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#it’s ingrained into his psyche
justanotherdrfan · 8 months
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I’d like to know was this before or after he got his baby girl ass picked up off the stage??
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t4tails · 10 months
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I think what bothers me the most about people being like: "Harry and Kim adopt Cuno and they all live happily as cops." is like... did you play the fucking game? Like, what was the reason Harry went bonkers? What was the reason Harry and Kim are so alienated from everyone? Like what is the fucking common denominator between Harry and Kim being such fucking depressive losers that absolutely nobody likes or wants in their lives?
Like, I get it cuz that's the way the game ends but like... it's literally a fucking basic math to know that the only way for Harry and Kim to get out is to stop being cops. They literally destroyed their lives by being cops and just in the moments in Martineise when they weren't cops they found shut that they had never found.
Cuz like... if you play the more... destructive ways for Harry to be? You can finish the game easily and Kim will still follow you and talk greatly about you, Harry and Kim can both sink in very much willingly in the life of cops to meet the end they have had walked to since they joined the force.
well you see these people dont actually play the game they just see communism jokes, gay men, and possible quote unquote found family and then black out. when they wake up two months later theyve drawn harry du bois as attractive and still dont know who klaasje is
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phatcatphergus · 5 months
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I think Tubbo would have a better relationship with streaming if he didn’t hold himself to such a high standard to make every stream his best and instead realizes that we just love watching him play/do things he enjoys.
I think he wouldn’t be as upset he doesn’t know what’s next and can just d things he enjoys until he knows what big thing he wants to do next. Weather that’s streaming or something else, he puts too much pressure on himself to one up himself in ways that no one expects him to
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a-partofthemob · 2 years
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hi! i hope you're doing well ^^
do you have any thoughts on reigen with cats
im pretty sure he canonically likes dogs, so i think him with cats is a funny concept
i like to imagine he's cool with them and thinks they're cute but they hiss at him </3
(i love your blog theme btw "get ready wake your psyche up mob" was stuck in my head for WEEKS)
-💫
i like to think that reigen loves dogs much more than cats but he still love cats, like 100% dog and 60-70% cats
he loves cats dont get me wrong, he doesnt hate them nor dislike them theyre cats theyre cute hes 100% chill with them, he likes cats, but most of the time they dont like him 😭 he'd have staring contests with cats, lose, and the cat is smug. he's try to get a cat's trust for the whole day and at the end the cat still doesnt want to be near him, but the moment mob enters the room the cat is purring and allows mob to pet them. reigen 100% hurt and wallowing
the only cats that pay him any attention would be cat cafes, but if serizawa was there the cats would gravitate to seri more and reigens only left with one cat by his side
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thebibliosphere · 3 months
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Do you think "Riddle me this, Batman?" has become a common lexicon among Gothamnites for when they don't understand something?
I like to think it has. I like to think they've heard The Riddler say it one too many times, and now it's just ingrained into their collective psyches in much the same way as "No shit, Sherlock" is.
I also like to imagine Bruce Wayne making a rare appearance at a corporate meeting, and the latest Gen Z hire, a generation that infamously doesn't fuck with formal office corporate speak, just leans over the table and says, "Okay, I hear what you're saying, but riddle me this, Batman," and Bruce tries not to choke on his coffee.
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jadenvargen · 7 months
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free online james baldwin stories, essays, videos, and other resources
**edit
James baldwin online archive with his articles and photo archives.
---NOVELS---
Giovanni's room"When David meets the sensual Giovanni in a bohemian bar, he is swept into a passionate love affair. But his girlfriend's return to Paris destroys everything. Unable to admit to the truth, David pretends the liaison never happened - while Giovanni's life descends into tragedy. This book introduces love's fascinating possibilities and extremities."
Go Tell It On The Mountain"(...)Baldwin's first major work, a semi-autobiographical novel that has established itself as an American classic. With lyrical precision, psychological directness, resonating symbolic power, and a rage that is at once unrelenting and compassionate, Baldwin chronicles a fourteen-year-old boy's discovery of the terms of his identity as the stepson of the minister of a storefront Pentecostal church in Harlem one Saturday in March of 1935. Baldwin's rendering of his protagonist's spiritual, sexual, and moral struggle of self-invention opened new possibilities in the American language and in the way Americans understand themselves."
+bonus: film adaptation on youtube. (if you’re a giancarlo esposito fan, you’ll be delighted to see him in an early preacher role)
Another Country and Going to Meet the Man Another country: "James Baldwin's masterly story of desire, hatred and violence opens with the unforgettable character of Rufus Scott, a scavenging Harlem jazz musician adrift in New York. Self-destructive, bad and brilliant, he draws us into a Bohemian underworld pulsing with heat, music and sex, where desperate and dangerous characters betray, love and test each other to the limit." Going to meet the Man: " collection of eight short stories by American writer James Baldwin. The book, dedicated "for Beauford Delaney", covers many topics related to anti-Black racism in American society, as well as African-American–Jewish relations, childhood, the creative process, criminal justice, drug addiction, family relationships, jazz, lynching, sexuality, and white supremacy."
Just Above My Head"Here, in a monumental saga of love and rage, Baldwin goes back to Harlem, to the church of his groundbreaking novel Go Tell It on the Mountain, to the homosexual passion of Giovanni's Room, and to the political fire that enflames his nonfiction work. Here, too, the story of gospel singer Arthur Hall and his family becomes both a journey into another country of the soul and senses--and a living contemporary history of black struggle in this land."
If Beale Street Could Talk"Told through the eyes of Tish, a nineteen-year-old girl, in love with Fonny, a young sculptor who is the father of her child, Baldwin's story mixes the sweet and the sad. Tish and Fonny have pledged to get married, but Fonny is falsely accused of a terrible crime and imprisoned. Their families set out to clear his name, and as they face an uncertain future, the young lovers experience a kaleidoscope of emotions-affection, despair, and hope. In a love story that evokes the blues, where passion and sadness are inevitably intertwined, Baldwin has created two characters so alive and profoundly realized that they are unforgettably ingrained in the American psyche."
also has a film adaptation by moonlight's barry jenkins
Tell Me How Long the Train's been gone At the height of his theatrical career, the actor Leo Proudhammer is nearly felled by a heart attack. As he hovers between life and death, Baldwin shows the choices that have made him enviably famous and terrifyingly vulnerable. For between Leo's childhood on the streets of Harlem and his arrival into the intoxicating world of the theater lies a wilderness of desire and loss, shame and rage. An adored older brother vanishes into prison. There are love affairs with a white woman and a younger black man, each of whom will make irresistible claims on Leo's loyalty. 
---ESSAYS---
Baldwin essay collection. Including most famously: notes of a native son, nobody knows my name, the fire next time, no name in the street, the devil finds work- baldwin on film
--DOCUMENTARIES--
Take this hammer, a tour of san Francisco.
Meeting the man
--DEBATES:--
Debate with Malcolm x, 1963 ( on integration, the nation of islam, and other topics. )
Debate with William Buckley, 1965. ( historic debate in america. )
Heavily moderated debate with Malcolm x, Charles Eric Lincoln, and Samuel Schyle 1961. (Primarily Malcolm X's debate on behalf of the nation of islam, with Baldwin giving occassional inputs.)
----
apart from themes obvious in the book's descriptions, a general heads up for themes of incest and sexual assault throughout his works.
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pin-k-ink · 4 months
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Yandere kurapika with a heavy heavy breeding kink. He’s absolutely obsessed with the idea of you being pregnant 👀👀👀
progeny // kurapika kurta
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tw ⇢ dub-con, obsessive behavior, imprisonment/isolation, breeding kink, mentions of pregnancy, unprotected sex, dirty talk, mention of lactation, implied murder, drugging, handjob, grinding
wc ⇢ 7.3k
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It had been six excruciatingly long years since the Kurta massacre. Six years of chasing empty leads, of doors slamming shut in Kurapika's face whenever he got close to the Phantom Troupe. His crimson eyes, once a source of pride amongst his people, now mocked him daily - glaring reminders of his failure to attain vengeance.
So when the encrypted message arrived with a potential location on a Kurta survivor, Kurapika could scarcely allow himself to feel hope. Too many times it had been cruelly dangled in front of him, only to dissolve into agonizing disappointment. He pored over the intelligence again and again, his hands shaking. This had to be legitimate. It simply had to.
Four sleepless nights later, Kurapika found himself on the first available airship to Yorknew City. His leg jittered anxiously the entire way, his mind cycling through every possible scenario. A trap from the Troupe? A sick game? Or could the near-impossible be real? When the ship finally touched down, Kurapika moved like a man possessed, following the coded coordinates to a dilapidated apartment complex.
His trembling hand barely registered the flimsy doorbell as he rang. Seconds ticked by like torturous eternities. Then, after what felt like a small age, the door creaked open to reveal...you. Kurapika's knees very nearly buckled at the sight of those telltale scarlet irises. Tears stung his eyes as he choked out a wavering, "You're one of my people."
That first night, he simply sat in reverent silence, studying the sacred eyes of his kinsman that he'd been deprived of for far too long. You seemed equally transfixed, if not deeply uncertain of this severe stranger's intentions. When you attempted to ask him to leave, Kurapika answered with a resolute headshake.
"I cannot do that. It's too dangerous to leave you here." His voice was thick with the weight of trauma, but carried a steely undercurrent of determination. "I'm getting you somewhere safe, where no harm can befall you."
True to his word, Kurapika immediately went about securing a transport ship to whisk you away from potential threats. You didn't have a choice. He had failed his clan once before through negligence - he would not repeat that grave mistake. This time, he would smother any flicker of danger towards the Kurta with extreme prejudice before it could even spark.
The following weeks were a fortified blur as Kurapika installed you in a veritable military bunker tucked high in the treacherous mountain ranges. He pulled every resource at his disposal to ensure your isolation and safety was absolute. Each day, he would rise before dawn to pursue his hunt for the Phantom Troupe, searching for that agonizingly elusive trail of vengeance. But like clockwork, he returned to the safehouse every evening, his frayed nerves only calmed by the sight of your scarlet eyes.
At first, Kurapika tried to keep things professional, nodding stoically whenever you greeted him. But the more time passed, the more you became his sole remaining attachment to a people he had lost. He drank in your every word, no matter how innocuous, wanting to ingrain the cadence of his kin on his psyche again. Your existence, your pure perseverance despite all odds, stoked something primal within him.
Eventually, Kurapika began staying later and later into the night, reluctant to abandon your presence, irrationally fearful something terrible may occur the moment he left your side. He started simpling...hovering. Watching you for long, unblinking stretches despite your visible discomfort. His fixation had been ignited, and it burned brighter with each passing day.
It was on one particularly humid summer evening when the stifling mountain air had you gasping for respite. You moved to crack open one of the safehouse's windows, hoping to coax in even the faintest whispers of a cool breeze.
The moment your fingers pulled against the latch, the electronic lock released a sad, mechanical whir of protest. You froze, realizing in that instant that the safety restrictions were not mere automated security protocols. They were under the total control of your increasingly overbearing guardian.
Slowly, you turned to find Kurapika shooting you a pointed look from the wingback chair across the room. His sharp jawline was locked, lips pressed into a severe line as he clutched the access fob in a white-knuckled grip.
"I wouldn't advise that," he said at last, his tone carrying curt reproach. "It's for your own safety to keep the windows secured at all times."
You opened your mouth to protest the blatant removal of your autonomy, but Kurapika silenced you with a mere arch of his brow. Heat prickled in your cheeks, flustered by his sheer audacity, his utter dismissal of your objections before you could even voice them. Who was he to declare what you could and couldn't do?
But as quickly as that spark of defiance flickered, it extinguished under the knowing weight of Kurapika's stare. He knew better than you, had spilled more blood and peered deeper into the abyss of human monstrosity. If he deemed something a risk, no matter how small, you didn't dare challenge it. Your very life rested on his prudence and protection.
So you bit back the fleeting urge to assert your independence. Instead, you gave a meek nod of surrender and retreated from the window with one last, regretful glance at the impenetrable night sky beyond the sealed glass panes. Your world had become startlingly small under Kurapika's wing.
He watched you like a lion scrutinizing its cornered prey until you sank back into the shelter of your designated space. Only once you had compliantly resumed your spot did that intense scrutiny finally ease, his body unsettlingly loose and calm again.
"There's fresh fruit in the kitchen if you need refreshment," Kurapika offered, as if making peace after the unspoken admonishment. "Let me know if you require anything else for your comfort."
You murmured a soft thanks, careful to not meet his pewter gaze for too long. The complex bundles of emotion they sparked - shame, defiance, loneliness, begrudging gratitude - were still too tumultuous to comfortably untangle.
With a slight dip of his chin, Kurapika turned his attentions back towards the scattered intelligence reports sprawled before him. But you could have sworn you caught the faintest wisp of a self-satisfied smirk playing across his lips as he resumed his nightly obsessive planning.
The message was clear: no matter how insular and temporary you hoped this arrangement was, he had no intentions of loosening his ruthlessly overprotective stranglehold. Not now, not ever. For in Kurapika's mind, he had already failed his clan once before.
He would not fail their legacy again, even if it meant eclipsing your every last freedom under his total, unwavering control. Your life belonged to him now.
What had begun as a flicker of protectiveness had been steadily stoked into an all-consuming obsession. And there would be no putting out that raging fire.
The next few days passed in their now familiar routine of forced complacency. Kurapika would depart each morning on his futile hunt for the Phantom Troupe's latest trail, leaving you confined to pacing the reinforced walls like a caged animal. You attempted to resist the itch of restlessness, but it clawed at your insides, making you increasingly reckless.
It was on one particularly moonless night when Kurapika was delayed by an anonymous tip that you decided to seize your fleeting window. You waited until the security monitors confirmed him still blocks away before punching in the override codes and disabling the safehouse's locks. You didn't have a plan or destination in mind - you simply needed to feel the sweet embrace of open air again, to remind yourself of the unfettered freedom you had lost.
The sleepy mountain town seemed almost haunted in the inky blackness as you strode its deserted streets. The crisp night wind caressed your face, and you reveled in the simple pleasure of being anything other than a prisoner in your own refuge. Eventually, your aimless wandering drew you towards the soft amber glow and faint music wafting from the local tavern.
A hand came to rest on the rickety oak door, then stopped as you wavered. Kurapika could return any moment now. But the fleeting indulgence of a cold pint and casual conversation with strangers was too tantalizing to resist any longer. Steeling your nerves, you pulled the door open and strode inside.
The raucous sound of drunken laughter and the thick fog of smoke immediately assaulted your senses. You wound through the crowd to the dingy bar, squeezing between bodies until you could flag down the bleary-eyed bartender. He poured you a tall glass of the darkest stout on tap without a second glance at your rumpled, out-of-place appearance.
As you nursed the first few sips, savoring the bitter familiarity, a rough voice lilted from behind you.
"Well aren't you a little ways from home?"
You turned to find a smarmy looking stranger waggling his brows lecherously. His breath reeked of stale beer and desperation.
"Just looking to unwind is all," you replied curtly, turning back towards your drink.
His calloused hand suddenly snaked out, gripping your forearm with surprising strength as he leaned in too close. "Well then how 'bout I buy the next round and we can 'unwind' together, sweetheart?"
You wrenched your arm away with a disgusted glare, preparing to hurl a blistering retort. But even as the first word formed on your lips, an eerie wave of dizziness crashed over you, blurring your vision. The tavern seemed to tilt precariously as you swayed on the barstool.
No...it couldn't be. That first drink. You made the mistake of leaving it unattended. As the horrible realization dawned on you, your faculties began to rapidly abandon ship.
"There's a good girl," the leering stranger's voice slurred as if underwater. "Just relax and enjoy the party favors."
You tried desperately to cry out, to raise even a tremor of alarm, but your voice failed you. The room pitched and spun until merciful darkness finally swallowed you whole.
The crisp slap of cool night air was like a bucket of ice water shocking you back to semiconsciousness. Your eyelids fluttered open to find yourself being half-carried, half-dragged down a dank alleyway by that stranger. The cloudy haze in your brain screamed at you to fight, to thrash and flee, but your body responded with only feeble murmurs.
Suddenly, a dark silhouette stepped out from the shadows up ahead, swiftly blocking your captor's path. The figure prowled closer, the dim streetlight glinting off a shock of brilliant blond hair.
Even in your drugged stupor, you immediately recognized the menacing aura radiating off of Kurapika. He had found you. Your heart should have leapt with relief, but your addled mind could only focus on the pure, unadulterated fury etched across his features.
"Let her go." His tone was low, practically subterranean with its seething intensity. "Now."
The stranger paused, seemingly taken aback by Kurapika's threatening presence despite outnumbering him. His grip on your arm only tightened stubbornly.
"This doesn't involve you, kid. I'd beat it while you still—"
He never got to finish that thought. Kurapika's knuckles connected with the man's nose with a wet crunch before anyone could blink. As he collapsed in a heap, clutching his bleeding face, Kurapika moved with terrifying fluidity.
A haze of fists and chains and guttural screams engulfed the cramped alley. You flinched with each tormented wail, hunched against the damp brick wall as your assailant's bones shattered piece by piece. The copper stench of blood flooded the air in thick, viscous clouds.
When it was finally over, the sickening sound of the stranger's gurgling breaths were barely audible above the drumming of your pulse thundering in your ears. Kurapika stood over him, chest heaving from exertion as he slowly retracted his bloody knuckles and Nen chains back into waiting.
Only then did his gaze fall upon your fragile, crumpled form. The molten rage simmering behind his eyes extinguished instantly, transposing into something akin to lucid fear. In a single deft motion, he scooped you up and cradled you against his chest.
"It's alright...you're safe now," Kurapika murmured, his voice dripping with the type of tender worry one reserves for a gravely injured child.
