#in the second because he truly doesn’t think he has anything to hide (which says a lot in itself)

[thebaldursmouthgazette]

I think people have it in their head that solas in inquisition is his “true self” but like. He’s manipulating the inquisitor the whole time too. That’s not his true self, that’s another mask he’s using as a tool

His plan was to use the orb to tear down the veil after the conclave. He allowed corypheus to find the orb, with the goal of swooping in after the explosion at the conclave to rip open the fade from there. The inquisitor disrupted his plans as much as they disrupted corypheus’ plans, and as much as corypheus disrupted his plans by staying alive. In that moment, both the inquisitor and corypheus are the people who fucked up his plans.

He doesn’t join the inquisition out of some altruistic desire to save the world from corypheus. He joins the inquisition because he wants the orb so he can tear down the veil. Which means stopping corypheus and retrieving it from him AND either retrieving the mark from the inquisitor or finding a way to use it through the inquisitor to his purpose.

He doesn’t stay with the inquisitor following the conclave explosion to save their life. He’s there to study the mark and figure out how to remove it. He can’t, so keeping you alive to preserve it is the next best thing.

When he talks to you about stuff like blood magic, or debates on the personhood of spirits, he is not speaking as a humble elven apostate trying to convince you of his point of view, he’s gauging your reaction to things to learn about you and how to manipulate you. In one of these conversations he even brings up a hypothetical world without the veil, because he’s trying to gauge the inquisitors reaction tho that possibility (which is very much not hypothetical to him)

At the end of the game it has become obvious he’s not getting the mark from the inquisitor anytime soon, he’s not going to be able to manipulate the inquisitor to join his cause, and the orb is broken. He has no use for the inquisitor or the inquisition, so he leaves. It’s all a pretence, and it’s one he abandoned in an instant.

This image he presents of a humble elven apostate with generally good intentions who journeys in the fade and has knowledge that has given him unconventional views he wishes to debate on is not who he truly is, it’s a mask he’s put on to get to a position where he can try to manipulate things

[moonstruckme]

hey sooooo I have a fic request for u babe! What about reader with Remus and it's like the first time she's sleeping over and she unexpectedly gets her period and she's like sorry I ruined our night I can go home and Remus is just like what?? No stay and just him soothing her through the cramps

Thank you for your request ml!

cw: period pains, mention of blood, brief allusion to mdni activities (though they truly could just have been making out if you want)

Remus Lupin x fem!reader ♡ 960 words

It’s rare, this early in your relationship, that you and Remus can sit down to watch a film and actually watch it. But it seems you’re both thoroughly spent from partaking in those other activities so frequently during the day, and now you’re both just winding down for the night, waiting to see who will admit to wanting to go to bed first. 

Remus is just as content with this, your arm pressed against his and your head heavy on his shoulder, feeling your ribs expand and contract with relaxed breaths. He could get used to having you here. It’s taking more restraint than he could have imagined to keep himself from just offering you his spare key and begging you to come and go as you please. 

“Oh, shit.” 

It’s a whisper, not particularly alarmed, but the way your muscles go stiff tells Remus it’s not nothing. You sit up, taking your weight off of him. 

“What is it?” he asks. 

You don’t answer him at first, squeezing your eyes shut. Your expression is one of unmistakable mortification. You look agonized. Remus tries to let you have the time you need to think, but a worm of unease eats further into his gut with every second of your silence. 

You push out an exhale that sounds laborious. When you open your eyes, there’s enough apology in them for a capital crime. Remus thinks that he’d probably forgive you if you told him you’d committed murder (and maybe that should scare him more than it does). 

“I think I’ve just stained your couch,” you admit. 

“Okay,” he says slowly. He doesn’t see the cause for such distress, but he also isn’t sure what you’re talking about. You’re not holding a drink, so how could you…oh. “Oh, is that all?” 

His nonplussed reaction doesn’t seem to affect your unease. “I’m so sorry,” you say, wincing. 

Remus tuts. “Don’t be, you can’t help it. Do you have anything with you, or do I need to nip to the store?” 

“I’ve got stuff.” You stand to get your bag, turning to grimace at where you’d been sitting on the couch. 

Remus’ reaction skews in the opposite direction. It’s only a splotch; by your response he’d been half convinced you were sitting in a veritable puddle of blood. 

“I’m so sorry,” you say again. “I’ll be right back.” 

“You’re alright, love,” Remus promises you. “Take whatever time you need.” 

While you’re in the bathroom, he addresses the stain. Truly, it’s no great hassle. With friends like his it’s hardly the first trial his couch has faced, and besides that Remus has an unusual amount of experience with getting blood out of things. 

It’s soaking when you come back, a small rag covering the spot from your view. You’ve changed into your pajamas, presumably because you’d stained your pants as well, but this is far from an unwelcome development. You look terribly cuddly. 

“You alright?” Remus asks as you come back to stand by the couch. 

“Yeah,” you say, somewhat quietly. You seem suddenly timid, like a guest in his home. He wants to hug you. 

“Does it hurt?” he presses. 

Your mouth pulls to the side, which is answer enough. “A little. It’s been hurting for a while, I just didn’t recognize it for what it was. Sorry, I wasn’t expecting it this early.” 

“Oh, sweetheart.” He reaches for you, hiding his disappointment when you only put your hand in his. “That’s not a very nice surprise, is it?” 

“No,” you agree with a halfhearted smile. When Remus squeezes your fingers, you squeeze back, and you at least seem up to holding his gaze even if you still look sheepish. “I’m sorry to ruin our night. I can go home.” 

“What?” A bit of hurt bullies its way into Remus’ tone. Your expression changes like you’re surprised to hear it. “No, I think you should stay.” 

You look hesitant, so he tries again, gentler this time. 

“I mean, if you’re hurting and you want to be in your own home, I understand,” Remus says, “but I hope you’re not leaving on my account. I’d like for you to be here.” 

You watch his face as though looking for discrepancies. “Really?” 

“Yeah, sweetheart,” he says earnestly. “Of course I’d love to keep you. Getting your period doesn’t change anything, except that now you’re in pain and I’d like even more for you to stay so I can be with you.” 

The muscles around your eyes relax, your expression softening into something so tender Remus feels his own heart turn to mush. 

He gives your hand a little tug, and you take the cue, sitting back down on the couch between his open legs. 

“Can I put my hand here?” he asks you, touching your stomach. 

“Sure,” you say, still somewhat timidly. You take his hand in yours, moving it down a couple inches until his fingers are skimming the soft fabric of your pajama bottoms. “But it’s more like here.” 

“Oh, okay. Can I put my hand there?” 

With your nod, Remus slips his hand beneath your waistband, to that plush stretch of skin between your belly button and your panty line. He presses down gently. 

“Oh.” Your body goes lax. 

Remus chuckles, dropping his head to kiss your shoulder. “That helps?” 

“Yeah,” you sigh contentedly. “A lot, actually. Thank you.” 

“Don’t mention it.” He pushes on a tense spot experimentally, rewarded when you sink further into his front. “Just don’t try to run out on me the next time something like this comes up, yeah?��� 

You agree readily. “Mhm. I wouldn’t have, if I’d known this was going to happen.” 

Remus smudges another kiss onto your shoulder, smug. “Just remember this then, I suppose.” 

[koenigami]

tags : fluff, reverse comfort (kind of?), nightmares wc : 1k synopsis : his solace as much as his biggest fear

“No… don’t!-”

Caleb never knew that he could get so dependent on you. He'd probably go as far as to say that he's gotten addicted to your presence, in every sense of way. 

Specifically, on nights when sleep seems like a dystopian idea, a dream so far away and unreachable. Either because he's simply unable to fall asleep in the first place, or because haunting images won’t let him rest. 

Waking up to your body snuggled against his, hearing your soft breaths and seeing your serene expression, all of it is enough to immediately alleviate the lingering tightness in his chest, unlike when he has to go through all of that when he’s by himself. Tonight however, not even that seems to help at calming the persisting storm inside his mind. 

Long lost memories keep flashing behind his eyes, making his eyelids twitch almost uncontrollably and his chest rise and fall unsteadily. It doesn’t take long until you’re woken up by the broken pleas falling from his lips, and his trashing body which is physically trying to fend off whatever is robbing him of a peaceful night’s sleep. 

“Caleb?” You reach out to cautiously place a hand on his chest. Besides the sweaty shirt, he almost seems to be overheating considering how hot to the touch his body feels. Your breath staggers when you realise how much the nightmare is affecting him. It’s almost as if he’s frozen, limbs completely rigid and tense except for his head that turns from side to side. 

“Come on, baby. You’re alright, it’s just a dream.” But your words seem to hit an impenetrable wall, as he keeps on getting louder until he’s nearly screaming. With teary eyes, you hastily grab his right shoulder and try to shake him awake, unaware of the fact that doing so would do anything but calm him down. 

It all happens in a matter of seconds as you watch him shoot up, the sight akin to someone diving out of the deepest parts of the sea and desperate to finally get a breath of air. Something cold and hard envelops your wrist so tightly that it makes you wince in discomfort, and you’re pulled forward against his heated torso. 

With unfocused eyes, Caleb varily scrutinizes you before his gaze drifts off to the space around you. Ever so slowly, the fog in his head seems to dissipate as you watch his eyes visibly regain clarity while his grip on you lessens finally. As if fearing that he had burned you, he lets go of your wrist with a suddenness that makes you instantly recoil.

The sound of his laboured breaths fills the room, and when he eventually looks back at you, you think you’d preferred if he had just ripped your heart right out of your chest instead. There’s a slight shake in his left hand as he reaches out to you with a certain hesitation that makes him look as if he were afraid of scaring you away. 

On one hand, his fear might be reasonable, considering that it has always been him taking care of you. Always him comforting you, always him covering your ears and shielding you from the scary outside world, always him holding your hand and never letting go. Burdening you with further ballast would go against everything that he has been working up to until now. 

“I-I’m sorry. Did I wake you?” 

On the other hand, you remember that as a child, you often wondered whether there was actually anything Caleb was truly scared of. He’d been your personal little hero at that time, and ever one of the most, if not the most reliable and helpful person in your life. 

Proclaiming himself as selfish and overly defensive when it comes to you, he has never been the one to deny his flaws, especially ever since he’s stepped back into your life. In this moment, as your fingertips gently graze his until your palm is nestled perfectly in his, you wonder whether you’ve been the selfish one all this time. Now, as he desperately tries to hide his pain behind a strained smile, you wonder whether you’ve relied so much on him that you never made him think of the possibility that he could do the same. Rely on you.

Caleb’s gaze falls to the reddened skin along your wrist, and combined with the tears lingering in your eyes and threatening to stain your beautiful cheeks, he immediately jumps to conclusions. “I did this, didn’t I? Are you alright? Does it hurt a lot? Shit, I’m so-”

“I’m fine, but…” The streetlight from outside enters the room through the flowy curtains, and reflects in your eyes. Those same eyes carry so much sorrow, pain as well as anger. Yet, he’s unsure towards whom the latter is directed. “But you’re not, Caleb.”

He smiles. And the fact that you can tell that it is a genuine expression angers you even further because you know that he’s completely disregarding his own feelings right now. It’s just another attempt at hiding the anguish that he’s being put through, and an attempt at hiding the things plaguing his mind, even though you’ve reassured him countless times that there is nothing that could scare you away from him. “That’s okay.” As long as you are. 

In the end, there’s nothing you can do except climb into his lap and hold him close to you. You can’t do more than lean in and press a gentle peck against his forehead as a silent prayer for the turmoil inside his mind to stop hurting him. Because despite his futile reassurances, you can feel how fast his heart is still beating against his chest. You can still feel the slightest tremor in his hands as they cling to your waist.

“One day, we will be fine. Eventually.” He whispers and presses his nose against the column of your neck, relishing in the way you smell, and how you perfectly fit in his arms. Because as it turns out, there certainly is at least one thing that Caleb is scared of, and it is for his nightmares to come true. 

[sanguine-prince]

i’m sure i’m not the first to say something like this, but let me tell you about my poc-passing-as-white jay gatsby headcanon!!

for some background, in the 1920s there was an interesting shift regarding (white) skin tones. previously, tans were viewed as a sign that a person worked out in the fields, and therefore a trademark of the lower class. however, slowly after the industrial revolution, it increasingly became a representation of luxury, since the rich upper class would have the time to lounge about and sunbathe at their leisure.

i say all this to show that a poc gatsby would have the ostensible class and wealth for a tan, which would ‘excuse’ a slightly browner skin tone in the public eye.

(the 20s was also the setting of passing by nella larsen, so that’s neat.)

in my vision, he’s biracial (maybe his mother was black & his father was a german immigrant) with skin light enough to pass for white.

the fact that nick states that gatsby keeps his hair neatly groomed and cut might be to prevent it from curling up.

additionally, i think it could contrast tom’s white supremacy & his fear of poc social progress.

it would also create a deeper divide between gatsby and daisy, and once again the contrast between him and tom. in my mind, daisy wouldn’t know about it until the point where tom reveals everything about gatsby’s bootlegging etc. with jay revealing it to her in the car ride back (oops then she hits myrtle).

then, when she chooses tom and the life of comfort, wealth, status, etc that their marriage offers, she also rejects not only gatsby’s new money but also his race.

it’s a lot more thematically significant for the american dream as well—it’s still unattainable and essentially tainted by capitalism, and it also emphasizes that it’s restricted to the white upper class. social mobility only becomes available to gatsby when he disguises his racial identity.

similarly, it fits with gatsby’s identity reconstruction—the quintessential american is white, rich, and educated.

daisy and tom have that ticket into society because they have that inherent thing that he will never have—pedigree, in both class and race. that’s something that even nick has.

(in my mind, he tells nick all about it the night before he dies & nick understands as best he can and doesn’t think less of him, because it further highlights the differences between his & gatsby’s relationship v. gatsby’s relationship with daisy; namely, the transparency -> acceptance give-and-take that he and daisy never had. because of having to hide himself from daisy in order to maintain her affection, he builds an expectation that he must be someone that he is not as well as developing a transactional definition of love (he gives, and people love him as long as he can continue to give) in order to be loved. therefore, nick’s immediate curiosity and fascination with who he truly is is foreign to him. not to get too into their dynamic lmao i just think it’s really interesting.)

finally, the very last part where nick is sitting and looking at the bay and thinking about the first immigrants and their dreams and how gatsby embodied the purity and naivety of those dreams is further exemplified by his racial ‘otherness.’

and there’s,,, technically nothing in the book to explicitly refute this from what i remember!

(n.b.: it has been a hot second since i’ve read tgg, so lmk if i’ve got anything wrong!)

[kisses4reid]

warnings: mentions of being unlovable, angst, happy ending, love.

Spencer’s hands wrung with each other, the cool breeze in the car park pushing his hair from his forehead, “I love you.”

You blinked, heart sinking into the pit of your stomach, breath catching. You stood in horror, gulping and immediately lowering your gaze to anything but Spencer.

To yourself, you were an outcast in every sense of the word. No one likes you, and no one would pick you out of a room full of people. Why would they, anyways? You’re you, and you can never change that. Who would want to be stuck with you? Anyone who’s ever admitted to liking or loving you had told you it was a mistake, that you wasted their time, they should’ve spent their time on something worthwhile.

You didn’t want to put Spencer through that.

“And it’s completely fine if you don’t feel the same it’s just- I know we say we won’t profile each other but I kind of think that you might- maybe- like me back and-“

“Stop, Spencer.” You looked down at your heels, shifting your weight nervously.

Spencer obliged and gulped, eyebrows furrowing. His nerves were visually increasing, as were yours. The wind was loud, so was your heart.

“Spencer,” you sighed. How could you do this to him? Deny his affection, when it’s the one thing you crave, the one thing you’ve been thinking about for the past two years. “Spencer. You can’t do that.”

His face crinkled in confusion and then relief, “I know, it’s a bad place to confess things- We could go down to the park in front of your house or, that café you like?” He had a smile on his face, a cute one, one you didn’t want to leave.

“You can’t love me Spencer.” You replied, holding his gaze, heart breaking when his face dropped.

“Oh.”

Your eyes searched each other’s, and you felt like you would throw up at any second.

You turned to go, assuming that would be it. The end of your friendship, the end of your feelings and his. Until his voice croaked,

“Why not?”

You stopped, your car was only a few short steps away, tears brimming your eyes. Turning, you took a breath and decided avoiding his eyes was the best way you were going to get through this without crying. You’ve cried in front of him before, you’ve lied as well, and you’ve told him secrets nobody else knows. Why hold it back now? Why hide yourself from someone who loves you?

He won’t for long though. That’s how it always goes.

“You just can’t. It’s not… right-“

“All we have to do is talk to HR-“

“You don’t love me Spencer. You don’t, you won’t. Not now, not in the future. It doesn’t happen with me, okay? You just need some sleep and, I don’t know,” you ran your shaking fingers through your hair, tears welling onto mascara covered lashes before Spencer moved and grabbed your hand tight.

“You don’t know that! I do love you, Y/n. More than anything else,”

“No you don’t-“

“You don’t know how I feel-“

“I know how you will feel.”

Spencer flinched, hand dropping yours, the sudden absence of his touch freezing your wrists. He took a breath and trailed your face with his eyes, squinting them in disbelief.

“Y/n. I’ve loved you for years, nothing has changed- if anything my love for you has increased which statistically goes against everything that research suggests about relationships but I truly do believe it.”

A shiver ran down your spine, a tear rolled down your cheek. He looked sorrowful and hurt. You had caused it.

“I’m sorry Spencer.”

His shoulders slumped, “D-don’t say sorry. I respect your decision, um.”

“I love you too.”

The words escaped you before you could even think them, your eyes mirroring Spencer’s wide ones. And you continued with no second thought, “I have loved you, but, I don’t want to lose you.”

“How could you lose me?”

“Everyone I love leaves. It’s because of me. I don’t want you to get hurt because of me.”

You stared at each other for seconds, moments, what felt like minutes. You hadn’t even realised you’d been sobbing until a tear drop landed on your shoes.

“Y/n you aren’t unloveable. I’m living proof. Let me be proof, please. I will love you and stay with you until I can’t tie my own shoes and my dentures fall into my oatmeal.” He looked tired, disappointed. He had worked up all of this courage, done all of the confirmation you might have liked him back- and you did! But why, why, weren’t you letting it happen? “I can love you, I won’t get hurt, you won’t hurt me. The only thing I’ve seen you hurt it your own ankle trying to chase the ice cream truck outside Rossi’s house. Please, Y/n.” You stood a metre apart, but he closed it, “Please,” and took your hands.

