#nicer than being caged by my brain at least

[lustlovehart]

Caught In Her Web

A/n: I love women

Summary: [Yandere] Dinner never seems to go right with Kafka

Warnings: Toxic date, memory erasure, unwanted touching, unconscious kiss

Her gloved fingers tap against the wooden table, every sound only increasing the tension through the room.

"Hm? Oh, don't look at me like that, I'm not gonna eat you dear."

At this rate, you wouldn't doubt if she did take a bite out of you.

"Kafka, quit this, what do you need from me this time?"

"Don't be so heartless [Name], maybe I just wanted to have dinner with my favorite person through the universe's."

"Cut it out."

"I'm not messing with you," her leather covered hands slowly make their way into your own, both palms caging your own in hers as she makes heavy contact into your soul. "Let's just eat shall we?"

You don't reply, only looking hesitantly at your hand covered by her malice.

You knew of the existence of scripts, she never hid information from you. Whatever information she did withhold probably would’ve been stuff you wouldn’t wanna know anyway.

The food laid between you two, the steam floating off it being very visible, yet Kafkas eyes completely overshadow them, rather than being drawn to the appetizers your focus is entirely on her, you don't look into her eyes, but just staring at her gloved hands is enough.

She has that effect on people you assume.

Her left hand plays with your arm, the digits of her limb playful crawling up your skin until they catch onto your chin, forcing you to finally look at her.

"You know darling, it's common coutersy to look at someone when you talk to them is it not?"

"I'm not gonna look at you."

Her fingers quickly release you from her hold, a playful 'hm' leaving her lips as she takes a fork and, somehow, makes stabbing a steak look both violent and elegant at the same time.

"Fine, be that way, the least you could do is let me feed you."

"I doubt you'd give me a choice."

"Hm, you're smart, good," the knife cuts through the meat, her utensil slowly lifting it to your mouth, her lips telling you to say 'ahh'. "Be careful dear, it's hot."

You don't give her the satisfaction of listening to her, despite the heat of the food radiating off of it, you don't blow. You'd rather burn your tongue than make this criminal happy with you.

You were right, your mouth is in so much pain. You try to keep your face neutral, but you can't help letting a little of the pain escape.

"See, I told you it was hot. I just praised you too."

You swallowed, it hurt like hell, but you swallowed. You're sure if it wasn't boiling it would've been delicious, but what's done is done.

"Try to at least enjoy our dinner, this will be the last time I see you for a while"

"Hm, maybe you're right, that does sound like something to celebrate."

"Oh, so you're only witty when it comes to remarks against me?"

"Was that not obvious?"

"You wound me [Name]" she looked down at the food again, instead of giving you more she only sighs and pushes the plate to the side. "Seems the dinner plans fell through. That's okay, Elio saw it coming."

"So even your 'heartfelt' dinner was apart of the script."

"Not all of it, we were just meant to sit at table filled with food, that wasn't apart of the plan."

"So you decided toying with me would be funner?"

"Playing with anyone is enjoyable to me, it's just nicer when it's you." She smiles after her words. Just that, a closed lip smile at you.

You look at the clock she had set up, it felt more like a countdown than a way to keep track of time. 3 hours left, that's too long for you.

"What, so you added your flirtations into this dinner?"

The more you think, 3 hours left till what?

"Hm, I did, is there problem? I don't think I hide my liking towards you."

Your brain can't remember what it was you were waiting for. It's like the memory of what waited for you at the end wasn't there anymore.

"You don't, but I wish you did."

Keep... Date... As long... Possible...

She leans across the table, her lips ghosting over your earlobe, a deep laugh escaping from her throat.

"How will I express my adoration for you then?" Her whisper came out teasing, yet if you looked past that, you can hear her underlying annoyance slip through the cracks. "Perhaps lock you in a golden cage like an innocent bird? Or should I do like a spider and trap you in my web." You sit still, not daring to move.

"Jokes of course, though, I would like for you to stay with me."

Feint words of broken memories invade your head, beating like some painful headache.

"Once this is over, you'll be different. It's sad I won't be able to keep the [Name] I cherish, but it's the price we have to pay for the script. These last moments will be what I'll have left of you, so I hope we can enjoy it together.

The whispers felt familiar, like you've been through it before. Spirit Whsiperer...

"Now, can we please enjoy this last meal of peace before it changes ?"

Your hands grab onto her as you push her to her side of the table. Your breaths were heavy once you remembered the situation the damned clock. Looking back at the time, how could time go by so quickly?

1 hour left.

"Don't try using that shit on me Kafka. It was 3 hours left 10 minutes ago how the hell could that be."

"That's the [Name] I like to see." She doesn't answer you, not a single question. While you frantically shake her.

"I told you myelf, I really do enjoy messing with you." Her hands aren't gloved anymore. The leather long being discarded, her fingers slowly reach up to your cheek pulling you closer to her face.

Her fingers are cold, like a corpse. You don't shiver though. Her touch is the most undisturbing part about her. It's what makes her so horrifying.

"Times up dear." Her thumb ghosts over your lips, gently placing her digit on you. She stand up from her seat, being eye to eye to yourself, her other hand placing itself on your waist, seemingly pulling you closer.

"Boom."

Your vision blacks as your head falls forward, the last thing you remember being the soft feeling of your face resting on her shoulder. Ice cold fingers are left stroking your head as the sound of a door opens.

"At the end of the day," Though you're out cold, deep down she wishes you can feel the way her freezing lips place a chaste kiss on your own. "I'm a selfish woman."

------

A dim light is all your blurred vision can see, the sound of a feint hum ringing through the empty space as well. Your head is rested on what feels to be someone's thighs, whoever it is must be the one rubbing circles into your chest, more specifically, the area where a heart would be.

It's not beating. Your hearts not working.

"You're awake." Your eyes clear as you look up at the woman smiling from above. She's beautiful.

She's familar.

"Do you remember me?"

"..."

She waits.

"Do you like me?"

“I…”

She doesn’t say anymore, only tracing patterns into your skin as she waits, that unwavering smile still on her face. The lights grow darker. You don’t hear a throbbing in your ears, something someone with a heart would hear in distress. You don’t have that anymore. Well, maybe not anymore, you can’t remember if you ever did have one.

“Who are you?”

——

[everyeyeismine]

Statement of Senior Agent Meredith Crowley, regarding the ‘Hatchet Falls’ and 'Nursery’ research facilities in Romania, November 28th - 30th, 2019. Statement documented directly from subject on December 6th, 2022 by Jonathan Sims. Statement begins.

I had returned to Romania at the request of a contact - Carmen Preda, Council of Venice - after having wrapped up another investigation in the area earlier in the month. The village where we had worked together was experiencing a resurgence of werewolf attacks despite the situation seeming to improve at the conclusion of the previous investigation.

Follow-up revealed the werewolf packs to have been pressured into the areas surrounding the village by attacks by a new, larger monster. I was able to track the creature down and… eliminated it with the help of a vampire hunter operating in the area - John Smith, unaffiliated. He…

He set it on fire. And after it died, it. He. He returned to his human form after he expired - Nicolae. I knew him. He and his sister…

Sometime between the end of my previous investigation and being contacted by Agent Preda, Nicolae and his sister, Mirela, were abducted by Orochi Group researchers use in projects between the Hatchet Falls and Nursery facilities. Mirela was killed in their escape attempt. They trapped the wraith born from her soul to continue testing. The only mercy is that she killed the team that tried to use her.

They weren’t the only victims. There were dozens, children they’d abducted and tortured and killed, and more that they intended to but didn’t get the chance before everything spiraled out of control.

They kept them in cages at Hatchet Falls. Concrete and iron bars, ceiling-to-floor chain-link fences. It was a converted Soviet bunker, I think. Light on the conversion. Usually you walk into a place where everyone’s been slaughtered and you feel at least a little bad, but every corpse there deserved to be there, probably deserved worse than what they got.

Fuck. Um.

The… good ones went on to the Nursey for further experimentation. More modern facility, nicer rooms in the front. Parts of it could have been normal.

They were exposing their subjects to viral mutagens, lycanthropy, testing the effects of long-term possession on brain development. They… There wasn’t anyone human left. The ones that were still alive, they weren’t- There was nothing left of them to save. The things- the substances they’d been exposed to destroy minds and souls and there’s no reversing the damage. There was nothing we could have done. Killing them was the kindest-

…Sorry. Sorry.

We… I met a woman in the Hatchet Falls facility that introduced herself as a Council of Venice agent; she went with me to explore the Nursery and we found the hidden room under the director’s office together. A dark, red corridor to a dark, red room. The girl on the slab.

She was alive, the girl. Anima. When we found her, she was so cold and still, I thought… She’s alive. She’s fine now. But then… God, I was so scared we’d lost her too.

And then the woman I was with drugged. Because of course I was stupid enough to turn my back to her to look after Anima.

I tried to fight her off. I really did! But I… When I came back around, I was strapped to one of the tables.

…Do you have a Lilith? The original one? She introduced herself to me properly after I woke up. I don’t know how to explain it exactly… It might be different where you’re from, but. Everything is a medium. Anything - tangible or non - can have meaning woven into it. And Lilith’s very name - her real name, not just 'Lilith,’ but the form that is specifically her - carries the weight of countless lifetimes lived and the infinite atrocities committed across them. You can drown in the blood on her hands. There’s no bottom. And the pressure would crush you before you could ever got too far. I can’t even remember half of her gloating over me because I was too busy suffocating on everything she was and is and will be.

And - god, they’re going to want me to face her again. I can’t - She…

The little drone is Oculus. She stole them from me, reprogrammed them, swapped out the taser I had them installed with for a surgical laser, and had them cut off my legs while she took Anima.

I was stuck there for hours while they went across. Any time I tried to get loose, I just ended up making them cut a little more in a different direction, haha! I know I passed out a few times, but I’d wake up and they’d still be going! Inch by inch, millimeter by millimeter! And when they finally cut all the way through, I still had to-! I… I nearly degloved my hands getting out of the restraints, just… shaved off a lot of meat on the edge of them and… fell off the table. I…

…Sorry, my memory gets fuzzy from there. A lot of things… The entity in my head is usually fairly benign, but they feel strongly about Anima. Especially in that circumstance. I just remember them pushing me to get up and keep going. I don’t think there was much else left of me but what they wanted for a while. Everything else burned up.

Sometimes I’m still there, waiting, hoping somebody will come, and feeling everything I am burning away. Maybe next time it won’t come back.

[vnyu73]

me: *says they’re not accepting prompts anymore*

also me: *ends up writing it anyway bcos i’m a sucker*

...i can’t even trust myself

———

Madara walks into Hashirama’s office with Tobirama in tow only to stop only a step past the doorway when he takes in the scene before him.

There is a teen—possibly Uchiha but he doesn’t remember any of clan’s brats wearing such goggles nor with that chakra signature, he knows all his clansmen’s signatures and this one feels like a campfire in the midst of a sprawling forest—seated on the couch, fidgeting with what seems to be his uniform and the ends of his Konoha hitaiate.

Hashirama looms over his desk with an ominous air, his forehead on his interlocked fingers and hiding his face.

What the fuck is going on.

Tobirama shifts to stand beside him, his brow probably raised in curiosity.

“Madara,” Hashirama finally says, his voice ringing throughout the hush in the room.

“Uh? Yeah?” He’d just gone here with Tobirama for some signatures they needed; why is Hashirama sounding like a mother calmly enraged about her children doing something untoward and arriving home late?

Hashirama lifts his head, the light behind him giving him an intimidating look. Madara’s half tempted to look out the window to see if Izuna is joining Hashirama in his bullshit.

“Tell me the truth.” Hashirama leans forward, putting his chin on his interlocked fingers.

“About what?” Madara doesn’t get it. He looks to Tobirama for support.

No luck. Tobirama is staring at the teen on the couch, narrow eyes wide in surprise.

Madara looks at his best friend, face scrunched in confusion.

“WHY DIDN’T YOU TELL ME YOU WERE PLANNING ON MAKING A TEST-TUBE BABY WITH MY BABY BROTHER?!” Hashirama’s intimidating façade crumbles as his eyes suddenly pour out tears like some tan, human waterfall.

Multiple angry ticks throb on Madara’s person in quick succession. Not this shit again. “WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU SAYING?? TOBIRAMA DOESN’T EVEN DABBLE IN GENETICS LAST I CHECKED!”

“BUT— BUT THIS CHILD HAS MOKUTON AND LOOKS LIKE YOU!”

“WHAT?!” Madara’s eyes widen so much that they’re threatening to bug out of his eye sockets.

Hashirama frantically gestures at the fidgeting teen on the couch who pauses like a frozen scared rodent then waves shyly.

“I don’t even recognize this kid!” He throws up his gloved hands in exasperation. “Where did you come from?” Madara directs his question to the kid, hands settling on his hips. Hashirama’s just going to end up spouting more nonsense and he’ll be left with no other option than to set his hair on fire again to try and liven up some of his dead braincells.

“Uh,” is all that comes out of the kid’s mouth.

“He appeared here in a flash of light like Kakashi-kun!” Hashirama butts in.

Madara levels a glare at him disdain.

“Are you Kakashi-san’s friend, by any chance?” Tobirama finally speaks up.

“Uh. Yes, sir!” Huh. The kid does have a different eye like that Kakashi kid from a few weeks ago now that Madara looks closely.

“Your name?” Tobirama’s voice doesn’t lose its calming and deep timbre.

Madara valiantly tries to not lean into him and mildly succeeds. He mentally chastises himself, this is not the place. He can listen to Tobirama talk later at home, dammit. He used to have better self-control than this.

“U— Uchiha Obito, sir,” the kid—Obito, apparently—says.

“How did you get here, Obito?” There’s a light in Tobirama’s red eyes that say he already has suspicions on how the kid got here. He’s probably right.

“Uh.” Obito rubs at his spiky hair. “I accidentally activated the seal Kakashi set off that landed him here,” he ends with an awkward laugh.

He probably meant to activate it.

“My brother tells us you have the mokuton?”

“Y— yes.” Obito demonstrates by sprouting a flower on the table in front of him.

Hashirama apparently couldn’t take being silent anymore. “SEE?! LOOK AT HIM! HE LOOKS SO MUCH LIKE A YOUNGER MADARA WITH SHORTER HAIR!”

Oh no. Fuck no. He’s not standing for this shit anymore. He’s going to set his stupid silky fucking hair on fire.

Madara lunges, clearing the desk and tackling Hashirama onto the floor in one angry motion. 

Hashirama tries to wiggle out of his hold as Madara readies a katon in his lungs.

“STAY STILL, YOU GODSFORSAKEN LOG!”

To the side of the room with the couch, well out of the range of their scuffling, Tobirama glances at the teen beside him. He seems a bit hungry.

It’s only right that he entertains their young guest. Those signatures can wait until after the teen gets home and the two scuffling idiots in the office calm down.

“Let’s leave the fools, shall we?”

Obito only nods dumbly in response.

-

Kakashi had told his team about the founders and their peculiarities but it hadn’t prepared Obito for this at all.

Kagami-jii’s stories are all true. Kakashi had vouched for them after his impromptu trip to the past but it’s still surreal to experience in person.

Especially the white-haired Senju brother’s apparent penchant for taking in kids like his own.

The fearsome White Demon of the Senju from the history book is currently treating him to dango and Obito still feels like he’s having a fever dream.

How the fuck did Kakashi manage to keep his cool with any of them.

Even just alone with the Senju Tobirama is already making his brain threaten to abscond.

Senju Tobirama is ruffling his hair and his hand is so warm.

What the fuck.

He raises his head to look at warm red eyes only a shade off from the sharingan.

“Are you all right?” The man tilts his head.

“Y— yes, sir!” Obito can feel a blush creeping up his face. Fuck.

“Just ‘Tobirama,’ please.”

“Uh— yes, sir! Tobirama, sir!”

Tobirama lets out a warm chuckle. “That will do.” Then he ruffles his hair again before focusing on eating his dango, not paying mind to Obito’s embarrassed flush.

Obito starts thinking about what he can give the Hatake in thanks for telling him about the time-traveling array.

Maybe some dango.

———

i didn’t get to say it here but obito’s mom is a senju descended from the senju brothers’ cousin (not touka btw)

i swear this is the last request i’m humoring grrr

...i have no self-control ...but since i haven’t been very inspired in the last few years i’ll just treasure these requests that inspire me hhh

edit: posted on ao3 here

[mcfreakin-bxtch]

Playing with Fire

Part Five of the Just this Once Series

Warnings: Smut (no actual smut tho guys sorry), Masturbation (f), Teasing, Language, Dirty talk, Terrible Star Wars knowledge

Word Count: 2.3K+

Summary: A tease through the links and a bet fulfilled. 

