#paid surveys present

[twpsyn-who]

Soulmate AU in which when you touch your soulmate you swap bodies. It needs to be skin on skin contact and is instant. The only way to get back in the previous body is to touch again, otherwise you're stuck like that.

No matter the body all psychological and physical damage stays with you. That means if you get hurt then swap bodies, you will still feel it despite no longer having the wounds. This is only the case of existing wounds prior to swapping ; if new wounds happen to the hurt body after the swap you won't feel them, but the person in the body when it happens will. A very complicated way of saying that you can't get away from pain by swapping bodies with your soulmate as it will follow you.

There's no known consequences to not changing bodies back once swapped, though some might get sick for a few days after swapping back if they waited a long period of time to change back (say over a month, even longer depending on individual)

Now this but, you know... JeanMarco. And of course they find out during their time in the 104th Training Corps, because there's no way their skin didn't touch at least once in +3 years of training and being as close as they are. It isn't until break when they're able to visit home that they learn what it truly means ; up until that point they used it to swap chores (is the only reason why Jean didn't try to kill Eren during their shared chores- because it was actually Marco all along). At that point they knew each other perfectly.

Of course the whole situation was a little bit awkward for both of them when returning. They probably would end up avoiding each other for a bit because teenager boys and stuff, all until someone finally got the guts to mention the tension and ask them what's wrong- which forces them to talk and stuff. Doesn't matter, this is not what I want to talk about.

But the beautiful battle of Trost and what if, hypothetical speaking of course, they touch skin after Jean gets another ODM? And they're so used with each other by now, they don't even notice until the mission is nearly done anyway. And I don't know man, the idea of Jean dying while in Marco's body? Marco (in Jean's body) saying "I need to find Marco" once the mission is a success and research for his soulmate, just for him to not find him?? Not find him until 3 days later when some of them are assigned cleaning duty in Trost and he finds his own fucking body bitten in half???

The realization that it should've been Marco who died that day, but didn't because he was in Jean's body. The realization that not only his soulmate is dead, but he's stuck living his life. He's stuck living the life Jean can't because he died in Marco's place.

SEEING YOUR DEAD SOULMATE EVERYDAY WHEN YOU LOOK IN THE MIRROR. Poor Marco would most likely avoy any reflective surface for a very long time, unable to see Jean's face looking at him.

The guilt of lying to everyone, because how does one even begin to explain what's going on? Him lying to Jean's mother to protect her from the harsh truth of the reality- that her son actually died and the one in front of her was a fake.

And the sad truth is that no one would notice because they've been doing it for months already. They knew how to act like each other to perfection. Even if Marco slipped at some point no one would question it because they got many traits from each other already.

[captainmalewriter]

Made to Order

Franco pulled up to the apartment building of his latest client. He parked his car along the street and sent his client a quick text letting him know he had arrived. Franco then pulled out a pair of earphones from the glove compartment, connected them to his phone’s jack port, and put them on. He then booted up a survey app. It greeted him with a light blue screen and a ‘Hello!’ in a British accent. 

“Let’s see what kind of guy this dude paid good money to bang…” Franco muttered to himself as he pulled up the list of responses from the survey he sent to his clients. He scrolled to the latest data entry and skimmed it over. A grin formed on his face as he read it. 

“Alright then! No time like the present, let’s get to work.”

He downloaded the data entry into his phone’s local storage and composed it into an audio file. Once it was ready, Franco pressed ‘play’ and leaned back in his seat as the makeshift music began to fill his ears. He took a deep breath and cleared his mind of any and all thoughts, allowing the music to submerge his mind and body with powerful subliminal messaging. 

Gender: Male. Age: 24. Height: 6’4” ft. Weight: 170 lbs. 

Franco groaned as a cold chill ran up his spine. As he grew taller and heavier, the muscles in his legs rapidly flexed and relaxed. 

“Ohhh… Fuckk man…”

Franco couldn’t help but massage his aching body as he began to physically transform. He became hyper-aware of how his body felt and moved, which made touching his sensitive skin with his warm hands all the more pleasurable as it gradually changed. Franco moved the car seat back, as he needed the extra space to accommodate his sudden growth spurt. He gained several inches of height and about 30 pounds until he matched the size his client had requested. 

Hair Color: Brown. Eye Color: Green. Facial Hair? Mustache only. Body Hair? Yes.

The next few details of Franco’s client’s request rang in his ear and reverberated throughout his body. He gripped the sides of his seat as he felt his body working overtime to pump out heavy quantities of hormones. He winced in pain as his dark brown eyes changed colors. They became lighter and lighter in hue until they were a brilliant shade of green that glimmered in the sunlight. 

Franco’s hair was next to transform. The straight, black hair on his head grew lighter and curlier until he had wavy, brown hair. The skin on Franco’s upper lip tingled and itched as the hair follicles began rapidly growing in. Franco let out a heavy moan as his mustache hairs kept growing and growing until he had a thick mustache that hung over his lips. Once he had the right mustache, his underarm hair began growing, too. Franco only had a light dusting of pit hair, but thanks to his strange audio files, he could grow well past his natural limits. His armpit hair grew longer and thicker until he had a jungle of brown pit hair in his underarms. His pit hair had become so long that it even peeked out when Franco had his arms down!

Ethnicity: Mexican. Language: Spanish, or English w/ Accent. 

Franco let out a sigh of relief as he heard the next three lines of the audio file. Thankfully, the next transformation would be more mental than physical, which gave Franco a chance to take a quick breather. 

He relaxed against the headrest as the audio file echoed inside his mind. The more Franco heard his client’s preferences, the more his psyche changed to match his request. Suddenly, Franco was no longer a middle aged man from Midwest U.S.A. but a young Mexican man who had only recently immigrated into the country. His mind became filled with all sorts of new knowledge surrounding his Mexican heritage and culture, such as the Spanish language. 

“Mmm… Que rico…” Franco purred sensually as his throat muscles broadened and his vocal cords thickened, granting him the heavy accent his client had requested. The audio file also gave him a deeper voice too. Although that detail was more for Franco’s personal enjoyment than anything else.

But despite his newfound knowledge, there was only one thing the newly transformed Franco desired: to fuck as many men as physically possible. There was nothing he loved more than seeing a man pressed down against a pillow as he railed them to the next Tuesday. Just the thought of a man’s bubble butt swallowing his dick was enough to make him start leaking.

Size: 7.5 inches. Breed: Dom top. Body odor: YES.

While Franco was busy relishing his new voice and fantasizing about his next bottom, the next line of the audio file played, triggering the final piece of the transformation. Franco threw his head back as the next wave of bodily sensations caught him off guard. He let out loud, guttural groans as his manhood grew obscenely erect until it filled in his underwear. Franco massaged his sensitive, throbbing member as it grew longer and fatter than what he originally had. Before he knew it, Franco’s new endowment ripped the fabric of his briefs. His dick sprang to life like it was just begging to be released and played with as soon as possible! 

Franco wrapped his hand around his new dick and gave himself a few strokes just to test out his new tool. As he did so, a rank smell began to fill his car. It was sweaty, smelly, and addicting. That scent was none other than his natural body odor but kicked up to 100%. With the windows rolled down, Franco was becoming hot-boxed off his own tantalizing smell. Not that it really bothered him, as he was too busy admiring the glorious sight of his new, hung cock standing at full mast with a healthy bush of thick pubes to complete the look.

A tap on the window interrupted Franco’s moment of self-admiration. He glanced over and saw his client watching him with hungry eyes and a hand stuffed down his pants. Franco smirked, then rolled down his window.

“Hola papacito. ¿Te gusto?” Franco flexed his arms and winked at his client. The man nodded vigorously like a dog begging for a juicy steak. Then, he took a heavy whiff of Franco’s potent body odor and sighed, satisfied. 

“I can’t wait any longer! C’mon, let’s get you inside!!”

Franco grinned. He loved the whiny sound of a man begging to get fucked. He tossed his phone and earphones to the side and followed his client up to his apartment, where he proceeded to show him the dom Mexican top he requested to fuck him hard and raw. Another man made to order, another man satisfied.

[fanaticsnail]

Remember Me

This was requested by @aishabbbb, which I linked back to here for the full description of the prompt.

Word Count: 6,600+

Masterlist Here

Echoes of gruff laughter lingered in the air as tankards of ale clanged against one another. It had been a while since the Red-Hair Pirates had made port and as they viewed a rowdy port full of lively music, contagious laughter and bursting at the seams with a variety of pleasurable company; they could not resist.

This port had been known for some time to be a lawless town, accepting of any journeymen as they resupplied their vessels, sailors selling their wares and even the odd Marine here or there had graced the town with their presence. The World Government paid no mind to the comings or goings, knowing should the port be shut down; their supply of rum would slowly dwindle away.

The Captain of the Red-Hair Pirates sat upon a stool at the rear of the room as he stared into the bottom of his tankard, watching the amber liquid slosh from side to side. He withdrew into himself; his former joy and carefree attitude no longer present on his features this night.

A woman with a painted face sauntered over towards the captain, swaying her hips as she overemphasized her intentions.

“Care for some company, sweetheart?” she asked him in a sultry tone as she took his hand in hers that still clasped the tankard. He made eye contact and smiled from the corner of his mouth before withdrawing the hand from her grip and drew his drinking vessel to his mouth.

“Not today, love,” he said, taking a drink from his tankard, “but I can point you in the direction of someone who would be more than happy to share your time.”

She smiled as Shanks gestured to his senior officer, who had a black bandana featuring a white jolly roger insignia atop his lengthy blonde hair. His expression was one of a displeasing grimace, black glasses concealing more of his irritation behind them.

“See if you can bring a smile to his face, would you?” he laughed slightly as she nodded as she made her way to her next target.

Plonking two fresh pints down on the table before him, Benn Beckman sighed as he sat on a stool facing his Captain; taking one of the pints and gesturing for Shanks to do the same.

“You turned her away?” Beckman questioned his Captain, “I thought you’d enjoy a pretty blonde giving you attention this time.”

“I’m not as open today as I have been any other day to the company of a painted lady,” Shanks laughed in response raising his pint and clanging it against his First-Mate’s, “or any other man or woman you’ve since such sent my way. You know this.”

“Oh,” Beckman uttered, eyes widening before looking down at the table, “I didn’t realise it was today. Sorry Cap’n.”

“Don’t apologise, Beckman,” he smiled at him before drinking from the tankard. He moaned slightly as the cool, bubbling liquid hit his lips and he tasted the bitter flavour of the hoppy amber ale.

“How long has it been since-?” Beckman began, halting his words in search for the more appropriate way of phrasing it.

“How long has it been since my bride was claimed at sea?” Shanks offered to complete his First-Mate’s sentence. Beckman nodded in response, gesturing with his pint for Shanks to offer his answer.

Shanks sighed and leant back in his stool, his back thumping against the small railing at the back.

“This day marks ten years,” he added with a sad smile. A silence fell between them as they reminisced the day the Captain of the Red-Hair Pirate’s wife was lost to him.

After a brief pause, they commenced their drinking as they surveyed the movements of the patrons and crew interacting with one another.

Beckman raised his tankard to his lips and begin to gulp with gusto at the frothing liquid. He trailed his eyes throughout the bar as he did so; looking to Limejuice as he grit his teeth tightly at the blonde woman’s incessant and unrelenting flirtation was thrust upon him.

He continued his assessment of the room before his attention was caught by a group of sailors laughing amongst each other, a woman throwing her had back at the joke uttered by one among them. Benn Beckman spluttered into his tankard, coughing as the amber ale entered into his wind pipe and corrupted his lungs with it. He continued to draw in his breaths while maintaining visual contact on the situation unfolding before him.

“Benn,” Shanks addressed his choking crewman, “you alright?”

The First-Mate continued coughing and spluttering, managing to relieve his lungs of the bitter substance and gasping in a long breath. His pigment all but fled from his face as he continued staring blankly at the bar in horror.

“You look as if you’ve seen a ghost,” Shanks laughed, placing his tankard down on the table before clapping a hand against the upper arm of Beckman’s shoulder.

“I-I think I have,” Beckman stuttered slightly before bringing his attention to his captain, “look to the bar and tell me if you can see her too, Captain.”

Shanks furrowed his brows in confusion, laughing lightly at the confession of his crewman before turning and immediately having the playful expression pulled from his lips.

“You see her?” Beckman asked him in a voice just above a whisper.

The Captain wordlessly rose to his feet, almost toppling the stool over in the process as he made his way to approach the woman. His bride, his queen. His whole world was carelessly and unaware of his presence as the melodical laugh fell from her lips; a sound Shanks never thought he would once again experience.

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

You tapped the chest of the older sailor in front of you as you continued to laugh at his joke.

“Harold,” you gasped, wiping a tear from your eye, “and that’s the reason you only have three toes on your left foot?”

“Honest to goodness, lass,” he continued to rumble laughter, his eyes twinkling with utter mischievousness, “the bloody crab nearly carved the whole lot off, if not for my quick thinking!”

He imitated the pinching movements of a crab’s claw and crooked his head to make himself look as crab-like as he could, prompting another roar of laughter to erupt between the sailors and yourself.

“Alright, I’ll get you that drink then,” you teetered your laughter and turned to address the bartender you had come to know, “Mary, give us a couple schooners of ale- the pale stuff if you wouldn’t mind.”

“Right you are, my love,” she acknowledged your order and began pouring the foamed liquid into two smaller cups.

It had been ten years since you found yourself lying upon the shore with no recollection of who or what you were before your arrival. Thankfully enough, your body was strong. You knew how to hold your own when it came to unwarranted and unreciprocated attention, often brawling with men to assert yourself among them.

As you needed a job to afford food, you managed to bully Captain Harold of the Angelfish Shepherds Fishing Crew and would accompany them out to sea, bringing in several catches a day and selling their many items throughout town. It was only when the sun would disappear behind the horizon, you would come home to the tavern: "Mary’s Resting Track" and make yourself comfortable with your crew at the bar; drinking well into the night.

Just as Mary had finished pouring from the keg, you felt an arm placed upon your left shoulder, prompting you to turn to face it's source.

“My bride,” a tall, red-headed man gasped in a voice above a whisper as he drew you in to place his lips against yours. You squealed at the tender impact, a smile pulling at the corner of your mouth at the sudden softness and passion you felt from the unknown man. You pushed on his chest slightly before creasing your brows in confusion.

“Steady on, Sailor. Save it for your wife,” you laughed at him, collecting the two schooners from the bar and placing one into the hands of Captain Harold, “or at least buy me a drink first!”

You laughed, prompting your crew to do the same as they raised their glasses and took a drink. You rose yours to your lips and drank from it, keeping playful eye contact with the sailor before you.

He was handsome, his red hair immediately drawing you in. He had a black cloak shrouding his left arm from view and a three-point claw mark over his left eye. His face held a shocked, sobering expression on it as if he was staring at something extra-terrestrial in make.

“Y-You,” he stuttered out, “Y-You’re.”

The words caught in his throat as he again reached his right hand up to attempt to secure a fallen strand of your hair away from your face, tucking it behind your ear. You swatted his hand away from completing the action.

“No,” you said firmly, playfulness leaving your face as your eyebrows collected themselves with a frown, “no one touches my hair. It’s out of bounds to even those who know me, and know me; you do not.”

You swiped his arm away fully away from your face while keeping a warning, reprimanding look on your features. He continued to stare at you, his eyes swelling slightly as they fluttered between your own; pleading with you and searching within them for a small shroud of recognition.

“She’s saving it for her beloved,” your crewman mocked you in a high-pitched tone, bringing humour once again to the room. You laughed at his jest, prompting you to turn away from the red head to scold his imitation.

“I don’t sound like that,” you laughed at him, prompting your crewman to again mock you by wobbling his head from side to side and scrunching up his face.

You turned back around to see the man again gazing with a fierce intensity born deeply into your eyes and managed this time to tuck a strand of your hair behind your left ear with his right hand. At this, you brought your own hand firmly up and struck the side of his face, all humour once again leaving you.

At the crisp strike, chaos erupted at the bar. A crew of pirates drew their pistols, pointing it towards you; while your crew of sailors pulled their own from their belt and aimed it at them in response. You kept your eyes completely fixed on the red-haired pirate as his face continued to hold a yearning expression.

“She gave you a warning, Sailor,” your Captain spat at him, “I don’t care how much ale you consumed, you respect the wishes of a lady.”

This seemed to shatter whatever illusion was held on the redhead in front of you as he looked to the assortment of pirates behind him. He held up his hands in defence of himself, taking a step back from his proximity near you and nodding his head in a deep bow.

“Easy, lads,” he smiled, “put them away. We don’t bring out our guns at one little slap.”

The crew focussed their attention on you as you shook your head and creased your brows at his address. He again turned to you, and bowed his head slightly deeper as an apology.

“You’ll have to excuse me, miss,” he uttered, “I didn’t mean to cross your boundary. It was reactionary, and for that I offer my most sincere apologies.”

Your gaze softened at his words as you gently used your pointer finger to raise his chin to look at you once more.

“Apology accepted on the condition of buying me and my friends a round of drinks,” you scrunched your nose with a small wink. He laughed at your remark, shaking his head and smiling once more.

“I would have to agree, miss. Definitely the next one on me,” he continued to gaze into your eyes as you withdrew your finger from his chin and tapped his nose with it playfully.

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

You didn’t remember him. That must be the only reason you didn’t hoist yourself into his single arm and cling yourself against him. Why you didn’t lean into the kiss and allow him to lace his hand into your hair and relieve your face from it shrouding your vision. The act so intimately solidifying your relationship in the early days, holding onto it as you spoke your wedding vows.

No-one was to ever touch your hair apart from yourself and your beloved were the words you spoke while dressed in your white, lace dress aboard the Red Force; Beckman performing the ceremony all those years ago.

You were married in your youth, relationship blossoming from friendship to something more on the Oro Jackson under the watchful gaze of Gol D. Roger. The subtle glances turned into subtle touches, turning into kisses stolen from within the hidden halls of the Oro Jackson as you would press each other against the walls and roam your hands along your bodies.

He was obsessed with your hair, and with each caress, each embrace, he would find himself absent-mindedly playing with it. You vowed alongside your commitment in matrimony that only he and he alone would be allowed to tuck your hair behind your ear in adoration; and you be the only one permitted to place a kiss atop the crown of his head.

Shanks had to contain himself as his soul screamed within the chasms of his chest to embrace you, to hold you against him and cry out in joy at your return. He didn’t touch another woman in the ten long years it had been since your last departure; the notion turning to ash in his mouth at the mere suggestion. It had only been until recently that Beckman prompted him to seek out someone to relieve his tension, but he felt it would’ve been an insult to the beautiful memories you shared with one another.

You were even in the process of early conversations on what starting a family would look like aboard the Red Force with his assortment of rowdy crew.

You would bicker at having the ship make birth permanently at a port, returning every two weeks to the solid shore as Shanks refused to halt his travels. He wanted you and the children aboard, rearing them alongside his crew; an idea you immediately shot down as you understood infants waking and crying at every interval and the disruption would not be fair to bring to the crew.

Shanks remembered Beckman adding to that conversation with: “We’re already getting sleepless nights from the sounds echoing the halls originating at your quarters!”

He chuckled at the memory before he remembered the fear on your face as the storm threw you overboard in your attempt to raise the sheet from the topmast and secure it in place. The black sky and torrential winds making it impossible to see your form as you struggled against the waves. He didn’t see what happened, only noticing your departure once they successfully made it through the storm and into the central eye of it.

The roar-like scream rumbling throughout the chest of the Red-Haired Captain still reverberating within the ears and memories of the entire crew as they recollect it every year. The pain shared amongst them as their captain bore his grief openly; drowning in rum every night before Beckman pulled him out of his rut with the reprimand: “this is not what she would have wanted.”

It mattered not what happened to him from that point. The pain of loosing you was far greater than any earthly injury could bring forth. He didn’t even bat an eye as his arm was claimed by a great Sea-Beast; consuming his flesh within it’s belly. He was more upset by the fact his golden wedding band perished at its disappearance.

And here you were, not a scratch upon you; laughing as if you had not a care in the world.

You had no memory. That was the only explanation Shanks had as he gazed lovingly at you, drinking your free ale at his expense.

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

You shook your head at a comment made by one of your crewmen as they suggested to hold a drinking competition between the red-haired pirate’s crew and your own.

“I don’t think I have enough booze in the house for that,” Mary laughed from behind the bar.

You smiled at her comment, turning back around to see the far off look in the red-head’s eyes.

“You know,” you nudged him with your shoulder, bringing his attention back towards you, “for someone that leads in lips first, you’re awfully quiet.”

He chuckled at your comment, expression softening but with a hidden depth you couldn’t quite understand.

“I’m not usually like this,” he scrunched his nose up with a smile.

“Rough time at sea, then?” you asked him, gesturing to Mary with two fingers to indicate your intentions of purchasing the next round for you and the red-head.

“Not particularly, its just-,” his words trailed off, prompting you to gaze your eyes; flittering them between his own two deep brown orbs before he took a deep breath and looked forward at his crew interacting with your own.

“You gestured for the good stuff, right?” she asked, placing two short, round glasses down on the counter; spiced rum swishing in the base as she did so.

“That I did, love,” you replied, placing down your berry on the counter and taking the glasses from it. You went to place the glass into the red-head Captain’s hands, noticing it was already occupied with a half-drunk tankard of ale.

“You keen on a rum?” you asked him, bringing his gaze up. He gasped out a quick hum, raising the tankard and downing the remainder of his ale with haste and placing the empty vessel atop the bar. He rose his hand to accept your offer and his fingers brushed against your own as he claimed the drink from your hand.

He looked down to your collar bone and noticed a single gold ring hung from a piece of fine leather around it. He furrowed his brows at it as to inspect it from his great distance.

“The gold band around your neck,” he gestured down to your left hand, “are you married?”

“Not to my knowledge, Sailor,” you laughed at him, “I was found with it.”

You sipped at the rum and creased your brows as the heavy alcohol entered your system.

“I apologise for slapping you,” you uttered, “I, uh. I made a promise, you see. I don’t really know what about or to whom, truthfully.”

He hummed at your comment, fixing his eyes on your face as you spoke. He trailed his eyes over your body, looking at you with an expression completely unreadable. Somewhere between: bewildered, surprised, great sorrow, relief, curiosity and apprehension.

“I don’t actually have a lot of that – knowledge, I mean,” you reiterated with a smile, “For the better part of ten years, I’ve been building back what I think I used to be like. I have no idea, though. I could’ve been some prissy young lass with a string of twelve children; or some standoffish, uptight cow-.”

“-You were never like that,” the red-head interrupted you, prompting you to snap your gaze up to meet with his.

“Do you know me, Sailor?” you asked him, your brows creasing together.

“Shanks,” he corrected you, “my name is Shanks.”

“Alright, Shanks,” you corrected yourself, “Do you know me?”

He sighed, drinking a small amount of liquid from his glass and looking to the rowdy crowd as their boisterous laughter echoed throughout the walls.

“If you want to talk about it, I’m going to need two things,” he said, downing the remainder of alcohol from his glass in one quick swell, “another drink, preferably a bottle this time.”

You laughed at him, before asking; “and the other thing?”

“Privacy,” he uttered with a small hint of sadness. You expressed concern within your eyes before patting him on the back and rubbing small circles in comfort to him.

You weren’t sure why you brought your hand up to comfort him, it seemed almost reactionary. A natural instinct of familiarity; organic.

“Alright, Shanks,” you began, making eye contact with Mary once more, “I’ll buy you a bottle under one condition.”

“And what might that be?” he chuckled warmly.

“That you give me a small glint of information before we proceed to the beach,” Mary placed the bottle on the counter and you placed down more berry in response, “I need to know if you are threatening me with a good time, or if you plan on executing me to reclaim some debt.”

“Were we enemies?” you asked him, bearing your gaze at the wall behind the bar.

“Sometimes,” Shanks shrugged his shoulders, prompting you to snap your gaze back to his. He erupted a full belly laugh from his diaphragm at your reaction. He let out a deep sigh before he suggested; “let’s make to the beach and I’ll fill you in.”

Mary smiled, looking between the two of you before the beckoning of Captain Harold and several bottles of the cheapest rum called her from her place before you.

You nodded, neglecting to collect glassware while you grasped the neck of the bottle; not once removing your eyes from the red-head next to you.

You made your way down towards the beach, walking in step with Captain Shanks, as the crew bid him goodnight. You noticed several members of his crew gawked at you as if they had seen a phantom or something of the make.

Once gazing into the open sea, the Captain plonked himself unceremoniously on the sand, legs spread wide as he sat with his knees bent upwards. You smiled at him before crouching down to sit beside him, uncorking the fresh rum bottle in your hands and offering it to him. He smiled as he took it from your grasp and brought it to his lips.

You trailed your eyes over his form, trying to conjure a whisp of memory from the recesses of your mind. After having no image return to you, you rose up your voice.

“So-,” you began, only to be cut off my Shanks.

“You were – are,” he started to relay, laughing at the fact he spoke over you. You nodded to him to continue.

He paused, sighing before again voicing what he was attempting to confess to you.

“It’s been ten years to the day since I lost you,” he sighed, looking down to the sand near his knees, “and not a day went by that my thoughts were not drawn to you.”

You looked at him, puzzled at what he was telling you.

“Your gold band,” he gestured with his hand towards your neck grasping the bottle, keeping his eyes fixed on the sand below him, “was gifted to us by our former Captain we served under: Gol D. Roger. He had a lot of love for you and I.”

“The King of the Pirates?” you asked him, eyes wide before adding, “and us. What do you mean, us?”

He sighed again, this time bringing his head to slouch back as he gazed at the dark and cloudless sky above you.

“I can’t tell you what happened right now. It’s-,” he paused between the words, prompting you to inch forward and look at his face. He turned his face away from you as you attempted to gaze into his eyes; “-it’s too painful today.”

You frowned and instead reached down to the hand placed upon his hand, and swiftly reclaimed the rum bottle from within his grip. He turned his head towards you at this and trailed his eyes up to yours as you placed the lip of the bottle and downed two large gulps of the liquid. You squeezed your eyes as the strong alcohol burned its way down your throat and into the pit of your belly.

He laughed at your actions, finally the forlorn expression eclipsed by glee.

“You haven’t changed,” he uttered, reaching his hand up to your hair before recoiling it back again. You watched him do this, as processing the boundary you expressed earlier still lingered within his thoughts. Instead of reaching your hair with his hand, he fell his grasp to your hands as they held the rum bottle.

“Is there truly nothing you remember of me?” He asked you, looking down to where his single hand rested upon your own. You furrow your brows and search your mind through closed eyes, willing yourself to remember any aspect about him. You hissed out a growl in frustration as you found no recollection.

“I want to,” you whispered to him, “you seem a decent kind of man, if not a little forward with the kiss and all.”

He chuckled at your comment, his laughter building to a rumble. His shoulders began to quake lightly as his laughter died and morphed into soft sobs. He attempted to conceal them from you by raising his hand up from where it rested atop his knee and turned to face away from you. You were overwhelmed slightly by this man becoming wrecked with emotion.

“I’m sorry,” you whispered to him, bringing yourself to rest on your knees as you pulled yourself closer to him.

You opened your arms and shimmied your legs forward, hoisting them over his bent knees and found a comfortable spot on the sand to rest between them. Your arms circled his shoulders as you felt his right arm wrap beneath your waist and hook up your spine. He held his face flush with your stomach and squeezed his hand to grasp at your body as if you were to slip away at any moment. You felt his shoulders begin to relax into your embrace while inhaling your scent. You looked down the top of his head before absentmindedly bringing your lips down to place a chaste kiss against his hair. He flinched slightly at this impact, tension building in his shoulders before he slumped them forward.

You heard him sigh into your diaphragm as you did so, bringing his face away from its hidden position against you and resting his chin atop your chest to bring his sights to look up at you. For some reason, this man as he held you in an intimate proximity did not have you thrusting him away from your with excessive force as you did with so many others.

You unwrapped your left hand from around his shoulders and set it against his cheek. His youthful smile returning as you caressed him. You warmly smiled in response, feeling the gruff of his stubble against the palm of your hand before he turned his head and placed a brief kiss atop your inner hand.

“I am willing to dedicate the rest of my life to getting you to fall in love with me once again,” he whispered against your hand before turning his head to meet your gaze, “this I swear.”

Your eyes widened at the comment with a small smile toying at your mouth.

“I gather my undying devotion is overwhelming for you,” he chuckled, prompting you to move your hand away from his face and place both hands atop his shoulders.

“It is, to be perfectly candid with you,” you giggled at him, smoothing your arms over his shoulders and tracing circles against them with your thumbs, “I have tried everything to bring a small fragment of the person I once was to the forefront of my being.”

He trailed his hand from its place at the small of your back and rested it atop your left hip, grasping it firmly within his palm and kneading the flesh beneath it.

