#one of the guys said they don’t think collision would be any different and I had to chew my arm off not to say anything | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

yanderenightmare · 4 years ago

Note

bitchy bratty catty pretty-girl who gives fuck-all, the school tries to straighten her ways by introducing her to a temporary captured shiggy, who is soooo fucking pissed off at this smug pretty bitch, going to track her down and make her pay!!!! >-< plez Mizz Nightmare

yandere kidnapper ! SHIGARAKI TOMURA

TIP-JAR

goodiebag WARNINGS: yandere, dubcon/noncon, abuse, profanity, bullying, anxiety, drugging, kidnapping, abduction

CUTTHROAT

“Wow! Right for the kill?! You’re real cutthroat.”

She wasn’t really surprised to hear that they’d caught him, and unlike many others she wasn’t surprised to hear that they’d be holding him on campus. She had full confidence in both the faculty, the promising Hero-course students, and UA’s security system, knowing damn well it could serve well as a prison not just for the students who went there, such as herself, but for the leader of the League of Villains as well.

To say she felt safe as she walked with Aizawa to meet him would be an understatement. She knew why the teacher had been tasked with taking her there, the intention being to scare her, give her a picture of what scum she would become if she continued down the path of fuck-all she was currently on. But, even though she wanted to rebel against taking any orders, she was feeling something far more superior than the will to fight back, something that trumped safety and laid waste to fear, she was feeling thrill.

This would be a means to an end, a cure for boredom as well as a way to show once and for all that she was a hopeless cause, maybe then these obsessive heroes would leave her the fuck alone already.

“Wow, you’re really ugly! I mean, they warned me you were, but I could never’ve imagined it’d be this bad!”

She was jeering laughs at the lanky figure who towered over her, his hand wrapped tightly around her throat and his eyes spiraling in disbelief in process of understanding why what was found beneath his fingertips wasn’t turning to ash.

“Aren’t bad guys supposed to be sexy?” Her idiotic rambling only succeeded in confusing him more as she shrugged his seemingly useless normal hand away, walking to sit down on the floor, knowing it would be a while until Aizawa let her out again. “You know, to seduce and lure people into their ranks?” She looked over the meal tray he’d flipped out of her hand before seizing her throat, nothing sharp, no cutlery, no broken glass, just one measly apple. “I’m guessing you’re not in charge of recruiting. I mean… who would ever want to follow your ugly mug?”

She watched in anticipation of what remark he’d hurl her way. She’d heard he was bratty, she’d heard he was the one who could set her straight, divert her from this collision-course she’d set herself out on. Yet, his response was more than disappointing, not at all the tornado of a tantrum she had been preparing for. “You talk too much.” He didn’t even sound at all any provoked by her words, dismissing her as he slowly made to pick up the apple from the ground, checking to see if it was his quirk that was gone or if there was something else afoot, finding his answer in the ashes of the fruit.

“Come on.” She drawled, crossing her legs beneath her, keen eyes looking at him as he too sat back down to lean against the wall, looking only a fair bit of annoyed with her presence, as though she were a stain on his shirt, an inconvenience of some sorts. “You were gonna kill me!” She laughed, his red scrutinizing orbs looking to her with a sneer. “Without a thought, in cold blood, no remorse, even after I gave you food like the mutt you are, the least I can do is spit in your face!”

He didn’t answer. Eyes still set on her where she sat planted without a single care, annoyed with how comfortable she looked, as though she were in her element, as though she was winning some sort of game, a game that wasn’t even about him as her eyes flittered to the black-glass of the window every now and again.

She clicked her tongue, beginning a new ramble. “Tell me, Shiggy.” She smiled, eyes wicked and gleaming and untamed. “That quirk of yours…”

She might have phrased it all like a question, but Shigaraki could hear it plain and simple, how her one goal was to mock him, poke at him until he burst, and not even for the sake of watching him burst, but for the sake of proving to whomever was on the other side of that glass that they couldn’t tame her. He didn’t need to know her entire story to see that much, how he was being used as a pawn to convert some meaningless pretty-girl.

“Can you control it? Or does everything you touch turn to ash no matter your desire?” It wouldn’t have been out of place if she’d licked her lips with how dripping with venom her words were. “It’s like the Midas touch, isn’t it?”

Her poetic phrasing of his deadly quirk had his eyes narrowing, but he hadn’t much time to think her wording over before she began a new escapade.

“Have you ever fucked anyone, Shiggy?” She didn’t even look at him as she asked, alerting him of what he already knew, how she had no interest in his answer, only his reaction, and the reaction his reaction would beckon from the people in the other room.

She was trying to rile him up, prove how vicious she could be, prove how she hadn’t a single fuck to give.

“I bet you’ve never truly touched anyone. How could you? I mean, first…” She laid down on her back with a careless roll, looking to the ceiling, ignoring him if it weren’t for the fact she was talking to him, or about him, or at him. “Who would ever want to fuck you? All those wrinkles and all those scars. You look like the onset of death.” She giggled, and he watched her tits bounce as though they were laughing at him too. “I cannot imagine anyone willingly wanting whatever you have to offer. And even if you force it on them, you’d be bound to fuck up with how much they’d struggle.” You’d think she carried a vendetta toward him, with how personal her attacks were, yet it was all given away with how little she was paying attention to him, as though she’d judged already whatever it was she found interesting and was now done with him. All she remained focused on was creating a show, to see how far she could take it before anyone came in to stop her, how much she could poke until something snapped, how much she could bend until something broke. “Just one slip of the hand and you’re left with your dick only halfway wet in a pile of dust.”

He didn’t know if she knew how correct her imagery was, he guessed she didn’t, he wanted to believe she’d show a bit more restraint then, a bit more unease, more respect. She acted as though she wasn’t trapped in a box with a notorious villain, seemingly unaware of her own stature as well as his. She was nothing but a school-girl and yet she felt comfortable enough in her safety to be lying on her back, flinging insult at the person she was locked in with.

“I don’t see how it could bother you for too long though.” Again, she had him intrigued. “I mean… pretty stupid bitches who’re only worth one fuck anyway can’t really be counted as a loss, can it?”

It was clear she didn’t view herself as one of said pretty stupid bitches, even though a pretty stupid bitch is exactly what she looked like in Shigaraki’s eyes. Perhaps that was her point exactly.

“Have you ever dusted someone who did count as a loss?” She rolled over, head propped up on her elbows, laying in her palms, her feet kicking the air behind her. “You ever fuck up so bad? Committed an irredeemable act? Something so unforgivable even you can’t forgive yourself?” Her eyes were set on him again now. “Do you think about it every day?” Her tone shifted then, to something sadistically sweet. “Does it hurt just as much now as it did then?” Her face split into a grin, eyes ablaze as she observed, searched for a breach in his composure. “What happened to mommy and daddy, Shiggy.” She singsonged, toying with him. “Were they your first victims? Did you cry? Do you still cry? Or did they deserve it?”

Her look was earnest, salacious until she rolled her eyes in boredom at his lack of response.

Sighing, she calmed back down, briefly. “I get it… You don’t want to play with me ‘cause you don’t think I’m a worthy player.” She scoffed as she looked to the side with a melodramatic drag. “You should check yourself. We keep you in a cage, give you food, have you on a leash and collar. You’re nothing but our pet!”

She giggled again, biting her tongue, gnawing on it between the rows of her teeth with her mouth open in a wide smile.

“You know… My quirk is called immunity, but it should really be called repellent.” She looked at her hands then, now kneeling in front of him. Her gaze split like lightning, snapping to look at him again, a catlike smirk pulling at the corner of her mouth. “You and I aren’t that different, are we?” It looked for a second as though she were about to stand up, but the movement fell short as she instead gave way to crawl closer to him, one elegant arm followed by the other, all with the grace of a huntress, a panther easing in for the kill. “In fact… I think I’d go as far and say we’re the exact same…” His eyes didn’t deceive him, this time she did lick her lips, only now her words weren’t dripping with venom, but with some other sickly-sweet nectar. “’Cause…where I never let anyone come close, you let ‘em come close… only for them to die!”

“That’s enough.” He must have closed his eyes the second he felt her breath fan over his face, because he’d missed the time the erasure hero had walked in. “This was a waste of time.” The dark-haired man groaned, disappointed.

“Aw, really?”

She wasn’t in front of him anymore, to his surprising disappointment, though her sweet smell still lingered about him pleasantly.

“And I was just getting to the fun part…” She walked to the threshold of the cell-door, not once indicating she’d turn around and take one final look at him. “Well, anyway… tootles, pet.”

Even as she insulted him, she did it twice over by not returning his gaze.

She was still sleeping, she noted as her mind, though still groggy and drowsed out, became lucid enough to start thinking. She was sleeping, yet the sleep felt unsafe, as though her alarm was bound to go off any second, firmly shaking her awake and telling her time was running out for her to get to school. And if she’d slept through the alarm, a teacher was soon to come fetch her. Yet, for now she remained halfway asleep, waiting for an alarm or a knock on the door unknowing of how it would never arrive.

He wasn’t sure if it was the drug that had perhaps made some of her senses dull under the impression, for… surely she should feel that her mouth was stuffed full and made to suck on a rag, surely she should feel that her wrists were tied together behind her back, and how her thighs and legs were secured together in a frog tie, the rough rope, scratchy in texture, and how it scraped against her soft doughy skin. Perhaps he didn’t tie them tight enough. It was hard to get a good grip without accidentally dusting the ropes, but he knew the struggle was worth it, seeing her now, in all her defenseless vulnerable rightful glory.

“Not so tough now…” He taunted at her small sleeping frame. Even with her clothes still on, he knew her naked body was only a mere touch away from him. How he could spread her open without her being able to kick, only wiggle for him, like a worm on a hook. No… that imagery is too ugly to be describing her, when she’s so far from ugly. She’s more like a butterfly trapped on a pin, wings fluttering hopelessly, reduced to nothing but beauty, nothing but a little doll for him to play with, tamper and poke fun at just like how she’d done back when he was captured at UA.

He decided pro putting the blindfold on her, perhaps the product of her bullying him in the cell, her jabs at his appearance subconsciously having gotten to him despite himself wanting to dust them off like he did with everything else. Her comments were sharp, and seemed to have the same type of immunity her body had, where his ego, much like himself, hadn’t the thickest of skin. Besides, she was… so painfully out of his league.

It hardly mattered though, now that he would regain all the control.

She laid on her stomach, face mushed against the mattress. He’d removed the pillows and comforter so she’d be placed like a centerpiece on his little operating table. She looked so harmless now, so sweet, especially tied up the way she was, and with those whimpering moans that were simmering to the surface, breaching her sleep, escorted by her wiggling, her delicious tempting little wiggling, begging for Shigaraki to come introduce himself, now with the turned tables.

“Did you really think I was just gonna let it slide?” Her wiggles came to an abrupt holt, breath caught in her throat, making her choke out a curt gasp through the thickness of her makeshift gag. “Did you think you were safe? Like you were simply spitting on a grave. No ghosts coming to haunt you.” She panicked once she felt the bed dip, four fingers sharp in their venture, sweeping up her back, settling around her neck, drawing out painful sudden studded goosebumps, spreading across her skin like wildfire in a field. “Silly little slut.” She squealed at the feel of his warm breath on her cheek, unable to move away, her head halfway buried in the soft mattress, teeth sinking into the cloth in her mouth when his tongue, wet with drool, large and flat, dragged up her already teary cheek. “Boo.”

Her ears were burning, so much blood gushing and rushing and pooling in her head like a storm, she barely registered him drawing back with that maniacal giggle, where with as trademark as it were, there was no doubt where she was or who she was with. Yet, she hadn’t the time to think about it, she hadn’t the time to regret or answer questions she hadn’t even the time to ask, because as her mind was cooking up chaotic whirlwinds of fear, crippling fear despite being crippled enough already, brutal fear that her gut feeling like acid festering and mind reeling in on itself in such vehemence she felt she might just faint, give out like a light in a blizzard, she was given no time before he was talking again, pushing her even further out on the edge she found herself, stepping on her fingers one by one, with no mercy as she dangled above jagged rock that were sure to spear her like an arrow through a dove.

“You were wrong, you know.” She felt his hands trace a careful set of four fingers down the fabric of her shirt, rubbing into her spine, further pushing the breath from out of her lungs. “I’ve fucked before.” He spoke casually, though peppered in between the notes of nonchalance was found the spiked flavors of spiteful mockery, like the mean girl on campus, like how she usually talks, like how she had spoken to him. “But, what I haven’t done is played with someone’s body the way I’m gonna play with yours.” He listened to her whimper, sobs surely to soon wrack through her body, uncontrollably and thoroughly, making her gasp and choke on nothing but air and fear. “I mean, it’s only fair.” She heard the shrug in his voice, that sarcastic sigh and lightheartedness. “You fuck with me, I fuck with you.” This time he growled and she swore she would piss herself with how scared she was.

He was going to kill her, she knew it, she could feel it crawling up and down her body as though mites were hidden in her clothes. She already sensed him peeling off her skin, flaying her with her screaming. And in those seconds, those hopeless seconds, she wished for death, for it to be quick, painless, like simply snuffing out a light. She nearly prayed, squeezing her eyes shut to pray to that God or Devil she never believed in, never needed as badly as she needed them now. She wished for her heart to give out, for the right vein to pop, for a lung to collapse, anything, just for her to be dead before he had the mind to torture her to death.

“Does that sound fun, pet.” And there she broke, waterworks in full effect, no longer simple silent tears but something that had built under pressure like boiling pot of water, bubbling, soon to be blubbering incoherent sobs out into her gag, all to his vengeful amusement.

He watched her for a moment, one longer than he’d probably intended, despite not having view of her eyes, watching the blindfold wet as her eyes leaked at the complete overwhelming loss of hope, lips sucking on the gag those tears that managed to escape and run down to salt her lips.

“So pretty, aren’t you?” He accused, giving her barefoot a squeeze, making her wiggle with what mobility the bonds allowed her, looking handicapped, as though he’d disintegrated both her arms and legs when he’d simply tied them up where they would be stored safely and out of the way until he deemed it okay for her to use them again, where until then… she’d remain his little immobile toy. “Pretty little girl, all tied up.” He giggled, both amused and pleased, leaning down to tug those locks of hair that had curtained her face behind her ear, making the thin wisps at the back of her neck bristle in alarm. “All alone with the big bad ugly villain.” He bit it out with a smirk, and she swore she felt venom drop where he spit the words on her face. “Pretty girl… dressed in such pretty things.” He mused, tugging on the fabric of her silk pajama shirt, his other hand stroking a thumb over himself and his caged member, the beast behind the boxer, the one she was still so completely unaware of. “To hide her rotten core.”

He snickered some more at the notice of how ticklish she was, or perhaps it wasn’t as much a reflex but rather a violent display of her fear, how she kicked, or tried to kick her legs, once his hand with its lanky slender fingers danced a pattern on the sole of her foot.

“They won’t be of much help to you now…”

It’s was a cute display, seeing her struggle in an attempt to swat away his spidering hand, endearing, had him drooling he realized, but didn’t bother to wipe his chin, instead giving into the urge he had to touch what was so temptingly sprawled out before him.

“I bet you think of these as your armor, don’t you?”

All five of his fingers touched down on her shirt, and soon there was no shirt left to separate his dry course fingers from her warm skin. He nearly let out a gasp as he watched how she stayed in place, having not become a pyramid of ash. Her beautiful body still right there, warm glowing skin still touchable, more touchable than anything else.

“Keeping you safe from prying eyes and hands… Not my hands though.”

He could excuse how he hesitated on the fact of him wanting to enjoy himself, wretchedly and thoroughly, gorging in every moment he was gonna make her scream, but… he knew that wasn’t the reason… he was… and he hated to admit it, but… nervous. He had this gorgeous creature trapped and under his thumb and he was nervous? No matter how terrified she was and immobilized it was like she still had the power, just like she had in that prison cell.

Perhaps it was due to the fact that he’d thought about her everyday he was trapped in there. She had said she would see him later yet she never once, not once, came a second time. Why would she lie? Just to fuck with him some more? One last and lasting punch in the face? He had dreamed of it. How many times had he fantasized about doing every possible nasty thing in the book to her, teach her a lesson, make her beg, make her kneel, make her bow before him? But now, having her right there, this frail little girl who wouldn’t have the strength to fight him even without the tight rope holding her down, this little girl who despite being just that had him enthralled for months, still just as hellbent, enslaved, spellbound to make her pay… but that wasn’t it either… making her pay was only half of it, maybe even less… what he wanted, what he truly wanted, was to prove to her that he could have her wrapped around his finger despite being what ugly freak she’d made him out to be, that despite being ugly, he could have a pretty-girl like her melting.

He gave fully into his wishes then, her shorts gone with a touch, leaving her in a precious pair of cotton boxers. A sigh of reverence left him, a shudder running through him. He was expecting red lace or something exotic, something vain and narcissistic meant to enhance or simply show off just how pretty she was. He figured that was what she’d dress in, something sexy, because she had the full body that one believes go hand in hand with hot lingerie, yet… she’d chosen comfort. And why wouldn’t she? When she could make it look like the hottest item his eyes ever had the privilege of seeing.

“Fuck…” He drawled, now with a wanton whine, his hand giving himself a squeeze as his cock was beginning to strain uncomfortably inside the confines of his boxers. “Just look at you…”

He only barely dared touch her, not just out of fear of her disappearing like anything else would, but because he didn’t at all feel as though he had the right to put his hands on something so beautiful.

“You shouldn’t be allowed to wear clothes.” He stated, still in awe. “Not when they cover up this perfect body.”

She screamed into her gag as he grabbed around her waist, pulling her pliable little body up into a kneeling position, then pulling and arranging some further to have her in the same position, just over his slap this time, with his bulging cock rubbing through the fabric of his briefs up into her still clothed sex, though with both cloths a thin material she felt the abrasive ticklish friction begin to stir something in her lower abdomen despite her fear and no regard to her disgust. And now, provided with the full view of her delectable little frame, her precious tits sprung free and strutting towards him with how her arms were bent in their confinement behind her back, and perky by both the cold wind of his breath and the goosebump-giving anxiety, leveled with his face, looking eager to receive his mouth, perfect nipples for him to suck on, gnaw between the rows of his teeth.

“These perfect tits…” He licked his lips, hands kneading one mound greedily as the other held her steady. “And this…” He placed all five fingers on the fabric of her panties, turning them to ash, all five staying to touch the delicate skin of her sex, feeling her quake, such a good replacement to feeling someone disintegrate. He groaned out a curse, body sagging, slouching at the sight of her exposed bare little private, he hunched over in awe as he ran his fingers through to disappear in the slit of her precious pussy. “This perfect little pussy.”

She wiggled on his digits with a squealing whimpering sob, so alive and warm and soft he could cry with how safe he was beginning to feel, without the fear of touching just a bit too much getting in the way. Although he was feeling the slight sensation of inferiority in the light of her perfection, or maybe even because of it, he decided he’d give a little scare, perhaps as a means of tipping or evening the scales.

“You know, pretty girl…” His other hand, the one not currently preoccupied with cupping her pussy, brutally brazen for the first time, spread its fingers to stroke the dome of her ass, before curling like claws to grab a fist-full of the ample flesh, making her jump and lose balance, resulting in falling flush against his chest all with a muffled cry. Her face mushed against his collar, her wet reddened nose painting tears onto his throat, such a strange type of comfort against his scars. “I’ve never slapped anyone?” He could feel her heartbeat and how it hammered like a race-horse on the track. “Or, no, I’ve slapped plenty, but a slap from me means death, usually.” His hand ascended, wrapping around her throat, all five fingers with hungry-pressured fingertips, guiding her back off his chest to sit properly, though leaning to bite her earlobe, all to feel her rub down on his aching cock some more. “But I slap you and it means pretty marks and pretty screams, doesn’t it?”

He laughed, knowing full well that he wasn’t going to hurt her, or at least not as badly as he had given reason to think.

“Such a fucking pretty girl, aren’t you?” He trailed a path of wet open-mouthed kisses down her neck and between her breasts, gripping her waist as she recoiled back. “With pretty tits.” Breath labored, or hefty with greed and desire. “Pretty girl with a pretty pussy.” He squeezed her sides, as though getting ready to make a ragdoll of her again, pulling her into the desired position. “Let me taste you.”

Her heart hammered like a hammer hitting an anvil, as she was placed on her back, hands crushed beneath her, uncomfortably wrenching in their bonds. Her mind, stuck in its prospect, hadn’t pieced it together, despite having been stripped naked, she still hadn’t given it a thought, hadn’t dared give it a thought, but his comment made the realization coat thickly, drape her and the pressure seemed too much for her mind to take, plummeting into a free-fall. He wasn’t just going to kill her, he was going to rape her first.

Thighs easily pried open for him to settle in between, scooting back on the bed so he could lie down, lower half humping the mattress desperately, imagining having her wrapped around him, but all in good time. She shook more than writhed, seizurely beneath him, with her blushed pussy a beautiful slit so ripe for the taking, quivering at the warming breath he whispered upon the tender flesh. With his hands wrapped around each their ankle he pushed her thighs and legs up and out of the way as to not have her knee him in the head while he feasted.

He listened to her struggling to breathe, her stomach rising and falling sporadically with her sobs, untuned and painful and begging for any kindness he had to spare, he was going to give her exactly that. Kindness.

His chapped lips felt so good it was cruel, abrasive and inescapably delicious, welcomed yet unwelcome by the bucking of her hips as she squealed into her gag, falling prey to more and more hopelessness. His tongue came second, warm and wet and long and strong, sliding in between her folds only to swipe up and flick off at her clit, forcing a shudder to run all the way through her core into the tips of her toes, mind reeling.

“So cute.” He noted the sensitivity with a mocking jeer, the sound simmering on her skin. “I bet a pretty girl like you’ve never been fucked by a guy like me before.” Then his teeth were the ones to make an impact, grazing over her budding clit with how it reached out in search for stimulation, having its wish granted in such a sense forcing her toes to curl. “Come on my ugly face, pretty-girl.” She really couldn’t resist with how his words were tickling on that sensitive spot, and how intent on finding and following that spot that had her coming on done and abusing it, playing with it with his tongue and chapped lips, switching between such smooth soft yet forceful pressure and bristled rough chaffed contact, making her spasm, wanting so desperately to tug her arms loose to push his incessant face off, because she wouldn’t be able to resist it, she was going to come and make an humiliating mess on his tongue just like he wanted, the knot was going to snap and she would be screaming from the force of it.

He smirked with the taste of her essence on his tongue, giving her a couple more torturous kitty-licks that had her brutally recoiling by the oversensitivity he was abusing. It served well as an ego-boost as he was suddenly feeling the urge to take her blindfold off, make her gaze upon who had her wrapped around his finger. What more, he wanted to remove her gag, hear what she had to say to defend herself, what pathetic please she would come with to try and prevent him from going any further.

His mouth sloshed its way up her stomach, hands touching and grabbing and groping with greedy fingers onto anything and everything they got ahold of, feeling up her smooth skin and soft flesh, before having made their way to grab at the blindfold. Her eyes were petrified, blinking rapidly, especially every time his clothed cock bumped into her bare pussy, leaving strings of spit and fine silken cum to hang from between where she parted with the cotton of his pants.

She was thoroughly out of it, delirious, fear-ridden and numbed with pleasure, cotton yet swivel-eyed as he fought to be her focus. He pulled the gag out of her mouth too, wiping his chin before turning the fabric to ash, eyes looking her over all the while.

His tongue rolled over his lips. “Such a pretty face.” He gathered her face between his fingers, blunt fingertips pushing into squishy bloated cheeks. “Even prettier with those tears you fucking crybaby.” It will never get old, the feeling of nothing happening still under all his five fingers. “Even better with my handprint, don’t you think?” It was funny how she didn’t seem to pick up anything of what he was saying. “Or covered in my cum.” Her brows had scrunched so hopelessly close together, whimpers upon sniffles and whiny mewling and hiccupping panting, so pathetic and precious. “So fucking pretty.” He groaned, giving his lips a second wetting with his tongue. “Kiss me, pretty-girl.” He scrunched her lips together some more, leaving her incapable of refusing.

She tasted herself on his tongue, choking on the sweetness as he forced it like a slug down her throat. Her own tongue submissive in nature, staying beneath and out of the way of his. It was a series varying from needy whimpering moans and growls that followed from his throat, poured into her receiving mouth, giving nothing but weak whines in return. His one free hand, the other one still holding a firm grip onto her chin and cheeks, continued in its hungry exploration, grabbing with an almost childlike curious freedom, leaving painful marks in their wake, having her yelp against his willful lips, which smirk grew upon every inch of reaction she fed him, until pulling away in a haze, panting, with a new little wish he was going to have her be the star of.

“Let me fuck that pretty face.”

She hadn’t the time, nor the mind, to form any protest, reduced to mere whimpering as he pulled her back into a kneeling position, conjoined thighs and legs folded beneath and supporting her ass, still with her arms tied snuggly and unbudgingly behind her back, made to watch him fiddle with the band to his sweats, pulling them below his hips and falling to his thighs, displaying his surprisingly clean boxers and not so surprising hardness. Cock throbbing within its confines, fighting desperately to come free. His hand pulling his boxers down and, cock springing loose, slapping against his abdomen, standing long and hard, tip blushed red and angry, a bead of pre-cum spilling sweetly from his slit.

“Open up, lick it up.”

She’d been lost in taking in the sheer size of him, girth thick and threatening, looking bigger than what she could wrap her hand around, her stomach twisting in tension and unease. Too caught up in imagine it ripping her apart than realizing how he was going to fit it into her mouth first.

Her eyes widened upon the thought, lips slightly apart in horror, bottom-lip quivering. “Come on, pretty-girl.” One hand tugged on his shaft, the other gripped her face, protruding nails to sink into her jaw, prying her mouth father apart to accommodate his size.

She whined at the taste of him, arms struggling behind her back, knees shuffling wider apart to support herself as he pushed on further, fingernails still digging into her soft cheeks, making her lips pucker into a soft welcoming oval. He liked the way her brows furrowed into that beautiful look of plead that had his balls aching where they hung, soon to be pressed up against her soft skin, smothering her chin. He also enjoyed how her whimpers had turned to delicious little vibrations of his cock, drumming alongside his length, such pretty friction.

“Come on, take all of me.” He licked his lips as he urged, other hand coming to caress the back of her skull, gathering her pretty locks between his fingers, abandoning all regard to how she should be turning to nothing but dust molecules instead of being a nice warm soft wet pleasure hole for him. His usually small scrutinizing scarlet eyes turning moon-wide with lustful frenzy. Voice ragged as he clawed at her scalp to obey him, no thought to her whining in protest. “You can do better.” His tip met with the back of her throat and her whine turned more desperate, nearly a scream, but he couldn’t care, not with the memory of her talking to him like he was some pussy-bitch, he was going to show her who the bitch and who the boss was. “Such a pretty little thing with such a nasty filthy ugly fucking mouth.” He spit through grit teeth, begging to fuck the back of her throat, having her gagging on him, hopeless in search for breath. “A mouth like that is only good for one thing.” He gave a few more painfully deep ruts, having her eyes roll back at the loss of breath, before ripping loose again. “Same goes for that pussy.”

“No, no.” She scrambled on the bed, trying to get away, trying to rip free, so hopeless he should have felt bad, but couldn’t bring himself to the feeling as he sat there and laughed, eyes wild, dick prospering, hand pumping his length to the sight of her.

He followed her pathetic struggling little shame, climbing on top of her. The panic swallowed her again, forcing a overwhelmed rush of sobs to come spluttering and blubbering and screaming from her little shape caught beneath him. “Such a little slut.” His fingers were at once groping her pussy, diving between her folds to rub her slit and clit. “Still so wet, are you excited?” She turned her head away as she struggled, eyes squeezed shut. “Aw, pretending it’s not me.” He snickered. “Good luck.”

Offended, he decided against making it pleasant for her, thinking she deserved as little sympathy from him as she had showed him, but his brutal actions slowed at the feel of the pressure around his finger when he’d pushed it inside her.

“So tight.” He stated, shocked as he tried swirling the digit inside, to feel the walls giving little wiggle-room to do so. She winced as he hooked, a heavy breathy shrill type of wince, as though he was pulling a knife from her gut.

He left the finger there, much to her discomfort.

“That comment…” He started, working her tightness as much as he could, still with only one finger. “When we first met.” His other hand gathered her face again, forcing her to look at him as he leaned down, resting his forehead on hers, wanting to see those eyes as he got confirmation on his suspicion. “You said you push people away… that you were a… repellant.” Her breathing hitched as she sniveled like a little girl who scraped her knee. “Did that count for this as well?”

He hadn’t yet let the smile stretch on his face, but the chiding smirk started to grow as the answer was clearly displayed all over her face and by the telltale feeling his finger shoved inside her way too tight hole told him.

“Aww, is the pretty little girl a virgin?” He gave her no inch of regret, even with the fact clear as day. Having worked her tightness well enough to cram another bony-knuckled finger inside her, making her cry out. “Don’t worry, that pretty pussy is in good hands.”

She owed him, this way they would be even. Besides, he wasn’t making it completely miserable for her either. Her face might be telling one story of torment, but her drooling pussy was telling him something utterly different. Perhaps it was due to her amateur ability to hold on, but she was soon creaming all over his fingers, body spasming in tired bliss, eyes fluttering for a moment or two, trying to grasp what the fuck was happening. It was adorable.

“I think my little slut is ready.”

She murmured a sigh, energy spent on crying and struggling and coming twice already, all she could do was moan when his cockhead broke through her tight little weeping hole. He had to moan as well at the snug hug her pussy squeezed and seized him with, biting roughly into his bottom lip, tooth snaggling in the dip of his scar. Brows raised in bliss, scrunched in an eruption, as he sunk deeper and deeper into her tight convulsing cunt, preciously clutching around him, fluttering upon the fulfilling snug fit that had her toes cramping in their curled state, eyes zoning out, unable to focus, mouth blubbering and chewing on incoherent sentences, only capable on slurring out muddled moans and wet gasps as he fucked slowly into, lolling his hips forward carefully, holding onto the mouthwatering feeling of her warmth around him.

He pushed his thumb into her clit, which had her back arching and moan ripped from her throat before she settled down into the mattress again, welcoming the stimulation where she was crippled to preventit. “Your pretty pussy loves being taken by my disgusting cock, doesn’t it?” She could only hum and croon in reply, as he hit the very back, pushing into her cervix with a rather soft nudge, having her result to sucking on her bottom-lip, purring whines like a little kitten taking pleasure from their master. “I hear it in your pretty moans.”

He was no longer biting out the word pretty as though it were a curse or venom on his tongue. It sounded more like praise than anything, something akin to awe, pride even, smug for having it all under his thumb, burying his cock inside the word, for being the one to have reduced such a pretty thing to such a pretty mess, all for him, all by him, making her all his.

She made a shuddering gasp, moaning into his mouth as he leaned down. “Oh, is the pretty girl gonna cum all over my disgusting cock.” He cooed, all five fingers placed on her cheek when cupping it to have those gorgeous opium-blown eyes look at him when she came undone, for him to find such dangerous satisfaction in seeing her conquered beneath him, finding it to be the last push to send him off his own edge as well. “Fuck, I’m gonna cum in that pretty pussy.”

He made to have that final bone-crushing kiss, faces mushed together in a sloppy mess of wet slippery tongues and drool, moaning and groaning, inhaling each-other.

Reduced to mere gasping and panting. Cock, having for the first time felt the fulfilling pleasure of blowing inside the warm comfort of a precious goddess, feeling her gush and come all over him in the near split-second, feeling her clench and tighten around him like a vice, robbing and ringing and milking him for every drop he was worth. He gave some more pumps, pushing deep within her, felt a shudder run down the underside of his cock, overstimulated and satisfied for the first time.

Still coming down from his high, he made to take in her shape and state.

He hadn’t really fantasized she’d be so pliant after being fucked, but looking at her now, he couldn’t imagine her any other way, anything more right then her glossy sweat-slicked body spasming in aftershocks of her orgasms, laid so preciously snug against his chest, thighs visibly shaking with still small feeble stuttering moans slipping from her lips in blubbers. He wasn’t too far from the same state himself, having had only barely the mind before exhaustion rendered his limbs too heavy for moving, to untie the knots and rearrange them into something more comfortable. He decided tying her wrists together in front of her to be better, legs free but too tired and dumbed-out to struggle.

He looked at her drowsy state with a smile, betting he could make such a grateful little pet out of her, and if not, then scramble her mind through so many cruel methods, and make do with a brainless toy instead. But, looking down at that blissed-out hopeless look on her face and that dainty defenseless body he’d manipulated and forced to its knees, he couldn’t really see how any cruel methods would be needed.

It seemed to him that all she needed was cock, a couple of orgasms forced from her pent-up body, a little relief. The little brat was just a bit grouchy and grumpy because she hadn’t had her pussy played with. He could relate, he also gets frustrated when not getting his dick wet for a while. She was just begging for someone to come handle her and that’s all there was to it. Just look at her now, so sweet and spent, lying in his arms.

Come to think of it, he knew for a fact that he wouldn’t be needing to apply any harsh treatments in taming her, she just needed to be tied up and made to feel just how good being taken care of feels until she accepted it willingly. And if and when she decides on being bratty, he’ll have plenty of methods of shutting that trap right up, or in making her scream.

TIP-JAR

2K notes · View notes

soobmint · 4 years ago

Text

voices | choi beomgyu [f] soulmates! au, 14.2k words

s u m m a r y : after seeing your soulmate for the first time (whether in passing or by actually meeting them), you are able to hear their voice in your head—but only when they are singing. you have never been very interested in finding love, and choi beomgyu has lost all interest in singing. what happens when the two of you begin to change one another’s minds about the things you wish to avoid more than anything else?

c o n t e n t s : soulmates au, strangers to sorta enemies to lovers, guitarist! gyu, freckle gyu, college au, yeonjun is your best friend, gyu is a brat but a cute brat, very fluffy, a tiny bit of light angst

t a g l i s t : @hyuckworld @chanluster @honeyju @magicalstellar @yeonjuniper (if you’d like to be added to the taglist for future oneshots, please let me know!)

n o t e : this was requested by my dear friend alice, and i hope i did the request justice! the lyrics used in the oneshot are from genius’ english translation of “runaway.” i hope you guys enjoy the oneshot, and do kindly leave a like, comment, or reblog if you enjoyed it! that would mean the world!

