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mckiwi · 3 months ago

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The Dance of 1650

Chapter Two: Rumor Has It

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Rating: Teen and Up Audiences

Warning: Graphic Depictions of Violence

Category: Gen

Fandom: Good Omens

Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley, Aziraphale/Crowley

Characters: Aziraphale, Crowley, OFCs, OMCs

“I did the ‘I was wrong’ dance in 1650, in 1793, 1941–” -Aziraphale S2:E1 39:45

If 1793 was the crepe incident and 1941 was the magic show, what happened in 1650? Or rather, what happened the time Crowley was accused of witchcraft?

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This is written for Whumptober 2024. All of the prompts will be used by being divided up between six chapters throughout October. Each chapter will have a list of the prompts used in the tags.

Bell took a shaky breath and pointed at Crowley, “Witch!”

“That’s our cue to leave,” Crowley whispered to the girl and urged her to stand. The girl clumsily got to her feet and Crowley pulled her along.

“Don’t let them get away!” The Witch Hunter exclaimed and threw his stone. It hit Crowley in the back of the head, causing her to stumble, but she otherwise continued with the girl in tow. They shoved their way through the mob. People grabbed at her clothes. Tried to take the girl from her. By some miracle, they managed to escape and make their getaway.

The girl panted behind her, “What’re we going to do?”

Crowley looked frantic and pulled them into a small shelter, bracing against the door, “Hide. Run and hide. That’s what I always do.” The mob was drawing nearer. Crowley could hear the clamor and promises of death. The girl started to cry again. “Shh! You’re fine. We’re fine. You’re not going to die, you have my word.”

The Hunter was getting closer, “you all go look over there. We’ll continue down here.”

Crowley cursed under her breath and squinted through a small hole in the wooden door. “We’re gonna have to run. We’re sitting ducks in here.”

“Where would we go?” The girl whispered fearfully.

“Anywhere but here,” Crowley extended a hand, which the girl readily took, and prepared to flee. “We’re gonna have to wait until they’re not looking. On three. Ready?” The girl nodded. “Okay. One… two… three! Go, go, go!” They burst out of the wooden shed right as the Hunter barged his way into another building. They wove through trees and buildings alike rapidly.

Unfortunately, the girl couldn’t keep up.

There was a sharp cry as the girl’s ankle twisted from underneath her and her knees hit the gravel. Crowley skidded to a halt and cursed for the second time in as many minutes. She pulled on the girl’s arms and urged her to get up, “Come on! We’ve gotta go!”

“I can’t! I think it’s broken!” She prodded at her ankle and winced harshly in pain.

“Great,” Crowley seethed through clenched teeth.

The girl suddenly went wide-eyed and pointed behind Crowley, “Look out!”

Crowley went to whip around but was stopped by a rough hand slapping over her mouth and a strong arm winding itself around her shoulders. She thrashed wildly in the grasp and felt the beginning of scales crawl up her collarbone. “Shh!” Her captor hissed and wrapped his arm tighter around her. She used the shift in stance to kick at the man’s shins. “Ow! Would you stop that! It’s me!”

“Mirraful?” Crowley mumbled into the hand.

“Sorry?” The man prompted.

Crowley rolled her eyes and wiggled within the arms holding her hostage. Seeing that Crowley was no longer actively fighting him, the grip loosened and his hand fell away from her mouth. “Aziraphale?” She breathed.

“Yes! Who else?” He retorted and let his arms fall to his sides.

“Was that really necessary?” Crowley demanded.

Aziraphale held his hands up in mock surrender, “Okay, maybe not my best plan, but you get testy when stressed.”

Crowley gaped at him and exclaimed, “Testy?”

“Shh!” Aziraphale hissed at her again. “Help me carry her to my place.”

“Your place?” Crowley echoed but did as she was told, taking one of the girl’s arms while Aziraphale took the other. Together they pulled her to her feet and shuffled onwards.

“Yes. My place. Do we need to get your hearing checked as well as your head?” Aziraphale looked at her sideways.

Crowley brought her free hand up to the back of her head, and it came away red. “Huh. Didn’t even realize it’d gotten me that bad.”

There was a hint of concern in Aziraphale’s eyes, “I’ll look at it later, for now, let’s just get away from here.” Crowley didn’t need to be asked twice. The trio haphazardly made their way toward Aziraphale’s lodgings.

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“There we go, dear girl, all patched up and in tip-top condition,” Aziraphale gave a reassuring pat to the girl’s bandage-bound ankle. He carefully lifted her injured foot from where it was resting in his lap and placed it on the cushioned stool he had just stood from. “That should heal up nicely in no time at all.” The girl, which the two had learned was named Lily, rolled her ankle experimentally, pleased to find it no longer hurt as badly. “Now tell me, if you don’t mind, that is… how did you come to be accused of witchcraft?”

Lily straightened from her propped-up position on the chair, “My father is Dunbar’s doctor, so he’s been teaching me some things since I was young. Whenever he’s gone on trips, I take care of the people here.”

“Is your father currently away on one of these trips?” Crowley asked from her position at the kitchen table with a wet cloth held to the back of her head. “Is there anyone at home with you?”

Lily nodded her head, “my father’s been gone for a few weeks now, but he’s due to be back home today.”

Aziraphale released a breath, “And your mother?”

“She died giving birth to me. The townspeople think I’m cursed.” Lily explained sourly.

Crowley’s eyes unfocused as she Looked into another plane, “No, you’re not. You’re one of the lightest shades of grey I’ve seen in a long time.”

Lily looked down at her dark dress and raised a questioning brow. Aziraphale cleared his throat, “I’m very sorry to hear it. But as Crowley said, no, you’re not cursed. Those people are just being silly.”

“Why do they think you killed the old minister?” Crowley asked. Lily audibly gulped. “They think you poisoned him– infected him, or something?”

“I didn’t kill him!” Lily exclaimed.

Crowley held up the hand without the cloth placatingly, “I didn’t say you did. I asked why they think you did. Good at questions, me. You’ll see.”

The tension in Lily’s shoulders only grew. “He had been sick for a few days. With my father gone, I was the one attending to him.” She took a deep breath. “I was the last to see him alive.”

Aziraphale inhaled sharply, “Oh, Lord.”

“‘Killed him in his sleep,’ that woman said.” Crowley laughed shortly. “I told you something was wrong, Angel.” Aziraphale cut his eyes over at the demon. “Right, we should probably get her home, then.”

Aziraphale made a noise of disagreement, “don’t you think the people will recognize her?”

Crowley’s face twisted, “euh– well, I mean– wh, sh, a, mmh… yea, probably. They’d definitely recognize me, so we can’t go out in that crowd to take her to her father.”

The angel’s eyes lit up, “what if we take her father to her?”

“Wot, bring him here?” Crowley narrowed her eyes.

“Yes, I could go collect her father, or at the very least make him aware of the situation. You two could stay here and out of sight.” Aziraphale explained eagerly, already moving to grab his coat.

Crowley considered it for a moment, “You know, that might actually work. You’re acting as the minister right now, after all.” Something shifted in Crowley’s eyes, “They wouldn’t suspect you of consorting with the enemy.”

Aziraphale pressed his lips together and the skin around his eyes crinkled, “No one ever does. And let’s keep it that way, yes?” He turned his attention to the girl intently watching the two immortal beings, “Now, dear girl, Crowley is going to stay here with you while I go and find your father. Which house do you live in?”

Lily blinked up at him then startled, “Oh, um. The house with the green door. Three houses down the road with the stable.”

“I know where that is!” Aziraphale said cheerfully, “That’s not too far from here. Excellent, I’ll go get her father, Crowley–”

Crowley raised a hand, “I’ll stay here and watch her. I’m aware.”

Aziraphale nodded to himself, “I’ll be off then. Lily, you’re welcome to whatever food or drink you find. Don’t let Crowley take all my wine.”

“Oi, I’m working,” Crowley argued.

“We both know that’s never stopped you before, Dear.” Aziraphale chided and closed the door behind himself.

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It took half an hour to find Lily’s house. Aziraphale realized belatedly he never actually considered what he would tell the man.

Hello, your daughter has been accused of witchcraft because you left her alone for God knows how long. Please refrain from such actions in the future or you might find yourself with–

A horse huffed at him, breaking him from that particular train of thought. “Oh, hello!” Aziraphale noted its reins were tied to a post in front of the house. He ran a hand over the horse’s snout. “You’re such a sweet thing, aren't you?” A coin-sized piece of brass hung from the halter. One side had an engraved bell while the other read a name. “Scout. I take it that means your owner is home?” The horse huffed at him again. “Well, nothing for it but to check, I suppose.” He knocked on the door.

There was some shuffling inside the house. After a few moments, the door opened enough to reveal a stocky man with auburn hair, “hello?”

“Hello! I’m the new minister here, Azira Fell. I was just popping along the town and meeting all the people here these last few days, and I do believe this is the first I’ve seen of you. I apologize, I don’t think I quite caught your name?”

“It’s Doctor John Davis. Pleasure to meet you, Brother Fell.” Davis stuck out a hand for Aziraphale to shake, which he did.

“Do you live here alone?” Aziraphale asked.

Davis swallowed, “No, it’s me and my daughter, Lily.”

“Oh, Lily is your daughter? It’s a good thing I decided to talk then, I have some important news to share with you. Do you mind if I come in?”

The man paled at that and stepped out, roughly shutting the door. “No, I think we need to speak out here.”

Aziraphale hesitated, “alright. Well, it is of a rather… sensitive nature, I’m afraid.” Davis didn’t move. “Have you heard of the events that took place earlier this afternoon?”

Davis nodded, “I heard of what happened with my daughter, yes. Do you know where she is?”

“She’s perfectly safe, I assure you. She’s actually at my lodgings with my friend. Would you like to come and collect her?” Aziraphale asked.

The girl’s father seemed heavy in thought, “You said your friend was with her? My daughter is safe?”

Aziraphale nodded, “Yes. My friend, Crowley. She protected her from the crowd earlier this afternoon. She’s quite good with kids, you see, but never let her hear you say that. They’re both at my lodgings.”

“I’ll come with you then to see her. Just let me sort some things out quickly,” Davis gestured toward the front door.

“Oh, take your time. It’s only a half-hour walk from here,” Aziraphale answered.

Davis opened the door, “Thank you, Brother Fell. I’ll be out in just a minute.”

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The girl’s father closed the door with a sigh, revealing a man sat next to the window with a pistol in his lap. “I thought I told you to keep the door open,” the man said.

Davis considered his options, “I know where the woman you’re looking for is.”

The man perked up at that, “The Snake woman?”

“I believe so,” Davis agreed, “and I’ll tell you where, but I need to know my daughter will be unharmed.”

The man nodded, “you have my word as a Witch Hunter,” Bell promised with a cold smile.

Davis hesitated, “she’s at Brother Fell’s lodgings. We’re going there now. I can distract him for some time if you and your men can get down there within half an hour?”

Bell stood and grinned, “Certainly. Your daughter will not be harmed by my hand, Doctor Davis.”

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Davis stepped back outside to see Aziraphale petting the horse once again, “are you ready to go, Brother Fell?”

“Oh, yes.” Aziraphale patted the horse one last time and joined Davis on the street. “Are you not taking your horse?”

“That’s not my horse,” Davis said.

Aziraphale gasped softly, “I didn’t realize you were seeing to a patient. This can wait just a tad longer if you need to finish up?”

“Not a patient, either,” Davis answered with a light, humorless chuckle.

They walked in silence for all of two minutes before three horses swiftly passed by them, heading in the direction Aziraphale had come from. Aziraphale startled, “Wasn’t that the horse at–”

“So tell me, Brother Fell, how long have you been a minister?” Davis asked suddenly.

Aziraphale blew a raspberry, “Hard to say… for as long as I can remember, I suppose. Certainly since before you were born. How long have you been a doctor?”

Davis smiled, perhaps the first genuine smile Aziraphale had seen from the man, “since my daughter was born.”

“Oh, that’s nice,” Aziraphale praised. “Did you deliver her?”

“I did,” Davis answered. “She’s my pride and joy. The last piece of my wife I still have with me.”

Aziraphale frowned slightly, “what happened? To your wife? Lily had mentioned she died in childbirth.”

The doctor inhaled deeply, “I couldn’t protect her. I promised myself I would never let that happen again.”

“I’m so sorry about your wife,” Aziraphale said, then added, “Bless you and your daughter.”

Davis felt immensely lighter, like a burden had been lifted from his shoulders, only for guilt to constrict in his chest like a boa. His next breath rattled, “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

The man faltered, “What does God say about harming others? For the sake of protecting your own people?”

Aziraphale considered this, “Well, I’m hardly one to speak for the Almighty, but there is the sixth commandment. ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ But if you’re looking to protect your family… I’d certainly try to avoid an altercation, but it might be unavoidable. Adam killed for Eve, for instance, to protect her.”

A few more horses rode past them. “I think I’ve harmed someone,” Davis confessed.

Aziraphale made a noise of surprise, “Before you continue with that, might I remind you we’re not Catholic. Anything you say may have to be reported to the proper authorities.”

Davis shook his head, “I needed to protect my daughter.”

The angel looked at him, “Of course, that’s your child. It’s human nature to protect your offspring.”

The doctor looked back at him, “Will God forgive me?”

Aziraphale stared at the man, looked away, then looked back with a sigh, “I don’t rightfully know, to be honest with you. I’d like to believe so, but I know someone who was disgraced by God for far less.”

Davis blinked away the moisture gathering around his eyes as they neared Aziraphale’s house, “I’m sorry.”

Aziraphale opened his mouth to question why, until he spotted his house. The front door was broken down and the kitchen window was shattered. “Oh! My Lord!” He raced to the front of the house and felt his stomach clench in fear. Inside, tables and chairs were overturned. A curtain was torn from the wall. A few dishes were haphazardly splayed over the floor. Much to Aziraphale’s distress, a trail of blood led from the kitchen to the door. A soft sniffle came from one of the lower cabinets. He flung open the door to find Lily curled up inside, unharmed.

“Lily?” Davis asked from the doorway. Upon seeing Lily, he dropped to his knees and let out a dry sob, “Lily!” The girl immediately ran and clung to her father. Aziraphale couldn’t take his eyes off the blood trail. It smelt of iron with a hint of sulfur.

“Where’s Crowley?” Aziraphale asked no one in particular, already knowing what the answer would be.

Lily sniffled again and turned to face the angel, “they took her! They think she’s a witch!”

It was fortunate Aziraphale didn’t technically have to breathe. He didn’t think he could with the way his lungs felt like they were collapsing in on themselves. “Took her where?” He felt a sudden spike of pain flare from the very familiar presence. He felt it as she crossed over the consecrated ground of–

“The church!”

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whereareroo · 6 months ago

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MAKE GOD SMILE

WF THOUGHTS (6/16/24).

I recently watched a fascinating documentary about the recording of the song “We Are The World” in 1985. The project presented many huge challenges. I’m amazed that they got the job done. It was a miracle.

You may not be familiar with the backstory. There was a famine in Africa. Harry Belafonte, a highly influential musician and activist, came up with the idea of putting together a “supergroup” of American superstars to record a song to benefit famine relief in Africa. To attract the superstars, Harry knew that he would need an impressive leadership team for the project. He convinced Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie, the reigning megastars, to write the song. He convinced Quincy Jones, the #1 record producer, to produce the song. That was the easy part.

The project was a logistical nightmare. How was anybody going to get 45 of America’s greatest musicians together at the same time for a recording session? They decided to do it in Los Angeles on the night of the American Music Awards. After the awards show, the artists secretly went to a local recording studio. Most of them got there at about 9:00 p.m. It was the first time that they saw the song. (In fact, the song itself was only completed that very day.) They started recording at about 10:30 p.m., and they worked through the night. They finished at 8:00 a.m.

The participants were a who’s who of American musical greatness. The first verse was performed by Lionel Ritchie, Stevie Wonder, Paul Simon, Kenny Rogers, Tina Turner, and Billy Joel. The first chorus was done by Michael Jackson and Diana Ross. The second verse was done by Dionne Warwick and Willie Nelson, followed with a chorus by Bruce Springsteen, Kenny Loggins, Steve Perry, and Daryl Hall. The main vocals were completed by Huey Lewis, Cyndi Lauper, Kim Carnes, Bob Dylan, and Ray Charles. The background vocalists included Harry Belafonte, La Toya Jackson, Randy Jackson, Waylon Jennings, Bette Midler, and Smokey Robinson. All of those superstars were together in the same room for almost 12 hours. Isn’t that a miracle? The song raised more than $80 million for famine relief.

Last week, another miracle happened. A group of 107 comedians, from all over the world, gathered in the same room for a two hour meeting. This wasn’t some ragtag group of comics. It was the biggest names in the business. The American comedians included Conan O’Brien, Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon, Whoopi Goldberg, Chris Rock, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Jim Gaffigan, Kathleen Madigan, and David Sedaris. (If you’re not familiar with the last three, take a look at some of their stuff.) It was a room of heavy hitters.

Who had the power to gather this impressive group? The Pope! He has more power than the combined forces of Harry Belafonte, Michael Jackson, Lionel Richie, and Quincy Jones. When the Pope calls you to a meeting, you go. No questions asked. Getting called by the Pope isn’t a joke.

Why did Pope Francis want to meet with 107 funny people? The Pope wanted to thank them for bringing joy and laughter to the world. He praised them for using their artistry “to spread peace and smiles.” He reminded them that comedy promotes unity because “laughter is contagious.” He noted that laughter “helps to break down social barriers” and “create connections amongst people.” The Pope asked the comedians to spread cheer throughout the world, “especially to those who have the hardest time looking at life with hope.” The Pope blessed the comedians and closed by saying: “Remember this: when you manage to draw knowing smiles from the lips of even one spectator, you also make God smile.”

I’m thrilled that we have a Pope who appreciates comedy. The Catholic Church needs more laughter. The Pope’s blessing of the comedians included a joke: “I ask you to please pray for me- -FOR, with a smile, NOT AGAINST.” I’ll happily pray for any Pope who promotes smiles and laughter.

