#its been a while since i posted one of these how we all doing

[rafesbabygirlx]

Hi angels (this is gonna be long)

I ramble because when I feel big feels I don't think straight, but please read 🤍

I'm posting this now because I just need to get it out. This has been weighing heavily on me. But I doubt anyone will read it hahah

This is really hard for me to say, but after a lot of thought, I’ve decided to wrap up some things I have left, complete some more requests and step back from writing anything new—at least for now.

I’ve been contemplating this for a while, trying to push past the feeling, but I’ve reached a point where I can’t ignore it anymore. Writing has been such a joy for me, and I’ve loved being part of this little community. You all welcomed me with open arms, and I can’t express how much that means to me.

Honestly, I don’t think I’m in the right mental space for it right now. As much as I love creating, I’ve found myself constantly doubting my work, comparing my writing to others and thinking that I can do so much better, and overthinking every detail. It’s a cycle I’ve fallen into on my own, and it’s taken a toll. On top of that, I feel like my blog has lost some of its spark, and my writing isn’t going anywhere and not growing. I’ve also gotten some nasty anons the past few weeks that I ignore but they still haven’t helped with my thoughts. 🫠

With my final semester of college also weighing on me, everything feels like it’s piling up. So, I think I just need a short break. Ew I feel like I sound so insecure. I think I’m just too hard on myself, especially when I get overwhelmed and burnt out.

I feel really guilty stepping away after working so hard to build this space and gaining so much support. The last thing I want is to let anyone down. But right now, this is what I need.

Please stick with me and don't forget me.

That said, I truly love being here, and I don’t think I can stay away for too long. Honestly, I might still post every now and then if I feel inspired. I also won’t be going completely dark - I want to stay engaged and continue supporting the amazing people I’ve met here. I’d love for my moots to keep me updated on their posts, and I’ll still be around to chat.

Sorry if none of this makes sense. I really hate that I've gotten to this point. I still have some things I want to complete and then I plan to take some time off from writing. But I will be around. We can still interact. I don't want to completely lose what I have here. 🤍

I want to go through some more requests and I have a couple of parts left of The Pen Pal. I like to finish what I’ve started and I’m committed to that. I'm posting this and I have a couple of drafts ready to post tonight and then going to take a break for a day or 2 after posting this (because I feel awful and I want to avoid it)

I’m hoping that this will bring me some relaxation but I’m also hoping it will bring me some inspiration too. I have a series I’d love to restart and a lovely anon gave me a great idea for a JJ AU I’d love to do at some point. I hope those ideas would excite you just as much too.

I think right now it will just be a couple of weeks off just from writing. To refresh, heal my mind, and finally breathe. I’ve already expressed it slightly in some posts but I’ve been really thinking about it.

I already can’t wait to be back because this community has been so good to me. I appreciate every single one of you. What’s that corny saying? It’s not goodbye it’s see you later? I love you guys, and I’ll make another post when I officially take my break.

I HOPE THIS MAKES SENSE. IT ALL DOES IN MY HEAD. JUST A LITTLE BAD AT EXPRESSING MYSELF.

I wanna thank everyone who has supported my writings and I LOVE every single one of you.

I also wanna thank some of my moots! You all have helped me incredibly since I've joined. You're all so kind hearted and probably the best group of people I've ever connected with on the internet. I’m still here so please don’t stop tagging me or reaching out, I’ll still support all of you when I’m on a break. Forgive me if I'm forgetting anyone- not really thinking right now. But this goes for all my moots. 🤍

@rafesheaven @cameronsprincess @inthelibrarybtw @littlelamy @leather-n-velvet @writingroom21 @ivysprophecy @maybejj @rafescokewhore @nemesyaaa @rafescvntyclubgf @angelicameron @tanjamikaelson @starkeynation @quinnsbabygirl @frankoceanluvr11 @httpsdrewstarkey @v3n1ce-bxtch @zyafics @whytheylosttheirminds @rafesbuzzcutseason @maybankslover

[yatagarasuhonyaku]

The Raven of the Empty Coffin: Chapter 4 "Yukiya" Part 2 (The End)

Disclaimer: This is a fan-translation japanese-english of the original novel. The events of this novel follow after what's already covered by the anime. For an easier understanding, I recommend first reading the few scenes of previous books I've already translated.

Blog version

For the Index, you can find it HERE

Previously: Yukiya (Part 1)

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Chapter 3: Yukiya (Part 2)

Barely four and a half hours had passed since Natsuka received news of the Monkeys’ assault. At the time, he had been supervising the investigation of the wells, away from Wakamiya. When he heard the report, there was just one thought—‘the time has come’.

They had set a number of countermeasures beforehand—all accounting for a different hypothetical set of circumstances— just in case they found the Monkeys’ infiltration route. These had all been shared with the Imperial Court, so as long as they handled the crisis with a clear head, they should be able to avoid the worst.

Although Natsuka rushed to the place of the incident, by the time he got there, there were already guards posted at the entrance to the tunnel and they had established headquarters for the counter-efforts in a plaza not too far from there. It was in a tent, which had been used for a field training exercise until a few hours ago. Many officials had already gathered there after receiving the report, and were busy discussing the course of action going forward. 

Wakamiya and his group, who had arrived earlier than him, stood just beside them—and with them was Yukiya, standing right in front of his Lord. For some reason, they were glaring at each other.

“How is the situation?”

“The Imperial Court is acting according to the procedure we set in advance.” It was Akeru who answered Natsuka’s question.

Natsuka took a look at his surroundings—the court officials were all arguing with each other as they drew up their plan on how to proceed. It was their established goal to figure out the most effective way to block off the invasion route’s entrance while it was still under the watch of armed soldiers.

“However, something has happened. Something we didn't consider at all when first planning out those countermeasures……”

“What is it?”

“We found this right by the suspected access route.” Wakamiya—his eyes still stubbornly glued on Yukiya—offered something to Natsuka without even looking at him.

Natsuka couldn’t believe his eyes. “What the—!? The Monkeys left a letter?”

“That Oozaru(1) four years ago knew how to speak the Word of Within(2). There’s nothing strange about them also knowing how to write,” Wakamiya said with a sardonic smile. He then glanced at Natsuka. “It’s even politely addressed ‘to the Golden Raven’. As for the sender, it says ‘from Kozaru’.”

Natsuka opened the folded letter and checked its contents.

‘I wish for meeting with the Golden Raven.If the young Golden Raven comes, the Crow will be returned for sure.I won’t eat Crow.I won’t harm the Golden Raven.’ As hard as the letter’s penmanship was to read, the gist of the message was clear. “Unbelievable. Are they asking you to come meet them……?”

“So they kidnapped that trainee to use him as a hostage, huh? To force the Golden Raven to attend the meeting,” Rokon murmured with amusement from behind a consternated Natsuka.

“Your Highness, this is a trap. There’s no doubt about it,” Yukiya, shooting daggers with his eyes, said to his Lord. “While we don’t know what their goal is, from everything we can tell, this Monkey pulled this trick because it knows the True Golden Raven’s weaknesses. If we do as they ask, what will happen is painfully obvious.”

A True Golden Raven possessed power beyond any simple Yatagarasu, yet it came with a set of painful restrictions. Even if a Yatagarasu were to hurt him, for example, he would be unable to retaliate and take that life. That he was incapable of making any rational choices whenever hostages were involved was just the truth of the matter—and the kind of situation those serving Wakamiya feared the most. 

“Are you suggesting we abandon the same junior you treasured so much?”

“I’m not about to put you and the entirety of Yamauchi in danger for one person, even if that person is Haruma. First of all, we should prioritize sealing the passage.” Although both of them were keeping their composure on the surface, the atmosphere around them chilled one to the bone. The surrounding officials’ bustle was quaint in comparison.

“Do you even have an alternative, really? You’ll just get yourself killed if you obey their demands thoughtlessly and it turns out to be a trap,” Rokon added as if poking fun at the entire situation. “If we’re rational about it, giving up on the kidnapped trainee is the only option.”

“...... I think so too. You really shouldn’t go,” Natsuka too agreed with the others.

In answer, Wakamiya gave them a firm nod. “I see. I fully understand what you mean—but,” he said, “I’m going anyway.”

A development that surprised nobody. Wakamiya being who he was, they all knew what would be his answer.

Then, with a look at the letter in Natsuka's hands, Wakamiya dispassionately added, “The sender says they want to speak with me and—it bothers me how much it insists on saying they won’t harm me or eat any Yatagarasu.”

Natsuka heaved a sigh. “What are you saying!? Are you really planning to blindly trust someone who’s trying to set a trap for you?”

“Whether it’s a trap or not, we won’t know until we actually get there. More importantly, the specific phrasing in that letter doesn’t strike me as something anyone would use if they knew that taking a hostage would force my hand.” Natsuka looked at him with suspicion and, in turn, Wakamiya slightly smiled. “Don’t you see it? There’s nothing in this letter about what they’ll do if I don’t go.”

Wakamiya would have been left with no choice but to go after them—caution thrown to the wind—if they had simply written ‘Haruma is dead if you don’t come’. And yet, the writer of the letter only expressed its desire to meet the Golden Raven and wrote about how, if Wakamiya went to meet it, the ‘Crow’ would be returned to them.

What was this Monkey even thinking when writing the letter?

“They had this letter already prepared, so we can assume they came here planning to take a hostage from the start, but, although the other trainees were injured, none of them were killed. I’m not saying we should lower our guards, but…… There’s something. I feel there’s something different from the previous Oozaru.”

“—Are you suggesting it’s genuinely a completely different individual from before? We can’t have multiple Monkeys speaking the Word of Within!” Natsuka yelled in an unnaturally high pitch.

Wakamiya, however, was fully serious. “That’s how it feels to me. So I want to talk with this ‘Kozaru’ at least once and judge from there.”

And Wakamiya wouldn’t budge from that.

“I can’t accept that,” Yukiya said with a stifled voice, his head slowly shaking in denial. “This is a problem that concerns Your Highness’ life. It’s perfectly possible the Monkeys wrote it that way precisely to lure you to their den.”

“If the situation feels too off, we can always accept defeat and run away. If it’s you all, I’m sure you’ll be more than skilled enough to secure an escape route.” Wakamiya spoke in a decisive manner, as if to keep the still unconvinced Yukiya in check. “We shouldn’t be giving up from the get-go when there’s still a possibility.”

“But—!” Yukiya’s expression twisted beyond recognition for a second, yet Wakamiya paid it no mind whatsoever.

“I’m not asking for your opinion. This is an order. Stop talking and come with me on this mission. Understood?” Having said that, Wakamiya left the tent altogether. A troubled-looking Sumio followed right after.

“Hey! Wait, Nazukihiko!”

Natsuka panicked and went after him as well. There, he saw his little brother as he turned towards the tent and spoke with a hint of a wry smile on his lips.

“...... He’s truly quite the troublesome one as well.”

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Yukiya remained in the tent. Shigemaru, who had been watching over the scene in silence until then, gently patted his shoulder. “...... Good for you, Yukiya.”

He didn’t answer.

It seemed they both had figured him out.

In the middle of his preparations to enter the cave, the memories of the earlier conversation kept playing back in his mind. He bit his lips.

Abandoning Haruma, if Yukiya was honest with himself, was the very last thing he had wanted to suggest. It was just like Wakamiya said—as long as a chance remained, he wished for nothing but to try to help the boy somehow. Yukiya had been the one desperate to plead, to insist on not forsaking Haruma. 

But such words couldn’t ever come out of his mouth.

Wakamiya had seen right through him, however. That last order was nothing but his consideration towards him made manifest. As grateful as he felt inside, it all made him acutely aware of his own responsibility for putting Wakamiya through this kind of danger.

——He was going to bring Wakamiya back to Yamauchi even if it cost him his life.

That said, now that the situation had taken on such a turn, Yukiya had to make sure to bring Haruma home as well.

“At times like this, he won't listen to me no matter what.”

Natsuka knew Wakamiya's personality very well, so once he had fully prepared himself mentally, he went on to do his best to support the upcoming expedition.

He took it upon himself to gather everything required to enter the hole and to handle all the long and painful negotiations with the Imperial Court. They could never publicly admit to the fact that Wakamiya himself was going into the cave, so the effort required to slow down the Court's hurried attempts to seal the cave down was, if Yukiya had to guess, probably quite substantial.

Besides Sumio, three others were to become Wakamiya's accompanying bodyguards—Yukiya, Chihaya, and Shigemaru.

“We must keep our numbers down, or we’ll struggle moving in such a tight space. That limits us to a select number of elite forces and, at present, you are the most skilled among the few trustworthy men we have.”

Natsuka gave them an order as well—the sort that only he could give them. “If it comes down to it, move according to your own criteria. You must protect His Highness Wakamiya at all costs, even if that means ignoring his orders. Understood?”

In no way could they object to that.

Even after Yukiya and the others’ preparations were over, they had to face a number of problems before accessing the cave. They were likely to end up crossing the Barrier surrounding Yamauchi, after all. While, in such cases, burning incense had been determined the best way to avoid getting lost, they couldn't really expect the smell to reach far in this particular occasion because of the running water.

Akeru was the one to come up with a solution. “How about we put some Yellow Twin in the torches?”

“The Western specialty perfume?”

“That one, yes. The strong smell should be able to travel even there.” Although it was hard to tell how much distance it would actually cover, it was still better than nothing.

Besides that, the running water also made the Monkeys’ infiltration route almost impossible to block off entirely. To solve that, they chose to sharpen bamboo to build an abatis-like barrier, obstructing the way until Wakamiya's return. In case of an emergency, Rokon wasn’t to separate from Natsuka’s side.

“We'll have our best troops waiting around the hole with as many arrows as they can carry. If the Monkeys appear here, we'll have to assume you won't be coming back and have no choice but to close the cave,” Rokon, who was also put in charge of commanding said forces, explained to them. 

Wakamiya nodded, no resistance offered. “That's fine with me. If the worst comes to worst, brother, I'll be leaving it all to you.”

“Don't say that! Live and come back to us,” Natsuka hissed back.

“Please, be safe.” Akeru too sent them off, his worry plain on his face.

Finally, their group managed to enter the tunnel. As part of their preparations, they had brought with them the biggest waterproof fatuous fire lamp(3) they could find. They dropped a huge candy inside and, with a light noise, the bluish-white sparkling dust inside grew into a fist-sized ball of fire.

As a test, they tried to hold it up towards the cave's depths—its light reached up to the point where the current meandered out of sight.

That done, everyone hung smaller portable fatuous fire lamps on their necks. The big lamp was left in Chihaya’s hands, who took the lead with Yukiya right behind him. Wakamiya followed them, sticking to the middle of the group. Sumio stood after him, with Shigemaru taking the rear. Being the last in line, Shigemaru was entrusted with a spool of resilient jorougumo(4) silk thread. After tying one of the ends to a rock near the entrance to not get lost, he held onto the spool itself as they advanced.

They then crossed the abatis—its bamboo sticks with tips as sharp as spears—holding onto the rock walls on both their sides so that the current didn't drag them away.

“...... Let's go,” Wakamiya ordered. With that, the group stepped into the dark water.

They proceeded to go up the underground stream. While expected, the current proved to be quite swift. The water itself was cold and, polished by its flow, the bedrock was smooth and easy to slip off of. The walls’ rocky surface had barely any bumps, possibly because it too had been underwater once, which made finding purchase difficult.

Their group advanced slowly and deliberately, careful to not slip, but Chihaya's outstanding physical capabilities still came in handy in his role as the lead. He would tumble but never fall even at particularly difficult spots, where it was either hard to walk or easy to trip. Everyone else quietly followed after him, careful to take whatever path forward Chihaya had found.

The light of the torches at the entrance vanished as they followed the winding current, but the fatuous fire lamps’ flames fortunately proved to be enough of a light source. They advanced steadily like that for a while until, just as they passed through a slightly sloped spot, the waterway changed entirely.

“Woah,” even Yukiya let out an inadvertent gasp.

All of a sudden, the narrow pathway they had been walking through opened up. Its rocky surface was now speckled with giant, thick rocks that rose up from within the water. While the current at their feet went on, there were stones sprouting like bamboo shoots on top of whatever rock surface rose above the water level. Icicle-looking stones hung closely packed together from the ceiling too.

Shigemaru at the rear let out a shriek. “Yikes, we'll all be skewers if those fall on us.”

As they all took in the now illuminated space's odd appearance, Yukiya remembered something while observing those icicle-like stones. Actually, he had seen those before.

“There were rocks like these in the tunnels of the Undercity. Not nearly as many, but—”

“They’re stalactites. I heard about them in the Outside,” Wakamiya explained calmly. He was the only one among them with experience beyond Yamauchi's boundaries thanks to his time studying abroad. “The rocks’ source can be found in the water dripping from them. It takes quite a long time for any stalactites to get this big, apparently. I doubt they'll break that easily, but be careful.”

They all nodded and once again followed the flow of the water. Then, Chihaya stopped.

“...... The current has divided.”

“What!?”

Chihaya held his lamp forwards. He was right—the underground stream separated at that point into three branches. Yukiya was about to ask Wakamiya how to proceed, as they had no way to know which one was the right path to follow, when Chihaya's yelling stopped him.

“Wait a second!” Just as he said that, Chihaya jumped out of the water and ran as if bouncing over the slippery, rocky surface.

“Chihaya!? Did you find something?” Yukiya asked, following right after him in a panic. However, Chihaya didn't get to answer before Yukiya noticed the same thing.

“That's Haruma's strap!”

There was a piece of pure white fabric resting on one of those bamboo shoot rocks, and now that he paid attention to it, it stuck out, completely out of place. Upon further examination, they came to discover that it wasn’t simply wrapped around, but properly tied down. It didn't simply fall by accident—someone had left there. Intentionally.

“Do you think Haruma waited for an opening to do this?” Shigemaru pondered.

“I don't think so,” Sumio answered. “They went through the trouble to invite the Golden Raven. The Monkeys probably left it here as a waymark for us.”

Yukiya silently glared upstream.

“Let's move forward. The Monkeys and Haruma must be in this direction,” Wakamiya said. 

Everyone nodded in answer. Once again, they all started to walk in the indicated direction—progressing, however, from that point onwards proved a struggle. The water, which had been up to their knees until then, got deeper and deeper the more they advanced. To make matters even worse, the instances of the stones hanging from above and the ones growing from below connecting to form pillars became more and more frequent.

And then, there were the stones hanging so low they almost reached the water’s surface, leaving them with no choice but to dive into the water to pass through some areas.

While their bodies were chilled to the bone, they didn't hesitate in their way forwards even once. Whenever the path got particularly rough, there was always something peculiar confirming they were going in the correct direction.

The needle-sharp tips of the hanging rocks, all broken off.

“Remnants from the Monkey’s pass through here, most likely.”

“It must have hit its head, then.”

“—Or it broke them outright to make it easier to pass through.”

They moved on, waddling in the water for a while until Sumio found something on the bedrock, where clay had piled up. “Here, footprints.”

The water was quite clear, so it was easy to see the traces of the Monkey’s passing as long as they held up their fatuous fire lamps over it. Just as they observed them, Yukiya realized something disturbing—there was only one person’s worth of footprints there.

To make matters worse, the water level at that point went up to Yukiya’s chest and Haruma wasn't what one would call big. In his case, it may well have gone up to his head instead.

“...... Let's hurry,” Sumio said.

Nobody answered.

Finally, they reached a spot with terraced puddles—looking somewhat like small springs—stretching out in the distance. The sight was strikingly similar to that of the ridges on rice fields, all connected by stairs as often seen in the countryside.

They climbed their way through it, after which they once again faced a branching path. However, much like the time before, a torn white strap had been left there as a landmark. After taking the path given to them once more, they reached at last a more-or-less wide opening. Although they were inside a cave, the place felt more like the sandy bank of a river.

They held the lights up, searching for the way forwards, when they all heard Chihaya gulp and hiss. There, blended in with a strangely shaped rock, was a hunched, human-shaped figure.

“You bastard……!”

Yukiya almost threw himself at whatever that was, but Shigemaru managed to stop him in time, catching him by the arm. “Calm down, Yukiya. Leave this to His Highness Wakamiya, or did you forget why we came all the way here?”

He had lost his cool completely, Yukiya realized with a start—it was quite uncharacteristic of him. He stepped back with regained composure. Meanwhile, the human-shaped figure had hidden behind the rock out of shock at Yukiya's outburst, but, after waiting for a while, it finally took a fearful peek from its hiding spot again.

“The Crows’ chief…… Are you the Golden Raven?” it said with a low, hoarse voice.

——Those were Words of Within. No doubt about it.

“Yes, I'm the Golden Raven,” Wakamiya, warily and slowly, introduced himself. The moment he did so, it came out from behind the rock.

“Read the letter, right? I'm Kozaru. I won't harm you. I wanted to meet you, to talk with you,” the figure—a terribly tiny old man—started to passionately talk to him.

He appeared whitish under the fatuous fire lamps’ orange light. He wore a kimono resembling priestly cleansing robes(5), made of a glossy dark gray material. His white hair ran sparse and his face was entirely covered in wrinkles. Although he was in human form, even in such a shape he resembled a monkey.

“I came here just as promised. First, I'll have you return Haruma to us.”

“The boy?”

Yukiya's entire body went rigid as Wakamiya went for the subject right away. For some reason, the old man looked about to cry as he replied, “The boy is alright. Has no wounds.”

“Really?”

“Really. Will return home now. Come with me.” The old man was about to set off when he caught sight of the item in Shigemaru’s hand. He shook his head. “No good. From here, there are Monkeys who eat Crows and humans. Those who eat don't know this path. If they see that, they'll learn about it.”

The old man seemed to mean the jorougumo silk thread spool that Shigemaru had brought with him as a guide on their way back. Having more or less figured out what the man intended to say, Shigemaru held the spool up. “So, in short—there are man-eating Monkeys from here onwards, but they don't know this path exists. So you're telling me we're at risk of them discovering it if they happened to find this thread?”

“Yes! The man-eating Monkeys would.”

The way he spoke, it truly seemed to imply the old man was different. Wakamiya tilted his head. “...... You aren't one of those man-eating Monkeys, then?”

“I'm not. I won't harm you,” the old man answered in an oddly slow and measured manner. That done, he defenselessly turned his back to them, walking away full of restless energy.

Wakamiya gave Yukiya a careful signal with his eyes while avoiding the Monkey’s notice. Yukiya gave him a firm nod back. He had realized it the second he heard the old man's voice—it was just as Wakamiya had predicted. The Monkey who assaulted Yamauchi all those years ago, the one they talked with in the dried up well, and this one were different people. 

Because of that, they decided to do as instructed for the time being and, after they hid the thread spool under a rock, they followed the old man. They left the water behind, going into a dry cave without a word when the Monkey unexpectedly turned around.

“From here. Silence. Silence, got it?”

After saying that, the old man led them into a hole behind a nearby rock. It was well hidden—had they not been told about it, they wouldn't have ever found it themselves.

What awaited them at the other side wasn't a natural cave, like the one up to that point. The path had been clearly modified and remade by people's hands. It looked to be a corridor.

As Yukiya came to that conclusion, a younger man, much bulkier and better built than the Monkey accompanying them, appeared in front of them. Was that one of those man-eating Monkeys? They all took out their weapons. However, the young Monkey raised both his arms, showing his empty hands, with the deepest of scowls.

“This one is fine, so silence,” the old man said in a panic but, even with his assurance, they were incapable of relaxing. “He doesn't know the Crows’ words. He’ll keep see… look? View(6)……?”

As much as the old man tried to explain himself, his words failed him. He had his head cocked in confusion when Yukiya inadvertently came to his aid. “Do you perhaps mean ‘watch’?”

“That is! Watch. He'll keep watch. It's fine. It's here, hurry,” the old man said as he trotted away through the corridor and the group ran after him, their hands still on their weapons as they advanced. The young man, however, stayed right there, watching them go with his hands still up.

It didn't take them long to reach their destination.

“We arrived. Here.” The old man pointed at a place covered densely in withered vines.

