a distant cousin of mine. She will stay here with us from now on. This is my son, Jeon Jungkook.”

He saw her get up from the sofa in their drawing room, walking in front of him.

The meeting was unexpected, since he had never heard of this cousin.

She curtsied, a smile tugging at her lips before stretching out her gloved hand, "Pleased to meet you, Lord Jungkook."

His hand moved on its own, taking hers and lightly placing his lips on her knuckles, “The pleasure is mine, Lady Minji.”

And the never-breaking eye contact allowed him to notice a gleam in her eyes that dazzled him.

That feeling had grown over time and did not appear to fade. It was as if he was enchanted and subjugated.

Like now as she watched the moon and stars, standing in the garden, the moonbeams over her figure making her ethereal and almost mystical.

“Can’t seem to sleep?” he asked, pulling a blanket over her shoulders to protect her from the chilling night.

She sighed, “Who would?”

“Would you like me to sing you a lullaby and stroke your hair?” he joked, a half-smile making its appearance.

She pressed her lips together to keep herself from laughing, the back of her hand lightly smacking his clothed chest.

He feigned hurt, pouty lips and knitted eyebrows, clutching the injured part.

“You big jester! It’s too late for that. I am no longer a child, but you have my gratitude.”

“Honored to be your jester, my lady.” A slight bow followed the last words, taking a small chuckle out of her.

A pleasant silence greeted them.

After the death of her first husband, their meetings had increased to be as close to her as possible and offer her all his support.

The more time they spent together, the more curiosity, affection, and attraction worked its way into him.

Her trust in him had improved so much that she was even able to tell him how her family had been exterminated by witches in an ambush.

She was the only survivor of part of his father's family.

There were many members of the Jeon family, but she had never been heard of except before that misfortune happened, in which news of an illegitimate daughter spread fast and unstoppable.

She was still a Jeon, it was a duty and right to help her.

“Worry moves your actions,” she spoke. Now face to face, Minji moved as many steps as it took to have their chests brushing against each other, “but you need not worry.” A tender smile graced her lips, her fingers caressing his cheek. “Despair will never cling to me, because I have you.”

A flutter came at those words and a pleasant warmth embraced his heart.

And he wrapped his arms around her waist, feeling her body heat through their fabrics of clothing.

"After losing everything, you and your father are really the only people I have left. My family."

He sighed, a glint of sadness in his gaze, “However, we are not enough for you.” Her features softened more, her heart throbbing restlessly at his reaction. “I am aware of the difference, yet you acted hastily. I know you want to get married, how you would like to create that family you could not have, but you did not even know them.”

“I would have as time went on.”

“It doesn't imply loving them.”

She did not argue back, mindful of the truthfulness of his words. Not all marriages had that happy ending. There were many different endings that could be reached. She knew that, but if she was held back by all these ifs and buts, she would only live in fear and paranoia.

The loss of that comforting warmth on one of her hips awakened her from her thoughts, finding it now on her cheek, his thumb gently stroking the skin of it.

“For that reason, you should look closer to you. And your eyes will see that the right person is precisely the one on whom expectations were nil.“

Silence fell. His eyes wanting to convey without more words what he wanted to say, and when they reached their destination, Minji almost lost her breath.

“I love you.”

She was completely taken aback, so much so that she could not find the right words.

Heart racing, thoughts jumbling together. She was happy.

She beamed and covered her mouth with one hand to hide it from the eyes of the young man, who, however, noticed it immediately.

And she decided to answer his silent question.

“This is outrageously embarrassing,” a little ashamed chuckle left her lips, “I… had a desire to get married so that I could forget what I felt, since… I believed that you could never reciprocate my feelings.” She began to speak swiftly, “I am aware that throwing myself into the arms of those men without having any knowledge of them was wrong, but I was sure it was the best solution to avoid a possible unintended consequence of my unrequited lo-“

Voraciously her lips were assailed by his, moving them gently and slowly, savoring and devouring with ardor that first impulsive kiss of theirs.

His fingers brushing her cheeks, her hands on his hips for support.

Pulling a short distance away, their eyes met, chests going up and down.

“You were totally in the wrong. Because I love you and long for you as if you are my breath. Marry me.”

“Your father-“

“Oh, my father would gladly approve of our union,” he chuckled. “His confession about me being the best husband for a woman like you was quite telling.”

She blinked in surprise, “Did he really say such a thing?”

“He says many things that are to your advantage, my dear.” He pecked her lips, making her smile. “We will find that witch and get married. I promise you.”

She nodded, her arms circling his waist and her head resting on his chest. He pulled her close to him, his chin on her head and a victorious, sly smile adorning his face.

Happiness was overtaking him.

Who would have expected such a turn of events? It was an opportunity he would not waste.

However, if he had realized it earlier, she would have been his before those bastards interfered with marriage proposals.

Resorting to this charade had been worth it anyway; he had been wanting to get rid of the worthless scums who had immediately ogled her shortly after her arrival for too long.

Witches were the enemy of humans. Evil beings who deceived you with their human guise. For that reason, the Jeon household became witch hunters for the salvation of humanity.

Making use of the grimoires taken from those beings, they succeeded in creating tools that allowed protection against them, to trap and execute them.

Even if they still existed after centuries, the Jeons would still fight. And Jungkook, now, was the successor to that duchy.

So, no one would notice that a human was to blame for those incidents if you tainted the crime scene with evidence against witches. Least of all Jeon Jungkook himself, the witch hunter.

“What’s the meaning of this?!” the young man on the ground shrieked in a strangled voice, the rope net that had opened from the ball attached to an arrow shot from a crossbow blocking his movements with electric shocks.

They had invaded his house, turning it upside down in search of something he didn’t know about.

His own friends were treaking him like a criminal, like a witch.

“They are here!” a hunter notified from one of the rooms.

Quick steps on the wooden floor before his gaze ended on Jungkook and Minji, the latter holding a grimoire and a voodoo doll, features distorted by betrayal and disappointment like the rest of those present there.

With glassy eyes and his heart pounding, he began to shake his head, “They're not mine! I could never!” Minji’s lips were quivering. “Lady Minji, believe me! I’m not a witch! Please!”

“Take him.”

It was the last thing he heard from Jungkook before he was dragged ruthlessly out of his own house toward his last breath, screaming and trying to wriggle out even against that net-like trap that thwarted him with pain.

His pleas would go unheard and the answer to his question about the reason for this dogged and unfair framing against him never given.

Loss of sanity and restraint was there when it concerned witches, and the Jeon's young successor was aware of this.

Finding someone as a scapegoat was not difficult either, finding someone else who had allowed himself to look at her more than he could as the culprit of the curse, fitting in manufactured evidence, had been easy.

If he had known his place, he would not have ended up at the stake, undergoing pain and pleading he was not a witch.

The shock the townsfolk had experienced in knowing that Jung Hoseok, such a kind and shy young man who had just moved from afar, had actually turned out to be one of those monsters had been severe.

For Minji, who had welcomed him gently to put him at ease and had even grown attached to him like a sister, it had been another loss.

She still recalled how he lowered his timid gaze and played with his fingers while talking, the selflessness he showed if someone needed some help, and the small smile of when he was asked or considered in conversations and jokes.

And as she and the others watched the flames that had now devoured him and left only a burned body, she wondered who she might or might not trust around her.

“My love…” his soft, gentle voice and his fingers intertwining with hers as a sign of comfort led her to look at Jungkook, “This view destroys our hearts, but you’re free now.” She flashed him a half-smile and was immediately engulfed in a hug. “I’m here. All is well. You’re safe.”

She held him close, the feeling of safety and warmth embracing her once again, “You are right. I have you. My soon-to-be husband.”

Ah, how he loved those words.

He was at the mercy of this victorious enthusiasm.

It seemed to him to be an illusion well devised by a witch for how much he still could not believe that he would finally make her his for eternity.

The fear of losing her had been swept away by the knowledge that he had her in his grasp.

She could not escape; he would not allow it.

She would have no reason to, either, for nothing connected the situation they had gone through with him.

Their lives would run smoothly. They would have children, see them grow up, and would tell them and their grandchildren about how magnificent their wedding day had been.

That white dress had made her look like a goddess come down to earth to tempt a man and enchant him for life with sweet words, gentle caresses and breathtaking smiles.

He had not resisted and with vows of love and a kiss, they had sealed that long-awaited union.

Her gasp of surprise and giggle when he had taken her in his arms had stirred his heartstrings into more chords of love and devotion.

And it shone through his eyes that did not leave Minji's for a moment as he removed the veil from her hair and then caressed one of her cheek.

“I still cannot believe that you are here, as my wife.”

She leaned her face into his hand, on which she placed her own, “Believe it. For I will be here with you until death do us part.”

Without another word, Jungkook pressed his mouth to hers harshly.

Her hand gripped the back of his neck, pulling him closer towards her. His hands quickly made their way around her waist and she could feel her breasts brush tightly against his chest as he continued to deepen their kiss and led her back towards the bed.

Both crawling up onto the middle, her back resting now on the mattress, Jungkook’s mouth continued to work against her own, his kisses becoming desperate, her fingers running through his dark locks. He groaned against her, lips finding the skin of her neck and trailing kisses up and down slowly.

She arched her back and spread her legs, his hips now comfortably against hers and the feeling of his hard bulge in his pants against her obvious. His hands lifted the skirts of her dress, fingers trailing on her skin light enough to send sparks and goosebumps down her body.

But a sense of stiffening was detected by Jungkook, leading him to break their lips apart to give her a questioning gaze.

“What is it, my dearest?”

A tint of red colored her cheeks in embarrassment and shyness, head lowering and hands tightening around the fabric of his clothing.

She was so adorable that he wanted to tease her.

“I… It won’t hurt again, will it? My former husbands had not been very… gentle. I’m afraid I…”

Silence fell in the room, but the rage lurking in Jungkook did not stop growing after those words.

They had been fortunate enough to have such a delicate and special flower in their arms and had instead decided to fill with pain and sadness that important bond between spouses.

Ungrateful pieces of shit.

A soft smile tugged at his lips, “Look at me.” She did. “I would never hurt you, in any way. I love you too much to commit such obnoxious actions.”

A slight nod of approval from her was all he needed to kiss her again, his hands shoving her dress up to expose her bare skin before trailing his fingers over her thighs and rubbing against her sensitive spot over her undergarments. She let out a soft gasp, goosebumps all over her body.

Taking advantage of this, his tongue swept in between her lips, playing with her own.

She gripped his hair as he tore her undergarments off, helping him kicking them off with her legs and hands. Pulling away again, her dress was next, pulling it up and leaving her completely bare under his gaze.

Lust filling their eyes and patience vanishing, he undressed himself quickly of his wedding suit, leaving his hardened dick on display.

Minji couldn’t help but look at him, almost losing her breath at how handsome he was. That hungry, dazed gaze made Jungkook completely insane.

She was looking at him.

Loving him.