You brought your attention to the gold ring on your leather necklace as you held onto his shoulder, narrowing your eyes at the metal slightly; pleading within your own mind to bring forth any memory of the man cradling himself against you.

“To put myself in your hideous sandals,” you uttered, prompting him to quirk his head slightly to the side, “you found me, and it’s almost as if you did so only to lose me again.”

“Aye, it is,” he nodded, looking down again and meeting his eyes with the flesh of your forearm. He ghosted his lips over your left arm, dragging it higher within the crook of your elbow. Your hair follicles stood on edge under his ministrations, as he continued to not kiss your skin; but rather feel the way your body tasted below his lips.

“And you looked lovely in my highly practical sandals, last time you wore them,” he smirked his lips against your flesh before placing a kiss against it. He trailed kisses varying in intensity back down your forearm and against your wrist, prompting your breath to hitch in your throat.

That comment was it. After a variety of interpersonal and intimate words shared regarding your prior relationship with the man beneath you; it was the ugly sandals that brought a flitter of memory to grace behind your eyes. Any other comment; the hand in your hair from earlier, the wedding ring gifted by Gol D. Roger before he was executed, anything else; it was the ugly sandals he found in the run of the mill town that he purchased and, much to your horror, wore in public.

You remember taking them from his room and fleeing above deck with them in an attempt to throw them overboard to rid yourself of their ugliness forever, only to have your waist caught by your husband as he twirled you around to face the deck again with playful reprimand in the process of doing so.

At the request of your husband, you placed them on your feet and experienced the absolute comfort they bore you; almost shrieking in disgust at yourself for relishing in the feeling; as he belly-laughed at you.

“We’ll get you some at the next port” you heard his voice within your mind, “then we can be matching.”

You remembered him wiggling his eyebrows, prompting you to place your closed fist against his chest and tap him slightly.

“We can even get tiny little ones for when you relent and let me put a child in you,” you remembered his tone, causing a blush to rise presently to your cheeks.

“Something the matter, love?” Shanks' voice brought you from your singular memory and back into the present moment you were sharing so intimately with your husband.

No other memory sprang forward, only a few whispers of certain smells: sea water, spiced rum and stagnant drinking water with the natural smell men aboard a boat. You circled your arms around his shoulders and again pressed him against yourself, smothering his face against your sternum between your breasts. Your mouth fell slack as you pressed your face into his hair and inhaled the aroma of the fragrance he favoured to utilise in his red locks: sandalwood and ginger prominent with his natural scent lingering beneath it.

You began to feel a rough flurry of taps from the man beneath you as he indicated for you to release him. His laughter was unrestrained as his eyes twinkled with mischievousness.

“As happy as I am to once again have my face pressed between your breasts,” he heaved his laughter, “I do require air to sustain me.”

He brought his eyes to meet yours as you stared your eyes on the crashing waves of the beach as the tide began to come in further. Your eyes remained wide as you continued to will a semblance of recollection to come to you.

Once you offered no rebuttal at his comment, he again reached his hand up towards your hair only to halt it once more.

“What is it?” he asked you, now placing his right hand atop your left arm, holding it lovingly.

“I-,” you began, the words now halting between your lips. You brought your eyes down to look down and you continued to flitter them between each of his own.

“I-,” you again said, leaning in closer to him; prompting him to have a sense of seriousness overcome his features, “-will never own a pair of those ugly sandals.”

Immediately his seriousness fell away and his face split into a wide grin as his laughter rumbled within his chest one more.

“Yes, you always hated them. I think they’re wonderful,” he gasped while stifling his laughter. You continued to hold his shoulders as his laughter teetered off into a dull rumble.

“I tried to throw them overboard,” you uttered almost inaudibly, “and you threatened me with buying more of them.”

“You remember,” he gasped out a breathy sigh, “you remember me.”

He brought his torso up further to bring your foreheads to rest against each other. He nuzzled your nose slightly at the impact and squeezed his eyes shut with delight. He began to lean in to graze your lips with his, only to be halted by your gentle touch to bring him back.

“I don’t remember anything else aside from your disgusting sandals,” you whispered, closing your eyes before reopening them again and looking at him half-lidded, “and the way you looked at me when you suggested we begin trying for a child.”

A small gasp left his lips as a single tear fell from his right eye. Immediately he pulled your head against his further, seeking out your lips with his own. He moved his hand from its place at your hip to snake around your waist and hold you firmly against his lap. You felt him moan against your lips as you reciprocated his enthusiasm by lacing your fingers into his hair and tugging lightly at the new growth at the back of his neck.

As your proximity was so flush against one another, you had no choice but to press your full weight against him as he laid with his back against the sand; his hair sprawling out atop the course surface. He expertly maneuvered his right leg beneath yours without breaking the kiss, gasping into it as he darted his tongue out to meet with your own.

A soft whimper flung itself from your lips as he relentlessly attacked your mouth with his own; flittering deep and hungry kisses while trying to taste as much of you as he could with his tongue. You unlaced your fingers from his hair and raked them down his shoulders to his chest, massaging the hard muscle beneath them as you continued in your exploration. He gently rose his hand from its place around your waist and drew itself beneath your shirt and groaned when he felt your tender flesh beneath the material.

Placing your right hand below his cloak, you raked your fingers further along his ribcage and drew them up towards his left arm – halting your movement as you found none residing there.

You squealed into his mouth, feeling him smirk against your lips. You attempted to break from the kiss, only to feel his hand climb higher beneath your blouse and lie flat against your spine between your shoulder blades and continue passionately exploring your lips.

“Shanks,” you murmured a warning reprimand against his lips. He smiled while maintaining his lips against your own, feeling the soft pearls of his teeth as they made contact with your mouth. He continued to chase your lips each time you attempted to flee from his embrace.

You brought your hands up to ball the material of his white shirt within your fists and held him further against yourself, prompting him to let down his guard as he whimpered into your lips at your sudden domination. As soon as you felt him relinquish a small spectrum of control, you pushed hard on his collar bones and pried him from your lips. He first groaned in frustration before his body was wracked with uncontrollable laughter. He collapsed against the ground, prompting you to roll your body from above him to onto your own back in the sand as his laughter became contagious.

And as earlier, the heaving of your shoulders in fits of laughter evolved into heavy sobs from the both of you as you mourned the time lost between you.

“My bride,” Shanks called from beside you as he placed his right hand upon his eyes in an attempt to control his emotions.

“Yes, my groom,” you said as more of a whimper than an address.

He rolled over onto his side and hovered his face above yours, as the tears freely fell down the faces of the two of you; the moonlight cascading over your lover’s hair. Hesitantly, he reached his right hand up to your hair and slowly brought some loose strands from your face and wove it behind your ear. He sighed in relief as he watched you close your eyes and lean into his touch, taking your quivering lip between your teeth as you did so.

“You are as beautiful as the day I lost you,” he whispered with a slight hitch of his voice. You reopened your eyes to watch him smiling through his sorrow. You returned his expression and caressed his chest and ghosting your fingertips over his left shoulder.

“And you are one arm less than I remember,” you beamed a wide smile and giggled a little at your prod. He joined you in your laughter and pressed a chaste kiss against your hair before rising to his feet and offering you his right hand to hoist you up to meet him. You took his hand and allowed him to hoist you to your feet, before he dipped his shoulder down to make contact with your waist and lifted you over his right shoulder. He secured you in place with a crisp slap upon your left ass-cheek as he effortlessly crouched down to retrieve the forgotten, half-drunk rum bottle. He rose again to his feet and began to walk with you over his shoulder, using his teeth to uncork the rum bottle and spitting it against the sand.

“Is this quite necessary?” you asked him, mock annoyance in your tone.

He laughed and took a long swig from the rum bottle and gasped in joy as the liquid burnt its way down his throat.

“Not only is it necessary,” he called to you over his left shoulder, “it is also compulsory.” You laughed at him as he almost jigged back towards the tavern, him joining you in your laughter upon arriving at its steps and flinging open the door with his feet.

The arrival of the two of you had cheers erupting and reverberating from every corner and crevasse of the wooden building. Tankards were thrust into the air, foam sloshing carelessly from the top and onto the floor; much to the many protestations of Mary.

Shanks placed you on the floor after setting aside the bottle of rum atop a cylindrical raised bar table.

“Alright lads,” he addressed the room, “let me reintroduce you to my wife!”

He extended his right hand out for you to place your left hand within. As soon as you did so, he effortlessly spun you into him, your left arm laced over your front as he cradled you against himself.

You looked up to his face, your neck laying against his shoulder as he brought his lips down to meet your own for the first time publicly in a decade. Applause, shouts of glee and delight, more sloshing of ale and verbal reprimands from the tavern keeper echoed the hall as you smiled against the lips of your beloved. Your husband, and his bride.

[fics-and-quotes-andthelike]

A Dance in Death

Title: A Dance in Death

Pairing: Alastor x fem!reader

Word Count: ~3,927

In which Alastor takes the reader out to Mimzy’s club. Things go sideways much too soon, but the Radio Demon is quick to make amends.

A/N: Part 2 of sorts to my Never and Always series. Hope you enjoy!

Part 1

Mimzy’s speakeasy was most known for three things. 

One, it was known for its captivating acts and performances. Demons and sinners from all around Pentagram City had heard stories and whispers about what could be experienced there. Two, it was known for being one of the most lively and entertaining places on this side of Hell. And three, it was known for being on the wrong side of town, making it the perfect place for no-good demons to spend their time and even do discrete business, so long as they paid their dues to Mimzy, of course.

That last point probably should have kept you away from this place. But you couldn’t help but feel safe knowing that you had come on the arm of the Radio Demon himself. After all, who would dare approach you with Alastor around?

Nobody, as it turned out. You and Alastor had been sitting in a corner booth for almost an hour now, and nobody had dared to come within ten feet of you, save for one unfortunate server who had graciously provided you both with your drinks before scurrying off and hiding, not coming back even once.

And although you enjoyed any time that you got to spend alone with Alastor, you couldn’t help but notice that the two of you were both on edge that night. 

You, on one hand, simply wanted to dance. It wasn’t often that you were able to go to bars or speakeasies, and you would have loved nothing more than to lead the demon across from you on to the dancefloor. But you knew better than that. Alastor’s interest in you came with limits that you hadn’t yet discovered, but you’d be double-damned if you were going to find them out tonight.

Although you had to admit, as you gazed out longingly at the dancing demons on the floor, that you wouldn’t mind at least trying to share a drink and a conversation with your partner. But that wouldn’t happen until Mimzy finally decided to saunter over to your table.

Which led you to the reason for Alastor’s impatience.

The whole reason that he had invited you out tonight was because Mimzy had requested an audience with him at her place of business. To discuss what, you weren’t sure, but you knew that the Radio Demon hated to be kept waiting. 

His impatience was starting to become evident, though it was likely that nobody around you noticed anything amiss. You, however, had become well versed in reading Alastor’s silent cues.

He had yet to touch his drink, though his clawed hand was firmly wrapped around the glass. He was surveying the building with apparent disinterest, but you could see the way that his sharp gaze roamed over each and every other demon and sinner present. You could see tension in the corners of his ever present smile, even though his eyes were hooded in an expression of mild boredom.

As you downed the last drops of your drink, you risked a glance over to Alastor once again. You had wanted to strike up a conversation since you had stepped foot through the door, but hadn’t wanted to distract him from his thoughts. But when his grip around the glass tightened once again, your internal war finally ended. It wouldn’t do anyone any good to have him suddenly lose his composure and bring the whole place to the ground.

You cleared your throat lightly as you placed your glass back down on the table. You received Alastor’s attention immediately, his eyes darting over to yours. “Yes, my dear?”

You smiled back at him. “Mimzy has a lot of nerve hyping this place up when it has such terrible customer service, doesn’t she?”

With no small amount of satisfaction, you noticed Alastor’s smile ease into something that almost resembled kind amusement. “Indeed,” Alastor hummed. “Though I must say, her choice in song is quite enjoyable.”

You shrugged, looking back at the dance floor. “It’s fine to dance to, I suppose. Not so much fun when you’re stuck sitting and waiting for someone to show up.”

There was no response. You returned your gaze to Alastor to see him looking at you almost curiously. “I wasn’t aware that you were one for dancing, my dear.”

A laugh bubbled up and pushed its way through your lips before you could stop it. You pressed your fingers to your lips to try and conceal it as Alastor tilted his head at you in confused interest.

At the sound of your laughter, his shadow suddenly perked up, quickly making its way over and sitting beside you.

When your giggle had finally subsided, you opened your mouth to respond to Alastor’s comment. It wasn’t completely his fault that he knew so little about your past life, after all, but you hadn’t expected that he, of all people, would make such blatant assumptions.

Before you could get a word out, though, the shadow placed a clawed hand under your chin, tilting your head to face it. Its fingers wandered until they reached the base of your throat before gently clawing their way back up, almost as if trying to coax another laugh out of you through touch alone.

It was so much more intimate than you had thought Alastor was capable of.

But then Alastor waved a hand in the air, summoning his shadow back to his side. It obeyed almost immediately, caressing your throat once more before melting back into the floor and returning to its rightful place. 

You cleared your throat again, this time in an attempt to fight the red spots on your cheeks. Not that their presence had escaped Alastor’s notice. His smile had widened dramatically, though thankfully, he chose not to comment on the interaction, instead waiting for a response to his earlier comment.

“I do dance,” you finally replied, looking back up at the Overlord. “I used to dance plenty before…well, you know,” you said with a small grin. “I died.”

Alastor waved away your comment with a flourish. “Ah, yes, I do see how such a thing could impede on your abilities for a moment. Though, if I’m not mistaken, you now have two perfectly functioning legs.”

“But I haven’t been to a club since before I died. And there’s not much opportunity to show off my moves at the hotel,” you replied with a shrug. You tilted your head at the demon. “And you? Do you dance?”

The Overlord smiled wistfully. “Oh yes, I was quite known for my dancing abilities back in the land of the living.”

“I thought you were known for being a mass murdering radio host.”

Alastor shrugged, giving you a devious grin. “I’ve always been multitalented, my dear.”

You laughed again, this time trying to ignore the eager look you received from both Alastor and his shadow.

“You know,” you said slyly once you had calmed yourself, looking down at your empty glass. “I wouldn’t mind brushing up on my skills tonight after your meeting.” You looked up innocently, meeting Alastor’s eyes. “If you haven’t lost your impeccable skills, that is.”

The demon’s eyes flashed. “Careful, mon chere. I-”

“Alastor! How’re you doing, doll?”

You whipped your head around at the sound of the new voice. You stared as a short, blonde woman made her way across the floor, arms raised in welcome and a broad smile on her face. 

Alastor, on the other hand, didn’t seem at all bothered as he greeted the woman. “Mimzy, dear,” he drawled, turning away from you. His smile stretched unnaturally. “You are extraordinarily late.”

The woman- Mimzy- waved her hand in indifference. “I’m busy running a business, Al, you know how it is. Can’t eva get anyone to do what you want without a bit of prodding.”

Her gaze slid over to you, eyes widening as her smile grew. “Say, Alastor, did you bring me a new toy?” Her eyes roamed over you slowly. “She’s a little dull, but I can spruce her right up.”

You suddenly felt very exposed.

You recoiled slightly, attempting to keep your movements unnoticeable as you pressed yourself further into the booth to get away from the Mimzy’s prying eyes. 

You tried not to notice the way that other demons and sinners had begun to glance over at the sudden appearance of the bar’s owner. They aren’t looking at you, you told yourself. But you couldn’t help but take in Mimzy’s confident appearance and attitude, coupled with Alastor’s calm poise. You could see how the Mimzy could have mistaken you for one of Alastor’s wayward souls.

Almost as if it could sense your discomfort, Alastor’s shadow suddenly reared up and placed itself directly in front of you, blocking you from Mimzy’s line of sight. 

“Unfortunately, Mimzy dear,” Alastor said from opposite you, though he avoided looking in your direction. “Charlie has grown quite attached to her little friend, and I doubt she would be thrilled to discover that I had allowed her to become a part of your…”

“Productions,” you piped up. Alastor’s shadow looked back at you in delight before shifting through the air to sit beside you once again.

“Precisely,” Alastor said.

Mimzy only shrugged, giving you a wink. “Well, I’m here if you change your mind, hun.” 

She turned back to Alastor. “Let’s you and me talk for a bit, huh? I know this sorta thing ain’t really your cup of tea. I’ve got a room in the back that we can use. Your little doll will be alright on her own for a while, won’t she?”

At her words, Alastor finally turned to face you once again, his eyes roaming over your face for only a moment before he stood. “Of course. I never would have brought her otherwise.”

With that, he made to follow Mimzy without so much as a glance back in your direction. A move that he had made on purpose, you were sure. After all, it simply wouldn’t do to have others believe that the Radio Demon actually cared for someone.

Even so, you couldn’t help but sigh in disappointment as the two sinners walked away. From beside you, in the dim light that the club so generously provided, Alastor’s shadow placed its hand on yours comfortingly. You turned to face it with a smile. “At least I still have you.”

The shadow grinned, using its other hand to gently cradle your cheek, pulling you closer until your foreheads met. You closed your eyes, savoring the feeling as your heart grew light. The shadow might not have been Alastor himself, but you had learned enough to know that it was heavily influenced by Alastor’s own thoughts, feelings, and commands. This was as close to affectionate that he would ever be with you.

Suddenly, the shadow’s touch left you.

You opened your eyes to see that it was nowhere to be seen.

“My, my,” a voice said from behind you. You jerked forward in surprise, spinning around to see a tall, winged imp casually leaning against the booth. He definitely hadn’t been in the building a few minutes ago, you noted. 

The imp leaned forward. “What’s a pretty little thing like you doing in a place like this?”

You flushed, glancing around to see if you could catch a glimpse of Alastor’s shadow. But it was as if it had never been beside you in the first place. Which would explain why the imp had decided to approach you at all. Nobody would have dared spoken to you if they knew that you were here with an Overlord.

You opened your mouth to tell him as much before you caught yourself, clamping your mouth shut. No matter how well Alastor’s conversation went with Mimzy, it was likely that he never would have danced with you anyway. There were too many eyes and ears here for him to let his guard down.

“You here alone?” the imp asked, trying his luck once more.

You fixed a smile on your face. If this was your only chance to dance, you were sure as Hell going to take it.

You stood, extending your hand in greeting. “Would you like to dance?”

The imp’s flirtatious smile changed to one of intrigue. “Straight to the point. I like it.”

You wiggled your fingers. “Are we going to dance, or what?”

The imp grinned, taking your hand and leading you on to the dance floor. 

Sure, it wasn’t exactly what you were hoping for when you and Alastor had come to Mimzy’s club, but you figured that it would at least be a decent substitute for something that you would never be able to have.

You felt your smile slipping as the pair of you began to move to the music. 

You hated moments like these, when you realized that no matter what you did or how you felt, you would never be able to show your feelings for Alastor in public. It wasn’t just the fact that he disliked physical touch, which you had never faulted him for. It was the fact that as one of Hell’s most powerful Overlords, he felt the overwhelming need to keep up an appearance. One that did not, unfortunately, include you.

A gentle touch snapped you back to reality. “You alright?” the imp asked.

No, you weren’t. But you weren’t going to let that stop you from dancing.

You nodded, taking the imp’s hand in yours as you began to move to the music once again. “I’m fine.” You smirked. “Now, show me what you’ve got.”

~~~

If you were to later ask anyone at Mimzy’s speakeasy what had happened that night, you would probably receive a whole mix of stories.

Some would say that the Radio Demon had suddenly appeared out of nowhere, his antlers growing and his bones cracking as he laid waste to the bar, presumably for fun or out of an unjust anger.

Others would say that he had come to seek some sort of revenge on a winged imp that had been spotted dancing before he suddenly disappeared, not to be seen again.

One specific witness, who shall remain nameless, would say that she had been speaking to an old friend about a business opportunity that he had foolishly taken no interest in. As she was speaking, a shadow had entered the room, whispering in its owner's ear. Her old friend had walked away from her, re-entering her bar, where he was met with the view of an imp dancing with the very woman that he had brought here in the first place.

The witness hadn’t even had time to blink before her friend had taken on his true demon form, batting people aside as if they were only flies before promptly picking up the imp dancing with the woman and melting into the shadows with him.

When her friend returned, he refused to say what he had done with the poor imp, though the witness had no trouble making a few assumptions. He had walked over to the women, gently taken her hand, and gave the witness a clipped farewell before vanishing with the women into the shadows.

It was a brutal display, even for the Radio Demon. If the witness had to guess, she would assume that perhaps the woman had something to do with the whole debacle.

Not that she would ever say so to anyone else, of course. She knew better. 

You, however, had no trouble saying straight to Alastor’s face what you believed had happened. 

“We were dancing, Al. It was harmless. If I’d needed your help, you would have known.”

“You would never have summoned me if he was threatening you, my dear.”

You groaned and buried your face in your hands. The two of you had been going back and forth like this ever since he had so graciously brought you back to the hotel from Mimzy’s bar.

You lifted your head and took a breath before continuing. “If he was threatening me, we probably wouldn’t have been just dancing.”

Alastor’s eyes flashed dangerously, his shadow rearing up and scowling in disgust. 

You whirled around and pointed at the shadow. “And you. You went and told him that something bad was happening, didn’t you? You are a liar and a rat, my friend.”

At your words, the shadow suddenly shrank down in size and hid behind its owner, almost as if trying to avoid your accusatory glare.

Alastor, on the other hand, didn’t break eye contact. “He only meant to protect you, my dear, the way he was instructed to.”

“What did you think I would need protecting from, exactly? I can’t exactly die again, can I?”

“There are things far worse than a second death, my dear,” Alastor said with false sweetness.

He was right, you knew. You had almost been subjected to such a thing after your death, when you had sold your soul to the Vees. You still weren’t sure exactly how it had happened, but Alastor himself had found out about you and somehow saved you from a life of imprisonment and torture. 

Not everyone was as lucky as you were.

But that wasn’t why you were upset. 

As soon as Alastor had saved you from the Vees, you had been determined to help him even a fraction of the way that he had helped you. You owed him so much more than that, you knew, but it was the only thing that you could give. And so, from that moment forward, you had tried your very best to become a solid and stable presence for Alastor, unmoving in your trust in him and, hopefully, eventually something like a friend.

But tonight, you had done the exact opposite. To see the Radio Demon defend you was to know that he felt things like affection, or even something more than indifference. That wouldn’t do for his reputation at all, you knew, and you hated yourself for being the cause of it.

You sighed in defeat, crossing your arms over your chest in defense. “I know that,” you said, holding your position and glaring daggers at the Overlord. “But I also know that you risked a lot today by protecting me. I’m not worth losing your power over-”

You gasped as Alastor appeared directly in front of you, glaring intensely. He didn’t lift a finger, but you swore you could feel the heat of his gaze.

“I do hope you haven’t finally started to doubt me, my dear.”

“Never,” you promised, searching his gaze.

The Overlord stepped back, his stretched out smile immediately concealing his true feelings. “Wonderful,” he said. “Then we both understand that my power and status will forever remain.”

You nodded once before finally breaking eye contact, choosing to look down at the floor.

You could feel the anger seeping out of you slowly, replaced by embarrassment. Of course Alastor would never give up his power for you. Even if someone had truly seen the incident, it was unlikely that anyone would ever be able to use it to their advantage. You were talking about the Radio Demon himself, after all.

“You’re right,” you muttered, wrapping your arms tightly around yourself. “I made a foolish assumption.” You smiled to yourself. “I seem to be full of those today. I’m sorry.”

You were met with silence. 

But before you could look up, you suddenly felt the cool touch of a shadow. It rested its hands against your cheeks, tilting your head up to make eye contact. It moved its thumbs in slow circles, leaning down until your foreheads were touching. It didn’t move any closer than that, but you knew that this was more than anyone else had ever received.

It was lovely.

But oh, how you wished it were really him.

The shadow stepped back, returning to its place beside its owner.

Alastor himself acted as though he hadn’t noticed the interaction at all, instead looking around your room as if seeing it for the first time.

“I do plan to maintain my powers, my dear,” Alastor repeated. 

Before you could even open your mouth to reply, he pushed forward. “Although,” he said, almost thoughtfully. “I certainly wouldn’t mind losing a few souls to keep what is most certainly mine.” 

He looked towards you then, his gaze hard, as if daring you to argue.

And you should have. You should have told him that you weren’t worth losing souls for. You should have told him that you only wanted to help him, never hinder him. 

You should have done lots of things.

What you did do, however, was smile and duck your head to hide your rising blush. 

You looked back up and extended your hand wordlessly.

Alastor looked down at it before glancing back up at you, his eyebrow raised in a silent question as his shadow looked on eagerly from behind him.

Your smile only widened. “I believe, good sir, that you owe me a dance.”

The shadow nearly leapt with excitement, rushing forward and taking your hand. 

You laughed at its enthusiasm before Alastor stepped forward and waved his hand, whisking the shadow away and taking its place. 

He placed his hand under yours, bringing your hand up to place a soft kiss on the back of your knuckles before releasing you and straightening. Slowly, he brought his claws to the base of your throat before gently dragging them back up until he reached your chin. He tilted your face up further to meet his gaze before dropping his hand down to yours once more.

With his other hand, he waved his staff, summoning a slow dance tune that seemed to emanate from the walls themselves.

You tried to ignore the heat in your cheeks and looked up curiously. “Didn’t you used to dance to songs that were a bit more lively?”

Alastor smiled gently down at you before summoning his shadow and surrendering his staff to it. “I did indeed, mon chere. But we aren’t exactly alive now, are we?”

You smiled back in agreement. “No, I suppose we’re not.”

You placed your hand on his shoulder as he placed his hand on your waist. He lowered his head down until your foreheads were touching and began swaying, taking you with him on his slow trek around your bedroom floor.

You couldn’t have asked for anything more.

~~~

If you asked anyone at the hotel what had happened in your room that night, you would receive a few different stories.

Angel Dust would have told you that the Radio Demon had suckered a poor woman into going out with him that night, and you were most likely getting it on.

Charlie would have told you that she hadn’t seen either Alastor or the hotel’s newest resident all evening, though she doubted that the two of you had gone off somewhere together. Right?

Husk would have told you that he felt sorry for the woman who had gotten caught in the Radio Demon’s line of sight. You were such a sweet thing, and you deserved so much better.

You would have simply smiled and shrugged, giving nothing away.

Nobody would have dared ask the Radio Demon, of course.

But if anyone had bothered to ask the shadows, they would have received a rather lovely story about two sinners who had found their peace, only for a moment, dancing in each other’s arms that night. 

An Overlord and a sinner. 

A woman and a man. 

Two damned souls, finding home at last.

Part 3 Here!!

A/N 2: I didn’t get to proofread, but I hope you guys still enjoyed it! If you read the first fic (or even if you haven’t), I’m thinking of making another part where it’s platonic Angel Dust x reader and he finally gets to give her a makeover. Let me know if you want to be tagged!

Also, I want to write more Alastor x reader (maybe a continuation of sorts, maybe not) so let me know if you guys want to be tagged in those!

Taglist: @severusminerva @anh4125 @midorichoco @rapturenyx-blog @maybememoriesx

[tadpolesonalgae]

before the corn grows. 

Batboys x depressive!reader

a/n: oh my gosh this was so therapeutic—also, I was unsure whether to include people on the az taglist in this fic since it’s technically a poly fic? Sorry if you didn’t want to be included in this, I wasn’t sure about it :/

As always, thank you for the request, anon <3!

warnings: mentions of self-inflicted violence, fluff, I think this is technically hurt/comfort?

word count: 2,766

——————————————————————————————————————————————

“Judgemental prick.”

“I don’t think I said anything.”

“You didn’t have to. It was written all over your face.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Cassian scowls, stirring in the fifth spoonful of sugar. “For the Spymaster, you were practically yelling it across the table. It’s the small things in life—I’ll enjoy some damn sugar in my tea if I want to.” 

Azriel shifts in his seat, powerful arms folded over a broad chest, thighs spread as he relaxes into the seat. “There was nothing small about the amount you just put in,” he replies, smirking. “Just looking out for your health.”

“You look after yours and I’ll look after mine,” the General mutters, brows tightening at the cocky smirk on his brother’s mouth. Matching hazel eyes glint with sinister mirth that Cassian decides to ignore for today, raising the mug to his lips and drinking deeply. 

He jerks violently, spraying the bitter liquid across the table, making Az recoil. “It’s salty?” He glares at his brother, who’s now grimacing at the smattering of tea that’s been spat in his direction. “I told you I was looking out for your health,” he mutters, reaching for the kitchen roll. 

The General grabs it first, snatching the roll away, dabbing at his mouth and tongue before Azriel is leaning across the table, grappling at Cassian’s arm to try and pry it from his thick fingers. “Let go you prick, I’m the one who has that concoction on my tongue,” the General snaps gruffly. “And I’ve got your saliva all over my leathers. Hand it over.” 

