#leaning towards bait so enjoy the block anyway

[pwesident]

it straight up does over time. like there’s actual proof. because hormones influence bone growth. anyway ialso think transphobes should kill themselves

[jokeringcutio]

Reader & Stepbrother Stu Macher & Stepfather William Afton “Suspicious Ads” 👀

Fandoms: FFNAF & Scream.

Implied Reader x Stepdad William Afton, Implied Reader x Stepbrother Stu Macher.

Mature due to themes. No explicit Smut. Contains Humor.

[ for More x ] [ Follow me ]

The living room was quiet except for the sound of William's pencil scratching against paper as he worked on a blueprint at the table. You were slouched on the couch, scrolling through fanfiction on your phone, the blue of the screen lightening up your face.

"Seriously, Dad?” Stu's voice cut through the silence like the jarring chime of an unwelcome notification. He sounded way too excited. The door had barely clicked shut behind him before he was at William's side, his phone thrust accusingly toward the older man.

"Isn't her mom enough for you?" Now this caught your attention and you carefully glanced up from your phone to see the encounter play out in front of you.

Stu stood tall next to his father, William, who was still hunched over the blueprint. Despite the accusing tone of Stu’s words, you could see that he was carrying a smirk. As if he were enjoying this. Which was never a good sign. "Or are you still a horny beast in your old age?"

Ah. Too much information.

You quickly pretended to cast your attention back to your phone, but continuing the story seemed to have become impossible now. What had Stu come across that would prompt him to say such a thing? You were still listening in. Not that you wanted to.

"I don’t want to know what you’re up to that give me these specific ads," Stu continued, swiping a finger past his phone. “But I am not interested in finding older women in my area to bang.”

You flinched.

Inwardly, you complimented your stepdad for his lack of reaction to his son’s words. William's face remained stoic, his eyes never leaving the blueprint. He took the accusations without flinching. While Stu leaned in, a sultry smile on his face.

"I bet you're browsing things online again."

Finally, William’s blue eyes darted from the paper and slowly traced up his son. But still, no answer came.

You were holding your breath at this point, feeling the tension in the room.

“I know,” Stu said, shrugging as he deliberately added more oil to the fire. “Old pussy’s better than no pussy at all, they say. But you really need to get your searches in check before any of the ladies in our household get to see these. We’re all on the same IP and man… These ads. They’re brutal.”

William just watched him stoically, not rising to the bait. But you could see a flicker of annoyance in his eyes. It was unnerving, the way he silently absorbed the jab, the corners of his mouth betraying neither smile nor scowl.

Focus on your fic again. Come on now, you told yourself, forcing your eyes away from the scene.

"I think you’ll find these are basic ads. They’re provided when you block all cookies and won't allow them to keep track of your browser history. Internet will automatically assume you are a male interested in sex."

"Stu."

You jumped when your stepdad suddenly spoke. It came so unexpectedly. His voice was even, his blue eyes sternly fixed upon his son.

That shut your stepbrother up. You saw the gleam in Stu’s eyes as he tried to think of something witty to say, but nothing came. Nothing that could beat his father’s reasoning anyway.

“Sure, Dad,” Stu finally said with a wink, trying to save his grace. He finally lowered his phone, putting it inside his pocket as he stepped away from his father. William turned back to his paper, eyes already cast on the drawing he was working on while he leaned on his exposed elbows – the sleeves pushed up while he worked.

“At least, I take it you switched your search history off…” You had to suppress a chuckle when you heard your stepdad say that so casually to Stu. The jab was obvious. As expected, your stepbrother flushed a bright red. He probably hadn’t blocked any cookies or adjusted any settings to stop his data collecting at all.

“Are you chuckling?” you heard, and looked up in surprise to find Stu was suddenly next to the couch, looking down at you.

Fuck. He’d caught onto your eavesdropping.

“Just reading a funny story,” you swiftly replied, silently patting your shoulder for the way you quickly composed yourself.

That mental pat suddenly became a lot more real.

A warm hand surprised you as Stu leaned over you to glance at your phone. His fingers were on your shoulder, gently digging into your skin, while his breath was hot upon you as he leaned over you to catch a glimpse of your screen. The small letters were thankfully not too explicit, so you didn’t have to feel too ashamed.

He was silent for a moment, clearly reading along. Then you heard him chuckle softly.

"Careful not to fall into that screen," he teased, voice low, a whisper meant for your ears alone. “Apparently, there are older women there. And they only want one thing.”

You barely lifted your gaze from the glow of your phone, but you couldn't ignore the warmth spreading where his hand rested firmly on your shoulder. A tingling teased your core.

"Wouldn't dream of it," you murmured, your response automatic, heart betraying you with a traitorous skip. The faint pressure of his fingers imprinted on your skin, an invisible brand. Then his touch was gone.

He chuckled, walking away, the sound receding with each step until the front door sealed his departure with a soft click.

But you had felt the soft squeeze he gave you before he had let go. And wasn’t that something?

Why did it make your heart beat so loudly in your chest?

Your eyes flitted up to the now-closed door, but of course, he was no longer there. Stu had left. Behind you, you heard your stepdad shift. The rustling of the paper between his fingers, the way his shoes moved against the wooden floorboards. You turned your head to see what he was up to.

William expelled a deep sigh. His chair scraped against the wood floor, the sound abrasive, as he stood and turned toward you.

"Those ads," he began, voice a low rumble, "I assure you that I have never looked something like that up."

How sweet, you thought, that he tried to assure you he wouldn’t go around your mom’s back like that. You sat up on the couch, no longer slouching, and gave him your full attention.

"Really?" you asked, feigning nonchalance.

His footsteps approached, measured and certain. The distance between you shrank with an almost indecent intimacy. Now that was… different. You blinked up at him as he towered over you. Your pulse hammered in your throat, a frantic drummer setting the pace for this dangerous dance.

"Indeed." His silhouette loomed over you, casting you in a cool shadow. "My tastes run...”

Here he paused, his blue eyes deliberately raking over you until you felt it deep in your core. The implication. But surely not? Surely, he wouldn’t even consider…

“Younger." The words slithered through the air, filled with intent. His eyes locked onto yours, blue ice that seared straight through to your womb, leaving a trail of goosebumps in their wake.

"I’m fetching something to drink," the switch to such a casual comment came so unexpectedly, that you sat there, shaken to the core. Had you misinterpreted him?

“Can I get you something?” he asked, a thread of politeness woven into his husky tone.

"Water," you managed to say, voice barely above a whisper. "Water would be nice."

And damn the flames that worked between your legs, setting your entire body on fire. How did both men manage to do such things to you? To play you like a puppet?

He nodded once, a subtle acknowledgment, before striding away.

Alone now, your hands trembled as you fumbled with your phone. A few taps, a swipe and your search history stared back at you, a guilty confession in pixels and light.

Your eyes slid past the many variations of your searches for ‘Older man x younger woman' content.

Shame and arousal coiled within you, tightening around your chest.

Delete. Delete. Delete.

How could you have been so stupid to assume no one would notice when everyone shared the same internet access? Your heart pounded, a relentless echo of your fractured calm. You knew that the illusion of your innocence was just that – an illusion, as fragile as your resolve.

You silently thanked the Internet Gods for always assuming their users to be male-gendered.

Let your stepbrother and stepfather browse their older women. You could feign your innocence for a little while longer.

Right?

[onewomancitadel]

A smattering of general updates:

I played Tears of the Kingdom. I didn't really enjoy it. I understand why it was popular though; I'm just not the demographic for these types of video games anymore. I didn't find it creatively rewarding and after a time I sat there thinking 'I would rather be writing right now', and since then I have learnt that writing is made easier by doing things which are not writing, because it makes me miss it. My dad also doesn't really like it but for some reason has played hundreds of hours in it. I don't know either - I think he will take anything called Zelda at this point.

I spectated the Doctor Who David Tennant Special and watched some clips of the new season. I'm not a fan of RTD, and not a DW fan anymore (not for a long time), but it was an interesting study in how studios try to attract old and new fans.

I read a lot of books, and that lie people tell you about all books being good for you is a lie, because a cyberpunk anthology of short stories made me so angry I got heartburn. I think people who say that are saying so because they wish that they could read a lot, in which case I say, yes I think reading is a gift and we should engage with it, however, sometimes I get so physically angry from something stupid/bad I've read because bad writers exist that it gives me actual pain. I am reading Howl's Moving Castle right now and it's very joyful; I am very surprised by the liberties the animated film took! However so far I do think both experiences are worthwhile, and if you enjoyed the Ghibli film, I very much recommend checking out the original book if you want to revisit that world again. The prose is straightforward but a little whimsical, and Howl is very, very funny. I have laughed aloud a few times.

Well, you know I rewatched Dark, and it's funny that during my exile I said 'this is like if RWBY got the ending it deserves' and then, er, I found out it's not renewed yet, and that's still up in the air, which for the entirety of RWBY I have only had one true moment of doubt of such a thing, and that was a while ago.

On that topic, yes, I still ship Jaune/Cinder, believe Cinder's redemption is likely, etc., although there are some more external concerns I would wager now than before. Before I thought it very possible to do without any commercial influence, and it depends what compromises they do or don't end up making or having already made. My analysis of Jaune's arc in V9 may not hold water as much (e.g. if you lean towards the view there were rewrites to cater to growing the audience, or perhaps it's two ideas married? I'm not sure) so I'm going to think about it more, and there always has been a tension in RWBY between what is being expected/baited and what is foreshadowed/said/actually happens.

I figured out how to write again and what was blocking me, so there's that. To talk about it a bit more, since my break I have worked every single day on writing. My key takeaways are that you need a delicate balance of delusion and self-doubt to get anything done - you don't know you can do something until you actually do it - and every excuse I invented for not writing was not the reason I was not writing. I can write with a migraine beginning to set in on an uncomfortable desk where I can't even rest my elbows properly on the end of a bed with no back support without aircon in the middle of summer before I've even taken my hair out from bedtime plaits in my pyjamas. I didn't even expect to get my fic done right before midnight, actually I was like 'well lol that's not going to happen, I'll write anyway though, fuck New Year's' because I wasn't doing anything, and then I finished and looked at the time and was like ooooh. I actually completed my goal! So I'm very proud of that. Anyway writing is breathing, to me, I go crazy if I don't do it, no matter what it is, and every single piece of nonsense advice of productivity was not helpful, ever, but I did figure it out. Also admittedly I got a fire burning under me again because I found out I was actually right about Raven, in which case I took that as a sign from heaven I was on the right track. One should hope.

I am excited about Dune Part Two, yes, although I am trying to avoid Villeneuve talking about the film because I know all the marketing is basically directed at people who aren't Dune fans, and I have to see it for myself to see what it's worth. I enjoyed the first film, and Villeneuve seems excited to direct Dune Messiah, in which case I am willing to do whatever possible to make that happen. Because that's about as complete a story you're going to get in a major motion picture adaptation and it would be So Fucking Good.

[ptergwen]

stranger danger

w/c: 1.7k

warnings: swearing and peter being a smartass

summary: you befriend a certain crawling creature while out on a late night walk

a/n: hello my loves! it’s been a minute since i’ve properly written anything so i’m pretty psyched to share this with y’all :,) this was a fun one and i hope you enjoy as always hehe

-

a cool breeze cascades over you as you saunter down the sidewalk. you push your earbuds deeper into your ears, walking with purpose towards your destination. the usual horns honking and sirens sounding are drowned out by the music that’s playing.

you’re the only occupant of this particular avenue, trekking through the night in solitude.

just how you like it.

you happily continue on your evening stroll until out of no where, a figure swoops off the fire escape up above. they land directly in front of you. you jump, a surprised squeal slipping past your lips.

the unexpected encounter leaves your heart racing.

your fear quickly turns to irritation, however. how could someone be so careless? they really should have watched where they were going, especially at this hour.

you remove your earbuds so you can give this dipshit a piece of your mind.

“yo, what the hell? what’s your problem?” you demand. the disturber of peace cocks their head to the side, and very animatedly so. “what’s yours?” they deadpan.

you’re hardly able to make out their face in the darkness, which is unsettling.

“um… i asked you first,” you challenge, arms crossing over your chest. “fair enough. you wanna bite?” the stranger wonders. rhetorically, because they answer their own question.

“it’s you.”

oh, the absolute audacity.

“i beg your pardon?” you seethe, much to their amusement. “yup,” they shrug their shoulders. “i’m just saying, my job would be way easier if you weren’t out wandering the streets so late.”

“it’s barely midnight,” you justify, then think better of it. “not that i have to explain myself to you.”

your eyes narrow at the mysterious specimen before you. they let out a low chuckle.

“what does this job of yours entail, anyway?” you have to inquire.

the stranger steps toward you, finally withdrawing from the shadows. you gasp upon the reveal of their identity.

“spider-man, at your service,” he introduces himself, saluting you with his gloved fingers. “well… friendly neighborhood spider-man, is my official title.”

you’ve been sassing freaking spider-man?

“you shouldn’t be out here all alone, you know,” spider-man chastises you. he casually leans against the ladder of the fire escape. “says who?” you scoff back.

since he’s giving you attitude, you’ll continue to do the same.

spider-man looks you up and down. you can tell because of the way the eyes of his mask shift.

“says me,” he clarifies. “a pretty young lady such as yourself is, like, bait for bad guys.”

ignoring the borderline misogynistic part where he referred to you as bait, that sounds an awful lot like flirting.

interesting.

“suppose you were doing your so-called job instead of bugging me…” a smirk spreads across your features. “i wouldn’t have to worry about said bad guys, now would i?”

spider-man claps a hand over his heart in feigned offense.

“touché,” he compliments, the smug smile evident in his voice. “but, bugging isn’t the word i’d use. i’m an arachnid.”

not only is he a dipshit, but he’s also a sarcastic shit.

“whatever. clear the area, arachnid-boy,” you huff, swatting spider-man’s arm so he’ll move aside. alas, he stays put. “nah. i’m good right here,” he decides.

he’s blocking you from your route, body still rested against the fire escape.

“for real? don’t you have places to be?” you complain. spider-man hums thoughtfully. “nope. besides you, it’s been a pretty slow night. i’m gonna wrap up in…”

he glances down at his wrist, where one of his webshooters resides rather than the imaginary watch he’s checking.

“uh, now. i’m gonna wrap up now,” he informs you. “a perk of being your own boss is that you get to choose your own hours.”

that’s his first joke that earns a laugh from you. you shake your head at him, spider-man grinning under his mask.

you might be warming up to the guy.

might be.

“since you’re free, then,” you preface. “and, so adamant on me needing an escort home… how about it?”

spider-man likes what you’re suggesting.

“that’s where you’re headed, huh?” he implores, gesturing to the path ahead of you. you nod. “it’d be my honor to take you. we could both use the company,” spider-man concludes.

you embark once again on the journey to your apartment, this time with new york’s most infamous wall-climber following beside you.

he trades his usual transportation method of swinging for walking, wanting to chat with you a while longer.

“so, spider-man,” you prompt him. “how’d you come up with… spider-man?” the hero in question laughs softly. “crazy story, actually. i got my powers from a spider bite, and i’m a man.”

his explanation makes you giggle. spider-man beams, pink tinting his cheeks that you thankfully can’t see.

“a silly little spider bite gave you super strength and a sixth sense? that’s ridiculous,” you snort out. spider-man bumps his shoulder into yours. “it was radioactive, mind you.”

he’s far less cocky than he was when you initially met him, though he’s goofing around just as much. you’re into his humor sans the snark.

“tell me about you, though,” spider-man requests, inching closer to you. the two of you turn a corner. “personally, i’ve never been bitten by a radioactive spider… believe it or not,” you play coy. he breathes out another laugh.

“seriously. tell me something, anything,” he tries. “like… what’s your name, for starters?”

it hadn’t crossed your mind to share that, although you do owe it to him at this point. you owe him something for accompanying you the whole way home.

“it’s y/n,” you reply with a half smile. spider-man’s eyes widen as he processes this new information. “y/n,” he mumbles. “that has a nice ring to it… y/n.”

he instantly commits it to memory, which he’s normally terrible at.

“thanks. what’s yours?” you attempt to discover the name hidden behind his alias. “you already know it,” spider-man surprises you by saying. you clutch onto his arm. “wait, what? i do?”

“duh. first name spider, last name man,” he smoothly responds, not missing a beat. “keep up, y/n.”

you squeeze his bicep, a grin painting your lips.

“you’re kidding. i told you mine, tell me yours!” you almost whine. “i did,” spider-man sighs.

accepting your defeat, you release his arm and resume your shuffling down the pavement. he already misses your touch.

“ok, mr. man,” you concede. “could i get your initials, at the very least?”

there’s no harm in him revealing a couple letters to you, in your opinion.

“you sure can. SM,” spider-man cleverly retorts.

it seems he’s back to being cheeky. or, he simply isn’t comfortable disclosing that to you.

you forgot you two are new acquaintances because it feels like you’ve known each other forever.

“fine, fine. i get it,” you assure him. “it’s top secret, confidential and whatnot. i won’t press anymore.”

the pair of you then drift into silence. it leads to you scraping your shoes against the sidewalk to fill it, and spider-man nervously fiddling with his fingers.

he’s reconsidering.

“uh… PP,” he speaks up after a few minutes. you’re not sure you heard him correctly. “hm?” you murmur, spider-man letting out a rather shaky breath. “my initials. they’re PP,” he repeats, with more confidence.

it’s quickly shot when you bust out laughing.

“your name is pee pee? like, piss? urine?” you literally cackle, elbowing spider-man’s side as you double over. “no, that’s… no way. you gotta be fucking with me, dude.”

spider-man frowns.

“i’m not,” he quietly states. “and, technically, with my middle name… it’s PBP.”

gazing up at him, you find that spider-man isn’t messing around for a change. his shoulders slump shyly, head hanging.

damn.

you feel kind of bad for making fun of him.

he trusted you with part of his true identity, and now he’s probably regretting it.

“PBP is cool,” you correct yourself with a nudge at his arm. “yours has a nice ring to it, too.” spider-man’s tense body relaxes. “thanks, y/n,” he rasps, you flashing him a smile. “you’re welcome, PBP.”

you have the sudden urge to reach over and grab his hand, which is dangling between the two of you. as if he’s aware of this, spider-man holds out an open palm for you.

right, his sixth sense. his spider sense.

wordlessly, you slip your fingers through his suit clad ones. you’re honestly pretty geeked to be hand in hand with a real life superhero. spider-man chuckles, letting your intertwined hands fall back to your sides.

“you never told me what you were doing out here,” he mentions as you near your apartment.

you chew on your bottom lip, slowing down your pace. you’re not ready to say goodbye just yet.

“going for a walk. i do it most nights, whenever i need to clear my head,” you reveal. “it’s just me and my carefully curated playlists. it’s very… refreshing.”

“sounds refreshing,” spider-man agrees, locking your fingers tighter together. “maybe you could use a buddy, though.”

did PBP just invite himself to join you again?

you’re down, but you can’t let him win so easily.

“give me one reason why,” you muse.

spider-man didn’t realize you’d be putting him on the spot.

“i… you…” he stammers, snapping when he thinks of it. “you gotta have someone there to look out for you, right? that would be me.”

“aw, you’d protect me? from the bad guys?” you coo. “it is my job,” spider-man reminds you.

you sway your hands back and forth, peeking up at him.

“i can protect myself. because of your kind, i’ve had no choice but to learn how to,” you click your tongue, spider-man blinking curiously. “my kind?” he echoes. you exhale, “men… derogatory.”

spider-man snickers at your response. you two come to a stop, outside of what he assumes is your building.

already?

“gimme another reason,” you command, turning to face him. spider-man mirrors your stance. “‘cuz, uh…”

he raises his free hand and wiggles his fingers, a signal for you to take it. you do so with the hint of a smile on your lips, spider-man bringing both your connected hands to his chest.

“i like you, y/n. i have a tingle you like me, too,” he admits. you furrow your eyebrows, smile growing wider. “a tingle? guess i can’t argue with that.”

you meet his big, cartoon-like eyes that desperately search for your own.

“i do like you, PBP. we should definitely do this again.”

as much as you cherish your solo walks, you’ve honestly enjoyed having him around. you could get used to it.

spider-man runs his thumbs along the back of either of your hands, so gently that the simple action gives you butterflies. he grins.

“i’ll pick you up, same time tomorrow.”

[get-shiggy-with-it]

Just My Type Pt. 2

Pairing: Tomura Shigaraki x Reader

Word Count: 4.5k

Warnings: dom/sub undertones, dom reader, subby shig, light mommy kink, anal fingering, blow jobs, smut ahead so ya know be prepared, shigs is kinda an incel but we love him anyway, 18+ MINORS DNI

Summary: Shigaraki is a full course meal that showed up on your doorstep and you are more than a little inclined to devour him whole.  

Part 1

AO3 Mirror

You liked to think you understood Tomura Shigaraki. 

Probably a bit better than he understood himself if you were being honest. 

It wasn’t that you were particularly adept at reading people, but you paid attention and he was generally a lot more obvious that he realized. You started to get the feeling your client-turned-sometimes-boss had a bit of a thing for you not too long after you started working for him. 

Mainly because he stared. 

All the time.

You weren’t certain if he was completely conscious of it, and at first you sort of assumed it was just a weird, somewhat unnerving habit. It took you all of a week to figure out, though, that his one visible eye did not seem to focus on anything other than you. 

Initially, you had been wary of him. This was a slightly more dangerous clientele than you were used to, but the rest of the League warmed up to you quickly enough. The true realization came with the little, silent fits of jealousy—nails raking down his neck and scowls so harsh they were nearly audible—whenever anyone else, usually Dabi, showed the same interest.   

And being the type of person you were, it was hard to resist pushing those newly revealed buttons just once. 

Well. 

More than a once. 

But! 

All that pressing and goading had finally culminated to this. 

Needless to say, you felt more than a little thrill when Tomura had finally taken the bait and let you drag him all the way back to shore like a fish on a hook. 

And now here he was, beached and floundering, as chilled air like ocean waves rocked against your ankles. 

So yes, you understood Tomura Shigaraki. 

He wanted you, as much as loathed to admit it. 

And you wanted him too, but not so much that you were willing to go down without a bit of a fight. 

“Are you just gonna stand there?” you asked. 

You could see the shiver your voice sent through him, like lungfuls of sweet spring air after a lifetime underground. 

“What?” he mumbled, one hand holding the clasp on his pants closed and the other reaching up to tear at his neck. 

Always so predictable. 

You hummed at the gesture and leaned back to pull the door open a bit more. “Come on, you’re letting all my heat out.” 

His eyes narrowed significantly, not so subtly flicking down to your chest before meeting your eyes—suspicion clear as the tent in his pants, but a good amount of cautiously pleasant surprise as well. 

You dipped your head down, trying to get a better look under the mop of his hair and dark hood to see the dusty rose blush creeping up his neck. His scarred and cracking skin grew pinker with every passing second. The smile on your face was impossible to hide.  

“I caught you in the window of one of the shops like six blocks in,” you said by way of explanation and waved him forward once again. “You can stand out there and freeze if you want, but something tells me you might be a little more comfortable if you came in.” 

This was a calculated game, but no one ever got anywhere without taking a few risks.  

Your stress on the last two words and the way your tongue peaked out from behind your teeth was thankfully not lost on him. 

“Fine,” Tomura swallowed once as if this really was the last thing he wanted to be doing, and you watched his throat bob as he finally shuffled over the threshold.  

You liked the way he looked here, harsh but not out of place in the domestic setting. Surrounded by the scent of crisp air and clean laundry, you breathed deeply to catch the faint hint of cheap hand soap and dust and that strange, sweet smell that always tickled your nose when he got close. Tomura took a long breath of his own when you pressed closer, the top of your leg brushing just enough at the front of his jeans to feel his dick twitch. 

Yeah, he probably thought you hadn’t noticed him lifting your coat to his face when you left for the bathroom. That you hadn’t overheard Kurogiri chewing him out for all the different bottles of detergent littering the backroom like he wasn’t scouring convenience stores to find the exact one you used. Didn’t know you knew where all those ‘lost’ gloves or elastic ties or even your socks once when you’d taken them off to dry after a storm had ended up. 

It was hard to tell with him whether those strange behaviors meant he liked you or really wanted you dead. But you’d dared to assume the former and god it felt good to be right. 

“You like to watch, don’t you?” you asked, letting the words cascade from your lips. 

“Maybe. You like to be watched, don’t you?” he rasped, clearly trying to maintain some semblance of control but your chest was brushing against him and you could hear his mouth going dry. 

You raised your brow and leaned just a fraction closer, ready to let the last of the chips fall.

“Maybe,” you mused, your lips just barely grazing his. “I don’t mind if it’s you.” 

And finally, finally you saw the little glimmer you’d been waiting for. 

Tomura Shigaraki was beginning to understand. 

You could see it in his eyes, the dawning realization. Reluctant still and forever mistrustful, but coming around. All those nights he spent observing you when he thought you weren’t looking—shrouded in smoke and keeping a safe distance—you’d never been aiming to get away. You’d never been hiding or ready to run. 

You were always trying to get closer to him. 

The way you left so soon when he sequestered himself away in his room or how you let Dabi’s hand creep just far enough up your thigh before making your escape—all of it, was just to catch his eye. 

Just playing your cards—working with the hand you were dealt.  

Tomura might have been watching you, but you had always been watching right back. Really, it was a wonder how he ever missed the way your gaze was trained on him nearly every second from the time you set foot in the bar to the ever unfortunate moment you slipped back out into the cold, lonely street. 

How many nights had you been waiting for this? 

Laying awake, thinking of the way his scarlet gaze warmed your skin like the cinnamon in Kurogiri’s nightly cocktails. You’d seen what those hands could do, watched them turn glasses and tables to ash, but that only raised the stakes. And wasn’t it so much more fun that way?