YOU MET CHOI BEOMGYU THE DAY YOU SWORE TO NEVER FALL IN LOVE.

As dramatic as it sounded, the day hadn’t been quite so terrible. You were sitting cross-legged in the floor of one of the many practice rooms in your university’s music department with a bag of popcorn in your lap, your head leaned back against the wall as you stifled back a yawn. Your best friend, Yeonjun, was going on and on about his most recent breakup, but the story was so similar to all the other breakups he had gone through in the past two years that you were having a difficult time staying focused. The afternoon sunlight trickled in through the windows, reflecting off the symbols of the drum set that rested in the far corner. You scooted to the side a bit so that the light wouldn’t shine in your eyes anymore as Yeonjun paced back and forth in front of you.

“And then she just stopped talking to me,” He said, running his hands through his hair. “Out of nowhere too! Things had been going so well, but then it was weird. Next thing I know, she’s breaking up with me—get this—over text.”

You tossed a piece of popcorn into your mouth. “Tragic.”

“I know you’re being sarcastic, but yes, it was tragic.” He finally stopped pacing and collapsed to the ground beside of you, leaning his head against your shoulder. “Love is so hard. You meet someone, you think it’s going to work and that you’ll spend a long, happy life together. Next thing you know, you’re single and stuck with your best friend in a stinky music room, waiting for some club meeting to start—or whatever it is we’re in here for.”

“We’re here because we are in charge of organizing the music and theater departments’ performance at the open house next month,” You corrected, flicking his forehead. “And didn’t you only date this girl for like, a week?”

He sighed, sitting up to glare at you. “Love knows not the boundaries of time, my dear friend. You’ll understand once you find it for yourself.”

“Calm down, Shakespeare. I am not falling in love.”

“Unfortunately for you, I don’t think you have any control over that,” He said with a teasing smile. “But why wouldn’t you want to?”

You scoffed, turning to stare at him. “Well, for starters, you haven’t exactly given me a good idea of what ‘love’ is supposed to be, seeing as you’re crying about another ‘true-love-gone-wrong’ every three weeks. Why on earth would I want that for myself?”

“Hey, love is different for everyone,” He said. “Just because my love life is vibrant and exciting and full of various names and faces doesn’t mean the same will happen for you.”

“How do you predict my love life will go, then?”

He hummed, tapping his finger against his chin in thought. “Well, you’re pretty boring, so you’ll probably be the kind of person that waits until they find their soulmate, then you’ll settle down and live a long, safe and uneventful life with them.”

“Shut up,” you said as you shoved him, but you couldn’t help the laughter that bubbled out of you. “I think my soulmate is out of the question, though.”

Yeonjun frowned. “You still haven’t heard him since back then?”

You sighed, shaking your head as you leaned back against the wall. “Not a thing.”

It was quiet then as the two of you thought about what this meant. It wasn’t the first time you had been faced with the reality of your situation, but it still felt like a punch to the stomach every time.

In a world where people waited years, decades even, to hear the voice of their soulmate singing in their head, you had been considered extremely lucky to have heard the gentle voice of a boy in your mind at the age of thirteen. You knew that you had to have met him somewhere—at least in passing—in order to hear him, but you had no clue who he was.

Yet, in a way, it felt like you did. He sang often—so often you wondered if singing was as necessary as breathing to him. It wasn’t a bother to you though; in fact, it was quite the opposite. The songs he sang always told a story; some spoke of love and joy, others off loss and heartache. You felt like each song he sang held a piece of him, and that piece was something that was shared just between the two of you.

Until his voice was gone.

It was rare for him to go a day without singing. Yet suddenly, in your sophomore year of college, days and weeks went by without a single note, and you had yet to hear his voice since.

Your soulmate had stopped singing, and it was difficult to not imagine that the worst had happened.

Yeonjun must have noticed the solemn look that came over your face, because he leaned over and gave your shoulder a squeeze. “Don’t be so gloomy,” he said. “He could still be out there.”

You smiled the best you could, although the pit in your stomach remained. “Yeah, I guess he could.” You tossed the popcorn to Yeonjun and stood to your feet, wiping the crumbs from your hands. “Wait here, okay? The other guy that’s supposed to be helping us is—” You paused to glance at the time on your phone, “—ten minutes late. I’m gonna make sure he knows where to come or see if he’s lost or something.”

Yeonjun nodded, helping himself to what was left of your snack. “Who is the other guy, anyway?”

You sighed, picking up the piece of paper that the department head gave to you when she asked you to organize the showcase, claiming that it would be a great deal of experience for you to acquire in your senior year of university.

You were mostly doing it for the extra credit points.

You began to read the names of the seniors that were in charge of organizing the project listed at the top of the paper. “From the drama department, Choi Yeonjun and Kang Taehyun.”

“Taehyun had an appointment,” Yeonjun said through a mouthful of popcorn. “He’ll be here tomorrow.”

You nodded, tracing your finger along the page, stopping beneath the next pair of names. “From the music department, Y/N and Choi Beomgyu.” You looked up from the paper, tapping your forefinger against your chin. “Choi Beomgyu? Do you know him?”

Yeonjun pondered for a moment before snapping his fingers. “Ah—that guy!” You weren’t surprised; Yeonjun seemed to know everyone in the performing arts programs at your school. “He’s one of the top guitar students, if I’m remembering correctly. Have you not heard of him?”

You shook your head, looking back down at his name. Choi Beomgyu. It did sound familiar, but no images or information came along with the words printed on the page. It was nothing more than a tugging feeling in your stomach that made you feel like you knew him from somewhere.

You began walking towards the door, still staring down at the paper. Just as the tips of your fingers brushed across the metal handle, the door swung open, and you barely had time to glance up and see a head of fluffy black hair and big brown eyes before the door crashed into your forehead so hard you fell backwards to the tile floor.

With a hiss, you brought your hand up to your forehead, relieved to find a lack of blood there. Your eyes were blurred with tears, but through the fog you were able to see the same round doe eyes you had caught a glimpse of before you hit the ground.

“Are you okay?” It was a guy’s voice, clear and ringing in your ears. You rubbed your eyes to clear some of the moisture and were then able to get a better look at the boy in front of you. Curly black bangs hung over his brows, brushing just over the tops of his wide chocolate eyes. His sun-kissed skin was sprinkled with a light spatter of freckles across his nose and lightly flushed cheeks.

You blinked several times before responding. “Y-yeah, I’m okay.” You accepted his hand when he offered to help you stand back up, and soon, you were on your feet once more.

“Sorry about that,” he said, brushing a hand through his already tousled hair. He leaned forward a bit, tapping his finger against your forehead. “Just got a tiny bump, though. You’ll be okay.”

You backed away from his touch, but he didn’t seem to notice as he had caught sight of Yeonjun. Your best friend was quite literally on the edge of his seat, perched on the ledge of the desk while shoveling the last crumbs of popcorn into his mouth as if this were some movie unfolding before his eyes. If you had been close enough, you would have hit him.

“Yeonjun?” Door Boy’s face lit up, and he strode over to give your pink-haired friend a high five. “I haven’t seen you in ages!”

“Hey, man,” Yeonjun said with a grin, ruffling Door Boy’s curly hair with his fingers. “I know, it’s been way too long.”

“I’m sorry, who’s this?” You asked, still a bit dazed from your unexpected collision with the door.

Yeonjun looked back at you, gesturing to the newcomer. “Oh, this is—”

“Choi Beomgyu,” he finished the introduction himself, giving you an overdramatic bow as he said his name. “And you must be Y/N?”

Things were beginning to click together in your head: Door Boy was Choi Beomgyu. In other words, Door Boy was your assigned partner—the one you would be spending the next four weeks trying to plan a performance with.

For some reason, the fact that you had met one another by him slamming a door into your face didn’t leave the best feeling in your chest.

“I look forward to working with you, Y/N.” He gave you a big, lopsided grin, one that any other person would likely find heartwarming.

You forced a smile in return, rubbing your hand across the bump on your forehead. “Same here, Choi Beomgyu.”

PERHAPS IT HAD A BIT TO DO WITH HOW POORLY YOUR FIRST MEETING WENT, BUT SOMETHING ABOUT BEOMGYU REALLY GOT UNDER YOUR SKIN.

The day after you had first met one another, Yeonjun had asked everyone to meet up in the coffee shop inside the campus library. This time, Taehyun from the drama department was also able to be there. You had gotten to know him pretty well over the past four years because of how close he and Yeonjun had become, so the three of you hung out often.

In fact, for the first fifteen minutes of the meeting, it was just the three of you sitting there. You pushed your tongue against the inside of your cheek in agitation before taking another sip of your coffee. “Does this Beomgyu guy have a thing for being late?”

“Relax, Y/N,” Yeonjun said absently from across the table, his attention focused primarily on his cell phone screen. “Not everyone’s a time freak like you.”

“Time freak—What does that even mean?” You crumpled up the wrapper from Taehyun’s straw and threw it at Yeonjun. “Unlike you, I actually care about getting these extra credit points and would like to organize this event properly.”

“Hey! I care!” Yeonjun placed a hand over his heart, as though he had been wounded.

You and Taehyun exchanged a side glance with one another, eyebrows raised.

“Stop looking at each other like that! I do care!”

Before the point could be argued any further, a messy-haired boy crashed into the seat beside of you, out of breath, his backpack falling from his shoulder and onto the ground from the impact. You stared at him for a moment before realizing that it was Beomgyu.

“Sorry—I’m late,” he said in between deep breaths. “On my way here—saw one of the campus cats—got distracted.”

You stared at him again, almost laughing at how ridiculous of an excuse that was. However, considering what little you knew of Beomgyu, the thought of him being fifteen minutes late to a meeting because he got distracted by a cat didn’t seem all that unlikely. With a sigh, you slid a blank piece of notebook paper towards him and set a pen on top of it. “It’s all good. Mind taking notes?”

He nodded—a bit too enthusiastically, if you were to say so yourself. “Sure. Can I grab a coffee real quick?”

You were about to suggest that he should wait until after the meeting, since the three of you had been there for such a long time already, but Taehyun chimed in before you could say anything with, “Of course. We’ve got nowhere else to be.”

It took everything within you to not roll your eyes. You were usually on the same page as Taehyun, but of course, this situation had to be an exception, because Choi Beomgyu was there.

The slacker was rummaging around his backpack, searching for something. He pouted, looking up from his bag. “I forgot my wallet.”

“No worries! Y/N doesn’t eat breakfast, so she always has an extra swipe on her meal card,” Yeonjun said from across the table. Your mouth fell open, eyes wide as saucers. “I’m sure she wouldn’t mind letting you use it. Right, Y/N?”

You weren’t quite sure that you did want Beomgyu to use your meal card, but what kind of jerk would you be if you said no? With gritted teeth and a glare at your best friend, you fished your meal card out of your wallet and placed it into Beomgyu’s open palm.

The pout left his lips instantly, a big grin taking its place. “Thanks. I’ll return the favor sometime soon.”

Doubt it, you thought, watching him rush towards the counter to order. You’ll probably forget you said that by the time you get your drink.

Soon he was back at the table, caramel latte in hand, your meal card back in your possession. You cleared your throat, shifting in your seat. “If everyone’s ready, we can go ahead and get started. I met with my professor yesterday—she’s also the head of the classical music department. She’s technically our ‘overseer,’ but all the responsibility of planning the performance is on us. We’ll only have about forty minutes total to showcase the drama and music departments, so we need to choose our sets wisely.”

“Yeonjun and I were talking a bit about this earlier,” Taehyun said. “We’ve been preparing for our winter show since the beginning of the summer, so we figured we could just perform a scene from the play.”

You nodded, liking the idea. “That sounds perfect. What’s the play?”

“A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

“Right, I knew that. Could you guys work on finding a scene around ten or fifteen minutes long to perform for the open house, then?”

Yeonjun and Taehyun both nodded. You smiled, glad that you were finally starting to get some things together for the event.

When you glanced at Beomgyu to make sure he had written that down, the smile left as quickly as it had come when you saw that he was doodling tiny flowers and hearts all over the page rather than taking notes.

He must have felt your eyes on him, because he glanced up and caught your gaze. Seemingly unbothered, he simply smiled and said, “Don’t worry. I was just about to write it down.”

Your fingers itched to reach over and take the pen and paper from him so you could just do it yourself, but you kept your composure. “Beomgyu. Any ideas for what the music department could do?”

He finished writing down Drama Department—Scene from “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” before looking at you again. He shrugged, another nonchalant smile spreading across his face. “Not really. I’m down for whatever it is you decide to do.”

“Wow, helpful. Truly.” Your eyes went wide when you realized you had said those words out loud after Yeonjun and Taehyun began to snicker beside you. Your face flushed with embarrassment, but Beomgyu seemed unphased, that careless lopsided grin of his still on full display.

You sighed, brushing a piece of hair behind your ear. “Well, I was thinking about having the orchestra do a piece, and then having one of the student bands do a piece. That way we have something classical and something more contemporary. Thoughts?”

“I think that’s a good idea,” Taehyun said. “If we do our scene first, the orchestra could kind of act as a bridge between Shakespeare and more modern art.”

“I agree,” Yeonjun said. “And since Y/N is in the orchestra, she can get in touch with the director and have them prepare something. Oh, and Beomgyu!” The curly-haired boy looked up from his doodling when his name was called. “You know a few different bands, right? Think you could piece together a group of performers?”

“Definitely,” Beomgyu said. When he noticed your eyes on him, he quickly scribbled down Orchestra—Y/N. Band—Beomgyu Me.

“Well, since we all have our first tasks, I guess that’s all for today.” You were happy that the meeting was over; you were ready to get back to your dorm so you could get to work and actually get things done.

“Wait!” Beomgyu said as you stood up, slinging your bag over your shoulder.

Now you have something to say. You raised a brow at him expectantly.

“We should exchange phone numbers, right?” He smiled, standing up and holding his phone out towards you. “I have the others’ numbers, but I figure I should be able to contact my partner from the music department.”

You hesitated, but knew there was no logical reason why you shouldn’t give him your number. You were going to be working together for the next several weeks, after all.

After putting your number in, he took his phone back and grinned at you again, eyes scrunching up into crescent moons. “Perfect! I’ll try not to bother you too much, but I make no promises.” He reached forward and ruffled your hair, and you were too caught off guard by the sudden touch to back away, or to even react at all. He then waved at all three of you, throwing his backpack over his shoulder. “See you guys tomorrow then.” He turned towards you again, throwing you a casual wink that still managed to have you flustered. “I’ll be in touch, partner.”

You turned to watch him leave, face warm as you brushed through your hair with your fingers, trying to undo the damage your “partner” had done.

Something told you that he wouldn’t be keeping his promise about trying not to bother you anytime soon.

OVER THE NEXT FEW WEEKS, BEOMGYU PROVED HIMSELF TO BE ONE OF THE MOST BOTHERSOME PEOPLE YOU HAD COME ACROSS IN A LONG, LONG TIME.

The worst part was the fact that he didn’t do anything blatantly wrong. He did everything he was asked to do when it came to preparing for the showcase. The first week of work consisted of the two of you gathering all the students who would be participating in the performances, along with Yeonjun and Taehyun preparing those from the drama department. Beomgyu performed all of his tasks just as he was asked to do, so it wasn’t as if he was bothering you by being unhelpful.

It was just something about the way he held himself that seemed to get under your skin for no apparent reason.

For the past week, your “partner” had basically been a tagalong—he would stand beside of you and do what he was asked without contributing much to the creative process of planning. You found it hard to criticize him up front, as he just did as he was told.

However, that was all he did. When the four of you would all sit down together to discuss plans or ideas, Beomgyu’s role never changed: he would sit beside all of you, jot down anything you told him to in his nearly-full composition notebook, and crack an occasional joke that would always send Yeonjun and Taehyun into fits of laughter, but only earned a stiff, forced smile from you.

You were starting to wonder why your professor had assigned him to your team. After all, putting on this open house was your last shot at making a lasting impression on the higher ups in your department. Everything needed to be perfect; mediocracy was not an option.

In other words, Choi Beomgyu needed to step up his game, and he needed to do it quickly.

You thought about this on the day of your first rehearsal, where all of the students who would be participating in the performances had gathered in the main auditorium of the music building.

Drama students were scattered in all directions, occupying the space around them with dramatic line readings and critiques for their classmates as they practiced their roles. Yeonjun and Taehyun were busy taking charge of the drama students, making sure everything was running smoothly amongst them. You watched as Kai, one of the freshman students Yeonjun had taken under his wing, followed your friends around like a baby penguin waddling after its parents, and you couldn’t help but smile at the sight.

Music students were spread across the stage, the orchestra setting up instruments and covering stands with sheets filled by notes and lyrics while the band tuned their guitars and plugged up their mics. Soobin, a tall, blue-haired student from the same year as you, waved at you from stage with his mic in hand. You waved back, happy that you had been able to snag him as the main vocalist for the band’s performance—his voice was angelic, able to captivate any listener.

“Hey.” You turned at the sound of the voice you had begun to grow quite accustomed to, whether that was for better or for worse. Beomgyu was standing beside of you, brushing a hand through the curly black bangs that hung just above his eyes. The tip of his nose was flushed pink, a sign that he had likely just been out in the biting cold that had begun to creep up as fall quickly approached. He had his backpack slung over one shoulder and his guitar case held in one hand.

“Running a little late, aren’t we?” You asked, glancing at the time on your phone with no attempt at hiding your frown. “Is this going to be a trend with you, Choi Beomgyu?”

He laughed, nudging his shoulder against yours. You wanted to be more irritated with him than you were, but he had the kind of laugh that put everyone around him at ease; the kind of laugh that filled one’s chest with warmth, as if you had been directly touched by a ray of sunlight reaching down from the sky.

So you settled with being only slightly irritated, pursing your lips to keep your expression in check as he responded with, “What fun would it be if everyone was on time?”

“It’s not about fun, it’s about making sure this whole thing runs smoothly,” you said as you turned to face him. “Speaking of which, since you didn’t have any suggestions, I went ahead and helped the band choose a setlist. They’ll only have time for two songs, but the ones I picked are really diverse and should be—”

“Ah!” He cut you off, snapping his fingers in front of your face, causing you to flinch back in surprise. “I knew there was something I forgot to tell you.”

“What?”

He rubbed the back of his neck, grinning as he shifted a bit closer to you. You could smell his cologne—a misty citrus scent that was so light you could barely tell it was there. “Well, it’s kind of embarrassing, but the professor actually wanted the band to perform one of the songs I wrote. If that’s okay with you, of course—you’re the boss, after all.”

“You—you write songs?” You asked, trying not to get irritated at the sudden disruption of what you had planned. He had been complacent this entire time, so of course, the time he actually had something to contribute, he would be messing up what you had already set in place.

“Well, if it’s a suggestion from the professor, I can’t just deny you permission, can I?” You said with a forced laugh. “Do you have the—”

“Sheet music?” He finished your sentence, shaking a stack of papers in front of you. “Right here, partner. Want me to go tell the band?”

You sighed, crossing your arms over your chest. “Sure. Just tell them to switch the second song I had picked out with this one.”

He smiled at you again, ruffling your hair with the same hand he held the papers in. “You’re a saint. I’ll talk to you in a bit then?”

You had no time to respond before he was setting off towards the stage to talk to the band, papers and guitar in hand. You huffed through pursed lips, mumbling under your breath as you tried to put your hair back in place.

“What was that all about?” You dropped your hands to your sides when Yeonjun approached you, eyebrow quirked. Half of his cotton-candy colored hair was pulled into a ponytail, and he had on a pair of big round glasses with what you knew to be fake lenses—a fashion statement rather than a necessity.

“I don’t think Beomgyu knows much about personal boundaries or personal responsibility,” you mumbled, allowing Yeonjun to come up and finish fixing your hair with his fingers. “He decided to just now tell me that our professor wanted the band to use one of his songs in the performance.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing’s wrong with it, I just—” You hesitated, unsure of how to respond without sounding like a jerk. “I just wish he would have told me about it sooner. That’s all.”

“Y/N, you need to cut the guy some slack,” Yeonjun said, stepping back once he was finished fixing up your hair. “You act as though you have a personal vendetta against him or something.”

“I do not,” You argued, feeling you defenses flare up at his words. “Why would you say that?”

“I don’t know, maybe because every time he walks in the room you start to grimace, and every time he talks to you I can literally feel the amount of energy it takes for you to not roll your eyes.”

“You’re exaggerating.”

“If you say so.” He put his hand on your shoulder, giving you a stern look that did, in fact, make you roll your eyes. “Give him a chance, Y/N. You may end up liking him more than you’d expect.”

You scoffed as your best friend walked away from you, returning to work on his previous tasks with Taehyun. A vendetta? Was it really that obvious to the people around you that Beomgyu got under your skin?

Perhaps Yeonjun was right—you did have a tendency to be extra sensitive when it came to your academic responsibilities. Maybe you were being too hard on Beomgyu; his goal was the same as yours, even if his methods differed drastically from yours.

You looked up to the stage to see Beomgyu laughing as he said something to Soobin, the rest of the band analyzing the sheets of music in their hands—Beomgyu’s song, if you had to guess. His skin glowed like honey beneath the stage lights, and you noticed that when he laughed, he laughed with his entire body; his eyes disappeared into crescents, his shoulders shook, he clapped his hands together and even stomped his feet a bit. You smiled slightly at the sight, before a pang of guilt hit you.

He did seem like a nice guy. It was time you gave him a chance to be seen as such in your eyes.

ANY PATIENCE YOU HAD DESPERATELY TRIED TO HOLD WITH BEOMGYU WAS WEARING THIN, AND IT HAD ONLY BEEN AN HOUR SINCE YOU DECIDED TO GIVE HIM A CHANCE.

You had both stayed behind with Yeonjun and Taehyun to clean up the auditorium after the practice. “I think that we’re done, don’t you?” You asked everyone after picking up a few discarded sheets of paper left behind by the drama students.

“Almost,” Beomgyu said from the stage. You looked up at him to see him pointing at two large music stands left behind by the orchestra. “Someone left these behind.”

“Can’t we just leave them there?” Yeonjun asked.

Taehyun shook his head. “No, we were given specific instructions to not leave anything behind.” He glanced at his phone. “They’re about to close the building for the night, so we should hurry and put them up.”

“I know which room they came from, so I can take them back,” Beomgyu offered.

“They’re pretty heavy, Beomgyu. Are you sure you can carry them on your own?” Taehyun asked.

“Yeah, it’s fine—”

“No, no, someone should definitely help you. You have to carry your guitar too,” Yeonjun interjected, a mischievous glint in your eyes that sent sirens blaring in your head. The feelings of disdain only grew when Yeonjun made eye contact with you directly, seeming to give you a sweet smile, but you knew the expression was laced with ulterior motives. “Y/N, why don’t you carry one while Beomgyu carries the other?”

You wanted to smack him, but that wouldn’t have been a good look for you, considering that everyone already thought you hated Beomgyu anyways. You glanced up at him on the stage to see that he had already picked one of the stands up, his guitar in the other hand. He gave you a big grin, eyes sparkling like freshly fallen snow. “What do you say, partner? Care to give me a hand?”

You pushed your tongue against the inside of your cheek, knowing that there was no way you were getting out of this one. “Sure,” You said through your teeth, glaring daggers at Yeonjun before making your way up the steps to the stage. The music stand wasn’t too heavy, so you almost dared to ask Beomgyu to try carrying them both in one hand, but decided against it.

“We’ll go ahead and leave then,” Yeonjun said, throwing a taunting wink your way. “You two have fun.”

You hate to bite your tongue to keep from cursing at him as Yeonjun and Taehyun left the auditorium, leaving you alone with Beomgyu for the first time. You glanced his way, noticing that he already had his eyes on you. Instead of averting his gaze when yours met his, he just smiled wider, gesturing towards the door with his head. “Shall we?”

You forced another smile. “Lead the way, partner.”

You followed him out the doors and up the stairs to the first floor, where the orchestra’s practice room was located. You were very familiar with the area, being a violinist yourself. When the two of you reached the room, you rushed forward to open the door, as Beomgyu’s hands were full. He thanked you and stepped inside first, and you followed suit, letting the heavy door swing shut behind you.

“Where should we set them?” He asked.

You nodded to the far corner of the room. “Over there.”

The two of you set the stands down, and you instantly turned back towards the door, ready to get back to your dorm for some alone time after such a taxing day.

“In a rush?” Beomgyu asked from behind you.

You turned to look over your shoulder at him as your hand grasped the doorknob. “Nah, just tired. Aren’t you?”

He shrugged, shifting his guitar case from one hand to the other. “Not really.”

“Lucky you,” You mumbled, turning back towards the door. “Well, I guess I’ll see you tomorrow—”

You stopped mid-sentence, heart dropping to your toes. When you tried to turn the knob, it wouldn’t move. After a moment of shock, you tried again, and then again, violently shaking the knob, trying to get the door to open.

“No, no, no,” You said, shaking the handle desperately. “Come on, this can’t be happening!”

“What is it?” Beomgyu asked, setting his guitar on the floor before rushing to your side.

“The door won’t open.” You shook the knob more frantically than ever, the entire door shaking from the force.

“Woah, easy there, partner,” Beomgyu said, gently placing his hand on your arm. “Why don’t you let me try to—”

“What exactly do you think you’re going to be able to do differently?” You snapped, snatching your arm away from him. His mouth hung open, eyes wide with what you assumed to be shock. “We’re stuck in here, Beomgyu. We’re stuck, and we’re not going to get out for god knows how long, and with you as my ‘partner,’ I’m one hundred percent certain we’re not going to be able to find a way out of here on our own.”

You could tell that your words struck a nerve with him by the way his shoulders tensed and how his eyes went narrow. Looking back, you wished you could reel the words back in, but they had already done their damage.

“Why do you hate me so much?” He asked, his voice low and thick with irritation.

It was your turn to be shocked. “What?”

“I said, why do you hate me so much?”

You blinked rapidly, feeling exposed and vulnerable now that he was confronting you. “I don’t—I don’t hate you, Beomgyu.”

He scoffed, pulling his bottom lip under his teeth. “Come on, I’m not that much of an idiot. This entire time, from the moment we first met, you’ve been cold and snippy with me. You can barely hide how much you dislike me with your facial expressions. I thought maybe we just got off on the wrong foot, so I’ve been brushing it off and treating you kindly. But you still treat me like I’m some annoying fly that you can’t quite get rid of, and I want to know why.”

“That’s not—I don’t hate you,” You repeated, jumbling your words together as you struggled to figure out what to say.

“Well, what’s the issue then?”

“You don’t take anything seriously!” Your voice wasn’t quite a shout, but it was almost there. Beomgyu took a step back, arms dropping to his sides.

“You’re treating this entire thing like it’s an elementary school play,” You continued, your voice getting louder and your words coming out more and more rushed the more you spoke. “You don’t contribute in the meetings, you show up late, and you barely do the things I ask you to do. I understand it may not be anything special to you, but this is my last chance to do something memorable here. I’m graduating in the spring, and up until this point, I’ve been nothing but another violinist tossed in the orchestra. I don’t stand out to my professors, or to scouts, to anyone.”

Hot tears began to well in the corners of your eyes as thoughts of your mother surfaced. Every word she had ever said about your pursuit of music being a waste of time, of how little a chance you had of making it, how your only hope was to stand out in the department, which, of course, she highly doubted you would be capable of doing.

“I have to do this, and I have to do it right.” Your voice wavered as you swiped at your cheeks, where a few tears had fallen. “If I don’t, then I’ll—I’ll—”

“Hey, hey, it’s okay.” Beomgyu’s voice was gentle, in stark contrast to the razor-sharp tone he had held just seconds before. You looked at him through your teary eyes to see that his own eyes were wide, this time with concern rather than anger. “You don’t have to explain, I understand, okay? I’m sorry, Y/N.”

You sniffed, more tears gliding down your cheeks as you did so. “What?”

“I’m sorry,” He repeated, looking as though he were about to start crying himself. “I had no idea that’s how I was coming across. I’m really, really sorry.”

You stared at him, dumbfounded. How were you supposed to respond to that? The last thing you expected to hear from him was an apology, especially since, now that you had yelled at him, you realized how unfair you were being towards him. You shook your head, wiping furiously at your eyes. “No, you don’t have to apologize Beomgyu. I should be apologizing—I’m the one being irrational, not to mention I’m also the one that locked us in here—”

“How about we just call it even then, hm?” He cut you off, looking around before he spotted a box of tissues on the front desk. He grabbed one and made his way back over to you, gently wiping the tears from your face, being careful to not touch you directly. “We’ve both apologized for something that the other person doesn’t think requires an apology. The grounds are neutral now.”

You laughed, gently taking the tissue from his hand so you could wipe your eyes on your own. He stepped back when you did so, smiling nervously at your sudden laughter.

“Thank you, Beomgyu,” You said quietly, wadding the tissue up in your hand.

He rubbed the back of his neck, rocking back and forth on his feet. “No need to thank me, Y/N.” He paused, seeming to be in deep thought. It was quiet for a moment before he stuck his hand out towards you, expression cautiously hopeful. “Now that we both understand each other a little better, do you think we could start over?”

You smiled, wrapping your hand around his to give it a firm shake. “Yeah. I’d like that.”

THE WORLD ALWAYS SEEMED COLDER WHEN YOU WERE ALONE.

Of course, it could have felt cold because you were alone in a hotel parking lot, sitting on the cool pavement in the late hours of the night. You hadn’t brought a jacket with you, and your dress was sleeveless and made of thin fabric that didn’t do much to protect you from the wind that sent strands of hair flying across your face.

However, you were certain that if your mother or father had been sitting beside of you that early winter’s night, you would barely even notice the bite of the wind or the goosebumps that prickled up all over your bare arms. Even the stars had denied you their company; the sky was pitch black, void of any trace of light.

Lower lip trembling, you sighed as you kept your gaze on the sky above, thinking that maybe, if you kept looking, you’d find a single star shining amidst the darkness. Tears filled your eyes, but you wiped them away before they could fall.

“You’re a strong girl, Y/N,” Your mother would say if she were to catch you crying. “Strong girls don’t cry, do they?”

“No,” You whispered, even though she wasn’t there to hear you. “Strong girls don’t cry.”

“What do you mean?”

You jumped at the sudden voice, placing your hand over your heart before you turned your head to see a boy sitting on the pavement beside you. He had curly black hair that stuck out from beneath a beanie, covering the top of his eyes, and a big jacket on over his clothes. He seemed to be the same age as you, but of course, you couldn’t be sure.

“W-what?” You spoke through shaking lips, pulling your arms around yourself in an attempt to stay warm.

“You said that strong girls don’t cry,” He said, eyeing you with curiosity. “What do you mean by that?”

“Oh,” you whispered, looking down at your shoes—a pair of black flats with scuff marks all over the toes. “It’s nothing— just something my mom says.”

He hummed, leaning back on the palms of his hands. “Well, I think she’s wrong. Everyone cries, even the strongest people alive. If someone tells you they don’t cry, then they’re lying.” He turned towards you, a big grin on his face. “You don’t seem like a liar to me.”

You sniffled, wiping your hand across your cheeks to catch the few tears that had managed to slip down. “Thanks, I think.”

“It was definitely meant as a compliment.” He sat up straight then, narrowing his eyes at you. You shrunk back a bit, shoulders shaking as the wind only seemed to get stronger by the second.

A moment later, he was sitting right beside of you, so close that his arm brushed against yours as he slipped his coat off, revealing an oversized hoodie beneath it. He wrapped the coat around your shoulders, and zipped it up, trapping your arms inside. He smiled again and sat back, but he was still close to you, so close that your shoulders were pressed together and his pinky was resting on top of yours.

Eyes wide, you slowly shook your head and slipped your arms through the sleeves so you could reach the zipper. “No, I’m okay—”

“Hey, keep it on, please,” He interrupted, placing his hand on top of yours to stop you from unzipping the coat. “It’s freezing out here, and you don’t even have any sleeves.”

You hesitated, not wanting to be a bother to this unexpectedly kind stranger, but you would have been lying if you had said that the cold wasn’t starting to bother you. Not wanting your lips to turn blue, you nodded, pulling your arms back into the coat to keep them extra warm.

“Thank you,” you said quietly. “What are you doing out here, by the way?”

“Me? Oh, I was just sneaking out to the indoor pool.” He pointed over his shoulder at the building with a large dome roof made of glass. “My parents are already asleep and didn’t notice me leave. You?”

“Ah, well, my family is staying here for the night. My parents and I are going out for dinner to celebrate my birthday.”

“It’s your birthday?” He asked, eyes growing wide. You nodded sheepishly and his smile grew bigger before he reached over to ruffle your hair with his hand. “Happy birthday!”

You giggled, smoothing your hair back down when he pulled his hand away. Your eyes met his, which seemed to sparkle with the light of billions of galaxies, paired perfectly with his beaming smile, and you realized that maybe you didn’t need the stars that night after all, because he alone shined brightly enough.

He looked around then, eyebrows furrowed. “But, where are your parents? Shouldn’t you guys get going before all the restaurants close?”

Your smile faded just as quickly as it had appeared. You swallowed, your eyes drifting towards a car that sat a few yards away from the two of you. The car was running and the lights inside were on, casting a yellow glow onto the two occupants seated in the front: your parents. Although you couldn’t hear what they were saying, you knew that they were yelling by the way they pointed their fingers at each other, and by the expressions on their faces, and the intensity with which their lips were moving.

The boy followed your gaze, his mouth parting slightly in surprise when he caught sight of your parents in the heat of their dispute. He glanced sideways at you before moving to sit in front of you, blocking your view of your parents.

“Why don’t you sneak to the pool with me?” He asked.

You shook your head immediately, a slight smile returning to your face. It was clear that he was trying to distract you, and you were grateful. That didn’t mean you were willing to sneak away from your parents, especially when the tension among your family was already sky high.

“Why not?” He whined, sticking his bottom lip out in a pout.

“Because I’m not supposed to move from this spot,” You said.

“And I wasn’t supposed to leave my hotel room, yet here I am.” He shrugged nonchalantly, brushing his bangs out of his eyes only for them to fall right back into place. “What’s the worst that could happen?”