Your heart pounded and you looked into his eyes. There was something there you’d never seen before. Eagerness, longing, yearning.

“Okay.” You whispered.

“What?”

“Okay.”

“Really?” Spencer broke out into a smile, causing you to slowly grin.

“Yeah.”

“Oh my god, thank you.”

taglist (open!!): @jeffswh0re @reap3erslov3 @candyd1es

[readerwithsalt]

I think Hazel should’ve gone with Nico instead down to Tartarus. Without a prophecy or quest bc Nico and Hazel don’t play by the rule book.

Then we could’ve gotten an adorable underworld sibling bonding book with both of them hilariously being unaware of modern stuff. And telling each other stuff they’ve learned.

They ditch both of their boyfriends who are freaking out because they don’t know where they snuck off to. And since Nico said in HoH that when he and Hazel shared power that anything felt possible, they truly believe they can succeed.

(Also Hazel understands death and wouldn’t be complaining every five seconds like Will was. Maybe it would’ve been more original and less percabeth 2.0 (but worse)

It begins with Nico leaving Camp Jupiter, having visited Hazel (for what he believes could be the last time) and telling Will he would be back in a week or so. A lie Nico tells to keep his boyfriend from coming after him to Tartarus (way more in character of him lol) as he believes a child of Apollo would easily be snuffed out down there.

Nico realizes he’s throwing a good possible future away by sneaking out to do this, but the nightmares have become so twisted and unbearably disturbing that he fears he’s going to lose his mind either way if he doesn’t manage to find the person calling out his name every night.

He also doesn’t like when others are left behind.

Since Will has insisted Nico not use shadowtravel to get back to New York from California, Nico says he’s going to take the train instead.

But Hazel KNOWS someone is off. Knows Nico is hiding something. Something that causes her brothers eyes to tinge red when he hugs her, gives her a wobbly goodbye, and squeezes just a bit too tight. Something that causes the paper thin smile he gives her when she sees him off to board his train.

Something that inexplicably makes her sneak onto that train behind him.

Upon Nico putting his stuff away in the closet of his train compartment and finding a head of cinnamon brown curls say ‘ouch’ when he accidentally throws his suitcase on top of a stowaway sister, being mad is a bit of an understatement…

When Hazel knowingly questions why he’s so upset at her, Nico suddenly has no words.

They eat in the trains dining room, Chinese noodles with strangely large fortune cookies that they save for later.

Hazel doesn’t manage to get anything out of Nico as they sit side by side next to a window, watching the world whoosh by and making idle chatter that Nico only seems to be half heartedly replying to. Seeing her brothers zoned out gaze, thin hands shaking slightly, the ever present tinge of red and fear ringing his large dark eyes, Hazel knows this is something more than wrong.

If the bravest demigod she’s ever met looks this terrified, to her it can only mean one thing.

Her suspicion is proven correct when her and Nico crack open their fortune cookies from dinner and instead of a thin piece of white with a generic quote on the paper… two small black parchments with gold lettering come out instead.

Two warnings. From what god? They don’t know.

Hazel’s questioning dies on her tongue when she sees the thin lines of tears falling from her brothers eyes. She doesn’t ask him anything else that night, just wraps a hug around him as frail shoulders shake in her arms.

The next day Nico acts as if nothing happened and asks her if frank knows she’s okay which she sheepishly replies that he probably doesn’t even know where she is. Nico says the same about Will, and they decide to not tell their current boyfriends anything yet.

Yet…. After the incident of last night and the fortune cookie parchment mentioning a place that hazel has definitely heard of before, she knows exactly what Nico is planning.

And she’s not letting anything happen to him as long as she’s alive. Even if Nico insists on pretending Hazel doesn’t know anything.

After the long train ride and Nico questioning this one random passenger for an hour about the strange gaming device in his hands (a Nintendo lol) and the siblings chatting about mundane things happening in their camps; they finally are in Manhattan.

Hazel is now done with letting Nico pretend.

Before she can get a word out the word ‘No’ has already passed her brothers lips. They fight. Their first actual fight ever. One that ends in sobs wrecking through Nicos body and pangs of guilt, sadness, and anger piercing Hazels heart.

But one thing rises above them all:

Protectiveness.

After making up and Nico realizing Hazels not ever going to back down given the look in her eyes, he realizes he doesn’t have a say in this. She is coming with him whether he likes it or not. Fear plummets in his stomach.

After a trip to Target for food and supplies for the trip that neither of them currently want to think about because what they are planning to do is… insane. Literally insane. But as Nico remembers that feeling of the time he and Hazel shared their power that one time, a thread of hope starts to weave in his heart. Psychotic hope, but still hope nonetheless.

They shadowtravel to Central Park, Nico not feeling nearly as woozy with Hazels help. He also delightfully finds out that coffee seems to cure the fatigue from using that side of his powers lol.

They manage to open the doors of Orpheus’ by ‘borrowing’ a guys phone as they see him jog by, and play some random song called ‘into the dark’ (by death cab for cuties lol) from the guys playlist holding it up to the opening.

The song sounds like another warning. They both ignore it.

They travel down dark steps, hands clasped. They talk in the quiet empty smelling air, comfortable in the underground silence. Until faint light hits their faces. The ever constant line of fresh souls lead them to Charons boat where they are taken to the land of the dead.

They now must avoid detection from their father at all costs. Nicos not worried about Charon tattling on them to Hades since he doesn’t get paid enough anyway (lol). Nico takes Hazel to meet the trogs new home down in the underworld (one thing I liked in tsats).

Hazel adores them and their funny outfits.

The trogs tell Nico that his ‘really deep tunnel’ he requested they dig is almost done, and Hazel is hurt that Nicos been planning this so long without telling her or anybody. They make Nico and Hazel spend the night with them before they go and they play with the baby trogs and dance together, trying to forget what they’re going to do tomorrow. They fall asleep to the sound of baby trogs giggling next to them.

The next day Nico attempts to sneak away from Hazel one more time and Hazel explodes at him. Anger making her say some things she doesn’t want to and Nico apologizing profusely but saying he’s angry at himself for allowing her to come with him.

They are interrupted by the trogs leader saying the Tunnel Into the Dark is finished. They can feel the intense suction of The Pit even from several feet away. Memories of the first time Nico was sucked down threaten to spill over and embarrassingly makes him want to run and hide somewhere.

But he feels Hazels hand in his and that strange, wonderful feeling of intense power. And love. And then they are straddling a boat the trogs pull from the river of forgotten dreams (the Styx I think) and with one final push… they are falling.

On the boat it feels like they’re floating.

They fall for a very long time. But Nico notices it’s not as long as the first time. Or maybe it doesn’t feel that long bc someone is here beside him.

They use their shared geokinisis powers to make an enormous slide of bones, black dirt, and stone.

When the boat hits the ground Nico almost gets flung face first into the Phlegethon river. They drink from it and begin the search.

They devastatingly find out the voice was never Bob bc Bob was absorbed into tartarus’s breastplate (like in actual canon HoH) but that it was something else entirely.

Something that makes Nico perhaps the angriest he’s ever been.

They find Jason’s soul down there. Something that shocks both Nico and Hazel to the core. Nico thinks it’s a trick but soon can tell that the soul that is looking at him so coldly and unfamiliar is actually Jason.

A different Jason. One with hatred illuminating every thread of his form.

That’s why Nico didn’t know where Jason’s spirit had gone. It had been intercepted by something and Jason has turned into a mania like his mother. A spirit that fumes on hatred and forgotten dreams. The one thing he never wanted to be.

Nico cries over the horrid inevitable fate of Bob and promises that he will ALWAYS be remembered. He doesn’t have much time to think on this though because right now a livid son of Jupiter is rising higher and higher above Nico and Hazel, the threat is obvious.

In Jason’s manic state he blames Nico for not checking on him and seeing that he got a peaceful afterlife and greives the fact that Piper and Leo and Nico ‘never bothered’ to attend his funeral. He blames the gods, his father especially, for being unworthy of their demigod children. He blames the underworlds justice system not following up on his missing soul and dismissing his entire life as if it was nothing.

As if he was never a hero. Never anything at all.

Nicos is crushed, but realizes that Jason’s being manipulated by something. A dream demon that wanted to trap Nico the entire time in order to consume his energy/power and shadow travel out of his prison and into the mortal world bc it would’ve taken him years to get out otherwise.

The dream demon used its powers to intercept Jason’s soul thanks to Caligulas cursed blade that had killed him, and reached inside his mind to find out about Nico and figure out the best way to get Nico to come back to his worst nightmare.

And now that Hazel and Nico are both there that’s double the power to consume.

Turns out the entire thing was simply about a selfish monster playing with demigods. A tale as old as the beginning of mythology.

The demon taunts them saying he used Jason - son of the King of the Gods - as a little toy in order to easily bring his meal to him. Remarking how easy and quick it was to bait someone like Nico.

Someone who can never leave someone behind.

And Hazel, how easy it was to get her to follow her brother. Taunting that she’s just as stupid, gullible, and selfless…

The children of the underworld snap.

And all Hades breaks loose. Signaling to every monster within a 100 mile radius to know exactly where they are.

They battle together but the waves and waves of monsters is just too extreme. On the brink of inevitable death, a certain goddess appears.

The one who gave them the warnings in the form of fortune cookies. The one that sensed Nicos need for vengeance.

They escape with Nemesis help, but she wants something equally valuable in return for helping Nico and Hazel escape. Nico breaks down and agrees to relinquish all of his precious memories of Bianca and his past life in return for Hazel and a new possible future. A true balance in his heart.

Choosing Hazel over memories of Bianca makes Hazel cry and they bond stronger.

Strangely enough Nico becomes happier without the constant grief of his older sister on his shoulder.

In a way choosing to let her go the same way she did when she chose to be with the hunters.

And then once again when she chose reincarnation.

They still have to worry about Jason though who is constantly causing blood thunderstorms across Tartarus’s sky and wrecking havoc all over the place.

(Also it would be so funny to see Jason literally just… chase Nico and Hazel all over the place… flying after them screaming while they run for their lives bc they can’t see or hear due to the bloodstorm & huge booms of thunder and shit lol.)

Hazel manages to trap Jason in a kaleidoscope of his own storm and shadow with her mist magic and her and Nico manage to shadowtravel him to the ghostly boat that will lead them out. She lets him out but he’s struggling so much in his metal binds that Nico has to knock him out with a punch to the face bc he’s the only one that can touch ghosts.

They ferry up the river Acheron out of Tartarus and chat about what the fuck just happened down there.

Hades awaits them when they arrive.

He’s very angered that his two only living children disobeyed his strict order of not going down there, but relinquishes it eventually when he realizes how tired and beat up his kids look and praises them instead. Hades turns to Nico and states that his older sister would be proud of him. Which Nico replies with confusion saying he doesn’t have an older sister which saddens hades as he figures out what Nico had to give away.

He offers them both something they want.

Anything.

Hazel wishes for Jason to be cured of his mania, and Nico wishes to give Jason back a chance at life. As he still had so much work to do for the gods and goddesses that did not have shrines and action figures to respect them.

Both of these things surprise hades but he grudgingly does so (bc Jason is a son of Jupiter/zeus) saying that Nico and Hazel are indeed very special children.

Although Hades honors Nicos wish he can’t simply let a soul leave the underworld without a final test (hazel being the exception) and does something he did thousands of years ago with another hero begging for his wife’s soul back.

He tells Nico and Hazel they can lead Jason out of the underworld but only if they don’t look back at him. Across the fields of asphodel, across cerebus’ cavern, across the river styx, the journey on Charons boat, back up the many steps that lead to the mortal world…. If they look back once their friend is gone forever. Again…

They distract themselves with a deck of mythomagic cards Hazel stole from Frank (cause she wanted to know why her brother and boyfriend liked the game so much) much to Nico’s embarrassed delight. Nico’s so into explaining the game to Hazel, that the intense need to check if Jason’s still behind them dissipates a bit.

They only notice they’re outside when a wave of sunlight blinds them both and a large figure grabs them from behind.

Jason hugs the daylights out of Nico & Hazel crying like a little kid as months of memories of torment in Tartarus resurface into guilt.

Hades thinks it’s slightly amusing to see a tall muscular son of Jupiter being consoled by his two smaller children as he mentally watches the scene play out from his godly throne.

Nico says he kept the plans of the shrines Jason wanted to build and says maybe he can help with decorating (lol)

I’m gonna have to get an artist to draw a fancomic of this to heal my soul.

Also…. What the fuck did I just write?

[eurydicees]

Where’s the trans!Kyotani and trans!Iwaizumi fic (those were the characters right?)

HELLO YES SO GLAD YOU'RE HERE, THANK YOU FOR ASKING!!!!

solidarity, or some friendship of the like

summary: kyoutani gets his period, and it fucking sucks. iwaizumi is also there, and that sucks a little less. prompt: none pairings: kentarou kyoutani & hajime iwaizumi (platonic) words: 2829  warnings: discussion of periods, implied insecurities about being trans

Kyoutani is hiding. Practice starts in five minutes. He knows that practice starts in five minutes. He can hear the club room clock ticking, loud as a bomb’s countdown, even from the bathroom stall. He’s going to be late, or he’s going to miss practice entirely. 

For once, he doesn’t actually want to skip. Or, he does want to skip because fuck knows he can’t show up like this, but he didn’t intend to skip today. He actually wants to be on this stupid team, for some fucking reason. 

He was given a second chance and he’s going to take it, despite something in him screaming out that he’s not really a part of what the rest of the team has. After a few weeks of practicing with them again before their next tournament, he’s well aware that he still doesn’t have their trust, not really, but still—he’s kind of finding himself wanting to earn it. 

He wants Yahaba to give him the time of day, at least once. He wants Iwaizumi to look at him as more than something he can guide into being next year’s ace. He wants Oikawa—actually, he doesn’t really care about Oikawa’s opinion, but he’s besides the point. 

Some days, he sinks into the feeling of being part of the team and wonders if, one day, he could genuinely be a part of the dynamic that everyone else has found over the time he hasn’t been playing with them. Some days, he thinks he might get there. 

This is not one of those days. This moment is ruining everything he has worked to convince himself of for weeks now. This is not a day in which he believes he can reach them. If anything, this is only further convincing himself that he can never truly be one of them, be like them. He just doesn’t—doesn’t fucking belong. 

He can want to play on the boys’ volleyball team as much as he wants to. He can make it past tryouts and onto the team, he can be physically strong and he can beat almost everyone—everyone but Iwaizumi—in Seijoh’s arm wrestling tournaments, he can make himself look as masculine as possible. He can do all that. 

And he still will never actually fit in. He won’t ever fit in, not while he’s sitting on the toilet with bloodied underwear and pants both pulled down to his knees. He rubs his palms against his eyes, because he will not cry, he won’t, because boys don’t cry and he’s a boy, he is.

He can’t cry about this. He won’t. He just has to wait until the club room clears as practice starts, and then he can escape. Only, fuck, he doesn’t have a pad or tampon or anything, and he doesn’t even have clothes—

“Kyoutani?” 

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. 

“You in here?” 

Fuck. 

The thing about Yahaba is that he is persistent. He is persistent and he is frustrating and he is not going to give up once he has his mind set on something. While they’re playing volleyball together, this is something Kyoutani appreciates. While he is hiding from everyone in the bathroom because his body has decided to riot against him, this is not something he appreciates. 

“Oikawa sent me to find you,” Yahaba calls out, and Kyoutani can see his feet step into the bathroom. “We’re starting practice and he wants you there for some reason.” 

And, okay, normally that wouldn’t hurt because normally Kyoutani would have something to say back, but right now he feels fragile in a way he tries to never be. Right now he feels like he’s going to snap in half and he’s not going to be able to put the pieces back together. He’s going to have to quit the team, go back to the rec center, where no one knows about this, and—and all of that hurts. 

His body is aching and probably he should have seen the signs before he found the drying blood and discharge in his underwear, but he doesn’t really track his period because he hates even acknowledging that it happens. And now he’s suffering the consequences of that. Now, Yahaba’s comments are actually sending something stupid painful down his chest and, on a physical level, his chest already feels too tender to touch.

Yahaba’s feet pause outside of the stall door. “Are you good? You coming or what?” 

“I’m fucking fine, leave me alone—” 

“Are you sick or something?” 

“I said, I’m fine!” It’s a growl and a defensive anger more than anything else. Kyoutani can hear the angry anxiety in his voice, and he wonders if Yahaba hears it too. 

Yahaba doesn’t say anything—for a moment, Kyoutani wonders if he’s managed to hurt him back, and then decides he doesn’t care at the moment. He needs Yahaba to leave. He doesn’t want anyone to see him like this, doesn’t want to be caught—

“Should I grab Coach or someone?” Yahaba asks, and oh, he’s definitely picked up on Kyoutani’s anxiety, because his voice is just that much softer. “Do you need…something?” 

“No,” Kyoutani snaps. What he needs is to just not be here. “Don’t Coach. Please don’t get Coach.” 

And he’s begging Yahaba for things now, which is a new fucking low in his life, but he can’t face either Mizoguchi or Irihata right now. They know he’s trans—they had to know, it was information he was required to divulge to all his teachers and coaches, however much he resisted the idea—and while they’ve found it in them to be accepting enough that he’s allowed on the team, Kyoutani refuses to push it so far as to asking for help. Not with this. 

“Okay, fuck,” Yahaba says. “I won’t get them. Seriously, are you good?” 

“Just leave it,” Kyoutani mutters. “Tell them I’m not coming to practice today.” 

Yahaba doesn’t say anything for a moment. Then, “Oikawa’s not gonna take that excuse.” 

“I’m not quitting, I’m skipping one afternoon,” Kyoutani growls. “It’s fucking fine. You’ve all done it before.” 

Except even as he says that, he knows it’s not true. Nothing short of a career ending injury or terminal illness would stop someone on Seijoh’s volleyball team from coming to practice. Even then, they’d probably sit on the sidelines with casts on both legs and yell instructions from the bench. 

But Kyoutani will suffer being the first to do it because he’s not leaving this stall while there are people around. He can’t face that. 

“Your funeral,” Yahaba mutters. Louder, “I’ll tell them you’re skipping, but I’m not making excuses for you.” 

“Not asking you to,” Kyoutani snaps. “I’m not coming either way.” 

He doesn’t really care what Yahaba thinks about him not going. He doesn’t care what anyone thinks. Let them believe he’s ditching the team again, let them believe he doesn’t care about the sport, let them believe anything but the fact that he wasn’t born a man. 

