#in order the think they do and not get punished for: kissing on the tarmac (icemav) fucking in the showers (hollywolf) preparing breakfast-

[pollyna]

Tw: contain slurs, it's a single word but it's there.

It's a rule not to talk to them. Nobody really knows who imposed that or why, but it's something everybody follows, religiously.

(The fact is they know pretty well why not to talk to any of them. Ask the sailor who ended up with two broken ribs or the pilot with the black eye and dislocated shoulder.)

The bigger group they see together is of four or five when the Admirality is feeling generous and the woman comes around. But it's not just the four of them, because an equally numbered group is in another carrier or country doing what that group is doing.

What precisely they are doing, all of them, is the real mystery.

(Every squadron that has them, as a couple or all four, spends weeks praying to not be in the same situation ever again. The situation is: jumping at three a.m. in your jet in your pyjamas, six am and running around the carrier, nine am and debriefing, and then hop on the jet again and again and again. There were no limits on how high or low they had to fly, and unmarked jets passing less than an inch from each other's wings. Everybody on the normal communication channel, if not them.)

The sailors don't know if they have names, and before the beginning of the mission, they all have to leave their dog tags with the captain. Nameless people, on nameless jets and in nameless, patchless, jumpsuits flying only God knows where.

(They know their callsigns, or at least a part of them. The four are Iceman, Maverick, Slider and Mother Goose. The other two couples are Wolfman, Hollywood, Sundown and Chipper.)

The woman's name is Carole and she kisses the two taller men when she comes around. A kiss on their lips and one on their cheeks.

(The real reason nobody's able to talk to them is because a sailor, some Matthews from Philly, once tried to insinuate that Carole was easy. You already share her, so one more won't hurt, wouldn't he? The same day, another one tried to call Ice faggot in front of an entire room of people and captains. What happened next is just speculations but, realistically speaking, a broken arm and a couple of bruises were probably what they got home with. Other than the longest disciplinary note in the history of notes.)

(Some tales say that the Iceman didn't have to open his mouth to kill the man; one look was enough. Others want that Matthews from Philly got slap in the face so hard he saw white for ten minutes.)

When they're on board, the entire crew reorganises itself. Iceman and Maverick have their own cabin, Slider and Goose have another one, and they get the bigger one if Carole is going to come around. The entire floor is to be clear and free two hours before they arrive, and the newbie refers to that deck as the Olympus.)

If all the stories are true, they must have felt like Gods. And sometimes Gods have privilges normal people can't dream about. Like kissing each other before going on the jet, having sex in the showers without being reported, or preparing breakfast for your pilot without sharing a little bit with anybody. Having visible tattoos, particularly colourful ones, under the jumpsuits.)

The only time they saw them all together was on land, in a bar in Miramar, where three carriers were sharing port for a week. All of them were sitting around a table, eating fries and burgers like normal people, so normal that, if you didn't know who they were, you couldn't even say what they did. What really leaves the entire bar without words is when Mother Goose sits in front of the piano and starts playing Great Balls of Fire!

It almost feels like any other night in San Diego. But almost is the key word.

[franniebanana]

13 and 39 for the angst prompts

This took me longer than I thought, but it’s done. I combined both prompts into one short fic.

I’ll link it here, or you can read the whole thing below under the cut.

This includes a bad ending as well, because I couldn’t decide what to do.

               "Where are we going?" Noctis said, exasperated. He had been following Prompto for far too long with the promise of "something cool" at the end of the walk. He wiped the sweat from his brow on his forearm and replaced his cap. Prompto had been entertaining him with answers to his repeated questions, but now he stayed silent, not even turning back to flash him that mischievous grin that he had so often worn. The sky darkened as they walked and Noctis purposely hung back. He was a little wary of the alleyways and backstreets of Insomnia, especially at night, whereas they were all too familiar to Prompto, who had grown up in the inner city.

               Prompto hopped a fence and Noctis followed, jumping down, breathless. He clung to the chain link fence, steadying himself and letting his stinging calves recover. "Prompto, seriously, where are you taking me? It's getting late, and you know how my dad is."

               "Almost there," Prompto said at length.

               Noctis exhaled heavily, putting his hands on his hips, before starting after him again. He caught up with him after going around a corner, and looked around. "This is a...dead end. What are we doing here?" He turned around and found that Prompto had stepped behind him, closing the only exit. He slipped his backpack off and rummaged through it for a few seconds, pulling something out and dropping the bag at his feet. Noctis suddenly found himself face to face with the barrel of a handgun. "I don't understand," he said, blinking. "What's going on? I thought we were going to an arcade or something." He put a hand on his hip. "Is this a joke? I don't have time to play games, man."

               "No," Prompto said. "This was always the plan," he said stiffly, his finger on the trigger of the silver pistol. His knuckles were white and Noctis thought he detected a slight tremor in his hands. His head was spinning, he couldn't understand what Prompto was saying.

               "Are you serious?" Noctis said, his tone a mixture of disbelief and exasperation. "Put that thing away��you don't know how to use one of those."

               Prompto scowled and fired a round past Noctis's head. "Hands up, Prince." Noctis did as he was told, suddenly confused and scared out of his mind. Was Prompto really going to shoot him? What did he want? "This was always the plan," he said again, taking a step towards him.

               "Plan? What plan?! What are you talking about?" Noctis said. His own hands trembled now as he held them up in front of him. He had known Prompto for five years; they knew everything about each other: their hopes, dreams, and fears. Although, it seemed that Prompto had managed to keep some things hidden from him. "Are you really going to shoot me?" He was incredulous, he was confused—was this some kind of joke?

               Prompto furrowed his brow, squeezing his fingers around the gun more tightly. "That was the plan," he repeated through gritted teeth.

               "Ugh, stop saying that!" Noctis yelled. "I thought we were best friends! What the fuck is going on?!" His breathing was labored and irregular, and Prompto just stood there, his eyes hard and unfeeling, seemingly unmoved by his pleas. "Tell me what's going on! If you're going to kill me, you should at least give me an explanation!"

               Prompto flinched slightly, but didn't lower his gun. "You should know what this is about. I'm from Niflheim and you're the Lucian prince. I was sent here with instructions and I intend to carry them out."

               "Wait, what about the last five years? Hell, what about the last five days—that kiss—that was real to me. Wasn't it real to you?" He searched his eyes for sympathy—empathy—but found nothing.

               "Kneel and put your hands on the back of your head," Prompto ordered.

               Noctis obeyed, biting back a cry. Was this it? Some sort of execution? For what? Being a prince? For being born into a royal family? "Look," he said, as Prompto walked behind him, pulling his cap down over his eyes like a blindfold, "it doesn't have to be this way. I can grant you pardon in Lucis—immunity—so you can't be arrested or charged. We can be together and forget this ever happened!"

               There was a moment's hesitation, and then he felt the barrel of the gun touch the back of his head, right below his tightly-clasped hands. He cried out, "Please, Prompto! Don't do this! I'm in love with you! Don't you know that?"

               "No, you're not," Prompto said, his voice trembling. "No one could ever love me—not my parents, not my grandparents, not even you. You can't love a monster. And that's what I am. That's what I was created to be."

               "That's not true." Noctis tightened his grip around his own hands, acutely aware of how the barrel of the pistol was no longer pressing against his head. "No one gets to decide what you become, except you. Nothing is predetermined—there's no such thing as destiny. You know that this isn't right...that you're only doing it because someone told you to. They're the ones who are trying to make you into a monster, and now's your chance to show them who you really are."

