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l223m0nade · 2 months ago

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Bees (a stucky au snzfic)

ok ok

so I saw this random thing on a tumblr post:

and it got its Stucky-idea hooks so deep in my brain. It just did. And the thing is my deepest inspo is honestly in the land of snz. (This fic kind of ends abruptly sorry but i want to do more and it'll probably end up on Ao3 w like a M or E rating 😳🫣 when and if that happens i'll link to it)

Stucky au, no powers, age gap, what I'm picturing in my head goes less with the words "silver fox Steve" and more with the words "dorky Dilf Steve" like 2012 Cap fashion with current Chris Evans face? in..a good way? and longhair early-20s burnout Bucky. I have some backstory headcanons that are just hinted at here, hopefully it's tantalizing rather than confusing.

anyway have 11.5k words of this and encourage me to write more bc i have fallen in love with these particular boyz. Some light existential angst but mainly idiots pining aka the sweetest sauce

~Fic~

Sam isn’t sure how much longer he can allow this to go on. His barback and the new semi-regular square dude are once again being all awkwardly flirty while pretending they’re not, like two sad lonely white...ducks, who never learned a mating dance and have zero game.

At least Square Dude has an excuse: he’s the most obvious newly-divorced newly-out family-type guy Sam’s ever seen. He’s clean-cut, with a ridiculously handsome square jaw, wearing well-made but unstylish button-down shirts and pants that make him look like he belongs in a Norman Rockwell painting. He started coming in about two months ago, quiet, friendly when ordering his one or two beers of the evening, and firmly shy when it comes to the inevitable overtures sent his way. It doesn’t take a genius to see that this is him dipping a first toe into the pool: coming to a relatively quiet gay bar, just to sit and watch men talk to each other and let the whole notion sink in.

By now most guys would’ve found someone to spread their wings with or gone elsewhere to find em, but Square Dude, whose name is Steve, seems content to talk to the guy who pours his beer about whatever DIY project Bucky is pulling questions out of his ass about.

The crush is painfully obvious, and suburban closeted Steve can’t be blamed for having no deal-sealing abilities, but Bucky has no such excuse. Sam has watched him pull stiff-backed business bros in five minutes flat when the mood struck him, with his big blue puppy eyes and his dark wicked smirk and long lean slouch. But with Steve all he appears capable of doing is asking him questions about crown molding as though those words mean anything to him while gazing at him like he’s beaming the words You could fix me directly into Steve’s skull. Steve, for his part, just doesn’t seem to be able to look anywhere other than Bucky.

As usual, anyone that tries to strike anything beyond a friendly conversation is kindly but firmly rebuffed. “He’s not ready for that yet,” Bucky had insisted with unnecessary defensiveness when Sam implied it was time for the new guy to move from spectating to participating in the relatively mellow flirting and hookup scene the bar played host to most evenings. “People go at their own pace.”

“The only pace he’s going at is towards you,” Sam smirked. Bucky glowered at his implication. “You gotta make it weird. He comes here to, like, practice. I’m part of that, in a chill, friendly way.” He shrugged and looked at the glass he was drying. “When he is ready, it’s not gonna be for me, it’s gonna be for someone actually in his league, like a...hot college professor, or something.” Sam had rolled his eyes and resolved to stop trying to help Bucky Barnes flail around in his mess of a love life anymore, for the hundredth or so time.

Tonight is busy enough that Sam can mostly be distracted from this bad sitcom, and not so busy that he has to yell at Barnes for being distracted. Still, there are a couple empties on tables in the Steve-less side of the bar, and after finishing the drinks for the people in front of him he turns, catching Bucky’s voice, in a tone of delight he uses when speaking with only one person, saying “Wait. Seriously? Bees?”

“Yeah!” Steve responds, equally puppyish. He’s tall and broad, sandy hair and beard just beginning to show a hint of salt-and-pepper. He looks like anyone’s fantasy fireman or lumberjack, at least in the context of a place like this. He also exudes genuine sweetness and vulnerability despite his intimidating muscled height.

Bucky Barnes, Sam’s barback and old friend, leans against the bar doing the helpless-goober-with-a-crush stare, a look on his face like Steve just announced he was a Nobel Prize winner. “No way. How do you keep bees? Just as, what, a casual hobby? That’s, like, a whole thing, you can’t be an expert in so many things!”

Bucky is all shaggy longish dark hair and stupid cheap graphic t-shirts, with a striking, animated face that is used mainly for sarcasm. He and Sam had been at the same high school a few blocks away, though Sam is older, and in the funny way of life they’ve wound up good friends. He’s working at Sam’s place because, in his words, he doesn’t know what the hell he’s doing with his life. Bucky’s going through his own version of one of those fairly bleak lost periods of 20-something misery, but he’s smart and not a drunk and decent at what he does for Sam, and if he bangs a third of the customers he does it discreetly enough. Sam never knew dark-blond, broad-shouldered, bass-voice sad-eyed dudes pushing 40 were the kryptonite that made him unable to do anything including flirt, until Steve came in one day and Bucky sprayed himself with the keg he was tapping.

Steve chuckles— is this man blushing? “Oh no, I’m nowhere near an expert. But it’s pretty easy once they get established. Don’t need much from you. I’m not, uh, living at the place with the backyard where the hives are, right now….so….but they’ll be fine without me.”

Steve gets a little quiet and Bucky’s fangirl expression dims with distressed sympathy. It gets sad like this sometimes when talking to Steve. Recently divorced guys had this problem, where everything came back to the one topic. Steve’s not doing it pathologically, didn’t seem like, just genuinely realizing another change. Bucky looks stricken. He doesn’t always seem young, at newly 24, but sometimes it still shows.

Sam finally manages to catch his eye away from gazing at Steve to convey a quick head jerk of get-the-hell-over-there-and-do-the-job-I-pay-you-for, and Bucky peels himself away with an apologetic smile at Steve. Sam picks up the conversation with Steve as Bucky clears tables at top speed, hearing how he’s renting a place month-to-month not far away, not able to plan something more permanent just yet. He doesn’t say anything revealing, but it’s still easy to paint a picture of a small, empty apartment. Bucky’s not the only one with a soft spot for this guy, and Sam is warmed by the thought that his little bar offers him respite.

………………..

“That’s so sad,” moans Bucky a few days later. It’s just after opening on a weekday afternoon, and Bucky seemed quieter than usual so Sam is tantalizing him with what he learned talking to Steve the other day. “Did he say—you know he has kids?”

“Yeah, I know,” Sam answers. He’d been as offhand as a person could be about that sort of thing, but it wasn’t hard to see how he really felt. He was standing in the rubble of a sincere loving marriage to a woman with whom he had two 11-year old twins. Helped explain his rectitude when it came from moving from his spot at the bar, meeting someone other than the staff. Bucky’s eyes are pools of sympathetic anguish and Sam feels the need to say, “This kinda stuff happens to people, Buck,” earning an eye-roll for his patronizing efforts. “It’s good he’s coming here, learning about himself. I think you help a lot, for the record.”

Bucky starts and gives him a bewildered look. “What?”

This is aging him. Sam sighs, “He’s lonely. Maybe feels kinda lost right now.”

Bucky’s mouth gets a pained downward slant to it.

“He. Likes. You.”

At that, of course, Bucky gets uncomfortable, blushing and moving off to wipe tables somewhere away from Sam, rubbing his nose and clearing his throat like he’s been doing since he got there. He brightens when Steve comes in an hour later, and Sam rolls his eyes and leaves them to their game of mouse-and-mouse.

Steve is telling Bucky... how window insulation works. He thinks he asked, he hopes to god he did, at least. He’s been embarrassing himself for weeks, coming to this place almost every day. He’s kept it pretty well under wraps that although he liked the neighborhood simplicity, and talking to Sam, and got comfortable after the first few visits, the real reason he’s there more evenings than not is to see Bucky. With his bright grey-blue eyes and dark hair hanging past his chin, swinging against his cheekbones, with his smile and wicked sense of humor and his confounding ease in himself, the ease that gives Steve despair and hope for himself. With that mouth and that divot in his chin, and those last two thoughts are not allowed, because the need to put his thumb into that dot in his sculpted chin and kiss those ridiculously pink lips is urgent and unthinkable.

He doesn’t do that, he just sits and pines and chats awkwardly with him, and gets to know a few other regular guys and talks sports with Sam. He just likes talking to Bucky, it’s easy, easy like nothing has been in a long time, and he’s a creep, he’s a pathetic older guy using his experience to take advantage of a younger guy—

Only, he’s not actually experienced here, at all. And Bucky is so smart, he’s self-deprecating about it but it’s not like he and Steve aren’t generally on the same level beyond his inner glossary of home improvement terminology. He downplays the fact that he knows cars like an expert, insists the stuff Steve learned from keeping up an old house and the hobbies he picked up to stay sane is somehow far more impressive— Steve’s pretty sure he’s doing it on purpose, to make him feel less adrift and clueless. He has that way about him, of someone who looks after other people without realizing it.

Things were all dark there for a while, with the end of his marriage to Peggy. But he’s pretty sure he and Bucky are friends, and he feels bright when he sees him.

Tonight, though, Bucky seems just a little worn down. He’s wearing a waffle-knit shirt under his incomprehensible-thorny-calligraphy-t-shirt, as though he’s cold, and his eyes are tired. Steve waits for a reply to the last thing he said and looks to see Bucky with a dazed, spaced-out expression, before he shakes his head and rubs his nose, saying “Sorry, I thought I was gonna sneeze, what’d you say?”

Talking about the goddamn weather and window insulation was segueing into a real conversation, to Steve’s delight: “How my mom moved us out to Jersey so we could live somewhere better and I never forgave her.” Bucky gives a wide-eyed grimace of agreement and he can’t help the bright laugh that bursts out of him. “How about you, you grow up in the city?” He’d inadvertently spilled his guts about the divorce on like his third time in the bar, something that humiliated him to think of but Sam had simply said with an understanding face wasn’t too unusual, so Bucky knew the basics about Peggy and the twins, but Steve had felt clumsy asking Bucky about himself.

He rolled his eyes with his problematically attractive crooked grin and answered, “Aw man, I grew up practically around the block from this place. Went to high school at the big catholic cinderblock in the neighborhood. I was at school on the west coast for a couple years, but…” His eyes cast downward. “now I’m back.”

Steve remembers how bad it felt at that age, to not have accomplished enough fast enough. Saying that will make him sound like an old grey dad and even if that’s what he is he can still hold out a little hope of being something different here, so he just says, “Brooklyn’s a good hometown to come back to.”

That makes Bucky smile at him and look him in the eye, like he liked what Steve said, even like it made him feel better. Steve tamps his answering grin down to reasonable levels.

Bucky’s also been rubbing at his nose on and off this whole time, and he can see it give a little twitch right before he breathes out a “scuse-me” through hitching breaths, his eyes flickering closed. He pushes his nose firmly into his long-sleeved elbow. “hhh-hh-tdschuh!” He sneezes quietly and muffled. “Oh, snf, sorry,” he says, blinking and emerging from his elbow but not lowering it, the hazy ticklish look still on his face, breaths hitching. “Another—hhh—‘nother one?” He freezes, looking up at the overhead lights, nostrils flared, but after a second he deflates with a sigh. “Nope, nevermind. Snff.” Steve’s guts swoop. This crush is so unsustainable. He’s gonna fail to be cool and friendly and he’ll have to watch Bucky go all uncomfortable and pitying as he explains to Steve that he has six hot boyfriends who are not almost-forty almost-virgin losers who only know how to take up his time when he’s trying to work. According to his therapist these “harangues of negativity” are “unhelpful.” But Bucky looks tired and a little pale and like his nose is going to start turning pink and Steve is just trying to survive.

“Bless you,” Steve says softly in his gentle voice that’s so deep it takes Bucky by surprise and makes his stomach flutter every time he talks to him. He feels like he might be blushing.

“Thanks,” it comes out husky and he clears his throat hard, moving to the little sink to wash his hands.

“Allergies, or…?” Steve ventures, a little divot between his eyebrows of concern-more-like-pity.

“I dunno, something’s bothering my nose today,” he says lightly with a shrug. In truth Bucky has a good idea what’s making him sneeze. The fucking radiator that was supposed to heat his cheap shitty basement apartment had stopped working in the middle of the night, so he’d spent six hours until dawn shivering, and an itchy tickly feeling had been growing in the back of his nose and throat since around noon. It’s starting to evolve into a runny nose and an ever-present but elusive feeling of being about to sneeze, and he knows that means he’s coming down with a cold.

He sees some convenient glasses to clear and excuses himself with a smile so he can sniffle out of Steve’s earshot; he’s enough of a mess compared to Steve on his best day, he doesn’t need to show off his scraggly urchin runny nose aesthetic of tonight any more than he has to.

For the next hour, these light, tickly sneezes either sneak up on him or abandon him at the last minute, leaving his nose feeling like it’s going to start getting stuffy.

Steve watches Bucky do his job, sniffling, rubbing his nose, and sneezing furtively into his sleeve or collar; tucking the strands of hair that have come loose from his short ponytail behind his ears, and feels so helplessly tender for him that it can’t be normal or healthy even by desperate crush standards.

Bucky’s coming down with a cold. He seems to want to brush it off, but Steve can hear a slight change in the resonance of his voice that gives it away even if the tired pink starting to border his eyes and nostrils doesn’t. The place is getting crowded and he’s busy; Steve feels for him, as well as pathetically jealous of his attention as he banters with him in passing once in a while.

He glances up as Bucky heads in his direction with a short stack of empty glasses and sees his steps slow; he pauses, blinks up at the overhead light, eyes hazy, and then, wavering, starts to turn his face into his shoulder, before pausing again and then sighing and sniffing as the sneeze evaporates. He looks up and sees Steve watching him like a creep and laughs, “Damn, lost her,” and then as he continues behind the bar, “You havin’ fun watching me look stupid?”

“It’s agony actually,” he responds, gets a laugh, and feels the now-somewhat-familiar internal squeal of this is flirting! I’m flirting with a guy and I think he can tell! It’s painfully pathetic, but he can’t help but track the fact that Bucky knows plenty of the folks that come to Sam’s, that he’ll give anyone his attention if they ask for it, smiling and joking, but the only person he really goes out of his way to talk to, initiates teasing with, is him, Steve. It’s still nothing more than polite obligatory chatting, he’s sure— when you work at a bar this kinda thing is natural. Bucky is young and charismatic and gorgeous. His love life would probably give Steve enough combined envy and jealousy to cause heart failure, which would be perfectly appropriate because he is an old square divorcee. It makes him warm and bubbly enough that he seems to be Bucky’s favorite customer to pass the time with.

A guy down the bar gets his beer from Sam and sidles closer. “This seat taken?” he asks with a good-humored cocked eyebrow. This is why Steve actually started coming to this place: to meet people, to meet guys, in a way that, well, went somewhere. To call his own decades-old bluff. Not to moon over staff half his age who woulda been out of his league even if he was still in his twenties. He turns to the guy—his age or a few years older, attractively lithe with muscle, a hard but handsome face, and smiles.

Bucky gets busy for a stretch— Sam’s place is actually full tonight thanks to the playoff game. He enjoys the feeling of being a genuinely necessary part of the bar’s operation, when some nights it’s hard to believe he’s more than Sam’s charity case. Nights like this remind him that he has a real job, he’s decent at it even with a bum left arm; whether he’s living out his dreams or not he’s an adult with a job, a place to live, and people he cares about. Plus it distracts him from feeling sorry for himself for coming down sick.

His satisfied feelings fade when he looks over to the Steve end of the bar and sees Brock Rumlow talking to him. He scowls. Fucking Rumlow. He only ever comes on nights with games these days, but Bucky would be perfectly happy if he never came in at all.

It’s fine. Steve’s fine. He is a grown-up, significantly more of one than Bucky. Of all the people who have no need of his misplaced ineffectual chivalry, Steve has got to be last in line.

Maybe he finds more stuff to do in the general area of that end of the bar, and maybe he’s listening for Rumlow to say something dickish, or maybe he’s just a masochist and he wants to know firsthand if they hit it off. Sam is trying to point his “Don’t-be-Stupid” face at him like a flashlight beam but he resolutely ignores it while he replaces a couple bottles that legitimately needed it, ok, just because they’re in a convenient place doesn’t make that untrue.

“Yeah, I’m glad I found this place,” he catches Steve’s cheerful voice. A wave of bar noise obscures their next words, and then he makes out Rumlow,

“—actual sports on the TV. ‘Course,” the smile is audible in his voice, “the clubby places are good for at least one reason, y’know?” He quiets down to say it but not enough. Steve wouldn’t particularly like that, Bucky guesses, and then grinds his teeth as his brain helpfully supplies him with the memories of how easily Brock had charmed him, months ago. It wasn’t any kind of nightmare, but it was still probably his least favorite hookup to date: he’d been so happily focused on Bucky at first, then rough and selfish in bed, capped off by an unnecessarily clear implication that he wouldn’t be calling. Bucky knew the score with casual sex, but it had still given him enough whiplash to sting; it crossed his mind a few days later that it had been like Rumlow wanted him to feel like a dumb kid.

Steve has sputtered something about “not sure he’s looking for anything like that” while Bucky fumed about the past. He has to grab beers for a couple guys, and bending to get in the lowboy fridge makes his nose run suddenly, and flush with an insistent tickle. He manages, just barely, to squash the sneeze completely into a silent mmp! into his shoulder, andmakes a getaway to the bathroom. He blows his nose, but it won’t stop tickling, so then he stands there like an idiot, holding paper towels like they’re a book he’s reading, staring up into the lights and waiting to coax the sneeze out.

He can feel it coming but it still takes forever. At least the bathroom is empty. He wrinkles his nose exaggeratedly and sniffs and his breath finally starts to catch.

“hehh...heh...heh—heh-Uhh....huhh. Fuck.” There’s no way it’s not happening though, his goddamn nose tickles so bad— “hhHAh—EHSsschhooo!” It’s a ridiculous cartoony sneeze but at least it’s satisfying. He blows his nose again, then sighs. He’s definitely sick. Gonna be great sleeping in a freezing apartment. Turning into kind of a shitty night, he thinks with sarcastic pep.

When he leaves the restroom he can’t help glancing over to where Steve sits, and sees he’s now frowning at whatever Rumlow’s saying, looking politely uncomfortable on the way to annoyed. As he drifts back into earshot he hears, “….fun, but, if you’re looking for more than, um, casual, I dunno, kind of a dead end.” Then his pulse jumps as Rumlow looks right at him and finishes, “not dating material, trust me. Either way,” he leans in, “I think you can do better.”

Bucky closes the distance but puts himself behind the bar so he doesn’t immediately clock the asshole. His fists are clenched. Can he throw him out? If he doesn’t get away from Steve and shut up Bucky’s gonna end up fired and charged with assault, probably, but he doesn’t know if he can throw someone out on the grounds of being a jerk that he hates. Thank God, Sam’s caught on that something is up.

Rumlow doesn’t seem to have won Steve over, in any case. He’s turned cold and hard in a way that makes him look unfamiliar, and he says quietly but very clearly, “I think you’ve got the wrong idea.” He sounds like a straight Army Captain contemptuously shattering an underling’s heart immediately post-office-suckjob or something; in the morass of anger and panic it still registers with Bucky’s dick to his utter bewilderment. It definitely triggers some core memory for Rumlow, who turns the color of old milk before flushing and standing. He takes in the sight of Bucky glowering behind Steve and barks an ugly laugh. “It’s like that, huh?” he asks, shaking his head in mock pity. “Good luck with that rescue mission.”

Bucky feels like he did when Hank Ackerman pantsed him in 8th grade. Everything’s too bright and clear. He wants to cover his face and run into the back, but he’s rooted to the spot by the thought that that’s just what the dumb baby slut Rumlow’s been making him out to be would do.

“That’s it man,” Sam comes up beside him, smile on his face as though he’s just casually joining their conversation. “You’re done. Get outta here.”

Rumlow scoffs, takes a step towards the door, then turns with the beginning of a macho intimidation-lean in Sam’s direction. He’s hammered, Bucky hadn’t realized, and he can usually tell with people. He’s...kind of fucking scary. Had he gotten rougher around the edges, or had he been like this when Bucky went home with him? Jesus Christ.

Sam just returns his stare, all semblance of friendliness gone from his face. “Get out.”

Rumlow glares another second, but then he goes. There’s a reason Sam’s successful running a bar in the middle of the still-managing-to-be-seedy part of Brooklyn, as well as his finely tuned sensibilities to the unmet needs of Brooklyn’s grownup queer folks. He has the air, recognizable to serious troublemakers, of someone who will absolutely meet and raise any escalation. There were, in fact, a taser and a gun behind the bar, but Sam had never had to use them.

Steve stands up sharply, like he’s—what, gonna follow? Bucky opens his mouth to protest, but then—“Steve.” Sam’s got the side bar entry folded up and he’s intercepting his angry stride. “Please don’t.” He goes on, too quiet for Bucky to make out. Steve deflates and sits back down, taking a long drink of beer and then frowning at his knees.

Bucky consciously lets go of his tension as he sees Rumlow’s silhouette, walking outside, disappear from the last window on the right. He feels shaky, the way any kind of confrontation leaves him, and embarrassed as hell. He avoids Steve’s eyes for all he’s worth, scrubbing a hand under his nose and sniffing sharply.

Steve was just a customer. Bucky was just one of many people that Steve made polite conversation with in the course of a day. Feeling like this was just a consequence of getting that confused. Because he’s an idiot. He has to sniffle again. He also feels about ten times sicker than he did a few minutes ago, and successfully blinking away the brief prickle in his eyes just turns it into the need to sneeze.

Steve tries to breathe smoothly and calm down. This frat-boy rage is ridiculous, he still wants to go punch the hell out of that fucking creep. He must be drunker than he realizes, although deep down he knows it has more to do with the inarticulate surge of protectiveness he’d felt for Bucky since the guy had gestured to him with a jerk of his head as he crossed the room.

He hears a shuddering gasp and sees Bucky duck down to crouch behind the bar. His concern flares way up, but then he hears the three muffled sneezes, all in a rush, “hhhMPtchsh—hmptsschoo—hptsshhuh,”. He straightens back up, sniffing hard, more wetly than he sounded earlier. He’s rubbing his nose and glaring at the door, not looking at Steve.

“Bucky,” he says, frowning, determined to get this across, “what that asshole said about you—”

“Steve, snff, it’s fine, just drop it, okay, I’m asking you,” he meets Steve’s eyes with a downcast expression, before it flickers as his breath catches, and he sneezes again, half-pinched down into the collar of his shirt, “ihh-dtsschuh!”

His nostrils keep quivering and he lets out a shaky sigh of frustration before ducking around the corner out of sight with his hands tented over his nose and sneezing, “hiih-hih-HIDtschoo!...hih-HIH-TISchoo! ..heehh...heh—HEH—” the last one deserts him and leaves him sniffling. They’re still pretty quiet, but a lot heavier and spraying than the first sneezes Steve heard earlier. Bucky blows his nose and washes his hands thoroughly, and when he’s back behind the bar his nose is decidedly pink.

“Buck,” Steve says, and Bucky’s lips thin in exasperation— it’s not like him, compared to the guy Steve’s talked to the last few weeks. Whatever, he can’t help but say, “you do sound like you’re coming down with something, you should—”

“Steve, I’m fine,” says Bucky, in a soft tone that brooks no argument. Still tense, he turns to Steve with a crooked smile and says, “Really,” and it’s warm, if strained, between them again, and it seems like that’ll just have to satisfy Steve, and he says as much to Bucky who blushes and bites his lip for some reason.

Sam rescues Bucky by asking him to do inventory in back, letting him be sneeze and be dramatically in his feels without anyone around, especially Steve. The bar is slow enough now that he just shamelessly hides for the rest of the night. He’s constantly sniffling and sneezing and needing to blow his nose with the roll of rough brown paper towels back there, and even without that he’s too keyed up and pissed and miserable for human company, so it’s for the best.

He casts furtive recon glances to the bar where Steve sits, first craning his neck trying to spy Bucky, then brooding into his beer glass which makes Bucky feel like an asshole, then perking up at least a little shooting the shit with Sam, hopefully talking shit about Brock Dickface Rumlow. Then the misery wells up enough to get him to actually focus on work to avoid feeling it, and then it’s a few hours later and they’re closing up and he goes home to his little icebox and tires not to think about anything.

The next day, Sam chooses evil.

Steve and JB Barnes are both at least somewhat complex men, and it is always a bad idea to meddle in the affairs of others. But screw it, he’s had Bucky moaning in his ear for months now, and he was gonna have to recheck all his angry counting from last night, and these guys really seemed dumb enough to let the tension of mutual attraction strain between them until it just broke, some misunderstanding threw them both on the defensive or whatever, and they missed the chance at any of the fun part of connecting with each other.

So.

It isn’t a big surprise when Bucky calls him around 2, apologizing and pausing to make some gross “ihHgjshuhh!” noise, saying he was probably too sick with this cold to come in. What is a surprise, for poor Bucky, is Sam’s implacable response: “Duuude, I’m so sorry, but there’s some kinda convention in town and the place is packed, I need you here so bad, no matter what. You can take the next two days off, I’ll pay you.” He hears Bucky swallow back the what the hell and resignedly say ok. He feels diabolical. But hopefully it will be worth it. Steve usually comes in early on Thursdays, and he’d looked all hangdog-worried about Bucky the night before.

He’s been there twenty minutes already, chatting distractedly with Sam and staring at the TV screens but really looking all over the room like Bucky might be hiding somewhere. Bucky slouches in, ten minutes late, takes in the mostly empty room and gives Sam a betrayed glare.

“You really ndeeded mbe, huh,” he mutters as he puts his backpack away.

“You don’t even sound that bad,” Sam rejoins cheerfully, and Bucky’s mouth drops open with incredulity.

He moves some boxes around in back without issue. Then he tries to start prep by the bar. In a fifteen-minute period he has two sneezing fits that require him retreating to the bathroom to blow his nose endlessly and wash his hands. Sam decides that’s plenty sufficient. He and his customers are gonna pay a price in germ exposure for this stupid ass cupid skit he’s putting on.

“Steve, you believe this guy?” Bucky’s been avoiding Steve’s concerned hopeful looks since he got here. “He insisted on coming to work.” Bucky chokes in outrage, then coughs for real, while Steve moves a few seats closer. Sam turns; Bucky couldn’t look more betrayed if there was a knife with Sam’s name on it in his guts. Lord deliver him from dramatic white boys. “Did you take the bus here, Buck?” There was no other way for the guy to get to work, but he just replies flatly,

“Yeah.”

“You oughtta go home and rest.”

“Le me give you a ride, Buck,” Steve jumps in with the Air-Bud eagerness Sam had expected. They confirm it and bustle Barnes into a Civic while he’s sneezing too much to protest. Sam washes his hands metaphorically of the situation, and also very literally and thoroughly.

Steve’s car is a little old, and cold, and dusty. Bucky shivers as he buckles his seatbelt. He feels silently nervous and thrilled to be in Steve’s Car!!, but at the moment it’s hard to be anything but….sneezy…

“hhh-hh-hhmmPtchuh! S-s-sor-ry-hiihHIptchsh!” Holding them back when he feels like this just makes his nose more irritated and thus even sneezier. He stubbornly jams his fist under his nose to quell the tickle. He has some napkins from work, so a nose-blow is possible, but it doesn’t feel possible, not so close to Steve, who has it a million times more together than Bucky even on days when he isn’t falling apart on a cellular level.

“Bless you,” Steve says quietly. He looks at him reflexively, to see a small, sweet, sympathetic smile. “Ready?” Bucky gives a little nod and the car pulls out into the slushy road.

His nose is running onto his finger, it’s a crisis. This is why it’s always a terrible idea to leave the house when you’re really sick. “Ugh, I gotta blow mby ndose, I’mb sorry, I’mb so gross right ndow,” talking also makes his nose angry. Fucking Sam and his supervillain plan to humiliate him. What had he done to deserve this? He fumbles for the napkins with his less-dextrous left hand, the one he should have stuck under his nose, goddamnit, he’s gonna sneeze again…

“Psh, don’t worry about it,” scoffs Steve like the big huge dad he is, then with a sympathetic glance he turns the radio on, to the classic rock station, because of course, Bucky almost laughs even while racing to get tissues on his face before this giant wet sneeze overcomes him. The music is loud and it does help him feel less embarrassed.

“heh—HEH-KSSSHOOoo!” he gets the wad of napkins in front of him just in time. Blowing his nose after that demolishes them, but he feels a little closer to a human being.

“Bless you!” Steve chuckles. “Man you got a good bug, jeez!”

Why are he and Sam both so cheerful. “Thanks, I’mb glad you’re impressed,” he croaks.

“You have cold stuff at home?” Huh? When Bucky doesn’t answer he continues, “Tissues, tea, soup, medicine, you know?”

“Oh, umb, sorry, I’m tired,” Steve makes a sympathetic sound. “I usually just use toilet paper. I took the last of my Dayquil before work. I dunno if it even helped, all it feels like it did is mbake me jittery and sdeezy.”

“Why don’t we stop by a drugstore.” He sounded decisive.

