#man. as much as i love gore there's nothing like a good beating

[befuddled-calico-whump]

smacked around

[not-neverland06]

Hey! Love your writing and love Flux!! I was hoping to request a kind of angsty/fluffy fic with the worst!wolverine where the meet her in the void and maybe Logan knew her just not very well and he’s finally letting himself open up and be close with her (likewise with reader/flux towards logan) and they get into an argument or maybe logan has a nightmare and he ends up stabbing her with his claws and maybe the aftermath of him beating himself up and sabotaging the new relationship until reader finally snaps him out of it and says it was an accident and she still loves him?? Thanks!!

mistake

Logan Howlett x fem!reader

a/n: I want to thank you for this request because I've been having the worst writer's block in the world. I was worried about having to go into another unofficial hiatus, but this made something in my brain click together and I knocked it out in two hours. my life is yours 🙏🙏 Summary: You know him. Or, you knew him. And you never blamed him for what happened in your world. It wasn't his fault that everyone you loved died and you barely escaped with your life. But you never actually thought you'd have to see him again. You don't know what to do when all these feelings resurface with his appearance.

No one truly knew who you were back in your universe. After the horrific incident at the mansion, you had run. You’d run as fast and as far as you could from the slaughter of your friends. You’d barely escaped with your life, and from the amount of blood and gore they’d left behind, most people just assumed you were dead. 

It’s not like anyone cared about you. Scott, Ororo, and Jean had been the real heroes. But it didn’t matter because they were still mutants at the end of the day. It didn’t matter how many people they saved. How many lives they positively changed, no one would ever see past the fact that they were mutants. 

Being one of the newer members of the recently disbanded X-Men gave you enough anonymity to get through daily life without being recognized. It did not, however, protect you from being sucked into the shit fest that is the multiverse. 

You’re not sure what it is about you that just attracts bad luck. You don’t know if it’s some hidden power that’s a part of your evolution. You’re just apparently perpetually fucked. The TVA had determined that you were interfering with the proper flow of your timeline or some bullshit. 

Now you’re here. Stuck in the void with nothing but decay and drunk former superheroes. If you have to watch one more Captain America ‘rally the troops’ you’re gonna kill him yourself. You’ve considered switching teams and joining Cassandra Nova at times. If only so you don’t have to deal with Johnny Storm and the rest of the dipshits. 

You get along with Laura, at least. She likes to tell you about her Logan and you like to dodge her questions about yours. She doesn’t need to know that not every version of Wolverine has a golden heart and story worthy of tears. Yours was a fuck up, plain and simple, but you never thought the incident was his fault. 

As much as others tried to push the blame on him. The people who raided the mansion were determined. There was no other way that day was going to end up. You’d just have one less X-Man. But people always love a martyr more than a victim. 

After a couple of years, you get used to the monotony. Your days are only occasionally broken up by dodging Cassandra’s henchmen and trying not to get sucked up into the soul destroyer. Other than that, you spend your nights getting drunk with Gambit and pretending you know whatever the fuck he’s talking about. 

“Laura! I managed to find some chocolate!” You run into the hideout looking for the girl. It’s rare to find good food that isn’t already a month past its expiration date. You weren’t planning on sharing the candy with her but you figured she’d smell it on you and it’s not worth the fight. 

Instead, you stop short as the familiar blue and yellow uniform you’d always try to force on him comes into view. He’s stealing Gambit’s liquor and you know that’s not going to go over well. What you don’t know is why you are so sure that this is your Wolverine. 

You’ve never had a Wolverine in the void. Not once. This could be any one of the hundreds of thousands of variants. But you see that look in his eye. That familiar watery gaze shows just how much he hurts, even if he doesn’t want to admit it. 

“Logan?” You breathe his name out in disbelief. Bypassing the Deadpool standing nearby. You’ve dealt with enough of those in your time down here. He takes a step back, fixing you with a distrusting look. 

He keeps the bottle of alcohol clutched close to his chest like he thinks you’re going to take it. You track the movement and you scoff. “Right,” you shake your head and stop short. “Of course, the only thing you care about is still getting fucking drunk.”

He glares at you, taking a step forward like he thinks it might actually intimidate you. “Do I know you, bub?” He reaches forward, probably to jab his finger in your chest. You drop your gaze to his outstretched hand and narrow your eyes. 

The material of his suit fluctuates, pulling back and rippling over his arms like liquid and not spandex. He doesn’t notice the manipulation of matter until it's his skin you target. It melts off his adamantium bones and he stares down in horror. 

You know he's scared because he’s watching his body dissolve but he’s not feeling any pain. You could make it hurt, but that’s not what you want. You just want to see if he’ll remember you now. If there’s anything half-decent left in that alcohol-rotted brain of his.

“Flux,” he grits your X-Man name out through his teeth like it hurts him to say it. 

You nod and his skin and suit go back to normal, like you’d never tampered with it in the first place. “You do remember me, then?”

“Thought you fucking died with the rest of them.” Your face drops before you feel an astonished smile on your face. 

“You know, it’s a comfort to know nothing about my world has changed. You’re still the same spineless dick that left us all to die.” You shake your head and storm out of the hideout. You don’t know how long they’re planning on staying but you pray they leave soon. If you have to deal with him longer than a week, you’ll just kill him. 

You step outside just as Laura’s coming back from the bonfire. She greets you with a stiff smile and you wonder what’s got in her in a mood. It only takes a glance over her shoulder to find the reason.

Logan is sulking by the fire, nursing yet another bottle of whiskey. He’s drinking it like water and even with his healing, his liver should have turned to mush by now. “I can see why you didn’t tell me about him,” she mutters as she passes by you. 

You know she tried to be quiet but you can see the way Logan’s head tilts slightly towards you. He’s heard her and you know it has to sting just a little.

You glance down at the leaves under your feet, eyes glazing over as you feel the guilt sink into your stomach. You shouldn’t feel bad, you didn’t do anything wrong. You didn’t hurt him, technically, just reminded him who you were. But you still feel bad for what you said. 

You’ve never blamed Logan for what happened. And if you did, you would be a hypocrite. Because you survived too, and you left them all behind. You ran like a coward. You could never blame him when you failed to save them just the same. 

You take in a deep breath and steel yourself. You’ll just apologize, walk over there, and explain to him you didn’t mean what you said. You know he’ll be a dick about it. Claiming he doesn’t want your apology. You’ll just leave him alone after. 

You’re about to step forward when he barks out a gruff command, “Don’t fucking stare at me like that. I don’t want your company.” He turns back to the fire and takes another swig from his bottle. 

You roll your eyes and walk towards him. “You can be as miserable and self-pitying as you want, just let me say one thing.”

His head whips towards you so quickly you’re surprised you don’t hear it snap. “I’m not fucking pitying myself,” he grits out. You quirk your brows in amusement, glancing towards the bottle in his hand and the clear way he’s sulking. He turns his attention back towards the fire, intent on ignoring you again. 

“I don’t blame you for what happened,” you tell him. You ignore the warning look he shoots you, taking a seat beside him even if he doesn’t want you to. “I-” you choke on the words, struggling to admit to yourself what you’ve never wanted to. 

“Don’t.” You know it’s meant to be a warning. But when you look at him and see how completely broken he is, it sounds more like a pathetic plead. 

But you need to say this. As selfish as it is, you need to say this to someone., Need to unload this guilt you’ve carried for so long. “I was there, Logan. I could have saved them and I didn’t. I fucking ran.”

“Kid, don’t do this-”

“Jean was still moving,” you blurt out. You feel the way your heart speeds up at the admission. Your fingers shake and the air around you stills. 

His face drops and he slowly turns towards you. You’re afraid to look at him. You feel like a bunny staring down the snout of a wolf, there’s no escaping this. You’ve created this trap for yourself. 

“What?” He demands. His voice has lost that tremor of vulnerability. Instead, he sounds like he did when he first found out what had happened to you all. That same deadly level of calm that makes you want to bolt again. 

“She,” you stare into the fire until your eyes burn. You don’t know if it’s from the light or the smoke but the pain focuses you. “She was shaking on the floor. There was blood everywhere and she could barely breathe. They had gassed us with something. None of us could use our powers, it’s the only reason they got a one-up on us.”

You can feel yourself slipping back into that moment. You feel the warmth of the blood on your skin. It seeps into your suit and makes the material cling to you. Your gut is split open and the only thing holding your intestines in is your hands. 

Jean is in front of you. Her hands are twitching by her sides. There’s blood pouring out of her lips, dribbling down her tongue and cheeks. Every breath is a rattle so deep you feel it in your bones. 

Each inhale sounds like someone dragging glass through the membrane of her lungs. Her chest rises and sinks shallowly as she gasps for air. She’s practically convulsing, eyes twitching every which way.

The gas has faded from the halls. The people have left, satisfied with the carnage. You’re alone, surrounded only by the blood and bodies of your friends. None of the others are moving. Some of them are so mangled you can’t even tell who they are anymore. 

Jean’s eyes lock onto yours. The only anchor she has. And you can see it, the frantic, wounded animal gaze on her face. She knows she’s dying. She knows there’s nothing she can do about it. 

You can only stand by and watch as your friend dies. You could be her comfort. You could be the last face she sees before she dies, distracting her from the sight of her dead fiancee behind her. 

But what do you do?

You hold your guts in your stomach and you run. You can’t look at her. You can’t look at any of them. You can hear her croaking behind you. And even when you’re out of the mansion, when you’re in a hospital somewhere getting repaired and Logan’s on a rampage, you still hear her. 

You feel something heavy on your arm and it’s like you're being forcibly dragged out of a trance. Logan’s looking at you with something you’ve never seen before. But it’s something you’ve always desperately craved. 

It’s like he’s seeing you, really seeing you. For the first time in a long time, you feel that ache of guilt ease away ever so slightly. It doesn’t disappear, but you’re sharing the burden with someone else and it’s a relief you’ve desperately craved. 

“You’re not a bad person for leaving, kid.” He swallows roughly and you place your hand over his. He doesn’t look completely comfortable with the touch, slightly flinching away from it, but he doesn’t move. “If you hadn’t, you would be dead.”

You squeeze his hand, forcing him to meet your gaze. “I never blamed you for what happened.” emotion is so thick on your tongue and in your throat that the words come out a whisper. “Their deaths weren’t your fault, and what happened after wasn’t.”

He clenches his eyes shut and jerks his hand out of your grip. You sigh, knowing you’ve lost him. “I slaughtered them.”

You scoff, “They slaughtered us!” You nearly shout, anger bubbling hot in your gut. When you heard about him killing those who had hunted down your friends, you’d celebrated. And when you heard the way the public was crucifying him, you realized that no matter what you did they would never love you. 

You would always be nothing more than a mutant to them. 

“And the people who didn’t hurt them? The innocents I killed?” 

You don’t have anything to say to that. You just stand up, placing a hand on his shoulder as you pass by him. “I never blamed you, Logan.”

You don’t see Logan again after that. At least, not while you’re in the void. What was left of your little resistance was sucked up into the purple cloud of death. Only you and Laura are left with the carnage. 

Logan and Wade have disappeared to who knows where. It stings, to be on your own again. Sure, you have Laura, but she’ll never understand the pain of what happened to your universe. 

As much as it hurt, at least with Logan, you had someone to share the pain with. You could share your burden with him. You feel lonely and cold. Like there’s a part of you missing. You finally figure out what that ache is when the TVA comes to collect you and you see him again. 

He’s standing behind Wade as he enthusiastically tells you and Larua all about his world. But you can’t take your eyes off Logan, or the tentative smile on his face. Whatever had happened during that fight with Cassandra Nova had changed him, for the better. 

You smile back at him and it feels like taking a breath of fresh air after years. 

Apparently, whoever this world’s Flux had been, she was fucking insanely rich. And dead, which sucked for her but was great for you and Logan. 

It’s not hard for you to fake some government identities and explain that you’d been mistakenly marked as dead. It’s apparently pretty common in this universe. Superheroes are blipped out of existence all the time. You couldn’t get all of her assets as some had been liquidated, but you did get her giant ass house. 

You let Logan and Laura stay with you until they decide where they want to go. It’s better than living with Wade and his coke-fiend roommate. Laura finds her groove pretty quickly, it is her world after all. But you and Logan struggle to figure out what to do with yourselves. 

Neither of you has an interest in being X-Men again, and it seems like they’re not incredibly present in this world either. You also hadn’t been the best of friends, even before everything went wrong, back home. 

You’re not strangers, you’re not friends, you’re that awkward place in between. Each day is another opportunity to get to know each other. The progress might be slow, but you know that you’re getting closer to something real. 

It’s why you don’t feel any qualms about running into his room when you hear him shouting. You burst into his room and the door slamming against the wall isn’t even enough to wake him up. 

He’s writhing around in the bed, sheets twisted around his waist while sweat beads down his forehead. The noises he’s making remind you of a wounded animal. There’s something heartbreaking about this. 

He doesn’t get peace even when he’s sleeping. It makes you hurt for him. You want to smooth over the aches and pains he carries and burden yourself with them. 

The thought snaps you out of your reverie and you’re shocked by the revelation. You’d been growing closer to him, but you hadn’t thought you were growing this close. You feel so strongly for him, but you’re not ready to put a name on what it is that you feel for him. You just know that right now you want to make him feel better. 

You approach the bed cautiously, taking a seat beside him. The bed ripples and jolts underneath you as he tosses and turns. You place a gentle hand on his arm and shake, “Logan,” you whisper. You don’t want to startle him too bad. 

But he’s not responding to anything. It doesn’t matter how much you shake him or call out his name. Finally, you can’t handle it anymore. You get on your knees, sitting over him and bringing your palm down across his face as hard as you can. 

In a second he’s shooting up. You don’t even notice his hand until you see the way his vision clears. The visceral panic fades and something is aching in your gut. “Oh god, no no no,” he says the word so many times it stops sounding real. 

You look down and see the blood dribbling down his palm, the claws buried in your stomach. It’s almost funny, how perfectly aligned they are with the scar that already lived there. The reminder of your friend’s death being erased and reformed by Logan’s hand. 

He pulls his wrist back and you quickly snatch it up. “Don’t!” You shout, jaw clenching against the pain. “Don’t pull them out, I’ll just bleed out.”

“What the fuck am I supposed to do?” You know he’s worried, that’s why he snaps at you. But it doesn’t help the way you feel yourself fighting back tears.

He sees them drip down your cheeks and his face drops. His other hand, the one not in you, comes up and cradles your cheek. “What do I do?” He whispers, and he sounds more desperate than you do. 

You know he doesn’t want another death on his hands. But there’s something beyond that. He doesn’t want to be the reason you stop breathing. There’s a startling clarity when you’re slowly dying. 

He cares about you. Just as deeply as you do for him. You can’t make him go through this pain again. Can’t let him suffer alone, not when he’s made so much progress. “Slowly,” you tell him, guiding his claws out inch by inch. 

It’s hard not to black out. You’d barely felt it when he’d gotten you the first time. You think it’s because of how fast and sudden it was. But this, having them oh so slowly slicing through your insides is the worst form of torture. 

But you don’t heal like him. You have to close your eyes, focus on the pain, and forcibly reknit your skin back together. It’s a clever manipulation of your powers, but it’s a slow one. You could never take serious damage on the field because you wouldn’t be fast enough to repair yourself. 

This is easy to repair. But that doesn’t make it hurt less. It feels like an hour before he can safely draw them the rest of the way out. The second he does, you’re sinking into his arms with a pained sob. 

He clutches you so tightly to his chest you worry your back might snap. He keeps muttering apologies into your hair, hands desperately grasping at every inch of you he can hold. You’re too tired to say anything. 

You realized you should have. You should have told him you don’t blame him. You were the one who snuck into his room. You should have been smarter. But it doesn’t matter how many times you tell Logan not to blame himself, he always will. And you were too tired to try anyway. 

You only realize what’s happening two days after the incident. You figured he might need some space to process what happened. And honestly, you did too. It was awful and incredibly draining. You’ve felt fatigued ever since. 

But when you try and approach him and he just brushes past you like you weren’t even there, you know something is wrong. You watch his retreating back with a disturbed glare. You connect the dots quickly, already knowing what he’s doing. 

He doesn’t want to be responsible for hurting another person he loves. He can’t handle a loss like that again, even if it’s not by his hands. He wants to make sure you don’t want him, that you don’t care for him. Like that might ease the pain and guilt. 

But it wouldn’t. It would just make him feel worse. It would make you feel worse. 

You don’t waste a second, following him up the stairs and barging into his room before he can slam the door shut. It bounces off the wall and he lets out a deeply irritated sigh. He doesn’t turn to look at you, just walks over to his nightstand and rummages around through the doors.

You know he’s not looking for anything. He’s just trying to ignore you long enough for you to give up. It’s not going to happen, he should know better. 

You take a step further into the room and the smell of chemicals slams into you. Your nose wrinkles in disgust. It smells like he pumped Lysol into the vents. Your eyes dart to the bed and you sigh. 

Your blood, you’d completely forgotten. He must have been cleaning it up the morning after. You can’t blame him for wanting to get rid of the remainder. But this seems excessive. 

“Strong nose,” he mutters. You hadn’t realized you’d spoken aloud and you glanced over at him. “I can still smell it, even after cleaning.” He takes a seat on the bed and you hate the way his shoulders are slumped. 

He’d seemed so much more comfortable with himself lately. It’s like one accident has undone all his progress. “Logan,” you start, taking a step towards him. He holds his hand up, still not looking at you. 

It’s driving you insane. You wish he would just meet your eyes. You feel like you could change his mind if he would just see you. Maybe that’s why he won’t. He won’t let himself be happy. 

“Look, that night just made me realize what a huge fucking mistake this was.” He gets up and slides something out from under the bed. It takes a moment for you to register what it is. A duffel bag, packed with all his essentials and what little clothes he owns. 

He’s going to leave.

You act without thinking. Pure panic making your powers surge out. Logan grunts and the bag falls out of his hand. “Quit it,” he snipes, bending over to pick it up. But he can’t because it’s so heavy it’s making the wooden floor splinter and crack under its weight. 

“You don’t get to just leave when things get hard, Logan.”

He stands up, hands propped on his sides. There’s a challenge in his eyes that makes you nervous. “Fuck this,” he scoffs and brushes past you. 

It’s beyond manipulative to use your powers against him. But sometimes, someone is such a fucking idiot, they need a little outside help. You slam the door closed and the handle disappears, locking you both in his room. 

He turns towards you with a fierce glare on his face. “Open the goddamn door before I break it down.”

“You can try,” you taunt, a nasty tone to your voice. You’re sick of this. You’re sick of running from what you want. You’ve been miserable and alone for years. You want to be happy. For the first time in forever, you want something. 

And you want Logan to be happy with you. You can’t force him to feel the way you do. But you can stop him from actively preventing this. “Stop acting like a goddamn child and just talk to me!” You shout at him. 

There’s a disbelieving look on your face. You don’t understand why he won’t let this happen. Why does he have to fight so hard against any semblance of happiness in his life?

“I’m going to hurt you. That is all I do. I hurt the people I love and I cannot hurt you too.” Your eyes widen in shock at his outburst. Beyond anger, there was so much fear in his voice it was almost enough to make you miss what he’d said. 

“You love me?” You can see the realization dawn on him. The fact that he let slip why he’s so hesitant to be around you. You know he wants to leave, his eyes are darting around the room for an escape route, but you’ve blocked them all. You can’t let this go, not now. 

“Logan,” you snap, demanding an answer from him. 

“Fuck you,” he mutters, something vicious on his face. 

He’s going to hurt you. He’s going to lash out and say something cruel so that this doesn’t happen. You know him because you’ve been him. He will take every possible route to get out of this if it means he doesn’t have to face his feelings. 

You roll your eyes and take a step forward. You jerk him towards you and throw yourself on him before he can say something stupid. The kiss is brief, just enough to snap him out of this ridiculous headspace he’s in. 

When you pull back he looks dazed, but he’s relaxed in your hold, sinking towards you. You grin up at him, “I love you too, dumbass.” You lean up to kiss him again but you dart back at the last second, a mean glare on your face. “Pull some shit like this again and I’m going to melt your dick off.” 

You kiss him before he can respond, but you feel the smile against your lips. You can taste the defeat on his tongue as he wraps his arms around you and tugs you into his chest. He’s not going to push you away and you’re not going to let him. 

end. — I do not own the characters or the comics/movies Wolverine/X-Men, but this writing is my own all rights reserved © not-neverland06 2024. do not copy, repost, translate & recommend elsewhere.

General Taglist: @evasmlp

Logan Taglist:  @nonamevenus @smexy-bucky-waifu @wh1sp @peony-always @corvusmorte  

@mrs-ephemeral  @wolviesgirl @allllium  ♡ 

[treedaddymcpuffpuff]

Baba Jaga’s Books

݁ ⛧ ₊ Part one

݁ ⛧ ₊ @johnwickb1tsch’s requested book/antique store au (bc she and @sweetwolfcupcake put up with all my shit on the daily and I love them).

݁ ⛧ ₊ Cw: oversized anatomy, dreams, dubcon but reader 100% is into it, creepy old buildings and cobwebs and dolls, implied female plus size reader, heavy blood, gore and horror, NSFW. This is 6.2k words!!!

݁ ⛧ ₊ Art from Pinterest, but I couldn’t find the original source & apparently google image search isn’t a thing anymore? Dividers from @isisjupiter & @plum98

The woman that greets you at the weathered door is smiling brightly. “He is dead,” she says, delighted, and you blink a few times in response, because what are you supposed to say to that?

She shoves some rusted, ancient keys into your palm and leads you through a corridor lined with shelves of books and porcelain and dust.

She’s light on her feet, quick through the moth-devoured, high pile halls, but you can make out some oddities and bobbles along the way: a little clown doll in a shimmery cotton candy jumpsuit, a whole row of assorted dog figurines in pristine condition, a pearl vase with what looks to be real jade clusters at the base, an old rocking chair with an ancient language engraved on the head.

You’ll have time to explore all of this later, so you hurry to catch up with your host once you realize you’ve fallen behind and can only hear the light thump of her footsteps ahead, scared to get lost in the labyrinth of relics and tomes.

She’s made coffee, by the taste and temperature of it probably long before your arrival, but you garnish it with a little cream and sugar anyway and slurp the dark roast down. “I’m sorry,” you tell her, fingers smoothing over the mouse nibbles in the old green upholstered couch. “About the old owner.”

She shrugs, taking the deep velvet chair across from you with hot tea. “I didn’t know him. Have you ever worked at an antique store before?”

“No,” you reply, “but I sell independently, and I’ve worked retail.”

She’s still smiling, like the Chesire grin is permanently etched into the wrinkles of her pale face, and if you’re being completely honest it’s starting to freak you out a little bit.

“And you’re used to ghosts?” she nods, sipping at her cup.

“Ummm. Depends on what kind?” Even though she’s smiling, the joke seems to heavily sour whatever palpable, stale mood is already established between the two of you.

“Winston, he was haunted by an entity in this shop for the longest time. When his memory started to slip…” She presses her spindly fingers to her temple, then lets them tumble down toward the floor with her head tipped to the side. “Well, he called it The Boogeyman, can you believe that? The old fool.”

You really can’t help yourself. “I thought you said you didn’t know him?”

“Who?” She takes another sip of tea, and you get the sudden urge to cackle with the absurdity of this meeting.

“The…owner?”

“Oh, he’s dead. Good man. Out of his mind.”

“But you said you didn’t know him just a little bit ago and—” You’ve misinterpreted her smile, you realize. It’s not disdainful, it’s blank, like the expression on that cheery little clown doll you passed by so hastily.

An icy worm inches his way up the ladder of your spine before nesting a shiver into your spongey cerebrum. “Nevermind.”

She goes on, still smiling. “The keys I gave you are master. Do not lose them, it is the only set. The orange one is for the store, and the less orange one is for the garage.”

She’s in a hurry to go, it seems, bundling up in her oversized coat and hat, handing you a crumpled, yellow stained list of daily upkeep activities from her pocket.

You don’t mind, always preferring the silencing calm of solitude over lingering company, anyway.

You wonder, as you watch her pull away in a beat up buggy, if the owner was her husband. Or maybe a clandestine lover. Either way, you doubt you’ll be hearing much from her anymore.

The sales room is nothing like you expect based on the gothic, decrepit looks of the rest of the brownstone; it’s domed in a high-reaching skylight of wintery sun, with shiny dark hardwood flooring instead of matted, once-red-now-brown carpet. A wispy spider descends through a beam of dust and sunlight, and reminds you of the woman’s delicate bony fingers tumbling from her skull. There is a large oak desk still smelling of fresh, spicy wood in the very center of the room with an updated, computerized filing system and cash register. In the middle of a far wall, next to a gaping dark corridor, is a large painting of what you assume to be father and son.

He is tall, looming, with jet black hair that curls under his ears and satiny dark eyes that you think could mesmerize a corpse. His bones are strong and sharp under golden hues of flawless skin and neatly trimmed facial hair, and the red tie looped expertly around his collar would be the only color he sports if not for the plump rose of his lips. Without thinking, you reach out to touch the intricate piece of art and jump back when you feel that familiar gritty texture under your fingertips.

Just a moment ago, you were behind the desk, with a panorama of the entire room, and now you are inches away from this handsome man framed in rose gold.

You pull your fingers back and itch the lingering texture off on your blue jeans.

“He painted that.”

The voice from behind makes you jump again, now in the opposite direction, where you slam into the cold frame with the bony blade of your shoulders. You’re much too worried about the beautiful piece of sentimental decor, rather than your own sharp pain, and you turn to make sure you didn’t disturb it, horrified to find that you absolutely did, and scrambling to lift it up and hook the dangling corner back onto its wall fixture from whence it came.

A deep chuckle rumbles behind you, like warning thunder over the crest of rolling hills, and a pair of hands the size of bear paws gently lift the painting back onto the wall.

You turn to look up at him, and he is close, and his features are sharp and pronounced and familiar. You look back at the painting, just to make sure his likeness is still captured there, too, and did not somehow escape and form into solid matter before you.

“Hello, I’m John. Winston’s son.” He holds out his hand, and you don’t really take and shake it, but rather become enveloped it its warm, calloused sanctuary.

If his voice is thunder, his eyes are the lightning that precedes it, striking and shining—deep pools of dark lake water slivered with moonlight. You have to look away from him, because his real time stare is far more intimidating than the painted one.

“When my father told me that someone wanted to buy this place, I didn’t believe him,” he tells you.

“Oh…why?” Your dry throat longs for the water bottle left forgotten in your truck.

“It’s…burdensome.”

Your smile is tight. “Maybe I know how it feels.”

Well, you’ve said too much already, that is apparent by the bewildered, bemused look on his face. “I’m sorry. Let’s start over. Hello, I’m John. Winston’s—“

“—son,” you finish, taking his hand again, maybe a little firmer this time. You feel emboldened by the strange tension brewing here, and have the courage to maintain his gaze…

For about one second.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” you add.

“Thank you, I appreciate that.”

“Do you…live here?” Oh, that would be awkward.

“No, right next door. I was going to buy, renovate, and use it as a gym when he died.”

You snort. “Well, guess you’ll just have to keep paying for a membership to the Y.”

A little part of you is grateful that he can match your sass instead of getting offended as so many men tend to do. “For your information, it’s Planet Fitness.”

A bigger part is worried that this camaraderie only extends so far until you run your mouth just a little too much, as youtend to do, and either wind up publicly shamed or dead—you’re not so sure which is worse anymore. “righhhht, my bad, John.”

He smiles at you, those dark eyes twinkling in the natural light cast down on them from above. You think, maybe, you see him read you right then and there and decide he likes the synopsis. It shouldn’t make you preen, but his playful grin and starry orbs are hard to snub—at least, you think they are, from the minimal glances you’ve managed to steal.

“Did you have an okay time with Marjory? She can be a little strange.”

“Oh, we had loads of fun,” you reply, after a moment of wondering what he’s talking about with those sinfully unfair plush lips. “Right after she tried to steal my soul.”

He sighs. “Not again.”

You laugh together, and already his underlying aura of danger is fading away.

Replaced with…suspicion—he’s too easy to get along with.

After a minute, he says: “she was his last wife.”

“I knew it!” You exclaim, throwing your hands up in victory. “Uh, sorry.”

This is the third time you’ve made him laugh, and you’re really trying not to get a big head about it but it’s damn near impossible. One more deep chuckle and you’re going to start strutting around here like the bedazzled pet peacock of a wealthy warlord.

He’s looking at you again, and it’s making your skin feel tighter on your bones and your head a little woozy. One man should not have that much power in a single gaze, nor be allowed to look that palatable in faded blue jeans and a brown leather jacket. You do what any woman with a libido would, and deflect with humor.

“So, who’s this guy in the painting next to your father?”

It can’t be him. If it is, he doesn’t age. Winston looks twenty years younger in this painting than the recent online photos you’ve seen, and the real man before you looks exactly the same as the painted one.

“That’s my older brother.”

“Oh, what? He looks nothing like you.”

He smiles, more to himself. “Especially not now.”

You take that bait like a hungry trout. “Why?”

“He’s dead.”

“God, I’m sorry, John, any surviving family?” It occurs to you a millisecond too late that was an insensitive question, and you have the sudden urge to bite your tongue clean off.

Tact will never be your specialty.

“Just a sister, but she lives in Rome and we’re not on speaking terms... Hey.”

You tip your chin at him and give a little wave. “Hey.”

He snorts, leans a shoulder on the wall. You try not to notice how good he looks doing it. “Time to tell me about yourself.”

“Why?”

“Because I’ve told you so many things about me, and you haven’t even told me your name. I think it’s fair, don’t you?”

You hesitate, tucking your bottom lip between your teeth.

“Oh, it’s okay, though, if you’d rather not.” You feel guilty about his downturned mouth, and realize you’ve probably killed the atmosphere, but that’s for the best, anyway. This man would devour you, bones and all.

“I just don’t wanna bore you,” you shrug, feigning nonchalance. “But I’m y/n. Nice to meet you.”

His lips press together, probably holding back a dry retort, as he grabs your hand again, startling you, making you flinch back.