“Well,” you leaned in, tilting your head so that your mouths were centimeters away from touching, “do you want to see more?”

You were watching the levee break. Cracks forming up that skeptical and distant outer shell and letting desire leak out from every line and scar. The air was silent and heavy in the way it often is before a storm. You wondered if you’d be struck down by errant lighting before you got a chance to suck his tongue like you’d been dreaming of. 

His fist closed around your wrist, pinky poised threateningly over the skin. You let him hold you, not struggling in the slightest under his grip. Tomura could have you like that if he wanted. Could believe this was forceful, that he wasn’t giving himself away. You would gladly let him, but you had something else in mind. 

Something you were almost certain he’d enjoy more. 

All the deliciousness of the torture you planned to drown him in was completely dependent on him offering you the reigns. If he wouldn’t, well, you’d take what you could get. Encouragingly, he didn’t move further than his grip on your arm. 

Instead, he stared blankly and tugged you closer grunting under his breath, though never fully closing the distance. It took a second before your brain processed the slight pout of his bottom lip, the catch in his breath the way he subconsciously ground against your thigh. 

Oh. 

Oh. 

You’d said it before and you’d say it again: god, it felt good to be right. 

Coming to your door was his first move tonight, and now it was your turn to up the stakes. 

Grinning, you closed the small gap between your bodies and let your mouths slip against each other, filling in the cracks of his lips with your tongue. Tomura groaned when the weight of it slipped across his teeth just once before you pulled away from him altogether. 

There was barely an inch between you, but that would always be too much now. 

“You never answered me, Tomura.” Saying his name made you shiver. You wondered what it would feel like when you screamed it too. “Do you want to see more?”

“Yes,” he nodded and surged forward, knocking your teeth together and nipping sharply at your lower lip. “More, now.” 

Your grips switched, his fingers going limp around your wrist while you took hold of his and led him towards the door at the end of your hall. The soft bedroom light leaked out and illuminated the halo of baby hairs at the crown of his head. You longed to run your hands through it. By the time you got him safely inside—sat cornered on the edge of your mattress—you realized there was nothing stopping you from doing just that. 

So you did. 

Tugged his hood down and ran your fingers across his scalp, grabbing a handful and pulling firmly. The noise it earned you had goosebumps erupting down your arms. 

With his pretty face revealed, you took a moment to drink him in. The small lamp lit him from the left, leaving one side in shadow and those red eyes were so dark you could have drunk them down like expensive wine. Slowly, you lowered your lips to his scarred forehead and pressed them softly against the rough skin. 

“What would the others say, hm?” you hummed, stroking his cheek as you leaned back to look into his eyes again. “If they knew their boss was tailing around the new hire just to get a glimpse of some ass.” 

Tomura stayed resolutely silent, grumbling under his breath as he lunged forward to slip his tongue back into your mouth. Your hand in his hair tightened though and his thighs tensed below you. 

“Seems a bit desperate, huh?” 

He growled again but moved a hand to the open front of his pants, palming slowly against the growing bulge there. The swathe of light grey fabric covering his cock was already sporting a sizable stain that you were dying to taste. 

Feeling merciful, you dragged your tongue along his sharp jaw and nipped at his earlobe, “Do you really want me that bad?”

You weren’t sure what exactly was the nail in the coffin. It might have been the words themselves, or the soft, honest tone with which you whispered them, or even just the way your chest brushed against him, but that was the moment his resolve finally shattered. 

“It’s your fault,” he whimpered, hips bucking up into his own hand, “you’re the one that did this, so fix it.” 

You could only guess he was referring to the absolute rager he was sporting and the drool threatening to spill from his ragged lips. 

“Oh, you want me to make it all better?” you were having a hard time keeping it together yourself with Tomura talking like that. 

He nodded furiously and you took the opening to lick back into his mouth, tracing his teeth and biting softly on his rough bottom lip. When you pulled back, a silvery string of saliva glinted between your mouths, only breaking when you moved to roll your desk chair over and plop down on the cushions. 

Tomura’s eyes immediately drifted between your legs as you peeled off your thin shorts and spread them, propped on either arm, fingers digging absently into the meat of your thighs. 

“You didn’t get to see much before did you?” he didn’t answer but you hadn’t expected him to. “How about we start where we left off, but I want to see that pretty cock this time while you stroke it for me.” 

“Oh fuck ,” he gasped and tugged his jeans down so they pooled at his ankles. 

You smiled as he cursed. One hand still gripped his length, but you could see how thick it was from between his fingers. Long and hard and leaking so much onto his stomach where it rested. The other fisted in his hoodie, pulling it up to give you a glimpse at the lovely musculature of his torso. 

So many delicious surprises, all in one night. 

Your gaze drifted between his face and the hand slowly pumping his length. Every now and again, he’d stop to run his thumb over the tip or squeeze harshly at the base. Your hand moved too, sliding your underwear to the side and giving him a full view of just how soaked he made you. 

“Is that how you usually touch yourself?” you asked quietly, slipping two fingers down your slit and coating them in slick. 

“Yeah,” his voice was already so wrecked that you shivered at the single word. 

Your fingers found your clit, drawing languid circles over the bundle of nerves and groaning in relief. “Tell me what you think about.”

“You,” he responded simply, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. 

To his credit, it probably was but you wanted to hear him say it. 

“What about me?”

Your slow rhythm sped up to match Tomura’s hand now steadily jerking his dick, wet slaps and various groans emanating from both of you. 

“Your...mouth,” he mumbled, vision locked on the movement of your wrist as your fingers began to dip inside only to travel back to your clit and repeat the motion. “How it would feel on me, how wet and warm and tight your throat would be.” 

You let out a long moan of encouragement and nodded for him to continue, grinding down on your own wrist as he spoke. 

“I think about how you parade around like a whore every time you come over— shit —and how you’d look bent over the bar top,” he spat as he ran his palm over the head of his cock. 

Normally you’d have clapped back at the insult but you were distracted by the way the muscles in his stomach were twitching violently with every stroke of his hand. 

“That’s not all is it?” you asked between breaths. 

Your skin was buzzing, warmth rising to your cheeks as sweat broke out on your forehead despite the chill of the room. Tomura keyed you up in a way no one else ever had.

“No,” his eyes were redder than usual, glazed over and pricked in the corner with frustrated tears. He wanted to cum so badly, you could see it in the set of his feet on the floor, forcing his hips up but not getting quite what he craved. 

“Come on, Tomura,” you brought your other hand down to rub quickly at your clit, “tell me what you need.” 

“Touch me,” he hissed, head thrown back, exposing the graceful column of his scarred throat. “I want to feel you.” 

He was panting, head thrown back and mouth open with just his eyes cast down at you. You wanted a painting of this scene—Tomura, ruined and starving for you. Wanted it framed and hung in your foyer so it was the first thing you saw coming home. 

How could you deny such a pretty boy?

“Alright, I suppose you’ve earned it,” you sighed in mock annoyance and stood, honestly surprised he’d restrained himself from jumping you this long. Discarding your shirt elicited a series of wines as you stood completely bare for him. 

You thought for a moment about what you should do first, before settling on your knees between his legs and batting his slowly stroking hand away. Tomura stared, wide eyed and slack jawed down as you took his cock in your hands and admired him for a moment. 

He felt good in your palm, heavy with impressive girth and length. Leagues better than you had hoped for. Pretty veins ran up the sides and the gentle ridge of his tip was silky smooth as you leaned forward to run your tongue up the slit. 

The sound that left him was bone shattering—deep and low in a way that reverberated in your bones. 

You vowed to make him cry. 

Looking up through your lashes, you let your lips fall open to take Tomura into the warmth of your mouth.  

And if you thought his first moan was delicious. 

What fell from him next was a goddamn feast. 

Four fingers were fisted into your sheets, the balls of his feet tensing so his hips bucked up and forced his length deeper down your throat. You hummed around his length, drinking down the salty taste of him, and bringing your hands up to rub sweet circles into the skin of his thighs. Listening hungrily, you devoured all the little whimpers and moans and curses that spilled from Tomura. 

Objectively, you ought to have been offended by all this. That he was so desperate for you, blamed you for somehow leading him on (which you had to an extent but only because he refused to set foot into your traps). You should have felt a bit disgusted by the behavior he’d displayed, but instead you were invigorated. Spurred on by the knowledge that the man before you wanted you so deeply and obsessively, that just the sight of you drove him off the edge. 

Flicking your tongue over the sensitive tip, you doubled down your efforts. Hollowing your cheeks, you sucked hard and took his pulsing dick deeper, swallowing around it. 

“Oh god, yesyesyes—” Tomura cried out, hips twitching. 

It was on that particular backstroke you noticed the way he was grinding back into the sheets, rocking his ass just so and you really couldn’t help yourself from indulging a bit in the curiosity. 

Shifting a hand, you collected some of the spit and precum that had leaked from your mouth and coated the base of his dick, slicking your fingers. Slowly, you moved to give his balls a firm squeeze that had him whining before letting two fingers dip lower, between his cheeks to nudge the cute pink skin around his hole. 

“Fuck—” he gasped, staring down at you and letting himself fall immediately to the mattress, giving you full access to his pretty ass. “Hm, there please…” 

He trailed off, brain rotted with pleasure and unconcerned now with how desperate or needy he seemed. You thought it was a good look for him, and you gladly obliged his pleas. 

Just the slow circles you were tracing around the sensitive flesh seemed to drive him closer to the edge. You would have been shocked by how long he was lasting considering the unlikely possibility he’d had many partners in the past, but you were sure he’d had plenty of ‘practice’ on his own to get his stamina up to this level. 

Surprisingly, you were able to actually slip a finger past the tight ring of muscle down to the first knuckle. He was so tight your mind was flooded immediately with how good he’d look bent over—ass in the air and impaled on your strap. He made this delectable choked sound when you turned your wrist and slid a fraction of an inch deeper. But as you curled inside him and gave one particularly deft swallow around his aching cock, something even more unexpected tumbled past Tomura’s lust-loose lips. 

“Oh fuck, mommy —” 

As soon as the words left his mouth it snapped shut so hard you heard his teeth clacking. 

Well. 

You certainly hadn’t anticipated that, but thankfully, transporting required you to think on your feet often.

Tomura was beet red now, looking almost as surprised as you felt by what had slipped from him in the haze of lust and sweat that filled the room. You withdrew from him completely, pulling off his cock and planting both your hands on his slim waist. 

“What did you just call me?” you asked, tone dark, praying to hear it again. 

And of course you did, because Tomura was such a good boy . 

“M-mommy,” the tremor in his voice may have been due to residual shame or the fact that you’d nearly sucked his soul right out of his dick, “mommy, please.” 

And that, that lit something in you. All bets were off, any plans of a long, drawn out night of playing with your pretty boss until he begged for you was slipping quickly down the drain as you clambered off your knees and onto the bed. 

“Does my little boy need something?” you mused, slipping into the role easily and planting your knees on either side of his thin body while you brushed your nose against his cheek. 

He hadn’t touched you since you’d gotten him in your bed and while you thought it may have had something to do with the potentially deadly side effects, you really couldn’t have that. Reaching down, you guided his hand gently to your mouth and pressed a gentle kiss against the calloused knuckles. 

“Do you want mommy’s pussy?” 

That last question might have been boarding a bit on the evil end of teasing, but Tomura responded in equally bratty fashion by burying his face into your chest and reaching down to guide the tip of his dick into your dripping entrance. For once that night, you were the one gasping at the sudden stretch and quite frankly the fucking balls your boss displayed in surprise spearing you on his cock. 

Not that you minded, but damn. 

“I’ll take that as a yes,” you groaned as you dropped your hips to sink the rest of the way down his length. It took a bit, even as slick as you were, before he was bottoming out and letting out little poorly hidden sobs against you. 

Tomura’s feet still hung off the bed and couldn’t provide him the leverage to thrust up into you as he so clearly wanted to, but you could work well with this. Pulling back you got him to sit up, head still buried in the crook of your neck and braced your hands to start bouncing in his lap. 

His hands flew to your hips, any trepidation apparently lost in favor of marking you with crescent shaped bruises. You let your hands trail up his chest, thumbing over his flushed nipples before threading into the hair at the base of his head. Tilting his head back, you came up and dropped back down hard on his length, letting him strike that lovely spot inside you and making his face twist in pleasure. 

“Oh, good boy, “ you moaned, long and low. “Such a good boy for me, Tomura.” 

He whimpered loudly and you bounced faster, praise tumbling easily as the pressure in your gut began to build, “You look so perfect like this, pretty cock feels so good inside.”

On a whim, you gripped his hair tightly and pressed his face into your chest, leading his lips to the stiff peak of your nipple. He latched on immediately, moans muffled against you and lovely eyes rolling back in his head. 

You took it back— this was the picture you wanted immortalized from tonight. Tomura’s mouth was full of you, slick tongue curling over the bud and suckling softly only interrupted by the occasional graze of his teeth, his dick buried in you and pulsing as you rode him to your own high.  

A high that was coming sooner rather than later. 

You let your free hand slip from his shoulder to rub frantically at your clit, feeling yourself clenching tighter and tighter on his cock, strokes shifting into a more desperate grinding. The white hot pleasure grew stronger—spurred on by the image of Tomura’s pretty hair plastered with sweat to his forehead and his coarse lips grazing your skin—cresting and sending you hurtling over the edge, cumming hard on Tomura’s thick cock.  

“Oh, baby boy, yes, make mommy cum,” you shook and clenched around him, pussy in a vice grip around his length. 

He didn’t hold out long after that, biting down roughly on your chest he groaned and you felt the hot ropes of his release painting your walls. 

It was a bit of a blur after that. You recall lifting his mouth from you, revealing a deep bruise and the indents of teeth just around your nipple—a reminder that would stick with you of this quite eventful night. Residual clothing was abandoned and you’d agreed to forgo a shower in favor of pressing every available inch of skin against his under a light sheet. 

Tomura’s breathing had evened out a while ago, heart beat relaxing to an even tattoo from it’s initial pounding. His head was tucked securely under your chin, arms flung across your middle and legs tangled in a knot. 

You’d thought he was asleep until you felt his lips moving against your shoulder and heard the soft, whispered words, “Are you going to ask me to go?”

It had been so long since you’d had a ‘normal’ conversation with him that it took you awhile to recognize his casual tone from the wrecked and begging voice you’d been hearing from him all night. Something about that knowledge made your chest ache. 

“I’m not going to make you stay,” you responded simply. 

Which was all you could really think of to say, noncommittal but open. 

“But do you want me to?” 

His tone was harsh, but not in a purposeful way. The quiet rasp was a permanent feature of his voice you’d discovered and made it him sound far more severe than he usually meant to be. The question both surprised you and didn’t. You’d asked Tomura to give up control to you before, let you take the lead and see him vulnerable. Now he was asking for it back. Asking for a level playing field. 

“I would like it if you did, yes.” 

He nodded and you felt the brush of his lashes as he closed his eyes again, settling into you more than the mattress itself. You followed suit, at least for a bit, and rested your eyes to enjoy the feeling of finally not sleeping alone. Half dozing, you breathed in the scent of well earned pleasure and sweat and laundry detergent. 

Neither of you asked any more questions—you didn’t need to.  

Because you understood Tomura Shigaraki and he understood you. 

[angel-anoetic]

I wouldn't typically ask for a Dream imagine, but I can't get this idea our of my head. Imagine beating him in a spar and having your sword stabbed through his hoodie and giving him this smug smirk and him blushing bright red and aaAAAAHH! - 🌿

Ayup 🌿!! Has Dream been stuck in anyone else's head lately?? I don't know what man's did, but suddenly the green blob is getting to me. Anyway, here it is, this was a super fun one to write, enjoy, it's a little bit longer <3

c!Dream x gn!Reader - Strike Down

Genre: /rom

Warnings: reference to violence, nothing else, no one gets hurt

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The challenge had been set two weeks ago.

You, me, 12th of May, a little match to see who the real weapons master is.

The thought brought a smile to your face, you knew that he wouldn't truly do something to hurt you; you were close. However, that did not mean that the fight was going to be easy.

He teased you non-stop about it, especially within the mere days before.

You're going down. I'm still deciding what my prize should be...maybe I'll just take your armor...

His words hardly bothered you. You knew your strength, and it was true the Dream could duel like no one else on the server, but in your mind, you were still superior. You had balance, concentration, not to mention your agility was uncopied. There had been a reason for everyone wanting you on their side during the war, hadn't there?

You had trained extra hard for those two weeks. You perfected, practicing with Wilbur, Phil, even Techno, just to make it your best effort at the very least.

The day came, and you made your way out of the house along with Wilbur and Tommy, your seconds. You expected that Dream would bring Sapnap, perhaps George, if he was awake this early.

When you got to the field, Dream was there joking with, as expected, Sapnap. Sap motioned towards you, and Dream turned around smiling.

"I'm impressed. You even showed up earlier than I thought you would." He smirked. God, his confidence was beyond aggravating.

"Let's just get this over with, I want to get back to my bed before the sun is completely up." Sapnap snickered as Dream let out a chuckle.

You and he took position, 20 feet apart, hands-on sword, sword pointed towards the ground.

"On the count of five, begin. The point is not to harm excessively or kill your opponent, only to be the last one standing. Keep it clean and fair."

5

Dream narrowed his eyes, his smirk unfaltering

4

You grasped the sword tighter

3

The only thing that mattered

2

You steadied your breathing

1

Now

You ran forward, placing your sword in front of you, blocking his first swing. He pulled back, as did you, never letting your eyes off of him. He pointed the sword out to you, then pointed towards you, curling his finger, beckoning you to him.

You smiled, taking the bait. You ran towards him, seemingly going for his stomach area before winding your arm around and aiming for his shoulder instead. He was unable to block you in time, taking a small blow to his head.

He fell to the ground, unfortunately, able to grab his sword with enough time to block yours from coming down to him. He pushed you back, making you stumble, but you quickly regained your balance.

You knew that this couldn't go on any longer, but you knew your next move had to be perfect, or it could end very badly for the both of you.

You allowed him to get up, he was clearly losing his patience.

"Really thought you would have quit by now..." You say, egging him on.

"I thought you would have given up five minutes ago."

"Make me." His smirk grew, along with a slight blush across his cheeks.

He ran towards you. You didn't move, much to his dismay, and stayed still keeping your sword to your side. You watched his feet.

Three more steps.

Perfect.

You looked uplifting your sword at an angle. He was coming at you too fast with too much force.

Just as you hoped, the swords collided at a perfect angle, knocking it from his hand and into the air. It flew through the sky before coming to a stop behind you.

Dream was shocked. He looked from his sword to you. Sapnap was yelling at him to back up while Wilbur and Tommy cheered about how amazing the move was.

You began swinging towards him. He stumbled back, eventually falling, placing his hands to cover his face as you lifted the sword for a final hit.

When you brought it down, Dream was surprised at the lack of pain he felt. When he opened his eyes, he found you hadn't stabbed through him but through his bright hoodie.

You leaned down to him, whispering in his ear, "The last one standing, right?" His cheeks heated up as you removed your sword, making your way back to Wilbur and Tommy, who were absolutely freaking out.

Sapnap helped Dream up and looked towards you.

"Hey," you turned to face him, "what's your prize?" He scratched the back of his head, removing the hair from his face.

You thought for a moment.

"I'll guess we'll see." You winked, walking back towards L'Manburg as Dream just chuckled, smiling dumbly.

"Dude, I can't believe you lost. I owe George so much money." Sap groaned.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Please don't come for my descriptions, I really tried lmfao

[heavenlysageee]

A Seed That Blossoms

fandom: Jujutsu Kaisen/Gojou

pairing: Gojou x Reader 

word count: 2049 words

a/n: this is based on the blackout scene from In The Heights that’s been going around on tiktok! it’s a bit of a drabble w/ some fluff - please enjoy mwah!

»» — —  —   —  ♡— — — — ««  ♡  »»— — — —  —  — ♡ — — —  — ««

You and Gojo have had this unspoken tension between you for a while now. Despite your adamant denial time and time again to Nobara and Yuuji, there’s a small part of you that wonders what would happen if you indulge him just a little bit. This small seed grew into a larger impulse you couldn’t deny any longer and decided to give him a chance. Just one night, with no strings attached.

You peer over at the sun as the pink sunset dances across your empty classroom at Tokyo Jujutsu High. The day was ending and you were lucky to be just about finished with your duties when you felt a pair of familiar eyes drill themselves into the back of your head. Without even turning around you said, “Are you gonna say hi or you just gonna stand there and block my doorway?”

He walks over with a smirk plastered across his face before leaning against one of the desks. “Well, hello to you too, sunshine.” 

You roll your eyes at the usual stupid lines he would throw your way. On a normal day, you would let these slide because you weren’t all that interested. But that seed blossomed, took root, and is still demanding to be nourished. You took a pause and looked up at him from your desk. He was readily waiting for your snippy quip to his advances toward you.

 You knew him for a player, the type of guy who thinks more with the thing between his legs. But you ignored the warning signs flashing in your mind when you flash him a small smile and ask him out. 

“What are you doing for the rest of the night, Satoru?” 

His eyes seemed to flash a bit of confusion at the strange turn of dynamic. You were rarely interested at anything he had to say, let alone ever entertaining his stupid pick-up lines. He bit the bait anyways. “Hoping it would be you, but I’d like to hear what you have in mind.”

You chuckled softly and replied, “Maybe if you’re lucky. Let’s see if you’re as invincible as you claim to be. Meet me at my place tonight at 8:30 and we’ll go dancing at the spring festival. Don’t make me regret giving you a chance.” 

You walk away leaving the most powerful sorcerer feeling a bit confused but excited for the new possible endeavor. 

Staring at yourself in the mirror, you fix your hair and check that you have everything you need for the night. Cellphone, check. Wallet, check. Keys, Check. Glancing at your phone, you notice a text from Gojo indicating that he was outside. He’s leaning against the hood of his car, wearing a white button up with a few buttons open, tucked into dress pants that fit him all in the right places, and his signature rectangular resting low on his nose bridge. 

You think to yourself, well, crap, he does clean up nice. Guess the people he hooks up with aren’t as blind as I thought they were.

He immediately scans your figure and smiles, “Wow, well, aren’t you a sight to see. Hope the night works in my favor and I’ll be touching you too.” 

You felt your blood rush to your cheeks as you smooth out your outfit to regain your senses. You walked toward the passenger side door and slid into the leather seat. The entire car smelled of his cologne. The engine revs and you both ride off to the party. The city lights a kaleidoscope across the dashboard and onto his side profile. You keep adjusting in your seat to distract yourself from the knot building in your abdomen. You knock it up to general nerves from a new environment and try to release the excess energy by fidgeting every so often. You feel a large, calloused hand on your knee and freeze. 

Gojo glances over with slight concern, “You good? You’ve never been on a date with someone as hot as me?” His usual banter calms you down and reminds you that it’s just Satoru, you’ve known him for a while and this shouldn’t change much. It’s just a night of dancing. You feel the car slow down and pull into the lot. Gojo opens the passenger door and leads you by the arm into the plaza. You’re greeted by the glow of lanterns strung through the outdoor plaza, the smell of various cocktails and food wafting through the air, the pounding of the bass echoes in your ears and can be felt in your feet, sending rivers of your nerves into excitement. 

He pulls you to the bar and buys you both drinks to start the night out. He turns toward you with his sky blue eyes, drink in one hand and leaning his cheek on the other. “So, what was the turning point? What made you give somebody SO detestable a chance darling?”

The pet name sends a rush of blood through you and you ask for another drink to counteract the feeling. You turn and meet his eyes once more, “You know, I’m just gonna outright say it.  Although you can be detestable, you always flirt with me and I wanted to see if you got more than just a pretty face.” You throw a few more shots back and feel the former butterflies slip away, just enough to gather the courage to enjoy the party. 

While he watches you transform into someone far more outgoing from the liquid courage slipping past your lips, his eyes stare longer at them. Even if he hasn’t outright admitted it, you were the constant in his life that gave him a sense of normalcy. No matter how many people he wakes up next to in the morning, he always wondered what it would be like to wake up next to you or learn about you beyond the boundaries of banter and curses. As arrogant as he can be, the one thing he doesn’t want to sacrifice is the dynamic you have going on with him. He wouldn’t let his feelings ruin that if you didn’t want it to. This is a chance that can bring your relationship with him to a new level - one step forward or ten steps back. 

Before he could get a word in, another person offered to dance with you. You glance over at Gojo knowingly ready to reject them if he just said the word. But he didn’t. He nods, gesturing for you to continue, and you try to hide the slight disappointment behind your eyes. You wonder if it was worth inviting him out at all without even knowing if he wanted to go on a date with you. He could’ve just been flirting with you for shits and giggles. 

Gojo watches with a clenched jaw as you bounce from one person’s arms to the next. Time passes and you glance every so often to see what he was doing, wondering why he hasn’t pulled you and asked you to dance yet. Your hope for him to make a move dwindles and you feel it wither as each second passes. You feel your eyes drill into him as another person approaches him and grazes their hand across his, leaning into his ear to whisper something. He laughs. The loud music, the breaths of the stranger on your neck mixed with the smell of alcohol fills your nose but nothing defeats the angry drumming of your heartbeat in your ears.

You should’ve known he wasn’t here for you. You walk over with the firm resolve to nip this feeling before it grows even deeper roots and hurts you more. “I was just another score huh? You abandoned me. Gojo, you barely even danced with me.” 

His face distorts into irritation as he feels the pent up frustration bubble over, “Don’t make me laugh, I’ve been trying all night. You been shaking your ass for like half of the town.” 

