#the soldiers staring from their training in the square

[neep-neep-neep]

the first time Auden kisses Frey's cheek while they're chatting on the roof of the tower of Binnoi and Frey falls 200 feet before Cuff does the balloon thing to break her fall again and yells at her and she is just staring at the sky immobile

[b1rds3ye]

Mask On

How the boys react to their new ally who is more adamant on wearing their mask than Ghost himself.

Characters: Captain John Price, Simon “Ghost” Riley, Johnny “Soap” MacTavish, Kyle “Gaz” Garrick

GN!Reader w/ no physical descriptions (except shorter than Ghost)

Genre: Fluff

Word Count: 3.1 (~0.8 each)

Warning: Canon-Typical Violence, Mentions of Reader potentially having insecurities, Not Proof Read

A/N: You know what maybe I want to be the badass masked character 😤

Captain John Price

The captain is thorough, and he immediately knew something was up when he looked up your file only to be greeted with no photo. He’s honestly a little peeved that his rank doesn’t grant him this confidential information, he’s known Simon before he took up the mask so this is the first time he’s genuinely had a faceless ally

But ultimately, as long as he can trust that you’ll be following orders, he doesn’t care if you have a mask or not. But his concern is only that for a fellow soldier

It takes a little longer for him to warm up to you - facial expressions tell a lot about someone’s character. He’s a bit prickly around you, he learns about you indirectly with how you interact with the rest of the 141

But over time there’s a shift. He can’t pinpoint when exactly but the sight of your mask relaxes him. After days separated on a mission, high stakes and adrenaline has Price snapping his head at the faintest of foreign sounds. But upon the familiar sight of your signature mask, he feels at ease

Price is fiercely protective of you and your mask. He likens it to his hat, only far more important - that mask is part of your identity and he knows just how important a soldier’s psyche is. If the enemy manages to take off your mask, he’ll stop at nothing to get it back on your behalf, even if you reluctantly tell him to abandon it

If he can’t salvage your mask, Price has now made it a habit to carry a balaclava for you in one of his pockets. If that’s not available, he’ll even offer you his hat, tipping it down far enough to obscure your eyes

Off duty he finds himself staring at your visage more these days. Looking at how the mask curves over your features, or the small slivers of skin that reveal themselves. He catches himself before you notice but he’s still disappointed in himself, he feels like a Victorian-era prude hyperventilating at the sight of an ankle

“Looking fresh, sergeant.”

You let out an audible chortle at Price’s words. The last mission was a success but at great costs, one of them being your mask damaged beyond repair during melee combat. Your face still wasn’t revealed, but slashes against fabric embedded with dirt and ash have made your signature mask look unrecognisable. Immediately upon returning to base and after debriefing, you were out of commission until you could don a new mask.

Price would be lying if said he didn’t miss your presence for the last few days, hiding away from the rest of the soldiers in base. He has no doubt you’ve still maintained your training and visiting the infirmary for mandatory checkups, but he’s gotten far too used to you being at his beck and call. The famed sight of your mask is no longer in his periphery, giving a nod of approval (not that he ever needed your approval, but he does enjoy your attention).

And now here you are with a new mask, the highlights glowing under the overhead lights and the darks swallowing up the lightwaves like an animal starved. Your updated look had you noticeably confident, shoulders square and head tall.

“Thanks, Captain.”

He can hear your smile and he ends up sitting next to you. Did he need to sit so close? No, but he acts as though his thigh brushing against yours was pure coincidence.

“What are you going to do with the old one?”

“I don’t know,” you shrug, giving a light pat to a pocket in your cargo pants that your past mask currently resides in. “I know there’s a lot of memories in this… it’s my first mask… but I don’t know what to do with it.”

“I’ll keep it.”

You look at him. Price now has the uncanny ability to read your mood purely through your body language. From the speed at which you turn your head, the inclination of the neck, how your shoulders slant, he’s surprised that such a vicious soldier can act so endearingly in these moments.

“For what?”

“Safekeeping,” he says simply. “I’m proud of my soldiers, sergeant - want to remember their accomplishments.”

You shrug in agreement and fish your mask out of your pocket. You don’t need to know how much Price truly values you, how having your mask will be like having a part of you by his side to motivate him when he’s working alone.

Simon “Ghost” Riley

You’ve got a mask? Cool, so does he. Simon really doesn’t care when he first met you. He offers a simple nod of acknowledgement to you and then it’s all mission talk. If anything, the mask makes him respect you more, like him it’s always the masked ones who’ve seen shit and can get shit done

Even before you two became friends, you two were often paired together for operations. Perhaps it was just assumed the two masked people were on the same wavelength and to be fair, they were right. It didn’t take long for Ghost to admire your prowess on the battlefield

However as the two of you start to get closer, Simon gets a bit of a eureka moment. So this is how all his allies feel when trying to get along with a masked figure, unable to see any of their expressions. Oh how the tables have turned. It’s not daunting for him, more just amusing

He knows the struggles of having a mask so he helps out where he can. He reminds you if it’s been some time since you last washed your mask (advice he does not follow himself) and he’ll offer you some of his obsidian powder he uses to obscure any uncovered patches of skin

Price often has the two of you accompany him for interrogations, he calls it “mask pressure”. There’s nothing more terrifying to a target than having two imposing faceless figures standing on either side of them, unreadable and unpredictable

It’s clear you don’t want to show your face to anyone and Simon doesn’t question it. His natural curiosity is not worth your discomfort and he makes that abundantly clear. If on the rare occasion you catch him without a mask, he’ll sometimes put it back on so that you don’t have to be the only one with their face covered

If your mask is ever compromised, Simon covers you with his hulking figure. No one dares get on the bad side of Ghost who shoots the most terrifying glares towards anyone looking in his - and consequently your - way. He stands in front of you, back rigid and shoulders square, his posture only slacking if he feels you hold onto his back, seeking comfort

A few weeks ago, when left in a briefing, you finally noticed Simon was staring at you from across the room. He had been staring for a good while now, but you - ever the diligent soldier - were distracted discussing tactics with a corporal. So there he was, standing and observing in the corner of the room - his “observing” being drinking the sight of you. And that was when he noticed, among all the glory that was you, that your mask was slightly off alignment. Cue his eyes being trained on your head for you to get the idea that something was wrong.

When your head stayed still - probably challenging his gaze - he tried to change tactics. He added the occasional upward jerk of the head - miming an attempt to shake the mask back in place - but your head only tilted in confusion. You still could not figure out what he was doing.

Eventually he gave up and walked up to you. He lifted a tentative hand, silently asking for permission and you nodded. He pinched at the fabric on the side of your face.

“Your mask’s slippin’,” he said gruffly. It wasn’t the end of the world, only a small adjustment that only someone as observant as him could notice. Still, he felt satisfied at your heavy exhale, you must’ve noticed it’s a little easier to breathe with everything in alignment now.

“Thanks.”

Today, Simon finds your gaze trained on him, head following whenever he moves across the room. You used to stare when you first met, you probably found him intimidating and he doesn’t blame you. He thought you’d be over that though, you two were closer than that. At least he hoped.

“Penny for your thoughts?” He eventually asks and that spurs you into action.

Standing in front of him, you reach up, your hand grabbing the top half of the skull that overlays his balaclava. Your thumb lightly hooks into the skull’s eye socket - a little close to Simon’s actual eye but he trusts you. He feels you tug upwards, and Simon now realises that the skull had been sinking down his face, the peripheral around his brow no longer obscured. He’ll need to reapply the glue for the mask later.

“We really need a hand sign for this,” you mutter.

And so you two make one. It’s discreet, a closed fist with a thumb poking out, dragged from the jawline up to the hairline. The rest of the 141 just look at the two of you in confusion whenever you use it though, your little secret.

Johnny “Soap” MacTavish

Johnny’s generally a good judge of character. Although it’s a little uncanny being unable to see your features, he’s used to it because of Simon. One conversation is all he needs to reach a conclusion as to what type of person you are and now he treats you as if you’re good friends

Yes, he is curious about what you look like under the mask. He used to make comments about it occasionally until he caught you on a bad day

“C’mon Sarge, just a peek.” “Not happening, Johnny.” “What, you ugly?” “… that’s not for you to speculate, MacTavish.” “Shit, sorry. I- I’d never think that of you, or care. I know you’re a looker.”

And Johnny stands by his statement. Even if he’s never seen your face he quickly developed a little crush on you. How you conduct yourself in battle has him watching you with stars in his eyes and he just knows you’ll take his breath away if you ever show your face

When Johnny’s bored, he likes doodling your mask and potential alternative designs in his journal which he’ll show you sometimes. He’s not an artist but he gets the idea across. He’s created a “happy” design, an “angry” one, and the “when I see Soap” design which is just your standard mask with a whole lot of shoddily drawn love hearts on it (you haven't seen that design yet)

He’s genuinely surprised at how determined you are at keeping your mask on in all circumstances - you’re worse than Simon at this point - but he’ll never ask because he doesn’t want to potentially open up old wounds. Despite his curiosity for what you could look like, Johnny will never invade your privacy and ensures no one else does either. If you’re in your room he’ll knock once, twice, thrice, until he’s absolutely sure you’re ready for him to enter

If something goes wrong and your mask falls off he’s looking away and shoving everyone else to look away as well. He’s like a guard dog, shouting and name-shaming anyone who dares look in your direction. No one except other members of the 141 will be able to approach you until you’re covered

Was it smart to have you and Soap - combined to be the most disruptive and obnoxious soldiers on the field - alone to handle a stealth mission that was off the books? No, but you sure as hell weren’t going to disappoint Price or Laswell. The objective was clear and the rules of engagement were even clearer; under no circumstance can the enemy know you’re from 141.

“We’re gonna need to cover our faces,” Johnny mutters absentmindedly beside you. You pull your binoculars down to send him an incredulous look and he chuckles. “I need to cover my face.”

“You got a mask?”

There’s a pause and Johnny’s looking at you, eyes glinting in that familiar mischief. That was never good news.

“You bet.”

You offer a tentative nod of encouragement before lifting your binoculars back up to observe the target site. You hear the repeated shuffles of fabric against fabric and clothes sliding against skin. It’s prolonged, you swear it’s enough time for Johnny to change his entire uniform. His breaths become muted, mouth now covered until it eventually falls to complete silence. It’s unnerving, the designated demolitions expert is not known for his silence, and you have to look back at him yet again.

Of course you expected Johnny to be wearing a mask, but it was the mask itself that took you by surprise.

“Is that… mine?”

“Was yours.”

You squint and somewhere in the depths of your mind, you vaguely recall Soap asking if he could have one of your spare masks back at the base. You humoured him, and said your wardrobe was his.

That was your first mistake.

You figured he was just going to take the piss, wear your mask to scare some privates around the base. You didn’t think he’d actually wear it on a mission. It was unexpected, but it felt like an honour. How he was so willing to identify with you in some of the most dangerous of situations.

But your silence has Johnny getting fidgety. He’s already reaching up to pull the mask off.

“I have a normal balaclava. If you don’t like this I can-”

“Wear it.”

You can’t see Johnny’s face but you see him pull his head back in surprise. Then he smiles, one so wide, expanding his cheeks you can see it stretch your mask. In that moment you’re glad your mask obscures your features as you feel yourself grin at his own joy.

“We’re a team, aye?”

“You bet.”

Kyle “Gaz” Garrick

Kyle’s may be close to Simon but he's not entirely used to masked allies. When you first arrived he shot Captain Price a cautious look, a silent conversation between them finished by Price’s definitive nod. Eventually he relents and puts up with you

Subconsciously, without seeing your face he ends up reducing you to a weapon. He respects you like a soldier, a robot. His language is restrained, only issuing orders and you recite them back

It’s only when another soldier cracks a joke on the mission and you laugh does it flick a switch in Kyle’s mind. You weren’t all orders, you weren’t a machine, you were a human (with a damn nice voice might he add). He feels terrible for reducing you to a tool simply because he can’t see your face but he’ll make up for it now

He becomes a bit of a menace in the sparse quiet moments of a mission. He makes the occasional one liner about how you wear the mask so others aren’t distracted by your good looks, but then changes the topic so quickly you’re not even sure he said it

Yes, Kyle’s a little obsessed with your voice. He can’t see you and he doesn’t have the experience like Price or Simon to read body language accurately. Instead, he can read your mood near perfectly with the inflections in your voice (which is arguably more impressive). While he doesn’t want you to ever be upset or angry, sometimes how you taunt the enemy has a shiver running down his spine

Because your mouth is blocked by a mask, many allies don’t offer you food or drinks. Not Kyle though, if he’s grabbed refreshments, he always ensures he has extra for you. At first he just gives them to you and then leaves. But when you said it was okay for him to stay - trusting him enough to just look away when you lift you mask - Kyle’s heart soared

If anything happens to reveal your face, Kyle is immediately by your side. He pulls you close to provide comfort, while also guiding your head into his neck or shoulder to block anyone from seeing you. Another member of the 141 will find a solution to cover your face, you are Kyle’s first priority and he’ll gladly hold you all day

After a long mission, you and Kyle are finally safe upon reaching exfil. Sitting on a helicopter Kyle slumps against his seat, and you do the same beside him. Although he could finally relax, he feels absolutely filthy, swamped in his own sweat under multiple layers. Dirt and mud caked his boots and crept all the way up to his thighs. Some even sneaked up into under his tactical vest.

He spares a look and sometimes he thinks you can’t possibly be human. The heat is suffocating enough without a mask, Kyle has long forgone his signature cap to let his head breathe. If your body language was any indicator, you weren’t handling the sweltering heat of the helicopter engine or Al Mazrah’s temperament. Your chest notably heaving under the weight of your tactical gear, breaths so laboured it sent the fabric around your mouth pulling and billowing with each inhale and exhale.

There isn’t much Kyle can do for comfort, but he tries. He shifts a little closer to you. Your head shifts to look at him, the movement was far too slow, like your head was too heavy and his heart tugs a little.

With one hand, Kyle gently tilts your face up to him. With the other he lightly pinches the fabric of your mask at the junction between your jawline and ear. Teasing it between his fingers, when he pulls his hand away there’s gunk on his fingertips. Dust, dirt and as he squints at your mask he realises that some of the stains are likely the dried blood of an unidentified enemy.

The hand he’s resting on your chin is about to pull away until he notices how you’re resting your head on it. He can’t see your face but he has no doubt that your eyes are near shut, almost drifting off to dreamland. He occupies himself by gently brushing away loose debris off your mask which has you relaxing further into his touch.

“We gotta wash this,” he murmurs defeatedly.

“... yeah, we do,” you grumble, voice thick with fatigue. Kyle does not stop his ministrations - even pulling some fluff off of the cotton of your mask. It does little to actually clean your mask - at this rate it’s going to need pure bleach to clean it - but he can’t bring himself to stop. Not when you trust him this much, leaning into his touch, entrusting him to be the respite from your mission.

Masked Reader Masterlist Call of Duty Masterlist

[allbark-no-bite]

call it brotherhood (not love).

jake seresin x reader (wc: 6.2k)

summary: jake meets his match in a soldier rather than a sailor. you’re a bit more war torn than he expected, but it’s okay because maybe he is too

warnings: 18+ smut, * graphic descriptions of injuries and death ⚠️

* if you are uncomfortable with this, please don’t read

author’s note: spoiler alert, i know this isn’t the Jake fic that you’ve all been wanting but i swear that one is in the works. i’m about to go back to school and wanted to get this out there for y’all :) (ps i apologize for the lazy ending)

————————————————————————

"At ease, gentlemen —And woman," Admiral Simpson adds after a moment, shooting an uncharacteristically apprehensive look in Phoenix's direction. Payback snorts at his hasty correction, and Jake is surprised when the admiral doesn't fix him with a nasty look.

If the man's cursory show of inclusion perturbs the female pilot, she doesn't show it, and instead she takes a seat with all the rest of them. Jake turns back towards the front of the ready room, sinking down into his chair just a bit, toothpick clenched between his teeth as he waits for the admiral to address them.

However routine, this training meeting was a bit out of left field, especially for a Sunday afternoon. The Dagger squad typically had one weekly, but it was usually led by Maverick and much more informal. That wasn't to say that seeing Beau was surprising, but the man usually steered clear of the wayward captain and left him to his own devices when it came to training the Daggers.

Today the captain sits in the ready room beside the rest of the pilots. Jake watches as Bradley sends his godfather an inquisitive brow from across the room, to which the older man just shrugs. Interesting.

Cyclone clears his throat. "Good afternoon. I apologize for keeping you all, but I promise this will only take a minute of your time. As I'm sure you are all aware, the United States Department of Defense takes immense pride in maintaining one of the most well integrated military forces in the world. It's our job to work closely with other service members to ensure their safety and the safety of our nation." He pauses. "As experienced as you all are, your time here at Topgun has not reflected that."

Jake's brow furrows, his tongue worrying at the toothpick clenched between his teeth as he listens to the admiral go on. Javy shoots him a look but Jake stares ahead, waiting for Beau to continue.

"The permanent installment of your squad here at Miramar was to create a tightly knit group of elite fighter pilots who would be available at a moment's notice, and however successful that may have been, I cannot neglect the fact that comfort builds complacency. Later today, a squad of U.S. Army soldiers will be arriving to aide in your training for the next six weeks. The integration of mixed branch training units has been widely effective around the country, and it's about time we do the same here at Miramar."

With that, the screen positioned on the wall behind him lights up, displaying enlarged headshots of about eight soldiers. The first seven are males of varying ages, but none older than probably thirty. Jake quickly skims over their names and credentials, but when he gets to the last profile, his eyes stop.

The last solider is the only female projected on the screen, but even so she stands out as compared to all the other members of her squad. He can't quite put his finger on why though.

She's uncharacteristically pretty. And by that he means that to most, her appearance would be inherently off putting— even without the straight-mouthed scowl on her face. She's got a square, almost masculine like jawline that hardens her features considerably. Her hair is light, worn from spending too much time in the sun regardless of however dark it may have been naturally. The same goes for her skin, which is comparably bronze in contrast to the tan line on her forehead, he would assume from wearing a patrol cap out in the field.

Her eyes are wild.

And that's when it hits him.

She'd been all over the news just a few months ago. Something about a patrol gone wrong out in the Middle East, which ultimately turned into a high stakes rescue mission to extract the surviving soldiers. They went in hoping to bring back nine men and came out with one. Apparently they didn't even get to recover the bodies.

Jake can't imagine what that'll do to a person.

Before he can stare at her profile any longer, Cyclone quickly clicks off the projection and the image disappears. This time he appears almost nervous as he stares back at them. "These soldiers are recently returning from a deployment in the Middle East, so I trust that you all will do your best to make them feel welcome. If none of you have any questions, that is all. You're dismissed."

---

The following morning, the Jake receives word from Maverick that the Admiral wants to see him in his office. It's not a strange request but certainly raises Jake's attention as to why specifically he was needed.

Upon entering the room, Jake finds not only the Admiral but Maverick and another female that he's yet to have seen before. All heads turn towards him when he enters, as if he were interrupting something. Immediately, Jake snaps to attention, his heels clicking together and his fingers brushing his brow with a sharpness that would make the academy proud.

Cyclone nods in his direction, acknowledging Jake's customary greeting and dismissing him with the notion. "Lt. Seresin," he begins, gesturing to the female standing across the room. "This is Lt. (L/n). She's uh—a member of the squad that I briefed you on yesterday."

He hadn't noticed that she was wearing Army OCPs but he connects the dots as soon as the admiral mentions her name. He remembers reading it on the projector during the meeting.

Rather than introducing herself, the soldier stands rigidly across from him, her arms folded in front of her chest with a look on her face that Jake can only describe as fucking pissed. Unsure of what to do but aware from personal experience with Phoenix that he shouldn't try to cross any unknown boundaries, Jake settles for offering her a respectful nod. She glares back at him.

"You're two of our only service members with active combat experience," Cyclone continues, obviously ignoring the girl's crossed disposition. "I'm hoping that you and Lt. (L/n) can find some common ground. Perhaps it would do you both some good to—"

"Respectfully, sir, if I wanted to vent to someone about my feelings, I'd go see a shrink," the woman growls. "I recommend you do the same, Lt. Seresin." Her tone makes Jake's brow raise slightly in surprise. No one talks to an admiral like that, not even Pete Mitchell.

"Lt. (L/n)," Cyclone snaps. "That's quite enough."

This time, she rolls her eyes with a scoff. "You can't just—"

"Get out."

She clamps her jaw shut but doesn't budge from where her feet are planted in the ground.

"I said, Get. Out," Cyclone reiterates.

The eyes that had caught Jake's attention in the first place fix the admiral with a chilling stare. To Jake, there's something familiar in those eyes. Some sort of unmistakably justifiable rage that runs deeper than just being dismissed from the conversation. Jake watches, his breath stalled as she sets her jaw, unwilling to move, when it hits him. Identical jawlines and untwitching scowls mirror each other.

The illegitimate child of Admiral Beau Simpson stands before him.

He doesn't know how he didn't see it before, granted they don't share a last name, but Jake was aware that the Admiral was divorced, had been for a while. Allegedly he wasn't the marrying type. Jake isn't surprised by the statement. Beau Simpson is a hard man to deal with.

Jake watches in silence as the girl ultimately releases an irritated huff and storms out of the office, slamming the door behind her. He can hear the loud, petulant stomp of her boots as she retreats down the hall. Evidently her looks weren't the only thing that she got from her dad. She had a temper that rivaled even Bradshaw's.

The clearing of the Admiral's throat removes Jake's eyes from the door. "I hope you can forgive my daughter's behavior. Her return to the states has been...difficult."

"I'm sure difficult is the way she would describe you too sir," Maverick jokes.

Cyclone fixes him with a perturbed glare but decidedly ignores his comment in favor of addressing Jake. "Lt. (L/n)'s squadron was ambushed six months ago. Just about everything that could have gone wrong went wrong and she was the only survivor. As her father, I wanted her to accept the Purple Heart and retire." He gestures flippantly towards the door. "Obviously that's not what she did."

Jake speaks for the first time since he entered the room. "Respectfully, sir, I don't blame her. I'm taking this career to the grave. I'm sure both your daughter and Captain Mitchell can agree," he adds glancing over at his instructor.

Before Maverick can voice his agreement, the admiral cuts him off.

"As I'm sure Captain Mitchell can attest to, as her father, I'm just trying to look out for her."

With his preexisting connection to Rooster, the godson that he would risk his career to protect, Maverick has no room to disagree with the admiral. For once, the captain, who usually always has something to say, stands with his palms folded behind his back and keeps his mouth shut.

"As I was saying," Cyclone continues, taking a seat behind his desk and kicking back as if to signal that he's won the conversation. "It is my hope that given your own—" the admiral hesitates for just a moment too long for Jake's liking "—personal experience, you'll be able to get through to her."

Jake swallows and hopes that he doesn't look as uneasy as the insinuation makes him feel. He has to take a moment to reassure himself that the psych unit has repeatedly cleared him for duty and that no one's threatening to take his wings away.

The nights that he wakes up, drenched in sweat, with his fingers wrapped around imaginary joysticks hard enough to make his palms bleed are few and far in between these days. And even those he's gotten good enough at faking like they don't bother him because he hasn't failed a psych evaluation in months.

It doesn't mean he likes to talk about it or that he won't hear the fear in Rooster's voice if he does.

But he's more scared of not flying than anything, so all Jake does is nod and offer a dry, "I'll do my best, sir."

———

PTSD or modern day shell-shock is what they like to call it. You call it waiting on the other shoe to drop.

Because there is always another shoe.

The slam of a beer bottle down on the bar top lights your nerves up like nothing else. It sends your heart straight to your stomach and makes your palms sweat like when you miss a step on the stairs and for a split second, you think you're going to die. You never do of course, but your body is hard wired that way to keep you alive.

There's a flaw in your system that hasn't been right since the east.

You knew that a popular naval bar on a Friday night wasn't the best place for you these days but your nerves had been yearning for an ice cold beer and fuck all if you weren't going to get one. The alcohol would soothe your nerves anyhow.

But after thirty minutes of waiting on said beer, you were beginning to lose your patience. Normally you weren't bothered by that kind of thing. The place was obviously busy and the lone woman behind the bar was doing her best to satisfy the flock of servicemen that only seemed to accumulate with every beer that she handed out.

Just when you're about to give up and leave, a large hand covers your lower back, pressing you forwards through the crowd and toward the bar top.

"Two more on me, please, Penny."

The voice belongs to the tall man standing behind you. He's removed his firm, but respectfully placed palm from your back and is now leaning over you to accept the two dripping bottles of beer. It doesn't take you long to recognize the green of his eyes from a few days prior.

"My dad didn't put you up to this did he?" you ask, somewhat reluctantly taking the bottle that he offers you. It's finger numbing cold, just how you like it.

He kind of just slowly smiles and shakes his head.

Immediately you feel like a jerk. You sigh, dropping your shoulders and smile softly back. "Sorry. That was rude."

"No, ma'am, he didn't. Just had to find out if you smiled like that all the time."

The part of you that's a little bit of a bitch makes you clench your teeth together, tightening the smile that was once spread across your lips. "I'm not looking for that kind of thing right now," is all you say.

You want to tell him that you used to not be so mean.

At the realization that his words had the exact opposite effect of what he was going for, the guy graciously extends his hand. "Look I don't mean to bother you, I just wanted to say hi."

Despite not being keen on his advances, you aren't going to be rude so you accept his outstretched hand. You're surprised by his gentleness. It's not the rough, over-masculine shake you are expecting.

"Lieutenant (Y/n) (L/n)."

"I know your name," he admits with a light, almost embarrassed laugh. "I think everybody in here knows your name."

Your skin prickles. You stare at him stoney faced, bracing yourself for what's going to come out of his mouth. "Why's that?"

The guy—Lt. Seresin—you're remembering, shrugs. "I mean, you're quite the story back here in the states. A bit of a ghost story, I must say."

Ghost story is right. Because who survives that? How the fuck does a twenty-two year old girl survive an outnumbered ambush and not eight men with years of experience? Not someone who deserves to be called a hero, that's for sure.