“Oh I’m sorry, did I ruin your pretty clothes? Is your vanity hurt?”

“Piss off, bastard,” Azriel snaps. “You should have paid more attention to what you were spooning into your drink.” 

The door swings open and the third brother walks in, violet eyes visibly worried, fingers preoccupied with straightening the pristine cuff of his sleeves. Freshly polished shoes pause in their place, surveying the chaos that’s unfolded upon the kitchen table. The two pull apart, sobered by Rhys’s strained look, at once on guard. 

“Where are you going?” Cassian asks, noting the fine but not flashy dress of the High Lord—clean but casual. “Have you seen her recently?” Rhys asks, and they both stiffen, shaking their heads. Hazel eyes glance at one another across the table, before returning to anxious violet, in time to catch him running a hand through his hair. 

“She’d been focusing on getting orders done in time for solstice presents,” Azriel offers solemnly, “it’s when the most work comes in, so she’ll be resting now.” 

“I’m going to check on her,” Rhysand announces, and neither of the Illyrians object. Not a word needs to be spoken to know the High Lord will relay whatever news there is to the two of them the second he learns it. 

Then in a whisper of darkness, he vanishes. 

————

The door had been locked, but it hadn’t been an issue. 

The issue was the stagnant air in her house. The issue was the moulding bread in the kitchen. The issue was the dirty clothes scattered across her bedroom floor. 

The issue was, she looked like she hadn’t gotten out of bed for a week straight, hair knotted and oily, skin lacking the warmth of life, eyes numb and unfocused. 

He braces himself to deal with her, then lands three quiet knocks to her open bedroom door—letting her know he’s here. Blankets curl tighter, being pulled over her head, wrapping into a tight ball that shudders and sobs almost silently. He can hear the gasping inhales, the wet snivels as she tries to hide away. 

He knew something had been amiss. 

“Lovely,” he calls softly, the name like heated cotton against clean skin. “How long have you been sleeping for?” 

————

You curl tighter, feeling the bed dip, the shape of a large, warm palm settling over your shoulder. 

“Go away,” you manage numbly, throat raw, sinuses hurting. “I’m tired. Leave me alone.” Limbs wrap tighter, trying to pull yourself together for him. Simultaneously wanting to scream at him to get out, to hit and lash at him, wanting to melt into his arms. Yet the raging instincts rise, and rise, and repeatedly fall short, losing their momentum and disintegrating into silence. Your clothes are stiff and sticky, glued to your body with sweat and salt, and you hate you hate you hate everything so much that it has to be pushed away. Folded up neatly into a box and just pushed away. 

Fingers latch over the duvet, prying it from your grip with startling ease, hands too weak to do much against him, stomach aching with nausea. Light cracks into your vision, and you attempt to hide from him, conceal the gleaming spit and snot across your upper lip and chin, hide the puffiness of your eyes and the knotted mess of your hair—damp from tears that had been shed what feels like hours ago. 

“What’s wrong…?” He asks softly, knuckles brushing the rat-tailed hair from your forehead, pushing it away so it’s no longer being coated in saliva and mucus and tears. “Talk to me, please,” he whispers, making to pull you up. 

Sobs wrack your chest, slamming into you with violent force, wet breaths gasping from cracked lips as you heave with despair, uncontrollable spasms seizing your lungs as a fresh wave wrecks through you. He can feel you shaking your head, wet palms trying to dry freshly tearful eyes, hot water dripping heavily onto his shirt as you try to stop. 

“Please…” you croak out, stumbling over the word, interrupted by stuttering breaths. “Leave me…go…” 

“I’m not leaving you like this,” he whispers tenderly, pushing wet hair behind a pointed ear. But you shake your head again, crying harder, and his heart fumbles in his chest, aching sharply. 

“I don’t…go away,” you moan shakily, head lowered against his shoulder. “I don’t want you here.” Lips are weighed in viscous saliva, turning them soft and slimy, making it hard to speak.  “I’m not going anywhere,” he murmurs, arm wrapping over your back, power sliding for the window to flick the latch open—get some fresh air circling the space. 

“I don’t…I don’t want you here!” You cry sharply, trying to wriggle out of his hold, struggling to return to your grave-like bed. To dive into the thick and smelly sheets that’ll get tangled with your limbs. “Lovely,” he says quietly, “hold still.” 

Your body shudders to a gradual stop, shins and upper arms burning with the movement, left raw and unhealed from the lack of energy. Breathing stutters as you try to back away from hyperventilating, trying to calm your lungs, but the airways continue to spasm. 

His broad palm pushes the stray locks of hair away, still saturated with salty tears that clump at the ends, scraggly and messy and smelly and damp and cold and…you try to pull away from him, feeling disgusting for getting him dirty. He’s so clean and tidy, and smelling so nice, like freshly washed sheets and crisp morning air. He shouldn’t be in your room. 

You can hear the stuttering pulse of his heart, the only give to his emotions and one you’re only able to discern because he doesn’t think to hide it from you. He strokes your hair soothingly, goading you to calm, to resign yourself into his care so he can look after you. 

“I’m tired,” you manage, chest shuddering with stammering breaths. 

“Then rest,” he whispers, “but let us be with you.”

“No…” You shake your head, brows scrunching as your lungs begin to flutter and he holds you just that little bit tighter. It’s bad enough that he’s seeing you like this, it can’t be the others too. “Rhys…”

“Let’s get you cleaned up, first,” he murmurs, pulling away and cupping your jaw, violet meeting your gaze, “okay?” Your lower lip wobbles, fresh tears spilling as you grip just that little bit tighter, at last falling into him, if only because you lack the energy to stave off anything else. Far too tired to protest. 

————

It had been so much worse than he had been anticipating, and a small part of him recoiled with sorrow when wrapping her shins in bandages, carefully applying a numbing balm to her upper arms to ease with movement. 

He hadn’t realised…he hadn’t seen the signs… Even looking back on the weeks leading up to Starfall, he can’t find anything out of order. She’d been as peaceful as usual, as calm and reserved as normal, preparing for the influx of projects, almost anticipating them, desiring things to preoccupy her mind with, perhaps. 

He feels wretched and useless, only able to scramble after the remnants of the storm. Desperately trying to find pieces of what he’d known in the wreckage of a war. Her eyes stay vacant, though not as foggy as when he’d first found her. 

A bath had been too painful, so he’d used his hands to clean off the grime, only a flannel, soap, and a warm bucket of water at his disposal. He can only hope that once she’s fed, her body will begin its reconstruction, stitching together the thin slices, healing over scars so she doesn’t have to be reminded of it. Though he wonders if that’s an appealing aspect rather than a detestable one. 

He’s proud of his own scars, memories stored away within his skin, stories contained within the tissue of battles long past. A map of his history placed into the grain of his body. He wonders if it’s at all comparable—how she starves herself so the cuts might set, so she will be able to look back at what she’s gotten through. A token of some kind for surviving. To know that while it’s all inside her own head, none of its meaning is detracted. 

Pain is still pain, no matter where it comes from. 

————

You’d tried so desperately to pull yourself together. To keep those haunting beats of emotion kept wrapped up in ribbons and bows, so it would be less inclined to leap out if stored comfortably. 

Had tried to sit on the box to keep it from bursting open, so you wouldn’t have to bear that vulnerability. You’d rather stick yourself with knives that try to articulate what can only exist in the blood of your veins and the screaming caves of your mind. The echoes that repeat until painful instructions are being mumbled upon your numb lips, hardly unaware of the order to cut, cut, cut.

Had managed for the most part to section them off, until he’d finished tucking you into a spare bed, and his lips had brushed your cheek. 

Then some tears had again dripped out, but he’d thumbed those away tenderly, never becoming fed up on the nonstop trickle. 

You could hardly manage to look at him, not ready to face that reality yet. Then he’d told you he would be finding you a meal, and that you should eat as much as you felt capable of, but that you should try. And then he had pressed another light kiss to your cheek, swifter than the last, not giving you time to comprehend it, helping keep the tears to a minimum.

A large part of you is relieved, a great weight raised and wiped from your shoulders now your skin is clean again, now your hair is no longer sticking to your scalp but smelling fresh and healthy. Relieved you can again feel your circulation up and running, having gotten too used to the freezing tips of your fingers and toes, the cold numbness that had overtaken your shins and arms as your body tried to spool in the blood to your torso.  

A knock sounds at the door, and you lift your head to spot hazel eyes watching you, concerned, and you can’t help the small smile that tugs at the corners of your mouth. He sees the reaction, and sighs, opening the door a little wider so he can walk inside. 

“Does Rhys know you’re here, Cassian?” You ask, a sad smile on your lips as you incline your head to look up at him, stood beside your bed. Before he can answer though, you here a derisive snort coming softly from the hallway, and a tender warmth unfurls in your chest, throat aching a little with emotion. “Az, you too?” 

A figure wreathed in shadow steps guiltily into the empty doorframe, one hand resting on the wooden beam as if he might leave. 

You swallow thickly, shifting comfortably beneath the crisp sheets, liking how they rustle with the movement, scraping against bare and clean skin, even if it hurts a little. “Did… Has Rhys told you…?” 

Cassian watches you silently, an anguished look on his features, but Azriel pauses, then nods his head solemnly. 

Your lips press together into a thin line, unsure what to say if they already know. There’s no use in lying then, or trying to get out of it. Not without causing more concern. So you allow your shoulders to slump, resting back into the pillows. “I don’t really know how it happened,” you admit quietly, peering into your lap. “I just…I guess it had been building up for a while.” Your eyes shut briefly, hands rising to cover your face, rubbling lightly at your brows before falling away again, “I didn’t even know I was in it until I was out of it.” 

“It’s okay. You don’t need to explain anything,” Cassian says thickly, hand hesitantly settling over your shoulder, thumb stroking in slow, careful motions, ready to pull away if you don’t want the touch. But your lower lip wobbles, head dipping a little, before leaning into the gentle feel, the broad, reassuring warmth of his palm, the callouses rasping against your scrubbed-soft skin. 

“We wanted to make sure you were okay,” Az murmurs, closer than he should sound from the doorway, but then you feel the slightly cool breath of his shadows curling against your cheek, and a tear drips down your face. You nod. “I’m fine,” you rasp, voice thick, clogged with emotion, “now. I’m fine now.” 

“Are you…” Azriel begins, trailing off when you glance at him questioningly, his heart aching when you turn your gaze to him, the small cuts peeking out from atop the duvet. Cassian takes up the lead, thumb still gently sweeping over your shoulder. “We want to hold you. Will you let us?” 

Your lower lip wobbles, eyes growing hot and wet at the simple ask, somehow knowing exactly what you’re too afraid and embarrassed to ask for. “Yes…” you manage, voice small and quiet. 

Neither of them comment on it, moving with swift certainty, collecting at your sides as their wings reorganise at their backs. It’s a rare sight to see them in anything other than their leathers, but the soft fabric is welcomed as they settle, the pale linen thin enough for you to feel heat through it, to almost be swept away by the comfort their scent brings, like returning home after weeks away, remembering the scent that you become too quickly accustomed to, to fully appreciate and treasure. 

You lean into Cassian’s side, head tipped against his shoulder, Azriel pressed close enough to twine your fingers together in your lap atop the sheets, shadows roaming freely between the three of you, a sure sign you’re home again. 

A long sigh comes from the doorway, sounding more resigned than disapproving—he knew this was going to happen at one point or another. There would be no separating any of you in a moment of need or vulnerability. 

“I thought I told you to at least wait until she’d recovered a little more,” Rhys sighs, a gently scolding tone to his words, eyes displeased but softening when they spot how you’ve practically melted into his brothers’ sides. You switch subjects, eyeing the tray he’s brought, stomach grumbling as the promise of a hot meal dawns in your mind. “That smells good…” you murmur, watching him intently, and a fond smile curves his lips. 

“I’m glad to hear it,” Rhys replies. “Your favourite, if my memory serves.” 

Your brows curve, lip wobbling again—you don’t deserve this. Them. 

But Rhys has already leaned over Cassian, pressing a kiss to your forehead, smoothly sliding the tray into your lap. 

“Eat,” he instructs softly. “If you’re still so inclined, you can cry afterwards, but eat first, okay?” 

——————————————————————————————————————————————

general taglist: @myheartfollower @tcris2020 @mali22 @slut4acotar @sfhsgrad-blog @needylilgal022 @hannzoaks @hnyclover @skyesayshi @nyotamalfoy @decomposing-writer @soph1644 @lilah-asteria @nighttimemoonlover

az taglist: @azrielshadows1nger @jurdanpotter @positivewitch @nightcourt-daydreaming @assassinsblade @marvelouslovely-barnes @v3lv3tf0x @kalulakunundrum @vellichor01 @throneofsmut @vickykazuya @starlitlakes

[alexanderwales]

I did end up buying Tiny Glade, mostly to see whether it had something for me.

It's cute, but I think to enjoy it I need to engage my creative muscles, and when I do that, I feel restrained.

I found myself making up a story about a wizard who lived in a big tower and hired on a live-in maid. She had been brought in to tidy things up, to clean his clothes, to cook him dinner.

She had no close family, and was happy to have the cramped space at the bottom of the tower with little privacy. The wizard paid well, and she saved every scrap she could, fearing that he would be capricious. Instead he kept to himself at the top of the tower, surveying the lands and sometimes mounting expeditions that would see him gone for days, returning home sodden and with a smell of sweat soaking his clothes.

It was awkward between the two of them, not least because her bed in the bottom of the tower meant that he needed to move through her space when he wanted to come or go.

Eventually, after six months had past and she was feeling more secure in her position, she asked whether he didn't want a proper kitchen somewhere in the tower. She wanted a proper kitchen. All the meals she'd made for him had been over a campfire just outside the house, or more often, put together from pickled, chilled, or dried ingredients. He had harumphed and said that he would think about it, and she had assumed that this was his way of saying "no".

But when she came back from a trip to her estranged sister's house, the first vacation she'd asked for since taking the job, she was surprised to find that the tower had a small, single-story building at its base, built into it. She stepped through the door, feeling unsure of herself, and found that she was in a well-appointed kitchen with a cast iron stove, an ice box, two sinks, and checkered blue and white countertops. She had stared at it, befuddled, and the wizard had asked her whether it was to her liking. She had nodded, but then said that the kitchen was lacking one important thing, which was food. He'd handed her far too much money and sent her to the market.

When she returned with far too much food, she made a large dinner for the two of them, and they ate together at a small table in the kitchen, sitting on stools.

"If you can make such a thing as this kitchen over the course of a weekend," she said slowly. "Would it be possible ... would it be within your power to make me a room of my own?"

"You have a room of your own," he replied. "At the base of the tower."

"Somewhere that you didn't need to trek through," she said. "Where I wouldn't feel the need to wake early in the morning and make myself presentable in case you were going out."

He widened his eyes. "I didn't know you did that."

"I do," she replied.

"Then I'll think about it," he said.

She was more hopeful this time. It did not seem as though that meant "no". Indeed, it seemed that when the wizard said he would think about something, it meant that he was putting his considerable intelligence to the problem.

This time, she was around to see the wizard do his magic. Most of it consisted of crystals and chalks, and lengthy consultations with books that sometimes resulted in him saying a single syllable in thirty different ways, feeling which one was right. She'd had little to do in the way of her daily chores, and was past the point in her employment when she was always trying to look busy, so she watched most of it, and made them marmalade sandwiches with tea, enjoying the warm summer day. The wizard talked, explaining things to her that must have taken a decade of study for him to understand, and while it went over her head, she nodded along. He seemed to like having an audience of one.

When he was finished, the house had sprouted an extra room, far larger and more extravagant than she had been expecting. It was larger, in fact, than the room at the top of the tower the wizard lived in.

From that point onward, they were something like friends. He did more of his work outdoors, and did his reading in the kitchen, which gave them more chances to talk. The time seemed to pass more quickly. She had saved quite a bit of money by this point, and was tucking away every coin he gave her a bit less carefully. She bought a fine dress for herself, nothing too fancy but far more fair than the old one.

She came down from her room one morning to discover that a rag and brush had been enchanted to do dishes for her. She was befuddled at first, but the wizard seemed quite pleased with himself, and said that it had only taken a month or so of work. At first it felt unnatural to simply set the dirty dishes in the sink and have them be soaped and washed without her lifting a finger.

After that, the wizard entered a sort of mania. He was clearly pushing himself, spending more ever more time with his books, and every so often he would have some new miracle in the house they shared. His books sorted themselves automatically, a washtub cleaned their clothes, dust was drawn to a small bin rather than settling on their shelves. The very last straw was when the wizard made a complicated device to make dinners.

"Are you trying to replace me?" she asked.

He didn't seem to understand. "Replace you?" he asked. "Why would I ever?"

She gestured around the kitchen, which had been expanded since he'd first magicked it up. "You've been taking away my jobs one by one," she said. "If I'm not cleaning, not cooking, not putting things to order, not doing laundry or making small repairs, what use am I? And we both know that you pay me a handsome salary. I don't know a wizard's ways, but I know when preparations are being made to not have me work here."

"Ah," said the wizard. He rubbed the back of his neck. "This is terribly awkward, but you have it right. I don't wish to employ you any longer, but not because I'm hoping to replace you with magic. This was," he looked around the kitchen at all he'd done, and at the house he'd built up around the tower. "Well, I'm afraid this was all a way of courting you, but I can see that you haven't taken it as I've intended."

The maid sat there, stunned. They weren't so far apart in age, that was true, and she'd thought about it often in her first months there, sometimes trying to decide what she would do if he tried to take liberties, and later, with those thoughts tinted with fantasy rather than fear. But there were so many things they didn't know about each other, and he had always kept his distance from her, so the crush she'd carried had been smothered.

