#others mentioned but those three are really the only ones i actually talked about

[bridge-arsonist]

Why The Voice Of The Cold Hates The Narrator

Replaying the Nightmare -> Wraith route and I'm realizing...

Jesus fucking christ, The Cold hates the narrator. Honestly, I think he might just give Smitten or Contrarian a run for their money.

He:

Doubts every word the narrator speaks

Insults the narrator whenever he gets the chance

Actively suggests killing the narrator, even stating that the princess could help do that

Not only suggests killing the narrator, but also suggests that—no—actually, death is too good for the guy. They should lock the narrator in a void just like the fake good ending. Mind you, this route doesn't even have the narrator do that!

Mocks the narrator when he finally gives up on trying to make you slay the princess

Seems happy that the narrator is gone, saying he had a feeling The Wraith could deal with him

I'm pretty sure Cold over here'd rather be playing Slay The Narrator.

Really though, upon further reflection, The Cold's hatred for The Narrator is also prevalent in The Spectre, where one of the few things he actually seems to have a firm stance on is "We should kill the Narrator". In the Greys, though he's arguably at his most nihilistic, he still seems to oppose the Narrator. He joins the Skeptic in his suspicions, and though he mostly just seems to be having a time provoking Smitten during the Burned Grey, he still does take the occasional second to spite the Narrator.

And honestly, come to think about it, it makes sense. After all, the Cold manifests not necessarily from slaying the Princess, but more specifically, from killing yourself. But not just from killing yourself, slaying yourself in The Tower at the hands of the Broken doesn't manifest him, but specifically by killing yourself to spite the narrator. I mean, other than Empty Cup and Moment of Clarity (Where we don't actually know how he manifested due to the timeskips), each iteration of Cold's manifestation checks out.

Spectre: You slay her, get the good ending, but then decide "fuck this and fuck your contruct", and stab yourself even as the narrator repeatedly urges you not to.

Burned Grey: You kill the Damsel, and in a fit of rage against both you and the narrator, the Smitten kills you, even as the narrator urges him not to. (Funnily enough, this means that, despite the Smitten's line of "you killed her, and so I killed you", it was the opposite, and the Smitten manifested the Cold)

Drowned Grey: You kill the Prisoner, and, just like in the Spectre's route, you kill yourself even as the Narrator urges you not to. If you refuse to kill yourself, Skeptic does it for you, seeming apologetic towards you, but definitely not towards The Narrator.

Wraith: You kill yourself as the Narrator urges you not to, and Paranoid also spends this route doubting the Narrator.

These routes involve various levels of emotion for the Princess, ranging from "My love! Still gonna kill you though" to "So scary! Still gonna kill you though", and an overall perception of the Princess as a corpse. But the Narrator? In all of the routes leading up to Cold's manifestation, the Narrator is met with hostility, usually leading to you killing yourself out of a mix of spite and suspicion.

So Cold's manifestation has two constants:

Some level of apathy towards the Princess, regardless of your previous interactions with her. Whether she's your perfect damsel or your worst nightmare, you don't care. You stab her.

Disregard for your own safety. You're just going to stab yourself, cool. It's better than this hell. Sometimes it's another voice fulfilling this requirement for you, like Smitten in the Damsel, or Skeptic in Prisoner depending on whether or not you willingly die.

Distaste towards the narrator. A conclusion that the Narrator is untrustworthy and distinctly not on your side. No matter how you manifest the Cold, it is clear that you do not like this pesky raven one bit. The Nightmater -> Wraith route shows this through Paranoid's constant suspicion of the Narrator. This distaste frequently, thought not always, occurs due to the Narrator attempting to force you to live out your life in the void, though it can also occur due to the Narrator attempting to make you live a life without the one thing you cherish (Damsel route).

Apathy towards most things, but one thing's for certain: You don't trust that Narrator guy. He tried to make you live out a crappy, boring life for eternity.

Cold's attitude makes sense when you look at how he was created. Just like Smitten was made by deciding the princess was an immediately trustworthy damsel in need of rescuing from the pesky narrator, or that the witch is a gorgeous woman whom you can save by giving your blade in spite of the narrator's wishes—Cold is made through deciding that neither your nor the princess's safety particularly matters, but fuck that narrator guy. He sucks. As apathetic as the Cold likes to act, he reacts to Smitten's threats and the Princess's murder attempts with "interesting", and reacts to the Narrator's explanation of the timeline with "we should kill him".

So, my point?

Well, I think that—not only does the Cold hate the Narrator—but hating the Narrator is part of him as a voice. He's cold, apathetic, and he hates the Narrator. It's been baked into his very being through the choices that you make. The princess doesn't matter, your physical well-being doesn't matter, but know that the Narrator is an untrustworthy little prick.

TLDR: Replaying Wraith made me realize that the Cold probably hates the Narrator very very much, and he does so because it is baked into his very being because of the choices you made to manifest him. You go, king. Let your inner hater run free.

[tearlessrain]

please help me- i used to be pretty smart but i’m having so much trouble grasping the concept of diegetic vs non-diegetic bdsm!

gfkjldghfd okay first of all I'm sorry for the confusion, if you're not finding anything on the phrase it's because I made it up and absolutely nobody but me ever uses it, but I haven't found a better way to express what I'm trying to say so I keep using it. but now you've given me an excuse to ramble on about some shit that is only relevant to me and my deeply inefficient way of talking and by god I'm going to take it.

SO. the way diegetic and non-diegetic are normally used is to talk about music and sound design in movies/tv shows. in case you aren't familiar with that concept, here's a rundown:

diegetic sound is sound that happens within the world of the movie/show and can be acknowledged by the characters, like a song playing on the stereo during a driving scene, or sung on stage in Phantom of the Opera. it's also most other sounds that happen in a movie, like the sounds of traffic in a city scene, or a thunderclap, or a marching band passing by. or one of the three stock horse sounds they use in every movie with a horse in it even though horses don't really vocalize much in real life, but that's beside the point, the horse is supposed to be actually making that noise within the movie's world and the characters can hear it whinnying.

non-diegetic sound is any sound that doesn't exist in the world of the movie/show and can't be perceived by the characters. this includes things like laugh tracks and most soundtrack music. when Duel of Fates plays in Star Wars during the lightsaber fight for dramatic effect, that's non-diegetic. it exists to the audience, but the characters don't know their fight is being backed by sick ass music and, sadly, can't hear it.

the lines can get blurry between the two, you've probably seen the film trope where the clearly non-diegetic music in the title sequence fades out to the same music, now diegetic and playing from the character's car stereo. and then there are things like Phantom of the Opera as mentioned above, where the soundtrack is also part of the plot, but Phantom of the Opera does also have segments of non-diegetic music: the Phantom probably does not have an entire orchestra and some guy with an electric guitar hiding down in his sewer just waiting for someone to break into song, but both of those show up in the songs they sing down there.

now, on to how I apply this to bdsm in fiction.

if I'm referring to diegetic bdsm what I mean is that the bdsm is acknowledged for what it is in-world. the characters themselves are roleplaying whatever scenarios their scenes involve and are operating with knowledge of real life rules/safety practices. if there's cnc depicted, it will be apparent at some point, usually right away, that both characters actually are fully consenting and it's all just a planned scene, and you'll often see on-screen negotiation and aftercare, and elements of the story may involve the kink community wherever the characters are. Love and Leashes is a great example of this, 50 Shades and Bonding are terrible examples of this, but they all feature characters that know they're doing bdsm and are intentional about it.

if I'm talking about non-diegetic bdsm, I'm referring to a story that portrays certain kinks without the direct acknowledgement that the characters are doing bdsm. this would be something like Captive Prince, or Phantom of the Opera again, or the vast majority of bodice ripper type stories where an innocent woman is kidnapped by a pirate king or something and totally doesn't want to be ravished but then it turns out he's so cool and sexy and good at ravishing that she decides she's into it and becomes his pirate consort or whatever it is that happens at the end of those books. the characters don't know they're playing out a cnc or D/s fantasy, and in-universe it's often straight up noncon or dubcon rather than cnc at all. the thing about entirely non-diegetic bdsm is that it's almost always Problematic™ in some way if you're not willing to meet the story where it's at, but as long as you're not judging it by the standards of diegetic bdsm, it's just providing the reader the same thing that a partner in a scene would: the illusion of whatever risk or taboo floats your boat, sometimes to extremes that can't be replicated in real life due to safety, practicality, physics, the law, vampires not being real, etc. it's consensual by default because it's already pretend; the characters are vehicles for the story and not actually people who can be hurt, and the reader chose to pick up the book and is aware that nothing in it is real, so it's all good.

this difference is where people tend to get hung up in the discourse, from what I've observed. which is why I started using this phrasing, because I think it's very crucial to be able to differentiate which one you're talking about if you try to have a conversation with someone about the portrayal of bdsm in media. it would also, frankly, be useful for tagging, because sometimes when you're in the mood for non-diegetic bodice ripper shit you'd call the police over in real life, it can get really annoying to read paragraphs of negotiation and check-ins that break the illusion of the scene and so on, and the opposite can be jarring too.

it's very possible to blur these together the same way Phantom of the Opera blurs its diegetic and non-diegetic music as well. this leaves you even more open to being misunderstood by people reading in bad faith, but it can also be really fun to play with. @not-poignant writes fantastic fanfic, novels, and original serials on ao3 that pull this off really well, if you're okay with some dark shit in your fiction I would highly recommend their work. some of it does get really fucking dark in places though, just like. be advised. read the tags and all that.

but yeah, spontaneous writer plug aside, that's what I mean.

[smileysuh]

creep

🌙 staring. Mingyu x afab!Reader

🔮 preview. “If the roles were reversed - if you were a ghost bound to this apartment forever - you’re saying you wouldn’t watch me get naked every day?” He’s definitely got a point. As your eyes skim Mingyu's perfect form again, that tingle returns between your legs. There’s no reason for him to be as sexy as he is- murders aren’t the only shocking thing this man has under his belt and you can see that now. 

tw/cw. dark content warning, serial killer Mingyu, mention of suicide, touch starved mingyu, switch mingyu, pussy eating, pussy worship, blow job, hand job, fingering, multiple orgasms, overstimulation, big dick mingyu, pussy stretching, extreme voyeurism, mentions of non-consensual voyeurism, dirty talk, praise, choking, manhandling, etc… I pet names: (hers) princess. (his) good boy.

👹 rating. 18+ explicit I wc. 9.1k

🍭 aus. Halloween, ghost!mingyu, serial killer!mingyu, etc…

☀️ mlist + an. I really can't explain this one other than saying I tried to make Mingyu redeemable by saying he only killed bad men 👀

Out of all the guy friends you have over, Jeonghan is Mingyu’s favorite. He’s always up to no good, talking shit that Mingyu can listen to for hours, and tonight, he’s brought a Ouija Board, which has spiked Mingyu’s curiosity. 

“Come on, it will be fun,” Jeonghan insists. “I’ve been wanting to do a seance in your apartment since you moved in three months ago.”

You’re not as impressed as Mingyu is about the idea, and neither are your other friends.

“I just don’t think it’s a good idea,” Seungkwan says for the fifth time since the rag-tag group of friends entered your home. “We said we’d come back here between Halloween parties and drink, we never said anything about contacting the dude that killed himself here.”

Mingyu remembers the day you visited the apartment for the first time, the way the realtor had downplayed what happened here. Times are tough, and the price reduction had enticed you, despite Mingyu’s tragic history. 

“Come on, don’t you guys wanna ask why he did it?” Jeonghan presses.

“He did it because he was a top suspect in a string of murder cases,” Seungkwan fires back. “Case closed.”

Jeonghan scoffs loudly. “But what if he didn’t do it? What if the real serial killer came here, killed him, and made it look like a suicide-”

“Hannie,” you interrupt with a sigh, “what’s with you and your infatuation with murderers?”

“Me?!” Jeonghan’s eyes widen. “Who’s the one who watches all my slasher films with me? Don’t pretend you're innocent here, we all know you have a thing for bad boys.”

Mingyu’s noticed your love for dangerous men, you’ve had your share of bad dudes over to this very apartment much to his annoyance. On the flip side, Mingyu does enjoy a good horror movie night, and you provide more than enough of those, especially this past month.

“We’re doing this,” Jeonghan insists, pulling the board out and setting it on the coffee table. “It’s Halloween. If there’s ever a night for this ghost to talk with us, it’s now.”

Seungkwan only groans, taking another shot while Seokmin and Soonyoung exchange worried glances.

“You don’t think the ghost is going to actually like… talk with us, do you?” the man in the tiger onesie asks, playing with his tail nervously. 

“Well, the veil is thinnest on Halloween… I guess there’s only one way to find out,” Jeonghan grins devilishly. 

Five minutes later, candles are set up and Seokmin is sheepishly turning off the lights before joining everyone by the board. 

Mingyu holds back, watching with interest.

“How do we start?” you ask.

“Imma rizz this ghost,” Jeonghan explains, looking around the room. “Is there a presence here with us?”

In the silence, Mingyu can hear an ambulance a few blocks away. He crosses his arms over his chest, watching.

“Don’t we have to touch the Ouija thing?” Seungkwan asks.

“Right.” Jeonghan reaches out only to have his hand slapped away by his friend.

“Not you,” Seungkwan rolls his eyes. “You’ll rig it.”

Jeonghan sighs. “Fine, I’ll ask the questions, you all touch the planchette.”

It’s almost laughable how reluctant Seokmin is to touch the board, but soon, there are four sets of hands on it while Jeonghan addresses the room again. 

“Come on ghost,” he pleads, “don’t make me look bad, come say hi. If there’s a spirit with us, please move the planchette and tell us.”

Mingyu figures now is as good a time as any to communicate, God knows he’s waited years. With a sigh, Mingyu approaches the board. He crouches down next to you, reaching out. His fingers slip right through the planchette, but when he touches Seokmin, the man shivers.

“You okay?” you ask, looking at your friend.

“It just got really cold,” Seokmin breathes, already turning pale.

Mingyu tries again, this time aiming for Seokmin’s hands. The ghost focuses hard, willing the planchette to move, willing Seokmin’s hands to become his own. 

The small tool begins to shift on the board. 

“Soonyoung, cut it out,” Seungkwan snaps.

“It’s not me!” the tiger insists.

Little by little, the planchette shifts to Yes, and Mingyu lets out a deep breath at the effort it had taken.

“So there is a spirit here with us?” Jeonghan clarifies.

Again, Mingyu moves the planchette, slightly off of Yes then back again, an affirmative.

“I knew it!” Jeonghan practically screams. “Are you the guy who died here?”

Another Yes, and Mingyu’s getting annoyed with the questions already.

“What’s your name?” you ask.

Mingyu’s a little surprised that you’re beginning a line of inquiry, but he’s pleased too. Using Seokmin’s hands, he begins to slowly reveal his name. With each letter, your group reads it out loud.

“M… I… N… G… Y… U… Mingyu?” 

God, Mingyu likes the sound of his name on your lips.

A shift to Yes has the whole room going quiet and Mingyu waits for the next question.

“Okay guys, seriously, who’s doing this?” Seungkwan asks, ever the non-believer. 

“It’s not me!” Seokmin insists, followed by Soonyoung, who even crosses his heart to prove his own innocence.

“Did you really kill those guys?” Jeonghan questions, drawing all eyes.

“You can’t just ask that!” You bat at your friend’s arm.

Mingyu considers his next action, but with a sigh, he reaches for Seokmin’s hands again, using him to push the planchette to Yes. In Mingyu’s eyes, all the men he’d killed deserved it. They’d been predators, and it takes one to know one. Mingyu had simply been the better predator.

“How many people did you kill?”

“Jeonghan,” you say again, harder this time.

“We’re fact-checking!” Jeonghan insists. “If he gives us the wrong number, then someone here is lying.”

Mingyu doesn’t like to be tested like this, but at the same time, he admires the man’s shiftyness. The ghost reaches through Seokmin, pushing the planchette to 5.

Seokmin lets out a gasp, tearing his hands away from the board and leaping to his feet. “Guys, I don’t feel good about this.”

“But it’s just started to get juicy!” Jeonghan tuts. 

“We’re not going to force Seokmin to do this if he doesn’t want to,” you sigh, also removing your hands. “I think this is enough for tonight.”

Jeonghan’s not so easily convinced. “But we just made contact!” 

“It’s almost midnight, I thought you wanted to be at the bar for eleven fifty so your bouncer friend would let you in,” you point out.

“Let me in…” Jeonghan raises a brow. “Aren’t you coming?”

“Honestly?” you sigh. “I’m getting a bit tired.”

“But it’s Halloween!”

“And we’ve already been to one party and just used a Ouija board,” you laugh. “I think I’ve had enough fun.”

“You’re boring!” Jeonghan groans. 

“And you’re crazy!” you retort, heading to turn on the lights. “Say goodbye to your ghost friend, take another shot, and get out of here so I can get some sleep.”

Mingyu likes it when you take charge like this. He stands from the table, coming to join you as you head to the kitchen to get your friends their last shots. He’s always liked sticking close to you, your second ghostly shadow. 

The last tenant had been a guy, and the view had never been very great, but with you around? Mingyu is constantly entertained, in the most perverted ways possible. He’s really enjoying the skimpy outfit you’re wearing, and he can’t wait to watch you take it off. Maybe you’ll have a shower once your friends are gone- you’ll make his night if you do.

“Goodbye,” Seungkwan says loudly, pushing the planchette to the word scrawled in big writing. Mingyu’s not so easily dismissed, but Seokmin lets out a breath of relief as the board is closed and packed up.

You all take one last shot, and Mingyu can practically taste the tequila on his tongue. It’s been forever since he had anything to drink, or eat, or fuck for that matter. 

He misses it every day. 

The ghost hangs back as you hug your friends goodbye, with Jeonghan trying for five minutes to convince you to join the last bar outing. You stay firm, and Mingyu grins to himself when you finally close the door, shutting you in together.

You busy yourself with cleaning up the kitchen, putting the shot glasses and bottles away, then, to Mingyu’s pleasure, you head toward the bathroom. He follows closely, slipping in behind you before you can close the door. As a ghost, Mingyu can walk through walls, but it’s an unpleasant experience, one he avoids when he can.

He watches you turn on the shower, facing the mirror to remove your false eyelashes. You’re so pretty, and when you begin to take off your outfit, Mingyu practically drools. He can stare at your naked body for hours and not get bored, in fact, he has. 

You step into the shower, closing the curtain. Your silhouette is still as beautiful as ever, and Mingyu can feel his cock getting hard as he watches you. Voyeurism is something he’s always enjoyed, even as a human, and now that he’s a ghost, it’s something that makes Mingyu’s undead life go round. 

He palms himself through his jeans, looking for relief but also not wanting to take things too far. Knowing you, he’ll probably get a free show if he waits long enough. Your sex drive rivals even his own, and Mingyu’s nothing if not a good boy who knows how to be patient. 

***

You get out of the shower feeling refreshed. Your blood is still buzzing slightly from the drinks you’ve had, but you feel clear-headed as you wipe the mirror, looking at yourself while you wrap a towel around your naked body.

Your phone dings and you look down at it, reading Jeonghan’s contact name. It’s a text to tell you that your friends have gotten to the bar, and another request for you to join. You can only laugh, setting your phone down just as the clock hits midnight.

There’s movement in the corner of your eye and you turn your head, locking eyes with a tall, dark-haired man standing by the door of your bathroom.

Your heart lurches in your chest, and you immediately grab the closest thing, a hairbrush, hurling it at the man. He doesn’t even try to dodge it, and it hits him square in the chest. His gaze dips down, and he looks completely shocked that you’ve just thrown something at him.

“Get out of my house!” you scream, reaching for the next item-

“Not your expensive moisturizer!” the man yells, holding up both hands and backing up. “How are you going to explain breaking that to Jeonghan?!”

You freeze a little at his words, thoroughly confused. “How- how do you know-” You look down at the bottle of moisturizer that Jeonghan had bought for you last month. “Did Jeonghan put you up to this?!”

“Put the bottle down,” the man says, still holding his hands defensively. 

“You’re some creep in my bathroom!” you retort. “You don’t get to tell me what to do!” You grab your phone next. “I’m calling 911.”

“God, please don’t,” he sighs.

“Start talking!” you insist.

“I’m not Jeonghan’s friend-”

“Then who the fuck are you, and how did you get into my apartment?!” You lift the moisturizer again, ready to throw it at his face.

“Mingyu!” he belts. “I’m Mingyu!”

“Jeonghan definitely put you up to this,” you declare, feeling something like relief. This is just some prank-

“I’m serious,” the handsome man tells you. “I’m Mingyu-”

“You expect me to believe that you’re the ghost of that serial killer who died here years ago?” you scoff.

“Yeah, it was me with the Ouija,” he tries to explain.

“Prove it,” you insist, still not believing him. 

“You want me to tell you something only a ghost would know?” he laughs. “How about this, I know you hide your sex toys in a box under your bed. I know the last few guys you’ve had over couldn’t make you cum so you’d finish yourself off with your vibrator once they left. I know you still say your first boyfriend’s name whenever you cum, for some stupid reason-”

Your heart is thundering in your chest. There’s no way he can know all of that- no one knows all of that-

Why is everything he’s saying sex related?

An unfamiliar feeling washes over your form. It’s something like fear, but there’s an underlying emotion there too- a tingle between your legs. Is this guy really a ghost? Is he your ghost? Has he been watching you since you moved in?!

“Believe me now?” Mingyu asks. He must have seen the way you’ve faltered, moisturizer bottle lowering to your side.

“How-” You swallow thickly. “How are you here?”

“That’s actually a good question,” Mingyu admits, looking down at his form. “This doesn’t usually happen.” 

“The veil is thinnest on Halloween,” you breathe, remembering what Jeonghan had said earlier. “It’s midnight…”

“Sounds right to me.” The ghost nods. 

“How… how long are you going to be visible for?” you ask, eyes dragging across his large body.

“I don’t know… but, when you threw that brush at me, it hit me.” Mingyu steps toward you and you move back, hitting the wall. “Don’t be scared, I just wanna touch you-”

“As if that makes me feel any better!” You’re frozen as his hand reaches out, fingers coming to gently brush your collarbone. You shiver at the cold contact.

“You.. you felt that!” Mingyu’s eyes widen with shock.

“Are you going to kill me?” you ask.

“What?!” He laughs, moving even closer.

“You’re a serial killer, aren’t you?” This is just your luck.

“I only killed men, guys who were predators.”

“Like you.”

“Like me,” he admits. “But… my brutality never came out toward women.”

The ghost has no right being this beautiful, and he’s saying the right things. You can’t believe you’re actually starting to relax a little. You’ve definitely seen too many horror films-

“You… you’ve been watching me,” you point out.

Your words seem to make him almost bashful, his gaze dipping to the floor. You see his skin flush a pinkish colour and it’s almost endearing. “Uh… yeah.”

“And you were in here while I was having a shower too… You are a bit of a creep, aren’t you?”

“Every other tenant here has been a guy!” Mingyu exclaims. “You’re the first one who’s actually caught my attention.”

“I feel like you’re just horny after years of being alone.”

“You would be too,” he insists. “If the roles were reversed - if you were a ghost bound to this apartment forever -  you’re saying you wouldn’t watch me get naked every day?” 

He’s definitely got a point. As your eyes skim Mingyu’s perfect form again, that tingle returns between your legs. There’s no reason for him to be as sexy as he is- murders aren’t the only shocking thing this man has under his belt and you can see that now. 

“Can I…” he swallows thickly. “Can I kiss you?”

You can’t believe you’re actually considering this.

“Come on, please?” Mingyu asks. “I haven’t touched someone in so long, haven’t been touched-” 

A dead serial killer who sort of respects your autonomy and is begging for you? 

“We don’t know how long this is going to last,” he continues. “I need to feel something, need to feel you-” 

“Fucking a ghost wasn’t on my Halloween bingo sheet,” you joke.

“It will be fun,” Mingyu insists. “I know what you like, I know your kinks, I know you, better than all those other guys you’ve fucked so far. Come on, princess, let me make you feel good.” 

It’s kind of creepy that the ghost even knows your preferred pet name, but it sounds so pretty coming from him. 

You weigh the pros and cons. 

Pros: He’s one of the sexiest men you’ve ever seen. He actually wants to make you cum. He already knows your kinks. He might be a touch obsessed with you, which would do wonders for your ego.

Cons: He’s literally a dead serial killer creep who’s been watching you jack off and get fucked for a few months. He could also disappear at any second.

Well, you can’t pass this up, especially since you have no idea how long this will last. And when he’s gone, he’ll stay gone. There are technically no strings, none that you can see at least.

And to top it all off, you’re extremely horny. You’d stayed back from going to the bar with your friends specifically to fuck yourself stupid tonight, and now, you have a ghost willing to get the job done for you.

“Okay, big guy,” you sigh. “Let’s see what you can do.”

Mingyu doesn’t waste a second. He grabs your face, cupping his large hand around the back of your skull to pull your lips to his own. 

You’re a little shocked, but you melt into his embrace quickly, pressing your hands to his beefy chest while his tongue licks at your lip, begging for entry. You open your mouth to him, and he kisses you deeper, letting out a low groan as he shifts you in his embrace, grabbing at your hip to pull you closer.

It’s been years since he’s touched anyone, but he kisses with the best of them. 

It’s almost too easy to get lost in Mingyu, your mind going pleasantly blank as you make out with the ghost. 

You’re eating up the sounds he’s making too. His mouth is eager against your own, all tongue and plump lips. It’s clear that your ghost has been very touch-starved. His hand gropes at your waist, toying with the towel still wrapped around your body. 

You can’t help yourself, you reach a hand between your bodies, cupping his cock through his jeans.

Mingyu pants against your lips, breaking the kiss to look down at where you’re touching him. “Fuck, you feel so fucking good,” he groans, pressing his hips forward for more friction.

He’s literally adorable, and so receptive. 

“You’ll take care of me first though, right?” you toy, squeezing your hand tighter around the large bulge in his pants.

“Yeah,” he swallows thickly, nodding. “Been wanting to taste your pussy for fucking months.”

Your core throbs at his words- he’s got a big dick and he likes oral? Your night just keeps getting better.

“Then you should taste me,” you tell him. “I’m even sweeter than I look.”

Mingyu lets out a deep groan, and then he’s sinking to his knees on the bathroom floor. His mouth finds your calf, and his large hands grab at your leg, adjusting it onto his shoulder while his lips ascend to your thigh. 

You lean back against the wall, trying to catch your breath while the large man gets closer and closer to where you need him most.

He reaches up, grabbing at your towel and tugging. In one motion, you’re naked for him, and the cool air of the bathroom has your skin tingling, nipples pebbling with interest.

Mingyu spreads your legs wider, and you can feel his breath on your pussy. You reach down to tangle your fingers in his hair. He looks up at you, eyes dark with lust, and then he’s diving in. He’s all tongue, the wet muscle pushing into your hole to taste you while he releases an almost animalistic groan of appreciation.

It’s clear this man is a pussy lover, and you can’t believe he’s gone so long without having his mouth on one. You’re more than happy to make up for the lost time, enjoying the feeling of him pressing his face closer to your wet core, tongue lapping at you while he begins to grind his nose against your clit.

He definitely knows how to eat, and you find yourself closing your eyes, enjoying the feeling building in the pit of your stomach. His hands are on your hips, but one trails up, grasping for your breast. The added stimulation of his thumb and pointer pinching your nipple has you crying out, hips rutting toward his face.

He just feels so good- and when his lips move to suction around your clit, your thigh quakes on his shoulder. “Fuck-” you moan loudly, shocked that it’s been this easy for him to get you to the cusp of an orgasm. 

Most men don’t know how to handle you, but it��s clear that he does. 

You can feel yourself practically dripping, and you’re not sure if it’s pussy juice or the ghost’s drool, but you don’t really care. It’s sinful and sexy and dirty- exactly what Halloween should be. 

Mingyu lets go of your breast, adjusting his hand- two fingers slide into your core while his mouth continues on your clit, and you swear this purgatory-bound sinner has just taken you to heaven. 

You’re a mewling mess now, moans and gasps leaving you uncensored while his thick fingers stretch out your core, pushing in and out while his tongue flicks at your most sensitive spot.

“I’m gonna cum,” you tell him, eyes clenched shut as the knot in your stomach is pulled tighter and tighter-

The man between your legs groans in response, driving his fingers into you faster and harder, his mouth making lewd sucking sounds around your clit. 

