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allforhee · 2 months ago

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— 𝐈𝐓'𝐒 𝐀 𝐂𝐑𝐈𝐒𝐈𝐒! (ONESHOT) | LEE HEESEUNG

୨୧ pairing — secretary-general!lee heeseung x delegate!fem!reader

synopsis: decelis high's academic weapon, future valedictorian, model un prodigy especially in the crisis council, and top-notch secretary-general of the mun club, lee heeseung has it all. from earning constant "best delegate-s" left and right, no one dared to go against his stances in any debate. until a student like you transfers into decelis high. as a soon graduating senior, you were a newbie to press. but with your endless love for writing, you'd managed to steal the hearts of your peers. it was your first mun, and you didn't expect much. but when heeseung finds out about an article you've wrote about his arrogant performance in a recent committee session, he is set to strike you down.

୨୧ genre — kinda angsty but with happy ending, high school au, secgen/crisis delegate!heeseung x press delegate!reader, academic rivals to lovers, dumbasses in denial, a brief moment of rivals in public but lovers in secret, one sided rivalry

୨୧ warnings — a lot of model un terms (hope you guys can understand), cursing, hurt no comfort, heeseung highkey hates reader, reader is a bit feisty and could care less but she lowkey has parental issues, featuring all the other enhypen members, aespa's winter aka minjeong, txt's yeonjun and beomgyu, stray kids’ i.n, gidle's shuhua, and ive's wonyoung, one bed trope, forced proximity

୨୧ word count — 13.3k (not proofread, but will slowly edit/make changes to tiny minor mistakes found)

୨୧ author's note — dear readers, i'm back from a long overdue hiatus with a new layout and theme! this fic is long as HELL i didn't expect it to reach this long omg. i also changed up a couple details so it will be quite different from the teaser! i’m so sorry for the long overdue wait, senior year of high school has been so hectic, and i’ve been finally able to finish this so enjoy :) omg holy shit y’all are finally reading my full length fic i’ve been harboring since what? february?

𝐋𝐄𝐄 𝐇𝐄𝐄𝐒𝐄𝐔𝐍𝐆 had it all.

the walls of his room were littered with delegate lanyards from conferences across the globe, "best delegate" certificates framed all over his house (and a couple crumpled up inside his desk to fit the space), and a collection of trophies stood in every nook and cranny.

no one at decelis high dared to go against his stance. whenever it was, whether it was a moderated caucus or unmoderated, he'd always have his country or character's placard raised high, ready to speak, or leading whatever bloc was being formed.

there was no doubt that no one had ever beat him. it was no doubt that he was decelis high's mun club's secretary-general, and those who chose to go against him either got crushed in fear or knew when to step back.

even with his "best delegate" status, he wouldn't have gone far without his best mates, park jongseong, sim jaeyun, and park sunghoon.

park jongseong or jay, most known for his cold stares in the debate room, ready to make a delegate tremble, would always chair crisis. he was decelis high's deputy secretary-general alongside heeseung. and although being heeseung's best mate, he never favored him when it came to awarding. it's just that he was naturally talented.

sim jaeyun, known for his popular slogan around the school; "jake it till you make it!", was the strongest when it came to knowing what a country or character believed in. his research skills were like a pirate on the hunt for lost treasure, he had all the facts, the data, and the proof to back up any stance. whatever heeseung needed to know, jake already had his back.

and park sunghoon. even though he was the quiet one of the bunch, his position papers never ceased to appeal to any chair. even if he wasn't as strong in speaking out during committee sessions, his fingers were his weapon. the guys would always ask him why'd he chair press and not join in the heat with them, he'd always answer with "my words are stronger than my actions." where jay would always respond with "isn't that the other way around bud?"

the four were unstoppable when it came to model un. lee heeseung was unstoppable. he was. until you came along.

you were quiet at first. everyone just saw you as the new girl who transferred for her senior year. nobody cared. until decelis high's annual mun conference, which happened to take place a couple weeks after the first day of school.

students from all over the country gathered at decelis high once a year to join in on the fun. various councils were presented at decelis mun, from heeseung's favorite council, crisis, and multiple others like unhrc, who, unsc, disec, unicef, and your favorite, press.

without a doubt, you registered yourself for press, opting that you didn't have the guts to join any other council. you feared you'd tremble listening to another delegate question your stances and ideologies.

your parents would always encourage your writing. as a child, you loved to write little imaginary stories about your life as a princess. writing stories about the love you've seen in your parents, you were set to write a book. but when your mom passed away a few weeks before your senior year of high school, and your dad constantly traveling for work, you had resorted yourself to watching the news all summer long, spiking your interest in being a journalist, where all you had to do was report whatever was going on, spit out what had to be said, and done. you didn't need to think long and hard on what your character was supposed to do next to support the storyline, no opinions, no biases.

as you stepped into your assigned council's room, you felt a gush of wind. the nervousness had gotten to you more, seeing all the socially bright journalists with their laptops open and chatting amongst each other happily.

"hi! you're a new face! oh and you're cnn! me and you will be best buddies! bbc here!" a girl squeals, she has a bright smile and a oh-so friendly demeanor. no doubt a popular trait amongst the press council.

"minjeong! don't scare her off. we're so sorry, she sometimes comes off a bit too much to new people. i'm wonyoung, the co-chair for press." she introduces herself.

"oh, hello. i'm y/n. i just transferred to decelis this year. it's my first time at press." you smile. you lost all your socialite cheerfulness over the summer, but meeting minjeong and wonyoung felt like you've been recharged. "oh and i'm the journalist for cnn?"

the girls take a glance at your nametag, examining you, before wonyoung cuts, "first time? don't worry sweetheart, we'll tell you all about it! right hoonie?"

a tall figure walks up to the three of you, no doubt a intimidating face. "y/n right? i'm sunghoon, the chair for press." he asks.

"yes yes this is her! oh we've got to tell her all about press! first timer alert!" wonyoung beams, before entangling her hand with sunghoon's. there was no doubt that the two were a couple.

"ugh, okay you two cut it off! we're journalists, we gotta be professional!" minjeong argues, playfully slapping wonyoung's arm, causing her to let go of sunghoon's.

at first, you had no idea what you were stepping into. but when chair sunghoon welcomed you to press with his icy-blue eyes and quiet demeanor, the other journalists supporting each other when it came to writing their articles, you felt right at home.

it didn't feel like it, but two days of endless debates went on, countries arguing left and right, and articles written on the current hot topic. the tension was surely rising, and your fingers were tired.

you were glad it was all over.

at every post-conference social, before awards were handed out, the articles the journalists from press wrote would be released to the conference for the other delegates to read. besides their usual gossip box, the articles the press wrote were always the fuel to the fire.

one article stuck up to heeseung. it read; "secretary-general heeseung's love for crisis interferes chair jongseong's chairing process, now who's really chairing crisis?"

heeseung swore to himself that he's never seen a girl like you. so quiet yet so powerful in her writing. hearing rumors that you've only just recently transferred to decelis high. even sunghoon himself was surprised to meet a talented journalist like you, a first-timer at press.

"it was her first time?" heeseung protested, "i mean- she's so quiet and reserved, if she had been doing press for years, i wouldn't be surprised. but this is her first time?!"

"what do you mean she's quiet? look at hoon, he never says a word in comses, but look at him chairing press. and i would never mind you tagging along in crisis, you always give out good insights." jay interrupts his thoughts.

heeseung complains, "i understand that, but her innocent face says nothing to what she wrote about me!"

"her articles were critical. they were precise and to the point. there was never a single weak spot in her articles. i think she's gonna make a run for my position." sunghoon defends.

"it's just one article hee, it won't affect your entire track record anyways." jake compliments, giving him a pat on the back.

heeseung believed what jake said was true. he did have an outstanding track record. "best delegate"s here and there, one silly little article wouldn't ruin his entire reputation.

as the clock strikes seven, social night was slowly coming to a close. decelis high's third annual mun was coming to an end. all that was left was to hand out the awards.

heeseung made his secretary-general speech as usual, a couple thank you-s here and there, before he handed it over to the chairs to announce the awards.

as he was walking down the stage, he felt a couple stares from mostly the press council linger. fixing his tie, he shook it off before taking a seat in the front row.

awards were handed, from best position papers, verbal commendations, honorable mentions, most outstanding delegates, and of course, best delegates.

the press council was saved for last. sunghoon asked heeseung if he could be given more time to rethink his options for the awards, and as his best mate, he let him. in reality, sunghoon didn't need time to rethink his options. he and wonyoung knew who was going to win best journalist. sunghoon just wanted to save the best for last.

when heeseung hears sunghoon's announcement for best journalist, it clicks.

"and the press council's best journalist award goes to none other than... l/n y/n!"

cheers could be heard from across the conference room. minjeong practically jumping on you when they heard your name mentioned. you rushed to the stage with a red face and a still shocked reaction, receiving the certificate along with the medal. wonyoung gave you the biggest bear hug known to man, whilst sunghoon gave you a firm handshake.

you felt the cameras flashing at you, taking pictures from what felt like every single angle. unbeknownst to you, heeseung was glaring at you from the front row.

best journalist. best journalist? his mind was running all over the place. how could he? how could sunghoon, his best friend, let such a writer like you, who wrote a devious article about him, win best delegate?

a single glance at the other delegates of the press council only angered him more. amongst them were laughs and snickers. he swore he heard a journalist say; "looks like mister secgen is upseeet!" but decelis mun only happened once a year. he wouldn't have the need to care about you every other day.

or so he thought.

heeseung felt like you were everywhere. at every lunch break, you were always sitting across his and the boys' table, laughing at nonsense with yunjin and wonyoung. during free periods, you'd be at the library, hunched over your laptop or head deep in a book. and at mun club, you just had to be there.

he hated that you were gifted like him. he hated that his friends favored you. he hated that sunghoon would always send you to their rival school's muns to participate in their press councils. he hated that you always won. he hated that you were clouding his mind every single day.

you hadn't but uttered a single "thank you," to lee heeseung. as decelis high's secretary-general, you didn't think he'd care about you. you were just a writer. you had no strength in the debate field, no reason for lee heeseung to care. but why was he being so cold?

it started when you applied for the harvard model congress. you were ecstatic to find out you'd be attending the conference. obviously, you told minjeong and wonyoung all about it. even striking up small talk with sunghoon.

"that's amazing y/n. i mean, harvard model congress? that's big!" his tooth-rotting smile bringing a cheerful mood.

"you went from winning best journalist in schools across the state to varsity level in just a few months!" minjeong squeals, as she hugs you. you were really lucky to have such caring best friends.

laughing along in the mun club room, you could feel heeseung's glare from his desk. headphones on and focused onto his laptop screen, you felt a strange feeling resonating off of him.

heeseung was fuming. the entire club applied for harvard model congress. heeseung got in. his mates did. and of course, you also did.

it was supposed to be a three day long weekend with his mates full of debate, laughter, awards, and getting drunk on social nights. but no. you and your friends would be there too.

heeseung didn't understand why everyone was so trusting of you so easily.

even jay, was friendly with you. "well y/n, i think you're going to make a run for hee's job!"

wonyoung rolls her eyes at jay. "he should be scared. you've rose up through the ranks like jake's receeding hairline."

"hey! my hair is perfectly fine, thank you!" jake cuts, huffing at the ridiculous comment about his hair.

"yo hee! we gotta work out the letter to the school so we can get a few days off. come over here, you look like you're burning holes into your laptop!" jay chuckles, receiving a smack on the arm from jake.

a quick but surprising slam! from heeseung's laptop emitted a low echo throughout the room. followed by a ruffling of him throwing his decelis almameter over his shoulder, and another loud slam! of the mun club room's door. lee heeseung just stormed out.

"oof, what's got into him?" minjeong asks, her face contorting into an anxious look.

"i don't fucking know, he's been at it since decelis' annual mun. throwing temper tantrums left and right." jay sighs, concerned for his best friend.

"well i guess that temper is living up to my article." you suggest, letting out a huff and a subtle eyeroll.

sunghoon takes a deep breath before realization hits. "now that i think of it, he's been at it since you've joined our core team." while he points at you.

"what does that have to do with me? i didn't do shit. all i do is sit, join muns, write, and win awards for us. would he rather i'd be getting verbal commendations instead?" you sigh. you've done nothing but bring pride to decelis high's reputation.

wonyoung laughs, patting you on the back. "it's not about winning verbcom or bestdel, it's about heeseung finally finding his match."

"exactly! he's gone on and on about constantly winning at every mun. he's always complained about needing more of a challenge. and no shit he's been jealous of your achievements." minjeong pipes in.

"that's ridiculous. i don't understand crisis as much as he does, i'm just a journalist on the press council! he's basically just being an ass to me, that's all." you confessed, you and heeseung were basically on different levels. he was secgen and lover of crisis councils, whilst you were just one of the head journalists and co-editors of the press division.

"maybe he likes you? i don't know!" jake squeals, lifting his shoulders in question. jay and sunghoon gives him a slap on the shoulder each, a glaring stare between the three.

"no no, lee heeseung is a cold-hearted son of a bitch with an ego to feed every other day, there's no way he can feel shit." minjeong debates, a hint of anger in her voice.

"woah girl, what's got you mad? i get you two grew up together but that's a lot to say about heeseung." wonyoung asks her.

"i know it's a long story, but y/n deserves to know. right?" minjeong asks, waiting for you to nod to continue. "every single day of my life, i was my parents' star girl. i love my parents for supporting me. but ever since heeseung moved in next door, i was demoted from best girl in the neighborhood to second best to heeseung. ever since we were eight, heeseung didn't like to lose. to a boy he'd be a good sport. but when he lost to me in a mere storytelling competition, he'd throw a tantrum. that's heeseung to me. he's nothing but an egotistical ass who has to win everything."

you sigh, hearing minjeong’s words. "and you know what y/n?" she continues, "he's never lost it since we were 13. and you, y/n, have officially made him lose his mind. again."

this year's harvard model congress was held at seoul national university, the dream university of many korean students. the seven of you stayed at a hotel nearby, settling in.

sunghoon picks up the keycards at the check-in counter, "okay so there's three rooms in total, the girls are sharing, me and jake are in one room, which leaves heeseung and jay—"

"i'm sorry sir," the hotel staff interrupts him, "but the rooms are already divided by the hotel and cannot be changed. it says here, room 745 is for miss kim and miss yang, room 746 is for mister park, mister sim, and the other mister park— mister jongseong, and room 777 is for—"

"great. thank you. alright, let's settle in and get ready for opening night." heeseung sighs, grabbing his suitcase and your shared room's keycards before heading to the elevators. you gave the rest of the group a shaky smile before following heeseung.

the moment you two entered the lift, and as heeseung tapped the keycard and pressing the button for the seventh floor, you could feel the tension.

as the lift begins to move upwards, heeseung lets out a sigh. "look, l/n. we're sharing a room by casuality, so don't make it a big deal."

you huff shakily, "a big deal? you're the one who's been avoiding me all year! i barely disturb you and all i do is win awards for decelis. what else do you want from me?" your voice slowly getting angrier.

as heeseung opens his mouth to answer, the lift comes to a halt as its doors open, signaling that they've reached the seventh floor.

heeseung holds the lift doors open, so you can exit it with ease. you were surprised with this gesture. coming from him who could care less about your presence, you were baffled.

as you both reach at your hotel room, heeseung gave you one of the three keycards given before tapping his at the hotel room's door.

and as if your romance stories came to life, you spotted an oh-so familiar trope sitting in the middle of your hotel room. there was only one king-sized bed.

"shut the front door." you sighed, looking at the clear situation in front of you.

heeseung entered behind you, "i clearly have, what are you talking abou—"

"no dumbass, it was a metaphor. i'm talking about this." you exclaimed, pointing your finger at the bed.

"great. i'll call up room service and get this sorted—"

"no it's fine, it'll be too much of a hassle and social night is in two hours. besides, we're civil adults, and we're here for only two nights. we can bear 72 hours living through this stupid one bed trope."

"fine. just so you know i'm taking the left side."

heeseung dropped his bag near his side, as he was trying his best to keep his composure. sharing a room with you was bad enough (that's what he keeps telling himself), but a bed as well? he'd rather win verbal commendation than share a bed with you.

you were unpacking your necessities before you decided to break the ice. "heeseung just so you know—"

but before you could finish, heeseung was already out the door. before the door closed, you could hear a mere; "i'll go down for social night. you do you." and a click! of the door.

you scanned the room that was once filled with such tension, spotting your room keycard on the bedside table.

you took off your sweater and switched to something a bit classier for social night, changing to a blood red dress you had packed to match harvard's colors. minjeong and wonyoung had helped you choose it a couple days prior, the conversation reappearing in your mind.

"harvard's got nothing on you with that dress! watch out best journalist!" minjeong hypes you up as you're trying it on in the changing room.

"are you sure it's not a bit too much?" you questioned, feeling insecure in the dress.

"too much? my guess is heeseung would drop dead seeing you in that dress. after all, he is in love with you." wonyoung giggles, which earns her a slap on her arm from winter.

"just own it y/n. maybe layer it with a leather jacket if you get cold?" minjeong suggests. you look at yourself in the mirror once more. maybe this would be the turning point between you and heeseung's rivalry. maybe he'd look at you and decide that he no longer hated you and instead loved y— no. enough of those thoughts.

as you touched up your makeup from earlier this morning, you headed out to find wonyoung and minjeong waiting at the lobby.

