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platypanthewriter · 2 years ago

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Ding-Dong-Dashin’ on Heaven’s Door

My first @harringroveson-bingo prompt! BE WARNED: it contains TEMPORARY CHARACTER DEATH, though he will be brought back later! Read on Ao3

A2: Terminal Illness

Title: Ding-Dong-Dashin’ on Heaven’s Door

Rating: Teen and Up

Word Count: 3771/?

Ship(s): Harringrove

Major Tags: Temporary Character Death

Additional Tags: Terminal Illness, ghost, character brought back to life, Canon-adjacent, Billy doesn't die at the mall, But they can't save him until later, sad probably, but happy ending

Summary: They get Billy out of the mall, but even the hospital can’t save him...but even after he dies, he isn’t really gone, and strange things happen in Hawkins.

The thing with the Mindflayer was, it was stubborn.

They’d gotten Billy out of the wreckage (before he burned up, even), they even got his bleeding stopped on the way to the hospital (though he lost a lung in the process)—but if the Mindflayer was gonna die, apparently it was gonna take Billy Hargrove with it, sucking all the life out of him like it had the farm above the tunnels.

Steve wandered by Billy’s room on his way home, after they’d finished checking him over for weird truth drugs or whatever, and after he’d poked his nose in to see them stitching up El’s leg after they’d gotten the slug out. He could see Max across the hall, sitting in the chair in the corner of Billy’s room. She was gripping the seat with white knuckles, listening to all the machines keeping Billy alive while the doctors tried to find something wrong with him they could actually fix. She told Steve (in a flat voice) about Billy’s lung, and the damage to his spine, damage they couldn’t even estimate until he woke up and tried to move.

“His lung,” Max repeated, her voice gravelly with tears.

“I’ve seen damage like this before, actually,” his doctor told them, once she’d asked about Billy’s parents, and Max and Steve had stared back at her. “At the veteran’s hospital. We got a World War II vet in. He’d been hit by a sniper as he was boarding the ship home. Bullet bounced around everywhere, he lost part of his liver, a kidney, a lung, some intestine…everything in his x-rays was in the wrong place, because they just shoved everything back in, and sewed him back up. They didn’t think he was gonna live.”

Max glared at her, her knuckles whitening as she gripped Billy’s blanket.

“He made it,” the doctor stressed, gently. “He married and came in for his checkup with his wife, and talked about his children. And our medicine is better than it was forty years ago, in a war zone. Your brother’s injuries were severe, but they haven’t turned septic. The problem is…something else,” she said, using a swab to dab at the black slime dripping from under Billy’s eyelids.

“Shit,” Max whispered, as Steve bit his lips together, watching the doctor try and sound calm as they all watched Billy cough black smoke.

Steve kept visiting after that, feeling kinda weird about it, given that he’d tried to run the guy over, and he still remembered—too vividly, sometimes—the sensation of Billy’s fists connecting with his face. It was just…he kept remembering Max, sitting there next to the hospital bed, waiting for her brother to die.

Also, Steve reminded himself, Billy Hargrove was an unredeemable asshole, but he had stopped the Mindflayer from killing basically everybody. A few evenings here and there watching him gasp for breath, mumble to people who weren’t there, and puke slugs up into a bucket weren’t hurting Steve any. Lucas sat with Max sometimes, holding her hand—or Dustin tried to make her laugh—but mostly she just glared past Billy’s feet under the blankets. Sometimes she cried.

The couple nights Max couldn’t make it, she called, her voice eerily calm, to ask whether Steve would sit with her brother. “We don’t know how long he’s got,” she said, flatly. “I don’t want him dying alone.”

“Sure thing,” Steve told her, grimacing as he realized he was awkwardly giving the wall a thumbs-up. “I—yeah. I’ll hang out and, uh, I’ll—at least through visiting hours.”

“Thanks,” she rasped, and hung up without another word.

Billy was fairly lucid sometimes, though he mostly couldn’t talk—either he was throwing up stuff that horrified the nurses, or he had tubes in him to keep him breathing. Steve sat next to the bed and griped about shitty customers, and shittier uniforms, and Billy watched his face, sometimes. Sometimes he slept, but Steve stayed anyway, until visiting hours were over.

He was strong enough to lift Billy too, when he got confused and tried to get out of bed and fell, and Max couldn’t do anything except scream for help. Steve hugged her, after they got him back in bed and asleep, and she sobbed silently into his sweater, shaking.

Towards the end, Billy yanked the tubes out, over and over, until they stopped fighting him. “Fuckin’...dyin’...anyway,” he mumbled, taking a shuddery, wheezy breath between each word.

It was weird hearing his voice, raw as it was. His skin was mostly blue-black and veiny, but his eyes were still Hargrove, still the guy who’d climbed over furniture to get to Steve at a party, and then all he’d done was glare. Steve wondered what to say. “How’re you feeling,” he asked, immediately feeling stupid as Billy shook with silent laughter.

“Fff…fuck you,” he panted, his body jerking, and Steve grabbed the bucket fast, helping Billy turn to hork up the water he’d drunk earlier, black liquid, and what looked like some of a tentacle. He laid on his side with his eyes shut, afterwards. “...thought I’d…get to…do more shit,” he gasped, laughing.

Steve grimaced, nervously twiddling his thumbs. “...least you aren’t dying a virgin?” he suggested, fairly sure, and Billy choked again, turning his body as much as he could to drool and spit thick black fluid into the bucket. ��Sorry,” Steve told him, feeling underqualified for the situation.

“...I’m…fag,” Billy whispered, tears dripping down across his face as he shook again, trying not to laugh.

“What?!” Steve asked, grabbing for a paper towel, and cleaning the guy’s face up a little.

“‘Z’it even count…f’never…kissed…” Billy wheezed out, and Steve thought about it.

“...maybe not, huh,” he agreed, wincing. “If you didn’t…I mean, you didn’t kiss anybody you even…kinda…wanted to kiss.”

“...yeah,” Billy gasped, his shoulders jerking with hiccuping sobs. He didn’t open his eyes.

The next day, Max was there, so Steve just popped in briefly, to tell her a story about a customer who wanted child-appropriate slasher films. Billy’s skin was sunken and grey. He didn’t seem aware—his eyes were half open, but he didn’t look over when Steve talked, even when he helped Max sponge her brother off a bit.

Steve didn’t tell her what Billy’d confessed. It didn’t seem like her business—or Steve’s, even, except that he’d been the only one there to tell. The hallway seemed silent after the rasping, uneven sounds of Billy struggling for breath, as he left Max with her book and her dying brother, wondering whether Billy would wake up again.

Max called the next day, and Steve waited, biting his lips together, to hear Billy had died. “...Neil finally said they can start the morphine tomorrow,” she said, her voice hoarse. “They said…once they do, he probably won’t wake up. E-ever.”

“Shit,” Steve said, rubbing his face. “Fuck. Uh. You…”

“I gotta go to school,” she said, sounding wet, like she was breathing through a bunch of raw eggs, or had a sodden swimsuit in her sinuses, and Steve grimaced, wondering where the hell Billy’s parents were.

“I’ll take the day off,” he said quickly, and listened to her cry. “I—I can, um, I can at least sit there. I’ll tell him…stupid shit about Hawkins. I mean, he’s not really missing much—”

She gulped a sob at that, and Steve shut up, cursing himself. “See you after school,” she gritted out.

It seemed like it was gonna be super awkward, sitting next to Billy all day on his last day alive, so Steve braced himself for listening, but he also took a book—the novelization of the Star Trek movie with the little teddy bears. He was glad he did, because when he got there, Billy was out cold, his breathing labored. Steve sat down and opened his book, then, after some thought, read it softly aloud. At least if Billy could hear anything, he’d know he wasn’t dying alone. After the second chapter, when Steve’s throat was getting dry, he looked over to see Billy’s eyes open, focused on him.

“...hey,” he said, and Billy’s mouth quirked a little.

“That…ewoks?” he asked, closing his eyes for a second and working his jaw between words.

“...yeah, that’s what they’re called,” Steve remembered. “I always forget.”

“Ewoks,” Billy rasped. His breath was gurgly, but he actually sounded…better, somewhat, more awake.

“You want some water?” Steve asked, getting up.

“...nah. You…leaving?” Billy asked, his hand twitching in the blankets, and Steve tossed the book into his chair.

“No, nope,” he said quickly, glancing at the clock—five entire hours until Max could possibly make it after school, even if somebody gave her a ride. “I’m here until Max gets out of school, you’re stuck with me.” Billy squinted at him, and Steve pointed to the bathroom with both hands, like a moron. “I’m just getting a drink. ‘Cause I was reading.”

Billy bit his lips together, and Steve took that as permission, retreating to drink several refills of the tiny paper cup on the counter. His mouth felt like he’d been breathing desert sand, and he wondered why Billy didn’t want a drink in the dry hospital air, but the nurses had told Max not to try and force anything into him.

When he got back, Billy was trying to get the hospital bed to raise behind him. Steve helped with his pillows, so for the first time in a while, Billy could sit up, a bit. He didn’t weigh enough, Steve thought, pulling him up very carefully so he could stuff pillows behind. Billy shut his eyes for a long second after Steve finished, and Steve didn’t dare move his hands off Billy’s shoulder and back, didn’t dare drop him if he wasn’t steadied out yet, in case the asshole was hurting.

“Fuck,” Billy whispered, tears streaking down his cheeks, leaving oily black streaks. He shook with suppressed coughs, and more black goo dripped down his chin.

“Shit, I broke you,” Steve said, trying to look around for the “help” button without moving, and hurting Billy worse.

“Already…broken,” Billy wheezed out, trembling against him, and squeezing his hand. “S…fine.”

Steve waited a long second before moving, and then kept his arms up and ready while Billy settled back into the pillows. Steve sat on the edge of the bed, kind of…unwilling to yank back the hand Billy had squeezed, and worried about sitting too far away, in case Billy needed something, the bucket, or help lying down again.

“...why’s…Max coming,” Billy managed, his eyes closed. “Got…school.”

Not having much in the way of family meant Steve had watched other people’s so hard it was probably a little creepy. “...’cause she’s your sister, and she loves you,” he said confidently, and Billy snorted a laugh. “She does,” Steve told him. “I guess she’s got bad taste, man.”

“...gon’ get…in trouble,” Billy rasped out. “Max…”

“Look, she’s got my number, okay,” Steve told him, gingerly squeezing his arm, and trying not to tug on the IV. “I’ll be there.”

Billy glanced up at him and away, his eyes filling with the creepy black tears again.

“So,” Steve said, clearing his throat in the awkward silence, and Billy looked up, smirking a little, his eyes red-rimmed. “Uh. I got roped into going to see The Black Cauldron. It was the worst.”

“The what,” Billy grunted, coughing, and Steve dug his fingers into the blankets next to Billy’s hand, trying to keep his voice calm.

“It’s this shitty kid’s movie. There’s a psychic pig,” he said, rolling his eyes, and told Billy what he could remember of the weird story, while Billy watched his face, glancing down occasionally at his hand on Steve’s. He laughed until he cried some more at Steve’s impression of the creepy little furry monkey guy, and Steve found himself trying to remember every second of the movie, because Billy was awake for the first time in forever, and listening to Steve’s dumb rendition of an awful movie had to be better than waiting to die.

By the time he got to describing how they’d just edited in live-action actors with colored visual effects, Billy was grinning tiredly. “Wha…this shit,” he muttered, and Steve laughed, squeezing his hand.

“I know, right?” he agreed, noticing Billy was feeling better, for real, he had some pink in his cheeks, and the tops of his ears. Maybe he wouldn’t die, Steve thought. Maybe the doctors had been wrong, all of them, and Billy was going to be a pain in Steve’s ass for years to come.

“...keep going,” Billy rasped out, and Steve stopped just smiling like an idiot, and remembered where he’d been in the story.

“That’s most of it,” he said, “—but you wanna hear about dumb movies, I’m your guy.”

“Tell me,” Billy wheezed, closing his eyes tightly for a long second, and Steve waited for him to open them, squeezing Billy’s hand in both of his.

“Okay,” Steve told him, his own eyes stinging, because Billy’s hand in his felt cold. “Lemme tell you about Gymkata.”

Steve and Robin had agreed that Gymkata was the worst movie ever, every time they snuck in to see it, watching an olympic gymnast find convenient pommel horses and bars to swing on to defeat ninjas. Billy laughed silently, tears running down his cheeks as Steve got up and acted out scenes from the movie, kicking off the edge of the bed, or pretending to grip the curtain rod concealing Billy’s bed. “A fusion of ka-ra-te and gymnastics…GYMKATA,” he mimicked, as Billy wiped his eyes, shaking with suppressed laughter. “Worst movie ever,” Steve told him, delighted at the grin on Billy’s face, forgetting for a second the reason he was there—until he glanced at the clock, and realized Max’ school was out, and she’d be showing up any minute. It’d be stupid, he thought, to hang around in the way, while Max spent her last evening with her brother.

“...you…gotta go?” Billy rasped, looking from him to the clock.

“Hell no, I can wait until Max shows up,” Steve told him, sitting down on the bed again and kind of…trying to rub some warmth back into Billy’s hand. “There’s a guy in it with a rubber face on the back of his head, so when he turns around, he has to be really careful he doesn’t move his neck and make the rubber face wrinkle.”

“Jesus,” Billy wheezed, tears dripping freely out of his face.

“We snuck in and watched it all the time,” Steve told him, and Billy’s mouth quirked, again.

“...you an’...girl?” he asked, dryly, and Steve shook his head, then remembered what Billy had confessed the day before. He’d never had anyone he could tell, but a dying guy was probably the safest it got.

“No, um…Robin’s a queer too,” Steve told him in a hurried whisper, even though there was nobody else around, and Billy stared at him. “She crushes on girls,” Steve said, to be clear. “Just on girls.”

Billy licked his lips, glancing with wide eyes from Steve’s face to the open hallway door, and Steve wondered, suddenly, whether he even remembered his confession. He’d been half conscious, gagging over the side of the bed. Maybe he hadn’t meant to say anything.

“I’m here!” Max said, stomping inside to drop her backpack on a seat. Her skateboard scraped sideways across the floor as she tossed it, ducking her panting, sweaty self into the bathroom and slamming the door.

“Do you wish you got to kiss somebody,” Steve asked, in a rush. “A—you know, a guy.”

“What,” Billy whispered, blankly. He’d turtled back into the blankets a little since Steve had brought it up—the queer thing—his jaw set warily.

“You never got to kiss anybody you wanted to kiss,” Steve hissed at him, listening to Max flush.

“...fuck you,” Billy rasped out, his eyes shining with tears that overflowed down his cheeks.

“No! No, I just—”

Max turned on the water, and Steve just leaned in and pressed his lips to Billy’s, ignoring the taste of puke, and the awful, stale smell of dehydration, and whatever the Mindflayer had done to Billy’s body to turn his tears dark and slimy. Billy inhaled hard, coughing again, and Steve squeezed his hand, and left, because that had probably been a really stupid idea, but at least Billy’d have something else to think about, like what a fucking weirdo (and shitty kisser) King Steve Harrington was.

If Billy called after him, it wasn’t loud enough to hear.

The next day, Saturday, Max called again. “He’s gone,” she rasped out. “He, uh. He asked about you. At the…where you were. Where you’d gone.”

Steve was kind of…shocked, even though he’d known, even though the doctor had told them what to expect. Billy’d been more awake, he’d been grinning, and laughing, and Steve had thought maybe, just—maybe they’d been wrong, maybe he’d live. Max was quiet on the other end, and Steve cleared his throat. “Probably pissed I spent his last day telling him about The Black Cauldron,” he told her, grimacing.

“...I don’t think so,” she said, and then she was quiet for a bit again, and Steve paced around the kitchen.

“Want me to pick you up,” he suggested, waving his hands. “Get—uh, I’ll get you a—one of those breakfast sandwiches. At McDonalds’, you know.”

“A what,” she said, her voice as wet as Billy’s had been.

“We can drive out to the quarry and throw rocks,” he tried, because he couldn’t suggest they get high, though he put that thought aside to circle back to, in case of desperation.

“...okay,” she sighed, and he groaned internally, because how come somebody hadn’t stepped up to help who knew what they were doing, somebody with better ideas than kissing dying queers and throwing rocks.

As he hung up, he felt something cold brush his lips, and he shivered, stepping back, and frowning around.

Max didn’t want to talk. She didn’t want to hear about stupid movies, or do much more than heave rocks as hard as she could, so eventually Steve just turned the radio on, and let her be. To his surprise, when she climbed in the car again, she stared at the glove compartment, took a ragged breath, breathed slowly out, closed her eyes, and asked, “Can we do this again?”

“Sure,” he said instantly, giving her an over-enthusiastic thumbs-up, and she laughed, wiping her nose. As he looked in the rearview mirror, his heart nearly leapt out of his chest, because he stared straight into Billy’s dark blue, red-rimmed eyes. He whipped around to look in the backseat, and there was nothing, not even a bulky folded coat or a pile of trash to explain the shape, and he stared back at the rearview mirror again, seeing only the view out the back window of his car.

“...you can drop me off at home, I guess,” Max said, digging around in the wrappers from their McDonald’s breakfast and blowing her nose hard into a napkin.

“Y-yeah,” Steve said, glancing into the backseat again. “Uh,” he said, trying to remember what he’d been gonna say before he started hallucinating. “Um, you want I should drop you at Lucas’ house? Or somebody?”

She frowned, crumpling the napkin in her hands. “...I guess,” she muttered, sighing. “Mom keeps wanting me to cheer up.”

“...call me up anytime you wanna yell,” Steve told her, prepared to make excuses to Robin and his boss.

“He was a shithead, but…he wasn’t always a shithead,” she mumbled. Steve nodded, gripping the steering wheel, and wishing he had any idea what to say. “...his dad…” Max whispered, then bit her lips, shutting her eyes tightly for a few seconds. “...shit, just take me somewhere,” she bit out, with a sob, and Steve startled and hit the gas so hard gravel flew.

She didn’t call all the time, but over the next couple weeks, on Steve’s days off, he’d get a call from her little angry voice and go pick her up. She’d stare out over the quarry and tell him stories about Billy—sometimes little things, shopping for Christmas presents together, sometimes bigger things.

“He had a weird gap in his ribs,” she said one day, sipping her Coke. “You could feel the broken ends, and the gap between. Like…a couple inches, probably. He said he’d gotten it when spies broke in,” she said, snorting a laugh. “We were just…watching late night TV, y’know, I Love Lucy, all quiet after everybody else went to bed, and he had a few beers. He let me have one. It was gross,” she said softly, staring out the windshield. “I found this…hole in his rib, tickling him. He was…cussing me out, y’know, laughing, and I kept asking. He said his dad did it. Threw him into some cinder blocks.”

“...shit,” Steve muttered, grimacing.

“He was always—he’d grab Billy’s face, make him say things—make him say he was shit, or—or he’d hit him—” she cut off, her breath shuddery.

Steve didn’t know what to say to that, trying to imagine Billy allowing it.

“I know he shouldn’t’ve…what he did to you,” she said, glancing over at Steve, and glowering away. “...he was a shithead, I know he was, it’s just—it’s stupid—”

“He was your brother,” Steve said, grimacing. “I mean. I don’t have one, but…you knew him a long time. It makes sense to be sad about it.”

“Pissed as hell about it,” Max growled, sniffling, and Steve handed her his napkin.

“Yeah, that too,” he agreed, and she laughed, blowing her nose again.

Steve’s house had gotten drafty. He wore sweaters over long underwear, kind of glad he didn’t have a girlfriend, because it was not a sexy look. He’d wake to a chill feeling on his face, or pivot on his heel because he felt something tug at his sleeve, in a room colder than late summer in Indiana had any right to be.

Once, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Billy, sitting cross-legged right at the end of Steve’s bed, his mouth moving like he was talking. When Steve shoved himself up, staring around, his heart pounding, no one was there.

Chapter Two

#terminal illness #Harringrove Bingo #Harringrove #TEMPORARY character death #This is just chapter one #There will be more

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yeojaa · 4 years ago

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( SOMETHING COMFORTING. )

Jeon Jungkook loves Overwatch, drinking games, and Halloween. What he loves more than that? You.

pairing. gamer!jjk x named f!reader.

genre + rating. idol!au set in room filled with bunnies and a cotton candy machine that’s exploded. it’s just that fluffy. (but also explicit cause why not.)

tags / warnings. established relationship, gaming (overwatch), dorky weeb references, mentions of drinking, yugyeom makes an appearance (!!), fingering, soft soft soft love making in the shower.

wc. 9.7k

beta reader(s). the lovely @kerikaaria read through this to make sure i didn’t get too nerdy. tysm! 💛 i may like further changes once my beloved @hobi-gif gets her hands on it but i’m a potato who wanted to post this quickly. oops...

author note. this fulfills the “jeon jungkook” square of @btsholidaybingo‘s bts holiday bingo 2020 and this is the couple from angels & airwaves. while this story isn’t super plot-driven, it’s meant to be a little peek into the lives of a couple that live in my mind rent-free and continue to make me soft and gooey inside. i hope you enjoy it!

You don’t know how he talked you into it or how it really happened. You remember, faintly, the mention of a party. Something about it being a small thing - just a few close friends, the members, etc. He’d said it so offhand, like commenting on the sky or asking for another package of Choco Boys, so you hadn't given it a second thought. If it was important, he’d bring it up again and if not, well, you hardly remembered it anyway. Win-win or whatever.

So you’d given up some intelligence points, traded them for space to fit more gaming knowledge. Somewhere along the line went your memory too - the conversation wiped from your brain like Will Smith had lasered it clean.

“Zarya’s one! Zarya’s one—“ You’re not sure how many times you can repeat yourself, shrieking through comms to a team that doesn’t seem to want to listen. You’re blasted into oblivion, Mercy’s prone body launched across the map as you watch your Rein fall too. There’s an irritation bubbling in your stomach, fizzing uncomfortably like the Japanese honeydew soda you’d had at lunch. “Zarya’s actually one!”

No one cares. She’s healed by the time you respawn and make it back across the map.

“Jesus—“ Your push-to-talk remains off for that flippant comment, distaste colouring your words a bitter shade of blue. You almost want to let your Ashe get headshot by the enemy Widow, only switching the stream from damage boosting to healing when your teammate starts spamming their hotkey.

I need healing! I need healing!

What you need is a team that listens to your calls or at the very least communicates in some way. Doesn’t seem like it’s going to happen though. There’s near radio silence in the voice chat, the only other person remotely helpful being your bouncing booping Lucio that’s trying to keep a flanking Tracer off point. Stupid. You almost feel bad for him, Guardian Angeling to him when no one else seems to want to offer any support.

Ah, the life of a support player in masters ranked. So infuriating and yet— nope. Just infuriating.

You lose the first round with 1:56 to spare, to no one’s surprise. Okay, maybe to your Reinhardt’s surprise. He’s being surprisingly chipper in text chat, sending WP and a dorky smiley face. You think he must volunteer at the local animal shelter and buy coffee for the people behind him in the drive-thru. He’s far too well-adjusted, not shooting off a single accusation to anyone on the team. A silver lining, you suppose.

Your second round starts well enough. Your comp is solid - as much as it can be in the current off-tank dominated meta. Hog, Zarya, a private profiled GM Widowmaker, Tracer, Lucio, and you as Ana. You’d prefer to play Mercy - find the most comfort in her skill set - but on an attack map, you’re not risking a headshot right out of spawn. Broken maximum damage good stuff means healers are squishy and you don’t have your usual DPS to boost. (He’s off doing god knows what - maybe filming an ad for Samsung or breaking the internet with his permed man bun.)

