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yan-lorkai · 10 months ago

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Só lembrei da minha ideia agora, perdão mandar tarde assim

Você conseguiria escrever yandere! Azul, malleus e vil com uma Yuu que simplesmente não fica presa?

Não é como se ela quisesse fugir ou estivesse muito desconfortável, pelo contrário, elaate gosta deles, ela simplesmente so não fica presa

Tipo, o malleus prende ela em um quarto e meia hora depois ela tá andando pela diasomnia como se ela não tivesse feito a coisa mais impressionante do mundo, e quando perguntam pra ela "como vc escapou?" Ela só fala tipo "ah mano, o cadeado quebrou" como se não fosse nada

Muito obrigada, e time muito cuidado consigo mesma

.⁠｡⁠*⁠♡ Translation: Can I have Azul, Malleus and Vil with a reader that always escape somehow? Like, she's super lucky and things tend to work for her. But it's not that she wants to run away or don't like them, it's just somehow she always escape.

.⁠｡⁠*⁠♡ A/N: Gonna reply in english, Sweetie! But omg have I told you already that I loved this? This is all so silly and they're so dramatic, help---. I was imagining so many scenes when I was writing those hcs that I sincerely thought for a whole second to write a oneshot instead. Glad I didn't because it would be lengthy as hell, not that I won't do it in the future 👀. Well I hope you enjoy, darling! <33

.⁠｡⁠*⁠♡ Warnings: Yandere content, kidnapping (on malmal's part), Azul's insecurity + him guilty tripping reader, reader loves the yandere, technically fem!reader but no pronouns / gendered terms were used so everyone can read!

Malleus is a powerful wizard and he knows it. He could move mountains with the blink of an eye or make the seas stir, in fact, he would be more than happy to demonstrate everything he can do in front of you. He almost looks like a bird trying to impress its partner. So silly.

The problem is that Malleus is possessive, he wants you by his side all the time. He wants you to be the blood that runs through his veins, wants you to be the air he breathes and the water that touches his lips, that's why, after a few months of just being your friend, he takes the first step and asks you to be his lover. And he's a good boyfriend, a little clumsy and confused, of course, it's his first time in a romantic relationship, but he always tries to be better for you. He is almost perfect.

But not even that can tame the inner dragon that roars and breathes fire inside, far from it, having you so close makes Malleus more greedy. He just wants more and as usual he simply takes what he wants. Your moving into his room as he likes to call it happens at night, after you sleep so peacefully without knowing what is happening, his fingers gently groping over your skin, his lips connecting with your cheeks and forehead as he watches over your dreams. He can get used to it.

When you wake up and the first thing you see is your boyfriend and hear him say all those absurd things and feelings that have been building up in his chest, of course you don't react well. You're scared, confused but there's still love for him in your heart as you slowly turn away and hide yourself on his blankets, pondering.

But there's nothing you can do, not at that moment and controlling yourself as much as you can, you pretend that kidnapping people because you love them so much is considered normal - for someone who has lived a long time like him, Malleus certainly doesn't understand sarcasm, since he's overjoyed, kissing you and being content in watching you do completely mundane things.

By the way, even if you wanted to run away, appealing to Silver's good heart or Sebek's sense of justice is in vain. If their prince decided to do what he did then they won't stop him, instead they will talk to you, explain to you that things will be better if you just accept it. And Lilia will endorse this thought.

Now, after some time passed and you realized that you didn't care, it's not as if you're trying to escape per say. But as you were trying to open the doors to go outside for something, you applied a little more force and it opened. The same happened when you tried to open the windows, removing the padlocks from them with ease since they weren't even closed, letting the sun's rays illuminate Malleus's room. If Malleus was trying to keep you in his room he was failing horribly.

Your supposed plans to escape improving with each new attempt, but no matter how many times you "escaped" Malleus always seems to be two steps ahead, a smug smile on his lips.

He always knows that you will try to run away, just as he knows that after that you will come running into his arms as if nothing had happened, wanting the comfort that only he can offer. While your escape attempts are funny to watch, he asks you why you always escape and how, and your answer makes him laugh loudly. So you're not trying to escape, you just don't like to spend everyday in his room and away from him? Granted, he now takes you on walks in Diasomnia's gardens and through some ruins he has found. He also allows you to spend time with his brothers and father.

Now that he knows you're not trying to escape, Malleus will let you walk peacefully through Diasomnia and the campus but you know that somehow he is always watching you. At the end of the day you will return to his side.

⠀

Vil knows who he is and what he is capable of doing, what he is capable of achieving if he stays focused and persists in whatever is on his mind. And at the moment what occupies his mind is you, his sweet schatz. Loving you is the best thing that has happened to him, so soft and sublime, just like the books and movies suggested it would be.

And it's out of love that Vil brings you to live at Pomefiore after talking to you and knowing your opinion, he knows very well that his feelings of possession are unhealthy but in a world of villains, you learn to ignore that. It doesn't mean he doesn't first try to get your opinion on moving before he becomes a villain who stole your freedom in your eyes. And seriously, life in Pomefiore is better than in Ramshackle where you had to hope the roof didn't fly off and be careful with the stairs and the leaks and the hard mattress that made your back hurt.

You notice that Vil reveals his true colors slowly, switching this and that in your schedule to match his. Or doing your skin care himself because he likes the control and taking care of you, and well, you don't really care about that. Not even with the big changes he makes, as long as he still loves you, you follow him without complaining. And Vil realizes this, which is why he never imagined you would try to escape from him. If you can call this an escape attempt, that is.

You were creating potions in Vil's personal laboratory. Why? Because you wanted to show him what you had learned today, but the potion was so potent that it almost put him to sleep as soon as he smelled it. Needless to say, he wasn't happy about it, a little disoriented and with a growing migraine on the way, he thought that you were trying to put him to sleep to run away. But he was strangely happy to notice that you were feeling guilty and explaining what were your intentions as you make sure that everything's was alright with him. As an actor he knows how to recognize a liar, but you spoke the truth. So he decided to let it go.

It was just a single, terrible mistake, right?

Such incidents continued to occur. Sometimes even Rook had difficulty following you around campus, having to use his Unique Magic to be able to keep his eyes on you. Lady Lucky seemed to favor your above everyone else, helping you in your little escapades. You did a little bit of everything, you even managed to create a shrinking potion, staying tiny for a whole day and, instead of looking for Vil to fix this problem, you went out there into the world wanting to experience the spontaneity of the moment. One of these days you'll leave him gray with worry.

Despite the frustration bubbling within him, Vil sits you down at his dressing table to work on your hair and asks you about all these incidents, wondering if they were just tests to see how far you could push him to his limit before actually trying to escape. But when you explain your intentions to him, knowing that you're not trying to get away from him takes a weight off his shoulders. The whole situation becomes comical, here he was worried and with countless thoughts running through his head, a particularly potent potion hidden in his pocket and here you are, completely unaware of the effects you have on him.

He thinks it's ridiculous that he considered that you would run away when he stops to think about how you adore his affection, drink in his every word and savor his every gesture. You're a troublemaker but are still so dependent on him. Maybe he was a little hasty and now he can finally relax. This little quality of yours though both confounded and captivated him.

⠀⠀

Azul is above all a strategist. He plans everything from the way you will meet for the first time to the way he will steal something from you. Maybe a talent, maybe a skill, but something will become his to satisfy that strange feeling he has in his chest every time he sees you. Weeks of plans are thrown out the window as soon as one day you sit in his office chair, wanting to make a contract with him. And that is the unique chance he has been waiting for, regardless of what your heart desires, he is able to achieve it and in return have you.

If only it were that simple... It's only after his whole overblot fiasco that you finally start to get closer, you still staying by his side to help him rebuild Mostro Lounge. And months later, friendship became a relationship due to Azul's calculations and assumptions. In the end you had your wish fulfilled and so did he, having you as his partner was like a dream come true. Yet, sometimes he wonders what you see in him.

He doesn't let that thought stay on his mind much, preferring to spend time with you, thinking about you, heavens he's so clingy he can't even keep his hands off you, that is, when you're alone of course. You're so sweet to him, bringing him coins for his collection and asking him how his day was, it's nice to have someone who cares. But it's terrible to imagine the ways that anyone who has a beef with him would hurt you for his actions, so Azul proposes another contract with the intention of protecting you from possible threats.

The contract in theory is simple: to remain under the twins' watch and protection. Though, your friends and other people tend to avoid you because of this, because Jade and Floyd are too intimidating. You particularly find them funny with their very different mannerisms, hovering over your shoulders like two shadows, Floyd pestering you while Jade supposedly tries to control him. Azul thinks this is a good contract, whether you think so or not - he can be convinced otherwise through persuasion.

Something that Azul didn't foresee, however, was that the twins would get bored of playing babysitter and would drag you somewhere. Jade wanted to show you his terrariums while Floyd wanted to take you to see their house, neither of them answering any of Azul's messages or calls, not even you but that's because you were trying to get the twins not to fight each other. So your escapades happen because of them, because of that Azul knows that you're not trying to leave him and he recognizes that, but due to his insecurity, every time you return to him Azul seems about to start crying while he wrap himself all over you.

If you tried to run away he could at least do this and that to prevent it, instead he tries to make you feel guilty for making him worry so much. He was about to cut off his own tentacles and eat them if you took one more second to walk through that door, is that what you wanted? It must be, otherwise you wouldn't have run away without saying anything to him >:(

Cuddle him now. Or else, he'll gonna be cranky and fussy. He just loves you so much and he knows you love as well, so why do you do this? Just let him love you completely and wholly.

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enkas-illusion · 1 year ago

Text

(Not) Just Another Crush - Part 1/2

Fandom / Pairing: Attack On Titan / Eren x f!reader

Rating: NSFW/Explicit - MINORS DO NOT INTERACT

Content Warning: Fluff, fluff, A LOT of fluff, slow burn, kissing, language, slight make out, emotional edging of sorts (it will make sense)

Chapter Summary: Instead of pining over the mystery man at your gym from a distance, you decide to take matters into your own hands and talk to the guy. And you find out that Eren Jaeger, as it turns out, is akin to a man written by a woman.

Author's notes: Hello, here’s a meet-cute type of thing for gym bro Eren cause ~I need a big boy, gimme a big boy, gimme a big big boy~; this is a 2-part story so the chapters are super lengthy. Hope you enjoy it – feel free to like, reblog or comment! Thank you for reading!

-Eren’s Birdie

Song Dedication: Crush by Cigarettes After Sex

Part 1 | Part 2

To the unassuming eyes, it may look like just two people interacting – but to the ones who knew, you and the gym trainer, it was fate intervening to give you this opportunity!

“Bruh, if you don't go talk to him now…” you hear Porco, the trainer's voice as he nudges you in your crush's direction.

As you walk up to your crush you think about how stupid this idea seems. The plan was to ask him to alternate sets with you on seated rows since the gym was way too crowded.

Honestly, the move was a bit too obvious in your opinion. But you'd set your mind to it – Today is the day you finally talk to your crush!

It had been quite some time since you'd been secretly simping over this guy so what's the harm? All the other equipment being occupied was the perfect excuse, if you had to look for one, to finally talk to him.

Since you’re usually reserved, you don’t talk to anyone at the gym. You've always been this way – doing your own thing while blasting music in your earphones and going home without ever lifting your head up.

But ever since you saw him about a month ago, your eyes had been wandering around to find him the minute you'd enter the gym, stealing glimpses whenever you could without being creepy about it.

You decided it was just some stupid crush only because the man was ridiculously hot so it'll fade away eventually. But man, were you wrong.

When he didn't show up to the gym the whole week last week, you rushed to Porco, who's always hanging around to enquire – any semblance of subtlety thrown out the window.

It wasn't like you were planning to make a move (god knows the only reason you didn't talk much at the gym was to avoid the occasional creeps that would try talking you up).... but the fact that it felt like a missed chance with the mystery guy left an itch and a curiosity to know more.

“...you know the one who's always wearing anime t-shirts? Long, black haired pretty dude?” You'd asked, hoping Porco would recognize your crush from your half-assed description.

When Porco was seemingly confused, you'd pestered further, “The one who always has his hair tied in a messy bun but still looks gorgeous? Nothing? Ummm- The emo dude with the perfect proportions!”

“OH! Are you talking about Eren? I can’t quite remember his last name but pretty sure you’re talking about Eren. Yeah… he's a regular– has been here for a year now.”

“How come I only saw him a month ago?”

“I think he recently switched timings to fit his work schedule or something. Maybe he shifted back to the mornings.”

Your heart sinks at the information… there goes your imaginary chance with Eren.

Eren.

You memorise his name anyway… hoping that maybe the gods would be generous enough to give you a chance to talk to him.

And they do. He shows up over the weekend and you secretly cheer that he's back during your schedule. However, another month passes by as you keep on trying to find the ‘perfect’ opportunity to talk to him.

Which brings you to the present moment, as you walk towards him and wait at a distance while he finishes his reps. He slows down his movements nonetheless when your eyes meet, and before you can stop yourself, you wave at him before abruptly putting your hand down.

Eren stops his movements and pulls his headphones back, his serious face breaking into a soft smile, “Hii…?”

“Hey, sorry to interrupt but would you mind alternating sets with me? I’ve been waiting for about 15 minutes…” you point at the other equipments flocked by people, “Totally cool if you can’t tho-”

“Okay,” he smiles as he does five more reps before getting up and wiping the sweat off the seat.

“Thank you,” you say as you go to adjust the weights. Your jaw almost drops when you see it's set to 80kgs. You almost want to laugh as you set it back to 15kgs.

‘Dude’s a beast, don’t compare! Upper body never was your best muscle group,’ you think to yourself. You resume your music quickly and begin your set. When you’re done, you get up to wipe the seat as well as the handlebars of the machine with your towel.

You hear a snort from behind and when you turn to look at Eren and see him give you a smile that has you weak in your knees.

“What?” you ask confused.

“Wiping the handles as well? Cute,” he answers. He can’t help but find this action considerate – Most people don’t even bother wiping the patch formed by their sweaty ass cheeks.

Even if his compliment makes you blush, you try hard to not let it show. You simply move away to signal him to the seat. He bends down to readjust the weights.

“No way you’re gonna go above 80!?” you gasp as you see him push it to 100kgs.

“The last one is always till failure,” he states matter-of-factly.

“Oh... that’s crazy, I could never. I’ve got noodle arms,” you joke.

“Didn’t you get your first full pull up a few days ago?” he asks.

PAUSE. He’s noticed you before???

As if instantly reading your mind, he adds, “I saw you cheering and clapping your hands with Porco when you did it.”

“Oh that… sorry, I try not to bother anyone much usually,” you feel the heat rise to your cheeks out of embarrassment.

“I know, don’t be sorry, it’s a good thing to celebrate your PR… besides, Reiner has been teasing me about not making any progress lately so I need to step up my game for sure,” he laughs to himself as he gets into position.

“Reiner?”

“That’s the huge blonde who I usually come with,” he explains. You simply nod and don’t speak further, letting him begin his set. He starts well but by the end you can tell that Eren is struggling a bit as soft cusses leave his lips, face scrunching and chest heaving as he steadies his breathing.

“Come on… 2 more.” you cheer, causing him to grunt as he finishes his set. Your eyebrows raise in surprise when you see him wipe the handles along with the seat, imitating your habit.

“Thank you.” you blush as you bend down to readjust the weights to 25kgs, “So, you’re done?”

“Yeah…” he speaks, taking small sips of water from his bottle, “I’ll see you around?”

You nod and he smiles at you as he turns to leave, but quickly turns back again, “Shit! Sorry… What's your name?”

The blush grows even further at his question as you tell him your name and ask, “What about you?”

“I’m Eren… Eren Jaeger.”

Jaeger. Eren Jaeger.

You memorise his full name and you both say your goodbyes as you get back to your workout. Eren left way before you did, leaving no room for further conversations to occur.

This interaction hadn’t gone unnoticed by Porco, who rushed to your side when you were stretching, “Soooo, am I your cupid yet?”

“Don’t get your hopes up… we’ll have small talks whenever we see each other at best. Nothing’s going to happen!” you lie with a straight face, but deep down you were dying to check him out on Instagram once you were in the comfort of your home.

Your crush was oh so kind to spare you the stalking when you see your phone light up with a notification later at night.

Eren_j started following you.

You almost jump up out of your bed but steady yourself to call your best friend, Annie, before you even get to checking his account.

“Guess who just followed me on ig?” you giggle when she picks up the call.

“Huh?”

“Guess. Who. Followed. Me!” you repeat.

“Darling… I need context,” she replies dryly.

“Eren… Eren followed me… the gym crush!” you squeal, killing the suspense since you knew it was too late at night for her to indulge in your guessing game.

“Waitttttt… the supposedly hot emo guy who wears anime t-shirts?” you can hear her surprising tone, “you go girl– thought you were too much of a puss-”

“Annie!” you cut her off, “What do I do? Should I text him first or just follow back?”

“NO! Always let the guy text first,” she proclaims.

“Ugh… but okay, I hear you… wouldn’t want to seem like a simp after keeping my cool for so long,” you answer back as you put her on speaker to follow him back. You see the Requested icon turn to Following within seconds.

“ANN! He accepted already,” you almost yell.

“Welp, that was fast,” she chuckles.

“Sooo,” you begin in a sweet sing-song voice, “I’m gonna go stalk his profil-”

“Yeah, alright… have a good night babe.” you hear a dramatic mwah from her. You chuckle as you bid her good night before hanging up.

As you skim through his profile, you can’t help but feel giddy at the fact that this guy actually seems to have a personality, unlike some gym bros who make ‘muscle’ their entire personality.

When you’re going through his story highlights, you see his username pop up at the top of your screen, making your heart race faster. He had replied to your story. You rush to check on your profile what you’d posted, feeling your brain malfunction as you fear it being something embarrassing and goofy.

Phew. It was just a post-workout selfie showing off your wet, sweaty t-shirt.

You open his text.

Eren_j:

Guess u got a good workout in after I left afterall.

Feeling a bit bold, you text back.

I did… would’ve been a lot more fun with you tho.

And you almost want to throw your phone away in anticipation as you see the typing icon.

Eren_j:

Be careful what you wish for. I’ve been told im a strict/difficult gym partner.

I like me a challenge :)

Eren_j:

Is that so? Guess i gotta make it particularly hard for u :)))

I’m a tough girl Eren… i think i can take it.

You swing your feet as you roll around on the bed. If you ever showed this to Annie, she’d probably call it ‘fucking cringe but cute nonetheless’.

As the double entendre texts died down, seamless conversations kept you hooked. He was putting in equal amounts of effort to keep the conversation alive. You don’t exactly remember how you fell asleep but you remember talking to him for about two hours or so.

And that’s how you became gym buddies. As another month had passed by, you got to know him as a friend. You want to cuss yourself since your crush has only increased tenfold ever since you’ve gotten to know him personally.

You realise just how deceiving his looks are – on the outside, he’s this big, intimidating dude but on the inside he’s got the golden retriever energy. Eren is the perfect mix of what you’d call a serious yet laid back/chill guy.

He’s thoughtful, remembers tiny details about you, sends you songs whenever he finds one he thinks you’d like and memes that remind him of you and is a self proclaimed hopeless romantic. You could go on and on about Eren and it would still not be enough – needless to say, you were absolutely gone for him, the kind that they describe as being totally head-over-heels in movies.

And it doesn’t help that a few nights ago, when the gym was basically empty, you two almost kissed. Standing in the corridor, as you were saying your goodbyes, it felt as if he was about to lean in to kiss you before being interrupted by someone walking out the changing room, making you flee the scene, akin to a criminal being caught.

