#so is he looking for someone impersonating them or is he actually looking for them?

[dark-dragon-8]

I want to write a supernatural fic where Sam still hunts while in college.

Like, hunting has always been such a big part of his life that he just can't live without it, especially when he knows other people are going to die and/or suffer if he doesn't help them.

I want Sam to be one of those students that you know never goes to any of the classes but almost always gets an A (or at the very least a passing grade) on all the exams/assignments (he both knows from experience and studies in his free time while on the road).

I want Sam to be the weird/cool guy at school that everyone theorizes about ["Do you think he has a girlfriend?" "He must be rich or something, how else can he afford to travel so much while still attending school" (he's not BTW) "I wonder who that guy that always drives him to and from classes/exams is" (that's Dean) "So he's a passenger princess" (they've never seen him drive), etc].

Everything about the show is the same (I might keep Jess alive though, IDK, like that girl who ends up having a crush on him so she's looking into him and finds out some stuff) except he's still in school and he & Dean always cover their faces/only Dean impersonates people (that work with the state/law & stuff) so that the authorities won't be able to connect things too quickly and ambush them while there's a test or something.

Sam is literally the cryptid of the school after getting his powers, like people literally see him get visions/mumble about future events in the middle of those rare lessons he comes to/exams/assignments.

After Dean becomes a demon, people start thinking he's his drug dealer and that they're a part of some Mafia group that needs a new lawyer/future new lawyer (hence why Sam is learning law) after they keep hearing hushed conversations where Sam practically begs this Dean guy to "Just please give it to me, please Dean I don't think I can take it much longer" (assuming "it" probably means like heroin or some other type of drug. Also how they finally found out Dean's name) and Dean begrudgingly handing him a small red vial and telling him he'll give him more, sometimes directly from the source (his wrist), later. Sam also starts bringing a second, smaller, steel water bottle to school after those interactions start but almost nobody notices (or they do and there are a thousand and one new conspiracies about it and what it means, after all, it could just be coffee for all they know, they can't be sure though, and they're too scared to ask whenever they do see him and he actually stays in school for a little longer instead of instantly leaving to go somewhere. So they don't really get the chance to ask him even if they want to).

They see him "give a random girl hickeys" in the alley right beside the school (he's actually drinking Ruby's blood after she got her throat slashed/slashed her own throat just a little bit so that they won't look too suspicious) and they think that's his GF. And then some other students see him doing the same to his drug dealer's (Dean's) wrist a few days later and they don't know what to think anymore [he was desperate (read; needed a boost before a stressful exam/lesson/finals week), okay? He wasn't thinking straight and all three thought it was at least somewhat okay as long as they were being careful].

One day, during a lesson because the others know he won't answer during an exam, Bobby (because he still isn't talking to John, fuck you John) is calling him, saying it's an emergency and that they need him there ASAP. He doesn't remember to control his reaction in front of the class and now everyone further believes that he's in the Mafia and that was his boss talking to him [they vaguely remember hearing him, quietly whisper, if they need him to bring his extra guns at the start of the conversation/if he needs to kill someone/if anybody died towards the end of it (all said somewhat casually, considering the situation, mind you)].

I imagine Gabriel coming over to fuck with him one day at the school and people thinking he's part of a rival group/family (that may or may not have joined Sam's own after betraying said family, depending on the timeline) based on their interactions. On that same note, I want Castiel to be like the boss's right hand/messenger and that their boss's name/title is God/the lord (if I was in that situation, I would think their boss is very narcissistic, but I won't say anything about it because crime and I don't want to die yet). And then when Godstiel comes around, Dean, who at this point knows way more than Sam about these rumors (because unlike Sam he's actually been around), makes him seem like their new boss (he might just use it to help him get laid, like in that one episode, but IDK).

I really want to write it, and I might just do it, I just need to finish the series first so that I'll be characterizing them correctly (these are all characters I already somewhat know about/saw) so we'll see if I remember it by then.

Feel free to use this idea but also I want credit/link to the story (mainly a link) if you do use it, since I want to read it regardless of whether or not I actually write this (knowing myself, I probably will. Like 78% will).

[totallyjustabunchofhocuspocus]

Fic: Something to Sink Your Teeth Into 20/?

Pairing: Buck/Tommy (cause I still love this bar and everyone in it, y'all)

Vampire/Witch!AU

Read on AO3

Tommy watched Evan turn a slow circle in the middle of Greenway’s living room, a thoughtful frown on his face as his eyes darted to and fro. His gaze skated over the weirdly impersonal décor and furnishings, the frown only deepening on his face as they lit on a decorative mirror propped in the corner of one of the built-in shelves.

Evan seemed more present now that they were actually doing something constructive—the strange, almost shellshocked quiet that had enveloped him after Alonzo left the bungalow finally falling away a bit. Tommy was fully willing to admit he was using the idea of worrying about Evan’s reaction to distract himself from his own thoughts on what he’d just done, but he didn’t think he was wrong to be worried. Evan’s face when Tommy had dissolved his alliance with Alonzo’s coven…

After nearly a thousand years of practice, humans were easy to read. Even humans he did not know well. And yet, Tommy didn’t understand the depth of emotion that had been plastered across Evan’s handsome face. Shock and disbelief. Confusion and wariness. Even a touch of suspicion. All perfectly reasonable reactions, expected even. But beneath it all had been something so heartbreakingly fragile. Tremulous. As though in the end, Evan was not surprised that Tommy could do what he did, but that he would do it for Evan.

And it had been for Evan.

Tommy could claim that he was looking at the bigger picture, that his coven bond was a sacrifice he was willing to make for the possibility of avoiding coven war. He could claim it was the easiest way to protect his coven from as much of the fallout of what he was doing as possible. Neither were untrue statements, after all. The truth was, though, he would have taken the out of pretending to have been spelled if it had been any other witch offering it to him. He still could have helped Howie and Grant. Might have been able to help them more with the resources of his coven available. Evan’s plan had left Evan in the most danger. And so it was unacceptable.

Evan’s reaction was making him think that his witch was disturbingly unused to someone considering the idea that Evan might get hurt unacceptable.

Unbidden, the memories he’d seen when he drank from Evan rose in his mind. The utter, helpless sense of isolation that had enveloped his witch as he stood before the Pennsylvania high coven. The resignation. The despair. He knew Evan loved his sister beyond all reason, had gotten the sense that it was entirely mutual…but now he wondered who else in his witch’s life had ever made him feel like that. His parents? His familiar? His coven? Tommy was beginning to think the list had been distressingly thin even before Evan had been banished.

Tommy could sympathize. He had lived almost three centuries knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that he could not trust anyone around him. That no one cared about him outside of what service he could provide them. That no one would come to his defense if he was ever in danger, or if his bastard of a maker ever decided to get rid of him. They had been miserable, lonely centuries. Even being covenless after the bastard was finally killed had seemed like a relief. Finding friendship, brotherhood, and eventually a coven with Sal—and others, later—had seemed like an impossible dream when it happened. A dream he’d always thought he would defend tooth and nail, something he would never give up now that he had it.

He'd given it up for his witch, and he did not regret it. It hurt. He was sure it would hurt more when he finally had a chance to sit down and really feel it. He was also sure it would not hurt as much as knowing that his witch had been injured or killed while he wasn’t there to protect him. Tommy still did not understand the intensity of the connection he felt to Evan…but he was done questioning in. His instincts had never steered him wrong, not in nearly a thousand years. Those instincts insisted now that Evan belonged with him, and he belonged with Evan. His witch was vital to him in a way he had never experienced before, and he wasn’t letting go of that connection unless Evan himself told Tommy he didn’t want him around anymore.

He watched Evan turn another slow circle in the room, standing in a patch of afternoon sunlight that poured in from the large front window. He looked as though he’d been made to be bathed in the light Tommy could no longer endure, haloed by the warm glow, his curly hair turning a lighter, sandy blond, finally absent of the pallor that Tommy’s drinking from him and the strain of casting so much magic had left him with. Beautiful. So fucking beautiful.

And that…that was not something he needed to be thinking about right now.

He shook his head, bringing his attention back to the thoughtful frown on Evan’s face and not how tempting he looked, kissed by the sunlight. His witch had paused, his hands on his hips as he narrowed his eyes.

“They really didn’t find anything?” he asked.

“Nada,” Tommy confirmed, watching as Evan looked all around him. “Why? What are you thinking?”

“Nothing, I just…there’s something…” he trailed off, his eyes going strangely distant as he looked around the room yet again. Then he stilled. “Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me,” Evan muttered.

“What?” Tommy demanded immediately.

In answer, Evan spun another slow circle in the center of the room, one hand reaching out as though he were touching something in the air in front of him. “He hid something else here,” Evan said at last. “Fucking smart bastard, I’ll give him that.”

It was Tommy’s turn to frown. His witch had certainly proven himself to be competent, and even with the limitations his banishment placed on him, Evan was powerful. However… “Evan, what are you talking about? I’m pretty sure Howie and Grant would have known to look in this between place.”

“Yeah, but they might not have realized how big the between is here,” Evan countered. “Like I said…it’s not something a lot of witches learn anymore.”

Tommy tilted his head, crossing his arms over his chest. “You keep talking like the size of it can change. Isn’t space…you know, space? Like there have to be boundaries.”

“Ever been in one of those house of mirrors they do at fairs and theme parks?” Evan asked, taking a deep breath. He started to chant, the same words he’d used in the office building, and just now in the SUV to get them onto the porch. The hair on the back of Tommy’s neck started to rise this time, though, the air in the living room suddenly feeling oddly heavy. At the crest of his spell, Evan reached forward and made a grasping motion, his hand closing on empty air. There was a soft pop, and then the heavy feeling vanished.

On the desk in front of the window, there was now a leatherbound book that Tommy knew had not been there before. Evan grinned to himself and hurried forward, snatching the book up and starting to pull at the corners where it was tied shut with elastic bands. Tommy edged closer, carefully avoiding the shafts of sunlight that still poured through the window.

“Great work Ev—GET DOWN!”

He had only seconds to react. The space of a few of Evan’s breaths. Had he kept farther back in the room to avoid the sunlight, he might not have been at an angle to see at all when three figures suddenly came sprinting towards Greenway’s house from across the street, one of them winging its arm back to fling something small and black toward the window. Tommy was across the distance between him and Evan in a flash, ignoring the pain when the sunlight hit his skin, the sizzling hiss. Sunlight was no longer an instant death for him…but it still hurt like a bitch.

That didn’t matter, though. He wrapped himself around his witch, his only thought to shield Evan from what his mind had barely had time to register as some kind of flashbang or explosive. Even vampire speed wasn’t fast enough to stumble more than a step or two away from the desk before the window shattered and the device hit the desk. Tommy squeezed his eyes shut, pulling Evan more tightly against him as it went off.

Explosive.

Small, the part of him that had fought in more battles and conflicts than he would ever be able to remember noted. Not a large payload, else he and Evan would be vaporized. But enough. Enough to lift him off his feet and throw them across the room. Enough to destroy the desk, wall, and window, no doubt leaving a jagged hole in Greenway’s house. Enough to fill the room with flying shrapnel.

Pain blossomed on his back, white-hot, sudden and so intense he almost choked on it even as he and Evan hit the ground and he was consumed with lessening the impact, cradling Evan close, protecting his head as they rolled and rolled. His chest felt like it was on fire, his ears filling with a horrendous wet, shifting crack above the roar of the explosion and Evan’s wordless cries.

They came to a halt in a tangle of limbs, resting on their sides, and Tommy couldn’t move for precious seconds, pain radiating through him at levels even he couldn’t ignore. Impalement. Not a sensation that you could forget no matter how long it had been since it happened. Too low to hit his heart. Too far to the right to impact his spine. But a massive injury that would take time to heal, even with the effects of drinking Evan’s blood still relatively fresh.

Evan coughed underneath him, stirring and trying to sit up. “Tommy?” he gasped, the second time he’d called Tommy by name. It sounded just as sweet on Evan’s tongue as it had the first time, despite the dire situation. “Tommy, what—”

He grabbed Tommy’s shoulder and pushed at him. Tommy tried; he fucking tried to get up, to get his feet under him. He had to. He had to get up and move, because he could hear whoever had just attacked them clambering through the hole where the window used to be. He had to…

Evan wrenched himself backwards suddenly, looking down between them. His eyes went wide with horror at the sight of the huge piece of wood protruding from Tommy’s chest, nearly long enough to have impaled Evan as well. The scent of blood—Evan’s blood, too, but not much, not enough to overpower the dead scent of Tommy’s, he couldn’t have been injured badly��wafted up in a cloud around them. Their clothes were soaked with it, and Tommy could feel more crawling up the back of his throat.

“Tommy! Tommy, what—” Evan started again, and Tommy shook his head.

“Evan…run,” he managed to grit out, his own blood filling his mouth and spilling from his lips.

“Aw, come on Kinard. Let the witch stay.”

Tommy grit his teeth, fresh determination welling up in him as he recognized the voice of the blond vampire from the office building. Fucking hell, he needed to get up. He needed to keep Evan safe, needed to give him a chance to escape. If he could just get out of the house, he could run—the sun would be enough protection for him. He’d be safe as long as Tommy could keep Blondie and his thugs off his witch for just a little bit.

Evan’s eyes snapped to Blondie over Tommy’s shoulder. Tommy saw his eyes go wide and flicker between the three figures, no doubt coming to the same conclusion that Tommy had. He renewed his efforts to push himself up. If he could get to his feet, he could rip the shrapnel impaling him out.

He might even live long enough for the wound to start healing.

Before he could make any progress, though, Evan’s face…changed. His eyes narrowed. His jaw tightened. His pretty blue eyes went absolutely cold as ice, a cold sort of rage filling them. The low-level staticky electricity of magic that always clung to him increased what felt like tenfold between one breath and the next. Then his arm curled protectively over Tommy’s back, pulling Tommy’s body closer to Evan’s, and he started shouting a spell.

It felt different than any of the other displays of Evan’s power that Tommy had witnessed so far. Harsher. Stronger. Tommy had no idea what Evan was chanting, but he could tell the spell was meant to hurt. Power crackled around his witch, pouring off him in a wave that exploded outwards, racing towards Blondie and the other two faster than even vampire reflexes could deal with. The spell swirled through the air like something alive, more magic than Tommy had felt in centuries powering it. The white light of witch’s magic lit up the room, brighter even than sunlight.