"there you are— oh that dress looks, damn!" minjeong exclaims, covering her mouth with her hand to hide the utter shock.

"i just know heeseung's going to gape at that dre—" before wonyoung could finish her sentence, she earns a smack on her arm from minjeong. "ow minie! i don't want my arm to be black and blue at social night! which starts in... thirty minutes. we should get to campus and fill in our registrations so we're set."

opening night was a blast. harvard model congress knew how to throw a goddamn banger of a opening night.

there were so many things to see. a karaoke booth, a photobooth station, a merch station, even a snack booth filled to the brim with various snacks and drinks.

after receiving your lanyards and a couple papers where you'd find your assigned councils for the next day, you, wonyoung, and minjeong, were set to let lose one last time before you were head deep into your laptops, writing articles for the next three days.

entering the room littered with decorations and other delegates, you and the girls entered the ballroom hand in hand, in awe with the decor.

wonyoung spotted the boys immediately, already saving a table for the seven of you. the three of you walked to the table, which had name plates for all your names. wonyoung next to sunghoon, jay next to jake, minjeong on your right next to you, and heeseung on your left.

sitting at the assigned seats and listening to the opening remarks by harvard model congress' secretary-general, the food was served and you all dug in.

although this was only the first of two social nights, you and the girls had to make the best of it. from abusing the “free photobooths!” booth, and filling the room with echoes of musical ballads, your first night at harvard model congress was deemed memorable.

before you knew it, you were dragged to the back of the room, as wonyoung pulled out a small paper bag—which turns out to hold a couple bottles of liquor, you grabbed your glasses and started pouring.

you could see out of the corner of your eye—the girls downing shots of tequila (in secret, cause you didn't want to get caught), and the guys coming along to take a shot or two. but heeseung looked, tense.

jake slapped him on the back, giggling, “come on man, loosen up a bit! mun isn’t all about the awards and the roles, it’s about the memories!”

“and the friends we make along the way, am i right?” jay chimed in, with a teasing tone.

before you knew it, heeseung grabbed an entire bottle and downed what was equivalent to maybe 4 shots, wonyoung squealed, arguing the fact that it was a very expensive bottle of liquor.

“dude! that’s from my dad’s cabinet, it’s at least 500.000 won!” she argued, grabbing the bottle out of his hands.

as you tried to ignore his gaze, minjeong gave you your first shot—which you downed immediately, but it only made you feel like heeseung’s gaze was burning holes into you more.

heeseung sighed, “give me another one.” holding his hand out for someone to pour him a shot. “come on, i don’t got all day.” before sunghoon poured him another shot—which he downed immediately.

you hated the feeling of his stare. it felt, uncomfortable, but you liked it? the more he stared, the more you downed more shots. before you knew it, opening night came to a close, and you were stumbling your way down the hallway with wonyoung and minjeong, before finally finding your room. and in your drunken state, you passed out.

burning pain. your eyes couldn’t handle the bright light emitting from what seemed to be all around you. as you open your eyes, head spinning, you flopped back down onto your bed, exhausted, and with the hotel room ac, you felt frozen.

but as you get comfortable onto the bed once more, you feel a sense of warmth engulf your body. it felt welcoming. comfortable. maybe a bit too comfortable for your sake. but the warmth was soothing. it was, moving?

you shot back out of the bed, trying to rub your eyes to focus back onto the warmth, but that warmth pulled you back into its embrace. as if it needed you to survive.

as you try to recollect the events of last night, your usual 7am alarm rung. what a great way to ruin the moment.

a groan echoed from that warmth you once clung to, a familiar sound, a familiar… voice?

“l/n, what time is it?” it asked.

fuck.

"chill y/n, you'll be fine." you whisper to yourself, walking to your assigned council's room. from the rest of the journalists in your gang, you had been assigned to report on different councils. while wonyoung and winter were assigned to report on the ASEAN council, sunghoon to report on the UNHRC council, you were unfortunately assigned to the crisis council. just to your luck. your mind was still stuck in what happened this morning. you met your chairs, shuhua and beomgyu, role call was held, and your first committee session began.

while you were typing away a starting paragraph for an article, a bright face comes to greet you. "oh hello, l/n y/n right? i'm jungwon, the journalist for KBS! i sit right next to you in our council room."

"oh hello! i'm y/n, reporting for the new york times, it's nice to meet you." you smile, offering a hand out for him to shake, which he accepts.

"so, you got assigned to crisis too huh?" jungwon asks as you nod, "honestly it's one of the worse councils to report on because everything is moving... too fast." he sighs.

"i don't mind the speed, it gives me inspiration to write. but everyone has their capacities right?" you try to reason, whilst jungwon gives an agreeing nod.

not long after some small talk before you could enter crisis' council room, another boy tags along. his bright smile clearly infectious as you and jungwon couldn't help but smile at his bright appearance.

"annyeong! nice to meet you i'm sunoo!" he smiles, his blonde hair reflecting the lights in the room.

you shake his hand as a boy with blonde hair and black streaks tags along behind him before slapping the blonde’s arm, "i'm nishimura riki, you can call me riki. can’t believe i flew all the way from tokyo for this."

“yah! your writing is fine riki, your good shots will steal the show.” sunoo assures him, before looking back at you, and smiling.

riki sighs, before turning on his camera “i wanna get the redhead over there, heard he’s super good at mun or something..”

you blink as you realize riki was talking about none other than—heeseung.

"oh him? yeah he's my secgen." you tell him, the sentence floating out of your mouth. jungwon and sunoo turn to you with gaping mouths.

"wait- what? he's YOUR secgen? THE lee heeseung?" jungwon exclaims.

you furrow your eyebrows, "um, yeah? what's the big deal about him?"

sunoo's face lights up, as he prepares his words. "girl, he's the most highest ranking student in the high school mun circuit! his countless awards and times he's chaired makes him a legend. he's a literal model un weapon, even delegates with the veto powers are scared of him." he explains.

as you open your mouth to respond to his comment about heeseung, one of the chairs of the crisis council exits the room to greet you.

"ah hello journalists, you're here. i'm yeonjun, the head chair for crisis. we currently have unmod going on right now so you're just in time. we'll give you guys a couple opportunities to interview the delegates, but please be mindful." he explains.

you and the three boys smile back at him, before he opens the council room door and lets you in.

"delegates! i'd like to introduce to you all the journalists from the international press institute council, who will be observing our committee session. we have yang jungwon from KBS, kim sunoo from associated press, nishimura riki from NHK, and y/n l/n from the new york times. please treat them with the upmost respect.

a couple delegates say their greetings, and even explaining the current debate going on, as the four of you smile back at them. the crisis council was a popular council, and you can tell that from the amount of delegates in the room.

as you return your laptop back into your messenger bag and pulling out a notepad, a pen, and some sticky notes, you look back up only to lock eyes with heeseung. his gaze was deadly. you give him a slight smile, which he responds with an eyeroll.

the only thing you hated about being a journalist was the interviews. you needed to research, but having to interact with people you don't know? you'd rather kill yourself. it just happened that heeseung's stance was interesting enough for you to pass a post-it note to him, which he threw away.

so you were surprised to see him walk towards you during break, as you had thought he had rejected your interview offer.

"l/n, you wanted to interview me?" he'd asked you, no bad tone in his voice.

you looked at him surprised, kinda shocked, "umm, yeah? are you okay with that."

"i'm good. just, make it quick."

you open your notes to find your question you wanted to ask him, "um, do you mind if i record?" you asked, which he nodded. "okay, so as the delegate of colombia, what steps would you take to face the ongoing drug trade happening in your country? as a journalist, we have not seen you speak up much lately, so i'd like to know your thoughts."

"um, thank you for the interesting question, well i think—"

it was unlike him to treat you like this. unlikely for him to keep his cool. as you try to remember the words he was saying as you hold out your phone to record him, nothing was catching on. it was as if words went in one ear and out the other.

he was so professional. the way he walks, and the way he talks—the way his lips move when he talks, the way he explains his stance—the way he’s saying the words—the way his lips move to pronounce it, oh and the way he-

“l/n? are you done? i’m wasting my precious break time here.” heeseung asks you, breaking you out of that trance.

you compose yourself, hitting the stop button on the voice recorder app, “oh yeah, sorry, i was thinking of another question to ask you—got carried away…”

heeseung rolls his eyes at you, before thanking you and scurrying away.

what had gotten into you? you’ve never seen heeseung in that way before. he’s always been just a secretary-general to you. who also happens to hate you. you think.

but as the unmoderated caucus comes to a close, you return back to your council room, ready to write an article on heeseung’s stance. after all, you still had a day’s left worth of committee sessions, as well as a press conference held at the crisis council.

the press council room was chiming with the clicks and clacks of keyboards, journalists writing articles left and right. you were in the middle of writing once again another filler article, as you had no idea what to write for your mandatory article. as you look through your gallery, observing pictures you took earlier for your articles, you can't help but notice heeseung in his element.

as you're typing a possible title for your mandatory article, you hear from beside you, "hey, what's going on with you and heeseung?" sunoo asks, as you turn to him in shock, as you were in the middle of writing an article.

you laughed nervously, "what? nothing's going on between us. he practically hates me." you sigh.

jungwon pulls his chair over to you, placing his laptop on your table in the process, "i don't think so. not from what i saw last night."

you gasped at what he said, "and what i saw this morning! i could practically feel the tension emitting off the two of you as you were interviewing him. i've never seen a man so intrigued before." riki chimes in.

"this morning? nothing happened, i was interviewing him on his stances and whatsoever for a possible article! that's all to it!" you defend yourself, trying to get back into your article.

"y/nie, sweetie, i've seen way too many kdramas to tell that the way he's looking at you, is a look of love~" sunoo teases, smiling as if he knew something more.

jungwon and riki laughes at your expression, which seemed to resemble a disgusting look, but underneath that, you felt a sting in your heart. not a bad sting, a good sting.

"but hey you two seemed pretty cozy last night, i wonder what that was for?" jungwon asked.

riki gasps, "hey i took a picture! wait let me find it..." as he pulled out his camera, going through the camera roll. "here! you guys were dancing together a lot, and he basically was carrying you back to your room. what, did you guys get drunk or something?"

you choked on your water, as the events of last night start piecing together. "i remember taking a couple shots, he did too, but all i remember after that is falling asleep on my bed... i assumed my friends helped me to get back but now that i think of it... they were pretty drunk too."

taking another closer look at the pictures riki happened to capture, you saw two beaming smiles, and from the looks of it, it looked like you two were having fun. you've never seen him smile this much, let alone around you. the other picture resembled like a married couple. it was as if heeseung was trying to pick you up, but by the looks of your drunken states, it wasn't really working.

"wouldn't it be really funny if you guys accidentally fucked or something? that would explain the tension!" jungwon jokes.

you shake your head, before putting your face in your hands, "no way, not in a million years. our tension is, well, our tension! it's what happens normally!" you try to defend.

"no you're right won, they totally fucked. i mean the floor you guys are on? most of the rooms have king or queen sized beds. what would you guys be doing other than that? snuggling into each other till the sunrise?" riki assumes, scoffing afterwards.

your eyes widened in shock, as if jungwon cut your brain opened and took out the events of what happened this morning. you put your head in your hands once more before beginning to cry.

riki saw your reaction, "hey i didn't mean it that way! i mean it's- um... great? if you fucked? but if not then that's like, totally okay! i mean sex isn't for everyone—"

sunoo cut him off, shooing him away, "stop making it worse, ki-yah! y/nie? will you tell us what happened?"

you sniffed, not knowing why you suddenly burst into tears, maybe it was the frustration? you grabbed a tissue to compose yourself, "i don't know... all i remember is i woke up this morning, in his arms, and i just jumped out and got ready. we didn't even talk about it. all of a sudden he's back to his old self and he's being mean to me again."

you take a deep breath, sunoo rubbing you on the back, trying to calm you down. "he's been like this ever since i transferred. i was just the new girl who was a press prodigy, that's what they called me back at decelis, and i don't know, he's hated me every since. no reason whatsoever. i've tried to win his attention by winning muns and stuff but, it doesn't matter. he looks at me as if i disappoint him."

jungwon and riki both comfort you as well, before jungwon has a strike of realization. "you know, it's not that i wanna stir up delusion in your mind, but it's quite common for guys to hate someone because they like them. what if he has a crush on you?"

riki realizes as well, "yeah what if? what if all this time he's been trying so hard to hate you because he actually likes you?"

hearing the words likes you come out of their mouths makes you shudder in fear. no way he likes you. right?

before you knew it, your chair returns to announce that press conferences are due to start soon. and up first? was the crisis council.

stepping foot into the crisis room, with the information in mind, you start to notice the tiny little characteristics that match with the fact. the fact that the lee heeseung might as well have a crush on you. as you, sunoo, and two other journalists were guided to the front of the room, your chair explaining to the crisis delegates how the press conference was going to work, before giving the floor to the journalists.

you keep your head hung, distracting yourself by re-reading the questions you’ve written on your notepad, peeking through your hair, trying to take a glimpse of heeseung.

heeseung was in his element as always, head deep in his laptop, a couple volunteers passing by to give him a post-it note, filled with scribbles of other delegates wishing to be on his side. but as per usual, his critical self crumples the notes and puts it aside to his pile of other crumpled notes.

sunoo, on your left, nudges you in the arm, trying to snap you out of it. the moment you lift your head to look at the delegates and compose yourself, you catch heeseung looking at you.

with your bloodshot eyes, your usual smile fading, heeseung can’t help but notice what happened. you were fine last break. your eyes which used to be sparkling with curiosity had been traded for puffy eyes and a fake smile.

he wanted to come up to you, wanted to ask what’s wrong. but as your chair introduced the journalists, he’d wonder if it was just an impulsive thought.

each journalist had to share 10 minutes worth of press conference time to ask questions, a tight amount of time. as the journalist on your far left begins, the clock begins to tick. being the last journalist to ask, you begin to feel worried.

but as the mic is passed to you, and mere two minutes left on the clock, you scramble to compose yourself and your questions. “this journalist would like to open the question to the floor, with the excessive drug trade impacting the economy of your countries, what is an effective solution you’d have to decrease the drug circulation, but at the same time, would not damage your economy?”

placards were raised, and amongst them, were heeseung’s. you could see the colombian flag on his placard raised high, but as the journalist of the new york times, your work came first. therefore, you chose someone else. “yes, delegate of the united states?”

the delegate of the united states stood up, and you finally saw the name on his nametag. yang jeongin. he smirked at you, sending a wink. “thank you madam journalist for the intriguing question, as the drug trade across our country begins to increase…”

as you held your hand forward holding your phone out to record his answer, continuing to talk for the next minute. it felt like a lifetime. but in the corner of your eye, you could feel his gaze burning holes. heeseung held his placard high, glaring dead straight at jeongin even if he was still speaking. but as you thank jeongin for his answer, you open the question once more to the floor.

you hear a screech of the chair as heeseung, the only one holding his placard up, stands up to answer. but you don’t discern anything he says. you just stare at him. before you knew it, the clock rang, signaling that time was up.

sunoo nudged your arm once more, trying to snap you out of it. “you okay?” he asked, worry written all over his face. you nodded to tell him you were okay.

as you were escorted out of the room to head to the hotel restaurant for lunch break, you couldn't help but feel the same feeling of heeseung's gaze at the back of your head. you ignored him, walking out with sunoo by your side.

but you were stopped briefly by someone, none other than the delegate of the united states. "hey, that was a very interesting question you asked earlier at press conference. i was wondering if you need my insight on anything? given as i'm usa and you're the new york times." jeongin suggests, his usual smirk returning from before. sunoo winked at you, before leaving the two of you alone in the hallway.

you blink at him, "oh! yeah, i was thinking about gaining insight from, well our country's side of the story. so what can you tell me?"

your notepad flips open along the click of your pen, ready to jot down his words, before out of the corner of your eye, that sharp gaze returns. the burning stare heeseung emitted was back. you gulped and let out a breath you didn't know you were holding. "hey, um jeongin? could we find somewhere a bit more quiet so i can record the interview? i need to make sure everything is clear because i need to submit the questions to my chairs."

jeongin smiled, "of course sweetheart, i know just the place." before he took your hand and led you away. unbeknownst to you, heeseung was fuming.

as the two of you walked away, heeseung couldn't help but wonder. what's so great about yang jeongin anyways? compared to himself, his track record was not all that. yeah he may have won most outstanding or honorable mention a couple times, but never best delegate. consecutively.

heeseung felt a tap on his shoulder, before briefly turning around. jay was standing there with a cup of coffee. he grabbed it out of his hands before immediately drinking out of it.

"that's! hot coffee..." jay protested. but to heeseung, his rage burned hotter. "what's got your panties in a twist?" jay asked, sipping his own cup of coffee.

"nothing, just pissed at a delegate. per usual." heeseung lied. as the two begun to make their way to restaurant to eat lunch.

jay chuckled, seeing his pissed face, "dude, i've known you for over eight years, you don't get pissed at a delegate for no reason. this is harvard model congress for god's sake, everyone here? they're basically professionals. mun legends. i wouldn't have afford this shit if i wasn't good at it. the awards and prizes helped fund this hobby."

heeseung sighed, "it's not just a delegate. it's someone else."