You're trying your best to keep your cool with him. You know that you're in a public space and he's just being friendly. You used to be so good at this kind of thing, the flirting and small talk.

The thought occurs to you that maybe this is what you need. Maybe this will make you feel normal again. You need to feel normal again.

Maybe that is why you let him lean in closer, buy you another drink when yours runs dry, and another one after that. Maybe that is why you make an effort to laugh when he does, and you close your eyes when he reaches out to tuck a strand of hair behind your ear.

You let out the breath that's been tightening your ribcage and do your best to smile. "Thank you for the beer. You didn't have to do that." You hope the words sound as genuine as they're intended to.

He smiles back like he's supposed to, all polite and inherently forgiving of your original attitude. You catch onto the way it doesn't quite reach his eyes. You're not sure why but it makes you think maybe he's just a bit sad too.

Maybe that is why he lets you wordlessly take his hand and lead him to the back of the bar. Maybe that is why he lets you sink to your knees on the cold, sticky tiles of the men's bathroom floor, his hands already fumbling to unbuckle his belt.

It smells like beer and piss, and you don't even wait for him to get fully hard before you take him in your mouth, your nose buried into his pelvis, where it smells like sweat. It's all wrong and right at the same time, and he won't ask you to stop. He just curls his fingers into a fistful of your hair, pinpricks stinging at your scalp the same way tears sting at your eyes.

He—Jake—he'd told you a while ago, has a pretty cock. At least as pretty as cocks go. Pink and ruddy at the tip, where it mushroomed beautifully. Almost dauntingly long but not grossly so with a throbbing vein on the underside. You run your tongue along it and he muffles a whimper, his fingers wrapping harder around your hair in an effort not to buck up into your mouth. At least he's a gentleman about it.

He's heavy and twitching in your mouth. You feel heavy. He is standing above you, a harsh line of a man against the buzzing bathroom light. You remind yourself to breathe through your nose and he punches himself further, the head of his cock skimming the back of your throat.

You swallow around him, trying to hold together what little is left of your remaining sense of self. It's been a while since you've been so careless as to place yourself in someone else's hands, rolled over and showed your belly to someone who could easily take advantage of you.

Your jaw aches, uncomfortable and familiar, like something you don't want to remember. Tears well up behind your eyes, the threat of an unwanted but unknown feeling looming just out of reach. Jake's hand in your hair hold your head firmly against his pelvis, hips rocking up into your mouth. He sighs like he can finally breathe.

You can't breathe.

You try to and something rasps inside of you, choking. The feeling that had been looming threateningly sparkles through you. Panic.

You know that he tries to settle you, does his best to wipe the tears leaking from your eyes with his thumbs and murmurs softly to you. "Breathe. It's okay, breathe for me."

You can't. You can't breathe.

Your head is pounding and suddenly you aren't kneeling on the bathroom floor of the bar. You're on the ground, crying, screaming like a wounded animal and no one is coming to help. You can almost feel the dirt under your knees, taste the blood in your mouth.

"Y/N, you have to breathe."

Someone's grabbing you, hauling your useless feet across the floor. Your chest hurts like you've been punched with a bowling ball.

"C'mon, let's get some air."

How you end up outside the bathroom is beside you. All you know is one minute you're dying on your knees back in the desert and the next you're being sat down on the back steps of the bar. 

The cool air of the San Diego evening brings you back. That and the press of a cup of ice water to your lips, the condensation dripping from the glass and rolling down your throat. You swallow, letting the cool liquid soothe your burning throat.

You're aware of Jake sitting down beside you, close enough to touch if he wanted to but still keeping his distance. You can feel his eyes on you, watching carefully for a moment before he turns to stare out at the not so distance shoreline.

Your stomach feels odd, like you might be sick.

He probably thinks you're insane. You would think the same. But if he's dying to ask what the hell that was, he's doing a good job of hiding it.

How do you tell him that sometimes you think that you should have died, that sometimes the memories almost kill you?

"I hid."

He looks up from peeling off the label around the neck of his bottle. "What?"

You swallow, trying to collect yourself before your words fail you.

"I hid. A—After I was shot, I didn't get back up. I crawled under the humvee and... and I just laid there. I laid there and I closed my eyes and I prayed. I prayed that they wouldn't notice me lying under there or that they if they did, they would think I was already dead."

A mixture of sweat and dust burns your eyes. When you blink, you can feel the sandy grit trapped between them. You squeeze them shut while trying to swallow back the dryness of your throat in an attempt to alleviate the discomfort, but it doesn't do much. An unwarranted tear escapes and runs down the track of your nose.

With your rifle held closely to your chest, you let it slide down and collect on the bow of your lip. It joins the puddle of sweat that has already accumulated there. Out here, the sun cooks you alive. You swear it's a constant one thousand degrees. The twenty pounds of kevlar doesn't help.

Dirt kicks up beside you and gravel showers your helmet as a round of bullets buries themselves into the ground a mere six inches from your face. You hardly flinch.

Somebody is screaming. The sound of machine gun fire is ringing in your ears. Somebody is screaming.

"(L/N), C'MON. LET'S MOVE."

It's Cain. He's grabbing the strap of your kevlar vest and yanking you to your feet. You scramble after him, desperate not to be left behind. Bullets explode at your feet the moment the two of you emerge from the concealment of the dirt mound. Fear makes you run faster.

You spot Manny crouched behind the tire of the SUV to your right. He's firing rounds into the brush. You can tell that he's bleeding from a wound to his arm and you're about to veer off to help him when his head jerks backwards, the scattered remains of his brain plastered onto the white side of the truck.

You stop running, the words caught in your throat.

"RUN," Cain screams. He'd backtracked a few paces and grabs hold of your vest once again to drag you behind a second SUV. You stumble over him, falling haphazardly onto your rear once he lets go of you. He immediately turns to fire over the hood of the truck, and the bullets hitting the truck stop momentarily.

Clawing at the gravel on the ground, you hurry to scramble to your feet. Your head is pounding, your mouth dry and gritty. Huffing, you glance between Cain, who is fumbling to reload his magazine, and the crumpled figure of Manny a few yards away. You can only hope Ronny is still out there somewhere.

Before you can even try to locate him or any other members of the squad, movement to your left springs your muscles into action. You slam your back into the side door of the SUV just as a round of bullets pelt the spot where you were standing just moments before. Automatically, you raise your gun, returning the fire. There are a few more shots fired in retaliation, but they stop a second later.

Once you're sure they're subdued, you lower your gun, breathing hard. There's so much smoke and debris in the air that you can hardly even see Cain ten feet away. He's shuffling towards you in a low crouch.

"Let's move, (L/n). They know where we are. We've got to find different cover."

You nod, your finger still pressed tightly to the trigger of your weapon. You drop into a crouch and follow behind him as he creeps towards the back of the truck. He pauses a moment, scanning the landscape before looking back at you. His blue eyes are a startling contrast to the dirt and sweat covering his tanned face. He lifts his gun in the direction of a flipped humvee about fifty yards away. His mouth moves in a silent command.

One.

Two.

Three.

The gunfire starts up as soon as the two of you spring from behind the vehicle. You can hear the whizzing of bullets as they just barely miss your head. All you can do is pray you don't trip as you struggle to keep up with Cain. Your lungs burn and your boots feel impossibly heavy.

The terrain is barren but the ground loose, and rocks threaten to upend your footing, slipping out from beneath your feet as the two of you flee towards the vehicle.

30 yards from the humvee, Cain tumbles to the ground with a broken cry. The bullet catches him in the thigh, stopping him mid stride. He hits the ground hard.

Without even thinking, you skid to a stop. Bullets spray the ground around you. Somehow you're more afraid of leaving him than being shot.

"Go!" he yells at you, already trying to shove you away. "Go, I'm coming!"

Already, there's a lake of blood beneath him. You step in it and the ground squelches under your boot. Crimson gushes from his left thigh, effectively saturating the fabric of his pants. His face is terrifyingly pale. The bullet must have hit his femoral artery.

Fuck.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

"Like hell," you snap at him, your pervious fear suddenly boiling into the purest form of anger you've ever felt. Angry for being in this situation in the first place. Angry that of all people, Cain is going to die.

It's terrifying how quickly the realization comes to you, how easily you accept it as the truth. There's already too much blood. Without a tourniquet, he'll bleed out in minutes and there's not quite time for that.

"Leaving him behind wasn't an option. It never even occurred to me that it was," you confess, as if saying it aloud will somehow explain away this title of heroism that everyone wants to pin on you. "Dead or alive, he was coming with me."

You shoulder your rifle and use both hands to grab onto the straps of his vest, hefting him backwards towards the truck.

He must clamp onto his bottom lip to stop the scream that threatens to escape because the noise that comes from his mouth is garbled.

You drag Cain about ten feet before you realize how just heavy he is. There's sweat leaking into your eyes and all you can see is the bloody lake that's left behind as you drag him through the dust. Cain's gone quiet, his head lulled to the side, eyes almost shut.

"C'mon, Cain. We're almost there."

His boot snags on a rock, and when you tug him free, he doesn't utter a word.

Something inside of you knows he's gone, was gone long before you started dragging him. You're still ten yards from the SUV.

POP. POP. POP.

You pause, your eyes fixed ahead of you. "Have you ever been shot before?"

Beside you, Jake shakes his head.

"It feels like someone has shot a bowling ball into your chest. Knocks the breath right out of you."

Pain explodes straight through your ribcage. Your vision clouds and you're vaguely aware of your knees buckling beneath you.

When you come to, all of the wind has been knocked out of you from hitting the ground so hard and your immediate reflex is to suck in a reviving breath. Instead all that comes out is a gurgle, the tell tale sign that your chest cavity is filling with blood.

You swallow, looking off at the dark shoreline of the beach, watching as the waves crash against the sand. "I knew that I wasn't dead yet—I did— I just—" Your throat constricts and when you speak again your voice is quieter. "He was already gone so maybe a part of me had already gone with him."

Jake nods slowly, as if putting together the pieces that you're laying down bit by bit. Somehow his green eyes have remained soft this entire time and maybe that's where you find the courage to continue.

Lifting your head, you crane your neck to see the damage, but the thick layer of kevlar strapped to your chest obstructs your view of the lower half of your body. Grunting in frustration, you reach blindly in the direction that the pain is radiating from. Numbly, your fingers find the gushing hole in your side. The bullet had buried itself in the exposed inch of your stomach between your belt and your vest.

There mustn't be an exit wound because there isn't a ton of blood surrounding you. If the wet cough you emit is anything to go by, it's probably pooling in your abdominal cavity instead.

You're going to die.

"I don't know how long I laid there," you admit. "I knew that the clock was ticking, had been since the moment I hit the ground. It was only a matter of time before I blacked out or bled out... I guess I was just waiting to see which one came first."

The scattered rounds hitting the ground around you become muffled background noise as the lull of unconsciousness begins to sweep over you, dulling the world as you know it. Through the haze of your fading senses, your eyes fall on Cain's motionless figure a few feet beside you.

He's lying face up, his desert tan uniform seeped a muddy crimson. You'd known he was dead a while ago. Still, you carried him. He'd have done the same for you. He was your brother, dead or alive.

Blood bubbles from your nose as you struggle to keep yourself breathing. The fact that you have to remind yourself to do that isn't a promising sign. Your body is shutting down, doing anything it can to keep your heart pumping, even if it means shutting down everything else.

Somewhere through the dullness, you hear Cain's voice. MOVE, (L/N).

You close your eyes, trying to picture his face from what had been just a few minutes ago. You remember the urgency in his blue eyes, the intensity of his fear overridden by adrenaline. How had that been only moments ago?

MOVE, (L/N).

"I—I heard his voice," you state, your tone not open for discussion. "Not the gun fire, not God, not anyone else's. I heard his voice."

So many people had tried to convince you otherwise, tried to tell you that it was because of the shock and your brain was shutting down, that you were hearing things. But you know what you heard.

"He saved my life, Jake."

You can see the gears turning in his head, the question carefully forming on his lips. "Were you two— I mean was he—"

It's the first time you have to suck back tears, your chest rattling with a longing emptiness as you fight the urge to cry. Memories of his wild blue eyes and wide smile that could only ever mean he was misbehaving flash through your mind.

You met Sergeant Anthony Cain not long after you commissioned as a Lieutenant. You were still a green officer when you were charged with your first platoon and given orders to deploy out East. You were scared as hell and Cain was your saving grace. He came in as if he'd always known you needed him and the rest was history.

There was never any question about intentions or commitment to each other. Cain was as honest as they came and you left it at that. You never imagined that's where your story would begin and end.

"I don't know, Jake. We didn't get that far."

Forcing your eyes open, you access the area around you. The sound of enemy fire has slowed but that doesn't mean movement won't trigger a return of bullets your way. Still, you know they'll be looking for survivors once the dust settles, and you don't want to be around when they do.

The humvee is only a little over ten yards away. You might would say it was crawling distance if it weren't for the fact that you were actively bleeding out. Even so, you don't really have any other option.

You take as deep of a breath as you can, your chest rasping as you do so, before lifting your right leg and using the weight of it to swing yourself over onto your stomach. Immediately, searing hot pain radiates through your chest and legs. You cry out, curling in on yourself, writhing on the ground like a wounded animal.

Sputtering, trying to breathe through the pain long enough so that you can move, you feel hot tears track down your face. They're tears of insurmountable pain and hopeless desperation.

"All I kept thinking was 'how does anyone survive this?' It was unimaginable, the pain. Looking back now, I don't know how I did it. I don't think I could do it again if I had to," you admit.

Softly, as not to scare you, you feel the gentle weight of Jake's palm on your knee. "You won't have to," he promises. "But you did it. You survived."

You stare down at his hand on your knee.

With a trembling, blood stained hand, you reach out in front of you and dig your fingers into the ground. Heaving, you draw yourself forward, your legs dragging limply through the dust. It takes an unimaginable amount of strength to pull yourself even six inches.

Sniffling back tears and out of breath, you curl your fingers into the ground and drag yourself forward again. This time, you probably only move half as far. You have to fight the urge to just lay your cheek against the ground and cry.

You do this again and again, keeping one hand pressed into the gushing wound at your side while the other drags you forward. Your lower half has become increasingly heavier with each passing minute, your legs nothing but dead weight to pull along. You don't think you could move them if you tried.

It takes you forty minutes to drag yourself to the humvee. By the time you get yourself fully under the abandoned vehicle, your fingers are torn and bleeding, the tips ripped open and embedded with bits of gravel.

Your muscles collapse the very second you give them the chance. Your forehead drops down to rest against the ground, and you finally have a moment to shudder out a sob. Your throat is dry and cracked, and dust coats the inside of your mouth. You're dimly aware that your breaths are dangerously shallow. You just know that you're miserably nauseous and each passing moment is more unbearable than the next.

You turn your own palm over, staring at the scars of your ruined finger tips, scars that tell a story of how you survived. They're ugly, and you wish you didn't have to look at the all of the time. At least your torso is mostly hidden. You've moved to a beach town and will never be able to put on a swimsuit.

Jake’s eyes follow yours and after a moment he flips his palm over, his fingers spread and inviting. His hands are large and calloused from years of flying. There are fingernail divots in his palm.

Almost shyly, his green eyes meet yours. You see a bit of that sadness you saw earlier. “I know it’s not my job to be your shrink or whatever,” he adds with a laugh and you can’t help but laugh with him. “But you’re not alone. We’re all a bit fucked up if you haven’t noticed.” He shrugs. “It comes with the job.”

You can’t help yourself. You trace a finger over the scarred palm of his hand. “My dad would disagree.”

Jake is fighting the urge to close his palm around yours, not wanting to overstep, and so he’s pleased when you intertwine your fingers with his.

“Family dinner must be interesting.”

Jake came from a military family himself and so he knows how deep the ties run. His old man was a sailor and so he knew better than to come home sporting anything other than his dress whites.

You laugh out loud because he’s not wrong at all. Jake squeezes your fingers in response. His hand feels good in yours. Safe and heavy in the way a padlock feels. Like he’s not going anywhere.

“It’s not all ‘Go Army, Beat Navy’ believe it or not. Don’t get me wrong, I was raised a Navy brat and I have a hell of a lot of respect for my old man, but at the end of the day, I had to choose myself. I couldn’t do that with him watching over my shoulder. The Army’s been both the greatest and the worst thing that could have happened to me,” you confess.

Jake hums, dare you say almost disbelievingly.

“What?”

“A few weeks here and you’ll change your mind. No one does it like the Navy does.”

It’s your turn to make a noise of disbelief.

“I guess you’ll just have to impress me, Flyboy.”

Jake squeezes your hand again. “Oh I plan to.”

[the-fiction-witch]

Bracken Bunny P2

Media - House Of The Dragon Character - Davos Blackwood Couple - Davos X Reader Reader - (OC) Lady Y/n Bracken Rating - Smut (Non-Con) Word Count - 1900

Requested -

More please! Lowkey (highkey) into part 2! Would you consider it? I absolutely loved this Please part 2 Can we please get a part 2 of Bracken bunny?? I need to read what happens next 😫 MORE DAVOS PLEASE In desperate need of a part two for bracken bunny! So devious and wild

I contorted and writhed desperately trying to get myself out of his grasp. But Davos kept his hand locked around my upper arm leaving me with no choice but to walk with him. Often I tried to adjust myself slightly and to turn us around in circles but it never lasted long as he soon saw we were off-path and adjusted us back the way we needed to go. I screamed, swore and cursed his name a thousand times but it came out as nothing but muffled and mumbled grumbles from under the gag. If ever I tried to scream too loudly or draw attention to myself he would slap me hard on the ass to force my silence.

Finally, I saw it, Raventree Hall, The tall hall stood with ancient stone walls covered in climbing earthy moss, Large Square towers and a deep stone-lined moat.

I knew once I was inside it was too late, there would be little chance for my escape. And I hardly had hope of Davos letting me go, I used almost every last bit of my strength to try and get out of his grip but he forced me to the drawbridge, the only way across the deep moat.

“Who goes there?” A voice called out from the gate,

“It’s me you fuckwit!” Davos yelled,

“Ohh- Sorry- Who’s that with you?”

He chuckled, “Just a little bunny I found out hunting,” he purred, “Open the damn Gate!”

The thick wooden bridge slowly lowered revealing a well-kept courtyard, Davos dragged me inside with him walking me through the courtyard making sure no one saw my face.

The courtyard was busy with people. Many came and went from farming the various fertile lands House Blackwood owned, Blacksmiths working to make more and more weapons, and soldiers training and preparing. All ready for a battle at a moment’s notice, Likely a battle with my family.

He forced me inside the keep itself. The walls were tall and dark with a muddy smell to the air, and the timber rooms of the keep seemed cavernous and expansive with large dark oak beams high above it all. The walls were adorned with wollen tapestries, every piece of wood had intricate carvings, every door a detailed latticework, and each window had panes of diamond-shaped glass.

He forced me up through the Keep’s corridors until we reached a room, with stone walls lined with dark oak beams, a wooden floor, a stone fireplace in the corner, and a wooden bed lined with woven wool blankets with a window to the godswood above it.

I was thankful it wasn’t a prison cell, but fearful to be in his chambers.

He tossed my body onto the bed without care and locked the door behind him.

Davos came over to the bed leaving his weapons by the door, he pulled down the cloak and rested his finger in front of my nose. “You are not going to scream. You are not going to yell. I will remove the gag but you will not make a single sound. Do you understand me my little Bracken Bunny?”

I sighed knowing I didn’t have a choice, if I screamed the rest of his Blackwood family would come and I’d end up locked in a cell, or dead… or worse. So I nodded,

He smirked licking his bottom lip, “That’s a good girl,” He slowly untied the ribbon,

I quickly caught my breath staring into his dark brown eyes,

He grabbed my jaw hard, “I didn’t hear a thank you?”

“Thank you.” I spat,

“Humm that's a good little bracken bunny,” He smirked letting me go,

“What are you going to do with me?” I asked trying not to let my fear seep through,

He chuckled, “I am going to send a raven to your father, and we’re going to find out just how much Lord Bracken values his precious little daughter.” He growled, “You, my little bunny are going to stay here with me,” He crawled over me pinning my hips to his bed, “And we are going to have a lot of fun.” He stroked some hair from my face, “I am going to put a price on every little inch of you little bunny, your hair, your skin, your … maidenhead. All of it will have a price that your father is going to have to pay if he wants left intact.”

I tried to squirm out of his grip but he was far too strong, “My father would bring his army and burn Raventree Hall to the ground,”

“Oh, would he? Shall we find out how much he values you? Exactly how much he values? Down to the gold dragon?” he smirked forcing up my dress,

I squealed but he clamped a hand over my mouth,

“Quiet my little bracken bunny,” He growled licking my cheek,

“Don’t you dare,” I whispered,

“Don’t I?” He growled forcing me over onto my stomach pushing my head into the pillow and my feet on the floor so I’m bent over his bed. He forced my dress up to my waist exposing me completely to him,

I whined in humiliation at being so exposed, I kicked my feet trying to keep him away but he grabbed my ankles and forced my feet to the floor,

“Umm… such a cutie, “Humm… I best prep the raven now, I don’t know how long I can look at this cute little ass without ravishing it,” He growled his hands stroking my ass and digging his nails in as he forced my cheeks apart as far as they would go,

I squealed against the pillow in pain as he kept me like this for a solid minute making sure he got a good look at me, “If you do anything to me… It’ll start a war.”

“Will it?” he smirked, “Now that will be a war worthy of a song,” He growled slapping my ass hard,

“Ahh!” I complained,

“Ohh yeah do that again,” He growled slapping me again,

“Ahhh! Stop!” I pleaded,

He forced me up again by my hair and cut my hands loose with his knife,

I immediately went to hit him but he grabbed my hands and forced my wrists into chains that he attached to the bedpost of his bed, he chuckled slyly as he waved his knife around me and paced the half circle around me before he pressed the blade to my stomach,

“I think I have been very merciful, I could gut you, From cunt to cranium if I wanted to.” He growled, “But I have been very merciful, and I feel very reasonable. You are my prisoner, and you have my word that I will only harm what your family doesn’t pay to protect, So be a good little bunny and behave or your father gets a head arriving home to Stone Hedge,” He smirked cutting my dress and forcing it off me leaving me naked and utterly at his mercy, “Fuck… look at you,” He chuckled pacing around me once more, “I am gonna enjoy every last moment of this,” He growled in my ear, as his hands gripped me one on my hip and the other between my legs as he loomed behind me pressing his chest against my back,

“Ahh!” I squealed as he touched me so aggressively with no way of stopping him,

He chuckled lowly, “You are such a pretty little bunny,” he began to roughly hold my mound with his palm, his fingers slid over my lips,

“Let me go. Stop this! You gave me your word!”

“I gave you my word that I wouldn’t harm anything your family pays to protect. So… I won’t cut your hair if they pay for it, I won’t break your fingers if they pay for it, I won’t… deflower you if they pay for it.” He growled his finger circling my entrance, “But this,” He purred pushing two of his fingers inside me,

“Ahhhhh!” I screamed,

“This is fair game little bunny,” he purred,

“Stop! Please!” I begged,

“Ohh you sound so cute when you beg,” He chuckled moving his fingers fast and hard moving them in and out with no mercy for me at all, “Where’s that cute little thing threatening me in the field?”

“You gave me-”

“I said no harm, all I’m doing is having fun with you.” He smirked, “And we are going to have so very much fun the next few days… or weeks… or months. However long till your family pays up to get you back,” He smirked his hand moving off my hip and coming around to rub my clit mercilessly,

“Ahhhhhh Please stop!” I screamed my legs already shaking as he worked, standing behind me one hand thrusting his fingers at a merciless pace, the other hand rubbing my clit,

“I’m not stopping till you cum,” He growled nibbling my neck, “Ohh yeah I can feel you trembling, I can feel how wet you are, I know your gonna cum, and I’m gonna force it out of you whether you want to or not. So… Come on my little bracken bunny cum for me.”

I squealed and screamed trying not to hold back but he moved so fast and so hard I didn’t really have a choice, my body responding to the stimulation even if I didn’t want it to, I knew I was close and I tried everything to keep it back and stop it from happening not wanting to give him the satisfaction, of my satisfaction.

“You’re going to be good while you’re here, aren’t you? You’re going to behave, and be a good little bunny for me? Let me touch you and play with you?” He growled as he gave my neck a hickey,

“..Okay,” I whined, knowing I was close and there was nothing I could do to stop it,

“What was that?” he purred,

“Okay!” I yelped in frustration,

“Okay, what?”

“Okay, I’ll behave.”

“Say it,”

“What!”

“Say. It.”

“I will behave,” I said through gritted teeth my knees almost buckling as my hips and legs trembled,

“Properly bunny,”

“I promise I will behave,”

“Almost… little more,”

“Uhhhhh please stop!” I screamed clenching around his fingers trying not to drip down his hands even if it was already too late for that,

“Come on, you can do it,” He growled, “Say it. Properly.”

“I promise I will behave lord blackwood,” I screamed,

But before he could say anything I hit my orgasm, screaming out as my body was flooded with pleasure, my toes curling against the wooden floor.

He chuckled as he watched me, slowing his fingers and letting me ride it out until I was nothing but a gasping mess in his arms, “Good little Bracken Bunny,” He cooed kissing my cheek, “You did so good,” He purred his fingers slow but they hadn’t stopped,

“Please I-” I gasped as his nonstop rubbing and thrusting was sending my body into overstimulation,

“And as for war my little pet bunny,” He smirked thrusting his fingers hard and fast inside me faster than he ever had made me scream for mercy, “I would go to war for this cunt. A Thousand times over.” Before he pulled them out leaving me to gasp, “Get some rest, I’ll go send the raven.” He smirked licking his fingers clean,

“Yes my lord blackwood,” I gasped,

“Good girl,” He smiled giving my lips a kiss, “Such a good little bracken bunny,” He smirked before he left the room shutting and locking the door behind him. 