A/N: This chapter is a little short, but I hope you all enjoy! This may seem a little anti climatic and messy but that’s on me guys, that’s my bad. Also this may seem different in tone if that makes sense? The next one will be more smutty goodness but with some injuries (and yes i used another random star wars planet don’t kill mee)

You’ve finally figured it out.

After about a week of travelling to your next destination, it finally occurs to you to just play at his own game. You know—fingering you in a crowded cantina, smirking to himself while you struggled to stay quiet in that fucking booth...  

But first, you must say that Edis is a strange place. Rain falling at every hour with apparently no signs of ever letting up, and the humidity is unforgiving—how Mando is handling it in all that armor and padding, you’re almost too afraid to ask, because there’s just no way that he’s comfortable, and an uncomfortable Mando can lead to a grumpy one. 

Maker you’re grumpy yourself if you’re being honest. The Child has been restless lately, like the heat is getting to him as well, and that’s been taking a toll on your (already) poor sleep schedule; Mando tries to help, but there’s only so much he can do. However, it has given you the chance to think of the perfect payback for your little deal—or bet is a better word—and you gotta say, you’re a little proud of yourself for coming up with this evil—and small—tryst in the first place. 

If it’ll work the way you want it to, time will tell. 

“Were you even listening?”

The modulated crackle startles you from your thoughts. You turn in the pilot’s seat, making contact with the visor and the stiffness of his posture confirms your suspicions—he’s hot and grumpy.   

“Sorry,” you mumble. “Lost in my thoughts.”

He doesn’t acknowledge it. “I’m leaving. They should be nearby, and everything should work out as long as you and the ship stay hidden.”

Like anyone could. Mando isn’t messing around on this one—well, the man doesn’t mess around with anything, actually—and he’s made damn sure that not only are you available with a few weapons nearby (some hidden, of course, just in case), but that the Razor Crest is shadowed by towering trees a bushes in this small part of the rainforest; it’s nearly impossible to even see the gunk through the one of the thickest part of the forest. If anything finds you, they most likely won’t come back alive.     

“Okay. Good luck.”

He gives you one nod and the cape whips as he turns around, strutting towards the ladder as you follow behind. Mando checks on the kid—sitting up in the middle of the haul with a few little toys surrounding him—and gives him a gentle caress of his floppy ear before using his vambrace to open the ramp. He doesn’t give you a glance back, and that’s okay with you, but you can’t deny the slight stinging in your chest when he disappears into the foreign planet.   

“Alright little guy,” you say with a grunt as you plop down on the floor next to the Child. “Let’s figure out what to do.”

***

Ten days. 

Mando has been gone longer on bounties like this, believe or not, but that still doesn’t ease your increasing anxiety when the com link stays silent; you suppose you’re used to the quickness of his updates. 

Today, after hours of entertaining the baby the best you could, you can finally settle comfortably in the pilot’s chair… but now what?

Sleep, your body says, because what else is there really to do? Don’t, your mind tells you, because you have the baby here alone on an unfamiliar planet and anything could happen. A part of you wants to go out and check the foreign terrain. One look shouldn’t hurt—  

“Hey,” his voice speaks through in statics. 

You quickly fumble with the com, feeling like a clumsy mess when you almost drop it in your haste; he’s caught you by surprise, for about the hundredth time. 

“Y-yeah. Yeah I’m here,” you stammer. 

“Not so close,” he tells you, annoyed and tired. 

You wince and pull your hand back from your mouth. “Sorry. Good news, I hope?”

“Yes. And no. It’ll be at least a few days before we’re out of here.”

That sucks.

You suspect that the quarry is indeed with him by the short words, and that’s okay, because with your plan now in the front of your brain, fresh anew like the first time you cococked it in the wake of sleep, washing your quick irritation away, your chance is finally here. 

“Mando,” you say as sweetly as you can—your heart skips a beat when there’s a moment of silence. “They can’t hear me, right?” you continue before you can find out if the com is dead or not. 

This is incredibly risky. Even a little unfair of sorts, given that he’s technically working right now, and that leaves no room for games or distractions—the moment is just too good to pass up.   

Another minute goes by. You sink in your chair in disappointment, ready to admit defeat. 

“Not now.”

Yes. 

“This was part of the deal, Mando,” you remind him. “And I’m already starting to get wet.”

That isn’t a lie. The slickness of your arousal is starting to seep from your core—fourteen days (counting the week it took to get here) is a long time, and as long as you can get him to keep talking, this will work beautifully for you.    

A pause. “I can’t…”

“I’ll do all the talking,” you lick your lips and slink down comfortably, sliding your hand along the length of your neck, imagining it’s his hand wrapping around your throat. “You just listen. You can do that, can’t you?”

You wait, and for a split second you’re afraid that, yet again, you’ve done something wrong. You really have to start working on that.   

“You don’t—”

“Okay.”

Maker. Maker okay. 

“I uh—” what were you going to say to him when you thought of this in the first place? “I… you know what I think about when you’re gone?” You know he can’t answer much, not without giving himself away, but you pause anyway for dramatic effect. “First, I imagine you stalking towards me like you always do… like I’m one of your bounties.”

Your pussy quivers in excitement as you close your eyes and picture him doing just that, sliding your hand down to your chest, groping your covered breast and trying to mimic the same amount of pressure he applies to them—you really wish it was his hand instead. 

“Then you cage me in, leaving me with nowhere to go. There’s a specific type of exceleration to it. One that makes things even more… exciting.” You pinch your nipple and whine, loud enough to give him a good show—Stars you hope that quarry can’t hear you through the baskar bucket of his. “You like to drag it out, to watch me shiver in anticipation, and fuck if I don’t like it either.”

You can hear the light breathing through the comlink. A spark of victory, early victory, runs through your body and straight to your pussy, neglected and hungry for any type of friction. 

“And then,” your hand slides further down to the waistline of your pants, fumbling with the buttons. “You touch me. Softly, at first, because you love to tease—” a barely audible sigh interrupts, bringing a cheeky grin to your lips. “—and I think you’re an ass man, because you never miss a chance to lay your hands on mine.” Your fingers slither their way under your panties; your inner thighs twitch at the first brush of your finger against your aching clit, and more slickness escapes your cunt. “And you ghost your fingers over my breasts, down my stomach, over my hips where you like to grip them tight, to my dripping pussy…”

Not a peep from the com. You’re surprised he’s kept his composure. You shouldn’t be, yet a part of you is. 

“And,” you go on with a moan. “When I feel your thick fingers paw at me, rip my clothes off and fuck my pussy deep, getting me ready for your big cock while your teeth scrapes against my neck—oh fuck…” The curse slips from your lips without warrant; your fingers buried in your pussy like you’re explaining to him. “My fingers are not the same—” you bite down on your lip as you curve your fingers, delicately trying to find the spot Mando finds with precision. “They don’t make me feel as full as yours do. But I’m still fucking myself with them, Mando. While you’re out there, and I’m in here… it sucks, doesn’t it. Having to stay quiet when all’s you want to do is fuck me until I can feel you for days and day after, your cum leaking from me, and who knows, maybe I won’t even let you cum.”

“You will,” he nearly growls, and that’s an early sign you’re in a world of trouble when he does get back. “That’s part of the deal.”

“...What...deal…”

The faint voice cuts in annoyingly, and Mando shoots back with a decent threat that’d make you terrified for your life; again, it’s probably wrong that it does nothing to deteriorate the fluttering of your wet muscles. 

“Keep going,” his tone leaves no room for argument. 

Your fingers move faster. “I think you should be a little nicer to me,” you sigh dramatically. “You’ve been gone for so long, leaving me all by lonesome… you like to do this a lot I’ve realized, leave me high and dry. But you might have a chance to fuck my face if you’re a good boy.”

You have to stifle your giggle at the last bit. 

“Yeah, you’d like that,” you coo. “And I’d swallow every drop.”

A barely audible exhale filters through the link. You’re right there with him, your face scrunched in concentration. 

“I’m happy as long as you’re inside me,” you continue on with delight. “You’re an asshole sometimes, but you can fuck.”

Mando sighs again, this time feigned with theatorical frustration—well in his case, it may be truthful, but it sounds more for the quarry’s (and yours) benefit than the latter.   

This is more of an ego boost for him more than anything as well, if you think about it, but as long as you get him riled up and you cum, that’s enough for you. So you curve your fingers the best you can given the compromised position and flick your thumb against your clit, images of his gloves sliding down your pants in the cantina playing through on repeat. This time you moan louder for your own amusement, imagining him struggle; it’s sweet, sweet revenge. 

“And?” He asks suddenly—calm and steady. 

His voice, even modulated like that, makes your muscles twitch as the coil in your lower stomach boils to a tight flame, and the sloshes of your fingers slinking in and out of you adds to the euphoria clawing through your core. 

“Your cock,” you whimper. “Stretches me out so good every time. You’re so big, Mando, so thick in every way and it feels amazing. I bet you miss the way my sweet cunt clenches around you.” You bite down on your lip to hide a groan, wanting to hear his response as your fingers move even faster, scratching against the itch. “Don’t you?”

Your pussy flutters around your fingers at the first scrape against your sweet spot (finally!), and—well fuck, you’ve never seen much of him to actually picture what his cock looks like driving in and out of you at the verioucious pace he usually chooses, so this is a little bit difficult than you thought it’d be; as long as you keep fucking yourself like this…

“Yes.”

Your breath shakes as you exhale. “Shit I wish you were here right now,” you rub your clit harder. “I-I want you to fuck me so hard when you get back, Mando. Want you to—hmm—to grab me so hard that I have bruises the next day. Use me. And you’d come right in my tight little pussy, isn’t that right?”

You don’t expect him to answer this time. Not when you’re so gone in your little cheraid and your pussy clenches harder and harder until there’s nothing but white noise tying you down to this moment. 

“Fuck. Fuck I’m so close.” 

You try to conjure the feelings Mando gives you—the feel of his hands, pressing down all over you, fingers leaving indents in your skin, his mouth on your neck, biting down on the sensitive flesh until you’re marked; the drag of his cock along your slick walls until there’s tears in your eyes and you can feel him all the way to your cervix. 

“Mando,” you whine, then bite down on your lip again; the Child certainly doesn’t need to hear this. “I… I need to hear you. Say something, anything.”

“Go ahead,” gruffer, close to a grunt—your pussy gushes at that. “Now.”

The command is clear, and it’s not going to take you that much to ride the waves of your orgasm starting to crash down over you. Your moans and whimpers trapped behind tight closed lips and your fingers covered in your juices, it takes a few more curves of your fingers and tight circles on your clit to feel the hard and delectable clench of your inner muscles. 

“Yes,” your body trembles. “Oh Ma—” You hide the rest of the plea behind a muffled scream as short bursts of pleasure sparks through your entire body, your fingers trapped in the squeeze of your cunt as more juices flood down the slope of your ass, milking every drop of your orgasm. 

After a few long moments your tense muscles relax and deflate, relieved and satisfied. Though, the only problem is that it is short lived, an orgasm small enough to hold you over until the real deal comes back. Speaking of…

“Mando?” You breathe. “Still with me?”

“I’ll be there soon. Be ready.” And then nothing. 

Chuckling to yourself, you wince as you slowly pull your fingers out, wiping your slick covered fingers on your pants. 

And now you wait.    

For however long that’ll fucking be. 

[yandere-daydreams]

Kinktober - Day Ten

Prompt: Public-Sex

Pairing: Shigaraki/Reader (Boku No Hero Academia)

TW: Non-Con, Degradation, Oral Sex, Dumbification, Implied Stalking, Implied Jealousy, Delusional Mindsets, and Unfortunate Implications.

Shigaraki hated people like you.

The preppy type. The oblivious type. The kind that could be shot at point-blank range, and only realize there was a bullet in your fucking brain when the blood started to stain your clothes. You were just some dumb, overdressed thing that waltzed into his bar once or twice a week, hanging on Spinner’s arm or yapping at Dabi’s heels or doing whatever you did with Jin that had you coming back so often, and only leave when you were too drunk to walk and twice as ditzy as you were when you walked in. An moron who never looked over your shoulder as you walked home, never remembered to close your blinds, never gave the man glaring at you from the corner booth a second thought, after one of your oh-so-generous patrons laughed and told you something that made your cheeks flush and your smile widen. Shigaraki hated it. He hated people like that.

And for some reason, he hated you the most.

He’s sure you hated him too, by now, but he was starting to think you were too dumb for something that logical. You’d struggled at first, fought and yelled at him as he cornered you in the dark, grimy alley behind the League’s hideout - but there was no one around to hear you, no one who’d care, and there was nothing your kitten slaps and puppy bites could do after he forced you onto your knees, prying your mouth open as he grappled for something to turn to dust, something cheap and expendable to show you just how much it’d benefit you to mind your manners. But, if there was a drop of that confidence you still had, Shigaraki couldn’t tell. As soon as he’d gotten his message across, you were all bleary eyes, your spine straight but the rest of your body limp. Too much of a fucking idiot to even keep struggling, after he got his dick out.

At least you were useful, like this, his fingers tangled in your hair, your throat fluttering around his cock whenever he dragged your face against his pelvis and let you choke and sputter and drool around him. You were too air-headed to suck properly, too much of a bitch to make this easy for him, forcing him to press his forearm against the uneven brick wall and hunch over you, half his focus on holding himself up, half on fucking into your face. You couldn’t be enjoying it, but he didn’t want you to. He wanted you to learn, and the only way to teach someone like you anything was to pound it into them.

He was giving you too much credit, really. You hadn’t learned much of anything - you hadn’t thought much of anything, not since the back of your head hit something hard and the world around you turned into something distant, all shapes and colors and dark hues that blurred together, making the only clear objects the stranger’s face, his cruel grin. His voice, too, whenever he snapped at you, whenever he called you one of the degrading, disgusting names you thought you’d escaped, when you started frequenting this side of town.

And his cock. You didn’t think you’d be able to ignore that if you tried to.

Your scalp burnt as he jerked you forward, forcing you to gag around him and dig your nails into the fabric pooling on his upper thighs. Trying to keep yourself completely upright was pointless - when he wasn’t threatening you into hollowing out your cheeks and taking him in as far as you could, he was thrusting into your mouth, his hips pistoning in jerky, unpredictable motions as he fought to see just how miserable he could make you. There was a low hiss as he pulled out, your teeth just barely scraping against a prominent vein, but it couldn’t have hurt. He was so quick to push himself back in, to choke you on his cock, nothing he was doing could hurt. Or, it couldn’t be hurting him, at least.

“You’re such a little slut,” He growled, his tone low, raspy, drier than it should’ve been, considering you’d watched him nurse the same drink all night. What did Dabi say about him? You couldn’t remember, but it’d been funny, and you’d punched him in the arm and told him not to talk about people within earshot like that. If you knew what was going to happen, you wouldn’t have laughed at all. Maybe if you’d been a little nicer, he would’ve been, too. 

“I thought you’d be better at this.” Or not, he didn’t really seem like the type to be nice in any situation, much less just because you’d been. “I should’ve known you’d be too dumb for a little practice to make a difference.”

He was being so mean to you. He was being so mean, and you didn’t even know his name.

“You look better with your mouth full.” He was muttering, now, his bottom lip caught between his teeth and his eyes hooded, nearly closed as he pulled out, leaving the tip to rest against your parted lips. He was panting, his breathing heavy enough for you to hear over your own hammering heartbeat, but there was nothing rushed or frantic about the way he let go of your hair, reaching down and taking himself by the shaft. Everything about it was lazy, idle, and yet, everything about the way he looked at you, the way he touched himself, all of it was hostile. As dangerous as he was, as dangerous as he’d promised to be, if you tried to run. “If I cum on your tongue, are you going be a good little cum dumpster and swallow?”

You should’ve nodded. You didn’t want to, he tasted like dust and salt and everything awful, but there were worse things, and you really should’ve just agreed. Your body worked faster than your mind, though, and you were shaking your head before you could stop yourself, tears blurring your vision, all the panic you’d pushed down rising back up before you could think better than to let it. But, he didn’t seem angry. If anything, his grin only seemed to broaden as he pushed himself away, stroking his cock and…

Something warm splattered across your chest, soaking into your shirt and making something in your rib cage snap.