"it's y/n, isn't it?" heeseung snapped his head to glare at jay, as if he grew three heads. "chill dude, i can tell. you're painfully in love with her."

"no no no, you don't get it, she's a menace to my track record. do you remember back at decelis mun before she transferred? her article basically ruined my record the next five muns? i basically had to avoid chairing so the rumors wouldn't be deemed true." heeseung argued, reminiscing the times.

"but you'd argue she's a damn good writer, isn't she?" jay defended, "i mean no one from decelis has won consecutively aside from you. and she comes in to make the decelis name proud. aren't you glad? you're secgen after all. you're just in denial."

heeseung sighed, looking at his cup of coffee, once full, now empty. "i'm not in denial! i'm just stressed with a couple delegates in committee session, unmoderated caucus was, stressful."

entering the restaurant, their eyes landed to the corner booth, where you sat face to face with jeongin. jay turned his head to look at heeseung staring deadset at the two. "well, whatever floats your boat man, i'm gonna get some lunch. unsc might as well go to crisis next comses." jay pats him on the back, joining sunghoon, jake, wonyoung, and minjeong.

heeseung stood still. he couldn't help but wonder. is this what love feels like?

"so, yang jeongin, what can you tell me about the united states' stance on the current illegal drug trade? i assume that the country is fully aware of it happening?" you ask, pressing record on your voicenotes app.

jeongin looked around, before reaching over and pressing the stop recording button on your phone. before you could protest, "okay cut the crap, what's going on between you and lee heeseung?"

you looked at him strangely, not expecting the sudden confrontation. "well, nothing? i don't know what you want me to say, this isn't part of the interview."

jeongin dug into his food, "screw that shit, i wanna know why your secgen is all on my ass. i mean i looked at you once at comses earlier, and he looked at me like i lit an orphanage on fire."

you almost choked on your pasta, "what the hell, dude. he's just like that. he hates my guts so much he has to make me feel uncomfortable everywhere i go. i literally bring home decelis as many awards as he has in the past two years. i don't get him."

"nah, i don't think that's hate. he looked at me as if he was clyde and i was trying to steal away his bonnie. that's a look of love."

you sighed, "the thing is jeongin, he doesn't care. i've done everything to pique his attention, best journalist awards left and right, i was supposed to run for deputy secgen but he didn't let me. he said i wasn't a true decelis muner yet. i mean 8 muns in the span of a couple months? and i've never lost a single one? he probably hates me because i chose the lamest council."

jeongin swallows his food before he comes to realization, "hey weren't you the journalist who wrote on heeseung back at decelis' mun? i remember felix-hyung, my friend, that he went feral over it. he was chairing unicef, and in the chairs' room, he overheard heeseung talking about your article. how it was going to ruin his track record, or something."

"i mean, i do remember briefly. wonyoung, my chair, said i was allowed to write about the chairs or staff, even if they were filler articles. i wrote about heeseung and jay out of interest, i didn't know their history." you confessed, feeling quite bad about the outcome. "i didn't want my article to end up being gossip or shit talk, i just wrote what i wanted to."

"freedom of the press, am i right?" jeongin laughed, "speaking of the devil." signaling heeseung heading towards your table.

heeseung stood at your table. "yang. l/n." before scooting next to jeongin's side of the booth. you couldn't help but move your eyes between the two. after what sunoo and the boys told you earlier, and jeongin's confirmation that basically people could tell, you sit there in silence.

heeseung clears his throat, "well i'm not seeing much interviewing going on, delegates."

you scoffed at him, "it's none of your business heeseung. we're all delegates, it's lunch break. you don't have to boss around all the time."

"our decelis guidebook strictly confers to not confide in the enemy. and here you are, with the enemy. you know if you spill precious information regarding us we'd be dead?" he scolded you.

a laugh escaped your throat, "the enemy? jeongin is far from the enemy to me. matter of fact, heeseung, you've been more of an enemy to me rather than a secgen."

jeongin whispered, "keep it down y/n, it's okay."

you stood up in anger, "no it's not okay! i've been trying my hardest to do everything i can, i've won consecutively since my first mun at decelis, i've done everything you ask for. i've done nothing but make the decelis name proud, but i just can't happen to make you proud. what do i have to do next? i do everything and all i do is fall at second best. if you hate me so much then kick me off the goddamn team! wouldn't want me tarnishing your precious track record by having a traitor on the team, would you? all this over a stupid article i wrote months ago." you walk away from the table, returning to your room.

heeseung was speechless, the rest of the room was in awe, normally delegates would be able to stay professional. even if there was a break up or something. even wonyoung and minjeong looked at heeseung in anger, meanwhile jake, jay, and sunghoon looked at him in disappointment. jeongin stood up and left the booth, avoiding any more anger out of heeseung. "if i were you, i'd apologize. that girl has done nothing but try to please you and make you proud. start there." jeongin added before leaving.

out of habit, heeseung hung his head low in embarrassment. this was worse than the time you wrote that article about him. as he stood up to confide in the boys for advice, he spots a small leather notepad in the corner of the booth. it was yours. he'd have to find you, face you and give it back. it wouldn't hurt to read a bit of what's inside, right?

running back to your room, you couldn't dare return till next comses. the fact that an entire room full of delegates and chairs had heard you scream at heeseung's face. and returning back to the bed you woke up from this morning, limbs tangled with heeseung, didn't really help.

hiding your face in your bedsheets, tears flowing freely, you couldn't help but smell the familiar cologne he had left behind. the smell stung your nose, and made your eyes water more. the scent that once plagued you, now had lulled you to sleep.

a blurry facade appeared, the sound of heavy noise music remained muffled. your feet were cold on the hotel floor, destination? room 777. you were swaying side to side, but thankfully you were able to hold on to a pillar, which was moving with you.

"we shouldn't have drunk this much, right l/n? i'm not even sure i'm prepped for comses tomorrow morning." the pillar said.

"you have it easy, lee. you don't have to write 4 pieces worth of mandatory articles and observe other council's committee sessions." you replied, a clear slur in your voice.

it, who turned out to be heeseung, laughed, and it was like music to your ears. "i thought you journalists just copy-pasted shit off google or something, didn't get why you'd have to sit in the back of council rooms."

you scoffed at him, "well, as secretary-general, you should've known better. if only you noticed what i've been doing all this time to get your attention, maybe you would've understood."

"you think i haven't been paying attention? i've had my eyes on you ever since you wrote that silly article about me back at decelis mun. 'who's really chairing crisis?' you do know me and jay have been friends since primary, right?" he argued.

"that i know know, lee. the fact that you caused all the fuss over an article that was purely for mun, and had no ill intention is just stupid. i just wanted to be able to express myself." you confessed, feeling underestimated.

he sighed, pressing the up button on the lift, "it's not that i fussed over an article, it's that you wrote about me. i don't see many people brave enough to write about a secretary-general." before he could continue, the doors to the lift dinged and opened, allowing the two of you to walk in.

"i mean," he stuttered, clicking the number seven on the lift's buttons, "you amazed me. i've never met a person who could express themselves so much through their writing. no one paid attention to me enough to write such a critical piece about me."

you smiled at him, "so i'm special? i was the first to write about you, right?" he chuckled at your cheeky comment, "yes you're a first. i wouldn't mind if you kept writing about me."

"but why'd you hate me? i've done so much for decelis to make you proud, but you still have a way to butcher me. i just wanted to impress you." you'd sighed into his chest, the world beginning to spin.

luckily, heeseung had caught you before you fell, right on time as the lift reached the seventh floor. he basically carried you out, trying not to drop you.

"if i hated you so much, i wouldn't be helping you get back to our room, nor would i be making sure you get back safely." he assured you, holding you in his arms.

you groaned in protest, "but you do, don't you? i'm never enough for you, after everything i've done. all the things i did—"

you were shut up by his lips on yours. out of the blue, with no warning signs, he had kissed you. out of habit you kissed him back, lips molding against each other as if you had been waiting for years, as if you couldn't live without each other. all hatred you held against him dissipated. your arms crawling towards the back of his neck to pull him closer, his own pulling on your waist.

he pulled away to take a breath, but you couldn't breathe. he was your oxygen. you connected the two of you together, chasing his lips, his touch, his presence. it was the sweetness, the flavor of love and lust hanging. you’ve been craving his attention, hell, even his touch for months.

but your lungs craved oxygen, forcing you to pull away, hiding your face in his chest. as you were taking in the moment, he chuckled, "i wouldn't have done that if i hated you, would i?"

waking up with a jolt, the memories of last night came rushing in. you thanked yourself that the two of you hadn't fucked, but the idea of kissing him and liking it gave yourself insight. you wondered if heeseung remembered too.

opening your phone and seeing the time, you rushed out of your room as you were late to your next editorial meeting. it being the last committee session of the day, all you had to do was submit your mandatory articles of the day, and you'd be done. running back to your council room, knocking slightly on the door, you rushed back to your seat.

"journalist, you're late. why is that?" shuhua asked, beomgyu beside her, taking notes.

you sat down and composed yourself, "i'm sorry chairs, i slept in during break. it won't happen again."

the chairs nodded at you, letting it pass. the room discussed about how press conferences was, reminding the journalists of the upcoming deadline, but your mind was in the gutter.

you touch your lips, and you feel the lingering taste on your tongue. you were shocked out of your trance with the knocks of the chairs' gavel hitting the sound block. with only an hour left to finish your mandatory article, you begin to type.

social night was an mun tradition. after a full day of committee sessions, all councils, no matter what their council was, it gave a chance for all the delegates to mingle amongst each other.

free from the deadline of your first mandatory article, you had the whole night to party it out before tomorrow, where you had to finish your final mandatory article.

social nights usually had themes, and tonight, harvard model congress' was inspired by bridgerton, along with masquerade masks were in array. you had packed a a black dress, which belonged to your mother. she’d always tell you to save it for a special occasion, a moment you wouldn’t want to forget. and for tonight, as you miss your mom's touch, you wear your dress with pride.

walking to the venue, and right before you could even enter, you’re immediately greeted by wonyoung and minjeong. "oh my god sweets are you okay?" wonyoung asked, holding your face, clear worry in her eyes. "we heard and saw what happened at lunch, good for you to finally confront the bitch." minjeong commented, which earned her, once again, another slap on the arm by wonyoung.

you nodded at the two, holding their hands, "i'm fine, don't worry. i just needed to get it out of my system, that's all."

"to think of it, i haven't seen him since. normally when you pass by the crisis room, you'd hear his voice bouncing off the walls..." wonyoung confessed, "that's very unlike of him."

minjeong scoffs at her comment, "who cares? he's been downplaying y/n's achievements for the past couple months, i wouldn't be able to stay quiet if i were you."

you sighed at the two bickering in front of you, "guys, i just want tonight to be about us. this is harvard model congress for god's sake, i want to make the best out of it. so can we stop the heeseung talk and have some fun? please?"

the two nodded at your request, not pestering you any further. you all walk into the venue, being handed masquerade masks. the venue was decorated to the nines, and it felt like a ball straight out of bridgerton. the three of you were guided to your delegation table, which seated you, the girls, jake, and sunghoon. but heeseung? he was no where to be found.

"where's heeseung? it's not like him to miss out on social night." jake asked you.

you sat down on your assigned seat, and the seat on your right, which was supposed to occupy heeseung, was cold and empty. "why are you asking me? he hates me, remember?"

jake shrugged, "i don't know, i just reckoned that since the two of you are sharing a room, you'd know where he is."

minjeong scoffs, "who cares? y/n got ready at me and wony's room anyways, so no, we don't know where he is."

"jay said earlier today that he's been looking for him. wonder where he went. and if he found him..." sunghoon tells the table, sipping on his glass of water.

stuck in your trance, you were snapped out of it by a screeching of a chair, one, being jay, and the other was right next to you. heeseung. he was in his usual suit and tie, a couple buttons on the top were unbuttoned. you glanced at his tired eyes, hidden underneath the masquerade mask.

"dude? where've you been?" jake asked jay, slapping him on the shoulder.

jay sighed and drank a gulp of his water, "looking for this asshole over here." while pointing at heeseung, "took me a while to find him literally on the rooftop. i swear seoul uni has the most crazy hideouts. i'm not even sure i can even find my way back."

"how'd you find your way there anyways?" sunghoon asked heeseung.

he sighed, "don't know. just, found it." his demeanor slipping away as you begin to see the raw brokenness. you didn't hurt his ego that much, right?

as the clock struck seven, waiters all around the room began laying out the meals. you took a glimpse of the dinner courses in front of you, not really having an appetite for anything. but you still tried to eat, tried not to waste your food, tried to seem okay in front of him.

heeseung, on the other hand, was trying his best not to combust. sitting next to you was hard enough, but the fact you were wearing such a beautiful dress had him awestruck. he also lost his appetite. he couldn't help but stare at you.

after dinner, your friends stood up and ran over to the dance floor, and you were unfortunately dragged along. a remix of many famous hits were played, before you sang your hearts out to iris, by the goo goo dolls. you felt someone tap you on your shoulder, which to your surprise you see jeongin.

"could i have this dance?" he asked, hand out for you to grab, iris still playing in the background.

you nodded and grabbed his hand before you two danced foolishly to iris, heels discarded, his suit as well, just dancing your hearts out. but you had your limits, you were tired and excused yourself to grab some water. before you felt a nudge on your right, as heeseung leaned towards your ear. "can we talk later? don't say no just yet, just follow the green post its."

he walks away, as you look at him in confusion. feeling bad for what you said at lunch, you decide to meet him and see what he has to say.

following the pins of green post-its he left behind, you find yourself at the hidden rooftop jay was talking about at dinner. you open the door to be shocked at the view. the stars twinkling in the night sky. and stood there near the edge, was heeseung.

you broke the silence, clearing your throat, "you wanted to speak to me?"

heeseung looked at you and your dress, his mind going places. "yeah. i did. i'm not expecting an apology. i deserve it."

"but why'd you hate me so much, heeseung?" you whined at him, sick of his jokes.

"the thing is l/n, i don't!" he shouts, walking towards you, "it's not that i hate you, it's that i hate the way you make me feel. i hate the way you're so good at writing, i hate the way you win everything to make me proud, i hate the way you know my weaknesses, i hate the way you never gave up. you're on my mind every fucking day."

you walk up towards him, pulling his suit to pull him down, and him not expecting anything, you slap him across his face.

heeseung immediately pulled back, "ow! what was that for?"

"that was for not telling me about how you felt. you didn't have to bottle it up, you know?" you scoffed.

"and you didn't have to either!" he protested back, pulling out a familiar journal. your journal.

you grabbed it from his hands, "how'd you find this? i didn't even realize it was missing..."

heeseung sighed, "you know for a smart writer like you, you're very forgetful." a smile beginning to emerge.

"what did you read, heeseung? tell me." you asked, afraid that your secrets would spill out.

heeseung walked towards you, "enough to know that you're too stubborn to even tell me the truth. if you'd been feeling this way for months then you should have told me."

you gasped at him, "i would have told you about it if you weren't such a dick all the time? and then you kissing me last night just added more fuel to the fire." not realizing what you said, heeseung cupped your face, which was full of confusion.

"you remember last night?"

you blinked. "everything."

he laughed, "then you'd know i wouldn't hate you as much if i was doing this, would i?"

the familiar taste of his lips returned as he kissed you. you held onto his hands as he caressed your face. the oxygen you once craved had been fulfilled. you strung your arms around his neck, clinging onto him for dear life. you could feel the burst of sparks just surrounding the two of you, a moment you both craved.

the wavering facade between the two finally faded, unleashing the raw desire the two of you had, rushing through your veins.

you pulled away, heeseung leaning his forehead onto yours, before he gave you his best smile. you blushed out of nervousness and proximity the two of you held, not used to this view.

"you still hate me now?" you joked, smiling at him. his eyes softened, before he laughed, and kissing you once more, not wanting to let go. and as the stars glimmered under the night sky, you forgot time ever existed. forget the committee sessions due tomorrow, it was the two of you against the world.

surely, waking up on the final day of the conference would give you a sense of peace, right? wrong. you had spent so much time last night making out and talking with heeseung that you forgot your final mandatory article was due soon. waking up from the bed the two shared, limbs tangled once more, this time, you weren't ashamed.

you kissed heeseung's forehead to wake him up, and despite heeseung's wishes to stay in and make out some more, you declined and got ready.

"can't you just stay? a bit late to the first comses of the day won't hurt your awards." heeseung groaned, asking you to return.

"i was late at yesterday's comses post-lunch, so i think i'm going to be a good girl and come early to this one." you replied, fixing your tie.

heeseung basically stood up and tried to pull you back to bed, "come on, just be my good girl. i promise you will be awarded with all of my kisses in the world."

you shook your head, "missing out on a couple kisses won't be the death of me. come on, you need to prep for comses too."

heeseung moaned in complaint, "no, i'd break my streak for you, i don't care. i just want to stay in with you, away from everybody."

you were able to crawl your way out of his touch, "nope! i'm not letting you lose your streak just over me. come on, get ready. i'm going down for breakfast."

