#marksman filter

[bidhelp]

What is BOQ in Tender, Importance, and Types: tender information

You need a Bill of Quantities (BOQ) to bid on something. People, tools, and things on this list can help you finish the work. It tells you how much of each thing you need and how much it costs. The BOQ is a very important tool for keeping tendering legal, open, and fair.

What is BOQ in Tendering?

The number of this item Number BOQ stands for "Bill of Quantities." The list tells you what each work is, how many there are, and how much they should cost. The list is being made. A bid is one way to find out how much a work costs. This helps people figure out how much it will cost and see how the prices of different sellers compare.

There is an expert (number surveyor, engineer, etc.) who makes the BOQ before the bids are sent out. This way, all prices are based on the same amount of work. This keeps prices from going up or down too much.

What the BOQ means and why it's important in BIDs

When people bid, BOQ is used for many things, like

1. Prices that are easy to understand

It's simple to learn how to bid in BOQ because the style doesn't change. The price shouldn't change because everyone buys the same paper.

2. A good idea of how much it will cost

With BOQ, you can get a better idea of how much the work will cost. There will be less fighting, and the project will cost more than expected.

3. A level playing field

Because BOQ divides everything into things, work, and services, everyone who bids is on the same team. This makes everything fair and clear.

4. Finding out the best way to spend money

BOQ helps project managers plan and make budgets for their money. This keeps the work prices in the range that was agreed upon.

5. Taking better care of business deals

You can keep track of how things are going and make sure the person is getting paid while the work is being done if the BOQ is well-written.

6. Making sure there are no fights

When the BOQ has clear amounts and information about the work, both the project owner and the worker can understand each other better. We can't fight or make claims anymore.

Several types of bid forms

People use a different type of BOQ for each work and way it will be bought. These are the main kinds:

1. Based on what BOQ

This type of BOQ comes with a detailed list of everything, along with numbers, unit measures, and rough prices. It gets a lot of work in the areas of building, machines, and electricity.

2. One-Time BOQ

This kind only gives one price for the whole work, not prices for each part. It's good for work where the work is clear and doesn't change often.

3. A simple BOQ

In this way, each item is not shown on its own. Instead, it links work together, like digging, building a base, or putting on a roof. It's used for big building work.

4. BOQ based on work done

This BOQ is not based on sources or parts, but on work. A lot of people use it to plan and carry out projects.

5. Rate-Only BOQ

They should say how much it costs instead of how many they need. During the tender, this is what you do if you don't know how much something costs.

6. In the form of a BOQ

On the initial bill of quantities, there are still some items whose prices have not been set. This will happen when the work is done. People are being asked to bid on work where it's not clear what needs to be done.

Steps Involved in Preparing BOQ

There is a set of steps that must be followed to make sure that the answers are correct and easy to understand. These are the most important steps:

1. How to Figure out the Work's Scope: A list of all the parts of the project, like the tools, materials, and people who will work on it.

2. Measurement and Quantification: Writing down all the things you need to do along with their exact sizes and units is a good way to measure and count.

3. Specification Detailing: you should give detailed accounts of each piece of work.

4. To figure out rates: look at market prices, business standards, or work that have already been done.

5. Review and Finalization: Before sending the BOQ out for bids, make sure it doesn't have any mistakes.

Who does BOQ work for when it comes to managing contracts?

The BOQ is used as a guide for the following during the deal:

Tracking project progress: A project's progress is tracked to make sure that the work is done as planned.

Contractor payments: Checks that promises of payment are correct based on the work that was actually done.

Taking care of variations: This helps you choose whether to accept requests for changes and add more work.

How to settle fights: This is a guide for how to settle arguments when they happen.

Challenges in BOQ Preparation and Usage

It can be hard to get ready for the BOQ, even though it has perks, such as

Not enough or the wrong information: When measurements are off, costs can vary.

How much things cost: When market prices change, it might be harder to get exact cost estimates.

Changes to the project scope: If the project scope changes in ways that weren't planned for, the BOQ may not be as useful.

Mistakes that people make: Inefficient bidding can be caused by mistakes in measuring the amount.

Conclusion

Before the bids are made, the BOQ makes sure that the prices, details, and business are correct. Things can be bought faster, with less risk, and with less trouble if the right kind of BOQ is used. They can save money, make better bids, and make sure the work goes well if they understand what the BOQ is and how it works for prices. Read our site often to find out more about what the government gets and how bids work. At Bidhelp.co, you can find people who can help you with bids.

[marifilue]

Part 6: Thin Thread

Pairing: Logan Howlett x F!Mutant!Reader - Slow burn, no use of y/n.

Summary: You're an X-Men member with regenerative healing ability and skilled marksman. On a routine mission with the team things take a drastic turn when a mutant-inhibitor collar is forced onto you, leaving you vulnerable, unable to heal. With no quick fix in sight, Logan becomes your reluctant anchor, helping you get through each day as you fight to survive, unexpected bond with Logan begins to grow, one that becomes far stronger than either of you could imagine.

Warnings: Explicit language, Violence, Blood

WC: 7,7k

<- Part 5

The morning greeted you with a dull, relentless headache that pulsed at your temples, a buzzing ache that had been your unwelcome companion through the night. You’d tried ignoring it, relying on the painkillers Logan had slipped you last night, but the reprieve had been temporary. Now, as the sunlight filtered through your blinds, the ache roared back, louder than before.

You sat up in bed with a groan, pressing your fingers to your temples in a futile attempt to soothe the pain. A glance at the clock on the nightstand made your stomach drop. 9:00 a.m. Shit. You were supposed to be up an hour ago.

Dragging yourself out of bed, you shuffled to the bathroom, splashing cold water on your face to wake yourself up. The mirror reflected the exhaustion etched into your features—the dark circles under your eyes, the faint sheen of sweat on your forehead. You pushed the thought aside, finishing your routine quickly before heading downstairs for breakfast.

The kitchen was quiet, the usual chatter of students absent, leaving only the hum of the refrigerator to keep you company. You grabbed a bowl of cereal and sat at the counter, eating mechanically, the food doing little to ease the fog in your mind. By 10:00 a.m., you were already bored, the monotony of your restricted days weighing heavily on you.

With the collar limiting your abilities and activities, Charles had given you a break from teaching. “Take the time you need,” he’d said. You hadn’t argued. A day off, especially one where you weren’t feeling well, wasn’t something you’d pass up. But now, with nothing pressing to do, you found yourself wandering the halls aimlessly, searching for a distraction.

The library called to you like an old friend. The quiet space had always been a sanctuary for you, a place where the noise of the world faded into the rustle of pages and the scent of ink on paper. It wasn’t the same as your old life, back when you’d spent hours organizing shelves and helping readers find their next favorite story. But it was close enough.

You stepped inside, the familiar stillness wrapping around you like a warm blanket. The rows of books stretched out before you, their spines a comforting reminder of simpler times. Running your fingers along the shelves, you let your mind wander, the weight of the headache momentarily forgotten.

One title caught your eye: 1984 by George Orwell. Your fingers hesitated before plucking it from its place. The worn cover felt familiar under your touch, the pages yellowed with time. You’d read it before, years ago, but something about it called to you now. A story about control, about power, about losing oneself to forces greater than you, a theme that felt all too real these days.

Clutching the book to your chest, you left the library and stepped into the yard. The afternoon sunlight was bright but not overwhelming, the kind of warmth that invited you to linger. You found a quiet spot under a large oak tree, far enough from the students that you could sit undisturbed.

Settling into the grass, you opened the book, letting its familiar words draw you in. The headache still pulsed faintly at the back of your mind, but here, surrounded by nature and the quiet murmur of life around you, it felt manageable.

For a little while, at least, you could lose yourself in the pages, in the world Orwell had created, and let the weight of your own reality slip away.

The memories drifted through your mind like whispers from another life. You could still picture the shelves of your old job, rows upon rows of books arranged just how you liked, each with its own story, waiting to be found. You’d been happy there, in that quiet space, finding purpose in your work as a librarian. But your father had never seen it that way.

“Wasting your potential,” he’d say, the disgust clear in his voice. To him, every day you spent outside the military was another day you failed him. He couldn’t fathom why you’d choose books over bullets, college over combat.

You were supposed to follow in his footsteps. He’d trained you to handle a rifle from a young age, pushing you to perfect your aim until you could shoot as easily as you could breathe. He’d always wanted you to enlist. When you turned 18 and told him you wanted to study English, to build your life in your own way, the disappointment in his eyes had been searing.

Nine years passed. You’d found your own stability, your own peace, a steady job, an apartment you paid for yourself. You kept your distance from your parents, seeing them only on occasion, which kept the resentment at bay. But when you visited them that day, you hadn’t known your life would take a turn.

You still remembered the way your father had mentioned it over thanksgiving dinner, casual and offhanded, as if it were nothing. “I’ve got a friend coming over tonight. Wants to talk to you about an opportunity.”

That “friend” had turned out to be Dr. Emmy Killebrew, a name you would come to loathe. His glasses caught the light as he studied you, his expression unreadable but oddly pleased, like he’d found exactly what he was looking for.

“We’ve got a guy in the Marines who could use your particular skills,” he said. “It’s just a two-year contract, short and simple. Your family could really use the money.”

The words echoed back now, a dark, hollow promise that had lured you in. You’d wanted to help your parents; you’d agreed, believing it would be a standard military experience. Six months of training, intense, but doable. You thought you’d be home soon, maybe a little stronger, with stories to tell.

But instead, the injections had started.

There had been no way out once they began, no choice in the matter. They told you it was necessary, part of a new program to build “better soldiers.” You remembered the searing pain of each injection, the way it tore through your system, altering you, until you could feel it in your bones. Your father’s betrayal hit you harder than any training ever could. They’d manipulated your DNA, spliced it with something beyond human, the Wolverine's genetic material. You didn’t fully understand it at the time, but within weeks, your body began to change.

You were no longer just a soldier. You were a mutant, immortal, nearly indestructible. You could heal from any wound. The realization had terrified you. But to them, it was a success, proof that you were now a weapon, unbreakable, expendable, and no longer your own.

The sharp snap of fingers brought you back from the haze of your mind. You blinked, momentarily disoriented, the yard of the X-Mansion coming into focus around you. Afternoon light filtered through the trees, casting dappled shadows over the green grass. Logan was standing in front of where you were sitting, one eyebrow raised.

“You’re lost in there, varmint?” he asked, his gruff voice tinged with something like concern.

You scowled, brushing the memory away. “Stop calling me that.”

You stood up clutching the book, avoiding his gaze. The children in the yard caught your eye, some of them whispering to each other as they watched you. Some looked sympathetic, others fearful, their expressions reminding you of the weight of your condition. You glanced away, not wanting to see the pity in their eyes.

Without a word, you turned, walking toward the open expanse of the lawn, hoping Logan would leave you alone. But he didn’t. You heard his footsteps a few paces behind you, steady and unrelenting.

“Jean asked me to get you,” he said. “she and Hank needs to see you in the lab.”

You stopped, shoulders tensing. The last thing you wanted was to go back inside, to face whatever new test or evaluation they’d thought up for you. But you had no other choice. With a sigh, you turned, reluctantly heading toward the mansion. Logan kept his distance, letting you lead the way, but you could feel his presence, a steady shadow.

As you neared the doors, you heard more whispers from the students who lingered nearby. Their eyes followed you, wide and nervous. You caught a few of their words, murmurs of sympathy mixed with fear, as though they were hoping they’d never end up in your position.

Logan threw a sharp glance at the kids, his expression darkening. “Get back to class,” he ordered, and the whispers stopped instantly.

With clenched fists, wishing you could forget the eyes on you, forget the memories that still felt so fresh.

As you walked straight back to the library, the book still clutched in your hand. Logan followed close behind, his boots echoing against the polished floors. He couldn’t seem to help himself, his gruff voice breaking the silence. “Where are we going? They need to see you in the lab.”

“I’m putting the fucking book back!” you bit out, lifting the book over your shoulder for him to see without turning around. Your tone was sharp, your frustration bleeding through. You didn’t care if it sounded rude—your patience was wearing thin.

Logan snorted, clearly unfazed. “Shit, whaddya have for breakfast? Bees?”

You knit your eyebrows together, ignoring his remark as you pushed the library door open and stepped inside. “What do you care? Stop following me like I’m gonna fall on the floor any second,” you shot back, your words clipped.

Reaching the shelf where you’d found 1984, you slid the book back into its spot with more force than necessary. The neat rows of books, once soothing, only served to agitate you now. You turned on your heel, intent on leaving the library and Logan behind, but he wasn’t letting this go.

“You look like you’re about to,” he said, his tone dropping the playful edge and adopting something more serious.

You froze mid-step, glaring at him over your shoulder. “I’m fine.”

He didn’t move, just stood there watching you, his expression unreadable. Something in his gaze made you uneasy—not pity, but something close to concern, and it only made you want to push him further away. Without another word, you stormed out of the library, refusing to let him see how much his words rattled you.

As you walk through the mansion’s hall, you heard a small voice calling your name. It was familiar, one you’d heard just a few nights ago. You looked up, and there she was—Maya, the little girl you and the team had rescued from one of Killebrew’s facilities. She ran toward you, her short legs carrying her as fast as they could. Barely reaching your waist, she threw her arms around you in a tight hug.

Maya looked so much healthier than the day you’d found her, her face glowing with a newfound vitality. Smiling, you knelt to her height, returning her embrace with a gentle hand on her back.

“Are you okay?” she asked, her small voice laced with concern.

You managed a soft smile, touched by her care. “I’m okay, Maya. Do you like the school?”

Her face brightened, eyes sparkling with excitement. “I love it! I have two BFFs now! ‘Best friends forever,’ they said!” She beamed, and you reached out, stroking her cheek and running your fingers through her long hair. The relief of seeing her safe, healthy, and happy here filled you with a warmth you hadn’t expected.

"Yeah? What are their names?" You smile widely

"Ellie and Carter!" She exclaimed, announcing her new two BFFs to you.

“I’m happy to hear that, sweetheart,” you replied softly. You squeeze her shoulder gently. She glance down at the collar around your neck and place her tiny hand on the cold metal.

"What is this for?" She asked innocently. You sell her another smile this time didn't quite reach your eyes. "It's something like a necklace, but not a good necklace. I'm goin' to take them off." You told her reaching his arm on your collar. “I need to go now, okay?” You said as you rise from your knees.

Maya nodded, waving her tiny hand as she backed away. “Bye-bye!” she chirped, a sweet, innocent grin on her face. You waved back, matching her smile. “Bye, Maya.”

As she turned, she saw Logan standing a few steps behind, watching the two of you. She greeted him with a cheerful, “Bye, Mr. Howlett.”

He gave her a nod, his gruff voice softening as he replied, “Bye, kid.”

For a brief moment, you caught the look in Logan’s eyes as he watched Maya skip away down the hall. Something flickered there, a warmth, a tenderness. But as quickly as it appeared, he turned his attention back to you, that familiar, steely expression returning.

You walked through the winding halls of the X-Mansion, descending the staircase toward the basement. Logan was still following a few steps behind you. His heavy boots echoed softly against the polished floors, a constant reminder of his presence. You couldn’t help but wonder why he was trailing you. Surely, you could handle this on your own—Jean and Hank were waiting in the lab, and whatever test needed to be done, they had it covered.

Unless...did Hank need Logan for another one of those dangerous tests? The kind that required someone who could withstand extreme damage? You tried not to dwell on it, focusing instead on the approaching double doors.

As you entered the lab, the faint hum of machinery filled the air. Both Jean and Hank turned their heads as you arrived, their expressions tight with concentration. Jean offered a small, reassuring smile, but Hank’s focus was on a small device in his hand—a thin, rectangular chip that fit neatly between his fingers.

“Take a seat,” Hank instructed, gesturing to the chair in the center of the room.

You sat down, feeling Logan’s presence just a few feet away. He leaned casually against the wall, arms crossed, but his sharp eyes missed nothing. Always observing, ready to step in if needed.

Hank moved closer, holding the chip up for you to see. “This is the latest iteration. It’s designed to interface directly with the collar’s locking mechanism. If it works, it should override the suppressive controls.”

You nodded, a flicker of hope sparking in your chest. God, you wanted this to work. Four days of living with your powers suppressed, your body weakening, and that persistent ache in your head, it had been pure misery. You gritted your teeth, refusing to let the desperation show, but deep down, all you wanted was an end to this nightmare.

Jean placed a comforting hand on your shoulder as Hank moved closer to the collar. “Just stay still,” she murmured.

“Got it,” you replied, your voice steady despite the tension tightening your throat.

Hank worked carefully, sliding the chip into the thin slot along the collar’s edge. The device emitted a faint beep as it connected, and the three of you waited, watching and listening for any sign of change. Seconds stretched into what felt like hours. The collar remained silent.

Hank frowned, his brows furrowing as he adjusted the device. Still nothing. “Come on,” he muttered under his breath, his tone tinged with frustration. He pulled back slightly, checking his equipment. Jean leaned over to assist him, her telekinetic abilities lifting tools to his side as they inspected the chip.

“Is it supposed to take this long?” Logan’s gravelly voice broke the silence.

“It shouldn’t,” Hank admitted, his voice tight. “But these things are notoriously difficult to bypass. I thought—” He stopped, exhaling sharply. “I thought this would work.”

You sat there, staring ahead as the hope you’d clung to began to fade. Jean placed her hand on your shoulder again, her touch firm but comforting. “We’ll figure this out,” she said softly, though the strain in her voice betrayed her own frustration.

“I know,” you said flatly, your hands gripping the edges of the chair. You exhaled slowly, trying to keep your emotions in check.

Hank straightened, looking genuinely apologetic. “I’ll go back to the drawing board. There’s still more we can try—”

“No,” you interrupted, shaking your head. “Not today. I need...I just need a break.” You said as bringing your finger again to rub your temple.

Jean and Hank exchanged glances, unsure of how to respond. Logan, however, stepped forward, his sharp gaze locking on yours. “Then take one,” he said simply. “You don’t have to sit here feeling sorry for yourself. Hank’ll figure it out. You just focus on holding up until then.”

It wasn’t the most comforting thing anyone had ever said to you, but somehow, it helped. You nodded, slowly standing from the chair. “Let me know if you make any progress,” you said to Hank and Jean before heading toward the door.

Logan didn’t say anything as he followed you out, but the quiet strength of his presence was enough to steady you, at least for now.

You paced back and forth in the kitchen, the glass of water in your hand trembling slightly as you brought it to your lips. The headache was relentless, a dull thrum that echoed with every beat of your heart. You knew the painkillers Logan had given you earlier had worn off, but you weren’t about to ask for another. Not with him looming behind you like an immovable shadow.

Logan leaned against the counter, silent but watchful, his arms crossed over his chest. His presence only added to your growing irritation. You didn’t need his pity, and you certainly didn’t need him following you around like some overprotective watchdog.

The sound of footsteps broke the tense silence as Storm walked into the kitchen. She glanced between you and Logan, her expression curious but calm. “Good, you’re both here,” she said, her voice firm but warm. “Charles wants us in the meeting room. It’s important.”

You sighed, rubbing your temples as if the motion could banish the ache in your head. “Can’t it wait?” you muttered.

Storm’s gaze softened slightly, but her tone remained resolute. “It’s urgent.”

Logan pushed off the counter, his boots scuffing against the floor as he straightened. “Let’s go, varmint,” he said gruffly, his tone almost teasing. Almost.

You shot him a glare but said nothing, setting the glass down with more force than necessary before following Storm out of the kitchen. Logan trailed behind you, his heavy footsteps matching yours as the three of you made your way to the meeting room.

As the three of you walked down the hall toward the meeting room, Ororo turned her head slightly, her brow arching in curiosity. “What is a varmint?” she asked, directing the question toward you.

You shrugged, your tone dry. “I don’t know. Ask Logan.”

Ororo’s gaze shifted to Logan, who smirked and muttered your name. “She is. She’s a varmint.” His voice dripped with sarcasm.

Ororo’s lips quirked up as she observed the exchange. Something in the way Logan’s smirk lingered and the way you rolled your eyes told her everything she needed to know. You two were a fifty-year-old and a hundred-seventy-year-old mutant, yet somehow, the two of you bickered like high schoolers.

She chuckled softly, the sound low enough for only the two of you to hear. Both of you snapped your heads toward her, your glares sharp enough to cut through steel.

“What’s so funny, ‘Ro?” Logan growled, his tone defensive. “Nothing,” Ororo said smoothly, though the amused glint in her eyes betrayed her. “Absolutely nothing.” You crossed your arms, narrowing your eyes. “Didn’t sound like nothing.”

“Mm-hmm,” she hummed with a knowing smile, turning her attention back to the hallway. “Let’s not keep the others waiting, shall we?”