He came on your clothes.

He came on your clothes.

You wanted to cry. You wanted to scream, but it was all you could to sit back and stare up at him as he tucked his flaccid cock into his pants, barely sparing you a second glance before scoffing, pushing his hands into the pockets of his hoodie and taking a step back, watching as you failed to do anything to help yourself. He was still smiling, still sneering, but you couldn’t bring yourself to care when he took you by the arm, pulling you to your feet. About the abrupt softness in his voice, when he spoke to you, again.

You didn’t think you could care about much of anything, right now.

"I’ll walk you home. It’s the least I could do, for my new favorite whore.”

[humanmoodring-retired]

Feline A Little Clawstrophobic ||Nicole & Nadia

TIMING: Back in April  PARTIES: @nicsalazar & @humanmoodring SUMMARY: Two cat ladies walk into an elevator CONTENT: Drug manipulation (balam ingesting catnip)

Lack of focus was always a problem for Nicole, but it was safe to say things took a turn for the worst in the past weeks. She was hardly present anymore. To the point where she jumped on her truck and drove aimlessly for hours. Like sleepwalking but conscious, she mused. It was better to drive than to walk, though. Not only because she was forced to do light activity after breaking her ribs, but it was better for her if she put her mental energy into an easy task. Walking used to be how she processed things, and she wasn’t ready for it. She couldn’t think about that night without fear constricting her throat.

Wandering around the shopping center was manageable. It would take real bad luck to break her bones again. Nicole held onto a bag items she didn’t recall buying, and tired of just circling around the same places, she headed towards the elevator. She pushed the button for the first floor, but as the doors were closing, another person entered. The eye contact was minimum before she lowered her gaze, shoulders tensing at the presence. Her lips pressed into a thin line. The woman would be able to tell it was meant to be a smile, right? It didn’t matter, in a few seconds she would never see that stranger again.  

With the weather getting less shitty, and with her body healing more and more each day, Nadia was slowly but surely getting more comfortable with going out and doing things. And, seeing as she hadn’t done shit for her own birthday but it was well over a year since she’d found and rescued her cat, Rhiannon, Nadia decided she was going to do something nice for the little fucker. She was grateful to have the cat back in her apartment, even if she woke up with a giant mound of fur crushing her. It was a good reminder that she was still alive. She’d gone to the store and bought a few cat toys with her groceries, ended up snagging a thing of catnip before she was starting to feel fatigued and decided it was time to head out.

The woman in the elevator with Nadia felt like grief and fear and something numb, familiar and numb. Even if it was probably not as overwhelming as it could be, something that she was beginning to expect from many of the residents in White Crest, it was still a lot, and she felt herself tensing up in response. Still, she managed to give the woman a tired smile of her own and a murmured “thank you” before she shifted her weight a bit and waited for the elevator to take them down. Except there was a grinding noise, a jerk as the elevator came to a violent stop. Nadia grabbed at her side instinctively, even though she wasn’t at risk of stitches popping open this late in the game. “Shit,” she hissed, looking around, trying to figure out what was going on.

Nicole lifted her head when the elevator came to an unexpected stop. For a split second she expected the doors to open for another person, but the woman’s reaction made her realize what was happening. The elevator malfunctioned. They were trapped. “Uh—” she swallowed, slowly processing the situation. The feeling of being caged wasn’t exactly one she was fond of, and she fought to keep her rising anxiety in line.  She let out a nervous breath, eyes fixing on the emergency button. “It— it should be fine” she shrugged, leaving her bag on the floor. The less effort she made carrying extra weight the less oxygen she took out of the room, right? “Un— less...unless there’s a blackout or some— some shit like that” She pulled at the extra hair tie on her wrist, absently playing with it. What could be worse than being in a confined space with a stranger? Even her nightmares were nicer than that. “But... it’ll be fine” she met the woman’s gaze through the mirror on the wall, before pushing the button a few times. When she took a deep breath in, something tickled the back of her throat. Brow furrowed, she glanced at the woman again, trying to decipher her scent. Nothing was particularly strong, yet— she licked her lips, trying to concentrate on the smell.

This was cool, this was fine, Nadia thought as she felt her own nerves mingle with the stranger’s. She wasn’t a fan of tight spaces, she was learning, the way it reminded her of being able to look out her own eyes but not move as she lacked control of her own body. She dug her fingernails into the palms of her hands, the gesture grounding. She was real. It was a shitty situation, but she was real, and she was fine. She almost wished she could walk through the fucking wall like she was still a ghost. Almost. She never wanted to be like that again. “It’s totally fine. Someone’s gonna come, and, yeah, it’ll be fine.” The other woman just really kind of radiated a sense of anxiety that Nadia couldn’t quite get over. This was great. This was why she didn’t get out much. “Just my fucking luck,” she muttered. “Go to the store and get stuck in a damn elevator.” She leaned against the wall and slumped a bit, her bags hanging by her side. When she met the stranger’s eye, she tried to give a half-hearted smile. The other woman’s emotions had changed a bit as her brow furrowed, though Nadia couldn’t quite tell what it was. “Is the, uh, the help button working, or are we in a dead zone?”

Right. It was a good thing they were both staying level headed considering the situation, Nicole thought. Everything would suck so much more if one of them started panicking and sucked all the air in the small elevator. She looked down, hiding a smile at the woman’s words. It was nice to know she wasn’t the only one annoyed by the situation. Had she been better at conversations, she would’ve enjoyed spending the time complaining about shitty luck and poorly maintained machines with her. That was a thing adult women bonded over, right? “No… don’t think it’s working” very slowly, she lowered her hand, as if she still held a glimmer of hope that something would happen. She retreated back to the opposite wall, licking her lips again. What was in the air? It was familiar, yet she couldn’t place it yet. Some sort of plant. Nicole blinked once, twice, tongue poking between her teeth. Wide brown eyes stared intensely at the other woman. Searching, assessing. And then— She took a bite of air. Oh, no. Her heartbeat raced. In the back of her mind she was aware of what was happening, but she didn’t think she’d be able to stop it. Fuck. Still conscious, she tried to pass off the odd movement as a yawn. Good, quick thinking and — Oh, it was creeping on her so, so fast. Premium shit, it had to be. She didn’t think she’d care for long.  “I’m— I’m...do you—” poor woman, Nicole smiled lazily. “Have...cat?”

“Oh, good. Hey, I was worried this would be resolved quickly, right?” Nadia sighed, running a hand through her hair and hoping she wasn’t coming off as an ass. It was just, fuck, being stuck in an elevator wasn’t exactly how she’d imagined to spend the day, and at least she wasn’t alone, but she also wasn’t alone, which meant she had to deal with herself as well as someone else. Normally, she preferred that, preferred that she could focus on someone else instead of herself for just a bit, just a fucking bit, but maybe not while both of them were stressed over being stuck in a goddamn elevator. Nadia liked being able to focus on positive emotions, or even fun emotions like anger. Not anxiety. She had enough of that on her own. There was no need for anymore, thank you. She checked her phone. Yep, yeah, that seemed about right. No fucking service. She bit at the inside of her cheek before she felt a wave of just… mellow wash over her. She looked up at the other woman, the smile on her face and the look in her eyes, and Nadia raised an eyebrow in confusion. “Uh, yeah. Yeah, I’ve got a cat. She’s a total asshole. I actually came to the store to get her a few things and…” she trailed off. “Do you… like cats?”

Nicole inhaled deeply, enjoying the absence of stiffness on the side of her chest. She took in as much of the scent as her lungs allowed. The cast on her wrist was forgotten. The effect was much stronger now that her brain recognized the minty fragrance. She tilted her head back against the wall, transfixed by the emergency lights. “Fuck” she let out a breathy laugh. “I’m so so—” she wanted to apologize, knowing she would embarrass herself, but the words faded from her brain. Nice. “Mmm...I’m cats” She closed her eyes, a blissful smile plastered on her face. It was hot inside the elevator, Nicole registered. But for a few seconds there was nothing to worry about. No dreamscape, no cliff, no anger getting out of control. Just the fast beat of her heart to focus on. Not quite euphoric yet. She needed—  craved more. The scent just wasn’t enough. Her mouth was watering. Pupils were blown when she opened her eyes again. She got off the wall, taking a few clumsy steps towards the human. She offered a mischievous smile, nodding at the bag. “Hey... c’mon” she pleaded softly, before getting close enough to peek inside. Her prize. It was driving her wild. She gripped the human’s wrist, forcing her to lift the bag, before rubbing her face against it. Almost. Her patience ran out quickly, the human was so slow that she smacked the bag out of her hands, content spilling on the floor. She dropped to her knees, trying to rip the catnip bags open.

“What the fuck do you mean, you’re cats?” This was a little weird, even for Nadia, but she couldn’t deny that this chick’s emotions? They felt so much better than her own. Pure fucking contentment and happiness and relaxation. It’d been awhile since she’d felt that, and, sure, maybe it wasn’t full-throttle, but, god, it felt nice. It was weird as hell though. Nadia backed a bit into the wall, pushing herself against it. The woman grabbed Nadia’s wrist, the one that had been snapped sometime during or before the exorcism, and Nadia winced. “Hey, hey, no grabbing, let’s not-- let’s not grab, okay?” Nadia… knew this feeling, sort of. She recognized it from the few college parties she’d been dragged to, the way she’d felt it coming off of people from the crowd and filling her, making her want to go back for more. “Dude, are you-- are you fucking high right now? How? We’re in the-- you just spilled my shit, holy fuck.” She watched as the bag of catnip and toys spilled out on the elevator floor and the woman went down to the ground. “I just bought that. Fuck. Wait-- you’re cats. You… you want the catnip.” Okay, cats. Cat people? Cats. This was fine. This was totally normal. “I’m stuck in an elevator with a high cat lady. I wish I was a high cat lady,” she muttered, and she slid down the wall to sit, shooting the woman a tired look. But, hey, at least she was relaxing.

Nicole heard the sounds. Words, she knew. Vaguely. Not that it was ever her strength, but she couldn’t exactly form a coherent sentence at the moment. Her head bobbed without a clear direction, attempting to nod. A cat lady. Curious eyes observed the woman for a moment, waiting for some sort of reaction, any reaction to her trying to tear the bags opens. She was rude but not that rude. It confused her, tilting her head as the woman quietly slid down the wall, but it was the permission she wanted.

She crushed the catnip between her fingertips, nostrils flaring when more scent was released. All tension left her body. Nicole was weightless. She brought the catnip to her mouth, getting a taste of it. A hoarse grunt escaped her mouth. Shit. Shit. Her body tilted forward in slow motion, until she couldn't keep her balance and face planted on the ground. She rolled on her side, letting out a strangled laugh. Something out of the corner of her eye made her jump. She was ready to pounce when she realized— Oh right, the forgotten human. She could enjoy the catnip too, otherwise why did she buy it? Nicole wasn’t selfish. She pawed the air, until she got a hold of her sleeve and pulled her down to the floor. She laughed at that, before breaking down some catnip.  “Here…” she mumbled, her clumsy hand rubbed it in the woman’s face.

There was a woman getting high off of catnip, and Nadia was stuck in an elevator with her. That was what was happening. That was her life now. At least the woman seemed to be enjoying herself. Nadia could feel the relaxation and ease that was working its way through the woman, and it was nice to hear a laugh. Nadia managed a small one herself as she watched the woman struggle with movement. It was funny. It was enjoyable. It almost made being stuck in an elevator for the near future something that was almost tolerable.

Or, at least, Nadia could have believed that it was tolerable until she was pulled over and down to the floor with a groan. “Hey, no, no-- fuck.” She was on the floor with a woman that was high on catnip, and that woman was dragging her down and rubbing catnip in Nadia’s face. Sure, it smelled alright, but it wasn’t, like, weed or shit. “That was for my cat,” Nadia said, her tone dry as she plucked a piece of the catnip out of her hair. “But, hey, glad you’re enjoying it, you know?” It was hard to stay mad with the good vibes.

Nicole gave the woman a blank stare. She wanted to understand what she was saying, she really did. The words were floating above her, but they sounded like a foreign language as they reached her ears. She hummed in response, trying to keep a serious face. Whatever she was saying sounded important. Her cat, something about her cat. Her smile kept growing however, stretching until it hurt her cheeks. She buried her face in the bag again, taking as much as she could before discarding it somewhere on the floor. She allowed herself to close her eyes for a moment, eyelids heavy as warmth swept her body. The sensation was barely familiar. But it wasn’t new, just long forgotten. Like feeling loved or cared for. Being safe on her mother’s lap. She couldn’t remember the last time she felt anything similar.  

Jealousy filled her chest. The human had to be a great cat owner. How come no one was doing that for her? She turned her head to see the woman, watched her remove the catnip from her hair and while confusing, the message was understood. “Oooh” Nicole would’ve been embarrassed by what she was doing. So embarrassed that she would’ve considered moving out of town. But when the scent of catnip was impregnated in every corner of the elevator, shame was hard to register. A clumsy hand reached out to help, patting her head with no delicacy and tousling her hair in the process. Her human brain still pushed to communicate, thank the woman for bringing such a nice gift to her. Making her feel safe. But words kept failing. Instead, she settled by her side, gently pressing her forehead against the woman’s shoulder. Her breath slowing down.

The cat lady, who was a different kind of cat lady than Nadia’s type of cat lady, was well and truly high on catnip. Of all the things that she expected to happen when she came to the store, this just wasn’t it. Maybe, like, getting attacked by one of those fucking mime creatures. She could have seen that happening. Or maybe the sky raining fish. She’d been there, done that, even if she didn’t get the t-shirt. But this was… a little weird. Not the worst thing in the world, but a little weird. It was hard to be too mad, though, when the woman was smiling and felt genuinely content. It was weird as hell, but she wasn’t, like, malevolent. Nadia had been in worse situations.

“Shit, fuck, ow, yes, thank you, thank you, that’s very nice,” Nadia said as the woman swattered at her head. It was just like dealing with Rhiannon. If Rhiannon was a grown ass woman that was swatting at Nadia’s head. Really, it was practically the same thing. She reached up to fix her hair before giving up and resigning herself to it. Then, the woman leaned against her, calm and relaxed and, yeah, okay, maybe Nadia relaxed a little bit, too. Despite being locked in a fucking elevator, this really, really wasn’t the worst. “Maybe don’t, like, fall asleep. Just in case someone comes to get us out of here, soon.” But she was also a little tired. Just a bit. Not much. But Nadia was always tired. Always. But this was kind of relaxing.

Nicole could hardly remember what her life was before she was on the elevator floor cuddling with a stranger. Nothing extraordinary, surely. But she couldn’t care less. The back of her head was tingling pleasantly and that was all that mattered. She had a moment of utter relaxation and she was going to make the best of it. The human beside her wasn’t too bad either. She made a decent cushion compared to other human cushions, and some of the catnip scent had impregnated on her clothes, making her perfectly comfortable. She barely registered what the woman said, because it was time for a nap. And what was more important than that? So she hummed, letting silence fall on them as she enjoyed the best moment in her miserable 27 years of life. Nothing was going to ruin it.

The floor underneath them shook abruptly. The metallic sounds so jarring to her sensitive ears that her body jumped, suddenly on high alert. Nicole was on her feet faster than it was humanly possible, taking her surroundings in. Her brain was foggy, and though it felt like she should’ve been worried about the source of the sound, all she felt was confused. Not yet conscious, but the sensations gradually subsiding. She narrowed her eyes, staring at the woman on the floor with a puzzled expression. “Wha—?” she let out a big laugh, trying to understand why a woman would be lying on the elevator floor in a mess of bags and herbs.

Nadia was resigned to this. This was her life. She lived in this elevator now. She’d never get home. Her only hope was that Ms. Carmody would see about Rhiannon when it appeared that Nadia wasn’t going to go home. She’d never leave this elevator, and she’d die being essentially cuddled by a stranger that was high on catnip. Her saving grace was the second-hand relaxation that poured off the woman in waves, making Nadia not totally perturbed by her situation. Really, it could be worse. There were more tragic ways to go out. More terrifying ways. More nightmare inducing, memory tugging ways that she thought about all the time. This? This was fucking peaceful. Nadia could allow this, even if she’d miss her friends, her people. She was relaxed. She was chill. She was--

She was jolted away when the elevator started moving again, as well as when the woman moved. Nadia sat up, brushing the catnip out of her hair for real this time as she looked around them. The elevator door opened up, and she stood, grabbing her things. There was a guy that opened the door.