You make it through the choke without much ado. The enemy Rein is wildly out of position, eager to make some big brained play that goes terribly wrong. Your Lucio chuckles through voice and you join him, tossing a nade when your Zarya looks like she’s about to die to a poorly executed 360 shatter.

“You winning?”

It’s your boyfriend peeking over your shoulder, so close you nearly scream, mouse launched across your desk with the intensity of your reaction. You hadn’t heard him come in, the stupid sneaky bastard as quiet as a mouse.

(It’s not your own fault. He knows you can’t hear anything when you’ve got your headphones on, the noise cancelling in your state of the art Sennheisers not something to scoff at.)

“Jeez, Kook!” You want to be more mad. Really, you do. You’re scrambling across your desk to retrieve your mouse, squeaking a quick apology into team voice when your hero stays in one place for too long. Luckily, Hog - previously sweet kind Rein - throws his big fat piggy self directly in front of you, effectively saving you from an otherwise miserable death at the hands of Torbjorn.

“What?” Jeon Jungkook has the audacity to look scandalised, shiny eyes so wide and innocent they feel more as if they belong in an early 2000s anime.

You’re not even looking at him when you huff - too invested in your Overwatch game to give him the hell he deserves. All you manage is a swift don’t scare me like that! as you pump your tanks back to full health.

You notice Jungkook hasn’t moved away, still peering curiously over your shoulder. You know he hasn’t had much time to play lately, too involved with appearances for their comeback, his schedule too packed even for you some days. You don’t blame him when he pulls his chair up behind you, rolling into place so he’s just within your periphery.

It’s a little distracting; he smells good, like his - and by extension your - favourite laundry detergent and a fruity, nectarine-heavy shampoo you’d picked up for him when he’d run out of his usual. You notice then that his hair is wet, just the wrong-side of too damp with droplets beading over his neck. Moisture soaks into the top of his shirt and you think it might be more soaked than you can see; it’s hard to tell when it’s a jet black shirt, one of the many he keeps in your closet for the nights he stays over. You realise then that he must’ve been home far longer than you’d thought, if his freshly washed pink cheeks are any indication. (Because he takes seriously long showers, nearly doubling your water bill in the year you’ve been together.)

You want to ask what he’s doing here - you’d sworn he was busy for the next few days - but can’t find the adequate brain power to do so. You’re playing an incredibly high skill character (your words) and if you don’t get this goddamn shot on your Lucio to keep him up, your team is going to die (your ego’s words).

‘Ask Kook about his day’ gets scribbled on a paper on the desk in your head and filed away under To Do Later in your overflowing brainiac filing cabinet.

“Can we pleaaaaase focus their Zarya? She has grav.” Though you offer the tidbit of information, you don’t assume it’s going to be relied upon. Your team is well on their way to taking first point - surprisingly - and there’s still nearly three minutes left on the clock. If the six of you idiots can keep it together and kill that goddamn Zarya, there’s no doubt in your mind you’ll win the game.

Alas, fate is but a cruel mistress and said Zarya gets said grav off, sucking your own Russian tank and Tracer-turned-Soldier into her hell void. Not even your well-timed nade can save them from the Genji that dragon blades directly into their faces. Your poor Lucio dies to the same ult and you imagine you or your Widow are next. Your Hog’s just respawning, his lumbering silhouette not even on screen.

“Rip,” says your boyfriend - like the sound, not the letters - from beside you, a droplet of water splashing across your wrist when he shakes his head. He looks disappointed - as if he’s the one that’s lost the match. It makes you laugh, the sound tripping off your tongue despite the overwhelming rage you’re currently battling.

“Rip is right,” you mumble back, tossing yourself off the map. If you’re gonna die, it'll be on your own terms. Jungkook chuckles at that.

By the time you respawn, both you and Widow are joining a fight that looks like it’s going surprisingly well. There’s no one on point and you’re capping uncontested. Widow even headshots a wayward Moira.

“You should go top left.”

You don’t turn your head. Jungkook’s always been a bit of a backseat gamer, whether he’s watching your stream while he’s out of town or sitting right beside you. Sometimes, you love it; other times, you hate it. Most times, though, he’s right. He has surprisingly good game sense, despite being lower ranked than you (something you remind him of constantly, without shame).

“Can we go top left?” You parrot into your speaker.

For once, your team listens, most of them running up the sidewall with Widow right down main. Not for the first time you wish you were playing Mercy, if only to be able to damage boost your sniper while she distracts the enemy team. Still, you make due, taking your boyfriend’s next piece of advice when it comes, unsolicited. “You should be back right by the stairs. You can see up the hall and still heal Widow on top.”

You’d kiss him if you weren’t so intently focused, unable to tear your gaze from the screen when the enemy team seems to pluck their strategy directly from Jungkook’s skull and hold conservatively on point. Amazing.

“Your Zarya has grav. She’ll probably throw it on point so you should nade as soon as you get in and Widow can pick them off without full charge.”

If he were anyone else, you’d probably be giving him hell for mansplaining your favourite game to you. As it stands, you follow his instructions to the letter and the Team Kill marker flashes across your screen.

“Told you,” he quips, ever the snooty dork you adore.

“I was going to say thank you.” Just not right now. You can’t multitask quite like he can.

If you could look over, you think you’d see him grinning from ear to ear, buck teeth and dimples on full display. “I know.”

As it stands, the other team has trouble getting on point fast enough and you’re left with a whopping 3:56 left on the clock. Thank freaking god. You can win this, you think. Easy. No problem.

“Go Ana on defense.” At some point, Jungkook had gotten up to find a snack and he returns now, bag of shrimp chips in his hand and packet of matcha Pocky held between his teeth. You open your mouth for a stinky tasty treat and he shoves four crisps in, unceremoniously and with his signature dummy grin.

You manage to crunch crunch crunch through it all but shoot him a glare the entire time. He only smiles wider, all perfectly white enamel and enough cuteness to make your heart skip a beat.

“Do you just want to play?” You don’t mean it seriously. You don’t mind him watching and you know he enjoys pretending like he’s better than you. It’s a strange give and take but one that’s uniquely yours, built over nearly a year of online friendship and another year of a real-life relationship.

“Nah, I’m snacking.” He punctuates his response as a child would, shoving a handful of chips into his mouth. You wonder, briefly, why you love him so much when he’s a certifiable goon.

The third match begins and you’re not too proud to say you spend most of it following Jungkook’s directions. He tells you to sleep the enemy Genji trying to scale the right wall - you do. He tells you to nade once their Rein gets in because your own Rein is going to shatter - you do. He tells you to do the macarena and— okay, that, you don’t.

You sweep the match, leaving the other team without a single tick.

When it comes to the final round, he seems to have lost interest in the game, instead rolling himself back to his computer with a parting, wayward ruffle of your hair. You don’t blame him but you thank him nonetheless, blowing a kiss before he settles his headphones over his ears.

You, of course and unsurprisingly, win the game. There’s nothing like using a Sym portal onto point when they’ve got a Bastion set up off point and no shield to protect him from the back.

Satisfied, you don’t bother requeueing and instead force yourself into your boyfriend’s personal space, draping your arms across the idol’s neck as he scrolls through YouTube like a zombie. “We won,” you sing-song into his ear, proud and a little smug.

“Of course you did.” He sounds equally smug and you suppose the win does belong to the both of you. He’d been a great coach.

“What’re you doing here?” It’s pure curiosity offered in the form of a kiss to his cheek, fingers locked across the broad expanse of his chest. He’s delightfully warm beneath you, familiar and unyielding as you sink over the back of his computer chair. (You can feel the chair creaking as it reclines. You don’t care.)

“Whaddya mean?”

The look he levels you with makes you think you’ve grown a second head.

“Your schedule said you had a thing tonight.” You remember, because you’d been disappointed. Halloween was one of your favourite holidays and all you’d wanted was to watch some campy horror movies and use him as a personal eye shield and security blanket combo.

“We have a thing,” he states, like he’s talking to a moron. You know it isn’t meant meanly, too emphatic and amused to hurt your feelings.

When you echo his words (“We?”) you swear you see him roll his eyes in the reflection of his computer screen. Luckily, he laughs, sweet and cracky, somewhere high in his throat - a barking hyena. It’s so cute - your favourite thing in the world - that you don’t have it in you to shame him for it.

“Yeah, we,” Jungkook repeats around something close to a snicker. “Halloween party, baby. Seriously— you forgot?”

It’s then and there you have two crises: (a) you don’t have a costume and (b) Halloween party? You didn’t think idols had those. Weren’t they all too hip and cool to get together to dress up and act stupid?

(You know the answer is no. Exhibit A being the costume-wearing dance practices BTS put out.)

“I don’t have anything to wear.” It’s truly the one thing holding you back, creasing the soft skin between your brows to resemble a peach. It’s also nearing seven in the evening and you’re absolutely certain you’re not going to find something so late in the day.

To your surprise. Jungkook looks flabbergasted, that same you-have-two-heads stare wrought across his face. It’d be endearing if it were directed at anyone else but with it trained on you, it’s rubbing you and your confusion the wrong way. Why’s he looking at you like that? Why’s your memory so bad? Why hasn’t he said anything to answer all of life’s questions?

“You said you’d go as witch Mercy.”

All at once, you’re pulled back to the offhand conversation, the pleading in his eyes, your half-asleep acceptance. It’s the memory you’d lost somewhere along the way in upgrading your in-brain video game storage. A conversation had in bed, his cheeks so big and full of joy they’d waned his eyes into crescents, and your uncoordinated answer because you’d just wanted to go to sleep and not think about anything after indulging in a few too many mochi cream buns.

“I— don’t remember that.” You’re lying through your damn teeth. Your parents would be devastated, all their hard earned money wasted on the braces-straightened enamel that was now letting lies pass.

“But you did!” He’s like a kid being denied candy, rounded bottom lip dropping into a pout that should, frankly, be illegal. It’s far too powerful on him, paired with those Bambi eyes that scream don’t eat (hate/deny/etc.) me! You can only scowl at him, because you know your own puppy dog eyes only work 100% of the time half of the time whereas his track record was immaculate.

“Okay, but I forgot to get the—“

“I have it!”

Jeon Jungkook has an answer for everything, it seems.

“I picked it up on the way here. It’s in your room along with my costume.”

The knowledge of his own intrigues you, squarely centring your curiosity on that and not the fact that you apparently need to get tested for early onset dementia. “Who’re you going as?”

“You’ll see.”

Your costume is spectacular. You can’t even find it in yourself to put up much of a fight when your boyfriend reveals it like you’ve won the lottery, throwing his arms wide in a flourish.

It’s incredibly well made, intricately tailored in a way that makes you worry how much it costs. (When you bring it up to him, Jungkook simply shrugs. You think it’s as much a gift for you as it is for him.) It’s witchy and eye-catching, the belt hung across your hips clipped with an actual book - hollowed out, thank god but also poor thing. The hat that sits on your head is neatly crumpled, sitting at such an angle you worry whether you’ll need to avoid too-low door frames. Your wings - well, you’re almost too afraid to touch them; Jungkook has to help you pull them over your arms, falling into near hysterics when you twitch your elbow the wrong way and smack him right between the eyes.

“I don’t think I can pull this off,” you state, somberly, despite the fact that you’re not terribly self-conscious. (You were, once. Being in a relationship with someone that worships your body has helped with that.)

The top of your outfit is fitted, boned and ribbed and snapped together in all the right places. Leather stands in stark contrast to your skin - summer-soft and gently golden - and hugs curves that don’t quite exist, falling short in a way that has you glaring down at your own chest. You’ve never wanted a Playboy body but in this sort of costume, it practically demands it. (You try not to dwell on the fact that you’ve been conditioned to want to look like an impractically designed video game hero.)

From the foot of your bed comes a snort, a derisive sound that draws your attention. Jungkook’s unabashed in how he admires you, stare roving over every inch like he’s about to devour you. You’re not sure how you can feel so soft for him when he looks completely the opposite, jaw set and expression sharp. A Greek god carved from hardened honey, dressed in Balenciaga blue. “You look great, angel.”

Your heart skips a beat - plays a funny little game of tag with itself - and you can’t help the smile that comes, brought to life by his reassurance. It isn’t necessary to rebuff him then - eyes rolling, laugh spilling - but you do it anyway. “You have to say that. You’re my boyfriend.”

“I don’t have to say anything,” he retorts, levelling you with a look that has your insides molten. It’s the look that reads don’t test me but also I love you and you’re my idiot. It’s your favourite look in the world, lending wings to your flimsy heart. “You look great because you always look great, no matter what.”

“What about when you found me in the shower ?”

Jungkook hesitates then. He’s no liar and he had almost had a heart attack the first time it’d happened. He’d been minding his business, half-asleep and battling the need to piss, when he’d noticed you curled up in the bathroom. How he hadn’t realised you were missing from bed, he’s not sure. All he knew was that you’d terrified him, mentioning something about invading refrigerators when he was pulling his dick out of his boxers.

His scream was what had woken you up; yours was what had him bashing his head into the wall, foot slipping on the soft pink bathroom rug. You could laugh about it now but at the time, you’d thought he’d cracked his skull right open, shouting his name so loudly the neighbours had complained.

(Lucky for you two, they were a nice elderly couple who sometimes had you babysit their grandson. They’d laughed it off when you’d apologised with a loaf of fresh bread and a bandage wrapped around your boyfriend’s head.)

“Okay— that was scary. I thought you’d crawled out of the drain or something.” A shudder rolls through Jungkook’s body, shaking him from his shoulders all the way down to his knees. It’s a strangely adorable reaction from someone who looks like he could bench press you.

“You’re calling me the Grudge?” You’re deeply offended, gloved hands clasping over your chest as if to pull out the treacherous dagger he’s just lodged there. He only rolls his eyes, leaning forward to catch you in his arms; he’s relentless as he drags you to him, side of his face pressed to the bare skin of your thigh. His cheek’s searing but you’re not surprised; Jungkook ran hot, keeping you warm in winter and sweltering in summer. (Ah, the price you paid for love.)

“Yeah, you haunt me in my dreams.”

“That’s not the Grudge, Kook.” Your scoff earns you a pinch, right where the top of your stockings end. It blooms red beneath his fingers, a little reminder of his competitive I’m-never-wrong nature. You swat his hand away, not too bothered when it only finds a home elsewhere, hooked behind your knee. Jungkook had a habit of needing to be in constant contact. A little quirk of his you adored.

“I’m serious. You look—” You should clock the look on his face, the wiggle of mischief up his nose. A dead giveaway shining bright - a beacon. “—bewitching.”

If the book weren’t attached to your hip, you’d be clobbering him with it. Instead, you’re left to whack him with the equally intricate Caduceus staff, booping it over his shoulders. You feel like a certain shamanic mandrill, Jungkook the idiotic lion that’s asking for an earful.

“Shut up!” You’re laughing despite yourself and he is too, holding you so recklessly close it’s hard to hit him without hurting yourself. All part of his plan, you suppose. “You’re so freaking corny.”

“It’s because I’m a-maize-ing, ang—”

Another wap! to the head, shielded only by a tattooed hand that curls over his ear.

“Okay! Sorry!” Except he doesn’t look very sorry. More pleased that you’ve stopped the assault, dark hair pushed back from his forehead as he stares up at you. You hate how he’s so handsome - how you forget yourself when he smiles that smile, nearly yeeting your whole heart directly into the sun.

“Are you going to put on yours yet?”

It’s quarter past nine already and all you’ve done is rope him into eating some chapaguri - you’ve been obsessed with it since a few weeks ago - and play real life Witch Barbie. You have a feeling if you don’t get him into his own costume soon, you’re never going to leave the apartment. (Not that you really mind.)

Your boyfriend - bless his heart - pretends not to hear you, suddenly intently focused on an indiscernible spot past your hip. It’d be more believable if he was glued to his phone or doing anything remotely interesting. Instead, you stare down at him and count the seconds until he realises just how silly he looks. It usually comes around six, paired with a forced chuckle and that lisp you love.

Today, it comes after the fourth count.

“You’re gonna think it’s lame.” Well, of course you will. As his girlfriend - and one of his best friends, you’d like to think - it’s your relationship-given right to shame him for his more often than not absurd ideas. It’s what you deserve for suffering through all his bad jokes and 3 AM Instagram spams.

With a hand on his cheek, you squeeze the apple like you’ve seen a certain member do a million times. “So?”

He’s not really sure how to respond to that, mouth drawn into a pout that reminds you of children’s television show about penguins. It’s unfairly adorable. Still, you push. Jungkook’s bad at saying no to you - always has been, even before he really knew you. From “one more game!” to “bring me bingsu”, you always got what you wanted.

(Which wasn’t to say you asked for a lot. You were happy - more than that, ecstatic and over the moon - with the bare minimum. A selfie while on the plane, some shoddy cinematography during dance practice, a voicemail to wake up to. You didn’t love Jungkook for all the things he gave you; rather, you loved him for who he was, who he’d always been even before you knew who he really was.)

“Don’t laugh.” By the look on his face, you’re worried it’s something awful. The cheesiest thing in the world come to life to haunt you on your beloved spooky holiday.

It turns out to be the opposite: one of your favourite characters realised in the form of your achingly handsome boyfriend. He looks so good you’re not certain whether it’s your attraction to him or him in that particular guise that’s stronger. You figure it doesn’t matter one way or another. For tonight, they’re one and the same.

“Joker? Seriously?” You can’t hide the delight. It colours every syllable, sets them glowing like a neon sign.

Your boyfriend only rolls his eyes, as if he’d predicted this reaction. Dressed as he is, the movement is impossible to miss, brought into focus by the white domino mask. “Don’t sound so excited.” It’s an actual concern of his. He’s seen you sink upwards of ninety hours on the video game, playing it in the early hours when he’s fast asleep and you’re battling another night of insomnia.

Once, he’d asked whether you loved him or Joker more. He hadn’t liked the answer (joking as it was) and had spent the better part of the evening pouting.

This time, you’re sweet as pie, eyes so dark and twinkly he wonders whether he’s staring at the night sky. You wonder the same yourself almost every night, lost in the constellations of his irises. It’s the most intimate form of stargazing you can afford, a luxury you indulge in frequently. You’ve mapped the different formations, named them in honour of all the special moments you’ve shared; you think to label one for this night too.

“You look so good.” You don’t hesitate to brush his hair from his eyes. It’s still relaxing from the perm he’d gotten days ago, curling like classic calligraphy over his eyes. It’s surprisingly soft between your fingers, silk despite the constant heat styling. Bastard. “I can’t believe you’re going as Joker. You don’t even like Persona 5!”

By how Jungkook looks at you then - the same way he did the first time you met standing on the street corner in Dotonbori and a hundred more times since then - you realise it doesn’t matter. He’s dressed this way because you like the character.

“Oh,” you say, because there’s not much more to say. Nothing that needs to be said as he grins down at you, so heartbreakingly handsome you’ll never get used to it.

“Yeah,” he parrots back, a little smug.

Bangtan’s golden maknae is having the time of his life. He’s four cups deep into a game of beer pong that’s played like the Wimbledon classic, back hunched, jaw set. You’d think he was battling it out for the title of God of Beer Pong if you didn’t know better. (You suppose he is.)

“Angel, come here!” He’s giddy - slightly glazed in the eyes - as he waves you over, a red-gloved hand beckoning you to his side. Despite how good he looks in the costume - every weakness of yours encapsulated by the intricate dress shirt that hugs him like a second skin - the gesture is decidedly adorable, an eager puppy seeking unconditional love. There’s simply too much affection in his voice, so much sugar-spun love that you can’t deny him (even as you consider jumping his bones at a party full of people).

He’s shining as bright as the sun and you want nothing more than to live within his warmth.

With your fingers twined, he pulls you to him, drawing you tight against his side like he doesn’t need that same hand to throw another ball. You don’t mind. You know he’ll sink it even with his left hand.

“I’m winning,” he states, as if it weren’t wildly obvious by the fact all cups remain untouched on his side.

Across the table, Yugyeom’s eyes roll so far back you want to laugh. Jungkook’s competitive side is endearing at best and infuriating at worst. Luckily, his competition is enjoying himself too much to give him shit.

(He’s also probably too drunk to, given how badly he’s doing.)

“I see that.” You’re not a big drinker yourself but you like seeing Jungkook in his element. He thrives in this sort of setting, showing off all the talents he has and then some. It’s just another stage to him, somewhere he can prove himself (even if it’s over something as small as how good his bounce-shot is). “How many games have you won?” Because he’s been at this table for the last hour, dropping his competition like flies.

“All of them.” God, his ego. You know you shouldn’t stroke it but you can’t help it, brushing a hand through his tousled hair in the way he likes best. Fingers over his scalp, thumb rubbing soothing circles across the nape of his neck. He nearly melts then, tilting his head into the gentle caress.

“Good job, Kook.”

You’re so lost in your own little world that poor Yugyeom has to pull you both from it, launching a poorly-aimed white ping pong ball at the two of you. To no one’s surprise, it careens past your heads, hitting the wall behind you and disappearing off to god knows where.

“Can we play?” Again, that eye roll, visible just past the bandages that loosely wrap his cheeks. You know he’s only teasing, that he’s actually quite a fan of your and Jungkook’s dumb coupling (he’s told you), but you return his mockery with a raised hand, thumb and forefinger waving in salute.

“Losers don’t get to complain.”

The idol throws a hand to his chest, the gesture bordering on sloppy from the liquor that threads his limbs. Still, it’s cute, earning a sweet laugh from you and a witch’s cackle from your boyfriend. (How fitting.) “I’m hurt, Yoojin-ssi.”

It’s Jungkook’s turn to tease, brattiness flipped on like a haywire lightswitch. “No, you’re just bad at games!” He’s a sniggering schoolgirl, lines wrapping the delicate skin of his nose, streaking joy into the wrinkles beneath his eyes. Slightly-too-big front teeth are on full display, his expression the embodiment of an “uwu” emote.

That riles Yugyeom up, powder puff of hair bounding over to you before you have time to blink. In the next moment, your boyfriend’s half-wrestling with him, their arms locked around each other like some sort of weird four-limbed octopus. (Video game protagonist vs. hot mummy— who will win?) You jump back just in time, avoiding a wayward fist and laughing merrily. Idiots, the both of them.

“You guys have fun.” And then you’re gone, off to busy yourself with people who won’t accidentally give you a black eye or knock over the nearest thing not bolted to the ground.

You can still hear them tussling when you latch yourself to the back of a certain blond. He’s dressed like one of your greatest nightmares - an actual clown, drawing inspiration from a certain 2017 blockbuster - and yet somehow still manages to look good. You don’t understand it and frankly, you’re a little envious, but such was life.

“Jimin-ssiiiii.”

“Ahhhhhh, stop!” It’s the same reaction he always has, paired with wiggling shoulders and sweet laughter that bounces around the room and stirs to life your own. Indisputable and lovely, the sound is brighter than the sun or the lights that currently swing through the chandelier lights above your heads. “You two are ridiculous.”

“He’s ridiculous, not me!” You know it isn’t true. Separately, you and Jungkook were idiotic enough, finding humour in the silliest things (funny threads on r/Relationship_Advice and four year old Vines). But together? It was a two-person circus, graduate professors at clown college.

You absolutely loved it.

“Sure, sure,” the dancer hums, delightfully disbelieving as he takes another shot. One of three lined up across the counter, clear in little orange cups made to look like pumpkins. A whiff tells you they’re strawberry soju - your least favourite flavour. You decline with a wrinkled nose and waving hand when he offers you one. Jimin shrugs and downs the next, delicately wiping the corner of his mouth when he misjudges the pour. “Aren’t you drinking?”

You wiggle the half-empty Cass bottle in your hand in response and receive a scoff, different bottle - green, unopened - thrust into your other.

