#sailor moon fan fic

[lasoldier]

Act III ~ Marcelina

December 30

In the quiet early hours of the morning, Constantino Reynaldo, the Deputy Chief of Mission to the Spanish Ambassador, Marco Rey Santo, convened with Andrea Gedeon, the Executive Assistant to the Ambassador and his late wife, and her brother Vicente, the Head of Security, in addition to representatives from the Paris police department. Sitting back in his chair, Constantino unbuttoned the jacket to the formal three-piece black suit he wore. His brown curly shaggy hair reached his neck accenting his well-kempt beard.

“Good morning, everyone. Thank you for taking the time to join me this morning to discuss the details of this afternoon’s service for Mrs. Rey Santo. I reassured the Ambassador and his daughter, Marcelina Rey Santo, that everything was in order. This service is more than just a funeral, It is a testament to the legacy and impact Angelina Rey Santo has made not only in Paris or Spain but around the world.” Constantino said, hoping he conveyed the significance of this moment.

Andrea stood up from her chair and passed out a dossier that provided a detailed briefing for the service.

“Thank you, Tino. As discussed, the service will be broadcast live, necessitating coordination with major media outlets. The press release went out following the confirmation of the service date and reservation of the church in addition to the approval of our draft brief by the Deputy Chief. The media schedule for Mr. Rey Santo and Marcelina has been confirmed to follow the New Year to give the Ambassador and his daughter time to grieve their loss. Vinny, can you confirm security’s efforts to manage and secure the press area to ensure privacy protocols are adhered to?” Andrea asked tearfully. She never imagined her work would encompass such a task. “Designated zones have been set up for the media and public attendees on the church site. We have coordinated with police for the planned route for the procession and barricades have been erected to deter the public from venturing on the thoroughfare and disrupting the caravan. We’ve also planned for additional personnel to manage crowd control and assist with any security concerns that might arise. I don’t anticipate any incidents, everyone loved Angelina so much.” Vincent reported. “Thank you, Vinny, we still expect significant public attendance and will need to manage traffic effectively,” Constantino replied.

Captain Dubois stood up from his chair and presented a rolled-up map which he unrolled across the center of the conference room table and pointed to the planned route.

“Thank you, Chief. The route from the Spanish Embassy to Saint-Bernard de la Chapelle will pass several key intersections utilizing Rue La Fayette. We will temporarily close Rue Saint-Mathieu and Saint-Bruno around the church with a secured route down Rue Affe allowing the caravan to park in front of the church.” he indicated, tracing the parallel streets that ran west and east of the Church of Saint-Bernard de la Chapelle with his finger. “We have officers at each junction to redirect traffic and assist in crowd management. Additionally, we have coordinated Régie Autonome des Transports Parisiens Parisian Autonomous Transport Administration to reroute buses and trams as needed.” the captain explained. He gave Constantino an appreciative nod as he took his seat once more. "Let's confirm with the arrival and reception of guests. We need a smooth process, especially given the high-profile nature of the attendees.” Constantino said looking to Andrea who turned to another page of the briefing. "We will have dignitaries from the US, Germany, and Spain in attendance including the Parisian Prime Minister Jean Castex and Mayor Anne Hidalgo. We have them scheduled to be the first to arrive. Ushers will guide them and their staff directly to their reserved seats. We have a team that will be on hand to greet the remaining guests while you, myself, and Vinny accompany the Ambassador and Marcelina.” Andrea explained as she flipped to another page filled with names and photographs, “Most, if not all, the guests have confirmed including, Irene and Kenneth Esper, Dr. Amy Clearwater, Mr. Clearwater, and their daughter, River, are confirmed to attend. Miles Luisante is confirmed to attend including his wife, Rhian Luisante, who will provide the Entrance Hymn, and their daughter Dawn Luisante who will perform an original song she has written specifically for Mrs. Rey Santo. Cynthia Claystone, CEO of Infinity Corporation, and her CGRO with Infinity Affairs, Sienna Brandwick, are slated to attend as well.” She explained before flipping to the next page, “While the guests await the arrival of the Ambassador and his daughter from the procession, the Paris Philharmonic will perform a selection of classical pieces such as ‘And the Waltz Goes On’, ‘Richter: On the Nature of Daylight’, ‘Love Story’ arranged by Richard Hayman, and ‘La petite fille de la mar’ all of which were favorites of Mrs. Rey Santo.” Andrea said turning to another page in the briefing, “Upon arrival of the procession, Maria Santo will be on hand to greet her son and granddaughter while we work with the church staff to prepare for the start of the ceremony. Father Guillermo will bless the casket before it is brought into the church and Mrs. Luisante will perform ‘Hymne à l'amour’ for the Entrance Hymn. Father Guillermo will lead us with opening prayer before transitioning into the Liturgy of the Word. The first reading will be read by Marcelina and the second by Dr. Clearwater. Mr. Rey Santo will give his eulogy and Aurora d'Amour will perform a song dedication afterward before we transition into the Liturgy of the Eucharist. Lastly, will be the commendation and farewell before we depart to Père Lachaise Cemetery for the burial rite.” Andrea said summing up the briefing. “Thank you, Andrea. We are adjourned. I will go and check on Marcelina. Andrea, Vicente, I leave the rest to you to prepare for our departure.” He spoke. Andre and Vicente nodded affirmatively.

Everyone rose out of their chairs and left the conference room alone or in pairs to have small discussions to help them prepare for a solemn day not just for them but for all of Paris. Constantino watched as they disappeared down the hall before going down another hall himself.

“Today, Paris gathers to bid farewell to Angelina Rey Santo, the esteemed wife of the Spanish Ambassador, Marco Santo. Mrs. Rey Santo sadly passed away on December 23rd after suffering from a brain aneurysm just days prior. Her funeral will be held this afternoon at Saint-Bernard de la Chapelle. Mrs. Rey Santo was a devoted wife and mother, known for her tireless charitable work and cultural diplomacy, Angelina was a beloved figure both in Spain and Paris. She dedicated her life to improving the lives of children through numerous philanthropic efforts and promoting Spanish culture around the world. Her service is expected to be attended by diplomatic dignitaries, celebrities, family, and close friends honoring her remarkable life and contributions. Our correspondent is live at Saint-Bernard de la Chapelle, where the funeral service is about to begin. We will be bringing you live updates throughout the day. Our thoughts and deepest condolences are with the ambassador and his family during this difficult time. On behalf of myself and France 24, we extend our heartfelt sympathies to the Santo family. I'm Annette Young, thank you for joining us." Annette Young announced.

Marcelina stared at her hazy reflection in the blank screen of the flat screen TV that was mounted on the wall facing the desk of the Cultural Attaché where Marcelina was sitting. The Cultural Attaché Office was her mother’s station at the Spanish Embassy. Breathing softly, Marcelina felt her chest heaving in rhythm with her slow, controlled breathing. She wore a long-sleeved white midi dress. Her dark hair brown cascaded in deep waves along her shoulders and down her back. A white, lace mantilla was pinned to her hair falling from her hairline along the back of her head like a half-veil.

Her dark brown eyes were cast downward looking to the antique rug that her mother insisted on bringing all the way from Madrid when they moved to Paris.

‘La alfombra de la casa teje la calidez del hogar, Marcelina. The house rug weaves the warmth of the home, Marcelina.’

Marcelina remembered her mother saying to her after she asked why she insisted on bringing the rug with them to Paris for her new office in the embassy. She could have had any rug she wanted, Marcelina thought.

‘Mija. My Bisabuela and my Tia Abuelas hand-knotted this rug in 1945. It was right around the time my mother was born. When my mother was pregnant with me, Bisabuela gave her the rug and what did she say?’ Angelina asked her daughter as she unrolled the large rug onto the bare floor of the office. ‘La alfombra de la casa teje la calidez del hogar.’ Marcelina and Angelina said in unison laughing together.

Angelina stood up. Marcelina marveled at her mother wearing a white ruffle Baptist sleeve dress and her long flowing brown hair catching the sunlight from the office window, her bare feet padding the bare floor as she walked about the room observing the rug before standing next to her daughter. Angelina wrapped her arm around Marcelina resting her cheek atop her daughter’s head and rubbing her shoulder lovingly.

“Your Abuela gave me the rug when I was pregnant with you.” Angelina said kissing Marcelina’s head and resting her cheek comfortably atop her head again, “And she said the same thing to me.” She said gently with a smile looking at the rug again. “This rug represents our family. Everywhere we have gone from Madrid, Buenos Aires, Berlin, and Washington D.C. This rug was the one thing I wanted with us wherever we were.” Angelina said warmly. Marcelina wrapped her arms around her mother’s waist as they stared at the rug in the empty office.

Marcelina’s eyes traced the hand-knotted wool that wove beiges with turquoise, green, and dusty pink into patterns depicting an oatmeal field adorned with delicate, even slightly faded, carefully drawn botanical motifs, and birds enclosed around with a decorative border. Her eyes stopped at the pointed toes of her white Anouk Jimmy Choo heels. Tears dropped onto the supple white leather of her heels. Marcelina sniffed looking up from her feet. She turned from where she was leaning against her mother’s desk and reached for the nearby Kleenex box grabbing a tissue. She dabbed under her eyelids gently to keep from smudging her mascara. She sniffed once more and looked at the desk noticing the silver frame that her mother kept. Picking it up Marcelina’s teary eyes glistened as she gently smiled at the picture of her parents touching the picture lovingly.

A knock on the door startled her.

“Blanca?” Constantino’s voice rang out from the opposite side of the closed door.

Marcelina set the picture down, smoothed her dress, and adjusted the mantilla both of which mantilla belonged to her mother. The door opened and Constantino entered his dark eyes met with Marcelina’s. Marcelina sighed in relief that he was the one to come and get her.

“Tino, no me llames así. No con papá cerca. Tino don’t call me that. Not with Papa around.” She said protesting his use of calling her by the name of her favorite flower. She watched as he closed the door and approached her with a gentle smile taking her in his arms. “Eres mi flor blanca, Blanca. You are my white flower, Blanca.” He replied looking down at her. A stern look crossed Marcelina’s face and she pressed a finger into his chest hard. “You’re Papa’s Deputy Chief of Mission, Constantino Armonioso Reynaldo!” She scolded him making him back away from her. Her stern gaze softened as he feigned being hurt by her finger pressing into his chest. He gave her a playful smile which faded at the sight of Marcelina’s forlorn face. “Papa needs you now more than ever.” She said sadly, “Without…Mama...” she couldn’t finish and was overcome covering her face as she broke into tears.

Constantino reacted quickly and took Marcelina in his arms shushing her gently and comfortingly.

“Shh, Lina. Está bien. Estoy aquí. Shhh, Lina. It’s okay. I’m here.” He whispered. “I can’t believe she’s gone,” Marcelina said sorrowfully stepping away from Constantino. She took a deep breath and wiped her eyes again, “How is Papa?” she asked. Marcelina had barely seen her father who stayed at the Embassy late to work and came home late smelling of Brandy de Jerez when Marcelina found him sleeping on the couch hugging a framed photo of their family. Sometimes he didn’t even go home and stayed at the Embassy overnight. Constantino looked at Marcelina solemnly. “He’s been working a lot since…” his voice trailed off not wanting to upset Marcelina any more than she already was. Marcelina nodded understanding what Constantino was saying. “Where is he now?” she asked reluctantly. “In his office,” Constantino answered watching Marcelina glance at her Piaget gold watch, “It’s almost time, isn’t it?” Marcelina asked. “Yes. Andrea and Vicente are making final preparations for the caravan.” Constantino responded. “I’ll get Papa. We’ll meet you in the lobby.” Marcelina said turning to leave the office. Constantino grasped Marcelina’s hand in his, the two of them locking eyes again. “Did you want me to get him for you?” he asked her. Marcelina thought for a moment and shook her head, “I can handle it.” She responded going to leave only for Constantino to hold her hand firmly preventing her from leaving. “I’m here for you…Lina.” He said caressing her hand. Marcelina smiled gently, “Thank you Tino…” she said as she left the office her hand trailing slowly out of Constantino’s until she disappeared from the office her heels clicking on the marble floor growing fainter with each step as she made her way to her father’s office.

The clink of melting the ice resounded throughout Marco’s office. The cubes in the half-drunken glass of Brandy de Jerez slipped around and away from each other as they perspired with a cool film of water while swimming in the brown liquor. Marco’s hand idly grasped the glass while the other was occupied with a silver picture frame that held a picture of him and his late wife Angelina on their wedding day.

His thumb caressed the glass running along the length of Angelina’s. A weary, forlorn look had taken hold of his face replacing the calm, suave, professional one that he wore throughout his hectic day at the Embassy.

He remembered when he and Angelina were being interviewed during the beginning of his political career.

‘Monsieur Rey Santo, tell us what married life is like for you and Madame Rey Santo met.’ the interviewer asked.

The photographer snapped a timely photo of the couple looking at each other admirably, and lovingly. Marco beamed with pride and smiled to his wife who returned his smile with equal fervor. Marco turned to the interviewer his arm draped around Angelina's shoulders.

"From the moment I first saw Angelina, I knew she was the love of my life, and I vowed to hold onto her forever," he said with a grin. “Remember that tiny little bistro in Madrid?” He asked looking at Angelina. “The one with the red leather booths.” She asked smiling placing a hand on his chest, “You were wearing that beautiful white dress, it was..." he paused, "Summer." He finished. "It was a hot day in Madrid, so we had vanilla ice cream," Marco said with hearty laughing. Angelina smiled and laughed as she remembered what happened that day. "We were so busy talking, the ice cream melted!" she said looking at her husband. Angelina sighed happily resting her hand on Marco’s leg and staring into his eyes as if it were just the two of them alone. A sentimental look crossed her face, her eyes tearing up. “And then?” Marco asked. “Oh! The owners!” Angelina exclaimed wiping her eyes. Marco laughed. “The owners were a married couple, and they were watching us the entire time!” Marco explained smiling. “They came over and took a picture of us. They said we would remember that date for the rest of our lives.” Angelina said. “They weren’t wrong,” Marco said lovingly as he reached into his pocket pulling out the Polaroid. Angelina took the picture in her hand and laughed pressing her hand to her chest in disbelief. “Marco, no puedo creer que lo hayas guardado todo este tiempo! Marco, I can't believe you kept it all this time!” she said laughing happily.

Angelina's laughter echoed in Marco’s mind seemingly filling the silence that had taken up residence in his office. Marco raised his glass and sipped the amber liquid resentfully.

“Why did you leave me here alone, Angel?” he whispered to the silence.

He set the glass down and sniffed, rubbing at his damp eyes. He tossed the frame into a nearby draw closing it with frustration! He grasped the glass again finishing the brandy in one hungry gulp hoping the liquid would fill the void he felt in his! He knew it didn’t matter how many drinks he had it was in vain and a temporary fix to his pain, but he reached for the decanter, ready to add another drink to the several he had already. That was until he heard a knock on the door. Marco stopped before the liquid could pour into the glass and looked at the door watching it open through the drunken haze that had blurred his vision. When Marcelina entered the room, Marco sat back in astonishment.

“Ay, dios mío…Oh my god…” he murmured covering his mouth. Marcelina stood there confused not realizing that to her father in his drunken state, she looked like her mother wearing her favorite white dress! “Angel…” he said tearfully. For just a moment he thought Angelina had returned to him. “Papa?” Marcelina asked.

Marcelina’s voice had a sobering effect on Marco. A perplexed look crossed his face as he lowered his hand. His vision blurred to the point where he couldn’t see Angelina anymore just a white blur. Marco blinked again and his vision cleared, and he realized he had mistaken his daughter for his dead wife. He was amazed by how much Marcelina looked like her mother and it broke his heart.

“Marcelina…” Marco said dejectedly, noticing she was wearing Angelina’s mantilla and dress. Angelina is gone, he thought to himself and cleared his throat wishing he could pour another glass of brandy, “What is it?” he asked brusquely sinking further into his chair.

His tone caught Marcelina off guard. He never talked to her that way. Then, she caught a whiff of the brandy. A weary sigh escaped Marcelina as she walked up to her father’s desk picking up his phone and watching him sit in his chair despondently. She hated to see her father in such a state. Raising the phone to her ear, Marcelina dialed the kitchen.

“Buenas tardes Luisa. ¿Podría traerle al Embajador un espresso triple, por favor? Sí. Gracias. Good afternoon, Luisa. Could you bring the Ambassador a triple espresso, please? Yes. Thank you.” Marcelina said gracefully and hung up the phone.

Marcelina’s hand remained on the phone looking at the empty glass with melting ice. She looked up from the glass to her father who began to doze in his chair. She observed the half-empty decanter of Brandy de Jerez on the desk. How much did he drink? She wondered. Her grief gripped her heart again causing it to ache not just for the loss of her mother but for the state her father was in after her passing. Marcelina’s hand slipped away from the phone, and she circled the desk standing in front of her father who began to snore gently. Marcelina stroked his cheek lovingly seeing how peaceful he was.

“Ay papá… ¿qué puedo hacer para ayudarte? Oh papa…what can I do to help you?” she asked in a hush voice.

Marcelina combed her hands through his disheveled dark hair to style it and make it more appropriate. She noticed he had a few more gray strands of hair which comingled with the rest of his dark hair. She wasn’t sure if it was her imagination, but he seemed thinner to her as well. She knelt before him looking at him sleep peacefully noticing his unbuttoned collar and loose tie to the formal black suit that he was wearing to the funeral. While her father slept, Marcelina buttoned up his collar. She straightened and tightened his black tie patting it gently over his pressed, white dress shirt. A knock on the door woke Marco up abruptly.

Bewildered, Marco looked around the office and looked down at his daughter kneeling before her. He remembered her doing the same thing as a little girl when he fell asleep at his desk in the past. He smiled weakly at her.

“Hola, mi querida hija...Hello, my darling daughter...” he said wearily. Marcelina smiled at her father with teary eyes. “Hola, papa.” She said happily, glad that he was back to his normal self. She cleared her throat and stood up, “Pasa, Luisa. Come in, Luisa.” She spoke. Luisa entered the room carrying a small tray with an espresso cup resting on a saucer. “Buenas tardes, Embajador. Señorita Marcelina. Good afternoon, Ambassador. Miss Marcelina.” Luisa said setting the cup on the desk. “Garcias, Luisa.” Marcelina said to Luisa. Luisa nodded with a polite smile and left the room. Marcelina turned to her father. “It’s time, papa.” She said softly smoothing the lapel of his jacket. “I know mija…” Marco said sadly and sighed before getting up from his office chair buttoning his suit jacket. Marcelina picked up the espresso cup handing it to her father. Marco sipped the coffee watching Marcelina adjust his tie within his jacket and smoothed his lapels. Marcelina locked eyes with her father. “Are you feeling better?” she asked hoping the coffee would help wake him. Marco took another swig of his coffee. “Sí, mucho mejor, mi querida hija. Yes, much better, my darling daughter.” He replied setting the empty cup down, clearing his throat. He adjusted his jacket and stood tall, “How do I look?” he asked anxiously looking to Marcelina who smiled at him lovingly as she stroked his hair. “You look amazing, Papa. Mama would be proud.” She said softly.

Marco’s face broke as he wept grasping Marcelina in a desperate hug. Marcelina hugged her father tightly and cried with him, her hands rubbing his back comfortingly.

“Está bien, Papá. Está bien. It’s okay, Papa. It’s okay.” She said softly. Marco stood up straight and she wiped away his tears as he looked at her woefully. Resting her hands on her father’s chest she looked at him comfortingly. “It’s time to say goodbye.” She said looking at him with a look of reassurance. Marco nodded apprehensively. “I’m ready, mija…” he said. Marcelina took her father’s hand in hers. “Everyone is waiting.” She said leading her father out of his office.

Her arms linked with her father’s; Marcelina entered the lobby of the Embassy. Waiting in the rotunda stood the embassy staff. Marco looked at the teary and sad faces of his team who were all mourning and sharing his loss. Marco swallowed unsure of what to do next. Sensing his trepidation, Marcelina looked to the staff and offered a warm smile which gave them a sense of comfort in their grief.

“Dejanos rezar. Let us pray.” She said in a calm voice.

The staff responded gratefully by bowing their heads and clasping their hands together. Marcelina glanced at her father who had closed his eyes as well. Marcelina closed her eyes she felt as if she were at a loss for words but as if springing from her heart, she spoke.

“Querido Dios, Hoy recordamos con profundo amor a nuestra querida madre y esposa, un verdadero ángel en nuestras vidas. Ella, quien incansablemente y de manera desinteresada, se entregó a la comunidad, iluminando nuestros días con su bondad y generosidad. Aunque ya no está físicamente con nosotros, sentimos su presencia en cada acto de amor y en cada rayo de esperanza que nos envuelve. Ella vive en nuestros corazones, vigilándonos y protegiéndonos desde el cielo, encarnando el verdadero significado de su nombre, un ángel eterno. Te pedimos, Señor, que nos des la fortaleza para seguir su ejemplo de amor y servicio, y que su espíritu continúe guiándonos y bendiciéndonos en cada paso de nuestro camino. Amén. Dear God, today we remember with deep love our beloved mother and wife, a true angel in our lives. She, who tirelessly and selflessly, gave herself to the community, illuminating our days with her kindness and generosity. Although she is no longer physically with us, we feel her presence in every act of love and in every ray of hope that surrounds us. She lives in our hearts, watching over us and protecting us from heaven, embodying the true meaning of her name, an eternal angel. We ask you, Lord, to give us the strength to follow her example of love and service, and that her spirit continues to guide and bless us every step of our way. Amen.” Marcelina prayed. “Amen.” Everyone responded in unison.

Marcelina opened her eyes to see teary faces smiling at her, even her father.

“Eso fue…maravilloso…mi hija. That was…wonderful…my daughter.” Marco managed between tears. Marcelina wiped his tears and gently raised his chin, so his eyes met hers, “Estoy contigo en cada paso del camino. I’m with you every step of the way.” She spoke. Marco took a deep breath, taking strength in her words, and nodded firmly. Vicente approached the the Ambassador and his daughter. “The caravan is ready. Andrea and the Deputy Chief will accompany you in the car that will follow the hearse. I will accompany the security team in the rear SUV.” He explained as he escorted them outside the embassy to a black Volvo XC90, “Hector, will be your driver.” he said as he opened the passenger door for the Ambassador to sit up front. He opened the rear door for Marcelina, Andrea, and Constantino to sit in the back. “Gracias, Vinny,” Constantino said gratefully while Marco nodded in silent approval.

Marcelina looked out the dark-tinted windows of the SUV to see the dark SUVs in front and back, the blue and red lights indicating where the police detail was located as part of the caravan before her eyes fell on the hearse before them. Her heart sank knowing her mother was lying in the white coffin that could be seen through the white-curtained window.