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entomycetic · 9 months ago

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Written tidbits for some weird dwarf OCs under the cut so as to not spam the feed; maybe someday they'll get actual drawings and ref sheets :,)

Engineer (Beetle)

- Makes every solution to every problem Far too complex. Much to R&D's displeasure, he doesn't carry turret packages on the job. Rather, he's created his own RC drones with their own set of close combat melee weapons. The drone is able to project a hologram of a dwarf around itself so as to warn teammates where the drone is in the dark; Engie uses a headset to control the drone, at the cost of losing mobility. Yes I want a melee class how could you tell. No I don't care how impractical it is - Doesn't know what to think of Hoxxes anymore, due to current events brought up below - Is gay for Scout. His absolutely bonkers takes amused him

Scout (Dragonfly)

- A conspiracy theorist to the max, avoided by anyone beyond his crew; slightly comparable to a constantly shaking yet vicious chihuahua. He swears to core and back that DRG is only setting themselves up for a major disaster on Hoxxes, that the disruption of local life and food chains is going to come back to bite them in the ass, quite literally. This guy harbors all my little headcanons and love for Hoxxes' biosphere -...And in this timeline, he turns out to be correct! He and Engie found out in a very unfun way, and barely made it back alive. - Is gay for Engie. Someone finally believed him

Gunner (Spider)

- Will vehemently claim he's the Normal One of the group, and in the same breath will furiously defend his Oops! All Ziplines loadout (BFG, zipline, zipline, zipline, pickaxe). Always some level of grumpy until he has alcohol in hand, acts as if he's team leader (and everyone lets him), teases Scout as a hobby, yet still manages to be the most optimistic of the bunch in even the most dire of situations. He insists that the main reason he stays on this team is because they won't let him take such an R&D unapproved loadout with any "reasonable" team. While true, the amount of shit the team had gone through together forged a bond not even he can deny. - While they had been through plenty else, Gunner had been with Engie and Scout when the Conspiracy Fuckening occurred, but was in a separate part of the cave. While he could hear and feel what the other two were experiencing from so far away, he finds it difficult to believe what he was told went down

Driller (Cricket)

- Until recently, this position was frequently rotated. The vibes of the team were incredibly hard to match, much to Mission Control's torment. - In short, not long after The Incident: Scout would come across a crater in a cave harboring a starving grunt eating at very wounded yet still alive grabber. His bug-sympathizing ass deletes the grunt and successfully convinces the team to help the grabber. By some miracle they sneak it back on board, patch it up, and once they're off duty, Engie cyborgs the hell out of it. ..Only after enough time passes of them getting it to Not immediately attack them with the promise of food. It was first given general limb prosthetics, then experimented on with brain chips, all the way to building the now artificially enlightened beast a dwarf shaped mech suit. It remembered how it was found, now gladly and violently working alongside its team. Mission Control has been gaslit to high hell into believing all the weird shit this thing does is normal dwarf behavior. - As its ability to communicate and understand advances, Scout hopes they can get some insight into the ecology of Hoxxes that goes unnoticed by dwarfkind. For now though, drill go bzzzz and gun go pewpew

#procrastinates and does this instead of chores #drg #deep rock galactic #literally making shit up as we go but aint that just the way #if u ask me questions abt them/headcanons i will send u 3 cakes of ur choosing and 100000 money #im still not totally sold on gunner....need to solidify his personality more in my brainhole #also. yes driller is my dwarfsona. dont look at me

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myristicisms · 10 months ago

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Tender touches were something he'd grown bereft of for years, unknown and unfamiliar yet not unwelcome. There's a comfort in those pale fingers resting atop his face, trailing the curves of his sharpened features; He wasn't the same youth as he had been when he'd left everything behind, while the world continued to spin onwards, Zack sat suspended in time yet not unaging. His spine ached with the difference in height, arms sore from sustaining muscle mass that certainly wasn't there when he'd first gone under and gums still sore from the way his teeth morphed within them.

Zack was not the same youth as he'd been when he'd said his last ‘ see ya later! ’ and yet that didn't seem to bother the brunette sat with him, still lovingly tracing his newer features as though nothing had changed. There's a hesitance in the touch though, the gloved fingertips never lingering too close to his throat, his chest, and for whatever reason that bothers the raven haired man. His condition is stable enough, he thinks it is anyways given how swiftly his energy was returning and how the dull ache of flesh mending itself back together was far less common than it had been when the Turks had first found him. There was no longer the ever present fear of suffocating on his own blood or worry about any organs failing and yet…

“ Do you want to see them? ” He mumbles softly, aqua eyes following the curious curl of Squall's lips before tugging away from the man, not bothering with waiting for an answer. He wants to feel comfortable in his own skin again, wants to feel like he's the strong man everyone once revered before he was taken away, deemed as dead and made into a doll, a puppet. Tawny fingers clutch near desperately at the black knit of his shirt, an overwhelming sense of shame flooding his mind as the fabric is pulled from his body and the damage he's hidden away so delicately becomes exposed to the chill of the room’s air. It's a constellation of marred flesh, silvery holes where each bullet lodged themselves speckling over once pristine tanned flesh.

He's grateful for them though, the ones that managed to drag attention away from the neat lines that once split him in half, memories of fear and sorrow permanently carved into his stomach to never fully fade away, a story that perhaps some day he'll tell; It'll be a joke by then, a distant memory he might be able to find amusement in, in some awful fucked up way as he recounts everything done to him in the name of science. For now though, those lighter, older markings are to remain a mystery closely guarded, ignored if possible at that. Lips curl upwards meekly, finally focusing his gaze back onto the other man with him in wonder, in fear.

Would Squall think him ugly now that he's seen him? Think he's a monster or beast for managing to take that much lead and still not kick the bucket? ( I would have, if they were any later. ) He thinks, bemused to an extent at the way everyone seemed to just welcome Zack back as though nothing had happened and he'd never left to begin with but he always noticed the way they looked at him, with pity and curiosity. He knows he looks and acts different, anyone else would after being sentenced to death, the fact he wasn't turned into Hojo was a miracle that he thanked Genesis's goddess for but it doesn't stop the stares from getting to him. “ So..? ”

The hesitance in his voice is clear as day, nerves clearly doing some sickening tango within the depths of his stomach and making him feel ill. “ Ugly, right? I was thinking of getting them covered up once the scars are a little older, flowers maybe? You don't gotta give an answer now but… ” What the hell is he doing, Zack wonders for a moment as words tumble past his lips stupidly. “ Would you design a tattoo for me? Flowers are your thing, and I like how you draw them, y'know? ”

A lil sumn sumn for Turk Squall | @grieverled

#muse;; zack fair #grieverled | squall leonhart #verse;; tufts of phoenix down

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valorxdrive · 1 year ago

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((WillfulWayfarer)) ❝ we can’t change what fate has in store for us, but we don’t have to face it alone. ❞

A lesson like this has been firmly etched within his experiences. For fate was a measure of the totality of life, present potentials, old plans, cosmic forces that somehow ignore those laws of time entirely. Truthfully speaking? Sora was very far from realizing the true depth of how far all of that goes.

He wasn't too concerned at this point anyways. For if there's one constant that has been successfully read, a lot of these whims of fate want to certainly focus on the present.

Right now the honor of a shared meal was held between the Boundless Sky and Indomitable Earth. Their trials have tempered them magnificently, even if it leads to no shortage of injury upon body and heart, patches that can be melded with the strength of new experiences. Sora's spoon found itself repeatedly scooping up portions of rice as he drew in a portion of chicken, leaving another satisfied combination of flavor that only warms the moment.

"As it stands, in some ways destiny needs to stay beyond our control. I'm fine with that. ..Even if I know I'm in an unfair position of stating as such." It was a pearl of maturity grown from his encounter with Xehanort. After all, the decision who bares them, where they're raised, it leads to a goblet of circumstance only they can drink from. And sadly, some don't even get to have a chance due to circumstances of the past.

However, what Terra draws is a very important point.

"Facing this road together is where the miracles truly happen, the kind that we make. I hope you know that you'll always have me as a corner of support."

Just as the warmth of this very heart had secretly saved his own. In a way, their courage managed to be shared and ignited into a greater boon. The sort that even makes the hellish hand of Xehanort itself understand terror, in how much preparation found itself faltering before incomprehensible potential of the present.

@willfulwayfarer

#willfulwayfarer #| Bottle Mail #| Meme #always some true bonding time with these two

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myriadof-fandoms · 3 years ago

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harringrove week day 1 - wouldn't it be nice

did i think i would actually have something done for harringrove week? no. it’s a miracle tbh. what i did not manage is staying with the prompts for every day and this just so happens to be one of the days where i couldn't. the prompt i used was technically for tomorrow and it’s Hawkins Country Club During the Annual Benefit

ao3 link

Steve didn't ever really expect to be this happy.

Since he was small he’d had his whole life planned out; married by 25, steady job, 2.5 kids. The thought had always made him feel like he was suffocating.

Standing in between people from his past in the middle of the Hawkins country club’s annual benefit brings back those memories.

From where he's leaning against the bar he can see Nancy and Jonathan. Seated close together and talking like they’re the only people in the room. They're not the nuclear family either. Living in Chicago and working for a newspaper together while Jonathan tries to make photography his main job. Last time he asked if they wanted to have kids, Nancy laughed in his face. Not the nuclear family sure, but closer. Picturing himself in Jonathan's place, imagining his life with Nancy instead of Billy, makes him feel slightly nauseous though.

It's almost like there’s a different life staring right back at him, contrasting ridiculously stark with what his life actually is right now.

Steve works in a bar. Billy fixes cars in the evenings and studies during the days. When they feel like it they just leave on Friday evenings. They drive down to LA or through the night to get up to Seattle to see one of the grunge shows Billy loves. Sometimes one of the national parks. Sometimes just to a beach that isn't the closest to them. It's a freedom he hadn't ever dared to dream about.

It's kind of fun to fantasize though. Look at the road not taken where it’s drawing itself in front of his eyes, taking shape through the life of the people he knew when he was a teenager.

Steve sees a picket fence instead of their tiny balcony. He can see many of these sort of formal events with a wife who likes to dress up, someone who doesn’t complain the entire time they’re changing into formal attire.

Steve wouldn't want it for anything.

He loves the opposite that he’s living; 26 now and never going to be officially married unless some people in the government calm down very quickly about a couple of things. there's a ring though. At the bottom of his nightstand, the only place Billy is not likely to stumble over it. Steve figures why not. He's got no intention of ever falling in love with anybody else. Their friends all know about them. Steve's parents do too. There's nothing stopping them from having a ceremony or even just putting on the rings. They could call the other spouse. Just because the law won’t let them, doesn’t mean they can’t go for it. What do they care about the law?

If he was still living here, maybe down the road from where he’d grown up, he’d have probably reached all his dreams already. Stable life, stable job, maybe working towards a promotion.

Instead, he has Billy. and the two of them, they have plans. They want a dog at some point. Billy's finishing up a masters degree in literature. He's thinking of turning it into a double major still. Education. It would structure them more. He'd go through more training. But the weekends would still be theirs to leave. Stability mixed with a freedom neither of them is willing to give up ever again. Billy likes the solidity of living in one place though. Or rather one state. Sometimes they talk about moving down to San Diego. Closer to Max. It'd give the opportunity to leave their hypothetical dog with her when the itch to drive into the middle of the night becomes too great. But Billy's not quite ready to go back to a city he’s lived in with Neil. Steve figures they’ve got a lifetime to figure it all out.

What Steve's pushing more than almost anything else though are Billy's studies. It's the only thing Steve's really working for too. The idea of Billy as a teacher is too good for Steve to not encourage. When Billy first mentioned it, mumbling it into his morning cup of tea as if it’s no big deal, Steve had been absolutely dumbfounded. Looking back it made sense though. He taught Max how to drive, and at least kind of well too. Steve remembers the summer evenings when he was moping about his future on the Wheelers backporch and all Holly ever talked about was her swimming instructor. Billy had had all the kids from Hawkins wrapped around his finger. They fucking adored him. Tell tale sign of Billy being one of the softest fuckers alive hidden away behind the bad boy image he was keeping up at the time.

Steve can see Billy now, standing next to Eddie, who looks about as wrong footed as Billy says he always feels at these events. Crissy fits in though, sitting next to the two of them at the table she and Eddie share with her parents. And since Chrissy had wanted to go, there was Eddie as well. Really there’s not a lot that Eddie wouldn’t do for her. If anybody would’ve told Steve 10 years ago that Eddie the freak Munson would be the only one of them headed towards the lifestyle of a suburban family he’d have laughed in their face. There's no denying that Eddie looks happy though. Neither he nor Chrissy ever really stop smiling around the other. It’s almost sickening. Billy likes to make fun of them. Billy smiles a lot around them too though.

Maybe the best thing about the life Steve's getting to live are Billy's smiles. There are many of them and Steve's on a mission to know them all. The smile for Max, the smile for Heather, the dirty laugh when he’s thinking of a joke and the stupid smirk for Eddie and Tommy. The giggles when Steve kisses his stomach and that grin when he's shamelessly and unapologetically happy. It first appeared when they were on the road heading towards California without much of a plan at all. it’s a frequent one now, when he’s out surfing, or just when they’re crammed on their tiny couch together.

Their apartment is tiny in general, a two bedroom in the Castro district. They’re roommates, keeping up appearances so long as nobody looks into the second bedroom to see the bookshelves and working space instead of another actual bed. Billy had admitted to it once early on when they were still just fucking in a way that just as well could've been called fighting. Stoned out of his mind he'd wandered around the Harrington home and stopped by Steve's dad's study.

“I want one of those. Proper library. I want to own more books than I can ever read.”

Later on when Billy started letting Steve in, he'd admitted to much more. Like Neil's disapproval of Billy's love for reading and his reluctance to allow books that weren't for school in the house. Billy wasn't supposed to waste his time with fiction.

When they'd moved in Steve had spent one very draining day installing shelves while Billy was out. Put up the Lord of the Rings books that Dustin and Eddie had told him Billy would like. Now he’s stuck with Billy who’ll spent hours in the room, complaining about his coursework and bitching because he's still a little shit but when Steve tries to make him stop reading in the middle of the night he'll just flip him off with a grin that's so carefree it makes Steve want to die.

When they visit Hawkins, there’s always the contrast to the house Steve's parents still live in. Big, filled with signs of money, and as empty of actual affection as Steve remembers it. His parents still haven’t quite figured out how to show they care in ways that aren’t material. But they try and they did ask both Billy and Steve to come with them tonight. Every shared breakfast or dinner they make halting conversation with Billy and him, asking about their life without sounding scandalized about the conditions of it. Surprisingly, even right when he had just told them, they weren’t as opposed to Steve moving in with a man as he would've expected. They don’t get it, but they don’t mind either, and his mother, though still trying to hide it, absolutely adores Billy and his easy charm.

Billy hasn't spoken to his father since he moved out. He's seeing a therapist once a week. It's the only thing Steve uses his parents' money for. He figures if one of their parents caused the problem, the others can make up for it.

They only really come back to Hawkins about once a year, for Christmas or when a lot of things happen to line up. There’s not a lot that calls either of them back here. But Hopper and Joyce are here. This time Dustin is home deciding on which of the many post grads he should be doing. Max is visiting her mother. It had all called for them to come really.

To Steve it's been worth it to come here just to see Billy in a suit.

Like he’s been pulled from Steve’s thoughts, he’s there.

“I want to go home,” that deep voice in his ear that he’d recognise between a thousand others. Billy’s moved right into Steve’s personal space, a hand placed on his lower back shielded from view by the bar behind them and leaning against his side.

“Mh, we can leave soon.”

“No. I mean, sure, this is boring as fuck,” Billy smiles wickedly, still as excited as a 10 year old would be when presented with the opportunity to use a swear word, “and I definitely want to head out, but I want to go home.”

Steve draws his eyebrows together, “It’s like 10pm. We planned to leave the day after tomorrow.”

“Stevie, if we leave now we can make it out of Indiana tonight. Find a motel somewhere in Illinois. We’ll be home by the time we planned to leave.”

Steve just looks at him questioningly some more. Billy punches his arm.

“C’mon, live a little, my guy.”

Steve is. Steve has never expected to be living this much.

But yeah, Steve misses home too.

They don’t waste time saying goodbye, they’ll just call from the road.

Billy blasts his damned metal once they start driving, and lets down the windows, probably waking up half the population of Hawkins when he speeds through the empty streets. Steve laughs, loudly and exasperated. He’s happier than he ever thought he’d get to be.

#yeah idk #i just want them happy #harringroveweek #stranger things #steve harrington #billy hargrove #mentions of the friends and fam i guess #harringrove #harringrove fic #stranger things fic #mimi makes things #mimi's writing

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bloodsworn-marshal · 2 years ago

Text

FFXIVWrite2022: Prompt 13

Writing Prompt: CONFLUENCE Words: 952

What… day was it? What of the time? It mattered not. Nothing mattered after the world decidedly burned itself asunder.

Hazy were the number of minutes upon hours that have passed since hell cast its rain. Their utopia of peace and tranquility turned upside down in mere moments as destruction wrought at every corner. Magnificent buildings collapsed onto each other, turned into piles of rubble which became the grave for so many.

‘Don’t… Don’t leave me…!’

Harsh was the reminder of his first words uttered upon waking to a broken world. He who had been amidst the chaos. No direction. No protection. Only the mind to escape before their lives lost. Their lives… yes… he had been with another. Two fools thinking they could make a break for it like the rest of their lot. Panic swept as they were as though they could outrun the apocalypse that had paid visit.

Naivety led to a painful reality. Innocence lost as a falling building would claim their lives—though luck ever had a way of whisking Fos out of the deepest clutches of punishment.

Not so for his partner… Buried as they were beneath rock and rubble, they managed to fall into the shape of a tent over their battered persons. Fate itself protecting them from the worst of the outside. Though not without taking due payment… for she had not been so lucky when it came to collision with the ground and not tucking in just enough.

Despite his attempt to protect her. Despite the fear in his heart as he tried to race them to safety. When next he woke from briefest black out, dark eyes fell upon a broken slab of rubble that had fallen onto his partner. Right beside him. Just out of reach. But enough to whisk his beloved off into the stars where so many had departed.

‘No… No… you can’t… don’t leave me alone like this, Skia…!’

All he could think about was the splatter of red. Both on her and covering him all the same. Someone eventually drug him out from beneath that place when they heard his feeble cries from below—that he had somehow lived.

And now? His world had darkened. Lost in one’s thoughts as though it might block out that which surrounded him. What remained were naught but ashes and a rapidly dwindling population. All traumatized to some extent. Searching for a miracle out of this tragedy—some way of realigning the course of their star.