There were a lot of really terrible things that could happen as a result of you sneaking away to go night swimming with a boy you didn’t know while your parents fought in the middle of a hotel parking lot. You could probably list ten off the top of your head. However, when you looked into the starry eyes of the boy in front of you, his lips spread in an encouraging grin that made you feel warm inside despite the cold, you hesitated.

What was the worst thing that could happen? The list seemed to be erased from your head as quickly as it appeared.

He tilted his head to the side, a playful glint sparkling in his eyes. He stood up and stretched his hand out to you, his fingers trembling from the cold.

“Should we run away?”

Your fingers twitched, urging to reach out touch his own. You bit the inside of your cheek, trying to find the balance between being rational and following where your heart was leading. These two things did not seem to be lining up.

Before you could do anything, however, you heard a car door slamming shut. You jumped to your feet just in time to see your mother stepping away from the vehicle before your father drove off, leaving her alone in the parking lot. Eyes wide with worry, you watched as your mother brushed her hand across her cheeks before taking a deep breath and making her way towards you.

“Y/N,” she said when she reached you, not even glancing at the boy beside of you as she took your face in her hands. “Your dad is going to come pick us up in the morning. How about we just have a girl’s night to celebrate your birthday instead?”

With your heart dropping to your toes, you felt the tears welling in your eyes once again, but you refused to let them fall. You smiled and nodded, wrapping your hand around your mother’s. “Yeah. That sounds fine.”

You turned towards the boy to see that his face was full of concern. Forcing the best smile you could, you unzipped his coat and slipped it off your shoulders before placing it back in his outstretched hands.

“Thank you,” you said quietly. Before he could say anything back, you had turned away and began walking back towards the entrance, arm-in-arm with your mother.

“I was thinking we could order a pizza and rent your favorite movies,” she said, straining to keep the emotion out of your voice. “I’ll order the food once we get back to the room, okay?”

You nodded slowly, halting your footsteps just before the automatic doors that led inside.

But when you turned your head to catch one last look at the boy who shined brighter than the stars, he was already gone.

IN THE HAZY PLACE BETWEEN SLEEPING AND WAKING, YOU COULD HAVE SWORN YOU HEARD HIM SINGING.

With your eyes still closed, the sound rang through your head, clear as day. It was comforting, as if you had heard it before. Yet it wasn’t a sound that only echoed around you. This voice, so gentle and sweet that it seemed to drip with sugar and honey, filled all of your senses to the brim. You weren’t just hearing it, you were feeling it.

“In moments like those, when tears fill your eyes, hold my hand tight. Should we run away?”

You sighed, swept away by the sound and the words that the voice sang. You felt as though you had heard it before, but you couldn’t quite think of where. Snuggling closer to whatever it was that you were leaning against, you allowed the faintest of smiles to trace its way across your lips.

The singing stopped. “Y/N?”

“Hmm?” You pressed your face closer against the warmth you were leaning into, frowning at the sudden absence of the soothing voice.

“Are you awake?”

“Yeah,” you mumbled, slowly forcing your eyes open.

You weren’t quite sure where exactly you expected to be when you opened your eyes, but it definitely was not on the floor of the orchestra practice room with your head in Choi Beomgyu’s lap. Beomgyu was smiling down at you, black curls hanging over his eyes, freckles illuminated by the faint moonlight that spilled through the windows.

You sat up quickly, trying to fix your messy hair as you felt your face grow warm. You didn’t remember falling asleep, but you were incredibly embarrassed that you had.

“How—how long was I asleep?” You asked, your voice hoarse.

“Just an hour or so. I think you got so stressed out after trying to call so many people that you just passed out,” Beomgyu said. He reached his hands toward you and helped you straighten up your hair, which only served to make your face even warmer than before.

“Sorry,” you said, gesturing to his lap. “For . . . that.”

He waved his hand at you before folding his hands behind his head. “Don’t apologize. Seems like you needed the sleep—you were dreaming pretty intensely.”

“I was? Did I say anything weird in my sleep? What did I say? Was it embarrassing?” You grabbed his sleeve, eyes wide as you bombarded him with questions.

He laughed, shaking his head in reassurance. “Don’t worry, it was nothing embarrassing. But you were talking.”

“What did I say?”

“Hmm, something about it being your birthday?” He placed a finger against his chin, eyes narrowed. “I’m not sure exactly what else. It was all kinda random.”

You squeezed your eyes shut, biting the inside of your cheek as you let go of his sleeve. You remembered every bit of the dream you had—well, it wasn’t really a dream as much as it was a memory. It was embarrassing to think that Beomgyu had heard any part of the memory, but you tried not to think about it too much.

“Beomgyu,” You said, opening your eyes once more to look at him. “Were you singing just now? Before I woke up?”

He didn’t say anything at first, his expression blank. Then, he smiled, nudging your shoulder with his. “Of course not—you know I don’t sing. Why?”

“Actually, for the record, I did not know that,” You corrected. “And I don’t know, I just . . . thought I heard someone.”

“Maybe it was your soulmate,” Beomgyu said, moving his eyebrows up and down.

You sighed, looking down at your feet. “I wish it was. I haven’t heard from him in two years.”

The smile fell from Beomgyu’s face right away. “Ah, sorry, I didn’t know.”

“It’s okay, you don’t have to apologize.”

“Do you . . . know what happened to him?”

You shook your head, staring at the moon through the window. “No. I don’t even know who he was.”

“Hey, why are you speaking in the past tense?” He turned towards you and grabbed your shoulders, forcing you to face him. “Think positively, Y/N. He could still be out there. When did you first hear him?”

“When I was thirteen,” You answered. “But he stopped singing two years ago.”

“And you haven’t heard anything since then?”

You hesitated, thinking back over the past two years and all the sleepless nights you had spent waiting and hoping to hear any trace of a note ringing in your ears, the faintest hint of a voice. Sometimes, when you were just about to close your eyes, you would’ve sworn that you could hear his voice for the briefest of moments before you drifted off, but you would always blame it on being sleep deprived.

“No,” you said quietly. “I haven’t heard anything. He used to sing all the time, too. I would wake up to the sound of his voice, and it would carry me throughout each and every day. I know it sounds weird to say this about someone I don’t remember meeting, but I felt . . . connected to him, if that makes sense?”

Beomgyu didn’t say anything, so you continued. “He’s actually the reason why I picked up the violin. I got so used to his voice, I would go around humming all day. I guess my mom got tired of hearing me, because soon after I started hearing him, my mom signed me up for violin lessons. And, well, now I’m here.”

You looked over to see Beomgyu smiling softly, but his eyes didn’t meet yours. “Do you have any idea of who it might be?”

You were quiet for a moment. The image of the boy from the hotel parking lot with his star-struck eyes and diamond smile came to your mind, as always.

“No. But I have someone I hope it is.”

You looked over at him again, and this time, his eyes met yours. The silvery light of the moon highlighted the right side of his face and the bridge of his nose, casting a stark shadow across the other side. He was neither smiling nor frowning as his eyes searched yours. What exactly he was looking for you couldn’t be sure of, however, you liked the eye contact well enough to let it go on for a moment longer before you cleared your throat, looking back towards the window.

“Did you try calling Yeonjun again?”

“Yep. No answer.”

“Taehyun?”

“Nothing.”

“The professor?”

“Didn’t pick up—I left a message though.”

You sighed, allowing the back of your head to hit the wall behind you. “We’ll be stuck here all night at this rate.”

“Well, now that you’ve had a little nap, we may as well use this time to be productive,” Beomgyu said, standing to his feet and stretching his arms above his head as he did so.

You crossed your arms, raising a brow as you watched him pull his guitar out of the case. “What’s this? Choi Beomgyu taking initiative?”

“Hey, we said we were starting over.”

You laughed as he sat on the edge of the desk in front of where you were sitting on the floor. He pulled the strap over his shoulder and began tuning his guitar by ear, something you always struggled to do with your violin.

“What are you doing?” You asked.

He strummed through all the strings, nodding when he was satisfied with the sounds. Glancing down at you, he smiled. “What does it look like I’m doing? I’m going to show you the song I wrote.”

Interest piqued, you sat up straighter and smiled back at him. “I was hoping that’s what you’d say.”

He laughed, adjusting his position on the desk before his fingers found their place on the neck of the guitar. You listened attentively as he began to pick the first notes, watching the way his fingers moved deliberately across the frets, yet, his movements never lost their grace. At first, he kept his eyes focused on his hands. But as the song went on, his eyes slowly closed, and he played without seeing, relying solely on the sound of the notes he was creating and the feeling of the strings that pressed into his calloused fingertips.

Awestruck would have been an understatement for the way you felt as you watched him play. The way he became one with the sounds he created, the way his wrist twisted to strum and how his fingertips slid across the length of the instrument as if it was the very thing they had been created to do. You were hypnotized, allowing the music to seep into your heart and make it thump against your chest like a caged bird begging to be set free.

If you had to put a word to how he looked in that moment, “beautiful” was the closest you would be able to get.

He opened his eyes as he strummed the last note, a gentle grin on his lips. You noticed how his eyes sparkled in the darkness, despite his back being towards the moonlight rather than his face.

“What do you think?” He asked, his voice sounding sharp as it pierced through the thick silence that had settled over the room.

“It was—”

“It was real pretty, kid.”

You yelped in surprise at the sudden voice, jumping up to your feet as Beomgyu practically fell off the desk, nearly dropping his guitar in the process. You helped steady him, and together, you looked towards the door to see that it was wide open, fluorescent light from the hallway spilling into the room as the janitor stood in the entry way, arms crossed over his chest as he blew a bubble with the gum in his mouth.

“If you’re done serenading your girlfriend, would you mind leaving so I can clean up and go home? This building closed an hour ago, but if you both leave now I’ll keep quiet.”

Your cheeks went hot, and you struggled to form words as Beomgyu scrambled to put his guitar back in its case. “Girl—girlfriend? No, we’re not—I mean, I’m not his—we just got stuck and—”

“Thank you, sir. We’re really sorry.” Beomgyu cut you off as he picked up his guitar case with one hand and wrapped his free arm around your shoulders, pulling you into his side. You gasped, but were too stunned to do anything but follow Beomgyu’s lead as he pulled you out of the room.

“What was that about?” You asked once the two of you had safely made it out of the building. “You were not serenading me.”

Beomgyu shrugged, letting his arm fall from your shoulders. Your mouth fell open at his lack of a denial. “Choi Beomgyu! Stop messing around.”

“Who said I was messing around?” He teased, winking at you as he began to walk towards his dorm building, which was on the other side of campus from yours.

You scoffed but said nothing as you watched his back while he walked away from you, trying to piece together what had just happened.

“See you tomorrow, Y/N!” He shouted, turning around as he walked so he could wave goodbye.

You gave him a weak-hearted wave in return, pressing your hands against your flushed cheeks as you slowly began to tread back to your own dorm room.

How strange it was that just that morning, you would have given almost anything to avoid seeing Beomgyu.

But now, you found yourself counting down the minutes left until the next day so you could see him again.

WHEN YOU GOT BACK TO YOUR DORM FROM REHEARSAL THE NEXT EVENING, YOU HAD A TEXT.

Beomgyu: I know we said we were starting over, but I can’t forget that I still owe you a coffee. Meet me at the library in 15?

You felt like an idiot, but you couldn’t stop the grin from taking over your face. Slipping your shoes back on, you typed out a quick reply before slipping out the door.

You: Make it 5. I’ll be waiting.

When you arrived at the library, you were surprised to see that Beomgyu was already there. The line for coffee was very short, as most students had settled into their dorms for the night. Only a few stray overachievers and those that were desperately trying to cram for exams were there, and Beomgyu had claimed a place in line amongst them. He held his guitar in one hand, as per usual, and you wondered if there would ever come a time in which you would see him without it.

“How is it that you demanded to meet me ten minutes earlier than I planned, and I still got here before you?” He asked once you had reached him.

“First of all, I did not demand anything from you,” You said, pushing your fist against his shoulder. “Secondly, that is so unfair, because you know that your dorm is way closer to the library than mine is.”

“Sounds like an excuse to me, but okay. Ah, it’s our turn.” He placed his hand on the small of your back and pulled you closer to the counter. Your stomach flipped, but for some reason, you didn’t mind.

After the two of had gotten your coffees, Beomgyu told you to follow him up the stairs. You expected to stop at the second floor, but to your surprise, he kept leading you. He took you through a door in the back that you didn’t even know existed, where there was another flight of stairs. At the end of these stairs was another door. You stepped outside and found yourself on the rooftop, with a great view of the campus below.

“Are you sure we’re allowed to be up here?” You asked.

“Well, no. But I’ve come up here a lot and never gotten in trouble, so what’s the harm?”

“That does not make me feel any better.”

“Come on, Y/N.” He took your hand in his and brought you over to the wide ledge, big enough for the two of you to sit on without the fear of falling off. “What’s the worst that could happen?”

You paused, eyes growing wide. He stared back at you as he hoisted himself up on the ledge. He took a sip of his coffee before asking, “Why are you staring at me like that?”

You shook your head, setting your coffee beside of him before bringing yourself up to sit on the ledge yourself.

“Nothing,” You said. “You just reminded me of someone.”

“Ah.” He stared at you for a moment longer before he slipped his jacket off and wrapped it around your shoulders. You opened your mouth to protest, but he placed his finger against your parted lips, which was more than enough to shut you up.

“Just accept an act of kindness, would you?” He said, zipping his jacket up over you. You watched him as he did so, noticing the way his chocolate eyes sparkled in the midst of the cloudy night.

You swallowed, averting your gaze. “Thank you.”

“You’re very welcome. That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

It was quiet then, but not in an uncomfortable way. You enjoyed sitting beside of him in the silence, watching the lights of campus below you, feeling the warmth from his jacket spread over your chilled skin.

“Actually, Y/N, there’s something that’s been bothering me,” Beomgyu said, breaking the silence.

You turned to face him, curious. “What is it?”

For the first time since you had met him, Beomgyu looked nervous. He picked at the skin around his nails, doing everything he could to keep his eyes from meeting yours.

“Remember how you asked me if I sang? When we were locked in the orchestra room?” His voice was a bit quieter than it had been before.

“Yeah, you said you didn’t.”

“Right. Well, that—that was a lie,” He blurted, seeming to regret his words the second they had left his mouth. “Well, not a blatant lie, because I don’t sing anymore. But I used to.”

You were a bit confused, but seeing how nervous he was, you decided not to ask him why he would lie about such a seemingly trivial topic.

“What made you stop?” You asked carefully, not wanting to upset him.

He hesitated, wringing his hands together. After taking a deep breath, he spoke again.

“My father and I used to sing together,” He began. “I taught myself how to play the guitar, but he was the one who taught me how to sing. He loved to sing, more than anything else, and he always told me that I had a brilliant voice. He said it would be a shame to keep such a voice to myself.”

He smiled fondly as he spoke of his father, and you couldn’t help but smile as well. The joy slowly faded from his expression, however, as he began to speak again.

“I lost him two years ago,” He said quietly, voice thick with emotions that caused your heart to clench. “He was in a bad car accident. I was doing really well here, in vocals and guitar. But when I lost him, I just . . . I couldn’t sing anymore. I tried, I really did. I just couldn’t do it.”

“Oh, Beomgyu,” You whispered, gently placing your hand over his trembling one.

“It’s pathetic, isn’t it?” He sniffed, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. “Singing was the one thing he wanted me to do, and now that he’s gone, I’m failing at it.”

“No, Beomgyu,” You said, your voice firm as you squeezed his hand. “It’s not pathetic at all. You’re doing the best you can, and you’re still here. And most importantly, you tried. That’s what matters.”

He brought his eyes back to yours then, glistening with moisture in the moonless, starless night. He smiled at you then, and you smiled back.

“Y/N.”

“Hm?”

“Have I told you yet that you’re really, really beautiful?”

Your breath caught in your throat, and you froze, feeling the blood rush to your cheeks. You were frozen for a moment before you scoffed, pulling your hand away from his and tucking it into your lap.

“I thought you were going to start being more serious,” You mumbled, refusing to look at him. “Stop messing around.”

Then, he moved closer to you, placing one arm behind you while he brought the other to rest against your cheek, gently turning your face towards his. He leaned in, so close that his breath brushed against your skin. He smelled of citrus and vanilla, and you found yourself leaning closer to him.

He glanced at your lips, then met your eyes once again.

“What makes you think I’m not being serious?”

His lips were soft when they pressed against yours, and it felt as though your heart would burst right out of your chest. You allowed your eyes to fall shut as he gently moved his mouth against yours, slowly tucking a piece of hair behind your ear as he did so, before allowing his fingers to gently trace their way along your cheek, then your jaw, until he rested his hand against your neck, pulling you a tiny bit closer to him.

He broke the kiss for a fleeting moment, just to open his eyes so he could look into yours. You liked the flecks of light that beamed in his irises, as though his eyes were made of starlight. He smiled, allowing his nose to brush against yours as his eyes moved back down to your lips. Once again, he closed the distance between you, capturing your lips with his for the second time. He tasted like coffee and cheap cherry chap-stick—and odd combination, but you didn’t mind as you brought your arms around his neck and shifted closer to him, twisting your head to the side as you moved your lips in time with his.

The moment was unexpected, to say the least. But perhaps that was what made it feel that much more magical.

At least, it was magical until you felt scalding hot liquid splash all over the side of your leg, seeping through the fabric of your jeans to burn your skin.

You gasped against Beomgyu’s lips before pulling away, staring wide eyed at your jeans that were now stained with coffee. Your cup, which had been sitting between the two of you, was now knocked on its side, the contents drained.

“Oh my god, I’m so sorry, Y/N,” Beomgyu said frantically. His lips were shining from the aftermath of your kiss, his freckled cheeks and nose red as a cherry. He gently pressed his hands against your leg, pulling them back when you winced from the impact. “Oh god—I’m sorry, I forgot that it was there and I was leaning in and I knocked it over and—”

You laughed at how flustered he had become, amused by this side of him that you hadn’t seen before. You grabbed his face and pulled him towards you, pressing your lips against his in a swift kiss, effectively shutting him up.

“It’s okay, Beomgyu,” You said once you pulled away, letting your hands fall from his face. “I guess you just owe me another coffee.”

The goofy lopsided grin you had grown accustomed to took place of the frightened expression he had worn just moments before. He hopped off the ledge, extending his hand towards you to help you down.

“Come on, partner. Let’s get you cleaned up.”

IT WAS THE DAY OF THE OPEN HOUSE, AND YOU WERE SLIGHTLY UNNERVED BY HOW WELL THINGS WERE GOING.

You had hoped that everything would go smoothly. The past few weeks, you had spent all your time and energy making sure that the event would be as close to perfect as possible.

Well, you had also spent a bit of time with Beomgyu, but only when you had the time to spare, of course.

The performers were all setting up; the drama department was working on setting up the stage props, as they would be going first, and they were busy rehearsing with the orchestra for how they could effectively move the props to make room for the instruments in a timely fashion. Yeonjun was rushing about, directing them with the grace and efficiency only he could pull off.

Everything was going perfectly. You should have just been happy about that, but for some reason, it felt as though you were just waiting for something to go terribly wrong.

“Y/N.” You turned at the sound of Beomgyu’s voice, smiling as he walked towards you. He was dressed in a white button up shirt that he tucked into a pair of black jeans. His sleeves were pushed up a bit, exposing his forearms.

“Everything okay?” You asked once he had reached you. You glanced at the members of the band, who were talking in hushed voices right behind Beomgyu. Your eyes narrowed when you noticed that something was amiss. “Where’s Soobin? Is he on his way?”

Beomgyu sighed, running a hand through his already messy curls. “That’s what I was coming to talk to you about. He’s sick—he won’t be able to make it. I just got a text from him.”

You blinked slowly, trying to process what you had just been told. Soobin was the main vocalist for the band. Without him, or someone to fill his position, there would be no performance.

You quickly walked over to the band, desperately trying to think of something to fix the situation, and Beomgyu was following right behind you.

“Can any of you do lead vocals in Soobin’s place?” You asked.

“No,” the main guitarist said, looking just as stressed out as you were. “We’d have to change the entire key for it to fit my range, and even if we had time to do that—which we don’t—we wouldn’t have any backup vocals.”

You pinched the bridge of your nose, squeezing your eyes shut. “There’s got to be something we can do to replace him. We can’t just take the band performance out.”

“How about Beomgyu?”

Your eyes flew open at the sound of Yeonjun’s voice, and you whirled around to see him standing behind you.

“When did you get there?” You asked.

“A minute or so ago,” He said, striding forward so that he stood on the other side of you. “But seriously, everyone knows Beomgyu can sing. He used to do it all the time. Why not have him take Soobin’s place?”

“It would make sense,” the guitarist said, his face lighting up with a glint of hope. “He’s been here for all the practices—I mean, he even wrote the song!”

You turned your eyes towards Beomgyu, worry overtaking you in an instant when you saw his expression. All the color had drained from his face, his lips pulled between his teeth. His hands were trembling, and he refused to meet your gaze.

“Beomgyu,” You said quietly, taking his shaky hand in your steady one. “You don’t have to. We can figure something else out—”

“I’ll think about it,” He said, eyes finally finding yours. He did his best to force a smile, but it was so strained, your worry only grew at the sight. “Just . . . can you give me a little while?”

You nodded, squeezing his hand. “Of course.”

He slipped away from you then, disappearing behind the stage. Your eyes followed him until you couldn’t see him any longer, worry creasing your brows.

“What was that about?” Yeonjun asked, stepping a bit closer to you. “I understand not wanting to force anyone to do something last minute, but we don’t really have many options.”

“There’s more to it than that,” You said quietly. “Just trust me, okay? And if he says he can’t do it, he can’t. We are not going to force him to do this.”

Yeonjun still looked confused, but he simply shrugged. “Whatever you say, captain. But just so you know, if he can’t do it, you’re gonna be the one singing in Soobin’s place. And trust me, no one wants to hear that.”

You fought the urge to flip him off as he walked away, wondering why on earth you still kept him around as your best friend.

The rest of the preparations went on, and soon, the audience had begun to fill the auditorium. You hadn’t seen Beomgyu since that moment during rehearsals, and you were beginning to grow worried.

You stood in the right wing of the stage as the show began with the drama department. You tried to focus on the performance—it was amazing, of course, especially since Yeonjun played a lead role in the scene they had chosen. Everyone knew he was an amazing actor. However, rather than being able to enjoy the show, you could only think about where Beomgyu was and wonder if he was doing alright, your stomach twisting itself into knots as the seconds ticked by.

By the time the drama students were finished, the audience standing to clap for their flawless performance, you had bitten your nails down to nubs as you grew increasingly worried. Yeonjun rushed over to you when he left the stage, smiling widely as he stretched his arms out to his sides. “How’d we do?”

“Hm?” You snapped out of your daze, shaking your head as you gave him two thumbs up. “Oh—wonderful. You guys were great. Hey, will you make sure everything goes well with the orchestra? I have to go find Beomgyu.”

“Well why don’t you stay here and I’ll go find him—”

“Nope, I’ve got it! Thanks best friend, you’re the greatest!” You gave him a quick hug before he could say anything else, quickly rushing out of the auditorium. You made your way down a few hallways, taking a couple of turns until you had reached one of the dressing rooms. You knew this was where Beomgyu had been getting ready because his guitar case was propped against the wall outside of it, so you hoped he was still inside.

You knocked on the door. “Beomgyu? Are you in there?”

It was silent, but you heard someone sniffle from behind the door. You sighed, leaning against the wood. “You don’t have to say anything, okay? But just hear me out.”

There was no response, but you could have sworn you felt someone leaning against the door from the other side.

“I know you may feel like you have to pressure yourself to do this, but you don’t,” You said gently. “Nobody is going to be disappointed if you can’t get up there to sing. Not me, not Yeonjun, not the band.”

You paused, biting your lip before you continued. “Your father wouldn’t be upset either, Beomgyu. The fact that you’re willing to even think about doing something this hard just to help out shows just how great of a person you are. He would be so, so proud of you. I’m proud of you, too. Whether or not you get up there and sing tonight, I’m proud of you. Okay?”

You stayed there, waiting in silence for a moment longer before you pushed away from the door, walking back towards the auditorium.

The orchestra was almost finished with their set by the time you returned to the wing. Yeonjun and the band were waiting with anticipation when you returned, eyes wide and searching behind you, probably hoping that Beomgyu was close behind.

“Is he coming?” Yeonjun asked.

You sighed, shaking your head slowly. “I don’t think so. We’ll just have to call off the band’s performance, but it’ll be okay—”

“That won’t be necessary.”

You turned at the sound of Beomgyu’s voice, unable to help the big smile that overtook your face. You hurried towards him, grabbing both his hands in your own.

“Are you sure?” You asked. “You know you don’t have to—”

“I know I don’t,” he said with a smile. “But I want to.”

He leaned forward and pressed a quick kiss against your forehead. “Thank you. For everything.”

He went up to talk to the band after that, leaving you a blushing mess. The orchestra had just finished their set and were busy making way for the band. Yeonjun walked to your side as Beomgyu and the rest of the band took their places on the stage.

“Did he just kiss you?” Your best friend asked. For some reason, he didn’t sound surprised.

Dumbfounded, you brought your hand to your forehead and nodded, unable to speak. Yeonjun laughed at you, causing you to snap out of your daze so you could punch him lightly in the shoulder.

Once the band had finished getting ready, Beomgyu cleared his throat, tapping the mic before leaning forward to speak into it.

“Hello everyone, thanks for coming out tonight. My name is Choi Beomgyu, and these lovely people surrounding me are some of the many talented musicians in our music department.” He paused when the audience clapped, waiting until the applause died down before he spoke again. “To wrap up this showcase, we’ll be performing a song I wrote myself. I wrote this about someone I met a long, long time ago.”

He turned his head to the side then, making eye contact with you from the stage. He smiled, not taking his gaze away from yours. He looked heavenly in the light cast from the spotlight, strands of his black hair seeming to turn silver beneath the glow, his golden skin shining brighter than ever. You were sure that if you were close enough, you would see the star-like sparkles in his eyes that you had grown to adore.

“I hope she remembers me, even after all this time.”

“Is he talking about you?” Yeonjun whispered into your ear, noticing the direction of Beomgyu’s stare. “You guys just met like, a month ago.”

You were just as confused as your best friend, so in response, you simply shrugged, unsure of what was going on. He was definitely talking to you, but you had no idea what he was referring to.

“I hope she remembers me, even after all this time.”

You racked your brain, trying desperately to think of what he could mean. Had you met him before? Did he remember you from somewhere, from a memory that had somehow slipped your mind?

The music began to play, and you took a step closer to the stage, eyes narrowed, ready to focus on the lyrics, wanting more than anything to remember what Beomgyu was talking about.

“In moments like those, when tears fill your eyes, hold my hand tight. Should we run away?”

Your eyes went wide. You stumbled back, reaching up to hold your head in your hands.

“Y/N?” Yeonjun’s voice was distant, overpowered by the sound of the honey sweet voice that filled the air. “Y/N, what’s wrong?”

You gasped, hands tangling in your hair as the singing continued.

“Be my forever, call my name. Run away, run away, run away with me.”

Your head was ringing. Not only were these words the same ones you had heard in your head the night you were locked in the classroom with Beomgyu, but the voice—Beomgyu’s voice—was the same one you had heard day and night while growing up.

It was your soulmates voice.

You knew it was, not just because of the lyrics or the familiarity of the voice. You knew it was your soulmate because you didn’t just hear the words and the notes of the song, you felt them. Every inch of your being felt as though it had been struck by lightning. The voice filled up all of your senses, overpowering you in the most beautiful way imaginable.

But it was too much. His voice coming through the loudspeakers paired with it ringing inside your head built up so much pressure that it caused your vision to blur. You quickly stumbled out of the auditorium, fumbling your way through the front doors that led outside.

You sat down on the pavement, taking deep breaths as your mind began to calm down. No longer overwhelmed by all that was going on around you, you closed your eyes, listening to Beomgyu’s voice as it filled your mind.

“Don’t wanna stay, now we can go. Take me now to the magic named ‘us.’”

With those words, the voice died down, and you were surrounded by silence.

You simply sat there for several moments, your eyes remaining closed as you tried to understand everything that had just happened to you.

Beomgyu was your soulmate.

Beomgyu was your soulmate, and he was alive.

Bit by bit, you started to piece things together. The night of your thirteenth birthday, the day before you heard his voice for the first time. You had met the boy with sparkling eyes and a lopsided grin in the hotel parking lot. He had offered you his coat, and then his hand.

“I hope she remembers me,” Beomgyu had said.

You smiled to yourself, placing your hand over your heart as it beat fiercely against your chest.

“Yes, Beomgyu. I do remember you.”

“Y/N!”

Your eyes flew open at the sound of the door being thrown open behind you. You turned to see Beomgyu barreling towards you, practically collapsing to the ground in front of you. He took your face in his hands, eyes frantically searching yours.

“Are you okay?” He asked, his fingers gently running along the length of your cheeks.

You nodded, smiling even though tears began to pool in your eyes. “Beomgyu,” You said quietly, lifting your hands to hold his wrists. “You knew, didn’t you?”

“Knew what?”

“That you’re my soulmate.”

He paused, the worry in his face slowly being replaced by a wide, sparkling smile.

“So you finally figured it out, huh?” He said, brushing a strand of your hair back behind your ear. “If you didn’t figure it out after tonight, I wasn’t sure how else I was supposed to show you.”

You laughed, a tear slipping down your cheek as you tightened your grip on his wrists. His expression changed once again, brows knit with concern. “Are—are you crying? What’s wrong?”

“No, nothing, it’s fine,” You assured him, resting your forehead against his. “I’m just happy. I’m so, so happy, Beomgyu.”

He sighed with relief, wrapping his arms around you in a hug, pulling you snugly into his chest. His chin rested on top of your head as you slipped your arms around his middle, pulling him even closer than he already was.

“I was a little worried that you’d be disappointed when you found out it was me,” He said with a light laugh.

You shook your head against his chest, snuggling even closer to him. “Of course not. You’re exactly who I hoped it would be, Choi Beomgyu.”

The two of you stayed like that for a bit longer before Beomgyu pulled away and stood up in front of you.

The boy with stars for eyes and a smile that outshone the moon stretched his hand out towards you, fingers shaking from the cold, cheeks flushed from your embrace.

“Should we run away?” He asked.

This time, you placed your hand in his and let him pull you to your feet.

2K notes · View notes

yandere-daydreams · 4 years ago

Text

Title: Rose Tinted.

Pairing: Yandere!Kuroo/Reader, Yandere!Kenma/Reader, Yandere!Akaashi/Reader & Yandere!Bokuto/Reader.

Word Count: 3.9k.

Synopsis: Life is stressful. It was stressful when you were your own person, when you were free, and it is now, when you’re relegated to a captivity spent in the arms of your four captors. It’s only natural that you adapt to your current life by modifying the details of your old one.

TW: Prolonged Imprisonment, Kidnapping, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Mentions of Physical Abuse, Emotional Manipulation, Gaslighting, Mentions of Past Toxic Relationships, and Implied Non-Con.

Kuroo reminds you of your old roommate, sometimes.

It’s a sickening comparison to draw, but you can’t help yourself, not when you’re with him, not when he’s acts so much like her. Kuroo’s a morning person, and with his busy schedule and all the time he spends traveling, he tries to steal every minute he can with you, every second you’re not wrapped in Bokuto’s arms or sitting on Kozume’s lap or doing whatever Akaashi does, after he forces those little white pills down your throat and your mind gets too fuzzy to form memories, even if that means he has to fish you out of bed before sunrise, deposit you on the countertop, and mutter one of his favorite threats in your ear, just to ensure you won’t make another lunge at the knife block. You’re almost grateful for that last step. It gives you an excuse not to strain yourself, so early in the day.

It’s a vague link, but it’s there. In the way he hums to himself as he cooks, how absent-mindedly he moves around the kitchen as he puts together the meal you’ve watched him make a thousand times. He’s more rushed than she used to be, though. Whereas your roommate would still have one eye shut as she cracked an egg over a sizzling pan, Kuroo’s already fully dressed, even if his shirt’s slightly unbuttoned, his tie loosened and his blazer draped over your shoulders despite your attempts to subtly shrug it off. That was something she’d done, too, but differently, more innocently. She’d ruffle your hair as you collapsed on the kitchen island, commenting on ‘another late night’ or how helpless you’d be without her help. Kuroo doesn’t have to ask. He knows where you are, where you were, all the time, every day, and if there’s a lapse in your schedule he isn’t sure how to fill in, then you wouldn’t be watching him cook.

You’d be locked in a closet, left without food or water or warmth for however long it took for you to swallow your pride and admit that you’d spent two hours trying to break the deadbolt on your bedroom’s window yesterday, all while Kuroo sat on the other side of the door and congratulated you on finally being honest.

You almost don’t notice when the humming stops, Kuroo turning the stove off before he shifts, his eyes flickering in your direction while a soft grin tugs at the corner of his lips, more patronizing than endearing. You can almost bring yourself to hate him for it. In the moment, you think you do. “You’ve been awful quiet,” He starts, once you fail to say anything on your own. “Something on your mind?”

Lying to Kuroo is useless. Bokuto never catches it and Kozume doesn’t care, but Kuroo doesn’t allow it. He thinks it’s a sign of disobedience. He thinks it means you’re falling into old habits. “Just my roommate,” You mutter, hoping you sound disinterested enough for Kuroo to drop the topic. “She used to cook a lot, too.”

There’s a hum of acknowledgement, a collision of wood on wood as he opens the nearest drawer. Idly, you wonder if Kuroo can do anything without making noise. “Blonde hair, brown eyes? The same girl who always skipped out on rent?”

“She couldn’t keep a job.” You almost glance towards him, if only to smirk and tell him that, whatever he’s making, she would’ve made it better, but you stop yourself before you can. He wouldn’t like that, and as bland as Kuroo’s cooking is, your roommate probably would’ve burnt the pan beyond repair and left the mess for you to find, hours later. “It wasn’t her fault. She always got stuck with strict bosses, and she wasn’t good with schedules. She was really nice, though.”

Kuroo chuckles, taking a second to prod at your side. “C’mon, sweetheart, nicer than me?”

