#that is probably the only comforting thing about the biting cold despite us being a step away from april .........

[lwieserce]

WELL i am endlessly full of love and ready to burst at the seams in some convos i have with people and to me it is very obvious but it feels like this forbidden barrier i cannot cross. Okay. You will never love talking to me as much as i love talking to you. Whatevrr. Or you will never tell me

[hyper-fixates]

Time After Time

Logan Howlett/Wolverine x AFAB!reader (no pronouns/gendered language).

Explicit content (18+)

Word count: 15.2k never let me near him again

Tags/warnings: age-gap due to logan’s mutation (reader’s age not specified), mutant!reader, unprotected sex, teasing, friends to lovers, explicit language, dry humping, storm cameos, fluff, domesticity, the claws come out when he’s close (👁️👁️), detailed descriptions & scenes of nightmares/trauma/PTSD/panic attacks, one (1) ass smack, alcohol consumption, vomiting, biting/marking, angst, soft!logan, creampie, groping/touching, use of “baby” once, aftercare, yearning (kindly let me know if anything was missed!).

Summary: 4 times you end up in Logan’s bed, and the 1 time he does something about it.

Notes: this falls somewhere in between “which could mean nothing” and “we can fix each other” 🫡 (written with a mix of X1 & X2 logan!)

Your heart, despite always being alive and beating, sometimes wakes up before you.

You can feel it before your eyes even have a chance to open. It jolts your sleep-ridden body and collapses your lungs without giving your brain a chance to fight against it. Muscles and limbs feel lifeless and detached from your body, shaking from the sleep that your heart knows wasn’t completely dreamless.

You kick the blankets off of yourself and sit up in a panic, trying to regain some control of your sudden erratic breaths while bringing a lethargic hand to your heaving chest in hopes to ground yourself. It never works.

Maybe your ribs are shrinking and squeezing your lungs, making you delirious from the lack of oxygen, but you know that’s not the case. Your heart feels like it’s being squeezed and broken into a million tiny pieces.

No part of your body feels real, yet you keep your hand on your chest as firmly as you can, trying to focus on controlling the pounding of your heart that’s working so hard with each beat that it hurts. 

“Fuck. Fuck,” you choke out, feeling the tears finally breach and roll down your cheeks as your nervous system catches up to what’s happening.

 Panic. It’s all panic.

You can’t do anything but sit there and let the tears hit the freshly-washed fitted sheet on your bed. So you let it happen. Nothing can stop it.

Trauma is such a fickle thing. One moment you’re fine, and then the next, your heart is screaming at you and forcing your body to process something at 4 a.m. on a random Friday when all you wanted was some goddamn sleep.

There is no choice. Your mind doesn’t give you one.

The tremors subside slowly after a few minutes, giving you the feeling back to your arms and legs, albeit minimal.

You slide to sit at the edge of your bed, resting an elbow on your thigh and setting your chin into your palm with a defeated, yet shaky, huff. 

You look to your window and see that the sun hasn’t even started to rise yet. You’ll be up for the rest of the foreseeable morning, but there’s not much to do so early besides wander aimlessly and think…then think some more. 

You’re confident the professor isn’t even awake at this hour, which says enough about your state. You would typically go visit Storm for some comfort, but she’s been gone fuck-knows-where with Hank and Scott until Sunday at the latest. Thanks, Charles.

A questionable, and probably manic, decision comes to mind. One that’s only two doors down, one over from Storm.

Your impulsive feet make up your mind for you. The cold hardwood floor shocking you further into consciousness as if your heart didn’t do a good enough job.

You tiptoe a couple steps down the hall, forcing yourself to turn and face the large wooden door when you reach it. You just stand there staring at it, unknocking, analyzing the wood grains, suddenly very interested in what type of wood it is and what stain was used to—

“Uh. Are you okay?”

You refocus your eyes onto the man now standing in front of you in the doorway, adorning a barely-zipped school hoodie and black sweats.

“Huh?” You blink a few times, disoriented.

Logan quirks a brow, looking you up and down cautiously. “Are you okay?” He asks again, offering a look of concern—or maybe confusion—that you haven’t seen often. A look that’s never needed to be directed towards you.

You come back to yourself. “But—I…didn’t knock,” you respond, looking equally as confused as him as you point to the door. 

He leans against the edge of the door, face softening. “I could smell you before you passed Storm’s room,” he clarifies, a hint of reluctance in his tone. Oh. 

You feel like a child who has just gained awareness, all too conscious of your situation.

“You’re…awake?” Is all you manage despite probably needing to say much more than that to explain just why exactly you’re standing outside Logan’s room at 4 a.m.

“So are you,” he counters with a curious look. “So let me ask again. Are you okay?” He locks his eyes on yours, probably in hopes to understand why the fuck you’re outside his room at 4 a.m.

“I’m not sure how to answer that,” you say, and it’s the truth. 

You should probably be embarrassed. You show up at Logan’s door unannounced, dressed in a flimsy shirt and matching sweats—thanks, Charles—that can’t fully hide the remaining quivers throughout your body.

Logan pulls his lips together at your admission. You can almost see the wheels turning in his head trying to figure you out.

“Can’t sleep?” He questions, but he knows he’s right.

“Yeah.” You don’t know why you’re making it Logan’s problem, though. Sure, he happens to be awake, but maybe this is all too personal to push on the guy who’s seemingly all pride and no solicitude most of the time.

It’s not that he’s not a good, nice guy, but you don’t know how you would define your relationship, or lack of.

You know each other well enough from existing in the same space over the past couple months, being part of the same “team”, but it’s nothing to call a close friendship like you and Storm. He’s a bit of a rare species in the mansion, not really lingering around.

He cocks his head in a half shrug, the soft points in his hair broken by sleep shake gently with the movement.

“I don’t think I can help you,” he says wearily. “I’m no better. Clearly.” He gestures between you, drawing attention to the fact that you’re both awake. The helpless cannot help the helpless.

“Oh—no, I’m not looking for help. I think I’m beyond that at this point,” you laugh but stop yourself short when Logan doesn’t follow. Tough crowd.

“I, uh, don’t actually know what I’m looking for,” you offer.

You knit your brows together in thought, still wondering why the fuck you’re here. Comfort? Entertainment? Some other unknown third thing?

“I’m not really used to Storm being gone for so long,” you admit. “I just feel…all over the place, I guess.”

Logan considers your vulnerability for a beat, eyes flicking to yours. “I can hear you sometimes,” he says, a knowing—almost sympathetic—look on his face. “We have the same problem.”

You go cold, any expression you had on your face sliding away. You wish the floor could swallow you right now. You know things have been getting worse recently, but you didn’t think anyone could hear that fact. Maybe it shouldn’t come as a surprise from someone who could smell you from down the hallway.

He steps back, pulling his door open further. An invitation.

You don’t move right away. Could this be a false awakening? You’re not sure what you expected when you came to his door, but you also didn’t expect him to open it without you knocking, so you have to suspend disbelief for now. You figured he’d offer a few words of advice and dismiss you, or maybe even tell you to fuck off, but he opened his door wider for you. But you didn’t exactly think any of it through in the first place anyway.

You force your feet to carry you into Logan’s room. It’s not much different from yours; scarce belongings, minimal decor, a small work desk, brown curtains that are drawn back, and a bed. 

“Were you, uh…sleeping before I came?” You sit on the unmade bed, nothing noticeably different from it compared to yours.

He shuts the door quietly, moving to the small desk across the room and filing some scattered papers together neatly.

“Trying to,” he says, keeping his gaze on the desk.

Fucking duh. “Sorry if I disturbed you,” you wince to yourself. 

You see him briefly shake his head at your unnecessary apology. “I had to get up anyway.” His voice is still gravelly from sleep.

It feels like you’re invading his space. But he invited you in. How many others have had the opportunity to be in here? Probably too many. There’s nothing to make this special.

“I’m fucking exhausted,” you sigh, flopping back on his bed defeated. Simply overwhelmed with the uncontrollable repercussions of your mutation.

“Try to sleep. If you want,” he offers, moving to the edge of the bed. “It’s easier said than done, but I have to meet with Charles in an hour.” It’s gruff, but he’s sincere.  

Maybe the professor is awake after all.

You roll your head to the side to look at him. Was he really offering for you to stay in his bed?

“Oh, wow…uh, sure.” It comes off as more of a question, but he quirks his brows in acknowledgment, turning back to the desk and collecting a handful of other miscellaneous papers.

“I have to head downstairs and take care of some things. Stay as long as you need,” he says, zipping his sweater the rest of the way up. Thank God in heaven.

A shy “thanks” is all you manage as you situate yourself on the bed.

Is this fucking weird? You could name a handful of others in the mansion right this second that would kill without hesitation to be where you are. They’d probably kill you specifically to get it. It’s not much of a secret that Logan is the subject of almost all students’ desires. He knows it, too. 

“See you later,” he adds, his lips forming the slightest hint of a caring smile as he sees himself out. You throw one back before the door clicks shut.

Should you be offended that he didn’t stay? That he left so quickly? No, no, he can’t. He couldn’t. Charles is expecting him. The timing is just horrid. But now you’re just…alone…in Logan’s room, expected to sleep because of a random act of kindness in his heart.

Lying in his bed instead of yours is an odd sensation. The sheets and mattress are exactly the same, the pillows are just as fluffy, yet it feels unalike. 

You flop your head on his pillow, tugging the blankets up to your chin. Your fingers graze something by your hip as you settle in, making you push the blanket back down. Leaning over, you see three puncture marks in the mattress, fraying the bedsheet material into feather-soft strands around the deep holes.

Your eyes widen, remembering his words before he invited you in: “We have the same problem.”

Part of your heart fractures for the second time today. Your eyes cross over to the other side of you, seeing a matching set of holes just below the pillow. It’s suddenly easy to understand why no one besides him has been seen coming and going from this room in a while. One day, things just seemed to change. 

Maybe his act of kindness was an act of mercy. Trauma will always find you, and it will make sure you feel it until you either destroy it or it destroys you.

Even the Wolverine isn’t an exception. 

━━━━ ● ━━━━

The gold liquid is gone from the glass as quickly as it was poured.

Your throat clenches and protests the swallow as you try to suppress the urge to gag. You gently set the shot glass back on the counter, watching Storm chase with a piece of lime that does nothing to help the puckered face she makes from the tequila. 

“No more, no more. I can’t.” Your arms anchor you to the counter to stop yourself from swaying too much.

Storm nods, still fighting off the sourness with furrowed brows and a scrunched nose. You giggle at her when she quickly screws the cap back on the bottle, sliding it out of reach.

“You’re a bad influence,” she scolds as she wipes her mouth with the back of her hand.

“No—I’m under the influence,” you counter, a playful smile on your lips. “There’s a difference. You still have your own free will.”

Storm rolls her eyes so hard you only see the whites of them. “We have training tomorrow,” she slurs. “Charles will not be happy if we show up half-conscious.” She rounds the counter to you, grabbing your shoulders for stability, and you do the same.

“He’ll be lucky if we show up at all,” you mumble. 

The dim kitchen lighting embraces the two of you, the rest of the mansion blanketed in darkness with everyone fast asleep—like you both should be.

You close your eyes with a roll of your neck, more giggles falling through your lips as you clumsily grab onto Storm and rock and sway together for a moment, the alcohol quickly catching up to your motor skills. It feels like you’re spinning through time and space, and you’d be lying if you said it didn’t feel fucking euphoric. At this rate, neither of you will be able to make it back to your rooms.

“Am I interrupting something?”

You lose a bit of your balance as you try to find the resonant voice, eyes shooting open. Storm unintentionally startles and stumbles away from you, white hair also jumping from the excitement.

You grab onto the counter again, sucking in a deep breath. “Fuck, don’t do that,” you growl through your teeth, a hand on your chest as you try to calm yourself.

“Don’t do what? Come to the shared kitchen to grab a drink?” Logan huffs a laugh, an amused smile creeps to his lips as he takes in your drunk and shaken state from the entryway.

“Doesn’t anyone sleep in this place?” He mumbles to himself.

“And with that, I’m done for the night,” Storm chuckles, fixing her hair. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” Her eyes lock intensely on yours, index finger firmly poking the middle of your chest to make her point for you to show up to training very clear.

“See you, Logan,” she dismisses, stumbling as she passes him.

Logan shakes his head, still smiling. He steps to the fridge, opening the double doors and plucking a bottle of soda from the bottom shelf. No alcohol is readily available in the communal fridge because, after all, you’re all in a school full of kids, so Storm had to get creative; Scott will be missing a rather large bottle from the now not-so-secret stash in his room.

As the alcohol continues to settle in you, you feel more and more lightheaded as it brings you to a new level of euphoria again. You only know this because watching Logan pop the cap of his drink with mindless ease feels a little more exciting than it would be if you were sober. But you’re not sober, and that’s the problem.

“Not gonna follow Storm?” He asks, taking a generous sip from the bottle as he casually places his free hand on the counter to lean on across from you.

A tight smile forms, mostly to yourself. “I don’t think I can make it down the hall,” you laugh in embarrassment. Maybe that last shot was one too many, and it’s not even fully done working its magic yet.

Logan raises a brow. “Want some help?” There’s no judgement in his tone like you expect. Then again, you don’t know what the fuck to expect from him.

Your already half-closed eyes, blurry and unfocused, meet his hazel ones in interest. Another favour?

It’s been two weeks since he let you sleep off the nightmares in his bed. Two weeks since you learned he’s burdened with them, too. You traced the holes in the mattress over and over before you eventually fell asleep, wondering what—or who—could have hurt him so badly. He plays it off cool; you wouldn’t suspect anything from talking to him. The same could probably be said about you.

“I didn’t know wolverine’s were chivalrous,” you tease.

The yellow hue of the lights dance over the quaffed points in his hair, making them appear sharper than usual. You would never admit it, especially to him, but you adore them. They give him an absurd amount of character that you’d expect a guy like him to not care about. 

You’re not exactly complaining about the fitting grey tank-top he has on either.

“Not overly,” he plays along, taking another mouthful of the fizzy drink. “I like to think I’m special,” he says quieter.

“Maybe you are,” you say as you try and straighten yourself to see if you can stand unassisted.

The world tilts as you stand to your full height, eyes rolling into your head from the wave of dizziness. “Wow, okay,” you say to yourself, squeezing your eyes shut to stop the spinning. How many shots did you have again?

A warm hand presses between your shoulders. “Woah, nice and easy. Nice and easy.” Logan appears by your side to steady you, other hand grabbing your elbow to pull you straight. You wobble in his grip, letting him guide your useless, alcohol-ridden body.

His hand on your back rubs a few small, comforting circles as you work to regain your bearings. He watches your expressions intently, looking for the right moment to get you moving back to your room safe and sound.

Your arm crosses over your body out of instinct to grab the hand he has on your elbow for extra support.

“Are you okay?” He asks. He seems to ask you that a lot.

You lean into him, your shoulder to his chest, and you can feel the blackout creeping up on you like humidity from a thunderstorm—it’s usually too late to do anything once you notice it. 

“I drank a lot,” you laugh deeply, rolling your head onto his shoulder to look up at him.

He looks so much more delicate under the ambient lights—his usual defined features have shifted and melted him into someone that doesn’t look like they should be a feared animal out in the world.

Logan all but cradles you, that same look of concern crossing his features from the night you went to his door. The only difference is that you’ve had a generous amount of tequila—and are currently being kept alert by the hot touch of his hands. That’s new.

“Can you walk?” He holds your squinty eye contact, probably searching for any signs of a coherent thought behind the blissful expression on your face. “Or will I have to carry you?” He muses, a hint of a smile crosses his lips as his hand moves up to gently rub over your shoulders. 

Drunk you likes the sound of anything relating to Logan keeping his hands on you right now. You wonder what sober you would think.

“I’m not gonna tell you no, but it feels like I’m floating in a bubble that won’t stop spinning,” you hum as you let the sensation consume your senses. “I might fly away.” You dip your head back off of his shoulder in amusement as you laugh again. 

“Yeah, you’re fucked up,” he mumbles lovingly. Just like anyone else who’s concerned for your well-being would. 

“Hey, kitty cat—I’m perfectly buzzed,” you emphasize the teasing nickname, narrowing your eyes at him sternly as you bring your gaze back to his in defence.

“‘Kitty cat’? Really?” He snorts. “I think you’re past your bedtime by three drinks,” he remarks back with equal levity.

“Then take me to bed if you’re so concerned,” you sigh dramatically, going limp in his arms to make your point. 

Truthfully, you’re probably past your bedtime by five shots. But he doesn’t need to know that. You just know that you can’t control your limbs like you were able to ten minutes ago.

“Maybe I will.” You don’t see it, but he does his quick little eye roll that you’ve seen pointed towards Scott too many times. 

He slides the hand on your elbow down to the backs of your knees, pulling you up off the floor and into his chest as you fall into the arm that was rubbing your back. 

Oh, so it’s gonna be like that. 

An excited—or maybe shocked—noise escapes your mouth as he adjusts you in his arms. You extend your right arm up and over his shoulder to hug his neck and keep yourself stable.

The trip to your room isn’t one that should take long, but each sway from Logan’s steps goes straight to your stomach in waves of queasiness. It feels like forever before you feel him bend awkwardly to turn your doorknob.

You’re fighting to keep yourself conscious the entire time, not wanting to regret missing the feeling of being in his arms.

The room is only lit by the silver moonlight creeping through the window. It’s hard to distinguish anything through your bleary eyes besides Logan’s look of determination to get you in your bed.

He leans down, shuffling you out of his arms and onto the mattress as swiftly as possible. The care of it all pokes at your heart. 

He silently goes around each corner of the bed adjusting the blankets. It may be dark, but the moonlight highlights the peaks of his shoulders as he moves. Your eyes might be involuntarily half-shut, but that doesn’t stop you from staring.

You’re now probably no better than every other mutant in this school.

“Logan,” you start before you can fully process the foolish thing you’re about to say next.

He rounds the bed back to the side you’re huddled on, looking down on you. “Yeah?” The subtle jingle of his dog tag pierces the quiet that’s lingering in the room.

You part your lips to speak but the words die in your throat. They’re replaced by a flood of saliva that has you sitting up at a speed that shouldn’t be possible for someone as intoxicated as you. You cover your mouth with your hand, feeling your stomach churning and finally rejecting the tequila. 

You suddenly feel very awake.

“Hey, hey.” Logan squats down in front of you with his already permanently-furrowed brows pinched closer together than you’ve ever seen before, a hand coming to your shoulder in concern. “What—”

“Bathroom,” you mumble through your palm, eyes rolling shut at the nausea. 

He doesn’t say another word. He pulls you to your feet by your arms, walking behind you fiercely with his hands gripping your shoulders to guide you to the small bathroom across the room.  

You push the door open, falling to your knees in the darkness over the toilet as the mistakes from the night expel themselves from your body through rounds of coughing and gagging. He lingers in the doorway, keeping an eye on you but still giving you privacy.

“Fuck,” you cough, resting your warm forehead on your hand as you slump against the toilet. That definitely sobered you up fast.

Exhaustion hits you like a truck. “Logan…” you croak from your crumpled position on the tile floor. 

He steps in, bending down again to reach your height. You can barely make out the shadow of him in the fading moonlight.

“Just…help me back to bed,” you groan, reaching for his arm as you use the toilet seat to push yourself the rest of the way up. You stumble against him as you try to make it back through the doorway.

He guides you to the bed the same way he did to the bathroom—steering you from behind.

“I’m gonna get you some water,” he says as you settle back into bed, head hitting the pillow with a quiet thud. “Even though you did this to yourself.”

“Fuck off,” you groan.

You close your eyes, hearing his footsteps fade back toward the bathroom. You hear the tap run for a couple seconds before he’s next to you again, sitting on the edge of the bed. “Drink. All of it,” he says firmly, holding the cup out to you.

You sit back up slowly, no doubt lethargic, an unimpressed look on your face that earns you a raised brow that tells you there’s no room to object.

You finish the cup in four mouthfuls, handing it back to him. “Thanks.”

You fall back onto the pillow, no longer feeling like you’re travelling through space and time.

The clothes you’re in are close enough to pyjamas. There’s no sense in undressing in front of Logan, especially with what you were about to say to him before you were rudely interrupted by the consequences of your own actions.

He returns the cup to the bathroom and you pull the blanket over your waist as you hopefully settle in for the rest of the night. You owe him big time for this. The thought of just how exactly you’ll manage that fills you with anxiety.

You turn on your side, fingers sliding over the mattress with the movement. They graze familiar strands of feather-soft fabric by the pillow.

This is Logan’s room. Are you just that drunk that you couldn’t tell the difference when he brought you in? Or are your rooms just that similar to each other?

You dip a finger in one of the three holes, hearing the bathroom door click shut as Logan makes his way back. 

“Why am I in your bed?” You see him rustling through some drawers of clothing by the small desk, but he stops when you finish your question.

“You can’t take care of yourself tonight,” he says. “You’re too drunk.” He pulls the grey tank-top off, stuffing it in one of the drawers and shutting it.

You sit up at that, head still foggy and tipsy, watching him move to the foot of the bed across from you. You try to focus your eyes on anything but his bare chest and the dark hair that adorns it and trails down past the waistband of his sweats. His hair is somehow even more wild from mindlessly pulling the tank-top over his head.

“Ah. I was gonna ask you to stay anyway,” you reveal, almost whispering the bold confession.

You were planning to ask before the tequila decided to make another appearance, but maybe doing it this way isn’t so bad either. He did all the heavy-lifting.

A modest, tight-lipped smile graces his lips. “I think you still have some tequila to sleep off.”

Whether or not you still have some shots in your system, what you feel and want right now is real. It’s not influenced by anything besides some mild andronitis created by the fact that you share a common struggle.

“Is it…safe? To share a bed?” The most coherent thought you’ve had all night makes him stiffen from your sudden nervous tone. Your body could easily replace the mattress and become a new home for the deep punctures. 

Your eyelids have been fighting against being pulled shut by alcohol-induced drowsiness, yet your eyes are wider than they’ve been all night in this moment.

You’re sat right in the middle of the bed and Logan comes around to the right, sitting on the edge of the mattress to come down to your level.

“You’re just gonna have to trust me.” His eyes are imploring and apologetic all at once. He understands the prospect of even having you here in the first place.

You nod, sliding over to the left to give him more room. 

Logan wouldn’t put you in harms way, you reason with yourself. He wouldn’t risk potentially killing someone, especially a fellow mutant, if he wasn’t absolutely sure of his mental state. But you also don’t really know his demons.

You roll onto your right side, tugging the blanket up to your chin in comfort. “Why haven’t you been given a new mattress?” You ask as he turns to face you in the same position, his half of the blanket resting at his hip.

The bed dips significantly on his side, almost encouraging you to roll over against him.

“Forgot to ask,” he says quietly, running his right hand through his hair to push the shorter strands off his forehead.

From his tone you can decipher that he actually means “can’t be bothered.” It’s a devastating thing to imagine just how many he goes through, anyway. He probably doesn’t see the point in replacing something that will inevitably have the same fate as the others.

There has to be less than an arms length between you two. It’s a surreal situation to be in considering what you thought you knew about him. A recluse. Standoffish. Maybe it’s all a fluke and the alcohol is severely fucking with your perception of what’s actually happening.

“Thanks for everything,” you whisper as if someone else will overhear.

“Get some sleep,” he insists, rolling onto his back. You do the same.

You stare at the blank ceiling for a while, noticing the exact moment Logan falls asleep; his breathing grows slow and his body runs even hotter than before. 

You think about how he could wake at any moment, claws accidentally sliding right through your stomach from a nightmare or two. You imagine all the others that have been in your position—if they felt scared, if they even knew. 

He asked you to trust him, and that should be enough. 

There is a body full of secrets and hurt sleeping undisturbed next to you with the ability to withstand and regenerate from any physical injury, yet there’s something that hasn’t allowed the same to be done for his mind. 

━━━━

The bright amber sun hits your closed eyes through the window, making you roll your head away onto the other side of the cool pillow.

You want more sleep. Your head feels like a bag of bricks and your body feels like it got beat with them.

You stretch a leg out, gently grazing something solid with your foot. Your eyes shoot open, the night coming back to you as you drift into consciousness. Logan. 

You shoot up, bouncing a little from the momentum.

Logan startles next to you, clearly interrupted from a deep sleep. “What the fuck…” he groans, rubbing a hand over his face, not seeming interested in making a move to sit up with you.

“What time is it?” Your eyes bounce around the room looking for a clock.

He grunts, reaching for a watch on the nightstand. “Seven-forty.”

You needed to be in the Danger Room for 7 o’clock.

“Fuck!” You rip the blanket off, almost tripping as you run to the bathroom.

Logan also wants to roll back over and go back to sleep, but he knows he won’t be able to. He doesn’t work like that. So he just lays there, listening to you swear and make a mess of his bathroom as the clattering of fuck-knows-what fills the room. 

The surprise of how well he slept makes him feel uneasy. Although it definitely wasn’t eight hours, it was uninterrupted. He doesn’t want to credit that to you, though. He wants to believe that he’s getting better overall, and maybe he is, so he can’t offer you any flattery in his mind.

Another distant “fuck” escapes the bathroom, pulling him out of his thoughts. You exit a few minutes later, as refreshed and presentable as you could get yourself, and the sight of Logan still in bed makes something in you ache for another moment of feeling him care and tend to you. Maybe that’s your hangover talking.