Logan muttered something under his breath, and you let out an annoyed huff, but neither of you pressed further, though the irritation simmered between you like static electricity. Ororo, on the other hand, kept her quiet amusement to herself, thinking that perhaps this tension was more entertaining than it should have been.

The meeting room was brightly lit, the long table surrounded by familiar faces. Professor Xavier sat at the head, his serene expression tinged with quiet determination. Ororo took a seat to his left, while Scott stood at the opposite end, a tablet in his hand. Logan pulled out a chair next to you and sat down, his proximity both grounding and irritating.

Scott cleared his throat, tapping the tablet to project an image onto the wall behind him. It was a grainy photo of a familiar figure: Dr. Emmy Killebrew.

“We’ve got a lead,” Scott began, his voice clipped and professional. “Killebrew was spotted in Manhattan last night. Intel suggests he’s attending a private gala tomorrow night, hosted by the Manhattan Medical Research Society.”

“What kind of gala?” you asked, your voice sharper than you intended.

“A high-profile event for medical professionals,” Scott explained. “The guest list includes pharmaceutical executives, genetic researchers, and biotech innovators. Killebrew’s name wasn’t on the list, but sources confirm he’ll be there.”

“So, what’s the plan?” Logan asked, his tone low but focused.

Scott glanced at the professor, who nodded before continuing. “We’ll infiltrate the gala and confront Killebrew directly. The goal is to extract information—discreetly if possible, but we’re prepared to use more... aggressive measures if necessary.”

You shifted in your seat, the headache pounding harder with every word. Before you could stop yourself, the question slipped out. “Do you even need me for the mission?”

The room fell silent. All eyes turned to you, and for a moment, you wished you could take the words back. But you didn’t. You held your ground, even as Scott’s expression hardened.

“No,” Scott said firmly, his tone leaving no room for argument. “This mission requires precision and subtlety, and you’re not in any condition to—”

“Then why am I even in this meeting?” you interrupted, your voice rising. Frustration flared, both at Scott’s dismissal and the relentless pounding in your head. “If you’re not going to let me help, maybe just leave me out of it!”

“Enough,” Xavier’s calm voice cut through the tension like a knife. His gaze was steady, his tone gentle but authoritative. “You’re here because this mission involves a key figure in your past, and we believe you deserve to be informed. That said, Scott is correct. This is not a mission you should undertake.”

Your hands curled into fists under the table. You wanted to argue, to demand that they let you go, but the professor’s words left little room for debate. Instead, you leaned back in your chair, exhaling sharply as the tension in the room eased slightly.

Scott continued, his focus shifting back to the group. “Logan, Ororo, and I will handle the infiltration. Jean will provide remote support. The priority is information. We need to know what Killebrew’s planning and if he’s connected to any larger operations.”

You tried to focus on Scott’s words, but the room felt stifling. The headache pulsing in your skull grew sharper, your breaths shallow. The walls seemed closer, the lights too bright.

“I’m sorry.” Your voice cut through Scott’s explanation, and you stood abruptly, the scrape of your chair echoing in the room.

“I—uh—please continue,” you said, your tone soft but hurried. “I just need some air.”

Without waiting for a response, you stepped out of the room, your pace quickening as the door slid shut behind you.

Logan’s gaze didn’t leave you, his eyes locked on the door long after you’d disappeared. His expression was unreadable, but something flickered behind his sharp features.

Outside, you leaned against the cool wall, closing your eyes and focusing on your breathing. The tension in your chest loosened slightly, but the frustration remained. You hated the way they dismissed you, how powerless you felt, and most of all, how much you wanted to prove them wrong.

Back inside the room, Scott exchanged a brief glance with Logan. “We should move on,” he said, though his voice held a tinge of unease.

Logan didn’t respond immediately, his jaw tightening. Finally, he muttered, “You all know she’s tougher than you think,” before shifting his attention back to the plan, though his thoughts lingered elsewhere.

The equipment room was filled with the familiar scent of gun oil and steel. It was your refuge, the one place you could let your thoughts quiet and just be. You moved between the racks, your fingers grazing the cool metal of various firearms until you stopped at the DSR-1.

You grabbed the rifle, hefting its weight and feeling the sting in your side flare. The dull ache from the wound still hadn’t eased after four days, making you limp slightly as you adjusted the weapon in your hands.

“Fuck,” you cursed under your breath, the frustration bubbling up as you hung the sniper rifle back on its rack. Heavy footsteps echoed from the hallway.

Logan stepped into the room, his presence unmistakable. “Knew I'd find you here” he said, with voice low and steady.

Your focus was on the DSR-1 still on its rack. “I was on sniper duty with this gal,” you said, your tone distant. “DSR-One. Guarding George H.W. Bush. Back in the 90s.”

Logan raised an eyebrow but said nothing, letting you continue.

“He was visiting New York. I was stationed on one of the tallest buildings, just watching, waiting for a threat.” You traced a finger along the rifle’s edge. “Long hours. Quiet, but tense.”

Logan nodded slightly, his eyes not leaving you. After a moment of silence, he spoke. “If you really want to go on the mission tomorrow... I could convince the team. As long as you’re under my watch.”

You froze for a second, the offer catching you off guard. It wasn’t what you expected from him. Intriguing, maybe even tempting. After all, it was a simple gala—just find Killebrew and get information. You’d already thought of ways to hide the collar, like covering it with a scarf.

But reality set in as quickly as the idea tempted you. You shook your head, more at yourself than at him. “No, that’s dumb. I can’t risk the team any further.”

Your gaze landed on a Mini Uzi. Its compact frame was sleek and practical, perfect for your current state. You picked it up, sighting down the barrel with ease, satisfied with how manageable it felt.

Logan’s eyes narrowed slightly, as if he could see through the lie you just told yourself. “Well,” he said with a shrug, “I just thought you could use a night out.” His nonchalance was infuriating and, somehow, comforting.

“Ridiculous,” you muttered, shaking your head at his suggestion, though you couldn’t deny the flicker of interest it sparked in you.

Logan smirked faintly, stepping aside as you moved toward the door. “Just say the word.”

You shot him a look "No." As you kept walking, heading to the indoor shooting range.

The muffled echo of gunfire filled the indoor shooting range as you fired the Mini Uzi, each shot sharp and precise. Your arms were steady, the stance you’d perfected over years of experience still second nature. The paper target at the far end of the range was riddled with neat, tight clusters—proof that, even with an annoying wound and a relentless headache, your accuracy remained impeccable.

Logan leaned against the doorframe behind you, arms crossed as he watched in silence. His eyes weren’t just on your shooting. If eye-fucking were a crime, Logan would’ve been guilty without a trial. The way you stood, with both arms raised, your figure outlined by the loose t-shirt tucked into your jeans, the sweats on the back of your neck made Logan notice a visible mark there.

With your hair in high ponytail, he stare the mark, it was a tattoo. But also looked like some codenames, he can't see clearly but they're a few bunch of random numbers. It held his attention far longer than it should have.

The faint dip of your waist, the slight shift in your stance as you adjusted between rounds—it drove him mad in a way he couldn’t quite name, and the way those jeans hugging your hips didn’t help. He’d never admit it aloud, but he’d lost track of how long he’d been staring.

The last of the bullets left the barrel, the magazine clicking empty. You lowered the Uzi and set it down, your hand instinctively rubbing at your temple. The gunshots noise didn't exactly help your headache, in fact they're worsen now.

“You should really ask Jean to look into those migraines,” Logan said, breaking the silence. His voice was flat, casual, but his eyes hadn’t softened from their earlier intensity.

You jumped slightly, startled by his presence. “It’s not a migraine. Just a headache,” you snapped, dismissing him as you turned to put the Uzi back in its place. “What are you still doing here?”

“Watching,” Logan said, shrugging lazily. “I like guns.”

You turned a sharp look over your shoulder. “No, you don’t. They’re not even your style.”

He smirked, the kind of smirk that made you want to wipe it off his face—or kiss it off. You couldn’t decide which. “Who are you to judge what my style is?” he countered smoothly.

You rolled your eyes, turning away again as you began walking out of the shooting range. He followed, his boots heavy on the floor behind you.

“Oh boy, does It not written all over your face,” you said, voice clipped but teasing.

“Really?” Logan asked, his tone carrying a challenge now. “Tell me, then. What is it?”

You stopped abruptly, swinging around to face him, your hands on your hips. His sudden stillness told you he wasn’t expecting you to turn.

“You think guns are toys,” you said evenly, holding his gaze. “A joke.”

Logan didn’t reply immediately, his expression unreadable. You could see a flicker of recognition in his eyes, though. Part of what you’d said rang true, even if he wouldn’t admit it. Guns weren’t his style—they never had been. He’d always relied on raw power, his claws, and the ferocity that came naturally to him.

“You don’t respect them,” you continued, your tone a little sharper now. “You think they’re a quick fix, a lazy shortcut. Like pulling a trigger is the easy way out instead of doing the work. You think it’s all about power, but you don’t understand what it takes to handle a weapon. Guns are precise. They’re not for show. They’re tools for survival. But you, you think they're some kind of crutch. You think they’re for people who can't fight their own battles face to face.”

You paused, watching his reaction. He didn’t say anything, but you could feel his resistance, like you were pushing him into a corner he didn’t want to be in. “Thought so,” you muttered, half to yourself, but you knew he’d heard.

But there was something about the way you held them, the precision in your movements, that gave him pause. He didn’t know if it was respect, admiration, or something much more dangerous but whatever it was, it had him hooked.

His eyes lingering on your retreating form. You didn’t look back, but you felt his gaze like a weight on your shoulders.

He stood there for a moment longer, trying to decide whether to chase after you or let you go. But then he finds another reason to jab about, to chase you again wherever you go this time. He wants you to get checked. He's worried, or maybe even cares in the oddest way.

As Logan followed you into the medbay, the sharp scent of antiseptic stung your nose, mingling with the sterile chill of the room. You moved with purpose, throwing open cupboards and rummaging through their contents with a single-minded desperation. Your fingers tore through boxes and bottles, pushing aside anything that wasn’t what you were looking for.

Painkillers. That was all you needed.

The buzzing ache in your skull was relentless, a cruel reminder of your vulnerability. You couldn’t remember the last time you’d felt anything like it. Not after being thrown across war zones, not after enduring blasts that should’ve killed you. Back then, nothing had fazed you. But now, your head throbbed, sharp and insistent, as if mocking you for being weak.

Behind you, Logan entering the room, observing the frustration clear all over your face. His sharp eyes followed your frantic movements. He hated to ask, but he could see it—the way your hands shook as they rifled through the shelves, the tension radiating from your rigid posture.

“Are you okay?” His gravelly voice broke through the silence, laced with something unfamiliar: concern.

You didn’t stop, didn’t even look at him. “No!” you snapped, your voice sharp and raw. “Fuck, this headache is driving me crazy. I… I can’t even” You broke off, shoving another drawer closed with more force than necessary.

You kept moving, invading every inch of the inventory as frustration clawed at your chest. “Where the fuck is it?” you muttered, your voice trembling with barely restrained anger.

Logan stepped further into the room, his boots heavy against the tile. He scanned the shelves calmly, his sharp instincts making it easy to locate the bottle you so desperately needed. Without a word, he pulled it from its place and turned toward you.

“I can’t fucking do this anymore,” you said, your voice cracking as you slammed another drawer shut. “I hate it. I hate being h-” Before you could finish the sentence, a sting in your throat deepened, and for a moment, you froze, your hand gripping the edge of the counter to steady yourself.

Logan stepped closer, holding the bottle of pills in front of you. “Here,” he said simply, his tone steady.

You glanced down at his hand, at the label reading Painkillers, but didn’t reach for it. The tears you’d fought so hard to hold back began to blur your vision. Logan’s eyes met yours, his gaze unwavering, and something in the quiet strength of it made the walls you’d built start to crumble.

“You hate what?” he asked, his voice softer now, coaxing. His eyes stayed locked on yours, searching for an answer you were barely holding onto.

Your throat tightened, and you shook your head, your hand finally trembling as it took the bottle from him. “I hate being human,” you whispered, the words escaping before you could stop them.

There it was. The admission hung heavy in the air, as raw and unfiltered as the tears that threatened to spill.

Logan didn’t flinch. He didn’t pity you. Instead, he nodded slightly, like he understood. “I know,” he said quietly, his voice low and steady. “But bein’ human ain’t all bad.”

You scoffed bitterly, wiping your eyes with the back of your hand before they could betray you further. “Feels like it is right now.”

He leaned against the counter, his rough exterior softening just a little. “Bein' human is bearable, when you don’t have to carry this alone, y’know. Let someone help for once.”

You looked at him, startled by the sincerity in his tone. His expression was unreadable, but the weight of his words lingered, grounding you in a way you hadn’t expected.

“I’ll think about it,” you muttered, shaking a pill from the bottle into your hand and swallowing it dry.

“Good,” he said simply, straightening up. He stayed close as you leaned against the counter, waiting for the pain to ebb. “You needs to get checked for those headaches.”

“Maybe tomorrow,” you said quickly, hoping to end the conversation. Logan wasn’t having it. “What about tonight? After dinner.”

“Why the rush?” you shot back, trying to mask the fear bubbling beneath the surface. The idea of knowing made your stomach churn. You weren’t ready for answers, not yet.

“The sooner we know, the better,” Logan muttered your name, his voice gentler this time., and the way he said it made the tension in your chest tighten.

You didn’t respond immediately, letting his words hang in the air between you. Part of you wanted to argue, to push back, but the quiet insistence in his tone softened your defenses. “C’mon,” he urged, his voice low and coaxing. “I’ll keep you company.”

“What if Hank asks you to be the guinea pig for another experiment? I bet you won't be there.” you asked playfully, recalling the last time he got jolted by the electricity from your collar.

Logan’s lip twitched, but his tone was reassuring. “I don’t care. I’d still be there.” You raised an eyebrow, leaning slightly closer. “Did you secretly enjoy it? Being electrocuted?” He scoffed, his head tilting slightly as he shot you a deadpan look.

“Ha! Knew it! I knew you’d be one of those freaky masochists,” you teased, slapping his shoulder lightly with the back of your hand.

“That’s a little far-fetched, don’t ya think?” he grumbled, avoiding your playful accusation, though the corner of his mouth twitched in the faintest smirk.

The brief exchange pulled a smile from you, easing some of the tension lingering between you two.

With a heavy sigh, you finally relented. “Fine, after dinner.”

Logan’s lips twitched into a faint smile, his gaze never leaving yours. The intensity of it made you break the contact first, looking down as you pushed away from the counter. “I’ll see ya,” he said, his voice almost teasing but laced with relief.

You nodded, your throat tight as you headed toward the door. “See you,” you murmured, stepping out of the medbay and making your way to your room, trying not to think about what you’d just agreed to.

The team gathered around the long dining table, a comforting spread of food filling the air with warmth and familiarity. Charles was at the head, his serene expression softening as he listened to Hank animatedly discuss a recent breakthrough in his research. Scott interjected occasionally with skeptical questions, while Jean tried to keep the conversation light. Ororo added her own input with quiet humor, her calm presence a counterbalance to the lively exchange.

Logan sat across from you, his usual gruff demeanor softened by the glow of the evening. He wasn’t much of a talker during meals, but his sharp gaze flickered to yours more times than you could count. You tried to ignore it, focusing instead on picking at your food and chiming in when necessary.

“Logan, you ever consider shaving that beard?” Scott asked, smirking as he sipped his drink.

Logan raised an eyebrow, chewing deliberately before answering. “You ever consider mindin’ your own business?”

The table erupted into laughter, Ororo shaking her head as Charles chuckled lightly.

“You two are like oil and water,” Jean teased, her eyes glinting with amusement.

Logan’s gaze flicked to you again, and you felt your stomach tighten. He was watching you more than he should, and it wasn’t helping the creeping anxiety in the back of your mind.

The meal ended too soon for your liking, and as the others began to drift away, you found yourself trying to stall. Rising to your feet, you looked to Ororo, who was gathering plates. “Here, let me help with the dishes,” you offered quickly.

Ororo raised a brow but handed you a stack. “If you insist.”

Jean passed by, placing her glass in the sink. “Don’t forget about your check-up,” she reminded you, her voice tinged with gentle concern.

You hesitated, focusing on the plates in your hands. “I’ll be there in fifteen,” you said, keeping your tone light.

Logan knew immediately what you were doing. He's still sitting by the dinner table, his arms crossed. “You can’t keep puttin’ this off.”

“I’m not putting it off,” you replied briskly, focusing on scrubbing a plate. “It’s just a little delay. Fifteen minutes won’t kill anyone.”

Ororo glanced between you and Logan, sensing the charged air. She gave you a knowing look, a faint smile tugging at her lips as she patted your shoulder. “Alright,” she said lightly, though her eyes lingered on yours. “I’ll let you two talk. Maybe Logan can help with the dishes instead of lecturing you.”

The air grew heavier the moment Ororo left, leaving just you and Logan.

“You’re scared,” he said, his tone calm but insistent.

You clenched your jaw, scrubbing harder at the dish in your hand. “I’m not scared. I just don’t like being in that lab. It’s not exactly my idea of a fun night.”

“You’re lying to yourself,” Logan pressed, standing from his seat. “You’ve been draggin’ your feet on this. What are you so afraid of?” He said as he walk closer.

You turned to glare at him, your fingers still gripping the sponge tightly. “I’m not afraid of anything, Logan. I just—”

“You just what?” he interrupted, his voice rising slightly. “You’re tougher than anyone else, but right now, you’re actin’ like a damn coward.”

The word hit you like a punch to the gut, and you slammed the dish back into the sink. “Coward? Do you have any idea what it’s like to think something might be wrong with you? To not be able to fix it? To not even want to know because you’re terrified of what you’ll find out?”

Logan didn’t flinch, his eyes boring into yours. “So, admit it. You’re scared.”

You hesitated, the words caught in your throat. The vulnerability was suffocating, but his relentless gaze refused to let you off the hook. Finally, you exhaled shakily, your voice breaking.

“Yes I'm fucking scared!” you confessed. “For the first time in my life, I’m scared...”

The silence that followed was heavy, the kind that pulled you under and made it hard to breathe. Logan stared at you, his expression caught somewhere between shock and something softer.

“Then let them help you,” he said, his voice quieter now. “Do this for the sake of yourself, you deserve to know.”

His words struck a chord, and you glanced away, blinking back the sting of tears. “I don’t know if I can handle it, Logan.”

“You can,” he said firmly, stepping closer. Muttering your name with his gravely voice. “And you will. C’mon, finish up here, and we’ll head to the lab.”

You sighed, picking up the sponge again.

Logan stayed close, leaning against the counter as you finished your task. His presence was grounding, even as your nerves buzzed with the weight of what was to come.

When the last dish was placed on the drying rack, Logan gave a small, almost imperceptible smile. “Let’s go.”

You nodded reluctantly, wiping your hands on a towel. As you walked toward the medbay, his steady presence at your side, you couldn’t help but feel a strange mix of fear and comfort. Whatever the outcome, you wouldn’t face it alone.

The lab was dimly lit, the hum of machinery filling the quiet air. Jean gestured for you to take a seat near the MRI machine, her expression calm but tinged with concern. You followed her instructions, lying back and allowing the machine to begin its scan. The cool metal beneath you felt impersonal, amplifying the knot in your stomach.

Halfway through the procedure, Hank and Charles entered the room. Their quiet murmurs with Jean were a background noise you tried to tune out. As the scan concluded, you sat up, waiting in tense silence while the machine processed the data.

Fifteen minutes passed like hours. You stared blankly at the ceiling, your mind a mess of chaotic thoughts. Across the room, Jean and Hank hovered over the printed results, their conversation too quiet to hear. You could see the shift in their expressions—the furrow of Hank’s brow, the way Jean’s lips pressed into a thin line.

Your chest tightened when their eyes flicked to you, their gazes heavy with hesitation. Jean finally walked the results over to Charles, who studied the scan in silence. He didn’t look up, his expression grim.

Logan, standing off to the side, watched the exchange. His body tensed as he stepped closer to the group, his voice low but demanding. “What’s goin’ on?”

Jean glanced at him, her words too soft for you to catch. Whatever she said made Logan’s expression darken, his jaw tightening as his eyes flicked toward you. Sympathy radiated from his gaze, and you hated it.

You couldn’t sit still any longer. You stood, your movements stiff as you approached the group. “What is it?” Your voice was sharp, demanding an answer.

Jean turned to you, the scan in her hands. She hesitated, as if weighing how to say what she needed to. “There’s... a glioma. A mass of cells growing around the right side of your brain.”

Your breath caught. “It’s a damn cancer, isn’t it?” you asked flatly, cutting through her attempt at a gentle explanation.

