#kill our way to a better tomorrow
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carnival-core · 4 months ago
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Hey not to make a political post but does it ever feel like we can just never win and the suffering will be forever and we're always going to have to fight with moments of peace being fleeting and not worth looking forward to
#behind the tent#neg#current events#the worst man alive got shot and lived#if he DOES die he will be martyred . we will be considered a violent threat . the right will revolt#if he DOESNT die he will martyr himself as a survivor . we will be branded as violent and worth stamping out . we're going to be killed#moments of celebration do not last#two innocent people died as a result#and we couldnt even fucking kill trump immediately#and joe biden aint much better!!!#and halfway across the globe innocent families are being ripped apart in the name of an ethnostate and by god Im not letting myself give up-#-hope for them . Im not allowed to feel hopeless for them .#but fuck if the knowledge in my mind every waking day doesnt add to it#and neither of our politicians care!!! and of course the entire fucking world ends up dictated by the whims of the US anyways so the fact#they dont care is crucially fucking important!!#And my right to live and exist in this country will probably be wiped away entirely in a couple of years when I just barely got to taste it#there's a chance I could be hatecrimed next time I walk out the door#And maybe its the ahedonia since childhood speaking too but I'm starting to not see the point !!!!! what is the point !!!!#the fact there ARE people who care about me is the only fucking reason I'm not gonna end it all tomorrow! I swear to god!#And at this point I am waiting for this to finally fucking affect me personally so I can have an excuse to fucking feel that way!#I feel so fucking selfish for being so suicidal when I've been one of the lucky ones but god its not gonna get better is it?#everyone encourages radicalization and change . demands it . begs for it . but it hasnt happened! it will Never happen!#my only god damn choice is to let it lead to despair!#suicidal ideation cw#God I wish I had access to hard drugs
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deepwoundsandfadedscars · 3 months ago
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#today is essentially my first day driving combine this year since my 'first day' was only like an hour and a half long almost two weeks ago#but of course my first day we're harvesting the field that was the last one we did last year 'care free'#one year ago today was the last time i saw my sister#and tomorrow will be one year since we harvested this field and afterwards we went home for dinner#and while refueling equipment after dinner my brother in law went to see if my sister felt up to running grain cart for us that evening#and he found out she wasnt home and nobody had heard from her all day#so that was the evening of the 16th and we didnt find her until the morning of the 18th#it was probably somewhere around noon on the 16th when she killed herself#and it just wrecks me cause i can remember exactly what i was doing that whole day#like someone here sent me an ask about whumpy music so i spent hours that day compiling a playlist to share here#and i was talking with a friend (in a group chat that consisited of me my sister and our friend) about their zucchini harvest#and another discord server i was gushing about it being the new moon in a Blue Moon month plus the persied meteor shower#and the whole time i had no idea my world had already shattered without me knowing#it makes me hate this field and i hate that even with the way we rotate crops every year it still came up ready this week#probably would've been worse if it came up on the 16th again but it's not much better being on the 15th
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krystaldeath · 5 months ago
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//vent
God please. Please just go easy on me. Too much. It’s all just too much. Please
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stunies · 2 months ago
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very messy word dump below the cut + in tags :^) heh
okay it’s officially been a full day since reading this and i’m going to write down everything i remember feeling from day 1! and then in the tags im going to reread this (for the third time within 24 hours) and add thoughts that i didn’t put down here. SORRY FOR THE MESS & NO PRESSURE TO READ ALL THIS SJKDMF IT IS JUST A LOT OF WORD VOMIT BC IM INSANE OVER THIS FIC
okay i should start from the beginning. Wait I’ll use caps so it’s easier to read if you’re reading it bahahhaa OKAY. The way you write alpha / omega!!! It’s different from what I’m used to reading— and I mean it has a lot of a depth. The way you wrote reader being an alpha = being so protective over Aventurine fucked me up so bad /pos. Reader just wants him safe and they’re so real for that.
Going off on that, I LOVE HOW U WROTE THE READER. Understands Aventurine so well. Will literally do anything to keep him safe. Understands what sets him off and what he’s comfortable with. The part where Aventurine was talking about the next mission & reader seeing right through him ): are you serious /pos. WAIT I SKIPPED TOO FAR AHEAD. When Aventurine was trying to get reader to join the IPC? Dead. Evie DEAD. Reader saw right through him omg. Being able to notice the little changes in his scent, the way he tries to mask it etc etc. I love that so bad.
WHEN READER FOUND HIM IN HEAT FUUUCK. ARE YOU SERIOUS /pos. Fighting the urge to help him vs waiting to just make it better because reader has the power to ): I loved that so much. The struggle was so real. Literally bringing a doctor just to hear that he needs an alpha to help anyways omg. Lowkey when the doctor said that I was like PLEASE LET US HELP YOU PLEASEEEEEEE. But also. I didn’t want him to be scared either you know ):
I skipped over another scene sighs. THE part where reader said ‘I like your eyes because they’re yours” and then the end. Him saying he likes our scent because it’s ours. Are you serious /pos. Be so serious /pos.
Okay the scent gland scenes actually fucked me up so bad (I unfortunately did not dream about anything but maybe that is for the best because I’m still recovering from this scene). The part where he asks for just the wrist. Reader struggling when they FEEL HIS TEETH GRAZE THE WRIST IM GONNA EXPLODE OMFG. The immediate pulling away because we don’t want to scare him please. + the scent gland scene at the end. HE DIDN’T FEEL LIKE HE HAD TO BE ON TOP. We could lay side by side ): I was so happy that he was okay with that omg. Literally all giddy like aaaaa!!!!!! IM NOT A THREAT!! Actually that’s a lie I wasn’t giddy. I was literally in tears jejdkckckckk Aventurine 😭😭 ughhhhhhh /pos
I won’t comment on the actual scene (I am commenting on it right now actually) because I was literally so sad and my heart hurt so badly for him. I wanted him to see himself from our POV for just one moment so he can understand that we genuinely love him and treasure him & want to keep him safe. ):
ABOUT YOUR WRITING ITSELF : insanity. I will just say insanity. How should I put it in words….. just thinking about this fic again is taking all the words out of my mouth shejdjfjj (I say this as I type a 27738 page essay about it). I love how you write. I really do. Your writing style is so beautiful. I haven’t read the other tags under your fic but I’m sure many others have said the same thing!!! They word it better than me I’m sure bsjsjsjsjsk
I just love everything about it. How you add in little details (oh! Speaking of details— Aventurine’s reaction to reader cozying up to her husband in the other fic) HEJDJJDJDJ omg. But in this fic, the little signs of him being scared. Scared 24/7 actually ): I love how you conveyed his fear so much. And the way he tries so hard to hide it. HIM CRUMBLING DOWN TO HIS RAW SELF WHEN HES IN HEAT. AND THE FEAR THERE TOO. INSANE.
^^ How you wrote him so adamant about not needing help at first …. To him asking for the scent gland ….. to him agreeing to use reader. It was all so real. He didn’t just change his mind like oh okay! It took him a while to be okay with it and I love how real it all felt. You write dialogue & little details so well— it actually drives me nuts (/compliment /pos)
Oh this just reminded me. Your description of how Aventurine smells killed me /pos. And how you describe his scent as sweet. I’m really not okay /pos. It fits him so well. And … for reader…. the scent after rain ? Oh my god ???? I love that smell so much. It’s so comforting…. OMG. COMFORTING????????? BECAUSE. Oh wow. I’m really not okay now. I JUST LOVE ALL THE DETAILS LIKE THAT )))): it’s so clear you put so much thought into all these things because your fic has so much depth. I lowkey yanked out Notibility for your other Aventurine fic to highlight the parts I wanted to comment on ehdjdkkck I was annotating it like a book (I’m so sorry if this is creepy I promise I don’t do this on a regular basis. I don’t annotate fics normally. Actually please disregard this because I’m a bit red admitting this) (I just have the memory of a goldfish and can only remember feelings and not actual content) (That’s a lie because here I am remembering a lot of this fic MOST LIKELY BECAUSE I READ IT WITH MY EYES AN INCH FROM THE SCREEN PROBABLY I WAS LIKE O_O) /pos
NIGHT FLOWER: part i
Your place in the world was one of a tool. This was true of every slave: you were all things to be used. Kakavasha understood this about you, and he understood this about himself. It was how he survived all those years ago, and it’s how he survives now. And so, when Aventurine goes into his first heat in years and decides to suffer it alone, you can only think of one way to get him to accept your help: You offer to let him use you.
written for @/lorelune's spring fever collab & @ficsforgaza
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13.5k words of omegaverse, mutual pining, hurt/comfort, angst with an eventual happy ending. gn alpha reader + omega aventurine (they each have both amab and afab genitalia). explicit piv sex, reader bottoms, the sex is consensual but emotionally complicated and deeply sad. cw slavery, racism, gendered violence, including very brief and non-graphic (but direct) references to sexual abuse during slavery. the sa and slavery are not eroticized. dead dove do not eat, mdni.
thank you to @acerathia, @minnaci, @owlespresso for all your help with beta reading and to @kosmiccarma for brainstorming omega aventurine hcs!
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“I’ve alw███ l█ved ███, Ka██v█s███”
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You knew it from the moment you met him.
Gaunt, pallid, weighed down by heavy chains. Irises that glowed like the auroras back in your world. Delicate features that made every passerby in the market stop to read the description on the placard. (Sigonian, it said, although you couldn’t read at the time. Avgin. Male. Omega. Sixteen years old. Sixty Tanba, no tax.) He had an all-consuming scent that was impossible to ignore—one that possessed you, made your heels dig into the dirt, every atom in your body resisting the impatient jerk of the chains at your wrist. Even through your muzzle, through the perpetual stench of carbon-steel and blood, you could smell it: honey and wildflowers. A fragrance that settled deep within you, flooded you with a warmth that felt like home.
Aventurine is not a spiritual person. He once told you this, his smile cold in the glow of an artificial moon. He'd been deeply religious as a child, but hasn’t since cared for fairy tales about fortune and fate, three-eyed goddesses or merciful rainfalls. Hasn't thought about anything like a destined love. He thinks the idea of a true mate is laughable, that no such bond could ever be forged between an omega and an alpha. That nothing so unconditional could ever exist.
You know differently, of course. You've known it from the moment you met him, from the second you laid eyes on him and thought, I need to help you, and I need to protect you, and I need you to be safe, and you’d never once heard the word ‘love’ in your life—slaves are never loved by their masters, after all, and you'd always been nothing but a slave—but every atom of your being knew that you loved him, that you'd always love him.
And when your master cradled your face that night and crooned that he owned you, that you'd always be his obedient, alpha pet—for the first time in your life, you knew that he was wrong.
You didn't belong to your slaver.
You belonged to him.
To Kakavasha.
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These days, Aventurine does not smell like honey, and your jaw is not restrained.
Your muzzle was one of the first things that Aventurine threw away when he bought your freedom. According to the Amber Era system, it had been several months since the murder of your shared master. Ninety-five Star Calendar days after the Interastral Peace Corps had arrested Kakavasha. An entire rotation around the black hole at the centre of your wretched galaxy, all of which had been spent in the captivity of some new mistress. She picked you out because she liked your calming scent and the look of your face, but mostly she used you for the fighting pits just like your old master.
Aventurine had been sitting in the audience of your final match, then bought you out right after you won. “I’m in need of a fighter,” he’d said, smiling in his thick furs and jewels. He played the part of a slavemaster perfectly, his gloved hands wandering the span of your aching shoulders, touching the bloodied maw of your mask. “And I’d be willing to pay top credit for yours.”
She protested. You were her most prized possession, one of her greatest investments. Slaves from your planet were hard enough to come by—alphas capable of reproduction, nearly impossible. And you were so well-behaved, so poised, so endearing in a way that was rare for alphas. She was fond of you. Her omega slaves were fond of you too. They would be distraught if you left, and that would complicate her household affairs—and surely Aventurine, as a respectable owner of human capital like herself, could understand how inconvenient that would be?
Aventurine bared his teeth in a gracious smile. (You’d never seen Kakavasha make such an expression before—so disarming, so cunning, a crescent moon beneath snake eyes. He’d never smelt like this either, like an expensive cologne layered with bleach, and it left you feeling nauseous, wondering if he was ill.) He flirted his way into her good graces, made her an offer she couldn’t refuse, and then he brought you into the first-class ship on which he’d arrived. You were so stunned by its luxury—the handwoven carpets, the crushed velvet seats, the imported tea from several galaxies away and the custom-ordered outfit he had bought for you—that you nearly missed the tremble in his hands as he punched numbers into the remote control lock for your chains.
He had regained his composure by the time he pulled away your muzzle, though. He threw it carelessly to the ground—your titanium chains, too. Then kicked both away with his shined leather shoes.
“There,” Aventurine said, smiling cheerfully. “Much better, don’t you think?”
“Vasha—” you started, voice thick with wasted grief, and all you wanted to was reach for him, to double check that he was real, but he placed a finger to your lips and stopped you. You stiffened at the satin touch, but he seemed unbothered.
“‘Aventurine’,” he corrected.
You stared blankly. “What?”
“‘Aventurine’. Like the gemstone. That’s my name now.”
“You—” Your voice caught in your throat. You realized that you’d been holding your breath. You always had the habit of holding your breath in the luxurious, private rooms of very rich men, because you never liked what happened in them. Forcing yourself to breathe, you asked, “You gave yourself a new name?”
“No. The IPC gave me a new name. They gave me a job, too.”
“A job?” you asked, voice faint. Now that you were breathing again, you were noticing once more just how bizarre he smelled. Sterile and expensive and completely foreign. “You’re free now?”
“Well, I’m a freedman, but I don’t know if I’d call myself free. I’m a bit… indebted to the IPC, let’s say. But that’s fine. I can’t complain. I mean—look around. This beats the fighting pits, doesn’t it?” He gestured lazily at your surroundings, and you nodded.
“It’s nice here,” you replied, feeling absurd but not knowing what else to say. Once Kakavasha got talking, it was impossible to get a word in edgewise.
“You like it here? Good. This room’s yours. Mine is the next one over. You’ll live and work here, with me. I’ll make sure you’re paid well. Full benefits, vacation, salary, and overtime. The standard pay for your role is seventy-thousand credits per month, but I’ll see if I can get you more. HR is pretty strict about their hiring policies, but—”
“You’re hiring me?”
Aventurine went very still, his smile tightly controlled. His eyes remained fixed on you, but they seemed less snake-like, now. They looked more familiar. More afraid.
“I’m offering, yes,” he said neatly. “You’ll be part of my personal security detail. I don’t have the contract for you to review yet, unfortunately. I didn’t arrange one ahead of time because, well”—he laughed, as if this were polite conversation and he were making a joke about the weather—“I didn’t know if I’d find you alive. But things worked out in my favour. They always work out in my favour. I’ll make sure they’ll work out in your favour too, so long as you’re with me. So you’ll consider it, won’t you? Staying with—working for me, I mean.”
Your eyes went soft. Beneath the artificial fragrance, you finally caught a hint of his familiar scent—more wildflower than honey at that moment, the way it always is when he’s scared.
“Kakavasha—”
“Name your price,” he said loudly, “and I’ll match it.”
You sighed. “Vasha,” you said more gently, and his shoulders relaxed at the subvocal shift in your timbre, at the famed alpha Voice that necessitated your muzzle, “I don’t care about the money. Of course I’ll stay here. But—what happened? Why did you kill him yourself? Why didn't you let me do it? That was the plan. It was always supposed to be me.”
It was my job, you thought then, just as you had thought to yourself every night, curled up in your bed and trying to recall the scent of fresh honey, to keep you safe.
He shrugged and said, “It would have been too risky to involve you.”
“You were caught and sentenced to death. The risk was already too high.”
“But the stakes weren’t,” he replied simply, and before you could ask what he meant by that, he continued, “and it worked out, didn’t it? I work for the IPC. You work for me. We’re freedmen now. Whatever I've lost, it doesn't matter. Our gains far outweigh it.”
“And what have you lost, Vasha?”
He smiled at you, charming and distracting. A crescent moon beneath snake eyes. “Nothing of value,” he reassured you, and even though you could feel the calm of an omega’s voice washing over you, even though it released all the tension in your body, all you could smell was cologne and wildflowers, and you knew that he was lying.
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Vasha once told you, curled up and quiet on the basement floor, that he despised his eyes. They were supposed to be a sign of blessing from Gaiathra Triclops, but they'd never brought him anything but trouble. They were the first thing that the slavers always noticed about him, the feature that made him such an alluring commodity. Their aurora glow, their strange beauty, their promise of a rare opportunity: a chance at owning a specimen of an exotic, endangered species, possibly the last of its kind. These are all things that you've heard in the parlour of your master’s house as he entertained rich company, the crowd of them gawking at his human curios.
Avgin are said to make the most beautiful slaves, he'd often say. And Avgin omegas are said to be the most beautiful among them. What do you all think? They'd all hum, peering closely at Kakavasha’s features, and inevitably someone would joke, I think I'd like to borrow him sometime, and then they would all laugh while your pulse ticked up and you imagined tearing at their throats. Vasha would search for your gaze in these moments, giving you a long, pointed look: Don't do anything stupid.
He’d always been so blasé about it, the way people fixated on his Avgin blood. You'll never understand how. He didn't react to any of the comments, the groping, the innuendos. He was, however, distinctly unimpressed at the way that your master liked to play him up as a rare and expensive acquisition, as a sign of his own status. It's embarrassing to watch, Kakavasha had remarked. Everyone knows that Sigonian slaves are uncommon but cheap—people always think we’ll bring them more trouble than our worth. This was how Kakavasha had ended up in the market in the first place: because his last master had been robbed, and he'd been wrongly blamed for it.
The blame, to this day, has never stopped. People—powerful people, politicians, businessmen, socialites—look at Aventurine’s eyes and immediately reach for their pockets. You've seen it for yourself, these spineless despots and scammers feeling for their wallets. Sigonian, you know they're thinking. Liar, cheat, thief, whore, worthless, worthless, worthless. Your hands tighten around your blade each time, a loaded gun with a finger on the trigger.
Alphas are said to be violent by nature. Aventurine has often called you the one exception to this rule: the most docile, good-hearted alpha he's ever met. But this is a lie. You do have a predator instinct, and it comes out in full-force whenever you’re around these particular types of men. These types who notice Aventurine’s eyes and see a thief; these monsters who see his irises and imagine what it would be like to bed him. You’d kill them if you could. It would be so easy, especially now that you are an IPC dog. The Company is already such a violent force; what would be one more murder?
But Aventurine has never ordered you to punish anyone. (Don't do anything stupid, he always tells you with a glance, smiling through every humiliation.) Nor has he ever seemed bothered enough by these meetings to try concealing his heritage.
A fellow Asset Liquidation Specialist once asked why he didn't just hide his eye colour—it would likely be better for fostering relationships, negotiating deals—but Aventurine had shrugged it off. I'm a gambler working with the IPC, he'd said. Do you really think a pair of coloured contacts would make anyone trust me? He'd laughed, and his voice had carried a threatening edge, and his coworker had shifted visibly at it. Being an Avgin is the least threatening thing about me, wouldn't you say?
You think that Aventurine likes being seen as a threat. Sometimes you wonder if this is why he doesn't mind wearing his eyes so much, but abhors keeping his scent. He washes his clothes until they're free of his disarming sweetness and then masks himself with an unsettling blend of ambergris, jasmine, and wood. And he is on suppressants all the time—hasn’t had a single heat since the day he killed his master. Hasn't smelled like himself, either.
At the end of the day, it’s manageable being an Avgin in this business, he often comments, spraying half a bottle of masking cologne on himself, but you can't be an Avgin and an omega. Wouldn’t you agree?
You'd know better than me, you reply, noncommittally—and truthfully.
But you're an alpha, he observes. Don't you have an opinion?
You don't pay me to have opinions, you always remind him, stone-faced. You pay me to stand here and look scary. And Aventurine always laughs at this, and he always wires you money and calls it a bonus as he pesters you for an answer, and he always gets distracted and starts scrolling through all his shopping wishlists instead. I saw this thing the other day and thought of you. And this too. Would you like either of them? Would you like them both? I’m a very generous manager, you know. I'll buy you anything you like.
But even though he always gets distracted, Aventurine never forgets. Sooner or later, he inevitably circles back to these questions—these anxieties about his scent, about his eyes, about his blood. He never cares for anyone else’s opinions, but he's always been curious about yours. Even when he was Vasha, he wanted to know what you thought.
He’d been sixteen years old and delirious with heat the first time he asked you, face wrinkling with pain as he spilled his thoughts. It was so incoherent, so sad, you thought it must have been about a fever dream. Mama Fenge, he kept saying. Mama Fenge blessed me, She blessed me, I'm blessed, it rained when I was born—did you know that? My luck, I was lucky. The Katicans, they never caught me. They got everyone else, but not me. I was blessed by Her. I'm going to save my people. I will. I'll save my sister. My eyes are proof. My mistress liked them. Said they're beautiful. Worth sixty whole coppers. A blessing. He pulled you close, pressed his scalding face to your scent gland, and his whole body shuddered with relief. This was the first and only time he'd allowed you to hold him, and it was only out of desperation, out of his mind. Do you like them, alpha? Do you like my eyes? Why? Is it because they're beautiful? Because they're from Gaiathra?
“I like them because they're yours,” you'd replied, and Kakavasha had laughed deliriously.
This is when he told you he hated them: I'd close them forever, if I could.
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When you were younger—dumber—you had a habit of squirrelling away every spare coin you came across. You collected them in a little purse that one of the omega slaves had sewn for you—a thank-you for always keeping the other alphas away from her—and you hid it underneath a loose floorboard. By the time that Kakavasha was arrested, you'd saved up twenty-nine Tanba. You’d wanted enough to buy Kakavasha’s freedom and then to set him up for a comfortable life.
It had been a stupid plan. An embarrassing one. If you ever confessed it to Aventurine, he'd laugh at you. Slaves can't buy other slaves, he'd say. Leave the schemes to me next time. You’re too good-hearted for it.
You’d already known that, of course. You knew that you didn't have the status to buy him or mate him or even just provide for him, but you wanted to. God, did you want to—you spent every waking moment thinking about it, every sleeping moment dreaming of it. It wasn't even that you desired him, though he was beautiful and fragrant and more delicate than anything that had ever touched you in your life, which was only your master’s hands and your muzzle and your chains. Aventurine would feel so soft in comparison, you’d always figured. It made your heart ache, thinking about getting to hold something so lovely.
But really—that desire came second. What came first was how mated omegas feel safe around their alphas, and you so desperately wanted him to be safe. Kakavasha had looked so frail, so grim, as your master took his chains and led him home from the market, and you could smell the fear coming off him in waves. And you could do nothing to stop it. You had nothing you could use to stop it—nothing other than your hands that could kill for him and your pheromones that could soothe him and your useless heart that wanted to collect sixty Tanba for him. That was all you had.
So you failed in the end. Of course you did. You didn't have the status to buy him or mate him or even just provide for him. You couldn't even do for him the one thing you could have done—which was to kill. And Kakavasha suffered for your incompetence. He had to dirty his hands with blood and gamble his way into wealth and then suddenly he was freeing you, not the other way around.
And now you are comfortable. You'll lead an easy life from now, Aventurine reassured you when he brought you onto his ship all those years ago, and he's kept that promise. What about you? you'd asked him then. Will you lead an easy life with me, if you're working for the IPC? And he had smiled and lied to you: Yes.
It had been a painfully obvious lie. If you were a smarter person, you'd have never believed it in the first place. Aventurine has no interest in leading an easy life, because an easy life would be less profitable, and less profit would mean less safety. And he is always, always worried about being unsafe. It is indiscernible to everyone but you—an alpha (his alpha, always his, even if he doesn't want you) who has watched over him for so long that you can detect every shift in his scent. No matter how much cologne he drowns himself in and no matter how strong his suppressants are, you know when he is afraid.
And here is the bitter truth, the ultimate proof of your shortcomings:
Aventurine is always afraid.
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It is a beautiful day on Agnisahr, and you can tell that Aventurine is about to throw up from worry.
You're sitting in the middle of stunning wealth—Aventurine in his feathers and jewellery, you in your tailored jacket—in a lobby made from marble and pale sandstone, with a view of palm trees and rolling, scarlet sand dunes beyond the window. The waitstaff addresses him as Honoured Guest and they keep his crystal chalice filled constantly with water—one of the most expensive commodities on the planet. Aventurine has been drinking from it religiously, which is strange as he typically has the habit of forgetting to hydrate. A faint wildflower scent is drifting from his slender form. These are the only giveaway to his mood: he's otherwise as pokerfaced as ever, smiling calmly as he discusses his plans to sabotage the local government and acquire the planet for the IPC.
“This is a very dangerous mission,” you state flatly.
“All my missions are dangerous.” He takes a sip, one pinky up. “The IPC pays me well for a reason. As they say—”
“‘High risk, high reward.’ I know.” You try not to sound bitter, though you allow yourself to sound tired. “I still do not think the risk is worth the reward in this case.”
“I think over 5.6 million in credits is a great reward, actually. We could do a lot with that kind of money.”
You raise a brow. “What could an extra 5.6 million get you that you can't already buy?” It is—as Topaz would say—‘chump change’ in comparison to his current wealth, which sums to a number so vast that you can't wrap your head around it.
Aventurine pretends to miss the point. “Tons! We could buy a new spacecraft. Get another mansion. Or—we could take a vacation to Penacony. I hear it's quite nice there.” A playful smile. “I could get us a penthouse unit. With a featherbed.”