“Oh, you don’t have to bother with that, really Steve—” he pauses to sniffle desperately. Technically he can afford a couple things, and he probably needs them. “Or—you could drop me off and I’ll get myself home from the store, that would totally be a big help—”

“Is the heat even on in your place?” Steve interrupts, shrewd-eyed. At Bucky’s wide-eyed sputtering response he continues, “I knew it. I used to be a broke Brooklyn kid, once upon a time. Only reason to come into work, am I right? Can’t believe landlords are still getting away with this shit.”

Bucky considers denial, then slumps. “S’why I’mb so much...hhh...worse...hh-huh-hudschuh! Snff-snff. Worse today. They said it’ll be fixed by tomorrow so...we’ll see, ha. I got a space heater and an electric kettle though, I can get in my blankets and drink tea and I’m fine.”

Steve is quiet, no response, and Bucky worries irrationally that he pissed him off. A few minutes of classic rock later, he pulls into the small parking lot attached to the drugstore, turns the car off, and turns to him, looking a little uncomfortable.

“Bucky I—” he breaks off and laughs to himself. “I know you have to be polite to customers, I don’t want to—” he makes eye contact, looking pained and rueful. “I’d like to think we’re friends. But I don’t want to put you on the spot or anything,”

“We’re friends,” Bucky interrupts gently. Steve’s face brightens like a sunrise and Bucky’s chest does a nice warm thing.

“Yeah? That’s...I’m real happy to hear it.” Steve says, sheepish but grinning. Then his eyes get the determined look that Bucky is starting to think means trouble. “Well the reason I asked is, as a friend, I really hate the idea of you trying to ride this out in an icebox apartment. I have heat. And a couch!” He hastens to add at whatever wide-eyed look Bucky’s giving him. “It’s just, I know it’s no fun being sick by yourself, and, well, honestly I wish I’d socked that asshole at the bar last night, and I really wish I’d clocked him as a jerk faster, and I’d feel a lot better if I could do something nice for you, and you really seem like you could do with some rest and medicine. Will you let me grab some stuff here and spend the night at my place—where there’s heat— and let me fuss over you?”

“Steve, that’s—that’s so nice, but I really can’t imb—snff—impose on you, and I gotta be so contagious right now…”

“I don’t care about that,” Steve says easily. “And I know you’re not gonna die on your own, but,” and, whoa, he’s deploying some kind of dignified mature version of puppy-dog eyes, it’s so sincere, and also so certain, that it starts to seem like the only sensible course of action is to let his gorgeous crush take him to his apartment while he’s the polar opposite of sexy, an unspeakable snot factory, and also possibly starting to run a fever.

….His apartment is gonna be so goddamn cold.

And lonely, incidentally.

And Steve is so nice. He’s literally, actually here, he seems to mean it that he wants to take care of Bucky’s sick bedraggled ass as some kind of friend-favor. There’s no way this is a come-on with him in this state, even if he can still muster enough energy to wish it was. No way Steve’s ever gonna want to fuck him after watching him snuffle through 200 tissues and mouth-breathe all evening, but he was nuts to think he ever would anyhow. He’s just that nice, and Bucky is that pathetic, and that might not feel great, but he wants to be Steve’s friend, he really does, and even through his own shyness he can see that the guy is pretty lonely.

“You, umb. You really don’t have to.” He says, watching Steve, who waits with obvious hopefulness. “But. Uh.” Steve raises his eyebrows and gives him a little smile, and Bucky finds himself returning it helplessly. “If you really don’t mbind. It could, potentially, be really ndice to take you up on that. You really don’t have to though!”

“I want to, though.” Jesus, he’s so sincere. Bucky feels some weird kind of protective way about the earnest honesty in his eyes.

“Well, then, okay. Thangk you, I really appreciate it.” He laughs, finally feeling how miserable it would have been to go back home and try to sleep in a cold blanket pile on his mattress on the floor. “Mby place sucks right now.”

“Alright then,” Steve beams. “Let’s get you a couple things and then get you cozy.”

Bucky’s nose is not okay with him using his face to talk instead of constantly blow it. It’s gotten completely blocked, and it’s tingling unpleasantly, and running so bad again he has to smush his knuckles under his nostrils. The tickle crests and his breath catches before he can do anything about it, but he clenches his jaw and forces it into a stifle. “hhh-huh-MMP!!” The problem with doing that is it just makes the tickle— “hh-mMP!” worse. “Ugh, sorry.” His hand is a dam against his nose at this point.

“Bless you!” They both step out of the car, but Steve hurries over to his side with a crinkle in his brow. “Why don’t you just stay here and I’ll grab a few things. Anything in particular, or just tissues and NyQuil?”

“Dyquil is just schndapps,” Bucky grumbles, then his brain catches up a little and he says “tissues,” fervently, and then it catches all the way up and he says “wait, ndo way are you buyig!”

Steve cocks an eyebrow like a handsome jerk. “You really wanna go in there?” With your current nose situation? He’s kind enough to not say.

He casts about for a moment—“Grab me a little pack and then I’ll go in!”

Steve gives him a skeptical look and says “Sure,” in a way that makes him think his orders won’t be followed, but he’s too busy squishing his nose more firmly and silently begging it not to make him sneeze again to keep arguing, or to protest when Steve opens the door for him and puts his car keys in his hand before dashing into the store with a promise to be quick.

He’s back not even ten minutes later, by which time holding his nose plugged and not letting his sneezes out has put Bucky in a state of perma-misery, stifling relentless sneezes every few seconds, unable to keep his eyes fully open. Steve tosses a box of tissues onto his lap before he gets all the way into the car because he is a saint.

“Guh,” Bucky says gratefully, pulls out a wad of about ten, and lets the miserable sneeze that had been building out into the nest of forgiving softness. “HehgSHOOmpff!!” And then blows his nose forever. Finally he feels like he can speak and have a face again; the little drugstore bag is now home to a dozen nasty used-tissue balls. “Well,” he says as he puts the last one in there, “wish I hadn’t had a witness for that.”

Steve just chuckles. “You’re fine,” he murmurs, his voice a soothing rumble. “I grabbed you a toothbrush, and I’ve got some stuff that can fit you for pjs.”

Bucky feels like he sneezed out the last of his strength. “You’re way too nice.” He sniffles and slumps against the window, looking at the familiar blur of orange streetlight. “I should be more worried you’re a serial killer.” Steve chuckles again, and he likes that, so he goes on, “Probly got a nice Jeffrey Dahmer setup at your place. Sorry if I don’t make a good steak.”

“Why wouldn’t you?” Steve replies, sounding indignant. Then laughs for real, shaking his head, “I’m not gonna chop you up and eat you, I swear.”

“It’s fine. Just mbake mbe into soup,” sighs Bucky. That would be warm. He’ll just be a big hot pot of Bucky, and Steve will stir him and season him so carefully with his big strong hands. This is a weird train of thought. He might have a fever. But he can still hear Steve chuckling.

Steve pulls into his parking spot and the car shudders to stillness as he takes his key out of the ignition. Next to him, Bucky is asleep with his head mushed against the window. He’d conked out for the last five or so minutes of the drive. “Hey, Buck, we just got to my place,” he says softly, trying not to sound too bedroom-y. His eyes flutter open, the blue of them standing out, and Steve takes a steadying breath because Bucky is so good-looking it catches him off guard and overwhelms him sometimes.

His eyes are glassy-bright and there’s a flush high on his cheekbones, and as he shifts upright in his seat Steve reaches over and touches his forehead without thinking about it. It’s noticeably hot, but not burning. The twins’ childhood bouts with the flu gave him a sense of bad-fever heat. “Think you got a temperature,” he murmurs sympathetically. Bucky just blinks up at him, a little wide-eyed, and only then does he realize his big meaty hand is practically covering half his face. He feels himself flush to match Bucky, and for a second they just look at each other.

Until Bucky sniffs a miserable liquid sniffle and they both almost jump. “Sorry,” Steve mutters awkwardly, and Bucky’s saying the same thing at the same time. They both move to get out, “Just one flight of stairs up.”

“huh—tschumpf!” is Bucky’s answer, his nose buried in a new handful of tissues. “huhh, hUH—huh.” The second sneeze fizzles, leaving him blinking and frowning and wrinkling his nose snifflishly against the ticklish haze as he shuts the door. “Fuck. Sorry, scuse mbe.”

“Bless you.” It’s probably not normal to find someone so sick so adorable.

Steve leads him up and along the hall and then he’s unlocking the door, feeling giddy that he’s letting Bucky into his apartment, and then guilty for being excited, when the poor guy is just hesitantly accepting a much-needed favor. Bucky trails in behind him and then stands still while Steve sets the bag from the drugstore and started to turn to him, saying, “It’s not much, but—”

“ASHHOO!” Bucky’s sneeze interrupts and snaps him forward into his tissues, and then he just stays folded over for a second like it sapped the last of his energy. Then he straightens, rubbing his nose into the tissues and sighing. “Jesus, sorry,”

“Bless you! You don’t have to be sorry, you’ve just got a cold.” Steve has to hold himself still to keep from rubbing his back.

“You’re...hh-huh….? Snfff, ugh. Totally gonna catch this, I owe you way mbore apologies.”

“I won’t hold it against you,” he chuckles, toeing his shoes off. Bucky follows suit and he continues, “I stopped caring after raising toddlers, they’re little germ factories, you catch everything.” Why’d you bring up your old-dad status, Steve? “I’ll grab you some things to sleep in.”

An hour and one confrontation about Steve giving up his bed later, Bucky is ensconced on his couch like the king of cold-medicine commercials, surrounded by blankets and pillows and tissues and steaming cups and bowls. He feels a little more human, which is nice, but lets him access how incandescently awkward he feels at being rescued from his idiotic life like a snotty Cinderella. Steve has been flitting back and forth between the couch and kitchen, fussing over him to a truly excessive degree while exuding satisfaction and cheer, like some kind of calendar-model Santa with a caretaking kink. He was practically rubbing his hands together at the prospect of getting Bucky blankets and tea on his couch. Now he’s giving a rundown of his TV system standing next to the couch and it feels the tiniest bit manic and Bucky can feel himself getting a little too quiet but he can’t help it. After a minute Steve notices, and sets the remote down.

“I should stop babbling at you and leave you in peace,” he says with a bashful chuckle, turning to leave the room.

“No, I— you don’t—” Bucky doesn’t really have a response beyond ‘please chill out and hang out with me and let me picture cuddling with you,’ which will not be said aloud.

“You really don’t hafta feel like you need to entertain me, Bucky.”

“It’s not, I don’t,” he sighs and then sniffles. He doesn’t want to sit here and stare at the wall and stress about this, alone in this room in Steve’s goddamn apartment. He maybe should have thought about just how much he’d fallen for Steve before taking him up on this offer, because the concern and sweetness and fussing are starting to ratchet up his anxiety, because what if there was a chance it meant—

“Is anything the matter?” Steve crouches smoothly to be on his level and torment him with his eyes’ blueness. When all Bucky can do for a moment is flounder he looks more concerned, and a little downcast. “I really don’t want you to feel uncomfortable. If anything’s bothering you, you can just tell me.”

What the hell is an ordinary sinner supposed to do in the face of this much sincerity? Act like he thinks he’s a damn grownup, Bucky guesses, and girds his nervous loser loins.

“Why’re you—” he starts, frowning, then cuts himself off and tries again with a small, apologetic smile.

“It’s just...this is such an imposition, and you seem...kinda weirdly happy about it? I just don’t get why.”

One side of Steve’s mouth quirks up, making him look dry and self-deprecating and unfairly handsome. “You’re worried I’m gonna start talkin about Scientology, or put you in my basement dungeon?”

Bucky shrugs. “Kinda.” Just ‘cause he went home with strangers didn’t mean he had no sense.

Steve seems to cast about for an explanation, and he also starts to turn pink. “It’s—you’re just so—” and then he sighs and sits on the end of the couch, next to his blanketed feet, addressing his words to the wall in a rush. “Honestly, Bucky? I have a huge crush on you, and,” he laughs in embarrassment, decidedly blushing now, “I’m just real happy to have a chance to take care of you in whatever little way.” Now he does turn to look at him, pained. “I’m sorry, that must be so uncomfortable to hear. I promise you’re not my hostage! Please don’t make a break for it, it’s cold out and you’re so sick. I swear I’m not Cathy Bates in Misery.”

“Y—hihdsschuh!” The sneeze catches him by surprise, but he has wadded-up tissues in his hand already anyhow. He has to blow his nose, and he does it thoroughly to buy time. Steve stares stoically at the ceiling as though waiting for sentencing. Is this seriously Steve telling Bucky...he likes him?

“You…” he stops, sniffs. He needs a plan. He doesn’t have one. His mouth is gonna keep moving anyway, “You said, ‘you’re just so—‘, what were you gonna say?”

Steve looks confused for a second, and then just helpless. “Bucky, you’re just so sweet. I’m happy for a chance to do something for you because I owe you, you get that, right?”

“Owe me?” Bucky asks, nonplussed. Steve laughs with what seems like disbelief at his confusion.

“Yes, Buck! For the last few months! For taking pity on me that first night I came into Sam’s. You asked me a question about antifreeze.”

“Yeah,” Bucky murmurs. His world is rearranging itself. Steve remembered that?

“I feel—real self-conscious, I guess, coming into the “scene,” he gives it air-quotes and Bucky’s heart swells a little more, “by the route I have. Y’know, married dad who woke up one day and realized the stuff he repressed at sixteen might be the real him. Sam’s was the third place I tried to go into. I just felt so ridiculous, I still do— 39-year-old brand-new gay dude, it’s idiotic. I was practically gonna have a panic attack, I was definitely gonna leave and not try again and just...stop trying in general, maybe, to figure this new scary shit out. Except you were there, this—this smokin-hot guy, and you’re acting like you actually want to talk to me, and… so I stayed. And came back.” He looks Bucky in the eyes and it makes Bucky’s stomach clench. “I feel like you’ve been taking care of me this whole time, helping me ease into things, helping me not to feel bad about being completely uncool, asking me about stuff I actually know about instead of laughing at me because I’ve never heard of ‘poppers’,”

At that, Bucky has to give in to the giggle bubbling out of him, which inevitably leads to a short coughing fit. His first instinct is to keep laughing, rake Steve over the coals, but Steve is looking at him with a careful sort of expression, and it occurs to Bucky that just because he’s older and seems like he has it all together and has great posture doesn’t mean he’s immune to feeling vulnerable. And he looks like he’s feeling really fucking vulnerable right now. Acting like Bucky is worthy of this adorable schoolboy crush is absurd, but it’s not like it was so many eons ago that little baby Bucky Barnes was having his First Gay Bar experience, and he’d been scared as shit.

He already feels like he missed the boat on his life. Steve is starting over at 39. He’s so fucking brave. Bucky...somehow, unthinkably, Bucky is in a position where he could really hurt this guy.

“I’mb, umb. Snfff. Thing is, I’m a little surprised…” And Steve must think that’s the prelude to rejection because he pulls this sad little smile onto his face that’s the worst thing Bucky’s ever seen, and he has to make it go away, “It’s just, to hear you tell it I took pity on you and I’ve been talking to you to, like, guide you along and coach you because I’m some saint!” He smiles, starting to feel amused. “Steve— I just wanted some reason to talk to you, dude.”

Steve blinks at him. “What?”

He has to laugh, putting his forehead in his hand. “Sorry. I, just, I have not been operating under the assumption that I had a chance with you? And now it sounds like you’re telling me I do? While I sit on your couch filling your trash can with my disgusting tissue mountain?”

All he gets from the man is “...Huh?”

“You said ‘crush’,” he insists, and he’s not laughing, his heart is pounding actually. “What did you mean by that?” He’s gonna awkwardly say that he wants to fuck, and once that box is checked in his Gay Awakening, he’ll move on to actually date people actually in his league, and that’s maybe not gonna feel great, but, well…

Steve looks up from staring at his hands, makes eye contact, and he looks a little confused and a lot like he’s facing a firing squad. “I meant, I mean that…” he blows a breath out. “Jesus I have no idea what I’m doing. I mean that I’ve been trying to work up the courage to ask you out on a date, since pretty much the first night I met you.”

Bucky’s head does a record scratch and Steve scoffs and rolls his eyes, “But I guess instead I kidnapped you when you were sick and blurted this out to you while you were trapped on my couch waiting to be left alone to sleep. I was never smooth but I swear I’ve done better than this.”

A giddy feeling is rising up in Bucky’s chest, making him forget completely about how tired and crappy he feels. “Well, I am smooth,” he says, “I’ve got game. At least, I did, until you showed up and turned me into a giggling bimbo. What the hell, Steve.”

“This is starting to seem like a romantic conversation but I can’t tell,” murmurs Steve with his face still uncertain but a little twinkle in his eye.

Bucky’s nose is gonna ruin this, he’s surprised it gave him that long a grace period. “Yeah, snfff, real romantic, I’mb gonna—hih—fuckin’ sndeeze—heh-heTShoo! Againd.”

Another sneeze teases out, and then he has to blow his nose for about ten years. “Bless you,” says Steve all quiet and bedroomy in his deep voice, and he’s definitely smiling, sparkle-eyes, leaning towards him the tiniest bit, but still looking like Bucky’s leaving him hanging a little, unsure, and he can’t help the wave of doubt he feels.

“Steve, you—” he stares at the blanket on his lap. “I’m a mess. You’ve accomplished shit, you have a real goddamn job, I—I’m just, ok, we’re both adults, but I feel like a screw-up kid compared to you.” He takes a deep breath and says what he doesn’t want to, “I’d be...pretty damn flattered if you wanted to hook up. I kinda can’t imagine you actually want to date me.”

He dares to look up and Steve looks more serious. He doesn’t say, “no shit.” He says, “I won’t argue if you say you don’t want anything, but I sure don’t agree with how you describe yourself. I don’t want to hook up—at least, not just that— I want to date you, get to know each other better, because I like you. I trust my judgement, when I think someone’s a good person.”

He says it so simply, and Bucky finds himself believing it despite himself, and a warm happy fire is kindling under his ribs. “Well, shit,” he murmurs, “it’s starting to seem like you’re asking me out.”

“It’s...starting to seem like you might be saying yes? If I am?” Steve looks agonized and Bucky’s doubts are no match for the giddiness fizzing up inside him, and he lets it show on his face with a grin, and whatever that looks like makes Steve kinda gulp and scootch up closer to him. Bucky makes a show of giving a slow, considering nod. Yes.

Steve has this soft, nervous little smile on his face, but his eyes hold something weighty, almost burning, as he moves even closer, and it’s just, it’s really, wow, Bucky has maybe never been taken seriously in quite this way by anyone before, it makes his knees feel watery and kindles something in his core. “I know you’re sick,” he rumbles, “but I feel like I gotta kiss you,” and how is it that the softer he speaks the deeper his voice sounds? He brushes his curled fingers over Bucky’s cheek because that’s how close they are now and this isn’t really Bucky’s life, is it? “What if I was to kiss you, right now?”

It’s hard to tell with the sexiness melting his brain but he realizes Steve is actually asking, because he’s a gentleman— a gentleman Bucky wants to be taken apart and turned inside out by. “Then you would be a guaranteed victim of my plague,” he breathes. “But I wouldn’t stop you, I’m not that selfless.”

“Sounds like a dare,” Steve murmurs, and tilts his head and presses their lips together.

It’s a short simple kiss but they each give a quiet gasp at the contact, and then stay there a moment. Steve’s beard isn’t huge but he feels it, like a firm underline to the shockingly warm plush pressure of his lips. He thankfully tragically remembers that congested people can’t make out and pulls away after just a brief press of lips, but not before giving a soft lick to Bucky’s, full of promised things to come.

They sit there a few inches apart and breathe. Bucky feels like a vibrating tuning fork. He just barely stops himself from shakily saying “wow,” like a highschool virgin, but when he sees Steve looking at him with lips still parted and a gobsmacked expression he changes his mind and lets it out anyway, “wow,” with a giddy grin.

“Yeah,” Steve breathes, blinking like he got hit with a cartoon hammer, going from pink to red, and then he swoops in and kisses Bucky’s cheek, and then stands, going, “Excuse me, just gotta go...out of your sightline, and. Do something cool. And serious. No victory dances.”

…..the next morning…….

Steve could hear Bucky in the shower, sneezing three times, but not sounding—four times—nearly as heavy or exhausted as the night before. A few minutes and one loud noseblow later, he came out wrapped in a towel, mercilessly bare-chested, his nose bright red but his eyes clear and cheerful. Steve’s attention caught on his chest as his nipples tightened in the relative chill as Bucky said sheepishly, “forgot my clo-hothes—” his voice swooping to a breathy quaver on the last word, “hhh-hh-hehh—EHisSHOooh!” he turned as far away from Steve’s part of the room as possible and sneezed over his shoulder. “Snnfff. Excuse me, sorry.”

“Can I lend you some warmer stuff, just for now while we eat breakfast? There’s no way you’re not still sick,” Steve fussed, forcing himself to round the kitchen island slowly and casually instead of rushing over and wrapping him up in his arms and kissing his red nose that was twitching again. He quelled it with another sniff that sounded a lot less congested than the previous night.

“Ah, I’m ok. I felt really bad yesterday, but I slept so well,” he said with a warm grateful smile at Steve that went to his toes, “I don’t feel shitty and run-down anymore, just all, like, shnuffly.”

Steve chuckled helplessly and went over to rub his shoulder. “You’re adorable.”

“No way!” Bucky glowered, but then a few drops fell from his wet hair to his chest and neck, and he shivered into a sneeze so quick and light it sounded incomplete, “hih—tish!” followed by “ih-hihtchoo!” and he blinked, taken by surprise.

“That was... the cutest thing that ever happened,” Steve said truthfully.

“Shuddup— heh—edschoo!”

#at some point they bone and there are like snapshots of that written #just sayin #snz fic #stucky snz fic #sneeze kink fanfiction #cute sick bucky #snzfic #lots of not-snz plot but the story is still basically Bucky Has The Sneezies You Must Save Him Steve

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haveyouseenthismovie-poll · 1 year ago

Note

When I first saw the blog, I had a very disdainfull reaction of "we get it Tumblr only watch kid movies" but the more result I see the more I find it interesting that yes, the movie with the most overwhelming "yes" are movies that were really popular when we were children, but most adults movies either have an overwhelming "haven't even heard of it" or have actually very close "yes" and "no" answers. There's very little cultural monolith actually

Most of the kids' movies that have received majority "yes" votes haven't been all that surprising. Most of them are Disney (or other big animation studios') movies that came out in the 2000s-2010s, so a lot of this site's primary age demographic probably watched them as children. I think if you asked any site with a primary age demographic of 20-30 year olds about movies like Monsters Inc. or The Incredibles, the results wouldn't be that different- those are just extremely popular movies. That's where the adult-oriented movies prove more interesting IMO, as those are the movies that you generally have to have made an active effort to see rather than just had it played for you as a little kid. For instance, Blade Runner isn't a movie my parents would've shown me or that any of my peers would've been talking about when I was younger- I saw it myself once I got older because it was regularly talked about in film fan circles I'm in and thus I thought it was important to watch it. I have to imagine that at least a few other "yes" voters on that poll had a similar experience.

The fact that the adult-oriented movie results are, as you said, usually either primarily "haven't heard of this" votes or are a fairly even yes/no split is interesting because it establishes two types of adult-oriented movies: the ones that are critically acclaimed in film fanatic circles, but lesser known outside of that demographic, and the ones that are so absurdly popular that it's wild to think that anyone hasn't heard of it. Maybe you don't care about killer robots or evil shark movies, but chances are that you at least know about The Terminator and Jaws, whereas movies like The 400 Blows and Persona are apparently primarily heard about and watched only by those with an active interest in film history (at least as far as this blog's voting pool is concerned.)

A take-away from this blog that I've read and found interesting is the idea that a lot of folks basically just stop watching movies when they get older. I think this can be hard to wrap your head around if you are someone who really loves movies and still makes an active effort to watch a variety of them, but it does seem to be what this blog's results suggest. Most people simply aren't that into movies, especially when the movies in question came out decades before they were born. Maybe that's a bummer for some, but that just makes me interested in seeing what movies general audiences (or in this case, the Tumblr demographic) have deemed important to check out.

What do the followers think about this? Are there any results that y'all found particularly surprising?

#answers #(also obvi some movies are just generally obscure but im not talking about those ones here lol)

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pizzaqueen · 2 years ago

Text

Steve Harrington time stamps

For when you just want to watch Steve’s scenes

I had the idea to do this during my current rewatch thanks to @harmonictechnicality (who was very happy for me to post this) and then @al-ghoul sent me his timestamps so a HUGE thank you there!

Oh, and @faequeentitania has a supercut of all of Eddie's scenes (link is in their bio) so I didn’t add Eddie’s time stamps to this post

My original intention was to not post this until it was completely done, but I honestly don't have much energy right now, so there are only time stamps up to S04E05. But I do intend to finish it one day! (If anyone wants to help out with the remaining ones, that would be great.) You can also see where the formatting changes and that's where I stopped typing up my notes and just used what @al-ghoul sent me, but I do want to reformat it so it's uniform, and add in songs used for his scenes, but I just wanted to get this out there

And I want to say sorry if someone has already done something like this in the meantime! I tried searching but Tumblr search isn't great

SEASON ONE

Chapter One: The Vanishing of Will Byers

14:54 - 16:07 Steve’s first appearance in his rendezvous with Nancy in the bathroom

37:59 - 38:42 Mike sees Steve trying to climb through Nancy’s window

41:04 - 43:12 helping Nancy study

Chapter Two: The Weirdo on Maple Street

12:26 - 14:04 asking Nancy to the party at his house (mention of his parents); the scene cuts to Nancy and Jonathan at 13:20 but you can still see Steve in the background until 14:04

38:17 - 38:37 opening the door for Nancy and Barb (song: Raise a Little Hell by Trooper*)

43:06 - 45:39 pool scene with the drinking, etc., with Tommy H, Carol, Nancy and Barb (song: I Melt With You by Modern English)

49:18 - 49:40 drying off and going upstairs

50:22 - 51:18 we see Steve and Nancy through the window from Jonathan’s POV then it cuts to inside Steve’s room

52:36 - 52:50 getting hot and heavy with Nancy (song: tiniest snippet of the opening strains of Hazy Shade of Winter by The Bangles)

*seems to be playing inside Steve’s house because it’s muffled and gets louder when he opens the doors

Chapter Three: Holly, Jolly

00:40 - 1:50 sleeping with Nancy, intercut with Barb being killed (song: Waiting for a Girl Like You by Foreigner)

3:03 - 3:50 Nancy tries to wake Steve, then leaves

10:16 - 11:11 at Nancy’s locker

20:48 - 21:56 cafeteria with Tommy H, Carol and Nancy

30:07 - 32:16 confronting Jonathan about photos

36:01 - 36:43 waiting for the game in the hallway with Tommy H, Carol and Nancy; Nancy leaves

Chapter Four: The Body

13:16 - 14:30 meeting Nancy between buildings; asks her not to tell the cops about the beer (mention of parents)

Chapter Five: The Flea and the Acrobat

25:47 - 27:51 Steve shows up at Nancy’s to say sorry and invite her to the movies (mention of parents; song: Steve singing a bit of Old Time Rock and Roll)

Chapter Six: The Monster

3:29 - 4:45 driving to Nancy’s with Tommy H and Carol; sees Jonathan and Nancy on bed through window (song: Sunglasses at Night by Corey Hart*)

30:46 - 33:18 alley fight with Jonathan

* playing on the car stereo

Chapter Seven: The Bathtub

14:21 - 16:00 Tommy brings Steve a can of Coke and painkillers; Steve has fight with Tommy and Carol then drives off

18:40 - 19:21 offers to help scrub graffiti off cinema marquee

Chapter Eight: The Upside Down

14:42 - 17:03 comes to Jonathan’s to say sorry; gets introduced to the upside down shenanigans

18:53 - 22:00 Nancy gives Steve an out; he runs, then he comes back (it cuts to Hopper and Joyce at 21:18 for a couple of seconds)

22:27 - 23:50 following the lights with Nancy and Jonathan that Joyce and Hopper are lighting up as they go through the UD version (intercut with scenes of Joyce and Hopper)

48:01 - 48:24 epilogue snuggling on couch with Nancy in Christmas sweater

SEASON TWO

Chapter One: Madmax

12:13 - 14:02 Nancy looking over Steve’s essay in the car outside the school (song: Talking in Your Sleep by The Romantics)

20:09 - 20:38 waiting by the corner in the hallway to pick Nancy up and twirl her around by the lockers

31:38 - 33:50 dinner with Nancy at Barb’s parents

Chapter Two: Trick or Treat, Freak

15:58 - 19:22 studying in the library with Nancy/Steve is worried about the government if they talk too much about what happened and suggests going to party and pretend everything is normal (between 17:15 to 17:36 it cuts to Nancy thinking she sees Barb)

31:23 - 32:17 Tommy H and Billy come over while Steve is with Nancy at the party; Tommy H: “We’ve got a new keg king, Harrington.” (Song: Shout at the Devil by Mötley Crüe)

42:03 - 44:14 dancing with Nancy (song Girls on Film by Duran Duran)/spills drink on her/bathroom ‘bullshit’ scene