"Give me some time," said the maid as she rose from the table. "I'll think about it."

~~~~

And this is all well and good, but the game doesn't really benefit from being played in this way. Adding onto a house does not feel like organically growing a house from the story you're telling. The houses have no interiors. There aren't people. I can make a new little house off the side, for when the maid's sister comes to live with them, but it exists statically, and can only be grown in specific ways, and it pens in what's going on in my head. Constraints breed creativity is one of those old chestnuts that I think it's only somewhat true, and in this case, I find the constraints penning me in a bit too much.

Still not the worst $10 I've ever spent on a game though, and maybe arguably I'll get enough mileage out of it in the end.

[boundinparchment]

Autumnal Delights

Modern AU-esque. In which you and Sunday visit an apple orchard and create something delicious. Sunday/GN Reader, established relationship. Written for @owlespresso's Autumn Festival collab! On AO3 here. kudos, comments, and reblog are appreciated

The air was crisp and fresh, a reprieve from the oppressive summer heat that carried the slightest sweetness.  Dirt crunched under foot as you stepped off the line of people, two paid bags in your hand.  Sunday hung back from the clusters of people, instead taking a picture of the orchard map and stepping away to research the variations listed on it.

The first attempt at this had gone rather poorly.  That day, it was muddy and the harvest wasn’t that good.  Most of the remaining selections were picked clean and he’d torn a sleeve reaching to prevent you from falling.  He couldn’t fathom why people willingly picked their own fruit when it meant such an ordeal.

And so you planned better.  Made sure the weather was ideal.  You arrived as early as you could.  He was still a little uneasy but prepared.  More rugged but still stylish shoes joined a light modern jacket and while he still wore slacks, they were more durable than his suit pants.  You could tell by his wings that he felt at ease, and when he cast a warm smile as you approached, you saw a fraction of a flutter skin his cheeks.

“We’re all set,” you said, holding up the plastic bags.  “We can pick as many as we can fit.  Where should we start?”

Sunday assessed the map again, this time marking up the photo, drawing a loop around certain patches that ended at the entrance.  He showed you the result.

“This allows us to hit every grove that has the types you need—Granny Smith, Golden Delicious, and Honeycrisp—while also providing the most variety and enjoying the entire area,” he explained.

He pointed to particular groves along the way.

“I, for one, would love to try this…Keepsake variety,” Sunday said, making a note.  “It is apparently sweet and aromatic.”

You stifled a laugh as you looked over the grove listings.  “Sounds a bit Ludacrisp if you ask me.”

Your companion shook his head and shot you an enigmatic smile before you began to head towards a particular grove.  Sunday extended his arm and you took it, nestling your hand in the crook of his elbow as you surveyed the orchard, the trees absorbing much of the surrounding chatter.  The sky was clear and vibrant, a sharp contrast against the greenery.  Grass rustled as you walked and when you came to the grove with Granny Smiths, both of you began assessing the best options.

“Was there ever anything like this on Penacony?” you asked.  “Not apple picking, necessarily, but…did any dreamscape ever have its own seasons, ever emulate certain qualities from other planets?  The Charmony Festival is once in an Amber Era but…”

You plucked one apple, and then another, dropping them into one of the bags.  Sunday reached up above you and, after examination, pulled it from its perch with a snap, leaves shivering from the vibration.  It joined the others with a hiss of friction against the plastic.

“The Moments of Oasis and Scorchsand both have certain qualities that would allow for it, but considering they are still parts of a dream and one is asleep…it makes for a poor substitute compared to the feeling of the sun pouring down and the tickle of leaves or hearing genuine laughter and excitement,” he said.

Sunday’s words sat with you for a moment as you watched his eyes skim the tree, looking for a suitable candidate.  The morning sun glinted off of his halo and made his silver hair sparkle.  He was clearly trying to be present and cognizant of the moment, focused not only on being efficient but enjoying the day.

You moved on to the next section, looking for Golden Delicious next, every once in a while pausing and taking in a particular view or scent or sensation.  Along the way, you came across trees with irregular shaped apples, red coloration over yellow skin.  Sunday checked the map and paused, careful in his section.

“So these are Keepsakes…” he murmured.  “Quite vibrant.”

You held out the other bag, still empty, wordlessly offering your assistance.  Two bags made it easier to keep the apples you needed for baking separate from what you considered the edible options.

He picked three but paused with the third.  His hand hovered over the bag before it pulled it back, wings folding in careful consideration before he let the apple join the others.  

“I don’t know if I’ll enjoy them.  It seems quite wasteful to take up space if there’s another type you would like.” 

“The whole point is to try something new, not just get what we need for baking, Sunday.  Pick what you think you might want to eat,” you replied, adjusting the bag to lay a reassuring hand on his upper arm.  “Don’t hold back all because of a possible what-if that might not be the end result.”

Sunday leaned over and pressed a soft kiss to your forehead.  You felt his words of gratitude against your skin more than you heard them as his wings grazed your cheeks.  You continued on until both bags were bursting; the smile on his face during the drive home was worth every aching bone in your feet.

The next day, you tied an apron around your waist and assessed the haul closely, ingredients laid out and recipe card nearby.  It was an old thing, a copy of a copy passed down over the years, boxed at the corners with a coffee ring marring an edge.  You knew it by heart by now.  But you wanted Sunday to have the full experience.

He was already neatly folding up his sleeves and pulling them up so they stayed without constant checking.  Much like yesterday, he was wearing clothes that wouldn’t need dry cleaning and could handle the inevitable mess.  You couldn’t help tracing the lines of his hands up into his forearms, shaped from his time adventuring on the Express.

Out of the corner of his eye, Sunday caught you watching him and his wings fluttered as pink crossed his cheeks.  You smiled and mouthed an apology, only for him to step behind you, hands on your waist as he nestled into your neck, feathers tickling.

“I am always flattered by your admiration, my beloved, but you shouldn’t allow yourself to be so easily distracted.”

With a peck to the curve of your neck, Sunday pulled away and plucked his own apron from the nearby rack, ready to start.

You washed the apples together before you began to peel them.  At first, you expected to have to show Sunday how to hold the small knife and angle it just below the surface; he surprised you, picking up both with practiced ease.  The skin came free in long, curling ribbons that were pushed aside to be baked separately.

“It wasn’t often but I used to do this for my sister,” Sunday said when he caught the curious tilt of your head.  “Peeled and cored, with the skin left to be given to the visiting birds and other creatures in the gardens.”

There was more to the simple tale, you sensed, but you remained quiet and waited until he finished an apple before pressing a clean hand to the space between his shoulder blades.  Chances were, like all things, he stopped not because he didn’t want to, but because of his growing duties as Family Head.  

He said nothing else but cast you a soft smile before you stepped away to take care of the dough.

Butter, flour, baking powder, salt, were whisked together as Sunday continued peeling, humming as he went.  You added ice-cold water to the dry mixture, mixing with a fork before you reached over and pre-heated the oven, the soft pop of the ignition barely audible underneath Sunday’s melody.  Often, he wasn’t aware he was doing it but had said that it was a reflex when he was content, relaxed enough to focus his thoughts elsewhere.  

You didn’t recognize the tune but swayed softly as you sprinkled flour across the counter and began to roll out the dough.  Your heart skipped as he continued, his humming only broken by the snick of the apple corer and slices dropping into the ceramic bowl nearby.  

With the dough tucked into the pie dish and pricked with a fork, you turned your attention back to Sunday, who was finishing the last apple.  All of them were uniform and perfectly peeled, the air smelling tangy and sweet.  Baking took a specific exactitude that seemed to fit him like a glove and he measured each ingredient out precisely as needed.  You, in turn, stirred the apples to coat them, pausing only so Sunday could add a liquid after each thorough mixing.  Lemon juice, and then water, and then flour for good measure.

“Wouldn’t that upset the flavor balance?” Sunday asked.

“It’ll keep the filling from being too runny,” you replied.  “Otherwise it can ruin the crust, too.  Can you pour this into the pie dish?  I have to start on the dough for the top latticing.”

You made quick work of the second batch of dough, and rolled and cut strips, showing Sunday how to weave them between one another.  Here, too, you watched his precision at work as he kept the strips equidistant, spacing them perfectly.  Even after the edge of the dish was finished, both of you were left with a sizable amount of dough.

“We could decorate it a bit,” you offered.  “There’s enough here for a braid around the edge, maybe?”

After a beat, Sunday said, “I have an idea.  If you’d permit me?”

As soon as you nodded, he was undoing the ties of your apron, shooing you from the kitchen.  Your face must have carried a look of concern, eyes darting to the oven, because Sunday only chuckled and wiped a stray dusting of flour from your cheek, smile steady.

 “The recipe is very exact about the rest of the baking process, don’t fret.  I’ll come get you when it’s finished.”

With no other choice, you retreated from the kitchen, the smell of cinnamon and cloves and apples and butter wafting through the entire living space.  The timer went off roughly an hour later and Sunday retrieved you after you heard the oven open and close, the corners of his lips quirked upwards, proud in his triumph.

He covered your hands with his eyes and led you back out into the kitchen, chuckling softly when you mentioned how thick the scent was.

“That was your handiwork, you picked the arrangement.  I merely measured,” Sunday said, the tip of his nose nuzzling the back of your head.  “Okay, you can look now.”

His warm hands pulled away and you gasped at the golden perfection.  The edge of the pie had a vine-like pattern and small flowers dotted the cross-sections.  Tiny leaves were placed along the edge, carefully shaped to look like some of the leaves you picked up and pressed earlier in the season, the first leaves to fall this year.

You turned around, beaming.  “It’s so pretty I don’t want to eat it!  You have to have the first bite when it’s cool, I insist.”

Sunday, instinctively, was about to protest and defer to you as he always did, thinking of the joy of others; he paused when you shook your head and his wings relaxed, his face turning pink again.  It brought him delight to see others partaking, you well knew, but why deprive himself of the same?  He, too, deserved to feel the excitement and joy of his hard work every once in a while, not just witness that of others.

A compromise was reached—a shared first piece—and you swore you knew no greater joy than his expression, eyes closed as he ruminated on every flavor, wings fluttering with exuberance.  Warmth spread through you as you took a bite, sugary spice running along your tongue with buttery crispness from the crust.

Next time, you reminded yourself silently, he had to try it with ice cream.

[ak-vintage]

Quarry - Chapter 1

Pairing: Din Djarin (The Mandalorian) x f!reader

Summary: Din Djarin is on what he expects to be his last bounty hunt for Greef Karga. After all, Nevarro is swiftly moving away from its previous reputation as a Guild member’s paradise, and Din has more important concerns now, like finding a Jedi to train his mysterious foundling. However, after capturing a wanted starship engineer who would rather go anywhere other than “home,” the Mandalorian is forced to reassess his priorities.

Your taste of freedom had been brief but glorious. Now you are a prisoner of the most infamous bounty hunter in the Outer Rim – it’s only a matter of time before he turns you in. There isn’t much you would not do to keep from being sent home, but as you find yourself growing closer to your captor and his strange little companion, you start to wonder whether escape is really what you want.

Set after Chapter 13: The Jedi but before Chapter 14: The Tragedy.

Chapter Tags & Warnings: Reader is Mando's bounty, minor peril, threats of violence, second-person POV, no use of Y/N, minimal descriptors of reader character

Series Masterlist | Read on AO3

It was over.

Countless rotations it had taken you to plan your escape. Stolen hours when you were meant to be elbows deep in the bowels of a customer’s starship had instead been spent discretely stashing supplies in hidden corners of the hangar. Endless nights and scores of hours of sleep had been sacrificed to mulling over your options as you lay in your bunk, devising one strategy after another. You would only get one chance. When your moment came, you knew you couldn’t let it pass you by.

And you hadn’t. You had done it. A satchel full of ration packs, a canteen, and the clothes on your back had been all you had to your name, but you had managed to stow away aboard a freighter, wedged into the maintenance access crawlspace near one of the escape pods. Forty-eight hours you spent jammed between the bulkheads, breathing as quietly as you could manage and not daring to move any more than was needed to open and delicately sip from your canteen. When you felt the tell-tale jolt of the ship dropping out of hyperspace, the wave of relief that passed over you had made you nearly faint.

That had been over a month ago according to this planet’s local calendar. In that time, you had found yourself a bed at a local hostel. You had landed a job at a cantina clearing tables – perhaps not the best use of your skillset, but it paid, and to say you needed credits would be an understatement. You had even managed to save enough money to replace the pair of work boots you had been wearing for nearly a decade and had taped back together more times than you could count.

Freedom agreed with you. It was the easiest you had breathed, the soundest you had slept, since you were a child.

And now it was over. It had all been for nothing.

The bounty puck on the bar hummed quietly as it projected your image into the air above it, the blue hologram flickering, your name printed in red below your expressionless face.

Out of the corner of your eye, you could see the man who had presented you with the puck reach into his utility belt and pull out a tracking fob. The red beacon was blinking rapidly as he pointed it at you, the incessant beeping nearly inaudible over the sounds of the cantina. But even as he stood there, clearly expecting some kind of response from you, all you could do was stare at your own face in the hologram. You could hear the blood rushing in your ears, could feel your hands start to tremble uncontrollably. This couldn’t be how it ended. You had worked so hard –

“I said, this is you?”

You started, wrenching your eyes from the buzzing bounty puck to the man before you. He was tall, broad, and clearly humanoid, and he was clad head to toe in gleaming beskar armor, his face hidden behind a helmet with a distinctive black, T-shaped visor. Even in your brief survey of his appearance, you could see no less than four weapons stashed across his body. A set of binder restraints was clipped to his belt.

You gulped audibly. A Mandalorian. They had sent a Mandalorian after you.

There was only one thing you could do. You had to try to run.

In the same instant this occurred to you, it seemed that the Mandalorian had a similar thought.

“It will be worse for you if you try to escape,” he said, his voice low and modulated through the vocoder in his helmet. He made a movement as if to reach for the binders. “Best if you come quietly.”

Not kriffing likely.

Before you could consider it further, you spun around, grabbed ahold of a rung on the closest liquor shelf behind the bar, and threw your weight back. The heavy steel shelf tipped precariously and then, with an incredible crash, fell forward. You dodged out of the way just in time to avoid the shower of shattering liquor bottles, more than one breaking on the helmet and pauldrons of the bounty hunter before you.

“Dank farrik,” you heard him curse, but you didn’t stay long enough to see how he fared. Instead, you leaped over the bar and bolted toward the rear exit.

You had never been much of a runner, but you were nimble, and this was your cantina. It was just after shift change at the local lommite mine, which meant that the place was packed with patrons of all species dressed in bulky safety gear and carrying dusty equipment packs that made it difficult to navigate between the tables. Ducking and weaving through the crowd, it took you only a moment to reach the door.

You were tempted to glance over your shoulder as the exit door slid open, but the sound of shouting and arguing behind you was enough to tell you that you were being pursued. Instead, you took off running down the back alleyway.

There was no way you were going to outrun him. You had never encountered a Mandalorian personally, but you had heard enough stories to know that they were fierce hunters – clever, resourceful, and at the peak of physical fitness. Your only hope would be to lose him in the maze of buildings that made up this part of town. This area was densely populated, the buildings packed in close together and laid out in such a way that it was clear that very little planning had gone into the design of the neighborhood.

Take him on a wild bantha chase, you thought, your breath starting to come short in your chest, your legs starting to ache. Take turns at random, change levels when you can, try to make it back to the hostel. Get your pack. Head to the nearest space depot. Get off planet. Start again. 

You could do it. You could start again. This didn’t have to be the end of your freedom.

You could hear heavy footsteps behind you.

He was faster than you. He was closing in.

Nearly skidding into a wall, you threw yourself down the next alley, pushing your arms and legs to pump as hard they could. You were getting out of the mining district and into the market district; stalls and carts began to pop up along the walls as you continued to run. You dodged them with ease, but a dozen yards behind you, you could hear chaos erupt as beskar crashed unceremoniously through wood and fabric. If you hadn’t been so out of breath, you would have laughed.

Your joy, however, was short-lived.

As you came careening around the next corner, you found yourself inches away from a moving produce cart being pulled by a rolo droid. You had come in too fast – by the time you saw it, there was no way to stop.

In an instant, you slammed bodily into the cart, bending over the side and flipping headfirst into the pile of what appeared to be some kind of vegetable. The rolo droid squealed in protest, beeping and whirring and spinning in place, but you couldn’t be bothered trying to apologize.

The impact had knocked the wind out of your lungs – you gasped ineffectually, clutching your ribs as you attempted to work up the strength to fling yourself out of the bed of the cart. Every second spent trying to catch your breath was another second for your pursuer to close the distance between you. But it didn’t matter in the end – you weren’t fast enough. The moment you managed to get your arms under you, you heard a faint fwip cut through the air, and a grappling line wrapped snuggly around your leg.

A sharp tug, and you were yanked from the cart and onto the ground. Another, and you began to skid down the coarse pavement of the alley floor. Your arms flew out, scrabbling against the stones, but it was no use. Before you could figure out which way was up, the heavily armored figure of the Mandalorian bounty hunter was hovering over you, the setting sun glinting harshly off his beskar helmet. The grappling line was retreating into his vambrace.

Wordlessly, he stepped forward, planting his boot on the line near where it wrapped around you, effectively trapping you at his feet. You could do nothing but lay gasping on the ground, glaring poisonously at his helmet in what you hoped was the direction of his eyes.

“Put on the binders, or I’ll do it for you,” he said, unhooking them from his belt and tossing them onto your heaving stomach. Bitterness burned in your gut at the sound of his modulated voice. He didn’t even sound like the chase had taxed him at all; he was completely unphased. “And I won’t be gentle,” he added.

You swallowed hard. It really was over.

After a moment of silence, you clasped the binder cuffs around your wrists – one then the other. They glowed blue against your skin, tight, cold, and heavy.

The Mandalorian reached down then and wrapped his leather gloved hand around the connector in the center of the binders. With what appeared to be very little effort, he hauled you to your feet. He permitted you a moment to steady yourself before tugging once more on the grappling wire still around your leg. It slid limply away, and he deftly tied the end around the binders, creating a makeshift leash.

“Let’s go,” he muttered. And with a firm pull on the wire, he set off down the alley, you trailing reluctantly along behind him.

___

As you expected, he led you to the yards on the other side of town, specifically the ones intended for short-term docking. He stopped only once along the way, grabbing several skewers of cooked meat from a street vendor near the terminal. For a wild moment, you expected him to offer you one, but instead he took half of the skewers and stuck them into the small brown satchel he wore across his body. He kept the remainder in his hand, but made no move to eat them, which you found odd.

Had you been in a quieter part of town, you might have heard a wet swallowing sound and a high-pitched gurgle of approval coming from the vicinity of that satchel. As it was, however, you simply continued to follow your captor in silence.

The docking yard was as you remembered it – congested and impossibly loud. Species of all varieties milled about, standing in line to board their transporters, searching for their luggage on long conveyor belts, chasing small children, and arguing with the ticket and security droids that lined the terminal. It had been easy to blend into the chaos when you arrived. No one had batted an eye at the sight of your body slipping awkwardly out of a maintenance port on the underbelly of freighter. Now that you had returned, however, you couldn’t help but feel as though the crowd hushed as you passed. Perhaps it was simply the humiliation of being dragged through the throng on the end of a bounty hunter’s leash like a charhound, but you were certain that you caught more than one judgment-filled gaze as you passed.

The Mandalorian led you through the crush of people with confidence. It didn’t take long for you to realize that his ship must have been parked further down the terminal, for as you continued following behind him, the crowd began to thin, the massive ships designed for transporting large numbers of people falling away and being replaced with smaller personal transport vessels. It wasn’t until your eyes landed on a pre-Imperial patrol gunship that had clearly seen better days that you realized that this was where you were headed.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” you muttered under your breath, taking in the patchwork hull, the fading paint job, the countless dents, the blaster marks… You weren’t entirely certain of the specific make, but you knew it fell into the ST-70 class of assault ships. Then again, you wondered, did it matter what it was if it looked ready to fall out of the sky at the slightest provocation?

The Mandalorian glanced sharply at you over his shoulder, and your heart jumped into your throat. Perhaps it wasn’t the best idea to talk smack about your captor’s ship.

Luckily, you were saved from having to answer for that comment by the sound of a small, blue Rodian dressed in a dock worker’s uniform calling out in Huttese.

“Uba bata shado, murishani,” he said, nodding to the bounty hunter in greeting. You’re back quickly, bounty hunter. Or at least, that is what you thought he said. Your Huttese had always been rather rudimentary.

Your escort pulled up short at this, his head tilted and his shoulders stiff.

“Well, I’m good at my job,” he said, a hint of hesitance in his voice, as though unsure how to respond.

The Rodian replied, once again in Huttese, but there was enough in that sentence that you didn’t understand that you refused to even attempt to translate it. The Mandalorian, however, had no such issues.

“That’s ridiculous. I’ve been docked here less than three hours. I’m not paying you for the whole day.” His deep, raspy voice buzzed through his vocoder. The revelation left a sick feeling in the pit of your stomach. Less than three hours. Less than three hours it had taken him to find you, even in a city of this size. A part of you wondered if that was more of a reflection on his skill as a bounty hunter, or if perhaps it said something about your skill as a fugitive.

Oblivious to your distress, the two went back and forth for a few moments, the dock worker in Huttese, the bounty hunter in Basic.

After a time of seemingly no progress, the latter said decisively, “I’ll pay for a half day, but no more.” He took a step into the Rodian’s space, dragging you stumbling behind him. The reptilian made an offended noise, clearly about to continue to protest, but he was stopped short by the Mandalorian swiping aside his cape and hovering his hand threateningly over his holstered blaster. “I think that’s more than reasonable, don’t you?”

A beat of silence passed as you glanced between your captor and the dock worker. He appeared to be weighing the offer and the potential risk of continuing to argue, but before long, the tension left his body, and he extended his hand toward the Mandalorian in resignation. “Okey-okey. Wamma tonka.”

The bounty hunter nodded once and produced what appeared to be some denomination of New Republic credit from his pocket. Dropping it into the Rodian’s waiting hand, he gave a tug to your grappling line and pulled you toward the shabby gunship.

___

“Tell me, are you going to attempt to run again?”

It was the first thing the Mandalorian had said to you since he had taken you captive. It had taken little time for the two of you to board his ship once he resolved the issue with the dock worker, and he had just managed to pull up the exit ramp and close the blast doors. Interestingly, he had also stashed his few remaining meat skewers from the street vendor in what appeared to be a chilled rations locker that sank into the port-side wall.

Now, he stared intently at you, his hands on his hips and his helmet cocked at an angle, as though contemplating what to do with you next. You were still attached to his grappling wire by your binder restraints, though he admittedly had given you a bit more slack in the line once you were securely locked up in the belly of the ST-70.

You mimicked his stance as best as you could while still bound at the wrists and attempted to project a confidence you weren’t sure that you truly felt.

“What do you think?” you asked, your voice as even and neutral as you could make it.

He seemed to consider the question for a moment before replying, “I think you’ve already put up more of a fight than I expected.”

A thrill shot through you at that – a quick zing of pride that even though you hardly seemed to have been much of a challenge for him, you still had managed to subvert his expectations of you. A smirk tugged at the corner of your lips. “Then I think you have your answer.”

It was the truth, and you knew that he knew it, too. If given the opportunity, you would try to run again. You had fought and planned for too long to give up on your freedom this easily.

Something like a grunt of displeasure sounded through his modulator, and suddenly his posture was less relaxed, becoming straighter and more intimidating. “Fine,” he rasped.

With a sharp yank on the grappling wire, he tugged you toward him, knocking you off balance, and grasped firmly onto your shoulders.

“Hey, what’re you – ”

As the question started to leave your lips, your eyes landed on the padded recess in the starboard-side wall. You didn’t know how you had missed it when you first entered the ship. It was just deep enough for most full-grown bipedal species to stand inside. Several color-coded gas canisters lined the edges of the recess, dispenser funnels pointed inward.

“No,” you whispered, the breath suddenly stolen from your lungs.

A mobile carbonite freezing unit. You had only seen a handful of ships in your lifetime equipped with one. He was going to freeze you.

“Oh, kriff – no, no, no, wait, you can’t – ” Panic rose in your chest, threatening to suffocate you even before the pressurized gases could manage to surround you. Immediately, you began to struggle against his grasp – twisting and throwing your weight, beating your bound fists against his hard, shining breastplate.

Silently, mercilessly, almost easily, the Mandalorian wrestled you into the unit and punched the activation controls.

Your eyes slammed shut and a scream caught in your throat as ice-cold gas shot from the canisters nearest your feet. And then –

…nothing.

A beat passed. Silence. No carbonite panels. No freezing gases designed to hold you in place, in stasis, until someone decided to free you. There was just…nothing.

You gasped, your eyes flying open and quickly scanning your surroundings. A shrill beeping sound came from a control panel somewhere near your head.

“W-what happened?” you stammered, a wave of knee-weakening relief threatening to overtake you. “Why did it stop?”

“Damn it,” your jailer muttered. One hand came up to bear down against your sternum, keeping you pressed firmly back against the padded chamber. The other was aggressively thumbing at the protesting control panel.

A breathless, slightly unhinged laugh bubbled up in your throat. “It’s malfunctioning, isn’t it? Your unit’s broken.” Perhaps your luck hadn’t run out entirely.

“Shut up.” His voice was tight, his words terse.

That wild laugh overflowed for a moment, pressing your chest into his gloved hand.

“Oh no,” you huffed in mock sympathy. “Looks like you’re stuck with me, buddy.”

The bounty hunter cursed again under his breath, slamming his fist into the carbonite unit’s control panel one last time. “For now,” he growled.

“Now what are you going to do with me?” you asked breathlessly. A strange feeling of victory continued to linger in your chest. It hadn’t been you that had caused the malfunction, of course, but you couldn’t help but feel as though somehow the points for this particular encounter should go to you. After all, the son of a mudscuffer wouldn’t be able to get rid of you so easily now.

He seemed to take a moment to deliberate, but then he was pulling you back out of the recessed chamber and instead tugging you further into the ship’s cargo hold. “Come on,” he grunted. “You’ll say here until I can get the carbonite unit repaired.”

Pressing firmly on the tops of your shoulders, he forced you to lower yourself onto the deck plating, sitting you against the wall. He had your binder cuffs separated with a few deft movements, but quicker than you could react, he was reattaching them, this time so that they looped around the base of a ladder that appeared to go to the second floor of the ship.

“And uh…what exactly am I supposed to do in the meantime?” you asked incredulously. He couldn’t really expect you to sit on the cold, unforgiving metal floor with your arms hanging awkwardly from this ladder, could he? Even if he took you right back to where you had run away from, that was a two-day journey through hyperspace. You would surely lose circulation in your limbs by then.

The Mandalorian was less than sympathetic. “Just keep quiet, and don’t bother trying to break out of that binder – you’ll break your wrists before those cuffs release. Otherwise, I don’t really care.”

“Got it, I’ll keep that in mind,” you replied. Your tone dripped with sarcasm.

“Stay put,” he reiterated, jabbing a finger at you as though he were scolding a small child.

You rolled your eyes as you watched him grasp onto the sides of the ladder, one boot stepping up onto the lowest rung. However, before he could begin to climb up to what you assumed was the cockpit, you heard a strange sound coming from somewhere on his person.

A giggle, a high-pitched, gurgling babble – like the coo of a baby.

This seemed to startle the bounty hunter, as he immediately dropped his grip on the ladder and glanced down at the brown satchel strung across his body. Your gaze followed his just in time enough to see a tiny, green, three-fingered hand wave out of the satchel before he shoved it back down. He quickly wrapped his cape around his body to conceal his torso and in doing so, the bag.

“Wait – what was that?” you demanded. He couldn’t be carrying a baby in that satchel…could he?

His only reply was a weary sigh, and before you could repeat yourself, he was up the ladder and out of sight.

___

The next several minutes following the Mandalorian’s hurried departure were almost perfectly silent. You assumed you would be taking off soon, but in the meantime, while you were still on solid ground, you couldn’t help but take a few moments to test your restraints. There would be no point once you were in the air – where exactly would you escape to, once you were in the expanse of space?

You first tried to brace the binder cuffs against the side of the ladder, tugging down as hard as you dared with both hands against the center connector. Perhaps you could force the two cuff units to separate from each other. No success, though this didn’t really surprise you – the durasteel was nearly indestructible. It would take someone a great deal stronger than you to break them.

Your next attempt was simply to try wiggling a hand out of one. It quickly became very clear that that wasn’t going to happen either. Luckily, the insides of the cuffs were lined with padding, designed to mold tightly to the form of the prisoner regardless of their size without wounding them. If they hadn’t been cushioned at all, you may have done as the bounty hunter had suggested and broken your wrist. No matter how you twisted or pulled, your hand simply would not contort into a shape small enough to slip through the cuff without injury. In fact, you would probably have bruises later from the attempt.

Cursing softly under your breath, you took a moment to survey your surroundings as you contemplated your next move. It would be too much to ask for a toolkit of some sort to be sitting around somewhere you could reach. Small tech like this binder didn’t really fall within your expertise, but you were reasonably certain that given enough time and the right equipment, you could override the release code mechanism and remove them that way. However, judging from your current predicament, the likelihood of those conditions being met was less than zero.

Just as you resigned yourself to being tied to this ladder for a bit longer, the deck plating below you started to vibrate, and the distant roaring of the gunship’s engines turning over filled your ears. You were taking off.

You braced yourself as best as you could, folding your legs up to plant your feet flat against the floor and push your torso back against the wall. Given the ship’s apparent age, you could only assume the ascent through the atmosphere would be a bumpy one, and it wasn’t as though there was any safety gear for passengers in the cargo hold. However, to your great surprise, either the Mandalorian was an exceptional pilot or the ship was sturdier than she looked. The rise through the atmosphere featured minimal turbulence, and by the time you could feel the artificial gravity and life support systems activate, there was nothing but the constant, low-frequency vibration of the engines to indicate that you were anywhere other than solid land.

A handful of minutes passed, and then you felt a swooping sensation behind your navel as your body was suddenly, briefly tugged toward the rear of the ship.

You had jumped to hyperspace.

After that, the silence returned.

In that way, this wasn’t much different than your last experience with space travel. You had been alone, cramped, uncomfortable, and frightened, with nothing but your own thoughts to keep you company, and surrounded by an almost oppressive quiet. Though you supposed you could acknowledge the improvement in the view. Rather than staring directly at the anonymous gray hull of an escape pod, this time your eyes had a whole cargo hold to explore.