               "Dammit!" Prompto cried, letting his arms fall to his side. "This was my only mission and I can't even do it! Why did you have to be this way—why couldn't you be the daemon that they always said you were?" Noctis turned around slowly, but kept his hands where there were; the last thing he wanted to do was make Prompto any jumpier.

               "They wanted you to hate me, so it would be easier to kill me," he said. "But they didn't count on the type of person you are either." He shook his head slowly. "You're not a killer, Prompto."

               "I can't go back," Prompto said miserably, and in one swift moment, he had the gun at his own temple. Noctis's eyes widened—he had no time to react, but he had to try—he had to move faster than the time it took Prompto to compress the trigger. It was very close range, but he had no choice. In an instant, he had activated his warp strike, harnessing the power of the crystal once again, to propel himself into Prompto. The impact was painful for both of them, but Noctis managed to get his arms around him to soften the blow as they rolled over the hard tarmac. The pistols skidded to a halt several feet away.

As soon as they untangled their limbs, they both scrambled for the gun. Noctis reached it first and held it out in front of him, ready to defend himself. He had the upper hand, though he didn't intend to use it, nor did he think he would have to. Prompto was defenseless now. "Why don't you just kill me?" he said, dropping to his knees.

               "Why would I do that?" Noctis said.

               "It's better than the alternative." Prompto hugged his knees to his chest and put his head down. "I can't stay here, not after this, and I can't go back home. I was supposed to kill you or die trying. They'll never take me back."

               Noctis let his arm fall at his side, the gun disappearing into his hidden armiger. He slowly, tiredly, stepped over to his hunched friend—friend...he wasn't sure he could even call him that anymore—and knelt down beside him. He placed his hand on his shoulder, and Prompto's muscles tightened, but he didn't move. Noctis let his hand slide over his shoulder, resting it in the middle of his back, where his other hand moved to meet it. "I forgive you," he whispered, pressing his lips to his neck.

 Bad Ending

                 "I forgive you," he whispered, pressing his lips to his neck. "But...you know what I have to do now." He pulled away, brushing his nose against Prompto's cheek. Prompto stared at him, eyes wide and questioning. "I've already alerted the authorities."

               "What? But you said—that's not fair!" The anger was returning to his eyes.

               Noctis crossed his arms. "Fair has nothing to do with it. Was it fair that you've been spying on me for the last five years?" He clenched his fists. "Was it fair when you tricked me into falling for you—was it fair when you kissed me?! Dammit!" he shouted. "Was it fair when you pulled a gun on me?!" His grasp tightened around Prompto's shirt as he held him up. Prompto snarled and punched as the Crownsguard grabbed him and hauled him away. He managed to grab hold of Noctis's t-shirt, but Noctis wrenched it back, pushing his hand away. "Maybe a few months behind bars will help you repent!" he spat.

               "Let me take you back to the Citadel, Prince Noctis," said one of the Crownsguard.

               Noctis shook his head. "No, thanks. I'll walk," he said stiffly. He waited a minute, allowing time for the guards to all leave, then he headed out of the alleyway. Everything he'd said...it was how he really felt, but there was so much left unsaid. Like how hurt he was by the betrayal, and the reason it hurt so bad was because he really did love him. He hadn't wanted him to be arrested, but he had no other choice. It was the law, and treason was punishable by far worse than a few months in the Citadel prison. They would push for execution—that much was certain—but he would be there to stop that from happening.

               He flipped open his phone, idly scrolling through pictures as he walked. Prompto looked so happy...how could he have been planning this all along? And if none of that was real, then...why was it he had this unbelievable ache in his chest?

[chiclet-go-boom]

fracture: void

reylo fic / what if kylo ren was actually stupid enough to turn himself over to the resistance / i dreamed this so its a fraglet of a story

“Stop! Kylo!”

She spreads her fingers out helplessly. She not even sure what she’s imploring him, them, everyone to do but all she can think over and over and over again is be calm be calm please just everyone be calm don’t move it’s still okay and somehow it seems to be working because nobody is moving, nobody is doing anything, nobody is even breathing anymore, least of all her.

He doesn’t break her gaze. He’s gone completely still after that one explosive, frightening burst; carved like a shadow against the gray tarmac with the dust and sand and dirt of the Resistance colors clustered around him in counterpoint. Black hair, black eyes, black everywhere and the Force is boiling around him so hard that she wonders in a hiccup of time how she can even still see him through the distortion. But nothing is moving. Nothing worse has happened. Everyone is still okay and that includes her and that includes him and that includes everybody else who have all frozen where they were shoved away, the one man on his back with the metal restraints still clenched in his hand and this is absolutely and utterly ridiculous and then she looks again at the maelstrom happening around him that nobody else can see and she swallows her rising panic.

“Kylo, please. You have to let them put the cuffs on.” This time she sees his chest rise and fall and something terrible spears through the Force, something that tastes of rejection and something else that sings of retaliation. “You have to do it,” she soothes. Her fingers are still outstretched as if that alone could hold it all back. “You have to let them do it. I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere.”

He’s locked so hard into himself that she can’t tell what he’s thinking or if he’s even thinking at all. He’s made it this far but something about the shackles is where he’s balked and whatever it is, she can’t read it beyond the clench of his jaw.

Then, finally, he nods, once and sharp and straightens from the half crouch he’d fallen into. The Force settles a little and she can see him trying to calm down, his face trying to lapse back into impassivity but failing with the tightness around his eyes, the lip that keeps trying to curl.

The blasters that were half raised moments ago are now locked on target and the worst part is, she can’t blame them. The two men with the shock sticks edge back, edge closer and he looks back at her and she can see it in his eyes and she has to nod, this is okay, this is still okay, they knew this was going to be necessary but why the kriff someone had ordered this done on the platform as soon as they’d landed is beyond her but they have to do it, they’d both known this was going to happen at some point.

She keeps holding his eyes as the man he’d Force pushed gets back cautiously to his feet, never let it be said the Resistance lacks courage, and tries again shakily to put the handcuffs on.

This time it seems like it’s going to be okay. Kylo doesn’t so much as flinch this time as the first silver band snaps on.

It’s like being shoved underground. Rey exhales with a whimper. She grabs her own wrist hard enough to bruise in impotent reaction to something that isn’t even happening to her and she brings it to her chest as if that will somehow help, somehow restore function. She can feel it. Choking. Smothering. Half severed suddenly from air and light and life.

Her mouth is as dry as the desert she came from and his eyes still burn into hers but this time, this time he does nothing to stop it. His arm doesn’t move. His fingers don’t even flex.

In that heartbeat the jailor brings his other hand up and snaps on the second cuff.

The Force currents howling around him cut off instantly. It’s so jarring she actually takes a step forward as if falling into the void of it.

She knows there’s air still and she knows she’s still breathing but it feels like she’s not really doing either because where there was Kylo, where there was Ben now there’s nothing, nothing at all, an utter emptiness where there used to be so much presence and her heart is beating faster and faster and faster.

The look on his face crumbles because whatever she’s feeling it’s from the outside and he’s on the inside of that horrific vacuum and she takes another step forward as if it will somehow help if she can just get closer. Somebody grabs her arm and starts to pull her back.