Evan’s voice was ragged by the time he finished chanting, his chest heaving, brow furrowed in exertion, but his movements were steady as he disentangled himself from Tommy and got slowly to his feet. His hands were strong when he reached down and gripped Tommy’s arms, helping him up as well. The movement brought fresh pain, fresh blood welling up from the edges of the gigantic, sucking wound in his chest, and his knees nearly buckled when he finally made it up. Smoothly, Evan slipped his shoulder under one of Tommy’s arms, wrapping his arm around Tommy’s waist and taking most of Tommy’s weight.

“Evan,” he bit out with a gasp, finally able to turn and face Blondie with his witch’s help.

“I’ve got this,” Evan said, tightening his grip around Tommy’s waist. The icy anger in them cracked as they flicked up and down Tommy’s body, worry shining in them for a bare instant before he flicked his gaze back to Blondie and the other two.

Who had made no move to attack. Why hadn’t they attacked?

The three vampires were standing less than ten feet away from them, just barely out of the sunlight pouring in through the gaping hole that the explosive had created. Blondie’s whole body was trembling, unadulterated fury twisting his face into an ugly mask. The other two weren’t shaking as much…and they looked terrified.

“Will taking that out make it better or worse?” Evan asked him, flicking a quick look at the shrapnel that had run Tommy through.

In answer, Tommy gripped the end that sprouted from his chest, and with a roar of agony that he absolutely refused to feel any shame over, he pulled it the rest of the way through his body. He let the bloodied piece of what had been Greenway’s desk drop from numb fingers, pressing his hand futile against the now-gushing wound in his chest. Evan’s arm tightened around him again, the hand that was gripping Tommy’s wrist to keep his arm slung over Evan’s shoulders spasming.

“I’ll…be okay,” Tommy groaned. “What’d...what’d you do…to them?”

Evan’s face was terrible to look at, absolutely devoid of emotion as he glared straight at Blondie. “Tell me who you’re working for,” he said, the words oddly heavy. They dripped with magic. Bristled with it.

Blondie’s eyes were filled with pure hatred, his jaw working soundlessly for a moment before he managed to grind out, “Fuck…you!” His body shook as though he was being held by some invisible force.

Sweat started to bead on Evan’s forehead, his face a mask of concentration, and with a sickening start, Tommy realized what his witch had done. “You thralled them?”

What the fuck?

What the fuck?

There were spells witches could use to control people. Some were even strong enough to hold vampires. Evan himself had suggested that Tommy pretend to be a victim of such a spell. But three at once? At least one of them being as strong as Blondie obviously was? When Evan’s power was diminished by not having a coven?

What the fuck?

Evan took a step backwards, half dragging Tommy with him. His eyes darted down to the bloodied chunk of wood that had impaled Tommy, and then to one of Blondie’s companions. “Pick it up,” Evan said, his voice lower and more dangerous than Tommy had ever heard it. Again, the words came out…heavy. Laced with so much magic it was like pure lightning falling from Evan’s lips.

The nameless vampire, shorter than Tommy and Blondie both, with a head of messy black curls and a scar over one eyebrow, was not as old as Blondie. Or as powerful. His face was a rictus of terror as he stepped toward the piece of wood, his steps barely faltering.

“Don’t,” he pleaded as he bent down and picked up the sharp, jagged shrapnel. “Please…don’t…”

“You would’ve killed him,” Evan said, nothing even remotely resembling pity in his voice. He looked at the third vampire, another man who looked as though he’d been a bouncer in his human life, and pointed. “Don’t miss the heart.”

Blondie trembled like he was trying to slam himself against the force of Evan’s will as the other vampire turned towards the third, shifting the piece of wood in his hand until he was holding it like a sword. With slow, jerky motions, the vampire marched on his companion, the wood held straight out in front of him.

Tommy had seen plenty of his own kind staked through the heart. Many times, he’d even been the one to do it. It was still not something he enjoyed watching, knowing exactly what would happen to him if he ever found himself on the other end. The vampire under Evan’s control plunged the wooden shrapnel into his companion’s chest, barely any hesitation to show he was fighting. The other vampire let out an unearthly shriek, nearly convulsing as thick veins of black spread over every inch of skin that had been left exposed, expanding outwards like cracks in a windshield. Then his body started crumbling before their eyes. Like the vampire was made of nothing but sand being washed away by a wave, his body collapsed into a cloud of ash.

Blondie’s enraged struggles abated somewhat, and Evan’s grimace eased, his concentration no longer split between three vampires. He was silent a moment, and then his jaw tightened and he spat out a spellword, flinging his hand out towards the vampire still holding the wooden shrapnel, staring in horror at what he’d just done. A ball of fire erupted in the air and sped towards him.

And another pile of ash rained down on the hardwood floors.

“Who. Did. This?” Evan said again, all of his focus, all of his will, all of his power coming to bear on the last vampire. Tommy could only stare at Evan’s face, too weak to do anything but let his witch hold him up as his body struggled to heal the wound in his chest. Evan’s face was a mask of fury equal to Blondie’s, no mercy in his eyes.

Blondie was still struggling, but Tommy knew at a glance that he wasn’t going to be able to throw off the spell. Not with Evan’s magic no longer divided. A dark sort of satisfaction unfurled in him, accompanied by eagerness. Answers. Fucking finally.

Blondie snarled at them, but finally growled out. “Ortiz. It’s all…Ortiz.”

Tommy reeled back at that. He gathered himself to start questioning Blondie, but Evan beat him to it. “Why does Ortiz want to start a coven war? She’s allying with Gerrard.” Evan glanced over at Tommy for confirmation, and he gave a short nod.

“Ortiz doesn’t want…an ally. She…wants it all.” Blondie looked like he wanted to bite his tongue in half rather than keep talking. “She’s been…stirring up the witches…for months. Killed…half a dozen with…Greenway’s help.”

Evan went very still beside him, his hand tightening on Tommy’s wrist almost to the point of pain.

“Why?” Evan demanded, but Blondie shook his head.

“Don’t know…his angle. Gerrard’s party…was…supposed to be…the finale. A dead witch for the…high coven. Gerrard would look…like he was trying…to bring down…the witches on Ortiz’s…coven.”

There had been vampires at the party who knew who Evan was the whole time, Tommy realized. Or had at least known that he was witch. They’d intended for one of Ortiz’s turns to kill Evan at the party, and then it would have looked like Gerrard had deliberately planted Evan to make trouble for Ortiz with the SoCal high coven, or was so fucking incompetent, he didn’t realize that there was a witch right under his nose. Gerrard would have gotten the blame for the chaos that a witch’s death at his party would have caused.

And Ortiz would have been in her rights to challenge him instead of allying with him.

“Damn it,” he hissed. Evan looked over at him worriedly.

“Is that enough for Chimney and Grant?” he asked. He was still sweating, the corners of his eyes starting to go tight with the strain of holding Blondie, along with all the other magic he’d been performing.

“It’ll have to be,” Tommy groaned. “Don’t hurt yourself.”

Evan’s lips quirked upwards in a wry smile. “Says the guy with a six-inch hole in his chest.”

Blondie managed to shake his head, glaring at Evan balefully. “You’re both…gonna die…screaming,” he gritted out. Despite himself, Tommy felt his fangs drop at the implied threat to his witch.

“You first,” he growled, and started to let go of Evan; started to step forward.

“Don’t,” Evan said, not even bothering to try and hold Tommy back, just quietly asking. Tommy was not surprised that it was enough to still his movements…what was surprising was that Evan didn’t look shocked either. Evan smiled up at him again, his expression softening slighting before he turned his attention back to Blondie. His face went hard as stone again, and he looked out over Blondie’s shoulder to the gaping hole where the window used to be, and the sunlight pouring in through it. He focused on Blondie again, and pointed. “Walk,” he ordered.

There was something immensely satisfying in the way that Blondie’s eyes widened in terror before his body obeyed, turning jerkily and starting to march forward.

The moment he stepped into the sunlight, Tommy could hear his skin start to sizzle and hiss. A groan of pain escaped Blondie’s lips as he kept walking, thin wisps of smoke starting to rise from his exposed hands and face. The back of his head and next started to bubble and blister, though he didn’t catch fire yet.

Tommy could endure direct sunlight for at least a couple of minutes. He might be able to take it for longer, but he’d never dared to experiment. The damage he’d taken after two minutes had been enough to kill his curiosity. Blondie was fairly old. He had recently drunk witch blood.

But he wasn’t as old as Tommy was. And witch blood could only do so much.

The smoke rising off Blondie’s exposed skin grew thicker. Blisters burst and hissed and spat. Every bit of him not covered by his clothes turned an angry, excruciating red before scabbing over like the skin had been cauterized, vampire healing trying mightily and being unable to stand against sunlight. He looked as though some invisible force was pouring acid down over his head, and still he kept marching determinedly forward. By the time he was crawling through the destroyed window, he was screaming.

By the time he made it into the middle of Greenway’s yard, he was sobbing.

Black, oily smoke rose from his body, until with a final, animalistic shriek of pain, his body burst into flames. Incredibly, he kept trying to walk forward, only for his limbs to give out after a couple steps. Blondie collapsed on the lawn in a burning heap, and Evan sucked in a gulp of air like he’d been drowning and had finally breached the surface.

“Are you all right?” Tommy demanded, trying to take more of his own weight as Evan swayed a little under him.

Evan shook his head as though trying to clear it, and then firmed up his stance. He didn’t let Tommy shift away from him…and honestly, Tommy wasn’t sure he didn’t still need the support. “I’m good,” Evan muttered stubbornly. “We have to get out of here. Grant must’ve powered the look-away charms back up when they were here, but there’s no way in hell they hold against all this for long.”

“No argument here,” Tommy said. He bit his lip, before reluctantly asking, “Think you can manage to, uh, fold us? Back into the car?”

Evan frowned slightly, something like confusion flashing in his eyes before he nodded. “I…yeah. Yeah, I’m good,” he said. “Come on, I need to be able to see the car.”

They began limping towards the front door, Tommy still having to lean most of his weight on his witch. But Evan’s arm was strong around his waist, his shoulder solid beneath Tommy’s arm. For just a moment, Tommy let himself lean a little harder on his witch, pushed them just that much more together.

He did not think he was imagining it when Evan’s arm tightened around him, pulling them closer in return.

[adaines-furious-feast]

Fig's got a government agent (and possibly more) coming after her but they can't figure it out even when letters to Det. Decker and Dr Keller are being sent to her home.

But an order of knights that probably have 1500 years of mythologising their mission tracked her down.

At this point you're just incompetent, Mr Agent.

[sskk-manifesto]

Ep 5!!!

[faith-forgxtten-land]

Come to Bed | Donatello

this started with the idea of seducing donnie into healthy sleeping patterns and then just. spiralled from there. i didn't really have a specific iteration in mind but reading it back, it definitely fits bayverse most, i think, so that's what i'll categorise it under!

warnings: NSFW, swearing, general filthiness? gender neutral reader, everyone is 18+!!

summary: there is only one way to get donnie to come to bed (two if you count blackmail)

word count: 2411

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

It’s nearly 3am and your eyelids feel heavy, eyes glassy and beginning to ache just a little, and Donnie is still not in bed. You look at the empty space beside you, cold and untouched, and kick the covers off your bare legs. The air is cool, goosebumps raising the moment you abandon the comfort of bed, and you almost regret getting up as your feet hit the freezing floor.

Donnie is so lucky you love him and care for his health.

He's exactly where you'd left him hours before, sitting hunched over a desk in his lab, and you wonder briefly if turtles with their shells can suffer the same complications as humans with poor posture. Perhaps you'll force him to join you and Mikey for your bi-weekly yoga sessions. “Donnie?”

The terrapin doesn't so much as flinch, instead burying his face further into a screen that is already way too close to his face. Oh, his prescription is definitely going to need updating soon, you think amusedly. You clear your throat, attempting your best grumpy Raph impersonation. “Oi, four-eyes.”

Now Donnie does flinch, beak nearly crashing into his monitor, glasses slipping as he salvages his precious technology from being assaulted by his face and spinning in his seat to glower at whoever dared disturb him. He relaxes when he realises it's just you, shooting you a scowl that's devoid of any real heat. “You need to stop doing that voice, it's creepy.”

You grin at him, noting the exact moment he registers what you're wearing – or, rather, what you're not wearing. His eyes go wide and his lips part, scowl melting like ice doused in salt. He swallows thickly. “You're meant to be a ninja,” you tease, stepping slowly into his space and letting his hands fall to your waist before they curl around your back as he pulls you close, palms flattening against your spine. “You can't hear when one measly human is behind you?”

“You are so mean to me,” Donnie says instead of answering.

“We both know you like it. Besides,” you look down at your naked skin, his own eyes following your pointed gaze eagerly. “I think I'm being pretty kind, actually. Someone was meant to come to bed three hours ago and ravish me, but apparently, I'm not more interesting than,” you peer over his shoulder as best you can, squinting at the tiny squiggles. Lips pursed, you look at your boyfriend flatly, not bothering to finish your sentence.

“I can explain.”

“World of Warcraft? Really, Donatello?”

He winces at the full name. “I wasn’t playing for long,” he defends himself. “I’ve been looking over some things Leo asked for since this morning, I was just taking a break.”

“Taking a break means coming to bed and not staring at a screen for even longer.” Softer, you add, “I’ve been waiting for you for hours.”

You run your hands up the bumpy skin of his muscled arms, over scars and rough tissue that you’ve pressed kisses to countless times, to rest upon his shoulders. A small part of you is resentful, but the larger, kinder part of you is concerned; his eyes are bloodshot to the extreme, and exhaustion is etched deep into the lines of his face. You dig your nails in and massage a little roughly, feeling those worried knots and doing your best to soothe them with gentle palms.

It hits him then, just exactly what he’d missed out on by getting caught up, and his shoulders sag under the tender weight of your caress, twitchy energy that can keep him up for days deserting him instantly. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs quietly.