Really, there wasn’t much to see. The Mandalorian seemed to run quite a bare-bones operation. To your right appeared to be most of the storage space on the ship. A few wall panels that likely pulled out when pressed, as the cooler locker had when you first boarded, a stack of gray cargo bins that had slid to the back of the hold during the hyperspace jump, and, of course, the dreaded mobile carbonite freezing unit in the starboard wall. You suppressed a chill and sent a brief thank-you into the universe that you hadn’t been subjected to that.

Directly across from where you sat tied to the ladder was a large silver cabinet, the contents of which you could only guess at. All you knew was that it must have been important, as it took up the most amount of space in the hold by far and appeared to be under a coded lock.

Finally, to your left, fully open and exposed to the rest of the room, was a somewhat grimy multi-species vacuum ship head as well as an alcove where a thin, bare bunk had been tucked away. You balked at the apparent lack of a full refresher, or at the very least a sonic shower. Did this man who spent all his time wrapped head-to-toe in armor (which you had noticed was also layered on top of a padded flight suit) really not have a way to get clean on his own ship? Silently you hoped you would never get close enough to him to experience the consequences of that choice.

Just as you were starting to contemplate the humiliating eventuality of needing to use that exposed ship head, the sound of footsteps could be heard echoing off the deck plating above you. A distant hiss sounded, like the sliding of a blast door, and in the next moment, the Mandalorian was climbing back down the ladder.

“Didn’t expect to see you again so soon,” you said, feeling your eyebrows raise as you looked up at him.

At first, he didn’t respond. Instead, he gave you a once-over when he reached the bottom, clearly assessing whether you had attempted to escape. Finding you precisely where he had left you seemed to satisfy him, and he nodded once in your direction before making his way back over to the cooler locker he had opened earlier. Opening it, he retrieved the remaining meat skewers from the street vendor as well a couple of assorted ration bars.

For a moment, you thought he might go right back up the ladder without saying a word to you. However, once he kicked the cooler locker closed, he reached out and passed one of the ration bars into your bound hand. “Here,” he said, the voice floating through his helmet low and a touch raspy. “Thought you might be hungry.”

“Oh.” Blatant surprise colored your tone before you were able to school your expression. “Thank you.” 

His helmet tipped in acknowledgement, but he said nothing.

A beat of silence passed, almost as though he was waiting on you to say more. When you didn’t, he took a few steps back toward the ladder, readying himself to climb back up into the cockpit.

“Wait,” you blurted. You had to know – before he hid himself away again, you had to ask, “Are you taking me back? Back to Chardaan?”

The bounty hunter paused, seeming somewhat taken aback by your question. He backed away from the ladder, instead moving across from you to lean back against that large silver cabinet you had noted earlier. Cocking his head to the side, he considered you for a moment, then replied, “No.”

Your eyes widened in surprise. “No?” you echoed.

“You were the first of my bounties on this hunt. I’ll need to collect the others before I can return to my guild agent and make the exchange,” he explained. “He’ll be the one to ensure you make it back where you came from.”

A bolt of relief shot through you at this revelation. You still had time. He wasn’t taking you straight back there. Your freedom hadn’t entirely abandoned you. There is still a chance…

“How many more are you after?” you asked, struggling to keep your voice neutral.

The bounty hunter paused, seeming to mull over how much he wanted to share. After a minute, he said, “Six.”

In spite of the careful control you were trying to exert over your facial expressions, your jaw dropped at the number. You had never heard of a Bounty Hunters’ Guild member carrying more than four pucks at a time. “That feels like a lot all at once.”

He shrugged, the gesture emphasized by his shining beskar pauldrons. “I’ve been working with this agent a long time, and it’s going to be a while before I’m able to pick up more work. Plus, this lot includes a few lower-level quarries. Shouldn’t be much of a challenge.”

“‘Lower-level quarries’?” you repeated. “What, you mean like me?”

“Yes. Like you,” he replied. You could swear his modulated voice sounded smug, though perhaps you were projecting. Something about your classification as “low-level” made your hackles raise. Not just anyone could have escaped from Chardaan the way you did…

You looked away from him at that, your cheeks burning, and busied yourself instead with examining the ration bar he had placed in your hand. You weren’t familiar with the brand, though it hardly mattered, as you had seen bars like this more times than you could count. Nutrient-dense, packed with protein, vitamins, and carbohydrates. Hopelessly bland. Somehow both fudgy and crumbly at once. They were designed for deep space travel and, although efficient and sensible, you couldn’t help but feel a touch of dread looking at the one in your hand.

“That’s not poisoned, you know.”

The sound of the Mandalorian’s voice startled you out of your thoughts, and you glanced back up at him to see him watching you with something like confusion in his body language.

“If I had wanted to kill you, I would have by now. Poisoning isn’t exactly my style,” he added.

You almost chuckled at that. Perhaps this tin can had a sense of humor after all. “I don’t see you eating yours,” you retorted, staring pointedly at the bars he still held in his gloved hand. “I’m supposed to just trust that these are safe for me?”

“I don’t eat in front of others. I’ll eat when I get back to the cockpit.”

That comment did make you smile. “Ah, but you’re not the only one in the cockpit…are you?”

His posture straightened immediately. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” His voice was back to that cool, firm tone you had become accustomed to from him.

Gotcha.

“That thing you had in your bag. I know you didn’t want me to see it, but…” you trailed off, shrugging slightly.

“That’s none of your concern,” he snapped. The response left no room for debate, but you didn’t mind. It was enough for now that he had confirmed that you weren’t, in fact, losing your mind when you saw that little green hand emerging from his satchel earlier.

“Okay, whatever you say, boss.” You were sure you would learn more about that mysterious creature eventually. After all, it looked like you were going to be stuck with the Mandalorian for a while…

“Don’t call me ‘boss,’” was his only reply. His stance was tense, irritated.

You quirked an eyebrow at him. Perhaps…perhaps you should have been playing it a bit safer. Perhaps it wasn’t wise to provoke your captor, not when he quite literally held the keys to your future freedom in his hands. But…it was more fun than it should be to push his buttons.

“Well, what should I call you, then?” you asked. “I don’t exactly know your name.”

A somewhat exasperated sigh buzzed through his vocoder. “People call me Mando.”

You snorted at that. “Mando? What, like short for ‘Mandalorian’?”

“Yes.”

“That’s not really your name, is it?” It couldn’t be. There was no way.

“It’s what people call me,” he reiterated tersely.

That is not what I asked, you thought, rolling your eyes but unable to suppress a chuckle. This guy was like a character out of a holovid. Masked, stoic, almost comically mysterious.

“Fine. So, what’s next then, Mando? On to the next bounty?”

He shook his head. “Not quite. My carbonite unit is malfunctioning.”

You smirked, feeling that same surge of unearned victory from earlier rise in your chest. “You don’t say.”

“I can’t continue with the hunt until it is repaired,” he continued, completely ignoring your sarcasm.

“Why not? You seem to have handled me just fine without it.” You shook your arms, loudly jangling your durasteel binder against the ladder for emphasis.

“You, yes,” the bounty hunter acknowledged. “But this lot isn’t just low-level bounties. There are some that are…higher risk. Some that I’m going to need that additional insurance for.”

All of the good humor that had been building up inside you throughout this verbal sparring match evaporated at that, and a pit formed in your stomach.

Not for the first time, you took a moment to appraise your captor. He cut a powerful image – his flowing black cape, his fine armor that you would guess was worth more than your life, his purposefully anonymous face. It was also impossible to miss that he was armed to the teeth, even while in hyperspace, even while standing in the cargo hold of his own ship. The ferocity of Mandalorian warriors was legendary. He was clearly a formidable opponent. It made sense to you that this man would be someone skilled enough to bring in the…high-risk quarries.

The bounty hunter allowed you both to sit in silence for a moment as the reality of your situation settled in. This man was dangerous. This job was dangerous. And you were stuck along for the ride, at least for now, whether you liked it or not.

After a moment, he sighed and pushed away from the cabinet, once again making his way toward the ladder. “Eat your food,” he said, his tone somehow both commanding and…soft? Gentle? “I’ll be back later to start on repairs.”

He had climbed all the way up and reached the landing outside of the cockpit before you managed to call out, “Mando?”

A pause, and then, “Yes?”

You swallowed hard. “If you are able to fix it…are you going to freeze me?”

Your question echoed off the bulkheads, your heartbeat loud in your ears.

“Are you going to try to run again?” he asked.

You closed your eyes and rested your head on the nearest ladder rung. Yes, you wanted to say. Of course I am. It was on the tip of your tongue. I am going to try to run every chance you give me.

But…you didn’t reply.

He waited a moment or two, and then you heard the hissing sound of blast doors opening, the echo of his footsteps on the deck, and you knew he had disappeared back into the cockpit.

[bb-sg]

Wildfire

Relationship: Yandere!Dabi x fem!reader

Summary: Dabi can't stop thinking about the new warden of the prison. Prison AU.

MDNI! Please mind the content warnings, this fic contains dark content and themes.

CW: Smut, masturbation, violence, gun use, yandere!dabi, obsession, language, implied murder, language, punishment, implied non-con/dub con, domestic violence, darcyphilia

You were a natural disaster waiting to ravage him. You were like lightning; you were striking and consuming. You were meticulously put together, not a hair out of place, always presenting your best self. You shone through the bleakness of these cold walls. Just like lightning, your presence was electrifying. The moment you entered a room, your energy flooded the room and demanded attention.

Where there was lightning, there was thunder. Just like thunder, you made your existence known. It was the way you walked with confidence and an area of authority that made you impossible to miss. You carried your head high, beautiful eyes facing forward, your composed demeanor never faltering.

Why shouldn’t you carry yourself like a queen? You were the new warden after all.

The first time he saw you was in the cafeteria. A fight had just broken out between two gangs. Men in faded orange jumpsuits brawling over the thriving contraband economy. It was nothing that concerned him, so he sat back and watched. Secretly cheering certain men on until the security guards called for a lockdown. He rolled his eyes, annoyed at the inconvenience of having to lay on the ground. He complied but kept his eyes glued to the commotion.

He had never been happier that a fight broke out when he saw you. Alarms started blaring as you burst through the door with your face set in stone. He watched every move you made as you surveyed the scene. Two security guards protected you as you approached the two original instigators of the altercation.

“Take these two to solitary. Along with anyone else who was involved.” You snarled, looking down on the prisoners being detained on the ground. “Take the injured to the infirmary.” The clack on your heels could be heard as you walked to one of your guards, delegating him to get the rest of the prisoners back to their cells. You took one more look around when you locked eyes with him.

He thought you were too beautiful to be in such a wretched place with people like him. Everything about you drew him to you. You stern but gorgeous features never displaying any emotion as you stared him down. He let his eyes drift down your body, devouring your delicious figure under his gaze.

What really made him want you was the way you tried to exude control when he knew that you were just begging to be dominated. He could see it in your eyes, you wanted- no you needed, to be put in your place.

“Get them back to their cells and get this cleaned up. Now.” You barked out, while turning on your heels to leave the room. You paid him no mind as you sauntered away, but he could not help but watch your hips sway with every step. He listened for the sound of your heels fading away, like rolling thunder in the distance.

Each step echoed in his head as you disappeared from sight. That is when it began, when he found the silver lining about being locked up. Each step you took punctuated the thoughts that consumed him.

Clack. Clack. Clack. Clack.

You. Will. Be. His.  

That was six months ago and since then he has poured all his energy into finding ways to be close to you. He would purposely get caught with contraband, pick fights with a guard, and try to incite chaos wherever he went just to draw you out.

Every time he got called to your office, he wore a smile proudly. He always greeted you with compliments, pick up lines or charming anecdotes to try and get you to open up. The guards frequently jostled him around to try get him to behave but you stopped them. Each time you said the same thing. 

“He’s harmless, he is just trying to get a rise out of me. Don’t entertain him.” Your eyes always stern and unwavering. He wanted to laugh; you really had no idea what he could do. What he would do.

“Yeah, harmless.” He smiled a little too much, almost letting a chuckle slip out. “You do have me chained up like a dog after all.”

“This is the second time this week that you’ve been caught breaking rules. Do you want to be thrown into the hole?” You drawled out, with disinterest.

This annoyed him. He wanted to hold you by the neck while he railed you mercilessly. Wiping the arrogant look of your face. He wanted to make you cry for forgiveness, cry for ever thinking you were above him.

He painted on a calm face and leaned back in the chair positioned in front of your desk.

“There are a few holes I wouldn't mind being in, but solitary confinement isn't one of them.” His voice was laced with honey, batting his eyes at you.

“Please, at least have the decency to refrain from hitting on me.” You were unmoved by him.

“You always seem so high strung, I know how to get you relaxed, let me show you.” He smirked.

“I’m happily married, not that it’s any of your business. Now I’m assigned you to janitorial duties until you can knock off this shit attitude.” You deadpanned.

He was impressed with you. Never once in the past six months had you broken character. It only made the build up to the inevitable better for him. He couldn’t wait to see you reduced to a sniveling mess under him.

“Always work and no play.” He whispered to you. “Your husband must be slacking at his duties.” He laughed as the guard pulled him out of your office. He would keep chipping away at you until you revealed a crack in your armor.

Another six months had passed, and he continued his onslaught of mischief around the prison. It was like clockwork; he would break the rules and you would call him to the office to scold him. His crimes began to escalate, waiting for you to truly break and for him to see the real you.

Then one day he got a glimpse of it. He had gotten in a guard's face and refused to follow orders. On the way down the familiar corridor to the office he heard you arguing with someone. He heard your distraught voice drifting down the halls, your voice shook, wrought with emotion.

He savored it, trying to walk as slowly as possible to bask in the way the timbre in your voice made it impossible to miss the pain you were feeling.

He loved it.

The guard knocked on the door gently, undoubtedly feeling uncomfortable with disturbing you.

“Excuse me ma’am?” the guard beckoned to you. On the other side of the door, he could head you scrambling to get off the phone, shushing whoever was on the other end. You cleared your throat before inviting them in.

It was obvious, your normal shell was cracked. Your eyes were darkened from exhaustion, your hair wasn’t as neat as usual, and your usual conservative clothing was replaced with more relaxed, casual wear. He loved the way your tank top clung to your body, he took in every little detail.

When you saw it was him you audibly signed. You rested your hands on your hips while you tried to compose yourself.

“What have you done now?” you groaned, clearly not in the mood to deal with him.

“That’s no way to greet a friend warden. You don’t look so hot today, what’s troubling you?” He smiled and cooed at you.

You rubbed your eyes, trying to wipe away your fog. The guard shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot, the tension was thick, and the atmosphere was heavy and stale.

You walked around to the front of the desk and leaned against it, eyeing Dabi down.

“Can you please give me a minute alone with him?” You croaked out meeting the guard’s eyes. The guard nodded before he exited your office.

Dabi kept his eyes on you, standing still waiting for you to make a move.

“What is the purpose of all this? I don’t get it anymore. Do you want to be stuck in here forever? You have a parole hearing coming up soon and I have no reason to vouch for you to be released early. So, give me a good explanation on why you’ve been you’re constantly getting into trouble?” You ranted, speaking faster and louder than you normally do. You crossed your arms in front of you protectively when you waited for his response.

“What can I say? Seeing you is the best part of my day warden.” He laughed taking one step closer to you, his kept his eyes trained on you, almost stalking towards you. He couldn’t believe his luck that you asked to be alone with him, this was his chance to finally get to you. He didn’t know what he wanted to do first with you: force you to your knees and make you cry on his cock or push you down on the desk and make you beg to be let go, tears running down your face, whimpering beneath him. He knew you would look beautiful when he broke you and you were so close to finally letting your façade crumble.

“Stop fucking around. You are going to catch a new charge at this rate that you’re going, and you will end up rotting in this prison alone. Is that what you want? I’ll happily throw you into the hole for as long as I can if you don’t drop this act.” You snapped back, dripping with venom. You stood your ground when he took another step closer, his handcuffs rattling cutting through the silence.

“C’mon, you wouldn’t do that to me. Don’t act like you don’t enjoy seeing me warden. If you want, maybe I can get you out of your shit mood and make you feel better.” He sauntered closer to you, now standing directly in front of you. “Just beg for me and I’ll happily make you forget about everything. I’ll put you in a good mood and send you back to your doting husband, you’ll have a great night with him, make dinner, watch your boring shows and pathetically fall asleep next to him in your bed. Fuck, he will be none the wiser.” He whispered, baring his teeth like a wolf who has trapped his target. “What do you say warden? You wanna drop that whole bitch act and give in?”

“Shut up! You’re insufferable. Fine, you want to fuck around? Let’s fuck around and I’ll write a letter to the parole board begging them to keep you in here for your full sentence and then some.” You pressed a finger to his chest and pushed him back when you stood up tall. You gather all your strength to put forward some bravado, but your voice betrayed you as your voice shook with every word.

“You think you know everything about me, don’t you? You don’t know anything about me! How dare you talk to me like that! I’m so sick of the men in my life acting like fucking assholes! What is it about me that makes people want to take advantage of me…” You trailed off quickly and sunk back against the desk.

Then he finally got what he’s been pining for, seeing you break down before him. You covered your face, shoulders slumped and shaking.

Where there is lightning and thunder, there’s also rain. Right now, you were pouring. You started weeping, your sobs wracking your body while you struggled to breathe through each cry. You collapsed into yourself, holding your body as you fell forward.

His smile fell when he saw you. This was supposed to make him happy, overjoyed even but now all he wanted to do was to break the neck of whoever did this to you. The sight of you so disheveled made him feel feral with rage. It wasn’t supposed to be like this, he was supposed to be the one to break you. He wasn’t basking in your pain like he had wanted to, he actually felt sorry for you.  He would find out who did this to you and rip their throat out, he promised this to you silently.

You tried to pick yourself up, attempting to stop crying and fixing your clothes and posture. You wiped your tears away endlessly, still sniffling. Your eyes were puffy and red when you made eye contact with him again.

He was right about one thing though; you did look beautiful when you cried. It made you look more human, vulnerable, and weak. He wanted to protect you, keep you safe from whatever was happening. Keep you safe from this world, lock you up and throw away the key so nothing can make you cry again, except for him.

He lifted his arms up slowly, adjusting the handcuffs slightly to allow him to wrap his arms around you so he could comfort you. He expected you to push him away, but you didn’t. Your head fell to his chest as you started crying more. You knew it was inappropriate, but you didn’t care. He awkwardly tried to pat your back, but his restraints didn’t allow him to. Instead, he just held you, silently waiting for you to be done crying.

“I’m sorry.” You choked out between sobs. “This is so unlike me.”

You nuzzled into him, inhaling the scent of his body wash. He smelled like rich dark wood and smoke. It was soothing and relaxing to you. His broad chest served as a pillow for you while you drained yourself, purging out your frustrations.

After a few moments he spoke, his voice shaking you from your stupor.

“Who did this to you?” The base in his voice vibrating against you.

You pulled back, coming face to face with him. You admired him for a moment. Taking in his features for what felt like the first time. He was handsome, his eyes were beautiful and enticing. His lips fixed in a line while he looked at you, not giving away any of the thoughts running through his head.

“I’m so sorry, this was incredibly unprofessional.” You half-heartedly laughed and unraveled yourself from him. “It’s just some stuff going on at home.” You uncomfortably cleared your throat, fixing your clothes again and cleaning your face with a tissue.

“Is it your husband?” He said quietly. He secretly hoped it was.

He eyed the framed picture of you and your husband on your desk. He pictured beating your husband within an inch of his life for hurting you.

You bit your lip and looked at your feet. “Let’s just pretend this didn’t happen, okay?”

Bingo, he thought as his eyes shifted back to you. Your body language told him everything that you didn’t want to tell him. He shifted his attention back to the photo, he memorized it, burning the image into his brain. He vowed he would find your husband and rip him apart, piece by piece, make him plead for his life. He would laugh while he snuffed out your husband’s life. The only person that had the right to make you weak was Dabi and he would make sure of that. You were his and his alone, you just didn’t know it yet.

He couldn’t help but commit how you looked in the photo to memory too. How could he not? You looked ethereal, your smile was radiant, spreading to your eyes. Your skin was glowing, your eyes were bright, and your lips looked so inviting. He couldn’t stop himself from thinking about your lips around his cock while you drooled and gagged around him. It made his blood rush to his stiffening member. That was going to be one of his favorite ways to make you cry. In the photo you’re wearing a sundress that fit you perfectly, the color complimented your skin tone beautifully. He daydreamed about seeing you walk around in that dress, teasing him with the way the dress flowed around you and gave him hints of your body underneath. In his daydream he preys on you, pouncing on you while ripping your dress off you so he can take you properly. Whether you wanted to or not. He almost audibly moaned at the idea of sheathing himself inside you and fucking you like an animal. Your pussy clenching around him more with every thrust until he came deep inside you, breeding you. You wouldn’t be able to leave him if you were swollen with his baby, right?

You noticed him staring at the photo and quickly put it away in a drawer, feeling uncomfortable with the intensity of his stare.

“Let’s get back to the issue at hand. You need to knock off all your shit if you want to have any chance of getting released early. I don’t want to see you in my office again or I’ll throw your ass into solitary, and I will personally beg the parole board to keep you in here for as long as possible.”

Just like that, you were returning to your normal self, the armor was put back together and your walls were up. You glared at him, waiting for a snarky reply.

“Understood, I will be a saint. You have my word warden.” He held his hands up in defeat and smiled at you.

Oh, he would be on his best behavior, he has to get out in order to be able to find your husband. He’ll be a model prisoner if it meant that he would be able to see that man’s life leave his eyes and he would have you all to himself. He wouldn’t miss the opportunity to have you stuck in a prison of his own design.

You resigned and called for the guard to take Dabi away, hiding your face to prevent the guard from seeing your tear-stained face.

That night in his cell, the only thing he could think of was you. He made a list of ways he would fuck you and another list of ways he would put you in your place. The way you would be sobbing while he railed you from behind, his hands locked around your throat, made him hard. It was only a matter of time.

He swiftly pulled his hard cock out of its confinements and stroked it softly. He groaned at the feeling, thinking about how it would feel even better if he was in your hands. He caved into his lust and increased the pace of his strokes. He used his thumb to swipe the precum from his slit, shuddering at the touch.

“Fuck…” he whispered and lifted his shirt up, holding it out of the way with his teeth. Closing his eyes, he thought of how warm and tight your pussy would feel around his cock. How you would clench around him every time his tip hit your cervix, writhing with pleasure and pain when he held your hips down, making sure you take all of him. The strong, fierce woman he sees everyday reduced to the fuck toy you really were. His fuck toy. The idea of you blubbering over how good his cock felt almost made him cum too quickly. He moaned and slowed his strokes, he wanted this to last, he had too many fantasies of you that he wanted to play out in his head.

His cock twitched when he thought of you riding him, desperately trying to please him. Your breasts bouncing in his face while he lies to you and tells you that if you can make him cum in under five minutes, he would let you go. You would try your little heart out but fail, not only to make him cum but you would fail to deny that he makes you feel so good. The feeling of your slick covering his cock was evidence that you enjoyed every second. Then an even better idea dawned on him. Maybe he would make you make you cum in front of your shitty husband. He’d fuck you stupid while your husband watched his wife scream for another man. You wouldn’t be able to hide the shame you felt from cumming around Dabi’s cock, but you wouldn’t be able to help yourself no matter how much you tried.

His pace quickened and he let out a series of whinny moans while his toes curled in pleasure. He was thankful for the shirt in his mouth that was stifling his moans. The fantasy was perfect, you would look irresistible beneath him, your lips shaped in an “O”, eyes screwed shut and moaning for him. Just for Dabi. He was tethering on the edge, pressure building up as he approached his climax. He focused on imagining how beautiful you would look while he fucked into you relentlessly while your husband begs for Dabi to stop. Would he take you again after he killed your husband? Maybe. He would make sure that you were too scared to ever try to leave him. You’d be his to keep, a pet to play with, forever. He came hard as pleasure washed over him.

He laughed to himself as he came down from his high. You were going to be his. He would keep you hidden away, just for him. You’d hate it at first, but he’d break you down and make you appreciate him. One way or another.

The next few months passed by without an incident. Dabi was true to his word and stayed out of trouble. Keeping to himself and watching you from a distance. You went on like nothing happened, only sparing him a glance from time to time. Every time you graced his presence he memorized every detail about you, each time saw you he felt like he knew you more and more. He was obsessed with you, and he knew it.

His life had become monotonous, until one day he saw you speaking to your staff from across the yard. He noticed your lip was busted and eye swollen. You looked like you had taken quite the beating. He saw red. He knew it had to be your husband. He was filled with a blinding rage, barely able to hold himself back from approaching you. He thought about taking out his anger on the poor bastard next to him, beating him until Dabi felt better. Poor guy would be collateral damage, but it would be a win, win for Dabi. He would get to get this rage out of him, and he would be able to see you when you inevitably threw him into the hole.

He stared at you, his self-control weakening every second he saw your beaten face. How dare another man lay a hand on what was his? He was the only one that has the honor of putting hands on you. He wasn’t going to stand for this. He wanted you and your husband at his mercy.

Now.

He let out a deep breath and calmed himself. Deciding that tonight was the night he was going to get out. He couldn’t wait any longer, he wasn’t going to be able to sleep until you were his for good.

It was one in the morning when the sound of your cell phone ringing woke you up. You groggily rolled over in your bed to feel around for your phone on the nightstand. You figured it was your husband, presumably out at a bar getting plastered before he came home to start another fight with you. For months it was the same thing over and over. The smell of whisky overwhelming you while he yelled in your face about anything and everything. Ever since he lost his job, he hasn’t been the same.

You looked at your phone and noticed the call was from the prison. Your eyes widened in concern as you quickly answered the call.

“What’s wrong?” You croaked out, your voice gravely from sleep.

“It’s an emergency! A riot has broken out and some of the prisoners have escaped. We need your help, t-there’s not enough guards here to handle this!” One of the guards cried over the phone, panic evident in his voice.

“What! Who escaped and how?” You scrambled to get out of bed and throwing on whatever clothes you could find. You picked up a tank top and sweats from the floor before digging in the closet to get shoes. Your mind racing with all the possible ways prisoners would be able to escape. Trying to think of a solution to get the riot under control.

The guard listed several names before he sputtered out Dabi’s name. You froze, panic overwhelming you.

Why would he escape? His parole hearing was coming up, he could have been released. It didn’t make sense. You recalled the way he has been watching you over the past few months, the look in his eyes when you made eye contact and you shuddered.

“Okay, I’ll be there as soon as possible.” You frantically hung up the call and rushed to find your keys. You ran to the front door to where you kept your keys, but they were gone. You were sure you left them here when you came home. Your husband must have taken your car; that was the only explanation you could come up with.

You sighed as you pulled your phone out of your pocket to call your husband. You cringed at the thought of having to ask him to come home, expecting him to be too obliterated to be reasoned with. You called him, bracing yourself mentally when you heard the jingle of a cell phone in your living room.

You couldn’t move. Something wasn’t right. Why did your husband come home and not come to bed? He always ended up passing out next to you. If he’s here, then where are your keys? Your stomach dropped and your chest tightened with fear.

You hesitantly called out your husband’s name but received no response. You heard footsteps coming from the living room and the sound of a chair sliding across the floor.

Each sound reverberating through your body, your heart rate quickened, and you started to sweat. You thought about running out of the house and screaming for help, but you couldn’t bring yourself to flee. You slowly tip toed towards the living room, telling yourself it was just your husband. It had to be. You gripped your phone tightly in your hand, ready to call for help as you rounded the corner.

You stopped in your tracks when you took in the sight before you. Dabi was standing in your living room. He wore baggy joggers, a white tee that was tattered and splattered with blood with a crazed smile on his face. His hair hung in his face, but you caught a glimpse of his bright eyes staring at you. Fear jolted through your body when you saw him standing over your husband. Your husband was gagged and tied to a dining room chair, badly beaten and unconscious. You were about to cry out when Dabi pulled a gun from his waistband and cocked it against your husband’s slumped over head.

He tutted and shook his head. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you warden.”

Your eyes filled with tears; your heart pounded in your ears as you tried to process the scene in front of you. Maybe you were having a nightmare. You wanted to believe you were still in bed, but you couldn’t wake up.

“Come closer and hand me the phone, doll.” He cooed at you.

You slowly walked towards him, your body acting of its own accord. With a shaky hand you gave him your phone, never taking your eyes away from the gun.

“Hey, look at me.” Dabi whispered, pushing the barrel of the gun against your cheek to turn your attention to him. Your heart skipped a beat when you looked into his eyes. His blue eyes looked at you adoringly, he smiled as he leaned closer to you.

“You don’t know how many times I’ve dreamt about this moment. Don’t ruin it by doing something I’d have to punish you for darling.” He whispered his voice low and dangerous.

“Dabi. Why are you doing this? Why?” The tears in your eyes spilled over and raced down your cheeks.

“To see that look on your face. It’s just as beautiful as I thought it would be too.” He grinned while he watched your tears run down your face. “Plus, this piece of shit here needed to pay for what he’s done to you.”

Dabi kicked the leg of the chair your husband sat in, causing it to break. Your husband fell to the floor with a loud thud, waking him up. Dabi laughed when your husband cried out into his gag.

“Dabi...”

You tried to reason with him, but no words came out. You watched in horror as Dabi knelt down closer to your husband.

“Now, tell me. What do you think I should to him?” Dabi asked while locking eyes with you. You wanted to cry for your husband, plead with Dabi to let you both go but you couldn’t. You thought of the torture your husband has put you through, the screaming and yelling, the other night when he finally snapped and hit you in a drunken haze.

“Shoot him.” You whispered softly, your mind going blank as you uttered the sinful words.

Dabi burst out laughing, surprised by your response. Truly were perfect for him.

“Oh dove, you really are a force to be reckoned with, aren’t you? I’ll make a deal with you, I’ll do your little dirty work and rid you of this cockroach but in return you’re mine. You’ll. Belong. To. Me.”

You fell to your knees as you contemplated his proposition. Trying to weigh out your options, figuring out which was the lesser of two evils.

“This is crazy...” You whispered.