It’s everything you need to reach your high and you gasp loudly, tangling your fingers in his hair while your orgasm washes over you. Your hips buck against his face, only for his free hand to pin you to the wall, his motions never ceasing while you cry out, your core throbbing around his fingers.

No one has ever eaten you out this good. Your mind is practically blank, body completely overwhelmed with the pleasure surging through you. 

It’s almost too much for you to handle, and you find yourself tugging at Mingyu’s hair, trying to pull him away-

He won’t budge, growling heavily against your core. The vibration makes your legs twitch, and you’re not sure you’ll even be able to stand if he keeps this up-

Finally, Mingyu pulls away. He’s panting hard. His fingers slip out of your pussy only for him to place them in his mouth, sucking them clean while he groans lewdly. “Fuck,” he mumbles, looking up at you with stars in his eyes. “That was so good.”

You can’t even speak yet, too breathless from the mind-numbing orgasm to even think. 

Mingyu stands up, and you have to tilt your head to retain eye contact. God, why’s he so big and fuckable?

“Look at you, princess. You usually have good comebacks.” He leans forward, breath hot against your face. “Ghost got your tongue?”

You can’t help but laugh slightly, and Mingyu grins down at you. Then he’s cupping your cheek again, bringing his lips to yours. You can taste yourself as he kisses you deeply, but you don’t even care. You wrap your arms around his broad shoulders, pressing your boobs against his chest.

You need to be closer to him. Need to feel him, fully.

Mingyu reaches down, grabbing your ass and lifting you off the ground. Your legs wrap around his hips and the ghost carries you through the apartment, gently setting you onto your bed.

He towers over your now and your pussy throbs at the idea of how well he’s about to wreck you.

“You still want me, right?” he asks. “I’ll be good for you, I promise.”

You nod, licking your lips. “I know you will.”

“I’m a good boy,” Mingyu says quietly, eyes dipping down to your core.

“Then be a good boy and take off your shirt, I want to see you.”

He’s quick to comply, tearing off the black fabric to reveal his muscular chest. Your pussy throbs at the sight alone. His arms are huge, biceps bulging deliciously, and his pecs look downright biteable. Then there are his abs-

You sit up, trying to contain yourself. “Pants next.”

“Fuck, princess,” Mingyu groans, already working on his belt. “Has anyone ever told you how fucking perfect you are?”

“You’d know if they had, wouldn’t you, Ghost?” 

“These fucking dudes you have over,” Mingyu clicks his tongue, “none of them have known how to treat you right.”

“But you do?”

“Of course!” he scoffs, pushing his pants and underwear down, revealing the biggest cock you’ve ever seen. “Name one other guy who’s eaten your pussy like I have.”

He knows you too well.

“I should return the favour,” you suggest. 

“Fuck, I’d die all over again if you did.”

You get onto your knees, shuffling closer. You kiss him first, cupping his cheek with one hand while the other moves down to his cock, stroking him gently while he whines against your lips. He ruts his hips, forcing more friction while you grin into the kiss. 

“Needy Ghost,” you laugh.

“Need you so fucking bad,” he agrees. 

“Then I shouldn’t keep you waiting, should I?” 

“Please, don’t.”

You begin to kiss down his neck, taking your time as you trail your mouth across his body. You appreciate every centimeter, all the way down his pretty chest and abs. You trace your tongue along his hip bone and the ghost shivers, letting out a shuddery breath. “Holy shit.” 

“You’ll be nice and praise me while I have my mouth full, won’t you, handsome?” You sneak a glance up at him as you take him in your hand, adjusting his cock. 

“Yeah-” He swallows thickly. “I know how much my princess loves being told she’s a good girl.”

“Am I your good girl?” 

“So fucking good,” he nods eagerly. “So fucking good for me I can’t even believe it.”

You smile to yourself, pressing a chaste kiss to the head of his leaking cock that has the Ghost practically whimpering. 

“Fuck, can I- can I grab your hair?”

“Uh huh,” you lick a stripe along the head of his cock, circling it with your tongue while the gorgeous man shivers at the contact. 

“Please don’t tease me,” he begs, grabbing a fistful of your hair. “I don’t- don’t know how much time I have with you, and I’ll die if we spend the whole time teasing and I don’t even get to feel your perfect fucking pussy-”

You wrap your mouth around his cock, agreeing with what he’s saying, and it earns an immediate moan of appreciation from the man towering over you.

“Fuck, princess, you feel so good- you feel so fucking good-”

You swirl your tongue around his length, running it along the crease between the head and shaft. Mingyu’s grip tightens in your hair as more breathy moans spill from his lips. 

He’s much too big to fit in your mouth, so you pump what you can’t reach, using your saliva as lube to make stroking easier while you suck on him. Your eyes are closed, mind focused on pleasuring him the way he’d just pleasured you in the bathroom.

It feels good to be giving something back to him, especially as praises and words of encouragement fill the room. “Just like that, just like that, holy shit-”

You take him as deep as you can go, the head of his cock hitting the back of your throat, which constricts around him.

“Oh my god-” he practically whimpers, fingers flexing in your hair. “Please let me fuck your face, please, I want it so bad-”

You make a sound of affirmation and that’s all it takes for Mingyu to release a low groan, pushing his hips forward. He hits the back of your throat again and you do your best to clear your mind, focusing on anything but the gagging sensation as he begins to use your mouth for his own pleasure.

“Holy shit, good girl, good fucking girl-” he moans, quickening his pace. His grip on your head keeps you where he wants you, and it’s clear he’s being cognizant of not making you gag too hard. He seems to know your boundary, know just what to do without making it too much.

“Fuck, it’s too good- you’re too fucking good at this, princess,” Mingyu pants. “I’m gonna cum, I’m gonna cum but I promise I’ll still fuck you, I promise my recharge time is quick-”

You suction your cheeks harder around him and Mingyu practically cries out, grip tightening in your hair so hard it almost hurts. He’s a garbled mess of swear words now, and a few thrusts later he’s cumming down your throat, releasing the prettiest moan you’ve ever heard while his hips shudder with effort.

“Holy shit, good girl, good girl-” he groans, motions slowing as he cums rope after rope- “Taking me so fucking well, oh my god-” 

Mingyu pulls out of your mouth, breathing hard. He looks down at you while you also take a few deep breaths. 

It’s the oddest thing. His cum hadn’t tasted like anything. There was no salt or musk- it was just… different. You suppose he’s a ghost, so that could account for the lack of flavour, and you almost prefer it that way. 

“That was so good,” Mingyu tells you. “You’re good, right?” 

You nod, pulling away from him to fall back against the bed again. “I’m perfect.”

“Yeah, you are,” the ghost laughs. 

“So are you going to make me cum again, or…?” you cock your head to the side, assessing him.

He’s still trying to catch his breath, cheeks all flushed, hair a tangle of dark curls. He looks beautiful.

“Fuck, yeah,” Mingyu grins, and the smile lights up his whole face. “I know you probably want two or three more, you’re insatiable like that, aren’t you, princess?”

“I guess it takes one to know one,” you laugh. “I bet you usually cum two or more times watching me, don’t you, Ghost boy?”

“Guilty.” He runs his fingers through his wild hair. “But my hand is nothing compared to you.”

“Funny, my hand is nothing compared to you either.”

“Match made in heaven,” Mingyu muses, getting onto the bed to join you while you wrap your arms around his shoulders, tugging him in for another breathtaking kiss.

He slots so well between your legs, one hand pressed to the bed while the other comes up to massage your breast. You moan against his lips, arching your back, wanting more. His thumb brushes over your nipple and then he’s pinching it, making you cry out.

“You like a little pain, don’t you, princess?” he grins, looking down at you.

“A little,” you admit.

“You know…” his hand moves up from your breast, teasing over your collarbone, “sometimes, when you’re trying to make yourself cum, and you choke yourself- it’s one of the sexiest things I’ve ever fucking seen.”

“Oh yeah?” You grab his hand, guiding it to your throat. 

In the back of your mind, you remember that this hot ghost is also a killer- but his hands are shockingly soft and gentle as he squeezes your neck. 

“Fuck, you look gorgeous,” he groans.

“Tighter,” you tell him, stroking his forearm while the muscles move beneath the skin, his hand pressing harder onto your airway.

You let out a small whimper, closing your eyes and enjoying the lightheaded feeling. 

“Ready for my fingers again?” he asks.

“Want your cock.”

“Fingers first,” he insists, letting go of your throat so he can trail his hand down your body until he’s cupping your pussy. You buck against his hand and he grins. “So eager.”

“Be a good boy and make princess cum again,” you tell him.

It’s an interesting kink for him to have - the whole good boy angle -  you would have thought a man like him would be a full dom, but you kind of enjoy this switchy side. It allows you to tell him what to do, and you’d be lying if you said you didn’t enjoy holding a lot of the power in this interaction.

Two of his fingers slip into your core and you both groan at the feeling. “Still so fucking wet,” the ghost muses. “Did sucking me off turn you on that much?”

“I like the sounds you make,” you admit, rocking your hips against his hand while he palms your clit.

“Yeah?” His grin widens. 

“You’re my perfect puppy,” you sigh happily as he finger fucks you even harder. 

Mingyu reacts to the new petname with a low groan and you thread your fingers through his hair, tugging his lips to your own. You love the way his tongue invades your mouth, teasing and tasting but not dominating. 

His fingers continue to stretch you out, his palm a constant pressure on your clit. You can’t fucking wait to take his cock, and it’s just one orgasm away. 

You break the kiss to move your mouth to his neck, loving the whimpery sounds of appreciation that leave him as you begin sucking on his skin. There’s no reason not to leave marks, so you go as hard as you want, teasing your teeth over his jugular while it bounces with effort.

“Fuck, fuck-” Mingyu groans loudly, clearly enjoying the attention being paid to his pretty throat.

You can feel your core beginning to throb, your pussy tightening as another orgasm approaches, doing its best to keep Mingyu’s fingers buried knuckle deep even as he drives them into you rougher and rougher.

“Are you gonna cum again?” Mingyu asks, breathless. “Please tell me you’re gonna cum again.”

You can feel his cock, hard and pressed to your leg, leaking from how turned on he is while he finger fucks you and you kiss his throat. He’s so easy to make come undone. It boosts your ego like nothing else, and your pussy pulses with desire.

“I’m close,” you tell him, licking at his throat and making your way to his ear. “Be a good boy and make me cum.”

Mingyu groans loudly, and then he’s suddenly pulling away from you, moving down the bed to get between your legs again. His fingers don’t stop inside of you, but his free hand pushes your thigh up, giving him more space as he brings his lips to your clit.

“Holy shit-” you groan, threading your fingers through his hair and letting your head loll back against the pillows. You hadn’t thought you’d get his mouth on you like this again- but you suppose you had commanded him to make you cum, and this position is a tried and true winner. 

You can’t even tell him you’re about to cum, he simply tears it out of you. Your back arches off the bed, a sinful whine escaping your lips while your thighs quiver, pussy clamping down on his fingers, your clit throbbing desperately. Mingyu lets out a growl, slurping hard at the sensitive bud, and it brings tears to your eyes at how good it feels.

You feel like you’re the ghost now, your soul practically leaving your body while Mingyu works you through another one of the most intense orgasms of your entire life.

When he finally pulls away from your core, you can’t even open your eyes. You can only lay there, trying to catch your breath while the bed dips under his weight. You feel his hands digging into the pillows on either side of your head, and then something brushes by your nose.

You open your eyes to find Mingyu staring down at you, gently rubbing the tip of his nose against your own. “You good, princess?”

“I’m perfect,” you tell him, wrapping your legs around his hips to pull him closer.

You catch his cock between your bodies and a moan leaves you at how big he feels. 

“Ready for more?” he asks.

You can only nod, grabbing at his shoulders to drag him into a kiss. It’s almost relaxing to take a minute to just kiss him, mind blank, body still tingling in the aftershocks of your orgasm.

Then Mingyu begins to rut his hips, dragging his cock through your pussy lips and making you groan when he bumps your clit.

You’re the one who reaches between your bodies, grabbing his dick to line it up with your core.

Mingyu watches you carefully and you give him a small nod. “Do it,” you tell him. “Fuck me stupid.”

He only laughs, pressing his lips to yours as he pushes into you. Your pussy swallows him inch by inch, with you clawing at his shoulders when he’s finally all the way in. 

You’ve never felt anything like Mingyu- he stretches you out in a way that most men can only dream of. You feel small, fragile, needy- almost like a virgin again, and the way he’s kissing you eagerly definitely brings back memories of first times. 

He begins to thrust gently, allowing your body time to adjust to his massive size. You’re a little shocked at how easy the glide of it is, but you suppose you’re wetter than you’ve ever been after having cum so hard twice. It feels absolutely all-consuming. His cock is practically all you can think about as you tangle your fingers in his hair and kiss him deeper.

Mingyu is groaning into your mouth, and the sounds fuel your entire body with even more lust. You trail one hand down his back, enjoying the way it makes him shiver. 

“Do I feel good, Gyu?” you ask.

“You feel perfect,” he tells you, burying his face against your throat. His mouth is hot as he leaves wet kisses there, his hips moving even faster. “So fucking good. Better than I ever imagined.”

“You’ve imagined me a lot, haven’t you, big guy?”

“So many times-” he admits. “Never thought… never thought I’d actually get to fuck you like this.”

“Just wait till you make me cum while buried inside of me,” you grin, tilting your head so he can press fevered kisses to your jaw while groaning loudly. 

“Fuck-” One of his hands moves to your hip, keeping you pinned. He’s fucking you so hard now that the bed is rocking, but you can’t bring yourself to care about neighbors. “Wait, flip around for me, I know you go wild for doggy.”

God, it’s so easy with him. 

He has you on your knees in seconds, large hands cupping your hips to adjust your ass higher as he slips back inside of you. This new position makes him feel even bigger, if that’s possible, and it makes your toes curl. 

With each hard snap of his hips, your ass slaps back against his front. The sound of skin on skin mixed with his moans is doing something crazy to you- you’re completely consumed by him. There’s not a thought in your head other than “Yes, yes, yes! Fuck, harder Gyu, harder!”

He’s more than willing to comply, railing you like you’ve never been railed before.

You can feel fluids beginning to drip down your legs, that’s how wet you are. Stroke game has never been this easy.

Then he reaches around your front, leaning over your back so he can access your clit. You cry out from the stimulation, core clenching deliciously around the large intrusion. “Holy shit-” you whimper.

“Can you cum for me again, princess?” Mingyu asks, breath hot against your shoulders. 

“Are you close?” you gasp, feeling another orgasm building achingly fast.

“Yeah, but I want at least one more out of you,” the ghost says. “It’s Halloween, you deserve it.”

“I deserve it?” you nearly laugh, but the giggle is quick to turn into a moan as he applies more pressure to your clit.

“Yeah, of course you deserve it. You’re being so good for me, so fucking good-”

The praise goes straight to your pussy and you tangle your hands in the sheets. “Gyu-”

“That’s it, please, princess, wanna feel you cum.” He digs his fingers into your hip, drawing consistent circles on your clit. He knows exactly what to do to make you feel good, and you wonder how many times he’s watched you make yourself cum like this.

“That’s it,” Mingyu groans. “Fuck you feel amazing. Come on, cum for me. Come on, pretty girl.”

Your body twitches and you let out a gasp, tensing before your release hits you straight on. Your eyes clench shut as your pussy clamps down on his cock, a strangled moan escaping you as pleasure surges through you. Your mind practically short circuits, your brain blank except for the pure ecstasy he’s providing. 

Mingyu lets out a loud groan, panting harder as he fucks you through your high. He pulls his hand away from your clit in favour of grabbing your hips again, pushing his entire cock into your aching hole over and over again.

“Just like that, just like that-” he tells you. “Fuck, you’re literally dripping, holy shit-”

You don’t even care that your bed sheets are going to be ruined after this- all you care about is the man behind you fucking you like it’s his last night on earth. To be fair, it just might be.

“Good princess,” Mingyu breathes. “So good for me.”

“Gyu-” you whimper trying to push yourself up onto your hands. You rut your hips back to meet his thrusts and he lets out another guttural moan of appreciation. “I wanna ride you till you cum.”

You think he deserves it. 

In fact, you know he deserves it.

This man has made you cum three times already, and you’ll be damned if you don’t try to return the favor. 

“You wanna ride me?” Mingyu stops with his cock fully inside of you, and his hand smooths down your back. “Really?”

“Uh huh,” you nod, pushing back against him in an attempt to get him even deeper. “Bet you miss being ridden, don’t you, big guy?”

He lets out a groan, and then he’s removing his cock from your core, practically pouncing onto the bed next to you. He grabs your hips, helping you straddle him. While you reach between your bodies to grab his cock and line it up with your core, he slips a hand around the back of your skull, pulling your lips down to meet yours.

The ghost is grinning into the kiss and it’s almost laughable how excited he is. 

You sink down onto his length and you both release loud moans into each other’s mouths. 

It feels so good to be filled up like this. You begin by grinding against him, adjusting to his size. You can feel him so deep, all the way in the pit of your stomach.

He grabs at your thighs then your boobs, and you can tell he’s having difficulty deciding which parts of you he wants to worship. Then he takes a fistful of your ass, squeezing rough enough to have you whimpering while his tongue invades your mouth.

You begin to ride him, bracing your hands against his chest.

Mingyu is just so big- the sexiest man you’ve ever fucked and there’s no contest in that.

He’s so good at kissing too, moaning into it while you pick up the speed of your thrusts. 

He grabs your hips, helping you bounce up and down. Each movement fills you up deliciously, your drenched core swallowing him up like you were made for this.

You pull away from his lips, straightening while you ride him. Mingyu takes the opportunity to grab your breasts, kneading them in his hands while his thumbs tease your nipples. You cover his hand with one of your own, urging him to squeeze harder. 

“Fuck, you’re so fucking pretty,” Mingyu groans, hips thrusting up to meet you.

His cock is hitting even deeper now, and you swear no one has ever been this deep inside of you before. There’s literally nothing in the world like Mingyu… or his cock. 

“Look at you taking all of me,” he continues, cheeks flushed pink, breath hot. “I always knew you’d be able to- always knew you’d be a fucking champ in bed.”

You want to tell him he’s one to talk, but it seems the ghost has got your tongue again. All you can do is moan lewdly, riding him harder and ignoring the burn of your thighs.

Mingyu sits up, leaning forward to take your breast into his mouth. His tongue flicks by your nipple and you cry out, tangling your fingers in his hair to hold him to your chest. He groans deeply as you pull on his hair, teeth grazing the sensitive bud caught between his lips.

“Holy shit,” you whimper, core clenching tight around his cock.

The ghost pants loudly, giving your breast one last kiss before he flops down onto his back again. “You close?” he asks, reaching out so his thumb can find your clit, rubbing it.

“Fuck, yeah- if you keep doing that, yeah, I’m close-” you nod, clawing at his chest.

“I need you to cum with me,” Mingyu tells you. “Want us to cum together.”

“Me too, me too-” you assure him, closing your eyes to focus on the feeling of his cock filling you up perfectly while his thumb works harder on your clit.

“Want you on top,” the ghost continues, “but I want to take over. Can you rub yourself for me?”

“Yeah.” You swallow thickly, leaning over him so you can press your lips to his own. Your hand sneaks between your legs, and you hover over him, thrusts coming to a stop while he gets a grip on your hips.

His tongue battles your own as he begins to piston up into you- God, it feels even better when he’s the one fucking you from below. All you have to do is hold yourself over him with one shaky arm while your fingers work on your clit, dragging you closer and closer to the edge again.

“Oh my god-” you mumble against his mouth, and it only makes him smile, rutting up into you even faster. 

“I can’t-” he breaks the kiss to burry his face against your throat, “I can’t hold off much longer, please tell me you’re gonna cum with me, please-”

“I will!” you whine. “I’m so close-”

His mouth is hot against your neck and he sucks on your sweet spot, making you cry out. He groans loudly at the way your core tightens around his massive cock. Then he’s pulling away from your throat, wrapping a hand around it instead.

“Look at me,” he instructs. “Want to watch you cum.”

You force your eyes open, gasping as he tightens his grip on your neck. You’re so fucking close you can almost taste it. 

His other arm adjusts, palm snaking up your back as he fucks up into you wildly.

“Can I give you a countdown?” he asks.

You nod enthusiastically. He’s choking you too hard to answer. Your blood is rushing to your head and your pussy, body practically on fire-

“Three-” he moans loudly, staring up at you with dark eyes. “Two-” a small grunt leaves his lips, fingers digging into your back. “One! Cum with me- please, fuck, cum with me!” 

You let out a gasp, all the tension in your body snapping like the cord in your stomach. Pleasure washes over you, and it’s unlike anything you’ve ever felt. It’s better than the first three orgasms if that’s even possible, and if it weren’t for the tight grip on your neck cutting off most of your sounds, you’re sure you’d be screaming.

Mingyu’s deep groans are only making you more turned on as your core throbs around his cock. He’s still fucking you, but soon the pleasure seems to be even too much for him. He drags you fully against his chest, burying himself completely in your pussy while he fills you up with his cum. 

He releases your throat in favor of smashing his lips against your own, tongue running against your teeth while he groans loudly. You whimper into the kiss, pussy still pulsing around him.

This has to be one of the longest orgasms you’ve ever had- and with his massive cock still buried inside of you, your pussy gets practically no reprieve. All you can do is gasp and whimper against his lips while your body struggles to process the insane amount of pleasure that’s still coursing through you.

Mingyu lets out a laugh, resting down against the pillows and looking up at you. “Was that good?” he asks. 

You can only shake your head at him, letting out a small chuckle as the last of your orgasm wafts through you like a warm summer breeze. 

“Yeah,” his hand smooths up and down your back, “it was good for me too.”

“You literally just ruined me for anyone else.”

“That was the goal, princess.” He grins.

“You’re so bad.”

“Obviously you have a thing for bad boys.”

“And ghosts, apparently.” You’re still coming to terms with what you’ve just done. Part of you wonders if this is just some crazy dream.

“Just me though, right?” He kisses you gently and it leaves you wanting more.

“For now, but if I meet another ghost with a huge cock, maybe that will change,” you tease.

Mingyu sighs, shaking his head at you. “We should probably get you cleaned up, then… can we cuddle? I’m still not sure how long you’ll be able to see me, and… I think ending the night holding you would be nice.”

A ghost who loves eating pussy, made you cum four times, has a massive cock, and wants to spoil you with some aftercare-

You’re for sure ruined for any other guy you meet and you know it. 

It sucks to have to get off of Mingyu’s dick, and your legs hurt, but he helps you to the bathroom with a shit-eating grin. “Never seen you walk like this after being fucked,” he muses.

“No one’s fucked me like you just did and you know it,” you laugh. 

He gives you a bit of privacy while you pee and get all the cum off of you, but he joins you when you begin to brush your teeth. Mingyu stands behind you, hands finding your hips, eyes locked on yours through the mirror. 

“Tomorrow, when you get ready for bed, imagine me right here,” he tells you, leaning down to press a kiss to your bare shoulder. 

“Yeah?” You press your ass back against him. “Is this usually where you stand while I brush my teeth?”

“Uh huh.” His hands move from your hips to grab onto your tits, squeezing them. “Gonna miss being able to touch you.”

You frown a little at his words, spitting into the sink before turning in his arms. “I’m gonna miss you too, Gyu.”

“Really?” He grins. “So no more fucking randoms?”

You laugh. “Do you expect me to wait a whole nother year just to get railed again?”

“I guess that does sound impossible,” Mingyu sighs. “Just know that any guy you do bring over… I’ll be watching.”

“And judging, I bet.” He’s so obsessed with you that it hurts. 

“Always.”

“What are you going to do?” you ask. “Waiting for a whole year before you can fuck me again?”

“You know what I’m going to do,” he grins. “Every time you touch yourself, I’ll be touching myself too.”

God, this is going to take masturbation to a whole new level.

“Do you…” you swallow. “If I got Jeonghan’s ouija board, do you think you could communicate with me through it? I mean… you’ve never thrown books around or done anything like this before so-”

“Maybe,” Mingyu cocks his head to the side. “I kind of had to use Seokmin’s hands as my own tonight, but, I could try it with just you. But you can’t expect to ask a question and have the wooden thing move to an answer on its own.” 

“Okay, noted.” You let out a sigh. “Now come to bed with me, puppy. I need a good cuddle.”

He lets you take his hand, guiding him back to your room where he joins you under your duvet. 

Mingyu is quick to adjust you as his little spoon, pulling you tight to his chest. One arm is secured under your head as a mock pillow, and the other hand cups your breast. His breath is hot against your neck.

“Would it be too soon to say I love you?” he asks suddenly.

You can only laugh. You’ve just met him tonight, but you suppose he’s been watching you for months at this point. You can only imagine how much he’s pined for you by this point. 

“You can say it, but I can’t return the sentiment, not now at least,” you admit.

“That’s okay, Ghost romances are usually one-sided anyways, or so I would imagine.” 

You can only laugh, enjoying the feeling of his body wrapped around yours.

“You won’t be here in the morning,” you muse sadly.

“I mean, I’ll be here, but you won’t be able to see me.”

“Do ghosts sleep?” you ask.

“Yeah.”

“Where do you usually sleep?”

“On the couch.”

“Well, from now on, I give you permission to sleep here with me.”

“Really?” He squeezes your breast.

“Of course. This is going to sound crazy, but… I can even say goodnight to you, although you won’t be able to say it back.”

“I’ll say it back,” Mingyu assures you. “You’ll just have to imagine it.”

“I can do that.”

“Gonna have to imagine a lot of things.” 

You know that a relationship with a ghost isn’t a long-term plan. You know that things can’t really go anywhere with him- but at the same time, there’s almost a peace that comes with having your very own personal spirit who’s in love with you and restricted to your apartment.

“You’re tired, aren’t you, pretty girl?” His breath is comforting against the nape of your neck.

“Exhausted.”

“Then you should get some sleep.”

“You don’t want me to stay up? Don’t want to enjoy every second we have together?” 

“I always enjoy every second we have together,” he laughs. “Something tells me this touching thing isn’t going to last much longer, and I want you to fall asleep in my arms, even if it’s only once.”

“Goodnight, Mingyu.”

“Goodnight, princess.” He presses a kiss to your shoulder. “I love you.”

It’s the last words you hear from him as you drift off to sleep, your body succumbing to the exhaustion of four orgasms. 

When you wake up the next morning, your bed is empty, but you know you’re not alone.

☀️ mlist + an. thank you for reading! I hope I didn't scare anyone off with the serial killer tag, can we all agree this is a soft boy? "what about the people he murdered?" "what murder???"

🍭 support me by. sending a tip here or here - or become a patron to access monthly bonus content and extensions for fics like this one :) find the Patreon teaser below! 

🔮 preview. It has to be close to midnight now- it has to be- “I need you now,” you whine, moving your hand from your clit to grab the sheets. “We’ve both been so good this year, this is so unfair-” You’re horny, but you’re sad too, frustrated, desperate, annoyed- There’s no way you can make yourself cum while up in your head like this and you know it. Letting out a groan of defeat, you tear your hand from between your legs- only for it to be caught in a vice grip. Your eyes flash open, heart thundering in your ribcage. Mingyu is kneeling at the foot of the bed, and you watch as he brings your wet fingers to his mouth, licking them clean and letting out an absolutely guttural groan.

cw/ tw. masturbation, oral (f receiving), multiple reader orgasms, unprotected sex, praise, dirty talk, cock warming, bulge kink, deep kink, serial killer/ghost Mingyu, switch Mingyu, hand job, big dick Mingyu, fingering, mentions of suicide, recording sex with a phone, boob worship, etc… I pet names: (hers) princess, good girl. (his) good boy.

👹 rating. 18+ explicit I wc. 3.9k I teaser wc. 200

🌙 staring. Mingyu x afab!Reader

bonus

Part of you wishes you’d never told Jeonghan about Mingyu because your friend has become absolutely obsessed with communicating with your apartment ghost. In the year since you last saw Mingyu, there hasn’t been one hangout at your place that didn’t include Jeonghan whipping out the Ouija board.

“We should do another shot,” Jeonghan tells you, sitting on the couch and toying with the planchette.

“It’s almost midnight, I really think you should be heading home,” you sigh. Seokmin, Soonyoung and Seungkwan have the decency to have left half an hour ago, but they’ve never been that excited about your ghost adventures.

“You won’t even let me meet the guy?” Jeonghan whines. “Come on, let's ask Mingyu if he wants to meet me!”