You don’t answer, but Kuroo doesn’t seem to mind. There’s another laugh, another prod, and he steps in front of you, positioning himself between your open legs and supporting himself against the cabinets lining the wall, caging you in. It’s probably supposed to be a playful gesture. It’s probably supposed to be, he probably wants it to be, but somehow, you can’t find it in yourself to feel so light-hearted.

When he raises a hand, you don’t flinch, but you have to fight the urge to recoil as he cups your jaw, tracing his thumb over your cheek. You don’t want him to touch you, but you know better than to push him away. “We’re in a good mood today, alright?” The question is soft, well-meaning, but you frown regardless, tightening your grip on the edge of the countertop. “No fighting, no tantrums, and no trying to get away while I’m gone. I know the others go easy on you, but when I come home, I don’t want to hear a word about your behavior.”

They don’t go easy on you. No one goes easy on you. Kuroo’s just too harsh.

Kuroo’s strict, but… he makes good on his promises. If there’s anything about him you like, it’s that.

Apparently, you take a little too long to respond. Again, you're forced to think about your roommate when he sighs, the same way she used to when you had to tell her you wouldn't be able to pick her up from that bar or go to this party, that you were too tired, that you didn’t want to see her face after working yourself to the bone so the two of you could afford to feed yourselves. Like she was disappointed. Like she had the right to be disappointed.

“I know you’re still getting used to this, but try to give it time. The guys and me, all of us love you, and none of us want to see you sulk. I’m not asking you to cheer every time I walk through the door, just…” There’s a pause, another sigh. Kuroo straightens his back, pressing a long, lingering kiss into the top of your head. “Just try to smile a little more, alright? I promise, I’ll make it worth the effort.”

Your answer is short, but you can still feel Kuroo’s smile against your skin. And, just for a moment, you think you might be grateful he bothered to ask.

“I’ll try.”

Bokuto reminds you of your boyfriend, in a certain way.

Out of all of your captors, his intentions are the most unquestionably romantic. Akaashi and Kuroo seem to think of you as more of a pet than a partner, and you’ve never been able to figure out what Kozume wants from you, but Bokuto’s straight-forward, Bokuto doesn’t feel the need to hide his intentions behind pretty words and selfish gifts and mantras about how much he loves you, even if the last still comes naturally. You don’t appreciate him for it. You don’t like him for it, but it makes Bokuto bearable. If you had the luxury of choosing a favorite, he’d probably be your first pick.

It helps that he’s still so convinced your relationship is normal. When he’s the one to wake you up, he lets you decide what you want to wear, and when he kisses you, you don't have to kiss back. You’re allowed to say no, with Bokuto. You’re allowed to refuse, and he won’t push you to change your mind.

Tonight’s an exception to that rule, obviously.

You think you’re in Akaashi’s bed. The sheets are white, tucked in a little too tightly at the corners, and the lighting is dimmer than it would be, if Bokuto’d had the patience to carry you somewhere more private. You don’t remember falling asleep, but you don’t have time to forget waking up. The jarring dip of the mattress, the strong hand on your shoulder, barely bothering to shake for a second before pushing you onto your back and pinning you down, thighs straddling your waist and his chest pressing against yours before you can do so much as open your eyes. You only realize it’s him, realize that it’s Bokuto when he kisses you, taking advantage of your stupor in that messy, clumsy way that always leaves you breathless and gagging. That leaves you hurt, more so than you would be if any of the others treated you so roughly.

He’s smiling, when he pulls away. It’s not soft and it’s not subtle, and it hasn’t faded by the time he finds your neck, latching onto the sensitive spot just above your jugular. If he had been your boyfriend, you might’ve laughed as his teeth graze against your skin, you might’ve found it exciting when he bite down. But, it isn’t. Your boyfriend would’ve asked, and Bokuto isn’t your boyfriend.

“I asked,” He cuts in, not waiting for you to finish. That’s fine. It’s expected, honestly. Bokuto’s like a puppy, too eager for his own good, a trait that borders on endearing at times, but only manages to come off as frustrating, now. “He’s always really busy, and you just looked so sweet, I didn’t know of I could leave you all alone.” There’s a laugh, abrupt and bright, the sound soon muffled against the crook of your shoulder. “Just an hour, alright? Then you can go back to sleep.”

“Kotaro,” You try, pushing lightly on his chest. It’s a futile effort, one that only results in a groan against your skin and an arm around your waist, but you try regardless. You’re not sure you’d be able to forgive yourself if you stopped. “It’s supposed to be Keiji’s turn and… I don’t know if he’d be alright with--”

That sounds like something your boyfriend would’ve said, too. Just an hour. Just an hour, then you’d be able to go back to sleep, or back to work, or back to whatever you did to pass time when you didn’t have any time to pass. And when you didn’t have an hour, when you tried to explain that, you two would spend an hour fighting, instead. At least you didn’t have to fight with Bokuto. He made that part easy, with his willingness to pout and cry and fuck you into the mattress with tears in his eyes because, although you could say no, he doesn’t care if you do. It just makes things easier when you don’t.

“I-” Again, you’re interrupted, the words fading into a small, high-pitched shriek as his canines sink into your shoulder. And you’d just gotten your hopes up that he might let his last set of love-bites heal without interruption. “I don’t want to do this.”

Now, that makes him pull away. It’s almost surprising, how little relief there is to accompany the gesture, how much guilt comes with having to meet those wide, glassy eyes and swallow the apology playing on your tongue. You didn't apologize to your boyfriend, not the last time, not the most important time. Or, your ex-boyfriend, you guess. You’re pretty sure you broke up with him, or he broke up with you, or someone said something that made you angry enough to storm out of his apartment and into Bokuto’s waiting arms, Akaashi beside him with a length of rope and a needle full of sedatives.

His voice shakes when he speaks. ”Are you… Are you mad at me, again?”

You aren’t. It’s hard to be mad at Bokuto, and you’re so tired of always doing the hard thing.

“Wouldn it matter if I was?” You mumble, falling back onto Akaashi’s bed. “It’s not like you’d listen to me.”

You’re looking at the ceiling, now, but there’s a shift, a slight change. Soon, you can’t feel his weight on your chest, and you have to suppress the urge to mourn his stifling presense. “I’d try to.”

You almost wish it was Akaashi on top of you. At least then, you might be able to believe he knows he’s lying. “You wouldn’t,” You sigh, trying to sound exasperated. Trying to sound genuine. “If you listened to me, you would’ve let me go, by now. If you really loved me, I wouldn’t still have to tell you how much I hate it here.”

Less than a month ago, you’d yelled the same words. Screamed them, repeated them, told Bokuto how much you hated him and his friends and everything they’d forced onto you. Now, it’s all you can do to say them with enough strength not to crack under the pressure, not to give into the temptation to throw yourself at his chest and claw until he’s the villain again and you’re helpless, just an uninvolved bystander in your own suffering.

To your credit, it’s a fleeting urge, one that’s gone by the time you roll onto your side, away from Bokuto, curling into yourself as he settles against your back. There’s a heavy sigh, another gentle kiss to the nape of your neck. His arm wraps around your waist, but there’s no attempt to drag you closer, no attempt to go any further. You almost wish he would.

It’d be easier to cry yourself to sleep, if you could blame him for forcing you to.

Akaashi reminds you of your co-workers, all the time.

He spends so much time working, it’d be impossible not to draw the connection. He smells like an office, like ink and metal and more chemicals than an editor should use, and he feels like one, too, his skin always cold and his hands always quick to clamp down around anything warm and kicking and alive. It reminds you of the receptionist who used to give you a hug every morning, a sourceless gesture that was always a little too tight to be comfortable. Of Kuroo’s handshake, when you were first called back after your initial interview. You suppose he has more right to the position than Akaashi, you must’ve worked under him for months, but Kuroo invited you out for drinks, he made small talk, he could take off his suit and defrost when he wanted to.

Akaashi couldn’t. Akaashi can’t.

That, or he won’t, and you don’t know which option scares you more.

It doesn’t help that he works so often, either, even when he’s home. You can try to block it out, try to ignore the constant click of his keyboard, the occasional creak of his chair whenever Akaashi tries to reposition himself, but there’s only so much you can do on his lap, your arms strung over his shoulders and your face buried in his chest, your sleep-deprived mind momentarily forgetting its distaste in favor of seeking out as much comfort as it could.

That might be what drives you to speak, to break the silence as Akaashi bows his head, his lips brushing against the dip of your shoulder while his hands fall from his laptop to your hips. As always, his touch is cold, unnerving, the shirt he’d forced you to borrow doing little to protect you from the chill. “I hate you.”

There’s a tap to your side, a noise of acknowledgement. “I know, angel. You’ve mentioned it before.”

“So much,” You go on, your voice muffled by his sweatshirt. “More than the others. Every night I fantasize about slitting your throat and stuffing one of your stupid toys in the wound. I still have a scar from that fucking collar.”

This time, you get a hum, low and absent-minded. “A small one,” He adds. “Kenma’s done worse, and I’ve already apologized.”

He has. This is an old argument, one you’re still mad about, but one you know you’ll never resolve, not with someone so apathetic. So, you try a different approach. Not something more honorable, but something different. Something that wouldn’t leave a coat of ash on your tongue, hopefully. “My friends probably think I’m dead by now, my family too.” It feels good to say, but it feels awful, at the same time. Like you’re admitting defeat. Like you’re submitting to the same man who's been whispering those very same words to you since your first night spent in his loving care. “Even if I get out, you’ve already ruined my life. I won’t have anywhere to go back to, not a job, no place to--”

“That’s a good thing, right?” It’s an innocent question, judging by his tone. You try not to take it as one. “You always hated your job.”

It’s almost a reflex to defend yourself. “I never--”

“Yes, you did.” If it was Bokuto, you could’ve told yourself he’d been fed a lie, or pushed into a delusion that featured you as a damsel in distress and him as your big, strong, brave hero. If it was Kuroo, you could’ve told yourself that he wanted you to believe you hated your job, your old life, everything he was kind enough to rip you away from. Kozume would’ve been uninterested enough to stop the conversation before you started to spiral, but you’re not talking to Kozume, or Kuroo, or Bokuto. You’re talking to Akaashi, and Akaashi doesn’t care whether or not you’re happy. He doesn’t have a reason to lie to you, not about something so mundane. “That’s why we had to take you home. You were too stressed, I was getting worried.” He pauses, his hands moving to your sides, pulling you away from his chest. You don’t resist, but you don’t look up, either, not until he cups your cheeks in his palms, his voice suddenly going from sterile to soft in the space between one breath and another. “It was painful to watch, it was painful for all of us. I know it’s hard to see from your perspective, but you used to cry so much, and you were so close to falling apart. We just did what we thought would help.”

“So you decided to kidnap me?” It’s the harshest you’ve been in weeks, even if you barely manage to raise your voice. You grab his wrists, but you don’t try to jerk him away. Instead, you settle on digging your nails into his skin, and in return, Akaashi ignores your minor show of rebellion. “You’re not doing me a favor. You’ll never convince me I want this, because I don’t. If you have to tell me I’m happy, it’s only because you know I’m not.”

“You’re not happy, but you’re happier than you used to be.” He doesn’t try to make light of the revelation, but his neutral expression still cracks, leaving the smallest smile in its place. Not amused, but not sympathetic, either. Not malicious, but certainly not kind enough to spare your feelings. “It’s easier, and I think you know that. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. You just couldn’t handle life without a little help.”

You pull away, jerking your head out of his hands and crossing your arms in front of you, putting as much distance between you and Akaashi as you can. “You’re lying. You’re lying, and you’re not even doing it well.”

You can feel him let out a breath of a laugh, leaning forward just enough to push a kiss into your temple before drawing back, content to admire the long-awaited results of his work.

“Of course I am, angel.”

Kozume doesn’t remind you of anything, and it’s unbearable.

You’d worked with Kuroo, intimately. He’d introduced you to Bokuto, and you’d met Akaashi at his games, even if the two of you never shared more than a few polite niceties about the match at-hand. Kozume’s the only one who’s new to you, he’s the only one who’s just your kidnapper, even if he fit the role well. You can’t sympathize with him, because there’s nothing to sympathize with. You can’t understand his irrational connection with you, because he’s never bothered to offer an explanation. It shouldn’t upset you as much as it does. It shouldn’t be as awful as it is. He shouldn’t make you feel as disgusting as you do, but he does. You don’t know why, but he does, and you can’t forgive him because of it.

It’s almost a relief when you wake up alone on the edge of Kozume’s bed, tucked under heavy black sheets with sunlight already spilling through the open window. You consider rolling over, trying to go back to sleep, but you can already hear a lock clicking in the distance, light footsteps moving over wood as Kozume steps in, leaning against the doorway as he watches you start to stir. You’re purposefully lethargic, taking the time to sit up and rub your eyes until it doesn’t hurt to blink, but Kozume’s content to stare on. Part of you hopes you’ll get used to it, soon. The rest of you tries to smother the idea before it can spread.

“Mornin’,” He calls, when you make it clear you’re awake. He’s dressed, not formally, just jeans and a hoodie, but it’s more than you’ve come to expect from Kozume. Somehow, it only makes him seem more alien. “I’ve got few meetings today, Tetsuro’s out of town, Bokuto’s training, and Akaashi doesn’t get off until this afternoon, so you should have the house to yourself until sunset, at least.” There’s a glance to the floor, a quiet laugh. Despite everything, he can still seem shy when he wants to. “If you promise not to break anything, I could forget to lock you up before I leave. It’s not like you’d try to get out, anyway.”

“I would.” It’d be a damning confession with anyone else, but Kozume doesn’t blink twice. He’s already made up his mind, which means nothing you say matters. “I hate it here, and all of you know that.”

“Maybe, but you wouldn’t leave.” His voice is calm, his tone playful, but Kozume’s eyes narrow as he steps forward, and you square your shoulders, trying to glaring at the sheets rather than him. Still, you can feel him hovering over you, making you squirm as he goes on. “I mean, why would you want to? It’s not like have anything to go back to. Hell, from the way it looks, we might’ve been the only ones who stil pretend to miss you.”

“Of course I’d want to,” You snap, trying not to ball his sheets in your fists, trying not to acknowledge how reasonable he sounds, trying to ignore the part of your brain screaming for you to calm down before you make things worse for yourself. “I have a family. I have friends. I have a life outside of lying down, closing my eyes, and letting you live out whatever sick, perverted fantasy you’re trying to--”

“That’s not what I asked.” He doesn’t try to talk over you. He doesn’t have to, not when there’s already so little strength behind your argument. “You should want to escape, but…” Finally, his smile falters, but the unbothered frown that takes its place is no less comforting. He shrugs as he speaks, and you have to fight the urge to shrink into yourself. “Do you?”

You open your mouth. You open your mouth, then you close it again, then you close your eyes and drag your knees up to your chest, glaring childishly at the mattress, behaving exactly how they want you to. Kozume doesn’t try to push you any further. He doesn’t ask another question, he doesn’t force you to anwer, only sighing as he drapes an arm over your shoulder, slotting himself against your side, holding you. It’s cruel of him to do. It’s a small mercy. It’s nothing, it means nothing, but he’s mocking you, at the same time, belittling you, humiliating you. You hate him for it, but at the same time, you’re not sure you can. You’re so tired. You’re so, so tired, and you’re not sure you can be anything else, anymore.

You’re not sure you know if he’s wrong, anymore.

862 notes · View notes

scarofthewind · 4 years ago

Text

Too Far || Slashers x Reader

━━━━━━━━━▲━━━━━━━━━

A/N: I had two requests that were kind of the same, which I will have below. Warnings, there is angst! Enjoy!

Request 1 by @brideofcthulhu10 : Hey! First of all I wanna say I absolutely love your slasher fics, very detailed, you have a lot of talent! (I mostly dabble with Lost Boys on my blog!) Anyhoo, I'm not sure if I sent this yet, but I was wondering if you could do Brahms reacting to an S/O who's usually very patient with him crying because of an outburst? Like she's his caretaker who usually can handle his fits, but one day he goes too far screaming in her face, breaking things, and she just falls apart?

Request 2 by anon: Hi!I was thinking of a request if you wanna do it ofc, with Michael Myers when he is stressed out about something and maybe neglects or takes it out on s/o and she gets reallyy sad and goes for a walk at 3am and he Wakes up and not seeing her makes him feel guilty and sad and starts getting a panick attack just when she is returning and comforts him,im sorry if I’m being so specific I just wanted super angst with fluffy ending with Michael being super needy 🥺 sorry if i bother you

━━━━━━━━━▼━━━━━━━━━

Brahms Heelshire:

You had never seen him so angry over something so small in the time that you’ve been with Brahms. Not even being able to recall what the fight was about, you stood there in the center of the room that had been utterly destroyed. The lamps that were on either side of the couch were beyond repair, the book case was tipped and all it’s remains were scattered on the floor and the glass topped coffee table had long been broken. Brahms circled you like a feral animal, the glare in his eyes made you look to the floor in fear. You jumped when you heard another object being broken behind you and a coaster went flying by your head from behind you, hitting the wall in front. The small dent in the wall from the coasters collision, reminded you just how strong Brahms was.

“You can’t do anything right!” He shouted; the sound of glass crashing followed his words. “Why do I even bother keeping you’re pathetic ass around?!” He shoved past you, moving down the hall to grab the coatrack and throw it to the floor. One of the ends broke off and rolled towards you but you didn’t dare move, or even breathe. Your heart pounded ferociously against your chest and you wondered how you hadn’t had heart failures yet from all the stress he puts you through.

“Honestly, I should just get rid of you.” Brahms continued his rampage, breaking things and ripping paintings off the walls. You had become so numb to his usual rampages, that you were surprised when you found tears pooling out from your eyes at his words. Suddenly turning around, he walked over to you and you did your best to tune him out. His words cut like a knife and all you could do was stare forward and pray that this would all blow over.

But even then, prayers have their limits. “Why can’t you understand that I can’t stand you? You’re nothing but a good fuck and that’s all you will ever be!” That was the icing on the cake. A gasp so silent, it cut through the quiet air, left your lips and that’s when Brahms realized exactly what he’d done. It was like a switch had gone off in his head and the anger was gone, replaced with a guilt and fear of abandonment. His hands moved to cup your face but you almost tripped moving back, his eyes widening at your actions.

Everything he said was a lie; you both knew it, but he still thought them up somehow and felt like unloading them onto you in that moment. “(Y/N), I didn’t mean it.” Brahms felt sick watching as you backed away from him into the nearest corner he managed to maneuver you in. All the thoughts in his head came to one conclusion: There was nothing he could do or say in that given time that would make you want to stay.

“Please, listen to me.” He begged, his eyes holding so much fear you almost didn’t recognize the man before you. Brahms reached out to you gently, touching your shoulders and then your neck and then your face. “I didn’t mean any of that. Please forgive me; don’t leave me.”

Your throat was dry and you had nothing to say, all you could do was stare. “I love you, baby, please talk to me.” You felt his thumbs wipe away the tears on your cheeks and his lips pressed kisses to your forehead. Brahms knew exactly how much he had fucked up and the guilt and shame were eating him alive. “My god, what have I done?” You tensed as he pulled you into a tight and possessive hug. Your arms stayed by your sides, not moving an inch as the words and his face full of anger, kept replaying in your head. “Don’t leave me okay? I can fix this; I’ll fix it, I swear, my love.”

Meaningless. Everything felt meaningless.

But you had nowhere to go and you loved this man, even with all his issues. So, you swallowed any pride you had left and hugged him back, hearing him sob just a bit as he swore up and down that you wouldn’t regret it.

Michael Myers:

You couldn’t remember how you managed to get out of Michael’s grip while he was sleeping, but somehow you ended up outside in the freezing cold of night, walking down the sidewalk. You had managed to snag one of Michael’s jackets on your way out the door and thanked god it covered you well enough.

It wasn’t like you and Michael didn’t fight; you did, a lot. Tonight’s was just different and hurt you in more ways than you thought possible.

“Can’t you fucking leave me alone for once?” Michael’s voice was harsh as he moved away from your hands that were on his back. You realized he’d been under a lot of stress lately and he hadn’t really been himself; you were only trying to help ease the tension.

“Sometimes I really hate you and I think ‘why in the world, did I end up with her?’.” You remember that being the moment your heart sank to your stomach. The cold glare in his eyes was real, not like all the other times he’s done it.

The moon made your shadow look odd as you watched the pavement before you, every now and then glancing around to see if anyone else was up. Your already puffy eyes burned with the feeling of tears again and you managed to choke them down. “I should’ve let your father kill you. I would be a free man right now.”

You made your way around the block, making your way back home. “The only time you’re worth it is when your warming my cock.” You stopped, having arrived back at the front door. Your fingers twitched at the doorknob and you wondered if it was really a good idea to go back in. Michael had apologized after the fight and resulted in him not letting you out of an arm’s reach. But still. Was it worth it?

The second you opened the door, the air felt wrong. Shutting it behind you and taking your coat off, you realized why. Everything was torn apart. The furniture was all over the place and some pieces were broken, the TV was shattered and various pictures on the walls were on the ground. Loud sounds of footsteps came from upstairs when you shut the door and Michael practically tackled you.

To say you were shocked was an understatement. The man who put on a ‘Mr. Tough Guy’ act was now trembling in your arms, pulling you closer to him with each passing second. “Michael.” You said calmly, gently stroking his back with your hands. You heard him sniffle and your made a mental note to remember this moment.

“Look at me.” Your voice was calming and you were there. You didn’t leave him like he thought. His eyes met yours and you reached up and brushed his tears away, moving his hair from his face and cupping his cheeks in your hands. “Are you okay? Did you hurt yourself?”

He shook his head, his mouth too dry to speak from all the yelling he did while you were out on a walk. He’d woken up to your side of the bed cold as ice and all he could think was that you finally left him. He tore the house apart looking for you and when he couldn’t find you, he broke. This mountain of a man who hates showing one ounce of actual emotion, broke.

“That’s good. Can you tell me why the house looks like this?” You asked him, being very careful with your words as his hands once again pulled you against him.

“I-I was looking for you. I thought you left me.” His body shook as though the thought alone sent a chill down his spine. “You aren’t leaving me right?” His voice was so weak it was hard to remember what this man was actual capable of.

“Of course not, Michael. I couldn’t sleep and needed some fresh air.” You cooed, peppering kisses along his jaw and chin. “I’m here, I’m not going anywhere.” You assured him, nuzzling your face under his chin and letting him hold you close.

“I’m so sorry for hurting you. I didn’t mean any-” You shushed him, wrapping our arms around his back.

“I know you didn’t mean it.” Your words were music to his ears and he pulled back enough to bend down and press a kiss to your lips. “Let’s go back to bed, okay? We can clean this up in the morning.” You told him as your lips parted; you led him upstairs and to your bedroom, not leaving his arms for the rest of the night.

#brahms the boy #brahms heelshire #brahms x reader #brahms heelshire x reader #brahms: the boy 2 #michael myers x reader #Michael Myers #Halloween #slasher imagines #horror x reader #horror imagines #[✉️].request #🥲.angst #🍰.fluff

2K notes · View notes

amarimaryllis · 4 years ago

Text

I Do Not Think I Would (Bokuto x Reader)

Pairing: Bokuto/Reader

Prompt/Summary: The rational side of you tells you to leave, but for Bokuto Koutarou, you choose to stay. Alternatively, Bokuto Koutarou’s fangirls are ruthless.

Tags: Angst, Fluff, Haikyuu Timeskip Spoilers

Note: I used she/her pronouns for the reader, Bold Italicized sentences are excerpts from the poem “Love is Not All” by Edna St. Vincent Millay

Warnings: Mild Swearing, Mentions of self-hate, Mentions of insecurity, Bokuto has toxic fans

Part of A Sensitivity to Ephemera

You met Bokuto Koutarou in your 3rd year at Fukurodani, but you had known of his existence for longer. It was hard to not know of Bokuto Koutarou if you studied in Fukurodani. Hell, it was hard to not know of him if you studied in Tokyo in general. Aside from the fact that he was the embodiment of solar energy, Bokuto Koutarou also had a ton of admirers.

Fangirls

Fanboys.

And everything in between and beyond.

However, the first time you ever interacted with him was in Honda-sensei’s room. It was quick, a brief encounter that promised longer ones. Bokuto’s grades had been slipping, and you were his assigned tutor.

“Bokuto-san, this is L/N-san from Class 6.” Honda-sensei introduces you two briefly. “She’ll be tutoring you until your grades are back to… Satisfactory. I trust you to not give her a hard time.”

“Nice to meet you, L/N-san!” Bokuto bows briefly, the grin plastered on his face, unfading. However, there’s a sense of urgency in his stance, vibrating, itching to run off. Probably because he had volleyball training, and nothing in this world could keep Bokuto Koutarou from his beloved sport.

You didn’t know why, but your heart was beating a little bit faster than normal.

Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink

Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain;

After a few weeks of tutoring, Bokuto’s grades were slowly getting better. It wasn’t “satisfactory” yet, according to Honda-sensei, but you guys were getting there. As a celebration, right after volleyball practice, Bokuto drags you to the closest cafe and tells you to choose anything you want because it was “on him” as he enthusiastically stated.

“Bokuto-san, you didn’t have to.” You mumble bashfully as Bokuto sets a tray down and seats across from you.

“Don’t worry about it!” Bokuto grins as he slides the food over to you. “It’s the least I can do since you’ve been such a great tutor.”

A small smile makes its way to your face. “I guess I’ll take it then. Thank you for the food!”

As you eat, you can see Bokuto’s eyes continuously flitting back and forth between a spot on your face and away from it. He looked hesitant, but your sudden speaking urges him to reply.

“Is there anything on my face?” You furrow your brows, raising a hand to wipe at your cheek.

“Ah yeah, wait, not there.” Bokuto reaches over the table, a large hand cupping your cheek before he presses his thumb to the corner of your mouth and swipes to remove whatever it was on your face. “You had sauce on your face.”

Fire and ice could co-exist at once, you concluded. Because if it didn’t, then you would like to present yourself as evidence. You were frozen, but inside you, there was an inferno of different emotions swirling, sparked by a single touch on your skin.

That night, after Bokuto had walked you home and you had settled in for the night, you dreamt of black and white streaks paired with the brightest golden eyes. You let yourself dream. You knew that this was the closest you could get to him. The real world wasn’t as kind to you after all.

While you slept soundly, Bokuto walked home. It was raining, but it didn’t matter to him because as the rain drops onto his skin, he wished that it was your touch that fell upon him instead. And for a second as he imagines, it almost felt like it was.

And though he so desperately wished for it as he lied in bed, slumber never came. Instead, in its place, were a hundred different stories, a hundred different futures, a hundred different lifetimes, and they all ended with the sight of a bashful smile, and the prettiest eyes.

Love can not fill the thickened lung with breath,

Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone;

You gripped at your skirt tightly, fighting back the tears that threatened to escape your eyes. Fear gripped your chest as you watched Bokuto’s sleeping figure from your place on the chair beside the bed. There had been a small accident during Fukurodani’s practice match, a small collision, but it was enough to send him to the infirmary and you running after him.

It was stupid, you think to yourself. You had rushed to the clinic the moment your break started, and by the time you reached the room, you were a mess. The nurse only gave you a cheeky smile before she patted your back and said, “Don’t worry about your boyfriend. It’s a minor injury and it was probably just an ant bite for someone like him.”

Ant bites didn’t usually require sleep for recovery.

Also, he wasn’t your boyfriend, but you’d be the biggest liar on earth if you said that you didn’t want him to be. You were just his tutor. Sure you’d been tutoring him for a long time, and that was enough to form a friendship of sorts, but that was all you’ll ever be: a friend. So why were you acting like you were something more? Friends get concerned, they’ll drop by, check on you, go off once they realize it’s minor and you’re in good hands, and then wait for you to recover. They don’t stay, fussing, practically crying, and worrying over something so small.

You’re so caught up in your thoughts that the sudden placement of a heavy palm on your head startles you.

Bokuto chuckles as he takes in your disheveled state. Your eyes are damp, your hair is slightly messed up, and your skirt is still tight in your grip, but even then, he still couldn’t help but be mesmerized by the way you looked. “Hey hey hey, did I make you worry that much?”

You can’t help it. He’s recovering, you know that, but you couldn’t stop yourself from lunging at him and enveloping him in a hug. “I hate you so much. Promise me you’ll never make me worry like that ever again.”

Bokuto chuckles and you could feel the vibrations since you two were practically chest-to-chest. “If making you worry means you’ll hug me like this, then I don’t think I can make any promises.”

“Bokuto-san…” You attempt to pull away, but find yourself unable.

Sturdy arms wrap around your waist, and your frozen figure is pulled tighter against Bokuto’s body as he engulfs you with his larger frame. “Do you like me, Y/N-chan?”

You freeze.

Oh hell no.

Out of all the conversations in this world, this one was the one you did not want to have, especially not when you were emotionally vulnerable. You didn’t know if you had enough control over yourself to give the proper answers.

“What? No! I mean yes? You’re my friend, of course I like you.” Your fight or flight response to this conversation seems to have given you ample strength to pull away. You attempt to stand straight and face this problem head on, but your feet are pointing you towards the exit.

Ready to run. From this conversation. From your feelings. From rejection.

Bokuto raises a brow, a teasing grin on his face. “Oh, really?”

Contrary to popular belief (see: Honda-sensei), Bokuto Koutarou was not stupid. Very far from it. While he’s not academically gifted, he’s definitely smart on the people side of things.

You were an open book, and Bokuto was taking his time rereading every page.

“I…” You’re unable to answer, unable to find the words that would make the impending rejection hurt less.

“Well, if it helps—“ Bokuto sits up and sets his feet on the ground, lightly grabbing you to make you stand between his legs. “—I like you a lot.”

Your heart stops. Your world stops. Everything just stops. You’re gaping at Bokuto, mouth closing and opening as you try to find the proper words. You want to reply, eloquently, confidently, to save what’s left of your dignity, but you can only blink back at him.

You weren’t expecting this. Bokuto wasn’t expecting this.

A wave of uncertainty flashes through Bokuto’s eyes, and for a second, he wonders if he misread the situation. “Hey, it’s ok if you don’t feel the same—“

“Wait, no! That’s—“ You take in a deep breath, attempting to calm your racing heart as you try to find your next words. For someone who usually kept a level head, you sure weren’t acting like it. “That’s not it at all. I just… Are you sure?”

Bokuto is confused. He could understand the words individually. He could understand the sentence too, but he couldn’t understand its relevance in this context. What did you mean by ‘are you sure?’. Would he tell you if he wasn’t? Why wouldn’t anyone be sure about you? I mean, it’s you.

“Yes? Why wouldn’t I be?” Bokuto grabs your hand, and he laces his fingers through yours.

You don’t answer as you attempt to arrange your whirlwind of insecurity into one coherent sentence that could sum it all up. You didn’t want to burden him with an entire monologue of self-deprecation, but you couldn’t find a way to express the years of insecurity into one sentence that could do that feeling justice.

Bokuto sees this, and his heart breaks for a second. He was familiar with it. He knew those feelings all too well.

Uncertainty.

Doubt.

Self-Hatred.

“Can I kiss you?” Bokuto blurts out, and as he watches you get flustered, he thinks that this is a much better look on you compared to the one you were previously wearing.

You don’t speak. You just nod.

With that, Bokuto grabs you by the waist and reaches up to press his lips against yours.

It was Bokuto who broke the kiss, breathless as he pressed his forehead to yours. It was almost as if you had taken his breath away to breathe a new life into him with a simple kiss. You can feel his warm breath against your lips, his calloused hands gripping at your waist, and at the same time, you feel nothing. Maybe this is what it felt like to know of everything and nothing all at once. Hyperaware of every feeling, every part of your body that was connected to his, but at the same time you felt weightless, floating on a plane that didn’t seem to exist on earth.

“Can I do that again?” Bokut asks with a grin.

You don’t answer, simply grabbing at his collar and smashing your lips against his.

That was how your love story with Bokuto Koutarou started.

And you wish it ended there.

It well may be that in a difficult hour,

Pinned down by pain and moaning for release,

Bokuto’s fans were ruthless.

Bokuto’s fans are ruthless.

The toxic fangirls? Even more so.

Not all of them are terrible to you, some are kind, but there are enough bad apples that you start wanting to run away the moment you see the tree. His fangirls during highschool only ever went as far as gossipping and making snide remarks, but now that you were older and Bokuto was part of the MSBY Black Jackals, they had gotten worse.

Facebook? You don’t spend time there anyway.

Instagram? You’ve always avoided that place.

Twitter? Ah, good luck.

People are ruthless when they hide behind a screen and a fake name. Anonymity has a way of sparking bravery in even the most sheltered souls. There wasn’t a single tweet on your account that had no comment telling you how you’re not good enough, how Bokuto probably only stayed out of pity, how he’d probably break up with you soon, how they could make him happier than someone like you ever could.

Bokuto doesn’t know. He doesn’t have to know. You don’t want to tell him.

You’re never going to tell him.

It’s pathetic, you think to yourself. You’re afraid that if Bokuto saw these comments, the rose-colored glasses he wore would shatter. You were afraid that these tweets would tip him off the edge and plunge him into the sea of realization. The realization that he could do so much better than someone like you.

You were tired. So tired that you just want to give in to the comments and leave. It’s logical, after all. Bokuto would find someone much better than you. He’d go off, marry a girl deserving of him, and she’ll give him a family, a future, and a life worthy of someone like him. And you? You’d be free. Alone, heart destroyed beyond repair, but free. You could move on, move away, move as far as you could: out of sight, out of mind. It was so easy.

Or nagged by want past resolution’s power,

But you couldn’t.

The only thing you could do was stare at the tweets that dissected each and every single one of your insecurities and laid it bare, waved it around freely for the world to see and judge. You could only let the tears fall as the laptop screen glared back at your face. Everything is numb and you don’t feel like yourself as you scroll through every single comment and find yourself agreeing with each and every single one.

Sobs wrack throughout your body as it all becomes too much.

You’re too weak to stay, too weak to leave. So where do you go? Where the hell are you supposed to place yourself in this world when it feels like everything is going against you? Why was the world doing this to you? Why did it have to be you? You weren’t strong enough for this. You weren’t good enough for this, you never were, never are, and never will be--

“Love?”

You immediately slam the laptop shut and throw the covers over your body as if you had been there the whole time instead of sitting at the edge of the bed and crying over comments.