You frown. Sometimes Aventurine likes to flirt when you're being stubborn—not out of interest, but as a ploy to distract you. He’d developed the habit after he joined the IPC. It used to fluster you, but now it only makes you cross your arms.
“You could die,” you point out.
“You'll protect me.”
“No, I won't. You always find a way to get rid of me when things are most dangerous.” You give him an accusatory stare. “You never let me do my job.”
He's too shameless to deny it. “And it's worked out fine, hasn't it? I haven't died so far.”
“Yes. Just by dumb luck.”
“I beg to differ. My luck is quite reliable.” He sets down his glass. Glances back outside. A microexpression, brows knotting for the briefest second as he studies the sky. “I'm not worried.”
“You're a shit liar.”
That gets him to look at you, letting a small frown pass over his face. “No, I'm actually a great liar. You're just too good at reading me. It's very inconvenient, you know.”
“I can't help it.” You lean toward him, making a show of it as you sniff. An orchid-like scent—faint but unmistakable—has seeped into artificial ambergris and wood. “It's hard to ignore.”
He hums. He isn't frowning anymore—but doesn't look happy, either. “I should change suppressants.” He taps the side of his empty glass, fidgeting. Aventurine never fidgets: it's an amateur giveaway. “These ones clearly don't work well enough.”
“That won't help. I know you too well.” Your eyes soften. He's looking outside again, the blues of his irises distant. “You're worried, Aventurine. More than usual. Let’s back out of this—let Jade handle it.”
“The mission isn't what's bothering me,” he says patiently. “I just don't like this planet.”
“Because you can tell it's dangerous.”
“No. Well—it is, but nothing I can't handle.” He leans back. “I just dislike the weather here.”
You arch a brow. “...the weather?”
“Yes,” he says neatly, “it's too dry here. I'll break out.”
You open your mouth. Close it. It is possibly the most absurd thing you've ever heard, and certainly the worst lie that's ever come from him. For as long as you've known him, Aventurine has had flawless skin, marble-smooth, and ever since being freed, he’s never really cared much for looking handsome so much as looking rich. But he maintains his serious expression: all-in on the farce. “Did you know that outside the capital, this planet hasn't had any natural rain in a quarter of an Amber Era? And the stellar winds are terrible. I don't know how people live on a planet like this.” His eyes narrow at the cloudless sky. “The IPC is going to need to do a lot of terraforming if they want to make this into a merchant hub.”
“Aventurine.”
“It'll be a pain crossing the desert—the elements will ruin my clothes, you know,” he continues. “It won't be so bad while we're on the ships, but we’ve got to go outside from time to time. Can't make any friends otherwise.”
“Aventurine.”
“And there's nothing to do for fun when we’re not working.” He sighs dramatically. “I can't wait to get our 5.6 billion and leave for someplace else. I'm being serious about Penacony, by the way—”
“Aventurine.”
“—though not about the featherbed. I'll get you your own room, obviously. And I'll buy whatever dream experience you’d like. What kind would you want?”
Finally allowed a chance to speak, you say, “One where you retire.”
“Retire? Why would I ever do that?”
“I don't know. Maybe you decide you've made enough money.”
“No such thing.”
“Then you can settle down with someone.”
That makes him smile. It feels mocking. “Me? Settling down? With who?”
“Who knows. Someone who will treat you better than the IPC, I hope.”
“Anyone that nice would run in the other direction. But never mind me. This would be your dream experience. What happens to you in it?”
“I stop chasing after you and get to live out the rest of my days in peace,” you say dryly, and Aventurine blinks. “Please stop deflecting. The IPC gave you a suicide mission. We will both die if we stay here.”
He looks serious now. “I wouldn't let you die.”
“You can't know that.”
“Well, I do. And I've got decent chances at surviving too—at least one in ten.”
You feel like sighing—a deep, aggravated noise is heavy in your throat—but Aventurine doesn't enjoy it when you show anger around him. It's the one omega instinct that he can't ignore, you suppose: unease around an aggressive alpha. Voice tightly controlled, you say, “You’re going to bet your life on one in ten?”
  “Sure. My chances were worse on the last planet, and things worked out great. It'll be the same on Agnisahr.” Aventurine raises a hand, calls for the bill. The conversation is over. You lean back in your seat, watching sourly as he pays tens of thousands of credits just for water.
“You know, they say the royal family is backed by an Aeon,” you can't help but point out, once the waiter is gone. A last-ditch effort. Aventurine smiles at it, amused. Like you're a child.
“So what?” He glances outside, at the desolate landscape beyond the oasis—nothing but red sand, a blue, rainless sky, and two radiant suns shining above it all. “The protection of a god is nothing compared to the schemes of human beings. And gods abandon their people all the time, anyway.”
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During your tenth day on Agnisahr, you realise that something is deeply wrong.
It takes you some time to understand what’s happening. At first you think that whatever political danger you’ve intuited is much worse than you thought, and that’s why Aventurine has been so pale, so discomforted, so exhausted. Then his scent starts changing—he switches clothes two, three times a day (because of all this heat during Agnisahran days, he tells his new business associates) and spritzes his nape with his cologne almost religiously—and you wonder if he is sick with something. If the food in this planet has something that disagrees with his Sigonian biology, or if he has picked up one of the local filoviruses, or if someone’s poisoned one of his meals because they’ve correctly identified him as a threat. Aventurine dismisses every single one of these theories when you bring it up, and—as if in denial—only attributes it to the weather. (I’ve never done well in deserts, he tells you, his eyes on his phone screen. I'm not used to them. It is above 300 Kelvin, and you do not see a single bead of sweat on his neck, and his cheeks are not even a little flushed.)
You only figure it out when he is too ill to get out of bed one morning and forbids all the IPC staff from coming near his hotel room. It sets off alarms immediately—Aventurine, no matter how sick, will work and see through meetings as long as he is mentally capable of it—and so you naturally ignore his orders and check on him, using the spare key to his sleeping quarters that you're given as a policy. And as soon as the door cracks open—as soon as you step inside only to be hit with a violent, cloying sweetness—you realise what’s happening and slam the door shut behind you.
“You’re in heat,” you blurt out, and Aventurine—a shivering, panting mess on the bed—groans in response.
“Why are you here?” He turns toward you, still lucid enough to glare at you through the tangled mess of his hair. His voice is weak, but no less self-possessed: “I was very clear—no company today.”
“I am your personal bodyguard,” you remind him mildly. Your voice is calm—both non-threatening and non-condescending. “Those orders don’t apply to me. If things feel suspicious, I look into it. And they felt very suspicious.” Your brow knits as you study his clothes. Mulberry silk clings to his form, soaked through with sweat. Thin, eucalyptus sheets are tangled up around him. There are only two pillows. No water bottles. No knotting toys.
Nothing.
“You didn't know you'd be in heat,” you realise. “What happened to your suppressants?”
“I don't know.” There’s a quiet, frustrated edge to his voice. Vulnerable too. It makes you think of when you were both still slaves, and Aventurine was confined to the basement of the manor—the one that all omega slaves were made to ride out their heats in. Either they would do it alone or were ordered to spend it with some alpha, usually either a friend of the master or an alpha slave he wished to reward. That's when they're most pliable, he'd tell his guests, or sometimes even you. They get so desperate they'll present themselves to anyone. Then amused laughter from the other party—How obscene!—as you looked away, blood hammering in your ears.
You had been your master’s favourite. His most obedient, most profitable pet—striking enough for his guests to admire, deadly enough for his audiences to bet on, docile enough for him to enjoy. Good enough for him to reward, and he often rewarded you with his most beautiful slave: his Avgin omega. Just don't mark him, he’d said, fastening the muzzle around your mouth. It'll ruin his market value. Who knows if someday he'd sell Kakavasha off to some alpha master who wished to claim him, he said. Though I don't think there's anyone in this star system who'd want a Sigonian for a mate, let alone a Sigonian slave. Then he’d paused, eyes scanning over you. As if contemplating. But maybe they'd try to get Avgin whelps out of him, he added, and you felt like throwing up.
You'd never mate him in those moments, your muzzle always prevented you from saying. You didn't even want to think about touching him, and he didn't want to think about it either. Even in the cruel grip of his heats, with nothing but the thin mat beneath him and his slave’s rags around him, Kakavasha hadn't wanted any kind of contact from you, rejecting any chance of solace. Don't, don't—not again, not again, he'd begged. Then as the nights marched on and his mind grew hazier, he’d start whimpering too: It hurts, alpha. It hurts. Help me. It hurts. Don't touch me. Not again. It hurts. It hurts. Stop it, please stop it.
It gutted you.
It went against every instinct, not to touch him. To let him lie there, in scorching, lonely pain, when all you wanted to do was to dispel it. It would be so easy to press yourself against him and let his skin cool against yours, do the one thing that your body was good at other than killing. But not again, not again, I can't anymore, I don't want it, I never wanted it, and all you could do was sit there, unmoving. Watch as the most delicate, precious thing you had in your life shatter.
And standing here now, watching Aventurine shatter before you once more—it is unbearable. He needs a nest, you keep thinking. He needs a nest and some water and some kind of touch, some kind of relief, but not again, not again, and you’re still a slave, still a worthless and stupid slave, and Kakavasha is still crying on a basement floor and you can't do anything for him.
“You need help, Aventurine,” you say, voice soft, and his whole body tenses. His scent dips, and the scent of florals overwhelms you.
“No,” he breathes, “I don't.”
“You do. You're sick.” You bite your lip. Your heart splits as you suggest it, but you say, “I can call a professional.”
“No,” he spits. The facade is gone. The poker face has cracked. The anger and the pain and the fear are all on full display, and his voice sharpens: “No strangers.”
No foreign scents, you realise he's demanding. A new scent would probably make him feel unsafe.
Then let me help you, you think of pleading, but not again, not again, and you're filled with so much shame at the thought that all you can do is look away.
“Then—can I do anything?” He goes still. “Not—not that, but something to make you more comfortable. I can build you a nest, at least—”
“No.” He takes a deep, shaking breath. “No nests. I don't need one—”
“Yes, you do.”
“No, I don't,” he says. His voice is wavering now, on the verge of crumbling with fever and pain. “I've never—I’ve never needed a nest, I don't—I don't want to—” He presses his face into his pillow. “I need—I need to be alone, fuck—”
He doesn't mean to whine. The cry for distress is instinct, something that all omegas are programmed to do in heat. You’ve heard that they’ve evolved to make this noise as a way of appealing to nearby alphas for help, but you think this must be a lie as you never once saw your alpha master giving mercy to any of his omega slaves. Still, whether it is your biology or not—the noise that Aventurine makes has your heart aching so much you can't help but step forward. But he shakes his head and inches away, shuddering violently, and then his voice echoes again in that cold basement—not again, not again, and don't touch it anymore, don't use it anymore, don't use me anymore, not again, and it's all you can do to back away until your spine is pressed against the door.
“I'm sorry, Vasha,” you say, strained. “I’m sorry. I'll leave you now.”
As the door shuts behind you, you catch a final glimpse him—face pressed into the pillows, shivering.
If you didn't know better, you'd think he was crying.
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When you were both slaves, Aventurine hated seeing you during his heats.
Kakavasha was normally calm around you. Most of the time, he was even friendly (he was friendly to everyone whom he thought could be useful), but he was different during his heats. Sometimes he was vicious; mostly he was withdrawn. Nearly always, he wanted to be left alone. In those moments, all he could register was your alpha scent and his memories of what other people had done to him during his heats. And while you'd have hated to leave him, despised the idea of him being offered to another alpha—even more than that, you hated violating this boundary of his. Hated that you were allowed to do whatever you wanted to him. Hated being the reason he felt so unsafe.
Hated being an alpha.
Now that you no longer have the orders of your slavemaster hanging over you, it is the least you can do to respect Aventurine’s wish of being left alone. He has every right to privacy, and you have every obligation to give it to him. But instead you have been standing here, outside his door, for a full system-hour.
Every time you try to leave, your body is wracked with anxiety. The thought of other people—other alphas—coming near him in this state makes you seethe, your hands flexing at your side. The predator instinct comes out, and the people around you notice it. Every person unlucky enough to walk down this hall scurries away under your glare, even the other IPC staff wandering about to look for Aventurine: Must be their mate on the other side, they remark to one another, and then they're gone.
It is a hard thing to hear. You are not his mate. You are not even a heat partner. If you were, then he wouldn't be in so much pain. Not now, and not back then.
Aventurine has never had easy heats. You keep replaying your memories of all his past ones, each one a wound in your heart: the aching sweetness of nectar and honey; his withering body as he clutched his abdomen and curled up; the tears and sweat staining the mat beneath him. And above all: the fear. The scent of it, the sight of it, the sound of it in his voice. Stronger today than any other day.
By instinct, you know that he cannot persist like this. That this time is somehow worse than all those other times, and that he will become seriously ill if left alone.
After nearly an hour and a half, you finally open the door, fearing the worst.
“Aventurine?” you say quietly, but there's no response, and your stomach drops as you see him.
His body is pale, listless. If it weren't for the fragrance washing over you or the sweat on his temple, you'd worry that he was dead.
Tentatively, you reach out. Rest a hand on his forehead, and it scorches you. He stirs at the touch, doesn't open his eyes—but the quiet sigh of relief is unmistakable. His fingers twitch, as if wanting to reach for you.
“Aventurine,” you say gently. “Aventurine, I'm going to take care of you. Is that alright?”
He doesn't respond. You grimace, pulling away to fetch things for him: several spare pillows from the closet, an extra blanket too. From his suitcase, you grab a few of his sweaters, all thick cotton and fleece. He’d had a sense that Agnisahr would be cold at night. Deserts always get cold after sundown, since sand doesn’t retain heat, he'd told you while he was packing. Or I think so, anyway. Don't know why. Must have read it somewhere. Then he’d given you a long, unreadable look before saying, Make sure to bring a jacket. The warmest one you have. The elements on a planet like Agnisahr can kill a person—even a person like you.
I’m sure I’ll be fine, you’d dismissed him. I can survive anything. Any kind of weather, any kind of illness, any kind of pain: these are all things your species is known for being able to endure, the trait that made you such a prized slave in your master’s eyes, such a useful agent at the IPC. You hadn’t given Aventurine’s warning any thought and hardly paid attention to what you’d thrown into your own suitcase.
It surprises you, then, that you find one of your sweaters in his luggage. Made from Sedanian cashmere and heat tech designed by the Intelligentsia Guild. Cloud-soft and warm to the touch. Aventurine had bought it for you before you were deployed to Jarilo-IV to collect intelligence for Topaz. Warmest thing in the known universe, he’d commented. One of a kind, too. Remember to wear it, alright? Don't let my money go to waste, now.
You stare at it, kneading the fleece between your fingers. You hadn’t mentioned wanting to bring this sweater. You’d lost it in your closet some months ago and forgot about it. Aventurine must have remembered and gone looking for it, because—why? You aren't sure. Probably because it’s warmer and softer than anything he owns, you guess. Of course he’d want to wear it.
You throw it into the pile of things you’ve collected for him.
You take it all to his bed, the mattress dipping as you sit next to Aventurine. One by one, you scent each item with your wrist, watching him carefully the whole time. You’re quiet as you lay them out around him, leaving him undisturbed as you build a nest. You order water and electrolyte drinks too, and you’re quick about going to the door when you hear room service knocking—with how feverish he is, he probably badly needs it.
Aventurine is awake when you come back. His breathing is still laboured, pained—but calm.
“I said I didn’t need a nest,” Aventurine says, though he doesn’t sound angry. You wonder if he’s too weak to be. His voice is faint, and his eyes are barely open—focused on the pile of blankets and clothing around him.
“You’re welcome.” You open a bottle of water, hold it out to him. “Drink.”
Aventurine pauses, stares at the offering like it's some kind of foreign object. But he accepts it eventually, sitting up and taking it from you. He winces with the movement, which he tries to hide. He ignores your frown as he drinks, and he doesn't stop until the bottle is empty.
“There are more,” you say, pointing at the several additional bottles on the nightstand. “And some food and some painkillers. I don't know how well they’ll work. This isn't a normal heat. If you're alright with it, I'll call a doctor and—”
“Everything smells like you,” he says quietly, and you stop.
“...yes. Unless they’re mated, nests usually feel most comforting to an omega when they smell like an alpha.” You swallow, looking away. “...you don't have a mate, and you didn't want a professional, so this was the only option I could think of. I'm sorry.”
“It’s fine,” he says. He picks out one of the sweaters that have made its way into the nest, the Sedanian one. “I don't mind it.”
“Oh.” You let out a breath. “Then—can I call a doctor?”
His grip on the sweater tightens. “No.”
You frown. “Aventurine—”
“I’ve never needed a doctor before,” he says. He sounds unbothered, but he's fidgeting with the sweater now. “I don't need one now.”
A lie. He almost certainly needed a doctor in some of his prior heats, but you don't push the matter. “Maybe you don't need one,” you say instead, “but it would help.”
“I don't need help,” he says, and you look at him in disbelief. He catches your expression, and the corner of his mouth lifts. “Not more than you've already done, I mean.”
“I’ve barely—”
“Contact Topaz. Tell her I'm incapacitated. Tell her…” He hums. “Tell her I have food poisoning. The personnel too. It's not time-sensitive, our business on Agnisahr, so it shouldn't matter if I need a few days off.”
“You really need—”
“Give my regrets to our Agnisahran friends. Deliver it in person. They see you as my right hand, so they’ll most appreciate it coming from you. Topaz can help you with the verbiage. And—try to socialise with them a little, won't you? I think that little omega princess of theirs likes you. Some of the courtesans too, and they have surprising influence.”
“I do not want to be around any omega other than you right now,” you say before you can stop yourself, and Aventurine stops, blinking. His expression is blank, if perhaps a little curious—but his scent shifts. You can't identify how. You add quickly, “I’m not leaving you alone when you’re this sick.”
“Ah. Right.” Aventurine looks away. His voice sounds strange, and his heat must be getting to him again, because it carries a hint of pain. “But you have to. The IPC’s goals take priority.”
You frown. “Your life is more important than the IPC,” you say, and he laughs. Loudly.
“What? This is just a heat. I’m not going to die.”
“You don’t know that without seeing a doctor.”
“I do. I’m willing to bet money that I won’t die.” He cuts you off before you can reply: yes, you're always willing to bet on your life. “And even if I do, that would still be less important than Agnisahr. Do you know how many resources are on this lifeless rock?” His mouth slants. “If we mess up here, I’m dead anyway.”
“I wouldn’t let them touch you.”
“Yes, you would—because they would kill you too.” Aventurine sighs. His eyes close, and his brow creases—a sign that whatever reprieve he was lucky enough to get is about to end. “Go do what I asked. Don’t do anything stupid. I’ll… see a doctor if you do.”
You stand immediately. “Alright. I’ll be back to check on you.”
“I know.”
You stop at the door, giving him a long look. Seeing him like this—lying on a proper bed, cradled in a warm nest, with water and food and medicine nearby—you feel a little better. This is leagues beyond what he’d been afforded in his days as a slave, at the very least. Even if he isn’t free, at least he isn’t trapped.
But it still doesn’t feel good, having to step away. The last thing you want to do is talk to other people, pretend to have interest in other omegas. There are an astonishing number of them who are interested in you on this planet—that princess, and some baron’s son, and one of the prince’s favourite paramours—but you can’t bring yourself to care even for business purposes when Aventurine is like this. You can't act as if you are enjoying yourself when you know he is in pain.
You wonder about telling Topaz the truth. You wonder if she’d be worried enough about Aventurine to let you neglect this mission and cover for you instead, without letting Jade or Diamond or anyone else dangerous know. Not that you think that anyone at the Company particularly cares about Kakavasha—it’s only that he’s valuable. Aventurine of Stratagems is valuable. How many worlds have fallen because of him?
But he seemed unwilling to bet on his worth to them. Which is startling, given how often he's bet on it in the past.
“What’s so important about this planet,” you can’t help but ask, “that the IPC would rather you die than lose it?”
He’s silent for a long moment. His eyes are closed—hidden—but you can see his knuckles whiten as he clutches the Sedanian sweater.
“Copper,” he says. “They want it for the copper.”
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When Kakavasha first suggested a friendship to you, it had felt like something in between a proposition and a threat:
Go ahead, he'd said. Use me as you wish. You can even stab me in the back if you want. Just be mindful of this: I don't make deals that don't pay off.
It might have been a strange way of making friends in any other circumstance, but in a house of slaves, it was a natural one. You had not been a clever person—still aren't—but you understood that your place in the world was one of a tool. This was the place of all slaves: you were all things to be used. Your body was a thing to be used. It was valuable for its strength, for its hardiness, for its threat in the arena and for its convenience in your master’s bed (or in a dark basement, or within a heat house, or inside whichever omega your mistress ordered you to calm down). It did not surprise you that Kakavasha wanted to use it as well. It did not surprise you that Kakavasha expected you to use him in return.
You never would have, of course. Kakavasha was not a thing to be used—he had always been a mate. Though you were happy to let him use you, because all you were was a tool anyway, so it was really all you could offer him: to be used.
None of this has changed for you. You don't think any of this has changed for Aventurine, either. With each new friendship he makes, he repeats those familiar words: Use me as you wish. And with each person who accepts, this is exactly what they do: they use him, and they use him, and they use him until suddenly they notice he's tricked them and they've got the losing hand.
You damned gambler, they always spit. You Sigonian wretch. All you know is how to manipulate people. Thief, liar, cheat, whore. Despite all these insults, Aventurine always smiles at them. Cry as they might, he’s won his bet and has their world in his palms.
Winner takes all, he sometimes gloats.
Winning and losing. Using and being used. Exploitation and treachery. This is all Aventurine knows; these are his great guiding principles in life. (He's told you this point blank, stacking up chips in his favourite gambling dens with a self-satisfied grin.) You often find yourself coming back to these conversations, particularly when you need to convince him of something.
And right now, you very badly need to convince him of something.
Aventurine is ignoring his doctor’s advice. His suppressants are unstable in extreme temperatures, he's been told. During travel on Agnisahr, they'd degraded, and now he’s experiencing his first heat in several years. Of course it's going to be painful, his doctor had said. I can prescribe you some medication to ease the symptoms, but really—nothing will work better than a heat partner. It doesn't need to be a mate. Any alpha will do.
The doctor had been an alpha. You had asked for a beta or omega, but alphas tend to dominate in Interastral Medical Schools, so they're in short supply. Aventurine had been still the whole time, face unreadable, but you could tell he wanted to throw up at the stench of an unfamiliar alpha. You had stepped between the two of them, not bothering to hide the animosity in your voice. We’ll take the medication, you had said, and the doctor had sniffed the air and nodded at you in approval.
Probably won't need it. An alpha like you could sort him out with just a few rounds, he told you, and both of you stayed quiet as he left.
You still aren't talking, or even looking at each other. Aventurine has lay down in his nest again, closing his eyes, while you stand as far away as physically possible—at the door where you'd just shown the doctor out. With the room shut off again, windows closed and door locked, Aventurine’s scent is starting to flood your senses once more. Out of the corner of your eye, you catch him shivering.
“What do you want to do?” you ask.
“Nothing.” He swallows. “I'll be fine.”
He's afraid. You can tell he's afraid. And you can tell he’ll be more afraid if you take even a single step closer to him, so you nod and say, “I'll go pick up your medication, then,” and Aventurine doesn't stop you. You can see him curling up in his nest, face pressed into the cashmere sweater.
But he still doesn't stop you.
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After a few more days, Aventurine finally breaks.
There is a rare sag to his shoulders when he calls you to the room, along with a taste of dread in the air. You haven't seen him so vulnerable in years. Aventurine is not an open person, so cunning and self-possessed in his wealth—but Kakavasha was more brittle, more powerless, flayed raw and open even though he didn't often get the whip. (It would ruin his value if he ever scarred—his looks were his greatest selling point, your master said.) He was especially defeated when forced to spend his heats with an alpha he didn't want. You wonder, a vice grip of pain around your heart, whether this entire situation is simply an extension of that. Whether he is calling you here against his will, this time compelled by his pain, rather than his master. Whether this luxury suite feels like that wretched basement to him.
He doesn't look at you when he talks, nor does he sit up. He remains curled in his nest, nearly clinging onto the blankets and clothes.
“That stupid medication,” he pants out, sharp even in his heat, “isn't working.”
“I can tell.” Your brow knots. He’s in so much pain, it is palpable. “I”—you hesitate, voice dropping. “Can I help you?”
He goes quiet. As both Aventurine and Kakavasha, he has always been disinclined to accept help from other people. There is no such thing as unconditional help in his mind—only leverage and weakness. He hates it when people have leverage over him, and he hates being weak. Both are things that can be exploited, and Aventurine always needs to be the one doing the exploiting. He always needs to be in control.
Even like this, the last threads of his sanity about to snap, with every circuit of his omega biology trying to drag him into insensible lust, he fights viciously to be in control.
Winning and losing. Using and being used. Exploitation and treachery. Control and being controlled. This is how he's always lived. This is how he's always survived.
This is the only way to let him maintain control when he is most afraid of losing it.
“I don't mind,” you say quietly, “if you use me.”
Even through the haze of heat, Aventurine’s eyes sharpen. “What?”
“I don't mind if you use me,” you repeat, voice neutral. Unfeeling. The proposal might sound cruel to someone else, but not you. After all—your place in the world is one of a tool, and this is what you've always done as an alpha and a slave: sleeping with people to take care of their needs, or sometimes just their desires. It did always make you feel strangely hollow, but you think it will feel just fine with Aventurine. All you've ever wanted to do is keep him safe, and surely, this will do that, but—
“I'll only help if you want. I don't want to force it.” You lower your eyes. “But if you do want it, I'll be careful with you. You can lead. I promise.”