“Drink this!”

“You want me to drink an entire bottle?” You’re incredulous. Jimin’s seen you on the edge of intoxication and more than a little sloppy, giggling like a schoolgirl. It’s not unbecoming - you know better than to get blackout - but laughable nonetheless. Something to record and post on Snapchat with a voice-altering filter.

“It’s Halloween!” The pumpkin shot glass makes you go cross-eyed before he’s knocking it back too. “Live a little!”

Who are you to say no to the recent birthday boy? It would simply be bad manners and you were nothing if polite (though, you’re sure some might beg to differ - Yoongi, maybe?).

The remnants of your beer are swallowed down in the next moment, so quickly you almost choke on it. Your life flashes before your eyes, Jimin’s hand on your shoulder as he beats breath into your body. “Don’t die!” He cries, despite the fact that it’s his fist that’s making it worse, doubling you over with hacking coughs.

“K-Kook’s g-going to kill you—”

“No, you’re fine.” He’s reassuring you just as much as himself, laughing too loudly as you straighten up. You wonder how red your face is when he takes your place, slapping his own knee as he shakes with amusement. “Your face, oh— Your face.”

It’s not meant to be offensive but your buzzed brain demands payment for each giggle.

The base of the green bottle collides with the back of his knee - gentle, gentle - just hard enough to have him properly toppling over, collapsing onto the carpet like a frail old grandpa without his cane. You can’t help the snicker that careens off your liquor-laden tongue.

That is, until he’s pulling you down with him and the two of you are a giggling, giddy mess, tucked beneath the edge of the bar as you laugh together. It’s a chorus of sound, unrelenting and building the longer you both sit on the floor. Jimin’s practically hunched over, head caught between his propped up arms. You imagine it’s a funny sight - two people in their twenties acting like college freshmen.

“Baby?” It’s your boyfriend, amused and confused as he stares down at your and Jimin’s prone bodies. He’s got that dent between his brows, the colour of his eyes all but swallowed up by the way his cheeks press wide with his smile. “What’re you doing down there?”

“Just hanging out,” you answer, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world. At your side, Jimin’s still trying to collect himself, parroting your words around his lungfuls of quieting laughter.

“Are you drunk?”

You’re not, but that doesn’t stop you from gasping, overdramatic and with your unopened bottle of soju held aloft. A modern day olive branch. “No?”

Jungkook snorts and then all at once, he’s close. Too close - smelling of beer and your favourite cologne of his, citrusy and woodsy and every other nice thing you like. It fills your senses just as his smile does, blindingly bright and bunny-like. Even behind the mask, his good looks take your breath away. You must be staring up at him idiotically, all one hundred and sixteen pounds of ooey gooey tenderness. “You sound drunk, angel,” he teases, warm red-covered palm coming to cradle your cheek. It sears heat everywhere it touches, guiding the same hue over your skin. It creeps up your chest and over your ears, standing in contrast to the material of his gloves. “Pretty.”

(He really is, you think.)

“Get a room,” comes Jimin from beside you. There’s no malice in his voice - just soft affection for a couple of lovesick idiots.

“That’s the plan,” Jungkook replies, as if he’d been waiting for the moment. It skips off his tongue and settles into your ears, tipping your head curiously as you stare at him. He’s never been very shy about wanting you - at least, not since you’d made things official, so many months ago - but you’re surprised by the insinuation. When he speaks again, you realise your brain has been rolling around in the gutter, fallen out of your ears like candy from a worn pillow case. “Want to head home?”

You do. You really, really do.

When you stumble into your apartment - the same one with the polka-dot welcome rug and crisp white paint - you realise you were perhaps wrong about how drunk you are. Everything’s coming at you quite quickly, the ground beneath your feet somehow suddenly rushing at you like Mach Five.

“Whoa—” There’s an impossibly solid warmth against your back, fingers locked around your wrists that feel more like flimsy chicken feet. “Careful.”

Your boyfriend’s keeping you upright while stepping out of his boots - impossibly expensive supple dark leather - and you’re giggling all the while, practically sinking against him as he does his best to shuffle his shoes away and get you further into the hallway. “Sorry,” you offer in a terrible stage whisper, smiling wide when you catch sight of his, small and endlessly amused. It slips across his face even as he tries to bite it back, warring with the patience he holds in spades.

“Let’s just get these off.” He means the boots - the intricate, vaguely absurd things that creep up almost the entirety of your leg, neatly wrapped and knotted midway up your thigh. Dexterous as he is, it’s a task to unravel the strings and thread buttons when you’re weighing on him like a bag of bricks.

You’re fumbling for the tops, haphazardly smacking his hands away. “Here, let me.”

Somehow, you manage to get them off in what feels like record time. (In reality, it takes a good five minutes of futility before they’re left on the ground and Jungkook’s swept you into his arms, seemingly over waiting for you to do much else.)

“Oh, my prince charming,” you tease, clinging to him like a koala. You’re locked around him, practically suffocating him, but he doesn’t seem to mind. He’s used to it when you’re this way, just a little too much liquid courage turning your level of affection to eleven. “Or are you the court jester? That’s what Joker is, right?” It’s a joke and a bad one at that. Still, your boyfriend indulges you, depositing a forced laugh against your shoulder as he navigates to your bedroom.

“You’re drunk.” He says it more kindly than you expect. Perhaps even more kindly than you deserve. You know he’s not exactly sober himself, his gaze verging on heavy-lidded. There’s sleepiness blending seamlessly with intoxication, softening the edge of his jaw, the narrow of his stare. It’s terribly tender, skipping your heart when you look at him dead on.

It comes without thought. You have to tell him. Your drunk brain and your puppy dog heart demand it. “I love you.”

Jungkook returns the confession with humour, eyes sparkling despite the haze of alcohol that dims them down. As always, he indulges you, giving you support in the form of his heart and his hands. (Literally, he’s still holding you even though you’ve reached your destination.) “Love you too.”

“Is it time for bed?” You’re surprisingly tired, despite the fact that you’d slept until late in the afternoon. You certainly wouldn’t mind falling face first into your mattress.

“You need a shower first.” It’s a simple statement of fact, you know that. You’ve got at least ten pounds of makeup on and your hair’s the furthest thing from soft and silky, carefully coiffed to mimic Mercy’s signature style. You still pretend like you’re just a bit offended, scowling into the face of your boyfriend even as he rolls his eyes, already somehow able to read the words written into your expression. “I meant we and no, I’m not calling you stinky.”

He’s stolen your thunder, as he so often does. You pout, as you so often do.

“Okay,” you relent, finally, moving to rest your head against his shoulder. You could get down - walk on your own two tired feet - but you’re enjoying the closeness, how warm and real he feels in comparison to the swimming surroundings. “Will you wash my hair?” You don’t really need to ask but do anyway, because you like the sound of his voice when it’s so close.

“You know I will.” Because he always does when you shower together (and it falls on a designated hair washing day - that was important).

You offer your thanks with a kiss, laid right over the jumping pulse in his neck. When Jungkook hums in acknowledgment, you feel the way the muscles constrict, his Adam’s apple jumping beneath your lips. You zero in on it with laser precision, mouthing over his throat. Somewhere above you - against the shell of your ear - he exhales a laugh, breath hot.

“We’re showering, baby.” As if that’s meant to stop you. He, more than anyone, should know how adamant you get, singularly focused on whatever’s got your attention. He’s been on the receiving end of it more than enough times, strung into playing another one, two, ten matches of Overwatch or hunting down the limited edition Funko Pops that now sit proudly on your white shelf (and behind your plants and on the ledge by the front door).

“We can shower and have fun,” you mumble into the expanse of his chest. He’s so pleasantly warm, unyielding and firm and so, so comfortable. You think you could live in the feeling of his arms. (You’re lucky you get to.) You don’t even mind the sudden cold of the counter or the space that forms between you when he sets you down, because he’s still caging you in where it matters most. “Right, JK?”

It’s a nickname you rarely use now - one that only comes out in times of desperation. You’ve never quite understood why it affects your boyfriend the way it does, stuttering the rhythmic beating of his heart, but you love it nonetheless. It makes you grin, high on power and giddy with nothing but sweetness.

He’d explained it to you once. Jay was how you’d met him, the version of himself you’d loved first. Jungkook was the side of himself he’d wanted to give you but couldn’t. JK was the in-between - the chaos and the calm. Hearing you say it brought back all the memories of year one and he liked that. You could only laugh at his sentimentality and tuck the piece of knowledge somewhere deep, to be pulled out in instances like this.

“Right, angel.” You don’t miss the colour on his cheeks - so pretty you reach your hands out to cup them, squishing them between your palms like an old grandmother testing a watermelon. You continue to hold him until he pulls your hands from his face, guiding them to the edge of the counter with gentle pressure. “Gotta get undressed to shower,” he chides, that twinkle in his eye that makes it hard to look away.

Really, how can he expect you to do anything when he’s got an entire unexplored galaxy hidden in his irises? It’s an absurd ask.

“Or I’ll help you.”

Your clothes fall away while you’re still staring up at him.

First, the gloves, peeled from your fingers with utmost care. Kisses fill the spaces between each finger, passed from knuckles to wrist, all the way up to your elbow. You squirm when his teeth graze the sensitive underside of your bicep. He stifles a snicker into the skin.

Next goes your cape and wings, hung on the door handle. His mouth warms the suddenly bare skin, pressing affection into the line of your shoulder, up over your neck. You don’t squirm this time, instead humming a noise of delight. You hardly notice when the corset goes next, undone by surprisingly nimble inked digits. There’s hardly a moment to savour the freedom - you can finally breathe - when his hands replace the cups, palms eager over your chest. He doesn’t hesitate to hold you, pinching your perked nipples with a sly grin.

“I thought we were going to shower.” The words are barely out before turning breathless, stolen by the way he easily palms your breast, dropping his face into the crook of your neck.

“We are, angel,” Jungkook teases, rolling your bud between his thumb and forefinger, other hand moved to splay across the now-bare small of your back. It’s almost embarrassing how easily you fall into him, drawn against him like a moth to a flame. “Just need to get you warmed up first.”

“The shower’ll be warm,” you say - or think you say, anyway. It isn’t quite articulated, half your brain left somewhere at the party (or maybe caught dead centre in the coil that’s tightening in your stomach).

“Do you want me to stop?” It’s so quiet you almost miss it, too distracted by how he slips the rest of your costume off. Shorts, thong, stockings, silly witch’s hat. “Tell me if you want me to stop, baby.” Ever the gentleman, he’s patient, meeting your glazed stare with something close to concern. You almost laugh in his face then - stopping short only when you note just how serious he is, the tell-tale set of his jaw shining like a familiar beacon.

You return your hands to his face, palms cradling his chin like he might break otherwise. “I never want you to stop.”

That’s all Jungkook needs before he’s slotting himself between your legs, mirroring your motion with hands creeping up the side of your neck, fingers ascending into the roots of your hair. He holds you close and kisses you like it’s all he’s ever wanted. “I love you,” he breathes, speaks against the corner of your mouth.

You parrot the words back at him and he grins, stepping away in the next moment. He laughs when you pout, offering a kiss in apology as he undoes the buttons of his dress shirt, slipping the soft cotton off. You stop then, entranced by the revealed skin, how it shifts with each adjustment of muscle, sinew tight over his arms and shoulders. You wonder, not for the first time, how you’d managed to luck out so spectacularly.

“Start the shower.”

You hop down with the direction, slipping past him to do exactly that. You don’t miss the way he rotates, brings himself closer as you move away. The magnetism is undeniable - always has been.

“I love you,” he states, again, bare against your back as you hover by the edge of the glass door, one hand stuck past to test the slow-warming stream. He’s solid, familiar and comfortable, as he slinks his arms back around you, heat burning the shape of his hands over your ribs, the shape of your hip. You think he might mark himself there, just as neatly as the floral ink does. You wouldn’t mind.

The water is welcome, bathing the both of you in steam when you step inside. It’s an incredibly relaxing feeling, being caught between the spray and the hard body behind you. You hum a noise of pure delight, turning your face toward the one that nuzzles itself into your neck, and bring your hands to rest over his, fingers slotting between ink.

“Hair?” You’re not in a terrible rush but you like redirecting his attention (pretending to, at least) - the teasing that formed the base of your relationship presenting itself in the quiet reminder. It earns the laugh you expect, muffled into your hair, featherlight over the delicate shell of your jewelled ear.

“Patience, baby.” It’s something Jungkook tends to say a lot, whether waiting in queue in Overwatch or in bed, with you a complete mess. He repeats it easily, like he’s the poster boy for the virtue. (He isn’t.)

“What am I waiting—” The question dies, swallowed whole by the gasp he draws from you with a wandering hand. Fingers slip across your stomach, digits deftly seeking out warmth as if you weren’t already enveloped in it. It’s a touch that’s tantalisingly slow, unfairly light, but it still makes you keen when it drags over your lips. A single digit pushes past muscle - so shallow you’re not sure you’re not just imagining it - before retreating, dragging your slick back up to your clit. The moment the pad of his finger makes contact with the sensitive bundle of nerves, you almost jump. Would, if he weren’t caging you with his other arm.

You feel the cold of his teeth bared against your neck then, the throaty laugh that pulls out of his chest and deposits itself into your hair. “Patience,” he repeats, swirling his fingers over your clit, his mouth moving in tandem with the twist of his wrist. He peppers love and affection in the form of kisses, presses devotion with the edge of his teeth, soothes all your nerves with a sweep of his tongue.

“Kook,” you sigh, already well on your way to being a boneless mess. There’s tingling in your toes, fizzing in your stomach, butterflies in your chest. A whirlwind of emotion and sensation that he stirs to life effortlessly.

“Relax for me.” You do so because it’s easy, because he’s so devastatingly good to you.

The figure eights skating over your clit cease, fingers dropping further down to nestle against your cunt. He pauses there, almost experimentally flexing against the muscle that aches and clenches around nothing, eager for more. You think he’s smirking by the way his lips form with his kisses, a little lopsided and devilish. (You wish you could see him.)

A single digit enters you then, to the third knuckle as if your body was made for this, for him. (It was.) He coos against your neck when a garbled mess skips off your tongue and nearly laughs when another slips in alongside it, turning the mess into nonsense. Despite how badly you want it - need it, really - it’s a sensation that’s too much and not enough all at once, toeing the line between pleasure and pain.

It was how Jungkook loved you - recklessly, shamelessly, in no half measures. With more love than you could ever hope for, giving you things you didn’t even know how to ask for.

“Relax, angel,” comes as he begins scissoring both fingers inside you, stretching you out with an otherworldly amount of care. Even your neglected clit is given some sort of relief - anything to ease the sting of two long fingers - his thumb gliding over it with each stretch of your walls. He knows exactly where to touch you, how much pressure to apply, and you’re melting, lost in the feeling.

When he’s had enough and he curls his fingers within you, seeking out that particular spot, you’re trembling, caught off guard. Heat builds quickly with the precision of which he taps against that spot; it starts low in your back, climbing each vertebrae of your spine until you’re quivering in his arms.

“K-Kook.” It’s both a plea and a demand, nonsensical as he guides you through your orgasm, keeping you upright against him when your knees feel like they might give out.

“I’ve got you.” And he does - hook, line, and sinker. He holds you steady as the pleasure crashes over your head, keeps you anchored to the here and now and the pleasure that rolls through you like a relentless wave. It sinks beneath your skin, settles heavy into every atom, and he never lets you go. He’s got you.

When sensation returns - slowly, so slowly it feels like you’re stuck in the Twilight Zone - you only want to turn. See him, hold him, whisper sweet nothings as you kiss him silly and thank him for his service. Instead, you’re held in place, two hands firm upon your hips even as you crane your neck to look over your shoulder at him. You should recognise the look on his face. “Kook?”

“My turn.” It’s a statement more than anything, a kind heads-up as he nudges you forward. There’s that same twinkle in his eye, the only source of light around the pupil that’s blown out, otherwise engulfing the constellations he so normally offers you. It’s a black hole and one you’d gladly get lost in. “Hands on the wall, baby.”

You’d never been one for shower sex - it’s too small a space, too much happening at once, a guaranteed freak accident waiting to happen - but you can’t deny him when he asks so nicely. (It really hadn’t been that nice but you were a certified sucker for one Jeon Jungkook.)

Hands find themselves on the wall, palms flat, fingers splayed. In the same instance you wiggle your hips, there’s a ghosting touch over your spine. It trails up and down, soothes the residual heat that lingers, and then slips higher, palm gentle over your throat. His thumb rubs reassuring circles over the nape of your neck, pressing gently into the sensitive spot behind your ear. It’s distracting and you realise much needed when he sinks into you with one fluid press of his hips, filling you so full you can’t help the gasp that bounds past your lips and bounces around the glass enclosure. “Oh fuck,” he sighs, his grip on your hip tightening incrementally.

He sounds like sin and feels like heaven.

“Always so good for me.” Another thing he says, often and without prompting. It still feels just as good the umpteenth time, sparking pride deep in your chest as he pulls out and drives himself back in, staring in rapt fascination at where your bodies meet. “Always so perfect for me.”

“Because I love you,” you quip, more than a little out of breath and jostled by the way he thrusts into you, measured and with enough force to shake your legs.

“Love you too, angel.” He doesn’t need to say it back - you know, can feel it by how he holds you, drives you to brink of insanity with his cock - but he does it anyway. He always says it back, no matter what, even if he’s half-asleep or distracted. He’ll never stop saying it.

The hand on your hip falls, slinks across your hip and between your legs, and you’re pushed further forward, his feet gently kicking yours further apart. Jungkook assaults your clit then, timing each pass with each thrust. An attempted glance back has fireworks going off before your eyes, specks of pleasure lighting up your vision; it’s a technicolour lightshow, framing the way his face scrunches, brow set and jaw hard. He’s determined, focused on bringing you to another orgasm before he hits his own high. You assist him as best you can, swiveling your hips and grinding back against him even as the coil pulls impossibly tight in your stomach, barely held together by threadbare strings.

“Kook,” you whine when the tension becomes too much, hands scrabbling across the wall of the shower. The same overwhelming tingle sparks beneath your skin, entire body trembling like a leaf when the head of his cock brushes that spot inside you at just the right angle.

He doesn’t relent, rhythm turning almost punishing as he drives you over the edge, launching you headlong into your second orgasm. You’re not sure how you stay upright, near sobbing when you crash into euphoric bliss, neither his fingers nor his thrusts ceasing. It’s almost too much and yet you know how close he is, so you push back, whimper words you know he wants to hear.

“P-please, Kook. Please.” You’re reaching a hand back, desperate to interlace your fingers with his. He gives in easily, catches your hand in his own and plants it on the swell of your hip as he chases his own release with desperation. “Come for me, Kook. Fill me up.”

Jungkook does just that, balls tight as he spills himself inside you, hand at your throat so tight you’re seeing stars. Somehow - with the feeling of him grinding into you, overcome with so much sensitivity - you come for the third time, crying very real tears as the sensation washes over you. It’s weaker than your first two but unravels you all the same, seeping the energy from your limbs. You’re grateful for how well he knows you and the fact he catches you before your arms collapse, pulling you to him with gentle movements.

“I love you,” he whispers against your temple, out of breath and sweat-slick despite the water that rains down upon you.

“I love you,” you answer, pressing a kiss to the hand that still twines with yours. “But I still need you to wash my hair.” It’s cheeky and you know it so you don’t even mind when he bites into the meat of your shoulder, leaving a pretty red mark that’ll bloom for the next few days. “Ow!”

“You’re a brat.” Said even as he’s reaching for your shampoo bar, teasing it through your roots with practiced movements. He’s careful despite his scathing tone, gentle despite how he glares at you from the corner of your periphery. Each tangle is neatly undone and not a single bubble gets in your eye, much to your joy.

“I thought I was an angel.” You’re taking a page out of his book, speaking in fluent pout.

He catches your lips with his own, pushing your lathered up head beneath the steady stream when he withdraws and speaks. Suds run across your cheeks, eyes shielded only by the hand he keeps steady along your hairline. Even so mean, your boyfriend is still terribly nice. “You’re my angel - but you’re still a brat.”

You can’t argue with that.

tag list. @neverthefirstchoice @youwannabelostandnotbefound @snackhobi

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clonecest-bin-account · 4 years ago

Note

How about this: the Bad Batch all awkwardly flirting with Echo, trying to bring him into their poly relationship?

(ajhsdsjhk yes please I love this)

Echo is many things, but despite what people might believe, oblivious isn’t one of them. He’s an ARC, trained to notice even the smallest details - and in missions, those usually are the difference between life and death. What he wants to say with this is that he has noticed that the bond that unifies the Bad Batch isn’t just a platonic one; it checks out, he thinks: the only people they can lean onto are each other, so it makes sense that they would seek each other out for that too.

What he wasn’t expecting was for them to try and bring him along for the ride, which he appreciates and all but… Well, maybe it’s still too soon, he thinks; he needs time.

Of course, this doesn’t mean he can’t enjoy their awkward attempts at flirting, and what attempts…

Since Echo’s healthier now he can go back to physical training, which makes Wrecker the happiest.

“I’m gonna show you all my favorite moves!” he exclaims, eager to get started. Although Echo’s eager as well - he really needs to get back on track - he also knows that if he allows him, Wrecker would wreck his shit - he really can see how he got his name.

“Make sure you don’t break anything important, please? I don’t want to be stuck with physical therapy again…” he warns in fact.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be gentle…” Wrecker immediately says, smirking, although it doesn’t last for long as he realizes the implications of what he just said, which makes him cringe and stutter. “Um… I mean…”

Echo can’t hold back a chuckle, shaking his head. This doesn’t last long either, because in a moment he immediately goes on the offensive, taking advantage of Wrecker’s distraction to land a kick on his knee, making him lose his balance.

What? Last time Echo checked, there’s no rule against fighting dirty.

Tech’s way of flirting is more ramble-y than Wrecker’s, but Echo still finds it adorable. He’s so earnest in the way he begins to explain some complicated mechanical process that even though Echo doesn’t understand everything he’s saying, it’s still a delight to listen to him.

Right now he’s listing all the features he installed on his new mechanical arm; some have already gotten lost, but Echo’s gotten most of them.

“I figured you’d want to be still able to connect to machinery and such so if you close your pink like this…” he begins, gently moving Echo’s finger in the way he’s supposed to imitate next time he wants to do it, and soon a valve opens at the center of his palm, making space for a plug that begins to come out, just like a droid’s one. “There!”

“I’m sure it’ll come handy,” Echo says, “Thank you.”

“I’ve also adapted the shape to the rest of your body,” Tech continues, barely registering Echo’s reply. “You’re so well proportioned that I couldn’t not do it…”

“Well proportioned, huh?” Echo repeats, fighting back a smirk. He’s definitely heard worse - he really has - but still that’s not what comes to his mind when he thinks about complimenting someone.

After a solid minute of Tech stuttering, Echo thinks that he must’ve broken him. It’s cute but also he feels kind of bad now, so he decides to do something about it.

“Thank you,” he says then. “Took me a while to get back in shape, so it means a lot that you’d think that.”

Those words seem to calm Tech down, who sheepishly smiles at him.

Echo, of course, smiles back.

Crosshair’s idea of flirting is, apparently, not insulting him, which Echo appreciates he guesses, but it’s still peculiar.

“You shoot well for a reg.”

“Thanks?” Echo says. He’s never sure about how to reply to Crosshair when he tells him this stuff; he supposes it could be worse - he’s heard Crosshair says way worse - but it seems that the sniper has some sort of soft spot for him, not that he admitted it of course.

They’re firing guns at the improvised shooting range they’ve created for Echo. Now that he can move better he needs to improve his aim to get back to his previous levels; thankfully muscle memory is still a thing, so it’s going faster than anticipated. Still, it’s hard to keep up with an expert marksman such as Crosshair, though Echo likes the challenge.

