#no matter what I love whatever character these two play

[bamber344]

Subject G-5: 'Magpie'

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heyo! this chapter is a fucking MONSTER. biggest one yet. but that's what i get for trying to condense a character's entire backstory into one chapter lol. I'm sure you can guess who's backstory it is ;P

Enjoy!

CWs: living weapon whump, minor whump, whipping, electrocution, stress positions, non-con body modification, lab whump, starvation, controlling whumper, vomit, various other bodily fluids

Subject G-5: 'Magpie'

Maggie sighed, sinking further against the cushions as Diego’s hand massaged preen oil through the feathers on her back and wings, straightening them out and cleaning any debris out of them. After having to suffer through trying to do it herself with her limited human flexibility for the first nine months of her life, having someone else to help her with preening was something she would truly never take for granted. It wasn’t just her wings she had to worry about; the feathers trailed all the way down her spine, coalescing in a small, useless tail at her coccyx. Basically, it was a whole lot of work. At least she was blessed with a preen gland, producing her own preen oil and saving her the struggle of having to find another way to maintain her feathers’ quality, despite the fact that other people tended to find it…offputting. 

Well, Andreas was an asshole anyway, so what did she care about his opinion? Diego didn’t mind, and Hex never knew anything different. They were the only ones that mattered.

Maggie heard the door to Hex’s room open, and she plodded over to them, taking a seat on the couch near Maggie’s feet.

“Hey Diego?” she asked. “Can we get McDonalds for dinner?”

“That depends,” he hummed. The sound instinctively made Maggie relax. “Have you finished your studies for this week yet?”

Despite the fact that she was out of Maggie’s line of sight, she could almost feel Hex’s pout. “Maggie didn’t finish hers last week, but you still bought her chinese food when she asked!”

“Hey, I’ve been busy working at the construction site, making money so we can eat! I don’t always have time to read books,” Maggie complained. “Also, Diego loves me.”

“Actually, last week you skipped out on studying to try and go after Jordyn again, and she kicked your butt so bad she broke three of your ribs.”

“‘Scuse you! I kicked her butt! You weren’t there, you didn’t see!”

“I’ve gotta give that one to Hex, babe,” Diego said. “I did tell you not to go.”

“Whatever. Either way, I sorted it. She won’t be coming after us.”

“Anyway, that’s besides the point,” Hex said. “The point being: is McDonalds on the table tonight?”

“...Actually, I could go for some McDonalds right now, too,” Maggie muttered.

Diego laughed. “Fine. But that’s the last time I’m ordering takeout for the rest of the month!”

Hex protested, and Maggie smiled as the conversation between her sister and her boyfriend continued on above her. A comforting warmth settled in her belly; pride and happiness in herself for succeeding in giving her little sister at least some semblance of a normal childhood. It wasn’t perfect by any means – it couldn’t be, what with the memories of the things they suffered in the facility still plaguing them every day – but like this, Hex at least got a chance. She got to bicker with her sister without getting beaten for it, got to skip out on her studies to play video games like a normal kid. Granted, Maggie herself was still learning just what ‘normal’ was. Despite the difference between their physical ages, she was only four months older than Hex, technically speaking. Having Diego around was certainly helpful, though. Without his help, the two of them would probably still be the naive, bumbling idiots they’d been the day they broke out of the facility.

Maggie closed her eyes, relaxing into the couch and reminiscing on how she got to where she was today.

—

5 MONTHS AFTER WAKING

Magpie sat on the end of her bed, shivering. She didn’t know why. She wasn’t cold, not with her wings wrapped around herself protectively like they were. There was nothing to be scared of in the immediate vicinity. And yet, this horrible, pervasive anxiety just wouldn’t leave her alone.

It had been there since this afternoon, when Father screamed at and hit her for flying over the obstacle course instead of running through it. She didn’t understand why it mattered if she could run well when she had a perfectly good pair of wings on her back to help her fly. It was stupid. Father was stupid. She wasn’t sure how she knew, but something just wasn’t right about this whole situation.

As far back as she could remember, Father had been there, helping her recover after waking up from her supposed ‘accident.’ He was trying to help her become a superhero again, or so he said. Magpie just wasn’t sure that she believed it. If he was trying to help her, why would he turn around and hurt her in the same breath? Why did he want so much control over her, to the point where he refused to let her leave the facility, no matter how much she begged? It just didn’t sit right.

Really though, what was she supposed to do? Her memories were completely gone. She had no knowledge of who she used to be, or how the world worked. She had no choice but to just stick with Father until she learned more. Then, she would make a decision on whether or not to trust him.

She occupied herself by running her fingers through the feathers of her wings, straightening them out. Their softness was reassuring, but it did little to settle the quiver of unease that had sunken all the way down into her bones. 

The door opened, and Father walked in. Magpie instinctively hopped off of her bed, ready to defend herself. 

He studied her, eyeing her up and down, before sighing. “Come in, Hex.”

Someone entered the room behind him. Magpie gasped.

The girl was a lot younger than her, shyly hiding behind Father’s leg. Her short-cropped hair was black, just like Magpie’s, and she shared her tan skin. In fact, the girl was practically identical to her aside from her age and the lack of wings on her back. Who the hell was she?!

Father turned to the young girl. “This is the older sister I was telling you about. Her name is Magpie. You’re going to be staying with her from now on, okay?”

“What is this? What’s going on?” Magpie asked.

Father sighed again. “I’m truly sorry, I should have told you this earlier. Hex here is your younger sister. She was injured in the same accident as you, and only woke up a month ago. Since then, she’s been going through the same rehabilitation program that you did, and is finally well enough to join you properly.”

Magpie had absolutely no memory of a younger sister, but… what else could this girl possibly be? She looked exactly like her. It wasn’t like she had memories of anything else either, to be fair, and from the look on her face, Hex was thinking a similar line of thought.

Father placed a hand on Hex’s back and pushed her further into the room. A spark of protectiveness instinctively rose in Magpie’s chest.

“Get to know each other. Another bed will be brought in shortly.”

With that, Father left. Magpie and Hex stared at each other.

“I didn’t know I had a big sister,” Hex said. Her eyes kept flickering to Magpie’s wings. Magpie smirked.

“Well, I didn’t know I had a little sister, either.” She sat back down on the bed, motioning for Hex to join her. “You don’t remember anything either, huh?”

Hex shook her head, tentatively climbing up next to Magpie. 

“Even if I have no memories of you, it’s nice to finally not be alone. No one else… gets how hard it is, not knowing anything. Y’know?”

Hex hummed in agreement, but she seemed a bit distracted. “Can I… Um… Can I touch your wings?”

Magpie chuckled. “Sure. But be gentle.”

Hex reached out, carefully running her fingers along the feathers. Magpie tried not to shiver. The touch was gentler than anything she’d ever felt from another person before, and honestly, it was starting to get her a little choked up, especially with the cute little smile on Hex’s face as she did it.

There was something on the back of her neck. Magpie frowned.

“Hey, let me see the back of your neck?”

“Hm? Okay.”

Hex shifted a little to allow access. Sure enough, there it was. Starting just below her hairline, there were a bunch of lines making up a weird rectangle, and below that, there was writing.

G-6: ‘HEX’

PROPERTY OF PRECINCT 23

That same old dread settled into Magpie’s gut. Something just wasn’t right. Hex seemed oblivious to it, but somehow Magpie knew. Was she even really her little sister? Or was this just another lie from their ‘Father’?

There was one thing she was certain of, though. Little sister or not, Magpie had to protect her. They were in this situation together, and she wouldn’t let that old man hurt her like he had hurt Magpie. She swore it.

—

9 MONTHS AFTER WAKING

Magpie rolled her shoulders as she walked down the corridor, having finished her combat training for the day. Anxiety broiled in her gut for her upcoming exam tomorrow. It wasn’t that she was scared she would fail – there wasn’t even a chance of that. It was more a general excitement at the prospect of finally being allowed to go outside.

The past few months had been difficult, full of harsh training and harsher punishments, but as soon as Father gave her free access to the outside world, Magpie was gonna grab Hex and make a run for it. Their freedom from this underground hellhole was so close, she could almost taste it.

The thought of Hex made her sigh. The girl was struggling under Father’s ‘tutelage.’ She didn’t have the same distrust of him that Magpie did. She hung on his every word, followed every order to the letter, and the slightest hint of a smile from him was enough to have her practically melting. And yet, her young body just couldn’t live up to the demands being placed on her. He was being a lot gentler with her than he had been with Magpie, but she didn’t doubt it wouldn’t be long until his limited patience ran out.

Honestly, what was he expecting? Magpie was a full-grown woman of 25, but Hex was barely even a teenager! Of course she couldn’t complete all of these crazy, dangerous obstacle courses. If not for her telekinesis power allowing her to block the knives and poles being swung at her, she’d probably already be dead! Magpie herself had had way too many close calls on that course for comfort, and she could literally fly over it if she wanted.

The thought angered her, but she buried it down. Just one more day. One more day, and they could get out of here for good. 

Speaking of Hex’s training, Magpie was pretty sure it was still going on for today. She figured she might as well go and see how her little sister was going before heading back to their room.

A shrill scream and a loud crack echoed through the hallways. Magpie’s heart leapt into her throat. She started running.

He wouldn’t. Surely he wouldn’t. He’d threatened Magpie with it a few times, and only backed down on account of not wanting to damage her wings. Hex didn’t have that protection. But, still. He wouldn’t do that to her, right?

The cracking and shrieking continued, and it became clearer and clearer that, apparently, he would. Magpie was going to kill him.

The sight she saw through the window when she got to Hex’s training course didn’t betray her expectations. 

Hex, shirtless and on her knees. Father standing behind her, whip in hand. A dozen red, bleeding lines criss-crossing Hex’s back as her entire body quaked.

A rage the likes of which she’d never felt before burned in Magpie’s gut. She rushed over to the door, dismayed to find that it was locked.

Fine. It wouldn’t stop her.

She threw her fist against the metal, denting it. A grim satisfaction settled inside of her. Nothing could protect Father from her wrath now.

She punched the edge of the door over and over again, until there was enough space for her to get her fingers in between it and the frame. Ensuring that her grip was sound, she heaved, contracting every fibre of muscle in her arms and literally ripping the sliding metal door out of the wall. Inside, Hex was curled up on the floor, and Father was staring at Magpie like she was the consequences of his actions made manifest. He was scared.

Good.

With a flap of her wings, Magpie was flying towards him, ready to rip him apart. 

Her fist sunk into his side with the force of a wrecking ball, and she felt his ribs crack under her knuckles. The hit sent him flying, slamming into the far wall like a sack of bricks.

Magpie landed on her feet, planting herself between Father and Hex. He wouldn’t hurt them anymore.

Father coughed and gasped, spitting up blood as he tried and failed to get to his feet. “Wh… what… Wh-what’s the meaning of this?! How dare you raise a hand against me!”

“You stay away from us!” Magpie yelled. “Come near Hex again, and I’ll kill you!”

Father finally managed to drag himself up, clutching his side. He scowled. “You’ve always been a precocious one, Five. I see I’ve been far too gentle with you. It’s fine, you’ll learn obedience in time. Here’s your first lesson!”

He threw his hand up and Magpie screamed, suddenly overcome with an impossible pain coursing throughout her entire body, pinpointed in the back of her neck. She collapsed as her knees gave out, writhing on the ground in unknowable agony. Darkness flashed across her vision. She heaved, her body curling in on itself and forcing her lunch back out of her mouth. This was it. She was going to die. Her body couldn’t take it. Hex was going to be all alone with that monster, and there was nothing she could do.

With that one last thought, everything went black and Magpie died.

—

TWO DAYS LATER

If only she’d actually died back then. It would have been a mercy. If she’d died, she wouldn’t be stuck on her knees, with her arms wrenched and twisted behind her back, chained to the wall tight enough that she couldn’t move at all without searing pain. If she’d died, she wouldn’t have been stuck in this exact position for an unknowable amount of time, muscles burning constantly, stomach aching with hunger, thirst quenched by only the most meagre amount of water that would keep her alive, soiling herself over and over with no way to stop it. Passing out was her only consolation, but even then, she never stayed asleep for long. It was stupid of her to think she’d had it bad before. This was true hell.

Magpie closed her eyes, trying not to cry. She couldn’t afford to waste hydration like that. Her only hope was that Hex had been spared. She would put up with this forever if it meant that her little sister was safe.

The door opened, bright light spilling out from the hallway and blinding Magpie after so many hours in the dark. It was probably Father, come to torment her again. She braced herself for another verbal lashing or boot to the jaw.

“Maggie?”

If Magpie had the energy to, she would have gasped.

“H… H-Hex…? Is… Is that… you?” she rasped out.

The figure haloed in light stepped closer. Sure enough, it was Hex, her little sister, looking down at her in horror.

“Oh god, Maggie. Did… Did Father do this to you?”

“What are you doing here?” Magpie croaked, ignoring the question. “If Father finds you, he’ll hurt you again.”

“He’s not here right now. He and a bunch of the scientists left. I’m gonna save you, okay?”

The thought made a lump rise in Magpie’s throat. Her bottom lip quivered. “H- Hex…”

The young girl wasted no more time, rushing to the shackles binding Magpie’s arms and legs. They came undone all at once and she collapsed to the floor, relief flooding her tattered muscles. Magpie couldn’t help it; she started sobbing.

“It’s okay now, Maggie,” Hex said, kneeling at her side and gently massaging the base of her wings. “It’s all gonna be okay. We’re gonna get out of here tonight, just like you talked about.”

“I’m sorry… I c-couldn’t protect you… I’m so sorry, Hex.”

Hex’s voice cracked. “It- it’s alright. It’s not your fault, Maggie.”

Magpie let out a sigh, her body deflating. “I like it when you call me that. B-better than Magpie.”

“Then that’s what I’ll call you from now on, okay?”

Maggie nodded. She sniffled, summing up the energy to speak. “How much time do we have?”

“A little. The hallways are pretty empty right now, so I should be able to get us back to our room without any trouble. We’ll have a bit of time to prepare, but then we have to move. Do… Do you think you’ll be okay? Will you be able to fight?”

“I will be,” Maggie said. “No matter what, I will be. I’ll always fight for you, Hex.”

“Not alone, you won’t. I’ll fight, too. Like you said, we’re in this together. To the end.”

“To the end.”

—

Maggie laid in bed, enjoying her last few moments of rest before everything went down. Hex ended up carrying her down the hallway with telekinesis, and thankfully they didn’t run into anyone on the way. She’d had a shower – or, more accurately, Hex had showered her – gotten a change of clothes, and was now ready to fight for their freedom.

Okay, maybe ‘fight’ was a bit of an exaggeration for her current state. Shakily hobble toward their freedom, more like.

As much as she didn’t want to move at all for the next month, the promise of the outside world was invigorating, and it gave her the strength to sit up.

“Feeling okay to go?” Hex asked.

Maggie sucked in a breath to steel herself and nodded. “I don’t know if I can walk too fast on my own, but together, we should be able to make it.”

Hex nodded. “Let’s do this.”

Maggie dragged herself off of the bed and pretty much flopped over Hex, who wrapped an arm around her waist, supporting her as they walked out of their room and into the halls. The pain in her shaking limbs was almost overwhelming, but with Hex’s support, she could manage. She had to.

Maybe it was the fact that it was the middle of the night, or maybe it was because of what Hex said earlier, but the corridors were practically deserted, and they met no resistance as they slowly hobbled their way to the ‘elevator’ that Father was always leaving from. Now, Maggie didn’t really know what an elevator was, but she was sure gonna try and figure it out.

“Um… what do we do now?” Hex asked once they’d stepped inside the small room.

Maggie stared at the row of buttons on the wall.

“Uh, I dunno.”

Hex shrugged and pressed the bottom one, seemingly at random. Well, it was as good a plan as they could possibly have, given the circumstances.

The doors closed, and both of them yelped as the floor started moving. Okay. This was fine. Father travelled on this every day, so Maggie wasn’t gonna let it get the best of her.

After a few seconds, the doors opened again, and the world outside had changed. Instead of bright corridors, the room on the other side was dim, lit up only by dozens of… windows? That wasn't exactly what they looked like, but it was the closest approximation Maggie could guess, considering that she could see different parts of the facility through them. There was a chair in front of the windows, with someone sitting in it. Thankfully, it looked like they were asleep.

Was this the right way? It was worth a look around, at least.

Focusing all of their stealth training, Magpie and Hex tiptoed out of the elevator, sneaking towards the door on the opposite wall. Thankfully, whoever was posted up in the chair was out cold, so they were able to reach the door and get through without the person noticing anything awry.

The room on the other side was… weird. It was just as dimly lit as the previous room, only this time the light source was the large green cylinder next to the door. The walls were lined with other cylinders, but these ones were all made of metal, whereas the glowing green one seemed to be made of glass. Inside the cylinder was a small… something. Honestly, Maggie couldn't really tell what it was. It was tiny, and vaguely person shaped, but that was where her deductions ended.

A forgotten memory suddenly flashed through her mind. She remembered this green stuff. She remembered being submerged in it, floating in the warmth.

The realisation washed over her like ice water. This was it, wasn't it? This was where she came from. There was no ‘before’ the facility. This room was where she and Hex were… created.

Her heart lurched in her chest. They… they were never actually born, just… grown in a tube. No wonder Hex looked exactly like her. Screw ‘sister,’ they were probably the same damn person. And from the looks of things, the tiny speck floating in the green was probably the next little sister to come. What the hell did Father want with them that he would go as far as to create people?!

“There was never an accident, was there?” Hex asked. “This was where we came from.”

Maggie sighed, trying not to let the idea overwhelm her. “Looks like it.”

“B-but… what does that mean for us?”

She scowled. “It means nothing. It doesn't matter where we came from, because we're here now. We exist, we're people, and we're not gonna let Father push us around anymore just because he created us.”

Hex took a shallow breath and nodded. It looked like she was about to cry, but she held it back. “Right.”

Maggie wanted to hug her, but she wasn’t sure she had the strength. Instead, she looked at the little rectangle next to the cylinder. There was writing on it.

SUBJECT G-7: ‘JORDYN’

STATUS: NORMAL

She sighed. “Good luck, Jordyn. You're gonna need it.”

“I think we went the wrong way,” Hex said. “We shouldn't stay here.”

“Agreed. Let's go.”

They turned and exited back the way they came, into the room with all the windows and the sleeping person. They were going to just cross through back into the elevator when something on one of the windows caught Maggie's eye. She stopped walking.

“What is it?” Hex whispered.

“That window has writing on it. It says our numbers.”

“So?”

“Any information could be helpful, Hex. We know literally nothing about the outside world, or honestly, ourselves. It's worth it.”

“What if the guy wakes up?”

“I'll take him out.”

Hex bit her lip, hesitating, but ultimately, she nodded. “Okay.”