“...I know.” Aventurine’s voice is weak, cracks with pain, but you can tell he's speaking with clarity. “I know you will be.”
You look up. “Then you'll let me help?”
Aventurine looks away—a sign that he cannot adopt his usual smile. He’s clutching that sweater again, pressed close to his chest.
“Just your wrist,” he says quietly.
You listen carefully. “What?”
“I just—I just want your wrist.” He looks away. “Your—your scent gland. Only that.”
“Okay.”
You get up, then falter. When it was your job to comfort your mistress’ omega slaves, you were told to enter their nests—no permission needed from them, no permission needed from you, because only her permission ever mattered for anything. The omegas were usually too delirious to care, often had even begged for it with the state of mind that they were in. But Aventurine is different. He's not like you, and he's not like them. He's never bent to any of his masters’ wills. And even if he did, you wouldn't want to have him bend to yours.
Instead of climbing into his nest, you ask, “Can I sit on the bed?” He doesn't answer. “Just the edge of it,” you add, and you hear him exhale.
“Fine,” he says, breathing measured.
“Thank you,” you say, and he gives you a confused look. But then you're reaching out with a hand, offering it, and he is quickly distracted.
Aventurine drops the sweater, grabs your hand almost immediately. He turns over your palms, fingers tracing your heartlines—as if testing you, as if mapping out territory. He runs his thumbs along the veins of your wrists, too, right over your scent gland, and you have to force yourself not to shudder at the feeling. You only stay still, letting him explore the contours of your hands, letting him acclimate to the feeling of your skin. He laces his fingers with your own, a latticework trap, and he finally drags his wrist along yours.
Both of you inhale sharply.
You can't react. You know it'll scare him if you do, but it's hard to keep still. The way his scent blossoms, the way it mingles with yours, the way it all washes over you—what you're doing can hardly be called touching, but you feel like you're going mad. Especially when he flushes like that, his vibrant eyes fluttering shut. Especially when the sweetness of honey overtakes your senses. Especially when you can smell the way his body is reacting, all that wetness and heat and slick dripping between his legs. You don't miss the way his thighs rub together, nor the hard outline of his cock straining against his pants.
Aventurine shudders. He brings your hand up to his face, rests his cheek in your palm. His skin is flushed and burning with fever, and it's no wonder that he's sighing with relief at your touch. You try not to stare at the way his mouth falls open. He looks at you for a moment, his gaze a hazy violet and blue—before he closes his eyes again and presses his lips into your wrist.
Fuck.
“Aventurine—” You have to stop, voice strangled, when you feel the full softness of his lips working against your skin. He’s panting now, laboured breaths sweeping over your veins. Then you feel his teeth catch, a gentle nip on your flesh, and when he groans into your racing pulse—deep, relieved, desperate, a noise that makes your gut flare with heat—you realise you can't do this.
You pull back your hand, and Aventurine startles.
“Aventurine,” you say, voice strained. Maybe we should stop, you want to say, but he cuts you off.
“I need”—a shaky breath—“I need more.”
You watch Aventurine carefully. His pupils are dilated, blue irises nearly eclipsed. His cheeks are rosy, and he can't stop panting. You can fully smell his arousal now, even through his silk clothes. He's desperate, needing to be filled.
But he also looks torn. His brows are knotted, and you can taste a faint hint of fear in the air now. His knuckles clutch at the sheets, almost white, and he stares at them. He can't look up. He can't look at you. His whole body is tense, like he wants to bolt—and if he weren't so weak, you think he might actually.
“Are you sure?” you ask.
He doesn't nod. He also doesn't shake his head. His arms clutch at his midsection as he winces. He doesn't look like Aventurine. He looks like Kakavasha. It makes your heart ache as you watch him give into his body’s demands, wearing the same expression he did on the day your master bought him.
“...don't use your Voice on me,” Aventurine—Kakavasha—says quietly.
It takes you a moment to realise what he's asking. “I won't.”
“And”—his eyes somehow grow even more evasive, hidden by his long lashes— “don’t touch my commodity code.”
His commodity code. His commodity code that is seared into his scent gland. His code that, if you kiss, will ease his agony instantly. His code that, if you bite—will chain him to you irreversibly.
“Of course I won't,” you say instantly.
He closes his eyes. Takes a deep breath.
“And—” Aventurine looks away, jaw tight. His voice is quiet but wrought with tension: “—I don't like when people put things inside me.”
Something claws the walls of your heart.
“That's fine too,” you reply. “I don't mind doing it the other way.”
Aventurine’s sigh is nearly inaudible, but unmistakable. His scent shifts a little bit, the wildflower fragrance fading ever so slightly. But he doesn't come to you. He merely sits there—waiting. Expecting. Maybe dreading. Even in the senseless daze of heat, he’s too anxious to move.
You approach slowly. Though you're overwhelmed by the bouquet of his scent, though you feel a curl of heat in your belly in response to it—you are slow. Alphas are supposedly victims of insatiable lust whenever around an omega in heat, absolved of every action they take, but you are convinced this is a lie. You have never once wanted to handle Aventurine with such cruelty. You think that inflicting violence on him, more than anything else, would go against your biology. Every molecule in your body would reject putting him in such pain or inciting such fear. So you are careful when you approach him, slow as you inch up to him—but you do not think it helps.
Aventurine lies down, his face turned away from yours. His eyes squeeze shut, like he's expecting this to hurt. Uncertainty gnaws at your gut as you lean over him, draping your body over his—the only position you've ever taken an omega in, other than mounting them from behind.
(You do not want to mount Aventurine. You never have. It is an impersonal position, a position that omega biology supposedly would force him to enjoy, a position that alphas have likely dictated him to enjoy. You think there is nothing you would hate more. In your weakest, most selfish moments, in your worst ruts, when you’ve allowed yourself to fantasise about mating Kakavasha—you are always facing each other, and he is always looking at you with his eyes you've always loved, and it always feels intimate. Never impersonal. Never dictated. Never forced.)
Aventurine is so honeysweet beneath you. More fragrant than any omega you’ve ever been with. You glance at his commodity code, trying to ignore the scent of his branded skin, then lean down to press your face against the other side of his neck, where a faint scar mars the otherwise flawless slope of his nape. Like every other omega slave you've ever slept with, the scent gland there has been excised: a precautionary measure to reduce the risk of an unwanted mating bite.
(Not unwanted by them—the wants of a slave never matter—but unwanted by their owners. A mating bite would ruin the code seared into their neck, claim an omega more deeply and permanently than any titanium collar or carbon steel chain. It would hurt their resale value. Only owners are allowed to claim slaves in such a permanent way—and the wants of a slave have no relevance there, either.)
It's a funny thing, this surgical scar. Even with their gland missing, you've noticed that most omegas like having their neck scented by you anyway, probably from some vestigial instinct. You guess that Aventurine won't be any different, that maybe it will comfort him. But when your lips skim the scar left on him by his owner, his entire body stiffens beneath you. His fragrance cuts into your lungs, sharp.
You recoil, as if burned by the touch of him.
“Sorry,” Aventurine is quick to say. He tries to glance at you, but his diamond pupils quickly avoid you again. “Don’t worry about me. Just do whatever you need to do.”
“But you're scared,” you point out, and you see his brow twitch. “You’re scared when I touch you.”
“Not scared,” he lies. “Just…”
When his eyes finally look at you—land on your lips—you understand.
A bite would claim an omega more deeply and permanently than any titanium collar or carbon steel chain. If you lost your mind—give into the insatiable lust of an alpha whenever around an omega in heat—you might bite him, and then you would own Aventurine.
And Aventurine would rather die than be owned by anyone again.
He doesn't need to finish his sentence. You already know what you need to do.
“It's okay,” you say gently, and his brow knots. “I have an idea.”
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Aventurine is always afraid.
This is a fact that has haunted you since the day you met him. You've wondered about how to fix it—the bare minimum as his mate (always his, even if he doesn't want you)—and you’ve never quite pinned down how. Because when someone has spent their life in perpetual fear, how do you make them feel safe? When their life is constantly at risk, how do you ever make them feel calm?
You still aren't sure of the answer. But after seeing Kakavasha become Aventurine, you now have a good guess.
It is clear from his scent that Aventurine does not feel remotely safe right now. Not when you leave to fetch something from your own room, and not when you return. The anxiety thickens when he sees, in your hands, a very familiar muzzle.
Aventurine stares. He is not smiling, but he also does not reveal his discomfort on his face, even as beads of sweat line his temple. But his voice is too controlled, too calm, when he asks, “You kept the mask.”
You nod.
“I told you to throw it out,” he points out, “when I freed you.”
“I know. Sorry. I don't know why I kept it.” You remember how tightly you clutched it before the incinerator, thinking about how strange it would feel, discarding something that you'd worn everyday since you presented—but you don't tell him this. Instead, you say, “But it’s convenient.”
Before Aventurine can say anything, you toss him the remote.
“You’re afraid of my bite and my Voice, but you don't have to be with this,” you explain. Your tone is gentle, soothing. Probably disarming coming from an alpha, with how he is in heat. Perhaps that's why he’s studying the remote rather than chucking it away. “You'll be in full control if I wear this.”
Control. Mere seconds after you say it, you can smell his fragrance change again, mellowing. It's only a brief moment of calm that fades when you latch the mask onto your face, but he doesn't smell as nearly as stressed before.
Aventurine watches you carefully as the carbon steel swallows your maw, its old and familiar edges biting into you. For the first time in years, you cannot tell what he is thinking—truly poker-faced even to you.
“You aren't bothered by wearing that thing while we do this,” he says—asks?—and you shake your head. The muzzle was part of you for years. You were wearing it when you killed someone for the first time. You were wearing it when you went into rut for the first time. You were wearing it when your master had sex with you for the first time. It doesn't bother you that you’ll wear it when you have sex with Aventurine.
If you could speak, you would ask him, Why do you think it would bother me? But all you do is gesture for him to sit up. To switch places with you. You lie down—something you've never done with an omega—and wait for him to get on top.
Aventurine stares at you for a long, quiet moment. It's followed by a sigh of relief. Disarmed, he—for the first time in any heat you've witnessed—finally relaxes. His scent wafts over you as he climbs between your legs, and you can feel the heat radiating from his hands as he parts your thighs, almost scalding.
He doesn't bother getting you ready, too needy to think rationally, but he doesn't have to anyway. You've been wet ever since you felt his mouth touch your wrist, hard ever since you heard him groan into it. You're equally desperate to get some relief as you feel his cockhead sliding against your opening, leaking all over your entrance as his slick drips onto your thighs. His breath shakes as he enters you, and he can't hear it with how you're muzzled—but you groan just as deeply as him at the tight stretch.
You hear him swear when you clench around him, watch him lean over you. His arms shake as he supports himself, refusing to succumb to his heat even as he chases his relief. You seek out his gaze (just as in your dreams, facing each other, intimate), and his neon eyes catch on your eyes for a brief, breathtaking second—
—before he looks away.
There's a flash of—you don't know what, maybe pain? Or fear?—in his irises as he does. A twitch of the brow, a tell he'd normally rather die than let slip. You have the realisation, as Aventurine moves inside you, that even while you're muzzled, even while he has complete control over you—he still can't stand having sex with you. Probably because he can't stand being in heat in general, you tell yourself. Don't touch me, don't touch me, don't use it anymore, don't use me anymore. He'd have this reaction to anyone.
Still—you didn't expect him to have this reaction to you.
Your hands twitch, possessed by an old instinct to cover your eyes. But you'd probably scare Aventurine if you moved your arms, so all you do is dig your fingers into the sheets and squeeze them shut. You tell yourself again and again that he'd hate having sex with anyone in these circumstances—not just you. And then you tell yourself, as a desperate, broken moan leaves his branded throat, that he would also come inside anyone in these circumstances, caught within the cruel grip of his heat.
Aventurine stills inside you as he finishes. He pants, sweat dripping down his temple as he shudders in his ecstasy, his spend hot and thick inside you. You can feel his fever break as he comes down from his high, the heat coming off his body easing into a manageable warmth.
Do you feel better, you try to say, but you can't move your mouth while your mask is on. So you wait patiently for Aventurine to come back to himself, watching him carefully as he pulls out and rolls onto the mattress beside you. He finally glances at you then. His eyes narrow once they land on you, confusion flicking through them. Then displeasure. He reaches for the remote.
To your surprise, he immediately punches in the code to unlock your muzzle. Aventurine has apparently remembered the numbers after all these years, as if the moment he freed you has been since seared into his memory.
“Are you okay?” is the first thing you say, and Aventurine gives you a confused look. He’s still panting, dazed, so you ask, “Can I check your temperature?” And when he nods, you confirm your suspicion: he's still much too warm.
There is an ache between your legs and a strange hollow in your gut (because you aren't very experienced with receiving, you think—your body likely just isn't used to the feeling of it), but you quickly forget them. All you can think of is Aventurine, and how he’s still unwell, and how you need to comfort him. The instinct is so strong that you don't even say anything as you get up, straightening out your clothes.
“Are you leaving?” Aventurine asks. His voice is neutral, completely unbothered, but the thought is so horrific to you that you turn back to him with wide eyes.
“Of course not. I'm going to get you water and medicine.” A beat. You stare at Aventurine’s eyes, then think about how he hid them from you during sex. The hollow feeling comes back, but it's mostly eclipsed by your anxiety at the next thought: “...do you want me to leave?”
“Do you want to?”
“I—” I'd rather die, you think. Being forced to leave him right now would feel like tearing out a piece of yourself. You don't know if there's an alpha in this world who could leave their mate in the middle of a heat. And even if he is unmarked, unattached to you—you still think of yourself as his mate. (His, always his, even if he doesn't want you.) “I would prefer not to. I am your heat partner. I'm supposed to take care of you.”
You hear a quiet breath. “Right. Of course. You're always so conscientious.” Aventurine nods, as if convincing himself of something. “Try not to take too long.”
“I’ll come back soon,” you promise, and the air sweetens. Encouraged, you add, voice gentle: “I’ll bring that medication, and then we can have sex as many times as you need after I come back. I'll make sure you're not in any pain anymore.” You pause, studying him. “Is there anything else you need to feel better?”
His fragrance changes once more, this time in a way you don't totally recognize. “No.” His voice sounds strange. His scent is still foreign, fluctuating, possibly hinting at some kind of pain. The heat must be getting to him again—and of course it wasn't enough, what you just did, what you can provide. He likely needs to be filled to get any kind of lasting relief, but you left him empty. “No, that's all I want.”
You nod, forcing yourself to look calm. Ignoring the emptiness in your gut. It didn't feel bad, but you hope it'll feel better next time you have sex. You think it will. Alphas are supposed to be filled with an insatiable lust near omegas in heat, after all. And even though you’ve never felt that before—never felt anything sleeping with all those omegas in your mistress’ house—you are sure you'll eventually feel it around Aventurine.
But the feeling never comes. Even though you can tell that his heat has returned by the time you're back—sweat beading his temples, laboured breaths at his lips, his bottoms now discarded, with full evidence of arousal between his legs—you don't feel much of anything as you reach for your mask again.
“Don't,” Aventurine says, before it can clasp around your face. You give him a curious look. He explains, “Don't. I don't want to have sex again. Not yet.”
You stare at him, shifting. Uncomfortable. Uncertain. Not knowing how he wants to use you. “What can I do?”
He gives you a long look. “Come here. I… I want your scent gland.”
It's a sensible request. If there's a way to seek relief without fucking someone—without fucking you, which he clearly hated doing—you're sure Aventurine would prefer it. So you climb into his nest, holding your wrist out for him, and—
“No.” His voice is quiet. “I want the one on your neck.”
“...oh.”
You stand there, not sure where to move. If he wants you in his nest again, or if he’d rather do this standing. You’re relieved when he demands, “Lie down.”
You expect him to get on top of you when you do. Assume that he wants complete control—but he instead lies down beside you. Presses his body into yours, and then his face into your neck. His nose and lips brush against your scent gland, a full-body shudder running through him, and—
—and now you know for a fact that it is a lie that alphas want nothing other than to fuck an omega when they're in heat. Because even like this, with his lips sweet on your neck, with the sheets soaked with his slick, with his spend leaking out of you—you do not want to have sex with Aventurine. You only want to hold him. You only want him to keep scenting you. You only want to scent him back.
You only want him to feel safe.
You breathe in deeply, lungs flooded by honey. You think of what it felt like to hold him in that cold basement, when he was delirious with fever and pain, and you think about how different his scent is now. How much sweeter it is. How much calmer he feels.
“Do you feel better?” you ask, and he doesn't respond, but you know the answer. His hands come up to dig into your shirt, and he presses into you like you're a sweater in his nest. Silence blankets over you both, calm and warm. His laboured breath starts to improve.
He does eventually speak.
“Has anyone ever told you,” he says, “what you smell like?”
You stare at him. Your master used to say that you smelled good, but he'd never elaborated, and you hadn't wanted him to. “No.”
Aventurine breathes in.
“You smell like—” A little sigh, shaking and feverish, leaves him. “You smell like rain.”
Your eyebrows tick up. “Rain?”
“Yes. Or not just rain, but”—he pauses, next words quiet—“more Iike after it rains. You smell like the desert after a rainfall.”
“Oh.” You don't know what to say to that. Feeling distinctly like it's a silly question, you ask, “Is that a good scent?”
“Some would think so. Especially to people from the desert. You probably smell like a blessing to them. Although…”
Aventurine goes quiet again. You stare at the chandelier above you, all crystal and white gold, and wait.
“Although?” you prompt.
“...although I wouldn't really know,” he says. “It’s just a hunch. I bet it's why so many omegas on this planet like you.”
You couldn't care less about those other omegas. All you care about is Aventurine. “And?” you say. “Do you like my scent?”
His reply never comes. He just breathes deeply again, seeking relief from your neck—not intimacy. Any alpha’s scent would work; that doctor told you so. Any alpha’s touch would work, too. There are no special feelings involved here. Your place in the world is one of a tool, and tools are never especially liked nor disliked. Their value exists only in how they can be used.
You don't know why you even bothered to ask the question.
But then something strange happens: Aventurine curls against you, pressing even further into you. His lashes flutter against your pulse again; it ticks up in response, beating fast against his lips.
“I do,” he says quietly. “I do like it.”
You swallow. “But I guess that's because you're in heat. Any alpha would smell good to you, wouldn’t they?”
“No.” His fingers dig into the fabric of your shirt. “No, I like it because it's yours.”
You know better than to read too much into his response. Aventurine had already said it earlier: No foreign scents. He's only tolerating this whole arrangement because you don't smell unfamiliar to him. Only able to use you because you are the least threatening option.
But the words break something in you—break the thing that made you unable to throw out that little pouch of copper coins that you were saving up for Kakavasha’s freedom, the part of you that made you wear that carbon-steel mask for him. It is this part of you that has your eyes squeezing shut and your arms wrapping around him. You know he’ll recoil, reject you, but just this once—you need to try.
Aventurine doesn't push you away.
He melts into you instead, inhaling deeply. Your scent gland tingles with the warmth of his breath, the feeling of his lips. He seems—comfortable.
You can't fathom why he’s staying in your arms. Perhaps he's simply desperate for some kind of relief from his heat, just like when you held him in the basement while he was delirious from pain. But Aventurine had spoken to you with clarity just now, and his skin doesn't feel scalding so much as warm, and his scent is so different than from that moment. So sweet and so gentle, without a trace of fear. It makes your heart squeeze. As much as you've always wanted Aventurine to feel safe, you'd never imagined that his scent would be so beautiful when he is.
It makes your heart ache. You've never held anything so lovely before, and you’ve never felt so warm before, and it all makes up for how badly it hurt to let Aventurine inside you. How hollow it made you feel to let him use you. How none of that matters as long as you can keep him safe like this, because you belong to Kakavasha. You'll always belong to Kakavasha, in a fate that was chosen for you on the day you met him.
You're his, always his—even if he’ll never want you.
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end part i
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thank you so much to lore for hosting a fantastic collab and to my sponsors who funded this fic and got it over the finish line! please go check out @ficsforgaza to find other amazing hsr writers you can sponsor in order to help fundraise! here is my own wip list, if you are interested in seeing more from me!
and thank you most of all to YOU! I appreciate you so much for reading this chapter. thank you so much for sticking it through.
additional end notes
#彡 favorites.#cw slavery#cw racism#cw violence#cw sa mention#the first sentence with the block letters ): it says I’ve always love you ??? gonna go cry now (I already did last night)#‘your eyes went soft. beneath the artificial fragrance / you finally caught a hint of his family scent’ ‘the way it always is when he’s#scared.’ THIS LINE BROKE MY HEART. his facade is not facading . WE KNOW. WE WILL ALWAYS KNOW#‘nothing of value’ god dammit aventurine i want to shake his shoulders so bad. this is killing me#OMG THE COIN PURSE PART. THE READER IS SO SWEET )))))): OMG. I remember the face I made at that part /pos and I did tear up quite a bit#‘you never let me do my job’ YEAH. what’s up with that ????????? aventurine u turd. I WANT HIM TO LET US LOVE HIM SOOOO BAD HGGGRRRRRRRRRRR#‘no im actually a great liar. you’re just too good at reading me. it’s very inconvenient you know.’ okay i don’t know how to explain how i#feel. but can I say I heard this perfectly in his voice ? and it made me react some way. like jaw fell open kind of way. your characteriza#UGH I HATE THE TAG LIMIT characterization** IS SO GOOD I CAN HEAR EVERYTHING IN MY HEAD it’s like a movie is playing in my brain mhm mhm!!!#also the part where we keep repeating aventurine over and over and he keeps talking about what he could buy ): LISTEN TO MMMMMEMEEEEEEEHHRH#‘it went against every instinct not to touch him’ THIS IS WHAT I MEANT in my word dump )): trying so hard but so conflicted because#as an alpha you can make it better for him. but he doesn’t want that so u respect it. but he’s in so much pain ): UGHHHHHHHHHH#the sweater part . are you serious /pos. this is such a cute little detail ): I’m gonna start sobbing again can we give him the world#‘everything smells like you’ im sorry 😭 we don’t have much to work with mr aventurine BUT HE SAID ‘I don’t mind it’ SO🥺🥺🥺#‘copper’ ‘they want it for the copper’ the way I started laughing because r u serious . I’m actually a little . brow twitched. BROW TWITCHE#oh okay the copper! right. the copper. (the table flips over) be so fr rn /pos#the entire wrist scene I read with one hand over an eye and also hidden under my blankets because I was so tense HEJDKCKJCKD#‘aventurine would rather die than be owned again’ my heart shattered into pieces at this btw#him still remembering the pass to the muzzle ): and the ‘are you leaving’ im literally gonna cry all over again /pos#the neck scent gland fucked me up so bad. and the rain scent. and he likes it because it’s ours . x _ x / T_T#i have thoughts about your other fic but I will probably write them tomorrow because now I would like to re-re-re-read this one 😅#I’ve always loved * for the first tag dammit I can’t imagine how many typos are in this whole thing#TLDR : great work !!! loved this > < <33
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teabookgremlin · 7 months ago
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usually my boss is so good at managing the schedule and we’re well staffed or even over staffed but yesterday was so hellish
#it was free crepe day so the place was packed with college students looking for free food#and we had two baristas max plus a manager who had to help the kitchen#and gaps in the schedule where only one barista was scheduled so multiple of us had to stay late to not abandon a coworker#and it was so much#so many people#i had a sore throat when i left from yelling at people to leave open space in the restaurant so we could get through and from calling out#orders#i wanted to start killing#i was mostly calling out orders which was much better than doing register#but at one point i had to do both bc the other front of house person was helping the kitchen#so i was in charge of register getting people their food making drinks#it was so bad#also at one point their was a probably not service dog in there but i did not have the energy to go ask the two questions of the handler#and so many people being idiots#like no now is not the time to ask if our hazelnut chocolate spread is locally made#just order your food and get the fuck out of the way#and also fucking listen for your name! and if you didn’t get your crepe say something sooner than when you’ve been waiting for an hour!#and i’m working tonight and tomorrow morning! can’t escape!#actually next week i just have two shifts but i’ll probably pick up more bc people don’t know how to request time off#literally the same handful of people put shifts up for grabs every week when if you ask for time off you 99.9% of the time get it#i do like this job and it’s generally fairly easy but fuck it’s rough at times
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earlgraytay · 1 month ago
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I really wish that people had a better grasp on what The Average Person's Life was like pre-industrialization. If you're living in the global North the odds are good that your life is, in fact, better than a medieval king- yes, even with the political stuff- and would make your ancestors cry wild tears of envy.
The things that suck about your life are things that suck about the baseline human condition (at least since the invention of agriculture, but that's 10,000 years of humanity). Yes, including all the political stuff.
The baseline human condition is "being terrified of losing the harvest and starving", compared to that, losing a job is no big deal. (It's bad, it can be life-upendingly bad, but it's still not "you are guaranteed to die if you screw this up" bad for most people.)
The baseline human condition is "getting kicked around by a tin pot dictator", whether that be a king, a baron, a warlord, or a chief; it's taken centuries of social technology to get the world to a point where that's Not Normal.
The baseline human condition is "losing multiple siblings and/or children at a young age to diseases that are entirely preventable". That's a shocking tragedy now. The baseline human condition is "being in the pathway of said tinpot dictator's wars of conquest" and having to deal with soldiers' pillage, looting, and worse (even if they're nominally on your side). That is, again, a shocking tragedy-- it still happens, and happens in way too much of the world, but no one is going to tell you that it's normal.