A surprise gasp left her lips as one of his fingers slipped inside of her slowly, body hot and labored breaths.

“You’re so beautiful,” he whispered breathlessly, drinking in her beautiful face contorted with pleasure.

Leaning over, he bit down on her shoulder as he worked his finger inside of her, a moaning escaping from her.

“I’m gonna make you feel good,” he said in a dark voice, another finger starting to slowly push inside of her. “Make you feel how much I yearn to make you mine.”

She shut her eyes, his hot breath fanning over her neck, overwhelmed by his movements and hot body against hers.

His thumb pressed against her clit, sending more shivers down her spine as her hands gripped his hair and her back arched, hips rocking up toward his fingers.

“Jungkook-“

A breathless chuckle was his reply, “You’re so wet. You’re clenching so much.”

“Please- I’m-“

“Want to come right now? Or you want my cock to fuck your pussy? Mmh? Would you like that? Look at you, so ready to get fucked up.”

His vulgar words made her whimper more, his fingers bringing her close to her own release.

“Please, fuck me up, fuck me-“

The loss of his fingers made her grunt in disappointment, but a gasp of surprise left her lips as soon as she felt his cock pushing into her slowly.

He grabbed her wrists and brought them over the sheets, near her face, intertwining her fingers with his shortly after and kept rolling his hips back and forth as he was now buried deep inside her.

She looked at him, eyes half-lidded and everything around her disappeared.

She could only hear his fast breaths and see drops of sweat falling undisturbed along his temples, neck, chest.

His arms muscles flexing as they supported the weight of his body, eyes watching her with a glint of pure and primitive ecstasy

He was shuddering above her, showing how much she was making him feel fucking good. Bare. Hers.

A shift in his movements caused something inside of her to sent shots of electricity through her limbs and whimper in pleasure.

“You’re so good. Taking me so well.”

Pulling back from her body and then slamming into her roughly, it almost made her cry out in bliss.

Her legs hugged his hips, pulling him deeper inside her.

Clenching around his cock, she flashed him a lustful smile and his quiet grunts turned into moans as his thrusts became more erratic.

Dizziness invaded their senses and spasms ran through their bodies as Jungkook filled her with his seed, reaching their release.

Trying to catch their breath, he collapsed onto her, his face in the crook of her neck and her hand now stroking his hair.

He held her close, rubbing his nose against her neck, which made her giggle as she reciprocated the squeeze with a happy sigh.

The night was quiet while they enjoyed their proximity, but a sudden muffled noise caught Minji’s attention, her gaze ending on a black cat on the window sill glaring at her.

She reciprocated with a curious glance, but did not give it much thought.

The next few days she began to see him more often; he followed her wherever she went as if he were her shadow. So she decided to take care of him, eventually waiting for his arrival so she could cuddle and play with him. He was very affectionate for a stray cat.

Her heart melted like snow when the cat snuggled up on her thighs for a nap or just to be close to her, as he was doing now. The trust he placed in her filled her with joy. Getting it from an animal was not always easy, hence she was proud of it.

If she spoke to him, he understood. If her mood changed, he sensed it. A little moral support.

Her fingers passed gently through his fur, his purr widening her smile.

“You love that cat very much.”

Her cousin's voice rendered to a whisper brought her back to reality, the cup of tea between the fingers of her other hand now cold, sitting on a chair next to his bed.

Her gaze landed on him, seeing his softened features as he sipped his tea with his back resting on the back of his bed, the pillow making the resting comfortable.

“I do.”

She placed the cup on the undercup placed on the small nightstand to her right before reaching out her hands toward the cup and undercup he was holding out to her, the black cat coming down from her legs to wonder around the room.

"And Jungkook is still displeased."

She let a small chuckle escape her lips, "He is not some witch's familiar, the sphere would have reacted otherwise. Besides, Jungkook is displeased by anything that takes my attention away from him," she reminded him amusedly, setting the undercup and cup down next to hers.

“Oh! That young man is beyond smitten with you that he even wants to get rid of a cat! I wouldn't be surprised if one day he made all the animals around disappear.”

The man laughed wholeheartedly, enjoying the way his son was behaving out of his usual character. But coughing fits interrupped him, his hand over his mouth now smeared with his own blood.

Minji widened her eyes, concern again evident on her face as she knelt at the edge of the bed and handed him a handkerchief, wiping his hand with another.

He looked at her, a soft smile adorning his face, “You are such a kind soul, my lovely little cousin. I don’t see myself worried about leaving my son in bad hands. I’m glad you accepted to be his wife. It’s the best gift I could ever receive.”

She stood still, pain and sadness piercing her heart yet a sense of pride and gratitude followed those emotions at his words.

“Thank you, father-in-law.”

He caressed her cheek, tenderness and affection guiding his gesture, “Take good care of each other, all right?”

“Of course. Always.” She gave him a weak smile, “It’s better if I let you rest, I think I have stayed too long. I will visit again tomorrow.”

“I will wait for you, my precious daughter.”

And off she went, taking with her the tea cart carefully prepared by herself after placing the cups on it, the cat following suit.

After closing the door, she let out a sigh.

A few weeks after their wedding, as Minji and he were having their usual tea hour together, he had brought a hand to his chest before passing out.

Panic had risen, and when they had called the doctor, it was discovered that an illness had struck him.

It was incurable and nameless.

The despair and destruction she had seen pass across Jungkook's face had broken her heart more than the news had already done.

His complexion was pale, dark circles under his eyes, strength weakening, and some of his nights were sleepless.

Her cousin was dying and nothing could be done. Their helplessness was unbearable, but other than spending time with him, they could do nothing else.

He had taken care of her when she was left alone, welcoming her and engaging her immediately as if she was not a mistake of her father's with another woman. He had showered her with love, becoming a father and a brother.

She almost lost her mind.

But the appearance of that cat – which she had named Sese – had been a distraction. Jungkook was busy with family business in his father's stead, so he spent a lot of time in his office room. Caring for an animal helped keep her mind off that unforeseen tragedy, ignoring Jungkook’s disapproval.

The black cat was the witches' familiar. Deception and malice were part of them. Having one in the house brought bad luck, he had even come to believe that he was to blame for his father's illness.

This, however, was not possible, since if he had really been the bearer of misfortune, the protective sphere of the house placed on a pedestal in the basement would have counteracted his strength and prevented him from entering.

He was a normal black cat that she had chosen to take in.

Footsteps could be heard and she looked up, finding Jungkook coming her way with slow, tired movements.

“Is he sleeping?”

She nodded, “Likely. I left to let him rest.” He hummed and Minji approached him, her voice soft as she asked, “Do you want me to make you some tea?”

“What you have already prepared will be fine for me.”

“But it's cold.”

“It's still tea.”

“Alright, alright,” she exhaled before giving him a peck on his lips. “Go and relax a bit too. You need it. I'll join you right away.”

He gave her a weak smile, “Thanks, my dearest.”

Tired voice, slumped shoulders, dull eyes. His pain was palpable even now with his back to her.

She could understand him; he had lost his mother when he was young to a fall from a horse while hunting witches, and now he was losing his father to a disease.

She clenched her hands into fists.

It was not fair. They had begun happy days, their laughter filling the house, their fellowship with each other and even with the household employees.

She thought it would all end with the killing of the witch, but their family still seemed to be in the arms of a curse.

The organization was already mourning one of their important members, but when he actually died a few days later, no one could still believe that they were looking at his grave in the cemetery.

The rain and fog made the event more somber and unbearable.

Condolences and words of prayes were adressed to them with sympathy and compassion.

And the title of Duke had passed to Jungkook.

His obligations had increased and with them the pressure he perceived on himself because of the expectations other members now placed on him and the family business.

The incessant pounding in his head caused distraction and slowed his work.

And today was one of those days.

His vision was blurring and the hand that was holding the pen was trembling, the writings on those papers placed on the desk only meaningless ink.

He let go of the pen and with a sigh leaned back on the chair, rubbing his face with his hands to try to shake off the weariness.

A clink of something contrasting a surface awakened him, seeing his usual cup of tea on his desk and Minji at one side of it.

"Here's your tea, dear."

He reached out a hand toward her and Minji took it between hers, drawing her closer before wrapping his arms around her waist. His head resting on her stomach.

Her fingers began to run through his hair, slightly relieving his headache at which he breathed a sigh of relief.

He rubbed his face against her stomach.

She smiled, softened by his behavior considered childish, and let him be.

“Are you done with your work for the day?”

“Not quite. Unfortunately, I have a headache.”

She blinked, “Again?”

“Again.”

“Then drink, don’t waste time. You said it helps you get over it.”

“I will. Just let me stay like this a little longer.”

She snorted a chuckle and his heart skipped a beat.

He was so lucky to have her.

She supported him with simple gestures, understood when he needed something and assisted when he couldn't continue certain things himself.

She also declined every letter of invitation to tea parties to have a simple chatter with friends because she wanted to stay with him.

Everything about her was soothing. Her touch, her breath, her closeness. She was his main pivot. His life. His.

He couldn’t stop admiring and loving her.

And he was often caught staring at her like a fool and hearing her laugh every time she told him to stop was a cure-all.

For her he was also trying to like Sese, even though he was taking up too much of Minji's time. And she gently scolded him not to be jealous of a cat.

He probably was.

Normality was setting in again in their lives and he was over the moon.

However, something began to crack once again.

Minji was on the alert, often distant and silent. Whether at home or during meetings between members of the organization, or simply walking through the streets of the central city. Especially with him.

Anxiety and terror had mixed, shaping thoughts and theories that were taking root in his mind.

She was terrifying him. He was afraid she had grown tired of him. That she had a lover.

Just thinking about it sent him into a frenzy.

He had started having nightmares and the sleepless nights did not allow him to think properly.

And the discovery of her nocturnal outings fed his fear that was getting out of control even more.

She was not betraying him. She was not leaving him. She couldn't. She had no chance.

He had tried, he had tried to communicate, to understand the problem, but he had received no answer.

Every excuse was used to avoid confrontation.

This time he would wait for her to face the situation once and for all.

He saw her as she crossed the threshold of their bedroom with light steps so as not to make noise.

Her gaze had immediately focused on him, sitting in the chair by the window set at the left side of the bed. There was no surprise and fear of being caught red-handed; no, it was as if she knew someone was waiting for her.

Doubts crept more into him.

"Where were you?"

"I was thirsty, I drank some water."

"You were thirsty, you drank water,” he was mocking her as he got up, walking slowly up to her. “In your walking dress.”

He was so close that she could feel his breath on her face, the silent expressiveness in his eyes exposing his anxious thoughts. hands shaking and slightly labored breathing.

He was so close that she could feel his ragged breath on her face. The quiet expressiveness in his eyes baring his anxious thoughts.

She tilted her head to the side, weirded out and irritated by his behavior.

“I put on the first dress I could find. Finding a suitable one would have taken time.”

“Can… Can we talk about it?”

“About what?”