“You ladies alright?” he asked.

“Fine, totally, appreciate it,” Nadia said. She looked at the other woman who was still dazed. “We, uh, we should get off.” Nadia couldn’t tell what happened, but she’d gone from high to coming down relatively quickly, and that seemed to have left a lot of confusion in its wake. She didn’t even mind being laughed at. “Unless you wanna stick around the elevator, that is.”

The rumbling continued, and the elevator began to descend. Nicole felt as if she was being pulled in two drastically different directions. On one side, she tried to navigate the thick fog in her brain, recall important information, like who the fuck was the woman with her and why was she suddenly fond of her. On the other, she gripped the sidebar, her stomach filling with the primal urge to hunt down whatever monster was causing those awful sounds. It didn’t make any fucking sense. She gritted her teeth, but it wasn’t enough to contain the hiss she directed at the emergency lights. Her cheeks flushed, embarrassed. Great. Her awareness grew, but somehow so did the grogginess. Part of her was falling asleep while the other was waking up. And no one seemed to agree on who was going to take control yet.

When she looked down again ,her companion was sitting, brushing off whatever it was she had on her. Cat...nip, she read on the bags. Catnip. The wheels began turning faster. She breathed out, relieved to be able to read. The scent was still floating in the elevator, but it had no effect on her anymore.

The smile still playing on Nicole’s lips faltered, and as the door opened, everything clicked. Well, fuck. The woman’s voice came, and she saw part of her confusion reflected on her face. Nothing but babbling sounds came out as she tried to speak. God dammit, what did she do? And why did she still want to laugh? She nodded curtly at the suggestion, picking up her bags and following the woman. She clenched her jaw, wondering if she could spontaneously combust due to the humiliation. The doors closed behind them and there was silence. “Yeah, uh— sorry about...” she shook her head, pointing in the direction she was about to go. Making a mental note to never leave her house again. “Know what? we...we don’t have to,” they didn’t need to talk. Ever. Why bother? “We’re just not gonna...never” she continued to nod, gripping her bag with sweaty palms. Yeah, that was perfect. She turned around, too scared to wait for the woman to add anything. Eyes fixed on the ground, she bolted towards the nearest exit.

[cadykeus-clay]

Would you mind sharing your thoughts about vex and Beau being cross campaign foils?

so!!!! first things first: apologies for taking weeks to answer this, finals + having adhd sometimes makes my brain turn to mush and forget every ask ive ever recieved. second of all, i’m assuming you sent me this bc of what i said in my vm vs. m9 how they view the world meta. and i’ll be real with you. i have exactly 0 memory of what was going through my head when i wrote that line, so i am simply going to type out a bunch of thoughts that i have on the similarities and differences between beau and vex and i hope that lives up to what you were expecting jsdflksjdksld

I'll detail some specifics in a moment, but overall, I think beau and vex share a very similar kind of trauma of exclusion in their formative years, that's caused them to have a lot of similar traits that manifest in different ways - for vex, she maintains control through her material posessions and beau finds an emotional control in her asshole-ness. I've broken this down into 5 points on which I think comparing the two really emphasizes that claim:

1. daddy issues: both beau and vex have awful no good terrible very bad dads. both syldor and thoreau can suck my ass. they both raised their kids with little love and impossible-to-meet expectations, alientating them and leaving them with lifelong feelings of inferiority and unbelonging. If beau and vex were to meet, i think they would have a very friendly toast to shitty dads, and then have a good drunk vent about it an hour later.

but, at the same time, the actual minutae of their trauma and the ways it manifests are nearly polar opposites. syldor wanted nothing to do with vex, or else wanted her to somehow become a full elf. her issue was that she would never be able to belong, despite her desire to, and as she grew up it lead to her being overly protective and even possessive of the people she found who DID accept her as she was. 

With beau, rather than exclusion, her father created an environment of toxic inclusion. He created a role for beau to belong in, disregarding her distate for actually fulfilling it. And, as such, she ended up making herself into someone who could have no expectations and pushed away anyone who tried to set them up for her. In the end, they both came to love themselves by abandoning the woman their father wanted them to be but for vex it was the laying down of an impossible dream and for beau it was the picking up of a mantle she had feared to wear.

2. brothers: now, on the topic of family, I also think its really interesting how their interactions with their brothers play out. We've got vex and vax, tied at the hip til the very end and then some; and then we've got beau and TJ - decades apart and with beau barely acknolwedging TJ's existence. But, even that distance between beau and TJ didn't stop her caring for him when they actually met. She gave him lucky Jade, and she entertained the idea of kidnapping him to get him away from her stinko dad. 

And I'd espeically like to talk about what she said outside the hag's hut - "I think Luc and TJ could be best friends", in comparison to the way Vex reacted when Vax told her was going to Zephrah with Keyleth for the year break. There's an aspect to the way they interact with their brothers that lets them slip back into those bad habits they formed growing up (NOT that i'm claiming vex and vax were like toxic for each other. but even good relationships can have unhealthy moments). 

With Beau, when she offers to give her happiness so TJ can grow up safe, she's trying to take on the role she's ""supposed"" to fill - the big sister, the protector - because she failed to fill the one her father set out. And with Vex, when she grows jealous of Vax, it's because she's afraid that his leaving with keyleth is a sign that she no longer belongs in his inner circle, and she falls back on that childish, desperate desire to do anything to be accepted unconditionally. 

3. romance: spoilers for 5 or so most recent m9 eps (115-120)  if you haven't watched them ahead!!!! at this point, both vex and beau have an endgame romance - percy and yasha respectively. Obviously as the m9's campaign is still playing out, that could change, but like. yasha wrote her a love letter and they're officially going on a date so i'm counting that as at least endgame-track rather than just random flirting. What's interesting to me is that they both seem to flip between the SAME roles between their (in-game) general perception and their actual pursual of romance. 

Vex gets characterized as a pretty big flirt, right? She's got the winks, the casual "darling". She's flashed grog her boobs on multiple instances with little prompting. Beau, similarly, has easily the most game out of anyone in the m9. She's slept with two guest characters and at least one more npc in the events of the game. Caleb made her a fuck mirror in her room in the mansion. And yet, in both of their actual romantic endeavors, they became the shy, uncertain type. 

Vex only confessed her feelings when Percy was laying dead before her, and not an hour of game play before percy kissed her in the woods, she had a talk with vax about how she was pretty sure he didn't like her that way and she didn't want to pursue it. Beau, similarly, spent a very long time convinced that yasha wasn't looking for love after zuala, especially not in anyone like her, asked everyone in the party if they thought yasha ACTUALLY liked her, just to be safe, and then still terrified to ask her out after recieving a literal love letter. I'd argue this shift comes from that same sense of unbelonging - they're very good at pretending they fit a role but doubt their actual right to take it when the opportunity is presented. This time, the role is the lover rather than the daughter.

4. authority: Both vex and beau grew up shunned by the upper crust of society, and grew to mistrust those kinds of people. And yet, both of their arcs result in them assuming such a position. Vex, thrown out of high society gets her place as a baronness, and Beau, running from leadership of her father's business ends up a top member of the Cobalt Soul. There's not a lot here, but I find it interesting how both of their stories involve them shedding their baggage regarding authority and power and assuming it in a way that they feel comfortable in - invitation by someone she trusts for vex, and a promise of freedom of will and control for beau.

5. their deadliest sins: this is the point at which their similarities culminate and transform to a fundamental difference. despite everything they share - shitty childhoods, the small piece of family that's still good, flirtiness masking shy love, and a mistrust of those in power - vex and beau are such different characters because of their biggest vices. Vex, both in game and out, is "the greedy one". She's stingy with money, she haggles for everything, she mourns the loss of physical objects. Beau is "the mean one". She cares little for people's feelings if they're not in her immediate circle, she focuses on her tough guy image, she laughs at things she knows she shouldn't. 

And, over the course of the campaign, as they find unconditional acceptance, they grow away from these traits (I won't say they grow out of them) because they heal from the things causing these vices to begin with. I've always been vocal about vex's greed being a manifestation of her class insecurity, and beau's asshole-ness stemming from her fear of being forced back into another position of complacency. And I stand by that now - all the similarities in their backstories are what tally up to these different women.

Despite her careful tally of party funds and her reflexive bargaining, vex is not cruel. she is not angry on her own behalf. She saves two boys from the market in the city of brass at great personal cost, she relinquishes an entire dragon's hoard to the devastated city of Westruun, she took the time to save a baby bear from a cage when she could have just cut and run after escaping her own. She's the first one most people go to when they need a shoulder to cry on, and she's devastated when they don't (thinkin about when Scanlan left). She carved "forgiveness" into the bow she stole from a man after killing him by proclaiming how much she loved someone, because she knew anger had no place in her heart.

And Beau, Beau is a bitch and she's harsh, but she doesn't hoard or protect like vex did. she spends her money without much of a second thought. She pitches in to help her friends buy a ton of glowsticks, and she loves to indulge in material desires like drink and good food and the nicer inn room. She's a member of an organization that's about making knowledge public rather than guarding it. And, though this may be controversial, I think her position with bowlgate of "its not our problem what cali wants to do with it", her long-standing mistrust of their alliance with the bright queen and  and more recently with the tomb takers of "i want to go in and talk, rather than assuming they're antagonistic, even if it puts us at a disadvantage" are both examples of this non-possessiveness too - she has no need or desire to get involved in controlling what other people are doing.

so, i guess the general conclusion here is: vex struggles to let go of things, of money, of people. beau struggles to let herself be known in case she gets wrongly interpreted again. they both fight feelings of inadequacy, they both fight the feelings of not belonging, of 'doing it wrong', they fight the perception of them as shitty people because of the shells they hide in despite their absolute hearts of gold.  but at the end of the day, vex's story is one of having to lay down what could never be hers so she can carry what is, and beau's story is one of allowing herself to be known so a place can be made for her.

[vfdbaudelairefile13]

  Chapter Forty-Two:

The One Where the Baudelaires are Put to Work

 

That day, Violet Snicket was relieved that her father had finally arrived home, although, she didn’t say much to him. She was afraid if she started a conversation with him she would start asking about VFD and his involvement. She would ask him a million questions and expect answers to each one. But she couldn’t, not yet at least, she needed to compile every scrap of evidence she could before she questioned him. Why? Because she feared that after she interrogates him, he will make learning VFD information a lot harder than it already is. She wasn’t going to let that happen.

Violet sat across from her father as they both silently ate. You could cut the tension between the two of them with a knife. 

“You okay, sweetie?” Lemony asked after a while of the awkward tension. 

“Hmm mmm,” Violet said not really saying anything to her father.

“Are you sure?” 

“Yeah. Just glad you’re home.” Violet muttered rolling her eyes. “Finally,”

“Honey…” Lemony began.

“I know, you’re just doing your job. Putting food on the table.” 

Lemony frowned. He didn’t know what was wrong with his daughter and why she was so moody. Violet didn’t look up at him, afraid that she’d crack under pressure. Neither of them said anything for another couple moments of pure tense silence.

“So have you found her?” Violet asked.

“Huh?”

“My mother? Have you found her yet? Are you even close? Have you even bothered since the last time I asked?” She asked impatiently.

Lemony was taken aback by his daughter’s tone, he sighed and nodded his head in response.

“Really?” She asked not believing a word he was saying. “Can you explain what you’ve learned?”

“Violet…”

“Well…?”

He sighed again. “I rather not get your hopes up,”

“Of course not. Makes sense,” Violet replied in the same impatient tone as before. She absolutely hated how he had a lie ready at his disposal. 

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yep. Definitely.” 

He frowned. He knew this was a lie. He knew his daughter more than she would like to admit. That’s what happens when you’ve lived with just one other person for their entire life. He didn’t understand why she was in a mood though. Was it because she desperately wanted to learn about her birth mother or was it because he was absent more often these days. His stay at Lake Lachrymose had gone on longer than he had anticipated at first. But what could he have done? He had to help the Baudelaires. Maybe he should’ve called her and allowed her to know that he was fine. 

He opened his mouth to say something but as he did, the phone rang. Both Snickets looked at the phone. Lemony stood up before Violet had a chance to. “I got it,” he said as she rolled her eyes. He took the phone and went into the other room.

“Yes, Jacquelyn.” He answered knowing damn well who was on the other end of the phone call.

“Now, how’d you know it was me?” 

“You’re the only person who calls,” 

“Damn. That’s truly sad, Snicket. You should get out more.”

“Ha. Funny,” Lemony replied in a sarcastic tone as he rolled his eyes. “So...let me guess Olaf is after the kids again.”

“When isn’t he?” 

“Good point,” Lemony muttered. “What do we know about his plan this time?”

“Nothing. We just know he has found them,” 

“How the fuck is he getting this information before me?”

“Honestly, that’s something I’d like to know,” Jacquelyn replied annoyed. “I mean I work for the man who takes them to their guardians and he somehow knows before me…”

“You don’t think Poe works for him, do you?”

“No...no...the man is incompetent but definitely not evil.”

“Now are you sure?” Lemony asked.

“Yes. It would take a functioning brain to pull that off,” Jacquelyn pointed out laughing.

“Okay. Good point.” Lemony said convinced. “So where are they now?”

“Paltryville,”

“Of course…” 

“Why do you say it like that?” Jacquelyn asked concerned.

“...I’m not welcomed in Paltryville...for several reasons. One is that they think I helped start a certain fire,” 

“Ah. Should I send myself or Larry.” 

“No!” Lemony cried panicked. “No offense, but the last time that I allowed you to send yourself to the Baudelaires’ location, Dr. Montgomery died. And the last time Larry beat me to their location, he was kidnapped by Olaf and he could’ve been killed.”

“Are you going to keep using Dr. Montgomery’s death against me?” 

“Yes. Until you can explain to me why disguising yourself as a fucking statue was a good idea I am going to use that against you.”

“Suit yourself, Snicket,” Jacquelyn said. “You’ll need to get on the next train to Paltryville.”

Lemony looked to Violet who wasn’t paying attention. “Ummm…” he said. “I’m gonna need a day or two,” 

“What?” 

“I have an a...prior commitment. I have to...ummmm...research something. Shouldn’t take me long,”

“But the Baudelaires…”

“They’re resourceful kids,” Lemony said immediately. “They can survive a day or two without me.”

“If you’re sure, Snicket,” Jacquelyn said after sighing. “Just let me know if you want me to go for you...cause I can.”

“Again...no. Stop suggesting that,” Lemony said chuckling a bit. “Just keep me updated if you can. Surely there’s a VFD agent in Paltryville that can give us information.”

“Doubtful,” 

“Just give me a day or so,” Lemony said as Jacquelyn bid him goodbye.

Lemony walked back over to Violet. “You know what, I’m sorry. You’re right,” 

“What?” she asked confused.

“I haven’t made looking for your mother a priority in the last couple of weeks. That’s going to change.” He said as he watched her eyes light up. “I am going to find her, Violet. I promise.” He said.

As he watched a smile appear upon his daughter’s face, he could feel a ping of guilt in his heart. He knew that eventually, he would have to explain to Violet what had happened to her mother. When he told her that he was going to find her, what he meant was that he was going to figure out who stole Beatrice from Violet forever. He didn’t want to drop this piece of information on his daughter without closure. He didn’t want her to wonder who would kill her mother. He wanted to be able to have all the answers to every question she would have about her mother’s death. So he had decided to take the next day to focus on figuring out the exact cause of the Baudelaire fire. 

_____________________________________________________________________

Morning is an important time of day because how you begin your morning can often tell you what kind of day you’re going to have. If you wake up to a breakfast made by your father, your day will probably be decent. If you wake up in a mansion to a butler serving you blueberry pancakes and freshly squeezed orange juice, your day will probably be wonderful. Now if you wake up in a lumber mill to the sound of metal pots banging together, you know your day will be horrid.

You and I, of course, cannot be too surprised that the Baudelaire orphans’ first day at the Lucky Smells Lumbermill was a horrid one. The Baudelaire orphans did not expect a nice, hot breakfast or a butler, especially after their dismaying arrival. But never in their most uneasy dreams did they expect the cacophony that awoke them.

“Get up, lumber workers! This is your new foreman, and you’ve got a new shipment of logs to turn into flat wooden boards!” A rough voice yelled over the loudspeakers. 

“What’s that horrible noise?’ Klaus asked groggily. 

“Tympana,” Sunny muttered, which meant, “It sounds like someone banging metal pots together…” 

“Get up, you lazy, smell things!” the foreman’s voice yelled. “Time for work, everybody!”