The two of them silently crept over to the wall of windows, focusing on the one at the bottom. The person in the chair – who they could see now was a man – didn’t react. Sure enough, the window displayed both of the numbers Maggie and Hex had on the back of their necks. They started to read.

Subject G-5

Power already manifesting in early development stage. Subject has a pair of wings growing from her back. Whether or not they will actually allow for flight remains to be seen. Named ‘Magpie.’

(I will not allow a subject with a purely cosmetic power to waste my time. Is there any way to ensure that her wings will work? - Andreas)

(With a little bit of genetic engineering, we can give her super-dense muscles for some added strength. It’s not a guarantee, but it should help! - George)

(Do it. - Andreas)

Maggie rubbed her bicep absent-mindedly. She thought she was this strong from her own merit, but it was just Father – or ‘Andreas,’ if she had to guess which one was him – tampering with her even more. The idea made her feel sick. She kept reading.

Post-birth, everything is falling into expected parameters. Habilitation to continue.

Subject has a particularly rebellious personality, and is not very receptive to orders or Andreas’ explanation of why she is missing her memories. Programming may have failed to set in properly for whatever reason. Continuing to study.

Subject appears to have become quite attached to G-6 post introduction, and vice versa. Whether or not this is a good or bad thing for the program remains to be seen.

Subject excelling at locomotive and combat training. Subject’s aggressive personality, while difficult to control at times, is proving very effective in battle. Expected to pass exam with ease.

Subject interrupted one of G-6’s punishments, assaulting Andreas and threatening him. Her protectiveness of G-6 has proven to be a liability. No solution to this has been found as of yet. Correction chip was effective in subduing subject. Punishment to be carried out.

‘Correction chip?’ That was what knocked her out back then? Maggie shuddered. Just how much had Andreas tinkered with her and Hex’s bodies?

That was where her entry ended, and Hex’s entry began. She continued on.

Subject G-6

Subject was pulled out of formation tank early due to unexpected complications that would have otherwise resulted in her death. As a result, her body and brain were not fully formed, leaving her in a child-like state. Estimated physical age to be around 12 years old. Termination was considered, but subject displayed a strong telekinetic power that could effectively make up for her underdeveloped body. Named ‘Hex.’ Proceeding with habilitation.

(Well, this throws a wrench into things. How are we going to explain this to G-5? - George)

(Don’t worry, I’ll handle it. - Andreas)

Upon introduction, subject bonded with G-5. Cohabitation seems as though it will be successful. Continuing habilitation and beginning locomotive training soon.

Subject is struggling with locomotive training due to development issues, but seems determined to continue. Programming seems to have settled in well.

Locomotive performance has plateaued at an unsatisfying result. Punishments to ensue if the subject shows no more progress.

That was the end of Hex’s notes. The last one made Maggie want to punch the window, but she held herself back. What kind of a monster would resort to… to doing what Maggie had witnessed, just because a child wasn’t doing good enough?!

“Maggie, your wings!” Hex whisper-yelled.

“Ngh?”

It was too late. In Maggie’s anger, she’d failed to notice that her wings had puffed up, getting ready to extend so she could fly. In doing so, they’d bumped into the guy in the chair and woke him up. The two stared at each other.

He started scrambling. “H-Hey! What-”

Hex’s eyes widened, and the man was suddenly flung across the room, slamming into the far wall hard enough for Maggie to hear an audible crack. For a second, she thought he might have died, but he was still squirming around. She could use this.

Maggie let go of Hex and limped over to the man, gingerly kneeling down and grabbing him by the lapels. 

“Wh-what…? M… Magpie?”

“How do we get out of here?” she demanded. “Tell me, or I’m gonna start breaking things.”

“I… I don’t… what?”

From the look of it, he probably had a pretty bad concussion. Maggie sighed and tried again, speaking slower.

“How. Do. We. Get. Out. Of. Here?”

It finally seemed to click for the guy. About a hundred different emotions flickered across his face; most of them some variation of fear.

“Y-you… You can’t.”

Maggie snarled. “Why not?!”

“Th-they’ll find you. No matter where you go. They’ll track your chips and bring you back.”

“Chips? Like the correction chip?”

His eyes widened. “How do you…”

Maggie remembered when Andreas used it on her. She remembered exactly where the pain came from; where it was the most intense. “They’re in the backs of our necks, aren’t they?”

The man glanced from side to side, like he was trying to come up with a lie. “I…”

Whatever. That was good enough. They could figure out the elevator on their own. Maggie finished the guy off with the strongest jab to the face she could muster in her weakened state.

“What do we do now?” Hex asked as Maggie limped back over.

“We’ve got to get these chips out. They’re in the backs of our necks. If we don’t get rid of them, Andreas will be able to find us no matter how far we run.”

Hex grimaced. “This is gonna hurt, isn’t it?”

“Yep. But that’s what we’ve trained for.”

—

With the help of a first aid kit and a shard of glass from a broken cup, Maggie and Hex cut the back of each other’s necks open, and managed to fish out the horrible chip. There was a lot of whimpering, crying, and shouting involved, but they got through it in the end, stitching each other up just as they were trained for. Maggie felt sick having to hurt Hex like that, but it was the only way for them to truly be safe from Andreas once they got out. There was nothing she wouldn’t do to ensure that man never got his hands on them ever again.

Maggie wiped her eyes and sighed, trying to ignore the stinging pain in the back of her neck. “Are you ready to go?”

Hex nodded, her bottom lip still quivering. “Yeah.”

They stumbled over to the elevator, holding onto each other for support. Maggie eyed the buttons on the wall wearily. Nothing to it but luck, she supposed. She pressed the one at the top and the elevator started moving again.

“We’ve got this,” she whispered in Hex’s ear. “We’re gonna be okay. No one’s gonna lay a finger on us anymore.”

Hex’s nose crinkled, but a smile played at her lips. “Your breath smells bad.”

Maggie snorted out a laugh. “Gimme a break. I haven’t brushed my teeth in two days. You’re just lucky we had time for me to shower, or I’d probably still reek of urine.”

Hex chuckled. “Yeah. I didn’t wanna say anything when I found you, but wow, you didn’t smell good.”

“Aren’t I lucky to have such a caring little sister.” Maggie grinned.

The elevator reached its destination and the doors opened, revealing a room neither of them had ever seen before. It was wide and open, with a carpeted floor and several chairs sitting against the walls. Maggie couldn’t ascertain what its purpose was. On the far end of the room from the elevator, the wall was made entirely of glass, and a dim, cool light was drifting in from the other side. There was a door in the glass. It called to her; an odd tug in her gut urging her towards it. Somehow she knew; this was the way to the outside world. They were free.

She charged forward, filled with renewed strength, and slammed the door open. Cold air slammed into them right back.

There was a man in her way. His eyes widened at the sight of her face, then he looked to Hex and they widened even further. He wasn’t one of the familiar faces from the facility. This guy was just… a regular person. Huh.

Maggie wrapped her arms around Hex, flapped her wings, and finally took proper flight for the first time in her life. Cold wind rushed in her hair and through her feathers. Hex shrieked in delight from the thrill. The world stretched out below her and the sky opened up above her, little pinpricks of light twinkling in her eyes as freedom filled her lungs. She wouldn’t trade it for the world.

—

ONE WEEK LATER

If there was one thing Maggie had learned about the outside world in the brief week since they’d escaped, it was that the outside world was nothing like what she and Hex were used to. There were no more steadily provided meals, no convenient clothing that was always cleaned when they needed it, no directions or schedule or order. It was just her and her little sister against the world.

Hex’s stomach rumbled loud enough for Maggie to hear it. Maggie clenched her fists against the guilt that washed over her. She was supposed to be taking care of her, but she was failing miserably. She could barely even take care of herself. Hex was being so good about it, not complaining, always staying strong, but they couldn’t keep going like this. They were losing weight. Every night they almost froze to death, huddled up together wherever they could find even a modicum of shelter. What little food they could find was few and far between; pitiful scraps scavenged from bins or off the floor. Maggie had broken into a building to get them some new clothes the night they escaped, but it wasn’t going to last. She just had no idea how the outside world worked, frankly. Not for the first time, she wondered if escaping was a bad idea after all. 

Not everything was hopeless, though. Maggie had an idea that might help them get a little bit more to eat. She’d been doing her best to study up on what life was like out here; watching people from the shadows, reading whatever ‘newspapers’ she could get her hands on, and she reckoned she might have stumbled onto something promising.

A little ways away from their little hideout, there was a big plot of empty land, and every day, a bunch of guys would show up and start putting something together. A new building, if she had to guess. The way Maggie figured, if she could help the guys out a little bit, they might be inclined to help her out, too. A proper meal, some new clothes, maybe even a comfortable place to rest their heads. It was worth a shot, at least.

So, one day, Maggie and Hex donned their sunglasses – the best way they could figure to hide their identities, lest Andreas hear something and come looking – and made their way over to the yard.

The men were hard at work when they got there, each buried in their own task. Maggie walked up and, summing all of her courage, called out to them.

“Uh, e- excuse me!”

A few of the men stopped what they were doing and looked their way, before glancing to one man in particular. He stood up from where he was crouched near a steadily growing brick wall and raised a hand to the others. They got back to work, and the man walked over to the two of them.

“Hi, can I help you?” he asked, taking off his own sunglasses and wiping the sweat from under the weird hat he and the rest of them were wearing. His tan skin was speckled with pockmarks, and a dark, full stubble had taken up most of his jaw. He was quite handsome, actually. Maggie’s stomach fluttered a little as he looked her up and down, glancing at her wings, though that also could have been from hunger.

“Yes, u-um, actually, I was wondering if I could help you.” Maggie clenched her fists, letting out an awkward laugh. This felt weird. “I, uh, I’m pretty strong. I could lift some things, i-if you need. Hex here has telekinesis, too, so… Um, she could also help.”

The man frowned. “You want… a job?”

Maggie didn’t know what that word meant, but she nodded. “If that’s what it takes to get some food, then yes.”

There was a pause as the man analysed her. “You guys are in some trouble, aren’t you?”

“Please,” Hex suddenly blurted out. “We’re… we’re just hungry. If there’s anything we can do to earn some food, please. Let us help.”

The man bit his lip, glancing to the side. After a few seconds, he looked back at Maggie. “Alright, I’ll tell you what. I can’t let you guys work on the site for… well, for obvious reasons, but if you come with me, I can get you two something to eat, and we can sit down and talk this through. The company I work for is owned by the Heroes’ Union, so we should be able to work something out and get you guys some help. Sound good?”

Half of that meant literally nothing to Maggie, but at this point, she would take anything. She nodded.

“Alright,” the man said, holding out his hand. “The name’s Diego, by the way. Nice to meet you.”

—

Back in the present, Maggie smiled at the memory of her and Diego’s first meeting as she pulled her shirt back on and struggled to get her wings through the holes. It had been almost two years since then, and Maggie felt lucky for that chance encounter every single day.

Diego had taken them back to this very apartment, gave them their first warm meal in over a week, let them shower, gave them a change of clothes and heard them out; every last detail of their fucked-up story. At the time, Maggie hadn’t known how much to omit, so she just told him everything. If he’d been anyone else, that could have ended terribly for them, but thankfully, they’d run into one of the few genuinely good people in this city. He was the only one that knew the whole truth; that Maggie and Hex were nothing more than unwilling body doubles for a woman that died five years ago; that Andreas de Vygon was playing God below the precinct, creating life and forcing it to do his bidding; that Seven wasn’t just a superhero working for the police, but the next body double down the line. As far as any of his bosses knew, Diego had just taken in some powered people in need of help, and provided him the resources to do so. If not for his generosity, Maggie was sure she and Hex would have died on the streets, clueless and alone.

Not wanting to be a burden, Maggie once again begged Diego to let her work at the construction site, and finally, he acquiesced, promising to teach her how things worked. These days, it was what she spent most of her time doing, saving the company money by using her wings to do the high-up work that anyone else would need safety equipment for. It was hard work for sure, but it was rewarding, knowing that she was helping earn to support herself and her sister.

It was about a year after they started living together that this… thing that had been dancing between them finally caught alight. Maggie’d had time to learn about the world, about people, about relationships and how things worked. She’d seen them on TV, read about them in books, figured out how to determine the good from the bad by scouring the internet, and finally, made her move on Diego. They’d been sharing a few drinks after Hex went to bed, watching a movie together on the couch, and Maggie just went for it, grabbing his face and kissing him then and there when the moment presented itself.

Maybe it was the alcohol, or maybe she was just pent up from literally never receiving sexual touch from another person in her life, but things progressed very quickly from there and they took it straight to the bedroom. Safe to say, it was a night she would never forget.

They had a proper conversation about it the morning after, where Diego admitted that he’d felt the same way for a while, but wasn’t comfortable making a move considering that, for a lot of their relationship up to that point, Maggie was entirely dependent on him, and considering how little she knew about… anything, the dynamic would have been a little weird. But now that she’d started working, now that she had her own money and a half-decent understanding of the world, and now that he knew she was actually super interested in him, too, he figured they could give this thing a shot. And the rest was history.

Jordyn’s appearance on the streets had scared her. She knew it was only a matter of time before she came after their fragile peace, smashing through their glass walls and leaving Maggie and Hex nothing more than a bad memory in Andreas’ mind, splattered across Diego’s floor. That tiny speck that once floated in the green had grown into a monster, and Maggie had no choice but to get ahead of it.

To that end, and much to Diego’s protest, Maggie had gone hunting. What she needed was equipment. Weaponry that could stand up to a killer of Maggie’s own calibre. Sure, Maggie’d had more time to build her muscles, and she was undoubtedly one of the strongest people alive already, thanks to Andreas’ tinkering, but Jordyn had the backing of the entire police force behind her. Maggie needed to be smart.

So, she slaughtered two SWAT officers and stole their guns. Then she used that sniper rifle to shoot Jordyn down. Only, she underestimated the strength of her armour, and only succeeded in pissing Andreas off. For a month, she laid low, hiding out in the apartment and waiting for things to cool off. And once they did, she tried again.

Jordyn was no pushover, though, and gave her a real run for her money. Maggie got her down though. Got her down, and was seconds away from pulling the trigger and ending it, when that pathetic, terrified look on her face made Maggie freeze. 

Did she make the right choice in letting her little sister live? Who could say. The only thing to do was move forward, and take every day as it came. Maggie and Hex were alive, and they were free, and that was the only thing that truly mattered.

“Maggie?”

“Hm?” She blinked, returning to her body. Hex had been calling to her. “What’s up?”

“We were trying to ask what you wanted from McDonalds. Get lost in your head again?”

Maggie smiled. “Yeah. Thinkin’ about stuff.”

“Well, you’d better hurry up and order, birdie, or I’ll get you a 20 pack of chicken nuggets again,” Diego joked.

Maggie let out a mock gasp. “You wouldn’t dare! Making me eat my own kin; shame on you!”

Diego laughed, and Maggie basked in the sound. It was times like these that it felt like everything would turn out alright after all.

Taglist: @steelandblood @sapphicwhump @urnumber1star @alsolucakairomi @idkwhattodowiththisaltiamsorry

@iamheretohurt @anoyedartist @dontyoubleedoutonme @seastarblue @lettherebepain

@bacillusinfection

wahoo bird lady backstory!!!

i do really love maggie as a character, but in truth, she doesn't actually get all that much screentime in the current outline of the plot. granted, that outline is in the literal haziest terms imaginable, so that's open to change lol. or maybe i'll write a maggie spinoff once this is done

only 2 more chapters until the end of this arc! next up, we reconvene with Steve and see the results of his little investigation hehehehehehehehehehehehehehe (evil but cute laugh)

thanks for reading! let me know what you thought in a comment or reblog! It's v appreciated :> Ciao!

[chaoticwhisperedthoughts]

Does anyone has a ship, canon or not, from a movie/show that they never watched before and started to watch because of said ship? 'cause come to thing about it almost all my favorites I heard about it either here, ao3, wattpad, etc. Some I end it up watching and loving the show, but for the most part I didn't like it very much or just didn't have the patience to finish it, but to this day I will read fics and defend them no matter what happened in canon.

For me some examples ar like supercorp, swanqueen, dovesso, jemilly, holtzbert, wondercheetah and korrasami...

And don't even get me started on the amount of crushs that I have on characters that for the most part my only knowledge come from fics, posts or short clips from youtube, but I still would let those womem do whatever they want with me.

[cosmocove]

much ado about pleasure

[transmascutena]

thinking about how akio sees his younger self in utena and wondering if there's any fondness there. doesn't change the horror of what he does to her obviously but i do wonder

[hiraethwrote]

THE HEART GROWS FONDER

pairing : kento nanami x f!reader summary : (requested) — kento nanami loved you before he even knew you, and his feelings were the one thing he never questioned. like pieces of a puzzle, you fit together. whatever happens, your feelings never waver. cw : childhood friends to lovers, reader is v emotional, canon events/jjk0 spoilers, mentions of character death, mutual and intense pining, miscommunication lack of communication, mild one-bed-trope?, platonic!satoru (bc apparently i am unable to write anything without mentioning him), light profanity, pet names, talk of wedding, sweet fluff, a good chunk of angst, slight jealousy, no use of y/n word count : 10.1 k

Kento was a knowledgeable man.

He knew how long it took to get from one place in Tokyo to another, no matter what time of day it was. Well aware of all the best routes for traveling the city most efficiently, even during rush hours.

He knew all the ways to make the most money. Not what he was proudest of, but working hard had garnered him a set of useful skills that made him a good employee, a real asset to the company.

He knew how to read a map, a skill long forgotten by most in this day and age. Should he ever find himself in a situation where there was no reception, he would be able to get his hands on a sheet displaying the nearby areas and figure out how to return to civilisation.

He knew how to best take care of his body. He had done extensive research to make sure he moved his body correctly during workouts to not harm himself. He wasn’t interested in aching joints when he was old and gray.

And he knew he loved you — since the very first moment his eyes landed on you all those years ago.

He remembered the exact moment in excruciating detail as well, like how he had turned a little scared at the unfamiliar sensation of a racing heartbeat. When pressing his hand to his chest, he felt the rapid thumping. He quickly realised it was caused by the sight of you when it happened every time he spotted you.

His dad would tease him whenever he caught Kento sitting in the windowsill, chubby cheeks resting on his forearms as he gazed lovingly towards the little girl playing in her front yard a few houses down. “I’m sure she would love to play with you.” His face would turn bright crimson, a colour that had become all too common in the Nanami household whenever you were brought up, before an embarrassed Kento would stomp up to his room.

He didn’t learn your name until the first day of school — your parents had arranged for the two of you to walk to school together. He had been over the moon when he heard the news, pure excitement filling his body to the point where he could not sit still. But the moment he was stood in front of you, your voice sweet as honey when introducing yourself, his throat dried out and he turned tongue tied. His mom placed a hand on his shoulder, bringing his feet back on the ground, “Kento,” he croaked weakly before disappearing into his jacket.