“Really, you’re recovering much faster that I thought.”

Oh, this is new: usually Crosshair is a man of few words, but today he’s trying to strike a conversation - at least this is how Echo is interpreting it.

“I am, and it’s also thanks to you,” he replies, smiling at him, because it’s true: they’re helping him in many ways that he would’ve never expected, and he’s truly grateful that they’ve taken him in with so little hesitation.

Crosshair reels back like he’s just been hit on his stomach.

“Yeah, right…” he mutters. “Let’s get back to target practice. We’ve lost enough time already…”

A chuckle leaves Echo’s lips.

“Yessir.”

The way Hunter flirts is different from the others’: it’s less wordy or more physical.

Echo doesn’t mind that at all - it reminds him of Fives actually - but there’s always some hesitation in the way Hunter touches him, though he doesn’t know if it’s because he’s afraid he’d hurt him or because he thinks he might be overstepping some sort of unsaid boundary, which is beginning to unnerve Echo, especially if he’s doing it for the first reason.

Eventually, in fact, he snaps: they’re walking back to the Havoc Marauder, and Hunter’s hand is hovering over Echo’s shoulder, barely touching it. That’s the final straw.

Echo takes Hunter’s hand and draws it closer so that it’s actually resting on his shoulder. There.

“E-Echo?”

“I’m not going to break just because of a touch, Hunter,” he explains.

“O-Of course,” the other stutters, making a pause and then squeezing Echo’s shoulder with his hand. “… Is this okay, then?”

Echo nods, his hand still over Hunter’s.

At least they’re going somewhere…

“Wait! So you knew?”

Echo laughs at those words. Many things have changed since those awkward flirting attempts, and now Echo can say that he’s officially part of the group, officially as in he now cuddles with them and kisses them and… other stuff too.

“You weren’t exactly subtle,” he says then. He feels Wrecker shift from behind, but he doesn’t move away. He’s not going to lie: he missed cuddle piles, especially with these many people.

“Why didn’t you say anything then?” Tech, settled between his legs, asks.

That surely is a question. Well, there are many reasons why he didn’t say anything at first, but Echo decides to just shrug. “Was funnier.”

He hears chuckling on his left and he turns towards Crosshair.

“I knew there was a reason why I like you.”

Echo doesn’t have the time to say anything because Cross’ lips are on his. He smiles into the kiss, especially when he feels Hunter hugging his waist.

“Well, it worked, didn’t it?”

Yes, it did indeed.

Tag list: @maulusque @snap-p @menac-ika If you want to be added feel free to let me know! Just know that if you are a minor you’ll be tagged only for the sfw fics.

#assorted clonecest fics #cloneshipping #clonecest #bad batch/echo #echo/hunter #echo/wrecker #echo/tech #crossecho #arc trooper echo #clone trooper hunter #clone trooper wrecker #clone trooper tech #clone trooper crosshair #my fics #odekiisu

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jaggedwolf · 4 years ago

Text

air support, we need you (or: tscosi 2x09)

some bomb dropping, ofc, spoilers below duh

same game, top three things i had feelings ‘bout in reverse order

3. time skip time! Everyone could use a bit of a breather, even if it can’t live up to Arkady’s goat farm dreams

I thought all the planet assignments made sense, even if the completionist in me wanted it to differ more from the split that had already happened this season

ok ok the shipper in me was 50-50 but we’ll address that later

2. my man park!! is back!!!

Showing up with an anti-aircraft missile launcher as a wedding gift. I kept joking that Park would keep up his finale trend of showing up as a surprise being cool (as cool as Park can be anw), and thought it wouldn’t happen till it did!

and him also quietly saying the defector wasn’t Shelly....Park...are you going to talk about this...

narrowly avoided extended crew singing for the third time, will he keep up this success rate?

I would take a mini-episode that just followed Park in the second half of the season (Park: I am an independent man who needs no crew)

1. Arkady attacking Krejjh because she thinks they’re an enemy, AND then McCabe pulling a gun on her to make sure she didn’t run away. Bro. Bro, that shit was a direct hit to the id. Do I even have words for how good that was

Knowing what was about to happen as soon as Arkady said “You” in that tone of voice, ugh

Krejjh saying Arkady instead of First Mate Patel in desperation, and then brushing it off with a :D after

But god, McCabe. They’ve been so compelling this season, and yeah, maybe they’re approaching everything like a nail with the hammer they’ve got that shoots bullets, but the point is, it fuckin works

Arkady buys the threat (the promise of her crew’s safety?) more than she buys Krejjh’s reassurances

(though reading the transcript, Krejjh specifically telling Arkady “Science Officer Liu will never forgive you”, not “forgive us”, is excellent too)

“the only authority figures yet to disappoint me” / “I’m not an authority figure” / “you don’t get to decide that” is just like. embedded in my mind. just McCabe going no, you don’t get to run verbally either.

Do you ever think about how Arkady and McCabe had like, different kinds of fucked up childhoods compared to the rest of the crew. Like obviously McCabe ending up an agent so young and the stuff about their family suggests a pretty secure background, but it feels like the IGR and Dwarnian war starting when they were 12 gives them a kind of cynicism that meshes well with Arkady’s, in a way that’s distinct from how Arkady and Violet’s morbidness mesh, or Arkady and Sana’s pragmatism

ok more character feels under the cut

don’t scandalize the grandparents

A married man!

Impressed he made it through the season with no baddies wrecking his oxygen

Always ready to point out that Arkady is actually as much of a nerd as he is

AKA I didn’t realize it was a Mozart reference till he said so. Arkady defies the jock-nerd chart

okay who of Arkady or Krejjh is gonna tell him about MMA fight outside, or did they do a whole team debrief. For Arkady’s sake I’m hoping not the latter, though I guess everyone else would like an explanation for McCabe’s gun-pointing??

likes solving problems without guns, would prefer solving them by FLYING SPACESHIPS

Krejjh watches McCabe’s gun strategy work on Arkady and goes “do you folks really live like this?? why???”

I do love that their first thought on what to do next is to run a bunch of supplies around, probably between human populations that are going to be a wary at seeing a dwarnian show up. (Eat it, Eejjhgreb)

Kinda wonder if their feelings about getting choked out by their buddy are in fact more complicated than “it’s chill dude, please don’t do something stupid”

The cutest vow

who needs to calm down your crewmates with annoying words when you can just point a gun at them

Seriously where is the human-dwarnian war AU where it lasts longer or happens later where McCabe is the baby sniper posted to Arkady’s unit and they squabble a bunch (and perhaps kiss? When I wrote my third ever ficlet for this fandom never did I anticipate actually being interested in that)

what % of their Mirzakhani choice was thinking “what if Arkady tries to run from the goat farm and no one’s around to point a gun at her” jk jk

Their exclusion of Park from authority figures that didn’t disappoint them is fascinating. Is it that he left hoping for Shelly when it probably wasn’t her, or that he isn’t an authority figure anymore, a combination there of?

Or worst of all, is it that when he didn’t kill Krejjh back in 1x10, that really was a disappointment, no matter how much it might’ve been mixed with relief, and you can’t undo that moment?

What if they and Park talked. But I don’t think Park is going to goat planet, so that seems unlikely.

Their apology to Sana for heightened Martineau security! And Sana reiterating the profound gratefulness bit, gah

mostly read other people’s words and yet sparked consideration of two different OT3s, her power.

you know what, everyone deciding Sana is the best person to read words makes complete sense

There was one specific moment this episode that sent my mind into a tizzy about V/A/S, and it was Arkady going FINE GO ASK THE CAPTAIN THEN at how firm Violet was that Tripathi would be the one driving her, not Arkady.

I need you to understand that my V/A/S OT3 opinions are such that my shipping feels were more set off by that than Sana and Violet telling Arkady they were proud of her for choosing goat planet or whatever, like I don’t even know what dynamic was so captured by that argument, rip at Arkady having to be systems apart from them again

Though ofc my heart was buoyed by Sana’s earnest “Kady, you do more than that”, I want these two to go do a job together again, I miss that

To shift gears, I cannot believe “Lenny” started out as Sana being absolutely furious at the people threatening her crew and has ended up a teasing in-joke between her and Park, my Sana/Park shipping feels were very content. (When does Sana learn that Park didn’t get to hear the long list of fake crimes the Rumor crew specifically confessed to Lenny? This must be fixed. Tell him about the diamonds!)

Campbell said “Park, let me show you where we’ve been sleeping.” and my brain went. Wait. This is actually a good OT3?? Park is already unnerved by Sana’s earnest captaining, he should get unnerved by Campbell’s default magnanimity, please consider this

this is also where I point out that all these major characters have very convenient names for indicating ships solely via letters. V/A! B/K! S/P/C! This may solve my ot3 tagging problem...

get off that cotton candy boat, vi

Haha I loved that line from Doc Robinson she’s so no-nonsense, love Violet agreeing to work with her

Doc also said menders and I thought about this post again and also the team split and ahhh

But no, I very much liked Violet gently crushing Arkady’s goat farm dreams, and the two of them awkwardly discussing the very awkward stage things are at while still getting a feel for how the other operates

These nerds are trying and I’m still fond of them

at some point I was gonna make fun of Vi for not being able to drive before realising 1. she probably didn’t want to deprive the others of a vehicle 2. that would be incredibly hypocritical of me

wait does the igr have excellent public transport when they aren’t bombing it i take back every bad thing i’ve said abou-

*ahem* same question about the MMA fight debrief I had for Brian, it would be so funny if the situation was so rushed that like, Arkady+McCabe explain to Brian on the farm and Krejjh has to tackle everyone else

tick, tock, walking bomb, when it stops, nobody knows

arkady is so whumpable, and this show knows it

Redundant, but love how terrified of herself she is after hurting Krejjh and how strangely reassured she is by McCabe’s gun antics. And how she doesn’t like thinking of herself as an authority figure on the ship even though she literally is as First Mate

is ready to monologue about all major life events and the crew frickin knows it

is trying to help herself and stuff, still grumbling about it. in worse shape this season than last - probably all the constant discussion of the inevitable war just kept building stuff up and she kept ignoring it because haha who wants to deal with this prickly mess of a person haha

did i mention she’s the best

hope she gets her full goat farm dream one day, even if it’s not on actual goat farm

#tscosi #tscosi spoilers #jaggedwolf rambles #real rambling times yikes #mine #tscosi reviews

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rhysismydaddy · 4 years ago

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An Artful Revenge pt. 6 (Feysand)

Part of the Damnation series.

This is the last part of this fic! Gonna work on some asks next, then start the Nessian story (see the link above for details)

~Feyre~

Men, in general, are beyond stupid.

I honestly don’t even know how the male population is still around.

I mean sure, they have their moments. Fire? Pretty cool.

Maybe I should amend my statement: Men are stupid when it comes to women.

Because if Tamlin had any common sense, he would wonder why I drag myself into his office downtown, the day after I found out who he really is.

He’d wonder how I even found his posh little office, since he sure as hell never told me about it. (Answer: Rhysand).

He’d wonder why I’m crying and having an emotional breakdown, but am still dressed in a lowcut dress with my hair done. (Answer: men are even stupider when it comes to a woman with exposed breasts).

But he doesn’t.

He sees me stumbling toward him, a mess of tears and fluffy hair, and jumps to his feet, coming to my rescue.

His arms wrap around me miraculously at the same time my legs give out, and I fall into him dramatically.

That was a little much, but what can I say? I was a theatre kid.

“Feyre,” he says calmly, stroking my hair like he didn’t insult me twenty-four hours ago. In fact, he’s acting like we didn’t even break up. “What’s wrong?”

I press my face in his shoulder, trying not to think about how wrong this feels, how wrong he smells.

Rhysand smells like citrus and the sea and something so manly it makes my knees go weak for real. Tamlin smells like dirt and bad decisions.

“You were right.” It’s something all men love to hear a woman say, even though it’s hardly ever true. “You were so right, Tamlin.”

He pulls back and runs a thumb over my cheek, swiping a tear away.

His green eyes question mine, so calm and understanding compared to yesterday’s rage. His hands are gentle as they cradle my face, and I want them off off off.

“He’s a monster,” I wail, dredging up some more tears. Knowing there needs to be more of a concrete reason for my breakdown, I make some pretty seedy shit up. “He... killed his driver! Because he took a wrong turn!”

Gods, Feyre. Really?

I can practically see Rhysand rolling his eyes. He’d see through my lies in a second.

Tamlin, however, bites the bait... more like he swallows the whole damn line.

He hugs me again, so tight my feet leave the floor, and I go limp against him, pressing all the soft parts of me against the hardness of his chest.

Don’t get me wrong, Tamlin’s attractive. Wide shoulders, surfer boy hair, tan skin, and green eyes that look like the deepest of emerald.

But he also is a fucking asshole, and everything about him irritates me.

It’s crazy, I think as his hands slip lower on my back, that yesterday he called me a whore, and now he wants to sleep with me.

Prick.

“Tamlin,” I sigh against his neck.

“It’s okay, baby. I’ve got you.”

I almost throw up at the little pet name, but I nod and act like he’s the greatest thing on this planet, the gods’ personal gift to all things women.

But then he kisses me, and I get tired of this little charade.

I keep my eyes open as his warm lips meet mine, wanting to see his face as the needle sinks into his skin.

His eyes fly open, and he drops me to my feet roughly, a hand pressed against his neck. It’s too late, of course.

Whatever black market shit this is, it works fast.

His legs give out, and I shove his shoulder so he lands in one of the leather chairs in front of his desk.

“Feyre,” he growls, no longer happy to see me, “What the fuck are you doing?”

I roll my eyes, because even the dumbest of men should be able to figure that out my now.

You’d think he’d pass out or be too paralyzed to talk, but just like Rhysand promised me, the drugs have paralyzed him from the neck down but left him perfectly conscious.

I want him to see exactly what I’m doing.

Straightening my dress, I saunter over to his desk, eyes scanning the messy papers and folders for what I want.

Three rings, the exact copy of Rhysand’s, sit in a glass box, the shining titanium making them look like treasure. And they are.

But they’ve been here fucking long enough.

I try to open the box, but it’s locked, so I sigh and grab a paperweight, then smash it to bits.

“You do this, Feyre, and I’ll come after you.”

“Ooooh, scary,” I deadpan, completely writing him off in a way I know drives him crazy.

Glass flies everywhere, but I just grab the rings and put them on whatever fingers they’ll fit on.

Yet another piece of evidence men are idiots: I was wearing Rhysand’s ring when I walked in here.

A small detail, sure, but when I took that ring from him yesterday in his car, I made a vow to never take it off.

It’s a little big, resting on my thumb, but it’s perfect.

It means I’m his, and he’s mine.

“He might have Chicago, but I’ll make you’re life miserable!”

“You did that for two years,” I remind him with a smile.

Then I set the radio exactly like I’d been told to, turn back to Tamlin, punch him square in the jaw, and smile when I hear a crunch.

That wasn’t exactly part of the plan, but I was tired of his threats.

He howls in pain, and I know it makes me meaner than an adder, but I blow him a kiss and laugh as I walk out of his office.

A sleek black sedan, driven by the very much alive Rolando (I’ve officially stopped thinking of him as Beefcakes), waits for me at the curb. I swing the door open and climb in, turning to Rhysand with a grin.

I hold up my hands victory.

Rhysand smiles and laughs, relief and love and awe written across his beautiful features.

He’s so fucking handsome, I can’t hold out anymore.

Muttering an apology to Rolando for what he’s about to witness, I sling myself across the leather seat and pretty much attack Rhysand.

It might be the fact that I just drugged someone with illegal substances--my very first crime!--or maybe just how he looks when he’s happy. I don’t really care.

My hands are on his jaw, running down his chest, tangling in his hair.

He lets out a surprised laugh as I paw at him, and I use the opportunity to sweep my tongue into his mouth, holding back a moan at the taste of him.

The car stops, but I sure as hell don’t.

Until Rhysand takes me shoulders in his hands, and gently pulls away. “Adrenaline junkie,” he accuses with a smile, pressing one last kiss to my cheek.

I nod, because it’s probably true.

He gives me an amused look. “Then I can’t wait for what happens in twenty minutes.”

I stick my tongue out at him, ever the mature adult, and he smiles. Then he takes my hands, examines the rings, and takes the two that fit the worst.

He slips them on, and even though it’s a casual gesture, I almost break out into tears.

Too manly to cry like a baby, Rhysand just opens the door and walks out, taking my hand and pulling me with him.

Even though he looks calm and cool as a cucumber, I know he’s not exactly thrilled I’m here. We had our first real argument about me coming along for this part of the plan I’ve secretly begun to call Toppling Tamlin the Tool.

I won, obviously.

He warned me time and time again about what I was going to witness today, but I don’t care. His revenge is his to take, but I want to be here for him.

He’s been fighting for so long, completely alone.

And no matter how it started, I fell for him. He isn’t alone anymore, and won’t be ever again, no matter how dangerous the situation is.

Hand in hand, we stroll into Leperchaun’s Luck, the last remaining Irish stronghold in Chicago.

When I asked why he’d let it remain all this time, Rhysand smiled that cruel smile and said, “Revenge is only worth it if it’s slow and painful.”

I’d shuddered, half in horror and half in excitement.

I know it’s horrible and beyond absurd, but what he does for a living doesn’t scare me. He explained the gory details last night, and I listened. And even though I was scared, it wasn’t of him.

It was for him.

He has enemies with rap sheets longer than my arm.

The guy Rhysand blocks from buying Degas? Russian arms dealer!

But Chicago, he’d told me with a smile, is his. Someone would have to be suicidal to come after him here. So I guess I’ll just blow up his plane and never let him leave.

Sounds realistic.

I’d like to think it was my smile and charm that made him give in and let me tag along, but it was likely the fact that we aren’t in any super big dangerous.

We walk through the empty bar and to the courtyard in the back, and it’s a little amusing how quickly the six men sitting around a poker table jump to their feet and start shouting questions.

“What the fuck?” is the most popular.

“Hello, gentlemen,” Rhysand greets smoothly, ever the gentleman.

Someone behind us loads a gun, the sound making my eyes go wide.

But it’s never fired.

Because all of a sudden, red dots are on every single chest besides mine and Rhysand’s.

“Pull that trigger, McCallen, and all your friends die.”

They all look down and around at each other with huge, saucer-sized eyes.

Not one to dally, Rhysand smiles and tells the group, “I just bought this establishment. Needless to say, you’re no longer welcome. In here, or Chicago. You have six hours to leave my city.”

‘Bought’ is a bit of a strong word. He hacked into Tamlin’s bank account and bankrupted him, forcing him to sell to the highest bidder. Guess who that was.

“Or what?” one asks, feeling brave.

Another dot makes its way to his chest.

Gods, how many snipers does Rhysand have?

“Or you’ll die, and your precious little daughter Lena will be an orphan.”

The man’s jaw sets, even as his face pales.

Checking his watch with a casual gesture, Rhysand reminds, “Six hours and counting.”

Then he says, directly at the small box in the middle of the poker table, “That goes for you too, Tamlin.”

Since he didn’t want to risk coming back to Chicago, much less his last property here, Tamlin had been keeping control of his men by listening to everything that happened in this place on a private radio frequency.

Which, somehow, Rhysand knew.

He’d told me the number, and I’d turned the radio in Tamlin’s office to it before leaving. The drugs haven’t left his system and won’t until later today, meaning he’s still lying limp in that chair, listening to every word.

“Leave before I lose my patience,” Rhysand growls, and the men take the warning and haul ass out of the building.

Turning to me, he smiles and asks, “Ready, Feyre darling?”

“Ready.”

We walk out of the restaurant again, pep definitely in our steps, then get back in the car. Rolando starts driving immediately, leaving the restaurant behind us.

“Do you want to-”

“Yes,” I answer immediately, grabbing the phone from him and hitting call.

"So violent,” he murmurs with a smirk, turning in his seat to watch as the explosives he’d placed there years ago during a mandatory “city inspection” finally came into use.

The explanation I got on that one: “In case I got bored.”

Gods, he’s sexy.

The car rocks slightly as orange and blue and yellow flames race out of the building, leaving absolutely nothing behind.

Even though the violent woman in me wants to keep watching, I look at Rhysand instead.

His eyes find mine, and he smiles softly. “It’s done. It’s over.”

I nod and press a soft kiss to the corner of his mouth, linking our hands together. We both stare down at the rings. “It’s over.”

Tamlin will run back to wherever he’s been the past seven months, and since there’s absolutely nothing for him here, he won’t come back.

Rhysand has complete control of the city again, his empire built brick by brick through hard work and rage. He’s gotten his revenge, taken everything from the man who left him with nothing.

And he got me.

“Was that enough adrenaline for you, Feyre?” he asks, hitting a button to roll up the barrier between us and Rolando.

Someone else, it seems, is an adrenaline junkie.

Smiling, I slide down on the soft leather and lift an eyebrow. “Come find out.”

~Feyre, three months later~

Somehow, I feel nauseous, excited, and doomed all at once.

I don’t even know how that’s possible, but it’s true.

I’m so nervous, I might be sick. I’m so excited, I can hardly walk. I’m so unsure of myself, I might fail.

Focusing on the one in the middle, I walk down the aisle between chairs, ignoring the people watching me and focusing on the destination.

I can feel his eyes on me, and just like the first day we met, I can hardly breathe. But I ignore the tingly feeling in my spine and focus on what I’m doing.

I walk up to the slightly lifted stage in the large auditorium and turn to my peers, smiling and feigning confidence.

I’m presenting my senior project today. And even though I’m excited and nervous and doomed, I’m proud of it.

It turned out better than I expected, honestly.

It took me forever to finish the painting aspect because I wasn’t quite satisfied until late last night.

The paint’s interrupted and surrounded by photos I’ve collected this year.

Rhysand, covered in paint. Art from both Chicago’s museum and the private collection I visit almost every day. Random bits of architecture and the night sky and shots that just work.

Up close, it’s a bit of a mess, but from a distance--particularly, the distance between me and Rhysand’s chair--it looks like three dancers, twirling and leaping under the night sky.

My professor hugged me when she saw it. So did Rhysand.

No offense to Prof. Jones, but I enjoyed his a little more.

“This is called Starlight Dancers,” I tell the room, my voice surprisingly level. I’m glad for the bright lights, because I can’t see anyone’s actual face as I continue. “It’s a rendition of Degas’s work, Dancers in Blue, which is my favorite piece. I’ve also incorporated photographs of art and people who mean a lot to me. Like a lot of pieces from the Renaissance, it’s meant to be viewed at a distance.”

I keep talking, going through the difference elements and explaining how, essentially, it’s a celebration of painting and love.

More than once, my eyes are drawn to the photographs of Rhysand, and I find myself searching for him in the crowd.

I also get a little distracted by the mass of sparkles adorning my ring finger.

We’ve been engaged for three days, eight hours, and a handful of minutes.

He proposed in the museum, right where we met. When I almost feinted at the site of the biggest diamond I’d ever seen and told him it was too much, he’d just laughed and said, “It was this or the painting behind you.”

Ridiculous, wonderful man.

I know it’s fast to get married after less than five months together, but the scary truth is that I can’t imagine life without him.

I scan the crowd again, and it might be my imagination, but I think I see a pair of violet eyes watching me.

And I could swear one winks at me.

~Rhysand~

I’m not supposed to be in here.

I’m not a professor, and I’m sure as shit not a student.

But I snuck in anyway, ignoring the millions of things I actually need to be doing, because I want to support her.

I don’t even know what she’s talking about--impressionism and romantic elements and different types of photography--but she’s so passionate and beautiful, I can’t take my eyes off her.