The children sat up and rubbed their eyes. All around them, the employees of the Lucky Smells Lumbermill were stretching and covering their ears at the sound of the pots. Phil, who was already up and making his bunk neatly, gave the Baudelaires a tired smile. 

“I believe everyone has a good side. But I have to admit, our last foreman was a lot nicer,” Phil commented to the children.

“What happened to your last foreman?” Klaus asked wearily. 

“Must’ve quit in the middle of the night,” Phil said cheerfully. “It happens a lot around here,” 

Klaus and Sunny looked at one another uneasily. 

“Hurry up! It’s log day!” the foreman’s voice yelled.

“I hate log days,” a mill worker muttered.

As the children followed Phil and the other workers across the dirt-floored courtyard to the lumber mill, which was a dull gray building with many smokestacks sticking out of the top. The two children looked at one another nervously. Except for one summer day, back when their parents were alive, when the Baudelaire siblings had opened a small lemonade stand in front of their house, the orphans had never had jobs, and they were quite nervous. 

The Baudelaires walked closely next to Phil into the lumbermill and saw that it was all one huge room, filled with enormous machines. Klaus looked at a shiny steel machine with a pair of steel pinchers like the arms of a crab and hoped that he wouldn’t be asked to handle it. Sunny examined a machine that looked like a big cage, with an enormous ball of string trapped inside, and tried to think of what a machine like that could be used for. Both children stared a  rusty, creaky-looking machine that had a circular saw-blade that looked quite jagged and fearsome. Sunny wondered if the saw was sharper than her teeth, while Klaus anxiously tried to remember anything and everything he had read about lumber mills. 

All the while, the noise from all of the machines were starting to disturb Klaus. Klaus began to whimper a little as he put his hands over his ears and winced in pain. “It’s too loud in here,” he said to Sunny as Sunny nodded her head at her brother. 

“Now grab a debarker and start debarking!” the foreman yelled from his booth. The foreman wore a gas mask that completely covered his face, which seemed odd to the children. He also wore a stained uniform that completely covered his arms and legs, Klaus suspected it was to cover up a certain tattoo. Sunny noticed that his shoes had been taped shut instead of being tied, which seemed rather unusual for anyone to do. The foreman turned his head towards the children. “You too, lumber midgets!” 

“We’re not midgets...we’re children,” Klaus replied as he stood in line with Sunny to get a debarker.

“Children, midgets, do I care?” The foreman said in a muffled voice. 

“Oh, I love log days!” Phil exclaimed.

Klaus took a debarker from the dispenser and looked down at it. “I don’t think this is safe for even me to be handling,” he said cautiously to Sunny.

“Bite!” she exclaimed, which probably meant, “That’s okay. I don’t need one. I’ll just bite the logs.” 

As the children followed the other workers around one of the trees, Phil showed Klaus how to use his debarker. He began scraping it against the tree, filing the bark off like you would file your nail. Klaus nodded and tried to imitate Phil’s actions. 

Even though Phil had described the rigors of working at the mill, it had certainly sounded difficult. But seeing that he was an optimist, he still sugar-coated just how difficult the job would be, so the actual work turned out to be much, much worse. For one thing, the debarkers were adult-sized and it was difficult for Klaus to use it. He could scarcely lift it and even when he could lift up to the tree, he had to push with all his might to get it to file the bark from the log and even then only tiny pieces of bark would fall from the tree. He was in a mixture of jealousy and amazement as Sunny climbed atop the log and began to saw away at the bark with her teeth. She made it look so easy.  

To the Baudelaires’ misfortune, once a tree was finally cleared of bark, there would be another tree waiting for them. Which meant they would have to start this process over and over again. But if you asked the Baudelaires what was the worst thing about working at the lumber mill would be the deafening noise. Since Klaus had to use two hands to move his debarker against the wood, he had absolutely no way of blocking all the terrible noises from his eardrums. So the entire time he felt overstimulated and he continued to wince in discomfort. He longed for a break so he can go outside and maybe get a few minutes of peace and quiet. Finally, as the children finished their third log (noticing that all the other groups of workers were at least on their fourteenth log), the foreman began shouting over the loudspeaker. “Lunch break! Lumber slowpokes!” 

Klaus grabbed his baby sister and sat down where the rest of the workers were sitting. He started picking pieces of wood out of his sister’s hair noticing that she was completely covered in sawdust. He could only imagine how terrible he looked as he began to ruffle his hair in hope of getting all the sawdust out.“I hate log days,” Klaus muttered to Sunny as one of the mill workers replied, “Told ya!” 

“Otii!” Sunny replied, which meant, “We finally get a break.”

“Lunch break! Five minutes!” the foreman yelled as he threw two pink squares at the children. Klaus somehow caught it and looked down at the small pink square that was in his hands.

“It’s gum...this is gum!” he shouted not believing his eyes. “Gum isn’t lunch! Gum isn’t even a snack!” 

“Tanco!” Sunny yelled in agreement, which meant, “And babies shouldn’t even have gum, because they could choke on it!” Klaus was quick to translate.

“You’d better eat your gum,” Phil said, moving over to sit next to the two children. “It’s not very filling, but it’s the only thing they’ll let you eat until dinnertime.” 

“Can’t we use our wages to buy some sandwiches?” Klaus asked still staring at the two pink squares in his hands.

Phil began to chuckle a bit. “Kiddo, we’re not paid in wages. We’re paid in coupons.”

“I got one for 20% off a shampoo at Ed’s Haircut Palace,” one mill worker replied.

“I got a free refill of iced tea,” another replied.

“I got ‘Buy two banjos, get one free’. Of course, I can’t buy any banjos ‘cause I don’t have any money. Just coupons.” a third mentioned.

“That...that can’t be legal,” Klaus replied in utter disbelief.

“It’s not like we have a constitution,” Phil replied.

“If this place is so miserable, why don’t you leave?” Klaus asks. 

All at once, like zombies or brainwashed members of a cult, the mill workers stood up and in a monotone chant, they replied, “Lucky Smells is our life. Lucky Smells is our home.” They sat back down as if nothing they had just done was out of the ordinary. Klaus looked down at Sunny with a worried face. 

“We need to find those answers and run away,” he said as Sunny nodded.

“Book!” she replied, which probably meant, “Didn’t the mill have a library?”

Klaus nodded his head as he picked Sunny up and walked out of the noisy mill into the peacefully quiet courtyard. During the walk to the mill's library, he couldn’t help but ponder just how terrible Sir was. What kind of man forces two small children to work in a lumber mill? What sort of man would hire a dickhead like the foreman? What sort of man would pay his employees in coupons or feed them only gum? But his biggest question was the same as the one he had asked Mr. Poe before they were even dropped off here which was how is a lumber mill a suitable home for two children? With each step, the children raised small clouds of dirt that matched the clouds of dread that continued to hang over them ever since their parents had died. Their bodies ached from the morning’s work and they had an uneasy feeling in their empty stomachs. As they guessed from the way their day began, the two children were having a bad day and I hate to inform you that although the Baudelaires believed it couldn’t get any worse. They were entirely wrong. Because it can get so much worse...and it did.

Finally, the two children reached the building that contained Sir’s office and Charles’ library. Klaus noticed a mirror hanging on the wall and peered in it frowning. Both children looked tired and hungry. Both children’s hair and uniforms were covered in small pieces of bark and sawdust. Klaus’ glasses were hanging askew from leaning over logs all morning and Sunny had pieces of wood stuck in her four teeth. Both children frowned and noticed a painting of a seashore that hung behind them, which made them feel about ten thousand times worse because the seashore will always remind them of that terrible, terrible day when the two siblings went to the beach and soon received the news from Mr. Poe that their parents had died and they were all alone in this world. The children stared at their own reflections and the depressing painting behind them, and it was almost unbearable for either of them to think about everything that had happened to them since that day. 

“You know, if someone had told me,” Klaus cried, “ that day at the beach, that before long I’d find myself pursued by a greedy, evil man named Count Olaf, I would have said they were insane.”

“Wora,” Sunny replied softly, which meant, “If someone had told me, that day at the beach, that before long I’d find myself using my four teeth to scrape the bark off trees because I was now working in a lumbermill, I would have said they were psychoneurotically disturbed.”

The dismayed orphans looked at their reflections and for several moments, the Baudelaires stood and pondered the mysterious way their lives were going. It wasn’t until Sunny pointed to a pair of closed doors muttering the word, “book,” that snapped Klaus back into reality. 

“You’re right, Sunny. According to the map, the mill library should be just behind...behind this door,” Klaus whispered as he touched the doors to open up. Just when he had placed a hand on the library door, a door behind the two children swung open.

“Trying to get out of log day, are you?” Sir’s booming voice asked. Klaus jumped in surprise and turned to see his guardians, one whose face was still entirely covered by a cloud of smoke and the other who was wearing an apron. 

“We wanted to visit the library on our lunch break, Sir.” 

“Oh! What a lovely idea!” Charles said smiling at the children, turning to Sir. “I told you a library would be good for morale,”

“Nonsense!” Sir yelled which cause both Klaus and Charles to flinch. “Lunch breaks are for chewing gum, not sneaking off to libraries! That’s why they only need five fucking minutes!”

“But, Sir…” Charles began.

“You’re not going to cause trouble for my mill, are you?”

“Trouble? I’m your partner.” Charles said in a saddened tone.

Sir turned to Charles. “I was speaking to the Baudelaires!” he said in a loud and annoyed tone.

“Right,” Charles muttered.

“Look here, boy, I took a chance treating you like grown-ups. Don’t make me regret it!” Sir yelled. 

“Puer!” Sunny yelled, which meant, “We never asked to be treated like grown-ups. If I recall correctly, we explained to you that we were children! ” Klaus was quick to translate for his sister.

Sir growled under his breath. “ Get back to work!” 

With that Sir turned and walked back into his office as Klaus and Sunny looked at Charles with desperate, pleading eyes. Charles gave the children a small frown as he slowly began to back up into the office. 

“You’ll have to excuse Sir. He recently cut down on his smoking,” Charles explained, even though, he knew deep down that was not a good enough excuse for why Sir was treating the Baudelaires so terribly.

“Do you know he feeds the workers gum and pays them in coupons!?” Klaus asks angrily. 

“Yes...well, I’ve tried to discuss that. ” 

“Par!” Sunny yelled, which meant, “If you guys are partners , you should be able to stand up to him!” Klaus translated for his sister.

“It’s complicated. I know Sir can be...prickly, but you have to understand, he had a very terrible childhood.” Charles explained as he grabbed ahold of the office doors and began to slowly close them.

Klaus glared at Charles and took a step closer to him as he thought about that horrible day at the beach again. “I understand,” Klaus said through gritted teeth. “ I’m having a very terrible childhood right now, ” he said his voice breaking.

Charles continued closing the office doors as he whispered, “okay.” Klaus just gave a look of utter disbelief at Charles’ lack of caring for the children.

Klaus and Sunny just stood there for a few moments before shaking their heads and walking back to the lumbermill. In the hours that followed as the two children worked and worked. Klaus had a pit in his stomach as he thought once again about the eye-shaped building. He was certain that Count Olaf was lurking nearby, like some predator waiting to pounce on the children while they weren’t looking. He tried his best to get a good look at every mill worker. It would have been simple for Olaf to get himself hired as an employee, and snatch the children away when Foreman Flacutono wasn’t looking. But although all the workers looked tired, sad, and hungry, none of them looked evil and greedy. As the orphans performed backbreaking labor, Klaus wondered if Count Olaf would use one of these scary-looking machines to somehow get his dirty hands on their parents’ money. He then thought of Foreman Flacutono and thought about just how odd his uniform was. No one else here was wearing a gas mask and although the mills’ green uniforms covered every inch of the workers’ arms and legs, they still weren’t as long and awkward as the foreman’s uniform. Klaus then remembered how a nice man, Kronk, had claimed to be from the Herpetological Society back when the children had lived with their Uncle Monty. Even though the man had been nice and helpful to the children, Klaus had always found it odd that he wore a beekeeper’s hat to conceal his face. He pondered whether or not Count Olaf could be doing that now but with a gas mask. 

“Penny?” Sunny asked as she sat up on the log staring at her brother, this meant, “Penny for your thoughts?”

“Huh?” Klaus asked confused.

“Cogitare,” Sunny replied, which meant, “You’re thinking something.” 

Klaus sighed and put down his debarker. “It’s the new foreman. Phil said he just showed up last night. What if he’s Count Olaf and being a foreman’s his new disguise?”

“Pessima,” Sunny replied annoyed, which meant, “He is cruel like Count Olaf, but Olaf runs a horrible theater troupe, not a lumbermill.”

“But isn’t it suspicious how we never see his face?” 

“Sir,” Sunny remarked.

“I already thought of that, Sir’s way too short to be Olaf in disguise.”

Sunny rolled her eyes at her brother unimpressed.

“...and we only hear his voice over the loudspeaker,” Klaus reasoned.

“Impellit,” Sunny remarked, which meant, “Probably because the mill is too noisy. It’s probably the only way anyone could ever hear him.”

“But…” Klaus cried.

“ Ludum! ” Sunny yelled impatiently, which meant, “ I know what you’re trying to do!” 

“Keep us safe!” Klaus cried.

“Nos!” Sunny yelled impatiently rolling her eyes, which meant, “Find a reason to leave. And we can just as soon as we clear our parents’ names.”

“I don’t care about that! I have to keep you safe!” Klaus argued.

“Curam me!” she replied harshly, which meant, “Goddammit, Klaus! I don’t need you to keep me safe! I can handle my own pretty sure I’ve done enough to prove that! Worry about yourself!”

Klaus frowned and looked to the ground. “I...I...I need a new debarker,” he said sadly as he tossed his to the ground. Sunny shrugged her shoulders and went back to work. Klaus walked slowly away from his baby sister, wiping the tears from his eyes. Klaus turned back to make sure Sunny was okay, she seemed annoyed but content as she went back to biting the bark off the logs. Klaus walked towards the debarker machine but noticed that Foreman Flacutono was asleep in his booth with his left leg hanging out. Klaus took this opportunity and quickly walked up near the booth, slowly kneeling down to the ground. 

Ever so cautiously, Klaus gently grabbed the man’s pant leg and began to slowly pull it up. Praying that he didn’t wake the foreman. He just needed to see the man’s ankle. As Klaus pulled the pant leg up, the foreman began to move slightly in his sleep. Klaus held his breath, trying his best to not wake the man up. Before he could see the man’s left ankle, the foreman jerked awake as Klaus jumped up not making eye contact with him. 

“What are you doing, midget?” the foreman asked him angrily.

“I...I...I need a new debarker,” Klaus said in a low voice, nervously. still not making eye contact with the man, in fear that it was actual Olaf in disguise.

“Spoiled brat wants a new debarker? Old rust one isn’t good enough for him, eh?” The foreman asked in a patronizing tone. “They’re over there, rich boy.” as he moved his arm to gesture at where they were located. That was what caught Klaus’ attention, the foreman didn’t point with his finger, he used his arm to more or less point. Klaus watched confused as the foreman lowered his oddly stiff arm. 

“Wait…” Klaus said under his breath trying to figure out where he had seen this type of stiff arm before.

Before he could figure it out. He felt the foreman’s left foot give him a harsh, painful kick in the ass as he fell to the ground. His glasses slid off his face a few inches in front of him. He winced in pain as his mind scrambled to figure out what had happened.

The foreman walked in front of him and purposefully stepped on his glasses. “Whoopsie!” the foreman said in a mocking tone as he made his way back to the booth.

“Klaus!” Sunny yelled realizing her brother was on the floor. Phil looked up and noticed that Klaus was lying on the floor as well. He quickly grabbed Sunny and walked towards the boy. By the time Phil and Sunny reached him a small crowd of workers circled Klaus. This reminded him of when Olaf had both slapped him in the face and when Olaf had tortured him and his troupe just sat around and watched the show before them. He wiped a tear from his eyes as he looked up and saw a blurry blob that was small enough to be his sister. 

“Specks!” Sunny yelled as she reached her brother, picking up his glasses for him, which meant, “Your glasses...they’re…”

“Twisted,” 

“Cracked,” 

“Hopelessly broken,” 

“They look A-okay to me,” Phil commented giving Klaus two thumbs up.

Klaus put his broken glasses on his face and saw that his coworkers were correct. His glasses resembled a piece of modern sculpture that a friend of mine made a long time ago called Twisted, Cracked, and Hopelessly Broken.