It’s as if the whole room deadened to a halt as he spits out the words, placing the blame on you. Every one of your senses grow overwhelmed and all you can taste on your tongue is absolute bitterness. He never saw the way you longingly looked at him, all it took was a word and he never spoke up. That was his decision and it isn’t your fault. You retort, “Trying? You didn’t even approach me on the dance floor. I felt everyone’s hands on my waist except the one pair I was hoping would. Instead you were busy swapping spit with what seems like anyone that was willing to.” 

Shame continues to flood Gojo and pushes him into an inexplicable frustration, the flood gates opened at this point and wouldn’t stop. “That’s all you expect from me and never see me as anything other than a wandering, empty shell of a man into different people’s beds right? So why should I try to prove myself as anything other than that? I can have a normal conversation with somebody but to you it looks like I’m working for my next bed frame.”

Offense bubbles in your chest as you feel your voice begin to shake, “Why would I expect anything different when that’s all you’ve ever shown me tonight. I gave you a chance and you did what you usually do. With somebody else, again. And don’t ever shame me for dancing with other people, you don’t own me Goj-”

Before you can finish, you feel his hand squish your cheeks, preventing you from speaking. “You know that’s not my name sweetheart. I don’t want to hear you call me by anything other than my first name. You’ll never be distant enough from me that I’ll allow you to call me that.” Your eyes meet his and pull his hand away from your face as he seems to tower over you this time.

You stare at each other for what seemed like forever as a mix of shock and sentiment swirl in your mind, “Forget it Satoru. Good thing we established that we wouldn’t ever work. I’m just gonna find my own way home, you don’t have to worry about me. Have fun.” 

He grabs your wrist, “Give me a chance again. Please.” You try to rip your hand out of his grip but it was impossible. Tears sting and threaten to spill from your eyes as you look back and expect a smug look of victory. Instead you were met with a gaze that spelled absolute defeat. Your expression softened slightly and sighed, giving him a nod. He pulls you away from the crowd back through the exit only lit by the obnoxiously red neon sign above the two of you. 

His thumb gently swipes across your cheek urging you to look up at him. His voice softly responds, “You were doing your own thing and I wanted to try and distract myself from what I was feeling.” His hand moves from your face and he runs it through his hair trying to find the words. You reach for his hand and cradle it in your own, “What feeling Satoru?”

He slips his hand away and decides it’s time to come clean, “I was afraid that if I made a move you didn’t like, it would push you away. I don’t really care for a lot of people, but I do for you and I didn’t want to deal with losing a best friend. I’ve dealt with that shit before and I don’t want to make the same mistakes again.” 

Your heartbeat finally stills and you feel the stupid seed blossom again, leaving you in a feeling of vulnerability. “Are you trying to pull the sap card to get into my pants or are you being real right now?” He smiles exasperatedly and replies, “I’m being really genuine right now. If I JUST wanted to get into your pants, I would’ve done it FOREVER ago.” 

You gesture him to come closer to your face, he obliges and leans into you about a breath away from your nose. You fill the space between you both and press a gentle kiss to his lips with a small smile. “Hm, guess that makes two of us.”  

[taetaespeaches]

Liv you know how each member has a hobby they are into? How would each member’s ladies tell them they want to do it with them? I can see Peaches straight up being like yes I’m doing this with you because I want to spend time with you. And Holly secretly watching boxing videos and then hiding it once Guk catches her. Or or Poopsie trying to prove to Jin she can indeed cook without his watch 😭 or Petal buying bracelet diy kits 🥺

Well, I thought this was so cute that I turned it into a reaction sorta thing :) the selected hobbies are- Jin: fishing, Yoongi: basketball, Hoseok: diy bracelets, Namjoon: visiting art exhibitions, Jimin: video games, Taehyung: pastels, Jungkook: boxing. Anyways, thanks for asking love, and I hope you all enjoy <3 

“Remember that when I catch a bunch of fish and you don’t.”

kim seokjin x reader genre: fluff word count: 412

SCROLLING through the article about which lures are best for catching fish in fresh water lakes, Jin’s eyebrows were pulled together in concentration. Your head was resting upon his shoulder as you read through the descriptions with him, though Jin had no idea you were paying any real attention to the laptop screen.

“Mm,” you hummed, pushing your finger against the display at one of the lures. “That one is supposed to be good if paired with the right bait,” you told him, Jin quickly turning his head to look down at you.

“How do you know that?” He asked, you giggling as you looked up at his wide-eyed expression.

“I asked my dad,” you told him. “He’s a pretty good fisherman so I asked him for some tips.” A wide smile spread across Jin’s face as he stared at you. “Actually,” you started, standing up and making your way across the room to grab the shopping bag sitting on your dresser. “I got you something.”

Jin’s eyes widened even more, if that was possible, slowly taking the bag from you as you held it out to him. Digging inside, he pulled out a couple of the several lures you bought him, a gasp leaving his lips.

“Whoah, you’re amazing,” he told you sincerely, looking up at you as you grinned. “You got so many,” he noted in surprise, you shrugging.

“I guess I’ll have to come with to test some out for you,” you grinned, Jin’s expression showing even more astonishment.

“You want to come with?” He asked you disbelievingly, though a smile began curving on his lips.

“Of course,” you giggled. “I have an interest in you, therefore, I have an interest in your hobbies, darling.”

Dropping the bag of lures, Jin reached for your hand, tugging you on top of his lap, you less than gracefully straddling him. “I’m so in love with you,” he told you with a fond grin.

Pressing a kiss to his lips, you pulled away to rest your forehead against his own. Placing your hand against the side of his face, you soothed over his cheek with your thumb. “Remember that when I catch a bunch of fish and you don’t,” you teased, Jin immediately letting out a yell of complaint as he flipped you over onto your back, hovering over you.

“You little punk,” he chuckled before kissing you deeply, about to teach you a lesson on picking on your bad fisherman boyfriend.

“Just meet me on the court, you brat.”

min yoongi x reader genre: fluff word count: 450

FOR a man who liked to call you a brat, he sure was a goddamn brat. “Min, pick up the pace, come on,” you whined.

“What are we even doing?” He asked in complaint, though he did move a little faster as you walked down the street. He was dressed in a pair of basketball shorts and an oversized t-shirt with some trainers, as per your request, you in some workout shorts and a shirt just as big as his, because, well it was his.

“Would you just quit being a baby and trust me,” you giggled, receiving a grunt from your boyfriend. Suddenly, you felt a tug on the backpack you carried. Craning your neck to look behind you, you caught Yoongi as he opened up the bag. “Yoongi, no,” you whined, just as he pulled out the basketball.

A small smile gracing his pretty face, he shot you a confused look. “Why do you have this?”

Letting out a deep sigh, you grabbed his wrist, guiding him down the street a bit more, Yoongi following behind you amused but still puzzled. Rounding the corner, you pointed at the little park down the block, which just so happened to have a fully painted basketball court.

“I was trying to surprise you,” you pouted, Yoongi looking from the court back to you.

“Oh, Kid,” he chuckled at your expression, wrapping his arm around the top of your back and pulling you into his side. Pressing a kiss to your temple, he smiled against your skin, chuckling some more. “You’re cute.”

“I want you to teach me your moves,” you told him, the man giggling even more as his shoulders shook.

“My moves?” He looked down at you with a gummy smile. “Since when?”

“Since always,” you stole the ball from him, your boyfriend shooting you a wide-eyed look. “I always want to be involved in your hobbies,” you told him, Yoongi’s gaze softening as his orbs scanned your features. “You love basketball and I love you,” you informed him as if it was obvious you would then also have an interest in basketball.

However, before he could respond with a sweet sentiment for your interest, you shoved against his chest to antagonize him. “So show me what you got,” you teased, Yoongi scoffing.

Stealing the ball back easily and dribbling as he walked toward the court he called back, “you asked for it, Kid.”

“Yeah, yeah, Grampa, don’t break a hip,” you yelled back, Yoongi shaking his head as he smiled fondly.

“Just meet me on the court, you brat,” he called out to you, both of you grinning like two idiots in love, because, well, that’s what you were. 

“You have to show me what to do though, I’m not very crafty.”

jung hoseok x reader genre: fluff word count: 472

AT the sound of your boyfriend stepping out of the shower, you checked to make sure all of your brand new beads we situated on the coffee table. You were determined to join Hoseok in his recent bracelet making hobby.

“Hobi,” you called out from your spot on the floor in front of the table, receiving a cute hum in response from across the apartment. “Will you come in here when you have a minute, please?”

There was about a three second delay before you heard Hoseok’s feet patting against the floor toward you. “What’s up, Pe-” he cut himself off upon spotting your display of beads and bracelet making materials. “What’s all this?” He asked through a bright smile, his wet hair cutely pushed off his forehead.

“I was hoping you could show me how to make those bracelets you’ve been putting together on your lives,” you grinned shyly, highlighting the materials as you scanned over them with your hands as if you were displaying them in an infomercial.

“Really?” He asked with an even bigger smile, his eyes wide and excited.

“Please?” You asked cutely, Hobi immediately doing a little hip wiggle as he clapped enthusiastically.

“I can’t believe we haven’t done this together yet,” he squealed out, hurrying toward you and plopping himself onto the floor next to you. “You really want to?” He asked, looking over your selection of beads.

“Of course,” you giggled, watching him as he looked over everything.

“Ooh,” he awed, “I like these,” he pointed to the reddish-orange opaque beads.

“Yeah?” You asked, Hobi nodding happily. “I’ll use those for yours then,” you smiled, Hoseok leaning forward and placing several kisses on your cheeks.

“You’re so cute,” he mumbled against your face before catching your lips in a few short but sweet pecks.

“I got these too,” you reached forward, grabbing the special beads you got just for you both. Holding them up for him, he inspected the two flower charms and the two sun charms. “I also have a couple hearts,” you said cutely as you looked for them on the table.

However, your search was cut short from Hoseok grabbing your face between his hands and kissing you deeply. Surprised by the action, you took a moment to react but then easily fell into the kiss, your hands holding onto his forearms.

“You’re amazing, Petal,” he smiled against your lips after finally breaking the kiss. “Thanks for putting all of this together.”

“I’ve been wanting to join you in this,” you giggled, pecking his lips. “You have to show me what to do though, I’m not very crafty.”

Pulling away, he flashed you a smile that reminded you exactly why you and all of his fans called him Sunshine. “I got you,” he said cutely, you giggling at how adorable he was.

“Why, wanna take me out on a date?“

kim namjoon x reader genre: fluff word count: 665

ONE of the perks of dating Namjoon was he was always introducing you to new artists, taking you to different exhibits. Not being super knowledgeable about topics such as art but enjoying learning, you appreciated the new experience each exhibit brought to you.

To show Namjoon how much you enjoyed tagging along as he explored different art showings, you decided to seek one out all on your own and invite him to attend it with you. The one you had selected was the Kukje Gallery’s solo exhibition of artist, Wook-kyung Choi.

Looking up from your phone, which displayed the information for the exhibition, you locked your eyes on Namjoon as he scribbled in a notebook.

“Babe, are you writing or do you have a minute?” You asked him, Namjoon’s eyes meeting yours as he shut the notebook.

“No, I was just jotting down an idea,” he gave you a close-mouthed smile. “We can talk, is everything ok?” He asked, you nodding immediately. “Come here,” he opened his arms, inviting you to sit on his lap.

Coming toward him, you seated yourself across his thighs, one of his arms wrapping around your waist as the other draped over your legs. “Do you have plans this weekend?”

“No,” he shook his head. “Why, wanna take me out on a date?” He joked with a smile, his eyes widening when you nodded.

“I do actually,” you giggled.

“Huh?” He asked cutely, surprise evident in both his expression and his tone.

“There’s an art exhibit for Wook-kyung Choi at the Kukje Gallery here in Seoul,” you told him, his eyes widening even more. “Do you know of her?”

Shaking his head, he peered down at your phone as you held it up for him. “I’ve been researching her a bit, and I really fell in love with the way she would talk about her work,” you told him as you scrolled through photos of her black and white abstract paintings. “She was always a bit of an outsider in the Korean art world. She didn’t fit in with either of the dominant styles of the 1970s, so she kind of blazed her own path and ended up changing the whole scene and introducing Abstract Expressionism to Korea,” you relayed the information, looking from the phone to your boyfriend, only to find him staring at you adoringly.

He smiled softly, you looking at him in slight embarrassment. “What?” You asked shyly.

“Nothing, keep talking,” he told you. “I really love this, I had no idea you had your own interest in art.”

“I don’t necessarily, I just know that you do,” you admitted timidly, Namjoon’s jaw dropping a bit at the confession. “I wanted to invite you to an exhibit to show you that I truly do enjoy exploring all of this art with you, and when I stumbled upon this one of Wook-kyung Choi’s work, I just kind of fell in love with her,” you explained.

Namjoon leaned forward, pressing a kiss to your jaw. “She reminds me of you and the boys,” you told him with a small giggle.

“Wait, really?” He asked in shock, you smiling at his expression as you nodded.

Looking to your phone, you scrolled until you found the part of the exhibition description that stood out to you earlier. “These two discrete but related bodies of work demonstrate the artist's strong commitment to personal expression and social commentary through brave exploration of form and content, and how she chose her own path instead of blindly following or adhering to a single artistic movement,” you read aloud to your boyfriend. “That sounds like you and your music.”

“I-” Namjoon started, stopping himself as he stared at you intently. “I love you so much I don’t even know how to put it into words right now,” he confessed, you smiling as you leaned into him, pressing your lips to his.

“I love you just as much,” you whispered into the kiss. “No words needed, babe.”

“Cool it, Park, I haven’t had my turn yet.”

park jimin x reader genre: fluff word count: 517

Jimin/Dear: playing video games. (517 words)

WALKING into your apartment, your ears were immediately met with the sounds of Jimin’s frustrated grunts. Pulling your eyebrows together, you followed the noise until you reached your bedroom, peeking inside to see him sat on your bed, propped up against your headboard staring down at his Nintendo Switch with a grimace.

“Chim,” you giggled, his eyes darting up to meet your own across the room. “What’s up, my darling?”

“Ahh,” he complained, “this game is surprisingly hard.”

“What is it?” You asked, making your way across the room, peering at the screen. “Mario?”

“Yeah, Super Mario Odyssey,” he confirmed. “Jin got it for me a while ago but I forgot about it,” he told you. Sitting down on the bed with him, you watched as he controlled Mario, running through a busy city street.

“What’s the whole idea of the game?” You asked, your eyes glued to the screen.

“Bowser is trying to marry Princess Peach by force and Mario is trying to stop him,” he mumbled jumping over and on top of a bunch of people in the game.

“Ew, the fuck?” You asked, Jimin giggling as he dropped his head onto your shoulder.

“I don’t have to play right now,” he told you, preparing to shut the console down, “I was just bored.”

“No, no, you gotta stop Bowser,” you told him, kissing the top of Jimin’s head. “The fucking perv,” you added, Jimin giggling again as he approached a lever, bouncing on it and making a reddish moon appear. “Whoah, what’s that?”

“I have to collect these moons,” he explained as he jumped back over the crowd of people, snagging his moon. A big ‘You Got A Moon’ appeared on the screen, Mario doing a spin in the air as triumphant music played, Mario finishing with a celebratory fist in the air.

“Ayyyy,” you cheered in excitement, Jimin smiling widely at your reaction. “That’s my man, bitch,” you exclaimed, Jimin giggling as he kissed your shoulder.

“You’re so cute,” he cooed, you giggling as you continued watching him play. “Are you sure you’re not bored, Dear?” He asked, lifting his head from your shoulder.

“Chim, I just want to spend time with you,” you admitted. “I’m always entertained with you,” you noted nonchalantly as you continued looking at the Switch.  When Mario stopped walking amongst the crowd of people, you slowly dragged your eyes from the screen to Jimin to find him looking at you lovingly. “What?”

“Keep saying things like that and I’ll be so flattered I won’t want to keep playing this game,” he told you flirtily, you giggling as you leaned forward to kiss him softly.

“Cool it, Park, I haven’t had my turn yet,” you told him, pulling the Switch from his hands. “Now tell me what to do.”

Chuckling at you, he pressed a series of kisses to your cheek before stepping into game instructor role, pulling up his sleeves and pretending to crack his neck as he played up his acting bit.

If he kept being so adorable, you wouldn’t want to keep playing the game either.

“Couple goals or whatever.”

kim taehyung x reader genre: fluff word count: 483

WATCHING your boyfriend drag the blue color across the drawing pad, you tilted your head mesmerized.

“Are those hard to work with?” You asked, Taehyung humming in thought as he stayed focused on the pastel drawing.

“Not really,” he said, you nodding though he wasn’t looking at you.

You were sitting a few feet away from him in his studio, both of you only dressed in your underwear, having just been intimate on that very floor a mere fifteen minutes ago. It started with you simply visiting your boyfriend in his quaint little art studio, and turned into him taking you shortly after your arrival, unable to keep his hands off you.

When he eventually returned to his pastels, you sat and watched him curiously. Crawling toward him, you sat yourself next to him, his innocent and stunning orbs looking at you with a softness only you could conjure from him.

“Can I have a piece of paper?” You asked, Taehyung’s eyes widening.

“You want to draw with me?” He questioned, you nodding.

“It’s actually why I came here,” you giggled. “Though the sex was great as always,” you added, “truly, you never disappoint.” Taehyung chuckled lowly, running his finger along your thigh, some of the pastel transferring from his digit to your leg. “Turns out your interests are my interests now,” you rolled your eyes jokingly. “Couple goals or whatever,” you added, Taehyung laughing cutely.  

“Hang on,” he told you, setting the drawing pad on the floor and standing up. You watched as his long-toned legs crossed the room, turning around with a new drawing pad in his hands. “You can have your own pad, Peaches,” he grinned, handing it to you.

Gasping, you looked down at the object. “One of my very own?” You asked, Taehyung giggling as he bent over to leave a kiss to your forehead.

“You can have as many as you want,” he told you. “How long have you been wanting to draw with me?” He asked, you shrugging as you set your gaze on him as he took a seat next to you.

“For a while, I guess. I love watching you work, so I guess you kind of inspired me to try,” you told him with a small smile. “You always make me want to do new things, and this is something we can do together.”

Pointing your attention back to the art materials, Taehyung watched as you studied the colors. “Should I just,” you grabbed the light green, “dive in with this and see what happens?” You asked, looking up at Tae when you received no answer.

“I love you,” he told you, you smiling at the sudden statement.

“And I love you, Dearest,” you replied, scrunching your nose as he continued to stare. “Hurry up and kiss me, dude,” you demanded, Tae giggling as he leaned forward, pressing his lips to yours eagerly.

“What the hell are you doing watching boxing videos?”

jeon jungkook x reader genre: fluff word count: 635

WITH your ear buds in, you didn’t hear your apartment door open, much less Jungkook’s footsteps as he approached you from behind. You were stood in your kitchen, your left foot forward and knees slightly bent as you watched the video on how to throw a left hook.

“Pop the elbow, turn the foot,” you mumbled to yourself, a smile spreading across Jungkook’s face as he watched you in utter amusement. “Thumb up,” you barely spoke as you watched the video, mimicking the movement being shown.

However, you realized your solo boxing lesson had been interrupted when you caught a glimpse of Jungkook in the laptop screen and recognized his giggle overtop the instructor’s voice. Reacting quickly, you slammed the laptop closed and spun around to face your crinkly-eyed boyfriend as he was nearly bent over in laughter.

“I hate you so much right now,” you spoke in mortification, watching as he didn’t even attempt to gather his composure. “Oh my god, this is so embarrassing,” you whined.

Finally calming his laughter to just light giggles, he reached out for you, taking your hand in his. “Why are you embarrassed, baby? Your form is great,” he teased, you pulling your hand from his and shoving his chest as you held back a laugh.

“You’re so mean,” you groaned as he quickly stepped toward you, wrapping you up in a hug, you burying your face in his chest.

“Can I just ask you one thing?” He asked, you groaning at the request. “What the hell are you doing watching boxing videos?”

Sighing against his t-shirt, he giggled again. “I wanted to learn some stuff so I could box with you some time,” you admitted timidly, Jungkook immediately pulling you from his frame just slightly so he could look at you, you meeting his gaze.

“You want to box with me?” He asked in surprise, a small smile tugging at his lips.

“Well, I did,” you giggled. “Now I just kind of want to crawl in a hole and die.” Jungkook laughed at the comment before cooing at you.

“You’re so cute, you know, you could have just told me you wanted to come with,” he told you, pressing a kiss to the top of your head. “I could teach you better than these fools,” he pointed at the closed laptop.

Giggling, you raised your eyebrows at him. “Jealous?” You teased, Jungkook scoffing. “I just wanted to know some stuff before I asked to tag along so that I wasn’t slowing you down during your workout,” you told him quietly, Jungkook shooting you a look of disbelief.

“That’s silly, teaching you would be the best part,” he assured you. Giving him a questioning expression, he grinned mischievously. “Turn around,” he told you before spinning you around, his hands landing on your hips, your back pressed to his chest.

Sliding his hand down your thigh, he tapped the side of it. “Bring this leg back,” he told you, you following his directions. “And now bend just slightly,” he led you, his hands gently soothing across your body, a little too sensually for a boxing lesson.

“See, this is why I can’t learn from you,” you noted, Jungkook chuckling next to your ear.

“Why is that, Baby?” He whispered, you scoffing in response.

“Because I have zero desire to learn how to throw a left hook now,” you whined, Jungkook laughing as he pressed a kiss to the side of your neck.

“We can’t do anything, I swear,” he giggled against your skin, you laughing as you reached back to thread your fingers into his hair.

“Are you complaining?” You asked, looking to your side to meet his gaze.

“Definitely not,” he said just before pressing his lips to yours, immediately deepening it as you turned in his arms.

[theres-an-impulstor-among-us]

Team ZITS mischief? >:D

Team ZIT mischief! AKA: what might have happened if Impulse and Xisuma weren’t so quick to solve their dispute over the height of Xisuma’s building.

(note: it was agreed via DM that the prompt has been changed to team ZIT instead of the full team ZITS)

Hope you enjoy! I had a lot of fun writing this ngl

Writing requests still open! Please read pinned post for details.

...

  “This is a bad idea,” groans Impulse, clutching his sword as tight as he can. “Ooohhh, this is a REALLY bad idea.”

  “Stop saying that,” Tango says from his spot atop a nearby tree. “You’ll be totally fine. I have total faith in your ability to be an acceptable decoy.”

  “Acceptable?!” Impulse rolls his eyes. “All I gotta do is not die and I’m not even above “acceptable”? What’s a guy gotta do to graduate to “good”?”

  “Let’s see you not die first, Bait Boy,” Tango teases. “Zed, you in position?”

  Zedaph’s voice comes over their communication channel. “I am currently perched at the very top of Impulse’s tower in Aqua Town, nametags in hand. Dunno if this is where I’m supposed to be.”

  “Yeah, that’s fine,”Tango snickers. “Just keep a lookout and be ready.” 

  “Eight ninety-two, good buddy.”

  Tango frowns confusedly. “Uh… what?” 

  Despite his nerves, Impulse can’t help laughing. “Do you mean ten-four, Zed?” 

  “Probably? I dunno radio codes, dude; I’m just making up numbers.”

  “Focus, guys,” Tango says tiredly, rubbing his bleary eyes. “It took us all night to find these stupid things so let’s not blow it now that we’re close to the end, alright? Anyway, Impulse, are you ready?”

  Impulse takes a deep breath in and out. “Ready.”

  Tango shoots an arrow at the pressure plate, activating the door. The ravager inside the makeshift trap immediately spots Impulse just a few blocks away and charges towards him. He backs up a few steps, before hopping onto the block above the minecart. “Goooood boy. Goooood ravager. Get in the minecart.”

  Unfortunately, the ravager does not get in the minecart. Instead, it lunges upwards, attacking Impulse with its horns.

  Impulse screams as he’s catapulted off the two-block-high pillar. He scrambles to his feet and takes off running, pursued by the ravager. 

  Tango winces as he watches them go. “Uh oh! Stuff’s gone wrong.”

  “What’s gone wrong?” asks Zedaph’s voice in his ear.

  “Ravager did not want to go for a nice minecart ride. Oh, and Impulse… Don’t look now but I think you’ve got more on your tail.”

  Impulse looks. 

  Tango suspects that his best friend’s subsequent scream at finding out he now has three angry ravagers pursuing him can be heard all the way in Aqua Town. 

  “WHY DID I THINK IT WAS A GOOD IDEA TO PUT MY ELYTRA AWAY?!” Impulse shrieks. 

  Tango takes off using his own wings. He soars over Impulse and the ravagers, looking desperately for a way to save his friend. 

  Back in Aquatown, Zedaph glides over from the top of Impulse’s tower to the window ledge of Xisuma’s half-finished building, his eyes fixed on the place in the distance where his friends should soon appear.

  “What’s going on?”

  Zedaph involuntarily leaps to the side with fright, causing him to topple off his perch and tumble to the ground. Thankfully, he lands on the grassy verge, so his landing is softer than it could have been. He quickly grabs his dropped nametags.

  Xisuma jumps down and lands neatly next to him. Even though the thick visor, Zedaph can see a raised eyebrow. “Why are there rails going into my new shop?”

  “Um…” Zedaph pauses, giving himself as much time as he dares to think. “That’s a good question. We’re… um…”

  “We?” repeats Xisuma. “Who else is here?”

  Zedaph blinks, his mind racing to come up with something on the fly. “Um… G-Grian…? And… And… Etho?”

  “Good job, bud,” comes Tango’s sardonic voice in his ear. “You’re killin’ it.”

  Zedaph can tell from Xisuma’s expression that his friend isn’t buying his obvious lie. “Mmhmm. This wouldn’t have anything to do with my dispute with Impulse over the height of my building, would it?”