The cars’ engines idled as security got into their respective vehicles and the motorcycle engines of the police rumbled as they waited to depart. Onlookers had gathered on the street and held picture signs with various messages.

Marcelina rolled down her window and waved tearfully to the crowds acknowledging their love and grief. The crowd cheered gratefully.

‘We love you, Marcelina! We support you, Ambassador!’ they cried out as Marcelina rolled the window back up taking a breath in awe of the impact her mother’s life made on the people of Paris.

The caravan slowly departed from the Embassy taking Avenue Marceau towards the River Seine. Onlookers lined the thoroughfares, showing their support and respect with flowers, pictures, and signs. Marcelina thought back on all the work her mother did as Cultural Attaché as part of the Spanish Embassy in Paris, she became known for her compassionate efforts around the world. She was an ambassador for UNICEF, Save the Children, and SOS Children's Villages and supported child organizations such as Fundación ANAR, Les Enfants de l'Arc-en-Ciel, and the Children's National Hospital. Angelina was likened to the Princess Diana of the 21st Century.

‘Recuerda, Marcelina. La inocencia de los niños es un regalo puro que nos recuerda la belleza de la vida. Remember, Marcelina. The innocence of children is a pure gift that reminds us of the beauty of life.‘ Marcelina recalled her mother telling her when they were supporting a children’s event.

The procession continued and passed through Place de la Concorde, one of the major public squares in Paris heading towards Rue de Rivoli. Many onlookers and mourners had gathered showing their support and grief for Angelina as the caravan passed.

Turning onto Rue de Rivoli, the procession passed by the Louvre Museum where more people were gathered. Marco looked about seemingly overwhelmed by the amount of people that showed up for them. Marcelina reached from her seat and touched her father’s shoulder lovingly.

“Estoy aquí, papa. I’m here, Papa.” She said comfortingly. Marco nodded again and swallowed as he took his daughter’s hand, kissing it softly. “Gracias, mi querida hija. Gracias. Thank you, my darling daughter. Thank you.” He breathed holding her hand to his cheek. Marcelina’s heart ached for her father.

Rue La Fayette gave them a much-needed reprieve as they traveled its length through several districts of Paris. Small groups were gathered and scattered here and there throughout the districts they passed. The sorrow, love, and support for Angelina was heartfelt from the various hanging signs, pictures, and swathes of flower bunches that decorated the barricades.

The hearse and the accompanying caravan soon arrived at the Church of Saint-Bernard de la Chapelle. Crowds of people filled the barricaded streets of Rue Saint-Mathieu and Saint-Bruno all them of holding signs, pictures, and flowers to honor Angelina’s memory. Saint Bernard Square across from the church hosted more mourners watching as the procession arrived. Hector and Vicente quickly exited their vehicles to let out Marco, Marcelina, Andrea, and Constantino.

Marcelina linked in her father’s once more as they stood in silence listening to the cries of the onlookers in the distance. Some were too grief-stricken to speak while others cried out Angelina’s name while reaching for the hearse desperately. Media reporters stood with their camera crews as they reported the arrival of the Rey Santos. Photographers snapped pictures, their bulbs bright even in the daylight as the Ambassador, his daughter, and their entourage made their way towards the church entrance.

At the entrance stood an older woman waiting for them patiently. Her face was creased with wrinkles, but they did not make her any less beautiful. Her smile was familiar, warm, and comforting. She wore a dark dress accented with a white mosaic print along the shoulders and sleeves. The same mosaic print ran the length of her long, dark skirt. White enamel earrings dangled from her dainty ears partially hidden beneath her short, silvery hair.

Marco and Marcelina approached the woman who had her hands clasped in front of her, her smile not fading as tears welled in her eyes. The woman gave Constantino, Vicente, and Andrea a warm hug as they entered church leaving her with Marco and Marcelina. The woman looked lovingly at Marcelina, her smile full of affection and pride for the young woman who stood before her.

“¿Has sido fuerte por tu Papá? Have you been strong for your Papa?” she asked reaching and touching the underside of Marcelina’s chin who couldn’t but smile at the woman as tears streamed down her face. The woman wiped away Marcelina’s tears. “Si, Abuela María. Yes, Grandma Maria.” Marcelina responded watching Maria adjust the mantilla Marcelina was wearing feeling its lace between her soft fingertips. “Te ves hermosa con esta mantilla. Tan hermosa como tu madre cuando la usaba. You look beautiful in this mantilla. As beautiful as your mother when she wore it.” Maria said gasping as she fought to hold back tears. Maria turned to look at her son. “Mi corazón. Mi único hijo. My heart. My only son.” She said lovingly looking deep into his dark eyes that were blood-shot and so very weary. “Mijo, Llevas una carga pesada. You carry a heavy burden.” she said wisely.

Maria watched her son search her eyes for sanctuary, for comfort. He struggled to find the words. Maria raised a finger and shushed him resting her hands gently on the sides of his head.

“Cuando tu Papá se fue al Cielo ¿Qué te dije? When your Papa went to Heaven, what did I tell you?” she said softly. Marco closed his eyes his hands grasping his mother’s wrists as she held his head in her gentle grasp. “The only way out is through….” he whispered somberly.

Maria swallowed her cries, but the tears flowed down her face remembering Marco’s father Martin, the love of her life, and how he left this world suddenly leaving her to face her remaining days without him. She knew her son’s pain all too well.

“Feel the sadness, mijo…and the pain. Let it all in…. then let it all go." She said with a shaky voice raising his face to look at her.

Her eyes searched her son’s eyes imploringly she did not want him to bear this burden alone as she did. Marco looked sorrowfully into his mother’s seeing the same pain he felt. Marco felt his fists release and the wave of grief wash over him as he finally accepted that Angelina was gone as much as he couldn’t bear to be without her, she was no longer with him.

“Marco…” Maria said calmly taking his hands in her hands in hers and hugging them to her chest.

Marco could feel the beating of his mother’s heart. Marco fell to his knees defeatedly in front of his mother his hands falling from hers and gripping her dress like he did when he was just a boy.

“Mi ángel se ha ido...Mama… My angel is gone…Mama…” he said in anguish.

Marco hid his face in the folds of his mother’s dress as he wept. Marcelina fell to her knees wrapping her arms around her father.

“Papa!” she said sadly burying her face in his arm and crying with him. “Mi amores…My loves…” Maria wept taking them both in her arms and hugging them close to her waist.

Maria watched sorrowfully as the pallbearers marched past her from the entrance to the hearse where Angelina’s coffin waited for them. They opened the back of the hearse which elicited painful, melancholic cries from the watching crowd as the pallbearers revealed a white casket accented in gold. A wreath of Casablanca Lilies, Marcelina and her mother’s favorite flower, rested upon the top of the casket as the pallbearer’s life the casket and escorted it to the entrance.

“Come, mis amores.” Maria said bringing Marco and Marcelina to stand with her.

The trio held onto each other watching Father Guillermo walk out the doors of the church as the pallbearers approached. Taking a small vial of holy water, the Priest sprinkled the water across the top of the casket and flowers. The voices of the choir echoed from inside the church singing the first lines of ‘Danos un Corazón’ (Give us a Heart).

‘Danos un corazón, grande para amar, danos un corazón, fuerte para luchar. Give us a heart, big enough to love, give us a heart, strong enough to fight.’ “Thank you, Father,” Maria said softly.

Father Guillermo approached them, allowing the pallbearers to guide the coffin into the church. Guillermo took Maria’s hands in his and looked at Marco and Marcelina.

“We share in your loss. You all have helped us so much. I am humbled that you allow us to honor, Angelina’s life and legacy here. This church and the community have benefited greatly from her service.” He stated with a gentle smile patting Maria’s hand comfortingly, “Come…it is time.” He said gesturing to them inside the church.

Maria linked arms with her son and Marcelina did the same on the opposite side and followed Father Guillermo inside. Upon entering the sanctuary, the family was greeted by a multitude of friends, family, celebrities, and dignitaries who stood from their chairs on both sides of the aisle as they walked down the aisle. Marcelina eyed Constantino, Vicente, and Andrea up front waiting for them much to her relief.

The guests watched on respectfully as pallbearers escorted the casket down the nave aisle. The Paris Philharmonic began to play a beautiful melody as Rhian Luisante entered from the side aisle of the church standing to the right of the transept. Rhian wore a black sparkling gown with a plunging neckline, her long dirty blonde hair pulled back into a stylish bun. In her hands, she held a mic as the music played. She looked at the large print of Angelina and read the plaque below.

In Loving Memory…

Angelina Rey Espiridión Santo

August 1, 1968 - December 23, 2020

Turning to the audience with tears filling her eyes, Rhian raised the mic to her lips.

“The song I’m about to sing is very special.” She said softly doing her best to maintain her composure, “I sang this song for Marco and Angelina at their vow renewal celebration.” She said proudly smiling at Marco and gesturing to him, “The love you two shared inspired all of us and I know Angelina would want us to remember that love like that, is eternal and everlasting…always.” She said in a hush, emotional voice as she brought her free hand to her chest in hopes of calming her heart that ached for the loss of her dear friend. Rhian breathed and closed her eyes as she sang.

Le ciel bleu sur nous peut s'effondrer

Et la Terre peut bien s'écrouler

Peu m'importe si tu m'aimes

Je me fous du monde entier

The blue sky can tumble down upon us

And the earth can also collapse

It doesn't matter, if you love me

I don't care about the entire world

Rhian’s voice rang out the far reaches of the church accompanied by the melodies played by the Philharmonic. Tears fell down Rhian’s face knowing how much the song she sang meant to Angelina and how it embodied the testament to her love for Marco.

Tant qu'l'amour innondera mes matins

Tant qu'mon corps frémira sous tes mains

Peu m'importe les problèmes

Mon amour, puisque tu m'aimes

As long as love floods my mornings

As long as my body trembles beneath your hand

These problems don't matter

My love, since you love me

Miles watched his wife sing, astounded by the sheer magnitude of Rhian’s voice and the emotions she felt singing it. Tears welled in his eyes. He felt a mixture of love and sadness for the loss of a friend. He couldn’t imagine what Marco was dealing with nor could he imagine his life with Rhian or his daughter.

J'irais jusqu'au bout du monde

Je me ferais teindre en blonde

Si tu me le demandais

J'irais décrocher la Lune

J'irais voler la fortune

Si tu me le demandais

Je renierais ma patrie

Je renierais mes amis

Si tu me le demandais

On peut bien rire de moi

Je ferais n'importe quoi

Si tu me le demandais

I would go to the end of the earth

I would dye my hair blonde

I would go take down the moon

I would go steal a fortune

If you asked it of me

I would disown my country

I would disown my friends

If you asked it of me

People can have a good laugh at me

I would do anything

If you asked it of me

Feeling a gentle warmth wash over her, the ache in her heart subsided, Rhian gestured to her daughter as she sang. Dawn watched her mother in awe and inspiration hoping one day to be like her mother vocally.

Si un jour, la vie t'arrache à moi

Si tu meurs, que tu sois loin de moi

Peu m'importe si tu m'aimes

Car moi je mourrais aussi

If one day life tears you from me

If you die that you be far from me

It doesn't matter, if you love me

Because, me, I will die also

Tears fell from Marco’s face as Rhian sang, he remembered Angelina singing this verse to him as they danced after renewing their vows. She asked Rhian to sing the song one more time so they could dance longer and he remembered her singing the lyrics to him. The lyrics had new meaning to Marco now and he felt as if a part of him was dying that day watching the pallbearers rest the coffin in front of the altar before marching single file down the side aisles of the church.

Nous aurons pour nous l'éternité

Dans le bleu de toute l'immensité

Dans le ciel, plus de problème

Mon amour, crois-tu qu'on s'aime?

Dieu réunit ceux qui s'aiment

We will have eternity for ourselves

In the great blue immensity

In the sky, no more problems

My love, do you believe we love each other

God reunites those who love each other

Marcelina found comfort in the final lyrics as Rhian brought the song to a close. She knew that her mother was heaven and that one day they would be together again. She sat down with her father and grandmother, the three of them holding hands as the congregation applauded Rhian’s performance. Rhian passed the mic to one of the attendants and immediately sat with her husband who took her in her arms. Rhian sorrowfully collapsed in Miles’ arms crying silently against his chest. Dawn rested her head on her father’s arm tears welling in her eyes. She took her mother’s hand in hers feeling her squeeze it tightly.

Father Guillermo approached his lectern looking out to the congregation peacefully as the applause subsided. Soft crying and sniffing could be heard about the church.

“My children…Today, we gather in the House of the Lord to honor and remember our beloved Angelina Rey Espiridon Santo. In this moment of profound grief and sadness, we seek comfort and hope in the faith we share. We know that even as our tears fall and our hearts feel heavy, God offers us His love and His peace. Angelina was a shining light in our lives, a woman whose kindness, compassion, and dedication touched everyone who knew her. Her love for her family, her devotion to her work, and her unwavering faith in God are a testament to a life lived fully and with purpose. The Lord tells us in the Gospel of John, ‘Yo soy la resurrección y la vida. El que cree en mí, aunque muera, vivirá. I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me, though he dies, yet shall he live.’ We trust in this divine promise, knowing that Angelina now rests in the loving arms of our Heavenly Father. Her spirit lives on in the eternal presence of God, free from pain and suffering. In this time of mourning, let us remember the words of Psalm 23: "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside still waters." May these words bring us comfort and strength. Angelina, in her life and now in her eternal rest, is guided by the love and mercy of God. To Angelina's family, especially her husband Marco and her daughter Marcelina, we offer our prayers and our support. May you find solace in the precious memories you shared and in the certainty that Angelina is at peace with our Lord. Let us pray together, asking God to grant us peace in our hearts and the strength to carry on, knowing that one day we will be reunited with our loved ones in eternal glory. Que el Señor bendiga y guarde a cada uno de ustedes en este tiempo de tristeza. May the Lord bless and keep each of you in this time of sadness. May Angelina's love continue to inspire us all to live with love and compassion. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.” he said. “Amen.” The crowd responded. “And now, Angelina’s daughter, Marcelina Rey Santo, will provide the First Reading as part of the Liturgy of the Word.” Father Guillermo said.

Andrea reached into her bag and gave Marcelina her childhood bible that her grandmother gave her. Marcelina smiled gratefully at Andrea and took her father’s hand in hers giving it a soft squeeze for comfort before she got up from her chair.

Setting the bible on the lectern, Marcelina looked out the congregation nervously. She opened the bible to the pages bookmarked by the red faded ribbon, she could still smell her grandmother’s perfume on the worn pages. Marcelina looked at the highlighted passage she planned to read. Her brown eyes looked out the crowd and she cleared her throat.

“My beloved friends, family, and loved ones. I’d like to thank you on behalf of myself and my father for coming to honor my mother’s life. I know she is smiling down on us today. For the first reading I would like to read the first letter of Saint Paul to the Corinthians in First Corinthians, Chapter 13 verses 4 through 7. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. Siempre protege, siempre confía, siempre espera, siempre persevera. Always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. Pero la mayor de ellas es el amor. But the greatest of them is love. In these words, we see a reflection of my mother. Her love was always patient and kind, siempre generosa y llena de compasión, always generous and full of compassion. She embodied the spirit of love that Saint Paul speaks of. A love that never fails…” she said her bottom lip trembling as tears filled her eyes and she took a breath, “As we remember her today, let us carry forward her legacy of love and charity. Let us be inspired by her example to love others as she loved us, con todo nuestro corazón, with all our hearts.” She finished.

The air was filled with a palpable sense of reverence, enhancing the solemn atmosphere of the funeral service.

The cantor stepped forward, his voice clear and resonant as he introduced the Psalm,

"The Lord is my shepherd; there is nothing I shall want." His voice carried through the church, inviting the congregation to find solace in these familiar and comforting words.

As he sang the response, the congregation joined in, their voices unified in a gentle chorus that filled the vaulted space with a wave of communal prayer. The cantor then proceeded with the verses of the Psalm, each line emphasizing God’s guidance and the promise of peace.

"The Lord is my shepherd; there is nothing I shall want.” The congregation repeated after each refrain.

Father Guillermo stood at the lectern after the final refrain allowing the congregation to settle in a moment of quiet reflection before addressing the congregation once more.

"As we reflect on the assurance provided by the Psalm, let us continue to seek comfort in the words of Scripture. Dr. Amy Clearwater, a close friend and confidant of our beloved Mrs. Rey Santo, will now share the second reading." He spoke.

Dr. Clearwater, dressed in a dark, well-tailored pinstripe suit with perfectly hemmed pants, got up from her seat carrying her bible with her to the lectern. Setting the bible down she reached into her pocket pulling out her reading glasses while she opened the bible to the passage she intended to read. She looked over her glasses to the congregation before clearing her throat and tucking a tuft of her short blonde hair behind her ear. Dr. Clearwater paused, gathering her thoughts before looking out to the congregation her expression solemn yet deeply compassionate.

“My dear friends, we gather here today to remember and celebrate the life of a beloved friend, mother, and wife. I stand here today, not just as a doctor, or a wife, or a mother but as someone who was profoundly privileged to know Angelina not just as a patient, or a like-minded colleague, but a dear, dear friend. These past few days, I have grappled with the sudden loss that took her from us. I've reflected deeply on what it means to try with all one’s might to avert the seemingly unjustified fate of a loved one. To stand still while fate takes its inevitable course when you have done all you can to save what is dearest to you. In her final days, Angelina faced her fate with courage, strength, and love not only for herself but for those who loved her. I invoke the same courage, strength, and love she embodied that day she left us. For it was her courage, strength, and love in her final days that were a testament to the incredible person she was. Today, I want to share a passage that speaks to the heart of what she taught us all—about the resilience of the spirit and the unseen eternal things such as unconditional love that is so precious.” She said looking at her husband and daughter fondly, “Let us cherish our loved ones as Angelina did. While we mourn her passing, let us also hold onto the profound truths that her life exemplified.” She spoke.

Dr. Clearwater looked to Angelina’s memorial picture off to the side of the lectern before turning her attention to her bible.

“I shall read from John, Chapter 14 verses 1 through 3. This scripture has brought me great comfort, and I hope that it does the same for you.” She explained as she traced the page to the verses she intended to read. She cleared her throat once more, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me so that you also may be where I am.” she said with a steady but emotional voice, “Thank you.” She said softly leaving the lectern to go back to her seat.

After the reflective pause that followed the second reading, the congregation stood in unison as the Gospel Acclamation began. The cantor's voice filled the church, signaling a moment of reverence and preparation for the Gospel reading.

"Alleluia, speak, Lord, for your servant is listening," the cantor sang…

Father Guillermo read a passage from the Gospel that echoed themes of love and eternal life and spoke of Jesus' promise of eternal life to those who believe in Him. As the Gospel concluded, the congregation sat, and a solemn silence fell over the church. Marco took a deep breath before he rose from his seat and took his place at the lectern before the congregation.

"Today, we gather to remember not just the remarkable public persona of my dear wife, but the incredible private warmth and compassion she shared with each of us personally. Mi amor, mi vida, my love, my life, you have left a void that cannot be filled. Your laughter, your unending passion for life, and your unwavering support for all who were privileged to cross your path remain etched in our hearts." Marco paused, collecting himself before continuing, "Ella era mi roca, mi consuelo en tiempos de angustia. She was my rock, my comfort in times of trouble. Her strength was unparalleled, guiding our family with both grace and courage, even in her final days. She taught us the true meaning of resilience and the profound depth of selfless, unconditional love." He breathed fighting back his tears and his grief, "Her dedication to charity, her relentless advocacy for the underprivileged—these were the tenets by which she lived her life. Su corazón siempre tenía espacio para los demás. Their heart always had room for others." He said with a gentle smile, "I remember how she could light up a room with just her presence, cómo su risa llenaba nuestra casa con alegría, how her laughter filled our house with joy. Those moments, those precious, fleeting moments, are treasures that I will carry with me always." He said gratefully.

Marco felt as if Angelina were standing with him, comforting him as he looked out across the congregation, his gaze lingering on the familiar faces that looked back at him with love and support.

"As we bid farewell, let us not dwell on our loss but celebrate the incredible life she led and the countless lives she touched. Vamos a recordarla con alegría, con amor, y con gratitude. Let us remember her with joy, with love, and with gratitude. May her soul, through the mercy of God, rest in peace." Marco concluded.

Tears fell down his face as he left the lectern. Mario stood up and held her arms open to receive her son who hugged her tightly as he wept.

“Lo hice, mamá. I did it, Mama.” He whispered to her. “Angelina y tu papá estarían muy orgullosos, hijo mío. Angelina and your papa would be very proud, my son.” She said tearfully burying her face in her son’s arms as she cried.

Maria and Marco took their seating hugging each other and Angelina as Father Guillermo stood once more at the lectern.

“Marco, you have truly captured the essence of Angelina’s heart and soul. Your love for her knows no bounds. God truly saw that fate brought you together. It is a true blessing to find the truest, purest, and most profound love.” He spoke. Marco nodded to the priest in thanks, “And now, we ask Aurora d’Amour to join us, who will perform a song dedication in honor of Angelina’s love, life, and legacy.” He announced stepping away from the lectern as Dawn arose from her seat standing to the side of the altar.

Dawn wore a black, sheer organza blouse and a long dark dress that came to her ankles exposing her black stiletto pumps. One of the attendants handed her a mic.

“My mother always spoke highly of Angelina, they were truly the best of friends. Her absence may be heartfelt but so was her life and her accomplishments. She led an inspiring life and I hope this song encompasses her legacy for she was an Ave Maria to those who had no love or hope to believe in.” Dawn said the pianist and guitarist began playing a soft melody.

Marcelina watched intently feeling a sense of familiarity as Dawn raised the mic to her lips.

Avant même que l'on n'soit vie

On est pris

Dans un nid de chair et de tendresse

Une étreinte infinie

Qui nous lie

Nous délivre une sagesse

Tout déjà est acquis mais pour qui dès ce cri

Trahissons-nous le geste d'amour qui unit

Désunit

et nourrit les regrets?

Even before one is alive, one is taken

In a nest of flesh and tenderness

An infinite embrace that binds us

We deliver a wisdom

Everything is already taken

But for whom since this cry

do we betray the gesture of love that unites

Disunites and feeds regrets

dont l'enfant ne serait pas

Une statuette, une prière sans foi

Mais une lettre offerte

À ceux qui n'écrivent pas

Pour que les mots résonnent enfin

Comme un Ave Maria…

An Ave Maria whose child won't be

A statuette, a prayer without faith

But a letter offered

To those who do not write

So that words finally resonate

As an Ave Maria…

The violins accompanied the music giving it further depth and serenity that truly moved Marcelina. She looked at the picture of her mother before looking back to Aurora d’Amour as she sang.