“The foreman kicked me!” Klaus yelled angrily. “And then he stepped on my glasses!” 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about! How could I kick him when I’m up in this booth?” Foreman Flacutono replied. “It was probably karma,”

“See?” Sunny asked desperately.

“A little,” Klaus replied.

“He’ll live,” Foreman Flacutono replied.

“Fucker!” Sunny yelled at the foreman as Phil helped Klaus up. 

“Get back to work, midget,” 

“He can’t work if he can’t see!” Phil explained.

“Too bad for him,” 

“Oh, don’t be ridiculous,” Phil said calmly, “He needs an optometrist. A child could see that,”

“Not me,” Klaus said, “I can scarcely see anything.”

“Lucky for you, we’ve got a great optometrist right here in what’s left of our town,” 

The Baudelaires’ eyes got wide with panic. “You mean the eye-shaped building?” Klaus asked nervously.

“Oh yeah! Dr. Orwell treats all the workers. You probably saw the coupon in your welcome packet. I better get you there.” Phil said 

“No!” Sunny protested. “No take!” 

But Foreman Flacutono began banging his pots together as the other mill workers turned on the machines to finish the day’s work.

“That building has the mark of a bad, bad man!” Klaus pleaded as Phil dragged him away from Sunny.

“Yoryar!” Sunny begged crawling as fast as she could to stop Phil from taking her brother away from her, this meant, “Please don’t take him to that building!” But Klaus wasn’t able to translate because neither he or Phil could hear Sunny over the machines. Klaus gave Sunny a hopeful smile. 

“I’ll be fine!” he shouted to her. “Maybe I can find some answers!” 

“Same!” She yelled back.

The Baudelaire sister watched in horror as Phil led Klaus out of the mill. The whirring sounds continued all around Sunny, and Foreman Flacutono was now yelling at her to get back to work as he smacked his pots together. But that wasn’t the loudest sound that the younger Baudelaire orphan hared. Louder than the machine, louder than the pots, louder than the foreman’s yelling, was the sound of her own furiously beating heart as Phil took her big brother away.

[thebestdressedrebelinhistory]

Zarlie 2

zarlie 2: things you said through your teeth

“Would you just pull the bloody stick out of your arse for two seconds and listen to me? I’m trying to tell you something important.”

Charlie’s jaw is clenched, her arms crossed defensively over her chest. She is looking increasingly frantic, increasingly like a caged animal. Something about the expression on her face makes Zari’s insides twist. It’s the same look Charlie gave her when she was actually trapped. When she had accused Zari of keeping people in cages. Of doing to her, what Argus had done to Zari. To her family. To everyone else like her.

It made her sick then, and it makes her sick now.

And as much as Charlie gets on her very last nerve – as much as Zari desperately wants to say I doubt that, or try being a little nicer about it, or anything else that would be completely deserved but incredibly hypocritical, coming from her – she can’t quite bring herself to respond in kind.

Because it’s not like the has the most stellar track record when it comes to winning people over, either.

Instead, Zari drums her fingers impatiently against her bicep and says, “You haven’t told me anything, yet.”

Charlie is glaring harder than ever, but Zari sees the ripple of insecurity beneath the carefully curated scowl. An unfortunate side-effect of Sara constantly relegating her to the B-team is that she has gotten weirdly good at reading the minutiae of Charlie’s mannerisms.

“Well, it’s a tiny bit personal, and when I asked if I could come into your room so I can say it in private, you just stared at me like I asked you to eat your own foot.”

“To be fair, you’ve been directly complicit in me being turned into a cat – and left that way – not once, but twice. You’re pretty low on my list of trustworthy people.”

Still, Zari steps aside, and motions for Charlie to enter.

Charlie closes the door behind her with a good deal more force than Zari thinks is necessary. When Zari turns around to look at her, Charlie is fidgeting again, tapping the toe of one studded combat boot against the floor and pursing her lips. But she also looks a little like she’s about to throw up.

Zari resists the urge to tell her to please not puke in her room, but just barely.

Kindness never was her strong suit.

“Okay, out with it. You’re being weird and it’s wigging me out.” It’s the wrong thing to say, and Zari knows it, but finding the right thing to say – and then actually saying it – isn’t her strong suit, either.

And suddenly, Charlie looks like the words have been sucked right out of her. Her mouth opens, but all Zari hears is a strangled sort of “Yeah…” as she looks at the floor, the walls, Zari’s bedside table. Anywhere but actually at Zari.

Zari feels a pang of something she’s pretty sure is sympathy, and she tries, for a moment, to think of what the right thing to do in this situation is. Of what a better, nicer person would do.

Of what Amaya would do.

Reaching out slowly, tentatively, Zari places one hand awkwardly on Charlie’s shoulder, watching for any sign that this might be helpful. Or that it might not, which is much more likely. Charlie’s eyes shoot up, meeting hers with an intensity Zari wasn’t expecting. But there’s no hostility there, no anger, no spark. Just surprise and something Zari is pretty sure is vulnerability.

“Or, we can sit down, first?” It’s pretty much the dumbest suggestion Zari can make, since she doesn’t actually have any chairs in her room. But Charlie goes along with it anyway, walking over to Zari’s bed and flopping down on it dramatically.

By the time Zari sits down gingerly beside her, Charlie is back to staring at her intently.

It’s still unnerving, but Zari doesn’t say it this time.

“Okay, seriously. I’m probably not going to bite your head off, so you might as well just say whatever it is that has you so…” Zari pauses, thinks for a moment, then shrugs. “You know.”

Charlie lets out a sharp bark of laughter. “Yeah I do, love. It’s just been a while since a pretty girl got me all tongue tied.”

Oh.

Oh.

Zari’s eyes widen. She can feel the heat rushing entirely too fast to her cheeks, and she kind of wants to bury her face in her sweater, or her pillow, or anything else, to hide it. Or maybe she wants to run away. Not that running away from her own bedroom would do her much good. Instead, she just sits there, stupidly, frozen in place.

Charlie shrugs Zari’s hand away, and her expression becomes unreadable. “Anyway, just thought I’d let you know. In the interest of honesty and all that bullshit. And now that you do, and I’ve made a right idiot of myself, I’m going to go get plastered enough to forget that it happened.”

Charlie is already halfway to the door when Zari finally finds her voice.

“You’re really fucking dramatic, you know that?” She winces as she says it, and lets out an aggravated groan at her own uselessness where feelings are concerned.

But Charlie stops, and turns around, and Zari thinks it’s possible that she sees the hint of a smile on her lips. This, at least, is more familiar territory for them both.

“I might’ve been told that before.” Zari still can’t quite figure out what Charlie is actually thinking, but at least she’s stopped actively moving away for the time being.

Not that she’ll stay that way if Zari fucks it up again.

“You never gave me a chance to actually respond, you know,” Zari says, and it comes out a little more waspish, a little more impatient, than she means for it to. But Charlie just keeps staring at her. “And you also didn’t actually tell me anything,” she says. Because there is some serious clarification needed before she can even begin to figure out where to go from here.

Before she can figure out how she feels.

Charlie frowns, and the mask cracks. “What more do you want to know?”

Zari swallows, and she moves so she is curled up in a ball, her hands pressed between her knees. At least this way, Charlie won’t see her picking at her fingernails. “All you told me was that… was that you think I’m pretty,” she says, at last. “And I think there’s more, maybe, but I’m not a damn mind reader, and I can’t understand emotions for shit, so that’s not much for me to go on.”

“For fuck’s sake, are you seriously asking me to tell you that I have a bloody crush on you?” The outburst explodes into the air between them, and Charlie at least has the good grace to look somewhat abashed afterward. She walks back over to Zari’s bed, standing uncomfortably over her.

“Well, do you?”

Charlie sighs and throws herself dramatically onto the bed. Zari’s legs fly out, unprepared for the sudden percussive force tossing her about.

“Where does it leave us if I say yes?” Charlie asks, as though that doesn’t answer the question.

“I guess it leaves me needing to figure a few things out,” Zari says heavily, and she can actually see Charlie tense.

“What kind of things? Because if I read this totally wrong and–”

Zari cuts her off. “I don’t exactly date much. I spent most of my life running from ARGUS and trying not to be… well, put in a cage. And my options are pretty limited here. At least, they are since I don’t have Sara’s charisma and raw sexual appeal.” Her laugh is a little harsher than she necessarily intends for it to be, a little more bitter, even though she hasn’t actually been interested in anyone, really.

Except, maybe, Charlie.

Which she hadn’t thought about until right now.

But no one ever accused Zari of being self-aware.

Charlie purses her lips. “Well, no pressure. I mean, like, obviously one day I’d like an answer. But if you’re not into it right now, or at all, I can take rejection. I’m a big girl.”

Zari doesn’t roll her eyes, and she’s honestly kind of proud of herself. This is probably the wrong time to be quite as much herself as she would like. But she does frown at Charlie’s theatrics. “Can I just have like, two minutes to think about this?”

“Is that my cue to leave?”

This time, Zari does roll her eyes. “No, it’s your cue to shut up for two minutes so my brain can catch up.”

Charlie nods, and to Zari’s immense relief, she averts her eyes, staring up at the ceiling as she taps one index finger against her thigh impatiently. She’s giving Zari the time she asked for, but not graciously.

And Zari can’t help thinking about the unintentional grace with which Charlie does everything, no matter how obnoxious. About the little twinkle in her eyes when she gives Zari a hard time, that always makes her stomach flop a little unpleasantly. About the fact that she has Amaya’s face and Amaya’s voice, but she never, ever wanted to touch Amaya like this, and…

Oh, fuck.

“Yeah, I suck at this,” Zari says at last, and it’s not her best opening line, but it’s definitely not her worst, either.

Charlie looks back down at her, but doesn’t say anything.

“The whole feelings thing,” Zari clarifies. “Specifically, realizing that… I might have them. For you.”

She thinks this is what teenagers must feel like with their first crush. Except she was never that kind of teenager. So apparently she gets to get it all out of her system in her late twenties, instead, which is really just awesome.

But Charlie lights up immediately. Zari wouldn’t say the look on her face is excited, per se, but it definitely looks like Charlie is trying pretty hard to keep it that way.

“So, is that a yes?”

She’s going to make Zari say it. Of course she’s going to make Zari say it. With a great sigh, Zari reaches out and places her hand over the one still tapping out an uneven rhythm. She feels a little awkward doing it, but Charlie’s hand is warmer and softer in hers than Zari expected it to be. She doesn’t pull away, so Zari supposes she can’t be too far off track here.

“Yes,” she says. “That’s a yes. At least for now. But no promises. This is still… I think a lot newer to me than it is to you.”

The shit-eating grin that always, always prefaces some infuriating remark comes back, and Charlie nudges Zari with her shoulder. “Wait, does this mean you’re a virgin?”

“For fuck’s sake, Charlie, do not make me regret this already.”

But Zari is smiling, and she can’t seem to make herself stop, which is kind of mortifying, but also, she thinks, kind of nice.

[shieldagentscully-blog]

Scalpel & SHIELD: Chapter 5 - Big, Goddamn Hero

Howard University - 2002

Scully hadn’t ever seen herself teaching at a university. It was the farthest thing from her mind years ago when she studied under Daniel Waterston at Stanford, the brilliant cardiologist, thinking she was going to fix hearts and change lives. She had been young, brilliant, eager to please, and absolutely full of herself back then. But life had a funny way of turning things upside down. More than a decade ago, she stood at a crossroads. Broken hearted and betrayed, she had the choice to stay in the field she no longer loved with a man who had lied to her or to forge a new path in a more interesting field and perhaps make a greater difference than she’d thought possible. She took a gamble and left to join the FBI. It hadn’t worked out exactly as she had hoped, but it was the path that led her to the X-files and to Mulder. For all that she lost, she could never regret having him come into her life.

Now she stood at another crossroads, another choice between a road that was secure but not fulfilling and one that held the promise of the things she sought but could destroy her and her son. To most, the choice should have been simple, but Scully had wrestled with it all night, laying in bed, the young face of Samantha, heartbroken and tired, floated to her mind. She had been alive in 1974. She had lived until 1979. Just what had the likes of Spender and Rinehardt done to her? What had she endured? Were those men still out there, kidnapping other Samanthas? Did they have Mulder?

It was that last thought that sent her out of bed, finally, giving up on sleep as she flipped quietly through channels until William finally stirred, bright and early, as always. He hardly noticed her dark mood as he fussed and whined, his sore teeth and gums making him fractious as he piddled with breakfast as she tried to force coffee into herself. He had been even less thrilled to be dressed and loaded up in the car to go to his daycare, howling most of the way there until she got him inside, upon which time his entire personality changed to that of an angelic saint. Frustration didn’t even begin to describe her mood as she returned to her car and made her way to campus, fighting Midterm students and parking. By the time she even got to her office, she was in the mood to lock herself up, hide away, and pray that no student came looking for her.

Unfortunately, even as she rounded the corner, she saw someone sitting just outside of her office door. She had already sighed and begun to mentally prepare herself before it occurred to her that the man waiting patiently couldn’t possibly be a student. He was at least 80, far too old to be the average college student, and certainly no one she remembered having in her class. He sat straight in the heavy chair that sat out there, one hand laying on the cane at his side, his silver head resting against the wall by her door. She cleared her throat as she approached, causing him to look up with a broad smile.

“You must be the talented and amazing Doctor Scully I’ve been hearing about!”

That caught her short, but she smiled, recognizing the compliment. “Someone clearly has been telling you some sort of line if they said those things about me.”

“I doubt my daughter would lie to me like that. She hasn’t lied to me since she was seventeen, and I caught her in the backyard, in the dark, with a boy. She learned better! But, she says good things about you.”

It took her only seconds after that to realize who she was indeed speaking to. “Doctor Jones, I presume?”

“I could be Livingston, but that would flip the tables a bit, no?”

Scully laughed, unlocking her office to let the older gentleman in. He rose slowly from his seat, leaning on his cane, but still tall and proud despite the age that now withered him.

“Come in, sir! Have a seat.” She waved to one of the two leather seats by her chair, the one not currently occupied by a stack of ungraded papers. “Can I get you coffee? Water?”

“I’m fine!” He waived her offer off as he settled into the creaking leather. “If I knew that you were so pretty and accommodating, I’d have been here to see you sooner.”

“Well, you are here, and that’s what matters.” She perched on the other side of the desk, trying to bite back the grin of delight and amazement. Gabriel Jones was a figure of legend in her household growing up, as were all the Howling Commandos. The old films had been a staple of television viewing, and while Scully was well aware that the real life heroes were very different than the sanitized, Hollywood depictions, she couldn’t help but feel like a figure of history and legend had just alighted into her office.

“It’s an honor to meet you, sir! I can’t even tell you how special it is that you stopped by!”

“Well, Wanda kept telling me to get over here and I kept putting it off, but I happened to be by today. Had coffee with some of the donors and advancement, you know the types, all wanting to pump hands and look impressive. Had enough of that and decided to come find someone with a brain to talk to.”

She couldn’t help but laugh. “I’m honored! Ever since your daughter told me that her father was the famous Gabriel Jones, I’ve been bugging her to meet you. You were a hero of mine growing up!”

“You watched those stupid movies?”

“Well, I was also seven and convinced you all could walk on water, Captain America especially!”

“Well, Cap probably could walk on water, but the rest of us were just average, Army Joes, doing a job.”

“I don’t know, taking down HYDRA and defeating Johann Schmidt seemed more than just the average Army work.”

“Still fighting and dying, just like everyone else.” He nodded, solemnly, a sad sort of wistfulness about him as he regarded her. “Wanda tells me you were in the FBI before she dragged you over here.”

“I was for about ten years. I worked in a small division for most of it, investigating unsolved and strange cases.”

“The X-files, I heard about them.”

That surprised her. Few people outside of the FBI knew about them and those that did often mocked them. He didn’t seem to be doing that. “I’m sorry, how did you know about them, sir?”

“I’m not ‘sir’, I’m Gabe, and as for how I heard about them, I knew Arthur Dales from my days in SHIELD. He had been Army buddies with someone, maybe Sawyer, but anyway, he would come and chat with us on some of the more interesting cases he had going on.”

“You were in SHIELD?”

“For a bit, yes. We were all under the auspices of the SSR, which eventually was closed down after the war and rolled into SHIELD when it was formed. I was there for a while, till the kids started come along and getting older and I realized I wanted to be around to see them grow up. Left SHIELD, finished up my degrees and went into teaching history and public policy.”