At first, Yukiya couldn't quite make sense of his words. What did he mean by ‘here’? However, once he gave the place a better look, he found that behind the vines hid what seemed to be a broken double door.

While the surrounding walls were built out of carved bare rock, the gate was seemingly all wood with iron rivets. It was made to last, but someone had apparently smashed it with an axe at some point. To top it all off, withered wisteria vines came out from the open spot, entwined with one another.

Yukiya imagined there was some sort of room-like space on the other side but, with the wisterias in the way, it was impossible to see anything beyond them. He couldn’t even tell how they were supposed to go inside in the first place.

The old man, however, then went down on his knees and crawled through the vines, managing to cross to the other side of the broken door that way. They had come so far. To hesitate now of all moments would be incredibly stupid. Yukiya asked Shigemaru to keep watch out there just in case and followed after the old man, somehow forcing his way through the coiled vines.

Yukiya stood up the moment he was out of their grasp. Finally on the other side of the broken gate, he held his fatuous fire lamp up to illuminate the room he found himself in—the ceiling was much higher than he had ever expected it to be. Rather than a room, it would be better to call it a hall. One carved out in the rock itself.

It was about half as wide as the Monastery's great hall. The walls and floor were all covered in wisteria vines, yet he found someone lying down languidly at the center of the room, as if buried in the plants.

“Haruma!” Yukiya felt his heart tighten at the sight of his unmoving body. He dashed as fast as he could, checking his breathing the moment he got there.

“It's fine. He's just sleeping,” the Monkey said in a quiet voice.

He wasn’t lying. Haruma breathed and his heart was beating—Yukiya let out a big sigh of relief. That over, he turned around and nodded in the direction of Wakamiya and the others, who had followed after him, prompting yet another set of relieved sighs.

Now that he had the chance to take a better look, someone had changed Haruma into a dry white kimono. There was what seemed to be a bamboo bottle filled with water right beside his head accompanied by, from the looks of it, dango.

“This food. Don't tell me—” Sumio said, his voice strained.

“No!” the old man denied immediately. “It's made of fruit. No meat.”

Everyone's eyes focused on the Monkey, who explained himself in hushed tones, “If you eat human meat, body gets bigger. But you get stupid. Everyone, everyone got stupid.”

“So, you're telling us that eating human meat makes Monkeys grow larger, but it makes them dumber in exchange?”

“Yes!”

“So that's why you won't eat human meat……?” Sumio asked.

“I won't. Makes stupid,” the old man resolutely affirmed while looking at him. After that, Kozaru hesitantly bent himself forwards and, much to everyone's surprise, deeply bowed his head right on the spot. “...... I used the boy. Poor kid. It wasn't good. It was bad of me. My most heartfelt apologies.”

That last apology alone was unlike any of the old man's broken words up to that point. He sounded shockingly fluent for a second.

“How do you know the Words of Within?” Wakamiya asked him.

In turn, the Monkey lowered his head. “I learned. A long time ago. A long, long time ago.”

“Who taught you?”

Wakamiya’s question was met with the old man’s gaze on him—Kozaru didn’t move or talk at all. The moment he noticed Wakamiya’s questioning look, however, he slumped his shoulders in dejection. He didn’t answer.

Just as it had been promised to them, Haruma was safe and, at the present moment, Kozaru had given no signs of wanting to cause any harm to them either. What was even the old man's intention in bringing them here? It made less and less sense by the moment.

“...... My apologies for the question, but why did you do something like that?”

“It was necessary,” Kozaru answered the question instantly. “Truth is I wanted to meet you for a long time. But I couldn't meet you. There was a path before, but not now.”

“Did the Monkeys and the Crows interact before?”

“Yes!” Kozaru nodded incessantly at the dumbfounded Wakamiya. “We served Lord Yamagami together, led a proud and fruitful life,” the Monkey’s words turned fluent for a moment again before he let out a sigh. “The Monkeys who eat Crows. All are Monkeys who ate humans. They got a taste for it, went crazy. Before was different.”

Kozaru started to walk the very minute he said that, pushing away the vines intercepting his path. He went towards the wall opposite to the door they had all come through. 

“This is the path,” Kozaru said as he patted something.

Examining it a bit better, it turned out to not be a wall covered in vines like they had thought, but yet another door. It was about two times larger than the broken one they had passed before. Its surface was rounded and it too was double winged, its construction reminiscent of the Imperial Court's Great Gate.

“This opens. Open it.” Kozaru requested, his earnest eyes fixed right on Wakamiya. “The Crows’ house is on the other side. Monkeys don't open it, but you open.”

——’The Monkeys can't open it, but you can. So, please, open it.’

“...... Was this your goal?”

“Yes.”

“Why do you want me to do this?”

“It's needed. Can't stay like this. Everyone will die. But we have time yet.” Wakamiya frowned at the ominous words, while Kozaru kept going impatiently, “Lord Yamagami will go bad. Crows, Monkeys, everyone will go bad. If this path opens, it'll be a bit better.”

“Wait a moment! What's the connection between this door and Lord Yamagami? Give us a better, proper explanation. I can't figure out what you're trying to tell me.”

“I too don't know much. But doing it is better than not doing it. Open it, quickly.”

“Wait, Your Highness!”

Yukiya stopped Wakamiya right as Kozaru was pressuring him to go through with it.

“What?”

Wakamiya turned around and Yukiya pointed to a certain spot close to the door they had come through. “Don't you find it familiar? The way these wisteria vines grow out.” 

Yukiya had, in fact, been miffed by it from the very moment they had set foot in this place. It was easy to tell that the vines that extended over the whole place had, if one paid attention to it, multiple points of origin. Perhaps having realized what Yukiya was trying to tell him, Wakamiya started to check their surroundings.

Sumio approached one of those spots and, after examining it, raised his voice high, “It's an arrow! It's starting to rot away, but this old arrow here is where the wisterias are coming from.”

To mend the Tears on Yamauchi's Barrier using wisteria vines was one of Wakamiya's powers as a True Golden Raven—one employed with a bow made of green wood and arrows with heads of stone.

“...... This place is under the protection of someone's barrier.”

“So it seems. Someone with powers akin to yours, whoever it was, closed this door. There has to be a meaning to that, don't you think? Is it truly a good idea to break the barrier without first learning why it's here?” Yukiya warned him. “So, Kozaru or however you're called, could you tell us about who put up this barrier and why he did it?”

The tone of Yukiya's question was harsh. Kozaru, however, chose to remain in silence, giving him no answer. As that happened, Wakamiya had started to wander around, checking the hall out, when his gaze fell upon something right beside Kozaru, below the door itself. He froze completely.

“Is something wrong?” Sumio asked Wakamiya, approaching him. He followed Wakamiya's gaze with his—and made a harsh sound with his throat. Having noticed their odd behavior, Yukiya left Haruma under Chihaya's care and ran towards them as well. As soon as he got closer, Yukiya saw something there, hidden deep under the vines.

An old, dried out corpse.

It was there, sitting, leaning against the tightly closed door. It hadn't rotten, its skin instead desiccated and parched, barely adhering to the bones underneath anymore. It was impossible to tell the color of it anymore, but it was dressed in what seemed to be the robes typical of the Imperial Court. Its hand—quite literally only skin and bones—held a bow. Its hair was long and tied up.

Yukiya turned around, confirming the direction the corpse was facing—as he had expected, it was in a direct diagonal to all the arrows that acted as the source of the barrier.

“It seems that this person put up the barrier, huh? And then, right after doing so, he perished……” Now done with examining the dried out corpse, Yukiya turned around. The moment he did so, he was left speechless—there was clearly something wrong with Wakamiya. “Your Highness?”

A tottering Wakamiya approached the corpse, extending his hand to touch its face. “It's me.”

“Huh?”

“This corpse is me.”

Yukiya felt a chill down his back—it was all just as he had suspected. “... So this corpse is the previous True Golden Raven?”

“Are your memories back then!?” Sumio asked with astonishment.

Wakamiya didn't answer, his gaze instead hurriedly drifting through their surroundings. “No…… Well, yes. I died here. I had to protect my children, the Yatagarasu and—I was so desperate, so lost on it,” he murmured during the last part.

Wakamiya then opened his eyes wide. “This is bad.”

“What?”

“We must not be here. We must not open this door. Hurry, let's go back!”

“No! You must not run away!” Suddenly, Kozaru raised his voice in anger. Sumio quickly stepped in to keep the distance between him and Wakamiya, ensuring Kozaru couldn’t harm the latter in any form. Seeing that, Kozaru's face twisted in despair. “This is probably last. This is bad, no other chances. You ran away. Because of that, it all went bad. Are you running away again!?”

Although Kozaru had been the one to insist on being quiet when they first met, he was almost screaming at the end. Then, the sound of people running and Shigemaru's own yelling came from the other side of the vines. “That young Monkey from before has brought a lot of other Monkeys with him. They’re approaching as we speak!”

“Really!?”

“They are still far away, but we don't have much time.”

“Shit, so it was a trap after all!” Sumio clicked his tongue.

Yukiya, on the other hand, spoke in a calm manner, “Let's not panic. We still have the advantage as long as we manage to get to the point where we left the thread spool.”

Wakamiya glanced at him. “Will we be able to hold on until we get there?”

“It's not that far. With our current party, we can perfectly manage even with a frontal breakthrough.”

“But that means—” ‘You're leaving the unconscious Haruma out of your calculations, aren't you?’ Wakamiya was about to say the words, but he seemed to choose against it at the last moment. Still, they had always known this could turn out to be the case.

“Our duty is to bring Your Highness back to Yamauchi safe and sound. Leave Haruma's wellbeing to me.” Wakamiya looked back at him wordlessly. Yukiya nodded quietly. “I know the risks.”

“Your Highness. A decision, please,” Sumio rushed him.

However, before Wakamiya had a chance to utter a single word, Kozaru muttered, “The Monkeys coming here are many. Dumb Monkeys, strong Monkeys. Someone could die. But there's a way,” the old man proclaimed in a somewhat somber manner. “...... Open the gate. Run away through it.”

“Did you plan to have us assaulted by the other Monkeys from the start?” Wakamiya asked him in a low voice.

Kozaru gave them what looked like a wry smile. “I said it. I won't harm you. I don't want to harm you. You will return home. Everyone will be fine. So open the door.”

“There's no need to do that.” As he said that, Yukiya grabbed Kozaru by the arms and twisted them, pinning him to the ground. “Everything I said before was in the hypothetical case of combat, but we have you here with us. You can just be our hostage.”

That had always been the reason why Yukiya had followed the man so nonchalantly to such a place. He had seen the other man—the younger Monkey—salute Kozaru with his eyes when they crossed paths, while he was holding his arms up. They both had probably intended it to go unnoticed, but Yukiya clearly caught Kozaru giving the Monkey a magnanimous nod back.

Add to that the clothes the old man was wearing, and Yukiya was certain his position within his community was relatively high. It should make him more than valuable enough to act as a hostage. They may have succeeded in luring the Golden Raven to them, yes, but they had proven to still be quite stupid to Yukiya's eyes.

Within the vines his face was buried in, Kozaru let out a terribly dry laugh. “That won't do. Probably the Monkeys coming will kill me.”

“What—?”

“Monkeys who eat humans and Monkeys who don't. Different. I wanted to meet you, the Monkeys' chief didn’t want to meet. I—” Kozaru followed, his voice tinged with loneliness. “I betrayed our chief. He won't forgive me.”

——Was that a bluff?

Unable to determine it by himself, Yukiya turned his face towards his Lord. Wakamiya had his head tilted as he watched Kozaru's face intently.

“...... Yukiya, let him go.” Yukiya instantly released his grip on the Monkey, obeying orders. Kozaru sluggishly sat up but didn't stand, choosing instead to remain on the ground. “Listen. Have we ever met before?”

“You remember me?” Kozaru asked, raising his head in surprise.

Wakamiya, meanwhile, held his hand to his forehead as if in pain. “...... I don't know. I’m only sure that I once experienced something horrifying here and then I died—and yet, I wonder why. I can’t shake off the feeling that I knew you before.”

The moment he said that, understanding seemed to spark in Kozaru's dull eyes. “Trust me. I, you—no, Your Highness, I don't pretend to harm. I humbly plead with you. Please, return to this place!”

“They'll be here soon! And they even brought bows with them!” Shigemaru yelled to them as, his impatience winning over, he crossed over to their side of the vines as well.

“Everyone, get in position,” Sumio commanded. Instantly, Chihaya and Shigemaru both placed themselves in between Wakamiya and the entrance, their swords out.

The sound of the Monkeys’ shrill voices and their impressive footsteps reached them now. There was no time for hesitation. Faced with bows, they would be easy prey just standing around here. Whether they chose to open the door or to attempt a frontal breakthrough, they had to do so fast.

And yet, Yukiya couldn't tell which was the right option.

“Your Highness, the True Golden Raven,” Yukiya gathered his resolve and called out to his Lord. “This situation has now long surpassed what can be judged by logic alone. We'll follow whatever choice Your Highness makes. No matter how this ends, we won't resent you. Either way, be it all according to your wishes.”

The tension in the room was palpable. In the midst of it, Wakamiya looked at everyone one by one. Yukiya, the Monkey, his bodyguards standing around him and the unconscious Haruma.

Quietly, he made his choice.

“Let's open the door.”

⊛　　　　　⊛　　　　　 ⊛

The second his hand rested on the door, pain struck Wakamiya. It felt as if there was something there, something spreading like cobwebs all over his hand, getting absorbed within it. It was the late Golden Raven's strong will—his determination to not let the door ever open again.

What few memories Wakamiya had recovered were all warped. What had he feared so much? Why did he have to close this gate no matter what? He didn't get any of it. In such a state, the reason he chose to ‘open the door’—an idea that his late self had so loathed—was actually quite simple: in his current ignorance, only one thing was certain to him. Kozaru wasn’t trying to harm them.

——’How did I even dare to call myself a True Golden Raven when I'm like this’.

As he inwardly mocked himself over his own feelings on the matter, the kind he couldn't let anyone else know, Wakamiya clenched his fists. In so doing, he felt something invisible warp and twist. He held onto that with his hands and pulled with all his strength and, just like that, he could feel the imperceptible mesh on the door tearing off.

A moment later, the vines covering the door that he had been touching started to sprout new leaves. They had all been withered and dead, yet, all of a sudden, the bursting spirit of spring took over them, the breath of life moving from one to the next.

New vines started to spread over the room at an impressive speed. Young green leaves were born and from there spilled flower clusters, filled to the brim with purple buds.

“Open!” 

The second Wakamiya commanded it so, the buds bloomed instantly and the sweet aroma of nectar filled the entire place. The green leaves rustled for a short moment and the revived vines glided, spontaneously moving away from the door—as if every single one of them was a living creature capable of understanding Wakamiya's commands.

The Monkeys, who had apparently just arrived in front of the broken door, let out gasps of surprise at the sight. Wakamiya turned around. Life had apparently returned to all the vines in the room and, perhaps having taken on Wakamiya’s will, the wisterias closer to the entrance had grown far thicker and more numerous, blocking off the Monkeys’ way.

“Impressive work.” Shigemaru and Chihaya, who hadn't seen the True Golden Raven's powers at work before, were left in shock, but Yukiya modestly praised him. Yet Wakamiya, who felt no pride for the job, turned once again towards Kozaru. He stood petrified among the purple flowers.

“If we return now, you said you'll be killed, right?” Kozaru looked at Wakamiya in a daze. “Come with us.”

Upon hearing that, Kozaru's eyes went so wide they looked about to fall off. “Come…?”

“There’s too much we don’t understand. What happened in the past. What took place here. Please, share everything you know with us.”

Kozaru’s lips trembled. He looked about to cry. He stood up with a stagger and then, the moment he tried to answer—someone tore the wisterias covering the broken door off with sheer strength. It opened a small gap and, from it, a flash of reflected light appeared.

“Your Highness!” Sumio and Yukiya both jumped forwards straight away, but the released arrow wasn't aiming at Wakamiya. It went directly towards Kozaru, piercing his back.

Confused, Kozaru’s gaze drifted towards both the arrow sticking out of his chest and Wakamiya. Then, he chuckled. “Farewell.”

——They couldn’t hold on any longer.

The Monkeys’ angry yells resounded through the entire room, the green vines blocking the entrance falling to the ground one after the other. The people armed with bows were now visible at the other side, aiming at them through the hole. The next moment, a rain of arrows fell on them. The Yatagarasu were left with no alternative but retreat.

Wakamiya touched the door. It had no doorknob, and yet it opened as soon as he did so.　They all slid to the other side, dragging with them the corpse of the past True Golden Raven, which had collapsed backwards the moment the wood’s support vanished. 

Yukiya too sprinted there with Haruma on his back. Once they confirmed everyone had gone through the door, Shigemaru and Chihaya closed each one of the doors. That over, Wakamiya locked the gate—the sound of the commotion on its other side died off completely when he did so.

——For a while, the only noise around was their desperate gasps for air. Nobody there could bring himself to talk.

“...... Are we back in Yamauchi?” Shigemaru finally asked hesitantly.

Sumio answered as he wiped off his sweat, “Yes… so it seems…”

A round hall and stone coffins. Water which poured from the latter. From afar, they heard the stunned shouts of the group of priests who had found them there. Sumio put on a mirthless attempt at a grin as he informed the rest about the place they found themselves in.

“We’re in the Forbidden Gate.”

⊛　　　　　⊛　　　　　 ⊛

“How rare. A small Monkey(7). Did you just arrive here?” the man asked, his voice tinged with cheerful mirth. “I guess you don’t know our words yet. Do you want a snack? We’ve got sweets.”

He probably offered it simply out of a whim, but that didn’t change the fact that the man had been kind to him. It made him realize they weren’t all bad people like the others in his community said.

He was so pretty and nice—ah, he didn’t want to hate this man.

——That’s why he had wanted to do whatever was within his power.

Then, something cut off that nostalgic dream.

As Kozaru came back to himself, the aroma of wisteria flowers and his own blood overtook his nose. He didn’t feel any pain, but a hopeless cold overtaking him instead. Someone was peering right at him. It was the man he had ended up betraying in the end, despite how much it had crushed his heart to do so—his precious chief.

“You truly went and acted all on your own, huh? It’s a tad too early for that, you know.” The world got darker by the moment, yet the man’s voice reached Kozaru clearly. “But, well. With this, now we won’t have to break the door open by brute force. Let me say my thanks for that. It may be nice to have the Gate open properly when the time comes.”

Kozaru squeezed some words out of his throat. The sound of blood spurting out of his mouth accompanied his attempt to speak. “I plead with you, stop. Our kin have all lost their minds to stupidity because of all the human eating. At this rate, it won’t only be the Yatagarasu but us too who will—”

“And? What’s the problem? We’re doing it fully aware of the consequences, remember?”

“Please, reconsider. By all means, I earnestly plead with you—”

Kozaru wasn’t sure how many of his words actually managed to come out of his mouth. Regardless, at least from the sound of it, it wasn’t like his adored chief had the intention to pay his words any mind whatsoever.

“Ah, I’m so looking forward to it. Raven of Gold, just wait a little more. Just a little more, and I’ll go to welcome you back myself.” Kozaru heard the chief talk to himself with great anticipation, farther and farther away.

“I earnestly plead—”

He was so, so cold.

His consciousness gave out, once and for all.

⊛　　　　　⊛　　　　　 ⊛

The Imperial Court fell into chaos the moment they learned that the Monkeys were hiding—out of all places—in the depths within the Central Mountain, on the other side of the Forbidden Gate. It was locked off, but there was no guarantee that such a thing could entirely block any attempts at invasion. From there on, Guards were posted there around the clock just in case the Monkeys came, the security around it greatly tightened with the new addition of a number of soldiers.

There was no way the government could stay in a Court that the Monkeys could attack at any given moment, so its functions were hence determined to be moved away from the Central Mountain. Those affluent enough fought each other to run away ahead of everyone else, requesting new abodes in the countryside.

In the middle of such mayhem, a ceremony took place at the Forbidden Gate.

A white, impressive courtly robe embroidered in gold. A crown made of gold and jewels. The dried up corpse wearing them was in such a poor state that the luxurious outfit made it all look almost comical instead of tragic.

Alas, nobody was there to see it.

Such a burial would have been originally held for the entire country, yet the only noblemen in attendance were Wakamiya and Natsuka. Not even the Acting Golden Raven, the Empress or the Four Houses’ Heads were present—the Forbidden Gate’s surroundings were oddly quiet.

As the priests solemnly prayed(8) to Yamagami, they placed the corpse in the place it belonged with their own hands—the empty coffin finally welcoming its owner.

——Just like that, Naritsuhiko, the previous True Golden Raven, returned to Yamauchi after a long hundred years. The very instant his coffin was raised beside the Forbidden Gate, water started to pour from within it.

As soon as Yukiya had confirmed that this burial ceremony one hundred years in the making had finished, he took a glance at his Lord’s face—his sullen look remained unchanged. From the way Wakamiya wordlessly shook his head, Yukiya could tell the state of his memories remained more or less unchanged.

“Naritsuhiko tried to let Land Sovereign Eiju—Kageki(9) escape.” Wakamiya muttered to Yukiya. With the ceremony over, they had headed back to Sunrise Palace. “He knew that simply locking the Gate wouldn’t be enough. He didn’t believe himself capable of protecting the Yatagarasu from some sort of menace out there, so he opened a way for Kageki alone to go back and stayed there in order to seal the Forbidden Gate…… But,” Wakamiya’s eyes wandered with uncertainty, “I still can’t remember the most critical part—why things first got like that.”

After saying that, Wakamiya covered his face with his hands. For him, having recovered just a tiny amount of his memories of the past seemed to be a much more tormenting experience than remembering nothing at all.

It frustrated Yukiya to be unable to help him with it, but he wasn’t the only powerless one. In fact, nobody was capable of aiding Wakamiya in this. “I wonder if the danger across the Forbidden Gate was the Monkeys, by any chance?”

“...... I don’t know.”

For the late Golden Raven to be so afraid—what could he have been running from?

⊛　　　　　⊛　　　　　 ⊛

A tepid breeze carried the petals of the nearby peach trees, making them dance in the grey sky. Among the dark clouds, bluish white light appeared from time to time, followed by the falling of a thunderous roar powerful enough to make the earth tremble. Spring thunders.

There was no rain, but the weather was so bad it was even laughable. Yukiya remembered how clear the day he first arrived at the Monastery had been as he intently watched the sky through the lattice window.

The Unbending Reed Monastery’s Graduation Ceremony took place right after the burial ceremony for the previous True Golden Raven did—albeit it turned out to be a much smaller deal than originally planned.

The event was in the Monastery’s great hall.

Wakamiya, Natsuka and the Director stood at the front with Rokon, Sumio and Akeru right behind them. The Instructors in charge of the graduates, like Seiken and Kashin, were in line with all the others. The trainees too were in formation—their numbers slightly smaller than they had been just a little while earlier.

After the Monkey incident, a high number of trainees from noble origins had abandoned the Monastery. They were the kind likely to disappear from its halls one way or the other, but to see them all leave in one go like that still gave Yukiya something to think about.

First in line among the Seeds was a recovered Haruma, his back fully straightened as he waited. He had woken up, safe and sound, just a while after their group had returned to Yamauchi—that said, at the time, Haruma had a hard time believing everything that had happened while he was soundly asleep.

“I mean, all I know is what happened up until that first encounter with that Monkey. I turned my back to it as I tried to run away and then I remember feeling something hit my head, but aside from that……” Being soaked aside, they ultimately didn’t find any wounds on Haruma besides a bump on the head.

Knowing now that Haruma had remained unconscious the entire time, Yukiya could guess that the Monkey had carried him all the way to that hall. It at least explained the lack of footsteps on the bottom of the water. He had come to suspect that the kidnapper had actually been that younger Monkey on watch duty.

However young and strong the man had been, to carry someone without accidentally inflicting any injury on him whatsoever, all by himself, through a path so difficult that walking alone was a struggle, with all those stalactites hanging from the ceiling—Yukiya could only imagine how much care that had required of him.