But then again, you weren’t really sure if it was just your delusion overriding the tiny bit of logic left in your romance-ridden brain.

~~~

“Eren… I can’t– fuck,” you groan as your hands shake.

“You got it, come on. You’re doing so good. One more then we’re done. Promise,” you hear his voice as his grip on your waist tightens.

Eren supports your bodyweight as he pushes you up so that your chin is touching the pull up bar. The first few were bearable but by your 7th pull up, it’s more like he’s working his biceps rather than you working your back.

With shaky hands, you try to control your movement as you come down but your arms almost give in, causing you to slightly stumble as you drop to your feet with a light thud. His grip on your waist tightens to steady you before letting go gently.

Ever since the almost kiss, you’d been extra aware of his touches. So even his guiding touches, without any ulterior motives, have been making you feel some type of way.

You slouch slightly as you sit against a wall in the corner, sipping your water. You close your eyes to calm your breathing as you feel your arms burn. You groan as you realise you’re going to be super sore tomorrow morning.

“Good job bub,” he snickers. You open your eyes to see him bend down in front of you to pat your head lightly.

“I give up… you win, you are a ruthless gym partner.”

“Aww… I'm flattered,” he jokes further.

You roll your eyes as you swat his hand away from your head.

“Let me make it up to you, I’ll give you a massage. How about that?” he adds jokingly, though you know he wouldn’t mind actually giving you one if you ask him nicely.

“You better! I’m not going to be able to make dinner tonight!” you reply as you hold your arms out limply in front of him.

“Then don’t. Let me make you dinner,” he says, taking the opportunity.

“For real?” you ask, taken by surprise by his sudden yet tempting offer.

“Yeah? Got any plans for tonight?”

“No… let’s do it. I'm in,” you agree before demanding, “but, I want that massage as well.”

“Done… my massages can put those Thai spas to shame,” he boasts.

“Are you overselling yourself Jaeger?” you tease him, “it’s often disappointing when reality doesn’t match the hype.”

“You’re gonna eat your words later… I’ve been told I’ve got magic fingers.” he retorts, his cocky smirk wider than ever. You roll your eyes as you grab your things before getting up.

“That’s for me to decide,” you poke him further, “... the food better be worth the 7 pull ups.”

Surprisingly he doesn’t have a witty comeback in his arsenal this time. You simply hear a low chuckle escape his lips and it’s somehow more mischievous than whatever clever words he would’ve spoken otherwise.

You’d never been to his place before, meaning it took a few minutes for your brain to register that you were going to Eren fucking Jaeger’s place! In the changing room, you freshen up as much as you can to try to not look like a sweaty mess. You change into a pair of jeans and a jumper, slinging the gym bag over your shoulder before giving yourself one last look in the mirror and walking out to meet him near the entrance of the gym.

As you walk out, you see him waiting for you on his bike, securing the helmet on his head. He’s changed into a pair of loose jeans and a denim jacket over his t-shirt. Even when you’d seen his ride for the first time, Eren being a biker never surprised you since it felt very on-brand for him.

Imagine him picking you up for a date, waiting on his bike with a bouquet of tulips in hand. Ehe.

You snap out of your daydream when he holds out the other helmet in front of you. You lean your head down when he motions you to do so and he puts the helmet on you.

“Where did the second one come from?” you wonder out loud.

“I had planned to take you home tonight from the start,” he winks.

You snort as you slide the visor of his helmet down his face. You hear his laugh as he adds, “Porco let me borrow his, apparently he keeps an extra one in the cabin for god-knows-what.”

“I guess I really might need to call Porco a cupi–” you freeze midway.

“Hmm?”

“A good trainer.” you correct yourself, and you’re pretty sure it was far from convincing but Eren decides not to tease you about it. You’re 99.99% certain he heard it – maybe he just wants to save you the embarrassment, you think to yourself.

You hop onto his bike and hesitantly rest your hands on his sides not wanting to seem awkward by straight up hugging him from behind. However, he straightens his back as he grabs the top of your hands, pulling them to the front to wrap them around his waist. You smile to yourself as you rest your cheek on his back and hug your arms around him steadily.

The ride back to his place is barely 10 minutes long. You miss being so close to him as soon as you get off the bike in the parking lot. He parks and guides you to his apartment holding your wrist gently. It’s not a complete holding-hands-fingers-intertwined but that has never stopped you from overanalyzing things, has it?

You take in your surroundings when you enter the apartment and it doesn’t stand out much. It looks like any normal dude’s apartment, except it’s cleaner – probably more than your own.

“Wow, your apartment is clean,” you comment.

“You’re hurting me babe. Did you expect me to live like a savage just cause I’m a guy.”

“No, no… I’m sorry it came out wrong–” you try to clarify but he interrupts.

“Kidding! I know it’s cleaner than usual. I live with Reiner and Levi… while Reiner and I aren’t really shabby, Levi really can’t tolerate a dirty house,” Eren explains.

“Oh, that must be exhausting, no?”

“Not really. That was Levi’s one condition when Reiner and I went to him in search of a third flatmate so we agreed.”

“Ah, makes sense. Are they here?” you ask, curiously as you hang your bag near the coat rack and take off your shoes. Eren returns to your side, having locked the door and keeping all his things in their designated places.

“Nah. Reiner’s out of town on a work trip for like two weeks and Levi’s gone home for a few days as well,” he answers as he shrugs off his jacket, folding it before placing it on the side table.

You can’t help but find it cute that he keeps the place neat so diligently, being considerate of others… but then again, you’ve been finding all of Eren’s actions cute lately.

“... so it’s just us here tonight.” he says flirtatiously.

“Good thing, I’d hate to share food now… I’m hungry,” you say, dodging it. Usually, you’d flirt back but the two of you being alone at his place suddenly feels so real – anything could happen. You chicken out – there may be a possibility that he likes you back but there could ALSO be a possibility of him only liking you as a friend.

“‘Ight, what would you like to have?” he asks as you follow him to the kitchen.

“Surprise me… nothing too fancy though.”

“Phew… I was actually hoping for that answer since I’d prepared the dough for burger patties,” he admits sheepishly as he washes his hand and puts on the apron. You lean against the opposite counter to let him cook in peace without any hindrance.

“Do you want my hel-”

“OH– just a min,” he interrupts you as he hurries out of the kitchen. You blink in confusion as you follow him out to check on the guy and find him connecting his phone to the speaker.

A soft song plays through the speaker loudly and he walks towards you as if just now he’s truly ready to take on kitchen duties.

“It’s my cooking playlist,” he smiles.

He’s so fucking cute. For fucks sake!

When you ask him again if he wants your help, he declines saying ‘the only thing you need to do tonight is compliment my amazing skills.’

So you watch him work while chatting away about random things. It doesn’t take long for him to prepare the patties and heat the buns, adding copious amounts of veggies with melting cheese on top of it. He presents it with a ‘Tada!’ and you clap at his presentation with a dramatic ‘Bravo!’

When you taste the first bite, you almost moan at how delicious it is. The burger is huge, juicy and has the right balance of crispy and soft with spicy, sweet and sour. You close your eyes, delving into the heavenly taste.

You open your eyes to see Eren devouring his own burger, unfazed by the masterpiece that he’d created as if it were something ordinary to him.

“Eren!” you squeal, “if this is what I get to eat after, I might just do a hundred pull-ups from tomorrow.”

Eren chuckles at this, licking the cheesy sauce that had trickled down his fingers, “Told ya I only brag when I know I’m good.”

“I’m serious! This is too good,” you add, taking another bite.

“I know… thank you,” Eren smiles, clearly amused at the way you’re enjoying his burger. And in that moment, a thought crosses his mind – he’d make you dinner every night if it meant that he got to be the reason for you to feel such bliss.

Neither of you talk much till you finish eating. Your reason being wanting to relish in the taste with full concentration and Eren’s reason being not wanting to disturb your peace.

When you’re done, you clear out the plates and Eren cleans the table. As you’re walking out of the kitchen, you hear a familiar tune playing when he resumes the songs on his playlist.

You recognize it – Dope Lovers by DPR IAN.

“I love this song!” you exclaim as you walk towards him. The tension you’d felt at the beginner has almost dissipated and feeling a little courageous, you extend an arm out to him to dance.

He tosses his phone on the sofa before taking your hand to pull you closer to him. You sway your body to the rhythm as you mumble some of the lyrics.

“Is it the art or the artist that you like?” he teases.

“Well, you can’t deny that he isn’t hot… There’s something about DPR Ian, he’s soooo–” you pause to think about the right word to use before concluding, “– babygurl.”

“Babygurl?” Eren laughs as he rests his arms at your hips, “What does that even mean?”

“It’s like daddy – it’s a state of mind,” you joke but then you purse your lips as you really think about how to explain this endearing slang to Eren, “Babygurl is when a man is so comfortable in his masculinity that he isn't scared of embracing his soft side and being gentle. A man who knows that kindness is strength. Someone who looks so tough but is far from toxic. A man who’s a gentleman in the true sense of the word… does that make sense?”

“Hmm, I think so…” he nods, “Who else is babygurl?”

“You are, Eren,” you smile and lift your hands up to move to his neck but stop when you feel a weird stiffness in your shoulders, “ow, it’s sore already.”

“Okay, let’s give you that massage!” he declares with a booming laugh, taking your hands in his and guiding you to the sofa. He sits you down with your back facing him and gently taps near your lower back to signal you to sit up straight.

“Relax your shoulders,” you hear him speak softly as his hands move up to your shoulders but he pauses his movement. He lifts his hands to comb his fingers through your locks and you jerk slightly when his fingers touch your neck in the process.

“Eren, what are you doin-” you giggle as you turn your head to look at him.

“Shh, stay still,” he murmurs, knitting his eyebrows in concentration. His hair falls down, framing his face as he takes out his hair tie. You turn to look to the front as he runs his fingers to gather all your loose strands together once again. You feel him gently pull at your hair as he secures it with his hair tie.

“You know, you could’ve just asked for mine. It’s in my bag,” you chuckle.

“Too lazy,” he replies as his hands begin to massage your back gently. He alternates between pressing his thumbs down the length of your spine and pressing his palms flat to cover the entire area, sliding his hands down in slow pressured movements. You slouch in his touch and his hands move up to your shoulder blades to massage the area in circular motion.

“Mmm, Eren– that feels so good,” you breathe out, skin feeling like wax that could melt into his hands at any moment. You’re certain you’d fall asleep in a few minutes if he continued doing this any longer.

Eren changes his movement to bring up his fingertips to your nape, dragging them gently over the expanse of your neck, his fingers dancing over your skin as he dips them under the collar to trace your skin. This causes you to let out an involuntary whimper and your cheeks heat up in embarrassment when his touch comes to a halt.

You’re pretty sure he can see the goosebumps pricking on the surface of your skin and you mumble a soft ‘sorry’ as you create some space between to turn around to face him completely. Your eyes meet and you’re smiling at him awkwardly but he has a poker face.

He gets up abruptly, breaking eye contact as he hurries towards the kitchen. You look at him, confused and are about to ask him why he was acting that way but he speaks up before you do.

“Want anything to drink? Something sweet for dessert?”

“Umm… okay,” you mutter, still confused.

“Anything specific?” he enquires.

“I wouldn’t mind a cup of hot coffee,” you request, smiling as you abandon your previous thought.

“Coffee? At night?” he counters, raising an eyebrow.

“Yeah, that’s my talent. I can sleep like a baby no matter how strong the coffee is.”

“Hmmm… Would you like to try the Eren Jaeger Special where I mix loads of chocolate with coffee and cream?”

“So, basically a mocha?” you press your lips together to keep yourself from laughing.

“Yes or no?” he says with narrowed eyes.

“Yes,” you laugh and he rolls his eyes as he turns around, disappearing into the kitchen.

You’re scrolling through your phone when you hear his approaching footsteps after a few minutes. You close your phone as you turn your head to look up at him as he walks towards you with two steaming mugs in hand.

As soon as he places one of the mugs on the table, you pick it up instantly. He sits down in front of you to clink your mugs together with a ‘cheers’. You both take tiny sips together and your eyes widen at the frothy sweet and bitter taste.

“If you get me addicted, you’ll have to be the one to meet the demands too, just sayinggg…'' you blow over the surface and take another sip.

“Yes ma’am, I’d gladly oblige to all of your demands,” he winks before taking another sip from his mug. You try to hide your growing smile with your mug. For the rest of the conversation you try to change the subject from the two of you to literally anything else you can find – and Eren being the great conversationalist that he is, is talking about each topic just as enthusiastically.

“Aww man, the last of the coffee’s gone cold.” you swirl the liquid in the mug.

“Chug! Chug! Chug!” Eren fake yells, already having finished his. You raise one fist up as you gulp the last of your coffee down in one go and slam the mug down on the cushion. Feeling the frothy stache over your upper lip, you lick it off, laughing along with him.

“There’s still some left…” Eren mumbles, pointing at his own mouth to show the spot. Before you have a chance to wipe it, he swipes his thumb over the corner of your lips before bringing it to his lips to lick it off. It’s such a simple act yet it has the butterflies in your stomach going rampant.

“Hey, that was mine,” you try to feign offence but it comes out more desperate than you’d intended as you stare at his lips a little too longer than friends are supposed to.

He cups your face with both his hands as his gaze deepens before his eyes move down to your lips. Your breath hitches as you see him instinctively wet his lips. He leans in to move closer till your faces are just inches away.

“Then take it back agai–” he’s rudely interrupted by the sound of the front door opening with a loud thud. You pull back abruptly to create some space between the two of you. You see Eren’s jaw clench as he closes his eyes briefly in an attempt to keep his cool.

“REINER MY BROTHER– oh,” you see a man enter the living room with a large backpack.

“Jean.” Eren says, giving him a tight lipped smile.

“Eren. Where’s Reiner?” Jean asks as he looks at the two of you.

“Did he not tell you that he wasn’t gonna be at home for a while?” Eren answers, and you’re almost surprised at how cold his tone is.

“Yes? But I figured he'd leave after seeing me?” Jean retorts.

“And why would he do that?” Eren asks just as coldly.

“Since he said I was welcome to stay in his room while I was in town? Even told me to use the key y'all keep in the space behind the nameplate,” the man explains.

“Great! It's amazing how my roommate fails to tell me about shit like this.” Eren mutters but smiles at the guy nonetheless, “His room is unlocked… feel free to make yourself at home I guess.”

“Thanks. Have fun, I guess,” Jean half salutes Eren, giving you both a smug smile, feeling the satisfaction of having cockblocked his friendly foe. He leaves you two alone, making his way to Reiner’s room. Once you watch him disappear, you turn to check your phone for the time.

This time it was real! You’re not delusional, he really was about to kiss you!

You silence the voice in your head. You don’t know how to feel about the fact that Eren seemingly likes you but he can’t seem to make a move or at least declare his feelings with certainty. And there’s no way in hell you’d confess first since it’s pretty evident you like him, you’ve dropped enough hints over a month’s time – you want him to be the one to do it first.

“It’s late, I better get going,” you make an excuse as you stand up, gathering your things as you prepare to leave. Your cheeks feel hot and you give him a small smile, feeling a bit too flustered to carry on a conversation at this point.

“Let me drop you home,” he offers quickly as he stands up with you.

“My apartment isn’t far from here.”

“It's late,” he adds. You consider it and nod your head. He smiles as he grabs his keys along with his own two helmets this time.

The ride home is quick so neither of you bother with small talk. Once he parks in the parking lot of your apartment building, he tilts his bike to make it easier for you to get off. He gets off the bike, gently taking your helmet off and placing it on the bike. As you fix your hair, he takes his helmet off as well, placing it next to yours.

You slightly shuffle on your feet as you prepare to say your goodbyes. When he turns back to look at you, you smile earnestly.

“I had a fun time tonight… despite you being a meanie at the gym.” you try to lighten up the tension.

“Only for you bub,” he jokes back, making finger-hearts at you.

“Good night, Eren.” you laugh as you wave at him and turn to walk away. You barely take a step when you hear him say your name.

“Hmm?” you turn around to look at him again. He doesn’t speak but takes one long stride to close the distance between you, wrapping his hands around your waist. As if on instinct, you drop your bag to the ground and place your hands on his shoulders, looking up at him as your breath hitches in your throat again.

He brings his left hand up to your cheek, dipping his head down to kiss your lips without any further delay. His wider frame envelopes yours as the hand on your cheek snakes back to hold your head in place as he deepens the kiss. You wrap both your hands around his neck, standing on your tippy toes for better access while his lower hand wraps around your waist even tighter.

When your lips finally part to catch your breaths, he looks you in the eye, smiling contently. Your legs feel giddy from the high you’re experiencing and you’re glad he’s still holding you flush against his body.

“I’d been dying to do that ever since I laid my eyes on you… figured it’d be pretty stupid of me to let the opportunity go twice in a row,” he confesses, dipping his head down again to kiss you once again.

You’re surprised, your brain reeling at the information but you close your eyes nonetheless, getting lost in the feeling of his lips moving against yours.

“Yeah, it would’ve been pretty stupid,” you smile when he pulls back. You pull him down by the collar to give him a kiss on his cheek, “Thank you for not wasting any more chances.”

You run your hands through his loose strands and he hums as he closes his eyes. You pull him down for another deep kiss. His tongue invades your mouth and he squeezes your ass as he pulls your body further closer to his. When you feel his boner from under his clothing, it causes you to moan into the kiss.

Your hands move down his sides, lowering further but he stops your movement with his own hands holding your wrists firmly. He pulls away from the kiss, eyes still closed as he rests his forehead against yours. His hot breath fans your face as he speaks, “It’s taking everything in me to not come up to your place to fuck you right now.”

“Then do it,” you mewl desperately as you kiss him again. He smiles into the kiss but breaks it once again to speak, “No, I wanna do this right. Let me take you out on a real date first… tomorrow evening?”

You feel your cheeks burn up as you bite your bottom lip to contain the grin threatening to give away your excitement as you nod. You stand on your toes once again to give him a quick peck. He nuzzles his head into the crook of your neck, enveloping you into a comforting hug.

“Take this with you,” he mumbles as he goes to grab a helmet. He leans down to grab your bag from the floor, handing both the items to you.

“Good night Eren,” you smile. He cups your face with both his hands and leans down to kiss you again – it’s brief but passionate.

“Good night baby,” he smiles as he lightly smacks your ass, earning a yelp from you. Before you can scold him, he gives you a hasty kiss before making his way to his bike. You walk to the elevator and press the button, turning to look back at him as he secures his helmet.

He starts the bike but waits till he sees you enter the elevator. Just as the door closes, you catch a glimpse of him leaving. You lean back against the railing, covering your face with your hands, not really believing what had just occurred.

The man you’d been pining over for months had been crushing over you all along too.

Eren Jaeger never was just another unrequited crush – and come tomorrow, he’s going to mean a lot more than just a friend.

#erensbirdie #aot x reader #aot x you #aot #aot smut #eren yeager x reader #eren smut #eren x reader #eren yeager #eren jaeger

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undersprite · 2 months ago

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2024 Comic Contest Results

Before we get started, I would like to extend a personal thank you to everyone who created an entry for the contest this year. Although we only got four entries this year, those four entries' dedication to telling stories that are novel and interesting for this community to enjoy is worthy of commendation in itself. For a while, I was scared we wouldn't even get enough entries to fill the podium; thanks to your efforts, this has not come to pass.

Since we have very few entries this time around, I'll be providing a link to each comic, with accompanying scores and excerpts from reviews. Now, catch the results under the cut:

Runner-Up: "The Undertale Game Comic" by FutureGamer25

(Average score: 15.5/50)

"As the submitter says, this was made in a day. I can’t be too hard on this out of principle..." - Soufon

"[...it] succeeded at making me laugh multiple times, thanks in no small part to how it deliberately wields nothing looking like it fits together." - CHAOS_FANTAZY

"You know, honestly for being made in less than a day and being posted 5 minutes before the deadline, I gotta give you a lot of credit for that. I don’t even think I could have made that in a day [...]" - Mufeet

"The freaking car and the ending got me a good chuckle. I'll give you that. I congratulate you for tossing your coin." - Subna

3rd: "Frisk Visits the Store and Nothing Happens" by Trooper3

(Average score: 34/50)