He places the planchette on the board, and it immediately moves to Yes. Sometimes you think Jeonghan’s moving it himself, using your ghost roommate to further his own wants and needs. 

“I’m pretty sure Mingyu will want to spend the full-time slot with me alone,” you insist. 

The planchette moves to No and you roll your eyes while Jeonghan grins at you.

“Give me that!” You take the wooden tool from his hands, setting it on the board. “Mingyu, do you want Jeonghan to leave?”

You feel the familiar cold tingle in your hands, and without adding any pressure yourself, the planchette moves to the word Yes. 

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[cutebat]

You know what, fuck it. I'm going to write my own neglectful yandere batfamily cause everyone else is doing it, but I'm going to do it in a different way.

Yandere Batfam x Neglected, but Defiant Reader

Prologue (Diary Entry)

Warning(s): Mentions of yandere themes, neglect, emotional abuse, mentions of physical abuse, forcing to drop out, attempted guilt tripping, reader is just venting out her feelings

(I made this in the reader's POV to make the whole 'diary entry' thing more sense.)

~~~~~

July 22, 2024

It's funny when someone tells their story.

Only to be told back that it's unrealistic.

Almost as if they're afraid to believe it's real...

Oh, God, that sounded dark.

~~~~~

For everyone who doesn't know,

Bruce is a billionaire who's also a shitty dad

Dick is a dick, like actually

Jason uses his trauma to let all his frustrations on me

Tim is a delusional bitch

Cass was okay until she knocked me to the ground

Damian is just a thing who you want to burn to ashes

Alfred... I guess is just Alfred

~~~~~

I was basically raised as what people would call a 'black sheep'. Kind of like... actually, I don't need to explain all that.

Basically, I was adopted by the infamous Bruce Wayne when I was ten for whatever reason. After the first day of living with him and the family and giving me the new role of Batgirl, everyone just pretended as if I didn't exist.

I tried to interact with every one of them and all I got were "sorry, can't talk right now" and "can you shut up".

Like, WHAT THE FUCK DID I DO TO THEM?!

Is it because I'm prettier than all of them and had barely any trauma in my past? Seriously, why are people so jealous about these kinds of things?

Bruce really signed all that paperwork for nothing.

Of course, my little ten year old brain would think that if I tried to impress all of them with what I could do, maybe I could gain their attention.

So by the time I was twelve with my ten year old mindset goal in my head, I did nine different after school activities, won over fifteen awards for my achievements, and went out to patrol at least six nights a week.

And none of that worked! Those fuckers wouldn't even spare me a glance!

~~~~~

After a while, you don't see a point in trying your best.

I dropped out of most of the clubs I regret joining, I just laid back in my classes, and most of all...

I quit being Batgirl.

I didn't want to, but like I said, where's the point in that?

So with that, I just gave up on everything and just... stopped trying.

~~~~~

But then one year all of that almost changed?

For the first time ever, I found myself suddenly really pretty, and after a month I entered eighth grade, I was suddenly asked out by one guy, then two, and all the way up to ten!

It was like really cool!

The popular girls became my best friends, more guys would ask me out, and the teachers started pointing out that I was their favorite student, even the ones who weren't my teachers.

It felt like I was on top of everything. That I was special. The world is revolving around me.

Finally, I was in a place to build a great reputation.

And then life was like FUCK THAT!

~~~~~

After the first semester of eighth grade, Bruce was weirdly in my room and he said wanted to have a 'talk' with me.

So, during this talk, he was basically talking about the last three years of me being neglected by him and his family. To be honest, I forgot everything he told me, but honestly, I don't really care.

He also told the others about all this and now they suddenly feel bad which I don't give a shit about. But, I knew he was doing all this to guilt trip me, which was honestly so stupid.

Now, after he dropped that bomb, he told me that I had to drop out of school to do some "bonding time" with the others along with him and the people who actually cared about me didn't really matter at all!

I JUST GOT SETTLED IN!