But it wasn’t only that. Yukiya recalled they had changed the sleeping Haruma’s clothes and prepared him food. What had been the plan of the Monkeys who had sought to contact them? It made less and less sense the more he thought about it.

The ceremony proceeded in silence, irrespective of Yukiya’s inner turmoil. Out of the twenty four trainees who took part in the entrance ceremony the year Yukiya joined, in the end, barely eight had managed to make it safely to graduation.

One by one, the graduating trainees returned their ornamented blades to the Director. Wakamiya then exchanged places with him and granted an actual tachi to each of them. Their names were called from the worst score to the best.

“Third place. Shigemaru of Shimaki.” Upon hearing that, Shigemaru stepped forwards in a dignified manner to receive his tachi from Wakamiya. “I’ve heard you possess both skill with a sword and a virtuous character. It’s my wish to protect all Yatagarasu with you, who prides himself on protecting what’s important with no conceit about power. Shall I count on you?”

“Gladly so.”

“Then, from this moment onwards, you are part of the Yamauchi Guard. I entrust to you the protection of Sunrise Palace. Salute!”

“As you wish!” Graciously accepting the tachi, Shigemaru returned as the next person was called forwards—Chihaya.

“Second place, Chihaya of Hae.” Chihaya approached Wakamiya quietly, slightly bowing at him. “I’ve heard you excel in all manners of combat and your skill has no equal. It’s my wish to protect all Yatagarasu with you, who possesses a heart that won’t yield to tyranny and cares about the weak. Shall I count on you?”

“Gladly so.”

“Then, from this moment onwards, you are part of the Yamauchi Guard. I entrust to you my own protection. Salute!”

“As you wish!” Chihaya took the tachi, his expression unflinching, and returned to the line. It was finally time for the last man to be called forwards.

“First place, Yukiya of Taruhi.”

The second Yukiya’s name was called, Haruma took a big audible breath. Yukiya glanced at his junior—obviously much more moved by his graduation than Yukiya himself—as he walked to stand in front of the man he had chosen(10) as his Lord a long, long time ago.

“I’ve heard your martial arts are beyond reproach and your skills in archery too are of particular note. More important, however, is your unparalleled talent as a tactician, the kind our country hasn’t ever seen before—I see no bigger fortune than to have you with us in this era. It’s my wish for you to aid all Yataragasu in any ways I cannot. Shall I count on you?”

“Gladly so.”

“Then, from this moment onwards, you are part of the Yamauchi Guard. I entrust to you my own protection—and the role of Tactical Counselor for the Guard.” Yukiya bowed his head in answer to Wakamiya’s dispassionate words. “Salute!”

Yukiya took the tachi obediently—used as he was to the ornamented blade, it felt profoundly heavier.

A roll of thunder, like the skies’ roars, resounded as Wakamiya stood at the great hall’s seat of honor.

“A storm is coming.” Wakamiya declared quietly as he looked at the line of newly appointed members of the Yamauchi Guard. “The day we trade blows with the Monkeys will come soon. The Imperial Court won’t be able to remain as it is now, and change unavoidably awaits all of Yamauchi. But,” Wakamiya lifted his voice, clear and high. Not even an inkling of his own private agonies leaking through. “I swear to protect all Yatagarasu in Yamauchi, including you all, for as long as I’m the Golden Raven. We’ll withstand whatever storm comes our way. That’s why, gentlemen, I ask you to allow me to dedicate my life to this duty.”

All the eyes in the hall were focused on him. Wakamiya subconsciously smiled. “I trust all of you. I’ll be in your hands.”

There was a new gentleness to Wakamiya’s voice—unlike anything before—as he said those words.

Then, with a motion they had repeated more than they could ever remember during the last three years, the new Yamauchi Guards saluted, offering their Third Leg to their Lord.

Year Twelve of the Gentle Raven, the Third Month of the Lunar Calendar.

The year after the Yatagarasu suffered the second Monkey invasion, all of the Imperial Court’s operations were fully moved to a detached palace, the Above Clouds Palace. Although much chaos ensued during the early periods of the move, it was believed to have taken a reasonable time for the Imperial Court to resume functions.

However, using this opportunity, the Crown Prince Nazukihiko performed large-scale reforms at the Court. The heart of the operations was a group of young geniuses hailing from the Unbending Reed Monastery—a collective that included esteemed sons of the Western and Northern Houses. As a result, the Crown Prince gained the support of two of the Four Houses and succeeded in establishing a government with him at the center.

Right after the new government started operating, however, an unprecedented great earthquake would come to shake all of Yamauchi.

The Raven of the Empty Coffin: The End

Next: On Never Bending

—---—---—---—---—---—---—---—---—---—---

1: Oozaru (大猿) is what they called the Monkey at the dried-up well during Golden Raven. It simply means “big monkey”. It will remain untranslated as it’s used in practice as a name.

2: As alluded to here, the language spoken in Yamauchi is referred to as 御内詞 (Miuchikotoba) by the Yatagarasu. The “Mi” is essentially a prefix showing respect to the “uchi” which is the uchi from Yamauchi and means “inside”, and finally the “kotoba” isn’t using the usual kanji (言葉) but 詞, which also means words but it’s used more in the context of poetry or music lyrics. Words of Within is my take on the idea, as it mostly respects the spirit of the original while being understandable.

3: Fatuous Fire Lamps refer to the type of lamp Yukiya uses when going into the cave during Golden Raven. In short, they use 鬼火 (Fatuous Fire), which within the story’s lore consume sugar to light up instead and don’t risk burning your house if left unchecked or broken. This makes lamps using Fatuous Fires desirable and expensive—they’re a common sight in nobles’ houses and in places where the risk of a fire would be too great like libraries and archives.

4: Jorougumo (女郎蜘蛛) refers to both a type of youkai and a spider species. The youkai is known for appearing near to sources of water, where she ties the legs of her victims with her silk and drags them down to drown them. The Jorougumo takes the appearance of a beautiful woman during the day, but returns to her giant spider form during the night. Within Yamauchi, Jorougumo silk is treated as a luxury item for its high resilience with a lot of clothes for nobles being partly made of it—including the outfit Masuho no Susuki lends to Yukiya when he goes to the Undercity and ends up going into the cave.

5: It refers to a Joue (浄衣), an outfit employed during religious ceremonies, particularly those requiring a purification. They’re mostly white and with no pattern whatsoever.

6: In Japanese, “to keep watch” is said 見張る (Miharu), or 見張り (Mihari) when used as a noun. Here, Kozaru is trying a variety of verbs starting with 見 (Mi-): Mitoru (見取る), Mikiru (見切る) because he can’t remember the correct term. 見 as a kanji means “to see”.

7: Kozaru (小猿) means “small/little monkey”. It may have seemed quite the odd name/pseudonym for an old man, but there’s a reason for it.

8: These are specifically Shinto prayers, but Yamauchi has no understanding of ‘Shinto’ as a concept due to its isolation from wider Japan so it was impossible to include it here in an organic manner.

9: The late Land Sovereign’s name is 景樹, which can be read both as Eiju and Kageki. It’s implied here that he decided to change the reading to Eiju when he became Land Sovereign, but his name was originally Kageki—which is hence the name Naritsuhiko was familiar with and the name our Nazukihiko now remembers him by in consequence. The kanji for his name mean Scenery and Trees/To Establish respectively.

10: The verb used here is quite interesting. Yukiya’s narration uses 定める, which effectively means what I translated: To choose, to decide, to ordain. What’s notable to me (because Abe Chisato doesn’t use this verb often) is the word hidden within 定める—Sadame (定め). One of Sadame’s meanings is that of predestination or fate, albeit it often has a connotation of tragedy.

[dawnfinchh]

i made full "canon" allegiances for the start of the apprentice's quest: link to google doc

this is a part of a little series im doing, where im making full allegiances for the first book of every arc in order. i did bramblestar's storm before this due to the large time gap between the apprentice's quest and the fourth apprentice

here is the masterpost for all the allegiances

“canon” is in quotations because a lot of this is guesswork about who logically would be around at that point in time, but aren’t listed in allegiances or mentioned in the book.

this is mainly meant to be a resource for fanworks

general stuff that’s all still same as last time:

wiki pages are linked to character’s names

med cat = cleric

characters are listed by age. where there are no concrete ages, i make my best guess

tc is the only clan without a “kit” rank as all kits in the clan have known parents, tho we are entering an era where the majority of kits of all clans are starting to have known parents! just in general there is a lot less guesswork as non-tc clans have more filled out allegiances

thunderclan:

pretty much just the allegiances from the apprentice's quest, listed in accordance of age

shadowclan:

grassheart - she is listed as a queen in taq's allegiances and her kits are born next book, but due to the amount of time that passes, i don't think that she would be pregnant quite yet, or at least not noticeably so

riverclan:

sneezecloud is FINALLY a warrior. his apprenticeship took literal years

lakeheart's kits are not listed in taq's allegiances but they are mentioned as being born in like, chapter three, so i think it's fine to list them as born

wavekit/wavepaw and cypresskit/cypresspaw - they are apprentices in thunder and shadow, so making them kits here works. they have no canon mentors

beetlewhisker is not listed bc he is dead

windclan:

whiskernose is listed bc while he is not in avos allegiances, he shows up in surrounding SE and novellas, and in later arcs

outsiders:

pebbleshine and mistfeather - they are listed bc they are around the area. pebbleshine is tagged as (expecting kits) rather than having twig and violet listed bc i do think it's likely that she gave birth like 0.5 seconds before alderpaw found them

darktail's group is listed

[joshuamj]

EoW Zelda and Link designs

[skitskatdacat63]

2023 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix - Fernando Alonso

[killjoy-prince]

Ray's After Ending is so funny because for a good chunk of it, most of the RFA members are knocked out by V's sleeping gas (Saeran is immune, Saeyoung isn't present bc he was kidnapped by his agency under his father's orders and MC wakes up in like an hour) but the game has a call feature where you can call the characters and it would be a waste if you couldn't use it bc the characters were unavailable so instead they have other people pick up the call (Jumin's driver picks up Jumin's phone, Jumin's father picks up Zen's phone, Yoosung's friends and mom pick up Yoosung's phone and Jaehee's coworkers pick up Jaehee's phone) and we do get to learn about the characters from outsider's point of view but it's so funny to me that these people are visiting their loved ones and suddenly the phone rings and they decide to just. answer it. and start talking to this stranger they've never met

[arolesbianism]

Having realizations while looking through some of the newer logs again

[sharlsworld]

⋆⭒˚.⋆ guilty pleasure - 𝐂𝐋𝟏𝟔 ✴︎

（ 𝗉𝖺𝗂𝗋𝗂𝗇𝗀 ）𝖼𝗁𝖺𝗋𝗅𝖾𝗌 𝗅𝖾𝖼𝗅𝖾𝗋𝖼 𝗑 𝖺𝗋𝗍𝗁𝗎𝗋𝗌 𝖻𝖾𝗌𝗍 𝖿𝗋𝗂𝖾𝗇𝖽 𝗋𝖾𝖺𝖽𝖾𝗋

（ 𝗌𝗎𝗆𝗆𝖺𝗋𝗒 ）𝖼𝗁𝖺𝗋𝗅𝖾𝗌 𝗁𝖺𝗌 𝖺 𝗅𝗂𝗍𝗍𝗅𝖾 𝗌𝗅𝗂𝗉 𝗎𝗉 𝗈𝗇 𝗂𝗇𝗌𝗍𝖺𝗀𝗋𝖺𝗆 𝖺𝗇𝖽 𝖺𝖼𝖼𝗂𝖽𝖾𝗇𝗍𝖺𝗅𝗅𝗒 𝗋𝖾𝗏𝖾𝖺𝗅𝗌 𝗌𝗈𝗆𝖾𝗍𝗁𝗂𝗇𝗀 𝗍𝗁𝖺𝗍 𝗁𝖺𝗌 𝗁𝗂𝗆 𝖿𝗂𝗀𝗁𝗍��𝗇𝗀 𝖿𝗈𝗋 𝗁𝗂𝗌 𝗅𝗂𝖿𝖾 𝗂𝗇 𝗍𝗁𝖾 𝖼𝗈𝗆𝗆𝖾𝗇𝗍𝗌 𝗈𝖿 𝗁𝗂𝗌 𝗂𝗇𝗌𝗍𝖺𝗀𝗋𝖺𝗆

note ✫ pt. 2 of my best friends brother, this could be read as a stand alone but would make more sense to look at the other smau. the first post is kinda suggestive

🝮

yn

liked by pierregasly and 1,728,306 others

yn was going through my camera roll, i miss summer so bad

charles_leclerc first

charles_leclerc I remember that week was absolute hell I felt like a teenage boy going through puberty

⤷ arthur_leclerc ew is that why you wouldn’t play chicken with us??? y/n wanted to play so bad then you ran away. you sicko what a perv

⤷ charles_leclerc It’s not funny arthur and I don’t know why you would suggest musical chairs on a fucking boat but that was horrible she sat on my lap and I almost creamed my pants right there

⤷ arthur_leclerc No one wants to know that you fuckin perv 🤮🤮 #lockcharlesup

⤷ charles_leclerc stop calling me a sicko and a perv just because she’s younger then me. i’ll purple nurple you arthur.

⤷ arthur_leclerc I’ll shave all your hair off when you’re asleep. You sleep like a rock you won’t feel a thing.

⤷ charles_leclerc I’ll shave your eyebrows off then you cunt

⤷ yn ok let’s stop there 😊

⤷ charles_leclerc Whatever you say bébé

francisca.cgomes hottie 😍😍🤤

carlossainz55 Who’s that cutie in the last slide?

⤷ alex_albon I thought we had a connection…we went on a coffee date carlos 😔

⤷ carlossainz55 Shhh look away baby, he has attachment issues…you’re the one I come home to every day 😘

⤷ yn ally 🏳️‍🌈 now get this gay fest out of my comment section

🝮

charles_leclerc

liked by lewishamilton and 5,544,814 others

charles_leclerc y/n via jade’s instagram story

lorenzotl Wrong account?

arthur_leclerc is this meant for what i think it’s meant for?

jade_distinguinn Ummm???

lando charles marc hervé perceval leclerc do you run a fan page for your little brothers best friend? OMG IM GONNA GO FIND IT SHUT UP

georgerussell63 Ah, you’re one of us

⤷ danielricciardo NO WAY I FUCKING CALLED IT THIS IS SO CRAZY YOU LIAM ALEX AND LANDO OWE ME 300 BUCKS IM GONNA BE RICH

⤷ liamlawson30 you’re already rich?

⤷ danielricciardo Shut up and venmo me my money cunt

danielricciardo THIS IS THE BEST DAY OF MY LIFE

arthur_leclerc OMG YOU RUN A FUCKING FAN ACCOUNT FOR Y/N THIS IS SO AMAZING WHATS THE USERNAME PLEASE

alex_albon this is tewww good drop the user king

leclerc_pascale Charles how long has this been going on?

pierregasly NO WAY BRO YOUR LIFE IS OVER

maxverstappen1 Absolute gold, this is pure cinema. Keep it up mate 🥳😂

lando SHUT UP ARE YOU CHARLESLOVESYN???

⤷ liamlawson30 NO WAY I FUCKING LOVE THAT ACCOUNT BRO

⤷ alex_albon I always wondered how they were always so quick to update

⤷ georgerussell63 Omg no way I stalk that account every night before bed

⤷ danielricciardo SHUT UP AND VENMO ME MY MONEY YOU GUYS PLEASUHHHHH

arthur_leclerc CHARLES TELL US YOUR SECRETS HOW DO YOU MANAGE A SUCCESSFUL FANPAGE WHILE BEING A F1 DRIVER??? 🎤🎤🎤

yn awhhh charles baby you’re so sweet

⤷ arthur_leclerc WTF THATS SO CREEPY??? ITS BEEN GOING SINCE 2021 THATS WHEN YOU TURNED 18????

⤷ yn don’t be mean arthur it’s sweet

⤷ arthur_leclerc oh my gosh you poor thing he’s brainwashed you 💔

⤷ yn stop being mean or i’ll post that one picture of you for everyone to see

⤷ arthur_leclerc 🤐

🝮

charleslovesyn

liked by lando and 573,649 others

charleslovesyn l’amour de ma vie ❤️

estiebestie omg she looks so pretty where did you get this from??

⤷ charleslovesyn my camera roll??

⤷ estiebestie oh!

⤷ estiebestie OHHHHHH

lando I FOUND IT IM FASTER THEN THE FUCKING FBI THIS IS THE HIGHLIGHT OF MY LIFE

⤷ danielriccardo Bruh send me my money

⤷ lando are you going broke or something damn

maxverstappen1 How do you have 70k followers

⤷ alex_albon this is THE y/n fan page max

yn sweet babyyy i love you

⤷ pierregasly Wow you two are a different level of down bad for each other

leclerc_pascale Well, at least it’s a successful fan account son ❤️

arthur_leclerc If I speak…

⤷ yn shut up arthur you burned your neck with my curling iron and told everyone it was a hickey

⤷ arthur_leclerc Oh my goshhh why would you say that 😔

⤷ yn quit being mean to charles he’s feeling very overwhelmed right now

⤷ arthur_leclerc sorry i forgot he can’t focus on anything but you anymore 😒

⤷ yn you still watch moana whenever we finish watch a scary movie

⤷ arthur_leclerc y/n stopppppp

lance_stroll Bros really been playing hard to get when he’s been running a fan page since 2021

⤷ yn shut up maple licker go hug a moose or something

⤷ yn omg i’m sorry lance i just wanted to say that but i don’t know anyone else who’s canadian 😿

⤷ lance_stroll you’re gucci queen don’t fret

georgerussell63 What a time to be alive

⤷ danielriccardo Oh so you can comment on charles’ fan page for his gf but not venmo me my money I won fair and square??

⤷ georgerussell63 Give me a minute I’m still riding on the high of this whole thing

🝮

charles_leclerc

liked by arthur_leclerc and 3,381,160 others

charles_leclerc and what about it

francisca.cgomes King behavior honestly

alex_albon period

arthur_leclerc Okay tone the attitude down queen charles

⤷ yn 😐 have you learned nothing or do want me to tell everyone the time you peed yourself cause you got excited when you seen adele…last year

⤷ arthur_leclerc ain’t no way you just said that bruh 😓 i remember when you used to defend me like this when charles would be mean to me 😔

georgerussell63 Don’t ever let them shame the fan girl out of you ✊ we’re in this 4life

carlossainz55 Yesss queen show your true self

lilymhe I wish Alex would make a fan page for me too…guess he doesn’t love me 😔

⤷ alex_albon I literally tried and you told me no.

⤷ lilymhe BECAUSE YOU MADE A GOSSIP PAGE

⤷ alex_albon JUST SAY YOU HATE ME GOSH

danielricciardo i’m still waiting for my money…

⤷ lando we’re sending it damn 😒

⤷ georgerussell63 Do you need it for rent or something jeez…

⤷ alex_albon seriously you already blew through your savings or what??

⤷ liamlawson30 don’t worry bud, i sent you a little extra. get yourself something nice ❤️

⤷ danielricciardo You sent me 1 extra dollar…

⤷ liamlawson30 send that shit back then damn, everyone’s so ungrateful these days 😒

⤷ danielricciardo Hell nah I’m keeping that shit

[nereidprinc3ss]

hourglass

in which spencer disappears from fem!reader's life entirely for three months, right as it seems they were finally about to make things official. when he comes back they reunite, all the while knowing things can't be the same as they were.

18+ (smut, angst) warnings/tags: oh god so many. NOT canon compliant in the slightest, i make shit up, softdom!spence, nipple stuff prob, fingering, oral f receiving, piv sex, unprotected sex, pet names, tara mentioned, depression, mentions of trauma cause its the prison arc duh, passing mentions of alcohol, mentions of spencer losing weight, reader mistakenly thinks spencer tried to kill himself BUT ONLY FOR A SECOND, where is diana reid, nobody knows or cares, probably filming glee, optimistic ending a/n: haven't posted smut in forever but this wip required it and the angst was so angsty i just had to finish it. it was started in jan or feb and subsequently added to and changed months apart and then edited so the writing quality varies from section to section which i apologize for. originally based on good guy by julia jacklin... also the odyssey by homer? can't really explain that one you'll just have to see for yourself anyway byeeee ilysm!!! PLS tell me if you liked it! or if you hated it! but preferably if you liked it! MWAH! wc <12k

It’s been about three months since you last saw Spencer Reid.

About three months since you had an early Valentine’s Day celebration (even though you weren’t a couple) complete with champagne (even though he doesn’t usually drink) and slow dancing (even though you swore you’d be terrible and he spent the first ten minutes laughing at you as you stepped on his toes.)

About three months since you finally settled your head on his shoulder and let the warbling vinyl carry you somewhere distant as the two of you danced slow circles on the parquet floor for what felt like hours.

You’d have liked him to stay later that night. You’d have liked him to stay all night if you were being honest with yourself, but at 11:45 he gently pulled away and told you he had to go.

“Curfew?” you joked, the corner of your mouth lifting a little and you hoped you were hiding your disappointment well.

“Actually, I’m going down to Texas for a few days to speak with one of the leading doctors in experimental Alzheimer's and dementia treatment. I’m going to see if he can get my mom into a clinical trial. I leave early tomorrow morning.”

“Oh my god, that’s amazing, Spencer! What are you doing still here? You should be at home getting ready to go!”

A rosy blush stains his cheeks and he looks down at the ground, laughing that little self-deprecating laugh of his. It makes your heart dance to see him so happy, makes you want to wrap your arms around him and never let him go so that he knows how much you absolutely adore him—but you settle for an affectionate squeeze where your hands have come to rest on his biceps.

“I wanted to see you tonight because I won’t be here for Valentine’s Day... but I still really wanted to spend it with you,” he admits meekly.

If before your heart was dancing, it is now melting.

The dreaded ‘what are we’ talk has been lurking in the dark corners of every conversation you have with each other lately—at least, in your mind it has. What you have with Spencer is not easily defined, and near impossible to explain to your friends—you act like a couple, you go out on dates, he introduces you to his team like you’re his girlfriend without ever putting it into so many words—but this validation that your pseudo-relationship might be evolving is better than any flowers he could have gotten you (although the peonies he brought will look very nice on your bedside table.)

“Four whole days... what will I do without you?” you whisper, brushing a hand along his face, and your chest aches with the heavy truth of it—despite the fact that he often is gone for stretches about that length. They don’t ever start to feel shorter.

“Well, you can start by reading that copy of The Odyssey I annotated for you.”

“Depressing,” you admit. “And a little ominous, considering you’re about to embark on a hero’s journey.”

“I think you’ll like this one,” he smiles.

You chew on your bottom lip, looking up at him as you think.

“Give me something to look forward to,” you say, earnestly.

“I—well, honestly, I just really want to kiss you and I’ve wanted to for a long time now and, you know, if that’s something you’re maybe also interested in then we could, uh, figure out a time to—”

“You want to kiss me?”

“Wh—you couldn’t tell?” Spencer says, like he can’t believe it.

As if on reflex, you lunge up and capture his lips with your own. It obviously catches him by surprise, but when you lower from your tiptoes he follows you, pulling you in closer and holding your face in his hands.

It’s too natural, too right, to be exhilarating. There’s no rush of adrenaline—it's more like stepping into a hot bath or warming your freezing hands at a fire. Like pieces clicking into place. It’s a relief.

You breathe into it, letting more and more of yourself melt against him. He keeps coming back to you deeper and deeper like a rising tide, and you want more than anything to keep getting closer to him—but then he stops. He stays close enough for you to breathe his air, but dodges your kiss gently before supplanting it with a gentle one to the corner of your mouth.

“I really have to go,” he breathes, before moving away from your mouth to kiss your forehead and speak softly against your skin. “If I don’t leave now I’ll be here all night.”

Which is exactly what you want, and the implication does little to make you want him less. But you care about him too much to be so selfish.

At some point, his hands found their way into your hair, and you gently grab his wrists.

“Incentive for you to come home.”

Nearly three months since that night.

At first when he stopped answering texts, you’d assumed he just had too much going on down in Texas. Which you could understand—you knew how stressful this situation with his mother was.