Chapter Three: The Pollywog

19:11 - 21:14 playing basketball against Billy (Song: Go! By Tones on Tail) and talking with Nancy between the buildings

Chapter Four: Will the Wise

16:23 - 17:53 basketball again (Song: Scarface (Push it to the Limit) from Scarface) and the shower scene with Tommy H and Billy

Chapter Five: Dig Dug

35:17 - 35:52 shows up to Nancy’s with flowers and is waylaid by Dustin

Chapter Six: The Spy

00:51 - 3:43 In car with Dustin (song: Hammer to Fall by Queen*) going to kill Dart with bat

12:39 - 13:06 bringing meat with Dustin

24:51 - 27:34 laying trap for Dart with Dustin (meat on the railroad tracks) and talking about girls

31:48 - 32:37 at the junkyard with Dustin

33:10 - 33:21 at the junkyard with Dustin, Lucas and Max

35:27 - 35:38 fortifying the bus/setting stuff up at the junkyard

35:49 - 36:02 pouring gasoline

36:48 - 37:01 going into the bus

37:44 - 38:24 inside the bus; flicking the lighter

40:46 - 45:06 demodogs appear; Steve goes out as bait/to fight them

* playing on the car stereo

Chapter Seven: The Lost Sister

Doesn’t appear in this episode

Chapter Eight: The Mind Flayer

08:35 - 10:33 walking from the junk yard with kids at night, looking for Dart on the train tracks

13:27 - 13:56 in front of Hawkins lab; meet up with Nancy and Jonathan

15:15 - 15:45 in front of the lab

16:15 - 16:21 gate opens

21:58 - 22:22 waiting at gate; Hopper picks them up

23:06 - 23:42 at the Byers’

24:43 - 29:03 in Byers’ kitchen; Steve is in and out of the frame/sometimes in the background

29:23 - 29:55 duct-taping the shed with Nancy

31:51 - 32:07 finishing the shed with everyone

33:05 - 33:10 practicing with a bat at Byers'

34:32 - 34:35 blinking lights at Byers’

38:52 - 39:16 morse code

40:31 - 40:56 “close gate”

41:31 - 41:37 hearing demodogs

42:15 - 44:34 preparing to fight/El arrives

S02E09:

00:07:23 Steve (at Byers with everyone) (00:08:03)

00:09:08 Steve (at Byers backyard with Nancy) (00:10:02)

00:10:50 Steve (on the Byers porch with kids) (00:11:06)

00:15:22 Steve (putting demodog in the fridge) (00:15:57)

00:16:17 Steve (at the Byers with the kids / Billy arrives) (00:19:09)

00:19:47 Steve (fighting Billy) (00:21:02)

00:24:41 Steve (waking up in the car with Max) (00:25:54)

00:26:43 Steve (arriving to the tunnels) (00:28:17)

00:30:00 Steve (at the tunnels) (00:31:42)

00:33:40 Steve (torching the tunnels while Will burns) (00:34:43)

00:36:52 Steve (running through the tunnels) (00:36:59)

00:38:00 Steve (freeing Mike / meeting Dart) (00:39:38)

00:40:16 Steve (running out of the tunnels) (00:41:19)

00:43:40 Steve (gate closed) (00:43:44)

00:45:19 Steve (at the Barb's funeral) (00:45:27)

00:48:51 Steve (driving Dustin to the Snow Ball) (songs: Love is a Battlefield by Pat Benatar and Twist of Fate by Olivia Newton-John*) (00:50:10)

*both are playing inside the Snow Ball Edit: actually the Pat Benatar song seems to be coming from his car on re-watching 😅 it definitely sounded like from inside the building to me before but now it doesn’t

--------------------------------------------------------

S03E01:

00:09:15 Steve (letting the kids through Scoops Ahoy back door) (00:09:40)

00:10:46 Steve (lights go out) (00:11:01)

00:12:12 Steve (lights go back) (00:12:18)

00:24:42 Steve (Scoops Ahoy with Robin, hitting on ladies) (00:26:46)

S03E02:

00:10:15 Steve (Scoops Ahoy with Dustin) (00:12:34)

00:17:52 Steve (translating Russian with Dustin) (00:19:24)

00:35:27 Steve (Robin translated first Russian) (00:35:54)

00:41:26 Steve (mall after hours with Robin and Dustin) (00:43:37)

S03E03:

00:17:23 Steve (spying for spies in the mall with Dustin) (00:19:19)

00:27:12 Steve (found a sport fitness "spy" with Dustin) song: Wake Me Up Before you Go-Go by Wham!* (00:28:32)

00:29:20 Steve (with Dustin returning to Scoop Ahoy) (00:29:26)

00:30:03 Steve (Robin cracked the code) (00:30:12)

00:39:20 Steve (in the rain looking at delivery) (00:40:30)

*playing in the jazzercise class

S03E04:

00:09:04 Steve (Scoops Ahoy, devising a plan) 00:10:08

00:21:14 Steve (Robin brings Starcourt blueprints) (00:22:58)

00:24:32 Steve (bringing Erica into the plan) (00:25:11)

00:34:51 Steve (Erica goes into the vent) (00:35:05)

00:36:22 Steve (Erica got to the room) (00:37:00)

00:40:28 Steve (opening the boxes with the team Scoops) (00:42:08)

S03E05:

00:00:07 Steve (the elevator room falling) (00:01:58)

00:16:25 Steve (stuck in / getting out of the elevator room) (00:19:46)

00:25:19 Steve (walking the tunnel) (00:27:16)

00:34:40 Steve (finding the russian base / fighting the guard) (00:37:01)

00:37:21 Steve (Robin found The Machine) (00:38:21)

S03E06:

00:00:14 Steve (being apprehended by russians) (00:01:48)

00:17:12 Steve (being beaten up / questioned by the russians) (00:20:21)

00:31:06 Steve (tied to a chair with Robin) (00:35:58)

00:45:25 Steve (truth serum kicks in / Dustin saves them) (00:48:50)

S03E07:

00:06:31 Steve (Dustin is driving away through the tunnel / elevator) (00:08:45)

00:13:13 Steve (running from the mall guards into the cinema) (00:14:04)

00:14:30-32 / 00:14:41-44 (tweedldee and tweedledum in the cinema)

00:23:19 Steve (drunk with Robin in the cinema hallway) (00:25:08)

00:28:27 Steve (confesses Robin in the cinema restroom) (00:35:02)

00:39:07 Steve (sneaking out of the restroom) (00:40:03)

00:48:50 Steve (hiding from mall guards under the counter) (00:49:16)

00:49:41 Steve (El defeated the guards) (00:50:51)

00:51:09-14 Steve (El collapses)

S03E08:

00:00:36 Steve (Eleven's fucked up leg) 00:01:25

00:02:50 Steve (El pulls the Flayer out of the leg) (00:03:16)

00:04:28 Steve (everyone is catching up on things) (00:05:11)

00:06:34 Steve (hanging around while everyone prepares) (00:06:43)

00:07:40 Steve (driving away from the mall) (00:08:10)

00:13:32 Steve (driving kids to the radio hill) (00:14:42)

00:17:50 Steve (on the radio hill) (00:18:19)

00:24:19 Steve (on the radio hill, Flayer attacks Starcourt) (00:25:12)

00:26:03 Steve (on the radio hill running back to the car) (00:26:14)

00:32:54 Steve (hitting Billy's car at Starcourt, Nancy's driving away) 00:33:35

00:34:39 Steve (Flayer pursues the car, Suzie appears) (00:34:50)

00:35:49-53 Steve (in the car while Dustin sings over the radio)

00:36:28-31 Steve (in the car while Dustin and Suzie both singing)

00:38:04 Steve (in the car while Flayer goes back to Starcourt)

00:42:29-34 Steve (throwing fireworks at the Flayer in the mall)

00:43:03-04 Steve (keeps throwing)

00:44:16-22 Steve (on the radio with Dustin)

00:50:33 Steve (Flayer disassembles) (00:50:43)

00:54:58-01 Steve (at the ER car in the background)

00:56:44 Steve (arriving with Robin at the Family Video for a job) (00:58:04)

00:58:55 Steve (bumping into the cardboard figure) (00:59:12)

--------------------------------------------------------

S04E01:

00:15:24 Steve (in car with Robin) (00:16:58)

00:54:43 Steve (with Brenda at basketball game) (00:56:24)

S04E02:

00:07:56 Steve (at Family Video with Robin) (00:09:49)

00:28:13 Steve (at Family Video with Max & Dustin) (00:29:06)

00:44:58 Steve (at Family Video flirting / searching for Rick) (00:47:43)

01:01:45 Steve/Eddie (at Reefer Rick's) (01:06:14)

01:07:22 Eddie, Steve (talks about Chrissy / Vecna revealed) (01:12:30)

S04E03:

00:12:28 Eddie, Steve (receiving supplies at Rick's) (00:14:23)

00:15:14 Steve (at Fred's crime scene) (00:15:29)

00:25:29 Steve (with kids and Nancy discussing Vecna) (00:28:12)

00:38:21 Steve (outside shrink's house in the car) (00:39:28)

00:41:22 Steve (driving away from the shrink) (00:41:33)

00:42:00 Steve (driving the car while Lucas radioes) (00:42:43)

00:50:53 Steve (breaking into school shrink's office at night) (00:51:38)

00:55:54 Steve (at the shrink's office) (00:56:53)

S04E04:

00:02:09 Steve (school after Max's episode, Nancy and Robin arrive) (00:04:50)

00:07:29 Steve (the Wheeler's house - Max writes letters, Nancy and Robin arrive) (00:10:44)

00:17:35 Steve (Max finished the letters, wants to go) (00:20:04)

00:31:33 Steve (driving Max to the trailer park) (00:31:53)

00:34:35-49 Steve (Max returns to the car)

00:48:17 Steve (driving Max to the cemetery) (00:49:00)

01:02:32 Steve (going for Max at the cemetery) (01:03:04)

01:03:17 Steve (trying to wake Max up) (01:03:35)

01:04:58-07 Steve (with Dustin and Lucas trying to wake Max up)

01:09:01-12 Steve (Dustin brings music to Max)

01:10:45 Steve (everyone searching for the tape) (01:11:06)

01:11:50-00 Steve (Max flies)

01:13:43 Steve (Max is out) (01:14:14)

S04E05:

00:14:32 Steve (sleeping in Wheeler's basement) (00:14:38)

00:36:19 Steve (arriving at Creel's house with everyone) (00:40:06)

00:49:55 Steve (checking Creel's house with DNR) (00:52:36)

#Steve harrington #stranger things #st4 #steddie #steve x eddie #st3 #st1 #st2 #(steddie is the target audience but it's also for anyone!!)#(reblogs very much appreciated on this one!)

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octuscle · 10 months ago

Note

Hi:) what kind of stories do you like the most in terms of writing ? (Jock, bikers etc)

What kind of stories do you not like and/or have too much inboxes of?

Thanks! I love your stories btw

I have been thinking about this ask for a long time. I've been asked this question, or something very similar, several times before. And I have answered it. And I get asked it again. And asked again. And I get, even though I've written that I don't like celebrity TFs and reruns and sequels, requests for celebrity TFs and reruns and sequels over and over again.

I've been writing my stories here for about a year. I've posted almost 1,000 stories. Let's assume I've spent about an hour on each story. 1,000 hours of Tumblr! Almost three hours a day on average. Plus time for role-playing and the like.

If I had spent half the time in the pool or at the gym. And spent the other half learning Spanish… I wouldn't have an ounce of fat left on my body and would be fluent in Spanish. If I had tutored during that time, I could have earned 20 K euros. Ko-Fi earned me a staggering 15 USD in that time.

I always say that I wrote the stories here primarily for myself. Yes, the writing was hot. But the stories used to be in my head while I was jerking off. Was that worse or better?

There are very, very few people here with whom I had a lot of fun chatting. Really nice guys with whom I lived out hot fantasies. Virtually. Nothing was real. But still hot. I got a lot of likes and reblogs from a lot of people. I thank them for that. I received real appreciation from very, very few people. Thank you very, VERY much for that!

It wasn't exactly the question I was asked, but I asked myself which transformations I like best. My own is my favorite. It's more exhausting than the ones done by guys who use Chronivac. But I've decided to focus on my own transformation. And that's why I'm starting my Tumblr retreat today. There are a number of asks I'm already working on answering. I'll answer them later. Maybe there will be a few more exciting questions too. But only until tonight. Then Chronivac support will be closed. And I will delete the mass of unanswered asks.

I'll miss a lot of things when I retire here. But I have stopped smoking. And I managed to lose 20 kilograms a few years ago and get into the best shape of my life. Both were good for me. And I hope that the retreat from the virtual to the real transformation will be too.

#not a story #personal

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ulircursed · 5 months ago

Text

TOA Aniversary Munday

From Neffi!

Celebrating TOA and the people who contribute to make our group what it is.

Repost, don't reblog. Only fill in what you feel comfortable sharing!

Happy anniversary, TOA! Here's to many more years spent together.

Name: eri

Pronouns: she/her

Birthday (no year): 9/30

Where are you from? What is your time zone? Taiwan! GMT+8, currently 12 hours ahead of TOAST. Good news: the apocalypse hasn't hit the future yet!

How long is your roleplay experience? Probably around 10+ years at this point, unless running around as Pokemon on the playground counts, in which case more like 20 years ahaha

How were you introduced to roleplaying as a whole? I'm reasonably certain Fire Emblem was my first foray into tumblr RP, and Emmeryn was my first muse! There was a little indie community that I joined back then, though I haven't kept in contact with them

How were you introduced to TOA? I don't really remember, but all I know is that I lurked around the masterlist around the time of L&K but didn't pluck up the courage to join until nearly a year later when I saw there was a Reyson (shoutout to birdie!)

Do you have any pets? Nope! Moved around too much as a kid and current living situation doesn't support having one. Closest I got was sharing an apartment with my roommate's floofy cat for two years in college; his name's Chester and he was super adorable. I'd like to have a dog someday though!

What is your favorite time of year and why? (Season, holiday, general period) WINTERRRR I am a human furnace and summer is suffering. Every spring I start counting down the days to the next winter ahaha

What is your IRL occupation? I work at the counseling department in a junior college!

Some interests and things you like/enjoy? Learning languages, singing, obscure fun facts and watching Youtube video essays

What non-Fire Emblem games do you play? Used to be a big Pokemon person but I stopped playing the mainline games by Gen VII (not for lack of interest! RL circumstances changed around that time and I just never got back into the habit of buying those games); nowadays I play a few mobile games daily but that's about it

Favorite Pokemon type & Pokemon: Water; too many, but if I had to name just one I will probably say Rufflet

Tell us some funfacts and trivia about yourself! The first fun fact is that the moment I get asked questions like this I immediately go Brain Empty and this is why I rarely fill out toa monthly feedback forms dakfjslfj uhhhh my favorite color is blue! I joined an archery club in grad school (two years ago) to understand what shooting a bow feels like. I love swimming but haven't been to a pool for maybe like 9 years now. I really like going to zoos.

How did you get into Fire Emblem? My older brother introduced my younger brother and me to Japanese FE4 when we were kids, when we knew absolutely no Japanese and just messed around the first map and never beat it. I properly started playing when I was in high school, with FE7 being the first game I beat! I normally count my official FE gaming journey as starting with 7 in high school :'D

What Fire Emblem games have you played? All the mainline ones except 1-3 and Echoes (I'm...... working on it)

First & Favorite Fire Emblem games: FE7; FE3H

List your 5 favorite Fire Emblem characters across the series! You can't do this to me man. UHHH ok Lucius is my very most favorite FE character. Andrei needs to be here. I lump the Heron sibs as one unit for questions like this. Tibarn. Sylvain. There are probably a dozen more but

Who was the first character ever to make you go “ooh I like this one in particular” and why? Can be any context and reason! HONESTLY Andrei thanks to the Oosawa manga. His arc changed my brain chemistry permanently

Any Fire Emblem crushes? 😳 I don't think I've really crushed on fictional characters before ahaha

If you’ve played (or are familiar with) the following games, who was your first S support? Who would you S support nowadays? - Awakening: Chrom I think; uhhhh Lon'qu or Cherche?? - Fates: Silas I think???; I'm currently partway through a Birthright playthrough and I seem geared to S support with Jakob so him - Three Houses: Dimitri; started my first and only Myleth run a few months back and I'll probably go with Miss Thea :flushed: - Engage: None; man I don't know

Favorite Fire Emblem class? Bishop

If you were a Fire Emblem character, what would be your class and stats? Would you be playable? I think I could be a War Cleric wielding a giant hammer. If you don't go to bed on time I will forcibly join your army and make you

If you were a Three Houses character, what would be your affiliation? Blue Lions I guess!

If you were an Officers Academy student, what would be your boons, banes and potential budding talent? Axe boon, Reason bane, Riding budding talent

If you were an Engage character, which nation would you originate from? Brodia

How do you pronounce TOA? TOE-uh

Current TOA muses: Just me and my bow man for the moment

Past TOA muses? Leanne, Lucius, Altena, Nino

Who was your first TOA muse? If you no longer have them, can you see yourself picking them up again? Leanne was my first! Honestly she always lives in a cozy little corner of my head, so she can be back at any moment if RL permits

Do you believe you have a type of character you gravitate towards writing? Nice Girls (gender neutral) who have no quarrel with 99% of the world. As you may be able to see, Andrei does not fit this mold.

Do you have characters or types of characters you don’t think you can handle writing, but wish you could? Flirts. They're so much fun to read but I don't think I could flirt my way out of a paper bag irl so I would never know what to write

What kind of scenes, situations etc do you believe you enjoy writing the most? I honestly love fluffy cozy fun friendshippy situations!!! Again, Andrei is not conducive to this. I mean I do also like painful scenes but--

Do you have any scenario in mind for your muse(s) that gets you thinking “man I hope I get to write this one day”? that Yngvi AU where Brigid never disappeared because things will still go to shit but the circumstances would be so different. Honestly Brigid doesn't even need to explicitly be there for this to work so if any Gen I Jugdrals ever want to do this then I grip you

Favorite TOA-related memories? So many, but the West Faerghus Croc lives rent free in my brain forever.

Present or past tense? I started off with past tense, but now default to present. When the stars align and I notice my partner using past tense, sometimes I will also switch, but not always.

Normal size text, small text, no preference? Small text, though I am happy to switch for my partner's preference if needed!

Got any potential muse delusions to share? 😉 Waves goodbye to my faceless Glenn delusions honestly thank u new anniversary ruling for saving me from those eternal brainworms

#➵ a quiverful of arrows (ooc)#happy anniversaryyyyyy toa

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maskedemerald · 1 year ago

Text

Pre-Order The Last Straw Novella

So the Kickstarter didn't work out but that isn't going to stop me! The book still comes out on the 25th of November! I'm still planning to do a smaller print run so if you want Paperback its going to exist! Follow the link to my website to pre-order in either E-Book or Paperback format!

A Curiosity Piqued – The Last Straw Novella – Masked Emerald

Also If you are interested I have some thoughts about the Kickstarter experience below the cut! Just my thoughts going forward and not words from any kind of expert on the matter. In fact they are rather rambly, sorry about that.

The Numbers

Costs

Indie printing is definitely not cheap, the costs have gone up for pretty much everything. However the worst thing was the increased cost of postage. Everything I read said make 20% of the goal postage costs. The way things are now I found it was more like 35% which is not good. My original printing costs were £3000 but by the time I'd added on fees, postage for the physical books and taxes it was £7000!

The Problem with Social Media

One of the biggest adversaries I faced was the algorithm and social media. Discoverability is shit on pretty much all social media at the moment. Getting seen beyond my existing followers was a big challenge. The only place I found growth was Tumblr and specifically in the Writeblr side of it (Hi new writer friends! I appreciate you! I'm still catching up on the tag games from when I was ill!)

The Experience

Preparations

Definitely next time starting preparations earlier. There is a lot of preparations involved so I'm definitely going to give myself more time so I'm not trying to do it all at the same time.

The video was harder than I thought it would be, give me unscripted streams any day over trying to get that perfect take.

Shy Bens Get Nout

Is a useful phrase however my anxiety sometimes makes it hard to actually do but seriously if you don't ask then you don't get. While it wasn't me that asked, someone asked on my behalf and as a result I got to do a talk about the book on the radio. Pick up the courage and ask, it might just make a difference. The worst they can do is say no. Which yeah can be intimidating but I need to get better at it!

Stress

I've been describing the Kickstarter as a mad dash. That's what it felt like. I had to constantly be pushing it and then things got worse, I got ill. I was in bed with no capacity to do anything for a week. It tanked my ability to push the Kickstarter. I seriously think its a good idea to have a bunch of posts already written and scheduled to go out. That way anything I post is extra. I really didn't like the stress of it personally so if I try again in future I'll be working to keep the stress low.

Future Plans

Longer Term Funding Pool

I'm going to be tracking the money made by The Last Straw and any merch designs to count towards the next print run of either The Last Straw or the next book. I'm also thinking about the people subbing on Twitch and the people considering becoming a Patreon. These people by the time a book comes out have put money into the printing pool and I think it would be more fair if they can also get the physicals without needing to pay full price. Also without them feeling they need to participate in a Kickstarter to make the thing they want happen. So I'm planning to change my rewards! Subs and Patreons will get virtual stamps towards physical items. This lets me keep entry low and even based on how much I get across the Twitch subs and Patreons. I'll be posting a proper breakdown soon.

Plans for Trying Kickstarter Again

I plan to try crowd funding again if the long term pool doesn't get enough for the next book but I am also considering trying out other sites like Indiegogo. The flexible funding is interesting if I could work out the costs the right way. We'll see what happens in March/April when I need to start thinking about printing the next A Curiosity Piqued.

#writing #writeblr community #creative writing #writeblr #amwriting #writer #A Curiosity Piqued Series #The Last Straw Novella

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its300am · 2 years ago

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Something may be happening right now

What is written here is nothing but a compilation of uncertainties, something I should be taking to the therapy room from which I constantly find myself running away. I always wanted to have a blog, always thought it was great, and I was always in this field. I was in the golden eras of Tumblr as a reader and every now, and then I dared to write, but insecurity always caught up with me. I wrote, but I was terrified of being read. When someone who knew me discovered my writings, that was it, I would never appear on that website again. And that's why drowned and doomed to probably give up that I'm not going to give any certainty that this will one day become something, in fact, it may just be a journal. It will always be in process and if anyone asks, well, it's something I'm trying to make happen. Who knows, maybe one day it will happen even without me knowing.

I don't know if this format still works, It may seem cringe to younger ones, but I used to like things like this, and now that I'm way closer to my 30s than my 20s I'm in the right to be cringe or old-fashioned anyway… I'm not certain about my username yet, I wanted to be something that represents what people will find here, or what I look like to readers. I think the name will come to me eventually by itself. For now I'm its300am.

There are subjects that I like or deal with in general, and I think I should mention it to be aware of what may appear here.

• Movies, but my letterboxd is pretty empty, I mostly post vaguely there because I'm afraid of my mutuals, I mean, they know me IRL, so…

• Anime and manga, but it's been a while since I got close to any of those, college is being so hard on me. Still, my favorites are Dr. Stone, Bungo Stray Dogs and Jojo's Bizarre Adventure.

• Literature, but I have such a reading hangover that I spend more time thinking about reading than reading (and the bookshelf is just getting ignored). You can see as my goodreads is left to flies.

• Feminism, okay, in this one I think I'm more active, I'm even part of a women's collective, I may come to comment more on that in the future. I'm a Marxist feminist btw.

• Eco-socialism, this one is new to me, but I've always loved the subject, and now I'm getting closer, maybe one thing or another will appear even from my exploration on the subject.

• Comics, this is the sunken skeleton of that pool meme, you know what it is? I used to love it, but it's really been a long time since I've been close, I want to go back. I really like DC's specially their girls such as Wonder Woman, Harley Quinn, Ivy Poison, Punchline, Zatanna, and others. From Marvel, I enjoy X-Men, Guardians of the Galaxy and I have interest in the Eternals.

Other than that I get into a little bit of everything, in music I can't even say what my favorite genre is. My favorite artists transit between Mozart, Lily Allen, Sistar, Charlie Brown Jr, Selena Gomez, Ludmila, Green Day and so on, without any apparent pattern. My for you is summarized in compilations of kittens and some cosplayers, occasionally something about decoration or DIY appears.

In terms of games, I'm not committed to any, because I don't have much time to play, but I like Danganronpa, Identity V, Dead by Daylight, Street Fight V and Twisted Wonderland. The last one is the only one I play more often, since it doesn't demand much from me. I was addicted to Genshin Impact once, but I left the world of drugs and entered the world of hard drugs (college). Since then, it was a lost cause, and I'm not even a good student, I just need to work twice as hard to keep myself at least average. Thank you dyslexia, thank you bipolar disorder, without you my life would be very easy, so it wouldn't be any fun. /irony

My current addictions are listening to podcasts while doing daily activities, some of my favorites are Ciência Suja and Modus Operandi, both in my native language (Portuguese). Plus another addiction is organizing my stuff, the problem is that it never stays organized, so I'm constantly organizing a lifelong mess.

Now that you know me intimately, let's get to the formalities, I prefer to be called Kaká and I have no preference or identification with a specific pronoun. My sexuality is pan, but I'm not going to make war with anyone who confuses it with bi, I live in a huge fatigue, I don't have the energy for that, really. I'm studying literature and modern languages, focused on Portuguese, and I should graduate whenever destiny has planned to. I want to be a teacher, but every day I lose confidence that I have what it takes to pursue this career, so my plan b is to find a publisher that will take me on their team. Yo hablo Español & I want to learn Italian, French, Mandarin and Russian one day, not today.

I don't know what I'm doing here! Maybe it becomes a kind of logbook, and in this case I'm on board of my own life, trying to figure out what comes next and very afraid of what will become of me.

That's it. Fin.

#its the beginning of something new i think #journal #journaling #diary entry

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upsidedownsmore · 9 months ago

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ENTRIES CLOSED, reblogs turned off, thank you everyone for entering and sharing your wonderful works!!

A compilation of every entry piece can be found here!

The winner is @infestedslime and they have accepted the prize!

For transparency, the original winner was @civicrose but it had been done out of only 20 entries because I had forgotten to record @zero-two-one 's entry into the spreadsheet and only realized the following morning. The new roll was done out of the actual 21 entries, I'm extremely sorry for the confusion from this bad mistake!!

Roll proof:

The full entry spreadsheet can be found here! (it's also buried below the cut somewhere but I thought I should put it up here too lol)

Just like last time I'm super happy with how this event has turned out!! Thanks again to everyone who entered and made this a fun time!! Again, I am very sorry for messing up the entry records for the initial rolling.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

PROTEA PRIME ACCESS GIVEAWAY! *

* Provided by Digital Extremes! Info about the prime access here.

To enter, simply reblog with your art of any warframe playing a sport!

Giveaway entries will close and the winner will be randomly chosen on May 25TH at 10:00pm CST

The post for the above drawing (with reference screenshot and wips) can be found here!

More info under the cut, PLEASE READ IT IF YOU WANT TO ENTER!

(rules are the same as the gauss prime access giveaway I did back in February, just a slightly different art prompt! You can find that giveaway post here for reference)

Notes:

This is not a contest! The winner will be decided entirely randomly, art quality will have no effect on chances of winning! Make whatever you can in any medium you want! (not including unedited captura/game screenshots)

Please submit your own art!! Do not use any AI generation tools for your entry.

Only one entry per person, you will not get more entries for additional reblogs and/or drawings.

The goal of this is for the community to make a fun little gallery of warframe art in the reblogs, but don't stress over how "good" your drawing is! As long as you have fun and submit something vaguely in line with the prompt you're good! (You can find previous giveaway galleries here!)

You do not need to engage with me in any other way (likes, follows, etc.) to enter, just a reblog with art loosely following the prompt! The only way to submit images under a single post on Tumblr is through reblogs, but please know that I do not intend this to be a means of promotion. If people could submit images in the replies I would gladly take that option!

If you have any feedback about the giveaway please let me know!

Here are some example submissions that would all work, but of course whatever you want to make doesn't have to be limited to this!

I will be assigning one unique number per individual and then throwing them into the random number generator on random.org. (Edit: you can find the spreadsheet with info on each entry here!) After the entries close and I roll the winner, I will update this post with the winner's name and a message saying that the giveaway is closed. Reblogs will also be turned off once the giveaway is closed, as I am only using reblogs as means of congregating drawing submissions under one post during the giveaway period.

Whoever's number get's chosen will be contacted via DMs here on Tumblr, so please make sure your DMs are open! I will be asking for your Warframe IGN and platform so DE can give send over your prize! If you have cross-save linked or merged then please tell me, though I will also be asking in DMs as well. If the winner doesn't respond within 24 hours or no longer wants the prime access pack, then I will roll a new winner with the same method but with the previous winner(s) number(s) taken out of the pool.

Topmost drawing without the giveaway text:

Trailer scene reference:

Good luck and most importantly have fun!! :)

#free wf pa #warframe #my art #UpsideDownSmore's art #warframe fanart #wf tag #wf #warframe protea #protea prime #protea prime access #meant to get this started like 4 days ago but it took me longer than expected to finish this drawing lol #but i'm happy with it!#really looking forward to what you guys cook up this time! :)#UpsideDownSmore's free wf stuff

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moonbaby26 · 1 month ago

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Haha, oh gosh, @physics-of-one-piece . So I have two kinds of drafts. The first is something I WILL post when it’s done (no matter how long it takes my scattered self to finish). That type I do put in the WIP list on my pinned Tumblr post.