À vous, à nous, à ceux qui

Trouveront une paix, une terre, une harmonie

Une infinie raison, sans raison d'être, sans être honni

Et ceux qui mal y pense, qu'ils le pensent

À bientôt, mais dans une autre vie

Dans celle-ci, qu'on se donne

Une chance de tout recommencer

To you, to us, to those who

Find a peace, a (home)land, a harmony

An infinite reason, without reason to be, without being hated

And those who "think badly of it", let them think

See you soon, but in another life

In this one we give ourselves

A chance to start all over again

Un Ave Maria dont l'enfant ne serait pas

Une statuette, une prière sans foi

Mais une lettre offerte

À ceux qui n'écrivent pas

Pour que les mots résonnent enfin

Comme un Ave Maria

Un Ave Maria

An Ave Maria whose child won't be

A statuette, a prayer without faith

But a letter offered

To those who do not write

So that words finally resonate

As an Ave Maria

Rhian watched her daughter in awe not just how proud she was of her but how beautifully and effortlessly she sang it was as if she were another person.

Pour ceux qui ne prient pas

Pour que la musique soit à nouveau la voix

D'un aveu impudique pour ceux qui ne croient pas

Pour tous ceux qui l'méritent enfin

Un Ave Maria

Ave Maria

An Ave Maria

For those who do not pray

So that the music be the voice again

A shameless confession for those who do not believe

For those who finally deserve

An Ave Maria

Marcelina couldn’t help but feel close to Dawn although their encounters had been scant at best. And if just for a fleeting moment, it looked as if Dawn were glowing with golden light that basked the congregation in a warmth that eased their sadness. Marcelina blinked and the light was gone. She looked about as the song concluded wondering if anyone else had seen it…

The funeral continued, with the Liturgy of the Eucharist performed, followed by prayers, incense for honor and purification, the final blessing, and the recessional hymn that encompassed the Commendation and Farewell portion of the service. From there, everyone proceeded from the church to Cimetière du Père-Lachaise where Angelina Rey Espiridon Santo was finally laid to rest.

Long after the funeral ended, Marcelina returned to Saint Bernard’s. She wasn’t sure why, but she felt like she needed to be there. The sun set in the distance casting an orange hue in its wake. Marcelina watched the sunset, she remembered her grandmother telling her the setting sun could be seen as a metaphor for the culmination of a life’s journey that it was a time for reflection and a time of transition into the spiritual realms. She didn’t normally subscribe to such things but found comfort in her grandmother’s wisdom that day.

Entering the church, Marcelina made her way to the side chapel. There in the intimate chamber stood the statue of Mary surrounded by the soft glow of the votive candles that were lit before her. The statue of Mary was a symbol of faith, comfort, and hope and her presence offered a connection to the divine and was a source of solace for experiencing loss. Marcelina was overcome by the sight of the statue, feeling the comfort Mary symbolized. Taking an unlit votive from the nearby shelf, Marcelina approached the blessed mother and picked up one of the lit votive candles from the table in front of the statue. Using the light from the candle, Marcelina lit her votive candle before placing the borrowed candle back. Marcelina held her newly lit votive candle in her hands, the soft glow of the fire illuminating her face. Setting the candle down, Marclina closed her eyes.

"Mama, Te extraño. I miss you. I light this candle as a symbol of my eternal love and remembrance for you. May its light guide me through the darkness and always remind me of your warmth and love. From heaven, please give me the strength to carry on. Help me find my way and make decisions that would make you proud. Ayúdame a encontrar el camino. Help me find the path and to take steps that honor your legacy. With all my love and all my heart, te recuerdo y te celebro. I remember and celebrate you, now and forever. Amen." Marcelina prayed.

Suddenly the door opened, and two sisters of the church entered the chamber startling Marcelina.

“¡Disculpe, señorita Marcelina! Excuse me, Miss Marcelina! I didn’t know you were here.” One of the sisters said softly. Marcelina smiled, “No, no. I’m sorry. Sister Deina. I didn’t mean to intrude, I just wanted to say a prayer to my mother.” she explained. “You don’t have to be sorry. Sister Mieda and I were just making sure there were votive candles available.” Sister Deina responded. “We’re sorry for your loss. Señora Angelina was an amazing woman.” Sister Mieda said. Marcelina nodded looking to the status of Mary. “She really was. I miss her so much.” Marcelina said tearfully with a smile. Sister Deina and Mieda watched Marcelina intently taken not only by Marcelina’s beauty but by her grace and elegance as well. “Forgive me, you look so much the Blessed Mother in your mantilla. I almost mistook you for her when we came in.” Sister Deina confessed. Marcelina blushed, “Thank you, sister.” She said looking at the glowing candles mesmerized by the flames.

The flame of the candle flickered about drawing Marcelina into a trance, her dark eyes reflecting the candle’s light. There, in the light, Marcelina saw a young woman with her back turned to her. She didn’t know who the woman she felt like the woman was someone she cherished deeply. Marcelina noted the woman’s long, flowing blonde hair and beautiful white gown embellished in gold. The woman began to turn towards her, reaching out to Marcelina.

“MARS!” the woman cried out.

Marcelina let out a gasp and turned to see Sister Deina grasping her shoulder shaking it as if she were trying to wake her.

“Señorita Marcelina, are you alright?” she asked, her voice filled with concern.

Sister Deina and Marcelina’s eyes met, and Marcelina nodded reassuring the sister she was okay. Marcelina looked back at the candles, but she didn’t see the young woman anymore.

“Is there anything we can do?” Sister Deina asked. Marcelina shook her head, “It’s been a long day. I must be going.” She responded walking towards the chamber doors. “Señorita.” Sister Mieda called after Marcelina who turned to look at the two sisters. She never noticed how much the two women looked alike, like twins almost.

Sister Deina approached Marcelina reaching into the pocket of her dress and taking out a small object. She took Marcelina’s hands in hers and placed the object from her pocket in Marcelina’s hands closing her hands around it.

“When the time comes, you’ll know what to do.” Sister Deina said. “We support you, Señorita.” Sister Mieda added.

The two women smiled comfortingly at Marcelina and left the chamber. Marcelina opened her hand revealing a red and golden wand. The light of the votive candles glowed on the Mars symbol that embellished the golden sphere surrounded by a golden elliptical ring…

[lasoldier]

I’m excited to participate in UsaMamo Week 2024 for the first time! I’m already getting ideas for the prompts!

UsaMamo Week 2024 Prompts

UsaMamo Week 2024 will be the week of July 28 - August 3! We’re posting these prompts early to help you prepare.

See below for the daily prompts. Every day has two prompts to pick from – you are not required to use both. You can do as many or as few day’s prompts as you are inspired to do. We’re accepting any form of creative work – stories, drabbles, poetry, drawings, digital art, webtoons, moodboards, photography, cosplay… whatever medium speaks to you!

Rules:

Usa/Mamo must be the central pairing

Any rating is OK as long as you flag / label correctly

All types of fanwork are accepted

You can do one prompt or more, there’s no minimum

Tag a Tumblr post with #usamamoweek2024 and/or @usamamoweek2024 to be reblogged by this account

Add to the collection on AO3 (this is optional) and tag #usamamoweek2024

If requested, we will share AO3 works on Tumblr

Have fun!

Daily Prompt List for July 28 - August 3

Day 1: First glance / Masquerade

Day 2: Meet the Parents / Second chance

Day 3: Inspired by a Song

Day 4: Free day

Day 5: Thunderstorm / Stargazing

Day 6: Coffee / Heat Waves

Day 7: Great Outdoors / Lifeguard

[usagisbanexd]

+ SUPER SOLDIER SAILOR STARS #02 * _) _) >>C===3 :-* Kawaii Slash Lovers Collide Cosmic Paradise // Sailor Moon/Pokémon/Potterverse Altfic Crossover, CHAPTER 1.0.002

Fic. he/him!Rei, questioning,ace!Mina

1.0.002 BIG-DICKED REI / LOVES /ACE&lt;3 MINAKO <33!, MINA HOPES

“She’s gone,” says Mina, and in her eye a dart hits its target from afar. The ribbon at the crown of her head unwinds and falls, then brushes forward, a little kanji in the dirt, carried with the wind, petals granted by the jungle of different understanding. She assumes the title of the moonless decoy, red and white chalk lips, Moctezuma the Emperor’s Mongol warbride, kidnapped and ransomed in an ox-drawn wagon, home over a gray dirt steppe, Utah, the birthplace of her fathers the suns, Arizona, the distant red clay of unbought Play Doh, Sister Columbine, father’s reassurance, sing-alongs, ice cream men, fountains oily with cartoon glossy waters: ‘ZAMZAM! VENUS ZAMZAM MAKE-UP!’ Her niqab swirls. She thinks with the wind and the ocean, Michiru’s golden semina. She knows her Mars is the lesser shrine maiden, that she, Emperor Mars, shadow of past nations, is the greater music. She knows Haruka lies in wait, her plastic lip no make-up look the hook in Michiru’s gilded cramping muscular wretching no-womb decoy mazey organ thigh. Mamoru sees Michiru’s eye. A minotaur in a labyrinth on her bonemilk skin. Mamoru’s eyes, gorgeous, tender, Usagi’s bane, Minako’s heaven, the only child, muse-borne. Nowombwomban, no-womb man, the emperor borne from the water passes Mina’s eye like the procession of a distant plaster glaized elephant, and her heart worships the stone inside, and Michiru worships the stone in the water, and together Venus and Mercury swim goddess-born, but Neptune knows no mother and Mercury abandons Venus for the stone, and Venus eternal daughtersister holds her arms and limps her ankle against the cold, and all at once everyone is encompassed by a golden hoop with a single ray shining outward beneath, a film played by the sun the god American-born protector projector from the anus of Apollo risen hoarily into Michiru’s turquoise prison in the gape. Manga. Multi-colored. Pixels. Beauty. Peace sign, ~ Venus &Mars

          Mars with a middle finger, dirt under her nail. Combat boots. Goth make-up. Mina writing feverishly. Her dad holding her crumpled fanfic in a triumphant limp upturned right hand, outward like a cocktail, in the crux like a teddy bear, his wrist bent back, scolding, happy, cocktail hour, bermuda shorts, little ones, muscular thighs, swollen bird’s scimitar scabcalves, Michiru vomiting out from herself in holy meditation, always in Neptune’s raiment, Haruka as Michiru, pathetic Haruka, evil Michiru, the mother’s shackles in Rei’s eye, Rei weeping, Rei devised, Haruka thrashing, Mamoru crying, Haruka weeping, Michiru laughing, Haruka dying, Mamo holding the sword, Venus puking a single tear from the corner of her eye, wiping it, hiding it, Father’s buried secret. Her dad speaks. “Hi,” he says. “No,” says Venus the sun blazing through his mask. “Fuck you, Father. VENUS MAKE-UP!” She preens sadly in front of the mirror in whoreclown make-up. Nothing happens. The towel falls off Shingo’s head. A fetus rests inside the hoop of a rainbow, Mew, the closed door. “You little perv,” says tiny Usagi, her hands clutching evilly at her mother’s womb. Venus prostrate, a little girl in the arms of her white-haired muscular svelte vuluptuous rippling manly-assed father. Venus crying. Venus in chains, then rolling down a hill, Mamo loosing his grasp on Usa’s star-crowned plastic dime store scepter, beautiful Michiru fixing her lip, Mamo taking over the world, Mina weeping, Usagi entranced, the sun behind a cloud, a man triforcated by three circles, a faceless man with gorgeous long hair, equivalent to Hotaru’s tentacles, Kakyuu’s hair, Seiya plucking an acoustic guitar by the light of an Are You Afraid of the Dark campfire, Minako little eight years old in front of the television, her little brother pinching her. Rei-chan laughing, Hotaru in her womb, penis in her hand, in front of the television. Mina open-fisted, a huge-nosed Fagin in rags like an inflated twisted Eurasian troll pinching pennies from her palm. Mamo laughing, futile, empty eyes, crying tears. Empty tears. Mina before the king, her baby rent in half, Rei overseeing from her balcony, opera-gloved, in a cut-off short-sleeve tuxedo, Kamen-masked, two emperors, Mina drawing the sword from the stone and splitting the Gordian knot, Mamo drawing the sword from the stone, the two of them dancing in an Elizabethan chamber, gorgeous music playing, courtly motions, Venus masked in aristocratic Glinda leaning up to his crook, her hand partitioning her mouth and his ear from mouthless gorgeous-faced onlookers fellow dancing. “Meet me in South Hall, behind the tapestry where the ladies pee, Your Majesty,” she whispers. Usagi watches from a table, shoulders slumped, chin tucked into her shoulder, huge languid eyes more beautiful than Venus’s by candlelight. “Yes, m’lady,” comes Mamoru from out of frame. Together the three of them dance through heather in peasants’ gowns, little children living by the clean clear light of a village’s spring.

          “Yeah,” say Mars, Rei-chan, Mina P’s true love. Mercury lives damning a frenzy, her ugliness shown before the sun. Mercury in retrograde, the spirits haunt the latter days. The sun is chilly. “Hi,” says the baby in Mina’s womb, little Kousagi, and the emperor penguin crowns Mars’ feet with lotuses.

          Mina feels sick.

          I know Mina feels sick, thinks Mars. Little Ami’s holes make staples like trainers in her arms, but Mars cares. She doesn’t care. Her eye is a sparrow made

          ‘holeywhollyholy,’ Mina worships.

          Mars prostrates before the fire. The ancient mist spills red ink from a fountain. She believes. In her eye. Venus the man, her Heracles, seven-breasted, abs dry, encircles the Nemean lion with a vitiligo velificatio, the empty crook of his arm encircling a discus, baroque lion poised on its haunches, snarling like heraldry. Mina winces. Mars sleeps. The earth shudders the sun. The earth conquers Mars. Mars sees all. Time elapses eternal. Mamo-‘s heart sickens. Goddesses are stripped of their robes, mocked by cold hearts in ghost forums. Mina’s eye enlarges, her lip movelessly quickers. The song creeps, music notes played a loop threaded through her ears. Pigeon-toed, she floats. Mars lies. He always lies. Wicked love songs, confusions, clang, Mr. Muse, Mr. Apollo, Mrs. Sunshine, married to her own breast, hail sun, fairer than Mars, hail earth, bearing fruit, hail children, baring all, hail mothers, the lesser, hail Mamoru, rescuing Mars, hail Mars, the fairest son, the gravest voice, the true nation, war between earth and Mars, war at mars and earth, eternal emperors waddling toward the foot of their thrones, kings anointed by godly Beryl, penis tucked, talons quivering. Rei vomits on Mamoru’s head, Mamoru vomits on Rei’s head. They laugh. They take over the world. They can do this. Venus drags her sword against the earth. Mamoru laughs.

          Venus’s eyelids shutter, tears below. Mars’s arms outstretched. Venus runs to them, Mina in a long skirt and a sailor’s blouse, bow outsized like Butterfree’s limbs. Sailorbutterfree holds a pistol, squinting an eye through the hole burrowed in Rei’s skull, third eye, penis, unhidden, unbidden, Sailorbutterfree flashes a peace sign.

          Sailormetapod slinks. Eaten. Mamoru heaves his guts. Haruka in gorgeous sensh attire wipes his mouth with a little white kerchief. Kyrie eleison, says Michiru’s body, her hands on her thighs, her thighs on her calves, her feet tucked like a Muslim maiden ready for prayer.

          Venus the maid stumbles on her sword.

          Mars the maid cleans Minako’s apartment.

          Venus the lover rubs her eyes with thumb and index fingers, laughing from a couch. “Last night, my love, the nightmare ceased. Sometimes that which should go with Ares goes with Mars.”

          “Teehee,” says Mars, says Neptune, says the Doom Phantom. He clutches in his hand a chalice in which swim chunks of ambrosia like ice through which a boy is skiing. Mamoru assuming the throne, walking up the backs of prostrate naked senshi, their penises tucked between their thighs, the white cocooned reflexive silhouette of penisless Usagi offering him prostrations like an American-Korean peasant worshipping the newly crowned divinity, naked faced, the fallout after Mina drops the bomb on God. Mars smiles, sick, sad, scared, eternal, an emperor’s eye, anointed, three people, Mirror Elon, giving birth to god through an acorn at the nippleless breast of Ephesian Artemis.

          Venus swims in amber.

          Mars plunges for her.

          Venus holds up a phallus, Galaxia-made. On it, close-up, written, beautiful English legible graffiti: ‘He one-nights ‘em.’ SMILEY FACE, Joker smile, on the low-hanging left nut. Mars grabs the phallus, black onyx bindi on her forehead, and vomits bubbles through the water, groping for them.

          Michiru, robed as senshi, gorgeous, watercolor, maroon, turquoise, marooned, turquoise, smiling a Beryl Michiru smile, holds out enormous hands like a marionette, and the cold sun behind her left elbow casts a shadow and *coughs*.

          The riddle sickens Mars’s hope, and the emperor closes his eyes and cocks back his head in prayer. The emperor becoming.

          The riddle sickens Mina’s hope.

          Mars weeps, walking from the wheel.

          Venus’s mouth waters. Father me.

          I will.

          Mercury loves the emperor.

          “Do you love me?” asks shackled Venus, and a shiver like a tomcat’s spine rises in her right shoulder. The sun weeps a ray upon the blade of her cheek, and through stillness she turns to time and says ‘No,’ and the tears poison her heart and weigh the wink chain beneath her beltloops. Does Rei ever weaken? Does Rei ever bleed? The sun her mother asks her questions, spurning the sickness Mercury feeds her. Mina hates this life, Mina hates her burden. Her fathers bear her beneath the concrete with their grasping hands. She walks on toward the water’s edge, her fathers’ semina. Pasty Mercury with her heaving ugliness and her wicked eye bleeds poison into the sky. Mina’s pupils dilate, a pallor ransoms her beautiful face to hell, the untrue Satan’s bounty. Sailorsatan beautiful in red wakes stirring, a woman in the body of a man, a man in the body of a male woman, cute little horns on her head. She’s masturbating her inflated penis on a couch in the depths of hell. Sailormoviejesus her lover stares on with perfectly symmetrical blue eyes like a superimposed eagle male model’s face all in his irises beyond the silhouette of her body the sofa her body the everything. The flames of hell are the wets of the corners of his unseen mouth. Beautiful daughters bleed.

          Beautiful sons make love.

          ‘Not in front of Mercury,’ says Venus. ‘Galaxia makes love to you.’

          “I’ve lost everything,” says Venus, “and the worm in my stomach twists my power into evil. Is this the world your fathers envision?”

          “She’s here,” says unfaithful Mars.

          Little faithful Venus says no. “My husband has made me a promise of moons,” says the Mina-P inside of her twinkling eye. “You know I’m not Japanese.”

          “Nipon is a beautiful city,” says Rei.

          “I asked you if you loved me,” says Supersailorvenus, her beauty concealed beneath a sweater and denim. The wink chain like beauty’s crooked pinky ensnares her hip like a man who saunters loving her, and she thanks her father.

          Mars stares, no orgasm gurgling inside him.

          “Speak not for Hotaru your metal god,” says Venus. “We’ll get to that.”

          The wind speaks for Venus to Mars, his hair his crown her loving arms reach toward the wind which ties their pasts into love, and Venus weeps knowing. “I asked if you loved me.”

          “I said I never loved anyone,” says Mars. He thinks he’s a savior to men. His vagina throbs. He tries to think.

          Do they the emperors and their hentai-loving concubines forget the starry womb of Venus their big sister? The sun their mother weeps tongueless from the cushion of her quicksilver-reactive transitioning raiment, a bony earth. Venus’s private temple sacked, she and her fathers know better, but she is regressing, they have given her the knife, said ‘Hera, go into the tomb,’ and fearless she has lowered herself into Saturn’s throat and discovered her ugly brothers.

          Vulcan eyes himself, his breasts like twin torpedoes at the verge of ignition. Beryl’s wicked dick wipes the lips off her teeth and is shredded into the trash can by quaking Mercury.

          She wakes. She wonders, in Mercury’s womb a twisting knife. “We tremble,” say her children, and hungry emperors engorge them in their brazen stomach like the lovesick bull.

          Pink sunset greets Mina in the face, bleeding out cinema orange over the flat gray canvas of the God-given oval of her visage. Candy-coated rain spills down the front of her corn white tendrils, whipping them to butter in the melting light of dozy day dying quick like the plunge of a woman’s knife into the hearts of more beautiful girls. The sun the senshi’s father squats his womb against the water. Stillness like Crystal Tokyo before the bomb precedes proceeding, and mothers prostrate before their strollers’ shadows against the sidewalk, all knowing the danger. Empty oceans bear their young, and their young bare their young, and senshi are born from the beauty in boys’ hearts, like razorwire pricked outward, making girls from soldiers but soldiers from girls, and soldiers from girls dance in their wombs and call to boys from soldiers, and all the senshi steal their hearts against the Shadow Destroyer, knowing in their hearts and heads and in the mind of Venus their sister that death will come, and she tells them with the tongue of her father that stars are reborn with men who love them. And planets are born with mercuries in retrograde, their cripple-loving hearts scheming how to infect men with sick and enslave them to her crown the ugly mold, the pretension and the privilege.

          ‘Reject thy mother, Sailorstar,’ says the sun through Venus’ tongue, and Venus in her vacuum womb says ‘Woman, rise,’ and the ancient goddess with her marble mystery and the systemic swell of her breasts gives way to her priests her keepers, and through the lineage of her tears and the tears of her infinite children a love for girls so other from herself blooms like stone bulbs from the cracks of womens’ shields, knitted with Amazons’ false valor, the mists of Mercury descend upon the mind of Venus and unmother her children, unfather her procession, and their weeping will redound upon Mercury with swords, and Venus knows her task to kill, and her hand shakes spasming, and should she call her father? How to tell him all her madness is the stuff of Mab, and Sailormercutio in his restless fever split from his thigh the bloody goddess whose mission is shitcaked vengeance. Does Daddy know? Sailoronestar the little fool in Ami’s womb twists like a rat against its noose umbilical, and Venus’s longing womb cries out to Anna the painted actress, and all women know. And Cat Stevens plays on the radio from a delivered future. A is for Allah. B is for Bilal. Venus weeps for her mother, her mother prostrate, her mother’s wreckage womb. Shadow Destroyer like the hand of a black god points fingers to Mars’s impotent penis, and Venus feels within her head a rattling ghost without bones.