You smile at him, fond and warm, one hand trailing upwards to cup his jaw. “It’s okay.” His skin is something you’ll never get tired of touching, you think, as you rub your thumb over the swell of his cheek. You pinch him a little, coy and mean the way you know he loves, before soothing it with a whisper of a kiss when he hisses playfully. “Although, you’ll have to make it up to me.”

“And what is my punishment?” he asks dryly, guilt pushed aside to indulge in your teasing as you lean closer to hide your smirk in the crook of his neck.

“You’ll be in bed by 11 p.m. sharp every night for the next week.” You can tell an objection is on the tip of his tongue, and you fix your teeth along his throat in warning. “I’ve already cleared everything with Splinter and Leo.” 

Donnie sighs both in pleasure and in resignation. “Are you trying to seduce me into having healthy sleeping patterns?”

You start to kiss his neck, soft grazes of your lips against his scaled skin. “Maybe. Is it working?”

“Well—”

“If the answer isn’t yes, I’ll be very offended and I’ll be forced to dump you,” you add airily, tongue flicking leisurely over his rapid pulse. “You're incredibly lucky I haven't already for ditching me for World of fucking Warcraft.”

“Oh, blackmail too. Lucky me,” Donnie mutters, but it’s full of mirth and he doesn't push his luck any further.

You grin against his skin, and you grin even wider when he starts as your teeth scrape along the column of his throat. His hands have a bruising grip on your hips, and you bite down harder just to feel his grip tighten.

“You’re such a tease,” he whines, unable to stop himself bucking up into you. His breathing has turned to panting, short and desperate gasps that make heat curl in your stomach, and you trail your nails down the keratin of his plastron slowly.

“You love it,” you murmur coyly, fingers brushing against the elastic of his waistband mischievously. “And you deserve it.”

Donnie curses loudly, head falling back as you pull on that elastic just to let it snap back against him. His pants are soaking, and you feel that familiar rush of smug satisfaction as you slot your knee between his thighs. It does terrible things to your ego seeing him like this; it makes you drunk and dizzy seeing him drenched and needy for you, and you groan under your breath as he grinds against you. 

“Please,” he whimpers.

You hum as casually as you can. “Please what?”

“Fuck, please, I need you—” He cuts himself off with a loud cry of your name as you slide two fingers past his waistband and into his dripping cloaca.

“Keep going.”

He’s quick to turn into a blubbering mess, drool running down his chin and words slurring as he babbles and begs you to continue finger-fucking him. “Don’t stop, please—yes, yes, right there, there, fuck—”

Your fingers pump in and out, scissoring inside him at a harsh pace you know he likes. He’s sopping wet but that doesn’t stop the tiny spikes of pain mixing deliriously with pleasure as you stretch him wide without warning. You can feel his slick coating your hand, running down your skin and over your knuckles, and he only gushes more when you add a third digit.

“Faster, faster,” he chants shakily, almost sobbing when you slow instead. 

“You’re so tight, baby,” you purr. “I wouldn’t wanna hurt you.”

He’s definitely sobbing now. “I can take it, please, please.”

“Oh?” You curl your fingers and fuck him harder and faster, just the way he wants. His cock is there, thick and heavy and ready to drop, and he shudders as you brush softly against it.

His voice is choked as he calls your name again. "Gonna drop, please–”

Your laugh is light and a little cruel and it makes him wail, the sound overflowing with need and desperation. “Don’t you dare.”

“Oh god,” Donnie gasps as your fingers rub along his length still tucked inside, a fresh wave of slick trickling down to your wrist.

“I would’ve been kind,” you tell him nonchalantly, kissing his temple and huffing another laugh when he can’t stop his hips from grinding into you, body begging you to bury your fingers deeper inside him. “But you’ve been such a bad boy.”

He drops with a guttural groan followed by a pathetic whimper, gasping apologies feebly.

You sigh and pull your hand back, your resolve faltering just a little when Donnie whines and cries louder at the action. “You’re being very bad tonight, baby.”

He’s still wearing his pants and you roll your lips to hide a smile as he tugs them down frantically, his cock finally free in the air. His hands grip the arms of his chair so hard that you swear you hear them creak, desperate to touch himself but not wanting to disobey you any further. It’s a bit late to play innocent and good now, and you shoot him an unimpressed look that makes his jaw clench. “Please,” Donnie breathes.

Your hand is still soaked, and you watch him watch you as you raise your fingers to your lips, sticky tendrils trembling as you rub your fingertips together before parting them slowly. Eyes fixed on his, you glide your tongue over his slick, sucking gently and exhaling quietly at the flavour that blooms over your tastebuds. The arms of the chair are definitely creaking now, and you smile coyly as his cock twitches.

“Please.”

As much as you love teasing him into a pathetic frenzy, you remember his weary eyes and decide to put him out of his misery. There’ll be plenty of time to punish Donnie the way he deserves later – lots of edging and whining and begging and very little relief. For now, you’ll give him what he wants.

You kneel between his legs, coquettish as you glance up at him through your lashes; he’s working his jaw, teeth clenched and eyes darting wildly as he barely holds himself together. Grasping his hard cock in your hand, slick and heavy, you begin to pump slowly.

The chirps and churrs that escape him are whining and full of ecstasy, his eyes fluttering as you squeeze your palms around his thick length, hands twisting with an obscene squelch at every stroke. The lab is quiet apart from the wet pumping and his throaty groans, and you wonder if his moaning will be loud enough to wake the others. It wouldn’t surprise you, and the thought makes your hand move faster as you rub your thumb over the sensitive head of his cock.

Donnie can’t stop the stutter of his hips, head falling back. “Fuck.” He swears louder as your lips suckle his tip, your name a rasping prayer spilling from his mouth. You flick your tongue, tasting the slightly bitter flavour of his precum and just how soaked he is, evidence of what you do to him coating your face, and he cries noisily when you suddenly take another few inches into your mouth and swallow around him. He’s hitting the back of your throat, and he feels like he’s about to faint from how tight and warm you feel.

A wave of embarrassment hits him as you pull back and smirk, his head still pressed against your flirtatious smile while you continue to work him with your hands. “Please,” he begs for what feels like the hundredth time that night.

“You’re so good at begging,” you praise, eyes sparkling when it makes him moan lewdly. Oh, that definitely woke someone up. He’s back to bucking his hips and because you’re so kind, you let him dictate the pace as you continue pumping.

“So close,” he breathes shakily. “I’m so close, please.”

“Please, what?”

His eyes roll back, and the arms of his chair finally give way, crumbling under his crushing grip as impressions of his hands mould into the metal. Donnie doesn’t stop rocking and whimpering. “Please let me come.”

You kiss the head of his cock once more, delighting in the way he tremors at the whisper of touch. “Be a good boy and come for me, Donatello.”

There’s nothing Donnie loves more than being good for you and he shows this by coming undone the second his name leaves your lips, body jolting and convulsing like he's been struck by lightning as you continue to milk his cock while his orgasm wracks through him. Your face is completely covered, ropes of his come painting your skin as he groans pitifully, the sound agonised and mewling. 

It’s almost silent for a few moments, the only noises are Donnie’s wheezing pants and whimpers of oversensitivity, and you watch him quietly. He’s so beautiful like this, blissed out, stress a stranger rather than a constant companion, and you wish you could both stay like this.

The moment is over too soon as the terrapin manages to open his eyes blearily, although they nearly shut again in dizzying satisfaction when he catches sight of your come-smeared cheeks. It’s dripping down your chin, threatening to spill down your neck and to your chest, and a part of you wants to leave it, relishing in the way Donnie is entirely transfixed, but you scoop what you can on your fingers and bring the sticky threads to your mouth instead.

Donnie’s lips part and his breath hitches and it’s your turn to shut your eyes in pleasure, eyes rolling and unable to stop a soft groan as you lick and swallow what he’s given you. “Mean,” he accuses again when you finally open your eyes, and you grin at how faint he sounds.

“Just for you,” you agree and he churrs instinctively, flushing as you snicker. He’s so cute, you think fondly, letting him reach out and grasp you closer, seeking comfort. And so easy.

“I think I need that nap now,” Donnie tells you weakly, and you huff another laugh against his sweaty skin, tasting salt and nuzzling further into him. 

You press a loving kiss to his shoulder and reluctantly pull back. “Shower then bed, come on.” His legs are shaky, and you purse your lips to stop from chuckling as he stumbles like a newborn lamb, begrudgingly relenting to leaning against you. “Poor Bambi,” you tease, brushing your lips against his plastron in a loving caress when he grumbles playfully. 

Hopefully, no one has been awoken by your night-time activities and, if they have, you hope they’re not up and roaming because you’d really rather not have to bump into any of Donnie’s family with his come still coating your face.

[mehiwilldoitlater]

You never knew how you ended up in the Fortress of Meropide.The last few memories that you had were that you were on the brink of exasperation; every step was an open wound and more pain. At some point, you thought your body must have given up, finally falling to fatigue and desperation.

When you opened your eyes, you were in a bed—a modest bed covered in a tick blanket. Your wounds were treated, and despite the painful sensation in your head, you were able to understand the situation.

Someone had found you, cured you, and taken you to that strange place. After some glance at the windows, it was easy to see that; maybe you weren't on the surface at all.

The first creatures that you met during that day were the Melusines, a bunch of small creatures that surrounded you at your bed, asking eagerly if you were okay. That wasn't a surprise. After all, they were your main supporters from the first day you entered Fontaine,defending you from all the accusations. Sigewinne, like all of them, never wanted to leave your side. Make sure to cure all of your wounds. It was strange at the beginning, but nice at the same time. You couldn't remember the last time that you were treated like an actual living being.

The only oddity that you couldn't shake off yourself was One question: how did you end up in the fortress?

For sure, you knew that you weren't a prisoner, or at least, you thought, since you were treated with some kind of regard. Yet you couldn't shake off the sensation that whatever was happening there was just so... off.

The answer to your question came on the day that you finally were able to stay awake for more than ten minutes, in the form of the Duke of the Fortress himself. 

He entered without any kind of ceremony, only making some kind of sound from his throat—something similar to a sound of disapproval—after seeing your worried eyes meet his cold ones.

He didn't speak at all. He just dropped on the only available chair in the room, looking at you with some kind of worry,fidgering with his hand, searching for the right words.

He inhaled deeply.

"I'm Wriothesley, the administrator of this place. I suppose you have questions. Now, do you know where you are?"

You nodded, first slowly, then with some more energy.

"Good. And do you know, why are you here?"

You had a small idea of why you were there right now, but his demeanor wasn't that of someone who planned to torture someone. If that was their intention, then why should they take care of you and take time to cure you?You shocked your head, this time in a denial move.

"Well, it seems like you have been falsely accused of impersonating the allmighty—the big one, you know?"

Yeah, you got quite a lot too. He noticed your rigidity; maybe his approach was too professional? You must have felt more like an interrogation than a simple conversation... Was he that intimidating? Not like he didn't like that, but you weren't any kind of prisoner...

"Do you have some kind of damage that prevents you from speaking? I could ask Sigewinne to check you up."

He moved his hands, like asking you to continue his sentence. Of course he knew you weren't mute, and he knew that you could speak freely.

"... Y/n..."

"Ah! Good! So you can speak after all!"

He chuckled a little, maybe to lighten up the atmosphere. Then he cleared his throat again.

"So, as I was saying, you must be wondering why you are in the Fortress of Meropide. Well, do you recall your false accusation? ...Well, it seems like, thanks to our Ludex, the accusation has fallen."

Finally, a new expression on your face Surprise...maybe Hope?

"Wait, hold on! So... This means that I'm-"

"Free to roam? Not quite. The situation is still quite dense, especially with the other nations."

And again, you fell into a long, exhausted sigh. The last thing you needed was to know that, despite all, you were still wanted around this world dead. He looked at you with an inch of condolence.

"It's a temporary state... After Neuvillette and Lady Furina fix this situation, you'll be free to do whatever you want to do."

Again, the room was caught in silence. In other words, you were stuck there until the first notice; you were in fact a prisoner of that place. Great, just great. Well, it was better than being hunted down by every character in that damn game, right? ...like that could have been good news.

You decided just to roll in the blankets that covered you, facing the wall instead of Wriothesley.

"I suppose you're not in the mood for a chat. In this case, I'll let you rest a little more."

He taught the doorknob, holding it with force, but instead of the click of the door, you only heard the sound of his robes.

"I know you're scared, but... I'm not your enemy. I ask you to just...trust me."

But what he received was just silence. After that, the click finally echoed in your room.

//////

He kept trying to focus on the documents, a failure of distraction. He Taked a sip of his tea, taking a large sip.

This was a mistake—a big, huge mistake—but it was a necessary evil, at least from his point of view.Fontaine was the only nation that refused to participate in the hunt against the impostor.

Neuvillette and the Melusines sensed something in you. Something that no one could have noticed—only a creature so connected with this world.

This was a huge misunderstanding, and that was the main reason why Neuvillette had moved all Fontaine forces in order to find you. If he only knew that you were already under the custody of the Duke...He didn't plan this! He knew that he should have informed the two leaders of Fontaine, but something happened.

The Primordial Sea...Its stopped the moment that you stepped there, in the fortress.

He knew how dangerous it was; he was its first and last line of defense, and if you were something capable of calming it, you would void a catastrophe! You were the solution!

He said to himself that this wasn't a permanent decision. He wanted to inform Neuvillette ...sooner or later.

[pagodazz]

Emh fans when they're asked to stop sexualizing Evan Jennings and his characters because it makes him and his wife uncomfortable:

hope y'all are so happy with yourself for going against his wishes and being fucking freaks to him. You're all why he's barely online anymore. you cannot behave and you cannot be normal and you all have ruined what could be a very fun fandom.

Everyone in this fandom sees Evan as a piece of meat basically, you all only care about his character because Evan is a good looking guy. I mean!! let's be real here!!! let me quiz you on the lore!!! let me see just how fucking much you know about ALL the characters. let me see how much you ACTUALLY give a shit. Because all any of you do is post about how attractive you find Evan/habit and it's honestly so annoying.