I'm not saying that we can sit back and rest on our laurels. We can't. I've been calling the pre-industrial world the "baseline human condition" for a reason- unless you're very, very careful, that's what your society eventually reverts to. It takes a lot of people working very hard to make sure you don't have to live at the baseline human condition, and if you start slacking on that, you start backsliding into it.
How we treat each other- and how we use the technology, material and social, that we've developed to make things easier- matters. We can make the world even better than it is now. We can also make it significantly worse. The choice is ours.
...But if you know that you can reliably have food regardless of the season, you don't live in fear of a random attack killing you tomorrow, and you can listen to music on command whenever you want? You do actually live a better life than a medieval king. Because even kings and emperors were much closer to the baseline human condition than a random farm worker in Bumfuck, Iowa is today.
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velvetydream · 9 months ago
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꒰ :🥀 [ The radio star lost ] ”♡ᵎ꒱ˀˀ ↷ ⋯
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Summary : Your husband was the feared serial criminal in New Orleans, Louisiana, and you where his dearly beloved wife, his right hand. So.. Oh what a despair was awaiting you soon..
Pairing : Human! Alastor x Wife! Reader
Word count : 3549 Words
Genre : Angst, Drama, Romance (a bit)
Warnings ➵ Murder, Swearing, Blood, Death, Guns,
Death penality, Corpses
a/n : Continuation of my Alastor x Wife! Reader > Till death do us part < , seeing as this isn't really a continuation, but rather a prequel, it can be read as a stand-alone, hope ya'll still enjoy it just as much as the first part!♡
Another thing in advance, this is purely fiction and shall not be seen anywhere near reality, I do not condone anything in this and it's pureply based on fiction.
┌───────────────────────── ·  ·  ·  · ♡
1933'
You were like Bonnie and Clyde. A criminal duo, invincible. Or so you thought.
Alastor, your beloved husband. The man you had known for almost two decades, married for almost one decade now. You loved him dearly, even with his little quirks and tendencies. He worked as a well-known and quite popular radio host in New Orleans. Yet he had a tendency for disposing of those he deemed right, you had helped him many times already. Having found out way before you even married him, how he was a murderer, yet you found it enticing, how his mind worked, who he deemed worthy to let go.
"Dear, the meal is almost ready!" You got pulled out of your thoughts by the soft voice of your husband. It was rather unusual for the man to cook in a marriage, but your relationship was far from ordinary, so you enjoyed it. His cooking was far better than yours after all. "I'm coming!" Standing up from the couch, you make your way over to the kitchen, there he was in all his glory. His brown hair was pushed back, glasses sitting on top of his head instead of resting on his nose, and sleeves pushed up to not get them dirty, ironic considering the amount of times he got them bloody. "It smells amazing my beloved! Thank you so much!" A quick peck was pressed to your husband's cheek, as you took a seat at the table, some amazing meal steaming on the table. Alastor puts his apron away, sitting down as he slides his glasses back onto his nose.
Dinner time was always one of your favorites during the day, enjoying a warm meal while talking to your husband about both of your days.
Just after you had finished dinner, your husband took a seat in front of the piano, letting his hands softly glide over the tiles. The instrument echoed with the soft tune he was playing. Walking behind him, you lay your arms around his neck softly, swaying your body a bit to the music he played. Alastor was a talented man with instruments, being able to play a few of them, the piano being one of them. Also quite talented with the violin. "Oh my darling, what a beautiful tune as always~" Humming along now. No one heard the screams coming from the basement. The desperate screams of your next victim.
"When we're talking about music right now my dearest, Mimzy invited us to her performance tomorrow! So how about we postpone our.. plans to the day after tomorrow?" No killing and instead going to Mimzy's show? Oh yes! "Oh, how lovely that sounds! Of course!" Agreeing to his proposal. But for now, you two get ready for bed, lying down in your shared bed.
Another one of your favorite times of the day, getting to lay down with him and finally rest, letting the stress and exhaustion of the day pass. "Did I ever tell you that I love you a lot?" Resting your head on your husband's chest now, who was silently reading a book, closing it now that you were talking to him. "Many times darling and I do love you a lot too~" Alastor knew his way around words for sure, he was such a sweet talker, but that's one of the things you appreciated about him. Raising your head to face him, you take a glance at his lips, before up into his eyes, you knew how he felt about touches he didn't initiate, right now you were only cuddling because he pulled you onto him. Chuckling lowly, he lowers his head down and captures your soft lips with his. Alastor's kisses mostly were soft, like a butterfly resting on your hand or like a spring breeze. Usually, his kisses were planted on your hand or cheek, but from now and then he gave you the satisfaction of a soft kiss on the lips, which always left you giggling like you were right now. Falling asleep in the safe embrace of your husband shortly after.
The next day went by smoothly. Alastor was busy with his work as a radio host, while you took care of the house and did some grocery shopping, meeting up with a few friends of yours over tea. Shortly before you went home for the day, you visited Alastors mothers grave to leave some flowers and clean it, you sadly never met her, but your husband tends to tell you a lot of stories about her. Sitting down by the grave for a minute, you tell her a bit about what Alastor has been doing, how you were loving his cooking and music as always. It was a habit of yours, you hoped she was listening to all the good things you were telling her about him. Taking your things after a while, you bid your goodbye to his mother's grave as you make your way back home. Putting away the groceries before starting to freshen up. Loving to take your time to get ready when you and Alastor decide to go out in the evening.
"Dearest I'm home!" Hearing the lovely voice of your husband calling from the door, answering him now, how you were getting ready. Putting on your favorite dress. It was made out of a beautiful deep red color with black lace all over it, a few gems here and there. Your best jewelry could of course not be missing, most of it you got from Alastor or your own mother. "Darling I'm ready! How far are you?" Exiting the bathroom now, searching for your husband and finding him in the kitchen with a glass of whisky. "Oh my, what do I see here? What a lovely gem you are darling!" Abandoning his glass, Alastor walks over to you, taking your hand as he twirls you around, before kissing the back of your hand. Clad in a black suit, his button-up shirt underneath dark red matching to your dress, while his bowtie was adorned with a red gem, he looked lovely. "My you also look lovely dearest! Definitely going to catch some eyes!" Hooking your arm in his now, you together leave the house and make your way to where Mimzy's show will be held.
Mimzy was a great friend of Alastor, a blonde gorgeous but short lady, who performed like no other. Arriving at the place, you were led to a table for the regulars, as Alastor and you were known by the staff by now. Ordering two drinks, as you await the show. Soon lights go out and Mimzy comes out, her singing and dancing amazing like always.
"Dollface! Pumpkin!" Mimzy's voice was booming as she approached your table, giving both of you an affectionate hug. You ended up talking with her for quite a while, telling her how amazing her performance was and that you were so glad that she invited you two again. Thanking you for your kind words, her attention quickly diverted to Alastor again. It was almost always like this, she said she liked both of you, but you couldn't shake the feeling that she did have a certain distaste for you. But you decided to let it slide like always, as you listened to Alastor tell Mimzy what you two were up to since you've last seen her.
Alastor of course started to notice how you were getting irritated by Mimzy and how she was only focusing on him. "My dear, I think my lovely wife is not feeling so well tonight, perhaps it would be better to take our leave now, still thank you for having us as always. Till the next time." Alastor stood up now as Mimzy stomped off with an annoyed face, extending his hand for you. Smiling at him softly as you take his hand and let him lead you outside. A shiver ran down your spine as your arms got goosebumps, a coat was soon placed over your shoulders, looking over to Alastor who watched you with a soft smile. "Dear, next time you feel uncomfortable please do tell me and we will leave immediately, you know how much I care for your comfort." Thanking him, you take his arm as he leads you through the park to your home, it was a little longer than walking through the streets, but it was calming to walk through nature together.
"Shall we head to bed? It's been a long day and evening." Taking the coat from your shoulders at home, he hangs it on the hanger beside the door. "I love that idea, let me tell you about my day in bed, I visited your mothers grave again." You were already walking to the room as you talked to him, so you weren't able to see his eyes follow you as they softened. It saddened him you never got to meet his mother, she would've loved you dearly, just as he does. Telling him all about what you told her before, how you left flowers and also cleaned her gravestone, as you settled into bed, as he was changing into his sleepwear. Alastor was so thankful for having a caring and lovely wife like you.
The night went by fast, today Alastor would finally have a day off from work, which meant a different kind of work today for both of you!
The steps down to the basement squeaked as Alastor put his weight on them, your heels making clicky noises as you followed him down a stark contrast in sound. And there sat the victim he deemed perfect for his next case. The screams would be recorded for his personal little collection. You were getting everything ready for him, it would be interesting to watch like always. Alastor changed so much when he killed, no shimmer or glimmer in his eyes, not how he looked at you, the soft gaze replaced with a blood thirsty one. Liking it quickly, you were soon getting rid of the victim, this time deciding to bury him in a forest, you opted for the forest a few times already even though it was a bit risky, it was the easiest to get rid of them. At home, Alastor decided to take a bath, as he told you to head to bed already with a kiss on your cheek.
When he joined you in bed, he looked relaxed, cuddling up to you. Murders always ended like this, it somehow made him so calm and affectionate with you. Placing a soft kiss on your neck, as his arms hold your waist. Your hand threaded through his brown soft locks, something you loved to do. For once your beloved husband fell asleep quicker than you, making you be able to watch him sleep, not in a creepy way, but in a loving way. Alastor was often so stressed with work, yes he loved being a radio host, but it sometimes got to him. Rubbing your fingers over his cheek softly, then over the bags under his eyes before pressing a kiss to the crown of his head. Yourself slowly falling into dreamland.
Morning came way too quickly, Alastor was back to work, and while you decided to stay at home and do some housekeeping, a few rooms needed cleaning. A friend of yours stopping by to tell you how a new corpse was apparently discovered by the police, which is connected to the many murder cases lately. Tensing up a little bit when she told you how they discovered it in the forest after one of the farmers nearby saw some shadows in there. It couldn't be the corpse from last night, right? Simply agreeing with her that you would be careful, even telling her how your dear husband would never let something happen to you on his watch, which made her coo at your marriage, if only she knew..
Mid conversation your husband comes home, greeting you with a soft kiss on the cheek before he leaves for the back of your home. Your friend leaves soon after, as you go and search for your beloved. Finding him in his office, gripping the table. You knew what was about to come.
"Dear?" Approaching him, Alastor pushes everything on his table off, papers scattering, a cup breaking as pens roll all over the floor. "They already discovered it.. HOW?! I was careful! Pathetic! How dare they! Are they making fun of me?!" Worried for your husband, yet you stood still, listening to him. "I had to talk about it today! At the broadcast! Act as if I was surprised! Haha! If only they knew! Right doll?!" Turning around, his eyes were darting around the room, before falling onto you, laughing as he took your hand to pull you in. "They really think they can discover us like this! US! They are worthless! Pathetic even! Oh my dear! We truly are the greatest!" He was twirling you around as if dancing now, despite no music playing. Only his mad monologue. You've dealt with this behavior a couple of times already, knowing to just let him act and talk for now as he pleased. "Oh, what a wonderful day my beloved! I will go and make my favorite dish for us now! How beautiful!" Leaving the room now, a skip in his step, as you bend down to clean up the mess your husband caused.
Joining him in the kitchen now, as he was softly humming to the radio as he was cooking his favorite, Jambalaya.
A knocking sounds from your door, looking up, you tell Alastor you are going to get it, and upon opening it you come face to face with a detective and a police officer. "Greetings ma'am, is your husband home?" His voice was deep, you nodded, leaning the door closed as you hurried into the kitchen to get your husband. "Greetings gentleman, how may I help you?" Alastor opened the door composed as ever, drying his hands from washing them with a clean towel, as he gave the men at the door a polite smile. You retreated back to the living room, still listening to their conversation. Asking him about the murder cases, why him? It was probably only because of the radio broadcast, right? Maybe his boss told him to talk about it without the detective's permission. As the door closes and Alastor is back in the kitchen, still calm as always as you join him. "Dear? What did they talk about?" Looking up at him with worry written all over your face, he turns to you. "Don't worry your pretty little head dearest, it was nothing to be mentioned! Smile dear, you know you're never fully dressed without one!" Pushing the corners of your mouth up with his fingers now, making you smile, before shushing you out of the kitchen so he can cook. Not able to help it but worry, were you about to be figured out?
But over the course of the next few days it all calmed down again, no more police officers or detectives visiting you, which finally calmed your mind. Alastor meanwhile had found a new target, telling you about this man he met the other day and what bothered him. It was all back to normal now, which you were glad about. Till this one dreadful day.
Alastor and you made quick work of the man, your husband telling you to stay home this time to clean up and that he would take care of this on his own. You worried again, but he assured you that he would be quick, after cleaning up and getting rid of any evidence, you cleaned yourself and sat down to wait for your beloved. Yet after hours of not coming back, you grew anxious, desperate even to know what took him so long. As a knock echoes through your house, you rush to the door, opening it ready to scold your husband for taking so long, but your breath stops when a detective stands in front of you.. What happened?
He asked to enter your home, sitting you down on the couch as he took a seat opposite of you on the armchair. "Your husband got shot ma'am, he was burying a corpse, we assume him to be the serial killer at fault for so many murders lately. He passed away instantly, I'm sorry for your loss and to bring you this horrific and murderous news." Your ears were ringing. Huh? Shot? Was that man joking with you? Was he someone Alastor paid to prank you? No, he wasn't the type for these kinds of pranks. Tears were streaming down your face, burying it in your hands now, sobs shaking your whole body. If that stupid man just knew, knew how you helped your husband with everything! Stupid! "Ma'am I-" The detective started, when you darted up, grabbing the man by his hair and throwing him out of your house. "Get lost! Never show up again! Leave.. NOW!" Slamming the door shut now, he probably took this as a shock to knowing who your husband really was, but you knew that already for years. Sinking to your knees, your arms hug around you as your head hits the floor, screams and cries of agony echo through the now empty halls. Your husband, the man you loved so much was dead, just like this? What sick nightmare was this? Cries reduced to soft sobs when your throat started to hurt, by now your body was curled up into itself on the floor and like that, you fell asleep.
The next day you awoke to the sunlight, your body sore from crying and sleeping on the floor, looking around for a second, for Alastor before it doomed on you, he was dead. Shot like an animal.
Your mother accompanied you to identify your late husband, you of course clad in all black. His forehead is now adorned with a hole, the detective explaining to you that he was mistaken for a deer. Asking for some privacy from everyone, you were left alone in the room. If it wasn't for that damned hole he looked like he was simply sleeping, peacefully like the night before. Leaning down to press one last kiss to his temple. "I will always love you my dearest, for now and forever, till I join you in death."
Leaving the room, you didn't dare look back, you were going forward from now on, knowing that someday you would meet him again.
Your mother had offered for you to move back in with her, but you told her despite what he did, he was a lovely husband to you and that you weren't able to yet let go, which she understood. Back at your home, you sat down and just stared at the wall. Why did this have to happen? You could be cuddling together right now or enjoying a meal, but that would never be the case ever again. But you told yourself, swore yourself with that last kiss to his temple that you would carry on in his memory. And so you did, three more murders continued after your husband was dead, till you were discovered.
In front of the law, you were sentenced to the death due to having caused three murders yourself and helped with multiple, carried out by your late husband. You accepted it, not that anyone asked, but you would be seeing your husband again, at least you hoped you would. A few days later after the case was closed and you were sentenced, it happened.
1935'
"Alastor! Dearest! Charlie told me you wanted to see me?" Entering the radio tower with a bright smile, Alastor turned to you with his signature smile. "My beloved! You look lovely as always! Look at you, aren't you a little gem!" He was walking over to you, his red ears on his head bouncing slightly with each step he took. Closing your eyes now as he told you to do so, a sensation of something cold around your neck running through your body now. "Open up doll!" Opening your eyes and looking down, your eyes tear up. It was a necklace, that looked similar to one he gifted you on the first anniversary of your marriage. "Alastor.." Looking up at him, as a few tears escaped your eyes.
"Now now sweetheart, we don't want you crying hm? Smile dear! You know you're never fully dressed without one!" Giggling a little bit at that quote, he had used it so often when you two were alive. Not being able to help yourself, you throw your arms around his neck and pepper kisses all around his face and lastly a big kiss on his lips, you would be apologizing for suddenly kissing him later, but right now you just needed to kiss him. "I'm glad you love it dearest!" His arms are around your waist now as he laughs at the tickling kisses placed on his face, starting to spin you around as with a snip of his fingers music starts to play.
Charlie and Vaggie watch the soft moment from the door, tears streaming from the blonde's face as her girlfriend pulls her away to give you two some privacy.
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yanderenightmare · 2 months ago
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Have you ever wrote something like
Detective reader x criminal yandere or vice versa
♡ TW: yandere, kidnapping, serial killer, mutilation, blood and gore, amatuer amputation
♡ gn reader
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It’s so sweet of you to be so obsessed with him. Following his every track—of the tracks he decides to leave behind for you, of course. But in this game the two of you play it’s clear who’s the better player. But then again, it’s not exactly a fair fight. You have to follow the law, after all, and he doesn’t. It’s way easier for him when he can watch you through any means he deems necessary—while you have to go through your boss each and every time you wish to follow up on any simple lead.
Oh, but you’re so cute—with your little crimeboard. “Is all that red string for little old me?” he’ll chuckle under his breath, sipping his coffee as he stares at your busy body from across the room. It’s too bad it’s all a waste. You’ll never find him, even though he’s right under your nose as a fellow detective. 
In a way, he wishes you could play cat and mouse forever, constantly switching the roles. Though he salutes you for getting this far—there have been times when you’ve made him have to work twice as diligently—but in the end, it’s far too easy to stop you.
“I’m sorry about this—I wish I could do it differently, but you, of all people, know my M.O. better than anyone,” he apologizes, kneeling before the spot he has you strapped to a chair in his living room—a plastic sheet beneath you with your wrist neatly fixed to the armrest as he holds a heated knife to your pinky.
The gag between your teeth soaks with your spit and screams as he expertly snips the little finger clean off.
“There we go, all done!” he cheers, smiling at you gently, then putting your lopped-off digit into a plastic container filled with ice. “I’ll make sure our respected coworkers find this tomorrow.”
You shiver, screams turning to sobs and gasps. He places the box and knife onto the floor, then proceeds to cup your face in both blood-wet hands.
“Don’t worry,” he ushers. “I’m not gonna kill you like I did all the others.”
He gets in close. Thumbs stroking your tear-soaked cheeks, painting them red. His eyes seem black—eclipsed with something inhuman as he skitters across your face from your glassy doll eyes all swollen and glittery to your sniffling nose and your plumped lips sucking the cloth he’d tied around the back of your head. 
Even closer now, he continues with a rasp, “No—just for you—I’ll break my ritual and keep you safe and sound with me as a living trophy,” he laughs then, breathily with elation, placing his forehead upon your sweat-pilled one. “You’ll be my audience while I continue my work,” he muses while smiling giddily up at you. “My sweetest and prettiest little fan.”
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♡ BNHA – Deku, Denki, Hawks, ♡ JJK – Mahito, Gojo ♡ HQ – Tendou, Atsumu ♡ DS – Doma ♡ WB – Kiryu, Umemiya, Togame ♡ AOT – Armin
♡ FEM x M INSERT masterlist ♡ GN x M INSERT masterlist
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verdantlights · 21 days ago
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Round 7 Final thoughts/Analysis
First of all, Blink Gone is a banger but we knew that already.
Second,
Till is and also is not dead. Till was used as a pawn for the segyein for entertainment. Keep in mind this is Season 50. 50 seasons of Alien Stage, and you think they wouldn't go off without a hitch? Till was used to lure Hyuna and Mizi back. Hyuna is worth a lot and Mizi escaped live on stage. Think of the Quarter Quells in The Hunger Games. Do you really think... they wouldn't make Season 50 special? Especially since Luka won S49. It was always rigged in Luka's favor. Or is it? (hey, vsauce here-)
Now. Till was EXTREMELY drugged up. He may have had his fighting spirit back, but he was definitely 'roided up by the aliens for the plan. The Finals were rigged in Luka's favor, it was all rigged in Luka's favor. Those drugs in Tills system, for all we know, can be keeping him alive. There is a good chance they don't want Till dead and that they're only faking his death for the sake of the... "special guests."
It might have been rigged in Luka's favor, but there's a good chance he might not be getting out of this safe, sane, or even alive. He may have captured the hearts of the segyein in Season 49, but he is still a human pet. He is still expendable for the sake of entertainment. None of us character stans, Luka stans, are off the hook. ALNST is not over.
EDIT: I would also like to point out that Luka was probably also on drugs. He was in hysterics pretty much the whole time. Luka is trapped in this cycle and is a pet, just like Till.
As for those "special guests," Mizi and Hyuna: there can be multiple ways this plays out, either Mizi goes against Hyuna, or Hyuna goes against Luka. We already had Mizi v Luka, so they wouldn't do that again.
As for the song itself, I picked up a few lyrics:
Luka: "Before this piercing, radiant moment fades away"
"Piercing, radiant moment" referring to Till and/or Hyuna being injured.
Luka: "Neither today nor tomorrow, exist for me"
"Exist for me" is a reference to Ivan's thought process in why he chose to die in round 6
Till (i think): "Blink and gone, relish the present"
"Relish the present" as in Till needs to live in the moment to survive, rather than to win. He is on adrenaline, drugs, and survival instinct.
Till: "Clear your mind, leave the burdens behind"
A reference to himself that he... basically needs to lock in.
Luka: "The dark crimson air embraces us, lifting our spirits"
Ivan reference, specifically Luka imitating Ivan
Till: "And the fiery thrill blazes out to the sky"
Ivantill meteor shower reference
Now as for the meaning of the song itself, that could be multiple things:
Till realizing too late about Ivan's feelings and that he was wrong about his image of Ivan, "And in a blink, gone."
Till's life, "And in a blink, gone." (which is why i say he's dead and also not dead. He very well could be dead and just be brought back to life like the Sualive and Alivan theories)
Luka's ability to mimic others
Hyunamizi also realizing too late that they might have been set up
I think the flashbacks to round 6 are pretty obvious in what they mean and what was intended for it to mean/symbolize, so I'll spare it.
OH YEAH and speaking of the alivan and sualive theories, those are a LOT MORE LIKELY after this. Because what was the point of Till's death... after round 6? Would they (Vivinos, not the aliens) kill Till off after what happened in round 6? Death is too easy. Death is mercy. Yes I wish mercy upon Till, but there are better ways to show him mercy with what we have without him dying. That being said, if he is actually dead. Like dead, dead, (i will kms) then at least he died where Mizi was the last thing he saw.
Mizi was the last thing he saw.
We might have been wrong about Till only loving the "image" of Mizi, but then again, maybe not. Again, Till immediately lit up at the sight of Mizi, recognizing her instantly. It gave him the motivation to continue, he didn't notice of care how different, traumatized, and worn down she looked. He only saw her. Maybe it wasn't her image he was fond of. Maybe he really did love her. But maybe he was also grasping at straws to survive and continue on. Maybe he thought he had a chance. Cause Mizi was also grasping at straws. As we saw in the flashback with Mizitill, they were definitely friends. Mizi might only see Till as a friend, but now both would only have each other left, plus Hyuna and the resistance. Mizi might not give Till a romantic chance, but they can be there for each other because they both understand what the other went through.
Also Issac and Dewey better pull through I swear to fucking god. WHY WERE THEY NOT THERE. If you saw my bingo card, I marked off Dewssac appearance, I thought I saw them, but I was seeing shit so ignore that.
Personal note: I was really. REALLY overwhelmed leading up to this. I lost a lot of sleep over the past 48 hours due to anxiety over this and I'm glad that it finally happened. I'm a lot better now that my anxiety and nausea is gone and even if I'm extremely... scared... for Till... I'm still hopeful that he's alive, and that sualive and alivan are real. Maybe I am delusional, but I mean, I enjoy the Actor AU a bit too much... so...
That's all, I think. I might have more later after I stew on this a bit more.
@pwippy @starry-skiez @bluemoonscape @ivanttakethis @tsukacchako @shakingparadigm @rosedeleca @crustyfloor @k9punkout @junebluues god i cant think straight im sorry if youre not tagged and wanted to be im like gen tweaking tbh
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missnxthingg · 2 months ago
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𝑳𝑶𝑽𝑬, 𝑭𝑹𝑶𝑴 𝑨𝑳𝑳 𝑭𝑶𝑼𝑹 𝑪𝑶𝑹𝑵𝑬𝑹𝑺 𝑶𝑭 𝑻𝑯𝑬 𝑾𝑶𝑹𝑳𝑫 . (𝑺𝑴𝑨𝑼 𝑽𝑬𝑹𝑺𝑰𝑶𝑵) - 𝑇𝐻𝑅𝐸𝐸
𝑨𝒖𝒕𝒉𝒐𝒓'𝒔 𝑵𝒐𝒕𝒆 - Little throwback to Lando's win in Miami for the sake of the story. I think we all Lando girlies need to relieve this for a moment 🧡 raise a hand if you miss this moment (bc I surely do).
original chapter | series masterlist | main masterlist | taglist
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yourusername
London, England
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yourusername Enjoying some time with my best friend at home 💖
landonorris wonder who gave her that dollhouse 🤔
landonorris my pretty girls, i miss you
↪ yourusername stop whinning and go enjoy ur trip, dickhead (we miss u too) ↪ landofan4 friendship goals fr
ln4stan Ollie is the cutest omg
yourmomusername What lovely ladies! I love you
↪ yourusername we love you, momma
username1 we need to see this duo with lando again
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f1gossip
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f1gossip Lando Norris is enjoying King's Day with his friend, Martin Garrix, in Amsterdam, and ended up getting his nose injured. What do you think happened?
username1 did he get into a fight????
username2 for fuck sake, we have a race in a week!
username3 omg bless y/n so she can try making his image better for the media in miami
username4 i NEED to know what happened with him
username5 @.yourusername mother, feed us with info, please! 🥺
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yourusername added to their stories
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Caption: He's well and alive, might kill him later for the scare (just a glass cut, no fighting)
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landonorris added to their stories
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Caption: This is an apology for making her so concerned about a nose cut
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landopriv added to their stories
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Caption: Gave her the scare of her life @.yourusername and made up to her after a cuddling afternoon, brunch, NBA game and tomorrow the beach
↪ yourusername replied to your story: all forgiven after the pampering 💘 ↪ landopriv: love you, idiot
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yourusername added to their stories
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Caption: Who let this idiot bring a camera along with him? Keep him away from me. Every time I blink: FLASH!