All I said was "FUCK YOU" and just stormed out of my room with the only thing that I took was my diary that I had for quite a while that I never used before.

~~~~~

So, yeah. I'm currently in the attic, venting my feelings all out on this stupid glitter diary with a random pen that I found on the ground.

But whatever.

It doesn't matter.

Nothing matters...

My life is just a game.

A sick, hopeless game.

[ckret2]

Bill hates it when people mention Euclydia. Everyone thinks it's because he doesn't want to hear his home's real name; it's actually the opposite.

Here, have some fic. The naming of Euclydia (among other things), the birth of the Nightmare Realm, and the Axolotl planting the seeds of a trillion-year-long plan to keep Bill from the death penalty.

This is the 🎉FINAL PART🎉 of a 9-part plot about the Axolotl in the aftermath of the Euclidean Massacre. If you wanna read the others (or look at the art), here's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, and eight.

####

With the immediate crisis averted and the triangle, for the moment, not attempting to invade and/or demolish the multiverse, most of the god militia pulled back. A group remained stationed near the unstable border between dimensions to watch the triangle; but the less powerful gods could trickle back in to get back to their own work, first and foremost the construction workers doing emergency repairs to reformat and stabilize the neighboring dimensions.

The Axolotl—who, he suspected, would have been arrested himself for interfering if they weren't still focused on the triangle—wove through the crowd until he found the Time Giant; and then swam angrily up to her and demanded, "You used me as a distraction?"

She turned a stone-hard look on him. "That was the agreement."

"No! The agreement was that I'd try to talk him down! We'd only resort to distracting him if I couldn't get through to him!"

"Ya didn't get through to him." The Time Giant nodded at the Axolotl's burned side. "Look at you. Your leg's off."

He looked down at his missing foreleg. He'd been so distracted by the near end of the multiverse, he'd barely noticed the pain. "It's just a flesh wound," he insisted. "I'm an axolotl, it'll grow back!"

She shook her head.

"I would have gotten through to him! You saw me talk him down after an entire army threatened him!" the Axolotl said. "What if I had succeeded, and when we left my tank he found out you already wrote him off?! You never gave me a chance—"

"We did give you a chance," she said testily, "and I saw that you weren't gonna succeed." She hooked a thumb over her belt and tapped a finger on her time tape; the stylized symbol of the Time Giants glowed on the side, an unsubtle reminder that she knew what was coming far better than he did. "So I did my damn job."

So she'd sent him in already knowing that he would fail. The Axolotl was speechless for a second. "But—you couldn't know—I got so close, if I'd had just one more try to talk to him..."

"If I'd let you, I'm sure you woulda kept trying until the end of time," she said. "You seem like a good guy, Ax—but you can't save everyone." She pushed past him to get to work. "There's first aid near where Dimension 2 Gamma was. Get those burns looked at."

"They're fine."

She was wrong. He could save everyone. Because he wouldn't stop until he did.

####

"You're replacing it?" the triangle asked petulantly.

"I'm not talking to you," VENDOR said, turned away from the triangle. "You had your chance at diplomacy and you blew it." The crablike cop was holding up a clipboard with some paperwork for VENDOR to review, and didn't look pleased to have been temporarily reduced to a secretary.

"I'm just asking a question!"

"We're not speaking."

At the top of his lungs—which was, it turned out, very loud and very shrill—the triangle said in the direction of the reporters, "Oh wow, that's a crazy thing to say about Lady Morgenstern! And talk about obscene! She'd be furious if she could hear that—!"

"Shhhhh!" VENDOR rounded angrily on the triangle. "You don't even know who she is!"

"I know her name and I'm not afraid to use it," the triangle said. "You're really replacing my dimension?"

"If I can be left alone long enough to finish signing the authorization paperwork," VENDOR muttered. "The construction crew's already out here and waiting, so if you don't mind..."

"It just seems pretty tacky, replacing a universe just like that." The triangle spoke like dimension he was talking about was just a pawn to be used in a trivial argument about etiquette, rather than everyone and everything he'd ever known. "No memorial or anything? Yeesh."

"So hold a memorial for it," VENDOR said. "We don't have any choice, we have to repair all the fallen walls to keep reality stable. If you'd let us into your hovel to sweep up what's left of your old dimension, it could have at least been incorporated into the new one."

The triangle half reached for his hat, stopped himself, and curled his hand into a fist and thrust it down at his side. "Over my dead body," he said. "Which I'm pretty sure got incinerated! So that means never!"

"You're pretty sure?" VENDOR asked archly.

"It... I had more important stuff to take care of, okay? I'm a busy guy!"

"I'm sure," VENDOR said. "Well, it's too late for any cleanup operations anyway. Enjoy rotting away in your landfill."

"Wow, that's how you talk to a refugee from the biggest disaster ever?" The triangle laughed. "Hey, bet the muckrakers over there would love to hear how sympathetic you are to the—what'd you say I am—the 'last surviving soul from my dimension'—?"

"Let's find somewhere quieter to work," VENDOR said to the cop.

He looked relieved "You got it."

As VENDOR and THEIR impromptu secretary moved away from Dimension Zero, the triangle shouted after THEM, "Hey! How do I vote for Municipalitron!"

Volcanoes on several of VENDOR's planets erupted. THEY whipped around to face the triangle. "You don't! You aren't in my district!"

"Well, whose district am I in? This Morgenstern creep you keep bringing up?" the triangle asked. "How's voting work, do you toss a ballot across the border and I toss it back—?"

"You're not in anyone's district! If you were, you'd have been arrested already!"

The triangle stared in dumb shock. "Wait, so I don't get to vote for which of you idiots I have to deal with?" He hollered at VENDOR's retreating back, "That's fascism!"

Fuming, VENDOR passed the Axolotl muttering under THEIR breath about showing the triangle fascism; then stopped, abruptly turned to face him, and snapped, "You."

"You," the Axolotl agreed.

"You're an optimistic fool."

Yes, well, he knew that already. He'd been voted Most Adorably Idealistic in his law school yearbook for a reason. "I don't think I like you, either."

"No one does." THEIR camera whirred irritably as they looked the Axolotl up and down. "What are you doing here, anyway? I assumed you'd been sent to figure out who's liable for this whole mess—but no, you only handle afterlife cases, don't you? Who sent you?"

The Axolotl was silent.

Furiously, VENDOR said, "Are you serious?! We could have avoided half this mess if it weren't for you!"

"If it weren't for me, he'd have knocked down the multiverse before anyone realized he's setting the fires," the Axolotl snapped. "And if you had figured that much out, you'd have gotten your cops killed before anyone realized he's a god."

"The professionals here to handle the situation could have figured it out faster if you weren't derailing their investigations," VENDOR snarled. "And arguing about jurisdiction! We could have arrested that that little troublemaker the moment we figured out just what he's done—"

"Right after you arrested that kid with the spray can who didn't have anything to do with this?"

THEY growled in frustration. "Forget it! I hope you're happy with your genocidal pal over there—you seem about as concerned with public safety as he is." THEY stormed off, the cop with THEIR paperwork chasing after THEM.

The Axolotl watched VENDOR go; then turned to look ruefully toward Dimension Zero.

When the triangle caught his gaze, he formed a heart with his fingers over his top point and called out, gleefully singsong, "Genocide paaals!"

It wasn't exactly the reaction he'd hoped for.

####

The Axolotl was attempting to distract himself from scratching his itchy leg while it regrew by eavesdropping on the triangle. It seemed like the triangle was entertaining himself by darting around the border of Dimension Zero to start arguments with anybody he happened to recognize (except the Axolotl, whom he seemed to be trying to ignore outside of throwing a few odd quips at him.) At the moment, the triangle and the Time Giant were hollering at each other about her decision to reinforce the second dimensions by making them splinter into multiple timelines.

"So you're really willing to sacrifice zillions of lives by letting me incinerate all their parallel timelines?" The triangle laughed in disbelief. "And everyone here thinks I'm the killer! That's not a good look for you, buddy!"

She glanced up from a table full of paperwork to give him a totally neutral look. "You're the one who's willing to incinerate them. You could not do that."

"When I do it, it's justified."

The Axolotl was distracted from the argument as the storm cloud with the apoc agents gloomily blew past him. It was talking into a walkie-talkie as it went: "Yeah, I know he's a nut. But he's a nut that can't throw fireballs outside the border of his dimension, and I've got to finish this report before we can get outta here." He sighed at whatever the walkie-talkie said in response, and said, "Yeah. We'll rendezvous after I have his testimony." It let its tornado suck the walkie-talkie back in and drifted to the Time Giant. "Mind if I steal your conversation partner for a minute? ATTF business."

She grabbed a binder to try to shield her papers from the worst of the storm's rain. "Please. Take him."

"Thanks." It floated closer to Dimension Zero and raised its voice to bark, "Hey! Magister Mentium!"

The triangle looked over mistrustfully. "What?" As he'd talked to the Time Giant, he'd been playing with the fabric of reality, creating a circle out of raw... stuff. The Axolotl couldn't tell what the stuff was, but it looked like it was some sort of animal tissue, except far too uncannily homogeneous to be natural, disturbing in its uniformity. Like a slice of baloney. When he saw who'd called out to him, he rolled his eye and turned his attention to extruding the circle into a baloney cylinder. "Heeey, Officer Fun Police! Here to rain on my parade again?"

"Rain jokes aren't as funny as you think they are," it said. "No, this is Apocalyptic Threat Task Force business."

The triangle's eye narrowed. "What business? Are you gonna complain about my renovations again?"

"No. If you're not about to knock reality down, I don't care what you do anymore," the cloud said. "It's not my business to punish anybody for previous apocalypses, I just want to prevent future ones. Answer a few questions for our incident report and I'll be out of your life." There was an implicit and you'll be out of mine in its tone.

"All right," the triangle said dubiously. "Fffine. Then we're on the same side. I'm not fond of apocalypses either."

It paused like it wanted to argue with that claim, but said, "Good enough for me." It pulled out the soggy notepad it had been using all day, flipped through it, couldn't find a free page, and with a sigh pulled out a tape recorder instead. "You're from Dimension 2 Delta, right?"

"If you say so," the triangle said, lifting his hands in a shrug. "You guys are the ones who named my dimension."

"Uh-huh." Under its breath, the cloud muttered, "Not exactly a name, but... If you're from 2Δ, that makes you the only direct witness to how your universe was destroyed."

The triangle paused. "Mm."

"Can you explain what happened, exactly?" When the triangle didn't respond, the cloud added, "I'm not gonna arrest you for it. If we want to have a chance of stopping something like this from happening in the future, we need to know what happened here."

"Uhhh, yyyeah. Suuure," the triangle said.  It wasn't clear exactly how Dimension Zero rearranged, but the view of the eternal dance party simply vanished. There was no sign of the millions of shapes. The music had fallen near silent, just a constant distant low thumping noise, like your heartbeat in your ears; quiet enough that it couldn't drown out the whispery hiss leaking out of Dimension Zero. "It's not like I have anything to hide." Whatever he was about to say, it seemed like he wanted to hide it from his party prisoners, at least.

A bolt of lightning shot through the storm's recorder, turning it on. "You said you were an active participant in the end of the world, right?"

"Hey, what's that supposed to mean?" He eyed the recorder suspiciously. "What is this, some trick to try to get a confession out of me?"

"Again, I'm not a cop. And you already confessed in front of a thousand reporters," the storm said. "If you were involved, you've got a different perspective than some guy ten superclusters away who only witnessed it, that's the only reason it matters."

"Oh," the triangle said. "Then—yeah, I was there for the whole thing. Start to finish."

"Great," the storm said gruffly. "Then could you explain in your own words what happened when the universe ended and, to the best of your knowledge, what caused it."

"Oh. Yeah. Right. The cause," the triangle said. "It... it was a—monster."

"I thought you said you—"

"It was a monster," the triangle said, more confidently now.

The cloud hesitated. "All right," it said. "Tell me what happened."

The triangle took a deep breath. "Okay. So. It uh—started with the third dimension."

"The monster came from the third dimension?"

"No, we were going to the third dimension. But we needed—"

The hissing background static exploded into a roar.

The void filled with the staticky screams of countless dead voices, pleading for mercy, pleading for it to stop. Death rattles, howls of agony, wails of terror. Most of the crowd of gods outside Dimension Zero fell silent, turning to stare at the disembodied hysterical shrieks.

One voice, strained with pain, rose above the cacophony, crackling, "Emergency services! We need medical assistance! Ambulances, or—please—I don't know what happened—it's like everyone's internal organs spontaneously ruptured, there's—there's hundreds of people here! Some of them are missing parts of their body, they just—disappeared! I'm hurt too, I don't know what it is—I can feel it inside me—"

A second voice replied, "We can't send assistance. Everyone's bleeding, the whole city's dying! We can't help you!"

Whatever the triangle said was lost beneath the roar. He didn't even seem to notice it. His eye was filled with static. The word "blood" was just barely audible. The word "mandibles."

Another voice, trying to sound professional, trying to sound authoritative, but trembling with fear, "This is an emergency announcement! This announcement will not repeat! The fire can transmit over radio waves and sound waves! Turn off all radios and TVs! Turn off all radios and TVs and destroy any wireless phones and pagers! Do NOT listen to the screams! Again, the fire is transmitting over radio waves, this message will not repeat, destroy your radio and warn your neighbors!"

The Axolotl saw images flash in the triangle's eye, too fast for him to mentally process one before another ten had gone by: a plane like infinitely thin glass with tiny delicate shapes painted on its surface shattering in a rolling wave; a bleeding body reduced to shards and then the shards reduced to chips and then chips reduced to dust; fire spitting and crackling into every crack split in existence; a light shaped like a triangle. (Was that the light that had blinded the Oracle's seer?)

Another voice gasping, "It's doing something to the gravity, I-I don't understand—we don't even have the equipment to read... it's like gravity's turned in a direction that doesn't exist! Does anyone know how to stop it?! Our universe is tearing ap—" and the words were cut off with a scream; and the scream was cut off with a sudden silence that was swallowed whole by the other voices.

The triangle had peeled open, shining golden panels stretching out like petals, his mandibles unhinged and curling around his eye in a ring of teeth, like a blooming carnivorous flower, sun-soaked and mesmerizing. God, he was so bright. He shot light in every direction like an explosion that never ended. Like a star trapped in the moment of supernova.

Another voice, shaking with rage, "Did you hear that, you monster?! I told you we weren't ready yet! Why didn't you listen?! I can see the destruction from here—the sky's on fire, everything is burning. How could this happen?! YOU killed them all—" and the rage cracked, revealing the fear and grief just barely hidden underneath, "Remember us. If you're the only one left, you have to remember us. Please—"

The static snapped off; the triangle's body snapped back into place; his eye snapped back into focus; "—and then they appointed me their god," he said cheerfully, "and here we are!"

And with only a couple more dying cries of pain and pleas for help, the voices fell back to their constant background whisper.

The storm cloud had started sleeting.

The Axolotl had stopped breathing. Just the sound of the carnage was enough to make him sick.

But the triangle sounded perfectly at ease—more than he had before he'd answered the cloud's question. "So is that all you needed?" He'd resumed playing with the cylinder of meat he'd been constructing—extruding it further, and then, dissatisfied with the results, collapsing it back into a circle.

His hands were trembling as he messed with the cylinder. There was a tightness around his eye.

"What..." The storm cloud let out a low rumble of thunder, ahem, "what... did you say about blood? I didn't catch it."

The triangle blinked blankly at the storm. "I didn't say anything about blood."

It paused.  "All right, then—what about the other voices? Who were they?"

"What voices?"

The storm stared at the triangle, baffled sunbeam fixed on him; then swung the sunbeam over to the Axolotl. "You heard—?"

So his eavesdropping had been noticed. He nodded. Oh, he heard, all right.

The triangle glanced between them. "I think you guys are hearing voices," he said. "The only one talking here is me."

He said it like he meant it. The Axolotl was sure he did. Had he not heard the voices?

"Never mind, forget it," the cloud said uneasily. "You said someone... Who appointed you their god?"

"Uhhh..." the triangle tilted to the side as he tried to think. "Pretty much all my people? Yeah. It was everyone!"

"Your people? From your universe?"

"Yup!"

"They didn't appoint you their god," the cloud said. "They're all dead."

The triangle scoffed. "I don't know what you're talking about. They're all in here with me!"

"You mean the mortals from the other universes?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," the triangle repeated, a little slower, warningly. "They're all from my universe."

For a moment, the cloud just stared at him, at a loss. It glanced again toward the Axolotl. The Axolotl had nothing to offer it.

"Is that everything?" The triangle tried to keep his voice peppy, but there was an edge of exhaustion that hadn't been there earlier. (Yeah, him and everyone else here.)

"I guess that wraps up that part of the questionnaire," the cloud muttered uneasily, trying to recover its professional tone. "Just a couple more questions. I need your name. For the report."

Dimension Zero's hissing background static rose again: "The murderer... The name of the murderer... is—"

"NOBODY ASKED YOU!" The triangle turned and chucked the cylinder he'd been working on into the Dream Realm. He grumbled under his breath, created another circle, and started stretching it out again.

The triangle could hear the voices. Then why hadn't he been able to hear them earlier? Unless he had been able to hear them—and he just... couldn't remember that he'd heard them?

Even if the Axolotl hadn't known about the incomparable trauma the triangle had survived/caused, it would be pretty obvious by now that something was going terribly wrong inside his head. Contradictory stories about his own reality, memories he refused to remember, facts he simply set aside as not relevant. Was he refusing to face them, or was he unable?

From their conversation in the Axolotl's tank, he thought the triangle understood more than he was willing to admit. But the Axolotl might be the only one who knew that.

And that was beginning to give the Axolotl an idea.

"Just—put me down as the Magister Mentium, okay?" the triangle told the cloud. "Everyone'll know who you're talking about."

"If you say so," said the cloud. "What was your universe's name?"

"Its name?" The triangle glanced up from his new cylinder and gave the cloud a perplexed look. "You asked already. You said it's Dimension 2 Delta."

"That's its serial number. Every dimension's assigned one at its Big Bang. But it's standard to let a dimension's own residents choose its name. It makes it more personal." The cloud sounded as though it had memorized this explanation. The Axolotl wondered how many times it had had to take statements from a destroyed dimension's grieving survivors. He hoped it usually got to give this spiel to witnesses of a narrowly averted apocalypse. "Typically the first explorers to leave their dimension get to name it; but the only person ever known to leave 2Δ is... you."

"Oh," he said. "Right."

"So, what did your people name your universe?"

He stared at the storm like it was stupid. "We called it... the universe?"

"Everyone calls their universe The Universe," the cloud said. "Followed by The World, The Dimension, Reality, and Home. They're all taken, come up with something else."

"Seriously? You're making me name my whole universe and now you're telling me how to name it?"

"They're not my rules," the cloud said. "If you don't have a native name, we usually name a dimension after the first known explorer to leave it. Was that you?"

The triangle was quiet for an uncomfortably long moment. His gaze twitched away; and for a moment the Axolotl thought he saw another image flash in his eye: a triangle floating in space, eerily serene, dead. His voice was small when he said, "No."

Surprised lightning quietly flashed in the storm's cloud. "Oh. Do you know the name of the first?"

"Of course I do. He's my..." He stopped himself. He said, too evenly, "His name is Euclid."

Obviously, the triangle wasn't speaking a language that can be spoken with human mouths or written with human symbols. "Euclid" is a stand-in word for an unpronounceable name; trying to say the name without the right anatomy—without even the right laws of physics and sound waves—would only mangle it.

But the rest of the multiverse didn't have the right physics or anatomy either. "Euclid," the cloud repeated, mangling it. The triangle winced. "Fine. How's Euclydia sound?"

"It sounds stupid," the triangle said.

"Well, it's your dimension. Do you have a better suggestion?"

"I..." The triangle floundered helplessly. "That... Okay hold on, I've had a very long..." He floundered again as he tried to figure exactly what kind of time span he'd been having a long one of.

"If you want me to come back later..." said the cloud, who very obviously did not want to have to come back later.

"I don't knowww, gimme a second," the triangle whined. "I've never thought about a universe having a name! It's—it's fine. Euclydia's fine."

"If you're sure—?"

"Of course I'm sure," the triangle snapped. "Euclydia. Yeah. Great. Fine."

"All right." The cloud zapped its tape recorder, turning it off. "Thanks for your time."

As it started to hover off, the triangle said, "Hold on! I answered your questions, you owe me some."

The eye of the storm reluctantly swung back toward the triangle. "What?"

He held up the shape he'd been extruding. "What do you call this... 3D circle thing?"

The sunbeam swept over it. "A cylinder?"

The triangle pointed toward VENDOR, who was out at the edge of the crowd answering the questions of some reporters who'd caught THEM attempting to slink away from the scene. "And what are the 3D circle things Coin Slot over there is hauling around?"

It glanced at VENDOR's stock of planets. "Spheres."

The triangle shook his cylinder. "Well, what am I doing wrong, then!"

"I don't know, math's not my thing," the cloud said. "Try rotating it."

The triangle waited until the cloud had moved on; then created another circle, extruded it again, but curled the extrusion around into a circle. He ended up with a shape like a donut. He said, quietly, "Oo-oo-ooh." He sounded impressed.

The Axolotl swam up alongside the storm cloud as it left. "So. Find out what you wanted to know?"

The cloud laughed ruefully.

That was what he thought. "Are the interviews you've been taking classified?"

"No, our reports are open to the public. Anyone can request copies. The database is a nightmare to navigate, though."

"Let me know who to contact for the records on this incident. Especially the witness testimonies."

"I take it you're also planning to go through that noise we just heard with a fine-tooth comb?"

"That's hardly the start of it."

If the Axolotl had been convinced of anything during all his conversations with the triangle today, it was that the triangle could barely begin to grasp just what it was he'd done to his dimension and all the dimensions around it—and he did a very poor job of communicating what he did grasp.

And if the Axolotl could prove that—if he could build a convincing argument that the triangle hadn't understood what he'd done, psychologically couldn't understand, that even now he only had the fuzziest comprehension of what he was involved in...

Someday, that triangle's sins would catch up to him. Someday, he would be in the hands of the gods of death and justice, and they would have to decide what fate his actions had earned. And when that day came, it would be the Axolotl's job to ensure that the triangle didn't end up damned or erased from existence.

As it was now, that triangle didn't stand a chance in the multiverse of being found innocent. But there was more than one way to avoid a "guilty" verdict.

By the time the triangle stood before a judge, the Axolotl would make sure that the right laws were in place for him to do what he wanted to do.

####

Where there had been swarms of firefighters earlier, now the scene swarmed with construction workers, working on the emergency genesis of over half a dozen replacement universes—carefully, so that the big bangs didn't do any further damage to an already unstable situation; but quickly. Already every destroyed one-dimensional universe had been replaced. Several half-burned dimensions had been supplanted with oddly-shaped undersized universes that met at the older universes' burned edges; jagged 1D dimensions sealed the gaps between these dimensions like a line of solder between two panes of stained glass.

By now, the flat planes and edges surrounded the zeroth dimension like the sleek shifting surfaces of an infinity-sided die; all except for one last missing wall in the middle of the damage.

Dimension 2 Delta. "Euclydia."

The construction workers were already setting up the scaffolding and equipment to set off another big bang.

As the Axolotl looked at the copious warning signs around the construction site—"DANGER! COSMIC EXPLOSIVES" "GENESIS IN PROGRESS"—the specialized equipment, the veritable army of workers, the mountain of papers the Time Giant had been reviewing earlier to ensure that everything was up to code and nothing would go wrong... he couldn't help but think of the triangle holding the seed of a big bang in his bare glowing hand, threatening to set it off right there. The Axolotl had known it was foolish, but seeing all the workers' preparations put just how reckless it was into perspective. Like a toddler holding a stick of TNT over a campfire.

He spotted the Time Giant among the workers, flickering back and forth across the scene as she tried to literally be multiple places at the same time. When she settled down for a moment over a worktable to double check a pile of blueprints and forms and calculations and even more paperwork, she caught sight of the Axolotl passing by, and tipped her chin up at him in greeting.

He paused, then nodded back to her. No hard feelings. He was just following his principles; and she was just doing her job. They'd each found their own way to help hold up the multiverse.

"Hey," she called out, and gestured for him to come over. As he did, she said, "Your leg's healing nicely."

He glanced down at it. His new toes were stubby, but at least they were back. "I don't like being uneven." He'd take a few more days on his tail. "I'll probably pay for it tomorrow, though." When he finally got home, he'd have to see if he could cancel his morning appointments.

"Reckon we'll all be feeling this tomorrow." She tilted her head toward Dimension Zero. "I've got a message for the god of DIY over there. I think you're the only one he likes—you mind carrying it over?"

####

It wasn't hard to find the triangle; he was leaning against the membrane around the zeroth dimension, moodily staring out at the third. He seemed to be gazing past all the gods, unfazed by their hubbub. The Axolotl tried to see what he was looking at, and didn't spot anything of note. As far as he could tell, the triangle might as well just be stargazing.

Along with the police tape and the ATTF barrier and the long-forgotten cordons to hold off the reporters, there was now an additional grid of orange cones set up blocking anyone from getting too close to the destroyed wall and the construction site. The Axolotl glanced around to make sure no one was paying attention before he slipped past the cones and swam up to the triangle.

When he approached, the triangle was muttering under his breath: "Stupid, now it sounds like an STD. I should've named it something cooler. Like... Triangletopia. Or the Party Plane. Or Margaritaville—I bet no one's ever used that one before..."

"Magister," the Axolotl said.

The triangle's eye snapped to him. "Hey, look at that! The pompous psycho is back! If you're even thinking about sticking me back in your 'office'—"

The Axolotl held up his forelegs appeasingly. "I'm not." He wasn't even crossing the threshold into the triangle's turf. "This is the last time I'll speak to you today."

"Finally, some good news," the triangle grumbled. "What do you w—ha! Ah-haha! I caught myself, that one didn't count."

The Axolotl decided not to count it. "The Time Giant wanted you to know they're about to set off the big bang where Dimension 2 Delta used to be. You probably don't want to be too close to the wall when it goes up."

The triangle's expression darkened; but he just said, "All right. Fine. Have fun. Not my problem! Just keep the construction noises down."

That was all he'd been sent to tell the triangle; but he added, "If you ever want to leave your dream realm, this is your last chance."

The triangle groaned. "This again? Listen, frills, I already told you I'm not interested! And you don't have the right to drag me out, this is my sovereign god territory—"

"I'm not threatening to," the Axolotl said gently. "I just—wanted to make sure you know. If you change your mind later, you physically won't be able to leave."

That gave the triangle pause. "I... don't see why not."

"For something to pass from one dimension to another, it needs a large enough hole to pass through," the Axolotl said. "For a person carrying the mass and energy of an entire universe to cross from one dimension to another... they need a hole the size of a universe. The missing wall where 2Δ was is the size your universe used to be. And now... it's the only exit big enough for you to pass through. Do you understand?"

The triangle stared at him silently. There was that hard, heavy look in his eye. It was awful to see. He did understand.

"If you don't come now..."

"We came up with a way to fit my entire universe into this one," the triangle said. "If I ever want to leave, we'll invent a way to get it back out."

"Your universe didn't fit in without incinerating it."

The triangle tapped the side of his hat with a finger; somewhere inside it was the speck that used to be his universe—the seed of a big bang. "It's travel-sized now. The next time will be easier."

For the first time since seeing the awful ruin of Dimension 2 Delta, the Axolotl forced himself to turn his fearful gaze chronologically forward. He squinted toward the hazy, far-flung future; and then he gave the triangle, in the present, a sorrowful look. "No, it won't," he said. "But I'll do what I can for you."

The triangle stared sullenly at him, unmoved by the offer. "I don't see what you're getting out of helping me. Everyone else is dying to send me to ghost jail or however things work around here."

"Isn't it enough to help you just because you exist and that makes you worth it?"

"If you ever, ever say something like that again, I'll kill you. I will find a way."

He wasn't particularly surprised. But that was truly what the Axolotl believed—and believed strongly enough to guide everything else he did. 

The things this triangle had done were too ghastly for even an ancient, experienced god to fully wrap his head around. Without exaggeration, he might have done the worst thing anyone anywhere in the multiverse had ever done.

But.

But if the Axolotl could prove that he, the worst person ever, was worth giving a second chance—that he could change, that he could show remorse for what he'd done, that he could be a force for good in the multiverse... then he would have proven that everyone, no matter what, was worth it.

The Axolotl had been voted Most Adorably Idealistic, but he'd never been called soft. His ideals were harder than diamond and sharper than obsidian. He hadn't decided to protect the triangle in spite of the impact that might have on the multiverse; he was protecting him because of the impact it could have. 

The Axolotl was a god of justice, of monsters, of second chances, and through his actions he could shape what justice meant throughout the multiverse as if he were sculpting clay; and he thought a small, sharp little equilateral triangle would make a perfect sculpting tool.

"In truth, I just don't believe in punishment. Not even for you." The Axolotl lay a forefoot on Dimension Zero's bubble. "But I don't see why you trust me." Because it was clear the triangle did. He'd trusted the Axolotl to judge the character of the other gods. He'd kept looking toward him like he was trying to gauge his own situation based on the Axolotl's reaction to it. He'd admitted the truth about the remains of his universe and his plans for it. It seemed like the Axolotl was the only one the triangle trusted in all this mess.

The triangle thought that over; then said, "You seem like a grade-A sucker."

He laughed. "I'll try to live up to your opinion of me." He had a guess what kind of people this triangle thought were suckers. The charitable; the caring. The people who didn't think that seeing the worth in everyone was a kind of illness.

"You should know, I intend to legally register my tank as a purgatory. I'll probably submit my application before the end of the week. If you claim it as your afterlife, you'll be transferred to my tank for holding while awaiting trial to decide your final afterlife."

"Ugh, now it all makes sense: you're starting a cult! I don't wanna join your cult, frills—I've got my own."

"But you do want to go straight to your lawyer's office if you're about to go on trial for your sins," the Axolotl said pointedly. "I don't intend to house anyone in my tank permanently. It will just be a transfer place for clients preparing for trial or figuring out where they want to go next—another afterlife, reincarnation... You're already technically dead; you can request at any time to come to my tank, and you'll be there."

"Sounds great for your other clients! But I'm not planning to go on trial and I don't want to be in an afterlife," the triangle said testily. "I'm pretty sure we've been over this!"

"I know you don't. I wish you didn't have to face it. But when you have no choice," the Axolotl said. "When you need it. When your time comes to burn like your people—" (the triangle flinched) "—call me. I'll offer you a second chance at any time."

"Low blow," the triangle muttered. "Don't put yourself out on my account. I'll be fine by myself."

"I'm sure." The Axolotl suspected he'd be putting himself out on the triangle's account for a long time. "What's your name? Your real name."

The background hiss of cosmic noise roared louder. The echoes of billions of erased ghosts said, "THE NAME OF THE MURDERER IS—"

With a flinch, the triangle cranked the distant dance music louder so it spilled cacophonously out of Dimension Zero again. It was too late, though. The Axolotl had heard the triangle's real name.

He pretended he hadn't. He waited.

The triangle didn't answer for a long moment. "You probably wouldn't be able to pronounce it."

"Maybe not." He'd seen how the triangle had winced hearing the cloud try to pronounce the name of some other shape. "I still want to know who you are."

He wrestled with his words; then finally gave up and asked his question. "What... is this place? We're not in the third dimension. When I—freed my dimension, I expected to go up; but we went... down. I didn't know there was a down." He confessed his ignorance in a near whisper, almost drowned out by his own music.

"You're in Dimension Zero." But that wasn't right. Dimension Zero was—should be—a point, and it's impossible to be "in" a point. A point simply is. "You are Dimension Zero."

The triangle said, "Then call me King Zero."

The Axolotl considered that. "Yes," he said. "I think that is your name."

Someone shouted, "Clear the way!"��One worker at the construction site was looking directly at the Axolotl. "That means you! Unless you wanna be boiled frog legs!"

"I'm not a frog," the Axolotl muttered; but, he turned one last time to newly-crowned King Zero, said, "Call me," then hastily swam to the safe side of the orange cone barricade.

"Five, four, three..."

The Axolotl watched the triangle—and the triangle watched him—until the detonation. The big bang went off in a flash of light bright enough it would have incinerated anyone in the vicinity had it not been contained to a flat plane.

When the Axolotl looked away from the light, the afterimage of a triangle was burned into the center of his vision.

Dimension Zero was sealed off from the rest of reality—locking its king in for the next trillion years.

####

When the triangle said his name was "King Zero," of course, he wasn't speaking English. English wouldn't exist for a long time. The name King Zero is simply a convenient translation.

The English word "zero" comes from the French zéro. Zéro comes from Italian zefiro. Zefiro comes from Medieval Latin zephirum. And zephirum comes from the Arabic صِفْر—ṣifr.

####

Centuries ago, in the dream of a naive, trusting human, the human asked in Arabic, "What should I call you?" And King Zero responded, "Call me Ṣifr."

And years later, a dreaming human asked in Medieval Latin, "What should I call you, o muse of mathematics?" And of the two Latin words descended from his current Arabic nickname, Ṣifr responded with the one he thought was closer: "Call me Cifra."

A dreaming human asked in Old French, "What's your name?" And he replied, "My name's Cyffre."

Speaking Middle English, he told a dreaming human, "My name's Siphre."

And in Modern English, he told Edward Bishop Bishop, "The name's Cipher. But you can call me Bill."

In a year's time, and two years before his death from sleep deprivation, Edward would write Flatworld, a book about a 2D shape and his Muse journeying up to the highest dimensions; and also all the way down, below the spaces and planes and lines, to the self-absorbed King Zero, buried in the point-sized zeroth dimension, who thought a whole universe was contained inside him.

