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egcdeath · 6 months ago

Text

life's a beach

pairing: patrick zweig x reader request: @diorrfairy: i can't stop thinking about patrick x reader who's an introvert, kinda shy but with a fiery temper just like him. and she knows it's better not to get involved with guys like him but she can't help it. and he's constantly teasing her trying to get on her nerves like … summary: a chain smoking tennis player disrupts your day on the beach and uproots your entire summer vacation. word count: 6.5k warnings: enemies to lovers (kinda… the reader folds like a paper airplane pretty quickly), smoking, no use of y/n, low speed police (pool security guard) chase, mentions of smoking, brief mention of alcohol, so much exposition, vague descriptions of sports, some kissing, patrick and reader are spoiled rich kids author’s note: this fic definitely got away from me, but i hope that you all enjoy it! also, i apologize in advance for any characterization issues, since i’ve only seen the movie once. with that being said, i’m still taking requests if you want to send me anything!

For all your life, the beach has been your happy place. The soothing, repetitive push and pull of the water and the endless crashing of the tide was a guaranteed way to make your loud mind quiet down. Next to the endless ocean, you were just a tiny little dot–not a girl who was a golf prodigy, or someone whose parents' financial power caused everyone around you to treat you like a delicate doll. In fact, that was part of the reason why your parents purchased the lot in the first place, as you insisted that the comfort of a semi-private beach was necessary for you to properly enjoy your vacation.

That was also what made your smoking companion on the beach all the more jarring.

You were fully reclined on a beach chair and deeply immersed in the novel in your hands when you first caught a whiff of the strong, putrid scent, which immediately left you annoyed. Turning your head to follow the scent, your face somehow fell further when it fell upon the culprit of the foul cigarette smell. The side profile of a man who was about your age, casually smoking as he stared out at the body of water across from you.

Perhaps you had become so immersed in your book that you’d failed to realize that only a few steps away from you, someone new had joined you on the sand. After all, when you sat down just an hour ago, you were completely alone. Somehow, that managed to make your mood sour even more. There was all this space on the beach, yet this man decided to sit down right next to you and smoke a cigarette!

You were sure that you were gawking at him at this point, if at nothing else, his sheer audacity. When he finally seemed to sense your seething gaze, you quickly looked back at your book as if it was the most interesting thing in the world—despite you completely losing your spot.

After a moment of pretending to resume your reading, the stale scent of the cigarette had lessened, indicating to you that the man next to you had finally stopped. Good. Maybe your simple glare had been more effective than you realized.

But nearly as soon as a self-satisfied smirk could find itself on your face, the scent returned in full force. You practically had to physically restrain yourself from uttering, “Seriously?” aloud.

Seeing as your first passive aggressive attempt at getting him to stop was futile, you decided to pull out the big guns.

With your all but abandoned novel in hand, you curled your unoccupied arm around your mouth and began to cough profusely. You put all your might into pulling out the most atrocious sounds you could muster from your lungs, and when you decided you were satisfied with this passive aggressive approach, you glanced over at your beach companion, only to find him looking back at you.

With him looking straight at you, you felt your stomach trip over itself. You’d always been a sucker for pretty men, and with one pointed look, you were sure that this would be no different. Yet, armed with the knowledge that you were the one who started this, you willed yourself not to give in to someone with good looks and cigarette breath.

You continued to stare him down, hoping that you were coming off as intimidating, rather than swooning. Though, the longer the two of you glared at each other, you swore you could see his lips mold into the look of a smirk, particularly as he took a pointedly long drag from his cigarette.

It quickly became abundantly clear to you that he wasn’t interpreting your gaze to be anything near threatening—if anything, he saw it as a challenge. Unluckily for him, you were incapable of backing down to a challenge.

As soon as you opened your mouth to form some sort of sassy remark, you were surprisingly beaten to the punch.

“Want one?” he asked, the smirk unwavering on his stupidly attractive face.

“Ew,” you replied, then immediately regretted it. Seriously? Ew? That was the best that you could do? You would think that years of dodging and delivering verbal daggers over family dinner would’ve better prepared you for this moment, but leave it to you to be tripped up by a pretty face.

You paused for a beat too long before retorting, “You can keep your lung disease, thank you very much.” You readjusted the book in your lap, still not feeling completely satisfied with your reply, but anything was better than your first statement. “Maybe go smoke somewhere that’s not right next to me, like,” you paused to gesture to the widely empty beach. “Literally anywhere else.”

“I didn’t realize that you were queen of this strip of beach. My apologies, Your Highness,” he shot back snarkily. You swore you could feel your blood boiling as it pumped through your veins.

“I’m not saying you can’t stay here,” you could feel your volume increasing as more adrenaline pumped through you, “I’m just asking that you don’t smoke.”

You watched as his brows raised questioningly the longer you spoke. “Or at least, don’t smoke next to me,” you clarified, folding under the pressure of a set of rather piercing blue eyes.

“Fine,” he agreed with a shrug, to your surprise. That hadn’t been so hard after all. Maybe he wasn’t all that bad. You bit back the part of you that wanted to feel triumphant at your clear victory over this random, pain-in-the-ass man.

Once more, you pretended to read your book while in your peripheral vision you watched him grab his few items, including his box of cigarettes, and stand up to move. What you weren’t expecting to see was him plant himself just a few feet further from you, sit down, then begin to aggressively tap his box of cigarettes, just loud enough to grab your attention. Naively believing that he wouldn’t actually have the audacity to begin smoking again, you were slightly scandalized when he pulled a stick out and returned to happily chain smoking.

He briefly glanced back over at you, the smug look on his face telling you that he was eagerly awaiting your reaction. As much as you didn’t want to humor him, you clearly couldn’t hide your annoyance.

“Oh my god,” you huffed, grabbing your tote bag and towel and standing up to head back towards your beach house. Maybe the beach just wasn’t in the cards for today. At least that man couldn’t bother you in your sunroom.

——————

One of the benefits of owning and spending your summer at your vacation home was being able to have your friends stop by and spend a few days with you. Seeing as your parents were utterly uninterested in spending any of your summer break together, it was also nice that you were basically able to do whatever you wanted over the summer.

As a teenager, this mainly meant parties and intense summer flings, but as your time in college began to mature you and your friends, the novelty of doing something you weren’t supposed to be doing began to wear off. What never seemed to wear off was your love for the local ice cream shop, with its sweet dairy scent lingering in the air and a waffle cone that was nothing short of to die for.

With one of your friends’ visits coming to an end, the two of you sat on the patio of this shop, racing against time and heat as you worked on your cones. In between gossip about which one of your classmates had to attend graduation with a baby bump, you caught your eye on someone exiting the shop to join you on the patio.

You practically had to hold back your groan as you processed who it was. Unfortunately, your enemy from the beach hadn’t felt nearly enough shame, and he openly waved at you.

Upon seeing your eyes wander, your friend turned around to see what it was that caught your eye. Just as quickly as she turned around to view the asshole, she turned right back to you with a newfound excitement.

“Oh my god, you know him?” your friend asked you, shock and elation written all over her face for a reason you couldn’t understand.

“Unfortunately,” you replied, taking a bite of a bit of exposed cone. “Do you know him? Did he go to your high school or something?”

She scoffed at your words as if you were missing the most obvious point in the world. “‘Did he go to my high school or something?’” she repeated in disbelief. “That’s Patrick Zweig. He’s about to go pro.”

You tilted your head and furrowed your brows, as if to ask for more context.

“In tennis? He’s like, the thing right now,” she explained.

“Maybe that’s why he’s such an asshole,” you glanced back over at him, only to find that he was unabashedly staring at you as he licked his own cone of ice cream. If you hadn’t had such a ridiculous encounter a week ago, you would’ve thought that he was being suggestive towards you.

“What happened that made him such an asshole?” she prodded, and you swore that she leaned forward as she asked.

“Please try to look a little less excited,” you laughed, entertained by your friend’s investment in your story about someone who was a celebrity in her eyes.

“Sorry,” she apologized disingenuously. “Go ahead.”

“Well, I was just trying to do some reading out on the beach, when he sat like, two feet away from me. Mind you, the entire beach was empty. He could’ve gone anywhere else.”

“Dick,” she interjected, though the unsubtle glance over in Patrick’s direction and her overzealous body language suggested to you that she might’ve meant the words less than she thought she did.

“Right,” you agreed. “But that clearly wasn’t enough. So he starts chain smoking. Right next to me.”

“Rude,” she added, doing her best to validate you as you told the story. Her ability to only add commentary in a monosyllabic manner was entertaining you, but you couldn’t focus too much on that now.

“So I called him out. I was like, ‘Hey, you dick. I know that you want black lung, but not everyone else does,’” you explained, embellishing your story to disguise your lackluster responses.

She giggled as you explained and you continued on. “Obviously, he was embarrassed that I called him out. So he looks me right in the eyes, and-“

“And what?” she asked, her eyes practically glimmering, as if you were about to tell her a story about some wild tryst that left you with a negative impression of him.

“Babe, I don’t think this story ends the way you think it does.”

“We’ll see,” she said with a shrug and a wink.

“Well, he got his ass up and started walking away. Internally, I’m celebrating. But then, he sits down pretty close to me… and starts smoking again. And he’s staring me down the whole time he does it.”

“Ugh! He is an asshole,” she shook her head as you wrapped up your story. “But like, isn’t he kinda…?”

“He could be the sexiest man alive and couldn’t seduce me with that personality,” you replied confidently, although you weren’t completely sure of your words.

“That’s certainly not stopping him from trying,” she glanced over her shoulder once more, where he was still looking at you while very intently eating his ice cream cone.

“Gross,” you replied, feigning a full-body shudder. “You couldn’t even pay me to go anywhere near him.”

“It’s probably for the best anyway. A friend of my friend said there was some super messy relationship drama with him recently.”

“Lovely,” you replied, trying your best to look and sound disinterested, but feeling curious regardless. “I feel bad for whoever has to spend any extended period of time with him,” you popped the bottom of your ice cream cone into your mouth, then crushed a paper towel in your hand. “Wanna head out?”

——————

After that, you truly tried your best to avoid Patrick. Like clockwork, he seemed to appear on the beach in your backyard during the late afternoon. You weren’t ashamed to admit that you had watched him through the windows of your bedroom more than a handful of times, and you could almost swear that his head was on a swivel, as if he were looking for someone before he settled into his spot.

Unfortunately for you, it felt like he seemed to pop up wherever you were. As you evaluated boxes of strawberries at the grocery store, you noticed him eyeing bunches of bananas not all that far away from you. Midway through a hike, you noticed a familiar set of distractingly muscular thighs and tried your best to hide, much to your friend’s confusion. While drinking a fruity cocktail at a bar, you noticed him and finished off your drink and threw down a bill at record speed.

You guessed that you never realized how small a town was until you were actively attempting to avoid someone. In a way, it was a little bit exciting to be dodging him so vehemently, though you’d never really admit that to yourself. At least, it was exciting until it became an utter annoyance, much like it was becoming at that very moment.

After you’d decided that you’d spent enough of your summer lounging around without practicing any golf, you decided to take it upon yourself to head to your local country club and take on the familiar course. Of course, you couldn’t play any golf without fueling up first, which left you in the restaurant of the club snacking on a cup of fries when you spotted the one person you had been trying desperately to dodge.

You averted your gaze down to your phone and acted as if you were reading the most interesting thing in the world, but not even that farce lasted long, as you were met with the sound of a chair scratching the floor across from you. You looked back up and were met with Patrick’s intense, searing stare.

“Are you following me, or something?” he asked, his brows furrowed at you as he looked at you with concern.

“What?!” you asked with disbelief. “You’re the one who keeps showing up around me and keeps licking ice cream seductively at me!”

“Seductively?” he laughed right in your face, and you could feel your face immediately warm up in embarrassment.

“Shut up,” you replied weakly, though you knew what you saw. “Who even are you?” you asked, despite now having the displeasure of knowing exactly who he was, thanks to your friend and a Google search.

He began to smirk, and it took everything in you to not want to wipe that smug smile right off of his face. “I’m Patrick, and you are?”

You introduced yourself while mentally berating yourself for the butterflies erupting in your stomach over his intent gaze. Unfortunately, Patrick was even better looking than you could’ve imagined up close, with sunkissed skin and freckles that seemed to go on for miles.

“Well if you’re not stalking me, what are you doing here?” he questioned, though it was clear from his crooked, goofy smile that he wasn’t being serious.

“I play golf,” you explained with a casual shrug, though the feelings you were having inside were far from casual. “So I’m here to do that. You?”

“I knew I’d heard that name before,” Patrick began before stealing a french fry from you and popping it into his mouth. “You won a championship recently?”

You nodded with what you hoped was a neutral expression on your face, hoping to brush him off despite the fireworks going off in your stomach and the heat returning to your face. Sure, it wasn’t the first time someone had recognized you for your accomplishments out on the golf course, but it felt different coming from him.

“I did,” you replied as casually as possible, not acknowledging his fry thievery or reciprocating your knowledge of his athletic achievements. It was always better to be more mysterious with the type of person who seemed to love the chase, and it seemed clear to you that Patrick was one of those people. “Anyway, I need to go practice so I can win the next championship.”

You pushed your unfinished dish of fries towards him and stood up before grabbing the golf bag propped up next to your feet. You pushed your chair in and didn’t even spare him a glance back in his direction as you walked away, secretly hoping to yourself that he was still watching you as intensely as he’d been watching you at the table.