“Hey…” The side of the bed sinks. “Bad day?”

The fucking worst. You thought to yourself, but you only shook your head before burying your head deeper into the covers of your shared bed.

“Don’t wanna talk about it?” You can hear the worry in Bokuto’s voice as he places his hand on your waist over the blanket, rubbing up and down to soothe you.

Some part of you finds the courage to speak, and the words tumble out of your mouth faster than your brain can process them. “Why are you still with me?”

“Because I love you.” Bokuto doesn’t hesitate as he looks at your still-covered figure.

“What if you stop?” You mumble, but it was loud enough for Bokuto to hear,

“Not possible.” Bokuto gently pries the blankets away from you, uncovering your form that was curled up into a fetal position.

“But— Just—“ You turn the other way, unable to look at him. “What if you do?”

“Like I said—” You can feel the mattress behind you dip lower, sturdy arms moving to wrap around your waist as Bokuto nuzzles his face into your nape. “—not possible.”

With that, the tears start flowing once more.

You bury your face into the pillow, not wanting to show Bokuto because you knew that the sight of you crying wasn’t something he liked. He hated seeing you in distress, and he hated that the only thing he could do was talk you through it and comfort you.

“Hey hey hey…” Bokuto pulls away and makes you sit up straight before he sits against the headboard and pulls you to sob into his chest. “Where’s this coming from? What’s wrong?”

“Everything’s wrong.” You spat angrily, your grip on his shirt tightening. Anger at yourself, anger at the universe, all summed up in a single sentence. “Nothing ever goes right anymore, and I’m just—“

Your speaking is interrupted as another wave of sobs. “I’m so tired.”

You can feel Bokuto freeze, his hand that was rubbing your back stopping as he takes in your words. “Of what?”

“Everything.” You murmur, your grip on Bokuto’s shirt loosening as you press your forehead against his neck. “Just everything.”

“Does that include me?” You can hear Bokuto’s voice waver as his grip around you gets weaker. “Are you… Are you breaking up with me?”

You’re silent for a while. Was this it? Was the universe making the choice for you?

Whatever it was, you take it.

You pull away and look down, unable to stare into Bokuto’s eyes. You didn’t know if you could pull through if you could see the look on his face as you say your next words. “If it means that it will all stop, then maybe I should.”

Bokuto’s heart shatters, and his world follows in its footsteps. He can feel the tears pricking at the corners of his eyes. He knew you had been acting off the past few days, but he gave you some space so that you could sort it out until you were ready to finally approach him. But this? He wasn’t prepared for this.

“Why?” There’s a painful tug at your chest as you hear Bokuto speak in such a broken tone. “Did I do something wrong?”

“It’s not you. It’s me.” You cringe inwardly at your statement. Of all the things you could’ve said, you just had to say the most overused line in all of break-up history. “Bokuto, you—“

“It’s Kou.” You can hear Bokuto’s voice crack at the end. “It’s not Bokuto to you, Y/N. It’s Kou. Whatever it is just tell me, please I can fix it—“

“I’m the problem, okay?!” You couldn’t stop yourself from raising your tone, standing up from the bed to distance yourself from Bokuto. “I’m not good enough for you. I don’t deserve you. They’re right when they say that you could do so much better than me—“

You’re cut off as a sob pulls itself from your chest. Your chest is tight, your head is throbbing. Your legs are shaky and you couldn’t stop yourself from falling to your knees as you continue to cry. “I-I just… I know I don’t, but I-I’m so tired of b-being constantly r-reminded that I’m never g-going to be enough.”

“Y/N, none of that is true. Who told you that?” Bokuto’s tone gives away the pain he was feeling, but there was a hint of anger underneath it all.

You don’t answer, shaking your head, continuing to sob as Bokuto moves from the bed to kneel in front of you.

“Love, who told you that?” Bokuto places a comforting hand on your thigh as his other hand lightly grabs you by the chin to make you look at him.

“Everyone.” You wondered how pathetic you looked in his eyes right now. “Not a single day passes by where I’m not reminded by your fans. It’s stupid to keep listening to them, but they’re right—“

Bokuto cuts you off with a brief kiss, just enough to shut you up to give him a chance to speak as he moves to cup your cheek in his palm. “No, they’re not. They never will be.”

You don’t reply. You don’t argue, but you don’t agree either.

“Don’t break up with me, please.” Bokuto cups your face with both of his hands, occasionally brushing his thumb over your cheek as he presses his forehead against yours. “You mean the world to me. You’re absolutely perfect the way you are, and I know you don't believe that.”

You sob at that, and Bokuto is quick to press a kiss against your forehead and pull you into his chest. “If I have to spend my entire life reminding you of that then I will.”

I might be driven to sell your love for peace,

Or trade the memory of this night for food.

Bokuto hovers over you, his arms on either side of your holding him up as he looks at you with the most lovestruck look you’ve ever seen on someone.

“You’re perfect.” Bokuto whispers against your lips before he presses a searing kiss against your lips. “Absolutely perfect.”

Bokuto presses his weight against yours, pulling your bodies closer to each other as he continues to kiss you breathless. You wrap your arms around his neck, an attempt to blur the boundaries of skin, muscle, and bone that separate your soul and his. He pulls you closer against him, his fingers digging deeper into the flesh of your hips as he trails his kisses down your neck and every expanse of skin that was laid bare for him.

“I love you so much.” Bokuto whispers repeatedly against your skin between every kiss he puts on you. “So much.”

As you laid beside Bokuto, his arms wrapped around your waist and your face nuzzling into his bare chest, the thoughts of ever leaving slowly become more distant and fade away into oblivion. His chest rises and falls, and you find your breathing slowly matching his as you observe his sleeping face, peaceful, unbothered by all the troubles of the world beyond your bedroom.

You smile to yourself. All rational thought tells you to leave, but for Bokuto Koutarou...

It well may be. I do not think I would.

A/N: That’s two parts of the collection down, and three more to go! This one was supposed to be the lightest out of the five, but my finger slipped so... Whoops? HAHAHAGDHDHSJHS Anyway, I hope you guys like this one! 💖

#bokuto x reader #bokuto koutarou #haikyuu #haikyuu x reader #haikyuu imagines #genre.angstfluff #cont.spoilers #tw swearing #tw self deprecation #tw insecurity

187 notes · View notes

drwcn · 4 years ago

Text

maybe after today’s acls training i can finally write that chengqing ER oneshot.

— “Patient male, mid-twenties, motor vehicle collision, eta 3 mins”

— “What no vitals? No GCS? ETA 3 mins? Who’s on the paramedic team?!”

— “No one….Dr. Lu hit someone with her car on her way out of the hospital.”

【A Midnight Conversation in Your Local ER】- Complete

[1]

The night hunt had gone to shits.

That much was undeniable.

Jiang Cheng heard the panicked shout of his disciples just as he saw the array that he had stepped on.

Fuck.

The ghost of an once mediocre demonic cultivator wanna-be was going to bring Jiang Cheng, Jiang Wanyin - the Sandu Shengshou - to meet his maker. The irony of the situation would be laughable, if he wasn’t so irrevocably screwed.

That was his last thought before his entire body was engulfed by a blinding light and the world he knew disappeared.

The ground beneath his feet gave away, weightlessness paralyzing his body though he did not fall. He felt…launched, his body warping and squeezing and stretching, the air sucked from his lungs into the endless black vacuum.

But just like that it was over. Jiang Cheng barely had time to make peace with his death before his feet touch solid earth again.

Or at least….he thought it was earth, this black, tarry hard thing striped with yellow and white. He stared at it dumbly, breathless and disoriented, barely able to react when a loud blare assaulted his senses and his world went blindly bright yet again.

This time there was pain.

Jiang Cheng clutched Sandu, ready to fight, but then his head hit the ground and everything went dark. When he woke up again, an indeterminate amount of time later, he was in a small tube and had a distinct feeling he was not wearing pants, socks or shoes.

How the fuck do you ‘scan’ a cat???

[2]

Method actor. The nurse, from the other side of the curtain, mouthed silently.

“Sir, can you tell me your name.”

“Jiang Cheng, Jiang Wangyin.”

The resident paused, awkwardly contemplating how to continue. “Uh…..which is it? Jiang Cheng or Jiang Wanyin?”

“Jiang Cheng, zi Wanyin.”

“Traditional parents?” The resident tried to crack a joke, but it fell flat. The strange man stared up at him with a blank look in his eyes and a frown that was rapidly deteriorating into a scowl. The resident cleared his throat and cast his eyes back onto his clipboard. “Uh, ahem, just the name on your ID please.”

“My what?"

"Your personal ID….like a driver’s license?”

“Cultivators of the gentry fly on swords or ride horses. We do not rely on carriage valets.”

“Eh… right. Uhm, can you tell me how old you are and what year it is.”

“I’m 39, and the year is jiachen.”

Lu Qi frowned from where she stood by the door, arms crossed, watching her resident and medical student work. 39? He looks like a college student. But he also thinks he can fly, so I guess age is the least of our worries.

“Jiachen.…?”

The M3 fished his phone out from his scrub pocket pocket and typed it in. “Sounds like the ganji system, like an old timey way to record year used in the past.” He whispers clandestinely to the resident.

“….Right. And uh, do you where you are?”

The man scowled at him. “Am I supposed to?”

The resident scribbled something on the chart, and then looked up with a plastered awkward smile. “Well, thank you Mr. Jiang for your patience. Wang Fei here is the medical student on our team. He’s going to stay and ask you a couple more questions if you don’t mind. Afterwards we’ll confer with our attending and the team will be back to see you shortly.”

As he turned away, the R3 grimaced and shared a look with Lu Qi, who was the youngest attending physician in their ER, but was not technically working at the moment and so was not on the case. And technically, as the perpetrator who hit Jiang Cheng with her car, she had a severe conflict of interest.

At least this Jiang Cheng dude didn’t seem keen on pressing personal charges against her for MVA or suing the hospital in general… but that being said…

Yeah, they’re going to need a psych consult.

Unless he’s on acid.

Well… okay, psych consult either way.

[3]

"It’s okay, you can relax.” Jiang Cheng said, waving dismissively at the woman standing by his bedside. “I’m not going to take you to the magistrate for hitting me with your carriage - car. You didn’t mean to, and I just came out of nowhere.”

“....Thank you.”

“You’re not Wen Qing. I know that now. Your name is Lu Qi. You can call off those psychia - psych - psychics - head healers - or whatever, I’m not crazy. It’s not my fault, you just… look so much like someone I used to know."

"Wen Qing.” Lu Qi echoed.

“Yeah. Wen Qing. She was a healer - a doctor - like you, but different.”

“I see. What happened to her?"

"She died. Almost twenty years ago."

"I'm sorry... that's awful.” Lu Qi’s response rolled off her tongue so well, because she had said those word a thousand times during her residency. So much so that it no longer had much meaning to her. Tonight however, she meant what she said. “Were you two close?"

"No, well…yes, maybe. No we weren’t exactly friends if that’s what you’re asking. She...operated on me. Without my consent or knowledge. Took my brother’s golden core and put it in me and then lied with my brother to my face about it. So no we weren’t “close”, but Wen Qing saved my life - well the purpose of it anyway. Saved me from a life of ordinariness.”

Lu Qi did allow herself to dwell too much on what the fuck a “golden core” was, because her gut response was almost instantaneous. “That’s shitty of her.”

She clamped down on her tongue.

God, why did I have to say that? To his face?! He was obviously in love with this Wen Qing person and they were encroaching on some dangerous emotional territories, but Lu Qi swallowed down her caution and plowed on nevertheless. There were things she felt she had to say, and since she’d already hit him with her car, how much worse could this shit get? “What I mean is she shouldn’t have. Not without telling you. Besides...there’s nothing wrong with ordinary.”

Jiang Cheng chuckled bitterly. “Maybe you’re right. Still...she didn’t deserve to die. What her clan did was not her fault.”

Now that threw Lu Qi off. Did this guy...kill her?

Lu Qi half wondered if she stumbled upon a Yakuza-esque member whose psyche finally snapped after years of murder and violence. And yet, he seemed perfectly coherent, no flight of ideas, no tangential thought, no hallucations. Even his delusions seemed...logical.

I must be the one losing, damnit.

Jiang Cheng scratched a little at his chest, as if palpating for the “golden core” that he spoke of. "She saved my life, but when she needed help, I couldn't save her. But, if I were to go back… I can't say I'll choose differently. My clan needed me, my clan who was almost cleansed by hers. No, no I wouldn’t choose differently. I don’t regret my choices, but I am sorry. Sorry to her, sorry to my brother. I'll always be sorry that she died, and that I failed her when she needed me."

Jiang Cheng had no idea why he was telling this stranger any of this, but maybe after twenty years, he was finally ready to address this guilt that he lived with. I mean who else was he supposed to tell? Jin Ling? It was nice, to have that face as an audience, receiving his words of confession.

"She would forgive you."

Lu Qi had no idea why she was offering absolution as if she had authority in this matter, but when she said it, the conviction she felt was so real, it was almost as though some external force was acting through her.

Which was ridiculous of course, but...

"How do you know? You're not her." Jiang Cheng shook his head. “I wouldn’t forgive me.”

"No, but you said she was a physician. So she should know, more than most, that sometimes there is no choosing who gets to live or die."

Jiang Cheng fell quiet at that, and his gaze grew distant. Lu Qi thought perhaps he was no longer seeing her as she was in front of him - white coat, scrubs, stethoscope - but someone entirely different. The tension he held in his shoulders slowly eased, and he sighed. In the silence that stretched between them, Lu Qi hoped that this strange man with his strange past could find a sliver of peace.

[4]

— Did you love her?

— I thought so, foolishly, but maybe I didn’t. Even if I did, it was not well enough.

— Do you love her still?

— No... I don’t know. It’s been too long...but sometimes, late at night when Lotus Pier is quiet, I think I do.

...

— Are you ashamed of it?

...

— No. No I’m not.

[5]

The patient known as Jiang Cheng left AMA, that is, against medical advice. It was the term they used sometimes for people who just up and leave without informing the team.

Lu Qi had gone out to check on his labs, which came back with bonker numbers (I mean really, a hemoglobin of 455, sodium of 200, and a HCO3 of like...3?), but Jiang Cheng was gone from Bay 6 when she returned. The nurse made the overhead page, a code yellow was called, but four hours later, Lu Qi was ready to admit that she was never going to see this Jiang Cheng ever again.

Somehow, she was okay with that. She had said what needed to be said.

Her chief had given her a call on her cell and told her to go home and sleep. The guy didn’t look like he was gonna press charges, let’s count our blessings and move on. But the night had just been too damn strange that Lu Qi was all wired up from it and couldn’t possibly fall asleep. She had handover at 10 anyway. There was a change of clothes and toiletries in her bag. She could always take a shower in the anesthesia staff’s on call room and sleep until then.

Dr. Sun was the anesthesia staff on-call tonight and was currently stuck in trauma OR. They were buddies since medschool; she’d understand.

Sighing, Lu Qi took a seat on the bench across from the bougie cafe in the lobby of the hospital. At this hour, it was the only one still open in the entire facility. The drinks they sold cost an arm and a leg, but Lu Qi needed the pick-me-up after the night she had.

As she nursed the last bit of her matcha latte, two bickering voices pulled her attention to the front entrance.

“Aiyo, A-Liang I already said I’m fine! I don’t need to be here!”

“Fuck out of here with that bullshit, Chen Zhaoxi. You fell off the fucking roof! If Wu Kun hadn’t called me, you’d have gone on -”

It was him! Lu Qi shot up. It was Jiang Cheng!

But no...no it wasn’t him. The well-dressed man dragging the second man (dressed in red pajamas) into the hospital was not Jiang Cheng. He had the same face - chiselled, handsome, scowling - but it wasn’t him. For one, his hair was trimmed short and neat, unlike Jiang Cheng who looked like he walked straight out of a BL xianxia tv drama. Secondly, his face was softer, eyes younger, and he couldn’t have been older than Lu Qi herself in her early thirties.

“I was just trying to get to the litter of kittens trapped -”

“Yes, yes, and it was very heroic and I’m sure it would’ve made Wu Kun very horny, and you morons probably would’ve fucked once he got home had you not made a valiant attempt at breaking your neck -”

“Excuse me,” the security guard manning the information desk chastised sharply. “It’s 4am. This is a hospital! Lower your voices, sirs.”

“Sorry.” The men apologized sheepishly.

Then, A-Liang, Jiang Cheng’s doubleganger asked, “Could you please direct us to the ER? This is my brother, he fell off a roof.”

Lu Bin had no idea what possessed her to interject. “I can take you there.”

All eyes fell on her. She walked towards them, heart pounding.

This can’t be happening, this kind of thing just can’t happen...

A-Liang’s face broke into a grateful smile. “Thank you, Miss -” Then his gaze trailed to her badge, and he corrected himself, “Dr. Lu. I’m Shen Liang. This is my brother Chen Zhaoxi. I think he fractured...well multiple things, please help him.”

“Of course, come with me. Let’s get him a wheelchair. If he fractured is leg, he probably shouldn’t be walking.”

“I didn’t fracture -”

“You, you shut up.” Shen Liang rolled his eyes. “Don’t listen to him. He can lose three out of four limbs and say ‘ t’s but a flesh wound’.”

Lu Qi couldn’t help but chuckle as she put an arm under the complaining Chen Zhaoxi and helped him towards the wheelchair.

Shen Liang’s smile widened.

[Extra]

“Holy shit, took you long enough!”

When Jin Ling and Lan Sizhui finally dragged Jiang Cheng to their portal site, Jiang Cheng realized that the transportation talisman had created a channel through realities between what looked like two metal garbage dumpsters in a back alley behind a food establishment marked by giant yellow bunny ears.

Standing guard there, Lan Jingyi and Ouyang Zizhen were each munching on a strange layered bread and holding tall drinks contained in...what was it called again? Right. Styrofoam.

“What is that?” Jin Ling wrinkled is nose at it. Brat.

“It’s a Big Mac.” Replied Lan Jingyi as if Jin Ling was stupid. “And this is a milk shake.”

Jin Ling scowled. “I said the bag of gold I gave you was for emergencies.”

“Yeah but we were hungry.” Ouyang Zizhen defended. He neglected to tell them that the cashier had refused to accept the gold and instead asked for “cash” or “card”, neither of which they had, so Zizhen used a liiiiil confounding talisman he learned from Wei Wuxian. They did leave more than enough gold though...and that ought to cover the restaurant’s cost for their “burger”lary . Reaching into the brown paper bag he held under one arm, Zizhen pulled out a little box that opened to show pieces of... something. “These are chicken nuggets. They’re delicious! Try one! They’re really good with this sauce....hold on...”

Lan Sizhui sighed. “We don’t have time for this. The portal will close soon. Let’s get Jiang-zongzhu home and we can sample these exotic food later.”

The boys agreed.

Jiang Cheng shook his head and huffed.

#cql #the untamed #chengqing #wen qing #jiang cheng #a midnight conversation in your local er #cql ficlet #corie fics

288 notes · View notes

coexiising · 4 years ago

Text

Fade Into You - Chapter One

SUMMARY ◆ You keep having these reoccurring dreams of a strange man, but after speaking with him for the first time, you wonder who he is what what he wants with you

WARNING(S) ◆ Suitless! Darth Vader, Eventual Romance, Sith Anakin Skywalker, Eventual Smut, i make up rules of the force, angst, force sensitive reader

NOTE ◆ here’s my spin on suitless vader! i hope you guys enjoy this as much as i like writing it!

»»————-　★　————-««

You only see him in your dreams.

A flicker of an unknown presence that you haven’t ever felt before and it consumed you whole. Every time you closed your eyes and your mind drifted into your subconscious, you saw him. At first you didn’t know what this being was, if it was someone from the past that you couldn’t quite remember or someone you had seen in passing. Though, as the days went on and the dreams didn’t go away, you soon realized that you were dealing with someone with a powerful presence. No one should be able to infiltrate your dreams the way that he did.

It always started the same way. You would walk around the dimly lit corridors of an unknown building, darkness felt through all sides of the Force the more you pressed on. Your dream self would turn the corner and he would be there, back facing you as he looked out the large window. And you would join him in standing, glancing out at the large horizon, molten lava falling and pooling along crimson rocks. It was disturbingly peaceful, standing there with this stranger. The two of you never spoke, all intents of words forming died in your throat. It didn’t feel like a dream. Dreams were supposed to be made up of your imagination, though you never believed you could think of a place like this. It was so lifelike, almost to the point where you could feel the heat rising from the ground as you stood.

Last night, as you stood with this stranger, focusing your attention on a specific volcano that erupted in the distance, you spoke out a quiet, “Who are you?” He was an enigma, and it wasn’t as though you were the one making these dreams happen. It was as if you were dropped here every night. There was something familiar about him, like you knew him but didn’t at the same time. Like a stranger and a friend. It had to be him controlling this.

You could feel his emotions shift, and hearing your soft voice seemed to snap both of you out of this daze. You turned to him, but he was already looking at you. He stood taller than you, a strong build of a body dressed in all black along with a cloak that would tread on the floor behind him as he walked. You seemed to be around the same age, his features still bright with youth, a sharply cut jawline and messy dirty blonde hair that looked as if someone had tousled through it with their hands. Though, the most distinguished feature that this man had was his golden-yellow eyes, looking down at you as though he was staring into your very soul. You had never seen eyes like that before. It seemed dark, sinister, yet you felt yourself drawing closer to him.

As alarming as his aura was, for some reason you knew that he wouldn’t hurt you. You didn’t know why you trusted a complete stranger, but something in the Force told you to.

“Who are you?” He asked, relaying the same confusion that was laced in your voice prior. It wasn’t mocking, he really didn’t know what was going on here either. His eyes never left yours, hand coming and grabbing you by the wrist. The touch was unexpected and his grip was almost painful, though not in the way one would think. It was almost a burning sensation, like the very collision of your skin against his was causing hot, white fire. “And what are you doing here?”

“Y/N,” You answered, the words basically pushing out of your mouth. His gaze almost softened, another wave of confusion looking over his dark features.

You didn’t have the chance to answer his next question, explain how you were dreaming and how you didn’t know why you were here at all. Because it was as if some other force was pushing you out of your dream, bringing you back to reality. Soon enough his touch was gone and you were waking up, eyes fluttering open to the grey ceiling of your room above your bed. Glancing at the chrono on your side table, you saw that it was still early in the morning, no one would be up except maybe the council, doing their daily morning meeting before the day started.

Settling on the realization that there was no way you were going to get back to sleep, you moved to sit on the edge of your bed, feet falling against the floor. You hissed, feeling a sharp pang of pain shoot through your left wrist. There was a ring of burned skin around your wrist, red and blistering in some places and in the shape of a hand. The dream. Your thoughts took you back to that moment where the man grabbed at it, and realized that the burning sensation you felt was real and wasn’t a figment of your imagination after all. His touch physically burned you. The thought was unsettling, that you had such a connection with this unknown man that he could touch you through the force. Yet, on the other hand, it filled you with more wonder.

They say that attachment leads to the dark side.

Growing up in the Jedi Temple for all these years, you had repeated this to yourself multiple times. Whenever you find your heart pick up with worry over another fellow Jedi, you repeat what you had been taught. Over and over again you did this, until it stuck and your anxieties subsided enough to where you were sure your emotions were not getting the better of you. However, as much as you did not want to admit to yourself, you wondered how you were supposed to live your life without growing attached to anyone. You were Jedi, a peacekeeper, a guardian. It was your job to be compassionate, to fight for the good and keep the peace of the galaxy. And you did show compassion in anything that you did, even though at times you knew you were growing closer to the people you served with. It was a hard balancing act that you were still wavering on, and suspected that most Jedi had these same thoughts, they just never voiced it out loud.

It was later now, the shimmering lights of Coruscant illuminated the hallways of the temple, making shadows dance across the walls to any type of movement. You couldn’t sleep. In fact, you really didn’t want to sleep because you knew what would happen if you did. You weren’t scared of him, whoever he was, a hidden stranger in the depths of your subconscious. Though ever since you were given the burn on your wrist, you had been uneasy to the thought of closing your eyes and drifting to that place. Deep down you felt through the Force that he wasn’t trying to hurt you, and perhaps maybe he had done it without his knowledge. Was he even a person? The man seemed to be, though looks can be deceiving and the thought of speaking to him once again seemed too consuming to even imagine.

Out of the corner of your eye, you saw a figure walking towards you. The familiar Force Signature relaxed you, not bothering to turn and keeping your eyes focused on the trails of ships making their way to one place or another for the evening. Obi-Wan was a friend of yours, more so a companion that you grew to know throughout the war. You were younger than he was, but he never treated you much differently despite his obvious position over you in the Order. Should you tell him about your dreams? It was the type of thing you knew you should inquire Master Yoda about, though you found that once in a while when you came to the old, wise Master, he didn’t hold all the answers that you hoped for. Obi-Wan was a friend. You could trust him.

“Good evening, Knight Y/N,” Obi-Wan greeted, his taller figure standing beside and joining you in looking out the window. “Shouldn’t you be getting some sleep? It is awfully late.” His tone was wavering, skeptical, like he knew something was off just by being close to you. Your aura was off, stems of cool waves emitting from you the deeper you delved into your thoughts.

How were you supposed to answer that? The normal Jedi response would be ‘I’m just fine, thank you’ but you weren’t. You were confused and you weren’t sure what to do. You still looked ahead as you asked, “Master Obi-Wan, do you know anything about how the Force ties into dreams?” You turned to face him now, eyes showing a mix of curiosity and anxiety while he was already staring at you. The more he searched them, the more concerned he grew, you could feel his signature reaching out towards you while he remained motionless as a statue.

It wasn’t in his nature to walk away from someone who needed help with an issue, but your question was odd. “What kind of dreams?” He asked, voice in a hushed whisper.

“I’m not sure, they’re hard to explain. It feels like I’m inside of them and in control of them to a certain extent,” You replied.

“Is there anyone there with you?”

You hesitated, closing your eyes and seeing the picture of your stranger staring down at you. The golden curls that framed his face, those eyes of his . . . They were all with you now even as you were awake. It was a loaded question, you thought, especially when he felt so close now. The moment you opened your eyes and were once again met with Obi-Wan’s ocean blue ones, you took in a breath and remembered that you were within the safety of the Temple. No one could touch you here. “Yes, there’s a man with me,” You responded. Your heart was beating endlessly against your ribcage, this being the first time that you have actually spoken about your encounters. The burn marks on your wrist felt like heavyweights, rejoicing that you were acknowledging them, acknowledging him. “I don’t know who he is, it’s like he is a stranger, but not at the same time. And I just want to know what it all means.”

“I’m not sure myself. I’ve never heard of this happening before,” Your friend said solemnly, dissatisfied with himself that he wasn’t able to come up with a solid answer.

“That’s what I was afraid of.” You sighed, feeling foolish at thinking you could solve this problem that easily. Things were never that easy, especially when it came to the Force. There was so much that you didn’t know, so much that no one knew. And it was somewhat agonizing. You were in tune with such a powerful part of the universe and you didn’t know the first thing about it. All these years you spent at the temple and all the years to come, were they going to amount to anything? Were you going to be satisfied in the end? “Last night was different though, we spoke to one another.”

“You haven’t spoken before?”

“No, we never did. And he didn’t seem to know who I was either or what was causing this to occur. But I don’t know, Obi-Wan, for some reason I have a bad feeling about this. Like I shouldn’t be messing with the Force in this way.”

Your friend didn’t speak for quite some time, his calloused hand reaching up to scratch at the blonde beard he had grown out over the years. His eyes shifted from yours to the ground, making your hands clench together without your permission. In this moment, you berated yourself for ever saying anything about it. There was obviously something wrong and he didn’t know how to tell you, or even worse, he would have to tell the council. What if these dreams were the dark side tempting you? What if you weren’t strong enough to be a Jedi and were doomed to fall? You were spiraling, and it didn’t help that Obi-Wan wouldn’t even look at you.

It felt like an eternity went past before Obi-Wan said, “I think that you should try and communicate more with him.” That seemed like the last thing you thought he was going to say. And it seemed dangerous, unlike most plans that Obi-Wan had where he guaranteed that the most would be safe. But then you remembered he was completely going into the wind, he knew as little as you did. “If the Force is truly causing this to happen, then it must be a good thing, right? Us Jedi, we need to trust in the Force wherever it guides us.” Trust in the Force, Y/N.

Master Obi-Wan had a point. The Force wasn’t supposed to do anything without purpose, at least, you needed to believe that was true in this moment. So you quickly said goodnight to the man and turned on your heel towards your room, hearing only the echo of your footsteps as you thought. You would go to him, whoever this stranger was. You would go to him and finally get to the bottom of whatever was happening to you. You were a Jedi, you could do this. And as you got ready for bed and settled into the soft beige sheets, you ignored the way that your wrist felt as if it was completely submerged in fire.

#Anakin Skywalker #anakin x reader #anakin skywalker smut #anakin skywalker x reader #star wars #star wars the clone wars #star wars prequels #star wars fanfiction #sith anakin #suitless vader #suitless vader x reader

194 notes · View notes

anagentinwriting · 4 years ago

Text

Lifeline - Part 1

Summary: (First Responders!AU) Moving to Los Angeles and living with your brother, Thor, was never part of your plan nor was being a 9-1-1 dispatcher, but plans change when you are faced with your own emergencies. In your case, it was leaving behind a relationship that wasn’t as perfect as it seemed. Will this be the fresh start you were hoping for or will your past find a way to catch up with you?

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Odinson!Sister Reader

Word Count: ~1800

Warnings: Car accident, angst

Lifeline Masterlist / Main Masterlist

A line ringing over your headset notifies you another emergency call is coming in. You cleared your head, preparing for anything, and clicked the spacebar, answering it, “911, what’s your emergency?”

“Bro, that was insane,” the male voice said over the phone. “You’re gonna be famous on YouTube.”

“Excuse me, sir? What seems to be the problem?” you asked, letting out a sigh.

“My friend is having trouble breathing, and his throat feels like it’s on fire.”

“What’s the address?”

“576 Rose Lane in Westwood.”

You typed the address into your computer, signaling the nearest available unit to the caller's location. “First responders are on their way. Can you tell me what he was doing before this happened?”

“We were doing the cinnamon challenge.” You rolled your eyes. “I thought it was harmless. Then, he was gagging, and then he coughed, and a puff of cinnamon came out of his nose. It was awesome; he looked like a dragon.” It's been a while since you got a call about an internet challenge gone wrong, but it's been forever since you got a cinnamon challenge one. You didn't even know that challenge was still around. “Oh fuck!”

“Is everything okay? What happened?”

“He collapsed. He’s not moving. Should I shake him awake?”

“He probably passed out, but paramedics are only a few minutes away. Is he still breathing?”

“I don’t think so,” he panicked.

“Remember to stay calm, I’ll help you through this the best I can, okay? Okay, now I am going to have to ask you to administer CPR. Do you know what to do?”

“Sort of. I learned it in health class a few years ago.”

“Perfect. It's 30 chest compressions followed by two breaths going to the rhythm of the song Staying Alive. You can do this.”

“Ok---okay. Yeah. Right, right,” he mumbled. Hearing him set the phone down on the ground, he started counting and doing chest compressions.

The responding unit was about a block away, and once they arrived, you could hear the sirens coming through the phone call.

“Odinson, take over compressions,” a lady’s voice commanded. “Kid, come with me.”

“Is he going to be...” the line went dead as he hung up his phone.

You leaned back in your chair, rubbing your eyes. This wasn’t anything new; when help arrives, people hang up, and you don’t get to know how it ends, but maybe it was for the best. You sit back up, seeing your reflection in one of the many screens in front of you. At least, you knew most of the firefighters from Station 107 at the scene, including your brother Thor, if you ever wanted to know how it ended.

It's tough, taking call after call, emergency after emergency with little to no recovery time in between. It’s a stressful job that is emotionally and physically taxing. It requires extreme focus, patience, and puts you under a certain kind of pressure. The pressure of wanting to help and do everything you possibly can when this person you never met puts their life in your hands. You never know what the outcome will be, but you try to help them get through what might be the scariest moment in their life. It’s those calls, the ones you were able to save, that keep you coming back to work.

You stepped away from your command center and headed towards the kitchenette, spotting Luis rummaging through the fridge. It wasn’t unusual, but it did always bring a smile to your face. It was hard to believe he was one of the dispatchers who showed you the ropes after relocating to Los Angeles three months ago.

“Hey, Luis.” He turned around with a doughnut in his mouth, quickly removing it and shooting you a carefree smile.

“Hey, Chica, get any weird calls yet? You know I love hearing about those weird ones, right.”

“Nothing out of the ordinary, but a guy called earlier saying his whole body hurt everywhere he poked. I told him to drive to the emergency room and get his finger looked at because it’s probably broken. Oh, and there was another cinnamon challenge victim.”

“Another one, I thought that craze was over.” He shook his head. “But I did hear about this crazy call that came in last night, right. It wasn’t so much crazy, but one of those nuisance calls, you know what I’m saying, the kind where you’re like, ‘why are you calling, this isn’t an emergency type of situation?’ Anyways, Cameron Klein took the call; you know the dude with the great hair, the kind you just want to run your hands through. It has the perfect fluff to curl ratio. I mean, I touched it once, and it was like a cloud. I asked him what products he used in his hair, and he was like…”

“Luis, how does this relate to the call?”

“Oh, right. Sorry, sorry, sorry, so there was this lady caller, right. She was telling Great Hair how she couldn't leave her car because there was a hostile raccoon outside her door. So then, Great Hair was like why don’t you go out a different door. And this caller says ‘yo I tried, but it’s like this trash panda can read my mind, right. He follows me when I move to the other side, and he’s like crazy, stupid fast like a rocket.’ And here comes the best part, Great Hair was like, ‘Hey girl, you better run fast then,’ and hung up,” he beamed with a slight chuckle.

“Oh my god, people really need to learn what an emergency is,” you chuckled, shaking your head.

“You know that’s right, but duty calls.” He tilted his head towards the door, carrying two doughnuts and a huge mug full of coffee.

“Later, Luis.”

Years ago, you never would have imagined you would be working as a dispatcher in Los Angeles. You preferred helping people hands-on, which is why you became an ER nurse. It was the feeling of never knowing what was going to come charging through those doors next that excited you. But being a dispatcher gave you a whole different kind of thrill because you could only use your voice to help.