He watches as Yahaba’s feet round the corner and he disappears, presumably to tell Oikawa that Kyoutani isn’t coming. At the moment, Kyoutani can’t bring himself to care what Oikawa is going to say. Putting his head in his hands, his back hunched, still sitting on the stupid toilet, he lets out a long scream into his palms. 

He hates this. He hates this so much. He had probably stained the desk chair during his last class of the day, he doesn’t know how long he’s walked around like this, he doesn’t know how he’s going to get home without exposing everything, and he hates this. 

He squeezes his eyes shut for a long moment, trying to imagine himself out of this situation. Maybe when he opens his eyes again, he won’t be in this bathroom stall and none of his clothes will be stained and he won’t have this awful cramping in his lower stomach and he can go to the gym and play volleyball with the rest of the team like his body doesn’t hate him. 

“Mad Dog?” 

“Don’t call me that.” The response is immediate, instinctual. Then the panic sets in as he realizes Oikawa is the one now standing outside of the stall door. “Get out of here.” 

Oikawa has no hesitation when he says, “No. Tell me what’s going on. Why can’t you—” 

“I started my fucking period!” 

Maybe he says it because he needs to get it out of his chest and into air where someone else can deal with it. Maybe he says it because he’s just so fucking tired. Maybe he doesn’t want to be the only one who knows anymore. Maybe he just says it because he doesn’t give a shit about Oikawa’s opinion of him. 

Oikawa is silent. Kyoutani bites down hard on his lip because he wants to either cry or scream and neither of those are options, not over this and not in front of motherfucking Tooru Oikawa. He’s stronger than that. He has to make himself stronger than that. So his heart just hesitates in his throat for a long moment, a moment of tense, glass-fragile silence. 

The Oikawa exhales, long and slow. He sounds calm, somehow. “Do you have what you need? Pad, tampon?” 

“No.” Kyoutani’s words, again, are the growl of a cornered animal and he wants to sink his teeth into something. “Just—fucking leave it, Oikawa. I’ll deal with it.” 

Oikawa exhales again, that same long breath that’s setting Kyoutani so on edge. He wants to scream, wants to punch something. Oikawa, maybe. The wall, maybe. The stall door. 

Then Oikawa does the last thing Kyoutani expected him to. He had expected a laugh or a jeer or an insult or a joke. But instead, Oikawa turns around, and he leaves. He doesn’t protest, doesn’t start an argument, he just…leaves. It was what Kyoutani had wanted to happen, kind of, but somehow the resulting silence is just as humid and oppressive as Oikawa’s presence had been. 

Okay. Oikawa is gone. Kyoutani can deal with this shit. He got his period for the first time when he was fourteen, and pretty consistently for every month after that, so he’s dealt with this—he can’t actually do that math right now, but he’s done this enough times to be able to deal. Probably he just needed to be dramatic first. 

He has his gym shorts in his locker. He can change into those, even if he’ll be cold on the long walk home. It’s better than wearing this. It’ll be fine. With that figured out, he pulls out a wad of toilet paper and folds it up in his hand, then carefully places it in the stained underwear, wincing at the feeling of the dried blood accidentally brushing against his knuckles. 

“Kyoutani?” 

Fuck. Why are his teammates rotating through this fucking bathroom like he’s a fucking zoo exhibit—

“It’s Iwaizumi,” he says, as if Kyoutani wouldn’t recognize that voice anywhere. 

Kyoutani did not, before this, have a ranking of which of his teammates he would least like to catch him in the bathroom when he’s on his period. Now, though, he thinks he has a working list and the list is the exact people who have come to find him today. Yahaba, who has never backed down from making fun of him. Oikawa, who always knows exactly what to say to antagonize and provoke him. Iwaizumi, who he respects so stupid much. 

The thing is that Iwaizumi is everything that Kyoutani wants to be. Iwaizumi is strong and bold and brave and an ace through and through. He’s also kind and he’s patient with everyone except for Oikawa. He helps his underclassmen with their form no matter how bad it is to start with. He never makes fun of anyone who doesn’t deserve it or can’t take it. He’s masculine and built strong and good and he’s—

Kyoutani is afraid of admitting to so many things, but one thing he’s not afraid to admit is that, honestly, he just wants to be like that. He doesn’t want to be an outsider like he is right now, he doesn’t want to be this in-between body that craves Iwaizumi’s masculinity but, ultimately, still menstruates. 

Iwaizumi’s shadow passes in front of the stall door. “Oikawa came and got me. Told me what you said.” 

“He shouldn’t have.” Kyoutani’s voice is a hollow rasp. “I shouldn’t have told him and it’s none of his business.” 

Iwaizumi snorts. His feet come into view underneath the stall door. “Been telling him to keep out of other people’s shit for years. It has yet to work.” 

“It’s none of your business either.” 

“Maybe not,” Iwaizumi admits. “I brought you some things anyway. I’m gonna slide them under the door, okay?” 

Kyoutani doesn’t answer even as Iwaizumi does as he said. He passes over a small black bag, something like the makeup bag his sister uses to keep her lipstick and blush in. Hesitantly, Kyoutani picks it up and unzips it. Inside: pads and tampons. Nondescript, simple white packaging; both nighttime and daytime pads and both heavy and light flow tampons. Whoever prepared this bag clearly wanted to be ready for anything. 

He swallows, staring at the contents. He needs them and he hates it and he’s grateful and he has so many questions. “How did you…” 

Iwaizumi is quiet for a moment, shifting his weight between his feet. It’s after a long moment of tense and near-audible heartbeats before he speaks again. “Mine are a little irregular. I got caught off guard at some point my first year and had to leave practice early. It was…humiliating, I guess, is the light word for it. Exposing, maybe? I dunno. But I’ve tried to be better prepared since then.” 

Kyoutani goes still, his grip on the bag tightening. He pulls out a pad, turning it over in one hand. Then he sets the bag down and pushes it back under the door with his toe. “You…” 

The question goes unasked, but Iwaizumi hums a yes anyway. 

“Oh.” 

“Is it really that much of a surprise?” 

“Yes,” Kyoutani says immediately. 

And it is, it is a surprise, because this is Iwaizumi, who is practically the epitome of masculinity to Kyoutani. This is Iwaizumi, undefeated in three years of arm wrestling. Iwaizumi, who has the fastest mile across any of the sports teams at Aoba Johsai. Iwaizumi, who has the highest lift weight of any of them. Iwaizumi, who has never shown any sign of being anything other than man. 

Iwaizumi hums again. “I guess you don’t really see me a lot outside of school and practice.” 

Kyoutani takes a shaky breath, unwrapping the pad with a crinkle that makes him wince. Iwaizumi doesn’t react to it—something that Kyoutani is entirely grateful for—and keeps talking. 

“I like to think we’re friends,” Iwaizumi continues, steadily, as if he isn’t altering Kyoutani’s entire worldview. “I like to think I’m friends with everyone on the team. But it’s…I mean, it would be hard for them not to have a guess by now. But no one ever really talks about it in the clubroom or at practice. So it makes sense you didn’t know, I guess. Sometimes it feels a little like no one knows. Except Oikawa, since he doesn’t know when to shut up sometimes.” 

Kyoutani snorts. That feels true. 

“I love him, but he can be an idiot,” Iwaizumi says. There’s a fondness in his voice that Kyoutani is pretty sure he will never understand. “Anyways, I get it, is the point. I’ve spent my fair share of time in this bathroom panicking.” 

They both fall silent for a long moment, the two of them just taking soft, even breaths. For a moment, Kyoutani actually feels comfortable in the silence with him. 

Iwaizumi inhales, and then exhales, long and slow. He shifts his stance again. “You don’t have to come back to practice if you just want to go home now. But we want you there.” 

Kyoutani swallows around some kind of lump in his throat, overwhelmed by the kindness Iwaizumi is somehow, for some reason, showing him. It feels like some kind of solidarity, or—something like friendship, maybe. 

“Up to you,” Iwaizumi says. “But know that if anyone gives you shit, on the team or off it, they’ll be answering to me. And probably the rest of the team, though honestly it’s not like any of them could really finish a fight. But—yeah. You get the point.” 

Iwaizumi laughs a little before continuing. “I’m gonna go up now, but feel free to let me know if you ever need anything else.”

Somewhere in him, Kyoutani finds the strength to nod, even if Iwaizumi can’t see it. “I’ll, uh. I’ll be up in a few minutes.” 

“Sounds good, Kyoutani.” With that, Iwaizumi is turning around and walking away. 

I like to think we’re friends, Iwaizumi had said. And, in all his great and unsure honesty, Kyoutani would like to think so too. 

[seeker-of-stories19]

Jaime & Khaji Da Headcannons

- Khaji makes a habit of naturally and even subconsciously adjusting Jaime’s body to make it more adaptive, it takes a lot of arguments and reminders for Khaji to stop giving him extra limbs and eventually they compromise on night vision and sometimes fangs/claws

- Khaji still secretly does it at night to pull Jamie’s blankets back up when he insists on sleeping in bed because he will kick them off if he gets hot

- Jaime only wears his Gotham law hoodie at home because he’s worried Khaji will destroy it and it’s his biggest comfort item

- There’s definitely an element of horror in having his body invaded in such a traumatic way, but oftentimes the thing that freaks Jaime out more is that it feels so right. He can’t remember and doesn’t want to imagine what his life would be like without Khaji Da

- Jaime routinely spaces out while talking to Khaji and literally won’t respond to his family. It freaks Bianca out a bit but Milagro and Rudy love messing with Jaime and totally take advantage of it to scare him

- Although one time Rudy jumps on him from behind and scares him so bad he gets electrocuted again, even though Khaji knows he’s not a threat they think Rudy deserves it for making Jaime scared

- After that they stick to hiding his stuff when he’s spaced out communicating with Khaji

- Jaime goes to ridiculously extreme lengths to hide the extent of his trauma because he’s terrified of having to explain what Victoria and Carapax did to him

- Eventually his family starts picking up on it and accommodating him without him asking about it, not coming up behind him, letting sit closest to the exits, not making him wear ties or anything tight around his neck

- It gets to the point where Jaime slowly starts venturing out of his room after panic attacks and nightmares, so he isn’t alone and his family learns that the best way to support him is just looking out for him and not asking about it

- Although there are definitely moments when weird things trigger Jaime and it makes them wonder why having stuff touch his neck causes him to lock himself in his room for hours or blast off to sit on top of a building somewhere

- Khaji is the only one who knows what really happened to Jaime on the island and they’re very protective as a result

- Jaime will absolutely have a breakdown if Khaji takes more than two seconds to answer him because he’s terrified of losing that connection again

- The longer they’re bonded the more Khaji learns about human emotions and experiences, eventually they’re able to contextualize the horror Jaime feels over their bonding and feel guilt for causing him pain. They still don’t understand it in truly human way but they know they hurt him a lot physically and mentally which goes against their purpose

- Jaime spends so much time and energy looking for clothes that won’t show off the bumps along his spine, definitely has to wear stiffer fabric than he likes so it lays somewhat normally

- There’s definitely a period where he tries sticking kinesiology tape over Khaji to try and make the shape less obvious because it’s too hot to wear long sleeves and they burn it off immediately

- Finally after months Milagro points out that if people ask he can just tell them it’s a back brace or some type of medical equipment which makes him feel very stupid for not thinking of it sooner

- He has a lot of scar tissue around where Khaji latched onto his spine even with the advanced healing because of the trauma it put on his body. He also has jagged scars all over his back and shoulders with some stretching down his arms and legs from the electricity since Khaji didn’t have enough resources at the time to heal him fully

- Definitely at least one occurrence where he scares a stranger half to death walking to his car at night because his eyes are glowing yellow

- Jaime saying we instead of I when talking about things, “We’re so tired” and “Gracias we appreciate it”

- Khaji is incredibly attached to Jaime as well, having bonded more intensely to him than any previous host and like Jaime they’re also terrified of being separated, although they know it is an inevitable part of their reality

- Jaime’s family being so confused by what a symbiotic relationship is and definitely asking some invasive questions on accident

- Jaime is sort of permanently torn between horror and affection toward Khaji, a constant tug of war between the violation of being forced to share his body and not truly have control over his body and choices and the fact that their connection feels undeniably right, the understanding on a level he doubts any other human being can comprehend experiencing

- But even on the bad days he doesn’t blame Khaji, they were simply doing what they were programmed to without any understanding of the pain or trauma it would cause

- And he knows they understand it better now and regret ever causing Jaime damage

- Clothes never stop being a problem, he ends up putting all the basics in an Amazon list and reordering a cheap wardrobe every couple months

- On nights he goes to events with Jenny or other nicer things he just prays he won’t transform and accidentally destroy his one suit

- Even though he can never convince Khaji to stop burning his clothes they always protect the necklace he wears of his fathers

- No matter how long they’re bonded Jaime still answers Khaji out loud sometimes, when he’s at home it just leads to some confusion and teasing but he gets some nasty looks in public for mumbling nonsense to himself or talking over people in conversations

- Clicking/chirping sounds when he’s happy

A/N I totally didn’t expect to get this many likes so thank you, maybe I need to do headcannons more often! Anyways please feel free to add to these in reblogs if you have any more ideas and use any of these that inspire you in your own stories! But if you do tag me or send me AO3 links so I can see!!!!!

[anjelicawrites]

Respite

Paring: Michael Gavey x reader

Synopsis: you and Michael are swamped by finals, when you realize he needs a hand to unwind from all that stress.

Warnings: daddy kink, public sex (blowjob in a, university library), degradation, hair pulling, skull fucking, fingering.

A/N: reader is AFAB but not described. Where needed, they/them pronouns used.

A/N 2: this stemmed from this question. It can be read as following piece to Fun to be had or as a standalone piece.

You know Michael, you’ve witnessed how obsessive he can become while studying, how hard he works himself. And how frustrated and tired he ends up being.

It’s the little things that alert you: the tapping of the foot on the floor, the huffs of impatience when his mind isn’t working as fast as he wants it to, his fingers tapping on the ancient wood of the table you two are sharing.

You lift your head from the book you’ve been studying when his hands leaves yours.

It’s a stupid thing, but you always hold his free hand while studying (you two are facing one another all the time). He had huffed a bit, the first few times you reached towards him and curled your fingers with his, as of late, he’s been the one to take your hand, without saying anything.

You follow his movements with your eyes and see the nervous way his fingers are tapping on one of his tomes. Oh baby, you think. This exam is particularly hard, for this reason he’s been slaving in the library, because this class is one of the few that truly pose a challenge to his bright mind and he’s enrolled in with his academic rival (yes, your boyfriend is the kind of smart idiot who has an academic rival), which means he has to be the best and get the highest mark. To achieve is goal Michael is focusing everything he has on this exam, studying more than what’s on the syllabus, and he’s burning himself out.

He’s so busy he doesn’t even hear you stand up and walk around the table to stand by his side; when your hand, lightly, touches his shoulder, he jumps out of his skin, surprised, biting on a curse.

“I’m sorry.” You whisper to his furrowed brow. “Come on. Let me help you.”

For a second you see that he doesn’t understand, this level of math being too complicated for you, therefore how can you help? Then his mind makes the connection and he realizes with what you’re offering and hand with; yes, he definitely needs you.

On swift feet you two hide in the darkest corner of this side of the library. Since you two have almost risked to be caught, you are both trying to play it safe. No one comes here and, since that faithful night, there’s only one table left, which has become unofficially yours. Yet, there’s the librarians and the nook where the table is, doesn’t offer enough cover for what you’re about to do.

You can feel how warm Michael’s hand is and a bit sweaty, a light tremor coursing through the muscles. Your poor baby is reaching the end of his tether and you can’t wait for this exam to be over; he has some more, none of the remaining for this semester is as hard as this one, and then the holidays await.

Michael follows you, his fingers in yours, his eyes drawn by the gentle way your hips sway as you pull him to your most hidden corner, the one where nobody comes, but you two, and not for reading the old tomes.

With a fluid movement you fall on your knees, your hands going for his fly, swiftly unzipping it to let his half-hard, clothed cock out: your mouth waters.

You’re probably setting feminism back a few centuries by enjoying sucking cock the way you do, but it’s the truth: having your boyfriend use and abuse your mouth drenches your core and helps you unwind from your own tension, there’s nothing wrong with that!

“My cock is not even in your mouth and you’ve already lost all brain cells, haven’t you, pretty thing?”

Michael’s voice is a low rumble that goes straight to your core, you can feel your slick pooling there, your hole clenching around nothing.

“I’m sorry daddy.” You answer, eyes downcast, your hands falling on your thighs.

“And why should I let you suck my cock, uh?”

Michael’s hand is in your hair, his hold strong to stop you from moving, his eyes cold behind his glasses. You whine, like an animal.

“I’ve asked you a question, or are you too stupid to answer?” He adds, pulling your face backwards and away from his cock.

You have to wet your lips for a second, buying time for your brain to come up with an answer.

“Because I am very good at it.” You manage to blurt out. “And I am the best you’ve ever had.” You add, a pained moan follows when his hand tightens in your tresses.

Your Michael is not happy with your answers; with his free hands is closing the zipper, to your absolute panic.

“Because I need it!” You barely manage to keep your voice under control. “I need to be used. Please fuck my skull, daddy!”

His hands rests on his, partially, closed zipper, his eyes zeroing on your tongue lolling out of your mouth. So pretty and debauched, your hands grabbing the thick material of your own trousers to stop yourself from reaching to him, your hips canting against thin air; it would be a shame to waste your needy mouth, wouldn’t it?

“That’s better, pretty thing.” His free hand slaps your cheek lightly and you moan. “What a slut you are. Do you want my cock that bad? Take it.”

Your hands fly to his zipper and you hear him hum unhappily. You stop and stare at him with a dumb expression all over your face.

“I never said you could use your hands.” He says coldly, as if his cock isn’t swelling painfully in his briefs.

You want to cry in frustration: you need him to fuck your skull and you need him now!

Desperate your teeth grab the zipper and, laboriously, start lowering it, fighting against his growing cock, your need making your impatient and clumsy.

When your teeth lose their hold for the third time, you hear him huff exasperated and your blood turns into ice.

“What a dumb whore you are.” Michael’s voice is cold. “Do you think I have all the afternoon to waste?”

Angry he pushes your face away, his hands make a quick work of his jeans and briefs, his hard cock in his hand, the tip already leaking.

“I should solve this issue myself, maybe I’ll come all over your face. What do you say? Any input from your stupid brain?”

Your eyes stare at the ground, your whole demeanor is as submissive as possible as you try not to cry.