You opened your mouth to respond but only a pathetic whimper escaped your dry lips. Horror at your near miss quickly gave way to the warm comfort of Kurapika's secure embrace. Your eyelids grew impossibly heavy as you nuzzled against the soft linen of his blazer. Even as the world faded to black again, you felt utterly, inviolably safe within the confines of his sinewy arms...his obsessive protectiveness.
When you finally came to again, it was in the dimly lit familiarity of the safehouse's living quarters. Kurapika sat vigilantly on the edge of the mattress, his eyes two orbs of hollow, sleepless torment.
As you stirred, he immediately went into a flurry of doting. Cool rags were pressed to your clammy forehead. Chilled teas and electrolyte waters hovered against your lips, Kurapika tipping them carefully to soothe your sandpaper throat. His touch was insistently gentle, but you could sense the roiling tempest churning beneath that zen exterior.
In your addled state, you kept up a litany of small whining sounds and petulant fidgets. Kurapika bore each one with inexhaustible patience and care, stroking your hairline languidly as you grumbled childish complaints about your headache or an itch that needed scratching.
Even as the last vestiges of the toxin worked its way out of your system over the next several hours, you never felt fear or vulnerability - only the profound relief of being tended to so meticulously under Kurapika's hawkish devotion.
Several times, his gaze seemed to unconsciously drift down to your parted, pouting lips as you whined insistently. You thought you caught his throat bobbing ever so subtly, as if waging an internal war with some primal desire. But the moment never transversed, and he remained ever the devoted, if tightly-wound caretaker through the hazy night.
It wasn't until the first rays of dawn filtered in through the slitted windows that you drifted into a deep, restorative slumber. And in those last, fleeting moments of consciousness, you realized with dawning horror how completely and utterly co-dependent on Kurapika's obsessive protection you had allowed yourself to become.
In the aftermath of the nearly tragic incident, there would be no venturing outside again...not without him. Not ever. The fire of his obsession had been stoked into a conflagration - one he wholeheartedly welcomed if it meant never going through such terror again.
You had been rescued from the depths of pitiful frailty, only to become irrevocably entangled in the dark, singular orbit of Kurapika's unhinging fixation on you. And from that point on, fleeing its gravitational pull would be inconceivable.
In the days following your terrifying brush with tragedy, Kurapika became an utterly inescapable presence in every waking moment. Where there was once at least a semblance of periodic solitude as he attended to his Phantom Troupe hunt, now there was only the soft footfalls of his eternal proximity.
He lingered in the periphery like a silent, hollow-eyed sentinel as you tentatively went about your daily routines. If you retreated to the bathroom to bathe, Kurapika wordlessly trailed just beyond the cracked door - near enough to instantly intervene at any prospective threat, far enough to preserve a facade of privacy. You found yourself instinctively avoiding the mirror, unable to meet the shame of your own reflection exposed under his vigilant leer.
At night when you crawled between the sheets, Kurapika took up an immovable post in the wingback chair at your bedside. You lost track of how many dawns you awoke to find him stock-still in that exact position, eyes open but untainted by even the slightest hint of slumber. His piercing stare studied your sleeping form with the rapt diligence of a memorial statue guarding a crypt.
You stopped attempting to dissuade him from these nightly vigils. The few feeble protests you voiced only caused his jaw to hinge tighter, a muscle throbbing with mute ferocity. He would not be deterred or negotiated with - this was the price to pay for the grave lapse that nearly severed you from his obsessive care.
If you shuffled into the kitchen to prepare meals, Kurapika's shadow would materialize just behind your periphery. You quickly learned to suppress any instinctual startles at his sudden appearances, lest you mistakenly provoke his haunted man's nerves. He never spoke or impeded your chores, but the mere imposition of his intense presence transformed even the most banal acts into ordeals of hyper self-consciousness.
Some evenings as dusk cloaked the mountain safehouse, you would chance hopeful glances out across the perimeter's reinforced windows. Vast forests of pine and spruce swayed in hypnotic tandem with the coastal breezes sweeping up from the sapphire horizon. Your gaze traced every contour of the landscape beyond that glass barrier - drunkenly drinking in the beauty and vast freedoms you had once taken for granted.
Without fail, Kurapika would seem to materialize at your side during these morose ritualistic dances. Not an inch separated your arms as you stood wordlessly, noting how his chest would slowly rise and fall in mirror-sync to your own. His quicksilver irises carefully studied the longing etched across your features, probing for any fragile cracks that may signal another reckless bid for escapism simmering beneath the surface.
You soon discovered it was easier to not meet his needful, imploring stare on those evenings. To instead lose yourself in the melancholy meditation of what lay on the other side of that glass partition - the lush, unfolding world of oxygen and wilderness and infinite possibilities now forever sealed away from your grasp by this compound's fortifications. The reckless abandon that landed you in such peril in the first place.
Even during the sporadic moments you managed to steal for idle time - curling up with a borrowed novel or simply staring vacantly at the safehouse's sterile walls - Kurapika's presence would pervade your space like a congealing, inescapable vapor. You became aware of every infinitesimal motion in your peripheral field, each aborted gesture from him laden with fierce meaning and scrutiny.
He would simply materialize in your blind spots, folding that lithe frame into the nearest chair or loveseat until his entire posture radiated a single, silent statement: I'm here. I will always be here to watch over you from this point onward.
And you lacked the will to protest this gradual dissolution of personal boundaries. Not when the memory of that squalid alleyway still haunted your subconscious with visions of shadowy hands groping, of Kurapika's knuckles shattering bone in retribution. You were in his custody now, for better or for worse.
Even as the weeks blurred indistinguishably together, Kurapika seemed to only swell with more unquenchable determination. Daily you witnessed his demeanor oscillate from the gruff stoicism of a jaded warrior, to the endearingly focused worry of an overly-fretful parent, then finally the predatory ruthlessness of a beast safeguarding its sickly litter from any prospective encroachment.
There was a possessive ferocity igniting behind those slate irises anew each time his gaze passed over you. As if merely looking upon your face, your chest inhaling each breath, was an involuntary ritual - the only reassurance that could momentarily dull the roaring anxiety in his psyche.
So Kurapika kept vigil, and you stopped attempting to politely deflect his obsession. Better to accept this isolated existence under his ever-watchful protectionism than risk another lapse that may invite that same violence and horror down upon you both. At least here, within these confining walls, remained the unshakable constant of his presence...his dominion over your absolute safety.
The weeks crystallized into cold months, Kurapika's fixation only intensifying like a caged flame feasting on its own limited oxygen supply. Until eventually, you struggled to remember what life could have possibly looked like before this arrangement - before his utterly uncompromising ownership of your personal inviolability became the sole, inescapable pillar of reality itself.
You mustered up what little courage remained and approached Kurapika one evening as he pored over the dwindling stack of intelligence reports.
"Kurapika...I need to get out of here, even if just for a little while," you said, trying to keep your tone measured. "Taking a walk through the village, feeling the sun on my face. Please, I'm going stir-crazy cooped up."
His pewter gaze slowly lifted, boring into you with an inscrutable intensity. You braced yourself for the immediate dismissal, the curt rebuff that your pleas for a shred of freedom were selfish folly in the face of your security.
Instead, Kurapika simply gave a slow, deliberate nod.
"Very well. But I will accompany you. My presence is non-negotiable for your safety."
Your heart leapt at his acquiescence, yet you knew better than to voice any objections to his stipulations. That, too, was non-negotiable when it came to Kurapika's obsession.
The next morning, you ventured out with Kurapika at your side, his eyes sharply scanning every alleyway and passerby like a starving falcon scrutinizing the underbrush. You tried not to let his overdone protectiveness dampen your elation at breathing fresh mountain air and ambling aimlessly without the barriers of steel and concrete constraining you.
At one point, you stopped to admire a young mother cradling her newborn along the village square's central fountain. The infant was swaddled snugly in a pale yellow blanket, their tiny face completely ensconced in peaceful slumber. You couldn't help the wistful pang that tugged at your heart watching the scene.
"Would you like to hold them?" the mother offered warmly after catching your enamored glances.
You looked to Kurapika, almost reflexively seeking his permitting nod as if he were your warden. To your surprise, he simply watched in pensive silence as you gingerly supported the bundle's head and brought the sleeping babe into your embrace.
A serene calm washed over you as the newborn's warmth and weight settled against your chest. Your body seemed to instinctively know all the coddling motions - the gentle swaying, the soft shushes, the protective tuck of the blanket over their tiny frame. For a fleeting moment, everything from the outside world evaporated - the threats, the walls imprisoning you, even Kurapika's hawkish presence. There was only the simple perfection of cradling new life, so pure and unblemished by the world's cruelties.
All too soon, the spell was broken as the mother reached to take her child back. You surrendered them with one last, regretful look into their peaceful slumbering features. As you turned back towards the path, you caught an indecipherable look swimming behind Kurapika's silvery irises. Was that...yearning?
The walk continued in loaded silence until you reached the safehouse again. Ever vigilant, Kurapika checked and triple-checked all security parameters were active before allowing you both back inside. He then insisted on giving you a full body inspection, tutting over any prospective scratches or bruises you may have sustained.
Night fell, and you began your usual bedtime routine of winding down with a book on the living room's plush sofa. Right on cue, Kurapika appeared to take up his self-appointed post in the chair alongside you.
Rather than lapsing into his typical reserved observation, he seemed...restless this evening. You caught his gaze flicking over your face and abdomen several times, his stare carrying an uncharacteristic intensity more akin to hunger than mere study. Finally, just as you were about to question his odd distraction, Kurapika leaned forward in his seat.
"You looked quite natural with that baby earlier," he stated in a low, ruminative tone. "I could envision you as a tender, nurturing mother. The image....suited you."
You felt your cheeks flush hotly despite yourself, ears straining to detect even the faintest undercurrents of impropriety in his demeanor. Just what was he implying?
When you finally found your voice to respond, Kurapika cut you off by rising abruptly to his feet.
"Get some rest. That's enough activity for one day."
With that, he swept towards the bedroom, leaving you to simply blink owlishly in his wake. You worried your lower lip, unable to voice the nagging feeling that his comments carried some suggestive subtext your mind simply couldn't piece together.
For now, it seemed Kurapika's ever-watchful protectionism had evolved to encompass...other considerations. Ones that, given his increasingly mercurial obsession over you, prompted entirely new uncertainties to send your heart murmuring apprehensively against your ribcage.
In the days following Kurapika's unsettling comments about motherhood, an inscrutable new energy seemed to permeate his already intense obsession over you.
His customary silent vigils persisted as always - the motionless sentrylike presence shadowing your every action, the sleepless nights spent unblinkingly patrolling your bedside like a fanatical bodyguard. But there was also something... else underlying those mercurial silver irises whenever they washed over your form.
Kurapika's gaze had shifted from the typical hyper-focused studying for dangers into outright lingering. You began noticing his line of sight would unapologetically rake up and down the curves and lines of your body whenever you moved about the safehouse. As if he were committing to memory every last dip and swell, documenting it alongside the myriad threat assessments constantly churning through his mind.
His comments, once clipped and strictly pertaining to your security, started carrying strange insistences that left you disquieted.
"You have such a patient, calming presence," he remarked one afternoon while you lounged with a book. "The kids would love you."
You shot him a bewildered look over the rattling chains of innuendo in his tone, but Kurapika simply arched an expectant brow as if awaiting your acquiescence.
Another evening, you bent to retrieve a dropped utensil from the kitchen floor only to straighten and find his towering presence hunched mere inches away, studying you with unrestrained focus.
"Carrying a child would suit your figure," he stated in a detached, clinical murmur. Before you could even formulate a flustered response, Kurapika simply turned and strode off to catalogue more intelligence reports.
The most overt advancement came one evening as you diligently prepared dinner, muscles burning from chopping and stirring the hearty stew. You were so engrossed in your motions that you failed to notice Kurapika materializing behind you until his sinewy arms snaked insistingly around your midsection.
A startled gasp seized your lungs as his palms came to rest possessively over your abdomen, his firm chest pressing flush against your arched back. For a dizzying moment, you were overwhelmed by the masculine heat and musk of him surrounding you so utterly and inescapably.
"Don't linger over the preparations," Kurapika's lilting voice reverberated against the nape of your neck. You shivered despite yourself as his warm breath danced across your skin. "I'm...starving this evening."
His hips unconsciously canted forward ever so subtly, enough to insinuate himself deeper into the negative space behind you. The unmistakable prominence of his semi erect cock nestled with shameless insistence against the supple curves of your ass through the thin linen of his trousers.
Just as your befuddled mind scrambled for any coherent reply, Kurapika abruptly extricated himself and strode off with the same unruffled collectedness as always. As if he hadn't just allowed the most salacious depths of his obsession over your body to rupture, however briefly, to the surface.
You stood rooted in place, blood pounding deafeningly in your ears as a dozen frantic impulses warred within you. Outrage, indignation, fear, reluctant curiosity... and horrifyingly, something darker and more primal still that responded with undeniable want to the memories of Kurapika's powerful, unapologetic dominion over your personal space.
When you finally managed to recompose yourself and carry the pot of stew to the dining table, Kurapika was waiting with his customary inscrutable expression. No hint of the previous violation lingered in his pewter irises - only that same boundless, soul-deep need to protect and provide that had morphed into such zealous, all-consuming obsession.
As you picked warily at your bowl, hyper-aware of his eyes drinking in your every move, you knew there would be no acknowledgement or discussion of the incident. He had simply exercised another disquieting assertion of ownership over your body and intimate personal freedoms. Just as he had with everything else in the vise of his self-appointed guardianship.
With a smoldering pit of unease taking root in your core, you realized this new dimension to Kurapika's fixation was only beginning. What fresh transgressions would his possessive appetites attempt to justify through the warped lenses of security and obsession?
Only time would tell what depraved lines he may be willing to cross... all in the name of protecting the last remaining embers of his beloved Kurta legacy.
Over the following days, Kurapika's comments about you having children took a disturbingly frank turn. Gone were the veiled observations about motherhood - replaced by straightforward statements that left no room for interpretation.
"Feels like you'd make a good mom," he mentioned offhandedly one evening as you cleaned up after dinner. His eyes shamelessly raked over your body. "Got the hips for it, that's for sure."
You froze, heat prickling your cheeks at his brazen appraisal. Before you could formulate a flustered response, Kurapika simply continued.
"We should think about making that happen sometime. You know, for the clan's sake." He gave a nonchalant shrug, as if discussing something as mundane as laundry plans.
Your mouth opened and closed, utterly stunned by his audacious suggestion. But Kurapika didn't linger or acknowledge your discomfort. With a final weighted look, he turned and strode from the kitchen, leaving you rattled to your core.
The inappropriate remarks only escalated from there. Kurapika seemed to grab any available opportunity to leisurely speculate about you bearing his child in graphic detail.
"Pregnancy's gonna do amazing things for those breasts," he mused one morning while you brushed your hair. You could feel the heated trail of his stare lingering on your chest in the mirror's reflection.
You very nearly dropped the hairbrush, whipping around to gape at him in disbelief. Kurapika simply held your flustered glare, his expression infuriatingly impassive.
"What? Just being honest here," he stated with a casual shrug of his broad shoulders. "Don't act so scandalized. This is a big damn deal for preserving our people."
His dismissive indifference towards your obvious mortification only fanned the flames of your humiliation. You wanted to shriek at him, to demand he stop vocalizing such disturbingly personal thoughts. But Kurapika's piercing stare maintained its unwavering intensity, extinguishing any momentary flicker of outrage before it could take root.
You knew better than to protest his obsession. Raising objections now would only make his intentions that much more overt...and quite possibly hostile. The thought chilled you to your core.
So you suffered in whip-tailed silence as Kurapika's indelicate comments plagued nearly every interaction. No activity, no matter how innocuous, seemed off-limits for him to unsubtly speculate about you becoming his breeding mate in graphic vernacular. And with each new remark, you saw the feral glint smoldering brighter and brighter behind his slate irises.
It was only a matter of time before he outright admitted the depraved depths of his fixation upon you. You dreaded that inevitability, but decided playing meek and obedient remained the wisest strategy for self-preservation. At least until you could formulate an escape plan from under his obsessive watch.
You did your best to hide any discomfort at Kurapika's increasingly frank comments about you having his children. Outward protests only seemed to egg him on with even more graphic remarks. So you kept up a facade of calm obedience, hoping it might discourage him from acting on his unhealthy fixation.
But Kurapika wasn't so easily deterred. His obsession had morphed into an all-consuming hunger that chipped away at his restraint day by day. You saw the signs - his jaw clenching, fists balling up as he inwardly battled those urges. Sometimes you'd catch him staring at you with undisguised longing, his gaze hungrily tracing your curves.
It all came to a head one autumn night as you pretended to read, keenly aware of Kurapika's presence lingering nearby. The tension was suffocating, his pent-up intensity rolling off him in waves. Several times you felt him move closer, only to sense him forcibly checking himself. Finally, you decided to try excusing yourself to the bedroom.
The moment you stood up, Kurapika pounced with startling speed. In one fluid motion, he gripped your shoulders and shoved you back into the armchair, caging you in as he straddled your hips. His lithe body was coiled like a panther pinning its prey.
"Enough games," he growled, his voice low and gritty with want. "No more pretending."
You gazed up at him wide-eyed, taken aback by the naked hunger etched across his chiseled features. This wasn't the restrained Kurapika - this side of him was feral, unrestrained. Arousal and obsession burned in his dilated pupils.
He leaned in close, the hard planes of his body hovering over yours as his hot breath fanned your flushed cheeks. You could feel the thrum of his hammering heart against your own chest.