“About how you’re lying to me.”

The snort she gave him left him stunned, the rope of sanity permanently snapping.

His heart began to pound faster, his trembling hands cupping her face. Despair clouded his mind at her faint mocking smile and no definitive answer.

He couldn't stand it. She was kind. She was loving. She loved him.

“What’s happening? Why are you reacting like this? Is someone bothering you? Threatening you? You don’t have to hide things from me. I’m your husband! I can help you!”

He was a mess.

He spoke fast, his voice quivering, and he felt like he was losing his mind.

It was exploding. He felt suffocated.

He took his head in his hands, his knees ending up on the ground, another headache suddenly occurring. This time heavier and more persistent.

His stomach burned, a lump forming in his throat until he vomited blood before falling sideways, a few splatters reaching Minji's dress.

She had moved a few steps closer, looking down on him.

Bent over, panting, shivering, frail.

“The tea has finally had its effect. Did you enjoy the nightmares? Probably of me leaving you alone. The twist is… you were always alone. I’m not your father’s cousin. I’m not part of your family. I am not a Jeon. Spreading rumors of an illegitimate child was a child’s play.”

Jungkook was gasping for air, tremendously shocked by what was happening. He looked at her, pupils shaking, face pale, jolts sweeping through his body.

"Too many questions you're asking me!” she chuckled, her arms behind her back with the fingers of one hand intertwined with the other. “My amazement at observing human greed will never end. Tearing books from witches and using them against them to feel powerful, killing them with no mercy whatsoever. Creating massacres and making children orphans. You have no respect for what you have. Truly deplorable.”

Anger was audible in her voice, her face disfigured with disgust.

“In two of those many massacres were the three most important people in my life. I am sure that the memory of a big wolf protecting a woman is not easily forgotten, as the sight of such a wolf is not every day occurrence. They were my parents. And I was watching with my husband and brother, hidden from your eyes under my parents' request. Shortly afterwards I lost my husband as well." A sinister glint appeared in her eyes, bending her upper body slightly toward him, "The pain I felt had been so immeasurable that I was burning with the desire to make you feel the same. You should have seen your father's face the day he died, when I revealed myself as a witch. My smile must have scared him a lot.” She smirked, “How do you feel?”

Betrayal was the only thing that was piercing his lungs and heart, immobilizing him from regular breathing and opening his mouth to respond.

Bitter tears began to stream down his cheeks.

“Nevertheless, I must admit that your obsession with me was a great benefit; you made access easier for me, and getting rid of those other lousy hunters didn't bother me at all.”

“Do you really have to tell him everything?”

The interjection of a dissatisfied male voice made her straighten up, but she didn’t take her eyes off Jungkook, whose attention was now on the young man who had stopped beside Minji with the black cat on his right shoulder.

“Where is Sese, brother?”

“On my shoulder.”

Jungkook saw the pet jump down and walk behind Minji.

He thought he would see him popping up from the other side, but what appeared before his eyes were boots. Looking up, he noticed pants, a shirt, and finally a face.

A face he had last seen burning at the stake.

“We should leave, I can't stay one more minute in this shitty place,” Hoseok grumbled, his arm resting on Minji’s shoulder. “I can still smell that damned burning smell and my skin being roasted.”

“You'll get over it.”

“You go to the stake next time, Yoongi.”

“What do we do now, Minji?” Yoongi completely ignored his annoyed comment, addressing his sister.

Silence crept in.

They were watching Jungkook like a fucking prey. Like a trapped animal. And he was.

He couldn’t do much. He had been deceived.

“Burn everything down.”

As Minji uttered those words, his hand clutched her skirt in a desperate gesture, shaking his head.

He didn't care. He wanted his wife. His love. He didn't give a fuck about her being a witch or something else. He loved her. He fucking loved her!

“Don’t… Don’t leave me, please…”

“This bastard is desperate. Apparently, you left a deep mark,” Yoongi sneered, followed by a giggle from Hoseok.

Minji extended her hand in front of her brother, and he pulled out a hunter's knife taken from the house to give it to her.

“I told you destroying them from the inside would be more satisfying, brother. My role has more impact than yours. Even though women are witch hunters, they are still viewed differently than men. Taking advantage of this was essential. Look how they collapsed like a sandcastle. I hope you had as much fun as I did, Jungkook.”

The knife was held in mid-air above Jungkook, at heart level.

His fingers tightened on her skirt, pleading with his eyes not to, but she didn't listen. Instead, she released her grip on the knife.

And as if moved by an invisible force – her power – it cut through the air and pierced his chest, reaching his heart.

His eyes lost their vitality, his body stopped moving.

And the room fell silent again.

Some time later, the house began to catch on fire.

Yoongi hid and Hoseok took on the appearance of a cat again, while she warned the employees who lived in the house to get out.

It had been a wonderful sight in her eyes.

The flames that enthusiastically enveloped the Jeon house.

Bright, big, lightning up the night.

Like the witches who were burned at the stake.

It had all been so simple that it bored her.

When she discovered that her mixed blood could somehow nullify the effects of the witches' spells used by those humans, she realized that she could do something to destroy them.

And she was succeeding. After carefully studying the methods, observing the hunters, and strengthening herself, she had taken action.

Her brother was against it, he didn't want her to put herself in danger, but she assured him that it wouldn't happen. And here was the wonderful result.

She was thanking her father for being a werewolf, and the human stupidity in not having yet discovered the existence of other living beings with different abilities.

On top of that, the compassion they were showing her after this misfortune was truly hilarious.

Talking about how her late husbands, father-in-law and her distancing from society were the work of the successor to the dukedom, his obsession and fear of having someone take her away from him, how he started a fire and she ended up having to shove a knife in his heart in self-defense, it had been a theatrical show.

The Kim family even offered to host her. A kind family indeed, she had to admit. However, they had too much faith in the witchcraft that they detested so much, and she had once again entered another house of witch hunters without repercussions.

Humming as she sat at her dressing table in her new room, she looked at herself in the mirror, fixing some messy locks in front of her face.

"Jin, Namjoon or Taehyung? Who should I go for first?" she asked, eyes fixed on her reflection before showing an interested and pleased expression. "Oh, all three? Naughty."

After smiling one more time, she stepped out of her room, her reflection still adjusting her hair through the mirror.

Then she smiled, getting up and disappearing from the mirror.

A victorius and sly giggle echoing within the walls.

103 notes · View notes

angelynmoon · 9 months ago

Text

Look, it's been awhile since I've been in the Harry Potter Fandom, and all the things with the author makes it hard to go back to(except the stories that were written before all was revealed) but this thing demanded to be written and I was possesed until it was done so, for those of you that still enjoy the fandom, have a little thought.

Death has known Harry his whole life, from that fatefull killing curse to the one in the Forbidden Forest, he's been by his side.

He sat with him while Severus Snape cradled his mother as Harry cried, He held him in the tiny cupboard after a beating too harsh, as hunger atempted to bring him closer to that final breath.

He stood behind him when he encountered Tom Riddle Jr for the first time, (the second time), He knelt before him as Fawkes cried for him, He watched him as Harry battled his minions for Sirius Black's soul and the boy's own.

He flew with him against a dragon, swam with him to the depths of a lake, He stayed with him in a graveyard as he stood before Tom Riddle Jr's insanity.

He watched over him as he crept into the Hall of Prophecies, sat with him as he mourned Sirius Black's fall, He stayed with him though his journey to find all the ways Tom Riddle Jr attempted to avoid Him.

But you cannot avoid Death, not for long, Death is inevitable, it's the end that comes to all, from the smallest single celled organism to the great trees that span the world, it comes to them all, just as, eventually, it will come to the very planet.

Yes, Death has known Harry Potter his entire life, and chose him for His Master long before Harry knew of the Hallows.

He chose him when those green eyes looked up at Him as Tom Riddle Jr turned his wand to the boy, as the tiny boy raised his chubby arms up and smiled at Death while Tom Riddle Jr spoke those two words that would take the life of a child, a child who accepted Death openly, willingly, with a smile and trust.

And Death sat with that child as He twisted a Mother's sacrifice into a protection that would last a childhood.

He flew alongside a motorbike as they journeyed across a rejoycing people, He cradled a sleeping boy while the moon was high and sang lullabies as he was left to cry alone in his cupboard.

He watched as childish drawings and writings filled the small space and made it their own, He petted sweaty hair as the child suffered his illnesses without care or kindness.

Death gathered him up after Tom Riddle Jr's host fell to the protection Death weaved of Lily Potter's sacrifice, held him and whispered stories that Harry was not ready to remember, one day, when Harry was old and grey, when time was no longer his friend, when the last of his loved ones were collected.

Only then would Death reveal Himself, only then would He finally be free to collect His heir.

Death comes to all, even Death Himself eventually.

#harry potter #death #master of death Harry Potter #ficlet #mentioned abuse #mentioned near deaths

18 notes · View notes

ohsalome · 2 years ago

Text

youtube

Here is famous jewish-russian poet Iosyf Brodsky reading poem dedicated to Ukrainian proclaimation of independence (translated by Artem Serebrennikov, but without his commentary).

Brodsky is considered one of the geniuses of modern russian poetry. He has a number of awards (including the Nobel Prize), and he had to flee from the Soviet Union due to the fear of state presecution. So, you know, a classic russian liberal.

Dear Charles XII, the Poltava battle*

Has been fortunately lost. To quote Lenin’s burring rattle,

“Time will show you Kuzka’s mother”*, ruins along the waste,

Bones of post-mortem bliss with a Ukrainian aftertaste.

It’s not the green flag, eaten by the isotope*,

It’s the yellow-and-blue flying over Konotop*,

Made out of canvas – must be a gift from Toronto* –

Alas, it bears no cross, but the Khokhly* don’t want to.

Oh, rushnyks* and roubles*, sunflowers in summer season!

We Katsapy* have no right to charge them with treason.

With icons and vodka, for seventy years we’ve bungled,

In our Ryazan we’ve lived like Tarzan in the jungle.

We’ll tell them, filling the pause with a loud “your mom”:

Away with you, Khokhly, and may your journey be calm!

Wear your zhupans*, or uniforms, which is even better,

Go to all four points of the compass and all the four letters.

It’s over now. Now hurry back to your huts

To be gang-banged by Krauts and Polacks right in your guts.

It’s been fun hanging together from the same gallows loop,

But when you’re alone, you can eat all that sweet beetroot soup.

Good riddance, Khokhly, it’s over for better or worse,

I’ll go spit in the Dnieper, perhaps it’ll flow in reverse,

Like a proud bullet train looking at us askance,

Stuffed with leathery seats and ages-old grievance.

Don’t speak ill of us. Your bread and wheat we don’t need,

Nor your sky, may we all choke on sunflower seed.

No need for bad blood or gestures of fury ham-fisted,

Seems that our love is up, if it at all existed.

Why should we plow our broken roots with our verbs?

You were born out of earth, its podzolic soils and its herbs.