“Thanks again. I’ll see you around,” you say hurriedly, offering an apologetic smile as you turn the doorknob to leave.

“Good luck with Charles.” It’s a genuine advisory. Fuck. You’ll be so incredibly lucky if he doesn’t give you more than a stern lecture in front of everyone.

You take a deep breath in and slip out of Logan’s room. There’s not a single cut, mark, or scratch on you, just like he promised.

━━━━ ● ━━━━

“I was told it’ll take a day to fix,” Storm explains with a shrug. “You’ll have to find somewhere or someone to room with until tomorrow. Jean already offered to have me stay with her.” A contrite look passes over her face.

You stand outside your rooms, staring in at the remnants of the mess caused by two terrakinetic kids fucking around in the courtyard when they weren’t supposed to be. They somehow managed to throw, or launch, sizeable tree branches right through each of your windows. Of course it wasn’t on purpose, but the Danger Room exists for a reason—to avoid mishaps like this. 

Shards of glass and fragments of wood splatter your floors. The branches are hanging half-way out both of your windows, caught on the window sills and bobbing in the evening summer wind. The kids are extremely fortunate that neither of you were in your rooms when it happened.

“It’s fine. It’s just one night,” you sigh, rubbing your eyes in frustration. You don’t love how quickly your mind picks out who to go to. It’s already nearing 11 p.m., so you have to work fast. 

Storm squeezes your shoulder in comfort. “The living room is always free,” she suggests with a remorseful smile.

But you don’t want the living room. Stiff couches mixed with students clamouring and passing by at the crack of dawn isn’t exactly a recipe for a good nights rest. As if you usually get one, anyway.

“Not a fucking chance,” you laugh. “I’ll be fine,” you say again, dismissing her worries. You wish her goodnight when she steps by you to head towards Jean’s room at the very end of the hall.

You glare at the mess in your room, not daring to step in. The amount of shattered glass everywhere makes the floor look like a body of water from the reflections of the pale moonlight bouncing and refracting off of the jagged shards.

“Fuck,” you spit through your teeth, solely to yourself.

Not even a full week after Logan saw you at your worst, you’re going to go back and ask for the left side of his bed. Shameless.

You don’t have much of a choice; you’re not comfortable having it be anyone else. It’s only because Logan saw you at your worst that you feel he’s the most logical choice. Already having shared a bed with him this week may also have some weight in your decision.  

You take the few self-assured steps to his room, once again standing in front of his door. This time you feel more confident in approaching the Wolverine in his den.

You knock three times, the piercing sound echoing through the hall.

“You start to miss me or what?” A bare chest enters your view. You note the dog tag hanging from his neck again before you find his unyielding gaze full of ambiguity, wondering why you’re here. Again.

You blink at him slowly in hilarity. “Ha, funny. Can I stay with you tonight?” You ask flatly, not thrilled with the situation, but not completely displeased with being here now. “My window—”

“I know what happened,” he interrupts. “Figured you’d go for the couch in the living room.” He looks at you more pointedly with teasing suspicion. 

“I think you know no one would ever willingly choose to sleep out there,” you reason, running a hand over your face in both shame and defeat.

He makes a face that tells you “touché” and you smirk in satisfaction. “If you don’t mind giving up half of your bed again, I would really appreciate it. I promise I’m not trying to make this a habit,” you sigh. Spending the night in Logan’s bed three times in the past month has to be a record for anyone recently. 

“I don’t think it would be a bad habit,” he argues. Oh. “C’mon.” He gives a jerk of his head to allow you in, his tufts of his hair bristling with the quick movement.

“Thanks,” you squeak. He wants you here? 

He shuts the door behind you, following you to the bed that’s clearly already had him in it. The blanket rests in waves on the mattress that remind you of just how human Logan is despite his reputation and image.

“Do you have an early morning?” You ask, slipping under the blanket.

“No. Charles was feeling nice for once,” he raises his tone sarcastically to rag on Charles’ judgement, which has clearly been a much needed one before now.

“Not an early bird?” You roll onto your right side like last time, facing him as he settles on his back with a deep breath. The bed sinks in again where he lays, your body wanting to give in to the laws of gravity and fall into him.

“Fuck no,” he laughs lightly, eyes crinkling around the corners. It’s self-deprecating, but it’s still a genuine laugh. The condescension from it lingers in the air, all directed at himself in a way that tells you he’s thinking about how inconceivably fucked up he is.

The last time he had a decent sleep was when you were drunk in his bed a few days ago.

“People like us don’t usually get the pleasure of a full eight hours,” he notes, sliding his gaze to yours for a fraction of a second.

He props an arm behind his head, the other resting on his chest and idly twisting the dog tag between his fingers. You watch the thin piece of steel slide and flip easily, the chain tinkling with every movement.

People like us.

“You mean mutants,” you state. You see his jaw tense in what little light there is from the half-moon tonight.

You see his brows pull together. “Yeah.” He has a point.

You think about the mutants you know, how they all have some horrific story about their gifts or family, or both. How they either were shamed by society or experimented on like rats. 

The scenarios are endless. If you can think of it, some mutant has probably lived it.

Your heart sinks to the bottom of your stomach. You and Logan are not isolated or special cases, but you’ve already shared a moment of vulnerability with him when you came to his door all those weeks ago seeking solace for the same thing he fights with: the inescapable ability of remembering.

You pull the blanket tighter against you. “I don’t think you’ll hurt me.” 

He turns his head to you, confusion written on his face. “What?” He stops toying with the dog tag.

“Your claws. I trust you.” You didn’t feel like you were in immediate danger that first night, but you want to reassure him anyway. Or maybe you’re reassuring yourself. 

He hasn’t had to say a single word for you to know his nightmares trigger something instinctive and combative that’s been hardwired into his DNA. In this case, it’s his claws needing to find a home in his mattresses, where another body could potentially lay one night. Like yours is right now.

You noticed the lack of holes in this mattress when you first got to the bed. Maybe you mentioning them last time was enough for him to finally request a new one.

Logan knows he shouldn’t make promises he doesn’t know he’ll be able to keep, but he wants to keep you here tonight, so he improvises. He abandons the dog tag between his fingers completely, turning onto his side and reaching to find your hand under the blanket. You meet him halfway, sliding your fingers between his as your palms lay flat on the bed.

A smile tugs at your lips for a moment. He watches your interlinked fingers, observing the size difference, wondering if he really just did that—and why. 

You assume it’s his way of saying “thank you” for your trust when you probably shouldn’t be putting that much into him.

“Does it hurt?” You whisper, pulling your fingers out from his just enough to caress the divets between his knuckles that conceal the claws.

He knows what you’re asking. “Every time.” He softly pushes his fingers back into yours, squeezing a little. 

There’s a deadly stillness in the room despite his window being cracked. You both know you’re one in the same in a way, and that’s a connection that Logan hasn’t let himself experience. Not everyone likes looking in a mirror.

To be truly seen by someone, wholly, without judgement or fear, is what he deserves. 

“What are you?” He asks, rubbing his index finger back and forth along the top of your hand. “Telekinetic? Psychic?” His curious voice grows quiet, hazel eyes fascinated with you and your lack of a physical mutation, at least nothing that he can see.

It never occurred to you that he didn’t know your mutation, or that you’ve never told him. It was never needed, but it seems unfair that you know about his when he wasn’t the one who told you.

“Ha, close.” Your eyes twinkle as you notice how intently he’s listening. “Psychometric,” you correct, watching his forehead crease.

“Sounds like math,” he quips, readjusting his head on the pillow. He’s close enough that you can feel the heat he’s putting off.

You laugh quietly. “No, it’s extrasensory perception. It lets me see the history of any object or person I touch, but only if I accept the energy,” you explain.

You watch his eyes narrow and you know what he’s thinking, so you quickly interject as he begins to pull his hand out from yours. “I need to touch a pulse point to be able to see anything,” you reassure, feeling his fingers slide back against yours. “The heart remembers everything,” you clarify.

The catch? The person’s memories and past stay with you after you see them. It’s become hard to distinguish what memories are yours or someone else’s. They all become intertwined. Good or bad, violent or gentle. You see it all, and then it’s part of you. Forever.

“I haven’t looked. I promise.” 

“Good. You don’t need to see that shit,” he huffs, eyes wandering over your face. He isn’t sure what he’s looking for, but he’s a little startled for the first time in a while.

“I’m sure I’ve seen it all,” you state. It’s probably not far off from the truth. Your gift came when you were all too young, and plenty of time has passed since then for you to rack up this amount of damage from near-strangers and their lives.

“No, you haven’t.” A sure expression passes over him, shaking his head as best as he can against the pillow. 

“Then I’ll count myself lucky,” you say softly. You have no idea what Logan has experienced, but his demeanor makes you want to stay curious. Not everything needs to be known, and you’re definitely not entitled to it.

A faint smile appears on his lips, then it’s gone just as quick. “Get some sleep,” he rasps. He turns onto his back and his hand abandons yours. 

It’s a complete repeat of last time.

Something twinges in your heart, and you don’t like it. What exactly had you expected from Logan? He’s just doing you a courtesy by letting you stay here for the night. Nothing more. And that’s what you should expect: nothing.

The hum of crickets outside eventually lulls you into a dead sleep. It’s heavy and deep, not a single muscle twitching in your body. Logan breathes steadily next to you, a hand on his chest as the occasional snore fills the air.

From above you two might look like you’re transient, only here in this moment for a short time. And, realistically, you are. 

━━━━

Logan was no where to be seen by the time you woke up, and you made quick work to get out of his room. It always feel wrong to be in someone’s space when they aren’t there.

Just like Storm said, the windows in your rooms were fixed the next day. It looks as though nothing even happened.

“Thank fuck,” you mumble to yourself as you step back into your room.

If you ever have to spend another night in Logan’s bed, you might as well wear a shirt that says “yes, we’re fucking!”, even if it isn’t true. You could deny it all you want, but it won’t stop what students would say. Nothing gets past them, even if it’s behind a closed door.

━━━━ ● ━━━━

“Are you fucking Logan?”

You almost swallow your tongue. “Sorry?” Your brows shoot up in surprise, eyes round in disbelief.

“Are you guys sleeping together?” Storm casually asks as she flicks through the T.V. channels, glancing over to you from her spot on the couch.

You’re sat comfortably in an arm chair, suddenly no longer caring what channel she decides on. “Why would you think that?” Technically you were sleeping together, but not like that. It may never happen again, no matter how badly you want it to.

“Things travel fast around here,” she deflects with a cheeky smile. “And, you know, Logan is…Logan.” She shrugs.

You don’t even know what to say to that. Is there a right or wrong answer?

“It wasn’t like that,” you grumble. “He was doing me a favour. As a friend.” It hasn’t even been a full day since he let you stay with him while pieces of your window laid on your floor, and people are already convinced you’re fucking. 

You haven’t even managed a chaste kiss, despite how much as you want to, never mind his dick being balls deep in you.

“Right.” She emphasizes the word, not convinced. Or just pushing your buttons because she can. 

You roll your eyes. “If anything was happening, you’d be the first to know,” you point out. 

She looks back over to you. “I know,” she says with another, more sincere, smile. “You two would be cute, though.” 

You give her some side-eye, not quite sure if you disagree entirely with that statement. Whatever happens, happens. Logan is not something you can control or influence. He does what—and who—he wants, when he wants. 

━━━━

A bolt of lightening strikes you. You gasp, then release a choked cry, eyes flying open as you claw at your chest in terror.

Your throat tightens and you break out in a cold sweat as you sit up. The soft blanket around you feels constricting. Sporadic and short breaths make you heave as your body registers the horrors in your subconscious. 

There was never any lighting. That’s just what the pain feels like.

The muscles in your shoulders and neck tense from your panicked state as your heart struggles to keep a normal rhythm. You yank the blanket off, feeling weak from fear and the onset of tremors. Your whole body gives up on itself as you sob through broken exhales. Your legs have gone cold, lungs shrinking inch by inch with every passing minute. 

You crawl to the edge of your bed, wanting to just get out and leave—the blanket. The bed. The room. Most of all, you want to escape your own mind.

You sink onto the floor when a foot touches the ground, and you realize walking isn’t in the cards right now. You’re shaking too badly to be able to physically move. All your strength is gone, robbed by your memories.

Balmy tears paint your face in determination, making sure no part of you is left untouched by this spell.

You screw your eyes shut, tears still slipping out with ease anyway. Leaning your back against the bed-frame, you curl into yourself and wrap your arms around your knees on the chilled hardwood.

You try to focus on your breathing to at least slow your heart down to a pace that doesn’t hurt.

Wounded cries rip their way out of you, interrupting the breaths you try to steady. A hand touches your arm and you yelp like an injured dog, flailing at the contact as your arms swing out from around your knees in shock.

“Hey, hey, it’s me. It’s me.” Strong hands quickly wrap around each of your wrists to stop your arms from thrashing.

You try to focus your eyes, blurred and stinging from tears, on the person kneeling closely in front of you.

“L-Logan…” you whisper, balling your fists to try and expel the shakes.

He looks like someone who shouldn’t be able to be concerned about another person, yet the look on his face scares you. Brows pinched together in worry, eyes frantic, lips parted from heavy breaths. All because of you.

“It’s just me,” he hushes your cries. His thumbs stroke the undersides of your wrists tenderly, no doubt feeling your racing pulse. 

You feel disoriented. “Wh…how…” 

“I heard you,” he explains, watching you process everything. He drops your wrists when some recognition passes over your face.

“What do you need?” He follows your gaze as it wanders around the room, trying to keep you from spiralling further.

You look at him for a moment. He’s got his white tank-top on, the black sweats, and an intense need to help you written all over him. Fresh tears burn your cheeks as you come back into reality.

“I want it to fucking stop,” you weep, head falling into your hands in shame.

You don’t want him to see you like this, even though it’s a commonality between you two. It’s too intimate. You’d take him seeing you blackout drunk everyday of the year over this.

Then you do remember that it has stopped. Each time in Logan’s bed. There was silence. Peace. For the whole night. For both of you.

“Tell me what you need,” he says firmly, angling his head down to keep your eyes on him, desperately wanting an answer.

“You.” You suck in an agonizing breath to try and collect yourself.

He doesn’t flinch like you expect him to. If anything, his eyes become more pensive, clearly considering something. Then he shakes his head in wariness.

“C’mon. Let’s get you out of here,” he breathes, voice barely above a whisper. The only sound echoing in the room is your wobbly breathes, your body jerking with each one as you enter the aftermath and begin to go slack.

An arm slides behind your back, his hand grabbing ahold of your side while he pulls your legs over his other arm, picking you up off the floor.

He cradles you against him just like he did when you were drunk, carrying you out of your room.

He left your door open when he came in, and you hope no students heard or saw anything. He tilts to grab the doorknob, shutting it without a sound.

You wipe and rub at your eyes as Logan takes a few steps down the hall, quickly getting to where he needs to go when you feel him lean for his doorknob.

You’re sure a few rogue, leftover tears fall onto his shirt before he manages to sit on his bed lightly, you still curled tightly in his arms. 

His hand pushes on your back for you to sit upright on his lap. “Face me,” he encourages, holding onto your sides as you twist around, bending your legs to slide over his thighs and straddle him loosely. 

You look down at him, he looks up at you, feeling the quivers in your body dissipate as you melt further into his lap. A fondness crosses over both of your tired faces. He rests his arms over your thighs, warm hands linking behind your back as you do the same around his neck. 

It’s nothing provocative or seductive. All you can feel is the care and concern rolling off of him in suffocating waves. He wants you to feel safe, and if that means overrunning your senses with his presence, then that’s what he’ll do.

“Got anything to say?” He murmurs, the fallen strands of hair around the edges of his forehead bristle with each move of his head. The rest of his hair fails to fully resemble the cat-like ears he had earlier in the day. 

What does he want to hear? 

You let your head hang a little, your nose almost brushing his. “I have nothing to say,” you assert, fidgeting with the chain of his dog tag at the nape of his neck. 

You don’t necessarily feel embarrassed about him seeing you in such a helpless state, but you don’t want to simply unload your shit on him. So, in turn, you have nothing to say.

“Bullshit.” He almost rolls his eyes. There’s no real threat of him forcing you to say anything behind it. He won’t pry, but he doesn’t believe you.

An offended look overcomes your face, and you almost pull away. You don’t want to feel the humiliation of elaborating on just why exactly you said you needed him in this moment out of everything else. 

“I just…” You roll your lips together in thought, measuring the words you could say but won’t. “Want to sleep. Here,” you sigh. “I don’t wanna go back.” You deflate in his arms, voice wobbly. 

It’s already who-knows what time, and you need to pacify your wired nervous system; Logan simply holding you has already helped with that more than you want to admit.

His mouth quirks up briefly at that. “What happened to not wanting to make that a habit?” His eyes soften as his arms retract from around your sides, letting you slip easily onto his bed from his lap in a moment of calm, or relief.

Habit, if not resisted, soon becomes necessity.

“Special circumstances,” you reason, already pulling the blanket over you while he keeps his place at the edge of the bed, observing you with amusement.

“Seems like you get into those a lot,” he notes, pushing himself off the mattress.

He steps around to the other side—his designated spot—and slips the tank-top off, letting it drop to the floor. You’re not trying to be a freak, but you watch the whole thing.

The flex of his arms and shoulders are out of your mind as fast as they entered as you watch him hook his thumbs in the waistband of his sweats and pull them downright in front of you, not even turning around or to the side to try and conceal himself.

Your eyes widen, then you reel in your thoughts before they get lost at sea. No one who is sane fucking sleeps in sweatpants. Duh.

But didn’t he the last two times? It’s hard for you to remember, but you’d certainly recall if you were face-to-face with the outline of his di—

“It’s rude to stare, y’know.” Logan pulls his lips together, interrupting your thoughts. You try to not eyeball the bulge too hard, but it basically looked at you first. 

The snug briefs do little to hide anything. They hide nothing, actually.

You almost scoff, but the playfulness in his tone tells you he couldn’t give a shit. He probably likes it anyway. From what you know, he definitely does.

“Oh, yeah, like you’ve ever cared about modesty,” you throw back, averting your gaze to the ceiling anyway.

It’s not that he runs around the mansion naked, but he definitely isn’t shy about what he looks like or against showing some skin. You’ve seen and heard enough over the past few months.

You hear a stifled chuckle as he joins you under the blanket without a retort. He knows you’re right. He’s just glad you’re a little lively and alert.

“Will you be okay for the rest of the night?” He brings both hands behind his head on the pillow, propping himself up a little.

“I should be fine,” you say confidently. “The challenge will be getting back to sleep.” You laugh in exasperation. 

It’s always hard to calm down and get back to a place of tranquility after everything has settled with your mind. You’re pumped full of adrenaline and there’s not much that can curb something that persistent flowing through your body.

You haven’t found anything to help with it. Yet. 

“There’s not many people that’ll understand what you go through,” he starts, voice rough with fatigue. “But I do.”

You look to him, sliding an arm under your pillow as you turn on your side. “How do you…help it.” You’re not sure if you phrased that right. It feels crude to reduce something so complex to the likes of a common cold that has an array of over-the-counter solutions. 

“You don’t. It just has to run its course.” He looks to you, wanting to see your reaction. 

It wasn’t meant to be hurtful or insensitive, but he’s not going to lie to you and say that things can only get better and that the worst is over. Especially for mutants, that’s not always true.

Although you don’t know what Logan lives with every day and sleeps with every night, you do know that his capacity for empathy is still intact. Here you are in his bed after all, seeing and indulging in a side of him that many never will. 

You sigh lightly. “We’re quite the pair.” 

A comfortable half-smirk slips over his lips. “I think we’re just fucked up insomniacs,” he suggests with a breathy exhale that’s close enough to a laugh.

You wish you could slide a thumb over the pulse in his wrist and see what’s haunting him, just to understand what happened to the Wolverine, but you’ve learned that doing so usually isn’t worth the price you’ll pay after. If what’s in his head is horrific enough to cause him to go through a couple mattresses a month, then it won’t do you any good either.

“I sleep pretty good with you,” you offer, seeing how he raises a brow in doubt almost instantly.

He sleeps well with you, too. It kind of rattled him when he noticed a pattern of uninterrupted nights and you being by his side. Not a single mattress ruined on those nights.

“Try not to knee me in the stomach tonight,” he deflects with ease. He takes his hands out from behind his head, sliding his left arm under the pillow as he turns over onto his side and closes his eyes. Facing you.

You mentally smack yourself. Multiple times. You didn’t think you drifted that much when you slept. 

“No promises,” you mutter. You catch a small shake of his head before you let yourself join him in unconsciousness as you mirror each others lonely bodies.

━━━━

Your eyes ache—to open, to move, to touch. Enough crying will do that to you.Your eyelids are heavy, but there’s something else weighing down on you. 

A tired groan crawls from your throat as you try to place yourself for a moment. The morning sun is just beginning to shine too brightly for your liking, and you squish your face deeper into the pillow.

You’re still tipsy with sleep, lying flat on your stomach, but there’s something dense and hot resting over your back. 

You prop yourself up on your forearms, giving yourself a minute to wake up. You twist your hips around to sit yourself up, feeling the thing on your back slide down to your waist. 

The blanket pools around your hips, and you feel a hand reflexively squeeze over the meat of your hip in disapproval of your moving. Something in you clenches at the sensation of something invading the area with ease. A spot reserved for intimacy.

Your head quirks to your right, seeing Logan on his stomach with his right arm thrown over your midsection. 

You blink in surprise, staring at his sleeping body. His hair is sticking up every which way, his head half-off the pillow, his side of the blanket not even covering the curve of his ass anymore. It’s endearing to see the Wolverine in such a normal, human state.

But if someone were to walk in, it would look like you two spent the whole night fucking. A lot. That wakes you up a little more.

You peek over at the nightstand behind him and see the time blinking on his watch. It’s already 8 a.m. 

You rest a hand over his shoulder to gently guide his arm off of you, but you stop yourself. Instead, you lightly trace your fingers down his shoulders and upper back a couple times, occasionally scratching softly over the ridges of muscle.

A shiver quickly rolls through his upper body, but your touch doesn’t fully wake him. He knows it’s just you.

It’s the least you can do for him as a thanks for recovering your broken body from the floor of your room and bringing you here when he didn’t necessarily have to.

It almost feels like instinct to offer comforting gestures to him. There’s something inside you that just pulls to him. You want to be the one that can give him comfort and help him put himself back together. 

You want to be the only one.

━━━━ ● ━━━━

There’s a shadow that’s been following you around the mansion. 

As soon as you stepped out of Logan’s room that morning a few days ago, it started. 

This shadow likes to be nosy about what you’re doing. This shadow likes to be in your space. This shadow wants to be in your space. And he is.

No one has seen Logan out around the mansion this much, including you, and that’s how you noticed he’s basically been attached to your hip ever since he decided your back was a comfortable armrest. 

He’s always just there, like a stray cat begging for food or affection. There to entertain you, banter with you, indulge you, in any way he can, including now as you trail back inside the mansion well behind Storm from an evening walkabout in the garden.

“No smoking in the courtyard,” you sing as you pass him carelessly, not even offering a glance to him in interest. 

You like playing this game. Whatever it is. Constantly poking and prodding at each other to see what you can do to get the other to break in some way, no matter how slight. 

Your heart flutters and flips every time; maybe from the thrill of it all, maybe from the arousal you get from the tension. You hope he feels everything, too.

He turns his head to watch you cross into the entryway. “Blow me,” he throws back playfully through a thick puff of smoke, leaning against the brick wall with a cigar pinched between two fingers.

You suppress a chuckle, keeping your unwavering pace. “Yeah, you wish!” You yell over your shoulder. You know he hears you. He wouldn’t let himself miss it.

Logan smirks and shakes his head in amusement, always impressed with your quick rebuttals that occasionally tent his jeans. He takes one last drag out of spite before following your footsteps inside. 

You have become, by definition, friends…in a way. Even if you sorely cross the line into other territory more often than not. Sexual innuendos and friendly flirting can only go on for so long before the underlying intentions and meaning reflects real desires. 

It’s evolved into more than just borrowing his bed a couple times or helping each other out. It’s surpassed the fear of whatever habit you were afraid of forming from doing so. It’s become a dependency to get that adrenaline high from simply riling each other up.

You have an assumption that if you were to end up in Logan’s bed again, somehow, there will be a point of no return that you’ll be faced with. There aren’t many more excuses that can be used for explaining to yourselves why you’re together in bed before you have to recognize the truth.

That platonic line is being stretched too thin, and you’re not sure how much farther it can go.

━━━━ ● ━━━━

“How’ve you been sleeping?”

“Fine. You?”

“Could be better.” Logan hides his smirk, but you can hear it in his voice.

You narrow your eyes skeptically as he fishes around in the fruit bowl sitting in the middle of the kitchen island.

“How so?” You ask. Your legs swing leisurely as you sit upon the chilled countertop on his left, idly waiting for Storm to show up and go with you to training.

A smug, tight-lipped grin flashes across his face, a green apple rolling around in his palms before he puts it back. “You could be there,” he provokes, his eyes bright.

It’s your turn to raise a brow at him, but you can’t stop your smile. “Oh?”

He turns to you, tenderly grabbing the tops of your thighs and parting them slightly to stand between your legs.

This isn’t the first time he’s done this, and he knows it rouses you in all the right ways. But, neither of you will do anything about it. Not even a brief kiss.