He drops your palm, takes a step away for himself. “I’m sorry, I thought—“

“It’s fine,” you wave him off, trying not to start spiraling into a fever fantasy about how warm he is, and how he makes every nerve in your body harmonize like a vengeful choir with just a touch. You try to compose the treacherous axons back into silence.

“Alright, fine, you can open up more as we clean. Until then, I’m not telling you a thing about myself.”

You blink at him stupidly. “What?”

“Oh, she didn’t tell you? I’m helping you. Took the entire day off and everything.” He grins proudly, and you see a whole different, youthful side of him.

“Oh?” You smile again. “Where do you work?”

“Nice try, y/n.”

You giggle, hand pressed over your mouth. “Ah, damn. Almost gotcha…I don’t need any help, though, really. I got it.”

He looks around the big room with his hands shoved into his pockets. “Alright, I’ll just watch, then.”

“I’d actually prefer some solitude, if you don’t mind…”

You commend him for that expertly crafted wounded look, but you will not fall for it. Even hungry wolves can sometimes look like the sweetest puppies.

“Are you sure? I know where his supplies are.”

“I brought my own.”

He kicks some dust, looks away. You shouldn’t feel bad for wanting your space, but you absolutely do. “Alright, if you say so.”

Maybe you can soothe him a little bit with your next inquiry. “Anything you want from the building before I start going through things?”

He shakes his head. “No, if I have to look at one more book from childhood cluttering my house, I’m going to throw up.”

“Take it easy,” you rib. “What did Charlotte's Web ever do to you?”

“Stole my lunch money,” he teases.

Maybe it would be nice, to have his company. He doesn’t seem so bad—

No. Nope. Bad y/n. Slippery slopes are always captivating and luminescent from a distance…

“Anyway,” you tell him. “I should get to work. Nice to meet you, John.”

He tips his head down at you. “The pleasure is mine.”

You’re not religious, but you would swear to God himself that you put your ladder in the truck bed. But it’s not here, and you’re not a good climber, and the chances of you growing a foot taller right now are slim to none.

Grumbling, you lug your cleaning supplies in the door, and almost run into John, who looks like he’s taking his leave.

“Oh, actually,” you ask sheepishly, letting him help you set the heavy bucket of rags and sprays down, “do you know where the ladder is?”

The piece of decaying wood he pulls from a nearby closet won’t hold a toddler let alone you. You test the first moldy step and it immediately crumbles under your foot, spilling damp rot over the carpet. “Fuck,” you say.

He snickers, and you glare at him, which turns the visible laughter into a subtle clearing of his throat and a shy glance away from your wrath. It shouldn’t be adorable. It shouldn’t breathe life into your little dead heart.

“Let me show you something,” he says, and walks over to a tall shelf, reaching up on the balls of his feet to touch the spine of the highest book. “Still sure you don’t need me?”

Is it just you, or is he a little bit of a cheekier bastard than originally thought?

You huff at his timid grin. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad, his devil smile and twinkling eyes whisper, to have a tall, strong man around to fight those evil top shelves…

“Looks like I have to go to the store,” you conclude.

“Ouch.”

“Why do you wanna help so bad?”

“It was his last dying wish?”

“Bullshit.”

“I’m lonely.”

You look him over, from head to toe, skipping those intense eyes, and cock an eyebrow…

“Double bullshit,” you conclude, because there’s no way in hell a man like this is lonely unless if it’s by choice.

“Earlier, you asked me if there was anything I wanted to take. There is, but I don’t know where it is.”

“What is it?” You ask him.

“It’s a book. My brother wrote it.” He looks pensive, eyebrows pulled down.

“What’s the name?” You ask.

“I don’t know.”

“What’s it look like?”

He runs his nimble fingertips thoughtfully over the spines of some dusty dictionaries, and the spiders nesting in your marrow quiver. His thick veined hands are almost as dangerous as his eyes.

“I don’t know. It was his manuscript. I was supposed to receive it before he died, but my father kept it from me. Hid it. I broke in many times to look for it.” His fist clenches at his side and all you can think about is how big his knuckles are, and how bad they would hurt striking, and how good they would hurt curled up inside you or brushing softly against your cheek.

You must have taken a step away from him, or adopted some feeble prey expression, because he turns to you and softens, jaw unsticking itself, shoulders falling back. “I’m sorry.”

No, please, anything but showing someone your soft shy underbelly right off the bat in this new town…

Luckily, you can think on your feet.

You give him a big, triumphant smile. “Made you talk about yourself again.”

“You little…” He tsks, narrowing his eyes; for a moment you think he’s going to chase you down the corridor, and the electrical conduction of your heart seizes.

You try to act like you’re not scared, or titillated by the thought of that.

“When did your brother die?” You ask him while you’re rummaging through boxes of porcelain cups, faux gold and silver jewelry tangled together in a tight wad that it takes hours to dig through, a menagerie of plastic animals and colorfully dressed figurines that fit into a miniature circus model, occult literature from the early 1900’s.

There are so many fascinating items in this collection, some of them worth more than your truck or apartment. Trinkets infused with cultural significance, bobbles laden with ancient tales and silent history. And the books—god, the books.

Tomes of famous Russian poets, scholars, eccentrics. Vintage romance novels in mint condition. You can’t wait to curl up on the old couch with some tea and a hefty stack of Agatha Christie and Anne Rice.

“A year before my father.”

You wince and fold a weathered Dickens paperback into your lap. He is pulling them from the shelves, glancing at them, and then handing them to you to sort into piles. “That’s so much.”

“Yeah,” he agrees, sitting beside you with a grunt and whoosh of air. “You want a drink?”

“I’m not thirsty,” you say, motioning to your water bottle.

“I meant something spirited.”

“Oh, well in that case, of course I do.”

He opens a bottle of sweet whiskey in the kitchenette, and you drink it from coffee cups with freezer burned ice.

He downs it without flinching, and you enjoy the view of his Adam’s apple bobbing under five o clock shadow and durable skin, more courageous now thanks to over half the liquor from your cup.

“Sorry it’s not something fancier.”

“Whiskey’s perfect for the occasion,” you tell him, motioning to your grime and dust covered self. “I think I should head back home after it runs its course, though. I’m tired. This is a big place.”

You apologize to him, because he looks exhausted, too, and he has helped you make three times the progress you would have achieved on your own with his extra foot of height…and still his brother’s book is nowhere to be found.

However, you want to see him again, and that means you should never see him again, so you withhold any invitations.

He’s been a perfect gentleman. Good company. He doesn’t need to talk to feel comfortable, and the long silences shared between you, working through boxes and cobwebs, have been pleasant. Your initial resistance to him was unwarranted, even if he is a dark looming shadow with inescapable eyes.

He is a nice man, and that is terrifying. You need to stay far, far away from him. You would put a continent between the two of you if it wasn’t for your life savings recently sinking into this bookstore.

But when he asks to come back, you fold like wet parchment, not even trying to be reluctant or resist his deep, enchanting gaze.

You’ve become soft. You’ll have to work on that.

He insists on walking you to your truck, because it’s dark outside, and this little snowy town is short on street lights. Outside, autumn is employing winter to cover some of its crunchy dead leaves in crispy white tufts. You love the smell of transitioning seasons, and as you tip your frost bitten nose up to the air to take a big whiff, John watches.

“It’s pretty out here,” you say, looking around at the mixture of Halloween, Thanksgiving…Christmas decorations just starting to sprout. Lights twinkle along rooftops, lifting the night up in rainbows.

You’re too busy paying attention to the scenery of small town magic to notice the slight dip in the sidewalk next to your truck. Your foot catches it at the right angle for disaster, and a split second too late, you realize your soft skull is headed for the hard metal of a door handle.

You screw your eyes shut, waiting for the impact, for the crack and the pain and it just never comes…In fact, seems the soles of your feet have been placed back on solid ground, and your back has been formed into something warm and diuturnal behind you.

His hands really are big, Jesus. His palms fold into the curves of your sides, long fingers resting against the soft beginning swells of your tummy, sending fizzy warmth down through your hips and deep in your guts.

Resembling a feral animal, you jump out of his arms, as if you’ve never been touched by another human or as if he’s made of spikes—it’s more to get away from the feeling of his touch—from the feeling it causes—rather than he himself

Luckily, you don’t have time to think about how much of a pathetic waste of human you are, because you’re tumbling right off the curb again in your haste to get away.

This time, he wraps his gentle hands around the divot of your lower back, and guides you up against your freezing door with a bewildered, dazzling smile.

Shit.

“Are you okay?” He asks in a white puff of warm minty breath.

You look up at him to speak, but his sharp features are highlighted in candy apple red from the nutcracker decoration mounted on a street lamp next to your truck.

When you were young and saw a venomous snake for the first time, it was a viper, locked inside a thick cage of glass with eerie red lights shining down on its sharp little head and black almond eyes. Generally, you had never been afraid of reptiles, because they were ostracized and feared, and you maybe knew how that felt a little too well…

But you were afraid of the viper—some primordial instinct traveled through time to warn you not to fuck with that animal, just as it’s doing right now. The once excited butterflies in your middle are suddenly desperate to break free, gnawing and sucking at the lining of your gut, digging their tiny barbed claws into tender pelvic tissue.

He sees it in your eyes, maybe, as they blow two sizes wider, and backs away, hands stuffed inside his pockets. “I’m sorry—“

“It’s okay,” you say too quickly, too sharply. Fear is such a potent thing, filling you up until you’re leaking it from every pore and orifice.

“Get home safe.”

You nod, hop into the front seat, and speed away after fumbling with your keys in trembling hands for what feels like a good five minutes. Your shakes are not from the cold snow descending upon the town.

When your eyes decide to disobey direct commands from the sympathetic nervous system and look at him in the rear view, he’s standing under the red light, on the street, watching you drive away.

In your dreams, the calm day spent rummaging through books is forgotten. There’s no peace here, trapped inside your mind. The one place you can’t hide.

It’s the same scene every night.

You are running under thick overgrowth, sharp wet earth tearing up the delicate plantar surface of your feet. It’s cold, dark, maybe right before dawn or just after sunset. The thorns snatching at your skin, the branches and vines whipping gashes into your face—these sensations are nothing compared to the adrenalized fear overtaking you.

They’ll take you back to freezing metal bondage and endless gray walls and the blistering, assaultive smell of bleach over blood. You want to live, desperately. You’ve never wanted anything more than a beating heart and expanding lungs, but you’d rather die than go back with them, so under cover of a weeping tree, you grab your little stolen pocket knife and press it to your throat.

Life, shining and wet, leaves you in gushes and spurts. It’s messy work, takes a few good sharp, haphazard digs at the jugular, and they find you just as you hit crimson gold and feed the muddy ground with your blood.

You don’t know why you still try; to die, to live, to fight. The dream captures your memories, freezing them in time, and solidifying your fate. You will yourself to struggle harder, hit, kick, scratch, bite, scream, beg, pray—to a God who has forsaken you—for just a little bit of fucking mercy for once.

Mercy looks nothing like you expect.

He is as tall as the surrounding trees, at least 9 feet, with inky black tendrils of thick hair growing down his back.

Massive, clawed hands perfect for hooking and ripping mortal flesh; he lops a head off with one finger, like opening a bottle of coke—tips the body upside down and gulps, greedily, blood and grisly clumps of viscera. Your pursuer’s heart is a tasty, candy gush sweet in his palm, and he swallows it whole.

You are covered in red, so saturated that trying to run is impractical and useless. The forest floor is garroted with it, slick and impossible. You fall into a bundle of pointy thorns and vines and the thick, muddy soup of blood.

It can’t all be yours—

It’s not. It’s theirs. He is tearing them apart. Two at a time. Under the rising silver moon, their plasma has an easy and graceful Grande Jete.

He skewers someone through the chest, and your stomach lurches at the sick crack of pulpy bone.

But you can’t puke, not now.

You need to run. You grasp at the thorns holding you, ripping at your skin, peeling layers off.

The screaming and popping and splintering and wailing ends abruptly, and in the eerie silence, as you freeze in fear, trying to listen for the creature, all you can hear is the drumming beat of your own pulse inside your head.

You have never been small-waisted. In your youth, when you still had stupid hopes that true love and chivalry could find you, you longed to have the same natural slim lines and desired smoothness of your female counterparts, watching enviously as a masculine palm could fit easily into the small of their back to lead them, protect them, court them.

He fits you in one hand just like that, and the gentle nature in which he handles you makes you audibly gasp. These long, sharp fingers, that just effortlessly took apart bone and skin and muscle, dig into your side politely, bluntly, holding you in a way you’ve never considered to be attainable.

You writhe against him, pushing your palms down to feebly pry his long fingers off your hips, but he traps you effortlessly in his arms, and lifts you to his face.

There are razor sharp fangs in place of his upper canines, and they are dripping fresh, hot blood over his bearded chin, his torso, your breasts and tummy. His hair is long, ethereal, soft, floating as if he is in water, smooth tendrils feathering around your shoulders tenderly.

His mouth is just too wide for his face, and if he grinned, it would make any mortal man tremble. You start to recognize the hard lines of his expression underneath these subtle uncanny features…and then you look into those eyes.

They are narrow and dark, and impossible to keep, just like you remember. You glance away, overwhelmed with their intensity, the second before they soften.

You should be terrified, intimidated, screaming, but those eyes prick at your heart, bead a heady drop of life’s blood. This feeling, it’s familiar and centuries old—It’s yearning, agony, imbued and heavy in your very marrow.

You gasp, and writhe against him, but now for another reason; delicious, agonizing need breeds from his touch, infecting your body and spreading through every piece of you like a ruthless pathogen.

His eyes are the key to something inside of you that you wrestled, chained and imprisoned a long time ago, and you sob with the intensity of it bursting free.

You try to hide your face in your hands, protect yourself from whatever natural, effortless connection is happening between you and this unnatural man, but he grabs your head between his thumb and forefinger, tenderly pinching at your puffy cheeks. “Look at me,” he says, voice unmistakeably deep and rough and so human.

But a mortal man could never, ever make you obey so easily without force or pain—with just the heavy infliction of his tone. Your traitorous eyes lock onto his of their own volition.

He brands your soul with black fire, makes your whole being ache, toes and fingers curling against the onslaught of it all, chest heaving with the force of your breath. Your fate is sealed, your time is up, it’s curtains, you’re fucked.

For years, you’ve been painstakingly arranging a wall against the world, against your own pedky emotions. He knocks it all over with a look, and the tough woman that built it is whimpering like a baby as the fallout buries her alive.

“Please stop.” You hardly recognize your own voice when it’s sweet and pleading.

“I…can’t.” There’s something pained in his expression, maybe confused, like he’s just as bewildered by what’s happening here between you.

A loc of his hair slithers around your neck like a curious snake. It’s alarmingly soft, like thick silk ribbons trailing over your skin and between your heaving breasts. You reach out to stop him, because it feels too good and it’s too much, and he wraps your pesky arms behind your back, binding them with the same satin coils collecting at the base of your heartbeat, tickling at the underside of your breast where your very life stems from, where you are soft and tender and feminine.

If you could think straight, you would hate yourself for the way your hips twitch and shudder as an aching throb worms its way into your heart, travels through your bloodstream, and nests inside your cunt.

He hums his approval. “Me too, little witch.” His long mouth curls at the edges like a hungry wolf’s, and it’s terrifying, but you have no sense to be afraid. Instead, you want to touch—feel through the heavy black cloak of shadow covering him, right into his heart, if he has one…

You whine, because you can’t do anything else, reduced to this pathetic mess of a woman, and test the bonds he cradles you with. They are comfortably snug. Undreakable. You are secured.

It’s been so long, since anyone has touched you with reverence, gentleness. You hate it.

Not because it doesn’t feel good. Because it feels far too good, when he folds you up in that strange cashmere darkness that emanates from his being, and exposes all your coveted vulnerability…inside and out.

And you’re just…helpless. Like a stuffed doll in his sure grip.

It takes about two seconds for rationality to drown—sink deep into the blackness again and leave you quivering and warm and wanton.

Velvet serpents test you, first at your fingertips and toes, then your palms and soles. Your calves, thighs, cheeks, collar.

It’s a libidinous swarm descending upon you, swallowing you whole. The last thing you see is his mirthy, onyx eyes before being completely consumed.

The sound you make as he slips over the dusky tips of your breasts is more animal than human. You wretch your head back and forth, because it’s the only thing you can move before he traps it, too, and you swear you hear an impish chuckle before this darkness fills your ears and takes your hearing.

He covers your mouth, your eyes, your cheeks and nose, puts you in total sensory deprivation where every caress, tease, flick, kiss…suck is amplified tenfold.

You growl like an angry little kitten as he finds the sensitive, ticklish spot at the back of your knees.

Then, you sob, or at least you think you do, while slippery little tendrils wrap around the swell of your nipples and press at the soaked fabric of your underwear and mold against all the curves of your tummy

You’ll have time later to hate yourself for rolling your hips against him, for silently begging him to touch your throbbing cunt—to delve under thin cotton and test your wetness before filling every little inch of you up with shadows inside just as thoroughly as he is out.

It’s been a long time, since someone has touched you there. It’s been…never that someone has touched you like he is.

If you were trapped here for eternity, you’re not sure if you would call it heaven or hell.

As he slides past your underwear and flicks your swollen clit, your vote is on the former. When he does not increase the pace or the pressure of these teasing touches after several agonizing moments, your vote is on the latter.

He devolves you from his shadows, placing you upright on the ground, pulling out from the curves of your body with swollen pops, smoothing your hair back against your face.

In an attempt to soothe your animosity, he runs a finger down your cheek, and you bat him away with your hand, taking a quick step back, slipping on fluids—

He catches you. You push him away again. “Get away from me.”

“It’s your dream.” He raises an eyebrow, dark mouth titling at the corner. It’s absurd—you’re arguing with a terrifying bloodthirsty creature of the night like it’s casual when you should be running and screaming.

And…well…he certainly has you there.

“Go away,” you say, because obviously you’re the epitome of wit.

You feel his eyes slide up and down your body, inspiring a deep shiver and a timid step back and a good look at yourself—oversized, ratted band tshirt, old cotton panties. Blood in various stages of drying patching your skin.

You feel your neck, and there is no gash. The thorns and sticks embedded in your palms and soles are gone; not a scratch or scrape or tender stinging place on you. It takes you a second to realize he healed you.

As if he can read your mind—maybe he can—he says, softly, “I am not all death.”

When you’ve woken up from this repeating nightmare in the past, it’s usually been with a panic attack; heart racing, mouth screaming, hands grabbing your stuffed dog to press him into your chest for some warm comfort.

This time, you’re gasping, soaked in—you have to look down at yourself to make sure it’s not blood—sweat, uncomfortably slippery and sticky between your thighs, twitchy and irritated.

You’ve never had a wet dream, not in all your adult years, and having one about a man you just met is just fucking ridiculous.

He is not that great, you tell yourself. You just met him, for God’s sake.

First handsome man that’s nice to you in years and you become a delusional school girl? No. Hell no.

Boundaries need to be established, here. Rules need to be set. You need to put your foot down, have a little bite behind the bark, and tell John, Winston’s son, to go away.

Just like you did in your dream.

Notes: when I was describing the monster, I was thinking of something like Alucard from Hellsing or Dracula from Castlevania.

[1864reruns]

ㅤㅤㅤㅤthree–legged deerㅤ౨ৎㅤ4.3k

ㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤㅤ2024 ©1864RERUNS

educate yourself. 🍉

synopsis. trafalgar law is uselessly sympathetic to a vampire without a sire— he suffers as he learns that a monster without a mother is an animal without a leash. injured or not, it has its fill.

tag(s)&warning(s). afab! reader, nsfw 🤗, modern au, fledging vampire! reader, surgeon! law, reader nd law are both crazy switches, violence, blood drinking, biting, vampire/human relationship, don't ask ab the dynamic cause i have no answers for you, dub–con, non-linear narrative, law is a freak (for lack of better term) and likes being in control; he obviously is not in control...., blood, gore, cumming in pants (law you freak !!!!), cannibalism mention, pwp

from vyon. i've been listening to sir chloe's "i am the dog" album too much recently... i'm not sorry, i love law and i love freaks and i love the devotion that comes with devouring. UNHINGES MY JAW AND EATS TRAFALGAR LAW WHOLE. sorry, this was supposed to be quick and easy but i started ovulating sooo... might be cross–posted onto ao3 if i'm feeling up to it :3 honestly had to stop myself at 4k words cause realistically, i could have gone on and on and on and never ended up releasing this as it'd just end up as a neverending wip

don't repost / copy / translate.

“Even if you ask nicely, I have nothing for you.” There’s a mean lilt to Law's voice that makes you twitch, curling closer to your knees as you pressed down harder on the open wound to the side of your abdomen. It doesn’t take an idiot to know that he's enjoying the view— getting to see you crumpled over and laying at his feet, a hand on your side, the other clutching his pants, your head on his knee. Law’s eyes flicker from your hunched form, whimpering, to his fridge. His hand falls on the bicep closest to him and he pulls you up, “I’ll fix you up now and, in the morning, I’ll get you blood.” There's a dragged path of dirt from his door to where you're sat; handprints of grass and blood marked into his previously clean floor. He'll force you into the bathtub after this.

It’s bad practice, keeping an undomesticated vampire by you but Law can’t help the itch that crawls up his spine when he finds you laying by his feet; the satisfaction that unfurls inside him and brushes up against some depraved part of him that’s gone undetected for so long— it’s much too good to pass up on. Plus, you’ve always been the docile kind— the absolute horror that marked your features when Law had caught you on the floor of some old car, hunched over an open abdomen, hands deep into the heart comes to him at night sometimes. The widening of eyes, lips parting to threaten a scream like you’d caught him eating a man. The memory pushes him to amusement, his head rolling to the side as his hands fall onto your waist.

You let out a pained groan as Law forces you into your feet, he soothes you off your weight with his hand on the side of your waist that isn’t bloody and drags you to the island in his kitchen. Setting you down, he steps back to trace eyes over you— he clicks his tongue when he finds out, you don’t look as nice when you're at his eye–level.

There's a vile weight to your wound when Law moves away from you. You don’t feel him anymore as his footsteps round the island, then you hear some cabinets opening and then closing; when he rounds back to you, he’s fixing gloves onto his hands. Your eyes flicker through your lashes, a sharp snap resounds as he lets go of the rubber and it bounces back onto his wrist. Your breathing stutters, a burn behind unblinking eyes; you trace the curves of the veins that colour against tanned skin and everything else blurs. There’s suddenly a rhythmic beating in your head that drowns out Law’s voice and brings an itch to your gums, your side burns when your fingers tightened down around the wound— blood splitting through the cracks of your fingers and ruptured flesh, blood dripping down onto Law’s kitchen island, blood staining your hands, blood, blood, Law, blood. Your heart beats in twos. Blood. Law. Blood. Law. Fucking Law full of— you hiss in pain.

His features are impressively unmoved as he moves your hand away from your side and uses his other hand to push back at your shoulder, so you’re no longer curled into yourself. He peels away the shirt clinging to your skin and his expression scrunches around a mid–point of his face when he sees it. “Stay still, don’t be stupid and move.” He's awkwardly bent down to study the details of the wound and ponders on things like how it'd need to be treated; there’s no reason for him to be so close, his breath near heavy on your flesh. There’s a vague sickness haunting your gums, an itch deep-set in the holes beneath every tooth, a dryness to the saliva on your tongue as Law’s head tilts and you’re suddenly given a view of his neck.

There’s a quietness to you that’s stifling as Law pokes around your wound to assess nerve damage, he makes an attempt to nod his head up for a moment but is ultimately stopped by your face suddenly burrowing under his ear, your paced breathing suddenly brings his heart to life when it’s on his skin. “What are you doing?” His voice is oddly strained as a low hum sounds in your throat.

“Dizzy,” you mumbled lamely, and he sighs, almost relieved for a reason he doesn’t know. Right— of course this amount of blood loss has you weakened.

You push your head further in, close enough that he can feel your eyelashes dragging slow with each blink across his collarbone, your nose brushes away the collar of his shirt, and dried lips scratch his skin as your head moves up, so your mouth is sat at the base of his neck, your head under his jaw.

Law’s face scrunched up, a taste of annoyance at his mouth, “straighten up, I can’t see what I’m working with here.” And when you don’t move in accordance with his words, he's jerking back, anger flaunts his face, and he shoves at your shoulder to straighten up your back. An unperturbed gaze stares back at him, a pitfall trap awaits him when he meets the lens of your eyes, a deep cavity coloured in an eerie pink— near bleeding into red that almost makes Law dizzy, something sweet sits at the tip of his tongue as the face of a sheep cracks wide open. Its mouth rips open clean, skin splitting across the end of its mouth straight to its ears, as if it was made to unhinge that way, like there’s a threading you could pull out to allow its disconnected head to flop back onto its back like a puppet made for play. The forehead of the sheep knocks against the top of its shoulders; a wolf stares back at Law, and it mimics a mangled cry, sounding like a bleating of a sheep.

“Law, please.”

His bones lock into place and he feels a rupture of panic drown him, his senses dulled with a sweet nectar that'd urged him to you; you’re still sat where Law had placed you, too afraid to move in case you crossed too many boundaries, your eyes begging and pleading like you were still stood outside the threshold of his apartment, waiting for his permission to enter. There’s something in him that tells him to get away, run, anything to put some space in between you two and he finds the voice distastefully familiar—it brings about memories of pink feathers and his face scrunches up first in fear and then in amusement. Because it’s you, the weak-willed, spineless vampire that’s grown overly dependent on a human to supply bagged blood for it instead of hunting for its own lunch, and he was comparing that to an existence that knew nothing but cruelty and hatred. It takes one word, a twitch of his eyebrow, the pull of a frown to get you to retreat— he knows that well. But there’s a compulsion in him that wants to see where this takes him— an intrigue that’s always had its morbid way with him, stroked by your sudden insistence.

It's by choice that he allows you to push this further, duck your head neatly into your chin and gloat your pretty eyes up at him through flickering lashes, Law lets you intrude into his sense of personal space— there’s nothing stopping him from stepping back, forcing you away from him once more, telling you to wait, you’ve given him the power to do these things to you after all, but he doesn’t. His breath is a sharp exhale; Law’s body tenses and his face contorts— into an expression you’re sure you’ve seen before. You suddenly find it odd that you’re looking down at him; you expect a scream as your teeth drags deeper than the comical two holes you’ve seen in movies. Your incisors drag through flesh like bulldozers as you bite down, his skin rips and tears under the collar of his white button; you can still smell the lemon air freshener hung around the rear-view mirror, tangy as it hangs on the iron of his blood— it makes your nose itch and the blood taste weird on your tongue. You hear his mumblings about daughters and a wife, and you have to wonder which one of them you caught him at the hotel at; either way, it would be bad you think. If his wife was that young, if he was taking his daughters to hotels.

Law’s hand tightened on your shoulder, the memories of the night in the car park escape you again but they linger on your tongue; Law’s face, when you look at him, is all pinched together, a burdening mess and his hold turns harsh, for a second you think there’s a violence that’ll meet you tightened in his fist but he merely shoves you back onto the counter. It’s cold but it’s not uncomfortable. Hovering over you, Law is close enough for you to hear his fascinating heartbeat— this too is familiar, but you recognise it a little earlier into that night, when your eyes caught that man’s and you saw him stumbling into the hotel with the girl under his arm. A constant, steady hum. So, you push. Eyes stubbornly on Law’s face, his pinched eyebrows and his bottom lip hooked under his teeth, you watch as, fraction by fraction, his face relaxes when you finally lay your lips on him. It’s salt and it’s sweat and it’s warm; it burns the hunger in you alive when you stop kissing his neck, parting your lips over his skin to nip at his flesh.

It's all you do until he’s purposefully pressing his hip down on your thigh, pushing your lips against his neck in wet kisses until he’s delirious enough to chase after his own pleasure. You feel his hand drag up your thigh, pulling along the flesh until it stretches no longer and has to give up to tighten his palm against a new expanse of skin. Law, when you turn your head to look at him, has a hunger so vivid in his eyes that you think you’re looking into a mirror. You didn’t know you were laughing until Law has a hand around your cheeks, pulling your face away from his neck, “what’re you laughing at?”

The glare in his eyes doesn’t do much to stop you from laughing, only spurns on a more unforgiving pitch of laughter as you bend your knee, “this.” Law winces, his body doubling over yours on his kitchen island when you push against the obvious bulge behind his tight jeans. His head falls onto your shoulder and your lips are back to his neck, teasing with your canines; there’s no rush to your actions, like you know that it’s in the flesh to want to be torn, like it’s in man to be devoured.

You hear him curse, pretty, under his breath and his skin burns hot— it reminds you of the blood swimming around under his flesh as he goes back to kneading the plush of your thighs. He drags higher and higher until his hand disappears under the stained ruffles of your skirt and you feel the warmth of his palm over your underwear; for a second, as his thumb presses experimentally around in a certain perimeter until he gets that little gasp from you, you think that this is fine. You think you’d be okay with being underneath Law for a little while longer, just until he works you through that specific high you know he’d be mean about but when you shift your hips upwards to meet his touch, you feel a burn shoot through your side. Wincing, you remember that you’re still bleeding out and your tongue feels obtrusive in your mouth. With the reminder of your injury, you falter momentarily.

You might regret this, but your hand reaches out for Law’s wrist, tightening around his skin and urging for a stop; he looks to you in obvious question. “W–wait,” you huffed, a layer of sweat shining on your forehead. In hindsight, it was a horrible idea to grab Law’s wrist. You feel his unsteady pulse right in your palm, his neck is right there, and there’s some kind of buzzing that leaves your head heavy and awkward.

Law notices something wrong when your hand tightens impossibly hard around his wrist, when your breathing turns heavy and staggered. In his line of work, he’s never been a stranger to vampire victims. Unlike in the movies, there’s nothing romantic nor clean about being bitten by a vampire in reality; real vampires don’t just drink, they eat. Panic rapidly blossoms in his chest, branching out to his nerves and urging all his muscles with a simple task: move. If it were that simple, he’d never had been faced with so many corpses, all mangled and maimed. Law swears he sees your jaw unhinge around his neck, a whimpering ‘sorry’ break through your mouth before your jaw clamps down on his neck. He’s dead, Law thinks, you’ll bite right through all the meat and tear off the flesh from his body and then eat the rest of him as he’s bleeding out and his heart beats louder than its ever done before as he’s imagining his death.