[ghostlysoaps]

Soap who goes out to the pub with the lads, fellow soldiers who wheedle and jab and egg each other on. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise when they caught on to his one-sided staring contest with a man sitting on his lonesome, black face mask on with a glass of something amber between his hands, observing the chaos around him. He’d met Soap’s eyes once and well… he’s always been a sucker for a pretty pair, especially with the unspoken challenge being presented as he’d lifted his brows with a flat stare. So, when his friends push at his shoulders and hedges him to approach the man, Soap only puts up a token protest.

“What do you want?”

And Soap’s off rambling. He’s never been good at acting suave or mysterious. Put him in front of someone attractive he wouldn’t mind a sliver of attention from and Soap turns into a babbling mess. At least the guy looks amused by it, gaze flickering from Soap to the table he’d vacated a while back. Soap knows he’s blowing his shot with every damn word he speaks but he can’t help himself. Silence would somehow be worse on his fraying nerves.

“You need better friends,” the man, Simon he learns later, says once the topic of how he’d ended up here had come and gone.

Soap nods his head in miserable agreement. “Aye. ‘m sorry for takin’ up so much of yer time. I can buy ye a drink to make up fer it? The waitress will bring it out so ye won’t have to stare at my ugly mug no more.”

He tries to rise, fully intent on flagging down one of the waitstaff when Simon’s hand circles around his wrist.

“Or we can give ‘em something proper to gossip about.”

Soap’s dragged, wide-eyed and disbelieving and to the tune of wolf whistles from his supposed allies, through the front door. Simon might be laughing, his eyes certainly are and Soap goes along with him like a trained dog on a leash all for the chance of seeing them light up like that again.

They wander. Weaving through streets and alleys and around town squares. Soap talks and Simon listens and all-in-all it’s a pleasant evening. He’s got a new friend out of it, a number on a paper slip and the satisfaction of saying: “a lad doesn’t kiss an’ tell,” when Wright tries to prod him for information over their shitty, mess hall breakfast.

[tamajiki2]

Can you write a Reiner braun x scout make reader that takes place in S4 smut? If you don't watch aot then can you make a shigiraki x male pro hero smut?

sure!! hope you enjoy;

𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐎𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐒,, 🦏 𝐁. 𝐑𝐄𝐈𝐍𝐄𝐑

𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒;

porn with plot, frotting,

hehim amab reader,

descriptions of hallucinations,

𝐑𝐄𝐈𝐍𝐄𝐑 𝐏𝐄𝐄𝐑𝐄𝐃 𝐃𝐎𝐖𝐍 the neck of the bottle of whiskey. it appeared dark and boundless in the low light of the bedroom.

the soft candle glow on his bedside table struck him with a certain comforting nostalgia. he always opted for flame lights; something about them eased a deep part of him.

he took a loud, struggling gulp of alcohol, hissing as it stung his throat. he’d been drinking often lately— at the odd hours of night when guilt and the faces of those he killed invaded his mind and ripped at his sanity. but, seeing the crushed corpses of those within the walls weren’t even the worst of it. it was remembering the eyes of those who were still alive: full of pure, unadulterated, repugnance— waiting for the day he’d die at their hands. he feared for the day he knew he’d see them again.

reiner took another swig of whiskey and his mind retreated to his days at the survey corps. brutish training and barely-edible slop afterwards. he could hardly stand it.

the hands of his fellow soldiers patting his shoulders, yelling praises of, “you can do it!”, and, “keep going!” while annie and bertolt stared at him with empty eyes. their eyes always looked that way; he remembered, for as long as they’d been in eldia. they were able to tune out everything they’d seen and experienced, all for the sake of the mission. but reiner didn’t work that way. he couldn’t disregard it all like them. every day, his mind was torn apart by the facade while his soul cried out for something real.

that was when he saw you.

you came to him like an angel at his worst moments. you accepted him, the entirety of him, and still remained by his side although you knew he had something to hide. something about him being a “bad liar”, you had said to him. he remembered your face back in the shiganshina district upon seeing him transform into the armored titan. you looked more sad than anything. you knew the next time you’d see eachother, it would be in a battle that was likely to kill one or both of you.

he saw you at nights he was most lonely.

tonight was one of them.

he peered at his open window where he saw your familiar silhouette slipping through. he didn’t recognize the black bodysuit wrapped in silver supports you were wearing today. he always saw you in your tattered brown scout uniform— what he remembered you in. now inside, you laid beside him on the bed and gently wrenched the alcohol bottle from his calloused fingers. your body felt strangely warm.

“ [ name ] …”, he whispered, unsure if what he was seeing was even real.

you hushed him with a finger to his lips. if you spoke, you knew you’d tell him everything. and you sure as hell wouldn’t risk the lives of the other scouts for a love affair that was sure to come to an end tomorrow. you pressed your lips to reiner’s.

“just humor me one more time.”

he nodded.

reiner followed with a feverish kiss. he shifted to straddle you, his movements urgent and restless. he had bumped his forehead against yours multiple times and practically tangled his lower half in the linen in the span of seconds.

you gripped his shoulders in a square reassurance. “slow down. we have all night,”, you parted from the kiss to say. reiner released a shaky breath.

your hands lowered to rest on his hips while he rutted against your clothed erection. he was always just as eager. someone like him didn’t get the opportunity to do this often.

reiner clumsily pulled off his clothing, then yours. fluid smeared over your torso as he pressed himself against you. he jerked desperately, groaning and cursing at the feeling of his cock catching on your own.

pre ran along your shafts— sticky and hot. reiner pulled closer and sighed deeply. a chill ran down your spine. reiner bit along your neck as his pace sped up, chasing that warm feeling in his stomach.

it wasn’t long before reiner keened and spurted cum all over your your abdomen. his muscled chest heaved while he caught his breath.

you laughed, amused.

“i hope you don’t think we’re done, reiner.”

—

the morning following proceeded as normal. reiner overlooked the events of yesterday, seeing you, as simply another one of his drunken hallucinations. although much more vivid than normal, still imagination.

reiner finally realized when he saw you again fighting alongside eren yeager as he brutalized countless civilians underneath his feet. you were wearing that same black bodysuit wrapped in silver, and dark marks crept up the side of your neck. your eyes were sharp and murderous, as were the other scouts around you.

but reiner decided that he would be okay with dying that day as long as it was by your hand.

[ an; a lot less focus on the smut here haha um i’ve never written for reiner before so i hope this is okay ]

[stellarbit]

Devotee

Word Count: 3.8k Pairing: Crosshair x fem!Imperial Warnings: NSFW smut with little plot, piv, creampie, oral Summary: You joined the imperial army because of CF 99. They trained you as a freedom fighter and you hadn't stopped thinking of Crosshair since. He'd yet to come across someone who looked at him like you did, and he wants more

Crosshair never substantially interacted with civilians before the Empire. In just one week, he transitioned from dealing with those outside his squad on a need-to-know basis, to leading and training not just regular clones, but also regular people.

It was dismal work that, to him, proved nothing more than his superiority over the majority. Still, there were those who looked down on him for being a clone. Not that it mattered. They were of no significance to Crosshair, it only showed their lack of vision and poor taste.

However, when you came under his command, the opinion of another became of some interest to him.

As a new recruit in a promising class of soldiers, you were part of the elite he was tasked to train between assignments. Among your cohorts, you stood the straightest—rigid as a board, chin raised, eyes fixed forward. It caught Crosshair’s attention in the wrong way.

Walking the lines of you, he stopped in front of you and turned his hawkish gaze on you. Under the weight of his stare, your eyes wavered from their focus.

 In a low, annoyed tone, he challenged, "Something on your mind?"

You hastily shook your head, sealing your lips tightly to maintain composure.

Crosshair took your silence as insubordination. His voice sharpened, "You answer when spoken to by a superior officer."

You responded promptly this time, "No."

“No…?” Crosshair pressed, dragging the etiquette out of you.

You swallowed, willing yourself to relax and offered him a subtle smile. "No, sir."

Crosshair turned to face you fully, his expression tightened with displeasure. He heard attitude in your voice and with it the opportunity to let off some steam.

“Congratulations. You earned yourself an extra hour of training today.” His crisp tone fixed your posture, forcing your eyes forward again.

With a sharp nod, and a dry mouth, you squared your shoulders. “Yes, sir.” He made an annoyed noise and walked on. You’d spent too long planning your first interaction with him for it to have gone that poorly. The worst of it was that you didn’t even know how it managed to go that poorly.

Despite that, it was your first training session under Crosshair’s leadership and you were going to make the best of it. The exercises were more intense than you’d experienced since the Clone Wars. But you had experienced it before.

By the session's end, you still had enough energy to spare. Training to be the best and serving with the best was your ultimate goal. Disappointing Crosshair on your first day was not an option.

The other soldiers filed out, some muttering snide comments. Your instinct was to grab them by their hair but you stood determined to impress. Keeping your composure was crucial; losing it would only show weakness.Once the doors closed and you were left alone with Crosshair, all you could think to do was stand at attention, silently waiting his next command.

Crosshair took slow deliberate steps towards you. He’d been planning this all morning. Using you as a punching bag was going to serve two purposes. keeping the others in line and venting the rage that was consuming him—not just the condescension from the regs but also his fresh frustration with his brothers.

He halted a few paces away, his voice icy. "Anything to say, or is speaking to a clone beneath you?"

Your composure instantly vanished, head whipping to face him. “Absolutely not!” You protested.

"No?" Crosshair began to circle you like a predator assessing its prey. "Then you’re insubordinate." Having once embodied insubordination himself, he recognized it well and had no tolerance for it.

"Insubordinate?" you repeated, shocked. Your mouth opened and closed, searching for the right words. "Sir," you scoffed, tracking his movements, "I think you’re misunderstanding."

A cruel smile flickered across his lips, his eyes challenging you to further provoke him. He paused while still in front of you, taking two long, intimidating steps closer. "Are you questioning me?"

The severity of the situation was beginning to dawn on you. In a sudden panic, you turned towards him, your hands raised in a gesture of surrender. Your words tumbled out in a rush, "No, no! I'm not trying to— I mean, I didn’t mean to—" As his smile twisted into a snarl, you blurted out, driven by desperation, "I'm here because of you.."

Once the words were out, you wondered why you had been so fearful of expressing them in the first place. There was a pride swelling in your chest at the admission, genuine satisfaction in declaring it aloud. His expression didn’t change, but he fell silent,  waiting for you to continue.

You slowly lowered your hands, clearing your throat before adding, "Your squad helped retake my city from the Separatists. I was among the freedom fighters you aided." As you spoke, you watched his features soften, the simmering rage cooling into something more reflective. "I enlisted because of you and your squad. I want to help people the way you helped us. There were rumors about clones leading the best of us and here I am.

"In the Mid Rim?" His voice was a low murmur, recognition flickering in his eyes. You nodded, a spark of hope lighting up your face as he pieced the memory together.

Crosshair scrutinized you, shifting his stance slightly. Your eyes were wide, not with fear or challenge, but with something he hadn't expected—admiration. The smile on your lips wasn't mockery but genuine, warm respect.

You fidgeted under his gaze; it wasn’t a seething stare-down but a thorough inspection. The sensation of his eyes on you ignited a warmth in your stomach that quickly spread throughout your body. His focus intensified, sending heat creeping up your neck and flushing your cheeks.

With muscle memory, Crosshair plucked a toothpick from a compartment on his forearm, stepping closer as he placed it between his teeth. His expression, previously tight with anger, now relaxed into a scoff. "You came here because of me?" he asked incredulously.

“Yes.”

Crosshair rolled his head to one side, pulling out the toothpick to point at you. “You were an archer.”

A giddy flutter ran through you. “I was.” You didn’t think he would remember you. “Actually you showed me-”

"How to ricochet a shot," he finished for you. He all but forgot that mission—it had been a relatively straightforward one for Clone Force 99—but he did recall your group. Your enthusiasm back then had been noticeable.

Your squirming and the flush of your cheeks didn’t escape him.

“Well then,” Crosshair drawled, stepping away and easing the pressure off of you. When you visibly relaxed, he continued, “Then let’s see how good of a student you turned out to be.”

When the extra hour was up, you’d barely broken a sweat and your shooting accuracy rounded out to crisp 93%, Crosshair had to admit - he was impressed.

While you wracked up your training blaster, Crosshair felt something more than being impressed. He toggled through what it could be, almost settling on approval, until you faced him again.

You were smiling at him and whatever it was it didn’t matter anymore. He just wanted more of it.

From that point on, whenever his duties allowed, you had the privilege of receiving Crosshair's exclusive tutelage. He had intended to make your training a form of punishment, and perhaps to others it might have felt that way. But you clung to his every command, turning it into something different for both of you. It turned out there was more than one way to let off steam because Crosshair always felt lighter after your sessions.

At some point he even found himself looking for you in hallways. When the day came that he spotted you and you kept your attention forward, with not a glance his way, his approval soured to annoyance.

Over dinner, he thought about what that meant for your next training session. He was barely a bite into his solitary meal when a tray clattered down in front of him. Mid-bite he glanced over his fork to find you out of uniform and, again, smiling at him.

Swallowing his bite, Crosshair sat his utensil down to ask, “Why are you here?” His tone was more cautious than curious.

You settled into your seat and lightly shrugged, “I saw you headed this way and I’ve been trying to catch you alone.” You gave him a wink, adding, “Trust me, I see you more than you see me.”

Crosshair studied you for a moment, his sharp gaze softening slightly. “Is that so?” he asked, half-joking yet intrigued by your boldness

.Your eyebrows bounced as you quickly replied, “I followed you into the military. You don’t think I’d follow you to the cantine?”

There it was again—your unabashed admiration for him. That unfamiliar, stirring feeling returned, churning something inside him. Crosshair was momentarily taken aback, reveling in the pleasure of this new sensation.

You hummed at him, snapping him back to reality. He blinked, then chuckled—a rare sound from him. “How shameless,” he remarked.

Laughing as you took a bite, you managed to say, “Coming from you?” Setting your utensil down you leaned forward. “I’ve seen you in battle, you pose when you shoot and you and I both know it.”

He stopped mid-bite, slowly lowering the fork with a little smirk. Crosshair forgot what it felt like to banter or be lighthearted. It spurred that feeling inside him.

“If that’s where your focus was in battle, no wonder the mission took so long.” He said in a teasing tone.

Pressing a hand against your chest you laughed innocently, “I was just watching your back.” No matter how you tried, you couldn’t tuck your smile away.

The Clone Wars had been grueling. Imperial boot camp less so, but still a challenge in conformity. You did it all for the chance to be trained again by Clone Force 99. To do for the Galaxy what they’d done for you. Even one session would have made it all worth it. This unfettered attention was beyond what you imagined.w1

“What is your schedule after this?” Crosshair’s question brought you back to focus.

You shrugged, frowning in thought, “Just headed back to my barracks.” You couldn’t resist pushing him. Daring a flirtatious tone you asked,“Why? Trying to catch me alone?”

Crosshair stood, tilting his head back with a lazy smile. “Something like that.” The low tone of his voice sent a chill down your spine. 

“Let’s go.” He said as he waved you on and he left the table.

“Go where?”

“My barracks.” Crosshair said just loud enough for others to hear.

You didn’t hesitate to abandon your tray, nearly tripping to get around the table and catch up.

As you walked, Crosshair found himself discussing small, inconsequential details of training schedules and mission outlines - things that, without his brothers, he’d keep to himself..

"You're different from the rest," Crosshair finally admitted, his voice low as if confessing a secret.

You met his gaze, your expression serious. “I’ll take that as a compliment, because so are you.," you responded earnestly. ”So thank you.”

You could’ve swore you saw his step falter, but regardless in a few more steps you made it to his barracks.

Crosshair let you cross the threshold first, giving him the chance to watch you peruse his space. The room was devoid of life, his new cohorts adhering to strict barracks regulations. Your buzzing about brought a warmth to the space. 

After circling the room, clearly in awe of being in the barracks of the men you so admired, you paused at a rectangular table in the center. Running your finger along its edge, you seemed lost in thoughts of what it must have been like when the entire squad was together. The placement of a rifle nearby hinted at which bunk was his.

Leaning back against the table, you took a deep, satisfied breath. This moment, here in this space, might have been the happiest you’d ever felt. Resting on one hand, you turned to face Crosshair, your expression radiantly beaming.

You were by no means a soft person, if anything he would mark you as fierce. Strong, resilient, and fierce.

And, perhaps his favorite, loyal.

In a few slow strides, Crosshair met you at the table just as you perched yourself on top of it. He scoured your face, and while he wouldn’t call you soft it’s exactly what you made him feel. The feeling inside him grew feverish for more of you.

Crosshair leaned into your space, hands gripping the table on either side of your legs. He couldn’t get enough of the way you looked at him. Admiration, adoration, and Crosshair knew there was attraction. The longer he watched you heat through him and he started pressing his pants.

“Are you enjoying training?” To anyone else he may have sounded imposing, but you saw beyond that. He was teasing you and pinning you with his full attention. The last and only time he’d been this close to you he’d been wrapping his arms around you to show you proper shooting form. And just like the last time, the very scent of him made your core ache.

“Yes.” Your smile squirmed, refusing to go away. You gave them to him so often and freely and still Crosshair wanted more.

He lost all tolerance for the space between you and slipped his right hand down the length of your thigh until he angled it out of his way. “Then I must not be doing a good job.”

The sudden advance took your breath away, but quickly and hushed, you responded, “That’s not true. There’s no one better than you.” Your eagerness got the better of you as you hung a hand on his bicep. A few stars came to your eyes as you added, “You’re exactly what I thought you’d be.”

“And what’s that?” He tilted his head, eyes falling to your lips for only a second.

“The best of us.” You said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

His eyes flared with a sharp inhale. When had anyone looked at him like you were? You were so devoted to him and, beyond that, he suspected you were desperate for him. In one motion he slid his fingers under your thighs, wedged himself between your legs, and pulled you against him. A small noise left you and Crosshair purred, “Am I now?”

Steadying yourself with a grip on his shoulder, you managed a little scoff,  “Oh, don’t act like you don’t know that.”

Crosshair raised an eyebrow with a small smile, “Tell me anyways.”

For awhile you thought you’d been deluding yourself that Crosshair at least found you attractive. Now that you had concrete proof, you felt frantic for him. 

“You’re-” you started, interrupted as he stepped even closer. Crosshair pulled one leg to wrap around him, encouraging you as you continued on a gasp, “The epitome of precision and skill” 

Crosshair’s hips rolled into you on their own, suddenly very fervid to show you what you did to him.

Feeling him rock hard against you, you cursed under your breath. Slowly, you slid a leg to hook behind him. “Crosshair.” His name felt heavy on your tongue.

He only hummed in response and before you could second guess yourself you confessed, “I’ve wanted you since the moment I met you.” You took a deep breath and pulled him in. “And I want you right now.”

He snaked a hand behind your neck and angled you towards him. “I know you do.” His voice was strained, grunting against the urge to jump you and the pressure between you. “And I think I’ll have you.” His tone sent a thrill through you all the way to your core.

In a burst of motion, you tugged him against you and pulled him back by the neck. You moved your lips against his as you both fell back onto the table, Crosshair laying across you. His cock dug into you as your hips ground together. After a moment of shock, Crosshair’s eyes fluttered shut and he moved to consume you.

With a hand under your hip, Crosshair pulled you up just enough to give him the space to pull down his pants. They fell to the floor and his hand met yours at the hem of your pants. You both fumbled with the clasps and worked to wiggle you out of them. Simultaneously you stripped off your shirt, tossing them aside and grabbing each other’s faces. 

Crosshair maintained the kiss while pulling you to the edge of the table, his fingers sliding between your legs to your slit. He found you completely slick, feeling like velvet as he dipped his finger into you.

He moaned into your kiss at the feeling of you so wet for him.

His touch strummed you, pushing you into a feverish frenzy. “Crosshair.” You whined through kisses. Again, he only responded with a hum. You pulled away, panting and reaching between you two.

You found the length of him and gave him a few pumps that he leaned into.

“I need you.” Your words were another confession, an invitation, and a plea.

Crosshair’s huffed a laugh as he removed his fingers. Two were glistening with your juices with a small strand of you hanging between them. He brought his fingers to his open mouth, sucking the taste of you off his fingers.

Slipping them off his tongue, he directed them right into your mouth. The taste of you on him sent your eyes rolling back only for a moment until you felt him slip inside you.

The sudden fullness of him jolted you up right, your hands dropping to his hips. You pulled him against you in time with his rhythm. You both needed him to be deeper.

You squirmed around him, whining as he hastened his pace. The sounds of your body working against each other only heated the room. His moans stood out the most to you, stoking the growing ache inside you.

Not once did he look away from you. You were stunning as you writhed before him, cradling your hips against his. And never did you look up at him with anything other than a lopsided smile.

“Say it again,” He panted, relentlessly driving the full length of him into you.

There was no question as to what he wanted. “I need you, Crosshair.”

As soon as the words were out, his mouth was on yours. He groaned against you, filling you him in a smooth, long thrust. Pulling back just enough that his lips brushed yours, he ordered, “Get up and turn around.”

In perfect tandem, he slid out of you and you slid from the table. You quickly bent yourself over the table for him and he didn’t make you wait.

Crosshair leaned over you, putting one hand between your legs and the other on your face. He lifted your chin, aiming your gaze to the viewport in front of you. The pitch black night made a black mirror out of the glass and your reflection, dizzy and lost in lust, stared back at you. 

Your eyes moved to Crosshair’s. The moment your eyes met his in the reflection, his cock met your folds and pushed right through you. He held you in place as he fucked you, his hand just out of view as he made stroked your clit. 

“Is this what you came here for?” His voice reverberated from his chest into your back.

Had your fantasies played into your journey to Kamino? ”Yes.” The affirmation came out a happy trill.

Crosshair moved your head so that his mouth reached your ear. “You know what you are?” Every word that came from him pushed you further to melt around him.

“Tell me.” You sobbed. The kiss he pressed against your ear ended with a light bite, pulling a whimper from you.

“Mine.”

That was it. One single word and you were crying his name. Your orgasm hit and a moment later Crosshair sheathed himself deep within you. His cock swelled, throbbing and cumming in waves until it leaked out around him.

You slumped against the table, both exhausted and elated, but Crosshair gave you no time to rest. He pulled out of you and dropped to his knees, watching as his cum spilled out of you. After a few drips, Crosshair spread you with his thumbs and gave you a long lick. He started at your clit and ran his tongue all the way up.

“Crosshair!” His name was a mumbled moan from you. “You can’t.”

From his knees, Crosshair turned you around to stand before him. “Too late.” He crooned before diving back into you. His licking and sucking made it hard to stand. When he put two fingers in you and started curling them inside you, another, almost painful, ache bloomed in you. You were so sensitive and his mouth was already bringing you to a second release

You dared look down, not expecting to see his brown eyes looking up at you. With your full attention; Crosshair hummed into you and focused his fingers on a soft spot inside you. The stimulation struck something more in you. Warm pressure pooled between your legs while you reached the brink of release.

“If you keep that up I’m going to-”

You didn’t need to tell him, he knew you were close by the way you convulsed on his fingers and the noises you made. He rocked his fingers harder into you and as his mouth focused on your clit. Impatience took hold of Crosshair and in his drive to see what more you could show him he took your clit into his mouth. He sucked on you, swelling your bundle of nerves so much that when he let his teeth lightly graze you, your entire body shuddered.

The pressure that built around his fingers snapped and you came around him. His fingers didn’t stop though and they kept playing you until your own cum coated his hands. You couldn’t stop the shakes hitting you or the way the floor became wet from you.

Only when you were on the verge of collapsing did Crosshair let you go. You barely caught yourself, elbows catching the edge of the table as your legs gave way. 

Drained in every way you huffed and puffed with a barely there smile. “That was-”

“Have you ever came like that?”

You didn’t have to look at the small puddle you left to know what he was referring to. Getting your feet back underneath you, you admitted. “Never.”

Crosshair got to his feet, helping you straighten out as he went. “Good.” Tipping your chin up he returned one of your smiles. “Let’s keep it that way.”

Your knees went weak again as you said, “Sir, yes sir.”

[lucy-gray1075]

There Are Worse Games to Play

pairing: finnick odair x reader (hunger games)

synopsis: you and finnick get reaped for the 3rd quarter quell

warnings: fluff, angst, sadness, self-sacrifice

a/n: my first hunger games fic!! i love fin so much, so i hope you enjoy this <3

౨ৎ

"Finnick Odair," the Escort's voice rang loud in the silence of the gathered audience.

You let out a strangled cry of suppressed fury. It wasn't fair. He won, fair and square. He had played by the Capitol's rules, just like the rest of you. Why should he be taken again?

The Escort walked over to the bowl containing the female Victors' names and before you knew it she was calling out, "Mags Flanagan!"

"I volunteer! I volunteer!" your hand shot up as you stepped forward to ensure your intentions wouldn't be mistaken.

"How wonderful! We have a volunteer for the female tribute from District 4," the Escort sounded genuinely proud, like you had done some great service to the Capitol. In her eyes, you were a compliant soldier, a willing pawn of the Capitol. It disgusted you, but at least now, you had the chance to die in the games and leave this cruel world behind.

"No! Y/N!" Finnick seemed to be struggling against his anguish. You had forgotten this might affect him, just as much as him being in danger affected you. Well, if it came down to it, you would sacrifice yourself for him in a heartbeat. That knowledge was the only constant you could rely on in your quickly crumbling world.

Finnick wouldn't speak to you on the train. And every time you mustered the courage to say something, to try and explain yourself, your words died in your throat like mockingjays shot down from the sky.

"Finnick, would you please say something?" you finally broke. "At least look at me." You hated how you wore your desperation all over your face.

Finnick's head snapped to yours, and you almost wished you hadn't asked. His eyes were ablaze with a fury so deep you thought he just might hate you.

"I'm sorry," you let out a sob you didn't realize you were holding in.

Your embarrassing display of emotion made his features to soften. He didn't mean to make you cry.

"C'mere," there was a rough edge to his voice, which you suspected was from him trying to hide how emotional he had gotten.

Despite the tough guy act, he melted at your touch. He pulled you into his arms and when that wasn't enough, into his lap. You couldn't be close enough to him.