Quit flexing your rights and laying all the blame on us,

It is your bloody soil that has become your onus.

Oh, gardens and grasslands and steppes, varenyks filled with honey!

We’ve had greater losses before, lost more people than money.

We’ll get by somehow. And if you want teary eyes –

Wait ‘til next time, guys, this provision no longer applies.

God rest ye merry Cossacks, hetmans*, and gulag guards!

But mark: when it’s your turn to be dragged to graveyards,

You’ll whisper and wheeze, your deathbed mattress a-pushing,

Not Shevchenko’s* bullshit but poetry lines from Pushkin*.

For decades the conossieurs of russian culture has defended Brodsky and denied his authorship of the poem, until this video popped up in 2015. Oh but not russians tho, they don't deny it. They're proud of it! This particular translation I've found on an english website dedicated to popularisation of russian culture :) And of course it had a xenophobic comment expressing support of Brodsky and hatered towards ukrarinians ^)

So yeah, I think we have more than enough reasons to say that any person who claims that russian invasion of Ukraine came out of nowhere and/or that it was not motivated by xenophobia and imerialism towards ukrainians, is full of bullshit.

[context/references explained under the cut, buckle up for a long lecture]

Poltava battle was one of decisive clashes between Sweden and Russia during the Great Northern War. Initially Ukraine was fighting this war on the side of the russian empire as its vassal, but before the Poltava battle we switched sides. There were several reasons for this choice, among the most important - russian emperor breaking the treaty between the Hetmanate and Muscowy. Important context - the head of then ukrainian state, Ivan Mazepa, was very close to russian emperor - you could say, he was his father figure. Mazepa educated tzar Peter in European manner and helped him start the europeisation of the Muscowy. russians see this battle as a huge personal betrayal (the fact that Peter I betrated Mazepa first is always omitted, in russian culture, unlike ukrainian, the person higher than you on hierarchy doesn't owe you shit but has absoulte power over you). That was 300 years ago and russians are still salty about it. and Mazepa is probably the second most hated ukrainian historical figure after Bandera.

"Show you Kuzka's mother" - a phrase meaning "show them hell", famously used by the ussr general secretary Michael Khrushchev adressed to american politicians in 1959.

"Eaten by isotope" - reference to the Chornobyl nuclear disaster.

Konotop - a small city in Northern Ukraine, famous for the Konotop battle that happened between cossacks and muscowytes in 1659. In the modern russo-ukrainian war it became famous for witches that curse russian soldiers with erectile dysfunction. Interestingly enough, a "Konotop witch" has been a phenomena even before that, as refered in a short story of the same name by Hryhorii Kvitka-Osnovianenko, thus giving even more substance to the threat.

Toronto - canadian city, probably mentioned here due to the fact that many Ukrainians flead from the ussr to Canada, thus creating one of the biggest ukrainian diasporas in the world. Canadian ukrainians are known for being very politically active, publishing ukrainian literature at times when it was impossible to do so at home, and fighting soviet propaganda. As a result, Kremlin began a smear campaign painting all canadian ukrainians as nazis, which is effective till this day.

Khokhly - a common slur used against ukrainian. Most probably comes from old slavonic "xoxolъ" that means "bangs" and refers to the hairstyle typically worn by ukrainian men, that russians found funny.

Rushnyks - an embroidered decorative towel, used in home decor and some rituals [examples]

Roubles - russian currency.

Katsapy - common slur used against russians. They will want you to believe that the word comes from phrase "как цап" - "like a goat" and refers to the type of beard worn by russian men at old time, but this is purposeful misleading from the true origin of the word. Katsap comes from arabic "qassab", which means literally "butcher". A legend states that this comes from a single incedent when russian army, after promising to spare a city's residents if they surrendered peacefully, cut down every single person there. But different sources attribute this to different battles (some of which verifyably did not end with the city surrendering), so I don't think this can be bottled down to a single event.

Zhupans - a type of outer clothing popular in Ukraine and Poland [example, another example] Funny trivia - Word of Darkness tabletop universe used this word to describe a subtype of vampires from Eastern Europe, which is incredibly funny for me. Gimme mysterious british vampire warlocks called pullovers.

Hetmans - a military and political head-of-state in some medieval and Renaissance Eastern European countires, including Ukraine (known as Hetmanate back then).

Taras Shevchenko - perhaps the most influential ukrainian poet, artist, ethnografist and political figure, the metaphorical spiritual father of the country. His influence on the modern ukrainian culture is incomparable - half the things in Ukraine are named after him. He is also among the people who have the biggest number of monuments erected in the world - 1384. Taras Shevchenko's life story is extremely dramatic and deserves its own post - born in slavery, bought out of it thanks to his unique artistic talent, imprisoned for criticism of russian monarchy with an explicit ban on writing and painting, spent the second half of his life in exile. He wrote a lot about freedom and things we would call today anticolonialism and antiimperialism.

Alexander Pushkin - one of the "founding fathers" of russian literature, who is attributed with setting the standard of literary russian language. russians call him "our everything", but as far as I am aware he is hardly known outside the countries smeared by russian imperialism with the exception of some black classic literature fans due to being 1/4 black.

#russian culture #russian literature #russian poetry #poetry #brodsky #iosyf brodsky #xenophobia #imperialism #russian imperialism #rushism #rashism #Youtube

111 notes · View notes

abeycnce · 22 days ago

Text

walking through the picturesque streets of cardinal hill, you find ( reagan borges ), the ( 38 ) year old ( owner of just like heaven bakery ) originally from ( gloucester, ma ). living alongside them in such a small town, you know that they're ( loyal ) and ( sardonic ), but what you might not know is that they are a ( witch ), and that they’re hiding something… ― aubrey plaza, bisexual, woman, and she/her.

[ about ] ⧫ [ playlist ] ⧫ [ pinterest] ⧫ [ interactions ]

&. BASICS

full name: reagan cara borges

age: thirty-eight

gender, pronouns, sexuality: cisfemale, she/her, bisexual

species: witch

job position: baker and owner of just like heaven bakery

&. MORE BASIC INFO

zodiac sign: cancer

mbti: intp - introverted (69%), intuitive (70%), thinking (64%) prospecting (58%) assertive (63%)

scars: various scars of unknown origin, most notably three faint scars on her left side and one one her wrist from the plane crash

secret talent: she's great and knot-tying and sailing

fears: flying

five + traits: loyal, charismatic, inventive, dedicated, protective

five - traits: sardonic, impulsive, cynical, stubborn, irreverent

pets: olive, a 7-year-old tan chow-retriever mix + macy, a 2-year-old red and white kooikerhondje, and lupe, a stray black cat that Reagan feeds

&. BACKGROUND

tw: death, family illness

well, you don't know me, but i know you.

the hand first visited reagan borges at an early age. in the quiet of a warm september night, it seeped around the doorjam and coiled beneath her bedframe, permeating every inch of what should have been a safe space.

she had felt stirrings in her fingertips for months, ever since her eleventh birthday, but this was different. an unfamiliar disquiet settled across her shoulders, a cold restlessness that starkly contrasted the comforting warmth in her fingers. it felt sinister, and it had sunk its roots in her.

and i've got a message to give to you.

then, just weeks later, an accident. her half-brother, george, twelve years her senior and fresh out of flight school, had loaded them up in his brand-new piper cherokee 140. he was eager to show her the skills he'd learned — "maybe one day we can see the world" — just like her hero, amelia earhart, had.

so you better get ready. ready to go.

from there, the rest is a blur. one moment the siblings were cruising down the runway, broad smiles on their faces, and the next, they were canting downwards, weightlessness tickling at their stomachs. each one walked away with their lives that day, though neither returned to normal.

you can come as you are, but pay as you go.

reagan paid with her childhood. george had suffered a stroke, the spontaneous rupture of an artery causing him to have severe brain trauma, leaving his sister to face the daunting fragility of the human condition. he was unable to speak for months and, when he did, it was as the boy she knew had never existed.

this is the hand, the hand that takes.

the loss of her brother along with the sudden disappearance of the chill, unsettled the young girl. her mother, having grown up in a house filled with magic yet born non-magical, reassured her daughter that a spell hadn’t taken down her brother’s plane. it was a freak medical accident. that helped reagan sleep well enough, until…

hello? this is your mother. are you there? are you coming home?

her name rang out over the crappy grocery store intercom – “reagan, we have a call for you on line one.” could she bring home a pack of hotdog buns? fourth of july, the annual family cookout. her mother was exhausted planning for it all, graveyard shifts at the hospital draining the last of her energy. at least the house was quiet enough for the woman to rest; her son had gone to live with his father, her husband was down at the docks, and her teenage daughter was at work. so busy, that the latter didn’t notice the chill seeping into her bones.

smoking or non-smoking?

it didn’t matter when or where reagan became aware of her unease. time stops having a meaning when met with such finality. when her bike came careening to a halt in the driveway sending the buns clattering to the ground, ash and soot were all that greeted her. someone cried out, a piercing, haunted sound. and then she was on the ground.

the warm embrace of rough hands and the faint smell of the sea drew her back into her body, clearing her bleary eyes enough to find an explanation in matching brown irises.

neither snow nor rain nor gloom of night…

the fire rattled the close-knit community. fruit baskets were delivered daily to listless stares and halfhearted ‘thank you’s. most of the food went bad, spoiled due to the excess that poured in. the borges' were grateful, but lasagna held little interest when it symbolized the loss of a matriarch.

by the time the chill returned, reagan was ready. she pleaded for her father to remain home, to call in sick if he had to — they had to stay together, to stay safe. but what could he do? it was still early in the season and it wasn’t unusual for new england to have a chill in the air; it would be fine. the rain pelted the roof of their small apartment, the best he could afford on his meager income, and yet the tuna wouldn’t catch itself. his wife had left behind a sizable life insurance policy, but he insisted that reagan keep it for college; it was what her mother wanted.