His fingers grip into fists. His breath hisses out, shockingly loud and his eyes are suddenly nothing but black terror. He doesn’t even look human anymore and she can all but see him reaching, trying to claw his way back to reality through the chains.

Dust leaps into the air. There’s a delicate tremble under her heels. His hands clench again and the ground shakes once more, harder, and somebody curses off to the side.

Then one of the men with a shock stick strikes him with it and he howls with pain as he drops to his knees and the ground cracks around him as he falls. The man on the other side hits him as well as in frightened solidarity and she hears somebody yell get the collar on get the collar on now and how the fuck is he even doing that and Kylo is screaming as the shock sticks flare again and there’s somebody against his back fumbling and she sees silver against his black, black hair and something wraps like a snake around his throat and everything —

— just stops.

There are hands on her, hard and tight and she’s straining against them, she doesn’t even know who they are and they’re saying something and she doesn’t care. Kylo’s on his knees and she’s looking right at him and he’s not there, there’s nothing there at all, hard metal on his hands, on his neck, there’s just a shadow in the shape of a man kneeling where there used to be everything.

She reaches desperately into the Force where he burned so fiercely and there’s no answer. There isn’t even a whisper of an answer, an utter, aching void and she reaches again and there’s still nothing. In desperation she wraps her fist around her connection to him, the one thing that she had always, always believed inviolate even as she’d raged against it and there is nothing.

She can hear herself panting, high and pained. She didn’t know. She didn’t know it would be like this and he pulls himself up painfully onto his heels, shaking the hair out of his face, teeth bared and snarling but there is no answering fury anywhere to be felt except in her heart.

And then he gets hit again with the shock stick for something as stupid as moving and that everyone around him is afraid, will always be afraid, and he arches but this time no sound escapes at all, not even a whistle of breath.  She screams for both of them because his eyes finally close and she knows he’s setting himself to endure. She knows how pain moves through his body because she’s felt this before, every time he’s been hurt, been punished, been corrected and now this is her side doing this to him, her friends, and this is all her fault, he told her this would happen and she can’t find him anywhere.

“No! No! Leave him alone! Kylo!”

She knows how because he does. One step to blast everybody back, everybody away, they won’t do this to him, she won’t let them touch him again, she wants him back, wants all of him back and she reaches out with both hands and digs her fingers into the air and she knows she’s bruising his wrists but she wants those terrible things off and she crushes the metal, furious and panicked, digs again and pulls harder and finally they start to crack and she sobs with relief that she can feel him screaming through those narrow slivers. She reaches up to her neck and he reaches up to his in mirror and together they grab the collar and tear it off.

She’s running even as he staggers back to his feet, as he shatters the handcuffs in one convulsive strike and and he grabs her hard into his arms and he’s there, he’s all there, she can feel him all around her, heat and body and mind and breath and chaos and fire and she sinks her fingers into his flesh even as he sinks into her mind and she sees the silver on his wrists as a child when they’d tried to control him even then by cutting him off from himself and he’d tried, he’d tried to do it for her but it was too much, too much memory, too much fear, and he’d panicked and he couldn’t do it, so much silence, can’t feel can’t feel can’t feel and and if they try again he’ll rip them apart and she sinks her hands into his hair and never again never again never again.

She’s stroking him over and over, fingers on his face, her forehead pressed to his, his hands clutching at her hips, waist, running in agony up her back as he assures himself that she is here, still here, still bright and alive and blazing with light in his mind, not empty, not gone and she realizes they’ve sunk down again, knees to the rough ground with his face hard in her neck and she’s mostly crawled into his lap with the incandescent need to touch.

She looks up a thousand years later, blinking the tears away to find people are staring awkwardly at them.

“So. Yeah. Guess that’s not going to work now, is it?”

And she half laughs because that’s Poe sounding rueful, just like the last however long its been hadn’t actually happened and she could just kiss him with wobbling relief for how normal he sounds when she feels anything but. There’s trembling amusement sliding through Kylo simply because of how Poe’s voice made her feel and they agree somewhere that they both like the pilot but they can’t stay this vulnerable. Somehow they untangle just enough to stand again, his chest to her back as shield and comfort, one arm hooking around her chest to keep them in contact, fingers gripping her shoulder. She feels him looking for the men with the shock sticks because if they have to fight they need to go first and she hooks her fingers around his wrist, skin to skin and assents.

If they try and cage him again away from her, she’ll drop them all where they stand and she really, really hopes it won’t be necessary.

“No,” she says breathily. “It’s definitely not. Sorry.”

His breath is in her hair and she feels the burn of him extending in all directions around them as she threads herself into him again and he rumbles his agreement without words.

[tobns]

                             𝒮𝐸𝒱𝐸𝒩 𝑀𝐼𝐿𝐸 𝒟𝐸𝒞𝐸𝑀𝐵𝐸𝑅

I will myself to smile despite the instinctual urge to wilt.

                                                     ALEXANDER

It’s raining when we land in Newark – apparently, LaGuardia and JFK are options that are now null and void – and the feeling in my gut is screaming at me to turn around, hop on another plane that’s headed to an entirely different time zone and not look back.

Jen is all but excited to leave me choking on her dust the second her feet touch the tarmac, as her duties to me have technically ended from this point forward. Jen is not my biggest fan on a good day, and somewhere along the line, I thought that as a businessman I was making a strategic decision by hiring someone who had absolutely no bias towards me to promote my tour. She’d also gotten a thumbs up from someone whose opinion mattered most to me, which for me, set the deal in stone. I’d made it a goal to try and sway her, at least get Jen to appreciate me as a person before the tour wrapped. However, I think I’ve managed to create even more of a case for her disliking me throughout the duration of the tour than I actually did remedying my reputation in her eyes.

It’s all moot now, as she hops into a car without so much as an informal goodbye and rides off.

Dayo may as well be my shadow, next to me in the car that’s on a one-way trip to the city. He says nothing, doing his best to avoid any and all eye contact with me. As uneasy as I am, the situation only increases ten-fold in awkwardness for Dayo. He’s always present when I’m involved, and he doesn’t always appreciate that. 

My leg shakes the entire car ride, my attempt at keeping an idle body busy to prevent what I hope isn’t an impending anxiety attack. Coming home should not be this stressful. Coming home is supposed to be the breath of fresh air, the sigh of relief after spitting out a sentence that’s been building in the lungs, a drink of water in a drought. It’s supposed to be the only place in life where you are never anything but one hundred percent certain, and I can barely convince myself to be at one percent.

The buildings don’t pass by slow enough, they move at a blur until the only one that’s in focus is the same one that I paid an unspeakable amount of money to in order to call the two-story penthouse apartment my own. The car rolls smoothly to a stop in front of the entrance, Dayo and the driver both hopping out to retrieve bags from the trunk and leaving me frozen in my thoughts. My hand feels like an anvil as it rests on the handle of the door, feet refusing to move. The only part of me that’s moving is my mind, whirring past me at a rate I can barely comprehend – there’s a common thread running through the jumble of my thoughts, urging me to bow out now. Some man I am.

“You coming?” Dayo’s voice startles me, my eyes snapping back across the backseat and meet his as he peers his head back through the open door.

Still feeling as though I’ve been shot with an immobilizing agent right in the middle of my spine, I swallow and nod. It’s now or never, and clearly the fates prefer the former.