That doesn’t happen.

He feels your cheeks bulge against his jaw twice as you draw the blood away from his body, gulping down hungrily; his body weakens against your ravenous embrace but, as the dots blur into his vision and his eyelids weigh down, you pulled yourself away from his neck. Your tongue presses flat against the comical wound (two clean dots, just like in the movies), and he feels the muscle trail a line of saliva from his neck, across his jaw, and then around the shell of his ear. He doesn’t know what he expects but you press a kiss against his ear awkwardly and then, “you’re still hard, pervert.” When you work up your knee once more, he finds that you’re right. You trail your hands over his arms and hook your finger over the end of his gloves, snapping them off his fingers.

Shame burns through him as embarrassment forces his cold cheeks to warm, but Law’s body is in no position to listen to him right now. Though he has to wonder, if he wasn’t so terribly weakened right now, would he even have it in him to pull himself away from this? You keep pressing your lips against his neck as if you’re trying to wear away the skin, alternating between simple pecks and sucks; lips part and he feels your tongue warm and he braces himself for a prick that never comes. With how reckless you are now, with your arms tightened around his back, the constant movement of your knee against his only growing erection, it's not a reach to assume that Law's blood has healed you up enough.

His hands tightened on your shoulders; aggrieved groans mixed with whimpers spill out of his throat at an alarming rate as you begin to get more precise with your knee. Your hands slowly trail down his back until they reach the waistband of his pants, then they tuck upwards under his shirt and you're pressing down on near the bottom of his back to keep him pressed against your grinding. Law doesn’t think it can get any worse, and it doesn't. But you do press your lips against his, wide and devouring, and your damned tongue is pushing and pushing. It doesn’t get worse. Only Law ends up opening his mouth to let you curl your tongue upwards, flicking up against the roof of his mouth, he can taste his own blood on his tongue, iron heavy between his teeth, and then he’s chasing after the taste.

His hands fist onto the collar of your shirt and pulls you up closer to him. Despite himself, he flinches at the taste of his own blood— smooth — on his traitorous tongue; a taste branded against the depths of his mind like the heavy cloud that clings to the horizon, it's bitter and metallic. A ringing in his head accompanies the soft ‘mmf' that betrays him and gets swallowed up greedily by you some more as you worm your tongue into his mouth, Law shakes and trembles in your grasp; it’s strange, you're raw and starved and governed by an altogether different hunger. He chases after you when you pull back, that makes you stifle a laugh too; his face is furious, his eyes closed, eyebrows furrowed like a stroke of thunder, his jaw clenched and tense, hands still tight on your collar. You think he's about to burst, all the creepy, weird things he's wanted that were stuffed down, bottled in his throat; he's going to shatter and take you with him. Your thigh burns from the constant movement under him, hands still weighing him down but then you stop and he's left hanging. He's desperate enough to press himself down without needing prompting, his hands fall onto your hips and he straightens up a little, enough to get a better grasp and to stabilise himself as he tugs your body down the island.

You watched Law, almost in amazement. He fixes his position against your thigh and seriously starts rutting himself against your thigh; you can only watch, a breath stuttering in your throat at how sloppy his movement is and at the fact that he needed no prompting. Men are the dupes of their desires; you’ve seen that quote somewhere before— you didn’t know that you'd one day find Law to be a part of those men. His hair hangs awkwardly over his face as his lips part, and his eyes flutter shut, a shudder works up his spine as his hands tightened on your hips. It's not embarrassment that makes his skin crawl. No, what's eating away at him is the realisation that he's little care for what he looks like and if you end up thinking less of him after this. Vaguely, he feels his fingers press under the hem of your shirt and tightened down on cold flesh as he comes to the dreadful realisation that he's enjoying this. He's harder than he's ever been in his life and all he's done is fucking hump your thigh and kiss you a bit— he, without thinking about it too much more, dials it down to the fact that there must be some kind of aphrodisiac side effect to being bitten.

Thoughts are decisively turned away from him. He's nothing, empty, a marionette on its strings, a vessel to be filled, and for every moment you spend watching and observing and pulling back from his lips, instead of doing anything to help, his frustration builds. It's frustration that builds in Law, a kind that digs deeps into his bones, it’s fury and rage, a desire that eats away at rationale in his mind. “Fuck,” he curses, his head drops onto your collarbone and his pace becomes more purposeful, pressed even closer to your skin for leverage. There’s no room to breathe with how close he is, his head turns up and you can feel his lips against yours, a certain wobble in his upper lip as his tongue parts your lips. His hands drag up the side of your body and his hand bumps against the side of your chest. He grappled with the bra, his shaky hands doing nothing for him you can imagine, you arch your back upwards, your hands joining him to mess with the bra until the hooks and clasps separated.

The grip he has on your tit is unforgiving, grabbing the fat with his hand and squeezing without a care, Law arches off your thigh with a groan.

“I think we're past the point of you grinding on my thigh,” you mused, voice tinted in amusement. You move to straighten up but Law presses you back down within the second.

His eyebrows furrow, jaw clenched. “Don't move, I'm so—,” he trails off into a sigh. The realisation that he's worked himself close enough to an orgasm on your thigh brings an ache that almost as similar to hunger; your teeth itch and you wish you could take them out for a moment.

“Kiss me,” you murmured before you know what you’re saying, your voice throaty and thick. Law doesn’t let you dwell on it much; his lips are fucking searing against yours; your hands fall onto his cheeks and you feel his heart beat so loud just from kissing him, you're surprised that the room isn’t shaking yet. You're aware to the point of discomfort that your underwear is sopping, stained in obvious desires when Law's hand comes back up your thighs.

The flip of your skirt is fumbling, hasty; his hand pushes up your skirt, dragging his palm over the skirt as it covers your stomach and then it turns its attention back to your underwear. His knuckles brush against the hems of underwear, barely catching it as he pushes away the other thigh he'd been neglecting. “Shit,” he breaths when his thumb presses against the cotton material, “you’ve been this wet the entire time?” He presses his bulge back down onto your thigh, “gonna take care of you, promise.”

You nod as his finger drags against you, slow and teasing. His pace staggers, both his hips and his fingers momentarily as his hand moves to stabilise over your thigh; a shudder works through his spine and he's folding over, head falling onto your shoulder as he works through ‘fucks', each one louder than the last. True to his words, after Law has his own numbing taste of pleasure, he turns his attention onto you. One hand fumbled with his belt, undoing it as best he could with his other hand occupied with your pleasure.

Law is no stranger to sex, he's had his own share of lovers, but this, the way he grabs at you and the way he discards any acts to play nice, how he usually proceeds in these moments a mystery to himself— no warm–up, no teasing, no building you up until you're wired and squirming, vibrating. Just a man you've turned lost to his arousal. His hand digs into your flesh, the roughness of the touch chafing against the soft skin of your inner thigh; his eyes blurry and unfocused as he grabs at your underwear and pulls it to the side.

Guttural— the sound that leaves Law is breathed deep out of his nose, gasping against your skin and he, without second thought, sinks a finger right into you. His eyes are stubborn on the hand that’s enviably close to your warmth, watching the change of his skin from tan to pale as your hand goes to grasp his wrist again. Your legs fold upwards, feet finding purchase on the island as Law curls a single finger against the walls of your cunt. Pulling back gives you temporary reprieve— the next thrust comes with Law working a second finger into you. He's methodical with it. He watches. The tightening grip you had on his forearm, the way your head tilts back, lips part open with breathless gasps, everything; there’s little sympathy in how Law watches you— no hesitant strokes, no gentle caresses. This is the Law you'd been egging on, focused on the now, the here, the immediate, the tangible. It's not what he wants, rather what he needs. So, he forces a third finger into you and watches as you yelped, head turning from side to side as your thighs tighten, knees hitting each other.

He finishes tugging down his zipper and the hand moves to atop your knee, Law’s thumb and pinky finger press deep on the side of your knee. “C’mon,” he taunts almost, “how can I take care of you if you’re hiding from me?” His eyebrows raised, urging you sweetly when you turn your gaze to him, lips hooked under your teeth and eyebrows furrowed— you oblige. The reward you get from listening to him is ruining; all three fingers curled up inside you, pulling a shriek from you when you feel his blunt nails drag slow against you. His attention is offered to you in ways that turn your head numb, his finger still fucking into you at that gruelling pace, his body bent down between your legs to gaze down at you. Corners of his lips tug up into a smile, “still hungry?”

You’re not sure, your teeth had been grinding ever since Law’s fingers found their home in you, since you’d found a doghouse at the threshold of his entrance, but you’re not foolish enough yet to deny whatever Law was willing to offer to you so you nod. “Yes, yes, so hungry, yes.” All you see is starbursts, kaleidoscopic flickers that splinter at every angle as Law turns his head, offering you his neck once more. His hand grasps the back of your head, pulling you up gently to his neck; you feel as though you’re drinking from his cupped hands, licking up water before it falls through the gaps of his fingers. You press your dull teeth against his burning flesh first, then you urge your fangs to grow, prodding through his muscle.

You’re hungrier than you’ve ever remembered, even before you became a vampire, it’s reminiscent of a hunger from when you were first born; there’s hunger that isn’t quelled as your mouth attaches to Law’s neck, as you suckle on his blood, as you chafe yourself against his stubborn, moving fingers. There’s an ache in you that reminds you of the day you were born, once covered in blood and twice covered in dirt, Law becomes, to you, a necessary evil in the face of your single, insatiable hunger.

[mikareo]

⌗ SNOWDROP ₊ ˖ ་. nagi seishiro x fem reader (5.4k)

⊹ ⠀⠀ it's the end of the world and he's possibly the most unprepared person alive…perhaps he can rely on the pretty girl with perfect aim who just so happened to save his life at the very last second. he’s never been in love but maybe this love could last…so long as the both of you stay alive.

contains; resident evil inspired, badass agent!reader, helpless civilian!nagi, zombie apocalypse, guns, knives, blood, gore, swearing, angst, fluffy flirting, love at first sight, major character death, reo cameo!!!!, cannibalism (zombies) author's note; this fic destroyed my sanity, but i hope u like it! there are parts that are so unserious asjkl just trust me that it's a good read and pt2 is gonna be fucking crazy

⋆⋆⋆⠀ ⠀ videogame au milestone collab masterlist !

This can’t be happening. There’s no way this is actually fucking happening right now. 

He’s sprinting at full speed, his laces are barely tied, and the smoke in the air is surely clogging his lungs into a blackened pulp of nothingness. To be quite frank, Nagi would rather have those poisoned lungs than discover whatever the hell happened to his neighbors down the hall…because damn they look like they’re in some rough shape. With their sunken eyes, flaking skin, and very obvious urge to suddenly turn to cannibalism, that’s not really his vibe…but that’s a falling telephone pole! Holy shit that’s a falling telephone pole coming straight his way in 3…2…1. JUMP!

Whew, that was a close one. Good thing he’s tall!

The shift in humanity didn’t exactly happen overnight. It was actually just twenty minutes ago when his peace was so rudely interrupted. There he was, snuggled up in his gaming chair with a fresh bag of Cool Ranch Doritos opened and ready to meet his belly, when he finally beat the last level of his new favorite game; only to discover that those screams of terror and fear…yea those weren’t coming from his PC and his living room window is now a pile of ash. Nagi doesn’t think he’s ever seen so much red and yellow in his life, all of it becoming one big blur of flames that he somehow jumped through and landed on the street below— thankfully he lives on the ground floor, otherwise his body would join his couch in a pile of broken limbs. Damn, this is all such a hassle.

No one would be able to guess what it was that caused this chaos…okay, actually it’s not too out of this world; just a commercial jet falling from the sky with a monstrous thing (??) crawling out of the window onto the streets of Tokyo, whilst an oddly green gas dilutes the air.

Yeah, not too crazy— but just crazy enough to make even Nagi Seishiro, laziest man on earth, leave the comfort of his homely apartment to find his neighborhood in complete and utter chaos. He even saw his delivery man devouring the convenience store owner that always gives him an extra bonus off his nightly midnight snack. Man, he loved that guy. That’s a sight that’ll make him shudder for years to come; assuming he can stay alive for the next however many hours and days this newfound apocalypse is going to take.

Nagi thinks it’s been nearly an hour since he started running and he didn’t even know he had this much stamina in him. Maybe he’s secretly a superhuman or another one of the monsters the city has been consumed by— or perhaps his adrenaline rush is nearly infinite since he’s never utilized it in his entire life. He’s not sure of the logistics. He failed high school biology…and chemistry…and physics. There’s a reason why he turned to gaming and shied away from college. This thrill and rush isn’t meant for him. He’s a couch potato that wants to do nothing but rot and enjoy the satisfying ding Twitch gives him whenever he receives a new sub. His generation needs instant gratification…and right now? Well, he’s in desperate need of some water. 

Hesitantly, Nagi rounds into the glass doors of the nearest and safest looking building he happens to see— which is luckily a convenience store similar to the one near his apartment. He’s more than surprised when the automatic doors open in a pinch and he’s able to enter with no difficulty. The store is somehow in little disarray, with its grocery items on the shelves in their rightful spots and few sparse bags of chips laying on the tile floor. However, what is in disarray is the pharmacy section. There are drugstore pills scattered everywhere. He can’t even tell what kind of medications were being scavenged in a clear panic for medical amenities, and highly doubts that whoever was searching for supplies was able to get any with the state the back of the store is in. The font on the labels is so small that Nagi, the man who stares at a screen all day, can’t decipher what they say; and he’s assuming that whoever was in here is long dead and gone. But then again…

…he’s never been the kind of guy who’s always right.

“I come in peace!” His voice is two octaves higher than it normally is. If this were a choir audition, he’d absolutely ace it. “I swear I just came for some water! Please don’t kill me, zombie, please!”

Both of his eyes are shut whilst he awaits his inevitable demise, assuming that the unknown presence in the room likely has an appetite for human organs. There were so many things he wanted to do with his life…like ride a hot air balloon? Actually, that would be really hot if he were that close to the sun. Surf in the Caribbean? Ew, he could get bit by a crab. Get a girlfriend? He can’t complain about that one, that would be very very nice. 

Oh no, he’s already getting eaten…he can practically hear her imaginary laughter already.

“Really? Those are your last words?”

Zombies can talk?

Nagi fearfully inches one eye open to see the most gorgeous person he thinks he’s seen in his entire life. Sure, you look a little disheveled— with your soaked hair and dirt-crusted skin— but to him, you look like something out of his imagination. The female protagonist that he could only dream about campaigning with in a first-person-shooter game, and would later search for a worthy poster to stick on his wall. If love at first sight is real, then this is definitely it. The only issue? Your barrel is pointing straight at his face.

“You’re going to shoot me?” He exclaims, scrambling to back up but ultimately tripping on his own laces and landing on his ass. “Ah shit, that hurts.”

Elegantly, you rush to his side. “You have injuries?” With eyes scanning over every inch of his body, there’s genuine concern dripping from your tongue like honey. Your voice is like a melody, oh man. Nagi thinks he’s a goner— not because he could be eaten by zombies, but because he feels like he’d jump in front of a moving bus to protect you. Pfft, and some protection he’s doing, embarrassing himself like this…

“Nope, nothing’s hurt…” he mumbles, sitting up with an attempted nonchalant look on his face. “...only my ego.”

A small smile reveals itself before him and your eyes crinkle as you let out a little laugh, and instantly he’s almost more obsessed with you. It’s as if you’re some higher being that he was blessed to see on his final day on earth, with golden rays radiating from your skin and big irises that he could drown in. Perhaps if it weren’t the end of the world, the two of you could’ve walked to this store together— holding hands and speaking softly about your shared interests and passions— and he could make you laugh a million times and more…now that he’s really thinking about it, you’re the first girl he’s made laugh probably ever and he really wishes there wasn’t a menacing zombie apocalypse getting in the way of his beautiful fantasy. 

“I’m assuming you’re alone?” You stand up, looking down at him. 

Alone as in single or…

“You don’t have any family that you escaped with?”

…okay not alone as in single. Got it.

“It’s just me,” Nagi stands to his feet and is loving your shocked reaction to his towering height. “My family’s overseas right now, so I think they’re alright. I mean, I hope they’re alright. I don’t have any service to reach them, right now. My phone is down.”

You nod, reaching in your bag for something he can’t quite see. What he can see, though, is the massive shotgun strapped to your back and three large cartridges hanging from your belt— somehow you’re able to carry all that and four grenades, two handguns, and six rolls of bandages in that pack of yours, which you lay out for him so lovingly on the floor. 

“Take what you need.” Oh hell, what has he gotten himself into?

As he backs up cautiously, realization dawns upon your face. “You’ve never done this before have you?” 

“Is living through a zombie apocalypse a common experience?” His mouth is agape. “Yeah, sorry…can’t say this isn’t the first time for me.”

A sigh slips from your lips and you gather your things, packing everything into your bag except for a standard handgun. Nagi can feel his heartbeat picking up as you take three steps closer to him. One. Two. Three. He wishes you’d chosen to take a fourth— that way you’d be nose to nose, he’d get to see your beauty up close, and then memorize the curves and features of your face— which he’d surely never forget as he’d think about them morning, night, and day. He’d love to fantasize about you for hours but you have other plans, dropping said standard handgun into his palms. 

“Just aim for the head, okay?” 

Um. No. Not okay. 

“I don’t really shoot real guns…” he rambles, attempting to get rid of the deadly weapon you’ve so casually given him. “I’m more of a lover, y’know? Talk things out instead of shooting things in between their eyes? I like digital zombies! Yeah, those guys are chill…love ‘em so much…please take this away from me.”

You shake your head, already on your way out of the door. “Nope, you’re coming with me.”

“Why?” If this were a video game, there’d be a massive exclamation point flashing above his head, along with a grave that he could crawl into instead of joining you on this suicide mission. Being six feet under sounds pretty nice right about now…but he’s sure that the look you’re giving him is more deadly than any threat outside. “I don’t think I’m going to be much help to you.”

“Nagi, is it?” You clarify, to which he nods. “There are only two choices right now, and I know we just met but I’d rather you live than die. You’re tall. Your height is going to give you a range advantage when we’re out there, and I can already tell that you have great spatial awareness…not many people would’ve noticed me in the shadows. You know this area far better than I do, and sure, you’ve never held a gun before, but you’ve got to fight to live.”

As your voice continues in a soft-spoken tone, he’s mesmerized. “I want you to live, and I’m going to make sure you do.”

He can feel himself nodding along to your words— his heart getting lighter by the second, perhaps out of adrenaline but he’s going to believe it’s love. He needs something to look forward to when this is all over, if this is ever over, and that something is the image of you and him on a date. With you looking stunning in your favorite outfit and him hopefully looking better than he does right now…clear skies with the cicadas shushing themselves so he doesn’t miss a single thing you say…enough money in his bank account to cover anything and everything you wish for…and the biggest bouquet of your favorite flowers that he can find. What are your favorite flowers?

“Can I ask you something before I say yes?” Nagi’s voice is sweet, seemingly comforting you as your shoulders drop from their automated offensive stance. You look a little curious, likely assuming that he’s going to ask you some tips on how to shoot a gun— which he probably should if he’s being honest with himself, but that’s an issue that isn’t as important as his current curiosity. “Do you have a favorite flower?” 

With teeth shining at him, he’s blinded by the overwhelming beauty you send his way and for the second time, he makes you laugh. 

“My favorite flower? You’re so strange.” Overcome with a fit of giggles, he thinks that this is your first time laughing at something a man said as well. “Why do you need to know that? Are you asking me out or something?”

“I am.” He states bluntly and your cheeks flush red. 

There’s a minute of silence between the two of you and each second is more excruciating than the last. With a heavy clock ticking in his ear, telling him that he’s made a fool of himself as the hand inches more and more to the left; he’s counting down his probable rejection as he’s just shot his shot in the middle of the end of the world. What a stupid decision. He knows his timing could be better— could be a lot better actually— and there’s a part of him that regrets even attempting…but none of that matters, because you’re smiling.

Maybe he makes you just as nervous as you make him…

“Okay Nagi,” you grin and adjust the shotgun strap across your chest. “If we both survive this, I promise I’ll go out with you…but I have some high expectations. I want the most expensive flower arrangement money can buy.” 

“And what kind of flowers are you wishing for, gorgeous?” His voice is a sexy whisper, and Nagi didn’t even know he could be so seductive.

You jokingly roll your eyes at the pet name and toss him one of your inactive grenades, which he catches with ease, urging him to follow you into the chaos— but not before you give him the answer he so desperately desires.

“Snowdrops.”

There are two things that Nagi has realized in the past thirty minutes. 

1.) He’s a lot more athletic than he thought he was. 

Running for a half an hour straight is something that he never imagined himself doing— especially considering that he’s never stepped one foot into a gym in his entire life. What he originally thought to be clumsiness, turns out to be raw strength untouched. You were right to assume that his lengthy limbs would do him some justice in the fight for his life, and he’s thankful for his towering height as he’s blocked falling debris from smacking you atop the head nearly five times now; though, he did miss a flying sneaker that happened to nail you straight in the nose. He’s trying his best, give him a break. 

2.) You might be a figment of his imagination. 

Sure, this idea is likely false as he definitely felt your weight when you were sent flying from a stray hand grenade and landed on top of him, but you just seem so perfect. Getting to know you has been a dream come to life— though making conversation while running for his life isn’t the easiest feat, he’s managing. Some of the things you’ve told him do seem to be made up, though. For instance, you were the culprit behind the plane crash and while he’d love to picture a sunsetting sky with the two of you floating in the breeze, you’re not going to be piloting that jet. However, he has to give you a break because he’s never flown anything other than pixelated aircrafts, especially aircrafts that contain a deadly monster oozing toxic gas that turns people into zombies. Yeah, he couldn’t quite believe that either.

“On your left!” The sound of your voice snaps him back into focus and he realizes there are four zombified citizens barreling your way. “I could use some help here!”

You definitely don’t need his help. For God’s sake you have a shotgun the size of your leg that’s already mowed down three of them and Nagi’s just barely getting used to the sound of the bang. So far he’s pretty much been useless if not for letting you know what’s coming up in the distance, and also being the absolute last resort solution— which is rare, but oh shit it’s happening right now! You’re out of shells! How exactly does he fire this thing again?

Shakily, he attempts to point his handgun in the direction of the lone zombie bounding towards you. “Deep breaths, Nagi! Focus and aim!” Your words of encouragement are appreciated, but ultimately useless as he desperately starts stray shooting. 

“Fucking aim!” You’re losing your patience for him so fast, to which he tries his best to calm down and breathe.

In and out.

His heart rate begins to slow.

Breathe and concentrate. 

His eyes become unclouded by his anxiety, and his vision clears. 

Lock on.

He has a mark on the target. 

With his pistol’s aim assist shining against the zombie’s forehead, he confidently fires a single bullet. It soars through the air, squealing in its flight, and he lets out a sigh of relief…a sigh that he exhaled far too early.

Aw shit, he missed. 

You grunt, bracing yourself against his bullet that ricochets off of the nearby telephone pole and grazes your right arm. He has a clear view of the scarlet blood dripping down your elbow and onto the pavement, and his heart feels heavy. He’s so fucking useless that he’s injuring you. Nagi doesn’t think it’s even possible to be worse at flirting than him; he can’t imagine that there are many guys who are accidentally shooting the girl they like, yet here he is. 

Thankfully, you being the badass agent you are, you’ve managed to reload your eleven shells of ammo in the time it took for him to fire one bullet— and you easily dissolve the zombie to bits and pieces. 

“Your aim can use a little work.” You snort, brushing your fingers against the small wound.

He rips the sleeve of his t-shirt off and attempts to wrap it around your arm. This is what you’re supposed to do, right? The only training he’s had in the medical field is from that one surgeon simulator game he played in middle school, and to be completely honest, it was a pretty good game! However, he’s definitely doing something wrong because you place your hand over his and show him how to properly treat an open wound. Normally, Nagi would be embarrassed that he’s failing so miserably right now— but honestly, the only thing on his mind is how this is the first time you’ve held his hand. He can’t tell if there are butterflies in his stomach or if the smell of blood is triggering vomit. Hopefully the former.

It’s no surprise that your perceptive self notices his focus on your intertwined hands, to which you take the lead and insist on pushing forward. “As romantic as this is, we should find some shelter before we get eaten in the midst of making out.” 

Oh?

“You want to make out with me?” 

Oof that slap hurt. His priorities clearly don’t align with yours.

“Okay, okay.” Nagi holds his hands up in surrender before you can smack his chest for a second time, and he’s finally able to notice your surroundings. Since when was the Mikage Buildingright behind you? Hm…the imminent fear of death must have distracted him. “My best friend’s family owns this tower here. I promise it’s safe.”

Your gaze narrows at the wall of glass windows that are seemingly spotless. There isn’t a single crack, faulty line, or zombie-sized hole that’s visible to the naked eye and he feels a little swell of pride for Reo’s family. Yeah, that’s right! My best friend’s parent’s architects are great at making buildings! It finally seems like he’s had his first good idea of the night, and Nagi couldn’t be more proud. Progress is progress (even if he shot you in the process)! 

“It looks good.” You nod in approval and begin cautiously making your way towards the doors.

While following closely behind, he watches your back and ensures that there’s no one on your trail; which isn’t difficult in the slightest. Most of the civilians have died by now and you’ve already cleared every undead in the area…without his help. He doesn’t know how he managed to be so lucky that he ended up with you, but he’s grateful for every second— and now that you’re finally in his familiar territory, he can finally show you what he’s worth. 

“There’s an elevator up these steps.” Nagi leads you up the grand staircase, remembering how he lazily trotted down it yesterday after Reo tried, once again, to convince him to join his football club. “I think it’ll work, I know they have emergency systems and everything.”

“I don’t know, Nagi…” your voice trails off, something amiss about it. “I just have a weird feeling about this place.”

“I promise Reo’s family’s going to take care of us, they’re the best.” He deflects your concerns, trusting that his friend will pull through and have some crazy solution to save the world. There’s never been a time where he couldn't count on Reo and as soon as you reach the top of these steps, you’ll agree. The text he sent out asking for help is almost delivered, just a few more seconds and that blue line will slide all the way to the right and Reo will be right down the elevator as soon as possible. 3…2…1…sent! There! You’ll both be saved!

But if Reo’s on the top floor in his room…why did his ringtone ding just meters away?

There’s a corpse laying in front of the elevator doors, mangled and bruised. How did Nagi not notice it before? Was he too distracted thinking of his closest and only friend he’s ever had? No way. The security team must have destroyed all of the zombies in the building already, he’s sure Reo and the others are fine— but why does that body look so familiar?

No.

It can’t be him. 

Three steps away. 

There’s got to be some kind of mistake here. A prank right?

Two steps away. 

He can’t be dead. His best friend can’t be dead!

One. 

“No…” With his voice trembling, he stands over his best friend’s body. Reo’s violet hair is drenched in blood, seemingly resembling the color of a plum rather than the typical lavender hue. If it were a normal day, Nagi would laugh at the awful color— telling his partner in crime that the shade didn’t suit him in the slightest and Reo would laugh in annoyance, aiming a ball straight for the taller boy’s head…but this isn’t a normal day. This is the end of the world; and that beautiful lavender flower that Nagi associated with his teammate is wilting. It’s dying. It’s dead along with the heartbeat within it. Reo is dead. 

“Nagi. I need you to step back slowly.” He spins to see you with your barrel aimed at Reo’s corpse, but he can’t seem to move. It’s almost as if he’s been stunned, frozen in place with frostbite cementing his legs to the granite floors, and mouth encased in ice. He’s so overwhelmed that he can’t even open his mouth to give you a warning that there’s something moving behind you. Why can’t he speak? He needs to tell you! However, right when his teeth quiet their jitter, you’re tackled to the ground with a loud pummel. 

Immediately, gunshots ring out in the grand hall. You’re firing in every direction in an attempt to blast off your opponent, but this zombie is particularly agile and you don’t have much room to move with your large shotgun…looking back in retrospect, giving Nagi your only handgun wasn’t the greatest idea.

“C’mon!” Repeatedly, you call out to him, but he remains paralyzed in fear. “Stop being useless!”

He watches as you struggle to wrestle off the infected woman, grunting and groaning with every punch you deal to its face. The skin on her cheeks is almost a greyish shade, discolored and decaying with a potent smell that burns his nostrils. It’s hard to tell who’s who under the blanket of shadows she’s trapped you under, but occasionally he catches a glimpse of golden eyes that tell him the zombie is still alive. 

Somehow, with your almost supernatural raw strength, you’re able to hook your thighs around the zombie’s neck— pinning it down to the pearly floors and trapping it beneath your weight. It claws and cries out, desperately trying to escape your grasp, and Nagi almost feels bad for it. Just a few hours ago, this woman had a life. A real life that she likely looked forward to living every day; and now she’s nothing but a brainless carnivore with cannibalistic intentions. She could’ve been a mother. There could be a little boy out there missing her and waiting for her to come home, tell him that he’s safe, and that everything is going to be alright. When was the last time Nagi talked to his own mother? Why does he deserve to live and this woman doesn’t? Why is he so special that he was saved, while the rest of Tokyo was left to rot? 

It isn’t fair. 

None of it is fair.

He doesn’t deserve to live. He doesn’t deserve to be here. 

He’s taken his life for granted from the moment he learned to walk. Why should you be wasting your time trying to get him to safety when he’s nothing more than absolutely useless? He needs to help.

He needs to be brave…

…but he misses his chance once more. 

Letting out a wailing scream, you muster up enough energy to crush the woman’s head between your thighs, and Nagi is splattered with blood and guts. He doesn’t know how you’re so strong— it’s almost eerie in a way— but he’s more concerned with the state of your well-being. The look of exhaustion in your eyes acts as a glaring sun against his icy posture, and his feet are thawed from the floor, rushing towards you in mere seconds. 