... shall stay these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.

it took a week for his ship to wash in with the tide, scattered bits of hull and mast littering the beach. neighbors left wreaths at the fisherman’s memorial in the town square — a green-tinted bronze statue forged in honor of the souls lost at sea. where once reagan had ridden her bike around it, now she dodged the seafaring man and his wheel.

cause when love is gone, there's always justice.

at fifteen, reagan nearly became a ward of the state of massachusetts. her parents had forgotten to update their wills after george’s accident and he was deemed unfit to take full custody. without an apparent next-of-kin, reagan was slatedto be delivered to the foster system.

it was by an unusual stroke of luck that a woman with oversized tinted glasses, a cherrywood cane, and a star-speckled navy coat called an emergency courthouse hearing. that was the first time reagan met her grandmother.

the woman taught her about runes and sigils, protection spells, and bread. if a curse had taken hold, she would have to be crafty to evade it, thus the aleuromancer taught her recipes that incorporated mugwort, chamomile, and sage. lavender was reagan’s favorite herb, and she quickly became proficient at lavender-based muffins.

and when justice is gone, there's always force.

by the time she moved out for college, she was seasoned in kitchen witchcraft. her grandmother suggested culinary school, however, the pragmatist in her knew that any pipedream of opening a bakery would require business know-how. it was a difficult four years, made worse by the near-constant jeers of her male peers who prodded at her eclectic dating history and penchant for crude responses.

still, she graduated at the top of her class and learned to bare her teeth with the best of them. some professors argued she might have made a better lawyer than a businesswoman, but she had little desire to find herself back in a courtroom. so, she found a job at a startup in chicago and set to work.

so hold me, mom, in your long arms.

reagan never quite shook the desire to belong. all she had known was ripped away: her brother, her mother, her father, and the seaside town they once called home. her losses created a longing that could never quite be sated by the revolving door of partners she found herself with. she ended up in europe by accident, a surprise trip with a soon-to-be-ex partner gone awry after the extent of her aerophobia was revealed. regardless, it was an opportunity to experience the world, which she embraced with open arms. and that was how she landed in the arms of one scout proctor only a day before her ship was set to sail home.

scout was different, likeminded yet enough of a spitfire to match her energy and call her bluff. perhaps that should have been a sign that their conflicting beliefs of what life held for them would spell trouble, but they were already in too deep. reagan’s ship left without her, and so began the best four years of her life.

in your automatic arms. your electronic arms.

the loss of her relationship caught the brunette off guard and shattered her sense of stability. in impulsive defiance, she visited her ex’s hometown. cardinal hill reminded her of her childhood and, when she saw the bakery was up for sale, she leapt at the opportunity. one could say she baked away her feelings, however, reagan would argue that she established a customer base through overzealous muffin handouts —this time with lavender and lemon zest— and late-night recipe experimentation. now, she finds purpose in helping her customers and toying with new daily specials. those who areinterested can place custom orders for runes to be baked into their bread; if she can heed off her curse from touching the small town she's begrudgingly come to love, perhaps it wasn't all for nothing.

bold which habits your muse has

&. HEADCANNONS

under construction.

#cardinalintro

5 notes · View notes

raineadey · 2 years ago

Note

ooooooo you want to tell me abt uour oc sooo bad /nf

WAHJ TAHNK U THANK YOU OKAY SO. wow this is long. i divided this into three parts: backstory, main story ( crk episode 16 stuff ), and parfaedia ( what happens after the story, which actually has more in store but ill elaborate on that in another post )

BACKSTORY

once upon a time, blueberry pie cookie was looking through the wizards journals, until she came across the journal filled with the wizards trials and errors in creating moonlight cookie. it was her favorite book, the one that she read most often by the small moonlit corner.

having gone this far in her duties, blueberry pie thought a bit of company wouldnt hurt.

curiosity winning over herself, she uses the journal as a recipe book to bake her own cookie. thus, bo-berry cookie was born in the image of moonlight cookie (obviously nowhere as powerful though. shes just a cookie thats baked using the wizards recipe)

bo-berry cookie grew up between the high, never-ending bookshelves in the archives, reading anything that caught her interest to pass the time. she was like her mother in some ways — curious and hungry for knowledge.

but the library wasnt enough for her. she wanted to explore the city. though each time she asked her mother, "can i go play outside?" she would always say no.

"we have a promise to keep, a duty to uphold. there is nothing left for you in the city, bo-berry cookie."

(she also mentions those stars roaming the streets. shed turn to crumbs if any of them caught her)

ever since then, bo-berry practiced illusion magic behind her mothers back, attempting to make herself go undetected or even invisible. one day, her hard work and practice came to fruition, and she escaped the archives without her mother knowing — only to find that the city is completely empty of cookies.

she decided it was better than the archives, though. she explores the empty abandoned buildings, scavenging for any interesting magical artefacts to play with. its technically not stealing if the owner left it behind, right?

shes lonely. no one else to talk to or play with. her mother was right, this city has nothing for her. but perhaps somewhere out there..

MAIN STORY

she joins the main trio and saves them from the biggest golden star from the graveyard while invisible and undetected.

gingerbrave: that wasnt easy at ALL. huh, why do i feel like were being watched?

and as he said that, wizard cookies hat was floating in the air, followed by an air of laughter before revealing herself to her. she hasnt met anyone to interact with for a good while, so she got a liiittle excited.

her mood quickly turned sour when gingerbrave explains that theyre headed to the archives. but ahe agrees to show them the way. she told herself she wasnt going to go in, but once she sees the book worms attacking them, she groans ("i cant let you cookies pathetically crumble here on your mission 🙄") and helps them through to the library.

she knows whats coming. its inevitable that shes going to face her mom again. ( scene in this short video its like 14 secs )

once gingerbrave and co are done with what they came here for, she was about to leave with them when blueberry pie stopped her.

bbp: now, where do you think youre going? are you not staying here?

bb: mother, i cant stay here

bbp: are you leaving?

bb: [ a bit guilty ] i have to help my friends save the city

bbp: i see. [ just as bo-berry was about to leave again, ] bo-berry?

bb: [ stops ]

bbp: when i baked you, i should have known i couldn't keep you within these same walls ive been kept in my whole life. your curios soul knows no bounds, therefore i can not stop you from pursuing your life. [ quiet for a moment ] i love you, my child. i apologise for everything.

bo-berry merely gives her a smile and joins her friends outside.

another thing worth mentioning in this part is when stardust cookie destroyed the city of wizards. everyone was confused bc everything happened so fast, but upon mention of her mother still stuck in the archives, bo-berry immediately hopped on her staff and flew smartly between the falling stars to find her mother.

PARFAEDIA

after the events in the city of wizards episode, blueberry pie decided to let her daughter go. she cant keep her here for much longer, not when her place is out there in the world. so she sends her to parfaedia institute, where she can learn and grow as a magic enthusiast and a young cookie with other students her age.

she soon became friends with cream puff cookie and coffee bean cookie ( @deliberatingwthecookiecouncil's oc ! ). cream puff is an anxiety train, coffee bean is a sarcastic nerd, and bo-berry is a silly little menace. theyre perfect for each other.

such a strong desire for knowledge leads to bo-berry feeling like the structured education she receives in the institute is not enough. she craves for more magic in this world.

thus, she goes out of her dormitory at most nights to explore the magic city, knowing theres way more to this place. she uses her illusion magic to sneak in to houses, rummaging through their treasury for anything of use to her.

this soon becomes a thing she does at night, and more cookies seem to be aware of this mysterious thief. the m.e.h. department is also having trouble identifying the thief responsible for the disturbance. though, one cookie finally caught her in the act.

"hold on, you're not phantom bleu! but, no matter. i, detective walnut cookie, have caught you in the act, thief!"

14 notes · View notes

turnipmage · 7 years ago

Note

Are you telling me that the lyrics 'I want you stuffed into my mouth, hold you down and tear you open, live inside you' don't fit John's vore agenda?

ok youre absolutely right actually i guess this song just in general until like that third verse is very much a john thing

#'ive murdered half the town #left you lovenotes on their headstones #ill fill the graveyards until i have you'#that fits nicely into my self indulgent 'taken over by the hunger and fucking obsessed with merle' au john #patchworkcrows

10 notes · View notes

i-sveikata · 6 months ago

Text

new chapter lovelies!!! enjoy!!!

#ill fill the graveyards until i have you #okay im off to bed #will reread and catch all my no doubt existing typos when im no longer delirious lmao

43 notes · View notes

toms-cherry-trees · 3 years ago

Text

All We Have Is Each Other || Victoria Shelby

Summary: The youngest Shelby brings on the biggest scares

Word count: 2425

Warnings: Infant illness, some swearing, no proofreading

Author’s note: This was sort of inspired from last week’s experience of having to look after my niece with adenovirus (she also has kidneys issues so big panic but she’s doing well)

Taglist: @alandofmyth @nickwilding

Let me know if you wanna be in my taglist

(I know the gif is not Tommy fight me. I got it from Google, not sure who the artist is)

When you struggle every day to get by and money leaves your pockets faster than you can earn it back, a vital part of survival implies staying healthy. No money means no doctors, no hospitals and no medicines. A poor person knows that illness and poverty do not mix well together, and a little cough could turn into a one way ticket to the nearest graveyard. Amongst so many tragedies in their lives, at least all of the Shelbys had been blessed by fate with an iron strong health. All of them but one.

From the moment of her birth, Victoria had been a survivor. The old midwives who attended Rose Shelby on her last delivery deemed the baby too small and frail, struggling to draw in every breath, murmuring that she wouldn’t live to see the sunrise. Then they said she wouldn’t make it to Christmas. Then, she wouldn’t survive the winter. But every day Victoria proved them wrong, slowly, ever so slowly gaining weight and health, rosy replacing the paleness of her cheeks and little rolls filling her legs and arms. Even after Rose’s tragic demise, when they couldn’t figure out how to feed her, and definitely didn’t have the ways to afford a wet nurse, the little girl hadn’t given up and proved herself to be a true, strong Shelby.

That didn’t mean their worries were soothed, no. Even the slightest sign of discomfort sent the family spiralling into panic, fearing the old days of frail health would come back and fate would once and for all cruelly claim their sister’s life like those of so many other kids of her age. It had simply become part of the routine to listen closely to her breathing at night and count carefully every bottle she drank and every nappy she went through. Keeping Victoria alive and well had become the family’s main goal, and they believed themselves to be doing a great job at it. Slowly, Tommy stopped having mini heart attacks every time she breathed too fast, and Polly didn’t fret whenever she had just half a bottle of milk instead of a full one. The worst had passed and the upcoming summer promised warm days and healthy children. Or so they thought.

One early evening the entire family had gathered around the small kitchen table, eagerly wolfing down their meager dinner. Polly had her spoon in one hand and in the other Victoria, the child leaning against her chest; halfway through falling asleep. Not a noise could be heard besides the scratching of cutlery against plates, that was, until the littlest Shelby broke into a fit of coughing, which abruptly ended with the poor thing spilling the contents of her stomach down the front of Polly’s apron and breaking into hysteric crying. Pol rushed to stand and sat the baby on John’s lap as she tried to clean herself. John attempted to rock Vicky to calm her, but the second he touched her, he retreated his hand as if he had touched an open flame.

“What’s the matter?” Ada inquired, after nearly being hit in the face by her brother’s elbow.

Meanwhile John looked as if he had come across death herself “She- she’s fucking burning. How didn’t I notice before she’s like a damn furnace” His fingertips kept pressing against her forehead and cheeks, almost as if John was trying to believe he had made a mistake and it was just his hands being the wrong temperature, not his sister.

In a split second everyone had gathered around Victoria, Arthur pulling at his hair and Tommy scolding himself for not noticing sooner her ragged breaths and her glazed eyes. The old terrors came tumbling over them like an avalanche, paralyzing them with fear and not allowing them to think clearly. Polly was the only who remained level headed, having had children of her own and having cared for this girl since the moment she left the womb.