You tried your hardest not to ruminate over your conversation and feelings too much, but as you walked out to the first hole, you couldn’t help but over analyze everything. The first and most confusing of which being your feelings towards Patrick. Clearly, you were attracted to him. Despite your terrible first impressions of each other and having what could arguably be described as a meet-ugly, you couldn’t pretend like his good looks and charming, yet cocky demeanor didn’t have an effect on you. It was clear from the way that the butterflies in your stomach decided to stop lying dormant every time he was in your vicinity.

What you still couldn’t quite place were his feelings towards you. It was obvious that he was getting some kick out of teasing you. Hell, it was obvious from the first interaction you had with him. And it seemed like he might be interested in you, based on the way he seemed to be magnetically drawn to you, and his less than appropriate treatment of his ice cream cone, which he could deny all he wanted, was definitely a shoddy attempt at flirting. Even your friend had noticed.

Just as you began to try to make sense of your previous interaction, you looked up to find a golf cart headed your way. The cart was manned by none other than the subject of your deep thoughts, and as Patrick got closer to you, you swore you could see a fiery excitement ignited in his body.

“Play with me?” Patrick asked once he parked, despite already being off the vehicle and reaching for his rented golf bag.

You paused for a moment, as if you were considering his proposition, despite you already knowing your answer. “As long as you don’t mind getting your ass whooped.”

You made sure to deliver on this promise, beating Patrick with ease. In a way, it felt like comeuppance for him being a nuisance towards you just a few weeks ago. But that didn’t mean your mini tournament was without its downsides for you. You tried desperately to fight the urge to giggle like a schoolgirl when he said something stupid and snarky, and to quiet your screaming brain during the many, many, times you corrected his stance.

What you were also surprised to find was that Patrick wasn’t all that terrible of company to keep. He seemed to know exactly what to say to make you laugh, despite your effort to be unimpressed with him, or how to throw you off right before you swung at a ball. More than once, you had to remind him that no amount of teasing would change the fact that he had a terrible score, but it certainly didn’t stop him from trying.

With your landslide victory clear and your game over, the two of you made your way back to the rental station.

“You definitely cheated,” Patrick commented as he put his equipment back.

“You’re such a sore loser,” you replied with a roll of your eyes and a laugh. You’d been doing a lot of eye rolling and laughing while playing golf with him, and it was oddly quite pleasant.

“I’m not!” he insisted, turning back to face you as if that would somehow prove his point.

“You are, though! You’re a dirty player, too. I don’t think anyone has ever come up behind me and yelled for me to focus before.”

“Whatever,” he dismissed you casually, “You would be eating your words right now if we were playing tennis.”

“Yeah?” you questioned with raised brows.

“Yeah,” he parroted back, taking a step towards you and locking that intense gaze on you once more.

Feeling bold, you matched his step forward, practically getting in his face. “Fine then. Let’s play.”

“Really?” he sounded shocked by your proposition, and looked utterly unintimidated by the fact that your faces were practically touching.

“Sure. There are some courts over by the pool,” you turned to look in the direction of the pool, taking that as an opportunity to step away from him. You feared what you might do if you stayed that close to him for any longer than you needed to. “Isn’t that what you came here to do anyway?”

“So you are stalking me?” he joked, referencing your earlier conversation.

You rolled your eyes once more. At this rate, your eyes were going to be stuck at the back of your head. “Do you want to play or not?”

If you were a beast on the golf course, Patrick was a sight to behold on the tennis court. The brief article you read online simply did not do the man across from you justice as he served balls at you that probably would have wiped your head clean off of your body if you had any slower reflexes.

While you were able to get a few good hits in, courtesy of the lessons your parents put you in before they realized that golf was your calling, none of them remotely compared to the man across the court.

But your embarrassing loss was rewarded by hearing the repetitive loop of grunts and groans from your competitor. It was somewhat of a miracle that you were able to keep it together without bursting out laughing or squeezing your thighs together. You were also handsomely rewarded by seeing those muscular thighs in action. To be completely frank, there were more than a few moments where you lost momentum due to distraction from Patrick’s good looks.

While Patrick had proved himself to be a sore loser while playing golf, he wasn’t a terrible winner. He only gloated about crushing you once the two of you had finished playing, but he did happen to revel in his win for the entire walk from the tennis courts to the locker rooms.

Surprisingly, you weren’t that annoyed by him. In fact, you were pretty sure that you were hovering around the feeling of endearment.

You sat out in the lobby, freshly showered and playing on your phone when a familiar presence joined you once more.

“Are you hungry?” Patrick asked you as he made himself right at home and sat down across from you.

Was he about to ask you out on a date?

“I could eat,” you replied, trying to ignore the butterflies in your stomach once more.

“Let’s get dinner, then,” he suggested, and you tried your best not to look too excited. He was asking you out on a date. What an unexpected turn of events.

“Sure. There’s a place just up the street if you want to walk?”

The diner was slightly further than you remembered it being, but the time passed by quickly as the two of you divulged stories of your sports accomplishments on your trek over. Over dinner, the two of you instantly bonded over a similar upbringing of wealthy parents who couldn’t really be bothered to raise you, and backgrounds in boarding schools that prioritized your athletic skills over anything else.

After spending way too long at your booth and working through a spread of food that would send a shiver down your coaches’ spines, your waiter finally stopped by your table with an exhausted look on their face.

“One check or two?” they asked you.

“One,” Patrick replied before you had the chance to pipe up. The waiter turned around without inquiring anything more, clearly tired of having to serve the two of you.

“Wow,” you said with a giggle. “Chivalry is not dead.”

“I’m single-handedly keeping it alive,” he joked right along with you.

Feeling emboldened by your day of camaraderie and teasing each other, you decided to ask something. “Does that make this count as a date, then?” you asked it as a joke, though you were genuinely curious about the answer. While you’d previously found yourself intrigued with his looks, you’d now learned that he was far more than that. It was safe to say that you’d developed a full-blown crush over the span of the day.

“Do you want it to count as one?” he asked almost earnestly, and despite the fact that you were sitting, you swore you felt your knees go weak.

You shrugged nonchalantly, but the grin on your face was anything but. Fortunately, he was wearing a matching grin, and you almost swore there was a dusting of pink on his cheeks. You buckled under his gaze, and looked down into your nearly empty cup of water. “Sure.”

“Then it’s a date,” he confirmed.

“It’s so hot,” you huffed as the two of you stepped outside and into the humid night.

“Wanna cool off at the pool?” he suggested after holding the door open for you.

“Wow, you just don’t want this date to end, huh?” you teased. “The pool is definitely closed by now.”

“So?” he replied.

“So you want to break in?”

“Why not?” he shot back.

You stared at him for a moment with a mostly blank expression.

“You’re such a bad influence. Let’s go,” you conceded, heading in the direction of the city’s pool.

Once the two of you arrived at the locked gate, you stood expectantly, waiting for the next part of Patrick’s plan. You didn’t have to wait for too long, as with a brief confirmation that you were ready, he hoisted you up and over the fence. You then watched as he flung his own body over the fence, and you bit your lip as you attempted to distract yourself from how that image made you feel.

With both of you on the correct side of the fence, you took it upon yourself to shuck off your clothes—save for your underwear–before you dipped your toe in the cold water.

“How’s the water?” Patrick asked as he approached you, taking his shirt and shorts off in the process. You tried your best not to ogle too much, but his six-pack was definitely staring at you. Yeah, you were definitely ogling, and he was definitely noticing.

“You tell me,” you replied, then pushed him into the pool without really thinking. You probably wouldn’t have done it if you hadn’t just been caught looking at the man like he was a piece of meat, but you had been doing exactly that, and panicked.

After a moment, he resurfaced and spat out the water that he’d swallowed from your surprise movement. Yet, as he came back to the surface, he didn’t say anything to you.

You eyed him nervously while he began to approach you in the water, and you opened up your mouth to apologize just as you felt a hand wrap around your ankle. With a yelp, you were dragged down into the water, luckily dodging the ledge on your way down.

Coming back up, spat out the chlorinated water and coughed out what you’d swallowed. “I deserved that.”

“You definitely did,” he agreed, lightly splashing you with water from where he stood.

You splashed him right back, putting a little more effort in and splashing him with slightly more force. “But you also deserved that.”

“And why is that?” that overconfident look appeared on his face once more. Just twenty-four hours ago, if you’d seen that look, you’d probably want to knock it right off of him. Now, you were tempted to keep prodding.

“Because you were being a dick about smoking not that long ago,” you replied, getting a little closer to him and matching his look with your own confident gaze.

“Huh,” he hummed. “Fair enough.”

“So why’d you do it?”

“Who knows. Maybe I just really wanted a smoke. Maybe I wanted to catch the attention of the cute girl on the beach.”

“Shut up,” you replied with clear disbelief. “I like how you try to flatter your way out of every sticky situation.”

“I mean it.”

“So you thought annoying me was the best way to get my attention?”

“It worked, didn’t it?”

You couldn’t argue with that.

“What if I was allergic to cigarette smoke?”

“You weren’t.”

“What if I just didn’t react, then?”

“You did,” he said.

“Must’ve been fate,” you replied dryly.

“Must’ve,” he agreed earnestly. Immediately, you felt a tension in your chest, and you wondered if he felt the same way. You didn’t have a witty or sarcastic comeback, and his face was dangerously close to yours.

Unsure of what to do, you splashed him once more.

“What was that one for?”

For making me fall for you in the span of a day, you idiot.

You shrugged, unable to come up with a coherent answer with you realizing just how physically close the two of you were. Now that you were beginning to have a bit of clarity, you could hear the pounding of your heartbeat in your eardrums. Or maybe it was Patrick’s. With your bodies this close to each other, you couldn’t be too sure.

You wondered what was going through his mind, but if the quick glance to your lips and the bob of his Adam’s apple as he gulped was any indication of his thoughts, you were sure you were on the same page.

You found yourself in somewhat of a standoff as the two of you stood there, wordless and hearts pounding as you stood together in a freezing cold pool. You shut your eyes for a moment, and when you opened them, Patrick’s nose was practically pressing against yours. But just as you began to follow his lead, you were met with a blindingly bright flashlight.

“Hey!” a new voice yelled out, pulling the two of you out of your trance. “What’s going on here?”

Patrick’s eyes widened and you were sure yours did too.

“Shit, security,” you muttered to yourself as it occurred to you what was happening. The two of you immediately scurried to the side of the pool. “I don’t think they saw us, but they definitely heard us,” you whispered.

“Do you think you could outrun them?” he asked, matching your low tone as the light of the flashlight moved across the pool without

“What?”

“Come on,” he hoisted himself out of the pool and you did the same, trying your best to be quiet as the two of you grabbed your discarded clothes.

“Patrick…” you trailed off, glued to his side.

“Come on,” he repeated as he shepherded you to the fence. “I won’t let them get you. Now,” he gestured for you to come over so he could help you climb over again, and you did. As he climbed over, the security guard’s flashlight had finally caught up with the two of you.

“Hey!” the guard repeated, lunging in your direction just as Patrick made it over.

“Run!” you yelled at him as the two of you took off. All of that tennis training clearly paid off, as he was far faster than both you and the security guard.

“Get back here!” the guard shouted as he chased the two of you.

The two of you sprinted, your bare feet screaming at you as pebbles and sticks poked your soles. Running on pure adrenaline, you swore you could hear Patrick laughing as he ran ahead of you.

The two of you ended up by his car, parked safely at the country club. You desperately tried to catch your breath as you leaned against his car door, now completely sure that you’d lost the security guard who was chasing you.

“I hate you so much,” you got out in between panting heavily.

“No you don’t,” his chest rose and fell quickly as he corrected you.

“No I don’t,” you confirmed, taking satisfaction in hearing his heavy breaths next to you and knowing that you weren’t the only one affected by the chase.

It felt as if the two of you had been transported right back into the moment you were having in the pool, a heavy, undeniable tension settling over the two of you, with the adrenaline of the chase and your hearts still rapidly pumping blood from all that running. It was almost as if one second you were standing next to each other, and the next you were pinned up against his car door, kissing like your lives depended on it.

With one of his hands up your shirt, you somehow found the willpower to use the logical part of your brain. “Wait, stop,” you reluctantly said as you pulled away for air. “I don’t want another security guard chasing us.”

“They won’t,” Patrick insisted before leaning back in to kiss you.

“They will,” you disagreed, exerting all of your willpower to dodge his advance. “Take me home?”

Patrick’s hand sat securely on your thigh for the entire ride back to the beach house. With the tension between the two of you crackling and the excitement of successfully running away beginning to die down, the two of you were mostly quiet on your way over.

After he pulled into your driveway, he looked over at you with hesitance. If you didn’t know any better, you might even say that he looked a little nervous.

“Wanna come inside?” you broke the ice, knowing that was what he was surely thinking about, and just as you predicted, he seemed to light up at your invitation.

The heat of the moment seemed to have passed, with the two of you now safely in your home, and not coming off the heels of being chased down the street. Patrick sat on your living room couch while you poured two tumblers of a criminally expensive whiskey.

You returned to the living room and sat down on the far end of the couch, passing him one of the cups before extending your legs out. You were pleasantly surprised when he positioned your legs over his lap and began to soothingly rub up and down your calves.

“What a day,” you sighed, taking a long sip from your cup.

“You’re telling me,” he chuckled in response.

As you laid there, you realized that you were actually quite exhausted. A silence settled over you once more as you yawned, then Patrick yawned not too long after you.

“You know, you’re nothing like I expected you to be,” he said randomly.

“Oh?” you replied questioningly. “Should I be offended or flattered?”

“Up for interpretation,” he looked over to you to gauge your reaction, and you playfully pushed his thigh with your foot.

“Then I’m gonna interpret it in a good way.”

“I meant it in a good way,” he said after a beat.