"I'm so scared," his voice broke. All you could do was nod. If Finnick couldn't be strong about this, there was no hope for you. You pulled his head into your chest, stroking his soft curls to comfort him. He rubbed your lower back in wide sweeping motions, trying to quell your tears.

"We have each other," you wiped at your face harshly. You needed to see the bright side. "There are worse games to play. This time, we're older and stronger and we'll be together, most importantly."

"You're right, love," Finnick dried your remaining tears more gently than you had. The pad of his thumb was soft against your undereye, and you tried to focus on the feeling of his arms around you for as long as you could. You loved how much he cared for you. You loved him so much, and if anything ever happened to him, you didn't think you could live with yourself.

"I love you," he whispered, touching his forehead to yours.

"I love you more, Finn," you closed your eyes, feeling his lashes flutter against yours.

"Not possible, birdie," you opened your eyes to find the ghost of a grin lighting up his entire face. You stared hard, committing this image of him to memory. You didn't know if you'd ever see him this way again.

[sgt-tombstone]

Polaris

This is my secret santa gift for @gorsime/@farahfriday! I hope you like it!!

----

When Simon was a kid, he stole a book about space from his local library. Not his finest moment, to be sure, but the guilt of it was vastly outweighed by the comfort of scrambling up onto the roof of his house—the only place where his dad couldn't reach him—with nothing but a flashlight and his pilfered book. He'd sit up there for hours, naming the stars and tracing the constellations, until the sun rose and hid the tiny pinpricks of light once more.

The hazy glow of Manchester hid all but the brightest of stars, so many of his favorites remained little more than pictures on a page, but he glutted himself on Arcturus and Gaia, Cassiopeia and Andromeda. On good days, he challenged himself to find as many of the zodiac constellations as possible. On bad days, he stared at the North Star for so long that his eyes blurred and his chest ached. He didn't know why it called to him so strongly—its brightness, maybe, or its stubborn persistence—but he knew, with an inexplicable yet unshakable confidence, that home for him wasn't the building beneath him. Home was due north, somewhere along the longitude pointing true north.

When he joined the military, he assumed that his true north was a long-lost dream. Officer training had briefly reawakened the dormant sparks when he'd had to sit through a seminar on astronavigation, but the embers were snuffed just as quickly. Dead men had graves, not homes, and he didn't feel the pull of Polaris deep in his chest for a long time. Not until recently. Not until Johnny.

----

Ghost didn't give the universe credit for much—it had screwed him over more times and in more ways than he could count—but he had to admit that, at present, things weren't as bad as they could be.

He'd long since stopped expecting missions to go smoothly, because life didn't work that way and apparently neither did the 141. Being an optimist in the military was a recipe for disaster, so most soldiers maintained a healthy dose of realism, but Ghost had fully swan-dived into pure pessimism years ago and hadn't ever really breached the surface, despite Soap's consistent and concerted efforts to sway him towards some sort of sustained positivity.

At the current moment, though, the tables had turned. For once, he wasn't being the pessimistic one.

“Just our fuckin' luck," Soap spat, kicking at his gear bag before continuing his rampage around the small cabin. "Stuck all the way out here in this god forsaken forest, fuckin' middle of nowhere, piece of shite safe house-"

The mission had been easy, almost suspiciously easy, but Ghost wasn't in the habit of looking a gift horse in the mouth; he'd turned himself into a well-rounded veterinarian, capable of handling whatever inevitably, predictably went wrong. And in the grand scheme of things, this particular gift horse was barely limping. Sure, he and Soap had been separated from the rest of the 141, forced to retreat to the only safe house in four hundred square miles, all communication cut, but it could have been worse.

"How the fuck are we supposed tae get out o' here?" Soap growled, ripping his earpiece out and hurling it to the floor with a wordless scream of frustration. "Comms doon, no radio, fuckin' smoke signals or catch the nearest fucking pigeon-“

Ghost was leaned against the wall next to the only door, his arms crossed over his chest, enjoying the show with a single raised eyebrow. He knew that most of Soap's anger wasn't really anger; their separation from the rest of the 141 had come in the form of several very close calls with stray bullets, followed by over an hour of climbing up a forest-blanketed mountain to their one-room hideout. Adrenaline, fear, and exhaustion warred in Soap's blood, erupting as righteous, turbulent rage. Ghost's eyes tracked Soap's movement around the room, letting the artificial anger flow around him like water in a stream.

"Dinnae ken how long it'll be before they find us," Soap ranted, pulling his tac vest over his head, sending a mag pouch skittering across the floor. "Fuckin' sitting ducks out here, we are, waitin' for some bampot to pull their heid out o' their-"

“Thought you'd be happier to be stuck in a safe house with me, sergeant. Weren’t you the one who mentioned cohabitation recently?” Ghost asked, cutting his sergeant off, and he regretted the words as soon as he said them, his joking tone doing nothing to soften the way they landed like a mortar shell in the middle of the room.

Soap had brought up the topic of moving in together just before loading out three days ago, a half-finished conversation, and Ghost hadn't had the chance to answer one way or the other before they'd had to board the transport for infil. He could tell that the lack of response had weighed on his partner in the days since. Joking about it now was probably a bit too much, too soon. Soap spun in place and fixed Ghost with a withering glare, every muscle held taut with barely-contained rage.

“Tha's no' what I meant and you fuckin' know it, Simon.”

“I know, Johnny, I'm sorry," Simon said gently, his entire body softening on an exhale. He took his mask off and opened his arms slightly, an invitation. "Come here, love."

Johnny needed his boyfriend right now, not his CO, and despite Price’s grumbling on the subject, the two of them did a bang up job of keeping the two facets of their lives, the two aspects of their relationship, separate. He watched as Johnny sloughed off the tension in his shoulders and trudged the short distance between them to press his forehead to the ridge of Simon's collarbone. Simon wrapped his arms around his boyfriend, glad that he'd had the foresight to doff his own plate carrier when they'd entered the safe house half an hour earlier; the only thing separating the two men were their shirts and several layers of dried sweat, and he could feel Johnny's heartbeat against his ribs.

“We’re going to be okay, sweet'eart,” Simon murmured, pressing a kiss to Johnny’s temple and burrowing his nose in the dent that Johnny's headphones left in his mohawk. He swept a hand down Johnny's spine, coaxing him to relax against him. “We always are when we’re together."

He felt Johnny heave a deep breath and nod before his arms came up to wrap around Simon's back, gripping the fabric of his shirt in his fists.

"Don't terrorists know tomorrow's Christmas?" Johnny muttered, and now they were getting to the crux of the issue. "Don't they know I'm supposed tae be in Glasgow with my boyfriend right now?"

"I don't think they care, love," Simon rumbled with a smile. He was helpless against it, his chest constricting with awe and affection every time Johnny called him his boyfriend; such a simple thing, but it meant everything. His free hand wrapped around the back of Johnny's neck, gently massaging out some of the tightness in the muscles at his nape. They stood like that for several moments, swaying slightly in place as the adrenaline of the mission eased and their heartbeats softened to a synchronized thrum.

"We’re safe," Simon continued lowly, dropping his head to speak in Johnny's ear, his lips moving against the shaved portion of his head. "No one’s shooting at us, neither of us are injured. We have a well-stocked safe house in a very defensible position. It's the only safe house in the area, so Price'll get Nik out here by tomorrow, comms or not, no messenger pigeon required. We're gonna be okay."

"I know," Johnny said. His voice was muffled by Simon's chest and he drew back just enough to look him in the eyes, blinking slowly like a cat.

"We can spend New Years in Scotland instead," Simon said, his lips brushing against Johnny's forehead. It wouldn't be the same, he knew—Johnny loved Christmas, had been so excited to bring Simon home for the holidays for the first time—but it was something.

"Lookin' tae get a New Years kiss outta me, Simon Riley?" Johnny grinned, wiggling his eyebrows salaciously, like Simon needed a special occasion to kiss him. He rolled his eyes and pressed his lips against Johnny's in a chaste peck, just to prove the point.

"Every year, for the rest of my life, Johnny," he said, then took a step backwards and caught one of Johnny's hands in his, tugging him towards the door before he could fully process what Simon had said. "Now, come on, come outside with me.”

“Why?”

“It’s a beautiful night," he smiled. "We’re going stargazing.”

And it was; this close to the equator, December temperatures rarely dropped below 20 degrees Celsius, and the sun had set a few hours ago, leaving the mid-winter air just shy of too cold. The trees had already lost most of their leaves, granting them a good view of the night sky, undisturbed by light pollution.

Simon led them to the roof of the safe house, tucking themselves and their guns between two dormers; they were several dozen miles from the warehouse they'd raided hours before, but Simon didn't want to take any further unnecessary risks. He braced his feet on the gentle slope of the roof, his arse already protesting the rough shingles, and tugged Johnny to sit between his bent knees, back to his chest. The warmth of Johnny in his arms chased away the slight chill and any remaining tension that clung to their bones.

"Tha's gotta be a planet," Johnny murmured as they settled, pointing to a point in the distant sky. "Look how bright it is."

"Hm," Simon hummed in agreement, glancing up to get his bearings among the stars. "'S Mars." He laid his palm over the back of Johnny's hand, entwining their fingers. "There's Cancer, just behind it." He swept their joined hands to the left in a slow arc, sweeping above their heads. "There's Gemini, Taurus, Aries, Pisces, and Aquarius, just above the horizon. But look, see Capella, right there? 'S the brightest star in its constellation, Auriga, but it's actually four stars all bunched together. I don't remember their names, but it's two pairs of stars orbiting each other."

"How do ye ken all this?"

"Looked at the stars a lot as a kid," Simon shrugged, knowing that Johnny would understand what went unspoken in the mundane statement. "You should always be able to find the North Star, Johnny. Find the North Star and you can find your way home."

"Awright," Johnny said, leaning his head against Simon's. "How do ye find the North Star?"

"You see Ursa Major, there?" Simon asked, bringing their extended arms back to the right. "'S one of the most recognizable constellations. The two stars on top, Merak and Dubhe, form a line, and if you follow it up," he traced the invisible line with Johnny's fingertip until it hit, "Polaris. The North Star. As long as you're in the Northern hemisphere, that's true north."

"What if I'm in the Southern hemisphere?"

"Then you're fucked," Simon said, deadpan, and Johnny snorted a laugh.

"No, I'm serious," Simon protested, prodding Johnny lightly in the side in chastisement, but he was chuckling too. "Polaris is a pole star, it's aligned with the Earth's axis of rotation in the Northern hemisphere, but the Southern pole star—Sigma Octantis, I think—is barely visible, even on a clear night. You have to use two other constellations , the Southern Cross and two stars of Centaurus, to find approximate true south. It's a pain in the arse. Stick to the Northern hemisphere."

"What aboot that star?" Johnny asked, pointing to another bright spot, and Simon easily obliged.

They spent the next hour or so curled around each other on the roof, Simon pointing out every constellation he knew, along with fun facts about the stars in them. Anyone else would've thought Johnny to be uncharacteristically quiet, but Simon knew the man was a sponge; the fastest way to get him to shut up was to teach him something new. Finally, Simon exhausted his knowledge of the visible stars, and they fell into a comfortable silence.

This, he thought, was the closest to heaven he'd ever get. Johnny, safe and warm in his arms, spread out beneath the stars, the only two human beings for miles. He'd never given thought to his retirement, never thought he'd get that far, but if he did, he wanted it to look something like this. Johnny would hate it, he knew; the man was too social to live the rest of his life in the middle of nowhere, but maybe they could find a happy medium. If anyone could, it was the two of them. Their entire relationship was a game of balance; sunlight and shadow, passion and duty, pleasure and pain.

"We could do it, you know," Simon murmured after a few minutes, his voice nearly lost among the sounds of unfamiliar birds and bugs settling down or revving up for the night.

Johnny hummed in question, and Simon realized he had continued a conversation that had happened only in his head.

"This," he elaborated. "Us. We could retire, spend our days just like this."

"Ye dinnae have to retire, Simon, I ken how much ye love yer job," Johnny said, tilting his head to knock gently against Simon's temple. "When I was talkin' aboot movin' in together, I only meant off base." He caught one of Simon's hands in both of his own, kneading idly—almost nervously—at his palm with his thumbs.

"I'd love to move off base with you, Johnny," Simon said earnestly, forfeiting his hand easily to his boyfriend's ministrations. "But… We've been in the game for a long time, love. Reckon we've earned ourselves a nice retirement. Get away somewhere, just us and whatever slice of nature we land in."

"Are ye sayin' ye want tae retire?" There was no judgment in Johnny's voice, just curiosity, and Simon didn't blame him. The military was all either of them had ever known; retirement had never been in the cards for them. They lived 141, and they'd always expected to die 141, too.

"I'm saying that I'd follow you wherever you wanted to go, Johnny."

"It's a hell of an idea," Johnny said with a chuckle, nestling even further back against Simon's chest and laying his head back to rest on his shoulder. He finally released Simon's hand and Simon immediately laid it on Johnny's chest, right over his heart. "The Ghost playin' domestic."

"Here's an even better idea," Simon rumbled in his ear. "Simon MacTavish waking up every morning next to his husband."

"Oh," Johnny breathed, all amusement gone in an instant, and Simon could feel the trembling of his chest as he stuttered an exhale. "Oh, aye, I like that idea."

"Thought you might," Simon murmured. At that moment, his watch, set to local time, beeped softly. "Happy Christmas, Johnny."

Johnny sat up slightly, turning in Simon's arms to catch his gaze, and Simon brought a hand up to give him a place to rest his head, cradling the side of his face in his palm. He ran his thumb in a sweeping arc, pressing into the divot of Johnny's temple, feeling the smooth scar tissue against his calloused fingertip.

He'd almost lost him, that day in the tunnel; if Makarov's aim had been any better, Simon would've been spreading Johnny's ashes instead of making a bedside confession in the hospital. Every time he caught a glimpse of the starburst scar, he thought of Polaris and thanked whatever higher power that bothered to listen for giving them a second chance. He didn't intend to waste it.

"Happy Christmas, Simon," Johnny said with a sad smile that Simon hated; he'd pluck all of the stars out of the sky to keep Johnny from ever looking like that. "I'm sorry we couldn't spend it at my family's."

"Johnny," Simon breathed, hand still cupping Johnny's face. "I don't care about one holiday when I know we'll spend a hundred more together. When I know that we'll be able to invite your family over to ours one day to celebrate. You're it for me, love. I'm not sayin' we have to retire tomorrow, but… If it came down to you or the job, The Ghost would disappear in a heartbeat. You brought Simon Riley back to life, sweet'eart, and I'll spend the rest of it loving you."

For a long moment, Johnny gaped at him, his mouth opening and closing noiselessly as he struggled to form a response. Simon let him process, using the time to get lost in his eyes; the endless, glacial blue that had become the brightest star in his sky, his North Star, his guiding light. They were filled with unshed tears and unwavering love, and he would never understand what he'd done in his life to deserve such devotion, but he'd spend every day of his life trying to prove himself worthy of it.

"Yer no' proposin' to me right now, are ye?" Johnny finally asked, and it was obvious that he was trying to keep his voice light, joking to ease the suffocating sincerity, but his accent was thick with emotion.

"Hm," Simon hummed with a smile, chewing on the inside of his cheek as he pretended to think it over before tilting his head decisively. "Not yet. Trust me, John MacTavish, when I propose to you, you'll know it."

"I dinnae ken how you'll top tha' little speech," Johnny chuckled wetly, still sounding breathless, and Simon was helpless to do anything but kiss him.

It was innocent, relatively speaking, their lips staying closed even as Simon leaned back against the angled roof, tugging Johnny to follow him down. He let himself be consumed by the feeling of Johnny's lips on his, soft and plush and slightly chapped. He'd never get used to his partner's easy adoration, the way one of his hands found its way to Simon's cheek, then up into his hair, not tugging, just… Holding. Holding them close. His other hand was braced against the rough shingles, holding him up so he didn't smash their skulls together.

It would be so easy to turn it into something more, just a brush of Simon's free hand down Johnny's flank, a peek of tongue against his lips, a thigh raised to wrap around Johnny's hips. But neither of them pushed, content to bask in the moment, the easy intimacy of being together, being alive.

They did, however, need to breathe, so Johnny pulled away an indeterminate amount of time later, but he didn't go far. He hovered above Simon as they caught their breath, panting each other's air.

"I'll find a way," Simon rasped, not missing the way Johnny shivered at the husk in his voice just from kissing.

"What?" Johnny asked, and god, he didn't sound much better. Simon at least suppressed the chills that ran down his spine better than Johnny had.

"I'll find a way to top that speech," he whispered, reminding his boyfriend what they'd been talking about before making out like teenagers hiding from their parents. As close as they were, he saw the joke light in Johnny's eyes, taking a breath between smirking lips—

"Don't," Simon said, eliciting a yelp of outrage.

"Ye dinnae even ken what I was gonnae say!"

"Yes, I do," Simon said, but he couldn't hide his grin, especially when Johnny collapsed against him in a fit of giggles, forcing the breath from his lungs with a whoosh. "You're too predictable, Johnny. Saw it comin' a mile away- Don't!"

Simon didn't know how long they laughed, each lull sparking another bout of giggles. They clutched each other to keep from falling off the roof as much as they did for warmth, and he couldn't remember ever feeling happier. It was a strange thought to have in the middle of the woods, stuck until Price could find a clearing big enough for Nik to land, clinging to the roof of a safe house on the side of a random mountain halfway around the world from home, but…

Home, for Simon, wasn't a building. It wasn't Manchester or Credenhill. It wasn't his bunk on base or his shitty, off-base flat that only saw his presence when Price forced him on leave. Home wasn't a place.

Home was in his arms, huffing laughter against the side of his neck, stupid mohawk tickling his jaw, a bundle of blazing heat across his chest. His North Star, his true north, his guiding light. Home was wherever Johnny was; a fixed point in Simon's life, the center of his sky. He'd follow Johnny anywhere, called to his brightness, his stubborn persistence, and he knew that he'd never get lost as long as he could find Polaris; it would lead him home.

----

Read it here on AO3!

[heaven-s-black-box]

Cupid- Dainsleif x Fem!Reader

Return to File

Recovery date: April 16th, 2024

Description: Rhinedottire and Halfdan play cupid.

Notes: It's missing Dain hour. When will my husband return from the war?

Word count: 1 082

Back to directory

Y/n let out a forlorn sigh as she stared out the window. Below the alchemy tower the knights were training, and she was leaning against the glass to watch. Somewhere behind her she heard a much more irritated sigh as Rhinedottire watched her friend stalk the Captain from their window. She let it continue as she finished separating the petals from the flower stems.

“Enough ogling, back to work,” the chief alchemist said as the last petal settled into the small basket.

Her voice startled Y/n, making her jump and scurry back towards the work bench.

“I wasn’t ogling,” she muttered, picking out a stem and ground it down with petals from a different flower.

Rhinedottire watched her fellow alchemist pummel the ingredients with a flush on her face. Y/n scraped down the mortar and dumped its contents onto a piece of paper.

“Is he shirtless today?”

“Gold!”

The woman laughed as she took the paper and folded it over, setting it under a book to press the paste down.

“Well? Is he?”

Y/n didn’t make eye contact as she removed the heavy recipe book and unfolded the paper. She picked up a ruler and began sectioning the paste into squares.

“Yes…”

With a faint smile, the chief alchemist slowly nudged the basket of flower petals towards the edge of the work bench. The woman’s smile widened when Y/n looked at her in confusion, and she held eye contact as she pushed the basket off the edge. Y/n’s eyes widened as the petals fluttered across the floor.

“Oh no…” Rhinedottire deadpanned, picking up the basket. “I knocked over those petals we needed, Y/n, be a dear and go pick some more.”

“Gold, no, come on.”

“I have no idea what you mean, you make it sound like I’ve asked you to do something absurd. Now, I believe those flowers are planted near the training grounds. Take your time, you might have to root around the bushes a bit.”

With a groan, Y/n grabbed the collection basket that Rhinedottire had previously used and left the workshop. As she got closer to the base of the tower, she could hear Captain Dainsleif coaching some knights through a sparring match and the sound of wooden swords hitting each other. She pushed open the door, wincing at the bright light.

Y/n followed the garden path on instinct as she watched the knights train. Dainsleif was correcting someone’s form when out of the corner of her eye, Y/n realized she was being watched. Halfdan smiled at her, waving discreetly, and then focused back on his Captain.

“Captain Dainsleif, sir!”

“Yes?”

“Perhaps a demonstration would be valuable?”

The alchemist tripped over her own feet, letting out a startled yelp and catching the attention of the training knights.

“Sorry, tripped on a rock.”

Y/n pointedly looked away, clearing her throat.

“I suppose a demonstration wouldn’t hurt,” Dainsleif said.

As Halfdan prepared to go against the Captain, Y/n stepped over the garden border and settled down facing the training area. She began to part the bushes, looking for any remaining flowers, occasionally peaking up at the match.

Y/n would never understand why the alchemy tower was beside the training court, but she definitely couldn’t complain. When she wasn’t submerged in research, she’d taken to watching the knights train. It was purely out of a fascination with the strength they demonstrated, getting to ogle Dainsleif was just a benefit. 

Looking up once more, Y/n caught Dainsleif tripping Halfdan up causing the elite soldier to land on his butt while the Captain pointed the wooden training sword at his throat. Both of them were breathing heavily, and Y/n found herself staring at the way Dainsleif’s back muscles  moved with each breath. 

“I yield,” Halfdan panted out.

“You did well.”

Dainsleif extended a hand to his friend and helped him up. The second the Captain turned even slightly in her direction, Y/n looked back down.

With only a handful of smaller flowers, Y/n picked the basket back up and stepped out of the garden. Y/n was halfway back to the tower door when a second pair of footsteps joined her.

She looked back to find Dainsleif jogging to catch up with her.

“Hello Y/n.”

“Hi Dain,” she smiled, stopping and turning to face him.

Behind him, Y/n could see the rest of the knights distractedly cleaning up. One of the knights caught her eye and immediately rushed off.

“I noticed you’ve been watching our training sessions recently.”

“You what?” Y/n’s voice broke, and she cleared her throat awkwardly.

Dainsleif pointed up at the window where Rhinedottire was currently standing. The woman smiled and waved before disappearing back into the workshop.

Y/n cursed herself for not realizing that she was also being watched.

“It’s really not all that high up, but I digress. I wanted to ask if you’d be interested in some one-on-one training.”

The alchemist choked on her own spit.

“Why-why offer that?”

“Well, I’ve been meaning to offer for a while, but I wasn’t sure how interested you would be. After all, I would hate a repeat of our first meeting.”

Y/n felt her teeth grind in annoyance. Their first meeting had not been her finest moment as he’d been escorting her to collect some ingredients and had to save her from a small slime. It was definitely embarrassing, especially when Dainsleif had approached her the next evening at a tavern by calling her slime food, but it had sparked an almost more embarrassing crush.

“I guess some self-defense training wouldn’t hurt.”

“Excellent, how does tomorrow afternoon sound?”

“I’ll have to make sure Gold doesn’t need me, but that should work.”

Dainsleif smiled, and Y/n felt her stomach flip.

“Then I’ll come by tomorrow, please enjoy the rest of your day.”

“You too.”

Y/n watched him return to the knights and put his shirt back on, the realization that he’d been half naked during that conversation causing her face to heat up, before heading back up to the workshop.

She’d barely stepped into the room when Rhinedottir addressed her.

“I don’t need you tomorrow afternoon, don’t worry, so enjoy your date.”

“I knew you must have done something,” Y/n huffed, dropping the mostly empty basket onto the table. “Hope it was worth the wasted flowers.”

“You can consider my repayment an invitation to the wedding.”

[star--nymph]

WIPS

By some other worldly miracle, I have managed to write some stuff. I can't believe it either. tagging peeps to join me!: @ndostairlyrium @pinayelf @shivunin @dreadfutures @plisuu

@greypetrel @cullenssweatyballsakk @rosieofcorona

@schwarznummer1 @elfroot-and-laurels

@pickelda @lyana-chan @isayashai @chanafehs @flowerofthekeep

WIP #1

Outside, she can hear Skyhold rising up with her; the distant echo of livestock being fed, the first rounds of soldiers and scouts trailing from the barracks, the clash of shields as early morning training begins, servants receiving their deliveries from the wagons and carts. Eurydice twists her hand again, letting her fingers dance between the light and shadow, her eyes peeking up at the perfect, vast, empty blue sky spying down from the hole. She shifts, her body nestled under the blankets and pillows, her other arm pinned underneath her. She spreads her free arm out around her, searching, grasping, wanting. She finds nothing, the space beside her is barely warm and growing colder. Her fingers dig into the sheets. There is a noise behind her, the hush of fabric and weight on wood, and she lifts herself toward it. Cullen is on the left side of the room, where he has organized his wardrobe and grooming supplies on a small table. He stands in front of a long square mirror, its edges ridged, a crack in the corner that crawls down the surface like a spider web. He stares at his chipped reflection as he secures the clasps of his gambeson. Even with his back to her, Eurydice can guess what his face might look like. Brow knitted, lips pressed into a thin line, most likely he is grinding his teeth without realizing it; a grave, tight expression she could not decipher, did not have the skill to understand. Only that it was the face he wore when he contemplating and had gone far from the world. His taunt shoulders and hunched back give only a hint of the thousands of things he must be thinking; what is coiled at the pit of his gut and left to fester overnight, merely ignored because he acquiesced to his body’s need to rest.