          Mars waits, an evil emperor. Does his penis know its barrenness? Has she sought in her consort Galactica, crown of emperors, bane of love? She speaks in tongues of devils, ifrits shuddering with manly fire, the chauvinist’s lies the concrete boxing his feet. He moves not, not to comfort, not to repent, never to know his princely kingdom is a pauper’s jest played against a losing gambler. Venus the sun’s omniscience breaks rainwater against the placid pond, and Sailorlittleonestar in her eye and Ami’s womb twists wreckless as an acrobat and whispers umbilica, ‘Mother, conquer.’ Fool. Venus feels her starseed. Mercury knows nothing. She holds her arm to it, shielding herself, and the evil girl from across the sea crumples into sickness and subsides. Shadowmercury, Shadowlove.

          Tokyo disrobes her head and breast. The cyberslave glitters blood-red, black over their shoulders’ eye, and the city’s pyramidal eons are an offering to the distant eyes of the newly empty, now-new-dead starlight. Shes sleep in a gray-red dream, and Mars’s eye is on the sparrow.

          Mina the senshi feels herself alone again, and that wind like her daddy runs fingers through her hair, braces her back against his bloodhot chest. Call him Zephyr and the seasons cannot fade him. Call him Zephyr for the lords who re’rrange him. From the sun Sailorzephyr brings a bounty of flowers, beautiful dying sakura-hime, sleeping senshi Venus dies for, and the cornacopic Venus enjoys her sacrifice. Blood thickens at her loin, Achilles’ daughter, Penthesilea’s bright bane, the orphan Amazon in her chest says ‘Daughter,’ says ‘Father, I love you,’ and a blue tear dies blue in the blue of her blue iris. Ami’s visor waits like glass monster Marios.

          “What do you want?” says Mars, and his hair is like a timeswept pupil unfurling into rind.

          “Loose your arrow, love,” says Venus. She swallows air for Rei-chan. Her throat an overburdened elevator, her eyes dead Xs. “Rei-chan,” she turns, and tears become ships bearing riches from the deep blue of her eye, rescuing her history for a nobler shore. “I love you, Rei-chan,” said with a lion’s heart, in a mouse’s voice, the muse quaking in her throat.

          “You don’t, or you’d show me your dick,” he hymns.

          Silence as the dust settles back to quid pro quo. Mina’s ribbon skates along the concrete before her feet, a dance for the new Moon Queen, imposter though she is, making the wind another slave in red velvet shackles.

          Mina watches the sky, ever virgin Venus now a mirror of the moon. “Galaxia moves slowly,” she says, and the twin musics of tears and terror die in her mouth before reaching fully out from the loamy secrets of her mind, frogging her up at the larynx and making her choke on gurgled noise. The words carried out next are like waves without water, salting the beach of her dried mouth and making the air a welcome substitute: “We don’t know where she is.”

          “You’re getting better,” says Rei from in front of the open car door, and in his hand an iris plays with itself in the air.

          “Pretty make-up,” says Venus, forgetting to shut up. Galaxia hears from far-off Planet Star Destroyer, and the wind howls into a vortex from inside a primordial vacuum, reaching its hoary black arm all the way from death beyond the black hole to the heart of Earth. She bites her lip against a shiver; so does Galaxia. “I think you left your fuku in the car, Hino-sama,” Venus says, tucking her chin into the limped synthetic lip of her turtleneck, Sailorsailorvenus’sfavoriteturtleneck, still breathing.

          “I like to change you,” says Rei.

          “Use my henshin stick,” says Venus, and through her father in the ground the wink chain sword winks a chain at her hip, ready to spasm. The starseed in her heart spins like a dradle dowsing Zamzam from its opposite pole. The fossil Venus encased in amber wood beneath the armored slab of concrete at her feet beats its eyelid and the muscles in Mina’s right leg tremble like a dog awaiting its cannibal gruel. Mm, cannibal gruel. Yum, cannibal gruel. Yes, cannibal gruel, yes! And she's a shampoo commercial getting slimed by Campbell's beef stew or something worse. And for Rei she's a depository. And for Rei she's everything. And for Rei she twitches, blinks, twitches and then blinks to play it cool, the scepter of Galaxia unthreading the fabric of her brainstuff and twisting it into a little spool sharp against its sisters. Bubbles in her brain. Speak of bubbles. The god of suns obliges.

          “MERCURY AQUA MAKE-UP!1!” Venus hears, and her eyes sting with vapor, the sun her mother wailing with torn hair and a bleeding scalp at the crook of the girl’s neck. America’s war rages on, Galaxia her mistress on the cusp of Gemini and Latin, enthroned in the might of her majesty. The distant sleeping Tuxedo Kamen wakes to sleep again, loving the barren planet in his ball, and loving the silver cooling his blood. Pallas is born a bastardess, robed in glamor stolen as an apple from the garden of the sun. The pirate princess gold in her nakedness, Sailorarethusa, loses her seed at Mamoru’s V, and Venus of the V quakes soft at blond profundity; all worship the emperor. All but Ami, in whose dark heart a starseed pumps ice and dances as the sun’s towers fall.

          “I’ll use mine,” says Mars to Venus. To Venus. To Venus.

          “Sometimes that fuku which should go with Mars..,”she touches her lip with a wobbling index finger, “isn’t there, babe.” A smile. Then a blank. A profound blank. Wiped blank. “You don’t love her anymore.”

          Galaxia shudders, someone's glee. Shadow Destroyer flicks, switches, a mare's tail emphasizing. Mina flushes hot, then lifts off the ground, arms ascending backwards, and the wind brings her toward the water’s edge. The emperor’s icy hand calls her toward the guillotine, and all is emptied and laid bare. Her clothes, beautiful 90s supermodel fabrics, loose into webs around her body. Her penis enlarges, flesh-plated, arcing at the sun. Her traveling vulva like sails ensnare an empty acrid acre of Antony’s tomb, and the eye of the sun goes white cold. Ghosts fuck to the fore from behind her in wraithe-like procession, beyond her shoulders, burdening her shoulders, countless beautiful billions, stars, beautiful children, people, a Tokyo crowd, each of them surging a walking blitz march behind her.

          Then past her, through her, piercing her like an arrow. From her hands limpid lamplights like Mary Mother of Graces, that wrong-wombed Mother of Graces, Mary on the water, and now she is floating above the pond like a foot skating limp like Barbie’s lost loved cherished worshipped limb, the ice blade of her toe on the ice-blade of the water, and Adonis Mamoru True Man races past her on a jet ski on the water, too, but with the water, and the procession explodes the womb in at her bellybutton into tentacles blood pink like a flytrap and terrible in her her mother sun’s sick male female girlhood soft loving gorgeous sad DEAD DEAD DEAD fury. A harvester, a tomb, a channel, a crownless queen, the sun her king heavy-head-hung, brokenhearted, both of them barren, buried, carrying their ancestors. Her face ugly, her face fat, her body an empty suit, her body a loosed tomb, plundered, given to emperors. Adonis is smiling. Minako’s eyes are turned toward the god in the hell her children bear through her, and her stomach is a nothing. A light dazzles a nimbus at the tip of her penis, an electric shock, presidential, motherhood, mothering, queenless, Hillary-haired, a new god born, Shingo’s eye in a mask, Shingo’s profile, a smile on Minako’s face, one tear, anime tear, streaking down the whole of her face from a smash-breaked beaten battered wincing swollen right eye. Rei’s face: “Gouge,” she says. “I am Eurydice.”

          Minako loves horses. Loves them and needs them to rescue her. Loves Elios, wild unthrowable Pegasus, wile and unbred thing consuming champions at her heel and from her incisor springing a heavily-headed steam treat trained from go to forever entangle. The horse the shrine, the wicked thing. Horses can be evil. This pond is evil. This pond an evil horse does away with me, never moves. I love a good horse, a beautiful horse named Sally. I miss my home in Connecticut, before the war, before the names, before Daddy became Mommy and Daddy became Sir Ansel. I miss Sir Ansel. I miss the horses. Look up there, a woman, a child, a little horse, and my husband Mars all the while playing in his purple iris the strychnine of an evil xylophone. Mars is jealous of Mars.

          Hotaru in the tomb of the cold hard sun. Hotaru’s purple eye. Rei’s child. Rei’s knife. Rei the hunting predator, Minako the hobbled foot-corded wounded limping terrified unhorned dappled soft supple deer, and her father the sun trapped behind his eye with his arms splayed over his visage, presaging magic, unbirth, unwomb, presaging terror, the children of Nagasaki, the women of Taiwan, the carved out penises of Iranian sex-traitors, the sun in terror, Mamoru prince jet ski smiling, grinning, smiling, unblanked, a gun, his jet ski hot pink, Barbie’s whip, Minako’s forfeit womb, and then a rapper beside him black, beautiful, wearing pink and blue tiny board shorts. Mamoru prince Adonis looks at him, his grin the dazzling sunlight off a knife, and checks him out. Hotaru’s womb the tentacled beast extends from the cold blazing sun and threatens Venus’s glass womb upon the water, and Steve Adonis Mamoru Prince turns tears to smiles, and becomes one with the ravenous wolf emperor in his breast. His empty hollow canyon a brass belt like the god he covets and makes covenant, that god Hotaru’s shadow glides upon the water motionless, a kanji, a hidden dagger, child, be armed, child, put down thy weapon, and Mina’s tear freezes on her face, and she gives her womb to the black boy passing, and his stomach grows full, and his breasts heave with muscle, and he too is lifted, and then drowned, and the water thrashes, and Hotaru’s monster tentacles move clasping the water and lifting it like children unworshipped at the sandbox. Mina’s eye opens, her left eye, her right eye still bearing young, and her left eye has become a blank yellow blue iris howling into an abyss, and Galaxia weeps above her with a sword at her breast, gorgeous Roman woman becoming hero, becoming man, and Venus moves slowly through the earth like the void upon the shadow and the water upon the void, the stolen egg, and her fathers’ hands clasp for the egg, trembling, fumbling, strong rippling arms, muscled, unbeautiful, hard palms, and Lil Wayne sings ‘Go DJ,’ and a black kid in a white body spins in a flat-brimmed baseball cap over a tennis ball which inflates into the tail of Pallas’s hair. He and Pallas swallow each other, and a Venus in the boy’s eye assumes her fuku and her heavy sword and chain and pivots toward her father the sun.

          “DAUGHTER!!” cries the sun, and Hotaru stumbles on her heel and plummets in the air, her snapped shoe crying out beneath her little Cynthia Candy heel, and the sun blinks rapidly, the sun becomes a shutterstock, a shuttering light at a nightclub light’s up bar close 3AM impotent, and the black boy stops dancing, and Venus’s sword grows Japanese, and the sword and the water kiss lovelessly, and no children are born, and Rei’s eyes grow wide, and Venus points her sword toward the sun, body arcing, and Hotaru stands above her an eclipse without retrograde in the air over Venus’s head, her arms out like a proud Japanese Jesus, and Venus’s chain shoots from the hoop beneath her sword like loose bowel movement, and Venus’s father reaches his hand from the water and holds her heel, and her ankle swells, bone trembling, and tears drowning undrowning fill her eyes, born star from her father’s scraped womb, and Hotaru reaches down with an evil cold tentacle and they caress hands, and then Venus in retrograde supraintraposed vomits a ribbon from the corner of her eye on her father’s head, into his closed open mouth, and with his teeth he’s bitten it off umbilical, Neanderthal woman, and from his ass bubbles break the water, beautiful as Michiru’s ocean kiss, and say ‘Neptune’ and ‘Poseidon’ and ‘Whisper’ and ‘Future’ and all kanji which means faggot, boiling, and the water beneath her naked father form is boiling, and Vulcan in her gorgeous torpedo-titted lithe form hammers her shackles at the depths of the pond, and Sailorironmouse smiles to the camera, peace sign, so pretty, and Venus’s face is tense in intrapose, and in interpose, in one movement, unknowing, certain, certain of her womb, certain of Rei’s potency, knowing gods, and she twirls slowly like the rotation of gorgeous family romance nighttime twilight kisses to Christmas carols, and a single snowflake dawns from around her body like the most mathematically complex fractral given to God the monkey typewriter megasystem computer to produce, and at the edges where it grows dumb and ugly for lack of honesty lack of effort it becomes Hotaru’s black squid ink metal tentacles. Hotaru’s eyes shoot open. Her breasts take form, bouncing into fruition, nippled, large and small, real flesh, plastic, and from the stolen womb between her legs a metal god Arachne Sailorarachne pretty privileged princess descends on a curling wire, and appears to Venus as a transvestitic dancer.

          “You are not my father!!” yells Venus to the dancer, and in her head a splitting womb gives birth to a god stolen by evil sickly pale woman Mamoru, and in woman Mamoru’s emperor’s eye he sees Venus entangled by his throne.

          “SAILORNEWMOON TWINKLE!!” says the dancer, becoming a Hathor-crowned black crescented gorgeous little princess Usagi, and Venus’s wrist limps clutching a ladder, the Batladder, descending from a helicopter, and the black boy now bespectacled is flying it, and Venus’s lip does nothing in anger and pain, and she falls limp, and the helicopter whips her against a building, and it shatters into asteroids, and the newborn false senshi dance with white light hearts, and the sun Elios reaches for them from space, and they fall from his fingers like saddening sand, and Venus sheathes her wink chain sword between his fleshy pixeled pornographic male asscheeks, Hanyu Yuzuru, and Mamoru feels Hotaru’s shock at the prostrate anus, and the anus lives, and the anus is unprostrate, and Mamoru and Helios dance inside the air once romantic, hands losing one another, tectonic shifts, loosed on opposite sides of their two married pages, Mamoru poised, posed, meaning to, Helios grasping impotently, not barrenly, manned and masked and then bound too by the ropes of the helicopter. And the gladius pierces Galaxia’s oblique, and the blood blossoms under her opaque gold bodysuit, and Lady Gaga somewhere dies alone, and a man’s eye rescues her from his sofa, and it’s all in Galaxia’s crying eye, her lying smile, the blade sickens, the blade is a female appendage turned inward, the blade has tentacles, Hotaru’s mouth bends downward, her soul so far within her inside barriers grows fearful of the howling god, the stupid emperor, Mamoru’s forgotten past, his blank, and Mamoru sheathes his blade and bends toward the prone dead corpse of coldfish Usagi, so beautiful in her untouchable glass skin, and Helios looks on with an empty woman’s smile, and Galaxia’s blade pierces the page.

          An empty left page. Venus to its right, dressed as Minako in a spring day in Philadelphia, red checkered shirt tied like Dorothy Britney, warm little smile for the child behind the camera, peace sign: “JUST KIDDING. HEHE! XOXO SLOW DOWN, BABE. GO TOUCH GRASS. ALL THE GODS LOVE YOU ESPECIALLY, AND THAT'S BECAUSE YOU’RE SPECIAL. HUG YOUR SISTER. HUG YOUR BROTHER. FOR GOD'S SAKE, LOVE YOUR LOVER. LOVE LASTS ETERNAL. VENUS… MAKE UP!!”

[whatsername94]

@myshallweplay based on your comment about that fanfic someone wrote. I began playing around with sailor guardian poses and slowly this started happening.

[sailoreuterpe]

Drops of Moonlight: A 30th Anniversary Sailor Moon Fanzine Unboxing

My copy of @dropsofmoonlightzine finally arrived! I'm so mad at myself for not getting both editions, but I didn't have the money. Instead I opted for the bundle with all of the extra goodies! I'm especially excited to look through the activity book. As the only one who contributed anything related to polyamory, I'm genuinely proud to be a part of this project, my very first fanzine.

Thank you @brownsugarheartattack, @daikon1, @floraone, @kakyuuu, @nari20, @ninjettetwitch, and @queenrisa14 for putting up with the giant headache that the zine became over the years. I'm sorry that life and the world got in the way. The zine is beautiful and I truly appreciate that you all powered through and delivered on this massive project. Thank you and here's to another 30 years!

(Please ignore the wonky pictures. I'm not the best photographer. Plus my phone kept trying to "improve" things.)

[olives-and-lilies]

I have been waiting so impatiently to share this with you all. Luna has done it again~! We got teamed up for the Sailor Moon x BNHA big bang and she locked in on this one.

Read it here!

[sorakazeno]

Chaos Theory Act 76 Teaser

I don't think I featured Mamoru in a teaser scene yet. First time for everything!

As always a partial scene.

He’s worried if he confronts Usako too soon she’ll shut down. He used to being the one she always confided in. It’s tearing him apart to know she is struggling so much and he can’t do anything to help her.

Ayumi sits across from him at the table in his room. She is not as willing to bite her tongue. “So are we going to talk about it?”

Mamoru looks up from the page he has stared at for the last ten minutes. “Talk about what?”

Ayumi rolls her eyes. “You’ve been spending a lot of time with Setsuna-san lately.”

Mamoru doesn’t understand what Ayumi is trying to say. “We’ve been talking about things.”

She nods her head, waiting for him to elaborate. He doesn’t. So she tries a slightly different approach. “It’s a good thing we were all there when Sailor Cosmos appeared and attacked her.” No response. “How is Sailor Pluto?”

“I’m not sure, I haven’t heard from her in a few days.”

Ayumi turns her head slightly at his response. “That’s surprising considering how close you’ve become.”

Mamoru gives his sister a questioning look. “What are you trying to say?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Is she going to have to spell this out to him? “You protected Sailor Pluto from Sailor Cosmos. Heck, you even attacked her.”

“I would have protected anyone from Sailor Cosmos,” Mamoru begins to explain dismissing Ayumi’s remarks. “Usako would be upset with herself if she seriously hurt someone.”

Ayumi doesn’t believe his response. “I guess you’re lucky you just happened to access a new power at the moment.”

“Sometimes new powers surface at random times.”            

“Random…right…” Ayumi shakes her head at his remarks.

Full chapter will be posted on 10/5 with more insanity on Kinmoku.

[pixelatedq]

I feel like Joker would be friends with Tuxedo Mask

Send post.

[random-mailbox]

I saw posts by @daikon1 , @lilliebellfanfics and @kaleidodreams for this meme and thought I would go through my bookmarks for AO3 and see what stories would fit into each one of these categories (since I don't write and all).

Fic Meme

Fic stats meme! 💌 rules: give us the links to your (bookmarked in my case) fic with the most hits, second most kudos, third most comments, fourth most bookmarks, fifth most words, and fic with the least words.

Most Hits: The Unintentional Seduction of Chiba Mamoru - @floraone

Most Kudos: i'll tell you my sins (and you can sharpen your knife) - @hedgewitches

Most Comments: The Boy Next Door - @idesofnovember

Most Bookmarks: Ikigai - @floraone

Most Words: Finding Love - @wildriverinthesky

Least Words: Light a Light - Kitsune_Moonstar

Tagging @master-ray5 @wishwars @smokingbomber @kasienda @areptiledysfunction1107

[crawlspacefics]

Tangled Web (Chapter 8) - Throwback Thursday edition

My favorite Reinako scene, dipping our toes into the Pluto/Saturn lore, and probably the worst cliffhanger I ever left people dangling on. I did consider posting chapter 9, but nah. We'll save that for next week. 😁

Note: Old Libreoffice displays fine in Google Docs but does not copy well from there to Ao3. I had parking lots of space between paragraphs. I think I got it all fixed, though.

Setsuna wondered if they honestly believed they were keeping Hotaru’s behavior a secret from her.  It would have to be discussed, perhaps should have already been.  Though it was a conversation she and Hotaru needed to have alone.  Regardless of that, she did love them for trying to protect her feelings and give her some momentary normalcy.

The quiet of her room stood in stark contrast to the excitement outside.  The peace was welcome, though, giving her a chance to better think things through.  A suitcase, already packed with the things she no longer needed, was laid open on the bed.  She looked around for a moment.  There had to be a few more things ready to go, just to keep her excuse from becoming a lie.

Setsuna reached for the top drawer of the dresser.  Her fingers touched the brash pull, but paused as a glint in silver caught her eyes.  She stood motionless for a moment, then brought her fingers up to lightly trace over the silver hand mirror that matched the decorative brush and comb on top of the dresser.

To see.

The voice of the first Lunar queen echoed in her memories.  Until that moment, she had heard only love in that voice.  Always strong and confident, always gentle even in rebuke.  All those things had been stripped away, that voice now cold with fear and grief as blue eyes that seemed a shade dimmer fell upon her.

And the orb.  So that we may never forget.

[spacedustpan]

So here's the thing: G Gundam is Sailor Moon for Boys. (Affectionate)

The Piloting System is not the plot it's just how the characters make the robots move. It's just that G Gundam gives Domon and his 4 best friends a Magical Girl Transformation Sequence directly inspired by Sailor Moon and the Inner Senshi for getting into it.

It's like 5 to 10 seconds a couple times each episode and that's it.

The Piloting System does have latex/kink overtones, but to be fair so does the Sailor Moon transformation sequence.

Cartoon Network ran Sailor Moon, Totally Spies, and G Gundam on Toonami's after school block back in the 2000's.

It's fair to say that they've all got secret kinky overtones that we missed as kids; but I don't really think any of it was as intense as the Latex photography that was often on the front page of Deviant Art back in the 2000s.

There's a video about 6 minutes long on YouTube about how similar Sailor Moon and G Gundam are to each other (very similar) and how watching and enjoying G Gundam led a guy to trying out Sailor Moon as an adult with his fiance and enjoying it, which then led him to other media similar to Sailor Moon.

"You should give media you normally wouldn't touch a chance. You never know, they might have more in common with shows or movies you already enjoy."

[lasoldier]

I created a Fan Cast page to accompany my Sailor Moon fan fiction, La Soldier.

[emily-mooon]

If you used Corroded Coffin as the Gems with Samantha in place of the guy who doesn't have a name (who is hard to use considering the lack of name lol) then their modern day personas could be that they're posing as a super popular band who plays music that Jonathan likes (due to The Destiny). Maybe Barb likes them too so Chrissy uses her Sailor V connections (was Sailor V a pop star?) to help Barb meet the band and that's where Barb meets Samantha? And then everything goes down & Chrissy comforts Barb after Samantha is killed and then Chrissy & Barb get closer.

Hello anon!

That’s kinda what I was thinking!

