#say what you want but i know the value of my writing

[sage-nebula]

This has been spinning around in my head since I watched season 2 arc 1, and I can't refrain from putting it down to post anymore.

In season 1, Jayce and Viktor get into a fight when Viktor evades the blockade to go speak to Singed in Zaun. During their fight, Jayce snaps at Viktor that he didn't know that Viktor's friend was from the undercity, and when Viktor asks why that matters, Jayce says the above: [people from the undercity] are dangerous (earlier he had also said, "there are people down there who seem hell-bent on destroying us!"). That's when Viktor grows cold, reminding Jayce that he is from the undercity, and even after Jayce apologizes, Viktor knocks his hand away, choosing to stand up on his own.

In season 2, chembarons hired by Ambessa (though no one knows that at the time) attack the memorial for the dead council members. In the aftermath, Caitlyn calls them animals. Notably, Vi shows no reaction at all to this; she doesn't so much as flinch at Caitlyn's word choice. Instead, while she does downplay what happened to an extent ("they wanted the spectacle, they're trying to scare you"), what's notable is that she separates herself from the people of Zaun. This is especially notable when she tells Caitlyn to call off the invasion, because of the risk it poses for those not from Zaun:

"Down there, you'll be on their terms."

Viktor seems to have pride in the fact that he is from Zaun. He has love for his home. As difficult as life was there, as much as the pollution led to his illness and disability, he has no shame that he's from Zaun and he still sees value and has love for the people there. This is why, when Jayce writes the Zaunites off as "dangerous", Viktor grows cold. He is no different from them, in his mind; if they're dangerous, then so is he.

Vi is . . . different.

In season 1 arc 1, Vi expresses to Vander that she has bought into and believes that those in Piltover are more than those in Zaun:

Now, here, Vi is still grouping herself in with the rest of Zaun. But there is a level of self-hatred (and hatred for one's home) that we don't see in Viktor. Viktor doesn't see himself as lesser than those in Piltover. He doesn't see the Zaunites as lesser than those in Piltover. Vi, however, does. She states this as if it is a fact. And while she loved her family, and has parts of Zaun that she likes (e.g. Jericho's food), it's worth noting that at the end of season 1 episode 1, she isn't telling Powder that they'll liberate Zaun, or fight for Zaun, or anything like that. Instead?

"This city's gonna respect us." This city. Not our city. Here is the first moment we see in which Vi puts some separation between herself and the rest of Zaun. She wants to make them respect her (and Powder). Even if she's less than those in Piltover, she still sees an opportunity for herself to be above those in Zaun.

All of this is to say that, when she has no reaction to Caitlyn calling Zaunites "animals", when she refers to them as "they," when she refers to Zaun as "their terms" . . . ultimately, it isn't too surprising. Vi represents a type of person who does exist in marginalized groups: the self-hating type, who hate others in their group for "drawing aggression" or "negative attention."

Think about queer people, for instance, who hate those who are flamboyant or open about who they are and who they love. The ones who think, "If we just assimilate more, be less of a bother, be less obnoxious, then the queerphobes will accept us." Obviously, other queer people find this type of person extremely frustrating, sometimes even infuriating, because we know that it doesn't matter what we do or how we act; bigots will never accept us.

But what we should understand, and extend compassion for, is that self-hating marginalized people are that way because it's a defense mechanism -- a survival mechanism, really. They can't square why bigots hate them, so they reach for any kind of explanation they can find, even if that explanation ultimately blames others in their own group and does more harm than good. Not to mention that hating yourself for who you are is often a result of long-term, systemic abuse -- the exact same kind of abuse that comes from living under an oppressive regime that murdered your parents and will assault you at any given opportunity, even for something as petty as your little sister miming shooting them with finger guns.

Vi says that she, "grew up knowing [she] was less than them." This is extraordinarily damaging to the psyche, and Vi's self-hatred -- and the extension of that hatred toward Zaun, not wanting to save them but wanting to make them respect her -- is a trauma response to that. One that Viktor, obviously, doesn't share (and neither does Ekko, or Jinx) -- but everyone reacts to trauma differently.

The point is, we saw shades of this already in Vi's childhood; her statement that she's less than topsiders, but that she wants those in the undercity to respect her. So when Caitlyn calls the Zaunites animals, Vi doesn't flinch. She agrees. And she speaks of them as separate from her, because Caitlyn has already designated her as one of the good ones (reinforced to her by what Maddie told her Caitlyn said right before the memorial), and because, well, those who attacked the memorial did do something horrible. And maybe if they wouldn't do that, and maybe if Jinx hadn't blown up the council building -- maybe if they were better behaved -- then the enforcers wouldn't have to invade and do what they were about to do, now would they? Those in Zaun -- or at least those in Zaun who decided to strike against Piltover -- brought it on themselves, so Vi isn't with them. She's with Caitlyn, and is okay with referring to them as animals.

It's interesting to think about.

[kinichval]

haiiii ;3 can i request kinich and a reader who’s like half siren? like in h20 where when they’re dry they have legs and mualani finds her injured and keeps her in the springs and one night when he goes to see her she’s singer and he like falls in love? i’m not the best with ideas but ignore if you don’t want to lol

hi !! ty for requesting :3 i love the idea so i gave it a shot. i'm not deep into the siren mythology so i switched the lore and tried my best writing this one < 3

"you can't just take in a random stranger in your house just because they're injured, mualani."

"but they were suffering and needed urgent help!"

"then, you should've taken them to the clinic. who knows how severe their injuries are or if they have good intentions."

the conversation of your savior and a stranger stirs you awake from your slumber, eyes fluttering open as your mind gradually processes that it is time to get up. well, maybe if your legs weren't a bit impaired then standing up would've been useful.

except you're not in the best shape as you found yourself tangled in washed-ashore seaweed causing you to trample over rocks and bruising your legs; this means that you can not transform back to your siren appearance (and vice versa if your tail was injured). thank archons, your ridiculous situation ended soon when a kindhearted mualani decided to tend your injuries.

you were honest with your true self with mualani, believing in your instincts that she is as kind as she shows herself to be. like you, she was one with the waters, a soul that's tied to the flow of the oceans and destined to live freely just as the waters liberty to just be.

in the silence of mualani's shelter where you rest and heal, there's the envy creeping up in your heart that you desperately want to repress. but no, it makes itself known for you are not like mualani.

mualani is a free-spirited surfer, an adventurer of the seas; while you were a siren shunned out by society, viewed as a menace and a threat to the land's safety. kill a siren on sight before they destroy your life is what the people would say.

but you do not have the heart to decline her kindness, rather you want to see her heart as a chance to be seen by humans in a different light. because if mualani can, then why can't they?

still, you uphold the value that your mother had instilled in you; there's no point in proving your kindness when they do not believe in your existence. so you remain hidden within the confines of mualani's home, waiting for your injury to subdue until you're able to become siren again.

"kinich, this is yn. yn, this is 'malipo' kinich." mualani introduced you to a trusted friend of hers with enthusiasm high enough to reach the heavens. simply, you give the dendro user a nod and a gentle smile, he returns the gesture with a civil nod of acknowledgement. kinich's reserved attitude is intimidating, given that mualani is the only human you had ever interacted with, you're confused how human relations work and whether the land culture is different from those who reside under the waters.

you trust that mualani hasn't let a word out about your identity, yet it doesn't assure you when you feel the man's skepticism clawing at your skin as if he's ready to capture you the moment he confirms your true nature.

or maybe you're just overthinking.

kinich never intended for his lingering stare to feel like a dagger pointed at your neck, on the contrary, he harbors the curiosity to learn about you. he often finds how his mind wanders off to mualani's newfound friend whenever the usually occupied space in his head is vacant. who is she? why is he so subconsciously adamant on knowing her? only he fails to grasp a clear picture of reason as to why the voices inside his head are telling him to seek at least a fragment of her soul.

"mualani, thank you for taking care of me."

as a parting token, you granted mualani to experience your siren form. the two of you are within the privacy of the springs that only a few ever come to visit under the moonlit night sky.

your heart sinks at the thought of returning back to the deep, uncertain if you shall ever come up to the surface once your clan learns about your predicament knowing that despite you were well taken care of, they will only emphasize the what-ifs and assert the dangers of a siren caught on land.

natlan's springs are peaceful. you requested to have time in the waters for yourself the next night; promising that when morning comes, you are off to return to the ocean where you belong. but right now, you are neither your ascribed identity or whom you want be, you are just part of the waters.

cold air hits your skin, you lightly splash the water with your luminescent tail and softly smile at the quietness. sometimes, the water doesn't have to be constantly flowing, staying still is alright.

in the midst of your solitude, you hum a tune that your mother used to lull you to sleep when you were a young siren. your voice mimics the gentleness of a mother's love, a cradling feeling of tenderness and comfort. slowly, it shifts to a song, your voice becoming louder and alluring.

and just like a serenade, your song had captivated a certain saurian hunter's attention, he stands on the opposite edge of the spring right across where you were situated in. your eyes still closed and immersed in your enchanting euphony.

"i believe i'm not under a spell, but allow me to compliment your melody. may i stay here and listen?"

kinich fixes his composure, hiding the nervousness inside his pocket. but oh, the moonlight acts like a spotlight on your figure, your true nature completely open for him to realize that you are not human at all.

but kinich isn't fazed, neither does he yield the urge to capture you in exchange for the prestige that comes with catching a siren alive.

"are you not afraid?"

instead, you were the one afraid, wrapping your arms around your torso as if it's any help in shield your true form from his green and amber eyes.

"i'm fascinated. you are a beauty."

at this point, kinich does not intend to supress his longing need for you. he's conscious and sober, implying that a siren's song is not all about luring prey into the waters.

sometimes, just like yn, a siren's song is an open book to her innermost thoughts and heartbeat's poems. it doesn't need to hold words for kinich to depict the sentiments carried into the wind as she sings; to be known, to be understood.

"may i stay with you for tonight?"

this time, you wish for the moon to stay in its place, for time to pause, and for kinich to stay in the springs with you.

[zarathelonewolf]

Some people need to write in this absence of courage though, and purely because of it, and purely FOR it.

Not to say that I don't get your point: it is a good point and I would like to see more hopeful dark stories, stories similar to what you prefer. I would prefer them too, ideally.

However sometimes people really do not have the courage to "want something better, to know that it was wrong"... Because to THEM (and I say this as someone who is similar to them to an extent, though I fight everyday to be hopeful) it does not seem like an act of courage, it seems like an act of insolence.

Why insolence? Because of a lot of things.

"How dare you (general you, not you, OP) want something better? The result of what was done for you is a negative thing that pushes you to do negative things, how dare you think that you should want something better?"

This is the insolence I speak of. The insolence they think they are culpable of. Sometimes people really do need to show the trauma "bare". They need to write out the negative voice. It's what they know and they feel isolated because people keep telling them it'll get better but they are not there yet, so they want to show their frustration. They may want to reject the idea of not taking up space, alternatively, when they show their trauma: so they show it in a gritty manner and without solution to spite the people that tell them they should just keep it all in unless they have healed, or unless they have the intention of doing so.

It may not be hopeful dark art, that's true. But that's not what dark stories HAVE TO be in order to be "good art", either. They don't want to fix something. They just want to show it. They are "vent art".

And it is needed. By people that don't have the "courage" yet, that maybe won't ever have that courage. They need to see something other than their mind crumble... something other than their body, something other than their voice, something other than their memory while it's crumbling. They need to see a story that crumbles without getting back up. That way they feel less alone, perhaps. They feel that the suffering is real and that it does not need healing to be considered suffering. Especially when others interact with the story and cry alongside them while in a similar situation.

A weird broken sort of solace so to speak.