####

(It's FINISHED. 🎉🎉🎉

Hi y'all, if you just joined us for this Axolotl plot arc, usually this is a post-canon human Bill fic. I took a break from the main plot for one week to post a one-chapter flashback and then it was nine chapters. This bitch is 50k words. It's a novel unto itself.

Anyway if you only showed up for this story about the Ax, it only exists in service of a much longer story; so if you enjoyed this check out the rest of the fic. This is technically chapter 69 (lol). (If human Bill isn't usually your thing, I've been told that this is The Human Bill Fic For People Who Don't Like Human Bills because Bill is clearly very much a triangle unhappily trapped in a human body, rather than just chill with being human—so you might wanna give it a shot.)

And for the regulars who are already reading the whole fic: OH MY GOD IT'S FINALLY FINISHED, WE'RE FREE, WE CAN RETURN TO THE PRESENT. Listen I love the Ax and his bizarre but unbending morality, but guys. Guys. I miss Mabel so much.

Pre-warning that I may end up needing to skip a chapter or two before the end of the year, because work's piling a LOTTA extra work on me this month and I might just flat out not have time to edit & do art. I'm up at 3 a.m. editing & queueing this post and I was up til 3 a.m. another night doing the art because I HAVE NOT HAD TIME this week to do it any earlier. I did this because I love y'all.

No that's a lie, I did this because I want to FINISH this DANG ARC. That's my birthday gift to me.

Anyway lemme know what y'all think!! 💕)

[yuujispinkhair]

sukuna who's over heels with y/n, but y/n is stupidly in love with yuuji who is falling in love with megumi?!

Omggg I love this!!!! Thank you for sending me this 💗

Modern!Sukuna x Reader (female)

Fluff. Hurt & Comfort. Friends to lovers. 2k words. Unrequited love/pining in the beginning. Sukuna and Reader get their happy end (Yuuji gets his happy end with Megumi). Mentions of cigarettes + alcohol. All characters are of age. Minors don't interact. Divider @/benkeibear

Sukuna can only shake his head at the irony. He is in love. He is fucking in love for the first time in his life, and of course, it has to be someone he cannot have! Out of everyone at this stupid college, it has to be the girl who likes his brother!

If it were any other guy, Sukuna wouldn't give a fuck and just flirt like hell with the girl he wants and give his best to steal her away from that other guy. But the problem is that Itadori Sukuna might be an asshole, but he isn't the type of asshole that would steal his brother's girl.

So Sukuna swallows down his heartbreak and forces himself to hold back, refusing to stand in the way of his baby brother's happiness. Sukuna might only be three minutes older, but he is still the big bro, still the one who sees it as his responsibility to look after his "little" brother. And Yuuji deserves it. He deserves a girl like you. He deserves your love. Sukuna will stay strong. He can do it.

But what Sukuna didn't take into account is how completely oblivious his brother is to your feelings.

You follow Yuuji around like a lost puppy, giving him hearteyes, practically swooning anytime he smiles his sunshine smile, hanging on his lips when he talks about his movie-directing classes and his new favorite TV show. But Yuuji doesn't seem to notice. And it makes Sukuna so mad! It drives him crazy! He almost spits his drink out when his brother gives you a high five and calls you "bro".

Sukuna feels sick to his stomach when he watches you wring your hands and shyly ask Yuuji if he maybe wants to go to the cinema with you to see the newest Human Earthworm movie. That super trashy horror series that Yuuji is always gushing about, which Sukuna is 99% sure you don't really like but only want to endure for the boy you have a big crush on.

But Sukuna's oblivious idiot of a brother just laughs and nods, happy that someone shares his taste, and totally misses the point,

"Yes, that's perfect! Let's also ask Megumi and Nobara to join us! Let's all go together! It will be so much fun!"

Sukuna thinks he can not only feel his own heart ache but also yours as he sees your face fall even while you force yourself to nod bravely and smile a sad smile at Yuuji.

It takes everything in Sukuna not to say something. But his restraint only lasts until he is alone with his brother. The moment the others have left, he shoves Yuuji into the wall, grabs his collar, and growls at him,

"You are so fucking dumb, brat! I would give anything to be in your shoes, but you don't even see that she wants you!"

And Yuuji blinks at him, all big eyes and completely confused,

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

Sukuna lets go of Yuuji, slumping against the wall next to him, sighing and explaining the situation to him. How Sukuna likes you, and how you like Yuuji, and how everything is such a mess, and how much he hates it, especially when his little brother is too blind to see what he could have!

"Now you know, brat. Go, get her. Just don't rub it in my face, ok? I'll stay away as much as possible."

Sukuna pushes himself off the wall, about to run away and hide in some dark corner or maybe find someone to fuck and distract him from all this shit. But to his utter surprise, Yuuji's hand darts out and grabs Sukuna's sleeve.

"Wait, Kuna! I don't even have those kinds of feelings for her! There is... um... well, there is actually someone else I like."

He stands there, scratching his neck, looking sheepishly at Sukuna and blushing a bit as Sukuna stares at him with question marks in his eyes.

"Who??"

"Um, he has black hair and likes dogs and... ah shit."

And Sukuna can't help it. He bursts out laughing, doubling over because this is just so fucking dumb and messy and getting more complicated every second, and he probably should have known!

"Damn, brat, that really sounds like you! Falling for your best friend!"

In the end, Sukuna plays matchmaker for Yuuji and Megumi. It's easy, considering the way Fushiguro has been looking at Yuuji since the first day he met him. And yeah, Sukuna is not only doing it because he loves his baby brother but also because of selfish reasons. Because it means you will have to let go of your crush on Yuuji. Not that Sukuna thinks you will turn to him, but at least he won't have to watch you date his brother and pretend he doesn't care!

It feels like someone is stabbing Sukuna's heart when he watches your face twist in pain at the next party when you see Yuuji walking into the room with Megumi's hand in his.

But it will be fine! After all, Sukuna is here to catch you and mend your broken heart again. As a friend, at least.

He quickly follows you when you leave the room and run towards the backyard. You sit down on the slightly damp grass, and Sukuna joins you, sitting silently next to you while tears run down your cheeks. Sukuna offers you his half-smoked cigarette, and when your eyes meet, he can't help but think that surely you must see the pain in his eyes, too.

He quickly takes a sip from the bottle he is holding to hide the emotions threatening to swallow him while silently cursing himself for following you out here. He misjudged how fucking hard it is to look at you when you are crying. If only Sukuna could just close the distance between you and claim you as his, just kiss all your pain and his pain away.

But of course, he knows it would be too soon. For once in his life, Sukuna doesn't just want to be a one-night stand or a rebound or a revenge fuck or whatever. For once in his life, he wants more. He wants everything.

And so Sukuna is patient. Just offers you his silent company, his cigarette, his bottle of vodka, and his leather jacket when it gets chilly, and you start to shiver. He offers you his friendship, his protection, and the kind of comfort he can give without fucking you. He drives you home, makes sure you have something to eat and get some sleep.

He bangs on your door three days later when you still haven't come back to campus, calling you a brat and an idiot because it's the only way he knows how to show his worry. But he hopes he's making it better by shoving a vanilla latte and a bag with muffins from your favorite coffee shop into your hands.

Your eyes look puffy from crying, and you seem confused about what he is doing here, but you take the food and coffee from him. And Sukuna smirks at you and refuses to leave when you tell him you look like hell and don't want him to see you like that.

"I don't care, princess. Eat those damn muffins and drink your latte before it gets cold. I didn't stand in line for half an hour for you to just ignore my treats. And by the way, you always look pretty to me."

He stays until you had breakfast and took a shower, coming back to the living area with a soft,

"Thank you, Sukuna. It was nice of you to bring me muffins and coffee."

Sukuna finally leaves, lifting one tattooed hand to casually wave at you as if his heart isn't about to burst because he wants to pull you against his chest and hold you and tell you he can make you happy again.

He skips some of his classes and instead goes to the gym, working out like a madman and beating up a punching bag until he is too exhausted to think about how sad you looked and how fucking much he wants to kiss it better.

He comes back the next day to pick you up and take you to the coffee shop with him, making sure you leave the house and join the living again! It cannot be that you are crying your eyes out in your room all day!

"Stop complaining and get your bratty ass off the couch! It will be good for you to get some fresh air and shit. I am warning you if you don't put on shoes in the next 30 seconds, I will make you walk to the coffee shop in socks!"

Oh yes, Sukuna is good at this. Acting grumpy and playing the asshole while taking care of you and making sure you are ok. And somehow, you are the only one, apart from his brother, who can see right through him because you roll your eyes and laugh softly and tell him that he is the nicest asshole you have ever met.

The two of you fall into a routine where Sukuna picks you up every morning and has breakfast with you before he walks you to your first class. You constantly grow closer, and Sukuna feels his mask slipping more often around you. His typical arrogant smirk softens into a genuine smile. His snide comments turn into compliments. He isn't sure if he is doing it by accident or intentionally. Maybe he is only reacting to the way you act around him.

Because your gaze doesn't follow his brother anymore. Your face doesn't fall when you see Yuuji with Megumi. Your smile doesn't falter when you spot pink hair and realize it's the bad boy twin with the tattoos and not the good boy twin with the sunshine smile. Sukuna even feels like your smile is growing brighter when you look at him.

Could it be?

And he notices more things. Notices how you always sit so close to him now when he is at your dorm and you play video games against each other. How you always laugh at his jokes, no matter how sarcastic they are. Or how you look at him sometimes when you think he doesn't realize it. How your eyes get that dreamy little sparkle when Sukuna is sleepy, and his voice gets low and a bit raspy. How you get goosebumps on your arms when Sukuna puts his hands on your hips to steer you through a crowded room.

A few weeks later, Sukuna finds himself back at the same spot where all those weeks ago, it all began. Sitting next to you in the grass in the small backyard of your friend's dorm, where you cried when Yuuji broke your heart.

But tonight, you aren't crying. Tonight, you are smiling and throwing your head back, laughing at some dry joke Sukuna makes, looking so carefree and happy. Your shoulder is brushing against Sukuna's biceps, and your hand lands on his thigh, giving it a playful smack and staying just a little too long. And Sukuna can't help but say in that low voice, you seem to like so much,

"You are so beautiful."

For a split second, he feels his chest tense up, scared that he fucked everything up. Scared that he got it wrong and you still want his brother. Or maybe some other guy. Scared that you only see Sukuna as a good friend. Or that you only see him the way the whole campus sees him: as that sexy, asshole guy who is only good for casual sex and nothing more.

But then you turn your head to look at him, and Sukuna sees that soft expression in your eyes, the one he used to see on your face when you looked at his brother. But now it is for him, for Sukuna. And he simply knows without you having to spell it out. He knows that things have truly changed.

So, Sukuna decides to do what he wanted to do for a long time.

"I am sorry that you cried the last time we were in this backyard. But I am not sorry for why it happened. My brother is an idiot for not wanting you like that. But I am glad he is an idiot because otherwise, I wouldn't be able to do this..."

And Sukuna puts a hand under your chin, cupping it with a gentleness he didn't know he possessed while looking deeply into your eyes, checking one last time if he really got it right. You look at him with wide eyes, but you smile and nod softly as your gaze travels down to his lips.

And Sukuna sighs and presses his lips gently against yours, kissing you like he never kissed someone before, slow and gentle, as if he is scared you will break or slip through his fingers. A kiss with his eyes closed and his chest filling with a warmth he didn't know until now. A kiss into which Sukuna pours all the secret longing he felt for you for months, all the feelings he tried to hold back for his brother's sake and then for the sake of not fucking things up.

But finally, he doesn't have to hold back anymore. Because you chose him. You chose Sukuna. You are sitting here with him, with your hand in his hair and your lips moving slowly against his, a happy sigh and a soft murmur of his name falling from your lips.

The two of you only stop kissing when Sukuna's head is already spinning from the lack of oxygen. He pulls away only enough to grin at you and stroke your cheek with his thumb. And you smile back at him and whisper,

"I am glad, too, that Yuuji turned me down. Because otherwise I wouldn't have found out that it's his brother who is my perfect match. I wouldn't have found out that you, Itadori Sukuna, are the one I like the most out of everyone."

AAAHHH I LOVE HIM SO MUCH 😭😭 Thank you so much for sending me this ask. I see Sukuna + unrequited love/pining and I lose my mind!! It's my weakness and makes me so so soft for him (even more than usual).

I hope you liked this little hurt/comfort story!! Comments and reblogs would be very sweet 💗

[lovelyyandereaddictionpoint]

If your taking requests can you please do Yandere Tengen uzui and his wives with a reader who died and was born as Tengens wives. ( a bit like recantation mawhnas)

Reincarnated Wife to be | Yandere Uzui Tengen + Wives

Being reborn into the world of shinobi is hard

Your higher intelligence is helpful for somethings but it still doesn’t compare to strength training before you can properly walk

Not to mention its the Taishō era 

Everything is different 

No plumbing 

No typical school

And on top of all that demons are alive and well

In your new lifetime demons don’t physically appear until your early teens

“That man…”

“Yeah a demon. Those overpowered slugs got to our target before us.”

It’s brutal 

That the clan you come from was just so nonchalant of an epidemic on humanity

That was arguably much more brutal then sending a shuriken before an unsuspecting person’s eyes

You only realize they intend to give you away when you hear whispers of the arranged marriage

“He’s the only one who’s survived…”

“Ah he must have the best genes…”

“....or the only one who actually can learn from those graves on their property.”

“What are they at….six?”

The final nail in the coffin is when your prepped to meet with your fellow wives

“Make sure you take note of their weaknesses. It’ll make all the difference when it comes to his favorites.”

Your hesitant

By now you recognize the venue, your sister wives, his surname

But despite how cool it is you don’t want to marry the future sound hashira

You know how it goes��

And your not sure if you’d survive with your addition to the other wives

So you run

Using your built up skill and knowledge to get as far as you can from your family if you could call it that

Your plan is to hide in someplace until you can gather enough wisteria to give yourself a private sanctuary

In the meantime you try to find the mineral of nichirin

Enough for you to craft a decent weapon that bodes well when demons occassionaly attack you

For years you’re sure your scott-free 

Able to slowly widdle at the demon’s population in your little sanctuary 

That is until you stop at the sound of jingling chains from the roof

“I heard there were talks about a mysterious ninja outside of demon corp! To think it’d be just who I was looking for!” 

You barely escape a young but powerful demon slayer who you can’t seem to decipher

Is he trying to kill you? 

To catch you?

Why does he keep following?

You hold up pretty well for a while unil you narrowly dodge a star thrown in your direction

“We really liked you (Y/n). Why’d you choose to run away?”

If it wasn’t worse already all three of them seem to arrive from the shadows to continue their assault

You try to reason with them 

“Can’t you understand?! I didn’t want to be forced to marry some guy I didn’t know!”

“But you knew us! Doesn’t that make it better?!”

“No it really doesn’t!”

It’s getting overwhelming 

So unless you’ve mastered some kind of style of your own

They’ll overpower you

“Yack!” 

Your strength is preying on their care for one another 

Sending an unusual violent kick toward Hinatsuru 

You take advantage of them running to help her

Easily disarming a distracted Tengen, you run off 

But you aren’t home free 

For whatever reason your ex-fiancees are just so hung up about you 

And between Uzui’s new occupation he’s aiming for your capture

“You’re just as flashy as I’d hoped! When I do win, there’s sure to be fireworks.”

[st7rnioioss]

۶ৎ HANDYMAN!CHRIS x NEIGHBOR!READER

neighbor!reader getting back at handyman!chris after he stole her underwear..

˚𝜗𝜚 warnings... mentions of masturbation (m), swearing

the soft sound of your feet padding across the floor was the only thing that could be heard as you opened your front door, and stepped outside. keeping the door open, you took one or two steps onto chris’s doormat, knocking three times on the door.

waiting patiently, the cold breeze from the staircase gently blew by you, leaving a small trail of goosebumps. suddenly, almost messily with a faint ‘fuck!’ behind the door, it flew open.

your eyes met chris’s, before they trailed down his form. he was wearing a white tank top, along with grey sweatpants. his hair was tousled, and you could tell he hadn’t shaved in a couple days. “oh- hey there,” he then spoke with a gruff voice, rubbing his eye. it left you to wonder if you’d just woken him up, but that made no difference.

“hi, chris. um- i was just wondering if you could help me with the sink? it’s, um, well. it’s rather messed up,” you smiled with a soft voice, pointing over your shoulder to motion for your apartment. “i mean, if you’re not in a hurry or anything.”

he definitely wasn’t. he’d just been woken up by your knocking, almost shocked when he saw your pretty face ask for help.

“uh- yeah. sure, it’s not problem. i’ll just go get a few things.. just wait inside, you uh- you must be cold,” yeah, he knew you were cold from the way his eyes trailed down to your hardened nipples beneath the tank top you had on. his eyes trailed back up to your face, offering you a smile before he turned back around to find whatever he needed.

returning the smile, you went back inside, leaving the door open for him. no, the sink wasn’t broken. the sink actually worked perfectly fine for that matter. you just wanted to see chris, who’d snooped through your underwear, so what else could you do than loosen the pipes a little?

not long after, chris stepped into your apartment, closing the door behind him. you returned from the bathroom, giving him a small wave. “come on, it’s in the bathroom. there’s, like, a wet mess under the sink,” you said while walking him to the bathroom, before you both stepped inside.

“oh, yeah. that’s not a problem, it’ll only take a second,” his eyes flickered from the wet stain back to your eyes, while you just nodded, acting completely dumb and clueless. “thank you!” you chirped, watching him awkwardly fit under the counter, just like you’d done prior.

while he worked on the pipe, you chitchatted. he explained that his door was acting up, and you were confused as to why he didn’t just fix it—he knew so much anyway. you talked about your studies and how boring university is, while chris spoke about his business,

“have you also.. lost some clothes?” you said with a smirk, that he couldn’t see, leaning against the counter. you knew exactly where those panties you lost a week ago had gone—chris’s pocket. immediately he went flushed, which you also couldn’t see. thank god for that.

“um, no. uh- not really. ma-maybe, like, a sock?” he lied straight through his teeth, well aware of the panties he had sneaked out of your laundry basket and later fisted around his cock.

“but um- no. nothing other than that. it’s odd,” he muttered, getting back up from under the counter. “yeah, it’s odd.. well, it’s whatever. thank you again!” you smiled at him again, meeting his eyes in a form of unannounced stare contest, that he then broke off.

“it’s no problem. just- just give me a call if you have any other problems,” he rubbed the back of his neck, praying that the pink tint had worn off his cheeks. it hadn’t.

more neighbor!reader x handyman!chris here!

۶ৎ taglist: @jetaimevous @missmimii @mattscoquette @pearlzier @witchofthehour @elizasturn @loveparqdise @delilahsturniolo @phone4pills @sturnsmia @hearts4werka @cayleeuhithinknott @strnilolover @sturnvxz @lovergirl4gracieabrams @ifwdominicfike @toftomgmf @emely9274 @sturnioloangell @blushsturns

© ST7RNIOIOSS est. 2023

[thelikesoffinn]

„Astarion ending as the Vampire Ascendant is the correct ending for him, because it is what he wants.”

That is a claim I’ve been seeing pop up more and more often these days. And I think it’s both a very bold and a very odd claim to make.

But first things first: Hello, I’m a licensed social worker! So far, I’ve worked with children, refugees and youths with behavioural issues stemming from bullying and or abuse.

Please be aware that I will be mentioning different kinds of abuse, coping mechanisms, and victim/abuser relationships. If any of this is difficult for you, don’t force yourself through it. My jabbering about a traumatised vampire is not worth your wellbeing, not ever.

I will, however try to stick to Astarion and not use other examples. If, in any case, I do use a non-Astarion example, I’ll add a warning beforehand so that you can skip the part. And I’ll make it clear what will be discussed in the next bit, so that you have a chance to skip it entirely.

This is an effort to make this as accessible as possible for everyone that wants to indulge on a mad woman’s rambling – and I know there’s a few people that like this sort of stuff!

And, uh, there's obviously spoilers for all three acts. Serious spoilers, even.

Before I can get into the whole ‘why Astarion didn’t really want to ascend,’ we need to understand him a little more. And to understand this pretty boy’s brain, we first need to understand the gist of what we’re talking about when we throw around the word ‘abuse.’

“Abuse” is when someone is treated with cruelty, violence, or neglect – often to bad effect – on a regular basis. Repetitively. Check’s out for Astarion, I’d say, but we all knew that already. I mean, if one thing was obvious, it was this.

1. Astarions Abuse

Next we need to look at what kind of abuse Astarion faced over his long years of torment, seeing as different types of abuse will have different effects on the victim.

Not that that is anything we have to worry about with him – Astarion won the abuse lottery, to put it bluntly. In a horrible game of fate, he got everything. He himself indirectly mentions all the types of abuse he faced, albeit never using the correct terms.

The first we properly notice – fitting, seeing as it is often the most obvious form of abuse – is the physical abuse. Astarions scars are probably the biggest tell Larian could shove down our throats, only underlined by Astarion’s tale about the night itself. About how Cazador ‘misspelled something’ every time he flinched or screamed and had to do ‘many corrections. On top of this, Cazador locked Astarion up for months on end and tortured him – or had him tortured – on a regular basis both as a rite and as a punishment.

Next up, we have the fact that Astarion was forced to basically prostitute himself repeatedly. This is what we call sexual exploitation.

“I spent two hundred years using my body to lure pretty things back for my Master.” – Act 2

Two hundred years is a long time, filled with great many people. Now, we don’t know how many of those people actually tapped into the sexual exploitation and how many he could just lure back with other means, but the fact that it happened a lot is undeniable.

Next we have a form of abuse that we often disregard in adults: Neglect. It sounds odd, I know, saying that a fully grown adult was neglected. They can care for themselves, can they not?

Well. Yes and no.

Adult neglect is proceeded by the condition that one adult has to lean on another adult to fulfil their needs for whatever reason. This could be anything, from disability to income-based issues.  

Seeing as Astarion had absolutely nothing, while Cazador had everything, we can assume this was the case. Cazador had the house, the money, the power. Astarion owns but one pair of clothes, assumedly, that he has fixes over and over again. Fair to say, that’s pretty neglectful. (And it’s one more reason to shower the guy in pretty armour and camp clothes. Go ham, people.)

Last we have the form of abuse we actually get to witness later in the game – emotional abuse.

Once again, it’s undeniable that this happened. Especially since we’re all seeing it in the flesh upon meeting Cazador in his crypt.

“Have you no respect for yourself?”

“I strove for perfection in all things. Even those as imperfect as you.”

“A pity you amounted to so little, despite my efforts.”

“A pathetic little boy who never amounted to anything.”

All Act 3, Crypt

Here we have just a few examples of things Cazador throws in his face. It’s like reading a textbook on emotional abuse, this one (and it’s definitely a reason to throw hands).

Blaming the victim, keeping their sense of self and their self-worth as tiny as possible to make them cower and flee. A true classic.

This pretty much shows that Astarion suffered all forms of abuse we commonly see and it is implied – once again by Astarion himself – that at least a few of those instances were ritualistic.

Now, what does that mean exactly? Well, I fear I need to use a real example here, so please skip the next paragraph.

Ritualistic doesn’t refer to a proper ritual – it can, but that’s mostly a thing for those in a cult. So, we’re not necessarily talking about a ‘Vampire Ascendent Ritual’. A husband, beating his wife every evening after his third bottle of beer is also called ritual abuse. It happens regularly. It is part of a routine. Both parties know what will happen.

I can’t find the exact quote, so I’m working of my memory here, but at one point he said that when Cazador invited him to eat and he said yes, he would be served a putrid rat. If he said no, he’d be beaten.

The way it was phrased made it clear that it happened more than once and that Astarion clearly knew what would happen. So, this can be classified as ritualistic abuse.

2. A Note on Conditioning and Compliance

By default, abuse victims are conditioned to behave a certain way or in a certain fashion. This is a natural response to avoid further abuse.

In Astarion, the thing we see most often is his inherent need to please. Not literally, he doesn’t mind being an arsehole. But he initially feels the need to follow Tav’s orders, even if they go against his own wishes.

This can be clearly seen in the conversation with Araj Oblodra. Astarion very clearly doesn’t want to bite her. He doesn’t. But he will do so, if Tav tells him to. This behaviour is not conscious – he doesn’t know why he does it, he just does – and it is to be expected. This is how he kept himself save for two centuries, so of course he will fall back into his usual pattern when the pressure is high.

This goes hand in hand with the fact that most abuse victims don’t fight. Maybe initially, but not after long term abuse. Especially not after two fucking centuries.

This is true in Astarion – offered by his ‘siblings’ during act 3 and unhappily acquiesced by the man himself. Astarion stopped fighting and, once again implied, cowered, and did as he was told in order to survive.

3. The Astarion we know and love

Obviously, all that abuse does have an impact on our vampire boyfriend. He shows various common signs of abuse and just like with the forms of abuse, Astarion raked every coping mechanism he could find. (Not really, but it feels like it.) It’s also important to note that nearly all of the following things happen inwardly. Astarion is not one of the victims, that tries to rationalise and minimise the actions of his abuser. Quite the opposite, actually.

I’ll note from the beginning, that rationalisation will not be covered in this bit, as most examples will be important later on. But he definitely does it.

One of his biggest skills is to hide every ounce of fear or hurt behind sarcasm and snarky theatrics. He doesn’t seem to hide his anger much, though, so that’s something! Our boy is cool with anger, not so much with being afraid.

“Ahahaha, now that you mention it….I might have done…that.” – Act 3, regarding the Gur children

“The thing that will decide my fate forever more? Yeees, it’s been on my miiiind. Why?” – Act 2, regarding the Ritual

And there’s many more instances that prove this. Honestly, half his dialogue is sarcasm, so it would really be too long to get into and we all know what I mean, right? We have alltalked to the guy before. It’s obvious that he’s sarcastic to a fault.

This goes hand in hand with his penchant for defensiveness. I would personally state that he’s simply not really good with guilt. When talking about fear, he usually just opts for sarcasm or avoids the topic completely, but guilt especially has his defences going up. This is also when he’s most likely to shove all the blame off to Cazador.

“Don’t look at me like that. Cazadors orders.” – Act 3, Crypt

“I just did what I had to!” – Act 3, Crypt

And don’t get me wrong, he does that anyway. And with good reason. Astarion didn’t have a choice for the most part, but he’s still easy to shove things off.

This kind of connects to his penchant for denial.

Astarion doesn’t really like to talk about most things. He firmly believes he is an ‘action’ sort of person that just does instead of plans, which invertedly just means he’s great at pushing the thinking stuff away. He also likes to get rid of stuff, so that he doesn’t need to face it ever again.

“I never want to see these little scraps of misery again. The world doesn’t need to know my shame.” – Act 3, about the children

And yes, this partly rings true. He’s probably ashamed and doesn’t want anyone to know what he’s done. But it’s also very clear that he himself simply doesn’t want to face his own actions, something that is just  underlined by his extreme willingness to red rid of the other spawn.

As mentioned by Astarion himself, he’s big on manipulation. I mean, I don’t think there is much explaining necessary. The guy is willing to do a whole lot in order to get what he desires – which mostly revolves around safety and survival, to be honest – and he’s not really shy about it either. And that’s despite the fact that he doesn’t really like intimacy – especially in form of sex.

It’s not a secret that Astarion is not big on sex and anything surrounding it. This goes far enough for people to consider him either ace or ace coded.

A claim that, personally, I’m not super in line with.

Now, it’s not entirely wrong and if this is your head cannon I’m surely not going to stand in your way – but on a larger spectrum, I think he’s more traumatised than ace. And while those go hand in hand sometimes, it’s a bit difficult for the ace community if you attach traumatised characters to them because it can fuel a whole lot of stigma that is honestly neither needed nor wanted. But I digress!

If it comes to his own behaviour, he’s great at minimising his mistakes. Honestly, he’s a master of minimisation. A very obvious and famous example would be:

“’Killed’ feels like a…strong word. Not many corpses have your vigour.” – Act 1, after killing Tav

Astarion. You literally sucked poor Tav dry and left them flopping around, cold, and dead. Killed is exactly the right word and we all know it.

“Quite the deviation from my usual routine. Capture, not lure. I didn’t bring them in with sweet rolls or anything.” – Act 3, Gur Children

This is another attempt at minimising what he did, if a bit less obvious because at this point there isn’t much he can say. But at least he didn’t sexualise the gur children, right? They’re still spawn but whoo, at least that didn’t happen.  

The next point would be dissociation, which is extremely common in abuse victims – of all forms of abuse.

Astarion himself mentioned certain moments that could be classified as dissociation over course of the story, which is probably the coping mechanism I personally expected the most.

The pale elf has a penchant for violence, but he’s not entirely shameless or abhorrently vile, which gets clearer the more the story progresses. So, two hundred years of forced prostitution, torture and doing whatever other horrible things? Yeah, I’d be more surprised if he didn’t dissociate.

Examples of that would be:

“A moment of disgust to push myself through and then I could’ve carried on, just like before.” – Act 2, after Araj

“I felt nothing the moment I handed them over.” – Act 3, Gur Children

“Did you enjoy it? It felt like you weren’t fully there.” – Act 1, Tav after Sex

The latter is generally more of an assumption than actual prove, but with context it does make sense.

The last common sign of abuse we find in our boyfriend would be his low self-worth. It’s a consistent trait that stays over the course of all three acts, noticeable in many different conversations.

We can see it in his reaction to wanting to break up before finishing his story. We can see it in his genuine surprise when Tav picks him over any of the other characters. We see it in his insecurity whenever Tav asks to sleep with another character. He’s fine with it, but he still worries their decision to sleep with someone else is based on something he did.

It eases up ever so slightly after Cazador is dead, but even then he’s still struggling which is once again perfectly illustrated if you try to break up with him.

“Oh shit. I- Did I do something wrong?”

That is the first thing he asks and I think it speaks for itself. He genuinely doesn’t believe he has much to offer and for Astarion, it’s likely that Astarion will always be the problem.

4. "Oh, I tried them all none of them answered.”

Another big thing that’s important to note, is that Astarion was never saved. No one came to save him from Cazador. There was no darling boy on a white steed riding into that castle to rescue him and princess carry him away. Not even the gods answered his desperate calls.

So, he never received any kindness or luck. To him, the world seems as cruel and horrid as before because he didn’t have the chance to experience goodness in two centuries.

But worse than that, he didn’t even get to save himself. Astarion didn’t stand up to Cazador, he didn’t run out of his own might.

He was beaten to near death and ‘saved’ by Cazador, who would become his abuser.

He tried to save someone and, in turn, was locked up and starved for an entire year.

He was abducted by mind flayers, i.e., saved from Cazador, only to end up tadpoled and on the cusp of getting a fancy, squiddy beard.

Anything that’s good, any kindness, any selfless action…it all came with a ginormous price tag.

5. Over the Course of the Story

Astarions behaviour changes a whole lot over the course of three acts – which is important once we talk about his quests climax – so let’s review what we’re working with!

Act 1 Astarion is guarded as fuck. The man has walls around him that are so high, even the gods can touch them.

A lot of his behaviour in act 1 revolves around staying save and staying liked. He lies, manipulates, and flutters his lashes in order to get what he wants and needs. Instead of asking, like Wyll, Karlach and Gale do, Astarion uses all he has to offer to get by. He is still very much in survival mode and tries to weasel his way through an unfamiliar situation with familiar methods.

On top of that, and most notably, he’s absolutely not fond of kindness or selflessness.

#I saved a child and now my boyfriend is mad

Here, we are most likely to gain disapproval for doing the decent thing – unless you sent him outside for a minute whenever you’re being a good person.

And I’d assume that this is because of two things.

First: The very traditional ‘Why not me?’

As I mentioned before, Astarion wasn’t saved. He hasn’t experienced kindness in a very long time so seeing that the world is literally filled with kind people is hurtful. Why didn’t anyone save him? Why was he left to his own devices for so long? Why should he care about others when it’s so clear that no one ever cared about him? No, dead to all of them. If he didn’t get it, neither will they.

“And what am I owed? What about the injustices I suffered? Am I not entitled to anything?” – Act 3, Crypt

“I was in the prime of my life when I was turned. Everything was taken from me too.” – Act 3, Crypt

And secondly is the fact that, as I mentioned, goodness always has a price. And it’s one most people won’t be willing to pay. That’s how his life has been, so why would theirs be different?

This is precisely why Astarion may disapprove of kind actions, but he mostly neither approves nor disapproves if Tav asks for payment. That’s just how the world works.

Once you venture out into act 2, after getting to know him a whole lot more, he starts to mellow a bit – if only towards Tav.

“He’s afraid, so afraid, of everyone but you, who she should fear the most.” – Sceleritas about Astarion

His approval is a lot easier to gain – or at least keep! – and he tends to approve of some more proper actions. He doesn’t throw a fit if you promise to find Mol, he approves of Tav being kind to His Majesty, of saving Aylin and he even approves of Durge apologising to Isobel after threatening to rip her to pieces.

He's slowly starting to open up, allowing Tav to see some parts of him he previously kept hidden. He accepts their offer to help, if hesitantly and, by god, the man starts experimenting with boundaries.

The social worker in me is shedding tears at this. It’s my favourite thing to see in my clients and it’s no different here. Yay to saying no!

Of course, it’s still a bit hit or miss. If Tav urges him to bite Araj, for example, he will only to later notice that he didn’t fucking have to. He recognises this on his own and he calls Tav out on it. Just like he calls them out on not helping him with his Orthon quest.

Good job, chap. Good fucking job.

And the growth-train won’t stop going even as we reach act 3.

In act 3, there’s not many things he disapproves as of right now – those he does, mostly have to do with how Tav treats him and not with anyone else. In fact, he’s more likely to approve good behaviour now, like giving Yenna food or money.

