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sohnric · 3 months ago

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a brief inquiry into online relationships – k. sunwoo

pairing: kim sunwoo x fem! reader

genre: enemies to lovers au, internet best friends au. friends to lovers au. gamer! sunwoo and gamer! reader. fluff, comedy. sunwoo has a big fat crush and is a bitchless loser but is also simultaneously being very annoying and mean sometimes:(

wc: 20k

warnings: swearing, sexual innuendos/jokes/flirting, the reader is referred to with she/her pronouns and called a girl! i call league players virgins :/ (and im right). certain parts are really chat heavy (but what do you expect from an internet best friend au am i right). the reader is said to have dyed hair! I wrote this with a friend in mind yall just get to read it 😔

there's only one person kim sunwoo treasures the most in the whole world, and that person is his internet best friend. there's also only one person kim sunwoo hates with a burning passion, and that person is you. well, imagine his surprise when he finds out... they are the same person.

playlist: fruit roll ups - waterparks / royalty - enhypen

I wrote and dedicate this fic to @csenke 🩷 happy birthday best friend, I hope you like your little present. I dont like being sappy in public, but do know that I love u the absolute most.

a/n: a HUGE thank you to @from-izzy for beta reading and helping me out with this fic so much, listening to me ramble and cry and hyping me up izzy, it means a LOT. thank you @sanaxo-o for beta reading a bit as well. 🫶🏻 ive wanred to write this fic for literally years so im glad it is finally out hihi.

The first time Kim Sunwoo has ever been accused of having a crush on a girl he hasn’t even met in real life yet was on October 11th, 2023. It was a few months after meeting the said girl online through a Minecraft server and talking to her during the night over a Discord call, not being able to fall asleep after and coming to class looking like a zombie from the deprivation of relaxation. After he said the story to his friend Changmin, he got laughed at and teased– all because he said he didn’t want to hang up on his online best friend yet, and she was so full of energy, and Sunwoo wanted to know what she had to say because she was so adorable gushing over how much she loved Paw Patrol as a kid and how she got some magnets for her fridge from her local grocery store and put Skye right in the middle, where she keeps her shopping list.

Of course, Sunwoo refused this accusation. He does not have a crush on his online best friend– the girl he hasn’t even met in real life yet. He doesn’t like her, because let’s be real, he doesn’t even know what she looks like. Navigating the boundaries of an online friendship was already hard as it was for the boy– was he oversharing? Was he being too much, too annoying at times? – so asking for the girl’s socials outside of Discord or begging for a simple selfie in the chat is far away from the things he’s comfortable saying out loud to her.

And Sunwoo can’t be into her– because he doesn’t even know her that well. He doesn’t even know where she lives or if the name she’s given him online is her legal name. What he does know, though, is that she’s the same age as him, she’s funny and pretty fucking cool, she has obscure interests like the Spiderman movies or collecting albums of her favorite kpop artists, and her voice is nice over the speakers of his laptop when the two of them call and play Minecraft together in the late hours of the night.

That’s not enough to develop a crush on someone, right?

Right…?

The first time Kim Sunwoo starts to question his own feelings for his friend is also, coincidentally, October 11th 2023. See, he might say that he’s not as dull as one would think after looking at him, but after the conversation he had with his best friend in the morning, something started to click. (Mainly because he just couldn’t stop feeling the blush creeping onto his cheeks, bashfulness filling his composure. Why is it so hard to deny the obvious?)

In the late hours of the night, Sunwoo logs onto the Minecraft server and walks around the world he’s created. He is on a mission of cheering his online friend up– she said something about an exam going terribly wrong in his Discord DM’s just a few hours ago, and although he tried his best to cheer the girl up over messages, he thinks he has to go an extra mile to remind her that life is not as rude and that she’s loved even when she feel like a disappointment. (Just the sentiment of the wording in his head is suggesting that he’s trying to stay oblivious to his own feelings– there is no doubt he is failing, though.)

He checks the people online in the server, noticing she’s not there yet– as he expected, since the girl usually logs on only a few minutes before midnight– which assures him that there is still time to execute his little plan. With a pep to his step, Sunwoo’s character moves through the terribly half-assed house he’s built (that his friend teases him for) and opens one of the chests in his underground storage area. After taking everything he prepared earlier– for whatever reason, he’s not sure (or just trying to deny the obvious, once again)– he skips outside of the wooden building and runs towards the portal he built leading to her house last week.

Once she saw the portal outside of her house, she asked him about it. To the question of why he wants easy access to her house at all times, he replied that it’s so he can rob her when she least expects it. Her and him both know she’s not the one keen on mining, so there’s not really much to steal in the first place, but to Sunwoo’s surprise (and relief), his friend dropped the topic quickly, moving on to the next one.

After the vision of his character finally clears and he is left standing right outside of her house– which is a stunning piece of architecture, by the way– he looks around for a bit to find the best place for his little offering.

He settles on the place by the front door of her house and gets to executing his little surprise. Opening the inventory of his character, Sunwoo takes out a bone meal and uses it on the grass blocks next to the door, making all sorts of flowers grow next to her humble abode. When he’s satisfied with the colored petals blooming in their digital world, the boy gets out the pink wool and digs into the remaining dirt blocks on the ground, replacing them with the rosy cubes and shaping them into a small, but telling heart.

He stands back and admires his work for a bit, laughing at the ridiculous actions he caught himself doing. Sometimes he gains self-awareness in the weirdest of situations, and this is surely one of them– he prays his friend doesn’t log on in this exact moment. He would have no other choice but to jump out of his window and kill himself, he thinks.

Still, he follows up with his initial idea and places a chest next to the heart, filled with emerald and diamonds that he gathered over the last week. He worked hard on them and she kept whining that she still didn't have any– and although he’d like to keep them, he figures he can just get more the next time he’s alone in here, mining.

A cherry on top is placed next to all of this– a wooden sign that he types “What if we put our Minecraft beds next to each other? xx” on, against all his thoughts telling him otherwise.

This might be a terrible, terrible idea, he thinks. But the thought of making his best friend smile fuels the boy. Taking one last look at his masterpiece, he snickers. Yeah, Sunwoo. Maybe there really is no getting out of those allegations. Maybe he won’t tell about what he did to Changmin– and he’s lucky the boy doesn’t play Minecraft and has no way of finding out by playing on the same server as the two of you.

Sunwoo logs out of the game, sitting back in his chair. After scrolling through his Instagram for a bit, he hears the familiar sound of an incoming Discord call waking him up from the doom, making him breathlessly accept and wait for the girl’s voice to come out of his headphones, making him feel excited and on the tips of his toes.

“Ya, Steve, was it you who made that cute altar in front of my house?” she asks, making his heart skip a beat.

“Depends,” he hums, “did you like it?”

Every Tuesday afternoon, 6 o’clock sharp, Kim Sunwoo takes the role of the head of the Video Gaming club at his university. It’s quite an easy job, he’d say– since all his responsibilities lay in meeting up with the members of the club in an internet café once a week, playing a video game of their liking– and he also appreciates the fact that he has something to put onto his CV. The extra points towards graduation are also good, and so in reality, he has nothing to complain about– he likes video games and he also likes socializing.

There is just one thing he hates about the Video Gaming club, and that is the fact that Y/N Y/L/N, his best friend’s ex-girlfriend, managed to somehow infiltrate herself into the circle.

Now, you and Ji Changmin dated in the early stages of high school. The two of you met in Science class, and although Changmin wasn’t the smartest when it came to Chemistry, he still managed to make himself your designated helper in all experiments, just to make himself close to you. That slowly worked and the two of you started dating– for 2 months, that is– before you realized Sunwoo’s poor best friend wasn’t who you were looking for and you broke up with him, starting a new relationship with Park Sunghoon, the handsome ice skater from the private school downtown just 2 weeks later.

Changmin cried for three days straight and then one more day after he found out he was replaced, and since then, Kim Sunwoo has decided that he hates your guts– because no one makes his best friend sad.

Every Tuesday afternoon, 6 o’clock sharp, you waltz into the internet café with your friend Aeri clinging to your side, both of you laughing about whatever you found amusing that day. The sound of your laughter is insufferable to Sunwoo’s ears and the sight of your dyed hair makes his stomach churn with acid– everything about you angers the boy, makes him all alert of your presence. For some reason, he can’t control his anger around you– everything you do infuriates him, makes him wish you were anywhere but in the same room as him.

Can’t you read the room? Do you not realize you’re not welcome here? This is Sunwoo’s territory, and for some reason, he thinks you should respect it. You haven’t spoken to each other in over 4 years, but that doesn’t mean he forgot about everything. Maybe you just keep showing up because you know he hates your guts– you do it out of spite.

Kim Sunwoo won’t have that, though. If there’s something about him that he makes perfectly known in the Video Gaming club, it’s that he is awfully competitive– and for once, he tries to use this quality of his for something good: getting you out of the club.

Because he might be the head of the club, sure, but that still doesn’t give him the permission to kick you out of it for no apparent reason.

He figures making your life a living hell for the entire hour or two you’re in his presence every week would surely be sufficient enough. Surely, one day, you must have enough.

“There’s someone behind you, dude, watch out–” Intak calls from next to Sunwoo, helping his teammate out.

Today’s game of choice is CS:GO– too bad for you, Kim Sunwoo is exceptional at shooting games.

He watches his screen and moves his mouse swiftly, shooting the opponent– he thinks it might’ve been Jaehyun or Chan– before they even have a chance at spotting him. His team– Terrorists– are winning by a mile, coincidentally having the best of the best in the group. He’s playing a perfect 5v5 game alongside Intak, Haechan, Yeji and…. and you.

“Do you even have your screen on, Y/N?” he grunts from behind his computer, glaring at the screen. He notices you not really killing any opponents, and even though he understands that not everyone is going to be the best at every video game that gets played over the course of semester, he’s making sure to trash talk you each and every time you’re even an inch away from perfect.

“Fuck off, I’m trying.”

“Doesn’t seem like it,” he snickers, pointing his gaze towards you only for a split second to watch you roll your eyes at his comment. An annoyed sigh escapes your throat, making the boy’s veins reek with satisfaction.

“We’re winning anyway, so I don’t get why you’re so pressed about it,” you grunt, tucking your hair behind your ear as you play, momentarily taking your hand off the mouse.

Sunwoo notices your character in his point of view on the monitor– the nickname ‘ceo.Y/N’ shining proudly over the default skin of the terrorist figurine– when a bright, spiteful idea sparks up in his brain. The boy realizes he left the friendly fire option on when assembling the game room, and with that, he’s set on his decision.

You don’t deserve anything nice in Kim Sunwoo’s eyes– which is why he shoots you in the head the first moment he sees you, laughing to himself.

“Yeah, no thanks to you,” he comments as he watches your character drop to the ground.

“What the fuck?! Yo, why did you do that?” you gasp, snapping your head around to point your daggers of eyes onto the boy, frustration dripping off your face. It does nothing to ruin the mood of the satisfied boy, only making him shrug and offer you his brightest smirk.

“You weren’t contributing anything to the game anyway,” he shrugs, “might as well sit this one out, Y/L/N.”

Yes. This one surely will teach you a lesson.

When Kim Sunwoo reaches his room after his shower– at 1 in the morning sharp and feeling too awake for the late hour, since all the hot water ran out due to his roommate’s greediness (curse Eric Sohn’s long ass showers)– he notices a notification shining on his phone in bright light, making him reach for his phone with curiosity. He doesn’t have many friends that would reach out to him at the late hours of the evening, since he talks to most of them during the day anyway, and so even subconsciously, as he reaches for his phone, he expects to see his online best friend’s username pop up in the notification bar.

And he was right– clicking on the Discord notification waiting for him at the top of the screen, he already feels his heart skipping a beat, his insides flowing with immediate warmth despite the cold shower he took just a few minutes ago.

Further shaking out the water out of his hair before plopping onto his bed and reading through the girl’s messages, the boy finds himself smiling at her profile picture. It’s a close up of her Minecraft character standing in front of the little display he put out for her– and he can’t help but feel like this is some sort of a soft launch. Of what, he doesn’t really know– since the two of them are far from dating– but that’s okay. It satisfies him enough. Nobody even really knows it’s him who she’s showing off, but to him, it holds the weight of the whole entire world.

sunpoodle [0:22] – a missed voice call sunpoodle [0:35] – a missed voice call sunpoodle [0:36] – so u dont like me anymore sunpoodle [0:38] – i see how it is sunpoodle [0:48] – everything ok tho? sunpoodle [0:54] – a missed voice call

Squinting at the screen, Sunwoo starts to type out his reply to his friend. Before he has the chance to click send, though, his phone lights up with the incoming voice call from her, leaving him to accept it almost immediately. He hears her voice coming out of his speaker after a few seconds of silence, having his ears perk up and heart beat a little faster.

“Damn, took you long enough,” she hums, making the poor boy chuckle. “I thought you were either dead or ignoring me.”

“I wasn’t,” he replies before settling deeper into his bed, going as far as putting a blanket over him to provide himself the most comfort, “I would never ignore you,” he lets himself speak out, a full body cringe taking over him the second he realizes just how far gone and infatuated he must sound with his friend.

“Oh, okay,” she says, “I was getting kinda worried, though.”

“Worried?”

“Yeah, we didn’t speak at all the whole day,” she replies. And she’s right– Sunwoo was too busy the whole day to text her or check in with her throughout the day. He was working on his assignments with Changmin and Juyeon in the library, and then he had to listen to Eric talk about his crush on the new girl from the café he works at. Before he knew it, it was late in the night and all he wanted to do was shower and go to sleep– his plan was thrown into the bin the moment he got back into his room, though.

He might have not put his online friend as his priority during the day but if it comes to sacrificing sleep for her, he won’t even think twice.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” he mumbles, although something inside of him cheers at the fact that she cares about him enough to want his presence every day.“I was just busy with assignments and socializing.”

“You do that?”

“Strange, isn’t it?” he chuckles, poking fun at himself. There’s no doubt of him being an extrovert, but for the sake of hearing the girl laugh through his speaker– his insides squeezing on themselves with violent tenderness at the sound (what a contradiction)– he is content with simply ignoring the fact.

“What’s up, though?” he asks. “You usually don’t call and I have to pressure you into picking up in some way.”

“That’s not true.”

“Kind of is, when you think about it–”

“I just like to be persuaded,” she hums, making the boy chuckle.

“Noted,” he says– and it might’ve been just a figure of speech, really, but there is a secret folder inside of his brain that he calls the girl-he-likes-folder, where he keeps all the information and random facts he learns about his friend safely, until he has a chance to use them. “But really, what is it? You seem uneasy,” he notes, making the girl laugh softly on the other end of the line.

There is some shuffling on the other side before he finally hears her voice again. Sunwoo furrows his brows at the ruckus, but he doesn’t mention it– maybe she’s just moving around the room, doing her own things as she talks to him on the phone. It makes his brain wander, though– imagining her cleaning her room, putting things away. Stacking some old papers or throwing stuff into the trash can. The image of his friend is always hazy in his mind– he was never really the most imaginative when it came to stuff he doesn’t know– but he still feels attracted to the girl in ways he can’t explain without sounding absolutely crazy to an outsider’s ear. He has no clear idea of her features– he doesn’t know how long her hair is, what her figure looks like, or what color her eyes are, but he still knows that to him, she’s absolutely beautiful and no reality he could see would break this image he has of her.

The fact that she’s calling him while going on with her life, as if he is an active, real part of it, makes him smile to himself. Every time the girl acknowledges her friendship with him, he feels like he’s on Cloud 9– he doesn’t really know why he needs that validation, though.

“This might sound stupid, but I just wanted to hear your voice,” she says nonchalantly through the speakers of his phone, and with that, Sunwoo is a goner. He feels the world stop turning for a while, his breath hitching in his throat. Something about the girl’s words makes his head spin and thoughts run laps around the walls of his skull– is it just him, or does that sentence sound strangely intimate?

“Why?” he asks on autopilot– because the annoying voice inside of him needs answers.

“Hm? Oh, I dunno,” she quickly utters out before she makes a sharp turn in the conversation, completely disregarding her previous statement, “did I tell you about that party I’m invited to this weekend?” she asks instead, making the boy shake his head in disbelief and throw his face into his pillow to stop himself from screaming.

“No,” he sighs, “but tell me now.”

“Okay, so–”

The rest of their conversation is drowned out by his thoughts. Don’t get him wrong, he is actively listening to what she has to say– how she doesn’t know what to wear and she’s not sure if she wants to match with her best friend– but he is also subconsciously focused on the fact that the way she talks in her low tone, keeping her voice down to not wake up her roommate next door. It makes the atmosphere that much more sincere and intimate. He finds himself admiring his friend’s excitement and joy, the energy she has when she talks about how her day went and how she can’t stay keeping up with one topic for long– getting lost in the track somewhere along the way, making Sunwoo remind her what she was even talking about in the first place. Everything about the girl is mesmerizing to the boy, and before he has a chance to notice, he’s falling asleep to her rambling on the phone, eyelids heavy in comfort and sleepiness.

“Are you still there?” she asks, receiving only a soft hum from the boy on the other side. “Am I boring you?”

“No,” he half-whispers, “I’m just comfortable. Keep talking,” he says, hugging his pillow to his chest and putting the phone next to his head. He hears a soft scoff on the other side of the line, a kind, sweet voice lullying him further into dreamland.

“Okay, keep using me as your bed time story, then,” she jokes, a tint of faux offense in her tone, “I’ll disconnect the call when you stop giving me fakely interested hums after every other sentence.”

And with that, Kim Sunwoo falls asleep to his online best friend talking his ear off on a Discord call. How could she ever think that wanting to hear his voice was stupid? He understands– he thinks that perhaps, he’d choose listening to her even over hearing his favorite song.

The idea of teaching you a lesson with his competitive nature is quickly thrown into the bin when the next week comes as the game his friends choose for the afternoon is one that he is not fond of. Why does he not like this game, you may ask? Well, simply put– he is absolutely terrible at it.

The love for League of Legends is a telling sign of someone’s virginity, though, so Sunwoo thinks he can take pride in the fact that he is not a bitchless loser by playing it in his free time. (Don’t mention the fact that he is a Discord user and currently does not have a girlfriend. He will ignore it for the sake of his reputation.)

“I’ll go bottom,” Intak says as he chooses his champion in the lobby, making Sunwoo huff. He’s not really good at playing the mage, he’s terribly, terribly bad at going jungle, and tanks and fighters are equally as easy for him to play as learning the Pi number by heart (very difficult). Soon enough though, he finds that the rest of the roles are quickly divided in his team, and that leaves him nothing else to do than to just humbly take the responsibility of the middle lane, equipping the only champion he’s played before– Fizz.

With him locking in his character, the image on his monitor morphs into the loading screen, letting him once again scan the names that belong to his team. Having 10 members in the club is easy enough to divide into two teams by 5, which he is thankful for, but the teams are almost always randomly selected– which makes him angry only at times where he gets the obviously weaker players.

This time around, surrounded by Intak and Yangyang teaming up on the bottom, Soobin taking over the jungle and Yeji resigning on the top lane, Sunwoo is satisfied to see he at least doesn’t share a team with you this time around– because that means he can do everything in his power to make your life a living hell while playing the game.

“Try not to die in the first few seconds, Sunwoo,” Soobin snickers as the game starts and the boy aimlessly moves towards the middle of the map, moving his character with the mouse. Sunwoo only salutes at the taller boy, making him giggle.

“I’ll try not to, boss!”

Sunwoo’s quest in this game is to protect the tower and farm as much as he can– so that destroying the opponent’s tower is easier and opens up the shortest way to the enemy. After seeing how his character moves in the game– don’t make fun of him but after so much time since he last played the game, he’s forgotten– he puts his head into his hands and mourns, noticing that he foolishly chose an assassin. It’s not that they’re bad per se, it’s just that Kim Sunwoo is much better at League of Legends when he has some distance from the opponent. Which, when he wants to attack, is not a feature Fizz awards him with.

Much to his surprise though, the middle lane seems to be empty. There is no one from the opposite team walking up to him and trying to start combat, and that puts him at ease. Maybe he can do his job right– for at least a few minutes before the tower is damaged enough that the enemy realizes they need to protect it.

And so clueless Sunwoo enters the circle under the tower, attacking it with the red minions by his side, veins flowing with satisfaction that hey– maybe he will be successful with something in this game. He surely doesn’t need the validation of his team, but look– all he needs is to not embarrass himself in the process of playing this game. His pride is precious to him.

The talk around the internet café slowly drowns out around him, providing him only a background noise. He doesn’t need to listen to his team’s strategy– he knows he isn’t really included in it, as the weakest link. Hyperfocusing on the game, he almost jumps when two characters suddenly appear from the bushes– not skilled enough, Sunwoo didn’t think to check them when he arrived in the middle of the map– attacking him.

The nicknames aerichandesu and ceo.y/n shine proudly above the characters of Annie and Vi, both of the females cornering him and making him scowl at the screen. You don’t do much damage to him, he notices, but there is something about the way Aeri plays that tells him that he is royally fucked in this game.

Only a few seconds of combat pass before the banner saying First blood appears on the top of the screen, embarrassing him and making the rest of the team laugh at his death. He finally acknowledges that he was tricked, and as the seconds pass of him waiting to be revived, his eyes meet yours from across the room– and oh how he wishes to wipe that smirk off your face.

“As expected,” Soobin chirps from Sunwoo’s right, making the poor boy sigh and cross his arms defensively at his chest.

“They teamed up on me!”

“That’s the point, sweetheart,” Yeji hums from the corner of the room, “you’d know that if you knew how to play.”

“Oh, shut up, you losers…” he grunts as his character revives, making him hurriedly move towards his designated place again, noticing his team’s tower slowly falling apart due to leaving you in there unwatched.

Once he appears back under his tower, he watches you retract from your place. Sunwoo takes this as his opportunity to show you that one on one, you’re not going to win against him– and so he chimes forward after you, using Fizz’s trident to deal you magic damage over the next couple of seconds. The clicking of his mouse onto your character resonates through the crowded café and the banners showing his teammate’s successful kills do nothing to help him focus on the task at hand– but your health bar is slowly dropping, and that satisfies the male.

“Not so strong without Aeri now, are you?” he teases, watching as you aimlessly start to run away from him, no longer focusing on killing his character.

He doesn’t get a verbal reply from you, but one thing is certain– the poor male forgot to keep a check of his own health bar, and while chasing after you with greediness, wanting to be the one to get you down, he foolishly gets shot down by the enemy minion following him. The kill is still written off to you though, and when his screen freezes with the death announcement, he watches you cheer– eyes glimmering and a victorious smile spreading across your cheeks– before you high-five with your best friend to your right.

Turns out that maybe you don’t need Aeri to carry you in League of Legends. At least not when it’s Kim Sunwoo you’re playing against– and that puts him at a big of a disadvantage.

Is this how you feel every time he conspires against you? Because if so, he has to applaud you– you have an awfully big patience. He can handle it for one Tuesday out of the semester, but if he was in your place, he’d be running away from the room the moment he dies in the game again, all because of you.

Running around, out of breath and heaving for oxygen, Kim Sunwoo starts to contemplate if all of this was even a good idea. He should’ve known the whole thing was bound to be a failure when the first mishaps started happening, but against his best assumptions, he decided to go on with it and try to figure things out.

The first thing wrong with this whole entire thing is that it wasn’t even his idea in the first place. Hyunjae suggested that the whole friend group goes to play laser tag at the end of the week, to wind off a little before finals. And Sunwoo agreed– because that sounds like a lot of fun, doesn’t it?– and expected to just read out the details of it in the groupchat. He thought turning up to the place would be the only thing he had to do, but oh how he was wrong.

Lee Hyunjae decided he didn’t really feel like going to laser tag on the single day where all of them were free– which meant that they either cancel the whole thing or go without him. And since Eric Sohn was all too excited for the idea, Sunwoo decided he won’t disappoint his dear roommate– in fears of getting sabotaged or killed in his sleep if he declines– leading into making Kim Sunwoo being in charge of the whole thing because as the only Aries of the group, he takes his leadership seriously when he has to.