Yet my second kind of draft is random stuff I start all the time on a whim, not sure if it will ever become anything. I don’t really count them as WIP’s though, because most likely they will never see the light of day. But since you asked…let’s see.

I’ll just go ahead and describe them all since I don’t have asks. Asks are only off though because I would stress like crazy about not answering them in a timely fashion or well enough 😭.

Currently in my One Piece docs, with their actual filenames:

-Chapter 20: The only thing really happening. Doflamingo’s Marine next chapter. It’s nothing crazy I assure you. It won’t justify the long wait. I just did all those oneshots in between this and Chapter 19, and had to finish the oneshots first or I knew they’d end up in the purgatory pile.

And here is said purgatory pile…ready for a ride? 🤣

-Christmas Morning: drabble I started thinking of Doffy and Cora in a modern!AU dealing with getting all their kids’ toys assembled and distributed Christmas morning. Basically Doffy bitching and flustered, Cora amused. Inspired by watching my husband putting together a dollhouse this Christmas and the misery that was for him. But Christmas is over. So probably ditched.

-Chateau: This one was a oneshot inspired by a YouTube playlist of classical, slightly off putting waltzes. Like tragic/haunted vibe. But the premise was reader being the daughter of an abusive nobleman in the North Blue. At one of her dad’s balls she’s sitting alone at a table hating life and Redsuit!Doffy shows up to ask her to dance. Because the Donquixote Family is actually there to rob the place.

But it turns out Doflamingo had been doing business with her dad, and Doffy decided he was done and is just going to clean her dad out/probably kill him. But Doffy takes a liking to her, sees the abuse and gets more personally involved. She actually had the glass devil fruit first that I later used in “The Gift” oneshot instead. He was going to encourage her to kill her own father to be “free” like him and leave with his pirates as they’re on their way to the Grand Line. And she is a noble. So he’s thinking he just bagged a nice queen for Dressrosa too.

-Doffy Dream: Oneshot of Doffy lucid dreaming of what his life would have been like if Tsuru had found him as a child instead of Trebol. Him being aware it isn’t real the entire time, but getting into it and not wanting to wake up anyway. Because he can interact with Tsuru and Rosi fully in the dreamworld of being all marines together. And it just being really bittersweet for him of how different things could have been.

-Doffy Nightmare: Lol, my working titles are so creative! But Doffy having a nightmare of reader betraying him and him flying into a rage and killing her in the dream. It’s a very vivid dream. So he wakes up sweating buckets and panicked to see her still sleeping safely beside him. But being Doffy, yes, he’s extremely upset, but now it’s also in his brain of that possible betrayal. So he wakes her up and is all pissed off at her even as he’s still upset at the thought of losing her. She doesn’t know what the f*ck is going on. I think a lot of this ended up in the “Please Don’t Leave Me” oneshot anyway really. Him pissed off, but also upset at the idea of reader possibly dying and leaving him.

-Pool Party: This one is pretty much finished. I never posted because the tone is so different than all my other stuff. I feel like I’d need to sort of rewrite it to post it now. But this is from an actual dream I had.

My parents live in a different part of the country than me. When I did used to visit more before I had a kid, I’d usually fly in for a few days by myself. They have a pool, so we’d sometimes have a pool party and invite over whoever wanted to see me basically. Family, school friends, so I could see everybody at once on the short trip.

But I had a dream that at one of the parties Doffy, Cora, Law, and Luffy were there 🤣. Modern!AU versions anyway. BUT I was just chatting with Law like we were old premed student friends or whatever and then Doffy and Cora got in this big argument in my parents’ kitchen.

Law grabbed Cora and I got to hug/push Doffy into the counter to break them up. He was taller than me and in a white polo shirt and swim trunks. And he LIKED it. He kept bitching at Cora, but never pushed me off. He was so damn warm and I swear I remember this so perfectly. He even smelled good 😭. But then Luffy ran past us and deeper into the house, and I had to go catch Luffy because he was going to destroy the house and I knew that. And Doffy got mad! Mad that I let him go so easily after that to go chase Luffy.

So I basically wrote this dream with Reader instead of me. But the modern!AU setup was that she was home from college, her parents were Neptune and Otohime, and her little sister Shirahoshi. Law and Cora were her high school friends (Cora was still a little older than them), but her mom Otohime invited her friends and Shirahoshi’s friends to the party.

Luffy shows up as a Shirahoshi friend, Law and Cora for Reader. BUT Cora has to bring Doffy because Doffy got his license revoked for DUI or some bullshit and their parents want him out of the house for a while (he also got evicted from his rich boy apartment for selling drugs out of it and trashing it with Vergo and Trebol). He’s the rich badboy that got expelled from reader’s high school before she graduated and has been in trouble ever since.

The fight that Doffy and Cora get in is because Doffy still had drugs with him and Cora found them in the car. Cora ends up leaving with Law. Doffy pretends to have Vergo pick him up after the fight, but actually comes back to the party because he’s toxic shit and took an interest in Reader after she broke up their fight.

He ends up pressuring her and getting her to take one of his pills to f*ck her upstairs in her own childhood bedroom. Hot, but terrible. But, I tried to make it clear he has big fish in little pond syndrome. He’s going nuts in their town and acting out because he knows he’s meant for more than this.

I was going to say he decides to move to where reader is currently attending college (invite himself to be her new roommate probably). Still be a terrible guy there too, but get away from the small town drug dealer vibe and go more for politics and higher aspirations instead. Maybe the name of her college city is Dressrosa? 😅

Reader Birthday: Reader is a very dry humor, leave me the f*ck alone wife of Doffy and queen of Dressrosa. She’s hiding, doing busy work in the underground harbor because she doesn’t want to deal with today being her birthday. She purposefully erased all record of it. So genuinely, everyone forgets. Even Doffy because he’s busy.

He gets pissed initially because he thinks she’s ignoring him (this man needs attention every day). But eventually he realizes what it really is and confronts her.

This was a bit too real life for me maybe. My husband did actually forget my birthday this year. But I realized I liked that for some reason. I deleted it from all socials, so only my parents and one bff I’ve known since kindergarten texted me happy birthday that day. And that was it. Nothing else to make the day different at all.

It fell on a Friday and my husband went out with his friends without me that night (again, he didn’t know and I didn’t tell him). I really don’t know why I wanted it that way. I’m not afraid to be older. I just didn’t want to deal with it this year. I also reused this in “The Gift” I think but from Doffy’s perspective of not wanting his birthday acknowledged. By the way, WEEKS later my husband just looked at me suddenly in the kitchen one night and was like “YOUR BIRTHDAY PASSED” and I burst out laughing.

Reader Headache: I started this one when I was having one of those “either kill me or let me vomit” kind of migraines. I don’t get them too often, but when I do it’s painful enough to make me nauseous. Too painful to sleep. So this was basically wish fulfillment of wanting to be comforted in an instance like that. Reader in her and Doffy’s bed in Dressrosa, and him realizing why she can’t sleep and being affectionate/worried trying to help her.

Singer!Reader: This one still kind of interests me if I ever get time. But basically Reader is a singer in a Dressrosan nightclub. She becomes close girlfriends with Viola who also dances there sometimes. Reader is bi with a crush on Viola. But she genuinely is ok just being friends too. Either way, they get close because of course Viola really has no one she can trust.

But then Doffy has to be Doffy. His possessive bullshitness makes him jealous of where Viola’s been spending her time. And once he realizes the actual dynamic, he’s got to use it against them. He uses Viola as bait to get Reader to the palace. Then forces them into a non con threesome with him. Because everything in Dressrosa belongs to him. Especially its most beautiful women.

Stray Puppy: Oh, actual fluff! I keep repeatedly wanting to write something with a cute animal being forced on Doffy. Reader is Doffy’s wife and the queen. He’s been off island for a while. But he comes back to find she’s found a stray puppy and has been letting it sleep in their bedroom. She’s super apologetic, and tried to hide it from him. She swears it will be gone as soon as she can find it a home.

He is not enthused (doesn’t want it to shit and piss everywhere or give them fleas), but it’s adorable and he does secretly like interacting with it.

No pressure tags: @saracrossing02 , @tuquidflamingo , @ladycrocy , @donquixotehomura

WIP Tag Game

Thank you so much for the tag @fanaticsnail 💕🫶🏻❤️ I can’t wait for Rockier Port Incident and some pollen fics and so much Kid Pirates you’re writing, love it.

Rules: make a new post with the names of all the files in your wip folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous. Tag as many people as you have wips. People send you an ask with the title that most intrigues them, then post a little snippet or tell them something about it!

(Me, opening my folder)

Haahaha, fuuuuuck

Okay, so let’s focus on the active WIPs that I am working on daily. All of them are Doflamingo x Reader in some form. I have only one fully Corazon x Reader but you can also ask regarding that one. P.S. NSFW usually it isn't thaaat smutty but just Doffy's inner thoughts are horny as hell in a lot of these and there are dark/adult themes throughout so... Yeah! If there is a bit of smut I'll put it as 🌶️, if the fic is smut-only 🌶️🌶️🌶️)

I’ll build castles for you, my love (look at me, not my brother) - Doflamingo x Rosinante's Wife! Reader (and some Past Rosinante) (multi-chap, NSFW, 🌶️)

Merlot & Primroses - North Blue Doflamingo x Rosinante's Wife!Reader, post Rosinante's death (multi-chap, NSFW, 🌶️)

close your eyes (it’ll all be over soon) - Doflamingo x Rosinante’s Wife!Reader (NSFW one-shot 🌶️🌶️🌶️ set in Merlot & Primroses where North Blue Doflamingo treats you differently when he meets you aka when you thought it can’t be more fucked up and dark, Doflamingo laughs in your face)

resemblance - Doflamingo x Rosinante’s Wife!Reader (NSFW one-shot, 🌶️🌶️🌶️)

marigolds - Marineford! Doflamingo (my love aka I squeal when I see him, I love him and his orange pants and his half buttoned shirt, and the fact he is fully wearing his coat and looks like a pink pom pom, "Doflamingo, I choose you!🦩" sir are you free on Saturday 😳😳😳) x Rosinante's Wife! Reader (SFW, oneshot)

As you can see, the Rosinante's Wife!Reader trope has a real hold on me. I got the idea in August and am still writing about it. Idk what it is about it. Prob cus the trope of Doffy longing after Cora's wife is so very Doffy of him? Now... For...

Celestial Dragon Doflamingo Fics 🤍

There are a few main ones. To know, Reader is not a Celestial Dragon in any of these stories.

Celestial Dragon Doffy x Rosinante’s Wife!Reader (NSFW multi-chap, 🌶️)

everything the world can offer - Returned to Mariejois Celestial Doflamingo x Civilian!Reader (NSFW, one-shot or multi-chap, tbd, 🌶️)

your saint - Returned to Mariejois Celestial Doflamingo x Doflamingo’s Wife! Reader (NSFW, one-shot, 🌶️🌶️🌶️)

butterflies and daffodils - Mariejois Raised Celestial Doflamingo x Civilian!Reader (NSFW, one-shot)

For these other ones, I’m mostly struggling with deciding how Reader reacts to Celestial Dragon! Doffy, depending on their history or lack of it, and it also depends whether this is Never Left Mariejois Doffy or Came Back and was Accepted Back Celestial Doffy. Those two are vastly different 🤣 I want to write a naive Reader but also Reader who is aware enough of how CRAZY Celestial Dragons are but then you get to that fear/dread factor once more and deciding how much of that to describe bcs what if they’re childhood friends, would that fear factor burst its head out regardless of their history? Would Reader just be appeasing Doffy while also still letting her guard down and just interacting with him like nothing’s changed?

(Sighs) I am overthinking myb a bit too much? Who knows...

Also, making this tag game for artists, too, same rules apply if the artists are comfortable with sharing their art wips as in the title of the art wip they’re working on!

Tagging @moonbaby26 @daydreamer-in-training @ohnomyhooves @skullfacedlady @tuquidflamingo @veroinfaciem @magnoliandew @wrennyx @darklordofcutlets @sugarpsalms @allmightskitten @froggiewrites @queenmimi2817 @ladycrocy @saracrossing02

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dreamofbecoming · 2 years ago

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pale shadows of forgotten names

so people seem to be enjoying my writing lately, and i realized i never properly posted my first witcher fic on here when i first wrote it- i posted a link to the ao3, but i wasn’t super active in the fandom yet and i didn’t make it readable on tumblr. so i thought i would share it here now, in case anyone is interested, and because it’s nice to have all my writing together in my tag on here

pls note i knew even less about the non-netflix canon then than i do now, so everything about spying is just made up lmao

ao3

geraskier, post-s2, getting together

rating: t

wc: 13k

“Might be best if I stay out of Redania for a while, actually.”

“If you get arrested, I’ll just break you out again. There’s a book there I need, the copy in Kaer Morhen’s library was destroyed. Vesemir said he knew someone in Oxenfurt who might be able to get his hands on one.” Geralt’s tone, as usual, leaves very little room for argument. Luckily, Jaskier has never needed much room when it comes to arguing. Certainly not with Geralt.

“It’s not just that, I really shouldn’t get close to Tretogor anytime soon, either. Especially with Ciri being hunted by half the Continent.” He’s hoping desperately that they won’t ask why, but who is he kidding. His luck is never that good.

“And why, exactly, is Tretogor a problem? Not that we would want to parade around a capital city regardless, but I’m curious. Oxenfurt I get, they’ll be looking for the Sandpiper, I’m sure, or at least the twit that broke out of their jail, but what’s in Tretogor?”

Damn the fucking witch, always too perceptive for her own good. And to think he was almost starting to like her. Well, at least the familiarity of wanting to claw her eyes out is comforting.

Jaskier sighs. He should probably be honest with them if they’re going to travel together, though who knows how long that state of affairs will last this time. Still, he’s not going to risk Ciri. He’d have kept his silence if it were just Geralt and the witch- he already has, in fact, and it worked for nearly 20 years, after all- but Ciri is precious cargo. The rules have changed.

Plus, Yen could probably just read his mind now that she has her magic back. Fucking sorceresses.

Speaking of, “Alright, but not here,” he sighs. “Wait until we make camp and Yen can set up wards or silencing spells or something.” He hasn’t noticed any white owls following them, but she’s always been good at avoiding being seen. That’s sort of the point, he supposes.

“Who do we need wards from, Jaskier? Are you being followed? Should I have left you behind? Did I put Ciri in danger by trusting you?” Geralt’s voice is hard, and Jaskier feels hurt pool in his belly for a moment before cold anger takes its place again.

“Considering I just traipsed halfway across the continent and back, no questions asked, and nearly died trying to help stop a fucking demon from killing her, what the fuck do you think, Geralt? I’ll remind you that only one of us has known and loved her since she was small. Do you really believe I would do that to her? To you?” And maybe that last bit wasn’t really meant to come out, certainly not in that small, sad little voice, but Jaskier is nothing if not a master of pushing through slip ups and missed lines. He’s a goddamn professional. He doesn’t let his expression change where he’s glaring up at Geralt’s stupid, angry, handsome face. Fucker.

He’s traveled with Geralt a long time. Almost a quarter century, on and off (including this last year, which was most decidedly off), more than half of that physically by his side. He knows the Witcher’s face better than he knows his own, and he can predict Geralt’s reaction in almost any scenario you care to name. A perceived threat met with scorn will make him double down on his anger, almost guaranteed. Jaskier knew this going in, but he didn’t spend half a year belting his rage and betrayal to every student and passing traveler in a hundred miles (not to even mention the whole ‘living through a massacre’ thing) to be cowed by Geralt’s glower now, no matter how distressingly sexy it may or may not still be. Or how it maybe still makes his stomach twist with something sick and anxious at the idea of having disappointed him. Again. Fuck that. Geralt has no right to be disappointed in him, not this time.

So naturally he’s a little shocked when, after a few more seconds of unreasonably attractive scowling, Geralt, improbably, backs down.

He heaves a sigh where’s he’s perched on (new) Roach, a sleeping Ciri safely ensconced in his arms on the saddle in front of him. His eyes fall shut for a moment, and when they open, the cold fury is gone, replaced with something that looks a lot like…regret? Sadness? It’s hard to tell in the dark, but regardless, the air of melancholy around him right now is out of character for this particular situation, and extremely disconcerting. Jaskier is definitely disconcerted.

“You’re right. I’m sorry, Jaskier. I do trust you. There’s a cave not far from here, it shouldn’t be too hard to secure. We can make camp soon.”

Was that…an apology? An actual, genuine expression of remorse, unprompted and freely given? He pokes Geralt’s upsettingly firm calf, staring incredulously.

“Are you really Geralt? Do I need to check you with silver or something? Yen, read his mind. Is he some kind of Doppler? Is this actually our Witcher?”

Geralt’s face is flatly unamused, and he kicks out to swat Jaskier’s hand away. Luckily, Jaskier has decades of practice avoiding Witcher speed for annoyance purposes, and pulls his hand back before Geralt can accidentally break his fingers or something. At least, he thinks it would be accidental. Probably.

Atop her borrowed mare, curtesy of Kaer Morhen’s surprisingly impressive herd, Yen raises a perfectly sculpted eyebrow at Geralt’s obvious irritation. “It’s a fair question, Geralt. Immediate, unsolicited apologies for bad behavior are not exactly your brand.” Jaskier is grudgingly impressed that she manages to keep the arch look on her face despite his current frigid distance from her. Apparently they’re not back to mutual teasing levels of familiarity yet, though he’s sure it will only be a matter of time before they’re back to forgetting he’s there mid-sentence to go fuck like stupidly attractive, scary, powerful rabbits. Won’t that be fun to live through again.

Geralt glares harder. Jaskier can’t actually see his face well enough to be sure, but he can always feel when Geralt is glaring, and the angry face quotient in the air definitely goes up a few degrees.

“Cave’s just up here. Jaskier, start setting up camp. Yen, wards. I’ll get Ciri and the horses settled and find something for supper.” He nudges Roach’s flanks and pulls ahead, aiming for a little gap in the trees near a rocky outcropping Jaskier can just barely make out in the scant moonlight. Conversation over then, at least for now.

Yen looks vaguely affronted. “Is it always like this? Traveling with him?”

“What, the glowering? Or the barked orders and being left behind?” If perhaps those words are a touch more bitter than they would have been a year and a half ago, well. That’s no one’s business but his own.

“Both, I suppose? The time I’ve spent with him has rarely been on the road, but he’s never been quite so…demanding. We didn’t exactly do much talking on the way to Kaer Morhen. I’m quite sure he would happily have killed me, or at least have been actively trying to shake me and leave me in the dust, if he hadn’t been so focused on getting to Ciri as quickly as possible.” There’s something brittle and harsh in her tone that feels uncomfortably familiar. It’s far too much like the heavy weight in his ribcage these days, sharp-edged and desperate and miserable.

“If life could give me one blessing, it would be to take you off my hands!” The hurt and dread freezing his blood in his veins, ice cold and inexorable. The awful silence, waiting for him to take it back, to laugh, to say it was all a horrible joke, or even a dream. The yawning pit of heartbreak and despair that started to rend his chest open, as the reality set in that this was actually it, actually the end, after everything-

Nope. No. Absolutely not. He is done with that, thank you. He is quite finished reliving that moment again and again (and again), he has put it behind him, he is a different man now. A stronger man. A man who won’t betray the loyalty he promised so long ago, but who refuses to let his heart back into the mix this time. He wrote a song about it and everything.

Funny how he almost believes it.

“Oh, I’m sure he was always far more…solicitous with you, darling. This is pretty much standard. The apology is new, and I’m a little surprised he’s letting me set up camp unsupervised,” (this is said with an impressively deep eye-roll, of course), “but besides that, yeah.”

He should be offended that he’s surprised to be given that responsibility, probably. He’s actually a remarkably competent traveler, both with company and without, but even towards the end it rarely occurred to Geralt that Jaskier managed to survive by himself for months or years at a time, or that the camp ended up much the same as it started even when he felt the need to redo all of Jaskier’s work, or that he wasn’t the one cooking the food he hunted or patching his own wounds when Jaskier was around. Not even the handful of times their camp was targeted by bandits, and several of them were already dead by the time Geralt got to them, seemed to register. Or all the times he came back addled and injured from a hunt, and Jaskier knew exactly which potions he needed to recover, and where to find them. Jaskier isn’t sure the great White Wolf ever even noticed a difference. He’s once again a little amazed that it took him so long to see it, that those furious words on the mountaintop actually managed to catch him by surprise. Love really is blind, he supposes.

The cave isn’t huge, but there’s enough room for four bedrolls and a small fire pit without having to snuggle up too close to each other, and it’s dry and lacking in horrid smells or angry monsters, so Jaskier has definitely seen worse.

Roach is tied near the cave entrance, under a small overhang jutting out from the rock to provide her some shelter from the elements. He wants to ask what happened to the old Roach, his- well. Not his Roach anymore, he supposes, not for a while, but he was still fond of her. It had taken years to win her over, but they were good friends by the end, he thought. Certainly she was freer with her affection than her rider. (Which, he realizes now, probably had more to do with his dearth of affection actually available than with his crushing emotional incompetence.) It isn’t really his place to ask, not anymore, but he wishes he could. New Roach is fine, she’s admittedly beautiful and probably a lovely animal, but he misses his friend.

Jaskier has the camp fully set up and a small fire going, near enough to the entrance not to fill the cave with smoke, but far enough inside so as not to be easily seen, and Yen has left her mount next to Roach, filled their waterskins, and is finishing up with the last of the wards shielding them from being found or overheard, when Geralt returns bearing…an entire deer. Fucking overachieving cockhead. He’s cleaning that shit himself, Jaskier isn’t interested. It definitely isn’t sexy seeing Geralt stride in, slightly blood-spattered, biceps bulging, thighs flexing, evidence of his prowess slung easily over his shoulders like a king’s mantle…nope. Not sexy at all. Jaskier isn’t even looking. He certainly isn’t biting back an embarrassing whimper.

He turns around hastily to begin rummaging through his pack for his spices and cooking supplies, filched from Kaer Morhen, of course, since all he had on him when Geralt found him in Oxenfurt was his charm and good looks. He wishes he had his lute, but it’s probably in pieces, rotting in a rubbish heap in Redania. He’ll mourn her at some point. Besides, he’s not sure he would be able to stop himself playing Burn, Butcher, Burn just on reflex, so it’s probably for the best.

They eat a decent supper of venison stew, Ciri waking just long enough to scarf down a bowl and collapse back onto her bedroll. Demon possession and Sphere-jumping really seem to take it out of a person.

Yen tosses another silencing charm around Ciri’s bedroll (they’ll fill her in tomorrow- they don’t intend to keep secrets from her but she deserves her sleep) and Geralt gets to work packing the leftover venison in salt for the road, before they both look up at him expectantly with eerily similar, piercing gazes. Violet and gold, a royal combination if ever there was one. Oh, that’s nice actually, there’s a song in there somewhere. Not one he wants to sing, really, but he’ll probably end up writing it at some point anyway.

“Alright, sharing time, I guess. Always figured this was coming eventually. Not that I imagined anything like this, what with the demons and the horrible rock monsters and the dimension hopping and- yes, yes, alright, I’m getting to it. Calm down.” He heaves a sigh. Hopefully they don’t toss him out on his arse after this, or just kill him. He doesn’t think they’d kill him. Would they? No, they wouldn’t. Probably.

“So you know I’m technically Redanian.” Yennefer nods expectantly while Geralt just. Blinks at him. Fucking gods, honestly. “Wow, ok, you really never paid attention at all when I talked, huh? That makes sense, actually. I guess I should have figured that.” He’s staring into the fire to shield the hurt in his eyes, so he misses the matching look on Geralt’s face before he presses on.

“Anyway, yeah, I’m Redanian, from Kerack, Lettenhove to be specific. Seriously? I’ve introduced myself to a dozen people in front of you with my full name, you really never- ok, yeah, right, never mind. Moving on. Julian Pankratz, Viscount de Lettenhove. That’s me. Or, it was. Technically it still is, but I never wanted the title. I never wanted that life. I left for Oxenfurt as soon as I was old enough, and when I graduated I went on the road, and then. Well. Then I met you, and, well, you know. You were there. For the rest. Some of it, anyway. Right. Well, Vizimir, or more likely someone on his council, since Vizimir is about as savvy and creative as a garden slug, and almost as charming, and I’m not sure if Dijkstra was advising him at that point-“ He catches Yennefer’s sharp look at Dijkstra’s name, but barrels on, “-anyway, someone noticed that a minor Redanian noble was doing a lot of very visible traveling all over the Continent and associating with a lot of people the Crown wouldn’t normally have an in with, and figured that would be useful. I think at this point, we’d been traveling together…2? 3 years? Something like that. Long enough that I’d started building a name for myself, definitely. Or, for us, I suppose. That’s why they noticed me in the first place.”

He knows he’s babbling, but there are nerves roiling in his gut like a cauldron, and that feeling has always translated into more words, for him. Like a pressure valve. He pauses and risks a glance at the person whose reaction he’s genuinely worried about.

Yen will understand, she’s been in and out of courts and noble circles and political tangles for decades, she knows how this works. She probably won’t trust him, but he’s fairly sure she doesn’t trust him now, so that’s no great loss. He doesn’t trust her either.

Geralt has a more…rigid concept of morality. In Geralt’s world, there are Right Things and Wrong Things. Sometimes you have to do Wrong Things to prevent Wronger Things, but that doesn’t make them not Wrong. And anything to do with kings and courts is usually Wrong. There’s a good chance Geralt might never forgive him for this, or if he does, he won’t be able to look past Jaskier keeping it from him so long.

Geralt’s eyes are fixed on his face, sharp and intent, and utterly unreadable. Jaskier thought he had gotten pretty good over the years at reading the subtle shifts in Geralt’s expressions- the tiny crinkles around his eyes when he wanted to laugh, the minute furrow between his brows when he was confused, the slight tick in his jaw when he was frustrated- but his face is as blank as new parchment right now, nothing but the glint in his golden eyes that says he’s listening to every word out of Jaskier’s mouth.

What a time for him to start doing that, he thinks bitterly. Decades of tuning him out when he thought they were friends, and now that Jaskier might be driving him away for good (again, a tiny voice whispers viciously), he’s hanging on every syllable.

“I was approached by a member of the royal intelligence service, and told that the king had ordered that I be recruited as a spy. Technically I am still nobility, and as such I’m obligated to obey the crown. And while I would gladly give up all the trappings of my title and never be anyone but Jaskier the bard ever again, at the time there would have been serious consequences for refusing, and not the kind that would fall on me. I’m technically a Lord, and I do have people I’m responsible for. I left people in charge that I trust to take care of them in my stead, but it’s my name they’re working under. And if I refused a direct order from Vizimir, I wouldn’t be the one to suffer for it. It wasn’t an option.”

He doesn’t look up from the fire. He doesn’t want to see the expressions on their faces, so he presses on, heart thumping wildly in his chest.

“I did my best to keep my reports…not vague, exactly, but mostly useless, I guess? Obviously I have no interest in being a part of whatever bullshit Vizimir or any other king feels like stirring up, but I had to send them something. Little stuff, mostly, frivolous gossip from the taverns I played in, details of drama and rivalries I picked up in various courts or nobles’ beds. Sometimes accounts of monster populations or incidents if there was anything especially notable, since they knew that’s a lot of what I was doing with my time. Nothing actionable, but useful enough that I couldn’t be accused of shirking my duties.” He’s suddenly struck with an awful fear, and he looks up desperately into slitted golden eyes. “I never said a word about Ciri, Geralt, you have to believe me. I told them about that night, and I had to mention that Pavetta had magic because there’s no way that wouldn’t get out some other way, but I never said a word about a Witcher claiming a Child Surprise. I would never risk her like that, or you, you have to believe me. Please say you believe me Geralt, whatever you think of me, that I would never betray you like that. Please.”

He knows he sounds frantic, that he must look insane, that he can’t stop his begging mouth like a runaway cart, but the thought of Geralt thinking even for a second that Jaskier would ever put orders from a king he cared nothing for over Geralt’s own life, over the life of a child, is a knife in his gut, twisting and pulling until Jaskier thinks he might vomit if Geralt doesn’t say something.

The blank expression is gone, and Geralt looks somewhat taken aback. His brow furrows a little in what looks like confusion, before settling into resignation, or maybe chagrin. Jaskier thinks for a moment that he sees a brief flash of what almost looks like…grief? That can’t be right…in his eyes, but it’s gone as soon as it appeared, and Jaskier thinks he must have imagined it.

Geralt takes a swig from his waterskin and draws in a deep breath before speaking.

“I wasn’t worried that you betrayed Ciri, Jaskier. I know you would cut off your own arm before you did something like that. I don’t love where it sounds like this story is going, but I promise, I’ll never be concerned about that.”

That’s…well, those are more words than he was expecting, surely. And different words than he was expecting, too. He would assume that Geralt is placating him, to calm him down and get him to finish talking, but he can hear the sincerity in his voice. Geralt’s eyes are almost imploring, as if he’s as anxious for Jaskier to believe him as Jaskier had been to be believed. He…isn’t sure what to do with that, actually.