With small feet carrying you to and from school, you tried to force a conversation out of him but to no prevail. He remained shy and quiet, eventually resulting in a statement that had saddened him more than he could have anticipated; “you don’t talk much, do you?”

There had been no ill intent in your words, but it had Kento distance himself from you. What was supposed to blossom into a friendship (and maybe even more with time), only simmered down to him consistently trialing five steps behind you on the path to school that became all too bleak when it hadn’t turned out how he had imagined it.

His infatuation didn’t seem to disappear anytime soon either. If anything, now having the opportunity to observe you in closer proximity only deepened his feelings. He now got to witness the outgoing and bubbly personality that was wrapped in your cute exterior, exceeding all his expectations of what he had imagined you would be like — fascinated by how you seemed to excel in aspects where he lacked.

And the more time that passed, it seemed the day he would find the courage to catch up and walk along side you traveled further out of his reach.

He continued to admire from afar, watching as you earned yourselves new friendships as easily as putting your shoes on in the morning. Kento wasn’t the only one drawn to your outgoing personality and charming smile, his heart breaking a little when you formed a tight knit friend group and he didn’t get to be a part of it.

That’s how it went. Kento sort of just blended into the background, never making a number of himself. He was nearly certain no one really knew he even existed at all (except the teachers, who absolutely adored him). Day after day, he sat by himself with a book in his hands, only ever looking up to admire you for a few seconds as you would play with your friends.

However, he preferred the quiet life in school more than what it evolved into as second grade rolled around.

During recess, he would sit with his book, same as always, counting the minutes until school was over so he would walk those five familiar steps behind you — that’s when two third graders had approached him, their intention clear as day.

Their antics continued for two weeks — until what he thought was the voice of an angel interrupted.

“Hi there.”

Kento would recognise that voice anywhere, turning towards the source to see you, huge grin plastered on your face, both hands behind your back as you stared down the two third graders.

“What’s going on here?” You asked in such a sweet and innocent tone, but all three of the boys could see there was something borderline unfriendly in your eyes that was not present in your words.

“Doesn’t concern you,” one of the mean kids bit back.

“Hmm,” you hummed, pressing your lips together before shifting to a serious tone. “I think it does, because from over there-“ you pointed in the direction of where you had stood moments earlier, “it looked like you were picking on my friend.”

Friend? Had he heard you right?

Before they could retaliate, you had already opened your mouth again, “I’ll scream! The adults will come and you’ll be in biiiig trouble!” Your tone had been so cheerful, but that same threatening intent lingered in your gaze — a look one did not want to receive from a stubborn, little seven year old.

It seemed like your scare tactic worked, because after grumbling to themselves for a few seconds, they shuffled away with their tails between their legs. And once they were far enough away not to be a bother anymore, you squatted down on the gravel beside Kento, wrapping your arms around your legs.

“You okay, Kento?” Completely transformed, not a hint of your malice present any longer, just soft and genuine concern when speaking his name.

He blinked a few times, using the back of his hand to dry the few tears that had watered up in the corner of his eyes before he answered you. “‘M fine,” he sniffled, then daring to look you in the eyes to mutter a shy “thank you.”

“Anytime.”

You couldn’t explain why you had decided to interfere — because labelling Kento a friend wasn’t entirely true. The boy had barely said a word to you for the year you had known him, but you had just been filled with anger when you witnessed the older kids choose to pick on him. He did not have a mean bone in his body. And maybe somewhere along the line, you had gained a soft spot for the reserved kid, having not been able to stop glancing over your shoulder from time to time when you walked to and from school, just to make sure he was still there.

Never had Kento imagined that the taunting from his upperclassman would be his biggest blessing to date. He no longer sat alone during lunch, but instead accepted your invite to eat with you and your little clique.

And finally your friendship with Kento had the opportunity to grow.

Thanks to you, school had become a lot more enjoyable for him after that. The walks to and from school was no longer spent with an awkward distance, now matching your pace as you both indulged in small talk from the moment you left school until he left you at your door.

He knew he should have been satisfied, and in one way he was. He was finally allowed to call you his friend after all, but during school hours, you usually hung out the entire group. And on your spare time, you had a tendency to reserve your time just for the girls. So while he wished for more, he continued to shoot longing, and not so subtle, gazes across the table.

It abruptly changed when you were thirteen, walking home from school like any other day, when your blunt question had cut through the conversation.

“Hey, you want to go to the movies with me?”

“What?” Kento’s thirteen year old brain had not been able to comprehend the question, stopping dead in his tracks to stare at you with big eyes, swallowing the massive lump in his throat. Had you just asked him on a date?

You stopped when you noticed he did, staring right back at him like this wasn’t a big deal. “None of the girls were interested, and you’re the only boy in our group I can tolerate without any of the girls,” you rolled your eyes. You had turned a little feisty when entering your teens.

“Uh, yeah, sure,” he said, drawing his lips into an awkward line, hoping he could play it off as a smile.

Your deadpanned expression immediately twisted into one of pure joy. “Great!”

Kento had stood in front of his mirror all afternoon, using both his hands to smoothen the crinkles of his shirt, treating it very much like a date. He didn’t even realise how long he had been stressing in his room until his mom came knocking, telling him you were waiting outside.

He had been a little disappointed when he saw you, because it became very evident you did not consider it a date. Wearing the same outfit you had worn to school that day, resting on the handlebars of your bike. “C’mon, we need to get popcorn before the movie starts,” you nagged, just the tiniest bit annoyed.

When stood in the kiosk, he had offered to pay for the popcorn, like the good, little gentleman he had been raised to be. “Oh, no need. Mom gave me money to pay for it,” you said cheerfully with a shrug and a smile. “Thanks, though.”

The movie couldn’t hold Kento’s attention, even if he wanted to, because for the whole ninety minutes you had your knee rested against his. The sensation of the shy touch of your leg had his heart beat so loud against his ribcage, he was scared you might turn to him and tell it to shush so you could hear the movie.

It wasn’t much, but the pressing feeling was definitely prominent enough that you had to be aware of it too. And in his mind, it seemed only logical you kept your leg still against his because you wanted it to touch him. But whenever he flickered his eyes over to you, you seemed utterly unbothered, attention fixated on the screen as your hand continued to grab popcorn from the bucket.

He tried to keep his breath even, letting his tension spill out by clenching and unclenching his fists. He was so determined to sit completely still, scared the tiniest flinch would cause you to shift your leg away from him.

Trips to the movies, just in each other’s company, became a regular occurrence after that. And about half of the time, you let him pay… only because you paid the other half, but he let himself wallow in the idea that he was treating you for the evening.

He was in high school when one of your friends had asked about it. “What’s really going on there, Kento?”

He had immediately decided to play dumb. Not because he was embarrassed, but if there was even the slightest chance it would feed them material they could use to make you uncomfortable, he wanted to avoid it. “What do you mean?”

“Come on, man,” he laughed mockingly. “You and her,” nodding towards where you stood with your girlfriends in the cafeteria line. “The two of you hang out with each other more than us these days.”

“I don’t know, we’re friends?” Kento shrugged, almost certain he was able to play it off as casual.

“Friends? Right, friends who constantly go on movie dates together.”

“They’re not dates,” was all he had been able to say to defend himself, feeling his cheeks grow hot like they had done when he was younger.

They had all chucked at him then. “Yeah, whatever man. Congratulations bagging the prettiest girl in school,” was the last thing that was said before you and the rest of the girls joined their table. You sat down beside Kento, like always.

Carefully, you had nudged his arm to get his attention. “You okay?” You asked quietly so only he could hear.

He gave you a weak but genuine smile. “Yes, just lost in thought is all.” You smiled back at him, making his heart skip a beat.

You don’t remember when it changed for you. If it had been a gradual thing, or if you had just woken up one day with this feeling — but something was definitely different.

The realisation had hit you mid sentence. Rambling on about some meaningless topic, like you always did, and suddenly you noticed the way he was looking at you.

He was listening so intently, not missing a single word coming from your mouth, a faint smile stamped at the corner of his lips and a tenderness in his eyes you hadn’t really noticed before. You only managed to snap out of it when he spoke your name.

“Am I losing you by not talking?” He teased before taking a sip out of his coffee.

“Shit,” you muttered, his eyebrows raising in surprise. “I just remembered this group assignment I have due tomorrow.” A lie — and an obvious one at that. But Kento didn’t get a moment to ask any follow-up questions before you had gathered your stuff and rushed to say goodbye, leaving him alone in the cafe.

For the entire walk home, you thought about Kento, now suddenly in a new light, reflecting over the entirety of your friendship.

You became aware of how he always seemed to prioritise you in the group without hesitation. You had just brushed it off, assuming he felt indebted to you for coming to his rescue when you were seven. But you realised now how ridiculous that sounded.

You thought of all the times he had come running when you had asked for him. Whether it was after a fight with one of your girlfriends, or a date that had gone horribly wrong, he dropped everything to be by your side.

You realised now why you always caught yourself answering with a frown when girls came to ask you about him. As you had gotten older, he had definitely grown into his looks, a subtle kind of handsome that snuck up on you.

When you got home, you had pulled out your phone to send a text to apologise for bailing so abruptly. But you typed and deleted the message twenty times over, anxiety you had never felt about him before overwhelming you. In the end, you ended up not sending anything at all, feeling like no words sufficed.

And the next time you met, you acted as if nothing had happened, and he just went along with it.

You tried desperately to act as if nothing had changed, beyond terrified you would scare him off or make him uncomfortable if he picked up on your new and revolutionary feelings for him. If there was one thing you were absolute certain about, it was that you would never do anything to jeopardise the friendship you had with him. There was no competition of what person in your life you cherished the most; Kento Nanami. You’d be the earth's biggest fool to gamble that away for anything.

When you were 16, you nearly caved.

In your desperate attempt of keeping things normal, you had continued your meaningless escapades — which meant going on terrible dates with even more terrible guys — turns out teenage boys are just assholes by default.

“It’s their loss,” Kento cooed in a warm tone, sitting beside you on your bed with a comforting arm around your shoulders.

In all honesty, you didn’t even care all that much about the date. You couldn’t even remember the guy’s name. No, your mind was way more interested in how his strong hand cupped your arm so perfectly.

You turned to look at him, faces closer than ever before. He happily held your gaze — you were just hoping he was able to read the messages it conveyed.

Tell me to stop seeing these guys, and I’ll stop.

Tell me you want me the way I want you.

Tell me it’s you I’m meant to be with.

“You’ll find someone worthy of you eventually.”

Your heart sunk, having built up your own expectations based on how his eyes had roamed your face as if he truly desired you. Maybe this was all in your head.

It wasn’t.

But Kento, much like you, didn’t want to lose you over anything. Confessing risked the relationship he already had with you. He would rather have you as a friend, than not have you in his life at all.

Not long after that, you both joined Jujutsu tech. Slowly but surely, you slipped away from your childhood group — him more than you. You tried your very best to stay in touch, though your new schedule made that hard.

With these new threats looming around you, neither of you could help how your friendship — or whatever you would call what was going on between you — continued to grow deeper. More serious. It went unsaid by the both of you, but there was just a mutual understanding that it was the logical development when there was the slightest possibility of it ending all too soon.

Still neither of you confessed.

You fell into routines, so accustomed to seeing him every minute of every day, your first instinct when returning from a mission was to find him.

As expected, Kento heard the three soft knocks he knew all too well at this point, before you squeezed through his door. With a deep exhale, you fell back on his bed, while he sat in his desk chair, arms crossed over his chest. “I’m exhausted.”

“Did you just get back?” His muscles were a little tense, like they always where whenever you had to go on a mission without him, his eyes searching every inch of you to see if there were any visible injuries he had to worry about.

“Little over an hour ago. Had to escape Gojo talking my ear off about his own mission.”

Kento observed how the corner of your lips tugged upwards in a tired smile, your chest vibrating with a soft chuckle.

He was always happy to see you come back unharmed, but he hated the exhaustion that rested in your joints — and it filled him with an unexplainable urge to help you somehow.

He imagined guiding you to lay on your stomach, placing his legs on each side of you and slowly soothing your muscles, rubbing caring motions along the curves of your body to fill it with the relaxation you deserved — but he couldn’t. It would definitely cross a line, too intimate for just friends.

“Glad you’re back,” he said almost in a whisper.

“Me too.” He could barely hear you, the mission slowly catching up with your energy as well, sensing on your breathing that you weren’t too far from falling asleep.

The silence that surrounded you was comfortable. You had grown so accustomed to each other’s presence, any awkwardness had ceased to exist. Nevertheless, Kento didn’t quite know what to do with himself, just looking at you sprawled out on his bed, a scene he would like to see every night.

“Kento?” Your voice was so soft.

“Yes?”

“Can I stay here tonight?”

He heard the slight hesitation in your voice before you expressed your request. Raising up his neck and face was a burning heat, his breathing coming out shallow as he didn’t quite know what to say.

Being a cautious man, he thought of every possible outcome.

It was prohibited, so he should decline. But he would hate himself forever if he simply sent you away because of the school’s outdated rules — he also knew he would regret it until his heart stopped beating.

So having you stay here was the only reasonable outcome — but then what? He supposed he would end up sleeping on the floor, like the gentleman he was. He would at least never assume he could sleep next to you, and he would not be as vulgar to ask.

He cleared his throat before speaking. “Of course. I’ll just-“

“Kento,” you said his name again, just as soft as always.

“Yeah?”

“There’s room for both of us on the bed.”

He had to swallow the massive lump that felt as if it was suffocating him. It at least stopped any further words to come out of his mouth. He slowly raised from the chair, floorboards creaking as he stepped over.

With his eyes locked on you, seemingly so calm with your eyes closed, he positioned himself beside you so he was facing you.

Goosebumps prickled up his arm when he felt your breath fan against his face, and he wondered how you managed to keep it in such an even rhythm. Didn’t this closeness send lightning through your body like it did for him, temptation threatening the act of finally crossing the line?

There was a crease between your eyebrows that seemed unintentional, like the events of the day had just planted themselves on your face and even your calm breathing couldn’t ease it. Against his better judgment, Kento’s urges steered his thumb towards your face, not reflecting over his action before he had ran his skin across the crinkle to smoothen the tension.

Shit, he thought to himself, certain you would open your mouth to tell him off — instead he saw how there had been a slight strain to your shoulders that was now released.

While he let his eyes roam your face, taking in every breathtaking aspect of your beauty, he felt a small spark of fear fill him at how right it all felt — lying next to you, so close he could feel the warmth radiate from your skin, his soft touch being able to bring rest to your body, the mere idea that he could envelop you in his arms if he wanted to.

“I’m happy you’re here with me,” your voice startled him a little, as he had assumed you had already fallen into the oblivion of sleep. “I’d never be able to navigate this world without you.”

“That’s not true.” Your eyes opened to meet his, catching his breath immediately, so stunningly deep he always felt himself fall into them. “You’ve always been the one looking out for me.”

You chuckled a little at that, endless memories of the two of you throughout childhood. “I guess in one way. But you’ve always kept me afloat.”

“You give yourself too little credit.” He had to stop himself from letting his fingers graze your cheek in the most tender caress. “You would have done just fine on your own.”

A small smile of flattery dared dance on your lips. “But I don’t want to.” It felt like a confession, unspoken feelings hidden within those words, begging for him to be able to deduce the true meaning. “Thinking of a life where you’re not at my side scares me.”

“Let’s never find out what that life is like.”

Kento would later eat those words.

Haibara’s death hit Kento the hardest. Numerous evenings were spent in the eerie silence of his cold dorm. When he cried, you held him. When he was trying to distract himself by reading, you sat and watched him, keeping him company. When he went the entire night without sparing you the slightest gaze, you knew you had overstayed your welcome, leaving him to be alone for a night.

“I don’t think I will continue to be a sorcerer.”

That was the first thing he said that hadn’t been a complete necessity, and it sent a spike of ice down your spine, not daring to understand his statement right away.

“Oh,” was the only thing you could think of to respond that did not entertain his idea.

His eyes met yours, the eye contact more intense than it had been for days, realising just how much you had missed having his kind eyes directed at you. Seemed like he felt it too, as the smallest gasp slipped out of him.

“I mean it.”

The tears instantly burned in your eyes, blinking them away before they had the chance to come running. “That's what scares me,” your voice betrayed you as the usual confidence came out cracked.

He didn’t push it any further, reading you as an open book — you knew he was telling the truth, but refused to acknowledge it. It was like if you ignored his statement, it would somehow end differently.

Luckily, after that night, Kento started to somewhat fall back to his old self. His smile started to return, it was easier to hold a conversation with him, which you obviously appreciated — however, he had planted a fear in you that had taken your body hostage.

You abandoned any sense of boundaries entirely, hanging onto his arm at all times. It was only when you were physically aware of his frame you were able to cling onto a string of peace. Feeling his body glued at your side only served as a confirmation that he was still here, and as long as you held on he couldn’t go anywhere. He couldn’t leave.

And whenever you had to pry yourself off of him to tend to your responsibilities where he wasn’t assigned, you were constantly living in a state of anxiety. Foot tapping against the floor, picking at your skin, petrified you would end up returning to see his room stripped of any signs of life — that he would have finally done the thing he said he would do, and part with the Jujutsu world.

Every time you returned, the sweetest sensation of relief washed over you, tears welling up immediately when he always stood ready to greet you. “Hey you,” he said softly, pulling you into his arms, holding you tight until he could physically feel your body let go of the stress that had tainted every muscle, every joint, for the entire time you had been separated.

But graduation day came and time was up.

You had held onto hope he would eventually change his mind, that it was only the initial grief that had weighed heavy on his conscience. But you were now standing in his bare room, everything packed into cardboard boxes. Of course it had only been a childish dream to think he would stay — there was no changing his mind.

“I really am sorry.” He was so earnest, like always, making it hard to be mad at him even though you so desperately wanted to. He genuinely had so much compassion, his hands stroking your arms in an attempt to calm the bouncing of your shoulders that followed the frantic rhythm of your sobs.

“I just don’t understand why?” You continued to sob, sentence coming out in sad intervals as you heaved for air.

“This isn’t right. It’s not right of them to expect us to be okay with watching our partners lay down their lives like this.”

You wanted so badly to scream at him, bang your fists against his chest before clasping onto his shirt so he wouldn’t even have the opportunity to leave. You knew it was unwarranted for you to feel that way, but the fact that he was following through with his stunt felt like a betrayal.

“You said we weren’t going to find out what this would be like.”

His heart shattered. Looking into your doe eyes, tainted red with sorrow as the sentence laced with innocence sent him back to every fragile evening throughout your journey together he had spent comforting you. How many tears he had dried, happily so? But this time it was his doing — him who brought you to a state of despair so grave you couldn’t breathe, and he knew this time he wouldn’t be able to comfort you.