Is it nice? No, not really. But in certain moments of people's lives it's what they need. In a twisted sense, for some people, all they will ever want to experience. It's not just insolence after all. For certain people, darkness itself is the refuge, because the world outside is too bright and a lot people want to be rid of their dark thoughts and want the victims themselves to be rid of the dark thoughts and find a solution for them, whereas these victims just CAN'T, they can't manage yet and they feel inadequate so they produce something that makes them feel like they matter for something.

Something dark and gritty and hopeless.

Art isn't good due to the fact that it expresses correct values. Art is good because it makes you feel, or merely because you feel drawn to interacting with it. Same goes for dark art. It is good dark art when it makes you feel dark stuff, whether or not it heads towards a good or bad ending.

I say this as someone who is hopeless about herself and himself and hopeful for others. Weird right? But it's how I exist. People's comfort sometimes makes me feel even lonelier. I would prefer silence and reading dark content AND hurt/comfort most of the time.

I come from a place of being pressured into healing. I want to heal on my own now, I don't trust therapists for shit. I will find my hope but not now. And dark content with hopelessness, vent art done purely for the vent and not for the healing helps me immensely because I feel my resistance to healing seen without someone telling me that I can heal because I know I CAN, I just don't want to because people have all sorts of expectations about how my healing should be, but while people can object to my healing not really being healing, they can hardly disagree that the dark stuff I write isn't dark. At least in my experience.

People have differing types of sensitivity, and not all people who are lovers love themselves. Love doesn't have to be total, not all people experience it like that. Sensitivity does not have to make you like dark hopeless stories, but it does not mean you are sensitive only if you prefer hopeful stories OR when you reject completely dark stories. People can be "lovers" and sensitive in all three of cases. So I agree about being frustrated for people saying "you're not sensitive enough" because that's not true, your sensitivity simply differs from theirs.

Vent art can be self care just as much as hopeful art. And dark content does not have to be vent art, it can also just want to make people witness gross stuff because they enjoy gross stuff being depicted for the sake of it (to make an example: people with certain laraphilias that cannot be explored safely in real life).

I am merely playing devil's advocate, with the devil being something I love: my only chance at venting without feeling pressured into a reaction. So I will concede this exposition may seem personal, almost too personal, and angry, but I tend to be passionate about the things I love.

I hope I didn't anger people with my response to this. But then again, I should take up space more often...

too much to say in a post but i re-read (partly skimmed) my manuscript of my book from a year and a half ago and it's so fucking good and also feels like a hemisphere of my brain has been returned to me. like oh yeah. my creative self. the fullness of my being. i missed you

i need to fucking talk about it but it's intimidating

[princessfbi]

Do you still write for buddie or are you exclusively a bucktommy writer?

I write, as I always have, whatever brings me joy.

I'm going to say something and this is not directed at you Nonnie. It's just something I've needed to get off my chest and you've unfortunately opened the door. This is something that's been happening since the moment I "deviated" from what other people have been demanding.

Fanfic is not my job. Creating content is not my job. Crafting your escapism is not my responsibility.

I write for me. I write what I want to write and when I want to write it. I am not a machine. I am not getting paid. I am not here serve to the masses. The sheer entitlement some people have had these last few months has been exhausting. When we, the authors, see you talk about how we've "forsaken" you or you talk about how you can't understand what it is we see in something you personally don't want to read? The answer is simple: it's because we like it. It's because it brings us joy. It's because it's not fucking about you.

My fanfic is about me.

Let's look at the timeline of my works:

Most recent going down.

Bucktommy

Tumblr prompts which include Bucktommy, Buddietommy, and Buddie

Buddie

Buddietommy

Bucktommy

Buddie

Bucktommy

All of that has been written post 7x04.

Do you know how many words I have written for Buddie?

1,558,689 Words.

Over a million words have been dedicated to Buddie.

So excuse me for doing something else that may also bring me joy. Excuse me for having the audacity to not cater to your every whims and pleasure. Fanfics are a form of escapism. I get it. But this is not my job. This is not a Starbucks. I do not owe you anything and to imply otherwise just shows how much you truly do not value it. Half of you can't even be bothered to leave a comment. You spit in the face of people's joy and you have been cruel, mean spirited, and unkind. All of you.

I am a person with wants and needs including a moment of goddamn peace in this shit show of a world we find ourselves in. I am entitled to curating and creating my own form of joy. I am a person. I should not have to beg you to see that. And the fact that these last few months people cannot and will not acknowledge that makes me not want to write for Buddie ever again.

I'm going to because that is my joy. I am making the choice to share it with the world. But it will be on my terms. Because what I write is about me. It is for me.

So if that means I write for Bucktommy or Buddie or some entirely different show or movie that catches my attention then it will be because I have decided I want to do it. Not anyone else.

[themoodyestj]

Jensen is a white, rich, straight, man, living in a country that favors people like him over everything else, he controls the finances of his family, he has a squeaky clean reputation.

he's so strong that he can lift Jared over his head with no trouble.

do you seriously think Danneel has a chance against him? if there's a inbalance of power in that relationship, Jensen is clearly not the one with a disadvantage.

so if there was a problem with their marriage, why should i asume that Jensen is the one being abused? when all evidence suggests that it's most likely to be the other way arround.

i mean, he is the one who gets to go out there to shine and expand his career while she stays behind taking care of the kids, with seamingly no life of her own. for all we know, he could be shamelessly sleeping around and D just having to shut up and endure for the sake of their children.

Why do I have the feeling that an anon that writes awfully like you sporadically comes into my or my mutuals inbox asking the exact same question?

And if that's the case, what's the issue? Are words hard to understand?

But in case it's not, let me provide the answer, prefacing that whatever I write here is pure speculation based on my personal and professional experience.

No he doesn't. Unfortunately for him, Jensen has the reputation his fans let him have. And opinions on him will differ depending on which part of the fandom you are addressing. If his wife wanted to start a rumor, all she would have to do would be to cry wolf. Unfortunately, there are many people that still think like you and fabricating something to tarnish his image, especially coming from the wife, would be super easy. The justice warriors of this world would have a ball defending the poor defenseless damsel from, like you put it, the mean white rich straight man.

Strength, power, money mean nothing in an abusive relationship. Violence is rather a consequence than a form of control (although it can become control later on). I've seen cases in where the abused makes more money than the abuser. I've seen cases in where the abused had more power, did more around the house and the abuser was, in reality, completely dependent on them. Abuse is not black and white, it's an ocean of gray with many specs of many colors.

What is the real key here is how easy the abused is to manipulate. Take someone, for example, who is already somewhat fragile from abused suffered in the past from a parent. Add a few mishaps that make them feel less worthy, uncapable of seeing their real value. And then put them with a narcissist. That person can have all the power in the world, but the narcissist will make them believe they can lose it all in a blink of an eye, and only with the narcissist they can keep it.

It's not about having power. It's about whom the victim believes has the power.

If he held the power in this case, he would be home a lot more frequently to exert said power. If there is something abusers like is to see the fruits of their manipulation. He wouldn't say his wife "runs a tight ship", he would praise himself. He wouldn't call her a strong woman, he would imply he is the strong man. Abusers don't give away power. They take it. They like to be the good strong heroes for their audience.

On the other hand you have a paraphernalia of instances in which she implies he doesn't help at home, he's messy, he didn't cry when his kid was born, she was the one helping him with his acting, etc. All things she says to make herself look good. I'm yet to see a true compliment towards her husband. Most often that not, she is putting him down," playfully". And she would do a lot more if she thought it would stick/not ruin her meal ticket.

Furthermore, if she was the victim, she would not make jokes at the abuser's expense, for fear of retaliation. She wouldn't initiate contact, she wouldn't try to touch him or kiss him.

He's the one who gets to... Probably run.

She stays behind "taking care of the kids"... do you count ordering nannies around to take care of the kids? And she does have a line of her own. She did "charity", initiated a jewelry line, became the "power producer"... The thing is, she's incompetent. All she touches turns to shit. Her lack of a life is not due to her husband, she only has herself to blame. Besides, she's not alone. She made sure to surround herself with people she trusted while simultaneously trying to drive him away from the people he trusted.

And maybe she isn't the one having to shut up for the sake of the kids. There are two parents in this equation, did you forget? She could be staying for the kids, but so could he.

Anyway, there's a lot more but my time and patience are limited.

[fandomfixationstation]

Asexual Reader x TWST Characters: Part One! Rewritten

This is a rewrite of earlier posts I once wrote on a different blog. I am revisiting this and trying to improve on what I wrote and once again doing this for myself and other asexuals who lack the content and kindness others get. Writing this for every fanfic I've read where the character breaks up with the reader for being asexual and doing better. 

That said, Everything will be entirely my headcanons and you aren’t required to agree with my interpretations of the characters and story.

Vil Schoenheit

Vil will give you a fond smile, because honestly he’s just happy you are willing to tell him, and that you feel safe enough to do so. He’ll treat you no differently than he has, still being a caring and considerate boyfriend. Since boundaries are the most important thing in any relationship he’s probably going to make sure that he understands your boundaries and make sure that none have changed for you. Or if some boundaries have changed to make sure he understands them and to make mental notes. After all, he knows very well what it’s like to have someone cross boundaries, he absolutely would not want to cross his significant others boundaries and be the source of their discomfort.

Vil has always been one to find different ways to show affection, some more traditional than others. Gifting flowers, brushing your hair, doing each other's nails, greeting you with a kiss to the back of your hand, Taps on the shoulder or wrist to say I love you, holding pinkies, or even pinkie promises. He absolutely cherishes forehead kisses above all else, he’d even lean down for one if requested. He’d find any way to bring a smile to your face because that’s all he really wants, is for you to be happy.

Honestly, I think the longer the relationship goes on, and more specifically as his understanding of asexuality develops. I think Vil slowly comes to the conclusion that all too well describes himself. He comes to enjoy quality time, and other gestures of intimacy that he finds more enriching and cherish worthy. In fact he learns the value of words of affirmation and learns to appreciate them in a new light with his significant other. Because giving sincere compliments and affirmations to someone he cares about deeply feels beautiful and receiving them from the same person ? even more so.

At the end of the day, He’ll always make sure you're comfortable with what he is doing. If you ask him to stop, he’ll listen and stop and make sure you're okay. He mostly just wants someone he can trust and spend his spare time relaxing with. Considering the rest of his time is spent being busy and stressed. So being able to make each other comfortable and spend time resting and relaxing, making each other smile is more than enough for him.

Jamil Viper

Jamil at first might not completely understand, however he is a fantastic listener, so he will let you explain and ask questions to make sure he understands completely. He is very calm and understanding throughout the whole thing. He’ll make sure to ask what is acceptable and what is completely off the table. Regardless of whatever those boundaries may look like he is bothered because at the end of the day he just wants you to be comfortable and happy. To him it's rather simple like that. Because he values your boundaries and your comfort. Much like he wants his significant other to understand and respect his own.

He most certainly shows love in less physical ways, touch isn’t something he is particularly good at. However, he is quite fond of gifting his significant other two things, flowers and food. The flowers are specifically chosen with care, they always have a hidden meaning of their own, and he often doesn’t enjoy cooking for others, for his significant other it is different. He wants to make sure they are well fed and taken care of.

More importantly he is just a sucker for quality time, especially since he is also a busy person. So if you guys are just in the same room spending time together he is very appreciative of that time together. Sometimes that may look like cuddling together and not doing anything for about 30 or 40 minutes. Sometimes that looks like him doing whatever chores he has to get done while talking to you while you do something completely different. Whatever works for the two of you that day or that moment.

Jamil values communication significantly, so i’ll always be communicating what he is doing or what he plans to do, and if you voice your discomfort or disinterest he will absolutely understand and respect that. Especially if you do the same in kind for him when he isn’t comfortable with something. Needless to say he’ll always make sure that the two of you are on the same page.