"I thought Sans and ESPECIALLY Papyrus were super funny [...] I think we’ve finally reached a point where the skele-bros are just consistently characterized properly now, and I love to see it." - Mufeet

"The FunMart[TM] makes an earnest effort to capture the feeling of exploring an area in an actual Toby Fox game, and [...] captures at least a bit of that shine." - CHAOS_FANTAZY

"I honestly like your idea, is funny and it works perfectly to show these OCs of yours in this format. I wish there was more content to see about them, I wish to know them [...]" - Subna

"As light as it is, I like having this kind of slice of life look into UT’s world, the comedy focus helping to make the comic feel more breezy than insubstantial." - Soufon

2nd: "Undertale: Pushing On" by Mouse

(Average score: 34.75/50)

"Of all the entries we got, this is the only one that really felt like it captured the essence of telling a story as if it were still part of a game—something I have sorely missed." - CHAOS_FANTAZY

"Great story and great teaching from it. Can add up greatly to UNDERTALE’s world and...tbh I’d LOVE to play a full game with Alvia." - Subna

"[...] I like having who [Gerson] is in UT be because of Alvia’s actions, like how the orange soul kid is framed as responsible for the bunny family in Snowdin’s success - having all the soul humans impact the underground like that helps all of them feel real to UT’s world[...]" -Soufon

"I was captivated from beginning to end, and god, the ending [...] it actually made me a bit teary-eyed." - Mufeet

1st: "Knock Knock" by StarlightShores and ToMoChao

(Average score: 47/50)

"I was not expecting something like this out of this contest. Knock Knock is a substantial storyline, not a peek into an adventure, or a silly reprieve." - Soufon

"Even if it’s pretty lengthy, it keeps you engaged, to know where this is all going, all the way to the end." - Subna

"Flowey and Sans pair-ups are so rare, but when done it is ALWAYS such a fun time. They both play off each other so well, and it is no exception in this comic, especially towards the end where they start to bond over dealing with the loss of someone important to them." - Mufeet

"You created a story going on a thousand panels where, while reading it, my attention never flagged [...] You created a webcomic the Undertale fanbase will, if there’s any justice left around here, be obsessed with for years to come. It’s art, I’m afraid." - CHAOS_FANTAZY

Our full score card for the event can be seen here. The full reviews will be available in the Discord server on request.

With regards to prizes: the judge whom was contributing to our prize pool has begun college for the year, and unfortunately they were unable to set aside the money they had originally promised for the cash prize. The illustration prize is still available; winners, please reach out to fmsdraws on Discord to claim your prize.

And that leaves me...with this blog.

I'd like to write up a proper postmortem for this experience, but that can come in another week or two. For now, please enjoy the comics and celebrate the victors!

#undertale #deltarune #undertale au #deltarune au #undertale sprite comic contest #undersprite #results

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isagrimorie · 2 months ago

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Watching YouTube reactions to the last Agatha All Along episode I'm struck by how many people seem to disregard Agatha's actual grief and regret over, IMO, accidentally draining Alice to death. (Question mark?)

The Nerdy Nightly channel's review on the episode had a more nuanced take recognizing not only Agatha's complexity but also the metaphor of addiction that applies not just to Agatha, but to almost everyone in the coven.

I'm glad more people are discussing this metaphor for Agatha. It makes Agatha so interesting.

Also, in light of this, I think we can't push past that Evanora's ghost meant for Agatha to drain someone in the coven so they would all turn against her.

It's almost like pushing an addict off the wagon, except pushing Agatha off the sobriety train means people die.

Jac Schaeffer was never interested in simplistic morality plays. She is committed to exploring characters in all their complexities, allowing them to be their fullest, often flawed, selves.

Schaeffer explained her character writing approach while writing WandaVision:

“It was important to us that it be all Wanda and that it would be her responsibility because we didn’t want—we weren’t doing Mephisto, Nightmare, the Grim Reaper, or any other people or entities,” Scheffer explained. “If we’re not going to take the cheap way out that there’s this other force, right, if we’re going to give the gift of storytelling to Wanda, I give the whole power, she also then has the culpability and has the accountability.”

(source: Gizmondo) (hat tip to: @ennn)

(Emphasis mine.)

And it seems Schaeffer's views on writing have changed with Agatha All Along. She doesn't want an easy answer for Agatha's character, and that's genuinely refreshing. For a Disney+ character to be allowed to have her flawed and authentic self?

It feels right. It feels real.

Schaeffer mentions this in a recent interview with Script Mag:

I think the fun of Tony Stark is that he wants to be bad, but he's a hero despite himself. But Agatha is not that. Agatha is not a hero, despite herself. Agatha is entirely selfish and self-serving. I don't know, I feel like it should have been harder. It should have been more like, 'Oh, gosh, how are we going to make this villain sympathetic?' But it wasn't that challenging because she's not. It's never her aim to hurt someone. She doesn't hurt anyone just for the fun of it. She's interested in two things: She’s interested in what serves her and she's interested in witchcraft, specifically, enormously powerful witchcraft.

Schaeffer goes on to say that all main characters in Agatha All Along function as anti-heroes. And the writers go on lengthy debates about the story beats and character choices.

Later on in the same interview with Script Mag, Schaeffer discusses Agatha's hidden motivations.

The way I defined Agatha—prior to the room, prior to anything—is that she's a liar, that it's just masks. This show is about pulling that mask all the way off. And what do we see? What is under the mask? It's hard to talk about at this point because there's so many spoilers inherent in that.

But I think what you can get from the earliest episodes is that, yes, she wants power, right? That's her superficial goal. That's her super objective. But that can't be it, right? That's boring. What's underneath it? And it's fairly clear from the beginning that she reluctantly wants community, that this is a covenless witch who, deep down, wants a coven. And that's fascinating to me. What did Wanda want? She wanted to be safe and cozy with her family. That was a that was a very clear, true north. But there, the friction was the sort of logistical trappings were untenable. For Agatha, she's in the way of her own thing. And it's much more of a subtext and a fabric that we then exploit and explore deeper into the show.

I love that we haven't been reading Agatha wrong -- Agatha does want, deep down, to have a community but she's been wearing her mask for too long that Agatha's also her own worst enemy. Her reputation and defensive persona push people away.

When backed into a corner, Agatha slips on the mask of a villain because if she hurts them first, then no one can hurt her.

It's so fun and interesting to have a character like Agatha again! Especially within Disney+ Marvel's ecosystem of shows.

Netflix Marvel used to feature similarly complex characters but Disney+ Marvel shows have struggled to find that line.

#thinky thoughts #tv: agatha all along #jac schaeffer #agatha spoilers #ish #character analysis #wandavision

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inbabylontheywept · 2 months ago

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So. So. I have a horrific backlog in my inbox, and past attempts at answering it have generated more asks. Generally at a higher rate than I could answer the asks. Exceeding escape velocity. And I've been mulling over how to solve this, and my idea was to create a super-bus answer post. It'll be a little lengthy, so, you know. Click read more at your own risk. Roll them dice.

Well, you clicked it. God speed and god bless.

--- @meowserita says

I feel obligated to tell you i stayed up till four am reading a bunch of you stories, because they're incredible. Also feel like saying that the only other times ive stayed up this late in recent memory is when i was binge reading one piece so take that as you will. We'll see how much i regret this but odds are i wont like i didnt regret staying up reading one piece

Hahaha! Ha! Oof. I am extremely flattered and awed and impressed but also, my stories are going to be there tomorrow, and the next day, and maybe forever depending on how this whole "civilization" thing pans out. So. Sleep more. But also thank you for being a mega fan.

I had like, a week long binge of Naruto in middleschool that was awful. I didn't even like the show that much. People recommend anime to me now, and I feel like a former alcoholic turning down drinks at a party. No thank you, there's a 99% that will simply help be relax after work one day and a 1% chance that will ruin my life and I'll catch myself unironically saying "believe it!" years later, and I just can't take that chance. I have too many people depending on me.

---

Anonymous says

i see you are also from Utah. do you have a favorite swig menu item

No. I've never actually been into a Swig. There were a few soda shops back in AZ, but I never really got them either - I'm still not sure how a gummy shark in a blue soda is supposed to make it taste better.

My poison is generally gas station stuff. Slurpees are amazing, and I also like their little pickled sausage snack things. Probably literal poison, but they call to me.

---

Anonymous says

four more messages in my head. four more tests of sanity.

hm. troubling. hope you pass.

---

Anonymous says

yooo “fireflies infinity mirror room” mention!!! i lived in Tempe for a few years…one time i was making my way down the escalator from the PHX skytrain and there was a group of like 20-30 Mormons (?) at the base of the escalator waiting there to welcome out-of-state Mormons to some sort of Mormon convention in…well, Mesa, presumably? google is now telling me it may have been for the Easter pageant.

That does sound likely. My grandpa was actually in charge of the easter pageant for a few years down there - I actually broke my arm on the little pony Mary rides to Bethlehem. I was trying to keep my little brother and sister on it by using my arms as a seatbelt, but when they fell off anyway, I just had to kids land on my arm from 6 foot drop and got blessed me with a third elbow. I had some crazy ideas on how to become a professional baseball player with it, but my dad insisted we go to the hospital to do drugs, and when I woke up they fixed the damn thing. Could've gone pro.

---

@synapticwanderer says

hello! just wanted to say I'm a big fan, your stories make me laugh and sometimes cry and sometimes both, sometimes at once. when my partner asks me what I'm laughing so hard at I read them to them, and sometimes I just go read them to them anyway. thank you for sharing your delightful way with words with us, and I hope you don't mind that I've got notifications on for your posts (you and I think three other writers at the moment) anyway, have a great day!

I don't mind! I hope I haven't ruined that privilege, actually, I shitpost more than most people think. I like mixing happy and sad as well as silly and earnest. But. Yes. A lot of shitposts.

Anyway, thank you for the comment! Happy trails.

---

@funnynamedottxt says

I kept hearing about your wrestling post, and then I saw the word “bisexual” when you were talking about it, so, needless to say, I sought it out immediately.

And, while this isn’t technically part of the actual post, in that reblog where you were talking to that one dude about sexism and societal issues and shit, you made some pussy joke about Lake Michigan and that may just be the best thing I’ve read all week.

Sorry about the run on sentence btw, I know it probably deeply hurts the writer in you, but I find it funny and am too lazy to self-censor sooooo

I'm glad you had a good time reading it. I don't know which gender I'd imagine the great lakes as to be honest. I just know that their thing with Michigan is beautiful and would be very distracting should I ever become an astronaut. I don't want to make fun of people for wanting a better world, and I would actually say I did a botch job on my response. Didn't realize it until several hundred people got mad at me. I know I write well, and the catch .22 of that is that people assume that my ability to read the room is probably higher than it is.

Anyway. I don't fault them for getting mad. Not my finest hour.

And I'm not a snob about run on sentences by the way. English teachers want to make rules about how you write and rules to follow, but that's because they need to grade by rubrics for it to be fair. It turns an art form into something mechanical though. Just make it natural and the rest comes after.

---

@00x7 says

Hi. I hope you're doing well.

I had read your wrestling story. I had not laughed so hard in a great many years. I thank you for this, though I am also sympathetic to your misfortunes.

There was enough going on that I was naturally curious if you were or are Mormon, a curiosity born from being someone who grew up as such myself (something that being queer doesn't really bump up nicely against, though you hardly would need to hear such a thing from me), and which visiting your blog quickly answered for me.

Of course, scrolling down for two seconds immediately had me realize that you were also the kid with the grandpa and the worms. I had read the worm story before, but visiting somewhere and realizing it was you was a nearly transcendent experience. My third eye was rather forcibly opened. What a storied life you have had.

Anyway, as an amateur writer, I'm very happy to have found your blog. We don't know eachother, but your words resonate with me.

Whenever you read this, I hope you have a good one. Thank you.

Oh! That's my favorite thing - when people like two different stories with very different tones. It's kind of a would you love me if I wasn't beautiful sort of question - would you like my writing if it wasn't purely silly? And it makes me happy when the answer is yes.

I actually wandered through your blog to try and find your writing, but I didn't have much luck. I'd love to see some, if you're willing. Send me a link if you keep it on another platform. I couldn't do a critique if I wanted to - all my writing knowledge is just gut level stuff that I don't know how to share - but it's just a fun way to know people. And sometimes, I see a style and I go ah, I can pick a few shiny bits off this and wear them around.

---

@turtletotem says Your bio says to tell you if we write, so, new follower here, and i write! Lots of fanfic (links in bio) and also original fiction under Shelly Greene and Elizabeth Belyeu (both on Amazon). Feel free to check it out, but I won’t take it personal if you don’t, lol.

I checked your pages on AO3 for this, and alas - No snippets for me first. You write books and novels, which is something I've always aspired towards, and never really suceeded at. I had this view when I started writing short stories that I'd eventually writer longer stories and serials and in fact I just got better at writing short stories. Which isn't much of a tragedy, actually, but it's a road I haven't really moved forward on yet. Writer to writer.

As a reader, I already have several books I've promised to read people. If you have any shorter works (less than 5k words?) lob them my way though! c

---

Anonymous says

Just read your post about Atlas Shrugged (my condolences, comrade) and I must, simply MUST ask if you've ever heard of The Cobra Commander Dialogues? It asks the very important question "what if Cobra Commander was there and found this all at best inane and stupid, and at worst it offended his villainous sensibilities?" As someone who hasn't read the book OR watched the cartoon I found it very entertaining!

I just took a peeksies at those - they're beautiful. Dialogue is a great weakness of mine, and it is hard not to be a little envious of this writer. Thanks for sharing this with me.

For the curious

---

Anonymous says

Your story about the breakup and the olives and the Slim Jim's and your dad made me cry -- not like, tear up, but an actual good cry for a couple minutes. I don't totally know why I reacted like that but I definitely felt better in some way afterwards. So, thanks. I think I'm gonna remember that story for the rest of my life.

The story stuck with me both because everyone involved was good. My ex's dad, the neighbor, my dad - everyone was doing their best. And it was true, wasn't it? Brains are good at remembering bad things. It's a breakup. And it hurt like hell. But the pain of that memory carries with it this feeling well, even when things suck, people don't. I also liked this view of my dad parenting so consciously. It wasn't a background thing to him. He thought a lot about what he was doing, and what he was saying, and how he was treating me. I owe him big for that.

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Anonymous says

What did you do with the left shoes after your date?

So, I think teenagers like being able to convey fuck you, I do what I want through their clothes. There are punk scenes for that, and goth, and other things. My way of doing that was just dressing aggressively badly. Mismatched plaids and sports jackets meant for people half my height and twice my width, purchased from goodwill, and basketball shorts mixed with knee high socks and on and on. That was part of my teenage rebellion.

Anyway, I added the shoes in and just wore mismatching shoes to make the outfit worse, both because it was a fashion crime, and because it was a litltle inside joke with my friends who knew the story. I wound up losing them over the years because I would use the left sets as makeshift projectiles.

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@galapagos-spinch says

I just wanted to compliment you on your story about wrestling a girl in middle school, you're a fantastic writer

Thanks. I have some regrets about that story, but it was fun to write, and it from a craft standpoint, i am proud of it. I appreciate the comment. :)

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Anonymous says

equality is when young boys aren't allowed physical boundaries i guess

Eesh. We're getting to wrestling asks. Look, when we all signed up for wrestling, we signed up to wrestle girls. It's part of the sport. If your boundary is to not wrestle girls, the way you maintain it is by not signing up for wrestling. The point of my response, which I did not convey clearly enough, was to ask for forgiveness for failure. A middle school boy falling short of the right thing is different from a middle school boy seeking to do the wrong thing, and as a bar, it's...

It's the kind of thing I'd hope people would go, Well, they're shits, but I can't hate them over it. Don't defend us as having done the right thing - we did not. Just, have some grace for the weakness of teens. They're still growing, and if you put too much pressure on them, they'll crumble. And we crumbled.

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Anonymous says

Hey there! Sorry, not actually a question, just wanted to say I've seen posts of yours reblogged before on occasion and I finally started following you because you're a gifted storyteller and your stories are hilarious, poignant, or both!

Oh! A relief. This is so nice. Thank you. Hopefully you read this. Maybe I should turn anonymous asks off or something going forward if I set myself on doing more of these super-bus replies.

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Anonymous says

i am crying with laughter at your stories. the way you tell them is perfect, please never stop

I'll try. I had a several month period of no writing after burning out on HFY. Wasn't sure how to make a genre change. I'll probably have more periods of quiet like that, but to be honest, my writing is probably my favorite thing that I do. I like engineering, and I'm pretty good at it, but I love this, and I am very good at it, and in periods where I don't write it feels almost painful.

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@auronlu says

just sending you some gentle love from an older queer person.

My parents moved to Utah after I went to grad school. I am eternally grateful that my dad turned down that promotion the first time, when I was about to enter high school, because I didn't want to lose my friends and move to Utah and go to school there in the 80s.

So I escaped, but I've seen a little bit of what you had to go through and I've heard from some of my mom's friends that she's made there how hard it is when you don't conform. I'm glad you were able to escape and that you have your own life now.

I bet that girl remembers you and that when these topics come up, she's not as willing to throw people like us under the bus without question.

you did the best you could in a very difficult situation, and by being you, you helped some of the next generation realize the lines they're told about queer people may not be true.

There may have been a closeted or questioning kid in that class, reassured by your example or simple refusal to show prejudice. you don't know what positive impact you had on those kids, but you went in with the best intentions you could and I have a feeling you did more good than you know.

take care and have a good life

( note: my main blog is actuslly @sepdet )

This is actually one of the earliest asks that I didn't want to answer because I didn't want to lose it. For anyone else looking, they're talking about a story I told about teaching primary as a Mormon.

I hope she does. I don't think anyone in the ward ever actually knew I was bi - I kept that very close to my chest. Even after I left. The kids certainly didn't. But they knew that I loved them very much, and they apparently felt strongly that I was a good person. I think the lesson I gave them was that a person can leave the church and still be good. I hope that serves them well.

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@karmaajr says

UR A FUNNY GUY 🫵

aw yissssss

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@abisexualfrog says

Hello, I just wanted to say that I really like your stories and the way you write, your style

Sometimes I’m in a bad mood and then I go read a few of your stories -I especially like the ones at your work- and it cheers me up because of how funny it is. (The fridge story? So good)(oh and the water balloon and and and… endless)

Im not super good at compliment because well English isn’t my first language and all that but I figured I could still tell you, can’t hurt.

So yeah I really really enjoy your writing!! It’s so good!

And not just the stories of things that happened to you, the other ones too, they are also very good

This is another one of the ones I kept because I didn't want to lose it.

Thank you for reading my stories. Your english is fantastic. And it is rare to get comments on my old fictional sci-fi pieces - those were kind of my baby's-first-steps. If you read those you are in deep, and I am incredibly touched.

I'd hug you if I could.

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@rockinhand says