I step out of the car, the crisp autumn air forking a breeze right through my path. The building stretches upward, and I can feel my head naturally reclining back to watch it trail all the way up to the sky. Home sweet home, I think dully as the driver hands me one of my duffel bags.

The elevator is out of service, which doesn’t come as a surprise. It’s always up in the air as to whether or not it operates, most of the time it not. It doesn’t perturb me all that much; I’ve had plenty of practice hiking up these stairs, especially with luggage. Dayo, who’s made the same trip many times himself, enjoys it very little. Every time I round the corner and start up another flight, I catch a glimpse of his face and the frown that continues to make itself much more visible deepening.   

When we reach the right floor, I push the door open with my shoulder to reveal a very short hallway. There’s a door that sits at the end of it, facing me directly with its gleaming gold knob and all staring right at me, as if it’s been waiting. I force another deep breath into my lungs as I keep marching ahead, if only to save myself from Dayo’s grumbling and him ramming me along with one of our rolling suitcases. The distance between the door and I grows shorter and shorter, until it’s within an arms distance.

I can almost feel the weight of the world pressing down on my shoulder as I lift one of my hands, and deliver a swift knock to the door. Might as well put the ball in someone else’s court.

Plus, the truth of the matter is, I’m not sure if the key Dayo still has on his ring will work with the lock anymore. 

Out from underneath my fist, the door is yanked open. My heart goes into free-fall, expecting to slam right into concrete until I see my own blue eyes looking back at me in such elation, it’s like all the power in the city is rerouted right into one little girl.

“Hi daddy!”

My bags have barely brushed onto the ground before Noelle launches herself into my arms, a whirl of ribbons tied to her pigtails and gleeful laughter ringing in my ears. Relief floods through me as I sigh, pulling her into a tight hug. When she pulls away after a moment and both of her hands come to rest on my face, all of my problems seemingly melt away into oblivion. My eyebrows furrow together as I feign confusion, solely to get a rile out of her. “Do I know you?” I tease.

Another high-octave peal of laughs floods the foyer. “It’s me!” she insists, and I nod slowly.

“Well, hi ‘me.’” I say jokingly, holding out one of my hands for her to shake. “I’m Dad.” This excites Noelle, her face scrunching up as she flings her arms back around my neck.

“No, I’m Noelle!” she squeals as she squeezes in another hug. “I missed you.” I manage to kiss the top of her head before she squirms back out of my arms.

When she pulls away this time, I push a stray piece of hair that’s escaped from her braids out of her eyes and smile at her. “Oh, but I missed you more, Noah-Kate,” I claim, her eyes lightening at the use of the nickname that only I ever call her by. “I guess next time, I’ll just have to smuggle you on tour with me.”

“Really?” she asks me enthusiastically. The last remnants of her lisp have seen very little improvement over the last few months, her r’s still hinting on the edge of a w-sound. I nod.

“Sure thing, jellybean. My triangle player now is nowhere near as adorable as you.”

“Where do you want these?” Dayo grumbles from behind me, leaning up against the doorframe and interrupting the moment. I glance behind me, Noelle already beginning to tug at my hand in an attempt to redirect my attention.

“C’mon, daddy!” she says, her impatience only heightening with every second I’m not focused entirely on her.

“You can just leave ‘em down here,” I tell Dayo, my eyes leaving him before I even finish my sentence and allow Noelle to pull me along behind her.

She drags me into the kitchen, where everything smells like a goddamn sweet shop. Once it all comes into frame, it certainly looks as though one’s exploded – there are baking trays and flour everywhere, stacks and stacks of Tupperware containers housing treats and a rack of brownies still on the sheet resting on the island. The sweetness stops there, a wave of hostility subsequently crashing into me.

I should have known it would have taken an army to create this kind of mess, and that’s exactly what Jackie Emerson and Jack Quaid have always been: a two-man army that could send a thousand men running. Their eyes are glued to me the second they lay sight, and already I want to turn around and walk out. Their glares are scrutinizing and pierce right through me, especially Jackie’s. Jack, who’s always been a few inches taller than me, is a little less threatening when he’s sitting down on one of my barstools, but even at a foot and a half shorter, nothing could possibly take away from the fear Jackie strikes in me. She’s standing with one hand propped up behind her on the counter, the other hand resting on her hip as her eyes wield daggers that have got my name all over them.

Standing next to her is Isabelle, eyes cast down at the floor and her body ever so slightly turned in Jackie’s direction. My stomach is knotted up in my throat, fear shooting through my bloodstream like Novocain. The world still stops when I look at her, but now it’s for all the wrong reasons. Her hair is tied back in a loose bun that’s halfway fallen out, wearing a pair of jeans and a grey t-shirt with Columbia written over the chest in burgundy letters that she’s owned for years on end. I can’t find any words to say to her, and she can’t be bothered to look at me. It’s not a surprise by any means.

Noelle doesn’t seem to take any note of the tension that’s suddenly blanketed the air, instead tugging on my hand as she drags me towards the island. “Look, daddy, Momma and I made sugar cookies!”

“Yeah, I see that,” I say, my voice strained. One of my hands rests on her head and I ruffle the top of her hair. “Looks like you’ve been busy this morning, huh, Noah-Kate?”

“Noelle,” comes the thin correction from across the room, so quiet that if I didn’t know any better, I would have dreamed I imagined it. I force myself not to cut my eyes back over to Isabelle, even though the irritation wedges its way under my skin in a split second. Isabelle has always loathed the Noah-Kate nickname, for reasons that are entirely beyond me. Her excuse was that she’d intentionally picked out a name that very, very few nicknames existed for; Isabelle is the queen of nicknames, about a dozen variants for her name alone and she didn’t want the same fate for her kid, being referred to by a different name every five seconds. She’d picked a solid name, and she was hellbent to stick to it. It wasn’t my fault, really, that Noah-Kate just rolled right off the tongue, but she sure did punish me for bringing it into existence. Isabelle refuses to call her anything other than Noelle and threatens anyone else within an inch of their life to do the same, leaving only me to stray from the rules.

Noelle pulls herself up onto one of the barstools, reaching for a cookie and handing it off to me. “Sit next to me!” she requests, and I do my best to comply without accidentally stepping on one of the many, many landmines that have been planted in the room. It is most definitely me against all of them, Noelle being none the wiser towards the evident strain among the adults. It must be nice to still be that naïve, not even know enough on what tension is to sense it.

From the corner of my eye, I see Jackie inch a little closer to Isabelle, presumably whispering something to her. The rigidity is radiating off of Jack; it’s very clear that I am unwelcome. He seems to be biting his tongue, resorting to just glaring at me for the sake of the girls. Or, rather, Isabelle, I’m sure Jackie has given him full permission in advance to do as he pleases.

My daughter is talking twenty miles a minute, all of her words running in one ear and out the other as I try to somehow ground myself in this environment’s unstable climate and get out of my thoughts before things proceed any further. She looks over at me to ensure I’m keeping up, two rows of teeth exposed as she grins. All I can do is smile back and nod, acting as though I’ve heard every single word she’s said thus far. She’s my only lifeline in here – everyone else is on a team opposite from mine, and just my eyes meeting her own makes me feel a little less like a stranger in my own home. Like I’m actually wanted here.

Isabelle shifts away from Jackie, her eyes finally lifting back up to sea level and moving right around me to look at Noelle. “Baby,” she says softly, catching Noelle off guard in the middle of a rapid-fire sentence about how she’s got two loose teeth (maybe I’ve retained more than I think I have). “Why don’t you go ahead and get your stuff?”