  “What building?” asks Zedaph innocently.

  Xisuma takes a step to the side. “The building you just fell off.”

  “Oh.” Zedaph gapes at his friend in a panic, unable to think of a reply. “Um…”

  “Gah, my elytra broke!” Tango yelps at that moment. “This cannot get any worse!”

  “IT’S WORSE!” shrieks Impulse’s voice, not over the communication line but real, in the distance. “IT’S WORSE IT’S WORSE IT’S WORSE!”

  Xisuma spins round to find Impulse rushing towards him, followed by three angry ravagers. He lets out a screech and goes to activate his elytra but it’s already too late. 

  Zedaph manages to nametag one of the ravagers before scrambling out of the way as the three beasts bear down on Xisuma, who is cowering in the doorway of his shop. Scrambling into the BOVE offices, Zedaph runs right into Impulse, knocking both of them down. 

  Seconds later, Tango appears and manages to slam the door shut before his foot catches on Impulse’s leg and he ends up joining the two in a heap on the floor. 

  The three lie on the ground in silence for a few minutes, gasping for breath and listening to the terrifying ravager sounds outside. 

  After a long time, a message flashes up on their communicators. 

  Xisuma was slain by You’ve Been Bove’d!

  Impulse and Tango very slowly crane their necks to look at Zedaph, who is staring straight up at the sky with wide eyes, pretending not to notice his friends’ gazes. 

  Finally, the two simultaneously burst out laughing, and after only a moment, Zedaph joins in. 

  “I feel like I had an explanation for that name but now I don’t remember what it was,” Zedaph gasps out through his laughter. “It doesn’t even make any sense!”

  Impulse reaches over to pat his friends on the shoulder. “It’s very Zedaph. Oh, boy… Well, that did not go according to plan.”

  “It really did not,” Tango exhales. “But we kinda achieved our goal in the end anyway.”

  “Xisuma’s gonna kill us, right?” asks Impulse.

  Tango snorts. “Oh, absolutely. But I don’t have the energy to run anymore so I’m just gonna lie here, maybe take a nap, and hope he has mercy on me.” 

  “Oh, a nap sounds pretty nice right now, not gonna lie.” Yawning, Impulse tilts his head to rest on Tango’s shoulder and closes his eyes. “I’m so tired…”

  Zedaph laughs quietly and leans his own head on Impulse’s shoulder. His eyelids are so heavy that he can hardly stay awake anymore…

  And that is how, fifteen minutes later, Xisuma finds them when he finally manages to dispatch the last of the ravagers. He goes to push open the door but spots the three sleeping in a pile on the floor through the window, and he lets out a fond sigh, most of his annoyance already dissipating. 

  “I’ll deal with you three morons later.”

[penrose-quinn]

Musubi [Preview] | Suguru Geto/F!Reader

posted: 04.02.21 | full: [Ao3]

word count: 2.2K 

content tags: pre-hidden inventory arc. can be read as an excerpt.

tw: slight mentions of blood.

a/n: i haven’t written a fight scene in such a long time so apologies for the rusty writing. as for the full one-shot itself, i can’t give a date yet but i hope ya’ll can settle for this. enjoy the laughs for now! *cries in the corner*  

First impressions were always drawn by an encounter, and tied tautly between bravado and cutthroat competition in the annual Kyoto Goodwill Event, the curious color of the string tugged out of Geto running into you was one of interest.

Strategically speaking, it made sense in any fight.

However, a downside to this was that they were inevitably a precursor for nasty introductions when names were traded like bruises and conversations for combat tactics. 

Openings made for a good invitation for a counter, but Geto was quick to parry them with a looming many-limbed pillar of a curse that walled between the both of you with a screech; jolting back the memory and taste of sickness. A spirit of obsession.

Deformed hands, riddled with watchful eyes, reached for you, fixating in your every movement to resist them. You were fast, he’d give you that, but you were paired against a curse that was built from vile adamance. In short, a pain in the ass. Capturing it was, undoubtedly, and now, offered leverage to him when it made things a little simpler and interesting to watch from afar.  

Attention to stances and a razor-sharp interest in the opponent; they were all inevitable, after all.

The moment your strings began to unravel from the pads of your fingers.

They were something to look out for when seemingly anything with cursed energy were bound to be entangled by the subtle manipulation of your hands, and in a span of a minute, the curse was left dangling and viciously writhing in suspension, held fast on the tough bark of oak trees like a fly to an intricate web.

“A Grade Two.” You gawked at it, giving in to a low whistle. “Cool.”

“Can’t believe you ate it up, though,” you said, hinting on that you already knew about his cursed technique. “Did you have to hack it up to pieces?”

Then you made a hand sign – two fingers pressed together – and with a smooth motion, your wrist rotating in an arc, the strings tied to the curse tightened, almost twisting its body for good measure. Or to flaunt. The two never seemed to be far from each other from what Geto observed from you. Typical senior behavior.

“It doesn’t work like that,” Geto said anyway, but unwilling to elaborate further.

From your distance, you peered back at him. “Not the chatty type like Six Eyes, eh?”

But he had a feeling you were.

“I’m afraid not.”

“You’re not gonna show your cards then?” you asked, perhaps alluding to a binding vow.

Geto was uncertain with what you’re trying to get out of this. Cautious as he was, he knew better than to play along, though something about your blatant drawl made him realize how he’d been curious enough to take the risk, mirroring that lazy confidence that curled up your peach-stained lips.

“Not going to show yours, senpai?”

There was a flicker of challenge in your eyes that appeared to make them brighter, like a glint of a knife. However, for whatever reason, you downplay it with a halfhearted shrug. “I’ll be honest,” and in a low amused voice, humoring him, “kouhai.”

The corners of his mouth bent into a slight smirk.

“I’m not really in the mood to help out anyone. Hell, I don’t even care if your school wins,” you admitted, pausing for a moment to listen in to the devastation of some uncharted area of the school grounds. Satoru. “See? We’re on the receiving end anyway.”

“Fair point,” Geto said with a nod. Though he kept the sentiment to himself, he would argue that you should have at least made an effort to appear concerned for your team.

“But that doesn’t mean I’m going to back out from this fight either. That’d be no fun. So how about it?” you offered. “Want to try something?”

Geto did contemplate on it—you. What your whole angle was about, why you went about it in such a roundabout way. Perhaps, the Kansai dialect had a hand in it when your manner of talking turned your inflections more offhanded and overfamiliar. Though he couldn’t deny that he caught on that you sounded more cryptic in comparison to his friend’s open, rather crude bluntness.

Something about your exchanges were like that, full of traps and layers, and as tired and eye-rolling as they were on another person, Geto wasn’t annoyed of you. Rather, he was keen in pursuing answers himself. What kind, he wasn’t sure yet. You had a way of making things interesting, and drawn by the pang of something like inquisitiveness and hunger, he arrived to a decision. “What do you have in mind?”

“Great! That settles it then,” you grinned, clapping your hands together. Another hand sign. “I’m setting your curse free.”

Once the strings began unwinding from the many-limbed curse, Geto felt a tremor from his gut; body apprehensive and prepared to strike.  

Then it all came crashing down with a wink and a red and gold knot forming between your fingers, untwisting it with one decisive pull.

“Unbind.”

It was a sharp breathless feeling.

A sudden relief, followed by a sense of loss. A kind of detachment, brief but deeply harrowing like losing a limb to a cleave, losing the weight of it all at once, where the curse tethered to him had been released, his control slipping, senses disoriented. Severed. It wasn’t bound to his will anymore.  

Resentful in its newfound freedom, the many-limbed curse lunged at him to attack, hands spread out and reaching, eyes crimson and pulsing wide when it set its sights on him.

Snapping out of his stupor, Geto was quick to react with a bolt. Shadow and silhouette bloomed under the ground by a summon, and what stretched forth was his massive hookworm curse, mouth gaping open to devour the Grade Two, and now, snapping shut for the kill before disappearing entirely from his bidding.

Geto would have rather reserved the curse for later, but he won’t gamble losing another one to your technique.

“Personally, I think we’re a bad match,” you mused aloud.

Then your strings whipped at him in a lightning second. Evading them, Geto leapt back and landed aptly on his feet.  

“Especially when I can bind and unbind things with my inherited technique. Seals, shikigami, curses … hm, I suppose yours is an interesting case,” you stared at him thoughtfully before shrugging. “But it’s a kind of attachment either way.”

“Now you’re showing your cards,” Geto hissed out a breath, running through a new game plan.

“Sure, why not.” Your mouth broke into an easy grin. “Keeps the ball rolling, you know?”

There was a cool refinedness in your stance, feet anchored to the ground while your hands were doing all the fighting: flexed out, full of precise flourishes albeit strained, with strings unspooling from your deft fingers. The distance worked to your advantage, though closing it between the both of you was jumping headfirst into a trap in itself.

Geto surmised. But—

“I’d rather end this sooner.”

Mind set and carried by a surge of adrenaline, Geto sprinted towards you, dodging each assault for a closer range, until your strings finally coiled around his wrist, and in reaction, he tugged at it in a vice-grip with a strong pull; drawing out a look of shock from you, and then an eager anticipation. Your body shifted into a steady position, ready and waiting, arms posed for a counterattack.

Geto kept on his pace, charging at you with a wave of his free hand; darkness unfurling and taking shape of a half-formed spirit. Eyes wary of another summoned curse, you took the bait when you made another motion with your other hand, and he took it as a sign of withdrawing the curse back and kicking dust on your face, temporarily blinding you. The strings loosened on him. You recoiled.

When your guard was lowered, Geto seized the chance to swing his foot up at you; a swift kick to your forearm, minutely braced into a block to offset the full brunt of it, but it was powerful enough to send you skidding back your heels.

“Cheat,” you spat, cracking one vigilant eye on him.

Stubborn and quick to recover, you pulled at your strings to reel him in for a mean right hook, knuckles meeting his face. He was able to buffer the blow with his cursed energy, though the hit still landed, hard and fast.

“We’re even.” Geto winced from the bruise on his jaw. Your fist was imbued with cursed energy too, and now, was hurtling back at him with a ferocious amount of force. He side-stepped, dodging the hit that smashed against the tough bark of a tree, splintering it from the impact, and as you were about yank your arm back, he finally found his opening.  

All it took was a faulty step; a split-second of being swept by the heel, knocking you off your momentum as you fell back to the tree, ensuring his victory through a newly summoned amorphous curse restraining your hands and feet.

Geto lunged forward. His fist hurtled down at you, mere inches from your face, until he felt something taut restrain his wrist and his wide eyes followed the cord curled around your two fingers, protruding out of the oozing wound of the curse grappling your hands.

Leaning back, you let out a sigh of relief.

“Okay, kouhai! I forfeit.”

Geto stopped to think for a moment, and testing the string latched onto him with a careful tug, he cocked his head at you to ask. Just in case. “You sure?”

“Yes.” You rolled your eyes at him, blowing a strand of hair from your cheek. A faint waft of mint. “Unlike you, I can’t get my face bruised.”

It was only a fraction, but the insouciance of your smile cracked a little from the edges. More brittle and thinner, from whatever sentiment you hid between your lips. Regardless, he sensed no insincerity from your words.

It was his turn to sigh.

“All right.”

Once the string disentangled from his wrist, Geto stepped back from you, drawing in a raspy breath, as he held himself upright, still tense and arduous from the heat of the fight. He felt heavy from the sweat, dull ache, and spent adrenaline straining on his shoulders, the backs of his legs, everything. He wouldn’t have to undergo through this ordeal if he could only use his cursed technique against you.

“You’re right,” he admitted, tugging at his collar. “We’re really a bad match.”

“Told you,” you crooned.

A set-up? Geto considered it, recalling how they were separated in the fray with the other team; Gojo getting sidetracked at some point and you luring him here with your strings. “Was that intentional?”

“Everyone was counting on it,” you answered, wrenching out your hands from the curse in a violent splatter. “But honestly? The whole plan doesn’t matter in the end. We’re still worse off. And I’m no one’s backup either.”

Noticing his stunned reaction, you amusedly held out your open bloody palm at him. A gesture of reassurance. “Don’t sweat it. This is still your win.”

While Geto was still wary around you, he eased a little from your words. He nodded.

“If that’s the case, why did you go along with the plan?”

“Didn’t want to pass up something,” you said vaguely, looking back at him before tearing off the other curse clinging on your feet, cringing at the sight of gore on your shoes once it was split open by your fingers. “These things aren’t cute at all.”

“You could’ve been more careful with them,” Geto pointed out.

“Gotta get back at you somehow. They have teeth, you know.”

Which you nonchalantly ripped apart with your bare hands.

Before you could wipe off the blood on your hand to your skirt, Geto still went out of his way to give you his handkerchief for the mess, which you stared at for five agonizing seconds before accepting it with a mutter of thanks.

You began to clean your knuckles, bunching up the fabric on your palm. “Well, this is ruined.”

“Not really planning on getting it back,” said Geto, flipping up his phone. He received a photo of Gojo with some members of the other team, ragged and beaten shitless, followed by a text that went somewhere along the lines of everyone being so weak and a demand as to why he was taking so long.

“Geto-san.”

Geto snuck a glance back at you from his phone.

“You’re pretty strong for a first year.“ You hummed in thought and he listened more intently. "Ah, but that’s expected. Judging from the rumors circling around, I suspected you lot from Tokyo Tech were either a piece of work or something else.”

“Something.” Geto smiled.

“Cheeky.”

“Speak for yourself.”

Geto was going to reply back to Gojo until you chuckled, light and airy, drawing his attention back at you.

“Oh, and another thing,” you said, and for a moment, beneath the long spidery lashes, there was a quiet profoundness to your eyes that made a glance blur between an appraisal and a clarity one could find from a thin thread of interest, tugged up by a wry tilt of your lips.

“What kind of woman is your type?”

a/n: . . . that last line is so cursed. i wish todou was the one who asked. for context, reader is one of yuki’s students.

↣ side note: i thought satosugu were already both classified as special grades upon their enrolment like yuuta, but i didn’t realize later on that they were only promoted as special grades after the spv mission. i won't be rewriting this and will be keeping it as it is, but apologies for getting those details wrong!

↣ side note: nvm. i caved. [revised: 04/17/21]

[badwithten]

doesn’t have to be a love story

〉yangyang x fem!reader

〉highschool au

〉word count 3.7k

〉warnings swearing, alcohol, vaping, violence? (not really)

 〉yangyang and y/n have been close for a long time but it didn't really make sense.  those two didn’t mix, especially if there was no romance involved. this is why their friends found it so hard to believe that this wouldn’t end in a relationship, it won't right?  

“Yangyang it's pretty obvious you like her” It's not the first time he's heard those words, and he's certain it won't be the last. I suppose it was strange around here for guys and girls to be friends without a relationship. But that's all it was, only a friendship.

“It's not like that” He groaned and turned his attention to the block of wood he was supposed to be cutting for his hard material class, so far it was not coming along how he wanted. But he didn't feel discouraged, Xiaojuns one was way worse.

“Why don't you just say something?” Xiaojun was pretty reluctant with this whole Y/N and Yangyang thing, convincing himself that they were the end game. But in Yangyangs eyes it just wasn't like that. 

You two became friends in your first year of high school after being sat at the same table in math. You found joy in his jokes about the teacher and he thought it was funny he had to help you with your math every five minutes. Admittedly he wasn't the best at it either. 

Although the constant comments from his friends regarding the relationship between you two got annoying, he understood where they were coming from. He had never had this close of a bond with a girl before, especially not with a girl and it didn't lead anymore. But you were different. You were kind, funny, you understood him, you listened and even cooked for him when his parents went away for the weekend. Even though he loved his group of friends, they were ‘the boys’. It was difficult talking to them about things, it made it hard to talk about emotions or what he enjoyed in fear of not fitting in. He was probably being ridiculous but either way, it didn't matter, because he had you to express his feelings with anyway.

What Yangyang didn't know was that you were also dealing with similar comments from your friends. They were suspicious about the amount of time you two spent together. Even after you explained to them, several times, that he was just a friend nothing more. They insisted that you make a move. It made sense to them, you were always complaining about being single, how you wanted someone in your life. The way you would describe the person you wanted, someone funny, caring, passionate and stood up for what they believed in. All those things were Yangyang, 

But that's not how you saw it, if you and him had gone out, it just wouldn't have worked. The friendship you had was too special to risk that. You will always be grateful for the late nights spent with him, only heading home when your mum calls you telling you she's going to bed. 

Maybe it was because you saw a different side of him. Yangyang, the class clown, who ditches class, doesn’t hand in homework and writes rap lyrics on his tests. But the Yangyang you knew was sensitive, he took into consideration his surroundings and how he affected others and despite what many people think, he was intelligent. The conversations you two had under the stars never left your mind.

The sun was too hot for you to be stuck in such an uncomfortable uniform for any longer than you had to, yet Yangyang was nowhere to be seen. You agreed to meet him outside the gym after the last period since that's where his class would be, and he still managed to be late. This isn't surprising, he had PE. Five minutes after the bell goes, he and Ten finally pile out of the gym, the rest of their class nowhere to be seen. 

“Hey Y/N” Ten skips over with Yangyang trailing behind. He pulls you into a hug, you watch Yangyang roll his eyes from over Tens shoulder, causing you to laugh. “What's funny?”

Ten pulls away to look at you two but no one makes a move to say anything. “Well have fun on your date you two” Before you can get a word in to defend yourself he leaves, slapping Yangyang on the ass for good measure before dashing towards the front of the school.

“They’re still going on about that?” You and Yangyang finally make your way out the back of the school to start the long journey home. 

“Yeah don't worry about it, you know what they're like” You hum in agreement, not wanting to dwell on the awkward subject. Although you were both forced to hear these remarks every day, it was a different story when the other was with you. It just made things weird. Which caused even more confusion, you both strongly denied that you had any feelings, if so why did it make things awkward?

“Why did you get held in any way?” 

“Me and Ten kept getting balls stuck in the roof so we had to pack up” 

“On accident?” 

“Oh yeah definitely on ‘accident’. And you know what Mrs Hooper is like, doesn't like to have fun” You let out a laugh and rub your eyes, you forgot what he was like. You continue walking towards your usual hang out spot, the park down the road from his house. Stopping at the corner store first, getting drinks and chips to snack on.

“These pringles taste like ass” You look down in disbelief at the whole container of BBQ pringles that you had just bought after Yangyangs suggestion. “Why did you tell me to get these?”

“Well I think they're nice” He reaches over the table and snatches the container away from you.

“You baited me into buying you chips!”

“Not my fault you're slow” He gives you a cheeky smile and downs a few pringles followed by his redbull.

“Unbelievable”

“What's your speech on?” You almost jump out of your seat, not expecting Yangyang to come whisper such things in your ear. 

“I haven't decided yet, I've just been playing the snake game” You look around the room to see where the teacher is, yet you can't see him anywhere, the reason why Yangyang is standing beside you.

“I know I've been watching you” He sits down in the empty chair next to you. “You could always write about me you know?”

“Yangyang, I love you” He leans forward, resting his head on his hand and batters his eyelashes. “But no”

“Tsk your lost” As the teacher walks into the room he quickly stands to head back to his original seat across the class. 

“Yangyang, what are you doing out of your seat?” Mr Smith, a usually pretty chill teacher, still didn’t appreciate people mucking around when he's gone.

“Y/N needed help, sir” Your eyes go wide and you stare down Yangyang, he has the biggest smile across his face.

“Why didn't you say so? I'll be there soon Miss L/N '' You turn and mouth to Yangyang.

‘I hate you’

“Aren't you cold?” Yangyang asks, you can hear in his voice that he himself is shivering from the cold, despite the fact he has a jacket on. 

“A bit but what am I supposed to do about it?”

“I got an idea” You expect him to offer you his jacket, or maybe his sweatshirt. But instead, you just get pain.

“Ow! Yangyang, did you just punch my leg?” You reach down and rub the spot he just hit, it wasn't that painful but you liked to play it up. 

“It'll burn up now, you're welcome” Even though it's pitch black, you just know that he has the biggest shit-eating grin on his face.

“I think I should head home now, we have school tomorrow” You stand up and pat down your slightly damp leggings from the dewy grass. Yangyang also scrambles to his feet.

“Wait if this is because of the punch I’m sorry” 

“No, what the, it's just I have to walk home and it's already so dark” You pick up your bag and head towards the footpath out of the park. His house is on the way towards your house so you always end up dropping him home first,

“I don't wanna leave yet, my parents aren't home, it's scary living by yourself” You stop in your tracks, unable to believe what he just said.

“If your parents' aren't home, then why have we been sitting out in the cold for the past 3 hours?” You hear the rustle of his jacket, indicating he simply just shrugged. “Oh my god, Yangyang. Do you want me to stay with you tonight?”

“Yes please,” You don't mind the idea of spending all night with him, especially if it means you don't have to walk all the way home. As you turn into his street you realize you've ever actually been to his house before, despite the countless times he showed up at your door. You were caught slightly off guard at how nice the place was, you don't know what you were expecting but something about Yangyang didn't exactly scream fancy. 

“Wow your place is really nice Yangyang” You comment as you take off your shoes at the door, the warmth comforting from the chill you had gotten.

“Thanks” Yangyang heads straight to the kitchen and you follow, unsure what to do with yourself. “Do you want anything to eat? We should probably make tea”

“Well, what is there?” He walks around the counter and opens up the fridge.

“Not a lot” You move around to look over his shoulder and are disappointed at what you see.

“Why is there only grapes?” 

“I don't know, grapes are good.” He grabs out the grapes and starts popping them into his mouth, unfazed by the fact that there's there's no real food in his fridge, apart from various condiments.

“How long have you been home alone for?” 

“A couple of nights”

“And you've been eating grapes the whole time?” He nods and continues eating. “Should I make some proper food?”

“Yeah, I can't cook”

“Pasta?”

“Yeah but I don't like onion or garlic, or tomatoes really” You sigh and rub your face, this was going to be a long night.

You and Yangyang weren't the best at being organised, meaning you left his house at eight am, it took forty-five minutes to walk to school, and school started at eight-thirty. Luckily for you, you had art first, meaning there was no real pressure to get to school on time. Not so lucky for Yangyang who had studies of society. You get to school and part ways. You know you'll see him throughout the day but your conversations are never as good when other people are around. 

You get to the art room and the teacher says good morning, no comment about being late although you know you'll hear all about it from Ten when you see him sitting by himself.

“Morning,” You say as you drop your bag down. “Where's Winwin?”

“Sick apparently” He shrugs and focuses on the work in front of him, carefully shading in the portrait of himself with charcoal. “And someone had to leave me all alone this morning”

“It was fifteen minutes” You roll your eyes and wander off to get your art from the folder up the front, it's not your best piece but it'll get you a pass. A portrait of Harry Styles.  “I can't believe they let you do yourself for this”

“Why would I not be allowed to?” You sit down next to him and start working right away. 

“The project was a charcoal portrait of someone you look up to or who inspires you” 

“Yeah, I look up to myself” You laugh at his confidence, something you wish you had. You can't blame him though, the photo he chose is very flattering. And Ten is talented, it's coming out like a masterpiece.

“You like shit by the way” Ten is known for not holding back his comments, but even then he always catches you off guard.

“Thanks” 

“You know what I mean”

“Yeah yeah. I stayed at Yangyangs last night and didn't have any of my stuff” Ten groans and turns in his seat to look at you deeply. 

“Y/N this is frustrating. Do you like him or not?” 

“We've been over this a hundred times Ten, no I don't like him” Ten Reaches forward and presses the back of his hand onto your cheek.

“Then why is your face heating up?” Your eyes go wide and you rest your head on your arms face down on the desk. You hear Ten laughs as he begins rubbing circles into your back. “You're allowed to have feelings for him you know?”

“But I just don't want to ruin our friendship, he's special to me”

“So you do like him?”

“Ugh, Ten I don't know!” Your voice is louder than expected and the class turns to look at you, embarrassment bubbles up more in your stomach as you stare down at your desk.

“Y/N, Chittaphon. Quiet down.

“Sorry Sir”

“Yangyang, why are you fifteen minutes late to class?”

“Sorry Miss, I had a guest round this morning and lost track of time”

“Ok just make sure you catch up, get Kun to explain the work to you” She sighs and flicks him away with his wrist, he hurriedly moves to the back of the class where Kun is sat, as well as a couple other kids.

“I thought you were home alone, who did you have round?” Yangyang is surprised Kun even heard what he said to the teacher, but apparently, it's one of his many talents. 

“Y/N stayed '' He immediately regrets saying anything but he knows he won't be able to lie for long either way.

“How was it?” 

“Fine” Kun looks over expecting more of a reply than that. “I don't know man, she made me pasta and we watched a movie. Nothing happened.”

“She made you food? She must be whipped.”

“What?”

“In creative catering, she wouldn't even let me try her icing to see what it was supposed to taste like. Mine ended up being sour.”

“Ok, so she cooked for me? That doesn't mean anything”

“Hmm sure,” Kun turns back to his history assignment.

“Wait tell me what it means”

“God, are you that thick?” When Yangyang just stares at him blankly he drops his head. “She likes you”

“She does?”

ten: did yangyang talk to you this morning

ten: about anything

ten: specifically y/n?

kun: Maybe? Why? Did she talk to you about anything

kun: He just told me she cooked for him

ten: y/n never cooks for anyone

ten: did he not pick up on that?

kun: Ikr 

kun: He seemed happy to hear that she likes him

ten: should i tell her that he likes her as well?

kun: Go for it

kun: Nothing will happen otherwise

The next day you managed to get to class on time, although you can't say the same for Yangyang. You walk into a semi-full class and head to the back to join Ten and Lucas, accounting was boring and you never understood anything but Lucas managed to make things bearable. Ten, well he mainly made things worse. 