And so he sucked it up and called the laser tag place, asking for a reservation for 5. Another failure hit him in the face when he was announced that they can only let them play if they have a group of ten people, and before he had the chance to let the rational part of his brain take over and cancel the plans, he was left agreeing and saying he will find 5 more people to come with them.

Sunwoo figured that Eric, as the born extrovert, will have no problem finding 5 more people for the laser tag game. He was wrong, though, when his friend announced that all of his friends magically have some plans for that exact Friday– he thought that there’s a party that somehow, only the loser friend group he is partaking in wasn’t attending, for some reason– and Eric could only think of one person that would come, which left Sunwoo with solving the issue of finding 4 more people to come to play laser tag with him.

So he brought out the big guns– the Video Gaming club group chat.

sunwhooo [9:31]: hello friends i need 4 people to join us for laser tag tomorrow sunwhooo [9:31]: anyone down meet us there at 5pm

And with that, he considered the task done. Too over with the whole thing and too tired of being the only one with common sense in his friend group, he didn’t check who agreed to his invitation. He figured that someone will either show up, or they will shamefully go home. Which option it’s gonna be is the problem of the day after– in this moment, he needed sleep.

He appeared in front of the laser tag arena on Friday, 4:45 sharp, waiting for his group to arrive. He felt like one of those tour guides in the middle of big cities– all he was missing was a flag in his hand, or an umbrella– either or– waving around and calling out for his friends. Five minutes after him, Changmin and Juyeon arrived, tailed by Eric and a boy that’s introduced to him as Jake Sim– who is, just by the way, a carbon copy of Sunwoo’s dear roommate both with energy and some of their small mannerisms.

Five minutes before they were supposed to enter the arena and get the safety tutorial on how to play, 2 members of his club came up, smiling widely ear to ear. If Sunwoo had to guess who would say yes to his invitation the fastest, Myung Jaehyun and Lee Donghyuck would be first in line– and he was right.

“Where’s the rest of you?” he asked after greeting the boys, and right in this moment, after hearing their reply, was when he knew he should’ve canceled the plans the moment Lee Hyunjae turned down his own offer.

“Y/N and Aeri’s bus was late, but they’re on their way now!” Jaehyun said, smiling ear to ear. “Y/N texted you in the groupchat, but I don’t think you saw it.”

“Pretty sure I have her number blocked,” he grunted under his breath, sighing to himself. Was it too late to leave now…?

“What?”

“Nothing.”

And that’s how he ends up in this mess. You and your best friend arrive 2 minutes late, but you’re still let in– much to Sunwoo’s dismay. Everyone seems to be excited– almost too excited– when they choose to play the game in the complete darkness, and before Sunwoo has a chance to protest, he is thrown into the laser tag game, nothing but a laser gun in his hand and a vest with the sensoring clutching to his chest.

He can’t see anything, he’s constantly bumping into the obstacles, the arena is too big for his own liking– because he doesn’t really know where he is and can’t see anyone else, making him feel strangely alone and kind of afraid– and it’s so hot inside that sweat is slowly dripping down his forehead, making him irritated.

Once in a while, he hears a scream from somewhere inside of the arena when two players meet. He contemplates just sitting on the ground and waiting for the game to pass– not really that mad about being the last one in the ranking– but the last remains of his pride are telling him to keep going, to keep trying.

He’s good at shooting games! What is he doing?

Taking a deep breath in and out, he makes a run for it– hoping he won’t be met with the wall and break his neck in the process (now that would really take the crown for the worst thing that could happen in relation to the laser tag), before he’s met with the sound of footsteps in his ears, making him painfully alert of his surroundings.

Turning his head around, trying to see where the sound is coming from and who he has to protect himself from– or shoot and get some points in, that is– he feels his body meeting full speed with another person, a yelp coming out of their throat right before the sound of clothes rustling and body mass hitting the floor resonates through the place.

“Fuck,” he curses under his breath, dropping the gun, “are you okay?” he asks, genuine concern lacing his tone.

“Watch where you’re going, for fuck’s sake!” he hears your voice call out of him… and the last remains of genuine concern leave his body at that, irritation swimming to the shore.

“How the fuck am I supposed to watch where I’m going when you fuckers chose to play in complete darkness?!” He yells over the music– that is, just for the record, an atrocious EDM remake mix of early 00s songs– and lets his eyes adjust to the darkness for some more, watching the outline of your figure on the ground slowly appear in his retina.

Acting on auto-pilot, though, the boy reaches out an arm towards you, trying to help you to your feet. The view of your face is hazy in his eyes but he can still make out the scowled expression you offer him before you take his hand and let him drag you to a standing position.

“So much sympathy in one man, wow,” you grunt, shaking your head at him once you’re standing tall in front of him. “Wouldn’t hurt to apologize, you know–”

“This clearly wasn’t my fault–”

He starts, but stops himself mid-sentence when he sees you point the laser gun towards him, shooting. The interaction is short– it goes by almost too fast for him to register it– and before he has a chance to let the sensor cool down and aim towards your chest as well, you’re running away from him, full speed skillfully through the maze.

“Hey!” he yells out, but is much slower at following you. Is he doing something wrong? Why is everyone suddenly so good at navigating the space?

And while Kim Sunwoo is competitive– there was an agreement that the last place pays for everyone’s meal after– sometimes, his spirit is overshadowed by his emotions. Frustrated, irritated and a little mad, although he pays much effort into shooting at his opponents and gathering up all the points he lost while he was aimlessly walking through the place like a blind man, he just can’t seem to catch up and crawl out of the last place.

Standing outside of the room and looking at the scoreboard after, having the rest of the team pat his shoulder and thank for the meal, his eyes land on you as you’re the last one to leave the arena aside from him.

“Looks like being good at CS:GO isn’t enough to be good at shooter games in real life, huh?” you tease, pouting at the scoreboard in mock sympathy. “Thank you for the meal, Sunwoo. I’d like a large fry and a cheeseburger, by the way. Make it extra cheese.”

Maybe he should’ve canceled the laser tag the first moment he wanted to.

You know what? Maybe he should cancel the Video Gaming club altogether, while he’s at it.

Sitting around the study room in the library, accompanied by Eric and Changmin arguing about something and enveloped in a gray, fuzzy hoodie, Kim Sunwoo lets himself roll his eyes at the aimless quarreling and puts the hood of his sweater up, leaning back on the uncomfortable chair. After a couple of minutes spent listening to the fight– that’s about the assignment at hand, just for your information– Sunwoo feels himself zoning out of the room before he’s brought back to reality by the buzzing of his phone on the table with the incoming notification.

At this point of the uneventful afternoon, he would’ve replied back to anyone within a few minutes– anything to pass time, he figures– but when his eyes zone in on the name on his screen, he is left clicking at the Discord bar quicker than the speed of light.

sunpoodle [6:44]: can u call rn? notsteve [6:45]: no notsteve [6:45]: im at the library rn notsteve [6:45]: why

“You can’t just completely ignore that point of the essay, because it’s going to look like we didn’t do enough research,” Changmin argues his point in the background, the loud voice of Sunwoo’s roommate almost startling him as he tries to prove otherwise.

“We can’t just include every. single. point. in it, though, or else it’s gonna become a wholeass bible at this point.”

“Better to exceed the word count than to hand in an unfinished essay–”

sunpoodle [6:48]: oh so u hate me notsteve [6:48]: pretty sure this is emotional manipulation

“What do you think, Sunwoo?” Eric speaks up, turning his head towards the last boy of the three– the only one that hasn’t spoken up about the matter yet. It’s true that he didn’t really do much work on the actual essay yet– only some very, very brief research last night– but that didn’t mean he suddenly felt like doing much more.

“Hm? Me?”

sunpoodle [6:49]: dont care sunpoodle [6:50]: youre probably with some other bitches

“Yeah,” Changmin chimes in, “say your part. It’s three of us here, so the majority will go. What do you think?”

“Oh, I don’t really care…” Sunwoo hums without much thinking, eyes glued to his phone screen.

notsteve [6:51]: ??? sunpoodle [6:52]: anyways i just wanted to show you my child sunpoodle [6:52]: but you’re clearly not interested so

“Are you even listening?” Eric asks.

Sunwoo hums in response, automatized. Did the words really register in his brain? You can bet they didn’t.

“Are you texting that online girl again?” Changmin scoffs, Sunwoo’s ears perking up just a little bit at the mention of his friend.

“Yeah.”

notsteve [6:53]: a child??? notsteve [6:53]: is this another sylvanian families toy sunpoodle [6:54]: no:(( notsteve [6:54]: what is it then notsteve [6:54]: because we both know youre not responsible enough to have a child

“Still can’t believe you developed a crush on a girl you don’t even know,” Eric sighs from next to him, the previous topic of their conversation long gone when it means he can make fun of his roommate for being absolutely, totally infatuated with a girl in his phone screen.

“How can you even know she’s real?” Changmin jokes. “For all you know, that could be a 50 year old white male trying to get nudes out of you,” he adds, making the shortest boy snort at the comment.

“I don’t have a crush on her,” is all that leaves Sunwoo’s mouth, although his tone is not very argumentative– just mindlessly spoken out, most of his attention still glued to his messenger app.

sunpoodle [6:55]: are you underestimating me?? sunpoodle [6:55]: im offended sunpoodle [6:56]: might just block u. and here i was considering sending u a pic of my dog…

“Sure you don’t,” Eric sighs, “because you’re totally not smiling like an idiot right now.”

“Shut the fuck up…” Sunwoo breathes out, rolling his eyes. The smile on his face freezes and drops at the unnecessary comment, but his cheeks grow a soft pink hue to them, only further proving his friends’ point.

notsteve [6:56]: A DOG????”,?” notsteve [6:56]: show it to me notsteve [6:56]: show it to me rachel!!!!

“When are you going to ask her for a picture or something?” Changmin pries, kicking his friend to his shin under the table.

“When she asks first,” he shrugs, “I don’t wanna sound like a creep.”

“I bet you already do,” Eric jokes, making his roommate glare at him.

“Besides, we call often,” Sunwoo shrugs, “I know she’s not a 50 year old man. And so far, I’m content with this. It’s not like it would be going anywhere in the first place.”

“You don’t know that,” Changmin says, and something about that sentence makes Sunwoo momentarily glance away from his phone screen, furrowing his brows at the male.

“Yeah,” Eric chimes in, “you don’t even know where she lives. For all you know, she could be just down the street and you two could be going on embarrassing lan party dates together, or something.”

“Or– and get this–” Sunwoo ironically argues, “she could live on the other side of the country. Which, logically speaking, is much more likely.”

“You never know until you don’t ask,” Changmin shrugs, “I mean, it doesn't hurt to know.”

Shuffling his feet under the table, Sunwoo thinks to himself. There is a reason why he never really asked his online best friend any personal questions– and that is because he was simply afraid. Afraid of what he might find out.

No matter the distance, it’s scary for Sunwoo to know about his friend’s whereabouts. Because if she lives far, it means the chances of ever meeting her are unlikely. If she lives close, the chances rise– but he’s also completely terrified of the chance to meet her because, to put it blankly, he is petrified of the image his online friend would have of him when she meets him in real life.

Hiding behind the cloak of the internet is much easier for the boy. His friend doesn’t know what he looks like, what his mannerisms are in real life. And it’s not like he is faking his personality online– because truth be told, he’s acting the same way in his Minecraft server then he would in any real life situation– it’s just that he is strangely insecure of if he’d still be liked in the same way, had his friend met up with him in real life. He’s nervous of awkward silence. He’s stressed out about the fact that maybe he won’t click as well with the girl he met online. It’s all strange and new to him, and that’s why he never really dares to ask.

“I don’t know,” he shrugs, “it’s all just kind of weird.”

At this point, he doesn’t know if he fears meeting up with his friend online, or never seeing her with his own two eyes more.

sunpoodle [6:57]: doggo sunpoodle [6:58] – sends one picture sunpoodle [7:02]: wow youre ignoring me again sunpoodle [7:05]: why do i even try at this point… sunpoodle [7:08]: teaching my dog to bite u if he ever meets u irl notsteve [7:09]: how are u gonna do that notsteve [7:10]: BUT OMG THATS SUCH A CUTE DOG notsteve [7:10]: BEST BOY sunpoodle [7:11]: i have my ways… sunpoodle [7:11]: but he says thank u so i guess we will let it go for now

Sunwoo chuckles at your reply, making the rest of the boys in the room look at each other with knowing eyes, shaking their head in disbelief. It’s not that they’re disapproving of their friend’s little (big) crush on the girl he met online– they’re supportive of whatever makes their dear bundle of sunshine happy– they just fear that this whole thing… might not end the best for the young gamer.

notsteve [7:12]: u like me too much to make your dog bite me notsteve [7:12]: admit it sunpoodle [7:13]: im resuming with my lecture!! sunpoodle [7:13]: he is small and fat but he is strong. do be afraid notsteve [7:14]: all that for not paying attention to you for 5 minutes? notsteve [7:14]: your actions speak for themselves, honey <33

“Right…” Eric awkwardly clears his throat, calling the attention of the enamoured boy, “shall we dwell deeper into your online relationship, or do you want to help us with the group essay for a change?” He asks while kicking the boy into his shin lightly, to make sure he has his full attention.

“Essay please,” he replies, nodding to himself. There is no way he is going into details of the embarrassing crush he has on the girl living in his phone.

sunpoodle [7:15]: what can i say life isnt fun without my jasper :// notsteve [7:15]: try not to die as i work on this assignment sunpoodle [7:16]: dont lie u dont do those notsteve [7:16]: unfortunately i do:(( notsteve [7:16] – sends one picture

Sunwoo points his camera so only a part of his laptop is shown with the study room in the background– making sure neither his friends or him are in the picture– before sending it to his friend. It’s not like she needs proof– Sunwoo knows that despite the playful teasing, she understands his need to put in some work into his education– he just feels like slowly testing the waters with sharing more and more of his real life with his online best friend.

“Okay, so let’s get back to what we were talking about before,” Changmin says, “I was thinking we should at least briefly talk about the points that are against what we’re trying to argue here, but Eric says it would completely disregard like, half of our work, so…”

sunpoodle [7:17]: wait is that at SNU notsteve [7:18]: yea notsteve [7:18]: how’d you know sunpoodle [7:18]: oh my god ?? sunpoodle [7:18]: i study there too

You know what? Forget the assignment– it’s due in a week. It can wait 7 more days.

“Guys, uh…” Sunwoo hums, hands shaking and his heart doing somersaults in his chest, “I’d actually like to go back to the topic of my online friend for a sec…”

Although Kim Sunwoo feels like the world stopped turning– or shifted in its axis, either or– since he learned about the fact that his internet best friend goes to the same university as him, and therefore, could be just about anyone he sees in the halls on a day to day basis, much to his dismay, it did not. The world didn’t stop turning and nothing really changed, all events happening around him as if he wasn’t just gifted with the life changing information: and that meant that besides the exam week fastly approaching him, he still had to host the Video Gaming club the Tuesday after.

He still has to turn up to the internet café and take the attendance sheet with him, even though the groupchat announced to him that they’re all going to study for the incoming exams instead. Because the rules are rules– as the head of the club, Kim Sunwoo has to host the meetings every week, or else the rights for the club will be revoked and all the privileges that come with having one will be taken away from him before he even has a chance to blink.

It’s already bad that he will be the only one on the attendance sheet– if he doesn’t decide to fake some signatures, that is– but now, he is alone and bored, and as it turns out, playing games alone isn’t as fun as playing them with someone else. The competitive nature in him yearns for multiplayer games, it longs for the social contact he so effortlessly has with someone when playing a video game with them. He thinks he built a decent group out of the other video game lovers at this university, and he didn’t even realize it up until now– when he’s sitting alone in the internet café, in the far back on one of the couches.

At least he has the chance to test out the new Playstation console they installed here.

Legs spread wide on the small couch, having the whole place for himself, Sunwoo turns on the Test Drive Unlimited game, clicking through the settings. He is not a big fan of racing games in general, but he figures it’s the only game that he can play alone and still have at least some fun, and so after picking out a fancy car to drive around the world, he focuses on racing and fulfilling the side-quests the best he can.

Until a figure squeezes itself right next to him, startling him. “Oh, Jesus!”

“It’s Y/N, actually,” you snicker, making the boy’s mood drop at least two notches, eyebrows furrowing at your sudden arrival. What are you even doing here? He thought no one was available this week?

“You came?” he asks, and despite the sincerity of the question, the tone sounds kind of spiteful.

“Yeah,” you shrug, “am I not allowed here? I thought the club is on every Tuesday?”

“It is,” he agrees, a hint of annoyance in his voice, “I just didn’t expect you to come.”

“Didn’t expect, or didn’t want?”

“Both,” he grunts, before he turns his head towards the screen again, ignoring your presence completely. The noises coming out of the console provide you two with some background music, but it’s still not enough to diffuse the tense atmosphere. Sunwoo hates every second of you by his side– your thighs touching in the small space due to his dominant manspreading– even the sound of you breathing making him immensely annoyed.

“What’s your problem with me anyway?” you suddenly speak up, breaking the silence. Something about the way you ask the question puts a dagger through Sunwoo’s heart, for some reason, but he doesn’t dare to drop his tough facade.

“I don’t like you, that’s all,” he shrugs nonchalantly, chewing on the inside of his cheek as he focuses back onto the game, trying hard to not fail at his sidequest. Everything but focus on the difficult conversation beginning to take place right in this moment, right?

And why do you even care? It’s not like the two of you are friends– anything close to that, even.

“Why?” you scoff, shaking your head in disbelief. “I mean, I don’t get it. I did nothing wrong, and you seem to be getting on fine with the rest of the girls, so I don’t think that’s the problem here,” you lightly laugh, trying to take some weight off the situation.

Sunwoo’s jaw hardens. He doesn’t want to have this conversation right now.

“At first I thought it was just harmless teasing, something you do for fun or attention, but then I realized you were being serious about it, so I really… I really just wanna know what’s the deal behind all of this,” you grunt, swinging your arms in the air at the last word, putting more emphasis on the end of the sentence. You’re starting to get frustrated, and that’s slowly ticking off Sunwoo’s patience.

“Oh, you don’t know?” he scoffs, turning his head to you. “Then you’re even worse than I thought.”

“What are you even talking about?” you yelp out, the eyes of others in the internet café turning towards you with furrowed brows, annoyed glares pointed at your little commotion due to being disturbed while playing their favorite games.

“You’re my friend’s ex, that’s why,” he mutters, before scoffing at you and pointing his eyes back to the TV screen.

There is a moment of silence following his confession. He’s not sure what is the reasoning behind it– if you’re rocking your head, trying to remember what he’s talking about, or if you’re just shocked that he is so loyal to his friend. Maybe you’re in disbelief. Maybe you feel ashamed. Truth be told, Sunwoo doesn’t really care.

“Ji Changmin?” you ask, suddenly sounding surprised. “This is about Ji Changmin?”

Sunwoo hates the way you sound almost… amused?

“You can’t be serious. That happened over 4 years ago! There’s no way either of you is still hung up about that,” you say, shaking your head at him in disbelief.

The boy snickers, talking to you, but not really offering you any eye contact as he continues on with his game. “Maybe you didn’t think it was serious, but I surely won’t like someone who did my friends wrong.”

“Sunwoo, we were kids.”

“Does that mean it didn’t count?” he scoffs.

“Yeah, basically,” you bluntly agree, a bitter laugh escaping your throat. “Ask Changmin. I’m sure he barely even remembers–”

“Well, I remember him crying over you for two weeks straight, so maybe stop bragging into spaces where you’re not welcome,” he snaps, finally looking at you.

He chose a bad moment to have eye contact with you, though. The second the words leave his mouth, hurt flashes by your face, your expression instantly dropping. Your orbs get a little sadder and there’s a wrinkle between your eyebrows that makes Sunwoo’s stomach drop, guilt washing over him in waves strong like tsunami. Realistically, he shouldn’t care about hurting your feelings– by his logic, you must have even deserved it– but there is something in him that wants to physically crawl out of his skin and give himself a big, fierceful slap across his face for the words he just said.

Because who is he to tell you you’re unwanted in the club? The other people there like you. Everyone gets on with you just fine– it’s not Sunwoo’s right to ban you from the space he created, just because he has personal vendetta against you.

You’re not even doing anything wrong… Maybe he did fuck up.

“O-okay–”

“No, wait,” he hurriedly says, reaching out an arm towards you instinctively so he can stop you if you wanted to leave. “I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just… I care about my friends a lot, that’s all. It’s… nothing personal,” he explains, humming to himself.

Except he’s lying, and you both know that. Everything about this was nothing but personal– the targeted jokes, the mean comments, the rude energy he has towards you any time you show up. Everything about his behavior and his annoyance whenever you are around is personal, because it involves you, and only you.

There’s no way he can save himself now, though. The words are already said and out there, and even though he regrets them, there is no way Kim Sunwoo is apologizing.

A cloak of silence falls over the two of you again but this time, it’s slowly eating Sunwoo alive. It’s biting on his arms and crawling on his insides, carving out every harsh word he’s said to you into skin, making it unbearable for the boy to continue just aimlessly sitting next to you. He has to do something.

“Do you want me to leave?” you ask in a soft, quiet voice– a tone slightly familiar to him. It makes his ears perk up and his stomach squeeze on itself. It’s a weird, visceral reaction, but he won’t really allow himself to put much importance into it.

Instead, he sighs and turns to you with the controller in hand, offering you a soft, guilty smile. “No,” he shakes his head, “you can pick your own car and play for a while as I order us some snacks, if you wanna. I’m also pretty sure there’s Smash bros on it, in case you wanna play with me when I get back.”

The air is tense and awkward, and Sunwoo curses himself from the way events unraveled. He feels like he is betraying his best friend, in a way, but the guilt he carries in him is too big to not try to dissolve.

You take the controller from him and nod, chewing on the inside of your cheek. He thinks this might be the beginning of truce– not a friendship, just tolerance– between the two of you, but he is soon taken out of his delusions when he sees you clicking off the game and opening Smash bros instead.

In that moment, he knows he is going to get his ass kicked, and he knows it’s going to be personal.

The remote control in his hands feels like a weapon after he managed to finally stick the strip of LED lights all around the ceiling– and with how things have been going (the previous ones not working and them falling down every few seconds this time around), it might as well turn into one if it turns out he failed at installing his newest room decor again. He will use it against himself, he thinks– there is not much will to live left in him after the whole day, leaving him weak and exhausted.

Praying a little before trying for one last time, Sunwoo clicks on the red button of the remote control in his palm, squeezing his eyes shut– and after wishing on all 11:11s and all eyelashes, it seems– the LED lights finally turn on and illuminate his room with a dark red glow that he quickly turns towards a more muted purple, because it’s easier on his eyes and he kind of doesn’t want his room to look like literal hell upon walking in.

The boy’s heart leaps in his chest. It finally worked– he is every gamer girl’s dream! (And to stay true to the statement, he reaches towards his phone, clicking on the Discord app, approaching the one he dreams about.)

notsteve [10:45]: ive got these really sick lights if u wanna come over ;;) notsteve [10:45]: they tried to scam me twice but omg look notsteve [10:46] – sends 1 video notsteve [10:46]: they can change colors hihihii

Ever since the moment Kim Sunwoo learned that his dear online best friend loves to be persuaded– her words, not his– alongside with the new knowledge of the fact that they both walk across the same halls and visit the same lecture rooms, the dynamic he had with the girl shifted just the tiniest bit.