He knows Geralt came back for him, knows he was at least not lying when he said he missed him (though how much is anyone’s guess), knows he trusts him to travel with his…his little family, to help keep them safe or at least not make things worse, but he never assumed it went beyond that.

Geralt was clear, on that mountain. Even if he’s sorry now, even if he missed having him around, he meant those words at the time, and Jaskier has no illusions that he won’t get to that point again. Geralt may have spat those words in helpless anger, may have turned his ire on someone who had nothing to do with the state he was in at that moment, but Geralt doesn’t say things he doesn’t mean. He says plenty of things he regrets, but he always means them at the time. He did, at one point, believe Jaskier to be a curse and a burden, and Jaskier is fully aware that he will come to that belief again, eventually.

He knows what that particular heartbreak feels like, now. He knows he can survive it, even if he wishes he wouldn’t, sometimes. Mostly, he knows that it will always, always be worth it. Geralt will always be worth it.

Gods but he’s a lovesick fool.

But now, instead of cold distain, or fiery wrath, or, worst of all, blank indifference, Geralt is looking at him like…like he’s sorry. Like he’s desperate for Jaskier’s forgiveness. Forgiveness for what? Jaskier is the one who hid the fact that he was a spy for most of their relatio- friendship. Acquaintanceship. Association. Whichever one wouldn’t piss Geralt off. Geralt hasn’t fucked up here, this time at least.

But he could never resist when Geralt asked him like this for anything, with genuine emotion instead grunted contempt, with even the vaguest hint of affection, like maybe Geralt enjoyed spending time with Jaskier, too. Like maybe Jaskier mattered to Geralt, at least a fraction of how much Geralt mattered to Jaskier. Gods above, he’s so weak for this man.

“Ok. Alright, good. That’s good. I’m glad. Thank you. I know I- anyway. Thank you. Right, where was I? Yes, ok, reports. So I kept myself mostly useless for pretty much the whole time we were together. I mean- not. Not together, obviously, but traveling together. As friends. Or not friends. Whatever. What was I saying?” He’s spiraling, fuck, he’s spiraling, he needs to get out of this, how does he get out of this?

Geralt is looking even more confused than before, but Yennefer is definitely laughing at him in her head. Witch. Like she isn’t just as much of a mess for him. She should be on his side! They bonded over this already and everything!

At least the indignation is enough for him to pull out of the whirlpool of awkward babble and self-sabotage he was trapped in, and he manages to right himself.

“Anyway! Ok! So! Right, well, things changed not quite a year ago, now, after the raid on Bleobheris.” He sobers at the memories, the scent of blood and the sound of screams suddenly heavy in the dry air of the cave. “It was…brutal. I’ve never seen anything like that, not in all my years Witchering with you. I wanted to help. I needed to do something, to…fix something. Anything, no matter how small. That’s when I was contacted by an anonymous benefactor, who offered to fund an effort to smuggle refugees to Xin’Trea. Word had spread about Nilfgaard’s alliance with the elves, that they could be safe there.”

“So the Sandpiper was born,” Yennefer says.

“Right. But I don’t like not knowing where my help is coming from and why. I may not have been a very useful spy in Redania’s eyes for the last 20 years, but it actually takes quite a bit of effort to be ineffective without being useless enough to fire or kill, and as it turns out, I’m actually quite good at it. Call it the performer’s heart in me, or something. So I was able to ferret out that the man behind the money was Sigismund Dijkstra, who had managed to get himself appointed spymaster to Vizimir, which, interestingly, made him my employer, as well as my benefactor.”

Yen looks up sharply again at Dijkstra’s name. Jaskier turns to her, curious.

“You’re familiar, I assume?”

“He’s been causing rifts at Aretuza, riling up the Brotherhood,” she says, brow furrowed. “Pretending to bring counsel and information but really just sowing discord. I’m not clear on the details, but I know elves were mentioned. There are those on the council who take issue with my heritage, so I try to keep on top of the rumors. I wasn’t at Aretuza for long, though, and I…didn’t exactly leave on good terms. I haven’t got many friends left there.” Geralt glances at her sympathetically.

Jaskier nods. “That sounds like him. I wouldn’t trust that man to clean my privy, much less provide thousands of crowns, probably from Vizimir’s coffers, for a worthy cause with no expectations of repayment.” He shakes his head. “I kept my suspicions to myself, though, the network needed the coin and regardless of his motivations, we really were helping people. I wasn’t going to let that go to waste.

“I guess, with me finally settling in one place for so long, and probably Dijkstra feeling like I owed him for the funding, even though I wasn’t meant to know it was him, they started expecting more from me, in terms of intelligence. I didn’t really have a choice, since now they always knew where to find me if they wanted to cause me problems, and besides, Dijkstra was already privy to the network’s efforts anyway as the main benefactor, so I figured it was mostly alright that I’ve had to give more…comprehensive reports to Vizimir the last several months.

“Since Cintra fell, most people know about Ciri, or at least that she’s on the game-board somehow. There are rumors of Nilfgaard searching for a Witcher, so I’m sure some people have put together that you’re involved somehow, but I don’t think too many of the courts, at least, have details. Just that Nilfgaard wants her and maybe there’s a Witcher involved. I made sure not to include too much information that they didn’t already have, but I can’t say for sure what every Northern king knows, or what the Brotherhood knows.” He glances at Yen, who shakes her head and shrugs.

“Anyway, so that’s the meat of it. The concern is that since I became an actual useful asset for them, they’ve been keeping a much closer eye on me. That’s why I was worried about the wards.”

“Alright, I can understand all of that,” Geralt cuts in. “I don’t like that you kept it from me, but I can’t fault your choices. You’re right that we can’t have them sniffing around you, not with Ciri in your orbit.” He frowns. “Would it be possible for you just…fall off the map? Disappear? Redania can’t demand anything from a missing viscount.”

Jaskier winces a little. “I would love to do that, the problem being that Dijkstra works closely with Tretogor’s court mage, who has the charming little talent of transforming into a bird whenever she wants.”

Yen’s eyebrows both go up this time. “Phillipa? She’s quite impressive. A little too entrenched in political intrigue for my taste, but I can’t deny she’s talented. Tissaia speaks very highly of her, certainly.”

She looks thoughtful as she gazes at him over the fire. “You’re worried she’s following you, then? For information on Geralt, since everyone knows Jaskier the Bard is the man to talk to if you want to know about Witchers.”

Her tone is…teasing? Is she teasing him? First hugging, and now teasing? Yeah, he’s not dealing with that right now. He sticks out his tongue at her (he does still have a bantering streak to uphold, after all) before nodding.

“I don’t know for sure if she was in Oxenfurt when Geralt broke me out. I don’t think so, but I certainly wasn’t combing every tree for owls, and there’s no chance of me noticing her out here in the woods. I’m just hoping that if she were around now, you’d sense her, Yen, and that she wasn’t able to bring back anything about Ciri or Geralt or Kaer Morhen to Dijkstra. Or you, either, since the Brotherhood are so unhappy with you.”

Yen looks surprised and very slightly pleased to be included in Jaskier’s concern. Or at least Jaskier thinks that’s the expression he can parse under her normal very scary murder face, which he finds is almost a relief to see. The soft regret and concern of recent weeks has been…unsettling. The sun rises, the rain falls, Yennefer of Vengerberg is gorgeous, aloof, and terrifying. This is the natural order.

Geralt is wearing a pensive expression, frowning slightly at where Ciri lies, sleeping peacefully. Dear girl, Jaskier hopes she isn’t having any nightmares. She’s been through hell lately, and she’s always had trouble sleeping anyway. Jaskier wonders if he can find the name of that tea Mousesack used to give her to help her sleep. Jaskier even tried it once or twice, when winter nights in Cintra without his Witcher’s soft, even breaths became too much; the stuff worked wonders.

“Alright,” he says eventually, nodding. “I’ll see if I can go to Redania myself, and leave you two with Ciri until I can get back. We’ll keep our campsites warded if we can, Yen, I don’t want you to wear yourself out, but some protection would probably be best. Are you able to see if you can sense anyone from here, or do you need to go outside the wards?”

“I’ll do a lap around the area, but there’s a chance anyone who is out there will sense me as soon as I start casting about. It would be best if you all stayed here, to protect Ciri in case someone actually has come for her.”

“I don’t like any of us going out alone, Yen, especially with the express intention of seeking out danger. I should go with you.” Geralt makes to stand and grab his swords from beside his seat, but Yennefer waves him back down.

“You’d only distract me, and besides, do you want to leave the totally untrained sorceress and the normal human alone here?” Jaskier makes an affronted squawking noise.

“Hey! I’m plenty competent, thank you!” He prudently ignores the minor inaccuracy of his humanity, and instead huffs at the matching incredulous looks he receives. “Rude. Honestly, I get no respect around here. I survived just fine on my own for years, you know! Besides, I traveled with a reckless idiot Witcher for 20 years, you pick up more than you’d think.” He glares at them both until Yen smirks and Geralt looks baffled and vaguely offended, but at least they both look away, which is an improvement.

Until the two of them end up in a stare off, clearly having some sort of emphatic conversation with their eyes alone, and Jaskier has to turn away to start putting away the cooking supplies they won’t need for breakfast tomorrow. He’s warming up to Yennefer, much to his chagrin, but he’s had quite enough of watching the man he loves eyefuck someone else, for this lifetime and the next, thanks ever so.

He hears Geralt huff, a sound he recognizes as him realizing whoever he’s arguing with is just going to do as they please anyway, and he might as well make the best of it.

He made that sound at Jaskier a lot. Usually when he talked his way into coming along on hunts, but really any time Jaskier wanted something from him beyond some seared rabbit, a fire to sleep beside, and monosyllabic grunts in response to questions (if he was lucky)- a night at an inn, a stop at a local festival, an actual hot bath with herbs and flowers and scented oils. Arms to hold him on especially cold nights, when blankets weren’t enough to warm (mostly) human skin.

Jaskier used to think it was cute. A game, just for the two of them, Jaskier pushing, Geralt pulling, or the other way around, always meeting in the middle (or, more often, closer to Jaskier’s side) with what Jaskier had always assumed was mutual amusement and affection. He knows better now.

There’s the telltale swish of Yennefer’s skirts, a strange popping sensation in his ears, and then the feeling of the wards coming back up behind her.

The silencing spell around Ciri is still up, as far as he knows, and she’s dead to the world besides, so it’s just him and Geralt now.

It isn’t the first time they’ve been alone since Oxenfurt, but it is the first time since Jaskier was invited (by Ciri, it should be noted, not Geralt) to travel with them as a companion, not as backup.

That one still stings, if he’s honest. He held out hope for months that Geralt would come back for him, would seek him out with a stuttered apology (or more likely a silently offered ale and an invitation to come with him to his next hunt). Maybe at a tavern, or the Seat of Friendship, or even a ball or musical competition where Jaskier was playing. He knows how much Geralt hates getting dressed up, how much it would have meant for him to go to that effort just to see Jaskier.

He imagined seeing him sitting silently in the back of one of his lectures one day, watching the lesson with quiet affection and waiting for him to be finished so they could talk. Imagined hearing the sound of Roach’s hooves coming up behind him on some backroad to nowhere while he strummed his lute in the sunshine.

He imagined a thousand different reunions, a thousand apologies, a thousand ways for them to turn back the clock. (During some of the longer nights, when he was alone in his rooms staring out at the moon through the window, wondering if Geralt was lying on his bedroll in a forest clearing somewhere staring up at the same moon, he imagined a thousand different love confessions. But he has no intention of admitting that to anyone but his own foolish heart. He may be a bard, and a hopeless romantic, but there’s no need to bare all of his weeping wounds, especially when there’s no hope of healing them.)

For all his daydreaming, he never imagined that Geralt would seek him out only when he needed an extra set of hands and all his other options were exhausted. Never imagined he would be not just a tool to be used, but the last resort as well.

He shouldn’t be surprised, after everything, but the knowledge that he was never really anything else to Geralt still aches like a broken rib, flashes of pain shooting through his chest with every inhale.

This is the first time they’ve been alone together without an immediate crisis, without a clearly defined mission beyond the open road, just like it used to be.

Except nothing like it used to be, because how it used to be is gone. It will never be that way again. Geralt burned those memories down, with words as sharp as swords and as destructive as dragon fire.

Jaskier has no fucking idea how to deal with this.

“Jas-“ Geralt cuts off and clears his throat. Jaskier can hear him gulping from his waterskin before trying again. “Jaskier.”

“Yes?” He tries to keep his voice light, but he doesn’t turn around.

“Jaskier, can we. Can we talk? Please?”

It’s the ‘please’ that does it. Geralt so rarely says please. Jaskier may need more than his fingers to count the times he’s heard it directed at him, but he can still remember each one in perfect clarity. Besides, they had more than 20 years together, “more than 10” is still not exactly a stellar ratio.

Jaskier’s resolve breaks (did he ever really have any? Has he ever had any when it comes to this man?) and he turns, schooling his face into something meant to look bright and open. He’s not sure how well it works. “Of course, Geralt. What’s on your mind?”

“I-“ Geralt looks…lost. He looks like he has absolutely no idea how to get where he’s going, and it’s killing him. Jaskier crumbles.

“You’ve already apologized, Geralt, if that’s what you’re worried about. I’ve forgiven you. You were angry, you needed a target, I was there. It’s behind us.” He looks at the fire, for lack of anything else that isn’t Geralt’s stupid awful gorgeous face, wishing desperately he had his lute. He never felt awkward with his lute. Never rubbed anxious circles around his calluses for lack of anything to do with his hands. Never sat in a silence so painful he wondered if his ears would bleed.

Geralt lets out a breath like he’s trying to remember how. “That’s not. I mean it is. But. I. Fuck.” Jaskier looks up from the fire to see him scrubbing a hand through his hair in an uncharacteristic display of emotion. The adorable fool manages to get his hand tangled in the locks when he forgets about the band holding half of it back from his face.

“Oh for Melitele’s sake- stop moving, you lug, I’ll fix it. You’re going to tear it out in chunks if you keep pulling like that, just hold still, or I’ll have to rewrite all the songs to be about The Bald Wolf instead. Ye gods, Geralt, how did you survive without me? Honestly.” He’s across the cave and kneeling behind Geralt on the other side of the fire before he consciously registers the decision to move. Fucking hells, even his own body is against him.

He has his hands in Geralt’s (soft, silky, gorgeous) hair, untangling it gently from where it’s wound itself tightly around his (scarred, strong, beautiful) fingers. He thinks he hears Geralt’s breath catch, but he’s too distracted trying to keep his own lungs working at all to focus on it.

Once Geralt’s hand is free (and does Geralt seem as reluctant to let go and put his hand back in his lap as Jaskier is to let him?) Jaskier sets to work on the much more finicky task of removing the band without pulling half of Geralt’s hair out with it, which would honestly be a crime against…well, anyone with eyes really. Jaskier may be in love with him, but he’s also seen a truly exorbitant number of beautiful people across the continent, many of them naked, so he thinks he’s fairly qualified when he says that Geralt is one of the most singularly stunning people on the face of the earth, bias or not. Especially now that he seems to be taking better care of his hair than he used to when Jaskier wasn’t around.

Jaskier is actually rather shocked at how well-kept Geralt is. His hair is smooth and soft and clean, and smells like…is that apple blossom? That’s one of Jaskier’s favorite scents. It never fails to make him feel light and warm, like spring sunshine. He uses it in his own hair more often than the other oils he carries.

Back when washing Geralt’s hair for him was an occasional but deeply treasured privilege of his, Jaskier used to use it for him, as well. That Geralt has somehow, for some reason, gotten some of his own to use during their separation…it makes something warm and fragile stir in Jaskier’s chest. Warm and fragile and dangerous. Hope is easily crushed, and when it is, it takes everything else down with it. Jaskier isn’t doing that again. Not so soon.

He finishes detaching the tie as efficiently as he can, and hands it over Geralt’s shoulder before sitting back on his heels and exhaling violently.

“There you are darling, all fixed. Now,-“

“I didn’t.” Geralt interrupts him, whisper quiet but still somehow deafening over the crackling fire.

“What?”

“Survive without you. I didn’t. Or, I guess I should say I did, but that’s all I did.”

Jaskier has, for once, absolutely no idea what to say, so he tries something new, and says nothing. He’s barely even sure he’s breathing, staring at the back of Geralt’s head and all his moonlit hair like he’s staring into the jaws of a barghest as he waits to see if he will continue.

He does, words falling out of him in a rush like a river pouring through a broken dam, desperate in a way Jaskier has never heard him before.

“I knew I’d fucked up, on the mountain. As soon as the words were out of my mouth I knew it. It’s like. It’s like I was a bottle of juice, gone off, going ranker and ranker until the cork flies right out and takes someone’s eye out. I thought I was angry at Borch, at Yen, at Calanthe, at fucking Destiny, at everything. Even you, who hadn’t done one thing wrong. But really it was just me. I was just angry at myself, and there’s. There’s not. There isn’t anywhere for that kind of anger to go. It just builds up and up and up until it explodes, and you with it, and I knew I was going to let it out at someone. And then you were there, and you were trying to help. Like always. You always help. You make everything better, like you were just trying to make me feel better. But I was so angry, and it was all my fault, it was all my stupid selfish choices, the djinn, the wish, Ciri, all of it my fault, and I didn’t deserve to feel better. I didn’t deserve it and I had to make you stop and so. I did. I did it on purpose. I did it because I knew that was the thing to say that would hurt you the most. That would make me a monster like I know I am. Monsters are easy. Easier than mistakes and bad choices. So I made another bad choice and hurt someone else and decided to be a monster.”

There might be tears streaming down Jaskier’s face, but he can’t tell because he can’t breathe, can’t think, can’t hear anything but the rushing in his ears and Geralt’s voice ripping into him with savage, gentle claws.

“Once Yen was gone- It’s hard to think with her around, sometimes. It’s the wish, I think. Everything else gets duller, quieter, a little out of focus. Like in a dream when the only thing you can see clearly is the person you know the dream is about, the person you’re supposed to talk to.” Oh this…this is actually torture. Geralt might actually be killing him because he still can’t fucking breathe and he just keeps talking.

“It’s better now. Maybe it’s Ciri, my Destiny is split between them now so it’s not so overwhelming. Or maybe Ciri is her Destiny too, and now that we’ll always have her, the both of us, the wish doesn’t need to force us to be in love for us to stay nearby. I don’t know. It’s easier now, though. And even easier when you’re here.”

Wait, what? Now Jaskier knows he’s dead, or dying, or hallucinating, or something, because there’s no way that means what he wants it to mean.

“After Yen left, my head started to clear. Things came back into focus. I realized what I’d done, but suddenly I could also see that it wasn’t just what I yelled at you. It was so much more, so much deeper. I had been so awful to you, for so long, and you just. Took it. All of it. Everything I had, all my anger and my fear and my loneliness. You just let me. You always came back. You kept choosing me, even when I was cruel. I was ashamed, but I also thought…” He breaks off with a great shuddering breath, his head hanging.

Jaskier feels a little like he’s floating. Like he can see his body, kneeling there in the dirt behind Geralt, staring at his sculpted shoulderblades with a blind, devastated look on his tear-streaked face. How odd.

Geralt, somehow, impossibly, keeps going. This is more words than Jaskier has heard him say in the last two decades. This is more words than he knew Geralt was capable of saying. Where are all these words coming from?

It’s like all this time, he had been saving these. Stockpiling them, though for what Jaskier can’t begin to guess. A rainy day? An emergency? This? And now the doors of the granary have come loose and the winter stores are flooding the yard and Jaskier thinks he might end up buried alive.

“I thought you’d come back.” Geralt’s voice is thicker, somehow, and oh, gods, is he crying? “I thought you would come back, like before, like always, and it would be ok. And I would try to be better. I would try to be the man you thought I was. And it would be ok. But you-“ He cuts off with another great shuddering breath, and seems to center himself. “You didn’t come back. And that’s when I realized I had finally gone too far.”

Jaskier has been trying to process all of these many, many, many, mostly incomprehensible words, and he’s maybe fallen a little bit behind, because he hears himself cut in with an incredulous “Wait, are you saying that every time you were rude or dismissive to me, it wasn’t just because you don’t know how to conduct yourself in a normal friendship because you’ve never had one, but actually because you knew you were being cruel and you knew you could get away with it because I would always come back?”

Geralt’s head hangs even lower, and Jaskier has to strain to hear his gravelly whispered reply.

“Yes. Maybe not consciously, or in so many words, but yes.”

Jaskier flounders for a moment, wounds he spent the last year trying to close tearing back open even wider than before.

“All this time? You thought so little of me, all this time? I was just a- a- a practice dummy? Something that won’t fight back or feel pain, so you can hit it has hard or as many times as you want?” His voice began at a whisper, to match Geralt’s, but has gotten steadily louder and more tear-filled the more he speaks.

“No, that isn’t-“

“I can’t- I’m not- I need a moment. Please, Geralt I need- Please.” He can’t keep sitting this close to him, feeling his body heat just as warm as the fire he’s blocking Jaskier from, can’t keep listening to his low rumbling voice, like thunder and gravel and home, like a silver sword through the midsection. Not when the pain and the anger and the hope are all bleeding together and he doesn’t know how to feel them properly and he still can’t fucking breathe.

Geralt’s breath hitches, a tiny little wisp of sound, and Jaskier is going to fucking lose it.

“Please, Geralt.” It comes out in a broken whisper, which is more revealing than Jaskier was hoping, but it’s not like he’s managed to hide anything anyway, so it hardly matters.

Geralt nods, back still to Jaskier in front of the fire, and stands smoothly to walk over to a corner near the entrance, where he can see all four bedrolls and the cave mouth clearly. Ready to protect. Always ready to defend. He sinks to his knees and his breathing takes on the familiar cadence of meditation.

Jaskier takes a moment to look at him. At the way his hands are clutched a little tighter on his thighs than they normally would be while he mediates, like he hasn’t managed to purge all the fear from his body the way he has his mind. At the new scars he can see on his forearms and one snaking over his collarbone, scars that Jaskier wasn’t there to bandage and fuss over. At the way his hair spills over his shoulders, still tousled from Jaskier’s fingers. At the single tear track carving a path down one marble cheek.

Jaskier sucks in a breath and turns away before he breaks down and Yen comes back to find him catatonic on the ground.

He ends up standing at the mouth of the cave, stroking New Roach’s neck and petting his hands through her glossy mane gently. Her slow breathing and the familiar warm, earthy smell of horse help ground him, bring him back from that awful frantic-floating feeling, where he was nowhere and trapped all at once.

He chatters to her quietly, just like he did to her predecessor. She, at least, warms up to him much more quickly.

A warm, black nose thumps gently into his chest. “Yes, my love, I know I need to protect my heart. I’m trying! Can’t you see how hard I’m trying?” She nickers softly, more of a puff of breath than a proper sound.

“Well aren’t we feeling smug this evening, sweet thing.” Another thump. “It’s alright darling, I don’t blame you. I think I’m ridiculous, too. I just don’t know how to fix it.” He strokes a hand down her forehead, scritching lightly.

“No, me either. You know what the problem is, don’t you?” She lips at his hair, which he takes as an invitation to continue.

His voice is even quieter now, the barest thread of a whisper, quiet enough that even Geralt might not overhear if he comes out of meditation. “The problem is that I’ve spent all this time coming up with plans and strategies and contingencies for not giving my heart away again, when the truth is I don’t think I ever got it back in the first place.”

He rests his forehead against hers in defeat, tears falling silently again. He’s going to dehydrate at this point, but what does he care when he has a beautiful lady providing him such warm, solid comfort right here?

“I have to say, songbird, this is not what I expected to find when I came back tonight.”

Jaskier does not flail. He is a professional performer, he has immaculate control over his body at all times. And he definitely doesn’t squeak, no bard would ever be caught dead making such an undignified noise unintentionally.

So no, he neither flails nor squeaks, and if New Roach gets very slightly spooked and a lot disgruntled, it was from Yennefer sneaking up out of bloody nowhere like a wraith in the night, and certainly nothing Jaskier did. If either of them say different, they’re lying.

“Are you trying to give me a heart attack? Is this your plan to kill me and make it look like an accident? I’ll tell Ciri, she’ll come after you with her dagger, see if she doesn’t. Ciri likes me. Ciri would avenge me.” He’s clutching his chest, heartbeat gradually beginning to slow.

New Roach is still giving him a dubious look. That’s rude, this is hardly his fault. It’s Yen she should be grumpy with.

“Well, I was rather hoping that by this point in the evening, you wouldn’t need a miniature Witcherling-sorceress to defend you, since you’d have your big strong Witcher back, but somehow things seem to have gotten worse in my absence. Did he not manage to tell you his real feelings? Bloody Witchers, trust him to be resistant to my recipe, it’s never bloody failed before, if he’s made this worse somehow I’m going to bloody dissect him to figure out where I went wrong-“ She continues muttering darkly while Jaskier stares at her in shock.

His mind is valiantly trying to shake off enough of the lingering fog of tears to pull some of those threads together and figure out what the fuck she’s talking about.

Recipe? Real feelings? Make what worse? Did she…did she dose him with something? Did she put a fucking spell on his Witcher? He might have to have Ciri stab her after all, since he has no illusions about his own abilities to take her in a fight.

“What the fuck are you talking about, witch? What did you give him? What the fuck did you do? I’ll kill you myself you vicious little shrew, see if I don’t!”

She waves a hand dismissively, scoffing at his threats. Admittedly he is not at his best, though in his defense it’s hard to adopt a proper fighting stance when you’ve just spent half an hour kneeling in the dirt while your still-beating heart was slowly diced into bite-sized pieces. Tough on the knees, you know.

“Please, you should be thanking me. It was fucking exhausting, these last few weeks, watching you two throw longing glances back and forth when you think no one’s looking. I’m just trying to help things along.”

“Help- what? What things? Help things along how?” He’s trying very hard to hold onto his righteous anger at her for (possibly?) drugging the man he loves, but she keeps saying things that dredge up that dangerous warm feeling from before, and he’s losing his resolve.

“Nothing sinister, songbird. I’m done with that, I’m on the side of the White Knights now, remember? Have a little faith in me, for Lilit’s sake.” She rolls her eyes, but either he’s getting better at reading her or she’s making an effort to be easier to read, because he can feel the sincerity in her words. “We both know all that nonsense about Witchers not feeling is horseshit, yes?” He nods. Obviously it is, Geralt feels more deeply than anyone he’s ever met. “But I know you also understand how much he struggles to make sense of what he’s feeling, or to make himself heard when he does.”

She’s right about that, too. Jaskier knows the emotions are there, has always known, since the moment he saw Geralt in that tavern in Posada. But he’s watched Geralt get lost in the tangle of feelings inside him so thoroughly that all the words get stuck and nothing comes out. He’s seen it happen hundreds of times. That’s part of why he’s always wanted to badly to sing about him, to tell the world what Geralt can’t, to be the words when he can’t find them.

Yen gestures to the corner where Geralt is still meditating peacefully. “I didn’t do anything to his feelings. Couldn’t if I tried, that’s not really how my magic works, anyway. But I knew there are things he’s been wanting to say, and he’s been suffering for not knowing how. And as antagonistic as we may be, I don’t actually hate you nearly so much these days, and I find myself discomfited by your very obvious pining, as well.” Well, that’s…actually quite sweet. And rather disquieting, if he’s honest.

“So I gave him something to help him articulate himself. It won’t make him say anything he doesn’t want to, won’t force him to reveal any truths against his will or create any feelings that weren’t already there. It just…smooths the way. Untangles all those knots in his head so something coherent can make it out of his mouth. But you two aren’t cuddled up by the fire making me want to vomit, which means it didn’t fucking work, and I have to figure out why!” She looks rather like she would huff and stomp her foot at this, if the great and powerful Yennefer of Vengerberg would ever stoop to something so childish.

Jaskier thinks very hard about the last hour or so of his life. He thinks about Geralt saying “please,” and he thinks about the way all those words fell out of him and just kept coming and coming and coming, like a pot boiling over, piling up in a heap at Jaskier’s feet. He thinks about Geralt crying.

“Well- uh. Hmm. You know, it occurs to me now- it’s funny really, I think you’ll laugh, definitely laugh, not look at me with that petrifying glare you’ve got on right now, no you’ll be laughing I’m quite sure- Alright, yes, ok! Yes! Right, well, um. I think, looking at recent events, fresh eyes and all that you know- I’m just saying, it would have been helpful to have some of this information going in, is all- Ow! Melitele’s tits, that hurt! Do those nails come standard at Aretuza, or were you just born lucky? Ouch! Ok, ok, stop pinching me, witch! Like I was saying, with the benefit of this new information, I think it’s possible your magical intervention whosit thingy may have worked exactly as expected?”

She narrows her eyes. “If it worked, why are you crying to a horse instead of snuggling with your man?” His man. That can’t be right. Can it? Geralt isn’t his. Except. Except for all the things he sounded like he might be gearing up to say when Jaskier cut him off. Fuck.

“I, uh. I maybe. I maybe stopped him partway through and told him I needed a break?” He winces back as her already truly impressive glare intensifies even further- yep, she’s still got it.