WIP #2

A constant state of discomfort. Cullen squeezed his eyes shut from the moment and shoved himself the wall, nostrils flaring as he harshly exhaled. He would persist. One foot after another, dragging as if he walked in thick sludge, he would climb the stairwell higher. Perhaps he did not remember where he had come from or how, but his body had carried him this far because it had known where it would find his sanctuary. Not in his loft nor in the chapel on his knees in front of the Blessed Bride; but behind the door where the dabbled sun pours in assaults his senses and yet embraces him in a hug. He brings a weak hand over his eyes as they begin to adjust to the noon light and starts to descend up the final set of stairs when a soft breath—a laugh, really—roots his boots to the spot. A laugh lulls like waves through a river into a song, “…gan tsaoil mhór Seothín seo ho, nach mór é an taitneamh Mo stóirín na leaba, na chodladh gan brón.” Cullen peeks through the holes of the railing and sees her there, sitting on the edge of the bed with her back to him. Her gray hair coils around her in a mess of mattered coils and knots, a nest he could barely run his hand through this morning without it catching. He hadn’t the mind to help her with it and Eurydice hadn’t cared to do it herself, though it was most likely that she hadn’t the time to spare. He sees her hair move and a tiny fist barely bigger than a sovereign caught within. Eurydice’s ears flicker up and he hears her sigh. “Shuuussshh, shuusssh A leanbh mo chléibh go n-eirí do chodhladh leat Séan is sonas gach oíche do chóir Tá mise le do thaobh ag guídhe ort na mbeannacht Seothín a leanbh is codail go foill.”

[kastlequill]

iii/v. ‘til my pulse loses time: pulsus paradoxus

pairing: kyle gaz garrick x f!reader word count: 1.7k synopsis: the third time you save gaz tags: whumptober, infection, wound tending, hurt/comfort, medic!reader, 4+1, no y/n warnings: none ao3: read here ← prev | next →

III.

You had lost count of how many times you’d warned him about the risk of infection, which was already quite high given the sheer frequency at which he acquired open wounds.

Best keep that thing covered, soldier, had been your soft-spoken command to close out his fourth visit in the span of a month and a half. That time, a stabbed forearm, and the time before that, a nasty gash down his spine, and so on. I don’t want to see you back in my infirmary for a long while, copy?

But it seemed your cautioning had gone in one ear and out the other. It wasn’t that Gaz didn’t know how to protect himself, nor was he incapable of mitigating the damage he sustained in combat; the sergeant was a competent man, something that you greatly appreciated when it came time to patch him up.

Rather, it was more so the case that he treated his life recklessly. Surviving was one thing, but exiting the fray unscathed? That was an altogether different and separate objective which, in his mind, warranted far less concern than completing the mission.

To him, the game plan was very simple: successfully execute orders, then get the hell out of there. Bonus points if he kept the majority of his body intact and functional.

For a soldier, this logic made total sense. Such a thought process was to be expected from someone who had spent over a decade honing his physical form into a weapon and had thus learned how to mentally detach himself from his personhood whenever necessary. During the firefight, his muscles and limbs moved in accordance with years of conditioning and training, acting on autopilot. Gaz, the man who brought you lunch on your busiest days and made damn certain none of your rowdier patients were giving you shit, faded into the background; what he did became exceedingly more important than the fact that it was he who did it.

For a medic, however? The stunning lack of self-preservation irritated you to no end.

And today, that irritation spiked to a record peak the instant he walked into the medbay with unfocused eyes and beads of sweat on his brow bone, jaw slightly loose, chest heaving for air.

“Hey, Doc,” Gaz said with a wince, the greeting sounding more like a croak than anything else. He pressed the palm of his hand to his forehead. “I’m not feeling too good. You mind if I. . ?”

Those were the last words to leave his lips before he all but collapsed into your waiting arms. Ignoring the worry that had begun to churn in your gut, you immediately helped him stumble to a nearby cot then gradually sat him down. Instinct took over, spurring you to quickly gather your medkit, don a pair of surgical gloves, gently open his mouth, and stick a thermometer under his tongue.

High body temperature, difficulty attending to external stimuli, fast pulse—textbook signs of an infection.

You were thankful that the nurse was too busy checking on another admit to notice how you cradled his face in your hands for a beat longer than was necessary after removing the thermometer. “Gaz, I need you to stay sharp, you got that? You have to show me where you’re injured so I can do my job.”

Blinking a little more awake, he gave a curt nod and lifted up the front end of his shirt to reveal what looked to be a knife wound slightly above his left hip. If the accumulation of dried pus was anything to go off of, it must have been at least a week old.

That’s definitely infected, alright.

“Why didn’t you call this in?” You lightly pressed into the inflamed flesh around the problem site, assessing its tenderness, but stopped when he let out a low, pained hiss. “We could’ve gotten it squared away in less than half an hour and saved ourselves the trouble.”

His half-lidded stare locked onto your alert, wide eyes. “Y’told me you’d rather I not come around for a bit, yeah? Can’t have you getting sick of me already, Doc. It’s bad form.”

It took everything in you not to flinch.

Of course a soldier would interpret an offhand joke in its most literal sense. Your playful tease had been intended to disguise genuine concern. Instead, the man had gotten the impression that you were annoyed by his insistence, which couldn’t be further from the truth.

In reality, you damn near prayed to any and all deities for them to shorten the time between his visits and lengthen his stays.

“That isn’t—” You swallowed an overwhelming wave of mixed emotions. “That isn’t what I meant, Kyle.”

He grinned, suddenly very coherent and present. “So it’s Kyle now, is it? Well, if I’d bloody known some measly infection is all it’d take for you to call me by my name, then I would’ve fuckin’ done this ages ago.”

Heat rushed towards your face, mostly pocketing itself in your cheeks. Some reassurance followed suit; Gaz couldn’t be too bent out of shape if he still had the energy and mental faculties to. . . to flirt with you.

As you cleaned the oozing gash, flushing it out with cool water and dabbing on a topical antibiotic with a Q-tip, the sergeant lowered his head to watch you work, eager to witness you in your element. Perhaps it should’ve annoyed you because of how frequently his forehead bumped into yours, but you understood his curiosity well. It was only fair, considering how often you wondered about him in the field; what he did, how and why he did it.

Who he became.

The occasional graze of your fingertips along his ribcage made the skin there to ripple, and he released a shaky exhale. “What’s the verdict, then?”

“Nothing that oral antibiotics and proper wound care won’t fix. But I want to keep you here overnight for observation and rehydration.” You stuck on a lopsided bandage and used your hand to smooth out any crinkles in the adhesive. When you lifted your face to address him more directly, the slight brush of his nose against yours caused a hitch in your breathing, and you jerked backward, startled by his closeness.

A pleased hum emanated from his throat. “Always lookin’ out for me. Soon as I get this blasted thing sorted, I’ll thank you properly.”

“There’s no need,” you assured him, stepping further out of reach. “Just focus on getting better, will you? This prescription is over the course of seven days. Don’t let me hear you’ve been skipping your meds.”

Needing to put several meters between the two of you, the shelves at the backend of the clinic were the perfect escape. There, no longer in view, you sifted through various supplies until you found an open box of penicillin, counted fourteen tablets in total, then funneled the antibiotic into a standard orange prescription bottle. By the time you returned to his cot with the medication, the sergeant was already munching on a couple of crackers, courtesy of the nurse.

He visibly straightened at your arrival and softly said, “Thank you. I mean it.”

Just doing my job, was what you should have replied. Nonchalant; not the slightest bit personally vested in your patient outside of the clinic.

“If you really want to thank me, you’ll stop getting hurt all the damn time,” were the words you muttered instead, sounding like a petulant child. Or perhaps you simply sounded like someone who gave a shit.

Because you did. You, a tested combat medic who should honestly know better by now, cared deeply about him, a special operator who risked his life daily so that the rest of the world remained relatively out of harm’s way. And given the horrors you’d seen both on the battlefield and in the infirmary, to care for someone like him was a terrifying notion.

What a nuisance, these matters of the heart.

His eyes dulled at your response, and you were consumed with the desire to bring back the light in those brown depths. “You know I can’t.”

The confirmation, though expected, still stung. Knowledge was such a curse, you decided. On some occasions, it benefited you to wield it, but on others, it only brought inescapable suffering. Regardless of the consequences, the possessor of said knowledge was forced to carry it within them always, robbed of a chance at blissful ignorance.

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” you sighed, lips settling into a resigned smile. “It was worth a shot.”

From then on, the remainder of your tending to him was spent in silence. Not an awkward silence, nor an angry silence; just silence. A neutral, comfortable silence—your favorite.

All that was left to do could’ve been passed off to the technician or even skipped entirely, but you felt compelled to go the extra mile where he was involved. You wet a rag to rid his forehead of sweat and used a tissue to gently dust away the crystallized mucus in his tear ducts. Before you had the opportunity to assist him in laying flat on the cot, your pillow-fluffing was interrupted by the slight weight of cold metal meeting the warm skin of your neck.

A dog tag. His dog tag.

Your brain momentarily short-circuited. The gravity of the action was not lost on you, nor was its heavy implications. Not in the least.

“I’ll try. For you,” he clarified, resolutely holding your gaze, an oath on his lips, “I’ll try.”

Good enough, you thought. Because it had to be.

This would have to be enough, whatever this was. This, a fledgling, precursory thing. This, stealing moments with him during the brief lapses of warfare, hidden behind the plastic tarp covering the infirmary. This, assuaging your anxieties by catching sight of him from afar, the distance between your clinic and his barracks too vast. This, an invisible threshold, a nonexistent white line that warned do not cross. This, the space decreed by professionalism somehow both too much and too little.

This would have to be enough.

tbc.

[trancylovecraft]

(KNY) YANDERE PLATONIC! KOKUSHIBO x SISTER READER: You, Shibou. I, Kokoro (CHAPTER FIFTEEN)

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CHAPTER FIFTEEN: "..Soldier on, Achilles."

Amnesia is the loss of memory. It can inhibits the formation of new memories and/or the recollection of old ones. Several regions of the brain are involved in the process of memory including the amygdala, hippocampus, cerebellum, and prefrontal cortex. Damage to one or more of these areas can often result in post-traumatic amnesia.

Shizuko sat still, Legs closed and basketed at the end of the table.

The dark spots of his eyes remained enthralled upon the udon bowl before him, Unwavering as he watched the liquid residue of the noodle inside reflect the lights of the small dining room he sat in.

It was like watching fish make ripples in a pond. A quirk on his lips and a scrunch of his face, Tongue bit. He didn't even dare to pick up the lone pair of chopsticks sat beside the bowl, Seemingly went unnoticed by the boy.

Neither did the dim interior of the room, Where the sunlight of the brisk morning just didn't reach the small room. Only spits of radiance shining through the perfect square grid shoji-walls, No thin paper to let the sun from the surrounded garden shine in.

Despite the lack of light, Shizuko scrutinized the Tupperware, Scowling at the meal inside.

"Seriously, What the hell is that thinking face? You're lookin' at your udon like it offended you personally, Aren't you gonna eat it?"

Shizuko jerked his head up at the brash jest coming from across the table. Wide, Owlish eyes glaring back at Genya who spoke them.

Suddenly snapping back into reality, Registering the small dining room that they were located in.

"Mind your business. I'll eat it on my own time, You just focus on yours." Shizuko retorted, Quickly and despondent as he vaguely gestured towards Genya's own majority-eaten portion of Udon.

Shizuko swiftly retracted his hand afterwards, Defiantly tossing his head to the side to stare off somewhere else within the room. Anywhere but at him, Shizuko had better things to think about right now.

Genya's eyes narrowed, The pair of chopsticks entwined between his rough fingers lowered, Dropping into the bowl.

"..You're thinking about what happened back at the old Kakushi Base, Aren't you?" He asked, Knowing the answer not with words but by the way Shizuko snapped his eyes back over to his.

They widened like saucers, Accusatory in stance as he tried to keep his cool.

"Wow, Detective. How'd you figure that one out?" Shizuko retorted, Finally plucking the chopsticks from beside his bowl and scooping up the udon noodle inside. The woollen gloves hugging his hand being the only thing stopping from puking up at the touch.

Genya and Shizuko, The two renowned Tsuguko of Gyomei Himejima. Constantly in competition and combat with each other, Sparring or spat used interchangeably. Ever since they were both younger and in the care of their master, It had been that way.

So with all the time they had been together there was no question that Genya would be able to tell when Shizuko's off, Especially if it had been happening for a few months. Ever since that day in the billowing mountainside, Shizuko had just been.. Strange.

The ticking of his eye tocked a little more often, His sensitive fingertips were just a little more potent. He woke up just a little later, Sloppier when it came to training.

Genya could tell that it irked him.

"Whatever, I'm just saying that it's been months since it happened. I mean, I'm still pissed about it too but I mean.. Come on, Man." He scoffed, Rolling his eyes as he finally tossed down his chopsticks into the finished bowl, Only pungent residue remaining within the ceramic.

The other boy however paused the movements of his own chopsticks, Just before the udon noodle touched his lips.

"It's not like you could understand, You weren't there! You were stuck helping out on evacuations!" Shizuko scowled as he lowered his hand, Troubled face even more gnarly with that expression on his face.

Genya lowered a brow.

"Oh, You're going on about your fight with Upper Six." He said, Starting to sort his used Tupperware into a neat pile. "..You know, Neither you or Himejima-sensei has spoke about it. What did go down there..?"

Genya's follow on was much quieter than his starting statement, Dark eyes honing on Shizuko with a sharp glint. Since the Shrine Invasion neither Shizuko or Gyomei had talked about their brawl with the Uppermoon.

Not a lick or lisp of the event, A seemingly wordless agreement between the two to keep it under wraps. Genya couldn't deny he was curious. Especially since it was the catalyst for his allies discomfort.

Shizuko's lips pursed together, Thinning along with his eyes starting to wander off in what seemed to be thought.

The grip on his chopsticks tightened, Almost snapping them in half.

"..Upper Six, He was.. He was my friend.. Ne, Someone I was raised with and someone I use to consider my brother.." Shizuko whispered, His voice almost a brush in the air or a prayer amongst thousands.

His eyes focused on nothing, Nothing except the blizzard and the electric blue that chased it. Almost possessed, His gloved hand twitched and moved on its own, Covered fingertips raising to near graze his forehead under the mess of his curls.

They were shaking, His fingers. Even more once they brushed against his skin.

"He's.. He's the reason I had my accident, The reason I.. The reason I can't remember anything." His fingers entangled within the wilderness of his hair, Swiftly wrangling back his curls to reveal his forehead.

Large, Swollen and horribly malformed were only the first few words that came to mind. A massive scar where a gash had for no doubt once lain, Shaped like a star and mis-coloured from the rest of his skin, It was hideous and most seemingly painful.

Genya's eyes went ajar. The scar he was aware of through missed strikes of a training sword or a stray gust of wind, All accidents that were quickly covered up.

But now..?

Gloved fingers grasped at the scar on his forehead, Ever so slightly tighter and so absent-mindedly that the disgust of the sensation was forgotten in the moment, Along with the memories of how the scar appeared.

The only thing he recalled from that night was the emotion he felt. Betrayal, Terror and agonising pain. His head bashing against the far wall, Ichor bursting from the wound and the blood loss flowing out along with his memory lost.

That, And his face.

His childhood, Everything before he had came to the old monastery was gone like a drop in the sea. Forgotten in the waves of time, The only thing he remembered..

That touch, That warm touch..

It was divine.

"..I'm sorry." Genya finally spoke up, Much more serious in tone as he looked at him in shock. "I shouldn't of brought it up. Just forget I said anything.."

Shizuko sighed, Hand finally relenting from his forehead as the nauseating feeling of touch returned to him.

"No, You're right. Ngh.. I shouldn't be caught up in it, It's not like Kaigaku means anything to me anymore. He's dead in my eyes, Left us and became a demon.." Shizuko mumbled as he finally returned the udon to his lips, Starting to chew.

Genya shuffled on his knees, Now uncomfortable as the silence returned. The sounds of the early day and the chirp of the crickets in the square garden outside was no longer a comfort, Nor the birds warble in the trees, Just unsettled now.

Shizuko frowned, Sipping up the noodle into his mouth.

"Ne.. Either way, I have another demon to replace him." Shizuko chewed, Now directly gesturing to Genya with his chopsticks. Sly and sarcastic grin spreading his face, Watching as Genya's jaw dropped.

"Eh..?! Oh come on, I thought we were having a good moment there!" Genya exclaimed, A weathered fist slamming down onto the table which made the Tupperware atop shake and clatter together.

Shizuko however, Wasn't as startled as the dishes.

"Why, What's wrong? I'm just stating the obvious here, It's not my fault you're a demon muncher." Shizuko replied with an ever-smug grin on his face to which Genya scoffed at.

"It's not my fault you've got a girls name!" Genya retorted, Scrunch in his nose.

"Hey! It's not mine either, You think I wanted this name? What shitty caregiver I had must've hated me.." Shizuko muttered now with a slight tick to the smugness in his grin, Afterwards tossing the chopsticks onto the table and cupping the bowl to bring it to his lips.

Genya huffed.

"Must have, Though to be fair who wouldn't take one look at you and feel unbearable disgust." He jested, Trying to lighten the mood yet it seemed too heavy to be lifted as Shizuko didn't jab back.

A bad sign, Written in the boldest of inks.

Genya's smile lowered as he lowered his head along with Shizuko's, Awkward tension filling the air now. Shizuko tilted his head upwards towards the wood-panel ceiling, Bowl raising as he felt the savoury liquids enter his mouth.

He took a moment, Leftover toppings of broken seaweed and tofu chunks to chase it. It flooded onto his tongue until there was nothing but running droplets in the ceramic, Shizuko slammed it down with an audible clank!

Shizuko wiped his mouth on the sleeve of his clover-coloured kimono.

"Ngh.. Done." He breathed, Throwing a hand onto the tatami floor (Making sure it was just the start of his palm, Not his fingertips) to push himself up. "..I think I need to go take a walk in the garden for a bit.. I need to clear my head."

Genya blinked.

"Hey.. I didn't actually upset you, Right? You know I didn't mean that, Just said it to piss you off is all.." He admitted as he watched Shizuko get to his feet, Shake his hair until it was in an acceptable position and turn away.

"Ne, I know. I'm just not feeling well, Training from earlier really got to me is all.." Shizuko replied, Not turning back to Genya who still sat though a little more disgruntled than he was before.

He could only watch as his ally dragged his feet over to the sliding door. With practice, Using his elbow to push it open. Shizuko didn't look back at Genya and Genya knew that it wasn't what he said that irked him so.

It was still the Shrine Incident.

Genya wanted to know what really was up with him, But he wasn't exactly the right person to deal with it. He wasn't there, He didn't know his past with the new Upper Six, Nor was he there when he had his accident.

It was best that he stayed out of it, For now at least. Genya picked up the finished dishes, Cupping the Tupperware in his hands and not even getting annoyed at the ones Shizuko had left for him, He had other things to think about.

Genya just hoped Shizuko would search out the man who could cater to his worries. He sighed as he opened the adjacent door the the one Shizuko left from, Carefully balancing the ceramic in his hands, He started to march towards the kitchen.

☆♡☆

"There.. It seems to be all healed now.."

The ever-dim darkness of the false shrine was finally broken by the faint light of a rusty lantern, The amber light flickered against the decaying walls like the ember inside. It sat on her bedside, Right next to the eaten bowl of udon licked clean.

As ever, The infinity castle was cold. But even more so against the bareness of [F/N]'s skin, Her mid-section once kept warm and bound by bandages was now naked, The garments laying in a scarf-like heap on the old floors.

She felt down her stomach where the stitches once were, That life-threatening gash that near took her like and most certainly put her in a weeks long coma. It was a miracle that she was still alive, That she had came out of it without any chronic debility.

So much so that there wasn't even a scar..

"I see.." [F/N] whispered as she laid her cold palm on her equally cold stomach, Shivering in the brisk air, Hair on her nape standing up. A strange sensation as her time was mostly spent within the cold peaks of her Shrine.

Her eyes were focused entirely on her gut, An uneasy-wonder as she looked at the scratch-less skin.

Kokushibo stood only a few metres away from her, The reason the chill had affected her so much in the first place. Her muscles still tense from his presence, That and the fact that she had barely anything on apart from a Koshimaki and a thinnish layer of bandages she had used a chest cover.

His eyes, Six glowing eyes that were even brighter than the faint spark of the lantern-light beside him. They examined her, Her injury or lack-there-of especially. He just stood there silently, Not moving a muscle facial or otherwise.

She knew very well that he wouldn't try anything, No, Whatever obsession he had with her was never like that. But it still made her feel vulnerable and easy to attack. An instinct from her childhood days.

Never leave yourself defenceless..

"..Do you mind if you just.. Leave the room while I change?" [F/N] exasperated, Headache brewing in her mind both from the current situation and what happened yesterday. "No offense, Kokushibo-sama.. But it's just disturbing when you stand there like that.."

Kokushibo's lip twitched, Only a tick.

"..We will be heading off to do your daily training straight after, There would be no point in me leaving.. Either way, It isn't anything I haven't seen before.." Kokushibo replied, Stone-faced and stoic as his voice rumbled in the room.

[F/N] swallowed, Disgust running on her tongue and sweat dripping down her neck yet it hadn't even gotten to the sparring part yet.

"..Right" [F/N] gulped, Swallowing down the nauseating distain pooling and festering in her mouth. "Then if you could just turn around that would be fine, I'd.. I'd just prefer if you weren't watching.."

As soon as the words left her lips, Drifted into the frozen air of the room she had waited for him to turn.

But he didn't.

Kokushibo continued to stand there, Stiller than she was as she waited for him to look away. But instead all six of his eyes continued to linger on her, Wandering away from her injury to her side, Sickly golden slits narrowing.

Had she done something wrong? Was there something she had somehow let out on her persons? What was he looking at..?!

Kokushibo hummed, A single step towards her that sounded like exploding rocks made her repress the urge to back away. His hand reached out, Slow like a knife preparing to cut. Talons and all as they grazed her side.

A burning pain shot through her side, [F/N]'s muscles tensed up.

"I wonder.. How did you get an injury like this?" Kokushibo drawled as he examined the bruised skin, Slightly tugging her around so he could get a better look at where Akaza had jabbed into her.

Her saving shot, Or whatever it would be called, The one where he broke his vow to hurt a woman but aided her all the while.

[F/N] would've rolled her eyes if it wasn't for the ice currently running through her blood.

"It's.." [F/N] directed her eyes away from Kokushibo, Tounging at the side of her mouth to try and come up with some explanation she could tell him.

Tell him that she tried to commit suicide? Her captor of all people? [F/N] still felt a deep regret burning in her for telling Akaza, Her state of mind warped back then, She wished she had just kept her mouth shut.

So there was no way that she would ever tell Kokushibo. Not like he "sympathised" with her or whatever, Not like he still had some inkling of humanity in him unlike Akaza.

No, He was just a monster.

"You still haven't told me how you injured your wrist.. Is there something you aren't telling me?" Kokushibo mumbled as his eyes snapped over to her bandaged hand, The injury she had caused when she had punched a wall into the shrine's structure.

His gaze sharpened.

"..I do hope that my Tsuguko hasn't garnered any.. Distasteful feelings for your prescence here again. Tell me, How did you gain these injuries..?" Kokushibo lowered himself so that his eyes met with hers, Stabbing, Piercing into her.

Her lips thinned.

"..I tripped down the stairs, Hit my side and my fist at the same time. You know, Kokushibo-sama, You should see to getting some kind of banister lining them.. This isn't the first time I near fell down them.." [F/N] responded, Snake's tongue speaking quick and somewhat formal yet she still refused to look at him.

Though for some reason, The lies she use to taste didn't come so sour anymore.

"..Ah, So my comment about your footwork wasn't taken to heart then.." Kokushibo remarked, Referencing his constant jabs at her apparently flawed "footwork". He retracted his hands, And [F/N] tried not to scrunch her nose up.

Was he trying to make some kind of joke?

[F/N] just silently stared at the floor, Almost waiting for his next move as he stepped back away from her. The air much more thick, The consistency of tar. She didn't laugh, Neither did Kokushibo as he continued to stare dead at her.

[F/N] kept her eyes on the floorboards, Not looking up at him. Kokushibo breathed out.

"..Go get ready. It is time for you to test your strength once more.." He spoke, Stepping back just a little further, Feeling the depression of the floorboards move away to the other side of the room.

[F/N] sighed, Shivering once more within the nipping atmosphere of the Shrine. Shaking off the still aching bruise on her side, She scoffed once she realised Kokushibo had turned his back to her, Giving her some semblance of privacy.

Sparring, Even though he knew she was injured. [F/N] stumbled over to the closet not even a metre away. Kokushibo didn't even bat a single eye, And he had many. [F/N] asked herself why he even wanted to clash swords with her.

He knew she was strong, She fought against him a few months ago as a formidable opponent. [F/N] fished out her old samue set, The one she used often to train in. Now she had been turned into nothing but a caged animal to be poked with by sticks.

He didn't need to test her strength, She was cursed with it. [F/N] was the one who killed a thousand of his kind, The one who gave him a run for his own money, The one who fought Upper Three barehand on this very roof for fuck-sakes!

Maybe he liked torturing her, That was it.

[F/N] pulled the trouser half of the samue up from her ankles to her waist, Slipped her arms through the loose-fabric sleeves. She folded it over her, Set it in place. Making sure everything was fine, She dusted it off.

It wasn't like she didn't deserve the beat-downs, It's not like she didn't want him to go too far one day. She deserved it after all, The blood of hundreds still ran down her. It's why she couldn't bare to look in the mirror, To catch a glimpse of that red.

She strained her eyes away even now, Much preferring to turn back to Kokushibo and tell him that she was done. Kokushibo cocked his head to the side, Examining her up and down before he wordlessly stepped out of the door.

[F/N] didn't need words to understand he wanted her to follow, She did soundlessly, Just wanting to get this over with.

☆♡☆

The light filtered through the diamond-like holes in the walls, A designed pattern meant to illuminate the estate during the day.

The air was cool, Not the kind on a summers day but instead the faint chill of a golden hour autumn. A strong wind to blow through the hair and fabric of anyone caught in it. It was strange since it was the middle of spring, But the mix of both leaving summer heat and oncoming winter cold made it feel like it was much later in the year than it actually was.

Shizuko stumbled through the hallways, Wooden floorboards depressing under his minimum weight. He had traversed the rather linear hallways thousands of times, Yet he felt lost in his gait, A direction unknown.

He gazed towards the gardens, Barely lifting his head to catch glimpses of the carefully trimmed bushes and miniature lakes within. It was surrounded by the rest of Himejima's estate, A sort of plaza kept safe in the squared layout of the house.