the red bun on those burgers was actually dyed via Beets. i tried it when it was around and it was unremarkable

I know what this is referring to. Surprisingly. But I will leave it be and just enjoy have this remain esoteric bordering on arcane.

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@newkittypoom says

i saw your reblog on that falin fanart and i was like "wait. this is the 28 eggs snake guy?" and i came from the post about your wrasslin days and i saw you answer an ask about being ex-mormon and well. im definitely following the blog for your writing. thanks for sharing these stories!

thanks for commenting! It's flattering to get recognized online. Means my writing voice is distinct. Got a little niche and I'm thrivin' in it.

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Anonymous says

I'm sure someone must have pointed this out by now, but you weren't dating just because she thought you were dating. If that wasn't the kind of relationship you thought you were in, you weren't dating. She was just being presumptuous. You didn't "accidentally date" someone. You can't. Dating is a mutual, consensual thing.

Yeah. Yeah. Phrasing and all.

@nbspacegay says

(1)

Hi I read your dating stories they are hilarious. I am spiritually holding hands with you because I too am terrible at dating. I accidentally pterodactyl screamed at my boyfriend when he told me he loved me once. I did also love him. I just panicked, screamed and then quite literally sprinted away. I also did not have the excuse of being in high school because I was in university.

(2)

if you so choose you can publish that last ask, i sent it becuase i thought you and your followers might find it funny

(3)

also sorry for sending you three messages like a lunatic, but also feel free to ignore it

I haven't been ignoring this, it just got buried and then I panicked and it has been crushing me like an ancient marsh, squeezing out all my peaty-bits until all that was left was an ultra-flamable bed of hydrocarbons.

Pterodactyl screaming at your boyfriend is a power move. You should do it more often. I am going to answer more questions that way. I had a customer with a masters in geology ask me why I could not provide their specified sample rate, sample times, and sample counts, and I had to explain to them that you can actually only pick two of those numbers, and the third just happens, and that the numbers they gave me did not work that way. It's like saying "I need to drive 50 miles, and I want to drive at 15 mph for two hours." I'm like, yo, go faster, or drive longer, but you have given me a multiplication problem that does not work. And they kept arguing with me, despite the actuall oscilloscope screen telling them, hey, bozo, that math does not math, and I kept trying to reason with them, when in fact I should have just pterodactyl screamed.

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Anonymous says

When I saw your blog title my first thought was that it's a reference to psalm 137 (it's on my mind since it was just tisha b'av) and was wondering why a nonjew would do that, but then I realized you're a fan of Babylon so it's probably a reference to that. And then I googled it and apparently its also a song. So which one/which combination are you referencing?

Also your blind date story was a fascinating read, it made me laugh. Very impressed by your chutzpah

Oh nvm, saw that you answered the above in another ask, feel free to ignore

No, I totally get it. Mormonism robbed and scrambled the iconography of a lot of religions, but the two it yoinked the most from are the Masons and the Jews. Like, it is my culture now, but I will acknowledge that my culture is what would happen if you asked a 14 year old conman from NY to skin your culture and wear it. I can't imagine how weird it must be to hear us talk.

Glad to have you approval on the blind date story though. That was a nightmare.

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@conkreetmonkey says

Personally I think you should do the egg thing again just for the hell of it. I honestly would because you made it sound fun, but eggs be expensive around these parts

My budget is a liiiiittle bit tight for the next month because my wife is doing occupational therapy, but there's a grocery store nearby that sells quail eggs, and to celebrate her finishing that, I am going to be a dozen and shotgun those bad boys. Hell yeah.

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Anonymous says

bulking must be so easy if you can effortlessly consume 15 raw eggs

No, for two reasons.

The first is that it was not effortless. It was effortful. I had to sweat to get them down. I had to fight them into me. I have a very vivid memory of finishing the eggs, and then leaning over to tie my shoe, and feel the eggs start to actually tip out of me, not even as like, puking, but like emptying water out of a boot. I actually had to sit for a half hour after that for the eggs to actually stay.

The second reason is that eating is easy for me, but gaining muscle mass is not. If I work out like crazy and lift weights, I get very wirey, but I never actually get big. I tried bulking one time, and my muscles stayed the same size while the 20 pounds I gained just went right to my belly and I looked like a grape on a toothpick. Very wild experience. Made my peace with being a skinny nerd.

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Anonymous says

just letting you know that you can sterilise raw eggs by keeping them at 130°F for a few hours, you can do this with a sous vide and eat them with no salmonella concerns

I love tumblr so much but all the people that read a story about some idiot eating 15 raw eggs on an impulse and then went ah, yes, this man clearly owns a sous vide machine and is willing to use it are crazier than I am. Get some realistic expecations of the world. Know your audience. You are setting your bar too high, and will find yourself endlessly disappointed. Stop it. This is why left leaning people are so fucking sad. They read the egg story and think they can solve my life with a sous vide, instead of reading the egg story and realizing that there is nothing in this world that could possibly save my from myself. I am not a stupid person. I am a highly motivated clever person who enjoys doing stupid things. There's no stopping that.

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@brambledboneyards says

Hey OP I just wanted to let you know I was informed when I was younger that farm fresh eggs will not give you salmonella. I would recommend fact checking this, but if it does remain true I hope you can date the cravings once more

This is actually good advice. I know several people who own chickens down here. Bless you.

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@queerdo-mcjewface

Some stores sell pasteurized eggs for recipes that require raw or undercooked eggs

Alas, they only sell egg whites down here, which are flavorless. I want the whole egg experience. The slime, the yolk, the cracking open - I appreciate the advice, but no, it's just not visceral enough.

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@decentmonster says

you'd probably love quail shooters tbh, you can get them at most sushi restaurants and theyre served raw and are really good (also safe to eat)

Also farm-fresh eggs are less likely to have salmonella!!

Two months time, I will eat a dozen raw quail eggs.

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Anonymous says

I want you to know the egg story is literally one of the funniest things I've ever read in my life. I laughed so hard I woke up my husband

I think that was the first little life-short-story thing I posted. Maybe? I'm glad you had fun reading it.

#babylon-lore #there are like 40 asks in this #it took me three hours to answer all of them #BUT I DID #and i love you all #and if you are tagged in this and dont want to read the whole thing just control-f search your username and you'll be fine

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pinchofhoney · 1 year ago

Note

Can I get a Jack request where reader is like castiel level protective over him? Like it could he during the time he was burning away his soul, or Dean just attacking him and reader getting super protective? Thanks <3

Also thank you sm for being my mutual <333

like real people do

jack kline x reader

word count: 1.6k

warning: the events were made up by me, but in time they probably take place in thirteenth season, platonic relationship

summary: Ever had one of those days when life just can't get any worse?

a/n: thank you so much for your request!! once i read the first four words and found out it was about jack i was so happy! this character makes me feel like hiding him in my jacket pocket and protecting him from the whole world, including my favourite white boy; dean. i hope you will enjoy it!!<33 it's so funny that we clicked so quickly because of ketch hahah

pages that may interest you: masterlist ♡ taglist ♡ who i write for

gif is not mine, credit to the owner

What does it mean to have a bad day? For some, it might involve a pointless hunt for a missing sock in the early hours. Others might deem it a disastrous day if they find themselves in a nerve-wracking business meeting, their professional future hanging by a thread, only to be unexpectedly showered in scalding coffee. But let me tell you, what went down in South Dakota, well, that was beyond any bad day anyone's ever had.

Walking down the bunker's cold, metal stairs, your eyes stayed fixed on Sam's broad back. The echoes of two more pairs of footsteps behind you added an unspoken burden to all four of you. The lengthy, six-hour drive from Sioux Falls passed in silence, punctuated only by the occasional growl of Dean's car engine.

In the midst of this oppressive silence, a tangible anxiety filled the atmosphere, much like the sensation of holding a grenade with a fragile safety pin. Each of you knew that speaking the first word out loud could be equivalent to pulling that pin, possibly setting off a surge of emotions and consequences you weren't prepared to deal with at that moment.

As you finally reached the colossal table stationed at the heart of the spacious room, you wearily rested your hands on the chair's backrest, your head drooping in helpless resignation. A deep sigh escaped your lungs, carrying the weight of the day's exhaustion. In the stillness that followed, you could discern Sam's chair scraping against the floor on the opposite side of the table as he settled himself heavily into it and Dean's footsteps resonated down the corridor, indicating his retreat to the kitchen.

Lifting your exhausted head, you gave a quick once-over to your disheveled clothing, recognizing its disorder. It had not only withstood the harsh impact of multiple falls today but was also stained with splotches of blood. Nervously, you ran your hand through your hair, attempting to regain some semblance of composure. Pushing away from the chair, you turned on your heel, scanning the room with a sense of restless anticipation.

You stopped your gaze on the young man by the stairs, who had stayed there the whole time. His face showed a mix of confusion, sympathy, and regret. Your lower lip was gently caught between your teeth as you pondered your next steps. When his gaze met yours, you drew a shallow breath. His appearance wasn't any better than yours, but because he was still Lucifer's son, he appeared more composed than you.

With determination, you approached him step by cautious step until you were standing alongside him. “Jack, are you alright?” you asked, your voice reflecting genuine worry. A quick glance back at Sam, who remained seated at the table, revealed that he was now observing your interaction. You then shifted your attention back to Jack, waiting for his response.

Jack's reply hung in the air like a heavy cloud, his voice a somber murmur that revealed the depth of his guilt. His gaze dropped to his fidgeting hands, fingers twisting in anguish as he confessed, “It's all my fault...”

You couldn't help but feel a pang of sympathy as you witnessed the torment in Jack's eyes. In an attempt to ease the crushing weight of his self-blame, you placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. “Hey,” you said gently, your voice a soothing balm, “you're not alone in this. None of us expected it to go down like that.”

Sam, the voice of reason, chimed in from his seat at the table. His tone was calm and reassuring as he added, “Jack, we knew it wouldn't be easy. We'll figure this out together.”

Jack looked up at both of you. His eyes were pools of sorrow, and he seemed on the brink of tears, even though he didn’t know what emotions are. “But you guys almost got killed because of me. I couldn't control my powers, and I let them get too close.”

Before you could offer words of reassurance, Dean's voice cut through the room like a sharp blade, “That’s damn right,” he snapped. His anger was palpable, and you could feel the tension rise as he entered with a bottle of beer in his hand. You had been so focused on Jack's emotions that you hadn't noticed Dean approaching.

Your attention shifted to Dean, and it was clear that he had no intentions of concealing his rage. Such suppression was never in his nature. He scrutinized both of you with an intense gaze, his jaw clenched tight, the lines of his face etched with frustration and anger.

Dean proceeded to the table, his movements forceful as he shoved one chair back with a grating screech before taking a seat. The bottle of beer landed on the table with a heavy thud, emphasizing his simmering anger, and the room seemed to shrink with the weight of his emotions. It was a moment where words hung in the balance, and the fragile tension in the air threatened to shatter at any moment.

Jack’s connection to his human emotions was weak, but regret had clear place in his eyes, keenly sensed Dean's anger. His Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed hard, and he shifted uncomfortably, his body language a reflection of the confusion within him. In a moment of desperation, he cast a furtive glance in your direction, silently pleading for support, his eyes searching for any sign of comfort.

You, on the other hand, found yourself torn between conflicting emotions. Your heart ached for Jack, understanding the crushing guilt that weighed on him, yet you also knew the importance of not undermining Dean's authority. It was a delicate balancing act that you had become all too familiar with, navigating in these tense moments.

Dean finally broke the oppressive silence, his voice laced with bitterness that hung in the air like a heavy cloud. “You know, Jack, your little power surge not only almost got us killed, but it also cost us Castiel at the very beginning of your existence. You may not remember, but he sacrificed himself to save you.”

Jack's expression remained stoic, but his eyes bore the weight of remorse as he regarded the hunter. “I didn't ask him to,” he replied, his voice carrying the burden of the past.

Dean's face remained unyielding, his anger unwavering in the face of Jack's distress. He leaned forward, his gaze locked on the young Nephilim. “Doesn't change the fact that he's gone because of you.”

The room seemed to shrink with the intensity of the moment, emotions swirling like a storm around the three of you. Jack's regret was a silent force, Dean's anger an unrelenting presence, and you, caught in the middle, felt the weight of the situation pressing down on you like a heavy shroud.

You decided to step in, taking a deep breath to calm yourself as you tried to ease the heavy tension in the room. You spoke gently, "Dean, listen," in a calm and careful way, "Jack didn't want these powers, and he didn't want Cas to save him. None of us knew this would happen."

Dean looked at you, his anger softening just a bit as he heard your caring tone. You had been through a lot with the Winchesters, so you knew how emotions could run high.

But Dean, being stubborn as ever, couldn't let go of his anger towards Jack. He narrowed his eyes at you and replied with bitterness,

“Yeah, well, empathy won't bring Cas back,” he retorted, the pain of loss seeping through every syllable. “Neither will help any of the people who have been harmed today, because of him.”

Jack, still struggling to contain his emotions, lowered his head in acknowledgment. He understood the depth of Dean's anger, and he carried the weight of guilt knowing that nothing he said could bring back the angel who had given his life to protect him.

You exchanged a quick, supportive glance with Jack, a silent understanding passing between you two. Then, you turned your steady attention back to Dean, determined to break through the walls of resentment that had formed around him. “We're all hurting, Dean,” you said, your voice laced with sincerity. “But pointing fingers and blaming Jack won't change the past. We have to move forward together if we're going to face the challenges that lie ahead.”

Dean's jaw clenched, and he took another long, deliberate sip from his beer bottle, as if using the act as a moment of respite from his simmering anger. It was clear that he was still seething, but your words had managed to make some impact, no matter how small.

“Fine,” he grumbled, his anger not completely gone but his tone less harsh. He reluctantly agreed to try and move forward, but he was still stubborn. “But don't think for a second that I'm okay with any of this.”

You nodded, acknowledging Dean's raw emotions. “We know you're not, Dean. But we're a team, and we need to stick together.”

Jack, encouraged by your words and Dean's reluctant acceptance, finally found the courage to speak up again. “I promise, I'll do everything in my power to make amends and prove myself to all of you.”

Dean's gaze remained fixed on his beer bottle, and while he didn't offer immediate forgiveness or approval, he also didn't object further. It was a tenuous truce, fragile as glass, but it was some kind of a start, and everyone knows that the beginnings are always the hardest.

#platonic relationships #no use of y/n #supernatural #supernatural fanfiction #jack kline #jack kline fanfiction #jack kline imagine #jack kline scenario #jack kline x reader #dean winchester #dean winchester fanfiction #dean winchester x reader #sam winchester #sam winchester fanfiction #sam winchester x reader #alexander calvert #alexander calvert fanfiction #alexander calvert x reader

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mixelation · 1 year ago

Text

reborn au, deidara POV. start of the chunin exams

Deidara sat across the desk from the Hokage, wedged between Itachi and Tori. Oonoki, and any commanding officer below him, would have made him stand, even if he was bleeding out.

Minato, meanwhile, tended to make meetings feel more like a conversation. Brief communications were done standing, but for their longer meetings he’d gesture for them to pull up chairs and then lean back casually in his own seat. He usually didn’t even complain if someone interrupted him with questions.

(Which Team 4 did. A lot. Because Itachi and Tori were both assholes who thought they were smarter than they were. Deidara, meanwhile, only had the most salient of interruptions.)

MInato did this even with super serious missions, like his insane plot to have them enter the Iwa Chunin Exam as cover to extract a Konoha prisoner.

Deidara wasn’t sure if Minato was so casual for all his shinobi, or if being on his wife’s team got them special privileges. Kushina-sensei had, in fact, chosen to sit on the desk rather than a chair, the backs of her sandals clunking against the wood. But even if it was just a perk of being on Kushina-sensei’s team, Deidara would take this lax style over anything Iwa ever put him through.

“Iwa sent their finalized list of contraband,” Minato said, voice cheerful. He held up a stack of papers. “I’ll read them to you. It’s pretty intense.”

The list was… lengthy. And sort of insane. They banned them from bringing in their own weapons, promising to provide adequate replacements upon arrival. They also banned all fuinjutsu related material, including any type of paper or writing utensil, and then an increasingly unhinged list of items which seem to pose no real danger to Deidara.

Minato’s voice cracked at reading the phrase “nectars and other viscous juices,” and then he turned and coughed a couple times to cover up laughter.

Kushina-sensei was also covering a smile with one hand.

“Did they put an insane person in charge of communications?” Deidara asked.

“No, they…” Minato had to pause a moment to get ahold of himself again. “They really, really don’t want you sneaking in a Hiraishin marker. Or making a new one.”

“Sorry,” Kushina-sensei told them, not looking the least bit sorry. “They’re probably only this paranoid because I’m your sensei.”

This did make sense to Deidara. The Iwa he’d grown up in, in the other timeline, had been one in which the Yellow Flash was dead and gone, and the man was still haunting old people’s nightmares. Some of Deidara’s older Academy texts had been from before his death, and they’d included insane protocols for what to do if he showed up on the field. Not a Konoha ninja, not a ninja with a specific technique– just him. No other Kage had such an honor.

He could only imagine the sort of cultural anxiety Minato was inflicting on Iwa just by existing.

The idea was sort of exiting, actually. All that fear and anxiety building up for years, just waiting for someone to come along and end it all in one glorious moment–

Tori elbowed him. To Minato, she asked, “Will they give us fuinjutsu supplies too, or do we have to get creative?”

Minato’s lips quirked upwards.

“They will give you fuinjutsu supplies,” he said. “A village only makes money off an exam if they can show off promising genin, and I convinced them it would be necessary for you to give a good show.”

“But I don’t get any?” Kushina-sensei clarified.

Any Iwa-nin who’d done two seconds of research on Uzumaki Kushina would want to ban her from even touching a brush forever. Even if she hadn’t gotten famous off of murder like he had, she and Minato came as a set: half his techniques were from her, and if anyone was going to be making Hiraishin markers and spreading them around, it would be her.

“I don’t know how they’ll enforce Tori having access but not you,” Minato admitted. “Supervision, maybe.”

Itachi cleared his throat. “You're sure this isn’t an ambush?” he asked.

This seemed like a good point to Deidara. They were basically just agreeing to waltz into Iwa completely weaponless and submit to whatever asshole demands Iwa might make. And like, someone like Deidara could do it, but it would be super annoying.

Minato took a moment to answer, gathering his thoughts.

“It might be,” he said, tone suddenly deadly serious. “But their doors will be open to plenty of foreign powers, and they’ve already advertised a team from Konoha. A move against us would be very, very stupid of them.” He let a humorless smile cross his lips. “Besides, I intentionally picked a team that could still function even with every disadvantage they might give you.”

Next to him, Tori shifted uneasily. Deidara didn’t think she was nervous for herself, because Tori had wandered into worse with no ninja skills whatsoever and came out on top. It was that there was no way Minato knew that, because Tori liked to downplay her talents at every turn. She had worked her way into the mission plan as a competent fuinjutsu user, but he probably wasn’t including her in his super special hand-picked team.