Floyd Leech

As I once stated before, This to Floyd, Has changed absolutely nothing about your relationship with him. He still gets cuddles? Perfect. He still gets hugs? Even better. He does apologize whenever he does cross a boundary and learns to make up for it and not do it again. He does enjoy physical contact but that doesn’t mean he’s going to cross your boundaries, besides there are different ways to do so. He quite enjoys even the most subtle of touch.

Though, there might be some questions farther down the line that he might have, however that is something he will talk about with his significant other and the two will decide on how you both will handle things moving forward. Because he is considerate about his significant others' wants and thoughts on important and trivial matters. Especially considering how much damage he would create in the hypothetical of someone just being disrespectful towards his significant other, for any reason.

That said, Floyd is more than happy to just spend time with you. That may be pulling you along to pull some prank, go on an adventure of some kind, scare the daylights out of younger students, or maybe just being a cuddle puddle on the floor, either watching something together or talking endlessly about anything and everything. You’d be surprised how philosophical and down to earth Floyd can get sometimes. Oftentimes talks can go for hours and feel very cathartic.

Honestly as long as you enjoy supporting him in whatever he is doing whether that's on the sports team or whatever antics he gets up to he doesn’t mind or care. As long as you are both happy and enjoying life to the fullest. He, far more cares about being able to dance with you under the moonlight and having thought provoking conversation at late hours that ends with you telling him to shut up and go to bed because it's 3 am.

Azul Ashengrotto

The first thing that comes to mind while rewriting this for Azul is that I think he would honestly be relieved. Clears the air for him and removes a lot of self placed expectations from himself. Honestly makes him feel better and helps him relax a little bit in the relationship. Big heart to heart conversation about wants, needs, expectations and boundaries that should leave you both feeling better and more confident with each other.

He will do his best to set aside time to spend time with you, and when he has to cancel plans he often will get you something to make up for it. Not that it’ll solve the problem but he usually does it so he can give it to you in person and spend time with you anyway. Its usually something that you had mentioned needing or wanting or needing a replacement of something. He wants his gifts to be thoughtful, practical and helpful.

Even when it comes to simply cuddling on the couch he’ll make sure you're comfortable and make sure you're okay with where his hands are resting. He enjoys quiet peaceful relaxing time with his significant other. Nothing has to be happening, maybe the radio is on, or the tv. Maybe you're both doing your own things, but just getting to be in each other's presence with no expectation of the other is nice.

Post it note messages. He won't admit how soft he gets when he sees a note you left him. Not to mention he’ll find ways to slip you notes in return. They will always be unapologetically sweet and sappy. Not to mention he’ll find ways to just let you know that he was thinking of you and that he loves and cares about you. Even if it is just a short message saying I love you.

Lilila Vanrouge

Previously I had said Lilia was Asexual, today I say he is still Asexual and very much so polyamorous, No I won’t elaborate on how or why. He is a hopeless romantic by nature and that manifests in many different ways. He will be the most understanding and accommodating and will continue to fall head over heels for you. He’d do many things for those he cares and loves oh so dearly, and you will be able to feel his affections on an emotional level.

Poetry, Love letters, cheesy pickup lines, flowers, cute or thoughtful gifts, he’d even serenade you outside your bedroom window if you let the man. Most of the ways he shows love aren’t very physical to the touch, they are actions of love. Doing laundry for you, or getting you coffee while you're busy. Bringing you something to help you fall asleep on a sleepless night. Telling a story to make you laugh or maybe feel better. He’ll literally sweep you off your feet if you let him.

Consider him inviting you over for afternoon tea on a day off, a harp and piano playing a soft melody as the two of you dance in the gardens peacefully. Honestly he’d probably pull this off at any time of day for as long as it felt magical and enchanting for you. Because at the end of the day he just wants his significant other to feel loved. Ideally the goal for him is for you both to continue to fall in love over and over again.

Cold winter nights will be spent drinking your favorite warm or winter drink of choice, cuddled up together by the fireplace. Lilia softly humming a melody of unknown or forgotten origin. Curled up in more handmade blankets than you can count. This could also apply to cold rainy days.

[zepskies]

@lamentationsofalonelypotato

The angst was so real (in the best way)! 😭

She does, she's just afraid to admit it to herself and afraid to have those feelings for someone who doesn't love her back. And it really makes you want to hit her over the head with a frying pan LOL. And thank you! That's how I intended it to be, which is even more heartbreaking 😭

It does make sense, poor thing. 😭 She's so unwilling to believe he could love her the way she wants/needs, while he's hesitating to allow himself to do it. And I'm thinking he's fighting off some self-doubt/self-worth issues as well?

I love this journey of self-discovery for her, both with her brother and past, and with her expanding powers. It's pique Hero's Journey stuff! 💚

Plus, I really think that the creature is adorable, well, besides the murder tendencies. (I guess we could also say that about Ben LMAO)

LMAO factssss. Who could say no to that adorably confused grandpa face?

The reader is killing me tbh. I know I've said this before, but writing slow burn is literally almost as bad as reading it. Don't get me wrong I LOVE slow burn, but oh my stars sometimes it's so frustrating for them to both be in so much denial lol. I shouldn't complain because I did this to myself and now it really is "oh look the consequences of my own actions" lol.

LOLL the slow burn is a killer for both of us! "The consequences of our own actions" is so deeply relatable for the writing process. 🤣🤣

Thank you so much!💗 For me there really is something wonderful about reading/seeing creative chaos in a home, and also looking at creative spaces that people have. I think that there is warmth and comfort in a home that looks lived in. It's why I don't love minimalism, because it looks cold if that makes sense lol.

Aw you're welcome! I totally agree. I love seeing that as well -- it's like getting a window into a person's mind through their living space. I don't like minimalism for that reason either!

Again, I was so on the fence about Soothsayer, but what you said about her being in "an even better position to give her advice when it comes to that man" is exactly why I decided to include her.

Honestly it was a great twist! It makes her friendship with Ben more fleshed out and her own past, and how it serves to help the reader now. Especially now that it seems she's going to help get the reader and Ben together! 😂

I know 😭 She is going to realize it soon and I am so excited about that reveal. Oh plus I do think that she does know deep down that she does love him and care about him, but she's afraid to admit it because she doesn't want to fall for someone who she believes doesn't value relationships like she does.

God I can't wait!! lol And I totally get that. She really does seem to realize how deep her feelings run for him, but she's afraid, for the reasons you said. 🥲🥲

Mayyyybbbbeeeee...😉 Honestly, as much as I love reading fics where the reader isn't a supe, there's always a little part of me that can't help but see the reader growing old and Ben staying the same, and it always breaks my heart. There really is something so intimate and romantic about being able to truly spend your life with someone else, not just your life and then they go on for another few centuries.

Ooooh yesssss. 😏 And totally agree with you there! It's too bittersweet for me when you know one of them is going to die someday and the other keeps living on, carrying the weight of their memory. It's why I had to come up with that twist in BMD loll. Thank you for noting on that! It took some head scratching and BS science (and some inspo from my love of Smallville), but I think the reasoning was convincing enough on how the reader in BMD "caught up" with his longevity of life. 😂 I also love the idea of the plants giving her healing abilities and prolonging her life through that cell regeneration. 💚💚

It's my favorite line too! That and the bundt cake 😂. But you're right, he's afraid of everything that he's feeling and after Countess, he's not sure if he should fall for someone again.

Can't forget the bundt cake!!

Oh yeah, Countess sure fucked him up. 😬 That, along with the torture and years of being treated like a god in all other respects. 🫠

Oh Ben, he'll get there. He just needs some actual love in his life, and someone stubborn enough to not only put up with his shit, but like you said, "take a chance" on him. 😉

It's always my pleasure to read your stories, hun! Giving the feedback is the least I can do. 💕

Chapter 14: Don't Be A Bundt Cake

Pairing: Soldier Boy x f!reader, Reader POV, Soldier Boy POV

Summary:  When you decided to work with Butcher and his merry band of supe hunters to take down Homelander, you never expected to be saddled with a sullen, grumpy, jerk like Soldier Boy when the job was done. The more you're around him the more you hate him, but you can't help but wonder, is he really as big a jerk as you think? Reader is a supe with plant powers. This takes place in an AU about a month after the end of The Boys Season 3, in which Butcher has let Soldier Boy continue to work with him on his team.  (I'm real bad at summaries, please forgive me!)

Tropes: Enemies to Lovers (Not in this chapter), Slow Burn, Age Difference (Reader is in her 20s), Soft Ben/ Soldier Boy, Protective Ben/Soldier Boy, Miscommunication Trope

Word Count: 13.1K

Warnings: I'm going to label this 18+ because Soldier Boy (he's a warning and everyone knows it), Swearing, Mentions of Sex, Sexual Innuendo, Talks of Death, DENIAL, Idiots in Love, Pining by the Reader (and SB, but he won't admit it) Depressing Thoughts, Mentions of sexual assault/rape (not detailed at all, really just in passing) Talks about weed, Sexist comments, Ben makes derogatory comments, Threatening Ben/Soldier Boy might be a little bit OOC.

Note: This is told from Reader's perspective. Any references to the reader is made using you or your. There is minimal use of y/n. I tried my best to proofread, but nobody's perfect. If you don’t like, don’t read, but if you do like, you’re my favorite!

Internal monologue is in italics and is in first person.

Series Masterlist

Main Masterlist

A/N: I am so sorry this one took me a bit longer. The writers block was fighting me the whole way, but we are very closely nearing the end of this series and the moment the reader and Ben stop being so stinkin' stubborn.

Reader POV

You lean your forehead against the cool window, watching the world flash by in a flurry of color. The wooded forests had vanished hours ago and all that was left were the yellowed sprawling fields of corn and grain and family farms that were laid sporadically along the interstate. Each one a little world that caught the flecks of golden sunlight as the sun began to peak above the horizon.

The bus rolled smooth and steady over the weathered pavement towards it's destination and was filled with an odd assortment of people young and old. There was man with a brightly colored parrot that had been singing "It's A Small World After All" since you left NYC, a woman with a little boy playing with an iPad and who refused to turn down the volume no matter how many times his mother asked him to, a group of teenagers a few seats up that continued to pass around a flask, and due to how far back you were sitting on the bus an uncomfortable smell emanated from the bathroom each time the door was opened.

But you didn't notice any of it.

The only thing on your mind were the events that happened almost twenty hours ago. They continued to circle your mind, playing over and over again like a perverted cassette tape making you sink further into the worn cloth covered seat at the back of the bus. The images were haunting, some new and some old, but all the more still horrible to re-live.

The song "Nights In White Satin" floating into the backseat of your family's car, the flash of unnatural light you knew was never lightning, the caskets at your parent's funeral covered in flowers that were much to pretty to lay on something so morbid, Elijah's body succumbing to the poppies that ripped him apart, the proud sneer on your brother's face when he admitted to killing your parents, Darren's broken and bloodied body strewn in pieces over the street with the creature standing over him with a dripping red maw, the ruined building that housed "Please Don't Die" reduced to nothing more than rubble, and the look on Ben's face when you turned your back on him and fled the scene.

For some reason that particular image seemed to cling on to you and refused to fade. You'd never seen him look that way, almost… helpless and a little fearful. In all the time you'd known him, Ben had never looked at you that way. Sure you'd seen him proud, angry, cocky, lustful, mischievous, but never fearful. And you were sure that it wasn't an emotion that he was used to feeling, but that begged the question… why?

Why was he looking at me like that? Why wouldn't he let me go? And what was he afraid of?

The creature curled in your lap snorts something in it's sleep, turning it’s head further into the cradle of your elbow to shut out the brilliant early morning sunlight. It was now the size of a toaster and had warranted several odd looks whenever you got off to change buses, but you didn't care.

You weren't sure about anything anymore. Everything your brother confessed to you made you feel like you were living a lie and the revelation of exactly what your powers could do- take life from plants to heal yourself, create whatever the hell it was on your lap, and speak to plants… it scared you.