Noelle deflates a little, but she obliges, scrambling off of the barstool and exiting the kitchen. I look over at Isabelle, catching her line of sight for the first time since I’ve gotten home.

“Get her stuff?” I repeat, confused.

Isabelle doesn’t respond. Making eye contact with me seems to have had the same sensation as her getting electrocuted, her green eyes jumping away and locking back onto the floor. I try Jackie, because even though she scares me to death, she’s much easier to read than Isabelle. Unfortunately, she’s already looking at Jack, the two of them having some sort of silent conversation.

I figure out soon enough what secret they’re all in on when Noelle comes back into the kitchen, her pink Disney princess suitcase clacking along behind her as the wheels roll over the hardwoods. She’s staring up at Isabelle expectantly, waiting for her next cue.

Jackie’s apparently up to bat next, the corners of her lips forging her mouth into a smile. “Ready to go, bug?” she asks cheerfully as the hand comes off of her hip.

“Go?” My voice echoes out, and I glance back over at Isabelle in bewilderment. Noelle, whom I don’t think was entirely sold on whatever plan her mother and Jackie have concocted for her, suddenly lights back up with a swell of hopefulness that I’ll take her side.

Isabelle has apparently foreseen this happening, and she walks over to the doorway where Noelle stands. She bends down, her back to me as she rests her hands on either of Noelle’s arms. “You and Aunt Jackie and Uncle Jack are gonna have so much fun at your sleepover while Momma and Daddy catch up, yeah?” she asks, the chipper tone a little too saccharine to be real. “Aunt Jackie told me you guys are going to Times Square tonight. I think if you asked really nicely, they’d even take you to the Disney store.”

My heart sinks a little in my chest. I’d planned to take Noelle down to the Disney store tomorrow, since it was all she talked to me about doing over the last three weeks’ phone calls.  

Noelle looks past Isabelle at Jackie and Jack for some sort of confirmation to Isabelle’s theory. Jackie gives an overexaggerated shrug (meaning that it’ll be a yes, so long as it gets her out the door) and Jack shoots her a thumbs up. I’m very quickly arriving to the conclusion that I don’t get any say in this, no matter how I might feel about it.

After squeezing Noelle’s shoulders, Isabelle prompts, “Go tell Daddy bye, alright?”

Trudging over towards me half-heartedly, Noelle holds her arms out for a hug. “Bye, Daddy,” she says, just as Isabelle’s told her to.

I have to bite down on the tongue that wants to protest all of this bullshit, because I’m sure Noelle is none the wiser and the last thing I need to do is throw a wrench in the plans of the people holding much more terrifying weapons. Straightening myself out, I stoop down to Noelle’s level and give her another hug. “Bye, jellybean. I’ll see you tomorrow.” Arms still looped around my neck, she leans away from me and is visibly excited at the prospect of this.

“Daddy will come get you sometime tomorrow after lunch,” Isabelle quickly throws out. I think it’s meant to appease Noelle and myself, show us that we’re not really getting that bad of a deal in all this.

Noelle blinks a few times, head tilting ever so slightly to the side as she looks for me to affirm it. I nod. “I’ll see you then, okay?”

“Okay,” she repeats, mimicking my nod.

Jackie swoops in like a goddamn hawk the second Noelle is released from my arms, grabbing onto one of her hands. “C’mon, Noelle,” she says brightly. “If we beat Uncle Jack to the elevator, we get to pick where we go to dinner tonight. And I know you don’t want Tony’s again.” Noelle giggles.

“Elevator’s out of service,” I find myself interjecting as I stand back up. Jackie glares at me over her shoulder, and if looks could kill, she’d only be one step away from shoveling dirt on top of my body.

“It was working earlier,” is all that Jackie has to say in response, her voice cold.

Noelle gravitates back towards Isabelle before she leaves, Isabelle bending down from where she’s taken up leaning against our refrigerator to kiss the top of her head. “Bye, baby.” She offers Noelle one more smile, and even from across the kitchen, I can see the cracks forming in the façade already.

Jack slides his barstool back, getting up and pushing it back under with his foot as he grabs a giant Tupperware container of cookies. I get one more scowl from him before he moves in Isabelle’s direction, folding her underneath his free arm in a hug. He mutters something in her ear, and when he pulls away, I watch as Isabelle gives him the single nod of her head. Her lips are pressed down in a thin half-smile now.  

Jackie, Jack, and Noelle all walk out of the kitchen, Isabelle shifting her body against the refrigerator so she’s no longer facing my direction, but that of the window. We stand in silence, able to hear as the three of them make their way out of the apartment. The door finally shuts, and the veil that was only ever up for Noelle’s sake swiftly drops from the atmosphere.

“Really, Isabelle?” I growl. Some of the tension leaves Isabelle’s frame, and one of her hands comes up to massage her temples. “I just got back home.”

“She doesn’t need to be around to hear us fighting,” Isabelle snaps, finally cutting the evasiveness and looking at me. Now I understand why she wouldn’t earlier; her green eyes are poisonous as they slice right through me in the manner a knife would. “That I figured you’d agree with me on.”

“You could have given me more than five minutes.”

She shakes her head in defiance. “No. I wasn’t going to subject her to being in the crosshairs of an impending explosion. Jackie and Jack both have quite the piece they’d like to give you; the only reason they kept their mouths shut was because of her.”

“And I thought we agreed this was just going to be between you and me, not you, me, and all our fuckin’ friends.”

Isabelle shrugs, peeling herself off the refrigerator and letting her hands slap against her thighs as they fall. “Yeah, well, that was before you fell into bed with some other woman.”

Her words sting as they ricochet off me, despite them being nothing but the truth. I run my hand over the countertop idly. “Look,” I start, my voice quiet. “You know I didn’t want for you to—”

“Didn’t want for me to what?” Isabelle finishes for me, her eyes wide in offense. “Find out?”

“Not like that.”

“Or at all,” she adds. At first, I’d figured that the only reason Isabelle had been clinging to Jackie was to add a little backbone to whatever stressed and brittle state she’d gotten herself in upon my arrival, but it’s pretty evident now that Jackie was the only deterring force between me and Isabelle’s unleashing of her wrath. “I’m terribly sorry that I ruined your little affair with your opening act, honey, next time I’ll be sure to keep my mouth shut when I get a phone call from someone who isn’t even involved telling me so and just…share my husband like a good little girl.”

“Do you want the papers?” I fire back at her. “’Cause we can still do that. I offered it to you up front.”

She snorts. “Because you always want an easy out.”

“Well, can you blame me? Why the hell would I want to stay in a relationship with someone who’d prefer to see my head on a stick?”

“This is not about you,” Isabelle seethes. In her eyes, I can see that there is plenty more she’d like to say to me, but she swallows it down. Her face goes dangerously blank as she exhales shallowly. “This is why I didn’t want her here. We can’t even have a civil conversation.”

“Civil,” I mumble under my breath. “A little hard to do when the environment’s far from it.”

If Isabelle hears me, she simply elects to ignore it. Her head is back in her hands, giving me a small reprieve of her fury. The heels of her hands go dragging down her face, body slumping back against the refrigerator. “We need to decide on an arrangement for Noelle,” her voice small as it attempts to cleave through the heavy silence. “You’ll…you get her tomorrow, pick her up from Jackie’s. Do whatever you guys want – I’m not gonna be at home. But after that, we need to just decide how we’re gonna do this.” One hand leaves her face, gesturing between the two of us. “It can’t be like this, though.”