She has me completely wrapped around her finger, and it should probably scare me that I don’t even care.

Years and years of planning, and everything that’s happened in the past month still surprised me.

Not the part about running every last Irish bastard out of my city; that’d been set in stone.

The part about me getting engaged.

Ironically, that’s the only part that makes me smile.

Sure, I sent Tamlin running for the hills with his ragged band of leprechauns, set his stronghold on fire, and finally have peace over what happened all those years ago.

But even that pales in comparison to waking up next to the woman up on the stage.

She’s a bed hog and always puts her freezing feet on me as soon as I crawl next to her, but the way she smiles at me when she wakes up makes up for it.

Everything about her makes up for it, actually.

She’s still absolutely crazy and wonderful and I now have paint splatters on more than a few of my suits, but being loved by her is like... standing in the sun after being locked in a cave. Or some other shitty metaphor.

The fucking point is, even though getting down on one knee in a museum and asking her to share her life with me is the last thing I expected to happen, I’m glad it did.

Because being with her gives me something I’d thought I’d lost ten years ago: happiness.

________________________________________

Thank you for reading!

TAGS: @elorcan-trash @januarystears @emikadreams @alpha-omegas @joyceortiz13 @sapphic-beauty @meowsekai @ahappyhistorianreader @courtofjurdan @acalypsot @acourtofsjmtrash @highladyofthesith @bookwormq702 @swankii-art-teacher @lunaroseperdomo @leaf-love-life @mari-highladyof-feels @raghad-50725 @perseusannabeth @cursebreaker29 @a-bit-of-a-cactus @elriel4life @girl-who-reads-the-books @shinya-hiiragi @aelinfeyreeleven945tbln @ireallyshouldsleeprn @highqueenofelfhame @nahthanks @ghostlyrose2 @lovemollywho @tillyrubes10 @claralady @tswaney17 @rowanisahunk @superspiritfestival @thegoddessofyou @awesomelena555 @booksofthemoon @greerlunna @jlinez @studyliketate @over300books @justgiu12 @maastrash @aesthetics-11 @bamchickawowow @b00kworm @sleeping-and-books @musicmaam @hizqueen4life @maybekindasortaace

#feysand #feysand fanfiction #feyre archeron #feyre #rhysand #acotar #acomaf #acowar #acofas #acotar fanfiction #a court of thorns and roses #a court of wings and ruin #a court of mist and fury #a court of frost and starlight

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teamhappyme · 4 years ago

Text

a series of promising events (2/5)

aaron hotchner x female!reader

word count: 10.6k (yeah i have a spacing problem)

a/n: part 2 of this series is here! some dialogue, cases, and themes taken directly from criminal minds (S03 EP20, S04 EP01, & S05 EP08). originally, i had it planned to be 3 parts, but after editing, and looking at the word count, it makes more sense to be 5 parts. i don’t want to inundate you lovely people with massive word counts (even though 10k is massive) so this is the finalized count. because i finally got my shit together and finished this out, part 3 will be up wednesday morning, part 4 will be up friday morning, and the final part 5 will be up sunday morning. thank you to everyone who showed some love for part one, and thank you to anyone else who stumbled across my crazy writing and read along!

at the end, I’ve tagged the peeps that interacted with part 1. if you don’t want to be tagged for the other parts, just let me know :)

ok enough of my rambling inner monologue, here we go friends!

link to part 1: here

****

May 2008

We were in New York, investigating what started out as five connected shootings in the city. After twelve hours, we were up to nine fatalities.

We delivered the profile at nine thirty, finally satisfied with the outcome after a day's worth of combing over crime scene photos and witness statements. Hotch didn’t want to waste another second, making sure the profile went out before the night shift went out to patrol.

“Now, our first theory is that we’re dealing with a team.” Derek started. “In the case of the D.C. snipers, there was actually one intended victim.”

“John Muhammad wanted to kill his ex wife, but he knew if he did, he’d be the prime suspect, so he created a spree in order to mask his primary motivation.”

Spencer added before turning to SSA Joyner. “Muhammad and Malvo also left a death card at one of their scenes, just like this unsub.”

“We believe our unsubs have studied that case. They’re opening a line of communication.”

There was an outpouring of judgement focused on us, since we were in charge of the D.C. snipers case as well. These unsubs know we’re here, and they’re trying to show they can outthink us.

“Yes, they are playing games. But what that tells us is at least one of them has some intelligence.” You tried to hold your ground, and not let their opinions get to you.

“And like I said,” Prentiss interrupted, ready to put these cops in their place. “They know these cases. He’s also studied the placement of the surveillance systems well enough to avoid detection.”

“We’ve asked officers to canvass their precincts, and look out for a father-son type of duo that fit the dominant-submissive profile.” Rossi had Reid hand out some gang related profiles, just in case the profile shifted. But we were pretty confident in our first go.

“Talk to the people on your beats, look out for anything suspicious. And let's pray that this isn’t random.” The detective in charge finished and let his precinct disperse.

“Hey y/n/n, we’re gonna head back in five if you want a spot in the fun suburban.” JJ teased and lightly shoved Spencer’s shoulder.

You smiled and started packing up your backpack. “Okay. Just, leave the fragile doctor alone.”

After packing up any files you wanted to review when you got back to the hotel room, you let Morgan and Rossi know the four of you were headed out. They weren’t much further behind with Prentiss and Garcia.

You met Reid and JJ in the lobby, droopy eyes and mouths full of yawns adorning the three of you. It was a long day, and it was only going to be worse tomorrow.

“Where’s Hotch?” You asked, ready to get your feet out of these narrow leather dress shoes. You were wearing your combat boots tomorrow.

“He’s checking in with the lady friend.” JJ nodded her head toward Hotch, who was conversing with Joyner in her office. They were standing close, and you thought you caught a smile on his face. “Do you think they’re into each other?”

“She looks like she could be Haley’s twin,” Spencer added and you sighed.

The moment the team arrived at HQ this morning, everybody noticed the resemblance to Hotch’s ex-wife. SSA Kate Joyner went pretty far back with our unit chief. They went through the academy together and had some assignments overlap over the years. If it were up to Morgan and Garcia, the two of them would be out on a date right now. But you and Rossi quickly quieted the rumors, not wanting to deal with the rage that was Aaron Hotchner if he knew we were discussing his love life.

It had barely been six months since Haley left with Jack, and Hotch had just taken off his wedding band a few weeks ago. He didn’t tell any of you until you all witnessed him getting served in the office. It slapped you across the face, especially since you’d just met Haley and Jack for a quick lunch a month and a half before. I guess she wanted Hotch to tell you when he was ready.

As much as you valued your three year friendship with Aaron Hotchner, you knew Haley deserved better. Hotch adored his wife and son, and would fight heaven and earth to keep them safe. Unfortunately, he was too busy fighting the demons from hell to be a present father and husband. Everyone had their breaking point, and Haley had hit hers. From what Hotch has told you, they’re still amicable, and are trying to be friends again. After all, it wasn’t a lack of love that ended their marriage. It was a lack of prioritizing his family.

“Knock it off. He’s on his way over.” The three of you turned to one another, pretending to hold an intriguing conversation about one of Spencer’s magic tricks. Truthfully, you were always intrigued in his magic tricks; you never understood how he could pull endless quarters out of your ear. But that conversation would have to wait for another day.

“Ready to go?” Hotch pulled the keys out of his pant pocket, and the three of you nodded as Spencer called shotgun. A smile crossed your lips, never getting over the jovial things Spencer loved to claim when his intellect wasn’t needed to solve a case.

The fifteen minute ride to the hotel downtown was silent. You were all exhausted, emotionally and physically, sick of having to watch people die over and over again.

The four of you made it into the lobby, tomorrow morning’s papers already spread across the table. “The late edition didn’t miss a beat.” You said and picked up one of the papers, the headline reading ‘Execution Style’ with a still from one of the murders. You showed it to Hotch and he shook his head.

“I’m glad I never stooped to this level when I was publishing.” You murmured, reading the first paragraph of the article.

“JJ,” Spencer started and pointed across the lobby, causing all of us to turn. It was Detective Will LaMontagne Jr., JJ’s adorably chivalrous Louisiana boyfriend.

“Will.” You could practically hear the smile on her face as she led the walk over to him.

He was supposed to fly into D.C. to visit JJ for the weekend, but came to surprise her in New York when he heard the news. Spencer and I shared a look as Hotch extended a hand to him.

“Detective.”

“I’m sorry for showing up like this, I know you’re working. But, um. I can’t stand you being on this case. And me not being here, not with what’s going on.”

JJ shook her head in the slightest, and you started to get nervous.

“Is there a problem?” Hotch asked, concern completely taking over his voice at the thought of any harm happening to his team. The couple shared a knowing look, and your patience was starting to run thin with the information being withheld. JJ meant the world to you, and you wanted to make sure she was okay.

Reluctantly, she turned to face you all, a shy smile covering her face. “I’m pregnant.”

Spencer looked over at you, not knowing how to react to the news. But you couldn’t help the smile widening on your face.

“Oh my god, JJ! Congratulations!” You wrapped your arms around her and she laughed, most likely out of relief. This was a secret she kept for a long time.

“I’ve asked JJ to marry me,”

“Will.” She cut him off as Hotch gave him a congratulatory handshake.

“We’re working out some kinks.” He added as Spencer was next to hug your blonde friend. A baby, in the BAU. You might have been more excited than JJ.

“We’ll, uh, give you both some privacy.” Hotch started towards the elevator, and JJ was quick to follow.

“Hotch,” She didn’t continue, you knew this wasn’t the exact situation she wanted to tell everyone she was having a baby.

“JJ, you could have told me.”

The tenderness in his voice could have broken your heart in two right then and there, but add on the fact that you swore you could see Hotch’s eyes tear in the slightest, you were done. You didn’t want to mention it in front of Reid, but you knew this had to do with Haley. You’d be an idiot not to notice.

The three of you filed into the elevator, leaving JJ and Will to talk in private. You all got off on the fourth floor, Reid’s room the first to come up in the hallway.

“Night Spencer.”

“Goodnight. Seven a.m.,” He reminded you as he opened the door with his keycard.

You and Hotch walked down another ten feet before he found his room.

“Goodnight,” He mumbled out and reached for his key.

“Hotch,” He closed his eyes, nodding his head in the slightest.

“I’m tired, y/n.” You could’ve pushed harder. You could have gotten him to crack if you started nagging enough. You’d earned the title as baby sister from the team since you could whine and nag them into doing anything. But tonight didn’t seem like a good time for your skills.

You nodded, understanding this conversation wasn’t going to happen.

“Goodnight. Get some sleep.”

Despite your best efforts, you didn’t sleep a wink. Hotch had gone over his files and called for Kate to meet him in the lobby. But then there was an explosion, and you had to watch from your window as Hotch sat by Joyner, waiting for her to die.

Once the team had caught the second unsub and wrapped everything up at the precinct, you headed to the hospital to check on Hotch. And unsurprisingly, he was refusing any further treatment for the ringing in his ears he tried to deny. You saw him kick Rossi out of the room, the third member that couldn’t get through to him.

“Bobo, why don’t you give it a try. Can’t yell at the baby with a broken arm.” You were the one to tackle the unsub, and landed pretty hard on the pavement downtown. Nothing a black cast covered in smiley faces from Spencer and Garcia couldn’t fix.

“I know you can’t tell, but I’m flipping you off right now.” You responded to Morgan as you raised your casted hand toward him.

You headed to Hotch’s room, knocking on the window before you walked in.

“I swear to god if you try to put me in another MRI,” He started to raise his voice when you interrupted him.

“Shit, I should go tell Morgan he was wrong. Boss is willing to yell at the baby with a broken arm.”

He turned around to face you, the lines on his forehead disappearing once he saw it was you and not Rossi.

“What happened to your arm?” You smiled and glanced down at the cast. “Just another day on the job. Tackled the unsub, the pavement was not very kind to me.”

He sat on the edge of the bed, trying to put his tie back around his neck. You scoffed, stepping over to him.

“Why the hell would you want to put that back on?”

“Because it’s part of my suit.”

You knew better than to pull it out of his hands. He was holding on to any semblance of control, and his outfit was all that he had left. Instead you took a seat in the stiff chair across from him, watching as he grimaced every time he lifted his arms too high.

“If your goal is to get me to stay another minute here under observation, you’re not gonna win.”

You shook your head. “That’s not my goal.”

He sighed, giving up on putting his tie on. He moved to finish his top button, he was at least going to be covered.

“You should be excited for JJ.” You started, testing the water on this subject.

“Did I suggest otherwise?” He asked and you shook your head.

“When was the last time you saw Jack?” His eyes widened the slightest, and you regretted asking the question. You gripped the arms of the chair, ready to be ripped a new one.

Instead, Hotch let out a sigh, and you snapped your head up. “Two weeks. Haley went to visit her mother for a week, and then we went from Florida to New York in three days.”

He was already away from Jack half the week when they were still living under the same roof. Now he was lucky if he got to say goodnight on a weekend.

“Why don’t you take some time off? I’m sure you have weeks saved up. I’ve been here three years and have never seen a tan on you.”

He shook his head. “Strauss would never approve of it.”

“Hotch,”

“Y/n, I really want to get out of this hospital room and call my son.” You shook your head, crossing your arms over your chest.

“Fine. But you’re not flying home. You have a choice between Morgan and Rossi to drive you home. My recommendation would be Morgan, you don’t want to sit through four hours of Opera music.”

You stood up, refusing to meet his eye. You were sick of dealing with stubborn men.

“I’ll see if they can fax your records to D.C. before we leave.”

He muttered out a thank you as you left the room, shaking your head at the rest of the team.

“Nothing?” Morgan asked as you returned to them.

“Nothing. Even the baby gets yelled at.” Spencer spared you a glance and you gave him a small smile. You would be fine. “And Derek, you’re driving him back.”

***

January 2010

You didn’t think it could get worse than seeing Hotch with nine stab wounds at the hands of Foyet. You desperately wanted to believe that it couldn’t be worse than that. But you were naive to think that he would let Aaron survive and not make him suffer.

None of you would be able to erase the image of Haley’s bloody body lying in the home where she and Aaron created their family. You wouldn’t forget the sight of Hotch beating into Foyet’s face, or the sobs that raked through his body once Derek had shaken him off. This was a tragedy that shaped the entire team.

After Haley’s death, the seven of you took turns checking in on Hotch, Jack, and Haley’s sister Jessica. She stayed close by when Hotch was on leave, helping him with Jack’s routine, and how to explain to the four year old where his mommy went. She moved back into her apartment a few blocks away before Aaron returned to work. He wanted to prove to her that he could do this on his own, that he could be the strong father that Jack deserved, and that Haley would be proud of.

While the three of them were together, the team would try and make it over every Saturday for dinner. Hotch needed to be around friends, and Jessica needed a guilt free night to spend with the people that made her feel good. He was reluctant at first, not wanting us over the apartment, complaining that it was a mess, and it was too small to fit everyone. But it was impeccably neat, the result of a widow not being able to sleep. Once he became comfortable with us coming around on Saturday’s, we’d pick two weeknights to stop by with a dinner, movie, or game to help take their minds off of the pain. Although you and JJ stopped by every friday regardless of whose week it was, Hotch really appreciated the extra company, and so did Jack.

Despite his attempts at being independent, there were one too many distressed calls being made to you or JJ if he couldn’t get a hold of Jess, or if he didn’t want to burden her with the responsibility.

Your feelings about Jack Hotchner hadn’t changed in the four years since you met him. You would still do anything to see the adorable little boy smile. So, it was easy to say that you didn’t mind the late night phone calls worrying about Jack’s stuffy nose or when he should take the chicken out of the freezer without it going bad. Because the more he reached out to any one of you, the closer he was to finding a new normal.

However, all of you were surprised to see SSA Aaron Hotchner in his office only a month and a half after the event. Sure, he made remarkable progress, but you all assumed he would take a little more time, maybe take Jack on a well deserved vacation. Instead, you walked into the office on a monday morning, Hotch the first one in attendance.

That was two weeks ago.

The readjustment period had worn off, and Hotch was back to being a drill sergeant. Even more aggressive than he was before.

The case we were working was local, saving us the discomfort of sleeping in a hotel bed. We were in Virginia, investigating two murdered families, similar to ‘The Fox’.

“Who?” You asked, not familiar with the creepy nickname.

“Four years ago Karl Arnold, aka the fox, killed eight families.” Derek informed you. It must have been just before you started at the BAU.

“Similar to this case he took the father’s wedding rings, except in his case he took them as trophies.” Spencer finished.

“Hotch, you gave evidence at Arnold’s trial. I think you should go see him.” Derek was acting unit chief since before Haley’s death, and continued his position even with Hotch’s return. Strauss was weary now more than ever to give Aaron the title back so quick.

“I’d like to take l/n with me.” You looked over to Hotch, his eyes resting on yours, waiting for your approval.

You gave a small nod, placing your sunglasses over your eyes. “Okay. Let’s go.”

Hotch got the keys to a suburban and before you could meet him at the car, Prentiss pulled you back.

“Hey, are you sure you’re okay with this?” She was always looking out for you, heck she was the one that made you pack extra barf bags for crime scenes. She knew meeting face to face with a family killer would do a number on you. But Hotch can’t face this guy on his own. Not after what happened.

“I’m good. Not the first time I've interrogated a psychopath.” She reluctantly nodded.

“Okay. Just, let Hotch take the lead.”

You gave her arm a squeeze. “I will. Let’s find this guy.”

The ride to Red Onion Supermax was a short and quiet one. Hotch filled you in on the particulars of Arnold’s case, making sure you knew it inside and out. This was a team effort after all.

You couldn’t get a clean read on Hotch, however, on the ride over. He’d yet to crack a true smile or laugh in the weeks he’d been back, which normally wouldn’t be so out of character for him. But Reid had been trying to get him to crack with every magic trick he knew, even agreeing to let Derek joke about his lack of childhood and understanding of pop culture. But nothing worked.

It worried you to see the regression he’s made since coming back. You knew how happy he was at home with Jack, that a smile crossed his face most of the day when he was playing legos with his son. You hoped he was here because he wanted to be, not because he felt like he had an obligation to the team or the Bureau.

“Karl has a big ego. He’s going to answer every question with a question. He’ll try to gain the advantage with me by asking why I’m not wearing my wedding ring.” You looked down at his left hand, the gold band that you noticed on your first day, now gone, along with the woman he loved. “And then he will turn his attention to you.”

“So that’s why you brought me along.”

“Your presence will throw him off guard. And he’s going to want to describe to you in graphic detail every sexual act he committed with the families.”

“To freak me out?” Because you haven’t even met this sick bastard and you were certainly already freaked out.

Hotch met your eye, and you knew this was only going to get worse. “To pull you into his fantasy.”

The guard radioed for the gate to open, and you tried to contain the tremors in your hands. This was a wing of psychotic sexual sadists, they would pick up on your nervous ticks.

You looked to Hotch once the gate opened, and he nodded for you to go in.

“Go ahead.” You followed the guard in, surprised at the lack of noise you were welcomed with. “Keep your eyes forward. More than anything he’s going to want to see images of the children.”

“We can’t give him that.” You argued, as you started to hear the men from their cells.

“We have to give him something or we’ll get nothing from him.”

You’d kept your breathing under control the entire walk down the hallway, until a man crashed against the glass, causing you to flinch and spare a glance.

“Isn’t that, uh,-”

“Derek Payne.” He finished for you, his eyes still straight ahead.

“It’s reinforced glass.” You scoffed. Of course he wasn’t worried about another man ripping him apart.

“Easy for you to say, he tore apart fourteen women.”

The door opened to the interrogation room, and this time Hotch entered first. You were met with Karl Arnold, red bushy hair and a beard to match. He was average height, and a little stocky, not what you pictured him to look like.

“Hello Karl,” Hotch greeted him as we settled in on the other side of the table.

“Agent Hotchner,” He stood. “I wasn’t informed you were bringing a, uh,” He glanced at you, looking you up and down before turning back to Hotch. You really regretted wearing a white silk top with your dress pants today. “They just said two agents.”

“This is Agent-”

“Y/n, l/n.” You tried to control the dilation of your eyes as he looked right through you. “I know all about you.”

Now you understood why Emily asked you if you were sure about this. He kept his eyes on Hotch as he started the interrogation, never looking you in the eyes longer than a second. Even if you directed a question toward him, he would only answer to Hotch. He was a misogynist. You don’t know why you’re so surprised at this discovery, he tortured wives and families.

When he offered up his book of dialogue between him and his fans, he smelled your perfume as you reached across the table to grab it. Hotch quickly took it for you, letting you sit back down in your seat. Your gut was no longer in your stomach, it was lodged in your throat.

“How’d you lose your ring, Agent Hotchner?” It was beyond your level of profiling to understand how Hotch could just sit there and take the assault on his personal life from a man who ruined families, especially with what he’d just been through. You’d never mastered the art of compartmentalization quite like Hotch. But right now, you were thankful for your uncontrollable emotions.

“I can look past your refusal to answer my question, if you let me see the children. It’s the only way I can truly help you.” You gripped the files harder at the mention of the victims and looked at Hotch.

“Can I speak with you for a second?” He nodded and the two of you stood.

“Is there something wrong, y/n?” You bit back the sarcasm that was threatening to fall from your mouth.

“Nothing’s wrong, Karl.”

You exited the interrogation room, still clutching the files close to your chest.

“We cannot show him these.”

He looked at Arnold, who seemed to find your eyes, even through the reflective mirror. “These images will be his undoing and will lead us to the killer.”

“These are not just images.”

“That’s exactly what they are.”

“Hotch, I am not about to parade a dead twelve year old girl in a bathing suit in front of a serial killer who gets off on it.” You raised your voice, not willing to compromise any respect you had left for these victims.

“Then show him the others. It’ll gain his trust and get him talking. He won’t talk to me, he knows I know everything that gets him off. But he’ll want to tell you just what he would do to them. I told you, he wants to pull you in.”

You shook your head. “These are children! Helpless children whose fathers have to live with what this animal did to their families! These strangers do not get to see the torture and humiliation that they went through.”

“If you can’t stomach showing him what he desires, then I’ll do it. Because we’re not leaving until we get a name out of him. You’re either with the team or you’re not.”

You scoffed. “You’re not the unit chief anymore. I do what Morgan says if we can’t come to an agreement.”

It was bold of you to remind him of his subordinate place. But you were equals now, despite the decade between you two. You didn’t have to listen to his orders if you felt they were wrong.

He reached for the files, but you turned away from him. “I’m going in there. Not you. But I’m going to run the interrogation my way, not exposing these children. If you have a problem with that, you can call Morgan.”

You motioned for the guard to let you back in. You took your seat across from Karl, a smirk still evident on his face.

“What, no Agent Hotchner?”

“You know, yours was one of the first cases I studied,” You started, trying to loosen up the muscles in your face. Going against every natural instinct in your body was making it hard to relax. “I’ve been fascinated ever since. I wanted to tell you sooner, but I was embarrassed with him in the room.”

“You’re embarrassed because you want to know what I did, don’t you.” You pushed out a smile, a little giggle behind it to entice him.

And of course it did. “Yes.”

“I can show you exactly what I did to them.”

“Tell me.” You tilted your head to the side, pushing some hair behind your ear. You were fighting the bile rising in your throat with every word you exchanged with him.

“Children are so precious, so clean. But they need guidance, especially the girls.”

You narrowed your eyes. “Why?”

“Girls have much more to lose than boys. It’s a fact, the female body can handle pain much better.” If this wasn’t a serial killer across from you, you’d agree with him and make some jokes about the female anatomy. But he was enjoying this, just like Hotch said. He was pulling you in.