“John, grab Finn and put him to bed. I don’t know if it is contagious and we can’t afford them both getting sick. Ada, put water to boil in the big pot and the kettle. Arthur, you go knock on Mrs. Woodward door and tell her to come quickly, she owes me a big favour” She turned to face Tommy, who had gone pale as if he was about to be sick himself “You take her up and get her off those dirty clothes, I’m going to prep her a bath”

Everyone rushed to do as they were told, Ada nearly tripping over her own feet as she went to fill the pots, while John struggled to wrestle a very annoyed Finn up the stairs. Tommy’s hands trembled while he carried a still howlering Vicky to the small bathroom and dropped her stained clothes on the sink. Now that he paid more attention, he noticed only her cheeks were red, for the rest of her body had acquired a ghostly pale tone, allowing him to see the tiny blood vessels under the skin. The muscles in between and under her ribs sucked in dramatically with every laborious breath.

Reality had somehow turned into Tommy’s worst nightmare. Nursing that little girl to health had been an uphill battle, but right now it felt as if they had rolled right back at the bottom. Tom was painfully aware of the emptiness of his pockets, and knew that even if they gathered all the money they had, they wouldn’t even be able to afford a cough syrup. Keeping a child alive was a hard task, and the brothers had given everything they had to keep their young ones alive. But right now it seemed as if that hadn’t been enough. They hadn’t been enough.

Polly interrupted his disastrous train of thought by entering the bathroom, carrying a steaming pot and a ragged towel hanging from her arm, closely followed by Ada with the kettle. Both stopped in their tracks when they found Tommy sitting on the edge of the bathtub, cradling Victoria into his chest, silent tears sliding down his cheeks. He seemed to be mumbling something into her ear, inaudible to them. He didn’t move from his spot as Polly got the water to the right temperature; and barely even looked up as his baby sister was pried away from his embrace and placed into the tub.

Polly gave Ada a single look; the girl immediately got the hint, silently slipping out of the bathroom and giving the elders a little bit more privacy.

“She will be fine” Polly mumbled after a while, breaking the unbearable silence. It wasn’t clear if she said that to reassure Tommy, or herself “She has not survived everything she has gone through just to go down with a pathetic flu” Her motherly hands moved with expertise only acquired after having children, hurriedly washing and drying the baby before she could get cold “You all have gone through things like this and you were fine”

“You know I am not afraid of many things Pol” It was true. Tommy only feared a handful of things, but those fears were greater than the world itself. He feared the poverty his family could sink in anyday. He feared losing what little they had earned through sweat and blood. He feared their efforts not being enough and having their young ones taken away by the parish “But I think nothing terrifies me more than losing Vicky. If she dies” He had to force the word out of his mouth like it was venom in his tongue “I’m sure this whole family is dying with her”

“You talk as if we were already laying her down on the churchyard” She regretted those words the moment they were uttered, noticing her nephew visibly flinch, as if her statement had physically hurt him “Here” She handed him Victoria, tightly tucked in the thin towels “Dress her up while I warm up in the kids’ room”

“No. She is sleeping in my bedroom tonight” Polly was quick to open her mouth and protest, but Tommy gave her a rather pitiful look “Let me have this win. You know I could not sleep anyway. Not with her like this” He kept his head down, gaze focused on his sister as he held back tears again, shaky fingers fumbling with the sleeves and buttons of the nightgown.

While most of the initial fuss had subsided, Arthur still hadn’t come back with Mrs. Woodward, and they still had no idea what to do with Victoria. All they had at hand to soothe her were damp clothes to bring down the fever, and different herbs prepped into a sort of warm infusion that the baby refused to drink, now matter how hard they tried to trick her into opening her mouth. Seconds ticked down dreadfully, every minute dragging immensely as they tried to calm the crying child and put her down to sleep, hoping that some rest could cure whatever ailment afflicted her, and they were too poor to treat.

Midnight struck with no signs of improvement, while Arthur returned alone, with nothing but advice to try and give her rice water, and a half-dependable promise to drop by the next morning. Tommy had ushered everyone out of his room, even Polly, and laid Victoria down on his own bed, her ragged breaths and feeble cries piercing his heart with a thousand needles. Even though he could not be to blame for anything, in his eyes, he had failed his sister and therefore failed his mother’s memory.

He had simply resorted to sitting on a pillow on the floor, chin propped onto his thin mattress, his eyes never moving away from his sister’s chest, carefully counting each rise and fall of her breaths. How many minutes ticked by like that he didn’t know, but he had almost dozed off when his door creaked open, the faces of Arthur and John peeking in through the gap. He jerked up so quickly he almost knocked over the basin with the towels and the cup with rice water he had unsuccessfully tried to give to his sister.

“We just wanted to check how she was doing” John explained almost apologetically, after the sudden noises awoke Victoria and caused her to break into yet another fit of silent cries, since she had already screamed herself hoarse.

“Just the same” Tommy stifled a yawn into his arm as he replaced the now warm towels with new ones, mentally scolding himself for falling asleep. His neck felt stiff and his joints already ached from the uncomfortable position he had been sitting on. Arthur plopped onto the single chair in the room, while John sat near his brother, chewing nervously onto his bottom lip.

“Why don’t we call a doctor. We could sell some things” Arthur mulled over, very well aware that there wasn’t much left to sell. The only valuable thing they had were a few jewels belonging to their mother, and they had agreed as a family to sell them only when they were stuck between that and living under a bridge. John made sure to quickly cut that idea “It’s two in the fucking morning Arthur, where are you going to go and find yourself a doctor, eh?”

“There has to be someone in this bloody city. If you are not going to help then -”

“Shut the fuck up, both of you” Tommy could already feel a vein popping in his temple, but whether it was caused by sheer stress or his brothers’ bickering, he couldn’t tell. All he knew was that they were not helping anyone like that “We are going to stand watch and wait. If things get worse, I’m bringing a doctor down at gunpoint if I have to” Tommy usually tried to bite down his temper, since the last thing he needed was to be thrown in a jailhouse, but he wouldn’t hesitate to go to any lengths to help his family “We can figure it out the rest later” Tommy himself had been in full panic a few hours ago, but seeing his own family panicking pulled him together enough. Someone had to keep the head above the water, and he couldn’t exactly count on his brothers to do that.

Without any arguments to contradict, and at loss for a better plan, the three brothers sat down and watched. Waited and watched. At some point through the night Ada joined in, claiming she couldn’t sleep. Then Arthur brought in Finn, stating they couldn’t leave him alone. Shortly after John brought in every pillow in the house, complaining that the floor was too hard to sit on. Ada came a bit later with blankets, since the floorboards were cold. Every time someone dozed off, one of the babies started to cry for whatever reason. The black skies had faded into a stormy grey before anyone got anything remotely close to real rest.

The following morning, Polly did her usual early round on the children. Great was her surprise when she found every bed empty. Not even Finn in his cot. Her frantic steps rushed down the hallway, trying to enter Tommy’s bedroom, but finding the door jammed. Pushing a bit more, she came across one of the sweetest scenes in her life. All of the Shelbys were crammed together in Thomas’ tiny room, occupying every last inch of space available. The floor was a tangled mess of hairs, limbs and bedding, Ada had cocooned herself with most of the blankets, leaving Arthur and John to hug each other for warmth. Tommy had his head against his nightstand in a very awkward position, lanky limbs sprawled as uncomfortably as possible. On the bed were the youngest Shelbys, Finn sucking onto his thumb, his free arm crossed over his sister’s chest. Victoria’s eyes were wide open, still pale but much closer to normal, and she looked quite pleased to see her aunt, making grabby hands at her. Polly did her best to tiptoe around the minefield of Shelbys and grab her youngest niece to give her a much deserved breakfast. She didn’t even bother to try and wake the others, they all looked like they could do with some more sleep. Polly smiled to herself as she went down the stairs, reliving the image again in her mind.

The Shelby family may not have much, but they had each other. As long as they had that, they would be fine no matter what.

#my post #my writing #victoria shelby #shelby sister oc #shelby sister #shelby reader #tommy shelby #arthur shelby #john shelby #finn shelby #polly shelby #thomas shelby #peaky blinders #peaky blinders fanfic #peaky blinders imagine #peaky blinders x sister #peaky blinders one shot #peaky blinders x sister oc

837 notes · View notes

theotheroccassionalfanficwriter · 3 years ago

Note

CAN I JUST SAY THAT YOUR WRITING IS AMAZING????? Its so detailed with a great flow and filled with so much emotion I LOVE ITTTT!! You got me lying in bed tossing and turning with “in pursuit of knowledge” 🥰🥰 that’s my favourite one I really hope you continue it!

Can I request one of the upcoming chapter to explore more on how Zhongli and reader first meet and what are the other things they did that made him fall for them more and more each day? Zhongli doesn’t seem to be the kind that falls in love at first sight so I’m interested to see how the reader seems to have slowly crawled her way into his stone heart UGHHH ❤️❤️😩😩 It can be filled with fluff or with smut, up to you! Thank you so much ❤️

Thank you! You can keep on tossing and turning then with this! I also head canon that when it comes to love, Zhongli wouldn't fall in love at first sight but instead he'd be like a snail. The entire time I'm writing this I thought long and hard on how to proceed because I couldn't decide on a satisfactory way Zhongli would meet reader. I already knew that it would be a speed run of Enemies to Friends, and slow burn Friends to Lovers. So I wanted their first meeting to be seemingly unremarkable to Zhongli.

In Pursuit of Duty

Summary: The simplest of things can lead to the greatest moments of our life. Meeting you was Zhongli's greatest fortune.

There were a few mortals in Zhongli’s life, both as an Archon and on the few occasions he mingled with humans, that were able to capture his attention or even his praise. And in all of his life, mortal and divine, no one was able to capture his enmity in the way you did.

“Would it really matter what Rex Lapis thinks if we entered and fucked around the domain in Guyun stone forest?”

Zhongli blinked, aghast at your tone as Childe covered his mouth to stifle his laughter.

“What?” You asked the two of them as if you had not merely suggested tampering with the seals of Guyun Stone Forest.

“The entire place is home to the fallen gods” Zhongli reminded you “a graveyard for those who died in the Archon War”

“It’s been decades, they should be already on the reincarnation wheel at this point” You waved his worries off, sending Childe to another fit of laughter while Zhongli felt indignant “‘sides Rex Lapis is busy doing fuck knows what he probably wouldn’t even notice if one of the seals got messed with unless one of the dead Gods decide to fuck shit up”

Zhongli, who was very much Rex Lapis in disguise, very much noticed it and though he was the one who orchestrated this whole scenario, felt no less than pleased with the attitude you were having.

“The dead still deserve to be respected!” Zhongli insisted as he blocked your hand from reaching towards one of the seals.

“You stick in the mud! You make it sound like I’m defiling their graves or something!” You whined “Besides the Heavens must be willing if they had a stray seal plaster itself on my face!”