Jean glanced back at Hank and Charles for support. The professor moved forward in his wheelchair, his tone measured but serious. “Yes. We believe it’s a brain tumor.”

The words hung in the air, heavy and suffocating. Your voice came out hollow, stripped of emotion. “How long do I have left?”

Hank adjusted his glasses, clearly uncomfortable as he answered. “Approximately six months.”

Charles rolled closer, his gaze steady. “We’ll find a way through this. Don’t you worry,” he assured you, his voice calm but filled with determination.

Your chest tightened, your breathing shallow. The words felt distant, like they were happening to someone else. You wanted to break down, to cry or scream, but all you felt was a cold hollowness.

Logan moved to your side, his presence grounding even as your world spiraled. He didn’t say anything at first, just stood there, his hand brushing yours for the briefest moment.

“You’re not facing this alone,” he muttered, his voice gruff but steady.

You couldn’t meet his gaze, afraid of what you’d see there. Instead, you stared down at the scan in Jean’s hands, the shadow of the tumor a stark reminder of what was coming.

“I’m dying,” you whispered, more to yourself than anyone else.

Jean stepped closer, her voice gentle but firm. “We’ll do everything we can to fight this. You’re not out of options.”

But you barely heard her. All you could feel was the weight of the diagnosis settling in, an immovable force pressing down on your chest. Logan’s hand finally rested lightly on your shoulder, the simple touch anchoring you just enough to keep you from falling apart.

For now.

Part 7 ->

[singularattitudeofasafetypin]

The Great War: Part 2

When You Are Young, They Assume You Know Nothing

Summary: Briefed on their new assignment, Hunter and his squad get to know the princess they’re protecting. Word Count: 1.3k Warnings: None

Part 1

Please don't copy my work

Midday sunbeams filtered through the leaves and twinkled through gently tinkling wind chimes. Its rays touched the velvet flowers and soothed the hands that worked away at their stems. Shielded beneath his armour, Hunter wondered what they might have felt like. The sunlight that is.

The briefing had gone well. It wasn’t like they’d had much to do. The palace guard took the lead, detailing the ins and outs and assuring the princess that nothing about her daily routine would be disturbed in any capacity.

One member of the squad would be assigned to her at all hours on a regular rotation while the others were stationed at strategic areas around the palace and investigating the threat. She was free to go about her day as normal and had absolutely nothing to worry about.

As squad leader, naturally Hunter took point. He’d followed her around since the briefing, two steps behind as instructed.

With the way the guards had pandered to her and grovelled in their mollifications, he’d half expected to find her to be affected and volatile like the stories the squad had heard of other nobles about the galaxy, but he couldn’t have been more wrong.

Though she had sat wordless through the lecture, her expression wasn’t prim or imperious.

When he accompanied her down the corridor, she didn’t sweep ahead in state and grandeur.

In the garden, she had no servant to cut blossoms while she watched. Instead, she knelt with her dress in the dirt and fingers pricked raw.

“Father hasn’t ordered you not to speak to me, had he?”

Hunter had been staring. The question caught him off guard.

“No, ma’am,” he stuttered, steeling himself as a faint smile flitted across her face.

“Good,” then a shadow doused her satisfaction, “it’s the kind of thing he’d do.”

Before the full pang of her words could twist in Hunter’s chest, her eyes were on him again.

“I’ve heard about the clone army,” she said, “You’re the finest soldiers the Republic could’ve asked for.”

“That’s very kind ma’am.”

“My father told me your squad was even more skilled than the rest?” She paused, “How, if you don’t mind me asking?”

He let out a breath with a smile. All her status and prestige, all the fawning of her guards and concern of her father, and she was worried about hurting his feelings.

“We’re an experimental squad,” he returned, “Genetically enhanced.” The explanation he’d honed over years of interrogation didn’t seem so commonplace with her listening. “Crosshair’s an expert marksman, Wrecker’s enhanced strength is obvious along with Echo’s cybernetic implants, and Tech has accelerated brain capacity” he grinned behind his visor, “He can talk your ear off about anything!”

“And what about you, Hunter?”

His breath caught. She hesitated, apology prevalent in her face. “I heard your brothers calling you that.”

“I have enhanced senses,” he stammered. “I can… feel electromagnetic frequencies. I can hear them.”

He forced himself to pull it together. Her face split into a grin. “That’s incredible!” A breathless laugh escaped her chest as she stood. “Can you hear my heartbeat?”

“Yes ma’am.” It was a good thing she couldn’t hear his!

She smiled, gathering up the flowers in her arms. Then her face fell. “Can you hear the war from here?”

Hunter’s throat caught. She didn’t need an answer though.

“Father keeps trying to tell me it all happening far away but it isn’t is it?” Her eyes were pensive, heavy with the weight of responsibility too heavy for her age. “That’s why you’re here isn’t it?”

“Ma’am?”

She scoffed but not with malice, “I’m not stupid Sergeant. I know the Separatists want to use me to manipulate my father.”

So much for keeping her in the dark. “You don’t seem scared?” The words passed his lips before he could restrain them.

She glanced at the blossoms in her arms with a small smile. “In the face of terrorism, the most defiant thing one can do is remain unafraid.”

The words sounded so simple but Hunter was no stranger to the toll war had on people. He could see the tremor in her hand and the dread in her eyes. Perhaps that was what made him step closer.

"We aren't going to let anything happen to you!"

She sniffed but smiled.

“Thank you, Hunter.”

*

Over the course of the next few days, the squad formed their opinions of the princess.

“I love her!” Wrecker burst out. He reclined on the floor against his bunk, gorging himself on the treats he and she had stolen from the kitchens. Hunter still remembered his face when he’d returned to their quarters. He’d never looked happier.

“I concur,” added Tech, looking up from his datapad and recounting again how she had actually asked him questions about his knowledge of the indigenous bird species on her home planet.

Echo had lived up to his name in his praise of her too, calling her sensible but kind-hearted and level-headed despite her inexperience. Tonight, he kept watch over their charge. Hunter would relieve him in a few hours.

“All royals are the same.” Crosshair’s habitual distain was unchanged. He rolled his eyes at his brother’s commendations and chewed his toothpick scathingly.

“What d’you think of her Sarge?”

Wrecker’s inquest was harmless enough but Hunter went still. A warm heat covered his face.

"She's-."

He tried to pull himself together but the words wouldn't come. Crosshair laughed. A low, snickering sound that always meant Hunter was about to get teased within an inch of his life.

“I know that look.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Hunter winced at his own pathetic display of indifference.

Crosshair sat forward with a smirk, “You’ve got a crush on her!”

Wrecker’s jaw dropped and Hunter’s face only got hotter. “No, I don’t!”

“So much for staying focussed and not letting our guard down,” Crosshair parroted his own words back to him with delight.

“Stow it, Crosshair!” Hunter scowled, but it was Tech’s turn to pipe up.

“Based on my analysis of your heightened heartrate and temperature, I would have to agree with Crosshair’s hypothesis.”

Hunter clenched his fist, “Quit scanning me!” Oh yeah, he was being really subtle. He forced his tone into something like an authoritative leader, “The princess is under our protection, we have a duty to the Republic and by extension her and her father. That’s all there is to it.”

Crosshair opened his mouth to retort but Wrecker beat him. “Get off his case, Cross! If the Sarge says there’s nothing, there’s nothing!”

He stopped Tech too with a direction to let Hunter rest up so they could all do their jobs and the room hushed. Hunter closed his eyes and silently thanked Wrecker for his tact. It wasn’t long before the others were joking around like normal, albeit quietly.

*

A few hours later, Hunter relieved Echo of his post. It was nearing midnight so he stood scanning the corridor outside of the Princess’s bedchamber. Silence was almost as overwhelming as too much sound. Hunter’s senses stretched, starving for anything at all.

His one consolation was the two heartbeats that thumped in time with each other. One his own. The other resting peacefully on the other side of the door.

What had Crosshair meant? Of course he did like her. She was beautiful, kind, and the way she’s instantly befriended his brothers, the way she’d made them smile already…

But that was ridiculous, he’d only known her a few days. Besides, the Republic had made one thing very clear: clones were soldiers and nothing more. Since birth, that’s what he’d been trained for. To fight, to die if necessary for peace!

Still, the war had to end eventually. What would happen if he was still around to see it?

What would happen then?

He wondered and puzzled and went over it again until the passageway began to lighten.

“Mornin’ Sarge,” Wrecker loped, bleary-eyed toward him, ready to take the next shift. “Any trouble?”

Hunter shook his head with a small smile, “All quiet.”

He yawned, “Hand over then.”

Hunter patted his younger brother’s arm and made to leave but Wrecker caught him. “Do you really like the princess, Hunt?”

He felt his throat tighten again but the storm of thoughts he’d been caught in finally broke. He took a breath.

“Yeah, Wrecker. I really do!”

***

Thanks for reading! Please let me know what you thought and reblog if you liked it so more people can read it!

Hunter Taglist: @clonethirstingisreal

[youtubeyouniversitytherapy]

#1 Check in // July'24 - Matt H.W.

Matt was almost always tired at therapy. He at least had medical conditions that could excuse it, but if he overshot it and was too wired there was no way out of the questioning he would get. So he looks across at Dean Tat with lidded eyes and she stares at him through their first few minutes of therapy. He thinks this might be the lucky day she had given up on him, but just as he curiously tilts his head, she smiles warmly. “How have you been adjusting to the new residents on campus?” She asks, looking at him intently even as her hand makes marks on her notepad. Her pencil sounds so loud… couldn’t this bitch use a pen? No… she’d probably click it and see if she could make him break down. He was being tested. She knew, but there was no body to find. Just a dead man walking that was captive to her office for an hour. She wasn’t his usual but he knew that didn’t mean she won’t know what the other dean knew. She wasn’t a good target for any lying games that get him out of this honesty hour.

“I liked the old ones.” He mutters in reply and turns his eyes out to the outside, the hot sun beams filter through the tree leaves outside to a tolerable heat once it hits the window. 

“I understand that, but all the same, how are they settling in?” “Fine I guess…” he sighs trying to push down the thoughts that like to crawl up from the depths his darkest blues. Tracing the choice tree through what he could have done differently to keep anyone as if it were in his power. “I haven’t met them all… but I really like one of them.” He shrugs.

“Oh go on!” She smiles excitedly, even putting her pen and paper down. Was this truly off the books or did she just know how to make him feel comfortable? 

“I call her Aimee, she calls me Eugene. We don’t know each other’s names its just fun.” He tries to cut off any interpretations of that but she’s giving him that inquisitive look.

“What makes it fun?”

“The mystery? Maybe just like…the joke?” he shrugs and looks away from her gain.“The joke being that you don’t really know each other?” She ask with a tilt of her head and this stupid sympathetic look in her eyes. “Do you feel like you’re having trouble opening up again?” She pushes and he stays quietly looking outside. “Does she remind you of-”

“Of course she does!” He cuts her off, fearing any name she might say. He scoffs and rolls his eyes. “Everything reminds me of everything! Hello! It’s one of the reasons I’m here.” He slouches back on the couch and gazes at the trees outside. He peers around the scenery, thinking maybe he’d see him out there, but he knew they knew better than that.

  There’s another break of silence as Dean Tat writes a few notes in her book. Her pencil strokes sound softer, like she was defeatedly muttering these notes than loudly reading him. “You seem on edge.” She says calm and steady, and when his eyes go to meet her scribbling he finds her gaze narrowed right in on him. “Any cravings?” His skin crawls, hairs prickling up. God that made him sound so pathetic! Was he craving anything? Did he wanna have a little cheat day with the girls? 

The worst part about it was that it was true.

He wanted a little treat. He’d try to avoid it and prove he didn’t need it but he’d buckle to have a good time with the girls. Girl. 

“I guess… nothing I can’t handle, especially with Ryan’s support.” He looks back to her, a challenge in his face for her to call him on his shit. “I look at him and it keeps me clean… Wouldn’t want to disappoint him.”

“I’m sure he appreciates that, that it’s very healing for him to see you on the up and up.”Ouch. She was stone cold with a marksman’s precision. He wished she just call him a slur and kick him out.

“I bet.” He gaze falls back to the window as he yawns, laying his head on the back of the couch, severely slumped into it now. “You wouldn’t be able to tell me what he says to you about me, would you?” Why would he ask that? Another yawn, he tries to rub the sleep out of his eyes.

              “Of course I could. It’s about you right? You should know what he says about you.”What?

              “You want to know what he says when he doesn’t talk. You want to know what he hides.”

He doesn’t hide

              “Even from you.”

  “No-” 

  Matt wakes with a start from a laying position on the therapy couch, his head feels like it is filled with syrup that is sloshing around as he tries to move, but as it settles back into place he slowly comes to. His phone is quietly buzzing, Dean Tat is typing at her desk. 

“Fuck….. Sorry.”

“You’re perfectly fine Mathew, I’m aware of your condition.”

“Doesn’t mean it’s not embarrassing.” He mutters and remembers why he had his dreadful cravings. The sun was no longer shining through the trees but peeking through the buildings nearby, the golden hour exploding on the horizon. “How long?”

“Maybe forty-five minutes. It’s definitely one way to get out of talking about your feelings.” She shoots him a lighthearted but stern warning in a glance. “Don’t try and make a habit of it, we don’t want to have to hook you up to a vitals machine for every session.” Disheveled and sleepy he has no wit to fight back with, so he just nods, gathers himself and heads out with some generic and mutter goodbyes. He finally answers his phone and frowns against the black glass.

“Sorry, I fell asleep. I’m heading out now.

…… Sorry if I worried you……..

I dunno jus- …..  

  ….. Okay….. 

See you in a second… yeah… 

love you………………..”

[seirclys]

OG! Penelope Eckhart Headcanons: The System

Part 5!

Now, Penelope's System is vastly different from Siyeon's. I feel like Siyeon's system is much more helpful in giving information.

—— Again, MAJOR SPOILERS! ——

Siyeon's System

The System seems to be able to be sensed by those of high magic sensitivity, seeing as Winter deduced that Siyeon had a high magic presence on the Eve of the Hunt.

Dialogue Choices On/Off: I guess this kind of acts as an OOC filter which Siyeon can toggle on and off.

Affection Scores: It appears as percentages above the heads of the MLs. Upon reaching 70%, the percentage becomes locked and only a discerning color is given.

Rewards: Usually percentage increases in affection, fame, and popularity with Eckhart servants. For tangible rewards, they are usually given through actual characters, not by the System itself(Crossbow, Camouflage Bracelet, Gold)

Money System: The System can keep track of the personal funds that Siyeon accumulates.

Magic: The System is able to prompt Siyeon into using magic by providing spell incantations or descriptions of what magical artifacts do.

Background Information: Siyeon can access basic information about MLs and Penelope Eckhart. Later on, the story of Laila and the original Penelope is told to her via the System.

Teleportation: Limited, as it can only teleport Siyeon to continue the story's progression. Siyeon can't prompt it to teleport her to a different location.

Story Progression: Relating to teleportation, the System can lead Siyeon to places such as the garden maze to further chapter progression through glittering light trails.

Story Chapters/Events: Helps Siyeon discern potential events by giving a prior warning. For example, the hunting competition hunting portion. In addition, it provides her selection choices such as in the Trial.

Corporeality: The System can be blocked by physical entities such as bodies, as in the case of Winter.

Marksman Help/Mini Games: The System displayed targets for Siyeon to take down the bear, and during the assassin chase, took control of Siyeon's body to give her perfect marksmanship.

Transmigration & Reincarnation: The System has offered these options for Siyeon and Ivonne respectively at the end of the story.

Penelope's System

Unlike Siyeon's system, Penelope's does not help her in terms of the story. Siyeon's is a romantic storyline System, Penelope's is an action-genre type(befitting their different paths).

Stats: Penelope is able to see her stats and level up on them as well. These include Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, Constitution, Mana, and Charisma.

Strength and Constitution are stats that are time-dependent, so they reset each loop back to her initial stats. Charisma is physical appearance and mental charisma, so it gets knocked down a little.

Mana doesn't change, but it may affect her body if her Constitution is too weak.

The System sometimes gives her stat points to allocate to certain stats or skills.

Soul Status: As alluded to in Part 4, Penelope can track her soul shards easier through the System. Right now, they're "orbiting" around the biggest piece, which is Penelope.

Inventory: Ah, the classic video game inventory. It can carry anything of any shape, size(to some extent), organic/inorganic, except living, sentient beings. A shame.

However, she found a cheat to hack the System and her inventory doesn't get wiped after each death. It's her money glitch. She's duplicated money, jewels, kept copies of her wardrobe, sentimental items unique to each loop, priceless artifacts, and other supplies. However, certain artifacts of great power cannot be duplicated.

Because of this, she often requests as many unique and commissioned gems and custom dresses as possible. What's the point of having six of the same dress?

Library: A subcategory of the Inventory. Throughout her travels, Penelope slowly accumulated tomes, scrolls, and written knowledge of the Ancient Wizards, usually found when treasure hunting or pulling an Indiana Jones and breaking through traps. Of course, being the last Ancient Wizard, she's able to easily figure them out. Other archaeological excavations have ended up in failure because the triggered traps destroy the vaults of knowledge entirely.

Background Information: It acts more like her notes compiled about locations or people. The System organizes them into the correct sections, but all of the information is what Penelope has been told, overheard, or otherwise gotten from her interactions, not from the System.

In some rare cases, the System will give her some information. It's not necessarily specific or important information. It may be, for example, information about a foreign culture.

Story Progression: This is actually linked to one of her skills, which is "precognition". It technically isn't, but Penelope is much more attuned to a world's "Story" and thus can predict some major events through gut feelings and her sharp mind. The System helpfully records these instances for her.

System Shop: From physical items to even skills, the System Shop has it all. A mix of real currency and System-specific currency can be used.

Intangibility: It cannot be interfered with by those other than Penelope.

Connection to Spirits: As mentioned, Penelope is followed by a group of spirits, some of them her ancestors. They are connected to her via the System as well, though they cannot access it like she can. Think of them as being on Guest Mode on a computer while Penelope's on Administrator.

These are the ones I can think of for now. As with the rest of the OG!Penelope posts, I'll be adding onto them if I think of new things, even if that section has already been posted. Not sure how.

[cast-you-dxwn]

You've said the 778th has "futuristic" equipment. What exactly does that entail?

Firstly, the Harbinger powered combat suit. Power armor, in common parlance. An interlocking suit of angelic steel plate and blessed ceramic armoring, designed to withstand attack from blade, claw, as well as mundane and profane munitions, sporting a respectable resistance even to blessed weapons.

One of the finest examples of the Fabricators engineering, each suit is sustained by the fire of its wearers faith, their zealotry collected in the suits power plant and being cycled into the rest of the armor. It gives them the strength of a hundred men, augments their overland speed to be able to keep up with the Trueborn. Their reflexes are augmented, your average Legionnaire in their armor capable of feats like catching arrows. (From war-bows, mind you, stunt arrow catchers use bows with extremely low draw weights and arrows with special fletching that slows them down.)

Armored, your average member of the 778ths reaction time is .002 seconds (three times that of your average human), their peak running speed is 35 MPH/56 KPH (a good margin faster than the worlds fastest mortal man), and can lift roughly 1 ton.

Earlier models complicated flight, but downsizing the power plant negated this.

Aside from augmenting their physicality, each suit comes standard with an extensive suite of tech hardened against EMP, hacking, and electrical attack. This include an encrypted internal comms system, motion sensors, IFF tags, low-light/infrared/surface-penetrating optics, enhanced targeting systems, trail-finding optics and heightened sensory input, toxin filters, heating and cooling systems, systems for automatic tourniqueting of wounded limbs and distribution of painkillers, and many other functions that slip my mind as of now.

Each suit is also highly customizable depending on each Legionnaires personal preference and battlefield role. The suits are theirs until they day they die or retire.

For example, Decanus Alistair Von Licht favors to face his foes in melee combat, so the power plant directs more power to the arms of his suit to strengthen his strikes, and he has additional plating upon his thighs, arms, and gorget.

Legionnaire Ramirez is his Contuberniums designated marksman, so he has many different optics mounted on his helmet which are linked directly to his weapon, and additional stabilizers in his gauntlets to further steady his aim.

There are other things, but I went on a rant about their armor and this is getting very long so I will talk about them later lmao

[amostdelectablescribbler]

WIP Intro: Steel Horses and Hot Irons

As requested by @tea-and-mercury, i am writing up a wip intro for the big ‘un. 32k words deep as of writing this. Sooo:

Genre: Action

Setting: South USA, Arizona-Texas-Nevada area. The Mojave, pretty much.