Even when four days came and went without even an alert from him that he was back in town, you thought, okay, maybe he’s been called away on a case. It wouldn’t be the first time he’s disappeared because of his work. But even then, he’d at least text you enough information so that you would know he was alive. Now, radio silence.

So you tried not to be clingy. You tried to act like an adult, to focus on school and your life outside of Spencer, but when Tara Lewis cancelled your weekly meeting due to an “unforeseen work-related emergency”you called her immediately. Tara was something of a mentor, and it was she who had connected you and Spencer to begin with. You had met the other members of his team by that point, yes, but none who you knew as well as Tara.

When she had informed you that Spencer had been arrested in Mexico and was now facing prison time for murder, you laughed.

Laughed until you realized her end of the line was silent.

Realized it was not at all a joke.

In a catatonic state of tranquility, you asked her for more details. Beyond assuring you of his innocence, she couldn’t (or more likely, wouldn’t) provide them. Asked where he was now. Asked all the right things that made sense to ask.

Then you hung up and had a panic attack because Tara said something about 25 years and you saw Spencer evaporate from your future like an apparition.

Slowly, you felt him evaporating from your past, too. Those memories from the night he left, became visions of you swaying with a ghost. Holding nothing but light between your hands as you kissed the peony air of your apartment.

He doesn’t want to see you, she had said into the phone one night, her tinny voice cutting in and out. You’re not on his list of approved visitors.

“You asked him about me?” you had whispered, curled up on top of your made bed in the dark.

I tried. I’m sorry. I’ll call you when I know more.

All your days melded together like a muddied smear of paint. Suddenly you felt you had nothing to look forward to. No anchor, no goal. Yes, a PhD... and then what?

The only thing that punctuated one 24 hour period from the next was the time you spent crying because Spencer was in prison and he didn’t want to see you and by the looks of things you may never see him again. When you weren’t crying, you were thinking about how your life was a big cosmic joke. An unfortunate statistical anomaly that didn’t mean anything to anyone else, and that you couldn’t do anything about.

That copy of The Odyssey, which wasn’t even bound and instead was a thick stack of printer paper organized by a single black clip, became something of a manifesto for you—a tome that your poured over, reading and re-reading each note in the margins, each word beautiful and imbued with meaning because you knew Spencer had selected every single one specifically for you. You traced the letters reverently, because in a way this was the last thing he had said to you—about Lattimore’s faith to the original text, Merrill’s strict use of dactylic hexameter, the stylings of Wilson and Lombardo, and how he thought you would enjoy Hammond’s prose just as much as he did.

Day by day it was becoming more prophetic than fictional, and you allowed yourself to sink into madness. You would rather be a deluded zealot than be nothing at all.

He didn’t want to see you.

He might as well have been dead, for all that you were grieving him. And you started to hate him, because he wasn’t dead, but wouldn’t do you the kindness of proving it. Like a festering wound, scratched open day after day so as not to ever heal, you had to live knowing he was less than an hour away. So no, you weren’t exactly over it. You lived day by day, waiting for the occasional call from Tara to keep you updated on Spencer, but either she didn’t want to share much about how he was doing, or he had specifically barred her from doing so, because she was always sparse on the personal side of things. That thought actually lifted your spirits, because it meant he was at least acknowledging your existence in some tiny way.

But your routine was becoming more regular, and so you staid on top of your classes and your non-Reid related meetings with Tara once a week, and you learned to dip your toes into existential dread and the oily black pool of depression every night without ever fully submerging yourself. You learned hope, because it was pretty much all you had, and the BAU had confidence that they would get Spencer out one way or another so you did too.

So you didn’t really think about it when you missed a couple of calls from Tara some evening in May. You were preparing for finals and had way too much on your plate academically to think about anything else which was a welcome relief so you fully embraced it. I’ll call her back tomorrow, you think, as you clean up from dinner before going back to the living room where your textbooks and papers are completely covering every available surface. Maybe I have no idea what I’m going to do with my life after school, but I’ll be damned if I don’t even make it that far.

Hours later, well into the night, you’d all but forgotten about the calls. A knock at the door takes you a bit by surprise, and you frown as you stand again, tugging your Georgetown sweatshirt down over your shorts as you shuffle to the entrance of your apartment. You’re not expecting anyone, so you crack the door, peering around the edge of it.

And you couldn’t even consider trying to hide that shaky inhalation of dead air when you see Spencer standing on the other side.

Surely you’re hallucinating.

Surely this man in front of you who looks like he just got back from a day of work didn’t spend three months in prison pretending you didn’t exist.

He looks the same. Hair a bit longer, maybe—and gaunter even more than is normal for him. 

But it's him.

You can’t think about the apprehensive look on his face—you can’t think about the impossibility of him being here. You can’t think at all. Without your explicit permission, your body surges forward into his, and he’s real, and alive, and warm, and he is an anachronism in the hallway as he accepts everything you pour into the embrace, doesn’t flinch when you move your arms from around his waist to loop around his neck and back to his waist again with crushing force because you just can’t get him close enough.

“I’m sorry,” Spencer mutters into your hair, I’msorryI’msorryI’msorryI’msorry, he keeps saying, rubbing your back as you try to find a solid grip on the sleek material of his suit—try to gather all the pieces of him, already afraid he might fall apart and float away again.

“You—dis—disappeared,” you hiccup after an eternity, pulling away enough to look up at his pretty face. Tears blur your vision and darken the front of his jacket, bending the florescent lights so they form a kind of halo above his head.

Through the surreal haze you can see his throat bob.

“I know.”

He knows?

He knows?

You scoff.

“You have no fucking idea, Spencer. What the fuck is wrong with you? I—I'm—”

The hot anger is such a relief for a second, boiling the oceans of your despair into a wrathful, scorching fog, but as soon as you try to tell him how you feel, the barbed wire cuts into your throat again. You shove him away, skin burning where his hands had been.

“I’m sorry,” he croaks, hands hanging uselessly at his side. There’s that kicked puppy look about him—and it’s familiar, but now there’s more damage. You don’t know anything about his time in prison, you haven’t heard a damn thing, but beneath the glassy desperation in his eyes there is an unfathomable void that seems to be preventing him from being fully present—and you realize for the first time that he is different.

It chills you.

Before, you and Spencer shared everything. There wasn’t one part of his internal machinations that you didn’t understand, nothing you kept from each other. But as you study him now from a few feet away, you realize there might as well be a yawning chasm between the two of you.

He is so different.

Those eyes look deeper. No gears turning just behind the slashes of gold and brown anymore—only an endless dark corridor that goes places you will never go.

Gone is the perpetual boyish up-turn at the corner of his lips that always made him look slightly vacant in a way that you found incredibly amusing. Something you had been so fond of, even if you teased him.

He seems to have aged ten years—if not physically, then in demeanor. And now you feel like a little kid throwing a tantrum.

You cross your arms, suddenly unable to meet his eyes.

You’re embarrassed. And pissed. And relieved. Everything is worse and better. You want to fall back into his arms, but you have been jarred by the revelation that this might not be the same Spencer. It might not be the same relationship. You have no idea where you stand.

He says your name gently, with so much familiarity you’re briefly jerked into the past. It makes you wish you could look up to find him as he was three months ago. Wish this was just a bad dream. But that’s not fair to him.

“Sorry,” you mutter, studying the grey carpet fibers instead of looking at him.

“Don’t apologize,” Spencer says immediately, “you’re right. I don’t—” he clears his throat— “I’m being incredibly selfish. I shouldn’t have just shown up, I’ll just—I'll leave. I’m sorry.”

A silent moment passes.

You don’t look up as he turns and swiftly begins to move down the hall toward the stairway, leaving as quickly and silently as he had come, like a few bars of a song sighed in and away on a fleeting breeze.

Your bare feet are concretely planted, imagining him jogging down the steps and speed-walking away from your building—

And suddenly you’re sprinting after him, feeling like you might puke because Spencer was just here and you let him go again—and even though you’re still so mad and confused and hurt, the realization that he is leaving again makes the entire building spin and lurch.

“Wait!” You yell, almost wiping out as you run down the stairs and whip around corners in your slippery fucking socks. “Please, wait!”

The lobby is already empty as you spill out into it, and cold dread tightens around your neck like a fist as you shoulder your way through the double doors and right into Spencer.

“Please don’t leave again, you just—I'm sorry, I really need you to not go—” you blabber, lachrymose once more, gripping onto his forearms for dear life.

“I’m not going,” he breathes shakily. “I tried to leave because I think you were right and maybe I should and maybe it would be better for you but I can’t.”

“You can’t,” you agree, more sob than spoken word. He cups your jaw, then your cheeks, wiping tears and brushing away hair like he can’t figure out how to hold enough of you between his hands. The wild kaleidoscope of his eyes, bright and alive and real as he scans you desperately captures your attention enough to slow the tears to a trickle. He notices this and stares back, entranced.

A silent agreement is made, or maybe an inevitable fate is accepted—either way, something was set in motion three months ago and it matters to see it through. Spencer kisses you and you’re ready for it. You don’t need slow or tender. You need to feel how he feels. You need to know what he knows.

You sling your arms around his neck and he pulls you closer until you almost tip backward, chasing the bruising kiss even as you regain your footing. You want to drink him in and you do your best, breathing deeply as he kisses you deeper, backing you inside and toward the elevator.

“Is this okay?” he manages, only after blindly reaching for and mashing the up button on the wall panel.

Ideally it wouldn’t happen like this, but the world you live in obviously isn’t ideal and your personal situations as they coincide are far from ideal, so this is how it has to happen. But it’s hard to explain, and you’d rather not admit that this is so far from what you wanted for both of you and follow up with the fact that despite that you need him like you need water. So you don’t say a word as the metal doors slide open promptly. Instead you pull him in and let him press you to the chrome wall as he hits your floor button, and that very hand comes back to grab your ass like you didn’t think Spencer Reid capable of. It almost aches as his fingers dig into the flesh, but it’s a good ache because it means he’s real and he’s there.

You gasp as he hitches your leg up, arching into him. The shorts that you’re wearing leave very little to the imagination to begin with, but they become downright indecent like this.

Quickly the elevator stops and the doors hiss open. You don’t hesitate to pull Spencer by the hand down the hall. When you notice you left your door wide open, you don’t even care. Neither does he, apparently—once you’re inside he slams it shut, flipping the deadbolt while his eyes are glued to you like you’re already naked. Now Spencer is shameless in the way he drags his eyes over every curve, every place your clothes and hair are disheveled from his touch and eye-fucks you so obviously it makes your face warm. Three months ago Spencer would have at least been bashful about it when he met your eyes again, but this Spencer is far from apologetic as he pins you with his burning gaze once more. His hand stays stuck to the door like he’s holding himself back.

“Is this what you want?”

There’s an undercurrent of sorrow below the gravely arousal, like this isn’t what he wanted for the two of you either. But you’re both at the mercy of fate. This is all you have, and it might be all you can do for each other anymore. So you don’t need to say that, because he understands.

“Yeah. Yes, this is what I want.”

For just a second more he watches you from his place by the door, and there’s an unexpected softness to it. He looks at you the way he would have looked at you before. Like as long as he stays there he can entertain the idea of being that person again.

Need wins out quickly, though, and he surges forward. Immediately you’re caught in the riptide of him, helpless as he kisses you all the way to your bedroom.

He’s never been in here before. You find yourself glad it’s relatively clean—one of the pastimes you’d picked up in his absence was keeping everything tidy. It was something you could control.

A lamp glows at your bedside. You lean against the footboard of your bed, hands timidly behind your back and suddenly shy to have in him in your intimate space. Both of you set aside the heaving desperation long enough to catch your breaths, and for him to scan the room like he too is being forced to reconcile with the innate and unexpected intimacy of the moment. He cuts a harsh, dark gash in your sweetly decorated bedroom, radiating something wild and powerful and unsure of himself like a chained bull as he takes in the soft, pale bedding, the paintings and photos taped to the walls, the woven rug and the sheer drapery. His breathing slows as he studies it all—eyes eventually catching on something behind you. Looking is unnecessary. You’re sure he’s spotted the dried peonies in their ceramic vase. Or maybe the now worn stack of papers that is his Odyssey, marked up and soft around the edges from constant flipping-through.

Then Spencer looks at you, and that softness seeps in again. Along with something like... fear? Grief?

In some other universe your first time with Spencer is sweet and giggly and kind and he smiles at the decor in your room and looks around with wonder because it’s another way he gets to know you. It’s a different way to learn you from the inside.

You sense that he’s caught in between universes right now as well, painfully aware of what he would have given you that he can’t anymore.

He breathes your name like an apology, and foolishly you let a second go by in which you think he might offer you one. But he doesn’t. Not with his words, anyway. His eyes tell a different story.

“It’s fine,” you say unprompted on a whispered exhale, then a little louder as you push off the footboard, crossing the space until your hands are on his chest. You focus on his tie, not making eye contact as you rush to undo it. “It’s fine.”

He lets you do this for a few seconds before finally covering your trembling hands with his own. You still can’t meet his eyes.

“We don’t have to do—”

“No! No, please. I want to. I need—I need us to be okay.”

“Hey,” he murmurs, catching your chin and forcing you to look at him. “We are okay. Me and you are fine.”

It’s a pretty thought, but it’s not true. In fact, it’s a hideous and abject affront to the truth. Sure, maybe you’re fine in comparison to last week. Maybe anything feels fine compared to an eight by six cell. But it would be impossible for you and Spencer, for your relationship, whatever that relationship may be, to be fine. It’s especially impossible for him to make that claim, after all he did or rather didn’t do while he was gone. What you need is for him to stay anyway. What you need is to find a way to be with him, to exist with him, even when you are so clearly not fine.

“I just need you to stay,” you whisper, and he’s already nodding, wide-eyed like he’d do anything for you. You ignore all the bitter venom rising in your throat. You pretend this isn’t all happening after he cut you out of his life with a dirty switchblade. Instead you focus on his hands on yours, the familiar smell of him, which invites you to let go of each and every thought and worry. He must’ve showered before coming here, you realize. How long has he been out? What happened? 

“Okay. Okay, I can stay. What else can I do? How do I make it better?”

You sniffle and look back down.

“You can untie that for me.”

He hesitates, then nods some more, fingers working under yours to undo the tie around his neck.

“Okay.”

A moment goes by and after that final whispered word, the tension begins to build again. Spencer senses it in the way your fingertips linger on his chest and you step even closer, dragging them down to his belt. The metallic sound of it unbuckling, despite being your own doing, still manages to flip your stomach. How many times have you pictured this? When was the first time you realized you wanted it? You’re sure you haven’t stopped wanting it even once since then.

Spencer tosses the tie away and is shrugging off his jacket now, then before you see it coming he’s kissing you again, ducking down to do it. He feels taller this close up, and especially in your bedroom, where he just seems rather out of place. But you want him here. God, you want him here.

You break the kiss, forced to look down as you fumble with his belt.

“Sorry,” you gasp, embarrassed by your lack of dexterity. The light is barely sufficient to see what you’re doing, especially when he’s wearing black on black and your eyes are still bleary.

“You’re okay,” he assures you, and it’s so Spencer a fresh round of nerves electrifies the tips of your fingers. That thing is happening—the thing you’d hoped to avoid if you hadn’t lost momentum partway through, where you’re allowing your actual feelings for him to get in the way rather than getting swept up in the pathos of the moment and letting everything be easy and mindless. “Here, can I help you?”

But he doesn’t actually wait for an answer before he’s finishing off the belt for you, tugging it loose from his hips till it’s a leather coil in his hands. Your fingers brush the material and he lets you take it as if it were your prize. It’s heavier than you thought it’d be, and you just feel the weight of it in your hands for a moment, your dropped head brushing his chest.

You have a terrible feeling that if you do this now, it doesn’t mean everything will be alright. Because it can’t just go back to normal. Spencer has told you nothing of what must be an enormous trauma, and you haven’t spoken about it at all, but you sincerely doubt that after this he’s going to be ready to just jump into that committed relationship the two of you had been toying with for months before his absence. You’re almost... scared of him, now. Scared of where he’s been and what he’s endured—things you’re sure you couldn’t have taken. What that does to a person, you can’t imagine. He seems so solid and real in front of you now—but you know that’s not always enough. Maybe you’re just scared that somehow whatever he’s been through will have made him care for you less. That you were too far removed from the whole ordeal, and now you’ll never understand. If you could understand, maybe you could fix it for him. Maybe he’d stick around.

Still—even if you do end up pushing him further away in the long run—won't it have been worth it to have had him so completely, even just once?

You toss the belt to the ground, compressing all of these very complicated thoughts and feelings into a few seconds so short he can’t ask you any questions about them. Instead you find his top button, and just as you manage to undo it with relative ease he’s gently grabbing your wrists. You look up at him, immediately surrendering.

“If we’re going to do this I need you to relax a little bit.”

Gears grind in your chest. You feel need and anxiety comingling in every square inch of your body. It’s a sick buzz—a high on an empty stomach.

“I can’t,” you admit.

“Yeah, you can,” Spencer gently disagrees, slowly lowering your hands. When he’s sure you’re not going to try ripping his clothes off again, he releases, and his eyes lower to the zipper of your hoodie. His fingers follow, warm against the soft triangle of revealed skin at your chest as he grips the small piece of metal between barely shaking fingers. “You can.”

You match his eyeline, breathing shallowly and watching as he slowly drags the zipper down. You wonder if that sound has haunted his fantasies the way the sound of his belt has haunted yours. If he’s seen this hoodie on you and wondered what’s underneath, staring at you and daydreaming during movie night with you none the wiser.

Both of you have your eyes glued to the span of skin as the zipper parts. Spencer stalls with the zipper at your sternum, just below the band of your bra.

Right. No shirt.

You look up and find his eyes already on you, tinged with a curious kind of humor.

“I wasn’t expecting guests.”

The words come out shy. Spencer’s chuckle has its own nervous airy quality as he resumes tugging on your zipper, leaning down until your noses bump.

“You don’t have to explain yourself to me.”

Then he kisses you again, a little sweeter now. Sweet enough to give you butterflies and for them to flutter right out of your stomach and spill from your lips in a little whimper against his.

It comes as a surprise when he pushes the fabric from your shoulders without looking or asking. Not that you’d have said no—you're just underprepared for how assertive he is in this foreign context.

Left just in your flimsy shorts and your thin bra, you feel quite exposed—but Spencer’s hands are as demanding and hungry as his mouth. They skim up your sensitive sides and sweep lower, suggesting less proper placement over your ass and pulling at your bottoms until you gently put a stop to their wandering.

“Wait. We’re... we’re uneven.”

It’s a struggle to get any words out at all when he keeps chasing your lips, nipping at you like he physically can’t stand not kissing you, but they catch his attention and he laughs airily, pulling back to let his gaze pour over your less clothed form. It lingers and catches and lights you up everywhere it touches, drops of heat soaking into your skin and making you feel all fuzzy and needy.

“We are,” he acknowledges, tone low and colored with the faintest smile. “You’re a lot prettier without your clothes on than I am.”

“I don’t believe you.”

The challenge comes immediately and thoughtlessly. Spencer’s golden eyes flash up to yours. He’s breathing a little harder than usual.

“You want me to show you what I mean?”

If that means getting him naked, then yes, absolutely.

You nod, but rather than immediately stripping, he takes your hand and holds his own open next to it. A thick pink scar bisects some pretty significant palmistry lines, but you don’t mention that. Instead you swallow—your thoughts, your words, your nausea.

“That’s new.”

You wonder how you hadn’t noticed it earlier.

He nods.

“A lot is new.”

It sounds almost like he’s challenging you—there's a kind of tremulous force in his voice, despite the perpetual softness there, like he’s inviting you to say it’s ugly. And you realize he’s referring to more than just the glowing scar cutting an asteroid trail against the flesh of him palm. The scars he obtained in prison must form a constellation over his body.

“I don’t care. I wanna see you.”

Spencer swallows, cupping your face with the scarred hand once more. You can’t feel it against your cheek but you know it hasn’t gone away.

“I’m sure you think you do,” he permits, and that’s where the conversation ends for the moment—with his hand on your face and his lips back on yours. “For now why don’t you let me worry about you?”

Obediently, you breathe, “okay.”

This is, for whatever reason, amusing to him. The brief levity dies as quick as it comes like a snuffed-out brush fire as soon as he lets his hands fall back down to your hips.

“I want... I want to give you slow. But...”

But slow is for people who didn’t lose three months of their life. Slow is for people who don’t know what it’s like to be starving. Slow is not for the desperate.

You understand the feeling.

“I don’t need slow.”

You’ll let him use you up like quick-burning fuel if that’s what he needs. You’ll go as fast and as bright and as hot as he tells you.

“But you want slow,” he murmurs, a secret acknowledged into your own waiting mouth. You’d keep it there forever. You could be the object he hides his soul in. “I know you do. You deserve to get what you want.”

“I can go fast. I want whatever you can give me.”

Spencer’s shuddering exhale is like a drug, dizzying as you inhale it and your eyes flutter at the high, pressed head-to-head with him. For so long you’ve needed him so badly. It’s overwhelming to have him now, all over you. If only your walls could breathe him in the way you are, if this room could remember what it feels like to hold him the way you will, if any inanimate object could bear witness to how you’ll give yourself, any part of yourself, over to him, so willingly.

“I’m going to try.” Spencer’s voice is hoarse as he walks backward to the bed, taking you by the hips as he goes. “I want to do it right. I want to do this the way I... the way I imagined it, before...”

Now he’s sitting, and you’re standing between his legs as he finds the clasp of your bra and undoes it, his fingers a comforting pressure where they ghost down the slope of your back. Your heart is pounding at the confession, at the way his tongue darts over his bottom lip and his fingertips journey back up to your straps, looking up at you with haloed irises as if he’d find anything other than the most dangerous kind of smoldering devotion in your eyes—the kind cult-leaders seek and spend years nurturing, and he’d earned with a mere brush over your bare skin.

The fabric slides down your arms, and as it falls to the floor, you watch something like despair flash-flood his eyes. It is a deep, distinctly human grief. The ineffable kind where something is almost too beautiful; so perfect it offends the mortal senses because it should be permanent, but nothing is, and the clash of divine beauty with unstoppable time which oxidizes copper and covers marble with vine is almost as grotesque as metal rending delicate flesh. It is the grief that drove the first poet to write and the first parents to press their baby’s painted hands to the walls of a cave. It is the desire to do the impossible—to capture ephemeral perfection and make it eternal, and the knowledge that it is hopeless. You recognize it because you’ve felt it for him.

“I thought about you all the time,” he whispers, doesn’t bother calling you beautiful but you don’t mind because he’s telling you with his hands and his eyes and the waver of his voice. “When I was gone, I thought about you—”

You’re just as quiet, just as soft.

“Don’t, Spencer.”

He doesn’t get to tell you about when he was gone. Not now. Not after he acted like you didn’t exist.

“Okay.” He swallows the things he’d wanted to tell you like you choked on the things you needed to tell him for three months. “I’m sorry.”

But his hands—his hands are perfect over your waist and his lips are perfect where they kiss your ribs like they’re his homeland. You could forgive a thousand wrongs for each kiss he puts to your skin. Light from the full moon stretches over the room like a blessing from the cosmos, and you have every intention of making the most of that gift, how the silver gilds the planes of his face and highlights curls like they were carved, and invites you to search for something in each shadow.

Some of his kisses land over the sensitive skin of your breasts though you doubt he has much intention or that there is any sort of end-goal with the trail he blazes—in fact, you have to root your hand in his hair and pull gently back when he doesn’t seem to realize that he’s making you wait again. His eyes are glassy and cheeks slightly pinkened—you weren’t expecting this wave of fondness to knock you on your ass but here you are, falling all over again.

“You don’t have to go that slow.”

A slow smile splits the heart of his mouth at your bashful tone and he’s emboldened to bring his hands higher for a moment, thumbs brushing particularly delicate though not downright indecent spots. Nonetheless, your breath catches.