Waiting for his next words were torture, time at a standstill watching his mouth open and close while he constructed the sentence in his mind. Though useless, the glimmer of hope refused to die out, begging for his surrender — you’re right, I’ll stay.

“I’m sorry.”

Another one of your earth shattering sobs came flying past your lips, stabbing him right in the heart that had only ever beaten for you.

Comforting you would always be second nature to him, which had his hands cup your face and pulling it closer to rest his forehead against yours. He wished, begged, for his touch to bring you comfort one last time before he left. But your body continued to shake. “It’ll be okay,” he tried to reassure you, spoken in a faint whisper. Repeating it over and over, waiting for his small affirmations to take affect — they never did.

Ask me to come with you.

Those six words played like a broken record in your mind, knowing you would pack your bags and abandon this god forsaken life at the drop of a hat if he just asked you to.

Come with me.

The request laid restless at the tip of his tongue, fighting every voice in him that was screaming at him to be selfish. But he couldn’t with you, never with you.

Unlike him, you had a purpose in this world — you were able to see the good in what you did, and he would never be able to forgive himself if he ripped you away from it no matter how much he wanted to.

There seemed like there was no limit to your tears. Shuddering against his touch, he sensed your body didn’t have much energy left to stand. He ended up leading the two of you to his bed, stripped bare to just the mattress, duvet folded at the end. Without any words spoken, you laid down in his arms, burying your face in his chest while the sobs continued to tumble out uncontrollably.

His strong arms locked around you, holding you as close to him as humanly possible, letting the illusion of him never disappearing from you live on for another night.

Eventually your sobs calmed down, only happening sporadically. The shaking stopped and he felt your breathing even out, telling him you had finally been able to let sleep consume you.

He couldn’t stop himself — placing a chaste kiss at the crown of your head, mumbling quiet and secret apologies before sleep caught him too.

According to Gojo, his departure had been quick. He hadn’t said much, just given them all a nod before grabbing his bags and disappearing.

You had decided against seeing him off. The two of you had said your goodbyes the night before in the solemn of his empty dorm. It had been wet, heartbreaking and nothing short of painful, but at least it had been private between the two of you. No one knew how your tears had soaked his shirt, or how your fists had created crinkles in the fabric while desperately holding onto him. No one knew how you had cried until the exhaustion knocked you out in his arms, so scared to wake up to face the new reality where Kento wasn’t at your immediate side like he had been since you were kids.

You couldn’t really remember what it was like to not have him there. Even before you had grown close, he had always lingered, the one thing in your life that had stayed consistent throughout it all was him.

The next weeks were absolutely torture, having to feed the people surrounding you endless lies of “I’m fine, really.” You were really just trying to prevent yourself from letting the reality set in properly. If that can of worms were to open again, you had no clue when or how you would be able to stop it. Last time you had still been able to seek some comfort against his warmth, only able to stop it because you practically passed out.

Not a single moment passed where he didn’t cross your mind, small things reminding you of him. All your little routines — for days you forgot to grab lunch because you were so used to him bringing it to you. For days you ended up with one towel too many, because you always brought an extra for him after training. Mundane things you had always taken for granted, gone in an instant.

Despite feeling a little betrayed, you couldn’t really blame him either. So you reached deep within yourself to try and stay positive. It wasn’t like he was gone gone, he had just retreated to a normal life.

You stayed in touch, sending regular updates about how you were getting by in the world of curses without him — lying of course. When he had left, he had taken some of the purpose you had in it all with him. But you didn’t want him to worry. You told him how you eventually started teaching at Jujutsu High alongside Gojo, and it felt nice to be responsible for the next generation of sorcerers.

And at first you received regular updates in return. He got himself a quaint little apartment that fitted his needs perfectly. You even got a few blurry photos of how he had tried to decorate it so it would feel more homely — you had cried when you received those.

You never called each other though. It seemed like there was a mutual understanding that it would be too unbearable to hear the voice of the other.

After a while, the updates slowly came to a halt. You kept on sending yours however, only for that little checkmark to appear and confirm he had read it. But no answer — you cried then too.

Had you said something or done something to make him cut the contact? You never managed to wrap your head around why he stopped showing you his new life.

Kento had never wanted to stop sending the messages — on the contrary. If anything, he had to stop himself from not telling you about every single minute of his day, even the most meaningless things, just as an excuse to talk to you.

But one day, thanks to a white haired little birdie, all consuming guilt had struck him. “She doesn’t say it, but she’s miserable.”

He held his breath, his fingers unintentionally clenching tighter around his phone. “She is?” His voice came out faint. He heard Gojo let out a deep sigh at the other end of the line.

“She tries. Very hard. I stopped asking a long time ago because she kept lying anyways.”

“Oh.” Kento had been a fool, believing your words when he had read them on his screen. When he hadn’t been able to hear the tone behind the statements, he had been able to convince himself they were genuine. But of course you were lying — he was, after all.

“But I think she really enjoys teaching,” Gojo said after a moment of sad silence, trying to fill the conversation with some optimism. “And the kids love her.”

“Yes, I can imagine as much,” a small smile appearing on his lips, picturing the scene of you with the young students.

“Look, I have to run, she’s waving me over. Should I-“

“No!” Kento rushed to cut him off. “No, don’t say anything. Please.”

He made up his mind then and there — he was not going to cause you any more pain. So he had to let you go entirely to allow you to move on. The way he was selfishly clinging onto the crumps you gave him seemed to do you no good, if the image Gojo painted was accurate.

So he stopped. Even though his fingers urged to reach out, he fought against it, for you.

You, however, could not hinder how your finger pressed the send button every now and then. The updates definitely became less frequent when he went radio silent, but you did not have the strength to stop. If you stopped… there was a fear he would never come back.

Kento was supposed to share his life with you.

He had believed so ever since he was a little kid, ogling you from afar before he even knew your name. The way you made his heart jump and pulse quicken had to be his body’s way of telling him you were meant to be with him, quickly growing addicted, dependent, on the reactions you created in him without trying.

But he had made the drastic choice of abandoning that feeling, convinced the alternative did you harm — and the mere concept of being the reason you even felt the faintest glimmer of discomfort was something he could not live with.

He welcomed the misery, a small price to pay for the belief that you were doing better now. He also thought he had good reason to believe that was the case.

The updates you sent him were few and far between these days, but it did paint a picture. You were rarely in the photos, but there was an energy present in the moments eternalised that seemed pleasant and positive. He imagined you had found your role, your place in life where you would get to fulfil your potential. And whether or not he was there was irrelevant.

He convinced himself his own insecurities were a reality to make it easier to bear.

Ever since childhood, you had been the headstrong one. The independent one. The brave one. It always lingered in the back of his mind whenever he just observed you in different scenarios — that it really didn’t matter if he was there or not, forever just an accessory to your life. He even feared he was holding you back somehow.

So it was only reasonable to think time away from him would have provided you with the playing field to develop into the best version of yourself… right?

Years went by and Kento’s pain didn’t ease. He missed you — every single day. And he kept living in that constant state of torture for you, until the fantasy shattered.

It was just another day, nothing out of the ordinary. Kento was going about his drowsy routines of stopping by the same bakery he did every morning before work. However today, he was nearly tackled by two kids, a boy and a girl about the age of six, once he entered the building.

“I’m so sorry, sir,” a grown woman rushed over to apologise as she brought the children back to their little table.

“It’s no problem,” he mumbled monotonously, eyes following them as they scattered back to their seats, where another woman sat.

A wave of nostalgia crashed over him, feeling like he had the privilege of looking back in time. The little boy resembled a young Kento Nanami, his blonde locks neatly styled, chubby, red cheeks and a baby-blue button up shirt — a rather mature attire for a six year old.

And the boy had his eyes glued on his friend, a girl the same age, very evidently the more outgoing out of the two. She was rambling enthusiastically, arms waving all over the place as he told her story down to the smallest detail, exhibiting the same spark you always had.

The boy kept a glare of pure awe as he followed her every word, seen so clearly in his eyes how much he admired her. And Kento knew how this story would continue — that night the boy would lay in his bed, the biggest smile on his face, unable to fall asleep as the day spent with his friend would play on repeat in his mind — much like Kento had spent countless nights when he was young.

It wasn’t until the girl behind the counter called for him he was able to pull his attention away from the all too familiar scene.

So polite, a sweet smile on her face as she served him the same thing he ordered every day. And then she asked how he was sleeping. It fascinated him, how this girl didn’t owe him anything, and had her own worries — like the little curse sat on her shoulder — and still showed concern for him.

He had noticed the curse before, but purposely never done anything about it. It wasn’t a proper threat, and it would be more of a hustle for him to deal with the reactions of ridding her of it than let it be. But now, having the innocent scene a few feet from him remind him of you, he quickly began to consider doing the girl a favour.

You would have exorcised it — without hesitation.

Not just that, you would probably give him crap for not exorcising it immediately. It wouldn't cost him anything to do it, so why wouldn’t he?

“Could you take a step forward, please?” Kento asked politely, the girl a little confused but doing as he said. He had your voice in the back of his mind while he easily exorcised the curse with one swift motion, the strain in her shoulder easing immediately.

“Huh? It’s lighter!” She exclaimed, rolling her arm around at the newfound relief.

“If anything still feels off, please go to the hospital,” he said with a small nod. He grabbed his food and headed for the exit, sparing one last glance at the table where the two kids sat, still deep in the conversation.

His lungs let out a deep, involuntary breath when the realisation dawned on him — he could no longer stay away, caving to his desires.

Maybe enough time had passed for it not to be considered selfish? If you had in fact found your place where you were content and comfortable, and meeting him again would be causal for you?

The questions kept circulating his mind as he pulled out his phone to dial the one person who would be able to set it all up at the blink of an eye.

His whole world stopped when he saw you, and he wondered how he had ever thought it a good idea to leave you — how could he possibly have survived all that time without you?

It was almost painful how his heart was clawing at the inside of his chest, desperate to be with you. It wasn’t until he felt the overwhelming pounding he realised his heart had not beat properly for the years he had spent away — meant to beat in unison with yours. His skin was turning cold as ice and the only way for it to regain its warmth was your touch, your soft embrace.

Kento hadn’t known what to expect when he saw you again, but he had certainly thought he would have more rational and coherent thoughts. Right now, it was all scrambling in his head and the only thing that appeared clearly in his mind was you, framed in the halo of your aura, taking his breath as way just as easily as when he was six.

With his body going numb, he observed you interact with Gojo and two kids he assumed were your students. You looked calm, a small smile decorating the plump line of your lips — it wasn’t as radiant as it used to be. In fact, your entire energy just seemed a little off. Maybe you had just gotten home from a mission, or it has been a hectic day in general.

Truth was not so mundane. You wished it was as simple as a long and tiring day. That would mean you could just jump in bed and sleep it off, ready to face a new day tomorrow.

But the day Kento left the jujutsu society behind, he unintentionally stole your spark with him.

You could never hate him for it though, he didn’t know. He only did what he felt like he needed to do, and you would be a terrible friend to stand in the way of that. But you had no control over how your mind decided to react.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder was something you had always heard growing up, and you had never really understood it — until faced with the situation yourself.

Not a day went by where you didn’t think of Kento. You thought of how his grin always grew slowly when watching you, eventually revealing the shy smile lines across his cheeks. The ghost of his touch, which was always dancing the line of appropriate or not, never leaving your mind. Sometimes you still felt the imprint of his arms around you.

“Don’t you guys listen to him for a second,” you chuckled, the tiniest hint of frustration in your voice. “Gojo doesn’t qualify as a responsible adult.”

His jaw fell to the ground in fake offence, eyebrows narrowing at the innocent laughs spilling from the students. “You were never this mean when we were younger,” he whined, folding his arms across his chest, looking like a stubborn child.

“That’s what you think,” you teased, nudging an elbow into his side. “You should have heard the things we said about you behind closed doors.”

His big hand came piercing through the air, pressing it against your face, gently shoving you away from the conversation. A lighthearted, but genuine, little laugh escaped you. “We don’t want to hear what you and your little boyfriend did in private,” Gojo rolled his eyes, pretending to gag at the made up memories.

Annoying as he was, Gojo had a way to actually make you forget the pain of it all for a few seconds. You would never tell him, obviously, that he managed to put the storm inside your head on hold for a second — he would rub it in your face every chance he got.

“Wait, senpai had a boyfriend when she attended here?” One of the students interjected and suddenly the mood of the conversation shifted. Gojo’s hand fell from your face before he shot you an apologetic smile.

For the most part, it was never a problem whenever Kento was brought up in the company of Gojo and Shoko. Everything was out in the open between the three of you, shared history taking away some of the pain. But whenever it slipped outside your little trio, it quickly became a sore topic.

Mouth opening and closing, trying to find the words to answer without having to give an explanation. Luckily, a painfully familiar voice called your name behind you, instantly sending a shiver down your spine.

All of you turned towards the voice, and you couldn’t help but let out an audible gasp at the beautiful image of your other half standing in front of you after all these years.

Your heart’s instinct steered your body, quickly stepping away from the group and latching your arms around Kento’s neck, burying your face in the crook of his neck. He didn’t hesitate to close his strong arms around your frame, fitting right into the slots they used to fill. His familiar scent filled your senses, memories flooding back in an instant.

“Huh, speak of the devil,” Gojo mumbled.

“Him? That was her boyfriend?”

Gojo quickly snapped out of it. “Let’s give them some privacy, shall we,” and started rushing away the nosy teens.

Kento’s grip loosened and you pulled away, but neither of you dared let your hands leave each other. Your own hands ended up cupping his face, forcing him to keep his eyes on you until it hit you he was actually with you again — he let his rest on your waist, feeling the restlessness in him by how strongly his palms were pressing against you.

He was here. He was actually here.

There was a deafening silence filling the space of your office. You could feel it in the tension that both of you wanted to say something, but there was an unspoken pressure of saying the right thing.

So you let your eyes roam him, taking in the differences in his appearance.

He was gorgeous, same subtle handsomeness as he had always possessed, but a new confidence displaying it. Everything about him was more defined, sharp features drawing attention to his face, his muscles filling his shirt in a way they never did before.

“So, you and Gojo seem to work well together,” he swallowed, causing embarrassment to flush your face when he pulled you from your blatant admiring.

“We’ve found a rhythm that works for us, I suppose,” you shrugged.

He shifted awkwardly in his seat, arms flexing as he crossed them in front of him. “That’s good. I’m glad.” His tone of his short statements seemed to imply otherwise.

“He’s surprisingly good at his job,” you laughed, “the kids like him.”

“Who would have thought,” there was a pull of his lips, like he tried to smile but it didn’t succeed entirely.

“Not me, that’s for sure. I don’t know, he just meets them were their at.” You really wanted to stop rambling about Gojo. It was so clearly just a desperate way for you to replace the quiet that plagued you without touching the elephant in the room. “Don’t get me wrong, they find him insufferable, but I think they secretly really like him. Much like the rest of us.”

“Sounds about right.”

You squinted at him, slowly growing somewhat antsy. “You’re not jealous of Gojo, are you?”

Of course you still saw right through him. He, who usually managed to hide his true feelings, would never be able to conceal them from you. And he was jealous, petrified that he had made the biggest mistake of his life and Gojo had ended up taking the place that was supposed to be for him only.

“Is there something to be jealous of?”

“You tell me.”

The tension was thick, nearly suffocating, years of yearning and pining fuelling the energy. The reunion only served as a dangerous spark that threatened to set the fuse ablaze at any second.

Why couldn’t he take the first step? He was the one who had showed up all of a sudden, and he still hadn’t given you any explanation. He owed you that much, right? But he kept letting his restlessness control him, one leg bouncing quietly against the floor, hearing how the cogs in his mind were turning.

“Why are you here?”

Your words were soft, but Kento knew you well enough to know the true feelings that lingered in the question.

“I’m coming back.”

“You’re coming back?” You weren’t able to withhold the bite that was slowly making its way into your tone.

“Only if you’re comfortable with it.”

“Don’t do that,” your voice threatened to crack. “I don’t want that responsibility.”

He sighed deeply, unfolding his arms to rest his elbows on his spread knees. “That wasn’t my intention. I’m sorry.”

Always so polite. Always acknowledging his faults before they had the opportunity to grow. Always so damn righteous.

“What I meant to say is it looks like you’ve really managed to establish yourself here, and I wouldn’t want to come in and cause any discomfort by intruding what is essentially your space.”

The sound that escaped you next was a mixture between a flat laugh and a scoff, not entirely appreciating the way he was behaving. “Have we been apart so long you can’t talk to me like I’m your best friend?”

That had him look up at you, meeting your eyes instantly. You were sad, visible on your entire demeanour — maybe not to the average person looking, but he saw, still able to read you like an open book.

“Hope not,” he tried to smile, lips formed into a tight line that exposed how nervous he really was. His attention shifted to look at his fists folded together, words resting on his tongue, he just wanted to be sure it came out right. “I’ve missed you.” Silence. “There hasn’t been a day where you haven’t crossed my mind.”

“Sounds familiar.” There was no hiding the flush crawling up his neck and colouring the tips of his ears red at the sound of your confession.

“It was the thought of you that finally convinced me.”

“Why now?”

“Because enough time should have passed for you to thrive without me.”

“If that’s the case, you’ll have to keep waiting.”

You had him gagged, no clue how to respond. For some reason, he had refused to believe you were still hung up on him the way he was. There weren’t any reason for you to hold onto the idea of him — yet you had, for dear life.

Abruptly you stood up from your chair, hands running through your hair in frustration, trying to make sense of his sudden visit.

You stopped in your pacing, back faced him and hands on your hips — then he saw your shoulders begin to shake, followed by stifled sobs. These were the situations he always used to know what to do, moving on autopilot to bring you the comfort you needed.

Did his hands remember how to soothe you? Did his voice still know how to form the right words to say? Did his presence still know how to envelope you until you felt happy again? There was only one way to find out.

Quickly stepping over to you, his hands hovered over your shoulders for a second in fear. He swallowed his selfishness and let them land to settle the bouncing, leaning his head forward to rest it against the back of yours, the smell of your shampoo surrounding him.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered and it only seemed like his apology opened the valve, no longer able to choke your sobs. Your hands left your hips to cover your face, muffling the sadness tumbling out in one stream.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he continued to mutter, head moving to press it to the side of your face. One hand traveled across your collarbone, the other around your waist to pull you as close to him as possible, determined to hold you there until he was absolutely certain you were okay.

He would stand there the whole night if he needed to.

Slowly but surely, your sobs came to a stop, your trembling eventually easing against his body. But he didn’t loosen his grip, not until he felt you shift in his arms to face him.

Cry painted cheeks, delicate red rim around your eyes, glossy irises that stared right into the deepest parts of him that only you had access to.