And yes, we need to consider that this could simply be because he gets used to Tav’s behaviour and just learns to roll with it. But it’s also highly likely that he notices that there’s truly good people around. At least one person. And that person is not only good, no, they’re in the process of helping him break free once and for all.

They’re helping him save himself.

By act 3, he has learned that he can absolutely say his piece where Tav is concerned and he’s more likely to disagree with them on certain things. It’s seen during a lot of small dialogue that he’s no longer terribly afraid to be honest with them, willing to listen and talk and he’ll ask for help if he needs it.

“I can do this. But I need your help.” – Act 3, Crypt

Something that can be viewed both positively and negatively is that he’s definitely loyal to a fault. He will stick by Tav’s side, no matter what.

“I really hoped we could avoid being pawns for a dark god, but here we are, I suppose. I’m with you, my dear, wherever this might lead.” – Act 3, After Jaheira confronts durge

As I said, this can be both positive and negative. On one count, it’s a recipe for disaster, seeing as he could be waltzing into a really bad situation for Tav alone.

But on the other side…this is a man who only cared about himself because that is the only person he could afford to care about. He needed to survive. He now has enough room to breathe and the capacity to care for someone else and I’d be inclined to count that as a good thing.

6. The Crypt

All the progress he made in act 2 and 3 is nearly tossed into the wind as soon as the crew enters Cazadors castle.

It’s not an immediate thing, of course.

At first, Astarion tries to stay light and simple and he hides behind flippant tones and relaxed faces. The way he recounts this is almost comically disinterested and the façade is actually quite good.

It’s start’s cracking after we meet Godie, one of the people who tortured him on more than one account, but he mostly manages to remain as upbeat as one can honestly expect for the first half of the journey.

All that, however, is done for the very moment we meet Sebastian. His mask not only slips, no, it full on shatters and there’s none of his apparent lightness left.

Which, of course it does.

The man is suddenly faced with years and years and years of victims. Innocent, unlucky people he lured back to his master over two centuries. People he liked, people he pitied.

“It’s sickening, seeing them again.”

It’s basically a room filled with guilt, exclusively for Astarion. And, as we mentioned before…Astarion is not great with guilt.

The guilt, however, is not where it ends.

No, he’s also faced with reflections of his own past. The spawn pose as reminders of what he did, sure, but also as reminders of what he was.

Weak, desperate, hungry.

There’s an abundance of images of his worst moments, reflected back at him in the thousands. It’s probably like staring into a funhouse mirror, but instead of seeing yourself in a funky way he just sees everything he so desperately doesn’t want to be.

“It should be [who I am]! I don’t want to be like them. They’re pathetic, horrible…”

He’s forcefully made aware of how darn weak he can be, which claws at all the wounds he’s barely had time to close. Something, he of course won’t admit if asked.

“THEY DO NOT [remind me of myself]. That weakness in me is dead, IT’S DEAD. I have a higher purpose.”

The high pressure of the moment brings out all of his act 1 traits in but a few moments. You can pretty much watch how he starts to shut down mid conversation, one of his old walls snapping back into place to remove himself from the situation.

Thing is though, walls usually become a bit brittle after disuse. Especially when talking to a person you don’t usually want to wall out.

Or, in his case, when talking to Tav.

After meeting Sebastian, Astarion shows extreme reactions to Tav nudging any of his weak spots. His reaction varies on whatever choice you make, but it ranges from aggression to defensiveness, to denial and even to downright begging Tav.

“Don’t hate me. I just did what I had to. I swear I did what I had to.”

This probably the most shocking out of all of them, since that is not something we got to witness before. The begging is likely a mixture of intense fear of losing Tav, his low self-esteem and pre-Tav behaviour, since we can assume that Cazador made him beg more than once.

Another old coat he puts back on would also be the least surprising of them all.

Manipulation.

He falls right back into it, using Tav’s affection to get what he want if we trigger the right action.

“If they die and I ascend, I won't have to rely on the parasite to walk in the sun. I'll be free. Truly completely free. Isn't that what you want?”

This, to me, was probably the biggest tell that Astarion was back in survival mode. He’s panicking, for fucks sake, and who can blame the guy? He’s back. He’s about to face down his abuser.

Of course he’s fucking panicking.

Panic leads to an increased craving for safety and, in his case, power. This is why he clings to Tav, why he begs them to love him still. And this is why he jumps head first into the rationalisation pool.

“I will need to sacrifice them all if I want to perform the ritual. - [You can save them.] – What’s the point? They're as good as dead! I thought they were dead. If they are unleashed, they will cause incredible carnage. […] They must die. Better they serve a purpose.”

Another textbook example.

They must die anyway. They’re basically dead. No need to save them now. They’re dangerous, I’m doing the right thing by sacrificing them. I already thought they were dead, so it’s not changing anything for me. They’re a lost cause and I deserve  all this power. I deserve it, because I suffered and nothing will change if they die.

So, seeing as we already spoke about his usual behaviour in act 3 – behaviour he showed after we allowed him to breathe and be himself for a while – I think we can fairly easily conclude he’s not thinking straight.

Astarion is right back in survival mode, where all that matters is he himself. If it weren’t for the seven thousand spawns, he might have moved through this more gracefully, but seeing those tipped the scales and Astarion is absolutely losing it.

Remember that for the last section, per favore.

7. The Ascension

“Astarion wants to ascend and Tav manipulates him into doing what they want.”

That is basically the essence of what people often claim and I can’t help but shake my head at such a blatant disregard of everything he has become. This is completely ignoring the change and growth he has gone through over the course of their journey.

Astarion wants to be free. He wants to be safe. That does not mean he wants to ascend.

And the claim that Tav manipulates him into doing anything is even more baffling. We are all aware that Tav is not manipulative by nature, yes? That is entirely on you. You decide who your Tav is.

And then let’s remember: Astarion is panicked. He’s afraid and he’s not thinking straight. His abuser is on his knees before him and he still feels so weak. And there’s seven thousand spawns that need handling.

Astarion is very much not okay right now.

In fact, reading his thoughts just proves this theory.

“You can see the fear in his eyes but also the hunger. The thick smell of blood in the air and the promise of power being so close is intoxicating to him. All he can see is the power of the ritual and the freedom that power brings. The freedom to do anything. To be anything.”

Tav, however, has none of those problems. They can actually see beyond the current situation and they are fully aware what the consequences are. Astarion is not. As we previously established, Astarion is a doer. Not a thinker. He didn’t think this through, not at all.

The only thing Tav is doing – the persuasion roll – is reminding him of the very real consequences he is facing. The consequences he hasn’t thought about before.

"I know you think this will set you free, but it won't. This power will trap you, just like it trapped Cazador."

And that is the kindest thing Tav could do in this situation. They’re not bodily dragging him away from Cazador. They’re not even telling him to not do it. They’re just offering him the truth. He can do with that information whatever he desires.

“Astarion cries when he doesn’t ascend, that just shows that it was the wrong choice.”

A hare-brained point that I thankfully have only seen once so far.

That crying? That is healthy crying.

That is him, crumbling under the stress that suddenly dissipates. That is him mourning two hundred years of torment. That’s him letting out feelings he hasn’t been able to for centuries.

And, for the love of god, try to put yourself in his shoes.

Two hundred years of torment, ended in but a moment.

Astarion was abused and tortured for so long, afraid for so long only to see his tormentor die just like that.

Cazador died within a moment and all Astarion needed was a darn blade. Of course he fucking cries.

Seeing how pathetic a being the very core of your life’s misery actually is hurts. It hurts like hell because not only are you finally free – free! – no, you’re faced with the fact that this pile of nothing, the thing that’s bleeding out right in front of you…this was what tortured for so long.

This thing hurt you so much. That guy took everything from you, everything you once were, and broke it again and again and again over years.

You were so scared of this thing.

And yet he has the gall and the gumption to die just like that.

It was so easy.

And yet you suffered for so long.

8. Evil Playthrough?

An evil playthrough is really a different setting altogether.

All of this, as you can probably tell, is really only applicable on a good playthrough. Realistically speaking. I’m not sure how the game mechanics handle it.

On an evil path, Astarion never really gets to experience kindness and goodness. Evil Tav will just prove him right in his believe that the world is a vile and cold place, meaning that he realistically would be more inclined to actually want to ascend.

9. Final Conclusion

I think all of this should be enough to make it clear that no, ascended Astarion is not the best ending for the guy. In fact, it is probably the worst. Because it’s just him, running away. He’s running into a lonely and cold state of being, where cruelty and power lord over everything else and he’s running because he’s terrified of being hurt again. He’s running despite desperately wanting to stop running.

“I'll spend the rest of my life running watching the shadows, never feeling safe…no, this has to happen. Here and now.”

And, the worst part is: Nothing about Astarion is left after he ascends. Even his tone of speaking gradually changes, his theatrics fading. He’s slowly losing himself, until there’s nothing but an evil caricature left.

So, in the end, ascension will have proven him right.

That version of him is dead.

[14dayswithyou]

As a humble admirer of Everything Yandere and of the inner workings of the sick and twisted minds of loving, lovesick maniacs and of their warped and muddled perceptions of love and intimacy, I pose you the question: What type, kind, flavor, species of Yandere is Ren/Redacted? I've gone through the asks on the blog answering what lovesick and yearning behaviors he goes through, why he does them, what they mean to him — but can we go deeper? What disturbing things does Ren do, be it for his own twisted satisfaction and perception of "love", be it to those he sees as threats to his Angel? What are his limits, where does he draw the line, how far is he willing to go to get what he wants, and who is he willing to hurt and how? Where does he draw the line when it comes to Angel? I know he would never physically hurt them, but what kind of mental warfare would he inflict on them to get them where he wants? Are we talking isolation, manipulation, gaslighting, brainwashing? And if so, how does that happen?

I'd be very very happy if you'd be okay with going into this analysis — and would it be possible to answer the Yandere Alphabet for Ren? Thank you for blessing me with this mess of a boy and sowwy for the ramble ♡ ♡ Tell Ren to clean up the bloodstains he left earlier ♡

⌞♥⌝ Because I get this question a lot, I personally feel like I've answered it to the fullest possible extent that I can gdkfgjdj ^^; So if you haven't already seen them, I reccomend going through these asks: one, two, three, four, and five!

As for your other questions:

I've highlighted them in pink to make it easier to reference/link it back to the questions above

The "disturbing" things Ren would do to his victims have been answered more or less in a few of the asks mentioned above.

Ren honestly doesn't have any major limits aside from physically harming or forcing himself onto Angel in any way. He doesn't find any pleasure in doing so, nor would he ever want to turn out like his father — much less subject the only person he genuinely cares about to the same things he had to endure as a child.

Ren also doesn't really draw the line anywhere — again, aside from upsetting Angel in any way — so anything is fair game when it comes to everyone else. But speaking as his creator for a moment, I will say that Ren is not the type to harm babies, animals, abandon his own/Angel's children, force himself onto anyone, or coerce anyone into sexual activities in order to get what he wants. That's icky af and I'm not rocking with it /gen /lh

On a slightly lighter topic, Ren is willing to go as far as necessary if it means having Angel rely on him and him only... So long as it keeps them happy at the same time. As much as he'd love to "remove" Angel's friends and family permanently, he won't entertain that thought if it'll make them upset. At most, he'd likely try non-lethal ways to get rid of them in hopes of keeping Angel happy (and oblivious).

One of Ren's major characteristics is that he's willing to change himself to suit Angel's needs, no matter how drastic it may be. If they find any sort of reliability or comfort in him by doing so, then he'll latch onto that notion and feed into it. By becoming someone Angel can trust and confide in, Ren would (potentially) be able to manipulate them and sway their thoughts... Almost like a metaphorical devil on their shoulder, in a sense lmao

I've said this a few times on this blog before, but Ren is the CEO of gaslighting and manipulation. He's down to try a bit of isolation if it's somehow possible to keep Angel happy while doing so, though I don't think Ren would be into mindwashing since he idolises, honours, and blindly trusts Angel's original thoughts more than his own. He wants them to genuinely develop feelings for him, not because he forced them to.

I've actually been asked to do the Yandere Alphabet by a few other people recently, so I'll get around to doing it sometime!! ^^

[lenaswritingandstuff]

Your Teddy ~ Theodore Nott x f!reader (PART 2)

Requested: No

Pairing: Theodore Nott x f!reader

Summary: Theo helps y/n get the pieces of her former life together.

Word count: 2.5K

Warnings: Lots of talking, mentions of drinking, English is not my first language

A/N: The next part should be the last one. Let me know if you want to be tagged! Comments and feedback are always appreciated. Sorry for the typos. Hope you enjoy it! GIF is not mine.

Tag list: @helendeath @im-jesus @wolfyychan @blocked-zombieartist

Tag list for this story: @cyriellee42 @littlepippilongstocking @lovetaylorrussellgrr @sequoiavink @cloudyyydayzzz @lovefushi @esmerai-artemis @atadoddinnit

PART ONE

Sitting on his dorm’s hard floor, his back against the door, Theo grabbed the bottle again and brought it to his mouth. He felt the burning liquid going down his throat, and while it actually did hurt, it was nothing compared to the pain he had been feeling since he learned a few hours ago that y/n didn’t remember anything - didn’t remember him. 

“I, um...I’m sorry, but... who are you?”

She doesn’t remember. The thought was like a thousand knives in his heart. She didn’t remember all the dates they went on, how much they laughed and talked during them, all their time spent just the two of them, just enjoying being together, their first kiss and those that followed, the first time Theo told her he loved her, the first time she told him she loved him, all their cuddles and nights spent embracing each other or spent loving each other, all their hugs, all the time they comforted each other - how she comforted him after his mother passed away and, every year, on her death anniversary. How much they loved each other - how much she loved him. That was the worst part. He could tell y/n about the moments they spent together, where and how their first kiss was. He could also show her how much he loved her and why they dated in the first place, but what if she couldn’t fall in love with him again? What if she wanted nothing to do with him? 

His stomach twisted at the thought, and he drank again. One part of him refused to think that y/n, having a big heart full of patience and understanding, wouldn’t at least give him a chance, but the other part of him, the one who always told him how she deserved better than him, told him otherwise. Theo had felt alone when his mother died, but the feeling had faded away when he and y/n started dating. It came back with y/n’s disappearance, and was worse than ever. No one had ever loved him besides his mother and y/n, and now he had lost both. Of course he had friends, and he deeply cared about them, but it wasn’t the same. They only knew the happy, sarcastic, careless Theo, not the true version of Theo who felt things deeply, was really insecure and kept wondering why his father didn’t seem to care about him at all. He felt tears suddenly running down his cheeks, but didn’t care. 

All of a sudden, Theo heard a knock on the door. He closed his eyes - which he would have probably rolled if he had enough energy and less alcohol in his body - in annoyance and was about to pretend not to be here when he heard a familiar voice. 

“Theo, open the door.” 

Mattheo knocked again after speaking. Sighing, Theo grabbed the bottle and managed to get up, finding himself feeling incredibly dizzy when he opened the door. Mattheo came in, and Theo went to sit on his bed. Mattheo closed the door behind him, and raised an eyebrow.

“Merlin, it’s even worse than I thought.” 

Theo, who now had a terrible headache, looked at him. “What?”

“Your ass is drunk. Like you had been for the past three months.” 

“So what?” Theo snapped coldly. 

He could find in him to tolerate his best friend coming to check up on him and comforting him, but not a lecture. They both had shitty fathers - and a crazy ass woman as a mother for Mattheo -, and had bonded over it, but Mattheo hadn’t always been single, and therefore couldn’t truly understand how Theo felt, as much as he tried. 

“I suggest you quit drinking, get a shower, eat something and clean up this room, because a little bird named Pansy told me y/n is leaving the hospital wing tomorrow. Do you want her to see you like that?”

Theo ran a hand through his face, frowning. “What?” 

“Mrs Pomfrey was able to heal all y/n’s injuries,” Mattheo said, and then his gaze softened. “Except for her memory loss.” 

Theo looked at the ground, and Mattheo slowly came to sit beside him on the bed.

“I’m sorry, mate. I mean it.”

Theo couldn’t say anything as he left that if he did, he would cry, and there was a short moment of silence before Mattheo spoke again.

“You know, y/n only came back today. They still can find a remedy. Pansy said they’ll look in other books.” 

“Did she find out why?” Theo asked in a hoarse voice. 

“No. It might be from trauma, a potion or a spell. They’ll probably do other tests.” 

“Did they come?” Theo asked. “Her parents, I mean?”

“Yes. They were…upset, of course. Pansy was here when they saw y/n. They asked her to come home for at least a few days, but she refused.” 

The thought was y/n wasn’t alone while meeting people who were now basically strangers made him feel better, but it was at this moment that Theo realised how selfish he had been. He had lost his girlfriend, the girl he imagined spending the rest of his days with, but y/n had lost everything. Everything she had known and was used to - from family and friends to her childhood home and the school - were now foreign to her. And instead of being there for her, he was fucking drinking. 

“She’ll need you,” Mattheo continued. “You were a big part of her life.” 

“I want to help her,” Theo answered. “But…What if she doesn’t want me anymore?”

Mattheo had a half-smile, “No chance, mate. She asked Pansy about you.” 

Theo’s heart almost skipped a beat, and he turned to his friend. “Really?”

Mattheo nodded, “Yeah. I don’t know the details, but she did ask questions, and apparently she felt guilty when she saw you leaving. So, as I suggested earlier, we’re gonna clean up this room, and while you take a shower, I’ll go get us something to eat. Alright?”  

Feeling a bit better - but still ashamed - Theo nodded, and Mattheo gently pushed his shoulder. 

✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧⋄⋆⋅⋆⋄✧

The next morning, Theo woke up with one of the worst hangovers he ever had. He had a terrible headache, and any light hurt his eyes, but he wasn’t as tired as he thought he would be, probably because he had a dreamless night which allowed him to get some rest. He took a shower, and, realising it was already 10 am, he quickly put his clothes on, arranged his hair, and went down to the Great Hall. He sat down next to Lorenzo, planning to eat quickly and then go see y/n in the hospital wing. He had to apologise to her for leaving as he did the day before, and planned on at least a real conversation. 

As he ate, Theo felt his frustration grow. This isn’t what he had planned for her return. He had planned to get her flowers and many gifts, and to cuddle for days, trying to make up for the time lost. The cuddles were absolutely obviously out of the question now, and the gifts were maybe too much, but maybe flowers would still be a good idea? After all, maybe y/n would like to know that, unbeknown to her, she had a boyfriend who had missed her terribly while she was gone? He suddenly had the image of her in tears, alone in the dark, waiting for him to rescue her, losing all hope with each day passing. He shook his head, finished his plate quickly, and left the Great Hall, but he had barely taken a few steps when he saw two familiar silhouettes coming the opposite way. y/n and Pansy were laughing, and if you didn’t know y/n had lost her memory, you’d think she was still the same as she was before her kidnapping. y/n noticed Theo, and something in her behaviour shifted. 

“Ah,” Pansy said, “Hello, Nott. y/n, dear, I’m sure you remember Theo, who you saw yesterday?” 

y/n nodded. “Of course. Hi, Theo.”

“Hi, cara- y/n.”

E che cazzo, Theodore. Pull yourself together.

“I’m…glad to see you’re okay,” he managed to say. 

He meant it, but the words had a hard time coming out of his mouth, as if this new uncomfortable distance between y/n and him made everything awkward - this was also new, because even before they started dating, they had always felt incredibly comfortable and safe with each other. y/n suddenly cleared her throat, which brought Theo back to reality. 

“Hum, actually…I was wondering if we could talk?” 

It took Theo a second to realise she was speaking to him. “Talk?”

“Yeah, I…I mean, you were a part of my life, and I want to put all the pieces together.” 

Theo nodded. “Of course. Well, if you want, we can talk now?”

“Sure.”

She gave him a small, shy, adorable smile, one of those that had made him fall in love with her, but this time, instead of warming his heart, it almost broke him. Pansy excused herself and entered the Great Hall after gently squeezing y/n’s shoulder. Now that they were by themselves, the awkwardness was even worse, but all of a sudden, Theo realised he had looked at it the wrong way - sure they were now, in a way, strangers, but it didn’t have to be the end? Theo had been able to make her fall for him once, there was no way he couldn’t do it again, right? He’d just have to show her, show her exactly why she gave him a chance in the first place, and how much she meant to him. It would take time, of course, but y/n had been very patient throughout their relationship, and it was his turn now.

“Do you want to sit somewhere in particular?” he asked.

“I don’t know, was there…a particular spot we liked?” she said.

Theo immediately had an idea in mind. “Yes. Follow me.”

She followed him through the castle, and Theo noticed she looked around the castle like the first years did when they first arrived. Sometimes, her gaze would light up, and it was adorable to see. 

“Did Pansy show you around?” he asked.

“Not yet,” y/n said. “I think she plans on showing it as we go.”

Theo nodded slightly, “Well, if you prefer, I could give you a tour. The castle may seem big at first, but we usually get used to it quickly.”

y/n looked at him and gave him a half-smile, “I’d like that.”  

They both walked to a bench situated in a corner of the courtyard, a bit away from where the crowd of students usually went, so it allowed them some privacy. They sat side by side, and Theo felt both the need to put some distance between them and to eradicate any distance that existed. He had never been able to keep his hands off y/n, and always had a hand on her thigh or around her; always craving her touch. 

“So, do…Do you have any questions?” Theo asked, making sure to keep his hands to himself. 

“Well, a few, yes. But I guess I just want to get to know you.”

Theo turned to her and smirked, “Well, you already know my name. Though I have to say, my name is supposed to be Theodore but all my friends call me Theo. You, however, called me Teddy.” 

She stared at him for a second, “Teddy.” 

It felt so good to hear her call him that he almost forgot himself, almost hugging her right here and there, almost also forgetting that she probably would feel uncomfortable. 

“I’m in Slytherin just like you, and we’re in the same class, with Pansy and my friends. What else… I’m also Italian, so I’m bilingual.” 

“That’s cool,” she smiled. “Do I speak another language?”

“Well,” Theo hesitated, “you were learning Italian, and you were pretty good.” 

“And…when did we start dating?” 

Theo let out a slight sigh, “Our fifth year.” 

“Oh. And you met my parents?”

“Yeah. They were nice.”

Nice enough to allow someone like me to date their only child. 

“And have I ever met yours?”

Theo gulped and looked at his knees, “You never met my father. But I don’t see him very often, so…And my…mother died a few months before we started dating.”

y/n’s gaze from interest to surprise, sadness and compassion. “I’m so sorry, Teddy.”

“It’s okay. You helped a lot.” 

“I’m glad I did.” She then shook her head and sighed. “I really wish I remembered, you know. If there was any way, I would do it.” 

“I know.”

Because I’d do anything for you to remember, too.

“What’s the first thing you remember?” Theo said before realising it. 

“Hum, it’s not very clear, but I do remember that large guy…Hagrid, isn’t it?” Theo nodded and she continued, “I remember him holding me and telling me I was gonna be alright. He brought me back to the castle and to Mrs Pomfrey. I slept a little, she examined me, and then this professor, Professor Snape, and this other man - I think they said he’s the Headmaster here? - came to talk to me and told me they had been looking for me for months. I don’t know why but for some reason, I remember being a witch, so they didn’t have to tell me. Then Professor Snape left to tell my parents and then…you arrived.”

Theo blinked, “So you don’t remember what happened during…”

“My abduction?” y/n completed. “No, not a single thing. But it’s better this way, I think,” she added.

Theo nodded slightly, and there was a moment of silence, with only the conversation and laughs of other students for noise. Theo was glad she didn’t remember anything - even though he would always remember the images of her being tortured that had been looping inside his head - but he didn’t like the fact that those who abducted her and held her somewhere would never be punished for what they did. He had no clue of how long he had been lost in thoughts, but at some point, he realised y/n was staring at him. He turned his face towards her, feeling his cheeks becoming hot, and suddenly felt nervous.

“Do I have a third eye on my forehead or something?” he said with a nervous laugh.

y/n’s eyes widened and her own cheeks became pink in embarrassment before she looked at the ground. 

“I’m sorry, I…I guess I was trying to remember something. Anything.” 

Theo had a silent sigh and put his hand on hers, which sent shivers down his spine.

"I'll do anything I can to help you remember, y/n. And if I can't, I'll help create beautiful new memories."

Theo thought y/n's eyes were suddenly shining, and she gave him a small, thankful smile before joiging their hands together.

PART THREE

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[axeoverblade]

Classmate

PART ONE (CURRENT); PART TWO ; PART THREE

Earth 42! Miles Morales x fem! reader

Synopsis! For the life of you , you couldn’t understand why Miles had it out to get you so bad. If it wasn’t for the mid-year seat change, he wouldn’t have even acknowledged your existence.

MASTERLIST

Genre: light fluff, enemies to lovers like trope, light bully!Miles

Warnings: mentions of sa (nothing happens just mentioned), mentions of violence, maybe foul language but I think that’s it enjoy!

word count: 5k

Authors comment: I keep seeing School themed hcs and I had to say me sphewl(?), planned to be one shot but thinking about a part two. Sorry for any bad translations my Spanish is meh, please leave a like <3

Do not copy! All rights reserved to ©axeoverblade

It was known half way through the school year at Visions Academy the teachers changed the assigned seats. Being in your last hour, you were pretty much comfortable sitting next to almost anyone in the class.

Albeit, you did have a few in your mind you would rather not be sat with. Kids who didn’t like to do the group work, kids who talked too much, kids who always were trying to copy answers, etc.

The teacher went through the neatly organized desks column by column, starting on the left side closest to the door for the new seating chart. There were only four columns seeing as the wooden desks were double seated. You listened as she went through assigning kids to chairs, finally reaching the last column. There were about seven other kids along with you still waiting to be called to the four desks available. All the kids left were somewhat iffy options to be next to for the rest of the year.

…

Only you and three others were left. She called out to the second to last desk, “Amanda and John”. You sigh a breath of relief happy to not be sat next to John who had a crush on you, your thoughts replaying all the times he had tried to get with you. Feelings were not mutual. “ And Finally Y/n and Miles.”

You walked over to the seat from the front of the room, seeing the Miles kid already getting comfortable in his new seat closest to the wall.

You never had the chance to talk to Miles much. Actually, you don’t think you’ve ever talked to him. He was very reticent in the classroom. The moment he finished his work which was always relatively quick, he was out of the class leaving a few minutes to spare coming back before the bell rang.

There was a reason you never made an effort to talk to Miles. In fact, it was more like you endeavored to avoid him. His hedonistic friend group were known for being-, uncivil. They treated others horribly, always making someone do something that would make your stomach churn if you had to be the one to do it. And even though Miles was known to never actively participate in those things, anyone who hung around people who did those things were bound to start someday.

What confused you though, he was extremely smart unlike the jerks he was always with. You heard he was one of the highest scoring kids, every report card stamped with straight As. That wasn’t much at this school, almost everyone had straight As and high Bs, but all his grades averaged above 94.

There was also no denying he was very attractive. Surprisingly he was never seen with anyone romantically, unlike his friends who always had a girl or two under their arms. There were definitely people were lined up at his feet though, always trying to cling to him. He always just brushed them off, sometimes blunter than he needed to be.

You had seen it once, a girl you hadn’t really liked had gone up to him during passing period asking for his number only for him to look at her and walk right past her. All his friends and their shallow twats of girlfriends laughed at her, walking with Miles past her.

She cried in bathroom for forty minutes after.

You stood next to your seat, putting your bag down. “Hi I’m y/n” you said, formally introducing yourself to Miles for the first time. He looked up to you from his phone. You watched as he took his time studying you, making you slightly flustered as his eyes roamed your body. He looked back down at his phone, disregarding your presence. “I know.”

You blinked a few times processing the abrupt rudeness.

You rolled your eyes and whispered a few choice words to yourself about the interaction as you sat down, realizing you were stuck next to him for the rest of the year.

You pulled out your phone, texting your friend and roommate Mei, who was across the room, about how rude Miles was. She looked up, seeing you staring at her irritated. She giggled before texting back.

Mei: He so fine tho 😍 ask em if he needs a dog

You: Mei 💀

You: he’s so rude n for what? Like he could’ve just nodded or said his name. I know he got that whole “bad boy” thing goin but ain’t have to do allat

Mei: Ion know gl tho 💯

You: Ur no help 😭 Ima ask for a seat change

Mei: It's the first five minutes you have sat next to each other, maybe he is just nervous from ur emmense beauty 😩 I know I would be

Mei: PLUS u know Ms Reita does not b swappin seats. You know how many times I asked to be moved from Jessica only for her to say tuff luck and move on? Seventeen times. Just give it time n maybe it gets better you never know

You: 😐

You shook your head and put your phone down as the teacher started passing out the work. It was a normal worksheet due by the end of class. You went through, solving the easier problems before going back and finishing the ones you skipped.

You were on your last problem when Miles hand shot up lazily. Ms.Reita looked at him and sighed, knowing that he was going to leave for almost the rest of class period if she let him leave the room. “Is your worksheet finished?” “I wouldn’t be raisin’ my hand if it wasn’t.” “Watch it Morales, wouldn’t want to have to tell your Mom you have detention would you?” He sighed before mockingly smiling “sorry Ms.Reita, can I so humbly excuse myself?” He batted his eyelashes for extra effect, clearly tired of the interaction and ready to leave. She huffed as pointed to the door. You snickered to yourself watching the exchange. He looked at you, a glint of amusement washing over his eyes, but the look left as soon as it appeared. He looked away getting up and walking out.

_

You walked with Mei back to your shared dorm, talking about the nonsense that flooded your minds. Luckily for you, it was Friday and you could go home tonight, you just had to go grab your bag and you would be free from this hell hole.

…

“Alright Mei I’ll see you on Monday” you said, grabbing your suitcase and backpack, pulling it with you to leave. She smiled and waved, still packing. “Bye baby mama” you rolled your eyes playfully at what she said. She would constantly make jokes about how she could care for you and be your sugar momma, even though she was just as broke as you were.

You walked toward the lobby of the school, seeing the exit to the building so close. It felt like knowing air was near when you were drowning, finally being able to catch a break and breathe- “oh sorry baby girl, didn’t see you there.” You felt someone bump into you, too intentional for it to be accident. You cringed at the nickname and gathered yourself. Luckily you hadn’t fallen, just stumbled causing your bag to fall off you. “Don’t call me that John.” You said, picking up your bag and slinging it in on your shoulder. “You know you like it” he said, closer than he needed to be. Recoiling at the sound of him so close to your ear, you stuck your hand out and lightly pushed him further from you. “I really don’t, I already told you I want nothin’ to do with you.” You continued to walk to the exit, only for him to walk beside you. “Cmon baby I can show you the world, stop playing hard to get.” You looked at him, stopping in your tracks, “I’m not playing hard to get, this is me playing I don’t want you” “so you admit you're playing about not wanting me?” He said, smirking. You closed your eyes and took a deep breath, just wanting to go home. “For the final time John, I am not interested.” You walked again, this time he didn’t follow because his friends were walking up to him. “I’ll see you on Monday baby!” He called out loudly, drawing attention to the both of you. You scowled and walked faster out the building, happy to not have to see John for a few days.

Unbeknownst to you, Miles was watching the interaction from the beginning, ignoring his friends talk about the girls that passed or the sexist comments they made. He noted how you reacted to John, how much disgust surged through your body language. He disliked John, but for separate reasons. John was one of those guys. Class A jock who didn’t know when to quit. Also didn’t know when to shut their mouths. Granted, those were the exact people he hung around. But at least he could tolerate their idiocy, and it was better than walking around the school alone all day. Only kid he hung around that wasn’t like that was his roommate Ganke.

He watched as you scowled and left the school. He shrugged minding his own business, zoning back into the conversation about who had the biggest boobs.

Monday rolled around quicker than you could’ve imagined. And it felt like a Monday, which never helped. You trudged into your last hour groggily, just wanting to be done with the day so you could go back to your dorm and sleep. Walking over to your seat, you looked at Mei across the room. She wiggled her eyebrows, mouthing for you to initiate conversation with Miles. You rolled your eyes, sitting down. Miles was sketching lightly on the worksheet already passed out on the desks. You tried to look at it, but the braid that draped over his shoulder covered your view. You didn’t want to seem invasive, so you just grabbed your sheet and began working.

Finishing the sheet quickly, you got on your phone, scrolling through your socials. You saw a news alert flash across the top of your screen, some message about “the prowler striking again” over the weekend. You swiped it away.

You didn’t hate the prowler in all honesty, but you would never admit that out loud. Whoever was under the mask did bad things, but usually only to bad people. Usually.

The police barely did anything anymore, making it hard to even go outside without getting mugged or groped or something bad. With the prowler being out and about, some idiots have been scared off the streets, enough to where you could at least walk to and from your family apartment to school. In your eyes, the vigilante kinda helped a little.