“Y/N, exciting news” Was the first thing said to you by Ten which usually meant it wasn't good news. You groan as you sit down, already feeling defeated.

“What is it?” Lucas seems more excited than you to hear about this.

“Yangyang finally admitted his feelings for Y/N”

“What?” You sit up straight, unable to believe the words you're hearing. Ten has a grin and Lucas is laughing harder than you've ever seen him laugh before. “Are you serious?”

“What's wrong with that?”

“Ughh” You rub your eyes hard enough you're sure that they're red. “I just, I don't know”

“You like him don't you? Isn't this a good thing?” Ten has gotten a bit more serious, not expecting you to be so upset by this news. 

“Yes but, I don't know, can we talk about something else please?”

You're also surprised at this news, you never thought you liked Yangyang. In fact, you were so certain you didn't like him. But finding out that maybe you do? It changes everything. Him liking you back only makes things more real. You would think you'd be happy at this news but you don't know. That's the only way to describe things right now. Confused. Yes, you like him, he likes you back. That should be the end of the story. But maybe not. Things are different and you don't know why. It's impossible for you to sleep with all these thoughts rushing. It's even harder for you to go to school without your friends bombarding you with a million questions about Yangyang. You wouldn't mind if it was something else, but you're so unsure of your feelings you don't know how to answer. You're certain Yangyang would have been told you like him as well, Yangyang has more confidence than you and you wouldn't be surprised if he made a move. The thought of him doing so makes you anxious, you don't want him to confess, you don't want to say yes, you don't want it. 

Your phone lights up the darkroom. A text from Yangyang, a perfect distraction from your sleepless night. 

yangx2: hey

yangx2: wanna go for a walk after school tomorrow?

yangx2: i need to get some supplies for class

y/n: sorry i’m not feeling very well

y/n: idk if i’ll be at school tomorrow

yangx2: damn :/

yangx2: get better soon

yangx2: i have to go with lucas :(

y/n: haha you’ll be fine

You didn't show at school for the rest of the week, being too ‘sick’ to do so. Every time a text would come through from Yangyang asking how things were, the conversation would die as quickly as it started thanks to your dry replies. You didn't know how to feel, didn't know what to do. Ignoring him was the only way for you to process your emotions right now. You just needed time. You couldn't be off of school forever, but thankfully it was over soon. It gave you two weeks to sort your shit out. During those two weeks, Yangyang stopped reaching out. You felt bad for giving him false hope but you knew this was what was best. Well, at least you thought so. Maybe things would have worked out in a different life. But right now, it wasn't the right time.

When school started again you were nervous, it was a fresh start. You hoped time just sorted things out. You walked up to the front of the school where you usually meet with everyone. Ten arrived first, then Xiaojun, Winwin next, Kun and Yangyang arrived together and Lucas was probably off at the skatepark vaping with Hendery. Surprisingly things went well, too well.

Everything was back to normal, almost normal. It wasn't awkward with Yangyang, but things weren't right. And you could tell. You two were not as close, he didn't come to annoy you during English, or invite you to his hard materials class to bully Xiaojun. He wasn't Yangyang around you anymore. You were scared you ruined things but maybe he just needed time as well. You hoped that was all, you didn't want to lose someone like him.

The sleepout at Lucas’ you were all hanging out in a heated up way too quickly, with a mixture of sweaty drunk guys and various flavours of vape clouding the room. You couldn't bear to be in there any longer, deciding to slip out the back and sit on the deck outside. The air was harsh but it was a nice contrast to the hot smoke from the room within. Your cheeks were burning hot so the crisp air made it relaxing. You weren't out there for very long until another person escaped the room as well, Yangyang.

“Hey,” You say as he sits down next to you, it wasn't that you didn't want to see him, but it was the first time you two had been alone for a while, especially since he was a bit tipsy.

“You ok?”

“Yeah, it was just hot in there. Are you ok?”

“I'm great.” He looks at you as smiles brightly and you laugh, you miss seeing his face more often.

“Oh yeah,” You entertain his drunk ways and talk to him like a child. “What's got you in such a good mood?”

“I was talking to Nina on the phone”

“Nina?” 

“The girl I like remember, I'm gonna ask her out soon” Your heart sinks and you start to feel sick, although you're not sure if it's from the alcohol or this news. Jealousy spikes within you but you don't know why you have no right to be upset when you pushed him away. You feel stupid for believing that he ever liked you. Ten was just a troll wasn't he? He got you to ghost one of your closest friends who wasn't even interested in you. Thinking back to it, Yangyang always showed signs of liking Nina that he never did to you. Calling her pretty, defending her, buying her food. Yangyang never did that for you despite the fact you were so close. Your heart breaks, even more, knowing you never wanted it in the first place.

“Oh” You try to hide your pain through a smile, he would have been able to pick up if his senses were not blurred.

“Yeah she's great”

“I'm glad to hear that Yangyang, you deserve someone like her in your life”

“Hmm” It turns awkward, you don't know what else to say. Instead, you just stand and head inside. You need another drink to get through the night.

“You ok? I went to look for you at Lucas’ the other night but Ten said you left” Yangyang took you off guard as he pulled up a chair to sit by you in English. 

“Oh yeah, I just wasn't feeling well” It wasn't lying, you just didn't say why you didn't say why. If he asks you'll say that you ate something funny. But in reality, you felt awful because of him. You swallow hard and bring yourself to say the next words. “Hows Nina?”

“Oh, I finally did it” His smile is bigger than anything you've ever seen on him, his eyes brighter than ever before. And it suits him. Being happy suits him. You know you'll never be able to bring him that, but Nina can. Nina suits him.

“Congratulations, I'm proud of you Yangyang” It hurts you to say that but you need to. You have to because you can't be angry at him, you can't. You left him. You ghosted him. Even if he didn't like you, it was a shitty thing to do as a friend. You thought you were so lovable that he had to have a crush on you, but in reality, it was nothing more than a friendship. Not everything turns into love, does it?

[ragingbookdragon]

Love Despite Imperfections

Tim Drake & Batmom Story! 

A/N: So this was formerly, ‘He Might Not Be Perfect, But She Loved Him Anyway’, but I thought the title could be changed to this, so I did! Enjoy! -Thorne <3

There were three words he never wanted to hear from her mouth. Three simple words, but three words that carried the weight of her judgement farther than any lesson Bruce could ever teach him. It’s partially what drove him to be the perfect son in her eyes, even though he knew she had no standard for perfect. Those three words came out of her mouth that night, and ever since then, he couldn’t stop replaying the scene in his mind.

Earlier Tonight:

           He stood beside Lucius, smiling and chatting to one of the corporate leaders from Metropolis. Negotiations had gone smoothly, and he’d scored Wayne Enterprises three new subsidiaries; it also gave them reason to throw the giant party they were at. He gave a final goodbye to the corporate leader and scanned the ballroom, looking for his parents; he found them a few seconds later, standing near the bar talking to Clark and Lois. He glanced at Lucius and spoke quietly. “I’m going to check on mom and dad.” Lucius nodded.

           “I’ll be here Tim.” He nodded and made his way over, occasionally stopping to say hello to the WE employees. Eventually, he walked up on the two couples; she was the first to notice, turning to him with a dazzling grin on her face.

           “Timmy.” He grinned at her as she reached over, pulling him into a hug. His arms wrapped around her waist and he squeezed lightly.

           “Hey mom.” She pulled back and reached up, cupping his cheek.

           “I’m so proud of you baby.” A soft pink tinged his cheeks and he shrugged.

           “It wasn’t anything super big mom. Just a few subsidiaries.” Her response was cut off by Bruce who rested a hand on the back of his neck.

           “Are you kidding me Tim? You literally brought in fifty million into the company, just by adding in these three subsidiaries.” He smiled lightly and glanced at Clark and Lois.

           “Mr. and Mrs. Kent. Good to see you.” Tim stuck out a hand, watching Clark take it with a smile.

           “You can call us Clark and Lois, Tim. It won’t hurt our feelings.” That brought out a chuckle from everyone and (Y/N) turned back to Tim.

           “Are you enjoying yourself?” Tim nodded and looked around.

           “Tonight, was more of a success party than a gala. There’s not a lot of press here to cover the story.” Bruce nodded at that.

           “I didn’t want all the press in your party tonight.” Tim looked around once more before turning to (Y/N).

           “Where’s the others?” She shrugged and sipped her champagne.

           “Dick and Jason went off to raid the buffet table, and Damian and Jon were around a few minutes ago.”

           “So, the demon-spawn and his super went off to explore?” (Y/N) looked at Tim and raised an eyebrow until Tim mumbled, “Sorry.”

           “I think the two of them went to Damian’s room. But I’m actually betting they went to the game room and are currently playing Cheese Viking.” Everyone laughed at her assumption and she smiled at Tim. “I am proud of you Timmy. You’ve taken on a lot at WE and managed not to collapse under it.” He snorted at her words.

           “I don’t know, it’s been hard. I really had to work at it.” (Y/N) raised an eyebrow and questioned,

           “Really?” Tim shook his head and deadpanned,

           “No not really.” The two of them chuckled and she reached out, hugging him again.

           “I love you baby.” A smile graced his face and he replied,

           “I love you too mom.” She pulled back once more and patted his shoulder.

           “Go enjoy the party Timmy. It’s for you anyway.” He nodded and turned to the others, saying his goodbye before walking off. He hadn’t even made it ten feet when he felt him come up beside him; he turned and glared at him.

           “What do you want Damian?” Damian smirked and crossed his arms.

           “Nothing.” Tim raised an eyebrow and leaned back.

           “Then why are you standing beside me?”

           “No reason.”

           “What did you do?” Damian shrugged and looked around.

           “I haven’t done a thing.”

           “That’s bullshit.”

           “Perhaps. But you will never know.” Tim stared at him for a few seconds before grunting and walking off, not in the mood to deal with Damian tonight. He got about five feet away before a taunting voice called out behind him. “They say they are proud of you for achieving what you have. But have you ever considered the fact that this was expected of you?” Tim stopped dead in his tracks and turned around.

           “Excuse me?”

           “Umi and Father expect a level of perfection and demand from us. What you’ve achieved was merely something they expected you to do.” Tim knew he was being baited, but he couldn’t help himself.

           “And I’m assuming you’ve got something better?” Damian smiled smugly, something that sent waves of anger through him.

           “We could paint a picture of the things I have that are better than you Drake. Father’s blood, for starters.” The low blow hurt Tim, but Damian kept going. “And more, Umi’s love.” Tim raised an eyebrow as he crossed his arms.

           “And what makes you think that mom doesn’t love me?”

           “Because you aren’t her favorite.”

           “For what reasons?”

           “Umi clearly has favorites Tim. And you aren’t it.” Tim swallowed his anger, clenching his jaw and spat,

           “Of the two of us here, we both know who mom’s favorite is.” He stepped forward and got in Damian’s face, his voice dark. “And while it might not be me…it sure as hell isn’t you, problem child.” Damian’s eyes widened a fraction and Tim felt a surge of satisfaction at it as he turned and began walking away. He hadn’t even moved a foot when he felt something slam into his back; it sent him hurdling to the floor, and the next thing he knew, fists were flying at him. Tim rolled onto his back, bringing his hands up to block Damian’s punches. No words were said, but he could feel the fury radiating off Damian as he blocked another punch, throwing one back at him. They rolled on the floor for a good minute until strong arms pulled the two of them apart; Tim thrashed until someone’s voice reached his ear.

           “Tim! Tim stop!” He halted and glanced up, seeing Jason staring at him alarmed; his gaze moved over and saw Damian being held in a grip by Dick. Tim’s arms dropped to his sides, and Jason let him go. Then, Tim felt eyes on him, and he realized the ballroom had gone completely silent; he glanced around, seeing the shocked looks on everyone’s faces. His eyes kept moving until he came upon (Y/N) and Bruce, who were too stunned to even move from their positions; Bruce’s gaze he could deal with, but (Y/N)’s was unbearable. A second passed, and he heard the clack of heels coming their way; he looked up and saw (Y/N) storming over, a seething look on her face. She stood in front of them, and Tim opened his mouth to apologize.

           “Mom I-” He was cut off as she rebuked him angrily.

           “Zip it.” He shut his mouth and she glanced between him and Damian. “Both of you to the study. Now.” They obeyed, following in a single file line towards the study, the crowd parting for them; she glanced at Dick and Jason and murmured, “Help your dad settle this please.” They nodded and watched her walk behind Tim and Damian.

           The door to the study slammed shut and she pointed to the couch. “Damian. Sit on the end of the couch. Tim, the other.” They sat down and she stood in front of them, her arms crossed as she tapped her foot impatiently, waiting for Bruce. A few moments later, he stepped into the room, Dick, Jason, and Alfred following. Bruce stepped beside her and she let them have it. “Are you two out of your fucking minds?” Their eyes widened at the curse, taking in the note that she was truly angry. Also, Jason’s minor, ‘oh she’s mad-mad’ made it clear that she was. “I cannot believe the two of you would do something like this in public. Patrol is one thing. Your faces are obscured. But in public? Where pictures and videos can be taken? The both of you have really stirred shit up in the pot this time.” Damian opened his mouth to defend himself, but she pointed at him. “I don’t want to hear a word come out of your mouth young man.” His lips pursed and he nodded, then she turned to Bruce. “They’re off patrol for a month.” He nodded and she turned back to them. “For a month, you two will neither go on patrol or step foot in the cave. You will go to school, any after-school activities, work, and you will come straight home. You will also write apology letters to the higher ups of the company WE just signed with and apologize for your horrendous behavior. Am I clear?” They nodded, but Damian spoke up.

           “What are we to do for the whole month we are ‘grounded’?” (Y/N) turned to Alfred and nodded.

           “I’m sure Alfred can find work for you two to do. This manor is big enough for it.”

           “That isn’t fair Umi!”

           “No what isn’t fair is the fact that you two have embarrassed not only Bruce and I, but yourselves.” (Y/N) gestured between them. “What the hell were you two fighting about anyways?” Silence enveloped them and (Y/N) crossed her arms. “I asked a question and I expect someone to answer it.” The two of them glanced at each other before Tim sighed and mumbled,

           “Damian insulted me.”

           “And it’s something new?” She paused and turned to Damian. “What did you say?” He was silent a few seconds before murmuring,

           “I said…that his achievements were expected of him.”

           “And?”

           “…And that he wasn’t…that he wasn’t loved because he wasn’t father’s blood…or your favorite.” (Y/N) went quiet at his confession, then she faced Tim.

           “Damian didn’t jump you until you said something back to him.” She tipped her head back a little. “What did you say to him?” Tim swallowed thickly before whispering,

           “That even if I wasn’t your favorite, he wasn’t either.” Damian pointed at Tim and blurted out.

           “He called me a problem child too!” (Y/N) raised a hand, effectively silencing him; she stared at them for a while, and the longer she did, the more Tim squirmed under her gaze, ashamed of the weight. After a few minutes, she inhaled deeply and wore a sad look as she uttered,

           “Shame on you.” Their eyes widened at her words as she continued. “Shame on you two for fighting over something this ridiculous.” She turned to Damian. “Just because Bruce is your biological father, it does not make you any more or any less his son than any of your brothers. He loves you the same as Dick, Jason, and Tim, blood or no.” She paused and faced Tim. “What you said to Damian was cruel.” She pointed to herself. “I have no favorites. I love each of you equally. And you four damn sure know that.” Her hand lowered and she looked between them. “I’ve given you your punishments. Go to your rooms.” They were silent as they rose from the couch, moving to the door and to their rooms. Tim had stopped at his door, sensing Damian pass behind him on his way to his room, and Tim looked at the back of Damian’s head before shaking his and going into his room.

A Month Later:

           It was the first night since they’d been grounded that they could finally go back on patrol, and they were ecstatic to go. Damian had already gone off with Dick, speaking animatedly about something involving a bank heist they were going to stop. Tim on the other hand was still lingering in the cave, apprehensive to go out. He stood at the Batcomputer, fiddling with his gauntlet before a low voice caught his attention. “Your mother isn’t angry with you anymore.” He looked up in shock at Bruce who wore a firm look. “She got over being angry at you two the day after the party.” Tim looked away murmuring,

           “She seemed like she was still angry.”

           “Disappointed is the better word.” Tim let out a quiet sigh.

           “I’d much rather have her anger than her disappointment.” He paused and looked at Bruce. “Anger is easy to wade through. But disappointment? That sits in your bones for a long time.” Bruce nodded and rested a hand on his shoulder, squeezing gently.

           “She loves you Tim. More than anything in this world.” He squeezed again. “You make her proud every day.” Bruce let go and began walking towards the Batmobile but stopped and spun back around. “And I love you too, son.” He gave Tim a small smile and hopped in the Batmobile, taking off and leaving Tim to his thoughts.

           He finished his quadrant early that night, and sat on the ledge of a building, watching the city go by. He could go back to the cave and start cold cases. He could even call Conner and have him come over and hang out. But something drew him to WE, and he stood up, making his way over the rooftops in its direction. He came up on it and grappled his way up to Bruce’s office. His hands gripped the railing and he clambered over, walking towards the door; he disabled the security and stepped inside, scanning the room. His eyes feel on a figure stretched out on the couch on the other side of the room, and upon closer inspection, he realized it was (Y/N). He knelt beside her and placed a hand on his shoulder, gently nudging her. “Mom…mom…mom.” (Y/N) jerked, rolling over and raising her hands until Tim came into view, then she dropped them; she sat up slightly, rubbing her eyes and murmuring,

           “What are you doing here baby?” Tim sat on the edge of the couch and pulled back his cowl.

           “Came to check on some things in the office. I didn’t realize you were here…I thought you were at home.” (Y/N) hummed, shaking her head.

           “The new subsidiaries needed new contracts for their workers, so I’ve been pulling some late nights to write them up.” Tim nodded and glanced at the computer.

           “Everything coming out alright?” She nodded replied,

           “I just have to proofread the last one before I send them to your dad so he can look them over.” They went silent, and after a few seconds (Y/N) said, “You hungry?” Tim looked at her and nodded.

           “Now that you ask, I am.” (Y/N) rose from the couch, stopping and stretching before walking to the bar and picking up a pizza box.

           “It’s a little cold, but there’s pizza.” Tim nodded and she motioned to the ceiling. “Wanna go sit up on the roof and watch the city?” He smiled and rose from the couch, following her into the elevator. It rose to the top and they walked out onto the roof, sitting down on the ledge and flipping open the box. They both picked up a piece and tapped them together before eating. “Any problems tonight?” Tim swallowed the food in his mouth and shook his head.

           “Nothing I couldn’t handle.”

           “What happened?”

           “Two-Face and his goons were hitting one of the banks.” (Y/N) stopped mid-bite and turned to him, a look of shock etched onto her face.

           “You…took them all out by yourself?” He nodded and she pointed at him. “As your mom saying this, that was incredibly dangerous and reckless. Don’t do that again unless you have help. Understand?” Tim lowered his head and nodded, then a hand gently rested on his head; he looked up to see (Y/N) grinning at him. “But as a former vigilante…you made me proud.” Tim broke into a smile as his heart lightened and (Y/N) pulled back her hand and rested it on his hand. “You know I’m not angry with you about that night anymore…right?” Tim went silent for a few moments before nodding.

           “Dad told me you weren’t.” (Y/N) nodded and turned to face him.

           “I’ve already talked to Damian about that night. Now I need to talk to you about it.” Tim looked at her and waited for her to continue; it took her a few minutes, and when she did, her voice was soft. “Do you know why Bruce and I never had any kids?” Tim’s eyes widened and he shook his head. “…A couple years after Bruce and I started dating, we were driving along a road when we were hit by drunk driver…my side took the impact.” She paused and sucked in a breath. “We both survived impact, but on closer inspection of the damage, a piece of metal had lodged itself into my lower abdomen. We were rushed to the hospital and were put into surgery. They were able to save my life…but at the expense of my uterus…which had been shredded beyond repair by the metal in the accident.” (Y/N) swallowed and cleared her throat. “Bruce and I drifted on ice for a few months, not wanting to hurt each other. But one night, we decided to go to couples’ therapy and try to get some help.” She glanced a Tim and gave a small smile. “That day turned into a night, and we found ourselves at Haly’s Circus.” Tim’s eyes widened and he whispered,

           “Where…” (Y/N) nodded.

           “Where we met our first son. Though at the time, he wasn’t.” (Y/N) sighed and scooted closer. “I never had the chance to bring children of my own into this world. And where I sometimes wish I had been able to…that I wish I still could…” (Y/N) glanced a Tim and brought a hand to his face, cupping his cheek and whispering, “I wouldn’t trade the boys I’ve been given for anything in this world.” Tears began to swim in Tim’s vision, and he lowered his head. “I’ve been given four of the most amazing sons to ever have been birthed on this planet, and I love each of them more anything.” Her other hand reached out, gently taking his chin and she tilted his head up until he looked at her, tears still running down his cheeks. “I love my sons so much that I would die for them. I love my sons so much that I would willing give my life for them. I love my sons so much that no one could ever take their places.” Tim couldn’t form words he was crying too hard, and (Y/N) reached out, wrapping her arms around him. He buried his face in her shoulder and sobbed; (Y/N) brought a hand up, caressing the back of his head as she shushed him, tears of her own dripping down her cheeks. After a few minutes, (Y/N) pulled back and cupped his face in her hands, her thumbs wiping the tears away as she murmured, “Each son that has come into our home has been loved and is loved.” (Y/N) squeezed his cheeks gently. “I love you Timmy. And all I’ve ever been of you is proud. You got that?” He nodded and she smiled, leaning forward and pressing a kiss to his forehead. “I love you.” He opened his eyes and gave her a wobbly smile as he whispered,

           “I love you too mom.” They stared at each other for a few seconds before (Y/N) patted his cheeks.

           “Now that we’ve had our boohoo fest and talk…let’s go home and re-watch Game of Thrones.” Tim grinned as they rose from the ledge; they began walking and he nudged her in the side.

           “So…mom.” (Y/N) eyed him.

           “So…Tim.”

           “How do you feel about Bran sitting on the Iron Throne?” He laughed as (Y/N) walked off, her hands raised in the air.

           “WE ARE NOT TALKING ABOUT THE ENDING! IT DOESN’T EXIST!”

           The three words that came out of her mouth at the party, hurt him to hear them. But the three words she told him tonight meant more to him than anything in the world. And Tim remembered one very important thing…he might not always be the perfect son…but his mom loved him anyway.

[chloelucia13]

Chapter 11: The Spy

Pairing: none for the moment (currently Jonathan Byers x Platonic!Henderson!reader)

Prompt:  You always thought Hawkins was the most boring town of all, stuck in a vacuum void of excitement and entertainment. Well, it seems that way until the world decided to flip upside down, literally. 

Chapter Summary: Leaving everyone alone at the lab may have been one of the worst decisions you’ve ever made, but at least you had a team of people who were ready to take on whatever was coming (even if they were children or acted like one)

Warnings: Mostly fluff, some angst, some violent descriptions, language, horror elements

Word Count: 2205

A/N: I hope you guys enjoy this part! I’m very excited for the next few parts coming up, so be emotionally prepared for them! As always, let me know what you guys think! The taglist is open!

Catch up here!

Tags: @just-my-fandom​, @nightbu-g​

As soon as the medics were able to get Will into a bed, you pulled Mike out of the room so that you two wouldn’t be in the way. You immediately collapsed into a nearby chair, both of your hands pressed over your ears to block out the sound of Will’s agonized screams.

However, you couldn’t decide if it was worse when he was screaming or when he was silent. 

You pulled your hands from your ears when his screams ceased, and you immediately glanced up at Mike, whose eyes were glued on the scene in the room in front of him. “What happened?” you whispered.

“They sedated him,” he responded, his shoulders slouching slightly with the small relief.

You nodded, leaning into the stiff chair as you stared down at the tiled floor beneath your feet. “I should’ve done something.”

“How? Not even the doctors know how to help him. You did everything you could.”

You shrugged, pulling your knees up to your chest. “I don’t know. Maybe I shouldn’t have gotten out of the car, maybe that’s why this is happening to him.” A sigh left your lips. “I don’t know.”

*** You woke up early that morning in the stiff hospital chair, all of your bones and joints screaming when you shifted. “Jesus Christ,” you sighed, forcing yourself out of the chair and onto your feet.

The eerie silence of the hospital was jarring, and the flickering fluorescent lights above your head made you nauseous. It was too much like the situation you were in exactly a year ago, but this time you weren’t stuck in a hospital bed. And this time, you were all alone.

You walked down the hallway and into Will’s room, that same horrible nostalgia punching you in the gut when you saw Will laying there in that hospital bed, still unconscious from the tranquilizer he was given. To the side of him, Bob and Mike sat in two chairs, nervously observing Will as if they were waiting for him to wake up at any moment.

“What time is it?” you whispered, pulling their attention away from Will. “Where’s Joyce?”

Mike shrugged. “Like 6 a.m. And she’s in a meeting.”

“A meeting?”

Again, he shrugged. “To figure out what to do with Will and everything, I guess.”

You nodded, glancing at Will for one more moment before staring at the floor. “I’m, uh, gonna go take a walk. Maybe stop by my house and get some food or something. I’ll be back soon.”

You stood there for a second before turning on your heel and making your way out of the room and over to the stairwell, in a zombie-like state as you made your way down the couple flights of stairs, out into the lobby, out the doors, past the metal gates, and out into the woods. 

You hated how familiar everything felt. The emptiness of the woods, the chill in the air was too much like it was that night everything happened. 

And you couldn’t forget how hoarse your voice was when you screamed for Jonathan. Now that hoarseness was only in your mind, but you were still screaming for him. Just silently this time.

And Jonathan and Nancy were another world away, just like how they are now.