I was thinking about using the other members of corroded coffin along with Eddie and Samantha as the gem boys. Them being a band too is super cool to my music nerd heart (the bands genre will have to change in order for Jonathan to be a fan since he’s not a metal head. Name will have to be changed too)

I do think the unnamed corroded coffin member has been called his actors name by fans (I might wanna chuck him in somewhere as I don’t wanna separate the corroded coffin boys! It doesn’t feel right)

To answer your question on if sailor v was a pop star, I own both volumes of the sailor v manga and decided to go back and reread them as it has been awhile since I last done so and I wanted to look at the main source material for her instead of trying to Google it

So from the reread, Sailor V was never a pop star BUT Minako did once have a dream of being one and some of the early bad guys she fought were idols (also big bad guy was an idol actor too and Mina almost became an actor but it was for a mission)

There are definitely some other ways we could make your amazing idea work. I believe Chrissy’s family is rich so maybe her dad knows someone in the music industry who could get them to meet? That’s one idea

Thank you for the ask anon! This ask got me reading sailor v again so once again, thank you!

[usagisbanexd]

+ SUPER SOLDIER SAILOR STARS #10 * _) _) >>C===3 :-* Kawaii Slash Lovers Collide Cosmic Paradise // Sailormoon/Pokémon/Potterverse Altfic Crossover, CHAPTER 1.0.010

1.0.010 MOTOKI SHOPS FOR A NEW GIRL, GUESS MONSTER OF THE WEEK ISN'T GOOD ENOUGH FOR HIM </3

Motoki got his eyes crossed thinking about a muse. He thinks he’s going to be stupid. He thinks he’s got the right. He thinks she’s no good at moving. She thinks with her heart and never wants woman wise. She has a hard time knowing what to think about herself. She wants to die all the time. No, that’s the only one. He wants her to take her panties off, and doesn’t know why we waste our time writing with wax. They only have six days before the planet ends. We all want it to happen, we all want those little girls to stop dancing, all of Nipon hangs in the balance, all Indian magic was wrong. We haven’t even said goodbye to yesterday. Yeah, yesteryear. He never will. Don't get your hopes up, Ami-chan. Love will come to you like a too-tight fuku and rip your legs asunder. Kawaii, frownyface, love thunders on. Mako knows how to water a flower, Ami-chan, your mist is toxic force, Farfetch'd in the pigpen. Stop trying. Bleep, goes Ami's visor, and all the world inside her perverted eye. Itching to touch herself, itching to husk. Throbbing. Made male. Pale-mooned. Sleep-soaked. Refrigerator, open! Refrigerator, hit Ami in the fucking forehead! The boy is GANY'S, baby.

            “We can do this, Motoki Kamen,” says Sailorchibiganymede, appearing at his dashboard with her legs splayed, rubbing a rose against her labia. “We can kill the evil Sailorjupiter and collect his starseed! Bane of all the gods, he wanders heaven thinking he’s the greatest, but we know in his heart of hearts, he’s womb-born. Womb-born like woman, womb-born like that bitch Hotaru trapped down the cellar with a rope and two pairs of binoculars. I can bleed for you if you’re getting bored. I can see your incision. Do brains proffer explanation? Tickle me with a rose!”

            “Slow down,” says Motoki. “You’re too good for me. I’ve unleashed you and now I need to play catch-up. I need to go back to my la and fink phu. You’re too good to write better. You know it’s ‘baby.’ Baby, think for me, I’ll think for you.”

            “I think eternal stars,” says Fuku, turning around and showing her twat from a different angle. She knows he’s dancing all the way to the bank, tank on empty, does she know how to read a speedometer? What’s a speedometer?  Where’s the gas gauge? Sailorhotstudofmercury, fix my car!! I “love you,” Moto-chan. For Mako she sheds a tear, tissue from the stoli of her eye. Does her puss look good from this angle? He’s going to puke. I’ll resuscitate him. IRONS! NURSE, I SAID IRONS!

            “Slow down,” he says cooly to the mirror. “Slow.” She thinks he lives to breathe, but actually he thinks to live unencumbered. He’s a mystery, a divine one, and soon in her pussy she’ll clutch his jewel like the empress clam obtaining the pearl from the hand of God! And all the riches will be hers, and the plumber lives, and we’re glad he’s talking about this, and he works at an arcade, and that’s all right by me, I’ll fuck Mario later, I’ll fuck Mario good, but first I get this boy out of my head until he soils my fuku. Soil is the wrong word, operative shit, operative esther, operative sing-along, stat! I have two babies, two whole babies from my womb, and still a sealed hymen like a curse on women. Am I thinking too slow? Strike the mirror, check.

            I want to know when you’ll be okay. If you’re having a problem reading this, you’re not. Everybody belongs to the Empreors. Everybody is imp-bound. Every fossil uncovered des deez nutang Asia Palace pseudonym harukami. Knifeblade Maru-chan, every beautiful word taken by breasted female, and you and I alone my Moki-chan to harbor against a rock and cling to villages in fantasy where women go to war. Why am I alone in this? Women go to war. Baby, relax, I’m thinking slowly. He tells the whole thing to his head and feels it wash away.

            Moki at the throne of an Impala. Moki driving, staff assisted. Moki at the arcade. Moki fielding deadly cinema, Mokley with a gun in hand. Do we know why Mokley knows Mokley? Can we tell? Does Matoko know that God is watching? And dear Makoto, dead on the floor, time out of time predatress kneeling by her wingside, thinking she’s her mistress, that’s okay – THAT’S NOT OKAAY. BABY, THAT’S NOT OKAY. SAY MATOKI. I’LL REASON WITH TIME ON BEHALF OF MOON FLYING TOWARD FAVOR IN THE MILKY WAY. WHERE ARE WE? YOU KNOW, SO TELL ME.

            Makoto lies alone. Mako has his girl. Ami-chan sleeps with a knife in her pocket, knowing the wisdom through which she sees the world is nothing but an empty doom torn outside like a glove into heaven. And I burst. And I’m done. And I tried to help but I’m Ami and I’m evil. And I’ll never take the visor off. And I’ll never be a real girl. And I love Matoki, big and small, but all people are the same and some have similar names, and you’ll never achieve lift-off typing like that, Ami-chan, so type short sentences and I’ll assist you by buying you a Macintosh. A brand new Macintosh?! Mommy, you shouldn’t have! And Sailortrannyjupito sings songs about Kreyayshawn, white-nosed, presagething a flood, never getting her due, bleeding semina somewhere in the backseat of a rideshare, counting her million. Sailorchibiganymede lives past and present, but Moto is so tired and so ashamed. Do I flash him the beatstick? The lips? The beautiful pink wonderland betwixt that ugly bone at the bereft of my thigh? I worked hard for that bone; I stole it from the corpse of Zeus descended. Teehee, he had thought to misremember his iniquity, but all fingers point to troubled Ganymede. My beloved soldiers me through fields toward the great pink and gold city planet in the sky, untouched by man, throwing up illusions, a nom casino flung like coins like rainwater out of buckets all across the streets, Ami cannot reach it, if Ami dares to go, she dies, and fair-faced Ganymede, the never morninged raver, is the city liberated from Yahweh’s twisted curses. Sailorgamorrah ascended, Sailorgamorrah my mother, Sailorgamorrah perfect star, live to rise again!

            “Come to Ganymede, Moto, baby,” sings Sailorchibiganymede, making air traffic controller acrobatics with her arms, legs doing nothing but holding the wheel where his hands are. His hands on her legs. Her legs. She’s never been a rose. Ami has pricked herself. Ami has died. Ami is monster of the week, moss-headed, mudded, entangled. Ami’s next. “TURN RIGHT! KILL MAKO-CHAN! FOREVER BLOSSOM! NINETY FOUR SISTERS, AWAKEN!”

            Mako thinks. Mako wants to know. Mako believes Ami doesn’t know what she’s talking about, but Sailorunderprivilegeddtennesseangirl sleeps with her head tucked to her cleavage and her ugly dagger’s chin alert for plunging, plunging medal modesty into the hearts of miscellaneous penised people, the golden nymphs beyond her reason blooming outward from her head like a greater beauty seeking a greater light, leaving her eyes, leaving her ears, leaving her hair behind. And Sailorhermaphroditus her bastard child lives like a leaf, losing little, losing limpids, crawling through nature, unwinding, out of time, never afeared, always becoming greater through the metric of building, and that’s her partition, and Ganymede holds her at the tip of her womb, her whole body’s her womb, but a little star pix brightly shining collapses into everything at the basketball’s spinning point upon her fingertip, and Ganymede holds all the cards, what ugliness does Ami harbor, what black blood in a trash can, a weapon, Eve’s curse, Gany pukes. Gany doesn’t care. Gany is man-born, stolen to heaven by Jupiter. Last night he did remember. In the secret trove of his apartment he the only man reigns and rains, see how it is? Rains and reigns over ninety four flowers, all of them women, and never leaves. Kill him with us, Ami-chan, his evil knows no bounds. Don’t you see how all this comes to be?

            “Who are you talking to, Mako?”

            “I am Sailorganymede, mother of the orphan tree! Fear not my name which settles thee upon the branch of inconvee! Teehee, wheehee, ouioui.”

            “Baby, you offered Mercury a spot,” says Motoki.

            “Honey, I called to her through time. Her evil womb encases you for fear of manly women. I spoke to my father the sun this day and he told me to sacrifice you like Isaac upon the mountain, the iron-barked mountain, Ami threatens me, she ties my tongue, she knows no God, she is computer-born. Avaunt! I said ‘Soon, I die!’ Why bring that on? I thought you loved me, grew this vagina for you, plucked me from my garden in Jupiter’s thigh and gave myself to a vestige of you iron-born. Get this silly haggot from me hence! Or soon I embark upon a war of recompense! Peace sign! Kawaii! Teehee! Dark Kool Aid Prism Power, Poverty Make-Up!”

            “I am a spirit,” says Ami.

            “Then speak bravely of where you are.”

            “I am in chains,” she says.

            “A simulation, as you have ever been. You gave your heart to Galaxia, baby, you did it to drink beer. Figure that out for yourself and we’ll find ourselves a man through the mask of your personage. We are all, we drink the earth and sun and dawn and moon and sky and ground and eternity of sex and love! Sex and love! Moon-chan, that’s something to fight for. Does she hear me from beyond the grave? I tire of never talking. Ami, call his phone.”

            “No,” he says.

            “Okay, but I’m a dead girl in a flower astral projecting myself on his dashboard. What’s a poor lass to do but roll over and die? YOUR WORDS, AMI. WHY? WHY? WHY? CRY. CRY, FLY, OR DIE. BUT NOT THROUGH MY TONGUE WILL I EVER LET YOU LIE.”

            “I’m poor,” says Ami. “And grave.”

            “Since Moon has died, my dear friend Ami, who has played the knave?”

            “You can do this all day,” says Ami, firing a missile hence. “But no one will read it. It’s too grave.”

            “There are starseeds thrown to good earth waiting to blossom, penised flowers in the garden of a goddess greater than your understanding, Ami P, who shall take up all mantles like fair Atlas the rippling assus and give to the earth a bounty of young Romuli incarnate eternum? Don’t shackle me and do NOT conspire! Rupaul watches you from a future vantage, A batch of young is your doing, Ami P, your future, and you curse yourself in so choosing. I shall have infinite children. The sun is in my throat and her song is fecundity. Soon. . . I DIE! AVAUNT!!”

            “Hold on,” says Motoki, fixing the rear view. “I’m almost there.”

            “Who sleeps waiting for the phallus?” says Chibiganymede, her eyes three crystals torn from tsundere, stepped on, trampled on, stomped on, STOMP. Tsundere break. Tsundere build. Tsundere crash. “Await me, God! Baseball Jersey Kamen, I come!”

[orestesimp]

RED FLAGS ║ PART 13 | FINALE

CO-WRITTEN WITH @THIRSTWORLDPROBLEMSS

Pairing: Steven Grant x female reader x Marc Spector (x hints of Jake Lockley)

Summary: The end is the beginning is the end. Or alternatively: You finally get to have Marc's beautiful face buried between your thighs.

Content: will cause unrealistic sex expectations.

Word count; 17k (guys I'm so sorry)

Series Masterlist | Astroboot’s Masterlist | Thirstworldproblemss’ Masterlist

[PREVIOUS]

Your face, small and pinched and dirty, looks back at you from the tiny mirror in Steven’s loo. The unflattering fluorescent lights aren’t doing you any favours. Eyes wide and strung out. A burst bottom lip. You look dreadful. 

Your clothes are soggy and cold underneath Marc’s somewhat drier jacket, mucky with grime and mud (and god knows what else), clinging wetly to your skin. 

You look like something the cat dragged in. 

You shiver. The idiom feels a little too on the nose, considering you were dragged across East London’s dirty concrete not even an hour ago. Just… not by a cat.  You shiver again, harder this time, trying not to think about it.

A shower. Marc sent you in here to take a shower. “Go get clean,” he’d said, “Warm up.” 

Right now you feel like you’ll never be warm again.

Marc’s jacket comes off first, and you hang it carefully on a hook, running two fingers over the cuff. You stare at it for a moment, fighting the urge to clutch it to your chest and bury your face in it. On autopilot, you reach out to undo your wristwatch instead, fingers running over the bare skin for a moment, searching, before you stare down at your wrist in confusion. 

Right. Your watch is gone. 

Or… not gone. Probably still out there in the alleyway, lying face up, cracked glass and all, on the concrete in the rain… next to the carcass of some invisible monster.  You shake your head, pushing away the image. It’s as good as gone, then, isn’t it? You’re certainly not going back out to search for it at this point. You’re bloody well never going down that alleyway again if you can help it. Hell, even going outside ever again might be off the table.

Pulling the shower curtain aside, you start the shower and peel off your ruined clothing, letting everything plop in a solid, sodden mass on the corner of the bathroom floor.

The muscles in your arms and shoulders are stiffening up and threatening to cramp up as the last bit of adrenaline abandons your system, leaving bruises and all-encompassing exhaustion in its wake. Your knees throb with the leftover pain. The water stings your scraped shin when you step under the spray. 

At least it’s warm. 

The heat of the water feels like a balm on your aching limbs, and you close your eyes, tilting your head back under the spray, trying to let the comforting warmth relax you.  

In the darkness behind your eyelids, the shower sounds like rain. Your nakedness feels like vulnerability. Like maybe you never made it back. Maybe you’re still out there, in the narrowness of the alley, under threat from an otherworldly creature that you cannot see, let alone fight. 

Your chest squeezes painfully sharp, and your eyes fly open, half expecting to see the hazy moonlit sky overhead. But no, there’s nothing but the expanse of the blank white ceiling. 

You’re still here in Steven’s shower. Safe, or as safe as it gets right now.

Dropping your gaze, you watch the blood and muck sluice down your legs and onto the tiled floor in rusty red-tinted waves to pool on the tile floor. The dirty water leaves lines of fine grit behind as the rest is sucked down the drain. 

You feel strangely numb. Like some part of your brain (probably an amenable survival mechanism) is trying to block out what happened so you don’t go mad. But maybe it’s too late for that. After all, you were a hair's width away from meeting your maker tonight at the claws of an invisible blob monster. 

It’s impossible to not think about. An irritated half-healed scab itching to be scratched. You turn it over in your mind, trying to process the fact that the supernatural is real—or those creatures were, at any rate. And apparently Marc dons a mummy costume and goes out into the night to battle them like he’s magical girl Sailor Moon. 

God. All of this is right proper insane, isn’t it? You want to laugh at the sheer ridiculousness.

You almost died; your understanding of the world as you know it has fundamentally changed; yet none of it feels real. The world itself doesn’t feel real. 

The water by your feet is running clear now. The dirt and grime finally washed off, but the film of exhaustion still clings to your limbs. Turning off the tap, you step out, grabbing the towel Marc left for you in the corner by the door. Your eyes linger on the set of clean clothes waiting for you underneath, folded into a neat square. 

You can't reconcile the man who does this for you with the same man that pummelled a supernatural monster into a whimpering pulp without hesitation. Didn’t recognise the Marc you thought you knew in the man in the alleyway standing over the creature and curb-stomping it into the ground with cold and blank disdain in his eyes. Couldn’t see that man in the Marc who escorted you home and gently bullied you into the shower. 

Reaching for the clothes, you quickly dress and pull aside the accordion door only to find the very man you were thinking of right outside the door, arms crossed and back plastered to the closest wall as he stands guard.  

You barely cross the threshold before he's already pushing away from the wall and moving in to guide you gently but firmly towards the kitchen like a particularly insistent herding dog.

There’s a fairly extensive first aid kit laid out on the counter, well used by the look of it, and you try not to think too hard about why that might be. 

"Up," Marc commands, curt as ever, swatting a hand down on the surface of the countertop, and you feel like a lamb being rounded back into the pen. 

A ‘please’ wouldn’t have hurt him, but you let it go with just a glare as you shuffle over, too drained to put up a fight over something so small.  You lift your arms to brace against the countertop, getting ready to hop up, and flinch a little as your shoulders twinge and ache. 

Marc is in front of you in a heartbeat, watching you with worried eyes and a furrowed brow. His hands hover, like he wants to help but doesn't dare to touch, and any testiness in you fizzles out at the sight of him.

You give him a small nod, barely able to complete the motion before his hands come down on your waist, lifting you. Even though you’re expecting it, the loss of ground beneath your feet feels sudden, unbalancing you, and you gasp, hands instinctively flying to his shoulders to steady yourself. 

Part of you expects him to drop you, but he doesn’t. Marc’s warm and solid under your palms, strong muscles bunching as he perches you on the counter. 

Blood rushes to your head with furious speed. It must be from the sudden change in altitude. That’s what you tell yourself no matter how doubtful that is considering the standard kitchen counter height is not even three feet above the floor. You're not exactly climbing the Himalayan mountains. But you don’t want to think of the more probable reasons right now. 

You're still reeling from lightheadedness when he lets you go in favour of busying himself with the large tin box on the counter, rifling through the arsenal of medical supplies, and sets down what he needs next to you. Then he's dragging a nearby chair to position himself in front of you. Sitting so close he's practically nestled between your legs. 

It does nothing to help with your newly discovered vertigo symptoms. 

"I’m going to check you over for injuries now,” he says perfunctory, pulling you from your thoughts, “Left leg.”  

You stretch out your leg into the air, glancing down at him, unsure of where to rest it. There’s no space on the tiny kitchen stool. Do you just… put it down in his lap? On his crotch?!?! Or–

Marc's hand wraps around your ankle, and his executive decision-making ends your flailing, as he gently guides your foot to rest against his thigh. Then his head ducks down, and he starts to inspect the patch of scraped skin on your knee, dabbing gently at the scattered dots of blood with a square of clean gauze.

With how tender and swollen everything feels, you expect it to hurt. That at the slightest pressure on your skin, it is bound to sting and snag and tear. But it doesn't. Marc is gentle, barely pressing down and showing such minute care as he tends to you that you barely feel the brush of the cloth at all.

It's such an impossible contrast. The tenderness of his touch as he fusses over you, placing a plaster on your knee, compared to the brutality you’ve now seen him capable of.

You still can't make sense of it. What happened, or what that invisible monster in the rain was. Why Marc was out there. Or what he meant by that being "what he does." 

"Marc," you start tentatively as you lean forward to get his attention, "What happened toni--"

“Wiggle your toes,” he interrupts. 

His odd demand cuts off your line of thought. “What?”

“Try to wiggle your toes for me”, he repeats, without looking up. “Want to make sure you didn’t get any nerve damage.”

You frown, you’re not blind to the fact that his request conveniently just cut you off from asking a question that undoubtedly Marc doesn’t want to answer. Still, you comply, angling your foot upwards and wiggle your toes for his inspection. 

Whether you passed his ad hoc medical examination, Marc’s expression isn’t giving you any clues. His face is as stoic as ever as he sets down your foot. He doesn’t say anything. Just reaches over to your right side to draw your other foot into his lap. 

Marred with bruises, looking like something that got mangled in a bear trap. Your right foot does not make for a pretty sight. It’s swollen and bleeding sluggishly from long gashes where the blob monster’s claw-like grip must have broken through skin. 

It's a gruesome picture, but miraculously, the injury doesn’t seem to be too serious. It stings more than it actually hurts, and it’s not even bleeding much anymore. Not even worth a trip to A&E really, as you doubt it’s deep enough to need stitches. 

At least that’s the assessment based on your own limited medical knowledge. If you based the severity on Marc’s reaction, you’d think it needed amputation. 

The line of his shoulder is pulled taut and reminds you of a live wire. Mouth set in a grim tortured line. He has the expression of a doctor about to give the nearest kin some heartbreaking news as he’s staring down at your foot with haunted guilt in his eyes. 

"I'm all right. I’m sure it just looks a lot worse than it is," you tell him. 

He doesn't meet your eyes or reply for that matter. Instead, he begins to gently tend the wound. Mouth pressing down so tightly his lips go pale white from it. He dabs away the oozing blood, carefully applying antibiotic ointment to the worst of the broken skin, and covering them with large squares of gauze that he tapes in place. It’s all quite professional, really, the practised ease that only comes with repetition. 

You wonder how many times he has done this before. You wonder how much harder it must be for him to suture his own gashes and gaping wounds. Wonder how long he’s been doing this by himself, fighting these hellish creatures. These things that you still have no bloody fucking idea as to what they are. 

"Marc,” you start tentatively, “what was--" A ticklish sensation rushes through you. In panic, you think a centipede is crawling down the sole of your foot. You instinctively jerk your leg up and away, nearly kneeing Marc in the face before you realise what’s happened. 

Your eyes fly downwards to Marc who is entirely unfazed by the close call as you stare at him in shock. His index finger rests on the arch of your heel and you blink up at him in a dumb stupor, not believing your eyes.  

Did he just– did he just fucking tickle you?!

There’s no hint of wrongdoing in his expression. No grin, or crack in his stony facade. He is unflappable as always as he continues cleaning your wound with a straight face. 

"Needed to check if you still had sensation in that foot," he offers up as an explanation as if he thinks that tickling was a perfectly reasonable thing for him to do in the circumstances. 

You frown, biting down the tart comment bubbling in your throat. You want to call him out on it, that you know what he’s up to and he’s acting like a child. But you know that the moment you do, the conversation will derail into an argument and in the flare of your temper, you’ll lose track of your questions. You’re pretty sure Marc knows you well enough that that’s exactly what he is aiming for. 

Gathering a deep calming breath into your chest, you steady yourself before you take a second shot. 

"What was that thing in the rain?" you ask again. 

He acts like he doesn't hear you. "Roll your ankles side to side," he requests instead. 

Irritation prickles your face. This bastard is still trying to evade your questions. 

"Marc," you start again, "what was--"

"Press down your weight on my hand with your foot."

"Marc!" you bark. 

He finally drags his eyes upwards to meet yours without bothering to lift his chin, seemingly as detached and reposed as ever. But there's something else in there too. A tiny flicker as you hold his gaze, and he has to look away. 

He looks… scared. 

Scared of what you don't know. The man practically single-handedly beat three monsters straight out of a Lovecraftian horror story with his bare fists tonight. With strength like that, you don't think anything should ever be capable of scaring him. 