“It was a ruined seal. The divine powers had long since dwindled from it. Thus, the Heavens had no hand on it” Zhongli stubbornly insisted as he moved to block your path.

On the side, Childe was still laughing loudly.

“That’s it! Fight me you bastard!” You shouted as you took a few steps back and summoned the elements to form your weapon, a spear.

And really, it was almost funny in hindsight, how you would choose his weapon of all things. The one weapon he was best at among others but right now, in this moment, Zhongli had felt more than annoyed.

“Very well” His spear, dragon’s bane, at his side “I accept your challenge.”

There were a few opponents in his life that gave Zhongli a thrill of the battle. Ever fewer were able to make the gears in his head turn as quickly as it did when facing you, each strike of your spear was clearly aiming for his life, and yet the look in your eyes didn’t carry a single thought of murder.

It was frustrating. It was Confusing. It was, most of all, fascinating.

Fighting you brought him back to the days before the Archon Wars, where the Gods of Liyue were at a semblance of peace. It made him remember the joy of fighting someone your equal, it made his blood rush in a way that it had almost forgotten. And Zhongli was starting to see that beyond your heretical ways, behind your annoying mask of affability, was someone who can walk in the path of the divine.

‘No, you would walk in it for the sake of your knowledge’ Zhongli thought as he blocked your attack and moved his feet to kick you in your stomach.

“This ends here” Zhongli declared as he summoned a steele behind your back.

The sound of your back hitting it rang loudly in the air but the look on your face was something he would never forget in a long while.

You spat out blood, shakily standing up from your position, “You win this round! But I swear on Rex Lapis’ six pack abs I’ll find a way to replicate that fucking seal!”

And then you were gone in a spark of electro.

The peaceful sound of waves remained in the air that somehow hung heavy. Childe had stopped laughing and was looking confused as he mused, “That’s the first time in a long while I’ve seen them look like that.”

Zhongli paid no attention to his words and instead picked up the abandoned seal and returned it to its proper position.

“Interesting” Childe muttered, softly and slightly ominous to Zhongli’s ears.

What he found interesting was something Zhongli wisely decided to not entertain. He really hoped that today would be the last time he’d ever have to be in the presence of Childe’s...friend.

For his part, Childe had no regrets in introducing Zhongli to you, or rather having Zhongli experience the misfortune of knowing you. From the moment Childe had met you again, he knew that his life would be thrown out of whatever carefully calculated plan Pulcinella had made. And it was one he was happy with, if the rumors in Snezhnaya had him part of the chaos then you were chaos incarnate.

It was precisely the reason why Childe had brought Zhongli with him when meeting you in the Guyun Stone Forest.

“A friend of mine, an expert in the ways of the divine and assorted knowledge, would lend us their skills in challenging the...impossible, shall we say” Childe said on the way “Most of their thoughts are heretical, almost, but well no one has ever said it wasn’t effective in reaching the desired result.”

“Ah, a researcher from Sumeru then?” Zhongli had asked, the light in eyes glinting in interest.

“Of sorts” Childe answered because as much as you stayed in Sumeru, most of your knowledge had come from your own experiments and cases from clients seeking answers the divine could not give.

This was why you were almost heretical.

“I must warn you that for them the sacred can be profaned and the profane can be sacred” Childe added as they reached the shores of Guyun Stone Forest, and found you basking under the gentle rays of sunlight in front of the Domain.

Zhongli stared at you, the sight of you head looking up with your eyes closed as it felt the warmth of the sunlight. Geo crystalflies surrounding you as a light breeze had the ends of your hair fluttering in the wind.

“Who is that?” Zhongli asked.

“My friend, the infamous Xiézhihuā Mìngfù of Liyue” Childe answered.

In that exact moment, you slowly opened your eyes, lashes fluttering softly as you blinked. The wind blew and a rain of leaves fell on you, gentle and calm as you stared at them.

Like an ill-fated omen, Zhongli began to notice you on the streets of Liyue Harbor. Rumors and words of your deeds would reach his ears, on occasion some of your cases would be told in the tea houses.

“Miracle” a few bystanders would say.

“Heretical” the few devout traditionalists would mutter in hushed tones.

But all agreed that you were a genius. An innovator that brought changes like a storm. You gathered envy and admiration in your wake, foreign nobles and dignitaries seeking you out for consultations or to ask for your help. And yet, for all of your infamy and prestige, Zhongli often found you amidst the crowd of orphans or Liyue’s slum dwellers.

Sometimes, Childe was with you, other times it was Director Hu and her friends, the second young master of the Feiyun Guild and the exorcist. In one memorable moment, Yanfei. But more often than not you were by yourself, answering questions from children with a pleasant smile and mischievous glint in your eyes.

It was such a huge contrast from the one he first met that it made Zhongli pause and observe you from afar. Enough times that those around him would say, “No need for alarm, Mr. Zhongli. Xiézhihuā Mìngfù is honorable.”

It was those words that made him ponder. For all of your borderline heretical actions, miracle works that trespass on the Divine, the entirety of Liyue agreed that you were honorable.

It wasn’t until Childe had asked for his help did he cross paths with you again. Weeks of avoiding you to maintain peace were all for naught when he found himself in your presence once more. A jar of osmanthus wine on your hand and an ingratiating smile on your face, you offered it to him and said, “Osmanthus wine, I’ll give this to you so don’t be a stick in the mud!”

In his youth, he would have immediately brawled with you. But now, Zhongli settled for drinking a cup of tea with contempt as much as the act could convey. Your laughter, melodious, rang in the private room of Liuli Pavillion.

“Aiyo! What a tough crowd!” You said as you sat opposite him and placed the bottle in the center of the table, “Then shall we begin anew? My birth name is a secret, my courtesy name is a secret, my title is Xiézhihuā Mìngfù! Xié for Heretic, zhi for knowledge, and huā for flower!”

“What kind of introduction is that?” Childe teased as he began his battle with chopsticks.

“An unforgettable one!” You replied, sending a wink to Zhongli who merely pursed his lips.

“I am Zhongli, a consultant for the Wangsheng Funeral Parlor.”

You smiled and decided to leave the matter at that, somethings could not be forced. So you retreated and decided to just straightforwardly tell him your intentions.

“I’ve heard that Mr. Zhongli is knowledgeable in Liyue’s history.”

Zhongli could sense your sincerity, it placated him a bit, made the dismal first meeting a little bit better. So he tries because he is magnanimous and there was no reason to burn a bridge, “I am merely remembering what others have forgotten.”

He looked at you in the eyes, drawn to the way your eyes burn bright with curiosity. It reminded him of Guizhong so he shakes the thought away because the dead and the living must not be compared. But as the conversation grows long, the topics eventually shift from the job to everything else, Zhongli can’t help but notice your innate desire to help those who are unfortunate.

Somehow it made him understand why you were seen as honorable. It wasn’t until all of you were facing unknown danger did he realize what it truly meant when used on you.

The case you were asking was slightly connected with Childe’s job for you. The case was about the sudden deaths of several brides that were kidnapped and found dead at an abandoned temple. No one had reported it to the Qixing until one of the victims involved was a distant relative of a Qixing who was to be wedded to one of the Szehnayan Merchants.

Childe had taken the chance to offer aide, calling for your help as one of the known detectives of Fontaine. It had surprised Zhongli, and made him respect you but all of it was quickly thrown away when you had given him a cheeky wink and said, “I can even tell how big a man’s dick is.”

“Shameless” He had admonished and yet he was unaware of the small smile he wore on his face.

The investigation led the three of you to a small village in the mountain, with a local shrine that was dedicated to an old god that even Zhongli had never heard of. The three of you had pored over legends passed down by mouth, discussing and comparing with the records found in Liyue’s public library and scholars. Childe, through his seemingly endless funds, had paid for information on every victim so far that wasn’t in the packet given by the millelith. Zhongli, with his seemingly endless connections, had talked to everyone and anyone that had studied Liyue’s countless lores and legends. And you had talked with the family of the victims, investigating the crime scene and connecting everything that could lead to an answer.

That was how Zhongli found you, messed up clothes and tired eyes poring over documents in the middle of discarded papers that laid on the dark wood floor of your secluded residence in Minlin.

“Have you not slept?” Zhongli asked, frowning as he made his way towards you.

“Not yet” You answered as you got up and discarded the paper you were reading to go to your wide cork board that held all the relevant information you had, “I’m close to figuring out what sort of deity or demon we’re going to fight.”

“What about the reason?”

“Solved it ages ago” You answered carelessly, pointing at the left corner of the board.

Zhongli went over and flitted through the papers on that side until he found what he was looking for.

“A vengeful bride?”

“Mn” You replied as you removed a pin and replaced the paper with an old newspaper clipping “There was a record of a previous incident however the Ghost of that time was listed as defeated. The stories all claim that the ghost was of savage rank, and disappeared after letting go of their obsession.”

“Then it returned?” Zhongli turned to you, alarmed and visibly frowning.

“No.”

You sighed and rubbed your aching forehead, “This was a man made disaster that went out of hand, I’m sure that whoever started this is probably dead. Chances are the first death awakened a sealed something” You looked at him, eyes serious “I’m figuring out just how old this thing is and what exactly are we going to face.”

“...The older it is…”

“The harder it would be to defeat it. Liyue’s lands are drenched in blood. Old grudges mixed with new ones from the Archon Wars. With cultivation clans dying out and having a single yaksha around, the karmic cycle of Liyue is already out of balance” You revealed and Zhongli was amazed with your discovery.

“Is there anything Rex Lapis could do?”

“...Fixing the karmic cycle? None. Solving this? His dragon qi would only end up being corrupted or he’d be punished by the Heavenly Dao. Time has changed a lot of things, but the rule that the Gods may not interfere with the mortal realm remains true.”

Both of you remained silent, You stared blankly at your board while Zhongli watched you. The heavy air from your words made your heart heavy, and Zhongli could see it. The fear that lingered in your eyes, the firm determination to save lives.

It left a ripple in the calm waters of his heart. A small unnoticeable ripple.

“Is it worth it?” Zhongli asked “Is it worth betting on your life to save the common people?”

You smiled at him, almost pitying, “To an adeptus like you, the amount of times mortals would bet on their lives to save others must be few, but Zhongli...I am the sort to always think that the common people are worthy.”

At that moment, Guizhong’s words echoed in his mind.

“Let me help you.”

A red sedan trudges up the mountain path, intending to pass through the temple. Behind the bridal sedan was a short entourage carrying three chests of dowry. In front of the sedan, were two people beating drums to celebrate the auspicious day.

Zhongli, Baizhu, and the Fatui disguised as locals were on alert as it watched the ominous trees of the mountain road. You sat inside the sedan, meditating in lotus position. Chongyun and Xingqiu were waiting in the temple where the zombified bodies of the previous brides were found. You had advised Ajax to not participate in the inevitable battle. Ensuring the possibility that his abyssal powers would react badly with ancient powers. With all of the preparations, you hoped that the odds would be in your favor.