Everything started to fall back into place, his big hand cupping your cheek as he stroked your hair out of your face. He let his eyes dart delicately across your face, taking in every single detail.

Then he let his longing get the best of him, thumb graciously tracing your bottom lip turned swollen from when you tried to swallow your sobs.

There was slight hesitation while he leaned forward, never having experienced time moving as slow as you waited for his lips to connect with yours. First, he let his nose brush against yours, testing the waters.

Please.

You felt his breath.

Don’t make me wait any longer.

Sparks.

Soft lips pressed against yours, moving tenderly in unison that sent intense sparks through your body from head to toe. The moment easily surpassed any of the fantasies you’d had of kissing him.

Needy fingers traveled up his broad chest before hooking your arms around his neck, pulling him closer — it still didn’t feel close enough.

Kento poured everything he had always wanted to say into the kiss — and he knew you understood. If he had learned anything from everything you had been through together, it was he could always trust you were able to understand him completely, even without anything being said.

When you pulled away you found yourself breathless. Meeting his eyes again, unexpected shyness you weren’t used to experience with Kento had you hide your face in his chest.

The roles had reversed, his warm chuckle serving as a comforting blanket. Oh, how you had missed that melody.

“Took you long enough,” you mumbled, hoping the teasing would have your normal confidence return.

His finger found your chin to tilt your head up, capturing your gaze. “Yeah, I should have done it ages ago.”

The previous sadness still lingered, and it was evident you still had a lot to talk about. But right now it was nice to just wallow in his presence again. It was way overdue, feeling like it should have been like this since forever.

“I really am sorry.”

“I think I can find it in myself to forgive you.” Your innocent jab was received with a dashing smile, tingles spreading throughout your limbs at the sight.

“Hope so, sweetheart,” he breathed quietly before he leaned in again.

They sat staring at each other, Kento with a raised eyebrow while a grumpy Gojo was positioned on the couch opposite him, legs and arms crossed in annoyance.

“You used to be nice.”

Kento scoffed at his colleague’s childish behaviour. “I still am, you’re just upset you’re not getting it your way.”

“But why?” Gojo cried dramatically.

“Why? What do you mean why? Because it’s not your wedding.”

“Were you always this boring?”

“Most definitely.”

“Will you guys please shut up?” You interrupted, unable to ignore them anymore. You had desperately tried to block them out as you were doing some paperwork you should have done ages ago.

“He started it!” Gojo pointed at Kento, which only had him roll his eyes.

“You know what,” you sighed as you gathered your stuff and raised from behind the desk. “It’s with a heavy heart I leave you, but I need to get this done by the end of the day.” You stopped behind Kento, placing a hand on his shoulder.

“Sorry, honey,” he said genuinely as he gazed up at you lovingly.

“I am not asking for much-“ Gojo continued to argue before you interrupted him.

“Will you pay for it?”

“Is that all it’ll take?” He beamed, and you nodded. “Of course! Done! How much do you need?”

“You’re too lenient when it comes to him,” Kento sighed.

“It’s not the craziest thing he could request. He’ll get his endless supply of sweets, and you won’t have to listen to his obnoxious nagging anymore.”

“I’m sitting right here.” Both you and Kento ignored him.

“I really have to get this work done though,” you sighed, hand squeezing his shoulder.

“See you at home?” His loving smile had you lean down to press your lips tenderly against his.

“See you at home.”

“I’ll have dinner ready.”

“God, I love you.”

Then he flashed you that smile — the smile which was reserved solely as a response whenever you said those three words he used to dream of hearing from you.

It was funny really, how after everything things would turn out exactly how he as always wanted them to. Despite the hopelessness he had felt and all the pain you had endured — both together and apart — would eventually lead up to the happy ending he had dreamed of since the young age of five.

He knew he would do it all over again, in every universe, if it ensured this outcome.

“I love you too.”

tags @sad-darksoul @toadtoru

an anon, i am so sorry if this ended up longer than you wanted it. idk what happened, bc it just kept on snowballing <3 however, i am very touched you wanted me to do this request. warms my heart. hope it turned out okay mwah also, if you've read my satoru childhood friends to lovers fic and see any similarities, no you don't comments and reblogs is much appreciated

©hiraethwrote 2024 . all rights reserved. reposting, translating and otherwise plagarisim is prohibited

[acid-ixx]

You mention in the first story that the Batfam finally realizes where we are because jon showed Damian our picture while calling us his parent- so I was wondering about how Damian reacted to that? Like did he realize we’d left at that point or did he just get hit in the face with that info?

— related post !

reblogs and interactions are encouraged and appreciated

a/n: y'all i have clogged nose and i hate it LMAO. anyways, i'm gonna write smth about this soon but damian's character for both the series again & again and this series is genuinely one of the more complicated to write because of how he's raised but it really goes like this—

"jon... what do you mean? that's my—"

he cuts himself off before he could continue running his mouth off. damian ignores the slight raise of jon's eyebrow, his thoughts running a mile every second.

his parent? no, never once in his life has damian considered you his parent, pushing you away whenever you try to bond with him. whatever gifts you gave him, no matter how small, or big, expensive, or inexpensive they are, he always makes a show of ripping them away right in front of you.

he told you himself. you are not his parent, never will be his parent, you'll never replace talia's standing, and there will never be a time where damian will see you as one. dick, jason, tim, literally anyone can consider you as theirs, but damian is a product of two genetically perfect individuals— you are imperfect, and it's not your business to coddle him just because you are merely married to his father in paper.

no matter how much you softly gaze at him with loving eyes, invite him with welcoming arms, praise his passion for drawing; all you'll do is weaken him and damian hates feeling weak, hates how you tempt him into melting into a puddle. that automatically makes you a burden in his book.

he hates you, and he should've been glad you disappeared off of the face of the manor.

yet the record stands still: why are you with jon? why do you hold him like he is the world in the picture? what does he mean by "sorry, damian, but me and my parents are gonna go to the carnival later!"? you, as in, bruce's spouse? why are you with them, of all people?

... why does jon get to have fun, with you? and he doesn't...?

and yet he couldn't reply to him, not when his friend babbles on for longer about his... parent. about how you, make him feel so complete. that you'll be the one helping him with his science fare project, how you two spent the night yesterday building a volcano, how you treat him with ice cream every time he achieves a good enough grade for a subject, how you, you, you always spoil jon, always comfort him, read him bedtime stories, matched bracelets, sung karaoke together, played board games with each other, picked him up from school, help him with assignments—

the more jon goes on, the more damian wants to rip his hair out. he doesn't know, doesn't know why he's suddenly pissed. is it because jon can never shut up, or because he couldn't shut up about you? about how perfect you are apparently? how you're the ideal parent he never once bat an eye on? the domestic life jon seems to brag about, it's something damian secretly wanted, and it's all ripped away from him.

it makes damian wonder, would you have done the same for him?

he knows it in himself, that if he hadn't pushed you away, he might've been in jon's place.

[kisskuni]

pet names

↳ pet names that the demon brothers like to call you by. [all brothers x gn!reader]

tags: just fluff! + pet names lol. ‘doll’ is used once, i wouldn’t consider it feminine but take it as you will. otherwise gn :)

notes: first fic on this blog heheh. reblogs are super appreciated, please and thank you <3

lucifer ━━━

a gloved hand runs through black hair, the eldest brother glaring at the paperwork covering his desk. you wonder for a brief moment if he thinks the look he’s giving it will force it away.

“stressed?” you ask him, a teasing tone to your voice.

he hums in discontent. “something like that.”

you straighten from your spot leaned against the door frame and walk over to him. your hands come up to his shoulders and rub at the muscles there, hoping to bring him some sore of relief.

“need any help?” you ask.

“i’m alright, darling, but thank you.” though still clearly stressed, he offers you a small smile.

mammon ━━━

“you will not believe what i just got!”

mammon walks into your room previously unannounced, dorky smile painting his face. he holds up two slips of paper, waving them in front of your face. it takes you a moment to read the writing.

“ooh, are those tickets? for that movie i wanted to see?”

he beams at your excitement. “i’m the best.”

“yeah, you are,” you smile and reach for the tickets in his hands. “thank you so much.”

“anything for you, doll.”

leviathan ━━━

“hey, can you—“ levi speaks to you, but frowns at his game. “no, i can’t heal you. there are two other characters who can.”

you watch him curiously, watch as he rolls his eyes at the person he’s playing with. “what’s up?”

he takes one side of his headset off. “i’m sorry. can you grab me my water? it’s on my nightstand.”

“oh, sure.” you reach over from where you’re tucked comfortably into his bedsheets and grab the water bottle on his nightstand. “here.”

he turns around him his chair to grab the water bottle you toss at him. he catches it easily and smiles at you. “thank you, honey.”

satan ━━━

“are you comfy?”

you sit upright with a small yelp. you look around, gathering your thoughts back. what was supposed to be a quick lie-down on the couch in satan’s room turned into a nap, apparently.

“i- uhm. yeah.” you answer quickly. one hand comes up to rub the sleep from your eyes.

“you can rest if you’re tired, my love. i have some reading i wanted to catch up on anyway.” satan says, moving to sit beside you.

you take a deep breath and ponder the offer for a moment. instead of responding, you simply lay back down and use his lap as a pillow. he’ll get the idea eventually.

asmodeus ━━━

the squeal asmo let out was beyond exstatic. he clasped his hands together, smiling ear to ear.

“ah, i’m so excited.” he said, running off to some corner of his room.

“is it really that exciting?”

asmo frowns at you rather dramatically. he feigns a look of offense and continues to his closet, you following a few steps behind.

“oh, i love how this would look on you, cutie.”

you smile fondly at the nickname and continue to watch as he picks out various clothes for you to try on.

beelzebub ━━━

“y’know… doesn’t matter how strong i am, you’re a demon and i really don’t think i’m capable of spotting you at the gym.” you say.

you know he likes to work out, but him lifting weights worried you sometimes.

“it’s alright. i promise i’ll be fine, sweetheart.”

you glare at him. you know he will be, but a little voice in the back of your head won’t let you stop worrying about him. you suppose its a good thing.

belphegor ━━━

“good morning,” you tease, nodding toward the alarm clock that read 4:38 PM. “nice of you to rise so early.”

he grumbles at you, wiping sleep from his eye. he takes one of the pillows he’s been snuggled up with and tosses it at you, playful smile making its way onto his face.

you bat the pillow away, smiling back at him.

“you are so mean.” you claim, though still smiling.

“mhm. whatever you say, lovely.”

[devourable]

⚘ the boys next door

sfwish, mdni | tags ; poly!male yanderes x gn reader (no prns used but 'you'), manipulation, yan behavior, slight fetishization of virginity

originally this was just gonna be one character so thank mazzy for convincing me to make him a poly duo instead lmfao. ik i have things to finish but like,,, boys 🫶

not too proud of this one so ill probs revise it or make a part two at a l8r time when im feeling less rusty

the boys next door were the two that everyone knew of as a pair.

sebastian and tobias grew up together, learned together, played together, and shared absolutely everything practically since they were born. they were what people thought of when the words 'best friends' came to mind.

nothing could or would ever come between the two boys, everyone said.

so it was no shock that when you came in and quite literally got between them — by virtue of moving into the vacancies that separated their homes — their instant mutual attraction to you would do nothing but strengthen the bond between them.

it was odd. any additions to their relationship was unheard of, but...

the boys next door shared everything. you didn't think that'd exclude you, did you?

toby and sebastian were quick to befriend you when you entered their life. you were around their age, practically the only other child in the area at that; but unlike the children at school who they'd turn away from in favor of each other, they readily made you part of their dynamic.

they didn't quite understand the feelings you gave them at first, they were too young to. all they really knew is that they liked being around you, they liked talking about you, and they wanted you to themselves.

when you were young, everything became about you. their favorite games involved them being your loyal knights, or bodyguards, or any other role that involved protecting you from whatever threat their little minds could imagine up.

and when you grew tired of playing the damsel in distress? they were fine with it. whatever you wanted from them, you got. sebastian's gaming console was practically yours with how much he pushed you to play on it. toby would beg his parents to get him any toy he'd seen you show interest in; and he'd always eventually get them for you.

they didn't want you to ever be bored around them. you'd always have a good time on their watch, and they spoiled you relentlessly to the best of their abilities.

you were theirs, now! and you took care of what was yours, no matter what. that's what both of them were taught.

they grew up with you. learned with you. played with you, and of course, they shared you — even as the three of you grew up.

everyone around you saw how much they adored you, too. when asked, the two boys would proclaim how they'd both marry you in the future. it was so cute! no one saw an issue with how they always took up as much time and attention as they could from you. or how you never really seemed to be able to make friends with other kids at your school...

you had your best friends, so it didn't matter. they were all you needed.

the pair grew to love their constant close proximity to you. it ensured that they'd know what was going on in your life at all times as you grew and developed. when you weren't all hanging out together, it wouldn't be unusual for the pair to simply watch your home from their windows, glimpsing into your windows to watch you go about your life.

you were turning into a fine young adult. but you still needed their protection! they both easily surpassed you in size as you all grew up — sebastian in particular, who's height was staggering compared to both you and toby. he liked the edge it gave him, and how intimidating he could be when needed. tobias didn't have that advantage, but everyone liked him enough to respect you as his territory anyway. you were so small and sweet, what if someone saw you the way they did? they couldn't have that, they had no choice but to keep you to themselves.

it felt like you always had at least one of the two at your side at all times. so much so that it felt odd when you were without either of them. sebastian and toby being by your side was as natural as breathing and you grew to never really question their behavior.

they were just making sure you were okay when they insisted on keeping you company when you were home alone. when toby took your first kiss, it was because it only made sense — it should go to someone you trust and care about, right? and when you told the two that you were still a virgin well into adulthood (which they knew, of course), they insisted on being your first.

they knew you better than anyone, they'd know how to make you feel good. and who better to give your virginity to than your best friends?

getting to claim your body, inside and out, was one of the best moments of their lives. no one would ever get to have you the way they did.

no matter what you'd do, where you'd go, you'd always be effected by them in some way — and that's exactly how they wanted it. they'd always be your first best friends, your first boyfriends, your first everything. and you'd always be theirs.

the boys next door would always be entangled in your life. but you wouldn't have it any other way, would you?

they know you better than anyone, after all.

[redr0sewrites]

NNN with the ACOTAR men

🥀A/n: surprise...! sorry for not writing for a MONTH ive been doing this. whoops.

🥀Cw: smut, nsfw, vague description of genitals, switch!reader. teasing

🥀Character(s): Eris Vanserra, Lucien Vanserra, Cassian, Rhysand, Azriel x reader (seperate)

🥀divider: @chachachannah <3

🥀minors dni

Eris Vanserra:

Eris is,,,, lukewarm to the idea to say the least. why on earth would he want to not fuck you for a whole month?

probably takes a lot of pleading to get him to agree ngl, but once he does agree..... HE IS MAKING IT

definitely lasts the whole month, no questions asked

there is no way his resolve is breaking im sorry i just dont see it. no matter how hard you tease him, Eris' only response is a noncommittal "hmm," and a devilish smirk.

he's definitely giving you a taste of your own medicine too- be prepared for teasing from HIM

he'd sneak up behind you and grab your waist, whispering filthy words in your ear about what exactly he's planning to do the minute the month is over... only to pull away and "tut" smugly

he's going to be soo mean if you give up, especially if you challenged him. the teasing is fifteen times worse, and on top of that he's STILL abstaining because even if you're not making it... hes seeing this through!

hes a lovable asshole about it.

"aw, can't even go a whole month without me?"

i feel like towards the end of the month, he'd get irritable and pent up. he has a high-stress life after all, and not getting any release on his frustration can take its toll. Eris would never take it out on you, but expect him to be a little more curt and snippy than usual

once the month is done though? be PREPARED. Eris is a lot more rough and intense when he's pent up, and would be adamant about making up on lost time. you're probably not leaving your shared bedroom for AT LEAST three days. even when you both aren't fucking, he's pressing kisses up and down your body and memorizing everything he didn't get to see throughout the month

i also see him being a lot more passionate at the end of the month. he won't admit it, but he missed getting to fuck you

overall, he'd last, but he would not like it and would make it up to you

"missed me, huh?" Eris coos, sinking into your aching hole. his skin is warm, almosst burning against your own as his tip just kisses that sensitive spot inside you, providing a tantalizing sensation of pleasure.

"f'course i did," you murmur, tightening your legs around his waist. your sat in his lap, completely bare, and his hands travel to cup at your chest.

"oh really?" Eris' gaze is calculating as he presses a nipple between two lithe fingers, rolling the sensitive bud and watching you squirm. "then why did you make me wait so long, darling?"

"mnh- 'was just a game..." you whine, nuzzling into the crook of his neck as Eris slowly begins to thrust in and out. you clench around him tightly with every roll of his hips, and his free hand begins to rub your clit/cock.

"just a game? well, why don't we play a game, hm? lets see how many times i can make you cum," Eris purrs, and you nod fervently. his eyed narrow, and he paused in his ministrations.

"use your words."

you arch your back, pleading for his touch again. "please make me cum, Er..." Eris chuckles at your obedience, before returning to stroking you, increasing his pace as he did so. "whatever my darling mate desires~"

Lucien Vanserra:

Lucien would not like the idea- he'd miss you too much, and i also feel like he has a pretty high libido in and of itself

he'd do it to make you happy, but i really don't see him lasting. Lucien would make it halfway through the month MAX. you tease him once and he folds- he's very whipped for u !!!

probably lasts at least 2 weeks, but after that he really doesn't pay much mind to it

sooooo fun to tease, in my mind he's the type to be unabashedly in LOVE with his partner and isn't afraid of acting flustered when you catch him off guard. he loves seeing you in lingerie and it's probably one of the easiest things you can do to get him to give in

i also can see him teasing you too- he's very flirtatious in nature, and if he wants you, he's pulling all the stops to see if he can make you break- ESPECIALLY if he gives up and you continue trying and to last the whole month

if you don't tease him throughout the month or give him reason to give up, i think that Lucien may have a sliiightly higher chance of making it through the month- but its still not guaranteed. like i said, he has a high libido and even if he doesnt fuck you he'll probably still end up masturbating

when it comes to the end of the month be PREPARED- he is absolutely waking you up at 12:01 because he "wants you so bad". its hard to say no to him when he's being all sweet and compliant, but know that it won't last bc he will very soon turn into a MENACE. if you can still walk, then he's not done

"you're simply divine," Lucien murmurs, almost worshipful as his lips trail up your navel. with each rise and fall of your chest, his sinful mouth travels higher and higher, kissing and sucking over marks he had left from previous rounds in a wanton mix of lust and love. his eyes never leave yours, his gaze reverent and his mechanical eye whirring as he takes you in, observing you as though you might disappear.