I'm not saying you can't compliment him??? or appreciate his looks?? but drawing him in sexually compromising positions, writing in great detail about what you want him to do to you (PUBLICLY. no one gives a SHIT what you fucking do in private.) Or you're fucking mixing up habit and Evan, and just acting like you know his story when CLEARLY the most of you have watched habit compilations on YouTube and NOTHING else.

You cannot even convince me otherwise because I deal with people coming in my comments all the time asking about BASIC INFORMATION. like IF YOU DON'T KNOW THE PRINCETON TAPES ????? WHAT THE FUCK. WHAT THE FUCK????? YOU NEED THAT FOR THE SERIES. YOU CANNOT EVEN BEGIN TO UNDERSTAND HALF THE THINGS WITHOUT IT???????

This isn't saying you can't write fanfiction or shit like that this is JUST SAYING BE RESPECTFUL?????? these slenderverse actors ARE NOT A LIST CELEBRITIES. they're not like fucking Oscar Isaac or whoever people are obsessed with right now. THEY'RE NOT FAMOUS. THIS IS NICHE. THIS IS NOT POPULAR MEDIA 😭😭😭😭

Emh literally made NO money from their series, they didn't create it to gain anything like that. they created something fun and NOW YOU ALL ARE THE REASON THEY HAVE NO PART IN THIS FANDOM ANYMORE.

you robbed them of being able to love their creation and I hope you're all happy about that honestly because it seems like this fandom is only gonna get worse in this area. and I'm deeply disappointed.

edit: I would like to add one thing, Vincent caffarello had to deal with situations of extreme sexualization as well, and his got to the point to where he had to leave. Vinnie used to be very involved with the fandom, he even used to read fanfic which he had to stop doing because people would be writing characters to SEXUALLY ASSAULT HIM or others and he just couldn't continue to read things like that. He delt with minors sending him explicit photos and messages and that's literally all kinds of FUCKED UP. He did NOT want to be involved with that stuff.

It's like when Evan had someone impersonate him to try to get with minors. THESE PEOPLE ARE NOT OBJECTS FOR YOU TO SEEK OUT PLEASURE WITH. THEY ARE PEOPLE.

they are HUMAN.

if they were women?? would you be doing this as much??? or would you realize how messed up it really is.

[homunculus-argument]

"Maybe magic, maybe mundane" is one of my favourite tropes, especially when it's featured in something where magic could plausibly exist.

One book idea that I had that is currently only a pile of haphazard notes features a character only known as The Queen's Mute - or simply "the mute" for short - who is exactly what it says on the tin: the queen's personal jester, who does not speak. He is also ambiguously human. An eerie, elfin creature who seems to find it funny when people are puzzled by him.

Besides being completely silent, he has an uncanny skill in copying how people hold themselves and move. Gait, posture, the expressions they make, he could just be standing completely still doing nothing, and it's still obvious whether he's standing like the king or the head cook. If you've seen the subject once, you'll know who he's impersonating. He's quick to spot every opportunity to insult someone by doing so - like spotting a nobleman who isn't faithful to his wife and following after him across the room in the exact same gait that his mistress walks in. The king once remarks that he can't understand how the hell someone who can't speak can have so many rude things to say.

The protagonist was sent to spy on the queen, and the mute is almost always with her - making no sound, not even footsteps, but making himself seen, and seeing and hearing everything. One never hears him come or go, he is just suddenly there, sitting on the floor, waiting to see who's the first person to glance down and get startled out of their mind because people don't just pop out of nowhere like that. Being fond of climbing furniture as well, he might also be sitting on top of a shelf.

Though the protagonist first assumes that he is somewhere close to her own age - somewhere in his late teens - and the narration refers to him as "boy" more often than "man", the queen corrects her. He is just as grown now as he was when she first brought him with her, and though she doesn't know his exact age, she knows he is older than she is herself.

The king - despite of being the mute's favourite subject of vicious mockery - tolerates him for some reason. Despite of being aware that the relationship between the queen and the jester is romantic as well as sexual in nature. Their marriage is as loveless as political arranged marriages get, so he finds it preferable to let the queen keep her mute if his taunting antics and his unsettling way of just appearing into places at least keep other men away.

The queen occasionally mentions things that she wasn't supposed to know - and couldn't have known - just to let the protagonist know that she knows more about what's going on than what she lets on. When the protagonist fails to hide her shock and asks the queen how she knew, the queen explains that the mute told it to her. The protagonist assumes this to be a joke, her way of saying "none of your business", since obviously the mute doesn't talk.

But he does talk. Only to the queen, only when absolutely no other soul is there to hear it. And as a plot twist on the last third of the book, it turns out that besides knowing how to move like other people, the mute is a frighteningly good vocal mimic. He can copy the queen's voice perfectly, which they have often used for her advantage. Looking back to every scene where the queen was heard but not seen - behind a curtain or a dressing screen, talking through a door, or just overheard singing to herself in the garden - there is no telling whether the protagonist was actually talking with the queen, or if she had that whole conversation with the mute. This would explain at least one incident where the queen was supposed to be in one place but somehow shows up somewhere else.

The protagonist never figures out what the mute's whole deal is. She never finds a satisfying answer despite of the queen clearly telling her that he is just as much a human of flesh and blood as either of them. The queen often sounds like she's lying when she's telling the truth, as she is now. The mute is completely, entirely human, just somewhat autistic and trans.

[queen-of-the-avengers]

Not All Bad

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Female!Reader

Word Count: ~3k

Warnings: smut, sexual tension, car chase

Summary: You and Bucky are called out for a mission involving a very powerful and very dangerous nuclear bomb. The thing is, you two hate each other yet you two are the best for the job. Tensions skyrocket when you have to get closer than normal in order to make a safe getaway.

Squares Filled: adventurers/explorers (2021) for @buckybarnesbingo

Author’s Note: any and all comments are greatly appreciated <3

x

You know why you’re going on this mission. You know why Bucky is going on this mission. You don’t know why you’re going together. You don’t care what Bucky has done or is capable of, you can’t stand the man. He’s quiet and minds his own business but you two clash every time you’re around each other. 

You’re normally a mellow person but there is something about Bucky that makes you want to commit violence. You two are very competitive against each other, you’re always trying to outdo the other, and you’re always bickering. You think you’re always right and Bucky thinks he’s always right. You don’t like his attitude because when he’s not being quiet, he’s cocky and arrogant like an old man is. The same thing could be said about you, but you’re not as bad as he is. The other Avengers have put your bedrooms on the opposite side of the compound so they wouldn't have to hear you two.

This mission is quite simple: get in, grab a nuclear bomb, and get the fuck out. That’s easy for you because you’re a shapeshifter who can shift into anyone just by looking at them, and that power has gotten you into every sketchy situation that the Avengers have thrown you in. Normally, you pair up with Steve because he has the super strength but he’s on another mission right now.

The only one who has his level of strength is Bucky. Plus, his vibranium arm is a major advantage for you both.

Shadow Corps stole a nuclear bomb from Russia and smuggled it into the States. The government wants you to grab it before they can use it. Whether or not the Accords were passed, you were still gonna take this case because no bomb should ever be put on American soil. After getting the bomb, the next team which includes Clint, Natasha, and Sam, will go in and arrest as many as they can.

The getaway car is waiting in position on the other side of the warehouse in Tony’s stealth mode. It will only activate when you and Bucky get close to it. There are bracelets that you two are wearing in order for the car to scan. The place is crawling with heavily armed guards with probably twice that inside. You have to do this quietly.

“Wait here. I‘ve got this,” you smirk.

Bucky growls lowly but does as he’s told. He knows his way will only end up with blood soaking everything. You’ve done some recon for Shadow Corps in the past, so you’ve seen what the big boss looks like. With ease, you transform into the big burly man and walk down the small hill toward the only entrance. The guard posted there stands up straight when he sees you walking toward him. Good. This man you’re impersonating demands respect.

“Sir,” the guard nods once.

“I need the bomb to be moved now. Someone tipped the police off. Get everything ready for transport. Go tell the others.”

“Sir--”

“Do I strike you as a man who likes to be repeated? Go, now.”

“Yes, sir.”

The guard scurries off to presumably tell the others. Once he is gone from ear and eyeshot, you turn to Bucky and give him a thumbs up. Bucky comes out of the shadows as you turn back into yourself.

“You’re welcome for making your job easier,” you grin.

“Bite me,” he growls.

You follow Bucky inside and keep your eyes peeled for any guards who might be coming your way. Tony provided a map he got from Friday, so you’re using that to get to the bomb the quickest way. This mission is all about time. You have to be fast. When word gets back to the actual boss, he won’t be happy that they’re moving the bomb. Luckily for you, he’s in another state doing business.

You turn the corner onto a straight and narrow hallway. The only way to get out of the hallway is either to go back the way you came or through the door on the other side of the hallway. You take two steps when the door on the other end is being pushed open. You turn to run the other way when you hear voices around the corner. If you don’t do something now, you’ll be caught and probably killed.

You can get out of this. Bucky can’t. As much as he irritates you, you kind of need him. There is a supply closet to your right that you’ll have to squeeze into if you want to make sure this mission is a success. You yank the door open and shove Bucky inside before sliding in yourself. The door barely closes when both parties on either side of the hallway come into view.

The closet is small enough as it is for the supplies in there, but it’s claustrophobic with you and Bucky. He’s too large of a man for you to fit comfortably. Your chest is pressed against his chest so you can either focus on the feel of his body against yours or you can focus on his eyes. You look up to see him already looking down at you.

You’re an idiot if you don’t admit there is some sort of attraction between you two. You know there is. You can’t do anything about it. Not only would that probably create problems for either of you, but it would only fuel his ego.

You can’t have that.

The closet is dark enough so you hope that he doesn’t notice you looking at his lips. As soon as your eyes lock onto his mouth, he licks his lips slowly. He’s the subject of your dirty dreams and now all you’ll be thinking about is his tongue.

“The coast is clear.”

Bucky opens the door and slips out with ease. You let out the breath you didn’t know you were holding and force your breathing to return to normal. You follow Bucky down the hallway and to the room where the bomb is being held. There are no guards around because they think this place is so secure that they don’t need to guard the one thing people can’t steal. Not that they could if they wanted to. There are so many guards here that it would scare the average person.

“Okay, you’re up,” you say.

As much as you’d like to be, he’s the muscle.

“Just be a good girl and make sure no one comes in while I do the heavy lifting.”

You roll your eyes but do as you’re told. You stay by the door and listen for anyone who might be coming. Bucky approaches the bomb and studies the best way to handle the device. For something that packs a massive punch, it’s not that big. Tony crafted a container that could hold something this powerful, so the only thing Bucky has to worry about is transferring it without setting it off.

You look out the small window on the door and see a big guard with an even bigger gun coming your way.

“Bucky, someone is coming.”

“I’m kind of busy at the moment. Take care of it.”

You transform back into the bossman and step out of the room. The guard stops walking and becomes ashen when he sees you.

“Boss.”

“What the hell are you doing here? Do I pay you to wander around? Do you have a brain inside that thick head of yours?”

“Sorry, sir, but--”

“But nothing. Do I have to do everything myself around here?”

“Sir, the cars are ready for transport. I was on my way to secure the package.”

“What about everything else we have here?”

“We’re having trouble securing some of the product in such a short time. I figured we should get the bomb out as soon as possible.”

You step closer to the guard and he does the smart thing and backs up in fear.

“If I have to leave here and do your job, I’ll have to call your wife and let her know you’re not coming home. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. Get everything packed up now. We will get this bomb out when it’s time. I need everything out of here.”

“Yes, sir.”

The guard leaves and you slip back into the room as yourself.

“Okay, I’m ready to pack it.”

Bucky carefully lifts the bomb and places it into the open container on the ground. He closes and locks the case knowing the wires in there will keep the bomb from moving. Bucky picks up the heavy case and allows you to leave the way to the car. As soon as the car senses both of your bracelets, it shimmers into view, and you unlock the trunk. This car was made specially to carry bombs such as the nuclear kind. It has a lead lining so that scanners won’t be able to pick it up, and the traction on the car is durable so if you hit a pothole or go over a bomb, the car won’t shake or move.

“Hey!” You and Bucky look behind you and see two guards running at you with radios to their mouths. Shit, you’ve been made. “Stop right here!”

“We gotta go.” The alarms sound throughout the facility and red lights flash brightly. “Just shove it in there!”

Bucky carefully puts the bomb in the trunk and you slam it shut before hopping into the passenger seat. As soon as Bucky is in the car, he starts her up and peels out of the place. Three cars immediately start chasing after you, and you look behind you to see how close they are.

“Looks like I’m not the only one who hates you. You’re insufferable to everyone,” you smile sweetly.

Bucky makes a sharp turn which causes you to grab onto the “oh shit” bar.

“Don’t act so innocent, Doll. They’re after you, too. I guess we’re both insufferable.” He looks in the rearview mirror and sees them getting closer. “Do something!”

You unbuckle your seat belt and roll the window down all the way. Before Bucky can question what you’re doing, you heave yourself out the window so that you’re sitting on the frame. You have the seatbelt clutched into your hand so that you have an anchor point, and you aim your gun at the cars. You shoot twice and run one of the cars off the road. Their tires blow and they go crashing into the tree.

“You might want to try the sunroof. It might be easier,” Bucky says.

“Now you tell me,” you roll your eyes.

Two guards start shooting at you, and you quickly duck inside to avoid being hit. Bucky opens the sunroof and points to his gun in the backseat.

“Try mine on for size. It’s bigger than yours,” he smirks.

“That’s the only time you’ll ever be able to tell a girl that.” You grab his gun and make sure it’s loaded with a few hundred rounds. It’s a machine gun so once you hit that trigger, dozens of rounds come out at once. You’re about to stand when the car jerks to the right. The second car in line has hit your car, and you almost went through the open window. “Try not to kill us, will you?”

“Shut up.”

You stand through the open sunroof and aim the machine gun at the second car. They don’t even have a chance. You fire dozens of rounds at the car and shatter their windshield. The car jerks so hard that the car flips twice before skidding to a stop.

“One to go!”

The last car has taken a different route instead of staying right behind you. Instead, they are zooming through the trees which makes it hard for you to get a shot from where you are. They are gaining speed and if you don’t do something soon, they are going to ram their car into the side of yours.