"can i at least have a goodbye kiss before you go?" he pouted, and the way his eyes resembled bambi, you gave in.

you tried to just give him a quick peck, but his touch was so fragile and welcoming, that if you didn't stand your ground, you'd probably be pinned down till the rest of the day. but you didn't want that, so you let go of his touch, assuring him that you'd spend more time with him after the conference.

now, here you were, back in your conference room with a giddy look on your face. you couldn't help but dream of last night. even sunoo, riki, jungwon, along with wonyoung, minjeong, and sunghoon, were even surprised to see you better all of a sudden.

"okay is this some weird process girls do the cope with sadness, cause if so how do we fix her?" sunoo asked, concerned.

wonyoung was staring at you like you were beaming, "it looks like pregnancy glow."

riki basically spit out his coffee, "wait so they actually fucked?"

minjeong snapped at riki, "who fucked?"

"we had speculation that, y/n and heeseung fucked the first night, hence why she was out of it the next day..." jungwon explained to the rest.

sunghoon, the only person out of the group who happened to know heeseung the best, commented that; "no there's no way he fucked her. if they fucked, they wouldn't have been here."

"could you stop speculating that me and heeseung fucked?" you snapped at the group. not out of anger, but annoyed that you couldn't concentrate.

"sorry, but did you?" riki enquired, earning him a riki! from the group around him. "what? i just wanna know."

you sighed, standing up and packing a couple things, "who cares if we fucked or not? just leave us alone." as you head out of the council room, heading to the crisis room for some final details.

contrary to how you first felt when you walked into the room, your heart felt full of hope. that this time, heeseung wouldn't be staring at you with hatred, instead of love. you hoped you wouldn't distract him.

as you walked into the council room, you nodded at chair yeonjun, before taking a seat at the prepared seats for the journalists. you sit down, open your laptop as you're typing your final mandatory article. you tried to glimpse towards heeseung, but you were returned with the same feeling as yesterday. the sharp gaze was back. maybe it's because he's in is element? mun is important to him... you thought, and busied yourself to writing your article. since it was your final committee session, you just had to submit your article and return for the closing editorial meeting. quickly clicking submit, and the chairs deeming the final committee session over, you wanted to sneak a quick kiss before returning for your meeting.

you stood up from your seat and walked towards heeseung. he stood up and saw you, walking your way. instead of being greeted by a hug or a kiss, he brushed past you to talk to his fellow delegates. you felt a pang in your chest, the way heeseung ignored you like that. you thought everything was okay. the kisses you shared, the conversations you had. you looked back at heeseung only to see him busy talking with the other delegates, barely sparing you a glance. you left the room quickly, not looking back.

unbeknownst to you, heeseung saw you leaving, his heart barely surviving after treating you like that. you deserved better than him. he couldn't have it all.

the final editorial meeting of press councils should be a joy to you. no more deadlines, no more press conferences. but you were stuck in your head. repeating the interaction over and over in your head, you didn't understand a single thing.

after the comments and input from both the chairs and the journalists, chair shuhua decided to pull out the gossip box. you'd been informed prior about the gossip box filling at social night, but since you ran off with heeseung to make out the night away, you didn't have time to fill it in.

as shuhua and beomgyu begin to read the entries, earning laughter all around the room, a certain entry snaps you out of your trance.

"oh this is a good one! new york times from press and colombia from crisis actually fit really good together! hope the enemies finally turn into lovers! wait is this about y/n and heeseung?" chair shuhua asks, causing the whole room to look at you.

you looked at everyone strangely, "what? there's nothing."

chair beomgyu shook his head, "no no no, i don't think there's nothing. come on spill the tea, something must've happened the past three days."

everybody was waiting on your response. waiting for you to tell everyone what happened. you just wanted them to shut up. "okay well. we kissed."

the group of six who were pestering you earlier, gasped loudly. earning you a rumble of no shit's, wait actually's, and a loud jinjja?!

you couldn't help but sink back into your seat, still upset about the way he treated you earlier. "yeah, but he's treating me like shit again today, so. that's that."

the entire room aww'ed in disappointment, before the chairs read out a couple more entries, and adjourns the final editorial. you stand up to clean your table, taking out a pen to begin signing each others' placards. signing everybody else's, photo sessions were in array, and after you were finally allowed to have some free time before awarding ceremony.

awarding ceremony was one of those moments where you have hope, but at the same time you don't. you start rethinking choices you made during the conference, wondering if you made the right option. you headed your way to where the press council was sat at, where you met a couple other delegates, even bumping into jeongin, wishing each other a good luck!

you sit down between wonyoung and minjeong, which earned you an endearing hug from the two, assuring your problems with heeseung didn't matter. stuck in your head, you didn't notice the boys' absence in the room. and awarding had begun. the secretary-general of harvard model congress came up and made their speech, thanking all the delegates for participating and giving their best. chairs from other councils begin to come up to give their awards.

meanwhile, outside of the room, was heeseung cornered by jay, jake, and sunghoon.

heeseung, not caught up with the situation, looked at the three with confusion. "what did i do?"

jay scoffed, "what did you do? you managed to fuck it up again? what did i tell you?!" shaking the life out of him.

heeseung shook his head in confusion, not knowing what to do, when sunghoon came up to him, "look man, your little feud with y/n has to stop. i don't get you anymore. i thought you'd be good at this after helping me and wonyoung get together..."

"nah dude you're in denial. what do you mean you two basically confessed to not hating each other and then made out a bunch of times, only for you to leave her and ignore her like so? that's crazy." jake protested. that was the truth.

"i don't know what to tell you, but me and jake have got to get back for unsc awarding, but please think about it? i know you feel scared of this whole love thing, but i assure you, it's okay to feel this way." jay says, leaving with jake, which left sunghoon with heeseung alone.

heeseung didn't know what to do. for the first time in his life, everything was out of his control. he craved you and needed you, but he felt like he didn't deserve you. it was as if a crisis was happening in his own mind.

as he hears the cheers of the room with every award that is given out, his heart races. he hears the announcement where jay and jake both won best delegates, which they had been double delegating in.

sunghoon kept trying to comfort heeseung, not knowing what to say to him. "look, i may not understand the way your mind works, but i assure you that you deserve her. you've put yourself through it all for decelis, and the track record that we have wouldn't have been what it is now if it wasn't for you. i don't know what plan you're cooking up, but whatever it is, win her back." heeseung looks at sunghoon with sheer nervousness in his eyes. "press and crisis are left, so whatever you want to do? do it now. before its too late."

leaving heeseung alone outside the room, sunghoon walks back in, returning to where the press journalists sat. he saw you picking on your nails out of habit, nervous for the next awards. as your chairs walk up to the podium, sunghoon just hopes heeseung would do something.

as names begin getting called out, sunoo winning best pre-conference video, then riki and jungwon winning verbal commendations, wonyoung and minjeong winning honorable mentions, you held on tight to the tiny string of hope left. it was probably between you and sunghoon left. as you look around the room, heeseung is still nowhere to be found. you had hoped that maybe with this win, you'd make him proud once and for all.

"the final two journalists were a tight match. these two shown impeccable talent in their articles and presence the past three days." shuhua announces. "it is with our great pleasure that the most outstanding journalist goes to, park sunghoon!"

wonyoung, who was on the stage prior, basically screams in joy. you high five sunghoon before he winks at you, knowing you'd win best journalist. but a part of you still thinks you won't.

beomgyu gives sunghoon his award, before adjusting his mic. "this final journalist has pure talent in her writing, and have awestruck the both of us with her work. without further ado, we would like to present that the best journalist award goes to none other than... l/n y/n!"

relief. that's all what washes towards you. yes you've heard your name and the words best journalist go along too often, but every time it happens, it always feels euphoric. as you walk up the stage to receive your award, earning smiles from the other awardees, you couldn't help but look to the crowd.

you see jay and jake basically jumping up and down in joy, but heeseung was still nowhere to be found. a pang of disappointment burns in your chest as you walk down the podium with your certificate in hand. an array of congratulations! are heard, as you sit back down for the final awarding. crisis.

zoning out, after feeling the euphoria of your win, your mind drifts off to heeseung. how would he feel? was he proud?

as chair yeonjun announces the awardees, you are cut out of your trance with every round of applause. you see jeongin win most outstanding, and you cheer for him.

as yeonjun clears his throat for the final award, he begins his speech. "this final award goes to a delegate who really deserves it all. although this mun may have not been his best run, he deserves so much more than the title: prodigy. i'd like to present this best delegate award to none other than... you know what? lee heeseung get up here, get your award, and get your girl!"

with pure shock, you watch as heeseung bursts through the doors, run up to the podium, quickly shake his chairs' hands, grabs his certificate, and runs down. and he's running to you.

he drops his certificate on the floor, before engulfing you in the biggest hug he's ever given in his life. spinning you around, you squeal in excitement. he whispers in your ear an array of i'm so proud of you's, before putting you down, and kissing you in front of everyone.

you cling onto him, parting your lips allowing him to kiss you deeper and deeper, and the feeling of sparks flying around you made it feel like it would last forever. your ears muffle all the cheers surrounding you, only focusing on heeseung, and heeseung only.

he puts you down and rests his forehead on yours, exactly like how he did on the rooftop the night before. "how'd you pull this off?" you ask him, still on cloud nine.

"eh, had some help from chair yeonjun. didn't expect the bestdel though." heeseung laughs, holding you by the waist, tighter, and tighter.

you held his face closer, wanting to feel his touch, "why'd you do that? why'd you run?"

"y/n. i love you. i never knew how to say it all this time, because it's a feeling unlike any other. to the point it made me feel as if my life was in crisis. but that's when i realized i never had it all. not until i found you."

taglist; @riekiss @sesameoil721 @desistay @capri-cuntz @beomluvrr @shawnyle @tya0 @heexoolio @sunghoonsgff @spiderhanzzz (crossed out = i can't tag you)

back to my masterlist?

disclaimer: this, in no way, reflects the idol. this is purely fiction.

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obxsummer · 8 days ago

Text

wave of you // ghost of you

pairing: jj maybank x routledge!reader

summary: more treasure hunting continues but your group takes time to enjoy the perfect surf day. it was perfect, that is until topper’s girlfriend becomes unhinged and you find yourself in the middle of an argument with… rafe cameron coming to your defense?

warnings: the usual obx angst, anxiety attacks, mentions of PTSD, cursing, crying. yeah.

navigation -- series masterlist

ask me anything

Sarah and John B had beat your half of the group back to the house, Kiara having been running the shop in the unexpected absences. After taking a shower to scrub the hospital off of you and changing into the comfiest clothes you could find, you joined everyone in the living area where everyone was sharing their half of the past few hours.

John B and Sarah had taken the amulet to get an inscription translated into what you found out said Where the living and dead collide, the gatekeeper will guide the way, whatever that meant. They were kicked out shortly after revealing where the object was from, the individual telling them it was cursed.

“Genrette was obsessed with Blackbeard, so maybe directions to his treasure?” John B theorized as he handed the amulet over to JJ.

“So, what is this treasure?” Cleo continued, “Gold?”

Pope shook his head. “No, I remember hearing something about like a… a crown, blue crown?”

His suggestion was immediately vetoed by Cleo and Kiara, neither girl believing a word he offered. You sighed and leaned back into the cushions of the couch, wrapping the blanket tighter around you as you listened to them bicker.

“Apparently, it is the most sought out artifact in the ancient world,” John B read off a page of a book he’d grabbed from the shelf. You squinted at the object in his hand, quietly asking yourself when your brother of all people read a book. “The blue crown was created for Darius the Great of Persia over 3,000 years ago.”

“That’s worth more than 50k.”

John B ignored JJ’s comment and continued, “It was said to possess the blessing of the gods themselves, granting the wearer immense favor and rare invincibility. Holy shit, look at this. Xerxes, the son of Darius the Great, he was a badass. He’s wearing it. Uh, Alexander the Great, beat the shit out of everybody. He’s wearing it. Julius Caesar, also a badass, murdered a bunch of people.”

“Dad told you all of this?” You asked him as he read the names off the pages. Pushing yourself to your feet, you moved to stand behind JJ and rested your chin on his shoulder as you looked over at what they were reading. He moved you into his side, thumb brushing your hip bone as he tugged you close.

John B shook his head at your question, glancing up at you. “No, no. I don’t remember any of this, I just know it granted wishes.”

“Like a genie?”

“Hold on, it says right here the crown was lost sometime in the 1700s, but it was rumored to be hunted down by… Blackbeard.”

There was no argument that the direction of the treasure hunt had been changed when it came to a priceless item versus 50k. The whole night shifted, turning into a bonfire and celebration between the group that brought everyone’s spirits back up.

“Oh, come on!” You complained as Pope smacked your burnt marshmallow from his face, sending the treat into the grass a few feet away. “Pope, that was my fuckin’ marshmallow!”

“I’ll make you a different one! The burnt ones are ass!”

You groaned in response and fake pouted before shaking the can of beer in your hand to find it empty. The six of you had been out here since sundown, embracing the thrill of the evening and what lay ahead. Despite hating the danger your group always seemed to head into, you missed this feeling of nostalgia and anticipation.

JJ’s hands grabbed your hips as you got up from your folding chair, bumping into him as you did so. You covered his hand in the one that didn’t have an empty can and smiled at him. “My knight in shining armor.”

“At your service, baby,” He replied instantly, trading your empty can for the fresh one he had next to him. Once it was securely in your hand, he tugged on your waist until you fell into his lap, a squeal escaping your lips before the two of you lost balance with the momentum and tumbled backward into the grass.

You screamed in shock, your beer flying away in the chaos as you rolled off JJ who was high off his ass and giggling loudly at the fall. You couldn’t stop the laughter escaping your lips and dropped into the grass completely, overwhelmed with happiness for the first time in what felt like forever. “You dumbass!”

“C’mere!”

Another yelp escaped you as JJ swooped you off the lawn and over his shoulder, hauling your ass toward the house with no explanation.

“Oh come on!” John B groaned and covered his eyes with his hand as JJ carried you out of view, various whistles from the ground following. “Fuckin’ hate you, JJ!”

JJ flipped your brother off with his free hand and walked into the house, closing the door with his shoe before he gently placed your feet on the ground. You grinned up at him, your hands wrapping around his neck to pull him impossibly closer.

“Did you need something?” You teased and faked innocence as you fluttered your eyelashes to drive the effect home.

JJ tsked his tongue, his fingers cupping your neck before he kissed you roughly, moaning at the way your body fell into him without hesitation. You knew he wasn’t going to hold back very long and there was a 100% chance your friends could walk in at any moment.

“Upstairs,” You rushed out as his lips dropped to your neck, nipping softly at your skin to make your knees even weaker. “Jay.”

“Yeah, yeah,” He mumbled, his kisses stopping long enough for him to crouch and loop his arms around your ass and waist and pick you up, your ankles crossing behind his back, supported by his strong grip. “Lemme love on you.”

You hummed, kissing him again and biting gently on his bottom lip in response to his request. “You can love on me as much as you went when it’s not somewhere John B can see it.”

JJ groaned and shook his head. “Please stop bringing up your brother when we’re making out.”

You laughed loudly as he started walking up the stairs to your room, his kisses lingering on your collarbone and his grip tight as he did. The lack of light was welcomed as you landed on the bed with a laugh, barely having a second to pull your shirt off and drop your shoes before JJ was hovering over you with a hungry desire in his eyes and a whole night to make you his, again and again, just as he intended to.

The next morning was a haze of blissful kisses and a warm shower between you and JJ, the house still silent as everyone slept. Your boyfriend wrapped you in a soft towel, pressing a kiss to your forehead before telling you he was going to check on the shack. It hadn’t taken more than a few minutes before he was running through the house, waking everyone up and telling them about the swell.

The warm sunlight was shining through the window as you slipped on a swimsuit for the day, taking the time to brush your skin with sunscreen and grabbing one of John B’s lightweight shirts to slip on over your shoulders. The boys were already down prepping the boards with Kiara as you and Sarah took the time to make breakfast for everyone, knowing food would easily be forgotten in the excitement of the day.

“Oh come on, don’t tell me you guys are seriously surfing today?” Pope walked across the screened-in porch while shoving his backpack on his shoulders.

You frowned at the sight of him in everyday clothes and not swimwear, “And you aren’t?”

Ever since you were little, you’d spent every surf day with the boys and Kiara. It was like the second the news of a perfect swell hit town, all bets were off and the beach was calling your name. Pope was usually the one to drag you out of bed for it, so to see him walking away was a surprise.

“Well, I don’t want to sell the million dollars I have in my hand for 50k so, I’m gonna look into this.” He held up the amulet for emphasis.

JJ looked just as confused as you did. “Wait, Pope. Didn’t you hear me? It’s a perfect swell day.”

“Yeah, and there will be other swell days.”

Low whistles and ‘ooohs’ followed his statement, the group collectively disagreeing with his mindset. John B turned to Sarah from his spot where he was waxing your board. “You wanna maximize beach day?”

Sarah pursed her lips. “I wanna maximize this tan.”

You bit into your toast and pushed at her with your toes. “Sarah Cameron, I know you used to be a Kook but you’ll learn how to surf the Pogue way today.”

She rolled her eyes in fake annoyance before pushing at your foot, sending you off balance from your stool as you yelped before laughing.

“Well, everyone have fun maximizing.”

“Wait!” You called out to Pope as he turned on his heels to leave. “Where’s Cleo? I have to see her on a board. She’s gotta be insane with it.”