First of all, they call more often. Not only during the late hours of the night, but also during the day– whenever either of them feels like chatting for a while. There is also an increased volume of voice memos and random pictures of their surroundings, which didn’t use to happen before. And believe me, Sunwoo doesn’t want to honk his horn too much, but he swears the amount of casual flirting increased at least twice the size– from his side anyway. But he promises his friend is reciprocating! Hell, she even starts it sometimes! You have to believe him.

sunpoodle [10:47]: and here i thought you died notsteve [10:48]: almost notsteve [10:48]: i couldnt get it up :(( sunpoodle [10:48]: i didn’t know that was a problem ://

Sunwoo snorts at that, heat rising to his cheeks at the comment.

notsteve [10:49]: god i hate u notsteve [10:50]: no that’s not a problem for me sweetie notsteve [10:50]: i can show you if u come over cough

The moment he sends the last message, he regrets it. Every day he spends talking with his friend, the boundaries and lines get pushed and pushed, and he can’t seem to know why. Is it the prospect of maybe meeting her one day? The idea of somehow sweeping the girl off her feet and getting to know her beyond the level that the online space gives him– in a more deep, personal way?

Why does the idea of getting to see her with his own eyes, the idea of touching her, make the poor boy so flustered and excited? It’s not like either one of them actually initiated any real meeting in the first place– all of it was just half-jokes and invitations. He wonders when the day comes when he will be able to just nod and say yes to any of it– he wonders when she will feel comfortable enough to actually set a time and place, ordering to meet him there. He would drop anything– cancel any plans– just to run and meet her.

sunpoodle [10:53]: i could get convinced sunpoodle [10:53]: to see the lights irl i mean sunpoodle [10:54]: nothing else…..cough sunpoodle [10:54]: youll have to clean first tho

After the replies flood in, Sunwoo immediately relaxes. The girl doesn’t seem uncomfortable– quite the opposite, actually– and so he takes it as a sign to continue the playful nature of things, subtly pushing the idea of a meet-up more and more. For some reason, Sunwoo feels like it should happen soon– although no time is running out, he feels pressure somewhere in the bottom of his stomach and quiet buzzing in his fingertips any time the thought of his friend crosses his mind– and he knows it will only go away if he finally meets the girl. (Or it might even get worse– either way, he desperately needs to find out.)

notsteve [10:56]: my room is super clean!! notsteve [10:56]: and my bed is comfy sunpoodle [10:57]: proof or im just gonna assume youre lying

The boy tussles in his bed, his hair getting messy in his sheets. The music playing in the background only further pushes the intimate atmosphere, and so after receiving your message, he doesn’t waste much time in opening his camera and putting effort into the angle of the picture he’s going to send you.

He makes sure not much of his face is shown. His phone screen mirrors mostly the white fabric of his pillow– that is now tinder purple with the LED lighting– but in the right corner, the majority of his tousled hair is shown. It looks soft against the sheets and he makes no real effort in tidying it, since he thinks it adds to the aesthetics of the picture. A glimpse of his face appears in the picture as well– only his left eye, though. It looks sleepy, hooded, and after squinting at the screen for a few seconds, Sunwoo decides to hit send.

The line is once again pushed a bit farther, making him wonder if his friend will follow in his footsteps and send a similar photo back. It’s secretive enough, yet also daring enough to make the other side wonder and fantasize– what does the rest of his face look like? Did she see him around? Does she recognise his face?

…does she find the glimpse attractive? (God, Sunwoo, get a fucking grip!)

notsteve [11:02] – sends one picture sunpoodle [11:03]: i feel like a victorian man seeing an ankle for the first time

The reaction makes Sunwoo’s heart pick up at pace, a dumb smile running to his cheeks. If anyone saw him right now, he’d get bullied and picked on until the rest of his life– it’s hard to hide the feelings he tries to keep under control, though. It’s already difficult enough to deal with them on his own– he bets bottling it all up and pretending they don’t exist would even result in making it all that much harder.

notsteve [11:04]: WDYMMMMM notsteve [11:04]: be serious for once sunpoodle [11:04]: oh i AM serious sunpoodle [11:04]: i mean that bed sure does seem comfy o:))

Sunwoo feels like he is going to faint soon. Hell, he feels like the world is suddenly turning faster and it’s hard to keep up.

notsteve [11:05]: i heard its even comfier when you cuddle i mean what who said that sunpoodle [11:06]: im open to trying that out for myself

There are pools forming in Sunwoo’s palms during the course of the conversation, but they only deepen when he realizes that maybe he has to be the one to make the first step and initiate something actually real. Something that isn’t just mysteriously looking selfies in the chat or silly conversations about cuddling and meeting up that could turn into reality, but aren’t, and for what reason is making him absolutely insane.

And so he picks up all of his remaining courage and starts crafting the message inside of his head. How does he bring it up? How does he make it sound real? Like he’s being serious– that he wants to meet her and will turn crazy if it doesn’t happen soon?

The semester ends in a few days and lord knows if his friend lives anywhere near the campus. Knowing that he wasted his only chance and opportunity would absolutely destroy him, no matter if it’s Christmas or not.

Before he has a chance to send the carefully crafted message, though, the tone of a new message in his phone makes his attention perk up, reading out the words she’s sent to him via Discord and making his heart drop to the deepest pits of his stomach.

sunpoodle [11:10]: in all seriousness tho we should hang out sometime sunpoodle [11:10]: since we live on the same campus and all lmao sunpoodle [11:10]: (im trying to be so normal about this)

Well, that’s sudden. And unexpected. The boy feels himself grinning, resulting in biting down on his bottom lip to keep himself from screaming out. It’s finally happening– and he wasn’t the one having to write it down first. It’s not only him that seriously wants to meet up, and that has him metaphorically bouncing against the wall of his newly decorated room.

notsteve [11:10]: oh my god its happening notsteve [11:11]: everyone stay calm sunpoodle [11:12]: LMAO bE SERIOUS FOR ONE SEC sunpoodle [11:12]: would love to meet outside of ur bedroom first tho notsteve [11:13]: omg ofc that was just a jokey joke notsteve [11:13]: just tell me when and where n ill be there notsteve [11:14]: im free literally whenever except from when im not and even then ill make sure i cancel any other thing sooo sunpoodle [11:15]: what about after exams? sunpoodle [11:15]: im busy on tuesday but i can do any other day sunpoodle [11:16]: they opened a new café close to the campus if u wanna see?:)

Sunwoo feels on Cloud 9. It’s finally happening and it’s so close– in just a week. More than 7 days, sure, but it’s still close enough– much closer than never, as he once presumed. Tussling a little in his bed, he makes sure his mouth is covered with his pillow before he lets out the scream he’s been holding for the last few minutes.

If Eric hears him, Sunwoo is gonna try to convince him that he just stubbed his toe. Nothing else.

The boy is painfully aware of the fact that he’s acting like a teenager in love for the first time– kicking his feet, giggling, thinking of his crush before falling asleep– but frankly speaking, he doesn’t really care. In just over 7 days, he can prove Ji Changmin and everyone wrong: he doesn’t have a crush on someone he hasn’t met before. Because in just over 7 days, he will meet the presumed love of his life and look at her with his own two eyes for the first time.

That day somehow feels more important than his own birthday. Maybe he should get the date tattooed… He’ll think about it.

When he finally takes his face out of the soft pillow, he notices his room went dark. When he reaches for the remote that belongs to the newly installed LED lights, he finds it not working. In any other circumstances, he’d consider either drowning himself in his bathtub or jumping out of his window– since he and Eric live on the 6th floor, it would be high enough to cause the damage needed– but right at this moment, he feels like nothing could ever break his mood again.

notsteve [11:20]: about the lights tho…

Sunwoo doesn’t really know how he grew to love video games. If he really thinks about it, perhaps he could say it was just how boys always turn out– fascinated with anything electric that had a cord attached to it (he once managed to make the power go out for the whole street when soldering his old pair of headphones that stopped working in one ear), but there was also something so fun about gaming that managed to make the boy stick to it– and that thing was how easy it was to make friends during it.

When he was little and his dad bought him his first game boy for Christmas, he not only managed to boost in front of everyone at school during recess by playing with it, but he also managed to lend the device to everyone who stared at it with even the tiniest bit of desire in their eyes for too long. Sunwoo knew not everyone was as fortunate as him, and playing it was so fun– he thought no one should go without trying the game boy at least once. The other kids at the playground kept going back to him to play with his toy and the friendships eventually blossomed to the point that the people around him stayed even beyond the video games– and that’s how Sunwoo met his first ever friend, Ji Changmin.

Sunwoo always liked having a group of people around him. He enjoyed when his friends from high school would come over to his house and play with the Playstation console he begged for his birthday. He didn’t mind anyone borrowing his phone during class and trying to solve the most difficult level of Geo Dash (since he’s the one that got the farthest in the game), because it meant he got to talk to the desperate gamers during break and have someone to run to the convenience store to buy snacks with afterwards.

He loved going to internet cafés, because even though the initial friendship he had with Eric Sohn and Lee Juyeon came around because they asked him to play Valorant after finding the poor boy alone, waddling into the place completely lonely during his first week of university, the bond got deeper and he can’t imagine his life without the two men in it anymore.

Sure, video games are fun. He likes to play shooting games because he enjoys winning. The competitive nature in him thrives during video games– he loves to tease his opponent, he loves to show that he’s the best. Yeah, Kim Sunwoo enjoys spending his time in the virtual world, escaping the mundane reality. But if he really dwelled deeper on it, he doesn’t think playing Minecraft would be as enjoyable if he didn’t talk to his online friend on the server every day, or if him and his friends didn’t go out and eat dinner together after a round of Overwatch in the late hours of the day.

Which is why he created the Video Gaming club in the first place. To connect people– to play games with the ones who need a buddy in their life. It made him smile to see people that met because of his club hanging out together even outside of it– he felt like he was doing something good. Sunwoo prided himself in the fact that he was the one to connect people together through his hobby, that he could share precious moments and make precious bonds in his circle through gaming.

Maybe that’s why the last meeting of the club for this semester made him so emotional. Truth be told, he didn’t think the Video Gaming club would make it big– hell, he thought not many people would care to show up each time. As a pat on his back of some sort, Sunwoo decides that the last game of the winter semester should be his favourite.

“Can’t believe you got us playing Minecraft of all games, what are we, 11?” Chan mutters from next to the club leader, making the boy snicker.

“Just say you’re embarrassed about the nickname you chose when you were 11.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Okay, mega_dino, I’ll believe you,” Sunwoo hums and nods, hearing his friends giggle as the younger one takes a hold of his gaming mouse.

Squinting his eyes at his screen, the club leader makes sure everything is set before the game starts. He already moved all of his important items from his main house into an underground hiding place of which coordinates he’d written down before getting to the internet café– knowing that his friends would want to sabotage him as soon as he lets them play on the server he carefully created. He knows letting them play on a different one would be much easier, but he kind of prefers to have the upper hand of owning a couple of diamond swords already, and he’s also too lazy to set up a new one. (And he would have to pay for it– which he isn’t really a fan of. Money is tight when you have to buy new LED lights off Temu every other week.)

“Are we starting already? I miss Minecraft,” Intak whines from the other side of the table, a glass of coke sitting in his hand.

“Why are you saying it like it’s a children’s game?” Sunwoo shakes his head at the comments. Ever since he announced the game of choice for the week, all he’s gotten were either complaints or dreamy sighs about how nostalgic it’s gonna be. Is Minecraft not cool anymore? Should he get a new hobby?

“Kinda is,” Yeji laughs, making the boy roll his eyes at her.

“You’re just mad you’re missing out on all the fun,” he argues, “heal your inner child a little. Make that pretty house you’ve always wanted!”

“I fuck with Minecraft,” an innocent voice lands into his ears from the opposite of him– a voice he would often curse out and cringe at just because of it’s sheer existence in his proximity, but now tolerates in favor of keeping peace in the room. The comment still startles him, though– he didn’t expect anyone to agree with his point. Not if it’s you, anyway.

“Can’t believe you two finally agree on something,” Aeri sighs from your side, the girl always glued to your hip. “You do realise you’re having an advantage if you’re letting us play on your server, though?”

“It’s not like we’re playing extreme survival tournament, come on guys–”

“You aren’t,” you shrug, “don’t really know about the rest of us,” you comment, meeting his eyes with a smug look, a teasing grin slowly slipping its way onto your lips.

“I’m banning anyone who tries to kill me today from the club,” Sunwoo suddenly announces, making everyone sigh at the dramaticness of his theatrical words. “Forever.”

“You can’t ban anyone over a game–” Haechan chimes in, but is cut off by his peer instantly.

“I will call it harassment and bullying,” Sunwoo shrugs, “try to argue with that.”

“You’re just begging to get targeted at this point,” Aeri mumbles, shaking her head at him. She’s right– but Sunwoo is also kind of confident in his defence abilities.

Unless he gets ganged up on, of course.

Which could happen– truth be told, he’s had it coming.

“Less talking and more gaming, please,” Yangyang calls from the corner, “I wanna steal Sunwoo’s diamonds now. Turn the shit on.”

And although Sunwoo doesn’t really like the implication of his friend’s words, he doesn’t argue. Mainly because 15 minutes have already passed and the club is only supposed to go on for an hour– which leaves the 10 of them only 45 minutes left to mine and do something meaningful. The owner of the server also moved the spawn point the farthest away from his house– in hopes of them not finding it and putting TNT all over the premises. (If they manage to craft some in the limited time space, that is. He doubts it, but truth be told, he can never be too sure.)

“Okay, I sent the IP of the server into the groupchat, so just type it in and press the Play button on the left and it should take you instantly here,” Sunwoo exclaims as he clicks on his server and connects to it, walking around the spawn point with his character for a bit, waiting for the rest of his group to arrive.

Pressing the TAB key, he keeps checking the usernames of the people jumping in. Once mega_dino turns up, he lets out an amused chuckle– there’s nothing that tops the nicknames you made when you were 11. Sunwoo’s email address scares him to this day, but he is too lazy to make a new one, since all of his subscriptions and social media are tied to it– it does make sending official emails to his university coordinators that much embarrassing, though.

Some nicknames are recognisable– such as yejiiiji or haechanahceah, but some are less decipherable, leaving him guessing who could be the one joining the game. He doesn’t ask about them, though, thinking that figuring it out as he plays will be more fun– when one nickname he recognises all too well suddenly shows up on the list of players, making his heart jump in surprise.

What is his friend doing on the server at this time of the day? She doesn’t usually play in the early hours of the afternoon– leaving her sessions to evening or late night. That’s when she calls Sunwoo and asks him to help her with mining (or begging for his diamonds, which he sometimes rejects, but complies with on the days he is the most weak to her cuteness).

He considers pulling up his phone and texting her on Discord to notify the poor girl about the influx of new players on the server. She must be confused– maybe even scared, who knows– to see so many new people playing at the same time. The server Sunwoo created was a bit small, hosting only a few of his friends and a couple of people he met online, so a big amount of players would surely make it seem like someone hacked him, right?

“Is everyone in?” he asks instead, hearing everyone let out excited hums and nods.

He furrows his brows. The server says 10 people are currently connected to it, but if his calculations are correct, the number should be 11– everyone from his club and his online best friend, sunpoodle.

He does a double take on the list, shaking his head. He counts the people in his head over and over again, a little frustrated. Why is everyone saying they’re in? It’s clearly not adding up.

Looking up from his computer, he eyes the rest of his friends in the café. Everyone is playing soundly and happily, it seems, paying him no mind as they get accustomed with the new world and warm back up to the controls of the game they haven’t played in ages.

Everyone but one person. Everyone but you.

Instead, you’re left staring at him with stern eyes. The look you offer him is sharp, maybe a little hurt– and at the moment, he doesn’t know why. Confusion is the only feeling jumping around the walls of his brain, making an unpleasant crease appear in between his eyebrows. Gears slowly turning, he tries to figure it all out.

You’re not playing. You’re not paying attention to the game. It’s like you know it all– like you’re so familiar with it, as if playing it daily. As if you know the server he made. As if you have your house in it, decorated with a cute offering in front of the door, a portal to his own home residing in the front yard.

It happens quickly– the realisation. He finally makes the connection. It dawns on him why you look so surprised. Why you look so shocked, so disturbed.

Because if you’re the only unmoving one on the map right now and his online friend is not the one to play on Tuesday afternoons, there is only one explanation.

“Oh my fucking god,” leaves his lips, albeit a little involuntarily. His voice is hoarse and harsh when he says the words, a final nail in the coffin for you as you stand up, the sound of the wheels of the chair churning against the floor, making everyone’s eyes snap to you.

You don’t turn off the game before you storm out of the room, giving him a clear view of your back, the character with the adorable skin you’ve picked out staring back at him blankly in the game. For a second, he doesn’t follow you– letting himself process. Everyone turns to Aeri for answers, as she’s the closest with you, but they get nothing as the girl just shrugs, equally confused, before she runs out of the room to find her best friend.

Sunwoos' ears start ringing. He feels like throwing up.

This can’t be…

There’s nothing more in this world that Kim Sunwoo enjoys more than playing Minecraft. He enjoys mining with music playing in his headphones. He loves crafting and making his house look perfect– just like little him always wanted it when he watched all those videos on youtube growing up. He likes to prank his friend Juyeon by putting random dirt blocks all over his house, or stealing all of Younghoon’s sugar cane when he’s offline, too lazy to grow some himself. He likes to teleport to his friend’s house and leave little surprises at the door, only to hear her call him a few seconds later, her cheerful, yet soft voice repeating in his ears even after he turns off the game and goes to his bed, letting her stories lull him to sleep.

There’s nothing more in this world that Kim Sunwoo enjoys more than playing Minecraft with his online best friend– the two of them ganging up on the dragon or entering the Nether together to find some glowstone for her house, because she wants it to look aesthetically pleasing. There’s nothing more he enjoys than helping her with little tasks and fighting off creepers away from her property, making sure they don’t blow out all the hard work she’s been putting in.

There’s nothing more in the world that he enjoys more than talking with his online friend during the mundane hours of the day, her messages making him hide his giggles in the back rows of his lecture halls. Nothing he enjoys more than her laugh, her jokes, her voice, her online presence. It calms him and sets him on fire all at once, and he doesn’t think he’s ever cared for anyone this deeply.

How has he never noticed that the person he hates the most is also the same person that he’s pretty sure he’s in love with? How has he never noticed it was you all the time?

And really, there’s nothing in the world Kim Sunwoo enjoys more than playing Minecraft with you. This time around, though, no progress in the world is made and your voice is not talking his ear off in the background. He shuts off the computer and leaves the place, not giving anyone an ounce of explanation.

You don’t text him in the evening like you always do. There’s no night call to help him sleep better.

He doesn’t turn the LED lights on in his room either, contemplating his life in complete darkness.

Nobody’s seen or heard of Kim Sunwoo in just a little under a week. Actually, that is an over-exaggeration– he went to take his exams, and he also went grocery shopping when he went out of ramen and his signature comfort food: red tasty KitKat bars– but other than that, it’s like the boy has disappeared from the face of earth.

There is no Video Gaming club, since it’s officially break time now– for only 2 weeks, but still– and he is declining every single invitation to hang out coming from his friends. He’s simply not in the mood to go anywhere or do anything, and so he spends his days locked away in his room.

Nothing is able to cut off his stream of thought. He’s not listening to music, so the occasional sounds of his roommate moving somewhere in the shared apartment are the only background noise to his loud inner voice. The elevator music usually playing in his head is replaced by a screaming match, and although he wishes it would stop, he can’t really control it– until the sound of his door opening makes him jolt away from the nightmare he’s living in.

Usually, he just tells Eric to fuck off and leave his room– since he is not in the headspace right now to spare anyone kindness, it seems– but when the disgusted face of Ji Changmin enters the place, Sunwoo knows there is no escaping this interrogation.

“Man, it stinks in here,” the boy grunts, moving through the obstacle course Sunwoo’s room has turned into in the few days he hasn’t bothered to put away his dirty laundry.

“Go away,” Sunwoo says. It’s a weak attempt– he already knows he lost this battle.

“Yeah, no,” Changmin shakes his head before moving to the window, opening it. “Eric orders a wellness check on you, so I’m not leaving until I figure out what’s wrong. I was told you left the club early the last time?”

Sunwoo doesn’t offer him a response. All Changmin can do is guess in this situation, and trust me, although they’re best friends, sadly, they still haven’t developed telepathy– and so the conversation is a little tougher than the squirrel-like boy would prefer.

“Did something happen?”

Sunwoo recognises it’s already dark outside, the sound of cicadas landing into his ears through the open window. He doesn’t know how long he’s been glued to his mattress, but it makes him feel a little foolish. Not more than his previous actions, though– that surely takes the crown.

“I have a crush on Y/N,” Sunwoo speaks into the existence, startling the boy.

It’s weird for the boy to call you by your name in regards to his feelings. While he was so sure of his growing adoration for you when he spoke to you online, unaware of your real identity, it’s much harder to admit it to himself when the person he spent countless nights dreaming about finally turns into reality, and it’s not the form he expected. It’s confusing. It’s overwhelming– it leaves him thinking. Why did it have to be you?

“What?” Changmin asks, genuine shock and surprise coating his tone. “I thought you hated Y/N.”

The words sting like a slap to his face. He hated you. How could he ever be so reckless with his words to you? How could he be so mean? You must hate him now.

“Didn’t you have a crush on that online girl? What– I’m confused, man…” Changmin trails off, finally sitting at Sunwoo’s bed, the weight of his body making the mattress shift under the lazy man’s figure.

“She’s the same person,” Sunwoo explains, the weight of his words making heaviness fall over the whole room, coating it with deep silence.

Changmin must think he’s foolish. He must think he is being crazy– hell, he must judge him for liking someone who once broke his heart, even though he was unaware it was the same person that made him feel so loved just by talking to him online.

He cares about what you think more, though. Do you never wanna see him again? Do you hate him? He would hate himself, if he was you.

Does he hate you? Does he want to see you again? Is your friendship over?

Did he lose you?

He hasn’t spoken to you in what feels like forever. Sunwoo’s throat closes on itself, making a real, visceral emotion run through his whole body and hit right in his chest, close to his heart. The corners of his eyes burn and he feels like running out of the room straight onto an ongoing traffic– he is unsettled. He feels terrible.

“Dude, are you crying?” Changmin asks with a shiteating grin on his face, pointing towards the younger one’s face.

“No!” Sunwoo bluntly replies, voice hoarse and scratchy, harshly wiping off the tear that managed to roll down his cheek– almost slapping himself in the process.

Changmin laughs. He laughs. Like it’s funny. Like it’s unserious and nothing is going on, like there is nothing to be worried about, and Kim Sunwoo is just being his overdramatic self, as always. Changmin laughs as if liking someone who once broke your friend’s heart is silly and not a big deal. As if not recognising someone you like online in real life is a normal experience, and not completely embarrassing– as if being mean to the same person you claim to adore is fine, and nothing to hate yourself over.

Sunwoo is conflicted. Talk about cognitive dissonance.

“Why are you laughing? It’s not funny,” Sunwoo pouts, the familiar wrinkle appearing in the middle of his eyebrows again, making his friend roll his eyes at the boy’s distress.

Changmin sighs. “It kinda is, if you think about it,” he shrugs, “you claim to hate Y/N, but turns out you’ve been in love with her all along…”

“You’re really not helping.”

“Well, what do you want me to do?” Changmin snickers. “I think this makes it easier for you. I know you were nervous about meeting her in real life, so this kind of takes off the pressure, since you already know each other.”

Sunwoo looks at his friend like he’s crazy. Does he not get the full weight of the situation? Does he not realise how serious this all is?

“What are you even talking about? Do you not hate me?” Sunwoo asks.

“Me?” Changmin asks, his head turning to the side like a confused puppy’s. “I don’t think I’m the person you need to worry about– although I’m sure you worry plenty– why would I hate you for liking Y/N?”

“Because she is your ex-girlfriend?” Sunwoo mumbles, twisting in his bed to have a better look at his friend.

He is met with a few seconds of silence. He is starting to think his whole life is a joke and he is in some sort of a weird knock-off of the Truman show. How can you and Changmin both have the same reaction to his undying loyalty? He is being taken for granted, that’s for sure.

“You utter buffoon, that was ages ago! I honestly forget we even dated sometimes, it was so short-lived,” Changmin laughs before he rests his back against the wall of Sunwoo’s room, getting more comfortable in his new position. He knows the conversation isn’t over yet– there is more on the boy’s mind than the past relationship.

“Oh,” Sunwoo hums.