“Impatient girl,” he scolds, and though it’s lighthearted it still inspires heat to dance across your face. Oh, I think I’ve been plenty patient, you itch to say, but you bite it back because it’s only sad and true and unkind.

Still, he gives you the beginning of what you want, really only the tip of the enormous iceberg that is your desire for him, by slipping his thumbs into the waistband of your shorts and tugging them down. His hands slide up the fronts of your thighs, tracing the trim of your underwear, and you’d swear he’s not even breathing. The moment one of his hand loops behind your knee and pulls forward until it’s pressed to the mattress and you’re half-kneeling, half standing, desire begins to truly cloud your mind. Manhandling never seemed like Spencer’s style, but when paired with how softly he reveals your hip, pulling gently down on the fabric of your underwear just to admire you up close, you don’t mind it.

More kisses are littered over your stomach, and he takes you by surprise a second time with a quick maneuver landing you on your back and him on top of you.

“I wasn’t doing you justice with my imagination,” he murmurs against your mouth. “I couldn’t have known.”

“Couldn’t have known what?” you pant as he shamelessly digs his fingers into the plush of your ass. You almost hope it bruises.

“How pretty you would be,” he coos like he means it, and you dissolve, slipping through his fingers like sand in an hourglass. “You were holding out on me.”

It’s a tease, not at all serious, but you manage to hit him with a, “Was not, asshole,” and he chuckles, placating your little hurt with another sticky kiss, and you get another disorienting glimpse of some other timeline where you’re both a little less damaged. Where it’s a little easier.

But in this timeline, his touch becomes starving and ragged and urgent, and you accept the drag of his thumb up your thigh and between your legs, gasping when he runs his knuckles up the center of you. This touch is metal on screeching metal. It does not pretend to be anything more than what it is—brute, powerful, executed to elicit sensation. You get the sense that Spencer’s never touched anyone this honestly, and while you do envy the girls who got to have him gentler, you’ll take this as the compliment that it is. A kind of vulnerability that is nearing primal.

His lips, though—always his lips—are kind when they brush and land on your skin guided by some invisible map. A dip down your neck and chest and then a plunge, his tongue dragging over your hips, chasing the fabric of your underwear as he almost pulls it off and then reroutes, making room for himself between your legs and pushing lace aside to mark the hinge of your inner and upper-most thigh. Your chest heaves and you don’t dare move for fear he’ll stop leaving signs of himself on your body and you won’t be able to reassure yourself that it was real and he was here and it was not another dream.

Because something in you knows, if only consciously recognizing it for the first time now, that he will disappear again. That this may be your only chance.

The desire to make the ephemeral eternal. An impossibility.

He’s clearly losing himself to something, eyes shutting blissfully. You wonder when the last time he let his guard down even a  little was. You’re okay with being the thing he gets lost in, even if you’re not exactly okay with him—something you are becoming more acutely aware of as each touch makes a part of you want to cry. Maybe you still have some things in common. A strange pain that doesn’t quite feel like it belongs to you, for one thing.

You slam back into your body as his nose nudges against you through fabric, and his lips catch on cotton as he drags himself up, eventually settling a kiss against the little bow at the waist of your underwear. There he stays, eyes closed, mouth pressed to you.

“Is this okay?”

You swallow, buzzing. Is this really what he wants? After everything?

“You don’t have to...”

“But is it okay with you?”

Nothing more than an airy whisper, you reply, “Yes, if that’s what you want.”

Being emotional at this point seems wrong, but it’s difficult to ignore the fact that you have thought about this before and it’s finally happening but it’s not exactly as you’d imagined it. There is an indelible sadness to it, to the way he’s so hungry for you because he’s been deprived, to the desperation with which he touches you because he’s had everything taken from him.

For a moment, before he tugs your underwear down, he pauses, and you wonder if he’s freezing one moment in time, this moment, and grieving all the other ways it could’ve been, and accepting that this is the way it is going to be. You are.

These higher realms of thought abandon you as he finally pulls the last barrier down your legs and encourages you to spread them further. You don’t have time or energy to be embarrassed, not even by his staring, or the way his eyes dart up to yours and back down again, wide and shining, as if to say, have you seen yourself? Do you have any idea how beautiful you are?

All you feel is the lack of him on you, the pull to have him closer so strong it’s almost sickening because he could be gone at any second. Maybe he understands that because he doesn’t waste anymore time before he’s kissing the most sensitive part of you. The drag of his tongue has you loosing a shuddering cry.

His mouth wanders, making connections you wouldn’t have realized the value of until you feel them on your skin. Your hips buck as he traces you and you’re unable to stop yourself from tangling your hands in his hair. Speech fails you—hell, you can hardly breathe as you watch his with a furrowed brow and parted lips, only expelling air from your lungs in the form of little cries and gasps and failing to hold your hips down to the bed.

The tip of his tongue teases around your entrance and he catches your leg as your foot rises off the bed, slinging it over his shoulder and consuming you more fervently until you have no choice but to moan though you’ve never been one for theatrics. Nobody has done this for you like he’s doing it for you. Locks of hair fall in front of his face and you hold them back for him, shuddering as he shifts his weight and presses the tip of his finger to your cunt.

“Ah—please,” you manage, your first words since he started. Spencer groans against you and the sound is so wonderfully unexpected, so much better than in your dreams. You cant your hips up in further invitation, chirping as he takes it, pushing two fingers into you at once. Your eyes screw shut and you bite back a whine at the slight stretch, unconsciously writhing your hips either to get further away or take him deeper, you’re not sure.

Spencer pulls back, kissing your hips and thighs and pumping his fingers very slowly as you adjust.

“’M sorry,” you pant, “it’s been awhile, I...”

“Don’t apologize,” Spencer says like it’s simple, his own breath coming quicker. “How’re you feeling? Need me to stop?”

“No! No, it feels really good, I feel good.”

He holds your burning gaze, matching it with his own, and his hair is tousled and his cheeks are flushed as he continues to move his hand.

“Yeah?”

“...Yeah.”

This little show of obedience, of call and response, has him smiling before he occupies his mouth with something else once more. It’s a different smile than you’re used to from him, but you decide you don’t at all mind it.

Like that, with his tongue and fingers working tirelessly, your orgasm comes on quickly. The feeling is rare but not entirely foreign, and in that brief moment of utter disconnect between your brain and reality, of sheer white-hot pleasure, you don’t feel you’re missing out on anything at all. How could you be, when you are here and Spencer is here and for a moment all your neurons are lighting up and flashing neon? How could there be anything more to life than the searing feeling of him slowly withdrawing his fingers from you, than your hips between his hands like he’s cradling the world, and his lips, indiscriminate with where they kiss because every part of you is worthy of attention?

You’re reeling, and your legs are gelatinous as he so affectionately sucks the darkest mark yet onto your inner thigh like a parting gift, like he’s signing his trembling work. If you could clamp your legs shut around the almost painful aftershocks you would, but he’s climbing back up your body, so all you can do is wriggle against him and release delayed, stunted little moans. He stops to kiss your neck before he makes it to your mouth and drinks down all your sounds until you’re gentle and pliant for him like you haven’t been yet.

His voice is soft and sympathetic when he speaks. “Better?”

Wordlessly you nod, both comforted and unsettled by how well he knows you. What, exactly, has been made better, you’re not sure. Not trust. You don’t trust him anymore. Something cheaper, but temporarily effective. A sense of permanence, maybe, however fleeting it may be. You’ve completed something with him now, and he’s still here, still sweet.

He looks into your eyes, then, for a moment—and there is just enough light in the room for you to tell yourself that the shadows dancing there as he looks at you are love.

They morph as you watch into haunting, wild hunger. Pained even now.

He sits up abruptly and so do you, scooting back against your headboard and pulling your knees to your chest to protect your pounding heart as Spencer takes you in with darting eyes and quick breaths. His fingers find the collar of his shirt and he begins to unbutton.

“I need you to remember it’s all going to heal.”

He swallows, and you hardly have the wherewithal to study the way he unbuttons his shirt, a way he exists in the world that you had previously not been privy to. The words are too distracting.

“What?”

Sometimes he reminds you of a deer, with those big brown eyes that can’t help betraying anxiety. Moreso in those old pictures he’d shown you from his early days at the BAU—but it shines through occasionally even now. It’s reassuring to know that something inside of his has remained soft.

“Just...” his fingers don’t stop at their task, and you come to the disturbing realization that his knuckles are bruised. “Please don’t freak out, alright?”

Your mouth goes dry, eyes glued to the lengthening span of revealed skin.

And before he even has his shirt fully undone, something isn’t right.

He’s like a Pollack of bruises—starbursts and watercolor blots of discoloration blooming over his side and stomach.

You’re glad the light is off for two reasons: one, being that you don’t think you could handle the bruising in all its glory, and two, you hope the look of horror painted on your face is at least partially obscured from Spencer.

But you can’t. You simply don’t have the gas in the tank to freak out, as he’d said—at least not externally. Those bruises shouldn’t be there, but 96 days is a long time to be gone.

You drag your eyes back to his—nervous, deeply insecure and mistrustful. A deer. Just like those pictures of a 24 year old Spencer in an FBI jacket that was too big for him.

It’s enough to have you scooting on your knees across the mattress to him. Those big eyes stay glued to you as you draw near, falling as you carefully push open his shirt, cautious not to bump any tender spots as it falls to the bed. A flash of white gauze wrapped around his forearm that makes your stomach flip. How? You want to ask. Why?

He doesn’t seem to know what you’re going to do, and neither do you, until you’re grabbing his hands, bruised knuckles and all, and just... holding them for a minute.

“I lost weight,” he says quietly, as if that’s the most shocking thing about his current appearance, though it is noticeable.

“You’re still pretty.”

He smiles at this—a true Spencer Reid smile. Flattened lips, eyes tinged silver with sadness, voice quiet and anxious and wavering.

“I didn’t have a lot to spare.”

A moment goes by.

“I’m not going to ask you about them,” you promise, though you care so much and you want to know but you already understand that he won’t want to tell you.

Another moment. It doesn't surprise you to watch the shiny vulnerability in his eyes to freeze over completely. But he squeezes your hands once in thanks, and you know it’s still the same Spencer.

“Lie down.”

Oh. Right.

This.

You do as he says, taking a deep breath to try and exhale the concern twisting your stomach like a poison. Somehow your room feels so unfamiliar, so new with him in it. Even the whorls on your ceiling look different as you study them, trying to time the pattern of your breathing with the pattern of the paint and plaster and not let the sound of Spencer further undressing quicken your heartrate too much.

Soon he’s coaxing your legs apart again, reverently, and kneeling between them, studying every part of you—lingering not on the parts you’d expect. He traces the scar on your knee with his thumb, follows a line down your thigh to the freckle on your hip. The scrutiny is unnerving and warms you everywhere. Perhaps he senses the microscopic clench of your thighs as you imagine pushing them together, if he weren’t in the way.

“You alright?” He asks, still stroking your hip. Tender again. It’s so hard to keep up.

“I...”

Suddenly your heart beat is a deafening echo in your own ears. The tide of your breathing is too powerful, too in and out and whooshing, leaving you always too empty or too full but never comfortable.

Maybe he’s changed, and he’s harder to know now, but he is the same Spencer. He is the Spencer you’d fallen in love with. The hard part is knowing that now you may never get a chance to tell him that. You don’t know if he’d be able to hear it.

There are things you can’t have with him anymore. Not now, at least. Maybe not ever. But you can have this. It will be different, but you’d rather him be different and here than the same and only in your memory.

You swallow.

“I’m good.”

Tangling your hand in his hair once more, you pull him down into a kiss. It’s hesitant, at first—maybe he can taste your thoughts, where they’d been balancing just on the tip of your tongue. But the uncertainty fades and he kisses you deeper, harder, in a way that is hard to keep up with. You like the messy overwhelm of his lips, teeth, tongue. That’s the only way he knows how to want you.

When you go to wrap your leg around his waist he catches it, running his hands over the soft plush of your thigh. The hard line of him presses against you like memory foam and you gasp and he breathes it in deeply as your brain short-circuits, as you realize this is really going to happen, that you’re going to have him like you’ve never had him before and in ways you’ve only imagined and immediately felt ashamed for.

“Spencer,” you whisper. He ducks to leave open-mouthed kisses along your neck and your eyes flutter shut, craning your neck but not losing sight of your objective as you reach down blindly. When you find what you’re looking for he freezes, groans against your neck at the same time as you breathe the tiniest whimper. Just in your hand he feels impossible, hot and imposing and hard. Your heart palpitates.

Without thinking, you angle your hips up and encourage him closer, until the tip of him is smearing through your folds, and you both go utterly silent like the breath had been stolen right from your lungs. The moment crystallizes, time around you hardening like preserved amber to keep you frozen there forever.

And then he rolls his hips, catching the underside of his cock on the crux of you, and then he does it again, and you choke out a moan and so does he, and it’s beyond perfect—it's nirvana, more than you could ever have conceived of, with his weight pressing you into the mattress, arms caging you in, his heavy breaths hot against your neck and vice versa as you twine together like serpents on a rod, your foot floating in the air as you widen your legs to make more room for him.

And you’re not even fucking yet.

“Oh my god,” you whine, just for him, barely audible under the heavy cloak of night, the thickened air in your bedroom and the sound of panting and fabric shifting. It’s like your heart is trying to reach through your chest to his own where they’re pressed together—that is how hard it’s beating.

Spencer only breathes a long, low curse and shifts so he can grasp himself. Your fingers drift down the shaft of him as he slots himself at your entrance, notching half an inch in and you hold your breath, and you brace yourself—and then he’s kissing you again, but gentler this time. Reassuring. You soften, you can’t not, releasing all your air in a soft gust through your nose, and then he’s pushing in.

Your lips part at the stretch as it fuzzes your mind, but he stays right there, nose pressed to your nose, lips ghosting over your own. He’s not going anywhere, you think, and you’re glad for it, when it burns ever so slightly, and the tiniest whine escapes your open mouth.

“Shh,” he soothes immediately, low and soft, only fractionally louder than you had been. “You’re okay.”

Spencer. Your Spencer.

For a moment, you’re living in that alternate universe. The kinder one. The flash of pain you feel then has nothing to do with the way he’s opening you up.

This is the closest you have ever been, and in some strange way, the furthest apart.

Together, fingers brushing, you guide him until he settles at not quite your deepest point. You can feel that he’s not giving you everything yet, but you’re okay with that, as you adjust to the full feeling. Spencer again senses your desire to close your legs against the deep intrusion, and gives you the best he can by encouraging you to wrap your legs around him.

“Good girl,” he whispers tenderly, nudging at your jaw with his nose and dragging kisses along the ridge of it. Your stomach flips at the moniker and your brain turns to warm sludge as your eyes flutter shut. It makes you feel all light-headed and you flutter around him. Spencer chuckles into the junction of your neck and shoulder and the vibrations send a chill down your arching spine. “I thought you might like that one.”

“Mhm.”

“Mhm. How are you? You okay?”

“’M ready.”

“You’re ready?” His tone is dripping sarcasm and faux-disbelief as he pulls back the slightest bit only to push right back in deeper, this time. Your toes curl, one thigh sliding higher up his waist as you cling to him.

“Fuck,” you manage, a pitiful, high pitched curse tossed to the wind. He echoes the sentiment.

“Oh, my god,” he groans, continuing with that slow pace, “you feel so good, angel.”

You grapple at his back, searching for purchase as your brow knits. “Faster.”

This inspires another breathy chuckle, but he obliges, and you cry out softly. It’s almost unreal, your head buried against his neck, drunk on his scent and the drag of him like a shock felt in the far reaches of your body, again and again.

There’s nothing you can say that will accurately demonstrate what you’re feeling, so you elect not to speak, to remain silent and try to get a grip on this cacophony of sensation and emotion. But it’s too much to be alone with. You feel you have to get it out, to seek understanding. You can’t do it alone.

“Spencer.”

“Hm?”

“I don’t know...” the sentence trails off into a gentle keen. He moves to kiss you, speaking against your lips.

“You don’t know?”

Shyly you shake your head. Spencer sighs wistfully.

“Do you know how much I missed you?”

It’s like he can sense your need for comfort. For something grounding.

And while this topic was off-limits earlier—you're softer now. The stone walls that form your boundaries have been chipped away and lowered.

Spencer continues unprompted.

“I thought about you every day. Every night while I was falling asleep. You were always on my mind, angel girl.”

You whine. Whether it’s pleasure or distress is anyone’s guess—including your own.

“You were gone so long,” you whisper, eyes shut.

At this, Spencer slows again, and the tension that was building settles back to a simmer.

“I know. I wish I could—I wish I could change that. But I’m here, okay? I’m right here with you.”

Then he makes sure you feel every last inch, and it takes your breath away. If your thoughts were any more coherent, they’d be something along the lines of: but for how long? How long until you leave again?

“You’re here.”

You say it like a mantra, once out loud, and then again and again in your head, timed with every clash of your hips. With each repetition he becomes more real. Every little ache, every tingling, head-emptying brush against that most sensitive spot inside proves to you that he could not be any closer. This can’t be faked. It can’t be another dream to wake up in tears from.

“You’re here,” you gasp as it hits you, as it truly sinks in.

“I’m here,” he breathes.

There’s so much you want to say—three months of words you need him to hear, of things you need to talk to him about, things you need to yell at him for and things you can only say crying in his arms and things you can only say laughing or whispering or drunk or half-asleep—and in this moment you can’t manage any of it. Every word condenses into one drop of salt water, drifting away from your eye and down your cheek. Spencer doesn’t tell you to stop crying. He only kisses the tear away, and murmurs I’m here I’m here I’m here over and over again against your skin until he’s not even speaking it out loud anymore. But you feel it. With every brush of his lips, every breath, every movement, you feel it.

Soon he’s adjusting his angle, gradually picking up the pace but retaining that unforgiving depth, and your nails bite into the skin of his back as your jaw drops. Spencer hisses, pressing impossibly closer.

“I’m sorry!” you squeak.

“Do it again.”

“Wh—what?”

“Please,” he begs, low and hot against your jaw, just beneath your ear. “Do it again, honey.”

Honey.

You’d do anything for him if it meant he calls you that again.

When he shifts his weight to one arm and reaches down between your bodies to play with your aching clit in exactly the right way, you don’t really have a choice. You arch and moan wantonly enough to feel embarrassed as your nails scratch down his back. At the same time he’s making noises of his own, and you almost feel guilty for marking him up like this only you think he likes it. The most perfect and troubling tension is building in your core, so taut you almost fear the inevitable rebound when it snaps. But you’re driven to be exactly what Spencer needs right now, and to let him try and be what you need. Even if it scares you. Even if you’re not sure how.

Spencer groans, head tucked to the bend of your shoulder. “I’m not gonna last.”

Any response you might’ve been about to muster is annihilated by a sudden, deep bolt of pleasure.

“’M gonna cum,” you mewl like it’s a secret.

“Are you?” he asks, coming up breathless. If your eyes were open, you’re sure you’d see him above you.

“Mhm.”

“Look at me. Look at me.”

It is unmistakably a command—one you fight to follow.

You cry out as you meet the intensity of his gaze, those shadowy corridors suddenly ablaze and alive. They are not unending, like you’d thought. They are a door thrown open to let the light in, or maybe to let the fire out. They’re open in this moment for you.

No more words are spoken after that—you cum hard, gasping as you fall and spin. Spencer follows very shortly after, like he was holding it together just for you, and your eyes are still locked though everything is a bit bleary.

“Fuck,” you whine as he continues to fuck you for as long as he can, despite your writhing hips, but you’re entranced by him, unable to look away now that you’re hooked. Until he slows to a halt, glances down at your mouth, and you just have time to pray that he’ll kiss you before he does. You whimper against his lips—a plea for understanding. A plea for him to stay, even though this is over. He kisses back so soft and sweet it’s like he can read your mind. Echoes of I’m here I’m here I’m here still buzz across your skin. His eyelashes tickle your cheek. Your heart stops beating quite so quickly, melting and warm like the rest of your body.

Soon the kissing ceases and you’re just breathing together, trapped and faced with the knowledge that it must end just the same as you had waited for it to start.

Eventually the air between you becomes mostly carbon dioxide and you let your head fall to the side, dizzy and giggling breathlessly as you nearly avoid asphyxiation. Spencer laughs too, letting his head fall to your shoulder once more, and you finally let your eyes flutter closed. To do something as simple as laugh with him again is its own small euphoria. It’s unexpected, and a soft landing once all that tension breaks underneath your combined weight.

It can’t last forever, you know that well. But the slow fade of it makes the next parts a little easier.

Spencer presses a kiss to your neck. “Is your bathroom through that door?”

You hum a confirmation and are only slightly disheartened when he pulls out and rolls off of you. You’re further disturbed when you see there’s gauze around his thigh, matching what’s around his arm, and you wonder how you missed that. Spencer scoops up his clothing and disappears into the adjoining restroom, assuring you he’ll be right back and leaving you alone with your thoughts and the whorls on the ceiling which have seemingly shifted into entirely new constellations.

He leaves the door cracked which is oddly reassuring—the sliver of warm light and the sound of the sink running. Only a few moments pass before he’s returning clad in boxers once more to sit on the edge of the bed, pushing away the sheet you’d just pulled over your chest and pulling one of your legs over his lap. Your face warms as he brings a washcloth between your thighs. As soon as he glances up at you and catches your eye you’re looking back to the ceiling.

“I should’ve asked first,” he says quietly as he cleans up the mess he’d made of you.

You speak just as softly, like you’re both afraid of disturbing some peace, of waking some sleeping giant. “It’s okay. I would’ve told you if I didn’t want it.”

His reticence, his unreadable face, make you nervous.

When he’s done, he rises to toss the dirtied cloth in the laundry bin, and with his back to you (as scratched up as it might be) you feel braver.

“Are you gonna, like... hate me now?”

It was a mistake. That’s clear by the way he turns around, brow knit deeply and grimacing slightly like even the suggestion offends him.

“Am I going to hate you?”

Again you pull the sheet up, and again you look away, studying the pattern of moonlight stretching out over the floor and scooting to make room for him when he steps in it.

“Not hate, I just...” the bed dips beside you and you are indescribably glad he’s not immediately running out the door. “I’m not dumb. I know what this was.”

He pulls you into him and you settle against his chest. It feels good. “I never thought you were dumb.”

This is your first real conversation since he’s gotten back, you realize. And how quickly you’re falling into familiar patterns, familiar syntactical beats. You know when to speak. You know when to bite your tongue and keep him talking.

The silence goes on longer than you’re used to. Maybe he got good at not speaking while he was away.

Eventually your eyes wander, falling to the white strip over his thigh where it is parallel to yours on the bed, only over the sheets.

“What happened?”

You said you wouldn’t ask, but that was then, and you’re upset again. You almost want to hurt him. To piss him off. You don’t know.

But it doesn’t work.

“Do you really want to know?” There’s a note of something heavy in his voice, and you look up at him. It’s a privilege to have him this close—his beauty is a constant surprise that you’d become unaccustomed to over the months. You say nothing, and he takes that as the yes that it is. “I... I did it to myself.”

He may as well have reached down your throat and grabbed for fucking heart for all its clenching. Tears well almost immediately, though they’ve been waiting in the wings all night.

“What? Did you—were you trying to—”

His eyes widen.

“No! No, honey, no.” You wilt as he gathers you closer, a deeply confused frown still contorting your features, too heartbroken even to cling to him, or to appreciate the ease with which honey slips past his lips again. “No. I was—it's complicated. I didn’t—I wasn’t trying to hurt myself, but I had to—I had to do it before someone else did something worse.”

The bruises covering his abdomen.

You sniffle and pull back enough to look up at him tearfully. “Why would they want to hurt you?”

Mist fills his eyes even as he’s looking down at you, a layer of separation, as if he’s two places at once. Even as he goes to brush your hair behind your ear, to stroke your cheek.

“I’m... not... the same, as I was.” It’s not an answer to your question—but it’s the beginning of the answer to a question you’d been too afraid to put into words.

“Don’t say that,” you beg, because you know where this is going. He keeps smoothing your hair like it’ll make this easier.

“But it’s true,” Spencer says gently, the slightest waver betraying his own emotion.