“Okay, new plan.” You duck back inside and look at Bucky with a sigh. “I’m gonna need you to trust me on this one.”

“I don’t.”

“Too bad. Just make sure we don’t crash.” You toss Bucky’s gun into the back seat and grab your much smaller one since it’ll be easier to use it with your plan. With light difficulty, you hop over the center console and right into Bucky’s lap. You’re facing him and his shocked eyes meet yours briefly. “I know you’re enjoying this but eyes on the road, Barnes.”

You roll down his window and aim your gun at the car that’s heading right your way. Bucky wraps an arm around your waist to keep you steady and presses on the gas. You aim at the tires and blow one of them but that doesn’t stop the car from barreling right at you. You empty your entire magazine and manage to shoot right through the windshield and into the driver’s head.

Bucky speeds up so that the car doesn’t crash into you. Instead, it smashes into the tree on the other side of the road. You sigh in relief and look at Bucky who is looking between you and the road. It’s like you’re back in the closet with him. Tension is high and adrenaline is coursing through your veins.

You can feel the tension on your inner thigh.

“That better be a gun in your pocket.”

“Nope,” he smirks. You roll your eyes but he’s done putting up with your shit. “Cut the attitude before I give you a reason to roll your eyes.” You shift to get off his lap but the arm that’s wrapped around your waist tightens. “Don’t move.” He drives like that for ten minutes before pulling over knowing they’re not following you two anymore. He leans his head back and stares into your eyes, allowing the tension to grow. “Fuck it.”

Bucky grabs both sides of your face and pulls you into him so he can kiss you. The second his lips touch yours, it’s game over. He growls when you grind your hips down on his either in frustration that you’re getting his cock hard or in lust for the exact same reason. He reaches to the side of the seat and pulls on the level that puts the seat back even though he pretty much has it all the way back. You reach over and pull the lever that lays the seat back, and he moves his hands down to your hips to grip you hard.

Even without that vibranium arm, his fingers will leave bruises on your skin for you to admire later.

You kiss down his jaw and to his neck where you nip at his skin, hard enough to leave behind marks. This between you two has been a long time coming so Bucky doesn’t want to waste any time with you right now. He pulls you back up to his lips and kisses you while snaking his hands down to between your legs. With an effortless tug, he rips your pants in half at the seam.

“What the fuck?” you mutter and pull away from him. “Your cock is so desperate to get wet that you couldn’t wait for me to take off my pants?”

“Shut the fuck up,” he says and pulls you back to his mouth.

You reach down and undo the button and zipper of his jeans before reaching in and gripping his cock with one hand. God, he’s so big that your entire hand can’t fit all the way around him. Good thing you’re a shapeshifter and can stretch as needed. It also means you can make it as tight as you want.

You pull it out and pump twice before moving your panties to the side. You position him right below your entrance and only slide the tip in. Bucky slams the back of his head against the seat in frustration but you’re not gonna make this easy on him. Unfortunately for you, Bucky is a lot stronger than you. He braces his feet on the floorboard and thrusts up while pulling you down on him. You don’t even have time to react because he’s filling you up deeper than you thought possible.

“Fuck!” you gasp and brace yourself with one hand on the seat by his head.

He starts with a ruthless pace, pounding up into you like his life depends on it. The car immediately fogs over at the increasing tension, and you slam your hand on the window which leaves behind an imprint.

“God, you’re such a good girl taking all of me. You’re so tight.”

“I can go tighter,” you smirk.

You lean down and kiss Bucky sloppily while he reaches down and slides his hand into your pants so he can thumb your clit. That plus the angle in which he’s thrusting is enough to push you closer to the edge. You know you’re close when the pressure is increasing, and you start to clench around him to show him you’re getting there.

“Awe, does my Doll want to come?”

“Mmhmm,” you whimper.

“Not yet.”

“Please, Bucky.”

“I said no.” He reaches up and grips your throat with his flesh hand. He slows down his thrusting only to go deeper. “Fuck, I’m close.”

“Then come.”

“You first,” he grins. “Come for me.”

Bucky rubs your clit in hard circles and that’s enough to push you over the edge. You gasp and moan as the waves of pleasure rush over your entire body. Your pussy spasms and clenches his cock, and he moans as he shoots his load into you. He thrusts a few times to ride out your high before relaxing into the seat.

“Fuck, you’re good at this,” you chuckle tiredly.

“Just wait until you see what I’m like in a bed,” he smirks. “Let’s go home so I can worship you properly.”

“Lead the way,” you smirk and move off him.

Well, Bucky’s good for one thing. He’s not that insufferable.

x

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[struwberrii]

Hello, I like your haikyu headcanons and was wondering if you could do tendou headcanons?:)

tendou headcanons ₊˚⊹♡

thank u for the request!! i feel like tendou doesn’t get a lot of love nowadays so this one is for all the tendou fans (•̀ᴗ•́ )و

he def just makes up songs randomly and sings them for you (usually just to make you laugh)

his shoes usually aren’t tied and he never noticed until someone points it out

imagine tendou with a snaggletooth (i saw someone on tiktok say this and CANNOT STOP THINKING ABT IT it so cute)

constantly does impersonations of characters (he’s actually kind of decent)

little trinket collector

chronically picks at his lips and always ends up bleeding

also picks at his nails/fingers

always celebrates your small little wins with you (yaaayyyy!!)

always comes up with silly games to play when you guys are bored

randomly drops lore on you

makes scary faces at kids if they’re staring for too long

i feel like he’d lowkey listen to tommy heavenly6

hates calling during the day but will have a full convo with you through voice messages

does not let anyone pick on you AT ALL like he’ll get super protective and use his ‘scary’ looks to his advantage to freak people out

encourages you to step out of your comfort zone and try new things

some days social anxiety is scared of him, then the next day he’s too anxious to even go outside

constantly begging you to let him do your makeup even if you don’t wear it (he botched you)

but he still gets insecure sometimes and needs to hear praises and reassurance

let’s you style/cut his hair for him

probably had a random pet growing up, like he found a frog or turtle outside and kept it as a pet

draws on his arms and legs when he gets bored

always scares you, like he waits around the corner for you then jumps out and scares you

has a HUGE sweet tooth

i feel like he would have a really bad memory but keeps all important dates written down, don’t ask him what he ate for dinner because he doesn’t remember

sits in the shower

playful teasing as a love language

watches mukbang videos while he eats

genuinely has a hard time voicing how he feels about people so he uses humor to mask his emotions and now nobody takes him seriously

shockingly the best guy to go to when you need to cheer up, and not because he’d make you laugh but he just knows what to say?? if that makes sense

like he tells you what he wishes someone told him when he was in middle school

always makes sure nobody is left out in a group activity

has the craziest diet, like i feel like he’d eat like a toddler

average tendou meal consists of a yoohoo chocolate milk, a pizza lunchable and a handful of grapes and that’s enough to hold him over for the day

sports garfield pajama pants ദ്ദി(˵ •̀ ᴗ - ˵ ) ✧

i feel like he’d also listen to alice in chains

but i also feel like he’d listen to gorillaz

his knees are always bruised (prob from volleyball)

has an impressive figure collection of his favorite manga character :3

sorry guys this is like 30% me projecting 70% tendou hcs 😭

[penny00dreadful]

Before He Cheats

AO3

“Munson Home for the Recently Deceased, you stab ‘em we slab ‘em. How may I direct your call?”

There was silence on the other end of the line for a few seconds before a light chuckle crackled through the speaker.

“Is that really how you answer the phone?”

Eddie smiled to himself. “Got you to laugh didn’t it?”

“Suppose.”

“Plus, no one calls the landline anymore unless they’re trying to sell something. You trying to sell me something?”

“No. No, I uh… I’m looking for an Eddie Munson?”

“Only an Eddie Munson? Only one? What a terrible fate. Well you’re in luck, my good sir. This is he. What can I do you for?”

The voice on the end of the line gave a light laugh once again but went silent almost immediately after. 

Eddie stared at the wall in his apartment, waiting for something to happen. In the quiet he could hear the guy letting out little nervous breaths before one big inhale.

“I um. I’m sorry to have to tell you like this, I’d prefer to do it face to face but I don’t know where you live and you probably wouldn’t even want me at your house afterwards and I did find you on social media but it’s not something I wanted to do in DM’s, you deserve better than that-”

“Okay, hold on, slow down.” Eddie tried to ignore the panic starting to kick around in his heart. “Is someone dead? Is someone injured?”

“No! No, Jesus, I’m sorry. I told Robin that I’d be terrible at this but I couldn’t just let it go on without saying anything-”

“You haven’t really said anything. You’re just rambling.”

“Right. Sorry. Again, blame Robin. I’m around her too much. But… okay. Do you know Rick Lipton?”

Eddie felt the panic leave him, replaced only by irritation as he sighed through his nose. “What did he do now?”

“He… um. I’m sorry to ask this but are you his partner? Like, romantic partner?”

Eddie scowled. “And if I am?”

There was movement against the line, almost as if the other guy was nodding. 

“Shit.” He muttered before picking back up in volume again. “Listen, I didn’t know. He told me he was single and I only found out because Robin lives in the same building as you and she saw him with you and asked the neighbours and they said you’d been a thing for like two years and you have to believe me if I’d known I wouldn’t have touched him, I don’t fuck around with cheaters-”

“How long?”

Eddie had expected to feel betrayal or sadness, devastation or heartbreak and they were there. 

They were just lost under a tidal wave of anger and indignation. He was even surprised at himself that he didn’t feel more caught off guard. 

Rick had never cheated before (that Eddie was aware of) but he had always had a wandering eye and a few off-colour jokes about 'going to find someone more his speed’. 

They’d never really felt all that funny.

Maybe it was because their relationship had felt dead for the last few months. 

They barely talked, they just existed around each other. The sex had all but dried up as well and whenever they did have it, it was completely impersonal. Get in, get out, move back to separate parts of the apartment if either of them even bothered to stay over. 

More often than not one of them would make a quick exit back to their home.

Eddie had been thinking a breakup was on the horizon for a while. 

But that was no excuse to cheat. 

At least have the fucking decency to end the relationship first before going out and chasing tail. 

“Um, like four or five weeks." The guy on the phone muttered, clearly ashamed. "I’m so sorry Eddie, I swear to god if I knew I would never… I have- I have proof if you need it.”

“If it’s a sex tape I don’t think I want to see it.” Eddie was trying really hard to maintain his calm and not snap through the phone. 

If what the guy was saying was true, then he was an innocent party in this.

Didn’t make it hurt any fucking less though.

Didn’t make him any less pissed.

“If- no it’s not a sex tape.” The voice sounded scandalised. “Fucking hell, do people actually do that?”

“Yes.”

There was a pause, as though the guy was waiting for Eddie to continue but Eddie just let it hang in the air. He wasn’t ashamed. 

But he was definitely going to have to purge those files now.

“Okay well… It's just a photo. I posted it to my insta a week ago but he was really weird about it being up, which in hindsight makes a lot of sense, so I took it down.” He said, quiet and sad. “I can send it to you if you want.”

Eddie pursed his lips. 

“Please hold.”

He unceremoniously dropped the phone with a clatter, leaving it dangling from the cord, bouncing against the wall and probably blowing the guy’s ear out. 

Maybe in the morning Eddie would feel a little bad about that, but for now it just felt very satisfying. 

He rifled around in his bedsheets for his phone before making his way back to the landline. 

“Still there?”

“Yes. Ow, by the way.”

Eddie just shrugged, well aware the guy couldn’t see him but whatever. He wasn’t in the mood. 

“Send it on.”

Only a moment later his phone pinged with a notification and Eddie opened the photo.

Well. 

Shit. 

There was Rick, in amongst a crowd at some nightclub, plastered to the side of some pretty boy who looked like he had a regular workout routine. 

Ugh.

Eddie couldn’t handle gym bunnies, the amount they could bench or whatever was all they ever talked about. But this must be the guy on the other end of the phone. 

@King.Steve.Of.House.Hair

Rick had King Steve’s earlobe in between his teeth and from the angle of the selfie Eddie could see his hands were wandering.

It looked like some kind of Halloween night, if the teeny tiny little sailor outfit was anything to go by.

God damn.

But even so, Eddie still wanted to be sure that what he was seeing was… well. What he was seeing. 

“Steve, is it?”

“Oh, uh, yeah. Sorry, I didn’t realise I hadn’t given you my name yet.” Steve let out a nervous laugh, like he was expecting Eddie to jump through the phone and strangle him.

Eddie was fit to strangle someone but Steve wasn’t in his crosshairs.

“Don’t worry about it. Tell me, what does Rick have tattooed on his ass?”

“Uh…” Steve paused. “He doesn’t have a tattoo on his ass? Not that I’ve seen anyway. But I can tell you he does have his taint pierced. For some fucking reason.”

Eddie gave a quiet laugh at that, despite the monumentally fucked up situation and the final cracking piece of his heart breaking away. Rick had that piercing by the time Eddie had met him. He insisted he’d gotten it because it was sexy. Eddie was pretty sure he’d just lost a bet.

Eddie was no stranger to intimate piercings himself. He had his frenum done a while back. 

That one he’d definitely done because it felt sexy.

He looked back down at his phone, idly flipping through Steve’s profile and all of his other photos. 

He probably shouldn’t be thinking about how hot Steve was, how it was juxtaposed with a soft cuteness that almost felt like it didn’t belong to someone with such broad shoulders and defined arms. 

He hated himself for thinking about Steve’s attractiveness. 

It felt wrong.

Even though he was pretty much single now.

Even if Rick didn’t know it yet. 

But fuck him. 

He’d find out.

One way or the other.

And Eddie was nothing if not a drama queen.

But he wouldn’t do anything tonight.

No tonight he would just… hurt.

And smoke.

A lot.

“Eddie?” Steve’s voice came through to him. “You okay?”

Eddie swallowed, finding it a little more difficult than he expected it to be and realised he’d just been staring down at his phone in silence. 

The screen had gone black.

“Yeah.” He answered, his voice thick. “I’m fine.”

Steve hummed. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

Eddie laughed. It was wet and sniffly and vulnerable and horrible. “What are you gonna do from over the phone far away… wherever you are?”