You thought for so long that you knew everything about your powers, that you were in control, but now you weren't sure.

You felt different, as if something had unlocked deep down that you couldn't shut up again.

You'd felt different after you killed Elijah, but this was more alive, weaving and twisting in the pit of your stomach. You felt more connected to the earth, to the world outside the bus even though you were divided by glass and metal. You could feel the energy that thrummed through the body of the creature on your lap, bending to your will, the life force of the plants it was formed from molding with you, becoming a part of you.

You felt so different than the person you had been before Darren entered the shop, so uncertain, and there was only one place you wanted to be when you felt like this… home. You couldn't wait to run up the worn front steps of your grandmother's house and into her arms. She always knew what to say in times like this.

And you desperately needed the comfort of her embrace.

The phone in your pocket buzzes again and you flip the screen to see the ridiculous selfie Annie and you had taken on Halloween last year. The one that you'd both spent dressed up as the two brothers from your favorite paranormal tv show. It wasn't the first time she'd called. Annie had called and texted you more times than you could count over the past twenty hours but you didn't answer her. You didn’t want to.

It was the first time that you didn't want to talk to her, but talking to her meant that you'd have to re-live all of it again and you were clawing at the last shred of sanity you had left to keep it together.

The overwhelming waves of emotion kept pummeling you, dragging you deeper beneath the white surf. Each one brought the memories of what happened surging over you and were followed by everything that Darren said to you. Years of taking care of Darren and doing whatever he wished were tearing at your soul, years of giving up little things in your life to make him happy, and years of taking care of a man who you thought cared about you, but hated you enough to kill your parents and try to kill you too.

It made your skin crawl. Each time your brother told you that he loved you was an even bigger lie and now that you knew the truth and saw him for what he was, it felt like you were drowning. The darkness that ebbed just on the edge was begging you to leap into the abyss, but you were resisting the best you could.

The tears had stopped falling miles ago, but you couldn't stop the memories or the emotion that formed a cold ball in the pit of your stomach.

A sigh works it's way up and you pull your legs on the seat underneath you, jostling the creature on your lap that raises it's head for a moment to blink it's black eyes at you sleepily.

It was surprisingly docile right now, especially considering that twenty hours ago it had ripped your brother to shreds. In fact it seemed to understand how upset you were and had spent the better part of the last twenty hours rubbing it's head against your arm as if trying to bring you some comfort. It was settled on your lap, the weight of it a comfort, almost like a weighted plushy that gave you something to focus on.

"It's alright buddy." You whisper, scratching him under his chin. "We're almost home."

The phone in your jacket pocket buzzes again, but when you pull it out to turn it off, you catch a glimpse of the screen, and you hesitate. Because this time it's not Annie who's calling, it’s Ben.

The picture that flashes on the screen under the contact name "Gramps" is the picture of Mr. Fredrickson from Up. It always made you smile whenever he called you and you saw the picture because Ben did often remind you of him. He was certainly just as grumpy as Mr. Fredrickson and just as out of touch, but you thought it was cute.

Your thumb hovers over the answer button and you think about talking to him.

But what would I say?

You weren't sure what to say to him, or why you wanted to speak to him so badly, why you wanted him to be sitting here on the bus with you as you went home, and why you wanted him to hold you against his chest while you allowed yourself to break, but you did. You wanted to feel his awkward shoulder pat and his awkward version of hand holding and you wanted to hear him try to tell you to "buck up" or whatever he thought that a comforting word should be.

He's really not the best at that.

You smile to yourself at the memory of how he tried to comfort you back at the hospital, but the longer you sit there and look down at the picture on the screen the worse you feel.

Maybe that scared you more than your newfound powers, how much you were realizing that you needed him, how much you depended on him when things got too much for you to bear. The memory of him appearing as soon as you needed him back at the shop, another of him grabbing Darren and throwing him into the street as soon as Darren insulted you comes in a flash, and finally followed by the memory of Ben carrying you out of Elijah's office while you curled into his chest. You couldn't remember too much from that moment, in fact you'd thought that Ben had kissed you on top of your head, but you ascribed that to the haze of pain you'd been in from your broken arm.

What you did remember was how wonderfully warm he was after you'd been trapped in that damn freezer and how nice it felt to be in his arms. Another memory of Ben sleeping on the couch at the hospital bubbles up and you feel something in your chest begin to crack open. And you try your best to tell yourself the same thing that you always do when you feel like Ben might care more about you that he was letting on.

Ben doesn't want that. He's made it perfectly clear. He doesn't want a relationship. He's only wants one night, that's why he goes out with all those women-

You hesitate, thumb still hovering over the answer button as you do, the memory of the week you'd spent at the apartment with him flickering in the back of your mind. The week where he refused to leave you alone in the apartment, where he refused to do any jobs for Butcher, where he took care of you the best way he could, when he sat with you on the couch and made you laugh with his ridiculous movies, and the week where he hadn't had one date.

Your finger itched to answer the phone, but you couldn't, because you didn't want to feel this way about Ben, not when he'd told you countless times that you kept romanticizing him, not when he told you that he didn't want a relationship, and not when you could feel yourself beginning to fall for someone you thought was the wrong man.

For just a moment you tried to pretend that it was different, that he was different, but you didn't want to. It only made it hurt more.

The phone stops ringing, but the pit in your stomach still gapes open at you and for the first time in twenty hours you feel tears begin to fall. You didn't know why you were crying about this, why the thought of not picking up Ben's phone call seemed to hurt more than everything that had happened, but something made it hurt.

The bus driver announces over the overhead that you're reaching your final destination as he takes the exit for your hometown. The familiar buildings that line the streets are sheathed in a honeyed glow from the sun, the long shadow of the bus darkening them momentarily as it rumbles down the small streets to the bus station.

When it rumbles to a stop at the bus station you wait for everyone else to get off, trying to summon the strength to stand, and swipe the back of your hand across your face to rid yourself of the remaining tears.

The bus station was about a thirty minute walk from your grandmother's house, and you still hadn't called her. You didn't know what to say, didn't know how to tell her that Darren was dead and that he was the reason why your parents were dead.

The creature crawls up your body to drape it's warm body over the back of your neck as you stand. It wasn't bothering to hide, besides the people in your hometown already thought that you were odd because you were a supe and you'd always welcomed it. You give him a scratch on top of his head and his warm tongue flicks on the bottom of your earlobe as if thanking you before it curls further into the side of your neck, seeking warmth.

The first few steps on solid ground are shaky, but you find the strength while taking in a deep cleansing breath of the outside world, letting the gentle warmth of the sun and the tickle of the autumn breeze pull at your coat. You hadn't stopped at your apartment before coming here, instead you had stumbled your way to the bus station covered in dust, flecked in blood, and demanded the first ticket back to Illinois. It was lucky that the next bus was leaving immediately, because you didn’t want to spend another second in NYC, not when all you wanted was to be home.

Plus you were worried that someone had recorded what exactly happened outside the plant shop and you didn't want to get arrested.

It was self defense anyway. Maybe Jake would represent me in court.

The thought of Jake makes you twinge. You hadn't checked to see if he was alright before you ran from the scene. Not to mention you'd destroyed the shop he'd put all his life savings into after he stopped being a lawyer.

Oh fuck, what if he sues me? He can't exactly sue Darren…

You hear someone call your name and you open your eyes.

Your grandmother is standing in front of the same baby blue pickup truck that she'd had longer than you've been alive, wearing a long multicolored skirt and a pressed white blouse tucked elegantly into it. Her silver hair is loose and long, curling over her shoulders in gentle waves. She looks the same way she looked one week ago when she left, and you've never seen anything so beautiful in your life.

You're running before you can stop yourself, crumbling into her warm embrace, with more tears streaking down your face, but she doesn't mind.

"Shh. It's alright honey." She whispers, rubbing her hand over your back, her embrace steady and surprisingly strong. "Let's go home."

Her home is the same as it's always been. A two story Victorian house painted in a happy yellow shade, with a white wrap around porch and two white rocking chairs sitting empty on the front porch. You'd spent more nights than you could count rocking silently beside her with a crochet project in your lap listening to the rain fall and soak the world outside, while the plants sang praises with every gentle bend beneath the heavy droplets.

You could barely remember the home you spent in your early years with your parents, not when you'd spent most of your childhood spending the night here and after your parents died living here permanently. There was still a large oak tree were a wooden swing swung in the slight breeze on the left side of the yard, a gardenia bush that stretched as high as the second story on the right side of the house and brushed it's soft leaves against the sunshine colored outer walls, a garden filled with both flowering plants and herbs that perked up on both sides of the front yard as you walked up the path, and a cobblestone path that Annie and you had spent hours of your shared childhood covering in chalk art.

Neither of you were good, but when the rain would fall and smudge the clean lines, you'd jump in the puddles that pooled along the walkway singing the lyrics to ABBA's "Cassandra" not quite understanding what it meant.

Standing here outside your house made you miss Annie and feel worse about not calling or texting her back, but you didn't feel like talking about what happened and you were sure that Butcher filled her in. The only thing that you wanted was to collapse in your bedroom upstairs and curl under the comforters.

Despite everything the house was a welcome sight, but at the same time it was different. You could feel the plants calling out to you, asking for you, bending towards you just to touch your shoes as you walked by. You'd never felt so connected with them before, not even when you were in your apartment or working at the shop.  It was overwhelming.

And although a part of you was frightened by it, another part of you rejoiced in it. You didn't feel alone, didn't feel weak, and you knew that you never would ever again.

The creature nuzzled into the side of your neck with a sigh, soaking up the sun's healing rays as you walked up the front steps with your grandmother following behind you silently. She hadn't spoken since she picked you up at the bus station and you hadn't supplied anything in the ten minute car ride back to her house.

You didn't know where to start and you were still trying to process everything yourself.

The inside of her house was just as cozy and warm as it was the day you moved out. There were photos of your parents and you covering the walls (Darren's had been placed in the closet long ago), half-finished knitting projects sorted in different baskets on both the dining room table and the living room coffee table, spools of yarn were strewn over the couch sorted by color, and the fresh smell of gardenia wafted through the open windows on the breeze.

It was home. This was what you'd been missing the moment everything began to crash over you, but as you stood there in the familiar living room it felt like something was missing. Something tugged at the back of your mind, but you couldn't put your finger on it.

There was something or rather someone that should be here, but you didn't know what or who. And your mind supplied Annie, but you weren't sure that's who you meant.

"Let's have some tea." Your grandmother says from behind you and you feel her soft hands come down on your shoulders to steer you through the familiar creative chaos and into the large kitchen at the back of the house.

The kitchen isn't spared from the madness, it rarely was. There are boxes upon boxes of cookies in different stages of being packaged all over the counter, dirty bowls and a measuring cup stacked in the sink, and a large opened bag of chocolate chips spilling over the flour covered kitchen island.

It wasn't unusual to find the kitchen or the house in a state of chaos, your grandmother always said that a house should look lived in and that the mess was part of the fun of any major project as long as you were responsible enough to clean it up.

"Bake sale?" You ask as you sit down in the breakfast nook, uttering the first words that you'd said to another human being in twenty hours.

The next breath that you inhale was supposed to be cleansing, but you can still feel a weight pressing down on your chest, the same one that settled in the moment everything happened with Darren.

You contemplate again how you're going to tell her that Darren is dead and was the reason why your parents died.

Damn it Darren.

"Mhmm." She hums, filling the well used red kettle. "Annie's mother practically cornered me in the supermarket yesterday and begged me to make cookies. I love Annie, but her mother needs someone to pull that stick out of her ass. It's been up there for so long that I'm sure it's rotten."

The creature crawls down from your shoulders and down your arm to sniff at one of the chocolate chip cookies nearest you. It hadn't eaten since…

Darren.