Pope shrugged, “She texted me, said she’s looking for bait in The Cut.”

“Lame, tell her we’re closed!” Kie argued back.

JJ continued to try and convince Pope to join you all on the beach, but the boy wasn’t having it, his mind stubborn on exploring more info on the amulet for the day. He informed you all he texted Cleo to meet up before hopping on his bike and disappearing from view.

You weren’t sure how the boys managed to get all the boards on the Twinkie, or honestly, you didn’t want to know, but the second the sand was in between your toes, you didn’t have a care in the world. Surfing was always one of your favorite pastimes. The sunshine, the water, and the feeling of landing a good wave were so rewarding.

John B had managed to find the group an open spot on the beach to set up chairs and the umbrella he almost took JJ’s eye out with. You took off in the sand and dove headfirst into the water, relishing in the refresh it gave you as the water crossed over. It had been so long since you had nothing to do besides lay in the salty water.

The peace didn’t last long, of course. Topper and his rowdy group pulled up in their newer vehicles, purposely parking close to your group as if it would make a point. You rolled your eyes at the sight of them, knowing this wouldn’t end well because it just never really did.

JJ met you in the water with both of your boards in hand, but your focus wasn’t on him. It was on the group piling out of the cars which happened to include Rafe Cameron.

“I won’t let anything happen,” JJ attempted to reassure you as he stopped to kiss your temple, sliding your board into your hands. You gave him a weak nod but didn’t move your gaze as you watched Topper move closer to your setup where he intercepted John B.

Your hands moved to give JJ the board back as you walked out of the water to approach the two boys. You didn’t need John B doing anything irrational, especially if Topper pushed his buttons the way he normally did.

“Nice of you to join the party,” Topper acknowledged as you came to stand next to your brother with crossed arms.

“Top.” You nodded in his direction, not backing down in your defensive approach.

Topper motioned toward John B, “I was just hashing things out, you know. Friendly banter to get things even.”

“Do you really think it’s even, Topper?” You asked him as the list began to run through your head. Every time you guys got the slight upper hand, the Kooks took you down two pegs.

Topper pursed his lips and looked away from you. “Uh, let’s go down the list. You guys sunk my boat.”

“Allegedly.”

“Then you cold-cocked me and put me in the ER, remember?” He looked at John B pointedly like it was the worst thing ever.

“You beat the shit out of Pope,” You reminded him. “Or, how about pushing John B off a two-story building, hmm?”

Topper rolled his eyes and pointed behind John B. “Look, I was with her first, bro. If your girl comes to me, if she can’t resist….”

“Real mature of you, Topper. Oh, by the way, thanks for burning our house down,” John B replied, his fingers twitching to throw the first punch, but he wouldn’t with you standing next to him.

You sneered at Topper’s attitude and stepped forward to block John B in case the emotions got the best of either boy. “Just here to surf, Top. Unless you had more to say?”

Topper’s eyes glanced behind you before he cleared his throat and refocused with no further argument. “No, no. Just here to surf.”

You hummed in agreement as he turned to walk away, mumbling something about having a good chat. Waiting until he was far enough on his side, you shifted back around to see JJ standing a few feet behind you, glare sharp enough to kill the Kook. No wonder Topper about shit his pants.

“C’mon.” John B grabbed your hand, tugging you away from the scene. You didn’t miss the way Rafe stared at you the entire time despite the new brunette he seemed to have attached to his hip. It took one glance to know she wasn’t a Kook, especially with the obvious discomfort she held around the group.

Pushing their presence to the back of your mind, you allowed John B and JJ to tug you out into the warm sea, Kiara and Sarah following behind the three of you as the waves started to kick up. It became a routine of swapping waves, dropping in amongst your friends’ cheers and applause. Even Sarah managed to grab a couple and remain on her feet for the course into shore, which had all of you celebrating.

Hours passed between the sun and waves before you flopped on a towel and treated yourself to a midday nap. Sarah had the right idea when she said she would maximize her tan, the warm rays lulling you to sleep before you knew it.

JJ pulled himself out of the water, brushing as much from his hair as possible so he didn’t look like a wet dog. He didn’t feel half bad dropping in on a wave that Topper supposedly thought he could claim. JJ laughed to himself; the damn Kook should know better than to try to out-surf a Pogue.

His eyes caught sight of you sound asleep and cuddled up on the oversized towel you insisted on grabbing for yourself at the thrift store. It was rare nowadays for you to sleep without someone by your side, especially at night. There were too many times when you’d crash on the hammock before the group came in and you woke someone up with a heavy scream.

In the years JJ had known you, he’d never considered you to be weak or broken. You’d always been an example of strength in his eyes, someone who could persevere even the toughest of challenges. He knew it took a little bit of support now and then, but you were healing, and he was so, so proud of you. You’d shared such vulnerable moments with him, and though he wished he could take the pain away, he knew it was a process. It took him longer than he’d like to admit to share about his dad with you, so he understood the hesitancy you had when it came to unpacking what occurred while John B was gone.

Usually, when you caught sight of Rafe, you shut down completely. JJ didn’t pry to ask what all happened when you were stuck with him, trusting that in time you would open up and share when you were comfortable. He was grateful that you felt comfortable enough with them around to sleep even though the person who’d taken so much from you was so close by.

“Guys, there’s a turtle hatch!”

Kiara’s excitement woke you up from the warmth of the sand, your eyes blinking in an attempt to adjust to the sunlight. You shifted to see where she was pointing, noticing the little movements of sand and the dark figures poking out. Pushing yourself to your feet, your friends scurried around to make a path in hopes of guiding the baby turtles safely toward the water.

You quickly tossed John B your towel to drag out the terrain evenly before taking a closer look at the small creatures, wishing you could pick one up but knowing better. “They’re so cute, what the fuck!”

“Make a turtle highway,” Sarah laughed beside you, the two of soaking up the once-in-a-lifetime event as Kie continued to build a path with the boys. Pulling out your phone, you snapped a few photos of the event, including one of Sarah pointing at the little turtles as they cruised by.

The sound of a revving engine pulled your attention away and toward where Topper’s supped-up Jeep was approaching. You frowned at the sight, not sure what his intentions were before you noticed Topper wasn’t even driving, Ruthie was.

“Hey!” Kiara stood up and waved her hands in the air, “Stop! There’s a hatch!”

“Topper, stop!” You yelled next, trying to point around the current path of the turtles who were moving as fast as their little bodies could take them. “Move!”

There was barely enough time for JJ and Kiara to throw themselves out of the way of the oncoming Jeep, thankfully missing the turtles and the near-death of the duo. You could hear Ruthie’s obnoxious laugh behind you as you faced the Kook group who apparently, found attempted murder funny.

“Hey!” You were shouting before you had a chance to think it through, feet stomping through the sand to carry you closer to where Kelce and his friends found it hysterical. “What the hell is wrong with you people?”

Kelce continued to laugh as Topper’s Jeep revved once more, coming to a stop next to you. “Maybe next time don’t drop in on our surf,” Kelce’s voice dropped deeper as he approached you, gaze darkening when he was eye to eye with you.

“Fuck you, Kelce. Whatever ego you all have that you think entitles you to run over baby turtles is sick,” You spat, pushing against his chest causing his friends to ‘ooh’ at your action. Not only did they almost ruin the hatch, but Kie and JJ were inches from getting run over because of their stupidity.

“Turtles?” A voice next to you stopped you from spitting another nasty curse at the group now that Topper and Ruthie had rejoined. You looked over to see the brunette girl looking back at you, her gaze familiar before you caught Rafe watching over her shoulder. “There were turtles?”

The heartbreak in her voice surprised you. You figured anyone following Rafe around would have the same cruel attitude he did, but the empathy you weren’t expecting.

“Go back to The Cut,” Ruthie interrupted whatever explanation you were considering giving.

You turned to glare at her, closing the distance between the two of you as you poked at her chest. “You have five seconds before JJ gets over here and loses his shit on all of you, so, I’d watch your words, Ruthie, before they bite you in the ass. You’re a pathetic excuse for a human, and I hope you’re fucking ashamed of your actions.”

The group clearly hadn’t expected you, of all people, to come mouth off about their actions. Silence filled the group, the girl in front of you at a loss of words that someone actually dared put her in her place.

“Look, we didn’t mean to-“

“Shut the fuck up, Topper!” You snapped at him, sick of his attempts to appear innocent despite all the damage he caused. “What happened to just here to surf, huh? Or is attempted murder always in the back of your mind?”

“Hey watch it-“

“Fucking leave, Pogue!”

“Get the hell out of here!”

“Hey, hey! Enough!” It was Rafe who put himself between you and Ruthie’s incoming hands. You didn’t know whether to be grateful or terrified and took a step back, feet stumbling as you did so. You stared at him, horrified as his gaze met yours and stole all the air from your lungs.

“Bitch can barely look him in the eye,” Ruthie laughed behind Rafe, but you made no move to correct her, terrified that even a breath in the wrong way would end your life. Rafe Cameron, of all people, to be the one to stop someone from harming you was a sick joke.

“Rafe?” The brunette girl next to him grabbed his arm, her eyes taking in your terrified expression. It was then that you recognized her. Sofia, the girl who you’d unfortunately come to know too well in the therapy sessions John B had forced you to attempt. The two of you had shared so much with each other but never once had you run into her since you stopped going months ago. She seemed to process who you were then too, a silent conversation running through her head as she mouthed your name.

At that moment, someone ran up behind you, hands landing on your hips before you were moved into another set of arms. You caught sight of JJ stepping closer to Rafe, likely starting an argument that you could only hope didn’t end with a fight.

“You’re okay, I’ve got ya.” John B turned you around to redirect your gaze, his arm wrapping around your shoulder as he started walking back toward the Twinkie. Everything turned to a haze, the adrenaline wearing off enough that you were heading into the inevitable anxiety attack.

“If you come near her, or any one of us, ever again, I’ll come back and kill every single one of you.” JJ’s threat wasn’t a light one, and you were certain it would come back to bite him in the ass considering the Kooks would take it and run with it.

Your heart was beating rapidly in your ears as John B pushed you into the passenger seat of the Twinkie, his hands grabbing both of your cheeks as you closed your eyes and tried to focus on your breath. Sarah’s grip on your hand was light as she climbed in the driver’s seat to sit on your other side.

“What the hell was that?” Kiara’s shout echoed through the van, ringing in your ears and causing you to squeeze your eyes closed even harder. “What did you say to them?”

“Kie, shut up!” Sarah was yelling back at her, their voices blending together as you tucked your knees to your chest and curled into a ball. The shakiness was setting in and all you could do was beg your body to calm down and catch up to your actions.

You forced your eyes to open, blinking as you managed to catch Sofia’s gaze across the sand. How you didn’t put the pieces together that’s who she was, you weren’t sure, but a pit grew in your stomach when you realized you’d spilled so much in those sessions that she was present for. Most, if not all of it, about Rafe.

Air choked in your lungs, and aggressive coughs followed before JJ’s hand was against your chest to keep you upright. His fingers were gently against your jawline as he kept your head up in an attempt to help you breathe correctly.

“You’re alright, baby. Just keep breathing, yeah?”

John B had left your vision, same with Sarah, leaving you face to face with your boyfriend. He climbed over you to sit in the seat Sarah had once occupied and pulled your legs out to rest over his. The desire to curl up and cramp your muscles happened more than often and he’d picked up on that after a few anxiety attacks, recognizing your patterns and habits.

JJ forced his hands in yours, keeping your fingers from stabbing your palms as you fought to take deep breaths, your body still on high alert even though your mind was coming back down.

“There you go, good girl,” His encouragement made you smile slightly, knowing he was messing with you on purpose. Moving forward, you puddled into his lap without a word, and he welcomed you with open arms. Physical contact helped more in the recent moments, something you never expected considering you used to be so fearful of someone’s touch.

JJ shuffled with you in his grasp, tugging the door closed to prevent unwelcome eyes from seeing you in such a vulnerable moment. John B was climbing in the driver seat shortly after, Sarah joining in the back before all doors were closed. Your breathing was slowing, muscles finding the forgiveness to loosen up on you but refused to move from JJ’s lap until your head was back in one piece.

“Kie?” You mumbled into his shoulder. The girl was clearly upset with you, but you didn’t have the capacity to question why.

“Walking,” John B replied simply as he started the old van. “Needs to clear her fuckin’ head.”

Sarah shushed him and you could hear her hand connect with his body gently, a grumbled protest coming from your brother in response. A comfortable silence filled the vehicle as John B drove away from the beach and started his course back home.

Exhaustion had set in on the drive, your body heavy in JJ’s hold as you listened to the occupants other than yourself share small chatter. Words weren’t enough to describe how grateful you were to your friends and brother for always supporting you no matter what. You knew it was a handful, hell, it wasn’t easy yourself, but the fact that they showed up time and time again said everything.

“Sorry about everything,” You apologized as John B parked the van in front of the house, ending your adventure for the day. “I’m trying to fix it and it just-”

“Hey,” Sarah interrupted your explanation as she popped her head over the seat. “No apologies. We’ve talked about that. Don’t apologize, ever.”

She left no room for argument and opened the back door to slide out. You looked at JJ and John B, both boys shrugged in agreement with her, making you roll your eyes.

“Maybe we could rethink therapy?” John B suggested as he watched you rub your face to rid yourself of tear marks. You shook your head, giving no verbal answer.

Therapy had been shit for you. When you first came back from El Dorado, the hospital had taken one look at you, post-gunshot stitches, and deemed you unsound. You went with it for a while, going to the group sessions and spilling stories without any names. Then you realized how cruel people were when they started comparing trauma and you never went back again.

JJ’s grip loosened so you could climb out of the van, arm slinging over your shoulder to keep you close as he followed you. Sarah joined your side, pulling your hand in hers to swing back and forth as the four of you started heading toward the house where Pope had come out the side door.

“Yo!” JJ called in greeting. “What’d you find?”

Silence followed the question, shifting your attention to Pope instead of the ground. The shock on his face was evident and your gaze immediately dropped to the dark red smears on his shirt and hands.

“Oh, shit.” Sarah was turning you into her instantly, both JJ and John B getting closer to Pope with an onslaught of questions. You kept your eyes on her, squeezing her hand tightly in attempt to keep your mind from getting involved.

“What happened?”

“Where’s Cleo?”

“She’s inside.” It was the only answer Pope had to give, and it sent JJ inside scrambling for the girl in question, fearing what he would find. John B grabbed ahold of Pope, steering him back to the house without any further questions before Sarah started to guide you along with the fresh blood out of view.

Sarah looked at you expectantly as you made your way through the door into whatever chaos you’d subjected yourself to. The girl next to you stopped short and shifted your path into the kitchen, rerouting you from whatever she’d caught sight of before you could. JJ was already in there, pushing a water into your hand and lifting you onto the kitchen counter without another word.

To your relief, Cleo moved in shortly after, her expression stoic and unreadable before Sarah left your side and you could barely hear Kiara’s voice joining whatever conversation was happening a room over.

JJ placed his hands on each side of your body before kissing you softly, pulling your mind to him and only him. You hummed quietly, fingers tangling in his hair for a moment before he shifted away.

“Can you tell me?” You asked quietly, not wanted to push too far if Cleo was clearly so upset.

He glanced at the girl behind you before answering, “Terrance’s body is in the other room.”

JJ watched you as you processed the information, a million questions running through your mind that you couldn’t bring yourself to ask. Apparently, there was no time to, as JJ’s eyes caught on to something out the window behind you. A quick glance over your shoulder revealed the all too familiar Kildare County Sheriff’s Office truck, and your heart sank to your ass.

“J-“

“Upstairs,” He replied with no room for disagreement. “Our room or balcony, kay? I’ll send Sarah.”

You nodded, doing what he said without another question and bolted up the stairs with your heart pounding in your chest. Sarah’s footsteps were behind you moments later, the two of you finding sanctuary on the balcony outside your shared room with JJ.

The sun was beginning to set and cast an orange lighting over the two of you as you piled into the hammock. Sarah leaned her head against yours just as another figure joined your group. Cleo fell on top of the two of you with a huff, both you and Sarah wrapping her up tightly into your cuddle puddle.

And suddenly, all you could hear, was silence.