“Come on,” he goads, planting his hands down next to your hips, bringing himself in closer as he bears his weight on his arms. “You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours.” He sways his head side to side to emphasize his point.

Fuck. That’s good. 

That may be exactly what you did for him, but it’s now a figure of speech for something else entirely. It’s almost impossible to argue against either way, as if you want to. This is what you’ve been patiently waiting for. 

You put your hands over his as you lean back a little to put some distance between you. “How sweet,” you hum.

His eyes flick from yours to your lips one too many times before you continue. “You start to miss me?” You tease as you lean forward again, echoing what he said to you the night your window got smashed in.

“Smart-ass,” he mutters as you laugh quietly. The tips of your noses barely graze each other as he steps in closer again. You’re almost at the same height like this. 

“Save me the left side,” you advise, bringing your hands to his shoulders as you fondle his white t-shirt between your fingers. You’re so close, and he’s already so warm against you just like this.

“Always do.”

━━━━

You want to rip your heart out of your chest from how hard it’s pounding against your ribs. It’s almost throwing you forward with each heavy beat.

Three resounding knocks fill the hallway as you shuffle on your feet, waiting for Logan to open the door.

It feels like you’re doing something bad. Something parents would warn their kids against. Something greatly envied.

Everything inside you feels on fire. Your thoughts, desires, anxiety, all jumbling together into one distorted state of mind and body.

“Ah, welcome back.” His sarcastic tone makes your face go hot. A satisfied smirk crosses his lips as he runs a hand through his shaggy, unstyled hair. 

You shake your head, pursing your lips. “Knock it off.” You gently shove at his bare chest. Misbehaviour already. But are you really surprised?

Logan grabs your wrist, delicately guiding you into his room. “You enjoy it,” he says lowly, quickly shutting the door as soon as you’re in. 

“Maybe,” you hum in response, pulling away from his grasp and seeking out your side of the bed. Logan follows closely behind, giving your ass a light smack in encouragement before he cuts away to his side while you jolt in shock, a stunned look on your face as you whip your head around to him across the bed.

“Oh, really?” You scoff. He’s biting back a smile, not moving until he knows what you’ll do next. He’s never gone that far before.

“I’m sorry, that was rude—how can I make it up to you?” He almost chokes on a laugh, pulling his dog tag back and forth along the chain while he considers you.

This Logan is very different from the one you were met with the first night he let you in his space. This one is attentive and exuberant, yet he hasn’t given you much up until this point right now. You’ve gotten way too comfortable with him without even doing anything to you. 

In this moment, he isn’t the brooding, animalistic Wolverine many see him as. He’s just Logan—for you. 

You watch him carefully, easing yourself onto the bed. “Get in the fucking bed,” you slap his side of the mattress with a thump of your palm. “And do what you promised earlier,” you stare pointedly at him.

He owes you that “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” favour he decided to pull out to get you here. 

“Mm, alright, alright,” he surrenders, a look of amusement still on his face as he kneels onto the bed. “I thought of a pretty good idea for it,” he says softly, crawling to sit next to you on top of the blanket as the bed-frame creaks with the added weight.

Your shoulders almost brush against each other. You shift, turning your body fully toward him. “Oh? Wh—woah!”

You squeal when his strong hands latch onto your sides, lifting you just enough to pull you over his legs to plant you on his lap. He leans back against the headboard, pulling on your thighs so you straddle him tightly. 

He looks devilish when you catch his gaze again, and you know what’s coming. What’s been coming. Your hands find their places on his shoulders, warm and taut, as his hands hold your hips. 

The bond between you will culminate tonight. It will be wrapped in a blanket and trapped between two alike souls that lie heart-to-heart in the dead of night. It will be perpetual.

The heat of him between your legs makes you restless. It’s just you, him, and the darkness in the quiet room you’ve become too familiar with.

“Logan…” you trail off bashfully when you feel something firm through his sweats poke against your cunt. It clearly doesn’t take much to excite him.

“Hm?” He takes you in for a split second, hands running from your hips up to your chest leisurely with a sharp inhale, not yet completely bothered by the fact that you have a shirt on. 

You suck in a shaky breath when your hips accidentally shift over his bulge from his hands pushing and pulling over you.

“What’s the idea?” Your voice wavers.

You know what it is. He knows that. You just want to hear him say it and fill the silence.

“Something I’ve wanted for a while,” he murmurs, eyes hyper-focused on you. 

Your fingers dance their way to the sides of his neck, brushing along the supple skin while you feel muscles and tendons flex with every slight movement. You subtly press the pad of your index finger against the pulse point right under his jaw, just to ground yourself and truly feel that Logan is there in front of you. 

His pulse is steady but hard, much like yours, and the prickle of energy festering against the finger almost makes it go numb from not accepting it into your body. 

“Show me, then.” You smile sweetly, leaning in closer while you tilt his head up with the hand under his jaw, your finger slipping from his pulse and caressing over the dense, coarse hair along his cheek.

Your noses bump while your lips part in anticipation. His eyes flutter as he falls into you and frantically claims your mouth in an unbreakable kiss.

The first kiss. Nothing could tear him from you in this moment.

Your hands cradle his cheeks, keeping him from pulling off too far. His hands scratch and paw at your back, trying to find a way to somehow get you closer against him.

It’s all a little messy, your lips mostly just mashing together without any rhyme or reason, but neither of you care. You only care about how electrifying it feels to finally have Logan and feel how perfectly connected you are together after all these nights. You go together like a key and its lock.

“Logan,” you pant when his mouth releases yours for a fraction of a breath. The seconds between kisses dwindle the more you take from each other.

Your thighs tense as he pulls half an inch away just to reconnect more crazed as his lips lock over your bottom one aimlessly. Something deep inside you trembles and aches.

He grunts, accidentally sucking the tip of your tongue briefly before slotting his lips back over yours in an apology. “Hold on,” he mumbles in a rush against your parted lips. He knows what you’re asking—or trying to ask. He snakes an arm up along your spine and wraps the other around your waist.

Then the world is tilting.

He drops you on your back on the bed from his lap, hovering over you as he distracts you with harsh but pleasing kisses and wet bites along your neck, settling his hips heavily between your thighs. You squirm and feel how bolts of arousal are making your cunt pulse involuntarily. 

Logan groans. “Fuck—I can smell it. I smell you.” He slowly grinds his hips into yours almost reflexively. He squeezes his eyes shut, and you tip your chin up to press a chaste kiss to his slick lips. 

“Taste…if you want to,” you propose, lightly scratching up and down his shoulders and arms, only enough to leave faint red lines for a couple seconds.

Logan’s eyes almost roll into the back of his head before he gives it a small shake, a conflicted look overtaking his face. “Of course I fucking want to, but—fuck—next time. I promise.” He swallows whatever you were going to say with a deep kiss that has you nearly shaking when he sucks on your bottom lip. 

“Let’s just take things easy,” he says roughly, bearing his weight on his left arm while he tries to get your sleep shorts and underwear off.

A promise of a next time makes your brain go fuzzy like static.

“I’ll hold you to it, then,” you resolve, lifting your hips as much as you can for him to lean back and pull away to wrestle your clothes the rest of the way down your legs, discarding them just as quickly.

“I hope you will,” he breathes through a small laugh as he shuffles on his knees. He doesn’t want to completely overwhelm you and scare you off, he just wants to enjoy you in a simple way that won’t entirely ruin you for tomorrow.

He doesn’t know what you can or cannot handle, but he’s going to find out.

The fresh air in the room brushes cooly against your wet cunt. It’s a nice contrast to how fiery your whole body feels, but Logan feels even warmer than you somehow. Maybe wolverine’s just run hot.

His sweats have ridden down his hips from his desperate grinding against you, and the dangerous cut of his v-line grows more and more narrow as the waistband teases the reveal of what’s underneath.

You watch him—palming his dick once as your knees sway side-to-side in waiting. His thumbs hook under the stretchy fabric, working what remains of his clothes down his sturdy thighs.

“It’s rude to stare.” He pops a brow, a smug, arrogant grin quirking his lips.

You push yourself to sit up, considerably shorter than him in this position as he stands on his knees, and walk two fingers up his toned stomach to his chest, avoiding the hard cock between you. 

He looks at you with curiosity until your hand grabs his dog tag in a fist, pulling it towards you. “Then stop showing me your dick,” you say as he leans in to your pulling a little to not have the chain break away.

You knew the night Logan dropped his pants in front of you and let you eye-up his bulge would come back to haunt you. But it’s alluring. Big. Curves a little to the left, barely noticeable. A respectable amount of hair decorates the space between his bellybutton and the base of his cock.

He gives in to the tension on the chain, falling back to the mattress with you and trapping you between his arms as his cock rests heavy on your clit.

“How about I find somewhere to put it?” His smile pushes a whole new wave of arousal from you.

“It would be a damn shame if you didn’t,” you say against his mouth, giving your hips a roll just to tease him before hugging his waist tightly with your knees.

“Good.” He gives you a strong kiss with a small grunt, running his hands over your sides under your shirt. The movement pushes it up, up, up, until you have no choice but to stretch your arms out above you and let him slide it off between more thoughtless kisses, leaving you entirely bare.

He lets you breathe for a moment, dipping his head to bite and suck marks along your collarbones messily. You squeeze around his hips harder, trying to get him to give you something other than his scratchy cheeks rubbing against your skin and the chilled steel of the dog tag dragging over your chest.

The tip of his cock falls and catches over your clit when he moves lower, licking and sucking over your chest like a starved animal finding food for the first time in a week. You gasp from the mixed sensations.

“C’mon, kitty cat, you can do all this while inside m-me,” you say breathily, fingers digging into his shoulders to stop yourself from trembling too much. 

Logan bites over a nipple before pulling himself back up to look at you. “Is that a promise?” He says lowly, that stupid smirk gracing his face again.

“Try it and find out,” you demand, enjoying the sting of the deeper bites blooming on your torso.

He purses his lips, shifting his weight back onto his knees to grab ahold of his cock to angle and guide it in.

“Hm, guess no lube is needed,” he muses when he gets a look at your cunt, sparing you a glance through his lashes.

You roll your eyes shut when your whole body lights up red-hot. “Jesus fucking Christ, Logan,” you slap a hand over your eyes as you grimace. You don’t want to be that aware of your naked self right now.

He suppresses whatever expression was about to cross his face when his cock notches itself between your soaked folds, teasing your hole with the blunt tip. His brows pinch together and you forget the embarrassment from his crude remark.

But he leaves his cock like that, on the precipice of sliding the rest of the way in with a snap of his hips. Instead, he carefully uncurls his upper body to crawl his way back up to you while holding his hips deathly still.

“Alright, stay with me,” he whispers against your neck when you moan, pressing a tender kiss to your rabid pulse in reassurance. 

“O-okay,” you sigh, running a hand through his hair and tugging at the roots while the other squeezes around his arm as best as it can. You’re not even really sure what he’s saying.  

He kisses up your cheek and over to your lips again. You try to keep up with his quick mouth, licking and sucking whatever part you can get ahold of, but you’ve become lost in the feeling of him all over you. 

He’s in your mouth, on your chest, against your stomach, nudging your cunt. Everywhere.

He slips his tongue over yours, securing your lips together at the same time he pushes his cock in halfway. Now you understand what he was saying. 

The lightheadedness from being filled, even just a bit, almost makes you lose yourself. The stretch makes your stomach drop, your legs shake, and your mouth fall open with a whine. 

“A-ah—fuck. Fuck, Logan,” you whimper, fisting his hair with both hands to stop yourself from falling apart.

He groans, either at the grip you have on his hair or how good your cunt feels already, and runs a hand up your left thigh in comfort as you squeeze around his hips tighter to draw him in. 

“Just a bit more,” he soothes, trying to resist the urge to slide into you in one fell swoop. It would be so easy to just let his hips fall into yours and fill your cunt.

Another heated kiss, another few inches. He works his cock into you the rest of the way with ease. You guess the lube thing wasn’t really a joke. His hungry, needy kisses may have also helped with that.

You choke on your gasps, not wanting to get too loud, and Logan does the same. He tries to muffle both of your moans with his mouth, attempting to form complete kisses, but it just turns into you panting against each other as he finally bottoms out, hitting his end. 

Your legs relax around his waist as he deftly rocks his hips in small thrusts to get you familiar with his size, his small grunts filling the air each time you swallow him whole.

You let out a deep breath, dropping your hands back to his tense shoulders. He lines your jaw with soft kisses, fisting the blanket in his hands beside your head.

“Fuck. Already feels too good,” he moans, pressing into you harder and unintentionally rubbing himself over your tender clit.

You smile, squirming while he works down your neck again. “Best of luck,” you huff, amused at the fact that he might not last as long as he wants to.

He brings his face back to yours, a completely blissful expression controlling his features, but there’s still some mischief in his hazel eyes. “Oh? Yeah?”

You hold each other’s gaze, both equally dazed and overwhelmed, and he draws his hips back and pushes into your wet cunt with a complete, strong thrust. The sound of his pelvis hitting against the backs of your thighs makes him laugh in pleasure and satisfaction when you instantly roll your eyes and head back.

Your cunt quivers, gripping him tight, and then it’s Logan’s turn to lose composure. He drops his head to your chest, managing a few deep breaths as he slowly pulls out halfway just to push right back into you, over and over. 

It’s a pace that isn’t quite pure, mindless fucking, but it’s also not somewhere near earnest love-making. It’s something that feels specifically curated for you. Something that feels measured and sincere. 

The strength of his thighs hitting against yours pushes you up the mattress a few inches, and you don’t know whether to gasp or moan. He reaches somewhere deep inside you, and you know he can feel that, too.

A helpless groan slips through Logan’s lips. “Where have you fucking been, huh?” He muses through shaky breaths, the determined plunge of his cock hitting something that makes your muscles tense throughout your body. 

Your fingers tangle in the hair at the base of his neck, keeping him close. “Two doors down,” you giggle, understanding that’s not quite what he was asking.

“Fucking smart-ass,” he grumbles, silencing any further rebuttals with a wet kiss. You don’t think you could manage much more of a conversation even if you wanted to.

The silence is quickly filled with obscene sounds that only seem to leave you wetter and Logan throbbing. You can hear your bodies connecting through your gasping for air and his choked moans, and you can feel the mess you’re making all over him. It’s smeared along the inside of your thighs from how deep he’s been hitting. The squelching only seems to make him fuck into you harder.

Something inside you starts to grow tight and wind up in your core, making you repeatedly clench around him while his cock strokes all the right spots inside you as he makes sure he’s fucking himself in to the base. He doesn’t deprive you of anything. 

He drops his head to your neck, wedging his face in to latch onto the spot right where your neck starts to slope into your shoulder. The dense muscle there gives him something to basically chew on, sinking his teeth in as deep as he can without drawing blood.

“H-hah, Logan,” you whine, tilting your head into the side of his and squirming from the pleasant sting.

You feel his arm move beside you, then you hear the sound of tearing fabric as he gives a particularly brutal snap of his hips, followed by a deep groan against your skin.

You can barely form any thoughts, but you can guess what just happened. If he pulled his hand back, three long, slim holes would probably be where his knuckles are right now.

“Fu-uck, Logan, you just got t-this mattress,” you laugh a little, your words choppy from how hard he’s driving into you now.

He draws back from your neck, seeing your half-lidded eyes trying to focus on him. “Can’t always control it,” he reasons, giving you two short, fleeting kisses as you hear his claws retract from the innocent mattress. 

You see the double-edged sword. You can guess that that’s the same explanation he would probably use for the nightmares. It can go either way, and now you’ve seen both sides.

“It’s okay,” you say in a hushed tone. You cradle his face, and he rests his forehead against yours. “Keep going…keep going,” you coax, face scrunching from your nearing orgasm.

You can feel it in your toes, your stomach, your shoulders—you’re tightening up everywhere, and he can undoubtedly feel it in your cunt as you pulse around him. It grips him just right for a couple seconds before relaxing completely and leaving him to chase for more.

“Keep squeezing me like that and you’ll get whatever you want,” he offers, fighting to maintain his steady pace for both your sakes.

You almost whine, knowing whatever your body does is beyond your control at this point.

“Just—inside.” You can’t even string together a full sentence anymore, but the urgency and stress on the last word makes Logan’s ears perk up.

He presses a soft kiss to your clammy forehead in acknowledgment, the muscles in his arms straining and flexing as he grabs ahold of his own orgasm after a particularly inviting flutter of your walls.

You’re both walking the line, teetering on the edge of utter euphoria, and you know nothing will be the same after. You don’t want it to be. You hope it isn’t.

He reaches an arm back, sliding his hand up your thigh again and slotting it behind the bend in your knee. He pushes forward—only slightly—bringing your leg closer to your stomach to stretch you open for him.

His cock brushes over something new. Something that makes you bite your tongue. The angle lets him fit perfectly against you, not hindered by the flesh of your thigh stopping his hips.

You want to cry from how good it all feels. You want to be suspended in this feeling forever. You want Logan to—

“Focus, baby. Focus on me,” he coos, bringing you back to reality. He holds the side of your head with his other hand affectionately. “Come on…come on, I know you’re almost there,” he encourages with a quick kiss that goes straight to your stomach.

The burn in your thigh from the stretch can’t overpower the sparks of your orgasm, and Logan just fanned the flames with a few little words.

You come with a broken sob, convulsing around his cock while he fucks you through it, submitting to his own orgasm only seconds after with deep, shaky breaths as he empties himself inside your cunt.

He doesn’t pull out or pull away. He relaxes on top of you, sweaty and sticky with cum, and he places the barest whisper of a kiss on your chin, your parted lips, your nose, and then your forehead. 

Your ears ring from your orgasm, eyes still slightly out of focus. Your body trembles from your muscles finally releasing the tension they’ve been caught up in. 

You desperately suck in air, trying to calm your pounding heart, and you just lie there and let Logan walk your body through a cool-down. Soft kisses. Soft touches. Soft looks. Between sweat, cum, and whatever else.

He rocks a little on his knees, weak from his release, and carefully pulls out of you with a huff as he caresses your stomach and thighs appreciatively to wind you down. You get a good look at him. Not a scratch. His hair tells a story, though—one where he’s completely possessed by bliss. 

You probably look like you survived an animal attack.

“Are we even?” Logan says through a kiss against your stomach.

A mindless laugh crawls from your throat, caught up in the feeling of his hands rubbing circles over your hips. “I think I still owe you,” you argue, resting your hands over his as they travel smoothly up your side.

You’ll find a way to make everything up to him. Including the sex. The scale is now tipping to his side too much. All the nights spent in his bed, what he’s done for you, what you’ve done for each other, may just be immeasurable, but that won’t stop you from finding a way to get him back for it all. 

“We’ll figure it out,” he mumbles, snaking back up your body and pressing himself against you. Face-to-face. Chest-to-chest. 

You mindfully run your hands over the sides of his head, trying to tame his hair and style it back to how it was earlier in the night. It doesn’t work. He enjoys it anyway.

“Do I have the pleasure of staying here tonight?” You ask rhetorically, enjoying the warmth of him on top of you against the brisk air creeping in from the cracked window.

Logan blinks. “You can stay every night.” 

A loving smile springs over your face. This may be the beginning of the end to your troubles and worries.  

You—maybe foolishly—trust him. You trust that he won’t accidentally bury his claws in your side during the night, but you’ve had impressive luck with that up until this point. The only thing you can do now is continue to push that luck.

Healing isn’t linear, and you can’t expect someone to fix you, but everyone finds their thing at some point. 

You slither your hand down to his neck, index finger grazing over his pulse again. You feel the energy biting against you.

Your lips graze over his, tempting him to give you a slow, deep kiss. “Can I have the left side?” Rhetorical, again.

Logan chuckles against your mouth. “Always.”

[katsu28]

the way you love

pairing: george russell x reader

summary: loving george russell is as easy as breathing sometimes, especially with the way he loves you. loosely inspired by stardust by zayn. (2.8k)

a/n: welcome to the first of four holiday fics! i'm hoping to post one a day until christmas eve, so stay tuned :)

Maybe you should’ve waited inside for George to pick you up. 

Granted, you haven't been out here long, and you know he’ll be here soon, but it’s cold. Frigid wind whips your hair around your face, scraping over your skin harshly. 

You nuzzle a little deeper into your scarf in a poor attempt to protect your cheeks. 

The two cardboard cups clutched in your hands do help a little with the biting cold. One for you, one for George, both filled to the brim with steaming coffee from the little shop down the street from your building. 

They’ve rolled out their holiday cups today, as noted by the festive little scene printed across the sleeve. It makes you smile, and you think George will probably like it too. 

George’s sleek car pulls up in front of you with a gentle rumble not long later. You’re expecting him to be smiling when he gets out, but when his head pops over the roof of the car, he just looks concerned. 

“Blimey, have you been waiting out here the entire time?” He exclaims incredulously, rounding the front of the car quickly. 

You barely have time to nod before he’s easing the cups out of your grip. Only once they’re secured into cup holders inside the car does he grab your hands, bringing them up to his mouth to breathe a little warmth back into them. 

“Didn’t want you to have to wait on me,” You say, as if it’s any excuse to have been standing in the freezing cold. Really, you just wanted to see George as soon as he came to pick you up. You’ve just seen him only last week, but it feels like forever. 

“Darling, it’s freezing,” He reasons. He’s smiling now, despite the attempt to keep his firm composure. 

You frown. “I missed you.”

He kisses you instead of answering, short and sweet, but still bursting with affection. 

“Hi,” You say softly, nuzzling deeper into his broad palm after he pulls back an inch or two. His thumbs swipe over your cheeks, bringing some more much needed heat back into your skin. You won’t tell him, but your nose had been starting to lose a bit of feeling. 

“Hi. I missed you too,” He replies, fondness dripping from his tone. 

“Yeah?” 

“Of course. Longest five days of my life.”

That makes you grin even harder, pushing forward for another quick kiss. “Mine too.”

“Glad we feel the same.” He looks very pleased. “Shall we get a move on? We’re a little early, but I know how much you hate being late to things. I even told Alex to expect us early.” 

You’re set to head to Alex Albon’s Christmas party in a little bit. George goes every year, but this is the first time you’re going too. You’re excited, nervous, and a little bit scared at the prospect of finally getting to meet all of George’s friends at one time. You've met a handful of them individually, gradually, George happily introducing you as his girlfriend every time, but never in such a large social setting like this party. 

You aren’t quite sure what to expect, but if the ones you haven’t met are anything like the ones you have, you’ll be just fine. 

“And what did he say about that?” 

“That Lily is relieved someone competent is coming round to help out, so I’d say he’s pretty okay with it,” George says, chuckling. “C’mon, let's get you out of the cold.” 

You allow George to help you into the car, letting out a comfortable sigh at the blazing warmth of the car interior. George has always liked to keep your shared spaces running hot despite your wishing for the opposite, but for the first time ever, you’re actually grateful for your boyfriend’s temperature preference. 

“Nice, isn’t it?” He teases as he climbs into the driver’s seat, nudging at your shoulder. “See, I told you you’d come around someday.” 

“Only because it’s cold as shit outside,” You huff, rolling your eyes playfully. “I got you coffee.” 

“Thank you, darling. Though I wish you hadn’t sacrificed your health to do so.”

“I know you had another late night yesterday, thought you might be tired. It’s fine, really, I didn’t mind,” You insist, shaking your head. 

“You’re very sweet,” George says softly, leaning over the center to press a kiss to your cheek. 

You’re not sure what comes over you, but you turn at the last moment so he catches your lips instead. He lets out a noise of surprise, but has no hesitation in kissing you back happily, slipping a hand around the back of your neck to pull you closer. 

You kiss and kiss and kiss until your lips start to tingle, and even then, you’re reluctant to pull away. There’s something intoxicating about kissing George that makes you want to do it forever. 

“If we stay here any longer, we might actually end up being late,” George murmurs. He blinks at you, long lashes fluttering open and shut slowly. His breath fans across your skin on every exhale, cologne invading your senses until all that surrounds you is him. 

“That would be bad.” 

“Mm, awful,” He agrees. Still, he doesn’t make any attempt to pull away, perfectly content here, hiding away with you in the coziness of your close proximity. His nose drags along your cheek, lips following the path until he reaches the corner of your mouth. 

You exhale shakily. “Alex and Lily are expecting us.” 

“They are.”

“So we should go.” 

“I mean, we don’t have to…” George trails off, letting his head tilt to the side. 

“Yes, we do. Someone roped us into helping with party prep.” 

He sighs rather heavily, handsome features screwing into overdramatic annoyance. “Starting to regret that right about now.” That makes you giggle. “Alright, fine. Let’s get this over with so we can go home.” 

“There’s that holiday spirit!” 

The drive over to Alex’s is fairly short. It actually takes more time to make yourselves presentable and not at all like you’ve just been making out in the car, before making your way up to Alex and Lily’s. George has brought presents for both of your friends—a watch for Alex and a bottle of perfume for Lily, he’d informed you in the elevator, bought by him, but a gift from the both of you. 

The door swings open with a blast of music and the smell of something delicious not seconds after you knock. Alex stands just behind it with a gracious smile on his face and a flute of something bubbly in hand. 

“Hi, welcome—oh, thank god you’re here,” He breathes. Then he stops, stares at the two of you for a few moments, as if he’s studying the both of you. A knowing smirk quirks his lips right after. “George, you’ve got lipstick on your chin, mate.” 