“Whatever you want makes me happy, daddy.” It’s so difficult to say the words when the only thing you truly need is to be used, until he’s satisfied!

Michael’s warm hand cups your cheek, his thumb caressing the soft skin is gentle.

“That wasn’t so hard, was it, pretty thing?”

Is voice feels like a hug and you moan: you just want to make him happy and proud!

Without even noticing, your face nuzzles his palm; you can’t see him, he’s smiling at how cute and needy you are.

“Open up. Keep your hands on your tights.” He orders with a gentler voice.

“Yes daddy. Thank you daddy.” You murmur.

Your lips part and you stare at him with glassy eyes, your tongue already out to lick his reddened tip with quick strokes that steal a moan from him. He’s so aroused he’s afraid he’ll come down your delectable throat in no time.

Both his hands cup your face, pressing against your cheeks to make you open up more, which you do gladly, a moan half choked when he starts pushing his cock in, slow strokes as his fingers travel to your hair, to control your movements.

Leisurely, he pushes inside of your waiting mouth as you hollow your cheeks to offer him more friction, he whimpers when your tongue sneaks out to tease his balls and you start humming around him, trying to take more than he’s giving you.

You try to scream around him when he pulls hard on your hair, his cock out of your wanting mouth.

“Dumb bitch that you are.” He spats at you. “I wanted to go slow, for you. Savor your mouth, but you had to think with your useless cunt, instead that using your brain.”

One hand tightens in your hair, pulling painfully, the other grabs his cock to use it to slap your cheeks.

“You’re lucky we’re out and about.” The hand in your hair grabs the strands better, immobilizing you. “Now open up again. Show me you can follow a simple order.”

With that, any gentleness is gone, your mouth invaded ruthlessly by his cock, his hands forcing you down his length without finesse, his ears deaf to your chocking on it, his bulbous head pushing against the back of your throat, until you open up and he can fuck you with abandon, grinding against your face as lewd sounds leave your lips and breathing becomes harder and harder.

He doesn’t care, the tightness of your throat is delicious, the sounds you are making spur him on even more, one hand around your neck to feel himself fucking you, the fingers curling with every push in, your face a mess of tears, make up and spit.

He releases you and you almost fall against him, lost as you are in the pleasure you have been giving him, your lungs desperate for hair don’t register in your brain, the fact that he hasn’t come yet and that you need him to fuck your throat even more, does.

“You are supposed to be smart.” His voice is cold and cruel. “Yet, when your mouth is full of my cock you become a desperate cumdump.”

You are still too confused to string an answer, you can barely nod, mouth open, spit seeping out.

“I’ve asked you a question.”

Has he? Your brain is floating a bit; it’s only thanks to his fingers smearing the mess of spit and precome and makeup all over your face, that you start to come back to yourself.

“Shall I come on your face or shoot it down your throat?”

“My chest, please daddy?” You ask, voice sweet and pleading.

Michael has to lean against the heavy bookcase: the idea of you going around the rest of the afternoon with his come all over your skin blanks his brain and turns his knees into jelly. Everyone will see you prim and proper again, and your clothes will hide your dirty, little secret, the knowledge makes his head spin.

“For a dumb slut, you are pretty smart.”

His words are cruel, his voice holds his appreciation for you, and you preen, hands flying to your shirt to bare yourself to him.

You are wearing a simple cotton bra, yet he has to curl his fingers around his base, or he’ll come without control just imagining his seed all over your breasts.

“Suck me, pretty thing.” He orders, breathless.

And by God you do! Cheeks hollowed to offer him as much friction as possible, one hand caressing his balls, the other jacking what you are not fitting in your mouth, his fingers guiding your movements against his jerking hips, your eyes never leaving his as he’s losing himself in the lewd, wet sounds you are making, for him and him only.

“Mine.” Comes out like a growl. “All mine.”

You want to tell him that you are, that you belong to him and him only, but his hands force you again down his length to fuck your throat raw, fast pushes as you hum, fingers playing with his heavy balls.

With a grunt he exits your mouth to jack himself fast, before coming all over your chest with a low moan, ropes and ropes of come adorning your skin like sinful pearls.

Breathless he falls on the floor and you find refuge in his arms, your lips seeking his in a searing kiss, his own taste mixed with yours has him moan and whimper against your mouth.

You remain like this, huddled in one another, on the cold floor, until his legs stop trembling and you are capable of talking again. Gently he cleans the mess on your face and closes your shirt with slow fingers.

“Thank you.” He manages.

“Do I look like I’ve been sucking cock?”

“No. You look radiant.”

And you do, even when you grimace the second you register the wetness in your panties; Michael groans inwardly: all that sweet nectar he can’t taste, not before your finals are over, following your request. He can’t wait to drown in your juices: he’s going to give back, with interests, until you are so overstimulated that it hurts to keep going, that’s the gift you’ve promised him for his hard work.

“Can you walk?”

Gone is the cruel inflection of his voice, now he’s just your boyfriend, who loves you more than anything and will gift you the stars, if only you asked.

“Yeah. Hold my hand?”

Those fingers that so cruelly had maneuvered your head and pulled your hair, now are gently entwined with yours as you two walk back to your table, your legs still a bit wobbly and your knees sore, but it’s worth knowing that now Michael is more focused, and you are as well.

You’re going to spend the weekend at Michael’s, because your roommate is going to have people over and party on Saturday night, and you don’t want to have to deal with that, not when you have so much to study. And you would never pass on the opportunity to spend time with your boyfriend, even if it’s just to sleep and hit the books, the two of you dancing too close to the knife edge of burnout to care about having full on penetrative sex; at the moment, you sucking him it’s just a mean to and end for you two: decompress.

When you exit the bathroom, wearing one of his oversized jumpers and loose gym bottoms, Michael is already in bed, his glasses folded on the crammed bed side table, his face illuminated by the small lamp perched on top of a column of books; his eyes are closed, but you know he is not asleep, not yet, his breathing not shallow for someone already in Morpheus’ embrace.

Gently, you pull down the covers and slide into the too small bed for two people, thanking God Oliver is not coming back and you and Michael can have have this sliver of peace.

Michael’s arm sneaks around your middle and pushes you as close as possible to his body, his long nose breathing in the smell of his shampoo in your hair.

Slowly, his hand makes way downwards, his fingers finding the hem of your bottoms to slide where the warm skin of your thigh is, and move over your clothed mound.

“Michael…” You moan, a shiver coursing through your body.

“Shh, pretty thing. You need this, I can feel how tense you are.”

And he’s right; you exams this semester aren’t awfully hard, there’s just a lot of them, to the point you feel like you’re playing whack-a-mole: you pass one, other two more pop up!

You move your leg over his to grant him more space, his fingers slipping under the cheap cotton of your briefs. And he doesn’t move.

“Daddy!” It comes out more whiney that you thought.

“Tell me what you need and I might give it to you, pretty thing.”

For the longest second you feel embarrassed to ask, after all, you’ve been raised in quite the strict household, where sex education didn’t exist. As much as you’ve managed to shrug off your upbringing, some things are difficult to overcome.

“Please, touch me?”

“But I am touching you, sweet thing.”

Oh God, the mirth in his voice makes you quiver. His hand moves to the junction of your thigh and you panic.

“See? That’s what I am doing. You need to be more specific than that.”

You close your eyes, the warmth of embarrassment spreading all over your body.

“Please, fuck my pussy with your fingers? Daddy please?”

Michael’s lips find your neck, where he leaves a small kiss that makes you shiver with pleasure.

“It wasn’t that hard, was it, sweet thing?”

Agonizingly slow his long fingers move back to your cunt, goosebumps exploding on their path, wetness already forming at your entrance.

"Your cunt is so hungry I don't even need to touch it and it's ready for me."

There's no mirth in his words, he's in awe of your body and what it can do.

His index finger touches your clit, a gentle clockwise motion that has you moan, hips following his movements. 

"So wet, sweet thing." His voice is a low rumble in your ear.

"Only for you. Ah!"

You whimper when his index and middle finger find your hole to scoop your juices there and then return to your clit, his motions now slightly faster now that you are absolutely drenched. 

"Daddy!!!"

"Shh, sweet thing, feel me."

And God you do! All your attention, all your nerves seem to converge to your engorged clitoris, his touches spark light bolts of pleasure everywhere in your body. Your center so slippery it's easy for his fingers to enter your hungry hole, thumb on your clit, the motions rougher there now that he's found your g spot as well, rubbing the rougher patch, scissoring his fingers so that you'd whine, your wetness leaking on his palm. 

Your hips move without your control, your whole body curling around his hand, begging, desperate sounds escape your lips as he eggs you on, his voice fucking with your brain as his fingers fuck your cunt hard and fast, the squelching sounds your cunt makes, add to the coil in your tummy, your hand grabs his wrist, nails scratching the skin there, until you come, chocking on a scream, breathless as he helps you come down from this incredible high. 

Michael's body curls around yours as you shake, his long arms around your middle, legs interwoven with yours, lips kissing your nape gently. 

"Thank you, sweetest." 

He says with gentleness and awe in his voice. He's so beyond lucky to have you. 

When's he's positive you're back to yourself, he exits the bed, making sure you're safe under the covers, to retrieve a small cloth and clean you up, mindful of how sensitive your lower lips still are. 

"I love you Michael."

"I love you too."

And he does and despises that the English language can't truly carry how he feels about you, how important you are for him, how he would crumble without you by his side. 

Sleepily you hug him, your head under his chin, his arms tight around your body; you feel like you're surrounded by him, the love of your life. 

You're safe here, in the cocoon of his bed sheets. Finals be dammed!

[fizzigigsimmer]

Back At One Part 2

Pairing: Caligator, Billy Hargrove x Gator Tillman

Fandom Fusion: Stranger Things & Fargo S5

Dom/Sub au

*Title taken from this truly sappy love song by Brian McKnight that these boys would NEVER admit was kinda okay lol.

<<<<PART I

“When is that fella of yours gonna make an honest man out of you?" Dot asks, just as Gator reaches for the pans stacked on top of the fridge, and he jerks, pulling too quickly, sending a cookie sheet clattering toward the kitchen floor - he just manages to save it. Scotty raises the cover of her book to hide her face, but his ears work just fine and he hears her snicker.

"What do you mean?" he gripes as he fumbles with the cookware. This is what he gets for trying to do something nice for his boyfriend on his birthday. "Billy's already registered as my dominant."

Which means if Gator really does burn the house down trying to make this fucking cake, Billy can have the honor of identifying his barbecued remains and save Dot the trouble.

Dot’s giving him this look though. Like she can see right through his bullshit. Let's get real. She always could read him like a book and play him like a fiddle.

“Alright, lets bake this mother fu-uuning,cake” Gator self corrects, remembering Scotty at the last minute. Shit that was close. Dot only has a few rules for when they’re together: no talking about the past when Scotty’s in earshot and no potty mouth. She literally calls it that. It’s kind of annoying though, cause the kid is like twelve right? Gator could curse in three different languages by the time he was twelve. But apparently that’s not the thing to be proud of that he thought it was when he was twelve.

“Real nice save Hon.” Dot laughs at him.

“Yeah yeah. Let’s just do this.” Gator grumbles in reply, and they do. 

Dot ties an apron around Gator's waist and hands him a mixing bowl while Scotty eagerly climbs up on a stool to read out the recipe as they work. She’s only meant to be walking him through the basics of a simple white cake with Billy’s name spelled out on it, but somehow the kitchen quickly descends into chaos. 

"Okay, first we need to cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy," Scotty reads.

Gator dumps an entire stick of butter and a heaping cup of sugar into the bowl. He picks up the electric mixer and jams it in after, cause that much he can figure out for himself. Only it sends a plume of sugar into the air the minute he powers it on. 

“Holy shit!”

"No, silly!" Scotty giggles. "You have to soften the butter first or it won't mix right."

Grumbling, Gator fishes the hard butter out of the bowl and tosses it into the microwave. A few seconds later, there's a loud pop - because he’s a fucking idiot and apparently it doesn’t take more than a few seconds to warm butter. One glance inside confirms the worst: the stick is now a molten mess, and butter drips down the microwave door.

"Oh honey," Dot sighs, grabbing a towel to wipe up the mess. "Just grab another stick and leave it on the counter for a bit to soften."

“Jesus. Come on. Get your head in the game!” Gator admonishes himself, trying to shake off his embarrassment and the feeling of shame welling up inside of him from fucking up something so simple. “I have cooked before. I’m just -”

What? Nervous? Fucking stupid? What else is there to say when he can’t even melt butter.

Dot lays a hand on his back. She doesn’t need to say anything, and she doesn’t as she hands him a clean bowl and Scotty reads out from Dot’s phone that it’s time to sift the dry ingredients together. He upends the bag of flour over the sifter, and thinks it might be too much. It definitely is, because he doesn’t get more than a few taps in before flour has started to overflow everywhere, dusting his hands and the arms of his black t-shirt. But hey, some of it is getting into the bowl.

Somehow with Dot's patient guidance and Scotty's enthusiastic "assistance", they manage to get the cake batter mixed and poured into pans. Gator slides them into the oven, sets the timer, and leans back against the counter with a sigh, his shirt and jeans thoroughly dusted with flour, bits of batter streaked in between.

Dot chuckles as she hands him a damp towel. "Well, that was an adventure. I think Billy will appreciate the effort you put in, even if it's not perfect."

Gator wipes his hands and grumbles. "It better turn out decent after all that. I still think I shoulda gotten him something else though. Something big, to really wow him, y'know?"

Dot studies him for a long moment, and then finally broaches the subject that has been festering like a smelly turd in the corner of the room.

"Want to talk about what happened at the store today?"

No. No he really fucking doesn’t. Gator turns to snap on the faucet, thinking that he’d like to stick his head under it and drown himself right about now. He focuses intently on scrubbing the batter caked on his nails instead.

"Nothin' happened. She was a stuck-up bitch is all. Lookin' down on me like I'm nothin' just 'cause I ain't some fancy dom in a suit."

He hears Dot murmur something quietly to Scotty about going to get her things together, and grunts in acknowledgment when the twerp says a shy goodbye before slipping from the room. He immediately feels like shit, because Dot can’t really punish him anymore - it’s not her place, and she’s got too much respect for Billy to overstep - but she can take away the one thing she knows he really wants. He wasn’t ready for them to leave, but he can’t blame Dot for not wanting her kid around him when he’s like this.

Her family is not something that Dot plays around with, and Gator might be someone she cares about, but there’s a stark line between whatever the hell they are to each other and the beautiful thing Nadine - fuck - Dot, built for herself with her own grit and guts in the aftermath of the Tillmans.

He understands. He gets it. He does. And yet he still flinches when she speaks again, body somehow unprepared for her to still be there even though he would have heard her leave if she wasn’t.

"She shouldn't have treated you that way," Dot says softly. "But Gator, how you reacted wasn’t like you. I haven’t seen you do something that rash in a long time. What’s this really about?”

Gator's jaw clenches and his hands still, suds dripping from his fingers into the sink. The air grows heavy with all the things unsaid between them.

"It’s nothin'. Alright?" he mutters unconvincingly. "I lost my cool is all. Won't happen again."

Dot sighs and leans her hip against the counter next to him, arms crossed. Her eyes are filled with gentle understanding and he hates it. Hates how much it reminds him of his mom, and all the times after, when she was gone and it was Dot standing in her place, filling the void as best she could. Hates most of all that he’s never been strong enough to resist the comfort Dot offers and the temptation to fall apart in her arms. She was his safety, even when safety was a lie and she was just a kid who couldn’t do shit to keep herself safe, let alone him.

But no matter how hard Gator had tried, he’d never stopped needing someone to lean on and take him apart and clean out his rust and dust, to put back together again good as new. That’s his curse, the sub in him, which is hard to swallow most days but Billy makes it better. No one does any of that for him like Billy Hargrove does. Even when Gator makes it hard on him, Billy always knows just which way he’s bent and how to fix it. Yeah it bugs the shit out of him, but he wouldn’t know what the hell to do with himself now without it. If Billy left he’d -

Stop that shit! He flinches away from the thoughts, and reminds himself for the umpteenth time that Billy isn’t going to leave him over some dumb shit like a lame birthday gift. He needs to just quit already. Why can’t he make the thoughts stop?

"You've been doing so well lately, Gator. Really making progress in therapy, communicating better when you’re dropping... What happened today?" Dot presses again.

Gator's throat works as he swallows hard. His hands clench the edge of the sink, knuckles going white. He doesn’t want to talk about this but maybe it will help. God he hopes it helps.

"I just... I wanted to get him somethin' special, y'know? Somethin' to show him how much he means to me." His voice cracks slightly on the last word and Dot's face softens. She reaches for him, laying a hand on his shoulder. 

"Oh honey... Billy knows how much you love him. You don't need fancy gifts to prove that."

"Don't I though?" Gator argues, a bitter edge creeping into his tone. "He does so much for me, Dot. Takes such good care of me, even when I'm a pain in the ass. And, like when am I not a pain in the ass, huh? You were gonna kick his ass and like send him to the Gulag. How am I worth that?”

Dot laughs, giving Gator's shoulder a gentle squeeze. "Listen to me. You are a pain in the ass, but only when you’re trying so hard not to be the sweet, kind, and wonderful man I know you are. You're a good boy, Gator. You always have been. And yes, at first I was worried when I found out your Saftey-Dom had a thing for you. Who wouldn’t be?”

Gator shrugs away her very good point - doms who are employed to counsel and provide subs with therapeutic care are bound by a strict code of ethics. Billy could have been in deep shit if anyone other than Dot had found out about their relationship before Billy stopped being his therapy dom.

“I kissed him Dot, and he never let it happen again while I was still just a case.” Gator laments. “That’s what I’m talking about though, all I could do was think with my dick - meanwhile I could have seriously fucked up his life. And he still took care of me!”

“He did. Which is what convinced me he’s the best thing for you.” Dot says. “It’s because he loves you for who you are, flaws and all."

Gator shakes his head, jaw tight. "You don't get it, Dot. I'm not...I'm not good like you keep saying. The shit that goes through my head sometimes…”

He trails off, shame burning hot in his gut. He can't even bring himself to say it out loud. But with Dot he doesn’t need to. 

She was there through the worst of it. She’s seen the worst of him. Shit Billy knows about, but hasn’t seen. Hasn’t really lived it, the way Dot had to live it, and maybe that’s why Gator’s been fucking everything up. 

Maybe he’s trying to see once and for all whether or not someone who isn’t trauma bonded to him will stay once they see him for what he really is.