Tropes: Bigass guns, physics that doesn’t really get addressed, a whole bunch of mental illness (poor Becca), romantic sideplot, big plot twist, secondary antagonist scarier than the primary.

Tag (so i can see it): #STHI (it’s gonna work a bit like a signature for me)

Imma just put the prologue and the character work i did in because it’s just that much easier.

Prologue

5 years ago, 2035, the atom bombs were dropped. First at the USA, then Afghanistan, Russia, China, most of the EU, France shone like a strobe light before the nuclear power stations finished exploding. They all fell in the face of nuclear armageddon. All that was left were craters, rubble and uranium. A few survived and began reclaiming the barren, toxic wasteland. In Utah, there was a lot of this. The Krugers, based in Arizona, were dangerous and silent assassins that disappeared into the night when they left. The Mob, the surviving criminals from the surviving prisons. The lowest of the low and barely organised. The Survivors, who can walk off just about anything and were mostly left alone by everyone else. Wandering bands of close friends also formed, finding work as hired guns.

The Motliest Crew were renowned the best. A group of 5; 3 men, 2 women, all balls-to-the-wall insane. They had no known names, only specialties. The Marksman, Rebecca Johansson “Pew.” A sniper who allegedly never missed a shot, but was very shy, anxious and probably depressed. This is to be confirmed as there are no therapists left in Arizona, or in Alberta, Canada. The Scout, aka, Sorren Clark. “Keep up, $#§/stain.” A speedster with a mouth and a shotgun, one get’s him into trouble, the other get’s him out. Not the most useful combo in Australia, but out in the wastes, invaluable. The Brawler, aka, Claudia Vander. “I’m gonna punch him.” A large frame packed with muscle and grit hailing from South Korea and California. Her fighting skills are near unmatched. 

The Demolitionist, aka, Callum Henderson. “I had a dog and his name was… Bingo!” A drunk, black, tartan-clad Scotsman with a grenade launcher and a rocket launcher. And a claymore, he has a sword too. The Gunman, aka, Rasputin Romanov. “Shoot first, ask question while reloading. Spetsnaz 101.” A man of few words and a Spetsnaz soldier from Russia, with a really heavy accent and a really heavy gun. 

Each of these wandering guns-for-hire wore a face mask or helmet to both obscure their identities and filter the noxious cocktail of chemicals in the air in some places. They were all armoured to various degrees with assorted run-down military kit that had been scavenged. The Gunman was clad in hulking Juggernaut military gear, the Demolitionist in assorted pads and plates, the Scout in Moto leathers and a bulletproof vest, the Brawler wore similar kit to the Scout and the Marksman was in ill-fitting, minimalist spec-ops kit. Minimalist because only a third of what they found came close to fitting her. Each suit was tailor-made (except the Marksman) by it’s wearer, each adding their own personal flourishes and decorative elements, like sketchily-woven tartan, tally marks, oil crayon, the works.

Now, the character work i did (and added):

Rasputin and Becca:

Callum, Sorren and Claudia split up to go and have fun, leaving Becca with Rasputin. They sat in the hotel room, looking at each other quizzically. Becca had curled herself up in a blanket nest across the room from Rasputin’s massive frame that was posted on a bed, leaning into the wall, staring blankly into the space between air molecules. He looked around, registered Becca’s comfort ball, cracked his back and shifted his posture to something more relaxed.

“So.”

“Mm?” Becca mumbled from her nest, poking an anxious head out into the dim light.

“Why are you hiding?” 

Becca paused in thought, eyes darting from Rasputin to the floor, to the roof before finally talking, her own indecision caving to his patience.

“I’m worried.” She whispered into her blankets, “I’m worried about them.”

“Hmm. In Spetsnaz, we had a good cure for worries. We would sit and talk about worry. You want to try?”

“Mhm” she slowly heaved her miniature frame out of the blanket nest and towards Rasputin, who lay down on the bed fully, shuffling along to make space, further dwarfing Becca. She curled up next to him, heart rate going from cardio to moving. Listening to his huge heart slowed down hers, his relaxed body position relaxing hers. There was a security in being so close to something so large, like swimming with a whale.

“So. Why are you worrying, Becca?”

“I- I’m worried for Callum and Sorren and Claudia. I don’t know what might happen to them. Even if I was there with them, I would just slow them down, but I like knowing where they are so that I know they can protect me if they have to.” Rasputin’s huge bald head turned around

“I will tell you this, Becca: I have protected all of them before. I can protect you.”

“There are monsters out there than can hurt them?”

“But none them can hurt me. I am Russian. I am Spetsnaz. Nothing hurt me.” Rasputin’s gravelly, broken English was somehow comforting. 

“Really?”

“Da.”

Callum:

Another cold, dark night came as the red sun plummeted below the horizon. In the town, there was a bar. A man sat alone, at the end of the bar, drinking from a flagon of foamy beer and people-watching and checking his watch, waiting. For something or someone to spur him into action. Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick. 

An hour passed and he finished his beer, ordering another from the barkeep. The night crept on fruitlessly for the man. The stream of people coming in and out slowed to a trickle as he waited in the dark bar, wooden flagon in hand, beer getting colder, patience wearing thinner. Finally, one man entered who caught his attention. A tall, burly figure with a tartan kilt and sash over his impressive armour and helmet. The man held himself proud and tall, confident in himself and his abilities, but not arrogant. He walked with a muted swagger as he progressed to the bar and made his order, shifting the claymore on his back to avoid the seat. Some whiskey or other on the rocks. He had an enormously Scottish accent and as he removed his helmet to drink, it was revealed that he wore an eyepatch and had a nasty burn scar plastered on the left side of his face, sprawling under the eyepatch and barely visible in the shadow. 

The man stalked forwards silently, sitting beside the Scotsman without making a single quiet sound. 

“So, is it really you?” The hooded man had a smooth, melodious voice, with a noticeable Mexican accent.

“Who’s really who?” Callum replied, unflapped by a stranger randomly appearing beside him. In the better light, the man saw belts of grenades wrapped around the scot’s waist and bulges from beneath his sash. 

“You. Are you really the famous Callum Henderson? Legendary demolition man for the Motliest Crew?” The stranger’s voice somewhere between admiration and mockery.

“So tha’s what they’re callin’ us. ‘The Motliest Crew.’ ‘Bit demeaning, no?”

“Not at all. I’m a huge fan of yours. I’ve been watching your antics for a while now and i was wondering if I could get an autograph?” The strange man spoke from beneath a hood, eyes glinting red in the gloom, a crocodile grin on his face as he reached i to his poncho and coat,

“Aye, sure. Tell me where tae sign.” Callum turned to get a pen from his pocket and when he turned back around, a tattered, sun-bleached “wanted: dead or alive” poster of him was placed on the dark wooden bar. The wind whistled as the man tapped the ‘dead’ part, “Just here, please.”

“Yer a bounty hunter, eh?”

“I am. One of the best, too. The Wolf of District 13.”

“So, wolf, is this the best yeh have? Vague, indiscernible threats and uncanny looks?” Callum replied, showing no fear of the man beside him, as he downed his scotch, putting a 5€$ bill beneath the glass. The Wolf chuckled for a second, before going dangerously calm, retreating into the dimly lit bar and drawing himself up to his full, enormous height. 

Cybernetics whirred to life from beneath the wolf’s poncho and hood, as his eyes glowed red and a hiss of steam whistled from his elbows. Callum stood, grabbing his sword, “So this is how yeh wannae do this?”

“Yes.” Hissed the wolf, as his mechanical legs grew a third joint, making them look like the legs of a wolf, lean and strong and good for chasing. Callum stood, taking the poster to inspect it. He looked for a while, put it on the bar, signed it, pocketed his pen and walked out of the bar. The Wolf lowered his guard in disbelief, hunching back over to examine the wanted poster. He had circled “Dead” and signed it at the bottom. The wolf finished his beer and sulked off into the night, after paying his tab.

Claudia:

The Wolf of District Seven stalked down the back alleys of the Last City, following the cheering to a dingy looking warehouse with lights and shouts coming from within. Loud, aggressive music blasted from huge speakers, the bass shaking the walls. The Wolf entered the building by walking through the front door guarded by bouncers without being noticed at all. In the centre of the building, a ring had been made, inside of which, there were two fighters. One was a large man with massive arms and cybernetic reinforcements on his elbows and shoulders and he wore brass knuckles on his ham-fists and a metal plate on his jaw. The other fighter -the Brawler- was a smaller woman with broad shoulders and strong, lean arms. Claudia was still tall, but this other fighter was massive, yet her confident stance, and side-guard indicated extreme proficiency in her trade. The large man wore brass knuckles, she wore steel boxing gloves haphazardly manufactured from scrap sheet-metal and cast-iron. 

The man brought a standard boxing guard up and his opponent steadied herself before bouncing on her toes. The large man angled himself to his opponent and swung a huge haymaker which was caught by the woman, pinned to her side and she started slamming him with crushing blows to the liver and ribs. Each blow made a cracking and a clanging as steel smashed bone. With one final powerful uppercut, she released the mans arm and slammed him in the chin, knocking him unconscious before he hit the cold stone floor.

The Wolf came through the crowd without detection or suspicion of a tall, hunched figure in a black poncho and hood hiding the figure’s face. She called into the crowd, “Who’s next? C’mon, dude! It said fight ring on the poster, not warm-up gym!” The Wolf took his chance and approached Claudia, weaving through the crowd, “I will fight you, if nobody else wants to, that is.” The Brawler looked at her new opponent, weighing up the fighting skills of this strange hooded figure, “Bring it, big dude!” she tapped her chin with her glove, taunting the Wolf. “You know, I’m a big fan of you and your crew, Brawler. Before we start, can I please get an autograph?” The Wolf asked, crocodile grin spreading beneath his hood, red eyes catching the light as he withdrew a pen and wanted poster from the folds of his poncho. His metal limbs glinted in the spotlight, clawed steel fingers on full display. He handed her the pen, “Just here please.” He tapped under ‘DEAD’ in ‘Dead or alive.’

Claudia signed the poster in pen before she realised what it was, stepping back as she realised, “Trying to bring in the reward money?”

“Have to make a living somehow. It’s not personal.” The Wolf removed his black poncho to reveal a body made mostly of metal and machine parts. Steam hissed in the shining pistons operating the Wolf’s arms and legs. Guards were raised and it began.

The Wolf dropped low, correctly anticipating a jab to the face, claws grating on the cold stone floor. “Slow.” He cackled with glee, swerving past a knee aimed to the gut and sweeping the supporting leg from below her. “Sloppy.” He taunted from behind Claudia as she got up and readied herself to fight properly. He took the next punch that came for him, a misdirect left hook into an elbow to the chin and a slam to the ribs. Both massive blows made a sickening clunk as metal was slammed together violently. “Weak.” Growled the Wolf, as steam hissed. Before she could process it, the Wolf’s metal fist was an inch before her face, and promptly slamming hard into said face, pushing her backwards. The next blow came before she was done staggering. A monstrously powerful ridgehand to the lower back, snapping the Brawler back up, only to take a huge uppercut to the liver and a sweeping kick to the back of the knee, bringing her down into a spinning back kick. She was out before she hit the floor. The Wolf drew his clawed hand into a stabbing blade, winding up to deliver the killing blow, before the referee stepped in, stopping the fight. “That’s enough. You’ve beaten her, prize ‘s in the pot.” 

“Fine. I’ll take your bribe, but that doesn’t pull her bounty off the board.” The Wolf growled, cursing under his breath as he left the dingy arena. 

and finally, Sorren:

The Wolf of District 13 sat at the end of another bar with another mug of beer. The MotoGP was on the TV, engines roaring through the abused speakers. One man sat watching, he had a beer in his gloved hand and a confidence in his demeanour. “I know you’re there, mate. I’ll get to you when Ducati finish this lap in first.” The Scout waved a hand in the Wolf’s direction, before retreating it and sipping on a gin. The Wolf stared in awe and bitterness at the scout’s arrogance, he had never been dismissed by a target before. Ignored once or twice, acknowledged every time, but never dismissed. This was not going to fly. The Wolf advanced silently towards his quarry, making no sound, red eyes glowing with malice. The Scout waved his hand again, tutting. “No, I said I’ll get to you in a bit. I keep my word. Sit back down, finish your drink, and put the knife away.” 

“And if I don’t?” The Wolf muttered under his breath.

“Them you’ll go down in history as the most boring assassin ever. If you want to kill me, you’ll do it on my schedule.”

“Idiot.” 

“No, you idiot, I’m reckless. The difference being one is being thick as bricks and the other is having no regard for your own safety.”

The Wolf was a very patient killer, he would wait for days for his quarry to show themself, but after 5 minutes with this intolerable little man he had very much lost it. He went in with his knife and went straight for Sorren’s spine. He missed the spinal cord because of the Scout’s impossible reaction speed, but instead his blade was buried in his lumbar. 

“Ouch. Welp, I’m off to die somewhere pretty. See you in hell.” Sorren groaned as he got up from his stool, blade still stuck in his back, and walked out of the bar bleeding everywhere, hopped on his motorbike, and caned it back to the Hotel California deep within the sprawling city.

-end-

Btw i got more wips to do more intros on, since you’re so desicated and insist on reading to the end of these :3

[scopeaid]

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[hiredassault]

[ nape ] a kiss placed at the nape of the partner's neck ( feel free to ignore )

[[ SINDAY MEME CONTRACT ]] @frstwomn

The former-Marine-turned-mercenary who had been recruited by the U.S. government (technically Amanda Waller && Colonel R.Flagg) had different assignments throughout the cabinet, IN as well as OUT of the Pentagon. Even if the man likes the job or not he was compelled to follow the mission commands. Since the last week, his assignment was to be the sniper intel of the President. Always covering her behind && checking for any incoming objects or living beings.

The President had a small party inside the White House where the marksman was unable to control the urge to take two or more SHOTS of alcohol && mindlessly forget everything that happened afterwards.

It was early morning; all the curtains in the ROOM were still pulled shut, letting a soft glow filter gently through the material. Floyd heard a kettle boiling distantly && let out a deep sigh, trying to curl further into the bed to block out any noise. After a few moments of drifting in and out of his thoughts, he was able to crack his eyes open as soon as there was a soft PROLONGED contact of LIPS that can be defined as an obvious kiss at the exposed nape of his neck.

" I... where am I? " Little did he recognize YET that it was the President herself.

[afvckton]

Marvel Eros basics:

has wings, typically white but when using his powers they tend to turn gold and give off a glow.

doesn’t do heroics in a super hero costume but rather he is either working something out looking good as fuck in some tailored gucci suit lol... orrr he is sporting something that reflects his ancient greek roots, such as a typical linothorax or sometimes when he is feeling it he doesn’t wear armor, just the Pteruges because he’s saucy like that.

he is an expert marksman and archer, but he also has powers that some think is telepathic in nature and pheromone like in nature as he can cause certain emotions in people. calmness, frenzied passion, lovesick, but there are mortals not as easily swayed (typically mutants that are telepathic or able to filter out pheromones). 

he can shoot physical arrows but he can also shoot psychic arrows full of his power to swaya person into a certain mood, or to knock people out, calm them down, or cause them to behave in a way he controls basically. 

** vaguely similar to cupid of 616 buuuut not because lol nah... the shit with mockingbird did NOT happen thanks. he has little history, it's all old shit, so consider it overridden by this.**

[marifilue]

Part 5: Losing Ground

Pairing: Logan Howlett x F!Mutant!Reader - Slow burn, no use of y/n.

Summary: You're an X-Men member with regenerative healing ability and skilled marksman. On a routine mission with the team things take a drastic turn when a mutant-inhibitor collar is forced onto you, leaving you vulnerable, unable to heal. With no quick fix in sight, Logan becomes your reluctant anchor, helping you get through each day as you fight to survive, unexpected bond with Logan begins to grow, one that becomes far stronger than either of you could imagine.

Warnings: Explicit language, Violence, Blood

WC: 7,2k

<- Part 4

A piercing, sterile light blurred above as you slowly blinked your eyes open, the muffled sound of voices filtering through the haze of your mind. Groggily, you raised a hand to shield yourself from the brightness, every muscle heavy and weak. Your throat was parched, lips dry and chapped, you swallow your saliva, wincing at the faint soreness that pulsed through your body.

Jean’s face soon appeared above you, her gaze gentle but assessing. "How are you feeling?” she asked, her tone soft yet concerned.

“Thirsty, actually,” you murmured, voice raspy. Feeling the dehydration, when is the last time you drink water, you pushed yourself and tried to sit since the headache from laying too long start taking it's toll. You noticed the IV in your hand. The sight of needle strapped trough your skin made your stomach twist uncomfortably, and you instinctively tried to tug your arm away.

“You’ve been out for about nine hours,” Jean explained, placing a gentle hand on your shoulder to steady you. “It’s seven in the morning now.”

Before you could respond, Hank’s voice caught your attention from across the room. “The collar,” he said with a slight frown, eyeing it with a mixture of fascination and concern. “It has a far more advanced protection mechanism than the ones I’ve dealt with before.”

He approached, adjusting his glasses as he examined it carefully. “I’ll need more time to determine how to disable it safely, without risking harm to you… or anyone nearby. Be careful not to accidently made skin contact with it, for now.”

A small grumble from your stomach made Jean chuckle softly, her gaze shifting back to you. You looked up at her, gesturing toward the IV with a faint grimace. “Can you take this out? I think I could really use a real food.”

Just then, the medbay door swung open, and Logan strode in, wearing a brown flannel tugged into his jeans with huge belt clasping around. You wonder how long did he spent Infront of the mirror with that hairstyle every morning, his usual gruff expression softening slightly as he took in the sight of you awake. Jean smiled, nodding at him. “Logan, could you bring her some breakfast?”

Before he could reply, you interjected quickly, “Can I eat in the kitchen instead? I…uh I don’t really want to eat in here.” Your gaze fell to the sterile surfaces, the clinical smell thick in the air, a sharp reminder of past memories you'd rather forget.

Jean glanced at Hank, who gave a brief nod of approval. “Alright,” he said, understanding in his gaze. “But take it slow.” With that reassurance, Jean turned back to you, gently taking hold of your arm.

“Let me take the IV out before you go,” she said, her tone calm and steady. You watched as she reached for a small gauze pad, her movements precise and careful. She placed it gently against your skin, then pulled the IV needle out in one smooth motion, pressing the gauze over the tiny puncture to stop any bleeding. “There we go,” she murmured, applying a bit of tape to hold the gauze in place. “All set.” You exhaled, feeling a small wave of relief as the IV was finally out.

Logan moved to help you, extending an arm, but you waved him off, determined to make it on your own. Despite the slight limp, you pushed yourself forward, refusing his support even as he trailed close behind, his expression a mix of amusement and mild exasperation. As always, you couldn’t help but meet his silent offer of help with a stubborn sense of independence.

“Good morning to you too, varmint,” Logan greeted with his gruff voice, the new nickname slipping off his tongue with a smirk. You shot him a look, eyebrows furrowed. “What did you just call me?”

“Varmint,” he replied with a casual shrug. You narrowed your eyes, clearly puzzled. “What the hell is that?” You said, clearly having a hard time taking a step by step, but refuse to visibly show the struggle.

Logan chuckled, shaking his head in disbelief. “You don’t know what a varmint is? You sure you’re a marksman?” You rolled your eyes, correcting him with a quick retort. “Markswoman, this is the twentieth century.”

The teasing banter, even first thing in the morning, was so typical of you two, and Logan couldn’t help but enjoy it. But beneath the back-and-forth, he noticed every wince and shift of discomfort in your steps. Watching you push forward despite the obvious pain stirred a mix of pride and concern in him. He knew better than to offer again, yet every step you took, each moment you hid a grimace, tugged at him, wishing he could do more if only you’d let him.

All he could do now was stay close, ready in case you faltered, even as he watched you struggle with that damn stubborn streak he’d come to admire, and maybe even care for, a little too much.

Despite the high walls you kept around yourself, you couldn’t help but think about last night, the way Logan had stayed by your side, squeezing your arm gently as Jean stitched you up, how comforting and reassuring it was from him. You still hadn’t properly thanked him, but you’d get to that later. A flicker of appreciation settled deep down, where you rarely let anything get through. His story lingered, too, a shadow of a memory you couldn’t quite shake, making you wonder just how many other stories he had tucked away, left untold from fragments of a life lived through wars and loss.

Trying to shake off the thought, you refocused and glanced over at him. “What is a varmint, anyway?” you asked, as you stepped into the kitchen. You opened the fridge, feeling his presence behind you as he leaned against the counter. Logan’s eyes glinted with that trademark mischievous look. “I’ll let you figure it out. Where’s the fun in just tellin’ you?”