↪ landonorris: you're no fun 🙄
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yourusername
Miami, Florida
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yourusername Miami on film 🏖
landonorris you're as hot as miami, baby
↪ username1 OH MY FUCKING GOD ↪ username2 boy is down bad for her 🥵 ↪ username3 Lando can't even pretend he isn't in love with her anymore ↪ yourusername police he has escaped again
username4 do you guys think he took the photos or that she stole his camera?
↪ username5 he definitely took them! we saw him carrying the camera everywhere and they were at the beach earlier
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f1
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f1 LANDO NORRIS WINS HIS FIRST GRAND PRIX
landofan HE DID IT GUYS!
mclarengirly OMG I CAN'T BELIEVE
ln4bitch oh man we just know he's gonna party HARD
yourusername I've never been more proud 🥺
↪papayafan y/n please tell lando we love him! 🧡 ↪lanfan4 give him the biggest kiss and the tighest hug for me
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landonorris
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landonorris WWE FUCKIJG DID IT. P1
username1 WE DID IT LANDO!
username2 Longest time coming! Congratulations, Lan 🧡
username3 My man!!! LFG
yourusername I AM THE PROUDEST
yourusername love you so much, you idiot. P FUCKING ONE! 🧡
↪landonorris i love you more, muppet ❤ ↪username4 your honor, i love them ↪username5 MOM AND DAD ARE GIVING PDA
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f1gossip
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f1gossip Lando Norris and his best friend, Y/N L/N, partying together in Miami after his win. Some people that were at the party reported on our DMs that they didn't keep away from each other all night and were missing from the party for a while. Do you think they celebrated it in a more special way? 💋👀
username1 Lord, I'm ready for them to be a couple
username2 i saw they leaving the club hand in hand last night, guys! they were alone and very much in a hurry to get out of there
↪username3 how do you know if you're telling the truth? ↪username2 you can check my profile, i was at the paddock today and after the gp, my friend and i followed them around town to party too!
username4 i saw this dude that swore they were kissing in the back of the club ln, but it's not something i can 100% confirm
↪username5 Can we please stop speculating on their friendship? They both have expressed they hate when people start forcing a relationship onto them.
username6 at this point, i'm just waiting for y/n's special post for lando on insta
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yourusername
Miami, Florida
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yourusername I knew you were special on the first time I saw your muppet face in my office. I've been your biggest fan ever since; rooting and praying for this day to finally come. I've never been so proud of you, Lan. Longest time coming to this moment. I love you so much, my grand prix winner – even though you got me so drunk we missed our flight today. Now enjoy some podium pics I took yesterday + a cute one from the hottest duo in Miami last night.
tagged: landonorris
landonorris I love you so much! Can't imagine life without my partner in crime. You being there made everything even more special
↪yourusername Stop or I'll cry again ↪landonorris Will be an honour to make you cry for me twice 😂
username1 GUYS WAKE UP Y/N POSTED ABOUT LAST NIGHT
username2 name a prettier friend duo, i'll wait
↪landonorris me too ↪yourusername me three
yourmotherusername Olivia has been non stop since the finish line! She can't wait to see her favourite uncle ❤ Congratulations, Lando
↪landonorris thank you so much, mrs l/n ❤ and tell ollie uncle lan loves her very very much ↪username3 now we're gonna have to wait until ollie and lando reunion after miami 😭 ↪yourusername promise to come back with pictures
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⋘ 𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐨𝐮𝐬 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 // 𝐧𝐞𝐱𝐭 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 ⋙
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honeylations · 6 months ago
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HUH YUNJIN x FEM!READER
Prompt: With Le Sserafim in New York and you coincidentally having a runway show, she makes the time to meet up with you
Warnings/Notes: G!p Yunjin, eventual smut, model reader, golden retriever Yunjin
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“So I have a confession to make” Yunjin randomly blurts out during game night in some New York Hotel.
Sakura had just rolled the monopoly dice and took hold of her cat piece. “What is it?”
“You’re gay?” Eunchae sarcastically question, earning an eye roll from the American.
“We’ve established that already, yes, but no that’s not what I was gonna say”
“It better be worth pausing this Monopoly game because I am becoming richer by the second” Chaewon smirked and showed off her buildings in majority of the board.
“So I have a girlfriend” Yunjin breathed out, feeling the weight roll off her shoulders.
The red head doesn’t know why she felt the need to keep it a secret from her girls. It wasn’t like she was scared that they wouldn’t support her, it was more of the fact that she gets nervous about almost anything.
And Eunchae may also be a little of bit of a big mouth.
Once a small detail goes through the maknae’s ear, the whole kpop industry suddenly knows.
“Oh? Congratulations Yunjin!” Kazuha applauded excitedly, even giving her member a quick hug.
“I’m surprised you can even pull” Chaewon teased, feeling a wad of monopoly cash slapped in her face. “Ow!”
“Eat shit. Anyways, she’s super awesome~”
This particular side of Yunjin was an easy way for the members to bully her love struck puppy personality and Yunjin knew she wouldn’t be able to defend herself.
“What’s her name?” Eunchae was the one to ask, already planning on texting Kyujin about the news.
Yunjin fiddled with her fingers and giggled like a school girl. “Park Y/n”
All girls sat up on their knees with eyes wider than saucers. “WHAT???”
“THE MODEL?”
“THAT HOTTIE?”
“Kill yourself Yunjin, there’s no way you’re dating THE PARK Y/N”
Yunjin slapped Chaewon with the monopoly cash again, tired of her teasing. “If you don’t believe me, she’s having a runway show tomorrow night. You can come with if you’d like. She can get us front row seats”
The eyes have gone wider and jaws were dropped.
“FRONT ROW TICKETS TO A RUNWAY SHOW?!?!” Sakura jumped up and about, squealing so high that the windows shook.
“I’ll take that as a yes. I’ll message Y/n and let her know” Yunjin said with a smile.
“It’s a coincidence that you both are in New York right now” The leader hummed and took her turn in rolling the dice.
She did a small fist pump when it landed on a double 6.
“Yeah I know, I’m just as surprised as you are. I’m planning to take her out on a date here soon and even introduce her to my family”
“Awwww our Yunjinie is such a good girlfriend~” Sakura smirked and playfully shook the taller member around.
Kazuha did a small applause. “I can’t wait to see her on the runway!”
The following night of the said Runway Show…
“Yunjin can you sit still?” Chaewon had hissed.
Chaewon could’ve been louder but she’d make a total fool of herself in front of the entire audience as the show was going. Well, not much of a fool as Yunjin right now.
The red head was fussing about in her seat, trying her best to get a clear view of whenever your turn was.
Which was literally in a second.
As you began strutting down with you beautiful model face, Yunjin squealed and started shaking her sign around that read: ‘I LUV Y/N <3’
“Wooohooooo! Go baby! You look so beautiful! Oh wow yayyyyy!~”
The Le Sserafim girls looked at their American member in disbelief. Did she suddenly forget she was an idol too?
“Huh Yunjin just how unprofessional are you gonna get?! Give me that and sit still!!” Chaewon growled, snatching the poster from Yunjin.
“Whatever. My girlfriend’s turn is over anyways” The red head grumbled before pursing her lips and waiting for the rest of the show to finish.
It felt like hours for Yunjin, but within minutes you had your bag over your shoulder and approaching your girlfriend and her group.
“Bebby!~” Yunjin made grabby hands and ran to you like an actual puppy seeing its owner.
Which was not much of a surprise for anyone.
“Must you be so loud whenever I’m on the runway? Be professional next time” You scolded but also melted into your girlfriend’s embrace where her large hands rested on your small waist.
She was squishing her cheek against your head and slowly pulled back with imaginary flat guilty ears. Her boba eyes grew wider and your body melted further. It was hard trying to maintain your nonchalant personality when your girlfriend was this fricking cute.
“I’m sorry bebby. I couldn’t help it. You look so pretty…I mean you always look pretty hehe”
You tried to be annoyed by her unprofessionalism but your smirk ruined it.
And Yunjin’s abrupt peck to your lips. “Mwah! Love you bebby”
“Ugh Yunjin quit being a love sap and introduce us to your girlfriend” You heard Chaewon hiss from afar.
“Right. Bebby, this is Kim Chaewon, our leader. Her temper is as short as her height-OW!”
“Piece of shit” The short blonde gritted her teeth when she slapped the back of Yunjin’s head.
“This is Miyawaki Sakura, the eldest. Then there’s me, your cute adorable girlfriend. And then Nakamura Kazuha, our Samoyed”
“Samoyed?” You repeated in question with a smile.
“Apparently that’s how my personality is” Kazuha shrugged and grinned, letting you slowly see why she got the title.
“Last but not least our baby girl, Hong Eunchae! We spoil her with love”
You softly pinched the youngest’s cheek and smiled at her giggle. “Definitely deserves to be spoilt. It’s a pleasure to finally meet Le Sserafim” you spoke calmly.
“Congrats on your runway event Y/n, you looked beautiful” Kazuha complimented sweetly.
“Thank you Kazuha, I’m glad you liked it. Yunjin told me you’d all be in New York so I thought it would be nice to get you girls a gift” you said with a smile and your manager instantly appeared with 4 bags of designer items that you collaborated with.
“Oh wow these are limited edition! Thank you so much Y/n Unnie!” Eunchae squealed with eyes as bright as the sun.
You would’ve thought she was Yunjin’s sister from how big her smile was. “You’re welcome Eunchae. Enjoy your time in New York”
“I will Unnie, I really will!”
“I’ll be going out with Y/n tonight for our date, I’ve already informed Manager-nim” Yunjin quickly reminded to Chaewon specifically in hopes she wouldn’t go ballistic but the leader hummed and nodded anyways.
“No worries. We’ll get going now. Oh and Yunjin-ah” Chaewon quickly called.
Yunjin’s brow raised in curiosity. “Hm?”
“Don’t stay out too late okay? We got content to film”
Yunjin saluted like a dork. “Ay ay captain!”
“Idiot. Take care and it was lovely meeting you Y/n!”
You waved at the girls but could feel Yunjin’s puppy eyes on you again. “What are you staring at?”
“Just how beautiful my girlfriend is. I love you bebby” she said and kissed your temple.
“Ugh. I love you too. Now where are you taking me tonight hm? You look so handsome” you smirked up at her and adjusted her blue button up long sleeve which was open at the collar.
“It’s a surprise bebby. This night will be memorable”
Well Yunjin wasn’t technically lying when she said memorable. She took you to a beautiful Italian restaurant, then surprising you with a bouquet of roses, and finally taking you on a walk by the beach where the moon shined bright.
Of course it wasn’t gonna just end there.
Because now you found yourself riding your girlfriend’s big cock in your hotel room. Both of your clothes thrown somewhere you’d have to dig through later but right now you were focused on milking your sexy girlfriend and the way she was STILL looking at you with those boba eyes.
“F-Fuck, stop looking at me like that” you moaned.
“Mmm, can’t help it. My girl is just so pretty riding me”
Your eyes rolled to the back of your head as you clawed onto her shoulder harder, feeling the tip of her dick reach deeper into your pussy. “You drive me crazy, baby”
Not needing to say another word, Yunjin quickly admired the hickeys she scattered all over your neck and collarbones, then giving into her cravings of your lips. She made the kiss slow, letting her tongue work around yours and felt the movement of your hips falter.
But your tone got louder, shamelessly moaning into your girlfriend’s mouth that some of your saliva went down your chin.
“Tired, Princess?” She whispered into your mouth.
You nodded at her, being enough of a sign for Yunjin to lift you up and make you lay face first and ass up. You supported your balance by leaning on your elbows and looking back at your girlfriend who rubbed your ass and inserting her fat cock back inside your sopping cunt.
“A-Ah!”
“Always tight for me aren’t you, Y/n? My good girl”
You moaned into the sheets from the use of your name instead of her usual nickname for you. One of the things you loved so much about Yunjin was how different she was during sex. She can be vanilla if she wanted to, but Yunjin thought where the fun was in that?
She loved making you wither under her touch. Hearing you cry for her name and beg for her to please you in all the right ways.
“Mmhm right there baby!” You screamed at the inhumane pace Yunjin was going at, the slapping sounds echoing throughout the room (and probably even outside the entire hotel).
Yunjin towered her body over your back and trailed kisses at your jaw, feeling her smile against your skin. “Your pussy is sucking me in so nice, baby. Gonna fill it up with so much of my cum. You’d like that wouldn’t you?”
You nodded, clearly too tired to properly answer and the abrupt hold on your jaw made your eyes go wide. Yunjin squeezed your mouth open. “Open up and tongue out, darling”
Doing so, the red head spat on your tongue and forcefully closed your mouth before holding your throat. “Swallow.”
She hummed in satisfaction at your obedience, the knot in her stomach growing. “Hmm fuck, gonna cum Princess”
“Yes yes please cum in me, Yunnie” you mumbled with tears.
Yunjin was panting in your ear before releasing an aggressive groan, her hips snapping in a harsh but slower pace as she reached her peak. You felt the warm flood of cum fill your needy pussy to the brim, Yunjin then slowly pulling herself out to watch your creamy pussy leak.
“So hot” you exhaled, using two fingers to scoop the liquid and popping them into your mouth. “So tasty”
Yunjin guided you to lay your body down with your head on her chest, then pulling the covers over your sweaty bodies. She kissed your head and spent a few minutes helping you calm down by rubbing circles on your back. “You okay, bebby?”
“Yeah. We haven’t fucked in so long, I almost passed out”
“I missed you so much, bebby. Sorry we haven’t been going out lately”
You shook your head and placed multiple kisses on your girlfriend’s face. “Don’t apologise, my love. We still call all the time so just hearing your voice brings me satisfaction”
Yunjin smiled at your words. “Did you want to join us tomorrow? We won’t show your face on the cameras. As long as I’m with you, I don’t care about anything else”
“You know I have a photoshoot tomorrow, babe and plus I think your fans will go on a killing spree if they see us together”
Yunjin pouted. “I won’t let them touch you, bebby. I’ll use my magic force field to protect you”
You laughed into her neck and pinched her sides. “You’re such a dork”
“A dork you’re super in love with, am I right?” She wiggled her eyebrows.
“Yes. A dork I’m super duper in love with”
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ragingbookdragon · 5 months ago
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Part of her duties required her to hear the calls of her people. Simon’s words rang true when many of her subjects blessed her at the foot of her throne and thanked her for the food and help she provided. Other times, she was forced to listen to the nobles and children of nobles boast and puff their chests like birds attracting a mate. One moment has stuck out to her when a group of rough looking men entered the hall and she felt a sickening feeling gather when she watched John and Kyle stand up straight from the windows they were leaning on; more so, when she felt Simon and Jonathan come to the left and right of her throne side and stand.
The leader, she assumed from the way he swaggered up to her throne, gave a showy bow. “Your Majesty,” he greeted with a disgusting tone and look in his eye. “It’s a pleasure to be in such a glorious and dignified hall.”
She ignored the desire to have them thrown out on their rears, and lifted her chin, replying calmly, “The pleasure is mine. Might I ask what you’ve come to me in request of?”
“Well,” he drawled out. “My men and I,” he gestured to the men behind him and then himself. “Have been doing an excellent job of keeping your border on the west end clean of ruffians and bandits.”
“I wasn’t aware I had commissioned a new squad of knights,” she answered, arching an elegant brow on her forehead. “Might I ask who your captain is?”
The man’s chuckle was anything but amusing. “Oh, we’re not knights. We’re simply concerned...citizens.”
“Ah, I suspect I shall see more armed citizens soon, then?”
“Perhaps,” he smiled. “My Lady.”
“So, what do you require of me?”
He took another step up but stopped when Kyle and John appeared and held out their arms, effectively blocking him. “Quite the group of knights you command, Your Majesty.”
“They are,” she affirmed. “What do you want from my kingdom? Gold? Land? Titles?”
“Well, if we are going to continue to protect the border, we’d like to know it’s going to be repaid.”
“I’ve never heard of your group before. Why would I repay such?”
“We are good. Better than even your knights.”
She hummed low and waved a hand; a young woman appeared with a golden cup and a pitcher, and she took the wine goblet. “Thank you, Laeneris.”
“Your Majesty,” the woman bowed and stepped down with the pitcher.
“I will offer amnesty, but I will send my own knights to see how you protect my kingdom. You will fight for my kingdom and my people. You will fight for me.” She took a sip of her wine. “I will give you one day to decide.” Waving a hand, she said to a man in the side hall, “Amnie, a few rooms in the inn in town for our…guests.”
The leader gazed at her as the men behind him laughed and cheered with one another; he regarded her with a curious and lewd expression. “Show me your cunt. I want to see if it’s worth fighting for.”
Simon was already drawing his long sword and down a half step when she simply raised a finger. “You are in my throne room. In my castle. And are going to be staying in my inn. You do well to remember as such.” She looked behind his men. “You have a decision to make, and I have more subjects to hear.”
He smirked and nodded his head. “Of course, Your Majesty. I thank you for your hospitality.” He turned and walked past Laeneris, pausing to slap her rear hard; she jumped and made a face as he muttered, “I’ll find you tomorrow evening.”
As they walked off, she leaned back in her throne. “Ser Simon?” she narrowed her gaze on the man’s back. “When you meet them on the border…kill that one first.”
Simon’s gaze darkened behind the visor as he sheathed his sword, and he assured, “Gladly, Your Grace.”
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neerons · 5 months ago
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Some of Gilbert von Obsidian's best quotes
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[Warning: Heavy spoilers about Gilbert's route]
"Ahaha, what is the prince of Obsidian, if not rotten?"
"I hate people."
"No matter how hard I try not to, I can't help but be gentle with her. What kind of villain am I?" (—Gilbert talking about Emma to himself)
"(...) I hope you don't accidentally end up calling me 'big bro' or anything." (—Gilbert to Leon)
"(...) You were just saying what you really think. I don't think doing that is rude. And it's true I'm someone scary."
"I like you because you're so warm, little rabbit."
"Ahaha! You're so sassy. But I like that about you."
"I want to make things awkward for you."
"You can't just focus on the best of someone while ignoring the worst of them."
"If you were a bother, I'd kill you, so don't worry." *smile intensifies*
"...I'm no match for that pure, innocent gaze of yours. You're the only one capable of pushing me around, you know."
"Depending on what you say next, I might just take your head clean off." (—Angry Gilbert to Emma)
"(...) You nearly died. ...Do you have any idea how much that chilled me to the core?"
"The only thing I can ever be for you is a villain. ...Unfortunately."
"...Thank you. I almost got murdered by some dust."
"If you keep on lying over and over about being fine, I might just... Well, you can guess, right?"
"I found it in a book in the little rabbit's room. They need to understand what happens to them if they try to interfere with what's mine... Don't they?" (—Gilbert talking about a poisoned needle targeting Emma to Roderic)
"You said it, remember? You said you wanted me to learn to love Rhodolite. To me, you are Rhodolite."
"Those born with status have the right to do whatever they like to those who are lesser than them. That's what you want to say, isn't it? (...) Hmm? What's that? You look a little distressed for some reason. But I suppose that's no surprise. You see, I have the right to tyrannize you however I please, just as you tyrannized those children who had no one to protect them. I'm imperial royalty, and you're just a third-rate aristocrat. So I'm going to have to teach you just how different our social positions are... Aren't I? (...) Aren't you lucky that we're in Rhodolite? You've narrowly escaped death. If this was Obsidian, you'd be dead for sure. After all, we have no need for disgusting nobles who defile the purity of children." (—Gilbert to a Baron of Rhodolite)
"Wait, so you're telling me you baked cookies for another man, even though I'm right here. Ouch, that hurts."
"(...) if by chance I run into your dear papa, he'll kill me." (—Gilbert talking about Akatsuki)
"Welcome to Obsidian. (...) I introduced myself as Gilbert von Obsidian, didn't I? There's only one person in this country allowed to use the Obsidian name. And that's the emperor."
"There's nothing about you or me that makes one of us intrinsically inferior or superior to the other. Humans are all basically the same. And naturally, from a societal perspective, we probably need people who can take the lead. People who are capable, and talented, who can bring others together, and build a better tomorrow. That's a healthy way to be. I'm the ruler of a country that knows deception and decay all too well, so I understand better than most. That's why my ideal, my ambition, is to conquer all the royalty that have infested this whole continent, and free the people who are under their control."
"I wrote that story based on you. (...) Akatsuki told me a lot of stories about you, and they were always stories about you showing love and affection for others. He made it sound like you believed that the true nature of people is love, and that the happiness of others was what made you the happiest. The idea of living like that was repulsive to me, but at the same time, it made me curious. I got to wondering what sort of choices you'd make, if you were in the same position I was."
"You were bullying small children to amuse yourselves. That Rhodolitian might have stopped at just punching you, but I'm not that kind. Did I make military regulations or didn't I? And do those regulations say attacking non-combattants is forbidden, or don't they?" (—Gilbert to Obsidianite soldiers)
"Then how about you call me papa?" (—Gilbert to Luke)
"...Don't go. (...) I don't know... if I can hold on... until you get back. Being on my own... is lonely..."
"...You're the only one I'll ever love."
"I'm taking your daughter." *smile intensifies* (—Gilbert to Akatsuki)
"I'm not oppressing you with my power, it's just my love for you, overflowing."
"You can't do things like this with other men... Unless you want to see dead bodies."
"You're liked by everybody. A lot of the princes helped you out today. That's because people adore you, and they naturally want to help you out. They're all beasts with strong characters, but you're important to all of them. Do you know how rare that is? That means you're charming to everyone you meet. ...Including me, of course."
"There's no way I'd ever let anyone else kill you. It has to be me."
"I can't just bare my body for free."
"I've never liked seeing you clothe your body in things that other people have put their hands all over."
"Don't force yourself to talk. I'm not so narrow-minded that I'll go around saying you're disrespectful just because you didn't thank me. You're sick; you're supposed to just drink medicine and sleep."
"Wah, boohoo. I can't believe we were on different pages this whole time. I've given you my entire heart, and yet, look at what you've done with it! (...) Waaah, I'm so heartbroken that the only thing that could bury my sadness is world domination!"
"For his sake, I'm going to pretend I didn't hear him call me 'eyepatch bastard'. Rude." (—Gilbert's thoughts about Silvio)
"Her ability to right what was wrong, purify what was once sullied... It runs at complete odds with my nature. I may have truly met my match." (—Gilbert's thoughts about Emma)
"I blinked a few times as my vision seemed to expand all at once... and the little rabbit become clearer and even more beautiful." (—Gilbert's thoughts about Emma)
"I'm never letting you go. If you run away from me, I'll conquer the whole world and follow you to the ends of the earth if that's what it takes. No wait... I just need to control your heart, so that you'll never even want to leave me." (—Gilbert's thoughts about Emma)
"We all approach life differently. Chevalier slices hearts in two. I trample on them. But, you... You respect them."
"I wanted to see you bawling your eyes out."
"You're... the most beautiful thing I've ever seen."
"I like the little rabbit very much, you see. So I certainly hope that bold declaration of yours doesn't end up turning into a lie." (—Gilbert to Silvio, in Silvio's route)
"I'm not interested in the average woman. There's someone that caught my eye when I was young." (—Gilbert talking to Silvio, Rio, Keith, Sariel and Emma)
"You like these stories, don't you? Ones where a lowly village girl falls in love with a big, bad emperor and makes him change his ways—"
"It's a good thing I was born with a pretty face. If I looked scary without even trying, it would almost be TOO perfect."
"Keith, if you get tired, we can swap places. (...) Shame, Daddy says we can't." (—Gilbert talking about carrying Emma instead of Keith, but is stopped by Sariel)
"I was able to find some... treasure too, so I'm very satisfied with today." (—Gilbert most probably talking about Emma to the other princes and Emma)
"What? You'd like some new heads to decorate the castle's gates?" (—Gilbert to Emma telling him she wants friends)
"After a while of being betrayed over and over again, you start thinking to yourself. That maybe the world would be a better place if everyone who wasn't your friend just dropped dead."
"I know her. But only in fantasy. Because there's no way an Obsidianite royalty can have anything to do with a mere bookstore worker. (...) Die without meeting her? Or die after meeting her. Well, that's easy. I prefer the latter in that case." (—Gilbert's thoughts about Emma)
"I tried to hold down my excitement as I knocked softly on the door. (...) The door opened softly, revealing a woman that was different from what I had imagined. Strange. I thought she'd be more childish looking based on his stories. Her eyes that looked directly at me were clear and devoid of any baseless optimism. She was clearly a woman, not a child. I smiled to carefully hide my surprise. (...) She's purer and prettier than I imagined." (—Gilbert's thoughts about meeting Emma for the very first time)
"Oh, I get it. You think I was with another woman, don't you? Ahaha, you get jealous so easily. But don't worry, I only see you.If it would make you feel better though, I could always kill each and every single woman that gets close to me."