‘I can’t continue like this… not without you…’

There was but one recourse, so the Amaurotines decided. Offer up half of what remained in body and soul. To bring back life to their world once more and start anew. To save that which had been so dramatically taken from them. They would call upon their God to do their bidding in exchange. Their souls would merge together with the elder primal once all would be said and done.

Dark sullen eyes watched on as the others reluctantly started to come forward. One after the other. Their life for another life. Hailed as heroes of their kind. Any who stepped up were regarded as such with praise and promises of a better tomorrow.

Fos stood at the principle of a decision in the making. His mind made up as he too took a step forward. Not for the nobility of the cause nor the showering praise in his sacrifice. Nay… he felt he deserved this. He should not have survived and was only righting that wrong.

“I would offer up my soul for the sake of our people.”

Lies.

There would be not a single hint of passion nor pride in his voice—only that of a broken man riddled with grief and want for an end. Though his tone would draw eyes, none would step up for him nor stop him. Not when their own hides were on the line should their summoning fail them.

It mattered not what happened next. What little aether he could provide to bring forth the summoning. He never caught a glimpse of the fruits of his demise. All that he remembered would be the raise of his hand, the siphoning of his aether… and a loss of consciousness as he fell to the ground for the last time.

When next he had any semblance of consciousness… it was as though he had awoken betwixt a rift in the stars. A curtain of galaxy stretching out as far as the eye could see. For briefest moment, he had this opportunity of a final thought before losing it all.

And there she would greet him upon that awakening. Tears in her eyes—she had waited here for him. To walk the next chapter of their lives by means of reincarnation.

Fos simply shook his head… and wrapped her up within his arms in deepest embrace.

“I cannot follow where you would go. Not yet.”

But in due time… In due time…

“My soul belongs to you, Skia. Wheresoever you go I shall be watching. As worlds rejoin and recover, I would slip away and rejoin you… for who else is my guiding light but you?”

His soul could no longer linger for much longer. His existence fading as darkness swept him in like a wave. A sea of souls doomed to lose themselves to Zodiark.

“I will reach you…” One’s final promise as they were torn apart in the aetherial sea.

Though eons upon eons would pass when next they would meet… their lives so different from their pasts before the sundering… they would inevitably find each other. One way or another. And they would embark upon their journey once more.

#ffxivwrite2022 #ffxivwrite #ffxiv #writing #amaurot au #Fos #Skia #sorry not sorry for the angst and feels

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whump-a-la-mode · 3 years ago

Note

I request fluffy fluffity fluff with feverish, injured villain, hero caretaker, painkillers and a kitten. Please.

This is so cute ヾ(•ω•`)o I don’t write a lot of fluff, but this is some cute cute sick fic. Hero caretaker? Check. Painkillers? Check. A kitten? You know it! Thanks so much for the ask!!

CW//Fevers, injury mention, intoxicated/feverish character, painkillers

The text had been unexpected, to say the least.

That wasn’t to say that Hero wasn’t unused to receiving messages, especially strange messages. Half of the time, a buzz on their phone indicated that they were about to have the record for ‘weirdest thing they’ve ever seen’ broken.

Yet, this text said nothing of giant lizards attacking downtown, or a mad scientist’s experiment gone wrong. So, perhaps, to a normal civilian, it would have been quite a normal message to receive.

“Hey, Hero? I have a really big favor to ask.”

From another hero, it would have been quite the daunting request. But, it was not from another hero. At least, not in the traditional sense.

Hero had known Doctor for quite some time-- hell, every powered person in the city knew Doctor. In some ways, they were more of a hero than the rest of them, put together. While most hospitals flinched and scurried away from the world of villains and vigilantes, Doctor embraced them wholeheartedly.

A particularly egregious wound, carved in the heat of battle? A power malfunction? Any one of these things could result in the doctor being awoken in the middle of the night, an exhausted, limping hero upon their doorstep.

Or, a villain. Doctor insisted upon making their policy for such things very, very clear. Adamantly, they refused to involve themself in the matters of heroes and villains. Their battles, their allegiances, to the doctor were all naught. As they explained it, no matter one’s actions, no matter their beliefs, no one deserved to have their wounds go untreated.

Thus, their home had quickly become a neutral ground. Lifelong sworn nemeses could have their injuries wrapped mere feet from one another, and not one glare would be shot. In Doctor’s presence, there were no heroes or villains. Only patients. Only those who needed aid.

But, it was the first time that Hero had been on the receiving end of such a request. Of course, they were not about to refuse the doctor. With how much help they had given them, it would only be right to return the favor.

“What is it?” Hero tapped in reply.

Given the length of the doctor’s response, the three dancing progress buttons hung on Hero’s screen for far too long.

“Do you know Villain?”

It wasn’t a name they’d ever expect to hear in a conversation so casual. Villain. Though Hero did not consider themself to truly have a nemesis, if they had to define one, it was Villain who would be on the very tippy top of their list.

That was, especially after their battle the day prior. Their wounds still screamed at them, no matter how they tried to quiet them with painkillers and icepacks.

“I know Villain.” Hero replied simply.

“Okay. Do you think you could take care of them for a few hours?”

Instantly, the conversation shot up to the top of their list of ‘strangest possible talks to have over the phone.’

Take care of them? Take care of Villain? What cold they have possibly gotten themself into that required Hero, of all people, to aid them?

Then again, they had looked quite rough after their battle...

They had no need to question, as Doctor continued on their own:

“They’re sick. I need to go to work, but they shouldn’t be left alone, right now. I know it’s a big favor, but they need this, Hero.”

They bit their lip.

As a protector of the city, they had a very, very long list of priorities, and upon that list, helping Villain in any way, shape, or form was at the very bottom. Helping Doctor, on the other hand...

“Okay.”

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It was only upon arriving to front door of Doctor’s home that Hero had a rather odd realization: Never before had they been to that place in a completely stable state of mind.

If they had made the decision to bother the doctor, it meant that, whatever injuries or illness had befallen them, they could not manage it on their own. Thus, far more often than not, when they stood in front of this home’s door, they did so with a head full of cotton and legs formed of gelatin.

Now, however, their mind was not clouded by any malease. Instead, it was clouded by the stark realization that they had, perhaps, just made a terrible decision.

By the time they had arrived at the house, however, it was already far too late. When Doctor opened their front door, Hero knew full well that there was no turning back.

The doctor looked terribly bedraggled, and they could not help but wonder if it was wise for them to even go to work in such a condition. Yet, every powered person in the city knew far better than to distrust Doctor’s judgement.

“Thank you.” The medic began, a warm smile creeping onto their cracked lips. “I know this was awfully short notice, but I couldn’t think of anyone else who would know Villain as well as you.”

Well, Hero certainly knew what Villain’s fist felt like, crashing into their face, though that was about it.

“Okay, come on, come on.” The doctor rushed. “I need to be heading out soon.”

The hero nodded, hurrying after them into the building. It wasn’t exactly a sprawling thing-- certainly not large enough to house all the equipment that it did-- but, nonetheless, it functioned, through some miracle.

Against their prediction, Doctor did not lead them to the home’s makeshift infirmary. Instead, they moved to the cramped dining room, which, truly, consisted of little more than a table with just enough chairs to seat a guest or two. The house itself was not impressive, its owner only made it so.

But, Hero had seen that dining room, barren table and all, more times than they could count. There was nothing unusual to be seen about it. No. The strangeness of the hour came in the form of who, exactly, was seated there.

Villain.

Oddly enough, either they had forgotten to take off their ostentatious garb, or they had simply not had the time. The villain’s cape draped over their shoulders as they hunched over, forehead pressed to the table’s surface. A full glass of water and a small pile of crackers sat near them, untouched.

Hero bit their lip. Seeing their nemesis was never a good thing, of course, but something about this simply made their heart stutter.

“What’s wrong with them?” They began, before their voice took on a more panicked pitch. “They’re okay, right? They’re gonna make it?”

Doctor snorted.

“Hero, they’re fine. They say they had a fight, overexerted themself a bit.”

A fight? Oh, god, was this all their fault?

“But... They look terrible.”

“They just have a fever.” Doctor reassured. “Power exertion is nothing to scoff at, but I promise, they’re not in any serious danger.”

Hero hummed. “Then, why did you bring me here?”

“Because we need to make sure they stay out of serious danger. They can hear you, by the way, so don’t be an ass, please. But, yes, I’m confident this fever will break, so long as it stays down.”

“You’re putting them in my hands?”

“Yes. I trust you. Seriously, Hero, you look like a deer in the headlights. I’m not asking you to perform open heart surgery, here.” They smiled playfully. “All you need to do is keep them cool and keep them comfortable.”

“What does that entail?” Nervously, they chewed the inside of their cheek.

“Not a lot. Keep a wet washcloth on their head, make sure they drink water.” As the doctor glanced to the nearest clock, they began to hurry their words. “There’s a thermometer on the counter. If their fever goes over 103, call an ambulance. But, as long as its below that, you’re safe.”

“And... keeping them comfortable?”

“Just... try to get them to sleep. It won’t be easy for them, in this state. But if you can manage it, it’ll be a lot better. Oh, and, there’s Advil in the drawer. Give them some if they’re uncomfortable, okay? Okay, I really need to go, so, you got all that?”

“Uh- I think so?”

“Good. Okay, bye! Remember, above 103, call an ambulance. What temperature is dangerous?”

“103.”

“Great. Thank you so, so much! I’ll get you like, some chocolates or something. Bye!”

By the end of their speech, Doctor’s words had sped to the point of blending into one long stream of syllables. They tossed a coat over their shoulders, shoving their feet into their already-tied shoes.

“Oh, and try not to kill each other, okay?”

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Hero was alone.

They supposed that wasn’t entirely true. In fact, it was quite far from the truth. The house was anything but empty-- their nervous glances to the dinner table’s current guest ensured them of that. But, that did not help the chord of nerves that wrapped itself about their stomach.

Power exertion was nothing to be scoffed at.

Though they weren’t alone, they were the only one in the situation who could be described as responsible. It was they who had to keep their nemesis alive. And, worse... comfortable.

How were they supposed to rock their sworn enemy to sleep? Maybe, a good place to start would be stopping staring at them like some kind of creep.

Yeah. They should probably do that.

The hero inhaled through their nose, letting out a long exhale from their mouth, before approaching the table. Throughout the whole conversation, the villain had not so much as raised their head-- their movements coming only in the slightest of twitches.

Standing at the stalled villain’s side, Hero could not help but feel to have walked into the den of a lion. Yet, not the slightest movement was made. In an attempt to gently draw their attention, they ghosted their hand over their nemesis’s shoulder.

“Hey, Villain?”

There was a twitch, and a groan, but nothing that could be described as words.

“Um, Doctor is gonna have me take care of you now, okay? Can you look at me? I think I’m supposed to take your temperature.”

If the villain had been listening before that point, there was little indication. Had they already been asleep? Had Hero already ruined everything? Either way, blearily, Villain lifted their head, unfocused eyes fixing on the wall before their face.

Placing their hand to their forehead, Hero nearly jerked their palm away. Their skin felt like the burner of a hot stove. But, if Doctor said they were okay...

“How are you feeling?” As they spoke, they felt the slightest bit of the doctor’s voice slip into theirs. That soft, coaxing tone that all medical providers seemed to be able to imitate. “You haven’t touched your water.”

“Mmm...” The fevered villain murmured. “Can’t...Swallow.”

“Does it hurt?”

“Mmm.” They were unsure if that was an affirmation or not.

“Okay. Um, well, the doctor says you need water. Let’s get you some water, then... What do you need, Villain?”

The villain blinked, seeming, by all accounts to be on another planet.

“I’m cold...” At last, they muttered a pair of coherent words. “And hot...” Well, maybe not so much on the coherent part.

What was it that Doctor had said? Something about keeping their head cool. That was it, right?

“Okay, um. I’ll cool you down, and warm you up, okay?”

“Hero!” It was an excited cry, even with the way the syllables all blurred into one another. “Hero...”

“Yeah, Villain?”

“Hero, I looooove you.”

Oh.

No, they were just feverish. Delusional, they probably didn’t even know where they were. They had no clue what they were saying, just making sounds.

“I’m gonna go get you a blanket.” Hero spoke hurriedly, rushing off to do just that. For a few moment, they dashed about the house, gathering supplies and, hopefully, not rummaging too much through Doctor’s things. When, at last, they returned to the kitchen, it was with a dripping-wet washcloth and a bottle of tylonel.

Villain, so it seemed, had fallen back into their half-restful state, head on the table. With a gentle hand, Hero tipped their chin up, brushing the washcloth over their forehead.

“You want something to help with the pain, bud?”

“Head hurty.”

“I’ll take that as a yes.”

They placed down the washcloth, and, in an exercise in tedium, coaxed a pair of white pills down the villain’s throat, alongside a wash of water. Hopefully, it would be enough, as a snowball would make it too the depths of hell before any more water went down.

“I have everything set up on the couch. Can you walk?”

“Mmm... Carry me... I love you!”

“Y- Yeah, alright.”

Despite the feverish villain’s words filling Hero’s chest with an odd sensation, they obliged, plucking them from the chair and draping the washcloth over their forehead, taking care to ensure that no water would drip its way to their eyes.

The couch, as opposed to most of the furniture in the house, had seen some serious use. With only one bed in the building, when a hero was wounded with such severity that an overnight visit was necessitated, it was upon the couch that they slept. Though, luckily, use had not worn away any of the seat’s comfort.

A large, white, puffy comforter had been draped over the seats, and, upon laying Villain down, Hero secured the blanket around their body, tucking it in in the corners and ensuring that no draft would disturb them.

It was all medically necessary, of course.

Though, they couldn’t help but giggle at just how ridiculous their nemesis appeared, dwarfed by the fluffy comforter, face half covered by a rag.

“Alright.” Hero smoothed a hand over Villain’s hair-- to make sure they weren’t sweating excessively, of course. “Are you alright? Comfortable?”

“I love you! Love you...”

“Okay. Well, do you need anything?”

“Sleep...”

“You’re tired?”

“Sleepytime.”

“Alright, bud. Sleepytime.”

They couldn’t help but smile.

With a few more strokes through their hair, the fevered person soon let their muscles go limp, sacrificing themself to the whims of the blanket they were half-submerged in. The sight alone was enough to make Hero’s own eyelids droop.

It wasn’t like they could disturb the villain while they slept-- no, they needed their rest far too much for that-- and, there wasn’t anything else threatening the city...

What would a nap hurt?

Though there was no certainly no room on the seat for another full-grown human, that was a problem easily solved. In a blink of white light, Hero’s bleary form was replaced by that of a feline, with a countenance just as exhausted.

The felidae-turned hero leapt onto the couch, settling themself near the edge, before shifting themself against Villain’s feet.

To know if they woke up.

After all, it was very medically necessary.

#villain whumpee #villain whump #sickfic #fluff #fluff fic #hero caretaker #whumpblr #whump community #ask

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theboredwritertm · 4 years ago

Note

"Oh, darling, everybody sees how you look at him" fic request with Din/reader! (Please and thank you :3)

Everyone Knows

A/N: Another request done and dusted. I’ve been getting some new prompt lists ready for when I open requests back up again (not sure what tumblr etiquette is for compiling a masterlist using other people’s prompt-lists, but I’m considering doing something like that), but I still have about 4 or 5 fics to finish off before then!

Rating: PG?

Pairing: Din Djarin x ForceSensitive!Reader

Warnings: Mentions of death, a bit of alcohol, that’s about it.

Word Count: 4500 (Me, failing to keep a story under 2k words? It’s more likely than you think)

Summary: After taking on the krayt dragon together, you’re forced to confront your feelings for Din (with a little help from everyone’s favorite marshal).

***

The monster was unlike anything you’d ever seen before.

There’d been times aboard the Crest, when there were still thousands of miles to go between stops, that you’d sit by Din, giving him your rapt attention as he’d recount one of his many stories about a particularly terrifying beast he’d encountered. Not that he would ever call them terrifying – the man had a will of steel when it came to facing these kinds of things. And on this occasion, in the middle of the Tatooine desert, things would prove no different.

Only this time he had you.

You were still coming into your abilities, not really sure what they meant or the true extent of what you were capable of, and amazingly enough you found you were learning a lot from watching the Child. For instance, before he came along, you had never known you could heal people. A simple experiment with Din had proven this to be true enough – the man was prone to injury in his line of work – and though it had taken a lot of concentration, enough that you were sweating by the end, it got you wondering just what other miracles your hands could perform.

Now, standing beside Din and the man who had introduced himself to you both as Cobb Vanth, you stared down into the dragon’s lair and found yourself hoping those powers might come in handy.

“So, how’re we drawin’ this thing out?” Cobb asks.

You glance back at the dozens of townsfolk and Tuskens around you, sensing their uneasiness as they shuffle from foot to foot and cast occasional apprehensive glances in the direction of the danger and you’re surprised to see a couple of the Raiders step forward. Considering how well their peoples’ last attempt to draw out the beast had gone, you hadn’t expected any of them to be so willing to approach the pit again.

Cobb glances over at them and cocks his head in immediate acceptance. Given his past troubles with their people, he can’t say he’s overly concerned over the prospect of losing a few more of them.

But you’ve never been one to stand by and watch people get hurt.

“No, wait.” The words leave your mouth automatically. Up until this point, you’d been feeling completely useless. Din had been keeping an even closer watch on you than usual since a stunt you had pulled back on Nevarro; one that had involved your unpredictable powers and the dozens of stormtroopers who’d had him cornered. Though he had come out of the situation a lot worse for wear than you had, he’d been hovering over you, keeping you a safe distance from any action ever since. You were starting to get sick of being kept on the sidelines. “I can do it,” you say.

The Tuskens turn to look back at you, not able to understand what you’ve said, but sensing a potential change of plans, then their attention is drawn to the Mandalorian beside you as he quickly dashes their hopes.

“No,” comes Din’s clear, expected response.

You turn to him. “I can handle this.”

“No. You’re staying where you are.”

You gaze at him for just a moment, anger starting to bubble in the pit of your stomach, before turning around and striding down the tall dune, towards the gaping mouth of the empty saarlac pit. You know better than to argue – you don’t have the time right now, but every time you did, he managed to use it as a way to distract you. You wouldn’t give him that opportunity now. You’d already made up your mind.