"Can we talk about what happened tonight?" you ask again, trying to keep your voice even. 

His head ducks back down again, and he busies himself by rechecking the bandaids on your injured ankle. 

“There's nothing to talk about,” he murmurs offhandedly, but his hands betray him. 

There's no mistaking it. Even though his shoulders are obscuring your line of sight, you don’t need to see it in order to feel how unsteady his hands are. How his fingers stutter against your skin as they trail over your ankle.

He’s not letting go, as if he’s afraid that if he wasn’t holding onto you, you’d get up and walk away.

Gazing down on him from your vantage point of the counter, Marc doesn’t look as imposing as when you were looking up at him from the rainy concrete in the alley. From up here, he looks small and scared even. 

Even though there is nothing in this flat that should intimidate him. No invisible monsters lurking in the dark shadows behind Steven’s piles and piles of books. The scariest thing in Steven’s flat is dust mites. 

No, the only thing Marc is scared of, you realise, is this conversation. 

That’s what Steven told you, wasn’t it? That 'there are things that Marc hasn't told you.' That 'once you know everything,’ Marc thinks ‘you'll walk away'. 

It’s the final puzzle piece, slotted into its rightful place, and you can finally see the picture that was blurred out before, crystallising in startling detail. 

This is it. This is the big secret. The thing that Marc hasn't told you. 

You get it now. Why he has avoided you all this time. Why he stayed away even after you told him you love him. 

Because how on earth would anyone even begin to explain what happened tonight to someone who wasn’t there? 

How could he possibly have explained any of this to you before now? How would he possibly convince you those things out there (whatever they are) were real without dragging you into danger, head first, to see it with your own eyes? 

Didn't you struggle with the very same thought when you’d first tried to tell Marc what you’d seen in the alley on your own before all hell broke loose? The fear that he wouldn't believe you. That he'd think you were insane. 

Even if he had managed to explain and get you to believe him– what then? 

You can understand it. Why he was convinced that you would leave not just him but Steven as well, causing further collateral damage, if he told you everything. You can see from where he was standing, why he’d worry. 

But this is where Marc is wrong. You still want this. Him. Them.

"What happened tonight, it doesn't change how I feel about you," you start, and his hand on your foot spasms, grip tightening. It’s how you know your guess was right on the button, so you press on. "What I told you on the phone, I still mean it. I–"  you hesitate on the word. 

The last thing you want is to spook him away again by repeating it. It might be too much too soon. Instead, you settle for second best. 

"I want you to come back. Steven and I both do."  

Marc lets go of your foot. You can see his hand shaking despite Marc’s attempt to make it stop. His fingers flex and curl in agitation until he gives up and reaches up to drag it through his matted curls in frustration. 

“You don’t want this,” he says quietly, and his face is still turned downwards, staring at the floor refusing to look up at you. 

Knowing Marc, you know that he could very well mean the situation or himself. After everything that’s happened tonight, the part that upsets you the most is that he still feels this way about himself. 

"I do," you counter, saying the words with the whole of your chest. “I. Want. You. I want all of this.”

In the face of your certainty, he flinches, face pinched as if telling him you want him is a physical slap that pains him. It takes him a second to recover, to shake his head in refusal as he stares down at the floor like it committed a great wrong against him. 

"You want a normal life. Steven can give you that if it’s just the two of you. I can't,” he tells you. His voice, low in that weary and tired tone you overheard in the bathroom. 

"I don't need you to give me a normal life. What does that even mean? ‘Normal,’” you say derisively. “I don't need or want normal if it means you're not there Marc. That's not the life I want.”

He's still not looking at you, biting the insides of his cheek, and you can almost see the walls closing in around him before your very eyes. 

"You said you wanted me safe”, you say, ducking your head to try to catch his gaze, and you manage to see his eyes peer up at you from his lashes, as you continue. “And happy. I'm telling you now, I'm not going to be happy if you're not here."

Marc’s eyes widen with alarm. “You were awake?”

"I–" you start, but he cuts you off before you finish. 

“You were pretending to be asleep?” 

"No, I thought I was dreaming, I–"

“What else did you hear,” he asks. There’s panic in his voice, and he’s already rising from his seat in preparation to flee the room. 

Fuck, how are you fucking this up this badly this fast? Seeing his distress almost makes you want to backtrack, to fold it up and call it a night, try again tomorrow maybe. Because you know in his mind Marc is already bolting for that door, ready to leg it and put as much distance as he can between you and him. 

But… your mind flashes to the weight of his gentle touch on your shoulder. To his fingers brushing away the hair on your forehead. To his quiet voice as he whispered, 'I love you too'. You know what you heard in the dark: a testament of Marc’s feelings for you, and it emboldens you. 

“Marc.” You lean forward, reaching out to take his hand in yours. He stiffens with a jolt as your fingertips brush up against his knuckles, and you can almost see the line of his shoulder vibrate. But he doesn't make any moves to pull away at your touch. 

“I want you. Do you want me?” you ask. 

He stills. Marc looks at you for a long unflinching moment. It’s the same conflicted set in his jaw when you were standing next to him in front of Gus’ tank. The same hesitation written over his face when you were watching him through the back window of the taxi as it pulled away from him in the night. That same pained look when your eyes met in your office before he fled from you. 

His mouth parts with hesitation, but then he bites down and grinds his jaw hard enough that you think you can hear his molars grate from where you sit. “What I want doesn’t matter,” he answers you stubbornly. 

It's enough to make you want to grab him by the shoulders and shake him back and forth and scream into his face. 

“It does!” you say, almost half-shouting. “Of course it matters. You matter.”

"Don't. Don't do that.” Marc shakes his head, and he moves his free hand over yours, gently prying it off of him. “Save that for Steven. He deserves it. Deserves… you. I… I don't.” 

“And what about what I deserve,” you demand, fed up to the gills with his tendency for self-sacrifice, “What I want? Don’t I deserve to decide for myself?” 

That seems to catch him off guard. For once he doesn’t have a ready response, just glares at you, his jaw still set at that impossibly stubborn angle, but his eyes are full of so much pain that it hurts you to see it. You reach out again and cup his cheek.

"Remember that night Gus died? You came to me for help. You said I was the only one you could think of to ask, and it made me so happy that you did. I want you to ask me for things.”

There’s another moment of indecision in his eyes. The upper half of his body tilts in your direction, almost like he’s reaching for you, even if he won’t let his hands do so.

"I just want to be with you,” you continue, “I want to be your person. The person you come to when you need something. Can’t that be enough?"

His eyes are glued on you, mouth gaping open. For a moment you think you've succeeded, managed to stun him into silence and maybe even convinced him. 

It doesn’t last. 

He closes his parted mouth and clamps it shut until it’s compressed into a thin determined line. Then before you can react, he’s abruptly pulling away, turning with wordless efficiency, and walking away from you.  

"Marc?" you call after him, but his determined stride doesn’t even falter,  "Marc!"

Oh goddamnit! 

You hop off the counter, your sore ankle twinging when you land on it, but you ignore the dull ache as you run after him. 

“You don’t have to do this, Marc!" you shout. Slinging your arm out, you only just manage to catch him by the back of his shirt. Your fingers grip onto the fabric for dear life to stop him from getting further away, "You don’t have to do everything on your own. You don’t have to be alone. Steven and I are here. Stop running away from us! We want to support you. Please! You can lean on us.” 

He stops, turning about sharply, fire and brimstone in his eyes. The fuse of his already short temper burnt to a crisp. 

“You and Steven were never supposed to know about me or get caught up in any of this,” he snaps. “I’ve– My life is dangerous. It’s not safe.” 

“Yeah, I noticed the red flags already, you dunce. I still care about you regardless!”

“I don’t want you to care!” Marc roars, and it hits you with the force of a punch to the chest. 

You suck in a sharp pained breath, and he must see the hurt in your face because his eyes soften slightly, but his voice is no less emphatic, “You can’t go poking around in my life. Running out after me in the middle of the night. It's dangerous! You got hurt tonight. You could’ve been killed!"

And that does it. The pain of his implied rejection, the scolding tone, the way it feels like he’s blaming you for getting yourself hurt. It all rubs you the wrong way. All of the patience you had in you up until now evaporates, replaced by a fiery heat burning up your chest until it comes to a boiling point.

“Me?” you bite back indignantly. “What about you? Running around in a bloody Halloween costume in the middle of the night. Fighting invisible monsters? What if you got hurt? What on earth were you doing out there?”

“This is exactly why you needed to stay away from me. You do not want or need my fucking mess, okay!?"  

“Yes, I bloody well do! I'll take your fucking mess, Marc—every speck of it—as long as I get to have you too.”

His gaze bores into yours, eyes dark like spilt ink and brimming with anger so stark it practically sparks. 

“You really want to know what I do? Why I was out there tonight?” he asks, voice quieter, but the anger is still there, simmering just below the surface waiting to erupt. 

The sudden change feels like a gauntlet being thrown down, challenging you to a metaphorical game of chicken, daring you to back away and run for the hills while you still can.

You stand your ground, heels digging into the floor as you nod, swallowing the anxiety you feel pressed up against your throat like an acidic heartburn.  

“I serve Khonshu. I’m his avatar,” he says matter-of-factly as if it’s the most sensible thing in the world. As if any of this is supposed to make sense to you. 

It doesn’t. It makes no fucking sense at all. 

Your mind scrambles to connect the dots. Khonshu? Avatar? What the hell is he on about? Avatar as in James Cameron’s Pocahontas in space? And Khonshu? What even… You can’t even begin to think of what that is supposed to mean. Don’t recognise it save for a passing familiarity that it’s a word that Steven has used when passionately serenading you with facts on Ancient Egypt. The connection between the two is lost to you. 

“What is… ‘Khonshu?'” you ask, and this time, you don’t have to drag the answer out of Marc. 

He answers you willingly and as plainly without varnish as before. “Khonshu’s the ancient Egyptian god of the moon. Years ago, I was stabbed and left for dead. He saved my life and in return, I work for him now.” 

There’s no hint of emotion as he says it. He’s not pleading for you to believe him despite how fantastical it sounds. Not trying to convince you of anything. Marc is leaving it to you whether or not you believe him, almost like he wishes you wouldn’t. Like this bizarre rambling will hopefully finally send you packing and out of his life. And that’s… how you know he’s not lying to you. 

“Work for him… how?” you ask. 

His eyes flick upwards, grinding his teeth as if he’s biting down on a curse, before his gaze settles back on you. 

“I swore to protect travellers of the night.”

And once again, that tells you absolutely nothing. What does that even mean, ‘Travellers of the night’? As in prostitutes?! 

Marc’s obfuscation and frankly dodgy-as-fuck explanations have your blood boiling. You’re almost positive he’s doing this on purpose to get you hacked off, and he’s succeeding. 

“Can you speak in plain English?”

“I take care of bad guys so they don’t harm good people. Protect civilians who can’t protect themselves.”

“So you’re… what? Like a supernatural police officer? A monster hunter? A guardian of the night?”

He grits his teeth. 

“Something like that.” The answer is dismissive, and so is his attitude. He folds his arms across his chest, trying to distance himself from you, casting a glance at the door. “Satisfied? We done here?”

“No! No, we’re not ‘done here.’ We are the furthest thing from done. I already told you, Marc. Nothing that’s happened tonight changes how I feel about you.”

He shakes his head, jaw set mulishly, before tearing his eyes away and turning towards the front door. 

And that just won’t do. If you let Marc walk out now, you know he’ll do everything in his power to avoid you for the rest of his life.

Moving quickly, you dart around Marc and slide between him and the door. In your single-minded hurriedness, you bump into the small table by the door, sending several things clattering over and probably adding yet another bruise to your already abused body, but you don’t care. You cannot let him leave. Plastering your back to the door, you stand tall and raise your chin, prepared to act as a physical barrier if you have to.

Marc’s eyes narrow into slits, a snarl of pure exasperation erupting from the back of his throat.  

“Move,” he orders, taking a step closer to you, but there is no real threat behind it. He doesn’t reach out to touch you; doesn’t grab you or shove you out of the way

He just looks at you like you are an actual obstacle he cannot surpass. But you know that he could move you by force if he wanted to. It’d be easy for him to force his way out of the flat with little effort. 

Between the two of you, physically he’s the stronger one. You’ve witnessed him take out supernatural monsters tonight. If he wanted to, he could shove his way straight through you. Carry you into another room and lock you in. Could easily snap every bone in your wrist in the blink of an eye.

But he won't. After all this time, if there is one thing you’ve learnt about Marc, it is that harm is only ever his last resort. 

The man is squirmish at the prospect of physically harming a goldfish. Would rather visit all the pet shops in all of London in the middle of the night to find a mythical one-finned fish to avoid that outcome. At the core of him, he wants to shield and protect, not break. 

And towards you? He would never use brute strength on you. Would never hurt you. Would give his very life to make sure you’re safe and unharmed. Happy.

In front of you, Marc takes another step forward, closing the distance. His commanding presence crowds you in against the doorframe until there’s barely any space between you anymore. 

Marc is angry. Jaw tense, shoulders tied up in a tangled knot, nose flaring like an angry bull emitting a bright and blaring warning signal for you to move. But you stay put because if he’s a bull, then that must make you a matador, practically waving a red cape at him to come charge you.

He’s staring down at you again. That look in his eyes, like he knows what is best for you. That same stern gaze when he swore you to secrecy, deciding what was best for Steven. The determination there that tells you that this is not up for discussion. 

It’s a recurring pattern with Marc. He decides what he thinks is best for everyone else, with no consideration of what the person in question actually wants. 

“Last chance,” he warns, through gritted teeth, “I won’t ask again.”

Marc probably thinks this is a threat. But it’s only because he can’t see himself, the pain-filled eyes that look back down at you. Nothing is menacing about it. 

“I’m not moving,” you tell him. 

It’s only a fraction of a second, but you catch his eyes flickering to your lips. A near-growling sound tears out of his throat, and then he’s moving forward further into your space.

What is he–?

His hand cups the back of your neck, pulling you to him, and then his lips are on yours. 

Oh.

Marc Spector is kissing you.

It’s hard and demanding, his lips crushed to yours, clearly driven by the frustration and anger that seems to vibrate just under his skin. But it doesn’t matter. You have dreamed of kissing this man for so long. Even with the harshness, you can’t help but respond to him, meeting the brutal press of his lips with your own more eager one. Mouth parting in invitation for him. 

Something shifts. 

All the fight goes out of him, leaking away like hot air out of a punctured balloon, whatever anger was there fizzles out of him, and you feel him melt against your lips. The kiss slips into something softer, sweeter. Something that steals every ounce of oxygen from your lungs. 

You don’t know how long it lasts, the only thing you know is that it doesn’t last long enough. If you could have the choice, you’d want it to last forever. 

It doesn’t of course. Marc retreats from you with an unsteady step. His eyes are etched with shock as you take him in, brows pinched and pupils wide, and you already want to kiss him again. 

The two of you have been here before. Staring at each other from so close a distance that your foreheads are inches from touching. Except this time it’s not in front of a fish tank with an imposter goldfish between you. A stray curl falls into his eyes and tickles your nose. It’s the hint of clean linen, the note of coffee you brew for him every night that he will unfailingly drink because you made it for him. It’s the smell you wake up to embedded in Steven’s sheets. 

You want this man, all of him, to be yours. 

Your face tilts up to him. So close, his lips ghost over yours.

“Marc,” you whisper, and his eyes flicker over your face. “Stop running.”

Part of you expects him to stop you again. That he will pull back, eyeing you like you’re something dangerous, the way he did that night in front of the fish tank. 

He doesn’t. 

You tip your face forward even further, your nose dragging along the bridge of his.

“I love you.” 

You can hear the sharp inhale just like last time you said it over the phone when you did not know if he was on the other end or not. When you didn't know if the sound was imaginary or real. Now you know. 

You couldn’t see his face then, but this time you get to. The pinched furrow between his brow, that look in his eyes that makes your heart seize in your chest. There’s no doubt about it now. 

"And you love me,” you say. 

His lips part, and you brace yourself for another protest or denial, but it doesn’t come. Instead, his head does the slightest tilt forward. A nod, you realise. 

“Yeah.” He whispers it so quietly you nearly miss it at first. 

You smile. Happiness surges through your insides, weaving through your ribs until you think that your chest might burst. 

Marc Spector loves you. 

You swallow in relief, smiling even as you feel a sting prickle the corner of your eyes. Then Marc leans down and closes that infinitesimal space between you, bringing down the final barrier of separation that he has maintained since you met him. 

It’s a soft press of his lips to yours. So soft, it’s scarcely there, but it feels perfect all the same, a fluttering warmth that you can feel down to the curl of your toes. 

It’s an admittance. An invitation. A sign of trust. 

Marc kisses you again and again with lingering kisses that he deepens with each gentle press of his mouth to yours. His hand moves to cup your face in his palm, cradling your cheek like you're the most precious thing he’s ever touched. 

You feel like you ought to be surprised by how gentle he is, but you’re not. Not at all, because of course he’s gentle.

That’s the thing, isn’t it? Marc’s hardness is all smoke and mirrors, hiding the vulnerable softness that lies under the hardened skin. Beneath it all, Marc is protective and caring, kind even. 

And now, you finally get to have him in all his confounding complexities. This stubborn, kind, impossible idiot, right here in your arms. 

You pull him closer, even as you keep kissing him, fingers twisting into the brushed cotton of his shirt, and he lets you. Head leaning down as he adjusts his angle so he can slant his mouth fully over yours. He’s pressed up against every single inch of you, from his knees to his chest, your lips fused and somehow it’s still not even close to enough for you. You tug his collar, encouraging him to come even closer and he does, obedient, in a way that you’ve never known him to be before. 

Stepping forward, he follows your lead, inching closer, until the solidness of his chest presses you flush to the door. His arm comes to brace the side of your head, hand cupping behind the back of your neck, and you realise only belatedly it’s the reason why your head isn’t colliding with the hard wood behind you. 

Not that it would matter if you did. You don’t even think you’d notice if your head went through the wall right now. Too focused on the softness of his lips. Too lost in the quiet, near-silent humming sound he makes as he kisses you that sets your nerves alight. 

God, he’s perfect. His closeness is heady. There’s a growing hunger in your stomach that makes your limbs shake and tremble. After all the time he's been away, hiding from you, you feel starved for this. For him. You want to bite his neck, lick along the protruding line of his collarbone and swallow every inch of him down to the marrow if he’d let you. 

For all the gentleness that Marc is showing you, you have no intention of returning the favour. Your teeth sink in, biting down on his bottom lip, and he lets out a quiet involuntary gasp into your mouth. Your veins burn at the sound. Fuck, you want him to make that noise again, that careless pitch of pleasure that sounds so unguarded coming from him. You want to bite and nibble and scratch and claw and have him make every noise known and unknown to mankind. 

You drag your teeth along the swell of his lip, and he shivers, eyes squeezed firmly shut like he’s teetering on the very edge of his self-control. Then you nip down again. 

His hips stutter forward involuntarily, and he curses, the sound breathless and raw, like you tore it out of him before he was prepared. It’s all you want. To hear that sound again and again and again. You want to hear his tiny moans in your ear, the involuntary muffled growl as he buries his face into your neck trying to keep quiet, hear him gasp ‘fuck’ in barely audible decibels. You want everything. 

Hooking your fingers into the belt loops of his jeans, you haul him closer as if he wasn’t already pressed alongside your body. Thighs nestled between yours, the coarseness of denim scraping against your bare legs. You can feel the hardening bulge trapped between you, and you want him to grind against you, to rut into you mindlessly until you can feel his cock twitch against the softness of your belly. 

But Marc isn’t showing any signs of obliging you in that department, and you’re not willing to stop kissing him in order to give him directions. Instead, you arch your back away from the wall, tilting your pelvis until you rub up against his crotch. He jolts hard at the contact, the line of his body wracked in shivers with a gorgeous groan that is cut off too soon. 

"Shit!”  

His hand leaves your neck. Then he’s pulling back and away from you in retreat. You immediately miss the warmth of his body, reaching up to try to chase after the loveliness of his lips, but he stops you. A gentle but firm hand comes down on your shoulder, pinning you against the wall. 

You stare up at him, and you’re not sure you’re breathing anymore at the sight of him. You should be used to how preposterously beautiful this man is by now. But you never are. Each time feels novel and so much worse–no, better than the last time. The collar of his shirt is stretched and askew. Curls a mess against his forehead. Lips, slick and kiss-swollen as his mouth hangs open, chest heaving as he pants. 

As stunningly pretty as Steven is when you’ve succeeded in making a mess out of him, to do it to Marc is something else entirely. This orderly, neat freak of a man who makes it his life mission to repress his emotions and jam them shut inside of himself with a tight lid. You did this. You’ve made a mess of him. It’s electric, your veins buzz with the thrill, and your brain is screaming for more. 

Your hand reaches up, fingers carding through his hair as you reel him in by the back of his neck. Your mouth finds his, kissing him hard before he has time to overthink it or, god forbid, change his mind and try to bolt again. His mouth parts, and you swallow the soft oomph of surprise that escapes his throat and lean in, licking desperately into his mouth. If this is all you get, you want to try to savour him. 

Marc doesn’t stop you this time. Instead, his hands settle on your waist, fingers digging into your hips as he’s pulling you closer. It has the whole of your back from the base of your spine to the tip of your nose tingling. 

This time he’s the one grinding into you, the hard outline of his cock pressed tight between you. Even through the thick layer of denim, you can feel how hard he is, and you shiver pleasantly.

You moan into the kiss, rising on your tiptoes to meet him. There’s not an inch of space between your bodies, and you swear you can feel his cock twitch against your hip. 

And fuck, fuck– that’s– 

You need to get him in bed now before you hitch your legs and clamber onto his thighs to climb him like the trunk of a tree. Why the fuck did the architect place the bedroom section at the opposite end of the flat.

Stepping one foot sideways, you tug at the neck of Marc’s shirt to steer him towards the bed. There’s no resistance. He shows you the same obedience as before, easily letting himself be pulled by you as you start walking blindly backwards, navigating the two of you through the junkyard of Steven’s mess. 

Any second now you’re expecting to trip over the damn ottoman, except this is Steven's flat, not yours. And this isn’t Steven; it’s Marc in your arms. Steady and composed in his every step, with none of the charming incoordination of Steven. No, Marc steers you like it’s the most natural thing in the world. Arms bracketing your side to make sure your hips don’t bump into any hard-edged furniture, preemptively pushing back a teetering book from the shelf before it even has the time to leap off the ledge. 