“Yeah, oh,” Changmin laughs. “I honestly thought there was more to your hate towards Y/N, but I never really asked because I thought it was some gamer stuff or something that I couldn’t give two shits about. If I had known it was all because of my relationship from high school, I would’ve set the record straight a long time ago.”

“Well, maybe you should’ve.”

Sunwoo feels defeated. Like a deflated balloon. The weight on his shoulders stays the same despite the newfound information– because truth be told, this was never the problem in the first place.

And he is aware of that. Changmin is as well– he knows his best friend a little too much.

“But that’s not all there is to it, is it?” Changmin hums, poking the boy’s side with his long finger, burying it into his hoodie-covered flesh.

Sunwoo’s averted gaze and the chewing on the inside of his cheek is enough of an answer. “What is it?”

“It’s just… I don’t know how to feel about Y/N anymore,” Sunwoo confesses, snickering to himself. “Like, online, she was this perfect angel, like– don’t laugh at me now, you know I’m fucking sensitive– she was just… she was everything, you know?”

Changmin hums. “And in real life?”

“In real life, we were never really close and I hated her. How can I like someone I so strongly dislike in real life? It’s stupid…”

“You only hated what she did to me when we were teenagers, Sunwoo. You made yourself loathe something that wasn’t even there,” Changmin says, smiling sympathetically at the boy. “Do you think she is suddenly a different person to the one you got to know online just because she made a few mistakes when we were young?”

“I dunno…”

“I think you do know, you’re just scared to admit it to yourself, because you know you were a dick to her,” his best friend bluntly announces, watching Sunwoo wince at the words. Truth hurts– but it’s what he needs to hear. Because Changmin’s right, and Sunwoo is too tired of keeping all of these doubts hidden.

“Changmin, I can’t like her–”

“Why?” the boy cuts him off. “Because you said so? You were so big on saying how much you loved her for who she is, without knowing her in real life and knowing what she looked like. And sure, I made fun of you for it countless times before– but don’t you think you know her well enough by now? And don’t try to tell me you don’t know her just because you met online, because you know you’d be a fucking hypocrite.”

“But it’s Y/N.”

“Does that make any difference?”

Sunwoo moves from the inside of his cheek to bite at the dry skin of his lower lip. After tugging at the chapped mess, he feels iron on his tongue from tearing off a piece of his skin, eyes still pressed sternly into the ceiling.

Does it make any difference? Does Sunwoo like you less now that he knows who you are? It was never about the looks for him– and god knows he barely even knew you in real life. Saying he wasn’t interested anymore would make him a hypocrite.

Every time he thinks of the night talks you two shared and the secrets you’d tell him, trusting him with anything and everything, his heart still stummers in his chest and his stomach does that weird thing everyone in the romantic movies his roommate Eric watches talks about– but now, the girl has a face and a voice, and Sunwoo can’t say he hates it. He can’t say he hates you.

“I guess it doesn’t,” Sunwoo whispers, saying the obvious.

He still wants you. Just the way you are. Sure, he was shocked– anyone would be– but the feelings he has for you are still the same; it’s just the hate that slowly left his body, disappearing like the puddles of rain on the pavement on a sunny day.

He can’t hate someone so important to him. How foolish of him to once think you were the bane of his existence.

“So why don’t you two just talk it out?” Changmin asks, pointing out the obvious.

Sunwoo plays with the skin around his cuticles for a while, nervously picking at the loose skin and making himself bleed once again, the nerves getting the worst out of him. “I think I’m a little scared.”

“So I was right. You’re scared she will push you away because you were a dick to her all those times before,” Changmin once again states the obvious.

“Basically,” Sunwoo says, his insecurities slowly slipping through his mouth and out to the wild, hanging in the air. “As much as my feelings didn’t change, I think hers might have. And that’s… that’s scary.”

In Sunwoo’s eyes, what you and he had together was special. He never wanted to lose you to something like this– over spite, a foolish lack of judgement. The thought of never talking to you again is making his insides crash on themselves, guilt slowly, but surely eating him alive. The best thing that’s ever happened to him might be royally fucked over, and there is no one else he can blame but himself.

“Well, you don’t know that. And although I know you might be too scared to find out, you two both need to have a talk. Don’t you think you owe each other that much?”

Changmin’s right. He almost always is– he doesn’t know why Sunwoo ever thought the older one needed protecting. Like a pouty child, Kim Sunwoo is comforted by his best friend’s words, maybe even a little scolded and enlightened by the dimpled boy. The appreciation in his heart almost outgrows the worry, but there is still a you-shaped hole in his chest that he feels the need to fill– only if you allow him to.

He didn’t expect for it to end up being you, but he doesn’t hate the idea.

He’s not opposed to it. He welcomes it, because

It’s still the same you. In whatever form, in whatever shape– he knows your soul, and he fears nothing will ever take away and move the feelings he treasures for you to another place, to some other.

They’re reserved for you only. (Also, he always thought your cunning smile was nice to look at. He just tried to suppress the idea of it deep, deep within his mind.)

“We were supposed to meet tomorrow,” Sunwoo hums, “I’ll see if she… still wants to come.”

Changmin smiles. “I knew you were smarter than this.”

The backhanded compliment would rile him up on most occasions– this time, though, he knows it’s deserved.

One would say Kim Sunwoo didn’t think much before going up to the new café that opened downtown the week after exams, just like you two scheduled. Why?

First of all, he didn’t really check in with you to see if the offer is still up and if you want to meet him after all of this. Second of all, he turned up almost 35 minutes too early, since he was so nervous pacing around his flat that he physically couldn’t stay in the closed space anymore, and third of all, he’s fairly certain he put two different socks on when he was dressing himself, and after further inspection by the front door of the coffee place, pulling his jeans up to take a look, he finds out his suspicions were correct.

The thing is, though, against popular belief, Kim Sunwoo thought almost a little too much before going to the scheduled hangout. He thought about it the whole night before– and the whole previous week, if he’s being honest. He thought about it so much it consumed his every waking thought, leaving him all over the place, distracted and distressed. On most occasions, Eric had to ask a question five times before he was heard by his dear roommate, and if he wanted a real answer out of him, he had to gentle parent him through the conversation.

Sunwoo thought about it so much up to the point that you were all that was in his head. You and your last conversations on Discord which he spent the whole week rereading, you and your house in Minecraft that was left untouched since the last time you two played together (he checked). You and your laugh and the gentle, soft voice you only used with him on your calls– the voice that lulled him to sleep and make him feel butterflies in his stomach, unrecognisable to the hardened tone you used with him whenever you met up in real life when the conflicts he used to stir got the best out of you.

You and your cunning smile. You and your piercing, playful gaze. You and your hair that always kept falling into your face when you were crouched over the keyboard. It’s almost laughable how much he managed to pay attention to you in real life before knowing you were the same person he spent months adoring over the internet– the universe really works in strange ways sometimes.

So really, Kim Sunwoo has thought a lot about you and you two meeting before actually leaving the house; which could also very well be the reason why he didn’t text you to see if you still want to see him in the first place– in fear of being declined, in fear of being rejected by the only person he so deeply craves the validation from.

If you don’t show up, he will just go home and pretend none of this ever happened.

(Or at least he hopes he can.)

The more time he spends standing in front of the coffee shop, though, the more his hope of ever seeing you again gets smaller and smaller. Minutes are slowly passing him by like last summer, and he swears he’s never felt the passing of time more than right in this moment. He feels like he is gaining 5 years every 5 minutes that he’s standing in the middle of the pavement– the clock striking well past 20 minutes of when you were supposed to meet.

He will give it 10 more minutes, he thinks. 20, at most. Maybe he can wait an hour. Maybe you got stuck in the traffic. Maybe you got confused with the time…

Or maybe you’re just not coming, and he has to accept that.

Kicking the rocks under his feet while also trying to get out of the way of people walking past, he puts his hands deep into his pockets. He would rather die than to embarrass himself in front of you by texting you, and so he figures that if he just waits a few more minutes, God will surely give him a sign of when to stop holding back his tears and go back home…

“You look like a kicked puppy,” a voice– teasing, yet also a bit cautious– falls into his ears, making him perk up and look behind his shoulder. God must really love him today, he thinks.

No words escape his mouth for the time being. His brain goes short circuit a little at the sight of you– and in that moment he fully realises that he didn’t actually expect you to come, and that makes him feel even worse about himself. Relief washes over him like a wave of tsunami, the surprised look adorning Sunwoo’s face disappearing in seconds as he tries to manage his racing heartbeat.

“You came,” slips out from between his lips, making the boy immensely embarrassed with his choice of words.

“I did,” you nod, pressing your lips tightly against each other, an awkward half-smile doing nothing to calm down Sunwoo’s nerves. “I figured you either come and we figure this out, or you don’t and I get something to treat myself to chase down the disappointment.”

You’d be disappointed if he didn’t come. Just the sentiment makes Sunwoo’s heart do backflips in his ribcage– how could he ever think he hated you?

“Kind of same, actually,” he replies, nodding.

An awkward silence falls over you two like a weighted blanket, making Sunwoo’s stomach churn in discomfort. This is not how he imagined your first meeting to be– but then again, it’s not like he is meeting his online best friend (if he can even call you that anymore) for the first time. He tries to find the memory of your first meeting somewhere in the depths of his mind, but much to his dismay, he is left unsuccessful. He never really deemed it that important before– curse him and his reckless teenage mind.

“Uhm,” you hum, scratching the back of your neck, “I was… the bus was late, by the way. I didn’t purposefully let you wait to like, get back at you or something,” you suddenly explain, your lips stretching into a sympathetic smile.

The explanation doesn’t matter to him anymore. He doesn’t care if you came 20 minutes late and if you took the bus or if you built a portal in the back rooms of the very café you’re supposed to enter in a few minutes– all that matters is that you came and that you’re here, right in front of Sunwoo’s eyes, and you’re not pulling out a machete or an axe on him as a revenge for all the times he acted wrongly towards you in the past.

“Oh, no worries,” he hums almost immediately, “you’re here now, and that’s all that matters,” he nods.

After another shared, prolonged look between the two of you– one in which he scans you up and down, as if actually seeing you for the first time (and noticing the switch in your usual attire: you exchanged your cargo pants for a skirt, something more fancy, yet telling), a look in which he gets all red in his cheeks, wondering if you noticed the way he did his hair differently today, just to appeal to you– he clears his throat and takes a step towards the café, opening the door for you like the gentleman he tries to be today. “Let’s go in, then!”

You follow his lead, entering the small, yet cozy place. The cold weather outside makes a good contrast with the heating of the café, and when Sunwoo takes a look at the board above the counter, he finds a seasonal menu welcoming him in with a big bear hug. Hot chocolate is just what he needs after all of this, and he won’t deny himself the pleasure of one now.

“Hot choccy?” you ask, smiling softly at the silent figure standing next to you. Sunwoo is caught off-guard with your suggestion and the gentle curve of your lips just the same, warmth spreading to the inside of his heart at the realisation that you know him so well. It’s her. It’s really her, he gasps in disbelief.

“Want one as well?” he asks after nodding, watching you shrug. He takes that as a yes, and since he thinks he did a lot of damage over the course of your friendship, he takes the lead and pays for your drink to try and make up for it– which you don’t fight him over, and he doesn’t find it in him to care. Actually, he thinks he kind of appreciates it.

After taking a seat in one of the booths in the corner– the cream sofa hugs him in just well, and Sunwoo thinks he might just give this place a 5 star review on Yelp, depending on the way this date- I mean… friendly gathering goes– he is met with another excruciating, suffocating silence. He never really had much trouble talking to you before– surely not online, but also not whenever you were around in real life settings as well, since he always found a way to tease you and make fun of you, giving you most of his undivided attention– but this time around, he thinks keeping up a conversation with you might just be the hardest thing he’s ever had to experience.

You make him nervous. You make him doubtful. If he wondered about how you’d perceive him after meeting him before knowing you two were acquainted already, he is wondering even more now– do you hate him? Do you wish he wasn’t the one sitting opposite of you right now? Do you want to leave and never talk to him again?

Is he good enough? Does he live up to the expectations– if you even had any?

All previous hatred towards you disappears as fast as a click of your finger, and Kim Sunwoo is left breathless at the fact that you’re right there, in front of him– his online best friend. He thinks he might have still liked you even if you turned out to be a mass murderer. He thinks he might have still liked you even if you were a 50 year old male in a disguise. He thinks the bond you two have built over the internet is much stronger than any mean comments he threw your way before– and the only thing left is to hope you feel the same.

Opening his mouth to speak, he thinks it’s time to have that conversation.

“Listen, I–”

“Were you disappointed that it was me?” you cut him off suddenly, fast as lightning– as if to hurry to get the question out before you chicken out of it.

Sunwoo is left staring at you open-mouthed, shocked. There was not a single minute of his existence where he’d feel disappointed with your identity. The thought never even crossed his brain once, and suddenly, he feels stupid.

He left you hanging for a whole week– all because he thought you’d hate him. He left you wondering in silence, doubting yourself and thinking you’re not who he would’ve liked– all because of his own insecurities. Why has he not thought of your side of things as well?

“No,” he simply states, watching your face morph into a more relaxed one, eyes softening. “Not at all, no,” he shakes his head.

“I just– it’s…”

“I’m sorry if I ever made you feel that way,” Sunwoo utters out. You press your lips together, listening. “Was I surprised? Mhm. Shocked? Yeah, of course I was… but no, I was never disappointed that it turned out to be you. Not for a single moment.”

“I thought you hated me,” you note, chuckling. The words sting on Sunwoo’s skin, but he figures he’s not the one to be hurt right now– and so he sucks it up and hums.

“I was being petty,” he agrees. “And childish. Nothing to be so passionate about as I was,” he admits, forcefully laughing at his own actions. “Nothing to throw away everything we… nothing to throw away the friendship that means so much to me.”

The sincerity of his own words scares him. There is a quiet desperation in him that wants to prove to you that he’s not as bad as he presented himself to be. There is a need in him to fix everything he ruined, to show you that he’s the same Sunwoo you know from the internet, and that all of this is worth it.

“And I’m sorry, just… just by the way.”

Sunwoo never thought he’d be left apologizing to you– but here he is. Maybe this whole thing taught him something– maybe you taught him something.

“Ah,” you shrug. “It’s okay. I mean, it was kind of fun watching you be so pressed about nothing, but I’m glad it’s resolved now,” you laugh.

You laugh, and the atmosphere immediately clears. Sunwoo feels like he can breathe lighter, like the cold isn’t so overbearing outside, like he hadn’t just spent the last week locked in his room, contemplating the point of living at all. He didn’t think it would be this easy…

Something inside of him truly believed he lost you for good.

“I mean, you were the one that ran out of the internet café without an explanation–”

“You cursed me out!” you argue, kicking his shin lightly under the table.

The boy fakes offense, pointing his finger at you. “That wasn’t directed at you! Just the situation in general.”

“That includes me,” you add.

“Sure, but still– I was just surprised. I really didn’t expect my online best friend to be sitting in the same room as me every week, that’s for sure,” he says, watching as your eyes light up at the title, a cute smile overtaking your features.

“I also didn’t expect you to ghost me for a full week after,” you add, shrugging. “You’re usually so desperate for attention,” you hum, making the boy’s cheeks heat up like a furnace, eyes averting your gaze at all costs. Now, this surely wasn’t on the list of things he wanted to discuss with you today.

Clearing his throat, he makes eye contact with his mug instead, desperately trying to shift the topic of the conversation. “Drink it, it’s getting cold…”

“Sure… Whatever you say, Steve,” you tease. When he looks up at you from under his eyelashes, there’s the same cunning smile on your face that he watched all those times when you won against him at League of Legends– the same smile that used to always drive him crazy, but he now recognises that he translated the implications of his insanity all wrong (because he thinks that maybe somewhere deep inside of his romantic, rotten soul, he might have known all along)– and he wonders if this was the smile you always wore when you made fun of him for falling asleep on the call with you again, the boy using your soft, sleepy voice as a lullaby.

Sunwoo almost chokes on his drink, pointing an accusing finger at you. “Speaking of,” he starts, “the kids miss you. Go and feed them, miss,” he says, watching you roll your eyes at him. The dogs you co-parent with him in Minecraft have been sitting near your front door ever since you last logged out, and even though coming to your house felt like an emotional torture in the time you were gone, Sunwoo always managed to feed them like he would with a real animal.

Call him childish, for all he cares.

“Okay, damn,” you say, rolling your eyes at him. “You only say that because you want me to finally move our beds together, don’t you?” you tease him, referencing the little offering he made for you months ago– the one that’s still secure outside of your house despite many of its renovations.

Sunwoo almost chokes on his drink again. You grin at him– a sight that makes his insides feel like they were threaded with gold. He swears hot chocolate has never felt so sweet before.

If he wasn’t sure of it before, he’s fairly certain now– you can fall for someone over the internet. And yes, the crush translates to its full form after meeting them in person.

“I mean, I wouldn’t be opposed to it…” he mumbles, not really quick enough to come up with a good comeback now that he’s face to face with you, making you giggle cutely at his sudden shyness. This is not how you know Kim Sunwoo– the sheepish composure is so far of the boy you met online, but also the one that ridiculed you during a casual game of CS:GO weeks ago.

“I’ll decide if it’s worth it after you show me the lights you’ve been talking my ear off about,” you say– and he thinks he won. Because this is an invitation to his room– an invitation for further hangouts. If you keep flirting with him like this, Sunwoo thinks he might just combust.

There is only one problem, though.

“About the lights…”

BONUS // A YEAR LATER

If you would’ve told Kim Sunwoo that he will end up in a long distance relationship only a bit more than a year ago, he would’ve believed you. See, he’s a stranger to denial– he is quite good at accepting his own feelings for what they were, inwardly, at least– and so he was fairly certain he was in love with his online best friend even before he had a chance to meet her. Somewhere along the line, given the fact that his feelings would be reciprocated, he imagined going further with the establishment, no matter how far or close in distance you were from each other.

Turns out, life is funny in many ways and his online best friend, the proclaimed love of his life, lived just around the corner with her roommate Aeri. She still doesn’t like him that much, but Sunwoo puts effort into visiting his girlfriend at her place often, in hopes that her best friend finally warms up to him a little– he thinks it’s almost like approaching a stray cat. The Sylvanian families shrine the two girls hold in their living room is also fascinating to him– he didn’t think someone with a stern look like Aeri’s could stare at something so adorable and small so lovingly.

“Sunwoo, once again, we are not in a long distance relationship,” you say over the speakers of his sister’s laptop that he borrowed just so he could call with you, making him mourn into the poor-quality microphone.

“We are! You’re so far away right now, how can you justify it not being a long distance relationship?”

“We literally saw each other a week ago,” you deadpan, “and we will see each other again after we come back to uni, you moron.”

See, Sunwoo’s definition of a long distance relationship is a bit warped. As long as you’re not in the same town as him, he considers you too far away– and in any other circumstance, you would find it cute (bless his heart), but when you’re trying to enjoy your break with your family that you haven’t seen in a while, it’s becoming just the tiniest bit overbearing.

“That’s too long.”

“You’re being a baby,” you grunt, making your boyfriend pout at the other side of the call, seen by his web camera. You were against turning your own on, but were forced to nonetheless– Sunwoo’s ‘I need to see your face or else I’ll die’ was too convincing not to. You know he won’t, but at the same time, the poor boy could turn a little manic at times– you had to make sure he will survive until your next meeting.

“God, a man can’t even miss his long distance girlfriend in peace–”

“I am not your long distance girlfriend. We’re literally only like 4 hours away from each other right now, that’s not even–”

“If you think about it,” Sunwoo cuts you off, making you sigh. “It’s like we’re back to square one. Y’know, before we started dating.”

“Not really…?” you try to argue with him, planning to point out the fact that back then, you used to call on Discord and not Whatsapp, with no camera on and using fake names, but the boy cuts you off fast, knowing that you’re right and he just can’t let you have the point.

“I miss your kisses, that’s all.”

Still hung up on the previous comment, you sigh. “We weren’t even kissing back then, Sunwoo.”

The boy stares at you for a second, blinking, before he breaks out into a huge grin. “Well, maybe not you. Me, however, I was kissing the screen everytime your character showed up–”

“I’m going to end the call,” you warn him. Why are you even dating him? He has a bitchless loser energy– maybe you should let him live up to it.

“No no no– okay, I’ll be normal.”

“I find that hard to believe,” you sigh.

If you would’ve told Kim Sunwoo that he will end up in a long distance relationship only a bit more than a year ago, he would’ve believed you. After seeing the little heart shaped altar in front of your house in Minecraft every time he plays– your beds now stuck together, making him sense that he finally made it– he truly wouldn’t find this accusation hard to believe.

Truth be told, though, he’s much happier with having a normal relationship with you.

One where he gets to hold you, one where he gets to kiss you. One where you finally come over and he gets to impress you with the LED strip he finally got off a proper electronic place instead of a cheap online store, investing money into the device he gets to use behind the locked doors of his room for atmospheric purposes whenever you two–

Anyways.

Maybe Changmin was right and he was always being just too overly-dramatic. He was also right when he accused Sunwoo of having a huge crush on you online, after all.

Still, Sunwoo wouldn’t change it for anything. Despite the history you share, he actually thinks you’re pretty fucking cute.

And real. And his.

And thankfully, not a thousand miles away. (Although it may feel like it right now.)

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dognonsense · 9 months ago

Note

Question...how do you make your patches? They seem so fuckin cool. I'm working on a vest and a jacket atm, and I'd like for them to be done by the time a pride fest rolls around next month.

Main technique I use for making patches nowadays is linocut. Its best suited for mass production of patches.

Make sure to remember your carving the mirror image so you have to flip all the text. Using tracing paper to flip the design is a good trick, as well as leaving graphite marks on side, then pressing that to the lino to leave the marks in the same spot. Another trick with pencil is to view what ur carving in negative space quickly, put a paper over your design and shade over it with pencil, darker marks will be where you haven't carved yet.

I use speedball fabric ink, it takes 1 week to set then will be fine to be washed. I have magenta, violet, turqouise, and white. They have a limited range of fabric colors at the store. I have seen gold and silver fabric paint for sale and I will investigate it one day.

I use a speedball roller, i find the smaller one to be better than the big one as I can be more precise and waste less ink.

I got a fancy handle for $40 but the screws fallen out so its broken now so just get some heavy books. I used to use a mug. Whats important is pushing your whole body weight into it.

I got a speedball carving tool with different heads I can swap out so I can cut into the lino at different deepness and widths. The heads are stored inside the tool since its hollow and has a screwable removable bottom. I use linocut or dollar store erasers for my carvings. Make sure to wash the ink off your linocuts after your done using them.

A thing to increase the lifespan of you're linocuts is to use wood glue, some cork or wood pieces, and glued the lino stamps onto them. I dont do that yet so my stamps fall appart from overuse sometime and because I cut way too deep into the lino since I hate chatter.

Chatter is the term for in linocutting when theres little messy lines and stuff. It makes the art more recognisably to be linocut. My work is very clean with no chatter which is why people don't notice its linocut usually. This is a stylistic choice, with diy styles having a lot of chatter can look really cool so experiment with leaving bits of extra uncarvered lino sticking out in ur stamp. I need to experiment and buy some more lino.

You can also use multiple linocut stamps together to make a patch. Some patches ive made have like 8 different stamps. Ive made a dog nonsense patch where each letter was their own eraser stamp. You can also use different colors between the different lino stamps on the same patch to add more color. An effect I like to do is first stamp it in color, then the next day I stamp it in white over the same spot but shifted to the right and down slightly. It makes the text have a cool border 3D effect I love doing.

If making a more detailed picture with colors, i reccomend hand painting patches. I use white fabric paint mixed with acrylics for color to get all the shades i need. Acrylic paint mixed with fabric softener works too.

If doing words and you dont want a unique font reccomend using letter stamps. If you want a unique font for that i recommend hand paint for individual or linocut for mass produce.

The positive of letter stamps is the font is neat and can be done quickly. I know from lending them to my roommate that they are very helpful if you have dyslexia and have trouble getting letters right.