You feel the air stir as his hand shoots out to grab you, but you’re too quick; one of the things that’s managed to keep you alive this long, but now maybe the very thing that’s going to get you killed.

“Dank Farrik!”

Cobb glances between the man beside him and your retreating form, attempting to hold back a smirk. In the short couple of days that he’s known you both, he’s already witnessed at least three separate arguments, none of which seemed to get either of you anywhere. He didn’t see this one going the big guy’s way, either.

The modulator seems to amplify the frustration in Din’s voice, but you ignore it. You were more than capable of looking out for yourself, as you had proven to him numerous times now, and whatever problem he had with that was his own – you weren’t about to let his fears hold you back. Yet, as you draw closer to the yawning darkness, your heart begins to thud in your chest. For the first time, you feel the enormity of this creature, and you’ve never felt so small in your life.

You sense him approach before you hear him. That was one advantage you’d always had over Din; he could never sneak up on you.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m tired of watching everyone else do everything,” you say, finally coming to a stop, your gaze still trained forward, “I want to play my part. I need to play my part.”

“No, you need to stay safe.” His words sound threatening despite their context, but you ignore him once more. This time he does grab you, catching you around the forearm as you raise your hands in the direction of the cave. “Stop!”You’re tempted to use your powers to throw him off, but you can feel how much he means it and you’re struck with a sudden guilt. He cares. That’s all there is to it.

“Please, let me do this.” You stare up into his helmet and feel him gazing back, considering things. His fingers loosen from your wrist.

“Fine. But I’m staying with you.”

“I wouldn’t expect anything less,” you reply, not bothering to hide your bitterness at the constant babysitting – though, if you’re being honest, you do feel better with him by your side.

You raise your hands again and close your eyes, focusing on the low hum of energy around you. You don’t feel it at first, but then its as if you’ve suddenly locked onto a connection – plugged yourself into an electric charge – and everything suddenly feels heightened. Everything feels more. You draw on from that, concentrating on the pit of darkness before you, then you push forward with your mind, reaching out. In the darkness, something stirs.

“What is it?” Din asks, as if he’s sensed the sudden change.

“I feel it,” you reply, eyes still closed, your brow now marked with a frown.

He stares down at you and you finally open your eyes to meet his gaze (as much as you can through the helmet) but before either of you can say anything, a low rumbling begins to emit from the ground.

It had worked.

And it was heading right for you.

You’ll admit that, as much you’d wanted to play your part in this, you hadn’t really considered what came next once you did manage to draw the thing out. So now, as you watch the sand shift and begin to rise a hundred or so feet in front of you, you find yourself rooted to the spot.

It’s Din who moves first.

Your hands had come up again, all you can think to do to hold the beast off, then suddenly a strong arm is wrapping around your waist and you’re being propelled into the air. You glance down just in time to see the enormous mouth erupt from the ground where you had just been standing.

This time, you don’t argue. You clutch onto him, air whipping through your hair, thankful that he’s just as stubborn as you are.

When you finally land, he sets you on your feet and quickly glances down to make sure you’re alright. You give him a quick nod, sensing the question in his gaze, and then he takes off again to rejoin the action. It takes you a moment to regain your balance, and you still feel the ghost of his arm around your waist, but when you glance back you find that he’s set you down by the landspeeder, with the Child. He’s put you back at the kids’ table.

You give a frustrated growl and the baby blinks curiously at you, eyes full of wonder. He’s just happy to be here, close to someone he likes. You offer a reassuring stroke over his little head, then turn to stalk back down the dunes; back towards the rest of the group whose lives apparently don’t mean as much to Din, since he’s more them happy for them to join in despite them having little-to-no fighting experience. You’re not about to sit back and watch them all die.

As the dragon bursts out of the sand once more, the Tuskens and townsfolk begin firing harpoons into its side – a desperate attempt to keep it in place – and you watch as it wrenches itself free with a simple shake of its body. There’s no way this plan is going to work.

When you arrive back by Din’s side, he simply looks at you, not even bothering to admonish you, knowing it’s not going to get him anywhere at this point anyway. But as you look at him, a silent warning to not push you aside again, he sees you’ve got that same look in your eyes now as you had back on Nevarro. And it worries him.

You move off together as a unit as the dragon begins its assault, firing with everything you’ve got to get its attention – in your case, your trusty blaster pistol – stopping only when it opens its jaws wide and proceeds to spit boiling acid down onto anyone within its reach. You watch in horror as people are disintegrated before your eyes.

A massive explosion beneath it distracts it long enough for any survivors to get clear of its path, and the creature suddenly dives.

You wait, watching for any sign that it’s coming back up, but the smoking landscape is silent and still. Yet, something doesn’t feel right.

“I don’t think it’s dead,” Cobb says, voicing your concern, and you exchange worried glances.

“Me neither,” Din replies. His grip tightens on his blaster, waiting.

Then suddenly, up on the mountain, the creature bursts forth once more. It opens its mouth wide and you glance down at the people in its path about to be annihilated. You can’t watch this happen again. Moving as fast as your feet can carry you, you rush down towards them, shoving them aside with a powerful force-push seconds before the acid hits the sand, clearing them of its path just in time – leaving you in a tricky predicament. You’ve caught its attention now – and you have nowhere to go.

You catch the sound of jetpacks as Cobb and Din land either side of you, weapons raised and ready to come to your defense.

“Get back!” Din barks at you, and you find you have no choice but to listen to him. Failing to do so now, even just to prove a point, and you’re certain you’d be the dragon’s next meal. You’d pick your hill to die on one day, but this just wasn’t it.

Din and Cobb take off into the air again, firing their weapons to draw the dragon’s attention away and give you time to escape. It works. The dragon, furious from the sudden new assault, turns and comes after them, spraying up sand as it whips its massive body in the new direction.

As you watch them draw it further away, you can’t help but wonder what the plan is, since the original one has long fallen apart. They can’t keep drawing it away forever. Now that you have minute to breath, you look around for a way to help, and spot the explosives-laden bantha that had been led down as bait. It looks like it would rather be anywhere else and, hell, you don’t blame it, but glancing between it and the massive monster that currently has its sights set on the one man who never failed to put himself in the path of danger for you, you think maybe it was time to return the favor and finish this once and for all.

So, you grab the bellowing, hairy animal by its halter and do something stupid.

You start yelling. And waving your arms. And when that fails to grab the dragon’s attention, you start firing your weapon. Taking your odd behavior as some kind of cue, the townsfolk closest to you begin firing, too, and finally the dragon turns to face this latest assault, drawn to the movement of your waving arms and the scent wafting from the bantha.

You spot the two armored men, now free of the dragon’s attention, flying up from the mountain before one in particular makes a sudden beeline in your direction. You can practically feel Din’s wrath radiating off of him before he even gets close, and it’s like the bantha can, too, as it begins to protest and pull against its rope. Or maybe it’s the giant monster coming to swallow it whole that has it so skittish. Either way, you feel like an ass as you try to calm it down, knowing the only reason you’re doing so is to keep it in place long enough to be eaten.

You’re grateful to have the marshal land behind you first as Din drops down in front, poised to lose his absolute mind at you for your reckless behavior, but finding the situation momentarily put on-hold as Cobb asks to no one in particular, “Now what?”

Din’s staring at you, gaze heavy, burning, and humiliating all in one, but he doesn’t have time to berate you as the dragon breaks from a nearby dune. “I have an idea,” he says, and before either you or Cobb can ask what that is, he shoves you into the marshal’s arms and sets off the man’s jetpack, sending you both careening up and away from the dragon’s path – and leaving him right in the middle of it.

You had come to suspect that you were in pretty deep with Din Djarin, ever since he had first rescued you many years ago, but watching him disappear into the enormous jaws of the krayt dragon was a lesson you had never asked for in how you really felt about him. Even as everyone around you falls into a stunned silence, your ears begin to buzz and you have to fight to keep your footing, absently leaning against Cobb for support as the energy drains from your legs. Cobb reaches for you but misses as you collapse down onto the sand by his feet. Your throat starts to tighten. Everything feels hazy.

This can’t be it. This can’t be the way it happens.

Then the beast erupts from the sand once more and you spot a familiar shape fly out of its roaring mouth.

Your heart leaps into your throat. Suddenly, you can breathe again. Then you’re back on your feet and racing towards him.

The huge blast that follows knocks you back and you hold an arm across your eyes to protect them from the cloud of sand billowing from the site of the explosion, but even that’s not enough to stop you as you keep your sights trained on the metal armor glistening in the hot sun.

When you finally reach Din, you stand for a moment looking at him, then a sound escapes you halfway between a sob and shout, and you shove him – hard. He stumbles backwards but remains on his feet.

“What the hell were you thinking?” You don’t think you’ve ever been this angry in your life. Fury radiates from every cell in your body, and still Din just stares at you. Then you hug him. Neither of you are expecting it, and his body stiffens immediately in surprise, but when you feel him relax and one of his arms comes up to wrap around you in return, everything suddenly feels right again. You couldn’t care less that he’s covered in gross dragon goo and that it’s probably getting all over your clothes, or that there’s a crowd of onlookers witnessing this moment between you – all you care about is the fact that he’s here, that he’s still alive.

A cheer erupts behind you as you part, and it’s not for you and Din, but for the smoking remains of the dragon nearby, and it’s soon joined by the howls of the Tuskens as they raise their weapons in victory.

It’s over. It’s done. And as you look up at Din, you can think of many things worth celebrating.

***

And celebrate, you do.

As much as he had wanted to make a quiet exit once he had collected his promised armor from Cobb, you had managed to convince Din to stay in Mos Pelgo just a little longer for the revelries. It had been a long time since you’d stayed anywhere close to civilization, let alone had a good reason to celebrate; and though you’d grown used to the comfortable silence of the Razor Crest, there’s some comfort in being surrounded by happy, chattering people for once, instead of the lonely vacuum of space.

Cobb had asked you back personally for a couple of drinks at the bar, and though the invitation had been extended to both of you, Din had failed to take it that way. In hindsight, you suppose your initial run-in with Cobb is to blame for this sudden standoffish behavior, since your contribution to convincing the man to hand over the beskar had involved you telling him that the helmet was ‘a waste on a face like his’. You guess that comment hadn’t sat too well with Din, but it had just sort of slipped out. What could you say? The guy was a looker. Yet even now, as Cobb glances over at your table from the bar, offering a warm, friendly smile in your direction, you find yourself distracted.

You look around and finally spot Din. He’d been radiating quiet irritation since arriving back, and stands now in the furthest corner of the room, watching the festivities with what you imagined was a sulky expression beneath the helmet. The Child sits by his feet, on the sandy floor, playing with something round and shiny, completely absorbed in his own little world.

“I take it Mandalorian’s aren’t much for parties,” Cobb comments as he finally reaches your side with drinks, breaking you from you trance. He sits down beside you and slides one of the glasses of bright-blue liquid your way.

“What do you mean?” you ask.

He nods over towards Din whose gaze is currently burning into you, and you shift uncomfortably trying to find somewhere else to direct your attention, unsure why you don’t just look at Cobb. You realize why when your eyes shift back to him and the feeling of being watched intensifies.

“Him?” you reply, trying to sound casual, now hyperaware that Din is currently reading every detail of this interaction, “Oh, he usually just prefers the quiet, you know? Not really the social type. He’s only here because I asked.”

“Just watching over his girl, huh?” Cobb teases, taking a swig of his spotchka.

“His gir—What are talking about?”

He frowns before giving you a knowing look, then risks a quick, pointed glance towards Din, who he’s noticed hasn’t turned his gaze away from you for longer than a few seconds the entire evening.

“We’re just friends,” you tell him, even if that label doesn’t feel quite right to you. “It’s not like that.” You take a mouthful of drink just to give yourself something to do, and wince at the unexpected bitterness. When you glance back over at Din, your cheeks heat up a little when you realize he’s still looking back. You finally drop your gaze away, reassuring yourself that the weird feeling you’ve suddenly gotten in your stomach is just the alcohol taking affect, but when you look back at Cobb you catch him smirking at you.

“We’re friends,” you repeat, wondering who you’re trying to convince now, since Cobb seems pretty damn decided on the matter. “Colleagues, you know. We’ve just been through a lot together.” You frown as he chuckles. “What?”

“I did not just spend two days listening to the two of you bicker like an old married couple, to hear you say that you two are ‘just friends’.”

“I don’t know what to tell you. I guess I just don’t look at him that way.”

“Oh, darlin’, everybody sees how you look at him.”

You think back to the desert, to your arms wrapping around him like he might disappear again at any moment; to the arm that had pulled you closer and squeezed you in return.

You take another gulp of spotchka to calm the fluttering feeling in your belly, and shoot a quick glance over to see if he’s still looking at you.

But he’s gone.

Panic floods over you.

You look around the room, hoping you don’t look as desperate as you suddenly feel, when Cobb nudges you. You look back at him and he nods to the door, where you just manage to catch a flash of cape and armor and Din disappears through it into the night.

Cobb smiles. “Go on. Go talk to the guy. I’ll still be here if you want another drink. If not, I hope we meet again someday.” He tips his glass towards you and you nod, managing a brief smile of appreciation as you stand.

Your legs feel heavy as you walk towards the exit. It’s dark outside – almost pitch black aside from a scattering of light coming through a few windows, and the few fires burning outside to keep people warm on the cold desert night – and you breathe a sigh of relief as you spot Din still standing out on the road. It looks like the kid is giving him some trouble, his fussy cries reaching your ears easily in the quiet. He settles as soon as he sees you, though, and Din turns to see what has the ability to calm him so quickly.

Of course, it’s you, he thinks. He should have known – you have the same effect on him.

“Hey,” you greet, still fighting back these unexplained nerves as you approach him. You’d known him for years, spent a lot of time in his company, and been through a lot together, but it’s the first time you feel nervous around him.

“Hey,” he replies simply, “I was just heading to take him back to the ship.” He pauses like he’s weighing up what he wants to say next, then adds, “When should I expect you back?”

“Back?”

“I can meet you there in the morning if that’s more suitable.”

He’s acting weird, and though you know exactly why, you can’t help but frown at the bitterness in his tone. He’s trying to keep it cool and calm around the kid. You wonder what he’d be saying instead if it was just the two of you.

“Why would you do that? Why would—” You hate what he’s implying, but you need him to say it, to admit why it’s a problem for him – to know if Cobb’s right. “Where am I supposed to be in all of this?”

You stare at him, the question written on your furrowed brow, wondering if he has the guts to admit the accusation outright.

He looks back towards the bar and then back at you, cocking his helmet as if he’s expecting you to be the one to make the confession, even if there is a low rage bubbling away inside of him at the thought of it. He thinks back to the desert, to the feeling of your arms wrapped around him, to the way his own arm had come up instinctually to hold you closer, and he thinks of how much he wants that again.

“I’m coming back to the ship,” you tell him.

“Don’t do that on my account,” he replies, and you swear he says things like that just to piss you off.

Before you can formulate a response, he turns away and starts walking towards his borrowed landspeeder. The Child looks back at you over his shoulder and stretches his little arms towards you with a cry, but Din ignores it.

You almost shout his name, forgetting for a moment where you are, and instead splutter out an awkward ‘Mando!’, which you haven’t called him in over a year; not since he entrusted you with his true name. He stops and slowly turns back. By now the kid is wriggling and fussing so much in his arms that he has to put him down, and the little one immediately heads towards you, reaching up to be held. You scoop him up and Din watches as the kid coos happily and buries his face in your hair. He’d thought they were leaving without you, Din realizes, and he can’t help but wonder if the kid’s picked up on his own emotions too – at his own distress at the thought of leaving you behind.

He watches you for a moment as you soothe the Child, observing the tender way you fuss over him, and feels guilt start to creep over him.

“I am doing it on your account,” you tell him firmly, after a moment, finally looking back at him again, and his helmet tilts slightly as he stares back at you. You screw up your face like you hate the idea of having to say the next words out loud, but you do anyway for his sake. “I’m not interested in the marshal.”

He makes a non-committal noise like he either doesn’t believe you or he’s pretending it’s not a big deal, and you roll your eyes, turning your attention back to the kid.

You wonder what you can say, how you’re going to make him understand what you’re feeling, because you can’t go back to the ship like this – things can’t just keep on going how they have been, with the arguments and all these unspoken words that are causing them. So, you step forward, closing the gap between the two of you as you rest a hand against his chest plate to get his attention.

Din stares down at you, heart thumping as he tries to read your expression and figure out what you’re going to say before you say it, hoping he’ll be less caught off guard this way.

You reach up to the back of his helmet, guiding him down towards you, muttering, “Come here, you idiot.” Then you press your forehead to the cold beskar of his helmet and find a way to tell him.

“Where you go, I go.”

He seems to understand that well enough.

#din djarin x reader #the mandalorian #mando x reader #fic requests #cobb vanth #din djarin #din djarin imagines

391 notes · View notes

gureishi · 4 years ago

Note

10 and Saeyoung if that's okay, thank you! 💕

Thank you for this request, darling anon! And I am so so sorry, but I have written a reset theory fic. I never do this! Really! But this prompt was screaming at me, and I just had to. If you don’t mind a bit of pain, I hope you enjoy this. It’s the good kind of pain, I promise. ♡

i can feel you even now

Saeyoung X Reader, T (cw: reset theory, angst), words: 2223

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・

There is an indent in the pillow where you used to sleep, and he isn’t smoothing it out.

It has been eleven hours, forty-two minutes, and seventeen seconds since you were here—which means, Saeyoung thinks (drumming his fingers impatiently on his desk, averting his eyes from his work phone, which is buzzing insistently), that he may get to talk to you again very soon.

He doesn’t know for sure that you’ll be back tonight. But lately, you haven’t been waiting long.

He spins around aimlessly in his chair. Checks the clock. Eleven hours, forty-two minutes, and fifty seconds.

The first time you left him, you were gone for weeks, and he nearly gave up altogether. He ignored his agency; he spurned his friends. He stopped checked the messenger; he didn’t pick up his work phone. It was a miracle that he survived those few weeks—a miracle he opened the messenger when he did (feeling a tingling in his fingers that told him, inexplicably, that you had returned).

And when you didn’t remember him, he felt sick to his stomach. His head pounded; his vision went fuzzy, like he, too, was fading out of existence. But he held on, somehow, for you: went through the motions the way he always had, because he didn’t know what else to do. Because you’d want him to. Because he knew, somehow, that you would find your way back to him.