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” he kneels on the ground before you and cups your face closely, “Hey— hey, don’t close your eyes. I’m right here. Please stay awake.” Nagi doesn’t think his voice has ever been so gentle nor has he ever felt this kind of worry for a girl before. Sure, he hasn’t known you for long, but he knows he can’t go on without you. You’re a team and a team sticks together. You can’t die right here! He’s not going to allow that!— but before he can lift you up like the knight in shining armour he wishes he could be, there’s a faint rustling behind him…a familiar rustling. Nagi knows that sound. He knows those movements. He’s heard them a million times and he’d be able to recognize them even in the midst of Shibuya Crossing in the busy hours. 

Where did Reo’s body go?

Perhaps it dissolved or maybe it was kicked aside in the midst of your fight. 

That has to be it, right? Where else could he be?

Nagi’s confusion is understandable. He’s thinking rationally given the circumstances and his heartbeat is somewhat steady. The mass of his body hovers over yours in a protective stance, like a dragon guarding a princess, and for once he appears to be confident. However, that confidence has been set aflame. He can feel his blood racing, burning through his veins in fear and distress, and he wishes he could simply rip his vitals from his skin to destroy the wretched emotions. The sight before him is something out of a horror movie…a horror movie where Nagi is the main character. 

“Oh fuck.” 

Reo leaps out of the shadows before Nagi can even react. 

There’s a blur of hands and feet, hitting and kicking at each other, and the snow haired boy never knew he was this agile. Reo is clearly doing his best to hit Nagi’s vital arteries; to which he’s blocking each attack with his forearms. This is chaos. He doesn't even have a second to think for himself and consider the possibility of blasting Reo’s head off with his handgun. He can’t do that…this is his best friend! 

As Nagi’s leg lines up to knock him off his feet, Reo lunges down and grabs a hold of it. In a panic, he attempts to shake his friend off— wiggling his leg up and down whilst reaching for his combat knife in his back pocket— and slices the skin in between Reo’s forearm and bicep…which is ultimately ineffective. Oh, shit he just got angrier! Growling, zombie-fied Reo clasps his hands around Nagi’s waist, lifting him off the ground with ease and throwing him into the elevator doors. The sound of his body slamming against the metal slab rings out, echoing in the grand foyer and deafening Nagi’s left ear. His breathing is heavy and he feels like he can’t get a single ounce of air in his lungs. Everything seems to be blurry, foggy with mist covering his irises as he attempts to see what’s right in front of him. 

A carnivorous Reo…

…and an unconscious you.

It’s clear to him what’s going on. There are two outcomes to this horrific situation and whatever decision Nagi makes is going to impact the rest of his life. 

1.) Let you go and join the afterlife with his best friend. 

2.) Save you and never see his best friend again. 

His heart is at war within himself. One side fighting for Reo, the boy he’s known for so long. The boy he’s laughed and cried with. The boy who knows everything about him. The boy who believed in him when no one else did…until you came along. 

Just the thought of seeing your lifeless eyes, bloodied body, and severed limbs flips a switch inside him— and Nagi finally comes to realize what’s happening. This isn’t Reo. This shell of a man with a monstrous hunger isn’t his best friend. Reo is a ghost now. He doesn’t exist anymore and now his body is being possessed by the undead, or whatever zombies are. He can miss his friend all he wants, but that doesn’t change the fact that the thing creeping towards you is nothing but a stranger who knows all of Nagi’s secrets. 

It’s time for him to fight to live. 

As he swiftly stands and tackles Reo to the floor, a wave of memories flash before Nagi’s eyes. 

The moment he first heard Reo’s voice. It was light and friendly. He had used a tone that Nagi hadn’t ever heard before, and although he had no interest in playing soccer, he still wanted to impress the popular boy— not because he wanted a higher status or a girlfriend, but because he knew this stranger needed a friend…and he really needed a friend, too. 

His palms grip Reo’s throat, ripping him off of your body.

The first time Reo laughed at something he said. It wasn’t intended to be funny, but the plum-haired boy couldn’t help but burst into a fit of giggles and Nagi found himself laughing as well. Sitting in the school courtyard, side-by-side with crumbling onigiri falling from their mouths, there’s no doubt that they looked like two elementary schoolers finding humor in something obscurely immature— but despite that, it’s one of his fondest memories. 

Reo struggles against Nagi’s weight, pinned to the floor with nowhere to run.

When he’d first shown him his concerningly large collection of video games, Reo hadn’t batted an eye. In fact, the very next day, Nagi received a friend request from him. Which seemed like a small act at the time, until he found out that Reo had gone to the tech store and purchased an entire PC set up just so he could be the Player 2 to Nagi’s Player 1. They were partners in both the real and virtual world— an unstoppable pair that won more tournaments as time went on— and Nagi will never clean out his xbox inventory filled with their trophies. 

His finger grazes the trigger.

This is it. 

No more memories.

It’s time to say goodbye.

In movies, when the protagonist has to kill their loved one, a single tear rolls down their cheek. 

For Nagi, his face drowns in his cries. 

“I’m sorry.” 

He’s gone.

“I love you.”

Reo’s body dissolves into ash…

…then dust…

…then nothing. 

“I’m so sorry.”

PART TWO COMING IN THE NEAR FUTURE (i’m a slow writer pls forgive me)

⠀ ⠀ ⠀⠀ ⊹₊｡ reblogs are greatly appreciated! ˚₊⊹

[odditycircus-2002]

Medusa!Reader Intro Banter

In my last post, you may have expected to have read some intro dialogue for the banter. Initially, I was gonna put a few characters for the intro, but then as I was thinking of the dialogue in my head, it expanded to more than just a few characters. And why deny me of that sort of fun? That's why the intro dialogue gets its own post! So for context, the reader is a Medusa-like creature, able to turn other beings into stone, and is married to Shang Tsung. If you'd like to read more about them for context, you can go ahead and check out these head cannons below.

TW: Suggestive and mentions of death and gore. If you're a fan of MK, you know what you're getting into.

First

Second

Third

Bonus

Yourself (Mirror Match)

Y/N 1: Am I correct to presume that Shang Tsung made you?

Y/N 2: How do I know that YOU'RE not the construct?

Y/N 1: We and Shang Tsung are going to need talk after this.

/

Y/N 1: Are you of my past or future?

Y/N 2: I've come to warn you to take out both Quan Chi and Shao Khan.

Y/N 1: Say no more.

/

Y/N 1: I was unaware you're still alive after all these years, sister.

Y/N 2: From what I've heard, you were the one behind my "illness".

Y/N 1: It was nothing against you. I had to test whether my medicine worked on humans somehow.

/

Shang Tsung (Your Hubby💕)

Shang: This takes me back...

Y/N teasingly: Why so sentimental?

Shang: We had a similar confrontation before making love under the moonlight.

/

Shang: Did you mourn for me, my sweet?

Y/N seriously: It took every ounce of my will not to completely spiral into madness when Shao Khan took you away from me.

Shang taken aback: I am... so sorry to have caused such pain.

/

Shang: Are you so surprised, princess?

Kitana: I find it impossible to believe you found someone like Y/N rather than clone her.

Shang: There's no use in replicating anyone like my wife.

/

Sonya: Is your wife aware of how much you've been chasing my damn tail?

Shang: She knows I'm having fun before I collect you for her garden.

Sonya: No way in fucking hell, Shang Tsung!

/

Y/N: I'm not usually the vengeful type of woman, as I find such reasons to be not worthy of my time.

Shao Khan: Is there a point to your insistent prattling, wench?

Y/N angered with all her snakes hissing: You are the exception and more than worthy of my fury.

Mileena

Mileena: You helped Shang Tsung create me?

Y/N fondly: I remember the day you opened your beautiful eyes.

Mileena trepidatious: Do you think the same with the rest of me?

/

Y/N: We shared the same pain of grief.

Mileena: yet YOUR lover came back, MINE didn't!

Y/N: I could help remedy that... for a price.

/

Mileena: Do you really believe I'm a fine Khanum?

Y/N: Better than your father, although you could do with a healthy amount of grace during your rule.

Mileena: *gives a growl in irritation* Like my sister?

Sindel

Sindel angrily: Never again will I be your or anyone's puppet.

Y/N: Aw, such a shame; you were and are my favorite puppet.

Sindel: You will be executed for the good of all the realms.

/

Sindel: Once upon a time, I thought that, like me, you were forced into a marriage by a cruel man.

Y/N: And now, your Highness?

Sindel: Now I know you and Shang Tsung are equals in evil.

/

Sindel with her voice trembling in rage: You killed Sheeva!

Y/N with a tranquil grin: Technically, you did so with your hands, not me.

Sindel: I will repent for her by wiping that smug grin off you before you can even blink!

Baraka

Y/N: So beautiful and fascinating...

Baraka squints his eyes in suspicion: What is your trick this time, Snake?

Y/N: No trick, just admiring a fine specimen.

/

Baraka: If you are so "fond" of Mileena and Tarkatans, where were you when Kotal wiped us out?

Y/N: In hiding lest I had the same fate fall upon me.

Baraka: Spineless coward!

/

Y/N: I would like to observe some of your rituals for research purposes.

Baraka: Only if you can beat me mercilessly in Kombat!

Y/N with a wide grin: It should be no trouble at all, then.

D'Vorah

Y/N: Such a fascinatingly resilient species.

D'Vorah: Appreciating how This One's the epitome of the ultimate species?

Y/N: Indeed. The perfect test subjects for my experiments.

/

D'Vorah: This One must ask if your snakes are all part of you?

Y/N: My "hair" and I all share one mind if you're dying to know.

D'Vorah: Even so, the Hive outnumbers you by many.

/

D'Vorah: You say This One reminds you fondly of your youth?

Y/N: I remember coming across insects resembling you while watching them feast upon the deceased fauna, as a little girl.

D'Vorah: Then may it comfort you in your last moments while This One uses you to feed The Hive.

Kollector

Y/N: You have the most beautiful eyes.

Kollector: Flattery or not, these eyes will never be for sale.

Y/N with a wicked grin: I never intended to buy, Kollector.

/

Kollector: Shao Khan demands your head.

Y/N: I will not give that brainless brute even a single scale from it.

Kollector: The choice is not for you to make, milady.

/

Y/N: I will not give Shao Khan, not even a single root from my cabinet.

Kollector: I must collect ALL that the Empire requires.

Y/N: Then I'll take four of your arms as compensation.

Kano

Kano: Well, color me gobsmacked, and I thought I had some out there tastes.

Y/N: Shang has far more manners and dignity than you ever will; you waste of air!

Kano: It doesn't make him less of a freak for marrying a literal snake lady.

/

Y/N: I require your services.

Kano: I don't DO that sort of thing, well, unless I've had enough grog.

Y/N irritated: I meant for you to steal from the Khan's gardens for its rare herbs.

/

Kano: Oi! I thought you were supposed to take care of your hubby's island.

Y/N: It was too empty for my liking after my love's passing and his followers requested the most potent poisons I had in storage.

Kano: Eh. Thanks to you, its treasures were free for the taking.

/

Scorpion (Hanzo Hasashi)

Y/N: Once, I was desired and sought after by all the men in my village and beyond for my beauty.

Hanzo: It is only fitting then that your outward appearance reflects your wretchedness.

Y/N: You can thank the Elder Gods for that.

/

Hanzo: I should have never come to you for your help.

Y/N: We both wanted Quan Chi's head, no matter the price.

Hanzo: The consequences afterward were far worse than I could have ever imagined.

/

Y/N: You cannot achieve your goal by yourself, and where did that bring you? Right back to me.

Hanzo, desperate: Please, Y/N, my clan has fallen ill with a long-extinct illness that only you can cure.

Y/N: I am sure you already know what sort of boon I will ask of you?

A/N: Don't forget to like this post, share, and repost! 😁😁😁😁😁Stay Weird, my fellow humans.

Playlist while Writing this:

"The Scorpion and the Frog" featuring Marc Senter,Jessica Lowndes, and Terrance Zdunich

"Prick! Goes the Scorpion's Tail" featuring Emilie Autumn

"Babooshka" by Kate Bush

"Zydrate Anatomy" by Terrance Zdunich

"I Can't Decide" by the Scissor Sisters

"Such Horrible Things" by Creature Feature

"Bad Blood" by Creature Feature

"Here There be Witches" by Creature Feature

"Mad Hatter" by Melanie Martinez

"Tag You're It" by Melanie Martinez

"Milk and Cookies" by Melanie Martinez

(for more like this)

Part II

[pupgawa]

Hello😁✋, I saw your work and I wanted to see if I can request fyodor, Nikolai, and my bbg sigma fluff

Can it be a fem reader and Hispanic (Nicaraguan if possible) and she likes to say random phrases in Spanish like: quieres casarte conmigo , mi amor ( would u want to marry me, my love) just random times of the day. So out of nowhere he learns Spanish and starts responding😭🙏

Sorry its really specific😭✋

Leaning their darling's mother tongue

୨♡︎୧ a/n: hello lovely ! Thank you so much for requesting and I love this scenario so much I find it both hilarious and adorable!

That being said that I am not Hispanic myself so I have no clue how to speak the language , I am just using Google translate which may not be 100 percent accurate, so please forgive any mistakes I may have made (⁠ ⁠≧⁠Д⁠≦⁠) but I hope you enjoy anyways !

୨♡︎୧ pairings: Fyodor Dostoevsky x reader, Nikolai Gogol x reader , Sigma x reader

୨♡︎୧ Genre: fluff ! No content warnings at all lovelies <3

Fyodor Dostoevsky 🩸

so being as smart as he is, I whole heartly believe that Fyodor knows multiple languages, anything stemming from English to Russian and everything in between, but you know he was smart, but you never knew that he actually knew what you were saying, he loves to tease so he acts clueless to your sudden language switch, seeing your surprised face is all worth it ♡

you and Fyodor decided to spend the day at home, finding that it was a good day and neither of you wanted to ruin it with blood and gore, you decided to relax at home, it had been a while since you two had.

Fyodor was reading a book and you sat there and admired him, Fyodor was the literal definition of a pretty boy, soft facial features and an even softer voice, it made it hard to believe that this man was a terrorist.

“ Eres tan bonito , mi amor ” ( you're so beautiful , my love ). You didn't even notice your language switch until Fyodor looks away from his back with a head tilt.

“ what did you just say ? ” he asks with a gentle hum. You let a sly smile take over your expression as you wave your hand dismissively. “ oh nothing, dear, it wasn't anything bad, don't worry about it ”, you reassure, Fyodor eyes you skeptically and returns to his book.

gosh he was so pretty you felt like you were falling in love all over again. You open your mouth to speak, intending to use English, but something else came out.

“ ¿Quieres casarte conmigo mi amor? ” “ por supuesto ” ( of course )

you blink, once, twice, three times, your face goes hot in embarrassment.

“ fyodor … you ?- ” he cuts you off with a laugh. “ of course I do ”

you were absolutely embarrassed, all this time you were speaking in your native tongue thinking that nobody could understand you, yet here your boyfriend was, knowing everything you were saying.

“ Eres linda cuando estas sorprendida ” ( you’re pretty when you’re surprised ) “ shut up … ! ”

Nikolai Gogol

similar to Fyodor I think Nikolai knows a bunch of different languages, but unlike Fyodor he isn’t completely fluid in them. So when he heard you talk in your native language he did some research on how to speak it. He’s not completely fluid in Spanish, but he understands a good amount of it ! He especially likes to flirt or tease you in your own language.

| You two were out on a date, out at a fair. You were enjoying yourself, but when you found yourself unable to beat a game for a plushie you had wanted, Nikolai stepped in and won that game for you !

| He hands you a giant white bear stuffed animal that held a plush heart in it’s paws, “ for you, darl’ ~ ” he coos lovingly.

| “ gracias amor ” ( thank you, love ) you were so happy that you didn’t even notice how you went from English to Spanish.

| “ De nada, querida ~ ” ( you’re welcome, dear ) he links your arms together and gives you a peck on the crown of your head.

| you let out an appreciative hum and you continue on with your date.

| the night was quite for most part, asides from the casual conversation of some people, but neither your or Nikolai paid them any mind.

| you two were sharing a plate of food since you had been getting hungry. Starting up small talk and casual conversations.

| “ thank you, for this ” Nikolai blinks and shakes his head with a small laugh. “ no need to thank me, darl’ ”

| there’s a silence between you two, before you break it “ Quieres casarte conmigo mi amor? ” you suddenly, not even noticing you said it until Nikolai responded “ por qué por supuesto ! ”

| you let out a snort of laughter at his enthusiasm. “ I’m glad you agree ” you peck his lips, Nikolai returning the kiss.

| “ Entonces, ¿cuándo planeamos la luna de miel? ” ( so when do we plan the honeymoon ? ) he asks. “ Nikolai ! ” your face flushes softly.

Sigma

Unlike the other two, He didn’t know much until you came along, hearing you talk in Spanish made him motivated to learn. So he picked up any resources he could. He wanted to surprise you, well no he wanted to impress you, actually.

| you had just come off of work, annoyed and stressed out, having to deal with annoying customers and a asshole of a boss.

| the house was clean and dinner was already made, thanks to your boyfriend, sigma who had spent all day making sure you had come home to a meal and a clean house so you could properly relax.

| “ dear ? ” he starts “ what . What ! What do you want !? ” you snap, whipping your head back to see Sigma’s surprised expression.

| your gaze softens a little “ mi amor … I’m sorry- I didn’t mean to yell at you like that- ”

| “ rough day at work ? ” Sigma asks, you nod your head with a soft sigh. “ still it doesn’t give me a right to yell at you like that, I’m sorry ”

| Sigma dismisses your apology “ it’s alright, let’s get something in your stomach and then you can tell me all about your day ” you don’t argue with him.

| After dinner you sat at the edge of the bed, Sigma sat besides you, massaging your shoulders. He was surprisingly good at it too.

| you let out a sigh, relaxing underneath his touch “ you’re too good to me, my love ” Sigma lets out a laugh. “ nonsense, dear, you deserve this after the day you’ve had ” he responds.

| he cooked dinner, he cleaned and made sure the house was clean, all to make sure you could relax properly.

| and now he was listening to you vent while he gave you massage.

| he would make the picture perfect husband, you thought and you unconsciously voiced it too

| “ Quieres casarte conmigo mi amor? ” you asked, not realizing what you had just said yet. Sigma takes all the months of learning he had and puts two and two together, it takes a moment for it register but once he realizes, his face goes red.

| “ si me dejas ” ( if you let me ) he responds, his pronunciation could use a bit of work but you were able to put together what he said.

| “ sigma when … ” “ are you impressed ? I’ve been learning for months ” you smile fondly at him and nod

| “ buen trabajo, mi amor ” ( Good job, my love ) you respond with a laugh. Sigma looks away to hide the smile on his face.

[sleepyangelkami]

INDIGNATION j.todd

 ☆ WORD COUNT - 3K

JASON TODD X FEM!READER  ☆ SUMMARY - the joker has tortured jason enough so he moves onto the thing he knows he loves the most.

 ☆ WARNINGS - angst, torturing, whump, blood and gore, ptsd, crowbar lol, beatings, intended lower case, nothing i write is ever proofread 🩷

it was supposed to be a good night, one filled with laughter and excitement, those nervous grins across the table because even after so long, jason still managed to make you so utterly timid especially when it came to flirting. you loved the boy with your life as he did you, so the plan had been to spend the evening at a restaraunt of your choice though he knew anything you picked, he would adore.

but while it was supposed to be a lovely night spent with your boyfriend of three years, though you had been friends much longer than that, everything turned to a change. he knew he was a little late though you would hardly blame him for having to help dick grayson get ready for his own date, instead you'd smile and tell him it really wasn't a problem. you were always kind like that. so you waited for him, outside of the restaraunt by yourself.

you supposed, looking back on it you perhaps shouldn't have waited outside alone in a summers dress within the black amiss of the gotham streets, it wasn't safe and the vigilante had warned you of such over and over, you supposed it was your fault after all that you were now in the situation you were in.

it all happened so fast, he approached you on his motorcycle, a sloppy grin on his face as it matched your own, you remembered kissing him softly and that was one of the last things you remembered before a sharp blow to the back of your head.

and now, as the man sat strapped to a chair the only thing on his mind was the unconscious girl in front of him, he didn't care for what would happen to him for he knew nothing could be worse than loosing you, his love. he knew who it was, the joker, he'd never truly leave even when jason prayed to any sort of god above that he would. he was always watching, like a stalker behind a camera, lurking though the man supposed it wouldn't be too hard to find out about you seeing as it had been all over the papers, the son of bruce wayne, supposedly died, dating the daughter of his fathers best friend.

"c'mon, princess, you gotta wake up." though he wanted to reach out, to push the hair away from your bloodied cheek that it was sticking too, you had fallen and cut your face yet nothing happened to him, why had the joker kept him if he weren't going to do anything aside from knocking him out and dragging him to your whereabouts. he cursed as he looked down at the restraints, holding him into the chair so he couldn't lift his arm.

it was the splutter of a cough that had his head instantly springing up from where it hung, eyes instantly surveying your form as you, weakly, attempted to sit up though with great difficulty due to your own restraints, chaining you to the stone wall behind you, it was damp on your back like a cloth dipped in water. the first feeling was confusion, the next was fear, and after that you weren't too sure what came up albeit you were sure it was more than five emotions mixed together. "jay?" a feeble rasp, the back of your throat felt like sandpaper.

"i'm here, baby, right here." confused, hazy, eyes glancing towards him where he sat wishing for nothing more than to allow himself out of the restraints, to hold you in his arms. he was a vigilante, he had seen a lot of fear in his life but on your face, he was sure that the emotion was enough to make a grown man cry, enough to make him swallow the lump at the back of his throat, apparently. "I'm gonna get out of here, 'kay? just gotta hold on." attempting to scratch the restraints against the seat he was shoved into, hoping they'd rip open but the attempt worked to no avail.

a night supposed to be filled with laughter and happiness, so why did tears coat your eyes? why did you back yourself against the wall only to glance up at your wrists, tied in some sort of cuffs that looked to be something one would only see in a tv werewolf show, then you remembered it was real life, that the blood surrounding your wrists from accidentally pulling a little too hard.

the sound of loud doors creaking had both the lovers heads turning, fear written all over them. "I see you have both awoken, good, it was getting a little boring all by myself." and a shrill laugh that had your body sinking into the wall further. you had always known of the joker, the man that had taken away the love of your life once but never, had you seen the man, sure on tv or on the newspaper but not in real life, not so close to you. "and what do we have here, a scared little doe?" You tried to back your face away when dirtied, calloused hands came in contact with your chin, holding it in place sternly. you were scared, terrified, even but even so you did everything you could to hide it on your face, unfortunately, you were never a great actress.

"let her go." the words gritted through the mans teeth, he was furious, he had never had a bigger indignation for someone other than the man in front of him, his hands on his loves face. "do whatever the fuck you want to me but let her go." but he wouldn't beg, he never did before and he certainly wouldn't begin now. he didn't miss the way your eyes flickered with distress because as utterly petrified as you were, you were double times for the love of your life. you had lost him once, it would never happen again.

this didn't seem to frighten the joker nor did he halt, instead, he roughly let go of your jaw in which you stared up at him in terror. it had occured to you that you were never often scared for yourself, usually, you were worrying about your lover and now as you sat on the cold ground, all you could do is stare. your mouth didn't open nor did your eyes blink, you just stared. you always wondered if you'd have a fight or flight instinct but never would you have guessed it would be to freeze. "how romantic, the knight ready to give himself up for the princess." a grin on the mans face, his makeup almost embedded into his skin.

"she's not a part of this-" but the joker was quick to shut the man down.

"oh, but she is." seemingly more serious than before, you didn't like this look, suddenly his laughs and grinned seemed so much less scarier than his serious, stern expression. "you knew she was as soon as you asked her to be yours." the jokers eyes moved from jason's to yours. "and now she'll pay the price for your idiocy. i mean, the papers, the news, you didn't really think no one would find out?" and his shrill laugh back, a giggle but not one filled with joy or happiness, one with a set goal to strike you with terror. "you're the reason she's here, you're the reason she's going to die, not today, maybe not this week, this month, maybe not even this year but the girl will die." turning his stern glance back to your boyfriend. "and her blood will be on your hands." and suddenly something struck jason todd, a strong, careless vigilante that people looked to when they needed a cold opinion, now he sat in the chair and his own stomach doubling over because for once in his life, the joker was right. jason todd would be the death of you, and he couldn't prevent it. "now... where were we?"

the sight, joker standing above your body, unmercifully beating your limp body with something sat in between his fingers, gripped harshly. but for a second, jason couldn't hear your pleas for him to stop, he couldn't hear your whimpers and attempts to get away from the man that so cruelly beat your body for his eyes had attached to something else. a crowbar, sitting harshly in his hands. a crowbar, possibly the very same one. but it didn't matter to jason for the only thing on his mind, he wouldn't let what happened to him happen to you, he couldn't. he wouldn't.

"hey! get the fuck off her!" but his shouts working to no avail. "don't fucking touch her!" attempting to shove his leg out, trying with everything he could to hit the joker in some way but he couldn't, he was too far away and all he could hear was your whimpers and sobs, begging the man to stop. "stop it!" but he couldn't help the glass that coated his eyes. he remembered this all too well, he couldn't re live the past but he gladly would if it meant you being safe. you were yelping, gasping and crying, but your body could hardly get away from the man covered in makeup, standing in a purple suit as if he were anything important.

it was jason's fault, all his fault, he should have left you out of this, you never should have been involved yet here he sat, his own voice choked, he couldn't do anything, he wasn't in control and there you lay, getting a beating for simply being in love with him. it wasn't fair, it wasn't fair in the slightest. y/n l/n the sweetest soul on the planet, according to jason, anyway, the girl with the gentlest of touches and the softest of voice, and the worst about it as he knew you lay, weeping and hyperventilating, he knew that in the back of your mind. you were relieved. because your lover was safe, a beating would hurt but nothing could beat the pure agony of the night jason todd was taken away from you.

your cries had begun to slow down, all jason could hear was the sharp intake of breaths as one landing followed the next, he couldn't see you, the joker being in the way of your body but he could only imagine the damage done to your pretty skin. "She won't die to today." the joker appeared to be out of breath as he raised himself from the previous position, his back still facing the man. "but she won't live forever, we both know that." jason's face twisting into some expression to keep himself from letting out the lump that had gathered at the back of his throat though his eyes still covered in tears that had been for you, the sound of your sobs echoing the room. "keep her guarded, while you can." and the joker had the impertinence to laugh. "sorry about that, dollface, nothing personal." as he bent down to stroke your hair from your face, jason heard you let out a whimper, he jolted forward in his chair. "just needed to teach the big boy here a lesson, a gift for your co-operation." as he dropped two keys on the ground in front of you.

for some sick, twisted reason the joker was merely expecting.... a thank you. so he waited, his face watching yours expecting for you to praise him, to adore him for letting you live. you were the kindest in the world, for the man that had killed your husband to be, you could spare nothing but honesty. "fuck you." and for a second, jason had been the proudest of you he had ever been, that was when his face twisted once more, realising that the joker wouldn't have taken such words lightly.

"bitch." slashing your face with something that jason could not see. he held your face up by your hair, pulling harshly on the roots. "you're lucky to be alive now, don't make me regret my decisions." but he needed her to stay alive so jason todd could live in fear, the fear that one day she would be snatched from his grasp, now, however, was not the time because he was sure that jason todd simply wasn't scared enough yet. jason watched as the joker slowly stood, turning to face him. "we'll meet again, the next time i won't be so kind." and that was all he had said before leaving the cold, damp room, the two lovers sat atop stone themselves, alone.

jason couldn't wait to look, he needed to see, he had to apprehend the damage. but as soon as his eyes laid on your body, he was almost upset with himself for looking. you were propped up against the wall, your long chained hands on the ground, your head hanging low but what jason could see from his angle, there was blood, too much blood. yet two keys sat in front of you, the jokers 'gift' had been your ticket straight out of there. "princess, fuck, okay you're gonna be okay, i- fuck." he was stressing, the keys so close to your body yet you were too feeble to take them, to unlock you both but if you stayed still any longer you were sure to pass out. "baby, listen to me, can you hear me?" the panic rising in his voice. a raspy hum in response but your vision completely blurred. "you need to get the keys, get us out of here and let me take you to the hospital, can you do that, sweetheart? c'mon i know you can, you're strong, angel, we both know that." that was something you certainly not, but he was trying to be encouraging, after all you supposed it was your fault you were here in the first place.

your hand reached out, slowly, wearily but nonetheless it reached out. jason could barely see the blood that coated your hand as you grasped the key into your hand, shoving it into the lock of your handcuffs. you unlocked yourself and just as you did so, your arms felt slightly limp. if there was one thing jason knew about you, it was that you were determined, so much so it annoyed him at times how utterly stubborn you were but in the end he loved it with every inch of him. "good girl, c'mon angel can you bring the other key over here? fuck, i'm so proud of you." but you knew it was nothings, to attempt to coax you into freeing him of the restraints.

you had the other key in your hand and somehow, you had made it to his chair, you weren't sure if you had crawled or staggered, you couldn't remember how your body moved from the wall to the centre of the room where jason todd sat in a chair, tied in restraints as you had, and you certainly weren't sure how you had managed to get a key stuck straight into his handcuffs.

it was now that you were close, now that your proximity defied you, you couldn't run, he could see every bruise that tattered your face, a large gash running across your cheek, and all up your arms was more bruises and grazes but he didn't miss how the blood soaked through your dress. your fragile, gentle body littered with so much danger, jason todd had never hated himself more and he could only assume you hated him the same, judging by the way you had not yet met his eyes, not yet said a word.

when his hands finally fell free they came to grab you, gently yet firmly as you practically fell limp. he shoved himself off the chair in an instant, crouching down to the ground with your body, holding you oh so close. he wrapped his arms around you, holding your head to his chest. he would save you but for a second he needed to hold you. to remind himself that you were here, alive, he wasn't sure if it would be the last time he ever would. how could you not hate him? it was all his fault, he was sure that after tonight, he'd never see you again, and how could he blame you?

he was expecting you to shove him away with the little strength you had left, maybe stay silent or perhaps you would raise your voice, he would have if be it he was in your position. however, what he hadn't expected was another whimper as you shoved your head into his chest and the next words to fall from your lips. "i'm sorry." sorry? you? why would you possibly be sorry? "i shouldn't have made you come to dinner, i'm sorry, i'm sorry, s-so stupid." but nothing could ease your sobs as you clung to the larger man.