A visual effect of the letter stamps is that have a nice boxy edge effect, its an imperfection that adds a personally touch to it. I have both lower and upper case stamps that I got from michaels. You can use a hair band or elastic to hold a bunch of letter stamps together to make a word stamp.

You can use other stamps than letters that you find at craft stores for example my racoon print is a craftstore stamp.

You can also find big plastic letter stencils at the dollar store that you can use to do lettering by filling in gaps with a sponge or or paintbrush. They make special paintbrushes just for using stencils.

You can also get plastic stencils in the shapes of things, i got some for children and use a horse stencil for my horse smoking weed patch. Easier than drawing a horse myself.

Another technique I use for more unique clean patches is gel plating. I haven't tried printing laserprint images with it as ive seen online a lot but I will try one day. What i personally do is use it to make imprints with chains and physical objects.

Another thing i use with gelplates are any stamps or linocuts that dont have words, or words ones that i fucked up with and forgot to mirror when carving. It flips mirror image twice with the gel plate so it goes back to being right again on the patch.

Another patch making technique is using foamboard cut into shapes glued onto cardboard. This is good for a quick test of a design and is very cheap to make. It will not hold under water so is more difficult to clean.

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mochinek0 · 11 months ago

Text

Daminette December 2023: 18-Hiding in the Shadows

Marinette looked around her pent house in Paris. She had everything she wanted as a teenager. Well, almost everything. She was a well-known fashion designer, to the people that were aware of her. She kept her business a secret and used an alias. Her clients all came from judgement on her other clients. Others designers knew her as 'Passion' after her store's brand. Very few knew her as Marinette Dupain-Cheng: Gabriel Agreste, Audrey Bourgeois, and Jagged Stone.

Marinette had enough money to pay her rent, her fabric, all of her equipment, anything a business woman could need. Marinette herself, not so much. She missed being able to walk out and go sit at a café for a bit. When she saw Wayne Enterprise opened a section in Paris, she came up with an idea.

'Wayne Enterprises is a place that usually pays big. Even a part time job should be fine. A little play money couldn't hurt. A few extra euros so I could eat out, get some comfy clothes so I'm not rushing between orders and messing up wouldn't hurt.'

Damian Wayne sat at his desk, looking through potential applicants. Many of them were attached to big names or had one of their own. As he rang background checks, he could see they were all connected to each other in one way or another. He smirked at his idea.

'Let's put on a show. I want to see what kind of people these applicants are around each other. Would they out themselves?'

Mari was escorted to a waiting room as Damian Wayne got through other interviews. When the door opened, the last thing she expected was to see some familiar faces: Chloe, Adrien, and Lila.

"I don't know why you're even here, Dupain-Cheng." Chloe snarled, after the door was closed, "This is a big company that would love to work with our families. You have nothing going for you."

Marinette sat down and smiled, "Is that right? I guess I must have sent the wrong order to your mother and that's why she wore my design down the red carpet at the MET Gala."

Chloe tensed up and refused to meet her gaze. She could tell Adrien and Lila were surprised as well.

Chloe cleared her throat, "You're lying."

"Call your mother and ask." Marinette shrugged, "Oh, that's right! She doesn't like you; she prefers your half sister, who can actually work and living on her own, instead of leeching off of her Daddy."

"This isn't you, Dupain-Cheng." Chloe declared.

"No. This is me." Marinette shrugged off the concerned looks, "I'm just not being forced to coddle you to make Caline Bustier's life easier. 'Oh, just show Chloe some love, so she'll know what it's like and she'll get better eventually. You'll see.' Even she knew you were a horrible person. She basically thought you were The Grinch. That with enough love, your heart would grow three sizes and you wouldn't be such a bitch anymore."

Everyone was speechless at Marinette's attitude. This wasn't the Marinette that they grew up with.

"Chloe Bourgeois." a security voice called.

Chloe held her head high as she walked into the office.

"Damian Wayne." Chloe stated.

"Sit!" he demanded.

Chloe was shocked by his attitude.

'Doesn't he know who I am?'

"Do you know who I am?" she shouted.

"A spoiled brat; Ive read the articles on the internet." Damian stated, "You are known for crying for your father when you don't get what you want. Even though you are the oldest, your half-sister is who your mother relies on to bring customers for Style Queen in New York."

"My father-" Chloe snarled.

"Isn't the mayor anymore. He hasn't been the mayor in three years." the Wayne heir spoke, "If you're thinking of blackmailing me, you chose the wrong person. Spread whatever lies you want or cry to your father, the hotel owner. I could make one post about how horrid his hotel is and he would go out of business. Could you live with that?"

Chloe stood there, speechless. The only person who talked to her like this was her mother.

"I'm in charge, here, and if it came down to it, your job would be scrubbing toilets all day." Damian declared.

Tears formed in Chloe's eyes.

'He's glaring at me, just like Mommy. He doesn't look happy. He looks at me like he wishes I was gone or someone else.'

"We're done here." Damian stated.

Chloe quickly rushed out of the office. The three saw her rushing away, crying.

'I knew she wouldn't last.'

"Marinette, I can't understand why you're like this." Lila spoke, as she took her seat.

'He made that Daddy's Girl cry. I better go at this carefully.'

"Oh, shove it, Lila." Marinette sighed, "All three of us, here, know you're a lying manipulative bitch. You don't have to fake it."

"I don't know-" Lila continued.

"Adrien already told me years ago that he made a deal with you. He made one with me, too. Did he ever tell you that?" Mari questioned.

Lila glanced towards Adrien, who kept his head down.

"Oh, he didn't." she giggled, "You see, I was already designing for Jagged Stone when you arrived to our school. Adrien even had me autograph things I designed for him."

The model had turned towards Adrien and was now glaring at him.

"I could have made your whole 'tinnitus-kitten bullshit' story go up in flames since day one." Mari smiled, "I could have video called him and you would have been labeled as delusional."

"I took all our friends away!" Lila cried out, in victory.

"No." Mari answered, "You took away people, who were finally talking to me. Chleo ensured that for seven years, I had no friends. Those 'friends' just went back to not talking to me. You didn't actually do anything. If anything, you helped me. You took away the class president duties from me and I had more free time. You turned Alya and Nino away, so I couldn't babysit. I designed more clothes and got more clients. You didn't make my life worse, Lila, you made it better."

Lila fumed. Adrien had played peace maker between the both of them. From what Marinette was saying, she could have won the war in an instant! She thought she had chased Marinette Duapin-Cheng out of school all those years ago and here she was smiling, practially laughing at her, saying it wasn't true. She had thanked her and said she made her life better.

'I need this job so I can rub it in her face! I need to win against her!'

"I do hope you at least did some research into Damian Wayne." Marinette stated.

"I've known Damian Wayne since we were children!" Lila announced.

"Is that what it told you, you should say when you looked up how rich his family is?" Mari inquired.

Lila stood up, in rage.

'How dare she!'

"Lila Rossi." security called out.

Lila smirked, "I'm coming."

"She really should have done her research." Marinette spoke out loud.

"Why do you say that?" Adrine asked.

"Lila likes to play off her tears and looks." Mari declared, "Damian Wayne hates going to galas because of girls that try to attach themselves to him."

"And?" Adrien questioned.

"He broke an Italian model's arm two months ago, for lying to him." the designer stated.

Adrien paled at her words. Marinette merely smiled and pulled out her phone and dialed emergency services.

"Hello, what is your emergency?" the voice asked.

"I think we need an ambulance at Wayne Enterprise." Marinette stated, "I think someone's arm is broken."

"Are you with this person?" the voice questioned.

"No." the designer answered.

"I have sent medical to your location." the voice declared, before hanging up.

"That was pretty extreme, Marinette. I have faith in Lila!" Adrien shouted, "I don't think he would do that! The Waynes have an imagine to uphold!"

"Maybe, you should have done your research." Mari shrugged, "You still have time. Maybe five minutes."

Lila sauntered her way into the office.

"Hello, Mr. Wayne." She spoke, calmly.

"Sit." He demanded, not looking up.

Lila waved off his decleration. She moved past the chair in front of his desk and walked her way to his side.

"Can I sit on your lap?" She asked, "You see, I have tinnitus and-"

"There is nothing in here that would activate your tinnitus. Tinnitus is when you can't here anything for a brief amount of time, but a loud ringing. It's usually followed after hearing an extremely loud sound. I should know; I went to medical school." Damian stated.

'Shit. My usual tactics won't work here.'

Lila nodded and made her way back to the seat.

"Why shoud I hire you?" The Wayne heir questioned.

Lila fluttered her lashes, "I'm a model for Gabriel Agreste."

"Former model." Damian interjected, "You now model on Instagram and Only Fans."

Lila turned red. She didn't expect them to aware of her new lifestyle.

"Now, Miss Lerouch-" he continued.

Lila paled, "Wh-What did you call me?"

"Cerise Lerouch." Damian stated, "Did you think I would not delve into your background? I have to know who I am working with."

Cerise quickly leaped up from her seat and rushed around the desk.

"Don't touch me." Damian demanded.

"I'll do anything." Cerise cried out, grabbing onto his arm.

The Wayne heir growled, "Let go."

"I can help you relieve stress in other ways, you know." Cerise pleaded.

Damian grabbed her wrist and twisted it behind her back, harshly. Cerise screamed in pain.

"I have no need for whores." Damian spoke.

He grabbed the back of her shirt, arm still twisted, and walked her to his office door. He grabbed the knob and threw her out, in front of his security team.

"Drag this whore out by the hair, if you have too, but I want her off Wayne Enterprise grounds and blacklisted!" Damian shouted.

"Yes, Mr. Wayne." they spoke simultaneously, as he slammed his door shut.

"Shit, I think her arm is broken." the one on the left declared.

"She would call an ambulance?" the one on the right asked.

"Please, help me! It hurts so much!" Cerise begged, cradling her arm.

"You shouldn't have pissed him off." the one on the right declared, "Damian Wayne isn't one to mess around."

A man rushed towards them with medical workers.

"Did you guys call for an ambulance and someone with a broken arm?" the new guy asked.

"No, but perfect timing." the one on the left stated, "Girl with broken arm right here."

Cerise was walked by the waiting room. Inside, she could see Adrien looked horrified before turning to Marinette. She was smiling at her. Then, the baker's daughter flipped her off.

'She knew! That bitch knew how this would end!'

Cerise burst into tears as she was carted off.

"I guess that just leaves you and me, Agreste." Marinette stated.

Adrien began to feel uncomfortable.

"I do hope you do better than they did." She spoke, "For your Father's sake."

"Huh?" Adrien asked, confused.

"Damian Wayne isn't one to back down, not even to his father. He can make his father bow down to him. You have no idea how......attractive that is to a woman, Adrien." Mari smiled, "A man with a spine."

The model gulped, watching Marinette lick her lips.

"You should grow a spine." she declared, "Maybe then your father won't force you to model for him. I' sure that's why Kagami chose Felix over you. Your cousin has a spine. It looks good on him. Maybe, that's why Kagami didn't take my advice on how to get back with you after the break up."

Adrien only looked at her in shocked.

"Alya told me you broke up and I went to see her." Marinette continued, "I tried to help, but she didn't want to. She said it was better that way and well, Felix and you did look alike as teens. The same face with a spine; kind of hard to resist. They're so happy and their twins are adorable."

"Adrien Agreste, Mr. Wayne will see you now." the voice spoke over the intercom.

The model looked over at the designer. She waved at him, but said nothing. Adrien stood up and stood tall.

Adrien walked into Damian's office. It was intimidating; Marinette was right. He was scarier than his father.

"Why should I hire you, Adrien Agreste?" Damian questioned.

"I hate modeling. I prefer computers and science. I want to break free of Gabriel." Adiren admitted, "You don't have to worry about me telling him anything because I never learned anything about fashion. I couldn't even tell you the names of two different shades of fabric. If anyting, you should hire Marinette Dupain-Cheng. Marinette has always been an amazing designer. She was recognized by Father and Style Queen when she was only thirteen. She's the one who would know everything about fashion."

Damian hid his smirk behind his hand and looked down at the papers about Adrien again.

'What a miracle worker you are, Miss Dupain-Cheng. Agreste grew a spine.'

"We may have an internship available in our science department." Damian spoke, "Do you still live with your father?"

"Yes." Adrien spoke.

"We have a company home we prefer our interns reside in." Damian continued.

He noticed Adrien seemed relieved about that.

"The internship isn't a guarantee." The Wayne heir continued, "We need to see you commitment and dedication first hand. If you can't keep up, we'll put you in a different department. If you keep failing to meet our expectations, you'll have no choice but to keep modeling for your father."

"Tell him we'll work with him for one year, as a test." Damian continued, "You have one year to get your affairs in order. You'll need to move in one month from now and if not, consider the contract cancelled. I will inform them you are expected."

"Thank you." Adrien smiled.

Damian waved him off and Adrine walked out of the office, happy.

Marinette stood up when her name was called. As she walked towards the office, she saw Adrien smiling at a paper. She entered the office and closed the door.

"Please sit Miss Dupain-Cheng." Damian ordered.

Marinette immediately took a seat in front of him.

"Why should I hire you?" He questioned.

Mari shrugged, "You don't really have to."

"Oh?" Damian pushed.

"I'm only here for a part time job." the designer answered, "You know, helping out on the floor, coffee grabber, secretary gig. That sort of thing."

"Excuse me?" he asked, shocked, " Aren't you a fashion designer."

"With my own clients and I can pay for my own things." She smiled.

"Then why are you here?" Damian questioned.

Marinette sat back further in the chair and got comfortable, "Play money. I spend my own on my deisgns, fabrics, equipment, rent. Why not have a little extra to treat myself to a night out or a night in, for once?"

That was not the answer he had been expecting.

Damian laughed, "What if I decide to keep you?"

"Keep me as in?" Marinette pushed.

"I decide I want to become one of your clients." he offered.

"Are you offering?" the designer asked, "I've seen some of those suits you wear to galas and it doesn't bring you out to your full potential."

"And that would be?" he asked.

"You're outshined by your father, your older brothers, and the company." She spoke, "You can stand out, but maybe you want to fade into the back, less people to grope you."

Damian chuckled and stood up from his seat. He made his way around the desk and rested on it.

"What would you dress me in, right now?" Damian questioned.

"Depends." Marinette smiled, "Do you always wear a suit to work or are you interested in a change?"

"Tell me about this hypothetical change." He demanded.

"Ever heard of quick change wear?" She asked.

"No." he replied.

"It mainly takes woman into factor. Clothes that can go from working at the office to going out on a date or partying." Mari answered, "Just a few adjustments and possibly a new shade of makeup and usually people tend to think they took all day to get ready."

Damian took what she said into account, "And for men?"

"Most don't really have the option." Marinette shrugged, "Shame, but on you.....your figure. Well, there's nothing sluttier than a man wearing a sleeveless turtleneck."

The Wayne heir couldn't help but think of his old League of Assassin's outfits.

"No one at work would know if you have a blazer on and buttoned." She continued, "It is your office so you can always install a closet here and keep an extra pair of clothes. Jeans, if you prefer. Who is to say that this whole time, you weren't wearing sweatpants and just dressed from the waist up."

He chuckled ather way of thinking.

'Effective, but true not the less. I could kick out anyone who entered my office, should I choose to dress comfortably, and there was a closet hidden behind the cabinets.'

"Another thing most people tend to do is incorporate their culture into their clothing, as well." Marinette spoke, "Personally, I use apple blossoms in most of my designs for myself."

"Miss Dupain-Cheng, you are not what I was expecting." Damian declared, "I like to expect everything."

Mari smiled, "I've been known to be...unpredictable."

"You want to work part time in the fashion section." The Wayne heir stated, "Even if it's just grabbing coffee or lunch for others."

"Correct." she answered.

"Fine." Damian spoke, "You can work here, part time, at least three days a week. I f you have a big comission, I want to know about it. You can keep the details to yourself, but I want a time frame."

Marinette nodded, happily.

"I also want you to make me something to relax in the office that could pass for office wear." he suggested, "I'll pay for fabric of course. I can send you the details of my heritage via email, later."

Marinette stood up, "I'll start on that and bring it by Friday."

Damian grabbed her hand and kissed it, "I'll see you Monday morning, at 9AM, for work. We can go over your schedule then."

Marinette felt her face flush as his lips connected with her hand. His gaze was piercing.

"Yes, Mr. Wayne." She answered, flustered.

Damian waved his hand, dismissing her, but he still followed her to the door.

"You know, Miss Dupain-Cheng." He whispered, pressing himself to her back, "They may not be able to see it, but I see what lurks in the shadows. I can see what you hide there. I can wait a bit longer for the side of you that wants to come out and play."

"Is that so?" Marinette whispered back.

"I'll enjoy getting to know you, in the future." Damian spoke, before opening the door.

Marinette took a breath before she walked out the door.

"Marinette, did you get the job?" Adrien asked.

"Yes." she answered.

The model sighed in relief, "I told him you were good. I told him about Father and Audrey."

"Did you think I wouldn't be able to get it on my own?" Mari questioned.

"That's not what I meant!" Adrien cried, surprised at the question.

"Then, don't belittle me and my work." Marinette declared, "He already knew who I was. The Wayne keep a check on everyone and everything. Did you seriously not expect him to know about our families? He was probably listening to us in the waiting room."

Adrien gulped in response.

"Besides, I wasn't apart of whatever you three were fighting over." Marinette smiled, walking away.

'What did she mean by that?'

Adrien turned to see Damian Wayne leaning against the door, wearing a smirk on his face. Damian took notice of the model and hardened his gaze. Adrien gulped as Damian stood tall and closed his door again.

'What was he staring at?'

Adrien turned his head back down the corridor and saw Marinette speaking to the receptionist.

'He was after Marinette the whole time!'

'He already knew who I was.'

'He was probably listening to us in the waiting room.'

'Besides, I wasn't apart of whatever you three were fighting over.'

TAGLIST: @maribat-calendar-events @animeweebgirl@a-star-with-a-human-name@meme991001@vixen-uchiha@abrx2002@alysrose-starchild@fandom-trapped-03@dood-space@moonlightstar64@saltymiraculer@marveldcedits20@09shell-sea09@icerosecrystal@animegirlweeb@insane-fangirl-of-everything@blueblossombliss@nickristus-dreamer@megawhitleycalderonpaganus@missmadwoman@meira-3919@princessdaisysolosyourfaves@blep-23@fangirlingfanatic@darkhinauniverse@ravenr22@im-a-satanic-ritual@ravennm84@bianca-hooks123@a-slytherinish-gryffindor@starling218

#daminette december 2023 #daminette #marinette dupain cheng #wayne enterprise #damian wayne #chloe bourgeois #adrien agreste #lila rossi #chloe salt #adrien salt #lila salt #mommy issues #cerise miraculous #daddy issues #mlb x dc #dc x mlb #hinding in the shadows #mochinek0

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jube-art · 6 months ago

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Get those kids some Milk (iv fluids rich in nutrients) ASAP!!!!!

“They’re very sick.” Superman is explaining. “Very sick. They don’t speak English either, so we’ll have to wait for Kara and Karen before we have full native translators, I can understand them a little bit.”

They’re hurrying to the medical bay, Superman’s got some kind of Kryptonian scrub on, tight material with something almost like a surgical mask covering the bottom part of his face. “Change.”

Kon doesn’t have to be told twice, the medical bay in the fortress is used only seldomly, every time it’s had to be booted up it was sort of a world ending emergency, a big player was down and needed to be fixed right away.

There’s already scrubs waiting for him, Kon sheds his shirt fast, the scrubs laid out are a “one size fits most”, adult version, so even though they’re meant to be skintight Kon feels sort of stupid and too small in the thick material. He seals the zipper up to the bottom of his chin away, securing the skirt like bottoms over his board shorts.

The medbay is a shitshow.

Kon has never seen so many people in here.

There’s five of them. Five skeletons laying out on gurneys and if Kon couldn’t hear the weak heart beats he would assume they were already long dead.

Black hair, long and greasy, unwashed. Skin wane and strange colored, sickly, and tight to the bone.

With the adult that was limp and unmoving, closest to Superman, the man looked a little like a bad Halloween decoration. Like somebody had taken a handsome Barbie doll and put the skin over a dollar store very wrong skeleton.

With the Kryptonians on earth, Kon knows they’re all on the heavier, rounder side, plump or chubby or whatever the fuck people wanted to call it. Producers had asked Rex just once for Kon to loose weight for promotions and TV shows and for his image, but when Kon had gotten skinny (an exhausting process for several reasons) they told Kon to gain it all back again. His bones, his muscles, were wrong.

The one closest to Kon says something, something strange and backwards and mixed together in syllables that aren't in any language that can be found on earth.

Kon can tell that he's begging, for something, for anything-

Probably for food.

yes sir right away sir time to put them in medical bay and stick things in them and shine strange light at their skin :)

#tim drake #kon el #superboy #superman #double kryptonian #double kryptonian au #art #my art #writing #my writing #ask #anonymous #batfamily #dc #dc comics #doodles

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lime1991 · 10 months ago

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those mlp infection aus on tiktok have been alright but heres my idea to consider:

the main characters of the au are the cmc. theyre not the lone survivors, and heres why: the infection almost entirely affects adults. this is just like a book i read in 5th grade, thats where im stealing this from.

Applebloom is the self appointed leader, shes best at foraging for food and growing it as well as building re-enforcements for the shelter (which is the clubhouse. it's higher up so they dont have to worry about most infected ponies reaching them.)

Scootaloo is the defender of the base as well as the group in general. shes the one who handles the weapons and is first to sacrifice herself for her friends to get to safety. She says its because he doesnt want to hold them back due to her disability, they tell her she doesnt have to think like that. but its hard not to.

Sweetie Belle is... not all there. sometimes she forgets the apocalypse has happened and that most of her loved ones are dead. Scootaloo and Applebloom take turns sleeping during the night to make sure someone is always lookout. that, and they can't risk Sweetie Belle unknowingly walking into the dark trying to get home.

Partially inspired by one of the best animes ive ever seen: School Live, Scootaloo and Applebloom sometimes, when Sweetie is having an episode, pretend everything is normal. Is the most they can do for their friend, who is clearly so traumatized that her brain blocks out the reality of their situation. Sometimes, Applebloom wishes that could happen to her.

When the infection started, it slowly took over the elderly first. Granny Smith got sick, fast. Big Mac and Applejack took care of her, but only a few days later she would turn into some kid of monstrous creature. Big Mac did the unspeakable act of putting her out of her misery.

Sweetie Bell was sent to go live with Rarity while her mother was sick. Her father began to feel ill too, and didn't want her to get herself and her friends at school sick as well. She could hear over the phone the conversations her sister and father had. How mom was getting worse, how dad was getting worse. How they stopped calling altogether.

A couple days into the widespread sickness, Scootaloo's aunts took a trip to the store to stock up on groceries just incase a quarantine was issued. They were gone for hours. They were gone for days. They never came back. Eventually, Scootaloo traveled outside of her home by herself, and could never return.

Once Big Mac and Applejack started showing signs of illness, Applejack spoke to cousins in other places wondering if they would be able to let Applebloom stay with them a while. But just like everyone in Ponyville, they were experiencing the same issue. At one point, Fluttershy agreed to watch Applebloom until AJ and Big Mac started to feel better.

After hearing that Fluttershy graciously took in Applebloom, Rarity sent Sweetie Belle off to her the moment she started to cough. She didn't want Sweetie to see her like that. She didn't want her to get sick either, and in fact, she probably transported it from their parents house and into Rarity's. That made Rarity angry. Her last words to Sweetie were about how upset she was that she'd brought the illness to her.

Scootaloo went to Fluttershy herself. She couldn't find Rainbow Dash, so she settled for the next best pony. She was shocked to see her friends had been there themselves the past few days. Scootaloo only managed to stay a few hours, because during the night the crusaders awoke to a crash in another room. Upon investigation they saw Fluttershy hunched over a broken glass. There was blood on the floor.