And you did. And it was different—and it was the same. You loved him every bit as fiercely as before, though the way you told him was different, and though your eyes were softer. Almost as if you knew that you had been here before.

And the more he looked at you, the hazier his memories became—till he wasn’t even sure what was past or present; till he could no longer remember how you had been before you had left him for the first time.

It all come rushing back when you disappeared again. You left—you returned. You left again. You came back.

He never got used to it. But he knows, now, what to expect.

He knows what time of day you usually slip back into his world—unnoticed, unseen, a tiny blip in the fabric that holds the universes together. He knows how you will behave when you want him—knows what you will say when you don’t. You don’t always choose him—and when you don’t, his heart arches like it has been submerged in a noxious liquid: burning, melting.

But most of the time, you choose him.

Most of the time, you make your wandering way back to him—different and the same, nostalgic and new—and his photographic memory can’t manage it, somehow, and all the moments of your past and present and tenuous future blur together into a mess of touches and delight, terror and devotion.

He tucks his legs up into his chair: a physical manifestation of the anxiety knotting in his chest. He looks at his phone.

Eleven hours, forty-six minutes, and twelve seconds.

You were with him longer, this time, than ever before.

He doesn’t check if the pictures of you are still saved on his phone. He knows they are gone—they always are.

But he doesn’t need them: your face is fixed in his mind like it has been carved by a hot knife into smoldering metal. He closes his eyes, his head pounding, and can see the shadows your eyelashes cast on your cheeks. He can see your jaw when it is lit by sparkling sun, as you sit in the passenger seat of his car; he can see the way your shoulders shake when he makes you laugh. He almost believes that if he stretches out his weary hand, he will touch your arm: find it soft and warm; feel your hands curling around his, the way they always do. He can hear the way you breathe when you’re sleeping; he can hear you calling his name.

Who is he, he thinks, without you?

With you, he is Saeyoung, and Saeyoung is someone who is soft and scarred and shifting. And loved; Saeyoung is loved. But without you, he is only Seven, and Seven is no one at all.

Ah: he feels sick again.

His work phone buzzes itself off the desk, and he doesn’t bother to pick it up. He digs his palms into his closed eyes and sees shades of purple and red; his office is dark, because it’s late and he hasn’t turned on any lights.

When you are here, the house is always full of light. He laughed—just yesterday (a lifetime ago), telling you that you were going to run up his electricity bill. You had lights on in the kitchen, the living room, the bedroom, the bathroom—as though determined to flood his sad, underground home with brightness. You giggled and kissed the tip of his nose.

“You can afford it,” you told him.

You padded around his home barefoot. You left your socks everywhere—and you were so clean otherwise, but in this one way, you were messy (just like him).

“I like that it looks like I live here,” you told him once—not recently, but two returns ago. “It makes me happy to know I belong.”

His other phone lights up: the messenger. But it is not midnight yet, so he turns the phone over. It can’t be you. If you are coming at all, you won’t be here yet.

The gaps have gotten shorter lately. Sometimes you are gone for only a day or two; last time, it was just twelve hours.

But he doesn’t tell you.

He wants to—oh, how he wants to whisper yes, I know when you tell him you love him for what you think is the first time. But he can’t, because when you look at him like that he is incapacitated; but he can’t, because he fears that if you know the truth, you won’t ever come back.

Saeyoung doesn’t know if time itself is repeating, or if he alone is stuck—fated to loop forever and ever around the moment in his life that means the most. He doesn’t know where you go when you leave his side—doesn’t know if there is another life you’re returning to.

Take me with you, he thinks. I’ll live there too.

He flips his phone back over again to check the time.

Eleven hours, fifty-two minutes, and thirty-three seconds.

You left at exactly noon. He knew it was coming—had feared, for days, that it would happen at any moment. The world was letting him have this for too long, he thought—so many nights in a row with you in his arms.

He often wonders if the circling of time is divine punishment for the person he used to be. But with you, he is becoming someone else—a person you can be proud of.

But he understands that he doesn’t get forever with you.

He knew, earlier today, that the time was drawing near, and so he tried not to leave your side. He has never seen the way you leave: never understood if you walk out a door and faded away, or simply disappear right where you are standing. No matter how hard he looks, how closely he watches—it always happens when his back is turned.

This time, you left him for a moment only. You slept in that day; it was late morning, and he was in the kitchen watching you make coffee. He was smiling at the way your hair kept falling into your eyes.

“Be right back,” you said cheerily. You went to the pantry for the jar of unground coffee.

“I’ll come with you,” he started to say—but the words died on his lips as you turned the corner.

Oh, he thought. This is it.

You didn’t come back.

He waited—perched on the counter, frozen in place—until his legs cramped up and his head started to ache. At last, he checked the coffee maker: empty, though you’d filled the canister with water just before you left. He didn’t retrace your steps—didn’t go to the pantry to see the spot where you’d vanished.

He’d tried that before. It had been excruciating.

He gets up from his desk, now—walks aimlessly down the hall, returns to the bedroom. He turns on the light—winces as it burns his eyes.

And there is the indent in the pillow: just the shape of your head. The objects you leave behind disappear, but the marks you leave linger. And he made the bed that morning, before you left—but he didn’t smooth out your pillow. He never does.

Just in case.

He sits carefully on the edge of the bed—feeling, for some reason, that he shouldn’t wrinkle the sheets (though he doesn’t know quite why he bothers). Even if you return tonight—even if you return at all—it will be weeks before you are back in this house.

He tries to swallow, and finds it difficult.

He’s not sure he’ll be able to sleep in this bed while you’re gone.

Often, after you’ve left, he sleeps at his desk—as he sometimes used to before you appeared in his life. Sometimes he sleeps in the living room, with all the lights on so he doesn’t have to see how dark it is in here, without the glowing stars he has on the ceiling of his bedroom. And sometimes he does come back to his bed: is thankful, at least, that no one can see him as he presses his face into the pillow that used to be yours and fights with his stinging eyes.

He paces the room. He feels something—not the emptiness he is used to, but something new. Like fire.

Ah—he knows this feeling. He is angry.

He hates the universe, he thinks, for cursing him the way it has—hates the other place you go, for taking you away from him. Hates you, for appearing in his life against all odds and putting the pieces of him together, then leaving him half-complete and longing to hold you.

No.

No—he doesn’t hate you. He hates the way his chest feels, like it’s caving in; hates the fear that claws at his stomach as he waits for you. But there is not one single thing about you that he doesn’t love.

You are good—too good, to care for someone like him. You are kind; you are forgiving. You are resilient.

You keep coming back.

Saeyoung flips the lights off, not allowing himself a last glance at the pillow. He makes his way back down the hall.

He steps on something.

And before he has stooped to pick it up, he knows—knows, in the part of his heart that always waits for your return; knows, in the tips of his fingers that remember how it feels to touch your cheek. His heart is in his throat.

He bends down. It is a sock.

Oh, and it’s a small sock, smaller than his—and it is short and brightly colored, and it has been left here all on its own, its partner discarded carelessly in another room.

Breathlessly, he says your name. The air seems to shimmer in the wake of his voice.

Because always, when you leave, the signs of you go too: the coffee maker is empty, the shoes are gone from the entryway, your clothes are no longer in his closet. The socks disappear from the halls.

Saeyoung is used to the way things are. But this—this is something new.

He stumbles mindlessly back to his office, the sock in his shaky hand. Breaking, he thinks wildly—shifting. Whatever strange twist of fate is taking you from him again and again is falling apart—or the walls between his world and yours are crumbling—or he misses you enough that you just can’t quite leave him behind.

It’s changing, he thinks—with a certainty he didn’t know he had.

He sinks into his chair. Eleven hours, fifty-nine minutes, and seven seconds. His head is spinning. Something has shifted in the very fabric of the universe. Something is falling apart. Something is being born anew.

For the first time in eleven hours, fifty-nine minutes, and fifty-five seconds, he feels a tiny flickering in his chest: a little fluttery thing. Less familiar.

It’s hope.

He opens the messenger. There are five people logged in. He closes his eyes. He tries to breathe.

Three, two, one…

He opens his eyes.

Six: there are six people now.

His fingers shake as he pulls up the users on his computer: and there you are. Not here, beside him, but in this world—one step closer to falling right back into his arms.

His dark office feels brighter, all of a sudden. He whispers your name again: intones it, like a prayer, into the still air.

This time will be different, he thinks—not with his mind, but with his whole aching, beating, longing heart.

This time, I’m not letting you go.

★・・・・・・★・・・・・・★・・・・・・★

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@currentlyprocrastinating @thesirenwashere @ultrasupernini @cro0kedme @otomefoxystar @dawn-skies06 @nad-zeta @hunterelys @pamakali @strwbryflvr @bootiful-face @mammonprotectionsquad @firelordtsuki @rebeckathefloof @stehkotori @what-imfabulous-acceptit @saphyhowl @ryuu-no-aneki @pinkdiamondsrose @wayward-bumblebee @otomaticallyobsessed @latte-delf @quirky-and-kind @starry-ash-606 @alicemc86 @taceticbitch @luxielle @agentmc606

#mystic messenger #saeyoung choi #707 #saeyoung x reader #707 x reader #gureishi writes requests #anon #after it all

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delaber · 4 years ago

Text

Three-Point Perspective (Part 2)

Rafael Casal x Reader x Daveed Diggs

Note: Guys! When I wrote Three-Point Perspective, I wasn’t planning on adding a second part to it but the amount of support was so overwhelming that I just had to do a sequel ...And let me tell you; I am so glad you guys wanted it because this was so much fun! I have never been more challenged with a story-line, portraying emotions, changing perspectives, and just the plot in general. I have never never never changed a story-line as much as I did for this one, haha! Crazy amounts of shout-outs and thanks to my amazing mate @einfachniemand for listening to countless of ideas, for feedback on several snippets, for being supportive af, and for telling me “yeah, no, that doesn’t work. Back to the drawing board.” Thank you boo! You are amazing! A huge thanks to @theatrenerd86 for starting off this sequel by providing the settings - and for just being the most supportive human being ever! Mwah! Also a huge thanks to the rest of you for your endless support! I love this community! (Oh, and anon; thanks for the (quite old, sorry) prompt but I didn’t do it for Rafa (sorry once again)). Let me know what you guys think!

Words: 13.8K

Warnings: Oh my goodness, I don’t even wanna get started... Blood, heartbreak, angst (my three tropes)

Rafael

Rafa almost tripped over his own two feet as he stumbled over to the bar and desperately ordered a large whiskey shooter. He was having a hard time keeping calm; his heart was beating fast in his chest, his throat closing in on itself, his hairline soaked in panic-sweat. He needed to put what had just happened in the very seat he was standing in front of at a distance. His hands were still itching to punch something! He needed the fucking drink!

The bartender had barely stopped pouring Maker's Mark into a small glass before Rafa quickly grabbed it and chugged its contents down his throat, desperately trying to block out what he had just witnessed.

Your tongue in his best friend's ear.

Diggs' hand sliding up your thigh.

The sensual smile you'd worn as Diggs had whispered promising words in your ear.

"Oh god," Rafa groaned as he recalled your excited smile as his best friend had escorted you out of the bar, his hand dipping uncomfortably low on your hips.

Desperately clutching the now empty whiskey glass, Rafa tried relentlessly to push away the image of what you and Diggs probably were in the midst of doing right now. Oh shit, oh no... His chest was stinging, his stomach aching horribly at the thought of you and Diggs fucking. Oh god. He tried to shift his focus to the burning sensation down his esophagus instead and quickly ordered another shooter.

It didn't take long before the bartender had placed another glass of golden-brown liquid in front of him that he quickly downed in one go, thinking about how stupid he was for not having acted on his feelings for you earlier. He had had eight fucking years to do so after all?! Why the fuck hadn't he just pulled himself together and called you up?! He wanted to punch something! He wanted to get fucked up! He wanted to call someone and get them to deliver a big fucking bag of blow - but he settled on a third shooter.

He gulped down the whiskey as the aggression subsided and was replaced by the same type of jealousy-induced heartburn that he had felt earlier that night. Fucking Daveed Diggs and the way he always seemed to be able to wrap women around his little finger! In eight minutes, he had managed to do to you what Rafa hadn't managed to do for eight years. Fuck him!

A fourth whiskey went down Rafa's throat as the jealousy was replaced by hurtful pangs in his chest; shit it hurt to think about you and Diggs together. Rafa knew that you had had a few men in your life since the summer in the taco truck, and even though it had stung to see pictures of your romances on Instagram, it didn't hurt half as much as seeing his best friend escort you out of the bar.

He ordered another whiskey. And another one after that. And then an entire bottle of Jameson just to recall the taste of your lips that night on top of the skate ramps all those years ago. Quickly, Rafa gulped down most of the bottle, his eyes watering from the sharp taste of alcohol on his tongue, but no matter how much he drank, he still wasn't able to get image of you and Diggs out of his head. It had etched itself on the back of his eyelids, somehow becoming clearer and clearer with every gulp of fiery liquid.

It didn't take long before he had reached the half-way mark on the bottle of Jameson, completely lost in constantly checking his phone to see if you had tried to contact him to tell him that Diggs by some miracle had blown his shot. You hadn't. And even though Rafa doubted that you would, he still couldn't put the phone away.

He was fumbling about on the screen as he accidentally found Diggs' name on the list of contacts. Completely lost in contemplating whether or not he should call him up and tell him to stay the fuck away from you, he jumped a little when he suddenly felt a soft hand on his shoulder. For about a mili-second, Rafa believed that the soft touch belonged to you, but as soon as he had whipped around in his seat, he felt the disappointment cloud his mind as he was met by his make-up artist Janelle instead. "Oh, hey," he spoke in an uninterested tone of voice, his words a little slurred from the amount of whiskey he'd been drinking.

"Rafa, honey, are you okay?" She looked at him with kind eyes, "you seem a little out of it."

"I'm great," he slurred into his whiskey glass before emptying it for what felt like the 100th time that night, "I'm fucking perfect! This night's just absolutely fucking perfect."

Janelle furrowed her brows and pushed the bottle of Jameson out of Rafa's reach, "is it because of Daveed and -"

"- DON'T say her name," Rafa warned, his voice turning to a low drunk growl afterwards, "I don't want to think about it."

Janelle sat down on the empty barstool next to him and sent him a slow nod, "yeah, I was afraid this might happen..." she sighed and sent him a pitiful look.

"That what might happen?" Rafa drunkenly mumbled, trying to avoid her gaze.

"Honey... I've seen the way you look at her," Janelle whispered and reassuringly put her hand on Rafa's arm as she searched his face for any kind of affirmation. Rafa groaned and met her eyes shortly before she softly added, "- and I've seen the way Daveed looks at her too."

Rafa gulped to keep the slowly forming lump in this throat at bay, "...so you don't think it's just a one-night thing?" He croaked in a small whisper, the pain in his chest suddenly twice as hurtful as before.

Janelle shook her head slowly, shooting Rafa a careful look.

"And - uhm," Rafa cleared his throat "- do you think that - uh - she's into him as well?" He added in a whisper, his face involuntarily screwed up as he was afraid to hear the answer.

"I don't know, honey," Janelle said diplomatically and pulled him in for a tight hug, inaudibly giving away that she definitely thought so. Rafa appreciated Janelle's attempt to salvage the situation and let her comfort him for a couple of seconds before she slowly let go of him again, sending him a heartfelt look in the process. "Do you want to talk about it?" She asked.

"No..." Rafa mumbled and reached for the bottle that Janelle had pushed away moments before.

She grabbed his arm and forced it down in his lap instead, "why don't you leave the bottle and instead call it a night, boo? You've been drinking quite a lot already."

Rafa gulped a little and realised that she was right. Nothing good would come from sitting at the bar, drowning his sorrows in cheap whiskey. "Yeah," he groaned as he ran a hand through his damp hair, "yeah... You're right. Might be a good idea..."

"Go grab your jacket. I'll call you a cab, okay?"

"Thanks," Rafa mumbled before scrambling to his feet, swaying a little from side to side. He managed to balance himself and stagger over to the coat check where he retrieved his leather jacket and slowly pulled it on with great difficulty.

"I got you," Janelle was suddenly behind him, helping him pull the jacket up his arms.

"Thanks," Rafa mumbled as he pulled on the collar to rearrange the leather over his shoulders.

"You wanna say bye to the rest of the crew?" Janelle piped from behind him.

He shot a quick glance across the room and towards the table that his friends were occupying. "I better set an example," he mumbled even though he'd rather be sitting in a cab on his way home right now.

With his arm around Janelle, and her hand on his chest to steady him, Rafa walked over to his co-stars, putting up his best attempt at a cheerful smile, "I'm off guys. Have a lovely evening," he slurred drunkenly.

He thought to himself that he was doing a tremendous job of hiding away his hurt feelings until he noticed their stiff smiles. Suddenly, he realised by the sympathetic looks they were all shooting him from their seats, that they were well-aware of what was going on. Rafa quickly scanned their silent, pained faces one by one until Alessandro - one of the leads - finally spoke up, "see you Monday boss!"

Annoyed with their pitiful eyes, Rafa mumbled a, "see you Monday, bruh," and turned around, facing Janelle again as the others awkwardly looked away. It made him feel stupid.

"Cab's outside," Janelle tried to smile and pulled him in for a hug, "are you going to be okay, boo?"

"I don't know," Rafa croaked truthfully against her neck and let her pull him just a little closer.

"Call me tomorrow, okay?" She let go of him, "We'll do something fun."

"Okay," Rafa slurred, his eyes stinging as he turned away from her and towards the exit.

Slowly, he stumbled out of the bar and hopped into the yellow cab outside, closing his eyes desperately in the backseat, trying to block out any thought of you and Diggs but failing horribly. The ride home was the longest drive of Rafa's life, his thoughts sporadic and unorganised but all centred around the same thing: what would he come home to? Had you and Diggs gone to your place? Or to Diggs' place that he just happened to share with Rafa? Fuck, he almost couldn't bear the thought of coming home to meet Diggs balls deep in you on the couch. Rafa would never purposely punch Diggs, but if he came home to face that, he wasn't sure he'd be able to hold back his itching fist.

"He's your best friend," Rafa mumbled to himself as a reminder, hoping to calm himself down, "he's your best friend. He didn't know. He's innocent... - well apart from fucking your girl..."