You gave him an unamused look, already making a mental note to Google it later. Turning back to the fridge, you grabbed a potato and a carton of eggs, shoving them directly into Logan’s hands. “Chop chop, mutton chops, you’re cooking. Mashed potatoes and scrambled egg.” you said, closing the fridge door with a smirk and easing into a chair, chugging a glass of water to freshen up your throat, relieved to take some of the weight off as the pain from walking flared again.

Logan chuckled, eyeing the ingredients in his hands. He shook his head, but there was a faint smile playing on his face. The comfort of the moment settled around you, and for the first time in a while, you allowed yourself to relax, even if just a little.

Logan set the eggs and potatoes on the counter, rolling up his sleeves with the look of someone gearing up for a challenge. He glanced over at you, eyebrows raised. “So…mashed potatoes and scrambled eggs, huh? Easy enough.”

You leaned back. “Just make sure to wash the potato first before you start peeling.” He paused, giving you a look as if to say Really? but followed through, rinsing the potato under the tap before he started peeling it with a bit more force than necessary. The way he handled it was almost comically rough, chunks of potato skin flying in every direction. You held back a laugh, but it didn’t go unnoticed.

“What?” he muttered, glancing over. “Nothin,” you said, still holding back a smile. “Just…careful not to take off half the potato with the skin.”

He grunted, focusing intently on the task, but when it came time to mash the potato, he just dumped the chunks into a bowl and started mashing with a fork. Before he could pour in a carton of milk into the pan which he almost do, you warned him, quickly gesturing toward the pan. “Wait! Butter first. You don’t want to dry out the potato.”

Logan shot you an exasperated look but stopped, grabbing the butter and slapping a hunk of it into the pan a bit clumsily. He went to pour in the milk, but you cleared your throat again, eyes widening as he looked over. “What now?”

“Butter…then the milk. It mixes smoother that way,” you explained, the amusement in your voice barely contained. Logan gave a small, amused shake of his head, muttering something under his breath. “I knew you’d be a backseat chef.”

“Only because I’d like to avoid a disaster,” you replied, raising an eyebrow as he half-glared at you with a smirk. He continued to stumble his way through the basics, cracking eggs with more shell fragments than you’d ever seen and stirring the scrambled eggs a little too vigorously, sending bits of yolk flying. All the while, you couldn’t stop yourself from correcting him, feeling oddly comfortable as you did. Logan was an absolute disaster in the kitchen, and seeing him out of his element like this was almost endearing.

Eventually, he managed to get the eggs and potatoes onto plates, and he set one down in front of you, leaning against the counter with a triumphant grin. “Not bad, huh?” he said, crossing his arms.

You eyed the slightly burnt edges of the eggs and lumpy potatoes, your amusement evident. “Not bad, exactly,” you teased, taking a bite and managing to hide a grimace. “It's closer to inedible than it is to edible, kinda.” Logan chuckled, his eyes narrowing playfully. “Oh, you think you could do better?”

“Definitely,” you replied, a spark of challenge in your gaze. The banter, the little corrections, his quiet grumbling, it all felt natural, easy. And as you ate, you caught him watching you, a warmth in his gaze that softened his rough edges. It was a strange moment, one you hadn’t expected, but the quiet rhythm of it felt like something you could get used to, even if you’d never admit it.

After a few bites you decided to fill your glass with some orange juice from the fridge. Pushing yourself out of the chair a bit too quickly, a sudden, sharp pain shot through your side, freezing you in place. You tried to brush it off, but Logan was already watching, his eyes narrowing as he took in your discomfort.

“Just sit down,” he said, his voice firm but not unkind. "Whaddya want to drink?" You sighed in frustration, muttering a few choice words under your breath as you lowered yourself back into the chair. “Orange juice,” you grumbled, arm clutching your side.

Logan poured the juice for you, setting the glass down beside your plate with a smug smirk. “Happy?” You gave him a reluctant nod, still annoyed but appreciating his help, even if you wouldn’t admit it.

As you both back to sit quietly eating, a thought lingered at the back of your mind. Eventually, you cleared your throat, looking down at your plate. “Thank you…for last night,” you said, hoping to keep the gratitude brief and to the point.

But Logan wouldn’t let it slide that easily. He let out a low chuckle, and you glanced up, eyebrows knitting in confusion. “What?” you asked, not sure what he found so funny. He grinned, his tone teasing. “You almost sound like every woman in a bar after spendin' a night with me.”

You rolled your eyes, regretting the thank you instantly. “Ew, gross. You know what? I take it back. I forgive you.” Logan looked genuinely amused and a little puzzled. “Forgive me? For what?”

“For crossing my personal space and boundaries,” you replied with mock indignation. “You carried me without my consent.” Logan chuckled as he leaned back in his chair. “Oh, you sure you don't want to sue me as well while you're in it?”

You gave him a wicked smile. “I’m considering it.” He shook his head, laughing, but beneath the banter, there was a hint of something softer, a rare moment of mutual understanding that neither of you needed to put into words. For now, the teasing would do just fine.

As you took another sip of juice, Hank and Professor Xavier entered the kitchen, their faces set with a hint of urgency. Hank’s eyes settled on you, then shifted to the collar around your neck. “I’ll need to run some additional tests on that collar of yours,” he explained. “It’s… more complex than I’d hoped. I want to apply a temporary layer that could block any accidental shocks, but for safety… well, I could use some assistance.”

His gaze landed on Logan, who arched an eyebrow, clearly not thrilled but not surprised either. “What?, you need me to play your guinea pig?” Logan drawled, voice a low rumble.

“Something like that,” Hank replied, a faint smile betraying his own unease. “Your healing factor can handle the worst of the shocks if the layer doesn’t hold up as expected."

With that, the four of you made your way to the medbay, footsteps echoing through the quiet hallways. Each step weighed heavily on you, soreness from the last night beginning to catch up. But as you glanced at Logan walking beside you, you felt a small surge of determination to keep up.

Once in the medbay, the sterile room filled with the faint hum of medical equipment, he could sense the quiet tension emanating from you. A subtle pulse beat in your throat, the sound of your heart quickening with each step though he knew you had no idea he could hear it.

Standing beside where you were sitting, he noticed how your breathing grew shallower. Despite the casual front you put on, Logan could tell his proximity unsettled you. When Hank gestured him forward, Logan drew closer, reaching out to help him adjust the protective device. His fingers brushed your shoulder as he steadied it, and your pulse sped up a quick staccato beat that only he could hear.

Logan couldn’t help but smirk slightly, feeling an odd amusement. He’d never been one for delicate feelings, but this was different. There was something about the vulnerability hidden behind your resolve that tugged at him.

“Relax,” he muttered under his breath, catching your gaze as his hand lingered on your shoulder. “This’ll be over before you know it.”

When Hank initiated the first low-voltage test, a shock traveled through the collar, and Logan took the brunt of it with a grimace, his skin tingling painfully. He heard you murmur an apology, voice slightly shaky, your expression a blend of guilt and concern. “Don’t worry, varmint,” he reassured, his tone gruff but soft. “Ya ain’t gon’ kill me.”

You bit your lip, and he caught the faintest quiver in your heartbeat again as he held your gaze, refusing to let you look away. Something raw lingered in the air between you both, neither of you could fully name. But he didn’t move back, didn’t break eye contact, letting you see that he was there, steady, no matter what.

The final layer was applied, and Hank sighed in relief. “All done. It’s stable now, and we shouldn’t have to worry about accidental contact.”

Logan's fingers brushed the collar one last time as he stepped back, catching one more pulse of your heartbeat a little steadier this time. He’d heard enough to know he affected you, even if you’d never admit it.

You let out a breath you hadn’t realized you were holding, though exhaustion settled into your limbs as the relief took its toll. The professor must have noticed, because he gave a slight nod. “You’re free to go,” he said gently. “Hank will monitor the collar’s function from here. Take some time for yourself.”

You nodded, already feeling the pull of sleep as you rose. Logan gave you a brief nod, his gaze lingering, but you brushed it off, determined to handle this last stretch alone. The stairs were a different story. Every step seemed to taunt you, the soreness sharpening with each push. By the second flight, your leg trembled slightly, but you gritted your teeth and continued, refusing to let the pain win. Finally, you reached the top, pausing to catch your breath.

As you approached your room, a faint shadow fell across the hallway, and you knew he’d followed. Logan lingered at the corner, watching with his arms crossed, that usual mix of exasperation and silent pride in his eyes. You almost said something, but he turned away before you could muster the words, leaving you with just enough strength to stumble into your room.

As you stepped into your room, the familiar, untouched stillness washed over you. The place was just as you’d left it before the mission, a strange reminder of all the events since. On your bed lay your cracked rifle, a heavy, silent witness to your day. You sighed, moving it carefully, feeling the weight irritate the still-tender stitches on your side. Gently, you slid it back into its case, then pushed the rifle bag under your bed, its worn fabric catching faintly on the frame.

The bathroom offered a quiet reprieve as you cleaned yourself up, the cool water refreshing against your skin. You changed into a comfortable T-shirt and shorts, savoring the soft, loose fabric after the tension of the day. With a sigh, you sat on the edge of the bed, reaching over to pull your laptop closer. Curiosity had been tugging at you since Logan tossed that new nickname at you: “Varmint.” The way he’d said it, half-smirked as he helped you, made it clear there was more behind it.

You typed in the word and read the definition that popped up:

Varmint:

noun, informal, dialect

• a troublesome wild animal.

• a troublesome and mischievous person, especially a child.

The words sank in, and you muttered a soft curse under your breath, though a smile pulled at the corners of your mouth. That asshole. You couldn’t help but picture the look in his eyes when he’d said it, that mix of teasing and something almost affectionate. He probably thought it was a perfect fit.

Still smiling, you closed the laptop and lay back on the bed, exhaustion pressing down on you like a weight. The stitches, the collar, and the strain of the day blurred into one heavy ache, and as your head hit the pillow, the last thought in your mind was of Logan’s voice and that infuriating nickname. The quiet drifted around you as sleep pulled you down, the sky still bright outside as afternoon slowly faded into evening.

Dust rises around you, stinging your eyes, blurring the world into a smudged haze of gunfire and shadows. The heat is unrelenting, baking down on your skin as the weight of the rifle digs into your hands. The sound of boots pounding against cracked ground, the shouts of soldiers, and the relentless thud of explosions make everything feel surreal. It's a landscape of Iran-Iraq chaos battlefield in the 80s.

Ivan's voice cuts through, clear and steady with his Russian accent. "Right flank, cover me!" His words are as familiar as your own heartbeat, grounding you in the nightmare. You turn, catching a glimpse of him. Young, so damn young, but his eyes have that determined look, that same fire he's always had since you met him at twenty one. He'd idolized you, looked up to you with a quiet, steadfast admiration. You'd taught him everything, every trick and tactic you knew. He had become your closest friend, almost something more.

But suddenly, that determination in his eyes falters. You see his lips form words, calling your name, right before a shot rings out. The echo of it slices through the noise, louder than anything else. In slow motion, you watch him stumble, that flash of surprise on his face as his body collapses, his rifle slipping from his fingers. There's blood on his temple, spreading, blooming against his pale skin like ink soaking into paper.

"No...no, no, Ivan!" you scream, scrambling forward, your hands shaking as you reach him, ignoring the chaos around you. You press your hands to his wound, feeling the warm, sticky blood seep through your fingers, knowing it's useless. "Stay with me, please," you beg, feeling your voice break, but his eyes have already gone blank, staring past you.

"I'm so sorry," you mutter, your voice strangled. You'd promised him- promised that when you both made it back, you'd show him New York. He'd laugh, light-heartedly mocking the idea of skyscrapers and traffic, but you knew he'd been looking forward to it. And now he'll never see it. You'll never see him again.

The scene shifts violently, flickering to his childhood stories of Montana, a place he once said was like no other. He'd wanted you to see it, too, promising you a tour of his small town, the mountains, the rivers. Now, it all fades, slipping from your grasp as you scream his name again and again, but it's just you alone in the dust, Ivan's blood staining your hands.

The scream still echoes as you jolt awake, drenched in cold sweat, Ivan's name a raw ache in your throat. After the long hours you drifted into a fitful sleep, only to wake up around two in the morning, feeling groggy and disoriented. The collar pressed against your neck, an uncomfortable reminder that even in your own body, you weren’t free. Frustrated, you shifted, trying to find a position where the collar wouldn’t dig into your skin. It was no use. Resigned, you pushed yourself out of bed and shuffled to the bathroom.

The mirror reflected a pale, worn face back at you. You traced your fingers over the bandages where bullet wounds were still healing, noticing the edges of the injuries, raw and irritated. Changing into a warmer sweater to stave off the night's chill, you thought about grabbing a snack.

But as you made your way toward the stairs, a muffled noise caught your attention. You paused, listening. It was coming from Logan’s room. The sounds were low and garbled, but you could tell he was muttering, though the words were too distorted to make out. You hesitated, then shook your head. Probably none of my business, you thought, forcing yourself down the stairs.

After finding a bowl of blueberries and drink a glass of water, you turned to climb the stairs, heading back to your room, only to hear the sounds from Logan’s room again, louder this time. You stopped, an uncomfortable feeling settling in your chest. His voice sounded tortured, as though he were reliving something terrible. Without really thinking, you moved toward his door. You stood there, unsure, your hand hovering over the handle. Finally, you pressed down. The door clicked open.

In the darkness, you could make out Logan, tangled in his sheets, eyes shut tight but muttering as if in pain. You placed the blueberries on his nightstand and flicked on the light, he's wearing a white tank top with jeans, what kind of psychopath sleep in jeans? You extend your arm reaching out, lightly shake his shoulder, calling his name. He jolted awake with a sharp gasp, his claws springing out instinctively. You barely managed to jump back, waist stumbled at his nightstand roughly, avoiding the glint of metal, your reflexes saving you but the sudden movement sent a sharp, searing pain through your side.

Logan looked horrified, retracting his claws immediately with his heavy breath. “Shit. I didn’t mean.. are you okay?” He asked voice slightly trembled.

You took a shaky breath, clutching your side. “Fuck...M' fine. But you were yelling. I thought…” You smirked slightly, hiding your discomfort.

“I swear I thought you had someone in here, keeping the entire floor up ‘til two in the morning.” You told him with hitched breath.

He almost cracked a smile, though a flash of something haunted lingered in his eyes. "Not exactly."

Feeling another throb in your side, you sank onto the edge of his bed, letting yourself sit for a moment. He scoot over to give you more personal space next to him, you picked up the bowl of blueberries, offering it to him with a shrug.

“Blueberries?” Logan accepted, and you both sat in a quiet, unexpected moment of ease, passing the bowl back and forth, the silence a balm for both your wounds. It’s rare to see his hair not styled in the way he always wears it, almost resembling cat ears. You’ve always wondered if that was intentional, but you could never be sure. Now, though, you can see how thick his dark brown hair truly is, with a slight touch of untidiness. A rare sight.

Both of you sat against the headboard of the bed, the room dimly lit, the quiet hum of the night filling the space. You felt the sting in your side with every slight movement but tried to ignore it, distracting yourself with the blueberries as you popped one into your mouth. You weren't exactly sure what to say to Logan. Should you ask if he's okay? The thought felt ridiculous, considering the two of you hardly knew how to talk about such things. It was easier to just let the silence hang. But it was suffocating, thick enough to choke on, and you needed to break it somehow.

“So,” you began, forcing casualness into your tone, “The PTSD from a hundred and twenty years in the military really got you good, huh?”

Logan glanced over at you, the faintest amusement flickering in his eyes. “What does twenty do to a person anyway?” He raised a brow, a little playful edge creeping into his voice.

You shrugged nonchalantly, popping another blueberry into your mouth. “Same thing. Probably why we’re both here at two, eating blueberries.”

Logan chuckled softly, the sound low and rough, as if it hadn’t been used in too long. There was a comfort in that, his laughter, even if it was bitter at the edges. You got him in a way few could, the way he handled pain, how he tucked it away under layers of sarcasm and distance. You weren’t sure if he even knew how much you could read him, how the small moments the way he carried himself, the flicker in his eyes told a whole story.

“That’s a hell of a breakfast,” he muttered, shaking his head with a grin that softened the edges of his usual guarded demeanor.

“Breakfast, midnight snack, same thing,” you shot back, a smirk tugging at your lips as you leaned back against the headboard, clutching your side again in an attempt to ease the pain.

A long pause followed. You caught him watching you out of the corner of his eye, like he was trying to figure something out. It didn’t bother you, though. After all, you’d both been through things most people couldn’t even begin to imagine. And you understood that, understood him better than anyone else.

Logan glanced down at the bowl, then back at you. “Guess we just keep eating until we’re tired of it, huh?” he said with a half smile. You smiled, feeling a little lighter. “Sounds about right.”

The air in the room grew still for a moment, the light dim and the weight of unspoken thoughts hanging between you both. Logan's voice broke the silence, softer now, tinged with something he didn't quite want to admit.

"I could've killed you, y'know," he said, trying to sound casual selling his nonchalant face, but there was a slight edge to his voice that made it clear he was anything but nonchalant. His eyes flicked to yours, searching, a trace of concern buried in his usual guarded expression.

You met his gaze without flinching. "You didn’t," you said simply, your tone light, but you knew what he was getting at. His worry was clear, even though he was trying to mask it, you broke the eye contact now staring down at the bowl.

"You might've just opened my stitches again, which, I think, is worse." Logan's gaze hardened as he caught the scent of fresh blood. He pushed himself up from the bed, voice firm. “Wait here.”

You blinked, confused, watching as he stalked to his bathroom. He rummaged around for a moment before reappearing, his expression annoyed. Apparently, he hadn’t found what he was looking for. “Just wait,” he said again, sharper this time. “I’ll be right back.”

Left alone in his room, you found yourself glancing around. The room was sparse but lived-in: unfolded clothes thrown over a chair, a cigarette-filled ashtray on his nightstand, and a couple of empty beer bottles lining the windowsill. You smirked a bit at that, wondering how Charles hadn’t whipped his ass for sneaking those in.

Before you could delve deeper into the small details of his space, Logan stepped back in, a med kit in hand. He shot you a look that bordered on impatience and determination. Your eyebrows shot up as he set the kit down. “What do you think you’re doing with that?”

“Well,” he said flatly, “you’re bleeding all over my bed, and I’m not in the mood to be blamed for murder.”

You scoffed, moving to stand, still clutching your side as the pain spiked. The blood had already soaked through the fabric of your cream-colored Brooklyn sweater, stain spreading visibly. “No, I’m not letting you do that. Do you even know how to stitch?” You took a couple of steps toward the door, ready to brush him off and leave.

But Logan stepped in front of you, effectively blocking the doorway with his full frame. His expression was one of deadpan defiance. “Told you, I’ve lived too many lives. I know a thing or two. Now, sit down.”

You scowled, the pain now pulsing sharply with every movement, but his unyielding presence made it clear he wasn’t giving you much of a choice. “No, I’ll be fine,” you insisted, though your voice lacked conviction. Logan’s eyebrow quirked as he tilted his head, unconvinced, not budging an inch from the doorway. You tried to nudge him aside, but he didn’t even flinch. The effort triggered fresh pain from your wound, and you cursed under your breath, feeling the sting intensify.

“Just sit down,” he said with a faint irritation. “I even brought painkillers this time.” His comment was a jab at the last time you’d been stitched up, without any anesthesia, which had been a special kind of hell.

Reluctantly, you made your way back to the chair he’d hastily cleared of laundry, watching as he shoved the empty bottles in the windowsill aside to make room for the medical kit. With a quiet sigh of resignation, you sank down, your movements stiff and strained. You set the blueberries on the windowsill beside you, grimacing but knowing you didn’t have much of a choice now.

Logan handed you a small pill from the kit, his expression giving nothing away. You tossed it back but quickly realized you’d need water. Without missing a beat, he grabbed a sealed bottle of beer from his nightstand and held it out to you.

You looked at him, half-exasperated. “How’d you manage to sneak this in? Charles is gonna be furious.”

Logan smirked, giving you a quick, deadpan shrug. “Oh, it’s my weekly pay for teachin” he replied, clearly amused with himself.

You scoffed, rolling your eyes as you twisted off the cap. “Right. Because Charles would pay you in beer.” With no other choices you sip the beer anyway, sending the pill down your system.

Ignoring your jab, Logan prepared a syringe, carefully transferring a regional anesthetic from a vial. He seemed steady, his brow knit in concentration, but there was a faint tremor in his hands that told you he didn’t do this often at least, not like this. Still, he looked confident enough to keep you from second-guessing.

You took a breath and lifted the hem of your sweater, the chilly night air prickling your exposed skin as you braced for what was to come. Logan knelt beside you, his face softened by the dim light, he wiped down your skin with alcohol wipes to sterilize the area before injected the anesthetic carefully around your wound, aiming to block the nerves around your stomach.