You smiled softly as you peered at him. “I didn’t expect you to be like this, either. I actually had a lot of fun beating you in golf and running from security guards.”

“No way you’re still talking about golf after I absolutely demolished you in tennis,” he laughed, a sound that you’d grown rather fond of throughout the day.

“It was pretty amazing watching you play golf with such bad form. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone use that many strokes on that course.”

“You wanna talk about bad form?” Patrick laughed again. “It’s a miracle you didn’t pull something when we played tennis.”

“Hey! My form is not that bad. You know I was in tennis lessons as a kid, right?”

“And how long ago was that?” he probed, looking at you with a suspicious raise of a brow.

You tried your best to do some mental math, but you were far too tired to be precise. “I mean, it was a while ago…?”

“Clearly,” he shook his head.

“Rude,” you replied, though your tone carried across you not really caring. “I’m still here for a few more weeks. Maybe you could teach me.”

“Only if you teach me how to get better at golf. I’m gonna have to impress my fellow board members someday.”

“Deal,” you agreed. Part of you wanted to leap for joy after establishing that this wasn’t some sort of one-and-done thing, and that you could at least see Patrick until you went back home.

You watched as he leaned further against the couch and tilted his head against the cushioned back of the piece of furniture, his eyes fluttering shut as he did so.

“Want to go sleep on a real bed? The guest room is clean,” you offered.

“No, I’m comfortable here,” he yawned and patted your calf. You didn’t believe him in this slightest, with his long limbs and less than ideal sleeping position. But you were quite comfortable, so you didn’t bother with insisting he leave the couch.

In the morning, you woke up in the same position that you’d fallen asleep in, with your legs draped over Patrick’s lap as he sat up and snored.

You did your best not to disturb him as you got up and went about your morning routine, taking a shower and changing into something comfortable before heading back downstairs. You were surprised to find Patrick somehow still upright and asleep on your couch, but you didn’t question it too much. It had been a long day and night.

You brewed some coffee in the kitchen, making sure to leave a portion for your guest, before you grabbed the book you’d been reading and headed out to sit on your portion of the beach.

You’d lost track of time while sitting out there, listening to the sound of the ocean and getting caught up in the contents of your book. In fact, you’d gotten so lost in your book, that you hadn’t even noticed that you’d gained a presence on the beach.

After Patrick cleared his throat, you turned to look at him. A smile grew on your face as the two of you locked eyes, and you scooted to the left on your oversized beach chair. Surely, there was enough space for both of you.

He took your invitation and sat down next to you, glancing between you and the ocean as he settled in. He wrapped an arm around your shoulder and occasionally peered down at your book, but otherwise didn’t bother you. The two of you fell into a comfortable rhythm, your chests rising and falling in sync with each other as the two of you lost track of time.

Maybe Patrick wasn’t such a terrible beach companion after all.

#patrick zweig x reader #patrick zweig #patrick zweig x you #challengers #challengers fanfic #josh o'connor x reader #art donaldson x reader

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theanimeroom · 1 year ago

Note

Ness would only agree to NNN if Kaiser told him to...but what if you ask him to take care of your needs?✨

another anon: Ness would fold the fastest during NNN, change my mind...

okay bc if kaiser told me to do nnn i’m not asking questions either 🫡

NSFW UNDER THE CUT | MINORS DNI

NOVEMBER 13TH, 2023 — 8:43PM

NNN CHALLENGE MASTERLIST

alexis ness is a sweetheart. was he a bit of a pushover when it came to certain people (michael kaiser)? maybe. but he was a sweetheart nonetheless. he was good at devoting his time and efforts to the people around him, and lending them aid whenever needed.

it had become a part of who he was, something irreversible.

it never seemed to cause him any problems before, it actually helped when it came to furthering his career and relationships, especially his relationship with you. you loved how doting he was, and how he would always take care of you without you having to ask. he was attentive, more attentive than most and it always left you with a twinkle of admiration in your eyes whenever you looked at him.

the only person who could ever hold a candle to michael kaiser in ness’ world was you, and the entire universe knew it. he would do anything if it meant making you happy, and depending on the situation, that would go for kaiser as well.

kaiser’s girlfriend had convinced him to do no nut november, only because it seemed “fun” and the sex would be “so much better” when the time came. also being a simp for his favorite person on the planet, he agreed immediately. he wasn’t going to be the only one suffering though, so he immediately contacted ness and told him that he was to remain abstinent until further notice.

of course, the male agreed without complaint.

ness loved you more than anything, and that included the way you felt wrapped around his cock whenever he got a little needy, but he thought that he could manage a month without touching you if it meant abiding by michael kaiser’s wishes.

you, on the other hand, didn’t give a rat's ass about the challenge. it was silly when you really thought about it, and although ness had his loyalties to kaiser, the same didn’t go for you.

“nessieee,” you sang to your boyfriend as you found him in the living room, leaning back into his favorite recliner. a small hum came from him as you climbed into his lap, arms wrapping around your waist to secure you in your favorite spot. he didn’t take his eyes off the television in front of you both but leaned over to press a sweet kiss against your temple.

you smiled as your heart warmed, but that’s not the type of action you were looking for.

you carded your hands through his hair, eyeing the side of his face as you settled into his lap a little more. you pressed the side of your body against him, tucking your head into the crook of his neck.

a light kiss under his jaw finally caught his attention, his gaze flitting toward you for a brief second before pulling you firmly to him. you giggled as he tried to limit your movements, your body wriggling as you burrowed your way deeper into his neck. another small kiss to his jaw followed by a soft bite and you were cooing at him again. “nessieeeeeee.”

usually, the man would have had you folded into a mating press by now, retaliating against you by littering your neck with purple splotches. you admired his tenacity as a smile crept onto the corner of his mouth, a wandering hand stroking the plushy flesh under your thigh. finally daring to look at you, your blown pupils and mischievous smile made ness’ dick harden instantly.

the growth didn’t go unnoticed by you, feeling it pressing against your leg but not reacting to it. he looked between each of your hungry eyes before caressing the skin on your hip that exposed itself to him.

“yes, baby?” his voice felt like silk as it entered your ears, the pet name nearly forcing your eyes into the back of your skull. this man was so unnecessarily hot for absolutely no reason at all, and the worst part? he had no clue just how sexy you thought he was.

his hands on your body only made your tummy stir more, a relieved sigh escaping you at the feeling. it had been almost two weeks, you’d never gone that long without ness’ cock either in your pussy or in your mouth, and for 13 days, you’d had neither. it was almost disgusting to you, and you were quite over it, to say the least. “want you to fuck me,” the words left you without a hint of remorse, hands grabbing onto your boyfriend as you pouted at him.

ness chuckled quietly, smiling softly as he pressed a small kiss to your lips. he pulled away before you could deepen it, a teasing smirk proving that he’d done it on purpose. “you know i can’t do that baby, i have orders,” his words made your eyes roll, you weren’t worried about kaiser or that stupid challenge.

“and i don’t care,” you flatlined before licking a stripe from his jaw to the lobe of his ear, biting down on the lobe. ness couldn’t help the shiver that ran down his spine, a huff leaving him as he understood just how down bad you were. he didn’t try to stop you, squeezing both your thigh and your hip simultaneously. “fuck me, ness.”

the male couldn’t help the way his cock twitched in his sweatpants at the way those words slid from your tongue. he was growing weary, resolve crumbling in mere seconds as your darkened eyes probed him. you were always going to be his biggest weak point, that was for sure, which meant that in the end, you would luck out in the battle of willpower between you and your silly boyfriend.

and with a quick text from ness’ phone (which you happily typed), the man was given permission (surprisingly) to fuck you senseless.

“yes! fuck me right there,” your eyebrows curled into one as you looked up at ness, streaks of sweat sliding down his face as he fucked you into oblivion. after abstaining for almost two weeks you were more than a bit sensitive, your loud obscenities and moans bouncing off the four walls of your living room. there were words and sounds spilling from you that he’d never heard from you before, his shock being masked by the arousal controlling his senses.

both of your hands were holding onto your legs, pulling them back against your chest as you remained seated in the soft. recliner your back was more than supported by the plush and weight of the chair, even sustaining the weight of ness’ knee as he used it for leverage to fuck you into the cushion.

your hands wrapped themselves around the heels of your feet, spreading your legs as far as your body would allow. your mouth was dropped into a wide 'O' shape, only closing when ness shoved two fingers inside the hole, effectively silencing your ear-piercing cries.

ness’ eyes never left your body from the moment you started, watching in an almost disturbed type of interest as you twitched and moaned at the smallest of movements from him. you were heaving under him, eyes nearly shutting when his thrusts slowed for a moment.

“if i knew you’d be this nasty i would’ve made you wait for it a long time ago,” he sighed, and you could’ve slapped the shit out of him when you heard those words leave his mouth.

shaking your head immediately you grabbed the nape of his neck, forcing him to become level with you. “don’t you fucking dare.”

what resembled a giggle slipped past his lips at your reaction. perhaps he’d gotten you hooked on him (his dick), yet he had no complaints about that. he was still pushing into you although his hips had become flushed with yours long ago, the pressure nearly sending you into an orgasm right then and there. ness didn’t miss the way your eyes crossed for just a moment, the sight leaving his cock throbbing inside of you.

with a grunt, he was perching his forehead against yours. he’d nearly forgotten about the conversation you were just having as the tension in his stomach started to become unbearable, labored breaths and sloppy body rolls taking over his once frantic pounding. you barely had time to react when he pressed his lips to yours, a soft moan coming from the both of you as he pulled away too look you in your eyes.

“i’m gonna come inside of you now, okay?”

bonus:

[7:34pm] alexis ness: hey, can nessie lose this challenge already? i'm getting blue balls over here <3

sincerely, (y/n)

[7:50pm] michael kaiser: no.

[7:53pm] alexis ness: pretty pleaseeeee? he'll even give you foot massages for a week!!!

[7:55pm] michael kaiser: ...deal.

clearly, ness was not very happy when he checked his phone the next day.

don’t plagiarize, it’s not nice <3

©️ theanimeroom

#no nut november challenge!#blue lock smut #blue lock #blue lock ness #blue lock ness smut #ness #ness smut #alexis ness #alexis ness smut #ness x reader #ness x you #alexis ness x reader #alexis ness x you #anime smut

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lifeiskentastic · 1 year ago

Text

Ken is jealous of gn!Reader (but for absolutely no reason)

Gif by @chriswevans

A/N: Dear anons, I am ofc a lazy asshole, but sooner or later I will answer every request, I promise (if I don't, you can burn me in hell);

Summary: gn!Reader interacts with the Other Ken, unaware of the destructive effect it has on Ken. So destructive that he even tore his bandana (but almost immediately sewed it back on)!

Word count: 711 words;

Enjoy!

Ken was very angry. Ken was very, very angry, irritated, furious and hurt. The whole world had suddenly become one big pile of injustice, betrayal and dishonour. Except for the horses, of course.

Every few minutes he sighed sorrowfully, and every few seconds he remembered you and held back angry tears. How could you talk to Another Ken when you already had one? Ken irratable kicked the sand with his foot, but missed and nearly fell backwards. This made him even angrier.

Ken fell rather than sit down on the sun-warmed sand, his head down on his folded arms in despair. It was too heavy because of... Well, because of the heavy thoughts. Ken couldn't stop replaying in his head that unbearably awful moment when he caught you talking to Another Ken.

His heart, soul, and the bandana he was clutching in his hands with all his fury were bursting at the seams (especially the bandana) as he remembered your laughter. No, your laughter itself was just a wonderful, sonorous sound, the best sound for Ken's ears! The problem was that this charming giggle was caused by a Ken. The Other Ken.

"Hello!”

“Ha-ha... Oh, Ken, hi!"

And then the Other Ken dared to speak to you again, without giving poor Ken a chance to get a word in. So he ran away leave with his head held high, went to the beach, sat down on the shore and began to sob with bitter nostalgia, remembering the pleasure of his time with you.

Ken would have sulked until dawn if you hadn't come to his hunched figure.

“Ken?”

He didn't answer. In fact, he showed no signs of life at all. Except for resentment, of course.

You sat down next to him, trying to look into his eyes. But Ken's head was turned a perfect 180 degrees away from you.

“If this is about Ken, there's something you need to know.”

Ken's heart dropped to his heels when he heard what he clearly least wanted to hear.

“Actually, he and I have been discussing...”

Ken squeezed his eyes shut as if he was about to be hit. The most insane versions of your words were swarming through his head, but none of them came close to reality. To the raw, harsh reality...

“We were talking about a film night for you.”

“What?”

Ken's eyelids fluttered shut, and he didn't even notice how he jerked his head in your direction. And when he did... Well, judging by his wry grimace as he looked at your adored treacherous face with pain, his resentment was quite deep. However, after the words "movie night", another terrible monster awoke inside Ken: curiosity.

"Yes, silly, me and the other Kens were planning to have a film party dedicated to horses. In your honour. And it was supposed to be a surprise!”

Try as he might, Ken was too happy to hide his big smile. A film? In his honour? Horses?!

Ken stared at you with the most devoted look possible as his smile grew bigger and bigger. In his pleasantly surprised eyes, you could clearly read "I'm sorry I thought bad things about you (but it was your fault too)". And perhaps somewhere in the secret corners of Ken's unexplored soul, the thought crept in that the Other Ken might not be such a scoundrel after all. But, of course, those were just the secret corners of his unexplored soul and nothing more.

However, even after bringing Ken back to a more positive mental state, you still needed to hear something very important from him:

“Ken, do you... Do you forgive me? I should have told you about my intentions earlier...”