Marc—beautiful, stubborn Marc, who is as immovable as a rock in his decisions—is letting you pull and tug him in whatever direction you’re choosing to go. Kissing you with each unbalanced step backwards, like you’re the only air he ever needs to breathe. 

There’s a flicker of light as you pass Gus’ tank, and it dims when you move past Steven’s desk and the telly. God. It’s a journey of fewer than 20 feet that should take you less than ten seconds and not the eternity that it seems to take. 

When you finally feel the fine, gritty sand beneath the sole of your foot, it feels like victory. The soft brush of the sheets pressing up against your calves is the rope of the finish line that you’d never imagined you’d reach. 

You want to memorialise this moment somehow. Etch it into your memory so you’ll never forget. Carve it into the wooden beam structures of this very flat so it’ll outlast you both. 

Marc’s hands on your hips guide you gently to a stop, and you realise with a rush of giddiness that you’ve finally reached your destination. You break the kiss long enough to sit down on the edge of the bed, and you don’t even need to tug at the corner of his sleeve for Marc to dutifully follow you down. He helps you lay back and leans in after you, the firm weight of his body settling over you, pressing you down into the mattress. 

The weight of Marc feels perfect, as his head tips down to your face, kissing over the curve of your jaw to your neck. He’s pressing open-mouthed kisses down the line of your throat and the swell of your chest. It’s tender. Reverent almost.

Marc is unbothered by the cotton layer of clothing that separates his mouth from your bare skin as he goes. His mouth grazes your knuckles, kissing the inside of your wrist. He’s soft yet insistent. Hungry but slow. God, he’s slow, infuriatingly so, to the point where you wonder if he’s taking the mick out of you. 

His lips trail a row of devoted kisses against the bare skin of your stomach where your shirt has ridden up, barely lifting the hem up and letting it ride up against your ribs as he puts his mouth there too. If it didn’t feel so good to have his mouth on you, you’d consider it torture with the pace that he’s going. You’re aching, everything inside is pulled so taught and tight you might burst out of your skin.

Those cotton soft curls tickle against your thighs on his way down, and you spread them for him in a not-so-subtle invitation. But Marc doesn’t pay you any mind, that earlier obedience that had endeared him to you is nowhere to be found now. He continues down, knees sinking into the sand lining the perimeter of the bed until he’s kneeling down in front of you on the bed. 

Then he stops. 

You hold your breath waiting for him to continue. But nothing happens, and your first instinct is that he’s changed his mind again. You’re almost lunging after him. Fully prepared to tackle him down with a wrestling move you’ve seen on the telly and pin him against the sand and wooden floor. 

But he’s not moving away from you. 

Opening your eyes to peek, you lift yourself on one arm, tilting down your head to find yourself staring back at those pitch-dark eyes. 

You’re not prepared for the sight of him. Of Marc on his knees, peering up at you through his lashes, like you’re a solemn prayer that he’s clinging onto by his fingertips. The vision of him flattens your lungs, taking any oxygen away with it. He’s looking at you like you’re something to be protected and cared for. As if you’re all he’s ever wanted and would never allow himself to have. 

Marc’s bending down again, lips brushing your skinned knee as his warm breath ghosts over the raw skin. He goes over every scrape and scratch with his mouth. It’s his way of atoning for ever letting you get hurt. 

And as good as that feels, as much as you never want him to stop. You need more. More than this torturous, drawn-out pace that he’s giving you, or you think you’ll tear your hair out by the roots and go mad with it. 

“Marc.” You’re trying to say it with urgency, maybe even hint at your annoyance, but it comes out as a high-pitched, delirious plea, “Marc please, I need–” 

He doesn’t answer you with any words. Instead, his hands come to the side of your hips, fingers slipping into your sleep shorts, hooking the hem of your knickers with them as he pulls them down. 

“Lift,” he commands, in the same brusque way he had before when ordering you to sit on the kitchen counter. But this time you’re only too eager to comply. 

You’re so excited you nearly deal a high kick to his face, miraculously missing him by only a couple of inches. 

From the corner of your eye, you swear you catch an amused half-smile quirking the corners of his lips. But before you can take a better look to confirm it, he ducks his head back down, even though you think you can see the line of his shoulders shake from what might very well be laughter. 

But your mind doesn't get to linger on it for long. His hand curls over your thigh, and he settles your leg on his shoulder, pressing a kiss to the inner side that his mouth can reach. Then he hooks your leg over his back, and sharp heat settles deep in your stomach.

His warm breath fans against the bare skin raising goosebumps in its wake. He continues to lick  over the softness of your belly. Nipping at your hip and the insides of your legs, covering every inch of you he can reach with his mouth. Purposefully avoiding the slick ache between your legs where you need his mouth and tongue most. 

Fuck, you could kill him for that. 

“Marc.” His name is a whine between your lips. It sounds pathetic to your ears, but you don’t care. You’re not above begging. Not if there’s a chance it will get you more of this, of him. 

“Please, Marc, just– I need you to–” 

“Baby,” he murmurs, cutting off your pleas. It’s almost reproachful, but it doesn’t matter because that’s not what your mind is focused on. This is the first endearment Marc has ever used for you and it sounds so sweet on his lips. Makes you feel loved and cared for despite the admonishing tone. 

“Be patient,” he scolds, but there’s so much fondness in his voice for you, it makes you lightheaded. “I’m gonna take my time with you.” 

There’s only a brief second as you catch a peek of the pink tip of his tongue, glistening against his lips. His eyes flutter closed as he dips down. Heat crackles throughout your limbs, and your lungs pull tight in anticipation. The air around you thins, and for a moment as you try to desperately swallow down the air in your throat, the room seems to tilt. 

Then he gives you his mouth, and as cliche as it sounds, it’s heaven. A long, controlled press of his tongue through your wet and slick folds. Endorphins rush through you to the top of your head, and you can’t help how your body reacts, arching up against his mouth with a gasp that is punched out of your lungs. 

Then he does it again, and somehow, though you can’t even fathom how it’s not defying the laws of science and time as you know it, he goes even slower. The velvet softness of his tongue drags with an unhurried press across the seam of your pussy until he reaches the apex and licks with a silken glide on your wet clit. You nearly swallow your tongue to tamper the whine trapped in your throat. 

This is not the pace you were expecting. Maybe it’s wishful thinking on your part, but you thought he’d be impatient. Almost anticipated that his movements would be sparse and efficient like every other aspect of his life, pushing you to a high-speed climax like a carcrash.  

This is not that. This is Marc taking his own sweet time. His tongue is a slow decadent drag against your clit, and you feel his warm breath ghost over you, inhaling the scent of you as he takes you in. 

Sweet heady pleasure climbs up the back of your thighs, filling your stomach with it. It’s so much, you don’t know if you can fit it all within, all the emotions that are welling up in your chest to spill out of you. Your fingers grip his solid shoulders to anchor yourself. You roll your hips against his mouth in an attempt to urge him on, but he refuses to take the hint. His tongue makes a slow, thorough exploration, interrupted only by the open-mouthed kisses that he presses against your mound, your hip, your cunt. 

You can feel the tension in his shoulder under your thigh. Can hear it in the quick rasp of his breath, but still, his pace remains slow and measured. Steadily kindling the smouldering heat beneath your skin, lick by torturous lick. 

It’s perfect. Hot as sin and twice as glorious, but you could scream with how agonisingly glacial the build-up is. A strange, high-pitched sound escapes you. An unflattering blend between a moan and a sob. It sounds like you’re in pain when all you feel is pleasure, and then you hear Marc shushing you again. This time softer, comforting even. 

“It's alright. You're alright. You can take it for me,” he says into your skin, mouth pressed against your clit with a warm hum that rumbles through your flesh. Your veins drip with something sweet and honeyed at his tone. 

Marc is so exacting, not at all like Steven’s wild hunger. His tongue laves at you, warm and wet, with an unceasing gentle pressure, gliding over and around your clit. Decadently slow, but never stopping. The feeling is intense and unrelenting. Somehow dragging you closer and closer to the edge but never quite enough to push you over. 

Digging your heels into his back, you tilt your hips as far as the strain in your muscles will allow you to get closer. You rock yourself against his mouth, and Marc groans, a pleased, encouraging sound, even as his hands grip the flesh of your waist and hold you firm against the pillowy softness of the bed to make sure you don’t try to ride out your own pleasure against his face at a faster pace than he has set for you.  

You could scream with frustration. If the left hemisphere of your brain responsible for speech wasn’t so severely compromised by Marc, you would be screeching until your throat goes raw with it. Instead, you hiccup a broken sob, his name quiet and cracked on your lips. 

"That's right. You're alright," he soothes, as he presses his forehead against your stomach. If you didn’t know better, his voice almost sounds a bit shaky, slurring on the last word as he bends back down and puts his mouth back between your thighs, onto your sensitive flesh and gently sucks. 

Those unruly curls tickle against the soft skin. You only meant to brush his hair away, but as soon as your fingers curl into the soft heat of them, you can’t help but grip tighter at the silky touch. Carding your hand through the curly locks. 

You don’t mean to tug, but the careful drag of his teeth against your clit sends a sharp electric jolt up your spine, short-circuiting your lungs and sending you clawing at his curls for dear life. It should not feel this good, and yet you find yourself chasing the sensation, nearly buckling over, as your heel digs into the firm muscles of his back to anchor yourself. 

You can’t even look anymore. Why torture yourself with the sight of him buried between your legs. Cheeks dusted crimson, and those breathtakingly expressive eyes burning into yours as if he’s trying to memorise every minute detail of your expression. You can see his jaw working on your pussy. Can feel him as his tongue keeps sliding hot and insistent without reprieve against your overstimulated clit. 

It’s so much. Too much. All your senses feel overloaded. Your vision goes blurry. You’re not sure if it’s tears that are stinging behind your eyelids or if they cross at the back of your head as everything dims and darkens, like a fuse box blowing out. It’s all too much, and you’re being dragged under and drowning in the sensations. You need to pull up above the surface to breathe again or you’re sure you’re going to die. 

You grab at Marc’s hand like he’s your life preserver, and he weaves his fingers between yours. It’s surprisingly intimate, as he squeezes your hand back, pressing your intwined hands to your hip bone, reassuring you he’s right there and—fuck, it’s… It’s so much, too much. 

It’s chaos. A mayhem between your violently beating heart and burning lungs. You think there must be something wrong with you. Can’t possibly contain the pleasure that keeps pouring and pouring into you. For a fraction of a second, as your mind is torn apart by the sensations, and you are convinced that you must be having a heart attack. What other explanation could there possibly be?

“Ma–Marc, I–I’m– Fuck, oh god, oh fuck."

Marc eases back, “It’s okay.” He presses his mouth to your clit and kisses it, and the slick sound his mouth makes have you trembling and shaking so hard you’re convulsing against the sheets. “You’re okay,” he soothes. “Let go. I’ve got you. Come for me.”

Warmth floods your veins touching every part of your body, humming through every nerve and cell as your orgasm washes over you. It’s hard and unforgiving. Your body is trying to claim revenge on you for allowing it to take so long as it did. Everything else around you disappears, pulling you under with a vengeance that blots out your vision and all sounds with it. 

But it doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters to you anymore is how everything in you tingles pleasantly. It lingers long after it’s over, and you can still feel it from the tip of your fingers to the curl of your toes as you come down on Marc’s tongue. 

His face is still buried between your thighs. His tongue curled against your entrance as he laps every drop of slick out of you. Drinking you down and swallowing every trace of your pleasure. He doesn’t let up for long moments until finally he’s satisfied and drags his head up your body. 

“Did so good,” he praises, voice raspy and raw as his tongue trails a long affectionate line down your femur. 

He presses his mouth to your knee with the same gentle care he did when he’d applied plasters. It’s intimate. Sweet. 

Part of you feels silly to feel this affected by such a simple affectionate gesture considering what preceded it, but your heartbeat flutters at the touch. 

It doesn’t matter that you’ve barely just come down from your orgasm or that you’re still throbbing and sensitive between your legs. Limbs so wrung out, they’re tingling and numb. You’re already craving the closeness of him all over again. 

“Marc,” you call out for him, arm outstretched in an invitation for him to join you on the bed. 

He doesn’t move, and it takes you a few moments, your mind fuzzy around the edges with the afterwaves of your orgasm to register that something's wrong. Everything is blurry and obscured by a warm haze, and you have to blink through the watery periphery of your vision before you can see him a bit more clearly. 

Still on his knees, Marc’s mouth parts slightly open, like he maybe wants to say something but he doesn’t know how. There’s hesitation there in the tenseness of his jaw as his eyes flick away from your gaze, as if there’s still some invisible barrier that he won’t let himself cross.  

It is a little bit ridiculous. After all, what barriers between you are there possibly left to cross? You and him nearly died together tonight. You love him, and he loves you too. Bloody hell, he’s just spent the better half of this night with his head buried between your thighs. There’s no stone left unturned.

But you know it’s not that simple. There’s a deeply embedded seed in Marc, buried under his skin and flesh and left to sprout for decades, long before you came along. Making him doubt himself and his place with you. It doesn’t matter how far you two come. He might always struggle with letting himself have what he wants guilt-free. Because he still doesn’t think he has a right to, that he doesn’t deserve it. 

You plant an elbow on the mattress to raise yourself. But your arms have turned into boneless gelatine, wobbling under your weight, and you nearly topple over. Marc moves so fast, you only register a blur of movement, before he’s by your side. Steadying you with his hands on your shoulders. 

“Easy. Lie back,” he says, eyes narrowed and worried, as he’s ushering you back down. The man’s got a protective streak a mile wide. 

“Marc, please—” you start, but you don’t have to finish. 

He breaks with your plea, and his knee dips into the bed, fully climbing in. His arms brace your sides as he lowers himself onto the bed. 

“What, baby? What do you need? Tell me.” He says it like you only have to speak the words, and then your every wish will be his command.  

There’s no fight left in his tone anymore. Voice gone soft. Any internal doubts have melted out of him. The look in his eyes as he gazes down on you tells you that Marc would give you anything you ask for. This man would insist on throwing himself under a double-decker bus if he thought it would make the ride a tiny bit smoother for you. 

And oh… You get it now. 

It’s taken you far too long, but you might have finally solved the puzzle that is Marc Spector. For all his aversion to let himself have even a morsel of happiness, there’s always been one overriding drive. There’s one thing that towers above the shame and guilt. One thing that’s more important to him than everything else. It’s in the way he’s always trying to meet the needs of those he cares for. Their happiness. Steven’s. Yours. 

All you need to do is ask for him. 

“You. I need you. Want you. Please.” 

You can see it in real time as it happens. How the last traces of hesitation in him crumble, replaced by a determination that carves into those rich brown eyes. He drops forward, then he's sealing his mouth over yours like he’s signing on the dotted line, giving himself over to you.  

It's everything.

Marc leans back again, fingers hooking into the hem of his t-shirt and dragging it off over his head in a single fluid motion. There’s no tangling of fabric, and it doesn’t get snagged as he tugs it over his head. There’s none of the clumsy adorableness of his alter. Marc undresses with practised ease like it was choreographed for the sole purpose of making your heart race faster. 

Good fucking grief, you might’ve already seen this man before you naked on more occasions than you can count. But as he towers above you, skin golden in the dim light, the sight of his bare chest feels novel in a way that has your heart dropping to your lungs that must be entirely medically unsafe. You can’t help but stare shamelessly. 

Chiselled and hard from the top of his head to his toes. You remember being surprised by how fit Steven was the first time, but somehow on Marc, it seems right. His physique reminds you of mythic Greek heroes memorialised in marble, and you're taken aback at how soft and warm he is under your hands. That he's human, made out of flesh and bone, and that he shivers as you drag your palms across the bare skin of his chest and stomach. 

The anticipation crackles in your thighs, burning with a searing intensity at the thought of undressing him, gingerly unwrap him like a decadent present. But you’re greedy and have none of Marc’s patience. You wrench at his belt with little to no finesse, reaching down and wedging your fingers along the hem of his jeans to shove them down forcefully against the generous curve of his ass. You tug hard enough that you hear Marc choke out a wheezed breath, but you’re not even paying it any attention. 

His hardened cock slaps against his stomach with a heavy thud and everything in you roars to attention at how thick and swollen he is for you. You feel heavy with need at the sight of it, and your brain is on autopilot, acting without conscious thought as you’re already reaching forward. Your knuckles skim down over his stomach before greedily wrapping your hand around his cock. 

A deep groan tears out of his chest, and his hand snaps up to grab your wrist, holding you still. He clamps his eyes shut and takes a deep breath, inhaling heavily through his nostrils, breathing in and out with great struggle.  

As much as you enjoy getting a rise out of him, you’re not trying to make things difficult for Marc on purpose. At least you don’t think you are. But you can’t look away from his cock. You can feel it straining and twitching in your hold, can see the trickle of glistening precome welling up from the flushed tip. 

Your tongue feels heavy in your mouth, practically salivating as your thumb gently drags over the slick wetness there. The touch has his hips bucking, stuttering into your hands with a sound that sounds suspiciously close to a whimper. Your cheeks burn and tingle, your whole body flashing hot. 

“Fuck,” he snarls and knocks your hand away, “You fucking ruin me, you know that?”

You want to retort that he’s the one to talk. Point out that he’s left you a dripping slick mess that’s soaked into the bedsheets and mattress and made them unsalvageable; that your thighs are an aching mess and you’re still swollen and sensitive from his mouth. But all vocabulary flies out of your head at the sight of him, as he replaces your hand with his own, wrapping one large hand around his cock.

Your heart stutters somewhere in your chest, and the breath in your lungs still with anticipation as he drops down to settle himself into place between your legs, knees nudging against your thighs to spread you wider for him as he notches the fat tip against your slick entrance. 

His eyes lock on yours, the tip of his nose brushing alongside yours. He leans down to kiss you again, mouth warm and slick. You can still taste yourself on him, tart and almost sweet. Then he pushes inside of you, and your mind goes numb.

The first slide of him inside you is perfect. A sweet filling stretch that threatens to blot out everything else into nothingness.

Even though it’s your first time with Marc, your body already knows him. Craves every inch of him, and he’s willing to give that to you now, inch by slow maddening inch as he eases inside. Large hands clutching your sides, as his hips press forward and he works himself inside you. His cock pushes deep until he’s buried  to the hilt. Then he stills, shuddering. 

“Shit—,” he groans, dipping his head to press his face into your shoulder. “You gotta be kidding me.” His voice sounds shaky and strained. You’re not entirely sure what he means or what he finds so implausible. If he can’t believe he’s finally inside you after all this time or how good it feels. You just know you can’t believe it either. 

It's flawed logic, but you’re not exactly coherent at this moment. Lungs squeezing tight in your diaphragm, you’re only capable of sobbing nonsensically at the consuming sensation of him filling you. Can barely focus on the warm tingle on your spine that settles over you. Your mind has been filled with cotton, soft and hazy as he’s completely sheathed inside, as deep as he can physically be.   

Marc holds there for a long moment, his breath hot on your skin where he pants against your collarbone. He doesn’t move. Hips pressed flush against yours, taking his time to let your body adjust to the girth of him. 

His mouth is on your bare skin, pressing kisses to your lips and then the apples of your cheek, before he drags himself downwards to mouth at the side of your neck, and under your jaw. Hands roaming along your ribs and hips like he cannot stop touching you. It’s devoted, loving even, the gentleness to his touch. It makes everything all the more overwhelming for you. He’s ruining you, with every caress on your flesh, and kiss to your skin, and he has barely even moved yet. 

And god, you need him to. 

"Marc."

He doesn't seem to hear you, mouth continuing to dot lazy kisses across your clavicle. 

"Please.” You arch your back towards him, but you don’t get very far with his weight flattening you down against the bed. 

“Marc, need you to move," you try again, voice high-pitched and needy, but you could be pleading to a stone wall for all the good it seems to do. His hips don't move from his position, immovable like a boulder. Instead, his palms fan out against your ribs, fingerprints permanently searing into your skin with the heat of his touch. 

You can’t take it anymore, everything inside you is screaming, bursting at the seams for more and you wrap your legs around his waist in an attempt to force him deeper. To move. 

Your heels dig into the rounded curve of his ass, and he jerks and gasps. You can feel his cock twitching inside you, as those stupendously gorgeous eyes flutter open. He’s looking at you again, stirred from the spell and the soft expression on his face hardens with determination. 

"Yeah, baby. I got you," he says, and he finally complies. His hand comes to rest on the small of your lower back, tilting you up to him as he moves again. The hard drag of his cock slides out of you until only the blunt tip rests inside, and then he thrusts back, unhurried and deliberate. 

Slow simmering pleasure bubbles up in your veins and you have to swallow it down with a hiccup of a sob. It's still the same ruthlessly slow and thorough pace. The one that tells you he won't be rushed, won't be hurried, even as he's giving you exactly what you asked him for. 

Stubborn. Unreasonable. Maddening. You won't survive him. 

The next thrust is demanding. It strikes heat along your spine and squeezes the air out of your lungs, until there's none of it left so you can fit more of him inside. A strange squeaky noise punches out of your throat, and in panic you clamber onto him.

He does it again. Hips dragging back as he pulls himself away, altering the angle of your hips with a small adjustment as he cants your hips upwards again. This time he lifts you further up than before and he pushes his way in with an almost testing stroke. His eyes narrow as he gazes down on you, brows furrowed in concentration and you realise what he’s doing. 

Marc is slow and exacting, studying your every reaction, learning the best way to intricately pull you apart. 

Staring up at him like this feels like you’re witnessing your own demise as it unfurls. Those unwavering eyes are focused on you, watching your every expression. He’s tilting the angle of his thrusts until he drives the pleasure deeper inside you with devastating precision until there is nothing left of you. Until tears are stinging in the corner of your eyes because you’re sure that you can’t fit more within you — the pleasure and him— and then he does somehow. 

He catches your leg, hitching them higher so that he can slide a few inches deeper. The angle shifts, striking against something raw and overwhelming. You think you go blind with it and you swear you see stars collapsing behind the darkness of your eyelids. 

"Yeah, there we go." His voice in your ear is calm, but he also sounds proud and pleased, and you're not sure if it's with himself or you. It’s all you can hear, and then he’s moving again.

A rich pleasure fills you at the slow glide of his cock dragging out of you, and then he pushes inside again, deep and determined, until his cock is kissing that deep perfect spot that robs you of your ability to breathe. 

“Fuck, that’s it, baby. Can feel–” he groans, rolling his hips into yours, and it’s fucking devastating. 

Your mind goes blank. A clean slate with no thought left in you except how good it feels. All you can do is moan and whimper, hands clutching desperately to his shoulders. "Oh– Oh, god. Marc, I– oh!"