“You’re just going to leave again.”

And you’re losing to the tears.

“I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere.”

“But you will,” you insist, like a child crying to a parent come to comfort them after a bad dream.

“Not right now. Right now I’m here.”

I’ll stay until you fall asleep again.

For now, maybe that has to be enough. 

You cry on his shoulder. He kisses your head and doesn’t tell you to stop. 

Eventually, you sniff and wipe your eyes. 

“We were so close. Before you… we were almost there.”

You’re sure of it. You’re sure that if he hadn’t gone when he did you would’ve been a real couple. You would’ve told him you loved him. 

“We’ll get there again,” he promises, rubbing your arm. “I just… I need a little bit of time. I think you do too. But we’re going to get there again.”

Maybe it will never be like it was. 

But as so often is the case—Spencer is right. Difference doesn’t mean it won’t ever be good again. 

You have to believe that, just as you had to believe you’d see him again. 

You look to The Odyssey on your bedside table. 

The sun has been obliterated from the sky, and an unlucky darkness invades the world. 

But the sun has a habit of rising, time and time again, after the longest nights, after the darkest storms. 

You feel the beginnings of its rise, see the golden tips of it lighting the room as he holds you. Even now. 

[cosmicmunsonwrites]

i’ll drive, i’ll drive all night

bf!rafe cameron x fem!reader

cw — alcohol, brief talks abt arguing, this is lowk short

summary — you drunk call rafe for a ride home from your friends house.

a/n — whipped this up in a few minutes so please don’t be too harsh. request!!

do not copy or post my work anywhere else.

you sat outside with the warm breeze as you waited on the steps to your best friends house for your boyfriend to pick you up. you were completely out of it, eyes feeling heavy, body all soft and feeling like jelly from the copious amounts of alcohol coursing through you.

you’d probably had one too many drinks and you were expecting a lecture from rafe when he arrived but you were too far past the point of caring. you just wanted to see him and go home after the terrible day you’d had.

the two of you had argued earlier in the afternoon which eventually led to you both parting ways and not speaking for a few hours. you were both very opinionated and you had attitudes that often didn’t mix well when you were frustrated. one of you usually apologized though and you guys moved past it.

this one was different though. you knew you’d been a little mean in your replies but you also felt like he deserved a little reality check. you currently couldn’t even remember why you were arguing due to your drunken state, but you knew it was something you guys could easily get over. you two would probably forget about it by morning anyway.

when you finally saw the big truck pull into the driveway, you quickly stood and almost immediately regretted the sudden action. your head began to spin and a pain accumulated behind your eyelids as you drunkenly stumbled to his car. he was standing on the passengers side waiting for you.

once you approached after tripping over your own feet, he opened up the door for you without a word and helped you up the big step to get inside. he shut it behind you and made his way into his own seat. he assured you had your seatbelt on and began reversing out of the driveway without a word.

“i’m sorry,” you slurred quietly, noticing the way both his hands held the steering wheel instead of one of them resting on your thigh. “didn’t know who else to call.”

you heard him sigh and begin to drive. “would rather you call me than anyone else,” he admitted honestly and spared a glance in your direction. his heart broke a little at the soft pout on your lips and the sad glint in your eyes. “‘nd i’m not mad at you, baby. ‘s fine.”

your eyes glistened with tears as you looked at him. “you’re not?” you mumbled under your breath, eyes feeling heavier and your head getting all foggy.

he shook his head with a shrug and gently rested his hand on your lower thigh just above your knee, thumb soothing over your skin reassuringly. “could never be mad at you,” he said before the car fell into a comfortable silence. the only sound being the quiet song playing on his radio.

you didn’t know when you fell asleep or how long it’d been since, but you began to wake to the sight of rafe standing in front of you looking extremely focused and a soft towel being dragged carefully over your cheeks. you were sat on the bathroom counter with your legs spread slightly and him standing between them with majority of your body weight leaning against his.

he was holding your jaw in one hand while the other hand did what you assumed was taking off your makeup. when you finally fluttered your eyes open for real this time, he scanned your face and placed the towel down on the counter. “you have fun tonight?”

you nodded and smiled softly. “mhm. morgan’s friends are really nice. the bar was so cool,” you replied, awkwardly rubbing your hands along your thighs not knowing whether or not it was appropriate to touch him. “‘m really sorry, rafe.”

he went silent for a moment but his eyes stayed fixed on yours. “its okay, sweetheart. we both said some shit we shouldn’t have. ‘s alright. people make mistakes.”

“i was bein’ a bitch earlier,” you mumbled, leaning your forehead against his chest.

he laughed softly and smoothed a hand down the back of your head comfortingly. “i think i can handle your attitude pretty well by now,” he replied just barely above a whisper. “c’mon. time for bed.”

you instinctively wrapped your arms around his neck as his hands found the backs of your thighs, lifting you and walking you to your shared bedroom before dropping you down gently on your side. he was quick to pull his shirt over his head and crawl under the covers beside you.

you scooted closer to his side and sighed at the familiar warmth you enjoyed so much. his arm loosely fell to the dip of your waist as he scrolled through netflix to find a movie on, knowing you couldn’t sleep without the tv on. “i love you baby,” you muttered through a sleep-laced voice.

he smiled and pressed a kiss to your hair. “i love you more, angel.”

[omgeto]

☆ THRILL (h)ER! — SATOSUGU X READER

summary: when watching a scary movie with your two best friends, you cant help but hold onto them tight every time you get jumpscared. but as the night goes on and your fingers roam... wait, what movie were you watching again?

wc: 3.3k (its alll smut guys so give me a medal)

cw: double penetration, praising, slight degradation, gojo and geto bickering, fingering, dirty talk (?) and some fun loving you're their pretty little princess. afab!reader, MDNI

an: guys look I finally posted a fic for kinktober, yay me, I hope you like it since Id say the smut on this one hits different sooo give it a chance. also only big brains will understand the fic title.

KINKTOBER M.LIST.

your best friends, gojo and geto always have a way of making you feel right at home, especially when you find yourself in your favourite spot on the couch – sandwiched between them. geto's embrace is a gentle yet possessive one, his arms wrapped around you in a tender hold that radiates warmth, his fingers lazily tracing patterns on your lower back.

to your side, gojo's long limbs seamlessly entwine with yours. your legs stretch over to meet him, creating an intimate tangle of limbs. his fingers trail leisurely up and down your thighs, their teasing caresses sending delightful shivers through your body. it's a familiar and electric sensation that's become an unspoken language among the three of you—one that hasn’t fully been enacted upon… yet.

"i don't know why you insist we watch this movie every year," geto complains, his gaze locked onto his b est friend, a playful frustration in his tone. "you're so predictable."

"oh, don't be a bore," gojo retorts, matching geto's glare before shifting his attention down to you. his voice is laced with mischief as he speaks to you. "you find it fun, don't you?" 

“what? do i like crappy slashers from the 80s with big titted damsels running from a shitly costumed killer?” you deadpan, your sarcasm evident. you could feel the vibration from geto as he lowly chuckles. gojo’s face forms a pout that prompts you to quickly add, “but i love them.”

gojo’s pout transforms into a triumphant grin as your admission earns you a playful nudge from him. “that’s my girl,” he exclaims, giving your thigh an excited rub as he turns on the movie.

geto, still chuckling softly, leans in closer. “well, i suppose if toru enjoys it, we can endure it one more time.” his words carry a hint of tenderness, his arm around you tightening ever so slightly, puling you closer into his embrace.                                                                            

you watch the movie in a comfortable silence, the only noise coming from the tv and gojo's oddly placed screams that you've come to expect every year. his over-the-top reactions to jump scares and gruesome scenes never fail to amuse you, and it's a source of endless entertainment for both you and geto.

geto, on the other hand, watches the movie with a more stoic expression, occasionally shaking his head at the implausible plot twists and unrealistic gore. His hand continues to rest on your thigh, his fingers now tracing soothing patterns as if to counterbalance the tension on the screen.

as the movie progresses, you notice how both gojo and geto steal glances at you when they think you're not looking, as their innocent touches progress into heavy petting. but there's a moment where you all pause, their movements stop, and you all look at each other as the loud sounds of exaggerated moans blare from the screen.

“i always forget this scene is in there,” gojo lies, with a snicker, an appreciative smile forming on his face as he watches the scene.gojo's arm remains draped around your shoulders, his fingers lightly tracing patterns on your arm, while geto's touch has grown increasingly intimate, his hand resting on your hip, his thumb making slow, deliberate circles.

“oh don’t bullshit satoru,” geto accuses, taking his hand off of you for a second to send a jab into gojo’s side, “i know you’re getting off on watching this ditzy blonde getting laid.”

“not true,” gojo retorts childishly, “i think there’s better sights to get off on, isn’t that right?” he finishes casting his eyes, not so subtly, over to you.

“well i can’t lie and say the sights aren’t… appealing,” geto grins his hands coming back on you, toying with the hem of your shirt.

“you two are such guys,” you laugh, trying to remain nonchalant even though on the inside the pace of your heart was quickening, and every touch of their fingers sends jolts straight to your core. “you’re focusing on the wrong things here.”

“and what should we be focusing on here?” geto murmurs at you, you couldn’t see his face but you knew a smirk was plastered across it. his challenge hangs in the air as you pause, hesitating as you scan the room, your eyes meeting gojo’s trying to gauge if they are thinking what you are. geto can sense your hesitation as he feels your breathing still as you lean against him, so he pulls his finger under your chin turning your head to face him. “let us focus on you, come here.”

you lean in, his lips enclosing on yours in a deep kiss, you turn your body almost straddling him so you could get better access. his tongue enters your mouth, as his hands work down your body, and as the kiss intensifies, you’re aware of gojo’s gaze on you. you extend an inviting hand toward him, flashing him a smile as you pull away from geto and set your lips on your other friend.

gojo groans as your lips work with his, and his hands go straight into his pants, fisting his dick that has been hard all night just at the sight of you. geto cascades kisses down your neck as he starts to pull your shirt up off of you, you gasp at the feeling of both of their hands and lips all over you.

“h-how long have you two been planning this one then, huh?” you grin, a laugh escaping through your moans, as you let geto get rid of your shirt, assisting gojo with taking off your pants. 

“how long have we known you?” geto responds rhetorically, and gojo nod in agreement, as they both take off their jogging bottoms, leaving you all sitting on the couch in your underwear. there is no more hesitation, or uncertainty between you three—you all know exactly what you want.

“so who gets to have me first?” you joke, your eyes darting between the two of them, their lustful eyes are unmistakable as they stare at your body, their dicks straining against their boxers ready to be suffocated by your tight pussy.

“i get to!” gojo sputters out quickly, but he’s not as swift as geto who’s already pulled you back onto him, his fingers pushing into you without any warning. your mouth parts, as you let out a whine, as his long digits give your pussy fast, relentless strokes, he adds another finger, smirking as your body buckles against his. “hey no fair!” gojo pouts, side eyeing geto, but he can’t help biting his lip as he hears your cunt squelch everytime his best friend shoves his fingers into it.

“don’t worry, ‘toru,” geto reassures, his fingers curling up into you before he pulls it out swiftly, spreading your pussy apart and giving gojo a knowing look, “there’s room for the both of us.”

gojo eagerly drives his fingers into you from behind, his body pressing against yours as he charges your fingers into you. your moans increase as you feel a flurry of digits explore your pussy, gojo’s hand grips on his shoulder and geto hand holds your waist as they both tug your body back and forth in an attempt to get you closer to them.

“s-shit” you cry out, as you clench around their fingers, trying to keep them inside of you. you grind down against both of their fingers, your whimpers encouraging them to twist and push their fingers deeper into you.

“you see how much of a mess she gets for us?” geto asks gojo with a low chuckle, and gojo nods, smiling as the wetness of your pussy allows for his fingers to slide into you with ease, “press down on her clit. hard.”

“don’t tell me what to do,” gojo mutters, but he does it anyway. his thumb going straight to your clit, pushing down on it, smirking as you groan your back arching right into him. 

“see i told you,” geto chimes, laughing as gojo glares at him. geto’s focus shifts to you, as he pulls his fingers out of you, bringing them to your mouth, he holds your chin, placing his thumb on your bottom lip as he raises his eyebrows at you for permission. you nod lazily, opening your mouth, accepting two of his fingers —which are drenched in your juices. “‘toru, you gonna finish her off for me.”

gojo smirks, his fingers working in overdrive, as he adds another digit inside of you and you could feel yourself about to release. geto can tell you're close from the way you bite down on his fingers. “you close? you gonna cum on satoru’s fingers as you taste yourself?”

you couldn’t even respond, as your cum sprays all over gojo’s fingers and geto’s stomach. the boys both smirk at each other, as they hear your high pitched moans and see heaps of your cum spilling out of your pussy running down your thighs. gojo is in awe, his fingers still remain in you and he pushes them up lazily, trying to keep you plugged with your cum. you relax onto his fingers, letting him do as he pleases, as you try and catch your breath your body slumping onto geto’s.

“you did so well,” geto praises in his air, lifting up your head off your chest, pecking your lips softly. “you took both of our fingers letting us stretch your tight pussy, it felt good didn’t it?” 

“y-yeah it felt so good sugu,” you sigh, turning your head to face gojo, as you pull him closer into you, “you both felt so good.”

“you wanna let us stuff you further?” gojo questions eagerly, his hard dick resting on your ass, as rocks against you.

“satoru,” geto reprimands, shaking his head at his friends over excitement. but gojo shoots him a look shrugging as he presses his face into the crook of your neck, practically inhaling you.

“but suguru, she wants us both to stuff her,” he argues, as fingers already go back to your sobbing cunt. “you want that dont you?” he whispers, directly in your ear, slowly coaxing your pussy with soft strokes as he murmurs in your ear. “you want me and sugu to shove our dicks right up your pussy, together.”

“i don’t know if i can…” you hesitate, your voice faltering, but you pull your lip between your teeth, closing your eyes as you think about taking both of them.

“c’mon pretty girl,” geto persuades you, forcing you to open your eyes and look at the teasing smirk on your face, “don’t think we don’t know how slutty you can be. you know your greedy little cunt take both of us with ease, and you want it to, don't you?” you nod your head slowly in agreement, but geto shakes his, “no, we need to hear you say it. use your words. tell us what you want.”

“i want your dicks to stuff my pussy,” you admit, feeling your confidence grow as the smirk on geto’s face widens and you can hear gojo lowly growl in your ear. “i need it.”

“well we have to give our girl what she wants, right sugu?” gojo taunts, pulling you off of gojo and onto his lap, his dick slaps against your pussy. “suguru got to see your pretty face, before, so this time you’re all mine, okay?” gojo says to you, and you could hear geto kiss his teeth, but he obliges letting gojo have his way this time. 

“you ready for me?” gojo asks, waiting for your approval as he lifts you up slightly over his dick, he even looks over to geto he leans back against the couch, with his dick in his hand. you don’t even answer gojo, sliding down onto gojo as you moan together.

geto fists his dick at the sight, “go on satoru, fuck her,” he orders, his strokes increasing as he watches as gojo begin to thrust into you. your hands press down on gojo’s shoulder’s as you start to bounce on him, you lean forward whining straight in his ear, causing him fuck you harder.

gojo plays with your bra strap, pulling it and letting it release against your shoulder, “i don’t know why you’ve still got this on,” he complains, as brings his hands to the clasp of your bra, undoing it. your tits bounce as he pulls off your bra, and both boys smile at the sight. gojo’s fingers pull against both of your nipples, twisting and pulling at them causing you to cry at every tug. “so sensitive,” he mutters to himself, touching your tits inquisitively as he continues to toy with them, loving how with every touch your cries grow louder.

“it’s crazy how we stretched you so well earlier, but your pussy is still tight as fuck,” gojo comments, his words punctuated with every thrust. “i had all my fingers inside of you already, but your cock hungry cunt just can’t seem to get enough.”

“is he fucking you good?” geto calls, feeling himself about to cum, as he rubs against his dick hard. you look over to him and smile, nodding quickly as you wrap your hands around gojos neck, clinging to him as his dick drives into you. geto stands up, coming up behind you pressing a kiss on your neck, “you need me to help get you off?”

“she doesn’t need anything from you, i’m doing just fine,” gojo mumbles, but he lets you slightly raise up off of his dick and he smirks as he feels geto join him, geto’s dick presses against gojo in excitement as they wait in anticipation for you to enclose them with your pussy. 

“don’t be nervous,” geto coos from behind you, nipping at your ear. you look at gojo and he gives you an encouraging nod, and you slide back down onto them hissing in slight pain as you feel them both enter you. “it’s okay pretty, you’re doing so so well,” geto continues to reassure you, pressing soothing kisses down your neck, his lips sucking at your flesh. you all pause as you fully take them both in, and you feel the pain subside smiling at gojo giving him permission to move. 

geto follows suit, and you all move in tandem, fucking against each other. gojo places his hands on your ass, pushing your cheeks in pace with his movements whereas geto’s hands cup your tits, holding them firmly as he spreads his fingers over your nipples, rolling them.

“fu-fuck you two are too big, you can’t” you whine, clawing against gojo’s chest. they were both drilling into you relentlessly, you couldn’t catch your breath as every second you were being double stuffed with dick. tears spring to your eyes, as you cry out in pleasure, grinding down against them trying to get as much as them as possible. 

“if only you could see how slutty our girl looks,” gojo says to geto, as he watches your head fall back, another moan escaping your lips. “her eyes are all glossed over, she’s fucking crying, all slutted out on our dicks right now.”

“is that so?” geto mutters, he forces himself into you deeper, his back hitching up against yours, his clench on your tits tightening as he inches himself in your pussy, his hips slapping against you. “she’s such a good slut, i knew she’d be able to take us well, and look she’s loving it, already creaming all over us, isn’t that baby?”

you nod, your hand coming up to hold geto’s head as he nestles into your neck. you were losing your train of thought, you wanted to tell them how good they felt, how their dicks rubbing against each other in you was all you needed for the rest of you life, but when you open your mouth all that can leave your lips is incoherent words and moans. 

both of them smile, watching as you come undone on their dicks. gojo gives geto a nod, and their hands trade places. gojos fingers coming back to your tits, rubbing and pushing them apart before lowering his head to your chest, nuzzling your boobs. gojo and geto were so close that some things between them didn’t need to be spoken, and they were so close to you that they knew your body in and out. they knew when to push and pull, and where to suck just to get you cumming their lap.

“i’m s-so close, i’m gonna cu—” you try and speak out, but your mind is too far gone for you to finish. their dicks slip out of you as your bounces become sloppy, the pleasure too much for you but geto forces you back muttering reassurance in your neck. and the sudden contact causes you to cum, you release all over both them, but they don’t stop their movements, their dicks driving into you still, pushing back in all the cum you were letting out.

“satoru, we gonna give our girl one final stuffing?” geto prompts, and gojo nods, they both give you one final push and you could feel your pussy stretch as their cum sprays your walls. you wail out, the tears streaming your face as your body jerks forward, feeling their dicks go limp inside of you as you all pant in pleasure.

“that was fucking amazing,” gojo praises, a blissful smile on his face as he leans back his head resting on his arms. you return his smile, your lips meeting his in a quick kiss, that he groans at as you pull away. you come off his dick slowly, all of your eyes staring at the ropes of cum that immediately spill out of your pussy as he unplugs you. 

geto turns your head to face him, his dick still lodged deeply inside of you, he pulls you into a long kiss, his mouth smothering yours. he pulls your bottom lip between his teeth, roughly biting down on it before releasing you, his hand cupping your chin, forcing you to stare up at him “you’re mine, my pretty slutty mess.”

“um she’s ours,” gojo chimes in, but geto shrugs, not caring to listen to your other friend. geto, finally pulls you off his dick, and your pussy clenches around nothing, already missing the feeling of their dicks.

“you too always know to take good care of me,” you exhale, exhausted your pussy sore about being stretched open by the two of them. geto pulls you back into his original hold, leaning back against his chest, and your legs stretch over gojo’s lap. but this time instead of innocent gentle touches, geto’s hands lazily tug at your nipples, and gojo caresses your naked thighs, his fingers flicking at your clit every now and again.

“that’s what friends are for,” geto muses, pressing his lips against your cheek before saying, “now satoru, are you gonna press play on this shitty movie or what?”

AN: ight so there you have it my FIRST FIC of kinktober, what do you guys think I need to hear all your thoughts since Ooooof this took me so long to write. so I hope it is worth it. also if you see my bias towards geto during this then LOOK AWAY, im sorry gojo stans but im a geto lover foreverrr. but yeahhh lmk ur thoughts stay tuned for my other kink tober fics which WILL be on time I promise smooches.

[soaps-mohawk]

Cherry Red, Crimson Blood

Chapter 39: Life

Summary: Something begins to throb in your chest as you lay there. Something thrums deep within you, something you haven’t felt in weeks.

Pairing: Poly 141 x reader

Word Count: 8,194 words

Warnings: Angst, Alpha/Beta/Omega dynamics, Alternate Universe, angst, PTSD, nightmares, POV changes, depression and anxiety, illness, language, slightly graphic imagery, very slight violence, rumination, lots of feels, and yes finally some comfort

A/N: Yes, it has finally arrived. The time has come. We are now in the comfort. This very much is a good place to end things for the next month. If you haven't seen my post then I'll say it here, I will be putting the fic on a brief hiatus for the month of October. I have Kyletober planned and trying to do CRCB at the same time will be too much. So this will be the last chapter for a couple weeks while I focus on other things and just give my brain a little break from CRCB. It's been eight months of just pumping out long chapters every week, or almost every week, so I need a little break to focus on other things. I'll still be writing and posting things here (and Ao3 of course) but there won't be another CRCB chapter posted until November.

But anyway, I hope you enjoy this one and the comfort starting and I'm super excited for what's coming next month (can't believe it's almost October)

11/30/24: **This chapter has been edited and rewritten from its original version**

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“I need you to be brave.” Christine says, staring up at him. 

His heart thumps in his chest. How bad is it that not only did she summon him down here, but she’s asking him to be brave. He knows you’re sick, that you’ve fallen ill after your moment of anger earlier. She had informed them over dinner as she made some broth that you came down with a fever. 

They had all been worried, sharing glances at the news. John looked like a dog that had been scolded. It was his fault, after all. 

If anything happens to you, it is his fault. 

Johnny swallows the lump in his throat, nodding slowly as he stares down at Christine. “I can be brave.” 

Christine stares up at him for a long moment before nodding. She pushes the door open, leading him inside your room. The scent in the air is thick, tainted by the bitter scent of anxiety still lingering in the air, and the sour scent of illness. He misses the fresh scent of strawberries, he has missed it over the last few weeks. Your scent had taken on a bitter edge ever since the cameras were revealed to them. It’s only gotten stronger recently after the events that transpired. 

All of their scents have been off lately. 

It’s dark in the room aside from the bedside lamp. It casts a soft glow around the room, elongating the shadows in the corners. They loom threateningly, and his fingers twitch to turn on the overhead light. 

You don’t like the overhead light. It’s too bright. 

You always prefer softer light. Is it an omega thing, or is it just a you thing? He’s not quite sure. 

How little they really understand you. 

The lamp illuminates a pile of blankets on the bed, stacked one on top of each other to create a lump of soft fabric. You’re underneath that pile, he knows it. You’ve always liked blankets, always carried one with you in the barracks, eternally cold in the harsh world they existed in on base. This many blankets though? It was excessive even for you. 

He approaches the bed slowly, scared at what he might find. Images of you laying in a puddle of blood, cold and stiff fills his mind. Images of a skeletal figure reduced to nothing but skin stretched over bones has his heart racing. What will he find on the other side of that pile obscuring you from his vision? 

He swallows down his fear, reminding himself that he’s a soldier. He’s seen dead bodies before, he’s killed before. So why is he so scared now? 

This isn’t war. It’s you. 

He steps up to the side of the bed, looking down on you. You’re shivering, trembling under the blankets. Sweat beads on your forehead, skin dewy and clammy in your fever. You look more alive than the skeletal figure he had pictured in his mind, but you don’t look well. 