Ken was looking at you with a bit of disbelief, although you could tell from his convulsively trembling lips that he was using all the possible and impossible powers of his plastic facial expressions to keep from smiling.

“Well, if you tell me when the party is, I might forgive you.”

Ken was far from an actor, and you could tell by the way he pouted when he barely found the control not to turn his head towards you again.

“Of course! Tonight.”

In the end, Ken not only forgave you, but also hugged you uncontrollably.

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sinisterexaggerator · 7 months ago

Text

I casually explained the cause of Bane's modulated “accent” in Stars Above and then promptly forgot about it.

Headcanon:

“So, ye've gotta lil' problem on yer hands, dhen?” Bane feigned interest to keep his potential employer entertained, his voice tinged with a certain air of sinister directness, words laced with an accent that was commonplace among his kind; his vocal cords vibrated in a unique way, even though he spoke in Basic. Duros' epilaryngeal tubes were naturally more narrow; it took practice to not slip up, as this language was not his first.

OK, SO.

I have already talked about how I think Duros use cutaneous respiration, absorbing oxygen through their skin and also the slits beneath their eyes where their olfactory organs are:

“Cutaneous respiration, or cutaneous gas exchange (sometimes called, skin breathing),[1] is a form of respiration in which gas exchange occurs across the skin or outer integument of an organism rather than gills or lungs. Cutaneous respiration may be the sole method of gas exchange, or may accompany other forms, such as ventilation. Cutaneous respiration occurs in a wide variety of organisms, including insects, amphibians, fish, sea snakes, turtles, and to a lesser extent in mammals. It also occurs in reptiles."

That is not to say he doesn't have lungs, he definitely does (Cutaneous respiration may be the sole method of gas exchange, or may accompany other forms, such as ventilation), but this may just be the way that Duros absorb oxygen, as it is obvious he doesn't have a nose, and these organs beneath his eyes must be slit-like or nearly microscopic, as we have never seen them, even with the mask off.

It makes sense Bane can breathe from the same place he can register smells, BUT, Cad has a different accent in Clone Wars than he does in The Bad Batch, and I felt this would be a fun way to explain it. The leading theory was it was due to the mechanical breathing tubes he sounds this way; his voice is modulated, BUT, Duros in Battlefront 2 ALSO SOUND LIKE THIS. And to me, Durese sounds a lot like Huttese.

youtube

I tend to think this ALSO sounds modulated, as stated above, therefore maybe it has something to do with the functionality / " cranial edge of their larynx."

Found in the Journal of the Acoustical Society of America:

A hypothesis was presented: The shape (length and diameter) of the epilaryngeal tube in nonhuman mammals is related to morphological parameters (vocal fold morphology, larynx size, body size) and parameters characterizing the species vocal repertoire (repertoire size, maximum sound amplitude, fundamental frequency range, occurrence of nonlinear phenomena). Preliminary results indicate that the length of the epilaryngeal tube is a poor predictor of repertoire characteristics such as maximum sound amplitude and fundamental frequency range. However, species with a prominent epilaryngeal tube produce a large proportion of high fundamental frequency call types.

Basically, what if Duros had NARROW tubes? Thus, this is the cause of the way they sound. It doesn't have to do with the BREATHING tubes being physically down his throat - the breathing tubes provide extra oxygen in the case he is force choked and his normal air pathway is blocked, therefore increasing intake through the scales/slits - it has to do with the actual shape, and "morphological parameters" of the Duros as a species.

The accent itself is the accent of the Descent Ghetto, or the accent of the last of the Duros who populated the planet before escaping to the orbiting way stations to avoid the pollution of their dying home world. That's just how it comes out in Basic.

As Bane spent more and more time around sentient beings, he possibly began to lose the accent, or he chose to undergo vocal training, most likely in the privacy of his hideaway, and needed something or someone to use as an example. Maybe he also has to train himself to relax his throat, which is entirely possible.

Now let's say he hates holomovies, but the only ones he can stand to watch are the westerns. Maybe he liked the style of the old cowboys, too. ;D I think you know where I am going with this.

This may also explain why Shriv doesn't have an accent, but he does have a lisp. He may or may not have been raised on Duro around other Duros, and he may have spent so much time around humans or other beings who speak Basic that he just talks normal and not like a Duros at all.

It should also be noted Bane slipped up once in the latest episode of the Bad Batch. There was a line that @allsystemsblue pointed out that also sounded like his old Clone Wars way of speaking. This proves to me he mostly “got rid of it,” but still slips up on occasion, and most likely especially when emotions are high, as his epilaryngeal tubes are still narrow. It is a part of his morphology.

BONUS (found after the fact. seems to me, I am right. ;D):

youtube

#duros #cad bane #shriv suurgav #star wars #clone wars #bad batch #battlefront 2 #alien biology #Youtube #headcanons

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mania-sama · 4 months ago

Text

something in the orange tells me you're never coming home

Something in the Orange - Zach Bryan

➼ information ❧ Call of Duty ❧ Pairing: John "Soap" MacTavish/Simon "Ghost" Riley ❧ Additional Character: John Price ❧ Tags: wwi au, christmas truce of 1914, football/soccer, ambiguous/open ending, gift giving, implied/referenced time-period homophobia, angst, hurt! soap ❧ Summary: In spite of the months they’d spent in the trenches on the Western Front, Soap still managed to give Ghost a Christmas present. ❧ Word Count: 5,325 ❧ Cross-posted from Archive of Our Own ❧ Original post date: 25 December 2022

December 24, 1914 ; Flanders, Belgium

Trench warfare was the absolute worst, Soap decided.

It had been raining nearly nonstop for weeks on end, leaving the trench floors so wet to the point that it was nearly impossible to walk anywhere without being swallowed knee-deep in mud. The winter clothing they had been issued blocked out the cold for the most part, but it had been months since he had last felt sincerely warm and dry.

The rain, mud, and cold itself weren’t the main issues by themselves. Rather, it was what they caused. At any given moment, parts of the trench would collapse under the weight of the wet dirt, burying soldiers underneath. On more than one occasion, it took precious lives. Then more soldiers would replace those that had died.

Even that was tame in comparison to what the soldiers had dubbed trench feet. Countless men had blisters and swollen feet, red and dirty and pulsing with pus. Their toes had sunken in, the bottoms of their calloused feet peeling apart to leave nasty, gushing wounds. The remaining men had long learned their lessons about keeping their feet out of the mud for as long as possible.

All in all, the trenches were terrible, and Soap wanted nothing to do with them anymore.

This was the first day it had stopped raining. It was replaced by gentle snow, creating a thin layer of white at the bottom of the trench. Soap wanted to be angry at it, because if it went on for enough time they would have to spend all of their time shoveling it out so they could traverse their grounds. But he couldn’t be mad, because it was beautiful.

For once, he couldn’t hear bombs exploding in the distance or gunshots ringing in his ears. Normally, the only time there was complete silence from the normal warfare was at set mealtimes. All of the soldiers, even the Germans, had to eat at some point. Then it would start again.

But not this time. The drifting white world cushioned any noise whatsoever, and John found himself actually wanting to devour the chocolate bar sent by Her Highness Princess Mary.

Not that he liked her very much. No true Scot liked any of the British, especially when they forced Scotland’s young men into the trenches.

There was only one exception to this rule, and Soap hated himself every day for it. How he couldn’t help but like the masked soldier to his right, a Britishman through and through. John had willingly joined the military years ago, if only because it was one of his only options. He stayed not just because he enjoyed the constant adrenaline-high of battle, nor the camaraderie of brothers in arms, but because of Ghost.

He was his life’s regret.

“The chocolate tastes much better than mud,” Ghost mused beside him, folding the finished chocolate wrapper neatly into a small square. There was no space inside the trenches for trash. “But if you’re content eating dirt, have right at it.”

Soap rolled his eyes and muttered a string of Scottish that he knew Ghost wouldn’t understand. As expected, a quick “speak English” followed.

“Anything from the throne is worth less than rubbish,” he said in a poor impression of a British accent.

“Even the winter clothes keeping your nose from frostbite?”

“Especially that.”

Ghost huffed in response. Even though he was wearing a mask, his breath still crystallized in the night air. It was a cruel reminder that even Ghost, someone who seemed so immune to death, was still human. And at any moment, even on Christmas Eve, he could meet his end.

The white silence found John once again. It was calming, in a way. He could almost forget that he was sitting in a cold trench, far from his homeland. He was simply having a cup of beer with a dear friend, participating in a merry conversation.

That was, of course, until he heard the sound of singing.

“What the fuck is that?” He exclaimed to Ghost, leaning his head forward and up to try to see anything past the wooden walls of the trench and the starry night sky. All it served to do was catch snowflakes in his eyelashes.

It took a beat for his friend to respond, eyes upcast in the same attempt as John. “The Germans have found the Christmas spirit.”

Whispers went up and down the British trench as the enemies got louder. “Schlaf in himmlischer Ruh. Schlaf in himmlischer Ruh,” they sang.

Down the line, Soap heard a soldier say, “It’s Silent Night, ‘innit?”

By God, it was. The German accent floated across No Man’s Land, worming its way into the tight space of their trench. Another soldier called to his brothers, “They’ve put up small trees on the line! They’ve got lights on them!”

Soap didn’t know what to feel. He’d always liked Christmas. Not for the sake of his own religion or for the time allotted to spend with family— his family was dead and gone, anyway— but for the spirit of the holiday. Call him childish, but he enjoyed seeing everyone in a brightened mood. He enjoyed sitting down with his brothers in arms and showing them the presents he’d scrounged together for them, relishing in the looks of surprise on their faces. He enjoyed having a bourbon and seeing entire streets decorated.

It was his favorite time of the year, which was the reason why he joined the quiet caroling of the British soldiers in response to the Germans. He was as loud as he could possibly be.

Ghost groaned. “Stop that. You sound like a howling dog.” Of course he would make that comparison. Soap hated dogs.

At least it proved that Ghost was paying attention. John leaned in and sang the lyrics to Silent Night off-key on purpose, directly into where Ghost’s ear was supposed to be. It didn’t take long for Ghost to put a gloved hand on his face and shove him away.

“C’mon! Join in, then!” He shouted, briefly cutting through the British’s now loud caroling.

“I don’t sing, Johnny.”

“Fine, then,” he said, and then cursed him out in a string of Scottish Gaelic.

“English,” Ghost said. If Soap wasn’t mistaken, he could almost pick up a bit of fondness in his tone. Perhaps it was just wishful thinking. War tended to do that to a person.

“I said, once you get your thick skull out of your arse, you can join the next song. ”

Ghost stared at him, unblinking, through his embroidered skull mask. His eyes were a pure brown, illuminated by the lanterns hanging from the walls Sometimes, his eyes were a green color, like shards of grass sparkling in morning dew. Now, they looked like the chocolate John refused to eat— sweet, but made from the most bitter bean.

His eyelashes were the most physically captivating part of him, though. They were the most pure white, whiter than the snow that laced the trenches and purer than water drawn from a clear spring. People tended to think it was a sort of make-up that Ghost wore, but the truth was that he had been born that way.

Maybe he stared for a bit too long with too much intensity. Maybe the songs were intoxicating him, pumping a drug too-strong to be physical into his veins. Maybe, for the first time, he thought that the fighting wasn’t worth it on Christmas.

The British men had families waiting for them. The German men were just the same. Soap had Ghost, and Simon had John. They had to fight, if they wanted to make it to the end of the war. The very same war that they had been promised would end long before Christmas Eve.

The trenches were getting to him, he thought. He let himself get drowned back into the noise of the caroling soldiers once more. They had moved on from Silent Night, battlin the Germans in a contest to see who could be louder. It was a nice change of pace.

Despite his exasperation, Simon didn’t leave John’s side. Not even after flasks of fine bourbon— too fine for the warfront— was passed around to the awaiting soldiers. Not even when more could be obtained in a different sector of the trench. Soap didn’t dare to abandon Ghost, either. They stayed side by side in that cold trench, quipping back and forth and singing to spite the war they’d been trapped in.

For a moment, Soap allowed himself to dream of a life outside of the war. A life where he would be able to set aside his constant need for adrenaline and settle down somewhere in a nice city or town. To live in a nice house with good food— may God strike down whoever made the food issued to the soldiers— and even better company. He tried to ignore who he pictured as that company. It was unrealistic, even for him.

It wasn’t necessarily uncommon to hear the occasional shout back and forth from the Germans and British. Most of them were insults before or after a barrage of fire, declarations of hatred fueled by the unburied men lying dead in No Man’s Land. This was different, though. This silenced all of the soldiers’ singing, from both sides.

“English!” A German voice cut through. Soap had half a mind to respond with “Fritz!”. “Tomorrow, if you no shoot, we no shoot!”

Quiet murmuring spread through the trench. It was an ask for peace, an armistice for just one day. The commanders would never allow it. They had been doing everything they could to keep up the fighting spirit of the British military, setting out new attacks every time their morale dipped too low. This request for truce would never stand if the higher-ups had anything to do with it.

Although, there was one person who did things differently. Soap wasn’t surprised to hear his voice, and from the shake of Ghost’s head, he wasn’t surprised either.

“Give us enough time to bury our dead?” Officer Price shouted back. Soap could see him further down the line, on the small ladder leading up into No Man’s Land. His head was barely sticking out above the sandbags on top of the walls.

It took the Germans a second to respond, no doubt going through their translators to understand what the commander had said. “If you give time to us, too!”

“When the sun rises,” Price said, “on Christmas day.”

“Frohe Weihnachten!” Cheered the enemy.

“Happy Christmas!” The British cheered back, commanders and soldiers alike. Almost in sync, all of the sector began caroling again, starting up with Hark the Herald Angels Sing.