(And also, if you evaluated Tori the way you would in a classroom– throw this knife here, use this type of kick, demonstrate this particular move– she was pretty mediocre, even for a twelve year old. Tori only seemed intimidating after she’d tricked into doing something deeply stupid and then was waving some insane seal in your face.)

Deidara wasn’t even sure Minato was including him, even though he ranked right up there with Kushina-sensei and Itachi in terms of “has an absurd bloodline limit, good luck taking THAT away.” It seemed more likely he and Tori got signed up to be semi-expendable benchwarmers, and any talents they ended up displaying were just a nice perk.

The thought made him angry. Minato might seem way cooler than Oonoki, but they were all the same, weren’t they? Minato would definitely abandon him and Tori to save his precious Konoha-born shinobi.

Tori must be putting thought into what she would do without weapons, because she remarked, “It’s such overkill to ban all paper, though. If I already wasn’t using sealing paper, I wouldn’t be like, ‘Oh, no regular paper either? Guess I’ll just give up.’”

Deidara attempted to reel in his temper. This was Tori probing the waters of what she could get away with. She was infuriatingly cautious about it, in Deidara’s opinion, but her paranoid little brain would be better attuned to when they might have to jump ship. He should let her take lead on this and not upset himself.

Kushina-sensei flashed her teeth at Tori. “No, obviously if you’re good enough, you can make any flat surface work. I assume that’s why they banned…. hand mirrors.”

There was a long pause while Kushina-sensei and Tori stared at each other, presumably contemplating what chaos they could cause with a hand mirror.

Minato’s swivel chair groaned as he leaned back, dropping his papers on his desk.

“It’s a moot point,” he said. “Tori, we don’t use untested seals in the field, and you can’t count on any seal that works on paper to work anywhere else. There’s a reason we use sealing paper. No hand mirror seals, okay?”

Hand mirrors were only the tip of the iceberg of insane shit Tori might try, but she plastered a meek smile on her face and agreed anyway.

Disgusting, Deidara thought. He trusted this version of Tori to save his ass if they suddenly had to abandon ship, but she was also the worst possible version of herself. Unartistic.

Itachi changed the subject again. “The overall mission is getting convoluted. How will Kushina get to Morino with fuinjutsu supplies if we may be supervised so closely? What are we going to do about Deidara’s explosion release?”

Tori opened her mouth, perhaps to suggest her own plan, only to close it and glance at Kushina-sensei. Ugh.

“We’ll just wing it,” Kushina-sensei said with full confidence.

Deidara turned to confirm that yes, Itachi did look like his brain had just exploded. Also seeing this, Tori said to him, “It’s okay. You can’t actually keep a fuinjutsu master from smuggling things wherever they want.”

Now Minato looked like he wanted to say something, but wasn’t quite sure where to start.

“I have an idea on how to distract them from Deidara,” Kushina-sensei said, twisting her torso to face Minato. “But they’ll eventually, uh… notice some things.”

Deidara clenched his fists, his nails digging into the bottom lips of his hand-mouths. Minato drummed his fingers on the desk.

“It’s tricky, but they don’t have a verifiable claim on him,” Minato replied. He eyed Deidara. “Do you have a preferred cover-up story?”

“...no,” Deidara admitted.

He didn’t like that Iwa thought they owned him, but he’d never had strong feelings about his family origins. They were assholes that treated him like shit, and he’d left. That was it.

They kicked around a few ideas, ranging from gaslighting everyone that Deidara’s explosions had nothing to do with Iwa’s only bloodline limit, to claiming he was an old experiment of Orochimaru. They didn’t come to any sort of real conclusion, and eventually Minato said he’d sleep on it and dismissed them.

“Deidara, can I talk to you for a moment?” Minato asked. Deidara narrowed his eyes at him, and from his peripheral vision he saw Tori flash a hand sign which was almost definitely Behave.

He crossed his arm and remained sitting while everyone else filed out. Kushina-sensei twirled in her seat so she could duck down and give Minato a peck on the cheek first. Gross.

When they were alone, Minato asked, “How do you feel about this mission?”

“It’s a mission, yeah,” Deidara replied slowly, trying to parse what he was actually being asked. Loyalty, maybe. His father was an Iwa-nin, even if he’d never met him. He added, “I don’t really like undercover missions, but it’s fine if I get to do some art. If I get a promotion and a nice paycheck out of it, all the better.”

Deidara still wasn’t sure he wanted to stay in Konoha, but the prospect of a steady income after being a child wandering-nin no one wanted to hire was incredibly alluring. Income meant he could have a bed, maybe even rent an art studio if Konoha Jounin got paid well. These fantasies weren’t enough to make him even consider going back to a hellhole that was Iwa, but if all Konoha had to torture him was a pushy sensei who got him in good with the Hokage, he’d take it.

“I know you intentionally fled Iwa,” Minato said, his voice… soft for some reason. Weird. “I understand going back might be uncomfortable.”

“I’ve never been to Iwa,” Deidara defended immediately. He’d made damn sure to leave Earth Country as soon as he could, and they hadn’t even been able to put him through any of their stupid ninja aptitude tests in this timeline.

Minato put up both hands as a calming gesture.

“I know, I know,” he replied. “But you have their bloodline limit. You grew up outside of a village, so this might not be obvious to you yet, but your art is going to link you Iwa permanently. I don’t want to send you into Iwa unprepared.”

Deidara had to spend a few moments grinding his teeth to hold back rude words. Of course he knew. Iwa had bred him to be their perfect little killing machine.

“It’s not Iwa’s bloodline limit,” Deidara replied eventually. “It’s mine, yeah. I decide what it’s for and what I do with it. That’s the whole point of my art, yeah.”

Minato raised both eyebrows. “Alright,” he said. “Good. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.”

He dismissed him, leaving him with a strange promise that his door was always open if Deidara wanted to “talk.” Whatever.

As he hopped down the stairs of Hokage tower two at a time, Deidara found himself surprised Minato had agreed that his bloodline limit was his own, separate from a village’s control. Probably a manipulation to keep Deidara away from any temptations to join Iwa. There was no way Minato would say Itachi’s eyeballs were for himself only and not Konoha, or that Kushina should use her chakra chains for anything but Konoha’s wellbeing. Villages just didn’t work like that.

Not that Deidara would complain about special treatment…

Tori was waiting for him outside, leaning against an outside wall. They started the walk back to the genin dorms.

“What’d he want?” she asked.

Deidara rolled his eyes exaggeratedly. “He wanted to know how I felt, yeah. Stupid.”

Tori frowned. “And how do you feel?” she asked.

“Like you and him are both annoying, yeah,” Deidara replied. “Also, what the hell is with you twiddling your thumbs and acting stupid whenever anyone asks about fuinjutsu–”

Tori rolled her eyes right back at him. This was an ongoing argument. Deidara understood her reasoning for downplaying her talents; he just thought it was stupid. Just because Orochimaru was a manipulative scumbag didn’t mean every ninja wanted to push and push until she had a screaming breakdown. Most villages did this very slowly and steadily in a very predictable, soul-crushing kind of way.

Somehow, Tori looped his rant at her back around. “I mean, if you have feelings about me and Oto, you definitely have some feelings about you and Iwa,” she said. “Are you going to be able to keep it together, seeing it?”

Deidara scowled at her. She’d worded it ambiguously because they were in public, but there was a definite seeing it AGAIN implied in there. And obviously Deidara didn’t want to go to Iwa, but that was the mission she and Itachi had signed him up for. He was an adult, if not physically. He could handle being annoyed by Iwa-nin for a month.

“Obviously,” he told Tori. Then he grabbed her arm and yanked her down a side street, changing the subject entirely. “There’s a new take-out place down here. We should get dinner, yeah.”

#reborn au #my writing

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imrllytootiredforthis · 11 months ago

Note

omg i JUST read your soob drabble “nightmare dressed like a daydream” and the concept of popular reader x outcast soob has just been brainrotting me

like just imagine you guys got into a secret relationship after that project, and your favourite pastime now is to tease him both in school and out of school.

in school you guys act like you don’t know each other, he’s alone again and you’re surrounded by all your friends, but as you pass his desk you slip a note telling him to meet you under the stairs or on the rooftop. the moment he arrives you pull him down and begin to roughly make out with him, unbuckling his belt and he just shyly tells you ‘not at school’, so you just wreck him with your lips, sending him back to class with his cheeks flushed, hair tousled, collar undone and neck full of hickeys. he sits back into his seat in embarrassment, everyone knows what happened but no one says a thing… maybe after a bit you’ll get cocky and ask him to wear a vibrator in class, he pretends to be embarrassed but he still slips it in. when the teacher calls on him you turn on the vibrator and he can barely stutter out a coherent sentence, the teacher lets him off but he glances at you with teary eyes. you do this a couple more times until he’s excusing himself to the bathroom, you follow him out ‘as a good classmate checking on their peers’ and the moment you enter the bathroom hes begging you to help him.

after school you invite him into your house again and you just spoil him with attention, letting him explore around and be curious before bringing him to your room and having your way with him. and he’ll let you because this is the most attention he’s ever had in his entire school life. he’s so pliant and obedient under you, letting you play with every surface of skin you can touch, rubbing his nipples, kissing his inner thighs and finally stroking where he wants to be touched most. hes a total virgin, but a total pervert who has a ton of fantasies and kinks and this is his absolute dream come true. overstimulate him for hours until its dark out, whisper in his ear about how you saw his little glances and stares and how all he wished was for you to pay attention to him like you did with your friends. and he would sob but he couldn’t say a word because all of it was true. after you were both satisfied, you would let him sleep over, cooing at how pretty and sweet he was, and maybe you guys can even go on a secret date during the weekends…

THIS WAS SUPER LENGTHY IM SORRY THANK U FOR LISTENING TO MY RAMBLING HAHSJSKDKE

- 🍓

holy shit, i had to scour back through my soob tag to find the original drabble you're talking about😭, i kinda cringe when i read some of my old work but whatever

BC THIS IS SUCH A GOOD ADD ON-fuck i love shy loser virgin boys who just wanted to be loved and used, he's so cuteeee<3

#inbox💌#🍓 anon #you don't understand #i just wanna play w him until he cries:(#hard thoughts #dom reader #sub soobin #soobin smut #sub txt #txt smut

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mrsjellymunson · 1 month ago

Text

Hey, Boss

A prequel to Hello, Stranger

Characters: Eddie Munson, Steve Harrington, Robin Buckley, Jim Hopper, Raymond ‘Red’ Reddington, Mr Kaplan, Dembe Zuma

Pairing: None until the next part (where it becomes Eddie Munson x gn!reader)

AU: Stranger Things AU with elements of The Blacklist

Summary: Eddie falls into a new line of work…

WC: ~3.9k

CW: 18+ MDNI. This miniseries is SFW, depending on your tolerance for dark/violent themes, but most of my blog is 18+ so minors please be aware of this and DNI. Dark humour, black comedy. Allusions to drug use, alcohol consumption, violence, crime and murder. Weapons, bodies and death are discussed. No smut, no reader in this part. This is a Stranger Things AU, the upside down is very briefly alluded to but Eddie doesn’t know about it. No time period mentioned, so if events or technology don’t track that’s why that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. The characters don’t know each other like they do in ST.

A/N: This is the prequel to ‘Hello, Stranger’. The two parts can be read in either order. As in the original part, there are some Easter eggs in here, this time from The Blacklist (obvs), Stargate, and a deliciously niche one from John Wick. Let me know if you spot any!

A/N additional: I would never have believed that I’d be revisiting this story a year after publishing it to add a fun little prologue, but here we are! 😃 The original part was written for a Halloween prompt event last year and was the first lengthy thing I’d shared; I was SO ridiculously nervous about posting it, you have no idea 🫣 Reading it again now, would I change things in the original? Yes. But mainly things like punctuation and formatting, because I think over the last year my writing has become clearer, so I’m kinda pleased that I’d leave the story exactly how it is. For anyone discovering this for the first time, I hope you enjoy!! Please let me know with a comment/reblog/feral spewings in my inbox, I’d love it, srsly 😉🖤

I have an Easter egg reveal post planned for this miniseries, if you’d like to hear about it just ask to be added to my general taglist where you can get notified about all my writing posts ☺️🖤

My masterlist

It’s a chilly October night, close to Halloween, and Eddie’s blasted out of his mind. Gareth got hold of some super strong skunk from a cousin who was visiting from out of state, and that combined with a few cool beers has left him even more buzzed than usual.

Forgoing his van on the insistence of his friends, and wanting to get home to the relative warmth of the trailer sooner rather than later, he’s decided to take a shortcut across Merrill Wright’s fields.

High as all hell, he's staggering as he navigates the pumpkins, managing to avoid most of the obvious orange orbs but forgetting that their tendrils need looking out for too.

He’s already tripped a couple of times, and curses out the vines for both being invisible at night and clearly conspiring with each other to sabotage his journey home. He swears that at least twice he’s seen them move...

Pushing through a thin layer of trees separating one field from the next, he stumbles forwards as an impeding branch snaps and gives way. Moving too quickly to stop himself, he totters forwards, hoping to regain his balance once he’s free of the spindly foliage.

But surprisingly, his feet fail to connect with anything at all, the ground disappears, and Eddie falls face first into… nothing.

Though it doesn’t remain nothing for long, swiftly becoming the harsh smack of hard, and very cold, dirt against his knees, torso and face.

Shocked, confused and more than a little winded, Eddie grunts and rolls onto his side, groaning.

“Oooooohhhhhh fuuuuuuuckk…. What the hell—?”

He spits out a few clods of mud, and possibly part of a worm (sorry, dude), and tries to work out what just happened.

His hair has fallen over his face, and he pushes the waves, now bedecked with a sprinkling of leaves and soil, out of his eyes and looks upwards.

Instead of the expected expanse of the clear night sky, perhaps even a few constellations if he cared to look carefully, his vision seems to have tunnelled, a significant proportion of it now a deep black.

Sitting upright, he briefly wonders whether he’s concussed, or worse, but then the sound of someone speaking garners his undivided attention.

A light, high voice cuts through the night.

“Hey, do you hear something?”

Eddie freezes, eyes wide. He’s not sure whether he’s comforted or more freaked out to discover he’s not the only one in this field at this time of night. This dark, isolated, middle-of-nowhere, nobody-within-screaming-distance field.

Another voice, deeper than the first, replies,

“Like what?”

“I dunno, a grunt maybe?”

“A grunt? Uhh, no.”

“Why am I asking you anyway? Your ears are shot after one too many sportsball encounters…”

“Hey, shut up.”

Eddie hears some shuffling and a chortle, like two people jostling each other, before the deeper voice speaks again, but it’s in no way comforting.

“Uh, this guy’s definitely dead, right?”

There’s a noise that sounds like thick plastic being prodded with something.

“Yeah, yeah, this guy definitely. But I’m sure I heard something from over there.”

“Are you trying to spook me? You know how much I hate Halloween.”

Eddie hears an overly dramatic brrr and the rustling of clothing, and he imagines the guy shivering, like he’s shaking off a covering of non-existent snow.

Eddie, terrified but with a new sense of urgency, and eyes adjusting to the new level of darkness, glances more fully around his environment, figuring out that he’s definitely below ground level and in some kind of a hole. He spreads his arms wide, moving them around, and notices he can feel the edges on two sides, but not all four, meaning it’s a long hole. Long enough for him to lay down in. A hole, long enough to fit a human being in, but not much else. Okay, so…

Wait, this is a fucking grave! Fuck, he’s in a goddamn motherfucking grave!!

Eddie stands, wobbling a little, and notices his eyeline is still below ground level. He reaches up, grabbing at the soil at the edge of the hole, but it’s dry and loose and crumbles in his hands. He tries to jump, grabbing at anything he can find on the ground, but to no avail. It’s tilled earth and there are no branches or roots, not even grass, that he can grab to pull himself out. He mentally takes back everything he said about pumpkin vines…

Suddenly he hears a dull thud, the sound of dragging, muttering, and two people grunting.

Shit, they’re getting closer. And now there’s a large package wrapped in blue plastic at the edge of the hole, and they’ve just dropped two shovels, and—

Feigning nonchalance, Eddie leans a muddy shoulder against the raw earth, one hand on his hip and the other swiping through his hair as two faces, backlit by moonlight, hove into view. His voice cracks with,

“Hee-eeey guys, how’s it goin’?”

What the hell?? He’s literally standing in an open grave, that these two have probably just dug, and that’s the best he can come up with?

The figures regard Eddie, then turn to each other, then look back at Eddie. They both frown and in unison cock their heads sideways in the same direction, and Eddie, stoned and in shock as he is, has to suppress a giggle.

Fuck, that weed really was strong… Damn you, Gareth’s cousin!

One of the figures, the slighter of the two, gestures into the hole with a muddy, gloved hand, asking,

“Is he one of yours?”

The other guy looks both startled and mildly offended.

“What? No! Of course not!”

“Well, there was that one time where you, y’know, missed the mark, and we had to spend an hour chasing the guy before we put him down.”

The taller of the two flaps his arms exasperatedly, trying to point an index finger in the air but failing, the heavy duty gloves he’s wearing making him look more like he’s holding up a fist.

“One time! The one time I miss a goddamn artery and you’ve never let me live it down. Jeez man, gimme a goddamn break!”

“Okay, okay, I’m just sayin’”

“Well don’t! I don’t appreciate it when you criticise my abilities and undermine my self esteem.”

The slimmer figure speaks again, resting the knuckles of one gloved hand against their waist.

“Did your therapist tell you to say that?”

“Hey, don’t knock it. She’s helping me process my intergenerational trauma and internalised lack of self-worth.”

The tall figure says the words like he’s reciting from a book, but he says them with conviction. Eddie briefly wonders whether he should ask the guy for the title. He finishes with,

“Anyway, I don’t know who the fuck this asshole is.”

Hands now on his hips, he turns his attention back to Eddie, who, whilst they’d been talking, had been surreptitiously clawing at the back edge of the hole, trying desperately to lever himself out.

The figure with the higher voice turns to their compatriot, and with a somewhat sardonic tone to their voice remarks,

“Well, I suppose we’d better try and find out who this asshole is, and where he came from, huh?”

They lean forwards into the hole and brace themselves with their hands against their knees.

The skinnier figure begins the interrogation with,

“Did Andrea send you? Was it Annie?”

The taller guy continues,

“Wait, was it Red? Cuz if it was Red you can tell him it’s not fuckin’ funny…”

Eddie stammers,

“N-n-o, man, no. I don’t know who any of those people are. I’m, uh, I’m nobody, literally! I was just stoned, and walkin’ home and I, uh, just kinda, fell into this… whatever this delightful arrangement is.”

He gestures around him, attempting to convey that he neither knows, nor cares, exactly what this is.

Tall guy regards him down his nose.

“So, if nobody sent you, then nobody knows you’re here. But now you know we’re here. And I’m guessing that you’re guessing what we’re about to do here. So, I’m guessing the best thing all the way around is if you, y’know, stay here…”

Eddie, in his inebriated state, didn’t completely follow what this guy just said, but when the guy reaches behind him into his belt, and Eddie hears the unmistakable metallic clink of a gun being retrieved, he gets the message pretty damn quickly.

The shovels, the ‘package’, the gun… oh god!

“Nonononono! Waitwaitwait!!”

He extends his arms and frantically waves his filthy hands in front of him in supplication.

Think, Eddie, think!! What would you encourage the sheep to do in such an impossible campaign situation? Thiiiiiiink!

The guy levels the gun at Eddie’s head. He still can’t see their faces clearly, but he can most certainly make out the end of the barrel as it glints in the moonlight.

Eddie scrunches his eyes up tight, grimacing, every muscle in his body tensing in expectation of the horror to come.

Abruptly, his mind fills with the most bizarre and inspired creative idea that he thinks he’s ever had.

Fuck, that weed really was strong… Thank you, Gareth’s cousin!

“What if I told you I could help make your job easier? Maybe more enjoyable? Or, at the very least, more interesting?”

He sees the barrel of the gun lower ever so slightly.

Oh good, now it’s not aimed at his head. Just at his chest. Progress?

He presses on.

“Your bosses want you to make people disappear, right? Boring, efficient, sure. But not that interesting. Probably doesn’t pay all that well either, huh?”

The two figures look at each other again, frowning, and Eddie’s pretty sure they're deciding whether they should let the guy in the hole keep talking, or just shut him up for good, drop the other package in and cover them both over.

“How about we give ‘em a little something extra first? Like a show? A demonstration. An exhibition, if you will.”

Eddie’s got into his stride now, and is walking up and down the length of the six foot hole waving his arms in wide arcs, as if he’s delivering one of his lunchtime diatribes on a canteen table.

“Say there’s some guy who’s been messin’ with your patch. Goods are goin’ missing, or his funds are coming up short. Sure, you could just pop a cap in him and stick him in the ground,”

He glances nervously at the tarp-wrapped bundle,