“I did not go to all the effort of brewing that fucking potion, tailoring it for Witcher metabolisms, and making it fucking tasteless and odorless so he would drink it, not to mention standing out here in the fucking woods in the middle of the night with nothing to fucking do, just so you could chicken out halfway through getting everything you ever fucking wanted.” Her eyes are glowing violet now, which is. Wow. Scary. She’s so scary. He remembers now why he always thought she was so so scary. She jabs her finger towards the kneeling figure by the wall. “Get the fuck back in there and finish the damn conversation, bard,” she hisses. “I will not deal with this bullshit all the way to the Redanian border.”

She turns to leave again, and Jaskier shoots out a hand to stop her. She looks at his hand on her elbow and he briefly worries he’s going to end the night as a slug of some kind, but she just looks up at him questioningly.

“I just. Fuck. I know- I know this probably wasn’t easy for you. You know I know better than most what you’re feeling right now. But you’re helping anyway, so. Thank you, Yennefer. Even if it doesn’t go like you think, like I hope, you were willing to try even though it hurts, so thank you.” He isn’t sure what his face is doing, but he hopes she can see how genuinely grateful he is.

She smiles a little sadly. “Come on, songbird, We both know he was never really mine. And besides, I’m not the settling down type. Now go, don’t make me curse you.” She shoots him what would be a very passable glare if it weren’t for the slight glimmer of tears in her eyes, then spins on her heel and stalks off into the night.

He turns back to the cave, hesitating for a single moment before there’s an irritated huff, a nip to the sleeve of his jacket, and a frankly unnecessarily forceful shove to his back. He glares back at Roach, who seems unperturbed. “I’ve got entirely too many black-haired gorgeous women trying to run my life right now, do you hear me? Too many!” Roach huffs again. “Fine. I’m going, are you happy?” He takes another step and looks over his shoulder. She looks smug. Of course she does. “I think you’re just the old Roach reincarnated. Never seen another horse look so damn satisfied with herself,” he mutters, but he’s already heading back into the cave, so he figures she’s won this round.

He feels slightly guilty about grabbing Geralt’s waterskin before going to him, but he isn’t sure how long Yen’s potion lasts, or if meditating will have burned more of it off. Maybe it’s disingenuous to give him more without telling him what’s in it, but, weirdly, he trusts Yen when she says it won’t force Geralt to do or say anything he doesn’t want to, and Jaskier isn’t sure he’ll ever get to hear the words otherwise. He’ll tell him afterwards. He won’t keep this secret forever.

He sits down quietly next to Geralt, leaning up against the wall of the cave. He takes one deep breath, then another, and another. He rests his fingers gently on Geralt’s hand where it sits on his thigh. Geralt’s breathing gradually picks up until he’s back to almost his normal, slow rhythm. His eyes open, landing on Jaskier’s hand on his and following the line of his arm back up to his face.

Jaskier hands him the waterskin, and Geralt takes it with a nod of gratitude before taking a long drink. “I’m alright now,” Jaskier says. “I’m sorry I stopped you.

Geralt searches his face, eyes searching Jaskier’s for signs of dishonesty. Apparently finding none, he nods slightly, golden eyes closing again for a moment. When they open, he’s not looking at Jaskier any longer.

Jaskier looks at his hand, fingertips still resting ever so lightly on Geralt’s palm, and considers taking it back. He thinks about what Geralt has told him so far tonight, about the conviction in Yen’s voice when she insisted Geralt had feelings for him. Fuck it, he decides, and lays his hand more firmly in Geralt’s, lacing their fingers together. Geralt draws in a sharp breath and looks up at him in shock, but he doesn’t pull away. Instead, he grips Jaskier’s hand tighter, like he’s worried Jaskier is going to try to run.

“I know you,” Jaskier says slowly. “I’ve known you for more than half my life, and I know that you aren’t cruel, or callous, or unkind. I know that there is always a reason behind the things you say, and the things you do, even if no one else can see it.” He swallows hard, closing his eyes briefly. Geralt squeezes his hand lightly, which…helps, actually. It helps a lot. “I’m sorry I accused you of hurting me on purpose, for the sake of causing me pain. I was overwhelmed and having trouble processing things, but I shouldn’t have jumped to a conclusion I know wasn’t true. If you still want to talk, I’m ready to listen now.”

“It wasn’t an illogical conclusion to draw. And it wasn’t even completely wrong.” His voice is calmer than before, measured and even. Not as frantic. The river is still flowing free, but it’s calmed, no longer the violent rush of a broken dam. He sighs, a great, world-weary thing. “It was because you’re safe.” Jaskier looks at him quizzically.

Geralt draws in another deep breath before continuing. “I can’t ever show emotion. Not to humans. Not anger, or fear, or sometimes even joy. The myths about Witchers not having feelings…they aren’t just vicious rumors made up by bigots. They’re there to protect us. From them.”

Jaskier frowns. “You mean Witchers put that rumor out yourselves? But why?” Surely demonstrating how human Witchers really are can only help matters, right?

“In a way.” Geralt tilts his head in the way Jaskier knows means he’s remembering something long past. “It’s part of how we’re trained. We’re taught to suppress emotion, to hide it from everyone, including ourselves. It’s how we’ve done things for 400 years.” His thumb sweeps little arcs across the back of Jaskier’s hand, and Jaskier’s heart trips in his chest. He knows Geralt can probably hear it, but it must not worry him and he keeps talking.

“The first Witchers were experiments. Men twisted by mages hoping to combat the monsters that plagued the world. The process has been…refined, since then. At first, they really were- well. More monster than man.” Geralt tips his head back against the rock wall. “Humans were terrified of them. One and all, right down to their bones. The first Witchers didn’t take contracts, because no humans would even speak with them. They just wandered around until they found a monster to kill, and then moved on to the next. Eventually, people started to realize that Witchers were only killing monsters, and leaving humans be, so they slowly started reaching out for help.”

“Ungrateful sods, the lot of them,” Jaskier mutters, and hears Geralt’s quiet huff of laughter in response.

“You’re. You’re so special, do you know that?” Jaskier jerks his head up in surprise to see Geralt’s eyes on his face, liquid gold lit like sunrise by the light of the fire, a tiny smile playing around his lips. “You’ve never been afraid of me. Not once. Not even when the only things you knew about me were that I scowled a lot and I had two very scary swords.” Jaskier flushes at the reminder of the babble that spilled out of his mouth the moment he laid eyes on the single most attractive person he had ever seen in his 18 years of life.

He drops his eyes, knowing there’s no hiding the blush on his cheeks but ignoring it as hard as he can anyway. “What’s there to be scared of? You’re a puppy, not a wolf.” He expects a grumble, or a glare, or for Geralt to ignore him completely. Certainly not the bark of laughter that would have woken Ciri were it not for Yen’s charm. He stares at Geralt’s face, firelight flickering over pale skin, honest joy written in the curve of his mouth, and grins back helplessly.

“You’re the only one who’s ever thought that. Except maybe Eskel.” He laughs again, more quietly this time, then sobers slightly. “Humans are afraid of us. They always have been. Less now, since you,” he squeezes Jaskier’s hand again and Jaskier flushes even darker, “but the first Witchers were barely more than feral, and that impression…stuck. Humanity never got past it. Even when new generations of Witchers were made, when we became something closer to men than to monsters, their fear never went away. Any emotion, even the faintest irritation, was enough to make most humans think a Witcher was about to go berserk, to start tearing out the throats of anyone who got too close. So, we learned to shut them down.”

His eyes are downcast now, and Jaskier thinks of a tiny Geralt, just a boy, younger than Ciri, excited about the world, curious and clever and mischievous, thinks about him learning to hide his heart away until even he couldn’t find it anymore, and he wants to scream. He wants to cry, he wants to rage, he wants to find every human who ever judged a Witcher by his eyes and not his deeds and mount their heads on spikes. He wants to tear out their hearts and make them watch as he throws them on the pyre, burning them out like so many boys were made to burn out their own.

Geralt can smell his turmoil, he knows, and he clings to the comfort offered when he holds Jaskier’s hand as tightly as he can without hurting him, still tracing circles into his skin with his thumb.

“It isn’t safe, to have feelings. Humans may spit on a mutant with a heart of stone, but they’ll hunt and kill a monster with teeth they think will harm them. It’s safer to be cold, to be hard. To let all of it roll off of us like snow off a mountain. And after a while, you forget how to be anything else. You forget that it’s a lie, that it’s something you had to learn. You start to believe it too.” There are tears dripping off of Jaskier’s nose now, but he doesn’t dare interrupt again. “I had forgotten, until you.”

He looks at Jaskier with such naked feeling in his fiery eyes that Jaskier can’t fathom how anyone could believe this man has no heart. “You made me feel. You walked into my life and just-“ He huffs another low laugh, the faraway look on his face impossibly fond. “You just didn’t listen to a fucking thing I said. Ever! Not once! And it drove me up the godsdamned wall. I was going out of my mind, I was so fucking annoyed. You never stopped talking, or singing, or playing that damn lute, you never stayed out of the way on hunts like I told you to, you ignored me whenever I said I didn’t have feelings or I didn’t need anyone or we weren’t friends. And you wouldn’t leave! You just kept coming back, no matter how much of an arse I was, even when I acted in ways that would have made other humans shit themselves, or come after me with torches and pitchforks, or both. You just kept coming back, and you kept not believing me when I told you I was a monster, and you never smelled fucking afraid, and after a while I realized that irritated wasn’t the only thing you made me feel anymore.”

He seems to withdraw into himself a little, his shoulders hunching and his head hanging slightly. He tries to withdraw his hand, but Jaskier isn’t sure he can get through this conversation without it, so he hopes Geralt will forgive him for pushing yet more boundaries and simply holds onto him tighter.

Geralt sighs again, but stops pulling away. “But there’s still so much shit in the world. There are so many humans who hate me, or fear me, or try to cheat me, or who end up being monsters worse than the ones they want me to kill, and the problem with having it smacked over my head that I do actually have feelings, is that it makes it so much harder to ignore them. And there’s so much anger in me, Jaskier, and grief, and loneliness. And I can’t ever show it to anyone, or it will confirm everything they think they know about me. It will make me a monster. It will make me the Butcher all over again.” He looks up again, his expression anguished. “You’re the only one who’s safe. You’re the only one I can be angry around, or sad, or scared, or just annoyed, without thinking the worst of me. You’re the only one who ever comes back.”

Jaskier is back to feeling like his heart is being fed through a sieve, but he thinks he understands what Geralt is trying to say this time. He feels a renewed rush of guilt for assuming the worst of him before. Is he any better than the rest, jumping to the foulest possible conclusion while Geralt wrestles with his tongue to try and make him understand? He turns his head away, closing his eyes against the tears and trying to breathe through the shame.

Fingers grip his chin gently and coax his head back until he’s looking into Geralt’s slitted eyes again. The look on his face is so soft, so open, that Jaskier feels like his ribs are being pried apart at the sight of it. “You have no idea how much of a blessing you have actually been in my life, Jaskier,” and those words just crack his chest wide open and bare his heart to the whole room, don’t they? “I took advantage of you. I wanted so badly to have someone in my life I could show all the darkest parts of myself to, without them running away, that I forgot to show you the rest. And I forgot to help carry your darkness in return. I left you with such a burden, Jaskier, and you never once complained or asked me to help. You have done nothing but give, for as long as I’ve known you, and I wish I could show you how sorry I am that I was content for so long just to take.” Jaskier is pretty sure he’s openly sobbing now, but Geralt is sliding his hand up from his chin to cup his cheek, sweeping the tears away with his thumb, so it’s probably ok.

“Let me make it up to you, Jaskier. Let me be the one to give to you for once. Let me carry your burdens for a while. Let me give you a reason to forgive me. A reason to come back.” His eyes are pools of molten gold, wide and dark and shining with- emotion. An emotion. Jaskier isn’t going to hazard a guess at which emotion, because he isn’t sure he can handle the answer.

“I’ve already forgiven you, you great lummox. For all of it. A safe place is all I ever wanted to be for you. I only ever wanted to give you a home. Like you gave me. Just- just share it with me next time, please? The anger, or the fear? Share it with me first, instead of letting it fester and burn us both. That’s all I need from you.”

Geralt’s hand on his cheek guides him forward until their faces are inches from each other, foreheads resting together. Jaskier’s eyes want to close but he can’t bear to look away, too afraid this is all an impossible dream that will disappear as soon as he opens them again. He can see the way the firelight glimmers off his silver hair, the scars through his eyebrow, the tears clinging to his eyelashes as they sweep gently over his cheeks. He’s never seen anything so beautiful in his life.

“I don’t know if I’ve ever deserved you, but I would do anything for the chance to try to be someone who does. I’m yours, Jaskier. You need only say you’ll have me.”

Jaskier is a man of words. He’s a bard, words are his trade, his weapons, the blood in his veins. No matter what else is happening around him, no matter what he has or what he’s lost or what needs to be done, there are always words ready to spring forth from him like water from a spigot. He has never, in all his life, been out of words.

Until now.

Fuck it.

Geralt’s lips are softer than he imagined, given that his skincare routine seems to consist primarily of monster innards. But they’re soft and they’re warm and they move so gently against Jaskier’s that he thinks he might simply melt into a puddle, to be absorbed into the earth and never seen again. The kiss is tender, and sweet, and longing, and not at all how he imagined his first kiss with Geralt would be. It’s perfect. Jaskier breaks it with a watery laugh, keeping his forehead pressed to Geralt’s.

Somehow his free hand has found its way back into Geralt’s silky hair, and he threads his fingers deeper into the moonlit locks and hopes he’ll never have to let go.

“You’re mine?” He knows he sounds a little pleading, disbelief coloring his tone, but he can’t help it. He’s had this dream so many times, he needs to be sure it’s real this time. “Really?”

“Really, little lark.” Geralt is smiling just as wide as Jaskier is, his cheeks just as damp. “I’ve always been yours, I was just too stupid to admit it. I won’t make that mistake again. I love you. I’ll never leave you behind again, not for the rest of your life, if you’ll let me.”

And, oh, there’s a conversation they should maybe have, because after all the revelations of tonight, Jaskier is fairly sure Geralt thinks he’s completely human, and is probably in pain over his supposed mortality. At some point before they go to sleep Jaskier will mention it, because apparently Geralt hasn’t noticed that his face hasn’t changed a lick in 25 years, the stubble he wears these days notwithstanding.

Because Geralt is a ridiculous, incredible, oblivious, stupid, wonderful fool, and Jaskier loves him so much he can hardly breathe. So he tells him so. The rest can wait.

#the witcher #twn #geraskier #geralt of rivia #jaskier #dandelion #julian alfred pankratz #yennefer of vengerberg #cirilla fiona elen riannon #the witcher fanfiction #my writing #i'll do the same with sleep now eventually i think but i want to finish it first

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chaoskirin · 4 years ago

Text

Why AO3 Works and Why You Should Stay There

I’m assuming most of the people posting about what AO3 allows are children. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it does explain why people don’t understand why people would defend AO3.

It’s because any alternative site that relies on moderation of any kind for what’s allowed will become Livejournal.

Everyone used LJ 20 years ago. Seriously, asking someone if they had a Livejournal was as common as asking someone if they had a Facebook.

The site got huge. It was sold several times. And between owners, moderation tried to reign in what was and wasn’t allowed.

Which was a huge undertaking. It was literally not possible for LJ to hire enough people to moderate, so they created bots which would do the work for them. “Top of the line” bots with a small margin of error. Bots that would delete the unwanted fic and allow other fics to remain.

If you know how AI works, you know that even TODAY there is no way to program AI to do exactly what you want it to do. If you direct an AI to delete all offending fics, it will find the easiest path to success wherein it uses the least memory and resources to do so. And it WILL delete every offending fic.

It will also learn that all offending fics contain certain words. Maybe it’s the word ‘fic.’ Maybe it’s the word ‘sex.’ To make sorting the good from the bad easier, it will now discard anything that uses either of those two words.

Now it’s got a bigger pool to learn from, the AI finds that fics that use the word ‘sex’ also sometimes use the word ‘gender.’ The AI decides that fics using the word ‘gender’ must also be deleted for being undesirable, and suddenly the AI is deleting fics about transgender characters.

This is essentially what happened on Livejournal. You’ll sometimes still see people posting about “the great strikethrough” in which accounts that used certain words too much, even if they weren’t part of the intended purge, had their accounts suspended. Accounts that were havens for victims of abuse were deleted, for example, just because the AI found certain key words it had deemed inappropriate.

And this happened so many times to so many people that it was impossible for the Livejournal staff to keep up with all the review requests. It would often take weeks for an account to be reinstated, and by that time, the author had moved on.

If AO3 decides to moderate more than they already do, they will never have enough volunteers to read every story that’s published. They will never be able to adequately sort through every request that comes in. Because perhaps YOU have good intentions. You will only report fics that violate the TOS. But someone else will report every fic of someone they don’t personally like, even though there’s no violation.

This happens on Instagram. I recently helped a friend recover her account because an art thief reported the original artist for stealing art. There were not enough people to really look into whether or not the original artist was innocent, so they just suspended her account. It took WEEKS to get it back.

This is what you’re asking for on Ao3. I know you don’t understand this, or your initial reaction is to say “that won’t happen,” but it WILL. Every time any site has gone to heavier moderation, non-offending accounts are lost in the shuffle.

I can’t believe you didn’t learn from tumblr’s handling of banning certain images. It’s the same fucking thing. C’mon, guys. Use your heads here.

#ao3 #ao3 shit #writing related #not bestiary

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charmed-asylum · 3 years ago

Text

RUMOR HAS IT

Pairing: Dark Steve Rogers x Angelina Fury (OC) Word count: 7,329

SUMMERY: Life was perfect for American boy, aka Steve Rogers. Great friends, hot cheerleader girlfriend, love and adore by everyone. Everything was perfect till senior year when Angelina came around and an anonymous gossip column, Rumor Has It, threatening to expose everyone’s dirty laundry.

⚠️WARNING:⚠️. It’s gonna get dark as we get deeper into the story. No one under age of 18 read this. Many dark themes. Before you ask there gonna be some thing explain later on in the story. THIS CHAPTER IS LONG. BITCH FIGHT /MOODY TEENS BLACKMAIL/ SEXUAL ASSULT/PERSON BEING DRUG is some of many warning. Everyone is 18 while Steve cute as he is 20 and Bucky is 19.

A/n: I wanna thank @sage1998c for coming to me w this. I hope I make you proud. If you wish to be added let me know if you wish to tell me I need to sit my booty down okay let me know I got a donut really for my buttocks. Also sorry for the 50 days delay grad school and a shitty computer can do that to you. Also tumblr hates me huh

Based on this Request: Hi I was wondering if you would please consider doing a dark Steve high school au story starting Kat Graham as the main oc/face claim. I would really appreciate it if you would think about it.

Tagged: @patzammit @what-is-your-wish @cjand10@sage1998c @deceitfuldevout@sage1998c @david-winters-93 @alagalaska

Pervious Chapter // Master List// Rumer Has it ML

CHAPTER 2: I write sins not Tragedies

Hot touch covered her with a pitch of cold sweat. Screams grew louder by the minute. A blurry vision of flames and hands came to sight. Quit whispers mumbled into white noise. Then it all went black.

“AHH” Angelina screamed out, jumping up in her queen size bed. Tears welcome soft cheeks. Bending over, she started counting back from 100. Without thinking, she traced the three-long line scar on her upper back.

Rumor has it now had over 10 million fans, and it’s only been out for a few months. It was getting harder to please folks and keep others in check. But she was cooking on something big. Something that makes those tiny tales and stories sounds like a nursery rhyme.

She turned to her side and pulled out her NIKE runner shoes from under the bed and keys decided it was a good time to run.

Zipping up her red Fabletic hoodie, she sneaked past the nosy shower and unprompted concert her dad was giving them out the front door. She felt something she had been feeling for two weeks now, a presence lurking around her. Bending down to tie her shoes, she checked for the flip blade she had hidden in her sock. Angelina slowly peeks in the reflection of the side mirror to see if it was anyone, none.

No one knew it, Angelina reminded herself.

Getting up to stretch her back a bit, securing her nightstick she stole from her dad the day she came back.

The breeze felt good as Angelina jogged down the empty suburban streets. The only people out were the newspaperman and a few crusaders that survived last night. Felt good.

“ On you left,” a voice shouted out before passing you.

A childish chuckle left as Angelina pushed a bit harder to catch up. Trying harder as hard as she could, she finally caught up to Steve, shouting out, “on your right.”

They both kept pushing one another, trying to win. After a bit, Angelina had to stop and ran into a neighbor's front yard. Steve shortly joined beside her. He was laughing a bit harder than average, holding his lower stomach.

He turns to her and stares. She was out of breath, puffing her chest in and out, making it pop out a bit in her navy blue sports bra.

“ Ain’t you a bit out of place, Rogers,” Angelina said, still out of breath.

He didn’t say anything, just watched as the sweat dripped down her neck and her chest went up and down. He wasn’t going to say anything to her, but he couldn’t stop himself. Steve has been doing that a lot lately by coming by to watch her house. After the second set of pictures Brock gave him: her in the girl locker room and coming out of the pool, he needed more. He looked down at her crotch area. Those panties would do, he thought to himself. He was already making a plan to pop in while she was away at cheerleading practice. That was the newest thing he did. It started two weeks ago when he started to come over. The window was open, and again he found himself going through the principal bedroom.

“ Not even Bucky can keep up. Is there anything you can’t do” Steve asked, lending his on the right hand?

“ Pee standing up is for one, so I guess you beat me there, for once,” Angelina said, slowly getting up.

Sweat peaks from under her sports bra. Steve had this discussion with himself for a bit, but he concluded she was 38c. As if the thought alone wasn’t making him feel something he should, her stretching made him grow incredibly hard.

“-Bucky, wow, he looks like a pig running around in the mud,” Angelina said, laughing at the memory.

He has been seeing her and Bucky together, never for long but always a couple of times a day. He tried asking Bucky about it, but he never answered, just told him it was nothing. He hated that he kept him in the dark and that he had secrets. Most of all, he had what he wanted, a relationship with Angelina.

“ You spend a lot of time with James,” Steve asked.

She didn’t answer him; instead of pretending, he didn’t say anything and looked at the mailman drive past.

“ Getting later than I wanted. Good run. Maybe next time, pace yourself better. You could have beaten me if you don't overdo yourself half a mile in,” Angelina said before running off.

The grip he had with the grass tighter. Breath stopped as he tried to calm himself. But it didn’t work. He knew she wanted him. It was plain as day, but she kept saying or doing something to upset him. He knew it was the price he had to pay after everything he went through.

Clicks of locks and chatter fill the abyss of the busy hallway—most in their groups, some alone, all reading and gossiping about the latest stories.

Rumor Has it some people were never taught the golden rule to treat others the way you want to be treated. It looks like Mr. Doom got some learning to do. Someone was voted most unlikeable.

Even if there wasn’t any news coming around, most people brought it on themselves to start up a game of it. Rumor has it. Make bets dares out of all of it.

Steve hated it. Instead of talking about the accomplishments he made like they usually do, it was all about that stupid blog. His jaw clicked as he sat back against his locker, watching them all go about their business. Shoulder push out to look broader chest out to show his status. With a bump, he looked down on the floor jackpot, he thought to himself. One thing he was waiting for was his little treats. With a simple swipe, he slowly took his boot and dragged it closer to him. His palms grew sweaty with nerves and excitement. Once, he was inside an abandoned bathroom close by the older side of the school, his office. He opened it and started to paint. There she was in the pool floating after-hours with her top off. Steve's thick fingers gently traced the picture right on her nipples and lips. With another hand, he dug deep and stroked himself, tracing back to her nipples. She did this, he said to himself over and over. She was the one who made him do this. He was a good Christian boy, perfect, and she was the apple of the sin dress in white—his Angel. The picture suddenly started to crumble as he released it. His face was covered in sweat, hair dripping flick to his forehead out of breath fatigue.

DING-DING

Fixing himself a bit, he ignores the warning bell. A few pictures and words cover half of his reflection. Once he felt everything was back into place, he quickly left the bathroom with a click of a key he had hidden between his compress with a picture of Peggy. Maybe he will play dress-up with her this week and have her wear Angelina undies he stole or something.

“Woo punk, where have you been?” Bucky shouted out from behind him.

“ Just huh, having some alone time before class. What up, jerk” Steve asked, pulling his sleeves into place.

“Huh, you ask me. You've been acting pretty weird lately. Look, it’s okay I’m okay if your friends are still with Nat. I’m onto new and better things now,” Bucky boosted.

He rolled his eyes at that statement. He needed more people he could rely on, not people that have him question himself more than another.

“ Nothing Bucky. Just pump about the game,” Steve said.

He sighs and mumbles something under his breath.

“ Just great. Typical you. How could you? I thought you appreciated good home values as much as I did. Why do I see you with Angelina? Was Nat the only cheater” Steve hissed into Bucky's ear.

Bucky stops in the middle of the hallways and pushes Steve into a locker.

“ Say that again. You can not be serious. This is all about her. How has nothing ever changed? What are you talking about” Bucky said, holding up his casted arm to Steve's neck?

More people came around to watch—the attention he did not want. Pushing Bucky back, he walked outside the door to the track field. Bucky follows behind like he always does. Steve looks around, making sure they outrun everyone.

“ I went to the gym after that thing came out and saw you with her. Seems very close. You did not know she was coming back either. So when did you two spend all that time together” Steve said harshly.

Pulling his hand down his face, Bucky sighs and looks at Steve with a frown.

“ Ten months ago. When I was at my darkest, I was in the hospital dealing with this” he stops and points to his arm “ I do not know how but she was there one night. She was in a hospital gown, black leather jacket with studs, and combat boots with candy and a little teddy bear on a motorcycle in her hands. Hours we talked about old days. For next week each day, she came by at night. The day you came over, she was gone. I asked around no one even knew who I was talking about. Stevie. Day she came to school on her Harley was the first day I saw her since then. She knew how hard and far I had come. She was checking I did not have another slip-up. That girl is a Pandora box, Steve,” Bucky said.

“ Why didn’t you tell me at the end of the line, Buck. Who are you loyal to, huh, me or her” Steve asked, pissed.

Before he could say something, the loudspeaker went on.

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, IN LIGHT OF ALL THIS BULLSHIT COMING AROUND I PRINCIPAL FURY AND LOCAL LAW ENFORCEMENT, DECIDE TO ISSUE A CURFEW AND A PRENATAL CAP ON ALL ELECTRONICS. TO ADD ON, I KNOW YOU MAY HAVE QUESTIONS BUT ALL CLASSES WITH MRS. HALL HAS BEEN SUSPENDED AND BE TAUGHT BY MR. COULSON UNTIL THE END OF THE YEAR. IF YOU HAVE ANYTHING THAT CAN BE USEFUL TOWARDS THIS OPEN INVESTIGATION, COME TO MY OFFICE OR A TEACHER.

Bucky looked at Steve then down at his phone as it started to light up.

“ That's Tony he said; come to the fountain. It's an emergency,” Bucky said and rushed past Steve but not before he could bump his shoulder into Steves. Steve frowned and punched the brick wall as a bit of blood covered his fingers; he glanced at his apple phone:

📰📰📰📰📰📰📰📰📰📰📰📰📰

Everyone settled around in front of the school, sitting down on its school fountain. Nat at the end with Bruce talking, making out. Tony next to Pepper talking over a class project and Peggy in her cheerleading uniform fixing her makeup. Angelina linger by a nearby tree in her mom jeans with a black belt with a heart on the front black tank top tuck in with crystal necklace wrap around her neck in one of her dad’s old flannel drooping over her tiny frame hair bone straight with her bangs tipping the top of her glasses reading Little Women.

Steve and Bucky rush to the group out of breath.

“ Tell me this is not true,” Bucky said, holding his phone up.

Tony peeks up from his shades and looks at the phone.

“ Yeah. Sam was pulled out from class. Next, I knew he was screaming at Fury. Hall has not left the office. Who would have known about this? This is next-level shit,” Tony said.

“ It has to stop. Who can be able to do something like this” Nat said, a little sad?

“ Was not me that all I know,” Peggy said.

Angelina pops off from the tree and walks over.

“ Peggy, no one said it was you. Stop with the William Shakespeare dramatics,” Angelina said with an eat-shit grin.

Peggy looks at her then back at Steve.

“ We know someone like you can not be behind it. It has to be someone else who would know of this. Teacher or something,” Steve said.

“ Yeah. I got better things to care about like Prom,” Peggy said, playing with her mirror.

“ I thought you did not care about this shit. Why do you care? Maybe it's your dad, and you're trying to cover it up,” Steve said with his hand intertwined with Peggy's.

“ You're right. It makes the most sense. My dad is the principal. However, he doesn't give a shit about all this. And he still has a flip phone. Stevie. I care because they outed me. They did everyone, but one, two, and three,” She said, pointing to Steve, Tony, and Pepper.

“ Hey, I am an open book. Alright. So leave me out of this,” Tony said, getting up.

Angelina laughed.

“ Just making a point,” Angina said, pulling her vape from her flannel pocket.

“ Anyway. I was thinking. Sam can not be alone. I am going to throw a party tonight,” Peggy said.