They went to comfort her, but she wasn't herself any longer. When she turned to face them it already looked like she'd been ravened by the infection. She was so hungry. Why couldn't the jar just open? She was so... hungry. Before she could even stand back up, the crusaders grabbed their things and fled to the only place they knew they'd be safe. The clubhouse.

#my little pony #mlp #mlpfim #mlp infection au #applebloom #scootaloo #sweetie belle #cutie mark crusaders #infection au #apocalypse au #ive made myself giddy thinking about this. i need to draw up some concept designs.

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sineala · 1 month ago

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Are there ANY stony/Star Trek AUs?

Okay. Um. I'm just going to assume this is a legitimate question and not actually a way to express frustration about my progress on the sequel I am writing (I stared at this ask for a while), so I will just conclude that you must have missed the Steve/Tony Star Trek AU I wrote, um, back in 2016:

Straight on till Morning (109848 words) by Sineala Chapters: 6/6 Fandom: Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616, Avengers (Comics) Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark Characters: Steve Rogers, Tony Stark, Carol Danvers, Janet Van Dyne, Hank Pym, Wanda Maximoff, Pietro Maximoff, James "Rhodey" Rhodes, Clint Barton, Donald Blake (Marvel), Jocasta (Marvel) Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Star Trek Fusion, Action/Adventure, Romance, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pining, Angst, Secret Identity, Identity Porn, Sex Pollen, Fuck Or Die, Caves, Sex In A Cave, Technobabble, Happy Ending, Cap_Ironman Big Bang 2016, Community: cap_ironman, Podfic Available Summary:

Tony Stark resigned his commission in Starfleet five years ago, after a disastrous away mission, and he swore he'd never go back. He just wants to be left alone to build warp engines in peace. But the universe has more in store for him than that, as he discovers when Admiral Fury comes to him with an offer he could never have expected and cannot possibly refuse: first officer and chief engineer aboard the all-new USS Avenger, a starship of Tony's own design. What's more, the Avenger's captain is Steve Rogers, hero of the Earth-Romulan War. Believed dead for over a century, Steve is miraculously alive... and very, very attractive.

But nothing is ever easy for Tony. As he wrestles with his secret desire for his new captain and his not-so-dormant fears, another mission starts to go wrong, and Tony becomes aware that Steve has secrets of his own -- and the truth could change everything.

So, yeah, if you actually haven't read that one, that'll keep you busy for a while. It's a Trek fusion with comics Steve/Tony, set in the era of the later TOS movies. (This is important so that you can picture the correct uniforms, and also because it actually matters that the events of Star Trek II, III, and IV have happened.) It was a Big Bang fic, so it's got some great art by Ran and Phoenix -- embedded in the story -- and also M_Samro made a really amazing podfic of it, if you like podfics.

For a charity auction in 2017, I promised I would write a sequel, and I plotted the whole thing out and started writing this extremely epic sequel, which was unfortunately, about a plague threatening the galaxy, and I got about 120,000 words in and then 2020 happened and I decided I needed to not be writing it right now. So it went on an extended hiatus.

But the good news is that I've actually gotten back to it! I picked it up again last month and I've put 40,000 more words in it since then and at this exact moment I am currently working on the last scene of Chapter 4 (out of six total)! I swear it is happening! I've been putting in about a thousand words a day for the past month! It is really happening this time! The sequel is coming! I promise! I know it has been years but it's happening!

See? It's happening! (I would include a screencap of the part that is happening, but all of Chapter 4 is pretty spoilery.)

So that will exist! Someday! I mean that!

And if you're asking about Steve/Tony Star Trek AUs by people other than me, there are some! If you filter the AU - Star Trek Fusion tag by Steve/Tony, there are 25 matches. Several of them are related to my fic (remixes, art) but there is some stuff that isn't my fault! I haven't read a lot of them because I was trying not to read things that seemed like they might be similar to mine while I was plotting my series here, and also I have never finished watching DS9, so I skipped the DS9 ones.

Under Stars by vulcanscully: A fun fusion that I thought was interesting because Steve is an ensign and that's not how this usually goes.

Discovery of the Century by DepressingGreenie: More 616 in flavor than a lot of the Trek AUs, this is basically Finding Steve In The Ice but Make It Star Trek. As far as I am concerned, Finding Steve In The Ice is great every time.

and so we rebuild by raeldaza: I'm probably biased because this one was inspired by my fic, but I also really enjoyed this one for not being how these things usually go. A lot of Trek AUs in many fandoms are written through a TOS/AOS kind of lens and will often do a Kirk/Spock thing and make one of them a Vulcan or half-Vulcan. In this one that's Tony, but also he's a terrible Vulcan! He's found a new way to disappoint his father!

Stellar Love Affairs by AvengersNewB: I honestly had never imagined a Star Trek fusion that was also A/B/O but I think it really works here! It's like bringing pon farr full circle.

Xenophilia by Captain_Panda: Captain_Panda has several Trek AUs but I am reccing this one because it's the longest. And also the whumpiest. Everyone loves some good away-mission whump!

So there you go! Live long and prosper! I promise I am still writing this Star Trek AU sequel!

#replies #stark-phd

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whatsk-poppinhomies · 1 year ago

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Pairing : Seo Changbin x F!Reader & Yang Jeongin x F!Reader TW : For Changbins : reader has type 2 diabetes ; ketoacidosis (is that a TW? Well it is now, it seems like it should be a warning) ; vomiting ; hospitals ; Changbin is still just a big sweetheart that cares too much ; IV's ; reader in a coma ; For Jeongins : reader has arrhythmia (irregular heartbeat) ; and potentially undiagnosed type 2 diabetes ; Jeongin has no clue so is therefore seemingly insensitive ; reader fainting ; Jeongin ending redemption ; Word Count : For Changbins : 4.6k For Jeongins : 4.1k (in total : 8.7k) Request : @maruskz @slayhyunjin & 4 other anons, the reader doesn't feel well!! A/N : THIS ONE IS FOR YOU ALL!! IT'S THE LAST ONE IN THE LINEUP!! I HOPE YOU ENJOY IT!! Thank you to the person in my comments who let me know I (and google) goofed up. I will try to be as accurate as possible when writing about any type of disease, so please let me know in the comments if I'm wrong.

Changbin

“I'm gonna go to the gym with Chan after work, but I should be back home before dinner time.” Changbin said as he pulled his t-shirt on over his head, smiling at you as you laid in the bed still, your eyes still heavy although he chalked it up to you tossing and turning all night and having to get out of bed every couple hours to use the bathroom. “Do you have enough medicine to get you through the day? I can stop at the pharmacy before I go to the gym and drop it off to you.”

Your head shook in response as you let out a long yawn, sitting up in bed but immediately falling back as your vision momentarily went hazy, which you attributed to sitting up too fast. “I have enough… Thank you Binnie. I gotta work today anyway, so if I need my medicine I can stop by the pharmacy on the way home.” You murmured and he sighed softly, dropping down onto the bed beside you, his hand brushing lightly over your cheeks before leaning in to kiss you.

“You know I don’t like you walking to the store by yourself…” He reminded you, his bottom lip jutting out into a little pout and you playfully swiped your finger over it causing him to chuckle softly. “Plus you said that you weren’t feeling well… you shouldn’t be going to work like that. You can just stay home and rest… You need to rest, babe.” Bin had been your biggest caregiver since he found out you had diabetes, but not only was he the best caregiver, but supported you through it all, changing his diet as much as he could so that you didn’t feel like you were missing out on good meals, texting you every hour on the hour to check how you were feeling and to make sure you were taking your medicine. He was just as good as any doctor, and you felt safe knowing that you had him.

“Bin, I’m fine.” You reassured him, grabbing his hand and locking your fingers with his. “I need to go to work… I called out yesterday. I’m not trying to lose my job.” You explained, sitting up more slowly this time and then immediately resting your head against his shoulder.

“When was the last time you threw up?” He questioned, and you knew that his reasoning for questioning you was valid and it all came from his genuine care for you, it made you feel bad in a way, knowing that he probably spent more time worrying about you than about himself. “I feel like I heard you get sick in the middle of the night…”

“And you did… But that was the last time I got sick.” You said as cheerfully as you could. “It was probably just some 24 hour stomach bug, I’m totally okay. Now go to work before Chan calls me up and yells at me for making you late.” You kissed along his shoulder, giggling softly at the way he’d purposely flex his muscles whenever you did. “I love you Bin…”

“I love you too…” He whispered, tilting your head up so he could kiss you correctly, his lips held against yours just a little bit longer than usual as his eyes closed. You could tell that he was worried, but you were adamant, and he knew the one thing you hated was to be coddled because of your disease… But he couldn’t help it, although he tried his best. “Call me if you need anything… Or if you start feeling sick. I’ll rush home… I love you so much, babe.”

Going to work really was on your agenda for the day, you had even texted your boss to let her know you were coming. Sure, you felt a little tired still, but you attributed that to the fact that you had woken up in the middle of the night to throw up a couple times and it just took a toll on you. You truly thought that you were better, that is, until Changbin was gone and you got up to make yourself breakfast, everything was laid out perfectly on the counter, you were about to start cooking, but, without warning, your body had different ideas and you ended up doubled over the sink, throwing up the lack of contents in your empty stomach.

You couldn’t seem to catch your breath which put you into panic mode which inevitably made you hyperventilate even more. The entire room seemed to go hazy, or maybe it was just your vision, and it sucked that by the time you came to realize what was going on, you were too late.

It was hard enough as it was to try to think, it was like every single thought that you once had in your mind was gone, the only thing you felt or could think about was panicking. Your legs gave out and you fell to the floor, and it was like falling against the hard tile had shaken you enough to have you pulling out your phone and dialing the police. Before it could even finish getting through the first ring though, your vision went blank, your thoughts were gone, everything went black…

“I’m just gonna go home and check on her, she hasn’t answered any of my texts.” Changbin informed Chan as they walked down the hall together. It’s not that it was unlike you to be so busy at work that you were late to respond, it’s just that with the way you were feeling the night before, he just wanted to make sure you were okay. “I’ll meet you at the gym.”

“Nah, I’ll go with you, just in case you need me.” And it’s not that anything in Changbins words had made the oldest feel that way, he just felt like he should be there. “Plus I haven’t seen her in a while, you never bring her into the studio anymore.”

“Well she has her doctor's appointments and then she has to work…” He explained as he climbed into the elevator, holding it open for Chan before pressing the button to go down to the main floor. “I always tell her that she doesn’t have to work… I think she just feels like that’s the one thing in her life that she has control of… I don’t want to take that away from her.”

Chan nodded understandingly, he knew all about your conditions, all of the guys did. Changbin was very upfront about it, letting them all know that there would be days that he wouldn’t make it into work on time so he could go to appointments with you, and there would also be days that he wouldn’t come in at all because you needed him more than the group did. You were always and would always be Changbins top priority, and everyone was well aware of that. They didn’t mind, they saw how happy you made him, and they knew that if anything would ever happen to you, they’d end up losing him anyway.

“I thought she was going to the gym with you on her days off… Did she stop?” Chan posed the question as he pushed through the front doors to the building, holding it open for Changbin and then following him down to the car. “We could have a gym double date or something?”

Changbins nose crinkled at the thought, and then he chuckled lightly, shaking his head. “Y/Ns just been feeling tired lately. I don’t want to push her. We take morning walks together and the doctor said that was enough until her energy comes back. They did switch her medicine recently, so that might be it.” He climbed into the drivers side and waited for Chan to get in before starting up the car. “I hope she packed herself a lunch, she shouldn’t be eating the junk they sell near her work… I should have packed her a lunch before I left.”

“You think too much, too pessimistic…” Chan mused, leaning back in the seat and glancing over at Changbin who seemed too lost in his thoughts right now. “You do a lot for her, not because you have to, but because you want to, because you love her… There’s not a lot of men who wouldn’t do that…”

“Well those men are assholes.” Changbin stated matter-of-factly, stopping at the red light that would have him turning down the street to home. “She deserves all the love in the world, maybe more… I wish I could give her every ounce of my love… I’d give her my entire heart…”

Chan pursed his lips, nodding along to what he was saying as he watched the familiar houses scroll past the window until he pulled into the driveway. “When does she usually go to work? She might already be there…” Chan mused when he saw that there was a package on the front step.

“Maybe they called her in early?” Changbin mumbled as he climbed out of the car, running up to the front porch and picking up the box before letting himself in. It wasn’t rare, in actuality it was quite annoyingly frequent that you were called in at a moments notice, usually going into work with an empty stomach, leaving Changbin to panic the entire time you were gone. “I hate when they do that to her…”

“It looks like she was in the middle of cooking something… or about to cook something at least.” Chan commented as he followed Changbin into the house, noticing the ingredients that were scattered around the counter, the sink not exactly running, but it was still dripping. “Looks like she left in a hurry.”

Changbin groaned loudly, pulling out the trash bin and dumping everything that littered the counter into it before slamming his hand down against the sink faucet to stop the incessant dripping. “I don’t care how much of a hurry she’s in… She shouldn’t leave the house like this.” He grumbled, looking around at the knives and the cutting board that were partially used. “It’s that damn job… She’s so scared of losing it… And they know that. They hold it above her head… And she won’t listen to me… It’s ridiculous. But to leave the kitchen looking like this!” His hands flew up in the air in disbelief before coming back down, slapping against the counter top. “You know what… I’m going to her work. I need to talk to someone… They’re completely taking advantage of her.”

Chan awkwardly chewed on his bottom lip, partially regretting coming along for the little journey that Changbin was now taking him on, but he hoped that being there himself would at least help him to be level headed enough to be as calm as possible. “Just… Don’t make a scene… And don’t try to jump across the counter, okay? We can talk about things like adults… Can’t we?”

Changbin rolled his eyes, not even answering the question as he walked out the door and climbed back in the car. The kitchen was disgusting, but he could never actually be mad at you, not at all… You were too innocent, and you’d never think that your work was doing exactly what Changbin knew they were doing. That’s why he wanted to talk to them specifically, whoever had called you in… “Oh I’m gonna talk about things… It’s up to them whether we keep things cordial though. Taking advantage of my girl like that? Not gonna happen! Not anymore!”

Chan knew that Changbin was an excellent driver, he was safe, he followed all the traffic rules, he’d drive with him whenever he felt he needed to… But not today. Changbin was pissed, and a driving, pissed off Changbin threw all of his cares to the wind. Traffic rules did not exist, and the other drivers abided by whatever rules Changbin came up with on the spot. “You know, if you get pulled over… You won’t be able to talk to anyone except the police.” Chan tried to remind her, but Changbin wasn’t listening to anything but the sound of the engine revving as he whipped around a couple other cars before pulling-very badly-into a parking spot right in front of your work. “There are going to be so many cops around your car when you get out of the store, oh my god.”

“As long as I get to finish with this conversation before they pull me out of the store, then fine.” Changbin said as he climbed out, his muscles tensed, the irritation just radiating around him. Chan was hesitant, but he knew that following him into the store would be the best course of action, so he did, but he did stay a little further behind, watching from a distance as Changbin walked up to the counter. “Alright… Where is she!? I know she had to work today and to be honest, she might say it, but I’m getting real fucking sick and tired of you taking advantage of her niceness and her willingness to work.”

The man at the counter was visibly confused as he looked around himself and then back at Changbin. “Uhm… dude… I don’t know what… Or who you’re talking about…” He mumbled, peering around Changbin to see the person waiting behind him. “But if you’re not buying anything… Can you get out of the line?”

Changbin turned around, smiling kindly to the stranger behind him, but the smile fell just as quickly when he turned back around to face the man at the register. “I know you called Y/N in today! Where is she, huh? You got her doing some backroom stocking shit right now?! You know she can’t do that! She didn’t even get to finish making her meal because you guys always call her in! It’s bullshit! Why have a damn schedule if you’re just gonna text her and tell her you need her earlier?”

“What are you talking about?” The man, now having harvested a little bit of sass to stand up to Changbin, who was still much bigger than the guy. “Y/N isn’t even here right now. She totally flaked on her hours, and the manager has been trying to get a hold of her but she hasn’t answered. How about you try calling her instead of coming in here and causing a scene and scaring away our customers.” The guy impatiently tapped his fingers against the counter before motioning with his head for Changbin to move. “Can you go now?”

If you weren’t at work… And you weren’t at home… Where the hell were you? His anger dissipated and quickly turned to worry. Your medicine was running out, but you had told him that you had enough to get you through the day. You were feeling sick the night before, but you claimed it was just a stomach bug and that you were feeling fine now. It’s not like you would leave him… He never gave you any reason to do something like that… Right?

“Maybe you should call the neighbors… See if they know anything?” Chan suggested as he and Changbin sat in the car, still parked in front of the store, and shockingly enough, there wasn’t a single officer in sight to get on Changbin about his reckless driving. That was a good thing though, clearly Changbin wasn’t in the mood or in the right state of mind to handle that kind of interaction. “Or maybe the police station or the hospital… See if any calls came in from your address?”

Changbin nodded, the movement kind of stiff as he pulled out his phone. He didn’t know where to start, but he also didn’t know the neighbors number, not by heart, and most of them had work today and they weren’t home. He didn’t want to have to call the hospital because that was the last place he wanted you to be, but it was the only option he had, the only line he had to hold on to right now.

The call was short, and for the first time the entire day, Changbin had been almost completely silent, only giving out the address and then a series of mumbled out acknowledgements were heard before the silence that followed once the call was ended. It was a scary silence though, one that held far too much emotion, and although Changbin hadn’t said anything, Chan could feel it. “So… What did they-”

There wasn’t a chance to finish as Changbins fists came down on the steering wheel, punching against it repeatedly as tears began to trickle down his cheeks, his screams cut off by his sobs. Chan didn’t know what to do, but he felt like he should try to stop him, mainly because the steering wheel looked like it would break off and neither of them needed that to happen. “Don’t touch me! Don’t!” Changbin shouted when Chan tried to grab his arms, but it had stopped his assault on the wheel momentarily, his head falling forward as his body shook.

“Changbin…” Chan said breathlessly, falling back against the seat and staring up at the roof of the car. “I don’t know what the hell is going on… But you can’t just beat up the car. If you want me to take you to the hospital, I will, because based on your reaction I’m just feeling like that’s where she is. Or I can take you home. Either way, you’re not driving, not like this. You’ll get in an accident and nobody wants that.”

He sniffled softly, nodding his head as he lifted it from the wheel, opening the door slowly and climbing out, walking around to the passenger side of the car. “They said… She was there…” He muttered, watching Chan climb over to the drivers side and then quickly getting in and putting on his seatbelt. “They said that she…. She can’t talk right now…” His head shook and his shakily sniffled, his entire body trembling as he practically gasped for air. “I knew there was something wrong… She wasn’t feeling good and… And I was worried but I didn’t do anything. I didn’t stay with her… I should have taken her to the hospital… I didn’t… I failed her…”

Chan knew that the guilt would be there, but it didn’t make it any less heartbreaking to see his friend, his brother like this. He didn’t even know what to do, because he knew that if the shoe was on the other foot, he’d be feeling the same way. “You didn’t fail her… You believed her because she said that she was okay… That’s not your fault. Plus, you said it yourself, she likes feeling like she has some sort of control over her life… Maybe she thought she’d be able to get better herself…”

“That doesn’t change the fact that I left… She’s supposed to trust me and… how can she trust me now… when I left her… Like that…” He was stumbling over his words as his tears continued to fall down his cheeks, his hands quickly swiping across his face to wipe them away. “She was… She was in the middle of making her lunch… She didn’t even get to eat…”

There was nothing that Chan could say to get Changbin out of his own head, so he just listened, completely understanding where he was coming from, but he wished that Changbin would understand that it wasn’t his fault. “She’s sick Changbin… These things happen… You’ve done a lot of research on it, you know these things can happen. But you can’t protect her all the time… You just can’t.”

Changbin was silent for a moment, his thumb coming up to his mouth as he chewed on his nail. “I want to… I want to protect her… I researched things and… And I knew that things like this could happen and I still left her. I knew the symptoms that were bad… and she had all of them… Why did I leave?” He was breathing heavily, it almost sounded like he was about to throw up himself. “If I was there..-“

“It still would have happened because she was sick, Changbin…” Chan said sternly, trying to snap Changbin out of this self deprecating spiral he was in. “You can’t be with her every second of every day, and I’m sure she wouldn’t want you to be like that anyway. This would have happened whether you were home with her or not. Beating yourself over it won’t change things.”

The hospital towered over the car, shadowing him and Chan when they stepped out, like a giant dark cloud and Changbin hated it. He hated hospitals anyway, and the only reason he was going in was because you were in there. “You don’t have to follow me in…” He mumbled when Chan climbed out of the car as well. “She wouldn’t want to be crowded.”

“I’ll wait in the waiting room, I’ll wait for you. You can’t stay here all night and someone needs to drive you home.” Chan said and Changbin just nodded, he didn’t have the energy to go against what he said. “Do you need me to go up to the front desk and ask f-“

“I’m not an infant.” Changbin snapped before taking a deep breath and running his hands over his face. “Sorry… I just… I’m scared, hyung. I can do it though… thank you.” Chan pursed his lips as he patted Changbins back, holding the door open for him and then following behind.

It was hard to ask the lady at the front desk about you, mainly because it made it more real that you were truly there. His voice cracked and his vision became blurry as he started to cry again just from simply asking what room you were in.

“The treatment is going well, sir. It’s-”

“Is it?” Changbin cut the doctor off as he stood at the end of your bed, the IV’s poking out of your arm looked painful, and the tubes that were in your nose and your mouth to help you breathe surely weren’t reassuring. “Is it really going well, because if it were, she’d be awake right now. She’d be happy to see me… But she’s sleeping… She’s still sleeping… So tell me how this is supposed to show me that the treatment is going well.”

His fingers were wrapped tightly around the footboard of the bed, and his head slowly turned to look at the doctor who was, rightfully, quite scared of Changbin. His temperament was nothing short of seemingly hostile, and it seemed like anything could make him snap in an instant. “Sir… We truly are trying to get her to rise as soon as possible, and I assure you, she will be okay… She will wake up… But this rest, it’s, in a sense… It’s kind of helpful… Her body has surely been through a lot.” The word helpful in this setting was definitely not something that Changbin wanted to hear, and his teeth gritted together as he narrowed his eyes at the doctor. “Wh-What I meant to say is… She was sick… For a while. Maybe she knew, maybe she didn’t, we’re unsure… But her body just wasn’t able to produce enough insulin and… Well I’m sure that you know what ketoacidosis is-”

“Yes I know what that is.” Changbin snapped, his breaths becoming more harsh as he glared at the doctor. “I’ve done everything to protect her… To make sure she’s healthy and well… So why did this happen?!” He knew that shouting at the doctor wouldn’t give him the answers that he wanted so badly, but he needed to get it all out, he needed to let go of the anger that he was holding in towards himself, and sadly for the doctor, he was the only one in the room right now.

“We all want to protect the people that we love, and I tell you, it is crystal clear that you love her… But you can’t always protect them, you can’t always protect her, and you can’t protect her from herself. She’s got a disease, and with this disease comes moments like this… And that’s just something that you either get used to… Or-”

“I’m not leaving her.” Her hissed, finally turning back to look at you. “You hear that, babe. I’m not leaving you… You’re stuck with me. I’m gonna sit right here beside you until your beautiful eyes open and you look up at me and I can tell you how much I love you…”

“Well…” The doctor whispered sheepishly, his hands clapping together as he looked nervously as Changbin, slowly backing away in the process. “There are visiting hours and… Everyone kind of has to abide by those hours. You won’t really be able to stay in here… Or sit beside her… As sweet as the sentiment is…”

Changbin chuckled, although there was nothing funny about what was going on, and the sound was more snarky than anything as he grabbed the chair from the corner of the room and sat it down next to your bed, dropping down into it and crossing his arms over his chest. “I said I’m not leaving… And you can try to drag me out of here, but I’ll come back. I’ll always come back because I’m not leaving her here with you guys all by herself. So you can either cause a bigger problem… Or you can just let me sit here.”