“I dunno. I could just… talk to you I guess? Help you plot Rick's murder?”

Eddie laughed again, a little brighter this time. "Yeah, that could be good. But if I'm plotting murder I want to be a little more comfortable." He unlocked his phone and hit the follow button on Steve’s account. “This conversation requires lounging, not standing by the landline.”

“Oh-”

“How do you feel about a video call?”

A notification popped up on his phone, letting him know Steve had followed him back.

“A video call is fine.”

“Great.” Eddie paused. He wasn’t even sure how to end this call with the guy his boyfriend of two years had been cheating on him with and who he’d just asked if he wanted to video call so Eddie could smoke his feelings away. 

He just didn’t want to feel alone right now. 

He could have called Chrissy or one of the boys to come hang out with him but that would require explaining everything over again and he really didn’t want to do that right now. 

Before he could think much more on it Eddie said a quick “Okay bye,” and hung up.

Steve knew the story and Steve had been wronged too and maybe they could just be mad and sad together. 

He unlocked his phone again as he walked back into his bedroom and hit the video call button, not even bothering to turn his light on, leaving himself and his room shrouded in darkness. He propped his phone up on his desk, angled towards the window where he sat on the sil and started to roll, using the streetlights streaming in the window to see.

Steve picked up only a moment later and Eddie got his first good look at the guy live in action and not through a photo online.

He was sitting at what looked like a kitchen table fully lit by the overhead lights, a pair of wire framed glasses perched on his nose and his hair messy and dishevelled, like he’d been stressfully running his hands through it, which he probably had been. 

Eddie didn’t know how stressed he would be if he had to make a call to someone to tell them their long term partner had been cheating.

He was leaning forward, elbows on the table in a cosy yellow sweater with a slight worry between his eyebrows. 

He looked so soft. 

Nothing at all like the nautical sea queen look he’d been giving in those photos. He looked comfortable and gentle and a little worried.

“Eddie?”

“Mm-hm?” He hummed, bringing the joint to his mouth and lighting it up before pushing open the window a little more and exhaling out into the dark rainfall outside.

“You okay?”

He shrugged. “I will be.”

“I’m not asking about whether you will be, I‘m asking about now.”

Eddie looked over and watched Steve as Steve watched him through the screen.

“Alright, then no. I’m not okay.” He took another drag. “I’m fucking pissed. I’m sad, I’m upset, I’m hurt, I’m angry, I’m disappointed and I don’t know if all of that is directed more at him for doing this to me or me for not expecting it.”

“How were you supposed to expect it?” Steve shook his head in disbelief. “No one should have to expect to be cheated on.”

“Dunno.” Eddie shrugged, looking back out the window. “Relationship was dying anyway.”

“Okay, and? That doesn’t make cheating okay.”

“Suppose not.”

“I’m sorry, for what it’s worth. For my part in it.”

Eddie glanced back over, taking in the downward tilt of Steve’s mouth and his big sad eyes.

“S’not your fault. You were wronged too.”

“I guess, but…” Steve bit his lip and looked up from the screen, casting his eyes around his kitchen like something was going to pop out and answer whatever question was running through his head. 

Eddie waited. The guy had been very gracious so far and he seemed to genuinely feel bad for all the mess he’d been wrapped up in. 

“I…” Steve continued. “I know how this thing usually goes. You find out you’ve been cheated on and you still love your partner so you tend to focus all your anger towards the person they cheated with rather than the person who actually wronged you.” He looked down, fiddling with some kind of flash card on the table in front of him.

“Sounds like you’re speaking from experience.” Eddie stubbed his joint out, happy enough with his current buzz. He was sufficiently mellowed, he hadn’t cried yet though that would probably come once he was in bed, but his anger had simmered down to a level where he didn’t feel like putting his fist through a wall but still angry enough to plot.

“I am, I guess.”

Eddie nodded. “This happened to you before?” 

That was probably rude. His filter malfunctioned at the best of times but when he smoked it was all but gone.

“Yeah.” Steve stared down at the cards in his hands. “My mom had to put up with my dad’s infidelity a lot. And my ex-girlfriend cheated on me a while back.” Steve paused before taking a deep breath. “Rick was actually my first attempt to get back into the dating world so…”

“So we can both be sad and angry together.”

“Yeah.” Steve smiled and Eddie stood up, plucking his phone from his desk and settling it on his bedside table, switching his lamp on and throwing himself face down on his bed, probably barely visible to Steve.

“We can be sad and angry together.”

Eddie glanced up. Now that he was closer to his phone, he could better see exactly what Steve was fiddling with, he could read some of the text on the card.

“Stevie.” Eddie sat up, moving closer to the phone and unable to stop the smirk running over his face. Steve’s eyes snapped up towards him. “Did you write out flash cards for when you called me?”

Steve’s eyes widened before he unceremoniously swept all the cards off the table in front of him, his cheeks turning a terrific shade of red and he leaned his face on his hand, trying to act as nonchalant as possible. 

“No.”

It was adorable. Incredibly dorky and adorable.

Eddie laughed, full on braying belly laughs, collapsing backwards onto his bed. When he peeked back up to look at his phone through his giggles, Steve’s face was somehow even redder. 

“Oh my god.” Eddie breathed. “That’s darling.”

“Shut up.”

“No, no. It’s really very sweet.”

“Ugh. Whatever.” Steve rolled his eyes but was still smiling, still had a blush lighting up his cheeks.

Eddie settled himself back against his headboard. “Actually, listen, let me ask you something.”

“Okay?”

“Does Rick know? Does he know that you know? Or that you told me?”

“No.” Steve answered, finally relaxing his fake nonchalance into real relaxation, folding his hands on the table and propping his chin up on them. “I figured if anyone had the right to rip his balls off it would be you.”

Eddie nodded. 

That he could understand. 

“I get that, but there’ll be no ball ripping from where I stand. No, I want to hit him where it hurts.”

“Woulda hurt me plenty.”

“Oh, I’m sure. But the only thing Rick loves more than his own balls is his car.”

Steve nodded. “Yeah, he’s like, obsessed with that thing. It’s weird. It’s not even that nice of a car.”

“I’d love to say he has bad taste but considering he picked the both of us, I’m pretty sure his tastes are actually immaculate.”

“Just his decisions are bad.”

“Exactly.”

“Well.” Steve sighed. “I’d love to help any way I can. I hate that I was involved in this, in what he did to you.”

“To us, Stevie. To us.”

“Right, so what’s the plan then?”

“When are you due to see him next?”

Eddie pulled his van into the parking lot of the bar. It was halfway across town and a place that he never frequented if he could help it. Rick liked it though, always had. Eddie just liked other places around town more.

But it could be cute, he supposed. A small little country and sports type place that had a rainbow flag behind the bar and a small number of regulars who, according to Steve, wouldn’t do anything unless you got between them and their drink. 

He knew that Steve was inside with Rick, playing up the flirty angle and acting tipsier than he actually was to put him at ease.

Steve had mentioned one of his signature moves involved pool, bending over the table and wiggling a little bit to keep the attention on him. Pulling out a little pout whenever he missed a shot or asking for help to line up his cue.

Eddie would be more upset by the fact that he was missing the sight of it if he didn't know he'd have the opportunity to see it himself at some point in the future.

They had talked for so long that first night, long enough that the sun was starting to come up by the time they'd both dragged themselves away from their phones to sleep.

They’d talked about their families, their friends, what they were doing in life right now as opposed to what they had hoped they would be doing when they were teenagers. They talked about their school selves and their dating lives and as the conversation wore on Eddie found himself thinking again and again about how long it had been since it had felt so easy to talk to someone like that.

It had been a very long time since Rick had put any effort into getting to know him as he grew through their two years together, like he expected Eddie to stay the same person as he was at the start of the relationship.

After that first night where they’d figured out their master plan, he and Steve had just… kept talking. Throughout the rest of the week up until tonight, they were in almost constant contact, only really taking a break to sleep and work.

Eddie felt connected to Steve and in some roundabout way he was thankful to Rick for bringing him into his life.

He’d even met Robin in passing one day, living two floors below him, holding the door open for him as he tried to wrestle with grocery bags. 

She was so weird. He kind of loved her the second she opened her mouth. Honest, but with the sharpest tongue he’d ever met on a person. 

She had knocked on his apartment door later that evening to tell him Steve was calling over to visit and asking if he wanted to come around to meet him. 

Steve had apparently delegated the asking to her because he was too nervous to do it himself.

Again, adorable.

Steve was somehow even sweeter and even saltier in person than he was over the phone and Eddie tried hard, he tried really hard not to look too much or let his fucking horomones run away with him but Jesus. H. Christ it was difficult. 

The sweetness of his soft sweaters and polos, his gentle smiles and understanding words matched with his salty mean girl attitude that would slip out every so often and the bitchiest of eye rolls that made Eddie’s heart jump.

Eddie was also trying to feel bad about what was happening but honestly, he was losing reasons to care that much.

He hadn’t texted or called Rick once in the last week and Rick himself had never reached out which all at once made Eddie realise he was the primary communicator in the relationship and it hadn’t been reciprocated in a long, long time. 

Adding onto that was the knowledge that Rick was still fucking cheating on him and was in regular contact with Steve left Eddie only half heartedly feeling bad.

He and Steve would go over the screenshots of the conversation together every night and every night Eddie found it harder and harder to hang up the phone.

He was pretty sure Steve was feeling the same way. 

They kept just catching each other staring. Or smiling or, pulling back from touching too much and he was almost sure that as soon as Rick was out of the picture for the both of them, something was going to blossom.

Even now, with Steve inside, flirting up a storm with Eddie’s ex-boyfriend who didn’t know he was an ex yet, they would be ending the night together. 

Robin was waiting back at her apartment with an alibi ready if Eddie needed it though he suspected he wouldn’t.

Neither he nor Rick had a great track record with the police and it would be more trouble than it was worth to get them involved.

Speaking of, Eddie spotted Rick’s car, some souped up four wheel drive monstrosity of small dick syndrome sitting in the shadows and away from the cameras of the bar where Steve had convinced him to park with a suggestion of something happening in those shadows later on. 

He hopped out of his van and threw open the back doors, grabbing his bag of goodies before sidling around Rick’s car to wait.

When the chords of some Shania Twain number started to leak through the walls, the signal he’d been waiting for, the sound loud enough to drown out what Eddie would be doing, he dropped his bag to the floor.

Curling his keys into his fingers and with almost a skip in his step Eddie began to carve a stripe through the immaculate and expensive paint work. Working his way around to the drivers side, he lifted the key up before bringing it back down.

With a little bit of sickening glee, he hacked the word CHEATER into the side of the car, the side that would be immediately visible from the bar door and the side Rick would have to see every time he wanted to get in and get out of the driver's seat.

At least until he paid a bomb to get it fixed.

Eddie had connections in this town. Working as a mechanic here for years would do wonderful things to extend this pain. 

Rick knew fuck all about cars. 

Tucking his keys back into his pocket, he sidled back around to his duffel bag, unzipping it and pulling out his Stanley blade.

Unsheathing it, he gripped it tight in his hand and punched it down into the nearest tyre, listening with satisfaction as the thing slowly deflated before moving onto the other three.

A second Shania song had started up. 

He could hear Steve crooning out from inside, getting louder and Eddie knew he was running out of time. 

He pulled Steve’s baseball bat from the duffle and gave it a little twirl, the same one he’d seen Steve do when he’d first handed it off and he had tried so hard not to be attracted to it. 

He’d failed miserably. 

Maybe Eddie could deal with a gym bunny if that gym bunny was Steve.

With an almighty swing, he brought the bat down, shattering one of the headlights with an almighty crash that wasn’t quite drowned out by the karaoke inside.

Rearing back Eddie swung again, smashing the other headlight and while the music didn’t cut off, he could clearly hear Steve inside calling out for Rick to “Wait!”

Okay, only a few seconds left.

Pulling the bat back and letting the anger and betrayal and indignation flow through him, he brought the bat down hard into the windshield where it embedded itself, the spider cracks of the tempered glass making the thing practically opaque.

The bat was fucking stuck.

Eddie knew that if he was able to pull hard enough he would be able to release the whole windshield from the car but he didn’t even have the strength in him to budge the bat.

“What the fuck?!”

Eddie slowly released his hands from the bat and turned, looking at Rick standing in the doorway of the bar, his mouth hanging wide open in shock, unable to believe what he was seeing. Steve was standing just behind him, with one hand over Rick’s chest.

To anyone else it would look like a comforting gesture, maybe. A show of support. 

But Eddie could tell the hand was there to hold Rick back if he decided to lunge. 

Both Steve and Rick dragged their gaze over the flat tyres, the word carved into the side, the bat stuck in the windshield.

“Hey sweetheart.” Eddie called across the distance, feeling comfortable enough to turn his back to pick up his bag, trusting Steve to at least shout if Rick was about to tackle him.

“Eddie,” Rick breathed, still open-mouthed somehow. “What in the god damned hell has gotten into you?!”

“I wasn’t talking to you.” He slung the bag over his shoulder and held his hand out.

Steve patted Rick twice on the chest and stepped out from behind him. 

Rick watched him walk away looking even more bewildered than before.

With one hand Steve took Eddie’s and with the other he grabbed the bat, wiggling it a few times before pulling it free. 

They broke apart as they reached Eddie’s van, Steve climbing into the passenger seat and Eddie throwing his bag in the back before starting up the van from his position in the driver's seat.

He leaned over Steve to shout out of the window, “Have a nice life, asshole!”

As the van tore out of the lot, Steve stretched both hands out of the window, two middle fingers extended until Rick, still frozen on the spot, was out of sight.

When he pulled himself back inside, Eddie saw him glance his way, a huge grin on his face.

Eddie had a smile to match, whooping into the night as they sped down the road.

AO3

@geekymagicalpotato

Big thanks as always to @hbyrde36 for her magnificent beta work and to the STWG for their motivation.

[rnelodyy]

The Owl House And Restorative Justice

At the end of Season 1 of The Owl House, it is revealed that Lilith, the main overarching antagonist of that season, was the one to curse her sister Eda, one of the protagonists, to win a tournament when they were teenagers. This information causes Eda to fly into a screaming rage and attack Lilith, and understandably so.