"I know I'm fucked up, alright? I know I got a long way to go before I'm anything close to the kinda sub Billy deserves.” He tries to shrug off the admission like the words aren’t sending pain twisting inside him like a knife.

But Dot, perceptive as always, cups Gator's face, turning him back to meet her gentle gaze. "Oh honey... Is that what this is about? You want Billy to collar you?"

Gator's breath hitches. Hearing it stated so plainly sends a jolt through him, equal parts longing and terror. He jerks away from Dot's touch, arms wrapping defensively around himself.

"No! I mean... Fuck, I don't know," he stammers, the words tangling on his tongue.

Dot is quiet for a long moment, letting his confession settle heavily between them. When she speaks again, her tone is thoughtful.

"Have you talked to Billy about this? About wanting his collar?"

Gator barks out a harsh laugh. "No. No fuckin' way. He'd probably laugh in my face if I did.”

Dot's brow furrows, her eyes shadowed with concern as she clicks her tongue in admonishment. "I don’t believe you really think that for a second. That Billy would laugh at you for expressing your needs."

Gator's shoulders hunch, defensive. He keeps his gaze fixed resolutely on the mixing bowl in the sink, watching the dregs of batter slowly dissolve under the running tap. The sweet scent of vanilla and butter hangs heavy in the air, incongruously cheerful.

"I didn't say I needed it," he mutters. "I'm just sayin'... a guy like me askin' for a collar. It's funny right? Like, I’m not some needy bitch who needs a collar to keep from dropping, and I don’t need Billy thinking he gets to boss me around more than he already does. Guy’s an absolute control freak."

"Uh-huh and you love it. I've seen the two of you together. The way Billy is with you... It's special. He'd move heaven and earth to make you happy. To give you what you need." Dot says. Her voice is soft but sure.

Gator swallows thickly, his eyes stinging. He blinks rapidly, determined not to let the tears building behind his lids fall. "Sure. Why hasn’t he done it then? I’d put that shit down in two seconds, but he hasn’t even tried. Y’know?"

And the reason why is obvious. Yeah, there’s the fact that Gator doesn’t need a collar, but even if he wanted one he’s too much work, too damaged.

Dot sighs heavily, like he said the last part out loud.

"Honestly Honey, I think you should think about it from his perspective. With the way you talk about it... He may not realize how much this would mean to you. Billy does a good job, making sense of what’s going on in that squirrel head of yours but he’s not superman. Talk to him.”

Gator grunts noncommittally. Because hell no. He will not be begging his dom to collar him any time soon thanks, but he doesn’t want her to worry either. 

Dot says she has to get Scotty home in time to start dinner and he follows her out to the front door where Scotty is waiting with Dot's purse and her school bag. He sees them off with a wave and a promise to attend some talent show at Scotty’s school next week. Dot gives him a kiss on the cheek, urges him to talk to Billy one more time and reminds him that her mother-in-law knows the president, and really can get Billy thrown in the gulag if he really does laugh in Gator’s face.

And then he’s alone. Alone with his thoughts. Which is frankly the best way to be. Gator can think much more clearly about this now that Dot’s not here, reminding him of the past and making him feel weaker than he actually is. He can totally still salvage this situation. He’ll just make the cake really impressive. Like those 3D ones that look like real shit? Billy loves to chill with him on the weekend and watch that show where people try and guess which random item is cake or not. Gator’s usually tied up, plugged or gagged when that happens so his memories are a little hazy - but it doesn’t look that hard. It’s just cake right?

When the timer goes off Gator brings the cake out of the oven.

He whips out his phone and starts scrolling through cake decorating videos on YouTube, determined to find something suitably impressive. His eyes light up when he spots a tutorial for a realistic 3D surfboard cake, uploaded by some fruit calling himself Barry Bakes. He doesn’t really want to take advice from some dude with pink hair, a full face of makeup, wearing a sparkly crop top with the word TWINK encrusted on the front, but the cake is undeniably badass.

"Alright, let's do this," Gator mutters, cracking his knuckles. He fast forwards through the beginning of the video, impatient to get to the good stuff.

First step - carving the cakes into a surfboard shape. Easy enough. Gator grabs a serrated knife and starts hacking away at the layers, tongue poking out the corner of his mouth in concentration. Crumbs fly everywhere as he saws off uneven chunks. When he's done, he steps back to survey his work. It...sort of looks like a surfboard. If you squint. And tilt your head to the side.

Next up - the "ocean" frosting. Gator mixes a batch of blue buttercream, dumping in what is probably way too much food coloring, but whatever at least he softened the butter without blowing up the microwave this time.

Gator continues to follow along with Barry Bakes' tutorial, growing increasingly frustrated as each step seems to go awry. The blue buttercream frosting he mixed up is a garish turquoise color from the excessive food dye. It's also too thin and runny, dripping off the cake in gloopy rivulets.

He blames Barry, that fucking fruit, because if he weren’t so hell bent on turning everything into some kinda innuendo maybe Gator could actually concentrate on what he is doing!

"Shit shit shit," Gator grumbles under his breath, frantically trying to smooth the messy frosting over the lopsided surfboard shape he carved. It's a losing battle. The cake looks like a melted smurf.

Next, Barry cheerfully pipes delicate white frosting swirls and curls to create realistic seafoam on his perfectly smooth blue surfboard. Reminding the audience that big tips are better for piping, and everybody loves a good pipe.

Gator glares at the screen. His own piping bag is loaded with frosting that's somehow both too stiff and too drippy at the same time. When he tries to pipe, it comes out in sad, deflated spurts. He can only imagine what Barry would have to say about that.

"Motherf-!" Gator bites off the curse, chucking the piping bag down on the counter. This was a stupid idea. He's no baker, who was he kidding? He should've just bought Billy a damn gift card like a normal person.

Dejected, Gator slumps against the counter, hanging his head. Failure churns in his gut, sharp and nauseating. He can't give this monstrosity to Billy. He just can’t. Can’t bear to watch him try to hide his disappointment.

Frustrated and embarrassed, Gator gives up on trying to salvage the cake. In a fit of pique, he grabs a spatula and starts roughly shaping the blue frosted mess, not even bothering to smooth it out anymore. He carves angry slashes and gouges into the cake's surface with the edge of the spatula.

Before he even fully realizes what he's doing, the cake has taken on a new, crude shape under his hands - a lumpy, misshapen hand with the middle finger extended in an unmistakable gesture of "fuck you".

Gator steps back, breathing hard, and stares at his handiwork. The hand is far from anatomically correct, with uneven sausage-like fingers and a palm that curves at an odd angle. Globs of sticky frosting cling to the digits in gloopy turquoise clumps. The raised middle finger lists slightly to the side, like it's too heavy to hold itself up properly.

It's possibly the ugliest cake Gator has ever seen. So ugly it crosses the line twice and becomes perversely impressive in its sheer awfulness. A surprised, slightly unhinged laugh bubbles up from his chest as he takes it in.

This is what he has to show for his efforts. This fuck-ugly, lewd gesture of a cake, cobbled together from the dregs of his failure. It suits him.

“Yeah don’t know what the fuck else I expected.” Gator grumbles, despondent. He goes to the fridge to fetch a beer and tabs it open roughly, determined to drink thoughts of the stupid cake away. 

He’s not crying over cake like some lame ass. It’s whatever. It’ll probably still taste good, and if Billy doesn’t like it he can throw it in the trash. They’ll order a pizza or something and Gator will ride him till his dick goes numb and call it a night. Happy birthday.

Gator stomps to the bedroom he and Billy share and pulls out the trunk where he keeps his hunting gear from under the bed, because it’s been awhile since he polished his knives and that always helps lift his mood. He takes the trunk out to the living room and gets to work. Ques up his workout playlist on his phone and connects it to the TV so he can put it on blast.

It helps a little. Allows him time not to think. But the time gets away from him, because he doesn’t even hear the sound of the front door opening and closing. 

Billy's entrance is marked by the faint scrape of his boots against the hardwood floor as he turns the corner into the living room. He pauses briefly, taking in the scene before him—Gator, surrounded by an array of gleaming knives, his trunk spilling open on the coffee table, and the ear splitting rifts of heavy metal blaring from the television speakers.

A faint smile tugs at Billy's lips as the dom sets down his bag and sheds his leather jacket, revealing the broad contours of his chest hugged by a tight white T-shirt. The room is thick with the scent of metal and leather, a comforting familiarity that wraps around Billy like a second skin. He approaches Gator slowly, noiselessly, his gaze fixed not on the array of blades but on the man holding them as gently as baby chicks.

Billy casts a long shadow across the coach and Gator finally notices him. He jumps up, fumbling the knife in his hands which clatters to the floor. The music crescendos, a dramatic backdrop to the moment. Gator lowers the volume, and whips around to glare at Billy who laughs at the fright he gave him.

“Hey, Baby Gay.”

“Don’t call me that!” Gator snaps. “And don’t sneak up on me. I was like, this close to killing you!”

“Oh?” Billy arches a mocking brow. “Probably shouldn’t have dropped the knife then.”

“Haha. Very funny asshole. You’re lucky I did,” Gator grumbles in reply, bending down to pick up the fallen knife. “You know how sharp one of these babies are? With one o’ these I can cut through the shell on a coconut just like that.”

He flicks his wrist to demonstrate the ease with which he could peel Billy’s flesh off, and Billy gives him this look - like Gator is just fucking adorable - and it’s god damn condescending, is what it is. But it also makes the back of Gator’s neck tingle with awareness, and his dick try to get hard. So yeah.

It’s probably a good thing that Billy’s so distracted anyway. Because swearing at his dom is firmly against their rules on account of the fact that Gator uses it as some kinda defense mechanism to keep Billy at arms length.

Or that’s what Billy said anyway when he made the stupid rule. Gator doesn’t make the rules here, he just follows them.

“I’ll count myself lucky then. I think I’ll get a beer. You want one killer?” Billy asks, already on his way to the kitchen. 

FUCK! The Kitchen. Gator remembers too late that he forgot to clean up and do something with that awful cake and scampers after him.

Billy strides into the kitchen before Gator can stop him.

His stomach knots as Billy pauses, his gaze landing on the misshapen dessert surrounded by strewn icing bags, crumbs and powdered sugar. Slowly a grin spreads across Billy's face, and blue eyes sparkle as he turns to look at Gator, where he lingers hesitantly in the kitchen doorway.

"Is this cake trying to tell me something?" he teases, amusement rich in his voice. He leans forward slightly to inspect the cake more closely. "Is this your way of telling me you don’t want to sixty-nine later, or is it a failed science experiment? Hard to tell."

Gator feels heat rush to his face, embarrassment mixed with irritation bubbling in his chest. He knows Billy is just poking fun, yet it stings, tapping into that deep-seated insecurity instilled by years under his father's critical eye.

"Scotty was here with Dot and it gave us something to do. That’s all," Gator mumbles defensively, his words sharper than intended. Then, unable to stop the words from tumbling out recklessly, he adds, "Just thought it would be nice to share, but you don’t have to have any if you’re just going to be an asshole."

As soon as the words are out, Gator regrets them. Swearing at Billy is one thing, but lying to him breaks one of their most cardinal rules. It’s not just about respect; it’s about trust.

Billy’s expression shifts subtly; the playful light in his eyes dims as he adopts a more serious demeanor. He closes the distance between them with measured steps. "Gator," he says softly yet firmly, "That’s the second time you’ve pulled that tonight. Watch it.”

Gator snaps his mouth shut and fumes silently, hanging his head. God, Billy sounds so disappointed in him and it’s worse than he even imagined.He wants to puke.

“Did Scotty really make this?” Billy asks, and Gator can tell just from his tone that Billy already knows the answer, but he’s waiting for Gator to fess up to it. Gator shakes his head, hot tears stinging at his eyes that he blinks away as rapidly as he can.

“It’s for you.” He confesses, feeling a weight lift off his chest despite his overall misery. “I made it for your birthday, and you made fun of it.”

“I did.” Billy acknowledges too easily for Gators liking, but before he can say anything Billy goes on. “I could have handled that better. You’re right. But before we get to that, don’t you have anything to say to me?”

“No. Can’t think of anything.” Gator immediately denies, because how is it fair that he has to apologize for a little white lie when he only did it in the first place because he knew Billy was going to laugh. He knew it.

“Oh?” Billy’s face is impassive but he’s unhappy with Gators answer. It crackles in the air between them. “Do you need a reminder of the rules?"

Gator swallows hard, defiance battling with remorse inside him. He shrugs stiffly, avoiding Billy’s gaze. “Let's just forget it. I don’t need a lecture right now.”

“I’ll decide whether you do or not.” Billy’s tone is calm but carries an undeniable edge of authority—one that sends shivers down Gator’s spine and fear bolting through him all at once. “You know, I was looking forward to a nice night with my boy. Didn’t know I was coming home to a brat.”

Gator ignores the voice inside that screams for him to stop stop stop, barreling ahead in desperate angry defiance.

“Fuck you and what you want! Maybe I want a boyfriend who knows how to lighten up huh?  Sorry I’m not your perfect little bitch. Go cry about it to someone else!” 

His insides shake from the fear and lingering tension. Gator has just royally pissed off his dom. It’s in Billy’s eyes and the slow exhale of breath he takes. Punishment is inevitable. Gator longs to take it back but he can’t - can never take it back - and nothing will fix it. Or fix him. He’s all wrong inside and nothing works no matter how hard he tries.

But the thing is, Billy is safe.

Billy is angry and Gator is terrified and trembling but It’s nothing like it was before, in his father’s house. When the fear of a hand went bone deep and lived in his nightmares.

Gator loves Billy’s hands. They way they touch him. The way they hold him fast and glue him back together. They’ve never let him down those hands, which is why Gator is shaking like a leaf right now, terrified that they won’t reach for him.

He didn’t yell those things at Billy because he wants more space. It’s stupid, he knows, but he yelled them because he needs Billy to take over. He can’t stop himself running full speed ahead toward a punishment. Billy will straighten him out. He can trust Billy to know what to do even when he’s lost sense of which way he’s turned.

Gator’s dom considers him for a long moment, the silence stretching taut between them.

“Go in our room and get me a paddle.” Billy finally orders. Then, deliberately turning away, he starts rummaging through the kitchen cupboards - no doubt in his mind apparently that Gator will obey him.

Of course he does. Knees shaking, Gator stumbles out of the kitchen because now that he’s driven them to this point his skin is crawling with the need to make it right. He’s aching with the need to be good so bad his knees feel like jelly and it’s everything he can do just to follow the order. He wants to hit the floor - go to his belly and plead for his dom’s forgiveness but that’s not what Billy asked for.

He will be good. He’ll make Billy forget that mouthy idiot who talked back and clearly had shit for brains. He can be such a good boy. The best boy! Just give him a chance and he’ll come wagging his fucking tail.

It’s pathetic.

But it’s also a relief, when he returns to the kitchen a few minutes later with a paddle from their toy chest and sets it on the table and Billy acknowledges it with an approving nod.

“Good boy.” he says, and Gator’s knees buckle. He catches himself on the table, holds himself up with palms pressed firmly to the wood because Billy hasn’t told him to kneel yet. He forces himself to focus on Billy as the dom takes an empty glass vase inexplicably sitting next to a bag of rice on the table, and places it on the floor between their feet.

Gator watches warily as next, Billy grabs the open bag of rice and tilts it sending a stream of white grains cascading down onto the tile. He stops when the bag is empty and kneels briefly to stir through them gently with his fingers before straightening and meeting Gator’s eyes again.

“Pants off.” he orders, and Gator sucks in a breath. He doesn’t have to ask why, and doesn’t bother, cheeks hot with shame as he reaches for his belt and gets to work.

"On the floor," BIlly commands softly, when Gator is down to his underwear. The dom points to the pile of rice on the floor.

"Kneel."

And Gator folds like fucking cake batter, sweet sweet relief coursing through his veins. He puts himself at Billy’s feet where he belongs, where he wants to be and shudders, biting his lip to stop himself from begging for the dom’s touch. He hasn’t earned that. Doesn’t make him want it less, but he can be good for Billy and prove when he remembers how.

Billy picks up the paddle that Gator chose – sleek and dark, crafted from polished walnut. As Gator settles on his haunches, head lowered in submission.

“You picked the heavy one. My favorite.” Billy remarks. “That why you picked it, or do you just really need to feel it tonight? You can answer.”

“Want to feel it.” Gator licks his lips. “Want you to be happy.”

“Good boy.” Billy says, leaving Gator to wonder which he is pleased with: that Gator wants his ass beat so raw he can’t sit or Gator wanting those things because they please his dom?

“Alright Baby, are you listening? I want you to pick those up and put them in the vase. Count each one,” Billy instructs, motioning toward the scatter of grains. His voice is firm. It brooks no argument.

Gator looks down at the nearly indistinguishable mass of tiny grains and feels a rush of frustration. "All of them?" His voice is a mix of incredulity and unease. What if he can’t do it? What if he can’t be good and Billy is disappointed in him again?

“Every last one Baby boy," Billy confirms with an implacable nod. “Don’t think about it. It’s not your job right now to think. Just do what I ask you to do. Can you do that?”

Gator takes a deep breath, steadies himself on the sound of Billy’s voice and nods. He can do that. He can follow Billy’s instructions. He doesn’t have to worry about ho much rice there is or whether he can even find it all. That’s not his to worry about. Not his place. He just has to listen. 

He reaches out shakily to touch the closest grain, his voice barely audible as he starts, “One… two… three…” His fingers tremble slightly; counting each grain feels like an impossible task. But Billy never sets him up for failure - not the way his dad used to. Billy doesn’t ask him to do things he’s not capable of just to fail. He asks Gator for things he knows he can do, and if he fails anyway it’s because Billy wants to be there when he breaks. He won’t leave Gator laden with shame and misery that will eat away at his insides.

As Gator focuses on the rice, Billy steps behind him. Without warning, he brings the paddle down gently but firmly across Gator's backside. The sound cracks sharply in the air, followed by another count from Gator's lips that judders from the impact.

“Four… five…”

Billy administers each swat in time with Gator’s counting—methodical and paced.

The pain is not harsh but it accumulates with each slap—the stinging warmth spreading across Gator’s skin contrasting starkly with the coolness of the floor beneath his knees and hands. Tears prickle at Gator’s eyes as he continues—his voice breaks around “twenty-nine… thirty…” 

It’s more than just physical pain; it's a release valve for all he’s been holding inside. Every impact sends ripples through him, but it’s not just his body. It does something to his soul too that he can’t explain. Something he no longer wants to deny.

“Let it out,” Billy murmurs close to his ear between paddles—a soothing contrast to the sharp swats.