“I know, I’ve read some of your articles.” The fact that Dr. Jones was an intellectual on top of being a hero had caused her no small delight, especially given his long career in academia. “So do you really speak five languages?”

“Seven? Been bored in my retirement.” He laughed brightly, as he leaned back comfortably. “Don’t get me wrong, I loved teaching and researching. By the time I got into it, I could actually have the sort of voice I couldn’t have when I was a kid in the 40’s, getting a degree that may or may not allow me to work in the nicer establishments of Washington DC. But, as much as I loved doing it, there was a part of me that missed the old life.”

“The Commandos?”

“Yeah.” He grinned with broad reminiscence. “I didn’t even start out the war with those guys. I was in the 92nd Infantry, the Buffalo Soldiers, because that’s where they stuck the black kids that signed up. We got sent to Italy to serve as support there. That’s how I met Barnes and Dugan. They were in the 107th and all of us were sent to face Schmidt. We all just happened to be captured together. War has that habit, I guess, putting folks together that would never have talked to one another until they were forced to live in the same, ten foot cage.”

That was the least of the horrors that Scully knew most soldiers faced in World War II. “Despite all that, you still wanted to fight?”

“Hell, yes! I saw what they could do, HYDRA.” Something dark and grave passed over his expression, a ghost of old terror, never forgotten, rising to the fore. “We were just sitting ducks there when they came up over the hill with their lasers, blowing tanks to kingdom come. Whole platoons cut down in an instant. We had no choice but to surrender. And then to be drug to Schmidt’s hell, forced to work till we dropped, or like Barnes, till we nearly died. I saw most of my unit go that way, drug off to wherever Zola had them. None of them ever made it out.”

Scully didn’t know what to say to that. She knew death intimately, saw it on it’s most basic, fundamental, scientific level everyday. And she knew something of the horrors faced by soldiers in World War II, but admittedly had only paid half attention to them. Like many historical events, they seemed so distant and outside of her, not something real and tangible. Seeing the grief of someone who lived it, even after sixty years, made it all too palpable.

“Anyway, when Cap came and got us out, the Army offered to send most of us home, discharge us on medical leave. I thought about it, frankly, more than just a little bit. After all, most everyone I knew was dead, and here I was, a colored boy with a college education doing grunt work and nearly getting killed for it. I had half a mind to come back home to Howard and walk away from it all. But, then Cap comes along, all truth and justice and wanting to punch Hitler in the jaw, and I’m signing up to join his suicide squad along with Dernier. Never regretted it for a second.”

This conversation was hitting uncomfortably close to home for her. “Even when it would have been safer for you to go back home and lead a quiet life?”

“One could have argued there wasn’t much of a quiet life back home, either, not for someone who looked like me. Maybe I knew that and didn’t want to have to face that. Maybe I wanted a bit of revenge for those that didn’t make it out, like I did. But, I figure, a lot of it was Steve.”

Captain America. Even the name caused a thrill, knowing that this man knew someone she so revered. “What was he like?”

“Steve Rogers?” That caused Gabe to laugh outright, a wheezing sound as he shook his silver head. “I’d love to tell you half the crap those movies put out there was bullshit, but a lot of it was true. First time he came waltzing into our prison, all by himself, not an ounce of self-preservation to him, saying he was ‘Captain America’ and that he’d punched Hitler 200 times. We all thought he was nuts. We didn’t realize it wasn’t that he was crazy, it was just that he was stubborn and convinced his will was bigger than yours. But, he grew up this scrawny Irish kid from the wrong side of Brooklyn, so I suppose he always had that chip on his shoulder.”

“As a scrawny, Irish kid myself, I understand that feeling intimately.”

Gabe only chuckled. “Yeah, but you are a hell of a lot prettier than Rogers was.”

“Oh, I’ve seen pictures. I don’t know about that.”

“Lord, you too! Barnes was always floored by it, these women throwing themselves at Cap and he wouldn’t know what to do. Of course, he only ever had eyes for Peggy, so I don’t think he even noticed.”

Shaking his head, he sighed fondly. “Steve could be obtuse like that, but in a good way, you know. He never saw differences the same way others did. Didn’t matter to him if you were white, brown or yellow, didn’t matter if you were even American, only that you wanted to do the right thing and were willing to take a stand when no one else would. Guess when you grow up like he and Barnes did, those things don’t matter as much, maybe.”

There was no hiding the deep sadness welling up in his fond words. “You must really miss them.”

“The Commandos? Yeah, everyday. There’s really only Peggy, Morita and me now. Jim’s harassing his grandkids and traveling the world. Peggy’s only now retiring from SHIELD. Thought they would have to carry her out on one, frankly, didn’t think she’d ever leave. And here I am, mostly retired, teaching a class now and again, stumping for my alma mater, going to museum openings.”

“Don’t suppose it’s as exciting as taking out HYDRA.” Despite herself, Scully couldn’t help but think of Coulson’s visit and his simple request, or the fact that deep down, underneath the pain of loss and fears for her son, she had really wanted to say yes.

“No, but it’s a good life for a man just turned 80. Besides, there’s others to fight those fights now. My grandson, Antoine, he’s joining up with SHIELD when he’s done with his degree. Says someone has to carry on the family legacy.”

Someone has to carry on.

The last conversation Scully had with Mulder before he disappeared had been outside of Skinner’s office, the fateful evening when Alex Krycek had shown back up in their lives. He’d begged her to stay, to leave the X-files, to go be a doctor and live her life and leave the mystery behind...to leave him behind. She tried, she really had. But Coulson’s visit loomed, along with the implied threat of what still lay out there. Spender, as far as anyone knew, was still alive and was still dangerous. It didn’t matter that she left the X-files and the FBI behind, that she had stopped asking questions, that she was attempting to lead a normal life, if he was still out there, he was still scheming. And knowing he had likely been with HYDRA the entire time made the danger even more overt. If he had used his own children in his heinous experiments, what was to say he wouldn’t come for his grandson?

“Do you know Phil Coulson? He’s an agent with SHIELD.”

Something sharp flickered in Gabe’s eyes, but he played off at being nonchalant. “I’ve heard the name, yeah. One of Fury’s agents, said to be really good. How do you know him?”

“He came to visit me last night.” She eyed Gabe pointedly, sensing he knew far more about that than he was willing to let on. “I found it interesting he rushed to see me on a Sunday evening, on my way back from Baltimore, right after your daughter made me a nice job offer to stay and teach here.”

“I’d only say it was interesting if I knew what a SHIELD agent was doing at your house.”

“Making me a counter-offer.”

“Well, then, that is interesting. SHIELD wants to recruit you.”

“Apparently, he heard from sources about me.”

“SHIELD could use a woman of your talents.”

“So could your alma mater.”

“Oh, I’m sure. Wanda would be upset if you left her. She’s been thrilled to have you. But like Antoine keeps telling me, someone has to carry on.”

As simple as that, she realized her decision was made.

“I have a feeling your daughter is going to be mad at me.”

Gabe only smiled knowingly. “Just like when I caught her in the backyard with a boy, I’m sure she’ll get over it. She’s used to me coming in and messing up her good time.”

[mvssmallow]

Cloudy With A Chance

Part 18: …of October sky.

Masterlist

It’s October. People probably think he’s mad but he can always feel a change in the air when it’s October. Or maybe it’s not as crazy as it sounds. October was the first thing he knew after he was born. He knows it’s different compared to all the other months.

October with it’s mild sky and intermittent sunshine, when leaves are turning shades of earth and trees are looking lonely. It doesn’t have the sharp sting of December’s Winter nor does it have the carefree warmth of June’s Summer. It’s not as optimistic as March’s Spring but he finds all that optimism overbearing after awhile anyway.

October just is. October lets him lay low and be who he wants to be. It lets him start to steal more of Jiwon’s clothes to wear underneath his jacket, like a hug he can walk around with when he goes and does errands by himself. Maybe it’s pathetic, he’s sure it is, but it’s nice having Jiwon so close to him, even if it’s just through an old t-shirt.

This is their first October together and he’s lying if he said he wasn’t at least a little bit irrationally anxious about it. He wants Jiwon to love October. He needs this to be good.

“How’s the book going?” Jiwon asks, fingers running through his hair as they sit on the couch watching late night Evangelion re-runs.

“It’s okay.” He sighs. “It’s a lot of research.”

“Are you ever gonna tell me anything about it? Or let me read it?”

He snuggles closer into Jiwon’s chest. “No. It’s not ready. And you haven’t won a mic night yet. You know the rules.”

Jiwon groans dramatically above him. “Seriously? But that might take months! Come on.”

He slides his hands under the soft fabric of Jiwon’s hoody and lets his fingers catch on the bumps and ridges of defined muscle. “Well, if you want to read it so badly, you should try to win the next one then. I told you, you’re better than him, it shouldn’t be hard.”

Jiwon chuckles softly. “Better than who? Mino?”

“Yeah. He’s too controlled and too handsome or something. It’s okay if you like that kind of thing.” He says with a slack shrug.

The fingers in his hair freezes for a beat. It always makes him smile, the way Jiwon reacts to some things and pretends it doesn’t affect him.

“You think he’s too handsome?” Jiwon asks casually.

“Well, he’s not ugly. Who cares what he is anyway. He’s not my type. He’s too clean or something. I’m not into that sort of thing.”

There’s a reflective hum. “Oh really? What’s your type then?”

“Dirty. Messy. Shreds everything I buy. Doesn’t let me touch his car stereo. And always forgets to turn the dryer on.”

“That’s weirdly specific, Hanbin. I don’t know anyone like that.”

His fingernails drag across Jiwon’s abdomen and he can feel the muscles flexing in response. “Hmm, I don’t either. Guess I’ll settle for you until he comes along.”

“Thanks, I feel so much better about myself now.” Jiwon says flatly. “Aren’t you going to ask me what my type is?”

“Okay, what is your type?”

“Not you.”

He bursts out laughing and turns over to hit Jiwon in the chest. “Rude!”

Jiwon lets out his dorky wheezy laugh as he dodges the punches. “Yeah I love guys who are really ugly, really dumb and bad at doing laundry. Know where I can find one of those?”

“Maybe on sale at the boyfriend store?”

Jiwon’s face turns serious then, smile softening and fingers brushing strands of hair away from his face. “Actually, if we’re being honest, I didn’t even know I had a type but I knew it was going to be you by the time we got to that cafe.”

He lays down with his chin resting on Jiwon’s chest and eyes him skeptically. “What?! Don’t lie. How could you possibly know? We met for like 15 minutes.”

“I’m not lying! I knew. I knew it’d be you.”

He stares at Jiwon’s face, trying to look for something that might be insincere or the start of a joke but Jiwon doesn’t back down and just stares right back.

“No way.” He shakes his head in disbelief. “No way you could’ve known we’d end up like this. No way.”

“Well, I didn’t know we’d end up exactly like this. But I knew it was going to be you.”

And right there, standing in the forefront of his mind, is the same insecure teenage that never even got a date in high school. He doesn’t want to ask but he knows the kid inside needs him to make sure. “Do you….still know?”

“Yeah, of course I still know….” Jiwon says defensively before trailing off.

He watches as Jiwon’s mouth opens and closes without anything coming out. It’s not because of a lack of thoughts. It’s because there’s too many.

“Don’t say it.” He cuts in, fingers sliding into one of Jiwon’s waiting hands. “Whatever you’re going to say. Just….save it for later. Okay?”

He rests back down, cheek against Jiwon’s rib cage, listening to the fast heartbeat underneath as his own thunders in his ears.

“Yeah…okay.” Jiwon replies, confused but not protesting.

Evangelion gets ignored for the rest of the night. He watches the pictures and hears the sounds but the only thing he can think about is if he’s really ready for the next phase of his life. He’s spent so long dwelling on the past that he feels totally unprepared for the future.

There was so much to think about all of the sudden. He doesn’t even remember falling asleep after that but he remembers arms carrying him to bed, tucking him into the sheets and a soft voice telling him to dream.

****

October 5th.

“HANBIN?!!!”

“WHAT?!!”

“HAVE YOU SEEN MY LUCKY BOXERS?”

He rummages through their drawers in a panic, like a storm blowing right through the streets of Hanbin’s neat town but this a DEFCON 1 situation. He can’t do a mic night without his lucky boxers.

A hand grabs his wrists. “Jiwon. Stop. You’re just messing up the drawers. Go shower. I’ll find them.”

“It’s the purple ones with the-”

“…yellow killer bees. I know.” Hanbin gives him a dimple grin as he kneels down on to pick up all the socks and clothes that littered their floor.

It’s always the smallest things that hit him right in the gut. The way Hanbin folds his t-shirts or writes him random notes or how he always seems to know exactly where everything is. Things that he almost takes for granted on his bad days but thanks God for on the good ones.

“Jiwon?”

“Huh?”

“Go shower. I’ll find them okay?”

By the time he’s done and wrestled with his hair, their bedroom is empty and the tornado of clothes has been tidied away. On their bed, he finds his lucky purple boxers folded next to a pair of jeans, his white shirt ironed and hanging from the wardrobe door handle. He could really go through the rest of his life sustained by all the small things.

Hanbin is sitting on the couch in their small living room, eating an apple and scrolling through something on his phone, hair slicked up to one side and dressed in a black jacket and black jeans that he didn’t even know Hanbin owned. Now that he’s working on his book from home, he hasn’t seen Hanbin dressed up in awhile. It still takes his breath away. Like his brain keeps wiping the memory so they have to re-live the moment like it’s the first time, every time.

“Hey.”

Hanbin looks up, apple hanging from his mouth as he types out a message using both hands. He looks ridiculous but somehow, still the most beautiful thing in any room, anywhere in the world.

“Youlooknice.” Hanbin mumbles around the apple in his mouth.

He shakes his head. The irony. “You look nicer.”

Hanbin pockets his phone, nibbles on the rest of the apple core and walks over to him. He’s seen Hanbin plenty of times. Every day for the past few months. But the way that thin frame walks towards him, all shy confidence with tight jeans and collar bones peeking out from the deep v-cut of his white t-shirt, still makes his stomach drop and his heart race out of time.

There’s a sweet and sticky kiss pressed against his lips but it’s gone before he’s had time to respond or demand more. As Hanbin walks into the kitchen to throw away the apple core, there’s a ghost of that cologne that always reminds him of the ocean for some reason. It’s ridiculous, he knows. The ocean smells like salt. The only other thing that reminds him of salt is the taste of Hanbin’s skin, especially down his neck. Maybe it’s not so crazy.

And then his mind does that thing that he sometimes loves and hates. It takes the smallest hint of a spark and roars into a fire, engulfing him with all the images he remembers from That Morning In Bed spliced together with all the dirty things that they haven’t even done yet.

He’s completely inside of his head as they ride the train to the club. Mental images of skin and hip bones and that pouty mouth he loves so much. He’s restless, frustrated and he knows it annoys Hanbin whenever he has to readjust himself. He’s grateful that his jeans are at least baggy enough to hide how hard he is. His hand searches out for something to touch, settling over Hanbin’s knee, where the rips in his jeans are large enough for his fingers to slide in and out.

It’s not until they’re stepping onto the platform and walking to the venue that Hanbin suddenly sighs loudly.

“Oh my god. What’s up with you? Are you actually high or just nervous?”

He forces himself out of his head. “What? Neither! I’m just thinking about stuff. I’m allowed think about stuff sometimes okay?!”

Hanbin stops walking and looks sternly at him. “Like what?”

He feels the warmth creeping up his neck. “Like….uh, rap stuff.”

There’s a exasperated groan and he really wishes he didn’t find that hot when Hanbin is clearly just annoyed at him for being a bad liar.

“What’s it gonna take?”

“For what?”

“For you to focus? You’re on stage in 2 hours. You can’t go like this. You look all spaced out.  So what’s it gonna take?”

He bites his bottom lip and raises an eyebrow. He doesn’t know what he looks like but all Hanbin does is glare at him for a few seconds before rolling his eyes.

“You are so predictable.”

And that’s how he finds himself sitting on a wooden crate in the dark alley behind the club, jeans undone, soft hair between his fingers and Hanbin’s hot mouth between his legs.

He wants to say that getting blown right before mic night might not really help but then again, only an idiot would put a stop to something like this.

The bass thumps in the background, drowning out most of the sounds they’re making but he doesn’t need sound, not when he has sight. And really, if he died right then, he’d die happy.

It’s not long before he feels the familiar tight tension building, like waves of electricity rolling closer and closer every time Hanbin swallows him down into that wet heat.