“This being?” I trail off, unsure.

“The both of us under the same roof,” she says bluntly. Apparently, my reaction isn’t what she had anticipated, one of her eyebrows lifting into her hairline when she sees my face settle into a frown. “What? I’d assumed that you weren’t going to hang around once you got back home. You’d come in, say your hellos, serve me, and then have Dayo be the middle man when you come to pick Noelle up from then on.”

My fist clenches, and I bring it up to my lip in the hopes of restraining the words instantly rising to the surface. “Do you really think so little of me that you think I’d just…stroll in and serve you without so much as a hello?” I mutter, my voice rough as I try to focus on the pattern of the floor.

Isabelle’s shoulders fall as she shrugs. “I haven’t seen you in five months,” she replies simply. “And you were the one who wanted something else. What was I supposed to expect?”

I don’t have an answer to that, so I guess she makes a decent point.

“Arrangements,” she redirects the conversation back to where we’d left off.

“I’m…” I take a deep breath, carefully lifting my eyes up to Isabelle. “I’m not moving out. I didn’t come home to start playing musical beds.” If I know Isabelle as well as I think I do, it is physically paining her not to make any kind of comment. Her lower lip is trapped tightly between her teeth, a hand knotted in the roots of her hair.

“Well,” she finally says, voice strained. “I’m not staying.”

I can feel the blood begin to rise in temperature as my heart begins to pound a little harder in my chest. Conversations with Isabelle used to be clear-cut, linear, and now they’re mazes with no exit or end in sight. “I don’t get it,” I tell her stiffly. “You don’t want to go through with a d—”

“Don’t say that word,” she immediately snaps, and my face falls.

“See?” I gesture out at her. “You don’t even want to entertain the idea of separating, shutting me down the minute you think I’m going to say the magic word, but yet you don’t want to live under the same roof in the hopes that we might be able to salvage our relationship if we do? Where is the logic in that, Isabelle?”

Isabelle’s chin tilts up towards the ceiling as she laughs, her eyes glassy when the light catches them. “God, Alexander, I know you’re not talking to me about logic,” she scoffs. She’s got a white knuckled grip on the counter now, turning so her back is now facing me.

“It just doesn’t make sense,” I argue.

“Yeah, I said that a lot when I got the phone call,” Isabelle informs me, and the chill in her voice sends a ripple down my spine. “’Cause I just kept thinking, there’s no way my husband would do that to me. The person in the world that knows me the best, loves me the most, he wouldn’t hurt me like that. He couldn’t. It doesn’t make sense that he’s cheating on me.” Her eyes cut over her shoulder. “It still doesn’t. But I’ve had to make do.”

“What, by giving me whiplash and getting off on it somehow? You certainly don’t want for me to leave, but god-fucking-forbid I leave!”

Something inside Isabelle snaps. Her hand smashes into a glass mixing bowl, sending it toppling over the edge of the counter and shards exploding as it collides with the ground. I jump a little, Isabelle having the more severe recoil. She nearly goes stepping on a piece of glass barefoot, catching herself and grabbing back onto the counter. “You tore me apart,” she growls hoarsely as she looks at me, the tears burning in her eyes and hanging on the edge of falling over. “Do you think I know how the hell to react to all of this, what I’m supposed to say? I can barely look at you, Xander.”

Her words strike such a painful chord inside me that I have the urge to double over. Not being face-to-face with Isabelle has spared me a lot of the pain that comes with seeing where I’ve put her emotionally. A tear slides down her face, and she angrily swipes it away.

“I don’t know who you are anymore,” she whispers, a hand extended out as she gestures up and down. “Whoever this is, it isn’t who I married.”

There’s an overwhelming lack of words coming to my brain, but my window of opportunity to say something, anything, closes almost as soon as it opens. I watch as Isabelle knots her fist back in her hair, giving me a half-hearted shrug. “If you don’t want to leave, then that’s fine. I can stay with Jackie, go somewhere else—”

“Isabelle,” I interrupt, trying to save her from verbalizing a train of thought that I particularly don’t feel like hearing.

“No,” she insists, shaking her head as she goes about stepping around pieces of glass. “It’s okay. I’ll figure it out at some point. Until then, let’s just…not do this.”

She’s making her way towards the doorway of the kitchen when Dayo suddenly appears, eyes wide as he looks around. I’d almost forgotten I’d sent him upstairs to drop off my luggage, that he was still even in the apartment. Chances are, the sound of glass breaking caught his attention. “Everything okay?” he asks, his eyes meeting mine before moving down towards Isabelle.

“Yeah,” Isabelle responds before I can. Her voice adopts that false cheeriness again, picking up her shoulders a little. “Yeah, everything’s fine. Good to have you back, Dayo.”

I spin around on the bar stool, both elbows propped on the granite island as my eyes catch a quick glimpse of the city out through the kitchen window before I bury my head in my hands. Manhattan is the most densely populated borough in one of the most densely populated locations in all of America, and I have never felt so insignificant inside what feels like the most infinite ocean than I do in my own kitchen.

                                                        ISABELLE

After flashing two rows of teeth in the direction of the waiter as a means of grabbing his attention, I ask, “Can we get another bottle of the rosé?”

He smiles back at me, a curt nod following. “Absolutely.”

He then scurries away from the table, my attention shifting back to the snickering figure sitting across from me. “And what if I wasn’t able to afford a second bottle of the Dom Perignon?”

“Then I don’t think you would have taken me out to the NoMad,” I counter, resting my chin on top of my hand as I lean forward.

“Fair point.” A few tendrils of blonde hair fall off Leven’s bare shoulder as she tilts her head slightly. “Plus, after the day you had yesterday, I’m not gonna be the one to slap the hand that’s pouring.”

I will myself to smile despite the instinctual urge to wilt. Leven knows me well, much more than I sometimes think she does. Her hand slides across the table, palm facing up and extending out for me. I take it, her fingers wrapping tightly over mine. “Sweetheart,” she murmurs. “It’s gonna be alright eventually. He just got home.”

“Yeah, only just. There’s no tour waiting for him to come back. There is no…out.” I exhale, slumping down a little. “He likes the easy outs, and I’ve gotten so used to expecting them that now I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. I mean, do I let him stay in the apartment? Do I make him find somewhere else? Do I leave?”

“Easy, Belle,” Leven warns me. “Don’t work yourself up just yet. You’re…what, five minutes into this? You don’t have to start apartment hunting just yet, you don’t even know if he’s still seeing her.”

I bite down on my lip, positive that if I’m not drawing blood, I’m taking up quite a chunk of my worn lipstick. “Does that really matter at this point?” I whimper hoarsely. “I mean, even if he doesn’t have her, I’ve got…I’ve got you.”

The edges of Leven’s mouth curl up. Part of me can sense that she’d like to continue playing devil’s advocate, so I keep letting the words fall out as they please. “And even if that wasn’t the case, Noelle’s still in the picture. I can’t just dump her off on Jack and Jackie, act like she isn’t affected by any of this. She adores him, Lev. I got an earful out of her when I wouldn’t let her go visit him on the road like last time – but what was I supposed to say? Yes? Let her meet Sawyer?”