Ghost made a noise that sounded dangerously close to a laugh. “Ol’ man is out of his mind again.”

John could hardly believe it himself. It hadn’t just been Officer Price that agreed to the Germans’ terms. It had been all of the commanders in their sector— only God knew how many other sectors of the trench had been offered an armistice as well.

“I give it an hour before someone starts shooting,” said Ghost in lieu of John’s silence.

He didn’t know how long their peace would hold, if it did at all. All he did know was that the Germans had started the singing, put up their trees, and shouted across the trenches. He knew that they weren’t to be trusted, but that they loved Christmas more than Soap could comprehend.

So, he shrugged, picking out a cigarette from his uniform’s inner pocket. “You’re an incarnate of Krampus.”

“Krampus?”

“Santa Claus’ devil brother. Stabs misbehaving children.”

“Yes,” Ghost said, “sounds just like something I’d do.”

“Sick bastard,” he muttered through his cigar, inhaling its fumes. A soft burn entered his throat, but it was something he’d gotten used to over time. It was pleasant rather than harmful, a welcome pain to contrast the biting cold.

The tobacco would give him a necessary adrenaline boost, but he knew it wouldn’t last for long. He was tired— a constant state he’d been in ever since he’d set foot in the trenches. The warfare was completely different from the missions he’d run in the military. Instead of maneuvering through cities or open land, trekking across streams and roads, he had to lay stationery and wait for the fight to come to him.

Just to break the lowering spirit of the soldiers, their commanders would send men out into No Man’s Land to rush to the other side, gather what data they could, and take down a few Fritz in the process. The number of men that went across would be halved, if that. Many times, it would be just a quarter left. Machine guns were carved from Beelzebub’s hands.

Sleep was hard in the trenches. He couldn't remember the last time he’d slept more than a few hours at a time. It was impossibly uncomfortable. There was no space to properly lie down, and he had to rush to snag a good spot before anyone else could take it.

Night was no longer the designated sleeping time. It was just whenever the soldiers could manage it, usually more in the daytime. Maneuvers and attacks tended to happen more in the shelter of the stars. The darkness masked moving soldiers and dead bodies in No Man’s Land.

Soap despised trench warfare. But if the temporary armistice went well, he could find it in himself to dig up some joy.

Stamping out his cigar burning cigar, he joined back into the singing, something he knew would last well into the night. As long as the Germans sang, the British would, too. It was a different kind of fight, one that didn’t involve bloodshed or crying wives or orphaned children. Beside him, he could hear, feel Simon hum along to the chorus with the other soldiers.

He didn’t say anything about it. If he did, it would make his friend stop. There was nothing Soap wanted more than to keep the warmth that Ghost’s humming made.

The singing did die down eventually, but not until the moon was low in the sky. Before long, it would be sunrise, and they would begin burying their dead. Hopefully, anyway.

Hitting Ghost on the chest, he said, “I’m going to take a kip. If Price comes around, tell him I’ve died.”

“Cause of death?”

“Christmas joy strangled my cold heart.” He pulled himself up into the hole behind him, just barely big enough for two people to cramp together inside for warmth and shelter. It was by no means comfortable, but it was better than sleeping in the middle of the trench and being snowed on.

“I thought I was Krampus.”

“You are,” he said, closing his eyes, “I’m your evil elf.”

There it was again. That huff of amusement that was so rare, yet seemed almost common in the snow that wrapped around them. Soap bottled up that fire and let it burn into his dreams. Dreams that consisted of a home with a cat, whiskey, warm food, and a face unmasked. A face that he’d only seen twice in his lifetime.

December 25, 1914 ; Flanders, Belgium

John woke up to screaming.

“It’s Christmas, soldier! Get your ass moving or you’ll be on latrine duty!”

It was quite possible Soap had never woken up faster in his life. Officer John Price’s face stared back at him, bright with joy that he only ever got from scaring the shit out of other men. Blearily, he saw Ghost standing a pace away, arms crossed over his chest.

Noticing his staring, Simon shrugged. “I told him you were dead. He said dead men don’t drool.”

“Did you at least tell ‘im how I died?” Soap asked, a little dizzy from standing so fast after being dead asleep. Around him, men were climbing out of the trenches and into No Man’s Land. They were languid, and none carried their weapon with them. It was odd, but the glistening snow made the sight beautiful.

“MacTavish, you’re the only man I know that’s given a gift to every single person he’s met on Earth.” John wanted to be offended, but it seemed like his officer was actually trying to compliment him. “Christmas couldn’t kill you even if it tried.”

Wiping away dirt from his clothes, he cleared enough of residual sleep to really take in the waking world. He could hear German and British accents alike conversing with one another, the sound of shovels hitting the dirt, and laughter. Genuine, hearty laughter didn’t have a place in war. Yet, there it was.

“It’s time to bury our dead. Afterwards, we can see what presents Soap managed to pull together,” Price slapped them both on the backs, then joined the group of men waiting to get up the ladder.

“It hasn’t hit the first hour yet. Bet’s still on,” Ghost said, trailing after the officer with Soap.

Soap nudged through the soldiers at the base of the wooden ladder. “After, you can stab any child you see.”

“What else would there be to do?”

He didn’t think he would ever get tired of hearing that dry humor. It was a trap that Soap had long fallen into, trapped in the jaw of the skull mask. Eventually, it would end. They would part ways as they became too old to serve. John would be expected to marry a nice woman and have at least two children, and Ghost would find a girl to do the same.

At least, that was the progressive expectation. It wasn’t what he wanted, but there weren’t that many options for men like him. Every time he looked at Ghost, he was reminded of the life he wasn’t allowed to have.

The graves they dug were nowhere closer to three feet than four. Some were as shallow as two feet. There wasn’t enough time in the day to get all the way down. There were even bodies that were so decomposed that they could hardly bury them at all.

It was gruesome and tiring work, but it wasn’t the first time Soap had done it. He didn’t believe it would be his last, either.

Their sector cleared their dead bodies, storing their dog tags safely with the commanders until further notice. During the burial, soldiers had cried from both sides of the war. They were all human, and some were burying their closest friends. If John had been burying Price, Alejandro, or Rodolfo, or anyone else he was close with, he could’ve been among them. But his friends were alive, their hearts beating with his as they intermingled with the German soldiers.

Soap refused to acknowledge that Ghost could’ve been among the dead. He was too good to die so easily.

“It’s hit the fifth hour. Lost that bet a long time ago,” John said, watching as a British man got his hair trimmed by a German soldier-barber. He already had his done— it felt nice to have his mohawk back. There were talks amongst the ranks about mandatory hair shaving, but he ignored it. Nobody was going to remove his hair without his strict permission.

“Day’s not over. I might just do it myself,” Ghost replied nonchalantly. At the beginning, the Germans had been very curious over his mask. It wasn’t too soon after that they realized that he had no answers to give and that if they kept asking him about it, there would suddenly be a whole lot more bodies to bury. It wasn’t very Christmas-y of him, but Soap let it pass.

Something hit him hard on the back of his head, which was then followed by, “Hey! Up for a game of football?”

In the face of the smiling soldiers standing before him, he couldn’t bring himself to be mad about being hit. Instead, he began toying with the ball under his foot.

“Only if Ghost is playing,” he grinned. Simon groaned, but it wasn’t long before they were separated into teams.

There were Germans playing with Brits, and Brits playing against Germans. Their nationality didn’t matter— none of it mattered, other than kicking the ball in the right direction. It was a euphoric feeling. He’d never experienced anything like it, and he knew he would never get to again.

He kicked Ghost on more than one occasion when trying to get the ball away from him. They’d agreed to be on different teams; it’d be more fun that way, and they hadn’t been wrong. He let himself cut loose and be aggressive in a sport he hadn’t played in over a year, pushing and shoving without any real malice in his actions.

If anything, he enjoyed watching Simon play football. That was a sight he wouldn’t forget, for more reasons than one.

The soldiers stayed out for a while, long after the sun had set and the stars had risen. No Man’s Land, despite its barbed wires, ditches, and bodies underneath the surface, was much better than the trenches. Yet, John had made his way back inside. It was the place he wanted to be the least, but there was something important he needed to pile together before the night was over.

There were barely any soldiers about the sector, so there was nobody to question what he was doing. It was just as well, when he was putting on the last finishing touches, that he should hear somebody climb down the ladder.

“The war finally got you?” Ghost called, rubbing his hands together as he stalked towards John. “No presents this year.”

“No presents?” Soap asked, carefully blocking the gift inside a little dug out area inside the wall. “Well, if that’s what you believe, then I’ll just have to keep this for myself.”

He brought out the bag hiding behind his back, the contents inside all wrapped as carefully as he possibly could with gloved fingers. He didn’t want to risk frostbite, even though he knew that in the end, he’d risk everything— not just a few fingers— for Simon.

It took a second for Ghost to react, as though he wasn’t expecting a gift at all. Then, he slowly said: “Who’s it for?”

“The vultures now, since you don’t want it,” he said. But despite his words, he handed the bag over to his friend. He wasn’t in the mood to play anymore games. He’d waited long enough for the best part of Christmas.

Ghost took the bag with impossible gentleness, like he was cradling a baby. When he looked inside, genuine surprise overtook his features. “It’s all for me?” He asked, and then quickly amended with, “Seems you really do like me, Johnny.”

“Don’t get a big head. You’ll grow out of your mask.”

All of the gifts inside the bag were individually wrapped. It’d taken him the entire month to gather all of the makeshift paper and strings he needed to do the wrapping. The items themselves had been a longer game, something he’d been accumulating nearly the entire year. He just hadn’t known his progress would become stagnant after the war started.

The Germans had been of help, though.

Ghost picked one of the gifts out, setting the bag on the ground so he could undo the strings and paper. His expression was the sole reason Soap loved Christmas so much; seeing barely contained astonishment in normally-stoic people’s faces, or unbridled joy in those that didn’t mind showing emotion. It didn’t matter to him either way. It was the fact that he could make people’s day so much better with one gift that kept him celebrating.

“How did you…” It was hard to get the Ghost speechless, but apparently traditional Chinese sweets could do the trick. “Are all of these sweets?”

“You’ll have to open them to find out. I won’t do the dirty work for you, you jackass.”

On more than one occasion, John had the burning urge to take off Simon’s mask. The reasons varied, but this time, he just wanted to see if his friend was smiling. The skull made it impossible to tell what was lying underneath. The only thing he could see was his deep brown eyes. For now, that would have to be enough.

The next present he opened was a package of specialized Egyptian chocolate. Outside of fighting, sweets were Ghost’s one true love. It was the only present Soap could manage during wartime. He prayed that Price wouldn’t say anything about it.

Ghost stared at that Egyptian chocolate bar for a long time. Somewhere down in the bag, there was a German cookie called lebkuchen. He’d traded it off with a German soldier for the British chocolate he hadn’t eaten. He knew it would be worth it.

“I don’t have anything to give you,” Simon said earnestly, exchanging the Egyptian chocolate for another wrapped candy.

John flicked his hand in the air, as if waving off Ghost’s concern. “I know what you can give me,” he said. “A promise.”

Ghost stilled, leaving the gift halfway undone. “My word?”

“When we leave the military, whenever that may be,” Soap hoped that Ghost couldn’t detect the slight quaver in his voice, blaming it on the cold, “we stay friends. Become next door neighbors in the same town.” In America, maybe, where the war hadn’t reached.

There were times when Soap liked silence, such as on Christmas Eve when all of the fighting had ceased and it only snowed. There were more times that he hated it, like now, when he couldn’t read what Ghost was thinking.

“I’ll adopt a dog. Name it after you.”

Relief had never felt so good. “Cruel, even for you.”

If Ghost picked up on Soap’s nerves, he didn’t comment on it. He did, however, relish in bites of the German cookie he eventually unwrapped. Soap was happy to see a little bit of his face, even if it was just his mouth and jaw. It was better than nothing at all.

He didn’t sleep very well that night; the bursting sounds of bombs and dying men kept jerking him awake.

September 12, 1917 ; Calais, France

It was lonely in the cot. There were nurses that came to care for him, and they were nice enough. There were the other men in the infirmary, but they were busy talking to each other and flirting with the poor nurses. Soap wasn’t interested in any flirting. While chatting would’ve been nice, he found it hard to participate.

Mostly because it hurt like hell to talk. On bad days, even breathing became a difficult task. Today wasn’t so bad, though. He had gotten word of a regiment coming into town.

At first, it had scared him. He could only assume the worst because he had lived through the worst. Then, he was told that the regiment was stopping to regroup and reorganize, as well as treat the wounded. The Germans had not done to them what they had done to his own regiment.

It became a waiting game after that. He only felt true relief when a nurse gently touched his shoulder and said: “You have a visitor.”

“What’s their name?” He asked hoarsely, though he had a feeling he already knew who it was. Or maybe it was just blind hope. He had been grasping at anything he could the moment the gas had filled the trench.

“It’s me, Johnny.”

There was only one person that was allowed to call him Johnny. For the first time since they had gotten separated in 1916, he smiled. “Took you long enough.”

Ghost was quiet. The indescribable and faint voices of the other men in the infirmary gave the illusion that his friend wasn’t really there at all. It sent a stabbing pain through his chest.

“I’ve eaten all the sweets,” Simon finally said. It sounded strangled, like it hurt to say.

“They don’t give me any here, so there’s none left for you. Won’t even let me have a smoke,” he grumbled. Between the gas corroding his lungs and the intense craving for a cigar, his throat was constantly hurting. At the very least, the nurses had given him chewing tobacco. It eased the cravings, but only by a little.

Ghost was so quiet, like he was just an apparition as his nickname suggested.