George’s hand flies up to his face, rubbing furiously. His cheeks have flushed an embarrassed pink at his friend’s smug observation. 

“I’m just kidding. But it was funny to see you panic,” Alex snickers. 

“Ha ha, hilarious. Maybe I won’t give you this gift after all.” 

Alex takes both boxes eagerly, tucking them under his arm with a wink. “Come on in, friends.” 

The flat is decorated tastefully—festive, but not gaudy. You assume Lily had done most of the decor rather than Alex.

Speaking of—

“You’re here!!! Thank god!” Lily exclaims, barely paying George any mind before she whisks you away, chattering away immediately, wanting your opinions on everything from the appetizers to the seating arrangements at dinner. You cast a helpless glance over your shoulder at your boyfriend, who merely gives you an amused wave back. 

You do what Lily tells you needs finishing up until the rest of the guests start to make their arrival. Most of the other drivers are in attendance, save for a few who’d opted to spend the holidays home with their families. Charles and Carlos are here, Lando and Oscar, Yuki, Pierre, Zhou and Franco, to name a few. 

The bundle of nerves in your chest starts to unravel as more familiar faces trickle in, and you’re able to catch up with a couple of them. You’re chatting with Kika and Pierre about what’s new with Simba when a hand touches the small of your back. 

Instantly, you know it's George. His touch is the only one that sends butterflies through you. That’s never happened with anyone else before, but with George, you feel alight with a certain energy every time. 

You lean back into him on instinct, tilting your head up to look at him. His cheeks are slightly rosy, hair still perfectly coiffed, save for one curl that has escaped to hang over his forehead. You reach up to brush it back and he smiles, sliding a hand around your waist. 

“So sorry to interrupt, you lot. Just wanted to pop in and see if anybody needed a refresher on their drinks,” He offers, though his gaze rests solely on you. 

“Thank you, but we’re good, mate,” Pierre replies, as Kika shakes her head to decline too. 

George says your name, lips lifting into a small smile as he juts his chin at your nearly empty glass. 

“Thank you, Georgie,” You say gratefully. “Don’t forget to—”

“Make it sweeter? Yes, I know how you take your drinks, darling,” He hums, kissing your cheek quickly before retreating with your glass. 

“You’ve trained him well,” Pierre teases, winking at you. 

“I think he was born that way,” You admit. 

That isn’t a lie. According to George’s sister, who you’d had the pleasure of meeting a few months back, he'd always been very kind, very caring, even when he was young. It’s one of the many qualities of his that has you falling in love with him a little more with every passing day. 

George leaves you to your own conversations after bringing you your drink, but you see him periodically throughout the night. He always looks like the life of the conversation, talking animatedly, listening with rapt attention when he’s not yapping away. 

Even as he’s listening intently, it’s like he can sense you’re looking at him, because he finds you almost instantly, sending a smile or a wink your way. That’s another lovable quality of his—knowing where you are even when he’s not with you. Like you’re two magnets being pulled towards each other at all times.

The more you chat with everyone else, one thing becomes obvious. George talks about you a lot. Not enough to be obnoxious, but he's mentioned you to many of his friends. 

Charles knows you’ve been looking into learning how to play the piano because George had asked him something about which pianos were the best. Yuki offers up a few cooking tips because George had mentioned you wanted to try your hand at a new dish. Lewis congratulates you on a big project you’d finished at work a while back, telling you that George had been singing your praises in the garage right after you'd called. 

If you look back at it, George has always been one of your biggest supporters. 

Always wanting you to call him whenever something big happens because he can’t be there all the time, always doing things for you when he’s away so you never for a moment feel like he's not thinking of you. Sending you flowers, ordering you food from your favorite spot in Monaco even though he's a thousand miles away because he knows it’ll make you smile. Even just texting you a picture of something he saw that made him think of you. 

George makes you feel so, so loved, all the time. Like, wherever you are in the world, no matter, everything will be okay because you’ve got him. You could be on some far off deserted island in the middle of nowhere with nothing but the land to live off of, but if George is there with you, it wouldn’t be all that bad. 

Sometimes you wonder what your life would’ve been like if you’d never met him, but you never get far with those thoughts. You can’t even imagine what life would look like without George Russell. And honestly, you don’t really want to. 

“Ready to head out?” George’s voice draws you out of your thoughts, and when you refocus, he’s right in front of you, holding out your coat. For a moment, you can only stand there, blinking back at him like you’ve just laid eyes on him for the first time ever. 

He falters a little under your intense staring. “Darling? Are you alright? You look like you’ve just seen a ghost.” 

“Sorry, yeah. I’m fine, I’m just…tired, I think.” 

“Let’s go home then. Stay the night at mine?” 

“Duh,” You say. Your obvious tone makes George chuckle a little bit as he helps you slip into your coat.

“How silly of me to even ask.”  

After finding your hosts to thank them for the great evening and subsequently being invited for a game of doubles padel with them one of these days, you're off. 

“I don’t have any skin cleanser,” You say suddenly, just as George has pulled onto the main road.

“What?” 

“At your place. I don’t have my cleanser, the one I always use before bed.” 

“The one in the little green bottle?” 

“Yeah.” You frown, slumping back in your seat. In hindsight, it’s really not the biggest deal in the world, and you’re not sure why you’re making it one. But for some reason right now, you’re focused on it. 

“Lucky for you, your wonderful boyfriend bought a bottle just in case this happened. He figured you’d probably forget it one of these days.” 

“Is there a reason my wonderful boyfriend is referring to himself in the third person?” You giggle, shifting in your seat to face said thoughtful boyfriend. George’s cheeks are flushed a little pink. 

“Yeah, I thought it was a little weird too. Anyways, there’s a bottle in the bathroom cupboard.” 

“Thank you, Georgie. You’re always so thoughtful.” 

“Y’know, you could just move in with me. That way you won’t have to worry about not having things at mine anymore.” He doesn’t take his eyes off the road as he speaks, but you can see his Adam’s apple bob as he swallows nervously. “You’ve already got loads of stuff there anyways, why not just bring it all? You wouldn’t have to drive across the city every time you come over, for one.” 

“I barely drive to yours anyways, you know. You always insist on picking me up,” You tease. George smiles, but you can tell he’s serious about wanting you to move in with him. You sigh, squeezing his hand. “Babe, I’d love nothing more, but…I could never afford to live with you.”

“I’m not going to have you pay rent or anything like that, darling. I wouldn't ask that of you.” George’s nose wrinkles, like it’s absurd of you to even think about it. “Just your company would be more than enough, honestly. Make the place less empty, more like…home.”

You can already imagine it. Falling asleep next to each other every night, waking up tangled together every morning, getting to come home and unwind with each other after long days. Breakfasts and afternoon teas and dinners you’d make together in George’s massive kitchen. Your stuff mingling with his in every room of the place. 

Maybe you’d adopt a pet together one day, one that could keep you company every time George was away for races. 

“Okay,” You say softly. You’ve already convinced yourself. “Let’s live together.” 

George pulls to a stop at the red light, taking the opportunity to lean over into your space and kiss you gently. “Let’s do it, darling.” 

Taking the next step in your relationship seems daunting, but George will be there to soothe any anxieties you have. He always is. 

“Oh no! We forgot about the coffee.” He frowns, plucking the still full cup out of the holder suddenly. Then he shrugs, taking a giant sip of it. “Cute cup.” 

“George, it’s cold!” You exclaim, tugging at his sleeve. “Just throw it out when we get home.”

“It tastes fine!” 

“It’s probably stale.” 

“I think it’s delicious.” 

“You’re so weird.” 

He chooses to ignore the muttered quip, letting a giant grin stretch his lips instead, eyes gleaming with excitement. “You called it home.” 

“Well, it is now, isn’t it? Or will be soon enough.” 

“Sure will. I’m thinking we move you in tomorrow.” 

You chuckle, shaking your head at his enthusiasm. “I have to get out of my lease first. It might take a while too, my landlord is kind of an asshole.” 

“I’ll give him double whatever you’re paying right now to let you out of it early. No, triple.” 

“I don’t think he’d appreciate bribery, but he is a Mercedes fan.” 

“Paddock passes and VIP club access to Monaco next season, done.”

follow @katsu-library to be notified when i post new writing :)

[satoruxx]

MORNING CHILLS.

✧ PAIRING: diluc ragnvindr x reader | 1.2k words

✧ SUMMARY: fluff, lots of domesticity, established relationship, clingy diluc, clingy reader, lots of clinginess overall, this is way too cheesy, an absurd amount of sweetness really, but anyways domestic mornings !!

✧ RHEYA'S NOTE: this is my entry for the summer santa event hosted by @solarisfortuneia and i got assigned to @pvbbyb0y !! i’m so sorry it’s late but i’m really hoping you enjoy this hehe :D i had a lot of fun writing it (diluc my beloved mwah)

despite wielding a pyro vision, diluc ragnvindr runs cold in the mornings.

you'll probably tell him he's absurd, clinging to him for warmth whenever you can, but he knows in his gut that it's true. he's usually warm, except for the early dawns, when he's roused from sleep and even the slightest shift of his skin against the sheets makes him shiver.

he used to hate the mornings for this exact reason. he hated being pulled from the comforting warmth of his dreams only to realize that there was nothing but cold and emptiness in the bed he slept in. he hated the feeling of ripping the sheets away from his body, hated the feeling of goosebumps rising over his flesh, hated the feeling of his bare feet touching the cold wood of the manor's floors. he hated it all.

he tells you as much one morning, when you're still hazy with sleep and slow to process his words.

"isn't it strange that those with pyro visions aren't always warm?" he asks quietly, voice thick with sleep as he speaks out into the silence. you attempt to crack an eye open, but the sunlight filtering in through the curtains makes you flinch, and you opt for burying your face into his arm instead.

when you answer, your voice is muffled against his skin. "what are you talking about?"

he sighs, quietly, so that he doesn't break the peace. he's been scared of doing that lately. "i'm always cold in the mornings..."

there's a silence that lingers in the air before you're snorting out a laugh, shaking your head. "no you aren't."

diluc sits up a little, so that his back can rest against one of the pillows. the sheets slide down his body a little, and he almost hisses as the cool air hits his skin. he eyes your disheveled hair, confusion evident in his tone. "yes i am." he replies simply.

you finally pick your head up to glare at him critically, unlatching yourself from his arm. "you're ridiculous, no you are not." you say, groggily adjusting yourself so that you can rest your face against his chest and drape your arm over his waist. "you run so warm all the time. it's the most pleasant thing ever."

he pauses, looking down at you with interest, his calloused palms coming up to thread through your hair like it's routine. "oh? what do you mean by that?"

"i mean," you stress with a sigh. "that you're so warm and so comfortable and it makes me feel clingy."

you say all of this with a grumpy pout, and diluc can already tell your only goal right now is to go back to sleep. the thought makes him bite back a grin, because it's almost funny how you can say these sweet things with such an exasperated expression. he doesn't really have an answer to give back, and instead he smiles to himself, fingers coming down to drift over the skin of your arm.

there's another comfortable silence between the two of you and diluc's thoughts travel through his head slowly, lazily.

"i hate the cold, you know?" he muses, gaze trained on the folds of his bedsheets with disinterest.

"is this another horribly concealed jab at captain kaeya?"

he laughs despite himself, shaking his head even though you can't see him with your eyes closed. "no, this isn't about kaeya. i just don't like how the cold makes me feel." he answers as his laughs die down, fingers still tracing patterns over your skin. "especially in the morning, when i have to get out of bed."

"why's that?"

he pauses, smiling to himself and leaning down to press a kiss to the crown of your head. "because you're warm, and when i get out of bed i can't hold you, so it makes me cold."

a tired giggle escapes your lips, and you shake your head against his chest playfully. "i hope you know that was extremely cheesy, diluc."

he shrugs, choosing to keep the rest of his thoughts to himself. one day, he'll find a way to explain it to you properly. how cold he's gotten used to feeling in an empty bed and how he always believed that cold would remain with him, lonely and isolating and oh so frigid. he'll find a way to tell you that he now hates getting out of bed because he can't bring himself to let go of your addicting warmth, in all of its loving and welcoming glory. he'll somehow find a way to let you know that it's almost torture for him to rip himself away from your embrace every single day.

but for now, he'll keep those thoughts to himself.

he moves to get up, and immediately your eyes shoot open, grip tightening. he laughs quietly, as though this doesn't occur every morning. "you know i have to get up, my love."

"you don't." you say simply, tugging his hand ever so slightly. "you could just stay."

his shoulders drop, a helpless smile on his face as he reaches over to smooth down your hair.

“and who would take care of the manor?” he asks, tilting his head as a few strands of fiery red hair fall across his eyes.

"adelinde runs the place better than you do."

"oh, she does." diluc chuckles, pressing his lips to your temple. "but that doesn't mean i don't have to attend to my duties too."

the look you give him is criminally endearing, and his sigh comes out more indulgent than anything else, powerless in front of you. he moves to get back into bed, and you make yourself comfortable against him again.

he doesn't even have it in him to be angry, instead just letting his fingers stroke your hair and lull you back into that sweet sense of security you claim to feel in his arms.

and all diluc ragnvindr can do in that moment is smile to himself, feeling slightly helpless but oh so warm and fuzzy.

he waits until he's sure you've fallen asleep again to finally get up, the telltale sign of your breathing getting slower so familiar to him it makes his stomach flip. your words echo in his head, and a smile tugs at his lips as he forces himself to turn away from you and get himself ready for the day. truthfully, if you opened your eyes again and asked him to stay, he'd get back into bed with you in a heartbeat. because you look so warm all cuddled up in his sheets like that, lips parted and hair mussed like it's the most natural thing in the world.

and archons above he was starting to feel cold all over again.

[miamochi-writes]

Hi! I’m the one who requested the Vash x reader and Wolfwood x reader scenarios of them having nightmares. Thank you so much! You wrote it so beautifully, my heart couldn’t handle how cute and sweet it was! 💖

I wanted to request if you could do the same thing but how would Vash and Wolfwood react separately to the reader getting hurt by someone? Bonus if you write for Knives too? The way you write him is so beautiful too 😭💖

I'm so glad you liked it! <3 And I can definitely take a shot at this :) Hope you like it :)

The Guys Being Protective

Vash

The minute this man finds out you're injured, your well-being is his first priority. He needs to know that you're okay before he decides his next move. If it is a minor injury, like a bruise or no bleeding, he'll probably let out a sigh of relief or give you a quick kiss. Vash is more likely going to caress your face or hold you very close to him without hurting you. He's thankful that you're still breathing and still by his side. Yet, he will remind you to be more careful next time. Vash has already lost many important people in his life, and he's not going to lose you too.

Although, if this injury is serious, Vash's fight-or-flight is going to kick in. He is going to make sure you're out of harm's way and that you get the necessary treatment possible. If anything, he'll try to patch you up with what he has available or rush to find someone to take care of you immediately. Vash is already restless that you're hurt, but would be devastated if your condition got worse.

If you even dare try to brush off your injuries as nothing, you're going to make him feel worse. He's only okay with him doing that to others, not when you do that. He's already beating himself up that you got hurt under his watch and that he didn't prevent it. So be sure to give him lots of cuddles and kisses to reassure him before he spirals. Make sure you tell him that he's not at fault and that you stay by him no matter what he says. He's been through so much, so you comforting him and showering him with kisses should do the trick.

Afterwards, he's going to ask you who did this to you. This man will find and go after whoever hurt you. Because if Vash finds the culprit, this person needs to run for their life. Vash may be Love and Peace, but that goes out the window if anyone hurts the people he loves and cares about, especially when it comes to you. He values you way too much. If he catches the culprit, Vash will make sure they don’t hurt you again. If this person gave you minor injuries, Vash will try to warn them not to do it again. But if that fails or if this person gave you serious wounds, Vash will use his fighting skills or his gun, (no killing obviously) I’m sure of it.

Let me just remind you, this is the same man who took out a good chunk of the Badlands Boys when the people in the Sand Steamer were under attack. Don't forget, this is also the same man who threatened E.G. Mine to disarm the bombs or else he'd make sure he wouldn't get away unscathed. Have you seen Vash angry? He may be babygirl, but he will punch, fight, chokehold, and bite whoever hurts you. Period. Vash will fight for you and your safety until the end of time.

Nicholas D. Wolfwood

If Wolfwood finds out you got injured there's a bunch of scenarios of what could happen. But they all to lead one thing, him beating the hell out of whoever laid a finger on you. It doesn't matter if you got a bruise, scratch, cut, wound, or mark, this man is going to be worried sick about you. Despite how cold, stoic, or teasing he is, Wolfwood has a big heart for you. He's cares way too much to brush off your injuries. Although after a minute or two, this man will be seething with rage. No one hurts you and walks away it.

Of course he's going to check up on you and see how bad the damage is. If Wolfwood finds out you're lying about the pain or hiding any other injuries, his anger is going to boil over. Not at you, but at the person who did this to you. But, he would rather you tell him honestly. Wolfwood has the biggest soft spot for you and would hate it if you lied about being fine. This man has already lost Livio, and he refuses to lose you too.

This man is invincible, but you're not. He knows you only have one life and he's going to make sure you live it to the fullest with him. Once Wolfwood is done looking you over, he's hunting down the person who did this to you. He's going to give you the: "I just want to talk to the person is all." Which means, "I'm going to beat the living shit out of this person."

No one messes with The Punisher and his loved ones. Just remember that this man carries the heaviest and deadliest cross weapon in No Man's Land. So imagine the beating this person gets once Wolfwood finds them. It doesn't matter how much they run, Wolfwood will find them and make sure they know what happens if they hurt you or anyone else again. Let's face it, Wolfwood is not going to let this person live unless you or Vash stop or convince him.

Once Wolfwood settles things with the person who hurt you, you're not leaving his sight. He's going to be taking care of you to the best of his abilities and making sure you get plenty of rest. This man will need lots of reassurance from you that you're doing okay so he'll be sticking by you a lot more. Probably going to cling onto you with hugs and kisses and giving you his lollipops. Call him Nicholas from time to time in private and this man will be putty in your hands.

Knives Million

Knives is someone who rarely wears his heart on his sleeve. But if it involves you, he'll only show his feelings in private with you. So imagine what is going on with Knives internally when he finds out someone hurt you. That stoic face? Gone. Composure? Shaken up. His blades? Ready to cut someone up with no hesitation.

If you're a human, Knives knows that humans are delicate and don't live long compared to him. If he sees a cut or a minor scratch, he'll tell you to be mindful of your actions. He knows those kinds of wounds will recover in no time. However, if he even sees a bruise, any deep cuts, or bleeding, Knives is not going to let that pass.

If you're a plant and Knives finds out someone hurt you as mentioned above, there's no stopping him from seeking revenge. Knives will send Con'rad to tend to your wounds. If Con'rad doesn't do a good job of patching you up, the plant will have a long and menacing talk with him alone. If you can bring joy, solace, or even fill the lonely void Knives has within him, of course he's going to hold you in high regard. You are beyond special to him and will make sure no one lays a finger on you. Or rather, make sure no one takes you away from him.

Knives will demand you tell him who did this to you. If it was someone from outside his humble abode or lower ranking men that hurt you, he's going to off them immediately. Plus he never liked most humans, so less people for him to worry about. However, if he finds out it was one of the more important men like Legato, Con'rad, or any other high ranking follower...good luck. He's probably going to make their punishment slow and painful. Knives will reiterate what happens if they dare even hurt you and that they should consider themselves lucky that he's keeping them alive. He’ll probably make an example of someone if he catches them hurting you again.

Once he's done taking care of things, Knives will go check up on you to see how you're doing. He will take time out of his schedule, more importantly his alone time, to see you. Knives needs to know that you're doing okay and healing from your injuries. If you visit him while he's playing piano, he'll beckon you to sit with him and play you a song. If you try to play along with him, you're going to brighten this man's day.

[akirayuri]

CSM rant. The tragedy of the Hayakawa family

The tragedy of Aki Hayakawa was not only his own, but also Denji's own suffering. What Makima did was to raise a dog. What She did was to build a foundation in which Denji could grow, flourish as a human being, using both Aki and Power as the core of this little dysfunctional rag tag trio, only to rip that away in the cruellest way possible. Destroy his home in front of his eyes, by his own hand.

Home is a person. Aki Hayakawa was already a gaping hole of loss and grief. And Power had no sense of what human connection feels like. They Worked as a perfect beat for Denji to bite into. For Makima, Denji was a dog and Power and Aki were the meat of an animal you fattened up to kill and feed the dog.

What was more disturbing is that, not only did she used Denji's own vulnerability against him, but also Aki and Power’s. She meticulously played her cards and chose those two as they work the best. When you are lonely for such a long time you simply try to grapple with whatever you can get your hands on. For Aki however, it was rather peculiar. He never really managed to cope with his loss. Which led it to fester and rot silently. He chose to keep the wound tender and burning as it would simply fuel his single minded death parade to kill the gun devil. But what he didn't expect was for him to feel so profoundly for each and everyone around him, he was still just a guy. He chose to build walls around himself, wear his cold anger on his face, to put on that unapproachable facade that led people to view him as a stoic jerk. But what he also wore was his heart on his sleeves. And somehow, some people choose to stick with him. Himeno being a prime example. The thing is, he lets people in without realising it. Because somewhere in him, he carves the connection.

And Denji, despite not looking like it, is highly sensible and empathetic when it comes to forming bonds and connection with people. It goes beyond his horniness but rather something that his teenage self also carves, the need for nurture and for a shoulder to lean on. Which is exactly what Aki is. He is stoic, he is a perfectionist and he knows how to take care of and nurture someone and to simply put, he is everything Denji needs in a guardian.

I guess I really want to talk about his sublit but prominent suicidal tendencies too. But let's save that for later.

With Power, it's something else but also not so different. The thing is, fiends also have empathy and feelings, they aren't exactly the heartless nightmare fuel that are often their devil counterpart. Power is kind of a different case then Denji and Aki. In where Denji chooses to shut his brain in order to make himself feel at home, and Aki simply ( trying ) to give his middle finger to establishing connection ( and failing to do so miserably ) Power is surprisingly open about it. She lets her emotions control the best of her. She is willing to bash Denji’s head open and probably get herself killed just to save her cat. And that openness is something that both Aki and Denji get more and more comfortable in. Power is selfish, she's a brat, but she cares. With her you don't have to pretend as she also has nothing to hide.

But Makima actually failed to fathom exactly how DEEP this connection between those three ran. And definitely not the outcome it will lead to.

And Denji himself as a person. Makima underestimated him a big time.

It's lowkey a fucking rant. I needed to proceed with the absolute psychological fuckary Makima dumped on those three unfortunate individuals. So yeah. It's kinda 'yap without any closure on sight ' kinda rant.

[aajjks]

thanks alinaaa!!! you rock girl 🩷 now lets give the people what they want 😏

NWO!JK

“Hi pretty girl”

“jungkook? where—,”

instead you’re once again met with the famous vigilante, or shall you say, ex-hero spider-man.

“oh. it’s you” you roll yours eyes. “you stalking me or something? or are you asking for another fist to the face?”

once again, you’re caught in the rain with nothing but a flimsy hoodie on and sweatpants that quickly become damp due to the pouring rain. you spent some time with jisoo for a little while and took the same route you usually take back home but the only reason you’re still stuck in the rain is because of a certain ‘hero’ that just refuses to get out of your way.

“look, my best friend will kick your ass if i get sick again so move it. i’m not in danger so why are you even here?”

the way you talk about him is so cute. you’ve no clue that your best friend is right in front of you thinking of so many ways to shut you up. you’ve always disregarded his feelings towards you; always looked at him as a friend. he’s even saved your life and what does he get in return? a fist in the face and being called a psycho.

look at you, even as you’re walking away you’re still talking shit about him. using his web he pulls you back towards him.

“hey!! what the—are you even human? you’re probably some robot-spider-THING!” you yell as you watch the vigilante jump around you before comfortably hanging upside down in front of you. you don’t know why but you find his company enjoyable…familiar, even.

you smirk before saying “if you’re a human, take your mask off”

and of course, he declines.

“then i guess you are a robot-spider-thing! you really are some crazy robot that probably—,”

before you can finish your sentence, you feel someone’s lips connect with you. they’re soft and despite the cold rain, their lips are enough to warm you up and he pulls away, you go back in for more.

~🫧

the ball is in your court. MAKE IT FILTHYYYYY

Oh fuck- you’re really asking for it,

So he begins to kiss you back, moving his lips eagerly against yours as the rain drops fall on the both of you, Jungkook feels his sanity slipping away the more he feels your lips tangle with his.

His pace quickens and soon he’s pressing his lips harder against yours, he doesn’t wait a single moment to slip his tongue in your mouth, licking your lips as he kisses you like his life depends on it.

Oh he will actually die if he doesn’t shove his tongue deeper down your throat. “Nghh mhmm..,” he moans as you grant him access in your mouth.

Jungkook is amazed, so fucking aroused and borderline crazy right now, he bites your lower lip before licking it, soothing the pain with his tongue, you moan in his mouth as you grab his face.

Shit- he’s so hard. “Mhmmp mhmm…” he whimpers, his mouth drooling, he’s a mess, he’s a fucking mess but he needs more.

So he breaks the kiss before jumping down and you’re in a daze, he’s panting hard. “Oh fuck baby…” he groans, his voice a husky breathy mess before he pushes you against the wall and uses his web to cage you in.