Everything inside him was on fire.

"You alright back there, mate?" The cab driver shot Rafa a look in the rear-view mirror, apparently concerned about the whispered words, he'd heard coming from the backseat.

"Yeah," Rafa replied unenthusiastically, a little annoyed that everybody seemed to be so concerned with him - but he eventually stopped thinking out loud.

For the remainder of the trip, the driver kept his mouth shut too but annoyingly enough constantly checked in on Rafa in the rear-view mirror.

Rafa was relieved when the driver finally pulled over outside his home and paid him quickly, slamming the car door shut with much force, hoping to alleviate some of the all-consuming itch that he felt deep in his bones. Little did it help. He still wanted to punch something.

Rafa turned his attention towards the house and gave out a short sigh before he started swaying up the paved pathway in the small yard, briefly stopping before he reached the front door. He prayed that you had taken Diggs to your place and not the other way around. He couldn't handle being faced with his worst nightmare - and especially not after having had so much to drink. Right now, he couldn't account for how he'd react.

He stood with his key in hand for a while, scared of what might come, but eventually realised that he would have to go inside at some point. With a deep sigh, he slowly slid his key in the lock and turned it around, his palms sweating terribly. He felt his heart sinking down to the bottom of his stomach when the key didn't meet any kind of resistance, and he realised that the door was already unlocked.

Fuck... Diggs had taken you here.

With a burning sensation in his chest, Rafa quietly pushed open the front door and stepped inside the small hallway, closing the door behind him with a small thump. He closed his eyes and threw his head up against the wooden door, forcing himself to relax by taking three deep breaths - a technique he had learned from his mother when he had been nervous about doing spoken words for the first time at fifteen.

He focused on his breathing for a few seconds and after having exhaled a third time - already more relaxed than before - he opened his eyes and took in the room. He immediately saw that the floor of the narrow hallway was decorated with several pieces of discarded garments strewn randomly about on the stone floor.

Diggs' pants. Your dress. Your bra.

"No..." Rafa groaned quietly as he took in the pieces of clothes with a hard gulp, the tears stinging in his eyes when he realised what he was being confronted with. "No, no, no!" he buried his face in his hands and took a deep breath to get himself under control again. His entire chest was on fire, the taste of stomach acid thick on his tongue. Everything around him went quiet as he heaved in a big gulp of air, wishing that he had stayed sober tonight. This was all getting too much; he couldn't control it. He was too drunk.

He took another big gulp of air, and was just about to slowly exhale when a soft sound hit his ear canal... It was coming from the other room.

A moan.

A sweet, heartfelt, sensual moan.

From a woman - from you...

It was the result of a sincere reaction to something that had brought you immense pleasure. A moan that someone else had brought to your lips. A moan that Rafa's best friend had brought to your lips.

Fuck! The itch in his hands that he had felt for quite some time now suddenly became too much and he punched the wall hard, causing an old, framed picture of him and Diggs to fall down, the frame shattering in several pieces on the cold stone floor. He stared at the broken shards of glass for a few seconds, torturing himself by carefully listening for more of your sweet moans echoing throughout the house.

They didn't come, however. The entire house was suddenly completely silent. Thank god.

Slowly, Rafa squatted down to brush the glass-dust off your dress, the silky fabric soft between his fingertips as he pulled the dress to his chest, thinking about what it would feel like to be the one to pull it off you.

Without warning, however, the silence in the hallway was broken by another loud moan coming from Diggs' personal space and Rafa was quickly brought out of his trance. He had to get out of there! He would go to a hotel or something! Anything to get away from the sounds you were making for another man!

Slightly panicked, Rafa shuffled to get to his feet, but overbalanced and fell forwards, his left hand immediately softening the blow as a reflex. From the moment his palm hit the floor, Rafa felt a sharp pain in his hand, but didn't realise that he had cut himself before he rotated his elbow and saw the huge piece of broken glass that was prodding out of his palm. "You're kidding me," he groaned as he tried to focus on the glass shard before he grabbed it tightly and forcefully pulled it out of his skin, the warm blood immediately running down his hand as a terribly sharp pain started pulling at his fingers. "OH FUCK!" he exclaimed a little louder than he had intended to, unable to hold back in his inebriated state.

Pressing in on the wound to try and get it to stop bleeding, he hurried to the bathroom and quickly located an old towel that he wrapped tightly around his bloody hand. "Shit! Oh fuck that hurts!" He groaned loudly and slid down the wall, his ass hitting the cold floor with a small thump. He could hear hushed voices coming from Diggs' personal space next door, and he realised that he had no idea what hurt the most; the thought of you lying in there wearing nothing but your panties, or his throbbing hand that had already bled through the old towel.

"Shit," he mumbled to himself as he replaced the old piece of cloth with a clean one, "ah fuck it hurts!" He hissed and tried to push the wound shut to get it to stop bleeding. It helped for a few seconds before the gash opened back up, fresh blood spilling out again. Just looking at it made him dizzy, and he realised that he couldn't handle this on his own. He was too drunk. He needed help. Embarrassed by himself and the situation he had put himself in, he took a deep breath before calling out the name of the last person on earth he wanted to see right now, "DIGGS!"

The hushed voices from the other side of the wall died down completely. They'd heard him. Still, there was no response to his cry for help. Meanwhile, the second towel around his hand was soaked through as well. What if he was about to bleed out? What if he was spending his last moments, pathetically heartbroken on his own bathroom floor?

"DIGGS!" he tried again, this time a little more panic to his voice.

The entire house was quiet still, and Rafa listened intently for few seconds before he finally heard an angry voice calling from the other side of the wall. "WHAT?"

"Diggs, I need your help!" Rafa called back, embarrassment flooding his voice.

"I'm kind of busy in here, Rafa!" Diggs bellowed back. Rafa had never heard him sound so annoyed before.

"Come on, man... I'm serious," Rafa let out a loud groan as he took in the bloody rag that was wrapped around his hand.

He heard cursing and shuffling on the other side of the wall and a few seconds later, the door to the bathroom finally swung open, revealing a very annoyed Daveed Diggs who was trying to hide away his boxer-clad erection with the palm of his hand.

Upon seeing how Diggs was already hard and ready to fuck Rafa's girl, there was no doubt: The pain in Rafa's chest definitely exceeded the pain in his hand.

Daveed

Daveed could not believe how lucky he was! He had barely closed the front door behind him before you had pulled him in for a string of sensual kisses in the dark. His lips were moving fiercely against your warm skin, your head lolling backwards as you panted and let him press you up against the wall in the hallway. He loved the sensation of your fingers tangled in his long hair as he attacked your neck and jawline with rough, affectionate kisses. You let out a small impatient pant as he untied the bow at the side of your dress, giving himself easier access to your beautiful build underneath as the dress opened up completely.

"Fuck, you look absolutely amazing," he cupped your ass and pressed his pelvis closer to you with a groan.

Your small fingers desperately undid the buttons of his shirt and Daveed quickly shrugged it off, finally standing in front of you in nothing but his dark blue slacks. His lips quickly resumed their positions on your neck where he immediately started sucking and nibbling at the sensitive skin while running his hands all over your torso.

Your fingers desperately found the button of his slacks and Daveed felt the tight sensation of his pants against his crotch disappearing slightly as you brought down the zipper and slid the slacks over his hips. Your small hand was palming him through the cotton of his boxers, and he couldn't stop the groan that fought its way all the way from his stomach and up his throat. He heard you chuckling incredulously above him as you let your dress fall to the ground before you dropped down to your knees in front of him, determinedly pulling his boxers down over his thighs.

Daveed's mind went completely blank when he felt your hand cup his balls while your wet mouth found the tip of his straining erection. Your warm breath against him had him let out an involuntary groan, and when your plump lips kissed his engorged head, the sensation sent a shiver all the way up his spine. He pulled your hair away from your face and held it in a loose ponytail on the back of your head, your eyes interlocking with his in the process. Even though you had him between your teeth, the submissive look you sent him had him feeling incredibly in control! Without giving up eye contact, you kissed his head twice before placing a long, wet lick at the tip of his erection, immediately sending hard vibrations throughout his entire body. "Fuck," he groaned and caressed the side of your face when you wrapped your lips tightly around his head, sucking a bit at the tip.

"Mmmh, pull my hair!" you panted around him and he immediately tugged on the ponytail, buckling his hips closer to your face, desperate to feel the ecstasy of warm, wet, tightness around him again. To Daveed's relief you immediately obliged and slid your lips almost all the way down to his base and back up again, releasing him with a small pop.

"Oh fuck!" He let out a groan as he looked down into your huge, submissive eyes, slowly stroking your cheek. You repeated your motions, your tongue wet and soft against him as you bopped your mouth along his length, his hips meeting you half-way, "yeah, that's it, baby, just like that," he panted softly as you kept gazing up at him, upping the tempo and bringing him all the way down your throat with a slight gag, reminding him of how big he was.

Daveed had received many blowjobs over the years but never in his life had he felt more worshipped and desired! You were massaging his balls lovingly as you brought his length down your throat, hollowing your cheeks and making him feel completely taken care of as you focused solely on his pleasure and enjoyment.

He was just about to let go and cum down your tight throat before he reminded himself that he'd have to take it easy if he wanted to last long enough to fuck you. And holy shit, how he wanted to fuck you! He knew he was very good with his hips and hands and he wanted to bring you pleasures that you'd never even dared dreaming of before.

It was hard to do, but eventually he managed to pull himself out of your wet mouth and you to your feet with a gruff, "come here!". He unclasped your bra and tossed it aside before he pushed you up against the wall, took your nipple in his mouth, and ran his fingers along your lace-covered folds. You let out a soft gasp and he repeated the motions of his fingers while attacking your neck and throat with toothy kisses. You were panting and moaning underneath him, your hand still stroking his erection lovingly.

"Okay, okay, okay, you gotta stop," he licked the shell of your ear with a low chuckle, "I still have so many things I want to do to you," he smacked your ass and you let out a small whimper when his palm came in to contact with your skin.

Slowly, you let go of him and carefully caressed his abs instead as he re-claimed your lips. The kiss was deep and soft, and it made the straining sensation in Daveed's erection even more unbearable, but he was patient enough to not touch himself.

After a few minutes of intense, passionate kissing, you pulled your face away from his and looked up at him with a dark look in your eyes, "well, are you going to do something about it? Or are you going to just leave it at talking?" You chuckled against his skin.

"Don't get cocky with me," Daveed smiled and hoisted you up in his arms. You let out a small yelp, but still threw your legs around his waist and let him carry you to his bedroom while licking his ear. He carefully positioned you with your back against the mattress of his bed and hovered above you as he put his lips to your collarbone, slowly kissing his way down between your breasts, over your stomach, and stopping when he reached the top of your panties. He sat himself down on his knees in front of you, sending you a hungry look as he ran his fingers over your body. You looked him square in the eye and raked a hand through his curls, pulling his head back slightly. The anticipating look you were sending him made his erection twitch between his legs, but he still didn't touch it. Instead, he licked his lips and kissed the laces between your legs. "I love this colour on you," he growled against the thin fabric. He could feel you shiver underneath him as he pulled the red laces down your well-shaped legs, caressing your inner thighs lovingly. "Mmh," he hummed as you spread your legs for him, your fingers still tangled in his hair. Your chest was heaving up and down in a slow, steady rhythm as he placed small kisses on your skin, his tongue just barely grazing you. He enjoyed the way you closed your eyes and dipped your head low as he repeated this motion a few times.

Slowly, he slipped his tongue inside your folds, your lips gently spreading for him as he tasted you. You gasped slightly when he reached your clit and gave it a small flick before he slowly ran his tongue over you again. You were panting above him, your fingers caressing his scalp as your face was screwed up in pleasure. Daveed couldn't look away even if he wanted to!

He caressed the back of your legs with his hands before he had his fingers join his tongue at your core. Slowly, he inserted a finger into your wet heat and was rewarded with a deep moan escaping your lips. Desperate to hear you again, he inserted yet another finger, letting his digits and tongue work in unison until you finally let out another deep moan.

He could tell you were close to letting go completely, and it was all working out so nicely, your chest heaving up and down faster and faster as you moaned loudly for him, your nails finding their way to his scalp, pulling his face closer to you - when clash!

Out of nowhere, a loud shatter was heard from somewhere in the house. It sounded like glass breaking, but Daveed was used to Rafa's clumsy ass, so he ignored what he assumed was his best friend returning home after his night out.

Daveed did, however, feel you freeze slightly underneath him, and you pulled back the moan that had been just about to escape your lips and replaced it with a, "what was that?!" a slight panic to your voice.

"Relax, it's probably just Rafa," Daveed whispered and resumed his movements.

"What's he doing here?" You panted slightly but not as sensually as before.

"He lives here," Daveed growled against your skin, annoyed by the fact that your attention was suddenly directed at his best friend instead of the very pleasurable things he knew he was doing. To make sure that you forgot about Rafa, Daveed brought out the big guns and put his lips around your clit, vibrating them while his fingers worked their way in and out of you. It worked expertly, and it didn't take him long before he'd earned himself another loud moan coming from you. You looked as if you were completely lost in the sensations, he was causing you - but not for long, because suddenly a loud "OH FUCK!" from Rafa rang throughout the house. It was followed by hurried footsteps as Rafa ran to the bathroom that was located next to Daveed's personal space.

Daveed felt you shuffle underneath him as you put your weight on your elbows and closed your legs slightly, craning your neck as you looked towards the wall that Daveed's personal space shared with the bathroom. You had a concerned look in your eyes that Daveed chose to ignore. Instead, he kept going with his fingers and tongue, but you weren't moaning anymore.

"Shit! Oh fuck that hurts!" Rafa exclaimed loudly from the other side of the wall.

"Don't you think you should go check on him?" You asked quietly, your eyes still glued to the wall.

"No," Daveed said curtly, and tried to get you to lie back down again so he could continue. You didn't budge, however. You were more interested in the loud groan that was escaping Rafa. You let out a nervous laugh as you once again heard him cuss and groan from the next room.

"Ignore him," Daveed panted as he spread your legs apart again, his tongue immediately finding your core, and he was rewarded with a gasp from you. He had just started moving his fingers inside you again when he heard Rafa call his name loudly from the other side of the wall.

"DIGGS!"

Daveed froze for about a mili-second before deciding to ignore Rafa and continue moving his fingers inside you instead.

"Go talk to him," you chuckled and raked a hand through his hair, suddenly totally unaffected by his movements,

"He can wait. I'm far too busy," Daveed let his tongue run over you again, once more losing himself in your wonderful wetness.

Rafa however, pulled him back to reality by yelling out his name a second time, "DIGGS!!" causing you to slightly close your legs one more time.

"You're kidding me..." Daveed muttered under his breath as his face was forced away from your wet centre. "WHAT?" he ended up bellowing back to his best friend on the other side of the wall.

"Diggs, I need your help!" Rafa kept calling.

"I'm kind of busy in here, Rafa!" Daveed bellowed while looking into your amused eyes.

You were chuckling slightly, "he needs you. Don't you think you better...?" You sent Daveed a charming grin while nodding towards the door, "he sounds quite drunk..."

Daveed shot you a pained look.

"Go," you chuckled, "I'll still be ready for you in here when you come back. Don't worry."

"Come on man... I'm serious," Rafa bellowed through the wall.

"I'm going to murder him for this!" Daveed groaned in an annoyed tone of voice and got up on his feet with a loud groan. He quickly located a pair of boxers and packed away his erection before storming out of the room, closing the door to his personal space shut behind him.

He found Rafa sitting up against the wall in the bathroom, his eyes swimming with alcohol. "What, bruh?!" Daveed demanded as he locked eyes with him, "what's so important that it couldn't wait until morning?"

"...Were you sleeping?" Rafa slurred while looking like a total fucking idiot as his drunk eyes scanned Daveed from head to toe.

"Of course I wasn't sleeping! I was in the middle of eating pussy when you ruined it!"

Rafa looked as if he was about to throw up, "...you're about to fuck her?" He slurred.

"Yes?! So make whatever you want to say quick, 'cause I got a soaking wet woman waiting for me on my bed!"

Rafa looked up at Daveed with a pained expression but kept his silence.

"I swear to god, if you don't speak up now and tell me what the hell made you call me out here, I'll kick your ass!"

Rafa sighed heavily, looking as if he was about to tell Daveed someone else's secret but eventually croaked, "I hurt myself," while holding up his left hand that was wrapped sloppily in a blood-soaked towel.

First then, did Daveed notice that there were several splodges of blood on the bathroom floor. It made him drop the attitude slightly, "Jesus fuck Rafa, what the hell did you do?" He groaned and crouched down next to him on the floor.

"I knocked down the frame in the hallway," Rafa slurred and let Daveed examine the deep cut in the palm of his hand, "cut myself on the glass."

"You did a thorough job," Daveed mumbled with a sigh as he lifted the towel to check out the gash that was still bleeding heavily, "come here, run some water on it. I'll find some bandages." Daveed turned on the faucet and helped Rafa find his balance as he quickly pulled him to his feet. He could tell that Rafa was struggling to stand still as he swayed back and forth while leaning in over the sink, playing a bit with the jet of water. Daveed sent him an annoyed glance; he did not have time for this! "How much did you have to drink after I left?" he asked, the irritation practically oozing out of him as he looked for the first-aid kit in one of the cabinets.

"I dunno," Rafa mumbled sleepily as he watched the water clean the blood away from his hand, "a lot?"

"Yeah, so I'd guessed," Daveed mumbled to himself as he located the first aid kit and quickly pulled out a couple of rolls of gauze. "Come over here," he urged Rafa to sit down on the edge of the tub next to him.

Rafa gave out a small grunt and turned off the water, before turning towards Daveed with lazy movements. Daveed had to bite his tongue to avoid telling Rafa to hurry the fuck up!

Rafa's ass had barely touched the white ceramic of the tub's edge before he lost his balance and vigorously swayed back and forth a few times, finally catching himself by throwing his hand up against the sink, leaving bloody handprints all over the bathroom in the process.

"Jesus Christ, Rafa!" Daveed groaned, he did not want to deal with Rafa's drunk ass right now, "look, I'll help you with your hand but I'm not cleaning up out here!" He said harshly.

"Then don't!" Rafa muttered as he slowly slid down to the floor with a loud groan, sending Daveed and irritated look in the process.