You wince slightly at the thought and hope that you hadn't created something that needed and craved human flesh. The last thing you wanted to unleash on the world was Audry two especially in the wake of Homelander.

Truthfully you were waiting for the guilt at killing your brother to come, but it never had and you wondered if it ever would.

Probably not. He deserved that, he killed our parents, he tried to kill me, he tried to kill Ben.

The thought of Ben again makes a lump form in the back of your throat. You didn't know what was happening to you only that you felt guilty for leaving him like that, for yelling at him to let you go, and just vanishing on him when he probably thought that you were going back to the apartment.

He doesn't know where I am. Maybe that's why he tried to call, because he got back to the apartment and couldn't find me there and he was worried. You press your lips together. Yeah. Worried. Right.

"Honey?" Your grandmother says in a soothing voice

You look up from the box of chocolate chip cookies that you didn't remember picking up. Even the creature is looking at you with an expression that you can only explain as worry.

"Yeah?" Your voice shakes slightly.

She's leaning back against the counter, arms crossed over her chest, head tilted slightly to the side, her beautiful grayed hair pulled up in an elegant bun, but in her eyes you can see genuine concern. "Fuck." She sighs after a minute.

You blink in surprise. It was the first time that you'd ever heard her say that word in your entire life.

"I shouldn't have left." She breathes. "I told Ben to look out for you. I told him, that little bastard was bound to show up again and what did he do? He left you at that plant shop alone with no protection!"

You'd only seen her really angry a handful of times in your lifetime. Like you, your grandmother often had a gentle disposition and didn't get angry unless the situation called for it.

I mean, Darren admitted to killing our parents and then got fucking ripped apart. But how does she know about any of that? I haven't told her…

"How did you know that he left me there? Did Ben call you?" You ask putting down the box of cookies.

An odd expression crosses her face, as if she's contemplating something. "No." She hesitates again. "I saw it."

"No." Your grandmother hesitates. "I saw it."

"You saw it?" You repeat, confused.

What's going on?

"Too late of course, but I'm a little rusty. I was able to warn Ben that Darren was coming back. That's how he got there so quickly or rather-" She shrugs sheepishly. "He got there in time to make sure that Darren didn't get you to forgive him. Which you shouldn't have at all, but I know he's always had a talent for manipulating you."

"What?"

Is she saying what I think she's saying?

Instead of explaining further your grandmother walks out of the kitchen, leaving the kettle behind on the stove and you in a state of utter confusion.

Is she saying that she can see the future? Because that would mean that she's a supe and there's only one supe in history that I know of that can do that. A supe that no one has seen in over forty years.

You can hear her open the door to the closet under the stairs and the sound of her sifting through all the junk that the two of you had shoved in there over the years instead of finding the right place to put it.

When she comes back into the kitchen, she's holding a giant cardboard file box that you'd never paid attention to each time you opened the closet to find something. Your eyes shift from the box to her still not comprehending exactly what she was saying.

"I probably should have told you this a while ago, but…" She trails off and nods her head at the box before turning back to the kettle on the stove that has begun to scream. "I kept putting it off."

The box is old, worn at the edges, and theres a musty black fabric beneath a collection of yellowed photographs. You pull out the one on top to examine it.

Ben is standing there in his full Soldier Boy regalia outside of Vought tower and the woman standing next to him is Soothsayer. The outfit she wore was familiar, a black-skin tight suit with a blind fold tied over her eyes.

Soothsayer was a supe who could see the future and who was apart of Payback, a supe that had vanished a year before the mission in Nicaragua and no one knew where she went. There were rumors that she'd died and that she'd been a Russian spy, but you'd never believed them. You'd heard Butcher talk about how he tried to find her when he was trying to figure out what happened to Soldier Boy, but he never had. Said that the trail went cold.

But now you knew where she went, because she was standing directly in front of you.

She's Soothsayer? Holy fuck that's why Ben kept accusing her of cheating in the poker game because he knew that she could see the future.

"You were Soothsayer?" You gasp. "But why didn't you say anything? Why didn't you tell me?"

She continues to measure the tea leaves. "I didn't tell anyone."

"Grandpa didn't know? But he was alive when you were a supe?"

Your grandfather had never spoken about a history with supes that you remember.

"No." She turns to look at you, a hurt expression crossing over her face for a minute. "Well, I know that I said I was going to have tea, but if we're going to talk about this I'm going to need something a little bit stronger."

Your grandmother opens a cabinet under the stove an pulls out an enormous bottle of scotch. Truth be told you'd never seen her drink more than just a glass of wine, to see her like this was about as shocking as seeing a polar bear sunning itself on a Florida beach.

"Do you still want the blueberry tea or do you need something a little stronger?" She looks back over her shoulder at you as she pulls down a glass for herself.

"I think I need something stronger." You answer honestly.

Learning about everything Darren had done was one thing, but finding out that your grandmother used to be a famous supe and that she never told you about it was another thing. It was like looking at another person. You'd always loved your grandmother's gentle way, her care for her community and her family soft, but now you weren't sure you really knew who she was.

She sits down across from you and hands you a glass of the amber colored liquid. There's a heavy silence that hangs between the two of you as she tries to find a way to start. The photo of her and Ben is laying on top of what you realize is her uniform inside the box and she smiles down at the photo, just a little twitch at the corner of her lips.

"I met Ben when I was twenty three years old." She begins taking a sip from the glass. "Legend 'discovered' me. I had the injection of Compound V maybe two years before that, not when I was born, but I hadn't gotten popular. Other powers were much more flashy and by then there were so many heroes coming out of the woodwork that someone with the ability to see the future didn't seem as marketable."

There's something reflected in her blue eyes, the same eyes your father had, that you can't place. "I had just moved to New York, I had no money, and the way I was getting it was by pretending to be a fortune teller and betting on some sports events on the side. It wasn't hard to prove that I could see the future, the past was more difficult, but Legend somehow stumbled into my shop and figured out that I was a supe. And he didn't think I was too bad looking so he helped me get big."

"You pretended to be a fortune teller?"

She snorts into her glass. "Mhmm. People really will believe anything if they're desperate enough and back then there was so much turmoil going on with Russia that people were scared and wanted to feel comforted. My job provided some of that."

"But why did you walk away from it if you were such a big hero." You ask. "Everyone knew your name, you were-"

Your grandmother raises an eyebrow at you and you fall silent so she can continue. "When I got onto Payback that's when everything exploded for me, the films, the commercials, the ridiculous ads." She sighs. "That's also when I met Ben."

You take a sip from the glass in front of you, sputtering slightly. It was stronger than you were expecting. "And you two were-"

Please don't say dating, please don't say dating, please don't say…

"Friends. Just friends." Diana sits back against the back of the breakfast nook, sinking into the navy blue pillows. "But he is almost as charming now as he was then."

You cringe at the thought of Ben coming on to a younger version of your grandmother.

She taps her glass with her index finger deep in thought. "But I think that I was the only person that Ben actually talked to, the only person that he was comfortable being around."

"What do you mean?" You ask confused. "Didn't he talk to Countess and to Legend?"

Her expression hardens at the mention of Countess's name. "He didn't talk to her the way he talked to me. Ben is difficult, he always has been and I think that most of the people he meet him write him off as this asshole with a chauvinistic look on the world, but he's not. At least, not all the time. There are so many people that he's met that are never willing to take a chance on him. To trust that there is really something beneath all of that bravado."

It was what you had been thinking for the past week, that there was more to Ben than he was willing to let people see, but you were slowly realizing that Ben was letting you see those parts. In the quiet moments at your shared apartment when he sat with you while you read or made you laugh or walked you to and from work you saw another side of Ben that you never saw when he was around anyone else. The guilt rises again when you think of how you ran from him, how you turned your back and left him standing there to clean up your mess.

I shouldn’t have done that, but it was all just so overwhelming and I didn't want to talk to anyone.

"I think that Ben is the most loyal friend I ever had. No one ever seems to believe me when I say that. That we were just friends, but nothing happened between us."

"You didn't date? Or sleep together?" You ask cautiously. It was difficult to imagine Ben being friends with a woman and not having a sexual relationship with her.

Well. We're friends, but that's different.

The last thing you wanted to think about was Ben and your grandmother having sex.

I would need so much therapy after that. You sigh. Yeah, because after all the shit I've been through and found out about my life in the last twenty hours, the knowledge that Ben fucked my grandmother is what's going to push me over the edge.

"No." She shakes her head with a small smile. "About a week after I met Ben, I was running late to a movie shoot and I stepped off the crosswalk without looking. There was a car coming and I didn't see it. Ironic isn't it?" She laughs at herself. "I can see the future and I didn't see a car coming, but your grandfather did and he grabbed the back of my jacket and yanked me onto the sidewalk, saved my life. And the second my eyes locked with his I saw our future. I saw our wedding, our first house, I saw our son take his first steps and I saw how much I would love him and how much he would love me." She clears her throat for a minute, her fingers tighten on the glass, and her gaze drops to the wedding ring on her left hand. “The future is never set in stone, it’s fluid. It morphs and shapes with your decisions, but in the future I saw, I was so happy. And I didn’t want to lose that.”

Your grandfather had passed a few years ago, but you knew it weighed on her everyday. She had spent the week after he died in her room not saying anything to anyone. And sometimes she'd look out the window into the backyard with an odd expression, but you knew that meant she was thinking of him.

Growing up you'd seen how in love the two of them were, more so than your parents. Seen the flowers your grandfather always brought home just because he was thinking of her, watched him do little things around the house without being asked, saw how they never walked away angry from one another, and seen the soppy expression he'd get when he watched your grandmother move around the kitchen baking with a grace that you'd never possessed.

You reach across the table to touch her hand and she takes it gratefully.

"I didn't want to tell him that I was a supe, and at the beginning I thought I could balance it all, but then Ben started dating Countess." She takes another sip from her glass. "She hated me."

"What? Why?" You ask. The creature crawls across the table to sniff at the glass in front of you, before it snorts and falls into your lap, curling into a ball.

"Countess was a bitch." Your grandmother says mirthlessly, her expression hardening. "She wanted to possess Ben completely. Only loved how famous he was, how popular it made her, and he threw himself at her feet, in his own way, not understanding that love didn’t look that way. He’s never had a good example of it in his life. And she never understood that Ben and I were just friends. By then I had been dating your grandfather for a few months and things were getting serious. It was about a year before everything that happened in Nicaragua."

She presses her lips together as if remembering what happened to Ben there. "She was jealous, possessive, and she came to me one night. Ben was out of town for a film so she knew we wouldn’t be interrupted. She threatened to tell your grandfather who I really was and threatened to kill him.” Her jaw sets. “My powers were never really as offensive as hers were. And she said that Ben wouldn’t ever protect me over her because he loved her and would do anything to make her happy. So I left and I never looked back.”

And here I thought I couldn't hate Countess any more than I did for what she did to Ben.

��You didn’t talk to him ever again?” You wonder out loud.

She left without telling him goodbye?

“There was the occasional phone call. Sometimes Ben would ask me to see who was going to win a ball game or something so he could make a few bucks. He stopped by to say hi a few times because he was in the neighborhood. One time he brought your father a baseball glove that was way too big for a one year old.” She snorts, the memory flashing in her eyes. “I always thought Ben would be a good dad some day. But I think seeing your father was when Ben realized how much he wanted to have kids. And I think seeing the way your grandfather treated me made him start to feel conflicted about Countess. But he respected that I walked away, he saw that I was happy.”

“But what about Nicaragua?"

A dark look crosses her face followed by something that looks suspiciously like guilt. “I saw what they were going to do to him.”

“What? But why didn't you tell him what they were planning? Why didn't you-"

"I tried." She snaps, shoulders tense, but then they drop. "I called Ben, but Stan answered. By then your father was turning two, your grandfather had opened up his practice, and Stan threatened me, he knew where we were and knew everything about us. So I kept my mouth shut and I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.”