“So helpless- so fucking hot.” He whispers, kissing your neck.

“More… more more..” he whispers

Fuck… he can even smell your arousal.

“Shit you smell divine.” He forces his knee between your shaky legs as the rains keeps pouring. He crashes his lips against yours again in a hungry sloppy kiss- drool all over the corners of his mouth as he enjoys the feeling of you kissing him back

“Nghh..” he runs his tongue all over your lips, all deep in your mouth.

“Shit baby… you’re so fucking wet for me- hmm? Aren’t you?” He breaks the kiss, a string of saliva connecting your lips before he pushes hand into your hoodie.

“I can smell your nectar..”

He gasps.

“Fuck- no bra?” His hands settle on your breast as he squeezes it. “you know I really wanna fuckin know how you taste but… I wanna make you cum undone on my actual fingers.” He licks your neck, mouth hot and hungry.

“Now who’s gonna save you from your saviour hmm, pretty girl?”

“You’re all caught in my fuckin web.”

[everydayzeus]

It's All Shit, Ted - Chapter 8

"He couldn’t help but picture the coaches, Roy, and Keeley surrounding Ms. Welton's desk where his termination paperwork sat under a spotlight beside one of those long creepy feather pens, like in an old Disney movie, just waiting for him to sign away the only thing he had left."

Read on Ao3

Word Count: 3005

Jamie has never had anyone over to his flat before. It was cold and dark, and so painfully empty. But sitting here at his dining table across from Will filled his heart with a warmth he hadn’t felt since he was last home with his mum. Even if they were just sitting in silence, sipping at the tea that Jamie had rushed to put together and Will picking at his plate. The kid was on his lunch after all, the least Jamie could do was warm up one of his frozen meals for him. The silence between them didn’t feel tense, despite how Jamie’s head was still throbbing, but comfortable and familiar. 

Will watched as Jamie subconsciously began to massage his temple while he sipped slowly at his drink. Placing down his fork, he walked towards the couch where Jamie’s bag had been abandoned upon their arrival. Digging through he quickly found what he was looking for and moved towards the kitchen, locating a glass and filling it with cold water from the fridge. Jamie hadn’t moved from his spot when Will returned, he hadn’t even noticed the kitman leaving the table, a testament to how tired and worn out he truly was. He only reacted when Will placed down the water and a few stray pills, looking closer he could see they were his pain and nausea medications, he gratefully swallowed them back and smiled in thanks at Will, who had returned to his seat. 

“Why are you pushing yourself so hard Jamie?” Uh oh, Will is using his serious voice. “You’re an amazing player and you’ve more than earned your place back on the team, why won’t you just rest and let yourself get better?”

“I haven't though. We lost against Coventry and-”

“But that wasn’t your fault” 

“Yes it was, I should've passed to Sam sooner, he would’ve scored. They hadn’t lost a game all season until I came back.” His head drops into his hands. “It’s all my fault, I’m cursed” 

“You aren’t cursed, Jamie. You can’t blame yourself for every single thing that goes wrong. It’s not on you, okay? We’re a team, we win and lose together.”

“They brought me back to score, and apparently I can’t even do that.”

“Jamie. You know what Ted says. ‘Be a goldfish.’ It was one match, it broke the tie streak, and now everyone’s out of their heads and training harder than ever.” Will reaches across the table and puts Jamie’s hand in his. “Right now, you need to rest and give your body time to heal. You don’t have to do this alone. I know you’re scared; scared of letting the team down, scared of failing—but you aren’t. We- I don’t want you hurting yourself trying to prove something you don’t need to prove.”

“I’m just... trying to do my job. Trying to help the team. And if that means pushing through the pain, then I’ll do it. I don’t care what it takes. I don’t need anyone to tell me I’m failing. I know that I am.” He squeezes Will’s hand before letting go and stepping away from the table. “So, no. I won’t sit around and let everyone think I can’t pull my weight!”

Will stands to meet Jamie’s eye, the two of them standing in silence. Jamie can’t help but focus on Will’s eyes. They are a rich chocolate brown, glistening under the light from the dining room light, and he has freckles? Pale spots speckled across his cheeks and nose, and he’s been biting at his lips, a mutual habit the two seem to share. Jamie finds himself staring at Will’s lips before shaking himself back into focus. 

“Um, you should probably head back, no sense in them being pissed at both of us.” He can’t watch the disappointment appear in Will’s eyes but he does hear the sigh the kitman releases. 

“I can talk to Ted and see about getting you a few days off?”

“Nah, don’t worry about it, I can handle all that.” More like he’s going to ignore Will’s advice to rest and be in first thing tomorrow. 

“If you’re sure. Just… please don’t shut me out, okay? Whatever’s going on, you don’t have to do it alone.” He reaches out to give Jamie’s hand one final squeeze before heading out the door.

“Thank you, Will.” 

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

Jamie did try to rest, he went straight to bed after Will left and stayed there until 6 am the next day. He sat and pondered whether or not he should heed the kitmans advice and stay home for approximately two and a half minutes before throwing his legs over the side of his bed and getting ready. He was significantly less dizzy and his nausea had settled into a consistent but less intense cramping rather than the aggressive churning it had been before, making him able to stomach a real breakfast for the first time in days. Still not wanting to risk getting behind the wheel, he had an Uber drop him a block away from Nelson Road and walked in through the front door rather than the side entrance the team frequented. 

He wasn’t ‘hiding’ per se, but he didn’t know who Roy talked to after yesterday. Best-case scenario, he would be faced with a very disappointed kitman, the worst case was he was walking into his execution. Okay, that was a bit intense but he couldn’t help but picture the coaches, Roy, and Keeley surrounding Ms. Welton's desk where his termination paperwork sat under a spotlight beside one of those long creepy feather pens, like in an old Disney movie, just waiting for him to sign away the only thing he had left. 

Jamie can’t help but shudder at the thought as he peeks around the corner and down the, luckily, empty hall. He manages to slip into the locker room, not seeing Will in the room across the hall, only to turn around and be face-to-face with Coach Beard. He is just standing there with his arms crossed, staring at Jamie, the man is always unreadable and today is no different. The two stand in total silence, neither moving, Jamie dares not even breathe. Why won’t he say something? Had Roy talked to him or was this just how he was in the morning? Maybe Jamie had just caught him off guard? 

“Come with me.” The coach says nothing else and heads out the door. It wasn’t a question and Jamie finds his feet moving to follow. This is it. He’s taking him upstairs to his death, except, they walk past the stairs, making no move to head up them. Where is he taking him? Oh god, is he just escorting him off the premises? Lasso didn’t have the guts to face him? Instead, choosing to send his friend to deliver the news and throw him out? 

Beard turns down a corridor and holds the door open to a room Jamie is not familiar with. Entering he finds an unsettling picture, Ted and Roy sat at the far end of a long conference table. The two stare at Jamie as he stands at the entrance, he feels his heart slamming against his ribcage as he takes in the scene. A voice screaming in his head to run compels him to step back and pivot to face the door, only to have it shut in his face, Coach Beard on the other side. He swallows in fear as the two face off once more, the coach shakes his head at Jamie through the small window. 

“Jamie,” It’s Ted. “It’s alright. We just think it’s about time we had a talk. One that should’ve happened a long time ago.” Oh god. This is it. He can’t face Ted when he fires him, he wishes Coach Beard would’ve just thrown him out, this is so much worse than he thought. 

“Oi, Tartt. Look at me.” Roy’s voice breaks through the static in his ears, he can’t help but comply with his former captain. Turning around and taking in the scene once more he can’t help his reaction. His throat tightens and his eyes fill with tears that quickly pour down his face. He raises his hands to his face and squeezes his eyes shut under his fists, trying to cover his face as he can't help but sob, his upper half curling into itself. “Woah, are you fuckin’ dying?” 

It’s still Roy's voice but it’s closer now. Jamie feels hands grab hold of his shoulders, rubbing gently up and down his, while Roy’s deep voice whispers soft, reassuring words and instructs him to calm his breathing. He is led to sit and slowly but surely his sobs calm as Roy rubs his back slowly. 

After a few minutes, he risks lifting his head out of his hands to look up and sees Ted looking at the table in front of him with a frown and sad eyes, Jamie swears he can see a dried tear track on his cheek. A box of tissues is slid across the table and Jamie cleans himself up the best he can, letting out a few stray sniffles as the room falls into silence. He can’t help but break it.

“Please don’t fire me.” That gets everyone's attention, Ted now staring at him with a look of horror. “I promise I'll be better, I swear I’m really trying Coach!” another tear escapes his eye. 

“Oh, Jamie, no. That’s not what this is, I swear.” Ted moves from his seat at the head of the table to the one directly beside Jamie and takes his hand in his. “We’re just worried about you, I need you to tell me what’s going on so I can help you” 

“Nothin’’s going on Coach.” 

“Well, I think I’ll have to disagree with you on that one, bud.” Ted tries to look him in the eye, but Jamie moves his gaze to their intertwined hands. “Roy here let me know what happened before you went home yesterday. Why didn’t you get your head checked out Jamie?”

“I keep telling you I’m fine, had concussions before, no need to make a big deal out of nothing.” Jamie tries to put up a brave front but the trembling of his voice gives him away.

“A head injury is a big deal you little prick.” Roy chimes in, moving his hand away from Jamie’s back and onto his shoulder. “I don’t give a shit how tough you think you are, it’s stupid to ignore that, especially if you keep training without your coach knowing. You’re lucky you only passed out yesterday.” 

“Jamie, if you’ve had a concussion before, you know they get worse each time you get one. You also know how I feel about them. No training of any kind until you are fully healed and cleared by the med team, so why did you push yourself? Why didn’t you tell me?” Ted’s voice is desperate, of course, it would be, coming from American football where they bash their heads in for a living.

“Couldn’t miss trainin’.” It’s almost unintelligible, had Ted not been so close he would’ve completely missed the boy's whisper.

“Jamie, no amount of training is worth more than your health.” Ted's voice was calm, but his face changed into surprise as Jamie scoffed in response. 

“Yeah right.” 

“Hey, look at me.” Ted puts his hand under Jamie’s chin and forces their eyes to meet. “What do you mean?” 

“Doesn’t matter.” Jamie pushes his hand away. “Can I get to trainin’ now?” 

“No Jamie, I thought we–” 

“Why the hell not? I’ve been working my ass off doing everything you wanted, why are you punishing me?” The trembling is gone, now he really is angry.

“I’m not punishing you, Jamie. You’re hurt, I want you to get checked out by the medics and then you’re going to rest, really rest, until they clear you. That’s at least a week off, no exceptions.” Ted’s voice is stern, not angry but there is no room for arguments, that won’t stop Jamie from trying. The player moves to his feet, his chair sliding back loudly at the force. 

“That’s such bullshit! You didn’t care before, why’s this time so different?” His heart is pounding again and he can't help but feel like the room is shrinking. 

“Last time?” Ted moves to his feet, the worry has returned to his face. 

“After you benched him, he came in saying he ‘was hurt’.” Roy’s voice is soft, not unlike how it was when they sat together yesterday. 

“Jamie,” Ted steps forward, Jamie steps back. “Were you injured that day at training?” 

“Told you I was, didn’t I?” He’s quiet again, not able to look at his coach anymore. 

“Jamie, I’m so sorry. I–” Ted’s voice is shaking now. 

“Why don’t you get to training Lasso, I’ll take the muppet to medical.” A hand grabs his shoulder and he is pulled into Roy’s side, the touch calming the panicked player.

“Of course. We’ll chat later Jamie.” Ted walks around the opposite side of the table to give Jamie space and shuts the door behind him. 

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Kieran and Vince, the team's medics, were none too pleased to see Jamie, especially when they pulled back his hair to see the fading bruise painted across his scalp. After a few tests, and several disappointed sighs from Vince and Roy, Jamie could feel nothing but relief. He had prepared for the absolute worst but was pleasantly surprised to find out his concussion was only minor and he hadn’t managed to make it worse the last few days. He wasn’t fully in the clear, however, they weren’t exactly thrilled with the weight he had lost and how much he’d clearly been over-exerting himself before the injury. So he and Roy left the treatment room with a mandatory week's rest, and if all went well he’d be cleared to play in their next match at the end of the week. 

Jamie let himself be led through the halls and onto the pitch where the team was in the thick of training. The two stood at the tunnel's exit and watched Dani fly across the grass, weaving through players and scoring a beautiful goal. Jamie’s stomach turned sour as the team celebrated with Dani, the goal didn’t mean anything but they cared about each other so much, he doesn't think he’s ever felt that, that mutual love and respect. 

He wanted to run and spend his mandatory leave wrapped in his bedsheets, away from prying eyes and judgemental stares, but instead, Ted had noticed their audience and waved them over as Coach Beard signalled the end of training. The team passed Jamie on their way inside but he dodged their eyes, finding a loose thread in his shirt more interesting than the concerned looks from his team. 

“What’s the verdict boys?” Ted sounded like his usual loud and cheerful self, but Jamie had years of practice watching for hidden expressions and contained anger and could tell he was still upset with the player. 

“Not as bad as we thought. He’ll be fine for Sunday’s match, just needs to sleep it off this week.” Roy’s taken to speaking for Jamie, the player hadn’t responded to anything Roy said since they left the medics. 

“Well, we’ll have to see about Sunday. For now, how about-” Ted is deflecting but Roy will be damned if he lets him get away with this further. 

“The medics will have him cleared by Sunday, his head’s mostly healed, he just needs to take a break.” 

“Even if they clear him, I’m not sure having him play is a good idea. The more rest we give him the better and then we can talk about getting him back out there.” Ted doesn’t want him to play? 

“Wait, what?” Jamie’s question is ignored as Roy slides between the player and coach, the vein in his forehead popping out again. 

“Are you fucking stupid? The kid’s the best player you’ve got and you want to bench him no matter if he’s cleared or not?” An angry Roy is not uncommon, it’s actually the norm, but Jamie doesn’t think he’ll ever get used to having an angry Roy aimed at someone else in his defence.  

“Now Roy-”

“No, I am not going to sit here and watch you punish the kid just because you didn’t drag him to get treatment after that hit. I don’t give a shit if he says he’s fine. They’re football players, they’d say they were fine while bleeding out. You’re their coach. It’s. Your. Job.” 

If the circumstances were different, Jamie thinks he’d be touched by Roy standing up for him, but instead, all he can focus on is his own lack of reaction. You would think the kid who’s spent the last few weeks breaking down in tears and panic attacks, would be the first to drop when his hero and coach were arguing about his future like he wasn’t even there, but he just felt numb. There was no laboured breathing, no heart pounding into his ribs, nothing. He just stood there, not even hearing the words passing between the older two anymore. 

His eyes floated around them, eventually landing on Beard, the older man was not watching the battle between Roy and Ted, choosing instead to lock eyes with him. A sigh from the coach has Roy and Ted halting as they turn to look at the bearded man. 

“You two arguing isn’t going to solve anything. There's no point in counting our chickens before they hatch so Jamie, Roy’s going to take you home and then we’ll see you on Saturday so the medics can look you over. We can discuss Sunday’s match when we know if you could even play.” With that, the man grabs Ted by the sleeve and drags him inside. Roy follows his lead, catching Jamie by his shoulder and moving towards the car park. 

[tsarisfanfiction]

Truth Comes Out of His Well (Chapter 9)

Fandom: Percy Jackson and the Olympians Rating: Teen Genre: Hurt/Comfort/Family Characters: Lee Fletcher, Kronos, Apollo, Apollo Cabin (and many more) As always, @stereden is responsible for the accompanying podfic! << Chapter 8 Listen to chapter 9 on AO3

Lee was asleep, as best he could sleep any more, light and fitful and uncomfortable enough that he only managed to doze at all because he was so exhausted his body just couldn't keep going any longer, when Kronos walked in. Footsteps on the cold, hard stone jerked him awake, and he groggily squinted at the approaching figure, blinking a few times to try and get his vision into focus.

"A child of Apollo, asleep in the middle of the day," Kronos commented, voice light and airy. "I'm given to believe that's very unusual."

Lee forced his head to raise, still heavy with exhaustion. It was the first time anyone had given him any indication of the time of day since he'd arrived, and despite himself he grasped for it desperately with mental hands. The middle of the day, when Apollo was high in the sky and Lee always felt the most awake.

Until now, apparently.

A glint of silver caught the flickering of the torchlight, as Kronos dangled one of his silver bracelets in front of him. "I can be generous, Lee," he said. "Silena didn't have the time to report to me and catch up with you, last week." – Hades, had that been a week ago? Time had been a whirlwind of more questions, more tests and avalanches of lies, food and bathroom breaks since then, but Lee hadn't thought it had been that long.

Not that he had any way of tracking time, anyway.

"She has some extra time now, though," the titan continued. He tilted his palm and the jewellery fell to the ground, landing with a discordant chink on the stone. "For your good behaviour."

As if on cue, the faded, washed-out version of an IM blossomed into existence in front of him, showing Silena.

"I'll leave you two alone." Lee's head jerked up in surprise as Kronos spun on his heel and walked out of the room, although the footsteps stopped long before they should have ended up out of earshot. Close enough to hear everything they said.

Reluctantly, he slumped back, raising his head to rest it against the stone behind him and dragging his eyes over to Silena. She looked uncomfortable, even though Lee imagined she was probably in the pegasus stables, or maybe in the woods somewhere. Somewhere much, much more comfortable than his cavern with its biting metal cuffs.

Why almost fell from his lips again, a desperate need to understand, but somewhere, not as buried as it felt like it ought to be, was a fragment of concern. Maybe it was because Silena looked so much more open this time, on the verge of tears herself.

"He's still in earshot," he said instead, warned her, maybe in some vague hope that she'd been able to tell him that she was actually a double agent, feeding Kronos cherry-picked information from camp whilst trying to glean his next moves in return. Her eyes widened, but Lee couldn't tell if it was surprise that Lee had warned her, or surprise that Kronos would eavesdrop.

Logically, it was probably the former.

She sighed. "Lee." There was a plea in the way she said his name, but Lee didn't know what for.

"Why?" he asked her, letting the instinctive question out. "Why, Silena?"

"Because things have to change," she said. "The gods create us then forget about us, unless it's to use us as their tools, and I can't forgive them for that."

Lee thought of Apollo, of dreams of music and poetry and the underlying feeling of love. Of being stuck in a social worker's office while his future was debated, only for an older man with a limp and an awesome cane to walk in and say he was there on behalf of Lee's father, that he'd be taking Lee to his new home.

"No," he said, softly but without hesitation. "They don-"

"Your father is an exception, Lee," Silena cut him off. "You know this. You know cabin seven is the happiest cabin, the only one whose parent bothers to remember they exist. We all see it." She sounded sad, and Lee realised he'd never really heard her talk about her mother, outside of the myths.

"You think Kronos is better?" he demanded. "You'd rather this war was won by a titan famous for eating his children?"

"We're not his children," Silena pointed out, correcting him with that slant to her lips that she usually used on younger siblings that didn't quite understand camp dynamics, and Lee remembered that Aphrodite had come from Ouranos, that Silena was closer to Kronos' niece, one of the few campers that wasn't technically descended from him, not that Lee liked to focus on that aspect of the family tree very much.

"I don't understand," Lee admitted.

She gave him a sad smile. "I know," she said. "Cabin seven is the only cabin without any defectors, Lee. You all have too much faith in your father to turn on him. I envy you that, you know. That you have at least one parent that you believe in, even if I don't understand how you do it. What does Apollo do to buy your undying loyalty?"

There was too much there to put into words, things that they didn't tell other cabins, not wanting to rub in how well they had it. Things they suspected Apollo wasn't supposed to be doing, with how secretly he always interacted with them.

"He remembers we exist," Lee eventually replied, knowing that Silena would have read something into his silence but not willing to give her secrets. Definitely not willing to give her secrets, now.

Once, he'd trusted Silena and Luke with his life, with his friendship and emotions and things that, as he got older, he found it harder to put onto younger campers. Luke had broken all that, and Silena had drifted away from Lee in the wake of his betrayal, too wounded herself, but Lee had still thought he could count on her when it counted.

He knew better, now.

Luke was gone, his body left behind as Kronos' meat puppet, and Silena… After the revelation that she was on Kronos' side, too, Lee couldn't trust her as far as he could throw her – and with the cuffs pinning his wrists to the wall, he couldn't throw anything at all.

"And you're happy with just that?" Silena asked. "Lee, we need more than just basic acknowledgement that we exist."

That, Lee refused to respond to. Apollo did far more than the basic acknowledgement, but Silena had lost all right to private conversations, now.

"Why are you doing this?" he asked her, instead. "If you believe Kronos is the better option, why are you still in camp? How can you possibly stay and keep lying to everyone's faces? Why didn't you just leave like everyone else did?"

"Because someone had to stay," Silena said. "Someone has to make sure the campers stay out of it."

Lee thought of falling barriers, constant monster attacks, and finally an invading army, and shook his head. "You're not succeeding," he said.

She looked down, fingers twisting together. Her fingernails were painted what looked like a shade of blue, but it was difficult to tell with the muted colours of the apparition.

"I'll keep them as safe as I can," she said. "They don't have to get hurt, if they'd just stay out of the way… Neither of us wanted anyone to get hurt."

Lee carefully didn't ask who us was. He was pretty sure he knew, anyway.

There was another question he didn't want to ask, but also needed to, because he had to know how, even if Kronos was eavesdropping. Luke and Silena had betrayed him for years and he hadn't had a clue, until it was too late and he was picking up the shards of a broken heart.

"You're delusional," he said, "if you think the camp won't fight this war." Any chance they had of staying out of it had disappeared the moment monsters spilled out of the Labyrinth and into their home. Kronos, Luke, whoever had made that call, had made sure of that. Gods, but Lee hoped that had been Kronos, after he took Luke's body.

If Luke had been the one to call the attack on camp, on what had been his home, full of demigods he had always promised Lee he'd protect with all the sincerity of an oath, then Lee didn't know what he'd do.

"No-one's even mentioned it since the start of summer," Silena countered. Since the Labyrinth attack, Lee translated. Since five deaths, in the place that was supposed to be safe. "They're safest like this, Lee. Keeping their heads down, not provoking Kronos. They'll survive as long as they stay like that."

Lee highly doubted that the campers would stay meek. Percy didn't have a choice, and Annabeth was a devout supporter of the son of Poseidon. Clarisse and Michael didn't know the meaning of the word meek, and if they put aside their rivalry long enough to work together, they'd be formidable.

He remembered the scorpion-hunting game, and the way everyone had complained at the unfairness of him being partnered with Clarisse because they knew there weren't many pairings more efficient than the two of them, in combat. If they could stop arguing long enough to work together, Clarisse and Michael would be a serious force to be reckoned with, even more so than Lee and Clarisse had been.

"What about me?" he asked her, and his voice broke on the last word, the deep-seated betrayal too much to pass unacknowledged, even if Lee tried hard to push it down. Guilt flashed across Silena's face for a split second before she got her expression back under control. "This isn't my idea of safe, Silena." He tugged his wrists again, trying in vain to find a weak point to exploit. As a bonus, the chains around his legs twitched hard enough to provoke the metal into clinking.

Silena's face paled, but she set her shoulders. "It didn't have to be like this," she said softly. "You could have joined, Lee. You should join." Her voice slipped briefly into desperation, and Lee didn't miss the present tense.

He shook his head. "I can't, Silena. I won't. I'm not a traitor."

She gave a full body flinch at the word. "Lee, please," she said. "Join us. We can protect everyone we care about, keep them out of the war-"

"I care about my dad," Lee interrupted her. "Joining won't protect anyone, least of all him."

"You're going to get torn to pieces if you keep fighting," Silena told him, and her voice shook. It almost looked like she was starting to cry.

Lee wanted to cry, except he didn't when he actually felt the tell-tale build up in his own eyes.

"Please, Lee. Don't do this to yourself."

"You did this to me," Lee told her, his voice quavering and breaking under the strain. "You, and Luke, and everyone else that decided to fight the gods. I'm here, like this, because of you."

And it hurt. It hurt when Kronos walked in, mimicking Luke's body language so perfectly that it had to be muscle memory, before golden eyes glared at him and the wrong voice came out of his mouth. It hurt when Alana, Ethan, and the other demigods Lee remembered from camp looked at him with uncaring eyes, neutral at best and with disgust at worse. It hurt, to see Silena still in camp, tearing it apart from inside and claiming she was doing it to keep demigods safe when all she was causing was pain.

Silena didn't seem to have a response for that, tears overflowing down her cheeks, as she put a perfectly manicured hand in front of her mouth to stifle her sobs. Lee felt tears cascade down his own face, too, because apparently he still had more left to fall.

"Just…" he said, his voice unsteady and wobbling. "Tell me one thing." He took a breath that morphed into a sob halfway through. "How… how did you and Luke get all of this past me?"

It was a dangerous question to ask, with Kronos eavesdropping just outside the door, but Lee had to know. Luke and Silena had both known about his ability for a long time – it had been more of an open camp secret, still, when Silena had first joined, and he'd trusted Luke with the knowledge himself in what was clearly now one of his biggest mistakes. He couldn't believe they'd been deceiving him the entire time, but at some point they'd clearly managed it.

Silena wiped away her tears with the back of her wrist, gently blotting it so it wouldn't ruin her makeup. Lee had seen her do the same thing so many times before; Silena had always been an easy crier, and had preserving her eye make-up down to an art.