The sensation was more disorienting than painful, and you clenched your jaw, trying to focus on anything else but the sharp reminder of how vulnerable this all felt. The pain had been long absent, a dull ache you’d forgotten, but tonight it was sharp and real, gnawing at the edges of your patience.

Logan retreated to the windowsill, waiting the anesthesia to function giving it at least ten minutes. He take a swig from the beer you’d just opened, his gaze flicking back to you as you reached for another blueberry. You caught him watching you, the hint of concern masked beneath his usual guarded stare.

“You don’t seem to do this often,” you said, popping the blueberry into your mouth, trying to sound casual.

He glanced at the bottle in his hand and shrugged, a smirk tugging at his lips. “Don’t worry. I’ve got enough experience.”

You offered a small, skeptical smile, sliding your hand under the collar around your neck, scratching at the itch that had settled there. It was an irritating reminder of everything this collar had taken from you. Your power, your freedom, and, in a twisted way, even the luxury of forgetting what it felt like to be so breakable.

Logan’s gaze dropped to your hand at your neck, but he didn’t say anything, just took another swig of his beer. For once, the silence between you both felt almost...safe. He wouldn’t pry, wouldn’t push, and you knew that even if he did, he’d understand more than most.

As the two of you waited for the anesthetic to kick in, Logan walked over to his nightstand, rummaging through a drawer until he found a cigar. Meanwhile, you felt the trickle of blood from your re-opened stitches and reached for some gauze, pressing it against the torn wounds in an attempt to stop the bleeding. Four ugly, circular scars, a nasty reminders of where bullets had torn through you. Only one suture held, while the other three had unraveled under the strain. You sighed, wondering how long you could keep dealing with this before you could stepped in this damn collar.

Logan sit in the edge of his bed, lighting his cigar with a flick of his lighter, his eyes on you as you dabbed at your side. Frustration is written all over your face as he observed your attempt to manage the bleeding on your own. He sigh and walk towards you again, placed the cigar on the windowsill and pushed the window open, letting the smoky tendrils drift out into the night air, you despised that smell so much.

Finally, he grabbed the med kit and knelt beside you, extending his hand toward the gauze in a silent offer to take over. You didn't hesitated this time, willingly to let go when his rough fingers brushed against yours as you handed over the gauze. Your left hand still held the fabric of your sweater up, and your right arm rested on the edge of the chair, giving him room to work.

Logan’s face was set in concentration as he wiped the blood from your side, tearing open another alcohol wipe and cleaning the area around your wounds. He was careful, his touch firm yet unexpectedly gentle. After ensuring the area was sterile, he picked up a small pair of scissors and nudged it against your skin. “Feel anythin'?” he asked, his voice a little softer, making sure the anesthesia had taken full effect.

You shook your head. “No, it’s numb.”

Logan's brows drew together as he worked, his expression locked in that rare, focused intensity you’d come to recognize, and even find comfort in. The dim light from the windowsill cast shadows over his face, highlighting the sharp lines of his jaw and the slight crease between his brows. You’d traced those lines in your mind a hundred times by now, memorized every edge, every angle. But tonight, as he worked with that raw focus, his face took on a different weight, a heaviness you could almost feel through the precision of his movements.

He held the metal scissors between his fingers, his hands steady, despite the faint flicker of hesitation in his eyes. Gently, he pull the teared suture trough your skin, putting all the old stitches down before guided the needle through your skin, pulling it through with a practiced care that made each puncture bearable. You could feel the slightest tug as he drew the suture tight, securing it with a small knot, his gaze unwavering, as if each stitch were a piece of armor he was layering over your vulnerability.

You tried to focus on his hands instead of the needle. He didn’t look up, not even once, and you wondered what was going through his mind as he stitched each small wound, patching you up like it was a matter of necessity, not choice. You felt his grip tighten a little as he threaded the next stitch, a silent determination in the press of his fingers.

Logan’s mind, however, was far from calm. Beneath his outward resolve, there was a nagging unease, an urge to make sure he didn’t cause you any more pain than you’d already endured. The sight of the torn stitches, the fresh blood trickling down your side, sent a quiet rage through him, one he was careful to keep hidden. He’d seen plenty of wounds in his time, but with you, each drop of blood felt personal, like a failure he hadn’t planned for. He pushed the thought aside, though, focusing instead on keeping each stitch even, precise. He couldn't afford to let his own frustration cloud the task at hand.

You studied him in silence, feeling the coolness of the anesthetic but still sensing the pressure as the needle punctured your skin again and again. Each pull of the thread was a reminder of how close he was, yet how distant he could seem. His breathing was even, steady, but every so often, you saw a muscle twitch in his jaw, a reminder of the strain he kept hidden. The Logan before you wasn’t the snarling fighter or the distant figure, he was here, in this quiet, steady moment, each movement deliberate, each pull of the suture a silent promise.

Another stitch slid through, and he adjusted his angle, his fingers brushing against your skin in a way that left a faint warmth where his touch lingered. You felt yourself tense, not from pain, but from the awareness of his closeness, the weight of his hand pressed against your side. He glanced up briefly, catching your eye, a flicker of something unreadable in his gaze. He held it for just a second, before focusing back on the task, his jaw tightening as he continued to work.

In the silence, you found yourself grateful for this quiet, for the way he grounded you, even with the thick smoke from the forgotten cigar drifting through the air. Despite his own guarded nature, Logan’s presence carried a steady calm that dulled the ache, that let you release the fear of being so vulnerable in front of someone who’d seen it all, and maybe even felt it all.

Though he’d never say it. He could see the way you trusted him, even as your body flinched from each stitch. The way you held yourself still, giving him your silent approval, it did something to him, stirred something that he knew he couldn’t afford to dwell on. He finished the final suture, tying it off with a slight flick of his wrist, but he didn’t let go immediately. His hand rested against your skin for just a moment, almost like he was hesitant to break the connection, before he finally pulled back, a slight softness lingering in his gaze.

With the stitches complete, Logan finally sat back, his hand lingering near yours for just a moment before he pulled away completely.

As Logan returned the medical kit to the windowsill, your blood is staining all over his hands, he picked up his forgotten cigar, pressing it back between his lips, exhaling a thin trail of smoke. You sat quietly, should you even tell him to wash those blood stain? He doesn't seem to care.

Inspecting the new stitches one last time before pulling down your sweater. They were tight, clean, a reminder of his steady hands, though they left a faint, uncomfortable prickling sensation beneath the fabric. Logan perched by the windowsill, the soft glow from the moonlight outside casting a warm shadow across his face, lending a quiet stillness to the room.

Standing carefully, you felt the weight of lingering awkwardness. There was no reason to stay, no reason to let yourself get tangled up in his space any longer than necessary.

All of this, this wound, this time spent at his mercy, could’ve been avoided if you’d just ignored the sounds coming from his room earlier. A part of you wished you’d done just that, stayed in your own corner, kept your focus inward. But here you were. You picked up the half-empty bowl of blueberries, eyes drifting to him briefly.

“Thanks,” you muttered softly, not looking back as you turned toward the door.

Logan gave a small nod, his voice low, almost resigned. “You should rest.”

“I know,” you replied quietly, before stepping out. Closing his door behind leaving him and the thick, smoky air. Crossing the short distance to your room, you closed your door gently and set the bowl on your nightstand, then melted into the bed, the weight of exhaustion pulling you down. The collar pressed uncomfortably against your neck, a constant reminder that rest would be scarce tonight. You sighed, eyes tracing the ceiling as your body tried to settle, though the tight ache of tension lingered.

Meanwhile, Logan stood by the window, his gaze lost in the night sky as he took another drag of the cigar. The smoke drifted outward, mingling with the faint scent of antiseptic and the lingering trace of vanilla. Your presence hung thick in the room, an echo of moments both fleeting and unexpected. He found himself staring at his bloody hands, then the medical kit, its open lid and scattered supplies a strange, quiet reminder of you—your resilience, your stubborn refusal to back down.

A feeling twisted inside him, raw and unfamiliar. Something about you had begun to grow in his mind, a constant, persistent thought that clung to him no matter how much he tried to shake it off. It didn’t make sense, you two had only met two weeks ago, yet he could already recall the details of your presence in a way that both frustrated and intrigued him. The vanilla scent was etched into his senses, something that lingered even after you’d left, the scent of your soap, shampoo—probably even your perfume, he figured. Vanilla, sweet and subtle, weaving through the air as stubbornly as you.

He couldn’t deny it anymore, you were driving him crazy. Every instinct told him to let it go, to put some distance between the two of you. But your determined, relentless spirit was wearing at him, chipping away at walls he’d thought were firmly in place. He closed his eyes, pressing the heel of his hand to his forehead. Whatever was growing inside him, you were a part of it, a force that tugged at his thoughts no matter how hard he tried to push you away.

With a final drag of his cigar, he stared out at the moonlight, each one sharp and unwavering against the night. And as the smoke drifted into the cool air, he realized that maybe, just maybe you had already rooted yourself somewhere deeper than he wanted to admit.

Part 6 ->

[nessietessimal]

I decided to redraw an old origins comic for my bois in @sketchygabz Spooky Woods setting~ 

[ansu-gurleht]

okay here is my beginner’s guide to morrowind! it talks about some of the mechanics you’ll want to know, but it’s also a little bit of a walkthrough to get you a good start on your journey. note that i originally wrote this for somebody specific: i don’t think it does, but if it seems like it’s talking at somebody in particular, that’s why. anyways, i hope this is helpful!

before you start the game:

there is only one mod i absolutely recommend you play with, and it’s not quite a mod at all.

when you download morrowind from steam or gog or whatever, you have the game! congratulations! however, what you really own is the assets of the game and a horribly broken engine. that’s where openmorrowind (openmw) comes in.

openmw is a remake of the original engine of morrowind. you see, morrowind’s original engine fucking sucks. this is for a multitude of reasons, but for me, the reason i switched was because at the later stages of a playthrough, the game will literally start corrupting your saves. don’t have that problem with openmw!

i can’t really give you a guide on how to install it and get it running better than the one on the openmw website (https://openmw.org/en/). go install it and you will have a much smoother experience overall.

before you start a new game:

before we start talking about PLAYING the game, though, let’s also take a peek through the options.

in the first page of the options, “prefs,” you’ll find some things you’ll want to switch on. namely, subtitles, always use best attack, and auto-save on rest. i’m not sure which of these are enabled by default, but enable them all.

in the “controls” section, you’re likely going to want to swap the “activate” and “jump” buttons. for some reason, the default control scheme has “activate” set to “spacebar” and “jump” set to “e”. this is, of course, counterintuitive to anyone who plays modern pc games. go ahead and just swap those around.

in the “video”-“video” section, go ahead and set your game to the highest resolution, and maybe increase the field of view a bit (i play with 75 fov, but you may prefer higher. idr what the default is, probably stupid low). in the “video”-“detail” section, crank up that view distance as high as it’ll go. i’m not sure what the default is, and i’ve fiddled with my set-up to maximize it for openmw. also turn on trilinear texture filtering and the anisotropy to the highest setting. also raise all the “video”-”water” settings to their maximum values. trust me, you can run this. it’s a new engine but the game itself came out in 2002. not the most graphics-intensive game out there.

tutorial and creating your character:

okay, that’s the options out of the way. now let’s hit that “new” button and make a new game.

watch the intro cutscene, talk to jiub, and tell him your character’s name. follow the instructions of the guards until you get to the one who asks you where you’re from. this is how the game asks you for your race. there’s no bad options here - pick whichever race you like best. you can take into account the bonuses each race gets, and compared to later games in the series these bonuses are more significant, but you can really play any character with any race in this game. it’s worth noting, however, that the beast races (argonians and khajiit) can’t wear full helms or boots/shoes. for a first timer, i would probably recommend dunmer (dark elf).

after that, go into the census office. this is where you build your class properly. you CAN take the class quiz, or pick from the premade classes. i would not recommend this. i’ve come up with a custom class that i think covers pretty much all the bases and gives a fairly enjoyable experience for a newcomer:

specialization: magic

attributes: endurance, intelligence

major skills: long blade light armor conjuration restoration marksman / destruction

minor skills: short blade medium armor spear mysticism alteration

now let me explain my choices here, to give you an idea where i’m coming from, and what those choices mean.

your specialization gives you +5 to all nine of the skills that fall under that specialization, and makes those skills increase more quickly. i’m giving you magic because magic skills don’t always increase the fastest, and every little bit helps.

your chosen attributes get +10 each. endurance determines your starting hp, which is obviously important, among other things, such as how much health you gain on level up. intelligence increases your maximum magicka. when you level up, you get to pick three attributes to increase, and depending on what skills you increased to get to your new level, you get multipliers on how much you can increase certain attributes. i recommend always increasing endurance, even if you don’t get a multiplier for it. speed, which affects your, well, speed, and strength, which affects your physical damage done as well as your carry weight, are good choices for leveling up as well. but you can increase other attributes as you think is necessary - i won’t elaborate on what each one does here, you can look it up on uesp.

your major and minor skills are what you need to increase in order to level up your character level. major skills get +25, minor skills get +10.

i always recommend at least one weapon skill and at least one armor skill for your major skills. i’m giving you long blade, bc it’s the most ubiquitous and useful weapon skill in the game, and light armor, bc it’s generally speaking the best armor skill in the game, and is also lighter to carry around as well.

i’m giving you conjuration and restoration bc having a magic skill as a major gives you a starting spell from that school. conjuration gives you bound dagger, which summons a daedric dagger for you to use for 60 seconds (and gives you the requisite skill to use it effectively), and restoration gives you hearth heal, which is a very effective heal, albeit a somewhat costly one to cast.

i’m giving you two options for your last major skill: either marksman or destruction for ranged capabilities. note, however, that marksman is not as good in this game as in later titles, and not all destruction spells are at range. destruction gives you the starting spell fire bite, a decent on touch (melee range) fire spell.

just like you have a weapon skill and armor skill in your major skills, i recommend doing the same thing with your minor skills. so i’m giving you short blade, the second most ubiquitous and useful weapon skill, and medium armor, which is almost as good as light armor, albeit a bit heavier. you can mix and match your armor pieces to great effect in this game, and wearing at least one piece of a type of armor (a medium armor gauntlet, for example) will increase that skill when you get hit.

i’m giving you spear mostly bc it’s a fun weapon to play with, and not in the other games. mysticism is an important skill for a few reasons: 1) telekinesis, which we’ll mostly use to disarm traps from a distance, and 2) teleportation spells like almsivi/divine intervention, which lets you teleport to the nearest tribunal temple or imperial shrine respectively, and mark/recall, the former of which lets you set a point the latter can teleport you to from anywhere. alteration gives you access to a lot of good spells, like feather, shield, levitate, water breathing, water walking, and open.

okay, that’s enough about your class. next you’ll be asked what your birthsign is. i’m going to recommend either the steed, which gives you +25 speed and makes walking around at the beginning of the game more bearable, or the lady, which gives you +25 personality and +25 endurance. up to you whether you value the speed or the endurance more. there are other options, of course, but i think these are best for a first-time player.

okay, after you pick your birthsign and confirm your character, you’re free! kind of. not really yet. you’ll be notified you now have an inventory menu, and instructed to pick up the papers on the table to your right. do so. then, we’re going to do something a little sneaky. on the shelf against the rightmost wall is a limeware platter, which costs like 650 gold. you want that platter. so you’re going to take it. now, you just did this in full view of a guard. but you’re fresh off the boat, so he won’t arrest you - he’ll just confiscate what you stole. BUT, if you drop the platter before he gets to you, he won’t have anything to confiscate. and since YOU dropped it, it’s technically YOURS now, so you can pick it up without any ramifications.  congrats! you just got like, 300 gold (note: your mercantile skill affects how much gold you get from selling things. very rarely will you ever get full asking price for anything).

(how do you drop the platter, you may ask? well, to open your menu/inventory, you need to right-click. very counterintuitive, i know. but you’ll get used to it. to drop an item, click it and drag it outside of any of the menus. you can either drop it directly beneath you, which usually happens, or you can place things directly onto surfaces like tables or shelves if you’re close enough to them.)

now you’re expected to go out the door across from the platter shelf. go out, and close the door behind you. there’s nobody in this side of the building, so with the door closed, you’re free to just jack anything you see without ramifications. there’s a lot of ingredients to take, if you want to get into alchemy (which can be useful, for either making beneficial potions or for making a quick buck), but most of what you want is the expensive stuff you’ll find. there’s a book you can take (books can be very expensive in this game), some silverware, a bottle of liquor called flin, a lockpick, and a shitty dagger. you’ll want to sell everything you get here except for the lockpick, and maybe the ingredients if you want to do alchemy. there’s a little chest on the bottom of the shelf by the exit that’s locked. you should be able to pick it with ease with the lockpick you just got, even though your security skill sucks atm. there’s like, 31 gold in there i think? worth taking regardless. to pick the lock, equip the lockpick (click and drag it onto the little portrait of your character in the left of your inventory screen), and “attack” (left-click) over and over while pointing your cursor at the chest until it unlocks. there’s a couple of torches you might want downstairs, as well.

after you’re done looting, leave the building. you’ll find yourself in a little courtyard. the game’ll tell you to look in the barrel by the next door, and take the enchanted ring you find inside. don’t get too attached to this ring. go into the next door and talk to sellus gravius, the guy inside. this is your first real encounter with morrowind’s dialog system. it is not like skyrim’s. at all. get used to it. this weird wikipedia like structure is going to be your best friend. you have a list of all available options on the right, and you can click highlighted options in the text itself. you can talk about whatever to sellus, but you have to say a couple specific things to progress. i can’t remember what it is exactly, but he doesn’t have much to say outside of it, so it shouldn’t be hard to figure out. he’ll give you some money, a package for caius cosades, and a note with instructions on how to find caius cosades. don’t accidentally sell the package. don’t try to open the package. just leave it in your inventory until you’re ready to go find caius.

seyda neen:

after that, you’re free to go! and this time you’re really free, and you can do whatever you want now! but that’s a bit overwhelming, so i’m going to let you know what there is to do in this town, seyda neen.

first off, almost right outside the door there’s a bosmer (wood elf) named fargoth. he’s lost his ring. yes, that ring. give it to him. that’ll earn you better prices with the local merchant, who happens to be fargoth’s friend. don’t worry, if you want the ring, we’ll be getting it back later.

now to go make some money with all the shit we stole. go to arrille’s tradehouse, which is the building with the little raised platform adjacent. the “front” door is locked, it’s actually arrille’s house, so you have to go around on the platform to the real front door. go inside and talk to arrille. in the right pane of the dialog, you’ll see the option to barter with him. click that and get to selling your shit. 

here’s what you want to buy with the money you just got (around 500-600 gold). buy all the chitin armor pieces you can. it’s very good light armor for this stage in the game. buy the iron saber for now; you’ll be replacing it soon but you need something, and it’s cheap. buy one of the journeyman’s probes - you need these to disable traps - and one of the journeyman’s lockpicks, since the one you stole from the census office only has 10 uses. buy 3 bottles of sujamma - it’s a regional liquor that gives you +50 strength and -50 intelligence for 60 seconds. it’s VERY powerful for dealing with foes you normally shouldn’t be able to handle at a lower level. note the intelligence drop though: if you need to cast a spell, cast it before you drink the sujamma. buy 2 scrolls of almsivi intervention - like i said earlier, this teleports you to the nearest tribunal temple. lastly, buy 2 scrolls of ondusi’s unhinging. sometimes you need to open something that you just can’t pick with your too-low security skill. that’s where this scroll comes in.

yes, you just spent like, all of the money you just earned. it’s okay. we’re going to make it back and then some, soon.

before you leave arrille’s, go upstairs (behind him). talk to the guy, hrisskar flat-foot, at the top of the stairs. he’ll offer you a topic about recovering gold. he wants you to find out where fargoth (the ring guy) is hiding his gold and valuables. you’re going to help him find it, because YOU want those valuables as well. we’ll get back to this quest later, though.

next, talk to elone, the redguard behind the counter. she’s a scout, which means she knows a lot about the land. you can ask scouts all sorts of interesting questions about geography. but what you want from elone is directions to balmora. ask her about balmora and she’ll give you said directions in the form of a note.

finally, talk to the wizard lookin’ fella in the corner. ask him about the latest rumors. keep in mind what he says about mentor’s ring - we’ll be pursuing this later.

now, let’s make sure we equip all the armor and weapon we just bought. right-click to bring up your inventory/stats/map/magic menu, click on each piece of armor and weapon, and drag them onto the little portrait of your character to the left. that’s it! you’re equipped and ready to face the wilderness.