You could feel your heart breaking for her.

Ben was her best friend and she had to sit by and watch them do that to him. She saw what they were going to do and they were going to kill her for it, kill my family for it.

The anger that surges in your chest makes the creature in your lap stir and grow a few inches, but you tamp it down before it gets bigger than a small dog.

“Does Ben know?” You ask her to distract yourself.

You didn't want Ben to hate your grandmother for this, didn't want him to hate her for something that wasn't her fault.

She nods. “Yes. I told him everything.”

“When?”

“The moment I saw him in your hospital room. I couldn’t keep it in any longer. I wasn't expecting him to be there, but it all poured out of me. I was so surprised to see him there. I hadn't seen a future where he came back."

“Was he mad?”

I mean… he didn't seem mad when I woke up, not to mention he was upset when she left to come back to Illinois.

“Not at me.” She shakes her head. “He knew how much I wanted a normal life and how much I loved your grandfather. He doesn’t blame me for any of it.”

“Good. I can’t believe you didn’t tell me.”

The glass in front of you is still more than half-full but you don't want to risk another sip of what you're sure is gasoline packaged to look like Scotch. Your grandmother reaches to pour herself another glass.

“I didn’t want to until you were ready.”

“And when would that be?”

Your grandmother shrugs. “Maybe on my deathbed.”

You weren't angry for her not telling you, more surprised, but now that you knew everything about her it was hard to see her the same way you had.

 You snort. “And no one knew?”

“Your dad figured it out.”

“How? When?”

“The moment you made that strawberry plant grow from your high chair.” She shakes her head with a smile. “It skipped a generation. Don’t know why, but you got it all somehow.”

“I was never injected?”

“No. That was a lie your father created. He knew that your grandfather didn't know and he knew that I didn't want your grandfather to know."

“Darren thought I was.”

“I know.”

At the mention of your brother's name, you watch her expression harden and she takes another swig from the glass in front of her, not flinching as the liquid goes down her throat.

“Did you see everything that happened?” You ask in a small voice.

You still weren't 100% sure how it was her powers worked, but you figured that she was able to see some of what Darren did and what he said.

“Yes.”

“You heard everything Darren said?"

“Yes.”

You chew the inside of your cheek for a minute hoping that she didn't take it as hard as you did. “Did you know that he killed them?”

“No.” She breathes, rolling the glass between her hands for a moment. “The night they died, I got a vision a few minutes before the car ran off the road. I was the one who called the police and who told them where to look, but I never saw that it was Darren or that it was anyone causing the accident. All I saw was the three of you in the car. I should have known.” Her voice breaks.

“It’s not your fault.” You squeeze her hand.

“And it’s not yours either.” She squeezes your hand back.

The memories are beginning to float up from the recesses of your mind and your teeth clench together as you try to keep them at bay.

“I know.” You breathe. The memory of the ruined shop flashes through your head. “I didn’t know that I could do something like that.” You gently touch your healed right arm and glance at the creature that is nibbling on the edge of the cardboard box with its sharp splinter-like teeth. “I feel so different and I don’t know how to go back to the way I was.”

“I don’t think you ever will.”

"Really?"

The thought was unwelcome. You were hoping that all of this was going to blow over, but you knew it wouldn't. Your powers had changed. There was an energy that thrummed in your veins now, stretching out of the house to the plants that grew in the garden. You could feel them all if you concentrated.

She frowns. “When you told me that you were working for Butcher I was worried about you getting involved in the supe world. I didn’t want that life for you, didn’t want you to suffer the way I did-“

“Was it really that bad?"

“Not all the time, just at the end. But I think that’s why I loved your grandfather so much. Because he was different than all the supes. He was down to earth, not just normal but-“ She shrugs. “I think Compound V does something to our minds, makes them more susceptible and when you’re surrounded by people using their powers and thinking that they’re gods it’s easy to lose who you are. I was glad I left when I did."

“Great." You huff, thinking about how your powers had grown exponentially since you killed your brother. It was scaring you to think that you would reach a point where you acted like Homelander, where you saw yourself as a god and killed anyone who stood in your way.

As tired as the stereotype of you only being able to make the flowers grow, you liked doing that. You liked healing plants, tending to them, and helping them grow. For you it had never been about using your powers the way that you had to kill Elijah and your brother and had always been about spreading a little more joy and love like your grandmother did with her kindness in her community.

Your mind flashes back to the first night that Ben stayed with you in your apartment and he'd asked you why you worked for Butcher and told you that he thought you "didn't fit."

Before you hadn't. You knew that. You weren't intimidating to look at or fueled by revenge or had a bone to pick with supes. You'd joined because you thought it was the right thing to do and because you wanted to be closer with Annie. She had been so involved in the supe world and you'd felt like you were losing your best friend. When in reality being at "Please Don't Die" was the only thing that felt natural for you.

You could feel yourself changing and you weren't sure that you wanted to and you weren't sure if you were changing for the better. Deep down you still felt like you, despite everything Darren had revealed, but your powers were greater than you'd thought they could be.

“No.” She squeezes your hand pulling you out of your head. “I don’t see you losing yourself in this.”

“You’ve seen-“ Your eyes widen.

“The future yeah.” Her lips twitch up at the ends in a smile. “It is what I do.”

“That’s so weird.”

You hadn't meant to say it, but you really didn't want to know too much about your future.

Well, not all that much. Maybe just a little.

“You of all people have no right to judge what’s weird. Not with Godzilla sitting in your lap.”

"Godzilla" yawns, flashing a mouthful of his pointy teeth, before settling back down on your thighs.

You smile for the first time in twenty hours, but then it drops. “I don’t like losing control. I thought I knew who I was but now I don’t-“ The emotions were bubbling up again, chest tightening, and lungs beginning to gasp for air. “I don’t know who I am anymore or what I am or what I can do and-“

“There’s nothing wrong with not being in control.”

“But what if I hurt someone? What if I kill-“ You body shakes as you think about all the important people in your life, Annie, Hughie, Butcher, Kimiko, MM, Frenchie- and then your mind stutters on Ben.

“Your powers are growing and there’s nothing to be afraid of or ashamed of. If you’re afraid of them it won’t get easier for you. You have to embrace the fear to see the lights that line the path through it.”

"I killed Darren, I killed Elijah-"

"Not because you lost control. You did it because you were protecting yourself and protecting your friends."

"But-"

"Who is it that you're scared of hurting? Annie?" Her expression turns sympathetic. "Annie is a supe and understands what it's like to lose control. None of us are in control all the time and it's ridiculous to believe that you won't lose control at least once."

Your throat clenches tightly, because when she asked the question you didn't see Annie's face, you saw Ben's. You knew that it was probably ridiculous to worry about hurting a guy with a nuclear reactor stuffed in his chest or a guy who'd been through every torture known to man, but you were. And you weren't entirely sure if you meant hurting him with just your powers.

Tears crest and fall down your cheeks as you sit there, throat thickening. "I don't want to hurt Ben."

"He's a little more indestructible than us sweetie." She cracks a smile, but you can't smile back and you don't answer because you're unsure how to.

She sits back against the breakfast nook and sighs, examining your face and slowly realizes what you mean. "Ben is complicated. He always has been. I like to think that most of it, is his father's fault. Has he told you anything about him?"

You shake your head.

"He was a dick. Made Ben think that he was a disappointment his whole life. I don't think that Ben has had someone love him unconditionally since his mother died. And loving Countess only made it worse for him. Her love was jealous, possessive, and I don't think that he's really come to terms with what real love should look like." She lets out a breath, tapping her index finger against the glass. "I never saw him as more than a friend, but I do love him. It's not a crime to love him."

"I don't love him." You say it immediately.

"Why not?"

"What?" You sputter. "I don't know what you're-"

"Tell me why you don't love him." Your grandma says methodically, as if she's trying to talk you through it.

"Because I-" The pressure was back in the back of your throat and you couldn't quite meet her eye. "Because-" You scramble for the answer, trying your darndest to keep your heart from clenching in your chest. "I want what you and grandpa had, what Annie and Hughie have, and what my parents had. A strong relationship with someone who sees all my flaws, the little parts, and the darkness and still choses to fall in love with me anyway. I don't want just one night I want every night. I want something real and Ben has said countless times that he-"

"So you've talked about it with Ben?" She raises an eyebrow.

"Only because he kept trying to sleep with me and I told him that I didn't want to have sex with him." You reply exasperated.

"You don't?"

"Gran!"

"What? He's attractive."

"It doesn't matter. None of it does. Because Ben has said that he doesn't have relationships, that he doesn't care about feelings, or emotions." Saying the words that Ben had told you countless times made something inside begin to shrivel up and die. "And I do. And I don't want to manipulate him into being something he's not or force him into a relationship that's doomed from the beginning. Ben is Ben. He's not changing or-"

"He has." She interrupts.

"What?"

"The Ben I saw in your hospital room is not the one I knew." She says it so matter of fact that makes it hard to breathe. "And neither was the one that I saw in your apartment when I stayed with you. I mean he is in essence Ben, but-"

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"He is changing. Not completely, but he's acting differently than when he was with Countess. I mean, I saw all the things he did for her. The way he was around her."

"Why does that matter?"

"Because he loved her."

The words make your heart seize in your chest. "Ben doesn't love me. He's my roommate and my friend-" It was the same thing that you kept telling yourself on repeat to beat back the other feelings that you hadn't quite identified yet. "And he's told me that he doesn't want a relationship and that I should try to meet other people."

That last part was a lie, but you honestly didn't know where she was going with this conversation or why it was getting so hard to breathe.

"Have you thought that maybe Ben doesn't want to love you because he's scared?"

"He doesn't love me and Ben isn't afraid of anything."

"He is. It might not look the same way on him as it does on everyone else, but if you pay close enough attention you can catch it." She hesitates. "And I think if you pay attention to you, you'll see what it is that you're afraid of too."

What does she mean? What the hell am I afraid of? Ben isn't afraid of anything, he's practically shouted that from the mountaintops like Julie Andrews.

"I already told you what I'm afraid of."

"I'm not talking about you hurting someone honey. There's something else that you refuse to admit to yourself because you're scared." She smiles sadly at you. "You should though, because when you embrace it, what comes after is really beautiful." There's a far off look in her eyes and you realize that she'd seen something further ahead that she wasn't letting on.

"And it's all I want for you. To be happy." Your grandmother stands from the other side of the booth "I think you need some rest. You drove all night long and I doubt you got any sleep. And I have to package all of these before Annie's mother calls down the four horsemen of the Apocalypse on me."

"Wait-"

"Please sweetie." She lays her hand down on your arm. "I think you'll feel a little better about all of this when you've had some rest." Her fingers raise to push back some of the hair that's fallen forward into your eyes. "Hmm?"

You didn't want to rest, you wanted to talk about this, but you knew better than to argue with her. Not to mention she was right, you hadn't slept.

"And when you wake up I'll make your favorite for dinner, alright?" She smiles, but there's something behind it that you can't place.

"Okay."

And this time you don't argue with her. You go up the worn staircase that you have your entire life and collapse onto your bed, wondering exactly what it was she saw your future hold, and what it is that you won't admit to yourself.

Soldier Boy POV

There was no light in the apartment save from the burning red tip of Ben's blunt and the bluish glow emanating from the tv that caught the dips and sharp edges of his face. But it was nothing more than background noise.

His hand absentmindedly stroked along Bean's back, his eyes focused on the ceiling above the couch. He hadn't moved in hours. It had been over twenty four hours since everything that happened at the plant shop, since you'd summoned a creature from the depths of the store, since Darren had thrown Ben through the plate glass windows of the bakery, and since Ben had last seen you.

He didn't understand why you hadn't let him take you back to the apartment and why it was that you had to leave. Ben hadn't liked the feeling that stabbed him in the chest when you turned your back on him and ran away. He'd felt the urge to comfort you the way he'd watched Hughie do for Annie in the car a week ago, but you hadn't let him.