The rest of your shift flew by until you were on hour eight of your ten-hour shift. A pileup involving a semi jackknifing on the highway forced a huge collision of cars. All the units in the area along with a few on the outskirts came in to assist. It was the same call coming in multiple times, and all you could say was help was already on the way.

“911, what’s your emergency?”

“Send help,” the woman cried, telling you her address.

“Ma’am, I am going to need you to tell me what is going on?”

“A power line…a power line fell into our pool, and my daughter is trapped on her unicorn floaty in the water. I don’t…I don’t know what to do.”

“Stay calm, ma’am. My name is YN, and I’m dispatching a unit to your home now.” You switched lines to the highway accident, getting on a line with Captain Danvers from Station 107, who was sending three individuals to the scene right away. You switched back to the caller. “Okay, I will need you to stay calm. What is your daughter’s name?”

“Morgan, she’s five years old.”

“Please, whatever you do, make sure Morgan stays on the floaty because it is protecting her from the water. There is a good chance the power line is sending more than 5000 volts through the water.”

“Okay, okay, I can do that, “ the mother breathed. “Honey, please stay on the tube.”

“I'm going to try to get in contact with the power company to turn it off.” You looked up the power company in the area, and someone slid next to you. You glance over, seeing Bruce get to work on calling the power company. You nodded at him, staying on the line with the mom. “Ma’am, has help arrived yet?”

“No, but I can hear the sirens.” You peeked at Bruce, but he shook his head, still trying to get a hold of the power company. “They are coming through the back gate now.”

“Ma’am, can you hand the phone to one of the firemen?” You bit your lip, studying the layout of their home on one of your monitors. There were flowers all over their backyard, and you got an idea.

“Hello, this is Fireman Rogers.”

“Hi, Fireman Rogers. This is 9-1-1 dispatcher, YN, how is it looking there?”

“Well, on the drive-in, we saw that a truck hit the power line pole, which caused the pole to fall into the pool. The driver isn’t in any serious condition, but one of our EMT’s is looking him over,” he informed in a deep voice. “Then, we have a pool vibrating with energy, but I assume you already know that part.”

“Do you have a plan in place? We are still trying to get a hold of the power company.”

“There are a few more floaties by the pool. I could ride one over to Morgan and pull her to safety?”

“Really? Where did you get that from the macho man handbook?”

“I don’t think that book exists, YN,” he added, making you scoff.

“I may have an idea.” You narrowed your eyes, playing out the idea in your head.

“What did you have in mind?”

“I can view the whole home on one of my monitors, and there are a ton of flowers. So, I can only assume a garden hose must be nearby.”

“Yup, I see it.”

“Okay, perfect. Grab the hose and cut off the metal ends; it's rubber, so it won't conduct electricity. Then, have you and another fireman take the hose and walk along the opposite sides of the pool. Have Morgan grab ahold of it and carefully pull her back to the edge."

“That’s genius, YN. Thanks for your help,” he acknowledged, making you crack a side smile. Few people said thank you in this job, but when they did, you appreciated it. “Here’s your phone back, ma’am.”

Morgan’s mother's breath was shaky and staggered through the phone. She was scared and had every right to be. If you were in that situation, you would be, too. “Oh my god, it’s working. It’s working,” the mother shouted into your ear. “Are you okay, honey? Are you hurt?”

“I am okay, Mommy,” Morgan replied before the phone line went dead.

You smiled at yourself in one of the now blank screens. It was these moments why you loved what you were doing; a happy ending. Some calls never get a happy ending, but when they do, those are the ones you try to remember when a stressful call comes in.

________

AN: I hope you enjoyed the first chapter. There is a long way to go and I promise things will definitely get more interesting. This was just a quick intro to some of the many characters that will make an appearance/cameo. Comments always welcome! Thanks for reading and I hope you’ll stick with me!

201 notes · View notes

whump-a-la-mode · 3 years ago

Text

Nemesis - Part 2

I’m so glad that you guys are enjoying this new series! Work was pretty hectic for me today, but here is the next part, albeit a little late.

For the last vote, A won out, meaning that Hero is going to attempt to a more direct approach to aiding Villain. Though, the things they see in this part may just change their mind.

CW//Shapeshifting, cartoon violence, insults, being called ‘worthless,’ interventions, residential medical facilities, flashbacks

The blow came out of nowhere.

It was a rhetorical statement as much as it was a completely literal one. That didn’t matter in the moment, however-- the fist had very much struck Hero in the back of their head, causing them to stumble forwards.

Before them, their assailant rematerialized from thin air, gasping with a smirk upon their face. They blew on their knuckles, as if blowing smoke from a firearm’s muzzle. Stupid, arrogant kid.

“Come on!” The villain taunted. “I thought you were supposed to be good.”

Hero didn’t bother to transform before they leapt; they did that mid-air, curled fingers turning into canine claws before them. Said claws were aimed truly at the villain a few feet ahead, directed at their panicked expression.

Suddenly, Hero felt to be on the edge of a roof. Facing a completely different foe.

Throwing themself to the ground was not a conscious choice, but it was the action that they took.

The hero in lupine shape skidded to the ground, head spinning as it struck concrete. By the time they were back to all four paws, their opponent was long gone. In their wake, the door slammed closed.

Why did they...

No. This villain looked nothing like them. They shook their head, turning back to human form in order to begin tearing out the door.

The laboratory was a nightmare to navigate. White walls stretched far further than they had any right to, all looking terribly identical. Had it been any other situation, Hero would have found themself hopelessly lost.

But they could make a pretty good guess where their target had run off to. It was probably the hall where the shouting and banging was emanating from.

Hero skidded about a corner, forgetting momentarily that in human form they lacked dewclaws, causing them nearly to fall. They did not, however, turning the corner and stopping before they collided with the active battle.

Leader swore loudly as they failed to land a blow on the villain. However, their attacker missed in turn, putting themself in such a position that allowed Teammate to grab them from behind.

The villain yelled and struggled. Almost as if they’d just fallen from the roof of a building, and were now screaming, fighting back against those trying to hold them down.

Hero was on a collision course with Teammate before they so much as realized it. Halfway through the movement, their body turned from human to that of a far more formidable wildcat, easily sending their friend sprawling on the white tile. In turn, the villain their friend had been restraining freed themself.

Leader was too stunned, in the moment, to react. By the time everyone in the corridor had returned to their senses, their opponent had long since dematerialized and left.

Leaving only the three Heroes in the hallway. Two heads turned to stare at the third.

Hero’s feline ears turned back a moment, an expression that was translated to flushing as they returned to human form. Teammate pried themself off the floor, brushing dust from their uniform.

“Sorry.” Hero dipped their head.

“Why the hell did you do that?” Leader snapped. In comparison to the quiet building, it sounded like a gong being struck. “We almost had them!”

“I was, uh, trying to get them on the ground.”

“I had it handled.” Teammate commented in a far calmer tone of voice. “I don’t think we have any chance of catching up to them now, though.”

“No. Probably not. No thanks to someone.” Leader shook their head. “We were so damn close.”

“And they got the medicines too.” Teammate added.

“They what?”

“The medicines?”

“I thought those were secured.”

“Well... They were. And then they took them.”

“Oh my god, you two are stupid.” Leader hissed through gritted teeth. “Hero, what happened in the other room? I thought you had them pinned.”

“They got away.”

“You two are so stupid. I asked for a team, and this is what I get... Worthless. Well, it’s a lost cause, now. Let’s get back to the car.”

Hero and Teammate hung their heads, but weren’t about to argue. They began their walk out of the building in silence, a silence that continued until they had traversed a few flights of stairs. That was when Leader spoke up, once again, some of the most acute venom seeming to have left their voice.

“Hero... You seem nervous.”

“I’m not.”

“I know you can fight better than what I just saw. I want to know why.”

“I guess... I guess I’m not sure.”

“Are you feeling alright?”

“Yes.”

“Are you sure?”

No. Of course they weren’t sure, because it was a lie. The night prior, after their diner meeting with Hacker, they had not succeeded in getting a single second of sleep. Now, they felt like their legs-- however many they happened to have at the moment-- were made of jello.

“I’m sure. I just need some sleep.”

“And then you’ll be back to normal?”

“Yes.”

“Good. I need my best fighter back in shape. Villains don’t catch themselves, y’know.”

Except, sometimes, they did. Sometimes they tripped, right off the edge of a roof. And, sometimes, their fall haunted the dreams of the hero who had caused it.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The dorms at HQ were a lot of things. They were cramped, and cluttered, and the thermostats never seemed to work quite right. All of that, though, was normal. A life spent living in apartments and dorms had gotten Hero plenty used to making themself comfortable in small quarters.

The bad thing about them was that, living in an enclosed space with the same people for years on end, it became just about impossible to pretend they weren’t home when someone knocked on the door.

That didn’t mean they didn’t try every single time, however.

Hero nestled themself further under the blankets that covered them, burying their head beneath their pillow in an attempt to block out the incessant knocking. Eventually, they gave up, shouting back:

“Hero isn’t home. You can’t come in.”

“If Hero isn’t home how are they talking to me?” Came Teammate’s joking cadence.

“This is a recording. Please come back later or not at all.”

“Well, can I at least come in and talk to a recording of Hero?”

“Fine.”

Hero rolled over, staring at the ceiling a moment before getting off the bed to let their friend inside. They were smiling, which was automatically a red flag.

Teammate found themself a seat on the couch shoved into the corner of the dorm, while Hero returned to their bed, collapsing dramatically onto their back.

“I have a feeling that you know why I’m here.” Teammate started, in that weird voice they used when trying to calm down a civilian.

“What are you, my therapist?”

“No. But I am worried about you.”

“I told Leader already. I’m just tired.”

“Is that why you tackled me out of nowhere?”

“I was trying to tackle the villain.”

“While I was already holding them?”

“Can you just drop it? I’m fine. I just need to go to bed early tonight.”

“it’s not just today, though. You’ve been acting weird all week. Maybe longer.”

“Have not.”

“When you froze up on that roof?”

“Nope.”

“When you pretended to be sick so you didn’t have to go to that ceremony at the university?”

“Had a cold.”

“When you just let a villain punch you in the face?”

“I- Why do you have to be right all the time?”

“Not all the time. But I think everyone has been getting a bit worried about you. You haven’t been acting yourself... We just want to help. Are you sick? You can be honest with me.”

“It’s not that. I’m fine. Physically, I’m fine. So I should be fine and dandy.”

Teammate nodded.

“The anniversary.”

“You remembered?”

“They had it on the news. Though I have a feeling you didn’t need any help remembering.”

“No.”

“How many days has it been, now?”

“374.”

“Nine days since the anniversary of Villain’s capture. Nine days you’ve been acting weird. That’s an awfully interesting coincidence.”

“I’m worried about them.” Hero dipped their head. “I can’t- I can hardly sleep.”

“You’re worried about Villain?”

“Well- I’m not worried about them. Of course I’m not worried about them, they’re a villain. But...”

“But?”

“It’s been over a year, and there’s been no news. You’d think they’d be like, fighting back, or trying to escape, or something.”

“Is that what you’re worried about, them escaping?”

How were they supposed to escape when they couldn’t even open their eyes?

“I guess so, yeah. It doesn’t seem right for them to be so docile like that.”

“The rehabbers are very good.”

“I know they are. But Villain is... they’re the worst! When they were captured the city threw a parade! They’ve hurt so many people. And now they’re just gone.”

“You think they’re planning something?”

“I guess.”

“Well... why don’t you go see them?”

“What?”

“It’s not like they’re being held on some secret Alcatraz. The rehab place is just across the city. They’ll probably let you in if you just go up and ask.”

“You really think that would work?”

“Why not? Villain is probably just going to like, spit on you or something, but if it’s worrying you this much, just go see them. You’ll see that they’re under control, and then maybe you won’t tackle me anymore?”

“I’ll try not to.” Hero chuckled. “You think that’s gonna work?”

“It’s worth a try. Besides, maybe Villain will be better, this time. Those rehabbers are crazy good at their jobs. I don’t think a single villain has come out of their still being, like, evil. They have a one hundred percent success rate, as far as I know.”

Almost one hundred percent.

Almost.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

This was stupid.

It was the only thing Hero could think about, sitting there in the parking lot, staring at the building with its cute little picket fence and brightly-colored exterior.

It was a stupid plan. They had spent so long the night prior, overthinking the few brief words they had exchanged with Hacker.

Villain needed to leave that place.

At the very least, they needed to... Hero didn’t know what they needed. They needed to be contained, certainly. They were dangerous. Too dangerous to be free. But they at least deserved to be awake.

Did they?

Yes. Of course they did. If asked, Hero was unsure if they could truly defend their position on the matter, but they knew that Villain did not deserve to be in the state that they currently suffered. It wasn’t right.

That wit. That tongue. Those sharp, intelligent eyes.

Villain did not deserve to be drowned in sedatives until they could no longer remember their own name.

It did not matter where they went. Where they were contained. So long as they were allowed to be awake. Allowed to live.

They at least deserved that much.

But... Hero had no power over such things. Every possible plan they had concocted fell apart as soon as they tried to think it through. Certainly, despite its cutesy exterior, this building was heavily guarded. Even if they did manage to get Villain out of the facility, where would they take them? Hell, as soon as they were out, Villain would probably tear their throat out!

They should have just gone right back to the HQ and forgotten the whole affair. But that image of their foe, dead to the world, would not leave their mind. It was burned into their eyelids. They saw it when they blinked.

Hero had no plan. But, they had a car, and a near complete lack of self restraint.

They had no intention of going in guns blazing. They’d be taken out in seconds, and would probably land in the very same facility, being “rehabilitated.” But, if they could at least get in, then that was a significant hurdle leapt.

And they had the perfect plan to achieve that step.

Hero’s hadn’t even realized just how white their knuckles had grown from having gripped the steering wheel with such force for so long. Their fingers ached as they removed them from the wheel, exiting the vehicle.

For a moment, they stood there.

The only sort of barrier between the facility and the outside world was a white picket fence, only a few feet in height. A moderately athletic cat could jump it. A villain would have no difficulty.

Beyond the fence, the building looked almost like any medical clinic. Decorative windchimes hung from the awning overtop the entrance, which was little more than a pair of glass doors. There wasn’t even a visible lock. From either side of the main part of the structure, wings of patient rooms stretched, their windows decorated with childish crafts made of construction paper and glue.

It looked more like a civilian hospital than something holding the city’s most dangerous criminals.

Hero hated just how nervous they felt, opening the gate to the picket fence and approaching the front door. Their suspicions were correct-- the doors were unlocked, and a bell above them even chimed as they were opened.

The lobby beyond was small, consisting of only a single desk, at which a lab-coated person typed on a computer. As Hero entered, they looked up. Their eyes widened.

“Hero?” Their mouth was almost agape. “I didn’t think we were expecting a visit from you.”

“Sorry about that. It’s kind of a more... spur of the moment thing.”

“Oh? How can we help you?”

Hero approached the desk, trying to hide the way their finger refused to stop twitching.

“I...” Their shoulders slumped. They weren’t an actor by any means, but they had gotten plenty of practice in lying to Leader about how long they had spent in the gym. “A bit over a week ago, it was the one year anniversary of Villain’s capture.”

“Was it? Time flies, I suppose.”

“I was wondering if I could see them.”

“Oh? Any particular reason?”

“I’m just a little... suspicious. I want to make sure they’re doing alright. That they aren’t planning anything.”

“Hm... Well, I can understand your concern, but I assure you that Villain has been a model patient.”

“Even so... Can I see them?”

Hero could see the tips of the Labcoat’s ears growing red.

“Let me talk to the head doctor.” They stood from their desk, notably turning off their computer as they did so. “I’ll be back in just a moment.”

“No need.”

At the back of the small lobby area, a door opened, revealing a man wearing a pair of blue scrubs and a warm smile.

“I’m right here, Labcoat. Is there something you need- Oh my goodness, Hero in the flesh! For what do we get the honor?”

“Um-”

“They want to see Villain.”

That dropped Head Doctor’s smile pretty quick.

“I see.” They nodded, nearing the desk. “Wanting to visit the old nemesis, hm?”

“I just want to make sure they’re doing alright. That they aren’t... planning anything.”

Head Doctor frowned a moment, before sighing.

“I’m sorry, Hero. And to think you came all this way. But I’m going to have to say no. You see, Villain has had a hard day, today. Usually they’re very well-behaved, but they had some trouble today. I don’t think it would be the best idea to rile them up like that, right now. I’m terribly sorry.”

Hero put their hand in their pocket, ensuring that the doctors could not see as they balled it into a fist.

“I understand.” They nodded, trying their best not to grit their teeth. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“It’s terribly unfortunate. If you had just come another day... But I don’t want to waste your time entirely. And it’s such a terribly long drive across town.” Again, Head Doctor’s countenance was brightened by a grin. “You won’t be able to see your nemesis today, but how about a tour? You can speak to our other patients, if you would like. They’re eating lunch right about now.”

A tour.

Hero could work with that.

“That would be great. Are you sure it’s... Are you sure it’s safe? Not that I’m worried or anything, but.”

“Of course it’s safe. It’s always safe, here. Come on. I’m sure everyone will be delighted to see you.”

Yeah. Delighted.

Head Doctor’s blue scrubs rippled under the bright florescents as they turned, heading back towards that door at the rear of the room. It felt almost too good to be true, but Hero wasted no time in following suit.

This door, unlike the others, was metal, and required a key to be passed through. It opened with a rather heavy creak, and clicked solidly as it closed behind Hero. They almost jumped.

If they were being quite honest, they had never really thought about where villains went after they were locked up. Like a hunting dog, they had little care where their prey ended up, only that they retrieved it. If they had to guess where their fallen foes ended up, they would have likely described a well-secured concrete building, complete with snipers and barbed wire.

Not a cute little hospital ward.

The door from the lobby opened into a wide-open, carpeted space, decorated by several sofas and a television, alongside a few well-stocked bookshelves. Beyond it, three hallways sprouted-- one to the front, and one to the left or the right.

Every door was wood.

“We call this the commons.” Head Doctor explained with a smile. “A sort of... hang out space. And those two halls lead to the patients rooms. Not much to see there.”

In an awfully hurried manner, they lead Hero forwards, into the hallway that led straight out from the commons. It was wide, with several doors on either side. Yet, not a single window.

“This is where me and my colleagues work, most of the the time. It’s mostly offices for our therapists. And that one, there, is my office.”

During the whole explanation, they did not stop walking forwards. They only did so at the end of the hallway, where a door was embedded.

“Um... This is the dining hall, just past this door. Everyone is eating lunch right now. I assure you that it’s perfectly safe, but I understand if you don’t want to see some of your, um, old foes.”

“It’s fine.” Hero did their best to smile. “Is Villain in there?”

“No. They decided to eat lunch in their room today.” Head Doctor chimed, opening the door. From behind it, there was no sound.

Nothing that Head Doctor said had been untrue. The dining hall was clean, immaculately so, scattered with plastic tables and chairs, both painted to look as though they were made of wood. Each table only sat two people, and most of them were full.

Full of the city’s worst. Villains who had hurt people, who had killed dozens.

They seemed happy enough, at least based upon the expressions on their faces. It was just about as typical as a cafeteria during mealtime could get.

Except for the quiet.

Even with the two dozen or so people sitting and eating, not a single one spoke. Each and every one of them seemed intent on sitting and eating the food before them.

Hero scanned the room a moment, gaze eventually setting upon one of the few tables with an empty chair. They didn't recognize the villain very well. They may have had ice-related powers, or something of the like. But they had fought, at least once. And Hero didn’t remember them being that horrible.

It was something. It was the best they were going to get.

“Head Doctor?” They spoke up.

“Yes, Hero?”

“There’s someone else here, I want to speak to.” They gestured towards the villain, sitting alone. Staring at their food. Engrossed. “We used to, um, we fought a lot. I want to talk to them.”

“Oh? Well, that’s just fine by me. It’s always good to reconcile. They’re a model patient. Do you want anything to eat?”

“No thank you.”

“Alright, then. I’ll be back at the end of lunch, if that sounds alright?”

“That’s just fine.”

“Splendid! I will see you then, Hero.”

Hero ducked their head in agreement, waiting until the doctor had left before approaching the table. They moved slowly, taking a seat across from the villain that they couldn’t so much as remember the name of. Even as they sat down, the person across from the table did not so much as bat an eye.

They only did so when Hero spoke up:

“Um, hello.”

It was oddly slow, the way in which the villain raised their head. They placed down their fork gingerly, smiling.

“Hello, Hero. I haven’t seen you in quite some time.”

“Uh, you neither. How are you doing?”

“I am doing just fine, Hero.” It was terribly stilted, the way in which they spoke, as though they had to carefully consider each word. “How are you doing?”

“Fine.”

“Did you come here to visit me?”

“Um, not you specifically. I came here to visit Villain.”

The edges of the villain’s smile flickered a moment, as if continuing to keep them upturned was quickly becoming a major effort.

“You should leave this place, Hero.” Even as they said it, their smile never fell. “It’s not worth it.”

Their hand gripped around the handle of their fork.

“Do you know where they are? Where Villain is?”

“Yes I do, Hero. I did not think you would care. It is you who put them here.”

“I didn’t do anything. Are they-” They looked around, expecting to see at least one guard, one nurse, one orderly. But the dining hall was barren of every person except villains. “Are they okay?”

“If I tell you that, I will end up like them. You do not want to be in this place, Hero. You should leave this place.”

“Um-” A single drop of sweat dripped down the side of their face, tracing their jawline. “I really suddenly need to use the bathroom.”

“It’s right there.” The villain raised a hand, pointing to a door labelled ‘16 - Restrooms′. “The bathroom is in room 43.”

Hero didn’t have to be given the hint twice.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Thanks so much for reading! Just like last time, there are two options along with every part of this story. Alongside each options is a question, so that you guys can give more specific suggestions if you so wish. The option that receives the most votes will be the choice that our Hero makes!

A.) Risk it all and attempt a prison break - Should Hero attempt to free the others, as well?

B.) Don’t take the risk. Leave and reconsider - Should Hero tell anyone what they saw?

#whump #whumpee #whumblr #nemesis #hero villain whump #whump community #villain whumpee #hero villain prompt #hero villain #choose your own adventure #choose your own whump

70 notes · View notes

link4eva · 3 years ago

Text

Kiro’s Collection of Sounds Date Translation [CN]

Hey! Just a couple of things before you begin reading. I don’t actually know Chinese so this translation was done through the power of Google Translate and with help from @keliosyfan. Thank you! 💛

I highly recommend reading the prologue to this date which I’ll link here. It gives some context and has some sweet and spicy moments. 😍 There’s also a phone call that comes before the date which I’ll link here.

This translation contains spoilers for a date that has not yet been released to the English server. If you wish to not be spoiled, please don’t look below the cut.

Hope you enjoy~ 💛

*Spoilers below for future content!*

[First Part]

The moment I opened the car door, unlike the smell of the city, fresh air flooded into my nose.

The air seemed to carry the fragrance of grass, and there were also some hints of wet grass.

Several flat brick houses in the distance were scattered on the hillside, and the smoke from the chimneys was also reflected by the sun with a faint golden light.

Ahead is the end of our journey; a village far away from the noise--

Kiro is currently composing a new song. To add more special elements to it, we are here to collect sounds.

Kiro: Miss Chips, come and help!

The flustered tone brought my thoughts back. I looked behind and saw Kiro getting out of the RV with several pieces of recording equipment.

I quickly hugged the microphone boom on his shoulders in my arms. He stabilized his balance, closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

Kiro: The air here is so good. I picked a good place.

Kiro: We will definitely find the best sound here!

Kiro: Gogogo!

We picked up the hand-drawn map and started to walk towards the village not far away.

MC: Passing through the small forest ahead, you will reach the elderly lady’s house!

As soon as the voice fell, there was a rustling sound in the grass not far away, accompanied by a few animal noises.

I followed the sound, and a big plump goose appeared in the gap between the grass and walk towards us swayingly.

I don’t know who was blocking the other’s way but we both stopped at the same time.

I couldn’t help thinking of the stories of many people being chased by geese, and my feet involuntarily took a step back.

Kiro: We unexpectedly met the rumoured “Country Bully”; Goose Boss!

It flapped its wings, telling us in a high-pitched manner, “Don’t mess with me!”

*Can confirm. Geese, especially Canadian geese, are hella vicious. They will just stand there and 👁👁. If you stare long enough, they’ll start honking and flapping their wings at you. They’re cute though!*

Kiro: Hahaha, it’s really as fierce as the ones in the video.

Kiro looked at Big Goose curiously and didn’t seem to realize the “crisis-ridden” situation at hand. I couldn’t help pulling on his sleeves.

MC: Let’s take a detour, just in case….

Before I could finish, there was another noise coming from the grass.

A few goslings poked their heads out. They are like yellow pompoms, and their eyes are looking at us steadily.

Kiro: Hey~ *The way he said this was so cute!*

He spoke softly, bent down and waved.

Immediately afterwards, the goslings wandered over with wobbly feet, trying to climb on his calf again and again.

Kiro couldn’t help laughing. He put down his luggage, sat down and carefully touched the goose.

Kiro: Hello, future Goose Boss~

[Second Part]

After a while, one of the goslings flapped its wings and struggled to climb to the toe of Kiro’s shoes while making a soft sound.

Kiro: Little guy, do you want me to hug you? *He’s talking so softly here 🥺*

The gosling seemed to understand what he meant by spreading its tiny wings and shaking its body.

Kiro gently held it up, looking at the little life in his palms without blinking.

Kiro: Miss Chips, would you like to come closer?

MC: Ok!

I just took a step when the ‘Goose Boss” in front of me gave a more threatening honk than before, and it rushed towards us with its neck thrust forward.

MC: ….Be careful!

Kiro quickly put down the goose in his hand steadily, but it was too late to dodge the collision of the Big Goose.

The moment the Big Goose pounced on him, he opened his arms and held the Big Goose in his arms.

“Goose Boss” was stunned for a second, then spread its wings again and his long beak approached his cheek.

Kiro smiled without worry. He stretched out his palm to cover the goose’s head and gently pet it.

Kiro: Don’t be afraid, don’t be angry. I won’t hurt you. *Changed some wording*

The Big Goose shrank its neck somewhat resisting and honked a few times in protest, but Kiro still stroked it without letting go.

Kiro: We can be good friends, right?

His voice seemed to have magical power, and the Big Goose gradually quieted down. Its menacing wings also retracted.

It leaned lightly on his shoulder and squinted its eyes in content.

Kiro smiled and hugged the Big Goose and couldn’t help rubbing its white head a few more times.

Suddenly, the young goose at his feet wailed as if hungry, and the Big Goose immediately spread out its wings and jumped out of Kiro’s arms.

It gently combed the feathers on the goslings and then swaggered away with them.

Kiro smiled crookedly and waved his arms.

Kiro: Goodbye, Goose Boss~

Watching them disappear gradually, Kiro stood up and rubbed the mud off of his body.

MC: Unexpectedly, the frightening Big Goose gave in to the “head pats”~ *This came out weird in GT so I changed this part up a bit*

Kiro: Of course, no one can resist “head pats”.

MC: Are you the same?

Kiro walked towards me, lowered his head and shook it.

Kiro: Miss Chips, would you like to try it too?

The curly blond hair swayed gently in the breeze as he shook, seemingly sending me the most sincere invitation.

It looked so soft and vibrant under the sun, I couldn’t help rubbing it a few times.

Kiro: Well….it’s true.

He immediately wrapped his arms around my waist and buried his head into my neck and shoulder.

Kiro: I am like a big goose now. I don’t want to leave anymore.

His warm cheeks were close to my collarbone, and a sudden rush of heat quietly reached the tips of my ears.

I didn’t know if he could hear my accelerating heartbeat. He raised his head and looked at me with pure blue eyes.

The next second, a hand fell on top of my head and rubbed it.

When I didn’t react, a sly smile raised at the corner of his mouth.

Kiro: Now it’s your turn.

He opened his arms and seemed to be waiting for me to pounce into his arms.

MC: ….Let’s hurry up and get to the elderly lady’s house!

I pretended to glare at him and walked forward with a chuckle.

But even if I speed up my pace, it seems that I can’t hide the sound of my heart beating like a drum.

(Cut to elderly lady’s house)

Soon we arrived at elderly lady’s house.

She is the person who is most familiar with the mountains and forests in the entire village. After she learned that we need to collect sounds, she enthusiastically introduced us to many places here.

After we gave her a greeting gift that we had prepared a while back, she took us to the backyard.

Although I heard many things about this lady’s backyard filled with a sea of flowers; after seeing it with my own eyes, it was even better than I had imagined--

Clusters of slender branches are adorned with flowers of different varieties. Large painting-like flowers rippled with the wind, setting off a “wave”.

I closed my eyes and the wonderful sounds around me continued to interweave, entangle, and overlap, as if playing a song.

I turned my head to look at Kiro and found that he had also closed his eyes.

The sunlight gleamed on the side of his face and the corners of his lips curled up as if greedily taking everything in around him.

Against the background of the sea of flowers, all the light and colours are gathering towards him, becoming extremely dazzling.

I don’t know if he felt my gaze but he opened his eyes and looked at me.

Kiro: Miss Chips, are you ready to move into our Flower Sea View Room?

(Cut to room)

We walked into the cabin. Although the space was not large, it was very tidy. Some flower buds had even bloomed, filling the cabin with life.

MC: It’s really nice here and the scenery is pleasant. And along the way, it was very quiet because there were no people around!

MC: This way, you don’t have to worry about being interrupted, and you can do what you want without any restraint.

Kiro: With no restraint?

Before the words finished, he raised a lazy smile and dragged me into his arms. Our center of gravity was thrown off at the same time and we fell on the soft bed.

I stared at Kiro above me in a daze. He pushed some hair on my face away, leaving an itchy feeling.

Kiro: Then I have a lot of things I want to do….

Kiro: You will cooperate with me, right?

His breath was so breathy and soft, it made the tips of my ears turn red instantly.

MC: If it is a reasonable thing….of course I will cooperate.

Kiro: Let’s rest for a while.

He fell on the bed and hugged me tightly, leaving only a small gap for us to breathe freely.

Kiro: Before collecting sounds, let’s be lazy. But not too much~

[Third Part]

After the afternoon nap, Kiro and I walked into the mountains with our equipment and started the official sound-collecting trip.

Seeing the porcelain doll originally placed in the RV hung on his backpack, I couldn’t help but be a little surprised. He seemed to see my doubts and shook his backpack.

Kiro: It is the main character of this song, and I want to take it and set off.

Kiro: I believe that everyone listening will be moved by it. *Changed some wording*

Kiro: Creation is like a kind of communication. The creator just tells us what the character wants and does it another way.

Kiro: So since it is going to find the “fragments” that have been lost, this doll cannot be absent from the process.

Kiro lowered his eyes and gently rubbed the porcelain doll with his fingertips. I couldn’t help holding his hand.

MC: So have you figured out what sound you want to collect?

Kiro: Of course….I’m collecting all of the beautiful sounds.

Kiro: There are always people experiencing unsatisfactory things, I want to use these sounds to awaken the beautiful memories that are not noticed by them.

His earnest words can’t help but remind me that each of his songs seems to bring light and power to everyone.

MC: Then I have to make a contribution and prick up my little ears to find the sound!

Kiro looked at me and raised his brows slightly.

Kiro: Miss Chips, do you know?

Kiro: In fact, in some special circumstances, you can let the sound actively find you.

MC: Really, how do we do that?

Kiro: Such as….

He pressed the corners of his lips, his eyes closed, and then a warm touch pressed against my ears.

Kiro: I am the “sound” that will come to your door. *It took everything in me to keep to the original as much as possible. My mind went many places 😳*

Kiro: Whenever Miss Chips gets bored or misses me, I will be the first thing to pop into your ears. *HIS VOICE IS SO BREATHY AND LOW AAAAAAHHHH*

I couldn’t help but tremble and my heart was beating wildly.

MC: You….!

He tilted his head, smirking like a little devil.

Kiro: I seem to hear a special heartbeat.

I realized that I had accidentally fallen into his “trap” and had to blush and ran forward.

MC: There seems to be a sound in front of me. Let me go and take a look!

(Cut to spring)

Kiro and I walked forward slowly and the sounds from the distance before became clearer and clearer--

The gurgling clear spring faintly made the sound of water colliding with the stones, and the crisp birdsong in the sky also flew near and above.

Kiro put in his earphones and walked forward softly.

He bends down for a while and stretches his hands in front of him; he raises his arms high again as if he is adjusting his posture following the bird’s path.

The sun shines through the gaps in the leaves, through the mist in the forest, and poured a little bit onto him, creating a beautiful aperture.

Looking at Kiro like this, I was subconsciously drawn in.

It seemed that whenever he was immersed in the world of sound, his expression would become extremely pure and profound.

There is a sense of keenness in his eyebrows, but the curvature of the corners of his mouth never fell.

He is very happy.

Thinking of this, I smiled to myself.

Suddenly, he walked up to me, took out the earphones and gently put them in my ears.

Kiro: Listen with earphones; you will find many unexpected nuances.

Following his whispers, the natural sounds around me rushed into my ears like a spring.

The sound in the earphones seems to be completely different from the sound heard by human ears at ordinary times--

The sounds of birds, cicadas, springs, and the wind brushing leaves are more delicate and clearer than usual.

These pure sounds are usually drowned out by the sounds of the city.

Kiro: How do you like it?

MC: I think these sounds have become a song….

Kiro looked into the distance with a serene smile in his eyes.

Kiro: They are original songs created by nature.

Hearing this, I quickly took off one of the earphones and put it in his ear.

MC: The let’s listen for a while~

I leaned against Kiro’s body, quietly feeling the “music” in the earphones.

The sounds around me kept flowing and flowing into my ears. I couldn’t help but close my eyes and imagine the invisible scenes one by one--

The leaves fell on the ground with the wind and the fish flipped in the stream with splashes, water droplets falling from a height….

These sounds automatically filled the picture inside my mind, drawing every detail. I couldn’t help but laugh softly.

Kiro: MC, what are you laughing at?

I opened my eyes and found that he had seemed to have been looking at me the whole time.

MC: I was just imagining the scenes of these sounds and I thought that the experience this time was amazing.