My eyes shift downwards towards the table, where my hand is still clinging to Leven’s. Her nails are painted a deep shade of red, so rich it may as well be black. “Ever since this has happened, I feel like I’m always playing the bad guy. And I’m not the one who cheated.”

Leven’s thumb runs over the tops of my fingers reassuringly. “My parents got divorced when I was ten,” she tells me. Her voice is soft as it falls onto my ears – I think it’s why I’m so quick to latch onto her. She’s living, breathing comfort. “My dad was having an affair, and infidelity was just something my mom couldn’t work past, so they ended it. All these years later, she’d still tell you that she was partly to blame for what happened, even though she didn’t do a damn thing wrong. There aren’t any good guys in situations like this. No one’s better or worse than anyone else. You go into a marriage as equals, and if you come out of it, you come out of it as equals, too.”

The corners of my eyes are burning as they meet Leven’s. In the low light provided by a small candle on the edge of the table, there’s a certain glint to her green irises as she looks at me, something I feel I may just be imagining there for my own sake.

Right as I go to answer her, our waiter reappears with another bottle of Dom Perignon. He sets it down on the edge of the table and then backs away as he flashes us a smile, the knowledge and slight guilt of his interrupting something there on his face. Leven’s hand uncurls from mine, reaching out and grabbing the bottle.

“Let’s get a little more rosé in you, yeah?” she propositions, one of her eyebrows lifting in invitation. “You should take me up on it, since next time I’ll be a cheap date.”

The laugh that comes out of my mouth seems to originate out of nowhere, but it feels genuine, and I don’t feel as though I’m trying to stretch myself out across all the cracks to keep from collapsing. Leven is one of the few places I can be in pieces, and she doesn’t mind if she has to dance around all the broken shards or clean herself up if I scratch her. She comes prepared with a dustpan and a broom, or simply throws herself off the mantle so I’m at least not in pieces alone.

“If that’s true, then you might not be getting another date with me,” I tease, holding out my glass for her to refill.

“Oh please, I’m irresistible,” she counters.

“Sure,” I drawl out, watching as the rosé splashes around the glass walls when Leven moves to pour me more. The low candlelight makes it look as though it’s twinkling.

She sets the bottle back down, and I’m quick to lift up my glass once she backs away. “Here’s to not being the bad guy anymore,” I offer.

Leven seems a little mystified by me presenting that up as a toast, but she doesn’t question it. Instead, she raises her own glass and clinks it against mine – if I didn’t know any better, and my mind was buzzing much more than it already is, I would have assumed I was sitting at another tea party with my daughter, Jack, and Jackie. “To not being the bad guy.”

I down nearly half the glass in the gulp I take, and Leven merely laughs.

Drinking your sorrows away works, after all, even if it is only for a brief moment.

[flying-rarepair-ships]

Got bored and wrote some fluffy modern Hux/Poe. Hopefully the read more thing works so it doesn't post as a massive text post.

Poe always saw him. But maybe Poe noticed the weeds growing from the cracks in the ground. He was weird like that. Hux was too deeply in love with the ace pilot that he ignored all the flaws he would normally see. He was so stupidly, head over heels in love with Poe Dameron.

He kept his personal life separate from his work. The New Republic would not take too kindly to one of their best commanders actively involved with a First Order officer. They would try Poe for treason and him for war crimes. A long drawn out process Hux rolled his eyes at. A much simpler punishment would come from the First Order—torture, interrogation, and execution. All in that order.

Of course, Poe would try and find a way to escape—he always did have a strange way of escaping the Order’s clutches without Hux’s intervention. But he was always alone. If Hux were present, he’d try and rescue him too. Then they would both perish as a result of Poe’s big heart. Hux didn’t know if he would be more flattered or horrified by this conclusion.

Poe knew nothing about his First Order affiliation. He thought Hux merely hated the slow lumbering pace of the Senate when it came to government decisions. Which was true. Hux liked things done quickly and precisely. Poe just didn’t know how precisely.

Hux wanted to keep him in the dark. Keep his personal life safe from reality. Poe didn’t know he was heading off to destroy one of the Order’s minor weapons depot. And Hux was not about to tell him. He would, of course, find some way to assassinate the officer with the loose tongue, but if all the man knew was the location of a minor depot, he was not a main priority of his. Poe came first.

“What are you thinking about?” Poe asked as he looped an arm around his elbow. He snuck over while Hux was staring out at the pinking sunset.

“You.” It was so easy telling the truth with Poe. Even if it was a half truth. His mind was always on Poe. It rarely ever deviated.

“I’m flattered.” The man swept his hand through his thick curls. One dangled loosely in front​ of his eye and Hux made a quick move to remedy that. “We’re deploying soon. You should probably head home.” Whatever was happening next was not for a civilians’ eyes. Poe was warning him about the closure of the hangar a few minutes early. Before he was escorted off the premises.

“The apartment will be clean when you get back.” He promised. He wondered if Poe was thinking about the ring in his sock drawer. Hux ran across it by accident. They hardly mixed up laundry. But Hux found one odd sock attached to one of his shirts and returned it. Accidentally running across the small velvet box hidden in the toe of its partner.

Poe stretched up and pressed his lips again his.

“Not too clean.” Poe snickered into his mouth. “Or I’ll have to make a mess when I come back.” Hux wanted to bite him for that insolent remark. He was sure Poe was goading him into action, what with that cheeky smile he flaunted.

“Be safe.” He said instead, crushing the pilot’s warm body against his. He buried his nose into his hair, relishing the intoxicating scent of fuel and sweat that only reminded him of Poe. Poe was doing the same, his fingers clenching tightly on his shoulders. Memorizing the contours of his body shape one last time. They could stay together like this for hours.

“Gotta go.” Poe kissed him again, this peck all to fleeting against his cheek after the too short embrace. He slipped from Hux’s arms and patted his right breast, which held both his life support gear and a picture of Hux from his college years. It was good luck, he told him. He never left without making sure it was there.

“Be safe.” Hux found himself repeating. Once more when Poe turned away and walked towards his X-wing. It was a stupid gesture he knew would never work. Praying did little in war. Only strategy and numbers made a difference. His words were of very little consequence.

But the anxiety bubbling up inside calmed as he repeated those words again, whispering them under his breath as he was escorted out of the hanger.

[move-along]

Recompense (Pietro x Reader)

Character: Pietro Maximoff / Quicksilver

Prompt: Just a passing thought :P

Warnings: Some swearing, mentions of drugs (Phenazapam), French lingerie.

Length: 1697 words

It was official. Exactly six months ago you and Pietro had become 'official'. You rolled your eyes at the thought. It had been the happiest and fullest months of your life. If it hadn't taken the fastest man in the world so much time to hype up the courage to ask you out, you probably would be married by now. It had started a few years ago with some overt flirting on missions. Followed closely by lots of gym sessions and movie nights. And then there was the incident with the whipped cream which really set things in motion.

You stretched and rolled over in your bed with a smile. You'd been having the most lovely dream. Pietro had been murmuring words of his native tongue into your ear making your heart race. You sighed. Your searching hands reached out in hopes of finding the warm body that was normally enthusiastic about morning cuddles. However his side was empty. You rubbed your eyes and peered around the room.

There were two half empty red wine glasses sitting on your dresser accompanied by a few empty bottles. Unconsciously you smirked. The night before had been quite an adventure. Lots of wine. Lots of laughter. Lots of Pietro.