How the fuck did the cards fall this way every single time?

navigation -- series masterlist

ask me anything

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year2000electronics · 2 months ago

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HERE THEY ARE! here's what everyone would be in my own take on monster falls!! you can agree or disagree, it's just me having fun with it :]

my general lore for the au itself would be that the town of gravity falls is cursed, and if you stay there long enough, you get turned into a monster. most people have some reason not to leave before it's too late and the curse becomes permanent, other just give up and let it happen

monsters under the cut!

dipper: deertaur (unchanged from popular fan choice)

mabel: unicorn (unchanged from sorta-popular fan choice)

stan: gargoyle (unchanged from popular fan choice)

ford: mothman (chosen for being a cryptid, ford has mentioned moths multiple times, mothman being a "shadowy figure", stan being able to pass himself off as ford when you see them both in the dark

soos: fairy (chosen for the irony- he has canonically killed a fairy! and also that he calls everyone "dude" when fae usually take names, fae are usually tricksters but he winds up being very helpful around the shack)

wendy: ghost (chosen because she's related to archibald corduroy, the northwest mansion ghost, also that she's "non-commital" to her job and constantly vanishes from it, also ALSO that her first big episode was themed around ghosts!)

gideon: haunted doll/puppet (chosen because he has creepy doll vibes, and puppets are often associated with performance- think puppet shows, pinocchio, ventriloquist dummy- haunted dolls and living puppets also have a common theme of something childish getting a mean streak.) (also, bud would be a fox in this au as a reference to honest john)

pacifica: dragon (chosen for the northwests' miserly behavior, hoarding of treasure, and pacifica's fiery tongue)

mcgucket: robot (chosen for mcgucket's affinity for robotics, and also for the idea that once he starts using the memory gun, he starts corrupting/mass erasing his own technology and has to repair himself using junkyard scraps)

robbie: cherub (he dyes his wings black to seem like some sort of dark angel. chosen for his last name, his hoodie, and his parents' chipper demeanor. they're a family of morticians who choose to spread the love by burying couples next to each other)

"billy-bob cipher": a vessel bill specifically crafted to hunt the monsters in gravity falls. he went with the idea of a greasy redneck hunter, because that would be the form people would be least willing to argue with about carrying a bunch of guns and traps around.

#gravity falls #monster falls #my art #dipper pines #mabel pines #stanford pines #stanley pines #soos ramirez #wendy corduroy #gideon gleeful #pacifica northwest #robbie valentino #fiddleford mcgucket #bill cipher #FALLS TO MY KNEES #DONE AT LAST!!#ENJOY EVERYONE

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starcurtain · 5 months ago

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Female Guidance in Aventurine's Life

One thing I haven't seen discussed in much depth yet, but which I think is especially interesting, is the consistency of female guidance in Aventurine's life: Every single person who we have seen on screen offering Aventurine assistance or making a positive difference in his life is female (with one exception, yes, I'll get there).

Under the read more cause it's longggg:

Before even diving into his family, let's just get the obvious out of the way: Aventurine is, at least supposedly, blessed by a goddess. The very origin of his good fortune--be it actual blessing or curse--comes from the literal "mother goddess" who watches over him. This is one of the only instances in Star Rail where a god character is specifically given a gender, and Gaiathra is not ever ambiguous. She is the classic female fertility goddess with all the trappings of other famous triple goddess figures of the real world. Aventurine's personal belief in the goddess may be shaky, but he nevertheless continues to treasure his people's faith. Thus, at the core, we can say Aventurine is a character who is guarded by the most quintessential mother figure possible.

Now, with the most obvious out of the way:

We know that Aventurine's father died before Aventurine was even born, and therefore he would not have any memories of his father, leaving him to be raised by his mother and sister.

Both women clearly made an enormous and lasting impression on Aventurine; they haunt every single one of his memories of Sigonia and are the key elements of the family Aventurine longs to return to. While he flirts with the concept of death as a way to see his family members again, it was also his mother and sister who instilled in him any sense of self-worth and meaning to his existence, the only things keeping him from giving up on living. His mother believed him to be blessed; his sister insisted to his face that not even the only remaining remnant of their mother had any value in comparison to his life.

It is for his sister that Aventurine first begins expressing a self-sacrificial nature, and from his sister that this self-sacrifice is reinforced when she uses herself as a shield to help him escape massacre at the hands of the Katicans.

It is also from his sister that Aventurine learns many of the deeply meaningful actions he holds onto to the present day, despite having been so far removed from his own culture.

Conversely, every one of Aventurine's early negative experiences on screen appear to have been driven (at least primarily) by men.

Although the Katican tribe of course would have both men and women, the tribal societies on Sigonia appear to be on the fairly traditional side, with Aventurine's mother staying at the camp with her child while his father was the one to go out and hunt for offerings for Gaiathra. This is also supported by Aventurine asking Jade to take him to her "chief" later on. Therefore, it is likely (although of course not guaranteed) that a majority of the Katicans' army was male, and that Aventurine's early experiences with outsiders consisted almost entirely of indiscriminate pillaging and massacre at the hands of what the Avgin viewed as savage, invading warriors. In separate instances, Aventurine was traumatized by these warrior figures three times--first with the loss of his father, then his mother, and then finally his sister.

And even their hope, supposed to come in the form of the "men in black" from the IPC, completely abandoned them, leaving Aventurine once again betrayed by masculine figures that were supposed to be there to protect him. Led by Oswaldo Schneider, another cruel male authority figure, the Marketing Department of the IPC permitted the wholesale slaughter of Aventurine's people--something which we know Aventurine is now aware of.

Then, of course, the next piece of Aventurine's backstory we're given is his male slave master. I don't really need to say anything about this, do I? This man violated Aventurine's human dignity and bodily autonomy, and forced Aventurine's hand in a life or death battle for which Aventurine still punishes himself mentally, even years in the future.

In part to escape the difficulty of his situation and rise to a position where he would have enough resources to--he thought--help his people, Aventurine joins up with the IPC. But when he attempts to make contact with a powerful man in the organization, Diamond, he is instead met by a woman, Jade, who against Aventurine's own expectations determines that she will raise Aventurine up (or use him as a tool, depending on how you currently choose to interpret Jade's motivations), granting him wealth and status beyond his imagination.

(And this line in particular is interesting, because you can take it one of two ways: 1) Aventurine comes from a patriarchal planet that traditionally put men into positions of power [thereby making his own slavery an emasculating act, aligning him further with disenfranchised women]; thus, he is making the assumption that to get anywhere in this organization, he will need to work with a man; or 2) He actually was counting on Jade taking his bet and helping him right from the beginning, because Aventurine perceives women as inherently more likely to protect and aid him than men would be.)

In the end, Jade does exactly as she claims she will, launching Aventurine into a position of power while also closing golden handcuffs around his wrists. She positions herself not only as his supervisor, but as his advocate and ally. She entrusts him with her Cornerstone, a sign of significant faith in his abilities. She even seems to be keenly aware of his bias towards the mother figure, referring to him as "child" in their conversations.

Whether this is genuine or a manipulation tactic can certainly be debated (and I'm not inclined to think at this point that Jade is a genuinely good role model or selflessly supportive person in Aventurine's life), but whatever the case, women are the only people Aventurine even remotely considers to be "in his corner."

We see this even earlier, in Aventurine's call to Topaz. Like with the example of his mother and sister, Aventurine trusts in Topaz's ability implicitly, and considers her above anyone else when it comes to completing the mission in Penacony.

Although of course we don't know if Aventurine has any other friends or allies among the Strategic Investment Department, it seems very likely that Topaz, yet another woman, is the one he is closest with. At the very least, she is the only IPC character (so far) that Aventurine has a complimentary voice line for, one that shows his respect for her talent:

Over and over again, the story aligns Aventurine with female figures in positions of authority, and demonstrates that he is comfortable (although maybe not too comfortable, in the case of Jade) with relying on them and trusting their judgment, just as he did with his mother and sister.

And this pretty much goes off the charts in Penacony, where Aventurine has more involvement with the female cast than virtually any other non-female character (even the Trailblazer!). We set the pattern off right away, with Aventurine immediately being placed into a negotiation situation with Himeko, respecting her role as the Express's leader and working to get himself aligned with the Express by acquiescing to her request for support.

Then there's the fact that Aventurine is the one who finds Robin's body, an event which, although he didn't let it show too much, was almost certainly traumatic for him, given the violent death of his own sister.

Next, twice in Penacony's story, we see Aventurine seek out Sparkle for information. He may not personally like her and her comments may be both racist and dehumanizing, but Aventurine does rely on her--being the only character explicitly seeking her aid, which no one else in Penacony seems to want.

In 2.0...

And in 2.1.

Now, say it with me, guys: Aventurine built an entire portion of his grand plan around the idea that if he looked pathetic enough, a female character would absolutely come and help him. And sure enough, the women come through for him, always! Sparkle gives him the exact last clue he needs to confirm his belief that he could use "Death" to reach the true Penacony, sealing the deal for the rest of his plan.

His plan which also hinged significantly on Black Swan's involvement too, another woman that he views as, if not trustworthy, then at least intelligent and hyper-competent.

Contrast all this, of course, with the treatment Aventurine receives at the hands of Sunday, the lone opposing male character he faces in Penacony.

Sparkle implies that Sunday would humiliate Aventurine in an unmistakably sexual and degrading way, and Sunday himself professes this same desire to see Aventurine humiliated.

Then we're "treated" to the moment in which Sunday uses the Harmony's (or perhaps actually the Order's?) power against Aventurine, in a scene which is supposed to reflect an interrogation but is also, very clearly, another nonconsensual violation of Aventurine's bodily autonomy and dignity by a man. While ostensibly seeking confirmation of the Cornerstone ruse, Sunday instead subjects Aventurine to unnecessary questions about his past on Sigonia, which recall and force Aventurine to re-endure memories of his trauma.

Even if this is what Aventurine prepared himself for and planned to have happen, the pain he experiences is very real, and he suffers both the physical and emotional consequences of Sunday's assault all the way up to his "Death" and possibly even beyond.

(Also, Sunday fans please don't get too up in arms with me for this; I also like Sunday! It's okay for characters to be morally grey!)

I think there's one other interesting example I would bring up here too, and that's Aventurine's conscious decision to weaponize his own masculinity against the Trailblazer. Through the 2.0 and 2.1 Trailblaze missions, Aventurine deliberately acts in an off-putting manner to the Astral Express crew, particularly the Trailblazer, in order to build up to the 2.1 climax where the Trailblazer is supposed to view him as an unrepentant villain and attack him without hesitation.

In order to achieve this uncomfortable, villainous effect, what does Aventurine do? Exactly what other men have done to him.

This is especially apparent if you're playing Stelle because of the ingrained societal taboo of a man entering a woman's personal space without consent, but even as Caelus, it is very clear that Aventurine is leveraging behaviors typically used to show dominance: In a complete 180 to all Aventurine's other body language in the game (normally quite withdrawn, frequently in defensive postures with his arms crossed or hand behind his back, almost always standing several feet away from other people), Aventurine violates the Trailblazer's personal bubble, looming over them (Caelus was sitting in this cutscene, lol), forcing eye contact, and commanding the space while informing them that they will have no choice.

For someone who was hunted, enslaved, had his movements restricted with chains, and due to his own slight stature has very likely been towered over by others who were intentionally asserting their power over him all his life, it is clear that Aventurine associates dominant, typically more masculine-coded physically-imposing behaviors with discomfort and even villainy.

Any girl who has ever had a man loom over her like this will realize very quickly: Aventurine wanted to make himself scary so he made himself act more like a bad man.

(Yes of course I know "not all men." I'm not saying every man behaves in this domineering way or that women cannot be domineering too, obviously, just that Aventurine had a very specific image in mind when constructing a "villainous persona," and the physically controlling tactics most typically used by aggressive men toward women was his immediate go-to.)

But where does that leave Dr. Ratio, the one male character actually on Aventurine's side?

Frankly, I don't want to derail my post about how intensely Hoyo chose to hammer on the message of "Women will protect you" in Aventurine's story with a discussion about a mlm ship, but the take-away here is going to lead in that direction anyway--so yes, Dr. Ratio is the exception.

What is interesting is that he does not come across as an exception at first, and in fact initially appears as another male character being rude and dismissive to Aventurine. Like, there are still people out there calling Ratio an unrepentant racist for this one.

Of course, it's later clarified that this is an act--likely even these insults were scripted specifically to give Sunday's spying ears the "insight" he needed to exploit Aventurine during the interrogation.

But even though it is an act, Aventurine still has noticeable trouble putting his faith in Ratio. He does genuinely doubt him a few times, despite knowing that they are working together to fool the Family.

Even his voice line about Ratio confirms that he doesn't think Ratio particularly cares for him; rather, he thinks Ratio simply tolerates him because he's slightly less unintelligent than those around them.

Ultimately, the entire act with Ratio ends up being a mirror of the real scenarios Aventurine has been experiencing with men his whole life (at least as far as we are shown his life). Men abandon him to fend for himself (unwillingly, like his father, or willingly, like Diamond leaving Aventurine to deal with Penacony alone on the inside). Ratio keeps leaving Aventurine completely alone. Men attempt to humiliate him and violate his boundaries (like Sunday and his slave master). Ratio insults Aventurine's appearance and intelligence repeatedly. Men betray him (like Oswaldo Schneider and his men leaving the Avgin to die). Ratio "betrays" him.

I'm not saying when Aventurine devised the plan for their act, he consciously drew up a list of all the ways men had hurt him in the past and had Ratio re-enact them one by one, but like... that's what happened, whether or not Aventurine intended it.

And okay, the shrinking scene in Dewlight Pavilion was just for fun and probably only slightly fetishy, the devs promise; yes, it was supposed to be a joke! ...But it's also not a mistake that this is yet another instance of a male character in a glaringly metaphorical position of power over Aventurine. Aventurine's tiny in this scene! He's completely vulnerable! He's in a dangerous position and the male character could very much hurt him in this moment.

But Ratio doesn't. (In fact, his line here is supposed to be sarcastic, very ha ha--but also, what is Ratio really saying? "I won't do anything to you without your express consent." What a good guy.)

Virtually everything negative that we see in 2.1 is Ratio doing these things as an act at Aventurine's own request. He doesn't actually disdain Aventurine; his own voiceline about Aventurine reinforces that he sees Aventurine as talented and intelligent.

Whatever you think he was apologizing for in their early scene, he's the only person we're ever shown in-game apologizing to Aventurine at all.

He worked hard to "betray" Aventurine but only as he was instructed to do, and immediately checks in on Aventurine's well-being afterward, even urging him to give up the plan if it becomes too much to handle.

And then, of course, there's the note: "Do stay alive. I wish you the best of luck."

After this point, it cannot be denied that Ratio is unequivocally on Aventurine's side, wants to help him, and is not doing so out of any sense of self-gain but largely because he is a good person who simply cares about Aventurine's fate. By the end of 2.1, it can no longer be doubted that Ratio is the exception to the "gender rule" of Aventurine's life, which--the story shows us again and again--was that guidance, protection, and care for Aventurine come from women, while men repeatedly represent dismissal, betrayal, or pain.

Ratio is, at least as far as Aventurine's story shows us, the proof that men can be good, that things are not as black and white in Aventurine's life as they might appear, and that--if you do choose to ship him with or see Aventurine as attracted to men--his attraction could be validated (and potentially reciprocated) by a male figure who would not bring additional harm to Aventurine's life. Aventurine makes the final decision to live after seeing Ratio's note--the exception to the rule ultimately proves to be the last piece needed to keep him alive.

But I promised I wasn't going to derail my own post about w o m e n, so let me get to the final point, and the one I really wanted to talk about: Although Ratio gets virtually all the credit for "saving" Aventurine in the fandom, Aventurine was actually saved by, you guessed it, another woman.

Not going to lie, the reason I started this post was specifically because I wanted to talk about how Acheron and Aventurine's dynamic was completely unexpected but actually fits flawlessly with the theme of feminine guidance in Aventurine's story.

Despite the fact that Aventurine made Acheron's life much harder and actively used her as a chip in his grand gamble, she doesn't blame or chastise him for those actions. Although she expresses some incredulity that Aventurine is actually that lucky, she then turns around and congratulations him for his ingenuity, immediately supporting him despite the fact that they don't even truly know each other.

Then it gets even more interesting. Acheron, who frequently hits her companions with deep and sometimes very emotionally fraught questions, asks Aventurine: "Have you never wavered?"

We as players know for a fact that Aventurine is constantly wavering, constantly doubting himself, his luck, and whether he'll even live--or even wants to live--to see tomorrow. But we also know that Aventurine is not forthcoming about those truths, refusing to express them to anyone, even himself. The only way we hear those dark truths is through his "future" self (who by the way, is once again another male figure cutting Aventurine down--of course it's himself but it's also, from the player's perspective, once again reinforcing the message that he isn't going to find safety or kindness in an adult male presence). Aventurine almost constantly deflects and diverts when his emotions or struggles are brought to the fore (unless he's divulging them for the specific purpose of allowing someone else to weaponize them). "I'm fine," he says, like a lying liar who lies.

But he doesn't lie to Acheron.

He chooses to be completely candid with her, to lance open the deepest wound of his life--that he can win and win and win and still have lost everything. The glitz and the glamour has all been stripped away here, at the end of everything, and Aventurine finally feels safe enough to admit that he fears he has absolutely nothing in his life worth living for.

And then, we get this direct parallel: Aventurine looks to Acheron, the woman now before him, for guidance, for explanation, exactly as he looked to his sister in the past.

He needs help, he needs answers, and he is continually seeking that help from the female figures in his life, whose support and kindness echo the lost care of his mother and sister.

"Go where you should be," Acheron tells Aventurine, guiding him across the river of death just as his sister insisted that he flee through the rain toward life.

Look guys, Acheron's even the one who reminds Aventurine to look at Ratio's note in the first place because apparently being an emanator of Nihility gives you x-ray vision, but my girl just gets no credit at all for being Aventurine's real savior, come on now!! Yes, Ratio's note was the final reminder Aventurine needed that someone would be waiting for him on the other side, but Aventurine would never have even gotten to the point of being willing to read that note if Acheron hadn't stepped in and provided him an answer to his question.