Instead all he'd done is stood there and watched you run, still covered in dust, rubble, and blood. Worse was you hadn't let him check you for injuries and Ben hated the thought that you were hurt somewhere and he didn't know where you were.

You were so much more fragile than he was. He was realizing that more every day, was acutely aware of it after everything that happened with Elijah. Honestly, sitting there in the hospital with you laying there asleep with nothing that he could do, but wait for you to wake up had been agony. Not to mention that looking at the bruises around your throat, over your eye, and the bright green cast only made him feel worse. He'd never felt so helpless in his entire life and he hated it. Because Ben wasn't some helpless damsel in distress, he was a man and a man shouldn't wait on anyone or feel out of control, or at least, that's what he told himself.

Ben hears someone walk down the hallway outside the apartment and he perks up to listen, hoping that it's you finally coming home. Ben's mind stutters on the word "home." He'd lived many places in his life, apartments that felt more like way-stations, and the drafty cold mansion back in Philadelphia where he grew up, but neither felt like home. And although he hated how small your apartment was, it was the first place that Ben liked living in. He was starting to understand the word home.

But the feet keep moving past the apartment and Ben sinks into the couch cushions. Even Bean seems to be disappointed. "It's alright buddy." Ben mutters. "She'll come back."

But he wasn't sure.

Ben also wasn't used to feeling this way. It was close to the way that he felt when he went to Boston and was sitting in that damn hotel room waiting for something to happen and he still didn't understand what it meant. He didn't understand why he couldn't stand it that you weren't back yet. It made him feel like a woman waiting for her husband to get home from work when he told her that he was "running late." He'd tried to distract himself by looking at some possible prospects on Tinder, but just like the week after you'd come home from the hospital and just like the date he had in Boston, no one held any appeal.

His mind was awake and roaming around, pacing back and forth. The blunt was supposed to help, but it hadn't.

His phone chirps and Ben picks it up to look at the screen, but it's not you, it's Jake.

Jake: I know that I'm not your favorite person, but thank you for what you did.

Ben huffs and turns his phone face down on the couch once more. "What a fucking pussy."

When you left Ben had realized that Jake was still inside the building and as much as he wanted race after you, he understood that you'd be even more upset if you'd killed Jake. So Ben had tromped back through the building and found him trapped beneath some rubble. Jake was okay, just unconscious, but Ben had carried him out and put him on the sidewalk before he high tailed it out of there. The last thing that he wanted was to be caught with a shredded body outside a ruined building.

I didn't do it for him. I did it for her. Ben thinks to himself, looking down at the text message.

As much as he hated the thought of saving your future boyfriend, he didn't want to see what it did to you if you found out that you killed Jake, so he'd done it to avoid watching you cry again.

Ben didn't understand why he hated watching you cry.

Women cry. They're damn emotional all the time. He tries to reason with himself taking a puff from the blunt pinched between his thumb and forefinger. And she fucking cries way too much.

The image of you crying outside of the shop in the wake of everything that happened pricks something under his ribcage. Fuck.

Ben didn't feel remorse for what happened, well, the only thing he regretted was not getting there sooner and getting to fuck Darren up himself. When Diana had called him to tell him that Darren was coming, Ben had practically ripped the apartment door off in his haste to get back to you. He hadn’t wanted to leave you at the plant shop, but Butcher had told Ben, that he had a possible location for Darren, but it came up empty and Ben had been at Butcher's apartment chewing him out for sending him on a fucking wild goose chase.

It only made Ben more angry to allow Darren to speak to you, but he was trying to let you handle it even though he wanted to handle him. But it had brought him an unholy amount of joy to throw Darren in front of that minivan and to watch that creature tear him apart while the final whitish blue pulses of electricity jumped and crackled down the street making the streetlights shower sparks everywhere.

But Ben was more upset that Darren had been able to land a few hits on you before you killed him.

Ben remembered the giant lizard that crawled out of what was left of "Please Don't Die" and felt his lips quirk up into a smile. As much as he hated the entire situation, Ben couldn't help but feel a little surge of pride at what you'd done to your brother. He'd never seen you look so powerful standing there in the street, your eyes glowing a brilliant green, arms outstretched, and the ground trembling around you as the world begged to be unleashed.

Of course he'd been just as surprised as you were at the fact that you'd healed your broken arm. He wasn't sure if you'd noticed it yet, but you looked different too. There weren't as many lines on your face and your hair was more springy, the few silver hairs that Ben had noticed in passing were no longer there.

He wasn't sure what that meant, but there was something that felt suspiciously like hope tingling in his stomach, hope that you weren't as fragile anymore and hope that it meant you wouldn't die.

When Diana had told Ben that her husband had died, he saw the pain in her eyes when she said it, saw her relieving the memory, and for some reason as soon as she said that he was dead, the first thing Ben thought about was you. Ben hadn't considered his inability to age as much in the past, hadn't cared about outliving anyone before. Seeing Countess as an older woman had made him more aware of it. Looking at the woman who he once thought he loved, had showed him what that was like. Not that he had a problem with daring older women, Ben always thought that women really did get better with age, but it was what came next that Ben wasn't fond of.

And for some reason thinking that one day he'd wake up and see the marks of age on your face or one day he'd wake up and he wouldn't be able to annoy you or hear you yell at him made his chest tight.

Ben takes another hit of his blunt. The longer he sat there the more then unnatural feeling stirred in the pit of his stomach, thrumming through his veins, the feeling that he was trying to avoid. He thought that the joint would calm him down, but he found himself jumping at every creak and footstep in the apartment building, perking up each time and hoping that it was you coming home.

He didn't know where you were. You hadn't answered any of his texts or calls and Ben was ashamed at how many times that he had tried to call you.

Get a fucking grip. He'd thought to himself when he typed out another text message to send you, stopping himself from sending it.

But he'd been so desperate to hear from you that he'd actually gone to talk to Annie who seemed upset that she couldn't get ahold of you either. When Hughie and Annie had seen how upset Ben had been, Hughie had laid his hand on Ben's arm and told him not to worry. Ben had yelled at him that he "wasn't fucking worried and to mind his own business" and had shaken off Hughie's comforting hand before stomping out of the shared apartment.

No one else seemed to be as concerned about finding you. Butcher, MM, and Frenchie were all deeply involved in trying to figure out the cover-up for what happened outside the plant shop. By some miracle no one had caught a picture of your face, but there was little they could do about Darren's body that had been strewn across the street. Annie was having to deal with the repercussions at work, trying to handle what the news was calling a "super villain threat."

Personally, Ben thought that since they froze Homelander, the Seven looked weak and Ben believed that the superhero team that represented America shouldn't look weak. Of course before Ben had also thought that they looked like a bunch of pussies and again felt himself sink deeper into the couch when he thought about what his supposed son had become.

He shakes off the feelings he has about it and his thoughts turn back inevitably to you.

Ben wasn't used to thinking about someone as much as he thought of you, but each time he settled back into the apartment and you weren't there he was hyperaware of how quiet it was.

Maybe I should call Diana. She might know where she is.

As soon as Ben thinks that, his phone begins to ring, but Ben doesn't bother to look at who it is before he answers it. 

"Hello?" Ben huffs out a breath of smoke that hangs in the air in front of his face, catching in the bluish light coming from the television.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" The voice on the other side of the line yells at him.

"Di?"

"Yes it's me. Who did you think it was? Santa Clause?" Your grandmother snarks.

"Why are you calling me and why the fuck are you so mad? What did I do?" Ben answers slightly annoyed.

As much as you got under his skin, your grandmother had been the same way. He actually thought that it was amusing that even before he figured out that she was your grandmother that he had often compared you to her in his mind. You had the same mannerisms, the same defiant and stubborn attitude that drove Ben up the wall, and you were just as beautiful as she was.

Ben was okay with admitting that he was attracted to you. To him that felt normal, it was the other feelings that he was conflicted about, the ones that he'd never felt before stirring in his chest that made him feel "too emotional" and "woman-like."

Truthfully, Ben was sure that if your grandmother had given him a shot that maybe he would have felt that way about her too. She was the only person that Ben actually trusted in the 80's, the only person that was brave enough to call him out on all his shit. You did that now. But he liked her husband also, so Ben was content with letting her go. He liked how happy that Henry, your grandfather, had made her. He knew that she wasn't happy as a supe and seeing her so happy and in love made Ben feel something that was close to happiness.

And it was seeing the way the two of them were together made Ben wonder if what he had with Countess was the same thing. Because he did have feelings about her that were different, but each time he went to visit Diana and saw your father playing on her lap he felt that there was something missing in his life.

It was the same way that he thought something was missing when you weren't in the apartment, but Ben hadn't realized that yet.

"Because I don't understand what the hell you're doing!" Diana replies and Ben honestly doesn't know why she's angry with him.

"About what?"

"My granddaughter."

Ben sits up the blunt in his fingertips forgotten. "Is she there with you?"

"Yes." Her voice softens for a moment.

Ben relaxes and leans back onto the couch, sighing in relief. "Good.  That's good." Relief swelled in his chest when he thought about you staying with her, safe.

That's what she meant when she said that she wanted to go home. Home is with her grandmother. Ben stopped the next thought before he could go there.

The thought that home wasn't with him.

Ben was trying not to think about that or think about you hating him. He didn't think you did, well, didn't think you did anymore. At first it really was touch and go, but now he was almost eighty percent sure after you'd told him more than once that you weren't afraid of him and didn’t hate him that you sometimes wanted him around.

"No, not good."

"What do you mean? Is she okay?" Ben's grip on the phone tightens so hard that he's sure that he hears the screen cracking.

"No."

"What happened?" Ben's voice is a growl, the feelings of relief evaporating as soon as they had begun to bloom in his chest. He mentally calculated how long it would take him to get to you.

"Her entire life fucking fell apart and where are you? Not here!"

Oh. Ben relaxed a little bit.

"I don't need to be there." He says on an exhale of smoke.

"Yes you do!" Diana presses.

"No, I don't. She a big girl she doesn't need me there, she's-" Ben takes a puff from the joint.

“If you were any denser you’d be a Bundt cake Benjamin!” She says exasperated.

"What the fuck are you talking about doll? I am not-"

“Let me guess." She interrupts and Ben can imagine her tapping her foot. He hated when she did that. "You’re moping around smoking a blunt on the couch probably with a glass of something that you're hoping to numb whatever the hell it is you're feeling."

Ben's eyes shift to the bottle of whiskey on the coffee table that he hadn't touched in a few minutes.

“I’m not fucking moping and stop spying on me!” He snaps back at Diana.

He hated how well she knew him. She was his best friend in the 80's through all the shit, she had seen him at his worst and at his best too many times to count.

“I don’t have to use my powers to know what you’re doing. I know you Ben.”

"Sorry to disappoint you sweetheart.” Ben grits his teeth, temper flaring hot. “But if you know me as well as you fucking say you do then you then you know that this is-“

“You avoiding your feelings by acting aloof and brooding like a fucked up version of Mr. Darcy.” She interrupts.

She certainly hasn't changed.

“I am not avoiding-“

“She needs you here Ben.” Diana stamps her foot, the same way you do when Ben pisses you off, and Ben can hear it.

“She doesn’t need me! She said that she wanted to go home, that she didn’t want to be here with me! I tried to-“ Ben shouts back standing up. It was the exact thing that he'd been thinking for the past twenty four hours, that you didn’t need him and that you didn't want to be any where near him.

That last thought made an uncomfortable sensation prickle in his gut when he thought it, because all it did was remind him of how you acted when the two of you first met, when you didn't want him to live with you and tried your darndest to make him go away.

He didn’t want to and he wasn't sure why that was.

“Try harder.” Diana interrupts him again and frankly it was pissing him off.