"You know how obsessed I am with continuing our legacy," Kurapika rasped with grit-toothed intensity. "I'll do whatever it takes."
One calloused hand fisted in your hair, wrenching your head back as he asserted his dominance. You instinctively froze, trembling at his overwhelming presence and display of power. Kurapika drank in your fear and captivation with a ruthless gleam.
"Don't fight it," he warned in a husky timbre. "By morning, you'll be pregnant with my kid whether you like it or not."
A shudder rippled through you at the grim finality of his words. Yet some primal part of your psyche still couldn't help responding to the masterful undercurrents of his seduction, your body warming despite your trepidation.
Kurapika's eyes narrowed, sensing that fractional flicker of reluctant arousal. With taunting slowness, he closed the gap until his lips hovered a hairsbreadth from yours. His tone took on a dangerous, velveteen purr.
"That's it...just accept what's going to happen," he murmured, the barest brush of his mouth against yours. "Don't fight my obsession growing inside you."
Then with a predator's swift strike, Kurapika's mouth crashed into yours with smothering, impatient desire. He hungrily devoured your gasp of surprise, his fervent onslaught of lush dominance overwhelming your senses.
His mouth moved hungrily against yours, hands roaming over your body as if mapping every curve. Kurapika broke the heated kiss for air, eyes glazed with undisguised longing.
"Do you have any idea how gorgeous you'd look pregnant?" he murmured with awestruck reverence.
One of his hands drifted down to splay possessively across your lower abdomen. Kurapika's gaze followed, drinking in the feminine plane as if he could somehow envision it swelling with new life.
"Carrying my child..." he continued in a hushed, wondrous tone. "Your body nurturing the next generation of our people."
He leaned in to trail feverish kisses along the slender column of your neck, causing you to shiver.
"It's all I've been able to think about," Kurapika rasped against your skin. "Just imagining how radiantly fertile you'd look, swollen with my baby..."
His hand stroked tantalizingly over your abdomen again as he nuzzled into the crook of your neck, inhaling your natural scent like an intoxicating elixir.
"I want that so damn badly," he admitted in a throaty rasp thick with yearning. "To see you heavy and glowing with our future growing inside."
Kurapika's kisses wandered across your jawline until his smoldering gaze locked onto yours again, pupils blown wide with naked obsession.
"Say you want it too," Kurapika pleaded, thumb tracing maddening circles low on your belly. "Tell me you'll let me put a baby in this luscious body..."
He drank in every microexpression flickering across your features with rapt focus, hanging on your every reaction. Kurapika leaned in closer until you were sharing the same heated breaths.
"Can't you just picture how incredible you'd look?" he murmured, voice strained with longing. "Tits getting heavy and full, that stomach finally swelling outward with our child growing inside..."
One of his hands cupped your breast almost reverently, like weighing the promise of its future maternal fullness. Kurapika's thumb brushed over your peaked nipple, drawing a soft gasp from you.
"Fuck...you'd be so unbelievably sexy carrying my baby," he groaned, utterly transfixed. "A goddess - all ripe, fertile curves and that beautiful glow mothers-to-be get."
He nuzzled his scruffy cheek against yours, peppering your jaw with open-mouthed kisses until you squirmed beneath him. Kurapika's palm stroked insistently over your abdomen again, as if willing his fantasies into reality through sheer habit.
"I can see it so clearly, feel how soft you'd be..." His voice dipped into a gravelly timbre. "Just imagine me waking you up with a nice, hard fuck every morning. How many times would I have to breed you before it finally took?"
A jolt of arousal coursed through you, your cunt clenching at his crude, possessive words. You bit back a whimper as Kurapika's hand snaked down between your thighs. His fingers expertly sought the sensitive nub of your clit, coaxing it with languid strokes.
"Maybe I'd just stay buried inside you all night," he growled, grinding his stiffening cock into your hip. "Keep that pussy nice and filled up with my cum, see if that does the trick..."
Your eyelids fluttered shut as Kurapika continued stroking your sensitive folds, his other hand kneading your breast. You felt utterly lost in the haze of his carnal need, swept away by his possessive lust.
"Fuck, that's the sexiest thought," he rasped, grinding his bulge against you. "Imagining you all stuffed and swollen with my kid, knowing I'd bred you..."
Kurapika's lips sought yours, tongue slipping inside to explore and claim. You whimpered into his kiss, helpless to the overwhelming desire coursing through your veins. He finally broke the kiss, his eyes smoldering with naked want.
He didn’t say anything, just studied your features intently as he slowly unzipped his fly. Kurapika's hand disappeared beneath his trousers, pulling his rock-hard length free. He gave himself a few languid pumps, hissing softly at the contact.
You stared, transfixed. His cock was just as you imagined - thick and veiny, pulsing with a hungry need to plant his seed.
"Go on...feel it," he ordered gruffly.
Your hand reached out on instinct, fingertips ghosting tentatively over the engorged flesh. Kurapika let out a hiss, his hips bucking into your touch. You felt a thrill at his response, a surge of feminine satisfaction.
He pressed his cock firmly into your palm, forcing you to curl your fingers around the warm girth. You stroked him experimentally, relishing the velvety-smooth skin stretched tight over his pulsating hardness. Kurapika let out a guttural moan, eyes fluttering shut as his head lolled back in pleasure.
"Get a good look, honey ," he purred. "This is what's gonna put a baby inside you."
His hands reached out to grasp your hips, yanking you down on the armchair until you were splayed before him. Your dress rode up to your waist, exposing your slick-drenched cunt to his ravenous gaze.
Kurapika's cock bobbed excitedly at the sight, already drooling an obscene amount of pre-cum. He gripped your hips, dragging you flush against him. The swollen head nudged your soaked slit, smearing its sticky promise against your heat.
"Gonna make you a mommy tonight," he breathed, eyes glazed with lust. "My sexy little wife, full and round with my kid."
With that, he plunged inside your cunt in one rough, impatient thrust. You cried out as his thick cock stretched you impossibly full. It was a delicious, overwhelming ache, like your body was being molded and shaped to his whims.
Kurapika set a punishing pace, fucking you with relentless intensity. He was like a man possessed, driven by a singular purpose. His hands dug into your hips, nails scoring your skin.
You clutched desperately at his broad shoulders, fingers raking his skin. You were completely overwhelmed by the sensation of him dominating your body, filling you up over and over again with his need.
Kurapika's face was contorted with lust, eyes screwed shut as he pounded into you. His breath came in ragged gasps, sweat-slick chest heaving with exertion. You could feel the raw urgency in his movements, the desperate need to spill his seed deep inside.
Your fingers threaded through his silken hair, gripping the roots as you held his fevered gaze. Kurapika's eyes widened, pupils blown wide with arousal at the display of submission. He gave a guttural groan, his pace faltering as he struggled to stave off his imminent release.
"So fucking sexy," he growled, teeth gritted as he fought to hold himself back. He pistoned into you harder, deeper. His thumb reached down to furiously circle your swollen clit. "Come on, honey. Let me hear you scream..."
You arched into him, the friction of his thumb on your sensitive nub and cock pistoning into your cunt pushing you towards the edge. Kurapika's hips slammed into yours with bruising force, his thrusts becoming more erratic as his orgasm neared.
You felt yourself teetering on the edge, body tensing with anticipation. His hand gripped your thigh, hiking it higher for deeper penetration. That last bit of delicious pressure was all you needed to send you careening over the edge.
Your walls clenched around him, milking his throbbing cock. You came with a strangled cry, body spasming as you squirted onto his cock. Kurapika gave a ragged gasp, his hips stuttering as he chased his own release.
With one final, primal thrust, he buried himself to the hilt. You felt the warmth of his seed flooding your womb, painting your inner walls with his virility. Thick, creamy spurts of cum filled you to the brim, his cock pulsing and twitching as he emptied every last drop.
Kurapika's hips rolled languidly into yours, prolonging the aftershocks of his climax. You clung to him, legs trembling from the intensity of your orgasm. Your bodies were entwined, sweat-slick skin pressed flush against each other.
As the haze of lust ebbed away, Kurapika's gaze softened, taking on an adoring warmth. He caressed your cheek, his voice thick with emotion.
"I hope I got you pregnant," Kurapika murmured, voice hushed with naked longing. He leaned down to trail openmouthed kisses along the column of your neck.
"Can you imagine?" he rasped against your skin, sending shivers down your spine. "Your belly swelling with our child, my obsession made flesh and blood?"
He nuzzled the crook of your neck, inhaling your mingled scents with an almost spiritual reverence. When Kurapika pulled back to meet your gaze again, his eyes were alight with feverish yearning.
"I'm going to dote on you relentlessly," he vowed in a low rasp. "Worship every curve, every new glow you get from carrying my baby."
His palm stroked over your lower abdomen, fingertips committing every plane and whisper of definition to memory.
"You'll let me, won't you?" Kurapika's tone edged towards pleading. "Let me obsess over you morning, noon, and night while you nurture our offspring?"
He dipped down to trail reverent, openmouthed kisses along the valley between your breasts.
"These are going to swell up so full and ripe..." he muttered thickly, voice muffled against your fevered skin. "I can't wait to taste how sweet your milk will be."
Kurapika's smoldering gaze met yours again, pupils blown wide with naked obsession. His hand splayed possessively over your abdomen once more, relishing the possibility of it bearing new life.
"Just stay right here with me and make my fantasy a reality," he rasped, the barest hint of a plea entering his gravelly timbre. "Let me put a baby in you and finally satisfy this all-consuming obsession."
His thumb stroked over the hint of your hipbone, gaze following the motion with rapturous focus.
"I'll take care of you both..." Kurapika vowed, voice dropping to a rugged murmur. "Mind, body, and spirit - you'll want for nothing beyond my total devotion."
With that, he sealed his promise with a searing, breathtaking kiss that made his singular obsession for impregnating you resoundingly clear.
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halfagone · 7 months
Text
One of the things I love the most about AUs where Danny moves to Gotham City is how easily he fits in. There are AUs where Danny makes a statement and gets noticed for the great guy he is and I enjoy those too, but I love the AUs where Danny fits in as if he's always been here. Where he doesn't stand out, doesn't make a statement.
There is something so quietly compelling about this transition in Danny's life. Danny has always stood out in a negative way. His parents are the town hacks, his sister is a genius that he'll never compare to. Friends who create rallies for their respective causes and actually makes people listen. Even amongst the outsiders, Danny sticks out like a sore thumb.
Danny likes Paulina because it's safe. Anyone would have a crush on the most popular girl in school. That's expected, that's normal. Of course he wants to be popular, what kid doesn't want to be popular?
The A-Listers stand out, not because they're particularly special, but because everyone else has set the standard that only they can reach. They present these kids as what every student should be, and everyone else is just failing to reach their level.
Danny has always striven for normalcy but the only way to achieve it is to fundamentally change who he is and he can't. No matter how hard he tries he can't be that person. He can try, and god has he tried, but he can't change who he is.
And then Danny moves to Gotham.
You can use all sorts of reasons for the move. Maybe this is a scenario where a reveal goes sideways and Danny has to flee. Maybe he has a bad breakup and he wants a fresh start. Maybe he's going to college out-of-state. Maybe he received a promotion at work and his boss wants him to manage the new Gotham branch.
No matter what reason you use, it all leads back to square one. Danny is in a city where he hardly knows anyone, but has heard all the horror stories for. The crime here is nothing like he's ever experienced before. At least with the ghosts, Danny knew they were coming thanks to his ghost sense. He doesn't always get the same courtesy with Arkham breakouts.
But he adapts. It's his specialty. He adapts to new powers and new enemies all the time, he can adapt here too. Human crime might not be his specialty but he knows how to protect himself. And for once he doesn't stand out for it.
Danny is paranoid and hypervigilant? Don't worry, most people here are. They have to be. Danny has scars on his knuckles from fighting ghosts? That's not the mark of a troublemaker, that's the mark of a survivor. Danny keeps a metal baseball bat by his front door? Okay, maybe that's a little strange; most people keep their weapons by their bed.
The point is that all these habits ingrained in Danny's psyche aren't out of place in Gotham. Here, no one thinks strangely of his behavior because they've all developed habits to help them survive. There is a different normal here in Gotham, a different standard, and for once Danny can reach it.
For once Danny is normal and he didn't have to change himself in any way to achieve it. It's proof that there was never anything wrong with him. He just didn't fit in with Amity Park anymore, but there is a place out there where he can.
Gotham City might not have been the home he grew up in, but it's accepted him more than the one he left behind. On the outside, this community might seem rough and harsh and brutal. But these people understand Danny better than anyone else could, because they know what it feels like to fight every day just to survive.
And I think there's something so cathartic about leaving one home, and all the fears that come with that, only to find a better one you never thought you could have.
I don't know. It's just so personal to me.
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frownyalfred · 1 month
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2 things I got feral for
1. Batman calling any of the former Robin's, Robin, to get them to snap out of a spiral or a panic attack
2. Other Heros, but excpecially the batfamily, being forcibly reminded that Batman is just a human. Seeing him go down, wounded or even at his limit. And being reminded that under the self confident, calm, cold manner is just another guy with no special power. Just a man
There’s something really poetic about former Robins still answering to “Robin!” even years later. It’s so ingrained in them, in their psyche, it forces them to get up and look for Batman no matter what.
And it’s equally poetic that Bruce can snap out of almost anything when he hears one of his kids say “B!” in that specific tone of voice. The one that says I need you now, something’s wrong.
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transform4u · 3 months
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I was raised in a Christian setting, but I was always so proud growing up about being openly gay and flamboyant. Now that I’m older, all my old school friends are getting married and starting families. I used to think those straight guys were so boring and mundane for wanting to settle down. Now I feel so bored with my long time boyfriend. I keep having this weird urge that I need to breed and spread my seed. The more my values change, I feel my breeder kink growing stronger. Can you help me understand what’s happening to me?
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It's late at night, and the verse from Corinthians weighs heavily on your thoughts. "Act like men, be strong." Those words, ingrained since childhood through Sunday sermons and Bible studies, echo in your mind like a mantra. You've never truly understood them, I mean it was all just boring, conservative values your parents tried to install in you. But you were nothing like that were you. You wanted to be out and proud and attend every Pride parade you could, putting on rainbow beads and tight clothes----but that's not what those words mean "Act like men, be strong."
Yet, as you mull over these words, a realization dawns on you. Your concept of what it means to "act like men" has been shaped not only by your Christian upbringing but also by societal norms and expectations. Society has painted a picture of masculinity that emphasizes toughness, stoicism, and dominance. It's a definition that leaves little room for vulnerability, sensitivity, or exploration of emotions.
The urge to conform, to live up to these ideals, is strong. It's ingrained in your psyche, reinforced over years of conditioning.
As you reflect, your mind drifts to your boyfriend, the person you care deeply for but who seems to fall short of the masculine ideal you've been taught. You try to reconcile his kindness, his gentleness, with this notion of strength and manliness. Your lip quivers slightly as conflicting emotions surge within you.
A smirk begins to form on your face—a smirk tinged with bitterness and a hint of rebellion. You think about how predictable your relationship has become, how safe and comfortable yet lacking in passion and excitement. The thought of being with another man, someone more assertive, more daring, stirs something inside you—anger mixed with desire, disgust intertwined with curiosity.
You can't help but feel a growing anger and hatred towards your boyfriend. He's not strong enough, not manly enough to satisfy you. You start to question why you ever fell for him in the first place. His kindness seems like weakness now, his gentleness a sign of femininity.
As your self-inflicted homophobia begins to creep into your soul, you find yourself disgusted by the idea of having sex with another man. It goes against everything you believe in; it goes against the Bible. Your mind fills with rage, a rage that will fuel your changes. You know what needs to be done – break up with him and find someone who can truly make you feel alive again.
Your smile morphs into a cocky grin, reflecting a defiance against the norms that have shaped your understanding of masculinity. The rigid expectations seem suffocating now, and you wonder if you've been playing a role, conforming to a stereotype that doesn't fit who you truly are.
It starts as a simple sigh, a release of tension and uncertainty that has gripped you for so long. The weight of expectations—societal, religious, personal—pressing down like a heavy mantle. You yearn to break free from these constraints, to redefine yourself beyond the confines of what others expect you to be.
As you exhale, the sigh deepens into a grunt, a primal sound of frustration mingled with determination. You feel it in your gut—a sudden surge of energy, a tingling sensation that spreads through your entire body. It's as if something dormant within you is awakening, stirring to life with newfound vigor.
You let out a deep, loud, and obnoxious "buuuuurrrrrrrrrp" that echoes through the room. The sound reverberates in your ears as you feel it pulsate throughout your muscles, filling you with energy. You stand up straighter, chest puffed out proudly as if to say "I am here."
Your eyes narrow into a fierce glare as you think about all the changes that need to be made. No more will you settle for mediocrity or complacency; it's time to take control of your life and become the person you were always meant to be – strong, confident, and unapologetically masculine.
Your gaze lowers instinctively to your stomach, where once a softness resided, now replaced by a transformation unfolding before your eyes. The smooth contours give way to something altogether different—a ripple, a shift beneath the surface. Thick, cobblestone abs begin to form, each muscle defined with startling clarity. You watch in disbelief as your body undergoes a metamorphosis, sculpting itself into a form that feels both alien and strangely exhilarating.
A deep, booming laugh escapes your lips, echoing in the room. Your Adam's apple thickens perceptibly, your voice dropping several octaves in pitch. It resonates within you, a newfound resonance that reverberates with power and confidence.
Your biceps swell, veins popping with every flex, pulsating with strength. Your chest rises, pecs transforming into hefty mounds of muscle and flesh that demand attention. You can't help but marvel at the physical changes taking place, each movement involuntary yet empowering. "Holy shit," you say to yourself, feeling your muscles grow underneath your skin. "This is fucking awesome!" You flex your bicep and watch it bulge outwards like a rock-hard mountain peak. A grin spreads across your face as you imagine what else might be possible now that these changes have begun.