You sighed softly, eyes opening as you felt the air change. You readied your weapon as soon as you heard the sounds of fighting.

The door opens and you throw out a talisman. In a quick move you stepped out, geo shield forming around you as you began plucking the strings of the Guqin. You looked at your enemy and found your heart easing up.

What stood before you was neither an ancient deity or demon, but rather a ghost on the verge of breaking through the Malice Rank.

“Don’t fear! We can subdue this one!” You informed your party, as you played the Sound of Vanquish.

Vines subdued the ghost, wearing the red robes of a groom. The Fatui began surrounding the ghost. Nine stone pillars acted as the foundation of the seal, pulsing with geo energy.

You felt rather than saw Chongyun come close, allowing you to draw upon his yang energy to balance out the pure yin energy of the ghost. Xingqiu stood on standby ready to recite the incantation for parting in case the seal fails.

The final notes of the song lingered in the air as Zhongli walked towards you, eyes never leaving the ghost, “I thought it was a bride.”

“A minor mistake” You replied as you played Inquiry.

‘Who are you’

The ghost didn’t answer.

‘Who are you’ you repeated the question.

‘Kill me’ it answered.

Your hands stilled in the air. You sighed and looked up from the strings and found yourself staring straight at the eyes of the ghost. Stunned at the mixture of emotions in its eyes.

“...There is no need to surrender to despair, your soul can still be saved.”

The ghost gave a mocking smile, “So what? My Chang’er is gone. We can never meet again in this life or the next.”

Zhongli’s eyes widened at the implication, just as Chongyun let out a small gasp. You felt your heart turn heavy even so you soldiered on, there was a need to find out the cause of this tragedy.

“Then tell me, why did you kill those women?”

“They deserved it!” The ghost screamed in anger, “They killed her! They killed her like she was nothing! Chang’er was innocent! They knew she was innocent and still-”

“You could have reported to the Millelith!” Chongyun said.

Cold mocking laughter rang loudly in the air, in it you could hear the bitterness of defeat and anger.

“Would it have done anything when the person behind this is an official? You’re too naive, boy!”

You closed your eyes, took a deep breath and decided to shield Chongyun from one of the dark sides of Liyue.

“Are you really forsaking salvation?”

“Yes.”

Zhongli watched as you walked towards the ghost and asked its name. He watched as the ghost whispered its name and you nodded before raising your hands, your index and middle finger pointing towards the sky, while the rest were closed.

Light gathered on your finger tips, the air charged with spiritual energy that was not of Celestial origin. It was an ancient divine power that Zhongli used to feel before he ascended to the peak of cultivation as a dragon.

With one downward stroke, the light slashed through the ghost. The light was so blinding that Zhongli had to shield his eyes as he watched the ghost turn into dust, its soul scattering to the wind. Your back stood straight, your hair gently fluttering.

Even though you were expressionless, Zhongli felt the heaviness of your heart. Despite that your eyes remained strong, unyielding as righteousness burned in your eyes. He watched as you strode in Ningguang’s jade chamber, as you reported your findings.

He accompanied you in going back to the village where it all began as you read the Liyue Qixing’s edict. He watched as you went beyond what Childe asked and went to the unmarked grave of Chang’er, offering incense on the blood stained stones of the temple.

He went with you as you sat on the highest mountain peak in Bishui, looking at the horizon with a blank look in your eyes. He didn’t speak and instead poured you a cup of osmanthus wine and silently waited.

“...Sometimes, I wonder if I can remain in the path of righteousness” You spoke, “I can never understand the hearts of humans, how could they easily ruin someone’s reputation, ruin someone’s life because of greed? I can’t understand why there was a need to go as far as scattering the soul?”

You cried without any tears, and Zhongli remained silent, unable to answer something he had always witnessed in his long life.

“Have you changed your answer?” He asked as he stared at his cup of wine.

“No” You replied and Zhongli could hear the self-mockery in your tone, “Even if one day I find myself in unbearable pain, I’ll never stop believing that the common people are worthy of saving.”

You looked at Zhongli, solemn in your bearing as the sun disappeared in the sky “Zhongli, no one has the right to decide on the outcome of human lives. Be it human or adepti.”

Zhongli thought back to the case, the sad story of two lovers who parted eternally because of jealousy and greed. The greediness of an official’s son for a woman who had no affection for him, the jealousy of the ladies over the popular young scholar. The selfish righteousness of the village folk that stoned an innocent woman to death over ruined reputation.

Zhongli thought of his contract. He wondered for a moment what you would say to him if knew that he dared to bet on the safety of Liyue and its people.

He closed his eyes and drank the wine that still tasted as he remembered.

“I pray that your heart remains in paradise.”

You toasted him and smiled softly. Zhongli vowed to never forget how beautiful you looked in that moment, with the slight smile gracing your lips as you drank the osmanthus wine.

The moon was beautiful that night.

Zhongli watched from afar as Osial rose. His thoughts echoing to the oath you swore that day in Guyun. A part of his heart felt sad and yet in awe of what you had accomplished.

He watched as the Millelith, Adepti and Fatui worked together to evacuate the civilians. He watched as humans and adepti fought together to bring down Osial once more. He felt proud and relieved at the result, glad at the knowledge that Liyue had no need of him anymore and yet a part of him felt trepidation.

The knowledge that the Age of Archons was drawing to a close. He thought of you, a beloved child of the Heavens, who could boldly declare that the Gods can be wrong. He thought of the words you spoke that night.

He thought of the days he spent with you, the rare times he went along with your tricks and harmless schemes. The easy way the two of you became friends. You were the first person he had easily became friends with, he mused at how quickly his dislike of you melted into fondness.

The way his heart had pinched when you said he wasn’t fun. The elation from being one of the few people you found interesting. He thought all of this as he handed his gnosis, as he kept his reason a secret. He thought of this as he looked around Liyue that had no need of him anymore, he thought of you as his feet automatically walked to where you were.

He stood away from you, watching as you cared for the wounded and then silently left. He spent the aftermath ruminating on his decision, on his actions while silently watching your actions with Childe during the last week of his stay in Liyue.

He waited for you to come to him, and ask him the question he could not answer. He steeled his heart and yet when you came to him, you didn’t ask and instead began talking about your recent adventures, asking him of his days and Zhongli didn’t know what to feel.

He knew that you knew nothing then. That you remained unaware of the truth but he let himself believe that you didn’t mind. So he spent his days with you, silently caring for you, protecting you in his own way.

He let himself bask in your vibrant presence, allowed himself to savor the feeling of watching you walk the path of righteousness. He unknowingly and willingly let you walk inside his heart, step by step, with each moment you spent helping others.

The days spent by your side, knowing the parts of yourself that no one else knew was the closest he felt in being mortal. It was so easy to forget that you remained ignorant when he spent his time worrying about your ability to be where chaos was, when his heart was easily influenced by you.

But now, in the privacy of the Dwelling in the Clouds, Zhongli watched as you grew disappointed. Your soft laughter filled with heartbreak and weariness broke his heart for reasons he couldn’t understand.

He regretted not telling you the truth when he had the chance.

He hated how he had no right to wipe away your tears even though he had spent countless nights and days warming your bed.

“Zhongli, I hate how I can understand why you did it” Your voice was so soft “Really, as an Archon you are undeniably good, you are peerless in that regard.”

He closed his eyes and readied himself for your next words.

“But I can’t call you a good person. Human lives aren’t something you should bet on so easily, no matter how careful you are” Your disappointment, your grief, and your weariness were all visible in your tone and body language.

He remained where he stood, watching as you descended. Each step breaking his heart as he slowly understood what you meant to him. He cried silently as you disappeared below the clouds and slowly sank on the ground.

For the first time in his life, Zhongli didn’t know what to do. There was no one he could turn to. He dreaded going back to a cold empty house devoid of you. He feared going back to the days that were dull, to a time where you did not exist in his life.

Where the sound of your voice was not commonplace, or the comforting scent of your magic that lingered in the space you occupied.

Zhongli laughed, loud and unrestrained, mocking himself for his stupidity. He hated how he didn’t realize it sooner, if he did then perhaps things would not turn out this way. He cried with all of his broken heart as he remembered the loneliness in your eyes.

He drank his sorrows away and as daylight broke through the clouds, he stumbled his way home. To the place that was devoid of you who he loved.

He fell on his bed that still smelled like you and silently cried himself to sleep.

He was already missing you dearly.

You stared at Zhongli, eyes distant as he stood in front of your door. A distant part of you wondered if things could be fixed, if the two of you could move forward from this pain.

But the rest of you were waiting for further disappointment, you knew the bone-deep pride of Gods. You understood that there was a bigger chance that Zhongli would cease contact with you, no one can easily put down years of habit and thought as a god so easily.

And yet as Zhongli stood beneath you, looking up to you. You couldn’t help but hope.

“...I can’t apologize for what I did” Zhongli began, “I don’t regret doing it the way I planned but I regret that I didn’t think of another way to test my people.”

You remained silent.

“I asked you once if the common people are worthy, the truth is I don’t know whether I find them worthy or not...but with you…” Zhongli trailed off, he felt that his next words were heavy.

He was afraid of laying his heart bare to you. The deepest parts of him that he didn’t fully understand, “I know that your life alone is worthy. I am a being born from rock, gaining humanity through cultivation. My heart is made of stone, softened by the dust. I don’t know if I would ever understand what being human means and everything it entails…”

You stared at him, unmoving, silently and patiently hearing him out.

“But I know that the only way I can keep on being with you is by changing this stone heart. So please, let me walk by your side, protecting you and your belief.”

Zhongli bent his waist, solemnly asking for your forgiveness and acceptance. He heard your footsteps coming closer and swore to himself to accept whatever the outcome would be.

“Stand straight.”

He stood and then he found himself in your embrace, your familiar scent filled his nose and Zhongli gently and firmly hugged you back. He held you fearing that all of it was an illusion.

“Let me learn how to be good while staying by your side” He whispered.

“I was afraid” You replied “of how easily you can decide on the outcome of your people’s life and death.”

You hugged him tighter, “I know that you still have secrets that you can’t tell. That even as you live as a mortal, the consequences of your actions as an Archon is something you would live with for the rest of your life. So I won’t judge you for that but Zhongli, I can’t be with someone who can easily bet on other’s life.”

“I understand.”

He thought of your words in Qingyun Peak, your confession that night in Minlin. He thought of the day he met you. He thought of the words he said in that temple ruin.

Zhongli understood what it meant to walk by your side, to take the same path as you did. He knew that from this moment onwards he would never be able to untangle himself from you.There was no room for anything else in his heart that was filled with you. It would always remain with you even if one day his entire being ends up in the abyss.

‘As long as your heart remains in paradise, I don’t mind letting myself fall into the abyss.

#zhongli x reader #genshin impact x reader #genshin impact zhongli x reader

165 notes · View notes