“But wouldn’t it be more satisfying to really teach him a lesson. Bury him at the four corners of the state? Spray him all over this field? Dissolve him ‘til there’s nothing left? Now that really sends a message, don’tcha think? Plus, it’d sure be entertaining for your bosses to watch. Must get pretty boring for them. Y’know, pop a guy, wrap a guy, pop a guy, wrap a guy…”

He regards the two heavies carefully, trying to judge whether he’s made any impression on them whatsoever. They’re looking at each other and then back at Eddie.

Eventually the bigger figure speaks.

“Whaddaya think, Rob? Shall we take him back to talk to—“

“Fuckssake Steve, don’t tell him my name! Ah, fuck, Jeez…”

Sighing, the figure turns back towards Eddie.

“Yeah, okay, if this is as revelatory as you say it is, then fine. But it better be. Don’t make us come back out here for a second time tonight.”

Eddie takes this threat very, very seriously.

“Okay, okay, whatever you say. I’ll do whatever you need me to do, I swear.”

The figure pauses for a moment, contemplative, before puffing out a long breath from between their lips.

“Well, for a start you can help us finish up with this guy. Steve, get him out of that hole and pass him my shovel...”

Eddie’s only thought is, great, I’m not gonna die! At least, not right now…

———

An hour later, freezing, muddy, exhausted, still terrified and, incongruously, still a little stoned, Eddie walks between Rob and Steve back to their vehicle, an SUV that he notices has “Buckley & Harrington, Landscaping Services & Specialised Waste Disposal” emblazoned on the side.

‘Specialised waste disposal’ indeed…

They bundle Eddie into the back, Rob grousing the whole way, and make him lie under yet another blue tarp so he can’t see where they’re going. He doesn’t much like being on this side of the plastic, and dearly hopes it’s the only time he has to experience it.

After some time, and a number of bruises acquired from sliding around the truck bed, the truck stops and the two figures start to bundle Eddie out of the back.

Still partially under the tarp, Eddie sees the lower half of a large, heavy set man in military fatigues and combat boots join them outside. Still shaken from the evening’s events and disoriented from the uncomfortable journey, Eddie can’t quite make out their entire conversation. He does hear what the hell and let me explain, plus a lot of grumbling in what could be a West African accent.

Finally freed from the tarp, Eddie is grabbed by the shoulders from behind by a pair of very strong hands, dragged off the truck bed and shoved, stumbling, forwards.

The three figures walk him into an old warehouse, the huge shutters open to the night and the entire place brightly lit and remarkably active given the hour. It’s crammed with pallets, shelves, crates, people and machinery. There are forklifts lifting things in and out of trucks and people carrying paperwork and speaking on phones. Many seem to have ominous-looking bulges in their waistbands and jackets that Eddie really doesn’t want to become any more closely acquainted with.

A large man is barking orders and holding a mug that says coffee and contemplation on the side, but judging by the subtle wince that happens each time he takes a swig, Eddie suspects it contains something stronger than his favourite Java. His voice is gruff, and to his great surprise, Eddie recognises it.

“Uh, Hopper, is that you?”

The man turns, frowning at first, but as he clocks Eddie his free hand flaps dejectedly at his side and his eyes roll up into his skull.

“Oh Jeez. What the hell is he doing here? What have you two idiots done now?”

Eddie's new acquaintances look sheepishly at each other. The one named Rob ventures,

“Uh, he has a proposal for Red, something about a novel business idea?”

“Goddamnit, I know this guy! And now, thanks to you two bozos, he knows me too!”

Steve interjects this time,

“Just give him five minutes with Mr Kaplan, boss! Honestly, I think Red’s gonna love this.”

Hopper doesn’t look convinced, but he grabs a guy with a clipboard as he scurries past and asks him to find whoever Mr Kaplan is. Eddie doesn’t like the sound of this. The dude sounds pretty scary.

After no more than a minute, a small, tweed-clad lady appears. She’s older than everyone here, and her face is pinched, but somehow also looks kind. Eddie imagines she’d look far more at home in a library than… whateverthisis. He wonders if she’s Mr Kaplan’s secretary, or something.

“Come on then you two, spit it out. I don’t have all day.”

The two stammer and splutter their way through an explanation, trying to justify why they not only spared this guy, but also brought him back to their base of operations. Eddie finally comprehends that this is Mr Kaplan. He doesn’t know whether to be relieved, or even more terrified.

At various points Mr Kaplan sucks in her cheeks, tilts her head and folds her arms, reminding Eddie of every disapproving teacher he ever had, and more than once he considers how far he might get if he hightailed it through those large doors and made off into the night. But then he remembers how he got here, who he’s with, the amount of hardware everyone appears to be carrying, how often he skipped PT at school, how much he’s smoked this evening (not to mention over the last however many years), and, not least, the fact that he has less than no clue about where he actually is.

Finally, the two cronies stop talking, and Mr Kaplan’s focus turns entirely to Eddie. Despite being significantly taller than she is, he feels about two feet high under her gaze, and that this moment could be about to define his future, his fate.

“Well, dearie, it’s certainly a unique proposition. And one I’m intrigued to see if you can pull off. But ultimately, it’s not my decision. All I can do is get you a meeting with Red, and then you’re on your own.”

Steve seems thrilled by this outcome, his eyes wide and a grin on his lips. He shifts in place excitedly and jovially taps his elbow against Eddie’s upper arm. Eddie side-eyes him, guessing the guy is pleased that he isn’t going to suffer any repercussions for going ‘off script’ by bringing Eddie here like this, but he does wonder what on earth makes him think they’re ever going to be friends.

Mr Kaplan nods to Hopper, who takes this as his cue and disappears out of sight. Mr Kaplan doesn’t see it, but Eddie notices his weary-looking eye roll.

Eddie finally gets a good look at the guy who ‘helped’ him off the truck and brought him inside. He’s tall, huge, shaven-headed and intimidating. Eddie doesn’t look for long.

After a few minutes, the shaven-headed heavy motions for Eddie to step into a somewhat more private area of the warehouse, sectioned off by some disturbing-looking medical curtains on rusting rails that offer visual, if not much auditory, privacy. Eddie figures the noise of vehicles and machinery elsewhere likely drown out any talking that goes on in here anyway.

There’s a screen set up that’s displaying a fuzzy, low quality image of a man sitting in what appears to be a lavish sitting room. There’s a picture of a landscape, or maybe sky, hanging to his left, and the audio quality is marred by a low rumble. Eventually, Eddie’s brain catches up and he realises it’s not a picture at all but a window, and what Eddie can see is clouds and what he can hear is the roar of an engine - the guy’s on a plane. All he can think is, Jeezus, this guy must be loaded.

As the image comes into better focus the figure looks oddly familiar. Eddie’s vaguely reminded of a sci-fi film he saw that had Kirt Russell in it and something about pyramids, but he brushes it aside, more important things on his mind.

The man is clad in a fedora and an exquisitely tailored suit, and as Eddie is positioned in front of what he presumes is a camera the figure removes his hat and lifts a crystal tumbler containing a deep brown liquid to his lips.

Hopper fills Eddie in.

“This is Mr Reddington. You can speak when he says you can.”

The well-dressed man speaks first, in a voice that’s even more imposing than that of the tall heavy who brought Eddie in here.

“I understand you have a business proposition for me, young man. I’d like to hear it directly from you, if I may?”

Eddie thinks quickly, describing possible scenarios that he’s come up with. He reiterates the ideas he had earlier, and adds a few more, getting inspiration from horror movies, comics, and even some of his D&D campaigns.

“That does all sound very interesting. And heaven knows we need some levity in this business. But I do need to confer with my colleagues. Chief, what do you think? Does this kid’s idea have legs?”

Hopper and Red have a moment of eye contact, before Hopper sighs loudly and admits, reluctantly,

“It is kinda novel. And he’s basically a good kid, don’t kill him yet, huh? He can be annoying as fuck, but goddamnit if he goes missing we’d have to do at least some kind of an investigation. The amount of people I’d have to interview, the press… The paperwork alone would be hell…”

He pinches the top of his nose, and Red purses his lips, apparently conceding that Hopper’s time would be much better spent doing whatever it is that he does for him rather than wasting it on unimportant matters such as police work. His expression suddenly brightens, and the formerly imposing figure on the screen turns disconcertingly jovial.

“Well, I think it sounds like fun. I’ll tell you what, we’ll try him out for a couple of months and see how he does.”

Hopper turns to look at Eddie.

“Okay, Munson, we’re gonna give you a try. You’d better keep it interesting though, or so help me…”

He makes a small but unsubtle slicing motion across his neck with his thumb. Eddie takes it at face value, knowing he means it.

Red addresses the whole group now.

“You know, this reminds me of the time I was playing miniature golf in Andalucia with the Sultan of Brunei and Jimmy Hoffer. Richard Pryor walked up and asked if any of us knew anything about llama farming. We all looked at him askance, I mean, do any of us look like we did? But then, to my great surprise and delight, the Sultan said…”

The burly dude holds Eddie around the shoulders again, but more gently than before. At least, Eddie assumes it’s gentle. The guy’s stature suggests significantly more physical ‘prowess’, which Eddie’s grateful he's not been on the receiving end of. He’s steered away from the screen and back towards the main area of the warehouse.

Nervously, just before they leave the curtained off area and afraid this might be seen as an offense, Eddie stammers,

“Where’re we- Shouldn’t I…?”

The man’s deep, caramel voice carries easily to Eddie’s ears, as he remarks,

“Trust me, you don’t want to be on the receiving end of any more of Raymond’s epic tales than you absolutely have to be. You can thank me later.”

Eddie looks back over his shoulder, just in time to see Chief Hopper’s brow crinkle and raise in what looks to be a poor facsimile of engagement, and he takes another, deep, swig from his coffee mug. He, apparently, knew he was in it for the duration.

They reach the area where Steve and Rob are still standing, apparently playing some kind of thumb war game. The big guy extends a powerful-looking hand towards Eddie, clasping his own in an iron grip. There’s a soft smile on his face as he looks down and says,

“Welcome to the team. I’m Dembe, by the way.”

Mr Kaplan finishes up a conversation she’s having nearby with another pair of guys with clipboards and conspicuous gun holsters, and as she’s making her way out, she remarks to Eddie,

“You’re in luck, you can start tonight. We’re expecting another package, so you can help these two clowns. God knows they need it.”

Steve frowns, and Rob emits a quiet,

“Hey—”

Mr Kaplan continues,

“No need for anything elaborate right now dearie, save that for next time. But we do need some supplies. Dembe, get him some cash from the office.”

Eddie’s conflicted. He’s confused, excited, relieved, and, yep, still a little wasted.

He does have his typical nervousness about how well he’s actually gonna be able to “perform”, and how long he can keep up the interest in what he’s suggested. Following a brief discussion with Steve and Rob, a few crumpled bills are shoved into his overly-sweaty palm.

Of course, his main thought is, great, I’m not gonna die! At least, not tonight…

But his overriding concern soon becomes:

Where the hell is he going to find rope, duct tape and a shovel at this time of night??

Next part, ‘Hello, Stranger’

My masterlist

I really hope you enjoyed this little prologue! Please reblog and leave comments, your support means everything to writers 🖤🙏

Tagging my ‘everything’ list, ILY @joejoequinnquinn @jamdoughnutmagician @guiltyasquinn @madaboutmunson @airen256 @sunshinepeachx @the-unforgivenn @skrzydlak @comeonatmebruh @jamiecb66 @80s-addict @abellmunsonmovie @definitionwanderlust @sheneedsrocknroll92 @munson-blurbs @wonderlanddreamer @daisy-munson @maedesculpaeusoubi @kurdtbean @mediocredreams @in2tswft @micheledawn1975 @littlebebebunny @12thatsanumber @alastorssimp @the-baby-angel @eddie-is-a-god @wolfqueenxxx @sassidykassidy @richter-raccoon @1deverland

Also tagging those who commented on/reblogged the first one, just lemme know if you’d rather not be! @bakusquadobsessed @mewchiili @bettyfrommars @pedroschka @transparent-enemy @ali-r3n @fracturedarkness @tinytyphooncloud @alverdekote @elegantkoalapaper @ddaydreamdelusionss @ramona-thorns @vitzi9 @lurkingprincess @cherrysabbath @pullingattheroots

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jils-things · 8 months ago

Text

I would never fall in love again until I found her

I said, "I would never fall unless it's you I fall into"

I was lost within the darkness, but then I found her

I found you

[3.25.23]

ouueeehh we're back to my corny love letters like last time 💜 again absolutely NO pressure reading these, because it WILL get lengthy 💜 this also serves as a personal love letter that i can archive!

ahh, steven st.one. a wild card in my f/o list. i never thought i'd find myself to like him... i've always tried my best to avoid the pretty boy design after i've gotten older which is why i was oddly in denial during my early steven days hehe... the earliest memory i have of him is just me battling him in my ruby emulator back in the 4th grade - but i don't think i actually remembered him too well, i only thought he looked like a silly anime version of the classical composer be.ethoven and tbh, i still like to think he does look like him in the rse style lolll 💜

for the whole, actual story - it was just last year - i was reading the r/s arc, of course. it was one of those days in school where i had nothing much to do and snuck my phone to read manga to pass some time. at some point, my classmate joined to read with me - it was at this moment where steven debuts properly and it caught my classmate by Surprise. she thought he looked very handsome! to which i teased her... strangely enough, this exchange impacted me? maybe it's because someone acknowledged what i was doing and even bothered to briefly read along with me - so in a way steven kinda bookmarked that memory.

so after that exchange, i just kept on reading. everytime he had something to say, i couldn't help but just stare at his face? he looked nice, i guess? he's also very gentle and polite... i kept this thought of mine for quite sometime until i was discussing the manga arc with my p.okespe mutual and he mentioned him. i somewhat confessed he looked nice and that was the biggest mistake i've ever done because what my friend did after was absolutely blow me with art after art of the pretty rock collector and i was STRUGGLING. it ultimately came down to this one cute panel in the o.ras chapter where he was blushing and I wasn't the same person since then 🚶🚶🚶and funnily enough, i told myself I wasn't going to fall for anyone because of the manga and whoopedoo p.okespe!steven my beloved the greatest man ever. i mean i love the game counterpart as well, they're nearly identical - it's just the manga that totally swept me... sighhhh

steven is such a nice character to begin with, he's honestly a very humble and nice champion. he's not showy about his identity and would rather be alone by himself to indulge in what he wants. he is willing to give up a very respectable position in the po.kemon league just to pursue his interests and with that i see a man not after power and fame but a man who just wants to find joy in what he does even if it demotes him. on top of that, he's just a sweet gentleman. he was raised well of course, and you can see it clearly in his acts in the story. i love him very much for that and who wouldn't want those traits?

i was really absolutely embarrassed to be all over this guy at first - it took a whole month for me to actually share to my blog about how i liked steven and took awhile to adjust to that fact that i opened up about it 😭 but the community was very kind and supportive about the pairing and if i'm being honest, i think stevaide made a super lasting impact on my blog recently and it's really so comforting to picture them as a young loving married couple with ruby. it made me feel unashamed with what i can do with my silly ships. i'm still very glad for the endless support for steven and jaide.

soo, yes. happy memoryshipping 💜💚 thank you for making my times of struggle more bearable if not perfect and thank you to everyone who enjoys this ship even if it was just a little bit :]

credits to @/cafekitsune <3

#~ art #pokemon selfship #selfship #selfshipping #selfship community #safeshipping #there it is guys... the day #so glad i was able to make this before i got busy and i really havent been drawing anything fun so!!! ahhh #this is currently my wallpaper since rendering it and i LOVE it to bits #also yay full reveal of that chibi doodle hehehehhe #iim so happy yippepeieeyeyeee #💚 memoryshipping

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laura1633 · 1 month ago

Note

i need to say this somewhere and i hope you won’t mind if i send this “rant” here. bc this is just a stupid smut pet peeve that i let annoy me so much.

but anyway every time i go to the lestappen tag i get really disheartened bc there is such a imbalance. there is so much bottom charles and omega charles and charles being loved and worshiped and i honestly wouldn’t mind that at all but the number of fics where max gets the same are pretty much nonexistent compared to charles-centric fics like there are bottom max fics but they get drowned out. pretty much all the popular fics that have thousands of kudos and that ppl recommend to everyone are bottom charles. seriously i saw a rec list once where the few bottom max fics had the fact that they are bottom max mentioned in the same manner as content warnings for some other fics. it was super weird but maybe the person who made that didn’t think it would come across like that.

i know there are lots of bottom max fics (i’ve probably read them all lol) and ppl who like both, like you. i’m happy about the ppl who comment on bottom max fics those fics still get a lot of love even when it seems so little in the grand scheme of things. but i’m just annoyed and a bit confused that it’s so disproportionate. probably bc charles is more popular than max and bottom charles has gotten so popular ppl are inclined to it and it's "safe" and gets more love.

then again there’s so much talk about omega max on tumblr and then none of that shows on ao3 weirdly. (except maybe on the maxiel side i literally became a maxiel shipper bc i wanted more omega max lol) some ppl on here who say they’re bottom/omega max “truthers” have like several top max fics on their account and no bottom max fics which literally not that deep everyone should write what they want and what they are inspired to write but not practicing what you preach confuses me a bit not gonna lie haha. i’ve written my own fics which are pretty much premises i want to desperately read but no one has written them (like fine i'll do it myself) and i've gotten a good response but i’m a slow writer so i haven't written everything i want to write. thank you for everything you’ve written laura!

I don't mind at all anon, I have added your second ask too <3 Sorry this ended up being a lengthy reply. I love that we can yap about the bottom or omega Max agenda though 😂

I started writing maybe about two years ago and at the time a lot of the Lestappen stories were definitely bottom Charles and omega Charles. I started writing because a little bit like yourself there was some stuff I wanted to read that didn't exist so I just wrote it myself. At the time I had no clue how to write but I have hopefully improved over the past couple years! I was just desperate for there to be some more soft Max or Max being looked after and cared for. I just think Max doesn't get enough love and there can never be enough fics where it's pointed out just how hot he is!

I also like the idea of sexy, hot alpha Charles and think it's fun to not always see him in that 'babygirl' role if that makes sense. Although I can see why he ends up in that role a lot, he is also very pretty

I used to read a lot of Maxiel for the same reason as yourself, in fact I do still read Maxiel because of that reason and also because there are some very talented writers writing it. (although I also think of Daniel as being quite omega like!)

I definitely agree that there is a lot more bottom and omega Max within the lestappen tag now compared to a couple of year ago.

For me, I like to swap it around. I like to write soft alpha Max and even bottom alpha Max. The main thing for me is that the dynamic works for the story I want to tell. I have started leaning more towards omega Max though because I know that there is plenty of omega Charles out there and there are plenty of people who can write omega Charles much better than I can!!

You are absolutely correct about the comments and kudos thing. Firstly I should say that there are some amazing writers writing some amazing bottom and omega Charles fics that deserve all the love in the world and I am not for one second suggesting that they only have so many responses because of the dynamic but (at least to start with) I found that my omega Charles fics got more kudos than the omega Max ones. That might have just been a coincidence but when I start writing a story I know it will get more attention if I write it with the omega Charles dynamic. I'm not for one second suggesting that that is what people are thinking about btw, it's just a fact I have noticed with my own work. These days I just write what I like and hope some other people like it. If I ranked my fics by kudos they definitely wouldn't be in quality order so I don't worry about that now 😂

Like you have said, everyone should write what they like as it's all for fun. I am just glad there are other people out there reading and writing bottom/omega Max or even just Max getting the love and attention he deserves.

I will read top Max and I enjoy top Max. The only Max fics I don't like are where the writer clearly doesn't like Max and is making him unnecessarily aggressive or just making him the butt of the joke in a mean way. I prefer to read Lestappen when I can tell that the writer likes both of them if that makes sense (obviously people have a favourite but that's different. )

The content warning for the bottom Max fics made me giggle. I don't know what context that was in as I didn't see the post but it definitely made me laugh. Maybe it needs a content warning because its likely to alter your brain chemistry and you'll not be able to see him topping again 😂

I will always write some bottom Charles and some omega Charles because it just works in certain contexts for me but I have felt myself leaning more towards the other dynamic. Hopefully most people don't mind because there are so many Lestappen writers these days so there is definitely plenty of omega Charles to chose from.