"perfect," he whispers breathlessly, crawling above your nude form and supporting himself with a strong arm on either side of your head. your lips meet in a sickeningly sweet kiss, and he rolls his hips tantalizingly against yours.

"mngh- jus' came!" you whine, and Lucien chuckles breathlessly against your lips.

"you can give me one more, hm?"

Rhysand:

i think Rhysand is a bit of a wild card, i think he would be into the idea at first, as he loves a good competition, but after realizing what it fully entails, he'd be pouty about not getting to sleep with you for a whole month. like, do you even love him anymore???

he'd probably make it to at least 3 weeks -> the end of the month

in all seriousness though, i think whether or not he makes it depends on how much you want to make it- if you don't tease him or don't try too hard, then i can see him making it with ease, but if you turn him on? ohhh he's not letting you go without making you both lose.

i see Rhys as kind of a hornball, genuinely it doesn't take much to turn him on, but it's whether or not you do it intentionally that really gets him going. like seeing down the front of your chest on accident? sure, he's horny, but he'll get over it. you intentionally bend down in front of him in a loose shirt, or flash him as a joke? ohhh he needs you now.

PETTIEST TEASE !!!!! you think you can get away with teasing him with no repercussions? think again, because he'll make you come running to HIMMM- he's sending you nudes through the mating bond randomly throughout the day, he's flashing you, he'll wear lingerie under his suit and tell you about it inconspicuously, stuff like that

Rhys is also quite touchy, i genuinely see him being like. clingy. especially when he misses you. what he can't have in sexual intimacy throughout the month, he makes up for in physical intimacy as he is practically almost ALWAYS at your side, and demands a lot more of your attention than usual. not in a bad way, he just loves when you focus on him

when the month is over, he's actually turning into a FREAK. instead of waking you up, he invades your dream, filling it with his own dirty desires so that you wake up aaallll hot n bothered. then and only then does he give in to his own lust and fuck you senseless

you awake with a gasp, feeling a sticky heat between your legs. your cheeks flush as memories of your more than pleasant dream fill your mind, clueing you in to the reason behind your own arousal.

"i see someone had a good dream," a sensual voice purrs in your ear, and you whip around to face the violet-eyed speaker.

"this is your fault, Rhys. i know your behind that.. dream." you grumble, and he lets out a velvety laugh.

"oh, but you'll never prove it~" he teases, but your having none of it. you waste no time in pushing him down against the bed, moving to straddle him and grinding down hard.

"s-someones being forward tonight," Rhysand hisses, hips jolting upwards to meet your impatient humping.

"hah- f'course i am, its been a, a month! i swear, if you don't shut up and fuck me Rhysand i will-" your cut off with a yelp as strong arms find purchase on your waist, flipping you over so that your pinned down beneath your lover.

"be careful what you wish for, darling."

Cassian:

loves the idea of NNN in theory... hates it in execution. Cassian is probably more overconfident in his abilities to abstain from sex than he is actually capable of in reality, so he goes into NNN ready to face it head on- only to CRUMBLE by week two because he just needs to cum.

lasts 2.5 weeks TOPS.

Cassian is always packing some sort of heat, his dick is big big, and he swears he's never noticed it until now. literally everything you do gives him a ridiculous hard on- it's almost embarrassing. its a phenomenon, the more he can't have you, the more he wants you!

Cassian could probably withstand torture, but can't withstand your teasing. just a few lustful innuendos and giving him a look and he's down on his knees practically begging you to let him fuck you, just the tip, he promises he won't even cum.... (lies)

can not take teasing, but he's pretty good at teasing you- although not subtly. not subtly at all. comes up behind you and grabs your hips with two big hands, pressing his boner against your ass like,,,, hey. whispers absolute filth into your ear until he's borderline humping you, and is so caught up in the moment that he can't focus on anything (or anyone) other than you if you don't give in then your better than me fr

at the end of the month Cassian is practically in heat, he's nearly drooling with need as he shakes you awake, ready to beg politely ask you to just fuck him already...

rough hands gently cup your face, and scratchy stubble tickles your cheeks as your lover plants kisses all across your face.

"babe," Cassian murmurs, "its december." you hum, shifting slowly into the realm of consciousness and turning to look at him.

"and?" you tease, feigning innocence as Cassian pouts. "oh, fuck you," he grumbles, nuzzling his head into your neck, and you giggle.

"aw, the big strong illyrian warrior can't last a month without me?"

"f'course i can't. it's you, afterall." you feel Cassian's grin against your neck, and hum thoughtfully. one of your hands trails to his wings, rubbing gently over the sensitive membrane. Cassian lets out a strangled moan, rolling his hips desperately as he begins to grind on your thigh.

"fffuck, hun, jus' like that," he slurs, shuddering as you continue stroking is wings. "you're so perfect f'me," he mumbles, increasing his pace.

"cum for me, Cassian," you mumble, pressing a kiss to his temple and feeling his breath shudder against your neck. suddenly, he pauses his motions, gently pulling your hand from his twitching wings.

"hngh- hah, not yet- wanna be inside you first."

Azriel:

i don't think Azriel would care too heavily about NNN, if you were into it he'd do it but he doesn't feel too strongly about it- however, he is quite competitive, and will take it seriously if you challenge him

Azriel is making it through the month no questions asked. i simply can not see him giving in- he loves you dearly, but nothing will stop him from winning

honestly, your probably more at risk of giving in then him- he's teasing you worse than anything you could ever do to him, only to pull away last minute and watch you squirm with arousal. you're also NOT getting away with teasing Azriel because he WILL get you back ten times worse, that is a promise

you "accidentally" brush over his crotch? what a shame, he's "accidentally" grinding on you. you moan in his ear? he's dirty talking to you in front of your entire friend group. you wear something provocative? he will take his shirt off in front of you. he WILL get you back, and it will be worse than anything u give to him

at this point he's just downright Evil with his teasing- like he's coming into YOUR room, kissing you senseless until your all hot n bothered, and then just leaving!!! Evil!!!!!

definitelt tries to piss you off and get you needy just because he thinks it's attractive- the hornier you are the happier he is !

when the month is over, he's merciless. probably edges you and then overstimulates you for LITERAL hours, still teasing you and trying to piss you off solely because he can. however, he does reach his breaking point eventually, and when he does i DOUBT you will be walking for 2-5 business days because he will be ROUGH

the sound of skin slapping against skin fills the room as the scent of sex invaded your senses. your own pleasured moans drown out the sound of Azriel's cock squelching in and out of your aching hole with each thrust, his breath hot and heavy on your neck. large, scarred hands find purchase on your hips, and your thighs tremble as he forces you deeper into a mating press. he holds your gaze as one hand begins to toy with your clit/cock, his calculated motions bringing you to the edge yet again.

"uh-huh, y'like that?" Azriel smirks, watching as you writhe and moan. "y'wanna cum this time baby?"

"p-please! please Az, 'm so close," your voice is cracked and embarrassingly whiny, your hips rolling against his with every thrust.

"patience, baby," he murmurs, pressing feather light kisses to the soft skin of your neck.

"you'll get your turn. i've waited a whole month, you'll let me have my fun, hm?"

[oxenfreeao3]

I need Caitlyn “if I cannot become ungovernable I will become the government” Kiramman to have a full-on Machiavellian anti-hero arc so that The General Public finally takes her seriously.

Analysis:

I've mentioned it before, but Caitlyn's character embodies nearly all the traits of a Machiavellian with high cognitive empathy.

Firstly and most obviously, she manipulates systems and people to accomplish her goals. Vi would still be in Stillwater and much of Act II and III would not have happened if Caitlyn weren't willing to cleverly and unscrupulously lie and forge her way to success.

We can argue she's not a very good liar. I argue that doesn't really matter. One, her lies work. Two, she is clearly ready and willing to deceive so long as she thinks it's for a good reason. The inclination is what matters. I think the important question to ask is, "What is this character willing do to?"

Secondly, she's huge on agency. It's one of the main features of her character. She demonstrates (from the five-factor model): achievement-striving, assertiveness, self-confidence, emotional invulnerability, activity, and competence.

Regarding emotional invulnerability. I want to touch on this because I think it's missed. Caitlyn is an extremely guarded character. She reveals almost no personal information about herself, even to Vi. During high-stress situations, she flinches from her own vulnerability, tries to play it off, or compartmentalizes heavily.

Vi is the bleeding heart, the open book, the one who can't guard worth a damn (it's not even subtext, other characters say this to her face and I believe it has a dual meaning).

Meanwhile, Caitlyn waits until Vi is vulnerable with her and shows her respect before even giving Vi her name. (I have more to say about the "Cupcake" scene but that's for another time).

Other aspects of a Machiavellian character include:

Cynicism, selfishness, callousness, arrogance, deliberation and orderliness.

I argue that Caitlyn's character hints at the first one, gets away with the next three because she's "sweet," and blatantly embodies the last two.

Caitlyn in S1 is a sharp edge sheathed in kindness. We like what she's currently doing and think she's a Good Person because her trajectory aligns with our own sense of right and wrong. But Caitlyn is doing what she wants. What she thinks is right. Again, it's not subtext.

Marcus: "She does whatever she wants, I can't control her!"

And in S2, I think the same behaviors we currently love in her could easily be used to spin her down a corruption arc that leaves us a bit aghast -- but shouldn't leave us surprised.

I argue such an arc would be squarely in character.

Paraphrasing from the AMA:

"Everyone is a little bit opposite of who they are in Season One."

What will that mean for Caitlyn?

I don't know, but the recipe for a very interesting time is written all over her character.

[dazed-19]

based on @havanillas role swap au

normal ratio and gambler ratio switch places :3

probably gonna write this out when i finish up my argenthill fic

dr.kakavasha is suspicious of “Lapis” but chalks it up to him being weirder than usual

ratio actually understands what’s going on and tries to play the role of Lapis. he hypothesized that aven probably took his place in this universe but when he sees dr.kakavasha he freezes up and almost reveals himself.

when dr. kakavasha actually has a meeting with veritas (by force not choice, more contrast between the characters hahaahha) he realizes its not Lapis and threatens veritas.

“You’ve done your research, you know that this stoneheart’s real name is veritas ratio, but it seems you somehow haven’t caught wind of who he is now. I suggest you reveal yourself so you can lessen your punishment. Impersonation of a stoneheart is strictly forbidden.”

Ratio being ratio, uses his wits to convince dr.kakavasha. He understands that since Dr. Kakavasha is similar to himself, he should see his reasoning. Dr. Kakavasha is surprised at first, but after he learns of what Ratio’s universe is like he obliges and helps Ratio figure a way back home. All the while asking Ratio questions about himself as he finally has a chance to see who the Veritas Ratio he heard so much about while studying was like before he turned into Lapis. He does this to also understand Lapis better, because he wants to know what was the difference and why they became so different. He also is very surprised when veritas whips out his abalasor head because what the fuck?? when they’re alone together ratio uses it when he’s deep in thought because while this is kakavasha, he isn’t his.

aventurine immediately realizes it’s not his doctor bc while Lapis understands what’s going on, he dreads having to be veritas ratio again. so he disappears (as best as he can) as he knows his counterpart will find a way to fix this. aven being aven finds Lapis (he’s lucky ofc he’s gonna find him) and is surprised to see how different Lapis is from veritas and makes note of how much nous’ gaze really impacted the both of them. (if aven already knows that ratio never received nous’ gaze make it so that he realizes how much it matters as well. idk if aven actually knows this so that’s why we gotta research.) he also invites Lapis to stay with him bc Lapis has been staying at a run down hotel with a casino. aven invites him also because he wants to understand veritas more so if he learns more about Lapis, veritas’ opposite but still similar, he’ll be able to figure veritas out. and also because he wants to find out how to get his doctor back. Safe to say he is SHOCKED when Lapis is almost exactly like himself. He knows he shouldn’t be surprised since Lapis already explained what was going on, but he’s still surprised. While he would love to see a version of Ratio gamble and win 10 times in a row, he knows that his Doctor would hate to see his reputation ruined and to be thought of as a gambling addict so he makes sure that Lapis stops before things get even crazier. He opts to let Lapis gamble with himself to at least keep him entertained. Also while Aven originally let Lapis stay so they could find out how set things right, he is again shocked when Lapis slacks off and almost never touches a single book or article about dimensional travel.

“Lapis, I hope you know that while I enjoy winning against you when we gamble,” Aven stated. He wanted to get a start on how to get his doctor back, and Ra- Lapis, had done as much as spending two seconds reading a book. He took a breath, “That’s not why I invited you to stay with me.”

“I am aware, however I’m sure your Ratio is on his way to figure out whatever happened. He’s honestly probably working with my little doctor hah. Oh how I wish I could’ve seen Dr. Kakavasha’s face when he realized it wasn’t me.”

Aventurine froze. “Sorry, Kakavasha?” Lapis looked at him for a moment. And then laughed.

“Oh right, hah. Here you’re not called by your birth name since your a stoneheart. I keep forgetting that, sorry Aventurine.”

Also there’s probably one moment where Aven finds Lapis drunk and there’s a reference to the comic the artist made.

“Lapis stared into Aventurine’s eyes. Like he was lost in them. It seemed as though he could stare into those multicolored eyes forever.

“Lapis, my friend, its about time we head back no? I’m sure you’ll regret not drinking any water tomorrow so-“

“They’re beautiful.”

“…What?”

“Those eyes.” He pauses, taking another moment to stare before he dons a smile too wide for the face Aventurine has come to know. “Hah its just like what happened last time I drank this much.” The blonde’s eyes widen into saucers. The sharp inhale he does does nothing to calm himself down.

“Haha, is- is that so?”

“Quite. It's most likely the one constant throughout the universe. Your eyes will always be pretty, and they will always make me yearn.” Lapis whispers the end of that sentence, like if he says it any louder this moment will shatter into a million pieces, like a mirror.”

[chsopnk]

「 ✦ DADDY’S HOME ✦ 」

☆. # SHIP — gojo satoru, nanami kento, toji fushiguro x gn!reader

☆. # AUTHOR’S NOTE — the guys as the father of ur kids.

☆. # WARNINGS — mentions of puke

GOJO .

i could see him as a boy or girl dad. or both

tries to give his daughter cute hairstyles and fails miserably. crooked pigtails where half of her hair is still hanging down is the best he can do. but hey, he tries

definitely hangs his kids upside down by their feet. probably shakes them too.

the kids are definitely small gojo’s. sorry not sorry

every single day is chaos.

when he goes out with the two on his own, he loses one of them about 80% of the time (he always finds them again, don’t worry 😭)

let’s them have snacks before dinner and tells them not to tell you. they always do.

despite all of that, he’s a fun father

gojo has a lot of energy so he runs around with them all day and plays with them <33

(then he complains about how tired he is when they’re in bed :/)

lots of fun trips. to the playground, amusement parks, places in japan, different countries. the beach.

if his kids have hobbies, he’s always ALWAYS!! the loudest and most embarrassing parent there. he says it builds character and he needs to support his babies ‼️‼️

NANAMI .

girl dad. twin girls.

he definitely does their hair!! and he’s good at it too <3 nanami has done their hair since they had hair.

he spoils them TO DEATH.

the girls only want to eat the food he cooks 😒 they say it tastes better

he dances with them in the living room when no one’s home. ugh he’s so CUTE 🥴🥴

nanami’s a very very loving father but he’s also strict when it comes to certain things

example a: the girls will never not do their homework. he makes sure of it 💯

just imagine nanami sitting at a table with his two little girls while explaining math to them 🥹 he’s so so gentle and understanding but he will not let them give up

imo he really loves it when they wear cute dresses and look all pretty. he’s a girlie girl dad.

he will play with them no matter what they want to do. play dress-up? he will wear the tutu. want to play house? of course he’ll be the baby. the girls wanna do his hair + make-up? he’ll be the test subject no problem ‼️

he’s also never ever going to miss any special day his girls have. their first day of school, bring your father to school day, their dance shows — whatever their hobbies are, he’ll be there to support them <33333

also: a REAL father. never had a problem with changing diapers or cleaning up baby puke.

TOJI .

not the best father, but he’s damn sure trying

the child was definitely unexpected and not exactly wanted but once he came to terms with it, he tries his best to be there as best as he can

he doesn’t have the money needed to take care of a child, neither do you (not really)

but whatever his kid wants, his kid gets.

mostly, that includes fast food and cheap toys from the dollar store

but hey!! the kid doesn’t care where the toys are from (/gen)

definitely the type of dad to get one of those leashes for kids. he’s not risking losing his kid somewhere 💀 and he knows damn well what kind of menace that child is

he can and will bribe his son with candy to get him to stop crying or throwing a tantrum

toji cannot deal with his kid screaming or crying. honestly mostly leaves you to deal with those situations because he’s unsure how to handle them

will change diapers but not without complaining and almost throwing up 💀 it’s not his fault !!! it stinks okay?!!

acts like he doesn’t care about the kid but then shows up after a mission with a bag of candy. or pulls out some toy the kid’s wanted

cannot, will not & should not help with homework.

[remlionheart]

Hello beautiful

Can I put in a request where Megumi and reader both have a partner but are fully attracted to each other and Megumi of course plays it stoic, indifferent etc. but then something happens( I haven’t figured out what event exactly, maybe they get drunk at a party?I’ll leave it up to you 🤍) and they succumb to their needs( a little coercion from Megumi oops) and Megumi is just so pussy drunk, whiny, non sensical blabbing mess and reader baby traps him 🥴🥴

I just need Megumi so bad, he plagues my mind every second of the day… I need therapy and Jesus. Thank you if u decide to go with it, love everything you do 🤍🤍🤍

Hi pretty ♡ Sorry to say - no Jesus here, but maybe this can be therapy for both of us bc I’ve been thinking about this ask heavily since I got it. And what better time to start a depraved lil drabble than at midnight on the night of a full moon? 🌙✨

((as always, all characters are aged up to 21+, if u don’t enjoy that feel free to scroll along ♡ all trigger warnings are in the request itself, lemme know whatcha think, luv u ✩࿐࿔ ))

⋆˙⟡MDNI ⋆˙⟡

Megumi’s new girlfriend was sweet, kind, cute. Always by his side no matter what and tonight was no exception.

She was smiling at you with her hand wrapped delicately over his arm, asking you how you’d met your date… who was also, at your side and wrapped around your arm. He was cluelessly bantering back and forth with her while you and Megumi exchanged the same pointed look.

It was subtle, the way his blue eyes lingered on your boyfriend’s hand placement, watching him gently squeeze your hip as he laughed at a joke that two of you had missed entirely.

You'd only been been dating this most recent fling for a few weeks - it was hardly anything to be jealous of, but the fact Megumi had noticed at all gave a sick part of you satisfaction. It was an unspoken rivalry you had with him, one that you typically found yourself on the losing end of. He’d fuck someone, so you would too. He’d date someone, so you would too. He’d show up to this stupid fucking party with a date, so you would too.