Involuntarily, you flex, feeling the newfound strength coursing through your veins. A laugh, almost primal in its intensity, escapes your lips—a laugh that breaks through the constraints of expectation and conformity. It's a laugh of liberation, of embracing what it means to be yourself, unapologetically.
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As you stand there, caught in the throes of transformation, you're acutely aware of the societal expectations weighing upon you. Masculinity, as defined by the world around you, seems to demand a certain mold—one you're unwittingly beginning to fit into. The laughter that bubbles up from within feels almost intoxicating, a euphoric rush of newfound strength and vigor.
But with each laugh, something shifts. It's subtle at first, like a distant echo fading into the background. Your thoughts, once sharp and nuanced, begin to blur. The intricate web of ideas and knowledge that defined your intellectual prowess starts to dissipate.
You chuckle, the sound now more boisterous, more carefree. The complexity of language and the depth of thought seem distant, replaced by a simplicity that borders on naivety. Words become harder to grasp, sentences more challenging to string together. The transformation is not just physical but cognitive—a gradual erosion of the sharpness that once defined you.
In its place, a new narrative emerges. Football dominates your mind—Nick Bosa's stats, the plays of the 49ers. It's as if sports trivia and player statistics fill the gaps left by receding memories of literature and philosophy. Workout routines and protein shakes become your daily rituals, intertwined with memories of frat parties where showing off your gains was a source of pride and admiration.
You remember vividly the time when you and your bros were goofing off, teasing each other for acting like fucking homos. Endlessly in the mirror, flexing your biceps and pecs until they shine with sweat. You could feel the burn as blood rushed to your muscles, making them grow bigger and stronger by the day. The sense of accomplishment after each workout fueled an insatiable desire to push yourself even harder next time.
You remember being at the gym with your bros, pushing yourselves to the limit during a grueling workout. The smell of sweat and testosterone filled the air as you grunted through each set, encouraging one another to go harder.
One day, things got a little out of hand when you decided it would be funny to rip a gross protein fart in someone's face during downtime. PFFFFFFTTT Laughter ensued but so did an overpowering stench that lingered long afterward – even in the showers later on, you found yourself growing dumber by the minute as if unable to process basic information like addition or subtraction anymore due solely to this lingering odor clouding your mind.
The once-keen mind now swims in a constant haze, like a permanent state of drunkenness. Thoughts are simpler, actions more instinctual. You revel in the camaraderie of locker rooms, the adrenaline of the field, and the thrill of physical prowess. Intellectual pursuits fade into the background, replaced by a newfound appreciation for physicality and camaraderie.
You awaken and find yourself at a raging frat party, where the air is thick with excitement and the beat of music pulsates through the crowded room.
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As you make your way through the crowd of the party, the changes become palpable. Your face, once marked by youthful innocence and boyish soft features, begins to shift. There's a subtle hardening of your jawline, a chiseling of your cheekbones into a more angular shape. The lines of your face sharpen, mirroring a rugged determination and confidence that exudes from every pore.
The party scene materializes—a frat house buzzing with energy, filled with the scent of sweat, alcohol, and the faint hint of testosterone. You remember the cheers, the high-fives, the sense of camaraderie that surged through you like a tidal wave.
Amidst the revelry, a cross necklace slips around your neck—an unexpected accessory that feels strangely comforting. It's as if with each clasp, a subtle shift occurs within you. The liberal, woke ideals you once held dear start to fade, replaced by a deepening conservatism and a newfound faith.
You find yourself thinking about how liberals are just a bunch of whiney pansy-ass snowflakes, crying about their lame-ass woke agenda.
You find yourself immersed in conversations about sports, politics from a conservative viewpoint, and the importance of faith in shaping moral values. Your vocabulary shifts, becoming peppered with phrases like "alpha," "bro," and "dude." reflecting a growing sense of identity—one that aligns with traditional notions of masculinity and righteousness. You bump into your best bro, Chaz, a linebacker for the college football team. He's already fucking wasted as shit. He's got a beer in one hand and the ass of some sorority bimbo in the other.
"Hey man, how's it going?" you ask as you give Chaz a fist bump.
"Fuckin' great," he grunts in response. "I just beat the shit out of some faggy snowflake loser who thought he was too smart for his own good."
You nod along in agreement, feeling your blood boil at the mere mention of liberals and their woke ideals. "Yeah bro, those guys need to learn their place," you say with conviction. "They think they can just walk around being all sensitive and shit...well not on my watch!"
Chaz chuckles before patting you on the back. "That's my boy," he says proudly.
You become more assertive, bordering on brash. Your actions are bold, filled with bravado—a display of confidence that borders on arrogance. At the party, you're the center of attention, regaling others with tales of conquests both on the field and in bed. The admiration and envy in their eyes fuel your sense of self-importance.
As the night wears on, you find yourself surrounded by like-minded individuals, bonding over shared ideals of masculinity, conservatism, and Christian values. The party becomes a celebration of these newfound convictions, a reaffirmation of identity that feels both liberating and confining.
As you navigate through the pulsating crowd at the party, your steps grow increasingly unsteady with each sip from your red plastic cup. The alcohol courses through your veins, emboldening you with a false sense of confidence. Your demeanor shifts subtly, from casual revelry to a more exaggerated swagger—a display of bravado that borders on arrogance.
Through the haze of the party lights and the din of music, you spot her—a pretty girl, a pretty drunk girl with her friends, laughing and chatting animatedly. Her long, flowing hair catches your eye first, illuminated by the flickering lights. She's wearing a stylish outfit that accentuates her figure, exuding a natural allure that draws you in.
As she laughs with her friends, her smile lighting up the space around her. She's wearing a tight, revealing outfit that accentuates every curve, drawing attention effortlessly.
You find this chick incredibly hot. Her tits look huge in her tight outfit, straining against the fabric as she laughs and talks with her friends. There's no denying that she's dressed like a fucking slut, there's no way she's not looking for some action tonight.
You can't help but think of all the ways you could pleasure her; how good it would feel to have those big tits bouncing up and down as she rides your cock while she moans your name. The thought alone makes your blood rush and muscles twitch with anticipation.
Without hesitation, you make your move towards them, hoping that tonight will be the night where all your fantasies come true.
With a surge of bravado and a newfound sense of confidence, you make your way towards her, navigating through the crowded party. Your muscles tense subtly beneath your shirt as you approach, a smirk playing on your lips. You know you've got her attention even before you say a word.
"Hey there, sweetheart," you greet her, your voice carrying an edge of cockiness and slurred drunkenness. "Enjoying the party?"
She looks you up and down, her gaze lingering appreciatively on your physique. "Oh, definitely," she replies, a playful glint in her eye. "Especially now."
You can't resist showing off a bit. With a confident grin, you flex your biceps, the muscles bulging impressively. "Like what you see?" you tease, punctuating your question with a quick pec dance, causing your chest muscles to ripple under your shirt.
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Her friends giggle in response, egging you on with cheers and playful banter. The girl herself leans in closer, her demeanor flirtatious and unapologetic. "Very impressive," she remarks, her voice teasing.
"Yeah, been hitting the gym hard," you boast, leaning in a little closer to her. "But enough about me. What's your name?"
As you flex your biceps, she can't help but feel the thickness of your muscles beneath her fingertips. Her eyes widen in surprise and admiration at the sight before her.
Blushing deeply, she bites down on her lower lip – a telltale sign of how horny you're making this little slut. It's clear that this girl is interested in more than just conversation; she wants to explore what else lies beneath those bulging muscles.
She introduces herself, her smile widening as she matches your flirtatious energy. The conversation flows effortlessly between you, punctuated by laughter and lingering gazes that speak volumes. You revel in the attention, enjoying the rush of attraction and the validation of your confidence.
"You know what they say," you smirk, leaning in closer to her. "Want to see what a real man is like?"
Without waiting for an answer, you yell over the music and laughter for your bro Chaz. He appears moments later with a keg in hand, grinning from ear to ear at the sight of this potential conquest. You motion towards him and he slides the keg closer before taking off again into the crowd.
Grabbing two plastic cups from somewhere nearby, you start to fill them both up with beer before handing one to her. As she takes it from your hands, your eyes travel down her body – lingering on those "big tits straining against her top and that fat ass encased within tight jeans…god damn she's hot little slut!" you think. With each pump of the keg comes another surge of desire; any notion of your old boyfriend is washed away by now replaced instead by an overwhelming need feel manly tonight here now this very moment right here right now while also experiencing deep-seated homophobia. The thought of two dudes kissing makes you want to puke. You can't stand the idea that someone might think you're gay just because they saw you hanging out with another guy.
Your disgust for fags only fuels your desire for the chick in front of you. She represents everything that's feminine and attractive - everything that a fag isn't. As she grinds against you on the dance floor, all thoughts of fags disappear from your mind as your horniness reaches new heights
Nothing else matters; the only thing that matters is getting laid tonight. As she takes a sip from her cup, your dick hardens in anticipation. Without hesitation, you grab her fat ass and pull her closer for a drunk makeout session while Chaz cheers you on from nearby.
"Babe," you slur in your thick New Jersey accent between kisses, "you're so fucking hot." Your hands roam over her body as she moans breathlessly into your mouth. "I wanna fuck you so bad."
"Giovanni—Gio—take me! You big Italian stallion; I need your thick cock!" she moans breathlessly, with that cocky smile still plastered across your face, there's no turning back now…your fate as the biggest college douchebag ready to plant his seed across campus has been sealed. You fuck the dumb slut with all the passion and aggression of a true alpha male. The cheers from your fellow frat bros only serve to fuel your ego, making you feel cockier and cockier with each thrust. This is what it means to be a man – taking what you want when you want it without hesitation or remorse. And right now, all that matters is claiming this woman as yours while satisfying your primal urges...
You wake up the next morning, hungover as fuck but feeling pretty damn good about yourself. As you stretch out your muscles and roll over in bed, two dumb blonde cheerleaders suddenly appear – tickling your thick abs and impressive pecs playfully.
"One of you sluts gonna suck it?" you ask with a grin on your face. They both smile back at you knowingly before climbing onto the bed to fulfill their duties as groupies...
As the two hottest chicks on campus go to town on your dick, you can't help but think: "Lord forgive me." But who cares about forgiveness when you're experiencing this kind of pleasure? Their lips and tongues work in perfect harmony as they take turns sucking and stroking your cock. You moan loudly, lost in the moment – enjoying every second of this decadent morning after.
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possiblylando · 4 months
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Chainsaw Man 168 Early Analysis
Okay so- I'm going to start with something pretty important translation wise. Viz as usual did not translate things very well.
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Keep this in mind because it changes this whole scene's meaning. [Edit Start] Bit of a further correction since the phrasing is further complicated.
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Some important updated context that fleshes out Asa's mental state further. [Edit End]
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This whole fucking section is sickening not just because this is Denji again being sexually abused and then tossed aside as he has been since chapter 1, but because this is a near exact parallel to Makima and her treatment of Denji. Denji and Asa don't even seem able to process the handjob and instead go to the kiss. Remember Denji's first 'kiss' was from Makima. She framed it as an act of love and then ripped all that away by the end of part 1. Yet again Denji is kissed and his reaction is to want to know if she actually loves him or is just using him like Makima did. I doubt he's specifically thinking about Makima in this scene but you can see how deep the scars have been ingrained in his psyche. Similarly fucked is Asa's reaction to this because she's just as much a victim in all of his as Denji is.
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Asa is able to control her body just enough to start beating the shit out of Yoru. It's a pretty fucked parallel to self harm inflicted by victims of sexual assault. Asa obviously has a lot of mental issues and in this moment she's unable to fully process the fact she's also a victim in this situation. She instead pivots to the idea that she's just as much of a perpetrator as Yoru is.
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The thousand yard stare kinda has two different meanings in this end bit as well. For Denji its showing his inability to fully process things. We've seen before he goes straight to self harm to get his mind of things but since he can't turn into chainsaw man in this instance he has nothing. So he resorts to his other terrible coping mechanism; He freezes. Whenever something traumatic happens to him he near completely freezes up until someone snaps him out of it. As for Asa it seems to be because she's stuck in her own head spiraling. I doubt she'll be able to recognize the fucked up complexities of the situation anytime soon, so her mental state is just going to continue to get worse.
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alienpossession · 3 months
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"So, what's the matter with the little faggot? Still shell-shocked?" asked the 50+ something man in bathrobe to the younger guy also in bathrobe, both staring at the shirtless and stunned 21 years old college junior
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"Yeah, he refused to talk to me, daddy. But I managed to keep him in place as little part of me already ingrained in his brain, so he won't even move an inch from there unless I allowed him,"
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"Well then, Ollie. Try to look at this arrangement from a more positive perspective. Rather than living miserably with your homophobic father that will never write you back on the will after finding out your fairy ass self jacking off to gay porn and also a horny casanova for an older brother that never bothered about your existence, we provided you with more affection, security and trust when we're in control of their bodies and make them behave according to what you desired them to be. After all, we can read your minds, so.....we know pretty well that this really turned you on despite how out-of-character this whole thing is. You can even join the whole fun if you want to," stated by the "father" rather bluntly
Ollie found himself stunned and exposed by the revelation, it caused him to stutter to explain and counter the barrage of statement coming out from his "father's" mouth. But even before he could manage to muster the answer, his "father" already remarked once more
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"So, what is it gonna be? Accept our presence in your life from now on or do you want to make it hard for yourself trying to run away or even fight us? Sneak peek, you won't be alive if you choose the latter, that little fella inside of your brain now will get a couple more friends to ensure full subjugation of your psyche. You will just become yet another human vessel for our kind to thrive,"
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ticktokrobotsnot · 9 months
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Recreational
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Pairing: Carmen Berzatto x fem!reader 
Summary: Two chefs, one needs a distraction and the other needs anything but. 
Word Count: ~11k
Notes: This one has been stuck in my drafts for almost 6 months, google docs was my editor so if you mention any grammar/spelling mistakes I'm gonna blame Google lol.
--
Y/n always had the idea that life never let her be too happy. And not to be unnecessarily pessimistic or ungrateful for the good things that happened in her life, but it was really only a matter of time before the other shoe dropped. To be completely honest, if she was remotely better at anything else or something else paid more, she wouldn’t have been a chef. She thought her career as a chef was the universe having a good laugh at her, making her a part of a culture so deeply rooted in making connections which she couldn't reciprocate.
“They aren’t your friends.” The lesson was so deeply ingrained into y/n’s psyche that it was impossible for her to even spare a simple congratulatory smile after finding out her co-worker had won a James Beard award a few years prior or give that same co-worker a nod of approval when he retained a star. They were at best two instruments in the same tool kit, easily replaceable to the other, and y/n wasn’t going to offer an olive branch. 
The French Laundry’s kitchen had perfected the skill to make even the best chefs throw their thousand dollar knife in a huff and quit on the spot. The head chef was a maestro of pushing buttons, ensuring a constant undercurrent of tension that never reached extreme highs because, in that kitchen, there was never a low.
That was before y/n was hired. There were chefs with better referrals, more experience, were more likable but there was something in her that put her above the rest, she didn’t crack. 
She didn’t flinch when the head chef lowered himself to her level, still towering over her, and told her that she didn’t deserve to be there in the middle of a dinner rush on her first week. 
Carmen kept his head down, anticipating the impending sobs and sniffles. However, as moments of silence stretched on, he resisted the unseen force compelling him to remain bowed. Slowly lifting his gaze, he noticed her studying the head chef as if extracting more from his irises than his words. Her eyes then swept over the rest of the staff before locking onto Carmen's. There, in that shared glance, he sensed her silent inquiry, a question of whether he, the second in command with a James Beard award and a Michelin star, was a coward.
He bowed down, focusing on the plate in front of him and pretending to wipe a nonexistent splatter.
The silence echoed while the rest of the chefs continued to slice, dice, and stir not sparing a glance, this was nothing new. When the head chef figured that she wouldn’t say anything back, he sauntered over to his next victim. Carmen lifted his head one more time, there was nothing he could do to comfort her if she was a mess but he already knew which chef would have to take over for her while she sobbed in the freezer. He was met with her side profile, she was smirking.
For a brief moment it felt like Carmen finally got a good look at her since she had been hired a week ago. It took a few moments for Carmen to decipher her expression. She was unimpressed with him, the head chef, and the kitchen. It wasn’t possible to be unimpressed and here she was looking at everyone like she was a parent listening to the squabbles of an irritable child, it was different.
She was a dangerous person because her small stunt inspired him to do something he had never done in the French Laundry, roll his eyes when the head chef left after his criticism. It was a small taste of delicious, slippery, freedom that was bound to kill him later. The day ended and Carmen didn’t even notice that he was walking up to her until he was right in front of her. 
Y/n was expecting an apology and Carmen was expecting an opening to start talking, something had to give but it was too raw to do that here. After one more glance, Carmen started parting his lips but y/n slipped right past him and walked out. 
They aren’t your friends.
Y/n had many aspirations growing up: pop-star, astronaut, scientist, and ice-cream vendor. As she got older the list matured, and consequently shortened. It didn't take much for her to enroll in culinary school, a decision made almost impulsively. 
In the busy kitchen, amid clattering pots and the aromatic dance of ingredients, she watched chefs passionately invest themselves in each dish. She had heard stories from her colleagues, the heartfelt narratives that bound them to their culinary journey, and she couldn't help but feel a pang of shame that she couldn’t reciprocate. Her presence in the kitchen wasn't driven by sentimental attachments to food; she was here for a paycheck, a stark contrast to the fervor surrounding her. As she navigated the world of flavors and aromas, she grappled with the solitude of her own motivations, wondering if there was space for her in a profession driven by love, memories, and a deep connection to the culinary craft.