Ben clenches his jaw. “I think that you’ve confused me with someone else baby.”

“Don’t you 'baby' me Benjamin! We both know that you’re doing what you always do when things get hard for you.”

“And what’s that?”

“You pretend not to care and shut out everyone who tries to care for you. Not to mention you drown yourself in drugs, booze, and women.”

“She doesn’t care about me!” He spits.

“She does!” Diana snaps back. “And believe it or not she needs you here and she wants you here.”

"But-"

"Ben please." It was the first time that he'd heard Diana sound softer and almost pleading since the conversation started. "Don't do this to her. She's worth more than Countess and all those other women you've fallen into bed with."

"Do you really think I don't know that?" He roars. The answer surprises himself. "Do you think I don't know that she's different?"

Wait what?

"If you know that, then why aren't you here?"

He hesitates.

Everything you said to him the night of the party comes roaring back. You looking beautiful in a dress that made his throat tight, and you telling him that you just wanted to be friends and that you understood that he wasn't the type of guy to have relationships. He didn't understand why it stung a bit when you said that, but it had.

Ben thinks about the week that the two of you spent together after Diana went home, when he tried his best to take care of you, distract you from everything that happened with his movies, and would sit with you and try to make you laugh. He'd never wanted to take care of someone before.

Not to mention he kind of liked the way you laughed. He wouldn’t admit that to anyone, but each time you did, it made him want to laugh too. That had never happened to him before. But he wanted to make you laugh to forget everything that happened with Elijah. His fist clenches when he thinks of exactly what Elijah tried to do to you and it makes him feel so mad that he feels close to spontaneously combusting. Ben might not be the best role model when it came to women, but he couldn’t imagine the type of man who would force himself on someone else.

It had made him angry when he thought that you were suggesting that he would try something when he first moved in, because he wasn't that type of man.

Ben was trying to be better for you. He wasn't admitting that, but he really was trying to be better. He didn't understand why. You'd told him countless times that you didn’t want to be with him, that you wanted to be with someone else like Jake.

Ben frowns when he thinks about the man he'd pulled from the rubble of the shop. And again thinks to himself that you should be with someone different, someone who was a supe and could understand you. Ben had seen how difficult it was for Diana when she was keeping her supe life a secret from your grandfather and he didn't want you to have to do that with someone.

"Because I'm not-" Ben begins to say, but he holds his tongue. It was too honest, too raw, too unlike him to admit this to anyone.

Because I'm not this guy. Because I'm not the one she wants. Because I'm not some knight on a white horse. Because she's everything right with the world and I'm just a fucking asshole who sleeps on her couch.

"Ben." Diana breathes and he can practically hear her pinching the bridge of her nose. "In all the years I've known you, you've never done what you did for her with anyone else. You carried her out of that warehouse, you stayed with her in the hospital even after she woke up, you took care of her when she came home, you protected her from Darren. You can't ignore all those things."

"I'm not ignoring them. She's my friend." The word sours in his mouth as he says it. "And she would have done the same thing for me." He knew it was true.

She's a good person and she wouldn't let me chase her away if any of that shit happened to me and I told her to leave me alone.

"Yes she would. Because she cares about you." Diana sighs.

"She doesn't."

"Why don't you believe me?"

"Because she's told me what she wants!" Ben shouts so loudly he can feel the room shaking. "She wants to be friends-“

"Because she doesn't think that you want a relationship you nitwit!"

"I don't." Ben spits the words before he can stop them, but as he does something tightens at the base of his throat.

"How is it that it's been forty fucking years and you're still able to dance on the grave of my last nerve?"

Ben chuckles. "I missed you too sweetheart."

She sighs into the phone again making it crackle in Ben's ear. "She needs you.” Diana repeats. “And I think you need her too.”

His temper was flaring again, the thoughts that his father pressed into him surging up before he can stop the words. “I don’t need anyone. I’m Sol-“

“If you say that you’re Soldier Boy, I’m going to reach through this phone and slap you silly.” She snaps. “And you do need her, but you’re still just too stubborn to admit it.”

“I-“

“Ben I know that everything that happened with Countess was fucked up, but my granddaughter she-“ Diana pauses before she changes the thought.  “You say that you know she’s different, but right now you’re treating her the same way you treat all those other women.”

“I’m not-“

“My granddaughter has decided you’re important to her and once that’s happened it’s hard to make her let go. You saw the way she was with Darren and that guy was a manipulative asshole. Imagine what she thinks of you.”

“I-“

“Stop making excuses!”

“You didn’t even hear what I was going to say!” Ben shouts.

“And I don’t need to! Think what you want Ben but if you’d stop acting so stubborn and so ridiculously blind to what’s right in front of you. I promise that what comes next is worth the risk.”

“Don’t go all fucking mystical on me doll.”

“And don’t go all macho- no feelings asshole on me! So stop being so damn stubborn, get on a plane and get your ass here.” She retorts. “Don’t fuck this up Benjamin because if you do I’ll fuck you up.”

The line goes dead.

Ben sat there for a minute in the silence still holding the phone up to his ear, listening to what your grandmother said to him ring around in his head for a second.

No one ever spoke to him that way. In fact, Ben had never allowed anyone to speak to him the way that she did, well, not until you came along. You reminded him so much of her that it was astounding and he wasn't going to admit that maybe it's why he liked being around you so much.

Ben frowns at what Diana said, thinking about the unusual feelings that were swirling in the pit of his stomach. He felt wrong and the feelings were odd for him. He hadn't felt anything remotely like this ever in his life, not even for Countess.

And although Ben refused to be afraid of anything, the feelings he was having scared him. He didn’t understand and he wasn't sure that he wanted to. He wasn't sure that he wanted to see where this ended up. He felt like he was in too deep.

As much as he wanted to go to you like Diana ordered him to, he wasn't sure that he should. Something was holding him back, digging it's heels in and refusing to budge.

But why do I feel like-

His phone rings and he doesn't look at the caller ID when he picks up, expecting it to be Diana again, yelling at him.

"Di I-"

But it's not Diana.

"Hello Ben. It's nice to hear your voice again." The familiar voice says, sounding calm and collected.

"What the fuck do you want?" Ben snarls.

 "I thought it was time the two of us had a chat.”

A/N: At this point Diana is really just trying to give both Ben and the reader the kick in the pants they need. And yes I know another cliffhanger, but you know you love it. 🤭😉 We are quickly reaching the end of this series, but that means the confession scene is coming and I am so excited about it!!

As always thank you so much for reading! Reblogs, likes, and comments are not required, but are always appreciated. I love hearing what y'all think! If you'd like to be added to the taglist for this series let me know. 😊

Taglist:

@roseblue373 @mrsjenniferwinchester @corruptedcruiser @winchesterwild78 @the-super-who-locked-wizard

@criminalyetminimal @52ndstreeet @bitchykittenconnoisseur @anna6307

@faephoria @possiblyafangirl @jqtaro @quietlybitchy @tinydancer40

@roger-that-cap @megara0224 @miskwaadesiwag @rainyeggvoidpurse

@soldiergrimes @tiffsbagels @podiumackles

@ifyouwerethemoon @ririshkin @peachhiz @fitxgrld @sukunassfinger

@xx-spooky-little-vampire-xx @ej13928 @deans-spinster-witch @kr804573 @modiddys-blog

@acciosherlockholmes @minas-fantasies @fireskyy

@n-o-p-e-never @nesnejwritings @am0rem @tpwkcalli @momggn

@fitxgrld @whimsicalcherry @ladysparkles78

@spxideyver @zepskies @impala67stellawinchester

@reidtomewinchester @samanthadegaro @glossy01 @nikimisery

@tunnelvisionlove @incandxscents @winchester-stark @samahanta

@melonmochi

@kamisobsessed @whichwitchwanda @karolina-12110905 @jcollins03-blog

@pixviee @filmologetica @yvonneeeee @c1nnamong1rl29 @kmc1989

@livya99 @cherrygirl444

[isekyaaa]

Sometimes I see RI fics with a lot of notes, then I look at my writing, then to theirs, then back to mine, and I find myself thinking, "I could do it better..." But then I think about it more and realize there's a reason why I do things the way I do and that way is just better for me in the long run.

[jackklinemybeloved]

kipperlilly is suuuch an apt villain for a season that takes place during a junior year of high school. she’s basically the smart privileged kid who’s mad she doesn’t have any interesting trauma to write about in her college essay.

[trentcrimminallybeautiful]

no but fucking really. "i'd love to get your thoughts. let me know if there's anything you disagree with--i won't take it out, but i'm more than happy to tell you where you're wrong ;)" versus "yeah. mm, yeah. yes; sorry, sorry. um. yeah. ......i just want you to like it. ...i'll leave you be." makes me. fucking. OUGH

trent, confident and playful, telling them he's happy to correct them if they disagree with anything he's written versus him anxiously awaiting ted's approval and actively seeking it out, nervous, eager in a sort of rattled anxious way. the confidence versus the hesitancy, the independence versus the want for ted to like it, like him.

and then ted giving him a word of praise and a word of criticism in one--that it's a good book but it shouldn't be called 'the lasso way'--and trent takes it. i honestly think he does disagree, but instead of "telling ted where he's wrong"--maybe just out of respect for what he wants, trust for his opinion--he changes the title. what he said he wouldn't do. for ted. what if i wailed and screamed

[harrowscore]

why are you, as an adult in 2024, still hung up on reylo. why are you still mocking the shippers. why do you believe yourself to be superior only because you dislike a stupid ship from a fucking space fairytale. girl (gnc) get a grip

[wammyhoe]

When will you update the fanfic whiskey in a teacup🙏 Its well missed

I'm surprised (in a super good, heartwarming way) that you guys still ask about it. It's been on hiatus for about 6 months now, and I'm really sorry for the delay.

I've been incredibly busy, but I'll try to find time to update it soon. The story has become more demanding than I originally expected, and I don't want to post just to "keep it going" with endless fillers that would detract from the story.

Mello is trying to reach his goal but is conflicted about his feelings for the reader, and she has her own challenges to overcome as well. They both need to resolve their individual issues to be together, and I want to execute this well. I aim to keep him as in-character as possible, which is really challenging in a romance story. I've accepted that the Mello I’ve developed might be a bit out of character, which leads to a lot of asks (that I frankly just delete bc ugh, get a life?) criticizing my portrayal, as if those commenters know him personally.

Anyway, my experience in the fandom has been mixed lately, which is unmotivating and mostly disappointing. But I appreciate your support and interest, and I hope to post the next chapter soon!

ily!!! take care 💜💜

[detective-piplup]

okay but like I joke about how much I like fireknight and how it consumes so many of my waking thoughts but it actually does . it does so much to me. a lot of it was built through fanon and clinging onto scraps from the games bc i doubt devsis will ever let them interact again but they are like insane to me.

fire spirit’s weird relationship with affection and love is also part of why I like them so much yes that was the source of the divine visions earlier .

nobody look at the tags of this post.

[lususnatura]

🎤 🎤 🎤

a song that i associate with my muse meme!

AHH, hey, ramone!! thank you for sending in this prompt :D since you sent in three of the mic's, i shall now be treating you to three songs that make me think of blamore when i hear them / that i associate with it. an explanation of why i chose them will be in the tags <3

hozier - who we are.

icehouse - crazy.

depeche mode - personal jesus.

[dreamsy990]

fuck akuroku as a ship btw not only because its pedophilic because thats obviously a huge issue. but also i think we should be able to have platonic relationships with the same amount of devotion as any romance. not everyone who loves each other is in love DEREK.

[papyrus-onlyblogokay]

i love your blog, thank you for reblogging papyrus for me to look at!!!!!!!!!

💚💚💚!!! Of course! I love papyrus and i love sharing papyrus! I think out of every blog i have ever made, this one is the most worth it for people like you💚! Cheers to the coolest skeleton!