Brock talks over just that and screams,” PARTY AT PEGGY HOUSE TONIGHT.”

“ I assume this is open to everyone or stick up the ass club. Hey, sweet cheeks,” Brock said, giving Angelina a wink.

“ And with that, I am out. Too many Breakfast Club rejects,” Angelina said, walking off.

Brock let out a catcall and shook his head. “ Can you believe she is up for Prom Queen”?

Peggy's head quickly turned to him, “ WHAT.”

Brock smirks at her discomfort and walks off.

“ Maybe it's him,” Bucky stated.

With that, Steve nods and watches as the two walk further away. Tonight might be perfect.

👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀👀

Fury marches back and forth. Fist under his chin, thinking. Angelina had her feet up on the chair, looking over Gram and texts to a few people.

“ I do not know how this happened. Hall is one of my best teachers. Two years. Sam is 18 now, which means since he was 16. That rape. Shit. Maybe I should rethink this curfew,” Fury said.

“ You and I both know you can not judge a book from its cover,” Angelina said.

“ Still, this is not good. What if one of these things makes someone do something crazy” Fury said.

“ You're right—your right, Fury. You tried to, and I do not know, hack it, see who is doing it. Can you do that knowing a guy” Angelina asked?

He shook his head.

“ You're my guy. Honey. I figured it out. Who is blowing up your phone” Fury asked with an eyebrow bend?

“ A friend. She wants me to come over. But maybe we can chill and stay in—play monopoly. Like we used to do,'' Angelina said, putting her phone down.

Bucky came in before stopping.

“ You wanted to see me,” Bucky said.

Fury looks at Angelina, then at Bucky.

“ Yes, Yes. Honey. Go over and be back by 10. I need to talk to Bucky,” Fury said. With a nod, she salutes Fury and walks out.

Fury waited a second before walking over to his desk and sitting down.

“ So James. Have anything for me” Fury asked.

“ No, Sir. Nothing,” Bucky said, shrugging his broad shoulders.

He nodded and hummed to himself. On his desk were a picture of him and Angelina and a woman in her forties.

“ Keep an eye out. I am doing a lot to make sure no one knows about what happened before. It would be a lot harder if people knew where exactly you were for those months,” Fury said.

Bucky sighs and rolls his eyes.

“ Yes, sir,” He said, then left.

“ Still think I am the worst Fury, Jamie,” Angelina said, waiting outside.

“ No, that bastard you called dad to be that. We gotta talk,” Bucky said.

She smiles and wraps her arm around Bucky’s neck and plays with his short bit curly neck hair.

“ And what is that?” Angelina said playfully.

Bucky looks at her lips before pushing her away.

“ Steve. He might know,” Bucky said.

Angelina's smile got brighter.

“ Know what, Bucky,” Angelina asked, hand on her hip.

“ About us,” Bucky said, flicking a finger between the two.

“ No, he does not. What if he does. We can be friends. Or this about the two of you. Little fun you two have now and then. Does Bucky want to have him join? We both know you two love each other. You probably bit more than him. Maybe we can kiss and tell,” Angelina teases.

“STOP. I'M NOT GAY. ANGIE. WE HAVE TO STOP TALKING. BEING AROUND EACH OTHER,” Bucky hissed, holding onto her bicep.

She pulled away and looked at him.

“ Do not worry. So afraid of Steve. What can he do, Bucky? You are a bipolar Winter Soldier. Could you not talk to me at the party? I don't particularly appreciate talking to you when you're like this,” Angelina said and walked off.

Bucky slid down the wall and pulled his head between his arms. If only she knew how dangerous he could be.

💔💔💔💔💔💔💔💔💔💔💔💔💔

Party was starting to get lively when Angelina walked in hours after. Peggy had more than a dozen handwritten notes in her locker. She had to tame her before it could get worse. She was already inching to release the next rumor.

Streamer and unwrap condoms fell from the ceiling and plaster over the walls. Drake boom from the nearby speaker. She walked against the sea of people looking for Peggy but found MJ with Peter in the kitchen.

“ Hey Angelina over here,” MJ shouted over the loud music. Peter had his arms wrapped around her shoulder, bopping his head to the beat the best he could.

“ What up, Jones Parker? So this is a Marvel High party,” Angelina asked, standing across the pair.

“ Yeah. I know, juvenile. Peter here, though, has to make an appearance. He is popular now. Congrats on the nomination. You got me and Peter vote,” MJ said, taking a sip.

She nodded her head and looked around. Her eyes slowly stop at a pair of brown eyes. Who spotted a similar look, one from her past often used. A chill covers her bare shoulder.

“ Hey, you cold,” a voice said from behind her.

Steve stood there with Bucky and Peggy right beside her.

Angelina looked back to see the pair of eyes had left.

“Yeah, but it’s okay. Nice party Peggy. Guess you're more than a pleasant voice and nice boobs,” Angelina said nonchalantly.

Bucky sip on his drink and smirk.

“Well. You will be surprised by the many things I know how to do,” Peggy said.

Steve looks at her, and she must be still mad at the slip-up he had in the car, he thought.

“Did I hear a bitchy voice? I knew Angelina had to be nearby,” Tony said, walking over to toss an arm around her shoulder.

Curving her lips a bit, she bit down the never-ending need to roll her eyes.

“ Hey Tons, the only way you hear a bitch is by tuning up for tool R,” she said.

“ Cute. Well, Peggy Steve, I’m bored. Let’s play a game” he stops and looks around at all but one confused face. “Who's up for a game?” Tony asked, tossing his Tom Ford navy blue blazer over Angie. “ Sweet Peggy, be a host and get some more drinks,” Tony said, taking a sip of his drink.

“ No, I do it. I do not drink anyway. Peggy, which way” Angelina said, pushing from the counter.

“ That way, it's in the wine cellar,” Peggy said with a bit more sass.

Angelina rolled her eyes. Peggy really can not be mad at her for still getting nominated. Before she could cross past Peggy, she blocked her way out and gave Steve a passionate kiss on the lips. She was smudging her Bésame 1946 Red Velvet lipstick across his pink lips catching the whole room in shock.

“ He mines Bitch. Just like Prom Queen. Trash Bitch” Peggy hissed into her ear.

“ Whatever. I do not want him or care for the title. You're just a sad excuse, little girl. Soak it up. Because you are popping baby number four before you're 21,” Angina said toe to toe to Peggy.

Peggy frowned that it was something she confided in Angelina when that first night they were together. She was not even mad at her but the man she had just kissed. She always envies Angelina. Angelina knew that very much and always used it against her.

Angelina looks at the crowd around them and flips them the finger.

“ FUCK PLAYING GAMES WHO UP FOR TRUTH OR DARE,” she shouted out.

🥤🥤🥤🥤🥤🥤🥤🥤🥤🥤🥤🥤🥤🥤🥤🥤

Steve watches from across the circle at Angelina laughing at Peter trying to do the Unlock it ( Lock it) dance. He tried to talk to her, but Peggy was extra clingy.

“ Hey, have you heard from Sam?” Scott asked.

“ No. I haven't; he is not here?” Steve asked.

Peggy snorted at Sam's name.

“ Poor Sammy, baby. Now he is a boy I should have fucked. I bet he got a big fat dick,” Peggy giggled into Steve's sleeve.

“ She's just drunk,” Steve said, grabbing Peggy up.

Angelina stops and looks at the two.

“ Need me to lay her down?” She asked for a brow bent with suspension.

“ No, she's fine. Can you grab me some water” Steve asked?

Peggy pushes past Steve rocking back and forth.

“ I do not need a man or woman to help me. I fucking Marget Carter. You all should bow down and worship me. I am everything you losers are not. With a snap of the finger, I can end you,” Peggy said on baby deer feet.

Taking her arm, Angelina pushed back everyone.

“ Peggy, shut the fuck up. No one is trying to do anything to you. She is drunk. MJ Nat help,” Angelina said with others walking behind her.

Tony started to slow clap, laughing. “ One hell of a bitch, but damn, that demanding tone makes it even harder for me.”

Brock started to laugh with a bent-over wheezing laugh.

“ Follow me,” Steve hissed into his ear when everyone decided to watch Halloween instead.

Brock waited a bit and followed the golden prodigy to the garage. As soon as the door closed, Steve’s elbow was against Brock's neck. Eyes dark as the midnight sky, Steve pushed a bit harder.

“ You know, when I was younger. I had a pet dog. I loved that dog. Skippy was his name. He and I were unbreakable. Everywhere I went, he went. All until one day, Skippy decided to chew my GI Joe action figure. Even at my weakness, I still was able to snap that bitches neck into two. You, I do not like you. So what stops me from snapping this neck and tossing you beside Skippy” Steve said with a wide grin.

With one hand, he pulled a baggie of Brock's drugs and flicked it back and forth.

“ My sweet angel. As spicy as she is. She is a good girl. No drugs or liquor. Smokes only organic. She is perfect but if she likes anyone else who takes this she will be…. Well, fuck up. I want you to slip these into her drink and take some up-close pictures. Maybe one with a dick. With your phone this time. You got until the last person leaves this party if not. Before you even reach your car. Cops are up to your ass,” Steve said.

Brock's eyes grew ten times big.

“ You fucking stupid. That fucking jail time. I will be someone bitch. Fuck that. Angelina strong you think she will allow me to slip her a pill, you crazy man” Brock said, pushing Steve.

“ Did you forget? You are only one person bitch, and that my bitch. And I am ten times crazier than anyone you are ever going to meet,” Steve said, letting go and flicking the bag of drugs to his feet.

💊💊💊💊💊💊💊💊💊💊💊💊💊

She watched from the corner as MJ and Nat both gave up and left. Peggy had locked herself in the bathroom about five minutes ago, which led her to now pick the door open.

With one hard push, the door swung open.

“ You do care,” Peggy said with her arms wide open, mascara running.

“ That is a stupid question. You know I do. I shouldn’t with the crap you pulled down there. You were about to spill it. All we have done down the fucking drain,” she said, shaking her head.

Angelina looked at her and sighed, then got on her knees and put Peggy's cheeks into her tiny hands. Her ruby red nails gently rub her cheek.

“ You know I care. I didn’t know about the prom thing. I didn’t. It doesn’t matter if that’s why you're upset, don't worry, it’s just some silly contest. I used to be like you. I look at all the wrong reasons for validation. It became a drug I feed on. In the end, it was that same thing that ended up almost destroying me. “ Angelina said softly.

Peggy pushes at her and frowns.

“Nothing wrong with me. I got you and Stevie. We are going to be remembered for decades after we are gone. I heard something that can make us go to the next level,” Peggy whispered, pulling out a small baggie.

“ You shouldn’t depend on anyone. For most men. They only care about themselves. When I was younger, I learned about the 1st boy who showed me attention. I gave them a part of my sanity. To get it back, it cost my peace my soul” she stopped talking and touched her back “ Alright. If you feel it’s big, we put it in for the next one. You remembered how I taught you” she asked. Peggy went to grab her phone when there was a knock.

They look at each other. Angelina hushed Peggy's giggles and went to the door. Peaking out, she saw two glasses of water and a thing of pills. Picking up, she started to turn when someone startled her, making her drop the glasses on the floor.

“ Fuck. Really” Angelina said, pissed off, bending down to pick up the glass.

Brock smirks down at her.

“ But come on. I got you a little something. Think of it as a white flag. I surrender to you peaches,” Brock said, blocking the door.

Looking up, Angelina rolled her eyes, “ Why won’t you leave me the fuck alone. That would be a perfect parting gift, Olgar”.

“ Now I’m down for pet names, but that won’t do,” Brock said with a snap of the finger. A group of guys came out from a room and quickly grabbed her.

Music got loud, bumming through her body. She lands a few punches knocking a few of the men screaming. Times like this, she wishes she didn’t leave her bag in the car. Brock's laughter overpowers the music. She is not sure how it happened, but out of nowhere, someone forced her to take some pills. She tried throwing up, but between fighting them off and stopping from snatching her, she couldn’t stop the feeling from taking over.

A familiar rabbit hole started to come to focus, and the world around her began to melt in the walls.

“ No, “ Angelina shouted, pulling up her hands clawing at anyone coming close. Her hands were bloody from attacking, and the glass found its way back across her body.

“ Damn your one wild kitty. I know I’m supposed to be a gentleman to you and all, but you're too damn good to pass,” Brock teased.

“ Fuck you,” Angelina said wobbly.

Guys around her laughed as she kept trying to stand her ground. More she tried to fight the weaker she felt the world was bright lights and circles. Music started to flip words coming into her ear backward. Floors began to cave in. With one last warrior cry Angelina passed out.

😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏😏

Steve waited downstairs by the rest of the guys listening in and out of whatever conversation they were having, putting in the bare minimum. He was over the whole thing till something caught his attention.

“ Man, she is one hell of a fighter. DAMN I hope Brock allows me a turn after he is done with her. I always wanted to fuck a black chick,” Jeffrey said, coming down with the rest of the Strike Gang.

He looked around for Angelina. Nat did mention that she was checking on Peggy, but how could Brock get a hold of her. Maybe giving him free rein wasn't the best idea.

“ Hey, have any of you seen Peggy?” Steve asks, looking around.

Everyone either shook his head or said no.

Taking each step by, too, he called out for Peggy but was looking for Angelina.

Little far up, he could see an intoxicated Peggy slowly walk out.

“ Where have you been?” Steve asks.

“ I don’t remember Fury was there, and she left. I came out, but Brock was with some chic,” Peggy snorted.

“ A girl,” Steve asked.

“Mmm,” Peggy said, playing with her nails.

Steve pushed past Peggy and into the room she had just come from. Brock was on top of someone grunting like a wild beast's hand around one's throat. Closer, he got more; he could see his poor Angel. Her eyes were close, but he could tell she was afraid tears would roll down her face, and her hands would come up to try to attack him time and time again. Anger grew by the minute. The more he watched, the angrier he got.

“ WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” Steve shouted out aloud.

Brock slowed down a bit and turned around to him; out of breath, he smiled, “ Getting my award.”

Steve jumped on Brock and started to attack him left, right, left-right. Even past the sound of bone cracking, he did not care. He was furious at himself. Punches after another until a sound breaks. Like a sweet violin, her cry broke. Slowly finding his footing, he stumbled to her, who was half undressed, dry blood covering across her body. With a bloody hand, he wiped the sweat off her face and gently picked her up bridal style, and walked out.

People surround the pair as he walks down the stairs. No matter how loud they tried to get though to talk, he didn’t answer. He didn’t listen. He just walked her out. To them, he was a hero without his plan work, without a doubt.

🦅.🦅.🦅.🦅.🦅.🦅.🦅.🦅.🦅.🦅.🦅.🦅

- 2 and ½ weeks later -

“ And I knew. I had to do what I was born to do and protect my people. Steve stopped and thought about it, then scratched on his flashcards. Angelina was still out, and he decided to wait, asserting that she was his girlfriend.

“ I had to do the right thing. No one should have to go through something so horrible” Steve smirks at that one.

“ Mr. Rogers. Principal Fury is ready to see you,” Secretary said.

Fury was standing by the window, looking at the front of the school.

“ I am proud of my values. Work I put into this world to make it a better place, but what happened to my girl. Have to excuse my tardiness. I would have talked to you before today, just priorities. I should have protected her more,” Fury said, looking out.

“ Sir, I promise you that you did a hell of a job. They said she put up a fight, and they're going to find Brock soon. I’m just happy I was there,” Steve said.

Fury looks back at him and frowns.

“ Still, thank you, Mr. Rogers. We want to invite you to our house for dinner—you and your family tonight. Monday, I was hoping you could come back, and we can discuss your future. I have connections that can take you far,” Fury said.

Steve looks down and smirks. Life has been great; Angelina was on his side since she was in the hospital. Steve made sure to visit her once a day. Every day he would come by and leave her homework for her and even make her a unique blend of soup. With that, they grew closer. Everything was perfect, just a few things out of place.

“ Thank you, sir. I am there,” Steve said, getting up.

Peggy was waiting for him right at the front door in her cheerleader uniform.

“ Took you long enough. You know I never thought it would take me to have to hunt you down to talk to my boyfriend literally,” Peggy said, walking behind him.

Steve laughs and continues pretending she wasn’t there already thinking about his and Angelina's 1st kiss. Peggy ran up in front of him, blocking his view, her arms across her chest.

“ What, Carter?” Steve asked, annoyed.

“ WHAT I TELL YOU WHAT, STEVE. I DESERVE RESPECT, “ Peggy shouted.

“ What is this about?” Steve asked.

“ Maybe I should tell them what I know. It looks like everyone forgot all that I can do what I’m capable of. I bet that bitch and your little friend Sam learn their lesson, “ Peggy said

Steve stops and looks back at Peggy. The parking lot was still crowded, full of eyes and ears.

“ Come, let’s go to Lover Lane later. Like how we used to,” Steve said, holding her side.

“ Really ?” Peggy asked, rubbing his chest.

Steve nodded and bent to kiss her roughly on the lips with a quick look at his watch as he hopped on the bike. He had wished the next time he came here was with Angelina on their third date, one he would eat her out for the first time. Well, at least with her awake, not knocked out from the soup he made. Not like this. He could not worry about any exes or people trying to distract each other.

“ Steve,” Peggy repeated.

He looked at her, still sitting in the passenger seat. It was darker now, and he forgot how much time had passed.

“ You said something earlier about Sam. Do you know anything? Steve asked, turning around, so he was facing her.

Peggy smirks and folds her arms over her chest.

“You used to take me dancing,” Peggy said, looking out the window.

“ We both used to do a lot. I'm asking you something, Peggy. Do you know who is in charge of this stupid blog” Steve asked once more?

“ You used to look at me like I was your one only, but I knew once that girl came back. I lost. You always talk about the one who got away. Never a name, but I knew. I hated that bitch. Now it hits. It was her. The worst thing is I can see why. I want to be better than her '' Peggy said more to herself.

Steve looked at Peggy like she had three heads.

“ Dance with me,” Peggy said, getting out of the car and into the cold car.

His hands were as white as snow from the tight grip he had. What was she talking about?

Getting out, he followed her to the edge of the cliff, “ Peggy, I think we need to talk.”

“She never wants a freak like you. It doesn’t matter how much you try. You're still a loser. I think I don’t know, but I know. I know everything,” Peggy hissed to Steve.

His eyes widened at Peggy, who was having a belly laugh. She was laughing at him, just like the way they used to. He didn’t even realize he was doing till he felt a tap. His arms were tight around her neck. She tried calling out for help, but it didn’t matter. Slowly she dropped to the dirt ground. Still, Steve squeezed tight. Eyes wild.

“ You are not doing anything to me. I'm ALPHA. You will not take away all the hard work I have done!!”Steve whispered in her ear.

After her heart started to beep, he held her tighter like a rag doll and danced with her under the starlight. He imagined his and Angelina's 1st dance.

🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨

Brock trips over his left foot as he leaves his safe house, a bag full of crumpled 20s and 1s mixed with drugs poking out.

He has been on the run for two weeks now. When he first went to Steve for help, he was quickly dismissed. He tried to put his case, but it didn’t work. He was screwed. Not only up for second-degree rape but drugs too, it wasn’t good. He had to get out and make it to fucking Mexico.

Popping the truck, he dropped the bag onto the ground and looked in terror. At least ten cop cars pulled up as he continued to look in.

“FREEZE” they shouted out.

Brock slowly turned around pulled out a gun, “ It wasn’t me. It was STEVE ROGERS. I DID NOT KILL HER”.

After a few seconds, Brock started to fire back, trying to run away. POW POW

Brock stops running, drops money and drugs, now painted with his blood. A couple of inches from the car inside, a glass eye corpse of Peggy Carter was there.

🥧🥧🥧🥧🥧🥧🥧🥧🥧🥧🥧🥧🥧

“Suspect is Down. Repeat Suspect is Down,” a voice said over the COP RADIO APP.

Steve smiles and fixes himself in the rearview mirror.

KNOCK KNOCK

Angelina tilted down to look at him, trying to get his attention. She had her hair down to the side in a fishtail braid dress in a white lace summer dress that went to her knees. She bit the corner of her lip as she waited for him to roll the window.

“Hey, huh, just warning you, my dad is in a bad mood. So please don’t take any offense to it. Now that over, it’s only going to be the two of us till he gets out of his study, “Angelina said, lending to the side.

“Oh really. Is that so? Principal Fury on the warpath. Think I need to bring my shield with me” Steve asked, flexing his muscles.

Angelina smiled and hit him on the side.

“Alright, the caption settles down. Come on, I’m freezing my tits out here,” Angelina said, rubbing her shoulder pushing her boobs together without notice.

Before Steve could respond, Angelina was already walking inside, swaying her hips a bit.

He thought having a taste of her would be the death of him but coming home to the smell of a home-cooked meal and Angelina in the kitchen might be it. She bent down to take out the roasted chicken. Across the kitchen island were different dishes and an apple pie in the center in a glass case. He could hear Fury from his study cursing and screaming at someone.

“You get used to it. Settle down in the dining room. I will be out with the food in one second, “Angelina said, putting the chicken on the counter.

“No, I can help. My mom would have my butt if I don’t help out the lady of the house,” Steve said, rolling his sleeves up.

“I’m sure if your mom were here, she would be trying to arrange our wedding. Haha, god, how is Sarah doing anyway” Angelina asked, fanning the food.

Steve came a bit closer and leaned over her shoulder, taking a sniff of her shea butter shampoo and sweet potatoes. Angelina looks back at him and moves away, taking a couple of dishes into the dining room.

A frown on his face went to the stove, turned the burner on low, and put his hand on it, trying to control his urge.

“Rogers, can you get the chicken? I’m going to check on Fury,” Angelina called out from the dining room.

She’s yours now; he thought to himself as he went and grabbed the chicken, without mittens, and walked out the kitchen.

Angelina was gone, probably checking on her father, so Steve decided to check around. Everything was perfect, from the spotless surface to the pictures of the two. He liked one more than the other. It was one of her in a pink tutu giving younger him a kiss on the cheek.

“Crazy how much time has passed, huh,” Angelina said, walking back in.

Fury was right beside her this time.

“Sorry about that. Steve sometimes comes home from work. Sit, let’s eat. Where is your mom?” Fury asked.

He could be honest and tell him he never told her; instead told her he was with Bucky and Thor.

“She’s working, “Steve said, rubbing his hand behind his neck.

“I packed a plate for her dad. Can we start? I’m sure Steve has better things to do on a Sunday night,” Angelina said.

“No, I told you I don’t mind being here. It’s the protector in me,” Steve said, pulling the seat out for Angelina.

She nodded and sat right next to him. Steve sat down and placed his hand on the back of her chair. After a prayer, they started to eat. Angelina not so much just kept playing with her food nodding at Fury stories. After a heated discussion on war fury and Steve vs. Angelina, Steve went on to help clean up. He watches her closer as she moves, looks, and speaks. The righteous bitch she could be was gone, and all was left was his Angel.

“So, how are you doing? “Steve asked, looking at Angelina’s hand, trembling a bit as she cleaned the dishes.

She looks over her shoulder and smiles at him, “I would lie to you, Rogers, but I don’t think I have it in myself. He has me stuck here only to see a few people, mostly you “she stops to look at soap slipping through her hands and picks it up to the light “Like any sanity I have is slipping away from me. What are you without that” Angelina said, shaking her hands clean?

As if it was an open invitation, Steve came up and held her hands. He gently rubbed his thumb against her hand look deep into her eyes, and, taking a deep inhaled, the scent of her perfume and the rest of the pie on the counter. For a glimpse of a second, he saw the little girl that adored him that followed him around and called her Ms. Steve Rogers with a strawberry flavor ring pop holding heavy on her ring finger.

“Let’s go then. Anywhere you want. Let me keep that promise I made when we were kids. I take care of my Angel. I’m important now the strongest person ever. No one can hurt you say the word,” Steve said, touching her cheek, warm to the touch.

Her thin lips parted a bit before she moved back to the sink and braced herself firmly with her hands holding tight. “Sorry, Rogers, that girl isn’t here, and she left the same day you stopped caring. Now help me clean up a big strong man,” Angelina said, poking her finger into his chest.

“I’m not giving up on Angelina Fury,” Steve said, coming close, looking down at her.

📰📰📰📰📰📰📰📰📰📰📰📰📰

Angelina slows her pace as she walks through the hallways. Everyone was looking at her and Steve, who would leave her side since that night. Everyone was whispering but about what. The grip around her waist got a bit tighter differently leaving bruises among old ones from a past life. Felt like a twisted mirror all wrapped in a bow.

“Maybe I can just meet you later,” Angelina said.

“What no. Don’t worry. We are almost at the locker, “Steve said, smirking down at her. His eyes sparkle glee, at least till he stops to check his phone. “FUCK” he shouted.

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the-wild-wolves-around-you · 3 years ago

Text

hear those bells ring: chapter 3 (a deaf!bakugo x reader fic)

Summary: Bakugo wakes up with his hearing and a bunch of questions.

Pairings: Katsuki Bakugo x Reader; Katsuki Bakugo x You

Rating: M(ature)

Warnings: Blood, descriptions of gore, and adult language.

A/N: Sorry for the wait on ch 3, I had to work over the weekend. Anyway, hope you enjoy!

~*~*~ No spoilers or anything. This is just a self-indulgent AU fic with aged up characters. Everyone’s in their mid-20s. Fic title is from a song called “Achilles Come Down.”

Ao3 Link: Here

Ch 1 Tumblr Link: Here

Ch 2 Tumblr Link: Here

Bakugo woke up confused, disoriented, and pissed off.

He bolted upright, the taste of smoke and ash still on his tongue, but when he whipped his head from side to side, there was no fire, no burning asphalt, no villain, only the empty, dark expanse of his apartment.

But something was still tugging at him, fucking incessantly, and it took him a moment to realize it was his phone alarm.

Red eyes flicked to the device on his bedside table, and even though its continuous siren was like nails on a chalkboard, Bakugo found himself unable to move, unable to stop it.

Because he could hear the alarm. Clearly. Loudly.

He hadn’t been able to hear his phone alarm in weeks, not really. It was nothing more than a muffled tone that petered out toward the end as it rose in pitch and frequency. Thankfully, Bakugo’s internal alarm got him up most days around the sun, but he’d been late to morning patrols a handful of times.

But now…

Numbly, Bakugo finally reached out and tapped his phone. His ears rang slightly in the ensuing silence, but it was barely perceptible, nothing like the perpetual buzzing he’d been living with, like a hive of bees had taken up residence in his head.

The quiet, after so long, was almost… unsettling.

And it was all because of that woman. He was sure of it.

Bakugo pressed his lips into a thin line as he thought about you, the memories of last night flooding back. The blurry image of your face, crouched over him, splattered in a thin mist of red blood and dusted with white plaster. He couldn’t remember much from right after he blasted that villain into the fucking dirt. He remembered the feel of glass breaking around him, and pain, a lot of fucking pain, but then it was black until you appeared. When he’d opened his eyes and met yours, he recalled thinking he should be in more pain, but then you spoke to him and derailed all coherent thought.

Because he’d heard you. Clear as fucking day.

That immediately drew his attention, and so did the blood all over your hands.

There was a lot of it. Way too fucking much for nicking yourself on some glass or whatever bullshit excuse you gave. And Bakugo knew it was bullshit. You weren’t a convincing liar. Well, maybe to some idiot extras you would be, but not to him. He clocked the way you stuttered, the way you fidgeted and averted your eyes. And when you looked at him… fuck, your face was so goddamn guilty.

Why, he had no idea.

But he did know one thing.

You had a healing quirk. There was no other explanation.

Even if he hadn’t just miraculously recovered the hearing that a doctor told him he would never get back, there were a lot of other little discrepancies. His left arm, for one. Bakugo remembered how it felt when the villain’s asphalt wrapped around his limb, the burning, scalding agony of it. But now, the skin was just pink and barely blistered in some places.

Then there was the blood.

When he’d gotten home after ditching the crime scene, Bakugo had immediately beelined for his bathroom to take a shower. But, when he stripped off his hoodie, he realized it was heavier than it should be right before he noticed it was dripping onto his floor. Dripping blood. Without thinking, he’d wrung the hoodie out on the bathroom floor, and a fuck ton of red liquid seeped out of it.

He had immediately dropped the jacket and started scanning his body in the bathroom mirror, but besides the shallow gash on his abdomen, the burned arm, and a few other minor scrapes and bruises, he was uninjured.

But… his back was coated in red, and so were the seat of his dark jeans and boxer briefs. It was almost like… he’d been lying in a pool of blood.

So, you had to be a healer. You just had to be.

Unfortunately, he hadn’t been able to confirm this since the cops had been circling you like vultures. He also hadn’t wanted to be bitched at by any more heroes, or the fucking media, so he made himself scarce.

But he needed to see you again. Needed to hear the truth from your own mouth.

And maybe he could coax you into a deal.

The doctor Bakugo spoke to yesterday obviously hadn’t known what the hell he was talking about. He had made it sound impossible to fix the blond’s ears, and yet you’d somehow done it easily, in the middle of a fucking battlefield.

With that kind of power, Bakugo wouldn’t have to worry about going deaf or designing stupid hearing aids with some company.

With that kind of power, Dynamight would become Japan’s Number One Hero in no time.