It was the same pitiful dance that you'd been doing for the last year and a half, your feelings for him always right on the tip of your tongue but never at the right time.

Watching his girlfriend rest her head on his shoulder as the four of you continued on with your mindless banter was your own personal hell and yet, you said nothing. Instead, mirroring them, clinging onto your own date harder as you pretended to care about whatever work story was being tossed around.

The night carried on like this for the next hour or so as the once small house party started to evolve into something rowdier. The music getting louder and the living room getting more and more crowded as you knocked back three more drinks.

You were dizzy, trying not to lose your balance while you excused yourself from your group to go venture upstairs in search of a bathroom. Your boyfriend had offered to come with you, but you insisted that you were alright, shooing him away with a smile as you told him to go get another drink.

He seemed to be enjoying himself and you didn’t want that to end just because of your pathetic urge to chase after someone who clearly didn’t want you back.

Your footsteps came to a clumsy pause, a small, drunken laugh escaping you as you entered the bathroom and caught a glimpse of yourself in the mirror. Your red dress was shorter than you remembered it being when you left, your hair just as perfectly disheveled as your thoughts. You steadied yourself before taking a seat, letting the music from downstairs provide you with a comfortable sense of privacy.

You had just washed your hands and were in the middle of throwing your hair into a bun when the door opened unexpectedly. Your ankle almost sprained from how quickly you’d whipped around, your heart stalling in your chest as Megumi looked back at you with the sound of the lock latching behind him.

“The hell are you doing, Fushiguro?”

A faint smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth, his arms folding over his chest as he rested his back against the door. “Since when do you date coworkers?”

You almost laughed you were so stunned, your posture straightening a bit as you continued to keep your attention focused on your reflection and not on him. “Since when do you care who I date?”

“I don’t,” he shrugged, “just don’t want to hear you complain about it later when things don’t work out.”

You rolled your eyes, biting back a stupid smile at how annoyingly apathetic he had to be at all times. “And you felt it was necessary to follow me into a bathroom to let me know that?” You countered, finally turning to face him.

It was the first time all night that you’d seen his stoic demeanor start to waver.

His eyes narrowed as he raised his brow at you, letting his arms fall back to his sides. “You’re drunk.” He quipped, taking a slow step towards you. “Just because your boyfriend’s careless enough to let you go running around by yourself doesn’t mean I am.”

Your throat was suddenly dry at how close he was to you, his tidal wave eyes flooding your senses as they dragged down to your lips.

“Your girlfriend’s downstairs.” You reminded him, desperately trying to ignore the heat that was gathering at your center.

“I know,” he breathed, his hand traveling up to the back of your neck as he held you in place. “But you’re right here.”

“Megumi…” Your voice nearly trembled, your insides catching fire at the feeling of his lips grazing yours. “We can’t…”

Your protest was hardly convincing though - not with the way your body was having its own private conversation with his. Practically begging to be touched as he wedged his knee between your thighs just to see how much temptation you could withstand.

He knew you wanted this. Knew that you thought about it just as much as he did, if not more. You’d always followed him around like a lost puppy. Always mirrored whatever he did like your intentions weren’t glaringly obvious. He’d been fighting to restrain himself for the last year and a half. Did everything he could to not succumb to the carnal urges that plagued him every time you showed up to his house in the shortest sundress he’d ever seen. He kept himself busy with other girls - lied to himself and pretended that it wasn’t you he was thinking about when he closed his eyes and thrusted into them. But you were everywhere, not just tonight and not just right now, but always. A constant thought in the back of his mind. A task he couldn’t ever mark as complete. A gnawing, agonizing, need that he couldn’t fight for one more fucking second.

“I’m so tired of it always being someone else,” he said against your lips, letting out a heady little exhale at how submissively you were staring back at him. “I want it to be you.”

The coiling tension in your lower abdomen felt like it was going to snap as the firmness of his knee pushed at just the right angle, giving your clit a much-needed brush of friction while his words swirled lazily through your mind.

He was right- you must’ve been drunk because there was no way he was prompting you to grind on him. No way that he was parting your lips with his tongue. No way that his grip was tangling into your hair as your hips began to rock rhythmically against him. No way that he was helping lift your bra over your head all while a mere staircase separated the two of you from your partners.

There was simply no way any of this was real.

His mouth was warm against your skin, kissing and nipping across your collarbone while his hand palmed at your chest. “S’fucking pretty,” he praised, his gaze pointed at the way your dress had nearly hiked all the way up your hips as you kept riding his leg.

“Show me what you do when you’re alone thinking about me,” he panted, “just like that, don't fucking stop.” His voice was sinful bliss trailing back up your neck, your dress now only covering your midsection as he pulled the straps of it down over your arms so that the top half met where the bottom half had ridden up.

You were dangerously - pathetically, close to cumming, not caring at all who heard you as your nails dug into his shoulder blade. Your needy little clit still pushing and pleading into his leg. “More,” you begged, “please - this isn’t - fair.”

“It’s not fair?” You hated the moan that slipped out at the sickeningly sweet way he mocked you. “Poor thing." His mouth was warm and torturous in the shell of your ear. "You know what I don't think is fair?"

The whimper you let out was all the answer he needed though.

His fingers wrapped delicately around your neck - an odd sense of security laced into them despite the way they were cutting off your oxygen. “I don’t think it’s fair that I have to want you this bad.” His other hand suddenly roaming along the curve of your hip. “I don’t think it’s fair that I have to pretend not to care when you do dumb shit like dangle new men in front of me.” His lips returned to yours, catching all the little whines that were escaping you. “And I really don’t think it’s fair how hard I’m about to fuck you while he’s downstairs waiting for you.”

It definitely wasn't the sentence that should've brought you to your breaking point, but it did. His grip tightened on you, fingertips digging perfectly into each side of your neck making your vision blur and your center ache. Your moans were every bit as broken as your thoughts, your eyes not leaving his while he nodded back at you.

"That's it." His grasp slowly began to release, loosening up with each whine you let out for him. "Cummin’ so easily for me.”

The room was still hazy, electricity dancing along your skin as he gently helped bring you to your feet before turning you around. You watched him from the reflection in the mirror, a dizzy smile cutting across your face while you watched him slip your dress all the way off and bend you over the counter.

"Fuck," he groaned, admiring the slick glistening off of you as he undid his belt. He ran two fingers between your folds, his mouth slightly dropping open at how sensitive you were to his touch - the cute little noises he could coax out of you by barely doing anything and the way your back arched so perfectly for him.

"Look at me," he breathed, placing a firm hand on your shoulder as he lined himself up with you.

His eyes trailed back up to yours, his tip carefully prodding at your entrance while he watched the desperate little expression that had taken over your features. "God damn," he hissed, his breath hitching in his throat at how faithfully your walls were swallowing him.

You were so wet, your brain and body both completely enamored with the sight and feeling of him sinking into you. The waiting game you'd been playing was well worth reward and you were enjoying every inch of your prize.

He was stretching you so tenderly, going deeper and deeper with each thrust. Though he'd told you to look at him, he seemed to be the one having a hard time maintaining your stare. His pretty blue eyes were glazed over, his composure starting to leave him the longer he looked at you.

"Oh my god," he groaned, "why do you feel so fucking good?"

His rhythm became harsher, both his hands grabbing onto your hips as he used you to his liking. “You know how many times I've thought about doing this, huh?" You weren't sure where your moans ended and his began, the rest of the world slipping away as he continued to blissfully bully his way into you. "Look at you, so pouty and pretty. Taking me like such a good girl."

His words made you clench, your cunt nearly suffocating him as he kept letting out more incoherent praises. He was just as lost as you were, just as dazed-out and unaware of his surroundings. The only thing keeping him grounding was the sound of you whimpering his name and how it kept getting needier and louder.

He wanted people to hear. Wanted everyone in the entire house knew that he had you bent over with your tits pressed against the counter and your ass flushed firmly against him. Wanted them to know that it was his name you sang out when you came.

“Megumi -” you whined, “right there, ohmygod, right.. the - re.”

Your walls spasmed around him, little hearts and stars suddenly filling your vision as your eyes rolled back. “Please,” you begged, chasing the blinding white light of your release as far as it would go, “cum inside me, please - fuck, don’t stop.”

He knew he shouldn’t. Knew you weren’t on birth control. Knew you well enough to know how desperate you were to keep him around. He knew all the risks. Knew what a terrible fucking idea it was and yet,

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” he grunted, his movements just as needy and out of control as yours. “For me to fill you up,” he was losing himself to the thought, “to go back downstairs with me dripping down your leg? Yeah, I bet you fucking would.”

It was the worst idea. Every reasonable part of him screaming at for him to stop.

“Y - es! Please, please - ah~!”

But the sound of you begging made that reasonable part of him disappear entirely, replaced by an absolutely unhinged part of him that he didn’t even know existed until that very moment.

He wanted your belly to swell, wanted everyone to look at you and know that it was him who had bred you and that it was him who would do it again and again. He was going to make the whole world know you were his and it made him fucking feral.

He groaned, chest heaving as he gave you one last punishing thrust, burying himself as deep as he could as he twitched inside you. His breath hitching in his throat, his mind only filled with you and your body only filled with him.

A beautifully damning warmth coated your walls while you shot him the prettiest, haziest smile he’d ever seen. Both of you slowly returning back to reality.

He carefully pulled out of you, watching the mess the two of you had made spill out of you as he grabbed your shoulders and turned you around to face him.

His hands were warm against the sides of your neck, thumb placed firmly under your chin to tilt your head up towards his, “Next time you decide to shove another guy in my face,” he said, “you better make sure they’re not dumb enough to leave you alone with me.”

⋆𐙚₊˚⊹♡

[lyssaluvs]

Just Play the Part

(Luke Castellan x Fem!Dionysus!Reader)

Summary: A makeover from Silena and the Aphrodite girls gives you the confidence boost you need.

A/N: this took me so bloody long it's borderline embarrassing. also luke is so out of character it almost makes me sick but whatever. god this is so short, i'm so sorry.

Warnings: Use of Y/n, reader is described to have curly hair but that's about it.

Children of Dionysus are rare, daughters even more so. As a matter of fact, you were the only one. To your knowledge… Before you came to Camp Half-Blood, you were an only child, and when you arrived, you suddenly had a much larger family that you did before. A father, brothers, it was fantastic, it felt amazing to have the family you had always dreamed of. However, with a somewhat absent mother, apparently no sisters, and not a whole lot of friends, let alone female ones, you had had little to no feminine influence in your life. This resulted in you becoming a bit of a tom-boy. It’s not that you didn’t want to embrace your femininity, you just didn’t know how.

“Oh goodness, those curls are a mess.”

“That outfit certainly isn’t doing her any favours.”

You heard the whispers as you walked past the small group of Aphrodite girls. As a child of Dionysus, you had quite a talent for theatrics, as well as being prone to sarcastic remarks, so you just couldn’t help but snap back.

“Can I help you?” You asked the group of girls, hands on your hips with your brows furrowed.

“Actually, we were wondering if we could help you…”

---

You now found yourself sat in a surprisingly comfortable barber-style chair in the bathroom of the Aphrodite cabin.

“Sorry I got defensive; I’m not really used to talking to girls much.” You apologise to Silena once again. 

“Stop apologising! We love having a new girl to give makeovers to. And who knows, maybe this will give you the confidence boost you need to finally talk to Luke, since he’s obviously too shy to talk to you first.”

You cast your gaze downward as a warmth spread across your cheeks.

“Don’t worry, you’re not that obvious. I just have a knack for these kinds of things, comes with being an Aphrodite kid. Luke, however, is about as subtle a sledgehammer. Please don’t tell me you haven’t noticed.” She paused combing your hair to look you in the eye.

You just shrugged.

“The lingering touches when he corrects your stances, yearning stares…” She awaited your reaction and when she was met with a befuddled expression, she continued.

“Oh my god, you’re oblivious. Here’s what you’re going to do. Once we’re done here, you’re going to walk right up to him, and ask him out. There’s no way he’ll say no, so don’t try that excuse. And I’ve seen you on stage, you can certainly play an outgoing character, so if you’re going to use the shy excuse, I’ll tell you to just pretend you’re on stage.”

---

It had been almost two hours and your makeover was finally over. Your curls were healthier than ever, your nails were painted, light makeup had been applied, and you had never felt more beautiful. You looked at your outfit in the mirror, taking note of the way the new flare jeans were much more flattering than your previous daggy cargos, and your camp tee now a size smaller and no longer drowning you.

“You’re lucky orange suits you, now go get your man!” Silena pushed you out the door, giving your butt a playful smack on the way out.

---

Feeling more confident than ever you approached Luke while he was practicing his swordsmanship in front of the setting sun, alone, as he usually was at this time of day.

“Luke”

The brunette boy turned around so swiftly he almost lost his footing. He looked you up and down and swallowed heavily.

“Y/n, you look ama- “

“Do you want to go out with me?” The words shot out of your mouth before you could stop them. Regardless of Silena’s reassurance, if he did end up rejecting you, you wanted to get it over and done with as soon as possible.

His jaw dropped and he looked as though he wanted to say something, but his voice wouldn’t cooperate.  The two of you stood in silence for a few moments as you waited for an answer.

“It’s fine if you don’t. I’ll just go.” You began to turn around.

“YES! Sorry, yes, I want to go out with you. Please. I really want to go out with you.”

It seemed his voice had finally caught up with his mind.

Hmm… He’s cute when he rambles…

@elz-zalarrr this one's for you!

credit to @cafekitsune for the divider!

[enkays-den]

I have been having so many feelings about the court trial since the livestream on Skizz's birthday.

First off, the court is inherently farcical, which is already so funny you don't NEED to build on it, but they did.

Second, EVERYONE is coming to the courtroom with WILDLY different motivations, which is literally the basis of Shakespearean comedy.

First off, it is the BIGGEST stroke of luck that Joe and Skizz were the only ones available to be lawyers, because I think they are probably the two hermits that could pull of that role best. They both so smart and able to stay on their feet in this absolute KANGAROO COURT

Skizz is the most straightforward. He's playing a classic lawyer, interested in the state of the client, using logic and emotion to build a case. Effective, but for the sake of content, a little dry (not an insult i love skizz i love the lawyer character sm) This IS skizz, though, he knows how to take the MOST effective L possible.

Cleo is mainly here to have fun and make doc suffer, they don't need to win the battle, they just need to win the war, they can throw everyone out the window for the sake of the bit.

Joe as a creator wants to just make everyone have the most intense reaction to what he says possible. He'll help doc win, but it comes at the cost of his pride, which makes cleo happy, but cleo ends up as the losing party. Either way, WE as the audience win.

Doc solely wants to WIN on ALL FRONTS, no matter the cost. He is willing to play along with whatever Joe puts on the table but is also not above taking matters into his own hands and being violent and threatening. He has NO problem admitting he's a madman, but doesn't like being made the fool.

Ultimately, all parties have to play to the whims of Bdubs, who is NOT interested in settling this matter. all he cares about is the spectacle. For all he cares, EVERYONE could lose if it makes the best show.

Perhaps unfortunately for Doc, there was no way he could win. He is either found INNOCENT due to being a baby, or found GUILTY because he's a full-grown man. He had no choice but to roll with Joe's strategy. Joe had no choice but to defend doc, and thus made a situation that was going to be hilarious regardless.

While Skizz's case was perhaps a bit pedestrian and dull, the prosecution gets an advantage that the defense does not: the lure of a good sentence. The MOMENT Cleo put forward the idea that doc's punishment was boredom, it was a closed case. Bdubs knew nothing would make him more angry that being forced to do nothing but try and scavenge a pitiful existence in the middle of nowhere.

Doc has been gloating that no one in the server can truly match his power or that of the hivemind, but he now has to face the worst opponent of them all: his own innate flaws.

I love this server sm

[pin-k-ink]

the sequel // suna rintarou

tw ⇢ childhood friends to lovers, so much angst, hurt/comfort, alcohol consumption, yearning, happy ending

wc ⇢ 5k

a/n: i never cried so much while writing something

Suna felt like he was watching a movie. A sad, tragic fucking movie that he couldn't tear his eyes away from no matter how much it hurt to keep looking.

Frame by frame, moment by excruciating moment, he watched you - his best friend, the love of his life - fall in and out of love with someone else. Again.

If his life really was a movie...what role would he play? The sidekick? The comic relief? No, he decided with a bitter twist of his lips. He wasn't even important enough for that. He was just an extra. A background character that no one noticed or cared about.

Someone who faded into the scenery while the bright, beautiful protagonist - that was you, always you - took center stage and shone.

Suna had known you his entire life. His earliest memories all featured you, front and center, with him orbiting around you like a satellite, like a moth drawn to a flame.

You'd taken your first wobbling steps together, hands clasped and eyes wide with wonder. Babbled your first words to each other in a language only you two could understand. Gotten into mischief and skinned your knees and learned about the world side by side.

For as long as he could remember, you'd been his constant, his touchstone. His north star. The axis his whole world turned on. Life without you was unfathomable. Unthinkable.

But somehow, as the years scrolled by like frames on a reel...Suna started to feel like he was watching from a distance. Like there was an invisible wall between you, thin as glass but strong as steel, that he could never quite break through.

No matter how close you were, how many secrets you traded and inside jokes you laughed over and half-spoken conversations you could hold with just a glance...you always felt just a little bit out of reach. Like a mirage that would dissolve into mist if he tried to touch. Something too good to be true, too precious for the likes of him to grasp.

And how could he even think of reaching out, of trying to hold onto you the way he desperately wanted to? How could a mere background character ever hope to stand alongside the radiant lead, the brightest spot in every scene?

No, Suna was content to stay in the shadows. To watch and support and be there in whatever way you needed him, even as it killed him by inches. As long as he could keep you in his life, as long as he got to stay by your side...that would be enough. It had to be.

But god, it was getting harder. Harder to paste on a carefree smile and listen to you gush about your latest boyfriend. Harder to swallow the jealousy and longing clogging his throat when he watched you with stars in your eyes, so incandescently happy in someone else's arms.

Harder to bite his tongue against the confessions that always wanted to spill out, to choke back the pleas and promises and declarations his treacherous heart whispered in the dark.

"I love you," he wanted to say, every minute of every day. "I've always loved you. You're my forever, my reason, my home. Pick me. Choose me. See me. I swear I'll spend my life making you happy, if you'll just let me try."

But he never said it. Never took that leap of faith, too terrified of shattering the fragile status quo. Too scared of losing you entirely.

So he stayed quiet, stayed still, even as he felt like he was cracking apart inside. He watched you fall in love again and again, watched each bright-eyed boy promise you forever. Watched your smile dim and your shoulders droop when they inevitably let you down, broke your big, beating heart so carelessly.