It was uncharacteristic of there to be such tension between them. It wasn’t anger. It was something so much worse, and it practically emanated off of his friend.

Simon said: “The war’s going to be over soon.”

They said it would be over before the end of 1914. It’d been four years since the beginning, and all of his officers had said that same godforsaken phrase every day for every month and every year. The war had reached America, as well as just about every part of the damned world they lived on. There were no safe places.

It didn’t really feel like the war would ever be over. Not when he was still lying in a cot, still unable to see and still unable to breathe. He had walked out of that trench with cloth wrapped around his eyes and hands on the shoulders of the man in front of him. It was the only way to make it out of that trench without dying.

“The mask,” he said. His throat hurt much worse than it had before. “Take it off.”

Two times, he had seen Ghost without his mask on. One had been in a group setting, a sign of camaraderie and trust amongst the men gathered. The second had been alone in a state of vulnerability. That was when they had forged the bond that could never be broken.

Soap had asked him to take it off again several times, and he’d always be met with a dead end. Complaint after complaint about John’s nagging would get him to stop for a few months, and then he’d begin it again. This time, there were no complaints. Not a single word was uttered as John strained to pick up on the pulling of fabric.

He didn’t have to be told when it was all the way off. “Come close,” he said, motioning towards himself.

Rustling of a chair against the floor as Ghost moved closer to Soap’s cot. “This good, Johnny?”

Slowly, John reached an arm out to find his friend’s face. It took a moment, but eventually the back of his hand found his cheek. Now knowing where he was, he took his precious time to cup Ghost’s face with his palms.

He let it rest there before he let his hands examine the rest of Simon’s face. His fingers traced over the curve of his eyebrows, the wrinkles on his forehead, and the new, raised scar across his hairline. The tenderness of his lips and the hair on chin. He was gentle with the eyes, though he admittedly saved that for last. He ran his thumb over his eyelashes, wishing he could see the alluring whiteness once again.

Recording it with his hands would have to do. Sight wasn’t an option anymore.

He never wanted to take his hands away from Ghost’s face. For him, it was the equivalent of letting him go entirely. He didn’t want him to go back onto the front lines, not while Soap couldn’t join him.

He let his arms go limp at his side and leaned back against his cot. This would have to do. He didn’t have much of a choice.

A hand tugged at his blindfold, pulling ever so gently that if it weren’t for his heightened senses, he might’ve not noticed it. Then, two hands covered his eyes, feeling them in the same way he had felt Ghost’s.

“After the war,” Ghost said softly, “we’ll live wherever you want. I promise.”

Soap wanted nothing more than to believe his word.

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how-serene · 6 months ago

Text

Won't You Say That You Love Me?

Pairing - Johnson (Reprisal) x Fem!Reader

Summary - Why did you have to love another?

Word Count - 1k+

Warnings - not proofread, angst, nsfw, oral (fem receiving), mention of female anatomy, fem pronouns used, infidelity, reader is engaged, no use of y/n, first smut (still learning), mentions of guilt, reader prays for a second??, obviously I don't condone cheating

A/N - Inspired by 'This Thing Called Loved' by Stephen Sanchez.

Love was a funny thing, wasn’t it?

It was something that could mend and break, over and over again. Yet somehow, it always found a way to repair itself.

You wondered, looking up at Johnson, if love was strong enough to rebuild the damage you caused. If love was truly enough to save someone.

“We can’t do this anymore, Johnson.” You whispered, flushing from his touch. His lips caressed the edge of your jaw, peppering kisses down to your neck. He could feel the spike of your heartbeat, as you drew in a shuddered breath.

“Tell me you don’t want this.” He said, nudging his nose against yours. “And I’ll leave.”

Your fingers hooked around his dark blazer, subconsciously bringing him closer. His mouth burned against your skin, leaving behind seared memories you wouldn’t be able to scrub off.

“God, please don’t.” You pleaded, latching your lips onto his. The outside world melted away, as you heard him groan into the kiss. He cradled your jaw in hands, pushing toward you despite the height difference. Soft strands of your hair wrapped around his fingers like vines, as if trying to hold onto him. He smelled like sweet hairspray, comfort and familiarity coiled in your stomach. It almost made you cry. You could taste your cherry chapstick on his lips, but something else too beyond the sweetness. It coated his tongue. Nicotine.

“My fiancé-

Your words were cut off, as he harshly nipped at your bottom lip. The yelp that escaped you was swallowed back as Johnson’s tongue swiped over yours. His kiss was bruising, as if trying to leave behind an imprint. Your head felt fuzzy, as his hot mouth suddenly left yours. Sheer chapstick coated the outer edges of his swollen lips. Your chest swelled with ego, knowing the taste of you would linger for the rest of the night.

“Don’t mention him.” He said, hand trailing down your thigh. You watched, in fascination, as he slowly fell to his knees before you.

“Eyes on me, pretty girl.” He muttered, before pushing your dress up. The fabric bunched at your hips, showcasing a set of black laced panties. Johnson carefully hooked his fingers under the waistband and tugged them down, the material scratched against your skin as they fell to your ankles. You pressed your hands flat against the wall, shame pooling in your stomach as you glanced away.

“Look at me.” Johnson demanded, his quiet tone sending shivers down your spine. You caved, as your eyes met his. They sparkled up at you, solely trained on your face. The sight nearly made you fall to your own knees. Never did your fiancé gaze up at you like this, like a man kneeling before his god, to pray and worship. His hands on your skin felt like some sick form of salvation, one you weren’t aware you needed.

‘God, forgive me.’ You prayed. ‘Of all that I’ve done wrong, please forgive me for loving another.’

Then you felt him against you, as he slid the flat of his tongue over your slit. You squirmed, sighing from the sensation. His hands gripped onto the fat of your thighs, pulling your heat flush against his mouth.

“Fuck.” You whimpered, entangling your fingers in-between his soft curls. He parted your folds, his hot tongue lapping against you like a starved man. A whine bubbled in the back of your throat, as incoherent pleas fell from your mouth. You felt selfish, enjoying the sight of his worship. God, did your fiancé know what he was doing to you? He was just downstairs, waiting patiently at the bar for your return.

Johnson moaned, arousal blooming in his stomach. He hooked your leg over his shoulder suddenly, allowing for better access. He sucked at your clit, with greed and fervor. You felt your stomach tighten, eyes rolling back from the sensation.

“Please, please…” You uttered, the mantra falling from your lips.

The anticipation built, along with the shame and desire for another life. A life away from the ‘wifely’ duties that your mother ingrained into your head as a young girl. A life where it was Johnson, kneeling like this, proving his devotion.

Tears stung the corner of your eyes, as you felt heat build up in your core. It wasn’t fucking fair, for life to do this to you. To provide you a man that felt so sweet against you, yet felt so far from your grasp all at once.

“Oh, god.” You threw your head back, pressing him into you. “Johnson, I’m-

The orgasm washes over you, pulling you under its steady hold. You stumble forward, hands gripping onto Johnson’s hair as you ride it out. You hear him moan against you, as his nails imbed themselves into your skin. Stars danced in your vision, temporarily blinding you.

A sob worked its way up your chest, as tears pooled in your eyes, before falling down your cheeks. Johnson pulled your underwear back up, securing them around your hips before fixing your dress. Through your blurry vision, you pulled him down by his collar til he lips met yours. The kiss was disgustingly desperate. It was sloppy, and careless, as the taste of you on his tongue mixed with your salty bitter tears. His hands trembled as they wrapped around you.

“I wish it was you.” You whispered, embarrassed by your words. Your bottom lip quivered, something else wading on your tongue. A confession you knew there was no coming back from if it escaped you. So you left it, to sit and rot inside you.

“Don’t cry, doll.” He cooed, brushing away your tears. You burrowed into his chest, a cry leaving your throat. His hands held onto you, not ready for you to pull away. Like always.

You sobbed into his neck. “God, I wish it was you.”

“I love you.” He said, voice cracking. You couldn’t say it back, despite the urge to do so being right there.

You realized, with a heavy heart, that love was not enough to save someone in the end.

At least, not you.

What more could I do If love means what I feel for you? Won't you say that you love me? For, in your eyes, I know this to be true

#david dastmalchian #johnson reprisal #johnson x reader #reprisal 2019 #fem!reader #angst #smut #stephen sanchez

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mordenheim · 1 month ago

Text

Did you hear that?

Jake grinned as he pulled up in his beat-up panel van at the back fence to the junkyard. Grabbing his bag of tools and walkie talkie from the passenger seat and headed over to the fence.

“Made it, Bill. No guards, no cameras. Should be able to harvest a good few catalytic converters before I have to bail.”

“Good work. Just keep an eye out. Been some weird stuff going on out there.”

“Got it, going over the fence.”

He grinned hooking the radio to his belt and tossing his bag over the fence before clambering up to the top. Very carefully, he twisted on his side, squeezing between the coils of barbed wire before sliding down the far side of the fence and dropping to the ground.

Wasting no time, he pulled a cordless reciprocating saw from his back and wriggles his way up under the nearest car. Turning on the small flashlight in his shirt pocket, he grinned as he spotted his prize.

“Jackpot!”

He rolled onto his side to shield the rest of the yard from the glow of the sparks that rained down as he cut the part free. Racing back to the fence, he tossed it on the ground next to the chain link before racing a bit deeper into the yard to search for more.

After about an hour in the yard he had nine stacked up by the fence and he radioed in. “Just one more to hit the quota for the night. Hell, I could grab a few extra if you w…”

There was a screech of metal on metal coming from nearby, causing the thief to jump, nearly dropping the radio. It crackled and let out a squeal of feedback before he could hear Bill’s voice again. “..on out there? You still there? Where are you?”

Jake’s voice was a hoarse whisper as he asked. “Shit, did you hear that? I think someone’s here!”

“Then get outta there! You can grab the last one somewhere else!”

“Not just yet. Lemme see if it’s actually someone or just junk shifting around. This place has been a gold mine tonight.”

“Dammit, Jake, will… … just get… .. th..” Static overwhelmed the signal and Jake shut it off to kill the noise.

Using the moonlight to see where he was going, Jake made his way through the junkyard, keeping an eye open for any sign of life. He slipped around a stack of cars and into an opening in the yard itself, his jaw dropping at what he saw.

There, bathed in the silvery moonlight was a gorgeous red Astin Martin with gold highlights. He slowly stepped closer, his heart racing. He reached out a hand to caress the glistening paint before reaching for the door handle.

Quickly, the entire car seemed to fold in on itself, panels shifting and sliding as a huge metal hand reached out from within the engine block, wrapping around Jake’s waist, gripping him painfully tight, squeezing the breath out of him.

Within seconds he was lifted high into the air, held in the vice-like grasp of a towering humanoid robot. Just looking at it, it looked like it was made from the pieces of the beautiful sports car. Despite the pain, he was still in awe of what he was seeing.

Knockout looked at the human with disgust at first, then he felt a little flattered at the look on the human’s face. He obviously had good taste in cars. Shrugging, he reached up with his free hand, tapping the side of his head to activate his comm.

“Shockwave. I have another human for your little “Pink Alchemy” project. How many more do you think we will need before all is said and done?”

The cold, emotionless voice of the Decepticon Science Officer rang in his auditory sensors, giving even a medic like him a chill. “Not many more now. With this human we have nearly reached our goal for a renewable energy source that we can transport from world to world. Human flesh makes a surprisingly potent source of biofuel.”

#fictober24 #Transformers #fanfic #horror #Knockout #Shockwave #Decepticons #Pink Alchemy #biofuel

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ramu-ego · 2 years ago

Note

May I request puppy play and praise kink with Rin? Can the reader also make him wear a collar and leash like he does on the manga cover?

(nsfw) GOOD BOY :: xfemdom!Reader

not me scrambling to do this after hearing my baby's perfect english va ♡ - requests open cw: fem!Reader, dom!Reader, pet play, collaring, choking/breath play, drooling, unprotected vaginal sex, creampie, unedited word count: drabble character(s): Itoshi Rin

He liked it. Scratch that, he in fact loved it.

Tight tension around the back of his neck drawing his further down. And all it took was you moving your heads up the leash to tighten the collar around his throat. Rin's blue eyes would roll to the back of his head when his lungs struggled to fill with air. And his cock would throb within the gooey walls of your cunt.

"Slow down puppy." Your choking hold on his collar came with a warning. His thrusts having gotten the better of him as Rin drove himself into your wet velvety folds. Lost in the sensation of it all he chased his orgasm selfishly the second it began to show itself. It was nothing that your quick hold on him couldn't solve. Making Rin's blue eyes fluttered shut while his hips bucked into yours and left him grinding himself into your core unable to defile your command, "That's a good boy. Just- Go a little slower. That's my handsome good boy."

Jaw twitching with tension was all Rin could do to keep his focus away from blowing his load. The pressure on the back of his neck. Following the bulk of the leash to where your hand circled closer around his collar. He was a stuck mutt with no where to go but in between your legs. His chest swelling with a shaky breath Rin relaxed his jaw enough to lick his lips and finally draw his hips away from yours. Groaning from the over sensitivity of his cock as your walls begged him to stay deep within you. With hands on either side of your hips Rin leaned more into his propped up torso as he slapped his hips back into yours.

The bounce of your legs on either side of him and the moan falling past your lips were too much. Rin could feel how hard it was getting to breath from your grip. Enough to let him suck in a bit of air. Not enough for a deep breath. Causing his belly to tighten and his senses to sharpen. Before long he was back at it slamming his hips into yours. Filling the room with the sound of slapping skin. Loosing himself to the sensation of your walls clenching around him. Unaware of the drool seeping from his mouth as he stared down at you in a pleasure induced haze.