He watched the water of the tiny stream trickle along the garden, Watched as the carefully made buddha statues held the aqua in their palms and guided it on their course. The reeds and the rye-grass all a vibrant green.

Shizuko sighed, Scrunching up his face. Genya bringing up his incident with Upper Six seemed to make him much more irked than he had previously thought. Now some weight was placed upon his chest, Now some throb came through the abrasion on his head.

The faraway aria of the birds wasn't anything that could calm him, Not right now. Nor the crickets chirp or the trickle of stream, Everything was just so.. Numbing now. It made him grimace as he paced the halls.

His memory was perfect. If you picked out a date, Any year, Any month, Any day. He could tell you exactly what he did as if it was written out plain as day. What he ate for breakfast, A word for word recite of the conversation he had with his master, Or even how many birds flew past him that day.

But he couldn't remember that.

Ever since his head was cut and mauled, He couldn't recall a single day before then. He might as well have just appeared one day. Everything before then was just a blur, Just one hot mess.

Except.. For that one feeling. The one that he felt on his hands as if it was yesterday, The only touch he could ever tolerate, Or even yearn for. It felt otherworldly, Comforting. That person of muddled face was like a god themselves, Elusive and unobtainable.

Shizuko wanted to know who they were, Who that person really was. But Shizuko didn't know who, Or where to even start looking. His master hadn't known either, Just recalling he had been left at their doorstep one day.

His master.

Shizuko stopped in his walk, A stumbled halt as he finally pulled his head over to the door beside him.

It was his master's private room he had built to pray in, The one always shadowed by the dark and candle-light was shown like stars in the night. Shizuko paused as he looked at the door, Faintly hearing the chants of sutras inside.

He was there, His master was inside.

Shizuko made an effort to be quiet, Careful not to step on any of the floorboards he knew would creak. He steadied himself on the doorframe, Leaning over so he could peer through the crack in the door.

And there he was, In all of his glory.

Shizuko could only see the back of his saturated-lime haori, The one emboldened with kanji. He saw his prayer beads and heard the faint clacking of them hitting each other, The sutra's also getting much louder.

Shizuko debated whether he should knock or not, Whether he should disturb him as he prayed at the candle-lit altar. Gyomei probably didn't want to talk about it, Hell, Shizuko didn't want to either-

"..You can come in."

Shizuko's eyes widened, Just now realising the sound of the beads clacking and his sutra's had went silent.

Gyomei turned his head to the side, And even though he was blind, Shizuko could swear that he was staring right into him with those white-out eyes. Gyomei waited, Shizuko barely snapped out of it before he answered.

"..R-Right, Sir." Shizuko stammered as he pushed open the door, Bowing down low in a sign of respect before stepping in. Gyomei turned around on his knees, Facing him now with his hands still together in prayer.

Shizuko closed the door only slightly behind him, The darkness becoming all the more present as he stood there awkwardly in front of his master.

He sighed.

"..I'm sorry for bothering you during your prayer, Himejima-sensei." Shizuko started, Formal in tone as he bowed once more to the man. "I just wanted to talk to you is all. I.. I have a lot of stuff on my mind right now."

The beads surrounding Gyomei's hands chattered together, Gyomei seeming to take in his words.

"I see.. Then please, Let me ask what bothers you so.. It would not be wise to keep it to yourself.." Gyomei advised in his ever-solemn tone, Bowing down slightly before gesturing him to sit down.

Shizuko nodded and took his offer, Hurrying over to the empty spot in front of the man and sitting himself down neatly atop it.

After settling down and the curls of hair were parted from his eyes, He took a moment for himself. Still hearing the crackle of the candle fire in the back, He listened to it for only a second as if trying to find the words to say.

"Begin whenever you like.." Gyomei assured, Nodding once in encouragement to his Tsuguko.

Shizuko sighed.

"Thank you.. It's just I've been thinking a lot lately, You know.. About the night at the Kakushi Base?" He explained, Slightly hesitant as he eyed the older man for his reaction.

Gyomei's frown deepened, Sharpening as the soft clacking of the beads started to pick up. Shizuko deflated, Knowing he had stricken a cord somewhere.

"..Ah, Yes.. I suppose I should have known that we would have this conversation one day, In fact.. I believe I even might have been expecting it ever since that accursed day in the snow.." Gyomei admitted, Slowly nodding to his words.

Shizuko bit his lip, Vision seemingly elsewhere as he tried to hold back the spill of words.

"I-I mean.. Kaigaku.. How could he do something like this? How could he become the thing that killed our family, My siblings..! Did we just not matter to him?" Shizuko scoffed. "Of course we dont.. How could I say that he gives a shit when he went and became a people-eater?"

Shizuko muttered, Suddenly forgetting his manners as he spoke. Knuckles near popping as he gripped the hems of his green haori, Near ripping the fabric in two at the memory. Gyomei hummed, Brows furrowing.

"Kaigaku has always been troubled.. He stole, He thieved and he robbed.. But he always did it for the sake of us, Shizuko. Kaigaku has become undesirable and an enemy to the corps. But I admit.. I do have blame to take for the way he has turned out." Gyomei spoke, Growing much softer.

Shizuko finally looked up at the man, Staring him dead in the face. Disbelieving as he shook his head, Barely hiding a scoff.

"Ne, Kaigaku was always a rat.. You had no part to play in it, Sensei. He deceived us, He lied to us, He used us for money! He.." Shizuko croaked, Teeth starting to bare as he resisted the urge to grasp his head. "H-He let that demon maul my face.."

Gyomei's lips thinned as he listened on to his Tsuguko's words, Hearing as his talk start to become a rant.

"..I understand, That night was the worst one of your entire life.. And it was mine too. When I laid my fists upon the demon that killed my kids, When I found out of what Kaigaku had done.. I felt rage, I felt anger at everything that denounced my Buddhist vows, I felt rage towards Kaigaku and his ignorant actions.." Tears now started to flood faster down his cheeks, Hot as they dripped onto his hands of prayer.

His frown sharpened.

"But looking back, I know I should have discouraged that boy.. I had chose to forget of his thieving actions because we needed the money. I knew he was troubled and chose to ignore it.. It is my fault that he turned out as such." Gyomei finished, The sorrow in his voice much more potent.

Shizuko couldn't supress a sneer anymore.

"..Every time I bring him up, You always take blame for his actions! You keep saying that he was just troubled- Why can't you just accept that he's a monster? Both now and then?!" Shizuko spat, Pushing himself up to the floor now with a single hand.

Gyomei turned his head up towards where he had stood, Proceeding to follow him up to the floor as he got onto his feet, Easily overshadowing the boy before him. Shizuko

He knew he had to diffuse this quickly.

"Shizuko, It's a complicated an-"

"I DON'T WANT ANOTHER EXCUSE!" Shizuko finally whipped his head to look up at him with angry eyes, He was pissed, Knuckles near popping as he tried to get up in the face of the admittedly taller man. Shizuko seethed.

"I don't want some stupid explanation as for why Kaigaku was just troubled! Or- Or- Deserving of sympathy! E-Even back then you refused to kill him, Even though he's a demon!" Shizuko cried, Starting to stumble over his words as he bared his teeth at his master.

"I-Isn't that what you keep harping about? Our duty as a demon slayer being to kill every last one? Not to rest until you do?" Shizuko reiterated, Shaking his head as he approached him "Y-You could've just killed him back in the snow, But you didn't.."

"I couldn't kill one of my kids.. Shizuko. Not you nor Kaigaku, No matter how far he may have fallen.." Gyomei lamented, Shaking his head. "You know how much it pains me to kill.. To go against my vows as a monk."

"So what?! He's a demon now, Not a human being! You said it yourself, You insulted him too!" The younger jabbed, Incredulous, Looking at the man with ire and confused anger.

Shizuko stepped back, Looking at the man he admired with such unfound before disgust. What respect was usually given was held back now, Only giving venomous looks that Gyomei could only feel burning into him.

Kaigaku, The person now demon that was the reason his family was dead, Why that monster mutilated his face. Why couldn't his master understand that? That he should be just as angry as he was.

Gyomei on the other hand, He had foresaw this coming, He had for months. He knew that this talk had to happen eventually and thus kept himself calm, Not a muscle tensed or ticked.

He tried to reach out a hand, To place on Shizuko's shoulder.

"-I said it so you could get behind him without him noticing." Gyomei corrected "..I feel rage at the boy, I promise you that I do.. But I should not let it get the better of me, Not like it did back on that horrid day.." Gyomei deplored. And if Shizuko looked close, He could see his hands-in-prayer start to shake.

The feeling of fists on flesh, Beating the bloody pulp of that demon into the ground until the sun hit his face. It was gorey, The feeling of hot blood spurting out onto his knuckles. He had never felt so fallen from grace before, Not before he truly found out how strong he was.

Even now he felt the blood trickle down his fingers just like it was yesterday, Like it was still there..

But now he felt Shizuko slap away the hand he offered him, Consumed by the moment and his enraged heart. Gyomei could only feel sorrow for the boy as he continued.

"Y-You keep saying stuff you don't mean, It wasn't even just at the shrine! You.. Why can't you just understand that he's the reason that our family is dead..! H-He's the reason that I lost my memories.. He's.." Shizuko's rage, The one that spilled out in rage started to turn out in tears.

They started to speckle his eyes, His mouth growing more humid by the moment as his lungs started to burn.

His face was still snarled, The candles embers still burning bright even as they flickered. The darkness of the room barely covered the anguish behind his voice.

"Y-You don't even know where the hell I came from..!" Shizuko mourned, Voice wheezing and choking from his throat. The tears in his eyes started to build, Boiling like a pot, Stinging him.

Gyomei sighed, Stepping towards him.

"Please just-!" Shizuko stammered, His voice dying down to a near whisper before the tears finally spilled over his eyes.

"..J-Just tell me who the hell I am."

Gyomei reached out once more, And this time Shizuko didn't argue once he felt the firm hand of his mentor grasp his shoulder.

He was shaking like a leaf, A rare moment when his resolve started to tremble like a tree in a storm. Shizuko's fists were balled yet he threw no punches, Only dropped his head down to stare at them as he tried not to weep harder than he already was.

Gyomei's hand squeezed his shoulder, A single thumb rubbing circles into it. His touch was unfortunately revolting, Making Shizuko tense up. But despite the disgust coursing through his veins, He didn't shake it off.

He didn't want to, Even though it made him want to sob even harder.

"..I'm sorry, I wish I could give you the answer that you desire but that is not for me to give." Gyomei assured, His voice was soft yet it sounded so loud within the darkness of the prayer room.

"..Who you are is for you to decide. My rage got the best of me once, And it almost became who I was. But I never let it consume me.. And I have tried so very hard to make sure it never happens again." Gyomei spoke "So please.. Trust me when I say that who you are is who you choose to become.. Neither your lost memories or your anger define you, Not unless you let them.."

Shizuko sniffled.

"B-But that's just it, Isn't it?" Shizuko croaked, Wiping his tears on the sleeve of his yukata. "I do remember just the tiniest bit.."

Gyomei's eyebrows knitted together, The thumb rubbing circles into his shoulder halted, Just for a moment.

"..Whatever do you mean?" Gyomei asked.

"T-There's someone out there that knows who I use to be. There's someone out there who held my goddamn hand.. And hell, It felt nice." Shizuko admitted as the dried tears quickly became replaced, Falling down quicker once that otherworldly warmth came back to him.

Gyomei however, Whatever reaction Shizuko had been expecting from him. Shock, Intrigued, Happy that he had at least some memories. And sure, There was some of that there but it was taken over by something else.

Something more.. It was something more hesitant.

Shizuko caught onto it immediatley, Observant eye able to pick up the oddities in his expression.

He sniffled, Scrunching up his face as he shook the newly born tears off.

"..You.. You don't know who that is, Right?" Shizuko asked, Stutter still in his voice yet more pronounced and steady now. Gyomei thinned his lips, The intensity in his muscles becoming much more visible.

"Shizuko.." Gyomei drawled which just made Shizuko move forward, Eyes on him like a hawk, Not letting them wander for a second. The way he was acting, Though difficult to see in the dark.. He knew something.

"..Master." Shizuko replied, Slowly and with intent as he carefully eyed the taller man who was currently in debate of his own. Stiff as the statues he prayed to at the altar behind him, Cold stone on his face as he played out the discourse in his head.

He recalls the conversation he had with Kanroji back at the Hashira Meeting, When they had discussed [F/N] and her relation to Shizuko as his older sister. It was a good while ago now, But he still felt confused by it all.

Everything. How he was simply tossed on the temples doorsteps as a child, How he spoke of an older sister. Knowing now that it was [F/N], A colleague he had allied with for years, It shone an entire new light on everything now..

Yet somehow, He was still in the dark.

"Shizuko.. " Gyomei muttered, His morals at war.

"Alright then.. But keeping lies is against my morals and good concious, If he does ask about anything pertaining to this then I will not lie to him.. And I do hope you tell him in due time, Kanroji-san"

It was against his morals and his good concious, It would be a sin to lie to him. But on the other hand.. How could he possibly begin to explain to him something Gyomei couldn't even explain himself?

"Master.. Please. Tell me, Do you know something..?" Shizuko whispered, As faint as the candles waning. His eyes scanned over every facial feature, Ones he had learned the ticks and tocks to. "Do you.. You do, You do know something..!"

There was no way around it. No avenue or alleyway he could divert down to direct the conversation to a different topic. He needed to be honest, Be truthful. That was what his principles spoke of, Right?

"Shizuko.. I've been meaning to tell yo-"

"CAW CAW!"

The call of that all too familiar beast called out, Followed by a sudden sound of what seemed to be rapid tapping at one of the room's window frames.

Gyomei instantly snapped his head over to where the sound was coming from, Where the window was hidden behind several rich tapestries depicting stories from his religion. Suddenly feeling awkward, Shizuko stared as his master moved towards the window, Peel back the tapestries and let light flood into the room.

It was blinding compared to the shadow the room was bathed in, Making Shizuko stammer back and raise a hand to cover his eyes. Gyomei, Unaffected, Slid the window-shutter open to reveal the crow behind them.

It's feathers shone under the afternoon light, Light near rolling off them. Once Shizuko got use to the light he finally recognised the crow as Kamakiri, The Insect Hashira's crow, One he had often seen flying around in Corps Area's he often loitered around in.

Her beak snapped once, The little butterfly charm around her neck shaking as she spoke.

"CAW CAW! STONE HASHIRA HIMEJIMA GYOMEI! YOU HAVE BEEN ASKED TO MEET AT THE BUTTERFLY MANSION ON THE REQUEST OF MY MASTER, INSECT HASHIRA KOCHO SHINOBU!"

Kamikiri's voice was loud, Echoing out throughout the entire room as she delivered her message. Gyomei hummed, Rattling the beads snaking around his hands.

"For what reason..? Did your master give you any cause?" Gyomei asked.

"NO REASON WAS GIVEN HOWEVER IT WAS STATED TO BE IMPORTANT! CAW CAW! DO YOU ACCEPT THE INVITATION?" Kamikiri squaked once more, Flapping her wings once in the radiant light and waiting for his response.

Gyomei lowered his brows, Seemingly taking in the words as the beads around his hands clacked together like heeled shoes on the floor. He wasn't summoned often, Especially not by another Hashira..

"..Yes. I will set off to The Butterfly Mansion as soon as I can.. Please tell Kocho-san I will be there by the next morning at the latest.." Gyomei spoke softly, Lowering down into a bow with his hands still pressed in prayer.

Kamikiri did the same, Mimicking the same bow a human would do but on her talons. Once she raised back up however, She squawked out a goodbye before she flapped her wings once more, Turned around and took off out the windowsill.

Gyomei raised from his bow too, Reaching back up to his full height. Shizuko watched as Kamikiri soared into the air, Wind was no obstacle to her as he watched her surge out onto the horizon. And once she was gone, He snapped his head back around to his master.

"..Shizuko, We will need to continue this conversation later.." Gyomei finalized as he resettled the heavy haori over his shoulders, Adjusted the shirt of his uniform and fixed his belt.

Shizuko knitted his brows, Stepping forward.

"Wait! Can't you just finish what you were about to say? About what you were going to tell me?" Shizuko gawked as Gyomei finished adjusting his clothing, Turning his head over to the younger boy. He sighed, Frown thickening.

"Later.. I promise you that I will answer you in due time, When I get my words in order.. But right now I must leave." Gyomei assured, Taking a few steps towards his apprentice and bowing down slightly towards him.

And when Shizuko looked in his uncoloured eyes, He knew he had fucked up.

Shizuko didn't react, Just looked up at him. The thundering of his heart started to slow, What storm inside starting to dwindle at the action his master took. Shizuko suddenly became aware of the past conversation, What disrespect he had shown.

He had let his emotions take over, His anger consuming him. He had yelled at his master, The one he had grew up with and the one he had trained under for who knows how long? Forget that forgotten memory, Just for a second, He needed to focus on the person he remembered.

Shizuko sniffled, The last of his tears drying.

"I.. I'm sorry, Himejima-sama." He spoke, Returning to his formal tone through his shaky voice. He lowered down into a bow, Just like his master did before. "I shouldn't of been so disrespectful to you, Please, Forgive me."

Gyomei sighed but eventually a small smile came to his face, Something now illuminated by the newly moved tapestries. He moved forward just a step towards him, The candlelight still burning bright in the back.

"You do not need to worry.. I understand." He spoke. "I will be heading out now.. But in the meantime, Please go and rest.. I know how hard you have been working lately, Do not overwork yourself.. It is poison to the body."

Shizuko looked up, Taking a moment to look upon his face before nodding.

"Yes, Himejima-sama.." He spoke, Almost as low as the wind drifting in from the window. Gyomei nodded towards him, Turning around before striding off towards the door, Hands still pressed together in prayer.

He said his goodbyes, Leaving Shizuko alone within the room. His only company was the cantata of the birds outside, The flicks of the flames on the votives and his own screaming head.

Shizuko turned to the open window, The tapestries still peeled back from the usually covered opening. He looked out into the gardens outside, The tree's swaying in the open wind.

Gyomei knew something, Something Shizuko had been longing for his entire life. But how could Shizuko have been so brash when asking about it? He had just let wrath come to him, Let it burn him.

It seemed like that had been happening more and more lately, Becoming bitter about the slightest thing and not the orderly soldier he was suppose to be. But he couldn't fret, Once Gyomei was back he could fix this.

Shizuko felt a throb in his chest, Gyomei actually knew something. The look on his face told him everything he needed to know. Well, Not everything, But he knew that Gyomei was hiding something from him.

And hopefully that answer would fix his irritability.

☆♡☆

"ACK-"

[F/N] tossed around in the air, Launched back by another one of his strikes. And just as all the training sessions before, Her body slammed against the wall of the far courtyard. As always she was defeated, Tumbling to the ground with her training sword flying out of her hand.

Hands gripped into the ground, Lifting her aching head only slighty just to sputter up more blood.

"As always.. Your footwork is lacking.." The voice of her captor called out from the otherside of the courtyard, [F/N] could almost feel the smugness showing through his stoic tone. It made her grit her teeth, Blood dripping down her busted lip.

She scoffed, Tasting the iron on her tongue.

"U-Understood, Kokushibo-sama.." [F/N] spat out, Ichor decorating the floor where she cursed him under her breath. Shaky hands pushed down, Levelling her up to her knees where she tried not to collapse once more.

Kokushibo stood under the great tree in the middle, His golden eyes piercing through the shadow to stare at her. He watched as she picked up her fallen sword, Dust off her dirty Samue and wipe the blood from her lips.

They narrowed in on her, Almost disappointed.

"Pick yourself up, Our session here today is done.." He simply stated, Sliding the flesh-forged blade of his sword into its sheathe. And without a word, [F/N] watched as he turned away.

And as soon as she blinked, He was gone.

[F/N] groaned, Hands going to grapple at her side. Akaza really didn't hold back there, Neither did Kokushibo as he mercilessly sliced at her. He didn't go easier on her despite her injuries.

[F/N] knew that she'd have a few more bruises to show for it, And she cursed Kokushibo out all the same.

She pushed herself to her feet, Stretching as she raised her arms into the air. [F/N] tried not to cringe once she felt that pain in her side, Almost like her ribcage was settling back into place.

It wasn't a pleasant feeling.

That bastard, [F/N] thought as she sauntered over to the tree. These sessions were completely pointless, Him telling her that it was "Training" which made absolutely no sense. She was a slayer, So called the strongest alive.

He knew this, He didn't care. [F/N]'s knees shook once she finally got under the tree's shadow, Too tired to even walk as she pressed her back against the stump. [F/N] slid down until she was nestled within the thick roots, Held high atop the little grassy hill.

[F/N] let out a sigh, She just wanted to sleep.

And she almost did, Eyelids fighting to stay vigilant. She had only woken up about an hour ago yet she still felt exhausted.

Haze started to set over her vision, Curtains closing as she felt her body grow limp.

"Hey."

[F/N] blinked.

"Oh.. It's you." [F/N] yawned, Rolling her shoulders as she propped herself up against the tree. A good few metres away from her stood Akaza in all his glory, Stature tall as his eyes narrowed in on her. Akaza rolled his eyes.

"Of course it's me, Who the hell did you expect it to be?" He scoffed as he took a few steps towards her, Something gripped tightly in-between his knuckles as he went.

[F/N] didn't respond, Only curling up into herself tigher. She seemed to bury herself into the roots of the tree, Not meeting his eyes. She didn't want to, Especially once she felt the heat of them burn into her figure.

Akaza's brows furrowed.

"Okay.. Fuck it- But are we gonna talk about what happened yesterday? I mean, Come on. Are we just gonna ignore your suicide attempt? Not talk about it at all?" Akaza took a few steps closer, Only making [F/N] curl up further.

[F/N] winced. Of course he was going to bring it up.

"I don't want to talk about it, I wasn't in the right mind back then. Just- Ignore everything we talked about. I was tired, I was bitter about being here.. I was just being stupid. Just forget it, Okay..?!" She hissed, A defensive snarl starting to appear on her lips.

Akaza just stepped closer towards her.

"But are you fine now?" He asked, Raising a brow at her. She stared at him, Only for a second. The shoulders [F/N] held up like a barricade started to lower, Leave it up to [F/N] to get defensive over a question, One that she knew was due to be asked.

She sighed.

"..Now, Yeah." [F/N] replied quietly, Still unable to meet his eyes. Akaza took a moment to look into her eyes, The ones that didn't look back at his. He almost didn't believe her, But unlike yesterday her fighting spirit wasn't roaring like it use to. No, It was completely dead now.

"..Right." Akaza said, Finally sauntering up the little hill and setting down the rectangular box he had been holding in his hands. Handle clattering into its normal position once he let go of it.

[F/N] blinked, Snapping her head over to look at the noise.

"Erm.. What's that?" She asked, Hesitantly eyeing it up and down like a ticking bomb.

"Food. If you want to get out of here and fool Upper One, You're doing it on a fighter's diet." Akaza replied as he kneeled down towards the wooden box, Starting to peel off the lid from the top.

[F/N] grimaced.

"I'm not hungry." She replied quickly as she watched Akaza open the box, Letting the aromatic smell of perfectly cooked fish and other delicacies inside flow out. [F/N] tried not to salivate at the scent of it, Not daring to look at it either. Slightly suprised that he had brought food for her.

Akaza shook his head.

"No, You're gonna eat it." He stated, Almost as if she had digested it already. "It's got everything you'll need to scale the Infinity Castle, This is the standard that your weight-class and gender should get."

[F/N] bit her lip.

"Yeah well.. I've just not been that hungry lately. Thank you but.. You can have it." She replied, Shaking her head as she smelt the scent of fish come from it. Seeing the enticing shimmer of the fish scales inside, She tried not to give in.

And fuck.. She was starving.

"I can't eat human food, Idiot. Besides, I can basically see you drooling there." Akaza scoffed as he watched her take peeks at the food "You look starving. Are you seriously gonna waste food?"

[F/N] quirked a lip, Already regretting telling him about her childhood. Dirty tricks, But there weren't much else he could play. Swallowing down the excess of her saliva, She finally turned her head to look at him.

"I hate you for this, You know that? Right?" [F/N] hissed as she reached a hand down towards the box, Bare hands starting to grab fistfuls of rice and fish-meat cutlets from within the neatly packed bowls.

"There's cutlery there.. Oh." Akaza trailed off once he saw her shove handfuls of rice and meat into her mouth, Bare-handed and she didn't care that she looked like a rabid beast choking down meat into their maw.

It matched the rest of her appearance. Her ragged hair, Her dirtied skin and clothes. Even her eyes had a wild look in them as she scarfed down her meal and wipe the excess off her samue's sides, Eyebags protruding them from her face.

Akaza almost gagged if not for remembering how he did the same thing, Only with human meat of course.

"So.. " Akaza started, Continuing to watch her scoop handfuls of mixed food and shove them into her mouth. "About that thing with Upper One.."

[F/N] choked down another chunk of rice, Wiping her mouth on her sleeve before looking up at him.

"What thing?" She asked.

"..You know? The idea that I suggested and the one you agreed to? To get closer to Upper One?" Akaza raised his brows, Watching as [F/N] narrowed her eyes before shoving another fistful into her mouth.

"Oh- Yeah, That thing.." [F/N] said through her chewing, Almost deflating once he reminded her. She had been hoping to avoid it but..

"So? How's that coming along?" Akaza asked, Folding his arms as he watched her scarf down her meal. [F/N] shook her head, Lowering her gaze away from him as she swallowed down her food.

Fuck.. She loathed how disgustingly delicious it tasted.

"..Come on, How exactly am I suppose to get along with him? He's an unfeeling prick.. I doubt he even has any emotions I could appeal to.." [F/N] groaned, Shaking her head at the mere prospect of him having feelings.

"You said he's fucking obsessed with you, So appeal to that?" Akaza exasperated, Shrugging his shoulders.

[F/N] rolled her eyes.