"We told you the truth," she said. "I love camp, I love the people in camp. I want everyone in here to be safe, and happy."

They were things she'd said to him before, things she'd said over and over, for years, because it was hard to be a year-round camper and not fall in love with it all. They had always been true.

They were still true.

"Luke wanted the same thing," she said. "He wanted us to be acknowledged by our parents. He wanted us to grow up as something more than the gods' discarded tools, picked up when it suited them and neglected the rest of the time." She met his eyes evenly through the murky colours. "We only ever told you the truth, Lee."

The knowledge settled over him like a thick, constricting blanket, the only freedom a single breath of fresh air as Lee understood.

He didn't like it. He hated it. It meant that all he was good for was just spotting petty white lies and nothing drastic enough to be dangerous, but he understood what had happened.

Truth was personal. He'd told Michael that, once, the only time Michael had indulged in enough curiosity to ask him about his ability. If someone believed what they were saying, it was a truth to them.

Luke, Silena, and no doubt so many others, believed in what they were doing. They believed it would, eventually, bring the best result for the demigods, and because they believed that, Lee believed them when they said it.

"It got harder, once Luke left," Silena confessed, and a fresh wave of tears formed in her eyes. "When people started asking different questions, how anyone could do what he did, whether anyone else felt that way… Questions I couldn't answer without lying to them."

Silena had pulled away from Lee, after Luke's betrayal. He'd noticed it at the time, but deep in his own grief, had assumed it was her way of dealing with the same.

He swallowed.

"You started avoiding me," he said. "So I wouldn't notice."

Her nod was a devastating confirmation. "I'm sorry, Lee," she said, and she meant it but Lee couldn't accept it, not then. Not when it was raw and he had chafed wrists and bruised ankles.

Not when Silena had admitted she and Luke had been working together since before Luke betrayed them and left. Before Percy was poisoned and almost killed.

Where did Percy fall in Silena's determination to save campers? Kronos needed him dead, and Luke had almost done it. Was he written off as a necessary sacrifice?

Lee was clearly an exception, too. Maybe they didn't want him dead – he was fed enough to keep surviving, even though he was certain it wasn't three meals a day, his room was as clean as a cavern could expect to be and he was shoved into the bathroom periodically, aside from that one cut on his palm and the injuries from the restraints they had hardly physically injured him – but this wasn't safe. Either the gods would win and Lee would be freed – if anyone found him – or the titans would win, and would Kronos really keep him around after that?

He let himself slump back against the wall, head hanging again. There was no point seeming resilient to Silena. He would never convince her with words that she was wrong, that what she was doing wasn't protecting anyone, just spouting pretty words that for now she still believed. But he could show her the hypocrisy of her claims, how he wasn't safe or well.

His hair flopped down in front of his eyes. It was getting longer than he usually let it get, but he was resigned to no haircut any time soon; Kronos had been careful not to give him anything that he could use as a weapon, and Lee refused to trust anyone in Kronos' army with a sharp object near him.

"I really am sorry, Lee," Silena said again. Lee refused to look up at her any more, feeling more yet more tears fall. "I didn't want this to happen to you. Please, at least think about cooperating?"

Lee swallowed. "I'm not a traitor," he said. "Not like you."

Silena sniffled. "You always were the reliable one," she admitted. "Just remember to look out for yourself, too, Lee."

There was no response to give to that that he wanted to say, so he said nothing, keeping his head down even when Kronos' footsteps came back in, and the tinkle of silver said that the call was over and that the titan had scooped up his bracelet.

Silena didn't understand. She wasn't protecting anyone, with what she was doing. All she was doing was hurting everyone.

Lee refused to join her.

Chapter 10>>>

[mysleeangel]

is there anything that helps you when you run out of ambien? tbh i think i'm going to end up in a similar situation soon (in my case i haven't been overusing them but my doctor is just never in his office and the other doctors i get put with won't refill it and try to take me off it cold turkey) i hope you can find some way to hang in there, i'm sending kind thoughts your way and hope life gives you a break. wishing you the best 🫂

(I’m sorry this is so long, prepare for the biggest yapfest of 2024)

This is my first time running out, and it was due to my own stupid irresponsibility, so hopefully I shouldn’t deal with this issue again. However, I absolutely hate that your doctors are treating you so badly, it can be dangerous to pull you off of your meds at random especially when you really need it. If im not misreading and you’re taking Ambien as well, cold turkey quitting that stuff, whether it was your choice or not, can be dangerous depending on a few factors such as dose and length of time you’ve been on it. The doctors you are dealing with sound like they’re being incredibly careless with your health and if it’s possible I would see about switching doctors, but that process can be difficult and frustrating so I completely get it if you can’t do that.

If things start to get bad (like you begin having withdrawal symptoms or you start to feel like hurting yourself) and you have the option available near you, I would go to an urgent care or the ER.

I know that isn’t available to everyone though, but in the past four months I’ve been to the er and urgent care at least 15 times. It’s not an exaggeration, I just have been running into health problems that badly that many times in a short period. I’m saying this because it was the only way I could get SOME kind of help in my most desperate times. Maybe they can listen to the issues you’re having and someone might be able to help you get in contact with your doctor. I can’t say for sure what they’d be willing to do though, it’s like a gamble with every healthcare worker. Sometimes they’re really helpful, sometimes they’re indifferent to your situation.

Depending on where you are and what insurance you have, trying to get the help you NEED is like pulling teeth. I’m so sorry you have to deal with it, it’s stressful, scary, and it’s enough to drive you fucking insane. I’m also sorry that I’m not very good at giving advice and for going on a tangent. Despite being on the highest dose, I probably haven’t been on this med for as long as you have, and so therefore i have not dealt with much physical withdrawal symptoms. Mainly just anxiety, rebound insomnia, nausea. Its difficult for me to say exactly what I’m doing to deal with it, a lot of it is me just sitting and watching the clock, biting my nails, stuffing my face with food to deal with more bubbling over anxiety.

As far as I know, I am with certainty getting that prescription filled, so I’m able to find some comfort in knowing that it will happen eventually. For you, it seems that the future of your prescription refill is uncertain right now. I don’t know how you’re getting through any of it, but if I was in your shoes right now I’d probably be handling it very badly. That’s to say, I genuinely think you’re a resilient and strong person who has likely dealt with more than your fair share of problems and stressors. I think you’re going to make it through this, and you will be able to get in contact with your doctor or a doctor willing to listen to you, even if it’s a painstaking, infuriating process.

As for what I’m doing and I’ve been doing for the past week to get through it…I’ve been trying to keep myself distracted with other things and I take some other meds I have so that I’ll eventually get tired.

At night I take two benedryls, six hydroxizine (25mg), half a mirtazapine (15 mg, previously prescribed for insomnia but I stopped taking it after I got prescribed the zolpidem. I still have it so I’m using it to get through these two weeks) and two 10mg meletonin gummies. These are split into two doses, not taken all at once. I take a Benedryl, three hydroxyzine, and a meletonin gummy. Then I take the rest after a few hours, usually closer to 5 am and then I try to sleep. It’s worked so far, the key is to not start flipping out if you can’t fall asleep immediately, which I do a lot.

I’m not sure if you have hydroxyzine on hand, they give that stuff out like candy, but it’s an antihistamine similar to Benedryl and it can make you sleepy. If you don’t have that, 10mg meletonin gummies and Benedryl might help at least a little BUT PLEASE BE CAREFUL with how much Benedryl you take. It’s funny to joke about that hatman, but you can seriously die if you’re not careful. I went to the icu last month due to an accidental overdose of Benedryl and hydroxizine, wasn’t in there long but it was ROUGH.

At max, take three, but don’t take more than that in one night if you can help it. And don’t take them all at once. If you feel like they’re not working, give it time. I used to take about six or seven benedryls every night just to maybe catch a little sleep. Tolerance can build on it, so you have to be cautious about how much you’re taking.

I wish I had some better way to help, I’m so sorry for this long ass paragraph, I really hope I was able to answer some questions but please feel free to ask more if you need some clarification or anything else. I’m sorry that your doctors aren’t helping you, I know how fucking awful it is to deal with. I’m sorry if I didn’t make any sense at all but I hope I did, let me know if there’s anything else I can do to help. You’ve got this 🫂💖💖💖💖

[sempsimps]

undertaker x reader

this is mostly gender neutral, but using the female body parts for the good stuff, ya know

actual text i had before writing this;

me: gonna be real i want undertaker to raw dog me in a coffin and then give me one of those fucking biscuits

bestie: i- holy shit. real

SO THIS IS THAT LMAO there we go literally that, but the new season got me re watching the whole of black butler and thinking of unholy shit (the things I would do in Sebastian's confession box oof) anyway that's a little off topic and i just aaaa with this new season it's so good and ill definitely be making like 2 at least on Gregory violet so stayed tuned for that but ANYWAY WHAT YOU ACUALLY CAME HERE TO READ NOW

Warnings:

He's kinda creepy (but we love that about him)

Mentioned fitting in a coffin (is that even a warning)

Undertaker is a warning as he is

If your cluster phobic get out

You fell into a coffin dumbass (with a hint of cliché writing)

Pussy eating (oh no the horror- actually with him probably)

Some light cuts they bleed a little (made by man's acrylics)

Bites hickeys scratches (a part masochist wet dream)

You actually don't finish because of him being a tease and other people

is it considered necrophilia becuse he's dead?? idfk shower thought leave me be

it was a weekend, and the servants convinced you to come into London town for the day as well as your sister, but as they got closer to the destination you wanted to go, to you strayed from the pack and headed into the undertakers shop, to see him might as well since your free today, and the others were busy shopping.

Honestly, it was a match made in hell, as the earl described it. you were into the strange and unusual, and undertaker is the very definition of idiosyncratic. you worked with ceil on the police as an allies, and that's how you two solved many things. yall had connections beforehand anyway, ceil is like the little brother you never had, and you treat him just like that, especially when it came to his betrothed, your sister. but in his defence, he brought you to the undertaker. Ceil was trying and failing to make the undertaker laugh, so he brought you in from waiting outside, and from one joke, he was cackling. and so whenever the Earl wanted his Information, he would bring you along becuse it seemed like he only liked your jokes, and honestly how could you complain, some one actually laughing that's a first, so ill take the win. but undertaker was equally pleased by this, he couldn't describe the attraction he felt, his heart was long cold and dead, but the little dark light the Earl brought to his shop was enough to get him to question again, but you wear merely mortal and he shouldn't get attached not after last time.

walking around the dark shop, it was more empty than usual as it was completely closed on a Sunday, which is kinda ironic thinking about it. the only bits of lights that guided my way were slowly dying candles, and further in the store there was less and less, of that comforting yellow glow fading quickly, i was calling out for him quietly, still looking around despite the strain on my eyes. i assumed he wasn't here, maybe out, i took a look around, noticing a back room. 'huh, that's new but i guess ive never stayed to long' hollering for the strange man once, more as i stumbled through the dark. my foot caught on something wooden on the floor, and i fell right into one of the many coffins, putting my hands and knees out to stop the fall. i felt something plush under me. I did indeed fall into a wooden create. my eyes finally adjusted to the room, and the panic set it. 'oh my fucking god, im on top of undertaker' my limbs barely didn't touched his body, my knees either side of his waist, and my hands at the side of his head, in his long hair. 'oh fuck fuck shit, this is bad' he was asleep some fucking how, his chest slowly rose and descended in an easy rhythm, a tiny snore escaping every few breathes he looked peaceful, and not like a menace like he usually did. 'This would be cute. If i wasn't right over him.' my eyes traced the scars once more. 'god, that neck one is so biteable.' i took in a deep breath, and slowly picked up my left foot, raising it higher than needed so i don't make contact with the wood, i slowly lowered my foot searching for the ground, making a soft thud as i found the floor. next would be my right hand, and this slowly turned into the worlds quietest twister, i started to turn my body backwards so i could lay on the floor to escape. getting my hand up in the air, and I balanced on one knee and hand to get out. I started to bend out, but my hip lightly grazed the side, and then in in a flash, an arm wrapped around the top of my hip and right wrist. It was so sudden i let out a surprised squeak.

"Hello dearie"

One half closed fluorescent green eye shining in the dark room, and I quickly panic to explain myself.

"I am so sorry! this isn't what it looks like, I swear"

"Hehe, I'm quite aware, I knew you were falling, but not that fast. hehe"

"What? oh, that was a bad pun... but if you knew why, didn't you move? Or at least tell me you were awake"

he kept giggling softly, shaking my body as well as his.

"Oh believe me, my dear, it was near impossible to keep up the act, when you look like that, my i might just injure myself laughing"

I took a second to remember how I looked, right hand up in the air, and right foot out of the wooden box, barely keeping me stable was one knee next to undertakers waist, and my left hand in his hair. if it wasn't for his arm around me, I would of fallen over. but the grip he had on my left wrist was unusual I could feel his nails lightly scratch my skin 'wowzah that's a thought' he giggled a little.

"Hehe, my what a face your pulling there"

"Well, could you help me get uh unstuck from this?"

(insert a totally seamless paragraph smoothly going into the smut)

Here I was half naked with my legs on undertakers shoulders he's kneeling down leaning over face near my pussy breathy giggles sending small shocks through me as the breath made me twitch in anticipation the situation becoming indescribable.

"My my look at you dear hehe I could just eat you up. I knew you'd fit in my coffin"

His tongue came out at the end of that sentence and licked my clit, my body thrusted towards him without my brain catching up to actions. his hands opened my thighs, nails digging into my skin, making light cuts at the grip, specks of blood appearing, the sting feeling like fire, my legs edging to close around his head

" Hehe. Come on, don't be shy. I won't bite unless you want me to . Hmm, how about we test it"

With that, he leaned over and harshly bit my inner thigh. His teeth were kinda sharp at the K9s, adding to the pain that was building my pleasure. I let out a soft moan, my hands scratching the wooden box, gripping the plushness underneath me that confirmed his suspicion instantly.

"My, my, you liked that more than I thought interesting"

Pulling my legs further up to get closer, his mouth wonders, his tongue working over the blood lightly licking and his teeth gripping into my flesh, he detaches from making a large hickey laughing.

"Well, would you look at that come on pretty things shouldn't cry hehe those tears preserve your beauty, my dear, oh how those marks suit you"

soon he was back at it again his tongue swirling in me and my moans echo from his coffin he kept on giggling the sensation adding so much pleasure the feeling of his nails reaching across my skin before finding my clit the slow movement making me go wild he was being a complete tease about this. he starts slow speeding up and then leaving, going back to licking my hole that was leaking with arousal, gathering the taste on his lips.

"You taste like the finest sweet my doll. mhh, smell devine as well"

"Please stop teasing me~"

"hehehe, as you wish, my dear"

his teeth touched my clit, and i bucked into his face at the masochistic contact, i felt him smirk at the movment, and he bagan to properly eat my pussy out his nose bumping into the delicious sweet spot, as his tounge delved deeper, his skillful hands moved to my clit, he slowly made circles around it, increasing the speed every so often, still teasing but making me body hover on the edge. I was so close he could feel it. My legs closed around his head, ankles locking as I started to shake rapidly approaching my orgasm but as quickly as it came, he stopped. I whined, and undertaker chuckled, voice lower now.

"Ah doll, if I let you continue, you'd be embarrassed to righ to heaven your phantom friends are here"

My heavy breathing evened out, and I slowly released him from my strong hold. he gently placed my legs down, undertaker stood out of the coffin and passed my clothes that I had on. Before grabbing a biscuit, putting it in my mouth, then grabbing the lid of the coffin, placing it over me. 'wait, what the fuck?' I sighed crunching on the biscuit, taking it as an opportunity to get dressed and fix my hair. I was still shaking from me being so close to cumming, then i closed my eyes. it was quite in the coffin, dark of course, but cool, a really good thing to sleep, in be it a nap or eternity. but coming back to reality, I knocked on the coffin lid, and the undertaker was quick to use his boots to kick it open carefully. The candles that suddenly appeared blinded me for a second. I slowly sat up, shaking a little. All I could hear was the deadpan of ceils voice ringing in the shop. They must have guessed I was here.

"Undertaker, what is the meaning of this? Why do you have one of my allies in one of your coffins?"

"Ahaha Oh, don't worry, little lord, I can assure you they are far from dead if you were thinking so"

".... are you okay your shaking?"

It was my sister who asked me, I was going to respond before undertaker chuckled, putting another dog bone biscuit in my mouth with a pat to the head, offering a hand to help me out which i took, my legs wobbling a little from the loss of blood in them. At this time, I realised Sebastian was giving undertaker a look as well.

"Well, that was quite the luagh hope to see you again soon maybe I'll fit you in your own coffin"

He wiped away a fake tear and bid goodbye from his shop. The other three people looked at me, and I just shook my head with a "I'm not getting into that" look, we all walked out of the shop and carried on with our day but I missed the contact of the strange man.

Okay so I finally finished this jesus christ it took like 3 days to do this but I'll have more on the way for black butler so I'm working on that ASAP anyway sorry if my writing sucks :)

[tumsa]

Dear writer, what happens after? Does Kim leave him in that gym? Do Vegas and Kim ever talk about it when sober? I demand more comfort! :D

well, i am in need of a whole lot of comfort myself, so i'll play. this is not edited in any way, so excuse typos, long sentences, and whatever else happens.

- - -

Kim gets himself together quickly. He wipes tears with his shirt sleeve and bites his lip hard enough that it hurts. The pain keeps him grounded. Showing emotions is like being honest. It gets you in trouble. Kim knows because Kinn has replaced Tankhun, who is more astute and a lot better at detecting treachery than Kinn, all because Kinn looks more competent and is less emotional. All because Tankhun could not bottle everything up like everyone else. All because Tankhun says what's on his mind. Kim wonders if Korn has three sons just so he can swap out whatever he deems to be the weaker link.

Vegas dozes off despite the pain within minutes and stays asleep as Kim carefully cleans his wounds and places patches on the bigger ones that ooze blood whenever Vegas moves in his sleep. Kim removes the bloody shirt and throws it in a trash bag with whatever he used to clean the wounds. He considers putting the shirt in some cold water in the sink, but it's probably a lost cause already and the least of Vegas's problems. 

Kim knows he can call someone to pick Vegas up and get him home, but Vegas must have left the house for a reason. Kim decides that Vegas has had enough trouble for the day. He gathers foam mats from the room that houses leftover equipment and puts them together in a makeshift bed near the entrance. It's not a great place to sleep, but Kim wants to move Vegas only a little to prevent his wounds from reopening.

He moves purposely and efficiently until he runs out of things to do and he no longer has a task to throw his full attention at. Staring at Vegas, who is still out on the foam mats with his bruised and battered torso on display, Kim exhales shakily. In the dimly lit lights, relaxed in his sleep Vegas looks his age, barely twenty. It's easy to forget how young he is when he punches or throws Kim on the ground, when he laughs maniacally before pulling Kim closer, either for a kick or a kiss. Or when he talks about where to shoot or stab to kill someone, where to do it to make it really hurt. Make it count. Vegas is twenty and talks about torturing someone like Kim's friends talk about writing music. It gnaws at Kim and unsettles him how much he cares about Vegas. It's stupid.

Kim forces himself to turn away and find something else to do. He texts his bodyguards to let them know he won't be home. These days they don't trail him silently at his father's orders and stay away when Kim demands. Then he finds his bag, headphones and a phone charger and sits down in the tiny office room, between cardboard boxes and broken chairs. Then he spends the next few hours listening to music and talking his way out of checking on Vegas.

Nobody looks for Vegas. His phone stays silent the whole night. 

Around four in the morning, Kim can no longer keep his eyes open no matter how much he tries. He considers going home but doesn't want to leave Vegas alone. Doesn't want to be alone either. 

Carefully, to not disturb him, Kim lays down on a foam mattress next to Vegas. There's still a scent of alcohol mixed with whatever perfume Vegas prefers these days and the wound solution Kim used. This close, Kim can see he missed a few blood splatters on the cheek and chin when cleaning up the split lip. It looks painfully swollen.

Sleep finally wins.

- - -

Kim wakes up because Vegas is making quiet, whiney noises. He's awake, sitting beside Kim, covering his face with his arms. Kim opens his mouth to ask how Vegas feels but stops himself. He wants to allow Vegas to leave while he thinks Kim is asleep. Vegas can disappear as he always does after their fights, and they can never mention this again. Kim can already imagine their next fight; Vegas will ensure Kim knows there is nothing soft or vulnerable between them, and Kim's ribs will hurt for days.

"Fuck," Vegas murmurs in English, as he always does around Kim these days. Kim guesses there's a hangover that's pounding Vegas's head and a layer of shame and regret on top of it. If their places were swapped, Kim would be mortified. 

Vegas doesn't move while Kim tries to focus on even, slow inhales and exhales. And he thinks he has the "pretending to be asleep" role under control until Vegas touches him. He takes Kim's left arm and moves it away from Kim's side. For a moment, Kim thinks that Vegas will do something insane, like stab him in the sleep, dig a grave and bury Kim with his secrets. He wonders if Vegas can feel his heart picking up the speed as he moves Kim's hand enough to lie down in its place. 

Kim freezes, only for a second, and wills himself to stay relaxed as Vegas wraps himself around Kim's body carefully, still making tiny pained noises. Once settled, Vegas presses his cheek against Kim's shirt and settles.

Kim tries to breathe normally, but Vegas can probably hear his racing heartbeat because he grips Kim's side and then pets it as to soothe a startled animal. 

"I'm cold," Vegas murmurs. "Move your arm."

Kim snorts at the audacity but obeys and moves his arm around Vegas's shoulder. "Better?"

"Much better," Vegas replies, yawning. He's unbothered with the whole cuddling situation, and Kim can feel Vegas's weight relax against his body. 

Like a kid who got away with stealing candy Kim smiles to himself and lets the even sounds of Vegas's breath lull him back to sleep. 

[writerthesans]

Chapter 1 - Prologue

??? POV

Stone is almost never a comfortable place but here it seems a bit more cold. The darkness in the room is crushing. If the area is in fact a room is unknown. Even now the circumstances are unknown despite repeated attempts to comprehend or even understand them. So the only intelligent thing to do was done. 

[Retracing how he got here]

School. It's not a fun place for most people but it can have some benefits. Friends are pretty easy to make and, on occasion, you'll learn something useful. Jeru in particular believes that while school does need some changes, most of the hate is from peer pressure and the words of the people. There is probably something wrong with this line of reasoning but he never really followed it. It'd be a waste of time. 

What IS important though is learning about the people around you; at least to some extent. Many people have a small habit, on the grand scale of things they don't mean much. Whether it be biting your nails or your eyes wandering. But right now, or right then, there would be two main ones that matter. 

First of all, when the teacher hasn't entered the room for a while, students get a bit energetic and fidgety and want to release pent-up energy. That can mean simply reading a book, talking to friends or playing a game. Some games are more violent, like right now. A play fight, an annoying habit. Where a student is knocked into an empty desk and chair. This, as you might expect, results in a good amount of noise. No teacher is coming though, the student at watch by the door is still just watching, although he did jump from the crash.

But the second one is a bit more subtle but somehow more impactful. A sigh, just a sigh. Not a loud one or a really angry one. Just a sigh. There's a moment of silence across the classroom and students near Jeru lean out of the way, allowing for a pretty much straight line to the still standing student. But, as tradition, Jeru lines up his shot. With a flick, an eraser goes flying... and misses by about 10 feet... despite there being a 10 foot distance between the shot and the target. 

A few disappointed remarks from the audience, a few laughs and a comment on how he'll get it next time but most of the class stays silent since the real show is about to begin. Jeru gets up from his seat and walks over to his eraser and pockets it. He then walks over to the fighters who are actually still going at it. There are about 4 students participating, 2 on each side, but they all stop to face Jeru.

"Alright, break it up." Jeru starts. "It's Monday, can't we do this another time?"   

"Can't you mind you business, today?" One of the fighter comment rudely.

Some exclamatory sentences from the audience, quickly interrupted by Jeru, "Come on guys, that doesn't count as a creative insult," Jeru pauses for a moment, "Or an insult at all."

Some more exclamatory sentences, negative this time, which Jeru rolls his eyes at before looking at someone.

"Hey, Drea!" Jeru says looking at a girl in the back of the classroom, "Do you want a part of this one?"

Drea, along with Jeru, keeps the peace in this class. It gets pretty rowdy sometimes. Drea outranks him in most physical aspects while Jeru usually takes the mental aspects. They're both pretty popular in class, even among the ones they've already beaten. Drea maybe more so due to her... proportions but the popularity might just be in Jeru's imagination. She's usually able to handle herself or his stares at whoever even stares at her in a perverted manner. They remain associates though, never making it a point to go out of they're way to talk to each other. But when a problem arises they don't hesitate to reach out.

"Nah, it's your turn, I'll watch this one." Drea comments, smiling, "I'll do it next time."

"Yes. Next Time. They'll definitely survive for next time"

"Of course. Of course."

After the short joke exchange, Jeru turns back to the fighters, "Ok, just sit back down before a teacher eventually comes." Almost never one to throw the first punch, Jeru offers a chance to surrender. As has happened many time before and as usual the result is the same. The first punch is thrown.

Despite being fairly bulky, Jeru can be pretty quick when he wants to be and he parries the attack away from his head with his right fist by directing the punch past the right side of his head. And as a quick counter he jabs the opponent's solar plexus with his left fist. They stumble back and are knocked down when he punches them in the chest.