You look near death. 

“I’m worried about her.” Christine says, closing the door behind her. “She needs someone from her pack close. You’re making the most effort right now, and if anyone might get through to her, it’s you. She needs...someone.” Christine sighs. “Someone who can offer what I can’t.”  

“She needs a member of her pack.” Johnny says, easily putting together what Christine was saying. 

He knows what she’s asking. He’s scared. He’s not sure how you’ll react. The last people you want to see right now is your pack, including him. How will you react to having him so close? 

“Exactly.” Christine says, stepping up right next to him.

Her fingers wrap around his wrist, and he lets her guide his hand to your cheek. It’s hot and clammy against his palm, a fire blazing under your skin. You let out a shuddering breath, the air fanning weakly against his wrist. Your head turns just slightly, pressing into his hand. It’s a good sign, despite the delirium you have to be stuck in. What are you imagining is happening right now? What is your brain telling you? 

“Touch her, talk to her.” Christine says, releasing his wrist. He keeps his hand there, pressed against your cheek. “We need to try and get her back before this gets worse.” 

Before they lose you. 

She won’t say it out loud. 

She doesn’t need to. 

Johnny nods, turning his head to look at Christine over his shoulder. She looks exhausted, and not just because of the late hour. She’s done so much over the past few weeks watching you and caring for you. Maybe it is time one of them tries to step up and help her. You can’t avoid them forever, no matter how much you might feel like trying. 

He has to try. For you. 

“I know what tae do.” He says, his eyes flickering to the books stacked on your dresser, the ones Simon and John picked up. 

Christine squeezes his arm. “I’m just across the living room if you need me.” 

“I’ll try not to.” He says. 

She stares up at him for a long moment before nodding. She understands. He doesn’t have to say much else. She leaves the door cracked and he doesn’t mind, moving away from you to look through the books on the dresser. A handful of them are new, or at least ones he’s never seen you read before. A couple are ones he knows are in your collection at the barracks. He picks one of those, some fantasy novel he’s seen you read more than once. 

He looks between the bed and the chairs. He could pull one over and sit by your side. 

No, Christine said it was better to touch you. 

Instead he climbs onto the bed, sitting close enough he can feel the heat from your body. He cracks open the book, flipping through to the first page. He clears his throat, staring down at you for a moment before he begins to read. 

Rain batters the roof, coming down hard outside. The wind is blowing, whooshing past the house, rattling the shutters. The storm blew in from the sea, dumping rain by dinner and then the wind picked up by the time they were all getting ready to settle in for the night. 

It feels fitting, a storm blowing in at a time when a storm is brewing within their pack.

The storm he blew into their pack. 

He lays there in bed, listening to it rage outside. It’s quiet in the house, Simon and Johnny already settled in, and so are you downstairs. Kyle is beside him, but not asleep. He’s laying awake again as they have done since their arrival. He can feel the heat of Kyle’s body against his arm as he lays on his back, Kyle on his side facing away from him. 

“You just had to do it, didn’t you?” Kyle asks quietly, breaking the silence. “Can’t even go a week without trying to apologize knowing full well she won’t forgive you.” 

John stays silent, having expected some kind of reprimanding for his actions. He really was selfish for what he did. Kyle is right. You won’t forgive him, no matter how many times or ways he tries to say sorry. 

“You’re just making it worse.” Kyle huffs out. “You’re the last person that should try apologizing right now.”

“You’re right.” He finally says. “It was selfish of me to do that. I just wanted her to know-” 

“She knows.” Kyle snaps, cutting him off. “She’s not stupid and oblivious. She knows we’re all feeling guilty, she knows how sorry we all are. She won’t let us apologize until she’s ready. Shows just how little you actually understand her, trying to do that.” Kyle pushes himself up to sit. “She doesn’t want words. She’s had words spewed at her, her whole life telling her what to do, how to feel, how to act. She wants actions. She wants us to prove to her that we do care, that we are sorry, that we’re making an effort to make things up to her. She wants us to prove that we’re putting her first by putting her first.” 

John knows he’s right. Words won’t solve a situation like this. None of them know where to start, though. How do you try and make things up to someone when you’re not even sure that person wants you to try? 

“She’s sick now, because of what you did.” Kyle continues. “If anything happens to her...” He trails off, shaking his head. 

“I’ll let you take the first shot.” John says. “I know. I’ve been a miserable excuse of an alpha. It’s easy when you have the confines of the military to hold everything in place. When those expectations dictate your life and how to run a pack. It’s easy, when you can exist as a pack with those set routines and structures. The facade that makes everything seem like it's working.” He shakes his head. “We never would have worked outside of those confines.” 

Kyle’s head turns slightly towards him, but his gaze is still on the far wall. “No, we wouldn’t have. None of us would have chosen this in the first place.” 

“Probably not.” John agrees. “Then we got an omega added, an outsider that showed us just how weak we really were.” 

“We were crumbling long before that.” Kyle says. “We weren’t ready for an omega, we shouldn’t have ever had an omega.” 

“I should never have been head alpha.” John says. “Being an alpha is different from being a captain. It shouldn’t have been me.” 

Kyle snorts. “He would have never agreed.” 

“That delay might have saved us.” 

“Or it would have made things worse.” Kyle says. “Shepherd wanted us to bond with her right away so his control over us would strengthen if he had to use that power. If those bonds weren’t put into place when they were, they might have tried to force it.” 

“That would have only destabilized things further.” John says. Kyle isn’t wrong. Who knows what lengths they would have gone to, to ensure what they wanted would happen. “They were watching us from the start. They knew exactly how to play all of us.” 

“Simon was right all along in his suspicions.” Kyle says, laying back down on the bed. Their shoulders are touching. It feels nice, having him close again. They’ve been close for the last few days, forced together by their sleeping arrangements, but it feels different now. 

“He’ll be a better alpha than I ever could be.” John says quietly, almost speaking to himself. 

“I think she will come to forgive you eventually.” Kyle says, turning his head to look at John. “You just have to give her time. A lot of time. You have to figure out how to prove yourself worthy of that forgiveness.” 

“I want to take her to the beach.” John says. “Once she’s recovered.” 

“If she recovers.” Kyle had pieced together the worry in Christine’s voice combined with her words. They all had. 

“She will.” John says, sliding his hand across the sheets. “She’s a tough little thing. She’s not going to give up just like that.” 

“I hope you’re right.” Kyle says. He doesn’t pull away as John’s fingers brush his hand. 

“I may not have the best track record with being right currently, but I’m confident in her and her strength.” John turns his head to look at Kyle in the darkness. The storm is calming outside, the wind dying down and the rain lightening. “She’s stronger than all of us combined.” 

The corners of Kyle’s lips twitch. “You are right about that.” 

It smells good. 

There’s a rich scent in the air as you begin to wake. It smells like Christmas, like spices and citrus. Warm gingerbread and cider. Freshly squeezed orange juice on Christmas morning just like every year. It had been your favorite, though you never understood the lengths your mother went to, the early morning and the hours spent in the kitchen on Christmas slaving away to make everything perfect. Everyone got something they wanted, something they loved. You never appreciated that effort until now. 

Oranges. Spices. Warmth. 

You know that scent. 

It’s hot in the room, sweat soaking your skin as you lay on your right side. Heat surrounds you like a cocoon, just like the scent. Warm and soft and too much. You try to wiggle out from under the blankets but you can’t move, so instead you shuffle them off. Some of them hit the floor with soft plops, the others just barely hanging on the side of the bed, trapped under your body. You’re still stuck, still hot as you lay there, a comforting weight around you. The scent floods your nose, fills your body with a pleasant feeling as you lay there, breathing through your nose. Oranges, spices, warmth. 

Someone is baking a pie.

It smells good. You want to bury yourself in it, press yourself into that scent until it’s the only thing you can smell. It brings you a comfort you didn’t realize you were missing. Something fills your chest, a weight beginning to press down inside of you.

Your hair sticks to your face as you lay there, tempted to get up and see who is baking and why. There’s weight pressing down on you from the outside as well. You can’t move. You’re stuck. 

The weight around you moves. 

No, it’s not pie. 

It’s Johnny. 

That’s why you know the scent. That’s why it feels so familiar, so comforting. It’s Johnny. Johnny is pressed up against your back, his arm tossed over your waist. That’s why it’s so hot, his body putting off warmth like a heater. 

You should be angry at the breach of your clearly placed barriers. You should be upset that he would come in here and just climb in bed like this. You should be pissed that one of them would try something like this after your outburst yesterday. 

You shouldn’t be crying. 

Not out of relief. 

Oh how you missed this. 

Something begins to throb in your chest as you lay there, crying quietly in Johnny’s arms. Something begins to thrum deep within you, something you haven’t felt in weeks. Life? Hope? Happiness? 

You should be upset. 

You can’t be. 

Johnny grunts quietly behind you, his arm leaving your waist as he stretches. He’s awake now, or maybe he hadn’t been at all and had been waiting for some sign of life, some movement from you, something to try and give him a hint at what you must be feeling. He doesn’t say anything, laying still as you sniffle in the silence. No one else is up yet, despite the blue light of dawn coming in through the gap in the curtain. 

“Johnny?” You whisper, even the quiet sound hurting your sore throat. You’re thirsty, desperately so, but that’s a problem for later. 

“It’s me, kitten.” He says hesitantly, the pet name making a sob tear from your throat. 

“Johnny,” You cry, the tears falling in a cascade. You can’t stop them. You’ve lost complete control as you lay there sobbing. “Hold me.” 

He doesn’t say anything else, his arms wrapping around you and tugging you close against his chest. He locks you in his embrace, holding you tightly against his chest as you cry. It feels good. Life and energy flows through you again for the first time in weeks. That empty space in your chest begins to fill slowly, warmth blossoming in your body despite the sweat soaking you both. Johnny offers no complaints as he presses his face into your hair. 

How you missed this. 

How you need this. 

You seem more relaxed at dinner. Despite your angry outburst the day before, and your sudden illness, you look significantly less miserable than you did your first attempt at joining them for dinner. The yelling did a number on your throat, but even now it’s nothing compared to that first day. You’re having soup again, and this time there’s a side of mash and peas next to the bowl. 

You even walked to the table without the crutch. 

Simon sits beside you again, all of them taking their respective seats at the table. They’ve assigned themselves these seats, even when you don’t join them for a meal. You’re at the head of the table as you were the first time, Simon and Chrstine on either side of you. Kyle and Johnny are seated next to them, and John is across the table from you. You’ve been avoiding looking at him. You haven’t even so much as glanced up at him. 

Simon is watching you carefully out of the corner of his eye, trying not to make it obvious. If you’ve noticed, you haven’t shown any disapproval. He’s ready in case he has to act fast again, but you are far more steady than you were that first time. There’s no tremble to your hand as you bring the spoon up to your mouth. 

The others look happier than before too. Johnny has stopped crying. Not even a sniffle from him ever since this morning when he emerged from your room. None of them had said anything about it, though they have an inkling of what had happened, judging by Christine’s lack of reaction to it. Kyle looks happier too, sitting straighter like a weight has been lifted off his shoulders. It probably has, with the lightening of the mood. Whatever happened with Johnny this morning, it’s made a huge change already.  

John has never been much of a religious man, but god bless Johnny for whatever magic he worked this morning. 

You don’t even look feverish as you sit there, spooning soup into your mouth. A lingering low-grade fever, Christine had informed them earlier that afternoon, but significantly less concerning than things had been yesterday.  

He’s glad to hear it. He’s always glad to hear Christine’s updates on how you’re doing, how well you’re healing, at least physically. The body heals easily. Mentally...there’s still a long way to go. Healing physically will help mentally, but with all the trauma, years and years of trauma, it’s going to take a long time to heal from that. 

The clink of your spoon in your bowl draws him from his thoughts and he glances up at you. 

“Getting full?” Christine asks as you take a sip of your water, wincing slightly as you swallow it. 

“Can I have some tea?” You ask. 

“Sure,” Christine says, going to push her chair back, but John is already standing.

“I’ll make some.” He says, not offering any room for argument as he turns his back on the table to head for the kettle. 

You’ve been drinking more tea lately, likely to soothe your throat. He never thought he’d see the day, given your determination to stand with Johnny on the side of coffee. It’s a bit late for coffee, but he does know it wouldn’t keep you awake in the slightest. You love your sleep, as most omegas do, and nothing will get in the way of it. Not even some late evening caffeine. 

He sets mugs out on a tray, deciding to make tea for everyone. At least that way it’ll make it seem less targeted at you. He’s not doing it to try and impress you or win your affections back. He just wants to help take the load off of Christine’s shoulders. She’s done so much for you, for all of them, already. 

He steeps the tea before bringing the mugs to the table along with some milk and sugar. He knows at least Simon and Kyle will drink some, and he will as well. He brings the kettle over, filling the mugs with tea. All of them sit there watching him, waiting tensely for what will happen next. Will you take the mug of tea he offers? Or will you refuse. Even if you threw it in his face, it wouldn’t make him mad. It would be horribly painful, yes, but he would deserve it. 

Perhaps him doing this was a mistake. 

He stares at the sugar and milk as he grabs one of the mugs. Do you like sugar or milk in your tea? He’s not sure. He doesn’t even know how you take your tea. He knows you like creamer in your coffee. But how do you take your tea? 

What a sad excuse of a human being he is. 

You don’t look at him as he sets the mug next to your water glass. You’re still eating your soup, your hand trembling just slightly now. Your scent is tainted still, a whiff of it filling his nose. Displeasure, a hint of burning anger. 

This was a mistake. 

He sets the milk and sugar next to you first, letting you finish making your tea. He won’t push that boundary and risk making it wrong. It would only add fuel to the fire, make it more obvious that he knows and cares so little for you. He doesn’t even know how you take your tea. 

He takes his seat again as the others help themselves to the tea, even Johnny taking a mug. Whether he’s doing it because he wants to make the moment feel less awkward, or because he genuinely wants some, John will never know. 

He made a mistake in doing that. 

Still, despite the awkwardness, it felt good to do that. 

Maybe that’s how they get closer to you. 

The little things, things that take some of the pressure off Christine. She has to be getting tired, going nonstop all day. Anything they can do to help, they should. Things seemed to go well with Johnny, so maybe the others can have some success in their attempts to gain your favor once more. 

John will have to stay away for now. Distance is what you need from him. 

That’s alright. He has other things he can do. 

He tries to hide the small grin on his face as you pick up the mug, taking a sip of the tea. 

They’re fighting. 

You stand at the back door watching them throw punches. They’re solid punches, nothing held back, no pulling them. They’re all breathing heavily, two of them watching the other two fight. 

Simon’s fist meets Kyle’s shoulder, Kyle’s fist going for Simon’s head but he’s too fast, ducking before he drives his shoulder into Kyle’s stomach. Kyle hits the grass, disappearing from your view. 

John steps forward, pulling Simon back and speaking to him, but you can’t hear from this distance. 

“Still out there?” Dr. Keller asks, stepping up beside you. 

“Yep.” You say, watching as Johnny takes Kyle’s place against Simon. 

“John did say it would be good for them.” Dr. Keller says, wincing as Johnny’s fist hits Simon’s ribs. 

“They’re gonna start a real fight.” You say, watching as Simon starts to get more aggressive. You can tell because you’ve been in that position before. You’ve seen when that switch starts to flip, when the alpha starts to take over. He was never this aggressive with you, but perhaps even his alpha could be rational given your obvious size and strength difference. 

And the fact you’re an omega. 

“Well, that’s their problem.” Dr. Keller says. “As long as they keep it out there.” 

“They might make you patch them up afterwards.” You say. 

She lets out a snort. “There’s ice packs in the freezer and a first aid kit in the bathroom.” 

You try to hide your smile as you watch John get in between Johnny and Simon, speaking to Simon again. Maybe it will be good for them to get some of that pent up energy out. They’re all used to being so active and always having something to do. Being stuck inside has to be driving them stir-crazy. Simon has been going on runs in the morning, and you know John has been going on walks every so often. 

You’re starting to feel a bit stir-crazy yourself. It’s taking you back to the days shut up in the barracks, unable to go anywhere or do anything, having to entertain yourself for hours while they were gone. At least there you had space and room to move around, even when you were being trailed, one of them constantly following you around. They might not be hovering quite as obviously here, but it still feels suffocating, like you can’t truly have a moment to yourself. 

“I want to go for a walk.” You say, shifting on your feet. The likelihood of you going very far is slim, at least right now. 

How far you’ve fallen from your running days. 

“I suppose you could go for a little walk.” Dr. Keller gives you a sideways glance. “Might be good to help get your strength back. I doubt they’d let us go without one of them, though.” 

“Probably not.” You agree, knowing they won’t even let you sit out on the porch without one of them watching. If you left the house without even telling one of them, all hell would break loose and you’d be condemned to your room once more. 

The thought makes you wince. 

You almost wish you could go out there and throw some punches at one of them. That might make you feel a bit better. Hell, line them all up and you’ll take turns beating the crap out of all of them. Maybe that might heal some of the anger and pain still stuck inside of you. 

That’s an idea for a different day, though. 

It’s oddly warm out today, or at least that’s what Ashley said. Soon the weather will turn, though, and the cold rain will come. Lots of rain. 

Your eyes flick between Ashley and Dr. Keller. The three of you are seated in a circle around a table outside, steaming mugs of tea in front of you. Neither of them are staring at you, instead focused on each other as Ashley speaks. 

Dr. Keller has a crush. 

It’s not hard to tell. Her eyes are focused on Ashley, a smile tugging at her lips. Her gaze only flicks to you when you shift and move in your seat before she’s staring at Ashley again. You can’t blame her. You can hardly bring yourself to look away from Ashely too. 

It makes you almost miss Kyle. 

They have the same soft brown eyes and the same bright smile. They’re both perfect, like they were chiseled out of marble and brought to life. They even laugh the same, a genuine chuckle coming right from the chest. 

It makes you want to laugh, even if you have no clue what was being said. 

How has Kyle been handling this? You’ve hardly paid him any mind. His connection to John puts him too close to the source of your anger and rage and pain. Johnny cries, Simon is a brick wall, John reeks of guilt and misery. Kyle...you don’t know. He’s been a blank spot, a hazy figure in the distance. 

It almost makes you feel bad. You’ve completely cut him off, isolated him. Has he cried? Has he been sulking? How miserable does he feel about everything? Does he feel guilty or miserable at all? He has to. They all do. 

Good. You think. They deserve it. 

“You do get stuck in your head, huh?” 

Your gaze snaps up, looking between Dr. Keller and Ashley. They’re both staring at you quietly, a small smile on Ashley’s face. You did get lost in your thoughts again, stuck in your ruminations as you usually do. Lately it hasn’t been a problem, as you’re alone or with Dr. Keller often. You’re supposed to be thinking and processing. It just happens at the worst times. 

Simon would hate it still. 

“Something specific on your mind?” Dr. Keller asks. 

You probably shouldn’t say anything. How would you explain how your mind went from Dr. Keller crushing on Ashley to hoping the guys feel guilty? You’re not even sure you should reveal that you know about Dr. Keller’s crush, especially if she hasn’t said anything yet. You don’t think she has. They’re not...close in the way a couple would be, a distance still between them. Does Ashley feel the same way? It’s hard to tell since you don’t know her quite as well yet. 

Maybe that can be your goal, besides healing. Something to focus on, something to distract from the constant emotions and pain. Get Ashley and Dr. Keller together. 

They’d be perfect for each other. 

“Not really.” You finally say, looking down at the book in your lap. You’re about halfway through it. It’s fine. Nothing to write home about. 

“What do you think of the book?” Ashley asks, sensing your end to that discussion. She doesn’t push. You like that about her. 

“It’s alright.” You shrug. “Kinda slow.” 

“They are spending a lot of time on character development.” Dr. Keller says. 

“We should keep a tally of how many times the phrase “his dark eyes” gets mentioned.” Ashley says, making you laugh. 

“It’s good to hear you laugh.” Dr. Keller says, smiling at you. 

“It...feels good to laugh again.” You say. “It’s nice to have something to laugh about.” 

“Well then I’m going to make that my mission.” Ashley says, taking a sip of her tea. “Get you to laugh as much as possible.” 

You don’t think you’ll mind that one bit.

“There’s something we need to talk about.” 

You don’t turn to look as Dr. Keller sinks into the seat next to you. It’s raining again, the rain pattering against the window as you sit in front of it. They won’t let you go out in the rain. 

“Something that is rather important.” She continues. “Something you should know.” She clears her throat, not waiting for a response. She knows she won’t get one. “When you told John that he left you there to be tortured...is that what Graves told you? Did he tell you they left you behind?” 

Her words have something sinking in your stomach. Your insides are squirming, your intestines tying themselves in knots. You haven’t even thought about that. You’ve been so caught up in the emotions, swept up in the anger and devastation. The memories of what happened are still blurry, still stuck in the recesses while your body heals. 

That pit in your stomach continues to drop as she stares at you, waiting for an answer. 

You don’t want to answer. 

“Hey,” She says softly, leaning to try and stay in your line of sight as your eyes begin to drop to the side. “We need to talk about this.” There’s a serious look on her face as your eyes slowly lift to stare at her again. “Do you believe they chose to leave you behind with Graves?” 

Tears prick behind your eyes as you stare at her. Of course you do. Why wouldn’t they? They’ve left you behind so many times, what’s another? They don’t care that you were being tortured. They never cared that them leaving you before was like torture. Why would they waste the chance to go after Shepherd before he found a place to hide? 

The job comes first.

“Yes.” You breathe, a tear sliding down your cheek. You want to say it, let all the thoughts rushing through your mind pour right out of your mouth but the tears choke you, keep you silent. 

The serious mask on Dr. Keller’s face melts away to a sympathetic look. It doesn’t surprise you. It’s the look she often wears when she looks at you. 

“Oh, honey.” She says, reaching out, but you withdraw yourself further away. “They didn’t leave you behind. They were doing everything they could to try and find where you were. John about blazed a path across the US to find you.” 

You don’t want to believe it. It sounds too good to be true. Her words stir the bitter pot in your stomach, the anger at them and at yourself. You let yourself believe that they would care about you, but they led you to believe they cared. They left you so easily and you never said anything to them to try and keep them with you. They left you behind when they knew it was dangerous, and you believed Phil when he told you they had abandoned you. 

Why would Phil tell you the truth? He wanted to torture you, wanted to take out his anger on you. It wasn’t your decision, nothing was your decision, but in the end the mark on your shoulder sealed your fate. You’d never belong to him. The more he could tear you and your pack down the better. The more hopeless you felt, the more you hated the members of your pack, the more satisfaction he would get. 

He wanted to drive the wedge between your pack, and you fell for it. 

Tears glide down your cheeks as you turn to face the window. They mirror the droplets of rain sliding down the glass. Your fingers curl against the fabric of the chair, your breaths starting to come in gasps as reality begins to settle in. 

“You’re okay.” Dr. Keller says, kneeling next to the chair. “I was there with them, I saw just how desperate they were. They wouldn’t leave you like that. Trust me.” 

Can you trust her? Can you trust any of them? Part of you would like to. The part of you that wants things to go back to the way they were, when things felt fine, when you still believed your pack loved you. Back when you could be delusional and believe something good could come of this entire situation. 

Now you’re stuck with a pack that never wanted you. Now you’re stuck with the trauma of the last few weeks, trauma you should have never faced in the first place. Not if your pack truly cared about you. It was always a risk, but you always believed they would take care of you, they would keep you safe. 

Now look at you. 

A sob tears from your lips as you sit there, the thoughts quickly growing to be too much. Dr. Keller reaches for you but you pull away, pushing yourself up to stand. You move towards the bed, grabbing one of the plush pillows. You bring it to your face, letting out a long, muffled scream.

The scream dies in your throat as you jolt awake in bed. The book that had been in your hands when you fell asleep drops to the floor with a quiet thud as you jerk up into a seated position. You’re breathing heavily, your breaths coming in ragged gasps as you try and calm your racing heart. It’s beating hard like it might beat right out of your chest. You’re shaking, your hands clutching at the baggy shirt you’re wearing like you’re trying to cling to some hope that it was all a dream, that you’re awake now and this is real life. 