"hey, hey, sweetheart none of this is your fault." as he pushed your face out of his shoulder with his hands, staring right into your beautiful eyes that looked so saddened, fat tears rolling down your cheeks as you scrunched your brows together. "okay, i fucked up, i never should have left you alone and i won't do it again okay just please- fuck just dont- dont leave me." and he knew how selfish it was to ask of you, to stay with the man that was sure to ruin your life but he wouldn't, not as long as he could help it for he would cling to you for the rest of your life, if you let him.

you shook your head, allowing the silent tears to continue to make their way down your cheeks. "'won't leave. 'wont ever leave." and once again your hands clung to him, like he would disappear if you had let go. he left once, you would never allow that to happen again. "jay, e-everything hurts." everything burned, right through your skin and you couldn't help but shake in his hold.

"fuck- i know baby, i'm gonna save you 'kay? promise." and he did just that. jason todd. some said he was a hero. others say he's a villain. some say that he was once a hero and turned bad others say he was never good to begin with.

but with you? jason had never done anything but save you. an everlasting hero.

main masterlist/jason's masterlist

[jumbojazzcats93]

PTOLEMAEA - Soap

Summary - You meet a charming Stanger while hitchhiking.

Tags/Warnings - Ethel Cain's Thoroughfare, GN reader, dark content, gore, murder, cannibalism, death, noncanon, obsessive love, toxic love

Banner by @/benkeibear @glossysoap @divine--serenity @violet-phantoms @lordlydragon @quietlyignoringyou

Word Count - 1K

He thought she looked so wildly beautiful the first time he saw her. With wind whipped hair, an old satchel and some well trodden clothes; holding her thumb out as she edged the freeway. He was unable to drive passed her, so he pulled over and asked where she was heading and despite signaling she wanted a ride, she looked tense and flighty. He noticed the hilt of a pistol sticking from her pants side pocket where she clenched her fist over and over. "Don't you worry now, m'eudail. I'll take you anywhere you wanna go.", and with that, she jumped in to join him.

You were silent, observing, but you didn't seem to dislike his chatter. He told you about his family and how loving they were. How after his parents passing he left to travel the world; how he wanted to find the love that they had together for himself. When you revealed you didn't really know where you were going, just anywhere but home, he suggested you join him. "Well, lass, how about you come see the west coast with me? Some company is surely welcomed on this never ending journey of ours." That was when he saw his first smile. A hesitant, crooked smile followed by a small chuckle, "Sure as hell beats walkin' don't it?"

Over months of travel he began to crack open your shell. Months of conversations over meals. Months of hours spent on the road together. Months of sharing motel rooms and beds. Months spent unknowingly falling in love with you. You said you didn't believe in love, you'd never felt it from anyone in your life, but were hopeful his search could change that. He had no idea he was the only man to ever show you kindliness and respect with nothing expected in return...

No idea you had fallen in love with him; him and his endless outpour of kindness and warmth, within just the first few weeks of traveling together.

He watched you take in the cross country sights of small towns, busy cities, open country and untouched forests. Watched as you learned to bear your soul to someone for the first time. The search for his love had been long forgotten. How could he see anyone other than the sweet, timid little thing in his passenger seat? He got you all the way to the coast before he could put words to it. You had told him how sorry you were that he didn't find the love he was searching for as he looked out over the California coast and he chuckled as he responded, "Well... I still made it this far without it." You caught his gaze as he turned to you and he thought then that with the wind in your hair, in those old clothes and with that open expression on your face; he had never seen anyone more beautiful. You looked just like you did the day he found you. "Well, maybe not...", he whispered into the sea breeze. "Look at what I've got." Your eyes were stuck to his as he said, "You might not be my love... but Bonnie I doubt it."

He asked you to stay with him. Keep traveling with him and keep exploring with him, taste the night scene of California for a little while. He couldn't let you go. Not when he'd found what he'd been looking for all his life. He needed more of you. His gaze betrayed it, too. You could see it in his eyes that he was consumed by his love for you, but you couldn't recognize it for what it was. Obsession. He wanted to experience everything there was with you.... but it started to prove too much. Too overwhelming. The drugs and the people, the liquor and the lights, his eyes and his gaze. You could see it in his eyes... and even if your mind couldn't recognize it your intuition knew it was no good. You wanted it to stop, but what? You had no idea what you were seeing, so how could Johnny know what to do? The deeper into the drugs he went, the more you felt it. You felt it the night you slept together and he bit you so hard you bled into his mouth. You felt it on your skin like you were on fire.

He promised, promised, promised, promised.

"I need you. I love you. I need you. I love you."

It became frantic, he felt manic; he swore he was suffering under the weight of his love. You had no idea the lengths he could go... You could see it in his eyes, but you had nothing to compare this love to. Everything seems normal when it's the first time. How could you know what you don't know? You couldn't see what was whispering in his ear... what was breathing down your neck.

His eyes. He won't stop looking at you. You didn't know him. You wanted it all to stop. "Please don't look at me. It's too much." He keeps looking at you and you can see it. The shadows. You could see them in his eyes; you couldn't lead him away from them, couldn't bring him back. There was nothing you could do. It had already been done. You just wanted to be his and you wondered if it made him sick. If you were turning in his stomach. Burning his throat. Souring his mouth.

Make it stop. Make it stop. Make it stop. Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop.

You wondered if it finally felt like enough to him. If he finally felt he had received all of you. His freezer bride. He was so handsome as he stood over you. Consuming you. Drinking you in. Your life in his hands. Were you making him sick? You wanted him to know that you didn't blame him. Please, don't think about it too hard. Please, just tuck away that bloody Polaroid. You wanted to tell him as he tore you apart that no matter how your taste sated him, he would never have all of you. Not now.

Not the way Death did.

[forwhump]

a/n; two in one day ?! sorry ;-; more straight whump but it’s because i love silas so much i want to beat him constantly & mercilessly, you dig ?

tw/cw caning, skinning, gore, grievous bodily harm, psychological torture, general cruelty, vomiting, misgendering, implied transphobia, the vaguest possible references to implied noncon, major character death (but not really because he dies all the time & always just comes back to life)

“Oh, no,” Point coos, sickeningly sweet. “Would you look at that? I think the girl might have a soft spot for you.”

Silas is kneeling at his feet in a pool of his own blood and the chunks of flesh that had been stripped off him. He gurgles in pain.

Point has the cane leaned over his shoulder, casual, almost jovial. The end of it is barbed and razor sharp, pieces of skin and chunks of flesh caked to the blades. “Is it the same as the soft spot she has for me?” He asks. “Do you get to touch the same soft spots of hers?”

Silas grunts. He’s so fuckin’ cold, but he grinds his teeth to keep them from chattering, so hard they all creak in protest.

It isn’t even about him this time. It isn’t something he’d done, it isn’t a scheduled field test.

Wren is being punished.

A different soldier, a man they call Blue, he’s holding Wren up with a hand on his neck and holding him still still a hand low on his waist.

Silas isn’t entirely sure what he’d even done — something they didn’t like, bitten or scratched or fought. He’d pissed them off, but there weren’t a lot of ways to hurt Wren in which they weren’t already hurting him. To get him where it really hurts, they have to get through Silas.

Wren is screaming and it rings in Silas’ ears like white noise. His face shimmers in the fluorescent light, wet with tears. Silas’ blood shimmers around him just the same.

Silas doesn’t blame him. He isn’t angry with him. This is nothing — this is Silas’ every day. There’s no getting used to a pain like this, but he’d come to expect it. He just wishes Wren didn’t have to be here to see it.

Point swings again, and the barbed end of his cane hooks the sensitive flesh beneath Silas’ chin. Fresh pain crackles through him like lightning and he groans, wet, from somewhere low in his chest.

Fuck, it hurts.

Point wrenches the razor blades free and slices open Silas’ throat.

His hands are shackled behind his back so he can’t even slow the bleeding. He chokes, his mouth full of blood, hot and acrid.

Wren screams, something that sounds like his name.

Through the growing crowd of black spots, Silas can see Point grin. He swings the cane back over his shoulder as he turns on his heel to look at Wren.

The way he looks him up and down makes Silas’ stomach turn. He gags and vomits blood onto the concrete, onto himself.

“Do you see what happens when you misbehave?” He asks, taunting. “All you had to do was be a good girl.”

“I’m sorry,” Wren sobs frantically, “I’m so sorry. Please. I’m sorry.”

“It’s too late for sorry,” Point says, and Wren makes the most broken sound Silas has ever heard. “I tried to warn you. You’re the one that decided to gamble with your little boyfriend’s life.”

“Please,” he sobs again, desperate.

Without warning, Point turns. Swings. Strips most of the rest of the skin off Silas’ chest. Tears all the tissue from the bone of his clavicle and it shimmers, sickening white plating peering out from under the gore.

It hurts so much, so hot, so desperately that Silas couldn’t scream even if his lungs weren’t full of blood. He gasps, soft and wet, and vomits again on the concrete, on himself.

“Silas!” Wren screams, but it sounds like he’s screaming it from somewhere really far away, somewhere Silas can’t get to.

He takes a wet breath that makes his chest rattle and heaves his chin off his chest.

It’s kind of surreal, the way everything comes into focus for a second. Silas lifts his head, and the world tilts, it spins quickly around him, and then Wren comes into focus and everything stills.

Silas has always thought that there’s something kind of sparkly about Wren, and he sees it in him now. His hair shimmers in the fluorescence and his cheeks, his mouth, his eyelashes glow with tears. There’s something so beautiful about Wren, something very pure, something almost holy, and it’s never made sense to Silas, how someone like that could end up in a place like this. How someone like Wren could be subjected to this.

It hurts almost the same as being skinned.

And then Point swings again, and he peels the muscle off the bone over the left side of his chest and his ribcage.

It knocks the wind out of him. He gasps for air and inhales more blood.

“I’m sorry!” Wren screams. “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! Stop!”, and Point swings, and one of the razor sharp barbs on the end of his cane sinks into the exposed bone of Silas’ ribcage.

It hurts like nothing else he’s ever experienced. It hurts in every nerve ending and artery.

His vision clouds, and he vomits again.

Silas is going to die.

That’s the thing. His party trick. He says that he can’t die, but that’s a lie. He dies all the time. He just doesn’t stay dead. He can’t.

He’s going to die this time, and Wren has to see it. It isn’t Silas’ fault, not this time, but he still feels guilty. Wren shouldn’t have to watch him die, he shouldn’t have to live with that because he bit or scratched or fought, because he was in pain or because he was scared. How is that fair? How is any of this?

He coughs, chokes, vomits again. He’s starting to get really dizzy.

“Please,” Wren screams, sobs, a horrible mix of the two, “stop, please! I’m sorry, please,” and he sobs again, and it's even more horrible. “Please. I’m so sorry. Don’t hurt him anymore. Please.”

Point crouches in front of Silas to grin at him properly. “She’s really pretty when she begs, isn’t she?”

Silas taps into the very last of his adrenaline and leans into it as hard as he can. He hauls his chin off his chest. He squares his shoulders. He grins right back, blood on his teeth, mocking. “You’ll regret this,” he promises.

“Who’s gonna make me?” Point asks with a snort. “You?”

He swings the cane again. He tears a big chunk of meat off Silas’ bicep.

Silas vomits, blood and bile.

“Please!” Wren begs. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

Point barely spares him a glance. “I warned you this would happen,” he says. “You should’ve been a good girl.”

Silas doesn’t realize he’s started shivering until the cuffs of the shackles start to bite into his wrists and blood starts to pool in the palms of his hands.

What a miserable way to die. Even for someone like Silas.

“I’m sorry,” Wren sobs, “Silas, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” and it isn’t okay, not by a long shot, but Silas wants to tell Wren it will be. Silas is in pain, in agony, but what’s agony to a machine? What was Wren done to deserve this?

“Wren,” he says.

Point swings again. The blades slide through the thin flesh of his stomach with ease and sink into the sensitive organ tissue beneath. They hook and bite and tear and hurt, a hurt worse beyond Silas’ realm of description.

Point has to brace a boot against Silas’ chest to pry it free, and it’s over.

Silas dies, and the way Wren screams for him follows him into the dark.

[cillianmesoftlyyy]

In Love, in War Pt. 2 | Thomas Shelby x Reader

Summary | She (the reader) comes from a wealthy family in Birmingham, England and he (Thomas Shelby) comes from a family of no-good troublemakers in Small Heath. Their worlds finally collide when Thomas lands himself in the triage tent of a nearby hospital camp during the battle of the Somme with a neck wound. Past traumas and heavy-handed words open old wounds, and yet, they always find their way back to Birmingham.

Warnings | Blood, gore, war, death, crying, and out-dated language ("Gypsies").

Before you gotta go- Courtney Barnett 🎵

Evil- Interpol 🎶

Crying lightning- Arctic Monkeys 🎵

Word count: 2073k

Not proofread- my b, folks!

Thomas was moved to the infirmary by nightfall. The tent was cold and poorly insulated so the nurses draped what extra blankets they could find over the patients. Thomas waved them off. 

“I’m fine. Give it to that bastard.” He’d say again and again as the blankets were distributed amongst them. He saw the nurse again during his 5th night in the infirmary. She had the night shift and set her things down at the nurses station. She did her rounds, checking vitals and distributing medication. He felt as though he recognized her from somewhere but with the habit-like uniform he couldn’t be sure. 

She moved on down the line until she reached Thomas, who was sitting up and smoking in bed. 

“I see they’ve discarded the bandages.” She put gentle fingers near the healing wound. 

“You must’ve stitched me up too well.” He exhaled and shifted beneath the top sheet. 

She looked down at his chart, hanging from the end of his bed and froze. Shelby. Thomas was a Shelby. She looked at the chart, her hands shaking slightly from shock. She hadn’t run into anyone from Birmingham before him, and of course, the first man she sees is a Shelby, one of the poor, troublesome families living in squalor in Small Heath.

“Are you from Birmingham, Thomas?” She cleared her throat. 

“Yeh, you?” He took out a new cigarette from the pack. 

“Yes, I am. I recognized your accent. This will be cold, sorry.” She put the stethoscope under his shirt, listening to his heart. She watched her watch and counted the beats per second. 

“Funny, I don’t recognize yours.” He tensed as the cold scope moved across his stomach, listening to his lungs. “Which neighborhood are you from, nurse?”

She removed the stethoscope and wrote down the numbers on his chart for the next nurse to read. She cleared her throat again, “Claremont.” She looked up and saw him chuckle, shaking his head.

“Ah, so you’re one of ‘em rich girls.” He observed pointedly and crossed his ankles beneath the bedsheets. She said nothing. She spread vaseline across the wound with a cotton swab. “I knew I recognized you from somewhere,” he continued, “must’ve seen you down at the tracks.” 

“How did you get in?” She asked a little too ignorantly and Thomas frowned slightly.  

“Poor men with money to spend will always be welcome at the tracks. I learned as much from my old man.” He looked down at the cigarette in his hand.

“I never saw you.” 

“You wouldn't have would you, eh? They put us farther back in the pubs where your-like couldn’t see us.” 

She blushed and slipped a thermometer below his tongue to record his temperature. He spoke around the thermometer, “Why’d you become a nurse? Didn’t your daddy tell you it wasn’t a hobby for the girls of your status?” 

“I wanted to help.” She answered truthfully, forgoing any mention of her fiance. 

“And was it everything you dreamed of?” He trained his cold oceanic eyes on her as she removed the thermometer. 

“No, it's much worse.” She whispered.

“Eh, imagine that. Can’t handle this can you?” He flicked the long butt of ash onto the dirt floor below. 

“I managed your stitches just fine, I think. You’re alive aren’t you?” Her face burned and she evaded his piercing eyes. 

“So I should thank you, should I?” He felt a swell of anger in his chest. “It was your lot that got us into this war in the first place and then you expect us to fight it for you.” 

“I didn’t get anyone involved in this bloody war, Shelby. I involved myself and I’m still here, aren’t I?” She fummed as she left the chart at the foot of his bed. 

“You’ll leave as soon as you get the chance, I bet.” He sucked hard on his cigarette, looking away. 

“Wouldn’t you?” She retorted angrily. 

“I don’t have a choice, love. They sent me here to die. I’ll leave when I’m dead.” 

“Excite yourself again and you may not have long to wait.” She pointed to her own neck and stomped away in her wooden-soled shoes to the nurse’s station. She heard Thomas huff loudly from his bed. She lowered the gaslight at the desk, letting the ward fall darker, and watched dutifully as the men tried to sleep. 

She was moved again to the triage tent and worked during the night shifts, restocking supplies and listening to radio calls requesting medical personnel. It was quiet that night as she ran through the stock of syringes and gauze. She came up short and approached the head nurse on duty. 

“Go to the infirmary and take from their stock then go home. We’ll get you if we need the extra hands,” the head nurse directed. 

She hurried to the infirmary tent, tripping over piles of mud and old grass. It was approaching summer again and the mud had warmed to a more bearable temperature stuck inside her stockings. She pushed aside the tent flap and approached the petite brunette behind the desk. 

“I need seven more syringes and about ten more rolls of gauze. Can you spare that?” 

“Let me check for you.” The nurse smiled and took the medical bag from her hands. She stepped into the connecting tent and disappeared behind the flap. 

She turned to the patients left in the ward and glanced over at the bed for Thomas Shelby, empty. She looked back to see if the nurse had returned before going outside. She spotted him against the side of the tent in the dark, smoking a cigarette by himself. 

“You shouldn’t be out here alone.” She said quietly. Thomas turned towards the voice. “You may tear a stitch and die without anyone noticing.” Thomas smirked in the glow of his cigarette.

“Then join me.” 

She said nothing but stepped in closer where she could see him properly in the light of the distant moon. He was pale in the dark with iridescent eyes and soft cheekbones. She stopped beside him and pulled her cardigan closer around her chest instinctively. 

“I’m not going to touch you, yeh know.” Thomas exhaled a stream of smoke and flicked his eyes at her cardigan. 

“I never said you would.” She murmured. 

“Right.” He rolled his eyes under the cover of darkness. 

“I know you’re not like that.”  

“Like what?” He looked over at her. 

“I don’t know.” She looked away and exhaled shakily. 

“People like me? People from Small Heath? ‘Gypsies,’ petty thieves, day laborers and gangsters?” He offered sarcastically. 

“I didn’t mean it like that.” She dropped her arms defeatedly to her sides, “I just mean…” 

“I get it, princess. I’ll keep my hands to myself.” He laughed breathily. She sighed and rested her head on her shoulder. The night noises were scattered with occasional popping sounds and squealing fireworks.  

“Do you miss it? Birmingham, I mean.” She broke the heavy silence. 

“I miss my family.” He answered and dropped the cigarette into the mud. 

“Do you have a large family?” 

“Yeh, most of them are here with me.” 

“Really?” She raised her head. 

“My brothers, yeh. John and Arthur. There’s also Danny and Johnny Doggs, not brothers by blood but they’re still kin.” He looked down at his chest and hissed from the movement pulling at his stitches. 

“Were your brothers out there with you before you were hurt?” 

“Mhm, they’re all still out there.” He gestured to the distant battleland shrouded in gray clouds and smoke. 

“I’m sorry.” She whispered. 

“Yeh well it’s our duty in service to the crown, ain’t it?” He laughed stiffly. 

“It's a massive sacrifice.”

“Sacrifice?” He laughed, “What sacrifices have you made, eh? Stop talking as if you understand what it’s like for us. We die out there, in the factories, in our homes and your lives never change.” He spat. 

She forced back the tears stinging in her eyes. 

“Hello? I have the things you requested! Where are you?” The nurse called from inside the tent. She turned back to Thomas, angry tears flooding her eyes. 

“What sacrifices have I known? What have I given in my duty to the crown and to this country? You have no right to speak to me like that, Thomas Shelby. You have no idea what I’ve lost in this war. Just because I don’t wear a black band or carry a pistol does not make me any less of a tool in this national scheme.” She cried beneath her breath and threw open the flap to the tent, leaving him struck dumb in the humid dark. 

“Thank you.” She smiled weakly at the nurse and took the bag. 

“Is everything alright?” The nurse asked in a low voice. 

“Oh yes, I just need a good rest is all. Homesick.” She lied and nodded goodnight. 

She deposited the supplies back at the triage tent and went straight to her tent, shared with five other nurses. She was alone in the tent and allowed herself to cry, cradling the abandoned black band that stood for Francis’s death. Her tears merged into angry sobs that she couldn’t suppress. As her sobs slowed, she stared off into space and ignored the quiet footsteps outside her tent. 

“Nurse?” Thomas whispered loudly through the thick canvas siding. She didn’t hear him until he had entered the tent and moved to crouch beside her cot. When she noticed him, she surprised herself by not reacting. He sat beside her on the cot in his army-issued thermal pajamas and wrapped his arms around her. 

“I’m sorry.” He whispered by her head. “I didn’t think… I wasn’t thinking.” He repeated over and over again as she cried quietly in his arms. “I’m so sorry.” 

She shook her head and gave into his embrace, burying her face into the joint of his left shoulder. 

“What was his name?” He asked gently. 

“Francis.” She sobbed. 

“Shhhhh-” He held her closer as she hiccuped. She placed her hands against his chest, warming them with the heat of his body. When she regained composure, she sniffed. 

“I’m sorry.” She whispered and pulled away, wiping her eyes. 

“Here.” Thomas offered his handkerchief and she took it. “Don’t apologize.” He ran a hand down her back, his leg propped up on the cot at an angle. 

“Thank you.” She returned the hankie to his hand, blushing with embarrassment. She looked up into his eyes and saw a newfound softness in their hue. His lashes were long and dark like his skunk-like hair. He looked back, glancing down at her lips, wet with her own tears. He licked his lips and withdrew his hand from the small of her back, pulling a thread of hair from beneath her cap. She covered his hand with her own and leaned into it, innocently. He leaned in and brushed his nose against hers, asking permission to go further. Her lips brushed his, barely a kiss and came back for more. She kissed him messily, like a virgin, and found comfort in the warm softness of his lips. She sighed and allowed herself to be swept up by the pleasure of his closeness in her sadness. He kissed her back, breathing in deeply. She ran a hand down his chest as he cupped the veil of her habit in his hands. She shook her head suddenly, shaking herself out of it. 

“You shouldn’t be here. Anyone could come in.” She stood quickly and he followed, his head brushing the small tent’s ceiling. 

“Will you be alright?” He asked. She stared back, caught off guard by his question, his interest. She stuttered slightly, catching on the roundness of her answer. 

“Yes, yes. I’ll be alright. We weren’t married yet… just-just engaged.” She looked down at the space separating his ribcage from his stomach, the divot of muscle that shook as he breathed through his shirt. 

“No, no. Will you be alright?” He stressed and she paused. 

“I miss him.” 

“I know.” 

She nodded stiffly and pressed her hand against his chest, pushing herself back away from him subtly. He covered her hand and looked into her eyes. 

“You should go before you get caught.” She whispered and he nodded slowly. He turned away and peered outside, looking both ways. 

“Goodnight, Shelby.” She uttered in a low voice which he returned with a sad smile. 

“Goodnight, nurse.”

...................

End of part 2 :)

[elliesmainhoe]

Hunted

Abby Anderson X fem!reader

Summary: Although you stopped Abby from killing Joel, Ellie still wants to seek her revenge.

Contents: violence, injuries, scarring, domestic fluff, trauma response, PTSD, guilt, angst, cliffhanger, death mention, death alluded to.

Requested ages ago by my lovely 🍞 anon

You can remember it. The gore, the screaming, the sobbing. An old man- who reminded you of your father laying on the floor as your girlfriend buried a club into his head and his daughter, who reminded you of yourself being pinned down as she watched the life in her father figures eyes begin to drain out.

Abby got two swings in before you finally stopped her. And you regret not stopping her sooner.

Violence wasn't something you were accustomed to. Of course you'd seen it- you grew up in a post-apocalyptic world, with fungal-infected cannibals that was governed by a dictating military.

But to see someone- a human like yourself- be beat to a pulp for protecting his child just felt wrong to you. No matter however many times Abby talked in favour of her father and praised him, you strongly believed that the revenge Abby was seeking would not fill the whole his death left in her heart.

You remember it well, the bloodied man on the floor looking up at you in delirium as you screamed out incoherent words to the blonde that was killing him. Your disruption made everyone stop and look at you, your voice filling throughout the room for two minutes allowing Jesse and Dina to rush into the room and begin shooting.

Guns were fired and people ran, usually Jesse and Dina would have followed after- hunting every last one of them until they were dead, but they were preoccupied on making sure Joel wouldn't bleed out.

You remember that night, you and Abby had broken off from your group and made camp in an abandoned barn for the night. The fire roared, it's flames casting a golden glow onto her fair skin and dirty blonde hair. As Abby cried in your arms, trying desperately to calm down.

"It should- it should feel good" she hiccuped, muttering her voice scratchy "but... I don't... Why don't I feel better?"

You had so much to say. But you just couldn't.

••••••••••••

Joel lived. However, the hits to his head had messed up his mobility, so he was stuck in a wheelchair and had to be pushed around by Ellie and Tommy full time. There was a large scar that split his face in two, one eye was damaged and it's vision was restricted.

And worst of all? He was quiet. So so quiet. He barely ever spoke, he never laughed, he never told Ellie his stupid- stupid dad jokes. Abby may not have physically killed the man, but Joel's spirit was gone.

Ellie hated it, she sat with him daily, helping his trembling hands to shovel spoonfuls of soup into his mouth. She tried desperately, cracking jokes and reminiscing with him and nothing, nothing worked. Joel was gone.

Her dad was gone.

••••••••

Oregon was beautiful, the mountains, the trees, the water. It was perfect for you and Abby to settle down into, and you did. You found a beautiful abandoned cabin hidden thick into the woods, the view was beautiful, the expansive lake and the greenery. Just perfect.

Domesticity was not something you had ever thought about before, but it worked. It worked so so well. Abby enjoyed the physical tasks, her axe chopping skills were rapidly improving, and she loved hunting wild animals. You spent your time taking care of your new addition to the family, a german-shepard you'd named BoBo, among other little chores like cleaning and filtering water by boiling.

It was a beautiful morning, the sun creeped through the closed curtains, waking you and Abby up from your slumber. Her strong arms wrapped around your waist and squeezed your body tightly.

"Good Mornin' love" you whispered into her ear, ignoring the loud snores coming from BoBo who laid sprawled out on the foot of the bed. "Mornin' sugar" Abby groaned nuzzling her face into your neck trying to block out the sun's intrusion.

"we gotta get up baby" you cooed, pulling the stray blonde strands of hair, that had become loose from her braids, behind her ears. "No we don't..." "Yes, yes we do"

You began moving, leaving the warm soft covers behind and making Abby let out another frustrated groan.

The day flew by like any other day usually would, you woke up, went outside and collected fresh eggs your hens had laid, you made two omelettes, and Abby joined next to you filling up two glasses of water and setting the table.

After eating Abby left the cabin, looking at the animal traps she'd laid out the night before, two rabbits and a squirrel 'not bad'.

The sound of sharp barking echoes through the woods- BoBo yapping like mad. Of course Abby had heard the dog bark before- just never ever like this. It was desperate territorial growling and barking.

Something was wrong. Very very wrong.

Abby had never felt her legs move so fast before. Abandoning her catch on the mossy floor of the woods. The wind rushed through her blonde locks as her feet carried her as fast as possible, her breathing heavy but controlled

"Abby" your strained voice whimpered out from behind her as she slowed down, still deep in the woods.

Ellie's left arm was firmly and tightly wrapped around your waist, her other one held a knife to your neck drawing a line of blood as she increased the pressure of the blade against your skin.

"Let her go Ellie-" Abby's voice came out shaky despite all the effort she put into keeping it level. "I don't want to fight you..."

You hiccuped in an attempt to keep your sobs at bay, only causing Ellie to dig the hunting knife into your skin. "You don't have a choice." She grunted, hatred spilling out through the tone of her voice.

"Fine. Just leave her out of this" Abby softened, her shaking hands made a fist to try and cease the shaking and jittering of nervousness or anger? You couldn't tell.

The sudden release of Ellie's tight grip on you caused you to lose your balance. You stumbled before your foot got caught on an overgrown root of a tree making you tumble to the ground with a hiss at the twang of pain from your newly sprained ankle. Great.

Your mind was hazy- you heard the grunts and heavy breathing as the two women fought, but you couldn't bear to watch. Instead you turned your attention to the now whimpering BoBo who settled by your injured ankle, licking it softly in hopes it would ease your pain.

Ellie had ran at Abby, balled fist punching and swinging at the blonde who dodged and avoided her assaults.

"I don't want to hurt you" Abby gritted

"Stop being such a pussy and fucking fight me." Ellie spat, taking out the blade and handling it- begining to try and slash at the muscle of Abby.

Abby's body contorted, moving under Ellie's arm as she tried to swing the knife at her- coming from behind her and shoving her into the bark of one of the oak trees that surrounded the woods clearing.

Her hand manhandled the blade out of Ellie's tattooed hand throwing it on the grassy ground, still damp from the dewy spring morning. "Are we done now?... I'm not going to kill you Ellie."

"Fine. I won't give you a choice." The sound of a click came from behind Ellie's back, her hand pulling out the gun that had been strapped to her holster and pointed towards your sitting frame.

Bang.

---------------

I don't think I like this. But here you go 🍞 nonnie.

Taglist: @aunslie @lonelyfooryouonly @eywaskisses @daryldixonh0e @kittynnie @lovelyyevelyn @randomhoex @moonlightdivine @haerinwho @mufflaa @mial1l @sarahsmileslikesarahd0esntcare @moonlighting87 @escaping-reality8 @magicalfreakcowboylawyer @hejdevkdbdjsd @dergy @half-of-a-gay @ellieismami @cyberlainn @gollumsmygel @sseorii @kyleeservopoulos @taloulalila @ellieluhme @kiiyoooo @delusionalvioleht @joelscharm @hi2647 @gumdropkoo @coffeeandbookskeepmealive @womaniza @namgification @kimiisims-blog @tayyyystan @abigaillovestoread @whoreshores @kylieeluvstlou @knowitsforthebetterr @endureher @erikaar @lanasluverr @sayah13 @ilovebufflesbians @srryhoneyy @222fine444u @jade1212

NOT PROOFREAD

[postmodernbeliever]

lifetimes and lifetimes - fox mulder x fem!witch reader

not every witch needs spells and stones to relive the past, or predict the future. in your opinion, the craft is much simpler than that- what is meant to be yours comes to you, at the right time. and the right thing does come, in the shape of a tall, curious fbi agent. it doesn't take long to learn just who fox mulder is to you- and that it seems you two always find each other, in every lifetime.