"One down, just sit down before anyone gets seriously hurt," Jeru warns, he's pretty relaxed but his fists are still up to parry and counter.

"Tch," the only female fighter there scoffs at him as the knocked down student gets back up. "You wish."

"Yeah, I do wish. Four on one isn't very fair," Jeru prepares for the next attack.

Jeru isn't particularly skilled in combat but he definitely isn't bad at it, at least from an average standpoint. However, he always holds back so that he doesn't injure someone. Anyone he fight does not have to worry about that; while he can't really take many hits head-on, he usually parries and his dark skin makes bruises more difficult to see. That latter isn't taken into account; when Jeru steps into a fight the main goal of his opponents isn't usually to win, it's to have fun so details in the future are not taken into account to some extent they can't really be blamed. They haven't gotten very far after they begin; if they're being honest, Jeru and Drea enjoy stopping them.

Two of the play fight students stand at the  left and right of the girl and the student that got back up. They both throw a straight punch with the  fists closest to Jeru; Both are parried and Jeru counter with a left hook to the shoulder of the one on his right; followed by a right hook to the one on the left. Jeru claps his fists together twice, making audible knocks, an invitation for his opponents to get closer. The girl throws a kick to Jeru's stomach; however, it is met with a backhand punch to the side of her shin. The student who threw the first punch throws a quicker punch this time which is swatted away with Jeru's forearm. 

Jeru steps back as the two outer students close in again. Two more predictable punches and Jeru catches them both by the forearm' gripping them tightly. Jeru would crouch down and pull both of the students to the floor if he did then that would certainly put them out of commission in the fight. But there's a pause as Jeru feels a tug in his head and his vision blurs for a moment but he sees and hears something. The cracking of skulls together as they fall towards the ground. Jeru's vision clears and he snaps right back to reality.

Not at all phased, Jeru throws both of the arms down with a flick of the wrist and delivers a simultaneous backhand punch to the skulls he just saw cracking. Hits from Jeru are never enough to injure someone, he's made sure of that, but can certainly keep someone down; the two students fall down and land on their backs.  

"Two opponents left," Jeru punches the air for show. "Would you like to stop here for today?" Jeru offers although the answer is predictable as always.

Another punch is thrown from the male student; it is quickly deflected when Jeru clashes his right forearm into their left and extends his arm sending the student's fist through empty space and to the side. The female student steps forwards with a hook. Jeru leans his head back, dodging the blow before another hook is thrown with the other arm; Jeru steps back to regain momentum as soon as possible. As soon as the next punch was about to be thrown, Jeru slams his fist down on her forearm and performs an uppercut to the girl's solar plexus.

At this point, the male student had regained his footing and attempted to sucker punch Jeru in the side of the head. Jeru bats away the fist with his forearm and uses his other hand to perform another uppercut to the girl's abdomen before switching targets and stepping on the boy's foot hard. He performs an open-palm strike to the child's chin, knocking him down for good. And turns back to the girl, whom is now holding her abdomen and breathing heavily, . Jeru slams her hands away from her stomach. No emotion in his eyes, he winds up for a final uppercut one hit left and this would be over.

And his vision blurs, all the students are one the floor. The girl has a few tears dropping from her eyes in pain and desperately gasping for breath whole clutching her abdomen and the the others are still on the floor in a daze. It would be satisfying, no one would be seriously hurt, at least not after a few weeks. He'd he'd help them up, they'd get back to his seats and behave. But that's not fair, not to him. No one really knows what these students go through each day. They didn't fight with the intent to harm. They didn't hurt him or even land to good blow.  (Though he silently acknowledges that he's a fairly big target) In a very real way, he would be placing more force than necessary. So his vision clears and he stops the strike just before it makes contact.

"Good attempt today," he gives a light smile and pats the girl on her shoulder, "Catch your breath slowly, deep breaths. " Jeru would turn to the rest of the class as Drea stands up.

 "And that will conclude would conclude our fight. A round of applause for our competitors." The entire class erupts in applause and Jeru gives a small bow before helping the fallen children stand.

[TWO MINUTES LATER]

"You're usually more silent and uptight, what's up today?" Jeru asks Drea with a smile from his seat.

"I don't know, I guess today feels like a special day."

Jeru would slightly smile at this, "I'm glad you're feeling a bit more outspoken, I think."

"You think... Interesting choice of words."

Jeru opens his mouth to speak but then quickly closes his mouth as a sense stops him. His shoulders tense as his heart races suddenly as he suddenly senses something. This had never happened before, being able to visualize the consequences of actions is one thing but now he feels something out of nowhere. It's ridiculous, surely this would have happened before. Nevertheless, he scans the room rapidly to confirm that there was nothing happening

"Woah, what's up?" Drea asks, surprised by the sudden change in attitude.

Nothing. There was nothing. But he still felt something. Jeru attempts to relax and turns to face Drea again, "...I guess nothing I thought I felt something but I guess no one-"

Jeru suddenly jerks up from his chair, almost tripping over his large bag as the room shakes violently as his attention turns to two things, his bag and the class.

"Alright class, you should know the drill but I'll explain it anyways!" Jeru yells over the rumbling walls and screams of the fallen, or in other words the student that were thrown out of their seats, as he crouches down and opens his bag. "Under the tables and hold on to them!"

Jeru quickly pulls out something from his bag; an item very dear to him; a brown teddy bear with red pearl-like stones for eyes. He's had it since he was small and didn't want to risk losing it. He dashed under his desk, crouching and grapples a table leg while holding the bear in his other arm. So this is what he felt, the tremors in the ground were just enough for him to feel. What he felt next, however, was beyond all logic.

Suddenly, his senses are crushing him. Adrenaline rushes through him as every nerve in his body flares with danger forcing him to let go of the table leg. He quickly scrambles from under the table with his bear as soon as he can. He turns around at the table just just in time to see a metric foot of concrete crash into it from above, crushing it completely. Shrapnel from the rubble burst out as Jeru covers his eyes with his free forearm. 

Jeru's attention is then shifted to the ceiling. Even while sitting and and shaking, not just because of the earthquake, Jeru can tell the ceiling is very thick, the sky isn't visible even though the ceiling has a giant gaping hole in the ceiling from where the rubble just fell. Even worse, there are cracks almost everywhere on the ceiling as well.

"It doesn't seem very stable," Jeru thinks; an obvious thought but he's still stunned from the near-death experience.

As soon as the thought leaves his mind, another block of rubble falls, smaller but probably still lethal.

"OH sh-" Jeru starts to move away in a random direction beforehand feels a strong tug on his shoulder, dragging him under the table.

"Holy-" Drea is interrupted as more shrapnel explodes from the rubble, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, thanks." Jeru rubs his forearm, which is bleeding badly from the shrapnel and scrambling around, to prevent it from becoming numb; at the same time he scans the classroom. Screams struggle and fear and rumbling of furniture and debris fill the air. One thing is immediately clear.

"We can't stay here," Jeru and Drea think out loud in sync.

Drea and Jeru lift the table to get a better view of the class and make it easier to be heard. It's difficult to stand but they keep their grip

"Alright class, new drill we'd usually delay this but we don't have time for that. If you have any objections shut up because then you're being dragged out by force! We're going to be running out of this classroom now because the ceiling will  not be holding up! If you can help it grab hold something above your heads to avoid instant death, stay together and thank for your co-operation!" Jeru doesn't hesitate. There's no waiting, there's no questioning, there's no room for objection, there's only pure power in his voice to carry over the noise. 

Children almost immediately dash out of the room to escape what could be their grave. Unfortunately, their class is the furthest from the door to outside. Children fall down and are stepped over, only to be picked up again to continue the cycle. All things considered, the class emptied out quickly. Jeru and Drea quickly grab their own bags to avoid holding the much heavier tables. Any other day and they'd have said the tables were LIGHTER. Jeru stuff his bear back into the bag, choosing it as a safer place for his item.

"Move forward to prevent traffic jams, I'll make sure that everyone leaves," Jeru tells Drea as they dash out of the door.

Drea responds with a grumble , never one to enjoy being ordered around even situations like this, but she obeys. Fortunately for Jeru, the classrooms were already in the process of clearing out, only needing to stay a bit behind everyone else to double-check the classes. The students that he fought a few minutes ago were warning the students in other classrooms. The classes were all mostly empty by the time Jeru had gotten to them, only needing a few seconds and words to get the remaining students and teachers out. Once Jeru was sure, he was the last person in the school, he ran out, almost. 

As soon as he was about five feet from the exit, the entire building crumbled down. He didn't die instantly but was immediately trapped in debris. Every nerve in his body felt the pain, not even get knocked out. Red liquid covered his eye as he tries to conserve his breath. Strangely enough, his bag had opened, dropping the bear on his head.

 "Well, I guess it's not that bad..."  

Then it all went black. And it stayed black for a good while. Then, there was a single flash of red and there was more dark. There was still rock and there was still pain. But the rock surrounded him a bit more openly.

[The Present]

His body was still in pain, he still didn't know where he was an somehow his senses seemed numbed. But he was still alive. He breathed a sigh, uncertain whether it was fear, relief or uncertainty. He somehow could still see to an extent despite the seeming lack of light but he stood up. He had noticed a single passage way when he had looked around, now he did the only stupid thing but only option he could thing of. He ventured through.

[hqmillioncorn]

A Memory is a Memory that isn't Mine

Babycorn sneezed, and then she sneezed again. The wind around her was so cold she was freezing her stupid horns off. Not to mention she was severely underdressed for being on the summit of a freezing mountain.  When had she even gotten here? The last thing she remembered was sneaking into the kitchen and grabbing a glass of chocolate milk with a side of an entire bag of dog treats.  Suddenly Babycorn had a realization. “OOooh I must be dreaming!” No duh.  She looked around. There was no one else near her. It was a pretty lonely mountain, except for the comfort of a freezing cold wind. “Hmm?” Babycorn looked down, at her feet was a small little plant remarkably shaped exactly like a moogle. Something in her told her that she needed to collect as many of these little plants as she could. Weird dream.  …That still didn’t explain why she was so cold. 

ffxiv write day 27: memory

dawntrail spoilers

on a fun little trip to eat some yummy food babycorn has a strange encounter with someone familiar and a stranger at the same time

Babycorn couldn’t remember where she used to live. Not that it really mattered at this point, her house was probably long gone considering how long it had been since then. Sometimes it would bother her but most of the time Babycorn was too busy to be thinking about lots of other things to be sad about it. 

That was the way to do it! To be so busy with other things that you had no time to be sad! It was genius to be honest, at least Babycorn thought so. 

Lately however, there were a few moments where Babycorn would find herself about the oddest things. 

Just the day before she had stared too hard at the pools of molten rocks in Urqopacha and felt a tug of sadness. The kind that felt like she was missing something, or someone. If she found herself trying to think of why she was feeling this way Babycorn would suddenly find herself losing herself in a storm of memories that didn’t belong to her. 

Ever since becoming a Starsinger her memories had been full of people she didn’t recognize but she still felt some sort of connection to them. A part of her missed them despite never meeting. 

At first Babycorn just figured these memories were just something that happened a long time ago to her and she had just forgotten. Or maybe–it was like her memory of what happened to her parents. Where her own mind had made up the lie that her parents had managed to make it out alive.

Whatever the case Babycorn didn’t worry about it too much. Not as long as she didn’t think about it too much, everything would be fine. 

And everything was fine, until a few weeks ago. 

Having just returned from Living Memory recently Babycorn decided she wanted to finally enjoy the vacation she had once ignorantly thought would be uninterrupted the day they arrived in Tural. Obviously that didn’t turn out to be the case but it was better late than never!

Now it was just time to sit back and relax on one of the chairs of Aunt Til’s tacooooos!!

Babycorn had never had a chance to try any of the tacos or anything from here so this was the very first place she had rushed to. Her and Cherrypit ordered everything on the menu. Twice! 

Of course they ate every single plate and Babycorn remembered how Lunya told her that she shouldn’t eat the plates at restaurants ‘Home plates only!’ is how Babycorn remembered her lecture and not ‘Please stop eating plates.’ Cherrypit also took this advice to heart but couldn’t help but take little bites off the plates.

As Babycorn continued to devour her food she noticed that Cherrypit was playing with the napkins in front of him. “Bebe! Bebe look at mine!” He was putting the napkins on top of his head, one over the other. He just kept going until there was a little pile of them on his head. “Look Bebe! Look! Me!” 

Babycorn giggled and added one of her napkins on top of Cherrypit’s head. Her little demon tail wiggled in happiness. “You’re real good at balancing those Cherry! I sure couldn’t do that!” This was a very true fact that even Babycorn knew was true. 

Cherrypit giggled and took a sip from his little sippy cup, full of soda and backwash. “Boo! Boo! Boo!” He put his arms in the air and turned his eyes a scary red color. 

He was scary enough to make Babycorn jump in her seat. “A-Are you a g-ghost…?!” There were a lot of things that scared her and one of those things were ghosts, the spirits of the undead. Especially if they were the kind of ghosts that sought out revenge against the living. 

Ever since she could remember she had been scared of them. “Cherryyyy!” Babycorn whined, “I told you not to scare me like that-! Ever since we explored that cave when we were kids and found that…that…?” Huh. That was weird. What was that? 

It was like the words had come out entirely on their own. They didn’t make sense. There was no cave near where her and Cherrypit had grown up. At least, not that she could remember…

…No! There definitely hadn’t been! She would have remembered! 

Not to mention that her and Cherrypit would have never been allowed anywhere near a cave with how protective their parents were. The farthest they had ever gone on their own was just a little bit outside the front door. 

And yet, when Babycorn really thought about it she had this clear image of her and Cherrypit exploring a cave. Him swinging a small hatchet around.Something that would and could happen but he just looked too big, not like a toddler. 

By now Cherrypit had noticed the worried look on his sister’s face. Also another big clue was that she had stopped eating. “Bebe? Okay?” Cherrypit didn’t really understand a lot of things yet but he did understand that sometimes something would be wrong with his sister. Her eyes would glow and she would stop talking for a long time. He didn’t like it when that happened. 

Babycorn heard Cherrypit’s voice and looked over to him. Something was wrong.

She wasn’t looking at her brother. She was looking at a stranger. His hair was brown just like Cherrypit’s but it was pretty clear that this was not a toddler–this was someone closer to her age. He was wearing green all over, albeit all a different shade. He also looked worried.

‘Chelinka don’t worry, okay?’ 

Babycorn blinked, “How do you know my name…?” She had never met this person before. How would he know? 

But at the same time Babycorn knew exactly who he was. 

“...Yuri?” 

There were so many memories in her head with him. It was hard to not know who he was. This was her brother, just another version of him. Normally it would be hard to wrap her head around a concept like that but after knowing she was just another version of a girl for more than half of her life it was pretty believable. 

Yuri let out a laugh. Babycorn recognized it, it was the same way Cherrypit laughed. ‘That’s me! Nice to meet you!’ Yuri paused, ‘Or I guess nice to see you again!’ Though technically they had just been talking a few seconds ago. 

…Or had they? That was Cherrypit but Cherrypit was Yuri too. Babycorn’s head hurt.

“I got lots of memories with you in them.” Babycorn admitted. Though Babycorn had no clear order of when certain memories happened she could sort of parse the difference between the ones where they were younger or older. “Are those people you traveled with doing okay? They seemed nice.” 

‘Do you mean Al, Meeth and Gnash?’

“Oh.” Well good news that Babycorn now had names to associate with the faces she didn’t recognize. “Yeah them!” 

‘They’re doing just fine! Al and Meeth still live in our village and Gnash comes and visits once in a while! And mama and papa they-’ Yuri stopped before he could continue, he had completely forgotten. ‘I-I’m sorry. I forgot that here your mama and papa are…’

Babycorn shrugged, “It’s okay. Honestly…it’s kinda nice hearing they’re okay somewhere out there.” Would she have preferred it to be her world? Of course. Always. But she had to take what she could get. 

There were lots of other memories that Babycorn wanted to ask about but if she did that they would be here all day. Instead she led with the most burning question she had. 

“Is there a reason I can’t remember anything after they killed papa…?” Everything after that fateful night to a random morning where she woke up as a twelve-year old was entirely a blank aside from a few hazy memories here and there. 

Yuri frowned, it wasn’t something he liked remembering much. ‘That was when you were sleeping. For a really long time.’ Everyday he would wake up and hope that that day would be the day that his sister would wake up. It was just the two of them back then and he had needed her back then more than ever. ‘But you woke up one day! And that was the best day of my life!’

Babycorn figured. The little memories she had from that time were just memories of Yuri talking to her as if she could say anything back. He would cook for her, clean the house and train the rest of the day to keep her safe. Yuri never left her side. “Thanks by the way. For taking care of me.” 

‘Anytime and anywhere.’ Yuri meant this with his whole heart. 

Babycorn could sense something in the air changing. Her time with Yuri was almost up. Well, at least with this version of her brother. There was one small thing she wanted to say, before it was too late. 

Babycorn took a deep breath. “I’m sorry you had to bury our papa by yourself…” At least she had Cherrypit with her when she did it. 

‘Hey…that wasn’t any of our faults. Especially not yours.’

He was right. “See you later then.” Babycorn waved at her other world version of her brother and the very next time she blinked her familiar baby brother was back in view. “Byeee Chewinka!” he was wiggling both his hands at her. 

“Wha-? Huh?” Babycorn was confused, she looked behind her to see if the ghostly form of Chelinka who she KNEW she couldn’t talk to anymore was somehow behind her. There was nothing there but a view of the ocean. “That’s weird…” 

Cherrypit giggled to himself.  His sister was so funny.

[foreverrogers]

bite the hand that feeds needs me

Pairing: sub!tasm!peter parker x f!reader

Summary: so maybe peter stops pulling his punches. and maybe he gets a little rageful, and a little bitter. and maybe sometimes he comes to you to repent.

Warnings: smut!!!!! 18+!!! unprotected sex, oral (f receiving), facesitting, choking, degredation kinda, sub/dom dynamics, safe word needs to be used, no reference to but strong allusion to gwen's death, solidly angsty undertones (happy ending), brief hurt/comfort

Words: 4.3k

A/N: based vaguely off of THAT nwh scene. i started this fic 2 months ago and now i truly don't know what to do with myself. cry? rejoice? stare at a wall for a couple hours? probably all of the above. full disclosure pretty sure this is the filthiest thing i have ever created so... enjoy ;)

i am apparently unable to name my fics anything other than lucy dacus songs, so title courtesy of bite the hand by boygenius

request something! masterlist

It's a rhythmic tap. Once, twice, and then a third in quick succession, matches the steady patter of rain against the metal of your fire escape and the concrete below.

"Morning, stranger."

You try to bring a lightness to it, even though you know just as well as he does that nothing good ever brings him to your window at 1am.

He tries, at least, gives you the faintest of smiles, already flushed and a little abashed as he haphazardly tosses his mask somewhere to the side.

Standing in your bedroom, Spider-Man is drenched to the bone. The tight spandex of his suit almost sags with it, starts to soak through your carpet where he stands, and the soggy flop of his hair would almost be cute if it weren't for that look in his eye. It's a look you're familiar with, all slanted lines and clouded eyes. Tonight, it's accompanied by a dark split in his lip and a blooming bruise at the peak of his cheekbone, sits right above the light scruff along his jaw.

He's still handsome despite it, maybe even a little because of it, a torturously beautiful boy with the saddest eyes you've ever seen who gets to be yours for a couple hours a week. In the back of your mind, you start the clock.

"You're bleeding." That's the second thing you notice, past the far-off expression, the dark crimson that's stained part of the blue fabric at his side. Your hand grazes the spot, notices the webbed material is still fully intact, lacks a scrape or a gash that would indicate a wound underneath.

Peter flinches at the contact, but not because it hurts. "It's not my blood."

You weren't naive. You had read the articles, witnessed through mugshots and secondary sources the steady decline of New York's friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man. He hadn't been so friendly, as of late, leaving bad guys with injuries that couldn't always be healed.

It doesn't stop the city from needing him, for abetting him, loving him out of necessity if nothing else.

You weren't naive. You knew the man you let into your bed— or at least you knew him better than most people could claim. You knew him well enough to know that being needed took its toll on him.

You try to read his eyes, are met only by a cold distance, a safe distance. It's something else you've gotten used to.

You try to counteract it, by any means, hand gentle on his cheek, careful not the brush over the dark bruise when you lean up to kiss him. "You sure you don't need anything?"

"Just you," He mumbles, hides it between kisses, slips an arm around your waist to tug you towards him.

Peter kisses you like kissing you is all he can do. There's something almost sombre about it, the knowledge that he comes to you to forget, to escape the numbness, to be someone without expectations.

Even still, you can't help the way being pressed against him like this makes you smile, mostly because this early in the night, before you've gotten into the worst of why he's here, he returns the gesture.

Peter presses curved lips to your jaw, trails down the column of your throat until you tilt your head to the side. "What'cha smiling about?"

"Nothing," You breathe, and now your arms are sliding around his neck, a hand tangled loosely in the damp strands of his hair. There's a pinch at the crook of your neck, a quick nip to pull out the truth. "Just missed you, 's all. Didn't think I would see you this week."

Peter's biting the inside of his lip when he pulls back to look at you, the perpetual crease between his eyebrows a little deeper than it had been before. You should have known better by now than to bring feelings into this, even if it was as simple as an I missed you. You knew you had no entitlement to his time, to the rarity and the beauty of this boy who always retreats back into himself when you reach too close. If he felt that way about you, he would have told you his name.

He's trying to look for something to say, and so you say it for him. "Forget I said anything," You smile, shake your head, try to draw him back out, and when your lips find his again it's deeper, heavier, gives him a taste of what he's here for. "Just c'mere."

The dampness of his suit has already soaked through the front of your pyjamas, so when you settle him onto the bed and climb into his lap your shirt is the first thing the go.

The webbed fabric is rough along your skin, hands at your waist pressing you close. Your own hands slip underneath the hem of his suit, tug and roll it up just enough so you can feel bare skin against your fingertips, heat rising through the dampness.

Peter does the rest of the work, peels off the top of his suit until there's nothing but warm, taut muscle under you. Your hands travel the rest of the way up, take their time lingering until one slips loosely around his throat.

The position forces him to tilt his head up, open towards you.

"This what you want?" You ask, don't need the gentle nod he gives to know the answer. This is always what he wants. This is why he comes here, to give the power to someone else for a night, to feel it sting like a soft hand wrapped firmly around his throat, to repent for the things that overtake him.

You can feel him beneath you, breathing heavy and straining through the tightness of his pants, and so you bring your free hand down to press your palm against the growing bulge.

"Do you remember the safeword?" Is your second question, and your tone has changed in an instant, talk down to him in that way you know he craves.

"Red," He mutters, too far gone in studying your face to think about it too hard. He tries to kiss you then, leans in and finds himself stopped by the tightening of your hand around his throat. There's a thrum of a quiet moan underneath your hold, the twitch of pressure beneath your other hand.

"And if it's too much?" You give a light squeeze to demonstrate, feel the three taps, rhythmic, in quick succession against your hand. "Good boy."

He worships you like this. You, bare and willing and kind, always kind, even with a hand wrapped around his throat. You, who makes the most of the little he gives you and still manages to make him forget, who never asks questions, who gives everything you have to this man who needs you.

Your hand is at the waist of his suit now, slipping under to graze the hair that graces his lower abdomen, yet to dip low enough to find the place he needs you the most.

"Have you been good for me this week, sweetheart?" He shakes his head, gasps at the feeling of you taking him in your hand, mouth hanging in a perfect gape. "Is that right? Do you need to be punished?"

"Need to be punished," He whispers, tries to use the limited leeway the stretch of his suit gives to buck up into your hand.

You tsk, bite your lip as the withdrawal of your hand earns a heady whine from the back of his throat. "What would people think if they saw you like this? Spider-Man powerless, all needy for me." You're barely touching him now, fingertips light brushing against the clothed bulge of him as you palm him through his suit. And then your leaning in, lips brushing just over his. "Pathetic."

There's a rush of warm breath against your lips, a long-held breath released. When he tries to kiss you this time you let him, taste his desperation in the eagerness of it.

You hum in approval when you pull away, hand at his neck slowly sliding up until you have a firm grasp of his chin. "Why don't you start by letting me ruin this pretty face?"

He nods, seems too busy staring at your lips and leaning forward to catch them in another short, heated kiss to convey anything intelligible.

"Need you to say yes for me, honey."

"Yes," He mutters, hot and breathy. "Please."

"There you go. Good boy," You smile, hands on his shoulders now, urging him down. "Lie down for me, sweetheart."

You kneel up as he slides his way down your headboard, head against the pillow as you shuffle out of your panties.

His hands are on you as soon as you're bare to him, soft at first, so carefully slip up the sides of your thighs before resting at the small of your back. The look in his eyes asks permission, asks to grip harder and guide you up until your cunt is only inches away from his mouth, and you're all too happy to nod your approval.

Peter doesn't believe he's a good person, but if he can't be good the least he can do is make you feel good, dedicate himself to this one cause that could never be bad.

Sinful, maybe, but not bad. There could never be anything bad about the way your body reacts to his mouth, hot and hungry and unrelenting as his tongue slides firmly over your clit. You're not afraid to rock against him, circle your hips as you chase that high, the one that seems to push you higher and higher every time you're together, sends you falling with the same heat as a meteor burning through the stratosphere.