“What did you do to them?”

He smiled. “I showed them, what men, their fathers, and brothers, are capable of.”

“And what is that?”

“Once I killed the children, It always amazed me how little the father fought the inevitable, the dying.”

“I never thought I would get these answers, let alone from the man himself.” You pushed out another smile, because you knew he was holding back. He was almost willing to trust you, he just needed to be groomed a little more.

“It takes a good woman, to make an honest man. And you’re prettier than Agent Hotchner.”

He was dancing around the information now, knowing that he had your time and attention. “Karl, do you know why you killed all those families?”

“I already told you why.”

You dropped the sweet tone, and pushed up on your elbows. “No, you told me how. And your motivations were all driven by sex, motivations you learned from your father.”

You saw him flinch, and you knew you were getting somewhere.

“You assert your dominance by making the father, the head of the household, watch you torture, assault, and take anything you wanted from the people he’s supposed to protect. Now your admirer, they don’t have the same ambitions as you do. And normally, that would bother a man like you. You want to be adored for every single part of your mess. But like you said, they’re an admirer, not a fan. So I’m guessing it’s a woman, who you’ve really come to care for.”

He tugged on his shackled wrists, you clearly got what you were looking for.

“Those women, those girls, they needed to be taught a lesson. How to obey who’s in charge. And you,” he laughed as he inched as far across the table as he could. “The things I would do to you if I weren’t nailed to this table. You’d be done before I could call your name.”

Before you could respond, Hotch came into the room, demanding a name. You stood up, no longer needing to play a role.

“It must be distracting, working with such a beautiful woman everyday.” You didn’t spare him another glance as you heard him mumble out a name to Hotch, finally getting what he wanted: power over you.

“Morgan, we’ve got a name. It’s a female guard in intake. Get everybody here ASAP.” The guard led you and Hotch back down the hallway, through the lion's den, and back to the elevator. Once inside, you let out a breath. Hotch turned to look at you, but you spoke up before he had the chance.

“Don’t ask me to do that ever again.”

You would’ve yelled at him, tore him to pieces in the elevator ride from the fourth floor to the exit, but there was a guard escorting you out. You didn’t want him to have the privilege of watching two FBI agents battle it out. And honestly, you weren’t sure if you had the heart to yell at him after all he’d been through.

But once you were escorted through the exterior gates, your team in sight, you regained the nerve to give Hotch a piece of your mind.

Not before he spoke first though.

“You did exactly what needed to be done. I didn’t ask you to act that way toward him, and I’m sorry you feel that that was your only way in. But I’m not going to apologize for getting the name of the killer.”

“So you would have acted in the same degrading way if the roles were reversed?”

He scoffed. “Yes, I would have. Because unlike you, my feelings don’t impair my judgement or ability to do this job. You’re an asset to this team, you need to find a way to get your emotions in check.”

You stopped walking, turning around to face him. You were in the middle of the driveway now, SWAT and BAU canvassing the scene. But you were going to do this here and now.

“The only reason you brought me here was to appeal to that sick son of a bitch. The only thing that makes me an asset to you is the fact that I have a vagina and you don’t. You turned me from a Supervisory Special Agent into a fighting fuck toy! You watched as I drained every ounce of respect I had for myself to turn into what that psychopath desired, all because I wouldn’t show him pictures of innocent children.” He looked over your shoulder to the team, embarrassed that they were hearing this. “At least have the respect to look at me while I’m talking to you!”

Hotch had never heard you yell like this. You were the calm one, the baby, as Derek called you. No one ever pushed you so far over the edge to get a reaction out of you. At least, not until he did.

“The next time you ask me, JJ, Prentiss, or Garcia to flirt our way into a serial killer's mind, to expect us to degrade ourselves in order to save another woman, I will not hesitate to report you to Strauss.” You could hear footsteps behind you, but you continued on as tears started to form in your eyes. “You used to say that my empathy was what made me an amazing agent. That my ability to connect with victims and families was the reason I’m here. So do not try and make me feel worthless for possessing something that you wish you could have. Because the way you act, with no capability for empathy, is a depressing way to live.”

“Y/n,” Spencer rested a hand on your shoulder, but you shook it off.

“Figure out the man you want to be.”

Before you could say anything else, Spencer dragged you away from Hotch and towards the cars. You could feel the tears freely falling down your cheeks, but you made no effort to remove them. You ignored the stares from the rest of your team, not giving them the satisfaction of knowing what went down in that interrogation room. Instead, you got into the passenger seat of the suburban, and Spencer started the drive back to the office.

Rationally, you knew you went off too hard at him. He never deliberately asked you to flirt with Arnold. He asked you to show him the pictures of Lucy, to get him to crack under the fantasy. But you refused. You would rather make yourself go through that pain than any young child. It’s what you’d always done.

Spencer tried to convince you they hadn’t heard the conversation. That they were all too focused on SWAT’s apprehending of the guard to pay attention.

“Spence,” You started and looked over at him. “We all had our earpieces in. You heard every word.”

And he was silent the rest of the ride back. You were exhausted, and you wanted nothing more than to go home and fall asleep on your couch with reruns playing in the background. But you had a mountain of paperwork to finish, and still needed to debrief when the team got back.

Halfway through your stack, the team came back to the bullpen. Prentiss gave your shoulder a comforting squeeze as she passed by, heading for her desk. Derek had agreed to let everyone go home without debriefing. This was the earliest we’d been done with a case so close to home. We needed to capitalize on our rest.

JJ was the first to go home, excited to be home in time for dinner with Will and Henry. Prentiss and Rossi followed shortly after, going to celebrate the win of this case at an expensive restaurant, at Dave’s expense.

“Come on you two, don’t make me drag you out of here kicking and screaming.” Derek addressed you and Reid as he pulled his coat on.

“We’re right behind you boss man.” Spencer said and turned his desk light off, grabbing his cane. He should be able to ditch all mobility aids soon.

You swung your backpack over a shoulder and turned off your own light. You didn’t even make it out of your four foot space before Hotch called out to you.

“Y/n, could I see you before you leave?” He was standing in front of his office, on higher ground than the rest of us. Power move, you thought to yourself. But he wouldn’t be that petty.

You looked back to Reid and Moran, the former nodding to you before seeing himself to the elevator. Now it was just Spencer, his eyes begging for you to leave.

“I don’t need to remind you how deeply you care for all of us. But if you keep putting yourself out there to comfort him, you’re going to get destroyed.” This was the first time Spencer had mentioned this to you. Sure, you’d been helping Hotch out at home, a little more than normal, but everybody was pitching in. His wife died for god's sake.

“Spence, I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He let out a sigh and fidgeted with his cane. You found it at a consignment shop on one of your weekends off, and bought it for him without hesitation. It had an eagle engraved in it’s clutch, something regal, medieval, and screamed Spencer Reid. You ignored the price, a forty dollars more than you would’ve liked to spend on a walking stick, but the look on his face when you gave it to him was priceless.

“You need to stand up for yourself. Nothing excuses the way he treated you today. Regardless of your decision to play a character.”

God, could he read you.

“No pair of rose colored glasses could cloud that. Not even yours.” He gave you one last shadow of a smile before limping his way to the elevator.

Once you regained your composure, you turned to make your way up to Hotch’s office. He was sitting in his chair, staring at the paperwork waiting to be filled out before him. You knocked on the open door, and he stood up without even looking at you. You were going to take Spencer’s advice and stick up for yourself, so you had to set the pace.

“Can this be quick? I wanted to get home before traffic started up.” He rounded the front of his desk, stuffing his hands in his pockets as he leaned against it.

“I’m sorry for the way I treated you back at the prison.” You nodded, not wanting to verbally accept the apology that was due to you hours ago. “I was out of line and completely blinded by the case. I should’ve listened to you and taken your reservations into consideration. It was narcissistic of me to think I was the only one capable of making the right decision.”

“Thank you.” You stuttered out, still absorbing the tone of his voice. His word choice was self deprecating, a cry for help if you didn’t know any better.

“Y/n,” He started but was interrupted by a shaky breath. “I hate that I made you feel like all you’re good for is to romance your way into their heads. You deserve to be treated with respect, to be valued because of your empathy and your psychological understanding of victims and their families. If I’ve ever made you feel like you were worthless before this afternoon, please tell me.”

“No, you’ve never made me feel that way.”

He nodded before turning to grab a piece of paper from his desk.

“Good. Because I’ve written up a complaint for Strauss, describing my behavior and language directed toward you today. You shouldn’t have to wait for a next time to file it.”

He extended the paper to you, and you walked until you were standing in front of him, accepting the complaint into your hands. But you didn’t even read it before tearing it in two.

“What are you doing?”

“Hotch, I’m not filing a complaint against you. Everything that I did today was my choice. You didn’t force me into anything.”

He ran a hand through his hair, the first time you’ve seen it tousled in the office.

“I was uncomfortable showing Arnold those pictures. So I made the choice to play a character, to appeal to his fantasy. You weren’t in the room, and you didn’t suggest that. If anything, you tried more than anything to get me to stick to the script. Did you have some choice words for me that weren’t necessarily appropriate? Yes. But we all have our moments. After we got out of there, I felt sick that I had to do that to get a name out of him. It wasn’t the first time I’ve camouflaged myself for the greater good, and it won’t be the last. I took out the self hatred I had on you, because you were there. Because if I did it your way, I wouldn’t be able to look at myself in the mirror again without feeling ashamed. But you didn’t deserve it.”

“Yes, I do. I deserve to be ridiculed for telling you that your empathy is a weakness. I deserve to be ridiculed for yelling at Garcia for missing something on a search. I deserve,”

His voice broke, and you froze in place. You were about to see Aaron Hotchner cry for the first time in four years. “I deserve to be punished for Haley’s death.”

Your own eyes started to water as you saw a single tear roll down his cheek. Without thinking, you reached forward and held his hands in your own. They were shaking, and he tried to pull them away from you. But you held on tight, you weren’t going anywhere.

“Hotch, look at me.” He kept his gaze on the windows, looking out onto the concrete roof.

“Hotch, please.” You were quieter the second time, and that’s what got him to meet your eyes.

“I’m not going to sit here and tell you that you could’ve prevented Haley’s death if you did one thing instead of the other. Because no matter what you did, Foyet would’ve found her, and done this all over again.” He tried to look away from you, but you tugged on his hands, begging him to stay. “But what you did prevent, was Foyet taking away the greatest thing you and Haley ever made. You saved your son, Hotch. And you ended Foyet’s reign of terror. You get to spend every day reminding Jack how amazing his mother was. How strong, resilient, and fierce she was. How she looked death in the eye and didn’t even flinch. You get to live the rest of your life for your son.”

He nodded and closed his eyes, letting the few remaining tears fall down his face. You let your own fall with the reprieve of no longer being under his stare, not wanting to fall apart when he needed you.

“I love her. I never stopped loving her. The divorce, it wasn’t because of that. It was because of this job.”

You squeezed his hands before letting them go, letting him wipe off his face.

“I know. And I know she never stopped loving you.”

You never thought you would get to this moment when you first met Haley. You let out a small laugh while remembering your first encounter, how pregnant and angry she was at Hotch.

“What?” You smiled and shook your head.

“I’m just remembering the first time I met her. She was pregnant, she called you a robot, and was cracking jokes left and right to try and get you to crack.”

That got him to smile. “I could always make her laugh when we were younger. She had the funniest, most embarrassing laugh. But it was Haley. And it was addicting.”

You wanted him to remember her like this, with a smile on her face and the loving soul she was.

“I truly am sorry for what I said to you, but you have to know I didn’t mean it.”

You nodded. “I know you didn’t. Just apologize to Garcia in the morning, and get home to Jack. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

He gave you a small smile as you picked up your backpack.

Spencer’s words stung in your ears while you were holding Hotch’s hands. You loved everyone on this team as your family. And Hotch needed you to be there for him a lot more over the last two months. Sure, you’d brushed off some harsh conversations with him considering the circumstances, but you knew when it went too far, like today.

“Y/n,” His voice pulled you from your thoughts, stopping you at the door. “Thank you.”

You nodded. “Of course.”

Maybe you did care too much for people. But if it helped them get back to normal, you’ll continue wearing those rose colored glasses a little while longer.

***

March 2010

“I’m grocery shopping. Because I have no food in my apartment and I never thought I’d say this, but I’m sick of eating pizza.” You threw a box of cheerios in your cart, careful not to hit the eggs on their way in.

“That’s how you’re spending your saturday? Our first saturday off in a month?”

“Well, unless I want to spend another twenty bucks on one meal, I’ve gotta do my grown up chores.” “You need to get your butt back home so we can go out and drink.”

Emily was relentless, to say the least. Every single weekend you had off, her number popped up on your phone the minute you got home. She hated resting in her own solitude, and tried to drag you along for any activity she could think of. Shopping, drinking, walking around the national mall, and, in desperate cases, running. But her record wasn’t stellar in getting you to attend.

“I’m spending the afternoon with my couch, a book that has taken me too long to read, and probably eat an entire bag of smartfood.” You chucked a box of granola bars in your cart too when you heard a kid cry. You turned to the end of the aisle, but the parent was blocking the child. “Besides, it’s dinner tonight at Hotch’s.”

“He canceled this morning. Rossi was supposed to call and let you know.” You rolled your eyes. Of course Dave forgot.

“Daddy! I want the poptarts!” You heard the kid yell out again. But you knew that voice, and you couldn’t help the smile that spread across your face.

“Em, I’ll see you on Monday. Have a shot for me.”

“I’ll have two.”

You laughed as you hung up the phone, pushing the cart over to your favorite little boy on the planet. You didn’t think to give the father another glance when you didn’t recognize him, but that’s because Aaron Hotchner is never without a suit at the office. He was dressed in jeans now and a quarter zip, looking like a normal dad.

When you approached the two boys, Jack was leaning against the shelf, tears streaming down his cheeks as he kicked his feet against the ground.

“It looks like SSA Hotchner could use some help profiling his son.”

Hotch was quick to stand up, meeting your eye. You only smiled while crouching down to Jack’s level.

“Hey little man, what’s the problem here?” He wiped the tears from his cheeks, and your heart broke at the redness in his eyes.

“Daddy won’t let me get any pop tarts.”

“That’s because you ate the whole box in one day without my permission.” Aaron argued back.

You hid your laugh in your shoulder, not wanting to upset Jack any more. But Hotch had already caused him to spiral into a meltdown again.

“Jack, have you ever had ants on a log?” He shook his head, tears continuing down his chubby cheeks. “Well, they were my favorite snack when I was little. It’s celery, peanut butter, and raisins all set up on a plate. And the best part is, you get to make it yourself! Now, I know how much you love peanut butter, and I bet if you ate this snack, Daddy will let you get poptarts the next time you go grocery shopping.”

“Okay.” He said and nodded his little head. “But I’m sick of grocery shopping.”

“Me too buddy.” I sat down next to him. “I do not like having to walk up and down these aisles searching for food. So, why don’t we sit here while daddy finishes his list?”

You spared a glance at Hotch and his practically full basket. You knew he would be done in ten minutes if you stayed here with Jack.

“Are you sure?” Aaron asked and you nodded.

“‘Course. I don’t need food that bad anyway.” He sighed and made his way back to his carriage.

You pulled a piece of paper and a pen out of your purse and handed it to Jack.

“Aunt Jessica told me that you know how to write your name now. Can you show me?”

He sat up straight, laying the paper down on the floor. You watched as he made a loopy uppercase J, followed with big and small letters to spell out the rest of his name.

“That’s awesome buddy. What about your last name?”

“Hotchner!” He yelled out and you laughed.

“Yeah, let me spell it out for you.” You wrote it out on the paper and it took him a few minutes to copy down.

“You’re turn now, y/n.” He handed you the pen and you wrote your name down, saying the letters as you wrote them. Jack repeated you, and it made you laugh. You forgot that kids were such sponges.

By the time you finished writing Aaron and Haley’s names for Jack, Hotch was back with his cart. “Alright buddy, it’s time for us to go. We gotta let y/n finish her grocery shopping.”

“No! I want y/n to come home with us for dinner. She was helping me spell everyone's names!”

You smiled as you stood up, giving Jack a hand. “Maybe next time buddy. But you gotta get home to try those ants on a log.”

“Actually, we’re making pizzas for dinner, Jack’s saturday choice. You can come over, if you don’t have any plans already.” You’d never heard Hotch this nervous before. It made you laugh a little.

“I’d love to. Only if I get to put extra cheese on my pizza though.”

“Of course!” Jack exclaimed and you matched his smile.

“Awesome! I’ll let you two pay for all this food and I’ll meet you at your house okay?” Jack nodded before running to the front of the cart.

“You sure you don’t have any plans? I don’t want you to give up another saturday night at my expense,”

“Hotch there is nothing more exciting than spending my weekends with the cutest four year old on the planet.” He smiled, but you knew he still wasn’t convinced. “Besides, every other twenty-nine year old I know is in a stuffy club in uncomfortable clothes. This is much more my pace.”

He nodded, a small smile on his face. “Okay. We’ll meet you at the apartment in a half an hour.”

“Sounds good. See you soon Jack!” You waved to the little boy and quickly tried to finish buying the staples that could get you through a few days at home.

You got home and quickly put your food away, making sure everything that needed to be refrigerated was chilled. You switched your t-shirt for a long sleeve tee, opting for sneakers instead of boots. Comfort was the utmost importance on days off.

It took you twenty minutes to get to Hotch’s apartment from yours, arriving at five on the dot. You were known for, and proud of your punctuality. Hotch answered the door after two knocks, and you couldn’t help but focus on the noise of three different locks unlocking.

He greeted you with a slight nod of the head, button down replacing his quarter zip.

“Do you even own comfortable clothes?” “This is comfortable.” You rolled your eyes, as he took the poptarts from your hands, raising his eyebrow at you.

“Didn’t I just have this fight with my four year old son about not buying these?” He asked as he let you in the house.

“Yes, but I’m the fun dinner guest. I bring the treats for the children.”

He tried to hide the small huff of a laugh that escaped his lips, but you still caught it. “You will be the death of me.”

You let out a laugh as he led you into the kitchen, putting them away on the top cabinet. I reached for my hip and pulled my holster off, putting it on the counter.

“Do you have somewhere I can put this? Last thing I need is to drop it while I throw up my pizza dough.” He unlocked the drawer in his desk, placing it in there before locking it back up.

You heard tiny footsteps running down the hall. “Y/n! It’s pizza time!”

You smiled as he tugged at your legs. “I know! I’m so excited!”

“Alright buddy, you’re up first. Show y/n how we properly throw our pizza dough in the air.” Hotch pushed a step stool over to the counter, waiting for Jack to step up. The grin on the little boy's face was ginormous as he powdered his hands with flour, taking the small ball of dough Hotch separated for him.

The two of you were on either side of Jack, each ready to follow his lead in the process. “Ok, on the count of three. One, two, three!”

You spun the dough in your hands before throwing it in the air, watching it separate the slightest bit. Jack’s giggles filled the apartment as he let his dough fall onto the counter. Aaron shook his head, you could tell this part of the meal was always a struggle for the little boy.

You watched as Jack spread out the miniscule amount of sauce he wanted along his crust, topping it off with a mountain of cheese. You taught him the more cheese, the better, and he clearly still believed you. You added some pepperoni to your own oval shaped pie, unsuccessful in making a perfect circle crust. But, not everyone could be the perfect Italian chef like David Rossi.

While the pizza’s were in the oven, the three of you sat down to play a few rounds of Candyland. You hadn’t played since your time at DCFS, and you forgot how there was no real objective to the game. It certainly wasn’t your game of choice, but Jack was still a little young to be able to contend with you in a game of monopoly. A few more years, you thought.

Once the pizza’s were done, Jack helped you set the table as Hotch cut the pies. You felt a little out of place, crossing some very important boundaries by having dinner with just the two Hotchner boys. This saturday was much different than the ones you spent when the whole team was over, Henry and Jack putting on dance parties for the guests.

You started to become more aware of your actions around the apartment; how you knew where the placemats were kept, that Jack used his purple cup for milk at dinner, and the strict no electronics rule at the table. However, that had been established by Haley years ago. The thought of her had a shot of guilt running through your stomach, sitting down with her family for dinner, just three and a half months after she’d passed.

You’d been thinking a lot about what Spencer had said that night at the BAU. He was vague, too vague for the doctor that could tell you how long he’d been alive down to the second. After a few sleepless nights, you called the doctor in question and demanded he explain himself. But after his admission, you quickly regretted having all the information.

Spencer Reid has known you for almost five years now, and has seen you through the moments that have shaped your adult life. Killing Stephanie Moore, testifying in the fisher king case, being your excusing phone call from multiple dates, and holding your hand as you took in one of your former foster siblings from a bad relationship. There was absolutely nothing in your life that could be hidden from him.

So when he told you he noticed your feelings for Hotch ‘about two years ago’, you nearly stopped dead in your pacing tracks. Not because you didn’t know your own feelings for the man, but because you didn’t realize it had been that long. That he had been married to Haley, albeit only for a month longer, that you started to notice how handsome your boss was. Upon hearing the truth out loud, and from another person, you ran to the bathroom and threw up a few times.

You were so embarrassed, so ashamed of caring for someone that couldn’t be yours. For caring for someone who’s wife you truly adored. After the third round of puking, Spencer reassured you through the phone that it wasn’t your fault. We can’t control who we love. And yes, he said love.

“Are you okay y/n?” Jack’s little voice pulled you from your thoughts. You smiled at his sauce covered face and nodded.

“Yeah, I’m fine. How’s your pizza, Jack?”

“Awesome! Daddy is the best pizza cooker ever!”

“You sure you’re okay? You look a little pale,” Aaron commented and referenced your plate. You hadn’t taken a bite.

“I’m good, really. Just thinking about how I’m going to make a bigger lego tower than Jack after dinner.”

That got the little boy to laugh, successfully switching the conversation to Jack’s favorite toys. But you noticed the glaces Hotch snuck your way, not believing you for a second. You were an awful liar.

The longer the three of you sat at the table, the larger your smile grew around these boys. Seeing Hotch being able to relax and really enjoy his time with Jack always brought a smile to your face. He was a natural father, sliding into the role of playmate and swaddler, cuddler and soother. You even remember him helping JJ out with Henry’s swaddle at work one day.

But you knew he felt guilty, not being able to be present in his son’s life everyday. You saw it in the hundred’s of views of the video of Jack’s first steps, the late night phone calls while away on a case just to say goodnight to his little boy. He missed out on a lot of the baby years, and he would be making it up to Jack for the rest of his life, with nights like these. With the whole weekend devoted to Jack Hotchner’s favorite things, minus the sugary pop tarts. Hotch had mastered the duality of being a Supervisory Special Agent for the FBI, and the loving father to Jack Hotchner. It was one of the reasons why you started caring so much for him.

“Alright Jack, you can build one tower with y/n, then it’s bath time and off to bed.” You saw the pout on Jack’s face as Hotch cleared our plates, and you helped him off the chair.

“Come on, maybe if we’re quick enough we can make two.”

He giggled as he led you to his room, stuffed animals and toys galore. This boy won’t want for a thing.

“Okay, you make a big blue one, I’ll do purple.”

You finished much quicker than the four year old, but under no circumstances would he let you sit and watch him make his masterpiece. Instead, since you had nearly two and a half feet on him, you stacked your tower on top of his and continued adding pieces to make it bigger. He cheered you on as it started to reach your head, and you were getting excited yourself. Until, it came to a crashing fall with the last green piece on top.

“Noo!” Jack yelled out, trying to catch the falling pieces.

“It’s okay Buddy, you can always make another one.” Aaron’s voice trying to soothe his son caught both you and the little guy’s attention.