the wilderness, plus notes on combat:

leave arrille’s tradehouse from the door you came in from. jump off the corner of the platform into the water below, and cross that little river, heading west. on the far shore, you’ll find your first foe: a mudcrab! very scaaaaary! this is your introduction to combat. it works a little differently in this game. first of all, just because you SEE your weapon connect with an enemy, doesn’t mean it’s going to HIT necessarily. this game plays off of dice-rolls, and a lot of factors contribute to whether or not you’re gonna actually do damage. but the two most important factors are: 1) your level of skill with the weapon you’re using, and 2) your fatigue. that’s the green bar in the bottom left of your screen, what you’d call in skyrim your “stamina”. if your fatigue is low when you enter an encounter, you’re going to really struggle to fight!

here’s a somewhat annoying thing about fatigue: running at full speed diminishes it! so when you’re out in the wilderness, you’re going to want to conserve your fatigue by walking. it’s slow, but hopefully bearably so if you picked the steed as your birthsign. and it’s better than dying to a mudcrab because you were too tired to properly swing your weapon.

fortunately, there’s this thing called resting! if you’re out in the wilderness, you can press “t” to rest for as long as you’d like, or “until healed” (until your hp, magicka, and fatigue are completely restored). unfortunately, this close to seyda neen, you can only “wait” - all this does is restore your fatigue. it’s illegal to rest inside of most settlements, or even in their outskirts.

anyways, hopefully you’ve completely dominated that first mudcrab of yours. should go down in one hit, so long as you can connect. another thing to note: you may have noticed when you bought your saber that its damage stats are ranges. for instance, its chop stat (the one you’ll be using with your “always use best attack” enabled) is 5-18. to maximize your damage on the high end of that range, you’ll need to hold down your click for a second or so to wind up the attack. you’ll do a lot more damage this way rather than just mashing left mouse button!

anyways, after you’ve gotten your first kill, proceed along the coast, making sure to head between the rocks just up the way. you’ll find either a rat or a kwama forager (worm thing), and that’s how you know you’re going the right way. it’ll attack on sight, but there’ll be another critter there, a little grey insect looking thing called a “scrib” that thumps its tail on the ground and squeals. it’s not going to attack you when you get close, so don’t attack it. be nice. it’s just a little guy! if you do decide to attack it, though, you might be in for a nasty surprise: it has a paralyzing bite! a scrib can really catch you off guard at this low level. so leave the little guy alone!

across from the scrib, to the left, you’ll find a corpse. if you’ve been talking to the residents of seyda neen (i highly recommend you do) you may have heard that the local tax collector is missing. this is him. take the tax record and 200 gold from him. let’s read the tax record! to read any note or book from your inventory, click and drag it over your character portrait! this is really how you interact with anything in your inventory. note who has the highest unpaid tax to find a motive, but we’ll get back to that later. we’ve got some other stuff to do in the swamp.

proceed northwest, killing any little critters (except scribs!) that get in your way. pretty quick you’ll find yourself with a mountain on your right and the ocean on your left. follow the coast along those mountains. you’re going to find pretty quick a weird looking door on your right. that’s an ancestral tomb door! they all look like that. make a note of where this is, we’re coming back to it. keep progressing along the coast.

eventually you’ll find a little shipwreck. yes, that’s a ship, albeit a local, kinda weird-looking one. just before you get to the ship itself, there’ll be a chest next to a log that’s sticking up out of the water. there’s a silver longsword in there! take it, it’s your new weapon of choice, slightly better than your saber. now let’s explore the ship! get on board and take the trapdoor down to your right. at the end of the interior, next to the next trapdoor down, there’s a crate in the water with moon sugar in it! you may be familiar with skooma, the narcotic? moon sugar is what it’s made from. it’s very valuable, but also very illegal, so we’re going to have to be careful with how we sell it. we’ll get to that eventually.

take the trapdoor further down, and immediately swim up, bc you’re gonna be underwater! at the end of this section of the ship, you’ll find a little chest on the floor with 3 diamonds in it! woohoo! now let’s get out of here, that skeleton’s freaking me out. there’s nothing of note in the cabin section of the ship, so don’t worry about it. let’s go back to that tomb!

samarys ancestral tomb:

okay, right outside the tomb, SAVE! you need to save a LOT in this game if you want to make progress! i recommend having multiple running saves going as well as your quicksave. my most recent playthrough has 5 different saves that i cycle through. it’s a good way to make sure you don’t get stuck in untenable positions! make sure you have your silver longsword equipped and head on in.

once you’re in, open the door right across from you. in the next chamber, you’ll see these little raised things with jars on them. those jars have dead people in them! you don’t really want what’s in those jars, though - you want what’s next to them. always check next to these jars in ancestral tombs for valuables. most of the time it’s just clothes or ingredients, but sometimes, like in the case of the first jar on the right, there’s valuable scrolls! take it, and proceed down the corridor and turn right.

here’s your first challenge! a ghost! this is why we got the silver longsword first, because only silver weapons (or higher quality) or enchanted weapons can actually hit ghosts! this ghost knows a nasty little fire spell that can do quite a bit of damage if you don’t kill him quickly. just keep up your consistent, charged hits until he goes down. across from the entrance to this chamber is another jar-plinth with another scroll, this time an offensive one! take it, it might prove useful. save again!

on the other side of the next door is either a greater challenge or an even greater challenge. sometimes it’s just a skeleton, and sometimes it’s a lesser bonewalker, which can be very dangerous! take him down as quickly as you can, because bonewalkers often know very detrimental curses that can lower your attributes. save again after you kill it!

next, you want to disarm the trap on that urn in the bonewalker room. equip your journeyman’s probe and start clicking on that urn, just like you did with the chest in the census office! once the trap is disarmed, take mentor’s ring! told you we were gonna get that. it’s a very useful ring that increases your intelligence and willpower by 10 points each. go ahead and equip that. there’s a weird named ash in the urn, and a key to the chest next to it, but don’t bother. the chest never has anything valuable in it. don’t forget to reequip your silver longsword after you disarm the trap!

speaking of, here’s another little tip. press f1. this gives you the quick-select menu, where you can assign items or spells to your number keys. i’d put your main weapon (right now the silver longsword) on number 1, then put your most used spells on the next few numbers, in whatever order or fashion you prefer. makes swapping between items and spells much easier.

heading back to seyda neen:

leave the tomb and hug the mountains going east until you hit the road. then follow the road east some more until you see a man fall from the sky. yes, that just happened. he’s dead and free-game, so let’s loot him. take his nice enchanted sword (it’s slightly better than your current weapon, so long as it has a charge), equip his nice conical hat, and either equip his robes and shoes (you can wear robes over your equipped armor in this game! isn’t that so cool) or take them to sell later. take any gold he might have on him, and take those weird “scrolls of icarian flight” he has. do NOT use those scrolls. sell them. you will DIE if you try to use those scrolls. also, take a gander at his journal underneath him, and then take it to sell as well.

alright, from here, follow the road east and south back to seyda neen. let’s head back to arrille’s to sell some of the stuff we got. note that you are now carrying moon sugar, which as i said, is illegal. honest merchants won’t trade with you if you have moon sugar or skooma in your inventory. we’ll find some dishonest merchants later, don’t worry. but for now, you’ll have to simply drop the moon sugar on the floor before you start selling. don’t forget to pick it up when you’re done!

next, remember that guy you noted from the tax record, the one with the highest unpaid tax? we’re going to pay him a visit, ask what happened to the tax collector. i won’t tell you where he is; check the houses around seyda neen until you find the one with his name on the door. before you go in, save, and make sure your fatigue is up.

talk to him. he’ll confess to killing the tax collector, giving you the option of letting him go, or doing justice right then and there. do the justice. he’ll immediately attack you - with his fists. this might not sound scary to you at first. in later games, hand-to-hand combat merely does a little bit of damage to your health. in this game, hand-to-hand hits do damage to FATIGUE. and remember how important fatigue is? it affects everything, from physical combat to your chance at casting spells. so you’re gonna wanna take this guy down before he does too much damage to your fatigue. if your fatigue reaches zero, you get knocked out, falling to the floor. at this stage, hand-to-hand hits actually do damage to your HEALTH. and it’s easy to get trapped in a loop of getting knocked down. so don’t let that happen and kill him quickly. this fight is probably actually harder than the bonewalker, since this guy does a lot of damage to your fatigue with each hit, and you’re draining your own fatigue by swinging at him. but keep up with your consistent charged hits and you should be able to take him down.

be sure to take the ring he’s wearing! it’ll come in handy later. then loot the place - it’s effectively your house now, a decent starter shack. especially important is the book on the floor, which is a skill book increasing your mercantile skill, and sells for a pretty penny. there’s also some ingredients in the various barrels and sacks, if you’re into alchemy.

next, let’s go back to the census office. yes, the place you started at. talk to the old dude who set up your class and birthsign. there’ll be an option to report the murder. do so, and he’ll give you 500 gold. nice!

next, head on to the lighthouse on the coast. you should be able to see it from anywhere in seyda neen. step inside and talk to the lady immediately on your right. ask her about the ring you picked up from the murderer and she’ll give you two pretty high-quality healing potions! nice. now, head upstairs. there’s a very valuable book at the top you can take (the lady downstairs can’t see you now) which increases your unarmored skill. 

now head outside to the top of the lighthouse. stand at the corner facing the rest of the town, and wait until 10pm. if you’ve spent a lot of time resting/waiting, you might have missed your first 10pm, and will have to wait almost a day for the next one. don’t worry about it, you don’t have a time limit. now watch that little torch-wielding gremlin fargoth crawl around for a little bit. he’ll make a few stops along his way, but don’t worry, he can’t see you from up here (even though he does approach and stop in front of the lighthouse at one point). eventually he’ll stop by a tree-stump in a mucky pool - that’s where you need to go. once he walks away from there, head back down the lighthouse and go there. inside the stump you’ll find a bunch of gold, fargoth’s old healing ring, and a nice lockpick. take it all.

now, hrisskar wanted you to return with the money so he could split you a cut. instead, we’re just going to never talk to him again and keep all the money. there’s no repercussions for this at all, unless you’re a completionist who wants to finish every quest completely. but there’s not really a tracker for your completed quests, so it doesn’t really matter.

one last thing to do in seyda neen. we’re going to talk to an altmer (high elf) named eldafire. she can usually be found across the bridge towards the silt strider (the big bug thing you probably saw when you got off the boat), although she tends to roam a bit. ask her for a little advice. she’ll recommend you take out the bandits in the addamasartus cave nearby. let’s do that.

addamasartus cave:

the cave is right across from the silt strider landing, hiding behind a big boulder. save and rest until healed right outside the cave, then head on in. the first enemy shouldn’t be much of a problem to you at this point. she should go down in a few hits, and not get much of a chance to hurt you. take any valuables she might have, especially the addamasartus slave key.

the next enemy, who is beyond the door down to the right, is going to be much more challenging. he’s a mage who will cast a weakness to fire spell at you, and then cast a fire spell at you. you’re a dunmer, so you have some resistance to fire, but this guy can still fuck you up if you’re not careful. try to dodge his spells until he runs out of magicka and is forced to attack you in melee. or be brave and try to take some swings as you dodge. up to you. don’t be surprised if he kills you a time or two - he’s pretty tough. if you need to, go outside (or close to the front door) to rest to heal your wounds after he’s dead. or before he’s dead - no shame in running to fight another day.

okay, now that the hard part is done, we can explore the rest of the cave. go down the stairs to where that mage came from, and turn left when you get to the water. there’ll be another enemy, this one throwing throwing-stars at you. you can try to dodge them - they’re kind of small so it’s difficult to see them - or you can just tank the hits as you rush her down. they don’t do much damage. she’ll go down pretty easy, too. she’ll have a lockpick and probe - take them. if you picked marksman as your ranged skill, you can take the throwing stars as well, although they’re not as effective as a bow would be.

now, loot the room - the crates, sacks, chests, etc. the crates near where the throwing-star lady was should have a total of 8 moon sugar and 2 bottles of skooma in them. the chest will have a random leveled item (that is, an item suited to your level) - you might get lucky with this! in my test run, i got a steel daikatana, which is better than my silver longsword (except against ghosts). don’t forget the crates and barrel over by the water! sometimes the crates can have scrolls, potions, or soul gems in them.

next, go behind the rocks to the left of where the throwing-star lady was. you’ll find a door the slave key will unlock. on the other side of the door you’ll find a little stretch of water. at one point you’ll have to dive under to get to the next chamber - just watch your breath meter! but you shouldn’t have a problem, it’s not a very long dive. at the bottom of the water in the next chamber, you might be able to find a skull to the right. if not, don’t worry about it! but there is a rising force (levitation) potion right next to the skull. don’t drown yourself looking for it though, it’s not that important.

in this chamber, you’ll see a spiral pathway rising out of the water. find where you can clamber onto the pathway and follow it up. there’ll be a rat up there - but nothing you can’t handle. up there you’ll also find some glowing mushrooms. in between them there’s a few pieces of gold, a netch leather pauldron (don’t worry too much about that part - your chitin pauldron is better), and the important part, a “thief ring”! it’ll give you a decent buff when you need it. it’s a little tricky to see against the stone floor of the cave, but try your best to find it.

follow the rest of the passage until you come out near the beginning of the cave. you may have wondered why we went down (to where the mage was) instead of up to where there was a door earlier. we’re going to go up there now. your addamasartus slave key will open the door, and you’ll find two argonian slaves and a khajiit slave. talk to them and offer to let them go free, and unlock their bracers. congrats, you’re an abolitionist now! the game tracks how many slaves you’ve freed for a hidden faction you’ll find eventually. you need to free quite a few to join that faction, so try to free every one you can if you want to join.

now you’re done with addamasartus! feel free to leave. we’re done with seyda neen, now, as well, unless you want to head by arrille’s first to sell off some stuff before you leave. don’t forget to drop your moon sugar and skooma before you barter, and then don’t forget to pick it up before you leave!

onward!:

next stop, balmora, where the imperials wanted you to go. there’s a couple of ways we can get there. the first and easiest is to just hire a silt strider to take you there. those big bug things are basically giant buses, and they have routes all over the western half of the island. but i recommend you walk to balmora, following the directions elone the scout gave you. a big part of this game is exploration, and you’d better get used to it quick. don’t be afraid to get a little sidetracked here and there. explore the occasional cave or mine or tomb on your way - but always save before entering one, and know your limits. the dungeons in this game are largely not leveled to you, and if you enter the wrong one too early, it can really ruin your day. so don’t be afraid to turn around and leave, or load the save you made before entering, if things get too tough.

there’s a little town called pelagiad between seyda neen and balmora. feel free to stop there to restock if you need to. otherwise, just follow the road signs and elone’s directions. you’ll get to balmora in no time. and don’t forget! conserve your fatigue. you don’t want to be running everywhere, run out of fatigue, and then run into even a basic enemy you suddenly can’t handle because you can’t connect any of your hits.

once you get to balmora, go to the south wall cornerclub like you were told in your directions to caius cosades, and ask around to find out where caius lives. i’m not going to hold your hand on quest instructions any more! figure it out on your own. it’s not too hard, so long as you just remember to talk to people about important topics - usually “latest rumors,” “little secret,” “little advice,” and “morrowind lore.” but peruse the other topics, too! you might learn something about the people and place you’re in.

before caius gives you your first official orders, he’ll tell you to join a guild to establish a cover identity. there’s a lot of factions in this game you can join. you’ve got the imperial guilds: the fighter’s guild, the mage’s guild, and the thieves’ guild; the morag tong (essentially the dark brotherhood of this game, but a bit different flavor-wise, as well as in how it works); the religious guilds: the tribunal temple and the imperial cult; the imperial legion; and the great houses: house redoran, house hlaalu, and house telvanni. i won’t go into detail about all of these, but i will mention a few.

factions, and a bit on fast travel:

even if you don’t plan on playing through the questline, i recommend joining the mage’s guild. it gives you a couple of invaluable services: spellmaking, enchanting, and the guild guide. the first is self-explanatory: it lets you use any magic effects you’ve already learned to make custom spells from them. enchanting as a service is what it sounds like - you pay somebody to enchant items for you (you still need to bring a filled soul-gem, though). the guild guide is probably the most important, however. basically, it’s a teleportation service between the mage’s guilds of vvardenfell.

morrowind doesn’t have a fast travel system per se, but there are quicker ways to get around than just walking everywhere. we’ve mentioned the spells that can do this, like almsivi/divine intervention and mark/recall. but you can also take the bus (silt strider) across most of western vvardenfell, or a boat across most of eastern vvardenfell. but those two systems are largely disconnected; the only real way to trade off is to silt strider to vivec, walk (or divine intervention) to ebonheart, then take a boat to sadrith mora or tel branora, or vice versa. 

but the mage’s guild guild guide solves this problem rather nicely! you can teleport from anywhere in the west to sadrith mora in the east much more quickly than the silt strider-boat trade off in vivec and ebonheart. so join the mage’s guild, i’m serious.

the only other factions i’m going to mention are the houses. they’re very important, and you’re going to want to join one. and only one, i might add - once you join one, you’re locked into it. so make your choice wisely. here’s a brief description of each house:

house redoran is a house of noble warriors, whose capital is ald’ruhn, literally inside the hollowed out remains of an ancient giant crab. they are most favored by the local warrior-poet god, vivec, and most of the buoyant armigers (vivec’s personal army) are from redoran.

house hlaalu is a house of sneaky merchants, whose capital is balmora. they’re the most closely affiliated house to the empire, whereas the other two are distrustful of the empire - and therefore distrustful of house hlaalu.

house telvanni is a house of arrogant wizards, whose capital is sadrith mora (literally translates to “mushroom forest”). they live in settlements built around giant fungal wizard towers, and are most distant and distrustful of the new forces (like the empire) in vvardenfell. they’re also most likely to own slaves, although they will accept argonian and khajiit as members all the same.

there is a bit of a disparity when it comes to the rewards you get from quests from these houses. telvanni gifts you with powerful spells and enchanted items; hlaalu gives you gold; redoran gives you, um. “honor.” which doesn’t sell for much in this economy. that might affect your decision here, but really, choose whichever faction appeals to you most. you’ll be able to get your hands on lots of money and powerful artifacts regardless of which house you choose. 

i think that’s about all you really need to know to get started in this game! really, the best piece of advice i can give you is: take your time. take in the atmosphere, the lore, the books, the dialog. absorb yourself into this game and you will have the most amazing experience with it, i think. if you have any questions, let me know!

P.S. i’m going to add things to the end of this as i think of them:

a lot of the time, you’re going to run into people you need information from who won’t give it to you. every npc has a disposition stat, basically how much they like you, and if it’s too low, they won’t discuss certain topics. there’s a few ways to increase their disposition. 1) use the speechcraft skill to admire, intimidate, or taunt the npc. (taunting actually serves a different purpose to the other two, but we’ll get to that shortly.) 2) use a spell, namely the “charm” effect from the illusion school of magic, to temporarily raise their disposition with you. 3) increase your personality attribute, like with telvanni bug musk (always a good item to have around). and 4) bribe the hell out of them. you can bribe in 10 gold, 100 gold, and 1000 gold increments. 100 gold tends to be the most efficient way to bribe, and most people will open up to you after about 200 gold spent this way. money isn’t exactly difficult to come by in this game, especially after the first few levels, so this greasing of the wheels of commerce won’t hurt your wallet too much.

okay, that’s about how to increase a npc’s disposition. how about the scenario where you need (or want) to kill an npc without getting a bounty on your head? simple: either 1) take them out into the wilderness where there are no witnesses (this only works in cases where you can get this person to follow you, such as by using the conjuration school’s “command humanoid” effect), 2) use the “frenzy humanoid” effect from the illusion school to get them to attack you (this shouldn’t trigger a bounty, or for their friends to attack you as well), or 3) “taunting” them to get them to attack you. if your speechcraft is low, this will take many tries, because most of the time your attempt to taunt will fail, and also because it generally takes several successful taunts to get an npc to actually attack you. but you don’t have to worry about using a spell this way, and if you’re patient it’ll work out just the same. 

another thing to note: if you’re on an assignment from the morag tong to kill somebody, you’ll get what’s called a “writ” with their name on it. the morag tong, unlike the dark brotherhood, is a government-sanctioned entity - using the tong to have someone killed is completely legal. this writ is your permission to kill that person. you don’t have to worry about incurring a bounty when you have a writ - you can just straight up merk somebody in broad daylight. watch out, though - sometimes that person’s nearby friends will attack you too. most of the time, though, although they might shout about it, nobody will report the crime. if somebody does, expect to be approached by a guard. in that instance, just present your writ to them, and they’ll be forced to let you go. (if this appeals to you, consider joining the morag tong. although every major city has a morag tong chapterhouse, you can only join the tong from the headquarters in vivec city. i won’t tell you exactly where those headquarters are in vivec - it’s actually fun trying to figure out on your own. just ask around and you’ll figure it out.)

okay, i forgot to mention. once you’ve leveled up your major or minor skills 10 times (repeats of the same skill count as well), you’ll get a notification saying it’s time to level up. to do this, you need to sleep in a bed. simply resting won’t do it. you need some kind of bed. make sure it’s a bed you’re allowed to sleep in! i recommend saving before trying to sleep in a bed. sometimes you’ll find a bed in like a mages guild and assume it’s free game but it’s actually someone in particular’s bed and you get expelled from the guild for trying to sleep in it. not a fun time. 

since you’ll have the goty edition of the game, you’ll have tribunal enabled. that means sometimes when you rest you’ll get attacked by a dark brotherhood assassin. they’re not too tough, though, and they have very useful and very expensive armor and usually a decent weapon. if you want the attacks to stop, talk to a guard about them. but why would you, it’s free money. 

i forgot to mention in the main body of this guide, but there are only a handful of places where you can pawn off your skooma and moonsugar. there are two in balmora: there is ajira, the resident alchemist of the balmora mage’s guild, and ra’virr, a merchant whose store is right next to the mage’s guild. in general, if a merchant is a khajiit, and normally deals in ingredients or potions, they’re likely to buy skooma and moonsugar. 

another thing: you do have a journal! your character automatically records most important information in it about your quests. now, this is an actual journal, with entries in chronological order. so it can be difficult to find relevant information by just looking through it normally. if you have the goty edition (which you should) you have the option to categorize by topic and quest! should be a button on the right. not all quests are marked, but most are. 