Unable to reciprocate the profound connections others sought, a sense of bitterness and unrest festered within her. Her internal conflict wasn't born out of disdain for those more accomplished; instead, it stemmed from a profound inability to fathom the emotional intricacies that seemed to drive others but couldn’t seem to reach her. 
Y/n didn’t allow herself to confront a nuanced flaw—projecting her perception of routine loneliness onto the world, all while unconsciously imposing a self-isolation rooted in a complex interplay of guardedness and yearning for genuine connection. She kept herself busy by watching, judging, others in the hopes that eventually she would see something that clicked. 
Y/n spent the next few years in relative ease even if every single soul in the French Laundry were a bunch of battered devotees, who regularly got verbally and emotionally beaten black and blue, but still came crawling back. It was almost humorous to watch all the chefs line up to leave and look like they just had their soul siphoned out from their puckered assholes. 
Carmen felt like a cautionary tale to her, never getting too involved. He had crafted his own prison cell, a second in command with no real power, no life outside of work, and y/n bet he told himself that this was his peak. His self created pathetic life was so intensely interesting to y/n that she resisted asking about his life so she never made the same mistakes. But the way his focus scattered across the kitchen told her that he didn’t know why he was like this either. 
He didn’t come to work on a Friday, which was a bit of a shock, and it rippled when she walked in on some janitor emptying his locker a few days later, and just like that, Carmen was gone from her life. 
Months went by and by then y/n had completely forgotten about the chef that wasn’t strong enough until she saw browsing a food blog, and she found a name that she thought she would never see again. A post about a restaurant in Chicago that had served yet another "dish to die for". She refreshed the page a few more times, wondering if this was someone with a similar name but after a bit of sleuthing, a slightly blurry google review photo, it was undeniable, Carmen was indeed in Chicago. 
They shared certain similarities—they had comparable resumes, education, and paychecks. Given the exorbitant rents in New York, it was likely that their living expenses were almost identical. They were both engulfed in the demanding world of cooking, leaving little time for anything else. Yet, despite these parallels, a puzzling question lingered: why did Carmen have the financial freedom to make a spontaneous departure, a luxury y/n had yearned for but couldn't grasp for years?
Y/n wished that she felt that pulling force, like seeing a familiar face after a long time bloomed an ache in her heart. She spent a few moments trying to will her heart string to pull but she was unsuccessful. She was looking for a reason to leave the French Laundry and she was hoping that Carmen’s scribble tattoos, wavy hair, nauseatingly blue eyes would make a path for her to escape, or at least reveal what gave him that final push. 
She liked the restaurant that she used to work at, a local hotspot that was known for its penne alla vodka and other vaguely Italian dishes. Over there she was the hotshot young chef freshly graduating from the CIA and was leagues above anyone else. No one towered over her asking if she knew what she was doing, no one ever asked her if she remembered to stir the roux, or if she was an assistant. The only reason she left was because her student debt was closing in and she was exhausted from constantly debating if she should buy a replacement for her shitty knife or groceries for the month. Being poor was so tiring that y/n caved when someone came in with a job offer. As much as she hated the French Laundry it graced her with a different type of freedom, the freedom to not worry about if she could afford to survive. 
She waited till The Beef closed to give them a call, and unsurprisingly someone picked up with a heavy sigh, “ We are closed.” and then hung up. Y/n dialed again, “I need to speak to Berzatto.”
“Yo Cousin, some chick is looking for you.” A muffled, we’re closed, was heard but y/n insisted.
“We worked together in the French L-.”
“She says she’s French or something.” And before y/n could correct, Carmen was handed the phone. 
“The fuck do you mean French?” Still arguing with the guy with a gruff voice.
“Maybe it's a "pro" you sobbed in front of in France, you virgin. I don’t know your fucking life.” 
“French Laundry.” Y/n interrupted and just like that Carmen was glued to the phone. 
“Y/n?” Y/n ignored that he was able to recognize her voice even after all this time and how that made her almost soften her voice. 
“I’m in Chicago for a few days, when can I stop by.” 
“You want to come?" Carmen hastily recovered, "You can come when you can but we are doing some renovations and it's a mess-'' 
“I’ll be there tomorrow afternoon.” And with that y/n  hung up and emailed HR that she would be out for the week because she was sick. 
The Chicago air was unbearably similar to New York's and y/n was glad she didn’t have to spend too many miles on the same shitty city. And Carmen understated the “renovations”, it was a gut. The door scraped open dragging the paint cans that were leaning it. The door isn’t the working issue, it's the fact that the whole restaurant looked like it was on the verge of being classified as a collection of bare load bearing pillars and plastic tarp. Y/n was glad that she settled for sneakers because heels were begging for her to eat shit. 
“Ms. New York!” The man with a gruff voice yells with laced hostility, alerting everyone.
The echoing music was promptly shot off as curious onlookers tried to decipher why an unknown woman was waddling through a battlefield of loose nails and scattered sawdust.
Y/n didn’t have to look long before Carmen came tumbling out the kitchen door, looking at her like she was glowing. Y/n wordlessly walked over to him and extended her hand and much to her shock the shake was firm, eager even, the last time they shook hands was when y/n had to take a photo with him 3 years ago for Gastronomica. Y/n was the first to slip her hand away, not remarking on his softened calluses, it seems like he hadn’t done much cooking lately. 
Carmen ushered them towards the kitchen and held the door open for her, the room was empty and oddly quiet. They were holding the work outside so they could hear what they assumed would be confessions and passionate love making. 
Carmen probably sensed it too because he took them to what looked like the skeletons of an office. 
They both stood against the wall on completely opposite ends, their words would have to fill the gap. Carmen parted his lips a few times trying to formulate what he practiced last night but all the words seemed to die in his throat. His staggered inhale was followed by a soft, “What brings you here? I mean I’m glad you're here-”
“I wanted to know what you were up to.” Y/n twirled a strand of hair, looking into his eyes trying to relearn him again. 
Carmen’s breath stalled as he fiddled with his apron to avoid eye contact. “I’m running this place now so-” Carmen’s eyebrows furrowed, “How did you know where I was?”
“I saw the restaurant in a blog and thought I would….” Y/n noticed him deflate, trying to figure out from disappointment or finally relaxing. 
“I thought I would get something to eat but it seems like…” Y/n waved her hands at the bare walls, “That's not gonna happen.” She let out a soft chuckle but was a bit peeved that Carmen wasn’t doing anything but staring at her. 
Y/n crossed her arms and leaned against the wall, Carmen sighed and thumped his head softly on the wall behind him. Being across from him, gave y/n a familiar view of Carmen at the end of shift, pitiful and enervated. Y/n didn’t fail to notice that his arms had gotten bigger.
“Manual labor suits you.” Carmen let out an embarrassed but bemused “ha” as he failed to stop his lips from curling up. 
“Yeah, I have to do a lot by myself. Don’t exactly have the funds to be hiring a million contractors to do shit.”
“How do you afford all this?” Y/n lifted her gaze and tried to not look too eager. 
"A ton of loans. We're barely holding it together," he admitted with a soft chuckle, passing some papers to y/n. As he continued, Carmen listed the financial burdens on his shoulders, payroll for the chefs, government permits, contractors, vendors, appliance suppliers,each itemized until it culminated in a big, fat, red zero that highlighted the crushing reality of y/n's shattered dreams. There was no money left; they couldn't afford to keep her. The devastating truth settled in, she couldn't afford to work here, and Carmen couldn't afford to save her. 
Carmen walked over to the desk between them before plopping on his chair and balanced his head on his right fist as he looked up to y/n.
“What are you doing right now?” Carmen asked, the new view let him see more of y/n, which she didn’t know if she liked.
“I'm still at the French Laundry, it pays the bills, Carmen.” The air stilled and all the oxygen in his lungs contracted in his lungs as his name echoed in the otherwise silent room. He wasn’t Berzatto anymore. Y/n’s small smirk was enough of a reaction for Carmen to solidify that he had no clue about the women in front of him. 
As she basked in the lull, she extended her leg to stretch them out to, noticing that it wouldn’t take much effort for her to put her foot on one of the legs of his chair and roll him closer. Y/n wasn’t without decency so she resisted messing with Carmen anymore. She was being stupid and immature, it wasn’t his fault that he couldn’t help her, but a part of her still yearned to inflict some measure of discomfort on him.
“Enough about me…what have you been up to?” He was finally worth talking to, y/n thought. He would finally have something of value that she couldn’t get out of any other seasoned chef, a spark behind his eyes. Maybe there was something else that gave him the power to come here, something that could move her too. 
“I'm taking over the restaurant from my brother and we are remodeling and shit to make it…a spot.” He realized how stupid he sounded when he said it outloud. 
Y/n’s lips quivered downward, he was taking over a family obligation. He didn’t unlock any of the universe’s secrets that he could share with her, that would make the road ahead clear. He really couldn’t help her. The crushing feeling in her chest was worsened when he carelessly tossed out, “You could work here, ya know?”
A pile of bills at home dared her to throw caution to the wind and fail spectacularly. Y/n shut down any part of her that could have been swayed and diverted instead.
“What are you serving?” 
“You would be head chef, y/n.” Carmen's intense gaze made her look at him in bewilderment.
“It’s not a good fit.” Y/n pressed with a self-assured chuckle.
“Syd would be number 2 and I can focus on the business shit-” 
Y/n wasn’t going to justify his ridiculous proposition with a response, so she gave him a pointed look before asking a final time, “What are you serving?”
“Whatever I want.” His eyes focused on y/n’s, almost daring her to be enticed by the freedom.
Y/n's stomach somersaulted. The room around them seemed to close in as the weight of the unknown pressed against her. Y/n grappled with the question of what she had truly come for. The initial curiosity about his past now collided with the reality that the person standing before her was somehow a deity that had broken free from the shackles of depriving the self from freedom but also a mortal with dangerous arrogance that she couldn’t replicate. 
“You finished the menu?” 
Carmen nodded as his eyes wrinkled.
“Show me the menu.” 
“You’ll see it on opening night.” Carmen leaned back in self-assurance.
“I won’t be back.” Y/n briskly asserted as she went back to twirling her hair and crossing her arms.
Y/n heard a chuckle and a soft, “Doubtful”. Just as she lifted her head to argue, the words were gone and so was Carmen, who was at the door now, holding it open for her.
“You're the worst, you know that?” She presented him with a vicious side eye. “I came all the way to the menu, you know.” That wasn’t remotely true.
“You can see the kitchen.” His hand hovered over the small of her back before catching himself and slipping his hand back down. 
Carmen gave a run down on where the stove would go in relation with the expo, being mindful of speed but also spatial restriction. Y/n walked with him wondering if she would care enough about the minutia to organize a restaurant from the ground up like this. Her fingertips grazed the silver gas stove, teh cool metal brought back memories of working in LA. His expo covered in plastic wrap was the exact one she saw in her first internship. And most damning of all, Carmen specially picked out everything; so just like y/n, he had a story to tell with each piece. 
His eyes shimmered as he talked about not beating his time around the kitchen yet, and y/n felt her stomach roll over as a wave of… something rolled over her. 
Eventually, Carmen led her out to the front where she talked about table choices and the lighting to match, her eye’s glazed in wonderment wondering if the version of Carmen that cared about interior design was always a part of him or if it was a new development. Just as she was about to ask, Richie interrupted her.
“We’ve held it long enough, I think we would ALL love to know who you are.” He spread out his arms and nodded like a politician who was, “asking the real questions”. Y/n went from floating around the kitchen to being slammed shut in a bird cage. 
“Ms. New York didn’t give it away?” Y/n replied, doing her best to ignore the nagging whispers in her head telling her she wasn't wanted here. 
“Then why are you here?” He challenged right back, pointing an accusatory finger at her before migrating it to Carmen, “Why is she here?” The urge to run away tugged at her, to a place where it didn't matter if people liked her.
Carmen squinted his eyes before letting out an exasperated sigh, y/n could tell he was used to Richie’s machinations. Looks like the three of them didn’t know why y/n was here.
“Just ignore him, that's Tina..” pointing at an older woman who looked like she was just about to leave. 
“..Nat” was buried in a binder but her head still shot up and smiled which y/n politely reciprocated.
“.. and Syd '', who looked pissed that y/n was here, y/n looked at her hands clasping a notebook. Recipes…a menu…y/n tucked her lips to hide her laugh, they didn’t have a menu to show and she had interrupted their brainstorming session. Y/n made a mental note that Carmen wrinkled his eyes when he lied.
“I was just in the neighborhood, and I'm just about to leave.” She walked towards the exit, not failing to notice that Carmen was in hot pursuit.
It didn’t take a genius to know he was going to offer her a ride so she beat him to it, “I’ve taken enough of your time.” 
And just as Carmen was about to say something, Y/n hid her disappointment with a  smirk, “I’ll let you get back to making that menu.” Y/n caught a quick glimpse of shock before the door swung open and she walked the Chicago streets wondering if she got what she was looking for. 
This place wasn’t for her at all, and no amount of small town romance novels could convince her to leave her cushy job with a bunch of pompous clowns for a DIY restaurant. Her heart quickened as she allowed herself to be momentarily seduced by the idea, only to shatter any hopeful illusions with the harsh reality that Carmen couldn't rescue her from her financial nightmare. She needed a paycheck, a big one, and Carmen couldn't give it to her; he could barely afford the stove he wanted. It was almost cruel to give her a taste, let her acquire it, and then realize that she couldn’t have it. 
Y/n went back to her hotel and had the difficult choice between watching Pawnshop or Diners, Drivers and Dives when she got a text message from an unknown number. 
I’m off tomorrow, let me take you somewhere other than a construction site. 
Y/n let herself have one last taste of freedom and dialed the number, “Who’s this?” she asked to tease Carmen.
She could hear Carmen’s grin loud and clear as he gave her a soft, “The worst person ever.”
Y/n laid flat on her bed and made herself forget that he didn’t have a backbone, that he ran away without a word like a coward, and (most damning to her) he couldn’t save her. She pushed the part of her that screamed that she should run away before they realized they didn’t fit because right now, she wasn’t talking to Berzatto. He was Carmen. He had dreams and aspirations that were bigger than him or maybe just as big as him. He was working hard and confident; everything else he wasn't in New York.  
As she confirmed a good time for tomorrow, she sat up on her bed as she said her goodbye.
“Have a good night, Carmen.”
Y/n had trouble falling asleep that night. 
**
The week had reached its end a lot quicker than y/n thought it would. Before she knew it she had repacked her life back into her suitcase and was sitting at her gate waiting for boarding to start. 
Y/n had her legs propped up on her carry-on, balancing an egregiously priced coffee in one hand and a book in the other. It’s not like the book was any good, it was an autobiography about a famous chef who had died of cancer. She recalled her outing with Carmen a few days prior.
The pans that y/n had to use in her shitty old apartment were non-stick because she couldn’t afford the non-cancer kind till after she graduated from the CIA. She remembered joking with her classmates about it while they were learning how to take apart a chicken, and everyone gasped in disgust. Y/n gave a careless grin while hiding her warming cheeks and mentally punching herself for even saying that out loud. 
Her birthday came around and all of her classmates pitched in for a set of pans, non-stick pans. She laughed with her friends, went home and invited them for dinner made entirely from the pans and watched as they ate their dishes, nodding in pretentious considerment, not knowing it was made on Teflon and wondered if this is how that guy who served his customers human meat felt. 
Y/n told the story to Carmen during their lunch at a Korean restaurant and felt a surge run through her as he met her eyes and instead of laughing at what was meant to be a humorous story and mumbled, “That was shitty.”
Y/n’s lips parted as her eyebrows furrowed in anger and, more embarrassingly, shame. 
Before she could defend herself, Carmen added, “I wouldn’t call those friends.” 
He played with the condensation on his glass, y/n knew better to look down at him playing with the wetness with his pointer and thumb. 
“That’s how it is there. How was your first week here?” Y/n sipped her soup.
“I lost my knife, found it beat up on the floor. I would have quit if I could.” Carmen gave a soft chuckle and y/n hated that she wanted to know more about him. 
“Which knife?”
“It was the Yoshimi.” 
Y/n quirked her lips up, “I remember when you first got it.” Carmen looked up quizzically.
“It was a shit show.” The head chef was not in a good mood and Carmen pulled up, with a pep in his step and a new knife, begging to be shot down. Honestly, y/n was surprised that Carmen didn’t kill anyone that day. 
Y/n’s flight had started boarding so she threw all of her stuff in her bag while fishing for her passport. In her hustle she missed her phone vibrating till she was in her seat trying to catch her breath from shoving her overloaded carry-on in the ever shrinking compartment. 
You got on yet?
Just sat down, TSA sucks ass, might have to start working out bc im winded rn.
Have a safe flight. 
Y/n finally made it home and just as she was about to pass out, she quickly texted a picture of her exhausted face with a cringy thumbs up, she would regret that in the morning. 
Y/n fell right back into her regular rhythm, with two new additions. She had started running in the morning. The other thing was a new pen pal, of sorts. 
They tried texting more regularly for the first few weeks but their schedules were too different so they had simplified it to a photo every few days. 
The Bear  
Y/n got the photo on her train ride home after months of “talking”, a picture of a decal on the restaurant window, y/n didn’t miss Carmen’s furrowed eyebrows and grimace from having to be out in the sun to take the picture. His reflection exposed his paint stained t-shirt and y/n rubbed her eyes to check that his arms had in fact gotten bigger. 
Y/n sent out the first actual text message in months, Why The Bear?