"...And so we've decided to officially hold our wedding ceremony. Can we count on your blessing, papa?" (—Gilbert to Akatsuki)
"You're much more important to me than family, you know. (...) After all, you're still alive, aren't you? I wouldn't kill you no matter what you did."
"I really do love you. And it's because I love you that I want to look good in front of you, and hide the things that I don't want you to see." (—Gilbert talking about his health condition to Emma)
"Do you know how long I've been wanting to officially bind you to me?" (—Gilbert's thoughts)
"Oh, that hurts... I just wanted to shower my beloved fiancee with my love, but I guess you don't want to... I'm absolutely heartbroken now. I might just have to go out and conquer one of the neighboring countries just to soothe myself."
"You're my type of lady. Do you know why? (...) I, for one, enjoy the rebellious, sassy look you always have in your eyes. I feel this strong will— that you will never bow down to me. That even though you're terrified, you won't run away."
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nyrandrea · 1 year ago
Text
Everything's Fine
As you try to deal with everything that has been thrown at you so early into your journey: forced leadership, mindflayer tadpoles and taking on everybody's personal problems, it all just gets a bit too much for you.
(Takes place during Act 1)
Word Count - 3.5k
Also available to read here on AO3!
Enjoy!
xxx
You felt your patience starting to wear incredibly thin when you realised Astarion had been staring at you for over five minutes now. 
Not directly, he would never be so conspicuous—at least, not intentionally— but you kept catching those fleeting glances he was throwing your way; the corners of his red eyes crinkling every so often before returning to whatever book he was pretending to read. It wasn’t one of those charming, smouldering gazes he would sometimes give you after a night of feeding, asking if you were alright, knowing full-well that your answer was a resounding ‘I’m fine’, and that you would provide for him again soon. 
No, what he was doing right now—very carefully—was scanning you, studying you,  judging you. It was as if he was trying to leer right through to your very soul. 
You almost had half a mind to stomp over to his tent and demand what his problem was, but there were other unfortunate issues to contend with. 
Namely Shadowheart and Lae'zel. 
“I already told you that the artefact is my responsibility,” Shadowheart said, her aloof demeanour and confident tone betrayed by the hand hovering over the hilt of her dagger. “This way it will protect us all, I thought we had already established that!” 
“We have established nothing,” Lae’zel hissed back. “We only agreed not to slit each other’s throats in the night, though...,” she grimaced. “I still have no reason to trust that you will not try again.” 
“At least there’s still some sense in that bullish head of yours.” 
“Tsk!” Lae’zel spat at Shadowheart’s feet, much to the latter’s disgust as she recoiled back. “However, the matter still stands that the relic you hold onto belongs to my people. Therefore, it should be in my possession!” 
The cleric sneered. “I would sooner slit my own throat.” 
“Then go right ahead. Nobody will stop you.” 
Rubbing at your temples to try and ease the incoming migraine that, for once, was not caused by the mindflayer parasite living rent-free in your head, you decided to step in-between the two women, not really caring about risking a gutting from their trigger-happy blades. 
“C’mon, we’re not seriously having this fight again?” You huff incredulously, the question already sounding stupid as soon as it left your mouth. Because of course they were having this fight again. They had it yesterday, and the day before that, and they were probably going to have it tomorrow as well. 
“We are, as it happens,” Shadowheart replied, her eyes flickering briefly to you before narrowing forward again. “Because this savage bitch won’t leave me alone!” 
Lae’zel bared her teeth in a cruel grin. “Better to be that than a revrykal of Shar.” 
At the mention of her Goddess’s name, Shadowheart practically lunged herself towards Lae’zel with an enraged scream, her dagger raised high with the intention of plunging it straight into the githyanki’s chest, who in turn raised her shield to protect herself. In that moment, you were nothing to them but a speck of dust in the wind. 
It wasn’t until your hand shot up in a blind panic when Shadowheart realised what she was doing, forcing her to suddenly pull back to avoid injuring you, only a moment too late as her knife slashed the palm of your hand. Blood sprayed across the ground as your short but pained cry echoed throughout the camp. 
“Oh Gods...” Shadowheart muttered as everyone was suddenly on their feet and crowded around the three of you in a matter of moments. “I-I’m so sorry, I didn’t... mean to...!” 
“What? Attempt to kill our leader in cold blood?” Lae’zel muttered as she took your trembling hand to examine it, you only stared ahead as the shock took a moment to wear off. You didn’t even register her uncharacteristically gentle touch as she turned your palm up. “Only a flesh wound, you will live.” 
“Still,” Astarion piped up from behind. “Perhaps it would be best to get that dressed up lest you attract any...*ahem* unsavoury visitors.” 
“It would seem we already have,” Lae’zel replied, to which the vampire put a hand up to his chest in mock offence. 
“Lae’zel, you depreciate me,” he pouted. “I’m hurt.” 
Astarion’s sudden cold grasp on your wrist startled you as he decided to examine the cut himself in a much less gentle manner than Lae’zel. “Not that I would be able to get much from this anyway, even if I tried.” 
You were slightly worried that he was pondering the idea the longer he stared at the wound; you could practically see him drooling. It wasn’t until you cleared your throat that he snapped out of his daze. 
“Well, we should probably get this cleaned up anyhow,” he finally said. “To avoid infection and whatnot.” 
“...You’re not gonna lick it clean, are you?” Karlach asked with a grimace. 
“Of course not!” Astarion bit back, much more flustered this time. “I’m not some savage beast, you know.” 
“That’s... debatable,” Gale piped in. 
“Well! It’s lovely to know that you all think so little of me; the feeling is very much mutual,” Astarion said with a fake smile before taking you by the shoulder. “Now, if you’ll all excuse me, I’ll have to nurse this poor wounded soul, as well as my pride.” 
He started guiding you away from the rest of the group, you only allowed him to because the whole situation had you in a bit of a daze, but not before Shadowheart tried to get in another “I’m... I’m sorry.” 
“It’s... I’m fine,” you replied with whatever level of composure you could muster up with a smile in a small attempt to reassure her before allowing yourself to be led towards Astarion’s tent. Your words seemed to satisfy her as Shadowheart returned a sorrowful but grateful nod, though her expression turned sour when Karlach stepped between her and Lae’zel. 
“Alright now, ladies, what do you two say we let out our pent-up aggression towards each other in a healthier and less murder-y way, huh?” The tiefling suggested before holding up her finger to not let the other two get a word in edgewise. “And before you ask, I will not be taking no for an answer.” 
A small smile graced your lips at Karlach’s enthusiastic yet surprisingly pragmatic way of taking charge, and it seemed to be working as Shadowheart and—to your utter astonishment—Lae’zel agreed to whatever training regimen she had in store for them.  
‘Perhaps Karlach should take over as leader...’  
The idea was extinguished as soon as it had entered your mind, replaced with thoughts of the tiefling messing everything up, of her killing you in your sleep, that you shouldn’t trust her to lead your party. The only one who should have any authority over these subordinates is you. Only you are worthy. 
The voice quieted down after a few moments, leaving you only with a pounding head—just another one of the many wonderful side-effects of the parasite. 
You didn’t take any heed of whatever thoughts the tadpole forced upon you. You knew that Karlach would never hurt you, or any of the others for that matter—not by choice, anyway. However, those flashes of betrayal and blood were starting to wear you down a bit, especially with the lack of sleep; the very notion of it had been non-existent since you escaped the nautiloid and accepted the leadership that everyone had practically forced upon you. 
You weren’t exactly a natural-born leader; hell, you barely managed to keep yourself alive never mind a whole group of people. 
“That’s going to need stitches,” Astarion said as he observed your hand more closely now that the two of you were in the privacy of his tent. Heat flushed around your cheeks at how close the two of you were. Flashes of that night you had shared a bed—or well, the forest floor—came to mind, and you hated how flustered it made you. It was a one-night stand, a bit of fun to ease the stress of adventuring; clearly it meant nothing. At least... that was what you were made to feel. 
What had been a night of passion for you, had been the same old dance for him. 
“Take a seat there,” Astarion’s said, his voice cutting through your thoughts like a knife. “I should have a needle around here, somewhere.” 
“You know how to sew?” You asked, settling down on a cushioned stool. 
“Don’t sound so surprised,” he said, and a sting of guilt surged in your chest. “How do you think I’ve kept these clothes looking so good for over two hundred years? Certainly not by magic.” 
“Why not just buy new clothes?” 
Your prodding seemed to hit a nerve as he paused for a moment. 
“Why waste the coin?” He finally replied, sounding a little dejected. 
“Sorry,” you said, biting your lip as you tried to think of a way to quickly rectify your carelessness. “You do look great, by the way—y-your clothes, I mean,” embarrassment takes over as you trip over your own words. “The gold embroidery is um *cough * it’s nice.” 
Astarion seems amused at your inability to grasp basic English as he chuckles, the sound deep and almost musical. “Why thank you, darling. I’m glad someone around here appreciates the finer details.” 
The vampire kneels next to you and threads the needle before gesturing for you to hold out your hand. “It has been a while so... let’s just hope I’m not too rusty, hm?” 
Those words don’t instil a great deal of confidence within you, but you won’t allow it to show, trusting in him to get the job done. If you ended up getting sepsis, well... Withers was always on stand-by. 
“Now, hold still,” Astarion instructed. “This may sting a little.” 
You nodded, only wincing a little when he made the first stitch, the pain became more bearable as you watched him focus with the kind of laser-like precision that only came with a practiced hand; it made you wonder how many times he had done this. His methodical movements almost lulled you into a sort of relaxed trance, had your mind have not been working overtime, you honestly might have fallen asleep: Gods know you could have done with a bit of shut eye. 
Ever since the ship crashed, your problems just seemed to keep piling on top of each other: Lae’zel was hellbent on getting to that githyanki creche, and there was the matter of Karlach’s engine, Gale was close to blowing to kingdom-come if he didn’t get another magical item to consume soon, Astarion would probably need another feeding at some point, not to mention the dog, Scratch, and the owlbear cub who had started hanging around the camp. A dog was one thing but how much did owlbears need to eat?  
It was fine, you reassured yourself. Everything would be fine. 
“There we go,” Astarion said, relinquishing your hand back, freshly stitched and cleaned. The pain was still there, dull and throbbing, but it wasn’t anything a quick healing spell couldn’t fix. 
“Not my best work but it will just have to do for now,” he huffs, as if he was annoyed with himself. “You’ll have to excuse the sloppy stitching, it’s... been a while.” 
“It’s beautiful work,” you can’t help but admire the stitching; it was flawless. “Thank you, Astarion.” 
His gaze remains on you for a moment, as if he were expecting some sort of quip or punchline, and his eyes widen slightly when he realises you’re being genuine. 
“I... uh... you...?” He pauses and squints; still nothing. “You are... most certainly welcome.” 
You raise an eyebrow; did he really think so lowly of you that he believed you simply weren’t capable of a simple 'thank you'? Or was it himself that he had no confidence in? Your thoughts turn to when you asked him about how he came about becoming a vampire. Astarion kept most of his history closed off from you but told you just enough to let you know that this ‘Cazador’ fellow had treated him poorly. Belittled him. Enslaved him. 
You couldn’t begin to imagine how horrible it must have been; no wonder he didn’t trust anyone. 
A part of you wanted to pry into his thoughts, to let him know that you were here for him should he ever want to talk, but a new figure entered the tent, startling you into closing your mouth. 
“Hello!” Gale cheerily greeted with a smile, his eyes latching onto you immediately. “How are we feeling?” 
“Oh, we’re feeling quite dandy, thank you,” Astarion interjected with a frown. “You didn’t think to knock before deciding just to barge in?” 
“Well, given the materialistic structure of this very sound establishment, I think you’ll find it’s a little difficult to uh...” Gale trailed off, attempting to rap the tent flap to no avail. “...knock on.” 
“Then why not just knock on the wooden beams with that...” The vampire waved lazily towards Gale’s staff. “Very large stick of yours.” 
“Duly noted, but I think we’re getting a bit off track here,” the wizard said before turning to you. “I need a word.” 
You were taken aback slightly by his bluntness, and you couldn’t help but notice the almost pained way he was wringing his hands and how his eyebrows subtly twitched. He looked incredibly... uncomfortable. 
His hand hovered over his chest briefly, just above the mark that glowed whenever he consumed magic. 
Shit. Was it that time already? But hadn’t you given him something only yesterday? Or had it been a few days now? With recent events, it was hard to keep track of the time anymore; day and night just meshed into one big messy blur. 
Judging by your panicked look, Gale held up his hands in a placating manner. “Now, I know you’ve had a lot on your plate recently but this little uh... situation of mine is growing quite dire again so... if you could just relinquish whatever magical artefact you have, then all will be fine and dandy.” 
“I... don’t have anything on me at the moment.” 
Gale’s expression dropped. “Come now, you must have picked up something along the way, surely?” 
You grimaced. 
“In a dungeon? Along the road? What about that little goblin camp you rampaged through recently?” 
His sudden passive-aggressiveness made you feel uneasy. 
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Astarion cut in, folding his arms. “But we were a bit preoccupied with fighting for our lives to be on the lookout for any magic boots for you to chew on.” 
Gale chuckled dryly and drew the vampire a dirty look. “I don’t think you quite understand the gravity of what might very well happen if I don’t find something to contain the beast within me very soon- “ 
“Don’t threaten me with a good time, darling.” 
“This isn’t a joking matter!” 
“Ugh! Just shut up!” You snapped. “I do get it, Gale. Because you remind me Every. Damn. Day. About this big, scary, mystery catastrophe that might happen without actually explaining anything about it! A bit of context would go a long way!” 
Gale’s hurt wince suddenly had your stomach churning in guilt; you shouldn’t be snapping at people; you were better than that. 
“I’m sorry,” you quickly apologised. “As soon as we’re out on the road again, I’ll make it our priority to look for an artefact for you, alright? You have my word.” 
Astarion scowled and Gale forced a smile; his lips too strained for it to be genuine. It seemed like you couldn’t please anyone today. 
“That’s all I can ask for, and I promise... all will be revealed soon, otherwise the tadpoles will be the least of our worries.” 
When Gale left, you plopped down to the ground and took ragged breaths to calm your nerves, you couldn’t help but feel a pang of hurt as you nestled your injured hand in your lap. Had Gale only checked in on you so he could ask you for a magic item in return? Was he really that desperate? He must have been, seeing as you had completely forgotten about his predicament. 
What kind of leader were you? 
“You know, you can’t go making promises all willy-nilly like that,” Astarion said. “We have enough problems as it is without having to worry about...” 
His chastising faded into white noise as you grasped your head, the sting of your fingers curling and tugging through unkempt hair was just enough to distract from the pounding that came from within your brain. The ability to focus was suddenly lost to you as your heart raced, and dark emotions swirled within your chest like a wild tornado; it was tempting to let them sweep you away, to ride the waves into the unknown. To be anywhere but here without anyone depending on you for so, so much.  
“Hello?” Astarion drawled. “Are you even listening to- Darling...?” 
He moved closer to you; his steps measured and deliberate as he lowered himself down next to you, still allowing you enough space while being close enough to reach out a hand to your trembling shoulder, his touch cold yet oddly comforting. 
“Hey,” he spoke in a soothing, soft tone, his crimson eyes locking onto yours with unwavering support. “I’m right here with you, you’re safe, just breathe along with me, alright?” 
You nodded, albeit shakily, and tried to mirror his calm, measured breaths, inhaling deeply and exhaling slowly, attempting to regain control over your racing heart. 
Astarion’s voice never wavered as your frantic gasps slowly started to synchronise with his calm breathing. “I know things are tough right now, but these feelings will soon pass. You’re stronger than you think, darling.” 
He continued to gently rub your back, tracing comforting circles with his fingertips, a rhythm that matched the cadence of your breath. Your hands slowly unlatched from your hair as you felt Astarion’s reassuring presence and honeyed words grounding you. 
“There we go, you’re regaining control,” he encouraged softly. “Now, I’m going to get you a glass of water, will you be alright for a moment?” 
You nodded again, and with a quick squeeze of your shoulder, he left. As your panic attack started to ebb, your breathing evened and your heart slowed as you felt yourself returning to the present moment, the tension that had your body rigid starting to ease. 
Astarion was back by your side within moments, gently pushing a glass into your hand and helping you lift it to your lips for a small sip of water, the cool liquid soothing your parched throat. 
“How do you feel?” 
“I’m-” 
“And don’t you dare say ‘I’m fine’,” he scowled. "Because we both know you’re clearly not.” 
You racked your brain to try and find a way to explain that you were okay and that this was just a small moment of weakness, a blip in the road, that there was nothing to worry about and you had it all figured out. 
But the words never came, instead you draw your knees up and hug them close to your chest as if to hide away from his piercing gaze. 
Astarion lingers by your side for a moment, his expression unreadable. 
“Would you like to stay in here for a while?” 
Unable to find the energy to speak, you simply nod. 
“Then come on, scooch over.” 
As you shuffle slightly to the side, Astarion sits down next to you, draping an arm over your shoulder and allowing you to settle your head into his side and cling to his shirt in a way that a child might cling to their mother. 
“...I’m sorry." 
From the corner of your eye, you could see Astarion’s expression soften as he waved a nonchalant hand. “Oh, you have nothing to be sorry for, dear. If anything, I should be the one apologising, who knew being in my mere presence would be so breathtaking?” 
You managed a small chuckle at that. 
“But in all seriousness,” he continued. “I know a thing or two about putting on a façade and... well...,” he paused. “Just... know that if you ever want to talk, I’m all pointy ears.” 
You hum in acknowledgement, though you can tell by his undertone that he’s being disingenuous, kindness wasn’t exactly his forte after all, but you appreciated the attempt all the same. But you were just content to sit in his arms for a while, and he seemed pleased enough with the silence. So, for now, you inhale the comforting aroma of bergamot, rosemary and brandy, letting yourself get lost in his comforting presence. 
And exhale. 
xxx
Hellooooo Baldur's Gate 3 has me in a chokehold and the brainrot is real. I'm only in Act 1 hence why this fic takes place so early in the game but this idea wouldn't leave me alone so here we are. Apologies for any inconsistencies :'3 Let me know what y'all think!
*Edit - since this has been pretty well received, I've opened up requests! Pop me an ask if you would like one :)
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xzaddyzanakinx · 7 months ago
Text
Not That Kind of Guy
Part Twelve: Stalker!Anakin Skywalker × femme reader series
Warnings: stalking, weirdo behavior, psychotic/delusional behavior, possessive/protective, sexism/misogyny, sexual content/fantasizing, pervy behavior, panty/scent kink, mask kink (Ghostface), gaslighting/manipulation, spitting, cumplay, nude vids/pics, masturbation, domesticity kink, oral, PIV, dick piercing, forced orgasm, semi-public, bondage, blindfolds, biting/slapping/spanking, squirting, cumming untouched, NONCON/DUBCON/CNC, Somno, murder/blood/gore/drugs(referenced), knife, GEN. SMUT[Be sure to pay attention to future warnings in the series]
Info: Anakin is so full of himself that he’s somehow tricked himself into a bit of emotional maturity, Anakin has blooming bromance, post murder sex spree [diary entries from Ani] extremely not proofread. MDNI 18+
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Date
August 27th continued.
Anakin climbed through his living room window and shut it behind him, happily humming to himself as he shut and locked it behind him. He spread out two trash bags on the floor after rolling up the rug to get it out of his way.
Armed with a pair of scissors and a few gallon ziploc bags he went to work on the clothes he’d been wearing. Thankfully, he had enough sense to buy jeans and a hoodie from the Goodwill. He can’t fuck you in the clothes he killed a man in, that’s just gross. So he chopped up the fabric in little squares while watching an episode of Narcos for the irony of it.
He planned to drive around the city tomorrow and dump the remnants of his clothes down every sewer grate he could. He already said goodbye to his third favorite butterfly knife, having shoved it into a culvert on his way home. As well as his throwaway sneakers which he chucked into the murky water of the deep river that flowed beneath the bridge he trekked across to get home- the long way.
Anakin was a good citizen, he knew he couldn’t flush the drugs. He couldn’t dispose of them in the trash, he definitely couldn’t keep them, so he did what every responsible person would do: dumped them in the medical wastes slot at the CVS.
The cash on the other hand… over $2,000. That- that he could definitely keep.
With his mind cleared, soiled clothes squared away, and plan in place; he hit the shower and reveled in the faint metallic scent of blood that trickled down the drain. Mentally adding ‘new loofah’ to his to-do list, he scrubbed away at his skin with dawn dishsoap until he felt like his skin was screaming for him to stop. Then he used his favorite smell-good cedar soap, enjoying the steam of the scalding water pelting his back as he rinsed himself clean.
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Diary Entry: August 28th
I feel GOOD. I feel better, I feel fresh.
My worries went down the drain along with every scrap of evidence I created. Have you ever felt such a clear and palpable mental reset? I haven’t.
I haven’t had a single negative thought since my visit with Joel. It’s all been rainbows and shittin’ unicorns, I know what it’s like to live completely carefree now. I could go the rest of my life and suffer through whatever disaster life throws our way and do it with a fucking smile.
Gods I just love you. I love you so much.
You’re perfect. I don’t know how the hell you do it princess but you’ve found every possible way to improve my life and you don’t even know you’re doing it half the time! It’s like you know exactly what I need without ever speaking it aloud. You just let the pieces fall into place.
It was your idea to DoorDash the pizza, your choice to wear that slutty pajama set I love so much, your sunshiny predisposition that drew his attention and the bangin’ body that held it. Without that, all of it, I’d still be wallowing in the throes of despair at my untimely death via withering away.
But here I am, having a damn good day!
The only thing that would make it better is me fucking you like a jackrabbit on his third 5hr Energy. However, I love you and as much as I’d like to fuck you within an inch of your life, I will not. I have a hand that works perfectly fine and a plethora of porn starring you that I can drool over until I’ve sated myself enough to act like a semi-normal human.
How will I broach the subject of my unrequited love today? I don’t know. Am I worried about it? Hell no. I have faith in my goddess to deliver what I’m worthy of.
How will I look you in the eye after my late night escapade? With a fucking smile.
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Date
August 28th
You traded texts back and forth with Anakin all morning. Something had crawled under his skin and bit him with venomous lust, he’d sent you pretty pictures of his weeping cock, cum dribbling out and down the back of his hand. He’d texted, described in delicate detail what he’d like to do to you with the most vile and disgusting words to caress that sick little minx that lived inside your stomach.
He had you clenching around nothing, gushing slick behind the counter at the diner. Blushing deep, dusty rose petal red across your cheeks and creeping up under your shirt collar. You felt hot, your hands sweaty and mind flustered beyond belief. You hadn’t felt this sexually frustrated since Ghost had stopped torturing you in your sleep.
You were nervous and bashful around customers as if they could see straight through your polite voice and put together appearance. Underneath the confidence that you reserved for waiting tables was a deprived and thoroughly soaked cunt that controlled your every waking thought.
“Princess?” Anakin’s deep gravelly bedroom voice floated over the Formica countertop and wrapped you up in a warm embrace.
You looked up and saw the face of a desperate man. His pretty blue eyes had been completely swallowed up by his lust… love blown pupils. His normally calming cloud of energy was replaced by a jittery, buzzing storm of bottled up euphoria. He couldn’t wait to pop the cork and share it with you.
“Vigo?” Anakin’s voice cracked, his smile only growing bigger when your coworker popped his head around the kitchen door frame. “I’m stealing her.”
“Hey, you gotta clock out!” He shouted after you as Anakin gripped your wrist and whisked you out to his car. Vigo was already on his way to the time cards, punching it in for you to save himself the worry of you forgetting.
“Anakin what’s gotten into you?” You panted, trying to catch your breath while Anakin licked into your mouth and sucked the tip of your tongue. Kissing you as messily as he could short of drowning you via spit swap.
“Woke up missing you.” He groaned, nuzzling your breasts. His nose nudging the valley while he rubbed his cheeks against the swell, pushing them together with his splayed hands.
“Can’t help it.” He breathed out, biting your sensitive flesh through the fabric of your shirt.
“Ani.” You moaned, tugging his head away gently. “You already gave me a massive hickey.” He chuckled as you reminded him of the purplish bruise you’d attempted to cover with makeup.
“True.” He nodded, nipping you again anyway. “You could stand to have a few more though.”
“Shit, not now.” You shook your head and bucked up your hips, wiggling out of your jeans.
“Damn, that’s what I like to see sweetheart.” Anakin growled, smacking your ass lightly as he laid down in the back seat. “C’mere baby let me see my pussy.”
You giggled, complying and gingerly hovering over his mouth only to earn a frustrated groan from him.
“Goddamnit. I-I’ve never seen you this wet.” His eyebrows furrowed together as he looked up at you, his enlarged pupils snapping a mental picture of how beautiful you were from your position above him where you belonged.
Both hands suddenly gripped your hips and pulled you down on top of his face. He held on tightly, keeping you in place despite your concerns of suffocating him.
“Don’t care.” He moaned, thrusting his tongue up and swirling it around inside your entrance, the bridge of his nose rubbing your clit as he guided your hips to ride his face. “I’d be dying the happiest man on earth.”
“Oh my god.” You sucked in a sharp inhale, your palm smacking the headrest while your fingers hurt from the force of your grip on it.
“Mhmmmm.” You could feel his smug grin beneath you, even in this position he was able to establish dominance with just that crooked smirk and hard look to his eyes.
“Anakin…” moaning, you reached down to play with his hair, his mouth pulling your clit between his teeth to suck harshly, flicking his tongue at a fast pace in hopes to bring you to orgasm quickly. “Anakin please… s-slow.”