Eda’s curse is essentially a chronic illness, one that, in Eda’s own words, has ruined her life, being the reason she’s considered a social outcast and why, before meeting King and Luz, she hadn’t gotten close to anyone in years. In season 2, it’s revealed that the curse is why she pushed away her partner Raine to the point that they broke it off with her, and that during a particularly bad flareup, she accidentally maimed her own father, leaving him half blind and with permanent nerve damage to his hands, making him unable to continue working as a Palisman carver. The curse has ruled Eda’s life for decades now, so to Eda, this is the ultimate betrayal.

In the first episode of Season 2, Lilith has defected from the Emperor’s Coven, split the curse between Eda and herself to mitigate the symptoms for her sister, and has moved in with Eda at the Owl House. While Lilith herself still feels guilty and feels she has to make it up to Eda, everyone else, Eda included, has seemingly either forgiven her or chosen to look past it. Eda even makes fun of her for feeling bad about cursing her, and Lilith’s guilt is seemingly absent for the rest of the series. 

The response to this was… Less than stellar, shall we say. A lot of people were angry, saying Lilith got away with her crimes without even a slap on the wrist, and that Eda’s forgiveness of her was far too sudden.

This isn’t the first time we’ve seen this kind of critique. Amity spent years bullying Willow after her parents forced her to break off their friendship, and when she began trying to mend that relationship, the response from fans was that Willow should have been a lot more angry at Amity, and that they went back to being besties far too soon. I’ve even seen this criticism leveled at Hunter for the things he did while working for Belos, at Vee for impersonating Luz for months to trick her mother, and at Luz for hiding the fact that she helped Philip find the Collector from her friends. And it does seem strange for the show to keep tripping on this same point again and again.

Except, it’s not really. Because I think that, when viewing this show from a different angle, those supposed flaws are actually symptoms of something very important to understand – The Owl House operates on a system of crime and punishment that is very different from our world’s.

More specifically, our world mostly utilizes retributive justice. The world of The Owl House utilizes restorative justice.

So first, what do those terms mean? Broadly, they’re two different forms of handling interpersonal disputes, or dealing with crime. 

Retributive justice is the one our current justice system uses, where the focus is primarily on punishing the perpetrator. Retributive justice can mean detention, suspension, expulsion, jail time, monetary fines, some kinds of community service, exile, or in more severe cases, corporal punishment or the death penalty. It’s the lens most people view the world through, where if someone hurts you, hurting them back is the correct response.

Restorative justice is a very different approach, where you instead focus on helping the victim recover from what happened, and rehabilitating the perpetrator to prevent this from happening again. Restorative justice can look like verbal or written apologies, monetary compensation for costs and trauma, therapy for both victim and perpetrator, education for the perpetrator, mediation between victim and perpetrator, a restraining order, etc. 

When viewed through a retributive lens, The Owl House lets its characters get away with a lot of shit. Lilith cursing Eda, Hunter rounding up Palismen knowing they’ll be killed, Amity tormenting Willow for years, it’s all stuff that, in a retributive environment, they should be punished for, and they’re just not. Eda is only genuinely angry at Lilith for two scenes, Amity and Willow fix their relationship very quickly once Amity starts making amends, and Hunter isn’t punished at all. 

However, I believe the story of The Owl House is best viewed not through a retributive lens, but through a restorative lens.

Let’s look at the Lilith-example again. Lilith’s offense was cursing Eda, which she did because she wanted to win a spot in the Emperor’s Coven. Knowing Eda was better than her, she cast a curse on her, thinking it would only last for a day. But when the time came, Eda forfeited the match, soon after which she transformed into the Owl Beast and was pelted with rocks until she ran. The curse turned out to be very permanent, and Lilith spent the next 20 years trying to fix her mistake by working for Belos to try to capture Eda, since he promised to heal her curse. 

However, when she finally succeeded, Belos went back on his promise. Instead of healing Eda, he ordered her to be publicly executed. When Lilith protested, Belos essentially told her to shut up, that it was the Titan’s will, and left her there. 

So, having realized her method of fixing her mistake has gone real bad, Lilith sneaks down to the Conformatorium to free Eda herself, but arrives too late and finds Luz instead. After a brief fight they end up teaming up, and Lilith leads Luz to the elevator, but they are captured by Belos and Lilith is thrown into the cage with Eda. There, she restores Eda’s partially petrified body, and after fleeing with her, Luz and King, uses a spell to split Eda’s curse evenly between their two bodies.

From a restorative justice point of view, Lilith has done pretty much everything she reasonably could do to fix things. She’s denounced the Emperor’s Coven, returned Owlbert to Luz, helped Luz find the elevator to the execution platform, saved Eda from petrification, apologized to Eda, and while there’s no way for her to cure Eda’s curse entirely, she took on half of the curse at great expense to her own health, in order to ease Eda’s symptoms. 

Eda isn’t angry anymore because in her eyes, Lilith has already fixed things with her. Punishing her more at this point is pointless. What more could Lilith do, really? What other lessons could she learn? The only thing that punishment would bring at this point would be more suffering. 

Let’s look at another example: Amity and Willow.

Amity’s offense was breaking off her friendship with Willow because she was a late-bloomer, bullying her for years, and allowing her friends to do so too. Willow is left with horrible self-esteem issues because of this, and combined with her failing grades, turned her into a horribly shy and withdrawn wallflower (no pun intended). After she’s moved to the plant track she starts actually getting better, but Amity and Boscha especially continue to torment her. While Amity’s bullying of Willow does peter out over time, Willow is clearly still extremely resentful of her. In an attempt to make Willow forget their friendship, Amity accidentally sets most of Willow’s memories on fire, leaving her confused, amnesiac, and unable to grasp basic concepts like that chairs are for sitting in.

Luz pushed Amity into fixing Willow’s brain by going into her mind together and piecing her memories back together. There, the Inner Willow revealed what happened to Luz and the audience.

At this point, Amity shows her that her parents were actually the ones who forced her to end the friendship because they didn’t think Willow was a suitably powerful or influential friend, threatening to make sure Willow would never get accepted into Hexside if Amity didn’t force her to leave. Amity then apologizes to Willow for going along with it, and for the bullying, and vows to make sure her friends never mess with Willow again. 

Willow accepts her apology, but also makes it clear that, while it’s a start, she’s not yet ready to accept Amity in her life again. Restorative justice has not been fully attained, because to Willow, Amity hasn’t fixed everything – Boscha and her squad are still bullying her, and still consider Amity one of them. This changes two episodes later, when Amity tells Boscha to grow the fuck up when she starts bullying Willow again, and joins her and Luz’s Grudgby team despite her personal issues to get Boscha to back off. Willow doesn’t make a grand gesture of forgiveness in this episode, but it is after this point where the two become comfortable around eachother again. 

Did Willow forgive Amity too quickly for years of trauma? Maybe. If she had chosen to continue keeping Amity at a distance I certainly wouldn’t have blamed her. But in the end, Amity fixed the mess she caused as best she could, and has proven herself to want to be a better person, to want to be Willow’s friend again. She worked hard to prove herself to be a person worth trusting, and Willow decided to give that trust a chance again.

And while they did become friends again, that friendship was clearly still affected by what happened, which led to bumps that the two of them had to work through. Like in Labyrinth Runners, where Amity’s overprotectiveness over Willow makes Willow feel like Amity thinks she’s incompetent, and still only sees her as the helpless person she used to be. 

Willow continuing to be mad at Amity and punishing her for what she did wouldn’t be an unreasonable reaction, but it wouldn’t have fixed anything. It would certainly have an impact on Amity, seeing her former best friend rejecting her attempts to make up for what she did, but the hurt on both sides would have continued festering, because deep down, Willow missed Amity too. 

In Hunter’s case, there’s the question of whether he can even be held responsible for his actions. The Palisman-kidnapping in specific was explicitly done under duress – if he failed he would face verbal and physical abuse, and be threatened with his nightmare scenario: getting thrown out of the Emperor’s Coven. 

And that’s not an empty threat either. Hunter has no magic, and Belos has drilled it into him that witches without magic have no future. Without the Emperor’s Coven, his only future prospects would be starving to death on the streets or wasting away in prison. Either way, Hunter would be alone, without family or friends, without a job or job prospects, without anyone to turn to for help. Any child would be terrified of that. Hunter wasn’t always acting on direct orders – in fact he defied direct orders to stay in his room in Eclipse Lake to go look for Titan’s Blood, and then again in Hollow Mind to arrest the rebels. But he made those choices based on the idea that Belos wouldn’t want him if he was a failure, and that he needed a chance to prove that he could still be useful.

And contrary to popular belief, Hunter does know right from wrong. He has a very strong moral compass, he’s just been forced to ignore it in favor of doing whatever the Emperor wants. To shut up that little voice telling him he’s doing the wrong thing, he uses what’s called a thought-terminating cliche, a statement that feels so fundamentally true that the argument need not continue. In Hunter’s case, that statement is “It’s for the greater good.” Sure, kidnapping his new friends and abducting Palismen to feed to the Emperor and threatening someone who’s been nothing but kind to him to take the portal key from her girlfriend and justifying terrorism makes his stomach feel like he swallowed a cactus and saying it out loud makes him sound like a horrible person – but it’s for the greater good. He’s doing it to serve Belos, and Belos knows what’s best. 

So by the time Hunter is out of active danger and able to rest and recover from what happened to him… what would further punishment accomplish? He already knows that he did fucked up shit while working for the EC, and he’s proven time and time again that while he’s not fighting for Belos’s approval, he’s actually a genuinely kind-hearted kid. Punishing him now would likely cause him to react very poorly, because he’s been at the wrong end of that stick so often that he’s developed severe PTSD because of it.

And if you think restorative justice is still in order – Hunter is currently hyperfixated on making sure Belos can never hurt anyone again, and for the long term, he has expressed that he wants to become a Palisman carver when he grows up. While it won’t bring back the Palismen that were killed, it will help the current Palisman population recover and reintroduce Palismen to witches who may have had to give up theirs. 

When viewed through this lens, the writing of The Owl House starts to make more sense. As a show, it is extremely forgiving towards its characters – they’re still held accountable for their actions, but as long as they’re willing to grow and learn and fix the damage they caused, they are very quickly forgiven. 

However, I do understand why these writing choices can be… controversial, so to say. Because it doesn’t feel very satisfying, does it? When someone hurts you on purpose, your first impulse would be to try to hurt them back, that’s just how people work. 

That’s the hardest thing to come to terms with when you become an advocate for prison abolition for example – you’re not just arguing for freeing a guy who got 5 years because a cop found weed in his pockets, you’re arguing for the release, and most importantly, the humanity of some of the most vile, disgusting people this planet has ever produced. Even now, when someone commits a truly awful crime and gets sent to prison for life, my first thought is “Good, I hope they rot in there.” But that’s not justice. That’s just revenge. And revenge is not something we as a society should want to build our justice system on.

It’s not satisfying to see Lilith go from using Luz as a human shield in her fight against Eda to sleeping on the couch in Eda’s house within 2 episodes. It’s not satisfying to see Willow let Amity back into her life when Amity has hurt her so badly before, or to see Hunter become romantically involved with Willow after he literally abducted her the first time they met. But that satisfaction isn’t really the point. Revenge is satisfying in the moment, but an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind, and if someone shows a genuine willingness to change, it’s often better to give them a chance to.

However, my final point is about what happens when this approach fails. Because not everyone is willing to change. Some people, when faced with the consequences of their actions, decide to dig their heels in and refuse to admit fault, or blame the victim(s), or use those same thought-terminating cliches that Hunter used to justify their actions, “I was just following orders” being a big one.

And thus, we come to Belos.

If Belos showed a willingness to change, a genuine one, not an attempt at manipulation, should he be given the chance to? That vengeful part of me is VERY empathetically saying no. But logically, reasonably, he should be given that chance, if only because he’s a human being and no human being deserves to be mistreated. That doesn’t mean his victims are obligated to forgive him or be around him again, in fact I think that, for the sake of Hunter’s mental health, Belos should stay as far away from him as humanly possible. But he should be given the chance to start over, to truly better himself and do something good with the rest of his life.

But Belos isn’t willing to change. 

Belos is a product of a bad environment and grew up with a cult-like mentality and hatred for witches that he had to adopt for his own safety. It’s hard to break out of that mentality, but not impossible. Case in point: Caleb. The tragedy of Belos’s character to me is that he had so many chances to change, so many people to help him make that leap, but all of the people who offered him that help ended up dead by his hands because he couldn’t handle the idea that he may have been wrong.

At this point, Belos is stuck. Changing would mean not only giving up on his life’s work, but acknowledging to himself that everything he’s done, mutilating his body, killing his brother, slaughtering thousands and installing himself as God-Emperor of a population he despises more than anything in order to facilitate a genocide, was completely pointless.

He can’t admit that to himself. Especially the thing about Caleb’s death. He’s sunk-cost-fallacied himself so far into a corner that all he can really do when faced with opposing viewpoints is dig his heels in even deeper and lash out in a rage at anyone who challenges him. Even now, when his body is literally falling apart at the seams, he’s still trying to commit witch-genocide, because it’s all he has. 

Restorative justice doesn’t work in this case, because the perpetrator needs to be receptive to it. Logically you would assume the show would default to retributive justice, and characters like Willow and Camila do take a very vengeful glee in imagining themselves beating the snot out of Belos. But right now, the primary motivation of the Hexsquad and Hunter in particular when it comes to Belos is to end the threat he poses. As long as Belos is alive and free, he will continue to hurt and kill people, and if he can’t be talked down, he needs to be either contained or killed to prevent him from causing more harm.

The Owl House provides, in my opinion, a very nuanced take on restorative justice. It shows how it works in action, how different situations impact what it looks like, and what happens when it’s simply not an option. It’s not the most satisfying story to tell your audience, because when someone hurts our babies we want them to suffer, no matter how sorry they say they are. But in this case, I think that sacrificing that bit of audience comfort is worth it to tell the story like this.

[sexydoffyman]

Hello 👋, could I request some cod characters (perhaps Ghost, Price or Graves) defending a male military reader from a bunch of guys that are being homophobic to him?