She saw the bubbles disappear and reappear a few time before settling on,
Come and find out
Y/n snickered and the women sitting next to her gave her a side eye as she got up to leave. 
I don’t want to install appliances or check the plumbing for free. 
Carmen texted back uncharacteristically fast, maybe they had shot down texting too soon. 
“Don't want to” or “don’t know how to”?
Y/n squinted her eyes, he should believe her even if she was lying. She texted a middle finger back. You should be so lucky to see my trade skills in action, I could have been your contractor and it's sexist that you think otherwise.  
I’ll settle with you coming by as a guest.
Y/n called him, it was a split second decision that she didn’t have time to regret. He picked up just as quickly as she called. 
“I’m not coming back if you guys are still building shit.” Y/n asserted as she unlocked her front door. 
“We finished that a while ago, now it's real shit this time.” There was faint rustling in the background and what y/n could decipher as yelling. 
“Yeah?”
“We're missing some stuff, repair guys to call, and we still have some vendors to deal with but doors open in a few weeks.”
Y/n giggled, “Sounds like you're cutting it close, Carmen.” There was rustling heard on the other end, “You can probably get all that shit done with time to spare if you don’t get distracted.”
A laugh erupted from the other end, Richie’s. 
“He’s plenty distracted, got himself a girlfriend.” Y/n stomach fell to her ass as she stood in her kitchen with her work bag still slung on her shoulders.
“Really?” she croaked out. Richie must have slapped Carmen on the back because she heard him slap Richie back. 
“Ignore him. Doors open on the 1st.” The line stayed quiet for a second. 
“I’ll see if I can make it, but you know it gets.” Y/n wasn’t going to make it, she was taking it out of the calendar right now.
A door closed on his end and the line was disconnected. 
Before y/n could chuck her phone at her couch and sleep off her day, it rang again. Facetime. 
Y/n picked up and was met with a new setting. Carmen noticed her slight confusion. 
“New office, what do you think?” He propped his phone up and angled his body so she would see his fully stocked bookshelf. If y/n didn’t know any better she would have assumed that he was trying to impress her. 
“Dewey Decimal?”
“Alphabetical.” He pulled out a book and showed her the self-made label on the bottom that proved that it was in fact in alphabetical order. 
Y/n let herself be a bit difficult, “Your handwriting leaves something to be desired.”
Carmen covered his smirk with his tattooed hand before locking into her eyes,”Why don’t you come over and help me out?”
Y/n almost let herself fold before recollecting herself, “Unless you plan on working part time for our HR department, I don’t see that PTO being approved.”
“Sick days?” 
“Why don’t you come back to New York. Wanna slice oranges for our tarte á l’orange? Maggie misses you.” Y/n was referring to the kitchen’s pastry chef who didn’t miss Carmen in the slightest. 
“Are you opening a restaurant?” Y/n was a bit floored that she was getting sass from a man who put his jeans in an oven and shirts in kitchen cupboards. 
“Are you? Looks like your team thinks you're distracted? If I didn’t know any better I would say you're calling me to distract yourself from calling the repair guy.” 
“He can wait… tell me what I have to do to make this happen.”
“I took a week off, and we live in a capitalist hellscape so I already used up my PTO for the year. Don’t worry, I’ll make it to the next one.”
“You think I'm good enough to franchise.” Carmen ran his hands through his hair as he laughed and y/n cheeks warmed as his shirt slightly lifted as he leaned back.  
“No, when this one fails and you have to make it another Mcdonalds.” Carmen gave her an adoring smile that made her wonder if he heard something else. 
He put his right leg on his knee and spun in his chair, thinking. 
“It’s better if I don’t come, what if your team hates me or worse they love me, force me to be their leader, and kick you to the sidelines.”
“I can be on the sidelines for you.” Y/n ignored the fluttering in her stomach. 
“I’ll see…”She offered.
Carmen let out a sigh and y/n almost felt bad but the distance was good. They didn’t work together anymore, they texted irregularly, they barely were face to face, and it was working for them. 
She was forgetting the man who froze like a battered dog when she was being shredded in the kitchen, and she could forgive him for being selfish because now he was too far away for it to affect her. Closing the gap risked her relearning why she didn’t get close to him in the first place.  
His lips parted like he was constructing the words.
“What?” Y/n was just about ready to hang up and get ready for bed. 
“I just…I don’t know. I thought that I could…you would see something different.”
“It’s a restaurant, I've seen plenty of those.” 
“It’s different, I swear. I worked hard on shit and it's new and different. It's …better.” A chef analogizing his restaurant to represent himself was so unoriginal y/n would have laughed in their faces if it wasn’t Carmen.
“I’ll save you a table.” He offered.
“Looks like you’ve got a lot of tables to save.” Carmen quirked up his eyebrows.
“Your sister s, Sydney’s dad, Richie’s friends, me. Are there going to be any tables left for customers?”
“I need them all there, y/n.” He didn’t need to say her name but it still reverberated inside of her sending a shiver down her spine. In response, y/n felt a warm wave of relief wash over her, knowing that she couldn’t quite explain why that felt good to hear.
“I'm nobody.” Y/n squinted her eyebrows in doubt. 
There's a hint of desperation in his voice, as if he's been searching for something that y/n couldn’t figure out, “You saw me in New York and here so you're the only person who can compare the two. I don’t have anyone like that left.” Carmen rounded his eyes in closeted adoration and y/n’s throat closed up.
“I’ll see what I can do but no promises. I have to go… don’t forget to call the fridge guy.”
Y/n was a strong independent woman who built her own furniture, threw out her own trash, and even back out by putting an arm around the passage seat headrest so when she got an email the next day with tickets to Chicago, her head began to swim.
Her phone buzzed, Meet me halfway.
Y/n left him on read and gave herself the freedom that Carmen had unknowingly denied her. 
Birthdays were never y/n’s favorite holiday, she didn’t bother taking the day off and she stopped telling people since her CIA days, so she felt a little disgusted when grown adults would make a whole situation about this day. Celebrating birthdays in a restaurant was annoying for the kitchen but celebrating management’s family birthdays made y/n nearly quit every year. 
It came around like clock work, just as she forgot about it, her boss's friend's (or whoever) birthday would roll around and she had to remind herself that the only reason she still had a job here was because she didn’t break down in hysterics and the only reason she stayed was because the bill wouldn’t stop just because she disliked her job. 
It had already been a month since she and Carmen last spoke, they went back to curt messages. Y/n couldn’t help herself from texting back even though she knew better. The last message was a picture of Carmen in front of a finished kitchen, he puckered his lips to hide the full grin and seeing such joy, even if it was from a photo, was infecting every corner of her mind. 
The week was just as difficult as it always was, and the last thing y/n wanted to do was a large dinner like this but it was like the universe wanted to beat her numb. 
Y/n forgot to mention that the HVAC system had gone down for the afternoon and it was still over 100 degrees in the kitchen. As she chopped some chives, she ignored the expo coughing, and she walked over her collapsed body when expo inevitably passed out, to grab some more butter from the walk-in.
Y/n stole a glance from the corner of her eyes, they had no expo and a full house. Y/n puckered her lips in hidden contentment when the head chef practically roared and the unconscious women to get up and y/n swallowed a laugh when he had enough and started to manage the expo. 
Y/n’s eyes darted to her left and finally felt that Carmen wasn’t working there. He had long been replaced, twice over, and y/n went back to her foie gras terrines trying to figure out why it even mattered now. 
As orders were being barked and a rehearsed chorus of, “Chef” played back, y/n stalled her knife noticing that the pitch was off. It was missing the bass of a chef that had left just about everything to run away and was trying to convince her to do the same.
“WHERE THE HELL IS THE CONSOMME FOR 14?” 
For the first time in years, y/n flinched. It wasn’t noticeable barring the fact that her little jump made her slice her finger. Her breath picked up as the blood pooled over the chives, she grabbed her cutting board and dumped the herbs in the trash and grabbed another board. She pressed the kitchen towel deeper into her finger, trying to remember where the first aid kit was from her orientation week. 
Just as y/n was about to run to the stove to cauterize the wound herself so she could keep working, someone grabbed her arm and handed her a bandaid. She looked up to give them a silent thank you but they were gone. She hastily wrapped herself up and tried to lean inconspicuously on the counter because heat was getting to her too. 
A few minutes later when by and y/n had fallen back to her usual rhythm even as a waiter walked in, she had learned to ignore waitstaff when they entered the kitchen because they never brought good news. Y/n could feel a piercing glare on her back.
“You sent out a Coq au Vin, chef?” Y/n didn’t have to look up to know he was talking to her but she still met his searing glare.
“15 minutes ago, chef.” Y/n resisted wiping the bead of sweat that was torturously grazing down her face.
He stared her down like he was waiting for her to admit that she had actually eaten it, she kept her nose high and bit her tongue to stifle the grimace that was forming. 
“It's missing.” An ugly pause passed throughout the kitchen, she had almost convinced herself that she hadn’t actually finished it but the shift in his gaze brought her back to reality, he remembered her bringing it to him. 
In the smelting kitchen, in her cramped corner, with her chef whites sticking to her, she almost let this pathetic man think he knew more than her.
The command echoed out of her before she could contain herself, “Refiring the coq au vin.”
A familiar chorus of, “Chef” was missing its usual thoughtlessness, y/n wasn’t supposed to do anything till the head chef told her, she had given herself a command, it was sacrilege. 
Y/n was never a target, she watched as others were shot down time and time again, and moved on when she saw them break down crying in the middle of a dinner rush. The most she could give them was aloofness but as she stood in her corner, drowning in orders, and having every single one sent back from expo to redo, or having to wait longer for plates then everyone else and getting reamed for her dishes coming in late, she felt the weight of the kitchen’s gaze on her shoulders and wished someone one was there for her.
She kept her face composed as she finished up the last of her orders, her vision swaying from dehydration. Just as she was about to give into the weightlessness, the clock struck midnight and the kitchen was officially closed. 
She did her best to walk to her locker, and sat on a chair with her head in her hands wondering how she was getting out the door, let alone go home. Her phone buzzed in her lap and knew that it was Carmen. His restaurant was opening tomorrow and she didn’t want to hear about it right now. 
 The rest of the chefs filed out, each giving her a glance that told her that she had finally been properly assimilated, just five years too late. 
Carmen was giving her a taste of freedom in Chicago and that fleeting freedom was too seductive to ignore. The job offer echoed in y/n head, she wasn’t a good fit with them, she didn’t want a “work family”, but the temptation was poisoning her. 
She opened the text, it was a simple picture of Carmen in his chef whites, he was practicing the “look” the day before the restaurant opened. He had even slicked his hair back with pomade like he used to in New York, and for the first time in months she laughed.
The sips of warm gatorade had sobered her up enough to walk out, just barely missing the head chef on her way out the door. She performed a blasphemous act in the back of the uber, she opened the email that Carmen had sent a month ago and checked the tickets date and time. Tomorrow morning, and like the universe was giving back after being shitty today, the French Laundry was closed for the next few days.
Y/n got home, ate two day old Thai food, sat on her couch astounded by her sheer audacity as she checked in for her flight. She was sure that Carmen would have gotten the confirmation email by now but he did her the service of not mentioning it.
Y/n packed a carry-on early in the morning and got to the airport, each checkpoint moving much faster than usual. The TSA didn’t make her take off her shoes, her gate was super close, and they had upgraded her to first class because a couple wanted to sit together. All the stars were pointing to Chicago…to Carmen and she tried not to think about how she was running away from her problems just like he did. 
As she reached her hotel room, she hesitated to text Carmen. Nothing felt right to say, so she gave him the best thing right now, some space. She busied herself with getting ready and watching the shopping network.
As y/n approached the restaurant, she was a bit taken aback that the line was still so long. She stood next to an elderly couple who were talking about mortgage rates going down which meant that another housing bubble was bound to burst and the economy would be in shambles. Y/n tried not to think about how she couldn’t afford to lose her job right now because she had nowhere else to go.
No special treatment tonight, Carmen wouldn’t know when she got here so he could focus on his own work. She entered the restaurant and was relieved that the host and the waitstaff were new. She was led to her table and hesitated to pick up the menu. This was a long time coming and opening it felt so empty. It was like when she submitted her last assignment for highschool, alone on a Thursday night wondering why something so big wasn’t registering. 
As she digested the menu, she let her fingers trace over the faux leather and the brown stitching. She wanted to know why he chose brown stitching, or why he stuck with Seven Fishes despite the fact that he must have made it a million times in the French Laundry? Why did he choose certain wines, or why was there a donut on the menu? 
It's not like she hated the menu but a horrible thought dawned on her that all she wanted right now was for Carmen to sit across from her and talk about everything that she had missed. Every detail of this restaurant that reflected a better him, and how she had so much more to learn.
Her phone burned on her lap but she didn’t text him. Instead, she watched the people murmur about work and the food and y/n couldn’t help but hate herself for her self imposed loneliness. 
Y/n did herself a disservice by coming towards the end of the shift so the crowd was thinning and her cover was close to being blown. Her dish arrived and she didn’t need to walk into the kitchen to know that Carmen made this, after years of taste testing his food, his flavor was ingrained in her DNA. Y/n finished her bucatini and felt compelled to order another despite being stuffed, just to swirl the flavor around her tongue for a bit longer. She ordered the aforementioned donut, paid and left. 
She stood in the crisp Chicago air, a few steps from the restaurant, grappling with the audacity that led Carmen to abruptly leave the French Laundry. Immaturely, she couldn't help but wonder why he got to leave and she couldn’t. She knew why, but she let herself fester in the pain, it kept her alive. 
She was used to being alone but for the first time in her life she yearned for someone to be there for her. She had isolated herself to such an extent that she knew that right now no one knew where she was or what she was doing, even Carmen couldn’t be sure that she actually went on the flight.
She could hear the last of the customers file out and the bussers clearing tables. She felt her phone vibrate and took a few breaths before she picked it up.
How was the bucatini?
Y/n lips waivered and a pit dug itself in her chest as she tried to compose herself, but she felt her eyes watering. This wasn’t fair, he wasn’t playing fair. 
She hid her face in her hands, and tried to regain some of her dignity.
 She stood there for what felt like a few seconds and felt someone stand next to her followed by the familiar sound of a lighter. 
Y/n bit her lips shut and stared ahead, knowing that she was stronger than this.
“I didn’t take you for the donut type.” Carmen said in between puffs, he had changed into more casual clothes.
Y/n inhaled deeply through her nose and put her arms down, the night has hidden any trace of her vulnerability. “I wanted to try something different.” Y/n tried to put more power behind her voice but it came out too soft for her liking.
Carmen studied her profile and y/n knew better than to turn away, so she faced him. Her moist eyes turned his eyes into a kaleidoscope of silvers, blues and gold. 
“How did you know I was in the restaurant?” Y/n was relieved that she was able to get it all out before her voice cracked.
A silence passed through them and y/n wished they were doing this somewhere more private. 
He gave her a look, I know you.
The air hung heavy with tension as Y/n responded to Carmen's humored dismissive look. "You don't know shit,", a sardonic smile playing on her lips. She nonchalantly extended her hands toward Carmen's cigarette, a move that seemed almost too casual for the charged atmosphere. She was reaching out for the small remnants of warmth that she knew she would lose in a few hours, because right now and right here, he was there for her.
Their fingers brushed in the exchange, a subtle yet palpable connection that lingered in the air. It was a moment that could have easily been avoided, but neither of them seemed willing to retreat. 
As the smoke curled around Y/n, she maintained a facade of cool composure, seemingly unfazed by the intimacy of the shared smoke. It was as if the brief touch and the exchange of breath and saliva meant nothing more to her than the inhale and exhale of the smoke itself. The proding sense of sadness thumping in the back of her head telling her that this couldn’t last, they couldn’t last. 
“I liked the food.” Y/n returned the cigarette. “It's different…better.”
Carmen looked at her like he had a million questions that he wanted to ask and y/n wondered if she was giving him the same look. 
She leaned back, “Don’t you have an alley or something? Smoking out front is so highschool.”
“Syd threw up in the alley.” 
Y/n raised an eyebrow and wondered if this is how far they would go, she would have savored him for a moment longer if she knew it was going to end so soon.
Carmen stood straight and tilted his head so she would follow him. 
“They cleaned up fast.” Y/n marveled at the vacant restaurant, the lights were dimmed and Carmen led her to the office. 
“I think they wanted to get out of here before the last train left.” Carmen held the door open for her and the familiar heat of his hand hovering over the small of her back was a welcomed surprise.
Despite the practicality of the situation, the impending departure and the need for a clean, cold goodbye, there was a lingering question of whether she could maintain that distance. Carmen's proximity, the heat of his touch, and the shared space was going to make it challenging to stick with a clinical farewell.
The door clicked shut and y/n let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding. 
“Do your worst. I can take it, y/n.” Carmen sighed, y/n’s stomach fluttered and she dug her nails into her palms to compose herself. 
“Service was good, the waiter filled up my cup when it was halfway. The silverware was clean and rolled tight. Points off because my fork was from a different manufacturer from the rest of the dinnerware.” Y/n saw Carmen clench up for a second before nodding in concentration. It felt as if each syllable was being burned into his memory and the intensity of his gaze was making her sweat.
She gave herself the satisfaction of sitting because her feet were killing her and Carmen sat on the floor, leaning against the wall. 
“The saltiness of the guanciale harmonizes with the richness of the eggs and the sharpness of the Pecorino Romano. The dish was velvety but delicate. The guanciale provides a necessary contrast in texture. Simple but precise. I think…I know that it was the best thing I’ve had in a while, chef.” 
Yn was met with a humming silence. 
“We can do this tomorrow, I know you had a long day.” Y/n offered.
“No…” He shook his head and his eyes were distant before landing on her’s, the severity behind them had made her sit back, “I want to hear what you have to say.”