“Uh uh.” He shook his head with a chuckle, digging his fingertips into the fat of your ass.
“My pussy… my rules.” He mumbled, the words muffled and nearly incoherent.
He slurped and sucked, dragging his tongue in long stripes up your center, dipping the tip into your hole each time it passed over. He’d never eaten you so desperately, never had he sent you spiraling into orgasm this quickly. Heat traveled from your chest all the way to the tips of your ears, your hole quivering around his tongue darting in to lick up your cum.
“Ani- Anakin enough.” You whined, trying to get up but he just brought you back down and laved at you with just as much fervor.
“Please no… hurts.” You hiccuped, sensitive beyond belief and not ready for more in the slightest.
“Shhhh.” Anakin laughed, nibbling on your clit carefully, he slipped one hand beneath you, palm side up.
He tapped your hip and let you raise up for a moment to catch your breath, lasting less than a few seconds before he was one-armed manhandling you back over his face.
“Fuck yourself on my fingers while I watch baby.” He whispered, stroking your folds gently before prodding at your entrance.
“Oh sweet lord-“ he moaned loudly, watching your greedy pussy sink down on his fingers from below, your hole fluttering around the two digits.
“You’re so wet.” He whimpered, gazing up at you like you’d hung the moon just for him.
“All this for me?” He asked softly, as if he weren’t really sure what your answer would be.
“All for you Ani.” You nodded, brushing your knuckles across his cheek while he started pumping his finger inside slowly, stretching you out to take a third.
“Jesus, I don’t know what I wanna do.” He groaned, “I wish I could touch you all over all at once.”
He removed his fingers and brought them up for you to see the fruits of his labor, the creamy slick coated his fingers, stringing them together when he pulled them apart. He barely grazed your bottom lip with it before sucking it hungrily from his fingers.
“Goddamnit.” He moaned, pulling you back down with such force that you lost your balance and accidentally unlocked the car door, you giggled and quickly corrected your mistake, Anakin chiding you from below.
“Clumsy little brat.” He grinned, kneading your ass cheeks roughly.
His tone might’ve been playful but the look in his eyes was nothing short of predatory. He lapped at your glistening folds with the enthusiasm of a wildcat on a fresh kill, by the end of it he’d be sucking the bones dry.
Anakin hummed at the taste of you, groaning, babbling nonsense more to your cunt than to you:
“Tastes so good.”
“So pink and pretty for me.”
“Poor pussy just missed me so much huh? Is that why she’s crying?”
He switched up suddenly and had you frozen in place, your jaw dropped open as you let out a choked sob, tilting your head back to look at the car’s ceiling. He’d bit down on your raw and sore clit, peeling back the hood to tortuously bully it with kitten licks all while sucking as hard as he possibly could. It was too much, so much, all at once.
You were already so sensitive, you had already begged him to stop, now you had no words left, just pitiful whimpers as you bit down on your bottom lip hard enough to draw blood. Your legs quivered uncontrollably as goosebumps pricked your flesh, every hair standing on end as Anakin literally sucked you dry as you’d jokingly predicted.
He drew out a long and reedy noise from the depths of your chest, clawing it’s way through the fire in your lungs and past the torn skin on your lip. Creamy cum gushed from your core, coating his chin and neck.
The main course, what he was really after, was the hot juices that dribbled down the back of his throat as he sucked the nectar straight from the source. You would’ve worried you might drown him if you couldn’t visibly see his heavy breathing, feel and hear each desperate swallow and whimper. You could feel his stomach tensing along with his arms, his hands followed and closed into fists.
Turning his head to the side he bit down on your inner thigh, causing you to jolt and yelp, almost missing the way one of his hands flew to his crotch and squeezed his thick cock through his jeans, running his thumb over the fat, swollen tip as a small and sticky dark patch bloomed on his upper thigh.
“N-no no.” He whined, bringing you back down to his face, he carefully avoided your abused clit in favor of cleaning up your thighs and messy cunt, digging out every last drop of slick with his tongue.
“You… you are so fucking hot.” He panted, whimpering in pain when he sat up repositioned his cock.
“Did you-“
“Cum? Yeah.” He nodded sheepishly, stroking himself in his jeans for a moment before removing his hand and showing you the mess he’d made in his jeans.
“No way.” You whispered, a triumphant grin spreading across your lips.
“Yes.” He growled, shoving his hand between your thighs to wipe his cum off onto your spent pussy. “I don’t think you understand what you do to me sweetheart.”
“I’d pay good money to find a way to live inside your skin with you. Just to be close as I could get.” He said quietly, helping you back into your panties and jeans, wiping the excess cum onto the inside of his tshirt.
“I’d sell my soul just to breathe the same air as you if that’s what it took.” He said, pulling you into his lap and crushing you in a hug.
“You are like a Ghost that haunts every corner of my mind.” He whispered, licking the makeup off of your poorly hidden hickey.
Anakin didn’t miss the way you breathed in a sharp breath at his words it took a lot of willpower not to smile against your neck when he heard you audibly swallow with nervousness.
“I wake up and I think of you. I go to sleep and I dream of you.” His rough palms caressing the soft skin of your stomach. “Everything I see, everything I do, it all reminds me of you.”
“I wish you could see yourself through my eyes.” He said softly. “You’d never doubt yourself again.” His lips grazing your earlobe as he twirled a lock of hair around his finger, breaking the heavy tension by cracking a smile and tickling the tip of your nose with your hair.
He gently cupped your cheeks and brushed the pads of his thumbs across your cheeks and under your eyes. Staring at you with those unwavering black saucers in his eyes. If you didn’t know any better you’d think he’d done drugs. It’s unnatural for a human’s eyes to stay dilated for this long. But you knew Anakin, he was just high on you.
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Diary Entry: August 28th continued
I have so much energy and I don’t know what to do with it all. I might try bench pressing a school bus, I could probably make it move alittle. If I didn’t give myself a hernia first.
What I really need is more of you. I thought a little sweet treat might tithe me over but I was WRONG. I’m feeling a new kind of insatiable.
It’s time for Ghost to get back to his old tricks with a new accessory: my rarely worn tongue stud.
Man I love it though, it clacks against my teeth so good. I can hear it in my brain for like, minutes after I’ve done it. Such a satisfying sound. Its crisp.
Which is unfortunately the reason why I can’t wear it often anymore.
I click clacked it around my bottom row of teeth too much and the dentist made me promise not to do it anymore. Turns out abstinence is actually the best method when it comes to prevention. If it’s not in my mouth I can’t fuck up my teeth, but I can play with my lip piercings. Yeehaw I love a loophole.
Anywho. I feasted on my favorite meal today and I desperately need more before I actually go insane. I need to taste you. I need to feel you. I need to fuck you til I lose consciousness.
I want you to be awake though because as hot as it is to watch you cum in your sleep, it’s even hotter to see you reacting to the things I say. Deny it all you want baby but you’re my whore.
Ghost, Anakin, both. You’re willing to do anything for my cock.
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Date
August 28th continued.
Anakin can’t keep his hands to himself. It’s like he’s been corrupted by an incubus, he’s turned into an insatiable beast that just can’t stop. You’ve seriously considered the possibility that he may have somehow gotten his hands on some ecstasy and a suped up gas station boner pill.
Though logically you know exactly what is happening. He’s just giddy and feeling a weight lifted from his chest after confessing to you. It makes perfect sense. Carrying a secret like that is a burden, you know that very well by now.
Anakin is purely running off adrenaline fumes and endorphins. He’s burning it off the best way possible, by touching you in every direction, position, time, space and dimension that he can put you in.
He’s fucked you twice after taking you home from work today. Kitchen counter? From the back with your legs dangling helplessly, your sweaty skin sticking to the countertop. Coffee table? He pushed you down on it, swiping off the scattered items on it, including the freshly made sandwich and chips you’d brought him. He had said ’F-fuck… you’re just so sexy when you’re domestic.’
Right now on your third go around, he had finally, finally agreed to take you to the bed after you’d formed a triangle shaped bruise from the corner on the kitchen counter.
“M’sorry baby,” He whispered, licking away the dull pain on your hip from between your legs. “didn’t mean to.”
“I know Ani,” you breathed out, “it’s not your fault.”
“It is.” He nodded, pulling you toward the edge of the bed and gently helping you onto you hands and knees. “My poor girl.”
“You’re just so pretty. You’re so perfect. You’re so… you.” He sighed, standing behind and to the side of you to caress your injured hip.
His rough palm glided over the hot, sticky skin of your spine to brush your hair away. His free hand slowly tracing a delicate pattern across the plumped flesh of your ass, all five digits teasing the skin with tingling trails of warmth.
His lips caressed your tender skin up and down your side while he lovingly slipped a finger between your pussy lips. He groaned and made a fist between your shoulder blades to keep control of himself, your wetness feeding his need to be sheathed inside your warm and welcoming cunt.
“Pretty, pretty baby.” He whispered, his voice cracking while he brought his burning hot cheek down to rest against the swell of your ass, toying with his lip piercings to stifle a moan at the sloppy noises his pointer finger made on its descent into your depths.
“You’ve been so good for me.” He praised you, massaging your shoulder with one hand, kissing your ass cheek as he turned his head and rested the other side of his blushed face there, switching sides to watch your expressions change with each plunge of his finger.
“My little girl…” he growled, low and deep in his throat, “letting me take what I need.”
“Just wanted you to feel good Ani.” You sighed, gratefully accepting a second finger from him, feeling him twist his wrist back and forth with each slow thrust.
“Mmm, I did sweetheart.” He chuckled, “trust me, it’s hard to feel anything but heavenly when I’ve got my hands on you.”
“You’ve been so needy.” You whined, letting him guide your hand to your clit so you could rub yourself at your own pace along with his languid fingers.
“I know.” He clicked his tongue. “Are you okay sweetheart?”
“Course I’m okay.” You moaned, leaning back against his hand while his fingertips pressed and massaged your inner core.
“I put your poor little body through a lot today huh?” He cooed, switching his free hand over to your other shoulder to massage it the same as the other.
He smiled widely as he watched your face relax and felt your breathing slow into a steady rhythm. He felt proud. Proud of you, of himself, of his self control.
“Felt good Ani.” You whispered, your fingers tightening around the sheets in your fist while you rocked back onto his hand, fucking yourself on his fingers. “I needed it too.”
“That’s my girl.” He smiled, hearing the content sigh escape your lips. “You think you can cum for me again baby?” He asked softly, kissing the small of your back.
“N-no.” You whimpered, shying away from his gentle probing fingers.
“You sure sweetheart?” He asked, slowing his movements even further. “It’s okay baby, I just wanna make sure you’re taken care of.”
“M’sure.” You shook your head rapidly, “I can’t.”
“Okay baby.” He chuckled, “ready for me to stop then?” He asked.
“No… not yet.” You said quietly. “Lay with me?”
“Oh sure thing princess.” He grinned, removing his fingers just long enough for him to turn off your lamp and help you slide under the blankets, his nakedness pressed firmly against yours.
“Mm, you’re so warm,” you giggled, Anakin’s arms wrapping around you tightly while he kissed the nape of your neck, spooning you from behind.
“Cozy?” He asked with a gruff tone, slipping his fingers back into your messy pussy from behind to continue the slow and gentle caresses.
“So cozy.” You nodded. “I’m gettin’ sleepy.” You said tiredly.
“I figured so.” He nodded, his voice a soft whisper. “I’ll lay with you until it’s time for me to leave for work okay?”
“I’ll make sure everything is all locked up when I leave, I’ll kiss you bye.” He spoke low and soothingly as he gently rubbed your neck, removing his fingers from your folds when he heard your breathing slightly change.
“I’ll text you,” he whispered, sucking your slick from his fingers between words, not hiding his hard-on as it pressed against your ass. “when I get there and when I get back home. I’ll miss you so much until I see you again tomorrow.”
Soon enough you were deep in sleep and Anakin was glad he’d made you take your pills at dinner time, he’d thought ahead and considered the very real possibility that you’d end up being fucked to sleep.
He was right of course.
——————————————————————————
“Anakin what the hell man?” Trevor chortled shoving a handful of ice down the back of Anakin’s shirt in retaliation to the towel-whip he’d dealt Trevor.
“What? Can’t a guy be happy?” Anakin laughed.
“Happy? Nah you’re fucking hyper.” Trevor grinned. “What’d you do that’s got you feeling so good? Gimme some.” He teased.
“Shut up, the hardest thing I do is pot you know that.” Anakin snorted.
“Then what’s the deal?” Trevor splayed his own hand a few inches from his face.
“I’m love drunk baby.” Anakin waggled his eyebrows and shimmied his shoulders.
“Jesus I don’t even know you! Who are you and what have you done with my jackass?” Trevor grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him with a laugh, turning to pour a beer on tap for a patron.
“I ate him.” Anakin shrugged and giggled.
“I’m calling your girlfriend. I don’t know if I can be around you anymore.” April said, walking past the two of them with a serving tray.
“She needs a break from me, she’s very tired.” Anakin said with a proud grin.
“Oh my god!” April cackled and made a quick exit from behind the bar to serve drinks at a corner table.
“Fucking freak.” Trevor snickered.
“That’s what she said.” Anakin stuck out his tongue and flicked it with an impish grin.
After an hour or so the bar traffic grew stagnant and Anakin stepped out back for a cigarette, flicking his zippo out to light the flame and swinging in shut. Letting a curl of smoke leave his lips to breathe in through his nose. He leaned back against the brick wall with his legs crossed at the ankles, raising his arms above his head to rest his fists on his forehead.
He was looking up at the hazy city-light polluted night sky, searching for stars, when the back door swung open and Trevor stepped out with a bottle of beer for himself and one for Anakin.
“Trade me.” He grunted, sitting down on an old wood crate and holding out the beer bottle, two fingers extended for Anakin to sit a cigarette between.
“Yessir,” Anakin nodded, going so far as to light it for his friend.
“Anakin.” Trevor said thoughtfully. “Can I ask you something?”
“You just did.” Anakin said, tipping up the beer bottle and watching the amber liquid bubble as he took a gulp.
“Did you hate me?” Trevor asked. “When you first started here?”
“What? Pfft, no what are you talking about?” Anakin asked, pushing off the wall with his black leather boot.
“I don’t know, you’re just different.” Trevor said with a shrug. “You just seemed so… excuse my critique; cold and distant.”
“Criticism accepted.” Anakin nodded. “It’s true I guess.”
“Yeah? So what changed?” Trevor asked in curiosity, a rare moment of vulnerability shared between two male friends wasn’t to be wasted.
“Met a girl. Got my shit together.” Anakin said, flicking cigarette ash to the pavement. “I love her you know?”
“Do you?”
“Mhm.” Anakin nodded. “I told her. She hasn’t said it back yet.”
“Well damn I’m sorry man-“
“No don’t be. She’ll say it.” Anakin held up his hand to stop him. “She just ain’t ready to admit it that’s all.”
“How are you not all depressed and shit?”
“I was, but I realized… I don’t care.” Anakin said simply. “I don’t care how long it takes. I don’t care if I have to wait until I’m dead in the ground. I know she’ll tell me when she’s ready.”
“I had myself a bit of a freak out.” Anakin admitted, “but after I cooled off I’ve been… happier than I’ve ever been.”
“That why you’re all…” Trevor gestured to him with both hands.
“Yessir.” Anakin grinned.
“So you’re acting like you’ve won the fuckin’ lotto because your girl didn’t say she loved you?” Trevor raised his eyebrows.
“She doesn’t have to.” Anakin said, leaning back against the wall and crossing his arms, placing the cigarette between his lips, inhaling slowly. Grabbing it between his forefinger and thumb he brought it back down to his side and made an O with his lips, hollowing his cheeks and flicking the dip in his cheek to let a ring of smoke out.
“I know she does.” Anakin said, tilting his head back against the brick and letting it loll to the side to look over at Trevor. “She didn’t run off, she didn’t tell me to get lost, she laid there with me… pretty little head on my chest.” Anakin said, making a motion with his hand above his heart.
“Then today.” Anakin said, clicking his tongue with a smirk. “She sat on my face in the parking lot of the Bluebird during her break n’ let me fuck her all over the house when I got her home.”
“Jesus, here I was thinkin’ you were being sweet.” Trevor snorted, flicking his bottle cap so the it bounced off the toe of Anakin’s boot.
“If that doesn’t scream love I don’t know what does.” Anakin sighed contentedly, stubbing out his cigarette and dropping it into the designated rusty coffee can for cigarette butt.
——————————————————————————
“Hey, look Trev isn’t that the guy uh… the one who did that thing junior year of highschool?” April shouted over the din of the bar from the other end of the counter, pointing up to the smaller tv playing the news rather than the basketball game.
“Uh… hold on I can’t- I don’t have my glasses.” he said walking over and squinting, Anakin walking up behind him to look over his shoulder.
“Mm yeah that’s the guy they called- uh,” he thought for a second before snapping his right hand fingers and bringing his palm down on top of his fist, pointing up at the screen. “Duck! Didn’t they?”
“Yeah! Yeah, him.” April nodded, sucking on a lemon slice she’d dipped in sugar.
She turned back around and shook up the tumbler she was mixing a drink in, pouring it over two glasses and sliding it across the table to their owners.
“Why’d they call him that?” Anakin asked, wiping down the bar, before washing up some shot glasses.
“He’d duck his head up under the bleachers to look up girls skirts at the pep rallies.” Trevor said with a huff, “real shit guy.”
“Tried to sell my brother herbs instead of herb.” April turned around with an amused look on her face.
“Huh.” Anakin said, tonguing the inside of his cheek to hide a smirk. “Real shit guy indeed.”
“Surprised it didn’t happen sooner.” Trevor said with a chuckle.
“Why’s that?” Anakin asked, tossing his towel over his shoulder, rubbing his palms together while he sucked on the ball of one of his snake bites.
“Like I said, real shit guy.” Trevor scoffed. “Doubt they’re even looking too hard for the guys who did it.”
“Guys?” Anakin asked, furrowing his eyebrows.
“Yeah-“ he looked over his shoulder, “what’d it say April? Four of ‘em?”
“Yep.” She said, tossing her lemon rind in the trash.
“Damn.” Anakin shook his head.
“Yeah, the guy who ‘found’ him graduated with us too.” Trevor said, glancing back up at the tv and seeing it had switched over to the weather. “Supposedly it was a real mess, shit everywhere. Stole a bunch of stuff, some kind of drug related thing.”
“Well shit, poor guy.” Anakin shook his head, “that’d be a real nice thing to walk in on.”
“Well hell yeah it would, looking like the Red Seas in there.” Trevor snorted.
“How do you know?” Anakin asked with a smile.
“The dick posted it on his private Snapchat story before he called the cops.” Trevor said, “I didn’t see it, but my buddy did and he said it looked barf worthy, could smell it through the screen.”
“Goddamn that’s nasty.” Anakin winced, “thanks for that mental image.”
“I had to imagine it, so you did too.” Trevor said, clapping him on the shoulder. “Share the wealth or whatever.”
“Trev, I don’t think that applies to murder.” April said, walking past the boys.
“It does now, baby.” He said, tapping her ass as she walked past.
“Hey!” She shot him a dirty look but blushed and smiled anyway. “Told you not to do that at work.”
“Can’t help it.” Trevor shrugged. “Stress reliever.”
“Oh whatever.” She snorted.
“Anyway yeah- apparently the dude, Kyle Spencer, is suspect number one. He was high as a kite when he called Duck’s dad.”
“He called his dad?” Anakin asked confusedly, “not the cops?”
“His dad is the cops.” Trevor said, popping a piece of gum in his mouth before tossing a stick to Anakin.
“Oh shit.” Anakin scoffed, “so what, he called the guys dad to figure it out?”
“Mhm.” Trevor nodded. “At least that’s what everyone thinks. Cause Duck’s dad arrested the guy himself and seemed real ticked off about getting the call. He was at his other son’s house for the grandkids birthday.”
“Well, well, well.” Anakin snorted, covering his mouth to hide a grin as he poured a whiskey. “Isn’t that some good luck?”
——————————————————————————
“I’ve missed this.” Anakin sighed, cradling Boogie in his arms like a furry orange baby while he stood at the foot of your bed and watched you sleep.
“It’s the simple things you know?” He whispered, his filtered voice tapering in and out. He smiled beneath his mask, watching you stir slightly, kicking the covers off your feet.
He turned on his heel and walked out of the bedroom, setting your cat down on the kitchen counter and pouring her a third of a bowl of food. He took off his left hand glove to give her some chin scratches, then from the white patch between her eyes all the way to the end of her fluffy tail.
“You know, I used to really despise cats.” He said, leaning over on the counter and propping himself up on his gloved fist, watching her eat.
“The therapist I had as a kid said it was cause cats don’t automatically take to a person like dogs do.” He picked up her back foot and gently squish her paw pad to spread out her toe beans just to see her claws flex out.
“Cause they don’t listen. You can’t make ‘em listen, you can’t make ‘em do anything they don’t want.”
“I’m glad I met you.” He nodded. “You’re sweet, makes me… hmm, I wouldn’t say regretful. Just dissatisfied about before.”
“That’s okay though.” He sighed, “personal growth and whatnot.”
“I hope your momma won’t be too upset. I promised I’d start telling her before I visited, but you know tonight wasn’t really planned ahead and I got side tracked, and then sidetracked again, cause I’m here talking to you!” He chuckled, giving her a head pat.
“So hang out in here, okay kitty? I’ve got things to do.” He chuckled, unlacing his boots and setting them beside the front door, he made sure his socks were pulled up beneath his jeans and his gloves and sleeves were as they should be.
He crept back into your room, shutting the door behind him, thankful that you’d stayed naked after your evening escapade. You’d sprawled out, one leg bent and your arm above your head, the other hidden beneath the blanket along with your chest, middle and other leg. Anakin walked to the window and opened the curtain just the tiniest bit, allowing a sliver of moonlight to cast a pearly sheen across your exposed skin.
He stood and stared for a long while, having missed the scene before him. So many times he’d slunk in the shadows of your room, clinging to the wall to avoid disrupting that very beam of moonlight. He would scowl and chide you in his mind for leaving the curtains open, but he’d always, always, stop and observe the way you breathed under the pale periwinkle tinted light.
Once he’d had his fill of your nighttime innocence, he closed the curtain and returned you to the black of slumber, preparing to drag you with him on his path to midnight madness.
He lifted the blanket and folded it over out of his way, using the pretty patterned top sheet to cover his head after taking off his mask and placed it on the bed beside him.
Just for the extra security he tugged up his hood as well and hoped that he wouldn’t sweat to death before he could make you finish.
Slowly pushing your legs apart, he smiled at the soft breath you took in when he gently held your hip so that you wouldn’t shift out of position. Anakin pulled off his right hand glove and shoved it in his back pocket so it wouldn’t get lost beneath the sheets.
He kissed along your outer lips, pressing his nose against the crease at the apex of your thighs, inhaling the scent of you and dragging his tongue along behind as his nose traveled up that crease until he reached your hip, where the waist band of your panties should be. He took a moment to nuzzle into the softness of your lower belly, showering your satin skin with kisses before returning to your slit.
His mouth hovered over your folds as if he were mentally preparing himself to savor you slowly, compared to the fast-paced feasts he’d had on you earlier in the day.
With his tongue laid out flat he licked up the remnants of his cum and yours, introducing you to the warm ball centered toward the front of his tongue, purposely letting it catch against your clit. He breathed through his nose, leaving his tongue flat to circle and flick the metal ball over your clit, smiling in triumph when you jolted at the first movement.
He circled your entrance with the calloused pad of his thumb, slurping up your creamy slick from your folds. He flexed his tongue to swipe it side to side the bottom ball of the metal bar scraped along his bottom row of teeth, making a dull metallic sound that seemed much louder to Anakin than it was in reality so he halted his movements to listen for a change in your breathing.
After ensuring you wouldn’t ruin his fun too early he continued his gentle licks and prods of his tongue to your leaking hole. He pulled his mask closer to him, he needed to feel your heat around his fingers and he knew it wouldn’t take too long before you realized what was happening. After all, you didn’t drink your tea.
Inserting one finger slowly his curved it upward and flicked his tongue side to side at the same pace of his finger. He felt you stir beneath him, so he placed a sloppy kiss to your clit. Lazily licking across you rather than giving you calculated movements. He pushed in a second finger, groaning loudly at the squelch when your cunt hungrily sucked in the extra digit.
Your hands came down to push him away, trying to close your legs in your half-awake state.
“Ani?” You asked, trying to cover your drenched pussy with your hand when you felt an unfamiliar sensation slide over your clit, smooth and warm.
Anakin’s ego skyrocketed, but his penchant for deviant behavior told him that statement should be punished by Ghost. Although he’d have to make that decision later because you were getting whiny and impatient.
“Anakin, please.” You mumbled. “What’s that?”
Anakin halted his movements and slipped on his mask and quickly shoved his hand in his glove.
“I’ll give you one more guess little doe.” The modified voice cut through the fog of your sleep and you bolted upright.
“Ghost?” You gasped in surprise, pulling the blankets back over you. “You didn’t- why didn’t you tell me you were coming?”
“Don’t be embarrassed baby,” he cooed, tugging the blankets away and running his leather hands up your stomach, stopping just beneath your tits. “This is an emergency visit and-“
“What?” You asked in confusion, your eyebrows furrowed. “What happened? What did you do?”
“Um… ow. Hurtful.” He said in a disappointed tone. “I didn’t do anything except develop a raging hard-on.”
“You ass!” You shouted, smacking at his arm. “You scared me!”
“Hey.” He barked. “Maybe next time let me finish talking yeah? Jumping to conclusions like that’ll strain a muscle.”