MC: I haven’t finished yet, why are you laughing!

I said, poking at the corner of his raised mouth.

Kiro: Because I found myself thinking the same thing as you.

Kiro: So I can’t help but feel…. very, very happy.

Suddenly, a ray of sunlight seemed to pierce through the clouds and shoot straight down, making the surroundings shine brightly.

Even the porcelain doll hanging on Kiro’s backpack was shining brilliantly.

[Fourth Part]

As it was getting late, Kiro and I were passing by the small pool in the backyard with a “full load” when he suddenly stopped.

MC: What’s happening?

Kiro glanced at the pool next to him, his eyes flickering slightly.

Kiro: MC, do you want to cool down?

Although my clothes weren’t soaked, the sweat from my forehead kept coming.

I looked at the cold pool and couldn’t help nodding.

We put down the equipment in our hands, turned on the hose and walked towards the pool.

He sat down by the pool first and then stretched out his hand to me.

I thought he was going to help me sit down but I didn’t expect him to gently pull me to sit on his lap.

Kiro: There is mud on the ground. Sit with me.

As if guessing what I would do next, he wrapped his arms around my waist and tightened them.

MC: I’m….I’m not afraid of getting dirty.

I blushed and retorted but did not continue to struggle. My feet splashed the water gently.

The water splash sounded continuously and it blended into the surrounding cicadas seamlessly--

This is the sound of summer.

I couldn’t help but lean my head on his shoulder and the porcelain doll was reflected by the moonlight in the corner of my eye.

Thinking of its story, I couldn’t help but feel something in my heart and spoke slowly.

MC: This porcelain doll may represent a lot of people. Despite being “broken”, it felt that it was not a big deal.

MC: But over time, more and more cracks in the body began to make it incomplete….

MC: When I think about it, it must feel empty.

Kiro lowered his head, his breath lightly brushed my cheek.

He looked at me quietly, his eyes seemed to be mixed with inexplicable emotions.

MC: However, I’m not worried about this situation!

MC: Because I have you, Kiro.

MC: Whenever I encounter problems in life and work, I will face them more positively as much as possible.

MC: Because of you, I am not afraid of anything.

I couldn’t help laughing and there was a little splash on my feet.

Kiro: Mm, Miss Chips has me.

Kiro: I hope you are always happy.

His tone was with undeniable certainty and a warm current suddenly surged in my heart.

MC: However, Kiro, you also have me.

MC: I will also make you happy forever and ever.

Kiro looked at me deeply and suddenly widened his eyes slightly as if thinking of something.

Kiro: I seem to have a new idea!

He raised the corners of his mouth and hummed a brisk melody on the spot.

MC: Is this your new song? It seems different from the demo before.

Different from the soothing tune before, the melody this time is light and free; as soft as lying on a cloud.

Kiro: Because MC has changed it.

MC: Eh, how did I change it?

Kiro wrapped his arms around me tightly again and looked at me softly.

Kiro: Before, I wanted to awaken some of the beautiful memories that people hadn’t noticed and retrieve the lost goodness.

Kiro: But there are actually more powerful ideas than this, like a porcelain doll, for example.

Kiro: Even if it doesn’t get its lost fragments back, it can still use the leaves, petals and grass that pass by to complete itself again--

Kiro: It can have a new ending in the future!

Kiro looked straight at me, his eyes full of stars.

Kiro: In fact, we can also re-decorate with the beauty around us and become who we are now.

Kiro: Just like how you have been by my side, I became the current Kiro.

Kiro: When I am happy, you turn it into double happiness. When I am tired, you will be my power bank. When I’m frustrated….

Kiro: You are the reason that I won’t fall down.

Kiro: I accepted all the “fragments” you gave me and became my current self; a better Kiro.

Each word he spoke pulled my heartstrings inadvertently.

MC: Kiro….

Before I finished speaking, there was a sound of water pouring coming from the hose.

I don’t know why the hose was still trickling just now. A large amount of water came gushing out of it and began to dance in the air.

Kiro and I couldn’t avoid getting most of our bodies soaked and he hurriedly reached out to hold the hose in a panic.

Just as Kiro had grasped it, the hose sprayed me.

I instinctively turned my head and threw myself into Kiro’s arms, but my lips brushed against something soft.

I immediately lowered my head and buried it in his neck.

Kiro: What’s wrong? Why is your face suddenly hot?

MC: It’s nothing. It’s just a bit hot.

Suddenly, his chest trembled slightly, as if he has seen through my cover and was trying his best to hide a laugh.

Kiro: Oh~ So that’s the case. Let me cool you down.

As soon as the voice fell, he raised the hose in his hand and pointed it at me at a relatively safe distance.

The jet of water brushed my ears, bringing a comfortable icy coolness.

Kiro: Is it cooler now?

I subconsciously looked away and responded to him in somewhat of a daze.

MC: Okay, much better, thank you!!

Kiro: Now that you’ve said thank you, can I ask for another reward?

MC: ….What do you want?

Kiro: I want Miss Chips to replicate the moment with me before.

He seemed to be deliberately reminding me that he was very close to me, his hot breath blew from the tip of his nose.

I stared at him blankly and finally looked at his lips.

My thoughts flooded like a tide, and my lips suddenly became a little hot.

MC: You are shameless….!

Kiro: No, I’m asking for it honestly.

Seeing him blinking his eyes cheekily, I wanted to laugh.

MC: Well….

I took a deep breath, held his face and gave him a quick peck on the lips.

In the next second, a jet of water splashed my ears--

Kiro: That one just now doesn’t count. Do it again.

MC: Kiro!

As soon as the voice fell, he touched the tip of my nose, his eyes locked onto my face.

Kiro: I want more than that.

His soft voice crept into my ears, leaving traces of tickling.

Kiro: Those lost fragments….

Kiro: Let me fill them in for you.

After he finished speaking, he closed his eyes and my lips were instantly covered by a soft touch. His breath is sweet, like a fruit gummy.

He seemed to pour out all the hidden emotions that he couldn’t express out into this kiss, which was long and uncontrollable.

I also close my eyes and responded softly. In fact, I still have a lot to say.

I want to tell him--

Actually, you have done more for me.

You have brought light to me, and you have made me more courageous to look forward to a better future.

Because of you, I gradually became a better version of myself.

End

The call that comes after the date can be found here!

#mlqc #mr love queens choice #mlqc spoilers #mr love dream date #mldd #mr love #mr love game #mlqc kiro #mr love kiro #mldd kiro #周棋洛 #date translation #I'M SO PROUD OF MC!!! SHOW YOUR MAN SOME LOVING!!!#HE DESERVES IT!!#I really enjoyed this date #It was a perfect mix of all the flavours of Kiro

52 notes · View notes

remmushound · 4 years ago

Text

Rise boys = Raphael, Leonardo, Donatello, and Michelangelo. Bay boys = Donnie, Raph, Mikey, and Leo.

This is a fic to lead into a Bayverse/Riseverse crossover! This is also an opening to make any requests for the bay/Rise interactions! I’m also accepting bay requests separate from the crossover! @brightlotusmoon

Link to second part: https://remmushound.tumblr.com/post/645470221504839680/brightlotusmoon-part-2-of-the-bayrise

The alarms sounded in the lair in the early morning, while Donnie was still in REM sleep and Mikey still wrapped himself snuggly in his blankets. When Raph still hugged the bear he always denied he owned and while even Leo still hadn’t woke to take advantage of the day. The only occupant of the lair that was awake was an old rat in the dojo, taking advantage of his son’s absence to meditate on current issues that worried his mind.

His ears jerked to attention as the nirvana of his mind was jarred with Donnie’s warning alarm. He was to his feet in an instant, and soon from their rooms came his sons one by one. Leo first, like always, closely followed by Donnie, and then Raph, and last Mikey.

“Dude, who turned on the screaming?”

“Talk to me Don.”

“Working on it!” Donnie was already at his desk, working a mile a minute to pull up the camera from where the alarm originated. “Got it— wait, that’s not right.”

“What is it?” As usually, Leo was hovering over Donnie’s shoulder and looking at the screen.

“Just looks like black to me.” Raph grunted from where he stood, a more respectable distance away.

“Yeah— it is— somethings up with the cameras.”

“What, they broke?”

“No, someone turned them off— and the only way they could do that is to hack into the camera’s systems—.”

“Which obviously didn't happen.” Leo said, “Could someone be covering the screen a different way?”

“Well, I mean, I guess, but—”

“Alright, then lets move out— try to get a better idea of what we’re dealing with here.”

“Don’t gotta tell me twice.”

Leo held out his arm to stop Raph from running off immediately. “Careful, Raph. This could just be a sewer worker in over his head.”

“Yeah. Or it could be the Shredder.” Raph growled.

“Exactly. So be ready, but quiet. No use exposing ourselves if we don’t need to.”

Leo made the motion and Raph took point and was the first down the slide that took them out of the lair. Mikey was after him quickly. “Don’t worry, I’m a professional!” Mikey waved jazz hands.

“So am I.” Leo shoved Mikey down the slide after Raph. “Don, you next.”

“Arlight, but Leo I really think—”

Leo shoved Donnie into the tube the moment he got within sliding distance, and then gave it a few seconds before jumping in after him. The slide was a steep one, more like a straight drop than anything else, and eventually curving into a slope and then a tunnel. For a moment during the decent, Leo felt his shell leave the wall, and he braced himself for the jostling that came when he hit the curve straight on. He could see all three brothers in front of him in varying stages of the slide, Mikey making every attempt to loop around the length of the tunnel as many times as possible, which kindled his speed enough that he was dangerously close to colliding with Raph. He did another loop, narrowly avoiding the older turtle as he took the lead

“SNOOZE YOU LOSE, RAPH!”

“Mikey! Stop breaking formation!”

“Woah—“

Raph had to put on a quick break as he almost ran into Mikey’s shell, and the momentum made him spin around and slow. Before he could right himself, Donnie started to panic and tried to avoid raph by sliding over the walls as Mikey had, but it wasn’t fast enough and collided into Raph’s plastron.

“WATCH IT DONNIE!”

“THIS WASN’T MY INTENTION!”

“OUT OF THE WAY!” Leo just barely escaped another collision by doing the same move as Mikey, dodging the backup of his brothers as he sped after Mikey.

It took another half a minute for Raph and Donnie to detangle from each other, still sliding all the while.

“Move your arm!”

“Ow, that’s my leg—“

“I don’t care what it is, I’m gonna break it!”

“I’m trying— oh, my glasses—“

“Get offa me Don!”

“I’m struggling just as much as you are!”