I am shocked there is not more Omega Max x Omega Charles though as that seems to fit quite well.

Sorry, I totally rambled there but I am a huge lover of omega and bottom Max and always will be. I am also a huge lover of Max being treated nicely and softly and getting all the attention and affection in the world.

#laura1633 asks #Bottom Max agenda!#Omega Max agenda!

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the-bad-batch-baroness · 11 months ago

Text

The Last Notch

Fives x Fem!Reader

Summary: In a dystopian Star Wars universe where clones aren't just soldiers, but also pleasurable objects used to help finance the war, Fives starts to question his role in the Erotic Bingo lottery system when he meets you and discovers something more fulfilling than sex.

Pairing: Fives x Fem!Reader

Characters: Fives, Jesse, Hardcase

Tags & Warnings: NSFW, 18+, dystopian!AU, implied/referenced sexual content, NO SMUT, strong sexual themes, explicit sexual language, clone sex workers, erotic bingo/lottery system, kink mentions, clone objectification, culturally-reserved reader (also read as demi-sexual), misunderstandings, angst, happy ending, POV switches between the reader and Fives

Word Count: 8.5k

Author's Note: I began this bingo card with Fives and I'm ending this bingo card with Fives. This fic has been sitting in my drafts since I first received my bingo card back in May, and I was so excited to revisit the idea. It's a little out there, and may not be everyone's cup of tea, but the underlying themes are really good and it's actually super sweet. As always, please enjoy 💚

@clonexreaderbingo Square: Regret

The evening air is crisp and the sky is clear as you make your way home from work. It's only been two weeks since you defected from your home planet and began a life on Coruscant, so you aren't used to the planet's large size, crowded public spaces, and endless winding streets. You thought you were going the right way, but something doesn't feel right. You don't remember seeing that purple neon sign on your walk home last night, but there it is, flashing at you.

You sigh and rub your tired face. You're lost, again. However, this time, the street is darker and the walls are a little more enclosed. A bit of anxiety creeps in as you take a few wary steps forward, then hesitate when the idea of turning around crosses your mind. You're not sure what to do. There aren't any kiosk maps around, and even if you did find one, you don't know if it will help you find your way home. The only thing you do know is that you won't find it by standing still.

Thus, you continue onward, trying to remember the landmarks leading to your apartment even though every corner looks the same. It's not until you come to a four-way intersection of lengthy streets that you begin to feel real panic. Your breath quickens as you turn in a circle, looking down each path with no inclination to step towards any of them. If you can just get to higher ground, or find someone to ask directions from, you'll be able to get home, but there's no one.

"You look lost," a man says.

You startle and turn around to look at the man, but you say nothing in response.

"I can help you get home," he says.

Something in your gut rings an alarm bell, alerting you that this man has no intentions of helping you find your way. You don't know what his real intentions are, but they aren't in your best interest. You take a cautious step back, and he takes a step towards you. You just want to go home. That's all you want to do. You hate this planet, you hate your home planet, and you hate this stupid galactic war that has led you to this exact moment where you might die in the streets.

"Please," you say with a shaky voice. "Leave me alone."

"But you're lost, little one," the man tilts his head to the side and steps closer. "Don't you want to find your home?"

"I–" you stammer and take a bigger step back. "I can find my own way home, thank you."

The man chuckles. "Oh, but I don't think you can."

You want to cry. In fact, you might just break down right here in front of your would-be kidnapper because you don't know what else to do. If your feet could move, where would you run? Where would you go? You don't know where anything is, let alone a police station, and running into a Coruscant Guardsman would be a miracle at this point. Out of your brain's options of fight, flight, freeze, or fawn, your brain chooses to freeze, which is the dumbest thing it can possibly do right now.

"Please," you plead. The tears get stuck in your throat as a sob threatens to escape. "I–"

"Hey!" another man shouts from behind you.

You stiffen as you feel a firm hand rest gently on your shoulder.

"She said, get lost," the man growls.

You watch intently as the creepy man scrunches his face with indignation before he backs away and disappears into the shadows of one of the streets. You want to release a sigh of relief, but some other man you don't know is touching you, and your body hasn't ditched the freeze mode yet. You're too afraid to turn around and see who the mysterious hand belongs to, so you remain standing still, stiff as a board, hoping he'll go away, but he doesn't.

"Are you alright?" the man asks as he removes his hand and walks around into your view.

You glance up at the man speaking to you and look into his soft brown eyes. His face carries a worried expression that feels warm, and he tilts his head to the side while awaiting your answer. You study him for a moment. He's well-groomed, with short, curly dark hair, a neatly trimmed goatee, and he's wearing normal casual clothing. You're not sure if you can trust him yet, but there's something very calming about his relaxed demeanor and soothing about his deep voice.

"Yeah," you finally breathe, then swallow hard. "I think so."

"Good," he says with a crooked smile. "What're you doing out here all alone? This isn't exactly a safe area."

"I got lost," you explain. "I just moved here recently and I'm still not used to how big this place is."

"That's understandable," he says warmly. "Well, welcome to Coruscant. Where'd you move from?"

"Onderon," you say.

"Onderon?" he repeats in surprise, then takes a more rigid and guarded stance. "A Seppi planet?"

You sigh and roll your eyes. This isn't the first time you've been heckled for hailing from a Separatist planet, and it most likely won't be your last. "Just because the leaders choose to align themselves with the Separatists, doesn't mean the citizens feel the same way," you explain. "There's a reason I defected."

The man raises his eyebrows at your annoyed tone, then casts his vision towards the ground. "I didn't realize…" he pauses. "I guess I never thought about it like that."

"Not many people do," you whisper. "Judging people by where they come from is cruel."

"I'm sorry," the man says as he rubs the back of his neck. "You're right. The Republic is all I've ever known…" he pauses, "and I've never stopped to think about the civilians on the other side."

You give the man a half-smile. "Thanks."

"Hey," the man says. "Why don’t I walk you home. It’s late and I’d hate for you to run into any more trouble."

You ponder his offer for a moment. "That's very kind of you."

"It's the least I can do after sticking my foot in my mouth," he explains. "Take it as an apology."

You chuckle. "Then I accept your apology."

The man smiles and reaches out his hand. "I'm Fives."

You smile, shake his hand, and offer your name. "Nice to meet you, Fives."

When you give Fives your address, he snorts and makes a comment about you being really lost. You want to be annoyed at him, but you can't seem to muster the gumption. He's too delightful for you to be mad, so you sigh in defeat and follow him as he leads you to your apartment. Coruscant isn't so scary now that you have an escort, and a very strong looking one at that. You can't imagine anyone even thinking about approaching you with him by your side.

Fives keeps the conversation light-hearted and casual as you stroll together along the neon-lit streets. You talk about everything from your first childhood pet all the way up to where you work. It's not an extravagant job, but you work as a barista at a small caf shop that doubles as a holo-bookstore. He asks you questions about your job and why you like it, and you answer that you are a plain and simple woman. You like the quaint atmosphere the caf and holo-books provide.

An indistinguishable expression flashes across his face and you wonder if you said something wrong. You shouldn't care if he's bothered by your simplistic lifestyle or not, but you're enjoying his company. You don't have many friends on Coruscant to begin with, and you want him, at the bare minimum, to like you enough to keep in touch. You've never been good at making friends, but with him doing most of the talking, he's making it easy for you two to get to know each other.

When you finally reach your apartment, you share a moment of awkward silence in front of your door. You're not sure if you should ask him inside and offer him something for his trouble, or if you should part ways here. On Onderon, it would be disrespectful not to offer your hospitality to him after he saved your life and walked you home, but you're not sure about the customs on Coruscant. You're afraid he would mistake it as an opportunity to take advantage of you.

"Thank you for walking me home," you say.

"It was my pleasure," Fives says.

You pull out your key card. "Well, good night."

"Hey," Fives begins as he rubs the back of his neck. "I know this may be sudden, but would you like to get a drink sometime? With me?"

You turn away from the door and look at him with surprise. Of all the things you thought were going to happen tonight, this was the least expected. "Oh," you say nervously. "I appreciate the offer, but I don’t drink."

"Soda?" Fives asks quickly. "What about soda? Or water?"

You let out a small laugh. "Sure, I like soda."

"Great!" Fives exclaims. "How about tomorrow night, around 19:00?"

"Works for me," you say with a small smile. "Where are we meeting?"

"At 79’s," Fives says. "I can give you directions."

"The clone bar?" you ask in confusion.

Fives chuckles. "Well, yeah, I am a clone."

Your eyes grow wide. "You’re a clone?"

"Yeah…" Fives furrows his brows, then raises one. "You’ve never seen one before?"

"No," you say, feeling a bit embarrassed.

"Well, that’s a first," Fives remarks with amusement. "You really didn’t know?"

"I’m from Onderon, remember?" you say. "We don’t exactly get clones on our planet."

"I guess that makes sense," Fives says.

"Besides," you add, "you're not wearing any armor and the only clones I've ever seen had armor and helmets on."

"That's fair, too," Fives says. "I'm on leave, so I like to relax a little and ditch the kit."

"If you don’t mind me asking," you begin. "I’m not trying to be rude, but, how will I find you at the bar? You know, since you all… look alike."

Fives laughs, tilts his head, and points at the Aurebesh tattoo on his temple. "This. This is me. Fives."

You feel a little dumb for not noticing it earlier, but you blame it on the poor lighting. "I can remember that."

"Then I'll see you tomorrow?" Fives asks.

"Yes," you answer. "I'll see you tomorrow."

Fives smiles, takes a few steps away from your door, then turns back to face you. "Good night."

You smile at him, then swipe your card to unlock your door. "Good night."

You walk into your apartment and let the door whoosh shut behind you. Releasing your held breath, you turn around, place your forehead against the cool door, and smile. It's been a while since you felt like this, and you have to admit, you're a little bit scared. Your last relationship ended because of the war, differing opinions, and your sexual preferences. It's not that you don't want to have sex, or that you don't find men attractive, but it takes you time to feel safe to do so.

It's a huge turn-off to a lot of men. Sex is the only thing that men think about when they see a woman, and there aren't many who will willingly be in a relationship with you, knowing that they'll have to wait until you're ready to even touch you sexually. Most just leave after you explain it to them, so you're not getting your hopes up that Fives will accept it either. He seems like a decent and nice man, but the thought of him rejecting you like the others has you hesitant to try again.

You sigh and back away from the door. There's no use in worrying about it now, because you'll have plenty of time to overthink it all tomorrow while you're at work. Instead, you take care of your nightly tasks like making dinner, showering, putting your most comfortable pajamas on, and snuggling under your blankets to watch your favorite holo-show. It's the one that makes you laugh and keeps your mind from thinking about the life you left behind, and the people you miss.

However, as much as you try to pay attention to the holo-show, your mind keeps wandering to Fives. You think about his smile and the way he laughed. That's what you notice about people. You don't care if they're hot, sexy, or attractive, but only if their smiles are warm, their eyes are honest, their minds are humorous, and their hearts are soft. Those are the qualities you look for in a partner. And now here you are, lying awake, wondering what else you'll learn about him.

The morning arrives soon enough, and you feel exhausted from your lack of sleep. You tossed and turned like a secondary school girl going through her first crush, but your body doesn't bounce back like it used to, and you're feeling the consequences of your choices. Nevertheless, you're giddy to get the day started and get to work. The sooner you go to work, the sooner you'll get off of work, and the sooner you'll be able to go on your date with Fives at the clone bar, 79's.

That place makes you wonder. You've heard a lot about 79's since you came to Coruscant, and not all of them are good. While living on Onderon, you didn't frequent the bar scene, but then again, Onderon bars are upscale to begin with, so you don't know if the bars on Coruscant are similar or if they are more like the bars on Tatooine that you've read about, full of cheap booze and degenerates. You consider doing a little more research beforehand, but you decide against it.

Before leaving for work, you pack a small bag with a change of clothes for your date. It's a bar, but you don't want to be too flashy if it's like Tatooine, and you don't want to look too frumpy if it's like Onderon. You think back to the way Fives was dressed when you met him, and ultimately decide to go the casual route. Not too classy and not too frumpy, just comfortable. However, you do pack your lucky earrings and small bottle of perfume so you don't smell like caf all night.

Your shift goes as expected, with your routine customers coming in for their usual orders. You love that about your job, getting to meet new people and learning all sorts of things about them. But, perhaps your favorite part of the job is offering holo-book suggestions. The shop doubles as a holo-bookstore, where patrons can drink caf and read, so the holo-book side of things is just as important as making their caf correctly. As an avid reader yourself, your suggestions are always on point.

Once your shift is over, you hang your apron up and make your way to the back to change. Your co-workers say a few remarks and ask you a couple questions about your excitement and you explain that you're meeting a man for a date at 79's. Your co-workers exchange a few surprised and knowing glances and you can't help but notice. You're unsure why they're reacting like that for just a date, but then again, you're still new to the area, so it might be a bit of missing context.

After you're dressed and happy with your hair, you make your way to 79's. This time, you are determined not to get lost, and mapped out the route ahead of time to be extra careful. If he's in the bar waiting for you, then he won't be out on the streets to find you if you get lost. You're not sure why you didn't offer to exchange comm numbers the night you met, but you blame the scary life or death situation for rattling you completely out of your mind which made you forget.

As you get closer, you notice the large, bright, orange neon sign with the 79's logo in the middle, and you're taken aback by how big the place is. The bars on Onderon, even the high-scale ones, aren't this big. Its size alone makes you feel nervous. You don't like bars to begin with, and here you are, waltzing right up to a giant one full of men that you don't even know. You begin to wonder if all of your senses left you when you agreed to this date, but you can't back down now.

The door slides open and your senses are bombarded. The smell of booze is thick in the air, the music is loud, and the bar is filled with clones. Your eyes widen and you suck in a quick breath. This was not what you were expecting, not in the slightest. You stay frozen by the door, sidestepping lazily when someone walks in after you, too afraid to go in any further. There's half-naked women, half-naked men, pole dancers, a stage, and every other kind of strip club vibe.

You whip around to leave, but bump into a clone in your haste. He only has the bottom half of his armor on, with just the black bodysuit covering his torso, except the sleeves are rolled up. The armor doesn't look like the Coruscant Guard that you're used to seeing. Instead, it has blue markings and big leather flappy-looking things that cover his thighs, with holsters and black pouches draped over them in a criss-cross. You step back in surprise but don't say anything.

"Well, hello there, sweet little thing," the clone says with a cocky smile as he looks you up and down.

You feel uncomfortable with his eyes roaming over your body, and you're glad you chose casual modesty over anything revealing, but you still want to bury yourself in a pile of blankets to keep him from staring at you like some sort of snack. The clone's resemblance to Fives is uncanny, except he's bald, with a giant GAR logo tattoo covering most of his head and face, and a five o'clock shadow. You knew they were clones, but you didn't realize they looked that much alike.

"Uh, hi," you finally muster the courage to say, trying not to let your nerves escape through your voice.

"Don’t think I’ve ever seen you in here before," the clone says as he steps closer to you. He gently runs a finger under a lock of your hair. "What're you into? I can show you around to all the good spots."

"I'm meeting someone," you blurt out and pull your face back to let your hair slip from his finger. "For a date."

"Oh, apologies," the clone says, and backs off his advances. "Who're you looking for? I can bring you to him."

"Fives," you say. "I'm here for Fives."

"Fives?" the clone says in surprise. "Well, aren’t you a lucky girl, to be requested by Fives."

You knit your eyebrows together in confusion. "Requested?"

The clone studies your perplexed expression for a second, then shrugs. "Never mind. Come on, I’ll bring you to him."

You nod and follow the clone through the bar, trying not to look at the debauchery happening all around you. But, you end up catching a few glimpses that make you wish you could bleach your eyes. People throwing credits at scantily clad clones twirling around poles, people doing way more than just kissing in the booths, clones taking shots from women's cleavage, lap dances that are anything but dances, and you think you saw someone having actual sex. It's a nightmare.

Finally, you see Fives, sitting in one of the booths. You recognize his goatee and the Aurebesh tattoo on his temple. Although, at this point, you're not sure what to say to him, since you've been hurled so far out of your comfort zone you may never recover. Nevertheless, you smile at him and he smiles back at you, gesturing with his hand for you to sit down. You take a seat across from him in the booth, but squirm when you think of what you saw people doing in these booths.

The clone that escorted you leans over the back of your booth, cages your head with his hands, then smirks at Fives. "Trying something new tonight?"

You jump.

"Get lost, Jesse," Fives growls.

Jesse straightens up, raises his hands in defense, and walks away.

"Don’t mind him," Fives says. "He's harmless."

"He seems…" your voice is shaky, "nice."

"Do you want something to drink?" Fives asks, changing the subject. "They’ve got an assortment of non-alcoholic beverages."

"Sure," you say. "I’ll just have the soda."

"Got it," Fives says as he gets up from the booth. "I’ll be right back."

You sit alone in the booth and contemplate your life choices that led you to this moment. You're not sure how you, a respectful young Onderon lady, ended up in a vulgar place like this. 79's is nothing like the bars on your home world, and you're very disappointed. What does this mean about Fives? Is he into this lifestyle? Or does he come here just because he's a clone and it's a bar meant for clones? Maybe you're overthinking it and he likes caf and holo-books just like you do.

"So," a clone says as he slides into the booth to fill the empty spot left by Fives. "You’re Fives’ special hook-up, yeah?"

"I beg your pardon?" you huff. "This is a date, not some sleazy hook-up."

It's another bald clone, but this one has blue lines tattooed on his face, no five o'clock shadow, and no armor, at all. He looks like he just came down from the poles and you really didn't want to see that tonight. You're beginning to wonder if the bald clones are the weird ones and the clones with hair are the normal ones, because out of the three you've met so far, Fives is the only one who seems to be somewhat ordinary, and also the only one with a full head of hair.

"Jesse told me otherwise," the clone says, disregarding your earlier remarks. "So, how’d you worm your way into that spot?"

"Spot?" you repeat in confusion. "What are you talking about?"

"Seriously?" the clone says with a quirk of his brows. "You do know who Fives is, right? One of the top ten clone names in Erotic Bingo? Master of every position humanly possible? He’s only got the longest line of people waiting to scan him on their bingo cards. So how’d you cut the line?"

"Erotic…" you're stunned, mouth gaping and eyes wide. "What?"

"Come on," the clone says. "Erotic Bingo? The lotto system? You know, where you can win credits by having sex with clones? Do you live under a rock or something?"

You feel sick. The room begins to spin as all of the words this clone has spoken to you swirl around in your mind, setting off every klaxon in response, shouting at you to leave this place immediately. You've been duped. You've been lied to. Your image of Fives and his soft, sweet smile shatters into a million pieces. You feel stupid, like you should've known it was too good to be true. Sex. It's a drug, and they're all addicted to it. That's all you are to him, a sexual object.

Fives comes back from the bar with your soda and a Corellian ale for himself, and frowns when he sees the clone sitting across from you. "Hardcase," Fives says with a warning in his voice. "That's my seat."

Hardcase smirks, and slides himself out of the booth. "Whoops," he says. "Guess I mistook her for someone else. She's all yours."

Fives rolls his eyes and gives Hardcase a whack with his shoulder to get a move on, then sets down the drinks before sliding himself back into the booth. He smiles and grabs his ale, lifting it to toast with you, but his smile slowly dissipates when he sees your panicked expression.

"Are you okay?" Fives asks. "Did Hardcase say something to you? I'm sorry. He really can't control himself half the time."

"I…" you stutter, trying to find the words in your parched throat. "I have to go."