[epilvgue]

「𝔟𝔞𝔫𝔤 𝔟𝔞𝔫𝔤!」- "Uh... well.. they were pretty persistent..." A rather noncommittal answer. He almost shyly rubbed the base of his neck as he fully turned around and sat up back on his heels. The tails of his coat fluttered slightly in the cold winter breeze.

Blue eyes looked over the rims of his teashade sunglasses (which doubled as rather shoddy marksman glasses thanks to the orange-yellow tint that helped to somewhat filter out UV rays from the sun). He watched the man's eyes flicker around.

Then - A slamming door, a scuffle. Vash was scrambling up, only partially up by the time a hand unexpectedly gripped him by his coat-sleeve. Pulling him in a way he had experienced before - familiar, not exactly unwelcome - it felt a bit like when he'd run away from the girls all those years ago after showing back up again. He still felt bad about not fulfilling his promise sooner even though he'd apologized to Meryl so many times (and gotten scolded by Milly even more for 'making ma'am cry").

Vash stumbled to follow, hunched and awkward as he got to his feet and was tugged forward by the arm.

He understood almost innately what was being suggested. He'd already seen that alleyway and was planning to go down there anyways once he'd thrown them off a bit - or at least gotten some distance between himself and his pursuers.

"Ya really sure about this?" Vash asked as he climbed over the railing, grip firm on the metal and bracing those heavy-treaded boots of his against the wall. He was grateful for the assist all the same, even if it wasn't entirely necessary.

「𝔟𝔞𝔫𝔤 𝔟𝔞𝔫𝔤!」- Vash had been lying prone on the cool stone of the restaurant veranda for a long moment to catch his breath before he started to move. The entire time he never even noticed that somebody was actually sitting there to eat a meal. It was cold out and mid-winter, so why would anybody want to be -

"Looks like you've gotten yourself into some trouble. You might have shaken them off for now, but it's not hard to tell where you've gone. They'll make their way up here soon enough-- if you want to get away, don't poke your head out and show them exactly where you are!"

First he jumped. then he froze just as he was going to take a peek and see if the coast was clear enough for him to go back down and ditch this area entirely. Slowly he craned his head to look back over his shoulder. The gunman was on his hands and knees, palms and knees pressed to the cold, snow-dusted stone.

Geez, that had actually scared him.

"Oh... I didn't think anyone would be up here..." He let out a little laugh and raised a hand to wave. Not at all convincing or reassuring if that's what he was going for. "Sorry fer crashin' yer meal..."

[musings-of-a-rose]

Meet the Millers - Chapter 1

Pairing: Joel Miller x Benny Miller x Will Miller x f!reader

Word Count: 2700+

Rating: Mature - 18+ ONLY!

Warnings: Bear in mind the pairing of this fic along with the fact it’s set in a post-apocalyptic setting, so there will be themes and elements fitting the setting. Just like ao3, “creator chooses not to use warnings.” If you click Keep Reading, that means you agree that you’re the age to handle mature themes. Also by clicking Keep Reading, you understand warnings may not be complete in order to avoid spoilers for the story.

Notes: I hit 200 followers and wanted to give y’all a little something so I did a poll and let you pick what one shot I write next. This is what y’all picked! I hope I can deliver. I started this out as a one shot and it MAJORLY got away from me, so now it’s a mini series. Thank you so much for following me and reading my ramblings! Also a shoutout to@astoryisaloveaffair for helping me figure out how things work and being an amazing sounding board, @icanbeyourjedi for helping me to settle on a filter for this mood board, and @theewokingdead for being delightfully appalled at how many words this one-shot has turned into and cheering me on with memes and gifs.

-This is set loosely in The Last of Us universe. I’ve only played a bit of the game and watched others play (and the show isn’t out yet), so please forgive any inaccuracies. Also it’s a post-apocalyptic world so I’m taking a bunch of liberties here. Because fan fiction.

*Ages at the time of this story (so you don’t have to do math):

Reader: 28

Benny: 35

Will: 38

Joel: 50

Meet the Millers Masterlist

Main Masterlist

*Reader is ethnicity inclusive despite stock photo bias

**If you want to be added to the taglist, join here or let me know!

Quiet.

That’s what you loved about being on the patrol team at the very top of the wall. It’s why you volunteered for it. Most people want to be closer to the ground, whether from fear of heights or lack of wanting to traverse the multitude of makeshift stairs to get here.

But not you.

Up here, the sounds of Boston fade away to a soft din, allowing you space to breathe. It’s not that you hated the noise, but you grew up away from here, your family constantly on the move, avoiding raiders and clickers. The quiet gave your brain room to breathe, away from all of the politics and sector checks, ration cards and hidden gangs.

Not to mention the view was spectacular.

You could almost forget that the world as you know it had been nearly destroyed 20 years ago. You were only 8, but you remember your dad coming in the middle of the night, frantic and talking a long stream of words that barely made sense to you in your half awakened state. He had shoved a backpack at you and told you to fill it with clothes. You did as you were told, remembering to put on your favorite arrow necklace before your dad came back in and all but pulled you from the house. You had lived more rural but you still heard the sounds coming from the nearby town as your dad slammed the door behind you and you took off down the road, seeing people coming out of the woods and attacking your neighbors…

You shake your head, knocking you out of your walk down memory lane. Breathing in the night air, you exhale and watch your breath spiral out of your mouth in the cold air. You were always alone on this stretch of the wall, which was another perk of the job. Your fingers loosened and tightened on your rifle. You much preferred your bow, but it wouldn’t do much damage from this distance. That’s probably why they agreed to put you up here anyway - you were a skilled marksman. Markswoman?

You hear the soft pad of boots on the wall and immediately raise your rifle and point in that direction.

“Easy, easy. I’m a friendly.” The voice was deep and had a bit of a drawl to it. You didn’t lower your rifle as the man was still hidden in shadow.

“Show your face then.”

A man emerges from the shadows, hands up level with his chest. He has sandy blonde hair with a slight wave to it, about shoulder length, some facial hair to match, and killer blue eyes. He’s tall too, at least 6’3 and fit. You try to ignore the nerves that hit your stomach at the sight of him standing there in his jeans that fit his shape perfectly, black shirt under a worn black leather jacket.

“My id is in my pocket.” He moves his hand towards the pocket but you yell at him to stop. He moves his hand back up to the surrender position.

“You can come take it if you want, sweetheart.”

An interesting predicament. You could get his id and check that he has permission to be up here, and you’re sure he does. But if he wasn’t supposed to be up here, and you got too close, who knows what he might do. Not that I’d necessarily be unwilling.

Opting for option 2, you slowly walk up to the man who hadn’t moved from his position. Switching your rifle out for your handgun, you arrive at the man and he nods down to his front pants pocket. You keep your eyes on his as you slide your hand in his pocket, noticing how he shifts a little as your fingers maneuver around, finally finding the edge of a card and pulling it out as the man lets out an almost imperceivable grunt.

Stepping back to a good distance, you hold the card up to the side of your line of vision so you can look at it while keeping the man in your line of sight. Scanning the id, you see the man’s photo, name, designation (upper wall), role (patrol), and, moving the card up and down, you see the hidden logo only printed on the official cards.

“Benjamin Miller?” You lower your rifle and hold his id out to him.

“Benny.” He hesitates a moment. “You wanna slide that back in my pocket for me, sweetheart?”

You snort. “Does that line work with all the ladies?”

“Sometimes.” He gives you a half smile and you feel your lower stomach start to burn with a fire you weren’t entirely familiar with, not having felt it in a very long time. He still hasn’t moved to take his id back so you roll your eyes and step forward, sliding the card back in his pocket as he looks down at you, scanning your face. Stepping back and trying to hide the heat that rose to your cheeks, you tell him your name.

“But everyone calls me Ghost.”

“Ghost?” His voice hits something deep inside you and you shift a little, trying to relieve some pressure from between your thighs without him noticing.

“Yeah. I’m a good shot and very quiet. Comes with growing up on the outside.”

Benny whistles. “You grew up on the outside?”

“Yeah. It was…different. You?”

“Been here since I was 15 with my brothers.”

“Family?”

“Parents were on the outside when it happened. They never came back.”

You nod. “Sorry to hear it.”

“You?”

“Parents got me and my siblings out. We hid in our cabin for several years until clickers found us. Got my parents. My siblings and I lived on the road, never settling really. Lost one to gangs and one to Fireflies. Sister left to live with a raider. Then I was on my own and made my way here. And here I am.”

Benny watches you. “I get the feelin’ there’s more to that story.”

You smile darkly. “Probably.”

You turn to stare out across the nature overtaking the dilapidated buildings of the other half of Boston, the side not in the zone. You feel Benny’s eyes on you and it adds fuel to that fire growing in your belly.

“Why are you up here, Benny?”

“I like it up here. It’s…quiet.”

“It is. You assigned to this section?”

Benny chuckles. “Actually a section over but I took the wrong stairs. Saw you and figured I’d say hi.”

You turn to look at him, crossing your arms and leaning your hip against the railing.

“Hi.”

He smiles at you and it’s like you’re on fire with want, the crinkles by his eyes, the way he looks at you like you’re the only thing here, smiling with his entire being.

“I hope to see more of you, Ghost.” His voice sends another jolt through your body and you watch his eyes trail down your body and back up, meeting your gaze. He smiles once more as he turns to head to his section further down the wall. Watching him walk away was a blessing and curse too. What was the phrase? Hate to see him leave but love to watch him go?

Fuck it.

“Benny?”

He stops, having just about entered the watchtower to cross to the next section of wall.

“Yeah, sweetheart?”

You set your rifle against the wall and close the distance between you both in a few quick strides. Pushing Benny up against the wall, he lets out a small grunt as his back collides with the brick. You grab onto his jacket and pull him down to you as your lips meet his, Benny’s tongue immediately pushing into your mouth. It had been so long since you had simply been kissed, let alone with this much fire, that you can’t help the moan that escapes your throat, vibrating through to Benny’s. Your hands are still gripping his jacket but his are roaming over your body, one hand coming to rest on your hip with a tight grip and the other grips the back of your neck as he deepens the kiss. All too soon he pulls your head back and greets you with those baby blues.

“What’r we doing here, sweetheart?”

Panting heavily, your eyes heavy with lust find his, desire darkening his eyes like a raging storm on the sea.

“I need you to fuck me, Benny.”

He smiles. “That I can do.”

He grabs your hips and turns you, pushing your back up against the wall and putting his leg between yours, lifting you off the floor with his height. His lips find your neck and he starts kissing, sucking, biting, as your hands scramble to find something to hold on to. Benny’s large hands reach under your shirt and shift your bra down, massaging your boobs and pinching your nipples.

“Oh, fuck,” you pant as Benny’s mouth finds your boobs and he starts sucking and kissing there too. One of your hands tries to grip his bicep while the other winds into his long blonde locks, gripping his hair and tugging. Benny growls out a “fuck” when you do that, so you do it again.

“I gotta fuck you now, sweetheart.” His voice is deep and desperate and you nod frantically, whispering out a “yes, yes!”

Frantic hands from both of you as you try to undo the pants of the other, neither one of you having any success. A frustrated sigh comes out of you and Benny puts you down, moving to undo his own pants as you undo yours. You only manage to get one leg out, having had to remove your boot first before Benny picks you up, shifting his grip down to under your upper thighs. He kisses you hard again as you wrap your legs around him, arms coming around him to play with his hair again.

“You ready for me, sweetheart?” Benny breathes into your mouth. Before you can respond, Benny manages to maneuver one of his hands to your slit, drenching his fingers in your essence and moaning at the feel of you.

“Fuck me, Benny. Please.” You hadn’t meant to beg but fuck you wanted him.

“Yes ma’am.”

He lines himself up and slowly thrusts into you, feeling every inch as he bottoms out, moving his hand back to under your thigh. Your head flies back, mouth open in an “o” shape as you feel him stretch you and tap something at the back, a spot that had never been explored but you desperately need him to.

He slowly thrusts into you a few more times before picking up the pace, watching how your expressions change as he hits that spot. Your breaths come out in short gasps, a hint of a whine on them. He picks up his speed and you try to help him out by thrusting your own hips downwards to meet his upwards thrusts. This earns you a stream of expletives from Benny, followed by a series of groans and pants. The fire that had been simmering in your belly quickly ignites after just a few thrusts from Benny.

“I’m gonna..gonna..fuck!” you moan his name into his ear as you come, feeling him continue to fuck you through it harder, knowing he’s hitting a spot inside you. His hips start to falter as you come down and you know he’s close.

“Ghost, ‘m gonna..gonna…” Benny comes suddenly, little grunts and moans escaping his mouth as he spurts into you. You tug his hair a little and that makes him come more and you make sure to note that one for next time. Next time?

Breathing heavily against each other, you stay there for a few minutes just breathing and being connected. Eventually, Benny pulls out of you with a hiss and sets you down.

“Here. It’s all I have. I didn’t think I’d be…here.” Benny pulls out a bandana from his jacket pocket, pours some water on it from a bottle he had set down to the side, and hands it to you.

You stare at the bandana, touched he’d even think about trying to help you clean up after. Taking the red fabric you look up at him.

“This will work. Thanks, Benny. That’s…thoughtful.”

He smiles as he does up his pants. “Next time I’ll come better prepared-” he freezes and looks at you. “Shit, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to assume that we’d…that this would…”

You laugh to rescue him from his sudden embarrassment. “Thank you Benny. And yes, if you’re up for it, I would love for this to happen again. Maybe a steady thing?” You finish cleaning yourself off and start getting dressed.

Benny looks shocked at your bluntness. “Fuck yeah. But..no strings attached? Like friends with benefits or?”

“I don’t know you well enough to know if we’re friends yet.”

“I was just inside you.”

“Yeah but…” You really don’t know what to say. Usually these things never lasted past this point, maybe another meetup a couple of times. But never something where you’d see the person often.

“Are you not used to having friends?”

You sigh. “Honestly? No. They all end up dead or betray me.”

His face softens. “That won’t happen here. No need to be..exclusive. Just fuckin’ friends, I promise.”

That makes you laugh and he joins in, his eyes crinkling up at the corners and you know you’re in trouble.

“See you tomorrow night, sweetheart.”

Benny winks at you as he gathers up his stuff and heads through the watchtower to go to his post, leaving you with a sad smile on your face as his presence leaves the area feeling empty for the first time since you had taken on the post.

—----

Your days are spent sleeping or cashing in your ration cards, and feeding the raccoon in the alley that you’ve named Pockets because he always seems to be carrying some kind of shiny trinket.

Your nights are spent on the wall, keeping an eye out for intruders and clickers, although there have never been any since you got here. Most nights you end up with Benny inside of you, moaning out each other’s names into the dark, quiet space above the broken city.

One night, you went to visit him on his section of wall and you overheard him singing to himself, deep and soulful. You listened for some time before you stepped into view, gently pushing him to the ground to ride him as he tried to continue to sing, eventually giving up and replacing it with grunts and expletives.

You liked Benny. Of course, things weren’t exclusive, but conversation with him came easy. He was funny, charming, and definitely had some sort of ADHD but that made you like him more. A few weeks in, he started bringing you a mug of coffee almost every night, which shocked you the first time he handed you the mug. Coffee was an expensive luxury item these days.

“Where did you get this?”

“I know people.”

You fix him with a look. “I can’t take this, Benny. It’s too much.”

“Sweetheart, if I didn’t want to give it to you, I wouldn’t have brought it. It’s not much, but it’s decent.”

Tentatively, you take the mug from Benny, holding it with both hands and taking a small sip. It was black, but still warms you up, the bitter taste swirling around in your mouth with a hint of..some kind of nut? You smack your lips and Benny smiles, looking at you like you were the only person in the world.

“Sugar?”

“I thought I was ”sweetheart”?”

He chuckles. “You are, but-” he holds out a tiny packet of sugar and you audibly gasp. Sugar was also difficult to come by.

“Benny, I-”

Silently, he takes the mug from your hands and adds the sugar, giving the mug a few swirls before handing it back to you. Taking a quick sniff, you take another sip, quietly moaning at the sweet taste that you had missed, even if it was laced with the bitter taste of coffee. You offer the mug back to him, but Benny puts his hands over yours and pushes them back to you.

“I brought this for you.” His eyes locked on yours, soft and affectionate, and you get lost in the blue of his eyes for a long moment. He leans down and hesitates briefly before he kisses you lightly.

“See you later, sweetheart.”

—----

Chapter 2>>

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Will Miller Taglist:

@thatpinkshirt @triggerhappyflygirl

[viscountessevie]

The Viscountess’ Re-Introduction

Hello and welcome to my newly revamped blog! Due to some privacy issues that occurred a couple weeks ago, this decision has been on my mind for a while and I finally settled what I needed to settle with my previous username and I am now starting semi-a fresh! 

Okay firstly, I do not want to use my old name publicly anymore - its just not something I am comfortable with strangers knowing it. So whoever knew me as the name I used to go by, please treat it as a dead name, thank you. 

Instead on my blog/ask/referring to me on here, you can just call me Viscountess/Vi, Evie if you really want lol or use my Callsign, Sahara that stemmed from my side blog which has a lot of Top Gun content lol. Feel free to tag my stuff as #The Viscountess tag or #Sahara tag (I am leaning towards the former for myself cos its cooler ahahha) 

What does this change mean for my blog: I will still be posting Bridgerton stuff, it just won’t solely be a Bridgerton blog anymore. I’m dipping my toe into the HR world and started off recently with the later half of The Wallflowers Series by Lisa Kleypas! I’ve also made Mr. Malcolm’s List my entire personality irl so it would be nice to blog about it!

TLDR: new people feel free to follow me if you like the following: HR novels/blogging, The Wallflowers Series, Mr. Malcolm’s List, Alexis Hall [Imma be reading A Lady for A Duke after Devil in Winter woo hoo] also feel free to like or comment on this so I can follow you back!

For my current followers/moots: I totally understand if you want to unfollow me because of this change but if you still want to follow me for just my Bridgerton content, I’ll be tagging my other HR posts as #Not Bee Show for yall to block/filter. I will also be using the tag Bee Show instead of Bridgerton unless its something pressing I need everyone to see. I just don’t want to be on the main tag anymore. Speaking of tags, all my old asks will be now tagged as Bridgerton Asks cos I want to separate that from future asks and from my old name. Future asks will be tagged as #The Viscountess Answers 

I was going to add my fic and works links but I think I’ll make a new Masterlist once I’ve revamped my AO3 too. Will update this post with the link to that post when it’s ready! 

Anyways any other questions (that don’t include my old name or user - everyone that needs to know, knows who I was before); feel free to drop it in the comments, my DMs or ask which I’ll be opening again later tonight after I clear some of my older fun ones! 

Final Note: This goes without saying but NO BIGOTS ALLOWED ON THIS BLOG!

I dunno why this isn't obvious and common sense but: DO NOT send ANYONE death threats

We are going to rise above the bigots and just call out their shit - no need to send them nasty anons because it's not nice, we don't need to sink to their level and also they aren't worth it.

Also @ haters: you want to send me anon hate for whatever reason? Take a second look at my icon and remember I used to be a marksman in high school.