Finally, Donnie got himself separated and held his position by digging his staff into the stone to defy the rushing water. He waited until Raphael had turned the corner before he let himself go once more to rush after him.

~~~~~

“Get back here.” Leo growled and grabbed Mikey the moment he caught up, turning the smaller turtle to face him.

“Ah— mercy—!”

“What’s up with breaking formation?”

Raph arrived, flying out of the slide and into the lower section of sewer, landing hard behind them.

“I coulda crushed you!” Raph gave Mikey a harsh shove.

“Hey hey hey, chillax, my dudes!” Mikey tried, holding his hands up in defeat. “I didn't mean to!”

“That’s not an excuse!”

Leo heard Donnie fly out and breathed a sigh. That was all of them.

“Guys, Quit fighting!” Donnie tried to get between them and Mikey. “We’re not alone here, remember?”

“Right.” Leo huffed, and made a motion for the brothers to follow him. “Remember— stick to the shadows and if we do find something, wait for my command before you do anything. Think you can handle that, Mikey?”

“What? I could do that in my sleep, bruh! I’m a shadow! You’re think I’m over here— hwa ha!” He fliped around Leo waving his nunchaku, “—but I’m really—over here!”

Leo prodded the handle of his sword into Mikey’s stomach to quiet him before he took the lead in climbing up the tube that led to the higher section of sewer. The walls were slick and lined with a thick layer of sludge, so getting a grip was difficult, but not impossible. Every so often he’d look down to make sure his brothers were following after him— Mikey, Donnie, and Raph in that order. If they were to fall, each brother would be able to catch the ones on top of him— Mikey could hold Leo, but if he fell then Donnie could catch both Mikey and Leo, and if all three fell, then Raph was at the bottom as backup.

Leo stopped as he reached the surface, just barely peeking his nose up over the edge. All he saw was dark sewer, and after a minute of searching every shadow and potential hiding space, he felt a sharp prod.

“Ow!”

“Move it!” Mikey insisted impatiently, “I don’t wanna look at your butt all day!”

Leo growled and retaliated with a careful kick to Mikey’s shoulder before pulling himselfup finally through the tunnel. He took another look around before turning to give his brothers the signal to follow, but Mikey was already through and Donnie was halfway out.

Leo made a ‘really guys?” motion and sighed, just letting the misdemeanor pass as his three brothers joined him in the dark tunnel.

“See anything Don?”

Donnie hummed and pulled his goggles down over his face to get a better view in the dark.

“Hm. Not picking up any heat signatures besides ours, but there’s splash marks on the walls higher than the current should be able to reach.”

“Meaning?”

“Something’s been splashing around here recently— the amount of residue is too big to be a rat. It could be a dog maybe, but that wouldn’t explain the camera…”

“Dude, it’s like, totally an aligator.”

“No it’s not.” Raph nudged his baby brother.

“No, dude, it totally is! I read about it once!”

“There are no gators in the sewer Mike.”

“Actually, there’s reports of gators living in the tunnels as far back as the nineteen twenties. The story goes that people would buy baby gators when they were small and cute and abandon them when they got too big to be kept in an apartment. The fascinating part is that the city actually rescues up to a hundred alligators a year from exotic breeders or incompetant owners with no liscence.”

“Donnie—“

“Though theoretically they could survive in the sewers for a short time, long-term survival would be highly improbable given cold tempatures and the bacteria in human feces. The only reason we can survive down here is because—“

“DONNIE.” Leo said, this time louder, “The alarm?”

“Oh. Right.” Donnie cleared his throat, looking away sadly as his rant went unfinished. “I… am detecting trace amounts of mutagen, but that could just be cross-contamination from one of us or Splinter. I’m sure someone would have told us if Bebop or Rocksteady escaped.”

There came a noise. A loud, jarring noise like the snap of metal. Each brother had their weapons ready before the sound even stopped echoing, dropping into their respective defense stances as they stared down the side of the tunnel that the noise came from. Nothing happened. A minute passed. Nothing.

“Think they left—?” Mikey was shushed thrice.

Leo gave the motion for his team to follow him as he lead the way down the tunnel.

“It could be an ambush.” Donnie whispered to Leo as they approached.

“If it is, we’ll be prepared—“

Leo held out his hand to stop his brothers as the sound started up again. It took a second, but eventually Leo took notice that it wasn’t the same sound. This time it wasn’t metal snapping, it was more like groaning. Like someone had taken two metal pipes and twisted them together. And there were footsteps— heavy, slow footsteps in uneven intervals.

“What in the world…?”

Leo squinted when a figure made itself known. It looked amost like a spider, with a massive, spiked body and five and a half legs. It seemed to have two heads each moving separately of the other, and the noises it made sounded like something under great strain or in pain. It swayed unsteadly before them and tried to take a step forward.

“Stop right there!” Leo commanded to the beast, holding his katana in its direction.

The monster seemed to understand., and it stopped.

“Leo, that’s—“

Leo shushed Donnie.

“But it’s—“

The figure tried to move toward them again and Leo flashed his sword in another threat. “I said stay back!”

“LEO!” Donnie didn't give Leo the chance to say anything, pulling up his goggles and flicking a flashlight on the creature. “Look…”

The creature— or more like creatures— flinched at the light shined in their faces. Of the six legs Leo had thought he’d seen, only two of them proved to be real, and the one creature turned out to be two. The smaller one was on the bottom, supporting a second, larger creature on his back. Leo, Raph, and Mikey all gasped and withdrew in their shock, but Donnie held steadfast and kept the light trained on the enemy.

The smaller creature was a dark green with stripes of purple streaking across him, purple armor torn and some lost all together. He only had one kneepad and both of his sock peices were soaked dark and torn. His elbow pads remained mostly untouched, and his hands were bare. Technology littered his body— goggles on his head and a tablet on his arm and a belt and shoulder straps that supported a massive shield over his back— over his shell. From the armor came four metal arms, one of them broken and the rest straining to support the immense weight on top of him.

The larger was big enough to cover his carrier almost like a blanket, hiding a majority of the small turtle beneath his massive plastron and bulking arms. He might have been a lighter shade of green— it was hard to tell in the lighting, and even then it hardly mattered. The only evidence the great beast was still living was the fact that he was moving his head around, just slightly. Thick streams of crimson bubbled forth from a gaping wound in his carapace, bleeding out and covering him in streams of shiny red that dripped down his arms and side and onto his companion. He gave the slightest groan at the light shining on him and tried to open his eyes.

“What the fuuuuu…?” Leo gaped.

The purple-clad mutant looked weakly to the four with tired, terrified eyes. “Help…”

He collapsed into the sewage.

#rise raphael #bayverse raph #bayverse leo #tmnt bayverse #bayverse donnie #bayverse mikey #rottmnt donnie #tmnt crossover

119 notes · View notes

kasienda · 3 years ago

Text

Right Behind You - Ch 3: Akuma

Chapter 1: Scandal

Chapter 2: Friends

Chapter 3: Akuma

Chat Noir vaulted from one building to the next with the ease that came with almost a decade of practice. Even the explosions that tilted the ground with alarming frequency did nothing to throw off the hero’s balance or progression.

He landed in a crouch overlooking the akuma. The akuma was cemented into the ground with neon blue cannons on both arms, but able to pivot in every direction. Smaller turrets dotted the area in half a dozen concentric circles around the main villain.

It shot off a projectile that split off into six different pieces, each one flying towards a different building. Chat cringed as the missiles found their targets bringing down each building in what looked like controlled demolitions. Seismic waves crashed through the area seconds later.

Definitely not good.

At least it was stationary. But it had enough firepower that getting close would be near impossible.

Maybe he should have dove in immediately, but he didn’t see any evidence of civilians, and he really wanted some backup because explosions sucked. Even if Miraculous Ladybug healed everything after the fact, fighting with broken ribs was not fun. Not remotely. And with the explosives coming at the end of heavy projectiles with homing capabilities, they would have to approach this one cautiously, and probably defensively.

He groaned. He hated laying siege. It was going to take hours.

Carapace landed on the roof beside him. “How ya doing, Kit-Kat?”

Chat Noir smiled in greeting, but his eyes remained laser focused on the akuma. “Honestly? I’ve had better days. You?”

“Same. I got almost no sleep last night. And the alert woke me from the absolute best nap I’ve had in weeks. Now, I’ve got a killer headache instead.”

The rooftop under them shook as a nearby building crashed to the ground in a heap of rubble.

“That is one nasty akuma,” Carapace said.

Chat Noir nodded in agreement as he opened up the extra-dimensional pocket in his baton and pulled out two little white pills. He held them out to his turtle-themed teammate. “I keep some extra strength Tylenol in my baton.”

Carapace’s face lit up as he took the offered medication. “Dude! I could kiss you!”

Chat smirked. “You’ll have to buy me dinner first.”

Carapace barked out a laugh. “I’m sure I could whip up a can of tuna for you, Kit-Kat.”

Chat shook his head playfully. “You’ll have to work harder to win my affections. I’ll have you know this cat has a very refined palette.”

Carapace laughed.

Chat Noir smiled. Maybe an hours-long siege wouldn’t be so bad. Definitely better than staying home alone in his oversized studio obsessing over every missed red flag from his “date” the day prior.

Maybe he should have gone on a date with Carapace instead.

Keep reading on Ao3

“Shouldn’t we be fighting the akuma instead of standing around flirting?”

Chat Noir and Carapace both turned around to see Rena Rouge standing behind them with her eyebrows raised in judgement.

Chat just grinned, sweeping her into a sideways hug. “Rena! It’s been so long!”

“Missed you, too kitty. What’ve we got?” she asked, peering down over the edge of the roof.

“A demolition man?” Carapace observed, as another six buildings crumbled to the ground.

“Isn’t that a movie?” Chat asked. An old movie. Had Nino tried to get him to watch it? Nino loved any and all action flicks - new and old.

“Yup!” Rena confirmed. “My ex subjected me to it. Terrible movie.”

“Lies!” Carapace objected, shaking his head. “Don’t listen to her, Kit-Kat. Definitely worth your time.”

“I will never get those hours of my life back,” Rena said, drolly.

Chat Noir burst out laughing at the appalled expression on Carapace’s face.

“Guys! Let’s focus!” Ladybug’s voice interjected from behind them.

Chat started for a second, and then whirled towards her with a charming smile. “It’s good to see you, m’lady!”

She didn’t smile. “Not tonight, Chaton. Can we just get this over with?”

“Everything alright, boss lady?” Carapace asked, his lips curled downward into a slight frown.

She didn’t spare him a glance either. Instead, she watched the destruction below them without emotion. “I was having a good time with my friends for the first time in forever after an absolutely terrible week. And akumas…”

“Suck,” Carapace filled in.

“Exactly,” Ladybug agreed. “So, let’s get this over with and maybe the day can be salvaged. Chat, you go down the middle, Carapace go left of the building, and I’ll take the right. Rena, we need a ton of decoys. The goal is for all three of us to get there simultaneously and strike at once.”

Chat frowned, glancing away from the akuma and towards his partner. “Are you sure, m’lady? Wouldn’t it be better to huddle up, let Carapace cover us to get close?”

Carapace and Rena Rouge said nothing, both turned to Ladybug waiting for her response, but Ladybug’s face was still flat and impossible even for Chat Noir to read.

“If we split up,” he continued. “We’ll be more likely to get picked off. And the decoys will help, but they can’t replace an almost impenetrable shield against those missiles.”

“Playing this one defensively will take hours,” she said. “Let’s try the offensive strike first, and if it doesn’t work we can pivot quickly and we’ll be in a closer position to set up a shield.”

Adrien did not like it. She was asking him to gamble with their lives, with her life, to save time. Even Carapace and Rena exchanged a frown.

“Please,” Ladybug begged, taking a step forward, her blue eyes darting from one of them to the next, her face finally showing some emotion, and he did not like what he saw. “I really need to avoid an endless siege,” she whispered, her eyes suddenly glassy, threatening tears.

Her distress hit him like a punch to the gut. She clearly wasn’t okay, and hadn’t been for awhile. How had he failed to notice that she was far from okay? Because her tears now had nothing to do with the current akuma. This went deeper and he hadn’t noticed anything was wrong. How long had she been struggling while he ran in circles trying to keep his father happy in between grad school commitments?

He couldn’t remember the last time he had met up with her for a joint patrol or just took her out on a friend date, which had once been a regular thing between them.

He would have to make it up to her, and he could start with making this akuma go away as quickly as possible.

He nodded, and offered her a small smile. “Okay, m’lady. I know that if anyone can pull off a crazy plan, it’s you.”

She offered a watery smile in return and he felt his chest loosen for the first time since the akuma alert had sounded. The day wasn’t wasted if he could help her have a better one.

“Thank you, Chaton,” she said. “I…”

Her words were cut off as the building adjacent to them crashed to the ground in a crumbling free fall.

“Whatever we’re going to do, we should probably do it now,” Rena said.

Ladybug’s soft vulnerable tears disappeared as she turned back to the akuma. Her usual game face - serious and sharp - took its place. And Chat couldn’t help the fond smile that bloomed across his face. Even when she was coming apart at the edges, she had so much strength. So much resilience.

“Rena, I want as many decoys as you can pull off,” Ladybug ordered. Rena nodded. “We’ll charge with a two second delay once the illusion is in place. Carapace, on the left, Chat in the middle, and I’ll take the right. Ready?”

“Aye aye, boss lady,” Carapace acknowledged with a salute.

The familiar sound of the flute rang through the air, and suddenly an army of countless Ladybugs, Carapaces, and Chat Noirs surrounded them protectively on all sides, just far enough apart that he didn’t really have to worry about touching them.

Chat launched himself off the rooftop towards the akuma.

Missiles flew at the decoys, but the illusions dove sideways and away from the projectiles, most of them avoiding the collisions. The missiles were too fast though, and dozens of decoys clipped out of existence.

Chat Noir maintained his forward charge trying not to think about how unprotected he was. How unprotected his lady and Carapace were.

The akuma was right in front of him - just a single vault away, when he stumbled - tripped over an errant piece of debris like a raw beginner who didn’t have nine years of experience under his belt. He took out half a dozen decoys himself as they ran straight through him.

He launched himself up from the cracked sidewalk immediately, but the damage was done. Carapace was stalled, fending off an unlucky aerial assault. Ladybug took the lead and reached the akuma first. But the villain fended her off easily with a backhand that sent her flying. Then fired off five missiles all tracking straight for Chat Noir who had just given away his position.

He dodged around the first one easily enough. The second one, too. But the third cost him his balance, and he barely managed to swerve around the fourth. He ended up helpless on his knees, at the mercy of the fifth.

Every muscle locked, anticipating the blow, when Carapace slammed into him from the side, stealing his breath away. And they both ended sprawled across the unforgiving concrete. Before he could recover, the projectile hit the ground where he had been kneeling seconds prior.

The pavement launched upward, slamming him completely back to the ground. The sound was too loud to be heard, but he definitely felt it rip painfully through his body despite his protective transformation.

His ears - ringing with the aftershock - couldn’t hear anything else. But the protective green glow of Carapace’s shelter bloomed into existence around them, deflecting the worst of the next concussive wave over their heads. The ground remained unsteady beneath them though.

Chat Noir allowed himself one deep breath before he kipped up to his feet and hauled Carapace to his, as his eyes rapidly took in the field on the other side of the green shield that was already cracking from a relentless assault.

“Please tell me this day is almost over,” Carapace growled out.

Most of the decoys had been decimated at this point - only a dozen or so remained, but Rena Rouge couldn’t create more without losing the current ones, which would reveal Ladybug’s position immediately.

Chat laughed. “I wish.”

He knew which one was actually Ladybug, though. It was in her single-minded focus. Every version of her was quick and graceful, able to pivot on the spot, and perform impossible dodges, but Ladybug always landed closer to her target than she started, determined as she was to end this battle.

She truly was in rare form tonight. Her plan would likely have worked amazingly if he hadn’t screwed it up.

The akuma managed to take out another handful of decoys with his latest barrage of missiles. And then the akuma got lucky, and shot towards the real deal.

“Carapace-”

She dove forward under the projectile, and then flipped back to her feet right in front of the akuma.

“-drop the shield.” Chat Noir ordered, already running toward the barrier, not waiting for it to fall.

She snatched a keychain or a dog tag from the akuma’s neck, grinning in victory. She crushed it into pieces with her strengthened hands, but her grin dissolved when no butterfly emerged.

The green shield fell away. Chat put on a burst of speed.

The akuma swung his cannon arm and slammed it into Ladybug’s side. She was thrown sideways, and landed in a terrifyingly still puddle of red and black.

The akuma pointed his rocket launcher towards her.

Chat Noir threw himself forward just as the akuma shot off the missile.

He took the blast square in the back. His suit no doubt offered some protection but this akuma had the power to bring down solid steel super frames.

Chat Noir’s skeletal structure didn’t stand a chance.

Pressure exploded across his spine. The blinding pain came an instant later. It felt like he was being burned alive both inside and out.

He didn’t break his fall, his arms dangling lifeless at his sides. He landed face first, his chin striking the crumbling pavement sending a second wave of agony through his form.

He couldn’t breathe, let alone scream.

Was this what dying felt like?

It had never hurt this bad before.

…

Carapace was still processing what Chat said when he took off like a bullet. Straight for the shield. Carapace frantically dissolved the barrier before his teammate could crash into it. Carapace shot after him, only a few paces behind, but he already knew it wasn’t enough.

His heart jumped up to his throat and time slowed to nothing as he watched Chat Noir take the hit meant for Ladybug, and crash to the ground, both his magical suit and skin torn to shreds, exposing raw bleeding tissue on his back and legs.

Carapace threw himself into a roll to put himself between the akuma and his fallen companion, and landed sprawled against the black cat’s unmoving form, screaming for his shelter once again.

The shield went up not a second too soon, immediately taking hit after hit. The sound of cracking glass echoed overhead reminding him that the shield would only hold for so long against the maelstrom.

He glanced back, hoping he had managed to envelop Ladybug in the protective barrier as well. No such luck. She was just on the other side of the glowing green bubble. At least it was between her and the akuma. They made eye contact, and she jerked her head towards Chat.

She wanted him to take care of her partner - not dive back into the battle.

He nodded acknowledgement.

A second later, she launched herself off the ground and took cover in the growing piles of rubble.

His attention turned to Chat Noir who wasn’t moving.

“Talk to me, Kit Kat!” Carapace shook his shoulder, but there was nothing, not so much as a groan.

Up close, Chat looked even worse - like he had been chewed up and swallowed by a dinosaur, only to be spit back out. Carapace could only imagine how much pain he was in. Carapace had been knocked around more than his fair share in this line of work, but he’d never taken a hit that vaporized the suit away!

He carefully rolled Chat to his side and then to his back, trying not to touch his injuries, which was almost impossible as they covered more than a third of his body. He was completely limp. Carapace leaned his cheek to Chat’s mouth, feeling for any signs of breathing.

There wasn’t any.

Carapace sucked in his own breath, his throat threatening to squeeze shut, and dread twisted his gut like a coiled snake.

Carapace had seen Chat Noir put under mind control, transformed into various inanimate objects, erased or vaporized from existence. But he had never before had to confront a lifeless body.

But surely the ladybugs could bring him back, right?

Another volley of missiles struck the outside of his barrier, the ground underneath them tilting sideways. The shield was holding.

The sound of static buzzing filled the air and Chat’s transformation dropped.

Carapace was completely unprepared. They were adults. They hadn’t timed out in ages. And he jerked his gaze away, but unfortunately, Carapace could recognize his own best friend from just his clothes and shoes.

Especially when he had his face pressed to that shirt not thirty minutes prior.

His gaze whipped back up to the painfully familiar face, now marred with gashes and a rapidly forming bruise on his chiseled chin.

“Opaque!” Carapace yelled. The translucent barrier turned a dark and solid green, though the cracks and fissures remained. He wouldn’t be able to see the battle, but that was better than losing Chat’s identity to all of Paris.

Adrien’s identity.

The same Adrien who befriended him in collège when he had fallen into almost total isolation after his older brother had disappeared, the Adrien who had coaxed him through his first gig, the Adrien who had nursed him through his break up with Alya, who had held his hand through his bisexual awakening, the Adrien who had never failed to be there for him.

The Adrien who was his very best friend who was currently not breathing.

Nino cradled his best friend’s head in his lap as hot burning tears fell onto Adrien’s cheeks.

“Carapace,” Chat’s kwami said. “He’s not okay.”

“But he’s going to be okay, right?” Carapace asked, his eyes never leaving Adrien’s pale and lifeless form. “As soon as Ladybug fixes everything?”

“Probably not,” Plagg said.

The two words struck him like a freight-train. His gut dropped out from underneath him as his heart rose up to his throat. His eyes burned, and the whole world went out of focus. He fell forward, his head pressed against Adrien’s as his sudden grief came out in wracking howls that sounded inhuman even to his own ears.

He rocked back and forth, still holding Adrien close - if Nino held him close enough and hard enough, maybe he wouldn’t leave him.

Nino knew that’s not how this worked. His throat cemented closed, and yet his devastated cries broke past the emotional blockade anyway.

“Carapace! Listen to me!” Plagg flew right into his face. “There’s a chance to save him! I need you to keep his heart going until Ladybug does her thing!”

“W-what?” Nino stammered, staring at the kwami in confusion. “What do you mean?”

“Turtle boy!” Plagg barked. “I need you to focus! Hands on his chest! Now! I will not lose this kitten!”

“You mean, like CPR?”

“Yes! Now!”

Nino scrambled to comply, laying Adrien’s prone head gently on the ground, trying to ignore the stains of red on his own arms. He placed his hands on his friend’s chest. With elbows locked, Nino started pressing down hard over and over again.

“Faster!” Plagg directed. “Don’t stop!”

Nino tried to focus on his own hands, and not on the hot tears slipping down over his mask, or the blood seeping on the cement to his knees, or the angry deep cuts that slashed across Adrien’s face, or Adrien’s closed eyes that might never open again.

Nino tried to stamp down on his rising panic, tried to hold back the torrent of grief and tears, but he was failing. His whole form was crumpling in on itself as the wracking sobs kept coming in unrelenting waves despite his best efforts to hold them at bay.

“Don’t stop!” Plagg shouted again, diving towards Adrien’s jean pockets.

Nino swallowed his fear and his devastation, forced it down until his gut swam sickenly. He fought off his desire to fold into a ball and howl to the universe about how this couldn’t happen.

Instead, he forced himself to keep pressing down and up, and then down and up again on Adrien’s chest. It was a drum beat that he had to maintain, he couldn’t stop no matter how much his arms and shoulders burned in complaint.��

Because if he stopped, the world might end.

If it hadn’t already.

Plagg reappeared with Adrien’s phone in hand. A minute later he placed the device against Adrien’s bruised chin. A youtube tutorial on CPR was playing. Nino adjusted his rhythm to match the rapid counting in the video. It became mindless at that point, which unfortunately meant he had more ability to think.

It didn’t seem like it was working. Adrien wasn’t responding at all, and he was losing more blood with every thrust of Nino’s arms if the dark pool of red black at his knees was any indicator.

Nino lost his pace for a second overwhelmed with fear. What if it didn’t work?

“Don’t stop!” Plagg shouted.

“He’s bleeding out!” Nino screamed back, syncing up with the video once again. “Aren’t I just making things worse?”

“Probably. I doubt anything is getting to his brain. But you’re not trying to revive him,” the kwami said, dismissively.

“I’m not?”

“No, you’re just trying to keep his soul here until Ladybug defeats the akuma.”

“His s-soul?” Nino stuttered over the word, his desperate sobs now coming in torrents.

His fucking soul? What was Nino supposed to do with that? It was too big and too much, and Nino didn’t know how to wrap his head around any of it.

“P-please, Dri,” Nino begged, his voice cracking on the nickname. “P-please, don’t leave me.”

Nino’s arms kept the rhythm, never losing the pace. Even transformed, his shoulders and triceps were burning in protest, but Nino ignored it. Wayzz would provide all the endurance he needed.

The sound of shattering glass exploded overhead, spiderweb cracks spreading all across the dome.

“Fuck.”

The shield couldn’t take another hit.

“Lose the transformation,” Plagg ordered.

Nino’s eyes whipped toward the cat kwami. “What?! Plagg! I don’t know how long I can do this without enhanced strength.”

“I will destroy anything that gets through until Wayzz has another shield up. You can’t do CPR and replenish our defenses over and over, simultaneously.”

“But… doesn’t a kwami using his power by himself make bad things happen?” ” Carapace objected out of habit, not because he particularly cared at the moment. Nino had never had the opportunity to see Wayzz without the limits of the miraculous.

“Something bad has already happened! This is called damage control! We don’t have time to argue!”

Another splintering crack overhead seemed to punctuate Plagg’s point.

“Wayzz, shell off,” Carapace whispered.

Immediately, his arms and back burned more intensely with the loss of the miraculous’s support, and Nino grunted with effort.

But he wouldn’t stop - not now, not ever. This was Adrien and he didn’t care if his arms fell off. He wasn’t going to give up on him.

“Cataclysm!” Plagg shouted, flying rapidly out of Nino’s line of sight. He didn’t worry about how much of the city block Plagg might take with him in destroying the incoming missiles, trusting the kwami would direct the damage AWAY from them. He didn’t worry about anyone being able to see his or Adrien’s identity. There was so much smoke that it wasn’t possible. And Nino didn’t worry about the fact that they were exposed or vulnerable.

Adrien was already dead. If they got hit, then at least they’d go together.

Black ash rained down around them like some kind of ominous snow.

“Opaque Shelter!” Wayzz called half a second after.

With the shield in place, Plagg whipped back down to Adrien’s shoulder watching intently.

“Come on, Pigtails,” Plagg grumbled. “We’re running out of time.”

Nino’s right arm spasmed in that moment, and he wasn’t sure if it was fatigue or the rising panic caused by Plagg’s words.

“No! We can’t be out of time!” Nino screamed as if Plagg could control when Adrien’s soul was gone. Nino wiped his snot on his own shoulder, and turned his glare on Adrien’s face. “Do you hear me, Dri?!” Nino screamed, unable to wipe the tears dripping from his eyes over his nose to fall on his own now bare hands. “You can’t give up on me! You can’t!”

This wouldn’t be Adrien’s last day on Earth.

It couldn’t be.

Because Nino didn’t know how to face the world without his best friend.

…

Adrien’s entire existence was pain. Everything was on fire - from the top of his head, through his body, to the tips of his fingers. All of it was pulsing in an agonizing rhythm. He thought the internal inferno centered on his chest, but his back felt like he had landed in a pool filled with glass shards. He couldn’t feel his legs at all, which considering how everything else was fairing, might have been a blessing.

But it was his chest that cried out as it was struck again and again without care for his fractured ribs.

Stop, he tried to say, begged from every inch of his mind. But the words would not form on his lips. Please, just let it end.

But the hammers to his chest kept coming, relentless and never ending. He urged his arms to action - to move, but every last bit of strength had been sapped away.

He prayed that it had been worth it - that Ladybug was alive and well - able to defeat the akuma without him.

But his condition suggested otherwise. If Ladybug was okay, he would be too.

Someone was crying hysterically just above him, well on their way to screaming. Their voice was broken and raspy.

It wasn’t Ladybug - the tone was too deep - but it struck a chord in him. He wanted to soothe it just the same.

I’ve survived worse, he wanted to tell the voice, though he had serious doubts if that was true. But being erased from the time continuum had to be worse, right?

“Dri?”

That was Nino. Adrien could only moan in response.

“Shit! Plagg, I think he’s awake.”

Why was Nino talking to Plagg? Plagg knew better.

“Don’t you dare stop!” his kwami ordered.

No. Please stop. It only came out as a whimper.

Something hot and wet fell onto his cheek. “I’m so sorry, du-” Nino’s voice cracked before he finished the word.

Nino was crying.

Adrien had made Nino cry. He hated that.

Adrien opened his eyes only to be assaulted with hard edges and burning lights that were far too bright. None of it made sense. He slammed them shut again, but it didn’t help. His head still wanted to split into halves.

“Dude! Take it easy!”

A warmth settled on his shoulder. Soothing vibrations pulsed through his neck. Like a cat’s purr.

Plagg?

“I know it hurts, kitten.”

Adrien would have laughed had he been able. Hurt did not begin to describe the agony he was in.

“But you will survive.”

The painful beat on his chest - so hard, so deep - like a stampede of gazelles were trampling over him - continued. It never stopped.

Adrien wasn’t sure he wanted to survive.

The sobs from the boy above him - deep cries of pure despair - made him reconsider. Adrien would survive anything - go through any torture - to soothe Nino’s pain.

Mercifully, everything faded.

When Adrien woke up again it was to a miraculously pain-free world. He sighed, his whole body easing in relaxation. The memory of his torture was already fading fast.

He opened his eyes again, but he still couldn’t bring the world into focus. There was a flash of green light of a miraculous transformation, but it was too bright. And Adrien let his eyes fall closed again.

He pressed his hands down for balance, expecting to find debris and jagged fragments on the sidewalk below him. But the cold ground was smooth and undamaged. His hands were bare - he wasn’t transformed. He should have been transformed, shouldn’t he? They had been fighting an akuma.

The ladybugs had healed everything. But then, why did his head still feel like thick fog?

“Dude! Can you hear me?”

He wetted his lips. “Nino?” Adrien asked, recognizing the voice.

There was a beat of silence. “Yeah, it’s me, dude. Can you sit up?”

Adrien attempted to do so, and was surprised at how hesitant his muscles were to respond to his wishes. He managed to prop himself up with Nino was bracing him on both sides. Adrien leaned into the support. What was wrong with his body?

“Why?” The word came out slowly, as if Adrien’s mouth was just remembering how to form the sounds. “Why... is the world spinning?”

Adrien wasn’t often one to complain, but usually, the ladybugs did a way better job.

“You sure he’s okay now?” Nino was asking. But who was he talking to? “Should I take him to a hospital?”

“He’s fine. The ladybugs healed him. The hospital wouldn’t know what to do with him now.”

Was that Plagg? Why was Plagg talking to Nino? Plagg should know better. Adrien clutched the sides of his head, in both hands. Why did nothing make sense?

But the nasally voice continued. “He wasn’t completely gone yet, so they could heal him. He’s physically fine now. Good job, turtle boy.”

“What about mentally?” Nino asked.

Adrien squeezed his eyes closed. They weren’t helping him anyway, only making him dizzy.

“You worry too much. He just needs twelve hours of sleep. He’ll be as perfect as a freshly opened wheel of camembert.”

Adrien snorted out a laugh. And it was surprisingly painless. He found himself smiling sleepily, and leaning into Nino’s chest, which felt a lot… more solid than normal.

“We don’t normally need twelve hours of sleep after a Miraculous Ladybug.” Nino’s voice was hard with frustration. “What’s different?”

“The difference is he died!” Plagg snapped back.

Adrien wanted to ask about that. What was the big deal? He had died countless times before, and it had never mattered before.

But the conversation faded away.

He woke again when he was laid down gently into his own bed. A heavy hand rubbed his shoulder soothingly. There was a beeping sound. A phone. And the hand disappeared.

Adrien whimpered at it’s loss.

“Yeah?” a familiar voice answered. It was still Nino. “LB, calm down. He’s okay. I took him home before anyone could see who he was. Plagg says he’ll be coherent again in twelve hours. I’ll tell him you want to see him for patrol tomorrow?”

And now Nino was talking to Ladybug like they knew each other well. It was like his worlds had smashed together like a meteor crashing onto the Earth’s surface and Adrien had somehow managed to sleep through the world ending collision.

Was any of this real? Was he dreaming?

He tried to sit up, but Nino’s sudden hand on his chest kept him down. Plagg curled up on his shoulder and started purring. Adrien stopped resisting and stayed down.

“Yes, he was healed,” Nino said. “I don’t know. Plagg said it was normal for him to be out of it for a while even with the ladybugs because of… how badly he was hurt.”

There was another pause, as the person on the other side of the conversation - presumably Ladybug - responded.

“I promise he’s okay. Yeah… of course. I’ll be right there.” And the comforting weight on his chest vanished.

“Plagg?” Nino called. “Can you let him know that he has a patrol with Ladybug tomorrow at the normal time? I gotta run.”

Adrien’s chest tightened at that announcement.

“You’ll call me if anything changes?” Nino continued.

“Sure, kid,” Plagg said, still curled up on Adrien’s shoulder.

Adrien tried to sit up again, but his body wasn’t listening to his brain. “N-Ni…no?” he forced the name past his lips. Why was it so hard to speak?

The smooth gloved hand was on his chest again, easing his anxiety. “Just rest, mec.”

But the hand disappeared again too fast and too soon.

“D-don’t… g-go,” Adrien managed to string together.

The comforting presence came back, and this time Adrien pinned Nino’s arm to his chest with both his hands, determined to keep him there this time. “Okay,” Nino reassured, and slid into the bed lying prone alongside him. Adrien’s body finally melted in relief.

“I’ll stay until you go to sleep,” Nino said.

For a beautiful moment all the tension in his body seeped away, and he just let himself drift. But a few seconds later, he processed Nino’s words and his eyes shot open.

Because Adrien didn’t want to sleep. Something was clearly wrong. He looked frantically around at the walls, ceiling, and furniture. Adrien recognized none of it. There were too many lights and colors and none of it made any sense, and it felt like the walls were closing in on him. What the hell was wrong with him?

“N-Nino?” Adrien called, his eyes burned and his throat was closing off. “W-what…?” but he couldn’t get the rest of the words out. And it was hard not to panic. His breathing quickened, and his heart took off like there was a race to be won.

He sucked in air frantically, because he wasn’t getting any. His chest spasmed painfully, and his arms were shaking, and his fingers tingling. The tremors spread to his extremities, the numbness only a second behind. He tried to stop the convulsing, he tried to hold it still, but he couldn’t do it. The pinpricks spread to his head, and his vision spun worse than it already was.

“Dude!” Nino jumped in, clutching Adrien’s head in either hand. His hands were gloved and hard.

Was it really Nino? It didn’t feel like Nino, and Adrien didn’t trust his eyes that were incapable of making sense of anything at the moment.

“You need to stay calm. Breathe with me,” Nino said, their foreheads pressed together, but Nino was wearing some kind of hood - it was hard… like Chat Noir’s armor.

“Dri!”

The exclamation cut through all of Adrien’s panicked thoughts. That was definitely Nino. Whatever he physically felt like, no one else called Adrien that. Nino had come up with the diminutive nickname a few years ago, shortly after he had broken up with Alya. He didn’t use it often - it was usually dude, mec, man, guy, but in the quiet moments, Nino would call him Dri. And Adrien loved it, especially when Nino was the one saying it.

“Can you do that, Dri? Breathe in slowly.”

And Adrien trusted Nino more than anyone, except maybe Ladybug, and even then, he thought it might be a tie.

And so he listened. He breathed in deeply and slowly on a count of four before letting it back out again for another slow count of four from his best friend.

His panic gradually receded. And he just lay there keeping his eyes closed, his hand clinging onto Nino’s - when had he even grabbed Nino’s hand - as if his life depended on it.

Nino was still wearing the thick solid gloves.

Nino didn’t wear gloves. Not ever.

“What happened?” Adrien asked slowly, pleased that the words strung together fully and clearly.

Nino’s grip tightened. “I promise I’ll explain it to you later, Kit-Kat. Plagg says you need rest.”

Had Nino just called him Kit-Kat?

“Plagg always…” Was he seriously talking about Plagg with Nino? This had to be a dream. “Plagg always votes-” Adrien’s sentence was punctuated by a yawn, “-for laziness.”

“I think Plagg may be onto something this time,” Nino said.

Adrien wanted to argue. He hated it when people didn’t explain things. When people kept secrets. And he knew he was the biggest hypocrite on that front, but he would have told Nino everything years ago if it had been his choice.

But his head was growing heavy, and his thoughts were still smothered in a muggy fog, so he didn’t protest.

“I love you, Dri,” Nino whispered. “You have no idea how much. Please. Please, don’t ever do that to me again.”

I love you, too.

…

Chapter 4: Fallout

#adrino #adrinino #friends to lovers #slow burn #Adrien Agreste #Nino Lahiffe #temporary character death #mentions of blood #anxiety #panic attacks #hurt comfort #romance #battle scenes are also hard #right behind you #my own content #miraculous ladybug fan fiction

24 notes · View notes

danddymaro · 4 years ago

Text

Nameless Girl | Shizuo Heiwajima x Reader

I remember when I first watched Durarara years ago, I instantly liked Shizou. Such a sweet, misunderstood man.

‘ example’ = Italics in quotations are thoughts

example = Italics W/out are flashbacks

Wordcount:

Nameless Girl

She hadn’t expected to ever find herself filled with such excitement, much less having thought that it would come right to her,

But it did, and it started out like any other day...

“Yes,” she replied dully, “ I’m almost home dummy, stop worrying,” she said with a smile, trying to shake off her good friend’s worry. “I know it’s getting dark, but trust me the streets are packed,” (f/n) argued back, “So, nothing’s gonna happen,” she assured (best friend’s name.)

News of the Slasher set off worry, and her good friend was one of the many people set on protective overdrive,

“ Alright, Alright, I’ll message you when I get home, alright?” (f/n) said with a soft smile, shaking her head as she was still on the phone.

From the other line an exasperated voice continued to jabber, annoyed at the casual manner the young woman dismissed it with,

“-Ok, Ok Bye!” (f/n) laughed, hanging up. “I swear nothing will happen!” She added with assurance trying to play off the seriousness with her chuckle.

Because what were the odds she’d be attacked?

What were the odds something so extraordinary would happen to the ordinary?

She was ready to put her phone back in her jacket’s pocket when she suddenly fell back. Her cell, which had been in her right hand, practically flew from her loose grasp as she came down.

It then slid farther from her and onto the crowded street, making her eyes round widely,

“Oh shit!” she fretted, crawling towards the fallen, little technological piece with haste. Fortunately, she hadn’t taken long to react, scrambling off from her ass and crawling towards the cell before someone carelessly stomped on it.

Once her hand came in contact with the phone the young woman snatched it and clutched it close to her chest, almost afraid to take a moment to look down at it, knowing it could be cracked.

Yet again she cursed, hoping to high heaven that it was just fine, or that at the very least, it had a tiny, itsy bitsy scratch she could just ignore.

Standing up, she gave a quick heave before dashing her (e/c) eyes down to the cell, finding it to be safe from any nasty damage.

Not a single chip or crack was in sight making her cry out of utter joy,

“Yes!” she chirped, her face wiped off of any trace of negative emotion, instead, looking elated.

It had taken her months to pay it off, and she would have been heartbroken to know the small splurge she’d invested in hadn’t lasted even a year.

‘Luck is on my side!’ She cheered.

A low rumble of curses then brought her eyes forward, causing them to land onto a man who seemed to be in a similar position as she was,

‘Hold on,’ She thought to herself, feeling her blood run cold. ‘You've got to be kidding me,’ She inwardly cried.

As she had trailed her eyes up to him, her breath hitched, immediately recognizing him from the descriptions, and biting her tongue, she refrained from saying something stupid that could trigger him.

He was someone an everyday person would gossip of, but never have the nerve to face, not even in a wild dream...

‘Shizuo Heiwajima.’ She confirmed once taking a second look at his outfit.

It was the same Shizuo Heiwajima she’d been warned to stay away from. The same one that couldn’t control his rage, who terrorized the entire city with flying vending machines on a daily occurrence as well.

‘THAT Shizuo Heiwajima...’ She thought to herself visibly shrinking. ‘Lucky me’ She panned, taking back her earlier declaration of good fortune.

“I’m so sorry!” she squeaked, quickly bowing her head in apology, “ I should have watched where I was going!” she blubbered, “ I’m really sorry!” she rambled on before the man, sticking her head down with the utmost respect.

‘Please don’t kill me!’ She translated in her mind, hoping he understood the unspoken cry through her apology.

Watching with widened eyes, he stared down the young woman with a look of surprise worn on his face. His full attention was on her to such a degree that almost everything else became an afterthought. Heck, even the guy he’d been chasing down became irrelevant by then.

He had even forgotten why he had been so angry in the first place…

‘Some dumbass…’ He dumbly thought to himself, ‘It’s always some dumbass,’ He added, knowing it was true.

“That dumbass who’s probably gone by now,” he tisked to himself, slowly coming back to his senses, his shoulders dropping in defeat.

Taking notice of his rather passive, defeated behavior she stood up with returning confidence, her concern growing for him instead,

“Hey...I didn’t hurt you did I?” she asked with worry, taking a small step forward, a notable concern visible on her lovely face. However, it was clearly noted she was still cautious not to come too close, despite the placid kindness being directed at him.

‘I wasn't the one that just flew a couple of feet…’ He thought to himself as he shook his head.

He then stared stunned at her as he saw her hand open before him. Nervously, her hand stretched out to him and with graciousness he took it, soon standing at his full height and towering before her,

‘I guess I should just thank her,’ He thought to himself, intent on doing so, however, he found difficulty in doing so.

He opened his mouth to speak, letting nothing but a small croak escape his dry mouth. With pursed lips he continued to stare down at the female, not knowing how to push out the jumbled words from his mouth.

To his misfortune, his voice caught in his throat, and instead of being a normal human being with actual social skills, he turned, walking away stiffly.

That day, Shizuo Heiwajima cowered, leaving the dumbfounded cutie with confusion in regards to their first encounter.

“Wait...what was really him?” She said softly, murmuring to herself with wonder.

She lightly gnawed at her thumb’s already abused and previously chewed little nail, not sure what to really think of him.

‘ Rather odd, but not at all some monstrous freak, ’ she thought to herself. ‘...Kind of cute actually,’ she mused with a small, girlish giggle. “Kind of cute?” she said out loud to herself as she contemplated over her daring, little thought.

“More like handsome, kind of charming,” she corrected herself thinking back to the man and the little stain of pink that may or may not have been painted over his face.

‘But wasn’t he supposed to bash my face in?’ She wondered. ‘Beat me up?’ She added, confused, though grateful none were part of the aftermath of their collision.

Her thoughts were then halted when she heard a different voice, deep and masculine with a heavy hint of an accent clearly not native to Japan,

“ Come try Russian sushi, yes?” The man said, offering her a gigantic smile of welcome.

“Russian sushi?” she repeated back, confused, “Is there such a thing?” she muttered before she turned to the voice.

And In her vision was a very tall man, with dark skin and grey eyes peering down at her.

She jumped seeing such a gigantic man towering over her, but quickly calmed at seeing he was just offering her a piece of paper.

Gingerly she accepted it, her eyes skimming over it.

“Ah, Russian sushi, so Russian accent,” she confirmed with a nod.

“Yes, yes, come try, you will like!” He said as he began to push her towards his shop. “ It's fresh! it's good!” He insisted, not giving her room for denial.

She sweatdropped as she allowed herself to be pushed inside because she knew that even if she tried to oppose, she doubted he’d let her slip by without her giving his restaurant a try.

Staying was a decision she didn't regret because she did enjoy it there and if she could give it an 8/10, a rating she’d be more than willing to rethink once she came back later in the week.

Her life then went on as usual, with the same ol same ol, except for one, tiny, little detail,

‘Shizuo,’ She mused, wondering just what he’d been up to the last few weeks.

Nothing had changed in her life except for the fact that every now and then, far too often in her opinion, she thought of the blonde man. Sometimes it was unexpected, remembering him throughout the course of the uneventful weeks with fondness.

Other times, like the present time, she willingly thought of him, wanting to know if the rumors about him were true,

‘Does he always wear that suit, and nothing more?’ She pondered, truly curious.

It was a cold winter night and Ikebukuro looked beautiful, a lovely sight to behold. The gentle descension of snowfall was a pretty sight to witness as it covered everything in sight, painting the streets with pure white.

As the snow came dancing down from the sky and peppering the streets with teenie dots of white, she smiled happily, not at all in opposition to the chillier days to come.

It was the first snow day of many to come, and she looked forward to what days lay ahead, fully prepared to enjoy each and every one.

She liked snow, and of course, what was much more, the chilliness of the night.

Momentarily, (f/n) found herself stopping, gazing up at the snowfall with memorization as the rest of the crowd went along their night, almost as though nothing had changed.

Almost like the beautiful sight was something of the everyday,

‘I guess that's what city life is,’ she thought to herself, taking into consideration that in such a buzzing and packed city, people didn’t have time to just stand and stare at the sky as idly as she did.

They had places to go, people to be with...

And those who weren't in a rush to get home had already had enough of the season.

Her tongue peeked from her lips, sticking out straight in wait of a teenie, little dot or two to land on it. And it didn’t take long before she caught some, having them instantly melt onto her warm muscle.

“ ah...I really do love Ikebukuro.” She mumbled, keeping her nose lifted, staring up at the darkened sky with glazed eyes of astonishment. “It’s so lovely here,” she added, digging her gloved hands in her coat pockets as she began to walk forward mindlessly.

She didn’t have a real destination, nowhere she had to really be at the moment, so decided she wanted to see more of the busy city.

Maybe she’d find some new place to eat, a new place to shop...

Heck, even some new friends.

‘I should get to talking to more people,’ She mused, knowing that co-workers didn’t really count.

She did also have (best friend) But they were out of the city, a long way from each other, studying off elsewhere to work on their dream career.

‘Maybe I should have also gone...’ She thought to herself, ‘Maybe I should have just taken the risk...go off somewhere else.’ She thought dejected.

‘Thinking of taking risks...’ she added while her mind yet again drifted off to the strange man she had met a couple of weeks ago,

‘Shizuo, I wonder if I’ll ever see you again... I also wonder If It'd be such a bad idea to go and look for you...’ she continued while her mind went to the blonde male, well aware that she had gotten an innocent, little infatuation with him.

With a blue sigh, she pouted, ‘Figures I’d set myself on someone so

…unattainable.’

Her body then clashed with another and she fell back with a small yelp, startled by the collision.

“Ahh man,” she sighed, and she winced as she slowly rose her head up, looking up at the man standing before her. And as luck would have it had been the one person she had found herself thinking of just a little too much lately,

Shizuo Heiwajima...

‘ It’s him, ‘ she thought while her (e/c) colored eyes rounded, a smile rising.

The same blonde-haired, sunglass-wearing guy from before was right there and to her disappointment, he looked not all too different from the first time she'd encountered him.

With the colder weather, everyone had decided to switch out to burlier clothing, something to bring warmth, but Shizuo was the strange man out, wearing the same bartender suit as that previous night, having nothing at all to save him from the cold night.

He looked exactly as he did the last time they met, except now he was adorned with few bruises over his face, red little blotches staining his white button-up shirt as well.

He tisked, a sound of obvious annoyance, preparing himself to give whatever idiot that crashed into him a good scare, when he stopped dead in his tracks, staring at the person with widened eyes.

'No way,’ He thought while marveling at her.

it was the same girl that he ran into before, now sitting right in front of him, the same little, startled expression she had worn the first time being present.

‘Ah, damn…’ He thought to himself as he felt his mouth go dry, the little bit of saliva that he could gather up forcibly traveling down his throat as he tried to prep himself to say something, preferably something nice.

Something that wouldn't make her run off too quickly….

“Maybe this is how we’ll keep meeting, eh?” She said smiling, beating him, seeming to not think twice about starting a little conversation with him.

“You keep running into me,” she added, smiling with amusement, a hint of tease in her playful tone.

‘Does she even know who I am ?’ he wondered with a small huff.

“Yeah…” He responded, holding out his hand to her, one she took without hesitance.

Everything went by swimmingly until she frowned, pursing her lips together and sighing, seeming annoyed with something.

“ Oh... You shouldn't be walking around like that.” She Chided, shaking her head in disapproval and pointing towards him, more specifically his attire.

He looked down at his clothing and wondered just what the heck she was talking about, what bothering his choice of clothing did to her.

“It's so cold outside,” she said shaking her head at him. “....And you're wearing that,” she said in a knowing manner, a hand on her hip, fully judging him.

“ so ?” he responded, a bit roughly, raising his defenses up as she attacked his outfit, the same one his brother had so kindly given him.

“The so is that you’ll get sick,” she said in a ‘matter of fact’ fashion, her face showing worry, melting into sweet concern.

“ you don't know me,” he responded back, stuffing his hands in his pockets, glaring down at her, chewing on his tongue, knowing he was sounding like a complete asshole. He didn’t want to sound so sharp and dismissive, but she was making him nervous, the little woman making his heart grow erratic.

He’d been practicing small talk, little things he could say to her if he ever had the chance of running into her again, but as he found himself at the perfect moment to use his mirror exercises, he blanked.

“So?” She said copying in his earlier response, making his eyebrow twitch. “ I might not know you, but you can still get sick,” She elaborated.

‘Walking out in the cold like this,’ She thought with lightly pressed lips.

Didn’t anyone worry about the man?

Unwrapping the warm scarf around her neck she offered it to him with a gentle smile, “ Here,” she said to him. She held it out practically shoving it in his face, “ just take this,” she added softly.

To anyone else, the offer may have been easy to understand, but he seemed to not get the gist of what she was doing, staring quizzically at the held out piece of cloth.

Like before he said nothing and only stared down at her, the same face caught in between anger, frustration, and just a whole lot of other mixes of messy emotions he wasn’t well at controlling.

She gave him an exasperated smile and shook her head while seeming entertained by him, and he wondered if she smiled so much around everyone else.

Was she all giggles and smiles?

Was she always so cute?

“I can tell you're not the type of guy for hand me outs, especially from some stranger,” she giggled. “ nonetheless...take it please,” she added.

His eyes were unreadable to her as she couldn't see past the tinted frames, but if she had been able to peek past them she would have easily noticed that they were practically glowing with appreciation.

His hardened hazelnut orbs softened and glimmering with gratefulness he couldn't properly put into words because yet again his voice had died.

He inwardly cursed, belittling his stubborn mouth for not moving all while he berated himself for not being a normal human being.

And perhaps his behavior seemed strange to others, but to her it was endearing.

“Maybe next time we run into each other you can hand it back,” she told him, her heart fluttering at the idea.

She giggled against her will at the noticeable tinge of pink on his pale cheeks, because with such a serious face he looked adorable.

And once again, she wondered if this man, Shizuo Heiwajima was the same one the vicious rumors had made him out to be.

Was he really a violent man? Terrifying?

‘ Not likely...’ she thought.

She’d only met him twice, and each time it was pleasant to encounter.

He had the right to snap at her for bumping into him, but he didn’t. Instead, he stayed quiet, just shy enough to show off the sweet rosy color now present on his cheeks.

If anything, she concluded that he was just a bit more on the less social side, which she understood, being somewhat of an introvert herself.

“So just take it, It's fine !” she chirped with insistence. Giving him no escape by following up with a wave, dashing through the filled streets on her way home, grinning wildly, her heart happy and bouncing with each step.

“- Please take care of yourself! ” she advised him before running off into the crowd and eventually disappearing away through the mass of people.

She just wanted to go home now, push her face against a pillow and squeal, gush like a teen with a massive crush,

‘I can’t believe I ran into him again!

And I can’t believe I gave my scarf to him!’

It was only a matter of seconds before she vanished, not a strand of ( h/c) hair being left behind to trail after.

- Only then could he begin to function properly, finding his voice.

He then stared down at the piece of clothing and sighed, reluctantly wrapping it properly around his neck, his gloved hand momentarily stroking it, not being able to feel the material with his own hands, but from the way it tickled at the back of his neck, he could feel the softness, and even the warmth she left behind on it.

“At Least it's not flashy,” he muttered looking down at it.

It wasn't designed in any particular way that stood out, just a simple black color that seemed to be knitted wool.

if anyone were to see him wearing it they wouldn’t assume it belonged to anyone else but him.

But there was just one thing that was off...

A distinguishable scent invaded his senses, blocking out the rest of the city's mixed uniqueness, becoming the overpowering fragrance.

With his right hand, he pushed the material around his neck up slightly above his pointed nose, smothering it with the sweet smell.

‘ perfume.’ He figured, ‘ Her perfume...’

He stood motionless for a few seconds, lost in his thoughts, many of which were about the (h/c) woman, but he knew they had no true importance.

They were things like :

Did she knit the scarf herself? Or had she bought it?

Had a friend been thoughtful enough to give it to her?

Was it just perfume? Or was it the fabric softener she used?

Was it maybe body wash?

All he knew was that it was a sweet, little smell that surrounded him, making his mind grow jumbled with thoughts of the young woman, most of which included questions he had about her since he first saw her.

It made the already noticeable blush on his cheeks worsen, and he huffed in frustration.

His warm breath collided with the chilly air and made a large puff of white cloud form,

“Damn it …” he muttered, looking back to the direction (f/n) ran off to.

He should've thanked her...

He should have said something other than grunt like some wild boar...

He really should have...

‘I’m such an idiot,’ He thought to himself.

He regretted not doing so for the second time, proving he was nothing more than some unsociable buffoon not capable of even giving her a well deserved and good-natured thank you.

“Damn it !” he said louder, wanting to bash his head into a brick wall, maybe more than once… perhaps a good three or four times just to make sure he did a good job.

If he pushed everyone aside and sent their frail bodies flying as he dashed through... Would he then reach her..?

Would he somehow be able to find that sweet, little lady now that the full streets of Ikebukuro had swallowed her up? Or were their meetings only chance?

Two chances he had already blundered.

“It’d be my luck,” he grumbled, thinking about the possibility that this had been his one shot.

‘ What was her name?’ He wondered, inwardly cursing at the fact that in those two times, he hadn’t even bothered to ask for her name. She knew him very well, his name and his reputation, and yet she was a mystery to him.

A cute face without a name...

“She’s probably gone by now..” He said looking up at the darkened sky.

‘ She was pretty cute... ‘

So cute he thought about her again that night, not knowing he was on her mind with similar regrets.

......................

He took a low drag of his cigarette, the last of the death stick as he thought about her some more. By that point, nothing was able to give him ease as even his favorite brand of smoke was falling short.

He looked down at his watch's face, the hour hand finally changing before his eyes.

In his opposite hand, he held the black scarf, unintentionally squeezing it tight in his nervous hand.

Leaned against an open shop’s wall he waited for her to show up, having realized that it was around the time she usually passed by.

With another hour passing him, and an extra twenty-five minutes to add along to the waiting time, Shizuo sighed largely, his head hanging,

“ I look like an idiot, “ he muttered, his grip on the scarf tightening.

The hand where he wore his watch was also full, holding a small arrangement of flowers he had picked out, now being bent at their stems.

Pushing himself off from the building, he decided to go back home, having spent too much of his time waiting on someone that wouldn't show.

Someone he didn’t even know...

In all his frustrated disappointment he then caught the sight of (h/c) colored hair, the side profile of a familiar beauty walking right past him.

It was a desperate, daring move, but as she took a step forward his arm shot out, pressed against her midsection to hold her back, causing her to suddenly yelp.

“Hey just who-” Stopping midway through her rant she looked up at the blonde, her face instantly brightening, rid of all the trace of annoyance she had begun to show,

“Oh Shizuo!” she chirped, smiling brightly as though she’d just caught sight of an old friend.

“It’s really you!” She said with a small grin, not at all bothered by their proximity, nor his intimate hold on her, seeming somewhat disappointed when he let go, giving her the ability to properly face him,

“Here,” he said stiffly, shoving the crushed blossoms in her hands, and with Wide eyes, she gazed down at them,

‘He got me flowers,’ She mused, not able to hide the instant wash of giddiness that drowned her.

‘He got me flowers...’ She thought again as he walked alongside her, suggesting to walk her home, his justification being that there was a murder on the streets, one he’d protect her from.

‘He’s walking me home...’ She added, her face glowing the entire time.

“Thank you for walking me home,” she said softly, speaking with notable appreciation, “And for the scarf,” she added. “ Oh… and the flowers, “ she continued on, still holding on to the ruined bouquet, holding them with both hands, caring for them as though they hadn’t been completely destroyed by his stupid strength already.

“Yeah…” he muttered, his face drawing away from her, but his eyes peering down to the small flowers, slowly trailing them up to the small, pretty smile she wore.

“Well...this is it,” She informed him, stopping at a small apartment complex, “Luckily for me, it's right at the front,” She told him, gesturing towards the small entranceway facing the street.

“Um...Shizuo?” She said softly, seeming shy at the little utter. She gestured him closer with her index finger, and surely he came down to her, thinking she had something else to say, but to his surprise she came up to him, softly pressing her lips over his cheek, her warm lips spreading heat through his entire face, going against the chilly air’s own caress.

Backing away from him she hid behind her door, peeking out at him, her pretty (e/c) eyes batting, “ Thank you Shizuo… thank you for being gentleman,” she told him, seconds before she closed the door on him, a soft click of the door properly closing up, followed by another as she placed the lock on it sounded.

Dumbly, he stood motionless, staring at the spot before him where she had stood. With his hand slowly raising up, his fingers grazed over the small spot she had kissed him.

He couldn't believe she had actually done it or even considered it.

Putting his hand in his pockets he then hung his head, realizing he hadn't asked her for her name yet again.

They’d actually talked, swapping little mindless stories, and he was even led to her home, yet still had no name.

“Unbelievable,” he muttered while he hung his head, however this time around, he wasn’t defeated.

He wore a small smile, still feeling the ghost of the sweet press to his cheek present over his flesh.

‘Well...there's always tomorrow,’ He thought to himself, chuckling to himself as he thought of all the little excuses he could make to talk to her, knowing that it probably wasn’t necessary for him to wait out her door, because eventually, they’d run into each other again,

‘I’ll get it right,’ He mused, his walk back home pleasant as he thought of all the ways he could try and make her smile.

#shizuo heiwajima #shizuo heiwajima x reader #shizuo heiwajima x reader insert #shizuo x reader #shizuo x reader insert #shizuo one shot #durarara #durarara x reader #durarara x reader insert #durarara one shot #shizuo heiwajima oneshot #durarara oneshot #shizuo heiwajima romance #shizuo x y/n #durarara x y/n #anime one shot #shizuo fanfic #shizuo fanfiction #heiwajima shizuo

148 notes · View notes