She extended her legs towards Carmen, “You see these, chef?” Carmen hesitated to look forward like he was in the middle century and ankles were scandalous before gazing at her soft legs.
“They hurt like a motherfucker.” She flexed the back of her heel to show the blisters that had formed. “I gotta take care of this back in the hotel.” 
Carmen slowly shifted his gaze from her legs to her face before wordlessly getting up and walking out. Y/n rubbed her temple and allowed herself to be selfish once more by downing Carmen’s abandoned sugar free Redbull left on the desk.
As she collected her stuff to get back to the hotel, Carmen returned with ice and first aid. 
He placed everything on the floor so slowly that y/n could only assume that he was stalling. 
Carmen looked up at her with his bright, almost silver, eyes and his eyes asked, Can I help you? Can I be there for you like you were here for me today?
It was like time had stopped as y/n struggled to bring oxygen to her lungs. She mindlessly nodded yes and the first touch made her heart thump against her chest. His hands were scorching against her skin and every lingering touch imprinted its memory on to her. As he iced the swelling and followed it by placing his warm hand to ease the shock in temperature, it became hard for y/n to focus.
Carmen did her the courtesy of abandoning the ice pack. She took a hollow and staggered breath, “Ask me anything.” 
Carmen looked up from her, she hadn’t noticed that he had removed her heels, and asked her about every minor detail about her experience. He wasn’t aware that he was softly rubbing his thumb across her ankle, and y/n couldn't seem to move on from it. 
When y/n finished her summary, Carmen’s fingers seized dancing across her skin and she regretted not talking for longer. 
He didn’t let his hand leave her even as he asked, “How is work?”
Y/n grunted out in dismay and she leaned back and would have fallen backwards if Carmen hadn’t grabbed the seat between her legs. They both stared at his hand before Carmen quickly pulled back, y/n mumbled a quick thanks. 
“It’s great.” Y/n sarcastically pushed. 
Carmen quirked up his eyebrows in a sarcastic manner and y/n ignored him. 
“It was Henry’s birthday.” Carmen hummed in understanding, birthdays were always a mess.
“You wouldn’t guess who was doing the expo yesterday.” 
“I have an idea.” Y/n couldn’t deny that his smirk sent her spinning. He understood the fiber of that world so well even though he was hundreds of miles away, and she was barely hanging on to a tread. 
Carmen continued, “Feel bad for the poor bastard who was his punching bag for the night.”
Y/n swallowed the burning lump in the back of her throat and kept her gaze relaxed and gave him a soft, “Yeah.”
The silence was making y/n uncomfortable so she mustered her remaining energy to give him a relaxed smile. 
Carmen’s face didn’t give anything away, “How bad was he?”
“I'm here, aren’t I?” Y/n chuckled humorlessly. 
“I know you're strong but I was being serious, y'know…about the job.” Carmen asserted.
Y/n softened her eyes, he was making this so much harder for her. “Noted, chef. Why Chicago?” Y/n diverted.
“Inherited the restaurant from my brother and I had to deal with it. He killed himself.”
“I shouldn’t have brought it up-”
“It’s fine, I was going to have to tell you anyway.” Y/n didn’t have to know anything, she was no one and she didn’t deserve his trust. “It was a sandwich place before we renovated it.”
Y/n laughed in disbelief, “You made sandwiches? They sell truffles in Chicago?”
Carmen smirked as he went back to mindlessly rubbing her ankle again. “Regular sandwiches.”
Y/n widened her eyes and couldn’t hold her laughter in, “Pictures or it didn’t happen.” 
Carmen fished out his phone and showed her pictures of a messier restaurant.
“I get why you had to gut the place.”
“It's not that bad.” He asked humorously. 
“What you have right now is more your style, I like this version better.” Y/n heart skipped a beat when his hand shifted a bit higher up her leg. 
“I love the look though,” Y/n squinted at a picture of Carmen standing behind a counter at what looked like a bachelor party. 
“What look?”
“You know, the rugged, tired look.” Carmen rolled his eyes. “No seriously, I didn’t even know you had so much ink.” Y/n zoomed in on a tattoo of some numbers on his biceps. 
“I'll show you all of them later.” Y/n let out a laugh as she handed back the phone. She wondered if she was hiding her nerves well. 
"You spend all your time at work, when do you find the time to sit in a tattoo shop?"
"Prioritizing important shit, I guess."
"If you can prioritize getting tattoos and running a restaurant, when do you have time for your girlfriend?" Subtle, passive, non-probing was what y/n was going for. She forced herself to watch his reaction.
Carmen gave a puzzled look, his scrunched up eyebrows and distant look was accompanied with a quiet, "Don't have one."
Y/n gave a casual "Hmm…you sure? Seems like you got time to kill, always so relaxed." Carmen curled his lips up and bit his lips to stifle his smile. His lips turned pale pink before returning to rose red and y/n wanted to reach down and run her pointer finger along his lips to feel his heat.
"When I have the time. The restaurant is new and I need-"
"I thought you said you knew how to prioritize?" Y/n leaned back and rested her cheek on her fist. 
"Maybe if she's really special."
"And not distracting." Y/n added.
"Then I can prioritize." Carmen adjusted his posture before asking y/n.
"What about you?"
"I am a realistic romantic, so love is real but just not for me. I don't have it in me to text everyday or go to family dinners. But who knows, Mr. Right might make me less shitty and more sunshine and rainbows. "
"Your personality is fine right now." Carmen offered. 
Y/n jokingly scoffed before adding, "Then maybe I just need someone to distract from my own problems."
They sat in comfortable silence, but y/n’s eyes widened as she checked the clock, “It’s late.”
“It’s only one.” Y/n gave him a look of disapproval before nudging her foot against his stomach, where it had been resting for the past hour. 
“Go home, Carmen.” Carmen wordlessly picked up her heels and slipped them back on to her feet. He stood up and offered his hand. 
They walked out the restaurant and y/n pulled out her phone to call a taxi.
“I can drive you.”
Y/n looked over her shoulder at Carmen checking the locks. 
“If you drive me, you won't be getting any sleep.” A pause passed through them.
“I didn’t mean it like that.” Y/n rushed out. 
Carmen cleared his throat, preserved her dignity by not saying anything else and led her to the car. 
“You know these things will kill you.” Y/n lifted a Red Bull from the cup holder and cracked it open and took a few healthy sips. 
Carmen wordlessly slipped the can out of her hands at a red light, “I need it more than you.” He looked down at the lipstick mark and took a few savored sips. At the next light, y/n could see the remnants of red lipstick on his bottom lip. 
They reached y/n’s hotel too fast for each other's liking. Y/n swiveled her head, Carmen was already looking at her. She was fighting heavy lids a few minutes ago but now she was sprung with energy. 
Y/n looked up in feinted innocence before casually offering, “You want to come up for some tea?” The kettle in her room didn’t work, she checked this morning.
Carmen blinked a few times, wondering if he heard her right, before slowly nodding his head like he wasn’t sure it was a joke. 
She unlocked her room door for the both of them and Carmen shut it behind him. With a cautious gesture, y/n extended her hand, placing it close to Carmen's body. The darkness clung to Carmen's form as y/n's fingers grazed his side, a brief but intimate contact that went unnoticed in the dimly lit corridor, to check if the door was locked.
Carmen walked over to the office chair in the corner. Y/n room was so cramped that she was still within arms distance of him as she sat on the foot of her bed. 
“The Bear?” Y/n’s inquisitive gaze and playful smile made Carmen’s heart stutter as he nearly forgot what The Bear was, or what his name was. 
He cleared his throat, “Berzatto…Bear. It was a nick-name my brother gave me.” 
Y/n leaned in a bit closer as she scoffed, “Even the name is good. I kinda hate you a bit more.” She bit her bottom lip to stifle the laugh but was pleasantly surprised that he was bouncing from her eyes to her lips.
He parted his lips to formulate a coherent sentence but y/n extended her heels to the legs of Carmen’s chair and pulled him closer. The look of his thoughts scrambling right in front of her was making it difficult for her to be restrained and poised. “Sorry, I couldn’t hear you.”
His grip on the arms of the chair was telling her that she was headed in the right direction. She kept her hold on Carmen’s chair, as she softly assured, “I have to go back soon, so I’m trying to soak it all in right now.”
“You're leaving?” Carmen mumbled, sharing his attention between her eyes, lips, and her leg. He let his legs relax, which made them meet with y/n’s legs. 
“I hate Chicago.” Y/n leaned back. “And I don’t really belong here. My whole life is in New York, and I don’t want to change everything just for-.” 
“Come work for me-” 
A swift pang of anger rippled through her, he didn’t need her. “You’ve got your plate full, you don't need a distraction.”
“But you do.” Carmen placed a warm hand on her thigh and the heat made her breath heavy, y/n knew where this was going but she wanted it to last as long as it could because she knew that once the sun rose, they were done. 
“It’s going to be messy.” 
“It won't be.”
The room held its breath as they teetered on the edge of something undefined. The impending dawn loomed, casting a shadow on the delicate illusion they had woven. “I don’t want something serious.” Y/n argued. 
“And I dont have the time for something serious.” As Carmen leaned forward, pushing his hands high up her thigh. 
As y/n searched for any other reason no to do this, Carmen’s cerulean eye’s hazed with lust seemed to have the opposite effect. Any reservations, logic, or inhibitions that could have prompted her to stop were forcefully pushed away amidst the intoxicating allure of Carmen.
Y/n didn’t know who leaned in first but it didn’t take much time for both of them to topple in the bed. In between huffs and shirts flying off each other Carmen whispered into her lips, “Just pretend it’s real tonight.”
Y/n reeled her head back a second, but Carmen's intense gaze and his trailing hand convinced her otherwise. She leaned back in, hooking her legs around his waist pulling him closer.
Carmen stalled his kisses down the column of her throat, “I thought you wouldn’t come.” 
“I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.” Y/n twisted her hips and in a flash she was straddling him.
She sensed the subtle shiver that ran through him, his unsteady hands finding a resting place on her hips, torn between the desire to reciprocate from below and allowing her to continue her torture. Taking charge, she decided for both of them, lowering herself down to grind against his jeans.
Carmen’s mind went blank and the last thing he saw before he lost all sense of restraint and reason, was y/n’s eyes sparkling. 
--
You can read more of my stuff here
End Notes:
I love reading your comments, and that's what motivated me to finish, so share your thoughts bc I want to hear them.
I currently have like 10 half baked drafts and they all suck so this was the sole survivor. This one is kinda self indulgent because I hate my job so much but sometimes no matter how much something makes you miserable, there isn’t a way out, so you have to find something to distract yourself from the dull pain. 
I tried to keep it as realistically healthy as a relationship with Carmen can be because that man just needs some space to grow. Honestly, I'm not sure if they'll ever meet again, or maybe they might meet up more now. Im really not sure.
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malleleothreesome · 9 months
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Under the Mistletoe with Malleus
❤️ summary: Malleus' latest hyperfixation is mistletoe ༶༶༶ 💚 warnings: gender neutral reader, SFW, fluff, romance, Christmas centric but not religious ༶༶༶ ❤️ word count: 4k ༶༶༶ 💚 inspired by: this ask thank you! ♡✧*:・゚
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Malleus listens intently to all the tales you have to tell, all the little pieces of your world, of yourself—all the little snippets that come rushing out from the recesses of your memories, painting a picture of your humanity and the universe you'd once inhabited. All the intricacies and details of how your family would spend Christmas, the foods, the gifts, the songs—he loves hearing all about your unique traditions and experiences. Malleus is endlessly grateful for each of these recollections that you decide to entrust him with—small moments of personal history that hold so much weight in shaping who you are. Your mind runs wild as your thoughts run rampant, a blur of vivid recollections that overwhelm you. Then, he sees the tears brimming on your lash line and the tremble of your lower lip, his heart sinking instantly when the painful weight of homesickness visibly crashes down upon you. His own emotions, his yearning, his gratitude are all clogged up in his throat. When the tears finally drip past your lashes and down your cheeks, you're swaddled in strong, firm arms that cradle you. Malleus doesn't bother with words as he shushes your sobs, only offering his comfort with the secure tuck of your frame against his larger form, and the gentle tracing of his elegant, gloved fingertips along the curve of your back in soothing circles. His soft humming is melodious against the crook of your shoulder, warm and welcoming as he surrounds you completely.
Wanting to make the Christmas season extra special for you, his dearest friend, Malleus spends copious hours poring over the plethora of holiday books he could acquire from the school library—reading and studying each festive tale, tradition, and legend until the pages are wrinkled with the oils from his fingertips. Each chapter carefully absorbed and ingrained into his psyche, his eyes sparkling alight with delight and fascination, relishing in the lightness and warmth of the holidays as he familiarized himself with this magical and jovial festivity. When Christmas rolls around the corner, Malleus ensures the front entrance to Ramshackle dorm is lit up and decked to the nines in brightly glowing lights strung all over the framework—an aura of luminescence and color enveloping the dilapidated architecture with festive spirit. The rest of the exterior of the Dorm was covered with glittering golden tinsel, wreaths, garlands and pinecones—whatever he had deemed as festive in his extensive research.
Malleus was determined to honor this strange holiday—a special and important part of your childhood—but unfortunately, none of the decorations, lights, or Christmas cheer were quite as meaningful and special as what he wanted it all to symbolize. When he heard about the tradition involving a parasitic plant, he was naturally intrigued by the idea that a plant would wilt away and die if not united with a particular organism—it could only flourish and thrive when entwined with its complementary other half. In return, the mistletoe would provide both beautiful flowers and ripe fruit, enhancing the lives of the forest around them and fostering harmony within the ecosystem. However, it was the usage of that plant during a kiss that truly made him delighted by its macabre nature and its value to this sacred human festivity. It seemed befitting somehow that the now dead mistletoe, the melancholy parasite that thrives in connection with others, could bring a measure of life and happiness to all who cross its path through a kiss under its eternal, desiccated embrace. Perhaps, this tradition could serve as his best effort to explain that this gesture was intended as a token of appreciation for the kindness you have extended to him—the pleasure and privilege of having you, such a splendid and bright star, in his dark and dreary world—his reward to you for making him feel alive with such an overwhelming sense of happiness that he didn't even know the sensation could exist until you entered into his life. For Malleus, you were the one to awaken him, to pull him from a long slumber and into your embrace, allowing him the privilege of knowing warmth, love, and joy once more. A ghost of a smile appears on his lips, unbidden, as he imagines the roots of the mistletoe spreading through both your lungs, finding nourishment in each other's energy, a complete symbiosis.
Malleus desired so much that your connection would be reciprocal, as intimate and profound as the magic of this holiday would allow. Though your relationship up until this point has remained platonic, he hopes the magic of this custom might give him permission to love and cherish you as so much more. From the moment he first laid his eyes on you, his heart had already made his decision. That fiery intensity of emotion for you has only been compounded with each meeting the two of you have shared—the yearning that only grows stronger with each moment he spends at your side. His feelings for you have reached a saturation point; the deep well of passion and affection that burns ever stronger within the confines of his chest will not be extinguished unless the source of all his turmoil is revealed and answered in due kind. At long last, he wastes no time in preparing the customary kiss. His heart yearns so dearly for it that even the constant tug of his usual shyness and trepidation could never possibly bring him to halt in his advances. Malleus promised himself that the delicate, thriving thing you and he were developing would not fall prey to the same pitiful demise as the mistletoe if left untouched and unwatered. If you did indeed feel similarly about him, he could only imagine the beauty and majesty that would blossom between your intertwined souls, a union of great and unstoppable potency, a lifetime of adoration and devotion.
Therefore, he procured a large branch of mistletoe, so ripe and abundant with sprigs that its small, white berries shimmered and shone. The hanging plant seemed to call out, in a sing-song tinkle of fairy bell laughs, for his beloved to walk underneath, so he could ensnare you in its clutches and give you an obligatory kiss you couldn’t refuse—or so he hoped. Malleus wrapped the strand with some festive red ribbon, decorated with twirling glittery snowflakes, making it shimmer under the twinkling rays of Christmas light. Then, he carefully balanced the mistletoe at the highest point above the doorsill and stepped back, admiring the way the golden glow of the lights would reflect off the glossy white berries, casting them in an ethereal iridescent glow that made them pop, dancing across its branches as though possessed by some Christmas spirit. They sang for you, just waiting for you to take Malleus up on their unspoken promise of his unrequited, hidden desires for your lips.
With that, Malleus knocked on your door. Though, despite his determination and his willpower—so vast and endless that his ambition was virtually limitless—Malleus couldn't help but be flustered, his hands trembling and sweat forming along his brow, heart rate beginning to rise like a swelling wave until he could hear it beating in his pointed ears. The silence that engulfed him was deafening as his mind replayed the myriad ways you might respond to his advances—sharing his sentiments, returning his affections, giving him the opportunity to finally love and kiss you the way he so desperately, hopelessly yearned. Or—perhaps, his advances could have an unwanted negative reaction, creating friction or even destroying your friendship—if not the very love he sought—completely. Undeterred by the looming anxiety that threatens to drown him like a tempest-wrought sea, his heart manages to remain valiant and brave, the steady rhythm keeping him tethered, ensuring him the courage to risk the possibility of breaking apart and dissipating with the winter wind that sieves through his lithe fingers.
As he hears the creaking footsteps along the old staircase inside, the adrenaline kicks in, giving him the fight or flight impulse he has been lacking, his legs stiffening, threatening to buckle from his immense nerves, knees trembling so harshly that he almost loses his balance. He shuts his eyes, trying to brace himself for whatever comes next, not allowing himself to breathe again until the knob finally gives way and the door is thrown open. At last, Malleus gazes upon your dazzling appearance, flooding his vision with an image he's dreamed about for weeks: you stand before him, bathed in the bright, effervescent light, glittering hues of gold and green like a present wrapped up just for him. Before he even allows you a moment to compose yourself and register his presence, Malleus can't help himself, the need to let his words rush out overwhelming him until his syllables practically stumble over each other.