It was a particular kind of agony, holding you while you cried over someone else. Seeing the light go out of your eyes, powerless to do anything but wipe away your tears and murmur empty platitudes. Every hitched sob was a barb in his skin, every sniffle a dagger to his ribs.

He wanted to shake you sometimes, wanted to scream "Why can't you see what's right in front of you? Why can't you see how much I love you? How I would never, ever hurt you the way they do?"

But he never did. Just folded you close and stroked your hair and let you dampen his shirt with your grief. Let you give him tiny glimpses of the mosaic of cracks in your chest before you pasted on a wobbly smile and soldiered on, determined not to let the world see you bleed.

Those cracks scared him. Scared him in a bone-deep way few things ever had. Because he lived in dread of the day they splintered apart entirely. The day your seemingly endless capacity for love and joy and trust finally ran dry, bled out by a thousand careless cuts.

He couldn't bear the thought of your light going out forever. Of those glorious eyes going flat and dull, that incandescent smile withering on the vine. You were the sun and he was just a planet in your orbit - he genuinely didn't know if he could survive without your warmth. Without you, everything would wither.

So he would endure. He would be your rock, your safe harbor, your shelter from every storm. Even if it killed him, even if he shattered to pieces in the process, he would hold you together.

Because a world without your laughter, without your brilliant, untamable spirit...that was no world at all. And maybe his love could be enough to keep you shining. Maybe if he believed hard enough, if he poured enough of his own flickering light into you...you would be okay.

And just maybe, someday...you would turn that supernova smile on him. Maybe you would finally, finally see him. Not as a background character, not as a sidekick...but as a man who loved you with every fiber of his being.

As someone who had been there all along, just waiting for you to look a little closer. To see the shape of his devotion, the staggering depth of his feelings written in every line of his face, his heart in his eyes and your name carved into his bones.

But until that impossible day, he would watch. He would wait. He would bide his time until the credits rolled and the movie ended...and just pray that there would be a sequel. One where he finally got to step out of the background and into the spotlight of your eyes.

Where you were his co-star, his partner, his love. Where you wrote a new story together, one frame at a time, and the only tears were happy ones.

It was a beautiful dream, fragile and gossamer and so painfully far out of reach. But it was all he had, so he clung to it in the hidden depths of his heart and kept watching the scenes play out.

Kept hoping that someday, if he was patient enough, if he loved you hard enough...the dream would become reality.

And you would finally, finally be his.

As the years scrolled by, Suna watched you grow and change, always from a step behind. He watched you navigate the perilous waters of adolescence, cheering you on as you blossomed into a beautiful, vibrant young woman. Watched you stumble and pick yourself back up, watched you learn and evolve and become more yourself with every passing day.

He was there for all of it, every milestone and heartbreak, every triumph and disappointment. When you got your first period and cried from embarrassment, he was the one who biked to the store for pads and chocolate, the one who held you and reassured you that it was all normal and okay.

When you got your heart broken for the first time at sixteen, he was the one who showed up at your window with ice cream and terrible movies, the one who let you sob into his chest and rail against the unfairness of it all.

When you got accepted into your dream college, he was the first person you called, screaming with joy down the line. He'd shut his eyes against the sting of tears, against the yawning ache in his chest at the thought of you leaving him behind...and told you how proud he was, how happy he was for you.

Always, always, he was your person. Your touchstone, your safe place. The one who knew you inside and out, backward and forward and every way in between. He was there in all the big moments...and all the little ones in between that made up a life.

Like the lazy summer afternoons spent lounging in the park, shoulders brushing as you read your respective books, content to just exist in the same space. The midnight walks under a canopy of stars, hands casually entwined, no words needed in the warm, honeyed dark.

The cups of coffee he'd bring you on drowsy mornings, made just the way you liked. The way you'd curl into his side during scary movies, face hidden trustingly in the curve of his neck, his arm a protective shield around you.

All those insignificant, in-between moments...they were everything to Suna. He hoarded them like a miser, turned them over and over in his mind like precious gems on nights when the ache in his chest got too big to breathe around.

Each one was a flicker of light, a tiny ember of hope that maybe, someday...you would see. You would understand just how much he loved you, how much he had always loved you. You would realize that he was right there, that he had been there all along, just waiting for you to really look at him.

But you never did. Your eyes always seemed to skim right over him, to look through him like he was made of glass, transparent and inconsequential. He was furniture to you, he sometimes thought despairingly. Part of the scenery of your life, always there but never really seen.

Never the one you wanted, the one you yearned for. He was the one you settled for, the one you came back to when the newest bright-eyed boy let you down. The one you cried on, the one you leaned on...but never the one you loved. At least, not the way he wanted you to.

God, how he wished you would love him. It was a physical ache, a bone-deep longing that never went away no matter how hard he tried to ignore it. He felt hollowed out with it, scraped raw and empty.

Late at night, he let himself imagine it. Let himself paint a picture of a world where you wanted him back, where you looked at him with even a fraction of the desperate, clawing need he felt for you.

In his weakest moments, he let himself believe it could be real. That someday, you would wake up and realize that he was everything you'd ever wanted, that he could make you happy in a way no one else ever could.

That you would take his face in your hands, eyes wide and wondering like you were seeing him for the first time. That you would breathe his name like a prayer, like a revelation, and kiss him with a tenderness that set his soul alight.

That you would tell him you loved him, that you were sorry for taking so long to understand, but you wanted to make up for lost time. That you wanted to be his, wholly and completely, for the rest of your lives.

It was a beautiful dream, fragile and perfect as a soap bubble. But like a bubble, it always burst, leaving him blinking away stinging tears and feeling like a fool.

Because this wasn't a movie, no matter how much it felt like one sometimes. There was no guarantee of a happy ending, no artful resolution scripted in the stars.

In the real world, the guy pining in the background didn't always get the girl. Sometimes he just stayed in the background forever, watching her life happen without him, until the credits rolled and the lights came up on his lonely little corner of the world.

But oh, how he wanted to believe. He would never be the leading man, he knew that. He was too quiet, too steady, too content to let you shine while he basked in your reflected glow. You needed someone as brilliant and dazzling as you, someone who could match you spark for spark and set the world on fire.

Someone braver than him. Someone who would risk it all for a chance at your heart, instead of staying safe and silent on the sidelines.

He wasn't that guy. He never would be. But a tiny, desperate part of him still held out hope that maybe, someday...he could be enough for you, just as he was. That even if he wasn't the star of the show, he could still be an integral part of your story.

The one who was always there to catch you when you stumbled, to hold you up when you couldn't stand on your own. The one who knew your secrets and your scars, your hopes and your fears. The one who loved every messy, imperfect, beautiful inch of you, unconditionally and irrevocably.

Maybe he could be your co-star, your partner in crime and love and life. Maybe you could write a new story together, one where the quiet, steadfast best friend got his chance to step into the light and be seen, really seen, by the only eyes that had ever mattered.

It was a slim hope, gossamer-thin and liable to tear at the slightest touch. But it was all Suna had, so he held it close and carried it with him, a tiny flicker of light in the dark.

And he kept watching, kept waiting. Kept loving you with everything he had, even as it wore him down to the bone. He would play his role in your movie, would be whatever you needed him to be...until the day came when he could finally step out from the background and into your arms.

Until the day when "I love you" wasn't just a secret whispered in the dark, but a vow made in the light of your smile, your hands in his and your heart beating against his chest.

Until the day when the movie of his life finally got its happy ending...and you were right there beside him, radiant and real, as the screen faded to black and the credits rolled on a love story for the ages.

He just had to hold on until then. Just had to keep believing, keep loving, keep watching.

Because in the end, he knew it would all be worth it. You would always be worth it.

Even if it took a lifetime, even if it killed him...he would wait for you.

Always.

As the years went by and you both grew older, Suna watched you evolve and change in a thousand tiny ways. He watched you graduate college, watched you land your dream job and move into your first adult apartment. Watched you navigate the ups and downs of adult life with the same resilient grace he'd always admired, always loved.

Through it all, he was there. Your constant, your touchstone. The one you called when you got a promotion, voice bubbling with excitement. The one you leaned on when your grandma died, eyes swollen and voice thick with grief.

He was the one who helped you move, lugging boxes up endless flights of stairs and quietly assembling IKEA furniture while you flitted around like a hummingbird, arranging and rearranging. The one who showed up at your door with soup and medicine when you got the flu, who sat with you and watched terrible reality TV until you fell asleep on his shoulder.

He was woven into every part of your life, as essential and invisible as air. Always there, always just a phone call or a text away. Your best friend, your rock, your safe harbor in every storm.

But still, even as you grew closer than ever...there was a distance there. A wall that Suna could never quite breach, no matter how hard he tried. Because no matter how much of your life you shared with him, no matter how many secrets you whispered into the dark...there was always a part of you that held back.

A part that you kept locked away, hidden behind bright smiles and breezy deflections. The part that held your heart, your deepest hopes and dreams and fears. The part that Suna longed to know, to understand...but that you never quite let him see.

It hurt, that distance. It ate at him like acid, slow and corrosive. Because he wanted all of you, every messy, complicated, beautiful part. He wanted to crack you open and crawl inside, to burrow into the hidden depths of your soul and make a home there.

He wanted to be the one you turned to with your whole heart, the one you trusted with your most vulnerable self. He wanted to be your person in every sense of the word, not just the one you leaned on but the one you loved, the one you chose.

But you never did. No matter how much he longed for it, no matter how many nights he spent staring at the ceiling and wishing...you never saw him as anything more than a friend. A best friend, sure, but still just...a friend.

And god, it was getting harder to bear. Harder to swallow back the words that always wanted to spill out, the confessions and pleas and promises. Harder to bite his tongue and smile when you gushed about your latest boyfriend, to offer a sympathetic ear and a shoulder to cry on when they inevitably let you down.

He felt like he was drowning, sometimes. Like he was being slowly crushed under the weight of all the unspoken things, all the pent-up love and longing and desperation. He felt like he was fading away, bit by bit, worn thin by the constant effort of holding himself together, of keeping his heart locked away behind a friendly smile and an easy laugh.

He wasn't sure how much longer he could do it. Wasn't sure how much more he could take before he shattered completely, before he just...broke.

But what choice did he have? He couldn't lose you. Couldn't bear the thought of a life without you in it, even if being near you was slowly killing him. You were oxygen to him, necessary and vital. Cutting you out would be like cutting out his own heart.

So he endured. He swallowed the hurt and the jealousy and the desperate, clawing need, and he was there. Always, always there, waiting in the wings. Waiting for you to see him, to really see him.

Waiting for his chance to step out of the background and into the light of your love.

It was getting harder to hold onto hope, some days. Harder to believe that there would ever be a right time, a perfect moment. That he would ever find the courage to lay his heart at your feet and beg you to take it, to cherish it the way he'd always cherished you.

But he had to believe. It was all he had, this fragile flicker of faith. The tiniest spark of possibility, glowing in the dark.

So he fanned it carefully, tended it like the precious thing it was. He held it close on the nights when the loneliness got too much to bear, when the ache in his chest made it hard to breathe. Whispered it to himself like a mantra, a prayer:

Someday. Someday. Someday.

Someday, you would see. Someday, you would understand. Someday, he would be brave enough, strong enough, to reach out and grasp the future he wanted so desperately.

Someday, your movie would reach its climax. The music would swell, the camera would pan in...and he would finally, finally step into his destiny. Into the starring role he'd always been meant to play, the one he'd been rehearsing for his whole life.

He would take your hands in his, look into your eyes...and he would say it. The words that had been living in his throat for years, the ones that beat against his ribs like caged birds, desperate for freedom.

"I love you," he would say, simple and honest and achingly true. "I've always loved you. And I know I'm not the kind of guy you usually go for, I know I'm not exciting or flashy or whatever, but...I'm here. I've always been here. And I always will be, if you'll let me. Because you're it for me. You're everything."

And maybe, just maybe...you would hear him. Really hear him, the way you never had before. Maybe you would look at him with new eyes, with dawning realization and wonder and joy.

Maybe you would see all the love he'd been holding back, see the shape of his devotion in every line of his face. Maybe you would understand that he was your person, your forever...just like you were his.

"Oh," you would breathe, soft and reverent. "Oh, Suna. I...I never knew. I never saw..."

"I know," he would whisper, leaning in to rest his forehead against yours. "I know, baby. But I'm here now. And I'm not going anywhere. Not ever again."

And then...then you would kiss him. Soft and sweet and filled with promise, filled with all the love he'd always dreamed of. You would wind your arms around his neck and press close, and he would hold you like he'd always longed to, like you were the most precious thing in the universe.

Because you were. God, you were. And finally, finally...you were his.

His best friend. His soulmate. His happy ending, the one he'd always been chasing.

The credits would roll, the music would fade out...and a new story would begin.

The evening had started like countless others - just you and Suna, a few too many drinks, and a forgotten movie playing in the background as you laughed and joked and reminisced. It was comfortable, familiar, the kind of easy intimacy born from a lifetime of friendship.

But as the night wore on and the alcohol flowed, Suna found himself growing quiet, a melancholy settling over him like a fog. He watched you through increasingly blurry eyes, taking in the way the soft light played over your features, the way your laughter seemed to fill the room, bright and effervescent.

God, you were so beautiful. So vibrant, so full of life and joy and everything good in the world. And he loved you so much it hurt, a physical ache in his chest that never went away, no matter how hard he tried to ignore it.

"You know what's really pathetic?" he found himself saying, the words slipping out before he could bite them back.

You turned to him, head cocked, a curious smile playing about your lips. "What's that?"

Suna swallowed hard, suddenly feeling like he was standing on the edge of a cliff, toes curling over the precipice. He knew he should step back, laugh it off, change the subject. But the alcohol had loosened his tongue, lowered his inhibitions, and suddenly...suddenly he couldn't hold it in anymore.

"Me," he said, voice rough and scratchy with emotion. "I'm pathetic. Because I've been in love with you for so fucking long, and I've never had the balls to tell you."

Your eyes went wide, lips parting in shock, but Suna barreled on, the words pouring out of him like water from a burst dam.

"I've loved you since we were kids," he said, staring down at his hands, vision blurring with unshed tears. "Since the day you punched that kid for making fun of my haircut in third grade. Since the summer we were twelve and you broke your arm falling out of that tree, and you held my hand the whole way to the hospital even though you were the one in pain."

A smile flickered across his face, small and fond and aching. "I loved you when we were sixteen and you got your heart broken for the first time, and you cried on my shoulder for hours. I loved you when you accidentally burnt toast because you were singing in the kitchen. I loved you when we graduated high school, and you looked so beautiful in your cap and gown that it took my breath away."

He risked a glance up at you, finding you staring at him with a stricken expression, tears tracking silently down your cheeks. "I loved you through every boyfriend, every breakup, every lame movie night and inside joke and 2 AM phone call. I loved you on your best days and your worst days and every day in between."

Suna's voice broke then, a sob catching in his throat. "I love you now," he whispered, raw and ragged. "I love you so much it's like a physical thing, like a part of me. Like I can't breathe right when you're not around, can't think straight when you're near. You're in my veins, in my bones, in every beat of my fucking heart, and I...I can't keep pretending anymore."

The tears were flowing freely now, hot and fast down his face, but he made no move to wipe them away. "I know I'm not...I know I'm not what you want," he choked out, chest heaving with the force of his emotions. "I know I'm just your best friend, just the guy you call when you need a shoulder to cry on or someone to laugh with. But god, I want to be more. I want to be everything to you, the way you are to me."

He reached out with shaking hands, cupping your face, thumbs swiping at the tears painting your cheeks. "I love you," he breathed, pouring every ounce of longing, every shred of desperate devotion into the words. "I am so fucking in love with you, it's like...it's like I don't know how to be anything else. And I just...I needed you to know. Even if it ruins everything, even if you don't feel the same...I couldn't keep it in anymore. I couldn't keep lying to you, to myself."

Suna closed his eyes then, unable to bear the sight of your face, the pity or gentle rejection he knew must be written there. He felt flayed open, raw and exposed, heart lying shattered at your feet.

But then...then he felt your hands on his, warm and steady. Felt you lean in, forehead pressing against his own, the salt of your tears mingling with his.

"Suna, you idiot," you whispered, and he flinched, bracing for the blow. But your voice was soft, achingly tender, suffused with a warmth that made his eyes fly open in shock. "How could you not know? How could you not see that I...that I love you too? That I've always loved you, from the minute we met?"

He stared at you, hardly daring to breathe, to hope. But you were smiling through your tears, eyes shining with a light he'd never seen before. "You're not just my best friend," you said, hands sliding into his hair, cradling him like he was something precious. "You're my soulmate, my other half. The one person who knows me better than anyone, who's always been there, always loved me, even at my worst."

You pressed your lips to his forehead, his cheeks, the corners of his trembling mouth. "I love you, Suna Rintarou," you murmured against his skin, each word a benediction. "I'm in love with you. And if you want me...I'm yours. Forever."

A broken sob tore from Suna's throat, disbelief and joy and overwhelming relief crashing over him in a tidal wave. He surged forward, capturing your lips in a kiss that was messy and desperate and perfect, pouring every ounce of love, every year of longing into the press of his mouth on yours.

You kissed him back just as fiercely, hands fisting in his shirt, holding him close like you never wanted to let go. And god, he never wanted you to. He wanted to stay in this moment forever, wrapped up in you, in the love he'd craved for so long, the love he'd never dared to hope could be his.

When you finally broke apart, breathing hard, Suna couldn't stop touching you - hands skimming over your face, your hair, your shoulders, like he needed to convince himself this was real. That you were real, that this was happening.

"I love you," he rasped, resting his forehead against yours. "God, I love you so much."

You smiled, radiant and blinding, and pressed a kiss to the tip of his nose. "I love you too," you whispered. "Always have, always will."

And as Suna gathered you into his arms, as he buried his face in your hair and breathed you in...he felt something slot into place in his chest. A piece he hadn't even known was missing, a hole he'd carried for so long, suddenly filled by your love, your presence, your promise of forever.

From those early days when you first stumbled into each other's orbits, he'd watched your lives play out together like adjacent movies running on parallel screens. Two stories inching closer with each passing year, edging tantalizingly near but never quite converging into one. He was the yearning protagonist, you the luminous star burning bright just out of reach.

But now, in this transcendent moment, the projectors had merged. The credits were rolling on that old, achingly familiar film that had been his constant lonesome companion. And when the lights came up, when the screen flickered to brilliant new life...it was a sequel. Your sequel together at last, 3D and eye-searing in its vividness.

No longer was he resigned to loving you from afar, playing the supporting role in your story. Now you were his co-star, his perfectly matched lead - twin suns burning brilliantly side-by-side in their own cosmic romance.

This was just the beginning. Your beginning, the sequel he'd waited his entire existence to see... and it was more extraordinary than anything he could have ever imagined.