The two of you turned to see Hotch leaning in the doorway, arms crossed over his chest. You wondered how long he’d been standing there.

“And maybe next time, we can make one as big as daddy.”

Hotch let out a laugh as Jack smiled at you in amazement. He liked how your brain worked.

“Bath time, bud. We gotta get your face cleaned up from all that pizza sauce, and ship you off to bed.”

“But y/n’s here,” He whined, not wanting the lego fun to end.

“Well I have to get home and take a shower too, bud. Don’t worry, there’s plenty more playdates in your future.” You said and stood up, giving the little boy a high five.

“Go wait for me in the bathroom okay, I’m gonna walk y/n out.”

“Okay. Bye bobo.” He said and ran off to the bathroom, leaving you speechless in his bedroom.

“You let him be around Derek Morgan way too much.”

“Probably. But you can’t compete with the guy who brings over a new lego set every weekend.” Hotch got your gun for you, walking you back to the front door.

“Are you kidding? You’re his hero, Hotch. He asked me last week if I was a superhero like daddy.” He cracked a smile, but his eyes were glued to the floor, unable to meet your own.

“Why did you cancel dinner tonight?” He sighed and lifted his head. You’d been wanting to ask him since you were at the grocery store. The team had been coming over for three months now, and it was something we all started to look forward to.

“I was sick of feeling like a burden to you all. I mean, asking you all to give up your Saturday nights, sometimes our only free night of the week to spend in my depressing apartment, it had been enough.” If only you could show this man how much the team cared for him through your eyes, he would never doubt his worth another day in his life.

“Hotch, the highlight of my week is coming here to be with you all. My family. Watching Henry and Jack play with each other, listening to Spencer and Penelope fight over who the true godparent is, and getting to be on the receiving end of Rossi’s awesome cooking?”

He nodded, mumbling an ‘I know’ a few times under his breath. But he needed to know that as much as you all come here for Jack, you guys care for Aaron and his well being just as much.

“I come here every saturday to make sure that Aaron Hotchner has not dressed in a suit for the sixth day in a row, and to make sure he knows that he’s doing such an amazing job with Jack. That he is being the best father, friend, and boss, that he can be.”

This time, his eyes were locked on yours as you got a real Aaron Hotchner smile out of him, dimples and all. You couldn’t help but make a check mark in the air, the team tally still going strong. He playfully rolled his eyes as you swung your bag across your shoulder.

“So who’s in the lead now?”

“Me, for the last six months. I can’t be dethroned.” You felt your cheeks grow warm, hoping he wouldn’t think too much into your stat keeping.

“Well, that seems like a pretty accurate tally.”

You made sure it was. And selfishly, you hoped no one else could get that beautiful smile to cross his face like you could.

“Thank you for coming over. We both had a lot of fun.”

“I did too. I’m around anytime, my tower building skills are not occupied for many other people.” He let out a laugh as he opened the door for you.

“Goodnight y/n. Let me know when you get home.”

“I will. Night, Hotch.”

You got home in twenty minutes, texting Aaron as you walked through your door. Quickly changing into pajamas and throwing Legally Blonde into the DVD player, your phone dinged at a new message.

It was from Hotch, a picture attached to the message. It was of Jack, towel wrapped around his head, eyes shut from grinning so wide. ‘He wanted me to send this to you. He said, ‘this is how happy I am that y/n was here tonight.’ Thanks again for everything. Goodnight.”

You couldn’t help the tears that pooled in your eyes at the sweet little boy in the picture, and his amazing dad behind the camera.

****

tags: @simplyprentiss @michaelahah @ssahotchner99 @svrgicalhands @hotchtopic @unionjackpillow @philcoolson @tommhollandzxhaz @kathleenjasmine @canimarrypizzaornah @reaperwalking @inlovewithaaronhotchner @shelbymm11 @mrshotchner23 @tropicalwrites

#aaron hotchner x female! reader #aaron hotchner x female!reader #aaron hotchner fic #aaron hotchner fanfiction #aaron hotchner x reader #criminal minds fanfiction #criminal minds #aaron hotchner

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bloghcom305 · 3 years ago

Text

Boku no Hero Should Just Use Guns

Seriously, logically it makes sense to use guns, while not all characters are susceptible to them, a large part of the cast are.

Many of the most deadly villains wouldn’t stand a change against a wave of bullets or a long range snipe out of sight. And if the villains had them too, then a large part of the main cast shouldn’t even be heroes. And yes, I am aware of Japan’s gun laws, which I will go over later in the blog. However, guns are still seen in the show, so why don’t they use them more.

And to put it simply, it makes the show boring. If guns were accessible and acted as effectively as they did the real world, there wouldn’t be a show. The concept of heroes and villains wouldn’t really exist. Its why in military movies, the military are presented as being extremely powerful, while in super hero movies, the military is weak in comparison, as to shine more light onto the main focus, the heroes. Same thing applies to Boku no Hero. If the heroes had them, then like I said, most of the main threats of the show could be taken out by guns. Stain wouldn’t have a chance against a swarm of heavily armed police, let alone heroes with guns, Shigaraki and his goons would lose to a similar swarm, and while Overhauls group might bring more trouble. A large swarm with a trained professionals, armed with military-type weapons, would easily take them out especially if maybe few of the strongest heroes tagged along. Especially if the heroes that accompanied them in the raid, were also armed. Imagine instead of sending a bunch of heroes, a navy seal like team just pulls up, its literally over.

Not to mention snipers as well. Seriously, what are any of the character gonna do against a snipe from out of sight, they can’t, its literally just gg. There’s a reason Deadshot was mentioned by Talia al Ghul to be someone that scared the Injustice League even if he's technically cannon fodder because even in DC one good sniper shot can take out 60% of the cast. 95% of these characters aren’t fast enough or are durable enough to live waves of bullets or a snipe to the head. If the villains were to attack UA, like they did multiple times with guns, especially assault rifles, the villains would be done for.

Most of these characters are honestly kind of weak, they can only be considered decently strong when you compare them to other people fighting with only their quirks. There would be no 1 million percent Deku if roid rage over had a Glock, it’d be just dead Deku.

And no, this doesn’t make the show bad, I’m just pointing out something I think might have crossed people’s minds. I can feel your salt from here, so dw, I’m going to be addressing some of the main counter arguments towards the end of the blog.

However, I want to at least address the most common counter argument here, being Japan’s gun laws being too strict to even acquire guns. And if you live in America like me, you may or may not be aware that other countries have very strict gun laws in comparison. Attempting to acquire a gun in Japan is significantly more difficult when compared to the US. In 2017 the estimate of civilian firearms was .3 for every 100 people in Japan, while in the US it was 120.5 for every 100 people. So it’s unrealistic that every hero and villain will own a gun. However, it isn’t unrealistic that many of the villains would have these guns

Having these weapons, as I mentioned previously, makes many of the heroes obsolete. I see no reason for why these murderous villains would shy away from illegally owning guns to use to commit crimes. Overhaul and his men can be considered the anime equivalent to the real life Yakuza... who use guns. Anything from hand guns to full automatic weapons, have been used as seen in relatively recent Japanese news reports surrounding gang violence.

Now in terms of the good guys having them, the police are equipped with hand guns, as seen in the show. However, knowing the threats that Japan deals with because of these villains, it isn’t out of the question to equip the police with more powerful weapons. I understand that Japan in the real world doesn’t have a need for such fire power, but in a world like Boku no Hero's, I think that's reasonable. *interview*. Which is why I think I have a solution to adding guns in their world. And surprisingly enough, I agree with stain.

Let me explain, there are too many fodder heroes who can call themselves heroes, there's a huge power gap from I can make rock float in air to I can punch down a building. So knowing which heroes are qualified to give guns out to would be a real mess. The concept of heroes, should no longer exist. Instead, I think that the more reasonable option is to bulk up the Japanese military and police force. Arm the local police better so that they can deal with threats without the need of heroes. And for more serious threats send a SWAT or even Navy Seal like specialist team of well trained and efficient soldiers armed all the needed weaponry to take down the enemy.

Now, this is where “heroes” can come it. Those with quirks that can support and are just as useful as powerful weaponry can be part of a squad as well. Imagine Aizawa with a gun against someone who relies on their quirk, basically bringing fists to a gun fight. There won’t be any big fun battle, its in, and out, get the job done. And its mainly for that reason why guns aren’t as prevalent, cuz that's boring

Now, for the counter arguments, I’m not gonna spend too much time on each one because there’s a lot.

Lets start

Characters can out speed or are too durable to be hurt by bullets.

No, that isn’t true, I don’t think the majority of you have seen a live bullet fire, they are faster than sound and do crazy damage, especially if we’re talking about fully or semi automatic rifles.

People brought up power feats by some of the heroes and villains, however, 95% of the villains would go down to our previously mentioned specialist teams by a snipe to the head or rounds of bullets.

There’s armor that can block bullets and Momo can make them.

Unless your Tony Stark, I don’t know what type of armor is going to survive a wave of bullets that is also able to move swiftly in and you can use your quirk with.

What about Nomu?

I’m certain if Japan equipped its special forces as strong as the US, like they should if they live in a world like this, Nomu would struggle. And even if he did beat them, the special forces I mentioned earlier still include heroes, just the strongest ones like all might and endeavor, and its shown that they can solo Nomus.

Toya has the ability to take any equipment the enemy has so guns could be used against them.

When raiding overhaul, police switched to shields and batons instead of guns because of Toya, but against a large amount of people with assault rifles, they don’t have much chance. Also it was shown that other members had guns.

Mustard used a gun, and he still lost.

He used a revolver in combination with his quirk, which can be effective, but if he was just carrying around an smg type gun, then he would have for sure won

How come pro hero snipe isn’t just destroying everyone?

I don’t know, if I'm going to be honest, that just feels like an oversight by the writer

And that’s about it. I’m not saying that guns are the key to everything, since a solid amounts of characters will be able to counter the usage of guns

However, I still feel like the points I made stand. The police and certain villains should realistically have guns, guns of varying levels can eliminate most of the cast, the Japanese police force and military should be reworked, and if they did this it would be more effective, but definitely significantly less interesting to watch

And also no, not having guns does not lower the quality of the show

Hope you enjoyed.

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jessiebanethedragon · 4 years ago

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Grecian Juniper (Hunter x reader)

this was a request that came in as a message, not tagged becasue i’m not sure if they wanna be annon or not but love ya’ll either way!

oxoxox jessie

You had to admit, this time you’d out done yourself. Swinging your lightsaber around as it deactivates leaving the feeling of bubbling pride in your chest. Was this technically an abuse of your abilities? Maybe. But Crosshair has been an ass since you last left base, and it was time for a little payback. Thus bringing you to this moment of a perfectly sculpted “I ❤️Hutts” onto the backplate of his armour. Yes, your lightsaber had many uses indeed.

Working with Clone Force 99 did have its perks, Tech, Wrecker and Echo were lovely. Reuniting with the trooper after the techno union was a flurry of tears, happiness and a vow from you to never leave your best friend's side again. And then there was the sergeant. With his tousled hair, tattooed face, and a voice that had you buckling at the knees every time he said your name. Hunter made being a jedi very difficult.

“He’s gonna be pissed.” The man in question said, walking past your work of art as he re-ties the red bandana.

“He was such a nerf herder all flight.” You say with a sigh, still exhausted from having to put up with a very moody Crosshair. Your cheeks flush when you hear Hunter chuckle in agreement.

“Maybe so, but you know he’s going to be one hundred times worse now.” Hunter calls to you over his shoulder as he wanders into the cockpit and away from your shenanigans. Leaving you to force down the warm fuzzies in your chest and hide the childish smile on your face.

“Kriffing Jedi!!” Your face falls when you hear the shouting from inside the Havoc Marauder. The four of you are standing plantside on Kashyyyk for a recon mission, waiting for the sniper outside in the fresh air. Tech narrows his eyes at you while you suppress a small giggle.

“I have no idea what he is talking about.” You say, hoping to cover your tracks.

“Sure, as if you’re the order's golden child.” Echo scoffs with a smile, he may look different still, colour slowly returning to his face and hair that's now lighter, but the smile is still his. Telltale domino squad smirks and laughter that take you back to the barracks late at night.

“SARGE!” You hear Crosshair shout as he stops down the landing pad, armour in one hand and a furious look on his face. Hunter sidesteps the angry sniper as he beelines for you, shoving the plate into your face. Wrecker catches a glimpse and doubles over in laughter, tech and Echo lean on each other to giggle off to the side.

“Oh woah, looks like it got scratched…” You say, dramatically pretending to be shocked. Murmuring about how it could've happened and looking over to any of your friends for help.

“You’re going to regret this.” Crosshair seethes out through his heaving breath.

“I didn’t do anything!” you exclaim, still playing dumb. “I was with Hunter!” You gesture to the sergeant hoping he will cover for you. He turns away not wanting to be involved, but you catch the smallest of smiles.

“Oh you wish.” Crosshair spits, side eyeing the leader of the Bad Batch. All at once, you stop smiling.

“And what's that supposed to mean.” You grit out. He wouldn't. Crosshair wouldn't. Of course the sniper knows about your feelings, he’s too damn clever, but even he knows there's lines. And this is definitely one of them.

“Maybe if you weren't so hopelessly in love with him you wouldn't be such a bitc-”

“Crosshair!” Hunter shouts, louder and angrier than you’ve ever heard him, “Stand. Down.” with one last look at your shocked face, tears beginning to form in your eyes, his face softens. He knows he’s gone too far, unknowing of how deep the feelings really went.

“Ca'tra…” He begins an apology, the use of the nickname, your nickname of the brilliant night sky, shakes you out of your trance. And without another thought, you take off into the dense forest.

You run until the panting breaths are because of physical exertion and not a panic attack. You decide that it's unlikely Hunter will report you,so your rank as a Jedi won't be ruined. Explaining the sudden need for a transfer will be harder to pull off.

And then there's Echo. you promised not to leave him, ergo you have to stay with the Bad Batch. You’re so unbelievably screwed it’s almost funny. The air is almost still in this part of the forest, trees packed next to one another. Green melting into green as leaves interconnect and block out the sun.

Let go of your feelings.

Logic of your Jedi master rings in your ears, but the anxiety seems to be louder today. Just thinking about going back to the ship brings tears to your eyes. But it is inevitable, so perhaps you’ll swallow the rising bile, grit your teeth and just deal with it.

“Ca’tra!” Echo’s call resonates through the forest, he must have been the one to take off after you, your heart falls knowing it’s not Hunter. Then again, you never held out much hope for requited feelings anyways.

“Ca’tra!” That's Tech’s voice, great now you’ve got two commandos trying to track you down. And considering you’re not ready to face anyone yet, you turn on your heel to take off again. Coming face to face with the blunt grey plastoid of the sergeants armour. You jump back with a soft gasp.

“Senses need re-tuning?” Hunter asks with a raised eyebrow, you're rarely caught off guard. You open your mouth but the vocal cords don’t seem to co-operate, so instead you’re left to stand and gape. Eyes flickering to him for the smallest of moments before finding comfort looking at his boots rather than his face.

“You know he’s a shit.” Hunter says, filling the silence with small talk. expecting some smart reply and a smile from you. Instead You shift your weight from foot to foot and pick at the dirt on your clothing. You hear him clear his throat with a cough, but you still don’t look at him, transfixed by the ground, picking at the dirt on your hands now. Maybe a little too aggressively as his hand comes to pull it away from your reddening skin.

“You’ll hurt yourself.” He states, flipping your smaller, softer hands around, looking for other irritated areas. Thumbing each one over gently with a huff of disapproval before his switches to your other hand. Giving it the same treatment.

“Need to take better care of yourself.” He murmurs as he finds a particular bad spot. Watching as you move your head to stare and a new patch of ground off to the side.

“ ‘Kay you’re starting to scare me Ca’tra, say something.” Your heart hops a little at the sound of genuine worry in his voice.

“Sorry.” You whisper, it’s the easiest thing to say.

“You don’t need to be.” Hunter’s deep voice hums, as his hand makes it way to your elbow, coaxing you out of the hunched position you didn't even realize you’d gone into.

“Doesn't matter.” you sigh, looking up at the sky letting the tears fall back into your eyes.

“It does to me.” He tells you firmly. Rough but warm fingers pull your face to meet his, so you squish your eyes closed. Funny how the instincts take over - if you can't see it, it’s not there.

“Don’t like seeing you upset.” Hunter moves his hand, sensing he overstepped. The other refuses to move from your elbow though.

“Sorry.” you whisper again, letting out a shaky breath unsure if his presence is helping or making it all worse.

“I care about you.” He admits slowly, not to you specifically, but to the greenery around the two of you, like he’s not really talking to you at all, but you’re still able to hear him.

“It’s not the same.” You say quickly, trying to escape the conversation that’s about to happen. You know the difference between caring about someone and loving them, and the last thing you want is for him to tell you that.

“Yes it is.” He says it so quickly, you think he didn’t even mean to say it out loud. Hunter’s dark hair is falling around the bandana as he looks at you, backpack forgotten in his rush to find you, senses as ignored as they can be. Gently touching your foreheads together, he repeats himself. “Yes. it is.” the smallest panicked noise escapes you as you breathe, closing your eyes as his other hand comes to grasp your neck softly. While the one on your elbow sneaks it’s way to your waist. As gentle as possible.

He’s giving you a chance to run. Your brain realizes with shock. Hunter is giving you a chance to turn and bolt again. Exposing himself in the only way he knows how, eyes closed, gentle touches, and the opportunity to pull away from hands that have never known love.

Except this time, you don't want to run.

The sigh of relief that leaves him when you wrap your arms around his neck is monumental. And immediately his hold tightens, crushing you into the armour in a desperate attempt to feel your warmth through the cold metal. One hand grips your tunic with all his strength and the other buries itself in your hair.

You press your face into the gap where tan skin disappears under the top of his blacks. Feeling the prickles where scruff is growing in, and if you try hard enough, maybe you feel where his tattoo starts.

“What are we going to do?” You cry into his shoulder, this isn't allowed. The two of you are breaking every rule imaginable. Jedi attachment, Clone attachment, internal fraternization, breaking orders, disobeying line of command, and probably about a million more.

“It’s okay ner cayre.” He says stealing the anxiety driven breaths with a kiss sweeter than spice.

“I've got you.”

#the clone wars #clones #clone wars #clone wars x reader #clone wars x you #the clone wars x reader #clone wars x y/n #clone wars x #clone x reader #clone x jedi #the clones x reader #clones x reader #sergeant hunter x reader #sergeant hunter #bad batch #the bad batch #bad batch x reader #star wars: the bad batch #bad batch x reader platonic

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aggressive-positivity-network · 4 years ago

Note

Your demo in a relationship headcanons were simply aaaaaaahhhh!*chef kiss* could we maybe have some for everyone's favorite aussie stringbean?

I absolutely love Sniper...he’s one of those characters I can just fall back on. I also just like Australian accents, especially when he speaks in a low, intimidating voice. Gets me every time. Makes me either blush or happy stim whenever I hear it.

First Date:

You find Sniper on a dating app after a particularly bad break-up.

His profile picture is of him shirtless, holding a huge gun next to him. However, instead of looking sexily into the camera, he’s looking off camera with a bewildered look on his face.

His bio says, “My friends put me up to this. Don’t expect too much. If you go on one date with me maybe they’ll shut up. Who bloody knows?”

You get curious, and you decide to start a chat with him.

“Your friends put you up to this huh? 😏”

“yeah. what of it?”

“What, are you some lonely wolf type or what?”

“you could say that.”

He was texting back almost immediately. Even if he wasn’t a lovey-dovey person, he was certainly interested.

“How would you like to get those friends off your back?”

“i’m free wednesday.”

You make plans, which, despite only seeing this as a one-night stand, you gradually get more and more excited for.

You meet Sniper at a nicer restaurant, wearing a new black dress that you hadn’t worn yet.

When you finally see him at the lobby, you realize that the picture didn’t do him justice, even thought he now had a beige suit on.

His lankiness showed a bit more, but his arms were very strong despite his frame. He was wearing sunglasses, which added an air of cool refinement.

At first you thought he was British because of his texts, but when he spoke, you knew right away he was Australian. You are far from disappointed.

You are still waiting for your table when all of a sudden, Sniper takes out a huge knife. Before you can react, he quickly slices something out of your vision and then brings it before your eyes. You had forgotten to take the tag off your dress.

“I’m flattered. I didn’t think you’d get all shinied up for me.”

You breathe out shakily and rub your neck. Sniper’s eyes furrow.

“I didn’ nick ya, did I?”

“N-no...just s-scared me...”

You thought maybe you had met up with a psycho, and all your suspicions were not put to rest yet, but the close encounter seemed to awaken something in you.

The date continues as normal. Both of you are pretty awkward at first, especially since the knife incident. But before the main meal is brought to your table, you’ve started up a conversation.

Sniper told you he was in the military, but his base is very lax with dress code and schedule.

You start telling him about your job as a graphic designer when all of a sudden a scream interrupts you mid-sentence.

There’s a guy holding a gun about eight tables from you, pointing it at the many patrons. He doesn’t seem drunk, but just enraged.

“WHAT’S A GUY GOTTA DO TO GET SOME DAMN FRIES?!”

The manager tries to talk to him, but ends up getting shot, most likely dead.

The yelling continues for about fifteen minutes. You are very uncomfortable, not to mention terrified, but Sniper seems oddly nonchalant.

Suddenly, Sniper yells, “OI! THEY’RE BRINGIN’ OUT YOUR FRIES! RIGHT THERE, MATE!”

The guy follows Sniper’s finger, and all of a sudden there’s a gunshot. But it wasn’t from the madman’s gun...it was from Sniper’s.

The guy falls over on top of the bleeding manager, writhing in agony.

Before you can even process what’s happening, Sniper grabs you by the arm and drags you out of the restaurant.

“Dishes it out but can’t take it, eh luv? C’mon, we’ll go to my place. It’s real nice.”

You get into his van, which smells like a mixture of old leather, beef jerky, and...something else. However, your terror quickly trumps your logic.

“First Time”:

Despite your fiasco of a first date, you still decide to stay at Sniper’s until it’s all blown over.

His apartment is covered wall to wall with guns, memorabilia, and sticky notes, usually with names and dates written on them.

On the far wall was a cork board filled to the brim with pictures, yarn, and Xs made in thick red Sharpie.

“If I woulda known it would go this far, I woulda tidied up the place. Sorry about that, luv.”

You brush it off, and you both sit on an old leather couch with bits of stuffing sticking out of it.

You take this as a cue to get around to what this whole date had been about: some sweet, sweet rebound. It seems awkward now that you had gone through so much - besides, you hadn’t expected to connect with Sniper the way you have...

But you still manage to spit it out.

“Er...yeah. That’s what people usually do, right? Yeah? I dunno. I’ve been off the playin’ field awhile.”

Sniper puts his hands around your neck and let’s you begin to kiss him. But it was clear after a while he wasn’t into it, so you pull away and ask if he wanted to wait another time.

“Aw, no, shiela. Look at me, lyin’ ‘ere like a dead fish...I just...I’ll try ‘arder, luv, I promise.”

You pull away completely. This had trauma written all over it, and you weren’t about to force someone into it...you were better than your ex.

“Did I do somethin’ wrong?”

You asked him what was wrong, and why he was being so passive about what was happening to him. Why didn’t he say anything? Do anything?

Sniper sighed, pulling his hat way down in front of his face.

“I like girls, don’t get me wrong. It isn’t that. But I never felt...that way about ‘em. Or anybody else, honestly. I tried it once in college...I just ended up feelin’ sick. Tried it with another girl, then another, then another. I even tried with my guy roommate. But I always ended up feelin’ like I was gonna puke. Sometimes I did. It just never felt right. It wasn’t magical, it was bloody disgusting.”