Sweat beads on your forehead as you sit there, shaking in the darkness. You need someone. The shadows are closing in around you, your nightlight unable to keep them completely away. You need someone to fight them back. You need someone to reassure you that it was all just a dream, someone that can wipe the tears streaming down your cheeks and whisper softly to you that it’s all okay. That it’s all over. 

You need Kyle. 

Where is Kyle? How do you get to him without waking the others? You could go upstairs but what if they think you’re an intruder? You don’t even know which room Kyle is in. You wish you had a phone. You wish you could call him. You wish you could just telepathically reach out and tell him you need him and only him. 

You’ll wake them all anyway trying to find him. 

You suck a breath in, your hands still shaking as they cling to your shirt. You have to do it. It’s the only way to get them all down here, to get Kyle down here. 

You take a couple deep breaths before you scream. 

Within seconds the house is alive, footsteps racing across the living room towards your room as others thud from above. 

The overhead light stings your eyes, forcing them closed. It’s too bright, intrusive even with your eyes pinched closed. You can still see it behind your eyelids, harsh and too artificial. Just a price you have to pay to get what you need. 

Dr. Keller’s hands are soft as they peel your hands off your shirt, your fingers trembling with nothing to hold on to. They open and close, seeking out something to grip, something to give you an anchor to reality. You’re still panicking, your breaths shaky as you shit there, trembling in fear. 

“You’re alright,” She tries to soothe you, brushing your sweaty hair back. “It was just a dream.” 

You wish it was. 

“Kyle.” The name comes out as barely a whisper, stuttering out of your trembling lips. 

“What was that, sweetie?” Dr. Keller asks, leaning in closer. 

“Kyle.” You whisper louder now, the name shaky in the tense silence of the room. 

“Kyle,” Dr. Keller repeats, standing up straight. 

Quiet, hesitant footsteps approach the bed. Your eyes are still pinched closed against the harsh overhead light. You can’t bring yourself to be brave enough to open them, to face that harsh light. It might reveal the truth, that it was all just a dream, that this is still just a dream. 

It might not be Kyle approaching the bed at all.

You can’t know. You don’t want to know. You’re afraid to open your eyes. 

There’s a click as the lamp is turned on. You still can’t bring yourself to open your eyes. It’s supposed to be comforting, the soft light, but it could be used against you, giving you a false sense of hope and security. 

You flinch as the overhead light is turned on, still too afraid to open your eyes. Your hands have closed around the blanket pooled at your waist, gripping it so tightly your fingers are aching. It’s real. You’re touching it, you can feel the texture of it in your hands. It’s real. 

It’s real. 

Your breaths are shaky as you breathe in and out, trying to catch a scent. Any scent. Something to tell you that you’re really awake, that it really is Kyle standing next to the bed. 

“I’m here.” A soft voice says, something hovering in the air next to you. 

Kyle. 

You know that voice. You’d know it anywhere. 

You finally crack your eyes open, tears brimming as you turn your head to look up. Kyle is standing there awkwardly next to the bed, his hand raised as if he was reaching out to comfort you, but thought better of it. You’re glad he did. You might have spiraled into another panic if he’d touched you before you knew it was him. 

You stare at his hand for a moment before you peel one of your hands away from the blanket. Your hand is shaky as you lift it, reaching out towards his own trembling fingers. 

His fingers are warm and rough, just as you remember as they close around yours. You’re still shaking, a cold sweat forming on your skin as fear trickles down your spine. 

What if this is a dream? What if this isn’t real?

“I’m here.” He says, rubbing his thumb across your knuckles. 

You want to believe him. You really do. 

You pull his hand closer, pressing your cheek against it. His skin is warm against your cheek, and like Johnny, he makes no complaints about your sweat smearing on his skin. You’ve been that close to them before, sweat mixing together, slicking skin. How far things have fallen since then. 

Your tears drip onto his skin as you hold him there, just breathing him in for a moment. He smells like the sea, but with that soft, light scent underneath. You missed that scent, more than you realize you did. 

You let out a quiet sound as you rub your cheek against his hand, almost like you’re trying to embed his scent under your skin. 

He doesn’t say anything as you lean against his hand, tears still streaming down your face. The lamp is pushing some of the darkness away, but it’s not enough. It’s never enough. You can still feel the eyes from the dark corners of the room, the shadowy figures just out of view threatening to reach out and tear you away. 

A shudder runs down your spine, your fingers squeezing around Kyle’s in what has to be a painful grip. 

“I’m here.” He says again, pulling you from the dark thoughts plaguing your mind. He’d know if someone was here. He’d know if anything threatening was nearby. 

It’s his job. 

The job. 

The thing that’s kept you so separated from them, kept you at a distance. The thing that put your life in danger, that exposed them all as liars. The thing that’s left you an empty shell.

Maybe having him down here was a mistake. 

But the shadows...

You tug on his hand, pulling him closer to the bed. He sinks down on the edge carefully, still a bit hesitant. You don’t blame him. It’s not like you’ve been the most welcoming of them. For good reason. 

You need him right now. That need for safety and security far outweighs the conflicting emotions battling in your brain right now. 

“Stay.” You say, the word tumbling out from your trembling lips. 

“You’re sure?” He asks, his thumb still stroking your knuckles. You’re not sure if he even knows he’s doing it. 

You nod, tugging him closer as you scoot over in bed. He lets you guide him, laying on top of the covers.

You try not to think about it too much. 

It’s nice having him close. The shadows don’t seem quite as dark, the threats in them silent now that he’s here. He’ll keep you safe. He’ll protect you from the silent threats. That’s why you want him. That’s his role to play in all of this. They all have roles, they all have their places in the pack. They all have a part to play, not just for you but for each other. 

They’ve been struggling. 

They’re struggling because you’re struggling. 

The silence is loud as you lay there listening to the hum of electricity. You’re not quite sure what to say, how to break the silence. What is there to say that you haven’t already conveyed by your silence? What is there to say beyond what you’ve conveyed in your anger? They all heard your outburst, they all know the source of your anger and what they did to cause it. 

What’s left to say when you have nothing tying you together anymore except a claim and a half-broken bond? What is there to say when saying the wrong thing might fray that bond even more than it already has been? 

“I’m sorry.” Kyle says, finally breaking the tense silence. 

Of course he’d start with that. 

You let out a huff, turning on your side to face away from him. “I know you all are. You don’t have to keep saying it.” 

He lets out a sigh. He knows it. He’s not apologizing to you, for you. “Nothing can change what we did and we know that. We just...want you to know that we’ll do whatever it takes to help you and support you. We don’t want to push that boundary too far, but we’re all here if you need us.” 

You let out a hum. You already know that too. That’s why Johnny came so willingly, that’s why he stayed. That’s why they all tiptoe around you and stare at you like you’re a wild animal that may strike at any moment. 

Part of you wishes they wouldn’t. 

Part of you wants to go back to the way things were. Part of you wants to pretend that everything is normal again, that you love them and they love you just as much. You want to go back to that comfortable, seamless flow of one around the other, the way they all moved in sync, aware of each other without even needing to look. You want to insert yourself into that flow again and let them guide you along with them. You want to trust them blindly again and know they’d catch you if you fall. 

They proved they won’t though. They proved you can’t trust them to catch you. You’re on your own again, forced to catch yourself, forced to save yourself. You have to make that rope to catch yourself with. 

Yet, a deeper part of you yearns for that connection. Your omega screams for it, for your alpha, for your pack. You want them back with you, you want the bonds to heal and to be stronger than they were before. You want them to do as they said and prove to you that they’ve changed, that they're putting you first. 

The omega should be first. The omega should be the center. The omega should be the sun they gravitate towards, revolve around.

That’s what the book said. That book that’s sitting on your desk in the barracks. That book you read over and over, convincing yourself that it was true and they were a good pack like that book said. 

They’re not. 

We all make mistakes. 

They’ve never had an omega before. How are they supposed to know how to have an omega in their pack if they’ve never had one before? None of them came from big packs. John is the only one who’s ever even dated an omega before. They’re just as new at this as you are. 

You probably know more than them. 

You spent years learning how to be an omega in a pack. You read the books and wrote the essays and did the research. You read that book. 

Simon read that book too. 

Yet he did nothing. 

“Why did you want me?” Kyle asks softly, pulling you from your ruminations. 

You turn your head to look at him, staring into those soft brown eyes. Brown eyes you’ve missed. Tears trail down your cheeks as you stare at him, wetting the paths of the ones that had slowed to a stop in your rumination. 

Why did you want him and not Johnny? 

Johnny was the one that came for you, that comforted you, that got you through your fever. Johnny was the one you asked to hold you, to give you that support you’ve been so desperately clawing for. 

So why did you ask for Kyle?

You turn onto your back again so you’re laying side by side, your shoulder brushing his. He’s warm, and you just want to nuzzle into him and never let him go again. 

Another tear slides down your face as you stare at him, at that concerned look on his face. “I need you to tell me it’s going to be okay.” 

That concern morphs into understanding as he shifts slightly, reaching out for you. You let him, you let his thumb brush the tear sliding down your cheek away. He doesn’t say anything for a moment, just staring at you as you lay there in the warm light of the lamp. The shadows don’t seem so close now, so threatening with him here. The things that lay in the darkness waiting for you to sleep so they can seep into your mind and stir up the horrible memories lying there in wait are at bay for now, fought off just simply by his existence in this room. 

His thumb continues to brush your cheek, your skin tingling along the path it follows. “It’s going to be okay.” He says softly, quietly. 

You’re not sure if he’s convincing you of that or himself, or perhaps both. You don’t know what he’s feeling, what he’s been feeling. You’ve been ignoring him, pushing him away out of fear that if you looked too closely, you’d break down. That bond will never break between the two of you, held tight with steel simply because of that claim your alpha and his alpha has on the both of you. No matter how much you hate John, that bond can’t be broken. It can’t be cut. It can’t go away. It can’t be denied. Not completely. 

A small smile tugs at Kyle’s lips, a reassuring smile. His words are stronger this time, spoken with more conviction and surety, like he’s speaking it into existence, manifesting it for the future when things perhaps can be different. 

When things are better. 

“It’s going to be okay.” He says, cupping your cheek, staring right into your eyes as he speaks. “We’re going to be okay.” 

NEXT ->

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[peaktora]

𝐂 𝐈𝐒 𝐅𝐎𝐑 𝐂𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐘 ˚◞♡ ⃗ satoru gojo

𝙧𝙚𝙫𝙞𝙚𝙬 ┊ your husband is unbearably clingy.

𝙘𝙤𝙣𝙩𝙚𝙣𝙩 ┊0.9k words. no pronouns used or specified gender for the reader. intended lowercase. established relationship (#married).

a/n. — i’m warning u guys right now that this is not proofread 😭 .. i literally just typed this up rq and posted it bc it’s been too long since i’ve last posted something on here

p.s. the prompt was in my notes from a longgg time ago, but i believe it’s from @/creativepromptsforwriting .. if not please lmk !!

"c'mere, hold my hand," satoru pleads for what has to be the third time. he pouts at you, who’s sitting on the countertop.

your brows furrow as you look up from your phone, "but, you're washing the dishes?”

he twists the faucet handle, and a steady stream of water flows down. after a brief glance at you, he places the plate beneath the water and says, "i know how to multitask, baby."

clinginess is defined as “the tendency to stay near someone for emotional support, protection, ect.” but there has to be another term for what satoru is, because you can't give any of those things while holding his hand right now.

you let out a deep breath and turn off your phone, watching as the screen fades to black. "satoru, there's no way i'm sticking my hand in that dirty dishwater," you say, sliding your phone into your pocket.

he practically shoves the plate into the drying rack. "i can't believe this," he huffs. "we literally had vows."

“what are y—“

“we had vows that said you’d love me in sickness and in health.”

"well…are you sick?" you ask, crossing your arms across your chest.

he pauses his task of washing dishes, leaving them untouched. leaning over the sink, he rests his arms against its edge. he steals a furtive glance at you, only to find your gaze locked onto him. with a hint of hesitation, he softly mumbles, "no..." before you can respond, he interrupts, "but i’m in health, and the vows said that you have to love and cherish me in this state too."

you lean back, searching your mind for what the alternative of holding his hand would be. because in no world would you hold his hand in dishwasher. then, it hits you. "for now, would a hug make you feel better?"

he answers your question with a hum, and you can't believe he's debating whether or not to accept your offer after all that drama over holding hands in dishwater. even so, he adds, "i'll have to give it some thought."

two can play that game.

“it’s okay,” you say, gracefully hopping down from the counter. a smirk spreads across your face. “i could just go—sit on the couch?” slowly, you start to walk in his direction and make your way over to the living room.

he doesn’t say anything, letting you do as you please. it’s not until you start to pass by him, that you get the reaction you wanted.

or atleast, somewhat similar to what you wanted.

"on second thought—" he exclaims, and the dishwater swirls around him as he turns around, his hands still wet and dripping.

you cringe as small puddles gather on the tiles. "hey—" but he interrupts you as he reaches out to grab your wrist. “ew—I—what the hell?”

you instinctively try to pull back, but he slips his wet hand in yours; sealing your fate.

“satoru—”

“what happened to nicknames?”

“satoru.”

"’m not sure who that is. i go by a lot of names, but not that one. lets go down the list, yeah?” he clears his throat. “i go by "babe, baby, swe—"

"you should consider adding "gojo" to that list."

"now, when have you ever called me gojo?”

"right now, in exactly ten seconds.” your husband gasps, hanging his mouth open. “satoru go—"

“woah woah woah—what’d i do to deserve this treatment?”

“you put your dirty dishwater hand in mine.” you jerk your hand back, struggling to escape free of his grip.

his grip tightens on your hand, “if you’re feeling like not loving me today then just say that.”

“hey—don’t discredit me. i offered you a hug and you said you had to “think” about it.”

“cause holding your hand ‘s better.”

you sigh, “after you’re done with the dishes, you can hold my hand as long as you want.“

he lets out a soft, thoughtful hum—the same hum that got you both into this situation in the first place. at the same time you shake your head, a mischievous twinkle appears in his eyes, and a smile twists onto the edges of his lips. "deal" he says, shaking your hand. “but before-“

you tsk, making him drop his excuse.

“wh—“

"the quicker these dishes get done, the quicker you’ll be able to hold my hand. so get on with it—go," you playfully command, and his grip loosens in response. seizing the opportunity, you slide your hand out of his grasp. you look down at it, seeing bits of food that’ve stuck to your palm. gross.

you walk over to the sink, feeling the cool water flow over your hand, washing away the food and dirt that clung to your skin. as you stand there, you hear satoru's voice grumbling from behind, "i hate doing dishes,” and you can’t help but snort.

before you know it, you feel his presence close behind you, his body pressing against yours. his arms encircle you, creating a cozy pocket of space between the counter and his body. satoru leans over your shoulder, gets a sponge from the soapy water, and starts washing a bowl. you simply lean back and look at his features.

the sight almost makes you want to stay in his arms forever. that is, until you realize the predicament you're in.

“you did not,” you whine. you desperately try to break free from the cage he’s trapped you in, but your attempts prove more and more pointless.

"oh, yes, i did," he declares with a smile. “what did you say earlier?" he clears his throat before proceeding. "the faster these dishes are done, the sooner you'll be able to hold my hand," he says, mockingly imitating your tone. "so, the faster these dishes are done, the sooner you can leave and do anything you want."

you sulk and moan while you reluctantly grab a dish and a spare sponge from the sink. “i hate you.”

“i love you more.”

[sapphiresaphics]

EDITORIAL NOTE:

I wrote this months ago and since then Amanda Overton, one of the key writers for the show, was asked about this exact question and has answered publicly that “Caitlyn does not know Ambessa set up the attack on the memorial and if she did know she would not have joined her.”

I am leaving this post up in its entirety because while you can take her word as gospel, I do not think that negates my analysis based entirely on what was presented in the show itself. You are entirely free to disregard this analysis if you want, but I think it still holds some value because when you critique media you often don’t have the word of god (from the creators of the media) to explain every facet and you should be allowed to interpret things differently if it feels like it’s presented in the media that way.

Anyway, please enjoy or disregard this post if you want.

———————

Because I don’t think just describing it is as effective, let’s go through the scene where Caitlyn becomes the general. (Note: These gifs have been edited for time and comprehension.)

What’s important to remember before watching this is that we’ve been shown many times now that Caitlyn is a detective. She has the unique power to walk into a crime scene, observe the surroundings, and make logical deductions from the enviroment.

With that in mind look at Caitlyn’s face here after the initial shock of being nominated. She looks down and her eyes start twitching. She’s thinking hard about something.

And then we cut to Ambessa pounding her chest and see glimpses of her henchman arranging the attack on the memorial, in addition to her silencing all the loose ends that could lead back to her. I don’t think this is just for our benefit, I think this is a glimpse into Caitlyn’s mind. (Gif sped up for time)

And then we cut back to Caitlyn, who is now looking around at her surroundings and watching the peer pressure start to unfold. As Maddie and the other Enforcers begin to beat their chests in rhythm to Ambessa’s prompting, Caitlyn looks back up at Ambessa with hatred. Watch those brows furrow.

In this moment Caitlyn KNOWS. She knows Ambessa set up the attack. She knows she was wrong for attacking the undercity. She knows she fucked up by letting her anger at Jinx get the best of her and for creating a rift between her and Vi. And most importantly… she KNOWS that Ambessa is using her.

Note that Caitlyn doesn’t start moving forward until after Ambessa says “come, child.” And when she finally does start walking forward it’s with a slow deliberate knowing pace. She even turns her head and keeps her eyes glued to Ambessa as she walks past her. She may not know WHY Ambessa is doing this, but she’s not stupid. She knows what her name unlocks, having just spent the past 2 episodes abusing her namesake’s power.

But the writing is on the wall now. She has no choice. Whatever it is Ambessa is doing, she can’t stop this nomination. She will have to accept the power. And I think here she is finally FINALLY realizing how fucked up she is. She has just become Marcus. A pawn in a larger game. And the ONLY benefit she can see is that she can use this power to find Jinx and bring her to justice, so her memory of her mother can finally rest.

And Ambessa knows this too. That’s why she leans in and whispers “your mother will have Justice!” And that’s when Caitlyn finally assumes the role of martial law general.

She doesn’t want to be there.

She doesn’t want that power.

But she can’t turn away now.

She’s stuck.

And she KNOWS it.

[arolesbianism]

Me sitting and watching any oni discussion waiting for an excuse to bring up a seed is planted all like 🤓👉👈

[matsunoluvr]

୨୧ ‧₊˚ ⋅ how clingy sylus copes with your absence

warnings: swearing, mentions of drinking

characters: sylus

link to master list here!!!

authors notes: so basically we all love clingy!sylus and i don’t think people talk about it enough, so i here i try to do him some justice </3

i tried not to mischaracterise him, but i find it difficult to imagine how he’d react. he’s a full fledged adult - 27/28 years old - so i can see him trying to be mature about it. but after a while, it gets hard to wait any longer no?

more below the cut!! :3

first few days of your absence sylus is fine, i mean it’s one day - people get busy, people get tired. sylus understands better than most that life gets tough.

he checks his messages maybe two or three times to see if you’ve responded, but nothing. that’s okay, he’ll wait for you.

after five-ish days he’s a little irritated, how could you forget about him for that long?

yeah you could be busy, but seriously?

he gives you a call but it sends straight to voicemail, to which he refuses to leave one.

i bet he secretly feels a little embarrassed at how much your absence is bothering him, and out of spite he refuses to check his phone during the day.

“Tsk, ignoring me?”

luke and kieran definitely notice his small shift in attitude - his nonchalant facade isn’t perfect after all.

they are also secretly cursing you for disappearing, i mean come on! how could you leave them with an angry boss!!

another few days pass, how long has it been since he last saw you? a week?

gets fidgety and cracks, calling you again - no reply.

when he gets sent to voicemail he speaks in his typical, slow tone.

“Why aren’t you picking up my calls, kitten? Get back to me when you listen to this.”

despite his seemingly calm voice, he’s starting to really lose his cool. your absence was unsettling, and yeah he’s disappeared before for a few days on business, he at least picks up calls.

he never leaves you clueless for even a few days, let alone a whole week.

mephisto is sent out for surveillance of the n109 zone, and sylus keeps his phone close. always in his vision, hearing range, whatever.

every notification catches his attention, eyes snapping to the illuminated screen only to slowly drag away when he sees it isn’t you.

from the first to second week of your absence, his irritability shoots up. sylus is getting agitated, brushing it off as annoyance.

after all, what the fuck did he do for you to ignore him for this long?

he texts you almost every day now, the texts getting increasingly shorter, decreasingly floral and more concerned.

“Kitten, why aren’t you picking up my calls?”

“[YN], are you really ignoring me?”

“Hello? Are you okay?”

“Call me.”

he’s calling you every other day now, his sleeping schedule is deteriorating and his mind isn’t focused.

sylus is getting angry at himself, why is he so messed up about this? so what if you haven’t spoken to him in 13 days, isn’t it pathetic to be so affected by your absence?

he lived 27+ years without you, he can live another hundred without.

yet he still finds himself rearranging the plushies you two caught together, checking for your messages, scrolling through your posts.

almost a month has passed since your disappearance, and sylus isn’t getting any better.

why did you go? are you okay? did you get hurt?

god forbid something happened to you.

he’s hired some people to search for you, fuck waiting he’s worried.

finds himself drinking more alcohol with his meals than usual, to the point where even he - a heavy weight - feels his head becoming a little dizzy, his hands twitching for his phone.

one night, after downing a bottle of wine himself, he calls you at least five times, before leaving a voicemail.

his voice lacks its usual slow, bored tone. instead his words are a little slurred, his voice seems a little higher pitched - not too much but it is noticeable - and he’s speaking a little faster too.

“[YN]? Where are you, are you okay? Please pick up, it’s been a month. Do you really- have I deterred you? I know you dislike me, have you ran away? If you have, then at least tell me you’re alive. I mi-”

he catches himself before he says it, because he’s just realised something, something that was so blatantly obvious he feels shocked that he hadn’t noticed it

he misses you, he isn’t angry. he isn’t annoyed that you disappeared, he’s upset.

the fact that it took so long for him to realise is stupid, and all he can do it sit and chuckle drunkenly to himself.

“I miss you, [YN]. Please call me back.”

when you finally call him - exactly 43 days since you left - he almost scrambles to his phone

sylus picks up immediately, yet miraculously finds himself at a loss for words. what does someone say after over a month of waiting?

kind of just stands there, frozen - if you wait before speaking you can hear his almost shaky breaths

“Hey Sylus, you miss me? You left over 13 voicemails and 65 texts, I’m touched.”

gods your voice smoothed over his tense muscles like honey

he sits down, heart beating faster than usual. it’s stupid how much hearing your voice affected him, but he couldn’t help the way his body relaxed at the sound.

if he was a dog his tail would be wagging so fucking hard

“Come here, now.”

when you do arrive, you seriously expect to get killed or something. his tone sounded seriously pissed - i mean like the most pissed you’ve ever heard it

but when you open the door you just get swallowed into a chest and a pair of arms

if you try to move away or struggle, they just hold you tighter and restrict your actions and- oh, sylus is hugging you.

his face is angled down into your head, and you can’t see his expression - only the beating of his heart against you, and it was fast.

“Where the fuck were you? I missed you.”

explain whatever the hell you want to sylus, he’s already decided that you’re not going out without him knowing ever again

probably tries to download some sort of GPS tracker on your hunter’s watch to make sure he knows where you are

TLDR; sylus doesn’t realise how much he really cares for you until you go MIA for over a month in which he starts to genuinely tweak out! :3

AN; guys i actually spat this out in like an hour i think i might have clingy!sylus brain rot because oh my god anyways this isn’t proof read i just needed to express my love for clingy!sylus that gets worried because he isn’t just a dominant badass gang leader he’s also human and he also gets sad and upset and feels emotions argahdbansn he just sucks at recognising his own desires (get it because his evol eye can see other people’s desires but he can’t see his own :3)