He smiled tucking the gun away as he moved to kneel in front of you, capturing your face in his hand.

“What can I say, you make me crazy. I’ll let you in on a little secret love, you’re already mine, whether you like it or not. So, I’ll do you a favor and get rid of him,” he nodded in the direction of your husband who thrashed against his restraints. “But first, let’s show him who owns you.”

He leaned in, holding you still as he pressed his lips against yours. He kissed you feverishly, moving his lips against yours hungrily. He bit your lip harshly, causing you to yelp. He used the opportunity to slip his tongue in your mouth and taste you. You couldn’t stop yourself from moving in time with him, your skin burning with desire. You shouldn’t enjoy it, but you did. You hadn’t been intimate with your husband in months, and Dabi’s touch caused your body to tingle, you didn’t even want to fight it.

He pulled away from you and hummed in approval. He licked the tears off your cheek and smiled to himself. This was better than he imagined it. You tasted sweet, your lips and skin were so soft, and he could hear your heart beating rapidly in your little body. He felt his cock straining against his pants, the sight of you making him hard. Nothing and nobody was going to be able to take you from him now.

“Oh doll, you don’t know how far I’m willing to go in order to make you mine. Don’t worry, I’ll make you feel so good that you’ll forget all this asshole. You’ll learn to love how I make you feel. You’ll learn to love me.” He whispered in your ear.

You trembled at the feeling of his breath on your neck. You couldn’t think, speak or move. You could only focus on the heat radiating off of him, the tickle of his breath and cadence of his voice.

You may be a storm; you may be made out of lightning and thunder, but he was a wildfire. He would burn the world down to keep you by his side. He will destroy everything that gets in his way, and he will consume you with his flames. The passion he felt for you fueling him.

He stood up, unbuckling his belt. “Now take off your fucking clothes or I’ll do it for you.”

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

This was inspired by a yandere prompt list and a fan art of Dabi that has been living in my mind rent free.

Please let me know what you think, my first yandere/dark fic.

Reblogs and likes are appreciated, please help my spread my writing. :)

Thank you for reading!

[the-lonelybarricade]

Take My Hand, Wreck My Plans - Chapter 3

Summary: Fresh after her third, and final, breakup with Tamlin, Feyre decides a one night stand is exactly what she needs to get him out of her system. Except, her one night stand with a violet-eyed stranger ends up being far more than she bargained for.

Or; the one where Feysand gets pregnant from a one night stand

Read on AO3 ・Masterlist・Previous Chapter

-

“So—you still haven’t told him.”

Feyre kept her eyes held wide, careful to avoid stabbing them with her mascara wand, as she flitted her pupils to the corner of the vanity mirror and met her roommate’s disapproving stare.

Alis was leaning against the open doorway, arms crossed. Some evenings she neglected to leave the stern teacher role in her classroom, and over the last two weeks Feyre had begun to feel increasingly like one of her misbehaving students.

“There hasn’t been a good time,” Feyre said, returning to the delicate task of swiping the wand over her eyelashes.

“Mmhmm.”

Feyre grip tightened on the tube of mascara. A slew of defensive words rushed to the back of her tongue, but she held them, enduring another of Alis’s incredulous hums as she stepped into the room. She wasn’t one of Alis’s guilty students and she wasn’t going to act like one, even as Alis began surveying the diamond-studded hairpins Feyre had spent the better part of the morning arranging, the dissected makeup bag that hadn’t been touched in weeks, the elegant dress laid on the bed.

That was where Alis ended her inspection. The midnight gown was still in its protective casing from the dry cleaners, a new addition to Feyre’s closet. Alis pulled at it, and the plastic hissed as it slid over the bed—as if warning, begging Alis not to venture any further.

“And the art show this evening hasn’t had any influence on your decision?”

Feyre capped the mascara and whirled to face Alis, who held up the dress the way a lawyer might present a piece of incriminating evidence in court. Both the dress and the art show were a gift from Tamlin—an apology and a peace offering in one. It was his way of showing that he was ready to take her art career more seriously. Or at least, that was what he’d told her at the cafe, when she’d suddenly lost all nerve to tell him the truth.

“I’m not using him for the art show, if that’s what you’re trying to imply,” Feyre snapped. “It’s just…” her shoulders slackened. “He was so excited for this, Alis. He’d already paid for the venue and invited his colleagues. I couldn’t tell him no and I couldn’t… I couldn’t stand to start another fight.”

Feyre faced the mirror and it took all her self control not to cringe. The concealer had covered up the worst of the dark circles, but it couldn’t hide the exhaustion glazing over her eyes. Maybe it was all the changes in her body, but recently she’d just felt so… heavy.

With a sigh, Alis dropped the dress back onto the bed and approached Feyre from behind. Their eyes met in the mirror, and Feyre at last saw behind the mask of the stern teacher, to the concerned friend who clasped her on the shoulder and whispered, “I’m worried about you, Feyre.”

“I’m okay,” she said, but her voice scraped along the cusp of breaking. She swore that even her own reflection winced at the lie.

Alis clucked her tongue. “You’re trying to handle all of this by yourself.” When Feyre said nothing, Alis added, almost desperately, “Let us help you. If not me, then someone else.”

Besides Feyre and Alis, there were only two people who knew of her pregnancy. Two people that she had been admittedly avoiding since she’d blurted the truth to them outside the cafe. In a typical Mor fashion, Feyre had been bombarded with texts over the last two weeks, each of them cheerfully dancing around the pea-sized elephant in her stomach.

All but one.

I respect you and my cousin enough not to meddle. This baby stuff is between you and him and no matter what happens, I support you unequivocally. I just want to say one thing, then I promise I’ll never bring it up again:

Rhys is a really good guy, Feyre. You can trust him.

Anyway, you want to grab brunch this weekend? Bottomless virgin mimosas?

Feyre was fairly certain that a virgin mimosa was just orange juice, but it made her heart feel light enough that she’d pulled up Rhysand’s contact details and nearly sent him a message. But once it was typed out, her thumb waivered above the keyboard, and regardless of how hopelessly she willed herself to press send, her body resisted.

She’d only met Rhysand twice now, but each meeting had felt more akin to a collision, knocking her violently off her predetermined path, leaving her unmoored. Unsettled. It was too soon to see him again, when she was still barely keeping afloat the wreckage of their last encounter.

And if—when—she told Tamlin, he would almost certainly take issue with Feyre and Rhysand having any kind of relationship, no matter how platonic. In the long run, it was better to keep him at arm's length. Wasn’t it?

“I have my first midwife appointment tomorrow,” Feyre said, because she thought that might appease Alis enough to let this go. “Why don’t you come with me?”

Alis beamed and squeezed Feyre’s shoulder, hard enough that Feyre had to swallow a yelp, but that was Alis—unrestrained and a little heavy-handed, even in her affection. “I would love that.”

Feyre forced a smile. She’d never liked going to the doctors, and in truth simply making the appointment had been a nerve-wracking experience. There was no bump on her stomach yet, and besides the morning bouts of nausea and the wearing exhaustion, she could almost pretend she was the same Feyre she’d been eight weeks ago.

But an appointment made it real.

Bearing all of that to Alis felt impossible. She wished she could do this alone, so that no one would feel burdened by the weight she was carrying, heavier and heavier each day.

“You know,” Alis said, tone a little too casual. “They might want to know about the baby’s father tomorrow—his medical history, what his involvement will look like. It might be worth reaching out to him to make sure you have those details.”

Fuck.

“Right. Thanks for reminding me. I’ll, uh, try to call him later.”

Alis took enough pity to leave Feyre alone after that. But her words lingered, and Feyre spent the next hour staring blankly at Rhysand’s phone number, the sequence of numbers now so familiar she might have been able to recite them from memory. When she finally willed her thumbs to move, they tapped the letters out slowly, every word foreign. She repeated each sentence back, deleting the one that sounded awkward or clumsy or too inviting.

Hey, she eventually settled with. This is Feyre. I’m having an art show tonight at Brush and Chisel. 8 pm. Would you and Mor like to come?

Feyre hit send before she could think about how absurd it would be to have Rhys and Tamlin in the same room. But there was no taking it back. The message was read almost immediately, and Feyre’s panic set in when a small typing bubble popped up with little hesitation.

Rhysand: Sounds wonderful. We’ll be there.

Feyre: Please don’t say anything to Tamlin about… you know

Rhysand: He doesn’t know?

Feyre: Do you want me to revoke your invitation?

Rhysand: No need—my lips are sealed. Looking forward to seeing you again, Feyre darling.

Feyre: No calling me that, either.

Rhysand: No? What would you like me to call you, then?

It was close enough to the flirting they’d exchanged at Rita’s that Feyre thought he was doing it on purpose. Maybe he was trying to wind her up by forcing her to recall the different things he’d called her that night. Feyre darling… Baby… Good girl. The memory of them was making her cheeks feel warm, a sign she might have made a terrible mistake inviting him.

Feyre: Just call me Feyre.

Rhysand: Is that what your friends call you?

Feyre: I wouldn’t say we’re friends yet.

Rhysand: Well in that case, would you prefer I call you something more formal? Miss Archeron?

Feyre: Feyre is fine.

Rhysand: That she most certainly is.

Feyre groaned and resisted the urge to chuck her phone away. This was the man that Mor vouched for as a really good guy? One who couldn’t even control himself for five minutes?

Feyre: If you can’t behave yourself tonight, then I don’t want you there.

Rhysand: I assure you, I will be on my best behavior.

Somehow, that wasn’t very reassuring to her.

-

“Are you feeling nervous, Feyre?”

“Hmm?”

Feyre drew her eyes away from the double glass doors that comprised the venue’s entrance. She’d been staring absently at their reflection, but realized that Tamlin was leaning into her, his hand positioned supportively against her back—his touch was searing now that she was aware of it, though she couldn’t say how long it had been placed there.

He smiled, as though her response were answer enough. “I think it’s normal to be nervous. This is a lot more people looking at your art than you’re used to.”

That wasn’t empirically true. Outside of her instagram account—which had enough traction to keep her regularly commissioned—Feyre displayed her art fairly regularly in street art shows on the Rainbow. This was her first time displaying her art in a proper gallery, however, and perhaps two months ago she would have been nervous.

Presently, Feyre’s bandwidth on things to be nervous about was running low. There were only so many fears that could plague her mind at any given time, and occupying most of that real estate was the itty-bitty issue of her pregnancy and the baby daddy she’d so stupidly invited to the art show.

By comparison, what Tamlin’s business associates thought of her art was of trivial concern, particularly when they didn't even bother to speak to her. It was clear, by the firm handshakes and tactical segues into business deals, that most of the people in attendance were here to impress Tamlin.

“But hey,” Tamlin said, gliding his hand across her back until she was completely folded into his arm. “Hart was just telling me how much he loved that mountain piece. I think he might make an offer.”

Before she’d tuned out of the conversation, Hart had also been telling Tamlin how keen he was to get his investment proposal signed off. Conveniently, the mountain piece was also the only one in eyesight, and Feyre felt more like a corporate gift basket than a respectable artist.

Feyre didn’t say that, though. She smiled and said, “I love that piece.”

Tamlin hummed, as if he agreed. “Why don’t we go get a drink to calm your nerves?”

“Oh, no. I’m okay—”

“Come on, we’re celebrating!” Tamlin used his arm to urge her forward, guiding them both towards the open bar near the front entrance.

The bar was strategically placed, Tamlin claimed, because people were more likely to make impulsive purchases with a drink in their hand. Feyre couldn’t fault his logic, though she’d prefer for her art to be sold of its own merit and not because the buyer was drunk and trying to impress his boss.

“Really Tamlin. I’m not in the mood to drink.”

“You’re so tense, Feyre. A drink will help.”

Across the room, Feyre met eyes with Alis, who quirked a black brow when she saw where the two of them were headed. She took a step towards them, then stalled, and Feyre thought for a horrific moment that Alis was going to let her get buried alive in this hole she’d dug herself.

“Feyre!” Squealed a familiar voice.

Mor didn’t wait for Tamlin to step out of the way before she became a blur of red and gold, barreling towards her Feyre as if this was the first time they were reuniting in years.

She was squeezing so tight that Feyre’s responding, hi Mor, came out a little breathless.

“Mor,” Tamlin said. He’d taken a step away, either to give them space to reconnect or simply because he didn’t want to risk brushing arms with Mor. “Good to see you again.”

“Tamlin.”

Mor, by virtue of being her college roommate, was once privy to every fight and minor frustration between Feyre and Tamlin. As a result, she never tried to hide her dislike of Tamlin, nor did he give much effort to do the same in return. A polite cough behind Mor’s back prompted the tall blonde to peel herself away from Feyre and pivot to reveal Rhysand, who was withdrawing his hands from the pockets of his formal black trousers to extend one of them outward. Towards her.

“Pleased to meet you,” he said.

“This is my cousin,” Mor filled in, brown eyes twinkling. “Rhys.”

Tamlin chose that moment to turn to the bar and order two double vodka tonics. Feyre wasn’t sure which struck her with greater panic—how to evade drinking without raising Tamlin’s suspicion, or how to shake Rhysand’s hand without feeling like her whole world was shaking with it.

“Feyre,” she said. Her tongue felt like sandpaper. “It’s good to meet you, too. Thank you for coming.”

Rhys continued holding her hand a beat too long. “Thank you for inviting us. I’ve heard you’re a very talented artist.”

Drinks now in hand, Tamlin shouldered himself back into the conversation, pointedly holding a glass towards Feyre so that she was forced to let go of Rhysand’s hand. She accepted the drink with an exaggerated smile.

“Tamlin,” he said gruffly to Rhys, not extending a hand. He slid a possessive arm around Feyre’s shoulders—a statement that none of them misunderstood. “Feyre’s boyfriend.”

“Well met,” Rhys said cordially. If he was intimidated by Tamlin’s slow and evidently unimpressed assessment, he did an excellent job at hiding it.

Seeing it was her job to play mediator and hostess, Feyre saw her chance to kill two birds with one stone. “Can I get the two of you a drink?”

Mor’s answer was an immediate chirp of, “Wine, please.”

“She means a bottle,” Rhysand clarified.

Feyre laughed. “Oh, I remember. We’ll start with a glass for now, but I assure you there’s plenty more where that came from. What about you… Rhys?”

It was only his name, she told herself. Why did speaking it feel so intimate? She could still feel its shape on her lips from when she’d panted it into his skin, RhysRhysRhys—

Did he remember it too? Is that why he studied her for a moment, eyes turning a shade darker, before he cleared his throat and said, “I’m the designated driver, so it’s going to be sparkling water for me.” He glanced down at the vodka in her hands. “But do me a favor and ask them to put a lime wedge in it? I like to blend in.”

“Sure,” Feyre said, taking a step towards the bar. This was her chance to untangle herself from Tamlin and trade out her vodka for a sparkling water, too.

Or—that was the plan. Until Tamlin decided to follow, grabbing her elbow and seizing the opportunity to whisper in her ear, “He gives me a bad vibe.”

“You just met him,” she whispered back, irritated and not trying to hide it.

“I work in business,” he deflected. “You get good at reading people quickly.”

Feyre resisted the urge to roll her eyes as they came up to the bar. She repeated Rhys and Mor’s orders, noting with frustration that when the drinks were finished, Tamlin was the one who insisted on carrying Rhysand’s. She reminded herself that his fears weren’t unfounded—she had slept with Rhys after all, and she couldn’t deny that there was chemistry between them, even now.

Fortunately Rhys was unruffled, and he accepted the drink from Tamlin with a gracious thank you that really sounded like I’m the bigger man and I know it. Tamlin’s posture went rigid, and Rhys’s lips quirked, all smug satisfaction for getting under her boyfriend’s skin. Gods, what had she been thinking putting them in the same room together?

“Tam!” Lucien called, turning away from a small group of Spring Corp executives midway across the room. He made a gesturing motion with his hand. “Come here, Andras just came up with a brilliant new pitch for the Hybern deal.”

Tamlin pressed his lips together, surveying his present company like he didn’t trust leaving Feyre alone with them. And yet, he decided that was preferable to dragging Feyre along to whatever ad hoc business meeting was taking place at her art show.

“I’ll be just one moment,” he said, pressing a kiss to Feyre’s temple before he joined the group of well dressed men. The reprieve from his surveillance was short lived, however, given that he positioned himself at just the right angle to keep Rhys and Mor in his periphery.

It would have been less mortifying if she didn’t glance over to Rhys and see the way his smile flattened, having observed the same.

“He seems charming,” Rhys said.

“He…” Feyre struggled for an explanation that could possibly justify his behavior. “He’s just a little stressed. He really wants tonight to go well.”

“Funny,” Rhys said, leaning his shoulder closer. She found herself leaning in too, nervous he was about to say something she didn’t want anyone to overhear. “I would think that at an art exhibit, the artist would be the one worried about the night going well.”

“I…” Feyre didn’t know what to say. “I do want tonight to go well.”

Rhys raised his hand, fingers brushing over her white-knuckle grip on the vodka tonic. Heat jolted through her, and she resisted the urge to snap her hand back. Any sudden movement would surely draw Tamlin’s attention.

He pitched his voice into a whisper. “How do you feel it’s going so far?”

That was when his hand slid around the glass, gently easing it from her grip. And before she could summon any protest, or speculate as to why he’d decided to pry her drink away, he smoothly pressed his sparkling water into her vacant palm.

It all happened in the space of a second. Feyre was blinking, still processing what had happened, as Rhys leaned back and took a sip of the vodka tonic with a remarkably straight face. Between the lime wedge and the small, carbonated bubbles, their drinks looked identical. He winked, and she knew that he’d planned it this way. From the moment he’d overheard Tamlin’s order.

Feyre could have slumped in relief, were she not hyper-aware of the jade green eyes on her not ten feet away. She ducked her face into the glass of sparkling water to hide the laughter threatening to burst from her lips—it was the first genuine smile she’d managed all evening. All week, really.

“It’s starting to look up,” she said, once she managed to regain her composure.

She meant it, too, though she wasn’t quite ready to unpack the implications of that. Was she a horrible person, inviting him here? The list of things she was lying to Tamlin about was beginning to feel ever-growing. Insurmountable. Her mood quickly soured as she glanced down at the glass in her hand and realized it was just another deception. Someone had come to bail her out this time, but how long could she keep digging this hole until it buried her alive?

“Good,” Rhys said.

His eyes were dancing with a mirth that didn’t feel touchable any longer. Even if his grin was the infectious, wicked sort. The kind that could persuade a saint to deal with the devil. His gaze flicked over her shoulder, skimming the pieces on the back wall.

He jerked his chin towards the displays. “Which one’s your favorite?”

Feyre turned to consider them, though she already knew the answer. “Guess.”

A challenge. One he looked delighted to accept. As a group, the three of them drifted closer towards the art so that Rhys could study each of them with the intensity of a student expecting to be quizzed on their meaning.

Tamlin didn’t return until they reached the final piece. His expression was tight, though Feyre couldn't tell if that was the result of the conversation with his colleagues, or the fact that Feyre had wandered outside his line of vision. Knowing her boyfriend, it was likely the latter.

“What have I missed?” He asked.

“We’re trying to guess Feyre’s favorite piece.”

It was Mor who answered him, given that her cousin was far too busy studying the landscape before him—a hazy clearing of snow and skeletal trees and nothing else besides a curious pair of wolf-like eyes watching from the shadows.

“Oh, that’s easy,” Tamlin said, pointing two pieces down to a hand scooping incandescent water from a pond. The one she’d titled The Pool of Starlight. “That one’s her favorite.”

Feyre elbowed him for ruining the game. She might have done so more gently, if he’d actually guessed correctly. Tamlin offered her an exasperated look that said, What did I do wrong this time? Her tongue burned with the urge to correct him, but she said nothing, suffering the glance Mor and Rhys exchanged with each other. A shared disappointment of a game ruined, and something more. Something that left embarrassment itching up her neck.

Rhys glanced towards her alleged favorite painting and nodded good naturedly. “I understand why. It’s a beautiful painting, Feyre.”

Again, Tamlin’s arm fell over her shoulders. And he said, “That one’s not for sale.”

“Tam.”

He ignored her, continuing, “Feyre painted it as a gift for our four year anniversary.”

Mor muttered under breath, “Four years my ass.”

Tamlin narrowed his eyes. “Pardon?”

The whole room quieted for a stagnant beat, as Mor contemplated her response. Feyre widened her eyes, trying to silently plead with Mor to let it go. It didn’t matter that in those four years, they’d spent as much time broken up as they had in a relationship. What mattered was surviving the night, the week, the year ahead.

Mor tipped her chin, and as her red lips curled into a flat smirk, Feyre felt her stomach plummet.

“I said—”

A waitress stepped towards them, brandishing a platter full of mini quiches in offering. She was staring at Rhys, expectant. As if he’d been the one to call her over. He offered her a broad smile as he plucked one from the tray and promptly handed it to Mor.

Then he innocently looked towards Feyre and Tamlin. “Quiche?”

The smell of cooked eggs and salmon invaded her senses as the waitress swiveled the tray towards them. Bile rose in the back of her throat, and Feyre tried her best to swallow it as she politely shook her head.

“No thanks,” Tamlin said, his voice flat.

The waitress stepped away, wafting the smell under Feyre’s nose a second time. Nausea lurched violently in her stomach, refusing to be ignored.

Even Tam noticed the look on her face. He leaned towards her with a frown, pressing his palm into her shoulder. “Fey? Are you alright?”

Feyre feared that if she tried to speak, her stomach would upheave itself right then and there. She pressed a hand to her mouth, shaking her head before she turned and dashed for the bathroom.

The gallery became a blur of color and ambient sound. She thought she might have heard her name being called. Guests lobbed curious glances towards her as she brushed past, heels clinking urgently against the smooth concrete. The bathroom door swung open beneath her palms, and she didn’t spare the time to lock it before her knees slammed to the floor in front of the toilet.

She hated this. The puking. The way her eyes watered and her body trembled and the sounds of her retching bounced endlessly off the walls. If anyone was waiting outside, they’d doubtlessly hear it.

Feyre panted as the first wave subsided. She knew that wasn’t the end, could already feel her stomach turning in preparation for the next unforgiving torrent of nausea. Was this how it felt to be at sea, so lost and unsteady, with nothing to anchor her besides the cool press of the filthy bathroom floor?

She hunched as the next onslaught began, grasping onto the porcelain bowl, already imagining the bath she was going to take in disinfectant once she got home. Over the stomach-curdling noise, she heard the bathroom door creak open.

Feyre’s hair was pulled away from her face a moment later.

“It’s okay,” Mor soothed. “I’ve got you.”

She traced a delicate hand along Feyre’s spine, up and down. Feyre shut her eyes as she heaved into the toilet, grateful that it was Mor who had come, and not Tamlin. Or worse—Rhysand.

“It’s like we’re in college again,” Mor teased.

Feyre felt too wrung out to laugh. But when the nausea finally ebbed, she managed a shaky smile over her shoulder. “Usually I was holding your hair back.”

“Glad I get to return the favor.”

The memory ached. Three years wasn’t a long time, comparatively, but the Feyre who’d once sat drunk and giggling in public restrooms with Mor felt like a completely different person to the one she was now. It was more than time that separated them—more than motherhood, too. Back then, she had been so carefree, so full of light. And now…

She was trembling like a newly born fawn trying to rise to her feet. Mor slid a supportive hand beneath her elbow, her other hand still holding Feyre’s hair away from her face as they shuffled towards the sink.

Everything that was once simple now felt like a million steps. Twist the faucet. Pump the soap. Lather her hands… Over her shoulder, Mor watched it all with a pinched expression. She didn’t need to say anything; Feyre could still hear Alis in the back of her mind. I’m worried about you, Feyre.

Noticing she’d been caught, Mor took to coyly searching through her clutch, murmuring, “I think I have a pack of gum somewhere…”

The tap stopped running. Feyre stared at her friend in the mirror, how her blonde brows pinched together as she feigned an intensive search. And then Feyre looked at her own reflection. At her wide eyes, gleaming with unshed tears. And she finally admitted the truth to Mor, to herself.

“I’m scared.”

Mor’s mouth popped open. “Oh, Feyre,” she whispered, pulling her into a bone-crushing hug.

A great, gasping breath shuddered through Feyre, the final resistance before her foundation cracked, and every wall crumbled to dust. The next thing she knew, she was sobbing into her friend’s shoulder while Mor held tight, the only thing keeping her tethered.

Now that she’d let the words loose, she couldn’t stop. “I’m going to be a mom.”

“You are,” Mor whispered, swaying them back and forth. “You’re going to be a great one.”

“I don't know anything about being a parent.”

“No one does. It’s the kind of thing you learn on the job. And you—Feyre, you have always been exceptional at adapting to everything life throws at you. Even this.”

Her lower lip trembled. The question came tumbling out of her, broken and small. “Did I make the right choice?”

“There was no right choice,” Mor said. “There’s just the choice you made, and the one you didn’t.”

Mor leaned back to swipe her thumb along Feyre’s cheek, chasing away the tear tracks and smeared mascara as best she could.

“Though, you know what I think?” Mor’s brown eyes shined under the fluorescents as she held Feyre’s gaze. “I think that one day, you’re going to look back on this moment, and you’re going to be so happy that you decided to become a mom.”

Feyre sniffled, pressing a palm to her stomach as she attempted to imagine a future Feyre who was confident about this choice. Happy. “And Rhys?” She ventured. “Does he really mean it, about wanting to be involved?”

Mor didn’t hesitate, not for one second. “He does.”

Her eyes drifted towards the door. Tamlin and Rhys would be waiting on the other side. She didn’t know whether to laugh or feel mortified by the thought of the two of them together, stewing in hostile silence. If she was lucky, Tamlin had already dismissed this whole ordeal as female dramatics and was entertaining more of his colleagues without paying any mind to her absence.

Luck wasn’t exactly playing in her favor recently. Feyre’s eyes shifted to the hopper windows on the back wall, contemplating if she could squeeze her body through one. “What do you think my chances are of sneaking out?”

Mor followed Feyre’s gaze and pursed her lips, assessing the windows like she were truly calculating the feasibility of such an escape. “I don’t think those windows open all the way.” Her eyes slid coyly back to Feyre. “So… Tamlin—”

“Don’t start.”

She couldn’t handle another lecture about telling him the truth—not now.

But where Alis clicked her tongue and gave disapproving looks, Mor only laughed and patted Feyre on the shoulder. “Fine, fine. Just let me handle this.”

Mor didn’t give her an option to refuse. Which was just as well, because Feyre would have spent the entire night holed up in the bathroom if Mor didn’t pull her by the wrist.

“Wait!” Feyre dug her heels, trying to slow the too fast approach towards the bathroom door. “My makeup—”

“You look beautiful.”

A lie. Feyre looked like a trainwreck in a pretty dress. Not that Mor gave her time to do anything about it as she pushed the door open and announced to the two men standing on the other side, “Feyre has food poisoning. I’m taking her home.”

“I’ll grab our coats,” Rhys said.

At the same moment, Tamlin said, “I’ll take her home.”

He shifted, trying to peer at Feyre where she stood at Mor’s back, but her friend stepped into Tamlin’s line of vision. Her voice was flat. Unyielding. “You’ve been drinking.”

“So what? I’ll call us a cab.”

Feyre took a deep breath and stepped around Mor. “Tam.” Those bright eyes pinned her in place, seeing far too much. She knew it was obvious that she’d been crying, and his jaw tightened as he processed the lie, and the way she silently begged him not to push. Not yet, not here. “I need someone to stay here and make sure the art show isn’t a complete disaster.”

He contemplated this for a moment, a muscle feathering in his jaw as he looked to Mor, then to Rhys. He released a heavy sigh. “I’ll come by once it’s over.”

It was like standing on a frozen lake and watching it crack beneath them.

“Okay,” she whispered.

They both knew what was coming. It had always been precarious, this thing between them. Never simple, never clean.

Mor looped her elbow through Feyre’s. “Come on,” she urged, rushing them towards the front entrance before Tamlin could change his mind.

The stares of Tamlin’s colleagues followed them as they went. Rhys peeled off to collect their coats, allowing Mor and Feyre to make a swift exit into the liberating embrace of Autumn. The cool breeze pressed against her flushed skin, and Feyre drank it greedily, feeling the air cut a path all the way to her lungs. Finally, she could breathe again.

Rhysand emerged a moment later, two coats hanging off his arm. And Mor chose that moment to look up from her phone and say, “Rhys, you go ahead and take Feyre home. The night’s still young for me.”

“Mor!” Feyre whispered, horrified at the prospect of being alone with him. So much for not meddling.

“What?” She asked innocently, though the look she exchanged with Rhys was nothing short of conspiratorial. “Between my wine and Rhys’s vodka, I have the perfect pre-Rita’s buzz.”

Rhys didn’t seem at all surprised by this news, nor did he seem the least bit phased by the prospect of being alone in a car with Feyre. He simply walked Feyre to his car and opened the passenger door. As she slid into the leather seat, he called to Mor, “Do you want me to at least drop you off?”

“No.” The blue light of her phone lit her grin, and she giggled, looking down at the screen as she said, “I have a ride.”

“Emerie?” Rhys asked, raising a brow.

Mor bit her lip, offering no confirmation one way or the other. With a shrug, Rhys shut the passenger door, leaving Feyre briefly alone in his immaculate car, which smelled vaguely of leather and plastic and… and—him. It had been eight weeks, and Feyre still couldn’t get over the way he smelled.

She took a moment to compose herself, to prepare for being alone with him for the full twenty minute drive to her apartment. Whatever further words he exchanged with Mor, she couldn’t hear. But she could see the way he was smiling, and when he glanced at the car over his shoulder, she had a feeling they were talking about her.

Oh god.

The driver's door opened, suctioning all of the air and replacing it with the site of his obscenely handsome face. “Looks like it’s just the two of us, Feyre darling.”

She was majorly fucked.

[wisttwist]

jester's privilege

(past) nebu (nathaniel) & reader, morningstar (ithaqua) & reader cliche scene where the hero enters the defeated kings bedroom and all the concubines are crawling all over him but instead of a dozen concubines trying to seduce him it's a single crusty manservant making middle school tier jokes warnings: mentions of canon typical war crimes etc

...

There was a small, breathtakingly ugly cushion in the corner of the room, bright primary colours clashing with the creams and golds of the late Tower Lord's interior design (which was also ugly, Helel would like to append).

A similarly small and breathtakingly ugly servant (?) sits on this cushion, presently engaged in thrilling (mind numbing) icebreakers (he would like to break some ice over your head, yes) with the Sun Eater as he idly turned over Nebuchadnezzar's royal paraphernalia.

"So he doesn't bed you and you aren't politically valuable. Then why are you in here, and not out there?" He gestures to the smoke from the mines, visible from the tower window.

"He doesn't send me to the quarries because I'm special. I'm his special boy."

"He calls you that?"

"No."

Helel made the temporary generalization that conversation with you was a waste of oxygen and stalks off to continue his inspection of the room, deaf to your remarks.

A voice comes from right behind his shoulder. "What do I call you?" Somehow, you'd soundlessly traversed the cluttered floor to stand uncomfortably close.

He scowls. So much for ignoring you. "Don't you know who I am?"

"I do live in a cell." You mumble, picking your nose and wiping the snot on your pants.

For a second, the Eclipse considers retelling the story of his conquest for the nth time but honestly, he wasn't sure how much more gloating he could wring out of it, especially with this audience. "It doesn't matter who I am. Just know that I'm the new king."

"Your voice is very familiar."

"No it's not."

"Very well. It's not." You fidget on the spot, bell-studded clothes jingling. "Do I call you sire? Or are you more formal?"

"Do as you wish."

Satisfied with his vague and minimalist answers, he returns to his prior task of sorting through the Sun King's old shit; mentally categorizing them for later: keep, trash, take to the thrift store, incinerate. Surveying the shelves, he sighs. This would be a lengthy task.

…

"Do you want a tour?" Breathing on the back of his neck, again. Uncomfortably close, again.

Helel gives you a firm push back. "No."

"Are you still wondering what my purpose was?" You chirp, undeterred as ever.

"If I recall correctly, the Sun King already had a clown in his court. I freed him way back when." Maybe if Helel paid more attention to that event, he'd note that the Encroached did mention an irritating bell-wearing obstacle between him and his master. Not that you can prepare for this brand of mild but persistent evil. "But considering this room is full of useless junk, it's not hard to guess why you're here."

Ignoring his jab, you sidle close once more, plotting another invasion attempt on his personal space. "Jesters and clowns are two different things."

Yeah, you were different. The other guy was less annoying. Mercifully, he elects to give a noncommittal grunt instead of mentioning this detail, hoping that you'll lose interest in trying to continue your conversation.

The Sun Eater lifts up a decanter of mystery fluid (pale and golden like everything else). He's about to lean in to give it a smell test when you stop him. "That's not wine, sire."

Owlishly, his head swivels around to face you.