The doctor relented, shaking his head as he walked out of the room. Changbin wasn’t sure whether he should prepare himself for security to come in and try to get him out, or maybe the doctor was just letting the other doctors and the nurses know about the way that he was. Whatever the reason, no one had come in the room for the past five minutes, and he felt like he was in the clear, so he let himself finally look at you, really look at you.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were feeling bad?” He murmured, grabbing your hand and holding it tightly, wishing for the feeling of your fingers slipping between his own, but there was no movement, there was nothing. Your hands felt so cold in his and he quickly placed a kiss to the back of it before sliding it underneath the blanket to try to keep you warm. “I think I made you lose your job… But it’s okay… I’ll take care of us, I promise I will… I can even find you a job in the office if you really want to work… I just want you close to me.” Your heart rate started to climb the more he spoke, and that in itself had a solemn smile gracing his saddened features. “You hear me… I know you do. I’m right here, I’m not going anywhere. I love you… And I’d do anything to hear you say it back right now… I just need you to wake up.” His sniffles were loud as his head fell forward against the bed, his entire body shaking and his fingers gripping onto the blankets. He had never felt so helpless when it came to you, but the doctor was right… He couldn’t protect you from yourself… That didn’t mean that he wouldn’t try though. In fact, he’d try harder now… He needed you to wake up though… That’s all he needed.

Jeongin

Jeongin didn’t exactly live with you, although the guys often joked that he might as well considering he was over your house more than anything else. It’s not even that he didn’t want to live with you, to be completely honest, he just liked the way you sounded in the morning when he rolled out of bed, the way you’d so cutely ask him if he was coming back over when he got off work. Of course he was, there was nowhere else he’d rather fall asleep than beside you, but he loved teasing you, and you’d pout up at him making it almost impossible to resist kissing your perfect lips.

From a technical standpoint, he had been living with you for three months now… and Jeongin was not only an amazing person to live with, but he was also an amazing boyfriend. Not for the typical reasons though, actually, it was quite the opposite. Your condition wasn’t too bad, it definitely wasn’t the best medical ailment to have, but… When life gives you lemons… You make what you can with those lemons.

In the duration of your relationship, you had become somewhat of a master at both treating your condition and hiding it from Jeongin. Now, you may be asking… Why hide it from him? And, the reason was quite simple. You loved him, and the last thing you needed him to do was worry about you when he had so much to worry about himself. He was a jokester, he was a smartass, but he had a heart twice the size of the moon it seemed sometimes, and if he knew that there was something wrong with you he’d worry too much.

It also made it easier to relax, to be able to somewhat make light of the situation, which of course shouldn’t be made light of, but sometimes you just got tired of the seriousness from the doctors and your family, you got tired of being constantly told to watch for your blood pressure, to listen to your heartbeat, to take your medicines. You just wanted to be able to joke around sometimes.

“Damn sweetcheeks!” Jeongin teased as he laid his head on your chest, your fingers brushing lightly through his hair as you both watched tv. “I really do make your heart go boom boom crazy.” And you couldn’t help but snort loudly at the comment because, while he wasn’t exactly wrong, your heart already beat like crazy, he just made it even crazier. “It’s cause I’m cute, isn’t it?”

You rolled your eyes at him, teasingly pushing him away. “Oh yeah, you’re totally cute.” You said mockingly, watching his eyes go wide at the very obvious sarcasm. “You’re the cutest, Innie. You already know that though.” You leaned in to press a kiss to his forehead before sitting up and taking a deep breath, winded just from goofing up.

“Ooh, looks like I take your breath away too. Even after two whole years, I’ve got the same effect on you.” He sat up, kissing your forehead before getting up off the couch. “As much as I’d love to stay here with you for the rest of the morning, I have to go to work.” He pouted, as if you would somehow be able to bribe Chan into letting Jeongin stay home. “I guess I’ll just… walk out the door now… be gone for almost ten hours… that’s how long you won’t see me…”

He was always so dramatic, sometimes it seemed like Hyunjin had really rubbed off on him, not that you minded though. At the beginning of the relationship he had been so shy, it was like he avoided your touch and your affection, but now he was as clingy as you thought you were in the beginning. “The door will be unlocked when you get off, pooh bear.” You reassured him and he pouted even more now, causing you to, foolishly, jump off the couch, your head spinning and your vision going partially blank as your balance wobbled.

“Woah… you good there, sweets?” He asked, his usually cheerful voice masked with his worry as he placed his hands on your shoulders to hold you steady. “You coulda just told me to come over to give you the hug. Try not to get up so fast.” His hands slid down to your hips and he pulled you closer, leaning in to kiss you softly. “I’ll let you know when I get off and if you need anything from the store I’ll get it on my way back… I mean… If you want me to come over.”

“Oh shush…” You pressed your finger against his lips with a smile, still breathing quite heavily as you leaned your head against his chest, your hands falling to your side. “You can come over whenever because it’s your house too… It’s our house.” You kissed his chest and then backed up, falling back onto the couch. “Don’t work too hard… I’ll miss you.”

His lips drew into a thin line as he looked you over, trying not to think so hard about the way your head fell back against the couch and your eyes closed, your chest rising and falling heavily. If there was something wrong, you’d surely tell him… Of course you would. He was your boyfriend, you could tell him anything, he wanted you to tell him everything. “I’ll miss you too… I’ll be home in a couple hours… Love you.”

You hummed in response, listening for the door to shut before getting up and sprinting to your room, which in itself was a bad idea, falling to the floor and pulling out the shoebox full of medicine out from under the bed and taking one of the pills, laying your head against the edge of the bed as you tried to relax. You weren’t sure how much longer you could hide this from him, and you could see that he was already picking up on something being wrong, he just wasn’t questioning it verbally. It was just a matter of time now.

“Y/N’s been acting really weird lately…” Jeongin mused as he and the guys took a small break during practice, leaning against the wall and taking a sip of his drink, his mind reeling with far too many things right now. “I don’t know, maybe I’m just overthinking things… I do that sometimes…” He basically talked to himself now even though the rest of the guys were listening.

“Depends on what kind of weird it is.” Minho posed, and whether it was done on purpose or simply to try to help Jeongin get to the bottom of the way that he was feeling, it wasn’t helping at all. “Is it like a sneaky weird, like… Like does she have a secret side boyfriend? Is she gonna break up with you?” The questions were both terrifying and gut wrenching at the same time, Jeongins eyes widened at the possibility, but you would never do something like that… Not without talking to him first.

“N-No… It’s… It’s like a sick… Like she’s sick or something.” He quickly explained what had happened this morning, the way that you acted. He was worried sick, but he felt like if it truly was nothing then you’d think he was silly for being so scared. Then again, it came along with being your boyfriend… He was supposed to worry about you, right? That’s the way it seemed when he watched the other guys with their partners.

Minho hummed, nodding his head as he snorted softly, placing a gentle hand on Jeongins shoulder to try to calm the obviously worried boy. “She’s on her period. That’s what’s going on… And I promise you… She’ll be totally fine. She’ll just bleed for a couple days, she’ll probably cramp up so bring her lots of her favorite snacks and heating pads to help her… But other than that… There’s not really much that you can do. Best of luck.”

Your period, of course! Why hadn’t he thought of that?! He had been with you for a quite a while now, and he knew that your body wasn’t the kindest to you when it was that time of the month. “Right… Maybe I can get her some… Some ibuprofen or something too… To help with the cramps… Shouldn’t I?” He asked, looking to all of his hyungs for answers to this current situation that none of them knew about, but they had partners that suffered the same monthly fate that you did, so they at least knew enough.

“That’s good… That’s a good idea. Look at you! So smart.” Jisung ruffled Jeongins hair as he walked by, earning himself a grimace from Jeongin who took the comment as sarcasm, but he felt like he was a good boyfriend… A really good boyfriend for thinking of the medicine. He didn’t like seeing you in pain, and while he was rarely ever around for your times of the month because of work… He remembered the one time he came home when you were having really bad cramps and it broke his heart to see you hurting so badly.

“I’m the best boyfriend here. I’m gonna go home and take care of my girl.” Jeongin boasted quite proudly, and no one in the room disagreed. They were proud of him, they were happy for him. He had finally found someone to share his life with, he had grown and matured so much in the process too… They couldn’t feel anything but pride for having him as their little brother.

You laid across the couch, trying your best to relax, but it didn’t seem to be working, not the way it usually would. The last time you had felt this bad was so long ago, it had been your parents who had rushed you to the hospital, your feet not even touching the floor of the car yet as your mom sat in the backseat with you to try to help you breathe through it. The medicine was supposed to keep this from happening, or at least from happening as bad as it was right now. For the longest time it had helped, maybe you had just waited too long before taking it today.

“I’m home, sweets!” Jeongin announced as he walked through the front door, the sudden entrance startling you and saving you from slipping into unconsciousness yet again. “I know you’ve been feeling bad lately… So I got you some stuff.” He held the bags with a wide smile, and you didn’t know how he found out, but somehow he did. At least he wasn’t mad or upset with you for hiding it for so long.

“What’s in the bags, Innie?” You quizzed when he set them down on the floor next to the couch and then walked into the kitchen. “It looks like a lot.” It was about four bags, but they all seemed to be stuffed with a bunch of different things.

“Yah! Don’t go looking through the bags yet! I want to sit with you and watch your face when you see everything I got!” He called out, and you felt so warm, and your heart that was already beating erratically, fluttered even more. He had found out about your condition, and instead of coming straight home and trying to talk to you about it, he had gone and gotten you treats… He was the sweetest, kindest- “Damn, you really have been on that couch all day.”

Your soft thoughts practically record scratched at his words, and usually you’d be able to hear the teasing tone or the sarcasticness in his voice when he said something like that… But not this time. “What are you talking about? I have gotten up off the couch…” You defended yourself, because you really have been up on your feet, it just wasn’t the best thing for you to do right now so you were trying to keep yourself safe, that’s what your doctor had advised you to do when you felt this way.

The sink started running and you could hear the trash can lid being opened, slapping against the counter before being closed again. “Well not to do anything productive.” He countered, and you swore it was like a complete 180 with him. How could he just come home and seem so understanding and then get like this in a matter of seconds? “You left everything from breakfast all over the counters… Do you even know how long it’s been since I made you breakfast? That’s slob behavior!” He was clearly annoyed, and every time something was slammed down or thrown into the sink to be washed, your heart would skip a couple more beats and your chest would tighten up even more. “I know you’ve got your period and all… But damn, you couldn’t even clean off the counter or run some water over the plates? That’s just lazy.”

Period? You didn’t have your period… But now it was making sense. He thought he knew what was going on… He thought it was your period… That’s why he had bought so many things to try to make you feel better. He must have noticed you acting strange this morning and tried his best to figure it out, and obviously he wasn’t going to jump immediately to what your real condition was, there was no reason for him to even think that’s what was wrong. “I don’t have my period…” You retorted breathlessly, two fingers pressing against your neck as your eyes closed to focus on the rather quick, maybe far too quick, beating of your heart. “You don’t… You don’t know what’s wrong…”

“Oh clearly I do! You don’t have your period, there’s nothing actually keeping you from being even slightly clean. You’re just lazy.” He said as he turned off the sink in the kitchen and walked past you behind the couch. “I should have just stayed at the dorms tonight, at least they know how to clean up after themselves.”

You didn’t know where this was coming from, why he was being like this, but you were quickly moving on from being upset, to thoroughly pissed, and neither of those were good for your blood pressure right now. “Yeah… You should have… Because you’re not really helping me out here at all. You don’t fucking listen!”

Jeongin laughed sarcastically as he rolled his eyes. “I don’t help!? I just cleaned the whole fucking kitchen because you didn’t, but I’m not helping you out. Okay. Yeah… Yeah okay, we’ll go with that.” He scoffed loudly, shaking his head as he went to the front door. “You know what, next time you want to lay around on the couch all day, at least have the common decency to clean up a bit so I don’t have to do it when I get home from work.”

God, he was absolutely infuriating. This was a side of him that you had never seen before, and while he didn’t know what was wrong, it didn’t give him any right to talk to you like that. “Just get out… Get the fuck out!” You gasped out the demand, going light headed from the stress of it all.

“Gladly!” He shouted, throwing up his arms before yanking open the door and walking out. He always had to have the last word, and that in itself was the final straw, the breaking point for you. It was an awful idea, but your anger momentarily fueled you, pushing yourself up off the couch and grabbing one of the bags off the floor, beaming it at the door that he had just walked out of.

Sure, he had walked out, but he wasn’t actually planning on leaving. After a couple minutes he planned on going back in and shamefully apologizing for what he said. He was leaning against the front door when he heard the loud bang against it and a bunch of items falling to the floor, and he knew without a doubt that it had been one of the bags, it was the closest thing to you right now. What he didn’t know though, was the sound that followed after. A loud thud and glass shattering, and he knew for a fact that it came from inside the apartment, and he couldn’t seem to get inside fast enough.

From the sound of it, it just seemed like you had tripped over the coffee table and maybe knocked over one of the glasses that were sitting on it. Upon further inspection and actually seeing it, he could tell that it was way worse. The coffee table, which was glass as well, was now shattered completely underneath you, which in itself was scary considering how dangerous it was, but the scariest part was the fact that you weren’t moving, you weren’t making any sounds at all.

“Y/N!” He rushed over to your side, the sound of glass crunching beneath his feet as he got closer was stomach turning, knowing that a majority of it was beneath you. “Hey… Hey come on… Get up now… This isn’t funny…” He rushed out the words as he kneeled down beside you, hoping that you’d open your eyes and laugh at how worried he is right now and it would be the perfect get back for what he had just done… Although there was no way that you would have been able to plan for this to happen… No… Something was actually wrong. “Fuck… Come on, sweets… Y-You know I love you… S-So much… You’re scaring me real bad right now…” He rambled, his hands shaking as he tried to move you off the pile of glass, feeling the slight warmth against your back when he got his hands under you.

“Sh-Shoe… Box…” Your voice was weak as you wheezed out the word that only had him more dumbfounded. The hell did a shoebox have to do with it? Did you trip over one of his shoe boxes? “Under… Th-The bed…” You continued, your eyes opening momentarily, only for them to roll to the back of your head, your neck going limp once more as your breaths became even faster as more labored. The bedroom was so far away, and that meant that he’d have to leave you alone to get it… And even if it was just for a moment, he didn’t want to leave you like this.

“Shit… What… What do I do?” He whimpered, looking between your body that lay in his arms and the bedroom door that was cracked open. “I’ll… I’ll be right back… I’ll get it… I will…” He whispered, and he carefully laid you back down on the floor, feeling bad enough as it is, but leaving you there only made him feel worse. He didn’t even know that there was a shoebox under the bed, he had never seen it, and part of him thought that you were just hallucinating… But he still ran to the room, basically diving onto the floor and reaching underneath. Lo and behold, there was a box, one that he had never seen before, and when he opened it up, he saw a vast assortment of medications, a blood pressure cuff, a stethoscope, and the phone number for your doctor. “What… What the fuck?”

It wasn’t the right time for questioning things, not yet, and he ran back out into the living room with the box, lowering himself to the floor beside you. Your eyes were beginning to flutter once again beneath your lids, and then they slowly opened, looking up at him in a sort of daze. “Shoe… Box… Under the-”

“Under the bed… I got it…” He finished your sentence, pulling out the multiple bottles of medication and holding them up. “Wh-What do you need? Which… Which one?” Your hand was shaking and you could barely lift your arm up to point at the bottle, but he moved them closer and your pointer finger slid across one of them, and he hoped to god that you were paying attention, that you knew what you had picked because he didn’t know a damn thing about any of them.

His own hands were shaking as he popped off the lid of the bottle and poured one of the pills into the palm of his hand, grabbing one of the bottles of soda from out of the bag that was still on the floor and then gently lifted your head up. Your lips parted just enough for him to slip the pill into your mouth, and he ever so carefully brought the bottle of soda to your lips, tilting it so you’d get just enough to swallow the medicine without any trouble.

How long would it take to work though? Had he given you the right one? His nerves were absolutely shot right now, his mind was in a frenzy, and it felt like it took forever for you to finally seem stable enough to actually talk. “The cuff… Pen… Paper… Number…” You muttered, and he didn’t know what the hell you were talking about, but you seemed to know, and you seemed to have done it enough to be able to do these things on your own even when you were still partially out of it.

“How long…?” He whispered, and you quickly shushed him, your eyes shut as the hum of the blood pressure machine filled the room that was otherwise silent apart from your still shallow breaths. Once it had finished, you wrote the numbers on a tiny slip of paper and then slipped them back into the box.

“I’m okay… Gonna have to sweep this up…” You said as you looked around yourself, shaking your head as you slowly got to your feet, but you stumbled once again once you were on them, causing Jeongins panic to only worsen as he wrapped his arms around your waist, his eyes glossy as he stared at you and held you steady.

“No… We’re talking… We… We need to talk…” He stammered, moving you to the couch and sitting you down, standing in front of you so he could really see you, so you could see him. “Y-You hid this from me… I… I still don’t know what’s going on… I’m scared… I’m worried… I’m fucking traumatized!” Your head once again rolled back against the back cushion and he rushed to grab your hand, his own heart racing. “What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

“This… This is why I hid it…” You mumbled, your eyes still shut as you spoke. “It’s too much for you… It’s too much for anyone… I didn’t want to put you through this…”

“What are you talking about?!” He screeched, and while he thought it had been devastating to know that there was something like this going on without his knowledge, he was even more devastated to know that you had purposely kept it from him because you thought he couldn’t handle it. “I’m your boyfriend! I want to know these things! I want to be able to help you! If it’s about you… If it’s for you… Nothing is too much.”

“Jeongin… I didn’t do it to hurt you… Or to upset you… I did it because I care… I care about you. I didn’t want you… Worrying about me… You wouldn’t be able to focus on work… You’d constantly be wondering if I’m… If I’m having another episode… I just… I didn’t want this to ruin things for you…” You were breathing heavily again, your fingers wrapping around your wrist as you silently mouthed numbers. Did you have to do this every day? He had never seen you do this, and there were many times he had days off and things weren’t this bad. “We should just… Break up… So you don’t-”

“What?! Absolutely fucking not!” He screamed, kneeling on the floor in front of you and grabbing your hands, waiting for you to look at him before speaking. “You think breaking up will help? You think just ending this will make me forget about everything? You think it’ll immediately change the way I feel about you? I fucking love you, Y/N! And you’re goddamn right I’m worried about you… I’m gonna worry about you every single day for the rest of my life whether you were sick or not because I care about you.” Your eyes shut once more, but now shiny tears danced along your cheeks before hanging onto your chin, refusing to fall. “I may be young… And I’m dumb as shit sometimes… But I’m not a fucking idiot, I’m not gonna let you go, I’m not… I love you too damn much… I’m gonna take care of you… I will… You’re gonna be stuck with me the rest of your life, and I hope that I’m lucky enough to be stuck with you for the rest of mine.”

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angel-eyes05 · 8 months ago

Text

What's In A Name

pairing: roronoa zoro x fem!reader

summary: as a master thief, you pride yourself on never getting caught. that is until you're caught by the straw hats as you try stealing from their ship. unable to turn you in to the authorities just yet, they'll have to make due with storing you on the going merry in the meantime. but, your time in confinement has allowed you to get particularly close to a certain swordsman. how close the two of you get is to be decided though.

warnings/info: nsfw mdni, oral sex (fem receiving), alcohol consumption, drunk/tipsy sex, face riding, my own sex headcanons for zoro are VERY clear here lmao ,takes place in between jaya and skypiea (please pretend theres more time at sea in between those arcs cause this will not work otherwise OK THANKS), this is for the pre-time skip zoro girlies (he's 19 pre-time skip dont come for me), no use of y/n, the first half of this is just cute shenanigans between reader and the straw hats. its a lot of character building stuff but i like it.

word count: 6.3k

notes: HI GUYS IM BACK IVE MADE MY RETURN I FOUND SOMETHING TO WRITE ABOUT!!!! and its the longest fic ive ever written too god damn what a comeback lmao. ok so i started watching one piece and im head over heels in love with this man...but i'm only up to water 7 rn so i only know how to properly write for pre-time skip zoro so thats how this is gonna go. i was looking for zoro/one piece fics to read but theyre literally all established relationship ones which aren't my cup of tea so im doing it myself lmao. also i didnt proofread i got too lazy sorry if some stuff doesnt make sense sorry sorry sorry but im a simple lazy tired girlie lmao enjoy!!

dividers by: @cafekitsune

You didn’t know any of their names.

You had been aboard the Going Merry for about three weeks now, and you still hadn’t learned anyone’s names. Granted, your reason for being there wasn’t to make friends anyway. That wasn’t particularly easy to do, being tied up in some storage closet and all.

Being one of the few residents who actually lived on Jaya had allowed you to pick up a skill or two when it came to stealing. Pirates with big bounties and even bigger treasures left their ships unattended at the docks, leaving you with some perfect quick heists from time to time. Some steals were easier than others. As much as you believed in your talents, most of the time your ability to get out unscathed was based purely on the luck of the draw. It wasn’t an easy life, many recent nights leaving you with more injuries than berries and gold pieces, but it was all you knew having lived here for so long.

After having taken a break from heists for a bit, you finally laid your eyes on a ship worth stealing from. A pirate ship with a goat out in front and seemingly orange trees next to the helm. Most of the ships at the dock had been there for a while, leaving the pirates on board used to your tricks already. Being low on cash was another factor. So, after a bit of planning, you made your way onto the ship.

Earlier, you had found that one of the windows to a cabin had been left open, so you decided to make your entrance through there. You gathered your things and dove into the crystal blue water by the dock. Once you made it to the back of the ship, you took your rope, with your own handmade grappling hook at the end, and swung it to hook on the window sill. Luckily for you, it stuck the landing on the first try. You smirked to yourself and used the hook as leverage to climb up onto the ship. Unfortunately, this seemed to be the ship’s bathroom. Not super ideal. You’d have to venture more out into the ship. But with this came the risk of getting caught. Given your dire circumstances though, it was a risk you were willing to take.

With an attempt to make as little creak as possible, you slightly opened the door into the rest of the interior. Coast was clear so far. Suddenly, a shake rattled throughout the interior. You tumbled onto the floor, pushing open a door due to your unbalance. What the fuck was that, you thought to yourself. It quickly became no matter though, when you noticed the door had opened up to a room with a treasure chest tucked away in the back. Jackpot. You slyly made your way into the room and shut the door behind you.

The room was neatly kept, with bookshelves, a couch, two sleeping hammocks, and a desk with navigation tools on it. There was even a bar. Though temptation pursued at you, you had to stay on task. While making your way over to the chest, you heard different creaks vibrating across the walls of the ship. You prayed to yourself that it was just the wood’s reaction to the waves. As you had predicted, the chest was locked, so you searched your bag for anything that could key the lock.

Time became of the essence quickly as the thuds and creaks on the ship grew louder and louder. Finally, the lock to the chest made a perfect click, as the chest unlocked. You lifted the roof of the chest to find a sight for sore eyes: jewels and gold galore. This was it, you were set. You were so in awe with the vision before you, that you had failed to notice the woman standing behind you. The image you saw in one of the emeralds was a tall figure, with jet-black hair just below her shoulders, and dazzling blue eyes. “Looking for something?” the woman questioned, almost sarcastically. You seemed to have forgotten rule number one of thieving. Remember to lock the door behind you.

Quick on your feet, you whip around to throw a punch in her face, but her reflexes seem to be quicker than yours by the way she catches your fist. You then attempt to kick out her legs. The image you see next shakes you to your core. A hand, seeming to appear out of thin air, attaches itself to your calf. The hand then slowly raises your fear-frozen body into the air, dangling you upside down like a party toy. You attempt to throw more hits at her, all seeming to be in vain though. You kick and scream, like a child throwing a tantrum, in an attempt to get out. The woman looks out into the hallway and signals over another one of her companions. Fuck, this is turning sour fast. Before you can make out any other features of the man, besides his cartoonishly long nose, he uses his slingshot to pelt a rock towards your forehead. Your vision goes black as the rest of the pirates rush into the room.