You stared at him in a state of… not shock or fear, but a bewildered sort of amusement. Once again: the audacity of this man is astounding.
“What?” He asked, sounding irritated.
“I don’t- I don’t know.” You snorted, covering your mouth to stifle a laugh.
“W-wha… hey?” He stammered, confused by your laughter. “Are you laughing? What’s funny?”
“You.” Another laughed bubbled up from your chest.
“Wait- what? You… you’re...” His mouth gaping beneath his mask. “Are you for real?”
“Oh- I’m sorry no… no don’t be mad.” You said reaching out but snatching your hand back quickly after remembering what happened last time you touched him like that without permission.
“Mad?” His voice crackled, the modified voice hinting at hurt in his tone. “Why- why would you think I’m mad?”
“Doe, I’m… that makes me happy.” He said quietly. “This is the first time I’ve made you laugh.”
“What?” You scoffed, “no it’s not.”
“It is.” He said solemnly. “Trust me I keep track of things like that.”
“But-“
“No, no. Trust me.” He said, straddling your legs but not putting any weight on you. “You’ve done that dorky anxious laugh a few times. But I mean… that was a real one.”
“Are you sure?” You asked, your face falling when you realized he was probably right.
“Doe, I’m sure about everything when it comes to you.” He said low and serious, inching closer.
“I’m sorry.” You said, feeling horrible. “That- I’m sorry, that makes me feel bad.”
“Don’t.” He said sternly. “Don’t feel bad.”
“I just had the most fitting conversation earlier today.” He said slowly. “Talking about things and waiting till they’re ready. You laughed cause you were ready.” He said with a defining nod, cupping your cheeks with both hands and carefully caressing your under eyes.
“I’ve always been in favor of positive reinforcement.” Anakin said, smiling to himself. “Do you think you deserve a reward?”
“What is it?” You asked suspiciously, looking him over.
“Something new.” Anakin said simply.
“But,” he said, tilting his head toward you. “You have to promise that you’ll listen to me.”
“Okay…” you nodded cautiously.
“Good girl.” He gave you a curt nod in return, breathing deeply. “Now, I’m gonna give you some very simple instructions. If you do not listen, if you don’t follow them with precision, there will be consequences. Do you understand me?”
“Yes.” You nodded, frowning slightly.
Anakin very tenderly rested his leathered thumbs over your eyes, gingerly closing them and so, so, so carefully making sure they stayed closed.
“Listen closely.” His voice low and dangerous. “When I tell you it’s okay, I want you to take my mask off.”
“What?” You jolted in shock, this was not what you expected at all, you assumed it would be something much more… raunchy.
“Shut up.” He said sharply. “Quiet, listen to me.”
“Sorry.” You whispered, biting down on your lip and fidgeting with your fingers.
“When I tell you it’s okay, you are going to take off my mask. You’re going to be quiet. You’re not going to talk. You’re not going to hear me talk. You will not move. You will keep the mask in your hands, in your lap, and you will not touch me.” Anakin’s voice was clearly conveying a seriousness that couldn’t be ignored.
“Yes sir.” You nodded.
“I’m sorry, what did you just say to me?” He dropped his hands immediately and squeaked out the most pitiful unfiltered noise a man could make.
He didn’t hide it when he palmed his cock, he didn’t seem surprised when you moaned after he grabbed your face. He did lean down, eye level to you and lace his free hand’s long fingers with yours.
“Say it again f’me doe.” He groaned, shifting uncomfortably from his throbbing length.
“Yes sir.” You repeated in a smaller, less confident voice. You hadn’t expected a reaction like this, you’d meant for it to come out snarky…
“New plan.” He grunted, fisting your hair at the top of your head to pull you into sitting position.
He got down off the bed and grabbed his bag from the floor, pulling out a pretty, pink, silk handkerchief and tossing it at you. Along with a pair of padded pink fabric handcuffs, Velcro, not metal clasps.
“What are you… what’s this?” You asked in surprise, an amused smirk on your lips.
“Well, you know the tape ah- just… oh fuck off.” He huffed folding the handkerchief to make a blindfold and carefully tying it tightly around your head, guiding your arms behind your back.
You heard the loud *skrrrriiip* of the Velcro coming apart, then felt the soft liner enveloping each wrist.
“No gag this time?” You huffed, annoyed that he hadn’t finished his sentence, his explanation.
His belt buckle clanked around and he undid his zipper, guiding you to your knees in front of him. He pried your mouth open and pinched the tip of your tongue between his fingers, pulling it slightly before roughly pushing your head down, forcing his girthy length into your mouth.
“Gag on this.” He grunted, holding your head still while you choked around his fat cockhead, your eyes already beginning to water.
He thrust himself in shallow strokes but made sure to hit the back of your mouth every time as punishment, drool dripping down your bottom lip and onto his weighty balls each time they smacked the underside of your chin.
“I w-was gonna kiss you.” He gritted out, causing you to pull back in an effort to say something, but he forced you back down, fucking into your throat alittle deeper.
“Jesus, just listen damnit.” He barked out at you, tugging your hair. “I was trying to… fuck that feels good- mmph.” A puff of air left his nose and he inhaled through his mouth in a shaky gasp.
“Tryin’ to kiss you, m-make it special and soft.” He grunted. “Tried to get you something alittle nicer than some tape from the junk drawer and an old bandana.”
“Should’ve known better.” He groaned, gritting his teeth while he listened to your labored breathing.
“Bitchy little ungrateful brat.” He spat, thrusting harder after he’d said it just to drive his point home.
“Y-you would’ve still gotten your kiss if you hadn’t of smart mouthed me.” He panted. “Now you’re just gonna get a belly full of cum.”
“When are you going to learn?” He chuckled, looking down at you and red tinted face. He pulled out his phone, turning on the flash and hitting record.
“You were being such a good girl.” He moaned, low and gravely. “Callin’ me sir? Good manners. That was a good job, little doe.”
“Then you you went and screwed it up didn’t you? Hmm?” His condescending tone sent a zap of lighting to your core. “Smart mouthing me like I’d let you get away with it.” He scoffed.
“Apologize to me sweetheart.” He demanded, grabbing you by the neck just beneath your jaw and squeezing when you didn’t answer. “C’mon you know you were bad.”
You breathed out through flared nostrils and blinked away your tears, you spoke as best you could but of course it was hardly more than a few choppy sounds.
“Don’t you know you shouldn’t talk with a full mouth?” He laughed, smacking your cheek gently.
“Oh don’t do that baby.” He cooed, his hips slowing as you tried to wriggle free from your restraints.
“Tell you what…” He pulled up your blind fold and tossed it aside. “let’s play a game.” He grunted. “Just be still for a second okay? Then we’ll talk.” He carded his fingers through your hair and nearly keeled over on the spot when your eyelids fluttered, showing just the whites of your eyes.
He doubled over, accidentally shoving his length farther than he meant to, shooting salty ropes down your throat, a choked moan left his lips as his knees buckled slightly.
“Holy shit- oh fuck…” He panted, doing his best to pull back slowly so as not to hurt you. “Sorry baby.” He mumbled sheepishly, quickly tucking himself back in his boxers.
“You okay?” He breathed out, crouching down and getting on your level after stopping the recording.
“Mhm.” Your lungs felt heavy, coughing from your sore throat. “M’fine.”
“Stand up.” He said firmly, but not in a commanding way, more of a ‘I know what’s best for you please just do it’ way.
You nodded and stood up to face him, waiting for further details but you got none. Anakin spun you around and removed your cuffs, grunting in approval when he saw he’d managed not to mar up your pretty skin on accident with these new bindings.
Then, gentle hands on your shoulders turned you back around. He just stood there and stared at you. You hated when he did that, it was so hard to judge his mood already. But when he was quiet and still? Impossible.
“Do you know what a safe word is?” He asked.
“Yes…” you said, looking off to the side.
“Good. Yours is purple, got it?” He asked, gripping your chin.
“Okay. Safe word is purple.” You nodded, gauging his unmoving form cautiously.
“Put on some pjs.” He said plainly, flipping out his knife, one you hadn’t seen before, just to play with while he waited.
“Is that new?” You asked quietly, trying to make some kind of semi-normal conversation.
“What? This?” He asked, flipping it closed and holding it out to you.
“Yeah.” You nodded. “Is it?”
“You noticed.” He said simply, swinging his hand side to side in a gesture for you to take it.
“I’m smarter than I look.” You snorted, taking it from him and carefully opening it.
“We’ll see.” He said in a flat tone, his mood changed slightly now.
“Roses?” You asked, closing the handles back to look at the carved design in black metal with red backing.
“I bought that one just for you. I thought maybe you wouldn’t mind it as much if it were pretty.” He said softly, reaching his hand up behind his head to scratch his neck as though he were anxious.
“I- well.” You sighed, stunned by him for the thousandth time. “That’s actually very sweet Ghost.”
You awkwardly handed it back to him, unsure how to navigate this calmer water with him. You gave him a crooked smile and finished getting dressed.
“No.” He shook his head. “Not that. I like that one.” He said, crossing his arms.
“Fine.” You slipped back out of the matching set you had chosen, and tossed it in the drawer without folding it.
“Move.” He grunted, pulling out your bottom drawer and grabbed an old tshirt of Anakin’s and a pair of his loose boxers that you sometimes wore as shorts. “Put them on.”
You scowled, but tried to bite back your words. In some strange way of his own he was being nicer. He was trying. He obviously felt terribly about how he’d scared you into a panic attack, he cared enough to check up on you. You may as well play along.
After getting dressed you put your hands on your hips and faced him squarely.
“Run.”
“What?” You asked in confusion.
“Run.” He barked, his voice gritty and dangerous, he stood up to his full height and flicked open his knife again. “Get movin’, go!”
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PART THIRTEEN
Tag-List:
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THE TAGS LIST IS FULL! But if you want to be tagged I will comment ur username for you. Love you all so many.
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chaussetteblanche · 11 months ago
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Okay I’m obsessed with your Luke castellan stuff! Is there anyway I could request one where Luke and reader are a couple but get into a huge fight right before a quest? Something goes seriously wrong on the quest but they make back in in the end? Sorry if that makes no sense 😭
omg thank you !! and thanks so much for requesting ! this turned out a little dark, I hope you don't mind !
deception
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pairing : luke castellan x fem!reader summary : you and luke have a fight before leaving on a quest, but after something goes very wrong, you make up word count : 3.5k warnings : a little dark, violence, fighting (verbal and physical), swear words, killing of another camper, depiction of death
"Where were you?" The words were out of your mouth as soon as you saw the dark figure walking towards you. You needed no light to recognise him. You knew him by his walk, the way his shoulders swayed slightly and the unrecognisable limp in his left leg from an old injury. You knew the shape of his shoulders, for you had cried on them many times. You knew the swing of his hands, for they had held yours for countless hours. You knew the way he hung his head meant he was tired. But so were you. So, so tired. "We leave tomorrow, Luke. For a quest that could change all of our lives. Do you truly care so little?" You stood up from where you had been sitting down for the better part of an hour in front of your cabin. "Baby, I really don't want to do this now," he all but pleaded. You could hear it in his voice. The fatigue, the worry, the sadness. He stepped closer to you and took your hand in his, lovingly brushing your knuckles with his thumb.
You pulled your hand out of his grip, even though it physically hurt you to do so. You felt him flinch. "No, Luke, you do this every time! It's always the same with you!" You knew your voice was starting to rise but you couldn't help it. "You go out, won't tell me where you're going, won't let me come with you, come back hours later, looking like you've been holding up the sky for seventeen hours, still won't tell me where you've been, and ask me to-" "Baby, can you please drop it?" His voice was incredibly quiet in the dead of the night. You could see his brows furrow in the faint glow of the torch on the side of your cabin. "-drop it," you finish with a sigh, dropping your hands by your sides.
"Look, I'm sorry, alright?" He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "I just- I'm sorry." You could see his chest deflate like a balloon and felt tears well up in your eyes. You shook your head. You couldn't keep up with his lies. "No." His head snapped up and you felt his intense gaze on your face within seconds. "No, don't apologise for shit you're just going to keep doing. Apologise when you're actually going to change something, because I can't keep doing this." You willed your voice not to shake too much. You ran a hand over your face, sighing shakily.
"What do you mean you 'can't keep doing this'?" he asked softly, stepping closer to you and taking both your hands in his. You tucked your chin, not wanting him to see the tears slowly running down your cheeks. He lowered his head to look at you. "I mean I can't keep," your voice broke, "doing this. Us, Luke. It's not healthy." "No, no, no, what do you mean it's 'not healthy'? Baby, we're okay. You're okay, alright? Nothing has to change, we're good!" The urge in his voice broke your heart. He leaned down to look into your eyes as he cupped your face and wiped your tears away with his thumbs. "It's okay, baby, we're okay, I promise. I- I can change, we can work through this. Together."
You bit your lip to keep it from wobbling too much. You shook your head. "No, Luke. We- we can't. I can't keep doing this to myself, it hurts too much. And I can't change that I worry and get worked up, but you can't change whatever it is you won't tell me. So this needs to stop." Luke shook his head franticly and started pulling you towards his cabin by the hands. "No, baby, all you need is a good night's sleep, okay? In the morning, when you'll have a clear head, we'll talk about it again, okay? I promise we'll work it out, all-" "No, Luke!" You pulled your hands out of his, tightly crossing your arms over your chest. You didn't know when you'd started being cold, but you suddenly realised you were shivering violently. "I have a clear head right now! We don't need to talk about it in the morning! The situation will still be the same! And neither of us will have changed a thing! We're just pushing this back to later!" Your voice rang out into the night and it angered you even more to know that many campers were probably listening in on your exchange with Luke at the very moment.
"Wow. I can't believe this." Luke shook his head. You felt a few raindrops land on your face and arms before it started raining. "I can't believe you're willing to just give up on our relationship like this, Y/N." "I'm not giving up on anything! There just isn't anything left to-" "Maybe if you minded your own business more, and stopped worrying and fretting so much-" You scoffed loudly. "That's who I am, Luke! That's my personality! And I love you! So, excuse me for caring and worrying about you when you disappear for literal hours and won't tell me where you've been!" "Well maybe if you-" He cut himself off and raised a hand, shaking his head. Through the raindrops, you could see tears running down his cheeks. It shredded your heart to pieces knowing you were the cause of his pain. "Look, Y/N, I care about you, I admire you and I love you. So do this, go ahead, but remember that, and remember that it will have been your fault."
You had what was probably the worst night in the history of all worst nights. You hadn't slept a wink, had cried out all the water in your body and had second-doubted every choice you'd ever made in your entire life that had led you up to this moment. When you looked at yourself in the mirror the next morning at the crack of dawn, you grimaced. One good thing came out of having to meet so early, you wouldn't have to face the other campers who you knew were listening in on you and Luke last night. You would have to answer no questions and would have to ignore no strange looks.
Everything was still damp from the storm during the night. You hated the feeling of the cold humidity making its way through your clothes and sticking to your skin. You met with Chiron, Luke and the third member of your quest, a girl named Natasha, at sun rise near the border. You didn't meet Luke's eye as Chiron spoke before sending you off. You didn't even speak until Natasha brought up the tense silence.
"Look, I don't mean to pry," she spoke as she pushed her way through tall grass with you and Luke in tow, "but I'm not digging the vibe you both have going on right now." Luke inhaled before speaking, but he was interrupted by Natasha. "Just to be clear, I don't care what happened, just don't let it get in the way of the quest." "It won't." You answered without even glancing at Luke. You heard him exhale sharply. Natasha nodded curtly.
Even though the tension had been palpable since the start, within seven days you had managed to retrieve the artefact you had been sent to fetch and had started making your way home. Natasha most certainly had a concussion, but other than that, none of you bore any serious injuries. Still, you felt restless and anxious. The Oracle, though you could not remember her exact words, had mentioned deception. At first, you had thought it would be the monster from whom you had stolen the artefact who would be responsible of this deception, but that had not been the case. So you had been on edge for days. You'd barely slept, as Luke had pointed out many times.
"Do you not trust me anymore? Is that it? Is that why you won't sleep?" He'd asked you one night while he was on watch. You had tried to sleep, you really had, but thoughts of betrayal and deception clouded your mind and kept sleep far away. You shook your head. "That's not it." You couldn't bring yourself to tell the boy you loved that you feared he would turn on you. You leaned your head back against the humid trunk of the tree you were sitting against. A few raindrops landed on your face. You couldn't wait to be back at camp. You couldn't wait for all of this to be over.
"Then what is it? Why won't you sleep?" You shrugged. You wouldn't tell him about the nightmares you kept having. When you did manage to close your eyes for a few minutes, your mind was swarmed with dark sights and horrible fears. You would see Luke drowning, yourself burning, the artefact getting lost. "I guess I'm too nervous. We need to get it back to camp as soon as possible. I'll rest when we get there." "But-" "Please, Luke. Don't."
Despite your nerves, your fatigue finally got the better of you and you fell asleep. You awoke to strange, muffled sounds. Slowly opening your eyes, you squinted and tried to get used to the dim light of the flickering fire. After a second, you saw Natasha digging around in your bag a few meters away from you, one hand tangled in Luke's hair. You frowned. "Shut up," she snapped at Luke. You realised the muffled sounds must have been coming from him. You couldn't see much, as Natasha's body hid most of Luke and your bags. Quietly, you sat up and grabbed your bow and quiver. You slowly stood up, hiding your weapon behind your back.
"What are you doing?" you asked. Natasha whipped around, a scowl on her face. You'd never seen her look like that before. With her body more to the side, you were able to get a better look at Luke. What you saw made your skin crawl. He had a large black eye and a cut on his forehead. A dirty rag tied tightly around the bottom of his face kept him from making too much noise. You guessed from his position on the ground that both his hands and feet were tied up. And judging by the state of his shirt, which was torn and dirty, he'd put up quite the fight. Your blood ran cold but you couldn't help but feel relieved at the same time. Luke had not deceived you. Natasha had.
"Something I should have done a long time ago," she snarled, putting her boot against Luke's face and pushing it hard. He fell to the side with a muffled grunt. You felt your blood boil at the thought of her hurting him even more than she already had. You notched an arrow immediately and aimed it at Natasha's heart. "Natasha," you called icily, "I think you should think twice about this." "No need. I've got someone who will pay me a fortune for this," she held up the artefact in her hand, "and for the knowledge of two half-bloods roaming in the forest near a big town in New Jersey." "You wouldn't." Your blood ran cold. You knew you wouldn't let her get away without a fight, but judging by Luke's state, he had thought the same thing. You cursed yourself for choosing the strongest fighter in camp to accompany you on the quest. "You don't know me well enough, Y/N. I couldn't care less about that shit hole you want to go back to, there's nothing for me back there. So, if you're smart, you'll let me be on my way now."
You set your jaw. "I'm afraid I can't just let you go." She smirked. "I thought you might say that." She reached to the side and grabbed Luke by the hair, violently pulling him to his feet. He winced and you saw his jaw twitch. "Luckily, I have some leverage right here." Your stomach churned at the sight. Luke shook his head at you, but you ignored him. She may have beat him, but she wouldn't get through you. You'd die before you let anything happen to him or the artefact.
You raised your bow, aiming for her leg. You didn't want to kill her because she was a camper. That would be the equivalent of killing a cousin and you wouldn't be able to live with yourself if you did. Suddenly, you felt your bow get white hot beneath your hands. You shrieked and let go of it nanoseconds before it turned to flames. You heard Luke cry out your name and watched as Natasha kicked him to the ground. You grit your teeth, the fire in your stomach growing bigger by the second. "Mother taught me well." She twirled her fingers and flames danced between them. You cursed under your breath. You'd forgotten she was one of Hestia's children. Not giving yourself the time to mourn your bow, you darted forward, narrowly missing the flames of the fire which followed you closely.
Deciding to let go of dignity and humility, you tackled her to the ground. Surprised, she yelped and let the small turquoise artefact slip through her fingers. You both hit the floor with a thud. Frantically looking around for the artefact, you were relieved to find that Luke had managed to get ahold of it despite his bound hands. He locked eyes with you and started crawling away. Natasha grunted as she tried to push you off her. You resisted and managed to hit her in the face with your elbow. "Fuck you," she growled before punching you in the stomach. She harshly pushed you off her ribcage as you coughed, tears welling in your eyes at the pain.
You realised she was going after Luke when she pulled a knife out of her boot before running off. Terrified, you scrambled to your feet and took off after her. You tripped on vines and stones as you caught up with her. You had no idea how she could see so well in the near darkness of the forest. You abruptly spotted Luke near a tree, rubbing his bindings against the harsh bark. "Fuck, Natasha- Stop!" you yelled. She ignored you. Before she could get to Luke, you threw yourself forward, landing a hard kick to both her knees. She cried out in pain and collapsed in a head to the ground. You scrambled to get on top of her and pressed your knee against the side of her head. "Stop it!" you pleaded. "You don't want to do this! Money won't solve your problems!" "Yes, I do want to do this," she grunted as she struggled against you. She kicked out, knocking you off her. You got to your feet as quickly as you could, standing in between her and Luke. You spared Luke a glance before raising your fists in front of your face. He was frantically trying to get rid of his bindings, desperately tugging at them.
"Just get out of the way, Y/N!" she screamed angrily, spit flying out of her mouth. "Make this easier for all of us, will you?!" "You know I can't do that, Natasha." She let out a frustrated yell before charging at you with her knife. You ducked and hit her in the ribs before catching her by the hair. You pulled her away from Luke with a grunt. She cursed loudly and sliced at you with her knife. You hissed in pain as she nicked your side, letting go of her for a second. You stumbled backwards as you looked down at your right side, where blood was rapidly staining your shirt. Distantly, you heard Luke's muffled yell of your name and a string of curses. You looked back up just in time to see Natasha's face coming at your full speed. She hit you in the cheekbone and you collapsed to your knees, dull pain making your face uncomfortably hot. You were dazed for a second before you shakily got to your feet.
Natasha was trying to pry the artefact out of Luke's hands, her knife much too close to his skin for your liking. Growling, you bolted forward and wrapped your arm around her neck from behind. Choking her with your elbow, you pulled her off Luke with all the strength you could muster. She thrashed wildly against you before reaching back and grabbing on to your upped arm. Before you could comprehend what was happening, she had flung you over her shoulder. You landed on the ground with a thud and your breath knocked out of you. You coughed. Despite the haziness of your vision, you still registered the knife lying on the ground next to you. You reached for it but Natasha was quicker. She kneeled over you, the knife dangling from her fingers.
"I was really hoping I wouldn't have to kill you, you know?" She wiped from blood from her bottom lip. "But I have a feeling I'm not going to be able to get anything done with you in the way, so..." Slowly, she started bringing the blade of her knife down into your abdomen. You pushed at her forearms, trying to stop her, struggling and kicking but it was no use. She was too strong. With horror, you realised that you were going to die. You were going to die. In the middle of a forest, alone-
"Y/N!" Your head snapped to the side at Luke's voice. He was running towards you at full speed, having gotten rid of his bindings. He threw something at you, which you barely caught. A knife. His knife. Without thinking, you drove the knife deep into Natasha's stomach. She cried out in pain and her legs went out, her whole weight now resting on your ribcage. She looked shocked as she looked down at her wound, which was covering both your bodies in blood. You paled at the sight. She tried to speak, but only blood bubbled past her lips. She looked up at the sky before entirely collapsing on top of you.
"LUKE!" you shrieked and kicked her off you, scrambling to get as far away from her as possible. You'd just killed her. Natasha. Another camper. And you'd just killed her. What had you done? Luke threw himself down next to you, immediately gathering you in his arms. You sobbed loudly as you held on to him, surely leaving fingerprints. "I killed her! I killed her, Luke, and she's dead!" you screamed hysterically, your eyes stuck onto her lifeless form, lying just meters away from you. "Baby, are you hurt?" he asked, concerned, as he checked you over. He tilted your head to both sides, his heart breaking at the tears flowing down your face. He was horrified to see your side and immediately put pressure onto it. You hissed in pain. "It doesn't matter if I'm hurt! She's dead!" Your voice broke as you hit Luke's shoulder, sobbing.
"It was you or her, baby. You or her. You did what you had to do," he spoke softly into your ear. He held you closer to him, as if he wanted to squeeze the traumatic event out of you. "She's dead," you sobbed loudly, turning around to bury your face in his chest. "I know, baby. It's okay. You did what you had to do, you had no choice. She turned on us." He soothingly rubbed your back as he spoke. "But- but-" "You saved the quest, darling. You saved your life. And mine." He stroked your hair, trying to calm you down. "There was nothing else you could do." You cried for what felt like hours. He held you the whole time, whispering words of assurance and comfort. By the time you felt ready to go, the sun was almost up.
The trip back to camp was mostly a blur. Luke took care of everything while you followed him around like a phantom. He stitched you up and disinfected your wounds before you got to camp. When you finally reached the border, you were greeted by Chiron, who was chocked to see only two of you come back. He was even more chocked by what had happened when Luke explained everything to him once you'd been taken in by the infirmary.
When you awoke a day later, you had a long talk with Chiron, who reassured you on just about everything that had happened. You would be granted a recovery of undetermined time. You could taker as long as you needed to get over the quest. Feeling a lot better, you'd thanked him and immediately went to find Luke.
You found him near the lake, staring thoughtfully out onto the water. "Hey." He turned around as soon as he heard your voice. "Hey," he spoke softly. He opened his arms once you were closer to him and you didn't think twice before engulfing him in a tight hug. He buried his face in your hair and inhaled deeply. It felt good to feel the familiar weight of his arms around your shoulders again. "I'm so sorry." He sighed into your hair. "For everything." "I know. Me too." "I love you, baby." "I love you too."
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