“Stop tapping, its annoyin” a voice rudely interrupted you from your thoughts. You looked over to see miles looking at you, semi-irritated. You hadn’t realized you were tapping the desk, something you did unconsciously when you were lost in your own mind. You pulled your hand back, putting it on your thigh, “my fault, ain need all that attitude though” you said looking at him. He rolled his eyes and started drawing again. “Whatcha’ sketching?” You asked, leaning towards him slightly. He looked at you with furrowed brows, blinking a couple of times, before going back to sketching ignoring your question. El tiene algunos nervios. Instead of just excusing his behavior like you did on Friday, you opted to invade his personal space; moving his braid, your head now hovering over his shoulder. He moved his body quickly, his reflexes faster than you could process. “Qué coño estás haciendo?” He said sternly, but you didn’t budge. “You didnt wanna respond” you said not looking at him, more focused on the drawing. “That ain’ answer my question” he said, you could feel the irritation laced in his voice, but instead of leaving him alone like he wanted, you grabbed the paper to get a better view. The drawing was a well portrayed mask of sorts, oddly similar to the prowlers, and a few weapons all sketched on the back of his paper. You raised your eyebrow at the drawing. He was actually really good at drawing, the detail for him to have started that less than twenty minutes ago impressed you. He snatched the paper back. You turned your head to him, seeing him looking at you with furrowed eyebrows, getting ready to say something. “Answer me next time and I won’t have to do that” you said before he could speak, a mocking smile laying on your lips. He rolled his eyes, muttering under his breath before going back to sketching.

One word, Regret.

You really wish you hadn’t decided to let you imaginary balls get the best of you. Because now Miles how a personal vendetta against you. Damn your pride. Within the span of few weeks he somehow had broken into your locker and trashed you books, he made sure it wasn’t anything that you couldn’t fix easily though, just a few torn pages. He constantly would shove you, which he mude sure to do lightly to not actually hurt you, into the lockers when he passed you in the nearly empty halls when he was with his friends. He would say the most outlandish things to you whenever you passed him when the halls were too crowded and others could see what he did. He made sure his friends didn’t mess with you though, knowing they would take it way too far how they had with the other kids they harassed. And even though you tried to ignore him the first few weeks hoping he would stop, he never did. You swore you could feel yourself loosing your mind.

Miles had only originally planned on pestering you for a day or two to get the point across that you should’ve left him alone, but then he realized how fun it was to provoke you. You became his entertainment, or at least that was the reason that he told himself he went out of his way to annoy you. And now that he had gotten on your last nerve, you were like a ticking time bomb every time.

You made school easier for him, giving him something to look forward to. Your reactions were always so animated, almost comical, making messing with you so funny. He didn’t just mess with you in sense of picking on you., he would mess with you feelings too. He looked for you in the halls just to go behind you and pull you by your backpack into him. You would lose your balance then he would put his hands on you waist to stabilize you, whispering in your the cusp of your ear sternly to “watch where you’re going mami”, a nickname he now would often call you just to see how irritated and flustered you would get. You would always reply with a snarky remark, something along the lines of “he pulled you into him”, always stuttering through the sentence no matter the amount of times he had done this to you, siempre fue tan mono a él. Something that unintentionally brought his face to a smirk was how you never mentioned anything about the nicknames he gave you like you did with John.

His friends would constantly make comments about how Miles liked you and now you were off limits, but every time he shot the idea down with a quick annoyed face. But perish the thought one of his friends gets talks about you the wrong way. They had seen the way Miles looked at the guy who had walked up to and called you pretty. Didn’t ask for your number, didn’t do anything weird, just called you pretty. The problem wasn’t even the compliment, it was how genuinely big you smiled but it wasn’t because of him.

Miles wasn’t going to deny he found you attractive. He had seen you the first day he walked into Vision academy a year ago and couldn’t get you out of his head for week. Hell you were probably the prettiest girl in the school, but maldito eres molestosa. When laying on the bed in his dorm room the nights he wasn’t out doing his prowler work, he could hear your pesky voice ringing in his ears, también pudo ver tu cara hermosa. He hated it. He hated how sometimes your face would pop up in his brain during a mission, and it would make him falter for a moment. Something as simple as hesitating, even for a millisecond, could’ve had him killed mid fight.

He didn’t actually care for you, at least that’s what he told himself. So you can understand why it bothered him so much that he hated weekends now, knowing it was extra days where he couldn’t see you, feel you. Even if it was just a brush on the shoulder when doing partner work, or him shoving you lightly when walking past, glaring at you like you were the one that bumped into him.

It annoyed you to no end you were stuck next to him for the rest of the year. What annoyed you even more was how attracted you were to him. He was so dismissive toward you, and for some reason you would sit in your room giggling with Mei about how his laugh, even though the only reason you had heard it was because he was making fun of you, was the most attractive thing you have ever heard.

…

Luckily today was Friday so you could enjoy the weekend.

It had been a few months since you had been moved next to Miles, a few months since you decided to overstep a boundary you wish you hadn’t, a few months since you’ve been slowly loosing your sanity. Miles had taken it upon himself to mess with you in class, staying for almost the whole period now a days to do just that.

“If you would finish your work then we could be done already” you mumbled under your breath, looking at the shared work you had to do that Miles hadn’t even looked at, too engrossed in his phone. The two of you had been going back and forth since the start of class, now only roughly fifteen minutes left. He looked up to you, squinting from annoyance, “do you ever just, I don’t know, close your mouth?”. You rolled your eyes “If you, I don’t know, finish your half so I can go turn this in then yea maybe I would.” He scoffed, pulling the paper closer to him. A few minutes passed and he slid the paper over to you “don’t say anything else”. You looked at the paper, seeing he had completed his half of the work in record time, you must really annoy him. “Well if you just did that earlier” you said sarcastically, picking up the paper and walking over to the turn in bin, placing the paper in it.

As you walked back to your seat, John started to talk to you. You pursed your lips, walking past him heading to your seat behind him. That didn’t stop him, as all he did was turn his chair around to face you. “So the party is tonight, you can come-” he paused, putting emphasis on the word winking at you, hinting at something else. You looked at him disgusted. “And we can have a lot of fun, perfect chance for you to see how much you truly like me.” You blinked a few times, “yea no” was all you said before looking at your phone. You didn’t fail to hear the small, quiet breathy laugh that fell from Miles lips as he stared at his phone, overhearing the conversation. His laugh alone could make your knees buckle. You quickly brought yourself back to reality, not letting your mind flow with any positive thoughts about Miles. “Cmon’ baby, promise I’ll show you a good time.” “Ain’ I tell you not to call me that?” You said, annoyed that John just couldn’t leave you alone. “You know we locked in, you keep playin.” “John-” “aight hear me out, you come to the party, if you don’t have a nice time -which I can guarantee you will- I’ll leave you alone, how does that sound?” “You’ll leave me alone?” You said, intrigued by the offer. “If you come.” You sighed, “lemme ask my momma.” He smiled widely, happy to have finally convinced you. Miles secretly looked between the two of you with his eyebrows furrowed, thinking how pathetic John was.

A few minutes passed as John sat facing you, waiting for a response. You sighed, causing him to perk up. “I need to be home by 11, and you have to send me the address. My mom also needs your number and your mommas number, comprende?” He nodded quickly, typing all the information into your phone so you could send it to your mom. You sent the message, already regretting your decision.

Sure enough.

You sped walk home, the time nearing 10:45. Wiping the tear that trickled down your cheek, you scoffed. The party started off great, you and John had a great time, initially.

Then things got weird, he tried to take you to a bedroom upstairs, you declined, him being intoxicated, grabbed you forcefully to take you up. You were glad you were taught basic self defense. You kneed him in the bolas and grabbed your bag, quickly leaving. You wondered what would’ve happened if you had dranken something, where you wouldn’t have been fully aware of your surroundings. You hurrying to dismiss the thought, happy to be out the party

Normally you would be much more aware of the world around you, had you not been so lost in your thoughts. “Hey there pretty lady” you heard, you couldn’t catch a break tonight. You started walking quicker, almost jogging with your eyes focused ahead of you, as you just wanted to get home safely. “You ain’t hear us talkin to you?” Your eyes widened at the mention of us, realizing there was more than one. You searched for your switch blade that would usually be inside your pocket, but it was no where to be found. You figured it must’ve fallen out at the party, you silently cursed to yourself. Three men were now matching your speed, and suddenly were next to you.

“What’s a little momma like you doing out here all alone, don’t you know there’s bad guys out here?”

“Don’t worry baby, we’ll keep you safe”, they grabbed you forcefully covering your mouth so you wouldn’t alert anyone, not like anyone would help. They pulled you to the nearest alley. You bit the hand of whoever was covering your mouth, causing them to let go of your face. You took this as an opportunity to scream for dear life, only to be smacked into a state of drowsiness. You quickly shook yourself out of it, feeling the stinging sensation spread across your face. Your ear was ringing lightly, and you could’ve sworn this dude knocked your tooth loose. You spit at the guy across from you, seeing bloody saliva land on his face. The guy behind you who was holding you let go and moved to the side. Before you could react to the new found freedom, you were pushed roughly into the wall behind you. “Tonto puta, all you had to do was cooperate” the guy in front of you said, wiping the spit off his face.

Ready to accept whatever was going to happen, you closed your eyes and scrunched your face, only to hear screams of pain from the three men, followed by an uncanny silence.

You opened your eyes, seeing the prowler standing where the man in front of you once was with a bloody claw. The three men were laying on the ground, damn near lifeless. Your eyes widened, your mouth parting from the sight. The vigilante stared at you, you could see the eye like symbols displayed on the mask slightly widened at the sight of the hand-mark on your face before recomposing into a stoic, neutral setting. You were too shocked, and mostly scared to say anything.

The figure got closer, to which you could work out was a male. You took note of the two braids cascading down their neck behind the mask, as well as the oddly clean Jordan’s they sported. You didn’t have much time to take in their lanky appearance, as they took a final step towards you, making it so you had to look up at their mask. Their presence loomed over you eerily. You gaped at him, your pleading eyes filled with fear. You knew he wasn’t necessarily a villain per say, closer to the flip side if anything. He did just save you. But the thought of an individual being so much more powerful than you, knowing that at any moment he would always in control no matter what you did, threw your brain into a constant state of unease. Feeling your heart beating out your chest, you raised your hands lightly placing it on their chest to stop them from getting any closer, even though you knew they could easily overpower you no matter what you did. His heartbeat was slow, almost calming to feel. “Please” you whispered, voice barely leaving your larynx.

As quickly as he had come he left. You looked around, finally spotting him lurking on top of the building across from you, crouching along the ledge looking at you. You looked at the Prowler one last time, making eye contact with their mask silently mouthing a ‘thank you’. He flipped away to wherever else he goes, not acknowledging your gratitude. You nearly collapsed, sliding down the wall. Your hands aggressively wiped your face before meeting your hairline, resting there as you breathed ruggedly. The adrenaline you had was wearing off, and the bruises the men left you with became more prominent on your skin, as well as more painful. At least your opinion about the prowler was correct, he was a good guy after all, to you at least.

Returning to school on Monday was a catastrophe, news spread like wildfire about you being attacked by the three men, as well as your encounter with the Prowler. Random people were approaching you asking what is what like and other random questions revolving around your attack. No one however, was talking about what happened at the party. But you couldn’t blame them, not many people saw what had happened.

…

It was finally the last period. You wanted nothing more for this to blow over, and for you to be done with the day back in your dorm. You walked in, wavering slightly seeing John leaning on your desk. You noticed Miles sitting in his seat on his phone, eye bags deeper than usual.

You quickly sat down, trying your best to ignore John's attempts to talk to you.

“Y/n please it was an accident-”

You ignored him getting your pencil out of the top zipper of your bag.

“Y/n please just listen I was drunk and I didn’t know what I was doing you gotta believe me” he leaned toward to take your hand, causing you to flinch and pull back. You looked at him angrily “you think being drunk excuses anything?” Your voice was calm and almost at a whisper despite how you felt, trying your best to draw the least amount of attention. He sighed desperately, “No it doesn’t but you gotta see it from my perspective-” “what perspective John?!? The one where you tried to force yourself on me? Or the one where you tried to take me upstairs against my will? I swear if you come near me again, I won’t hesitate to cut your polla off, comprende?” Ms. Reita asked everyone to take their seats, causing John to look at you solemnly before scoffing and turning to his seat.

You huffed, putting your head between your crossed arms on the table. “What happened at the party?” You looked over to Miles surprised. You hadn’t expected him to ask you any questions, but if he did you figured it would be something about the prowler incident. “Nothin’.” You said dismissively. He looked at you skeptically. Before you could even react, he grabbed your phone off the desk and tucked it in his pocket. “You ain’ gettin’ it back til you tell me what happened.” “Why do you care so much?” “Your wrinkles n’ dark circles look worse than usual, wanna know why.” “Could say the same for you” he looked at you blankly. You sighed, “John got a lil’ too handsy is all, don’t worry ‘bout it. Can I have my phone back-“ “mami, how handsy?” His stern voice caught you off guard. He looked at John's direction for a split second, you could’ve sworn you’d seen Miles look at John with a look of determined death. He looked back at you eyebrows furrowed, “he tried to take me upstairs n’ I wasn’t feelin’ it, so he tried to make me” you uttered, a little quieter towards the end of your sentence. “Left before he could do anything” you finished, “can I get my phone back now?” You looked at him tiredly. He let out a simple huh and gave you your phone back, his full attention now on johns figure ahead in the seat diagonally ahead of him.

…

The class had been dismissed, luckily Miles had decided to leave you alone today, you were too tired to deal with his antics anyway. Walking over to Mei dismissing John's stare, you two began walking out of the class heading to the lobby so you head back to your dorm room. As you were walking back Mei stopped at a vending machine to get a couple snacks for the dorm so you two could have a movie night. You waited as she inserted her money, clicking which snacks you both liked to buy them. As she was stuffing the snacks in her bag zipping it up, a student screamed “FIGHT”. You looked over seeing a crowd forming and walked over to see what was happening. Bullying your way to the front you saw Miles on top of John, pounding John's blood stricken face damn near permanently into the floor. Your eyes enlarged at the sight. Miles was clearly irate, and from the looks of it, had no plans of stopping. A security guard quickly ran in and grabbed miles off John's limp body. Miles spit at John, yelling something at him in Spanish that you couldn’t hear over the commotion. You looked at John's body, seeing him look almost unconscious as he coughed violently and rested on his elbows, trying to catch his breath. You gaped at Miles, shock written all over your face. His chest rose and fell quickly as he looked around the room seeing all the people watching. His eyes stopped as they met yours, his gaze softening slightly before he looked away. A huff fell from his lips as he was dragged to the principal's office. He jerked his arm away, muttering something about how he knew how to walk.

John had to be sent to the hospital.

Miles was in the principal's office, sitting silently as John's parents screamed at the principal while Miles’s mother sat next to him upset. “My child is a great kid! And how is he supposed to feel safe in this school anymore knowing this can happen again, huh?” John's mom spewed mindlessly, ranting about how she was going to press charges. Miles scoffed, causing Rio to look at him with a look of “watch your mouth before I watch it for you.” He just looked down at his hands in his lap.

Miles walked out of the classroom to head back to his shared dorm. He couldn’t get out of his mind what John had done to you. As vague as your response was, he knew more had happened between you and John. He didn’t know why it bothered him so deeply, it wasn't even really his business. He knew the thought of someone being touched like that made him upset, but he felt pure outrage from this specifically, and he knew deep in his heart it was because it was because it was you who had gone through it.

As much as he hated to admit it, he knew he felt something different for you when he intervened the night the three men attacked you. He almost added three bodies to his belt, for you.

Usually, as bad as it sounds, he would mostly let people get robbed or thrown around in alleyways. He would help occasionally if it sounded gruesome or of dire need for assistance. But he had to save his city from the sinister six, and petty crimes that were bound to happened weren’t the ideal way to do that. But the voice screaming sounded familiar, kinda sounded like you. The thought of you being in danger offset his nerves, and he knew a you were going to a party that night so he went, just to check.

Sure enough.

He stalked you from above the rest of your walk home just to make sure nothing else happened.

He walked into the lobby consumed by his own thoughts, snapping back to reality as he overheard John talking to his friends about how “y/n finally let me hit, she was so tight-”. He paused in his tracks. Ain’ no way acaba de escuchar lo que pensó que hizo. He turned to the direction of John's voice, this was now his business. He walked over, becoming increasingly irate the more John talked about “how much you loved it”. John turned, hearing footsteps approaching alarming quickly. He saw Miles, John knew Miles had heard about what really happened at the party. John scoffed, somewhat anxious he had been caught in his lie and afraid Miles would try to embarrass him in front of his friends. He quickly spoke before Miles even had the chance to say a word,“You ain’ needed here Miles-” John was cut off by a fist colliding with his face, not what he was expecting at all. Johns friends gasped or yelled in shock, Miles didn’t stop though. Miles didn’t even say anything, small grunts of anger being the only thing leaving his lips as John hit the floor. Miles siguan latiendo la mierda fuera de él.

“What you won't even speak huh?” John's mom said, facing Miles. He furrowed his eyebrows at her. “You wanna send my baby boy to the hospital and have no reason why? Why are you picking on my kid huh? You-” “You think your kid is the best thing on Gods green earth”Miles scoffed, cutting her off. “Cause he is, my kid wouldn’t hurt a fly and you-”“your oh so wonderful kid tried to rape a girl then went around yappin’ bout’ how much she enjoyed it.” The room fell silent. The principal eyes went wide, “Uh-Uhm, how about we resume this tommorow-” “well hold on,” Rio spoke for the first time, “My son intervened and helped someone in danger because their son was making girls unsafe in the school? Why is he being punished?” “Well Mrs.Morales we didn’t know that happened-” “so you immediately assumed my son was the cause of this not even getting evidence before?” “Well he did start-” “uhn-uh, their child is making the school more unsafe than Miles ever did. Why aren’t they being scolded for this?”

The principal apologized, saying Miles would be suspended for the rest of the week for starting the fight, but no charges could be pressed to avoid anybody getting into serious trouble.

Miles sat in the passenger seat of his moms car, the leather caressing his skin as he looked out the window. A hushed silence had fallen over the two a while ago. Silence is always worse than actually being screamed at, the anticipation is always so suffocating. “So.. who’s the girl?” His mom said, looking at the road ahead. Miles glanced at her before looking back out the window, “classmate.” She nodded, humming. Rio knew her son, and she knew Miles wouldn’t damn near end a kids life just just for some classmate.

“Ella tiene un nombre?” He sighed lightly, “Y/n.” Rio nodded and hummed again, looking at miles through the corner of her eye. “At some point throughout the week, I expect her over for dinner.” “I don’t even have her number, how is she supposed to know” Rio clicked her teeth and smirked,

“Encontrarás una manera”.

©axeoverblade

[torasplanet]

❝𝙏𝙃𝙍𝙀𝙀 𝙒𝙊𝙍𝘿𝙎.ᐟ❞

K. BAKUGOU, S. TODOROKI, & I. MIDORIYA + SHY!GN. READER

𝙨𝙪𝙢𝙢𝙖𝙧𝙮 ; the main three when their shy/anxious s/o finally says 'i love you'<3

𝙬𝙖𝙧𝙣𝙞𝙣𝙜 ; fluff, hcs + scenarios, new relationships, literally that's it and skin color not mentioned

IZUKU MIDORIYA

izu just can't with this.

he understands how you're shy and all of that so it might take you some time to get comfortable saying those things

hell he even was scared to say it too but this long??? really?

izu has begun to think that you'd never say it at this rate...

he got so scared that you didn't love him at all and was just too scared to tell him the truth because you didn't wanna hurt his feelings!

or maybe he's just overthinking again...

that doesn't matter because izu never tells you his concerns. he wants you to take your time

he doesn't wanna rush you and make it forced!

that being said...when you finally do say it on your own, he thinks he just might lose his mind.

izuku's anxious sitting at his desk with you right beside him almost breaking the pencil in half and it was a mechanical pencil. he was holding back because he didn't want to frighten you but he just couldn't sit here while you're looking so cute.

he wanted to say he loved how cute you looked so bad but he was worried that maybe it'd make you uncomfortable since you weren't saying i love you to him yet.

that had been getting to him a lot lately and he didn't know how to handle it without talking to you. he knew how you were and didn't want to make it worse. see izuku himself was a fairly shy person, well not so much as he was in middle school but he understood you and your feelings but not enough for it to not bother him!

"ohhh! i get it now!" you exclaimed leaning back in your chair. your sudden loud speech snapped izuku out of his thoughts and he smiled at you sweetly with a hum escaping him.

you gave him a grin "thanks izu! i love you, i don't know what i'd do without you." you spoke without thinking and immediately closed your eyes out of embarrassment at what he'd say in response. you didn't think about what you were saying, you just said the first thing that came to mind...when you heard a loud bang, you opened your eyes and looked at your boyfriend with wide eyes.

izu's face was planted on the desk and he was letting out a hum that didn't seem positive or anything; more like he was a kettle on the stove. "oh uhm...are you okay?" you hesitantly asked going to reach for him but he snapped up before you could touch him. izuku's face was bright red and it looked like he was burning up "i love you too!" he shouted with a smile on his face clearly happy that you finally said that. you were a bit weirded out but at least he was happy.

KATSUKI BAKUGOU

oh please don't even get me started on katsuki...

like izu, he was really upset about you not saying you love him especially when he said it to you first and you didn't say it back

but unlike izuku, he could give less than a fuck about not wanting to talk to you about it

the only thing that stopped him from doing that was that denki told him that he'd probably hurt your feelings like that and that was the last thing he wanted to do so for once, he shut up

but his aggression was fairly obvious because every time he said he loved you with that frown on his face, it'd get deeper when you didn't say it back and just smiled at him

katsuki felt like he'd actually blow up a building if you took longer to say it.

"what the hell are you doing up there!?" katsuki shouted from down below in the training area while you stood on one of the buildings looking for denki who was supposed to be your other partner.

you looked down at the masked boy very cautiously i might add and just nervously gave him an 'uh' showing you didn't know. katsuki grunted in frustration as he looked around to see if there was any one from the other team around to make sure that you guys didn't lose. he was already beginning to sweat just from pure anger.

when the class was splitting up to go to the locker rooms for costume changes, katsuki had told you he loved you and that he'd see you on the grounds but...you didn't say it back. you just laughed a bit showing that you were growing embarrassed and gave him a very small peck on his cheek.

see katsuki did appreciate that but he wanted an 'i love you' back not a kiss especially not a little baby kiss to the cheek that one of his cousins would give him but again, he stayed silent and just grumbled under his breath in the lockerroom. he was already pissed off from that but now denki was nowhere to be found? that dumb fucker was probably lost.

little did the both of you know, he was behind you planning on surprising you which was not the best idea considering you were almost dangling over the edge of a building right now. "boo!" denki shouted in your ear making you jump and lose your footing. you slipped and fell off the edge of the building with a yelp drawing your boyfriend's attention.

he was quick to blast up into the air and catch you in his arms before you even slightly neared the ground "oh my god! i love you so much 'suki!" you said in desperation as you wrapped your arms around him and clutched onto him in fear that you'd fall. katsuki would never drop you but he almost did when he heard you finally say it back to him.

"ha! i thought you'd never say it!" katsuki shouted with a grin on his face as he landed on the ground, your face still stuffed in his shoulder. you hadn't even realized what you said until he just pointed it out "oh..." you muttered feeling embarrassment creep up on you as your boyfriend put you on the ground. you put your palms to your face to cover you hot face but the blonde grabbed your hands and forcefully pulled them away from your face "stop that shit! if you think i don't love you back, i do." katsuki said muttering the last part a little lower because denki was shouting apologies from the top of the building and could probably hear a few things.

katsuki had a bit to learn about embarrassment when saying that kind of stuff too.

SHOTO TODOROKI

pls dont ever talk to him about this

he'll actually just sit there silent probably dying inside

shoto has had his fair share of not getting told i love you or getting a sort of warped kind of love so you not saying i love you isn't something relatively new to him

but he still hates it.

he can't even begin to explain the ache in his chest when ou don't say it back to him, not like he'd ever explain it to anyone

unlike both of the other boys, he's extremely patient and no matter how he feels, he won't throw small tantrums over you not saying it and will just wait

but as he waited, he got more needy for hearing those three words

"sho..." you whined dragging out the o in your boyfriend's name while you tried to get up from under the many blankets shoto had you bundled under. he had the whole work for you.

thermometer on the bedside desk and cold medicine right next to it while you continuously sneezed and coughed in bed. you had gotten sick recently and your darling two-toned-haired boyfriend had been there for every step! making you food, running your baths, just being a complete sweetheart.

shoto, by default, was a sweet boyfriend but he had been a little extra kind lately in hopes that you'd tell him that you loved him for all of his efforts of going out of his way for you. he didn't know what was going on in your brain but he clearly knew you well because that was what you were planning to do.

telling the boy that you loved him would be the perfect way to express your gratitude to him for all he's done throughout your sickness that was caused by your stupidity of going to the market in the cold night after getting out of the shower "coming, my love." shoto said waddling into the room with a bowl of steaming ramen on the small wooden table he had in his hands to make it easier for you to eat in bed. he was really playing the house husband role.

"here, the broth will make you feel better. i promise." the boy said setting the table on the bed just above your legs while kneeling to the ground, you smiled at the todoroki boy deciding that this was the perfect time to tell him that you loved him.

with a blow toward the scalding bowl, you uttered the words quietly "i love you sho." you grew shy after saying that not knowing how he'd respond and his silence ate you alive. you grabbed your chopsticks as you kept your head down to avoid eye contact "sorry, just ignore it–" "no." he interrupted your excuse almost making you knock the bowl over with now fast your body turned to look at him again.

sho's cheeks were flushed a light pink "i love you too. just didn't expect you to say that." he said chuckling lightly with a smile on his face. it might've been true that he wished for you to say it now but it still surprised him.

in a good way though... "can i have a kiss?" you asked smiling back at your boyfriend who still gave you a close-eyed grin, sho stood to his feet "no. you will get me sick." he replied in a monotone before beginning to walk away muttering how he was going to get you something to drink.

you whined loudly throwing your head back. "sho....!"

©torasplanet .ᐟ reblogs and likes are very appreciated! pls do not repost!!

[reiderwriter]

Unhappy Holidays

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem!Reader

Summary: You're unlucky enough to run into Spencer Reid at holiday celebrations four years in a row. In the New Year, you're resolving to rid him from your mind forever, but you never were one to stick to resolutions 👻🦃🎄🎆

Warnings: SMUT 18+ minors dni, enemies to lovers, low-key work rivals, semi-public sex, car sex, hate sex, fingering, thigh riding, creampie, unprotected sex (no condoms but contraceptive mentioned), slight spoilers for s4 of Criminal Minds (but not really).

Prompt Request: #50"You're so fucking obsessed with me.” #82"Really? Because your pussy is saying something different, sweetheart.” #93"Use my thigh. You've been staring at it all night anyway.”

A/N: This is my first submission for @imagining-in-the-margins November/December Office Party writing challenge! I'm sorry I've been so busy recently, but the holiday season really does take a lot of effort to get through at work lmao. Hopefully, I'll be able to post more over my vacation! For now, enjoy some very unserious smut~♡ (as if I write any other kind).

Here's a link to my masterlist, where you can find all my work!~☆

Working with the FBI was no walk in the park, which, from your desk at the opposite corner of the bullpen, Spencer Reid sure made it look like.

Working on adjacent teams for the last three years had become gradually infuriating. You were forever in the man's orbit, stuck dealing with the other women on your team sat giggling about him and his many stupid haircuts, and wondering just how far you'd fallen to have to stare at his stupid face 5 days a week.

If you were unlucky. His team did happen to be out on cases a lot more, whereas yours handled correspondence and consulting cases, a cushy and safe job.

It annoyed you to no end that you had multiple field-based qualifications, extensive fire arms training and were top of your class at the academy only to be relegated yo desk duty whilst boy wonder with his doctorates was allowed to trip over his own feet catching actual killers.

Other people wondered where your dislike of the man sprang from, and you could only let out a disgruntled squeak and tell them your horror stories.

A few months into your job, your been fresh faced and bushy tailed or however that saying goes, and overly eager to take any assignment that came your way. Even if the assignment was baby-sitting an injured Doctor Spencer Reid. He'd been shot whilst out on a case whilst trying to talk down an unsub, and you'd jumped at the chance to get to know him.

He was an office legend, of course, though those days it was more for his characteristic lack of social graces rather than the beauty he'd grown into. You'd been so eager to get to pick his brains, find out how he'd managed to score the position on the BAU at such an early age.

Reality had hit you square in the face when he'd spent a week ignoring you, making you run around like a headless chicken searching for hard copies of documents the FBI had digitised a millennia ago, and hadn't so much as spared you a glance.

The straw that broke the camel's back came as you were running back to him triumphant with a document he'd requested eight hours before and had let yourself into Penelope Garcia’s office quietly, only to hear him bad mouthing you.

“She makes me uncomfortable. I've had her out searching for useless files all day because I don't know what to do with her.”

“She's trying to help, Spencer, it's her job right now, cut her some slack.”

“Her job is currently getting in the way of mine. I even tried writing my own doctor's note so I could get rid of her, but Hotch wouldn't allow it.”

You'd dropped the file loudly on the table, watched the two spin around with horrified looks and turned silently and left the room.

He hadn't once tried to find you after that, and you let your apprenticeship under Doctor Reid quietly fizzle out as you got back to your regular work.

Your resentment still burned though.

Each time you'd been caught in the same elevator with him, you'd ignored him to an almost insane degree, enjoying the way he squirmed and tried to make small talk.

You'd been in contact with JJ and his Unit Chief Aaron Hotchner as well, through cases you'd recommended, but always maintained your cold shoulder.

The one place you could not ignore him, however, was a Penelope Garcia party.

After you'd slammed the file down on her desk, Penelope had guiltily sent you a gift basket filled with sweet treats and books, and had hounded you for a week to make sure your feelings weren't too damaged by her friend's stupidity.

You actually liked her, and found at least one silver lining to the storm that was Spencer Reid ripping through your life.

In the three years since the “incident,” you'd found yourself at three parties where Penelope in all of her heartwarming ways had tried her best to force a reconciliation between the two of you, to disastrous results.

The first was a Halloween party, and you'd been incredibly proud of your Princess Laia costume when you'd arrived. Only until you'd gone to the kitchen to top up your drink to hear Spencer Reid boring some guest or the other about how Star Trek was more advanced, and had a richer plot line.

Penelope had stepped into the kitchen just as he'd caught a glimpse of your (rather skimpy) outfit - yes, you'd chosen swimsuit Laia, yes, you were going to own it - and had immediately jumped into introductions, as if you weren't already intimately acquainted.

“Spencer! This is Y/N! She loves Halloween, too, she makes all of her costumes. You guys should talk.” She'd led the other guest away and left you there with Spencer as you'd awkwardly looked upon his own costume.

“Are you the Tenth Doctor?” You asked begrudgingly, noting his pin-striped suit and the shorter hairstyle he'd chosen.

“Are you a fan? I prefer the original show run more than the current stuff, but David Tennant has really been doing a wonderful-”

“I'm sorry, let me stop you there. I don't watch Doctor Who. I guess I prefer something with a… How should I say, richer plot?”

He'd snapped his mouth shut and didn't have chance to open it again before you turned dramatically and walked away from him.

The second party you'd been cornered into was just over a year later.

Having been stuck in the office over Halloween, Penelope was determined to get in one last celebration before Christmas steam-rolled every other holiday, and thus you'd been invited to her single-people-only-friendsgiving-potluck, and you'd found yourself having to navigate knocking on her door with a casserole dish in your hands.

Luckily a large hand had appeared from behind you and knocked on the door for you. Unfortunately, the sudden shock from the silent appearance of a man right behind you startled you so much that the dish fell straight from your hands anyway.

Penelope opened her door upon hearing the crash and you whirled on your would-be attacker.

It was Spencer again, eyes round in shock, hand still curled into a fist.

You took a calming breath as you gathered yourself, trying not to bite his head off. You wanted to scream and shout and rip his head out but you didn't, instead letting the fury drip into your voice as you finally opened your eyes again.

“That dish took me four fucking hours to make.” You huffed in anger once more as Penelope guided you into the apartment and poured you a glass of wine before you moved back to the entry hall to clean it up again.

Needless to say he didn't care to converse with you after that.

A few small parties in between had been blissfully Spencer-less and you'd lulled yourself into a false sense of security. That's when you accepted the Christmas party invitation.

As one of the unlucky few members of the FBI who had to stay out over christmas in case of some emergency or the other, you'd been grounded in Virginia, unable to travel home for the holidays. So Penelope Garcia's singles-only-Christmas-fun-time-Party was your last ditch effort to spend the holidays actually resting and eating good food.