“Thirty-one… thirty-two…” The numbers start blurring together as sobs hitch in his throat. The task which seemed merely frustrating at first now feels poignant— slowly, bit by bit, Gator cleans up the mess on the floor, and swat by swat Billy cleans up the mess inside. He doesn’t hit Gator after every grain, that would be excessive. He takes breaks at interment periods, spacing them out so that it’s impossible for Gator to try and guess when he might start up again. The fresh sting whenever he does is brutal, worse in some ways than if he had just continued until Gator’s cheeks were numb.

“Two-hundred and ten…” 

Billy pauses, placing his hand gently on Gator's shoulder as he surveys his progress.

"You’re doing well," he encourages softly, and that little praise, that nothing bit of touch, is enough to break him. Gator chokes on a sob, hot tears spilling down his cheeks despite his best efforts to hold them in.

“Keep going.” Billy reminds him and Gator nods emphatically, tears dripping off his chin, because he hadn’t meant to stop. He was doing so well. Billy said so. He’ll never stop. Not until Billy tells him too.

With shaking hands Gator pinches grains of rice between his fingers and continues to count aloud between sobs and hits from the paddle—each number spoken is more than just an acknowledgement of rice grains; but of his submission to Billy. 

Billy’s little murmurs of praise and sounds of pleasure make him feel high. Like his head is floating in the clouds.

He loves subspace. Wishes it were easier for him to reach and he didn’t have to be taken down so hard. But finally he feels the familiar edges of it and the tears fall faster as he lets himself go.

Gator sinks into the feeling of weightlessness as it rises up to take him. Billy maintains a rhythm that is both firm and considerate, attuned to Gator's responses—his body language, his breathing, his blown out pupils and slurred speech. 

This is no longer about punishment. It’s a guided breakdown.

As Gator’s cries begin to subside into quiet murmurs and his ability to speak leaves him, Billy lessens the intensity of his strikes until he stops altogether. 

“That’s enough. You were beautiful Baby.” Billy halts Gator’s hands woozly still trying to lift rice and the sub sags against him. “You’re always so good for me baby boy.”

He brushes his fingertips along Gator's heated skin, tracing the raised welts along his buttocks and thighs softly, and making him shiver. Gator’s mouth stretches in a dopey lopsided smile, beaming from inside and out. He soars. Works his mouth to ask Billy to do it again - he can take more - but can’t get past the mushmouth.

The room is heavy with the scent of sweat and leather, the only sound now the quiet thud of Billy’s heart and Gator’s shaky breaths.

Hands roam over Gator’s back and legs, soft, soothing caresses that glide over his flushed skin. Billy leans close, his breath warm against the nape of Gator’s neck, whispering reassurances that float through his head like feathers.

The shift is gentle, a tender transition as Gator's breathing evens out and his trembling subsides. Billy’s hands are confident, knowing exactly where to touch to bring Gator back from the intense high of subspace. With each calculated stroke on his back and whisper against his ear, Gator feels the ground slowly come back under him, the weightlessness dissipating as reality takes hold once more.

Billy finally eases back, giving space for Gator to gather himself in the afterglow of their session. He cups Gator’s face tenderly, wiping away the trails left by tears with his thumbs. 

“Talk to me, Gator. What’s been eating at you?”

The use of his real name pulls Gator further out of his dazed state. He blinks slowly, focusing on Billy’s concerned face, grounding himself. “I... I’m scared,” he admits, voice still hoarse.

“Scared of what?” Billy probes gently, petting the long side of Gator’s hair now.

“I’m scared I’m not enough for you,” he confesses, dropping his gaze to where their fingers are entwined. He knows the words will hurt Billy. Make his dominant frown in the middle of his brow and start thinking of all the ways Neil Hargrove used to tell him he was a waste of space - too broken and wrong to ever take proper care of a sub. Nothing could be further from the truth. But if there’s one thing Gator knows it’s daddy issues and how they can haunt you.

But to his surprise Billy’s expression doesn’t change. He just nods quietly, still petting Gator’s hair. “Why would you think that?”

Gator hesitates, lips parting but no sound coming out. He swallows hard and shrugs.

“Listen to me Baby.” Billy says after a moment, fisting Gator’s hair between his fingers and tugging until he brings his eyes up. “You’re what I want. You. Even when you’re being a greasy dirtbag leaving your shit everywhere and blaring your candyass music.”

“Hey, lay off my Skyfire man.” Gator can’t help but smile, because Billy’s lips have curved up in amusement and they’ve had this argument a dozen times or more and it just makes him feel so good, that Billy pays attention to which albums he gravitates to depending on his moods. “They aren’t candy. Fractal is the best album produced since Reign In Blood.”

“Why are we talking about fucking Slayer, or Skyfire, right now when Ride the Lightning exists?” Billy growls, tugging on Gator’s hair until his scalp stings just the sweetest bit. “I should beat your ass again just for that.“

“Yeah. If you wanna.” he pants, eager, and Billy’s smiling mouth kisses him, hot and hungry. Billy licks into Gator’s mouth, possessive and sweeping, until he whimpers. The dom nips at his plump lower lip with a grin before pulling back.

“Don’t think you realize how sore you’re gonna be when you come down off this high babe.” He says. “But you heard me right? When I said I loved you? Cause I do. I wasn’t about to lose you before over shitty timing, and I’d never let anything take you from me now. Not Dot. Not him. Not anyone or anything. Okay?”

Gator shivers, but even the mention of his father can’t intrude on the blanket of safety Billy has woven around him, the sure way his gaze holds Gator and rings with truth.

“Yeah.” he sighs, breathless.

“Yeah?”

But it’s not good enough, according to Billy’s tightening grip. And fuck that feels good. Gator is suddenly aware of how hard he is in his briefs, but it’s strangely distant. Like he’d be happy to just sit here hard for another hour or more, letting Billy play with him.

“Yes Billy.”

“Good boy.” Billy's voice is soft, infused with a warmth that seeps into Gator's bones, coaxing his tight muscles to loosen.The room around them—their living room with its deep blue walls and plush gray couches— disappears momentarily, focusing all existence on their intimate bubble.

Billy lifts Gator’s chin so their eyes meet. "Nah nah, stay up for me Baby boy. I need you present." His thumbs brush under Gator’s eyes, rubbing warmth into his skin while he waits for Gator’s eyes to focus. "I think it’s time I show you something," Billy continues, when Gator’s gaze is clear once more.

"In the bedroom," Billy instructs softly, "In my sock drawer, there's a small white box. I want you to go and bring it to me."

Gator feels a jolt run through him. It shocks him rather unpleasantly back to reality, like he’s been dropped from a short height.

“Wait what?” he tries to ask, tries to think, because Billy can’t be hinting at what his muddled brain is trying to convince him he is. Can he?

“Shh. Don’t ask questions.” Billy warns. “And absolutely no peeking either. Just go get it.”

Gator’s movements are slow and automatic as he stands and makes his way down the hallway. This isn’t happening. Well obviously it is, he is on his way to their bedroom to open Billy’s drawer - which is strictly hands off unless he has permission - and get some mysterious box. But it’s probably like some new toy they can enjoy together. Maybe Billy went out and finally got those chains Gator found on that web store, the ones with the studs that dig into your wrists the more you struggle? He’s going to feel so owned wearing those. It’s gonna be great.

He’s convinced himself down off the ledge by the time he gets to the bedroom, but his heart hasn’t gotten the memo because it starts going double time in his chest as he reaches for Billy’s drawer. It slips open smoothly under his fingers which are trembling slightly. From fear or excitement, he isn't sure.

Inside lies a small white box, unassuming in its simplicity yet Gator just stands there and stares at it like it’s a bomb for a full minute before lifting it from its nest among Billy's socks. The weight of potential futures presses down upon him as he clutches the box in his hands.

He should be a good boy. He can just turn and go back into the living room and - Fuck it! Gator’s not kidding anyone. Least of all himself.

Before he knows it, Gator has torn off the ribbon and lifted the lid on the box to peek inside.

And there lies a beautiful black leather collar, its surface smooth and flawless except for the bold engraving of 'GATOR' studded across it in shining silver letters.

Gator stares at it in disbelief, eyes flooding with fresh tears. His heart trips over itself in his chest, thrumming against his ribcage like a caged bird desperate for flight.

The room is silent except for the sound of Gator's shallow, ragged breathing. Gator runs his fingers over the cool, shining letters that form his name, the studs scraping against the pads of his fingers sending tingles through him.

He lifts the collar, feeling its weight in his hands. It's heavier than it looks. He brings it closer, inhaling deeply—the leather smells rich and earthy. It’s the good shit. Supple and strong enough to take some serious pull, and yet the inside of the collar is lined with soft velvet, ensuring his comfort.

Something white resting on the blue lining of the box catches Gator’s eye. It’s a folded card, its crisp edge nearly taller than the sides of the box. Gently plucking it up, Gator flicks it open and scans, eyes widening at the one word message inside.

Peeker!

An unexpected burst of laughter escapes him as he wipes away tears. The simple word on the card speaks volumes, but so does Billy’s presence in their bedroom doorway where Gator finds him leaning when he looks up.

Billy is gazing at Gator with an intense mixture of emotions.

"Do you like it?" he asks, and there’s something like worry there. As if Gator might actually have shit for brains and do all that stupid stuff he’d told Dot he’d do back when he was scared shitless. All because he’d convinced himself that Billy wasn’t true - that he’d disappear like every other good thing has.

“Yeah.” Gator sniffs through his red nose, rubbing fiercely at his eyes. “Shit man. How long have you had this?”

“Since right after your birthday actually.” Billy confesses with an easy shrug. Like he isn’t just standing there admitting that he bought a collar for Gator and has been hanging onto it since September.

“Billy! It’s fucking March!”

“I know! I thought if I forbid you from going through my drawer eventually you would. I know what you’re like.” Billy said. Meaning of course he knows that no matter what, Gator eventually messes up.

But Billy says, “I guess I underestimated what a good boy I’ve got, huh?” with this soft look in his eye, like he’s looking at the best sight in the world and not his fuckup boyfriend standing in the middle of their bedroom in his tighty-whities.

Gator might be melting a little, which is why he has to sit down heavily on the bed before he crumples.

“Hey Billy?”

“Yeah, Babe?”

“I’m your sub…” Gator begins and Billy laughs, the sound loud and full of joy instead of mockery.

“No shit?”

“Come on, Billy please. Don’t be mean.” Gator whines, lifting the hand still holding the collar wordlessly and Billy finally takes pity on him and crosses the room to take it from him. Gator trembles, straightening up and bending his neck a little to give Billy room as he claps it on. He gasps a little, shuddering when Billy leans back and the heavy weight settles against his skin.

"You’re my sub," Billy repeats with finality."With or without this. But when you wear this, I want you to remember," he pauses for effect, letting his fingers softly caress down Gator’s neck and over the dark leather. "You’re my gift. The love you give me, makes me Gator, and I thank whatever lucky stars I’ve got that you came into my life when you did. Okay?"

A simple nod is all Gator manages in response; it’s all that’s needed. The smile that spreads across Billy's face is radiant—as if a piece has clicked into place within him too.

Carefully, lovingly, Billy cradles his chin and pulls him into a kiss.

It tastes sweet… like buttercream icing.

[shorthaltsjester]

It is such a bizarre choice to not have Vex see Percy forgive Ripley. The scene of her talking to him about forgiveness and how it is the only way to grow and how she carved it on Fenthras was such a good scene. Idk if they will still include it in another form now. Not to mention Percy says he forgave Ripley for himself, not for her.

no i doubt they will. and being honest i think this stems from choices they made in s1 with vex’s character that have just echoed down consequences because tlovm vex doesn’t really have anything she has to forgive herself for. she certainly has an ill-built sense of self, but it isn’t based in an actual flaw re: she is not responsible for her mother’s death but she was in fact a thief and frequently selfish during the campaign. but in s1, vex wasn’t really morally questionable in that way, she was just standoffish and cold and dependent on vax. for understandable reasons, she didn’t steal the broom, but she also has no history that’s disclosed to the audience of killing (even in self defense) or stealing and even her gold hoarding is like. one shot in the second episode when they’re fleeing from a dragon hoard. so then it’s hard to have vex be a character where forgiving herself is the sticking point rather than correcting her sense of self. in the campaign it was both because you couldn’t extract her greed (hunger) and self-interest from the fact that she was deeply scarred by her fathers insistence that she could never be enough.

but in the show at every chance they’ve limited vex to having low self-esteem which is fine, but does i think lessen the interest of a character like her if the basis of that low self-esteem is only her trauma and self-defence versus the more. call it self-offence that she did in the campaign. and i think that echoes into the relationship with percy. overall i’ve liked more than i’ve disliked with this version of perc’ahlia, but i do think there was a ramp up in s2 of feeling that hadn’t necessarily been shown developing (time limits time limits 😔) that much, and part of that is the lack of percy and vex reacting to each other being shitty people with hearts in their eyes. because they could both see the pain that was hiding under their shitty actions but were also just. find of the person doing the shitty actions. and ultimately i’ve kind of cut my loses with the level of like. snarky to each other while also being obviously in love and gross about it without ever admitting it to each other because they both have “How Could Someone Like That Ever Love Someone Like Me” complexes but i think im a bit more :( about the aspects of the characters that were truly just like. not good and not clean and not easily dealt with if dealt with at all that didn’t survive it into tlovm. like percy is truly not a good person (he’s not a Bad one either). like he does many many good actions, but he also is very willing to do horrible, horrible things in the name of what he vows to protect. and vex never really sheds the mask she learned to wear. there are people she allows to see through it but it stays for the entirety of c1 and some of matt’s choices suggest it’s something he echoes in portraying her in c3

anyway tldr. i agree about deeply missing the forgiveness percy and vex scene, even beyond the perc’ahlia of it all, it is one of my favourite cr scenes across all the campaigns, but unfortunately is one i’ve suspected to have been cut since tlovm’s version of saundor. i have the most naive of hopes that maybe i’ll be surprised but honestly i think i’d just be more questioning what the point of including that scene without earning it would be.

[steviewashere]

Terrifyingly Intense

Rating: General CW: Minor References to Sex, Steve Harrington's Self Worth Issues Tags: Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Arguing, Apologizing, Making Up, Steve Harrington has Self Esteem Issues, Emotionally Hurt Steve Harrington, Emotionally Hurt Eddie Munson, Steve Harrington is a Lover, Steve Harrington Loves Eddie Munson, Steve Harrington is a Sweetheart, Eddie Munson is a Sweetheart, Happy Ending

For the @steddielovemonth prompt: "Love is terrifying."

💕—————💕

Steve doesn’t know what’s wrong with him.

He’s pretty incapable of being normal about how he loves Eddie. From week two of their relationship, Steve was ready to get down on one knee and propose. Which is insane of him. They’ve been close friends since Eddie woke up in early April. And somewhere in there, Steve said the words all over again with true intent and intense feeling. Now it’s December and they’ve been together for less than a month. And Steve is driving himself up a wall.

But it makes him sick to his stomach.

Yeah, he said “I love you”, to Eddie. He’s said it out of fear in the hospital. Said it with hysteria in that field some weeks ago. But that doesn’t change the way Steve wants to say it again. In a sobering moment. When they’re doing something mundane. And he hasn’t disappointed anybody around him or nearly lost anybody to some third world grave danger.

He should know how to do this.

Yet, here he is in their little relationship—which, truly, feels too intense and big for human language—pulling himself away whenever Eddie wants to see him or talk to him or be with him.

Logically, he shouldn’t be doing something so stupid.

But—God—he’s so afraid. Afraid that Eddie will wake up one day, realize just how intense and lonely and nuts Steve is, and he’ll break off what they have. And then…Well, then Eddie won’t wanna be friends, he’ll stop hanging around, he’ll make up excuses to not have Hellfire in Steve’s dining room, he’ll do something crazy like unfriend all of them, he’ll get the fuck out of Hawkins, he’ll leave everything he’s ever known behind.

Yeah, Steve can’t be the cause of that.

So, he hides away. Keeps himself busy. Occupied, whatever. Hands never idle. Brain never quiet. Eyes never rested. And he stays away from Eddie.

——— By the second week of Steve’s little shenanigan, Eddie has caught on.

It’s obvious by the hurt that simmers in his eyes. His soft scowl. The lingering touches that used to make Steve’s skin light up with arousal, now fleeting. Just as fleeting as every other love anything Steve’s ever involved himself in. But he’s too afraid of whatever realization Eddie will make of him.

To be vulnerable, well that’s like death to Steve. He remembers one of the last times he did so. Sans Robin’s confession, because Steve doesn’t think he had an actual thing for her—he’s easily convinced, okay, and he’s also an extremely lonely person. But Nancy definitely left her mark on his self worth, that’s for certain. Bullshit bounces around his—what he thinks—empty skull. If he allows himself to love strongly, he’ll be bullshit eventually. If he forces himself to pull away, he’ll probably still be bullshit.

He won’t win either way.

And that’s apparent by the next time Eddie comes pounding on his front door. Very literally. His fist making the whole door shake.

Steve rips it open, ready to spit fire at whoever is there, but all words die on his tongue in the face of Eddie’s open anger. Eddie’s face is furrowed everywhere possible, his eyes are like lasers, skin red and redder as he looks at Steve.

“Hey, Eds,” Steve tries to coo.

“Cut the shit, Harrington,” Eddie growls back. He shoves his way past Steve. Stumbling into the foyer. It’s been raining and Eddie’s soaked, dripping water from his leather jacket onto the floor, but Steve is too stunned to do anything about it.

In fact, Steve’s stomach is lurching. His mouth filling with saliva. Ready to puke. He shuts the door behind himself, turning around to fully face Eddie. “What—uh—What’s wrong, babe?”

Eddie looks around the space. As if hunting for something. His eyes are sharp when he glares back. “You aren’t busy,” he spits, “you didn’t have a shift at work, I already asked Robin. And you very much so aren’t sick.” He crosses his arms over his chest. The squeak of his jacket loud between them. “When you’re sick, you’re miserable. Like a wet fucking cat. You make a whole ordeal of it. And I come to your rescue every time. Yet, you’re lying to me.” He steps closer into Steve’s space. Steve steps away, back slamming into the door. “Why are you lying to me?”

Steve shakes his head. “I’m not, Eds. I wouldn’t—“ He bunches his palms at his sides. They’re sweating. His stomach still heavy and twisting. Chest pulsing. “—I wouldn’t lie to you. I don’t know—“

“Then why are you pulling away?” Eddie is practically pleading for an answer. His voice goes pitchy. “I hardly see you anymore. You claim your busy or sick or whatever—But you never are!” He exclaims, his words echoing.