Without warning Hanbin looks up at him with those big dark eyes that are soft and adoring one minute then dangerous and wild the next. It catches him off guard, something vaguely passing as fear makes his hair stand on end, and he knows Hanbin must see the surprise on his face because there’s a wicked smile and the light scrape of sharp teeth over the underside of his cock.

It’s enough to push him right over the edge. He leans back too fast, head colliding with the wall behind them and cums with a loud groan, fingers pulling Hanbin’s head forward by his hair to keep that mouth exactly where he needs it.

He can feel the startled surprise as Hanbin’s throat gags around him. He tries not to but he can’t help fucking into that soft pliant mouth, riding out the high and chasing the heat as Hanbin swallows everything down with a long satisfied hum.

Once he stops seeing stars, his body collapses against the wall, completely blissed out and only vaguely registering Hanbin’s fingers tidying him up. He opens his eyes just in time to see Hanbin wiping his mouth like a cat. He loves watching him do that.

It’s the same every time they do this. He feels invincible afterwards. Like a champion boxer ready for a KO in the ring. Like the luckiest guy on earth. Ready to destroy everyone in the club, if it means seeing Hanbin’s wicked smile again. If only his legs would work….

Fingers comb through his hair in some attempt to fix it. It’s gentle for a few seconds before there’s a sharp tug pulling his face forward until it’s inches away from Hanbin and his sharp teeth.

“You better fucking win tonight.” There’s a snarl in Hanbin’s voice, sharpness in his tone and all it does is send a jolt of electricity down his spine and shocks any remaining lethargy out of him.

“Okay.” He says obediently.

Anything.

I’ll do anything you want me to.

There’s a laugh then, the dimpley one that he hates for its manipulative effect. “Come on, let’s go get a drink. My jaw hurts.”

They walk back slowly to the club. His fingers unable to stop touching something, anything, attached to Hanbin’s body. He knows he’s pushing it but he doesn’t unhook his fingers from Hanbin’s jeans as he pushes them through the crowd. More surprisingly, Hanbin doesn’t complain and just holds onto the back of his jacket.

They find June and Yoyo at the bar, bickering about something as usual.

“Dude, your hair.” June motions to Hanbin’s head with a laugh. “You look like you just-”

Yoyo elbows him sharply and clears his throat. The blush that colours Hanbin’s cheeks gives them away.

“Oh….Jesus. Disgusting.” June gags in the background. “Don’t tell me you guys just fucked before you got here.”

“WHAT?! NO!” Hanbin splutters out, caught off guard by June’s bluntness. He doesn’t say anything, he doesn’t care if everybody knows.

Yoyo scrunches up his nose. “Was it on the train? Because that’s so …unsanitary.”

“Ahh, I really need a drink now.” He announces, ignoring the questioning stares from his friends and dragging Hanbin to the other side of the bar.

“It’s not that obvious is it?”

“What?”

“My hair. Is it obvious that-”

“-you just blew a guy in an alley way behind a club? Yeah it’s obvious.” He chuckles apologetically. “Sorry.”

Hanbin touches his swollen lips gingerly but makes no motion to fix his messy hair. He reaches across and tries to help but his hand gets pushed away.

Oh. Weird.

He’s learnt a lot of things about Hanbin at this point but right at that very minute, he gets an inkling of what might become his new favourite thing.

“Actually, I’m not sorry.” He says, leaning in with his lips barely touching Hanbin’s ear. “You look so hot like this. And you like it don’t you? You like people guessing who you’ve been with and what you just did.”

He sees something hungry and unhinged flashing across those dark eyes and he knows he right. It stirs the animal inside him, the one that’s only just gone back to sleep.

“But they can’t have you, can they baby? Because you’re mine. I want them all to know you’re mine.”

Those lips open to say something but the bartender comes over with their drinks then and he leans back, leaving Hanbin opened-mouthed, mid-thought and staring at him with the kind of intensity that is destined to get him committing crimes and walking through fire one day.

He pushes the glass of gin over. “Drink this. And stop looking at me like that. You’re gonna get me hard again.” He says with a laugh. “Then we’ll be in a whole lot of trouble.”

He watches Hanbin down the entire glass like a shot and lick his lips wet. He can feel it, the angry frustration humming around Hanbin’s body, like a lightning rod or live wire that’s just been cut. This was going to be a long night.

*****

3 drinks in and he’s still so restless. Nervous-excited energy causing him to bounce his legs up and down to the point where Jiwon’s hands clamp down on his thighs to stop him moving.

At quarter to 9, Jiwon takes off his jacket and rolls up his shirt sleeves. That doesn’t help either and things just go from bad to worse. He leans right into Jiwon’s space without really meaning to, head resting on a broad shoulder and fingers already finding the skin of Jiwon’s smooth back.

4 drinks in and Jiwon slowly loses the rest of his restraint. Calloused fingers are jammed underneath the holes of his jeans, drawing some kind of pattern across his leg. He knows what they must look like now. He can see it in the surprised and curious faces of fans and rappers who come over to their couch to meet Jiwon. If there was any doubt last time, there probably wouldn’t be by the time this night is over.

And he knows.

He knows he needs to worry about rumours spreading and his parents finding out but by the time his 4th drink arrives, those concerns just make less and less sense. If he stops, he gets less Jiwon. But if he keeps going, he gets more. And he definitely wants more.

It’s maths.

It’s logical.

So why should he stop?

He plays with Jiwon’s fingers as they bicker with June and Yoyo about cars and tattoos and how subconsciously possessive Jiwon gets whenever someone looks in his direction. He doesn’t remember a time when he felt this happy, this carefree, this drunk…..

“Honestly, cut this shit out.” June says with a grimace. “That last guy didn’t even do anything. Are you gonna get pissed off at every guy who looks at him?” 

All it does is make Jiwon’s hand tighten across his thigh. 

“Urghhh. Get a fucking room.” June groans. 

“I would. But I gotta perform soon.” Jiwon replies with a poke of his tongue. It makes him giggle like an idiot.

“Aww, it’s kinda adorable.” Yoyo says, nodding in that happy way he does when he’s had one drink too many. “You both look so dopey. Good luck with the hangover tomorrow though.” 

They look across at each other. They do look dopey. At least Jiwon does, with his big bunny grin and ugly laugh. He wonders if he looks the same. He definitely feels dopey.

At 9:30pm, the rappers get called and he frowns when Jiwon’s body stands up.

“Babe, it’s time.” Jiwon says with a smile, trying to tug his fingers free. “You gonna let me go?”

He shakes his head and his thoughts just slosh around all bathed in the warm glow of citrus alcohol.

“Fuck, you are so cute right now.” Jiwon kneels in front of him and kisses his fingers. “I promise I’ll come back.”

“After you destroy all those guys?”

“Yeah, after I destroy all those guys.”

He relunctantly lets go and watches as Jiwon leaves, disappears and re-emerges on the stage as Bobby. He watches as rappers come and fall. Even Mino gets caught out by the slower backing track coming through the speakers. But that slack bassline and the too-fast-too-slow-trap-beat is as unpredictable as Bobby. It takes a certain kind of crazy to ride that kind of rhythm.

It’s our kind of crazy.

He lets Bobby get eaten up by the crowd that loves him, calls his name, touches his face and shakes his hands. They can have Bobby. Just leave him Jiwon.

They make out all the way home on the train. It’s past 1am. There’s 16 drinks between them, a winners check in Jiwon’s back pocket and hands on skin everywhere. He doesn’t care who sees it. If this is how October is going to play out, he wants it to be October forever.

[spockandawe]

Top 5 reasons you like Windblade and Top 5 reasons you like Windscream (maybe Top 5 Transformers Pitch ship if you like but if not it ok)

OOOOH, all excellent questions!!!

Top 5 reasons I like Windblade

She doesn’t have the war background to give her societal context, just like Tailgate and Nautica don’t, but she’s so fascinating, because she’s put herself right in the middle of a political minefield

AND she went into this hornet’s nest (and stayed there, almost completely alone) because she thought it was the right thing to do

Plus oh my goodness the whole thing with not wanting to depose Starscream and trying to work with him, even while disagreeing him on a philosophical level? And even while he’s being… Starscream? It’s so rare to see a character in here who willingly dives into that kind of compromise instead of having to be fenced into it, and her doing this with Starscream despite how difficult he makes it, just. I love her so much.

Ahhhhh, that balance of idealism (and the sort of construction-focused ambition that goes with her flavor of idealism) against the way people keep trying to tie her down or cage her, and how she manages to hold onto her ideals even while the world is beating on her. I’d say ‘that moment in TAAO 12′, but… everything in TAAO 12. From saving Starscream to helping forge him fresh to what she says to vigilem about the spark burning away ‘everything that isn’t true’ (that’s so conditional, I choose to believe he isn’t 100% gone. brain ghost titans are too good to waste).

And she’s so good. She’s so persistently kind and sweet, and she’s so naturally caring, but without it devolving into any sort of boring caretaker stereotype. She’s just so good-hearted and I adore her. I don’t know if I could dislike her.

(frivolous sixth reason: she is gorgeous)

Top 5 reasons I like windscream

Let’s lead off with that frivolous sixth reason this time: they are two gorgeous mechs who look gorgeous together, and even have complementary color schemes. It’s meant to be (ღ˘⌣˘ღ) Also, FEMDOM.

Then, let’s see. The way they disagree very strongly on like… the fundamentals of how to approach a task. Politics is the easy one, but tbh… almost any task. They often share end goals, but so much about them is so incredibly different, and it makes for an electric dynamic. They constantly disagree, but they orbit each other so naturally. I write mostly Windblade POV, but they’ve both got this massive undercurrent of fascination with the other one that neither of them wants to admit to themselves or out loud (windblade’s a little more willing, just because she doesn’t see attachment as a vulnerability the way starscream does).

She’s so young and innocent and inexperienced (even though she’s gaining experience very quickly), and he’s older than the war and incredibly cynical/paranoid/burned out. Neither of those positions are sustainable. But if it makes sense, like… it’s hard to see the weak spots in your OWN position, it’s easier to see them for other people. They’re perfect complements for each other, once they manage to actually listen. In a political sense, but also on a more personal, emotional level.

She doesn’t have that war background that most of the cast has. So many people have so many reasons not to trust/like Starscream. Which is, y’know. Justified. From both sides. And even if he’s genuinely trying to build something of himself PAST the war now, there are really not many people who will give him a fair shake. Windblade isn’t totally ignorant of his history or anything, I’m sure, but not living it herself makes it a little easier to look at Starscream and trust him to not be that same person with those same priorities.

They are both so petty and ridiculous when they’re annoyed, oh my goodness. I don’t know what it is, but these two, just. It flows so naturally. They’re both competent adults doing difficult jobs and doing them pretty well, but stick them together and they’re acting about as mature as middle schoolers trying to provoke each other. It’s fun on its own, but it feels even nicer because 1) Starscream isn’t having his sharp edges filed off, but 2) having all the sharp edges be pointed in this ridiculous, petty direction takes so much genuine venom out of the thing, and makes some space for him to Do An Emotion (and to get somewhere without shooting himself twenty million times in the foot) (nobody does self-sabotage like starscream)

But then, that goodness I mentioned for Windblade up above? If I balance them right, she doesn’t take unjustified shit from him. She works loyally with him as a team, while also arguing the points she disagrees with. She feels lots of sympathy for what she can see of his current emotional state and the bits and pieces of what she gradually learns about his megatron-specific past. But she can do that without turning him into some broken bird she wants to heal. She’s going to be all bristly and protective over anyone who poses a threat, and she’ll try to prod him into eating more or going out for a flight, but she’s not going to flutter and simper over him either. And Starscream has someone who isn’t afraid to fite him, but doesn’t want to do him harm either, and who isn’t drastically changing their everything out of ~pity~ for him. It means a lot to him (secretly) that someone would ever EVER put themself in harm’s way to protect him, but oh my god you idiot you are a baby and have never been in a real fight, YOU get behind ME. The push-pull between them, I just… it makes me sigh the happiest sigh ever

And my top 5 pitch transformers ships! Oh man, this is going to be interesting to break out, because I don’t usually mentally filter on quadrant, I filter on character, or d/s dynamics maybe, trying to pick out all the pitch bits out of the mess is going to be a challenge.

Windblade/Starscream is a gimme after all that up above, so that doesn’t count for the list :P

Drift/Ratchet. I adore these two, and I really really really love the way they went from tense and sometimes hostile to the emotional support they’ve got now. But it doesn’t feel them if Drift isn’t teasing or prodding him. Vulnerability is good, but it’s not like… steady state Drift. Drift is silly and has a sense of humor and is friendly and good natured, and Ratchet is dour, and both of them naturally care a LOT. But they’re opposites in so many ways that I live to see them both quietly being prodprodprod with a curtain of not-exactly-hostility overlaying a whole lot of trust and affection.

Whirl/Cyclonus, although I tend towards a very pitchpale feeling with them instead of pure pitch. But Whirl is not good with soft and squishy emotions, so at least pretending it’s full-on pitch sits better with him. This is a case where there are just soooo many similarities between them, what with their wartime pasts, being lorge and exceptionally good at violence, having a very difficult time with friendly social connections. But also, MAN do they get off to a rough start XD But that bit in 47 where Cyclonus tells Whirl that he knew Whirl would tell him the truth, even if it hurt? And Whirl was brutally honest with him? Oh my god so pitchpale, I DIEEEED. And both of them are bad at communication, both of them are quietly full of moral injuries, both of them are really surprisingly pro-social when they’re put on the spot, and do a LOT to protect other people. I love love love them.

…….Prowl/Rewind. With Chromedome in the middle, but that’s the pitch piece. Not necessarily healthy, but SO EMOTIONALLY CHARGED, holy shit. I poked at this once in a fic (ending disastrously). But I also want to do a near-disaster that works out okay (the solution is to put Chromedome in the middle until the scene has momentum). Or Prowl/Fort Max, which is even more complicated, and may necessitate the addition of Red Alert and Cerebros as buffers between them.

Similarly, Starscream/Windblade/Knock Out, all pitch, with Breakdown on the side being completely made for companionable needling. Starscream and Windblade, I have already said a ridiculous number of words :P Knock Out and Windblade have all this potential to be fascinating to each other, because their cultures are so different, but Windblade was able to get a win in Velocitronian politics, and Knock Out is from a colony with a living, functional titan (one in almost a waking coma, but hey). And they’re both outspoken and open with their thoughts and he can be so petty the same way Starscream can, and it’s deliciously infuriating and she just– (but also, windblade and breakdown being sweet with each other, and exasperated and fond while starscream and knock out get distracted and ridiculous with each other).

And…. hmm hm hm. I don’t have much of a continuity in mind except to specify not IDW, because IDW OP is being an ass. But Starscream/OP. There’s something about Starscream and disillusionment with Megatron as a leader, plus fascination with Megatron’s opposite and parallel, but without dropping the established hostility with the autobots, and demanding as much out of Optimus as he would demand from Megatron, and just, so good. So hard to established without ‘to end this war you need to robot marry’ sorts of scenarios, but soooooo good. So like, in TFP, Optimus is so chill and placid, and Starscream is high-strung and emotional, and everything about them finding a stable orbit with each other is so fun. Or TFA, Starscream is old and cynical, Optimus is young and inexperienced (I sure do love that sort of ship :V), massively differing ideologies, experienced cynicism versus young, idealistic optimism, and a HUGE size difference because mmmm priorities. Lov this ship.

And there are others, where I either haven’t pinned down the words or don’t have a good scenario or justification, or just can’t say as much about them. Soundwave/OP, Soundwave/Starscream, Pyra Magna/OP, Elita One/OP, Pyra Magna/Elita One, Rung/Froid, Overlord/Tarn, Overlord/Megatron, Deathsaurus/Rodimus (shh sh sh it makes sense), Sunstreaker/Sideswipe, Arcee/Prowl, Arcee/Windblade, Elita One/Windblade. Hahaha, I’m trying to run through the cast by characters and see what I remember :P

Bumblebee/Starscream has pitch overtones, but Bumblebee is so much of a sweetheart and Starscream is being open because just a ghost amiright??? and he wobbles out of pitch pretty easily. TFP specifically is good for Knock Out/Bumblebee and Shockwave/Soundwave. Jazz/Starscream is another one that’s superficially pitch, except Jazz is being difficult and slippery and refusing to make a single real move into that quadrant. Some of these might jump into the list if I can get them written out in a story, but for the moment, I can’t quite words them.