Learning from last time, Penelope reassured you that there was no potluck, that she had prepared all the food herself, and all you'd need were a bottle of wine and a willingness to party.

You'd taken those recommendations as law and had immediately let yourself into a glass of mulled wine as you arrived, and - noticing that the party was Reid-free - had allowed it to raise your Christmas spirits slightly more than you usually would.

By hour two of the event, you were full of yuletide joy and swaying freely along to the tune of Silent Night.

Spencer’s late entrance really would have gone unnoticed by you had you not bumped face first into his chest as you spun yourself around in your dance, his hands quickly falling to your hips to steady you.

The few moments it took you to gather yourself were about as long as you needed to realised that he'd caught you in his arms underneath the mistletoe. And with your mind fogged by mulled-whatever-it-was-Penelope-mixed-into-that-punch, the part of your brain that objected to the very existence of Spencer Reid went silent, and the incredibly tiny and somewhat damaged part of your brain that instead saw him as attractive started shouting loud instructions.

Before your common sense could return, you pushed yourself up on your tiptoes to kiss the very warm, very close man holding you upright.

“Mistletoe,” you muttered as you clawed his arms off of you and took yourself straight to Penelope's bathroom to throw up.

So yes, your acquaintance with Spencer Reid had never been good, and you were perfectly fine with resenting him from afar, privately.

With three years of bad experiences under your belt, you weren't excited at completing your yearly tradition of horrendous interaction. Which is perhaps why you immediately and loudly protested Penelope’s New Years Eve party invitation.

“Y/N, it's a party. What's the worst that can happen?” She pleaded as she followed you down the corridors of the office building.

“I could see Spencer Reid. I could be forced to converse with Spencer Reid. I could get absolutely wasted and kiss Spencer Reid. There, three options, please accept my resignation from partying.”

“Y/N we both know you don't drink anymore, so at least one of those is unlikely to happen. And Spencer might not even come, he has tickets for an indie theatre from 6pm onwards, they're playing some Russian movie from the 60s that's like 4 hours long or something. So u retire yourself and tell me you'll come?” She had to take three or four steps for each of your own, not that you were so different in height but because you were practically marching in order to avoid the topic.

But you finally stopped and let out a sigh as you turned back to Penelope who stopped just before she ran into you.

“You're sure he won't be there?”

“I'm sure he RSVP’d no.”

“Fine. But I'm not drinking and I will still be expecting the Penelope Garcia virgin punch experience.”

“Bring the party poppers and you have a deal.”

“Done.”

–X–

Over the week since you'd accepted the invitation, you'd made peace with it. For the most part, you did love a Penelope Garcia production. There was something wonderful about your friend and her ability to brighten anyone's mood, an ability that was only heightened at holidays. She was like a glittered goddess gaining power when worshippers used her altar, except the altar was her house and the worship was a range of hallmark-induced holidays.

You arrived at the party at 10pm, and though that was the start time you'd been given, you weren't surprised to see a full house of Penelope’s team mates already in attendance. Derek Morgan, Jennifer Jareau and Emily Prentiss sat spread across the sofa in the living room area, and you noticed a few techie friends also grabbing drinks and chatting.

“Y/N, I'm so glad you're here! You remember everyone on the team, right?” She pulled you into a hug and then sat you down in the middle of the group, waiting for you to mingle and become comfortable before she ran off to more hostess duties.

“Of course, nice to see you guys.” You grabbed your promised punch and sat back comfortably, striking up a conversation with Emily about how bleak the dating scene had been recently.

“It seems like all the men around me are jackasses,” Emily muttered and you giggled along.

“I'm wounded,” Morgan shot back, a hand pressed to his chest in faux pain.

“Good. You're like a lion out there in the clubs stalking gazelles, it's like watching a nature documentary when you're out there.”

You almost snorted your entire drink up your nose as Emily finished, needing to compose yourself for a second.

“I guess the men on our team aren't great with romance,” JJ laughed and took a swing. “Hotch and Rossi have four divorces between them, and Derek here is a lost cause.”

“Our only hope is young Spencer. May he grow into a respectful young gentleman and break out curse,” Emily toasted.

“Oh that ship has sailed,” your laugh this time was bitter, your mood immediately growing sour with even the smallest mention of Spencer Reid.

“Ah, Penelope mentioned you had a problem with our boy wonder. Care to share?”

You opened your mouth to give your standard non-answer and move the conversation along, but you were interrupted.

“Yes, Y/N, care to share? I am slightly curious about that as well.” You turned around and there he was, and your stomach turned in disgust.

Just one time, just one party. You'd been having fun, and here he was to ruin it.

“What are you doing here?” you gaped up at him, unsurprised to see him still decked out in sweater vest and slacks even in his down time.

“I was invited.”

“You declined, Penelope said you had movie tickets.”

“Ticket, singular. And it was cancelled so here I am. What's your problem with me, Y/N?” His jaw clenched and he grabbed the back of your chair and leaned down. It was supposed to be intimidating, but you rolled your eyes. When he looked that attractive, veins in his arms popping out of the sleeves he'd pulled up, you couldn't see him as intimidating. His arms were distracting yes, but God that was nothing compared to his thighs. His pants were tight, and you thanked whatever Clueless tailor had sewn them, because you now allowed yourself a momentary lapse to enjoy the appearance of his lower body.

You tried to shake the thought of his attractiveness from your mind, reminding yourself where you were and in what company.

“I don't think I need to answer that. I think I'll enjoy holding it over your head instead,” you said, standing up and beginning to gather your things.

“Wait, Y/N, where are you going? New Year isn't for another 30 minutes.” Penelope scrambled over and grabbed your hand, pleading with you to stay.

“I'm sorry Pen, but there's just this very annoying bug buzzing around me, and I think I need to get away from it.” You said your goodbyes and excused yourself from the party, happy to have walked away relatively undamaged.

Fate had other plans, and as you stepped out of the apartment building ready to walk yourself home, a hand caught yours from behind as a voice chased you.

“Y/N, wait. I'll go. You go back inside.”

“And return with my tail tucked between my legs after making a grand exit? I'll pass, thanks boy genius.” You shook yourself from his grasp and made to walk away again, but he quickly matched your pace and stepped into your path, cutting you off.

“I can't let you walk home. It's like 40° out here, and your coat is more style than substance.”

“Get into a car with a stranger? I'm sure you of all people know how stupid that sounds.” You stuck a finger out and poked his chest, but he grabbed your hand and held it in place as he spat out his next words.

“I'm not a stranger, I'm the man you're obsessed with, Y/N. Big difference.” You laughed, mostly in shock at his indignance, but he stared at your face as serious as could be.

“Me? Obsessed with you? I'm not the one who followed a woman they're barely acquainted with out of a party filled with all of my friends. Sounds like you're projecting, Spencer.”

“Am I?” He questioned, stepping closer and grabbing your hip as he continued his questioning. “I wasn't the one who was sat there talking about me with all of my colleagues.”

“Well, I wasn't the one who turned up to a party I'd declined an invitation to.”

He was imperceptibly close now, hand gripping your hip so tight you wondered if it'd leave you with a mark.

“I certainly was not the one who initiated a kiss last year, Y/N. You need to face the facts, you're so fucking obsessed with me.” If his hands had you feeling dizzy, his words were completely knocking the sense out of you. Suddenly you returned to the person you'd been under that Mistletoe, and everything from his closeness to the rough edge to his voice begged you to do it once again.

“Go fuck yourself,” was about all the words you could manage as he finally let his lips fall down and crush into your own.

You should've pushed him away, but instead your traitorous body wanted to prove his point, opening up for him faster than you'd opened up to anyone else before.

His tongue flicked against your lips and you gladly let him explore your mouth, opening up to tangle your tongue with his.

He tasted sweet, like the punch Penelope had handed you earlier, only now you wondered if someone had accidentally laced it with how free you were being with your affections.

He resurfaced for air, but you didn't care if there was nothing in your lungs at all if it meant that his lips would engage your own in battle once again.

“Look how much you want me,” he smirked. “Look how needy you are after a single kiss, chasing my lips like that.”

“You and your big fucking mouth. I wish you'd shut up once in a while.”

“I'll make it my new year’s resolution.” His lips joined your own again, and you clashed hard, exploring as much as you could muster as he pulled you in the direction of his car.

“I'm not driving… home… with you,” you growled between kisses, trying not to put your teeth to his neck and bite down hard. You're not sure if that impulse was a murderous one or a kinky one.

“I'm not putting you in the front seat, Y/N, I'm putting you in the back. You should be familiar with the idea.”

Heat sparked between your legs, and you allowed yourself to be manhandled into the beat-up trash heap of a car.

He'd not taken his hands off you as he got you in, pushing himself in first and then pulling you by the hand that you'd unconsciously gripped hard. You immediately straddled his hips, skirt naturally riding up in the process. He noticed and looked curiously down at you, growling as you pressed your lips against his neck and grabbed you instead by the hair gathered in a ponytail at the back of your head.

“See, you're obsessed with me. Just admit it.” Without breaking eye contact, he dug his fingers into the material of your tights and pulled in opposite directions, leaving your underwear exposed to his wandering eyes.

“I'm not obsessed with you,” your voice needed conviction to land, but it came out as a lusty whisper, especially as he slipped his fingers inside your underwear and finally touched your aching cunt.

“Really? Because your pussy is saying something else, Princess.” He found your clit faster than you'd ever expected, rubbing slow circles into your skin as you began rocking your hips back and forth.

It was becoming hard to disagree with him, with each flick of wrist growing the heat between your legs. You attacked his neck again, hands practically ripping at his top buttons so you could muffle the sounds of your arousal against his neck, collarbone, chest, any stretch of that pale skin available to you.

He forced your hips to a stop with one hand as he slipped a single digit inside of your hole, gathering your arousal as he set a steady pace, thumb keeping your bundle of nerves occupied.

“Listen, Y/N, can you hear that?”

“I can't h-hear anything.” You had to grind your teeth together to get the words out with minimal interruptions of moans bursting from the pit of your stomach.

He leaned in close to your ear, nuzzling your neck and placing chaste kisses up towards your ear, finally pulling away just enough to whisper a single word in your ear.

“Liar.”

His hand stilled and pulled off you quickly and your eyes broke open, hands unconsciously fitting into his shirt as if you were worried he was going to leave you there like this, on the edge of pleasure but still so far away.

“Use my thigh. You've been staring at it all night anyway.”

“Jackass. You've only been here for like 20 minutes.”

“You can climb right out of this car if you want to, Y/N.” He tried to keep his tone light, but the death grip he had on your thighs, the very obvious tent pitched in his pants and the way his eyes couldn't go five seconds without undressing you told you you had more power in this interaction than he wanted to give you.

There was no way either of you were letting the other go unused tonight.

You relaxed your grip on his shirt and shifted your weight to one of his thighs. Lithe he may be, but lowering yourself down there was an unexpected strength there. He watched on curiously as you rocked experimentally against him. Back and forth you rocked, trying desperately to keep up his momentum or tempt him to help you out again.

It was time to let your voice back out, and you did, moaning without a care as you hummed his leg like a bitch in heat.

“You're enjoying this lot, huh, Y/N,” he muttered, and you watched as his hand worked his pants zip open, removing one of the barriers in the way between the two of you, as he began palming himself.

“What's that saying? Anything you can do, I can do better?” He growled at that response but didn't stop you. Instead he bought a hand down on your ass as you moved, so hard you jolted at the sudden pain. Your eyes shot open as your hips stilled, but you felt warmth grow between your legs.

“Yes, you definitely enjoyed that. Should I do that again, or do you think we should hurry this up and go back up for the countdown?”

You hesitated only a second before you pushed his hand off his lap, shifting your hips further towards his knees before letting your hand reach for where his had just been.

You didn't let yourself think about how big he was as you pulled his cock free, didn't let yourself wonder how he measured up against anyone you'd been with before. You didn't let yourself waste time thinking about how various office rumours were true, and definitely not a second was wasted feeling jealous about how those rumours were spread in the first place.

Instead you simply slammed your lips back against his, mouth opening to let your tongue engage his as you lifted your hips with his help and lowered yourself down on him.

You didn't have to rid yourself of sinful thoughts after that as he purged every single brain cell from your head, filling you so contently that there was simply no space for anything but him.

You locked up on top of him, clawing at his shoulders as you whimpered at the stretched, falling so he was balls deep inside you. You wanted to move, to use him for your pleasure, but your walls tightened every time you even thought about it as he stroked your hair through it all.

It had been some time since you'd last had a sexual partner, and you needed the few minutes to overcome the first uncomfortable bliss of it all.

“That good?” he whispered, but the harsh tone of earlier was gone, replaced only by unsure humour to break the silence.

“Been a while.” He nodded, kissing you again to distraction as he shifted your positions.

Cradling your neck and securing your legs comfortably around him, he lowered you against the backseat, pulling out slightly as you adjusted to the new angle.

“Better?” You nodded quickly, because it was. There was no more pressure on your legs, and despite the cramped space in the car, you had enough space to lie almost flat.

“Yes… thank you.” Just as his cutting tone had escaped him, you also heard your own tone softening, the sigh of contentment slipping past your lips almost sweet. Almost.

“Are you going to fuck me now, or what?”

He let out a shocked laugh, but lent down to shut you up with a kiss nonetheless. Bracing himself against the car door, his hips softly rocked into you, pace increasing until you were back to the edge of cumming, nails pressed hard into his skin until you were sure he was going to complain.

He didn't though, but kept up his thrusts, until your vision suddenly darkened and stars exploded in them, rolled back in your head as they were.

“Shit, shit, shit, shit, where should I…?” He panicked, but you wrapped your legs around him, grabbing him by the tie and pulling him down to swallow his moan as he shot his load inside of you.

“Birth control.” You whispered when you finally let him go, gasping for air. “Contraceptive pill. No need to get the car dirty.”

He collapsed on top of you then, forehead resting against your own as you both caught your breaths.

The moment was silent, and you found the synchronicity of your breaths almost calming. Eventually you had to break apart, and he helped you up to a sitting position, but didn't break eye contact as fell back into his lap.

His hands stroked your back, dipping to your ass at times, but he didn't talk. Neither of you did.

The eye contact between the two of you was possibly the most pleasant conversation you'd ever had.

“I'm sorry.” He blurted, just as fireworks erupted into the night sky. Your heart shook, and you weren't sure of it was the shock of the sound, or the way the rainbow of lights illuminated his sincere expression.

“You don't have to apologise for cumming in me, Spencer.”

“Not that. Before. The casserole and the mistletoe, and the Halloween costume.”

“Wow. Um, okay. Apology accepted, I guess, though I'm not entirely sure why you're apologising now.”

He took a deep breath just as another set of fireworks went up.

“I pulled you under the mistletoe. It was Penelope’s idea, she knew how stupid I was being around you and sent me over. I saw it and took the chance.”

“Fuck. Why?”

“Because I was pretty useless at being chivalrous the year before.”

You climbed off his lap in a scramble and sat on the seat beside him, mind racing, trying to figure out where the hell he was going with this.

He turned to you, trying to keep your attention as he stumbled over the words.

“You couldn't knock on the door, so I wanted to help you, but I didn't think I'd scare you so much you'd drop it.”

“You didn't scare me it was a momentary lapse in my observational skills.”

“You shrieked,” a smile threatened to pull his lips up, they twitched as you flushed red.

“And Halloween?” You looked at him again now, trying to figure out what the hell was going on between the two of you.

“You refused to look at me for a year after we stopped working together,” he shrugged quickly running a hand through his hair and expelling a breath. “I don’t really know how to talk to women.”

“You just know how to piss them off?”

“Morgan says it comes naturally.”

“Yeah, well, Morgan is very wise.”

A brief silence stretched between you, or as silent as a night full of cracks, pops, whizzes and bangs could be.

“I don't get it. You tried your best to get rid of me when I was there to help you. I wanted to impress you, and you kept sending me on meaningless errands, and now you're saying what? You wanted my attention?” There was a quiet anger to your voice, but you were surprised to find it diminished and tired.

“I wanted you gone because you were distracting me, Y/N, not because I hated you.”

“Well, what's the difference, Doctor Reid? Please indulge me.” You huffed a little but kept your eyes on him, trying not to seem too desperate for his answer.

“I have an IQ of 187. Emily says when I'm around a pretty girl it's more like 52,” he fidgeted with his pants, forcing the words out.

“You're a pretty girl. We had a case to work and all I could think about was how to get you to like me. Hotch chewed me out like three separate times for being absent minded.”

He was looking anywhere but you, trying his best not to appear like a fool but you were locked onto him.

“Oh my god you're an idiot.”

“When you're around, yes.”

“And that means I'm equally stupid.”

“No, you just jump to conclusions and hold grudges. There wasn't anything really that stupid about your actions, though it could be suggested that not thoroughly thinking through the wording of the conversation you overheard-”

You cut him off with a kiss, pulling him down again mlby his tie.

“Oh my god, shut up,” you whispered as you broke apart.

“Does that mean we can do this again? Because I'd like to do this again?”

“Stop talking, start kissing jackass.”

He finally didn't argue with that, pulling you back into him as you sat under the stars in his car welcoming the new year.

[4unnyr0se]

❥ sfw & n$fw headcanons - yuu nishinoya & morisuke yaku

warnings: timeskip! characters, fem! reader, they're sweetiepies, noya is actually a freak, roleplay, switch! noya, hickeys, spanking, mentions of unprotected sex, dom! yaku, slight breeding kink with yaku, cowgirl, doggystyle, they love you so much

MDNI | 18+ content

word count -> 2k

a/n: im sorry if yaku is ooc i wrote this at 2am and i do not feel like editing anything. n$fw is censored because i would like to keep my blog lmao

Yuu Nishinoya - SFW

❥ Absolutely whipped for you the second he lays his eyes upon you. You could be doing anything, literally anything, and he knew right then and there that he would die for you, no questions asked.

❥ He doesn’t really care what qualifies as a “date” as long as he gets to spend time with you. You could be folding laundry together, and he thinks it’s the most romantic date you’ve been on because you’re with him and you’re his entire world.

❥ Spontaneous. Gifts. He’ll send flowers to where you work, give you cool rocks he found while hiking or doing some other such thing, making you a care basket full of your favorite chocolates and snacks, contracting Sugawara to help him write love letters (writing is not his strong suit but he still wants to do it.)

❥ So much food, like…just so much food. You’ve been to every restaurant in town at least twice because that boy loves to eat. Even if you aren’t a big eater, he’ll still make sure you get three meals a day plus snacks. And if you struggle to eat, he’ll be so happy even if you only eat a little bit off your plate.

❥ Quality time and physical touch are his love languages, so expect to be getting kisses often. Pecks on the cheek in public, his arms wrapped around your waist from behind as you wash dishes in the sink. And if he’s jealous? He has no problem making out with you in front of people because you’re his, and the world should know.

❥ Speaking of physical touch, this man will not stop holding your hand. At least one part of him is touching a part of you at any given moment when you’re together as if he’s afraid you’d float away if he let go.

❥ Hella clingy, this man is incredibly clingy. If you get up to use the restroom when you’re cuddling, he’s waiting outside the door for you to come back so he can kiss those beautiful lips of yours. He just can’t get enough!

❥ Obsessed with you and everything that you do. Did you sneeze? He’s on the verge of tears because you look so fucking cute when you sneeze. Did you buy a new outfit? He’s throwing a tantrum until you model it for him so he can shower you with praise. Noya worships the ground you walk on and them some. 

❥ Lowkey possessive but in a good way. Deep down, he’s worried that you’ll leave him for someone taller or better than he is, so he gets a tiny bit jealous when he sees someone talking to you that he considers a threat. Of course, you’re free to do whatever you like. He would never tell you what you can and cannot do. He respects you too much for that. But he will talk to you about his feelings because he’s mature like that.

N$FW

❥ So. Many. Hickeys. This ties into the part of him being possessive. He wants to let everyone know that you’re his, and what better way to show you off than by parading you around town with your neck and chest covered in little red and purple bruises? You’ve nearly gone bankrupt on buying just concealer because once a hickey fades away, a new one will take its place in no time at all.

❥ Literally anything the two of you do will end in him fucking you or vice versa. If you bend down to pick something up, his hands are groping your ass, and he’s pulling down your panties and shoving his fingers into your pussy, all the while whispering the filthiest things in your ear. 

❥ This motherfucker whines and whimpers, and he’s so incredibly loud about it. The second he shoves his dick inside, he becomes a babbling, pussydrunk mess that’s only focused on you cumming all over his cock.

❥ Noya is 100% a switch who doesn’t lean towards being submissive or dominant. He just does whatever you want him to. Do you want him to fuck you stupid for hours on end? He’s down for that? Do you want to tie him up, blindfold him, and ride him until he can’t think. Also completely down for that. 

❥ Endless stamina. As long as you’re up for it, he can fuck you for the entire day. He simply doesn’t believe in a recovery period on his end. He’ll fuck you from sunrise to sunset. All you have to do is ask.

❥ Tits man 100%. Noya loves tits, no matter the size or shape. If you have huge tits, he’s fondling them as he takes you from behind. Medium-sized tits? He sucks on them as you ride his cock, relishing in the taste. Small tits? He plays with your pert nipples as he fucks you missionary. All tits are good tits in his eyes

.❥ Highly experimental in the bedroom. He’ll try anything and everything if it means you both get to feel good. From you pegging him to him filming your third orgasm of the night, he’s down for whatever. The only things he isn’t okay with are hitting you (impact play) and sharing you with others. He will casually slap your ass but that’s as far as he’ll go. He just can’t bring himself to hit you, even if it turns you on.

❥ Could eat you out for literal days and not get tired, not even for one second. He wants you cumming on his tongue and pulling on his hair as you beg him for more, and he’ll give it to you.

❥ Focuses on your pleasure, not his own. You’re his goddess and he’d do anything to serve you, anything to make you cum again and again.

❥ Has a whole index of kinks, but his top ones are roleplay and passionate sex. Dress up as a teacher, and he’ll cum in his pants, begging on you to punish him for failing your class.

❥ Loves to make love to you.

❥ “Yeah? You like it when I fuck you with my fingers, angel? M’gonna make you cum so fucking much for me, my perfect angel.”

❥ “Fuck, you’re so fucking tight. Can’t get enough of this dick, can you baby? Gotta fuck you stupid.”

❥ “More, I want more! I’ve been so bad, I deserve to be punished, ma’am!”

❥ “Talk to the camera for me, angel. Tell the camera how many times my cock made this pussy squirt all over the sheets.”

❥ “Gonna fucking cum inside, can’t pull out. Oh, fuck, baby, you’re fucking milking me dry, shit.”

❥ “Faster, fuck me faster! Wanna fucking cum so bad, please! I’ve been good, right?”

Morisuke Yaku - SFW

❥ Loves when you get an attitude with him because he also has an attitude. He loves when you talk back to him and when you tell him how you really feel, it’s just so refreshing. Honesty is very important to Yaku.

❥ You and Yaku basically continue to mother Lev well after you’re both graduated. Lev will call and text you for advice and you’ll gladly help him, even if Yaku gets a little jealous that you’re paying more attention to the oversized Russian than you are to your own boyfriend.

❥ Takes you on the most romantic restaurant dates ever. He has professional athlete money, so order whatever the hell you like! If you want five lobsters, get five lobsters. As long as his baby is happy.

❥ Spoils you rotten, but he won’t ever admit it. If you point out a cute necklace that you saw in a magazine, it’s there when you wake up the next morning. Yaku will pretend to not know how it got there, but he knows, obviously. Expect lots of expensive gifts when you’re dating, especially from designer brands. Half of your closet is Chanel and you sure as hell aren’t complaining.

❥ Not that big on PDA, but will wrap an arm around your waist in public. Since he’s a well-known libero in the Russian Volleyball League, he gets approached on the street sometimes. He doesn’t want to draw too much attention to himself (especially if you hate getting attention from strangers, so he holds off on kissing you until you’re in the privacy of his penthouse apartment.

❥ Pleads and begs until you adopt a cat together. He just wants a cat with you, any cat will do. It can be a cat you found in a dumpster or a cat that cost someone’s entire yearly salary, he just wants a cat to raise with you by his side.

❥ Wraps his arms around your waist as you cook and leave kisses on your neck. Whether you’re taller or shorter from him, get ready for hugs and kisses from behind.

❥ If you struggle with your body image, he’ll kiss away all your insecurities. His lips will be on yours for hours as he tells you how perfect you are, and how much he loves you. He’ll kiss away your tears as you start crying as well, because to him you are perfect.

N$FW

❥ Not very vocal in bed, but he does make plenty of grunts and groans. The only time you’ll ever really hear him moan is when you bite down on his incredibly sensitive neck, which will make him cum on the spot.

❥ Advocate for safe and healthy sex but prefers to hit it raw. He’ll use a condom if you want him to, he isn’t a monster. But the way you react when his cum fills out of your womb makes him want to wife you up and fuck you every single day.

❥ Designer lingerie is his weakness, especially the ones with garters that squeeze your thigh beautifully. If you wear red lingerie around him, be prepared to not be able to walk tomorrow because he will ruin your pussy.

❥ 100% a pleasure dom. Nothing makes him happier than knowing that he fucks you so good each and every night that you can’t even get off without his help anymore because that’s how much he loves to fuck you.

❥ Ass man. His hands will be on your ass all the time and you just have to accept it. He loves to fuck you from behind because he’s mesmerized by the way your ass moves as he fucks you. His favorite position is doggystyle.

❥ A weird turn-on for him is when you walk around wearing his jersey. He fucking loves it when you wear his jersey, and he can see your lacy panties poking out under the shirt, it drives him wild. If you wear his jersey, he gets an instant boner.

❥ Sit. In. His. Lap. Sit in his lap and dry hump him. He needs it so badly. He loves watching as you struggle to get off on his thigh. You look so cute when you’re desperate.

❥ Definitely a brat tamer. He loves it when you have an attitude because he gets to fuck it out of you later, spanking you as he tells you how much of a brat you are and how you need to learn your lesson. You never do.

❥ Mirror sex. He’s mesmerized by how adorable you look in the mirror as your pussy struggles to take his girthy cock.

❥ “Yeah? Look at yourself in the mirror, princess. Look at how your slutty little pussy is taking me. You’re such a little slut, you’re my little slut.”

❥ “Did you think you could just walk around in my jersey and nothing else? Bend over, princess, right fucking now.”

❥ “I’m so fucking close, shit. You want me to cum inside you, princess? Want me to fill you up and give you my babies? You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

❥ “Fuck, you know what red does to me. So fucking slutty for me, babygirl. Now get on the bed and spread those legs nice and wide like a good girl.”

❥ “Take it, fucking take it. That’s my good girl. I love it when you behave for me, princess. Can I get another one of you, my love? I think you can handle another orgasm.”

❥ “You look so pretty when you cum, princess. Do you like how your Morisuke makes you feel? Use your words, princess.”

[angel5ofp0rn]

♡ part ten ♡

ExHusband!Price x f!reader

@rosiesghost we were totally on the same page with John and Nadia 🤭

“So, why did the two of you split up? John found someone younger?”

You nearly choke on your water, caught off guard by Nadia’s bluntness.

“Just teasing.” Nadia chuckles softly, taking another sip of her wine. “Younger than you? He’d ‘ave to rob a cradle.”

From the patio, the two of you watched John and the three children kick a football around in the backyard.

Your youngest struggled to keep up due to her age and size. John was quick to help by lifting her from under her armpits, helping her get a good kick in.

“Actually, it was you," you confess, a slight blush creeping up your cheeks. Nadia looks at you curiously.

"He wouldn't tell me where he was going when he would come here to visit you and Theo. I thought he was cheating."

Nadia almost frowns a bit, looking back to John and the kids. “And now that you know the truth?”

You sigh softly. “I don’t know… I still can’t move past you. I can’t stop thinking about John cheating on you, and abandoning you and Theo.”

“I told him to leave.”

“You… what?”

Nadia sets her wine glass down on the table between the two of you. “John and I… We weren’t in love, you see.” She starts carefully. “We just had a drunken one night stand, and I fell pregnant with Theo… John proposed just to do the right thing, but it wasn’t what either one of us wanted.”

You sit quietly, absorbing her words. The revelation leaves you stunned. You had no idea...

"We were unhappy for a long time," Nadia continues, her gaze distant as if reliving those moments. "We talked about seeing other people for a while, but John said he couldn't bring himself to do it. Even though there were no feelings between us, he couldn't date around while married. And then he met you."

Nadia smiles to herself as she explains the situation to you. You glance over at John, memories of your first meeting flooding back. John kept insisting that he wasn’t right for you, that you should just forget about him.

Now it makes sense.

Unaware of your eyes on him, John uses the bottom of his shirt to wipe the sweat from his face. You get a glimpse of his toned, hairy abdomen and that hint of a v-line that still lingers despite him getting softer with age.

“Can’t deny that he’s sexy, though.” Nadia murmurs, a low whistle escaping her lips.

You chuckle and nod in agreement.

The conversation lulls for a moment, both of you lost in your thoughts. The children’s laughter echoes from the yard, and you see Theo twirl your youngest around, her giggles filling the air.

"Do you ever regret it?" you ask quietly. "Leaving him, I mean."

Nadia pauses, considering your question.

"Sometimes. Not because there’s any feelings,” She explains briefly. “He was a good husband, though, and he’s a good father... But I know it was the right thing to do. We deserved to be happy, and so did Theo. And you deserve that, too."

You take a deep breath, feeling a weight lift off your shoulders. “You’re right.”

“I have a couple pregnancy tests under the sink in my bathroom.” Nadia mentions casually.

“I’m sorry?” You look at her incredulously.

Nadia gestures to your glass of water, with her wine glass.

•••

The drive back to the rental for your last night before heading back to the states is quiet. The soft hum of the engine and the rhythmic sound of the tires on the road are the only sounds filling the car.

The children, exhausted from their last day with their big brother, are fast asleep in the back seat. Their heads bob slightly with each turn, tiny bodies relaxed in the safety of the car.

You glance over at John, his profile illuminated by the passing streetlights. He looks deep in thought, one hand on the steering wheel and the other resting casually on his knee.

After a few moments of comfortable silence, you gather your courage. "Nadia told me about your marriage to her... how it really was."

John's grip on the steering wheel tightens slightly, but he keeps his gaze on the road. "Yeah? What’d she say?

“She told me about how the two of you weren’t really together… just married for Theo’s sake.”

John nods, still watching the road.

“I wish you would have just told me.” You sigh. “I wish you would have trusted me with the truth. Trusted that I wouldn’t have judged you for that.”

“It wasn’t about trust,” John explains. “I just… I wanted our relationship to be about us, our future, not my past.”

You stare at John, frustration starting to resurface. "There is no future without a past, John. You can't just compartmentalize parts of your life and expect it not to affect everything else."

John glances at you, his expression conflicted as he rubs a hand over his mouth and beard. "I know. I fucked up, alright? I was scared. Scared that you'd see me differently, that you'd think less of me."

"John, I already see you differently because of the lies," you say softly, your voice trembling.

The silence in the car is heavy, the air thick with unspoken emotions. You can feel the distance between you widening, even as you sit mere inches apart.

John finally breaks the silence, his voice barely above a whisper. "I'm sorry. I really am. I never meant to hurt you.”

You close your eyes, trying to steady your breathing. "I know you didn't. But it doesn't change the fact that you did."

John pulls into the driveway and parks the car. He turns to you, his blue eyes filled with regret. "I haven’t cheated. I haven’t abandoned my family. Yes, I hid things from you but I came clean.” John takes a deep breath. “How do we fix this?“

“I can’t talk about this right now.” You shake your head, turning to open the passenger door.

John stops you, his hand grabbing yours.

“We made a promise to each other to talk everything out, not fight.” John’s voice was stern as he locked eyes with you. “If you’re going to just walk away again… I’m going to take that as you wanting to end things for good.”

You turn to look at the children, still peacefully asleep in the back seat. The sight of them, so innocent and unaware of the turmoil around them.

"I want to fix this," you say quietly, turning back to John. “I want us to be together again, but-“

“Then we’ll be together again.” John insists.

“It’s not that simple…” You nearly whisper.

“It’s always been that simple with us.” The corners of John’s mouth twitch into a smile. “You found me at a bar and decided we’d be together. I took you on our first date and decided to make you my wife just a year later… It can be that simple. Just say the word, lovey, and I’m yours.”

You study John’s face for a moment. Everything he said is true, whether you want to believe it or not.

“I want us to be together again.” You confirm.

“You mean that?” John’s grin widens, his grip on your hand tightening slightly.

You nod, your own smile growing.

John moved to cup your face, leaning closer to plant a kiss to your lips, but you pull back.

“Wait- Before we get too far, have my own secret that I need to confess.”

John’s eyes flicker between yours, his expression shifting from elated to confused.

You reach into your bag and pull out a little blue-and-white box and hand it to him.

John studies it, then looks up to you.

“Y’r fuckin’ with me.” He mutters, eyes practically twinkling.

“You didn’t even look at it yet.” You roll your eyes playfully.

John tilts the box to the side, letting the pregnancy test slide out and fall into his hand.

It’s positive.

“When did you take this? How long have you known?”

“I’ve had a feeling for a while… I took the test at Nadia’s.” You blush.

John tosses the test to the floor of the car and cups your face again, peppering you with kiss after kiss, murmuring a few I love you’s against your lips.

Your oldest, pretending to still be asleep, opens just one of his blue eyes and peeks at his parents giggling and kissing in the front seat.

He reaches his little arm out to gently shake your youngest awake.

“Kissies.” Your oldest whispers, pointing a finger to the front seat.

Your youngest’s little hands fly to cover her mouth, muffling an excited squeal.

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