Finally, Steve finds his strength to move. Stepping around Eddie, speeding into the kitchen. Eddie is following him, his footfalls heavy and clumsy, chasing. He won’t give Eddie an answer because he’s not sure which words to even say.

“Sorry I’m pulling away, I love you too much.” That doesn’t even make any fucking sense. Steve never makes sense. This whole thing is starting to make him dumb.

He pulls open the fridge, sticking his head inside, acting as if he’s about to make food. His hands rummaging, digging through his things, knocking containers over, nearly breaking some glass condiment bottles. If he can just get Eddie to grow disinterested in this conversation, maybe he’ll leave and Steve can stew in his feelings, up until he actually knows what to say.

God, what is wrong with him?

“Talk to me, Steve,” Eddie is demanding. “Please just talk to me. Is it something I did? Did I hurt you the last time we had sex or something? Were you dissatisfied with the last date I took you on? Because I can think of a million other things to do, to take you to experience, if you would only talk to me!” He begins to shout. Steve flinches where his head is still buried. He’s always hated arguing, reminds him of his parents, if he’s being honest. But Eddie doesn’t know that. And he hasn’t taken notice. So he continues on, “Maybe you didn’t like the Christmas gift I got you? Is that it? What did I do? Please, Steve, please just—“

“I can’t!” Steve finally yells back, standing up ramrod straight, the fridge door quietly and gently closing behind him. He shifts on his feet, hands bunching at his sides once more. He shakes his head, the tears already prickling in his eyes. “You don’t want to know, okay? You’ll think it’s stupid or something and then I’ll feel worse and I—You can’t know.”

His eyes dart up to Eddie, When was I looking at the floor? And Eddie looks…Well, he looks damn unhappy about that answer. But also severely concerned. He chews at his lip, crossing his arms once more, popping his hip so that his body is leaning away from Steve. He sharply exhales. “If you cheated on me or something, you can just say that. And I’ll get out of your hair.”

“What?” Steve squeaks. “Why would you think that? I wouldn’t do that to somebody.”

“Then what’s wrong? That’s all I can possibly think of as to why you’re putting distance between us.”

He stiffens, swallowing. Sniffling. God, why is he about to cry? His breath stutters in his chest. Stomach churning and churning and flipping. “It’s because I—“ He hiccups a sigh. “It’s because I love you too much, okay?” He whispers. Steve can’t make his voice any louder than that. The shame at the admission coiling tight in his throat and chest. He crosses his own arms, fingers wrapping around his elbows, fingernails digging into his soft flesh. “Like so much, you’ll think I’m insane. And then you’ll get weirded out by me. And you’ll think I’m fucking with you or something and then you’ll just leave. Like everybody else has.”

Eddie softens. Arms dangling loose at his sides. He hesitantly gets closer to Steve. “Baby,” he’s softly cooing, “why would that make me not love you? All I want is to be loved by you.”

“I’m scared,” Steve confesses. “I’m scared you’ll hear me and you’ll see how much I love you and you’ll leave. Or you’ll…You’ll realize something that a lot of other people tend to realize—“ He takes a gasping breath, something salty landing on his tongue. Of course he’s crying. “You’ll just realize that I’m a bullshit person. That I’m too much and too intense and too enamored, or whatever. You’ll realize that I’m bullshit in the sense that I don’t know what to do in a crisis or when I need to make somebody happy. You’ll think I’m bullshitting you about every fucking thing. Because I—“ A sob leaves his chest. It’s got claws, it hurts on the exit.

Out of the corner of his eye, Eddie slowly raises his left palm and cups Steve’s right cheek. His other hand lands on Steve’s opposite bicep. He runs his hand up and down the arm in tender swipes. “Steve,” Eddie starts, his voice low and trapping—his words are almost congested. “Sweetheart, your feelings aren’t bullshit. You aren’t bullshit because you feel something. Especially something like love. You deserve to have that. And you deserve the possibility of reciprocating.”

“I love you so bad, Eddie,” Steve cries out. “It fucking terrifies me how much I do. And I—“ The sobs come easier now, rattling his whole body, crumpling him bit by bit. Eddie shuffles in and drags Steve to his chest. And over Eddie’s heart, Steve mutters, “I don’t know how to be normal.”

Eddie’s hand on his bicep moves to the back of Steve’s head. His other hand falling away to Steve’s shoulder. “I love you, too,” he murmurs. “It physically hurt to not have you near me. I thought that I fucked everything up, Stevie. I love you so much, it threatens to destroy me sometimes.”

Steve nuzzles in closer. Tentatively wrapping his arms around his middle. “I’m sorry.”

“No,” Eddie whispers, “You don’t need to apologize. I understand, it’s alright.” He presses a chaste kiss to Steve’s head. His lips lingering. “Besides, I’m the most abnormal person fucking ever, sweetheart. Your love won’t chase me away. Never ever. You never have to be scared about loving me too much. I welcome it.”

“Okay,” Steve mutters, “I’m still sorry.”

Eddie sighs. “I know, love bug,” he whispers. “I know you are.” He moves his arm to wrap around Steve’s own torso, swiping his hand in one long, soothing stripe over his spine. Another kiss, this time to Steve’s temple. “Let’s order some pizza or something, alright? We’ll cuddle on the couch and calm down. I’m sorry for yelling at you. Sorry for assuming the worst. I just love you so much and I know you love me, too—I couldn’t come up with a single reason why you’d stop.”

“I don’t think I can stop, which is also scary. But—Like a good fear? It gives me adrenaline.”

Eddie’s chest vibrates with his laughter. Bright in the otherwise gloomy and dark place Steve’s found himself in. “Don’t you ever stop,” he demands. “I want your love all the time. I’ll tell you if something bugs me, alright? Don’t go assuming. Because I love you, Stevie. I love you so much.”

Steve pulls back, face pointed up at Eddie’s. He matches his soft smile. “I love you, too. Let’s get some pepperoni pizza, though. Because I am fucking hungry.” He squeezes his arms around Eddie. “Hungry for you, too.” And he saunters away.

In return, he hears Eddie shout after him, “You better make do on that! I missed you too much for you to tease me!”

Maybe he should learn to just trust his gut. To just admit what he’s feeling. Because it seems, if he’s honest about it the first time, good things happen in return.

💕—————💕 Gotta be honest, this isn't my best work. I've been feeling pretty mucky recently and nearly didn't have the energy to write. But I think this suffices.

[livelaughlovesubs]

Okay since people wanted me to explain why I don’t like ra-on, I’ll gladly do

It might be a long rant, also it’s my opinion.

So, I don’t even mind that they have strong libido. I mean go ahead, fuck those devils if you want, but the problem is they are supposed to be the player’s inserts. For that, this character is written way too bland.

They are way too indecisive, for example Levi’s bloodshed card, he was hurt and that dude kept saying, ‘oh I really shouldn’t do this, this is wrong,’ but what did they do? They fucked anyway. Man was on the verge of dying, and I get that he looked beautiful while doing so, there is still a time and place for everything. Then, they got hints from Levi that he wanted to do it too, okay, great, lucky you ig. But they were still so unsure of it. If you really are that desperate to do it in a graveyard with a injured man then do it with confidence, instead of keep being so unsure. Cuz if you really were that worried, you literally wouldn’t touch him. Besides, apparently they are too dumb to do first aid on him. I’m not asking them to treat his wounds, Simply putting some clothes over him would have been enough, man’s laying in the rain on the ground while bleeding my god.

Second, they are around 20-22 guess? Because minhyeok is studying and they are childhood friends. Then why are they so incompetent that they have to live off that poor man. We never heard of them having any hobbies or job, all we know about them is that they watch porn in their free time. Great. Not to mention I bet they smell, there is a comic telling us about how they’d masturbate on his chair and not wipe it afterwards. Again, poor minhyeok is the one to wipe it afterwards

That’s fucking disgusting like bro, I get you had a sad past, I get you lost your parents and didn’t have anyone to teach you some stuff, but that is being a normal functioning human which they aren’t. In the beginning, we saw that minhyeok had to take care of ra-on like they were some teenager, they can’t do anything to contribute to sharing a living space with their friend. They can’t cook, could clean but doesn’t cuz they are slacking off. How amazing. Minhyeok is going to college and has to take care of such a nuisance, he truly is pitiful. I’m not asking them to make millions, a simple part time job would suffice, heck, even knowing that they cook their own food. But nooo, they are fucking useless.

Then, in the story, we literally never know anything. They are getting pushed around by the devils. Sitri keeps calling them by the name of another, Satan does whatever the fuck he wants with them, most of the devils use the reason that they have to fuck to take advantage of them, Levi hangs them, mammon also just does whatever he wants but suddenly claiming ra-on owns him. I mean that’s not bad, most of it are little things that could have been alright if only they asked first. Consent my friend, consent. Just ask: ‘I think you need devil energy now, if you don’t mind, I could help.’ (Some did, I think beliar did ask, so shout out to him) then everything would have been fine. But because ra-on’s opinion is so irrelevant, it makes it so clear that the devils only see them as ‘the descendant of Solomon’, as a toy. But they are also somewhat at fault, cuz they aren’t assertive at all. They have no opinion to begin with, they are a pushover.

Third, or fourth? Idk, anyways their goal. So the goal is to end the contracts between the devils and the soul of Solomon. Alright, so the most normal thing would be to ask who those 72 devils are, where to find them and where you will be heading next. But no, the little group is just dragging them to wherever. Also, that about fighting angels, I know they are a human and useless against such strong enemies, but at least don’t just stand around and watch? Like they could hide, go out of the way, call for more forces, pick up a fucking weapon and shoot like Amos and stolas, nope, staying useless again. Those angels are coming for your life, which is nothing they could have controlled, but doesn’t mean they had to stay a damsel in distress. If ra-on got separated from the devils just once, they wouldn’t be able to do anything.

Beelzbubs story, they met him at a bar and he starts to sniff and lick them? Starts to invade their personal space? Sure, why not, he looks good so of course they let him use them.

The devils are biting you, forcing their kinks on you without telling you beforehand, which is basic bdsm etiquette? They are a perv, they like anything anyway so it’s fine.

No it’s not. Ra-on lacks communication and an own standing, it’s as if they don’t respect themselves. Or they are just so chill that they don’t mind getting laid during war? Now that I think about it, you have an option to say you do stay in contact with minhyeok when bael asked you about ‘that special person you left behind’. When, how do they stay in contact? Through ppyong? They could have written a letter to give minhyeok then, a text for ppyong to show minhyeok, told ppyong to tell the only friend they had to take care or something. Nope, nothing, they really only used him huh. Or maybe I’m overthinking it and their character isn’t developed enough to think about such details. Now that I’m talking about development, they don’t seem to have any at all. They are still as plain as before, and we are at chapter 5. They haven’t gotten any more serious, mature or anything. They don’t actively participate in helping neither.

They don’t talk a lot, don’t seem to have a Typ, don’t seem to dislike anything except normal things like crimes, don’t have anything they especially like besides sex. Just a mindless horny doll with no own personality. They don’t understand how hell works at all. Heck, I bet they don’t even know the names of all seven kings. It’s always about the devils doing whatever they like with ra-op, and ra-op being surprised but accepting it with no complains. They are such a failure, like they don’t resemble Solomon in the slightest. I think Solomon has more layers to his personality than ra-on. I get them wanted to make them ‘relatable’ and ‘basic’, cuz it’s a player insert, but no, they aren’t giving us any choices to support that.

Ra-on can stay a bottom for all I care, I don’t relate to them anyway, but they could be a little more sassy maybe? And a bit more decisive and mature please like my god. If they caused for a funny quirky moment then that would be enough. The writing is a joke anyway, so it would be better actually to just straight up make it into a comedy.

I could probably say more if I read more, but I’m stuck at 5-21 cuz I don’t have energy anymore. I’ve written a lot already, and i should probably mention again that this is my opinion, also that I do like the game, just not the MC.

[apiratefellinlovewithastar]

https://www.tumblr.com/darlingjunebug/728466035752271872?source=share

it's skull, skull is the third party who gets involved bc he's the only who has the emotional intelligence to notice the problem and the lack of self preservation to put himself in the line of fire

There are some pros and cons to being a civilian suddenly thrust into not only the cursed mafia world, but also the cursed mafia world.

Pros: he gets paid to do what he loves—to play out his stunts in a setting where he doesn’t have to hold back so as to not to raise civilian suspicions about his condition, while also getting all of the acclaim when his subordinates genuinely shower him with it.

(Was it a mindfuck when some clown just showed up in his living room trying to reclute him? Yes. Is it dangerous? Yes. But if there’s anything the great Skull-sama loves, it’s a good challenge!)

Cons: once in a while he has to spend time in the vicinity of some less-than-desirable individuals, who consider him—him!—to be the less-than-desirable individual. The nerve!

(He’s not factoring Kawahira’s little misadventure, specifically, into this; getting turned into a toddler isn’t any weirder than being able to regenerate his body and coming back to life in his books.

Now that they’re out of the woods and he can laugh about it, he can begrudgingly admit—in the safety of his mind—that Checker Face did it for a noble cause, despite going about it in a not-so-hot fashion. If Skull were a millennia old being, he would play Russian roulette with some douchebags and give them body dysmorphia just for shits and giggles.

Skull will, however, complain about the acquaintances it left him with, as much as he wants, for as long as they’re assholes—which is shaping up to be for a very, very long time.)

The delightful but ultimately exasperating shit show that are one Sawada Tsunayoshi and Reborn-senpai does not fall into either of those categories, but in a secret, third, second-option-adjacent thing: idiots in love who, despite being more in sync with each other’s emotions than anyone could ever wish to be with their partner’s, couldn’t be more out of touch with their feelings if they tried. (And Skull has seen some paradoxes in his time, okay?)

All of this is relevant because, ultimately, despairingly, he’s gonna have to intervene. Jesus fucking Christ.

None of Tsuna’s little Elements, let alone any of Skull’s former colleagues—or anyone else who could, for that matter—is gonna do jack shit about it. They’re all either too emotionally constipated themselves, too scared of Reborn to dare going against him, or too willing to let them ‘go at their own pace’ (as if that will ever lead anywhere!).

So. It all falls into his hands to do something about it.

Does Skull win anything by meddling? Not in the slightest. On the contrary—

“I do not get paid enough for this shit,” Skull groans. “I do not get paid at all for this shit.”

If anything, he’s risking death by Reborn-senpai!

But he owes it to Tsuna, because despite being obviously influenced by Reborn in more ways than anyone would like, he has never, not even once, been unkind to Skull. Even before the whole Representative Battles happened—and that’s a whole other debt he needs to repay.

Unlike anybody else who has ever interacted with both Skull and Reborn, Tsuna has never once lacked basic human decency. (Skull wishes he had lacked basic human decency; he wouldn’t feel so morally obligated to protect the kid’s heart then.)

Enma pats his back in comfort when Skull hides his face in the other’s shoulder. Earnestly, he says, “I think you’re doing something truly honorable, senpai,” because he’s seen those two and knows what Skull has to deal with; more so than Skull, actually, because while Skull can just fuck-off whenever they get unbearable, Enma lives here and still has to interact with them on a daily basis.

What the fuck.

Skull raises his head long enough to look at him. “How do you deal with it, Enma-kun?”

Like the true child soldier he is—and he’s not gonna open that can of worms at the moment; Jesus, why did he even have to think about it?! One emotional crisis at a time, please!—Enma stares off into space before solemnly saying, “I grew up with Adel and Julie,” like that answers anything.

It kinda does, funnily enough.

“Ne, ne, Enma-kun,” Skull wheedles, getting an idea.

But Enma shakes his head, smiling apologetically before he can even say anything else. “I can’t help you with this,” he says, soothing the sting of his betrayal by running gentle fingers through Skull’s nape. “I grew up with Adel and Julie,” he reiterates meaningfully.

It takes Skull a moment.

“That bitch,” he says with an offended gasp. “She told you not to get involved, didn’t she?!”

Enma tugs gently at a lock in reproach. “Be nice to my sister.”

Skull pouts. Enma’s eyes soften. The fond amusement in his expression makes Skull’s stomach flutter.

(Maybe he has indigestion or something? He’ll have to pick up some Otha’s Isan on his way back.)

“If it makes you feel better, I will cheer you on every step of the way, okay? So hang in there, senpai.”

That does make him feel better.

If nothing else, Skull will at least have a cute little kouhai to come back to and be comforted by when this inevitably blows up on his face.

“Well,” Skull says, revisiting his earlier thoughts. He leans into Enma’s touch, feeling rejuvenated. “If there’s anything the great Skull-sama loves, it’s a good challenge!”

[okthatsgreat]

ok Idk if ur like hiding spoilers so don’t answer any of this if u can’t but if u CAN please please tell me why the dating sim girls hate & ur omnipotence so much they want you dead!!!!! is it the same reason they hated the first one or different? is there a reason tamsin wants you to stay on script, knowing she’s not interested and likely doesn’t like the dating sim format she’s stuck in? id kill to play this lee

ID KILL TO MAKE THISSSSSSSSS GOD I HAVE SO MANY IDEAS!!!!!! SO MANY IDEAS THAT ARE FAR TOO AMBITIOUS

BUT i can say this a lottt of it revolves around the medium of video games/dating simulators in general. if that makes sense. like the typical dating simulator is over the course of a few weeks(??) or something, which you AS THE PLAYER are able to pop in and out of as well as restart and redo to your hearts desire. if you want a different ending then you can simply restart the week and get a different ending!! if you want to date a different girl or see all of her reactions to everything you say to her then you can do that!! that’s definitely what the LAST guy did. but the thing that at some point these four girls became AWARE he was doing that. they are the only four people in this soulless world that are AWARE that they are stuck in an endless, one month cycle that all bends to one guys whim. they had no control whatsoever about what happened because they were not created to drive the narrative forward. and protag 1 was a very bored player with a lot of free time

so at one point the npcs finally actually for real talk to each other outside of their “pre-set” dialogue. the first protag has been repeating ellies route for a while now and the others were initially resentful of her just because they for real do Nothing when their route isn’t being played. but then one day ellie goes This Sucks. and the other girls go This Sucks. and the plan is formed to confront protag 1, and whether they MEANT to murder him or not they ended up killing him, at drowsy creek which is where ellie’s ‘final date’ is. and they don’t have that long to feel terrible or anything, because the timeloop STOPS. like they actually DID IT. which is why so many of them look different when YOU show up— they were actually able to explore the world and grow as people!!!!

but then here YOU are!! the second protagonist! you have the same ability as the first guy, and suddenly all four of them are stuck in the EXACT same cycle. which is why your decisions are really important here— IMMEDIATELY a lot of them are thinking about killing you, because that clearly worked for the last guy. pushing wayyy too hard about the murder is gonna make them even MORE hostile, especially tamsin who is quite defensive (hence why she’s telling you to BACK OFF BUDDY). a lot of the endings of this game are them taking you out lmao, only for you to come righhtttt back. if you go through the game just trying to do a normal romance route, it’s likely you’re gonna get killed!! ESPECIALLY if you do ellie’s bc she’s so over it lmfao

in my dream beautiful universe where i am able to make this game, the “true ending” of the game involves the four characters waving you goodbye before the game gets uninstalled from your computer entirely. bc that is truly the only way of ending the cycle. they have to be removed from the context of a video game and the protagonist simply can’t exist

[pedroscurls]

Third Time’s A Charm (Part 2).