She feeds him back his own answer: "Why does life slumber? To rehearse the death for which we are not currently prepared." It is Acheron who reminds Aventurine that giving into the Nihility is pointless, and that rather than simply embracing a meaningless death, it is up to humanity itself to find and make meaning by living. It's this, not Ratio's note, that Aventurine gives as his reason for choosing to go on when asked by his own younger self. It's Acheron's words that finally give Aventurine an answer--why do we live just to die? Because there are people we can still make proud. Because when we go into death, we should do so with our heads held high, having achieved our own sense of purpose in this life.

Ratio gave Aventurine a promise: Someone is waiting for you to come back.

But Acheron gave Aventurine a reason: If life is inherently meaningless, doesn't that just mean you are free to give it meaning yourself?

She saved him, as women have been saving him all his life.

Anyway, this has already been horrendously long, but really what I wanted to say is that I think it is absolutely fascinating how consistent Aventurine's writing is when it comes to portraying where his support comes from and who he seeks guidance from. (Psst, just in case you still haven't figured it out, it's women!) In virtually every instance we are shown, we see the message reinforced that women are Aventurine's greatest allies and role models, while male figures are continually positioned to intentionally or unintentionally let him down and cause him distress.

"But women playing the supporting role to a male character is nothing new, Star, why are you so excited by this?"

Because the role women are playing in Aventurine's life is not the subservient supporter and emotional crutch role that female characters all too often play to male counterparts. None of the women in Penacony or Aventurine's past were there to do the emotional labor for him, to be a trophy or prize, or to cater to his needs. They don't exist solely to help him fulfill his character motivations; they aren't following him around waiting for his next request as their only role in the plot.

Instead, with Aventurine's story, we almost have an inversion of gender roles, where the male character eschews the stereotypical "men are leaders, fighters, and stoic heroes" archetype. Instead, no matter how hard he tries to hide it and keep a stiff upper lip, it is clear from 2.0-2.1's story that Aventurine is a deeply insecure, lonely, and explicitly traumatized survivor of genocide, slavery, and exploitation. Unlike most male characters, who are very rarely portrayed as genuine victims--because come on, shouldn't men be strong enough to fight back? Shouldn't men be able to shrug it off when they are hurt, emotionally or physically? (Of course I'm rolling my eyes here!)--Aventurine is belittled, humiliated, emasculated, and victimized on-screen, roles almost exclusively reserved for women, for whom surviving victimization in fiction is seen as noble.

Meanwhile, the women in Aventurine's life take on the roles traditionally given to male characters. They're both emotionally and physically his protectors. Aventurine's sister gave her life to guard his safety; Acheron ensured he could safely pass beyond the river of Nihility into the Primordial Dreamscape. They give him the tools necessary to succeed where he could not succeed on his own. His plan could never have gotten off the ground without Topaz and Jade entrusting their Cornerstones to him. The knowledge and capabilities of the women around him--not their "feminine charms"--are what allow them to help keep Aventurine on the right path even though he does waver. Even women who disrespect him, like Sparkle, still play a positive role in his life, able to provide him insight gained with their own intellect and talents.

When he has no one to rely on and doesn't know what to do, Aventurine is able to continually turn to the women around him, asking for and receiving not servitude or fawning, but their genuine wisdom and guidance.

tl;dr: If nobody else has him, Aventurine knows this random woman he met two minutes ago on the street will have him, because the women in his life literally never let him down.

(It's just so, so good, and ultimately, it should be very clear why Aventurine's story is as popular with women as it is! A+, Hoyo!)

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ourflagmeansgayrights · 19 days ago

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crew of the revenge halloween party where everyone goes as a different flavor of captain bonnet:

wee john goes as stede’s fancy party powdered wig 1.05 look (but with more glitter)

frenchie replicates the cursed red suit (it’s only a replica tho so it’s fine, it’s not cursed, don’t worry you guys)

jim goes as all-white gut-stabbed 1.03 stede complete with a loosely tied piece of rope around their neck. remember in 1.06 when they fake tortured a dummy during the fuckery? imagine that much gusto being put into pretending to be stede getting hanged to death at random intervals throughout the party

olu goes as leather pants + slutty blue shirt stede and honestly? he kinda wears it better than stede does

zheng goes as the same stede but with a wooden board tied to the back of her pants to commemorate the time she publicly spanked planked him

fang goes as stede wearing ed’s leathers. this costume involves putting flour on his face to simulate how stede was suffering from severe blood loss in that episode

the swede goes as classic pilot episode teal suit stede and does a dead-on stede impression (picture stede in the background huffing “i don’t sound like that!” and ed kissing his cheek and lovingly saying “yes you do, babe”)

roach goes as 2.01 broke era stede. this costume also involves a pillow and a blanket and occasionally moaning “ed, oh ed” out loud

lucius goes as 1.08 stede pulling an all-nighter to stare at ed and jack through a telescope. nightgown, pink robe, makeup to emulate the bags under stede’s eyes, gripping a telescope for dear life (stede tries to argue “it wasn’t all night” but olu is like “no i was there, it was literally the entire night”)

black pete goes as 1.02 stede with his shirt all ripped up (ed voice: man it’s a good thing he’s already dead bc i could literally kill izzy for not telling me about this)

ed goes shirtless and wears an orange skirt. the crew is like “that’s not a stede costume” and ed’s like “no listen ok. one time i had a dream where stede was a mermaid.” the crew is understandably confused and ed’s just like “had to be there ig” and they’re like “had to be there… in your dream?” and he’s like “yeah.”

archie panics bc she hasn’t known stede for long and everyone took all the good ones that she was actually there for. jim offers suggestions but it’s all s1 stuff and archie’s like “i can’t do the treasure hunt look, i wasn’t there.” eventually she gives up and just shows up fully nude and is like “im stede on the night of calypso’s birthday”

about halfway through the halloween party buttons shows up and de-birds himself, at which point archie sees that buttons is there and is also naked and is like “bro no fair, i called dibs on this stede costume!”

#ofmd #our flag means death #gentlebeard #blackbonnet #stede bonnet #stede fucking bonnet #ofmd stede #crew of the revenge #txt #mine #og #j #holidays #fic(ish)#buttons isn’t even there for the party he just turned human for his monthly moonbathing

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yandere-wishes · 5 months ago

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⚜ 𝕐𝕒𝕟𝕕𝕖𝕣𝕖! 𝕂𝕟𝕚𝕘𝕙𝕥 𝕩 ℙ𝕣𝕚𝕟𝕔𝕖𝕤𝕤! ℝ𝕖𝕒𝕕𝕖𝕣 ⚜

˚ʚ♡ɞ˚ Been kinda depressed lately so this was all I could come up with.

⁺₊𝄞₊⁺ : "Player of Games" by Grimes

𐙚 Would you still love me? Out on Europa? ~💜

☆★☆★☆★☆

𝒴𝒶𝓃𝒹𝑒𝓇𝑒 𝒦𝓃𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉, whose lust for adventure leads him on a dangerous quest to rescue a poor kidnapped princess from the clutches of a deranged dragon. He's only ever sought out the thrill of the hunt, an adrenalin junkie desperate for the next rush. Fighting beasts and exploring new lands all for the sake of frivolity and adventure. But this time...this time things are different. His heart beats between his teeth when he catches a rogue glimpse of the fair maiden seated by the etched window. From the first look, he knows he'll fight hordes of monsters in her name, bring giants to their knees to gain her favor. From the first look, he knows he's in love...

𝒴𝒶𝓃𝒹𝑒𝓇𝑒 𝒦𝓃𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉, who kills the dragon and carries the princess home. All the way breathing in her intoxicating scent, he dreams of running his calloused fingers through her silky hair and whispering sweet poems of devotion into her ears. He asks for her hand from the king, practically begging him to let her be his bride. He needs her, more than anything else in this unholy world he needs her.

𝒴𝒶𝓃𝒹𝑒𝓇𝑒 𝒦𝓃𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉, who still craves adventure even when he's married. Who drives himself crazy on the lost tunes of adventures. Beckoning, beseeching, it's as if demons screech within his cranium. He needs to feel the familiar cool of metal nipping at his flesh. To feel the weight of his sword within his palm once more. So he leaves. if only for a short time. Promising to bring his lover treasures unimaginable. If only it were that simple.

𝒴𝒶𝓃𝒹𝑒𝓇𝑒 𝒦𝓃𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉, who loses himself to the thrill once more. Fighting for a darling who is locked away again. He promises he's not the dragon, not some monster trying to keep her stowed away. She's back home with the king and queen ruling over a kingdom. It just so happens that her lover is fighting for that kingdom. Traversing new lands and bringing back priceless treasures. He does it all for her because he loves her

Maybe that's why it stings so bad when -on the rare occasion he's back home- his darling tells him, that she's been engaged once more. This time to a prince. The Knight has his fair share of scars, he's been wounded countless times. Yet memories recall no such wound that hurts as much as this one. When his darling informed him of her eagerness to be married off to a proper prince. It takes all his willpower to not strangle her then and there. The love of his life is to be married off to a spoiled brat who knows not of sword fighting and war. A boy seeped in gold and dotted on his whole life. He wouldn't be a good husband, he's too soft, too frail. He'd run once the monsters came. A mere prince can't protect his darling as he can.

𝒴𝒶𝓃𝒹𝑒𝓇𝑒 𝒦𝓃𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉, whose madness runs deep. He kills the king, the queen, and the prince. Declaring himself overlord. Conquer, conquer, conquer. It's the only way he knows to keep his darling by his side. His darling is a queen now. A queen in shackles and chains, but a queen never the less and one who will forever remain by his side.

𝒴𝒶𝓃𝒹𝑒𝓇𝑒 𝒦𝓃𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉, who doesn't mind ruling as much as he previously thought. Who enjoys having his darling perched on his iron-clad lap as he proposes plans to capture new beasts for the kingdom's army. Who watches as his -and his darling's- kingdom prospers under their leadership. At night he holds her tightly, intoxicating himself with her sweet perfume once more. His heart races when he recalls how close he was to losing her.

𝒴𝒶𝓃𝒹𝑒𝓇𝑒 𝒦𝓃𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉, who is left heartbroken and enraged when he finds out his darling has escaped. Who hunts her down through enchanted woods and cursed terrains. When he finally catches her, he can't help but be reminded of chess, a move where the queen is finally captured. He kisses her deeply, wholly, trying to drown her in his love. Has she forgotten the romance they once shared? Has she forgotten the lengths he was gone -and will still go- for her? Oh, how careless he had been...

𝒴𝒶𝓃𝒹𝑒𝓇𝑒 𝒦𝓃𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉, who will do anything for his precious princess, his darling queen, his beloved. Who will remind her just how emphatic his love truly is...

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yanderenightmare · 1 year ago

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more gojo with curse!darling please! i lobe this concept<3

Gojo Satoru

P1 & P3

TW: abduction and captivity, mild condescension, mild coercion, NSFW hints, some descriptions of darling, but nothing too specific, a joke dissing people with blue eyes and pale skin

gn reader - fem labels (drama queen) & fem accessories (jewelry: various)

He kept you like one would a stray cat. Leaving you be as you found places of comfort around his apartment, hiding when you wanted to be left alone – which was almost always.

You hadn’t warmed up to him yet. Understandably so.

He’d set out food for you, locking the door with seals when leaving – scoffing out a laugh after coming home only to find the dish still on the table. He keeps forgetting you don’t eat.

You may look it, but you’re not exactly human.

But you are getting thinner, unfortunately. Suppose his apartment isn’t ideal hunting ground for a curse. And as you’ve gotten weaker, you’ve become wilder – primitive in a way – hissing at him when he gets too close – feeling vulnerable.

You’re very cute.

But, cute or not, he doesn’t want to starve you. He isn’t cruel. So he walks and wonders what it is that you would find appetizing.

Watching your behavior – how you sneak around his apartment looting – like a crow – collecting shiny objects to deck yourself in. Stealing all his rings, chains, watches, belt buckles, manchets, any gold or silver-rimmed glasses, and anything else you can use as jewelry – old coins, can tabs, all the silverware – along with everything else you deem pretty – fabrics, flowers, decorations, all his silk shirts.

You rob anything and everything of value, making a nest of it all in the tub.

His theory is that the bathroom is the shiniest place in the house and, therefore, where you feel you most belong. You sleep there despite him having given you a room – coveting all your findings.

He’s never really thought about how a curse can have such behaviorism. It’s not too odd to keep tamed ones as pets, but still, he’s never thought about why one would aside from utilizing them in combat. But you weren’t made for such intents and purposes. You were… just fascinating to have. Not far off from being an exotic pet.

But even for a curse, you’re unusual.

It’s not fear or death you thrive on. It’s… something a lot more innocent, actually – which is probably why you have no malicious instincts to hurt him – not that you could if you tried. But he can tell… you don’t want to be a curse, do you? In fact, those few times he has nicknamed you curse, you’ve scowled at him a little more than usual.

No, what you desire is devotion – to be worshipped.

What you want is to be a god.

Quite like him, actually. You like having your ego stroked.

It’s your pride that needs feeding, and he can only asses that it feasts on people’s mad desire for you – of which he has plenty to give.

But you reject it.

“I won’t rely on the pity of a filthy jujutsu sorcerer. I’d rather starve.” You tell him with a sneer, curling yourself up with folded arms upon your chest – pouting with eyes closed, drowned in your treasure bath as though everything wasn’t nicking your skin, trying to ignore him.

He slants his head to the side, crouched down beside you with his arms resting on the tub, a smirk on his face – playing cute as he reaches a slim finger out to touch your cheek.

“Won’t you let a filthy jujutsu sorcerer worship you a bit? Trust me, a curse has never made me feel so weak before. Don’t you think I’d make for the best beggar?”

You grimace, brows deepening into a vexed frown without opening your eyes, but you don’t flinch away. “I won’t be patronized. You keep playing with me like I’m your toy.”

“Maybe a little,” He chuckles softly. You’re such an honest and expressive little curse. “But I do think you’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen~”

“Naturally.” You reply simply, the furrow in your brow softening, but you don’t offer much more.

“Come on, pretty curse.” He drawls. “Let me help you before you waste away.”

You scoff. “Tch- foolish, selfish human… you really are such an ugly thing to behold.” The furl returns, but still, you keep your eyes closed. “Do you honestly think that your rancid touch is going to save me?” Then you laugh – harshly and mockingly. “Please, don’t flatter yourself. A god requires offerings left at their shrine, not the filthy touch of the peasants that leave them.” Your nose scrunches suggestively. “You should consider it a blessing to even be allowed to look at me.”

Vain and stubborn, he thinks. You are the curse of beauty. But still, he's never experienced rejection before.

Suppose he has to try a little harder…

He soon finds himself courting you. Trying to make you comfortable.

He starts giving you gifts – first, silver silk bedsheets that lure you into sleeping in your bed instead of the bathtub, along with other changes that make your room more appealing – ornate wallpaper, canopy drapes surrounding the bed, and a smaller chandelier for the ceiling. Happy to see you abandon your former treasure in the tub in favor of your new dwelling.

Then he gifts you other pretty articles – clothes and such that actually fit you – patterned silks and lace. He attempts to give you clothes you can use to cover up more of yourself, but you seem partial to wearing less – most comfortable in just an elegant kimono you can easily discard on the floor.

You’re confusing like that – walking around his apartment half-naked but hissing and scowling at him when he stares.

It’s more the jewelry you enjoy wearing – crowns, earrings, necklaces, body chains, rings for your fingers and toes, bracelets for your wrists and ankles – everything in abundance. Jingling when you step about.

You seem healthier after receiving his presents. Also, a bit less skeptical – now engaging in conversation with him – although often about what his next gifts will be and if he can buy you diamonds and rubies for you to bead your hair.

“Sorry, but the banks closed. I’m not giving you a single dime, your highness.” He laughs one day, eyes bright and smiling, watching the puzzlement befall your face before the spread of horror that soon followed after hearing his next words. “In fact, I’m gonna start taking things away.”

“You wouldn’t-” Your voice had dropped into something so weak it was adorable, no longer having that strident overconfidence you’d built up.

It makes him feel almost bad watching your face drain and become so distressed like a spoiled little brat who’d just been told no for the first time.

“Oh- I would.” He grinned like it was all only a cruel joke to him – something just for shits and giggles. “Satoru Gojo giveth and Satoru Gojo taketh away.”

“But-” Your lip wobbles, and he can spot the tears brimming in your eyes already.

He doesn’t let it bother him. Or at least he doesn’t let it show.

“I think I’ll start with all your jewelry- how about that necklace you’re wearing right now?” He threatens, pale hand reaching towards your neck to pull your pearls off – but you shrink into a ball on the floor before he has the chance to.

“No, no, no, don’t-” You start sobbing, and he thinks it’s the first time he’s seen a curse be so sad and desperate.

Not to mistake those countless curses he’d made cry and plead for their life, but that wasn’t what you were doing. You were grieving.

You’re really such a simple thing, aren’t you?

His smile softens into something not so cruel. Crouching down to your level, placing his hand atop your head where you’re bowed and bawling, petting you soothingly. “Okay then, drama queen. Stop your crying. I’ll let you keep it.”

You raise your head, hopeful. Looking at him with terribly puffy eyes - cheeks streaked with teardrops hanging off your lashes. Looking so pained and vulnerable, it made his heart ache at the sight.