"I wish to partake in the traditional parasite with you," he tells you quickly, trying to sound confident despite the urgent desperation to speak leaking through in his strained vocal chords, struggling to hide the shakiness that attempts to invade and taint the voice he wanted to convey his longing for you with. His words are filled with hope and trepidation, his emerald eyes wide with vulnerability as the mistletoe glistens under the shimmer of lights he personally strung up, bathing the two of you and your surroundings in a magnificent luminance that casts a perfect spellbinding glow upon the scene. Your mouth falls slightly ajar as your eyelids flutter in confusion before registering his intention, noticing the way his expectant eyes dart between your lips and the hanging plant above your door frame, his intense gaze giving you the most telling implication. The sudden realization of his motive renders your whole being paralyzed. Your face heats up from the sheer impossibility of the moment and your brain fizzles into a complete and utter daze, unsure how to comprehend the enormity of the offer he's extending.
An eternity seemed to pass as the seconds ticked on, his dark brows knitting together as the mist and tension seemed to wrap around the both of you. The sting of the cold wind whistled past the space that seemed to shrink between the two of you in unbearable torment. A curtain of lacy snow was falling around, shrouding everything in a dull glow. The night itself seemed to be in a strange sort of serenity and apprehension—watching his eyes lock onto you so intently and feeling his breath, hot and heavy, mingling in the frost between the two of you. The foggy mist of the cool evening air floats through your hair, tiny particles of frozen water suspended around you and shimmering brilliantly as the beams of multicolored lights shine past and illuminate each crystalline droplet in a celestial aura.
Despite it all, your focus was on him alone.
Finally, he was able to collect the breath stolen from his lungs and continue his confession, taking your floundering silence as an invitation for his explanation. "I had wished to spend some time with you under a mistletoe, even though this is something that humans usually do with their partners or loved ones..." he admits sheepishly. You couldn't stop the gasp that escaped your lips when you saw how glassy and emotive his eyes were, the sparkling lights catching the yellow flecks in his viridescent stare.
A shadowy flush washes over his pale complexion as he allows the words he had tried so long to repress to come flowing freely from his lips. "I've noticed how sad you seemed since you were removed from your world, and I wanted to bring you a little of the Christmas cheer you're accustomed to. I wanted to ensure we'd have a pleasant Christmas, especially with how often you've shown me such loving kindness," a sigh escaped his throat, "you've gone to such great lengths, I wanted you to know just how much you mean to me..." His fingers thread together anxiously as he continues his ramblings. "I was so excited to learn the Christmas tales, legends, and histories behind all the traditions... There is so much joy and good-will involved. It seemed a befitting way to honor our time together. As my beloved friend—," his tone holds a subtle note of reluctance to his last statement as he lingers on the term a bit too long. "I wanted to ensure your time in Twisted Wonderland wasn't depressing, and that you experienced Christmas as best you could under your circumstances." The more his sentences seem to elongate, the further he's pulled into himself and begins to overthink every minuscule aspect of his interaction.
The wind picks up slightly, blowing his silky, ebony locks away from his forehead, revealing the shiny scales that cascade up the top half of his head as his horns poke out through the billowing strands. His long, heavy cloak trails behind him, sweeping up the fresh piles of glittery snowfall, shimmering under the auras of the decorative lights he painstakingly strung for you. Malleus was so imposing in the darkness of the night—there's an ineffable beauty to it as his skin seems to emit its own soft glow. Yet, despite his frightening appearance, he appears so docile and timid standing before you with his head bowed, one foot dragging the toe of his boot along the white slush and ice, kicking clumps of snowy wisps, attempting to abate his mounting anxiety.
"...Are you aware, child of man, of the nature and symbolism of the mistletoe?" He pauses and peers into your eyes, emerald pools pleading for mercy as a crack opens within him, revealing his fluttering soul for your scrutiny, allowing you to glimpse his emotional state in a rare display. "Mistletoe requires the partnership and nourishment of another to keep it flourishing—without its partner, it will wither and die a gruesome death, gasping, desperate, starving..." The strain on his tone is audible, words full of unspeakable yearning as he pines so desperately, the loneliness of centuries seeming to distill within a single, all-encompassing desire for your acceptance and love. His Adam's apple bobs with a hard gulp of apprehension as he seeks the approval he longs for deep within your gaze, hoping he has finally found the love of which he has searched for since the first heartbeat he has taken.
"No matter where it falls, or how strong its stem or seed, it will perish without another plant to sustain and nurture it," his explanation was grave and yet somehow poetic, holding you entranced with rapt attention. Each sentence was meant to mimic his struggle—the endless waiting, and the desperate need for companionship that has weighed so heavy on his aching heart for so long. The solemn confession of a hopeless romantic, yearning desperately for the chance to take root, plant his soul and spread until all the ache was gone, replaced by the warmth and fulfillment of life only a partner could give him.
"And yet, if the two plants come into symbiosis with each other, the result is breathtaking—one would not expect something so simple would possess such transcendent beauty and vibrance," his melodic tenor takes on an ethereal quality, as the wondrous facts he learned are once again brought to the surface, replacing the melancholy in the air. "Mistletoe is capable of blossoming to life; producing flowers and bearing fruits when combined with its host, providing an environment for both plants to flourish and thrive," his heart picks up its pace at the subtle meaning and implication behind his words. "Once a healthy mistletoe becomes entangled with its beloved, the pair remain connected and thrive, ultimately strengthened by the bonds forged in interdependency, blooming brightly against the frigid temperatures of winter." Malleus' soul is brimming and bubbling over with the hope and anticipation of a relationship with you and, in an instant, Malleus understands what it truly means to be alive.
"Since you first crossed my path, the mistletoe within my chest grew with such ravenous appetite, longing to reach out to your heart and find harmony, sharing in warmth and nurturing life. You, my lovely starlight, are a plant of the utmost virtue," he gently caresses your cheek as you fall deeper under his enchantment. His words have rendered you completely immobilized, the smooth silk of his voice ensnaring you, unable to escape its sweet whispers and dulcet tone. "For the first time in all of my years, the bud inside me began to bear fruit and opened my eyes to a paradise I never thought possible. Through a simple act of your kindness, you have breathed life into my tired and aching heart and granted me new purpose." Malleus cups your face so delicately, long, tapered fingers stroking the curve of your cheekbones in loving affection. He gazes at you with glowing, adoring eyes, staring deep into the infinite possibilities of your future together. The soft plumes of the falling snowflakes softly embrace you as his feather-light touch communicates all his longing and unspoken passions. You allow yourself to bask in the tender and raw vulnerability of his heart as the glimmering lights and stars in the sky shine with the promise of a brighter tomorrow for you both.
"I had spent many years in unending isolation. Each passing second in your presence was the happiest, most indescribable euphoria. It took a considerable amount of time to discover these feelings and become aware that they are associated with the yearning for intimacy, something which I was denied for a great amount of my lifespan. I've long desired the things I've learned your Christmas legends signify," the words leave him on a wistful sigh, an endless source of elation. "Of family, comfort, love... All that I desire for Christmas is you," he concludes softly. "It was thanks to my research into the mistletoe that I realized how much I needed your lips as though without them I would never draw another breath, so I ask... Do you wish to be mine? Could I have the gift of your lips, of a kiss?" he requests breathlessly as the tip of his tapered thumb ghosts across the flesh of your plush lower lip, sending shivers throughout your whole being.
At last, the confessions of his affections toward you reach their inevitable resolution, allowing the culmination and coalescence of every feeling and emotion within his soul to burst forth like fireworks, shooting off into the midnight air in an explosion of beauty and intensity that would cause any witness to pause and stare in awe of the magic of the night. Like the soft, romantic tones of Christmas music and the enchanted glimmers of holiday lights, Malleus' spell woven in the lyrics of his confession engulfs you in an aurora borealis of ardent devotion. The feeling of his hands against your cheeks radiates warmth and comfort as he cradles your visage close, tender and secure against the soft flurries that flow all around you, surrounding you with an intimate aura of holiday mirth. You find yourself leaning into his touch as your heart and soul yearn to return the depths of his affection, so openly displayed across his handsome, captivating features. With a surge of adrenaline coursing through your veins, your knees threatening to buckle from his searing yet unyielding stare, you gather the strength to utter the most wonderful syllables you have ever experienced the pleasure of pronouncing—the sum of every single one of his blessings wrapped up neatly into one succinct phrase.
"I love you, too."
Your voice was shaky, unsteady, cracking under the emotion, but the message was unmistakable. The intensity of the moment rendered Malleus stunned and speechless, tears of delight stinging his emerald eyes, brimming at the waterline with the intensity of his joy. Every single day was spent thinking of the next instance where the two of you might cross paths and now, you'd just given him the most spectacular present in the world. Malleus doesn't think about anything else, he just leans in, lips parted ever so slightly, barely containing the gasping breath that escapes his throat as his nose nudges yours and his entire world collapses upon itself before igniting with an incandescence of pure elation. With all the delicate adoration of his whole, enchanted being, he offers you a sweet brush of his soft, inviting lips against yours. A whimper emanates from his mouth as a trembling sob of disbelief is unleashed, reverberating between the two of you and sending every last vestige of his restrained sentiment into you, engulfing your heart in a fervid embrace that crushes you with all the weight of his desperation—his centuries' worth of desire and craving for an end to his misery.
Despite having never been kissed, his lips moved confident and gentle, as though it were as natural as his very breath, or the thrum of his heart. The sensations were unparalleled—better than his wildest expectations as your flesh entwined with his, mingling the pliant texture and pillowy warmth. A satisfied sigh rolls past his tongue, which teases the seam of your mouth, offering gentle, fleeting sensations as he licks and teases your bottom lip. A series of jolts rock your frame when his fangs accidentally nip at the skin. The sound that leaks from his throat as he swipes his tongue over the wound and laps up the warm, metallic liquid of your blood is guttural and broken with the raw emotion of being deprived of such ecstasy for so long. It was heavenly—to finally be united and experience the taste of love, passion, and the transcendent rapture of the one and only person to ever make him feel such happiness. 
He swallows every whimper and moan of your kiss, reveling in the sounds that permeate through your entangled forms and dance on the frosted wind. Your fingers come to thread through his silk-like locks, nails grazing his scalp until a shudder rattles his chest and his tongue can't help but invade the hot, wet cavern of your mouth. There's a subtle pressure placed on the base of your skull, adding a deeper angle, so that he may completely envelope and taste the sweetness of your saliva as you revel in each other. When the chill of the winter winds brings forth the full impact of the cold, and the mistletoe spins aimlessly under its icy breath, swaying above, you are undeterred in the bliss of your newfound love. Your noses smudge as you press yourself further, gaining deeper contact and savoring each brush of his deft, explorative tongue and the tickle of his heated breath fanning against the sensitive surface of your palette. The kiss sparks flames within you that make you forget the bitter chill, warming the deepest crevices of your core, staving off the frigidness of the night and replacing it with the cozy, fluffy heat of your love. You clutch desperately, latching onto the black tailcoat and pressing the muscles and softness of your bodies even closer, desperate for each touch, wanting him as close to your form as you can manage. The fullness of your feelings for each other, and the completeness of his confession, finally come together in a bittersweet, perfect dance of two souls. Forever bound, hearts thudding in unison as you two continue to exchange kisses underneath the mistletoe, filling this merry season with newfound glee and a holiday tradition all your own.
When you two finally make it inside, you sit comfortably with his arms wrapped around you atop a pile of plush blankets, surrounded by mounds of pillows under the twinkling lights of the massive tree he had erected and draped in garland. Next to him, there was nowhere better you'd rather be, snuggling deeper into his warmth, burying yourself in his embrace and cuddled tight under his heavy, weighted cloak as the roaring fire before you burned in a warmth that reflected that of the deep, profound affection the two of you shared for each other. As he held you in his lap, surrounded by the soft music playing in the background and the decorations he'd strung, he looks at you with excitement alight on his beautiful visage, eager to share more fun facts about his latest hyperfixation. With the shimmering lights refracting across the deep emerald pools of his gaze, he starts to ramble, "Did you know, mistletoe is also a sacred symbol of fertility—"
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Woah, woah, woah, woah... I just spent all day working on this, its like, 10:30pm and now I'm just now eating mac and cheese for dinner. I really love what I created, I hope you all do too. This was fulfilling a request for my 12 Days of TWSTmas event, so uh, anon, I'm not sure if this is what you expected of me... I think I projected my own newfound mistletoe hyperfixation onto Malleus a bit too hard, but I hope this meets your expectations. I'm desperate to hear all your thoughts on this one, I really want you guys to love this as much as I do! I wish I had more to say here, but my brain is melting. My exhausted brain longs to sign this off like a corporate email. Best, Erica Malleleothreesome
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nyaagolor · 6 months
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I think my biggest ace attorney hot take is that Kristoph’s black psyche locks not being broken was the best possible decision Takumi could have made
Phoenix trusts people, that’s his whole thing, but i think more importantly he trusts in the truth— that if he can just find that truth and put all the cards down on the table that things will be ok. We see in so many instances that his deeply ingrained savior complex and pursuit of truth often comes back to bite him and hurt himself and others. So honestly, him seeing Kristoph having black psyche locks and being able to accept that he doesn’t have to break them is such a vital step in his character to me
Phoenix doesn’t need the entire truth anymore— he doesn’t need to figure out what makes Kristoph tick. Time and time again Phoenix will not stop until all the dirty laundry is hung out to dry, until he knows the why’s and how’s and everything in between— but for once, with Kristoph, he doesn’t. Kristoph hurt people, and to him, that’s enough
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profmagix · 8 months
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"In the wake of your leave"
Jophiel was lying down on the couch in the antique shop, he would have known three days had passed since Azazel left for Heaven had he been counting.
He frankly didn't really know why he kept returning, or why he kept staying at the shop after such big heartbreak happened in this very location; but he's a creature of habit, and the comfort it brings him outweighs the pain so he rests here. If you were to ask him why he was here, he probably would just answer that this place feels warmer, it gets more sun and is more cozy than his Mayfair apartment.
The truth was, even after its return to his possession, he still feels empty there. He had moved most of the plants inside of Azazel's living space, he had even somehow found a cardigan that would match his aesthetics hung on a door he could see (now that he thinks about it, was that a subtle gift that Azazel left for him? he feels suddenly way sadder) and has assimilated this space as his 'rest' space. Even though he doesn't really *do* rest anymore, he could only get himself to get some shut eye around Azazel, which Jophiel finds a little embarrassing but that's the only way he truly felt safe anywhere, really.
The sofa didn't feel Heavenly at all, nor did it feel especially Demonic... It just was a plain human annoyance that got created to annoy him in this specific moment.
The moment being: three days after Azazel left for Heaven.
Jophiel should probably start calling him his angelic name once more, right? But he can't really bring himself to say it, because right when he is about to remember it: it escapes him. Azazel is so ingrained into his psyche, as himself, as an angelic being; that him not being *Azazel* feels foreign...
(That or it's just the Metatron somehow impairing his praying ability to his old (is old the right word here?) friend.)
As Jophiel is to continue wallowing on the humanly annoying couch, he hears a bell chime. He is getting up quickly, his legs splay out a little as he's about to chase the customer off, but all he sees is starkly white envelope laid before the shop's doors.
He looked around outside but all he found were people just walking down the street, not really paying attention to him.
The letter, aside from being a white one could only describe as retina damaging, there was nothing else on it nor specifically adressed to him or the bookshop... Jophiel was hesitant for a second, maybe he should leave it for the other resident of the shop to collect; but he felt this urge to open it, as if it was for him.
Fortunetely (or unfortunately), it was for him. He tried not to let any teardrops drop onto the picture inside the envelope.
Of course he recognised it, he knew what this was. And he hated it.
After Azazel left him to go to Heaven, he shouldn't have the right to contact Jophiel, especially with such an intense moment.
He hated it. He hated that he did it, he hated that he was ok with pointing a gun at him, he hated that with one word he was able to erase most of his stress and follow through with a promise. The trick played spectacularly, but that didn't erase the nerves he had, and then later with the whole kerfuffle with the zombies and the tricks and the dinner.... He hated everything about that night.
(He hated that he had to lie to himself about the feelings he had.)
Jophiel kept relatively calm, he took the picture out and turned it in his hand, nothing abnormal about it aside from the wear and tear from all these years being in Azazel's possession. (He hated that he found it endearing.)
He recalled the words of that night, of trusting one and letting them do their work.
He wishes he could go up to Heaven and just scream at Azazel to finally let Jophiel love him without remorse, to trust that he was going to be protected like always.
He wishes he could go up to Heaven and just scream at Azazel to finally let Jophiel love him without remorse, to trust that he was going to be protected like always. That Jophiel was willing to fall from Grace if it meant that their love didn't need to be hidden. Either way, he'd still be on his own side; but somehow Azazel still saw Jophiel as still part of Heaven, as an angelic angel that never did wrong against anyone.
He wishes Azazel would have trusted him with the decision to love and cherish him, but all that happened was Azazel going back to Heaven and he hated it.
He hated he didn't get to say I love you, or he didn't get to say anything (do anything) that mattered enough for Azazel to stay.
Jophiel hates Heaven, Jophiel wishes he could hate Azazel (he never will, anyway).
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A little writing prompt and drawing I made inspired by @asleepyy 's Oopsie Omens AU and this week's prompt challange in the OO discord too!! Had a lot of fun doing both of these :)
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