“But every girl I’ve ever been with expected it, and to keep ‘em, I ‘ad to do what they wanted. Sometimes I’d just lie there, tryin’ not to vomit, trying to at least move a little, act like I was into it. They said they’d change my mind, that this time would be different. At the end of the day, it never was, and I lost ‘em. And now I’m gonna lose you too, ‘n I’m gonna halfta tell the guys...they’ll never let this go...”

Back At The Base... :

Spy called the entire team into the security room to watch the entire date go down. He had placed a bug on Sniper’s suit while helping him adjust it, and now everyone was here to watch the show.

Everybody cheered when the guy was shot, though Spy made a mental note to call Miss Pauling in the morning.

The whole team, Scout especially, was excited to see some action when Sniper brought you to his apartment. Well, everyone except Medic. He stood their with his eyebrows creased. He knew exactly what was going to happen.

“Aw, c’mon Snipes, what’s the hold up?! She is so inta you!”

There wasn’t any sound, so no one exactly knew why Sniper paused for so long.

Finally, you two came back together again, but after about thirty minutes of just kissing, the other mercs got bored really fast.

Scout was especially disappointed.

“Man, this was whole thing was a bust!”

Spy shrugged. “Not quite a waste of time. Look at her. She’s smitten. I never thought I would say this, but gentlemen - we have found Sniper a suitable suitor!”

Medic, eyes wide, kept his Sniper’s medical history too himself - not for HIPAA, but for the drama of it all. He wanted to see how this would play out.

Love At First Shot:

On a casual date at his place, Sniper catches you admiring one of his weapons.

“That’s one’s a beaut, ain’ it? That’s one ‘a my oldest guns. She’s outta service, the old girl, but she don’t look a shot over thirty.”

He picks it up and cocks it, nodding approvingly.

“Got this offa real bloody fruit seller. The muzzle ‘ad stains all over it, rust in some places...the bloke obviously had no idea how to take care of it.”

You suddenly feel a pang in your chest.

“Oi, luv, not a fan ‘a guns?”

“No...I...it just made me remember something.”

Sniper puts down his weapon, sits on the sofa, and pats his leg.

“‘Ere. Tell me about it.”

You hesitate for a moment before shyly sitting on his knee. You’re on the smaller side, but you were still afraid you might hurt him.

“Aw, it’s alright. Put your full weight on. These babies can ‘old an Aussie an’ an AK-47.”

You giggle, letting yourself get a little more comfortable.

“Now, luv...what’s on your mind? What’s that pretty lil’ head a’ yours thinkin’?”

You sigh.

“My boyfriend...or, my ex-boyfriend...we broke up for a reason. Or, well, I dumped him. We had been dating for almost three years, and I didn’t see it coming.”

“Crazy train crashed inta the station, huh?”

“He almost did. He...he had hit me before. I just didn’t say anything because I didn’t want him to get in trouble. But one night...it got really, really bad. He wasn’t even drunk. He was still in his work uniform. I stayed with a friend, and I told him it was over with a text - I was just so scared he’d find me. He knew my friends. He knew my address. And so I just wanted to find someone to protect me. It was more than just rebound...I just didn’t want to be alone. I wanted one person in my life he didn’t know so they could protect me.”

You could feel tears welling up in your eyes, but you bit them back. You didn’t feel like sobbing in front of your new boyfriend. Sniper, though, started laying down, taking you with him.

Your head was now under his chin, and you were laying all along his body. The sudden show of affection caught you off guard. You started to cry, burying your face in his chest.

Sniper wrapped his arms around you, supporting your entire weight easily.

Neither of you spoke for a good fifteen minutes, except for Sniper saying an occasional, “Aw, sweetheart...”

Finally, you calmed down, feeling safe in your boyfriend’s embrace.

“Y’know, luv...”

Sniper hesitated.

“I...could teach ya how to shoot. If it’ll make ya feel safe.”

You sniffle and look up.

“I know ya probably want some big, strong man to protect ya, an’ I will. God, if anybody even touches a bloody ‘air on your ‘ead, I’ll kill ‘em. But I wan’ you to go to the movies, or the store, or just ‘ave a nice walk an’ not be lookin’ over your shoulder. I wan’ ya to enjoy your life, luv.”

“I...I can’t shoot a gun...”

“Why not?”

“I can’t...aim or shoot...I don’t think I’ve even held a gun before...”

“Well, we can fix that! ‘Ere...”

Sniper leans over and picks up his old gun again, laying it in your hands. It’s a bit heavier than you expected.

You run your hands over the muzzle and barrel, not even daring to touch the trigger.

Sniper puts his hands over yours and guides them over the gun, giving you more confidence about handling the weapon.

“A gun is like...like a dog. You train it right, an’ you train yourself, you’ll be fine. You’re no kid, so you know ‘ow dangerous these can be. But fear doesn’t shoot the bullet. Fear doesn’ aim for ya.”

Every time you went to his apartment, he would do this. Sometimes you two would be talking, and he would nonchalantly hand you the gun, which, after a while, you took without thought.

Now it was time to take you to the range.

He gave you that old gun to use as practice, but promised a newer, more compact gun when you had gotten the hang of shooting.

Hands on your shoulders, hands over yours, he taught you how to target a person’s more sensitive areas.

Over the next few months, you grew better and better at hitting your mark. You weren’t perfect, but you could definitely defend yourself.

One night, Sniper went to go get you both Chinese food, and you were hanging out at your apartment.

You heard a knock on your window. You ignore it, thinking a bird had flown into it by accident. However, as the knocking grew louder and more insistent, you lift your head, startled.

It was your ex-boyfriend.

He was in a suit, but his face wasn’t nearly as neat. His eyes were red and wide, and his hair was messy.

He had walked up the fire escape to your balcony, and was leaning against the rail, relaxed.

You stayed inside, but you knew that the door was unlocked - he could come in any time he wanted. And he knew this.

He spoke, and you could hear him through the glass.

“Still single. Just like I thought.”

You opened your mouth to speak, but he cut you off.

“I came back because I was worried. It’s been so long since I’ve seen you...I thought maybe something had happened. You were so depressed when you left. I couldn’t help but think that maybe...well, that doesn’t matter. What matters is that you’re here, and I am more than willing to be with you again. I think we both have cooled off, right? We’ve had some time apart, and now we’ve realized we’re madly in love with each other and can’t be apart for another minute...”

“I have a new boyfriend!”

You blurted it out so suddenly you even surprised yourself. But your ex was unmoved.

“Oh, right. Sure. How much are you paying him, this boyfriend of yours? Do you have to pay extra for sex, or do you have a pity discount?”

“He...he’ll come back...and...”

You looked beside you. Your gun was laying on the floor beside you. Sniper had just taken you to the range, and you hadn’t had enough time to put it away.

You remembered what he said...

“I wan’ ya to enjoy your life, luv.”

You put your hand around the gun, grasping it tightly.

You swallow.

“Come back and what?” your ex jeered. “What’s your new boyfriend going to do? Beat me up?”

You are still trying to make your decision when you hear the glass door open.

“Look at me when I’m talking to you, angel. I want to see your beautiful face.”

You whip around, the gun in your hand. Your ex immediately recoils, his hands flinging up.

“Woah woah woah...!”

“Please. Leave.”

Your voice is hoarse, but you try to sound as firm as possible.

“Even if I didn’t have a boyfriend, I would never get back with you. Ever. You...you made me feel so helpless, scared, alone...I can’t feel that way forever. I don’t want you to get hurt, but I want you to leave and never come back. Please. Just leave me alone.”

Your ex smirks, albeit shakily. “You can’t shoot that. You’ve never touched a gun in your life.”

“My boyfriend wanted me to be safe. He wanted me to be happy. He wanted me to be able to deal with creeps like you.”

You get up, gun still in hand, and your ex backs away.

“He did more than you ever did.”

“What, so you’re just going to shoot me? End up on the six o’clock news?”

“No. I won’t. I don’t want to hurt you. I just want you to leave. For good.”

“I bet that thing isn’t even loaded.”

You show him a half-full magazine and point to the fire escape.

“Like you know how to -!”

You quickly turn to a picture of a seaside landscape, shakily aim, and manage to shoot it, shattering the frame to pieces.

“Get. Out.”

Your ex practically runs out, yelling that he was calling the police.

Sniper comes back a few minutes later, and when he asks you what the hell happened, you start telling him between trembling breaths what had occurred.

Sniper turned bright red and tipped his hat down.

“That bloody wanker...fruit sellin’...”

He starts to walk towards the fire escape, but you stop him.

“I scared him off, please don’t...he said he was going to call the police...”

Sniper took a few deep breaths, calming down.

“We’ve got th’ best lawyers in the country. I’d like to see ‘im try.”

The police was never called - you think it was probably a pride thing, since you had overpowered him so easily - but you weren’t sure you had seen the last of him.

But with your own experience and Sniper’s, you had some piece of mind.

However, you were soon going to find out that Sniper had more power on his side than you thought...

*****************

Long time, no headcanon! Well, good headcanons, anyway. I rushed my last post, so I tried to go all out with this one. I might write a second part when headcanons are open again, but I think I prefer leaving some things up to the imagination, hm?

Anyway, more headcanons on the way! Same bat time, same bat channel! The next one is about siblings, though I may post shorter headcanons before that, since it’s such a fun idea to write.

#tf2 #tf2 fandom #tf2 ask blog #tf2 headcanon #tf2 headcanons #sniper tf2 #tf2 sniper

45 notes · View notes

flatstarcarcosa · 3 years ago

Text

favors and heists

notes: i gave myself brain worms while roping @dadbodsandbots into my mass effect insert shenanigans by using her mans so I had to shake some of them loose. this turned out to be kinda fun, actually, for a change :3

also tags @jackals-ships while making pspspsps noises

summary: what's the point of your best friend dating a galaxy-renown mercenary if not for the favors you can squeeze out of the deal?

zaeed takes a charity case.

ship(s): stubborn goddamn jackasses, cat/digs (boomcat? harcat?)

******

The door alarm has been chiming for four minutes. Pressing the override button on his omni-tool shuts it off for a few scarce seconds, only for whoever is outside to activate it again. Finally, Zaeed gives up on ignoring it and wrenches the damn thing open manually. The metal squeals in protest before the hydraulics correct themselves.

"The hell do you want?" he asks, frowning. Cat stands in the door way with barely contained tears in her eyes.

"My final thesis is due next week and the whole argument hinges on this 18th century painting and-"

"Dooooon't care," Zaeed drawls as he goes to manually pull the door shut again. She lunges forward, getting a shoulder and half a leg across before the safety catch feels an obstruction and stops.

"-and it got stolen and if I have to report it to my boss I'm not only gonna fail the program but I'll never work in this industry again!" she blurts. Zaeed has already turned his back towards her and is cussing at his omni-tool's refusal to force the door shut.

"Don't caaaaaaaaare," he says.

"You gotta help me get it back!" she cries, "That fucking asshole Harkness stole it and if he gets too far I'll never see it again!"

Zaeed stops, shoulders sagging. He holds up a finger and turns.

"When you say Harkness-"

"Yeah, Digger," Cat sniffs. "You know, Captain Boom-"

"Will willingly shoot my other eye out before I call him that, thanks," says Zaeed. He goes silent for a moment, and then lets out a frustrated growl and runs a hand over his face. "All right, fine. But only because I've still got a grudge against that jackass I've been meaning to settle."

She looks up, elation flashing across her face.

"Really?! I mean, I can hire you, too, so-"

Zaeed snorts.

"You don't make near enough to hire me," he says. "Especially not if you want him alive, although honestly, that part isn't up to you." He steps out of sight into the other room, and Cat wanders into the kitchen to blow her nose on a wad of paper towels.

"Where was he last?" Zaeed asks.

"I mean, my office," she calls back. He steps back around the corner, the top half of his armor undersuit hanging around his waist.

"I meant where was he before he stole the painting?"

"Oh!" she pauses. "I...dunno, some hotel down on Silversun."

Zaeed hums, and pulls his arm through the sleeve on his suit. He drags a footlocker over to the sofa and plops down, bending over to unlock the lid.

"How'd Harkness get into your office, anyway?" he asks. "It's not exactly publicly accessible."

"Uh- I...I don't know," she stammers, "he's a thief, that's what he does!"

Zaeed quirks an eyebrow at her as he laces his boots.

"Uh-huh," he says. "And he just happened to have decided to specifically case your office for one painting..."

"Yeah."

"Your office, which is in a moderately secured area in the Citadel Tower," he continues. He raises an eyebrow at her. She shifts her weight from one foot to the other.

"Yeah," she says again, voice tight. "Why?"

"No reason," he says. Motorized armor joints lock into place with mechanical whirring, and she watches him strap a pistol and a sniper rifle in place. "Here's the thing, if he's already jumped ship and left the Citadel, I'm not chasing him all over. This lasts until I decide the amusement isn't worth the lack of money. Matter of fact, you knowing Reese is the only reason I didn't tell you to fuck off and throw you out."

"A fact which I am heavily aware of," says Cat.

"Long as we're on the same page," says Zaeed. "Might as well wait here, I doubt this is gonna take too long."

"Hey," says Cat, "wait a second. How do you know him, anyway?"

Zaeed clicks his tongue.

"Got unlucky enough to be on a job with him once," he says. "Stupid little fuck nearly got me killed. Spent four weeks healing from that."

"Oh," she says.

"Granted, wasn't the same as getting half my face blown off," he adds, "but it was still enough that I've had it in for him ever since."

"You're not actually going to kill him, are you?" she asks. Zaeed shrugs as the door slides open.

"That depends on him, love," he says.

"Oh," she says. Before she can get another word out, Zaeed steps into the hall and leaves her alone. She sighs and sits down on the sofa. "Well, that's just fucking great."

******

It takes less than five hours to track Harkness down. After checking out of his hotel earlier that morning, he'd stuck around the Silversun Strip rather than booking a flight off the Citadel.

For some reason that Zaeed can only chock up to the man being an absolute fucking idiot, he didn't consider that wandering around with a medium sized painting under his arm was going to make him stick out to the residents.

Only on the Silversun Strip would one get away with that without C-Sec getting called and dropping down on your ass. Try it up on the Presidium and every rich asshole with a penthouse would be ringing the emergency numbers for 'suspicious activity' while triple locking their doors.

Tucked away in a back alley and away from the main attractions of the Strip is a little pawn shop run by, who Zaeed assumes, are the only Batarians to have a permanent residence on the Citadel. There's an old fashioned bell hanging above the door and it jingles when he walks through. It catches his attention for a moment, and he glances up at it, wondering where the aliens picked up that detail about human stores.

Behind the sales counter, a bored looking Batarian is standing with his arms crossed over his chest and glowering with all four eyes at the man in front of him.

"Come on mate," says the Australian. He's leaning over the painting, so focused on his attempts at hocking it that he either didn't hear the door bell, or isn't interested enough to turn around. Zaeed catches the gaze of the sales clerk, and holds a finger to his lips.

"I said no," the Batarian growls, looking back at the would-be customer.

"All right, fine, screw giving me what it's worth," the man continues, "we'll settle for 60% and then I can be on me way."

"You think I'm so stupid or naive I don't know stolen merch when I see it?" asks the Batarian. "I know enough about you humans and your squabbles to know there's no amount of credits worth getting involved in this kinda shit.

"Harkness, why don't you do something useful and stop pestering this poor Batarian?" Zaeed asks, interjecting only when he's close enough to Digger Harkness that the sound of his voice makes the man jump. "Bad enough the poor bastard has to walk around looking like that every day of his life, he doesn't need you coming in here and cocking everything up for him."

The Batarian sighs and rolls his eyes.

"Is it asshole human day today and no one told me?" he asks. "Oh wait, I suppose that's every day, isn't it?"

"Goddamn right it is," Zaeed says. Harkness turns around, nervousness clear on his face.

"Zaeed," he says, slowly, "well, I'll be...funny running into you out here, eh?" He reaches behind himself, fumbling his hand across the counter as he searches blindly for the painting. Zaeed is faster, and snatches it out from under him.

"Lets go," he says, gesturing towards the door. "You know why I'm here."

"Aw, c'mon-" Harkness' protest is cut short by Zaeed grabbing his wrists and slapping a pair of electrified cuffs on them. He shoves the man forward, and then tosses a credit chit down onto the counter.

"You see a couple of human males today?" he asks the Batarian. The alien grunts, considering him for a moment before reaching down and snapping up the chit.

"Been a slow day, I haven't seen anybody," he says, shrugging. Zaeed nods.

"Good man," he says. He shoves Harkness towards the door again. "Get moving."

The bell above the door rings as the two leave, and Harkness turns, walking backwards with his arms locked in front of him as he addresses Zaeed.

"Well, I'm simply stumped," he says, "can't for the life o' me figure who I pissed off enough to hire you." Zaeed says nothing, and simply motions with his pistol for him to keep walking.

Harkness faces foward and catches sight of the skycar parked at the end of the alley. It's not the best area to try and make a mad dash for freedom, but that doesn't mean he's not gonna give it a go.

"How'd you even get into the Citadel Tower to get a hold of something like this, anyway?" Zaeed asks, holding the painting up to get a good look at it. He's never understood fuck all about art and it's not one of those especially famous pieces that he'd even recognize anyway, so he doesn't bother theorizing on why it's so important to Cat's thesis.

"Oh, you know," says Harkness, "made a friend."

"Find that hard to believe," Zaeed drawls as he tucks the painting back under his arm.

"Oi, I'm quite suave when I want to be!" Harkness stops walking again, turning with a shit-eating grin on his face. "Though, some people are just easier to woo."

"Yeah, that sounds more like you, doesn't it?" Zaeed narrows his eyes. "Making a mark out of some poor girl that always sees the best in people."

Harkness blinks.

"Hang on," he breathes, "how do you know that? Don't tell me she's the one that hired you!"

"Course not," Zaeed snorts, "like I told her, she can't afford to hire me. This is a favor for a friend."

"Well shit mate! In that case, why don't you an' I work out a deal, yeah?" The grin is back, and Zaeed makes a point of ignoring him as he opens the skycar door and lays the painting in the back seat. "You ain't on an official contract, I see no reason why you an' I as two consummate professionals can't come to some sort of arrangement that benefits us both!"

"There's an exhaustive list of reasons why that won't be happening," Zaeed says, crossing his arms. "At the top of which is simply the fact that I can't goddamn stand you."

"Fair enough," says Harkness, "But Zaeed, come on, mate! As it happens right now, you're not making any money on this! That's a problem for you, and I can fix that real easy. You just slip these bracelets off me, let me be on my merry way, and recoup credits for your time. Anyone asks, I was too slippery to get a hold of, we all move on."

"No," Zaeed says. "Get in the goddamn car before I knock you out and shove you in the trunk."

Harkness groans, and bounces on the balls of his feet in frustration.

"Come on," he says again, "we both know at the end of the day lining your pockets is the only thing you really care about, so why don't you-"

Zaeed lunges faster than a half blind old merc has any right to move, and Harkness lets out a strangled yell as he punches him in the kidney with enough force to knock the wind out of him. He's wheezing as Zaeed shoves him into the alley wall, hanging onto him by the collar of his coat and lifting him off the ground.

"Listen to me, you stupid fucking jackass," Zaeed growls, "I'm not remotely young enough or stupid enough to not know exactly how you got access to Cat's office. That girl is the only person Reese knows that isn't a killer or a junkie or some fucked up combination of both, and the last thing she needs is to be caught up with likes of you and I."

Harkness says nothing as he gasps again, and waits on his lungs to remember how to take in air.

"I care about her well-being for my own selfish reasons because of her proximity to Reese, and I recognize that doesn't put me in a position of dictating to her who she spends her time with," Zaeed continues, "but so help me, you cause so much as a minor inconvenience for her and I will carve out your goddamn eyes, sew your mouth shut and sell you to Batarians as discounted slave labor, are we goddamn clear?"

Harkness manages half of a choked, garbled word and gets his head bounced off the wall for his effort.

"That didn't sound like a yes to me," Zaeed growls.

"Y-yes," he says. Zaeed slams him against the wall once more for good measure before dropping him.

"Get in the goddamn car."

******

The rental apartment Reese and Zaeed have been staying in isn't much to come home to. Far from the worst place they've ever holed up, sure, but that's never been a very high bar to begin with.

Regardless, as he pushes Harkness through the doorway and pauses long enough to set the painting down on an end table, he does reflect on the warm lightning in the corners and the smell of a beef roast being pulled out of the oven.

It's temporary and it's barely big enough for the two of them to move without tripping over each other, but it is home.

"You found it!" Cat appears in the archway to the kitchen, and Reese looks up over the counter. Their eyes glance between Zaeed and Harkness and the painting, and they quirk an eyebrow in his direction. Zaeed responds with a subtle shake of his head.

Later, he mouths, reaching up to undo the clasps on his armor.

"Wasn't too much trouble," he says aloud. "Helps when you're being sent after a goddamn moron. I should take more offers like this, actually."

"Caaaaaat," Harkness purrs. He goes to hold out his arms, and stops when he meets the resistance from the cuffs. She bypasses him entirely to scoop up the painting and make sure it hasn't been damaged.

"You know, on a hunch I looked into something on the way to the Strip," Zaeed says casually. "C-Sec has multiple active bounties on him at the moment. Cashing in on just one of them would likely pay more than, well...whatever it is you even do currently."

Harkness lets out a nervous laugh and looks between Zaeed and Cat. She sets the painting down and regards him for a moment.

"Right now I'm more worried with getting this back before anyone notices it was gone," she says, causing Harkness to puff up slightly. He winks at Zaeed, only to stop at the look the other man sends his way. "It's unlucky for me the building is locked down for the day, though..."

"Sounds to me like you could use someone who knows his way 'round security systems," Harkness offers. Zaeed snorts, and Cat frowns. Silence stretches out for a moment, broken only by the sound of Reese turning on an electric carving knife.

"Okay, fine," Cat says when they've turned the knife back off. "But know that if we get caught, I'm telling them you kidnapped me and I can cry on command."

"Well now you're just talkin' dirty to me," Harkness says.

"Really?" Reese barks from the kitchen. "Some of us still gotta eat tonight."

Zaeed remains silent and utterly unreadable as he taps at his omni-tool. The handcuffs beep a few times before popping open and falling off. Harkness massages at one of his wrists, and manages to ignore the bait when Zaeed shoves into him on the way to the kitchen.

"If we leave now we should make it in and out without too much trouble," Cat says. Reese offers a wave.

"Call me when you get in," they say, "mostly so I know if anyone's gotta kill him later."

"Sure!" says Cat. She tucks the painting safely under an arm, and drags Harkness out into the hall by the collar of his coat. The door beeps as the automatic lock powers on, and Reese turns to lean against the kitchen counter.

"What?" Zaeed asks, opening the fridge and pulling out a bottle of beer.

"Do I even want to know?"

"Probably not."

Reese rolls their eyes and turns their attention back to the roast. "I leave for 20 minutes to get fucking dinner, and I swear to Christ..." they say, trailing off when Zaeed reaches around and snags a slice of beef.

"You do realize she's got absolutely horrid taste in men, right?" he asks. The top of the beer bottle pops with a resounding hssss, and he flicks it across the kitchen into the garbage can.

"Yeah, well, that's just something we got in common, I guess," Reese says.

"Oi," Zaeed protests. He takes a swallow of beer and reaches for another slice of meat, then stops. "Hang on, she can cry on command?"

"Yeah, fucking wild actually," says Reese. They frown. "Why?"

Zaeed is silent for a moment as he takes another sip of beer before answering.

"Goddammit."

#reese.fic #ship: stubborn goddamn jackasses #others: boomcat

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