You don’t say anything but he can tell there’s a question on your lips you’re unable to voice.

“Under one condition.” He answers.

You flinch when his hand slides from your hair to cup your cheek, holding your chin as he rolls on his feet and places a kiss on your salty lips.

You gasp and allow it for a second but then abruptly push him off – falling back on your butt. “No- you’ll make me filthy.” You rush out. “Beauty is meant to be admired, not reaped. It’s not right. You can’t-”

He watches you blush and stutter and thinks it’s silly how he hasn’t thought about it before. But now it’s become clear. Curses spawn from human fears, after all. It’s not strange that they’re so similar. But still… he’d never think a curse would be afraid of losing their virginity.

“It’s okay,” He coos, setting his knees down softly – crawling forward to where you sit, hiding your face behind small hands decked in too many rings. “I’m not gonna stain you…” He promises, his breath warm on your skin. “I’m gonna make you feel like the most desired diety in the world.”

Your breath shivers as he takes your hands and uncovers your face – eyes wide looking at him.

“And after I’m done admiring you, I’ll get you more diamonds and rubies than you can count.”

You swallow – eyes skittering from one of his blue ones to the other.

“Really?” It’s below a whisper.

“You bet.” He answers with a smile, flashing you a smirk. “I’ll get you enough to swim in.”

Your nose does a little twitch like it usually does, but this time, it’s not to express disgust. “Do you promise?” You bite your lip – staring at him.

“Let’s make it a binding vow.”

And that’s the arrangement.

You let him admire you in ways you’ve never let anyone else before, but only if he fulfills all your greedy heart’s desires.

He doesn’t mind. It’s nice to have something to spend money on that’s worth it.

You’ll lie next to him and he’ll get to study you up close – finding things that betray you – model details that aren’t in line with human imperfections. Missing bone structure, flawless symmetry, hairless skin devoid of any and all accent of mark or spot – just smooth milky texture without a single fault.

He says it’s sad – that the standard for beauty isn’t even achievable, to which you reply that it’s only fair everyone should be subject to the same disappointment, never to achieve perfection like you.

He asks if you think he’s really that ugly. And you say yes.

“Liar.” He accuses. Head propped on his hand, his hair a tousled mess lying in the bed beside you.

You’re looking up at the ceiling but close your eyes insouciantly at his comment. You tip your chin a bit as you speak – lips pouty and proud. “Lies are an ugly trade- in which I don’t partake.”

“Oh, really?” He rolls on top of you and you give a whine. Looking up into his sparkling blues and how his pearly hair falls loose and wispy. “Then look me in my eyes and tell me I’m ugly.” He dares.

“Puh-” You scoff, folding your arms above your puffed chest, looking off to the side, still with eyes closed as though to dismiss him like you so often do. “Men with beady bright blue eyes and pink skin look like pigs.”

You sneak a peek with one eye when he doesn’t answer. He’s still looking down at you – still daring you.

And you continue. Raising a finger to nudge his nose up. “Say oink-oink, piggy.”

He brushes your finger away as he leans in closer. Now with his nose rubbing yours.

“Tell me I’m ugly.” He repeats – his voice dipping low into that serious tone that makes your breath tight and your stomach flurry.

“You’re-” You try but it ends up swallowed, stifled beneath those big worldly blues. “You’re…” You try again but it’s worse than the first time, making you bite your lip. He’s not budging.

You look away. Feeling defeated and mopey because of it.

“You’re not as pretty as me.” You finally sulk.

So cutely grumpy with your pursed lips and vexed brow, he just has to laugh. “Tch- now that we can both agree on.”

And then he forces you to laugh too – beginning to snort like a boar into your ear, placing sloppy kisses to your neck while you scream out that it tickles.

P1 & P3

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amoscontorta · 2 months ago

Text

Alike and Cornered Beast: Sylus's POV

Summary:

I was desperate for Sylus's point of view during the first time that MC meets him in the Alike and Cornered Beast chapters of Long-Awaited Revelry. So I uh wrote it myself. I wanted to know why he touches MC so reverently but also quite brutally, so I spent a lot of time thinking about possibilities.

A/N:

Sylus x gender neutral reader/MC, second person POV (but we don't use Y/N in this house). Brief, derisive mentions of Xavier and Zayne (this is Sylus's POV after all, don't come for me). I love all the LIs, but Sylus has his hand wrapped around my throat and I see him as arrogantly having something to say about the other people who are also interested in his shiny treasure. He has mean thoughts about the other LIs, but he can be mean and we love that for him. Slightly canon divergent if you believe Sylus can't tell that MC is scared and repulsed by him until the shopkeeper informs him. I however believe this man is a little more perceptive than that. CW: violence, cursing, rude language, death, grief, murder, ok this is Sylus hello, non-consensual (non-sexual) touching of MC, metaphors involving hunger and blood, overuse of the word "lovely," but Sylus is a simp and it's mostly his POV so we must endure it. SFW, although clearly there is a thread of desire running beneath the interactions depicted ao3 link here

He doesn’t need the aether core in his eye to know how you're feeling. He can see it in the way your lovely jaw is locked tight, teeth clenched behind soft lips twisted into a tight line. The shudder you’re trying and failing spectacularly to repress, desperate to conceal your weakness: the fact that almost as much as you fear him, you hate him.

Almost from the very beginning, things have been going sideways for Sylus. First, that imbecile having the hubris to believe he could just pilfer what had clearly been claimed as belonging to Onychinus.

Second, the palpable fear that had juddered through you as he had graciously relieved the larcenist of the burden of his pathetic life, only for that fear to flare into bright, barely controlled hate once you figured out that using yourself as bait had succeeded in reeling in the largest predator in the N109 zone.

Third, even when he sauntered close to you, allowing you to drink your fill of his face, no other spark of recognition fired besides that of the leader of the most powerful criminal organization in the region. You didn’t recognize him personally at all, even as he hungrily mapped your face with his eyes and felt the bottomless well of want deepen even further in his heartless chest.

You didn’t remember a fucking thing. And for some reason, you hated him more than his worst enemies. And he had quite a large body count in the worst enemy column of the ledger of his existence.

The fear, he can understand. Onychinus is on the Hunter Association’s Naughty List, and you’re one of the Association’s true believers, a jewel in the hilt of their blade composed of naïve warriors. And like the noble, naïve creature he knows you to be, you firmly believe that any intel they fed you about him and his organization was the pure, unfiltered truth.

But the hate? He muses as he looks down into your upturned face, a face that has been carved into his dreams for weeks now, ever since Mephisto had reported back after scouting the Flux Nexus in the no-hunt zone. Ever since the night he finally found you, stumbling around and battling at the side of your sleepy, cunning rabbit of a partner in the dark wood, oblivious to the real danger perched amongst the leaves, watching through mechanical eyes. His lips twitch in an ironic smile, as he knows he should be grateful to the rabbit for the fact that you’re in front of him now, so agonizingly close. He can see the rise and fall of your chest. The breath you exhale, for him to inhale. All he has to do is let his hand do what it wants—reach out, fingertips drifting softly along the curve of your cheek, your throat, the pulse point that betrays your racing heart. You’re close enough that he could swallow you whole. A good man might be grateful, but he isn’t a good man, and he doesn’t have it in him to be grateful; he only catalogues the threat, and tucks away the thought of the light evolver to be a problem to contemplate, and solve, another day. Right now, he needs to solve the problem of why you hate him on a level that professional distaste can’t explain. The hate he sees in your bright, sharp eyes is personal.

Consequently, he might not need the aether core in his eye to know that you hate him, but he sure as hell needs it to figure out why.

He knows he should wait to use his power on you. He knows that strategically, the best play here is to move slowly, to rebuild your trust, to tease out what he wants from you, to prove to you that despite every instinct that the Association has indoctrinated in you, he is not a threat to you and never will be. He knows all too well that one can’t force trust and forge an equal relationship from coercion, but he doesn’t have the time. Not with the entire Nest on the hunt for his Prey tonight, not with his own house in chaos with Sherman running amok and running up the bill on collateral damage. He needs to know why you hate him so that he can deal with it now, all of it. To borrow the vocabulary of another one of your hapless suitors: now is the time for triage, and after he has assessed the carnage, then he will begin suturing the aftermath. Sylus may be a businessman, but he can appreciate a surgeon’s precision in approaching a crisis. Even if Sylus can’t appreciate the iceman himself, if only for the lingering looks the doctor indulges in when his patient is looking the other way. Sylus files this problem away, like the other, to be solved in quiet solitude another day.

So he indulges in a lingering look of his own, fingers twitching with the need to touch where they’re deceptively, casually resting on his hips. And then: Sylus lets himself look. He can feel the familiar warmth increase within his eye socket, the ember beginning to glow hotter and hotter, until it’s almost unbearable, and then truly unbearable, as it is every time, the price he must pay so that he may see.

A little silver apple on a chain.

A pair of smiling eyes.

An old woman’s hand placing a dumpling on a plate.

The relief of realizing that the danger has dissipated, and dinner is still waiting.

A strong, broad back, shoulders shaking with laughter as a door swings shut.

Almost from the very beginning, things have gone sideways for Sylus. He shuts his eyes, feels the heat and the pressure fade like grief with time, as the power in his aether core goes dormant once again. But you haven’t had time, have you? It’s still fresh, the wound still hemorrhaging. You think that he caused this. You’ve been bleeding for months, thinking it was his hand that wielded the knife lodged in your heart. Or rather, detonated the bomb that incinerated the only family you’ve ever known, leaving a smoking crater where your heart used to be.

Sylus’s mind races, compiling this new information, archiving the whys and hows, constructing and reconstructing his carefully assembled plans and all of the contingencies in between, laughing derisively at himself for not seeing this possibility coming. Sideways is an understatement. Things are well and truly fucked, Sylus thinks, looking into your lovely, livid face.

For a moment, an unfamiliar sensation drifts through his chest. He tests it gingerly, letting it cascade through him before he can identify it: despair. After all this time. Every year, month, week, day, second, breath, he has been carving a path towards you, littered with the broken dreams and broken bodies of others, and now he has finally found you, and what should have been his greatest victory (the spoils? His fingertips drifting up your silken skin, his fingers entwined with yours, home), may have been his greatest loss—a loss that is for once, despite all of his crimes and all of the corpses at his feet, every terrible thing he has ever done, not his fault at all.

He savors this strange feeling for a few heartbeats, indulging in it, pressing into it like a bruise, if bruises would actually remain under his skin. And then he discards it: the unexpected rarely obstructs his carefully laid plans, but nothing about you has ever been expected, has it? If he were the kind of man to resign himself to unexpected loss, like the other men clumsily flitting around you, he’d have been a dead trophy tossed at the feet of an enemy long ago. So the rules of the game have changed. So what? Sylus will adapt, because no matter his fucking luck, he is playing to win.

Because while gazing into the depths of your beloved eyes, Sylus not only saw the why of your hate, but the only thing that could soothe it. Something that you refuse to admit, even to your fundamentally honest self. Something you can’t admit, as you spend insomniac nights training until collapse, as you slice, maim, and end wanderer after wanderer, as you bare your teeth a little too savagely as blood spills beneath your fist and blade. You need vengeance. You need someone to hurt as much as you’re hurting. And not just anyone—the wanderers and criminals that you’ve trained your fists and pistols and blade on do not satisfy the blood-thirst burning through your veins. You need to punish the person responsible for the inferno in your chest. Maybe then you’ll be able to sleep again. Maybe then you’ll be able to not smile again, but at least retract the fangs that have been frightening the people around you for months now. The fangs you feared were always there, underneath the careful façade of the well-adjusted, law-abiding, healthy paragon of a hunter you’ve built to keep the nightmares at bay for years, to show your colleagues, your partner, your doctor and your superiors: Look, I’m harmless and righteous, the perfect tool, love me, love me, love me, please do not leave like everyone else I've ever loved.

And Sylus? Sylus has always, and will always, endeavor to give you everything your damaged heart could possibly desire. He knows that you will not believe that he was not the one who ripped your ‘family’ apart. And he knows that it will take time, time that he does not currently have, to rebuild what has been lost between the two of you. He recalibrates, sweeps aside the despair, and reinforces his resolve. If you want to exact vengeance on the person you think is responsible for all of your indescribable pain, Sylus will give his heart to you on a bloody platter, regardless of the pain it will cost him.

You need someone to hate right now to stay strong? So be it. He will be that for you, until he can locate the actual culprit. As he reaches out, ever so gently trailing the backs of his fingers along your hauntingly lovely face, he tells himself for a moment that he can't bring himself to use something so impersonal as the energy of his evol on you. But who is he kidding--Sylus is many things, but a liar is not one of them. He admits to himself that this is just him finally giving into his deepest desire, as he lets his hand drift from your face to the side of your neck, closing around your throat and lifting. He does not want to handle your precious form with such brute, concise strength, but he needs to hurry, he needs answers and he needs to fix this, now now now and you need him to be the enemy. This is what is best for you at this moment, in this place, and he only ever wants what is best for you, so he plays the part you need him to play:

"From your past to your future...to even all the crimes you'll inevitably commit. After all, you and I...we're the same. True kindred spirits."

As your body goes limp from his chokehold on you, he catches you, cradling your head in his hand, grateful for the strength of his body, the shelter he can provide you as he lifts you in his arms, holds you tightly, your chests finally close again, yours too full of a maimed heart and his missing one entirely, complementing each other, completing each other, even though you’re out cold and it will take so much—too much, too much, it’s already been too much time, you’re finally here, you’re finally in his arms, where you should have been all along—time to be able to have you in his arms like this but with your eyes wide open and fixed on his.

Later, when you wake up, in a dark room with this familiar stranger disdainfully staring you down through crimson eyes, as his evol winds itself around you, as it jerks you onto his big lap, you clench your teeth, you fight the tears of frustration and fury—why do you always cry when you’re angry? Is it not humiliating enough to lose control of the leash on your emotions, without tears spilling down your face to betray you to the object of your rage?—and you fight desperately against the immovable force pinning you in place.

"I want to kill you myself," you grit out, through the tears and the snot running down your face.

And then this man places your gun in your hand, eyes bright as blood never leaving yours, in answer to the quietest, deepest buried desire of your limping heart that he has driven you to saying out loud. Your hate flares, because how dare he expose you to yourself in this manner? Who does this motherfucker think he is, casually extracting from your own mouth and offering you that which you couldn’t before name in hushed whispers, as if it means nothing to him, as if it costs him nothing, his sharp jaw relaxed, a ghost of a smirk curling the edges of his wide mouth? You fight it, the surge of hunger that chokes your panting breath—you fight it so hard, you’ve been fighting it for so long, ever since the piercing ringing in your ears began to sound that replaced your grandmother’s and Caleb’s laughter, the ringing silence that followed as debris rained down on your useless, injured body. You are not a mindless animal. You will not give in to this voracious want. You and this man holding your gun to his own heart are not the same, and never will be.

“Do you need some help? Yes? No? Maybe so?” His voice is the purr of a jungle cat, his hand, large and just as calloused as yours, envelops your own, with that same bizarre gentleness that you can’t even begin to interpret the why of, his finger drifting along your own, until it slowly tightens over yours. Your mouth says “No,” and you see how his eyes dart from yours to your lips and back again, but the hunger inside you howls as this man presses your finger against the trigger and the sound of the bullet leaving your gun drowns out all of the other noise in the cacophony of your thundering heart.

His big body jerks back, head hitting with a painful sounding thump against his melodramatic throne (ok, so it's just an antique chair, but honestly, where do villains buy ridiculous props like this?), and for an endless moment in time, the hunger is satiated, and a sense of triumphant relief courses through you instead. And then your vision sharpens, as blood the color of this man’s eyes begins to pour through the hole he—and you, we, together—just shot into his fucking heart.

He jerks the gun from your grasp and tosses it with a loud clatter to the concrete floor.

“You—Are you fucking crazy?” You’re moving before you realize it, palms pressed over his heart (a spiteful part of you hopes that it hurts him, even as you are suddenly overwhelmed with the terror that he is actually going to die, before you get any answers, before you get any help, before you’ve accomplished anything at all).

“You wanted to take my life,” he pants. It never hurts any less, no matter how many times it happens. He can feel his flesh knitting back together already, each stitch as painful as the one before. “And so you’ve taken it.”

Despite the pain, Sylus watches you leisurely, drinking in the blood splatters across your lovely neck and chin. My blood, he thinks with satisfaction. He wants to soak you in it. He wants to watch you bathe in it. He shakes his head, tucking that urge away for later contemplation. He is finally in the position to do what he has been craving for so, so long. He has given you what you want. Of course he will always give you what you want. However, that doesn’t mean that he can’t simultaneously get what he wants—Sylus strongly prefers deals when they’re win-win. He has given you what you wanted, and the slate is now clean. Now, it is time to begin negotiation of the highest stakes deal of his life: the acquisition of your body, heart and soul. Back at his side, where you belong.

“Now what? Have you already figured out how you’ll pay me back?”

#love and deepspace #love and deepspace sylus #lads sylus #fanfic #this is a repost because I didn't realize that i had my visibility settings preventing this from showing up in tumblr search #this is the first fanfic i've written in years #the world is a shitty place right now for a lot of people and sylus has become my comfort character #i hope if anyone sees this they enjoy

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