That's when you noticed your pounding head.

You grabbed your phone and read through the notifications. That was strange. There were twenty messages. One or two worryingly asking where you were from your parents. A few from missed meetings and appointments.

What was going on?

Unconsciously you glanced at the date. Thursday the 22nd of June. Huh?

But yesterday was Tuesday. How the hell had you missed an entire day?

Stumbling towards the bathroom, you grabbed the painkillers from the shelf and bumped a small bottle into the sink. Holding it up to the light and squinting you caught the word.

Phenazapam.

You knew exactly what that drug could do. You'd been knocked unconcious. You'd been drugged! What the hell? You had missed your morning appointment at the dentist. A quick coffee date with your mother. And the mission...

The mission!

You threw clothes on as fast as possible and raced upstairs to the penthouse of Avengers Tower. The elevator couldn't go fast enough for your liking.

"Friday! What the hell is going on?"

"Miss (Y/L/N), the team left for the mission yesterday. Mr Maximoff informed your teammates that you were unwell and unable to make the mission."

"Unwell?" you shouted, storming from the elevator as the doors opened. "Unwell? I've been training for this for the last week. Pietro bloody well drugged me!"

This mission had been priority. The military had briefed the Avengers on a developing situation. Mercenaries were holding US troops hostage in the Middle East. It sounded straightforward. That was until you heard who was behind it.

Your brother.

If only you could speak to him. Reason with him. Apologise. Maybe he would come home and let go of this ridiculous vendetta that was costing so many lives.

The military were bound by peace-keeping treaties and unable to deploy further forces to rescue the soldiers. It was top secret. It would be straight in and straight out.

Of course, at the time of the briefing, you hadn't understood Pietro's hesitance. He had been quiet. As soon as you left the situation room he had barely said a word.

"Piet, is something wrong?" you'd asked quietly as you had both arrived downstairs at your shared suite.

"It's nothing. I'm just tired," he had purred, wrapping his arms around you waist with more speed than you could comprehend.

Little to say, you had forgotten the subject even quicker.

"The team are inbound. ETA is 3 minutes. Mission successful," reported Friday, breaking you from your thoughts.

You could see the Quinjet in the distance. Cross-armed you stood on the landing pad and waited.

The jet touched roughly onto the tarmac before tucking its wings in. The cargo door lowered. Obviously the team had guessed your absence wasn't your own choice. Tony's eyes were alight with excitement as he met yours with a grin.

"Sonic," he called behind him, "I don't think she's pleased."

That's when you saw him. He looked sheepish. With a small gust of wind, he was standing a few metres in front of you with his hands surrendered in the air.

"Darling..."

"I don't want to hear it, Pietro! You drugged me!" you shouted shrilly.

You could see Tony snickering in the background and Steve trying to drag him away.

"Love, please. It was for your own safety. I couldn't risk..."

"I'm perfectly capable of looking after myself, Maximoff. I don't need you making my decisions for me!" you spat, shooting fire daggers with your eyes.

"It wasn't that..."

"Then what was it, Pietro? Because I'm struggling to see why you needed to intervene."

"Your brother," he murmured in his accented drawl. His eyes dropped to the floor. "He...he...sent me a message."

"A message," you asked, anger falling away as surprise took over.

"Just before the briefing. He said he would release the two hundred hostages if I handed you over," his words were barely audible, "He made it very clear that two hundred lives would be spared for just one death. Yours."

The room was dead silent now. Steve had managed to corral every one from the room.

A tear fell from your eyes.

"He wants me dead?"

"Darling, please understand. I wanted to spare you the pain of all this. I didn't want you anywhere near him. But I knew you would fight me. I...I just...I couldn't risk losing you."

In an instant he was pressed against you. He held you tightly in his arms as you let grief overcome you. You considered fighting him off but that was more energy than you had. You thought your brother had forgiven you over the horrid incident in Nigeria that had gifted you both with powers.

"Promise me you'll never do that again," you demanded, meeting his eyes after a few minutes.

"I swear upon my soul, from this day forward, to never make a decision for you," he was so solemn that you couldn't help but forgive him. He knew he was in the wrong and he was genuinely remorseful.

"I love you, (Y/N)."

It was his first time saying those words. In those few seconds you went from valley low to mountain high.

"I love you too, Pietro. But don't think you get off that easy."

He snickered and pulled you gently towards he door to attend the team debriefing.

The mission had been successful to some extent. You learned the soldiers had been evacuated. The downside was that Natasha had suffered an extremely deep gash to her thigh, which Bruce had stitched on the return flight, and Bucky had dislocated his good arm.

While debrief was always essential, the Tower was always filled with happiness and relief after a successful mission. It normally meant a day off and a lot of drinking. Though today, the team opted for a simple feast. Each member ordered as much food as possible from their favourite restaurant and pooled the goods to share on the kitchen bench.

$1000 of takeaway food. What could be better?

While the merriment took place you let your mind slip to what kind of torture Pietro could expect.

Wanda caught your eye and came and sat with you on the couch.

"I'm sorry, (Y/N). If anyone knows how testing Pietro is, it is me,' she sighed with a smile on her face, "He's an idiot but a lovable idiot."

You nodded and watched Pietro talking intently with Clint.

"I've forgiven him," you smiled, "But I'm not going to let him off that easy."

Wanda paused in thought.

"Pietro doesn't respond to threats yet when he isn't allowed something he acts like a child."

Hmmm. That had given you an idea.

Later that night back in the comfort of your shared suite, Pietro was doing his best to unwind by watching TV. You would have joined him but he was watching on fast forward.

You slipped into your bedroom and riffled through your walk in robe. Shifting through a drawer of scarves, you found the box you had been saving for Pietro's birthday.

Nat had dragged you shopping last month and insisted on this purchase.

You laughed quietly to yourself as you opened the lid and ran your fingers over the French lace lingerie. This was going to be good.

After much fiddling and messing of hair up to add to the effect, you glanced in the mirror. The black lingerie was skimpy at best. You adjusted one suspender strapped stocking and then treaded softly to the lounge room.

"Piet," you cooed, "I'm going to bed. I'm still feeling a little groggy."

His eyes didn't leave the TV screen.

"Mmmm, love I'll be in soon."

"Uhhh no. I think it's best you sleep on the lounge tonight," you purred, "Just to make sure the lesson sinks in."

Pietro's eyes instantly shot to you.

His jaw dropped audibly as his eyes traced over your body. Before you could process what had happened, you were pressed against the wall behind you, gasping for air from being winded.

"No...no...no...," you hummed when you'd caught your breath. "Not tonight. The drugs have left me with a headache."

You caught his eye and smirked.

"I know exactly what you're doing, (Y/N)," Pietro growled. "Is this my punishment?"

His lips found the sweet spot on your neck that he knew you couldn't resist. He placed feather kisses along the skin. But you stayed strong.

"I'm just innocently going to bed," you said, struggling to keep the laugh from your voice, "I don't know what you're talking about."

His warm hands ran over your hips as he kept you pressed against the wall.

"You temptress. You minx. Are you trying to send me insane?" he laughed.

"Maybe," you murmured and with that you shoved him off and swayed towards your bedroom door, "Maybe next time you'll think twice before you mess with your girlfriend."

You snapped the door locked with a click and laughed to yourself.

"Recompense is a bitch, hey?"

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