"That's it! That's the spot! Of fuck- That's a good boy Rin-" Your babbling louder than his grunts in the small space between you both. Rin didn't care how loud any of it got, he could die happily just hearing you moan like this over him and only him.

Each time you gasped your walls would clench and your grip on his leash would tighten with a slight jerk down. Rin's head spinning. He couldn't stop even as he leaned down more into you. Spit dribbling off his tongue like a mutt looking someplace to put it's seed. His hips driving his cock into the gummy walls of your core. Rin utterly out of his mind unaware you were cumming until your toes curled, head tipped back and the grip on his leash became deadly.

In that split second Rin felt the collar tighten around his throat as much as it could. Not even a chance to wheeze if he tried. His world spinning as the pure euphoric bliss of it all. Tightening knot in his stomach suddenly released all at once. He sucked in a breath just as his orgasm hit him. Body shuddering and head lulling to the side. The soccer player nearly buckled under the pleasure of his own climax. Cum seeping into your walls with each twitch of his cock. Emptying himself as deep as he could while continuing to rut into you like he wanted to be closer. Rin looked at you half lidded through his bangs, panting and unable to catch his breath after you nearly stole it from him.

When your grip on his leash loosened as the same moment you reached up to trace your fingertips along his jawline. Grinning up at him and praising him for a job well done. Rin automatically moving away to lick his cum out of you. Was left with quite the surprise when he felt that collar dig into the back of his neck again.

"Where do you think your going?" You jingled the metal clasps together on the collar and leash.

Rin looked at you not entirely there as he swam in the murkiness of his post orgasm bliss, "...A good boy...to clean up..."

"Who said we were done?" You cinched the collar around his neck. Validating your hunch when you felt him throb inside you in that very moment. Paired with the sluttiest moan yet from the dark haired beauty when you choked him. Linking your legs around his waist and dragging Rin back into you so he was buried down to the hilt in your cum soiled pussy. You looped the leash around your fist a few times and yanked him down so you could lick up the corner of his mouth where a bit of his spit was drying, "I'm not done with training yet."

#bllk smut #bllk x reader #blue lock smut #blue lock x reader #itoshi rin x reader #itoshi rin smut #rin itoshi x reader #rin itoshi smut

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kiwisandpearls · 4 months ago

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honestly in watching season 2 for my lmk fic, I am reminded as to why the Lady Bone Demon is my favorite out of all the current villains in Lego Monkie Kid.

we have a full season of build up (season 2) to show why she’s such a potential threat to our main characters, but we don’t ever get an idea of how powerful she’s become in that season until she strikes and completely folds MK and gang, taking away Wukong’s staff, causing them to have to retreat.

we don’t see much of her in the next season as most of her dirty work is done by macaque, but in the final few episodes when we learn her goal and why she wants to ‘fulfill destiny’ it makes her so interesting.

especially in comparisons to other villains I’ve seen in general imo. She has good goals, she just wants to make the world a better place, or at least ‘better’ in her eyes. And to her it’s gotten to the point where the only way she can achieve that is to simply start the world anew. It’s not good and the story doesn’t try to trick into think it’s good of her to be doing that, but the goal itself is a noble one.

and while she might not be strong power level wise she’s very intimidating. You don’t even have to look any further than the fact that out of all villains the LBD was probably the one that shook MK up the most after her defeat. Especially with her ominous warning to him; “we both fight for what we think is right, that pursuit only leads to one thing…to pain.” Even outside of the actual story, I personally think she’s really intimidated, the way she moves, those weird whispers, everything about her just screams ‘eerie’ in a way I don’t think many of the other LMK villains have been able to capture.

season 5 spoilers under this line so if you don’t want to get spoilers you can stop here

heck she even (kinda) comes back in season 5! Well…it’s not actually her but still. And she clearly still terrifies MK. And technically, she was main catalyst for a good chunk of the events after MK’s kinda but not really encounter with her. She told (and showed) him he’d have to sacrifice himself and that was his purpose, that’s why he was brought into the world. And maybe this is just me but after their kinda but not really encounter…you cannot tell me that MK wasn’t nearly about to spiral into a full blown panic attack if he hadn’t hugged Wukong.

all this to say, Lady Bone Demon is my favorite MK villain, nay one of my favorite villains of all time and I personally believe she was one of LMK’s major peaks in terms of story writing

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panda-writes-kpop · 1 year ago

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A/N: Last part of the series! This might be my favorite series I've done from a narrative point of view, I love how the story has weaved itself together over all of the parts. I hope you enjoy the ending! (and await to see what project will be coming next... 👀)

TW: SPOILERS FOR EVERY PREVIOUS PART, mind fuckery at its finest, Yooh's villain era, OOC Yoohyeon (ofc)

Summary: You finally unmask the Author, but you realize that she's not the villain you've been looking for. Maybe the villain was the friends we made along the way...

♡ Masterlist ♡ 》》》 ♧ AU Masterlist ♧

"Where am I?"

"Back with me." The Author's voice rings through the darkness that has surrounded you.

"Wasn't I just with Siyeon?"

"But you wished to speak with me, no?"

"I-" You pause as your mind scrambles to find something to say. "I can't properly speak with you unless I can see with you."

"Fair enough."

A snap of the fingers pushes you into the light. You shield your eyes from the brightness as you find yourself surrounded by more books.

You melt into the comfort of the armchair as you stare at the women opposite of you.

Blonde hair…

"I know you."

A gentle smile breaks out on her face as she visibly relaxes.

"You do?" The tenderness in her voice, it's welcoming, soft, and… familiar.

"Dami-ya!" You cheerfully say as you hand her the drink she ordered. "You're coming with us, right?"

"Of course I am." She offers you a warm smile before gently brushing her hand against your face. "I wouldn't miss a moment I spent with you…

"And even if we were to part…" You repeat aloud, as you hope that Dami will finish your statement.

"...I'd seek to find you, again and again." She thoughtfully says as you smile in return.

"You remember."

"Why wouldn't I?" You softly ask.

"You didn't remember the other girls… I was worried that I would suffer the same fate." Dami answers as a sad look briefly crosses her face. "Do you remember them?"

"Bits and pieces."

"That's good. It means your memories are returning… which means that I can send you home."

"Home?"

"The world of the Awaken. You still don't remember much about it, do you?"

"Not really, but I have an inkling that there wasn't much to remember."

"It's no matter. When I get you home, you'll be able to pull your life back together." Dami reassures you before grabbing a book from a nearby bookshelf. "Are you ready to go home?"

"What about all of you?"

"We'll figure a way out of here, one way or another. Our predecessors did, and so will we."

"Predecessors?"

You're about to ask another question, but the sound of someone crashing through a wall causes you to jump out of your chair.

"You can't let them go home!" Yoohyeon appears out of the rubble before approaching you. "Don't you like it here? You've met so many great people! Isn't this all you were hoping for?"

"Ah, just the person I wanted to see." Dami mumbles before shutting the book. "Do you want to tell them, or should I?"

"Doesn't the magic bound you from-"

"Yeah, the magic did, but some nitwit broke the rules and nearly collapsed the foundation of the world that we live in!" Dami huffs before folding her arms. "Fine, I'll do it. Alice, Yoohyeon is-"

"No, I can't let you do this, Dami! It's not fair that they get to go home!!" Yoohyeon whines before nearly shoving you out of the way to get to Dami. "We had a deal!"

"You lied to me, Yoohyeon," Dami accuses her before regaining her composure, "so don't get preachy with me unless you want me to do the same with you."

"I didn't mean-"

"I know what you meant to do. You tried to find an unwilling replacement for your role. How does that make you feel?" Dami asks as Yoohyeon bows her head in shame.

"Unwilling of my role… as Alice."

"Alice?" You softly repeat as the gears start to turn in your head. "You… took me away from my life because you were unsatisfied with a choice you made?"

"I know it sounds bad-"

"Yes, it fucking does, Yoohyeon! You could've not only harmed yourself, but six innocent women as well. That's not even including those in the Kingdom of Hearts!" You explode as you vent your frustrations at Yoohyeon. "Is all that you wanted was to go home? I don't think it was because you could've easily gotten a child to come with you, but you chose me. So you might as well start talking."

"I-I… I was jealous." Yoohyeon admits.

"Of what?"

"Of how quickly you moved on from me when we dated in the world of the Awaken!" Yoohyeon yells as you stare at her in disbelief.

"Are you kidding me? This all… is for your petty revenge?"

"Okay, I didn't plan the Wonderland part, but when an opportunity like this falls into your hand-"

"I cannot believe you, Yoohyeon!" You scream at her. "You're vile."

"I know." She mutters in shame as you approach Dami.

"Did you know about this?"

"Handong figured it out before I did. The memories you traded, along with Yoohyeon’s…"

"-helped her put the puzzle pieces together, and then she told me." Dami explains before grabbing the book. "Are you sure you still want to do this?"

You glare at Yoohyeon before nodding at Dami.

"I want to go home."

"Okay, I'll get you home." She says. "Close your eyes, and focus on a memory that you have from the world of the Awaken. It'll anchor you to that world forever, and you'll never be able to come back to this place. Are you sure you-"

"Yes, Dami!" You exasperatedly say. "Let's go."

You close your eyes as your mind scours for a memory. You find yourself reaching for a memory from your youth when you read a book about a blonde haired girl and a magical world. She ended up going to that magical world because she fell through a rabbit hole, and that rabbit hole took her to Wonderland, where-

You force your eyes open as you look over at the clock in your bedroom.

I must've overslept.

You check the group chat with your six best friends before getting out of bed.

SuA: Morning sunshines!! How are my favorite people doing today?

Gahyeon: It's too early. I'm going back to bed.

Siyeon: Me too. I need my beauty sleep. 💅

Handong: You can get as much sleep as you need, but you won't be able to stop the acne breakouts that we all get.

JiU: Morning, SuA! I've been trying to bake cookies, but I haven't been able to make a batter that will hold up in the oven.

Dami: Morning, everyone. ☀️

You smile at your phone before typing out a message.

You: Good morning everyone! I have to work today, but maybe we can all go out to eat afterwards? 🥂 Last one to reply buys shots!

You laugh as they all race to answer you the fastest.

I missed you guys, even though I was only asleep for a few hours… I must've had some weird dreams.

You find yourself staring at a book on your shelf. You are drawn to it, and you abandon your phone to take the book in your hands.

It's a copy of Alice in Wonderland, but something's off about it.

Then you notice that the girl on the cover has black hair.

That's weird. I must have a misprint or something.

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rlyehtaxidermist · 4 months ago

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Followed you bc of your immortality post and I just want to say don't listen to the haters. I feel the EXACT same way. Time and life are the only things we can't ever get back once they're gone, and I'm not even sure about life. With enough time, any other problem can theoretically be overcome. It legitimately infuriates me that we as a species aren't making it priority number one to research anti-aging things (like telomerase) when our ultimate struggle is against the forces of entropy and death. Everything else is an aside.

I feel like we could someday achieve immortality through purely scientific means if we actually dedicated the time and resources to it, and therefore my precious life (and everyone else's) is being stolen by everyone who doesn't understand that. I was about to say that is the second greatest injustice in existence, right after mortality itself - but as I write this, I realize it's actually THE greatest, since "injustice" not caused by a sentient entity is simply misfortune.

I'm not nearly as confident about scientific "immortality", even defined as negligible senescence in homo sapiens.

Our understanding of biology isn't there yet, and despite what the singularitarians claim, it's not just a question of throwing more computing power and magically precipitating a solution. There's already exaflops going into folding@home and that's just one piece of the problem of basic cellular functions, let alone "simulating a brain" or understanding the full process involved in aging and hypothetical anti-aging.

The concept seems possible, but there is a world of difference between a plausible abstract concept and something that can be actually designed, demonstrated, replicated, and engineered. The few species with "biological immortality" are very, very different from mammals, such that few of the concepts transfer. Ideas are a dime a dozen without proper theory behind them, and the "engineered negligible senescence" movement has been... rather infamously soft on its theory. (There's a reason I refer to "someone with expertise in one field overgeneralising and making sweeping statements about fields in which they have no actual knowledge" as "Kurzweiling".)

The issue with "if this is possible, we are being robbed by people not putting resources towards it" is that if it is impossible, all of those resources are being pulled away from everything else. It's essentially a secularised Pascal's wager, claiming a hypothetical infinite reward justifies the exclusion of purportedly finite opportunity costs (see also: Roko's basilisk, which does the same thing with a hypothetical infinite punishment and purportedly finite fixed costs).

(As an aside, it's notable that Pascal himself did not intend his wager to be logically consistent, but to serve as a counterargument for the use of logical reasoning in questions of religion, something that its apologist proponents have gone on to ignore for centuries.)

That's not to say there's not plenty of waste in society and in academia, but I think it's inappropriate to define waste in terms of any singular goal - especially one that's essentially a high concept. There is plenty of work being done to understand aging, and lots of wealthy, aging, and anxious people to bankroll it, but the idea that it could be solved by simply throwing more money and mythical man-months at it is unconvincing to me.

That's not even getting into the social questions of who would control the means of producing and administering a hypothetical anti-aging treatment, because our current institutions are not set up to resolve that equitably.