But first, he had to find you.

Resolved, Bakugo shoved the covers off and slid out of bed, but before he could make it to his bathroom, someone started knocking on his front door.

No, not knocking. Banging. It sounded like they were trying to break the fucking door down.

“Bakubroooooooo!”

“Gotta be fuckin’ kidding me,” Bakugo grumbled as he padded to his front door. He was only dressed in boxer briefs, but that’s what the idiot got for barging over so early in the damn morning.

The banging persisted, growing louder and more fervent.

“I’m fuckin’ comin!” the blond shouted just before he undid the deadbolt and wrenched open the door.

Eijiro Kirishima, dressed in his Red Riot costume, blinked on the other side of the threshold, his fist still raised to knock.

“What the fuck, bro?” he asked after a moment of just staring at Bakugo.

The blond immediately scowled. “That’s my fuckin’ line. What are you doing breaking down my door at six in the damn morning?”

“Excuse me?” his patrol and agency partner scoffed. “I’m obviously coming to check that you’re not dead since you’ve been MIA for over twenty-four hours.”

“What?” Bakugo frowned. “I saw you yesterday morning for patrol.”

“Noooooo,” Kirishima drawled like Bakugo was a particularly stupid child. “That was two days ago, bro. Then that night, I see you all over the damn news, and no one could get ahold of you all day yesterday. I would have come to check on you sooner, but I’ve been having to play damage control with the media because someone decided to blow up a residential neighborhood.”

“Two days?” Bakugo echoed with a furrowed brow. He’d slept that long?

“Have you been passed out this whole time, dude?” Kirishima groaned as he shouldered his way into the apartment. “I guess that means you got none of our messages?”

“Our?” the blond grumbled as he closed the door and followed the redhead to the kitchen bar.

“Yeah, Denki, Mina, Sero.” Kirishima waved his hand dismissively, marching over to the counter where Bakugo kept the fruit and selecting an apple from the wire basket. “I even asked Izuku to message you, just to see if he’d actually get a rise and response from you.”

“I don’t need stupid Deku knowing about my problems, Shitty Hair,” Bakugo growled before he stomped over to his fridge to see what he had to eat because he was suddenly starving.

“Well, that would imply I know your problems, Oh Great Lord Dynamight,” Kirishima snorted and took a bite of apple. “So, what the fuck happened the other night?”

“I blew up a residential neighborhood,” the blond deadpanned as he turned on his stove, cracking a few eggs into a skillet.

“Yeah, I saw that. I was more wondering about what led up to it.”

“What the fuck do you think led up to it?” Bakugo snapped, rummaging through his cupboard for seasonings. “I was walking home from getting a drink, and a damn villain just popped up in front of me.”

“From what I heard, there were other heroes there, too,” the redhead mumbled around another bite of apple.

“Yeah, fuckin’ useless extras,” Bakugo sneered as he started to whisk his eggs with a pair of chopsticks, throwing in some leftover white rice and a bit of nori. “They obviously weren’t getting anywhere, and the bastard was tearing up the street, so I stepped in.”

“To finish destroying the street?” Kirishima cocked an eyebrow, chewing noisily.

“Fuck off,” the blond said with an eyeroll.

Internally, though, Bakugo knew the redhead was right. He’d been sloppy, careless, probably still borderline drunk. But he’d just been so angry about the doctor’s appointment, his fucked-up ears, his bleak and silent future. He had just wanted to break something, hurt someone, consequences be damned.

Except now the consequences were catching up to him.

Fuck, he didn’t even want to think about what his citizen’s approval rating must be now.

Silence stretched between the two pro heroes for several long minutes, in which Bakugo finished making his breakfast and Kirishima finished gnawing on his apple core. The blond quickly shoveled a few bites of eggs and rice into his mouth, but his scarlet eyes kept flicking over to the redhead.

“How bad?” he finally asked.

Kirishima, to his credit, had learned how to translate Bakugo’s curt grunts years ago.

“Actually, if I’m being honest, it’s not that bad,” he sighed, tossing the apple core in the trash and scratching at the back of his head. “Could be worse. From the reports I read, most of the damage—besides the road—is superficial. Broken windows, charred and peeling paint, a few busted cars that we’re still trying to figure out if our insurance or the city’s will pay for. It also helped that you saved two people. That definitely softened the blow.”

“Two?” Bakugo mumbled around one of his last bites. “I just remember the stupid extra on the street that I shoved out of the way.”

As the memory flashed through his mind, Bakugo frowned. He’d shoved that extra out of the way and got snatched by a giant asphalt hand for his troubles. The blond’s red eyes dropped to his pink and blotchy left arm and then trailed over to his chest. He recalled the sensation of his ribs snapping under pressure, but now only a mild soreness lingered after he took a deep breath. Yet another inconsistency…

“Yeah, two,” Kirishima said and drew Bakugo out of his thoughts. “Do you seriously not even remember your own heroics? And that girl had such nice things to say about you, too.”

“Girl?” Bakugo snapped his head up. “The girl whose… apartment I fell into?”

“Crashed into, dude,” the redhead snorted, but then he narrowed his eyes as a sly smirk tugged at his lips. “But yeah. Sounds like you remember her, huh?”

Bakugo didn’t like the smug look on his friend’s face.

“I remember her fuckin’ yellin’ at me.” The blond scowled. “Like I wrecked her place on purpose and didn’t just save her whole block from a lunatic.”

“I mean, to be fair, if you crashed into my house, bro, I would have yelled at you, too.” Kirishima grinned. “But don’t worry, she’s fine. In fact, when she called the agency yesterday, she asked for you specifically.”

“She did? Why?” Did she want to confess her healing quirk? Fuck, were there side effects Bakugo didn’t know about?

“Bro, seriously.” Kirishima rolled his eyes. “You’re Japan’s Number Two Hero, and you saved her life. And, like Mina keeps telling you, you’re not as ugly when you stop scowling.”

“Shut the fuck up.” Bakugo flipped him off before he went to dump the dishes in the sink.

“Yes, dear.” The redhead smirked. “But, in all seriousness, she called to figure out how to file a claim with our insurance. Or at least that’s what she said, but she also asked how you were doing, and she actually sounded genuinely worried.”

Worried that a random side effect was going to kill him? Or worried that he would say something about her quirk? She’d obviously hidden it for a reason, tried to lie for a reason.

And Bakugo was determined to find out just what that reason was.

“Yeah, well, I’m fine,” he grunted as he rinsed off his plate and put it on the drying rack. “Just a few scrapes and bruises.”

“I can see that,” Kirishima said as he eyed the butterfly stitches stretched across the gash on Bakugo’s abdomen. “Well, I’m glad I didn’t find you dead in a pool of your own blood. That woulda been a real bummer way to start the morning.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Bakugo muttered before he averted his eyes to the living room window across from him. “So… what did you tell her?”

“The girl?”

“No, you’re fuckin’ mom,” the blond scoffed.

“Oh, speaking of moms, you might want to text Mitsuki. I called her last night after you ignored my billionth text, so she’s probably going crazy wondering where you are.” Kirishima grinned and then immediately dodged out of the way as Bakugo hurled a fork at him.

“You bastard!” Bakugo hissed. “Now, I’m going to have to see that hag this weekend or she’s gonna fuckin’ barge over here.”

“Maybe you should turn the ringer up on your phone.” The other hero shrugged, ducking again when Bakugo chucked an apple in his direction.

The blond scowled at his friend, but he didn’t reply.

If you and your quirk were the real deal, Bakugo wouldn’t have to worry about missing a call ever again.

When Kirishima realized the projectiles had stopped, he popped his head over the back of the couch and smirked. “But to answer your previous question, I told the girl we would handle the insurance claim on our end if she sent us her info. And I didn’t really have anything to tell her about you since, like I’ve said, I thought you were dead. Kinda. I was at least thirty percent sure.”

“Have you filed the insurance claim?” Bakugo asked.

“No.” Kirishima shook his head. “She hasn’t sent in the info yet.”

“Well… we should go get it from her.”

This caused the redhead’s eyebrows to shoot up into his hairline, and the surprise on his face quickly made Bakugo backtrack.

“I just… want to get this shitshow over with,” he grumbled as he averted his eyes again, but he could feel a traitorous heat crawling across the bridge of his nose. “The longer her apartment’s all fucked up, the longer the press is gonna rake me over the coals. The hero ranking’s aren’t far off, and I’m not going to lose to Deku again over some stupid broken windows.”

“Righttttt,” Kirishima drawled, but his tone was mocking. “Okay, well, I know the hotel the police have set her up at. After we swing by the agency, we can head that way… to get her insurance info.”

He still sounded unconvinced and like he wanted to needle Bakugo more, but the blond changed the subject quickly.

“Why do we have to go to the agency?” Bakugo asked, and he frowned as he glanced back at his partner. “Even if I lost yesterday, my next scheduled patrol isn’t till tonight.”

“Oh, I know.” Kirishima nodded solemnly. “But Nao wanted to have… a word with you ASAP, if I confirmed you weren’t dead.”

“Fuckkkkkkk,” Bakugo groaned as he dropped his head back. If there was anything Bakugo hated more than the press, it was his actual PR manager. That old hag was good at her job, which meant she was always up Bakugo’s ass about something, and he knew she was going to have a field day with this shitfest.

“Yeah, I’d recommend coffee and preemptive painkillers before we head in,” Kirishima said. “Plus, some putting on clothes. Maybe we can stop on the way and get her something sweet as a bribe.”

“No amount of sugar is gonna make that bitch nice to me,” Bakugo grumbled before he spun on heel and started marching to his bedroom.

“Maybe flowers then?” the redhead shouted after him.

Bakugo slammed the door in response.

~*~*~*~*~*~

“This is fuckin’ ridiculous,” Bakugo growled around his cargo, kicking his foot out at Kirishima. “Why did I listen to you? I’ve had to go shopping twice today now.”

“Come on,” his friend laughed as he dodged the blow, which made the bags in his arms crinkle. “You can’t deny the flowers and cookies sweetened ole’ Nao up.”

“To you,” Bakugo muttered, shifting the package in his arms a bit. “She still yelled at me for fifteen minutes.”

“Well, you kinda deserved i—yow!” Kirishima yelped as Bakugo kicked him squarely in the ass this time. “This isn’t helping your image, bro!”

“No one even knows it’s us,” the blond hissed.

“Yeah, I guess the hoodies and sunglasses help,” the other pro hero mused.

“And the fact that we’re carrying all this stupid shit.”

“It’s not stupid.” Kirishima frowned in that earnest way of his, which made Bakugo roll his eyes. “It’s thoughtful to bring gifts to people who are having a difficult time. Especially when you made that time difficult. You basically kicked her out of her house, dude, not to mention her shop.”

A wave of guilt actually washed through the blond, which he didn’t like. It made his throat feel tight and his stomach churn, and he glanced away from the redhead with a scowl.

“Tch.” He clicked his tongue. “It’s not like we aren’t gonna pay for it.”

The excuse felt flat, even to him.

“Still,” Kirishima said as he shifted the bags in his grip, pulled out his phone, and consulted the map. “It must be stressful. So, we’re going to be nice to her, alright? Which starts with the gifts.”

“And how is a fuckin’ fruit basket supposed to help?” Bakugo asked as he glared around the overflowing mound of crinkling plastic and bright fruit that he held against his chest.

“Uh, one, it’s practical. Her apartment’s all fucked up, the power’s probably still out if not inconsistent on the street, and she’s been living in a hotel for two days, so she probably hasn’t had some nice fresh fruit in a while. And two, it looks nice!”

“We coulda just left this shit at the hotel,” Bakugo grumbled. “She has to go back there eventually, right?”

After old Nao chewed his ass out, Bakugo and Kirishima had gone to the hotel the police said they’d put you up in. Except you weren’t fucking there, and the number you left with Kirishima when you called the agency was going straight to voicemail, so here there were, fucking trekking through the city with a bunch of useless shit.

Bakugo just kept reminding himself it would be worth it when he got the truth about your quirk out of you.

“Nope,” Kirishima said and drew the blond out of his thoughts. “The city only pays the first two days after an emergency, unless the villain caused all the damage, but, uh, that’s not the case here, so we’ll be accommodating her until her apartment gets fixed up.”

“At the agency?” Bakugo asked as his red eyes clicked over to his partner.

As the Number Two and Three Heroes, the two of them had built a solid agency together. Bakugo still didn’t care for a bunch of extras riding on his tailcoats, so they had few sidekicks, all of whom reported to Kirishima and left him the fuck alone for the most part. But they owned a nice, sleek building in a nicer part of town, and one of the floors was dedicated to individual rooms with beds and other amenities. They were usually used when Bakugo, Kirishima, or the other sidekicks wanted to crash after patrol instead of going home—which Bakugo did more often than not—but they’d never had a civilian stay on the premises.

Until now.

“Yessssss, at the agency,” the redhead drawled as a shit-eating smirk crawled across his face. “So, you’ll be seeing a lot of her for the next couple weeks.”

“Wipe that stupid look off your face.” Bakugo scowled and shouldered past the other hero, who snickered as he jogged to catch up.

“Take the next left up ahead.”

“Shut up!” the blond growled, but he followed the instructions.

This was good news, though. Bakugo wouldn’t have to trek to this shitty part of town more than he had to.

And he’d have a healer just down the hall.

They marched along in silence for a few minutes, keeping their heads down, but there wasn’t much foot traffic. Bakugo was lost in his thoughts, planning out the questions he was going to ask you once he could distract Kirishima, but the redhead suddenly stopped in front of him.

“Hey,” Bakugo grunted as the fruit basket crinkled against the other hero’s back. He hadn’t even notice Kiri get in front of him again. “What’s the damn hold up?”

“Holy shit, dude,” Kirishima muttered, staring out at the road he’d just turned onto.

“What?” the blond grumbled, shoving past his friend, but then he stopped, too. “Oh… yeah.”

The street in front of him looked much worse in the bright light of midday. The road was a torn-up mess, more patches of dirt and gravel than actual asphalt. Most of the large-scale debris had been hauled away, but black scorch marks covered the sidewalks in long, dark smears. The walls of several businesses also bore charring along the facades, but most of the damage was focused in the center of the street. A crater nearly six feet deep was carved into the middle of the road, and the buildings on either side were blackened, their broken windows gaping voids.

And then there was the hole in what Bakugo remembered as your second-floor apartment. A tarp hung over the wound, but one of the corners had come undone, flapping in the wind and giving split second glimpses into the darkened room beyond.

Guilt crept up on him again, but Bakugo shoved it down, hunching over the fruit basket and nudging Kirishima.

“Come on,” he muttered before he started moving forward, and a moment later he heard the crunch of boots on gravel as the redhead followed him.

There were more people on this street than on the last several, but Bakugo could immediately tell they weren’t customers just passing through. People swept sidewalks, clearing away the last of the rubble and glass in front of their shops. Then a few old ladies stood under one awning shaking their heads, their hands laden with containers of food or gifts.

Guess Kirishima hadn’t been wrong with this stupid idea.

Then Bakugo realized some of those people were starting to look back at him, so he ducked his head further behind the fruit basket, grateful for his hoodie and sunglasses.

But then suddenly he was there, standing in front of your ruined shop. His red eyes immediately flickered upward, but if there was a sign there before, it was gone now, burnt to ash.

“What kinda shop did you say this was?” the blond asked under his breath as Kirishima paused beside him.

“I’m… not sure,” the redhead said with a furrowed brow. “I don’t think she said on the phone. No time like the present to ask, though.”

Before Bakugo could stop him, Kirishima shifted the bags in his arms, lifted one hand, and knocked on the charred metal frame of the front door.

“Hello?” he called through the broken windows, followed by your name. “Anyone in there?”

“Shit!” The squeaking voice was followed by a crashing sound somewhere in the shadows of the store.

Bakugo didn’t speak a lot of English, but he did know curse words, and the sound of it made his lips twitch in amusement.

“Are you okay?” Kirishima called out. “Can, uh, we come in?”

“Yes, I’m fine!” the voice answered back in flustered Japanese. The words were fluent, though, with barely the hint of an accent. “And, um, I-I guess you can come in, but—”

That was good enough for Bakugo.

The blond shouldered past his partner, boots crunching over glass as he ducked into the darkened shop, and Kirishima sighed as he followed.

The interior, if possible, looked worse than the outside. The room itself wasn’t very big, but it was a mess. Two metal rods had been embedded in the left and right walls at odd angles, obviously caused from the explosions, though Bakugo couldn’t tell what they used to be. Several pieces of blacked mannequins were scattered through the debris, and one wall was a charred mess of shelving and fabric, spots of color peeking through the black ash here and there.

In the back, left corner were the remains of a tri-fold standing mirror, the ones where you could see yourself from different angles. Large shards of glass were missing, though, so the image of Bakugo and Kirishima standing backlit against the street was fractured.

Last but not least, in the rear, right corner of the store was a counter that was half collapsed to the floor, behind which stood an empty doorframe that Bakugo assumed led to the back of the shop and upstairs.

And it was from behind this broken counter that you popped up with a dustpan in one hand and a tiny, handheld broom in the other.

The first thought Bakugo had was your face was rather plain… but in a somehow pleasing way. Like if his eyes had scanned over you in a crowd, something about the line of your jaw, the slope of your nose, the delicate quirk of your mouth would give him pause.

His second thought was that his first one was stupid. You were just some extra, of course you would be plain and unmemorable.

But his third thought was something about the color of your eyes was captivating, in a way that was damn fucking annoying.

“Sorry, I was just… cleaning… up,” you said, slowly trailing off as your eyes met Bakugo’s.

He saw the recognition flare in them immediately, followed by fear, and he couldn’t help the frown that twisted his face.

Why were you afraid of him?

“No, we’re sorry for barging in here like this,” Kirishima barreled on, oblivious to the stare off the other two occupants of the room were engaged in. “Didn’t mean to startle you. Oh! I’m being so rude. My name is Eijiro Kirishima, or you might know me as—”

“Red Riot,” you breathed, finally tearing your eyes from Bakugo’s, and you flashed the redhead a half-smile that trembled along the edges. “We spoke on the phone.”

“Yes.” Kirishima grinned, pointed teeth flashing in the dim light of the shop, before his gaze flickered over to the blond beside him. “And this is—”

“Dynamight,” you finished once again, and you looked like you were trying desperately to maintain eye contact with the hardening hero, but then your eyes clicked back to Bakugo. You didn’t flash him a smile. “We’ve met.”

“Oh, yeah, right,” Kiri chuckled awkwardly, and his arm jerked like he was going to rub the back of his neck, but the bags in his hands crinkled and stopped him.

“What… do you have there?” you asked, frowning at the bags and the fruit basket the heroes were carrying.

“Gifts!” the redhead declared as he hefted his arms up, and then he shuffled forward over charred fabric and glass and extended the bags to you.

You blinked at him for a second, but you set the dustpan and handheld broom on the counter, where they promptly slid to the floor since the whole surface was slanted. You winced at the loud clatter and tried to cover it up by taking the bags from Kirishima, which crinkled loudly again as they transferred hands.

Bakugo would be annoyed if he wasn’t more grateful that he could actually hear the innocuous little noise.

“O-Oh, um, you shouldn’t have, really,” you started as you peeked into the bags, and then Bakugo swore he saw your eyebrow twitch once you saw what was inside.

“It’s not much,” Kirishima said, and he was finally free to rub the back of his head and neck as his smile turned a little sheepish. “But, what with the state of your… apartment, we thought you might need some new clothes! And comfy clothes are the best after stressful days. These especially are super soft, we made sure of it. And, if you don’t like them, you could always sell them for a good chunk of change.”

The redhead winked at you, not in an overly flirty manner, that was just how he was, but your cheeks flared as crimson as his hair, and your eyes dropped to the floor.

Bakugo took the split instant to get a better look at you and noted you were wearing patched, faded jeans, solid boots, and a bleach-stained orange sweatshirt with some English writing he couldn’t read. Usually, he didn’t really see what other people wore because he couldn’t give less of a shit, but somehow he found your obvious cleaning clothes… endearing. The orange looked good on you, too.

Fuck, maybe you didn’t heal him as well as he thought. He had to be hemorrhaging into his brain to be thinking this stupid shit. Or maybe it was a side effect of your quirk?

He needed to get you alone and get answers.

“Well… thank you, this was very thoughtf—oh, wow, that is soft,” you murmured as you partially drew a sweatshirt out of the bag.

Bakugo instantly recognized the forest green and orange color scheme, and apparently so did you, because your face twitched, and you dropped the garment back into the bag and traded it for fuzzy socks with Red Riot’s signature gears stitched into them.

“These will definitely come in handy, my feet are always cold,” you said with an awkward giggle. Then you cleared your throat to cover up the sound. “Thank you, um, Red Riot.”

“You can call me Eijiro, or Kirishima, whatever you’re comfortable with,” the redhead said with another easy grin. “We’re going to be seeing a lot of each other, after all. Oh! We also got you a fruit basket, and I think there might be a few other sweets tucked in there.”

Kirishima nudged Bakugo forward, and your face rippled through a range of emotions, like your brain was taking a second to catch up to everything the pro hero just spewed. First, flustered embarrassment colored your cheeks, then confusion buckled your brow, and your eyes widened before they looked at the fruit basket Bakugo was extending at you.

“Oh, you can just put it down… um…” you trailed off as you turned to the counter and remembered it was half destroyed. Then your eyes jumped around frantically for some kind of flat surface, but the ruined shop didn’t offer any solutions.

“Told ya we shouldn’t of brought this shit,” Bakugo grunted, shooting a scowl at Kirishima.

“Yeahhhhh, we probably could have just delivered it to your room at the agency, my bad,” the redhead laughed. “But don’t worry, we’ll carry it back for you, along with any of your other things.”

“My… things?” you echoed, sounding out the words like a child, and a frown marred your face. “I-I think I must be misunderstanding you, I’m sorry, I’m American. But did you say my room at the agency? As in… your hero agency?”

“You’re American?” Kirishima asked with wide red eyes. “I wouldn’t have even guessed! Your accent is almost perfect, I thought you were maybe just from like the countryside or something.”

“I thought you said we were supposed to be nice to her,” Bakugo snorted at his partner like you weren’t in the room, and he saw you frown at him out of the corner of his eye.

“Oh, shit, no, that wasn’t what I meant!” Japan’s Number Three Hero immediately began waving his hands in front of his face, his mouth moving twice as fast. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to be rude. I really think your accent sounds nice! It’s very cute!”

Now, not only did your cheeks flush again, but the red hue traveled down your throat and across your collarbones, peeking out the stretched collar of your orange sweatshirt.

Bakugo found himself half distracted by the sight, but the other half was wondering why he suddenly felt irritation flare up in his gut.

“Okay, you don’t have to take her out on a date now,” the blond snapped, shifting his burden of fruit and plastic.

“I-I think we might have gotten off track,” you stuttered as you clutched the bag of Dynamight and Red Riot merch to your chest. “You said something about your agency.”

“Yes, right.” Kirishima cleared his throat. “We would have mentioned this in our follow up email after you sent in your insurance info, but—”

“Oh, no, I’m so sorry!” you cut him off with a grimace, and you actually dipped your head and shoulders into a bow. “I meant to send that yesterday, but my laptop is broken, and my cell service isn’t great—”

“No, no, it’s fine!” the redhead interrupted this time. “You obviously have a lot on your plate. I just meant that this might seem kind of sudden, but—”

Fucking hell, this was taking too long.

“You’re staying at our agency until we can pay for the repairs to your apartment and shop,” Bakugo said bluntly. If he didn’t step in, the two of you were just going to stammer circles around each other all day. “Starting tonight. We have rooms with beds and shit, so pack whatever clothes or crap you need.”

Your mouth fell open as you gaped at Bakugo. “I… what?”

“You deaf or something?” The words rocketed from his mouth before he could stop them, before he could even think about what he was saying, and he saw the way the question struck you like a physical blow. You flinched, your cheeks paling, and he saw dawning, guilty horror glint at the back of your eyes.

He’d been right. You did do something to his ears.

“Bro, you were just talking about being nice.” Kirishima frowned at Bakugo before he turned back to you. “Ignore him. We’re really sorry about the inconvenience this whole… incident has caused for you, but we’ll take care of everything you need until your shop’s grand reopening, so you don’t have to worry about a thing, okay?”

You continued to stare at the two heroes in shocked silence, your wide eyes clicking back and forth between the two of them as you clutched the bags to your chest like a lifeline.

“That is… all so generous,” you finally breathed, your tone rising in pitch like you were growing increasingly flustered. “It’s, um, a lot to take in.”

“Of course.” Kirishima nodded fervently. “What else can we do to help?”

“Could you leave?”

Bakugo blinked in surprise and then had to stifle his snort.

“Oh, no, I’m sorry!” you quickly followed up when you saw the redhead’s falling expression. “I didn’t mean… I just meant, could I have some time to process this? Um, alone? L-Like Dynamight said, I need to pack a few things, a-and there are some people I need to speak to before, uh… well, is it okay if I tell someone where I’ll be? Like, at your agency?”

“Yessss?” Kirishima said with a confused frown. “Why wouldn’t that be okay?”

“O-Oh, I just don’t really know how the whole hero and media thing works here,” you quickly lied, and Bakugo clocked the way you averted your eyes, the way your throat bobbed as you swallowed thickly. “I-I wasn’t going to post on social media or anything, I barely use that stuff anyway, but one of my customers, Mrs. Kojima, would be upset if I disappeared without saying anything.”

“Aww, that’s sweet.” The redhead grinned before he glanced at the shadowed ruins around him. “What kind of shop is this by the way? I don’t think you mentioned.”

“A-Alterations,” you said, ducking your face in embarrassment again. “My grandparents were a tailor and seamstress. I inherited this place from them.”

“I thought you said you were American?” Kirishima asked, but not in an accusatory way. He was just too curious for his own good and didn’t possess much of a filter.

Bakugo usually didn’t care for small talk, fucking waste of time if you asked him, but he found himself focusing intently on you, awaiting a response.

“I am.” You nodded. “My parents were both born here, but they moved to the States after they married, and I was born there. After my grandparents passed, my dad was going to sell the shop, but I was looking for something… new, so I decided to move here instead about a year ago.”

Bakugo pursed his lips at this new information. If you had a healing quirk, why were you patching up clothes in some little shop all the way across the world from your surviving family? Could it be because your quirk was dangerous?

“Wow, that’s cool,” Kirishima said with an impressed expression that quickly turned sheepish. “Except about your grandparent’s passing. My condolences.”

“Thank you,” you muttered, a small smile tugging at your lips, but then you quickly shook your head. “I-I’m sorry, didn’t mean to give you my whole life story, I tend to talk when I’m nervous.”

“You don’t have to be nervous,” Red Riot laughed like he did when he was meeting shy little kids on the street, flashing his sharpened teeth jokingly and winking in an overexaggerated fashion. “I promise, we look scarier than we are.”

“Speak for yourself, Shitty Hair,” Bakugo scoffed, which made you jump, like you’d forgotten he was there.

And that rubbed him the wrong way for some reason.

Kirishima merely smirked before he partially covered his mouth with his hand and lowered his voice into a stage whisper directed at you. “All bark, no bite, I’m telling you.”

“Stop making me seem lame, you bastard!” the blond growled, but the effect was kind of ruined by the fruit basket crinkling in his hands again.

This actually seemed to startle a giggle out of you, and the two heroes whipped around, one with a grin and the other a scowl.

“See, you don’t need to be nervous,” Kirishima said before he slung an arm around Bakugo’s shoulders. “But we’ll get out of your hair for now so you can have some time to pack and everything. Don’t worry about picking up too much, though, we’ll have cleaning crews in here before we start the remodel, and we don’t want you to get hurt in here. If there’s stuff up in your apartment that you don’t want to bring with you to the agency but don’t want thrown out, make a list, and we’ll be sure to keep everything safe.”

“O-Okay,” you said, still standing there with the hero merch clenched to your chest and a dumbstruck expression on your face. “T-Thank you again, Red--, erm, Kirishima.”

“Of course!” He grinned. “I have patrol tonight, but we’ll send a car to pick you up—”

“No,” Bakugo cut in as he locked eyes with you. “I’ll pick you up. What time?”

The blond could see Kirishima shoot him a look in his peripherals—probably because they both had patrol tonight—but Bakugo ignored his partner, maintaining eye contact with you.

You, meanwhile, squirmed under the explosive hero’s intense scrutiny, your face paling and flushing in turns. “I… no, you don’t have to do that, I can take the train—”

“I insist,” he interrupted again, narrowing his eyes so you would realize he wasn’t going to back down. “Like Shitty Hair said, we caused this… inconvenience, so I’ll pick you up. What. Time?”

You swallowed thickly, your throat audibly clicking. “S-Seven?”

“I’ll be here at seven sharp,” Bakugo said. “And you better be out front or at least answer your phone this time.”

You better not run, he didn’t say, but by the look on your face, you understood.

“Seven sharp.” You nodded, biting your lip as a resigned expression settled over your features. “Got it.”

“Great. See you then.”

With that, Bakugo turned on heel and crunched his way out of your store, leaving Kirishima stuttering apologies in his wake.

But that didn’t matter.

All that mattered was, tonight, he’d finally get you alone and get to the bottom of your damn quirk.

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