"Oh, Yeah, Right.. Let me just start acting nice and loving to him all of a sudden, I'll just start pretending that I actually like him. I'm sure he won't notice somethings up at all!" [F/N] sneered, A malicious smile spreading across her face which she proudly displayed to Akaza.

He sneered back, Shaking his head at her behaviour.

"Oh come on! How about you shut it and actually try make some leeway here, Eh? I'm not saying you should start liking it immediately, I'm saying that you try and work away at it." Akaza snapped, Stepping closer to her until he finally got to her side.

[F/N] stared up at him, His eyes made all the more prominant as they shone through the tree's shadows, Glaring back at her. [F/N] dropped her malicious smile in favour of a frown, Finally turning away from him.

"..Whatever, I'll figure it out." [F/N] finally spat, Wiping away the last of the foods residue from her mouth. Rice bits shook off her hands as she finally deflated back against the tree, [F/N] didn't have the patience to argue.

Akaza in turn, Lowered his snarl once he saw her start to shrink in on herself.

He felt a sort of pull in his chest, One that he instantly shrugged off in favour of kneeling down and sitting back down beside her with a grunt.

[F/N] watched as he pushed his half-naked back up against the trunk, Bare feet entwined with the overgrown grass. He didn't look at her, Just stared off somewhere far-off and pulled his knees near his chest.

She gazed at his features for a second. His gaunt skin to contrast with the deep navy stripes running across it, The way his pinkish hair drifted in the air. [F/N]'s nose twitched, He had no right to be demanding.

But whatever.

[F/N] turned back to stare in her own designated place, Nowhere in particular, But somewhere she could just relax back against the tree and take in the air. The air that was fresh, The air that brought her back to her senses.

The only warm place in this entire place, The heart of the shrine. Despite the coldness surrounding it, It flourished anyways. Despite the harsh environment it endured, It was still thriving. [F/N] breathed in the air.

It was nice.

"..You still haven't finished your food."

"Fuck you."

☆♡☆

The skies were orange, A pungent shade of burgundy into citron set over the small township.

The wind was crisp, Cool to anyone caught in it. Birds warbling an aubade could be heard in the trees, Crickets joining in for the chorus in the new morn. People were out in the streets, Walking by and happily conversing with one and other as they went.

Gyomei walked brisk, Short hair dancing with his haori waving within the wind. The Butterfly mansion was large, The biggest property in town so it gave him plenty room to just stride throughout the place unbothered.

But a walk wasn't what he was here for, No, Instead it was the Insect Hashira who seemed to be nowhere about. Despite asking around, Mostly from that Kanzaki woman and the three little girls that followed her, They had no idea where Shinobu was either.

So here he was, Wandering throughout the lavish gardens of the mansion. Striding past crops of fresh veg and tree's filled with fruit and fauna. The air was something Gyomei could appreciate, Something he almost stopped to enjoy within the daybreak.

He breathed out.

"..Himejima-san!"

A voice called out from somewhere above, Somewhere that Gyomei tilted his head up towards. On top of the tiled roof of The Butterfly Mansion, Sat Shinobu perched upon the edge.

She smiled down at him, Soft and delicate. Glossy eyes honing in on him.

"Kocho-san..!" Gyomei called out to her, Soft as a yell could be as he pressed his hands in prayer. "You summoned me here for something important.. Not explained by your crow.. Please, Do you mind telling me the reason I have came today..?"

Shinobu hummed. Luckily for her, The part of the roof she was perched on was rather low. Somewhere she could easily make her way down from, Which is exactly what she did as she nudged herself off.

Shinobu almost drifted, Butterfly haori glistening in the orange light as her feet hit the ground with a barely audible thud.

But Gyomei's hearing was impeccable, Now fully turned to the direction of where she had landed. Listening to the soft patter of her footsteps as she made her way over to him.

"Yes, Yes.. I must apologise for the lack of information as I sent my crow out rather hastily, I'm sorry for acting so rash.. It's not like me to do so~!" Shinobu sang as she came closer to him, Pausing in front of the man before bowing herself down lowly in respect.

Gyomei, Sensing the action. Reciprocated as he lowered himself in response.

Shinobu rose.

"The reason I asked you to come here today is because I got a rather interesting tip-off from my crow!" Shinobu announced, Hand raising before going under her haori.

"You see, I had sent out my crow a few days ago to a village in Fukushima. He was tasked with purchasing some specific herbs that I needed from that region, But unfortunately things didn't go exactly as expected.."

Gyomei lowered his brows, The beads around his hands starting to chatter.

"Yes..? And what exactly happened..?"

Shinobu's smile widened, Yet her eyes darkened all the same.

"My crow was intercepted by a man in the village when he had went to pick up the herbs- He had fastened a rather interesting letter around her neck, One that I think that would interest you.." She drawled out as she watched his expression change.

Gyomei, A man of not many expressions simply stiffened his figure. A man had targeted a Kasugai crow? Of course, Demons were known to try and attack crows during the night. But a man? A human man? And of all things had wrapped a letter around it's neck and sent it on it's way.

Shinobu's expression was bright, Just as scorching as the sun that silhouetted her. Smile stretched on her face, Yet her eyes contained such thanatoid dullness. Something dark brewing within.

Something that even Gyomei could feel, An unease going through him.

Shinobu fished out the letter from within her haori pockets, Hair dancing in the faint wind as she unscrolled the spotless fibre from it's shape. Though she didn't mean to read it aloud, No.

She just needed to check, Just that she was reading it right, Just for the thousandth time.

"..There is a possible sighting of Uppermoon two, Apparently associated with some sort of cult near the village." Shinobu announced as she scanned her eyes across those two dooming words, The ones that she smiled so scaldingly bright at.

Gyomei's eyes widened, The clanking of beads stopping.

"This is.. You mean to say that there was another Uppermoon sighting..? Of number two, Of all moons..!" First it was Upper Six, Defeated in The Red Light District. Next, It was the attack of Uppermoon Four and Five on the swordsmith village.

Just like that.. In over a century several had been slaughtered from their ranks. Now, It was Upper Two?

"Of course." Shinobu nodded as she gently patted the letter back within her haori pocket. Gyomei sensed there was something she was not telling him, Something that she was keeping away. It made him suspicious, Incredibly so.

Gyomei had a frown on his face, Deeper than it ever was.

"Kocho-san.. I'd advise you to go to Oyataka-sama before me.. I am not the messenger you want since you happen to have all the information.. We need to plan something out before we act..!" Gyomei urged, Cogs already starting to turn.

Shinobu hummed.

"..Of course, I will go to him but not right now. Not before I do some scouting of my own, You must understand!" She laughed airily until it trailed off into the wind, Blowing past her before it died down entirely.

Gyomei paused.

"I.. Then why me..? Why did you ask me specifically to come here if you don't want to tell anything to the corps..? Something I deeply advise against.." Gyomei warned once more.

But Shinobu didn't respond, Just acknowledged it with a single warble of her throat before clearing it.

"Oh, Don't worry about it~! I'll explain to you in a moment.."

She smiled, Even wider.

"There is still one left to arrive.."

☆♡☆

[F/N] laid, Still pressed up against the trunk of the tree, Listening to the sounds of air travelling through the shrine.

Akaza sat next to her, The box too now empty of the food it once held. Carefully packaged food, Bowls of rice, Canteens of soup and cutlets of many meats all ravaged and scarfed down.

[F/N] admitted that it was good. Disgusting, But good. Hard to swallow yet settled in her stomach fine.

She breathed in the air, Fresh and poignant as it filled her lungs with life. The aching of her bones from training earlier still had a lingering pain, Throbbing and bruised.

It almost spoiled her mood, Especially since she now felt something akin to normalcy once lazing on a mockery of hillside and it's lumber. She tried not to think about it.

Kokushibo and his little training sessions with her, What a monster he was. What reason did he have to do this all with her? With someone he already admitted was the best he had ever fought in centuries, You'd think she'd not need to partake.

He liked torturing her, That's what [F/N] came to. Some sadistic joy inside his dead little heart liked to watch her bleed, To bruise and blister. Always lingering around to watch her, Almost going over to get a better look.

[F/N] scoffed under her breath. He had even tried to gift her that hairpin, The one she still wore in her hair at this very moment, All to get her to stay compliant.

How could she? When every time they'd pass in the halls he'd keep his eyes on her, Expecting her to be what he thought she should. Keep her locked up here- All while beating her down daily.

There was no reason to it!

The warm air felt nice on her skin, Eyes almost drifting away into another dream. Akaza himself had long done so, His eyes closed and his breath steady.

[F/N]'s eyes widened.

A sudden hitch in her breath came, A neuron connecting within her brain.

Oh, That was the reason.

It was because he had no idea how else he could spend time with her.

[awkward-tension-art]

Viral Vector Chp.3 (Echo x Reader)

Chapter 2. Chapter 4.

Data

TW: Tarkin being an ass, Omega being cute, Galactic Empire, Swearing, mentions of a fight, reader insert, mentions of medical procedures, Reader is gender neutral, Reader a medical scientist, Echo x Reader, a bit of a slow-burn though

You were in a rush. 

Live rounds. LIVE ROUNDS!? IN A TEST!?

What game was Tarkin playing?

You had been resting, finally closing your eyes to sleep when Echo commed you. They had been tested rather than punished. But that test had turned potentially dangerous when the training droids started using live rounds. 

Wrecker had been hurt, a bolt hitting him square in the shoulder. 

You gathered some bandages and bacta and made your way to the squad's barracks. However, your steps finally slowed. Down the hall was Nala Se, Lama Su and Tarkin, behind the former was Omega. She kept pace, following closely behind them.

You followed, keeping your head down. There was an intense drive to keep that little girl safe. 

And she wouldn't be safe anywhere near Tarkin.

The three of them had turned, entering one of the Cloning wings. Before the doors closed, you slipped inside, pretending to do work. Your datapad was up to your face, and you acted as though you were inspecting some of the developing clones in their tubes. 

“Extraordinary, aren't they?” The Kaminoan scientist spoke, voice flat and calm. 

“That remains to be seen,” Tarkin responded, looking directly at a developing fetus in its tube. He then turned, facing those behind him, “Tell me about Clone Force 99.” His admiral kept his hands behind his back. 

Nala Se answered him, “They are medically defective clones whose cellular mutations enhanced traits desirable in a soldier.”

Your eyes were on Omega, she was technically a clone. How far that mutation went, you didn’t know. So far, the only difference is that she was a little girl. 

But sometimes, when she turned, or spoke, or moved, you saw the cadets in her. When she grew up, she’d be capable, just like them. 

There was a sense of pride in your chest.

Tarkin’s cold eyes went to Omega, “How many of these enhanced clones do you possess?”

Nala Se answered again, “Five are all that remain.”

Now, there was fierce protectiveness in your heart. Stay away from her, you hydro-snake. You thought bitterly. 

Lama Su stepped forward, now deciding to speak, “They could be an asset to your new Empire.”

Tarkin didn’t seem convinced, his stare was now on the Prime Minister, “Yet reports indicate they exhibit a concerning level of disobedience and disregard for orders.”

“A side effect of their mutation.” Nala Se cut in, trying to reason with him. 

Omega looked between the scientist and Admiral. She seemed so out of place among them. 

“Yet one that has never hindered the completion of their missions.” Lama Su stepped forward as he explained. 

“Then they executed Order 66?”

Rig. 

Your lungs tightened. 

“Since both the Jedi General and Padawan on Kaller were eliminated, one would assume.” The Prime Minister seemed nervous. Clearly he was anxious about the idea of Kamino being unneeded by the new Empire. 

“Assume nothing. Only the general's death is confirmed.” Tarkin interrupted him, “A counter-report, filed by one of their own, says the Padawan escaped.” He turned back to the tube containing the growing clone, “Let us see where the loyalty of these clones truly lies.”

Omega looked nervous. And so were you. You had to warn them. Silently, you slipped from the Cloning Facility. Once you were in the hall, you rushed to their barracks. 

“Live rounds? They used live rounds! On us!” 

You heard Wreckers voice through the door. He was angry, clearly. There was a bang, sounding like he slammed his fists on the table.

“We were there, Wrecker. We know.” Tech chimed in.

Echo spoke next, “I tried to warn you about Tarkin.”

Your hand hit the button and it opened, revealing all of them looking worse for wear. 

“Who's that Imperial snake think he is?” Wrecker huffed, pausing when you approached with your bag of medical supplies. 

Crosshair rolled his eyes as you began to check the larger clone over, “Stow it, already. You got shot. It happens all the time.”

“There's a fundamental difference between taking fire in battle and being used for target practice.” Tech interrupted, facing the sniper.

Hunter finally spoke, “Are you alright, Doctor?”

Your eyes must’ve given something away. You shook your head as you secured a bacta patch to Wreckers shoulder, “Something…is wrong. Seriously wrong.” You responded, “Tarkin is trying to do something with all the clones. But I don’t know what.”

“What do you mean?” Echo asked, taking a step closer to you. 

“He wants clone medical files. And now he’s talking about a test of loyalty.” Your words were shaky, “I..I don’t know what's going on.”

Why couldn’t you calm down?! Ever since the clone troopers turned and shot Rig, your body has been on fight or flight. 

The ARC trooper put a careful hand to your back, “Do you think we’re in danger?” 

You nodded, looking at your trembling hands, “I think he’s targeting you all…I don’t know why.” 

Echo moved his hand from your back to hold your hand. His grip was strong, yet kind and reassuring. You looked up, and his pale brown eyes held concern, “That explains the live rounds during the test.” He mumbled.

“Let it go.” Crosshair practically groaned in annoyance. 

“Hey! We aren’t dummy droids.” Wrecker snapped.

“That much we agree on,” Tarkin’s voice caused your heart to drop. 

Echo swiftly let go of your hand and stood at attention like the rest of his squad. 

You scrambled back, staying out of the way. Luckily, the Admiral didn’t seem to pay you any mind. 

“That was quite an impressive display.” Tarkin stated flatly, walking down the small steps into the barracks. 

Hunter watched him carefully, “Didn’t have much choice.” 

“Our new empire may have methods which seem a bit unorthodox, but so does this squadron.” The older man inspected each of the clones, “Both certainly have their merits.” He turned to nod to Hunter before carefully looking over Wrecker, “Nala Se speaks quite highly of her five enhanced clones. She claims you're more capable than an army.”

Understatement. You thought to yourself silently. 

The squad’s leader did well to pick up Tarkin’s intentions, “You have a mission for us, sir?”

“Indeed,” The slimy Admiral turned around to speak to him, “We have tracked a group of insurgents to the Onderon sector. They must be dealt with.”

Echo perked up, “What sort of insurgents?” Already he was mentally preparing for the mission. 

“Separatist forces intent on keeping the galaxy at war.” Tarkin explained bluntly, “If you neutralize this grave threat, you will be looked upon most favorably as I assess the needs of the Imperial Army.” He stated, rather coldly in your opinion. He didn’t even bother to bid the squad farewell before stepping up the stairs and walking out to the hallway. 

Once he was out of sight you visibly deflated. 

“We need to gear up,” Hunter nodded to you, “Try and find out what you can.”

“But keep yourself safe.” Echo chimed in, “We can talk when we get back.” He put his hand on your shoulder in comfort.

You missed how Tech perked up, noticing the ARC troopers change in attitude with you. He remained silent however, not finding the benefit of saying anything.

“Just…be careful,” You looked up at him, “Please…”

“We can handle it.” Hunter put a hand on his hip, “Whatever gets thrown at us.” he motioned for his team to follow. The squad couldn’t waste anymore time. They had to gear up and go on this mission the Admiral wanted. 

You bid them good luck and returned to your clinic. Once you were at your desk, you furrowed your brow. Your gut was telling you this was wrong. 

Everything is so….wrong. 

Tarkin wanted clone health files…

Why? What could he need them for? Assessing the clones' health? Their genetic data? See how useful they could be to this new Empire? What if he found their health lacking? Would the clones be decommissioned? Reconditioned? 

…you refused to give them to him.

Your hand opened a drawer and wrapped around a datachip. You had plenty of them, you were a scientist after all.

There were nearly countless health files on the clone troopers. Beyond millions. You’d need more than just the one chip in your hand. Not to mention the couple years of your own research into anti-aging medicine. 

You got to work. The first set of files you saved was everything involved in your clinic. Those would be the easiest to get afterall. That was your system. They were your patients. Everything was yours.

Next was your research. You’d be damned if Tarkin got his slimy hands on your work. 

Your clinic doors opened, causing you to jump. 

Omega approached, “What…are you doing?” Her brown eyes were on you, wide and curious.

You looked at her. She was so innocent. So naive. But could she feel the danger? The anxiety? 

“I’m saving all the data I can.” You stepped away from your desk, kneeling to her eye level, “I don’t trust Tarkin. I don’t trust Nala Se…So I’m saving all the data I can on these datachips.” Your palm opened, revealing the pieces of pure data and files, “Omega…Go to Clone Force 99…warn them. ask to go with them. Tell them I sent you. Get off of Kamino.”

They’d think you're paranoid. But you couldn’t risk this little girl. Every cell in your body told you there was danger around.

She nodded, “Ok…But what are you going to do?”

“Whatever I can.” You responded, “Now go.” 

Once she was out of your clinic and you were alone, you returned to your desk. There were still some files you needed to save. Halfway through the download, it hit you.

How far were you going to help the clones?

If you stole this data, you’d be arrested.

You weren’t one of them. You treated them, yes. They were your patients. But you were a scientist. You weren’t a member of the GAR. You would always be an outsider to them. 

…Echo never looked at you like an outsider.

Oh…Echo.

You liked him. Cared for him deeply. There was affection for him you didn’t have for the others. A feeling in your heart whenever he looked at you. A certain happiness whenever you saw him smile.

Download complete. 

You paused before grabbing the datachip. 

How far would you be willing to go for Echo?

Your hand wrapped around the chips and you put them in your pocket.

[andorshitdaily]

I appreciate Bix for fighting to the end no matter the odds. She simply doesn't stop, even— or maybe even especially— when the situation is hopeless. When she's being held up against a wall by a corpo while they're looking for Cassian, she makes a break for it the instant that soldier's back was turned— and might have made it, too, if his reflexes had been just a touch slower. She doesn't let that failure keep her from trying again, either, when they call her name in the square after she uses the radio. We see the look in her eyes as she glances back, several soldiers in close pursuit, and knows she doesn't stand a chance, but she turns back around and keeps sprinting, because if she's going down, at least she'll make it as difficult as possible for them when she goes. Staring down Dedra in that interrogation room, she knows exactly what's coming for her— she just saw Paak dragged unconscious from the same chair— but she never wavers. And even when all hope seems lost, when she can't stand upright, can barely hold her own train of thought, when it's been weeks and no one is coming for her— she summons a last bit of strength to drag herself hand over hand to the window, to the sound of the funeral drums and her community on the streets just below, clutching the sill and pulling herself to the light, as close to that faint bit of hope as she can. Giving up is simply not a possibility to her, no matter the circumstances. She has a will stronger than anything the world can throw at her. She's brave and stubborn as hell and a fighter at heart. Appreciating Bix on this fine Appreciation Friday (and also every other day forever)

You've certainly helped me and many others appreciate this outstanding character so much more <3

APPRECIATE. BIX. FOREVER!!!

[slotmachines-fearofgod]

sorry in advance, this IS angst. not proofread or edited heavily since it's just a WIP, but y'all have been patient with me so i figured it could be a little treat :3 let me know what you think in the comments!

—

The day that Marshal Commander Cody died was an entirely unremarkable one. 

It had been a busy market square in the Outer Rim. Closer to Tatooine that anyone would’ve liked. A raider’s run, soldiers and slavers clashing to defend or steal the people there. It was a common occurrence, the people there later revealed to Obi-Wan. 

Cody, in all his stubborn glory, put himself between the people of that planet and the raiders trying to take them. He got cornered, got shot, got left for dead. Rex didn’t know why he hadn’t called for help, hadn’t had the chance to ask anyone and hadn’t been able to stomach reading the report. 

Obi-Wan delivered the news to him. Rex delivered it to the batch. Only then did Obi-Wan file the official paperwork.

Fives had been hovering for the past few days. So had a few others, but especially him. Rex had thrown himself head first into work, giving himself little time to rest or come back to himself. 

Anakin and Obi-Wan approached him to offer Cody’s old position at Obi-Wan’s side. He was one of the most qualified and knew how Obi-Wan thought. He’d seen Cody’s day to day and knew what would be expected of him. 

Rex had politely refused and excused himself to go throw up in the fresher.

Rex had never really had a batch. He did, but he was weird. Different from them. Difference was deadly on Kamino. 

It had been Cody that found him, Cody that took him under his wing, Cody that taught him the importance of brotherhood and loyalty. He took an angry fucked up kid and made something worthy out of him and for that Rex would never be able to repay him. 

In the quiet of his room, the rare hours that he allowed himself sleep, he stared at the ceiling with tired eyes, unable to find rest. He stared and thought. Thought about the man Cody was. Thought about how Rex would’ve done anything for him. Thought about how he’d never see him again. 

Thought about how that was his big brother. Thought about how he used to think Cody was invincible. 

During their very brief time as children, Cody was untouchable. He was smart as all hell, good at getting in and out of trouble quicker than you could blink, and egregiously annoying about it. He used to tease Rex about coming back with a blush on his cheeks and a scowling trainer, boasting about how he wouldn’t have gotten caught. 

He’d only ever gotten caught for Rex’s sake. Once, when Rex had really fucked up, Cody took the fall. He left with the trainers, coming back hours later bruised and beaten from the extra training they forced on him. He’d met Rex with a wide smile and an arm around his shoulders, crowing about how Rex should see the other guy. Rex hadn’t known whether to laugh or cry. 

Fives had been hovering. Even now, he sat in Rex’s office while Rex worked, uncharacteristically quiet. He was scanning through mission reports, actually doing his work for once. 

It was sort of nice to have another body with him. To not have the crushing loneliness take him. 

It had occurred to him a few days after Cody’s death that Rex was alone now. Not truly, never truly alone, not while other clones existed. But still lonely. 

He’d always had his big brother with him, taking the fall for him, protecting him. He had memories of life before Cody, but they were fuzzy and far away, like remnants of a dream. The day Cody shoved himself into what he thought was an unoccupied storage closet to escape Fox’s wrath, only to bump into a small and sulky CT was the day Rex’s life changed for the better. It was easy with Cody. They knew each other. He always stood in front of Rex in the most annoying ways.

He thought he lost Cody once before. Before he’d grown used to death and the silence that accompanied it. Cody took a shot for him on Geonosis. Rex had never been so angry and he’d never felt so loved. 

I’m your brother, Cody had said, I’ll always take the shot for you. Stop acting like that’s a surprise.

Rex had gone back and cried. It was before he had Torrent and the 501st. Back when it really was just him and Cody. He hadn’t been able to stomach the thought of Cody going without him. Hadn’t been able to breathe when he thought about his brother dying, leaving Rex alone to fend for himself. 

It felt vulnerable in a way Rex hadn’t expected. Like all this time Cody had been a pillar of protection and without it Rex was left to the wolves. He couldn’t flip on his comm and shoot Cody a message asking for advice. He couldn’t wander to the 212th bunks during shore leave to catch up with him and complain about his Jedi. He’d never get to see if Cody would grow a pair and confess to Obi-Wan. He’d never get to spend the end of the war with his brother, endless days under some gentle far off sun. 

They’d made plans when they were kids about what they’d do once they left. It was the only promise Rex allowed himself to make. He knew there were no absolutes in war, but so long as he had the list and he had Cody to check it off with, he was okay.

They’d gotten less than halfway through when Cody died. 

Fives’ comm beeped and Rex watched his brow furrow. Rex thought about what he’d do if Fives died. He honestly didn’t know.

Fives looked up at him, took in his demeanor, and his face relaxed. Rex had gotten too transparent with everything going on. 

“I’m heading out,” Rex said, the hoarseness in his voice surprising even him, “I’ll be back by dinner.”

“I’ll come with,” Fives said quickly, already getting to his feet, “Where are we going?”

“Meeting,” Rex said, closing out of his work, “It’s above your security level.” It wasn’t, it wasn’t even a meeting, but Fives would insist if he told him that.

“I’ll talk to the General then,” Fives said, “I’m sure it’ll be fine this once.”

“Fives,” Rex started, before hesitating and backtracking, “It’s okay. I’ll be fine.”

Fives’ face hardened and he crossed his arms, “Rex -”

“I’ll see you later,” Rex sighed, his armor feeling like it weighed two hundred pounds, “Try to wrap up those reports while I’m gone.”

Fives jaw clenched but he nodded. Rex appreciated that about him. He knew when to push and when to let things lie. Many people thought he was brash, charging in with no regard to his surroundings. Rex always felt the opposite. He liked to push, yes, and he liked to get his way, but he only pushed when it was needed. When he was seeing something Rex wasn’t. 

He reminded Rex a little bit of Cody sometimes. 

Rex often wondered if it had been Cody and Fives on Umbara instead of him. He wondered if Pong Krell would’ve been able to take them apart the way he did. Those two were strong in ways he wasn’t.

Rex left his office, fixing his helmet over his head as he went. They’d landed on Coruscant two days ago, four days after Cody’s death. Rex hadn’t left the bunkhouse for anything except food and a summons to the Jedi Temple. 

He took a breath as he exited the complex, hating the weight of his kama as he moved. 

Cody never had a kama. Everyone mocked and made fun of him for it except Fox. Rex always thought there was some unspoken agreement between those two, some burden their ranks afforded them that the rest were all kept from. Rex had never been jealous of their relationship until now. 

He made it to the Coruscant Guard Complex almost unconsciously, too caught up in his own head to follow his feet until suddenly he was standing at the entrance. A trooper in red nodded at him from the front desk. Rex nodded back, taking a seat in the waiting area.

It wasn’t long before Fox came down, also in his full kit. He greeted Rex as warmly as he ever does, which is to say not very, and gestured for him to follow. 

“Almost everyone else is here,” Fox said as they walked side by side through the winding hallways, “Just missing Bly.”

“So you mean Wolffe is here,” Rex attempted to joke. Fox’s nonanswer was all he needed to know that it fell flat.