You couldn’t help this self-loathing that plagued your mind, it was all too familiar to you. And it fucking hurt, but you couldn’t stop.

You vigorously rubbed at your eyes as soon as your house came into view, not wanting to let anyone see you in such a way. With a huff, you hurried through your back gate and into your house through the back door.

“Y/N! You’re home!” your mother sighed with relief, rushing over to you as soon as you stepped inside. “Have you seen Mews?”

You shook your head. “No, how come?” you asked, grabbing an apple from the fruit bowl in the kitchen.

“I haven’t seen him since yesterday!”

You furrowed your brows. “That’s odd. That’s probably the last time I saw him too. I’ll keep an eye out for him.”

She sighed, nodding her head and grabbing her purse off the counter. “Alright, well I’m gonna go get some missing posters printed for him. Call Kathy if you see him!”

You nodded, not even being able to fully say goodbye to her before she hurried out the door. You watched as she drove away, your brows immediately furrowing when you saw Steve’s car parked out front.

The apple you had not forgotten on the counter, you hurried back out into the backyard. “Dustin? Steve?” you shouted, looking around.

And then you noticed that the storm cellar had been pried open.

With your heart in your throat, you rushed back inside to your room and retrieved your machete from your closet. You took a deep breath, tightening your grip on the handle before hurrying back outside. Once there, you peeked into the storm cellar.

A crunching noise sounded from the woods, and you covered your mouth to stop a scream from escaping. You shook your head, letting out a sigh before inching out of the backyard and into the woods, silently following the sound.

The sound led you to the old train tracks, and you held your machete out in front of you as you walked along. “Steve? Dustin?”

As you rounded a dense corner of trees, you could see two figures about 100 yards ahead of you, both of them throwing something on the ground. You furrowed your brows and looked down, noticing chunks of meat under your feet. You groaned in disgust before picking up your pace, making sure to avoid stepping on the meat.

“What the hell are you guys doing?!” you shouted at them, startling them both. They both spun on their heels to face you.

“Jesus! Put that thing down!” Steve shouted, holding his hands in the air.

You huffed and let your machete fall to your side. “Why are you guys throwing chunks of meat on the train tracks?”

The two boys exchanged a look. “I don’t think you’ll take ‘for fun’ as an answer,” Dustin sighed. You shook your head, narrowing your eyes at them. “Alright, it’s a long story. Come with us.”

The three of you all continued to walk along the tracks, both of the boys continuing to lay down a trail of meat. “So on Halloween, I found this weird pollywog in the trash can,” Dustin began to explain. “I kept it in the turtle enclosure.”

“Why?” you asked, dragging the tip of your machete against the dirt.

“To impress a girl,” Steve teased.

“Madmax?” Dustin nodded in response. “Ah, the perfect way to a girl’s heart.”

“Anyway!” Dustin huffed, already annoyed with the teasing. “he grew out of the enclosure, and...”

“I’m assuming you haven’t seen your cat recently,” Steve hummed, and your heart sank.

“What is that supposed to mean?” you urged.

“That pollywog turned into some weird sort of demogorgon. He... He ate Mews,” Dustin sighed, his shoulders slouching.

You nodded silently, pressing your lips together. “You okay?” Steve asked, resting a hand on your shoulder.

“Mews was my cat,” you whispered. “I got him when he was a kitten, when I was eight years old. I knew he was gonna die soon, he was old. Just... Not like this.” You sniffled and blinked quickly, trying to keep the tears at bay. 

“I’m sorry.” Steve squeezed your shoulder. 

“He escaped, so we’re trying to lure him back,” Dustin explained. 

“And I’m gonna kill him,” you stated plainly.

“Atta girl,” Steve hummed. “Probably not the best way to deal with it, but I’ll go with it.”

***

By the time the sun had gone down, you had just finished creating a makeshift armor around the broke down bus, which all of you were now using as a shelter. Lucas had been on the roof, surveying the area for the past ten minutes or so as the rest of you sat on the old leather bus seats.

“So you guys really fought one of these before?” Max spoke up, looking at you and Steve, two of you nodding silently. “And you’re like, totally 100% sure that it wasn’t a bear?”

“I don’t think bears take people into another dimension,” you sighed, chuckling slightly.

“Shit, don’t be an idiot. Okay? It wasn’t a bear,” Dustin cut in, basically hissing the words at her. “Why are you even here if you don’t believe us? Just go home.”

You all stared at him in shock for a moment before Max rose to her feet. “Geesh, someone's cranky. Past your bedtime?” she snapped back before going up the ladder and onto the roof.

“That’s good, just show her you don’t care,” Steve encouraged.

“I don’t,” Dustin huffed.

“Okay, hold on,” you spoke up, sitting up. “First of all, horrible advice.”

“How do you think I got so many girlfriends?” Steve chuckled out.

“And why do you think you’re single now?”

“And why do you think you’re so in love with Jonathan?”

You pursed your lips at his words, slouching back slightly in your seat.

“I’ve got eyes! Ten o’clock! Ten o’clock!” Lucas shouted from his perch, startling all of you into action. The three of you in the bus immediately peered through the guarded windows, watching for the movement in the fog.

“There!” Steve shouted, pointing at the shadowy figure.

“What’s he doing?” Dustin asked.

“I don’t know.” You all watched for a few moments longer, beginning to panic as the creature didn’t move. “He’s not taking the bait. Why is he not taking the bait?”

“Maybe he’s not hungry?”

“Maybe he’s sick of cow.” Steve leaned back, thinking for a second or two before turning towards the exit and walking that way.

“Steve? What are you doing?” you questioned, eyebrows furrowing with worry and shock.

He stopped and turned to you two. “Just get ready,” he breathed out, tossing his lighter to Dustin before turning back and quietly stepping out of the bus. He began to walk out towards the middle of the empty area of the lot, his bat held tightly in his hands. He let out a whistle before calling for the creatures as if they were dogs. 

“What’s he doing?” Max asked worriedly as she climbed down the ladder.

“Expanding the menu,” Dustin stated.

“Being a dumbass,” you corrected, not taking your eyes from the window.

“Come on, buddy. Dinner time. Human tastes better than cat, I promise,” Steve continued to call for the creature, planting his feet on the solid ground.

“He’s insane,” Max said in disbelief.

“He’s awesome,” Dustin amended, a big smile on his face.

A breeze blew through, blowing the fog away to reveal a reptilian creature with the stature of a dog and the face of a demogorgon. 

And then three more appeared, surrounding him.

“Steve, watch out!” Lucas shouted from his perch.

With no hesitation, you rushed out of the bus, your machete held out in front of you as you ran over to stand back to back with Steve. The creatures slowly began to close in on you two. “Steve, we’re surrounded,” you informed him, both of you looking around to gauge just how many were there.

“Steve! Y/N! Abort! Abort!” Dustin shouted from the bus.

Suddenly, all the creatures began rushing towards you two at once. The two of you found a clear path and ran that way, swinging at a few creatures when they lunged at you. From the bus, the kids shouted for you two to hurry.

You two jumped into the bus as soon as you were close enough, and Lucas yanked the lever that shut the bus door.

“Are they rabid or something?” Max asked as Steve began to barricade the door from the inside.

“They can’t get in!” Lucas shouted as Steve held the door closed with his feet. The bus began to shake from the force of how hard the creatures were launching themselves at the door.

Steve lost his control on the door, and a few of the creatures broke through, gnashing their teeth at all of you. You swung your blade at them, catching a few of them, but not deterring them. Steve joined your side, effectively launching a few back with the force of his bat.

Max let out a scream as soon as you were able to get the door closed, and you turned to see a creature’s head peeking through the emergency exit on the roof of the bus. Steve pushed her out of the way, holding his bat up. “You want some? Come get this!” he shouted at the creature.

The creature hissed, baring its teeth, before it went silent. Your brows furrowed in confusion as you heard its footfalls retreating from the exit and off the roof of the bus. A silence followed its exit, and you all shared a look of confusion.

Steve stepped out through the door and you climbed onto the roof to survey the scene, seeing that all of the creatures suddenly deserted the area.

“Maybe you guys scared them away,” Dustin offered as you climbed down the ladder.

“No way,” Steve argued. “They’re going somewhere.”

[carryonmywaywardwriters]

One Day At A Time - Jensen x Reader

A/N: Part Five! I jumped on to edit tags, so have it half an hour earlier than it was queued for. If you’d like to be tagged, please send an ask or message. As always, feedback is incredible. And, I hope you all enjoy <3

PSA: I am NOT a minor friendly blog. If you are below 18, please come back when you’re older. I don’t want to lose my blog because you were too eager to grow up. If I discover you, I WILL block.

Series Masterlist

Warnings: Widower!Jensen. Unrequited feelings. Sexual awareness. Guilt. The usual, at this point. We’re about to pick up!

Word Count: Roughly 2,800

“Papa Ackles!” You were hugged by the older man, tightly when you opened the door. The name had been adopted by you teasingly and had somehow stuck for the one and only Roger Alan Ackles. He liked to kid that his son was the prettier of the two, but the family resemblance hadn't been spared. Namely in that smile. Then there was the crinkles by his eyes. His genes were every bit as present as his wife's. “I didn't know you were coming over. Is Donna here, too?”

“Nah, she's busy checking in on Mackenzie.” A wink sent your way made you chuckle. You could only imagine the drilling the younger sister was busy getting from the sweet, mother hen. “Is my boy busy, or can I bug him for a bit?”

“He's in the pool with the kids.” Your thumb pointed towards the back, as you opened the door further to allow him inside.

“And why aren't you out having fun, too? Too old?” To the patriarchal figure, you weren't a housekeeper and nanny mix. You were part of the family and that was that. And, it was his and his wife's duty to look over the herd. Which meant you weren't spared from the loving questionnaires. “My son overworks you.” He knew it wasn't true. Was just trying to get a reaction. You simply tsked, not taking the bait as you got back to work. “What're ya working on today, missy?”

“I'm only thirty. Who're you calling old, Pops?” You teased, lifting up the laundry basket you'd set out. You'd gained the response you wanted. That tossed back, full bodied laugh his son had inherited. If it ever came to you leaving? You'd miss that over exuberant old man.  “And this?” The laundry basket was kicked forward a bit for emphasis, “This is the last thing I've got queued up. Now, go harass your son. He'll love it.”

A pat to your shoulder and an affectionate kiss on the cheek left you alone as he moved down to the pool room. You knew the moment the kids had spotted him. The echoing 'papa's sounding loudly up the stairs.

You moved down to the old cellar to pick up the discarded clothes from the kids. Or so you told yourself. It had nothing to do with the desire to be one of them. Nothing at all.

There wasn't even ten minutes of peace that passed before another, younger, Ackles invaded your alone time. A still damp Jensen walked in, rubbing his hair with the towel. Shirtless and completely at home in his skin when away from the camera, he padded over to the wine cellar. Searching out his favorite stash. You wanted to believe that you were strong enough to not lift your gaze away from the cleaning repeatedly. But, you weren't.

The sinewy muscles across his arms and back were outlined as he moved. He could be a little shy about the less than chiseled belly, but he had no reason. Mouthwatering still accurately described the being in front of you. Small drops of water trailed down as he grabbed two beers from the mini fridge he'd installed some time back. His swimsuit was dry enough to not drip, but damp enough to cling to the curve of his ass.

Every fan girl's wet dream was less than a foot away. And you couldn't touch. Shouldn't have even looked.

As he turned back around, you forced yourself to stare down at your hands. Not letting the lust you were sure was obvious anywhere near his eyes. “You're not gonna visit?”

There. That I can handle. With a shaky breath, you yanked your mind off him. Back to reality, instead.

“No,” You answered easily, folding the little dinosaur shirt that Zeppelin had almost destroyed neatly. “I already said hi.”

A low hum was all you got for a moment. Leaving you to believe that was the end of the discussion. But, he hadn't walked away.

“Are you alright?” The troubled question took you by surprise well enough that your head lifted. That was a mistake in itself. It left you to stare temptation down. “You've been...different.”

“I...” Clearing your throat didn't get the lump out of it when that bearded, overly attractive bastard's unreal pine gaze seemed to bore into your very soul. “I'm...I'm fine.”

“No, you're not.” That finally gave you the strength to jerk the pile of clothes upwards as he set down the beverages. Before you could make it out of there, a hand gripped around your arm. You froze at the firm touch. “Y/N...what's going on?”

His hand was ice cold from the both drinks and pool. You shouldn't have felt so warm. Yet, the contact made your blood pump faster. Looking down, his fingers weren't tight enough to leave marks. Simply catch your attention. And, boy, did it.

Breathlessly, you finally found your voice, “Let me go, please.” You were dropped as if he'd been burned. You knew the feeling well. The flesh he'd touched felt as if he'd branded you. “I said I'm fine.”

“Did...Did I do something?” He was trying to understand the distance that had sprung up over the past few weeks. His tongue wet his lips as he stared you down. Only making it harder to focus.

Even with the kids, you seemed to have taken a step back. They assumed you weren't feeling good. He was just clueless. As often as you were there, and as much as he knew, there was still a whole lot of empty resting between you two. It could have been anything.

“No.” That didn't help him piece it together, any. He wanted to know. Needed to. “Look, I'm okay. I just...I need to finish this up.”

Your eyes continued to evade him. Seeking a way out. As if he'd held you trapped in his home. Immediately, he wondered if that were the case. You hadn't said anything. But you wouldn't. He knew that beyond doubt.

“Look, the kids and Pops were hoping you'd join us back there.” He pointed towards the door. Hoping that the old man could see past your guard. Get you to open up.  “You can take a beer. Wind down a bit. Socialize with someone other than us.”

Arguing the point was useless, then. Unless you wanted to look like an ass, anyway. Jensen, bless his heart, was truly unaware of what was plaguing you. Even if half the world seemed to see right through the wall.

His obliviousness was both endearing and maddening. The loyalty to his late wife so sweet that it ached. Blindness to you? Scalding. Even though it never should have mattered.

“Okay,” Your shoulders wilted as you said it, making him frown further. Settling on the defeat. So confident that he'd solved the riddle.“Give me a minute and I'll be out there.”

“About time!” Roger boomed, drawing eyes your way.

You'd taken your time about it. An extra few minutes to clear your head. Long enough that everyone acted as if you'd been gone for weeks rather than had a few extra moments to yourself. Kids chattering all about; beyond excited that one of their favorite humans had finally decided to join them.

“Yeah, but I brought food.” The tray you carried held chicken salad sandwiches, some fruit, and some more drinks. It gave you the out you'd needed. “It's excused.”

“You keep this one around,” Papa Ackles hummed happily as you set the tray down in the middle of the large picnic table that rested on the perfectly manicured lawn. Rubbing his hands dramatically as he dug in.

The kids joined in, but Jensen waited. His eyes latched on you as you sat across from him. Careful not to bump your legs with his bowed ones. As if a single touch were more than you could stand.

You tried to ignore him. Focusing on the munchkins that were determined to make up for lost time. Talking with mouths full. Spraying water from their bodies everywhere as they fought for their feast. Not the food. But, your attention.

Texan sun beat down on your back. Hot and heavy in only the way the south could accomplish during the summer. Scalding through the clothes. You slipped the flannel you'd been wearing down over your arms as you managed a slightly average conversation with the older gentleman over the desperately goofy children.

The sun kissed skin wasn't anything that Jensen hadn't seen before. Yet, he found himself gazing over it as you patted down his curly coated dog. Imagining himself burying his face against the place where your neck met your shoulder. Pressing a kiss to the pulse point that would be racing. It was so vivid that he couldn't quite shake it away.

What the fuck? He came to his senses as you tossed the shirt over to the chair at the end of the table that had his clothes. However, it was soon lost when he focused on the pile. All he could picture was the bare skin meeting just as fabric had under the sun. Maybe Cliff is right...maybe I do need to get laid.

His body couldn't agree more as it awakened for the first time while he wasn't buried in his subconscious. The cold water that still clung to him doing nothing to slow his blood. A mistake in the making.

His mind tried to rationalize it away. You were too young. A young thirty just that year. There was the fact he was technically your employer. You'd been his wife's friend, for fuck's sake. A million reasons why it would never work. Yet, the longer he sat there, the more he found himself studying you.

There was the curve of your neck that came into his line of vision when you turned to address Zeppelin on one side, or Arrow on the other. The way the top of your breasts peaked out of the tank top as you leaned over to pour some homemade lemonade for J.J. How soft your legs were against his when Oscar knocked under the table.

“Jensen,” His name was said in confusion. Not the feminine, lust hazed moan he'd imagined. Slowly, he blinked away every piece of carnal sin that lined his deprived brain to stare at his future face. Roger didn't hesitate to investigate. “You okay?”

“I'm good,” The crack of his all too high voice said otherwise, but you didn't call him on it. Instead, you simply frowned a bit before excusing yourself. Making him feel ever the heel.

–

“Night, love.” You whispered back to Zeppelin as you shut his door. Sighing in relief. Everyone's worried gazes were getting to you. As if you were going to fall apart at the slightest inconvenience.

Sneaking out the back, you practically ran to your escape. Only to be caught by a looming shadow. There wasn't time to scream before the fuzzy beast beside him made it clear who it was.

“Can we talk? Without the kids, around?”

“About what?” You wheezed, holding your hand over your heart. Still trying to recover from the shock. There wasn't an option given. Instead, you were dragged to your home by your wrist. “What the hell is up with you?”

As soon as your door shut and light flicked on, he got down to business, “I could ask you the same thing.” Oscar danced around your living room. Sniffing the aquarium housing the clawed frog as he ignored two of his favorite people. “What's going on, Y/N?”

“Nothing.” You shrugged out. Refusing to make eye contact.

“Right...Okay, let's approach this differently.” That made the E/C sweep back his way. Distrust lining them. “My name's Jensen...not Mr. Ackles.” The commanding tone went straight to your ovaries as he stepped closer. Looming over you as he made his point.

“Really? Because right now? All I see is Dean Winchester.” The sass fell short as you caught your breath. Swallowing tightly, you got to the point. Hoping it would give you some space. “You want the truth?” A simple, stern nod was your only response. “You were right.”

“On what, exactly?”

“You're all about to switch up your lives completely, Jay.” Heavy defeat seemed to line your face as you backed away. Plopping on the couch in clear exhaustion. The poodle mix waddled your way. Reaching up to sniff your cheeks while his owner stared in utter confusion. “You're going to have all the time in the world....and...You guys aren't going to want me around, forever.” Your fingers pulled out a small knot in the coat you'd brushed just that moment. “It just seemed easier to back off, now, than to just walk away later.”

“Huh...” As he processed what you said, he turned away. Looking back around the room. Taking in all the pieces of you for the second time. “You really think those kids,” His fingers pointed to a selfie they'd taken with you, “are just going to let you walk away because I'm home more?”

“They have you,” Was shrugged out. As if it were really that simple.

“Yeah...but they want you, too.” Your head bowed at that. You'd known they had. But, that didn't mean it had to last forever. “I didn't mean to make you think that the ending changed...this.”

“It does, though.” The words were soft, but sad. Tearing through the air like a bullet as you focused in on the dog. “I'm a nanny...that's it. The second you're done? My job isn't as important. You can take on the brunt of it, and still be fine.”

“If you were just a nanny? I wouldn't be here right now.” Slowly, your gaze lifted. “Hell, Y/N...even if you decided to leave on your own? That door'd always be open for a visit. You've gotta know that.” Something in your eyes said you hadn't quite believed him. “Not everyone is just going to boot you out and never look back.”

“It doesn't feel that way.” The vulnerability on your face was unexpected. Jensen didn't bother to hesitate. Plopping down beside you. His arm flung around your back. Tugging you into a friendly hug. “What're you doing?”

“Trying to get past those feelings,” He huffed out. Resting his chin on the top of your head. “Besides...pretty sure my dad loves you more than me.” The small laugh against him made his lips kick up. “If I tried it? He'd off me.”

“You're probably right,” A gentle sigh left your lips as you held on tightly for a moment. But, then, you pulled back. “Thanks...I needed that.”

“Anytime, Y/N...” A short whistle followed. Immediately, the doodle turned tail. Diving to his owner's command. “And...I was thinking.” His hand stilled the squirming beast as he moved to open the door. “Maybe you'd wanna help me take the kids out. Laser tag, family night?”

“Count me in.”

–

“We're all ready,” Your hands pressed on your hips as you looked over the packed up SUV. Filming was about to begin. And with it? Would be the announcement. Things were speeding up and no one quite knew what to do with it all.

It had taken over a week to get everything ready. The kids had stayed with Danneel's family while you and Jensen worked on packing up for them and the dogs. You stocked up for the house sitter while Jensen finished rounding up the heathens. And then? It was time. You were all due to meet Jared at the airport.

“It's kinda bittersweet,” Jensen stepped up beside you as the kids fastened their seat belts. Awaiting their annual trip to Canada. The dogs wagged their tails eagerly from inside. Crowding in a fashion that screamed all American family.

“Focus on the sweet,” Your fingers squeezed his arm. An action that was nothing more than a way to express empathy before your name was cried out from inside. “And, that's my cue. You got the last bag?”

“Yeah, I got it,” A crooked smile made his stomach twist. A problem that hadn't ebbed since the day at the pool. As you climbed in, he focused a little too long on the way your shorts rode up when you bent over to help Arrow buckle up. Jensen shook his head before lifting the final bag. “You're losing your damn mind, Jay...”

“Sure as shit,” Cliff barked beside him. Making him jerk in surprise. “But, what's new?”

A glance your way seemed to catch the security guard's attention, “We'll talk later.”

Part Six

ODAAT: @winchester-ofthe-lord​ @smoothdogsgirl​ @ima-be-a-mongoose​ @briagallen​ @agusdoti​ @my-proof-is-you @thevelvetseries @blacktithe7 @sucker-for-dean @deanwinchestersmydaddy @sociopathtime @deans-baby-momma @aomi-nabi @brandinicole911 @demonqueen47 @c-ly-g @bakabozza​ @socalgem1124​ @hillface89​

Dean/Jensen: @akshi8278​ @screechingartisancashbailiff​ @woodworthti666

Forever: @dean-winchesters-bacon​ @supernaturalginger​ @lilulo-12​ @awesome-badass-cafeteria-sauce​ @michaelneedssomemilk​ @lemondropirwin​ @fanfictionismydeath​

[the-mandalorian-clone-lover]

Aces in Spaces Chapter 14

I’m late again! Sorry guys!

This is about a year and a half into their relationship, they’re steadily getting more comfortable around each other and leaning better what the other is thinking!

Tags: @sunshinepascal @rentskenobi @princessxkenobi @maybege @obaby-wan @agent-450

Masterlist

She’s halfway through her practice, Roman knows her routine well enough to know that. He’ll admit the first time he’d stumbled upon her dancing (not fighting, dancing) in the studio he’d been surprised. Not shocked, it was only natural that someone of her grace, stamina, and natural rhythm found joy in the arts, but still surprised, he hadn’t thought she would enjoy it. Its become a habit for her now, she’s in the studio nearly every day and dancing every other day. At first he was careful to give her space (he’s pretty sure the fact that they’re dating wouldn’t have made him any less of a creep if he stared at her while she was working out), but now they’ve come to the agreement that if he announces himself he’s more than welcome to observe. His ‘announcements’ usually don’t consist of much more than a wave through the door or a tap on the glass, he rarely comes in, but she appreciates it all the same (the time he didn’t say anything she had nearly smacked her own self in the face with a staff when she noticed him and he almost walked into Butcher’s back the first time he saw her fight for the same reason). At any rate, she’s enjoying herself, likely having forgotten his presence by now due to loosing herself in the music.

Roman’s eyes flit to her hands as she finishes the exercises on the opposite side, one firmly grasping the bar while the other glides through the space to her side. She finishes with a small knee bend before stepping away from the bar. His eyes remain on her hands but they haven’t stopped moving, long slender fingers twirl and curve, hands and wrists becoming involved before long. The overall movement is not all that different from that which is needed to play a piano, Roman muses to himself. He purses his lips in thought before nodding to himself and opening the door into the studio. She’s turned in the meantime and throws a smile at him as she reaches for her water bottle, soft piano notes are indeed lilting through the room and Roman smiles back, letting her drink before finally asking. “Did you used to play?”

She frows as she lowers the bottle, licking her lips before she sees his upward gesture towards the speaker and her face clears in understanding. “I did a long time ago, but it’s been such a long time since I had one to play on. I had a keyboard when I was in college, but it just isn’t the same.”

She finishes with a mournful look to the floor before shaking her shoulders and looking back to Roman, “You sticking around? I was thinking of getting out my swords today.”

Her eyes sparkle at the thought and Roman smiles, the duel swords are one of her favorites but she knows he likes them too. She’s always a flurry of movement with them, grace and beauty crashing into deadliness and lethality with all the intensity of two colliding stars and forging the unrelenting fury that she presents in her drills. Regardless of her weapon choice her style always favors agility, a dance of attack and retreat, feigns of improvised defenses that are, in truth, engagingly veiled attacks. He could stand in awe for hours but alas, his ringing phone (that he could swear he had silenced) begins to cause the vision to fade all too soon. Upon retrieving it he sighs, “I have to take this darling” she nods, moving to the stereo to pause the music and aid his focus. His eyes follow her as he answers.

“This is Roman.” She watches him nod along for a few moments before he moves the phone to press against his chest. “Love, I’ll have to follow this through, dinner? Tonight? I can order in, text me what you want?”