"Come on; give me your hand," Daveed demanded, determined to be done as fast as possible so he could get back to you.

Rafa held out his arm and Daveed rotated it to look for more injuries and noticed that Rafa had bruised his knuckles quite badly too, "...have you been in a fight?" He furrowed his brows.

"Just fix my hand, okay?!" Rafa shot Daveed an annoyed look, "Make it stop bleeding!" He slurred and gestured to the blood that was already dripping from his fingertips again.

Daveed gave out an irritated grunt as he started wrapping Rafa's bloody hand in gauze, "sit still!!"

"Oh fuck," Rafa groaned as Daveed slowly draped the gauze over the sensitive wound, "fuck it hurts."

"Quit your whining!"

There was a knock on the bathroom door and Daveed slowly looked up from Rafa's bloody hand and towards the door instead. You were poking in your head, looking curiously at what the two men were doing, your hair a big mess. "Is everything alright in here?" You asked carefully as you stepped inside, tugging on the oversized shirt you'd put on to cover up your naked body.

"Rafa cut himself - and apparently he's too drunk to handle it alone," Daveed rolled his eyes so Rafa couldn't see. He registered your amused smile just before he turned back to the hand in his lap, immediately noticing the small change in Rafa's flexibility as opposed to before you had stepped in. His fingers had somehow gone weirdly stiff, and by further inspection, Daveed realised that Rafa's entire body was suddenly tense, the muscles in his jaw continuously flexing and relaxing, flexing and relaxing. Still, Rafa didn't bat an eyelid, he didn't even emit a single sound. He was just silently staring at you, his eyes going up and down your front, his breathing hard and heavy. Daveed shot him a weird look out the corner of his eye. What the fuck was going on with him? He had definitely had too much to drink...

"'s that my shirt?" Rafa slurred to you as he took in your attire.

Daveed briefly looked up at you and realised that the oversized t-shirt you were wearing were indeed Rafa's favourite Raiders shirt that Daveed had borrowed the other day. Rafa had a weird look on his face, and it looked as if he was about the say something crude to you, so to diffuse the situation, Daveed spoke: "let it go, bruh," he said in an uninterested tone of voice before he quietly turned back to wrapping the bleeding hand. Why the fuck would Rafa care if you were wearing his t-shirt or not?? He didn't mind Daveed wearing it.

"Oh..." he heard you say softly from the doorframe, "Raiders... I'm sorry. I didn't realise."

"Yeah, no. Don't be," Rafa said softly and Daveed was just about to give his best friend a mental pad on the back for having enough sense to bring his attitude around so quickly, but then he added an "- it looks good on you!" in a flirty voice that vexed Daveed so much that he felt a slow anger bubble in his chest. He let go of the bleeding hand and straightened his back as he looked over at Rafa with a hard look. He could not believe that Rafa had the nerve - the audacity! - to act so disrespectfully! What the fuck had gotten into him?! He had been a huge cock-block to you and Daveed and now he found it suitable to be flirting with you???

Daveed had to take a deep breath to calm himself down, in the meantime reminding himself that Rafa was drunk as fuck and probably not even aware that his words could be misinterpreted as more than just friendly... Therefore, he purposely ignored his best friend's impudent behaviour and instead made sure to keep his eyes down low so he could concentrate fully on wrapping up the bleeding hand, determined get the fuck out of there as fast as possible so he could get back to slipping you his famous techniques.

The wound in the palm of Rafa's hand was still bleeding quite heavily, and it didn't take Daveed long to realise that he needed more gauze to make the blood stop dripping onto the floor. "Shit," he muttered under his breath and looked over at you, "baby, can you get me more gauze out of the cabinet?"

You whipped your gaze away from Rafa's face, your eyes immediately finding Daveed's. The look in your eyes instantly shifted from something that Daveed couldn't quite place to soft and cute, a small goofy smile slowly erupting on your lips as you scanned his face. You didn't say anything, just sent him a curt nod before you quietly turned to the cabinet, looking for the first-aid kit on the bottom shelf. As you bent over in front of him, your t-shirt rode up high and Daveed got a beautiful glimpse of the red laces under the hem of the t-shirt you were wearing. Your panties were hugging your ass nicely, and for a moment, he forgot about the bleeding limb in his hand - all he could think about was touching you again! He wanted to snap the useless piece of fabric between your legs in two and delve his tongue into your wet heat, bringing you untold pleasu- ...he suddenly felt Rafa's fingers do a small involuntary twitch in his lap and he realised that his best friend was checking you out too, his mouth hanging slightly open, his eyes glued to your ass.

What the fuck was the matter with him? Had the roles been reversed, Daveed would never have checked out Rafa's girl!

Angry with his best friend, Daveed gave Rafa's arm a small smack while sending him a threatening look, daring him to keep staring at your ass. When his and Rafa's eyes interlocked, Rafa's face curled up in a sour expression but he quickly fixated his gaze on the floor in front of him instead, probably realising that Daveed could knock him out easily.

Meanwhile, completely innocent and oblivious to what had just happened behind your back, you stood up straight and handed Daveed two extra rolls of gauze before resuming your position in the doorway.

Apparently, Rafa had learnt absolutely nothing from Daveed's silent threats and immediately went back to staring at you again. Daveed contemplated shooting Rafa a verbal threat as well but decided against it when he realised how absolutely pathetic his best friend looked. He was drunk as fuck, his eyes all foggy and glossy. Daveed would confront him about his disrespectful behaviour tomorrow.

Still, the fact that Rafa was staring intensely at you while you were only wearing the slightly oversized t-shirt and your beautiful, beautiful panties underneath, made Daveed uncomfortable as fuck, so he worked double speed on Rafa's hand to get you away from the bathroom faster. Luckily, with the fresh supply of gauze from you, it only took him a few more minutes before he was done with the wrapping, a sigh of relief travelling through his body as he finally let go of Rafa's injured hand.

The tension in the bathroom could be cut with a knife and Daveed took a deep breath to calm himself down before breaking the silence by saying, "Look, I can bandage this to keep it from bleeding all over, but you need to go to the hospital for stitches or something."

"Mmh," Rafa grunted beside him, clearly not pleased with the situation. His eyes were glued to you, and he was wearing a certain hungry look on his face as he drank you in - and Daveed realised that Rafa definitely was aware of what signals he was sending.

What the hell was going on inside his pea-sized, idiot brain? Did he want Daveed to punch him? Daveed was just about to grab him by the collar when he heard you piping from the doorframe, "...I can take you."

...what? Daveed immediately turned his attention to you and saw the soft look you were sending Rafa as you continued, "I can drive. I almost didn't drink tonight."

What?! You liked Rafas stares?!

"You'd - you'd do that?" he heard Rafa whisper from beside him, a soft smile erupting on his best friend's lips.

Daveed didn't like it. He thought to himself that it looked as if the two of you had developed a secret language in the time it had taken him to wrap Rafa's hand. What the hell had he missed out on?

"Of course," you nodded slowly, your eyes still interlocking with Rafa's, "Let me just grab some pants, okay?"

"Yeah, okay," Rafa whispered, a hopeful look on his face, "thanks."

What the fuck was going on between you two?

Daveed watched you send Rafa a small smile, your face flushed. The sexual tension was thick between the two of you, and Daveed felt the jealousy burn in his chest as neither of you were looking away from the other. How the fuck dare Rafa flirt with the girl that he had brought home?! How dare he send you those hungry looks?! It was itching in Daveed's hands to do something about the long, continuous gaze between you and in his frustration, he curled his fingers and accidentally pressed on Rafa's wound, making him hiss in pain as he shot back an angry look. Daveed was far too busy looking over at you, however. You finally had your attention directed at him - and not Rafa - your eyes huge and doe-like, looking as if you'd just woken up from a trance. He shot you a look as if to say 'what the fuck is going on?' and you gulped guiltily.

Suddenly realising that he finally had the full attention of both you and Rafa, Daveed spoke up in a voice that was much more strained than he had intended, "Nope! Not gonna happen! Uh-uh, absolutely no fucking way," he shot his best friend a hard look, "Rafa you can take a cab!" he turned his attention back to you, "Baby go back to bed, I'll be there in a second!"

He noticed your eyes skating between his own face and Rafa's and he sternly let out a "he'll take the cab, okay!" He didn't like the way you were looking at each other, and he still very much intended on fucking you tonight no matter how big of a cock-block Rafa was being!

He was trying to catch your eye, but you had your gaze firmly placed on Rafa again, seemingly unable to look away. Daveed noticed how you let out a small gulp as Rafa shot you a careful nod as if giving you permission to leave.

What the hell was going on????

He also noticed the long glance the two of you shared before you gently closed the door behind you as you exited the bathroom.

What! The! Fuck!

Daveed felt his chest bubbling over. He had never felt this way towards Rafa before, but his best friend had never looked more punchable! Automatically, his fingers once more pressed in hard on Rafa's wound.

"Ah! Dude what the fuck!" Rafa yelped loudly.

"What the fuck was that all about?" Daveed spat, "you're flirting with my girl!"

"She's not your girl just because you brought her home for one night, Diggs!" Rafa hissed angrily through gritted teeth.

"What the hell are you talking about?!" Daveed felt as if his eyes were bulging out of his skull, "She's crazy about me! You should've seen the way she was begging for it at the bar!"

"Yeah, I saw everything," Rafa said slowly with anger in his eyes, a low growl to his voice as he drunkenly staggered to his feet, "I saw exactly how you swooped in and thought you could erase eight years of history between me and her!"

"What the fuck are you talking about?" Daveed hissed before his voice turned to frustrated yelling, "Rafa, you have no history with her!" he too stood up, so they were eye to eye, "you made out with her once eight years ago and now no one else is allowed to touch her?! If you wanted a shot with her, you should have done something ages ago!"

"I did do something ages ago! I kissed her!"

"Yeah! And then you had eight years of nothing! You didn't even talk to her! How the fuck was I supposed to know that you wanted to kiss her again???"

"You could have asked me!" Rafa yelled frustratedly.

"I could have asked you?! Come on, man!! You're thirty-three years old for fucks sake! If you wanted something to happen with her, you should've engaged yourself!"

"I was planning on doing so tonight!" Rafa hissed angrily, "and she would've said yes if it hadn't been for you!"

"No she wouldn't!" Daveed was minutes away from pulling out his own hair. How could Rafa be so thick?! "Don't you think that something would've happened by now if you both wanted it so badly?"

"Did you not see how she was eye-fucking me just now?" Rafa yelled angrily, sending Daveed a hard look.

Daveed let out a low growl, "yeah, meanwhile I was minutes away from actually fucking her! If she really wanted you, don't you think she would've given you more signals than a few pitiful looks because you're drunk and hurt? She doesn't want you, man!!"

"Fuck you!!!" Rafa spat angrily and shoved Daveed in the chest causing him to stagger backwards as he was pushed out of balance.

"What the fuck's the matter with you!" Daveed spat as he took a step closer to Rafa, balling up his fists and sending him a threatening look, "you really want me to beat you up?"

"Do whatever the fuck you want with me as long as you stay away from her!" Rafa yelled and gave Daveed another hard shove in the chest. His eyes were bloodshot and Daveed had never seen him this angry before.

"What the fuck's gone into you?" He yelled louder than before, "she clearly doesn't want you! Why can't you just let her go?!"

"Because I'm in love with her!" Rafa yelled loudly, spit flying everywhere. His eyes were huge and aggressive.

Daveed took a step backwards and stared at his panting best friend as his angry words sank in. Rafa's nostrils were flared, and it looked as if he was about to punch Daveed in the face.

...Rafa was in love with you? Daveed could punch himself! Why hadn't he seen it before? Of course Rafa was in love with you... He took a deep breath to calm himself down before he quietly spoke: "Yes - well I'm crazy about her too..."

Rafa was still panting heavily, his nostrils still flared as he shot Daveed a hard look - but he didn't say anything.

They had feelings for the same girl... Daveed frustratedly pinched the bridge of his nose as the realisation sank in; a girl had come between them. How high school... "Shit," he said quietly, "what do we do now?"

Rafa shot him a dark look and answered immediately: "you back down!" he said harshly but not as aggressively as before.

"I'm not going to back down, Rafa," Daveed answered him quietly. He full-on intended on making you his no matter what Rafa's feelings were.

"I've been in love with her for eight years!" Rafa spat angrily but he had stopped yelling, "You have for eight minutes! Don't you think it's more fair that you let me have a shot?!"

Daveed was getting more and more frustrated by the second but was happy that Rafa had chosen to use those exact words: "Exactly Rafa! You had eight years! You sat on your hands for eight years and you expect her to come running to you now? You expect me to let you have a shot? You've had millions of opportunities to do something!"

Rafa's face was still wild but his tone of voice was quiet and determined: "you saw the look she just sent me!" he said darkly.

Daveed had to give it to him; the way you'd been staring at Rafa had confused him too: "Listen, I don't know what the fuck that was, but if she had any feelings for you at all, why would she go home with me?" He said quietly, "why would she take off her clothes for me and not you?"

Rafa shook his head back and forth as if refusing to believe the argument, "No..." he croaked, "please don't say it like that, man..."

"Bruh..." Daveed sighed, "I'm sorry it is this way, but I don't know what else to tell you." He felt bad for Rafa but he wasn't going to back down. No chance.

"Please don't fuck her," Rafa pleaded quietly. His heart obviously broken.

"You know I'm not going to guarantee you that..."

"Just... Let me talk to her first."

"What do you expect to gain from that?"

"She wants to talk to me too..."

"Maybe - but it won't go your way. She's lying naked in my bed right now! She made her decision, bruh."

Rafa looked pained. He was clutching his chest with his eyes screwed shut, a small tear rolling down his cheek, "fuck!" he quietly worded before he fell to his knees in front of the toilet and threw up.

You

"I'm going to murder him for this!" Daveed pulled himself away from you and on to his feet, desperately looking around the room for something to wear. He finally pulled out a pair of clean boxers from his closet, pulled them on, and hurried out of the bedroom to see what was going on with Rafa. He had sounded very drunk and even though you had been slightly amused by his constant swearing throughout the house, the sound of glass smashing combined with his drunk cries for help, had also left you a bit nervous that something serious might've happened to him. What if he had cut himself badly and Daveed couldn't handle it alone? Rafa was your friend too after all. You had to make sure everything was all right with him.

Quickly, you jumped from Daveed's bed, pulled on your panties, and looked around the room for something to wear that could cover your body as your own dress had been discarded during the make-out session in the hallway. You quickly located a black t-shirt that was casually thrown over a chair in the corner of the room and pulled it over your head, grateful that it covered you all the way down to the top of your thighs. Ready to leave Daveed's bedroom, and with your hand already on the doorknob, you took a brief look at yourself in the mirror to make sure you were decent. You tried padding down your messy sex-hair but the sound of Rafa hissing in pain from the other room had you abandon any thought of trying to fix your looks - Rafa's injuries seemed much more urgent. Forcing your eyes away from your own reflection, you opened the door to the hallway instead and listened for their voices.

"Just fix my hand, okay?! Make it stop bleeding!" you heard Rafa slur from the room next door. He was clearly very drunk.

"Sit still!!" Daveed growled.

It sounded as if they had the situation under control and you were just about to go back to Daveed's bed and wait for him there when you heard Rafa exclaim, "Oh fuck! Fuck it hurts!"

It made you do a U-turn on your heel and you decided to check in on the two men to see if they were in need of any extra help. Softly, you knocked on the door but didn't listen for an answer as you immediately poked in your head and took in the scene in the small bathroom: the two men were sitting next to each other; Daveed on the edge of the bathtub with Rafa's bloody hand in his lap while Rafa was splayed on the floor looking very drunk. Both of them were looking directly up at you with equally soft expressions on their faces. Daveed's eyes were loving as he silently apologised for having to help his best friend clean up. Rafa, on the other hand, was staring up at you with a sorrowful look on his pale face, his eyes huge and red-rimmed, his Adam's apple bouncing up and down in his throat as he gulped hard.

The tension between them was thick, the air cold. Both of them clearly equally annoyed with the other.

"Is everything alright in here?" You asked quietly as you pushed open the door and stepped inside, tugging on your t-shirt to prevent it from riding up.

"Rafa cut himself..." Daveed rolled his eyes so only you could see before he continued, "- and apparently he's too drunk to handle it alone," he shot Rafa an annoyed sideway-glance before he turned his attention to the gauze and Rafa's blood-covered hand in his lap.

You watched Rafa send Daveed an equally irritated glance, looking as if he was biting his tongue to keep himself from retorting something nasty. He had probably already realised that he needed Daveed's help to get the wound to stop bleeding and that he wouldn't get it by being crass. So instead, Rafa silently let Daveed wrap his hand as his eyes slowly found yours, his expression immediately changing from annoyed to soft.

You sent him a small reassuring smile and a goofy expression emerged on his drunk face when he happily reciprocated it. You let out a small laugh at his expression and he blinked a few times, looking as if he was saving the sound on his mental hard drive. His foggy eyes were softly gazing up at you with a soulful look, and he looked drunk but cute as he took you in, a weird undertone in his gaze that you couldn't quite place. It was a look that you recognised from somewhere, but not from him - from someone else. You scanned his face one more time, raking your brain to find out from where you knew the gaze, he was sending you, but it wasn't immediately clear. Suddenly however, you realised that it was the same look that Daveed had sent you several times over the last couple of weeks. It was a look of longing.

Softly, you cocked your head at him, and he sent you a small, sad smile in return, his green eyes kindly taking in your face before they travelled down your body, ultimately landing on your chest. You immediately folded your arms, and he looked back up into your eyes, your eyebrows now arched in an unimpressed manner, silently tell him that he'd been caught staring red-handed. His face screwed up in a painful expression and he paled a bit before he quietly slurred, "'s that my shirt?".

Unaware of what he was talking about, you looked towards the mirror above the sink on the opposite side of the bathroom wall, and when you caught your own reflection, you realised that he hadn't been staring at your chest. He'd been staring at the logo on the t-shirt. The Raiders logo - his football team. You weren't wearing Daveed's shirt. You were wearing Rafa's.