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩

this one is dedicated to @spookybasementboy bc they asked for it :))  i took some creative liberty because i’m not much of a witch myself- i was inspired by the past life situation in the season 4 ep “the field where i died” but also wanted to make sure i made it mystical, so i used a sort of invocation/prayer and vision experiences. but really i wanted to have an amalgamation of a witch and a regular person, who truly is a product of “coincidences”, run into our handsome little fox. i think it came out kinda cool. unlike anything i've written. ok ill stop explaining and let you read. <3

my ao3 | word count: 5,041

content tags: wicca, not too witchy but has spiritual experiences, mentions of bodily blood/gore, past lives, flashbacks, idiots in love, stress, fear, anxiety, slow romance, you both fall hard FAST but it’s gotta be slow!!!!!!!!!!

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩ ✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩ ✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩ ✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°

special agent fox mulder believes in everything. he doesn’t know how not to, not with everything he’s seen in his lifetime. because of this blind faith, he gets himself in constant trouble. it was the first thing you noticed about him as he handcuffed you to the chair in the police station bullpen, that he was trouble, but in a good way. in the way that without having said a word, you felt he could turn your life upside down. even in a state of shock, you could sense that.

you sat like a prisoner, eyes shut as agent mulder settled into the desk chair opposite you. behind your eyelids, you relived flashes of moments from not even an hour prior. there was blood and bullets; you tasted wood, glass, screams, more blood. you remembered the red eyes, and the way bodies flooded beneath the pews, the sound of skulls cracking against the cold tile. you remembered reciting the only prayer that you could remember, the first one you learned when you left the church at 18. you felt the wiry carpet burning your elbows as you crawled away. you heard their voices repeating, “baruch hashem, baruch hashem, baruch hashem…” you remembered being chased, and after that, nothing else. as you awaited what surely was to become your interrogation you began to pray again, because it felt like you had no other means of safety. the earth is my mother, i shall not want…

“so, you like to run, huh?” the man teased, easing into his questioning. 

agent mulder’s authority was practically dripping from him- tailored suit, slack tie, blue and white badge screaming from his pocket. the print of his gun pressed against the black holster which flashed enticingly behind his coat. you saw power in his eyes, and a boyish attitude in his smile as he awaited your response. he was an understated kind of handsome. the kind that snuck up on you.

you winced as you shifted in the chair, and the man watched you tremble, suspicious of your state. maybe it’s drugs, he thought, but he quickly rescinded that. you just didn’t seem like the type. to the naked eye, you were healthy; plump arms and legs, round cheeks, secretive eyes. you were an intriguing sight, and not just because of your clothes. chained to a chair, your curling tendrils of hair and berry lipstick looked so out of place in a dirty, bustling environment like the one in which you both sat. he saw a girl adorned in earthy colors both muted enough to communicate a soft darkness, and bright enough to draw people to it. the beat-to-shit brown boots on your sleepy feet showed how long you’ve been drifting by, living alone. silver ornamented your neck and ears and poised hands, and agent mulder liked how it contrasted the tarnished handcuffs. you were battered from the events of your evening, with deep cuts in your hands and knees, and bloody scrapes all over your body, taking turns sharing skin with the bruises. you were a dichotomous girl, giving him every reason to be curious; yet all personal inquiries aside, agent mulder had a job to do. he had caught you fleeing a crime scene, after all. 

something in his gut wanted to release you, to let you float right out the front door and back to wherever you came from; but in his chronic open-mindedness, he couldn’t be sure if you weren’t tricking him some way into feeling that. so he kept you locked tight and facing him, eagerly awaiting your statement. 

“running is for the guilty, agent mulder.”

“well, i had to chase you down, didn’t i?”

“who says you decide what i’m guilty of?”

the agent turned to the computer and opened a statement file, deciding to take yours himself. “what’s your name, miss?”

“which one? i have a few.”

“whichever one i can find in an official file somewhere in this pigsty,” he grinned. 

“well, that’s not gonna be much help,” you shot the man a wink, “they know me by a handful, too.”

“well, come up with one, then.”

you sat for a moment, already settled on the name you wanted to hear him repeat, but wanting to tease anyway. when you offered it up, the sound rang in his ears like angel’s bells. 

agent mulder simply couldn’t stifle his curiosity. as he typed your chosen name out, he asked, “what does it mean?”

“well, my last name is an old name. for us wiccan, it means old friend. and i like to think of myself that way- familiar, constant, when the world is always moving.”

“and your first?”

“my favorite shakespeare character.” you admitted. the man’s face flooded with color, and you could hear him thinking, is she fucking with me? so you tacked on, “you know, just because someone’s a witch doesn’t mean they’re an isolationist. i read.”

“i didn’t say anything!” agent mulder chuckled awkwardly. your intuition had him drawing nervous breaths. “so, you’re a witch. is that why you were at the church? did you plan to invoke, or just poke fun?”

“i’m not that kind of witch, agent mulder. not all witches are mean-spirited. i was there because i had walked past the church a few days ago, and i saw the stained glass windows from outside. they were so beautiful, i wanted to see them up close. i’m not a fan of what happens at churches, but i do love their art.”

for an accepting person, agent mulder didn’t realize how many preconceived notions he held. sat before him was a girl who pledges to be a witch, but visits catholic churches in her free time like museums. a girl who chose her name according to the day. in what little he knew, there seemed to be not one solid fact on which he could build a realistic profile. tight-lipped, the man asked for your age, place and date of birth, and address.

“i’m not sure exactly how many lives i’ve had, but in this one, i’m 29. arlington, d.c… um, october 31st, 1964… oh, and right now, i’m at 2632 hegal place, alexandria. apartment 42.” 

as you spoke, a wind blew through the station. it ruffled the papers on agent mulder’s desk, and it whistled through the links to your handcuffs. the hair stood up on your arms as the wind whispered, and you knew what he was going to say before he said it. you felt it in your gut. 

“2632?” agent mulder swallowed thickly, his curious pupils inflating almost cartoonishly. you saw his goosebumps and smiled.

as if you’d known all along, you asked, “you live in the building next door, don’t you? 2630?”

agent mulder didn’t respond, but the blood in his cheeks did for him. you shifted in your seat again, feeling a burning in your stomach. you hadn’t felt that hot intuition for a long time. there was a haunting quality to his face that was drawing you away from your defense; you couldn’t keep up the mysterious act, because something about him made it impossible to hide.

“s-so, what were you doing at the church?”

“you already asked me that, sir.”

you were surprised that even in the chaos of the police station, you weren’t alone. you felt alone. agent mulder seemed to look at you like his eyes didn’t recognize another thing, like the world was unfamiliar to him aside from your face, your eyes. and all those years of sitting in meditation, of attempting to regress, to see who you were before and who your soul was tethered to were useless. you should’ve known by now to trust in your world, in its karma. it always comes when it’s meant to. 

 “you can call me fox, if it’s easier. sir is so… formal.”

fox’s eyes sparkled. you’d seen that shimmer before, but in water, and in shifting light. you looked into him, and wiped your clammy palms against your pantyhose-clad thighs. for the first time all night, you felt your barrier coming down, the shield you raised back at the church, against the cops and the world. the fear you stifled to survive was finally flooding through your veins, and the tears in your eyes followed like dominoes. 

fox instinctively abandoned the report and took your palms in his own, passing his calloused thumbs over your trembling knuckles. “hey, hey, it’s okay,”

“i-i”m sorry,” you hiccuped, struggling to speak. “i’m- m’over… overwhelmed,”

“catch your breath,” he whispered, running his palms up and down your arms. his touch was seraphic, and by it, you knew you’d felt it before. lifetimes and lifetimes of it. “take it easy, i’m here.”

when you calmed down, he began again, “can you tell me what happened?” 

“well… i went into the church. to look at the windows, like i said. i was alone, it was maybe around six o'clock by then. they were just finishing mass, and everyone stood up to leave, a-and then they came in,” you stuttered, “the, uh, the shooters. they were- they were in all black, and wore red masks, like ones from the halloween store. they were chanting, they said, baruch hashem. it sounded like hebrew, but i think it was different, i’m not sure. it sounded old. and they were chanting, and they knocked so many people down in the aisles to get to the alter. they fired a few rounds off at the windows, glass fell on my head… i saw a lot of people fall, so i dropped to the ground and pressed my face to the wall. i prayed over and over, to the earth, it’s the only prayer i could remember. i just wanted to hide, y’know? a-and when- when they got up to the altar, they-”

the agent stopped you to ask, “what prayer?” 

“why does it matter?” you sniffled. 

“because it might have been what got you out in time.” 

his eyes were so pleading, and the fire curling around your bones stood to remind you he was to be trusted. so you recited the prayer, a slightly juvenile one that in your newness you cut down to the meat of: “the earth is my mother, i shall not want. she restores my body and awakens my soul. although i walk in the shadow of changing seasons and passing time, i will not fear death, for the essence of life is within me, the peace and beauty of earth comfort me. as i look to the skies with wonder at the immensity of the universe, i know i am blessed beyond measure to live all the days of my life in the bountiful house of gaia.”

the man marveled at how the words spilled from your tongue, so ingrained in your muscle memory that they were second nature. you kept a cadence, and each word was its own. he saw now you were not one to sit surrounded by potions and symbols to cloud your focus; you simply let the power of the world pass through you, and hoped to harness it and be protected as you yielded to it. you repeated that mantra like it was all you had left- he could tell. he’d never met such a modern witch. to him, you were a brand new kind of x file, with subtle powers he has yet to comprehend. 

“that’s beautiful,” he complimented as he squeezed your palms. “alright, now breathe. you're safe. keep talking.”

shutting your eyes, you tried to reimagine the horror. you’d never dreamed of seeing anything so inhumane, but maybe these details would be useful. you can’t have just seen them for nothing. 

“they, um, they took the priest. one of them shot him, and then another laid him on the table, and- and he used a knife to cut him open. there… there was so much blood,” you swallowed thickly. “they took his… y’know, his uh, insides. they dragged them out, and they chanted, and anyone who stood up was shot. i- i watched them take it all and, uh, they put it in the tabernacle, of all places… and their eyes glowed under the masks, bright red, and they never stopped chanting. once they started taking people from the pews with knives, i crawled out the side door, because i had th-this feeling, like, like it would be me next. i felt it everywhere. and when the cops showed up…”

“you didn’t want to get stuck. and you thought i was one of them, coming to take you, so you ran from me.” fox finished your thought, a resonant pain shaking his ribcage at the thought of making an innocent girl just try to outrun the danger. “you saved yourself, you know. i don’t know how your prayer worked, but you did something, summoned something that saved you long enough to get you out.”

“and it made you follow me.” you sighed, wiping your tear-stained cheeks. “why?”

fox’s eyes traveled across your face, inspecting every detail, wishing he had a microscope. his hand raised deliberately to brush a lock of hair from your face. “i don’t know.”

“what is your gut telling you?”

“its…” the man felt like his lungs were going to pop, two balloons over-inflated, under siege by a swarm of butterflies. “i wanted to follow you. to find you, not arrest you. but you kept running, so… y’know, logic took over.”

fox took a moment to fish the handcuff key from his pocket, and he unlocked your wrists, rubbing softly at the red marks. the agent winced, guilt-ridden for fastening them too tight. “does it hurt?”

“no, m’okay,” you muttered. your head was pounding, and when his fingertips grazed your pulse, you felt somewhat weak. 

fox let you rest for a few minutes while he typed up your account. he remembered every word. as he worked, his leg consciously shifted out to knock against your knee, and the two of you sat that way for a while, touching bones. when he was done, he leaned back in the borrowed desk chair and sighed, dragging his big palms down his face. 

“can i ask why you’re investigating this?” you brought one leg over the other, suddenly a bit conscious of the length of your dress. you saw his eyes follow, and you flushed. 

“oh, well, my partner and i- scully, you met her- we’re, uh, we’re investigating a string of ritual murders. we’ve followed these guys through the state, they shoot up masses and do what they believe to be sacrifices to jesus himself. that- that chant you mentioned, baruch hashem, i recognize it. it’s aramaic, the language jesus spoke. means “blessed be the name”. we’ve gathered they chant that over and over and they, uh,” the agent paused, seeing the discomfort on your face, “you don’t want to know the details.”

“no, i do! it's just a little raw is all,” you flashed a meek smile, gesturing with a nod for him to continue. 

“well, they seem to be taking people’s… entrails, the priest’s first, and offering them up by putting them in the tabernacle. my theory is they seem to think that if they offer holy blood, and let it be anointed with the eucharist, it'll reward them with god’s love and immortality. as far as we know, they belong to a cult that moves across the country, sacrificing lives to win god’s favor. and what you saw tonight- what you suffered- it’s going to help us stop them.”

“really?”

“yes, really,” he grinned. “listen, i’m not going to hold you here. you’re a victim, you don’t deserve to keep reliving this. you need to go home, get some rest.”

there was still that fire in you, churning and hissing within your throat, reminding you not to ignore it. you never did. in your practices, you always bended to the will of your fire. every invocation, every motion, was deliberate. it all came through you. you didn’t adhere to the rules of everyone else who believed like you did; you belonged to no wiccan circle, no congregation. you just made your way in the world, a ritualist by nature, working with this life and world while understanding your diversion from it. you let your selves be your guide- every version of you that has lived wisely for your benefit. 

thinking of what you are, and what you’ll become now you’ve met fox mulder, the flames licked your tongue, making you honest again. “i’m scared to leave. i… i don’t want them to come for me.”

fox’s comforting grin fell. he saw how you made yourself small in the chair, and he wished he could switch places. in an instant, he’d be the one interrogated, judged, the one seeing guts and blood when he closed his eyes. he couldn’t let that be what you turned into.

“i can bring you. i can get you security, protective custody, anything you need. i’ll protect you myself if i have to,” fox swore, “i won’t let them get to you, okay?”

a sad little laugh bubbled in your throat, and you reached for the hand that rested on the computer mouse. you adored the feeling of his tired skin beneath yours so sensitive. “i guess i don’t really know what’ll feel safe just yet.”

“then let me take you home, at least,” fox offered. “i do live next door.”

“you do.”

you stood up, feeling a bit achy in the knees. fox offered you his arm and you wrapped your palm around it gratefully. you watched him motion across the station to the pretty redhead you’d met in cuffs, who nodded softly. his partner. there was a smart look in her eye, and you knew she had the answers- to what, you couldn’t be sure, but she held a truth within her. it glowed golden against the pink of her skin.

the agent ushered you to a small car outside the station, opening the passenger side for you to slide in. you giggled at his old-fashioned ways, enamored by how he shed his suit jacket and laid it across your nearly bare legs in the car. “so you don’t get cold,” he explained, but you couldn’t care less about why.

the drive was silent. fox went slowly, although you had the feeling he tended to speed. his hand rested on the gear shift out of baseless habit, even though the car was automatic. he was tense, anxious, aware; the muscle at the curve of his jaw clenched and unclenched like it was keeping time, and a stubborn slice of hair kept falling against his forehead no matter how many times he blew it away. you admired him from your side of the car, seeing how traffic lights reflected in his eyes. all it took was for fox to deal a soft glance your way, with just a slight tilt of the head, for you to feel yourself in this car before, within this exact moment some other lateral time. a second wave of goosebumps riddled your body. 

show me, you begged in silence, willing to be heard by whatever force was showing you new versions of the man behind the wheel. show me who he is. show me who he is to me. 

a sudden burst of rain smacked against the windshield of the car, causing both of you to jump. there was no storm following- it was as if a squall came down, just momentarily, to rinse the car. when you blinked, you saw fox driving a first-edition ford in a tweed coat and flat cap, a cigarette bobbing between his lips as he asked you about your day; then, he was jostling atop a cart, hands on worn horse reigns, singing some folk song you’d never heard. another blink revealed him as a boy, holding your juvenile hand and speaking middle french as he passed you a flower, with that same concentrated head tilt and gaze as all the other visions. you’d been here so many times, protected by him, going towards a life with him. you knew he felt it, too, because the beat of his heart was loud enough to hear how it synced with yours. not a piece of you both was out of time, now that the world had removed its wedge. you rested your hand atop his on the gear shift, and the muscle in his mouth loosened. 

when fox pulled up to your building, you waited for him to come around and let you out with a teasing smile. he took your hand gingerly and led you down the sidewalk. he helped you through your building’s door, up the stairs, and he swiped the keyring from your shaking hands and unlocked your apartment for you. the familiar smell of cinnamon air freshener eased your nerves as you switched on the lights, and you saw fox get a glimpse of your life for the first time. he smiled at your home where you lived in the same room, on the same floor, in the same layout one building away, as him. your living room window looked like his. your television was in the same place. you had far more books, and your desk was littered with drawings, but everything was reminiscent of his apartment. and you saw his home now as you looked around, like you had three-dimensional lenses on- you in the blue film, and him in the red. he had no trouble finding the sink and filling a cup for you while you drifted to the couch and sat down. after having time to settle, your body ached. 

“i can't believe this,” was all he could say. 

you took the glass from him and sipped it greedily, falling out of shock and into need. you patted the cushion beside you, and he took a seat.

“you’re familiar with past lives, right?”

“well, yeah,” he confirmed, “i know different theories and cultural views of reincarnation. it's an interesting concept, to be born again but always the same, an amalgamation of the people you were before.”

“i think so, too.”

“but you’re wiccan, so you know all about that already, right?”

“well, i think you should know that things for me are different, fox. i mean, i tell people i’m wiccan, so they call me a witch, and i go with that. i guess i’m spooky to other people. i lean into it because it does them less harm to simplify me and me less harm to just live how i want in private. if i could create a whole new kind of practice, i would, but sometimes its easier to just let people see you how they do and move along,” you elucidated. “what you might think wiccans believe isn’t always what i believe, y’know? it’s just the closest label. works better than deist or freak or whatever. and being here with you, and all these visions, these memories i’m having… i don’t really know what i’m getting at. this is all to say that yes, i believe in past lives, and i’m not so much wiccan as i am just myself.”

“i get it. you follow your own rules. you have an instinct, just something that kind of… burns in you, right?” 

all the words he could’ve used, and he chose burn. because love burns, pain burns, life burns. this entire night has burned you. and he’s burned, too, branded with the belief you share.

“yeah.”

“so, did you know me in your version of past lives, then?” the agent inquired, bumping your knee with his knuckles playfully.

“i know i did, because i asked the world to show you to me, and now i see every version of you. four, maybe five of you, in the same exact moment. you don’t change. and you’re always with me, always a force. this gentle, ferocious thing, keeping me to yourself. and i think in each one, i love you.”

fox’s brain was swimming in confusion while his body buzzed with want. distractedly, he wondered, “how can something be gentle and ferocious?”

softly, you recited, “it’s astounding the first time you realize that a stranger has a body. the realization that he has a body makes him a stranger. it means you have a body, too. you will live with this forever, and it will spell out the language of your life.”

fox beamed, “if beale street could talk. you are well read.”

you set the glass of water down on the coffee table that looked just like his, and you said, “i know you, fox. not in this life yet, but i’ve known you in every one before. coincidences aren’t just coincidences.”

“i never thought so,” the agent nodded thoughtfully. you couldn’t tell what was in his head this time, and you wanted so badly to know. when he did reveal a question, you didn’t expect it. “what was the part of that prayer you said for me earlier? something about the universe?” 

quietly, you recanted: “as i look to the skies with wonder at the immensity of the universe, i know i am blessed beyond measure to live all the days of my life in the bountiful house of gaia.”

fox’s face burst into a wild smile, one that used every tooth he had. he thought of how his entire life, he looked up to the stars, worshiped them; hoping they’d be benevolent enough to bring his sister back, to save his life, to make all of his pain worthwhile. and there they were, divine within your oldest prayer, the very same prayer that guided him from the church in your direction in the first place. you could believe it was the earth, or the spirits you confided in all you liked, but to him the stars had made it all possible. maybe he was a witch in his own way, too, if he played by your rules. 

fox sat in silence with you for a while, refilling your glass while you collected your nerves. the man offered to patch a few of your cuts just so he could pick apart the details of your life in the apartment. with the cover of looking for a first aid kit, he flipped through your books, searching for your copy of james baldwin. he admired your records, finding music he’s loved for years and some he’s never heard before. he studied your little jars of herbs that coexisted alongside tylenol bottles. he saw the parts of your window that you colored with magic marker, because of how you longed for true stained glass. he frowned, thinking what a shame it was those bastards destroyed the art you’d gone to admire tonight. 

as he looked, he learned again what it is like to feel your presence, to be surrounded by you. he felt a sudden gap mending in the space within him, and he didn’t need magic to know why. falling in love was magical enough. 

you spent some time allowing fox to nurse your bumps and bruises (once he stopped fake-looking for the first aid kit), and admired how he childishly placed bandaids all over your arms and legs as if they’d heal all. it was more about letting him care for you, and feeling his hands in places you’d only hoped they’d touched before. he hummed softly to himself all the while, and you were a puddle by the time he finished; when you were the center of his focus, he was nothing but a big sap, muttering soft praises and showering you with smiles. you couldn’t believe it took you so long to find him, or rather that the world took so long to bring you his way. you had so much to make up for now.

when it was time for him to go, you followed him to the door like a puppy. you didn’t feel the discomfort anymore, or the fear of your death. you only felt the doting hands of karma, proving to you the night was simply a means to a much greater end. (un)coincidentally, karma’s hands felt just like his. 

fox leaned in your doorway, his tie undone and his authority stripped. “i’ll come by to check on you in the morning,” he assured. 

“i’ll be here.”

“where do you work?” fox asked, and when your lips melted into a helpless grin, he pushed, “come on, where?”

“i’m a receptionist at the national archives.” 

the believer before you fell to the mercy of his faith, picturing the building on the same street as his job. he imagined how many times you must have walked past him to go to work, all those days spent believing in a love he was missing. his ageless eyes folded on themselves with disbelief, and his laugh rattled deep in his chest.

“jesus. are you sure you’re not something else? a genie, a spirit? an angel?” 

“nope. just a witch. and a bad one, at that.”

you pushed onto your tip-toes and pressed a soft kiss to his cheek, finding his scruff so familiar to your lips. he sighed softly at the touch of your hands, feeling embers sparking in their wake. 

like it was a secret, he murmured, “i have one more question.”

“hm?”

“why do you choose me? if you’ve lived all these lives, why me?”

you settled back onto your heels and smiled. your palm rested against his jaw as you replied, “you know, i don’t think i ever had a choice.”

he wanted to kiss you, but you both know he’s too much of a gentleman. so he only gazed at you for a while, pressing your hand flush to his face, before letting it fall and stepping into the hallway. and as you watched him leave, you imagined every time he’d come back to save you, to love you, to tilt his head and realign himself as the lover you’ve kept for lifetimes.

“you know where to find me,” you called after the man, and he looked over his shoulder with enough love to shatter the sky.

“i guess i always do, don’t i?”

✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩ ✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩ ✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°✩ ✮ ⋆ ˚｡𖦹 ⋆｡°

prayer altered for story, sourced from this website

quote used from novel if beale street could talk by james baldwin

[dino-cattivo]

Pray for me, cos I won't pray for you

My fic for the @the-centennial-husbands-bigbang!

The amazing art for this fic was done by @jeniidrawsshit and oh my god I love it so so much. It is just so amazing.

LINK TO THE ART!!! GO CHECK IT OUT!!

Pairing: Hob/Dream

Rating: mature

Word Count: 40,657

Tags: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Happy Ending, Eventual Happy Ending, Blood, Canon-Typical Violence, gore like the dinner episode, The Corinthian is His Own Warning (The Sandman), Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Attempted Sexual Assault, Blood and Injury, Alternate Universe - Mob, Organized Crime, Hob joins the mafia, Self Confidence Issues, Hob Gadling Loves Dream of the Endless | Morpheus, POV Hob Gadling, Hob Gadling Needs A Hug, Misunderstandings

Summery: After their fight in 1889 Hob falls in with a bad crowd thanks to a boy that reminds him of Robyn. He tries to stop his descent into crime not wanting to be reduced to being nothing more than a murderer again. But eh fails. Compared to all the live he ends helping to guard a basement is tame. If only Corinthian, the right hand man of his employer, would stop flirting with him despite being turned down multiple times already.

Chapter 1 under the cut. Will repost the next chapters as reblog because of word limit.

~1889~

“You knew Lady Johanna. You know, Lushing Lou. You know everyone, don't you?” Hob asked in wonder. He may not know who or rather what his stranger was, but he could never help but be amazed by everything he could do. Sometimes when he laid awake, unable to catch sleep, he came up with the wildest theories about the man. He imagines him being a vampire, a fae, and even considered an old god from Greece. But he would never know, as his stranger never revealed anything about himself, not even his name. 

It felt unfair in a way. Him knowing everything about Hob, while Hob got nothing. It had crossed his mind to be petty, to keep things to himself, go against their deal in a way. But Hob couldn’t stop himself from telling the man whatever he could when they saw each other, eager to be able to share.  

“I saw her again, you know.”

“Who? Lady Johanna?” Worry flared up. He knew his stranger was fine, sitting across the table from him. He also knew the man was strong enough to protect himself. But he couldn’t help wanting to be there, to protect, to keep his stranger safe, even at the cost of his own freedom.

“She undertook a task for me and succeeded admirably, I might add.”

Jealousy, burning hot, filling his veins. He tried to tamper it down, to net let it get to him, but he couldn’t help himself. All the time he had wanted nothing more than to get close to his stranger, to prove his worth, and now he had offered that chance to someone else. He had chosen someone who had hunted them down and tried to do harm instead of someone he shared centuries of friendship with.

It hurt. 

Although, could he hold it against his stranger? The man knew Hob for so long, knew what he has done, knew all his failures during his long life. So it was no wonder he didn’t trust Hob enough to ask him for a favor. His voice was filled with self-loathing as he spoke. “That might be the only thing I've learned after 500 years. People are almost always better than you think they are. Not me, though. Still the same as ever.”

“I think perhaps you've changed.” Hob’s heart started beating faster at the other’s words. Did he really think so? Hob wished it was true. He wants to change, to be good, worthy of his stranger.

“Well, I may have learned a bit from my mistakes. But, uh… doesn't seem to stop me from making them. I think it's you that's changed.”

“How so?”

Hob should shut up now and be content with what he had, seeing the man he had fallen for every hundred years. He should not press the issue, no matter how desperate he was to be acknowledged by the other. But Hob had never been smart when it came to things he desired.

“I think I know why we still meet here, century after century. It's not because you want to see whether or not I'm ready to seek death. I don't think I'll ever seek death. By now, you know that about me. So, I think you're here for something else.”

“And what might that be?” His stranger looked curious at that. Hob liked the look as it meant he had done something to surprise the man.

“Friendship. I think you're lonely.” And in true Hob fashion, he managed to put his foot in his mouth. He knew the moment he had spoken, he had made a mistake. It was the truth, but the wording was just unfortunate and way too blunt. And not at all how he had planned to breach the topic.

“You dare…”

“No, look, I'm not saying–,” Hob tried to backpedal, but it was too late. “You… dare suggest one such as I might need your companionship.”

“Yes. Yes, I do.”

Maybe despite Hob’s foolish approach, there was a chance all of this still had a good outcome, and they would get closer. “Then I shall take my leave of you and prove you wrong.” Or maybe not. Hob sprang up from his chair and chased after his stranger as the man strode out of the tavern. The man couldn’t do this. If he wanted or not, they were friends. You didn’t just storm off and leave your friends behind.

“I'll tell you what, I'll be here in 100 years' time. If you're here then, too, it'll be because we're friends. No other reason, right?” He was met by silence as his stranger didn’t seem fit to answer and just disappeared. 

“Fսck.” 

~1897~

He was pissed, absolutely livid. Who did he think he was? He had no right to speak to Hob like this, no matter how powerful he was. That was not how things worked. You couldn’t be an asshole like that and expect people to stick around. Hob didn’t need him. They saw each other only every hundredth years, and even then the stranger often didn’t have time for Hob and fucked off with someone else. So what if Shakespeare was famous now? Hob would still have been better company back then. No, he didn’t need the man. He would make new friends. Better ones.

~1936~

Okay, so maybe mistakes had been made and Hob should have chosen his words more carefully. That was on him. His stranger still shouldn’t have exploded like this and should rather have tried to talk things out like a grown up, but still – Hob hadn’t been entirely blameless in the situation.

When they saw each other the next time he would have to apologize and maybe then they could laugh together about the stupid fight. Or well, Hob had never seen his stranger laugh, couldn’t even imagine it. He would settle for a smirk then.

~1983~

Anxiety was settled deep in his chest. What if his stranger proved him wrong. What if he didn’t show, determined to not give in. Hob had no way of finding him. He didn’t even know who he was looking for. What would Hob even do? Nothing besides showing up in the White Horse every hundred years and praying at some point his stranger would forgive him and come for him. 

Once more, he felt powerless in their relationship. It was the whole reason why he had even started the fight, wanting to know more, anything about his stranger. He didn’t want to be on equal footing, knowing it would never be, but he wanted something that was his. He didn’t want to be just another amusement the man had, but to mean at least something to the other. 

Tears sprung to his eyes as he hit his desk in frustration. It was unfair. The stranger meant too much to him, was such a big part of his life, and Hob didn’t even know if he was the only immortal he kept. Maybe Shakespeare was out there under a new name, living his best life and meeting his stranger more often than every hundredth years. And there was nothing Hob could do about it, no way for him to even find out.

Knowing he wouldn’t be able to concentrate on any more work, he gathered his documents and put them in a briefcase before leaving the empty office and making his way through the dark street. They were in the progress of having the gas street-lamps replaced by electrical once, but it was slow progress. And during it many streets stayed dark, since repairing gaslights when they were about to be replaced was a waste of resources according to the major. Hob didn’t care too much, he didn’t fear the dark.