You close your eyes sagely and pause for dramatic effect, wasting more of Helel's time on waiting for you to elaborate. "It's pee."

The decanter shatters on the floor. You watch him frantically wipe his hands off on the expensive curtains. "What the fuck?"

A good poker face is a crucial survival skill for your occupation, but given your employer is currently burning in hell, you are very much off the clock right now. You double over with laughter. "Oh heavens, sire. You're too gullible, oh stars and suns, oh- Oh!"

Helel's clawed hand yanks you up by the hair. "Are you five years old. Greater men have died for lesser-"

"Let me down, please, sire!" The twinge of stifled laughter slurring your pleas for your life don't help your case. "I'm sorry! Please!"

You're dropped in a crumpled, jingling heap on the floor. Briefly, the Morning Star considers sending you to the gallows, but is it really worth the effort? Your transgressions, frequent as they were, weren't significant enough for that. Besides, on a smaller level he won't admit, his pride refuses to let you get to him. "I'll take you up on the tour offer." He declares with finality, crossing his arms. "You touch everything before I do."

"Yes, sire!" You jump up to attention, back ramrod straight in a mockery of military obedience. "Does that make me the royal toucher? Or king's toucher? That's like being a king's taster but instead of tasting-"

Your voice trails off as you feel Helel's glare burning through his mask and into your skull.

"Ahem. On the left, we have war spoils from the southeastern peninsula…"

… 

Truly, the home renovation aspect of overthrowing corrupt tyrants is underestimated. The remainder of the afternoon was spent sorting doohickeys into piles in the middle of the floor for future storage. Or rather, Helel did the majority of the heavy lifting while you (un)helpfully stood in the corner, regaling him with tales of the previous regime and the exact happenings of court life. He wants to tell you to stop talking for 5 minutes and do something useful but you would probably cite the importance of 'moral support' and try to weasel your way out of it. Besides, even if you were trying to do something of substance, it probably involved inventing new ways to fuck up moving furniture, fiddling with his temper even further. You were like a mosquito, he decides. Too little to do real damage, too much to be ignored.

"There was this one time I was doing a bit about his virility and he said he could prove me wrong right there if I wanted." You were presently cross legged on an intricate rug (tribute from the Sun King's unfortunate allies), juggling a series of crystal balls (priceless artifacts, stained with blood by the 'divine' conqueror). "So I said 'You should know that I'm a eunuch', and he went, 'It doesn't matter.' We were hilarious."

The Usurper scratches his chin, half listening. It didn't sound hilarious, just weird. "You're sure he didn't bed you?"

"A joke is just a joke, you know."

"Okay. Just checking." Helel paused. "Then are you really a eunuch?"

"Are you gonna check that too?"

"No." You were really getting your money's worth from that previous temporary generalization.

…

After the walls and shelves were bare, and the loot was bundled up in leather bags, the Eclipse sank into one of the plush chairs, kicking his feet onto the table and massaging his temples. With any luck, you were as tired as he was, and he could slip away while you rested.

You yawned. "Ahh. That's enough for one day, I think." Helel watched as you plopped back down on your hideous cushion, procuring a lit pipe from thin air and taking a hefty drag. "Will you be looking for new furnishings?"

"Probably. This stuff is way too tacky."

A wisp of smoke drifts past, and the Morning Star feels that tell-tale foreboding feeling behind his shoulder again. "Will you be looking for new castle staff?" You bat your eyelashes.

He meets your expectant gaze with the exhaustion of someone who just fought another war and lost. "You're staying?"

Deliberately misinterpreting his question as a statement, you perk up, grinning from ear to ear. "Well, I can't refuse a direct order such as that! Especially not from his most esteemed, illustrious (and if I may add, very handsome) Majesty!" Bowing at the waist with a bell-bedecked flourish, you shoot back to eye level with hands clasped, nearly butting him in the head with your stupid hat. "When do I start work?"

...

(jump cut to jester being tossed out of tower window) this is too long to be funny but idc anymore. next time i'll write romance but i needed to fulfill my desire to annoy him

[last-herondale]

When to say Goodbye

Loki x Femreader!

Warnings: Alcoholism, Mentions of Addiction, cursing ANGST A/N: I had an experience similar to this interaction recently, and in my mind it seemed perfect for a Loki fic. When someone you love is struggling, how do you know if you're helping them, or if you're part of the problem? Enjoy

The first portion of the evening passed along well enough. The dinner party was a quaint affair at a fancy restaurant. Tony made the arrangements and bought out a nice private venue just outside of New York and paid the workers extra for a “privacy” insurance. No phones. No cameras. Everyone signed an NDA, which everyone other than Tony thought was unnecessary. It wasn’t everyday that the god of thunder came to visit Earth, and it certainly wasn’t everyday that he announced his engagement to his longtime girlfriend Jane Foster. 

Thor had assured all of us that he and his fiancee had celebrated on Asgard, and that the need for a dinner was unnecessary. And despite Thor’s rather weak attempts to stop Tony from going overboard, Mr. Stark, like always, had his way. It was a well attended event. From Earth, Tony was able to assemble most of the Avengers, such as Steve, Bruce, Natasha, Clint, Rhodey, Sam, Bucky, Wanda, Vision, and even begrudgingly decided to bring Scott along. And you, of course.

Thor invited his own entourage. The ever kind Jane, and the guardians. It was a pleasant surprise to see Quill and the gang, as they seemed busy with their crossworld travels, and hardly visited Earth. Rocket immediately took to the bar, with Groot on his tail, and conversation began to flow freely between friends. There were a few late arrivals, such as Strange, and Parker. You eyed the crowd a bit eagerly, not able to shake off the anxiety building in your chest. He should be here.

Perhaps it was for the best he didn’t show. 

Things didn’t usually end well whenever he showed up. For you anyway. 

After dinner, a large cake was brought out and placed before Thor and Jane. It was a beautiful 3 tier white chocolate cake, with a flourish of flowers adorning the dessert. Just as Tony was finishing a speech, and passing the mic down the table, the doors to the venue opened up, causing everyone to turn their heads. You knew before you looked. Your heart lurched in your chest and you felt your blood run cold. 

Loki came sauntering in. He was dressed for the occasion, in a nice shirt and slacks, with a jacket thrown over his shoulder. His hair was slicked back into a bun, and he wore the usual bravado smirk on his lips and he drew nearer to the table. He was glad to have the room’s attention. This was his goal all along. 

Tony seemed to come to the same conclusion too, his brows furrowed with annoyance. “Nice of you to join us Reindeer,” he mused. Thor was delighted to see his brother and commanded one of the workers to bring in a chair. 

“No need, brother,” Loki said wryly. His eyes surveyed the room until they settled on you. “I see an open seat.”

You clenched your fists as they rested on your lap. Steve was finishing his own speech as Loki pulled up a chair beside you. You could smell the liquor on him immediately. The sickly sweet smell of it lingered in the air between you. Of course he would show up to his brother’s engagement party hammered. What else did you expect? 

You refused to look at him, wanting to pay attention to Steve’s speech, or Mantis playing with her fork, or literally anything other than him. But of course he was not going to make it easy for you. He knew his affect on you. 

“Has the night been terribly dull without me, pet?” his words echoed in your mind. Even then, there was a bit of a slur to them. You clenched your jaw and shook your head. You did not want to play his games tonight. You had promised yourself to be present and in the moment rather than dedicating yourself to Loki and his needs. Steve finished his speech, and Thor rose to make a toast to his future wife. You raised your glass with the rest, and noticed from the corner of your eye that Loki did the same.

“Not talking to me tonight I see,” he thought with a laugh, “Haven’t you missed me my sweet? I’ve missed you– my pet. I can’t wait until I have you alone, once this dreadful night is over. Gods– how I need you. I might have celebrated a bit prematurely in honor of the Mighty’s Thor’s wedding announcement, which of course mother and father were just thrilled by–”

Thor finished his toast and everyone drank their champagne. You tossed yours back, anger flaring in your eyes and you turned to Loki sharply. He was expecting this reaction, and he met you with an amused face as he slowly sipped on his drink.

“Do not make tonight about you!” you yelled back in his mind. You turned away from him once more and focused on Jane and Thor cutting the cake as the room filled with applause. His hand rested on your thigh, his fingers grazing your dress under the table. 

“Love–” he began, his thoughts turning into a small whine, like a pouting child. You grabbed his wrist and violently removed it from your thigh. He did not resist, even though his strength far outmatched yours. He stilled beside you, keeping whatever thoughts to himself, registering your anger even in his drunken state. 

As dessert passed around, you kept your attention to Drax, who sat on the other side of you. Although he was not one for long conversations, you tried your best to reach through to him to occupy your mind. After the table was cleared, the party moved to the bar area and the dance floor. The party was starting to liven up, as the alcohol poured more freely and the tempo of the music picked up. 

Loki disappeared from your sight, and your anxiety grew significantly. He was unpredictable, especially when he was intoxicated, and especially when an event revolved around Thor. He had made amends with his brother years ago. Loki swore off his retaliation once he realized that was in fact loved by his brother. It was a hard pill to swallow. He had struggled for a while with coexisting with Thor, but you knew Loki feared who he would become without him. Who he would become if loneliness won again.

You had seen him try. It was a wondrous thing to behold. Loki decided to train with the Avengers, under extreme supervision of course, but Thor deemed it necessary for his redemption. Tony nearly outright refused, but Steve fought for his chance. “Everyone should have a shot at a second chance,” Steve had said to the team. It was left to a vote then. You were the last to vote. It was split. Half of the team didn’t trust Loki, which was to be expected. The other half, following Steve’s leadership, agreed that there might be a chance to redeem Loki. 

It was up to you. 

You believed in redemption. You believed in second chances. So it had been obvious. It was easy to decide. It was everything that came after… that became difficult.

While the party turned up, and everyone was dancing and mingling, you found yourself lingering next to the bar. You told yourself not to look for him, but you couldn’t help it. It's as if your body was on autopilot, searching for any sign of him to make sure he was okay. It was pathetic. It was exhausting. And yet it was the only thing you seemed to be able to do.

Mantis awkwardly made her way towards the bar, her antennas twitching a bit as she approached. Her presence made you avert your eyes from the crowd and paint a soft smile. You had always liked Mantis. 

“Hey, Mantis,” you said softly. She greeted you with a smile and took a seat next to you. She ordered water and seemed content to just sit there with you for a moment as the party continued. It wasn’t until a couple of songs passed that Mantis finally spoke.

“You’re very anxious tonight.” 

It wasn’t a question. You knew she could sense your emotions on you. That they radiated to her like waves that she alone could read and decipher. There was little sense in lying to her,

“Yes,” was all you said.

Mantis held out her hand gently, her eyes curious as she looked at you.

“May I?” 

You immediately placed your hand in hers, letting the entirety of your emotions flow into her like a river. It was a momentary relief. To allow someone to bare the weight of your heart in its fullness. She did not flinch away from you.

“You love him,” she said, tilting her head as she looked at the bar, “And this brings you great pain.”

You shuddered a breath. “Why?” you asked quietly. You knew the answer. Deep down you always knew. Mantis looked at you with a soft indifference. She was not malicious in her words. She was only speaking to what she could feel. 

“You’re afraid–” 

Mantis was cut off by a swiftly approaching Jane. Your body straightened at the sight of her looking somewhat distraught, clearly trying to hold her appearance together. Her eyes were focused on you and you alone. 

“Excuse me, Mantis,” you murmured as you rose from your chair and met Jane halfway.

“Oh thank god,” Jane said in a low voice.

“What’s wrong?” you asked, your eyes searching behind Jane for any sort of disturbance. 

“It’s Loki,” Jane sighed, “He’s drunk, Tony’s drunk– they’re having words outside on the patio. I stepped out for some air, and things seemed to be getting tense– I didn’t want to get Thor because we all know how calm he can be…”

You put a gentle hand on Jane’s shoulder. She was no fool. She knew at least bits and pieces of your relationship with Loki, enough to warrant her coming to you for assistance. 

“I’ll handle Loki,” you said sternly, “Go enjoy your party Jane, please.” You bent forward and gave her a soft peck on the cheek and hurried yourself to the patio. No one seemed to notice you move across the party, and once you entered the patio space, you saw Loki pointing a finger in Tony’s direction. 

“Tony,” your voice rang out clear and strong. This got Loki’s attention first. The sound of your voice snapped him out of his intense staredown with Tony long enough for Tony to look in your direction.

“Pepper needs you, she’s on the phone. Says it's urgent.”

It was a messy lie, but it did the job. Tony in his drunken state, widened his eyes and sloppily hurried his way back to the party. Once he was inside, you locked the door behind him and turned around to Loki, who was scowling with his arms crossed. You stood there, your arm wrapped around yourself.

“I was perfectly fine. There was no need for your interference,” he said bitterly.

“I am tired, Loki,” you whispered. You weren’t sure if he had heard you. There was still the dull beating of the music pounding just behind you. You moved away from the door, walking closer to Loki, standing a few feet away from him. You looked at him, unable to hold back the sadness in your eyes any longer. His eyes wandered your face for a moment, his face a bit slack and nonchalant. 

“I’m sorry,” Loki sighed, “This isn’t fair for you, I realize that. And yet…”

You let out a short laugh through your nose. “And yet here we are, again. Here I am, standing here between you and yourself– making excuse after excuse for you. So, I’ll ask you this, why? Why should I keep doing it? Why, Loki?”

“I need you,” Loki said immediately. His voice was soft, but stern. He was being as serious as he could be. You knew he meant it, believed it even, but you weren’t sure if it really mattered anymore. He took a step forward, almost as if he could sense the doubt radiating from your body. He knew your body well. You held his gaze as he moved closer.

“My life would be very different if it weren’t for you. You got me here, you’re why I can even step foot on this planet… I would have burned if you had not been there–”

“I have only fanned the fucking flames!” you hissed, inching closer to him. “What have I done for you, but cater to your every whim? Even when you continue to prove to me that you would rather drown in your own indignation than try to move forward in life. I humor you by being there every time you call me in a drunken stupor. Because let's be honest with ourselves, Loki, you only ever call me anymore when you are blacked out drunk, or in some dire need to drown your senses and need someone to drown with you.

“And I do. When it comes to choosing between you and my own fucking common sense, I always choose you. I drown with you because I would rather die every night with the sensation of fire in my lungs than deal with the constant breaking of my heart–” your words croak out at the end. You turned away violently as tears began to well up in your eyes. 

“Wait, wait,” he said desperately, his hand gripping your shoulder as he quickly placed himself in front of you. “I’m sorry, truly. I fucked, I fucked up. I keep fucking everything up. I hate myself for how I am… it's not a reflection of you. It’s never, gods it's never you. I know I have a problem, and I hate that I drag you into my mess. I am a selfish creature. I crave your company more than I desire your wellbeing, for if I truly cared, I would send you away, or love you like you deserve to be loved, totally and completely... But… I can’t. I can’t.”

His eyes search yours in desperation. His chest is heaving under his words and his hand runs up your shoulder until he is cupping your cheek. “I love you. Please understand that. As much as I can, in whatever capacity my heart can love, I do love you. I don’t know who I would be without you. You are my best friend.”

Tears fell down your cheeks. “I love you too,” you nearly moaned in despair, “And that’s the problem, Loki. I love you, and yet I continue to watch you destroy yourself. You constantly compare yourself to Thor, even now that you’ve made amends. You think you are unworthy of redemption and so you hide from it. You flee from it like a child and you run to me. And I have spoiled you, haven’t I? I have given you what you wanted, a distraction, a momentary blindness to the realness of your own life. But I have failed to give you what you needed. Failed to give myself what I needed.”

Loki looked like a broken thing. His face pained in ways that you had only seen momentarily. You tilted your head a bit as you continued. “Now look at us, love,” you whispered to him, “We are both dying.” You felt a cooling calm wash over you. An odd numbness that made time seem to slow down. You recognized the beating of your own heart, and the soft thumping of the pulse in his thumb on your cheek. 

This was finally time. 

“Please,” he murmured softly, desperately, “I can’t bare it.”

He did not cry or resist when you took his hand off of your face. You held his gaze for a while longer, savoring the last memories you would have of him. It took all of your strength to step away from him. It felt like ripping off a limb. 

“I love you,” you said gently, holding eye contact with him as you continued to step away. He did not follow you, or speak again. He simply kept his gaze on you, his brows furrowed in discomfort. Your heart ached in ways you never knew were possible. “But I will no longer play a part in your own undoing.”

And with that you were gone. You hardly remembered walking out of the venue, or getting into a cab, or even arriving home. Loki’s face was branded in your mind. You thought of that last look, that last devastated look as you lay your head down on your pillow that night. You would not sleep that night. You would not sleep for many nights to come.

[amywritesthings]

about you. (cassian x you)

Pairing: Cassian Andor x F!Reader

Word Count: 5.6K

Summary: You are a rebel spy working as an escort at Canto Bight's cliffside casino. When Luthen cannot meet you for an intel exchange on New Year's Eve, he sends his best asset. Never in your wildest dreams did you think that meant you'd reunite with your former childhood best friend, Cassian Andor.

Warnings: New Year's Eve, Spy Thriller, Escort Service, Romantic Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Childhood Friends, Reunions, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Mentions of Sex Work, Wall Pinning, New Year's Eve Kiss

A/N: Happy New Year, everyone! I had a fun holiday one shot idea and wanted to try my hand at writing Cassian Andor. I am wishing you all a happy & healthy new year, and I can't wait to continue writing in 2023.

( Read on AO3 )

Canto Bight is always bustling at New Year’s Eve.

It’s why Luthen Rael has shown up on your doorstep for the first time in months. In his not-so subtle way, the man requests (see: demands) that you float back to your old haunt, the one within the glittering halls of their monument cliffside casino, and do what you do you best: entertain as a partner experience escort for the rich and powerful. 

The partner experience operation has been your designation from the very beginning of this rebellious calling. Your contribution to the rebellion, as he claims, is valuable — because the whispers in the night by decorated Imperials that feel safe in your company are priceless.

Whispers bring intel, and not even gold is as priceless as Imperial intel.

Luthen claims he knew of your potential the moment he laid eyes on you in a seedy dive bar on an Outer Rim moon. The little lamb far from her home planet Ferrix, looking fearful yet enraged all the same; starved, but most importantly willing to do anything to take down the Empire one domino at a time.

It was the type of spunk the older man needed in a claustrophobic world.

So you struck a deal: under trained supervision, you would run the casino circuits and red districts — never quite getting close enough to sleeping with the enemy (who knew the Empire thrived on humiliation and edging?) but enough to drug them, learn from them, then report back to him for the next move.

Rinse and repeat for six successful years.

And right now, you were supposed to be done. Find a small shack in the middle of nowhere knowing you did your part in the small but mighty agenda. Perhaps, eventually, you would find a way to make peace with your past and your present.

Then Luthen fucking Rael shows up at the stoop of said shack only six months later with a new opportunity.

A new strategy on the chess board.

(The rebellion, as he so candidly puts it, is never final.)

“Did you hear about what’s going on with Life Day this year on Canto Bight?” Luthen grunts, opting to stand by the doorway rather than a seat at your makeshift kitchen table.

You drop down unceremoniously with your arms at your sides. You know — and you know he knows — there is a blaster taped on the belly of the steel table should this be an unpleasant visit.

“You mean the Wookie holiday?”

“Hmm,” Luthen sounds, caught between a yes and a no. “Supposed to be the Wookie holiday, but it seems the Empire has allowed the casino a profitable chance to participate until the new year.”

“I’d expect nothing less,” you muse in return, surveying him. “When you say profitable, you mean—”

“Everyone who is anyone will be visiting.” Luthen never makes any sudden movements; always trapped sounding bored with this life he leads. It’s also a tactic not to play his cards too far from his chest. “They’ll be running the gambit for paid time off.”

Smile bland, you nod once. “Which is code for… you need someone on the inside.”

“For the season,” he agrees, shifting his weight. “A gift to the faces who may have missed you.”

“Missed me?”

“I hear about the Diamond quite a lot.”

Their precious Diamond.

Maker, that nickname always made your skin crawl.

You huff, rubbing your nose with the back of your thumb. “Flattery gets you nowhere with me, Luthen, you know that.”

He takes a pause, small eyes observing everything that you do. Updating a mental database logging your quirks and your discomfort to cipher for a later date — that’s all he’s ever done, study and download people, and he’s done so without error yet.

(It’s why he’s never been caught.)

“It isn’t flattery,” he finally says. “It’s an opportunity.”

To do everything we couldn’t the first time, is what he really implies.

It’s feeding an addiction no amount of dead fascists will be able to quench.

“And how do I tell them why I want the job back after I quit?”

“Your mother was very ill. You needed to help with her expenses,” Luthen fabricates from thin air. “It was easiest to part ways without the low note on your record. But the credits have dried up, and their clientele will be thankful of the casino’s decision to allow you back on the floor.”

It’s your turn to pause — to study. He gives away nothing. You lean forward to rest your elbows on the tops of your thighs.

“You think that’ll work?”

“You’ll sell it,” is all he gives back like you’ve already said yes.

You’re supposed to be out.

(Do you want to be out?)

.

.

.

.

.

No.

No, you don’t.

.

.

.

.

.

Getting the job back at the casino as a specialized escort is easy. The difficulty lies in remembering how to fall into old, subtle habits when all you want to do is cause chaos. Staying engaged while chatting up Imperial scum as they spittle in their expensive liquors and moan about the woes of their occupations and agenda can only go on for so long.

Yet you laugh with the rest of them once they’re kissing your feet and your hands, because everyone in this rebellion has a part to play.

(Our loveliest of diamonds, back to see us once again.)

Luthen, of course, never leaves you to your own devices for long. Gifting a hefty sum of credits and a bag of dissolvable sedatives every time he passes through Canto Bight as his alter ego is about as noble as the illusive man gets.

You fill small briefcases with voice memos and holovideos of nightly conversations, drunken manifestos and slippery plans.

It works.

By some miracle, you have never been caught.

New Year’s Eve is filled to the brim with Imperial guards enjoying time off from their grueling schedules. Some of the higher commanding officers already have their arms draped over people inviting them to a great time. Others chase after the debauchery promised by scantily clad creatures inviting them into the halls and out of their money.

You? Have a booking in advance: a high-ranking officer, but not within the Inner Circle.

According to Luther, he’s a valuable asset double-crossing their superiors.

A plant.

You are to deliver the intel to him under Luthen’s command and trust.

(Ironic. You always believed Luthen trusted no one.)

At the final half hour of the year’s end, you round the corner from the main entertainment room and down the hallway towards the private event spaces. A multitude of sounds are muffled by the doors — some good, some not so. Your focus is set on the twelfth door where your officer awaits, and suddenly you feel nervous all over again.

Meeting one of Luthen’s other operatives feels all too daunting.

After a moment, you place your code into the code box by the door and wait for the durasteel to slide, revealing the plush crimson meeting space. It's staged with a convenient king-sized bed and a vanity for refreshment, inviting comfort and suggesting the obvious.

What greets you as the door opens — a silhouette at the edge of the bed, dressed in Imperial formals — is not what you envisioned.

The man’s hair is what you notice first: disheveled brown locks are combed back neatly, smoothed by gel to keep the unruliness at bay. The jacket’s shoulders are a little too pointed, as if he’s not grown into his uniform quite yet — or like he’d stolen it on his way into the venue. The lines on his faces aren’t new, but aren’t old. He’s tired — so fucking tired, but he sits taller the second the door opens.

The blank expression on his face is purposeful, almost doe-eyed, with a feigned, smug-like innocence only an Imperial officer would wear.

Then his gaze travels from your open-toed shoes, up your bodysuit dress of sequins, and locks onto your face.

Just like that, the façade is broken.

What once was blank now hardens, wholly confused, before the lines on his prominent brow smooth with recognition.

Cassian.

Of all the idiots in all the galaxy, Cassian Andor is dressed as an Imp in your meeting space on the eve of the new year.

And you thought, with this rebellion, that you’d seen everything.

While the officer in disguise is much older than what your memory recalls, you could never forget that face even if the Empire tried. The feeling of dirt under your fingernails, the scent of rubber burning, the spark of an electric charge from a stolen piece of property — it all floods back in a tidal wave, almost knocking you a step back into the hallway.

On Ferrix, Cassian Andor always ran around with different people — sometimes it was Bix when she wasn’t punished for entertaining teen scoundrels; sometimes it was other boys in scrappy brawls and mended machinery; most of the time, however, it was you.

Hand and hand, causing mayhem in the bright suns and the full moons. He'd shown you what it meant to stand up for yourself. To want what you want and not apologize for it. To be bold, even at the expense of disruption.

And then he’d pummel whatever wayward eye looked at you the wrong way.

Trouble. 

Cassian Andor was so much trouble, and you were mad for it.

Your last memory of him is as vivid as the neon lights lining the ceiling: you're both sixteen years old and shoulder-to-shoulder on an inclined metal slab, staring up at the stars. He's wearing that jacket from his father and hasn't combed his hair in days. You're lost in telling him about your dreams of a better tomorrow, of one day leaving Ferrix for good and making a difference in the vastness of the galaxy despite how small you feel. He laughs, a hum more than anything else, and takes your hand in his.

You're too afraid to squeeze back.

Having Cassian poke fun of the idea of doing much of anything in the galaxy never felt like he mocked you for wanting to try. More than anything, his laugh was one of envy: he couldn’t afford dreams, so you dreamt for the both of you. He couldn’t handle intimacy, so you were satisfied with resting your hand in his the entire night.

Nothing was said. Nothing had changed.

He gave what he could, and you understood.

Childhood friendship has a funny way of feeling that simple.

Cassian, however, never truly chose to change with you. He never truly chose anyone, not really, not when he had so much to give — to his mother, to his scrapyard confidantes, to Bix.

You fit somewhere in the chapters of his life, but Cassian Andor could never tell you which ones. He could not, and would not, promise someone tomorrow.

An unfinished book.

You never did tell him where you were going after hitching a ride on that stock transport to get the hell out of Ferrix for good. Not a single holocard or a note.

Just… gone, into the galaxy, to dream.

Now he sits in front of you at the edge of your meeting space bed, threatening to ruin your calculated cover in one-fell swoop.

Before Cassian can implode your operation, you turn on the mask: with a bright smile and squared shoulders, you gesture to the plush furniture of the room. “Is it to your liking, Mr. —?”

You trail off on your question to give him a chance to speak.

Cassian blinks a few times, only to remember himself.

“Raoul,” he blurts without dismissing his accent, eyes widening with an unspoken question: what are you doing here? “Sargeant Murl Raoul.”

Maker, you haven’t heard that voice in so long.

It’s deeper now. Rusty. Scratched.

“Sargeant,” you correct pleasantly, taking a step into the bedroom to toe the perimeter. Cassian pulls the geometric gray hat clear from his head, balling it in his fist, but you raise a palm at the hip when his mouth opens: don’t.

He listens, pressing his lips together with purpose.

“I asked if this room was to your liking," you repeat.

Cassian struggles with an answer, studying you with concern. You hate it. You hated it back on Ferrix when he tried to play protector, and a decade and a half apart doesn’t dilute the emotion.

Your brows rise, and he clears his throat. “I— yes, I am quite comfortable.”

“Good,” you conclude with a small nod. “Now before I join you and get more comfortable, do you have any questions for me?”

“More comfortable?” he asks a little too fast, so you recover with a glide of your hand along your sparkling thigh.

“Can’t do much when I’m in this old thing,” you coo, that stage performer voice now sounding so phony to your ears with a known audience. “Shouldn’t take long.”

Cassian runs the tip of his tongue along the seam off his lips, shifting his seat on the mattress. “I suppose I could ask how… uh, how long have you been doing… this?”

You don’t know if he’s asking about the escort arrangement or the Informant position, which further complicates the game. The odds of Cassian showing up on Canto Bight should be slim. Cassian wearing an Imperial outfit on his own ought to be slim to none. 

But appearing in your private meeting space, fake alias and all?

Your blood runs cold with truth between the lines.

(Luthen never does anything by accident.)

This meeting — reuniting Cassian and yourself — is his test, a judgment call, but you refuse to let Luthen win the game with this surprise hand.

“Years,” you answer honestly, to both.

You continue to face him as you skirt around the left side of the sparkling vanity, not taking any chances with your former friend. Your manicured fingers glide along the mirror’s back, searching for the planted Imperial wire.

(Not only are they cruel, but perverted in their efforts to catch spies.)

“So then you are... experienced?” The question comes out rougher than you believe he intends. Gruff, like he’s embarrassed to even ask.

(The question almost — almost — makes your face burn.)

“If you’re worried that you won’t have a good time, Sergeant, then I promise they sent you to me for a reason. I’m going to take great care of you.”

Cassian’s expression darkens at this as he rises to his feet with purpose.

You rip the microphone from the back of the mirror, holding the device between your index and middle finger for show. 

This stops him from moving ahead, eyes locked on the microphone before flickering back to you. You shake your head.

I said don’t.

He nods once, and you take the microphone between your hands. With two clicks, the wire cover pops open, displaying a multitude of tiny wires. You fidget between two, pulling, until the red eye at the center of the device dissolves into black.

The room is blanketed with silence.

Now it’s just you and a ghost here.

“We’re clear,” you tell him after another beat, dropping the seductive aloofness in your tone.

Cassian’s shoulders drop a fraction of an inch. “That was fast.”

Your brow picks up that fraction, raising high. “You have to dismantle them fast."

“Let me take a look at it,” Cassian replies, tossing the hat twisted in his hands to the mattress. "Are you certain it's off?"

“Positive,” you say, sheltering the item closer to your chest. “You don't need to look at it. Easy to disable and reassemble at a moment’s notice, so I’ll turn it back on when you depart.”

“What about lost footage?”

“Chalk it up as faulty equipment they’re too stubborn to replace in a shithole like this.”

Cassian mulls over your answer, taking a cautious few steps forward to observe the small device in your hand. “Imperial-grade wires are tough to work with. A five-second warning doesn’t give many people time to disable the alarm,” he informs in a whispered afterthought. “Where did you learn to do that?”

In your bones, you know it’s a trick question.

Fifteen-something years of reuniting in a moment like this comes with immense drawbacks. When he asks, it is not out of curiosity — it is out of the desire to see if you are truly you.

(Because he remembers your face, too.)

“On Ferrix,” you reply.

He gives no reaction, continuing to deadpan. “Where on Ferrix?”

“You want me to remember from that long ago?” you laugh, placing the microphone on the vanity’s surface and following up with a thick blue cloth to drape over top of it.

“Humor me,” he reasons, flexing his leather-clad fingers at his sides. Now that he doesn’t have a distraction, Cassian doesn’t stop looking at your face.

(The same intensity as the boy without dreams.)

“The old Slavyard. There was that one incredibly rainy month when those prim and proper freaks—”

“—installed the spyware on the back door in the middle of the night,” he interrupts, finishing the story with a misplaced awe under his breath. “You played lookout while I disabled the devices.”

You don’t answer, not really, as you offer a half-hearted smile. “Say what you want about that place, but you learn a lot of things when you watch restless boys who never know when to stop getting in trouble.”

The return smile is small and fleeting, but the corner of Cassian’s lip upticks. His brows knit together, contemplating before a huff of a laugh exits. “Not a very good lookout, then, if you were so busy watching me.”

“You never got caught, though, did you?” you joke.

You swear he almost laughs.

The silence settles at your ankles and rises with each passing second, encompassing you both in a shroud of possibilities: pleasantries are nice, but the popping of bottles and shouts of celebration passing by your room brings you both back to a reality where you’re playing pretend.