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isthisaria · 11 months ago

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My recommendation of '23

You’ve Got My Devotion (Hate You Sometimes) by lucythegoosey

Harry was in the biggest boy band in the world. He was also one half of the best (or worst, depends on who you ask) kept secret relationship in the music industry. Now, almost five years on, after One Direction has broken up, and Harry and Louis' relationship has as well, a video threatens to put everything at risk. One determined Irishman, a massive publicity stunt and two begrudging exes are all it takes to bring One Direction back to life and maybe, just maybe, Harry and Louis' mangled love life too. Or: Harry and Louis are forced to fake-date after an old video from when they were dating emerges.

the school of extraordinary lovers by stylinsoncity

"We keep telling the other, I love you and I love you, and we do, though we both know where the knives are." - Laura Van Prooyen harry is a third-year witch and violinist at Laitswold, the only magical academy in the UK, with dreams of taking on the world, and hopefully breaking the centuries-old curse on his family while he's at it. he does not dream of facing off against his childhood rival and duet partner, but louis is back in town after six years abroad, so that's exactly what happens.

The Second Hand Unwinds by kingsofeverything

Louis Tomlinson is one of the first members of NASA's top secret Chrono Exploration Program. When things go wrong and he's sent further back in time than planned, he has no other option than to show up on his ex-boyfriend's doorstep.

all we can do is keep breathing by thealmightyavocado

“Harry, I-I’m so sorry…” Louis stutters out, trying to keep his voice level and even, to portray a depiction of strength, but with the way Harry is looking at him, staring at him like he has a personal passage way straight to Louis’ soul, it’s so hard, nearly impossible. That simple opening phrase, that short introductory acknowledgement that is often rushed out so easily, painlessly, at a safe distance. Giving a doctor the ability to portray empathy without true emotion, without feeling the full brunt and sheer force of the underlying pain itself. But Louis feels it, he feels the crushing agony laced behind the phrase, he feels the weight of the painful words slipping from his lips, the cause and effect that the three-word expression holds. The distantly empty “I’m so sorry” that doctors throw out in self-preservation, isn’t at all empty for him. Louis recognizes it, he understands it, he feels it. a fated story of two broken and battered boys who barely survived the unimaginable and how the love of one little brave girl defies all the odds and somehow puts them back together.

A Package Deal by alltheselights

Louis knows Harry hasn't fucked and run because he can hear him talking quietly in the next room. He shouldn't care enough to get up and find out who he's talking to—he knows cops get phone calls at all hours of the night and day—but Louis has always been too curious for his own good. He pushes himself up off the couch and pulls on his underwear, which he finds several feet away, folded in a small pile. Harry must have done that while he was still asleep. It feels a little silly to be tiptoeing around in his own home, but Louis does it anyway. When he finally peeks around the corner to the kitchen, he sees Harry kneeling on the floor with Biscuit, and that alone is enough to disrupt Louis' usual heart rate. When he realizes that Biscuit is allowing Harry to scratch around his ears while he mutters to him quietly about what a pretty boy he is, well, okay. Now Louis might need a defibrillator. For the past three years, it's just been Louis and his one-eye orange cat, Biscuit. When Louis starts sleeping with Harry, the aggravating cop stationed at the ER where he works, he has no reason to think anything will change. Unfortunately, Biscuit and Harry have other plans.

a cycle of recycled revenge by brokenbeaks

Foxburgh, England, 1983. In the heat of summer, wreathed by pastures, rolling knolls, and thatched-roof cottages, Louis takes on a new job: caretaking for a recently blinded man named Harry. As it begins, what seems like a simple task turns into a quest that costs him every last bit of his pride and tolerance. Harry is, in practice, a two-legged curse. And Louis is just gonna have to put up with it. Or: The one where Harry likes to infuriate Louis almost as much as he enjoys straddling his lap.

#fanfic #larry stylinson fanfic #fanfic recommendation #larry stylinson #2023

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im-here-too-i-guess · 1 year ago

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New au, but this time its about Ase and the tree of trinity!

So, you know how Ase was incubated from a stillborn seed of an immortal tree? And I've established that he and the Tree of Trinity are closer to each other than the other two?

Now what if we take those two facts and Gais's might, and make him into something more?

So, something happened in Japan. A great plauge extended to each and every corner of the land, causing thousands upon thousands to suffer from its effects.

Some of them are lucky to die, others are cursed to a lifetime of pain and suffering and others.

Others turned into violent monsters.

Ase was instantly pissed after hearing about this. Because he saw something like this before, albeit a smaller and less dangerous case, this isn't just a plague no.

This was something that was a by product of forbidden knowledge.

These cases usually result in terrible consequences. Ase has seen thise consequences, but never one like this. He immediately gathered the students undrr him and started looking for ways to migitate its effects long enough to find a cure.

Ase have solved smaller cases of forbidden knowledge that plagued the kitsune kingdom over his long life, and as the son of a literal god said to be one step away from omnipotence and maybe the by product of an earth goddess from a whole different pantheon. So help him will he let some fucking forbidden knowledge destroy what he and his brothers work so hard for.

Ase and his students worked tirelessly, managing to save multiple kitsune, it was also helpful that kitsune biology worked the way it did. But Ase couldn't save them completely, the forbidden knowledge was still there, albeit weakened, but still there.

News of the kitsune managing to migitate the effects reached everyone, causing people to ask them for aid. To which, despite them not being kitsune, Ase gave. He sent his students to every corner of Japan to help whoever they can and he himself even went out.

But just when things were starting to look up, the forbidden knowledge suddenly grew stronger, so strong that it even started to affect him. He immediately went back to the kitsune kingdom, hearing that some of his students were folding left and right, even worse was that even his siblings were being affected.

And they didn't have the resistance he did, being made from life itself.

So, he laid down his pride and turned to the celestials for help. Even if it left a bad taste in his mouth to do so, for his siblings he would do anything.

So he sought Ameterasu, and she gave him a method, it worked, but everyone was still suffering. So, he came up with a plan, he decided to take her method and take it a step further.

So with the help of the Tree of Trinity, Ase stretched his power to every corner of Japan and pulled. The forbidden knowledge latched onto him and condensed inside of him, he nearly kneeled.

And so, filling his very being with life and returning to but a seed, he sacrificed himself. Taking the forbidden knowledge with him.

Ase made his peace with disappearing from this world.

But the Tree of Trinity was not content with his death. So it reached deep into the earth and connected with the world, ascending it to the World Tree.

And it wanted its brother back.

Ase's soul was pulled from the afterlife, and took his seed and pulled an Alaric. Incubating him inside of it and the worldly energies, resulting in the birth of a god.

The Abundance.

(Yes I stole from Honkai lol)

Ase connected to the World Tree and the world, becoming a kitsune god of life. Weaker than Alaric and Ameterasu, but a god nonetheless.

The world was plagued with forbidden knowledge, and it was not content with his life being sacrified with the forbidden knowledge.

And what the world wants, it will have.

@lulu-nightbon

#made from phone lol #Ase #Tree of Trinity #When u sacrifice urself to end forbidden knowledge #But the world said no lol

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carewyncromwell · 2 years ago

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“Are we too far apart? Two worlds among the stars? You’re gonna take a piece of my heart if you leave... So it’s two separate ways, Or am I too late to say, I wanna fight for what we got? ‘Cause I believe in family...in family...”

~“Family” by TobyMac

x~x~x~x

I gotta say, I didn’t think I’d become so attached to Carewyn’s youngest cousin Tristan when I decided to write for him in that one drabble I did, but...yeah, here he ended up as a young adult with Carewyn in my sketchbook! Go figure! XD

But yeah, this is Tristan Cromwell, age 18, and dressed to the Goth Victorian nines. Yes, that is his aesthetic -- he would’ve 150% been that Tim Burton-obsessed weirdo kid, if he’d been raised in the Muggle World. I see this being him reaching out to his now-nearly-30-year-old cousin Carewyn at the Ministry of Magic, specifically talking at that one fountain in the center Atrium, which has gone through some changes since its pre-Wizarding-War days and especially since the Wizarding War itself. As you can see, Tristan’s grown up a lot since he appears in that drabble -- a bit personality-wise, yes, but definitely physically. Tristan ends up being the tallest and lankiest of all the Cromwells at 5′11″, making him both an inch taller than his father and the same height as his deceased grandfather, Charles. It also means he towers over Carewyn, the smallest Cromwell at 5′3″.

Despite his and Carewyn’s differences, though, Tristan as a young adult really becomes all the more motivated to fix the rift in his broken family. (I’m not joking, while working on this, I must have played Scott Shattuck’s cover of Waiting on a Miracle a good twenty times, imagining it as a theme for adult!Tristan.) As Blaise’s only son and heir, he’s presumed to be the one who’ll have to take on the mantle of leadership for the Clan, even while the youngest of the Cromwell cousins, so Tristan feels an obligation to do what his father has been unable to and bring Carewyn, Jacob, and Lane back into the fold. One lesson Tristan does internalize that Blaise never does, however, is that love is about sacrifice, not just possessive control...a lesson bolstered by his interactions with his favorite "bastard cousin,” Carewyn. I could even see Tristan seeking out Carewyn’s help with getting a position at the Ministry as an adult, since his father’s influence is far less than Charles’s was back in the day and Tristan’s lack of real-world experience, connections, and social skills hampers him in his job search.

“I’m a Cromwell! I’m not supposed to have to struggle to get the respect owed me.”

Fortunately for however proud and entitled Tristan is thanks to Blaise’s toxic influence, he also is painfully aware of his duty to his family and is determined to be the best Head he can be...even if it required him taking a desk job he’d be miserable at.

“Wouldn’t I, what, prefer to do something else? Obviously. I’ve been locked up inside nearly my whole life -- you don’t think I don’t wish every day I could just pack my bags and go running off into the sunset on some whirlwind adventure, the way your brother does? Hell, reckon even your precious Quidditch player’s able to do that sometimes, with how much travel he must get up to...

“...But...I can’t. Not when it’d break Father’s heart. Not when the whole Clan needs leadership, and just about all of them presume it has to be me. It’s not like it could be anyone else, really. Elmer’s not the leadership sort, and Arsen and Kain...they can’t even score a promotion with the Hitwizards, let alone take charge of the Clan. And Heather, Dahlia, and Iris, feh -- the Manor would probably get burned to the ground in a week if they called the shots.

“I was raised to do this, by my father. I have to do this, the way he has -- but I can’t do it his way. Not just because the Cromwell name’s been tarnished and Father can’t help me get ahead the way Grandfather did for him, but because...well...”

“...You’re not your father.”

“...Yes. And...if anything is going to get better, with our family...if I’m ever going to make things right...I can’t be like him, either. No matter how much I love him and no matter how much I want to make him proud...if I’m going to make that dream come true, I have to do things my way.

“So just...put in a good word for me, will you? Maybe Father’s word doesn’t have weight here at the Ministry, but yours does. You’re the Ministry’s Star Prosecutor, after all. Even if I do have to be stuck indoors all day, well, at least it’ll be a different ‘indoors.’ And I know Father will be pleased, if I ended up in your Department. Sure he’ll see it as the perfect excuse to try to lure you back home...”

Tristan’s lips were curled up in an amused, mischievous smirk, when he said this: one that made him more closely resemble that thirteen-year-old boy Carewyn had seen back at the Cromwell Manor during the War.

As one can expect, Carewyn didn’t flaunt her influence around to get Tristan a job the way he wanted...but, feeling some compassion for her cousin, she did line up several promising Ministry internship opportunities for him -- one with the Department of International Magical Cooperation, one in the Department of Magical Games and Sports’s office closer to Quidditch League Headquarters, one at St. Mungo’s sponsored by the Accidental Magical Reversal Squad, and even three for the Department of the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. None of those opportunities, however, were in Wizarding Law.

Sorry, Tristan -- but I think you’ve had more than enough of being stuck indoors.

After much deliberation, Tristan selected one of the internships for the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, specifically the one that required him to work with the Dragon Research and Restraint Bureau, exploring more humane methods of transport for the creatures across Muggle-occupied areas. Tristan’s extensive knowledge of magical creature anatomy ended up being very helpful in this task -- though the best part of the experience, by far, ended up being when he was able to finally see a real-life Welsh Green for the first time. After only ever knowing such creatures as models and drawings in books, Tristan almost couldn’t breathe when he was able to actually reach out and touch one, with his own hands.

Blaise would probably be more than a little disconcerted about his son ending up so close to such a dangerous creature -- but in that moment, Tristan couldn’t keep the huge grin off his face as he ran a hand gently along the dragon’s comb, rubbing his wet eyes on his sleeve. He’d never been so happy in all his life.

#hphm #hogwarts mystery #my art #tristan cromwell #carewyn cromwell #my writing #blaise cromwell #jacob cromwell #orion amari #yes for the record carewyn's become legal partners with orion at this point #blaise hates orion's guts LMAO #he thinks carewyn deserves better than 'some orphaned broom jockey'#tristan acts condescending too because he's seen the whole situation through his father's filtered perspective #but he at least is a bit more conscious of the fact that orion's a famous quidditch star #arsen and kain both love quidditch like their mum did XDDD #iris also may or may not have swooned over some of the sexier quidditch stars out there a few times #when she didn't think the adults could hear >)#dahlia's type is more 'scholar' and heather's type is more 'action hero'#but yeah anyway tangent aside tristan's actually a bit more okay with carewyn dating orion because hey he's famous #that's cool #even if yeah winnie isn't even getting married and having a 'real' family that weirdo *impish grin*#hey tristan is blaise's son what are you gonna do #at least he's more just immature naive and proud rather than an emotionally toxic gaslighter #tristan has actually thought a few times that carewyn would be a good leader of the Clan #but he knows she wouldn't be able to bring them together -- there's just too much baggage there #if he's going to be head of the Clan though tristan would want carewyn's support #he wants both her and his father's advice on this journey he's taking and he's hoping to walk a path between them #time will tell how well that will go #this pic is set in 2002 for the record -- tristan is 18 and carewyn is 29

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