You'd seen him in it multiple times - hell, he'd even worn it the night you'd kissed on top of the skate ramps. You remembered because every so often your mind wandered back to that night. Played it on repeat. Rafa's hand on your thigh as Stevie Nicks' voice rang in the background. Your tongues intertwining. The stubble on his chin soft between your fingertips. The scent of his warm cologne. The thought of your passionate kiss that summer night eight years ago was enough to make a warm feeling appear in your stomach.

Still looking at yourself in the mirror, you let your arms drop to the side and took in your own reflection. The t-shirt was a few sizes too big for you and it covered you like a short dress, just barely reaching below the red panties you were wearing underneath. The Raiders logo took up most of the front of the shirt and the logo curved nicely along your breasts and waistline, making the oversized men's shirt actually look as if it'd been tailored to you. You liked this look. You actually looked good in Rafa's t-shirt.

From far away you heard Daveed's voice, "let it go, bruh," and it pulled you back to reality.

"Oh... Raiders..." you said quietly, unable to pry your eyes away from the way the t-shirt was hugging your curves. No wonder Rafa was staring at you. You had gone home with his roomie, yet you'd put on his shirt - and you even looked good in it. "I'm sorry. I didn't realise," you croaked.

Rafa was looking as if he was thinking about the same thing as you, and for a second you were afraid that he might get angry about the fact that Daveed's flirt was wearing his beloved Raiders t-shirt, but he just softly said, "yeah, no. Don't be. It looks good on you..."

You didn't react to his words but merely stared at yourself in the mirror as the memories of your Tacos Locos summer once more flooded your mind - and you slowly felt a dull ache in your chest when you looked back at Rafa's pained expression and realised that maybe there was a reason for his look of longing, his quiet, pained reaction to seeing you half-naked in his shirt when you'd gone home with his best friend. He probably wasn't as cool with you and Daveed as Daveed had let on. Maybe your suspicion about why Rafa had invited you to join his production was right after all...

Oh no.

The thought of kissing Rafa again had grazed your mind several times in the period of time between his phone call offering you the job, and your first day on set where you'd been introduced to his best friend for the first time. Daveed, however, had immediately pushed every sensual thought of Rafa out of your head and had instead replaced them with unholy thoughts about himself. The sexual attraction that you had felt towards Daveed for the past month was insane and you were definitely crazy about him! ...Still, you wondered if he was the type of man, you'd still fantasise about eight years after having shared a passionate kiss in the dark. The same way you so often had found yourself fantasising about Rafa.

...had you just made a huge mistake?

Rafa's cheeks paled considerably as his gaze constantly shifted between your face and the Raiders logo. He was clearly affected by the fact that you were wearing his shirt and nothing else, and it looked as if he was having a hard time sitting still. The tender yet hurtful look he sent you made you feel horrible about yourself and all the decisions that had led to this exact moment. What if things had been different back in the taco truck eight years ago? What if he had actually taken you home after one of your late nights out? And what if Daveed hadn't been so persistent in hooking up with you over the last couple of weeks? If he hadn't been so smooth and charming, would he still have been able to swoop in right before Rafa? Or would you eventually have gone home with Rafa instead?

Would it feel more right to be sleeping in Rafa's bed tonight?

Oh no...

"Shit!" Daveed's voice brought you back from your panicky train of thought. You looked over at him, his face sweet and innocent as he was helping his best friend recover, and you realised: no, it wouldn't feel more right to be sleeping in Rafa's bed tonight. But it would feel just as right as sleeping in Daveed's.

"Baby, can you get me more gauze out of the cabinet?" he continued.

Baby. It had slipped out of him. He hadn't even realised it... The caring, handsome man in front of you had called you baby and you couldn't help but send him a small smile as it had made you soft. You were baby to him.

Rafa had a reaction to the pet name too: he looked as if he was about to murder Daveed.

Desperately trying to untangle yourself from the situation you had put yourself in, you turned over to the cabinets and pulled out more gauze, promptly handing it over to Daveed before resuming your position in the doorframe.

Immediately, you and Rafa went back to staring at each other again, both unable to look away. The looks he was sending you were deep and longing, his eyes pained as he grew more and more tense with each passing second. He looked as if he wanted to touch you, to kiss you, to hold you tight. Shit.

Your eyes were flickering fast between the two men: both of them sweet and handsome. Both of them crazy about you. You couldn't decide whether or not you had made a mistake by choosing to go home with Daveed tonight.

Daveed broke the tension in the small bathroom when he in an irritated tone of voice said, "Look, I can bandage this to keep it from bleeding all over, but you need to go to the hospital for stitches or something."

Rafa let out a small grunt without looking away from you. It looked as if he wanted to tell you something but was unable to with Daveed being present. It was heart-breaking.

You liked Daveed very much but realised that you had to talk to Rafa as well. You had to hear what he had to say, "...I can take you," you piped up in a voice that was weirdly nervous, "I can drive. I almost didn't drink tonight."

"You'd - you'd do that?" Rafa said in a whisper and sent you a warm look.

"Of course," you nodded slowly, suddenly desperate to talk to him, to hear his thoughts, "Let me just grab some pants, okay?"

"Yeah, okay. Thanks," Rafa said quietly, his pained expression now completely replaced by a hopeful one.

Daveed had definitely noticed that something was going on with you because the annoyance was practically seeping out of him though he was trying his best to keep calm. He did something to Rafa's hand that had Rafa hissing in pain and shooting Daveed an angry look with his lips pressed together in a thin, white line.

Your eyes whipped over to Daveed as well. He was sending you a hurt look that said 'what the fuck are you doing?' and you gulped guiltily. Had he realised that you were unsure about what to do with the two men in front of you?

"Nope!" Daveed said loudly, shaking his head vigorously, "Not gonna happen. Uh-uh, absolutely no fucking way. Rafa you can take a cab!" he shot Rafa a hard look before he turned back to you, his eyes soft, but his voice full of irritation, "Baby, go back to bed, I'll be there in a second!"

There it was again. Baby. You looked into Daveed's soft brown eyes that were looking pleadingly back at you, your knees immediately weak. Slowly, you let your gaze wander a bit to the left and met Rafa's huge green eyes too. They also made you feel incredibly soft.

Daveed noticed your gaze drifting over to Rafa and harshly interjected, "he'll take a cab, okay!"

Rafa sent you a slight nod as if to say that it was alright for you to leave, and that he could handle Daveed and his bleeding hand on his own. Meanwhile Daveed was staring at his best friend with a murderous look in his eyes. You realised that they had to resolve some stuff too, so even though it hurt in your chest, you slowly turned away from the two men, and walked back to Daveed's bedroom. Just before the door to the bathroom closed behind you, you heard the beginning of an argument between the two friends: "Ah! Dude what the fuck!" Rafa yelped loudly.

To which Daveed angrily responded with a "What the fuck was that all about? You're flirting with my girl!" It was more a statement than a question.

You sat awkwardly on Daveed's bed, unsure of what to do now. Daveed had noticed the long looks between you and Rafa. Shit. Even though you hadn't intended it, you had still managed to turn them against each other.

You could hear their angry voices from the other side of the wall, but you didn't want to listen in on their private conversation, so you put your fingers in your ears. Their shouted words were not meant for you. It was a desperate conversation between two best friends, and even though you could've easily followed their screaming match, it didn't seem right to do so. Desperately, you pressed in on your ear canal and started humming softly to tune out most of their angry words. Still, snippets of their loud conversation penetrated your ears.

"Rafa, you have no history with her!" Daveed was yelling before Rafa's voice was heard a few seconds later: "Did you not see how she was eye-fucking me just now?" followed a little while later by a loud "Fuck you!" from Rafa and an angry "you really want me to beat you up?" from Daveed. They kept yelling loudly at each other, but you tried not to decipher their angry words as you found them private. There was a reason why they had sent you out of the bathroom after all.

After a few minutes, their angry yells finally died down completely and were instead replaced by muffled words in normal voices that you couldn't make out even if you tried. You slowly removed your fingers from your ears, instead burying your face in your hands, angry with yourself for having let it come to this.

Their muffled voices could be heard for a few seconds before the sound was disrupted by someone retching.

One of them was throwing up, the other completely silent. You listened intently for a few seconds to see if you could make out who was throwing up, hoping that the other would say some words of comfort, but neither of them spoke, and after about a minute of silence, you heard footsteps approaching the room you were lying in. The doorknob twisted and Daveed entered the room slowly, his eyes full of pain as he took you in. He sat down on the bed next to you, panting hard, obviously very upset about the entire situation. It hurt seeing him like this. And it hurt thinking about Rafa lying alone in the bathroom. You dried an annoying tear away from your cheek and just barely managed to reset your face before Daveed looked up at you with a sad smile. You did your best to look casual as if you hadn't got the faintest idea of what their screaming match had been about. You acted as if wearing Rafa's shirt meant nothing. Seeing his pained expression had done nothing. Hearing him sob in the bathroom made you feel no ways.

"Everything okay?" You asked Daveed carefully.

"Yeah," he grunted.

"How about Rafa?" you said quietly. Even the sound of his name hurt in your chest.

"He's..." Daveed's words died in his throat as he frustratedly buried his face in his hands with a deep sigh.

You gulped, "is he okay alone out there?"

"Can we please not talk about Rafa right now?" he said slowly.

"Yeah..." you nodded quietly, "come here," you folded your arms around his chest, hugging him tight. He pulled you on top of him and hugged you back, his strong arms squeezing you, bringing you comfort as if he knew what you were going through as well. You sat like this for a few seconds, your arms wrapped tightly around each other comforting the broken feeling you both felt in your chests until his lips slowly found their way to your neck, leaving sweet, sensual kisses to the side of your throat.

"Look," you said quietly, pulling yourself away from him and looking into his chocolate brown eyes, "it's not that I don't enjoy this, but I just think it's for the best if I go home."

"What? No?" Daveed looked up at you with a pained expression, "come on, we can't let Rafa ruin our night," he groaned and moved closer to you but suddenly paused, "unless you don't want to of course. I don't want to force you into anything," he looked carefully at you and you understood why. He wanted to make sure that you were comfortable with the decision you were making. Comfortable with him.

It made you realise that the fact that you were lying in Daveed's bedroom half-naked, meant that you had made your choice long ago. You needed to stick with it.

"Yeah, okay," you said and moved your lips close to his, kissing him softly.

"You have no idea how happy that makes me," he groaned against your lips and you felt him breathe a sigh of relief as if a weight had been lifted off his shoulders. He quickly pulled Rafa's t-shirt over your head, and harshly threw it onto the ground next to the bed. You couldn't help but think of the symbolics in his heated gesture.

His warm hands immediately found your breasts and he started running his fingers over your nipples with a low growl. You enjoyed the confident, hungry look he sent you as you were once again bare-chested in front of him. He moved his face closer to yours, "I still fully intent on making you feel good and make you let loose a little," he repeated his words from earlier that evening with a smile and carefully pushed you down on the bed, a warm shiver travelling up your spine with his words and movements. He hovered above you before his lips started pressing small, peppered kisses to the side of your throat, his one hand running down your stomach and dipping down between your legs, making you gasp softly. His lips moved over your collarbone and down between the valley of your breasts, taking one of your nipples in his mouth, and making you arch your back against him, as you felt his erection pressed up between your legs. He groaned as he pushed his boxer-clad erection closer to you, looking down at you with an erotic spark in his eye. Your fingers found his soft hair and you raked a hand through his curls and reciprocated the look he was sending you; dark and sensual.

You were both getting lost in the sensations you were causing each other when you were interrupted by the sound of Rafa retching and his heart-breaking sobs from the next room. It made your stomach ache horribly and you interrupted the kiss with Daveed, looking towards the wall to the bathroom instead. "I'm sorry, I can't just leave him alone with that..."

"What? You're not serious?" He looked at you with a disappointed look on his face.

"Listen to him," you said softly, as Rafa let out another heartbroken sob.

"He'll be fine," Daveed responded harshly before he resumed kissing your throat.

You pulled your face away from him, raking a hand through his hair one more time, "he's your best friend. Do you really want him to be alone right now? He sounds so heartbroken."

"Trust me - you do not want to deal with him right now."

Rafa retched loudly.

"I'm sorry," you kissed Daveed briefly, "but I have to make sure he's okay. I'll be back in a second."

Daveed let out an irritated grunt but eventually let go of you so you could crawl down from his lap. You quickly found the Raiders t-shirt on the floor and pulled it over your head, exiting the bedroom in a swift motion.

You knocked quietly on the door to the bathroom and found Rafa lying on the floor next to the toilet sobbing quietly. "Rafa, honey, are you okay?" you said softly as you sat down next to him and carefully put your hand on his chest.

He took a deep breath and looked up at you with wet eyes. The gaze he sent you was bloodshot, but he wasn't as pale as before. Throwing up some of the alcohol had definitely done him some good. "Hey," he whispered in a raspy voice as he put his good hand on top of yours, closing his eyes again taking three deep breaths. You noticed that he didn't answer your question.

As you pulled your hand away from his chest to fix him a glass of water, he groaned at the lack of touch and sat up straight, sleepily resting his head on the edge of the tub, looking at you with tired, sad eyes.

"Are you done throwing up?" you asked him as you handed him the glass.

He took a big gulp and nodded "I think so... Listen, can we talk?"

You sent him a small smile, "tomorrow, okay?" you didn't want to cause him anymore heartbreak tonight, "let's get you to bed," you held out your hand.

"Yeah, okay..." he took your hand and let you pull him to his feet. He was still very drunk, so you had to help him with his balance, your arm tightly wrapped around his waist, "come here," you chuckled and walked him to his room with his arm draped over your shoulder. As soon as you entered his personal space, he threw himself down on the bed with a loud groan.

"You're not going to disrobe?" you chuckled at him.

"Yeah, no... I don't care right now," he said and closed his eyes, "I just want to sleep... Let this absolute shit night be over."

You guiltily shook your head and forcefully pulled off his Chelsea boots and socks.

"Are you trying to get me naked?" He joked sleepily from the bed; his eyes closed.

"I'm trying to get you comfortable," you chuckled, "you have to take off your shirt and pants yourself."

Rafa groaned but sat up straight before he pulled his shirt over his head. His eyes were still closed, and his long hair was falling in unruly strands around his face. He looked exhausted as he undid the button on his pants and slid them off himself, plumping down on the bed afterwards.

"You don't think I'll bleed to death, do you?" he groaned and lifted his bandaged hand a little.

"I'm absolutely positive you won't," you chuckled at him, "if it's still bleeding tomorrow, I'll take you to the hospital, okay?"

"Okay, can't wait," he smiled sleepily and gave out a quiet snore as if he'd briefly fallen asleep. He was lying flat on his back which gave you time to study the tattoos he had on his chest and forearms. Some of them you didn't like, others were beautiful. He had one on his pec that you'd never seen before.

"If I love you, I have to make you conscious of the things you don't see," you read out loud, looking at his chest.

Even though Rafa had his eyes closed and looked as if he was just about to fall asleep again, he knew what you were talking about and softly tapped the tattoo he had on his pec, "that's right," he slurred with a small smile. For the first time since he'd cut himself, he looked as if he was peaceful, and you tugged one of his long strands of blonde hair away from his eyes and behind his ear instead. Your fingers lingered on his cheek for a second and he kissed your palm with a small hum, "that means that I have to make you conscious of the things you don't see," he whispered before he drifted off completely.

"Alright Rafa," you chuckled quietly as you ran your fingers through his soft hair. He had started breathing heavily, already fast asleep, "thanks for explaining the words of your tattoo with the exact same words!" You got up from the bed and quietly closed the door behind you as you walked out into the hallway.

You'd only walked a few steps towards Daveed's room when the meaning behind Rafa's sentence hit you and you froze in place. Inside your head, the written words of the tattoo and Rafa's whispered words played on repeat. He hadn't explained the tattoo to you. He had told you that he loved you.

He loved you. Rafa was in love with you.

And you were walking towards the bedroom of his best friend. You turned your head slightly, looking towards Rafa's room. Should you go back to him? Or continue to Daveed? You were completely frozen in time, desperately looking between the two bedroom doors on either side of the bathroom in the hallway, realising that even though you might have been lying naked in Daveed's arms only minutes before, Rafa's words hurt so much in your chest that your decision-making was far from over.

Rafa's room was to the left. He had just confessed his feelings for you. Or, he didn't just have feelings for you; he was in love with you. Probably had been since your summer together in the taco truck. You wouldn't say that you were in love with him, but there was definitely raw, heated attraction towards him on your part as well, or you wouldn't still be thinking about your drunk kiss in the dark eight years ago, the way he was always able to make you laugh, his soft, green eyes. It hurt in your chest to think about how you'd potentially wasted eight years without him by your side. If you went to him, you'd either finally be able to stop thinking of him as 'the one who got away' and actually engage in something romantic with him - or you'd see that eight years of absence might have grown the heart so fond that you had put him on a pedestal that he couldn't live up to.

Daveed's room was to the right. He was waiting for you in there, probably ready to fuck you so good that you wouldn't be able to remember your own name. The preview he'd given you earlier tonight had definitely shown you that he was able to bring all your sexual fantasies to life! And you had craved his touch for so long, to feel his strong hands on your body as he slid into you while whispering sweet words in your ear. You and him definitely had some insane potential - not to mention the fact that he was already calling you baby! He was so crazy about you that you were baby to him! - but did you feel the same emotional attraction to him? Or was the warm feeling in your stomach whenever you looked at him all due to sexual attraction? Could you and he ever become more than raw passion?

No matter what, you'd have to choose between them. You couldn't have both. With whomever you chose, you'd never be able to have the other.

Carefully, you weighed both your options; left or right? Rafa or Daveed?

You started at both of their doors, unsure about where to go, but eventually made a decision. With a deep breath, you stepped closer to the wooden door, grabbed door handle and stepped inside, softly closing the door behind you as you took in the handsome man on the bed.

Tagging: @exrthangel @theatrenerd86 @lonelydance @ohsoverykeri @summerofsnowflakes @ramp-it-up @alexander-hamilhoe @honeysucklechocolatedrippin @riiyy @mysearchforgratification @janthony-stan @sillyteecup @biafbunny @einfachniemand @cashskid @namelesslosers @simpinforu @diggsbeatriz (Imma keep tagging you unless you say something lol).

....No spoilers in the comments please :-)

#rafael casal x reader #rafael casal #daveed diggs #blindspotting #battle of the bay boys #rafael casal imagine #rafael casal fanfiction #bay boys #they gon fight #sorry rafa #sorry diggs #sorry reader

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