Cassian huffs once more, running a hand down his face and around his neck before dropping it in a gesture towards you. “He cannot be serious.”

He.

You catch that pronoun with intrigue and tilt your chin.

“Serious about what? Who’s ‘he’?”

His voice softens, shrinking in size, as he nears half a step closer and into your bubble. “Don’t tell me it’s you.” You maintain eye contact — maintain dominance of this situation — and stay in place. “When he said to wait…”

“...for the Informer, you didn’t think you’d run into a ghost?” you finish, and he’s polite enough not to nod. “He only told me the person he was sending in his stead was one of his best assets. This reunion isn’t my doing.”

“No,” Cassian agrees, low and certain. “It isn’t.”

Because Luthen knows.

Luthen knows, and that’s dangerous in and of itself: his little lamb on Ferrix knew his most trusted asset long before the mastermind was in the picture, and this sabotage is meant to figure you out.

(To figure you both out for his own gain: to make sure you were both up for the task, history aside.)

Your jaw clenches as you nod with assertion, mindful of the train of your body-tight dress when you shift around Cassian to create some space. He turns his torso, following.

“Did he force you to do this?” When you pause in your steps to quirk a brow, he struggles with verbalizing what this means. “Entertaining these low lives while they piss their credits away.”

“Very strong words for someone dressed as an Imp.”

He completely ignores you, hyper in his budding rage. “Because if anyone has touched you—”

“No one’s forcing me to do anything, Cass,” you reply, hateful that the former nickname leaves your lips so fluidly; as if no time has passed. “We’re all cogs working for the same machine.”

“That doesn’t mean he should be having you do this on your own,” the man argues. “He’s not even on the planet, for fuck’s sake. This is dangerous work.”

“You keep saying this or that, but you’re not really asking the real question.” Your nose scrunches, maliciously playful. “I don’t fuck them. It’s pretend, Cassian. My honor is intact.”

Cassian squints with a scoff. “That isn’t what I meant—”

“It isn’t?” you challenge.

“No,” he responds just as fast and just as intense. A smirk plays on your lips, slow and growing. “Fuck whoever you’d like to fuck. One or a dozen, I don’t care, but not them. They don’t deserve you.”

“And who does?”

“I don’t know, but not Luthen or the pieces of shit out there or anyone on this planet.”

“Not even you, right?”

He stares down at you, hard. You snort in disbelief.

“I never thought I’d see the day where Cassian Andor is jealous of a body count, but I guess stranger things have happened for both of us.”

Cassian’s jaw sets, nostrils flaring with an anger he refuses to bury completely. He searches your face, lost on a response, before sharply inhaling through his nose.

“I need information on your regulars.”

Ah.

No more games. 

You roll your eyes, absently waving him off as you turn to walk towards the crate-like nightstand. “I have the files on a drive.”

No more games, or so you thought — Cassian follows close behind. “Drives are easily corruptible or lost or stolen. You could just tell me.”

Your hand hovers on the drawer when you turn your chin to look at him. “Yeah, sure, let me just… tell you about a mission I’ve spent years finessing so you can get the details wrong when you relay with Luthen.”

“Do you think so little of my memory skills?” he says and it’s a joke, but it teeters on the edge of an argument.

Just like old times.

You don’t need this type of deja vu before the new year.

“Whisper down the lane only goes so far,” you answer, turning back to the drawer in front of you. Your hand lifts the edge of the bottom plate, removing a small box from the center of the hidden compartment.

You only pause when you feel his presence right behind you as soft puffs of air tickle the back of your exposed neck.

He says nothing, not at first, in this proximity. Then a syllable sounds:

“Why?”

The question is a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it whisper. His voice flutters along your skin, causing a shiver down your spine. Deep down you know he’s not asking about the drive or your distaste for his preferred method of relay. Why — the one word you hoped to never face.

If you concentrate hard enough, you can smell the scent of his cologne.

It smells nothing like Cassian.

You stay focused on a miniscule dot on the wall, too afraid to turn around.

“We can’t do this here,” you murmur, barely audible in return.

“I paid for the hour,” he replies. “If I were to leave ten minutes into your company, then there would be questions.”

(He’s right. As much as you hate it, your former friend is right.)

You raise your chin to the ceiling, closing your eyes. Contemplating. Seeking anything, everything, to say to avoid what’s to come.

You open your mouth to speak, but Cassian gets there first.

“I looked for you.” A vulnerable statement from an impenetrable man. His chin leans forward, the warmth of him spreading to your aura. “In dozens of quadrants—”

“Cassian.”

“—and about a hundred planets—”

“Stop.”

“—but you left nothing.” The final word emphasizes with raw emotion, causing your throat to swell. His gloved hand rests on your tricep, but you turn to finally face him. The closeness of him is a surprise — piercing brown eyes meet yours with mere centimeters between noses. “No note, no goodbye, no telling where you might have headed. Nothing.”

Frowning, you don’t realize that you’re shaking your head. The lines on his face are too distracting. He is distracting.

“You were never supposed to see me again.”

“And I never understood why.” He steps forward. You step back. When you think he won’t advance, he continues to step once, twice, until the third lands your back to the corner of the room. “So I am asking — now — while I can still have you: why?”

While I can still have you. You know the implication isn’t there, not truly, but your heart aches for it. The tension makes you feel so small, as if you’re eighteen and flying all over again.

You’re supposed to be over this; over him.

“I had to start new,” you answer after a considerable pause, forcing yourself to look him in the eye in what little space is held between you. “I was always going to leave Ferrix.”

“I knew that,” he argues softly. “I was never going to deter you from—”

“No. No, you were never going to,” you agree, nodding. “But you were always off and on the planet, doing what you had to for everyone else. If I didn’t cut Ferrix out of my life, then I wonder if I would have had the same fate as my parents or my friends: getting stuck there. And not just getting stuck, but waiting.”

“Waiting?” Cassian asks with confusion, brows knit.

You relax against the wall with a humorless laugh. “How did you not see it? The way I always waited for you.” Anxious, you turn your cheek to check the main door as you mull over your next few words. “I would have waited my whole life for you.”

The air in the room shifts.

Although he remains in your peripheral vision, the man stays staring at you without a discernible expression. The gravity of what you’re admitting drags lower, lower, until he says something that forces you to look at him head-on:

“I thought you were indifferent to me.”

Your eyes widen. “Indifferent?”

Cassian nods, short and quick. “You had all these big plans. I listened for hours. Not one of them involved me.”

“Because I didn’t think you’d want to be a part of those plans.”

“Maybe I didn’t think I couldn’t make a difference, not in a… rebellion, though the irony is not lost on me now,” he admits with a huff of a laugh, “but I wanted to be a part of you. I didn’t care what it was, so long as I still had you.”

You stare at him as he stares back at you, totally dumbfounded with this brand new information. Cassian swallows thickly, shifting his weight yet again from one leg to another. The loud party continues outside of your room, drowning these confessions in the excitement for a nearing midnight.

You had all these big plans.

Memories warp at a second’s notice as your brain tries to understand what he’s laid at your altar.

Not one of them involved me.

He shouldn’t be saying this.

He shouldn’t be saying any of this.

Closing your eyes to find a pause in your racing thoughts, you try — try to find where perhaps this is fabricated, designed to see if you’re easily swayed by the past that you so desperately let die in this rebellion.

Slowly, your eyelids flutter open. Cassian is watching with something close to concern.

(Something, maybe, closer to fear.)

You gently shake your head. “This is a test.” 

“I know.” 

“Luthen did this—” 

“Fuck Luthen,” he breathes out, eyes dropping to stare at your lips, and your heartbeat quickens. 

His brows meet in the middle, concentrated yet lost — as if he’s back on Ferrix, scrawny and scrappy and calculating the gravity of the risk should he decide to steal or trespass —

Or do something he wasn’t supposed to. 

“Cassian.” 

Your voice is gentle with a warning. His eyes do not raise, but he does answer.

“What?”

“You have that look on your face.” 

“I have a look?”

“When you’re contemplating doing something stupid? Yes.”

He snorts, amused. “You remember what that looks like after fifteen years?”

“It's very hard to forget it.” 

He mulls the moment over, flickering his attention back up to your eyes and nodding.

“You’re right. I am thinking of doing something stupid.”

“How stupid?”

“Incredibly.”

A beat passes.

Finally he blinks up to your eyes, searching for an answer to a question he hasn’t asked yet. You wait, just as you’ve always waited, to hear his voice.

“It’s almost midnight,” he says, flexing the leather gloved hand at his side. “I should go.”

Everything sinks.

The crowd outside grows louder as people depart from their private rooms to celebrate in the middle of the casino. Everyone begins the unison countdown of the final minute until the new year rings out.

The device in your hand grows heavy — a reminder of why he’s here in the first place, what Luthen will be looking for, yet your arm cannot rise to give it over.

(A few more minutes and he’ll be gone.)

To find a reason to keep him here with you would be selfish.

Instead of protesting, you nod. 

“Yeah. You should go.”

He nods, too, and his throat bobs with a swallow.

Outside your door, their laughter and shouts reach a collective ten, nine, eight, seven…

Yet he doesn’t move. 

Neither do you.

Six, five, four, three…

“Cass?”

Two.

Cassian speaks with broken finality, rushed and wanting. “I can't go without—”

You beat him to it.

Canto Bight’s cliffside casino roars with excitement of the new year while you grab the lapel of his Imperial uniform, dragging him in as he simultaneously launches his lips to yours.

The force of him smacks your head into the wall, but the stars behind your eyes aren’t from impact. It’s from the way he presses his mouth to yours, desperate to pour years of frustration and wonder into a long-awaited kiss. You whimper into it, eager to dissolve any space between you.

Cassian Andor cages your head into the palms of his gloved hands, holding you with a tenderness and strength only he can have. He groans into your mouth when he tastes you, tongue dragging along your lower lip — the neediness of it is enough to make your knees give out.

Except he drops his hands to your shoulders and spins you, pressing your chest into the wall. Using your hands to balance yourself, Cassian wastes not a second more to place his hands over yours, pinning you in place.

“We should have — opened with a fight,” he murmurs breathlessly into your ear, kissing your earlobe before bringing it into his mouth. 

You bite back a moan, dropping your forehead to the wall. “If I'd known you wanted to kiss me after all this time, Cass, then I would have — gone straight past a fight and went for it.”

He chuckles behind you, letting go of your earlobe to travel kisses down the side of your neck.

“There is a lot I wanted to do back then, but I was too chickenshit to try it.”

The imagery of a lot burns into the back of your skull.

“And now?” you ask, but it’s wavered.

Cassian slows down, but his lips remain against the crook of your neck. You mourn the loss of speed, pushing your hips back to connect with his.

A hand shoots down to still your waist as his thumb runs soothing strokes into the skintight dress.

“Not here,” he decides, but it isn’t regretful. It’s determined. “When I see you again—”

“When?” you interrupt.

“When,” he enforces, squeezing your waist, “I see you again, I’ll do what I’ve been too chickenshit to do and it won’t be under a watchful eye.”

When I see you again.

You smile small, delirious in the haze of him.

“Is that a promise?”

“As good as I can make one,” he responds in earnest, turning to leave a small kiss on your cheek. “You’re not losing me so easily this time.”

And you believe him.

Misunderstandings, miscommunications — all of that hardship to end up here, of all places.

You have so much to learn.

(He has so much to hear.)

Even if this was Luthen’s doing, even if this was a test of faith, you cannot find a reason to care. Not when your lips still tingle with the kiss you’d only dreamt about your entire life.

Reaching for his arm, you gently bring his free hand to yours and place the small drive in the middle of his palm. Cassian’s chin drops to observe the tiny metal, jaw setting to its unreadable clench.

Because at the end of the night, you both still have jobs to do.

A new year.

(A new horizon.)

“Until next time,” you say, removing your hand from his.

Cassian curls his fingers over the drive, shoving the small device in his coat pocket. He flexes and raises his hand to bring it up to your cheek, cradling your face once more as he leans in for one final kiss. This time it’s softer. Timid.

The closest Cassian Andor can ever get to a promise.

He pulls away, nose to nose, and mirrors in reply.

“Until next time.”

[strwberri-milk]

Songs of Sorrow - Ch. 3

Rancher!AU || Boothill x Fem!Reader || Slowburn, Drama

oh my god FINALLY first contact

You practise smiling in the mirror, trying to nail the look you’re going for today. You want to be simple, understated. The set for today is along those lines after all, you feeling up to performing more pensive ballads. You weren’t often given the chance to explore such songs but since your contact was finally coming to an end the management was willing to bend for you a little bit more. 

You wait for your cue, thinking for a moment you might miss some parts of this life when Sampo walks in. He’s been hanging around a lot more often recently, not something that you were exactly used to. He had many ventures on other planets and as far as you understood this wasn’t quite his most profitable one. 

“Good evening again,” he greets, pulling up a chair beside you to join you. 

“I have a proposition for you.” 

“If it doesn’t end in my debt being paid off sooner I don’t want it,” you sigh, turning back to the mirror to give yourself an excuse to stop talking to him. 

“Don’t tell me all you’re thinking about is money,” he mopes, clearly playing it up. 

“I don’t want to hear that from you. What do you want now? I thought you would have left by now on a business trip.” 

“That’s exactly why I’m here to talk to you! How would you like the chance to make more money?” 

His palm lands on the vanity beside you, forcing your attention back over to him. 

“Come on. You know I’d never steer you wrong, don’t you? I’ve been presented with a great business opportunity and I think you should come with me.” 

You raise a brow, scoffing in disbelief. 

“There’s no way you think I’d actually want to extend my contract.”

“That’s the best part! You’d get paid more. You don’t have the debt after all and I’d be nice enough to consider going down to a 70-30 split. You wouldn’t have the opportunity if it weren’t for me after all.” 

He seems smug with himself, clearly thinking that this was something you’d genuinely consider. You almost can’t believe him, rolling your eyes as your cue to come on stage. 

“I’m not going to keep doing this on your terms. Despite how shit you pay me I’ve got enough savings to take care of myself while I find a job that actually pays me properly without this stupid debt hanging over my head.” 

You don’t need to look at him to know Sampo is not happy with your decision. His arms are crossed, usually easy going expression darkening into something that would scare you if you weren’t so giddy about finally being able to leave. 

The stage loves you and you have to admit you’ve grown to love it back. You sweep up the mic stand, crooning to it reverentially as though it were a lover. The pianist keeps in time with you, your good mood leading you to walk further along the length of the bar today. Those who normally don’t get to see you up close start to get excited with equal parts joy and awe at seeing the performer they’ve been watching for years. You offer them a gentle wave, wanting to keep the allure of being so close yet so far from them on your person. 

You come right up against the bar, winking at the bartender of the month as you survey the clientele, eyes falling on a figure sitting at the end by himself. The fact that he’s alone isn’t what catches your eye. Instead, you’re curious by the way he looks at you, leaning against the counter and smirking when your eyes meet. 

You avert your gaze, mentally running through a catalogue of guests in your head to see if you could recognise him. If he makes a habit of sitting this far away from you then it’d make sense that you can’t place him, making your way back to the stage. Maybe if you socialise around a little someone can tell you whether or not he’s a local, unsure why you’re even that curious about him in the first place. The dim lighting of the bar only lets you see the slope of his jaw and an intense gaze that you think you still feel right now. A shudder runs through your body and you can’t be sure it isn’t one of excitement. 

With today being the middle of the week your set was scheduled earlier. It gives you more time with your evening to do as you please but thanks to that man at the bar you decide to linger. You talk to some of the regulars, almost forgetting Sampo’s offer to you until you see him round the corner. The patrons greet him gregariously. 

“Congratulations again on opening that new lounge!” one starts, piquing your intrigue. 

“Thank you, but it wouldn’t be possible without help from you guys. I’ve opened it practically by using all of your money,” he laughs, ever the charmer. 

“Such a disappointment you’ll be taking this one with you,” the other sighs, looking pointedly at you.

“What do you mean?” you ask, glaring at Sampo.

“I talked to you about this earlier, remember? You said that you’d agree.” 

You know he knows you didn’t. He knows you know you didn’t. But that’s not going to stop him from putting you in a tough situation, taking your silence as a way to push on. 

“The pay’s going to be much better there and the lounge itself is much more luxurious than this,” Sampo continues, throwing an arm around your shoulder and pulling you into his side. 

“It’d be dumb not to take the offer, don’t you think?” he asks the customers, both of them laughing boisterously. 

“Doesn’t matter if it’s a shithole in the middle of the galaxy. As long as you’re performing I’ll be there,” one winks, reaching out to touch you. 

Sampo quickly smacks the hand away, holding you in a way that could be perceived as protective. 

“You know better than to touch my staff. I’m not running that sort of business.” 

You don’t hesitate to think that if he figured out how to control it, he’d be more than willing to open up a brothel. The demand certainly existed but not enough for him to look into it yet. You just knew of other staff who’d go home for a decent chunk of change and a Sampo who was more than happy to accept their money. 

“I didn’t say I’d agree and you know that,” you hiss at Sampo, sneaking out of his grasp. 

The smile remains on his face, one that doesn’t give you much hope that he’s actually heard what you said but you ignore it. As long as you’ve paid off your debts to him there’s no longer anything he could do to you. He owed you that much at least. 

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧───  ｡ﾟ☆ *.☽ .*☆｡ﾟ ───✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

Boothill finishes off the glass of whiskey in front of him, softly humming along to the music coming from the stage. He’ll be the first to admit that the singer’s voice is truly as soothing as people claimed it to be. It’s comforting in the same way that a quiet evening in the tall grass was, hat placed over his face as he lets the breeze dance over his skin.

Starting up his ranch was hard work but nothing that scared him off. It ate up all of his time, keeping him away from this supposedly amazing lounge that had opened up in his absence. Now that he’s more than just settled in, he decided it’d do him good to take a day off for the first time in the last few years. He was glad that he made it just in time for the belle of the ball. 

Just like all the others, his eyes follow the singer’s form lazily making its way through the floor. Every step was made with intent, a certain charm that cloaked the figure in mystique that made him curious to find out more. Unlike the others he wasn’t interested in making the first move, or any move in general, content enough to just be able to bask in the presence. 

That was until the star landed just outside his orbit. 

Instinctively, he finds himself leaning against the wood of the bar’s counter, hat low on his head even inside as a force of habit from working in the harsh sun. He turns towards the singer, eyes trying their best not to gawk too much at the vision of beauty in front of him. Instead, he lets a smirk settle on his face as he tips his hat, keeping his distance to avoid burning up. The flush on the singer’s face was more than enough reward for him, chuckling softly to himself as the song came to a close.

Boothill never thought of himself as an especially romantic man, caught up in far nastier things to be able to consider something like that. But, something about the lowlight of the bar and the peace that finally started to settle on his shoulders made his mind wander. 

“Don’t tell me you’re falling in love already,” the bartender quips, making Boothill laugh. 

“Don’t be stupid,” he scoffs, handing back his glass to get another drink. 

“Just admirin’ is all. Don’t tell me you aren’t doin’ the same - I saw that wink.”

“I know better than to get involved with the staff here. No guarantee they’ll be here next week after all. You’re new here, aren’t you?” 

At that Boothill finds himself shaking his head, scoffing.

“Nothin’ of the sort. I just took some years away and finally thought I deserved a break is all. Don’t be actin’ like you don’t know me when you’re servin’ my cattle.” 

Recognition dawns in the man’s eyes, nodding. 

“I wondered who bought out our old supplier. You haven’t been in the business long, have you?” the bartender hums. 

“Clementine’s only been open under me three years but I grew up on a farm. Wasn’t too hard to step back in considerin’ there weren’t many ranches here that seem to know what they’re doing. The pasture was cheap and I have money to burn. ‘Sides, it’s easy to undercut those sellers that y’all have to import in if I got my own small team of staff that can deliver products as soon as ya need them.” 

He would have preferred to start from scratch but he knew realistically it would take far too long to source both a herd and some decent pasture for them. It was cheaper and easier to simply find some rancher who was far too out of depth with what they were doing, becoming the owner of Clementine’s Ranch practically overnight. The previous rancher looked relieved to see that someone wanted to take what he saw as a money sink off his hands so easily, probably kicking himself at how easy it was for Boothill to turn a profit. 

Then again, he knows that he’s just stupid good at his job. Failure was never an option for him. 

“Well, I’ll be the first to tell you everybody loves your product. Ever since you’ve been working over there everybody’s been ordering meals and making sure we’re using your livestock. If it’s anything else they don’t want it.” 

Boothill sits back in his seat, smirking smugly to himself. 

“Good to hear. So long as everybody’s enjoying the food I’m providin’ that’s all that matters.” 

He takes another sip of his drink, eyes wandering until they find the owner of the bar. He’d met the eccentric looking man often enough for business deals. On his arm is the singer from earlier and he can’t help but consider going over to talk to the two of them. It’s not like he’d be out of place to speak to the owner considering their business dealings but something about the singer under his arm makes Boothill balk, deciding that it was time to call it a night. 

He could always come back again tomorrow night. 

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧───  ｡ﾟ☆ *.☽ .*☆｡ﾟ ───✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

Boothill’s days always start off simple. 

He wakes up with the sun, stretching out his body and heading to the kitchen to brew some hot coffee. He makes sure to make enough for the ranch hands that’ll be arriving in a few hours, always inviting them in for a hot cup before they get their day started. After that, he enjoys the remnants of the sunrise, standing out on his porch as he takes in the dewy air from the previous night’s condensation. 

The thrill of chasing criminals and enforcing intergalactic bounties kept him busy, but not in the way he needed it to. He forgot how much he missed the simple routine of waking up to put in an honest day’s hard work, working out his body in a significantly less deadly manner. 

The sun beats down on the pasture as he’s tailed by two very excited dogs, more than happy to join Boothill on his busy day. They’re both rescues he adopted from a shelter, herd dogs who were unfortunately needing to be rehomed after being taken into families that don’t quite know how to take care of such energetic dogs. They took to the jobs quickly, Boothill taking great care to make sure the dogs were happy and healthy. 

“Oh! Boothill, you’re up!” 

Boothill blinks, shaking his head in amusement as he crosses his arms at the sight of the young man already up and preparing feed for the morning. 

“Luka. I didn’t see your car in the driveway. What time did you get here boy?” he asks affectionately, stepping over to join in helping his efforts. 

“Just half an hour ago. I didn’t wanna bother you so I parked further down the river and enjoyed a bit of a walk to the property before getting the day started.” 

“Good on ya. Don’t be workin’ yourself too hard though. Don’t wantcha keelin’ over and dyin’ on me. It’s hard to find good help, especially one as devoted as you are. Now let me help you out with that.” 

The days always pass by a little too quickly for Boothill’s liking but he never minds. He enjoys what he does, spoiling his animals with all the attention he has. He never mixes up any of the animals with each other, keeping them all active and well fed. If you didn’t know better you’d have no idea that Boothill was the boss of the whole operation. He works just as hard, if not harder than any of his staff, offering advice like he was just a friend. 

The first year his absolute determination to make the ranch work is palpable. He doesn’t overwork anybody of course but it’s hard to go home when Boothill makes himself busy even after preparing dinner for all of the staff. He scarcely had a moment to himself but he loved it, seeing the way his efforts were turning back tenfold as the ranch bettered itself. As time passed things only got easier, Boothill more comfortable but almost growing bored.

His evenings became even less eventful. 

He’d clean himself up, laying in a tub as he soaks the grime off of his body. Now that the ranch was out of the crisis he bought it in he didn’t have anything to focus on. On his next trip in to deliver product to several clients he’d overheard some people gushing about last night’s show at that lounge Sampo ran. He’d never seen the establishment at night, doing his deliveries early in the morning to free up the day for his animals but judging by how excited those patrons seemed he decided to come to a show. 

One show became another and soon he found himself absolutely enraptured by everything you are. He knew your name from the advertisements, memorising the letters on the board to make sure he didn’t waste his evenings on some other sub-par entertainment that he didn’t care about nearly as much as you. 

He became obsessed, fully aware that he was putting you on some sort of pedestal but he found it fun. He flirted with feelings he’d never really been able to explore. You were beautiful to him, a siren call that had him coming back to you every night. He knew he wasn’t the only one, tons of patrons coming to your shows on a regular basis. 

Whenever you came down to sit near the bar coquettishly, blinking up at anybody who met your gaze, he had to do everything in his power not to melt. You’ve already got him in the palm of your hands and he doesn’t even know if the name on the poster is actually your name. He understands the allure of celebrity crushes now, but thinks that what he’s got for you is a little too real to be simplified to something like that. 

He’d go home with a slight buzzing in his ears, not bothering to stay for any of the other performers. Some of the people he sat with noticed his schedule, teasing him slightly for having it so bad for you. He didn’t even quite understand what that entailed but he did know being near you made his day better.

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved on our archive

By - Nicola Davis

Immunologists push for increase in testing and more widespread vaccine booster rollout as new variant, XEC, emerges

Covid is on the rise in England, and experts have warned that more must be done to prevent and control infections after a “capitulation to the virus”.

Prof Danny Altmann, an immunologist at Imperial College London, said those working in the field were perplexed by the current attitude to the battle against Covid, as the latest figures showed an increase in hospital admissions.

The latest data for England from the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) showed that hospital admissions increased to 3.71 per 100,000 population for the week between 16 and 22 September 2024, compared with 2.56 per 100,000 the previous week.

The percentage of people with symptoms who have tested positive for Covid, based on tests at sentinel “spotter” laboratories, has also risen in the last week to 11.8% compared with 9.1% in the previous week.

Altmann described the prevailing stance on the virus as a “capitulation”. “To those who work in this field, the current attitude of acceptance to losing this war of attrition against Covid is puzzling and a little desperate,” he said.

“The data, both in the UK and US, show that the current Omicron subvariants are hugely successful at punching through any dwindling population immunity, so that we tolerate huge prevalence of around 12%. Our capitulation to the virus is a combination of a population where most are now many months or years from their last vaccine dose, and that vaccine dose was in any case poorly cross-protective for the very distinct current variants.

“Clearly, there is behavioural polarisation between those who are worried by this and look for mitigation, and those who think we must learn live with it and paid too high a price for our earlier measures,” he said.

Dr Simon Williams, from Swansea University, added that surveys suggest there is also a large group of people who are not thinking much about Covid at all. “Part of this is psychological – for two to three years it was something people had to think about all the time and is something that for many had many negative memories and feelings attached to it,” he said.

While Altmann said debate around measures needed to be properly informed and data-driven and to avoid extreme stances, it was important not to trivialise the impact of the virus.

“Those at the weaker end of the immune response spectrum may often experience four or more breakthrough infections per year. These may range from mild to those needing several days of work, with all the associated economic costs, plus any additional NHS burden,” he said.

Altmann also stressed the impact of long Covid, noting that it is thought to affect around 400 million people globally – with 3% lost workforce and a global cost estimate of $1tn annually – and can arise even in vaccinated people following reinfection.

The latest Covid data comes as a new variant is expected to become prevalent in the coming months. Known as XEC, it was first identified in Germany over the summer, and cases have already been identified in the UK. It is thought to have emerged from two other Covid variants, themselves descended from the BA.2.86 variant.

However, experts have said that, at present, XEC is not thought to cause different symptoms from previous variants and does not appear to be fuelling a surge in cases. It is also expected that Covid vaccinations and past infections will continue to offer protection against severe disease.

While bookings for the NHS autumn Covid booster jabs opened this week, Altmann said they should be offered more widely, together with increased use of lateral flow testing to avoid the spread of Covid.

Williams added that it was strange that more had not been done to clean indoor air and improve ventilation in public spaces including schools.

But while he backed offering boosters more widely, he also raised concerns: “I worry that again this autumn we will see a relatively low uptake of the booster among priority groups, including younger adults with a compromised immune system.”

[washed-octopus]

{@commanders-quarters}

It was a Monday evening like any other.

The incubation tanks, much like the severed sanitized tentacles that drifted absentmindedly within them, were still in their infancy. A fresh project on the cutting board. Such freshness was decidedly only worthy of being maintained by the most delicate pincers of metallic sheen.

Tartar’s inky claws rapped on the rust-kissed surface of the aged wall beside the elevator— a distraction from a recurring annoyance. He’d long since learned how to tune out the litany of chants from the training sanitized soldiers, yes, but he could seldom ignore each mild inadequacy that presented itself; it could be modeled by those who lagged behind in their footwork, or those whose strikes just scarcely missed their mark.

Food for later, it thought to itself offhandedly.

Finally, the elevator arrived, and it lumbered inside, taking care to angle its frame such that its back wouldn’t connect with the peak of the open frame.

The button for the second floor— the one housing the main surgical facilities in addition to the sector containing the incubation tanks— is pressed shortly after.

Idling away the seconds, stood formally as ever, he swears he feels a bump in the elevator’s trajectory, but it’s practically imperceptible. It goes ignored.

Once it stepped out, it halted mid-step to survey the area and recalibrate its internal navigation program, trying to align it with its previously saved layout of this floor. An error occurs. That can’t be right. He glances back towards the wall near the elevator. Instead of the usual identifying sequence that would indicate his metro, J-152291-L, he sees a sequence reading C-1515-L painted vertically along the wall. A different metro. Of course. The threads within the spool must be overlapping again. It should’ve paid closer attention to that disturbance within the elevator.

Tartar was on high alert now as he gazed out across the dark expanse of labyrinthine hospital curtains and stationary carts of medical equipment. It couldn’t hear a pulse for miles, but its radar was still detecting a presence within the area. He doesn’t call out, as he’s certain he’ll find the source soon enough, so for now, he stalks along on his pointed boots in silence.

Searching.

@commanders-quarters Today has been an odd day. Spui had been hard at work just hours ago, but his normal duties had taken a backseat as he had been ordered to keep track of any anomalous happenings. As annoying as it was to have his work messed with, he understood. Time and space had always been strange in the deepsea, but as of recent things had gotten more intense. Patients had been disappearing into thin air when nobody was around. And new ones had been appearing out of the blue as well. Of course, they were treated just like any others. A patient is a patient no matter where they might have come from. Being from a different time and place won’t keep you from being saved. But nevertheless, Spui would have been at work treating patients as he had been all morning, if not for the fact there was no one around. No one but him. Spui sat in an office chair, filling out forms as a creeping anxiety swelled within him. It was much too quiet, he hadn’t heard from anyone in hours, Not even from the Commander. It was unusual. Something was wrong, but he already knew that. Still, it ate away at him. Then he heard something, in the far distance, the ding of an elevator. And then, nothing. He tidied up his papers and got up from his desk. Walking out into the stretching hallways he looked around. Nothing.