Peter's been dedicated to your pleasure for long enough that he already knows your body like the back of his hand, your inner workings admired and mastered, knows just what to do with his tongue and his lips and his grip to have your legs shaking around him.

He knows the cues, too, knows that your fingers tangling through his hair and your shallow gasps and the flexing of your thighs tightly around his face means you're close.

It's times like this that he wishes he had the nerve to tell you his name. Because the mask⁠—sure, the mask had been a fluke⁠, but the sound of you moaning his name as you cum might actually be the thing he would risk it all for.

For now, he settles for the string of profanities that resonate around the room as you tremble in his hands. You're proof that he can still put them to good use, his hands, that they're still capable of more than just rage, that they can still pull something beautiful out of you.

And it is beautiful here, what you create together, even if it's raw, greedy, rough around the edges.

You're breathing heavily above him, kneeling back up onto shaky legs. He leans up on one elbow as you slowly slide down his chest, settling firmly back in his lap.

He's even harder than he was before, if that's possible, can almost feel him aching where he presses up into you and soaks a dark patch into his suit.

You laugh a little when you look at him, at the mess that slips down his chin, breathe it into a sigh as you fight your way through the haze of your orgasm. "'s impossible," You start, smiling, lean forward with one hand on his chest as you wipe his bottom lip dry with two fingers. "You're even prettier now."

He opens his mouth, expectant of your next move, can't help the strangled moan that slips from his lips as you sit back and place the digits onto your own tongue. It tastes like him, and like you, like sweat and sin. "Y/n..."

You smile again, release your fingers with a strong pop before licking your lips, seemingly satisfied by his reaction. "Go on, Spidey. Tell me what you want."

"Want you to fuck me."

"Oh, yeah?" His boldness only spurs you on, has you leaning forward so you can wrap your hand lightly over his throat, use the leverage to tilt his face to the side and kiss along his jaw. "Want it rough?" A quick nip, a blooming love bite soon soothed by the heat of your tongue. You tighten your grip just a little, just because you can, slip down so he can feel warm breath against his ear when you speak. "Want me to use you?"

"Please," He breathes, looks just as far gone as he sounds when you pull away to smirk at him.

"Well, since you asked so nicely... C'mere and help me take this off." He doesn't need to be asked twice, sits up and catches you in a kiss so quickly it makes you gasp, melts into a giggle once you lean into it. One arm around your waist, his other hand helps you drag down the bottom of his suit, pulls away his boxers in the same struggled movement.

When you're both finally bare a hand resting on his chest pushes him flat onto the mattress, and you bite your lip as you slowly slip it down, nails grazing tantalizingly lightly down his stomach until he's sitting heavy in your hand.

"Y/n," He mewls, the second whine of your name in a matter of minutes, and the way the sound makes your walls flutter around nothing is enough for you to give up on any further teasing you had planned.

"I like it when you beg," You mutter, and then you're kneeling again, settling yourself in the right position so you can sink onto his cock in one achingly slow motion.

Peter fills you up like nothing else ever can, just makes you miss him even more on nights with just you and your fingers and memories of these fleeting entanglements, the way he moulds against you and so easily finds those spots you can never reach.

"Fuck, always feel so good, honey." You savour it all, the stretch and the heat, didn't realise you had closed your eyes until your opening them to see that slack expression on his face.

A gasp makes his mouth fall agape with the first movement of your hips, the tight pinch of his eyebrows as you start to rock against him.

There's still something missing, though, an element of your arrangement you seem to forget until he's slipping his hand over the one still resting on his chest, urging it upward with a light pressure.

The movement of your hips picks up at the reminder, makes him tighten his grip on your hip with a strangled moan that's soon cut off by your hand slotting over his neck. It still turns you on, after all this time, that you're the one person that gets to see him like this, the vulnerability in each movement and each reaction.

Peter's a different person when he's with you. With what he wants, what he asks for, he thinks he's worse. But he also thinks you might make him better.

But it's thinking like that which encroaches on dangerous territory for Peter, like he might try to start scaling the walls he built up for his own good, makes him chase the one thing he knows can drown out thoughts too dangerous to indulge.

His hand is back over yours, but around his throat this time, forces you to tighten your grip while his other hand encourages the rocking of your body.

"Hey, just loosen up a little, okay?" Peter doesn't seem to hear you, presses and presses and squeezes your hand so tightly around his throat that it starts to hurt. You can tell that it's hurting him, too, that the pain is what he's looking for, eyebrows pinched together and a deep red flush blooming across his face. You try to pull away, but his grip is too strong. "Just- Spidey, stop, you're hurting me, just- Red!"

You're so lost in the searing pleasure of it all that you don't notice that he hasn't let go until it stings, until the pressure compressing your hand against his throat starts to throb.

It seems to finally snap him out of it, lets his hand fall away and you withdraw your own as soon as you can.

He sits up lightning-fast, gasps at the sudden access to airflow as he rubs at his throat, hadn't realised how long it had been since he'd taken a breath. He tries to speak, finds only a sharp cough there.

His lap is empty, feels the dip of the mattress and the warmth of you at his side, an arm wrapped firmly around his shoulders as he brings his knees up to his chest. "Hey," You whisper, movement of your hand soothing, gently rubbing back and forth along his bicep. "It's okay, you're okay."

"I'm sorry... Fuck, I'm sorry, I didn't-" He looks at you, finally, and you meet him with so much concern in your eyes it cuts him off. "I didn't mean to hurt you."

You feel the drop, the heaviness of your heart sinking to your stomach, faced so closely by that broken look in his eye, the guilt there, the remorse. "You didn't hurt me, it's- Hey." Peter's dipped his head, and you bring both hands up to cup his face, bring his eyes back to yours. You have to take a moment to swallow the lump in your throat. "I know that you don't... Come here to talk about things. But if you ever do... Want to. Just know that I want to listen."

The twist is a slow one, the pinch of his eyebrows and his deep-set frown and the clench of his jaw, and you think you might see the prick of tears gathering in the corner of his eyes before he's digging his face into the crook of your neck, sturdy arms wrapped around you.

You've never hugged before.

Above everything you've done together, seen the glimmering worst of each other and felt the pain and the pleasure of it as one, this might be the most intimate moment you've ever had.

Peter breathes you in, deep, shuddering breaths against the warmth of you skin, and you hold him just as tightly as he's holding you. Like you never want to let go. Like this is what you're bodies we made for, to slot together like this.

Peter thinks it's dangerous how familiar you feel, overwhelms his senses with a soothing warmth. He thinks it's dangerous how he wants to keep this feeling, the comfort over the pain, how he wants to stay.

"I should go."

Peter's pulling away, in every sense of the phrase, refuses to look at you as he untangles your limbs. "Hey," You start, catch lightly at his wrist, makes him look down at the contact before he's meeting your eyes. "Why don't you stay tonight?"

He sighs, dips his head back down and swallows, thinks if he looks at you you'll see how much he wants to say yes.

Your hand is still on his wrist, anchoring him, keeping him from dispersing into the night, everywhere and nowhere and lingering in your walls like smoke. "We don't have to do anything, or say anything, we can just-" You let go, let your hand cup his cheek and bring his gaze back up to yours. "I don't want you to be alone tonight."

Peter looks at you, at the way you're looking at him, and feels like he's being ripped apart from the inside, tugged in two different directions, both equally wrong, both equally essential, like the repulsion of two polar forces.

There's a tipping point there, though, somewhere in the depths of your worried eyes, one that makes the decision for him before he can think about the consequences.

-----

Peter has never been this comfortable in his life.

The late morning sun paints everything in a bright yellow, a hazy cellophane filter as he takes in his surroundings. Your room looks different in the light of day, no more shadows melting everything into an amalgamation of vague shapes in the dark.

And then there's you, wrapped around him, a puzzle piece slotted firmly into his side, warms him through with a blooming ache at every contact of bare skin. Nothing could have prepared him for the sight of you in the sunlight.

You don't open your eyes, simply feel the steadiness of his chest under your arm and nuzzle deeper into his side. "You stayed."

Peter smiles down at you, can't help it, slowly grazes a finger over your cheek. "Thank you for letting me." And it's sincere, the gratitude in his voice.

You shift slowly then, try to lean against his chest and squint up at him. "Fuck, it's bright," You mutter, close your eyes and dip your head to escape the light.

He laughs, music to your ears, a steady rumble you can feel through his whole body. You can't remember the last time you heard him laugh.

You're a little more successful when you look back up at him, match the faint remnants of a smile you find on his face. For a moment, you let yourself bask in the image of him, bright and smiling and warm in your arms. When you remember the events of the night before, it's unwillingly. "Do you want to talk about last night, or..."

Peter sighs, the sinking of his chest beneath you, closes his eyes as he lets his head fall back to the pillow.

"Hey, we don't have to," You attempt, prop yourself up against his chest, splayed hand resting over his heart steadying, makes him tilt his head against the pillow to look at you. You smile at him. "We could talk about... The weather, or... Crime? Or..."

There's a steady rumble under you body, the deep growl of Peter's stomach.

"Breakfast?"

Peter grins at you. As in, smiles with his whole face, all crinkling eyes and dimples and teeth, and it makes your heart ache so much you have to stop looking at him, lean up and kiss that stupidly beautiful grin off of his stupidly beautiful face.

You stay like that for a long moment, savouring this newfound gentleness. He doesn't feel so much like smoke in your hands anymore, constantly on the verge of slipping away. He feels a little more corporeal under your touch, like maybe it was your touch that was keeping him solid in the first place. "I'll go get breakfast ready."

You smile at him, pull away as you sit up and move towards the edge of the bed. But Peter doesn't want to let you go just yet, even if you're only threatening to walk a couple feet into your kitchen, isn't willing to go back to existing discretely like you had before. "Hey," He starts, voice soft and fond, still a little laden with sleep as he catches your wrist. You turn back to him, give him this wide, expectant expression as you wait for him to continue that almost melts him on the spot. "You're too nice to me, you know. I don't deserve it."

You sigh, shuffle back towards him so you can cup his cheek in your hand. "Yes, you do," You say, matter of fact, lean close to look him right in the eye, make sure he understands just what you're trying to tell him. "Everybody deserves a little kindness sometimes, Spidey."

"Peter," He corrects, lets it hang in the air for a moment, wraps around the silence of your surprised expression. "Parker. My name's Peter."

It's a bridge, you think. A broken one, built up with planks others had ripped away long before you met him, but it's a bridge nonetheless, and he's offered it to you willingly, hopefully. It's not a bridge the whole way there, but you think it might just be enough to jump to the other side. You smile at him, watch him sit up as you hold out your hand. "It's nice to finally meet you, Peter."

You're aware of it, in the back of your mind, that you're two half-naked people in your bed shaking hands. But right beside that thought is the clock you started as soon as he crawled through your window, marks almost ten hours and counting. The most you had ever gotten out of him before was three.

His eyebrows are pinched together when he looks at you, a sullen expression you're used to. His voice is small when he speaks. "I don't know if I believe that."

Neither of you pulls away, warmth of bare skin against bare skin, and so you let your joined hands fall to the mattress beneath you. You watch him look down, to where he's started rubbing his thumb back and forth over the back of your hand. "You're a good person, you know?"

"It doesn't matter if you believe it." You shake your head, give him a resigned shrug and surprise him by smiling, wide and bright and maybe just a little bit convincing. You kneel up then, still smiling, still shaking your head as you crawl into his lap. His face is in your hands. "Because I believe it. And I can believe it enough for the both of us... For now... If you're willing to let me. If you're willing to let me show you how good you are."

There's something in his eyes you can't quite place as he looks up at you. It's something new, all quiet and adoring, almost reverential, awestruck and awe-inspiring all at once. It's something you could get used to, you think, finding all the different ways Peter Parker could be utterly beautiful. "Okay," He whispers, like he believes it.

"Good," You breathe, nod, smile into the soft kiss you offer him. "After breakfast."

request something! masterlist

[cynettic]

hi, i hope i'm not bothering you, but i can order a Scaramouche × Kitsune reader, the two met before the vision hunt (and before he was a fatui if you want) the reader was always in the same place, sometimes having a conversation , the good old routine, but with the hunting of visions the reader disappeared not wanting to give up his own vision, and years later a reunion, SFW or NSFW is by your will, thank you, I really admire your work

Summary - Scaramouche met you as a child, growing up with the constant assurance that you would be right there, sitting at your spot where he could meet you with every visit. He isn't happy when you suddenly disappear.

Pairing - Kitsune!Reader x Yan!Scaramouche

Warning - Slight Yandere warnings?

Penpal - Ahhh- hope this is what you were looking for. I couldn't find a spot to put much nsfw unless I considered writing more for the series ( I could, just put a request in if thats what you’re looking for ). But I hope you liked it!! You're not bothering me at all and I'm glad you like my work!

A/N - Alright- so considering that with the 2.1 update with Scaramouche coming in, I just wanna state beforehand that I wrote this prior so I dont know if we learn about his backstory or anything!!

Link for Part 2

Stay With Me

Scaramouche was used to the routine he’d found himself going along with every visit to Inazuma. As a child he’d pass through the wild fields that stretched just beside his hometown, adventurous and curious with all the tenacity of a child.

And of course you, a kitsune that sat perched on the ground awaiting the Kitsune Saiguu, was bound to notice him. Unlike the other earth kitsune statues, you hadnt turned to stone during your wait. Instead, staying in the same place did you interact with travellers and the locals, which included Scaramouche.

“Fox person!” The little boy chanted, pulling at the hems of your clothing. Bright blue eyes bore into your own, and you slowly shifted your head to pay attention to the boy who was on the verge of bouncing on you.

Humming in reply to his excitement, the little boy paused, both of his small hands still tightly clasping the fabric of your clothes. Soft matted hair brushed past his face in a messy manner, calling out the boy for his boundless running and rebellious urge to keep his hair messy despite his parents wishes.

“Play with me!”

Staring at the boy only a moment longer, you simply chuckled at his antics. “I’m afraid I cannot move from the spot in which I dwell~ Perhaps I’ll be able to entertain you if you bring cards?”

But the young boy had made up his mind at the statement to which you couldn't move. A pitiful frown enfluged his face as he cast you the nastiest glare a five year old could muster. “Boring!” He shouted into the distance of the fields, dramatically turning on his heels and bouncing up into a sprint away. You watched his small figure fade away into the background, absentmindedly sighing and returning to your mindless thoughts.

As a child, Scaramouche would pass by you fairly often. Frequent when he asked you to play with him, and storming away with the same expression when you denied him. Nothing out of the ordinary, you’d lived for an exceptional amount of time, and even though grumpy children were not your specialty, you’d grown accustomed to their behaviour.

Growing up, Scaramouche got no better. You soon noticed his violent tendencies before they became an issue, the way the children shied away from him when playing Temari. Hiding in front of a tough exterior, he scared them away and laughed, approaching you later with tearful sob.

“Will you play with me?” He asked again, trying to hide the fact that he still wept when the other children pushed him away.

But your answer stayed the same, helping him wipe his tears and coaxing him into your arms. Not the first time you’d made contact with a human, but the first time you held them in such an affectionate manner.

It was clear Scaramouche was beginning to see you as some sort of pillar of reassurance when he began running away from home to simply ask to be held. You always welcomed him with open arms, urging him to head back to his household and sort things out. There was no harm in simply providing love and comfort for a child who received none was there?

“Now now, hurry back home little one. Your parents must be growing awfully worried if you’re out by this time at night.”

“My parents dont care about me!”

Darkness slowly pooled into the fields, an obscure shade covering the two of you from the tree you were under. Biting back form your normal emotionless statements, you pondered for something to soothe and convince the boy. Misunderstandings and hardships were normal from what youd seen with children, and you could only offer your hand on his shoulder, a promise. “Go back, I promise to stay here if anything further happens. But you shold give them another chance dont you think?”

And so he’d sprint back to his hometown, and you wouldnt hear from him again till he ran up right up to you a few days later. Begging you to play a game with him. The normal you supposed, and with a grin that seemed to stretch wider with every day, you told him the same thing you told him every single time.

“You cant move?!” Scaramouche nearly yelled one time, tiny fists curling at his side. “Thats… thats stupid!”

“It is isnt it?” You only smiled in response.

Unsatisfied with your response, he clawed your arm, pulling you with all his might. Strong, you realized with surprise that he was much stronger than most children his age. Easy enough to tug away from, but strong enough to take you off guard.

Snapping your hand back to your side, you narrowed your eyes. You weren't angry… no, you hadnt felt strong feelings like that after the disappearance of the Kitsune Saiguu. “Do not attempt to move me,” was your curt response, said in the most stern voice you’d used with the boy.

He’d looked at you only a few seconds longer before bursting into tears, turning away and running. You didn't feel regretful for defending yourself, only turning once more with a tired sigh to stare at the distance.

But just as you stayed ageless, Scaramouche grew older. Still, crossing each others pass was inevitable when you sat in the plains, just alongside the path that lead to his hometown.

With a permanent scowl that seemed to stain his face, he still seemed to have mature a tad bit. Maybe hadnt improved in the social department, because he now scared children and adults and alike, but more mature…

“Hm? Whats this?”

Once again, sitting criss cross under the large tree that provided the perfect shade on sunny days, you stared at the boy expectantly. His hands hesitated at your question, but he resumed shuffling. “Cards,” he simply said in response.

A small featherlike feeling flitted across your chest, making you feel lighter and… almost ticklish. A small smile crossed your face, and you recognized the emotion to be one of adoration. For him to have remembered words you’d spoken years ago, it gave you a warmth you’d sorely missed. A warmth akin to watching him and the other children grow up.

“Ew, dont smile like that, its creepy.”

Swatting at his head, he frowned further when you laughed. “You’re more mature,” you pointed out, lazily leaning back. “You need to work on your people skills though, as someone who hasnt moved in years, thats pitiful that I know more than you.”

“Shut it!”

But as he grew up, you hardly got to see much of him. He’d reached your height and then fully disappeared, leaving no goodbye. And much as you hated to admit it, you hardly noticed, not when days passed in a flurry. You were used to being by yourself, entertaining the kids and greeting the people that passed by.

Sometimes, there’d be the reminder of the warmth he’d given you. But it was quickly overshadowed by your duty to remain seated in wait for the Kitsune Saiguu. A dedication kept in its earnest, but beginning to dwindle.

Inazuma was beginning to change.

“The vision decree…” you repeated, staring at the traveller who’d mentioned it to you. “Care to elaborate?”

The new archon threatenening to take away visions from every inhabitant of Inazuma. It was preposterous, so much that you didnt move. Your vision meant the world to you, but so did the Kitsune Saiguu. You werent sure just how you weighed the two till you saw civilians passing by you, ones you recognized, ones that didnt recognize themselves.

It was snowing, cold snowflakes melting into your skin while your hair soaked in the water. Unflinching, you hummed to a little tune, awaiting someone to pass you so that you could attempt to strike a conversation of somesort. The unnatural weather distanced all who entered the field though, and you simply waited. For the Kitsune Saiguu, for someone, or for some form of entertainment, you didnt know. You Slowly closing your eyes, you decided not to care.

“Im gone for five years and you’re still sitting here like a dumbass.”

Eyes snapping open, you find yourself face to face with a complete stranger. Dark purple hair with dark blue eyes, piercing and dangerous in a way you dont recognize at all. Fancy clothing that you cant identify or put a name on.

The boy took a step towards you, crouching down to stare at you directly. His eyes scanned over your figure briefly, and he brushed the snow out of your hair and ears with one flick of his hand. In the next, he was offering a coat to you. “Take it, you’re probably getting cold.”

You leaned forward, ignoring the coat he offered you. Gently, you raised your hand to brush the hair from his eyes, centred on the way his pupils widened. Offering a small moment of surprise and one glimpse into the small childlike blue eyed wonder he was. “Kiddo,” you breathed, pulling your hand back and scanning him once again. “You’ve grown.”

“And you havent.”

Snickering at his comment, you took the coat. You didnt need it, but he looked like he didnt either. He was already wearing clothing that kept him warm, and with careful observation and an untouched coat, you settled on the fact that he’d brought it here. Brought the coat here for you.

“Still havent improved with those social skills of yours have you?”

He scoffed, letting himself fall back till he was sitting fully. “I dont want to hear it from someone who refuses to move an inch for years. Lazy ass.”

You open your mouth to retort, but instead laugh at his comment, shaking your head. “Gained some humour on your journeys have you? Bad words too it seems. Anyways...” He had sat down, which meant that he meant fully well to sit, chat, and catch up. That familiar warmth filled your chest, a contrast between the cold snow. “Welcome back.”

It wasnt often that Scaramouche visited Inazuma, but when he did, he was sure to visit you. The two of you would sit down for hours, talking about the most trivial topics. He never mentioned what he did in his time away, and you never asked.

But things began to go downhill when news of the vision decree finally took action.

“Its no joke anymore! The Raiden Shogun has taken custody of almost a hundred visions!”

In that moment you made your decision, weighing your vision over the Kitsune Saiguu. Awfully selfish you knew, but you’d spent decades sitting there in wait.

And for the first time you sat up from your position on the ground, clumsily stumbling upright but gaining balance. It takes a few steps until you’re back to normal, and you begin your journey in order to escape the Raiden Shogun’s vision hunt decree.

_-_-_-_

You didnt expect to see him again.

Long grass tickled at the skin of your legs, making you adjust your footing to no avail. Sun slowly descending past the mountains to mark the start of an evening and the soon approaching night. A normal day of exploring the mountains and islands of Inazuma, observing the constant changing situation, and running away from the vision decree like a favourite past-time.

With the exception of a firm grip on your wrist.

Dark purple like hair, same hate brimmed eyes and lavish clothing. You recognized Scaramouche the moment he had appeared, looking just as surprised as you were. That being before he snatched your wrist and snarled, “You.”

You wouldve considered it pure luck to find him, an unexpected reunion with someone you actually remembered. But no, his tone had some predatorial edge to it that had you cringing. Hard. “Yes, its me.” You answered back with a frown, trying to loosen his hold. “Nice to see you too, is something the matter?”

He only seemed confused at your words, pulling you closer.

“Something the matter?” He asked as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Well, to start, you’re not sitting at your damn spot.”

Taken aback for a moment, you wondered if that sole fact was what drove the boy to such lengths. Surely he couldn't be so troubled over the fact that you moved… “The vision hunt decree, I'm sure I mentioned that I was sticking around in wait for the Kitsune Saiguu. I decided to wander around and avoid the conflict until I could settle back.”

“You could’ve waited for me,” he stated almost instantly. “I could have protected you.”

You felt your brows furrow quizzically. “Wait for you? Why in the world would I-”

“Why wouldn't I?” He pushed you closer till he could fully grab both wrists, taking a step closer as if his words would resonate clearer in your head. “You took care of me as a child, it would only be fair for me to repay the favour.” But he only seemed to be looking for excuses. “And besides, you can't just up and leave… I didn't know.”

Before you could interject with the obvious answer that he didn't need to know, you stopped. You’d lived decades, nearly centuries if you’d kept count, and you had learned to read people's expressions even when you’d stayed away from them for so long. He didn't know. It hit you in the most unpleasant way that he wasn't aware that it was none of his concern. To him, you were just another thing he needed to keep track of, something he had control over. His face basically screamed, ‘I depended on you to stay in that place.’

Deep breath in and out. You’d lived long, longer than him, you could deal with a child throwing a tantrum.

“Don't worry,” you gestured to the vision ta your side. “I'm strong enough to protect myself, I appreciate your concern, but I’ll be back when the vision decree ends.”

Unconvinced, he pulled you closer, just until your faces were mere inches away from each other. “No,” he said in a stern voice. “I’d rather you by my side, where I can protect you. I hate to question what you’re capable of, but you’ve been sitting down for as long as I’ve known you for.”

“I’ve lived decades more than you,” a simple reply, hopefully enough to get by him. You snatched your hands back with ease, ears flinching slightly when a cold breeze swept past you. But you stayed firm, not wanting to look vulnerable against the imposing air he had around him.

Still unconvinced. “You’re coming with me.”

“No I’m not.”

You’d known him as a kid, watched him grow up along with all the other small ones in his hometown. And maybe you admit you cared a smudge bit about the warmth he gave you when settling down to play cards, but he was different. He had changed in the worst way and you weren't about to deal with it.

“So you’re not coming with me voluntarily?” He asked softly, taking a small step to which you responded by stepping back. He had his hands up, as if telling you he wouldn't hurt you. But the way he said voluntarily sent shivers up your spine.

“No.” Hand on your vision, you held your own hand up threateningly.

He took his time when tilting his head, taking a deep breath in, and then appearing in front of you in just a short stride. Too quick to react, you hesitated before you could attack him. You didn't want to hurt him, he was still a child in your eyes, and you paid the consequences for that. He slid his hand just along your neck, and a jolt of electricity seemed to thrum inside you just as you collapsed in his arms.

Scaramouche was quick to catch you, hoisting you up into his arms dearly. “I do hope you’ll come to understand,” he said softly, cradling your unconscious form in his arms. Making sure not to crush your tail when carrying your legs, he looked past the mountains, sigh resting on his lips.

Because Scaramouche liked to have control of the things he held dear. Like keeping all your valuables neat and tidy in a closet, he was happy knowing you were safe and stable in that spot you always sat on.

And he couldn't have you moving could he?