She nods her assent to each question as it comes before laughing at his persistence, walking over to him to place her hands against his chest. “I’ll let you know my King” She finishes with a soft smile, glancing down at the phone before finding his eyes again. He takes a deep breath,

“You know what it does to me when you say that.” She just smiles, leaning in closer to press her lips to his, she starts gentle but his hand comes up to cradle the back of her head, tilting his own to get a better angle at running his tongue along her lower lip, her hands are moving and he’s thrilled that he’s won her over-- until they end up in his armpits and she starts tickling him. He jolts away with a bark of laughter that sounds something like ‘stop’ before her laughing drowns it out. She’s bent over and clutching at her own sides, gasping out a ‘don’t forget your phone call’ before straightening again. She catches sight of the pout he knows he’s doing and tilts her head back to chuckle again. He loves her laugh, always has, even if it is at his expense at this moment. All the same he fixes her with a raised eyebrow and a disapproving set of his mouth.

“Keep on like that and I’ll order Chinese instead of tacos.”

She gasps theatrically, placing a hand over her heart “You wouldn’t” she says, voice full of disbelief and horror.

He smiles devilishly “You’ll just have to wait and see.”

Its all he gives her before strutting from the room, knowing she’ll still be watching. She is, and she smiles fondly at the way his entire posture re-arranges itself when he picks the phone back up, watching him until the wall blocks him from view before returning to the stereo and beginning her practice again.

*Later that evening*

She had requested Italian later in the day, and Roman had teased her a little more (‘just who do you think you are anyway? Tickling the King like that? Her response had been that she was his lover and well, how exactly was he supposed to tell her no after that anyway?) but in the end he had caved and they were both enjoying variations of pasta (he’d guessed her preference of Alfredo before she texted it and he’s quite proud of that). They’re seated at the dining table, she insisted he sit at the head of it despite the fact there’s only two of them, and he insisted she sit beside him. She’d pouted at not being the ‘right hand woman’ before he’d informed her he could ‘conquer the world with his right hand, as long as she held his left’. She didn’t mind as much after that. He waits until they’ve both finished and are picking at dessert before he decides to spring his latest idea.

“Maybe that’s what it needs” he says vaguely, staring into space as if he’d been daydreaming. Erica blinks at him, eyes flitting in the direction he’s looking (which is into the living room) before coming back to his face and pausing another beat waiting for the explanation. When she doesn’t get one she decides to take the bait. “What, what needs?”

Roman shakes himself before gesturing around in reference to the apartment “A piano, it seems empty in here.” He turns his gaze to her and finds about what he expects. Confusion, surprise, puzzlement, and then denial.

“I wasn’t trying to—”

He waves her off. “No, no, I’ve been thinking about it for awhile, I think it’ll add ambiance to my meetings. If people say things I don’t like I’ll just” He brings his hands down on the table as if he were keyboard smashing “Play music.” He pauses, she’s narrowing her eyes slightly, attempting to gauge how much of this is in jest and how much is in seriousness and he gives her a few seconds of agony before continuing in a more deliberate tone.

“Or, you could play music. I’ll lay across the back with roses in my mouth” He leans back in the chair throwing an arm over his head in an effort to elongate himself “It’ll all be very dramatic”. He fights a chuckle all through the sentence but by the end gives up and huffs out a laugh. She laughs along after a moment, smiling down at her nearly empty plate, even so, Roman can’t help but notice it isn’t entirely whole-hearted.

“I am serious” he adds after a moment, “I wouldn’t mind it at all, it would be nice to, break up the silence.” He pauses then, suddenly becoming aware of the implications she must be assuming he is inferring. To have not only the studio, but also a piano, two things she enjoys tied directly to him (and basically his house by default) probably sounds like a precursor to a moving in conversation. He rushes to clear the air.

“Unless you’d rather it was downstairs in the lounge, I could always arrange that, more meetings happen there anyway and ---”

She cuts in by placing a hand over his and weighing it down until it rests on the table again. “I, I think I’d rather get familiar with it in a quieter setting.” She says seeming to look into his soul instead of just his eyes, “As long as it wouldn’t bother you?” She asks the question timidly and he’s certain he’d like to deck whoever it is that told her she was a bother. Instead, he stacks his other hand on top of hers and smiles.

“I’d love to hear anything that you played.” He’s smiling softly as he says it but decides to crack one last joke before giving into the soft atmosphere fully. “Unless its at four in the morning. I know you like getting the early bird but I can’t live like that.” He turns his head away from her as he speaks, intent on feigning indifference but her huff of laughter causes him to turn back to her as soon as he’s finished. Her other hand is coming up to hold his chin, bringing his face closer to hers before he rests it in her open palm.

“You’re wonderful, Roman Clay Stanton. Absolutely wonderful.” She says it with admiration pouring from her tone, dimples forming as she smiles softly. “I wish every man in the world was like you.”

He’s flattered by the compliment really but, he can’t hide the way his chest clenches at her wish. Every man? He knows she doesn’t mean ill, and he’s never been the jealous type but somehow the thought of her loving anyone else the way she does him, it makes him feel sick. Her voice is interrupting his thoughts—

“No, I take it back, I don’t wish that at all” she says with stubborn conviction, tilting her head to catch his eyes from where they’d fallen to the table, “because if it were the case I’d have never found you. My beautiful, kind, caring lover.” She breathes out the last word, just above a whisper, turning her hand to drag the backs of her fingers across his cheek. He turns into it, bringing his own hand up to keep her there when she moves to drop her hand away.

“Why are you whispering?” He brings his eyes to hers as he questions in an equally hushed tone. He hopes she can see the love he’s pushing through his eyes toward her.

“Why are you whispering?” She returns, leaning in conspiratorially, tilting her head and glancing down at his lips before looking back up to his eyes.

His own recon of her face finds she’s biting her lower lip and he returns his eyes to her again before admonishing her “If you wanted me to kiss you Erica, all you had to do was ask.”

He sees the incredibly minute shiver run through her as he says her name and he wants to say it a thousand times more if that’s the reaction he gets.

“What day were you thinking for delivery?” She changes the subject with ease, and he smiles that she knows him well enough to know he’s done everything but give the word in preparation.

“They can do Thursday afternoon at the earliest, Friday morning if I’m busy.”

She nods, running her tongue along her lips, “That’s three days.”

Roman hums his assent.

“Well then Mr. Stanton, I think you’re owed three kisses.”

He doesn’t count necessarily, but he knows he gets more than three before he’s closing the car door to allow Butch to take her home.

*************************

[phony-stony]

I’ve got you (it’s okay)

written for @winterironmonth SFW Monday. Fills out the following prompts: TROPE/AU: Arc Reactor/Metal Arm Angst WORD: Kidnapped

Words: 9.6k Ao3 link

stay tuned for other fics this month!

Bucky's body is tucked in the leftmost corner of the cell he's in, eyes trained and glaring hard at the door not that far away from him. The room is bare and the walls are smooth and solid, lacking seams where portions have been fitted together. The ceiling, floor, and surrounding walls are steel, most likely incredibly thick. The door is similar, but Bucky had learned upon trying to thrust his fist through that it is reinforced with vibranium as well. There is no window or handle, and the hinges are on the other side. In short, there is nothing of even remote use in this cell for a possible escape. 

It may not be ideal, but the situation is far from hopeless. 

Bucky shifts his weight and flexes his fingers, trying to work some feeling into them. The vibranium enforced handcuffs that bind his wrists are tight enough to feel, but not enough to be the source of the static in his limbs—that would be the remainder of the drugs still in his system. 

The vague reminder of how this kidnapping even came about does nothing but make his mood sour further, his glare deepening. 

Today is Saturday, and Saturdays are date nights. Since it was Bucky's turn, he picked a new pizza joint that had recently opened. It had been getting good reviews online, and Tony had a thing for hole-in-the-wall restaurants, so Bucky was more than confident in his guaranteed success for the night—Tony would have a good time, they'd eat greasy pizza and enjoy a night out together. Not to mention that date-nights always ended with Bucky fucking a very enthusiastic Tony through the mattress. 

They hadn't even made it to the pizza place. 

Three blocks from the restaurant Bucky's instincts detected a shift, and he was instantly using his hand interlocked with Tony's to drag him between Bucky's body and the brick of the building behind them. His metal hand was on the gun at the back of his waistband even quicker, and his eyes systematically started to scan their surroundings. They hadn't gotten far; behind him, Tony's free hand came up to clench at Bucky's sleeve, "Buc-" he had started, only for his voice to cut off with a gasp of surprise. Bucky was already snapping his head in the direction that Tony had been facing, and his eyes narrowed on the lone figure just barely visible on one of the rooftops. 

The hand on Bucky's sleeve fell away, and the fingers around his slipped through a heartbeat later, limp. Bucky had spun, his heart plummeting and arms instinctively coming up around Tony as he crumpled, eyes rolling back, two darts sticking out of the skin of his neck. Bucky's brain instantly paired it with the cause of Tony's surprised gasp a second earlier. 

As Bucky caught Tony's unconscious and falling form, he felt four quick pinches on the skin of the back of his neck. He had gasped with the sudden onslaught of powerful anesthesia rolling out from the little needles and used a hand to desperately brush them off. There were footsteps closing in rapidly on their position, and Bucky would have to keep his focus to get the both of them home in one piece, especially with the addition of very, very potent drugs in his body. 

After tucking Tony's form carefully on the ground, he had brought his gun up, instantly pivoting on his heel. His body melted into a proper stance and he had two targets down before the rest of them closed in. 

Bucky shot another man and he went down hard, but Bucky hadn't waited to watch. As soon as the trigger had been pulled, Bucky turned, throwing all of his weight and strength into slamming the butt of the handgun into another soldier's face. Blood spurted up immediately, but the bit of gore didn't bother him—he had seen much worse in his time with Hydra. 

A pair of hands had wrapped themselves around his free arm, but Bucky just turned his attention to the new enemy, disposing of him quickly and efficiently. In the small window of time that it took, another man had jumped on Bucky's back and jammed three new darts into his chest, the man's other arm wrapping around Bucky's neck. Yelling in both fury and frustration, Bucky had tried to rip the man from his shoulders, but it was more than a little difficult with the new wave of anesthesia. His limbs felt like TV static and the ringing in his ears started to phase out to something more mellow. Black had been rapidly forming around the outside of his vision, and the addition of the pressure on his windpipe only had made the darkness grow faster. 

Up until then, the entire confrontation had lasted three minutes and thirty-seven seconds. Seventeen seconds later two black vans found themselves at the curb. 

Forty-nine seconds later Bucky's knees ended up hitting the ground, his whole body lead and numb. 

Within Fifty-eight seconds of the second wave of drugs, Bucky had been unconscious and laid out on the pavement next to Tony. 

 ~~~~~ 

 Bucky is standing before the door is even properly open. 

A soldier enters with his gun drawn, trained right between Bucky's eyes, and if his attention hadn't been on the other people entering his cell, he would have scoffed. Like one man with a gun can stop me. 

Two other soldiers followed the first, and between them was Tony. Bucky immediately caught his gaze, and the other man smiled brightly. There was a gash on his forehead and a bruise forming around his eye; Bucky had no doubts that if he gently looked, he would find other injuries on Tony's body. 

Seeing Tony hurt made his fists clench where they were fastened together in their cuffs, and if the flinch in the soldier with the gun was anything to go by, his rage was noticeable. 

Good. 

Tony was let go of, and he turned around, waving at the soldiers as they backed out of the cell. 

"Thanks for the walk back guys, I enjoyed our time together!" he called. Bucky huffed, but he couldn't deny the fondness in the noise any more than he could deny the way his mouth twitched upwards. 

Tony turned to Bucky and his smile turned into something softer, something that was just for Bucky. 

"Hey." 

"C'mere," Bucky responded, reaching out with his hands and pulling Tony towards him. They sat, and Bucky immediately manhandled Tony into his lap, throwing his cuffed hands up and over Tony's head until they sat comfortably around his waist. Tony leaned back into Bucky's chest and hummed, one hand around one of Bucky's. 

"You alright, sugar?" Bucky asked, his face pressed into Tony's neck. 

"Mostly, yeah, they just roughed me up a little to get the other Avengers' attention. Hydra seems to want that officer we captured recently back badly."

"So we're the bait?" 

"Guess so. Some sort of bargaining chip, or something else like it. I think they wanted to show that they were serious by throwing a few punches, and I don't think they're stupid enough to try and think that they can pull something like that on you." 

Bucky's hands curled possessively into the fabric of Tony's shirt, mood darkening for a moment. 

"They're already stupid as hell tryin' a' pull that shit with you."

Tony leaned his head back and pressed a fond kiss to the side of Bucky's neck, his grin a little wider at Bucky's Brooklyn accent popping through—it did that a lot when he was worried. 

"I'm alright. Besides, with how much you were glaring at those guys to keel over and die, I don't think that we'll have to worry about anything like that for a little." 

Bucky grumbled, but he relented; there was no use being too bent out of shape about it when it was all in the past. 

"They cuffed you, huh?" Tony said, changing the topic, "I'm guessing they're at least reinforced with vibranium since you haven't broken them to bits yet." 

"Unfortunately." 

"At least they gave you a collar to match. Kinky." 

"Very." 

"Do we know what it does yet?" 

Bucky grimaced. 

"It shocks me if I try and take it off. I don't know the voltage, but it was enough to get me to quit it." 

Tony's eyebrows creased in a frown. 

"Guess we'll have to deal with that too." 

"Right now you don't have to deal with anything. Why don't you try and get some sleep, huh, doll?" 

"They didn't exactly beat me to a pulp, ice-pop. I'm alright." 

"Yeah, well it's probably close to 'bout eleven at this point. Good thing about being locked up in an eight-by-eight square foot cell is that I don't have to worry 'bout you working 'till five in the morning fiddling around like you do." 

"Excuse you, I don't fiddle," Tony cried, "I'm a scientist and a mechanic and-" Bucky was laughing and only half paying attention at this point. Whenever Bucky tried to insinuate that Tony was doing anything else with his time besides being an absolute genius, he always reacted with the same indignation. Bucky knew that he would go on and on about the value of workshop time, how he was working himself to the bone for the sake of humanity, thank you very much, and how he had lasted this far on caffeine and brilliancy, so what was a few hours missing here or there when it meant the world was a little bit safer?

"-and another thing, I do not-mpf!" 

Bucky also knew that Tony is very easy to quiet with a kiss. 

When Bucky pulled away, Tony tried his damndest to look put out, but the corner of his mouth kept twitching like it ached to draw itself into a smile. 

"You kissing me to get me to shut up is wildly unfair." 

"Maybe. But you love me anyways." 

Tony rolled his eyes, keeping up the charade that they both knew was fake even as his body melted further into Bucky's embrace. 

"Yeah. Lucky me." 

 ~~~~~ 

 From what Bucky can gather, it's been between seven and ten days since they were drugged and captured. Thankfully, he and Tony have mostly been left alone to their own devices. 

Mostly didn't mean all the time though, and that was a lesson that Bucky was painfully aware of. 

Right now he was alone—about two hours earlier soldiers had opened their cell and dragged Tony out with enough guns drawn to keep Bucky from doing anything rash. Tony had flashed Bucky a half-manic grin on his way out, but the sight hadn't made Bucky feel any better. 

In the time that they had been here, Tony had been taken out three times, including today. The specifics of what Tony was facing outside of the cell was unknown to him because Tony refused to tell him, but Bucky didn't need to know the gruesome details to know that they had the gall to fucking torture him. 

In a clinical sense, Bucky could understand. Hydra's primary target was to regain the possession of one of the head officers that the Avengers had recently tossed into prison, and they were trying to do that through a prisoner exchange with the two of them. However, it would be more than welcome to achieve their goal without losing their hostages, which was where Tony came in. Tony and Bucky would obviously have the clearance to know not only where the Hydra officer was being held, but probably information about the building, possible forces on base, and other valuable details. 

Bucky had broken his conditioning ages ago, but that didn't mean that he still wasn't tough shit, and Hydra knew that personally. He could understand that torturing him not only would be a waste of time and energy—they wouldn't be able to get anything out of him even if they tried—but that it would put him in a very close proximity with weapons, and circumstances like those would turn out very, very bad for anyone even in the close vicinity. 

Tony, meanwhile, may be notorious for not giving anyone the time of day in his long list of kidnappings (a list that made Bucky see red), but zero was still greater than a negative, so him giving them anything to work with had a much higher success rate, and therefore it made him the obvious choice. 

Intellectually, Bucky knew all of this. Emotionally? Mentally? Bucky was close to shaking with rage every time Tony came back to him, more battered and bruised than when he had left. He had yet to return with a serious injury, and he wasn't showing any signs of reaching the end of his mental tether, but that didn't stop Bucky's brain from going a mile a minute. 

He was worried and upset and furious at both himself and everyone that had even the smallest role in each and every one of Tony's bruises. 

Bucky should have kept them from being captured, should have stopped them from taking Tony, should have protected him, should have done so much more. But that isn't the point right now—he can feel sorry for himself and make his excuses when they aren't being held captive. 

So Bucky was alone, trying hard not to think about what Tony was going through alone and failing miserably. 

 ~~~~~ 

 Bucky was already standing when the door was wrenched open. He pushed his body into a defensive stance immediately at the sight of soldiers and guns, but his eyes went wide at the sight of Tony. 

His lip was split and there was blood running down the side of his face from somewhere on his head. His torso and shoulders were curled in on themselves and towards the right, and Bucky's brain put forward the possibility of a rib or internal deep tissue injury. Meanwhile, his wrists had an alarmingly dark ring of bruises around them this time, and he was barely putting any weight on his left ankle. 

God, Tony, what are they doing to you?

Bucky instantly dropped his stance and took a few steps forward, intent on bringing Tony into his arms, but he had only covered a foot or two of ground when there was a cackle of energy in his ear and then there was molten heat bursting behind his eyeballs, sizzling through his veins and making his lungs stutter, the oxygen he so desperately needed taunting him from where it stayed outside of his body and just out of reach. 

Somewhere in the back of his head, Bucky heard Tony cry out for him. 

Bucky gasped as his vision returned to him, and he was on the floor on his hands and knees, Tony crouching in front of him—when had he gotten there? His eyes drifted to the now-closed door of their cell. They were alone. 

"Bucky? Hey, are you still with me? Terminator? Buck?" 

Bucky nodded, panting, reaching out to put his palm on Tony's cheek. 

"Alright?" Bucky managed, his voice croaky and too deep. He distantly registered the faint smell of burnt flesh. 

Relief washed over Tony's face, and he gave Bucky a smile. 

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine." 

His vocal cords felt raw and incapacitated, so Bucky just let his fingers prod Tony's head where Bucky wanted it until he caught sight of a gash along Tony's hairline. That's where all of the blood was coming from. 

It didn't look deep at all, and Bucky knew well enough that head injuries bleed and bleed and bleed. Still, he lifted his shirt from where it covered his body to the side of Tony's head and slowly cleaned away the dripping blood falling from the wound. He ripped off a corner of it and handed it to Tony, demanding that he hold it to his head with both Bucky's eyes and a few rough words. 

Afterwards, like every time Tony returned after spending time with the soldiers, Bucky systematically checked over all of his bones to make sure none of them were broken, cataloged new injuries, and did what he could to make Tony as comfortable as possible. This time that meant that he ripped off the hem of his shirt as well and wrapped it around Tony's ankle. It meant that he pressed feather-light kisses to the patches of purple and black and blue on Tony's skin. It meant that his heart ached, but Tony was smiling wide. 

It makes Bucky so, so angry to see his genius hurt like this, but right now Bucky can't get them out of this no matter how much he wants to, and that knowledge hurts. 

Bucky watched Tony's eyes flick over to the door for a second before a wave of determination overtook his features. He gently pushed Bucky to the corner of their cell, but Bucky was more than fine with following him wherever Tony wanted him. Making sure that Bucky's back was facing the door, Tony scooched himself in between the wall and Bucky's body, sitting right on his lap. He let his head fall onto Bucky's shoulder, but his hands drifted up to rest on Bucky's collarbones. 

"Thank you for taking care of me," Tony said, "Now relax, you can lean on me, it's alright. I have work to do anyways." Tony pressed a small, thin object to the front of Bucky's chest. "Don't look, but I managed to swipe it from one of the tables before they were done with me. It's not the best tool I've ever used, but since I'm not exactly going to be disabling a bomb or anything I'm not too upset at the limit on finesse." 

Bucky is just going to ask, sorry, what the hell Tony thought he was going to work on, but he felt fingers gently press at the collar on Bucky's neck, fiddling with the metal. 

"I bet that I can disable the electric on this thing, or just snip some wires and call it a day." 

"Yeah?" Bucky asked. His voice was coming back a little, but everything still felt raw. 

"Yeah, so you just sit tight and look pretty, they won't be able to hurt you like this anymore," Tony muttered, and Bucky caught just the edge of a dark, possessive look on his face. It made Bucky's heart swell to have another reminder of how much Tony loved him, how much he was willing to do to stop Bucky from having to be in pain. 

A moment later, Bucky's heart sunk in his chest. Tony was doing so much for him, and what had Bucky done besides hold him and kiss his wounds? How exactly had Bucky protected Tony? 

Bucky rested his head on top of Tony's and listened to the sound of his breathing and the faint noise of Tony messing around with the wires and metal around his neck. 

He would make it up to Tony. He had to. 

 ~~~~~ 

 Two days pass without much fanfare. They eat their meals, and Hydra doesn't bother trying to wrangle information that they aren't going to get out of Tony. 

Bucky's collar was now completely disabled. Tony hadn't cut the power completely due to his fear that they were monitoring the electricity feed to make sure that Tony wasn't tampering with their tech. Instead, he had relocated several different parts and rearranged the wires to them, shocking himself more than enough times for Bucky's comfort. In the end though, Tony had been quite pleased with himself, and Bucky was once again marveled at the absolute stunning genius of his boyfriend. 

Tony had explained it to him like a TV remote and the receptor in a cable box. The remote sent signals to the receptor, and those signals told the TV what to do. In this case, Tony had basically interrupted the circuit Bucky's collar and the "remote" were making by diverting the wiring to other parts of the collar. This effectively allowed it to still receive those "shock" signals, but prevented it from having the ability to read and therefore act upon those same signals. 

And Tony had done it all with his hands and the equivalent of a goddamn paperclip. 

Incredible. 

 ~~~~~ 

 Halfway through the  fourth day, Bucky could tell that something was wrong. To what degree remained to be determined, but for now, he was on edge. 

Ever since Tony had been dragged back to their cell, they had been left alone besides when they were given meals. Today's problem was that food came at strict eight hour intervals, and they were nearly up to hour eleven. 

In Bucky's experience, it's when a carefully regulated system fails that things turn to shit. 

The possibility of Hydra trying to starve information out of them was close to nonexistent. It was clear that their main function was to be hostages up for exchange of a valuable prisoner. Tony had been pried at and questioned, but it was mostly to see if they could squander up any loose ends and receive a bonus to their capture besides the return of their officer. Plus, Bucky had not only been conditioned to resist starvation for long amounts of time, but his juiced-up body was built to withstand food shortages, so attempting to get something out of him like this was incredibly inefficient and wouldn't work in the slightest. Tony hadn't been taken from the cell in several days, and there were no demands for them to fill. 

So the lack of food wasn't because Hydra wanted something. And Bucky would bet his life that they wouldn't just forget about their two currently most valued prisoners, which meant that there was an outside influence at play. 

On one hand, Bucky hoped that the wild card just so happened to be the Avengers. He had had enough of being locked up, and if Tony had got so much as another scratch Bucky might lose it. He wanted to get out, eat something very heavy in carbs with Tony, and then tuck them both away in bed for twelve hours. 

On the other, Bucky fucking hated whatever the hell was wrong. He couldn't exactly prepare for anything if he didn't know what he was preparing for, and that feeling of hopelessness sat in his chest, pressed right up against his ribcage. 

Tony's hand curled itself tighter in the strands of Bucky's hair, his fingernails dragging across Bucky's scalp. Bucky felt his body unconsciously relax just the tiniest bit to the touch. 

"Relax, snowflake," Tony murmured, "everything will be alright." 

You don't know that, Bucky thought desperately. All of his experiences were simmering at the front of his mind, and the anticipation of waiting for the other shoe to drop was almost killing him. He didn't just have to worry about himself, he had to worry about Tony, and that caused his heart to race. 

Bucky forced himself to try and relax, pressing himself further into Tony's chest behind him. 

Their backs were up against the corner, farthest away from the door—the only point of entry. The walls were too thick for Bucky to make a dent with a punch, so they were incredibly strong and provided ample protection. Tony was tucked away behind Bucky's body, as safe as he could be. 

Everything will be alright. 

Bucky hoped so, god did he hope so. 

 ~~~~~ 

 Forty-seven minutes later the door was wrenched open and nine armoured and heavily armed soldiers came streaming through the door. None of them approached Bucky or Tony, but it didn't matter—Bucky was already standing and ready to fight for Tony's life before the first guard had even taken one step inside the room. 

"Stand down, Asset, I do not have the time for this." 

The new man stands tall and with his shoulders pushed back, chin high. It is obvious that he far outranks the soldiers around them, and between his posture and how he strides in with a blase tone, he commands respect and compliance. 

Too fucking bad Bucky won't give him either. 

"His name is James, asshole," Tony says immediately, taking a half step out from behind Bucky's body—he had instantly pushed Tony behind him the moment he heard hands settle on the handle outside. Bucky's hand flew out to prevent Tony from moving any further out from the relative safety of the shield Bucky was providing, but that didn't stop Tony from craning his neck out to scowl better at their new enemy. 

"The Asset doesn't have a name. Now, you will step out from behind the Asset, or you will have a bullet between your eyes. I will not bargain; do not try me, Stark." 

"Yeah, sure, you can—" 

Bucky nearly snapped his neck trying to put himself in the way of the gun that the officer had drawn and leveled right between Tony's eyes. 

"Mr. Stark, I suggest you move or I will be forced to put a bullet in the Asset. I know how much he means to you. It would be tragic to see him in such pain, don't you think?" 