He should have.

A dark figure stepped in front of him, barely noticeable in the moonlight. Turning around to run, he saw another figure blocking the other exit of the street and walking towards Hob. A flash of metal in the dark, a weapon. Hob swallowed, not because he was scared, he had survived much worse, but because it spelled trouble, and he couldn’t risk anyone finding out he was immortal. Not with times changing and hiding who he was becoming more and more difficult.

“Your money or your life,” Hob had to suppress a snort at the nasal voice. Ah, criminals, always the same no matter how many centuries passed. He remembered the time well, when he was in the other's position, stopping the carriages of rich folks and demanding the valuables. He had used the exact same words. Although, he guessed there was no much need for flair when it came to such simple matters.

“Alright, I will give you what I have. Please don’t hurt me,” Hob held up his hands, talking calm and trying not to provoke them. He couldn’t die, sure, but being stabbed hurt like a freaking bitch. Hob would rather part with some cash he had on hand and his watch. Nothing holding real value to him, and easy enough to replace. 

So very slowly and telegraphing his movement clearly, he reached inside his coat and pulled out his wallet, holding it out until it was snatched from his fingers. Next was his watch that got the same treatment. And still Hob was well-behaved, not struggling, calm and cooperating. He gave no reason for the situation to escalate, giving his robbers all chances to just leave now with their loot.

Which was why Hob was so surprised when pain exploded at the side of his head. He stumbled, his knee hitting the pavement, his palm getting scratched as he caught himself. Blinking, he tried to lift the haze from his thoughts as he looked up at the two shapes hovering above him. 

It was only instincts, honed through centuries with conflicts, that saved him, his head ducking automatically as he heard the swish of metal through the air. But just because the knife didn't slash his face didn't mean he was safe, as he was not as fortunate in avoiding the kick to his side. He cried out as pain exploded in his ribs. Every fiber of his being wanted him to curl up and protect his soft belly, but he forced down this instinct with gritted teeth. 

No, if you wanted to survive, you had to fight with everything you got. Using the momentum of the kick, he stumbled back to his feet, and got some distance between himself and the attackers. Despite the throbbing in his head, he now could see them more clearly, that was not the face of someone just messing around. No, they wore big smiles, and were enjoying his pain. They wouldn't stop. At least not on their own. 

One of them, heavy dark coat, spindly frame, soon ran towards Hob, knife in hand. Amateur movements. Hob stepped forward, getting close, deflected the blade by smacking the other's arm. His knee meets the other's stomach, sending him down. Before he could make sure he stayed down the other man, this one smaller but wider, jumped on him, and they tumbled to the ground.

That was fine. Hob knew how to wrestle and had the other in a chokehold in seconds. Still two against one, but he kicked out the legs of the man running towards him to tear him off his friend.

The body was suddenly in free-fall, arms whirling trying to get back balance. 

Then a sickening crunch and Hob froze.  

He had heard it often during his lifetime. He had sworn he would no longer be the cause of it. 

Looking over, he didn't need to see the neck bend in an awkward position to know the man was gone. 

Hob had killed him. He hadn't meant to, it had been an accident. But he had killed someone. 

After all the lifetime he had lead and all the killing and dying he had done, he had wanted to be done with it. He just wanted to live in peace and do let others do the same. But now he had ripped someone else out of their life. How could he live with himself knowing what he had just done. 

“Chris,” the man, Hob was still entangled on the ground with, cried out and struggled to free himself. Hob helped him as best as he could now that he was no longer in danger of being attacked. 

Getting up himself, he saw the man kneeling next to the body crying, shaking it and begging for Chris to open his eyes. The man didn’t. They never did. Once someone was gone, there was nothing you can do, no matter how you cried out to your stranger to spare them. 

Suddenly the man got up, swinging at Hob, but in his grief it had become uncoordinated and Hob easily stopped the punch. 

“You murderer! You killed him!”

He hadn’t meant to. And it wouldn’t have happened if they hadn’t attacked him. But pointing that out wouldn’t help, as the man would not listen to reason. He wanted someone to be angry at, to blame, to lessen his own guilt. And Hob was the perfect target. Hob stopped the other punch and just held on as the man cried. It was the least Hob could do.

There was the sound of footsteps in the distance, spooking the man, and he ripped himself free and started stumbling away. Hob didn’t stop him, just sitting down on the ground next to the cooling body and waited. He should probably call the police, but he couldn’t bring himself to move, so he just waited. How long he didn’t know, but at some point steps came closer and when he looked up Hob could see men in uniform entering the alley. The police has arrived. 

Hob didn’t resist when he was dragged up and cold iron snapped around his wrist. Neither when he was pulled away. Everything was a blur. He didn’t remember how they made it to the station, just that he found himself in a chair, an officer sitting on the other side of the desk staring him down.

He was asked questions he can’t answer, the full name of the victim, their relationship and most of all why he did it. All Hob can say is, it was an accident, I didn’t mean to, they attacked me first, I just tried to defend myself, then he fell. Over and over, he repeats it like a mantra. Something to hang on when everyone wants to make him believe he did it on purpose. When their words make him question himself. 

I didn’t mean to. It was an accident. I was just defending myself.

He didn’t know how much time has passed, there was no clock in the room nor window. His voice was rough and black spots dance on the edge of his vision, they hadn’t bothered giving him a glass of water. The blood in his hair from the first swing he took was dry and flaking off every time he shakes his head in denial. His ribs throb with every breath.

He was about to just nod, accept whatever they said if it meant he will be thrown into a cell where he could lay down and close his eyes. It would ruin his life, but wouldn’t that be right after what he had done? A few years of suffering was the least he deserved. Especially since he unlike others had the option to start anew after faking his death.

His downward spiral was stopped by a man bargain in, under loud protests of some officers. The man’s briefcase hit the desk hard, and Hob flinched back at the loud noise.

“Don’t say anything,” sharp blue eyes drilled into Hob’s making him cower at the imposing figure in front of him. The man commanded respect, not because of the nice suit he was wearing or the expensive jewelry or because he was even taller than Hob, but in the way he held himself, his presence filling the whole room. 

So Hob shut his mouth. It was not like anyone was really listening to what he had to say anyway. And not speaking would be good for the scratching in his throat. His fate now would be decided if the new person was a friend or someone wanting to drag him down. Hob didn’t have the strength to fight anymore.

“You,” the man whirled on the officer, making him duck on instinct, only to puff up and try to make himself more imposing when he noticed. “Tell me how it comes that you had him in here for 8 hours and couldn’t even be bothered to give him a glass of water nor give him medical attention? Where are we? At the witch trials,” Hob flinched hard at the words, remembering the trials only too well. Back then he had broken as well, admitting to anything as long as it meant the pain would end. 

To his surprise, the stranger pushed his briefcase further on the desk, blocking Hob’s slumped form from view and gave him at least a bit of privacy as he fought with his demons.

“He killed a man! What do you expect? A fluffed up pillow and a three-course meal?”

“Human decency!” The officer was now absolutely cowering under the pressure, despite his best efforts. “Or are you that desperate you couldn’t take the 10 minutes to have him checked over? Maybe because you know you don’t have a case?”

“Bullshit! I know you love to put your nose where it doesn’t belong, Mr. Henderson. He killed the guy. We found him next to the corpse, and he admitted it was him who made the deceased fall.”

“And wasn’t he also quite persistence that the deceased and another man were the once attacking him, and he was just defending himself? Or are you just going to ignore that? So I suggest instead of harassing the victim, you should rather be out there looking for the second attacker.”

And the officer, despite his complaints and grumbling, got up and left the room. There was no way to know if he was really searching for the other attacker, and if there was even a chance to find the man with how little information Hob had been able to give, but getting a breather was enough for Hob.

His head laid on the desk, the cold helping against his headache, and he just rested his eyes for a moment. He heard movement but ignored Mr. Henderson for now. Or at least he tried to, but the man kneeled down next to Hob’s chair and his hand laid on Hob’s knee. 

Blinking his eyes back open was an effort, but Hob managed and looked down at the concerned eyes looking up at him.

“Mr. Gadling, I wish could say it will be alright, but your situation doesn’t look good. But rest assured, I will do anything in my power to get you out of this.”

“I don’t think I have the money to pay your commission,” Hob was not poor. But the last years after he had fought with his friend, he had let himself go. Gambling, and throwing money at unnecessary luxuries just because he could. When he had pulled his head out of his ass, he had already spent most of his fortune and was now living like the middle class. Not bad, but not enough to pay a man wearing jewelry that could feed a family for at least a year.

“Don’t worry about money. Just focus on getting through this.”

Hob snorted, so either once he was out the man would make demands to be paid back another way, forcing Hob into his servitude, or he was just plain stupid. Saying that straight to the man’s face was not the best idea, but the man just laughed.

“Personally, I see myself as someone just trying to do the right thing, reforming the misdeeds in the justice system.”

So, delusional. But Hob could work with that. And having a delusional lawyer was better than not having one at all, so accepting the help would be best.

“The biggest problem is all we have to confirm your story is your word. Even if the police showed an ounce of competence and finds the other robber, he will tell his own story.” Hob knew all that. He didn’t know why the other even bothered, since there was no way he would get out of here. Not with everyone in the station being hellbent on making sure he went to prison. But at least he got to go to a holding cell for now and take a nap until Mr. Henderson would return the next day. 

And return he did with a big smile on his face. The police had not found the other robber, but they had found a woman hanging around the alleyway, and with a bit of pressure she had admitted to seeing the whole thing backing up Hob’s story. The officers complained and tried to poke holes in his defense, but in the end they had no other option but to accept that his actions had been to defend his own life. 

Things dragged on, Hob being pushed from one cell to the other as people discussed his fate. Mr. Henderson, please call me Edward, was there every step of the way and the only reason why Hob didn’t fell apart. 

Still, Hob couldn’t believe it when the judge finally spoke the words not guilty, and he was stepping into the sun. Till the last moment he had waited for the second shoe to drop, for someone to jump out and present new evidence sending him to jail.

Turning to Edward standing beside him, smiling brightly, he couldn’t help himself, but pulling the man into his arms and thanking him under tears. The man had been there for him, like a true friend, and if he ever needed it, Hob would be there for him in return.

He had lost his stranger, but he was not alone. There were good people out there, just waiting for him. All Hobs had to do was open his heart and accept them. 

With this being over, Hob could move on with his life. Things finally looked up. Or they did until he found out he had no longer a job because of his long absence and his old boss was unwilling to hire a killer despite Hob being proclaimed not guilty. Hob didn’t understand it, but he was unwilling to start a fight. He could find someplace else. Only words of his case had spread through the whole city, and no one was willing to hire him. And without a job there was no money which meant he would be unable to pay his upcoming rent.

But nothing he tried worked. The only positions willing to hire him wouldn’t even make a dent in his rent, even if he had three jobs. And with the housing shortage, there was no place else he could live that would be cheaper. He could move, somewhere no one knew him. But he couldn’t bring himself to leave London. This was his home, where his only friend lived. And he had to be here in a few years to be at the White Horse in case his stranger returned. 

He could ask Edward for help, but he didn’t want it to seem he was just after the other's money. Especially with Edwards business taking a major hit after a person he was defending was proven guilty. Hob tried to help as best as he could behind closed doors but knew he couldn’t do more since it wouldn’t look good on Edward if he was seen with Hob. 

It was a major point of friction. Edward didn’t care about his reputation and had no trouble inviting Hob out for dinner or even hiring him. But Hob refusing frustrated him, especially when Hob even declined his money, despite Edward knowing how much Hob was struggling. He just wanted to support his best friend and being unable to do so and just having to watch how he made himself smaller and smaller, shrinking under all negative attention focused on him angered him.

Their love for each other made them want the best for each other. And it tore their friendship apart. They were unable to spend time together without a disagreement, and then their friendship ended in a big fight. 

And it was Hob fault. He always said the wrong thing, turning away the people he cared about. First his stranger now Edward. Maybe he was meant to be alone.

But the world didn’t stop for his emotional turmoil. The rent needed to be paid, now especially since there was no longer a friend who would have a place on their sofa for Hob to sleep on. And Hob really needed to keep a roof over his head. 

He was terrified of ending back on the street. He did it once, and it was the worst time of his life. Just a nightmare of pain, suffering, anger, blood, and a desperate fight for survival. He knew getting back up once you were so far down was almost impossible. He couldn’t let it get this far. Not if there was something he could do. Even if it means he had to let go of his pride.

The first time wasn’t planed. Was just walking, trying to clear his head and finding a way out. The window was open, everything else dark, and no car in the driveway. He knew it was wrong, he should be better than this. 

He climbed the fence and slipped through the window, heart beating fast as he listened for any sign of life inside the house. Nothing. Sneaking around, he grabbed anything of value. 

Ten minutes later he was out, pockets heavy, and on his way to the pawnshop. It was not enough to pay the rent but enough to satisfy his landlord getting another week before he would be kicked out. 

It made him think about how easy it had been. And how little effort had taken to get the money. And it was not as if he hadn’t tried other options. It was them, society, not giving him a choice. If they had just given him a job, he wouldn’t be in this position. It was their fault, not his. 

And it was not as if he had hurt anyone. A few valuables were gone. And? They could replace it, their house had been nice enough they could afford a small loss like that.

Yes. It was the least all of them deserved for letting him down like this. He would just take what he needed to survive. And it was only temporary until he was back on his feet. They all thought he was a murderer, a bit of stealing was nothing in comparison.

It became a routine, going on nightly strolls and returning with his pocket full. He was good at it. Always knew when someone was home or not, avoided being seen when he made his way inside, and didn’t spend a second longer inside than he had to.

No one had to know what Hob did. Well except, the pawnshop owner, but he didn’t say anything and just gave Hob a price much under the actual value of the items. Hob was fine with that. Paying hush money was better than being ratted out to the police. Especially since the police so far had no idea he even existed. There was always breaking and entering, and he chose his targets so far apart there was no connection. The cops had better things to do than chasing a criminal that didn’t cause real harm. And Hob liked things that way. He had managed to avoid prison once, he didn’t want to risk it, especially since this time there would be no Edward bailing him out.

His rent was paid, he had food in his belly and a new coat. Life was good. Or it should be. There was still the guilt nagging at him that all of this wasn’t his. That he had stolen it and it was wrong. But with every failed attempt to find another source of income, he fell deeper into his ways. It was just too easy. Until weeks passed by without him searching for a legitimate job. 

~1989~

He started hating the man he was becoming. Or rather, he was returning to. He had thought he had become better, had changed. But now he was back at square one. Just a lowlife surviving by harming others. He didn’t want to be like this.

But there was still hope. One last chance to turn things around. Hob may not have the best moral compass – if he had any at all- but his stranger always knew right from wrong. Even before society or law. It had taken him to tell Hob for Hob to realize slavery was wrong. Today it was unthinkable, but back then it has just been how things were. And even then his stranger had known it was wrong. Hob just had to tell him, and his stranger would set him right and correct Hob’s course for the next 100 years.

Yes, all Hob had to do was meet his friend and things would be okay. So he drove to the White Horse in a car he had stolen, full of excitement in the prospect of the weight leaving his chest. He would do better, become good. To get his stranger approval.

But the longer he sat there, alone, the worse he felt. It looked like this was his stranger's answer. They were never and never would be friends. Hob was alone, on his own. There was no one who cared. No one who had any expectations, everyone had given up on him. Why should he even try? If there was no one to judge him, why not make things easy for himself?

Things escalate from there, as there is nothing holding Hob back. So what if the houses he breaks into now are not from some rich fucks but middle class as well? They had shunned him just as well. And their security was a lot laxer. Also, less to steal, but it was enough. And then there was someone home, but the house was way too good to pass up on. But it was okay, he would just be quiet. 

A good plan if not for the man of the house stepping out of his bed to get a glass of water just as Hob was clearing out their silver drawer. They looked at each other frozen, and Hob was glad for the hat and the scarf hiding most of his face. 

Before the other could too much than let out a shocked shout, Hob had jumped over the counter and tackled him to the ground, choking him until he lost conscious. When the wife appeared in the doorway, he was prepared, knocking her unconscious.

He used things found around the house to bind them to two chairs and gag them, before taking his time emptying their whole house. They would call the police anyway, Hob could at least make it worth it. And worth it, it was. He left the pawnshop with a big bundle of cash.

And if he spotted some rich folks taking a shortcut through a dark allay, well then it was their own fault, since they had begged for it. You couldn’t blame Hob for standing there with a knife demanding their valuables in a sick play on the situation that had started this whole thing. But other than his attackers back then, he was just after the money. Once he had what he wanted, he let his victims go unharmed. 

He didn’t kill. That was a line he would never cross again. And if he had to attack someone or render them unconscious, he did it with causing as little harm as possible. It was something which baffled the police and press alike, as they couldn’t decide if he was a monster or a gentleman thief. It was kinda amusing reading about people losing their mind trying to figure him out. Especially since it was that easy. He was just someone no longer following societies rules and just living by his own codex, doing whatever he pleased.

Even if this codex was completely screwed. Like right now, still blood on his knuckles from having to knock someone out who resisted, but being offended by a bunch of teens ganging up on a gangly little thing. It just strokes him wrong, seeing something like this. 

But it is not his problem. There is no need to get involved.

Or at least it wasn’t until the boy rose his head and looked straight at Hob. Dark brown eyes, with hair of the same color. But that was not what stopped Hob in his tracks. He looked just like Robyn. Well, not exactly, it was more the vibes he was giving up. But Hob couldn’t stop seeing his son laying there on the ground beaten and bloody, his tormentors surrounding him.

He moved before he really thought about it. 

His fist connected with the nose of the guy to the left. The bone crunched under the impact and the guy stumbled back, shouting in pain. That got the attention of the rest of his group, who instantly stepped in to avenge their friend. With no option to back out of this anymore, Hob just went with the flow and beat everyone getting into punching distance. They had the numbers, but they were untrained and rather stood in each other's way than taken advantage and overpowering Hob. Which leads to Hob standing between fallen bodies, breathing heavy and blood on his shirt but mostly unharmed beside a few bruises. 

Walking over to the fallen boy, he saw him flinch. Hob hadn’t meant to scare him, although the display of violence must have been frightening. But he didn’t feel comfortable leaving him sitting on the ground with unknown injuries, especially since his attackers would get up soon. 

He wanted to gain the boy's trust, but Hob had forgotten how to be comforting and soft. Hadn’t had need for it in years. Even for Edward, he had not managed to bring back that part of himself. Which was just as well because Edward liked his brash and direct way.

But now he tried, crouching down, holding out his hands and speaking softly. “It's okay. I took care of them,” well, he tried. He failed miserably, sounding more threatening than reassuring, but he had tried. How had he managed to deal with Robyn without frightening the child? He couldn’t remember. And wasn’t that sad? Not remembering this everyday life with his son, only holding some special memories close to his heart while the rest faded?

Knowing that his presence would only distress the boy more, he got up and turned to leave. He would just call the police to check things out, once he was far enough away. Only there was a tug on his pant leg and turning he saw the boy grasping the fabric with shaking fingers. The big teary eyes looking up at Hob broke his heart, and he couldn’t stop himself from leaning down again and pulling the boy into his arms. Crying and wailing filled the alley, but the boy clung to Hob desperately. 

Carrying him into his arm and towards Hob’s apartment, reminded Hob of the times Robyn had been unable to sleep and Hob had walked through the whole house with the child in his arm to keep him calm, while Elenore watched them with a smile. He had forgotten it until his actions pulled the memory back up.

Entering his building, he sat the boy on his sofa and retrieved his extensive med-kit. Being unable to die meant treating injuries yourself that would bring up questions, going to the hospital. He didn’t need much of it to treat the boy. The injuries had looked worse than they actually were. A bloody nose, bruising, scratched hands and knees, a gash close to his hairline that luckily didn’t need stitches, and a cracked wrist. 

Once the task was done, Hob looked at the boy awkwardly, not knowing what to do.

“You want tea?” You could never go wrong with tea. The boy nodded and Hob set to work, returning with two mugs of tea.

“Thank you,” the voice was shy and soft. But at least the shaking had stopped as the kid started to relax.

“Don’t worry about it,” Hob meant it. Neither the tea nor stepping in had been much trouble, and Hob had done it for his own piece of mind. There was no need t thank him.

Hob swirled the tea in his mug, not knowing what to say. Should he give the kid money for a taxi? Take him home? Offer him the sofa for tonight? Hob didn’t know. 

Luckily for him, the boy was not as incapable of social interaction as he was.

“My name is Georgie Baldwin. What about you.”

“Hob,” he didn’t give a last name. The less the boy knew, the better it was for him with the life Hob lived.

“Thank you for saving me, Hob,” the boy put down his empty mug, hugged Hob and then left the apartment before Hob could compose himself. He looked at the closed door not understanding what exactly had happened, but then he just shrugged. Another weird day in his weird life. No need to think deeper about it. It was not as if hew would see the boy ever again.

After cleaning up the medical equipment, he laid in bed, unable to sleep. 

The encounter had brought up memories of a happier time. It made him realize just how lonely he felt. There was a gnawing emptiness in his chest, where his heart once was. He wanted someone to be there for him, to greet him when he got home, to care if he made it home. He didn’t want t be alone anymore. But every time he tried he messed up and ended up back alone. It was better to not try, and be disappointed rather than to suffer.

But knowing that didn’t fill the emptiness in his chest and no matter how much he tried he didn’t find any rest. Which left him cranky and short temperate when he stomped to the door, mug with extra strong coffee in hand, to tell whoever was on the other side to fuck off. Throwing the door open, he came face to face with the kid from yesterday.

The door banged close, as Hob didn’t have the patience to deal with whatever bullshit this was. Instead, he took a big swing of his coffee, cursed as it burned his tongue, and debated if a nice fluffy omelet was worth the effort of actually making it. 

His doorbell chimed again.

Hadn’t he been clear enough in his dismissal? But no, when he opened the door, the boy was still standing there smiling at him. What a prick. But not stupid, as he held out a bag that smelled heavenly of backed goods as bribery. 

With his stomach grumbling, Hob admitted defeat and took the bag, leaving the door open as he stepped inside. The boy had already been here, it wouldn’t do any harm to let him in. But Hob was not in the mood to play good host right now and didn’t offer any tea or coffee. Ripping open the bag, he found muffins and chocolate croissants. All things considered, it was a good bribe.

Humming happily, he dug in as the boy sat down watching him carefully. 

“So what so you want kid?” 

“It’s Georgie,” the way the kid pouted was kinda cute. He must have old ladies want to feed him all over town. “I want you to teach me how to fight.” Hob choked on the bit of croissant. He couldn’t say if it was his immortality or Georgie slapping his back that prevented him from entering the sunless lands. Whipping tears out of his eyes, he looked at the kid as if he had lost his mind.

“Are you completely crazy? Why would you ask me?”

 “The way you fought was amazing. Please, I want to be able to do it too.”

“Hard pass. Why the heck should I teach a brat?”

“I can pay you,” the kid dove for his pocket and placed a stack of bills on the table. It was no small amount. So, a rich brat. Well, it was not as Hob really needed money with how well his business was going. And he would rather not involve the kid by accident. If he went down for his actions it was one thing but dragging a kid down with him was completely different. And if he gave in now, he just knew the kid would one day rob houses side by side with him.

“Pass. Go home kid. You are young and have a bright life ahead of you. There is no need to get involved with the likes of me.”

“But what if they come back?! I need to be able to defend myself,” Hob just groaned as this was just playing unfair. Especially since it was a fair point. The bullies had found him once, and there was no guarantee they wouldn’t do worse when Hob was not close by to step in. It was just unfair. Hob was not responsible for the kid, could barely remember his name. But he had made it his responsibility when he stepped in. The least he could do was see things through now.

“Okay fine. I will teach you self-defense. Nothing more. And you will stay out of my business.”

“Deal,” the kid smiled brightly as he held out his hand for Hob to shake. Knowing that one day he would regret this Hob took the offered hand.

[crimsonfic]

Sanemi Shinazugawa Fanfiction- Turbulence

Foreign Musician Y/N

Subjects: Angst, Fluff, Smut, Violence, Gore, Death, Blood, Vulgar language, Mature Language & Content, other sensitive subjects

?? Chapters

Chapter 1

Chapter includes: Smut, Mature Language

You sat perfectly still as you watched your band mates set up their instruments. Laughing and talking as they usually did. You let out a deep sigh.

"What's wrong y/n?" Frank asked you as he cleaned his saxophone.

"Nothing." It's not that something was wrong, you were just bored. You loved singing, you loved doing this every night, but when it was over you were bored. Almost depressingly. You had no other friends, no one to talk to, no one to touch. As much as you loved your friends, all they did after was drink, smoke, or play cards. You were okay with spending time with them but you didn't drink heavy the way they did, the smell of smoke gave you a headache, and cards were getting old. Already you knew the way your night was going to go and you hated it.

Being in Japan was mind blowing, you had huge culture shock at how reserved the society was in general. You all got so many shocked stares and heard plenty hushed whispers when you got here. Whether it was your skin or the way you dressed, you didn't know but it never stopped. It didn't bother you. It wasn't much different from home. In fact, it was much more bearable than it was at home.

"She's just mad." Brass chimed in from where he stood with his bass.

You looked at him waiting to hear what he was going to say. "She's mad cause she needs to get laid. It's been what? 8 months?" He snickered sending you a look to which you playfully rolled your eyes. He wasn't wrong, but you weren't mad.

"Why don't you come with us tonight? We were invited to a special house." Muddy wiggled his eyebrows suggestively from where he stood inspecting his guitar.

"Special house?" You asked. "Like a brothel?"

"Oh, pass." You replied.

"You too good for us now?" Frank smiled.

"No, I think I'll just walk around tonight though. I want y'all to tell me all about it when y'all get back though." You returned the smile.

"Okay. Ima tell ya everythang. How it taste, what it look like, how it feel." Brass laughed.

"You're gross man." Frank said.

Brass feigned hurt by putting his hand over his heart and gasping.

You shook your head at their playful banter before turning your head up to the sky. You could hardly see the stars in the sky with how brightly lit the area was.

The entertainment district was the best place you could perform to make money in Tokyo. People have told you that the sultry sound of your voice, the energy of the jazz, and how good looking you all were was the perfect combination. You were often tipped generously by people here, whether it's because something you played got them in the mood, or brightened an otherwise dead date, or because it was just something new for them.

You tried counting the stars until Muddy signaled he was ready for you to take your spot.

Walking to the front of the tiny platform you grabbed your all white feather boa, draping it carefully over your shoulders. At the front you stood on your barely noticeable mark. In your head you counted the music in with the tap of Brass's foot.

When Muddy came in with his trumpet, people came closer. The lively beat pulling them closer to the makeshift stage. As Frank joined in you let yourself sway to the beat.

Your cue approached and you let your voice ring out. Allowing your voice to project since you didn't have a microphone.

As time went on the crowd got livelier, your bandmates and only friends energy rose, your heart felt fulfilled. Music was all of your outlets. It was therapeutic.

Your eyes roamed the crowd, making connections; it helped with tips. Some faces were familiar, some people had begun to come here regularly to watch your performances. Some were new and one of them stuck out like a sore thumb. There was a huge man standing with his arms crossed. He didn't seem like anyone else here at all. He wore large beads around his neck and wrists and a wondrous look on his face as he stared straight ahead at you.

Next to him was another large man, he had white hair and a headband with large jewels on them. His large arms were nearly ripping out of his kimono.

Beside him stood another man. He also had white hair, it was thick and styled in an way that was almost wind blown. He was tall but not as noticeably as the other two. His chest was exposed, scars apparent on his muscular and defined pecs. His kimono was only loosely tied, and it was all black. You found yourself entranced by him as you stared. Before, while you were looking at the other two, his eyes were adverted, his head to the side as he seemed to be watching for something. Right now however, he seemed to sense that you were looking at him so when your eyes made it up to his face he was staring at you already. He wasn't close enough to be able to tell the color of them but from where you were you could tell they were unique. All three of theirs were actually.

You held his gaze, lightly smiling through your singing at being caught basically ogling this man. As long as you stared at him, he returned it. His eyes only left yours when you looked away at the man in front of you getting down on his knees with his hands clasped.

Oh no, not again. You thought.

Not breaking your melody you turn to look at Muddy who thought the situation was funny. The crinkle around his eyes gave it away. Of course he wouldn't be any help to you. You took a step back and continued your performance.

When this song ended you felt anxiety start creeping up.

Please don't make a scene, please don't make a scene.

Of course the universe wasn't on your side. You already knew this.

"Please marry me. Please. Please be mine." The man who had gotten down to plead asked, shaking his clasped hands in front of you.

You only gave a polite smile and slight bow before saying "sorry."

"Please? Please Miss, I love you. You make me feel alive."

Oh dear lord

"Please Miss. I'll give you whatever you desire." He pleaded more.

You were hoping someone would step in because you hated to do it yourself. Granted your approach didn't help much. You probably made it harder, but you couldn't bring yourself to be firm with these people.

"Please, get up off the floor honey." You gestured for him to rise. The tone of your voice enough to coax him to listen, his mouth open in awe.

"I can't marry you okay? But you come back and see me tomorrow night and maybe we can go on a date...?"

He nodded his head quickly. "Yes miss. Yes. I'll be here tomorrow night."

"Okay, see you tomorrow then." You winked at him and he audibly gasped.

"Yes. O-okay." He backed away from you slowly, bumping into people in the process, as he was too entranced to look away from you.

You gave him a little wave before turning away from him and walking over to Brass.

Your face said a thousand words.

"You can't keep going on dates with the people you try to let down easily." He laughed.

"I don't want to hurt their feelings."

"They're already hurt, they want to marry you woman. You're breaking their hearts anyway might as well do it swiftly."

"Well maybe if you helped me..."

"No can do, I like to see their reactions. He's still looking at you by the way." Brass told you before waving at the man you presume.

You groaned. He was right you do need to stop doing this but you had a hard time telling them no. You definitely didn't want to be married but you hated to break their hearts even though you never felt the same. Not even after the dates.

"I'll be your back up for the date tomorrow. I definitely want to see how he handles himself. He's like a lovesick puppy right now."

"Yeah yeah yeah. Okay." You answered.