The rough fibers of the rope tying your wrists together were the first thing you felt as you woke up. This was quickly followed by the underlying nausea from the waves rocking the boat, reminding you why you preferred to stay on land. You attempted to stand up, but your dizziness and the rope tying you to the floor weren’t letting you get very far. Suddenly, the door to whatever room you were in swung open, and the group of 7 pirates living on board entered the room. You slinked yourself along the back wall, attempting to disappear into your skin. You weren’t sure what felt worse: The fear of what they were going to do to you, or the embarrassment that you had been doing this for so long and still got caught.

Nope, definitely the embarrassment.

The man, no boy was a better word to describe him, standing in the middle of them attempted to speak to you before a woman with short orange hair cut him off. “If you think we’re gonna let you get off easily just because we’re also pirates, you’d be sorely mistaken!” she spoke, fiery anger lacing her words. The tall woman from earlier put her hand on her shoulder, calming her down, and walked out towards you. You tried to scoot away as much as you could as she crouched down to your level.

“Listen, we want this to be over as much as you do. We would love nothing more than to get you off our ship and drop you off at the nearest island. But unfortunately for us, that would mean having to find a group of marines to hand you over to, who we aren’t the best of friends with right now. And we can’t drop you back off at Jaya since we’re too far by this point. So, for now, we’ll just have to keep you tied down here if that works out with you.” You began to speak before the woman cut you off. “You don’t have much of a choice in the matter by the way.”

She stood back up and began to exit the room, the other pirates following her except for two. The boy with the straw hat and another man, with striking green hair and three swords lying in a holster on his belt. The boy looked somberly at you as if he was against this whole idea. But the green-haired one just stared at you. As uncomfortable as it made you feel, you couldn’t help staring back into his piercingly soft eyes. “Come on, let’s go,” the green-haired man said to the boy, finally breaking eye contact and turning his back to leave. The boy followed him shortly after. As he closed the door, you had nothing left to focus on except for the itchiness of the rope, the empty stuffiness surrounding the storage room, and your worsening seasickness.

The following weeks had the same routine. Each of the pirates on board took individual shifts watching you during the day when they were just out at sea. The strange reindeer creature would watch you when they were out on islands. The first shift was taken by the tall black-haired woman. She would come in at the break of dawn to make sure you didn’t find some way to escape at night. You two would sit in silence for a little more than two hours, asking and answering some questions before switching spots with the blonde one. His company was strange, with him hitting on you at random points in your conversations, but he always brought you breakfast in the morning. As much as he made you uncomfortable sometimes, you couldn’t deny that his cooking was the best you’d had in years. He’d even let you take a hit off his cigarettes if you ever asked, so his visits had its perks.

The next shift was taken by the orange-haired one. The first thing she would always do when walking into the room was ask you how creepy the blonde one was. The answer varied on the day. Once she warmed up to you, she would bring you tangerines from the trees out on the deck. As the days passed, she eventually explained that the treasure you attempted to steal belonged to her, which you begrudgingly apologized for. On some level, you felt bad. These seemed to be small-time pirates, just trying to get by like you were. The more you learned about each of them, the worse you felt about your actions towards them.

Around lunchtime, the long-nosed one would bring you your meal, cooked again by the blonde man. This member would go into detail about his next invention he was working on in his workshop. You admired his passion and energy towards his craft. His rants and rambles were normally interrupted by the reindeer creature coming in for his shift, causing intense, yet entertaining, arguments to break out between the two of them. The reindeer was the sweetest of all the crew members, always checking in on your health and helping you with your seasickness. He would talk about his home and his experiences there. You developed a pity for the creature. His presence was calming, and you felt as if you could let your guard down around him. That would change as soon as the straw hat boy would come bouncing into the room, scaring both you and the animal. You would soon come to learn the energetic boy was the captain of the ship, which shocked you. But you soon came to understand why. His crew had a massive respect for him, even if he was the root of half their problems.

Being on the ship, you got extremely close to all the pirates. Even the tall woman from before seemed to respect you in some way. You enjoyed all of their company. There was something strange about them though. One morning early in your stay on the ship, you could’ve sworn you’d heard the tall woman say something to the rest of the crew.

“Whatever you do, don’t tell her your name. Your name is your biggest secret.”

You didn’t know any of their names. You had thought you heard some of them speak it to each other in passing conversations, but not enough to remember who was who. You had bonded with them, but if someone put a gun to your head and told you to name your prison guard pirates, you’d be dead in seconds.

Except for one.

Zoro seemed to be his name. He would come in for the last shift. His presence didn’t frighten you, but it slightly intimidated you. His habit of carrying his swords everywhere he went wasn’t helping. He was silent his entire shift, normally dosing off halfway through after spending around an hour sharpening his swords You didn’t even attempt to make conversation with him. You found out his name when the captain would yell for him to get back to his sleeping quarters. “Zoro! Your shift’s done, you can sleep for real now!” he shouted across the hall the first time it happened. Zoro almost bounced up from his sleep and gave you one look before bolting out of the room to catch up to the captain. You could hear the echoes of their bickering from down the hall as you giggled to yourself. At least he didn’t seem to always be that stern.

It seemed crazy to you. His name was the only one you knew, yet you knew the least about him. He had hardly said 5 sentences to you in the three weeks you had been on the boat. His stoicism was one of the things that drew you into him though. Something about his demeanor, how intensely he would sharpen his swords, how his worries seemed to melt away the minute he escaped into a slumber, and how alive he seemed when he was with his crew. It was enticing. You wanted to know more. You attempted asking him questions about himself, but the most you would get were one to two-word answers. The most you got from him was when your seasickness finally got to you, causing you to puke up the dinner the blonde one made for you. “Woah, are you okay?” he asked concernedly, shooting up from his seat. When your only response was a cough and more puke, he ran out of the room to go get the reindeer. One thing he failed to do was close the door behind him.

You speculated your options. You had no idea where you were. You could be out in the middle of the ocean. Or you could be right about to dock at land. If you managed to scrape yourself about the ever-loosening rope and sneak out, you’d be free. You’d never have to worry about these pirates again.

At this point though, did you want to?

You took too long to decide, the reindeer rushing into the room with his medical kit, the blonde one short behind him. As the reindeer gave you a dose of medicine and cleaned up your mess and the blonde one held your hand and consoled you, your attention stayed by the doorframe. Zoro leaned against the wood, watching the work from afar. What shocked you most of all was his face. For a man who seemed so disinterested in you and your existence, his brows were furrowed, his cheeks had a light pink stain on them, and a slight frown invaded his face. He was concerned. Maybe even a little nervous. But why? He’d never shown any sort of emotion towards you before other than sleepiness. Once the reindeer and the blonde one left, he continued with his shift. You noticed something though. He sat closer to you than he normally did.

You couldn’t tell, but you were blushing the rest of his shift.

Once he left, you sat in silence, thoughts racing through your mind, until you finally fell asleep.

You noticed a change in his behavior in the next few days. When you would ask him a question, he would respond now. And with more than just a “yes” or “no” too. He had more energy around you and wouldn’t spend his whole shift asleep. He would even let out a chuckle now and then. You didn’t know what you had done differently to get him like this, but you liked him like this. He was sweeter than he let on.

Something had changed in you too though. On the occasions, you would catch yourself looking over his appearance. The more you observed, the more you realized how handsome he was. His clear, warm skin, his hypnotic eyes, his striking hair. You caught his appearance giving you butterflies when he would walk into your storage room. Your heart skipping a beat when he would give you even the smallest smile. You would stare even more when he would nap during his shift. Noticing certain things. The way his breath would hitch sometimes. How he always slept with his mouth open and would wake himself up sometimes with his dry mouth coughs. How his chest rose and fell with his soft breaths. How fighting with a sword in his mouth probably made his tongue stronger than other men you’ve met. You felt weird about it sometimes. Almost like some freakish stalker. But you would feel better about yourself whenever you would catch him staring at you out of the corner of your eye.

As time went on, the crew began to give you some more freedom. The tall woman began leaving some of her archeology books in the storage room to keep you entertained. The orange-haired one would show you all her marked-up maps. The long-nosed one would even let you out of the rope to test his inventions from time to time. With the door locked of course. And then, the big display came. One day, during everyone’s shift, they told you their names. The blonde one was Sanji. The orange-haired one was Nami. The reindeer was Chopper. The long-nosed one was Usopp. Their captain was Luffy. And the tall woman, who initiated your imprisonment, was Robin. It was a small gesture, but it meant the world to you. With each passing shift, you grew more excited for the next. To learn the next pirate’s name, and with that, their story. Until the last shift of the day came. And you realized.

You already knew his name.

“My name’s Zoro,” he said quietly. “I know,” you replied, bluntly.

Something felt different about this shift. You didn’t feel the same excitement you normally felt when seeing him. Without your connection to him before, his being the only name you knew, something about him just didn’t excite you as much. Now he noticed your behavior change. “You okay?” he inquired. “Mhm,” you responded in monotony. The rest of his time there was spent in silence.

You felt bad about what you were doing. This wasn’t his fault. Yet you were acting like this. It was almost as if the two of you swapped places. He was now the one trying to dig information out of you. And you gave him nothing more than blank faces and empty words. You wished you could figure out why you were acting like this, but you had no clue.

Today though, the crew was going to take an extra step towards including you. Throughout your time on the Going Merry, you had only left your little storage room prison a few times. To go to the bathroom and visit the kitchen on special occasions. But you hadn’t seen the sun in weeks. After proving to the crew you had changed, they planned a little surprise for you.

Robin woke you up earlier than usual. “Is everything ok?” you asked, still half asleep. Robin just smiled at you. “Come on, get up.” You looked at her confused, as she walked over to your restraints, untying you from the hook keeping the rope down. She took you by your restraints and walked you out to the room. The mix of drowsiness and confusion left you slightly panicked as you realized she was walking you out to the deck. She opened the door to a still-dark morning.

The rest of the Straw Hats were sitting out on the deck, just conversing and eating an extra early breakfast, courtesy of Sanji. They all turned to you once you and Robin walked out. “What’s going on,” you asked, still very confused. “On Thursdays, we all like to get up early and sit out and watch the sunrise. And we were talking about it, and we felt like you should join us this time,” Nami smiled. She stood up and pranced over to you, mouth slightly agape and speechless, and took you over to sit in between her and Zoro. You turned to Zoro, overwhelmed with emotions.

It had been so long since you felt a part of a community of people. You never exactly fit in with the ruthless bands of pirates coming and going on Jaya. Finally feeling connected to people, especially after you wronged them so horribly, brought you happiness you hadn’t felt in ages.

A singular “I-” was all you could manage to get out, a tear trickling down your cheek. “Just enjoy it. They’ll be at each other’s throats again in a minute,” he joked, getting a soft laugh out of you. He smiled gently, brushing the tear off your cheek. His finger lingered there longer than expected. You blushed. The butterflies were back and you caught yourself staring again.

“What’s that supposed to mean!” Nami interrupted. “Well, it’s true!” Zoro retorted, leaning over you to yell at Nami. The two began arguing as you noticed the sun starting to peak out over the horizon. “Shut up you two, you’re gonna make her miss it!” Usopp and Luffy yelled. They stopped bickering once they also noticed the sky begin to turn orange.

The pinks and oranges mixed together in a beautiful watercolor painting as the sun reflected its image on the ocean. The soft waves bobbed the ship up and down in a calming hypnotic motion, almost putting you back to sleep. The beauty of it all was so serene. Against popular opinion, you always preferred sunrises to sunsets. The representation of a new day beginning. It gave you hope in your most dire situations.

You lifted your head back to see the colors slowly spreading to the rest of the sky. Everyone to your right was in the same headspace you were like they were in some sort of trance. They were all cuddling against each other, Robin holding Chopper in her lap, Luffy and Usopp mimicking each other’s smiles, and Nami resting her head on Sanji’s shoulder. They all seemed so close to each other. Like a little family. Connected. You turned to Zoro to see if he was doing the same as the others, but all you found was his eyes softly gazing into yours, and his hand slowly inching towards yours. The minute he snapped out of it, he sharply turned his head and hand away and cleared his throat. You couldn't help but laugh at his schoolboy behavior. With your ego controlling your actions, you took his hand and slowly intertwined his fingers with yours. You could see a smile float onto his face out of the corner of your eye. You did the same.

The rest of the day was spent out on the deck. The feeling of the sun on your skin for the first time in weeks was euphoric. All you wanted to do was soak it all in. The Straw Hats must have been in a good mood today, because, with some extra convincing, you got them to finally take off your shackles. You spent most of the day sunbathing out on the deck with Nami. She had let you borrow one of your bikinis. You two were slightly different sizes though, so the suit was a little tight on you. You didn’t mind very much. You were just happy to be out of the same clothes you had worn for 3 weeks. Sanji didn’t mind either, ogling both you and Nami and basically worshipping the two of you. “It’s ok, he’ll get over it in a few hours,” Nami consoled. You circled the deck a few times to see if Zoro was anywhere in sight, but you couldn’t seem to find him. He probably went inside to nap away from the heat. Part of you wanted him to get the rest he deserved. The other really wanted him to see you in your outfit.

The day really took a turn when Usopp brought out the liquor from the kitchen. “I was saving that asshole!” Sanji yelled. “Oh come on, this is a special occasion!” Usopp pleaded. With some more convincing, Sanji finally gave in. You and the crew got increasingly drunk throughout the evening, Zoro eventually coming out from wherever he was napping to join the party. You all had even decided to jump into the ocean and swim around for a little bit. All except for Chopper, very sober and very nervous for any incoming sea monsters. He had managed to get you all back onto the ship with some very convincing pleading.

You and Zoro caught each other catching glimpses of one another throughout the rest of the day. Zoro admiring your figure in the swimsuit, and you ogling at the way his damp shirt hugged at his muscles. One by one, as day grew into night, crew members began to pass out on the deck, deciding to sleep outside for the night. You and the other members who wanted to go back into the cabin, Zoro and Robin, made your way back down into the ship. “Make sure you tie her back up. No hard feelings but we can’t be too careful.” Even slightly tipsy, she was still her stern old self. “Yeah whatever whatever, goodnight to you too,” Zoro drunkenly pushed off. You giggled and blushed as he took your hand and led you down the stairs into the cabin. Robin sighed to herself as she watched the two of you scamper off.

You felt your heartbeat get increasingly faster as he led you to your room. For some reason, the air in the hallway got thicker as you got closer. You blamed it on your tipsiness. But your heart slowly sank as you got to the door, realizing you had to say goodbye to Zoro for the day. He opened the door and stumbled into your room, leading you in behind him. He closed the door behind him, hesitating for a moment before going to wrap the rope back around your wrists.

He seems distressed for some reason, breathing heavily and avoiding eye contact. You look down at your hands, as he so gently maneuvers the rope around them. The butterflies begin to well up in your stomach again, the alcohol fueling their ferocity. His hands. So calloused yet so gentle. You can smell the remnants of sake exuding from Zoro’s heavy breaths. You looked back up at him. Were you two always standing this close together? You the butterflies keep rising and rising. You don’t know what to do with yourself. You’re not sure if you should run, kiss him, punch him, but you have to do something before you implode. Until. He stops.

The rope undoes itself in his hands as he freezes. His hands are shaking, his breath is heavy, and his eyes avoid yours like the plague. You were just getting antsy but Zoro seemed in distress. “Hey?” you ask, lowering your hands and dropping the rope to the floor. “Zoro?” You take your hand under his chin and lift his eyes to yours. You might throw up at any second. His eyes are so softly intense.

He brushed his thumb against your cheek, sending chills down your spine. You both want the same thing. Both of you are just too scared to take the chance. “It’s ok. You’re okay,” you reassure him, placing your hand over his heart. His heart, which happens to be underneath his bare chest, him having taken off his wet shirt earlier. His breathing slows, and his eyes move down ever so smoothly from your eyes to your plump lips. You catch yourself doing the same to him, and you inching closer to him. “You’re fine.” Closer. “We’re gonna be…fine.” Your lips barely brush each other. The gentleness of the kiss is calming though, as you notice Zoro’s breath slowing.

You brush again. And again. And again. Lips touching a little more with each meet. Until they fully interlock. The two of you melt into each other as Zoro wanders your back into a wall for support. Your kisses are structured, made to get the most out of each meeting. You’re both ravenous for each other, but you know if you go at each other like mad dogs, you won’t get what you want. So you both take your time getting to know the feeling of the other person’s mouth. You slip a moan out as Zoro’s tongue seeps between your lips. His kisses get slightly more sloppy as he runs his hands down your body. He feels the underneath of your breasts, the curves of your waist and hips, and finds a nice resting place under your ass. Your hands roam his cheeks and jaw, making their way to tug slightly on his moss-colored hair.

“Needed this,” Zoro whispers in between kisses. “Needed you so badly. But I didn’t know how.” He separates his lips from yours and plants kisses and hickeys along your jaw and neck. “I was always just too nervous for some reason. You make me so nervous.” His hands find their way into your bikini bottom and fondle your asscheeks, getting a low moan out of you. The alcohol must’ve given him a confidence boost. “Good to see you found your footing now,” you whisper in his ear. He chuckles, the butterflies speeding up in your stomach.

The two of you stay here for a little bit. Hell, you could stay like this for hours. Just soaking each other in. Feeling his warmth brought a fire into your soul. You could tell Zoro was getting a little antsy though, one of his hands moving from your back to your front, beginning to slowly circle your clit. The other hand went to your bikini, untying the back and letting it fall to the floor as his mouth moved to your breast. Waves of pleasure crashed through your body as you let him do his work. “God, you sure this is your first time?” you moaned out. He removed his mouth from your nipple to talk. “Never said it was, sweetheart. You just assumed it.” “Well from the loner vibe you got going on mixed with being on this ship 24/7, you can’t blame me for thinking that.” “Well the loner vibe worked on you, so who’s to say it hasn’t worked on others?” he smirked. You laughed to yourself as he got down on his knees.

Zoro slipped off your bikini bottom, completing the set on the floor. He kissed your v-line with the same softness he treated your lips to. He sat back on his knees for a moment to catch his breath, looking up at you, as if to ask for permission. You held your hand out to his cheek and rubbed it with your thumb. His eyes closed as he placed his hand over yours, as if you would ever take it away from him. God now this was a sight you could get used to. He was so infatuated with you it made your heart ache. He was right here at your disposal, yet you wanted more of him. So you bent down and gave him a sloppy forehead kiss. Once you were back up, he decided to go in.

Like most things he does, he started slow and controlled. He kissed and sucked on your inner thighs. Once his hand finally left your clit, you knew he was ready. He kissed your cunt, using his tongue to lick up your wetness. You could pass out right now if you had less self-control. Whimpers and moans left your lips, your hips naturally starting to grind against his nose, relieving the ache in your clit. You let him know what felt good by the tugs and yanks you put in his hair. He was a natural. Your guess about his tongue earlier was right too. “You taste so good, just as I imagined,” Zoro breathed onto your lips. You could tell he was starting to lose his composure with the way he continued to bury his face into your pussy. Your cunt naturally tightened around his tongue as he tasted you. Your hips began to buck into his face as your grinding pace increased, the butterflies turning into a white heat you felt getting stronger and stronger. Your bud was becoming more swollen by the second. Your grip on his hair tightened to make up for your failing knees.

You wouldn’t be able to take much more. Zoro wouldn’t either, his hand making its way into his pants to relieve his own bulge. His pace got faster to match your grinds. The smack of your lips against his tongue, mixed with both of your moans, was pornographically loud. Suddenly, the situation of Robin or another crew member hearing became an apparent one to you. That worry quickly left your mind once one of Zoro’s hands made its way to fondle your nipple. If he asked you to follow him anywhere right now, you might just do it if it meant this every other night. You felt he knew your body better than you did. “So pretty. So good for me. You make this so easy,” Zoro groaned between licks. “Zoro god fuck me please!” Your final whimper sent you over the edge as you wailed and came all over his perfect face. He licked up your juices as he finished his own job as well. Your knees finally gave out as you fell on top of him, into his arms.

He brought you down gently, straddling you on his lap as you wrapped your arms around him. He traced his cum soaked hand across your back and kissed your nape. You were more exhausted than expected, almost passing out in the crook of his neck. Even now, he was so gentle with you. “You did so good, darling,” he praised, kissing your earlobe. “Want…more…want you…inside me,” you managed to get out. He just laughed and pushed you up to look at you. “If you took me right now, I don’t think you’d wake up tomorrow morning. Look at you, you can barely keep your eyes open, sweetheart,” he teased. You pouted. “Oh, you feel that proud of yourself?” your drunkenness fueling your frustration. “No no no, sweetheart,” he chuckled. Once your frown didn’t change, he stopped laughing and pressed a kiss deep into your forehead. “I’m sorry. What I meant was, if I fucked you with everything I have left right now, which is the only way I would want to do it, this floor would leave us with sore backs for weeks.” You stayed frowning. “I want to fuck you right, the way you deserve. And I can’t do it for you right now.” You pouted more at him. He smiled up at you and leaned in closer to your ear. “If you trust me, I promise I’ll make it worth your while. You’ll be walking funny for weeks.” God, you almost came again just now. You didn’t notice how much your jaw dropped until Zoro laughed at you. You couldn’t help but laugh back in tune with his infectious laughter.

He kissed you with a fever behind his lips, then scanned the room around the two of you. “What’s wrong?” you drowsily asked. The exhaustion from you coming, the sleepiness brought by the alcohol, and how late it was getting was starting to overpower you. Zoro didn’t respond. He just grabbed your swimsuit and helped you put it back on, tightened your legs around his hips, and hoisted you up as he stood. You decided to ask questions once you had a clearer idea of what was happening. He opened the door and walked with you down the hallway, passing the girl’s quarters and into the men’s room. He checked inside quickly before bringing you in and signaling you to bring your legs down. You confusedly followed him to his bed as he groaned, rubbed his back, and sat down on the edge of the bunk. “Wanna explain to me what you’re doing?” you asked, slightly more awake. “If you think I’m just gonna leave you to sleep alone, tied up, on that dirty floor after what we just did, then you must think I’m a really shitty guy,” Zoro quipped before getting under the covers and trying to pull you down. You put some resistance towards him though.

“B-but Zoro, I’m not supposed to be in here.”

“I know.”

“If someone catches me in here we’re both fucked.”

“They won’t catch you.”

“How do you know that?”

“I’ll wake up before Robin starts her shift.”

“Are you sure, I mean I just don’t kn-.”

“Hey.”

You stop your nervous rabbling and look at him as he sits back up. “Do you want to go back and sleep on the cold, dirty, hard floor?” You really didn’t. “No.” “Then stay here with me.” “But what if-.” “Do you trust me?”

You sure hope you did after all of that. His kind eyes reassured you in the darkness surrounding the two of you. You took a deep breath and nodded. “Do you trust me?” he asked again. “I trust you, Zoro,” you confirmed. He smiled kindly at you. “You’re fine. We’re gonna be fine.” He steadied you by placing his hands on your hips, running his hands along your waist, and pressing his lips into your tummy. You loved the way he looked at you. Like you were his whole world. It was comforting.

He took your hand and helped you into bed. You bundled yourself under the covers and wrapped yourself around his frame. He kissed your temples one more time before slipping into sleep, his light snores hypnotizing you into a slumber of your own.

The last thing you remember before dozing off was the feeling of his hands on your waist.

Everything you wanted was right here. In front of you. Straight out of a dream. Your only fear was that it would be gone once you woke up.

a/n: THIS TOOK FOREVER GOOD LORD. anyways thanks for being here for my comeback era lol. my upload schedule is NOT going to be consistent this is just a little splurge i wanted to write lol. thank you for reading i really appreciate it (i also really appreciate engagement lol please like repost comment etc im greedy). i love one piece and i love zoro. once i meet law expect all hell to break loose im gonna write so much fanfiction about him its concerning hes so fine im so excited. anyways lol thanks love you bye.

#one piece #roronoa zoro #zoro roronoa #one piece zoro #zoro roronoa x reader #roronoa zoro x reader #roronoa zoro x y/n #x reader #zoro x reader

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