Character(s): Frankie “Catfish” Morales , Reader (female, second person POV) Summary: Santiago tells the guys his plan and Frankie asks you a very important question. Word Count: 3,499 Author's Note: I’m obsessed with this story and have been writing non-stop. I hope you all are enjoying it as much as I am writing it! I will also be deviating a little bit from the movie regarding Tom, how Santiago asked the guys about Colombia, and the fact that I’m making Frankie not have a kid. Anyway, we are just at the tip of the iceberg... Stay tuned😉 Warning: Brief mention of implied drug use.

“Frankie,” you smiled. You felt your stomach do flips at the usual nickname hermosa. You couldn’t even focus on anyone or anything else besides him. He was staring at you like you were the only person in the room, his focus solely on you. 

The sounds of the crowd faded and you awkwardly reached around to give him a one-armed hug. Frankie, though, wrapped both arms around your waist. You felt his broad chest flush against your own, his strong arms embracing you so tight that you didn’t ever want to let go. And his cologne? You inhaled deeply, his scent filling your senses as you shut your eyes for a brief moment. This felt all too familiar, so you pulled away quickly, taking a step back to give yourself some distance. 

But Frankie… Frankie was still staring at you. 

“You look great,” he commented. “How long has it been?”

“A little over a year,” you answered all too quickly. “How are you?” 

Frankie shrugged. “I’m okay.” You knew what that meant and arched a brow in his direction. Your eyes raked over him from top to bottom, noticing how he brought the cup of beer to his lips. He wasn’t wearing a wedding ring, which confused you. 

“Hm, not buying it,” you said. 

Frankie let out a quiet chuckle. After he swallowed the contents of his beer, he gently nudged his shoulder against you. “Even after all this time, you can still see through me.”

“Only because you’re not good at hiding it,” you teased. 

Frankie feigned a pout. “I think I’m pretty good at it. My lady doesn’t even notice.”

My lady. He was still married. 

You forced a smile and shrugged, finally moving your eyes away from him to see Benny enter the ring. Frankie noticed the shift immediately, biting the inside of his cheek as he glanced over at Santiago who was staring at him. He wanted to move away from you, to keep his distance; after all, he was a married man, but he couldn’t. He wanted to be near you; it had been too long and it surprised him that he felt an immediate sense of relief and safety with you around. 

He hadn’t ever felt that way, not even with his wife. 

Frankie opened his mouth to say something, but was interrupted when you turned away to give Tom a tight hug. He watched as you whispered something into the older man’s ear, seeing his shoulders slump and a breath of relief escape his lips. 

You had been the missing piece that this group needed. You knew how to bring each one of them out of their shell without forcing them to talk about things they didn’t want to. Your presence brought comfort, a sense of safety and security, and the way you loved and cared about each one so genuinely and passionately gave each man the relief they needed to just let go of society’s expectations. 

Truly, each man had a soft spot for you. Aside from Frankie, you considered each man like a brother to you. So, when you pulled away from Tom, he looked at you with sad eyes and you didn’t have to ask him to know what was bothering him. 

“It’ll be okay,” you said. 

He shrugged. “Maybe.” 

“It will be. How’s Tess?” 

“Growing up too fast,” Tom chuckled. 

Before you could respond, though, another man walked up to you and the group. He glanced at each man before his eyes settled on you. He was tall, muscular, with deep blue eyes and dark hair. He was handsome, but he wasn’t Frankie. The men of your group knew what this man was about to say and when you flashed him a smile, they watched him get a bit flustered. 

You had always been so sweet, so nice, even when you weren’t interested. 

“Um, hi,” he said quietly. For a man as built as he was, as handsome as he was, it was surprising that he was so shy; it was almost endearing. “I don’t want to sound like a creep, but I noticed you over there and just wanted to say hi.”

“Well, hi,” you smiled. You told him your name and he returned the smile, showcasing his dimples. 

“I’m Alex,” he replied. “Do you come to these often?” 

Frankie, Tom, Santiago, and Will were all watching this unfold. The man had the guts to be talking to you, but he didn’t seem bothered by the group you were with. Instead, he was more nervous about making conversation with you than he was with the guys that were standing next to you. 

“Not always, but Benny’s a close friend of mine. So are these guys,” you answered, motioning to the men behind you. 

Your eyes met Frankie’s and you noticed how he was staring hard at the both of you. You noticed jealousy in his features with the way his jaw was clenched. You bit your lower lip and turned your attention back to the man in front of you. 

“That’s pretty cool. Um, I was wondering, can I get your number?” 

And there it was. Frankie took a step forward, but was stopped by Santiago. You looked over your shoulder at him before letting out a quiet sigh. 

“I’m sorry,” you answered. “I don’t feel all that comfortable giving my number out.” 

The man nodded. “Understood.” He cleared his throat and motioned over his shoulder. “I should get back to my group of friends.” 

You nodded. “It was nice meeting you, Alex.” 

When the man walked away, you let out a quiet chuckle and glanced over at the men who were now staring at you. “What?” 

“He seemed nice,” Frankie blurted out. 

“Well, he was polite, but he isn’t my type.” You replied, staring directly at him. 

Santiago arched his brow, looking between the both of you before he shared a glance with Will and Tom. “Anyway, you all up for drinks after this?” 

Will chuckled to himself. “Sounds good.” 

—

After Benny’s fight, you all went to a nearby bar and sat at an outdoor table. You were seated in between Frankie and Santiago, trying not to focus solely on Frankie’s body heat radiating so close to yours. 

“So, update us, what’s going on with you?” Benny asked, pointing in your direction. 

You shrugged, sipping at your drink. “Nothing new going on.”

“Not seeing anyone?” Benny asked, his eyes quickly glancing at Frankie. 

“Nope,” you replied quickly, dropping your eyes. “No one’s caught my interest. Besides, I’m too focused on work.”

“Right,” he grinned mischievously. “How is the teaching gig?” 

“It’s great,” you smiled. “It’s something I’ve always dreamt of doing. Teaching literature at a college level…”

Frankie smiled at that. He could listen to you talk for hours, especially when you showed as much passion and interest as you did with literature. He looked over at you and cleared his throat, deciding to chime in. 

“I’m proud of you.”

You looked over at him, a blush appearing on your cheeks. “Thank you, Frankie.” 

“I knew you could do it.” He smiled, gently reaching out to rest his hand over yours. You bit your lower lip, feeling his touch against your skin gave you a glimpse of the times you shared with each other and how his hands had roamed your body plenty of times. 

The rest of the men looked at the both of you, noticing that you and Frankie had shared plenty of moments tonight. Santiago gave Benny, Will, and Tom a knowing look and they all stood up simultaneously. Breaking out of your trance with Frankie, you looked up at them and arched a brow. 

“We’re gonna get more drinks. You guys stay, keep our table occupied so no one grabs it,” Santiago said.

“Pope,” Frankie warned. 

“Relax, Fish. Next round is on me.” 

Will, Benny, and Tom followed Santiago back inside the bar, giving you and Frankie the much needed alone time. You pulled your hand away from his, biting the inside of your cheek nervously as you brought your drink to your lips.

“How's married life?” You finally asked. 

Frankie cleared his throat. “Good,” he nodded. He didn’t know what else to say. In fact, he and his wife had been having marital issues since she had found out that his license was suspended for cocaine use. Frankie had been having trouble the past couple of months and turned to coke to alleviate some of the pain he felt. 

“I’m happy for you,” you whispered. “She seems great for you.”

Frankie looked at you. While you could see through his lies, Frankie could see through yours too. He noticed how you bit at your lower lip, how your eyes looked around the room, avoiding eye contact, and especially how you picked at your fingernails. 

“I’m happy for you too,” Frankie replied. He reached out, gently resting a hand over yours to stop you from picking further at your nails. “You got your dream job, hermosa. Your hard work paid off.”

“Did it though?” You blurted out. “I had to sacrifice a lot to get to where I am now and I’m not sure if it was a good idea.” 

Frankie said your name. “Look at me,” he said quietly. You shook your head. Frankie sighed. “Hermosa…”

You looked up at him. Tears stung your eyes and you tried to blink them away, but the way Frankie was looking at you, you knew that he was aware of what you were feeling. 

“You know that I couldn’t have asked you to stay, right?” Frankie said.

“But why didn’t you?” 

“That school was your dream,” he replied. “It would be selfish of me to ask, especially when I knew that if I did, you would have given up that dream to stay here.”

“But I’d be with you.”

Frankie sighed. “I know…” He knew very well that if you had never left, you would be the woman he was married to and he probably would have been ten times happier than he was now, but he couldn’t dwell on the possibilities of what could have happened. You both made your choices and now you both had to live with it. 

“I miss you,” you admitted, bringing a hand to wipe your eyes. “But I am happy for you, Frankie.”

“Come ‘ere, hermosa.” Frankie pulled you into a hug and when he felt both your arms wrap around him, he melted into you. It was wrong of him to be comparing you to the woman he was married to, but he couldn’t stop himself. Just hugging you like this made him feel safe, made him feel like this was where he belonged. 

Frankie whispered quietly into your ear. “I miss you too, hermosa.” 

When you pulled away, you looked up at him and noticed that you were both in each other’s personal space, lips inches from touching. His hands rested on your hips, gently rubbing circles into your shirt and therefore slowly lifting it to touch your skin. You shivered at the touch, your mind throwing out any morals that this was wrong, that this man was married, but you two shared so much history that you knew you couldn’t just forget. 

“Frankie… We can’t.” 

He sighed, pulling away and sitting back in his seat. “I know.” 

Before you could say anything else, Santiago and the rest of the guys came back to the table. You could hear their laughter and you glanced over at Frankie who forced a smile. All you noticed was Frankie putting on his mask and pushing aside his feelings. You tried to do the same, but being so close to him and being with the rest of the guys brought back so many memories. 

“I should head home,” you blurted. “It’s late and–”

“It’s Friday night,” Santiago replied. 

“I have a lot of papers to grade, Santi.”

You and Santiago shared a look. He glanced over at Frankie, noticing the distraught in his features as he looked away from him. 

“One more drink and we’ll call it a night,” Santiago bargained. 

You nodded, excusing yourself to go to the bathroom. You shared a look with Frankie and it almost stopped you in your tracks, but you gently rested a hand on his shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze before leaving the table. 

Once the rest of the guys made sure that you were out of ear shot, they all nudged Frankie and let out a quiet chuckle. 

“Like old times, huh, Fish?” Tom smiled. 

“I mean, seriously,” Benny added. “The way she looks at you, Fish, it’s like no time has passed at all.” 

Will nodded in agreement. “It’s obvious she still loves you.”

Santiago glanced over at Frankie and added, “Question is… If you’re gonna do anything about it.”

Frankie shook his head. “I can’t. I’m married.” He shared a look with Tom, knowing all too well that other man was dealing with his own separation with Molly and how it had taken a toll on him.

The rest of the men just nodded and decided to leave the subject alone. Frankie, though, thought about you plenty of times throughout the years, but seeing you and realizing that the feelings you both shared were still there had him thinking about the possibility of being with you again. 

“So, Pope,” Tom said, looking over at Santiago. “You’re back from Colombia… What happened?”

Santiago’s eyes lit up for a moment and leaned in close, his hands linking together in front of him. 

“I can get Lorea, but I can’t do it alone.”

“Haven’t you been trying that for years, Pope?” Tom asked. “What’s different this time?”

“I couldn’t find him, but I finally did.” 

Frankie, Will, and Benny shared a look before turning their attention back to Santiago. 

“17 grand for a week of work, guys,” Santiago added. “With a possibility of more. Listen, I made a deal with the agency down there, got us a good deal. We keep 25% of anything we seize and…” Santiago looked around the table, noticing how the rest of the guys were listening intently. “I have an estimate that Lorea’s got over 75 million dollars in cash with him.”

And there it was. The big and final selling point. Santiago and the rest of the guys knew how important this could be, how much money that was and how it could change their entire lives, but it was dangerous. 

And they were all retired veterans. 

“Holy shit,” Benny said. 

“I got it all planned,” Santiago said. “I have it all planned out. Just– I can’t do this alone. I need you guys. This can be good for all of us. We deserve this.” 

“I’m in,” Benny said. 

Will looked over at his younger brother, his jaw tightening for a brief moment. “Count me in too.”

Santiago nodded, clasping a hand over his shoulder. He looked over at Tom and Frankie, his eyes big and curious. 

“Fish? I need a pilot. I can’t do this without you.”

“I don’t know, Pope.” Frankie sighed. “I lost my license. I can’t even fly right now.”

Santiago was quick to respond. “I’m in with the army down there. I don’t need a pilot with a license, just someone I can trust.”

Frankie let out a breath. “I got busted. It’s not a big deal.” 

Santiago arched his brow. “What?”

“Actually, it’s a big deal.”

Santiago sighed. “Is it coke?”

Frankie didn’t respond. 

Santiago looked around the table, noticing how the rest of the guys didn’t look surprised, but then again, they had been here, in the States, with Frankie while Santiago was in Colombia. 

“Jesus, Frankie. Come on.”

Frankie sighed. “I’m workin’ on it. Besides, technically, it’s a suspension. I’m still under review. Count me in.”

“Redfly?” Santiago asked, pointing to Tom. “We need you on this. It’ll be good for you. Come on. You can’t be selling condos… You deserve this more than all of us.”

Tom sighed. “No live fire, and I’m in.”

“That’s all right,” Santiago replied. “We got you covered.” 

“When do we leave?” Frankie asked.

Santiago replied. “Thursday. We got about a week to prepare.” 

The rest of the guys nodded and they all lifted their glasses in the air to cheers. You noticed the five men raising their glasses with each other and you took your seat back in between Frankie and Santiago. 

“What are we celebrating?” You asked.

Santiago smiled. “We’re going to Colombia.”

You looked over at him. Your face fell and you sighed, glancing around the table to look at each man. You were right. They would follow each other no matter where it was or what they had to do. 

“Be safe,” you said. “Please.” 

“We’ll be back in a week, so we expect you to welcome us with open arms,” Benny teased with a wink. 

“Oh, I’ll even pick you guys up at the airport,” you chuckled. “But seriously, be safe.”

—

Santiago stayed true to his word. After one more drink, all of you were now saying goodbye in the parking lot of the bar. You were hugging Benny and Will while Frankie, Santiago, and Tom were talking amongst one another. 

“You know you gotta tell her about the coke situation,” Tom said. 

“Who? My wife? She knows. She isn’t happy, but she knows.” Frankie replied.

“No, not your wife. Her,” he corrected, pointing in your direction. “And trust me, Fish, if there is even an ounce of love that you still feel for her, you either stop it before it gets out of hand or you decide if she’s the one you truly want. Either way, you’ll be hurting someone. If it’s not her, it’s your wife. If it isn’t your wife, it’s her.”

Frankie nodded, gently kicking the rocks underneath his boot. “Thanks, Redfly.” He gave Tom a hug and watched him make his way over to you, Benny, and Will. 

“He’s right, you know.” Santiago said, clasping a hand over Frankie’s shoulder. “That woman still loves you.” 

“I don’t know what to do, Pope.” 

“Well, consequences aside, what do you want?” 

Frankie sighed, watching as you hugged Tom goodbye. “I want her.” 

“Then I suppose you got a lot of shit you need to think about then, don’t you?” 

Once Benny, Will, and Tom left the parking lot, Santiago and Frankie watched you make your way back over to them. 

“Can I take her home?” Frankie asked. 

Santiago arched his brow. “If she’ll let you.” 

Frankie scoffed and gently shoved the other man. He walked towards you, meeting you halfway and moved both hands to pocket in his jeans. “You mind if I take you home?”

“What?” 

“Only if it’s okay with you,” Frankie said. 

You glanced over at Santiago, watching the other man give you a nod and a thumbs up. 

“Okay, yeah, sure. Let me say bye to Santi.” You walked over to Santiago and gave him a tight hug, quietly whispering to him. 

“Will I see you all before you leave for Colombia?” 

Santiago nodded, pulling away and looking down at you. “Yeah, of course.”

“I’ll make dinner. You guys can come over.” 

“You? Cook?” Santiago teased. “Maybe order pizza instead.” 

You laughed, gently pushing him. “Ha ha. It was only one time that you got sick from my cooking.”

“Right, well, if you plan on cooking, make sure to read the expiration date.” 

You smiled, giving him one more hug. “Okay, okay. I’ll see you next week.” 

“You gonna be okay with him?” Santiago asked, pointing over at Frankie. 

You nodded. “I’m the safest when I’m with him.”

“That’s not what I mean.”

“I know what you meant, Santi. I’ll be okay.” 

Santiago nodded, grabbing his keys from his pocket. “Let me know when you get home.”

“You too. Drive safe.” 

Then, you turned to Frankie and noticed him looking at you with those brown eyes that you had come to love. They softened at the sight of you and he walked towards the passenger side of his truck and opened your door. 

“Still the gentleman, I see.” You teased, looking up at him. 

Frankie smiled. You took note of the dimple in his right cheek. You missed his smile, missed him. He took a step forward, entering your personal space once more. Your back was against his truck and he trapped you in between his frame and his vehicle with his hand gripping the top of the car door. 

“Hermosa,” he whispered. His voice lowered. Frankie’s eyes darkened. You knew that look all too well, knew exactly where this could go if you let it. 

“Frankie…”

“I have a question to ask you.” Frankie replied, leaning down inch by inch as your lips hovered against his own. This was dangerous territory. You knew that if you closed the gap between you and him, there would be no going back. 

“What?” You asked quietly. 

“Do you still love me?” 

--

Part 3.