"This isn't my first walk around the park. Everyone in this room knows that he and I are needed to have your little prisoner exchange. Shooting him would be like shooting your own goddamn balls," Tony snorted. Bucky didn't have to be looking at him to know that there was a mask on his face right now, each emotion and tone carefully constructed to show nothing of value. Bucky, however, was privy to all of the things that a normal person wouldn't be and he could hear the slight shake of Tony's voice—the possibility of Bucky being injured was stressing him out. 

The officer in front of them smiled coldly. 

"This has gone very far past the prisoner exchange, Mr. Stark, and Hydra has new priorities. The Asset will heal anything besides a fatal shot, and I'm more than capable of not hitting one of his major organs. Move, now, or he will suffer the consequences." 

"Trust me," Tony murmured. He stepped out from behind Bucky, but Bucky's hand lashed out and grabbed onto his sleeve, milliseconds from dragging Tony back to safety when the cocking of a gun made Bucky freeze. The barrel was aimed unmistakably on Tony's frame. 

"I am not a patient man." 

Tony leveled Bucky with a look that said everything, and Bucky found the fabric of Tony's shirt slipping right through his fingers. Tony stepped away and as soon as he was within arms' reach, the officer forcefully grabbed Tony by the upper arm and pulled him close, pressing the gun right to the skin of his left temple. 

"I can assure you that at this point Mr. Stark's value to me is nothing more than leverage to get you to do what I want. I will not hesitate to kill him if the method proves ineffective in its ability to control you. One of my soldiers will approach you and inject you multiple times. You will allow this or Mr. Stark will be terminated, do you understand, Asset?" 

Bucky was still for a heartbeat, his eyes stuck on Tony's wide ones. Then he nodded. 

"Correct answer." 

Bucky was injected with three vials of an unidentified substance. They were tranquilizers of some sort, but they didn't make Bucky's head feel like cotton or make his limbs buzz like TV static, so they weren't the same chemical as what had been used on them to kidnap them in the first place. It was most likely either diluted or completely different altogether. 

As soon as the soldier stepped away though, he turned right to Tony and produced another needle. 

"He doesn't-" Bucky began, panic flaring up in his heart. The chemical make-up was unknown, and Bucky didn't have any way to tell what the hell they were about to inject his boyfriend with. Not to mention that, assuming Tony was getting the same thing as Bucky, one dose would be more than enough to hinder Tony's mental and physical processes if three were affecting Bucky so much already. 

Wordlessly, the safety was clicked off, and both the sight and the sound sent Bucky's very soul falling through his ass. 

Needless to say, he shut up very quickly. 

Bucky watched as Tony was injected, his stomach twisting once the plunger was pushed down. 

"Let's move." 

The gun was kept at the side of Tony's head, and Bucky couldn't stop his eyes from drifting to the hand around it, the trigger finger a hair's breadth away from splattering Tony's brain against the wall. He let two soldiers roughly grab at his bound arms and haul him forward while a soldier walked forward to replace the officer and pulled out his pistol. He shoved it against the other side of Tony's head hard enough to make him wince, but Bucky didn't dare broadcast how much it made his hackles rise. 

They were both marched out of the cell and into the hallway. Distantly, Bucky could make out the sounds of fighting, and he smiled. That would be the Avengers doing what they do best. 

Bucky flicked his eyes to Tony to see if he had noticed as well only to frown deeply at the sight of Tony swaying a little on his feet, eyes lidded. 

Tony's body had taken a beating during their capture, and combined with the limited food that they were given, it had made him weaker. After the drugs he had just been pumped with Bucky expected him to be at least a little woozy, but he wouldn't have expected him to be this effected so soon. Was the meal that they hadn't been given making him react this badly? Something else? 

"Status?" The officer asked through a hand radio. The response was garbled, but Bucky's attention didn't tear itself away fast enough from Tony to catch it. The officer nodded and pocketed the radio. 

"You two, in front," he said, motioning to two of the soldiers. As they moved, the officer glanced back at Tony. "If he can't keep up you can shoot him." 

Bucky snarled, shoving the surprised hands off of his body and surging forward, ready to tear that motherfucker's throat out- 

He hit the ground hard, his head thumping loudly against the floor. There were three soldiers on top of him, but that didn't stop Bucky from trying to throw them off. He couldn't though—the drugs in his body were already making his limbs hard to move and now there was a terrible fuzziness in his head from his unfortunate spill onto the floor. 

Something hard and plastic jammed itself into his side and Bucky's whole body clenched as electricity surged through his core, radiating outward to make everything twitch and burn. 

Bucky gasped as it was pulled away, and then he was being pulled upwards and onto his unsteady feet. There was a gun now shoved into his spine. 

"Keep your outbursts to yourself, Asset, or I will kill him now," the officer snarled, "get moving." 

Bucky was once again sandwiched between two soldiers, but this time the remaining four surrounded themselves around him. They all had at least some sort of weapon drawn, and Bucky couldn't help but notice that the ones with a gun in their hand had their trigger fingers clenching and unclenching around the gun, anxious. He wondered who was making them the most nervous right now—the Avengers or Bucky himself. 

Tony was being marched in front of Bucky with about six feet of distance between them. He tried to make out how Tony was doing keeping up, but Bucky couldn't make out much through the soldiers in front of him. 

"Move, damnit!" the soldier with his barrel up against Bucky's spine mumbled, driving Bucky's feet moving faster. He didn't blame the man—he would be close to shitting himself too if the Avengers were nearly to nipping at his heels and most likely furiously pissed off. 

For a few minutes, all that could be heard was the sound of their feet against the floor and their breaths. But then the officer's radio cracked back into life, and this time Bucky caught it. 

The voice is several steps past panicked, and the sounds of violence bleed through the tiny speakers. 

"They've breached the secondary levels there's……….can anyone hear……...the Avengers have gotten past the—"

The voice breaks out into a scream and a burst of gunfire only to be cut off and for static to take its place. 

"Damnit!" 

The radio is thrown against the wall and the officer snaps his fingers, gesturing to the soldier holding Tony. 

"There's no time and we need a distraction. Get him on the floor and hold him down by his shoulders." His attention moved towards Bucky. "Put the Asset up against the wall and keep him there, all of us are dead men if any of you slip up. Do whatever you need to do to get it done, but for god's sake don't let him go." 

Bucky's legs are reflexively backpedaling as the soldiers snap into motion. His back slams against the wall, but he only dimly registers it because his attention is so firmly on Tony. Tony is manhandled onto the ground and and held there roughly, the hands on his upper body visibly digging into his skin. 

"What—" Tony gasped, squirming helplessly. 

Bucky watched as the officer drops and straddles Tony's waist, using his weight to keep Tony from moving his torso. He gripped the sides of Tony's shirt and ripped, the worn and dirty fabric tearing and falling away to expose Tony's chest molted with bruises in several different shades of healing, and the arc reactor. 

"What the fucking—hey! Get off of him! Get the fuck-" Bucky starts to yell, but a fist hitting his diaphragm pushes the air out of his lungs. He sucks in a breath back in greedily, and now Tony is yelling, panicked and trying to throw the two men holding him in place off, but he can't. His body is too weak from their imprisonment and the drugs are too strong, making his movements sluggish and uncoordinated. 

"Be happy that you're good for something, Stark. The Avengers will be too preoccupied with trying to save your life to stop me or the Asset." The officer said. Bucky started to scream, his whole body moving in an effort to get away from the soldiers, he had to help Tony, he had to, good god, Tony—

The officer's fingers curled around the edges of the arc reactor where it met its casing and started to twist, his face scrunching up into a grimace as he tried to find a good grip to twist it out of Tony's chest. 

Tony's words of protest devolved into yells of pain, his head thumping back against the floor. 

The officer was struggling, the arc reactor still locked into its casing. Meanwhile Tony had tears rolling down his face as the casing was pulled and jostled inside his chest. 

"I'll kill you! I'll fucking kill you!"

The knife sends a roar tearing through Bucky's throat and the surge of strength and determination and fury are nearly enough to pull away from the half a dozen soldiers pressing him into the wall, but these soldiers are fighting for their lives and their blind panic is enough to hold his drug-addled body long enough for one of them to shove another needle into Bucky's neck, the contents being violently pushing into Bucky's body. It's different from what he had just been given not that long ago—instead of a gradual buildup the leaden feeling slams through him fast enough to make him dizzy. 

The soldiers use his lapse to throw him back into the wall and keep him there. 

"Hurry up!" one of the soldiers bellows, "Or he's going to get his lights knocked the fuck out consequences be damned!" 

The officer doesn't even seem to acknowledge the insolence. Instead he jams the blade of his knife between the arc reactor and it's casing and twists. 

Tony screams, his whole body going breathlessly rigid and arching up against the hands and the body on top of him. 

For a horrible, terrible moment, everything holds still, and the only variable is Bucky's threats slipping between English and Russian, his brain too hyped up on panic to stick with one language. 

Then the arc reactor gives and it's popping out of the casing. The officer grins and grabs it. "One last golden egg," he mutters as he yanks out the cords connecting the reactor to Tony. Tony's voice cuts off instantly and he breathes in, the air passing through his lips sounding like a wheeze. His eyes bug out of his head and his body clenches one last time before the tension drops out of him and his body thumps against the ground. His eyes are open but they're glassy and unfocused. 

"Tony? Tony! Tony please-" 

The officer and the soldier stand, leaving Tony on the floor, motionless, fuck no please-

It takes all of them to pull Bucky away. He keeps screaming and thrashing, his body straining so hard against the hands and arms and fingers that hold him, but his vision is black at the edges and he can't feel his limbs from the drugs in his system. His body is compromised—he knows it. But that doesn't stop him from trying to break free, trying to get to Tony. 

Tony baby please, fuck, please please please hang on I'm coming, I'm coming! Tony! Tony!

He loses sight of Tony, but Bucky can still see him, slumped up against the floor, mouth gasping and eyes fixed unseeingly on the ceiling. 

Bucky's head is already counting the seconds; Tony can last five minutes and twenty-two seconds without the reactor before his chances reach critical, and even then he has about another minute until the first piece of shrapnel starts to bury itself into the wall of his right atrium. But Tony has less than seven minutes before he's dead, and thirty-seven of those seconds have already passed and Bucky's doing nothing, he hadn't stopped it and now he isn't even there with him. 

After another twelve seconds of Bucky fruitlessly trying to slow their progress, he's pulled into the back of a vehicle and several soldiers follow his body's fall into the bed of the truck, holding him fast. The officer isn't there—he must be in the front of the truck somewhere. 

Off to his right he hears a door slam open and then there is a familiar swish flying through the air before Steve's shield takes out two of the soldiers automatically, their bodies falling either unconscious or dead. 

Before they even hit the ground, three gunshots are ringing out through the air faster than Bucky's heart in his chest and Bucky knows that the men going limp at his side are dead thanks to Natasha. 

Bucky roars, grabbing onto the uniform of one of the soldiers and throwing him into the remaining ones standing. He hears bones crack and wants to stay and make sure that they all die, but there are more important things at steak. 

Four minutes and fifty-nine seconds left. 

He swings out of the bed of the truck and rips the driver's side door off, ignoring the gun that the officer is trying to pull. Bucky rips the arc reactor out of his hands and uses his metal fist to slam into the man's face, right where his eyes are drowning in terror. 

This time when he hears the sickening snap of bones yielding under his strength he smiles. This man wanted to take Bucky and erase everything again; He wanted to bring back the Winter Soldier back from the dead. 

Fine. 

He might as well find out exactly what the Winter Soldier is capable of. 

There's blood splattered across the dashboard and the seats, flowing onto the floor and following the cracks in the metal of Bucky's arm. 

Arms wrap around Bucky's shoulders and pull him back, and even though Bucky knows that they belong to Steve, he fights for a moment, he needs to make them pay-

"Bucky! Stop! We need to get the reactor to Tony!" 

Steve drops him just as fast as Bucky stills, his mind snapping back into focus. Tony needs him. Tony needs him. 

Four minutes and seven seconds left. 

There's so many drugs in his system from before that Bucky's nearly sick with it, but that doesn't matter right now. He takes off in a sprint, pushing his legs as fast as he can make them when they feel like jello, and then trying to take it up a notch further. His body is the peak of human perfection—it has to be good for something besides letting Tony down. 

Bucky closes the distance in nineteen seconds. 

Three minutes and forty-eight seconds.

Bucky skids to a stop and drops to his knees right next to Tony. On the other side of Tony's body—fuck, do not think of Tony like that, he's still alive —is Bruce, his fingers pressed up against Tony's pulse. Clint is almost right on top of them with his bow drawn, eyes murderous and fingers clenched around the arrow notched. His body is drawn in tight like he's hoping for some kind of threat to show up just to have something to work the anger out on. There's a part of Bucky that thinks of how close Tony and Clint are and knows that the man is nearly burning at the sight of Tony so close to death. 

Wordlessly, Bucky hands over the arc reactor. Bruce's eyes are green around the edges. 

Three minutes and thirty-nine seconds until death. Two minutes and thirty-nine seconds until his heart is breached. 

Bruce flips over the reactor and starts grabbing at the wires sticking out of Tony's chest, and fuck, Bucky finally gets a good look at Tony and he nearly throws up. 

Tony's skin is paler than Bucky's ever seen it, and when Bucky tries to push his sweat soaked hair out of his face he's clammy and cold to the touch. Heart in his throat, Bucky threads his finger's through Tony's limp ones and brings their hands up, resting his lips against the back of Tony's hand in what had meant to be a kiss but turned out to be more of a harsh exhale. 

Two minutes and eleven seconds until the shrapnel hits. 

"C'mon, c'mon sweetheart, hang on for me, alright? Almost there, why dontcha open your eyes for me, doll? Huh? Tony baby please open your eyes for me-" Bucky murmured, his voice cracking. But Tony's eyes didn't open. They were rolled back in their sockets, eyelids fluttering haphazardly. 

His eyes snapped back to Bruce, who was just finishing up with the reactor. Bucky knew that everyone on their team had been given training by Tony himself on what to do to reconnect the reactor, but there was the irrational fear that something was going to go wrong clawing at Bucky's chest. He would have done it himself but his hands were shaking too bad to hold anything. 

"Fuck!" Bruce snarled, carefully feeding his fingers into the gaping hole in Tony's chest to grab the last wire, his skin coming back bloody but whole; it was Tony's blood. 

"The knife, he used a knife to get it out, I-I-" Bucky gasped, the memories clicking into place and cause and effect snapping together. The knife had caused damage, and judging by the new slickness of Bruce's fingers, a lot. 

Steve's arm wraps around Bucky's chest, trying in vain to comfort. 

One minute and fifty-seven seconds. 

Bruce twists the last wire into place and Tony's body jumps as the arc reactor reconnects. Bucky's hand catches Tony's head before it hits the ground again. 

The arc reactor flickers before it hits steady, and Bruce is once again pressing his fingers to the side of Tony's neck, one hand red and the other nearly green. His mouth moves as he counts and Bucky isn't breathing, isn't moving, what if the arc reactor had been damaged, what if Bucky's counting had been off, was he too late, was-

Bruce sighs in relief. 

"He's fine, his heart is beating he's okay." 

The tension breaks completely, Clint tipping his head back in gratitude, Natasha closing her eyes and letting her shoulders fall. Steve also lets himself deflate for a moment, the tenseness that he had been holding onto flowing out of his body. 

Bucky's breath broke on a sob and he seemed to crumple in on himself, dropping shaky kisses onto Tony's hand over and over. 

Bruce was the first to break the moment. 

"We need to get him out of here and into medical immediately. Steve can you carry him? The rest of us will keep watch fine—I doubt Thor let anyone past him." 

"I'll carry him," Bucky interrupted, already moving to slide his arms under Tony's unconscious frame. Steve's hands stopped him. 

"You're in no condition to be carrying anybody, Buck. Let me take him, he'll be alright." 

Bucky opened his mouth to protest but Natasha beat him to it. 

"You've very obviously been drugged, you're bleeding and shaking, and you've been held captive for days now." 

"Yeah, you can probably barely carry yourself, man. Tony'll be fine." Clint adds. 

Before he can do anything Steve is gently scooping Tony up and Clint is helping Bucky stand. 

They make their way back through the base, Clint and Natasha on a high enough alert that Bucky allows himself to relax a little. There's a weariness that goes deeper than his bones, so Bucky is quietly grateful to Bruce's frame tucked under his arm, quietly supporting him. 

Thor is waiting by the quinjet, tasked with guarding it after he had disposed of all of the Hydra soldiers on base—apparently Bucky's screams had been loud enough that when the Avengers had heard them, they immediately put everything they could towards getting to Bucky and Tony, and that included letting Thor mop up. 

The god's face darkened significantly when he saw the state that Tony and Bucky were in, and he moved to take Bucky from Bruce. 

"'m fine, don't worry," Bucky mumbled, his words slurring a little. 

"You are not fine, let me help you." 

Thor didn't wait for an answer before easily taking most of Bucky's weight and helping him into the quinjet. 

Thor sat him down on one of the cots and Bucky nearly folded right over once he wasn't on his feet anymore. With a big hand on Bucky's chest, Thor easily caught him and kept him from tumbling to the floor. 

"Easy," he rumbled, "easy." 

Bruce appeared before them in no time. 

"He's going to be fine," he murmured, but Bucky didn't know if Bruce was talking about him or Tony. He wanted to ask, but his brain kept stuttering in his skull and he couldn't really feel his body too well. He was crashing from the drugs and the adrenaline. 

Bruce slid an IV into Bucky's arm, and right before he drifted off he dimly heard Bruce task Thor with making sure that he was alright for the duration of the flight. 

 ~~~~~ 

 Bucky let his thumb glide over the soft skin of Tony's hand, grateful beyond words over the fact that it was no longer clammy and pale. Tony was in his hospital bed, sleeping. There were more than a few bandages across his body and several machines hooked up to him, but he had color in his cheeks and the heart monitor assured Bucky that everything was alright. 

The hospital room door opened and Bucky didn't even have to look up to know that it was Janet, the nurse tasked with him and Tony. 

"There's a perfectly good hospital bed right next to him that you could be laying on." She grumbled, unhooking Bucky's IV so she could attach a new bag. 

"I know," Bucky said softly, "but I'm fine right here." 

Janet huffed and swatted him on the arm. It didn't hurt in the slightest, but it did make Bucky smile. Janet was tiny and a step past middle aged—to see her unafraid to mockingly hit the Winter Soldier was both funny and endearing. 

"I don't want to hear it. If I didn't have a million other things to do besides deal with stubborn superheroes I would have picked you up and put you in that bed myself." She checked over Tony's vitals and wrote a few things down on his clipboard. "We both know that as soon as he wakes up and sees you out of a bed it's going to be the end of the world, so if I find out that you weren't in a bed before then you're going to have me to deal with, understand? I don't need Iron Man trying to jump out of bed just to put his boyfriend in one." 

Bucky's smile was wide enough to crinkle the corners of his eyes—he really loved Janet. 

"Of course." 

"You say that now but you're just going to sit here anyways," she mumbled, turning back to Bucky and putting her hands on her hips. "I need your hand, or you're going to have to deal with my fingers on your neck." 

Bucky gently disentangled his flesh fingers from Tony's. He moved to replace them with his other ones, but a small hand on his metal bicep stopped him. 

"Let go of him for a moment, alright? He's okay." This time her words were soft, and Bucky listened. 

Janet took Bucky's wrist in her hand and turned it upward. She found his pulse and counted silently, her eyes on the clock on the wall. 

Bucky had initially refused any sort of treatment. He had woken up in the hospital with Steve and Natasha in his room, hooked up to the normal assortment of machines that he promptly proceeded to nearly rip off of him as soon as he was half conscious. Part of the reason was that he had many, many bad experiences with waking up disoriented and attached to medical equipment in his years of living under Hydra's thumb. More importantly, his eyes hadn't even opened before the memory of Tony screaming as his arc reactor was torn out of his chest slammed into the front of his brain. 

It had taken both Steve and Natasha to keep him on the bed, and Bucky's friendship with the both of them had been the only thing even remotely keeping him together. 

"Where is he?" He had ground out. 

Steve quickly gave him the run down—Tony was treated immediately and all things considered he was in pretty good shape. He had some extensive exterior and internal bruising across his body, a minorly sprained wrist and a hairline fracture in his eighth right rib. The only major injury he had regarded his arc reactor, but even then Steve had stressed that he was fine. 

The doctors wouldn't be able to fix the damage to the reactor and the casing, but it was performing fine and keeping the shrapnel out of his heart which was the important thing. What the doctors could fix were the wounds along the interior of his thoracic cage. When the knife had been used to wrench the arc reactor out of the casing, part of the metal had bent and popped out of place at one of the seams. This had led to tearing along the inside of his thoracic cavity regarding his pectoral muscles. When designing the arc reactor casing after he had gotten back from Afghanistan, Tony had worked with several doctors to design a circular fake sternum. It would be attached to the casing inside of his chest, and the doctors would use it to anchor his ribs and chest muscles as if it was a real sternum. When the casing had been compromised, it had cracked the fake sternum, causing internal bleeding and tearing, which Tony had been admitted into surgery for. 

The news of just how bad Tony had been injured nearly made Bucky lose it, but Steve had pressed him into the bed and forced Bucky to look at him as he said that Tony was fine. 

"The surgery is done, all the doctors are doing is putting one of the backup casings Tony gave them into his chest, he'll be out of that room before the hour and then you can see him. He's okay, Bucky, he's going to be alright." 

After Bucky had generally calmed down, they had tried to get Bucky back on the machines, but he kept refusing. Finally, Steve and Natasha gave up with the understanding that Bucky would stay on an IV and that he would be checked over as often as the nurses saw fit to make sure that the drugs were working their way out of his system. Bucky had only agreed because Tony had been exiting surgery, and he knew that if anything Natasha wouldn't let him out of the room until they had found some sort of compromise. 

Which brought him to Tony's bedside and Janet appearing every hour to "make sure that he was still breathing" as she put it. 

"You're fine," Janet said, letting Bucky's wrist go. Bucky watched her bustle around the room for a few moments. "You better be in bed when I come back in here, you hear me?" 

"Yes ma'am." 

Grumbling about superheroes and stubbornness, Janet closed the door behind her, leaving Bucky alone with Tony once more. Bucky slipped his hand back through Tony's, dropping a kiss onto his knuckles. 

"I'm right here, alright? Nothing is going to happen to you." Bucky's voice was a little shaky in the end, but he couldn't help it when Tony's unnaturally still body on the floor flashed across his eyelids whenever he blinked. 

In a way, it was like a memory surfacing during his recovery period. What had happened was in the past, and there was nothing that Bucky could do to change it, but that didn't stop the guilt or the helplessness, the overwhelming feeling that he should have done something, that it was his fault why those people died, why Tony was hurt and aching. 

I should have done something. 

Bucky brushed his hand through Tony's hair. 

"I'm right here, doll. Right here." 

 ~~~~~ 

 "What th' fuck 're you doin' outta bed?" 

Bucky jumped, his head snapping up to find Tony sleepily glaring at him. 

"You're awake! How are you feeling? Should I-" 

Tony shook his head and frowned deeper. 

"Wait," he mumbled and rubbed at his eyes. When he was done he squinted and then flopped back into bed hard enough to make Bucky's heart lurch—hadn't that hurt? 

"I'm...sooo high." 

"They had to give you something for the surgery, and I know they put you on painkillers." 

Tony hummed and then fell quiet. Bucky stayed in his seat, unsure what to do. 

"Do you… should I... "

"Stop that," Tony interrupted, turning onto his side and looking Bucky right in the eyes. Something in Bucky's chest loosened at the sight of Tony moving and talking, like a part of him was still waiting for the other shoe to drop and for someone to tell him that Tony really wasn't going to be okay. 

"Stop what?"

"Bein' mad 't yours'lf. 'M fine." 

Bucky chewed at his lip and for a minute everything was quiet. Tony pouted. 

"If I wasn' high off m' ass I'd chew you 'ut f'r thinkin' this was your fault," he said, words a little more slurred than they were a moment ago, "But I'm on th' good drugs an' you kinda need to be in bed w'th me." Tony grabbed at Bucky's sleeve and scootched over so there was a Bucky sized space on the bed. "C'mere." 

Bucky can't resist him on a good day, but now when he's sleepy and needy, a wrinkle between his eyebrows that Bucky wants nothing more than to smooth out? He doesn't stand a chance. 

Bucky gently maneuvers them both so none of the medical equipment is sat or tugged on, and something in him melts when Tony immediately plasters himself to Bucky's front, his hands curled into his shirt instead of the blanket. He wraps an arm around Tony and buries his face into Tony's hair. He tries to relax his body, but there had been a vibrating tension under his skin ever since he had first woken up in the hospital. How had he let anyone hurt this man? 

"Tell 'ur brain t' shut th' fuck up," Tony grumbled, twisting to try and get closer, "'m trying t' sleep. Not ev'n super soldiers c'n fight ev'ryone on 'nuff drugs t' stop a grizzly bear. Sleep, m'kay? Love you. Me too." 

Tony gripped at Bucky's shirt tighter and tucked his head right under Bucky's chin so he could press his nose right up to Bucky's pulse. He immediately dropped off to sleep, boneless. 

Bucky exhaled, forcing the tension from his limbs. Logically, he knew that Tony was right, and he knew that he was having such a hard time with it because of his time as the Winter Soldier. He still had trouble being helpless, but Tony was helping him learn that even ex-assassins had limits, and that it was okay. 

Eyes closed and head against the pillow, Bucky traced mindless patterns over the bare skin of Tony's arm. 

"Love you, doll," he murmured even though Tony couldn't hear him, "I love you too."