"Well now that that's over you fellas ready to get our night started?" Muddy asked as he came over to you both, trumpet already tucked away into its case.

"Yeah." Frank called from his spot, as he tucked his sax away.

You stood quietly waiting for Brass to finish packing before you four headed home, recalling the vibes from tonight's performance. They were excited, probably more eager to get to their next destination. Back at the house, the way they dressed up and cleaned themselves was very indicative to what type of night they were going to have. You followed them out of the house you were staying in and walked with them to the house they were visiting. There was nowhere in particular you wanted to see tonight so you would go wherever your feet carried.

You waved goodbye to your friends as you watched them confidently stride in. Women at the door were already blushing and covering their giggles as they passed by. You rolled your eyes in good nature before turning to start your night of wandering.

Japan was so safe. Much better than the states could ever be. You would never be able to walk around a neighborhood freely like this. It could cost you your life. Here, you didn't have to look over your shoulder praying you weren't being followed, you didn't have to sit idle or silent when harassed. It was a breath of fresh air!

You received lots of stares as you walked around admiring the city.

It had gotten significantly louder as you turned on a street you never been on before. It was packed here. Something eventful must've been happening here, surely. You were so busy looking all around you, hoping to see something interesting when you noticed the most captivating thing all night.

That guy with stormy eyes. He was here. He and his friends still stood out amongst everyone else. The taller one with the white hair was talking to some older women who looked delighted to be so close to him.

The even taller man, with the large beaded jewelry stood by silently listening to their conversation but just a step back.

Stormy however was facing the opposite way completely. Arms folded over his chest as he appeared irritated but like he was looking for something. Much like earlier, it's like he sensed your gaze because just seconds after your eyes landed on him he turned his head to you. His slightly furrowed brows relaxed briefly as he held your gaze.

Like a moth to a flame, you were drawn to him.

"Can I help you?" He asked.

Your heart stopped.

Is that- is that really his voice?

It was butter smooth and deep.

So deep.

Very deep.

It was rich. Almost sensuous. And definitely soothing.

You would follow him anywhere if he beckoned you with his captivating baritone.

"Maybe." You smiled as you stepped closer after letting people cross between you.

He turned his body towards you, arm still crossed and his eyebrows now raised in question.

"I'm y/n, you are?" You held your hand out to him.

His eyes didn't leave your face, and he didn't move at all.

"What can I maybe help you with?" There was an edge to his voice. It didn't phase you however. In fact, it made you more intrigued by him.

"Sanemi." The large man spoke, slightly turning his head in your direction. It almost sounded like he was  warning him.

"Hi, I'm y/n." You turned your attention to his friend, holding your hand out to him now.

He took and very carefully shook it. "I'm Gyomei Himejima. You have a heavenly voice."

"Thank you Mr. Himejima." You smiled.

"You're welcome. I-"

"Did you need something or not?" Sanemi chimed in. "We're kind of busy."

"Whoa whoa whoa. What's going on over here?" The other white haired man spoke turning around to face you all. The older women were walking away.

"Tengen, this is y/n." Gyomei said said gesturing to you.

"Well hello, you're that flashy beautiful singer."

"I don't know about flashy, but I'll take beautiful." You smiled, a small laugh leaving you as you shook his hand.

"Definitely flashy. What can we do for you?"

You looked at Sanemi, a look of annoyance still on his face and smiled. He was so attractive.

"Actually. I just wanted to meet your friend over here. He caught my attention." You flirted so casually Tengen was awestruck. You were showcasing the most dazzling display of charms right now.

He looked at his comrade, then back to you. He couldn't believe someone as lovely as you would be interested in someone so rough like Sanemi. But he was all about romance. He'd help you out no problem.

"Oh, he is rather handsome once you look pass his rugged exterior and poor social skills."

"Watch it beef brain."

Tengen opened his arms in a told you so gesture."See what I mean?"

You couldn't help but laugh at this. You hadn't been around them for more than a minute and you could already see they bickered like this all the time.

"Sanemi has a lot of great qualities." Gyomei offered smiling.

"Oh I don't doubt that at all."

Your remark was delightful to Tengen. You had a mastery over words. You were so far out of Sanemi's league but Tengen was rooting for you anyway.

Sanemi on the other hand, unbeknownst to any of you was fighting back silly blushes. It's so childish to be affected in such a way. By a stranger no less. No matter how gorgeous he thought you were. He didn't have time for trivial pursuits.

"I'm busy. I-"

"You're not actually. Those sweet old ladies told me everything I needed to know. We're done for tonight, there's nothing we can do until tomorrow."

"What?" Sanemi practically snarled. "What do you mean we're done? There's-"

"Shh shh. Relax." Tengen cut him off. "Everything's fine, now don't keep the pretty lady waiting. Off you go." He gestured with his hands in a shooing motion for Sanemi to walk away with you.

Gyomei smiled and then politely bowed to you. "It was nice to meet you y/n. I look forward to seeing you again."

"Same to you Mr. Himejima." You bowed back.

As it turns out Sanemi didn't need to be told twice to move on. He put his hand in his pockets and began walking away.

You stood slightly lost on if you should follow. You wanted to but if he was walking away from you to actually get away that would be....awkward.

His deep voice called out once he was a few feet away from you. "You coming?"

A smile spread across your face as you took quick steps to close the distance between you.

"So, what should we do?"

"I'm hungry. I'm getting food." He said

"We're getting food then."

He didn't say anything else as he continued walking. Leaving you to fill the silence.

"Are you from around here?"

"No."

"Oh okay. Where do you live?"

"Why would I tell you that? You're a stranger."

"Hopefully not for long." You smiled at him even though he couldn't see you as he remained a step ahead of you.

He didn't respond, not even in his body language. You decided to just stay silent until you made it to your destination. Maybe you'll have a better gauge on how to get him to open up, when he's got food.

You made it to a large restaurant with many seats outside. It seemed to be a popular spot as it was almost full despite the time of night. You weren't really hungry but you didn't decline when he turned to look at you expectantly after he ordered his dishes.

"Do you come here often?"

"No."

"Okay. Do you live far from here?"

"Maybe."

"Okay. Are you enjoying your food?"

"I would be if you didn't ask so many questions."

"I'm sorry Mr....." you trailed off waiting for him to tell you his last name.

"Sanemi is fine." He answered

"He is." You smiled.

He ever so slightly paused. If you weren't watching him so closely you wouldn't have saw it.

"Are you..?"

"I am. Yes."

You were absolutely flirting with him and it made it easier for you if he knew that you were for sure.

He appeared pensive as he continued eating his food.

"Do you want me to stop?" You asked him. You wouldn't be able to promise him you'd stop but you would atleast be able to dial it back.

"I don't care."

"Good." You smiled. "So what brings you to this area?"

"Work."

"And now you're done, for tonight I mean."

"Apparently so."

"So, would you like to maybe get to know each other better?"

Sanemi stopped chewing his food and his eyes locked on yours.

5 seconds.

10 seconds.

15 seconds.

"No."

This did not phase you. His response did not throw off your advances.

"May I......offer some sort of....relief.....without you getting to know me?"

You worded your proposition differently. He didn't strike you as a man interested in dating. That was fine, you weren't either. You were however, interested in sleeping with him. Bedding him. Being bent over by him. All types of things flitted through your mind and you were ashamed of none.

It's been a long time. An even longer time since you've been attracted to anyone.

He was nothing short of tantalizing.

The scars on his handsome face, the scars on his exposed chest, his stormy eyes, his wind blown hair, his wide strong shoulders.

His brows furrowed just a little.

"No strings attached?"

"No strings."

For the first time he let his eyes rake over your body. His hurricane eyes trailed from your face down to your chest, stopping at your abdomen where the table had blocked off the rest of you.

"Okay."

It took work for you not to clap your hands together in excitement. There was nothing you could do about your smile though.

When he finished  his dish he pulled yours over in front him before he obliterated your forgotten ramen.

"Thanks." You said with a sheepish smile.

"Mhm." He grunted between slurping the noodles down.

Once he stood so did you. You followed behind his staggering form as he returned the dishes to the stall, watching the way his back rippled beneath his thin kimono.

"Come on." He said before he started in the direction opposite of which you came. You didn't need to be told, you were already planning on it.

"Are we going to your house?" You asked after some time walked in silence.

"No. Too far."

"Oh." You replied.

"I'm lodging near by, that's where we're going." He answered.

"Oh."

"Mhm." He answered.

After about 5 minutes he guided you into a nice and quaint establishment. A small older woman was standing behind the desk. She bowed and smiled to you both as you entered. You gave a smile back as you walked past her to the stairs.

Sanemi stopped and held his large hand out to you before ascending. You placed your hand in his before stepping up.

You'd be lying if you said the small contact didn't have your heart racing already.

At the top of the stairs he let go of your hand, leading you down the hall to his room.

He slid the door open and stepped aside gesturing you in.

Once the door closed behind you, you felt more comfortable. You brain shut off those small pestering thoughts of "what ifs". Now wasn't the time to question what he may think, or if you would see him again. He was willing to give you something you've been craving, something he lit back up inside you tonight like a wildfire, all from a simple glance.

You had to make this memorable. The memories would probably be all you had for atleast another 8 months.

Sanemi walked over to his futon after removing his shoes. His kimono was still tied securely at his waist despite the gaping opening at his chest. When he turned to face you he grabbed onto his knot.

You followed suit by taking off your heels. But you remained by the door, atleast 7 feet away from him.

"Well?" Sanemi said as he untied his kimono and let it hang open.

You smiled at the new view in front of you. He was chiseled to perfection. Strong, sturdy, and amazing to look at.

A small sigh left your mouth as you admired him.

You reached for your zipper behind you. Hands holding the corners ready to unzip your dress before you spoke.

"Do you have any rules for me?"

He seemed surprised that you asked, but quickly covered it with his neutral expression he'd been wearing most of the night.

"No kissing."

"Okay." You nodded, waiting for him to continue.

"Do you have rules for me?" He asked.

Now it was your turn to be surprised. You're never asked that, and usually you get more rules.

"No." You answered. Your voice gave nothing away.

"Really?" He mused.

"Yep."

"Huh. If you say so." He responded as he took his kimono off completely. Now standing in his tightly wrapped fundoshi you had to work to keep yourself from drooling.

This style of underwear had a way of being unexpectedly erotic. Much more appealing then the bland briefs commonly found in America. Maybe it was the fact that his hips were exposed, providing more evidence of just how strong he was.

A sound between a chuckle and scoff left his mouth. "You just gonna stand there and drool or what lady?"

You laughed in response but did unzip your dress. You didn't say anything else as you let your calf length dress drop to the floor before stepping out of it.

Sanemi's face visibly went through a series of expressions. First shock, then awe, then lust, then admiration before finally settling back on his neutral expression.

Now standing in your all black lingerie, accompanied by your sheer black thigh highs, you slowly closed the distance between you.

You wasted no time in dropping to your knees before him. Giving a light tug on his underwear, by sliding your finger under the side laying on his hip, you asked "could you take these off for me?"

The way you looked up at him, a small fire blazing behind your eyes almost contrasting the soft and sweet tone in which you asked, has his breath hitching in his throat.

You were dangerous.

A very dangerous woman.

So seductive, with a voice to match, he understood whole heartedly why strangers were begging you to marry them.

He granted your wish swiftly, pulling them loose and throwing them to the side.

You didn't let yourself ogle at his large size, not wanting to tease. The other reason being that you really wanted him in your mouth. He was both endowed and beautiful. You were half way expecting him to be scarred here too but he wasn't.

Very gently you lifted his member before enclosing him in the warmth of your mouth. There was no reason to drag this out with teasing touches.

The quick gasp that came from Sanemi only served as encouragement to keep surprising him. With him mostly covered by your mouth you pushed him further back into your throat as your lips grazed around him closer to the base. You want desperately for him to fully be inside your mouth despite how difficult it was. You were breathing through your nose and relaxing your throat, pushing forward until your nose touched him.

Then you sucked, letting your tongue rest on the underside of his shaft all the while sucking as you pulled back.

The way your mouth was tightly closed around him made him groan.

Fuck Sanemi thought. No one has ever tackled him this way. Always small licks, and little pecks to start, which is why he didn't enjoy it, usually diving right into sex, not wanting to even experience the disappointment that was supposed to be head. You however, oh you were a pleasant surprise.

He lowered his eyes to watch you as you worked. The constant suction on him, mixed with the warmth of your mouth, the slick of your saliva but the gentleness of your tongue had him seeing stars already. He watched as you continuously bobbed on him, taking him down your throat, and not once letting him slip out.

The longer he watched, the more he wished he would've sat down. You were making a mess on him and of him. It was difficult to hold himself up. He was stronger than this. He was no weakling. But his legs were trembling. He didn't know what to do with his hands either. He kept alternating between putting them behind his head, and on his hips. He didn't want to mess up your hair he didn't know if he should touch you or not.

God you were doing amazing. He's never been so blissfully conflicted before.

It didn't take long at all for him to cum down your throat. You didn't even flinch as you swallowed what he gave you. Only when you felt that he was done did you let him fall from your mouth.

To say Sanemi was shocked would be an understatement.

When you looked up at him you saw that he was frozen.

"You okay?" You ask quietly. He was pretty silent the whole time, had it not been for his body language you might have thought he didn't enjoy your performance.

He seemed to snap out of whatever reverie he was in and nodded his head, before clearing his throat and grunting a "uh huh." at you.

You smiled up at him before moving to stand up.

"I think I'll get going now." You said

His hand clamped around your wrist stopping you before you could turn away.

"Huh?" He asked. Despite the irritation and gruffness of his voice, you could see in his face that he had reached a point of drowsiness.

Smiling to yourself, not wanting to seem obnoxious or cocky, you repeated your statement. "I'm gonna go."

"Why?"

"You should sleep."

"I'm fine."

You cocked your head to the side as you gazed at him. Taking in his worn expression. Proud of yourself but also amused that he seemed to be in denial that you'd worn him out.

"You-"

"CAW- Sanemi, you have been summoned- CAW Your pres-"

"Oh for fucks sake!" Sanemi blared out.

"Is that crow talking?" You pointed at the window where the bird had perched on the sill.

"Yeah." He sighed, letting go of your wrist. "I've gotta go."

"Sure." You nodded taking a step back.

You both got dressed. He moved very quickly despite seeming drained a few seconds ago.

He led you down the stairs and back outside. Before parting ways he said "thanks um...for the...you know."

You couldn't help but giggle at how low he said it. Like he was embarrassed.

"My pleasure." You winked at him before you turned away with a final wave at him.

Sure your night hadn't gone exactly how you thought it would but you still had fun. You've met the finest man you ever seen and you'd surely never forget this night. You did hear a bird talk after all. And you met a humongous man, who may or may not be blind and cries when he talks. And another large man with almost fuschia colored eyes that was so overly confident.

Definitely an unforgettable night.

—————

"You look rather.....unusual."

Glancing down at your attire, you laughed. You had opted for the least flattering outfit you owned for your "date" tonight. It was poop brown and basically a potato sack.

"It's not going to help." Brass said as he lowered his book to look at you and Frank.

"Why not?" Frank asked.

"Because, look at her ass."

You and Frank both looked at your derrière. You sighed just as Frank said "oh." Scratching his head.

The fabric was quite a bit tighter in that area; much to your dismay.

"Wear some of my clothes." Muddy chimed in.

"That might not help." Brass laughed. "That might be kinda hot."

"Yeah any other time but not to him. Seeing your woman in another man's clothes?" Muddy shuddered dramatically.

"Yeah you're right. That'll turn him off." Frank agreed with a nod of his head.

"I'm not his woman-"

"Tell him not me." Muddy winked at you.

Rolling your eyes playfully you began walking to his room. "Give me the ugliest stuff you got."

"I don't own anything ugly woman!" He said as he followed you.

After you finished dressing you headed out to the restaurant the guy told you to meet him at after your performance over an hour ago.

Inside you saw him sitting at a table looking dapper. You felt bad that he had dressed up so nicely. Your stomach began to twist in knots as you approached the table. His eyes snapped up to meet yours as you approached. A smile spreading across his face.

You couldn't do this. You really couldn't.

"Hi." You said taking your seat down on the pillow.

"Hello. You look amazing. You make menswear look good." He slightly giggled.

Oh no. He likes it. Now you're gonna have to resort to being a gross eater.

As the night progressed you learned that he was not the least phased by you chewing loudly and with an open mouth. You were sure to make a mess as well. It still didn't bother him.

By the end of the night he was still smitten with you. The knots from earlier twisted and turned even more fiercely as you knew you had to let him down again.

"I really enjoyed dinner sir-"

"Please, call me Kenji."

"Kenji." You paused and took a breath. "I can't be with you. And I can't marry you. I'm sorry."

His face dropped but he began to nod slowly. "You're already spoken for right?"

You were a terrible liar so you couldn't even just nod. "No, I...I just am not interested. No offense to you, I'm just not a relationship kind of person. I wouldn't be any good to you."

A light laugh left him. "I highly doubt that, but I understand."

"I'm sorry."

"No no. Don't be. I heard you last night, but I wouldn't forgive myself if I didn't try. I'm sorry for badgering you. You're just so......perfect."

You clasped your fingers together in your lap. You weren't usually bashful but you were kind of bad at taking compliments. Especially in this situation.

"I'm sorry. I don't mean to make you uncomfortable. Thank you for having dinner with me."

"Yeah, you're welcome. Thanks for treating me."

"Anytime." Kenji answered.

After your goodbyes, and a hug, which Kenji definitely lingered in, you started to walk home.

Per usual there were tons of people out in this district, giving you a lot to observe. There were Oirans out with customers and many men looking for places to drink. It was so lively and you loved it. This area in particular reminded you of home, minus all of the things to be fearful of at home, this place was safer.

When you made it home you paused, noticing a familiar head of wind blown hair leaning against the wall outside.

Your heartbeat picked up in your chest and your breath caught in your throat when his eyes found yours.

"Hey Sanemi." You smiled despite the tiny panic you were having internally.

He nodded in greeting. "What are you wearing?" His stormy eyes glossed over you from head to toe.

"Oh, I tried to look unappealing for this date I just left."

"And how did that work out for you?"

You laughed as you remembered Kenji's words. "Didn't go as planned."

He nodded once. "I can imagine."

You smiled at him, your turn now to look at his appearance.

He was dressed less formally, in a uniform of some kind, however his chest was still exposed. A white jacket sat on top. At his hip you noticed a sword.

You were curious now. Was he a....samurai?

"What's that for?" You pointed loosely at his sword.

"Work."

"What do you do?"

"Kill."

To say you weren't taken aback would be a lie. Something about the way he said it had an edge to it that was a bit discomforting. You weren't going to ask for further clarification though. You didn't even want to know any more. All of the scars you seen on his body, including the obvious ones on his face told you well enough you shouldn't ask questions.

You just hoped he was a good guy.

"Okay." You answered carefully. No tone to your voice.

He cocked an eyebrow at you but didn't say anything about it. He changed the topic. "Are you in for the night?"

"I am."

"Good. We have unfinished business."

That's all it took really. You grew incredibly libidinous, eager to pick up where you left off before you were interrupted last night.

"Oh. Is that why you're here?"

"Yes."

"Great." You smiled at him before moving past him to your door. You hoped the guys weren't home. Not that you cared; you all have brought people over before and heard things you didn't want to, but it would be your first time doing so in Japan. They would be more nosey than usual.

Inside, you lead him up to your room. Happy to hear it was quiet, meaning they couldn't be home, it's never quiet here.

As soon as you stepped into your room, Sanemi removed his sword, sitting it beside your door as you closed it. He removed his white jacket and turned to you, who was just staring at him.

He took in your attire once more. "I'm going to assume these aren't yours." He gestured to your clothes.

"You assume correctly." You nodded.

"And do they have some sort of significance to you?"

You honestly had to think about it now that he asked. You could see and feel where this was going, but for the sake of Muddy you nodded.

"Then you'll want to remove them quickly, before I tear them off." The look in his eyes changed like a light switch. A strong fire blazed behind them as he spoke to you.

That coupled with the deep honey of his voice; you were his to command. You did as you were told, undoing the buttons of the shirt in record time. You did not miss the way he took his bottom lip in between his teeth as you revealed your undergarments. Once the shirt was on the floor, you undid the button and zipper of the slacks, letting them fall to the floor easily.

You stood before him now in only your brown lace teddy, and sheer thigh highs with matching lace at the top.

He closed the gap between you, his large scarred hand coming up to touch the strap of your garment.

"What's this? You wore something similar underneath your dress last night."

He was holding the thin strap between his thumb and forefinger as he looked down at your chest.

"It's lingerie. This one is called a teddy."

"Hm. How do I take it off?" He asked as he peered over your shoulder, looking down to your backside.

Internally you were blushing but outwardly you were fine. Boldly you took hold of his wrist, pushing his hand away from you, the one holding your strap, signaling for him to pull the strap down your arm.

"You just pull it down." You said.

Sanemi hated the way you were looking up at him with so much wanton desire and that tiny smile; no— smirk, on your face.

You were sexy. And you knew it.

He hated it.

Because it made his heart race in a way he's never felt before.

He brought his other hand up to the left strap, ready to pull it down when a knocking sounded from your window. However, it was in a pattern or harmony.

A guttural sound left Sanemi's throat as he threw his head back in irritation.

"You have got to be shitting me." He said.

He removed his hands from your clothes and walked over to the window, sliding it open quickly.

That same bird, the unusual talking one reported something to Sanemi. You didn't catch it as you were thinking about how he was too busy to even have sex! No wonder he was grumpy. It made perfect sense.

He stomped over to the door after slamming the window shut. He put his sword back on his hip.

"I have to go." He spoke gruffly, his voice lower due to his anger.

"I see. I'll walk you out." You quickly pulled your pants back on before leading Sanemi down the stairs.

At the front door you opened it and stepped aside. "It was nice to see you again. Try to have a goodnight."

"Yeah. You too."  He grumbled before stepping outside. Making you smile to yourself.

It felt good to know he wanted it just as bad as you. Hopefully one day you'll both get what you craved.

*****

Next

[razzlerdazzler]

Fem OW character of ur choice x fem reader!

Reader typically stays out of violence as much as possible and prefers domestic lifestyle. Characters enemy kidnaps reader (proly to get back at character) when character goes to rescue reader shes drenched in her kidnappers blood. Like it’s stained her dress, on her face, in her hair, dripping from the huge axe in her hand.

Character doesn’t know whether to be terrified or turned on

Hi, sorry this took so long to get done. I just got a new job and it took me a little while to get used to the hours but it's all good now. By the way I chose Junker Queen for this one, I hope you like it :) Also Have a Happy New Year

Junker Queen x Female Kidnapped Reader

hSummary: Reader is kidnapped by King Howel's henchman, and by the time Odessa gets there, the henchmen are already dead and her girlfriend is covered in blood

Pairing: Junker Queen x Female Reader

Warnings: Blood and gore, spicy at the end but nothing too bad

This was not how you were expecting your day to go. You were bored inside of yours and Odessa's house, which you had recently got since she recently became Junker Queen and ruler of Junkertown. She's currently inside another room with an advisor, discussing a recent issue that has come up. She had been very busy ever since she became the new ruler, so you two have not been able to have much time to yourselves and have not been on a date in months. Since she was busy and you were bored, you decided to go out for a walk through the market.

It was a lovely day outside, the sun was shining without a cloud in the sky, and of course it was very hot, so you decided to wear a (F/C) dress outside. You were walking around the marketplace, looking at all the stalls and seeing what the vendors were offering. You started to walk past an alleyway, on your way to the next stall until you heard a scream come from the alleyway. "HELP! SOMEBODY PLEASE HELP ME!!" You stopped and looked towards the alleyway but you couldn't see anything. You slowly walked into the alleyway, the cries for help getting louder and louder as you kept walking. "Hello? What's wrong, are you hurt?" You tentatively call out to the voice. The shouting suddenly stops and the whole alleyway goes deathly quiet. "Hello?" You ask, now even more worried than you were before.

You take another step when a pair of arms suddenly wrap around your sides. You try to scream but a hand quickly covers your mouth. You try to struggle against your attacker, but you can't get out of their hold. The attacker seems to have had enough of your struggling because the next thing you know a rag is put to your face. You can smell the chemicals on the rag and try to struggle harder, but fail to escape as your vision soon turns to black.

The first thing you feel when you come to is the feeling of the cold hard ground. You groan as you open your eyes. The first thing you notice is how dark the room is, the only light source being a dim bulb on the ceiling. You sit up and look at your surroundings, the last thing you remember was someone grabbing you and putting a rag to your face. You look around the room and notice the concrete walls that surround you. You also notice the large metal door on the opposite side of the room.

You suddenly hear the sound of footsteps from outside your door and you feel your heart beat faster as the footsteps come closer and closer. You look around the room, trying to see if there is anything you could use to defend yourself, but are unable to find anything. Soon you hear voices outside the door. "You sure we shouldn't have tied her up?" "Relax, the boss said she wouldn't be much of a problem, beside the boss is just having us keep an eye on her, until her girlfriend comes to rescue her." So they took you just because they wanted to get back at Odessa?

The door opens, revealing two figures. One of them was a woman and the other one was a man. They close the door behind them and you notice that the woman is holding a broad axe. "Who are you people?" you ask meekly. The man smiles at you, "we're your worst nightmare. Sadly however our boss couldn't make it to this little gathering but he sends his regards." "Who is your boss?" You ask timidly. This time the woman answers with a smirk, "Mason Howl." You feel your blood run cold at the name.

You met Odessa a little bit after she became Queen, but you remember how she told you how awful the ex-king was and how he kicked her family out of town. She also told you about how she defeated him, and how she kicked him out of town. "You see he wants his throne back," she continues. You look up at her questioningly. "Then why go to all the trouble of kidnapping me? Why doesn't he just challenge Odessa?" You ask shakily. The woman crouches down to your level and says "he could just try to challenge her again, but you see that's just too much work. Instead he came up with the brilliant plan of kidnapping you, just so Odessa would have to come rescue you, and when she does get here, we'll ambush her. And with her out of the way Howl would be on the throne again."

You feel your heart plummet at the thought of Odessa being killed. "You won't get away with this." You say causing the man to chuckle, "oh but we will, she will die and there's nothing you can do to stop it." You feel rage bubble up inside you, and all you can see is red as you quickly punch the lady in the face, hearing a cracking sound at the contact. She falls to the floor and drops her axe as she holds her now bleeding nose. You quickly stand up and grab the axe as the man launches himself at you. You swing the broad axe at the man and hit his knee. The man screams in agony at the impact and falls onto his back. You quickly yank the axe out of his knee and you swing the axe down onto him, hitting him between his neck and shoulder. Blood gushes out of the wound as you put your foot on his chest and yank out the axe.

You turn back to the lady, and she is already back on her feet. She takes a swing at you, but you easily dodge her and kick her in the chest, causing her to fall back to the ground. You raise the axe above your head and swing down with all of your energy. The axe lands with a sickening crunch in her head. You hear the sound of more guards approaching, and ready yourself for the oncoming fight. The guards enter the room and you start to swing your axe at them again.

It feels like hours until they stop coming. You hear a loud noise come from the hallway, and you ready yourself for the next guard. That is until you hear her voice. "Y/N are you down here?" You freeze at the sound and Odessa suddenly appears infront of the doorway, her axe in hand, ready for a fight. Her eyes widen as she sees you and the state of the room you're in. "Odessa?" you ask, voice quivering. This seems to break Odessa out of her trance as runs towards you. "Y/N!" She pulls you into a hug, your eyes widen at the contact.

You feel youself physically and emotionally relax as her arms wrap around you. You drop the axe and hug her back. You both stay like that for what feels like hours until she pulls back and looks at you. "I came here as soon as I found out what happened, are you hurt anywhere?" She asks concerned while looking at you up and down. You smile at her concern and say "i'm fine." Her look of concern turns into confusion as she looks back into your eyes. "So none of this is your blood?" Your eyebrows furrow, confused at her question. You look down and you feel your breath hitch as you see yourself.

Your dress is soaked in blood, and your hands are covered in it too. This causes you to look up at her, feeling a little embarrassed. "None of it's mine," Her eyes widen in shock at your words. She takes another look around the room before looking back at you. You feel your face heat up in embarrassment. "I didn't want to do it, but they started to talk about how they were going to kill you, and I just saw red." You explain. Her arms tighten around you as she suddenly lifts you up into the air, causing you to squeal in surprise. You quickly wrap your legs around her waist, and your arms around her neck so you don't fall. "I knew my baby had a bit of fire in her."

"Baby," you say with a smile. She looks at you with a smile, "what it's true. It's honestly kind of hot knowing that you can kick someone's ass." You smile at her words and pull her into a passionate kiss. She sighs in contentment, at the feeling of finally having her lips on hers again. You gasp when she bites your bottom lip and she slips her tongue into your mouth. Fine two can play at this game. You move one of your hands to the back of her head, and you tangle your fingers into her hair. You yank at her hair a little bit, causing her to let out a loud moan. Soon you two break apart from the kiss, and she starts to pepper kisses down your neck. You moan as she bites and sucks on a sensitive part of your neck, most likely leaving a mark.

"Babe," you say breathlessly. She continues to kiss down your neck and hums to let you know she's listening. "I really want to continue, but I don't think this is a good place for this, you say as she kisses your neck one last time before she pulls away. Her face is flushed and her eyes are hazy as she looks at you, you feel your heart flutter at the sight. She's gorgeous. You don't think you look much better, as her eyes roam over your figure. "Babe," you say again, getting her attention. It seems to work as she shakes her head a little and clears her throat. "You're right," she says as she gently puts you back down.

You two start to make your way out of the building, and you get another good look at your dress. You sigh sadly causing Odessa to look over at you. "I'm gonna need a new dress," you say causing her to laugh. She moves one of her arms around your waist, "don't worry i'll get you a new one. You smile at her words as you two keep walking. She suddenly asks "where did you learn to fight like that anyway?" You're surprised at her question and say "babe, we live in Junkertown, you kind of have to to know how to live here." She smiles at your answer and soon you reach a door. "Welp this is the way out, you ready?" She asks as she looks at you. You look up at her, "with you by my side I'll always be ready." She smiles at your answer and opens the door. No matter what happens, you and Odessa will always be there for each other.