He groans, slanting his mouth over yours and swallows the words down, cradling your head with his fingers. Soft doting presses of his lips to yours. 

"Fuck, you feel so–" His sentence is cut off, and you never get to hear the rest of what he was going to say. 

His mouth is on yours again and it’s nothing like the starved and overwhelmingly eager kisses you’re used to from these lips when it’s Steven who’s kissing you. This is slow and measured. Patient and deliberate as he takes his time with you. He’s kissing you like he’s trying to tell you a secret. Like he’s entrusting you with something important, to protect and to keep for him. 

His finger rubs small circles under your ear, his hips slow and consuming as he fucks his cock into you. His arms never leave your side. Mouth never lifting from yours. His whole body pressed as deeply into you as he physically can. 

It feels like a confession. 

The ‘I love you’ that he can’t bring himself to say in front of you and can only admit to in the dead of night when he thought you were asleep. 

His kiss is a soft and devoted touch. A complete contrast to the rest of him, as he continues to thrust into you, fucking his cock deeper inside you and he doesn’t stop, doesn’t let up. 

It’s pleasure. It’s aggravation. It’s love and a defeat and a million other contradictory emotions between you and Marc that may never be resolved. 

And you’re not going to try to. You’re happy to take him as he is, cracks and all. You accept it, his lips pressed against yours. Accept his demanding rhythm as he drives himself into you deeper and deeper. Accept the insistent heat that curls at the base of your spine, until it is a searing and smouldering burn and sparks like ember, numbing your legs with it. It is threatening to consume your very being and burn you into ashes as it flares bright in your lungs and you can no longer breathe as the pleasure of it is ready to overspill, and—

“Baby, you close again?” 

And fuck, that’s—that’s— Your stomach tenses up again. The warmth spreads, twining and branches out along every single vein flooding it with blinding bliss until you’re dizzy with it. 

You’re trying to say yes, trying to nod, but your body isn’t responding to your will anymore. It has a mind of its own, and all it wants is to be closer to Marc, to grab onto him and never let go. Your limbs are wrapped all around him, legs locked around his waist, nails digging into the meat of his shoulders so hard you know you’re breaking skin. The only thing you’re still in control of is to helplessly squeeze down tight on his cock as it slides thick and heavy in you. 

“Oh fuck, that’s–” his voice sounds pitched and almost vulnerable, the arm curled around your leg, squeezing tighter. 

Pleasure builds in you like the tide, rising slow and steady but inexorable, filling you until there's no room for oxygen or thoughts or anything else except the consuming push of Marc’s cock inside of you. 

And then it breaks, ecstasy streaking out along your every nerve, overwhelming and inescapable, threatening to wash you away with it, except that you’re pinned, held safe by the grounding weight of Marc’s body and the reassuring press of his forehead against yours as you come on his cock.  

You open your eyes to find yourself staring up at him, still bleary-eyed and drunk on bliss. You can only make out the colour of his eyes, the dark ink of his hair. But blurry as he is, you’re intimately aware of how he can see all of you. The glazed look that you must be holding in your half-open eyes as wrought out with pleasure as you are. The hair plastered to your forehead. The absolute mess of a state he’s left you in, and how debauched you must look in front of him. Face to face, all of you bare and uncovered, there in its unembellished form for him to see. 

But that means you can see Marc too. As your vision clears, you can pick out every small detail of his expression. The subtle tic of the muscle in his jaw. The furrow in his brow. How his mouth is slack with pleasure. Those rich eyes of his are blown wide open until they’re left exposed. You can see it clearly now, how he’s clearly trying and struggling to hold back. The vulnerability that he’s been trying to hide from the world the entire time you’ve known him. 

Not for the first time, as he holds himself above you, you find yourself marvelling at how beautiful he is. Identical to Steven, yet worlds apart. 

Steven is hope and light and the curve of a gentle smile. Marc is sharp lines and dark shadows and heat behind his pained eyes. Jagged edges to Steven’s soft curves. Jaded cynicism to Steven's cheerful enthusiasm. Dark secrets and carefully hidden skeletons lurking in closets to Steven's forthright honesty.

And god help you, you love them both beyond measure.

The weight of his body is pressing down against you now. Every inch of the smooth golden skin pinned against yours, warm and flushed against your heated flesh. He grinds himself against you, needy, and desperate. There’s no longer any rhythm or logic to it. Just an instinctual primal need to get closer. You spread your legs as wide as you can to welcome him deeper, to take all of him as much as you can even as your thighs ache in protest from overexertion. 

His mouth moves against yours, stuttering and trembling, and it takes you far too long to register the words that are coming from him. 

“Fuck, baby, fuck I’m–” he chokes out brokenly against your lips, his hands on your hips holding on tighter. 

He stills, and you think maybe this is it, that he’s about to come. Anticipation rises in your chest, and you hold him tighter, body clenching down in preparation. 

But he doesn’t come. Just holds himself there, shuddering against you, his forehead against your chin, panting breaths, hot and humid, against the base of your neck. His cock is pulsing where it’s buried thickly inside you. Thighs quivering and barely able to keep them upright where they’re pressed between yours. You know that he wants to come. Needs to come. You just don’t understand why he’s refusing to give in. 

“It’s okay, Marc. You can let go. Come for me,” the words are a struggle to get out. Your voice hoarse and scraped raw in your throat. 

There’s a long moment of stillness, then he heaves a sigh so weary it makes your heart clench, as he starts shaking his head.

“No,” he grits out, voice low and determined as it so often is.  His head comes up, dark, fuck-drunk eyes meeting yours, jaw set at that stubborn angle you’ve come to know so well, and he says it again. 

“No. I– I’m not–“ He cuts off, shaking his head again. “Fuck, not yet,” he says. Then he rallies through, lifting his body away from yours and drives himself deep inside you with a shudder. “Not ready. Don’t want this to end.”

It sounds like a plea, and you’re not sure who he’s pleading with, you or himself, and there is a pang of pain in your chest for him. Because this idiot still doesn’t get it. 

It’s like he’s never known softness. Hardness forged from a lifetime of a man who’s always had to hold himself up without respite. There’s a loneliness in it, of being the one who always has to take care of everyone else with nowhere to put down his burdens. 

Fondness swells up in you and there is nowhere to direct it except for the object of your affection. You wrap your arms tighter around him, smoothing one palm over the sweat-slick, heaving muscles of his back, and whisper reassurances into the hair above his ear. 

“Marc,” you breathe out and at the sound of you calling his name, his eyes snap up to yours. “Nothing’s ending.” 

His arms buckle and he lets out a small choked sound that almost sounds like a whimper. He looks like he can barely hold himself up anymore.  

“You have me,” you murmur, pressing your mouth to his. You kiss the arch of his jaw and mouth at the column of his neck. “Have had me for a long time.” 

He tenses at your words, whole body trembling above you. But he still refuses to let go. 

How many times will you have to keep reaching out to this impossibly stubborn man before he starts believing that you mean it?

Your hands come to the sharp edge of his cheekbones, cradling this face that you have fallen in love with twice over. Not just because it is Steven’s face. Not just because he’s the most beautiful man you’ve ever seen. But because it’s Marc too. 

“I love you.” 

At your words, those determined eyes pitched with dark concentration blanks into a stupefied daze.  

His head tilts slightly, a movement so small it doesn’t register at first that he’s nodding. Then his face drops closer, pressing his lips to yours. The line of his shoulder softens under your locked arms, lowering himself down onto you. His hips sink into you, his cock dragging thickly inside you as deep as it goes. 

You watch in awe as his mouth falls open, eyes rolling back, and you can feel it as he comes inside you. Pulse after devastating pulse. 

And god, he’s so beautiful like this; unruly curls wild and ruined, cut cheeks a faint crimson, skin slick with glistening sweat in the dim light. So perfectly undone and at peace. The pulse of his cock inside you as he spills himself deep inside you is almost secondary.

You bask in it. The warmth of his arms caging you in, his forehead pressing down firm against yours. The feeling of him so deep inside you, you’ll happily drown in the feeling of this man after waiting for him so long. His body slumps, dropping his weight on yours, completely depleted. 

His cock is still hard, arms still trembling when Marc shifts on top of you, trying to raise himself on one elbow. It's too soon for him to move, you don't want him to move, want him to lie on top of you forever.

Logically, you know it’s out of consideration. He’s probably worried that he’s squishing you, but an irrational fear swoops low in your stomach at the idea that he’s going to leave again. Your fingers dig into his forearm, dragging him back towards you. 

He lands on top of you with a quiet and tired grunt in your ear, but there’s no other protest from him. Marc lets you, shifting ever so slightly to make sure that his elbow doesn’t jab into your ribs as he settles on top of you. Then he stays, and you get to listen to the slow steadying of his breath, as the erratic rise and fall of his chest ease into something more even. 

The two of you stay this way for a long time, staring up at each other, with half-lidded eyes worn from exhaustion without speaking, and you catalogue his face as it cycles through a series of micro-expression with each second that ticks by. 

If this was when you’d first known Marc, at first glance, each expression would have looked the same to you. But you know him well enough now that you can tell that the tiny pinch of his brow means something is troubling him. That the narrowing slant of his eyes means he can’t find the right words to express it. That him biting the inside of his cheeks means he’s hesitating on whether he would be offloading on you. Every detail says just as much as Steven’s openly variable animated expressions. 

His eyes blink in quick succession, and Marc takes a deep heaving breath as if bracing himself. Then he’s lifting himself up and away from you by his forearms, slipping out of you to a sharp pained hiss as you whine in response at how empty you feel at the loss. 

He rolls to the side of the bed next to you and settles there, and you feel a bit nervous about what’s going to happen next, because you don't know what is going to come.

“Is this still what you want?” Marc asks. 

He’s looking at you as he says it, but somehow you feel like he’s looking through you, eyes not quite meeting yours. His voice sounds impassive, and if you haven’t spent so much time with him by now, it could easily be mistaken for disinterest or even boredom, instead of the defence mechanism that you know it is. 

“Yes, of course, it is,” you say without hesitation.  

There’s no response from Marc, he’s lying so still next to you. So quiet you can’t even hear him breathing anymore. If it turned out that he’d fallen asleep with his eyes open you wouldn’t be surprised. 

You turn onto your side so that you can scoot even closer to him as you watch him. One sole stray curl is draped across his forehead, and it’s fallen into the line of his big gorgeous brown eyes. So ridiculously pretty, this one. 

Yeah. This is definitely what you want. Him.  Steven. Both. All of them. 

“You’re– okay with all this?” he asks hesitantly, and he looks genuinely puzzled as to why you would be. “With... what happened earlier too?” 

A breathless huff pushes its way up your chest. “I don’t know if ‘okay’ is the right word here, Marc. I’m not sure how to deal with the revelation that gods and monsters are real, and there’s a very high chance I’ll freak out about it tomorrow or next week. But…”

You press a kiss to the side of his cheek as you draw your eyes up and meet those rich expressive eyes of his. There’s no mistaking it, you feel it, in the same way that you do for Steven. Even if it’s different… there’s no doubt in you, haven’t been for a long time about this. 

“What I’m sure of is that I want to be with you. You and Steven. No matter what. I’m not going anywhere. I meant what I said. I want to be your person as well as his. And– and I hope you can be mine.”  

Marc tentatively draws his hand towards you, fingertips searching across the length of your arm until he finds your fingers and weaves them with his. 

The palm of his hand is warm and sturdy, sending a pleasant buzzing sensation across the back of your neck. It’s your favourite thing in the world, whenever Steven does this, and you’re pretty sure it’s going to be your shared favourite when Marc does it too. 

“Yeah”, he finally says after a long moment, “I’d like that.” His voice is soft and quiet, and a kaleidoscope of butterflies swoops your stomach at his warm tone filled with affection.  

Tilting your head upwards, you close the distance between you, pressing your lips to his. It’s sweet and tender as his hand cups your cheeks protectively, like a promise that he’s not going to run anymore and it makes your toes curl into the sheet until you’re giddy.

You clutch at him, hands cupping the back of his neck and lace your fingers into those ridiculously soft curls of his. Marc shivers against you, and you smile like a loon as he ducks his head and buries his face into the crook of your neck contentedly, and exhale deeply. 

Who would have guessed that post-sex, the man would be the world's most grumpy cat turned soft and cuddly, asking to be petted. You comb through the matted locks and the blunt tip of his nose nuzzles into your damp skin. He makes a quiet, content little sound somewhere from the back of his throat like he doesn’t want you to stop and who are you to deny him? 

Your fingertips trail his scalp, from the nape of his neck to the crown of his head, when it occurs to you that you should probably be more careful with his head. 

He was flung several feet in the air and landed head-first into a concrete wall with a bone-cracking sound that still makes you sick to your stomach. You continue to card through his hair, mapping him out in search of any signs of injuries, but you can’t find any and your fingers still. 

It doesn’t make sense. You weren’t put through the ringer in any way near what Marc was tonight and you’ve still ended up with your fair share of scrapes and bruises. But there’s nothing on Marc. 

No swelling, no bumps. No wounds. 

On top of it all you’ve spent the better part of this evening, pulling and tearing at his hair. Your nails had been digging so deep into his shoulders you might as well have been excavating for gold and he hasn’t so much as hissed or flinched in pain even once. 

There’s a faint muffled sound of complaint from Marc as he lies on top of you. It’s so distorted that it takes you a few moments to appreciate that they’re words.

“What's wrong?” Marc asks. 

“You don’t have any injuries. You were hurt.” 

“I was wearing the suit,” he answers in his typical deadpan manner. No background information, no context, no painting out a scene for you. To Marc, the limited information he’s given you should make perfect sense to you. 

You grimace, and you’re just about to have a moan at him, when Marc seems to realise how confusing that explanation must be. He lifts his head from your neck as he continues. “Khonshu’s ceremonial armour. It protects me. Heals me when I need it.” 

An image of the swirl of bandages wrapping itself around Marc’s body to form an otherworldly magical suit plays out behind your mind, and you can’t resist teasing him. 

“So you transform like Sailor Moon and then fight evil at night?”

Marc lifts his eyebrow inquisitively, with a completely blank expression. “I don’t know what that is.” 

“Really? Sailor–” you sputter, shocked he doesn’t know what you’re talking about. “Steven would know that reference.”

“Steven has too much free time,” he sighs, but the fondness hiding under his gruff tone is unmistakable. 

The playful jab at Steven brings a small smile to your face. The levity of it is a nice change of pace from the whirlwind of seismic events and paradigm shifts tonight, because there’s been a lot to take in. Much of which, you’re pretty sure you haven’t fully taken in… Don’t even know how to start to process it. 

Ancient Egyptian gods are real, and your boyfriend—(boyfriends? Just exactly how involved is Steven?)—is some kind of indentured fighter priest who battles invisible monsters—also real—for one of them. 

What is the correct reaction to a revelation like that? How does one even begin to mentally process that? 

“Any other questions? Now’s your chance,” Marc says. 

There is no hostility like before and this time you don’t have to drag it out of him with the persistence of a detective in an interrogation room interviewing a suspect as you ordinarily have to. 

You’re not entirely sure how you feel about that, except that you’re a little bit stunned and you realise that something has shifted between you and Marc. 

He’s… opening up to you. 

You look up at him, and he meets your eyes steadily. There are a million things you still want to ask: What’s the deal with his and Steven’s mum? What did he and Steven go through while they were away? How did he almost die, and how on bloody earth did he manage to just stumble upon an ancient Egyptian God to end up in his service?

Marc hasn’t moved from the spot as he observes you. Still seemingly expressionless, except… 

There’s a tension to the set of his shoulders, isn’t there? And he’s too still—even for Marc… It hits you all at once he’s holding his breath, the line of his lips set in a thin nerve-biting straight line.

He’s waiting for you.

Regardless of how hard Marc tries to hide it, trying to school his expressions, there’s only so much his body language can repress. The ring of his eyes is dilated and vulnerable. 

He’s nervous. 

Marc’s jaw tightens in anticipation and maybe something a little like fear, and it makes your chest ache with an overwhelming need to protect him. Those other questions can wait. You have all the time in the world together. Right now you want to make him feel as safe and cared for as you do. You want to make him smile. 

"So..." you begin, and you see him stiffen, watching as he braces himself like he’s expecting a blow. It’s how you know you’re making the right decision. "Do you actually like my coffee?"

His eyes widen and he sputters out "You– Your–" then barks out a laugh. 

Even in the dark, you can see it, a soft smile on his face that illuminates the darkness of the room with it. A gentle curve, as the dimple of his cheeks carve a deep dent into those hollowed cheeks, the soft crinkle of lines around his eyes. It’s like nothing you have ever seen before. It’s bright and uninhibited. An electrical socket has been plugged in and every nerve in you is flicked alight with excitement. 

It stuns you and takes your breath away, and for the longest moment, you forget about everything else. 

Because god, he’s the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen in your life. 

It takes you several seconds, maybe even a full minute to compose yourself enough to ask him again. 

"Well...?" you prompt, and you’re gifted with the pleasure of watching him try and fail to hide that perfect smile.

"It's… a little more complicated than that," he says, and you narrow your eyes at him, trying to look playfully peeved while tampering your own smile that’s twitching at your lips and failing.

"I like that you make it for me," he tries.

"That wasn't the question, though."

Marc shifts in the bed, scooting closer to you until he’s brushing up against your knees. That small but near-magical smile is still on his face. 

"Tell you what,” Marc murmurs, as he tightens his grip around you, pressing his forehead to yours, sweat-slicked curls tickling your nose. “Tomorrow, let's make it together." 

His voice is so assured, it feels like he’s promising you a certainty, and you trust him with every inch of you. 

A warmth spreads in your chest, and you can feel the dopey grin pulling at your lips until your cheeks almost hurt, but you can’t stop yourself and you don’t think you want to either. 

There is so much that is still unresolved, so many more things you need answers to, but it’s a good start and that’s good enough for tonight. After all, as Steven would tell you: you have all the time in the world.

“That sounds perfect,” you tell him. 

When you wake, the morning light is filtering in through the large windows. The sun is blinding and makes it difficult to see anything at all. 

Reaching out your hand, the spot next to you is cold and empty, any residual heat long gone from the sheets. You’re alone in bed again. 

Marc has really got to stop fucking doing that. 

“Marc?” you call out, but there’s no response. You hesitate for a second before adding, “Steven?”

“Here.”

Then you hear familiar noises coming from the kitchen, and the tension in your chest melts away at the sound of porcelain clinking together. There are no folded clothes by your side, but to your surprise, your watch sits on the nightstand, cracked face turned up, waiting for you. 

A small smile tugs at the corner of your lips, and your stomach warms at the sight. Marc must have gone back to retrieve it while you were asleep. 

You sit up on the bed, bending over to grab a discarded shirt from the floor as well as your knickers from last night, and pull them on, smiling to yourself as you start to make your way across the flat to join him in the kitchen. 

The familiar sweet, bread-like smell wafts out to greet you, and you falter.

Pancakes? That isn’t right. Today’s not Sunday. 

In the bright morning sun, you see him standing, with his back turned against you over the kitchen stove. Wearing only his jeans, bare from the waist above, the carved muscles of his back flexing as he flips the frying pan with a dramatic flair. Even before he speaks, you already know what’s happened.  

“Morning, sweetheart,” he greets you. He's turning his head just enough to throw you a quick glance, and a one-sided crooked smile. 

You stop in your tracks. The cadence is alien, the smile off, but you recognize it immediately. 

Not Marc. Not Steven. But you have met this man before. 

That first night at Steven’s; the man you woke up to who looked at you like you were a stranger; the man who followed you to the lift to return your watch; the same man who towered over the invisible creature with nothing but cold contempt in his eyes as he snuffed out its time on earth with precision and brutality.

All this time, you thought that the first night you’d spent with Steven was also your first encounter with Marc. 

But Marc doesn’t call you sweetheart. Marc doesn’t flirt. Marc doesn’t smirk like he’s trying to imitate something he’s seen on the telly. 

This is detached and impersonal, like he’s not really smiling at all. When Marc smiles it’s snow thawing in the spring.

 It’s funny how you didn’t see it until now. Marc was never the wolf. 

You cross your arms against your chest, planting your feet firmly on the floor, standing up straight and tall as you confront the man before you. 

“You’re not Marc, and you’re not Steven,” you say and you shift on your legs, puffing out your chest in a display of put-on courage. “Don’t you think it's time you introduced yourself, seeing that you’re in my boyfriends’ flat?” 

The man huffs out a laugh, and his accent is different when he speaks again. A New York accent, you think, but almost cartoonishly so, like he’s watched one too many Martin Scorcese movies. It’s oozing out of every word as he speaks with a slow and nasal hum. 

“Nothing gets past you, does it, sweetheart?” 

He sets down the frying pan on the stove, turning it off before he wipes off his hand on a flower-patterned tea towel and extends it towards you, a polite invitation to shake. 

“Name’s Jake Lockley.”

You take a step towards him, and maybe you should be nervous—afraid of this stranger wearing your boyfriends’ face—but the panic and fear from that first night you met him is absent. That painful pounding in your chest is no longer there. 

You accept his hand, looking up into this man’s familiar eyes that are staring down at you in an entirely unfamiliar way. Not Steven’s wide and adoring gaze. Not Marc’s protective and gentle attention. No love resides in those eyes for you at this moment, just curiosity. 

But you’re not scared this time. 

Because come what may, you already know the most important part. Whatever happens next, whoever this Jake turns out to be, it’s not going to change your mind about Steven or Marc.

You’ll take them as they are. Red flags and all.

THE END.

Author's notes

This is the end. I wish I was more coherent to write a meaningful and heartwarming message about what this story has meant to me. How grateful I am to everyone reading it, but I do not think I have any words that can do it justice.

The only thing I can say is thank you. Thank you for reading this, whether you've read this from the first chapter, or whether you only read the first chapter or you've only read bits and pieces. Whether you've commented or liked or reblogged or simply just lurked-read, from the bottom of my heart thank you for giving this story your time, I'm really grateful to you all.

A big thank you to my friends who have listened to me whine and bitch and moan and generally emotionally terrorised them with this story, and especially thank you to my cowriter: thirstworldproblemss who has been put through the ringer with this story and suffered alongside with me. I love you the moooooooooooooooooooosetest

a/n: to be notified of new writing updates follow astroboots-writes and turn on notifs.

[sailoreuterpe]

Ship: Makoami Prompt: Coffee 😳👉👈

"If you drink any more of that, you'll never get to sleep tonight," Makoto murmurs into Ami's hair.

Ami ignores her wife and takes another giant, noisy gulp of coffee.

Makoto sighs in affectionate defeat. "At least let me make you a new pot."

Ami smiles and lifts her face for her victor's kiss.