"Go?" Fives asks in confusion. "Go where? You just got here."

"Home," you answer as you try to hold back your tears.

"I don’t understand," Fives says. "What's wrong?"

"This," you say. "All of this."

Fives shakes his head, bewildered by your words, unsure of what to say.

"You're just like everyone else," you say as you get up from the booth. "All you men ever want is sex. You think women are cheap and gullible, and will rollover for you in bed. Well guess what, Fives. I’m not cheap, I’m not easy, and I’m not going to be another notch in your bedpost!"

"What…" Fives' jaw slacks. He scrambles to get up from the booth to go after you. "Hey, wait! Please, let me explain!"

"Just stay away from me!" you turn around and shout, tears threatening to fall from your eyes. "This was a mistake… You're a mistake."

Fives sighs as he watches you leave. That last remark hurt, but at this point he thinks he probably deserves it. The one time he actually wants a relationship, he botches it up four ways to Benduday. He pinches the bridge of his nose and rubs his forehead before making his way back to the booth. He sits down and slinks back so his feet can touch the opposite side, and watches the condensation slip down the side of your glass of soda, the ice clinking as it melts.

"Ouch," Hardcase says as he leans over the back of Fives' booth. "That was painful to watch."

"This is your fault," Fives says without turning around to look at him.

"I'm not the one that invited that kinda girl to this kinda place," Hardcase says, before pushing himself off the booth and turning around. "And they say, I'm the dumb one."

Fives groans, even though he knows Hardcase is right.

He's not sure what he was thinking when he invited you to 79's after you said you don't drink alcohol and you like quiet atmospheres. Everything that 79's is not. Perhaps it was out of a sense of familiarity. Then, to top it all off, you got the wrong impression about the date, but he can't blame you for coming to that conclusion when he's the one who invited you to a borderline whore-house of a bar. The more he thinks about it the more he realizes why you were so upset.

Fives fiddles with his Corellian ale, aimlessly twirling the base of the glass bottle against the table. As he takes a sip, Jesse slides in across from him.

"What do you want?" Fives asks.

"I take it your hook-up didn’t work out," Jesse muses as he takes a sip from his own beverage.

"It wasn’t a hook-up," Fives says.

"Sorry," Jesse waves with his hand sarcastically. "I meant your special hook-up."

"It wasn't a hook-up," Fives repeats, the irritation in his voice growing.

"What?" Jesse asks. "You were on a date or something? That’s cute."

Fives huffs. "What if I was?"

"Then I’d ask what you did with the real Fives," Jesse laughs.

"Don’t you ever get tired of it?" Fives asks. "The Erotic Bingo? Meaningless sex?"

"Nope,” Jesse says and takes another swig. "We’re toys. Toy soldiers for the GAR and sex toys for everyone else. Novelties. Created to be used, abused, and thrown away."

"That’s rather grim," Fives says.

"It’s our reality," Jesse retorts. "What did you think you were going to do? Date, settle down, have kids, and live a normal life?"

"I could try," Fives says.

Jesse snorts. “In ten years time, you’ll be old enough to be her father. How gross is that?”

Fives grunts.

"Listen," Jesse says as he puts his drink down and gets serious. "I wish it was different. Maker, I wish it was, but it’s not. This is the life of a clone. We’re only in our prime for a short time, so we have to do what we can before we're old and flaccid."

Fives sighs. "I get that, but–"

"Don’t think about it too much," Jesse interjects. "You’ll just make yourself depressed."

"Hey, you know what?" Jesse says. "There's a woman at the bar that needs to cross off "Dueling Arcs" on her card. You in? Might help you forget about your date."

"Not interested," Fives says dryly. "Echo's somewhere around here. I'm sure he'll do it with you."

Jesse chuckles. "That chick’s got you by the balls, huh?"

"Piss off," Fives sneers.

"Suit yourself," Jesse shrugs. "Careful though, I'd hate to take your place in the Top Ten Most Erotic Clones."

Fives rolls his eyes. He used to enjoy that title, now all it does is remind him of what he can't have, you. The Erotic Bingo lottery system was created soon after the war began. Apparently, the clones gained a cult following after civilians began to figure out that clones were attractive. The senate and the GAR realized they could bank on this new found interest, and created an Erotic Bingo lottery-type game that would benefit the clones, civilians, and the GAR's funds.

The Erotic Bingo game is pretty simple. People all over Coruscant can purchase the bingo cards at any lottery kiosk on the planet. The bingo cards have a range of prices that correspond to the difficulty of making multiple bingos or getting a blackout. The cards are labeled from 'D' tier being the easiest and cheapest, in terms of purchase and payout, to 'S' tier being the hardest and most expensive. The more bingos made and the more expensive the card, the better the payout.

The Erotic Bingo cards have a wide range of sexual activities from tame vanilla intercourse, mutual masturbation, and oral sex, all the way up to the most degrading and disgusting kinky sex imaginable. Usually, only the 'S' tier cards contain the extreme activities, but on occasion, an 'A' tier card will have one or two. Some common squares are: "sex with a shiny", "dueling arcs", "suck a sergeant", "commander facial", "69 at 79s", "barcs and arfs", and "medic masturbation".

The clones don't get much of a choice in the Erotic Bingo game. They can refuse an offer to fulfill a square, but most don't. It's the only way a clone is allowed to make any credits. When a clone scans their identichip into the bingo card, they automatically receive their kick-back as a direct deposit when the bingo card is returned. If a bingo was not achieved, then there's no kick-back. So, in reality, it's in a clone's best interest to fulfill as many squares as possible.

Many of the battalions have fully leaned into the Erotic Bingo game, making it a part of their culture. The 212th basically runs a gentlemen's club. They don't perform a lot of 'S' acts, but they do get a lot of repeat customers. The 104th is all about the animalistic kinks, like breeding. They call it the "Wolffe Den'' and it's exactly what it sounds like. Then there's the Coruscant Guard and their "Dungeon". For those interested in whips and bondage, that's the place to be.

The 501st, on the other hand, doesn't have a particular theme, but dabbles in a little bit of everything. A person can rarely find an unwilling participant in the 501st, but any square dealing with a commander has to go somewhere else, considering Rex is a captain. It's the only type of squares the 501st can't do. The Jedi disapprove of the entire system, and refuse to take part in any of it, but they didn't have a say in the system's creation and neither did the clones.

The GAR even built a hierarchy system of the "Top Ten Most Erotic Clones," which is where Fives landed himself after filling out countless bingo cards. And as Hardcase pointed out previously, he has a waiting list a mile long. For shinies, it's a right of passage to scan their names on a bingo card, but for higher ranking, popular clones, it becomes a full time job when they're on leave. It fills their every waking moment, and at least for Fives, it's dulled his libido.

Fives began to question the whole Erotic Bingo lottery system after he saw Tup come back to the barracks late one night, crawl into his bunk, and refuse to speak to anyone for days. Only Kix knew what happened and Fives never asked. Sometimes, attractive young clones get pulled aside to fulfill Erotic Bingo cards for the upper echelons of Coruscant, like senators. Tup ended up in that category, and Fives wasn't surprised at Tup's reaction, since senators buy the 'S' tier cards.

He doesn't want to do it anymore. He's tired of the meaningless, trivial, and almost chore-like sex, with not a single emotional bond ever created in the process. Everyone, literally, comes and leaves, like he's an object they can use to get themselves off, then either toss him out or come back to reuse him again. He's a walking dildo without a vibrate feature. And yet, the game is so ingrained in the clone culture, that backing out is considered taboo and he could be shunned.

After he met you, he wanted to be done with it. All of it. The sex, the Erotic Bingo game, the credits, the titles. He was ready to throw it all away just to have someone like you in his life. Someone kind, sweet, endearing, and funny. There was an actual spark when he talked to you. His heart fluttered and his body felt things it hadn't felt in so long. He just wanted to get to know you, but he screwed it up, and you left 79's hating him. He wants a second chance and to try again.

Fives downs the rest of his Corellian ale and grimaces at its disgusting warmth, but why waste the credits. He places the empty bottle on the table and decides to head back to the barracks to turn in early. There's nothing left for him to do at 79's tonight, so there's no point in staying. He glances at the bar on his way out and sees that Jesse found Echo. He wishes he could cheer them on at their endeavor, but he can't. Watching them only tightens the knot in his stomach.

Back at the barracks, he lies down on his bunk and thinks about how he's going to approach you again. However, his thoughts keep being interrupted by the sounds of breathy grunting from several of the bunks. Normally, he would zone it out, or maybe start masturbating to it, but not tonight. The only thing on his mind right now is you, and somehow touching himself to the image of you in his mind seems wrong after what happened. So, he is forced to listen until they finish.

Regardless of what is going on around him, he's still thinking about you. He runs all of the events through his mind, over and over again, trying to figure out why he didn't ask you out on a date somewhere else. Even an old diner would have been better than 79's. All of the signs were there that you would be repulsed by his sex-working lifestyle, but he chose to ignore them, and he doesn't know why. Maybe he was anxious and wanted the safety net of 79's to calm his nerves.

Fives groans and rolls onto his stomach, squishing his face into his pillow. Overthinking this is doing absolutely nothing to help him, and neither are the erotic sounds echoing throughout the barracks. He pulls the pillow out from under his face and presses it over his ears, trying to muffle the sounds so he can think properly without his dick getting in the way. Finally, he realizes that all he has to do is undo the misunderstanding and he should be able to win you back, hopefully.

You wake up this morning feeling worse than you did the morning before your date with Fives. With all of the crying you did last night, your face is all red and puffy. You try splashing some cold water on it, but it doesn't do you much good. Perhaps a bit of make-up can mask your broken heart. Although, you're not sure what you're so upset about. You've only known the man for barely two rotations and you're crying over him like you've been together for years.

There's no use wallowing in your own sorrow, so you do what you always do when life discourages you. You put your big girl panties on and go to work. At least your customers will be a good distraction for you. They won't try to have sex with you. Besides, it's only your third week on Coruscant, and there are plenty more men where he came from. Then again, if all the clones are in on the erotic-bingo-whatever-thing, then maybe there aren't as many fish in the sea as you hope.

Either way, you're sure you'll find someone to love you for who you are, and not just for your anatomy. But you can't shake the disappointment that you wish it was Fives. He checked all of your boxes and you really wanted it to be him. Even after you stormed out of 79's, all you could see when you closed your eyes was his smile. It was genuine. You quickly shake the thoughts away before you start going down the rabbit hole. You saw who he was, and that's the end of it.

Just as you predicted, your mind is in a better place when you start working. Your regular customers come in and get the same orders as they usually do, and you chat with them while you make their specialty drinks. They ask you how you are doing, and you give them a generic answer so that they won't pester you. You would rather talk about them right now, and not yourself. Keeping your mind occupied with others helps you stay focused on the task at hand.

However, you nearly drop the latte you're holding when you see a clone standing outside the large transparisteel storefront. Your heart starts racing, but you tell yourself it's just a coincidence. There are millions of clones on Coruscant. It could be anyone. You watch him out of the corner of your eye when he enters the shop, and that's when you see his goatee and the Aurebesh tattoo on his temple. You take a deep breath as he approaches the ordering counter.

"What are you doing here?" you ask while crossing your arms.

"A cup of caf and a credit for your time?" Fives asks as he puts a few credits down on the counter.

"I'm not a stripper," you huff. "I can't be bought."

"I know," Fives sighs. "And that's not what this is."

"Then what do you want?" you ask.

"To have a cup of caf and talk," Fives says. "That's it. I promise."

You roll your eyes and swipe the credits off the counter, then pour two mugs of regular hot caf. You call back to your supervisor to let them know that you're going on break, then pull your apron over your head and hang it up. You pick up the two mugs and signal Fives to follow you to one of the corner tables, then set the mugs of caf down opposite each other. You pull out one of the chairs and sit, then cross your legs, lean back, and fold your arms over your chest.

"You've got fifteen minutes," you say.

"I'm sorry," Fives begins. "For what happened at 79's."

"You lied to me," you accuse.

"That's not true," Fives says calmly. "I didn't tell you because I didn't want you to get the wrong idea."

"What other idea was there?" you ask. "You had me meet you at a strip club where I got bombarded by half-naked clones asking me how I made it on your 'hit list' for Erotic Bingo. What did you think I was going to think?"

"I… I don't know," Fives grimaces and glances away. "I just…" he pauses. "I just wanted to talk and get to know you. I swear. There was nothing else."

You lean forward, set your elbows on the table, and place your chin over your clasped fingers. "There's always something else," you say. "It's all you men ever want. All you care about is sex and I don't want it."

"I don't want it either!" Fives exclaims, then hushes himself when he remembers he's in a public place. "I don't."

"They all say that in the beginning," you huff. "Then they get you all emotionally attached and try to force you to do what they want. Well, I don't buy it for one standard second."

Fives sighs and smooths his index finger around the rim of his mug. "You know, I thought you would be different."

You furrow your brows at his words.

"You talked about not judging people based on where they came from," Fives explains. "Well, I didn't get a choice in being created, or being a soldier, or being a kriffing pleasure object. You get to leave your past behind and make a new life, but mine has to stay with me, right?"

"Fives…" you say.

He's right. You're judging him the same way he judged you when you told him you were from Onderon. It's true, the clones didn't have a choice in where they came from as much as you didn't have a choice in where you came from. He's throwing your own hypocrisy back into your face and you're mortified. The roles are reversed. You both thought of each other as different from the rest; what you were searching for, but ignorance and misjudgment clouded it.

Fives sighs and gets up from the table. "I guess we both lied."

"Wait, Fives," you say to try and stop him. You get up from the table and reach out to grab his arm, but you pull your hand back before making contact.

"Thanks for the caf," Fives says, then walks out the door.

You slump back down into the chair, mouth gaping in shock, feeling dazed by the whiplash you just endured. Regret washes over you and you can't believe what just happened. He came all this way, to your comfort zone, to try and apologize and explain himself, but you refused to hear it. You could kick yourself for the awful way you acted towards him. He was wrong about you and you were wrong about him. It was all just a giant misunderstanding. Maker, you're an idiot.

You scramble out of your chair and race towards the door, pushing it open and looking down the street towards where he went. You can still see him, casually walking further away. You can't let him go, not yet. You can still fix this. Everything can still be salvaged. You only need to apologize and start over. It's so simple, yet why didn't you realize sooner? You run down the street, trying to catch up with him. It might already be too late, but you have to try. You have to.

"Fives!" you yell as you get closer.

Fives turns around and his eyes widen in surprise.

"Wait!" you yell, finally closing the distance. You stop in front of him and pant at the exertion. "I'm sorry. You were right. I judged you before I even got to know you. I'm so sorry." Tears start rolling down your face.

"Hey, it's okay," Fives says, and he chances to wipe away one of your tears. "Don't cry. Please?"

"It's just… so hard," you say in between sniffles. "I'm so far away from home. I barely know anyone. The planet is so big and I'm so small."

"Shhh," Fives soothes. "It's okay. Sit here." Fives ushers you to sit down on the sidewalk against the wall, and he sits down next to you and listens.

"I just… I wanted a friend," you cry into your knees. "I wanted you to be my friend, and then all the sex stuff scared me, because it's not who I am. I don't care about it. I don't want it. I don't need it. I've had people leave me over it."

Fives sits silently next to you and waits for you to finish.

"I'm sorry," you say as you wipe your face with your sleeve. "I don't know what came over me, and I feel so stupid for crying after everything I said."

"Apology accepted," Fives says. "And you're not stupid."

You sigh. "One of us has to be."

"Then it's probably me," Fives admits.

"Can we both be stupid?" you ask with a small laugh.

"Sure," Fives smiles. "Hi stupid, I'm Fives."

You burst out laughing, and all of a sudden, every fear and reservation you have about Fives melts away. He really is just a nice guy that did the best he could with the hand that he was dealt, just like you did. It's amazing how two complete strangers, from different corners of the galaxy can somehow meet by chance and click together like puzzle pieces. Your heart feels warm and full of life, and you can't help but smile at the way he makes you feel; complete.

"You know," Fives says as he taps his knee. "I'd love to be your friend, and ditch the Erotic Bingo game while I'm at it."

"Really?" you ask, hope brimming in your tear-stained eyes.

"Really," Fives says with a smile. "I want connection, and the bingo game can't give me that, but you can."

"What about sex?" you ask. "I can't promise you that I'll ever want it."

Fives chuckles. "I've had enough sex to last me four life-times. Trust me. I can go without it."

"Are you sure?" you ask.

"Yeah, I'm sure," Fives says. "Just let me know what's okay, and what's not, and we'll go from there."

You smile and lay your head against Fives' shoulder. "This is okay."

Fives smiles and lays his head atop yours. "Okay."

Soon after you agreed to be friends, Fives did indeed ditch the Erotic Bingo game, much to his brother's displeasure. He wasn't completely shunned out of the culture, especially by his own battalion, but there were plenty of clones that disagreed with his choice and they weren't afraid to show it. Fives was strong though, and he suffered through it like a champ, even convincing a few of his closest brothers to ditch the game as well and seek out more meaningful connections.

Now, it's been a year since your fateful encounter with Fives and both of you have thrived. Your friendship quickly bloomed into a beautiful partnership. Without an ability to make any income, you helped support Fives' needs with your own job. It became easier once you were promoted to shift manager and began earning more credits. The extra credits also afforded you to find a bigger apartment, so that Fives could move in with you. It's been a lot of fun having a roommate.

When he's not off-world fighting the Republic's war, he's home with you, relaxing on the couch and watching holo-movies with you. Sometimes, you'll start a holo-series, then he'll get an assignment and have to leave. He'll beg you on his hands and knees not to watch it without you, and you don't, most of the time. Other times you'll start a pillow fight, or make brownies, or just talk and laugh at stupid jokes until your sides hurt and tears start rolling down your cheeks.

You can't believe that in such a short time, Fives has become the center of your world. He's your best friend, and he's never once asked you for sex or kisses or touches or anything else that you weren't ready for. He's completely content with what he already has with you and always waits until you initiate an act first. Even then, he will ask you a few more times before reciprocating, just to be sure it's what you want and not something you feel pressured into.

Today it's early evening, and you both just finished a delicious dinner that you made together. You're working on putting the leftovers away in the conservator and Fives is standing in front of the sink washing the dishes. You stop what you're doing for a moment and watch him. You're not sure when you finally fell in love with him, but you know you are; it's unmistakable. You walk up behind him, wrap your arms around his middle, and press yourself tight against his back.

Fives smiles at the warm gesture, but keeps scrubbing the plate in his hand with the sponge.

"Fives?" you ask.

"Mhm?" Fives hums.

"I think I'm ready," you say.

"Ready for what?" Fives asks.

"To make love," you say.

Fives stops scrubbing the plate. "You think?" he asks over his shoulder. "Are you sure?"

You stand on the tips of your toes and place a soft kiss at the nape of his neck, just at the base of his hairline. This is the first time you've kissed him and you can tell it's having an effect. A few of the hairs stand on end after you remove your lips and it makes you smile. He probably wasn't expecting it, and to be honest, neither were you. But the way he was standing there, doing the dishes, stirred something in you that you've never felt before. You nuzzle your face into his back.

"I trust you," you whisper against his shirt. "With all of my heart."

Fives places the dish down in the sink with the sponge resting on top, and dries his hands with the dish towel. He turns around to look at you, studying your face to make sure there are no hints of reservation or anything that would raise a red flag that you are feeling pressured to say this. Sensing nothing, he wraps his arms around your back and pulls you gently against him, barely allowing your bodies to touch, then tilts your chin up to lovingly stare into your soft eyes.

"Cyare, are you sure?" he asks again. "I don't want it if you don't want it."

"I want it," you insist. "I want… I want to be the last notch in your bedpost."

Fives smiles and kisses your forehead. "It's reserved just for you."

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