DEFENDING YOU FROM HOMOPHOBES

navigation

genre: fluff

characters: Simon Riley, John Price, Phillip Graves

A/N: Sick of writing for kinktober. Mby that's why I can't write fucking properly. So let's look at some fluff.

SIMON GHOST RILEY

Ghost is a fairly scary man. He's known for being cold and serious. No one expected you to hang around him. He had six inches on you (15cm). Some people joked about you being the love birds in your TF. They could never guess how correct they were.

You weren't dating or anything, but you both held some kind of mutual respect, trust and maybe even attraction. You both had some qualities of a couple. He was a little possessive of you. You were a little clingy with him.

Although you had some kind of a relationship, that didn't really matter. The thing that mattered was you having each other's backs.

He was like a predator, making sure no one hurts his weaker companion. But when he wasn't around, you were left vulnerable. Not physically, no. You held great strength. What was left to hurt if people cant hurt your body? Your mind.

They mocked you ever since you met at boot camp. Any time they saw your face, they felt the need to embarrass you. You could handle it. You were a soldier, after all. But that didn't stop you from feeling hurt.

This time, you just sat there and took it. They yelled. They impersonated. Of course, that commotion would attract some people's attention.

The one that had showed up was Ghost. You couldn't even register him when you saw a 6'4 dude punch one of them. The others tried running, but none of them could get far enough to escape him. Their jaws broken. Ribs shattered.

You could hear him laughing under his mask. He then glanced at you "Coffee?" He asked.

CAPTAIN JOHN PRICE

All I can say is father energy.

He has been your captain for a few years now. You have gone through shit with him, and you both trusted each other. You viewed him as a kind of father that you never had. And he viewed you as his new child.

He is not possessive, but he is protective. He wouldn't let anyone fuck with you. His rank helped him with scaring people off. He never really had a problem with disobeying soldiers to begin with, so he never actually used his rank, but now. He has to stick up for you.

You really do resemble a kid he would have had. You have similar hair colour and eye colour. Your postures don't have a difference, and you find yourselves finishing up each other's sentences.

These assholes who have been making fun of you were your superiors. What that meant was that you could do nothing to stop them. They could say anything they wanted, and they'd get away with it.

"Thirty laps now!" Your eyes averted to the sudden voice coming from the hall. He heard them. They slowly realised they fucked up. It was raining cats and dogs outside. Everything was muddy and slippery. Running thirty laps would be torture.

"Do I have to repeat myself?" Price grunted with a more aggressive tone. They stormed off to the exit to run their laps. He yelled at them before they got out. "Being on good terms with your fellow soldiers is a must. I will have your ranks stripped away from you until you learn that!"

As soon as they left, Price let out a small chuckle. He was proud of himself. Cheeky bastard.

PHILLIP GRAVES

I love this son of a bitch.

Now, this man is always with you. It's not an obsession. It's just the fact that everyone else wants to be either alone or already has someone to be with. He just doesn't want to be alone.

You felt like you were the chosen one. He was still your superior, after all. After some time together, you got used to it. He always apologised for being such a bother. You got free snacks, which you didn't mind at all.

You were fucking around the base, chilling. You would've never thought you'd be sharing stories with him, but there you were. You didn't know what kind of relationship it was. Were you friends, or were you together just because of the situation? You never figure it out.

The dudes who embarrassed you were your rank. But they fuck with both of you since they didn't know Graves's position. A big mistake. He never really said anything to them. One day, they were just gone.

When you looked deeper into it, you found out that two were dead, and three lost their jobs.

Graves is such a gentleman.

[clanwarrior-tumbly]

Arvin and kieran meeting a shy but sweet new girl with this team.

Tapu koko who through some magical shenanigans can't be more then a mile away from the girl with out falling incredibly ill.

A motherly salazle who has a charm that allows her to talk English

A blood moon ursaluna who's the girls main body guard and hes very protective

And a female iron valiant who acts like a big sister. Who threatens anyone that if they hurt the girl she'll cut them down

Gotta say I appreciate the addition of Blood Moon Ursa. Officially my fav gen 9 ground type <3

............

Arven

The moment he met you, he realized you were too nice for your own good sometimes...being the shy and sweet transfer student who winds up being his partner in many classes.

He might tease you from time to time, although he lightens up only after he realizes Mabosstiff likes you--which mean he has to like you as well and not accidentally be too rude.

During battle studies, you two have a match and he's shook when you suddenly bring out Tapu Koko.

Somehow you have a powerful Alolan Guardian deity wrapped around your finger...yet you never once bragged about it.

But Arven fully believes you have a Ditto or Zorua who just chooses to impersonate a Tapu, wondering when it's gonna drop the act.

Soon he finds out that nope, it's the real deal, and you have some strange connection that doesn't allow it to wander too far from you.

Otherwise, it falls violently ill and its magic abilities are weakened.

You're certain it was hexed by someone who wanted to punish it for its mischief, so you've been travelling around hoping to find a "cure".

And ofc that meant Koko had to abandon its duties at Melemele Island and become your Pokémon. It was reluctant at first, but quickly became a loyal friend to you.

Eventually Arven meets the rest of your team, including a female Iron Valiant that escaped from the crater and made herself your ally after saving you from trouble.

She's your literal knight in shining armor, acting like a big sister figure instead of an emotionless robot programmed to attack.

Oftentimes she comes out of the pokeball herself if she senses you're in any kind of danger.

Blood Moon Ursaluna is another bodyguard of yours....who is MASSIVE and utterly terrifying.

All you did was go to Kitakami on a school trip and you suddenly come back with an ancient Ursaring variant/evolution??

How tf are you picking up so many dangerous Pokémon?

Just when he thinks Salazzle is the only "normal" one on your team...

He finds out that she can actually talk, addressing him by name and asking what he was cooking one day.

For a split second he thinks her pheromones/toxins were making him hallucinate...until he sees you having a full blown conversation with her.

It turns out that she developed the ability to speak human language, using it to scare off a group of male Salandits who were threatening you.

At first, she only ever said random words she picked up from humans, but you taught her how to speak coherently and gave her some books...and now she's 100% fluent in English.

All in all, Arven finds your team very...diverse.

You don't really do many Pokémon battles, as they all act like your bodyguards/friends instead. But then again he's never been too battle-crazy either (unlike a certain girl he knows who'd give ANYTHING to battle Tapu Koko).

Kieran

Your personality kinda reminds him of his old self: shy and sweet, oftentimes hiding behind protective figures, etc.

Part of him kinda hated it, but he was good at hiding it.

Was instantly impressed by your Pokémon team, especially the robotic-looking Gardevoir/Gallade hybrid.

Although being a country boi he's bewildered about her LED eyes and her robotic trills, and is definitely not too thrilled about all Pokémon looking like her in some distant/potential future.

Tapu Koko leaves him bewildered, especially when you explained your connection to it while it roamed around the coastal biome, reminiscing about its home in Alola.

He's heard rumors of the Blood Moon Ursaluna back in Kitakami, not caring for it as much as Ogerpon, but he NEVER expected to see that someone like you could have tamed it.

During a battle, Incineroar's flames almost burned you, and your Ursaluna was enraged and knocked him out with one Headlong Rush. Completely unprompted.

Since then Kieran made a point to instruct the feline to be more precise with his fire attacks..lest he became weak.

You impressed the League Club with your talking Salazzle...but at first he believes you're just being irritating and distracting..

Until she talks to him directly, and he's like "...oh wowzers..so you can understand me????"

That's the most shocked anyone in the club has ever seen their leader...

Being motherly as she is, your Salazzle often asks how he's feeling and how Hydrapple is....and he usually shuts down and tells her to mind her business.

But after Area Zero's events, when she asked him again he broke down crying and the poison/fire lizard lowkey panicked.

She had to get you to calm him down.

Since then you two have become close friends, and while in the beginning he was envious of your unique team (that also reminded him of somebody else), he realizes you thought his Hydrapple and battle setups were unique, too.

It honestly made his day.

[anarchomitsumi]

okay so stl 61 !! this chapter has laid out ujie's worldview: there are those in this world that are liked, accepted, popular, —and those that will always be shunned. only a limited amount of people may be the lucky ones.

and turns out, shima's worldview isn't so different. for him there are those who take, and those whose things are taken away from.

either you are born a shunned monster or the doctor that created it. no nuance is accepted. it's essentially a reaction to being socially shunned, you end up resenting the people you deem guilty of your misfortune so much that you deny them their own depth of being. they are the fortunate, they could never understand your suffering. it's a feeling quite common among teenagers, i think.

if i were to point out something, it'd be that for ujie this classification into fortunate-unfortunate is unmovable. he has no hope of changing his social fate. for shima, however, it isn't set in stone. he's determined to get out of it and get back the things he's been robbed of.

ujie just seems...very bitter about the way he's been treated. when both mitsumi and his unnamed classmate say 'you shouldn't criticize someone who's giving it their all', his eyes just seem to say yeah, but who's gonna empathize with me? no one gives me grace when I'm giving it my all.

he's essentially jealous of the good treatment he thinks shima is getting from their peers. to him, shima's fortune is the cause of his own misfortune.

but along the way he's denied shima any humanity, shima cannot have any depth or trouble in his eyes. i think this is especially easy to see in the ending pannel, after shima confronts him, when he says so that guy is human too — implying he thought before that shima wasn't human because he couldn't understand struggle.

it's a type of ideology that, though an understandable defense mechanism, is very unfair to the people around you.

what specially gets me though, is that ujie tells shima he's ARROGANT for taking the monster role. this is shima, we know he has been behaving against his wishes to please others since he was little. we know he performs to be liked, but despises the attention he gets because they like him for his appearance, his performance, never truly him. when ujie calls him "arrogant", he's implying shima enjoys the empty attention he gets from his peers. and to be told that you enjoy the very thing we know troubles shima the most...i can understand why he got mad.

here's the thing though — ujie understands that the attention shima gets has nothing to do with what he actually does or with who he truly is. he understands it's an empty sort of acceptance, but regardless to ujie it still looks more desirable than his own situation. it might be impersonal but that also means it's unconditional. shima will always be liked because he's attractive.

(to shima though, it's not unconditional at all. he thinks the moment he starts acting truly like himself everybody will despise him)

so yeah. closing thoughts. i think this was truly a beneficial encounter for the both of them. for shima, it helped him get out of his self pity spiral for a bit and acknowledge ujie's point of view. and also he was assertive for a change ! shima exhibiting an emotion that isn't a fake smile or resignated indifference?? what?? i can't believe he actually....got things out of his chest for a change.

and for ujie, i think this has broadened his worldview. he understands know that people as seemingly perfect as shima can indeed struggle as well. the world isn't cleanly divided into Blessed By God and Doomed Forever.

i also hope this helps him get rid of those awful thoughts that he'll never be accepted. if shima is an anomaly, —like he found out today — maybe he can be too. if that little smile in the last pannel is anything to go by, his bitterness might just start to crack :)

[mehiwilldoitlater]

He gently caressed their scattered skin, dry for their living condition and from the mud that had been spattered on them while they were dragged to the sentences of the seven.

The imposter was finally captured, and now the day of their execution has come.

As they were taken to their pyre, the seven archons observed in disgust the blasphemy of the creature that dared to impersonate the actual creator. But three, among those who wanted to claim their heads, felt a heavy doubt about this call for blood.

The Hydro and Dendro Archons looked at each other, knowing that something in them was so off. And, just behind Lady Furina, the Ludex watched, in horror, the scene in front of him.

That wasn't justice. Justice was something that needed to be used in order to create peace—to judge and punish the ones that harm others lives, the ones that have to keep everything in check.

They dragged that poor, marturated body over the stage,their hands grasping some hair from their caged throats. Their jailers didn't lose the opportunity to shove their feet on their already broken ribs, causing them to cough and gasp. That wasn't justice.

Days prior, Neuvilette studied the case, searching for everything that could justify the looming execution against someone who had impersonated the creator. And his efforts took him to nothing; the accused was attacked on the spot, but there wasn't any activity from their part.

They never professed to be the creator; the persecution started without an actual felony.

And now there they were, the former dragon in front of the soon-to-be dead imposter.

Why did he feel his heart clench at the vision of that human in that sorry state? He was the great judge of Fontaine; he wasn't supposed to feel sadness against someone like them, and yet...

Without even knowing it, he moved in their direction. Some believed that he was ready to strike something, to hurt them more like everyone else. Instead, followed by the crowd falling into silence, he kneeled in front of them, watching the creator in their eyes.

There were no eyes to watch—just two burning holes. They once admired the beauty of that world.

His gloved fingers reached for their cheeks, meeting only a trembling and sobbing mess. They retreat, fearing another sharp blow.

"Please..."

His voice was calm and gentle, which surprised them. How lovely did someone actually use that tone with them?

They kept trembling, but they didn't retreat again when he had the courage to stroke their faces. Was that agonizing torture really necessary? The face of a god was enough to justify the horrors of what they did to that human. In all the years of his work, Neuvilette has never felt such agony for someone who clearly faces unnecessary violence.

Did the archer really enjoy this? Did they actually feel such happiness terrorizing and violating someone who was clearly at their limit? For the first time in a century, Neuvilette felt his blood boiling.

"Why did you impersonate a god? ...Did you want to fool them in order to gain power?"

There wasn't any evidence reported in the document; the witness never actually stated that they ever did something against their law. He had nothing; now he wanted to hear it out.

No words; just a small whine came out of their lips. They wanted to say something, but they were too weak to even talk. Neuvilette came closer, trying to understand something, anything.

"It hurt... It hurt so much. Please."

He didn't need any more words.

////

"Ummm... I wonder what kind of interesting new show you're going to put us through, my dear Ludex!"

Furina's voice was chirpier than ever, clearly infatuated by the outcome of the last week.

Neuvilette decided to ignore her small talk; he had more important matters to attend to.

"By the way, you said that the other day our new guest had... spilled gold from their bandages?"

"Yes, I think that happened. I think I saw a few traces back at the executor, but I never investigated anything about it."

"Ummm..."

Silence fell again in the office, and the two occupants now wondered the same question.

What now?