Sometimes Rex thought about Fives and his batch. Watching it shrink piece by piece, losing and losing and losing until all you have is yourself. Between Cody and Ponds, he was beginning to understand it better than he wanted to. 

“I’m sorry,” Rex said quietly, one of the overhead lights flickering as they passed.

Fox waved him off, “Gallows humor. It’s understandable.”

They walked in silence for another five minutes, the white lights painting everything in a stark light. Shadows were almost non-existent here, only lurking behind closed doors and corners the unnatural light couldn’t quite reach. It was too harsh. 

Rex entered Fox’s office, taking a look around the space. It hadn’t changed much since the last time he’d been here. There was still an old, cheap looking couch in one corner, a massive desk piled high with flimsiwork and datapads, windows that overlooked the Senate Complex, and if he had to wager a guess at least three blasters hidden in the room. 

Wolffe was currently sitting on the couch, already nursing a glass of whatever Fox managed to get his hands on this time. Pros of dealing with criminals everyday, Rex supposed. Still, Wolffe looked about as bad as Rex felt. 

He hadn’t been invited to this after Ponds’ death, instead meeting up with the batch at 79s after they had their initial wake. He wasn’t sure how this was supposed to go. 

“Rex’ika,” Wolffe greeted, standing to pour Rex a drink, “Glad you could make it.”

“Thanks,” Rex said gruffly, “for inviting me.”

Wolffe shrugged, his back to Rex, “You were his vod’ika. Pretty sure he’d come back from the dead to kill us if we didn’t invite you.”

Rex gave the best laugh he could.

Fox moved past him, pulling off his helmet. Rex followed suit, placing his on a small table next to the couch as he accepted the drink from Wolffe. Fox looked like hell, as per usual. He had a bruise forming under his right eye, his broken nose that never quite healed right standing out more than usual next to it. He had a new scar on his jaw, a small thin line that Rex probably wouldn’t have noticed if he wasn’t looking. 

“Prison riot,” Fox grumbled when he saw Rex looking, “Got a little out of control.” Rex nodded, accepting the answer without a fight. If Fox wanted to tell them more, he’d tell them more. 

Rex moved to the couch, sitting on the opposite end of Wolffe. The elder got a temper, especially in cases like this, and Rex didn’t want to be next to him when it inevitably showed itself. 

“How’s the 501st?” Fox asked, more of a polite formality than anything else. It struck Rex how weird this situation was. Normally Cody was there, a binding force that meshed two parts of his life seamlessly. It was never awkward or centered around small talk when he was there but now - now it was like they had nothing but small talk.

“Good,” Rex said simply, sipping his drink and doing his best not to make a face, “We’ve got a few more being sent off for ARC training soon and I’m working on proposing a few initiatives to the admirals about restrictions regarding eating habits.”

“Restrictions?” Wolffe asked, a puzzled look on his face, “What for?”

Rex shrugged, relaxing into the cushions, “Some of the heavy gunners and ARC troopers are complaining that their meal plans aren’t being switched to a higher protein intake despite their intensive training. I’m working with the Commander to get that fixed.”

He’d worked with Cody on it too.

Fox made a considering noise before saying, “The ration restrictions in general are a pain in the ass already.”

Wolffe raised an eyebrow at them, “General Koon got rid of those the second month of the war. What’s taking your people so long?”

“Palpatine.”

“Anakin.”

Fox and Rex made eye contact, a smile pulling at the corners of Fox’s lips. It seemed Palpatine’s influence had rubbed off after all. 

“The chancellor I understand,” Wolffe continued, “But General Skywalker?”

Rex shrugged again, “He’s more concerned with action, less so politics. Doesn’t like to get involved on the administrative level aside from the fight.”

Wolffe scoffed, “Sounds like a shit general.”

Rex smiled wryly, “He does alright. General Kenobi’s been helping.”

Wolffe rolled his eyes, “The 212th can’t be expected to step in everytime Skywalker throws a hissy fit over paperwork.”

“They don’t,” Rex said, a somewhat bitter smile on his face, “I do.”

Wolffe grunted but let the subject be for the time being. 

Fox turned to face Rex, “Skywalker visits Palpatine often.”

Rex nodded. 

“What’s that relationship like?” Fox asked, looking at Rex with a strange light in his eyes. 

Rex took another sip before answering, “I’m not sure. I get the feeling it’s complicated between him, Kenobi, and Palpatine. Everytime Kenobi and Palpatine interact I feel like they’re about to start brawling.”

“But Skywalker,” Fox pushed, “What’s his thoughts on it?”

“I guess he’s fine with it,” Rex said, “I mean, he wouldn’t be going to see him so often if it wasn’t.”

“And you?” Fox asked, “How does he treat you?”

Rex narrowed his eyes as he looked at Fox, “Why?”

Wolffe spoke up, “He’s a paranoid bastard, just answer him.”

Rex glared at Wolffe before turning back to Fox, “He’s fine. It’s fine. We get along well and the Commander and I are on good terms.”

Fox’s shoulders, which Rex had not realized were previously tensed, relaxed, “Good. Glad to hear it.”

Fox’s comm chimed. He looked down to read over the message before excusing himself to go retrieve Bly from the lobby. Rex watching him go, an alarm bell going off in the back of his head.

“Is he okay?” Rex asked Wolffe once the door closed. 

Wolffe stared after Fox, an unsettling look on his face. It was times like this that Rex was reminded of how close Wolffe and Fox were. If Rex noticed something was off, Wolffe certainly had as well. 

“He’s fine,” Wolffe said, something like steel in his tone, “As fine as the rest of us.”

Rex hid his wince. He supposed that was fair enough. Like he said, Cody and Fox had always understood each other on a different level.

“You?” Wolffe asked after a moment of silence. Rex looked at him, confusion written clearly across his face. Wolffe sighed, “How are you doing?”

“Oh,” Rex looked back down at his drink. He hadn’t really expected them to ask. “I’m fine.”

“Right,” Wolffe drawled, knocking back the rest of his drink. He stood and snagged the bottle from Fox’s desk, bringing it over to the couch to refill. “I won’t even pretend to believe that.”

Rex frowned as he nursed his drink, “There’s not much for me to say that you’re not already thinking.”

Wolffe scrubbed a hand over his face, “Look, kid, I’m trying to help you out here. Offer you a willow branch or whatever the saying is. You can’t be honest with the Jedi and you can’t be honest with your men so be honest with us.”

Rex bit the inside of his cheek, weighing Wolffe’s offer. He supposed that was the point of this meeting, to talk and memorialize and be honest. He rubbed his eye before saying, “He’s my big brother. My only brother, for a while there. What do you think?”

Wolffe leaned back, satisfied with his answer, “We’re your brothers too.”

“Yeah,” Rex agreed, “But you know it was different.”

“I know.”

Rex stared at the little scratches in his glass and wondered how many times Fox had pulled these out for similar situations. He wasn’t a big drinker, as far as Rex knew. He preferred to keep his head in order to better deal with senators and politicians. But these glasses told a different story. 

“I used to wonder what he saw in you,” Rex looked up at Wolffe, only to find the other’s gaze fixed on the window across from them, “What did you have that our batch couldn’t give him? Then I realized it wasn’t about giving. It never was with Cody.”

“I wondered that too,” Rex admitted softly, following Wolffe’s line of sight to the Jedi Temple, “I still think he just felt bad for me.”

Wolffe laughed sharply, “Probably. At least, initially. But he liked you enough to keep it going.”

Rex felt his mouth lift slightly into a smile, “I’m better for it.”

Wolffe hummed in agreement and they fell into a comfortable silence. It was easier now that he had other people that knew Cody. That weren’t just eyeing him like they were waiting for him to snap. He wasn’t going to snap, largely because he already had, and the constant handling had been getting on his nerves more than he realized. 

He’d gone down the night he got the news and whaled on a punching bag. He made it back to his quarters with bloody knuckles before collapsing and sobbing on the floor, crying for Cody like a child. He’d been ashamed of it the next morning, the physical evidence of a break that he shouldn’t have had blatant under the fluorescent light. He’d applied bacta from the stash in his room and slid on his gloves, hiding the winces that came everytime he flexed his fingers and raw skin rubbed up against the material. 

He looked at Wolffe from the corner of his eye, wondering what his reaction had been after they hung up the call. Bly Fox and Wolffe had answered with varying degrees of annoyance before seeing the look on Rex’s face. He was pretty sure Fox knew before he said anything, but Bly and Wolffe had both been caught off guard. 

Fox listened, offered his condolences, and hung up. None of them held it against him. Sometimes that was just the way Fox was. 

Bly and Wolffe stayed on the call, wanting to hear the how, when, and why. Bly shut down pretty quickly, compartmentalizing as fast as he could. Rex couldn’t blame him, that was his initial reaction as well. He’d told Obi-Wan thank you and assured Anakin he’d be fine before abruptly ending the call on them. 

Wolffe looked angry. He looked angry and scared and Rex knew from dealing with others that was not a good combination. He’d heard a knock on the door just before Wolffe hung up, suspecting it to be his general. Rex didn’t bother following up on that, figured either it was or it wasn’t and no matter which it was it wasn’t his business. 

“I keep thinking I see him,” Wolffe admitted to the silence of the room, “Now that the 212th has landed it’s like he’s everywhere.”

Rex winced, remembering his own reaction. The flashes of orange and yellow filling the bunkhouse, each one a reminder, a possibility, a failure. 

“It’s hard to move on like this,” Rex agreed, “When we all look like him. Talk like him.”

Wolffe snorted, “No one talks like him, not since Kenobi got his hands on him. Cody learned a bunch of big words and used it to sound like the smartest guy in the room.”

Rex dipped his head to hide his smile, “He’s always been competitive.”

“You’re telling me,” Wolffe grumbled into his drink, “You didn’t meet him before he developed a conscience.”

The door slid open, revealing Fox and Bly on the other side. Rex gave Bly a weak smile, he returned it with about the same level of enthusiasm. Rex let the greetings fade into the background, choosing instead to top off his drink as Bly settled in next to him. Rex poured another drink for Bly and handed it off, just trying to keep himself busy. 

“What did you two talk about while I was gone?” The question drew Rex back into the conversation. He looked up at Fox, who’d taken off his helmet again, before looking at Wolffe.

“What do you think?” Wolffe drawled, unbuckling his vambraces now that everyone was there.

Fox sighed and claimed a spot on the floor, leaning against his desk for support, “Just wondering. Maybe you finally met someone desperate enough to give you a shot, I don’t know.”

“Fuck you,” Wolffe sneered, “I’m a real treasure I’ll have you know.”

Fox rolled his eyes and turned his attention to his drink, apparently not feeling like putting up much of a fight. Rex was glad for it. 

The room fell uncomfortably silent, all of them looking at each other and thinking the same thing. 

It was too cold in here.

They were pessimists. All except Bly, but you wouldn’t have guessed that based on outward appearance. Every single one of them lived day to day, putting one foot in front of the other, and expecting every ounce of blood that swam around their ankles. 

Cody hadn’t disbelieved that, but he’d always been different. He wasn’t - Rex wouldn’t have described him as an optimist. But he knew how to be happy. He knew how to let himself go a little bit, balance the soldier and the person with effortless grace. The rest of them had never really mastered that without having help. Usually the help was Cody. 

He was just good with people. Good at being a person. Good at being something other than what he was engineered to be. Cody was the closest to ‘human’ most of them would ever get. 

Now, sitting in this cold office holding a glass of moonshine and staring at men that he’s suddenly not sure he’s ever really known, Rex felt like Cody was further away than ever. 

Bly cleared his throat, raising his glass, “To Kote. May he march on under the light of the Manda, guided forever by his wit and warrior’s heart.”

They drank, the swill burning more than Rex remembered from the past few sips. The silence returned, heavy and oppressive. Rex’s chest felt heavy, like a weight had been placed upon him since Obi-Wan first called him and now it threatened to suffocate him. 

“How’d you find out?” It took Rex a moment to realize Bly was addressing him. He looked up, reading an innocent curiosity on Bly’s face. “I assume Skywalker told you?”

Rex shook his head, “Kenobi.”

Bly sucked in a breath and nudged his shoulder in sympathy, “How soon after?”

Rex shrugged, his gaze going to the opposite wall, “About three hours.”

“How’d he break it to you?” Wolffe asked, stretching an arm out over the back of the couch.

Rex gripped his glass a little tighter, looking back down at it, “As best as he could. He asked me to pass the news along to you three before he filed the report.”

“Thank you,” Bly said, “I know it was a tough call.”

Rex ducked his head, not trusting the way his throat had begun to close up. The last thing he wanted to do here was cry. 

“Alright,” Fox drawled, “Enough of the downer stuff. If he’s going to die on us the least we can do is rip him to shreds at his own wake.”

Rex huffed a laugh while Wolffe sent a sharp grin Fox’s way. Bly rolled his eyes but a small smile played at his lips. It was unconventional, and not the way Cody would’ve broached the subject, but it worked. 

“Anyone got any pact stories?” Wolffe asked with a sly smile.

Pact stories were unique to this batch as far as Rex could tell. Instances or happenings from their training or later careers that were sworn to be kept between two members until one of them died. Cody and Rex had a few of their own, a few secrets and adventures that they both swore up and down they would never voice unless the other was dead and gone. It was funny, Rex had never thought he’d be the one telling them.

“He had a crush on Shaak-Ti,” Bly said proudly, cutting off Fox who’d opened his mouth to speak. “Remember when she came to see the commanders off? He gave her his comm code.”

Rex bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing. He had remembered Cody pulling the Jedi aside to speak with her, but it looked like a serious conversation so he hadn’t asked. 

“We only knew Shaak-Ti for a month before being shipped out!” Wolffe said incredulously, “He’s an idiot.”

Bly smiled toothily, leaning back now that his bit was done. Fox sat up with a sparkle in his eye, his expression spelling nothing but trouble. 

“Do you guys remember the weapons ring on Kamino? The one the Cuy’val Dar set up that the Kaminoans pretend didn’t exist?”

Rex did indeed remember it. A lot of the Cuy’val Dar were bounty hunters at one point or at least followed Mandalorian traditions. They complained about Kamino’s mass manufactured weapons, calling them cheap and useless. Rex wasn’t sure where it started, but one day he remembered seeing trainers walking around with shiny new blasters, bo staffs, and vibroblades. 

“Well,” Fox grinned into his cup, “Cody found where they kept the weapons. He didn’t tell me until about a week after, during the sleep deprivation training.”

Rex remembered how much Cody hated that training. He was incredibly physically and mentally strong, but the man had a thing about sleep. He hated missing out on it, going so far as to nap in active warzones when he could if he’d missed his baseline minimum hours the night before. 

“We sabotaged them,” Fox’s face morphed into one of malicious glee, one they were all intimately familiar with but hadn’t seen much recently, “Did just enough damage that nothing worked but they couldn’t prove anything without going to the Kaminoans for help. And the Kaminoans only turned a blind eye because no one talked about it. They had to buy the whole shipment over again.”

Wolffe whistled, mirth in his eyes as well. It was expensive getting things shipped out to Kamino, even more so when you’re paying for discretion. It was a good move on Fox and Cody’s part. Rex would’ve given anything to see the look in the Cuy’val Dar’s eyes when they saw what happened. 

Rex finished his drink and reached for the bottle as Wolffe took his turn to speak, “One time he kidnapped a padawan.”

Bly started coughing, his face turning red as he pounded his chest while Rex and Fox stared at Wolffe. 

“He did what?”

Wolffe grinned, smug as you please, now that he had everyone’s attention, “We were at 79s together, Fox had a meeting and everyone else was on a campaign or mission, and we ended up pretty much blacking out. Cut to the next morning, I’m laying in my bunk with the worst headache known to man and the first thing I see is my general standing over me very firmly asking where the padawan is. I had no clue what they were talking about, so I pointed them to Cody.”

Wolffe paused to take a swig while Rex took a second to muse over that mental image. He wasn’t sure what he’d do if Skywalker woke him up by looming over his bed frame after a night out. Probably yell for Ahsoka. 

“Well turns out they can’t find Cody,” Wolffe continued, the rest all leaning in, “And one of my boys told them that we’d been together. So we went to the Temple and pulled up security footage from the night before and there’s Cody, cooing over this little red head human who was about a third of his size. The poor kid was crying and it looked like Cody was trying to help but it wasn’t really working. Anyway, we followed the cameras and realized the padawan had led Cody out. Poor bastard was too drunk to know what was going on.”

Rex snorted, imagining a wobbly Cody being led by a little kid with a snotty nose and big eyes. It was the kind of routine that Rex can absolutely imagine working on his brother. 

“I went back to the bunks to wait and eventually Cody comes back a few hours later looking like hell. I asked him what happened and he just went,” Wolffe pulled himself upright to a proper soldier’s posture and puffed out his chest a little more than necessary, “That’s classified. You’ll have to ask Commander Dume for the full report. So that’s what I did. Turns out the kid led him to a late night food court and he spent over one hundred credits on him.”

Bly and Fox cackled while Rex laughed and shook his head. Honestly, Rex was a little impressed by the kid. He had guts, that’s for sure. 

“Anyway, Kenobi paid him back for everything but I swear Cody hid from that kid everytime he saw him afterward.”

“Isn’t that General Billaba’s padawan?” Bly asked, still laughing a little. Wolffe nodded in confirmation and Bly’s laughter picked up again as he pulled up his comm. “I have got to tell Grey about this.”

Rex chewed on the inside of his lip, wanting to tell his story but also unsure. He wanted to keep at least a part of Cody for himself. 

But the other three were looking at him and Rex was reminded that for as much as he was grieving, so were they. Cody might’ve been special to him, but his brother had a lot of people on his side. They’d shared willingly, it would be selfish of him not to.

“He tried to distract a Seppie senator by flirting with him,” Rex said quickly, automatically uncomfortable with the way everyone’s head turned his way. “We were on a diplomatic mission and the Jedi were getting up to something or other.” It had been on Mandalore, actually. He was pretty sure Obi-Wan and Satine had been fooling around and it was Cody’s way of getting petty revenge during a very important political ceasefire. 

“Skywalker asked us to keep the guards busy so I made up a story about needing help about something or other, but we ran into a senator on the way over. So Cody, in his full kit, decides the best way to distract him from asking too many questions was to flirt with him.” Rex smiled a little bit, remembering how horribly embarrassed he’d been in that moment watching everything happen. “As you can imagine, it didn’t go well.”

Wolffe’s laugh was practically a bark as he said, “What you mean the officer of the GAR flirting with a Separatist senator didn’t go over smoothly?”

Rex shook his head, “Well, the issue was that he started flirting back.”

Fox seemed to catch on, his jaw dropping slightly and a shocked look flitting across his face, “Please tell me he didn’t actually…”

Rex bit his lip but gave a tiny nod. A chorus of yells echoed from the other three before Rex intervened, “It didn’t get far! Cody made up an excuse and left and swore me to secrecy and that was that.”

Fox and Wolffe looked at each other, surprise still written on their faces. Bly finished his drink and grabbed another while Rex grinned. 

“That’s…” Bly sighed into his cup, looking disappointed, “Actually yeah that sounds like him.”

Rex laughed, his head starting to feel a little fuzzy. It was a good buzz, the atmosphere having lightened significantly now that they were more focused on happier things. He settled into the couch, cradling his glass close to him. Maybe Cody wasn’t here, and maybe he was. Maybe he could keep him alive and with him, just for one more night. 

—

Rex did not make it back in time for dinner. He’d answered Fives’ call drunk off his ass and assured him he was getting a walk back to the GAR complex and then stayed for about five more hours, drinking and talking and laughing for the first time in days. 

Eventually, he had to go. The 501st was taking off the day after next and Rex would be needed to oversee the usual pre-takeoff duties. That and Fives had gotten Kix on his case as well and he really didn’t want them to physically drag him away. That would put a damper on the night. 

Rex sighed as he left the Guard compound, his escort for the night graciously allowing him to lean against him. He stood at the doors, feeling the rare Coruscanti wind on his face and the cool night air hit him. It helped sober him a little, get rid of some of his haze. 

“Ready to go sir?” His escort, a kid named Rune, asked.

He nodded, moving to put on his helmet before deciding against it. On the off chance he had to throw up before he could reach a fresher he really didn’t want to have to clean it out of his helmet. 

They walked in silence for a bit, passing through the large stone structures that marked the entrance to this place. Rex didn’t get how Fox could stand being here. Everything was so enclosed, so ominous, so statuesque. It was too perfect, like someone was trying too hard to cover up something ugly. 

Rex’s eyes drifted to the Geonosis memorial, as they always did. The names and numbers of every clone and Jedi that died during the battle were engraved on that stone, a mass etching that spoke of death, sacrifice, and war. 

He had a batcher that died during the fight. He’d been surprised to be so upset over it, especially considering the distance that he himself created between them. But it had been there nonetheless, a little ball of grief that sat just behind his ribs. He wondered if he could find his number on the stone. He hadn’t lived long enough to earn a name.

Rex slowed in front of the memorial, searching for…something. He wasn’t sure what. 

“Captain?”

Rex turned his head to the side at the quiet call. It sounded small and shaky.

It didn’t sound like it belonged to Obi-Wan Kenobi.

“General,” Rex said, doing his best not to slur. He remembered a second too late that he was supposed to salute the man, but Kenobi waved away the motion before Rex could complete it. He looked awful. There were bags under his eyes, his normally perfectly styled hair was greasy and unkempt, and he smelled like he’d spent a week in a brewery in the Outer Rim. 

“Rex,” Kenobi said. Rex waited for him to elaborate, but he didn’t, just stared at Rex with sad, sad eyes and an expression of despair. 

“It’s me,” Rex confirmed, walking closer to the other man, “I was seeing a friend.”

Kenobi nodded, his eyes going back to the wall in front of them. It was odd. Rex didn’t think anyone but clones ever bothered to look at this.

“Are you alright sir?” Rex asked, turning to face the wall as well. 

“Please don’t call me that,” Kenobi whispered, his face scrunching up like he’d gotten a taste of something sour, “I don’t - I’m not that right now.”

Rex furrowed his brow, not sure what he was referring to. Oh well. He’d figure it out later. He was too tired and too drunk for that right now.

“But are you?” Rex pressed, the giddiness from his evening beginning to vanish.

Kenobi laughed, a wet, hopeless sound that grated on Rex’s ears, “Are you?”

Rex shrugged, “I don’t know.” It was the truth. He didn’t know how he felt. His mood had been switching too quickly for even him to keep up. 

Kenobi made another painful noise but didn’t answer. Rex shifted, looking back at Rune who was staying a respectful distance away. He didn’t want to waste too much of his time. 

“It wasn’t your fault,” the words were falling out of Rex’s mouth before he could stop them. He knew Kenobi probably blamed himself, knew Wolffe and Fox and Bly all did too. But they didn’t see what Rex saw. Kenobi would’ve done anything for Cody, including jumping in front of that blaster for him. He would’ve done it, if he were able.

Kenobi didn’t respond but his eyes shone in the ever-present light of the planet. Rex wasn’t used to such a blatant display of vulnerability from the other man. Kenobi was always snappy, witty, ducking and dodging through conversations as artfully as he did battles. 

Kenobi sucked in a ragged breath before saying, “We made plans. For after the war.”

Rex tried not to feel jealous about that. Tried not to think about the plans he and Cody had made so long ago, worlds away from this one, back when they had chubby cheeks and missing teeth, whispering under the blankets after curfew. 

“What plans?” Rex croaked. Kenobi needed an outlet, as Rex had earlier. He could do that for him. For Cody’s sake. 

Kenobi hummed, gathering his thoughts. Rex turned back to Rune and jerked his head back toward the complex. The younger hesitated, but Rex gave him a reassuring look and purposefully pointed at Kenobi. Rune nodded after a second and turned, pulling up his comm, likely to contact Fox and let him know what happened. 

“I wanted to take him to Kashyyyk,” Kenobi whispered, pulling Rex’s focus back, “He always loved the forests the most.”

Rex thought about that for a moment. Cody and Kenobi, away from the Jedi and the GAR, pulling each other headfirst into a new adventure every day, waking up to the sounds of birdsong and sun on their faces. 

It sounded like the kind of life Cody would’ve liked. 

Rex told him so and Kenobi smiled weakly, “I would’ve followed wherever he wanted to go.”

Rex’s eyes burned abruptly, the emotion he’d been trying to avoid so fiercely surfacing now. He blinked rapidly, trying to clear his vision and realizing too late Kenobi was still speaking. 

“-you all the time,” Kenobi’s eyes scanned the stone, taking in the many many casualties they’d suffered, “He loved you more than anything.”

It felt like all the air had been punched out of Rex’s chest. He didn’t want to hear that, not from the man that Cody had spent long hours pining over and making plans for every chance he got. He didn’t want to hear that from the man that was supposed to be Cody’s everything.

“Did he ever tell you?” Rex asked weakly, knowing the answer to his question. Still, he looked at Kenobi, just in case.

“No,” Kenobi said softly, a tear slipping down his face, “But I knew. We both knew.”

And that - that felt like getting hit by a freighter. Cody had known all this time. He’d known and still he’d held himself back, refused to allow himself even one small pleasure while lives were at risk. 

Rex wished his brother was a selfish man. He wished with all his might that Cody had been a little more cowardly, a little more covetous, a little less heroic. He wished Cody would’ve taken something for himself for once.

Rex ignored the hot tears beginning to spill down his face, looking stubbornly at the memorial in front of him, “He’s an idiot then.”

Kenobi huffed, “It would’ve been futile. It wouldn’t have changed anything. He’d still be dead.”

Rex looked at the Jedi, for the first time wondering how they grieved. The one time he’d seen Anakin do it was probably the most terrifying few days of his life. Things had been bad aboard the venator. He’d been angry and twitchy, yelling and snapping like a feral dog. Rex had stepped in between him and Ahsoka at one point, telling him to back off before he did some real damage. The look in his eyes that followed haunted Rex for weeks after. It was the first time he’d ever been truly afraid of his general.

Rex looked at the man in front of him and wondered if he loved anyone enough to be reduced to nothing like that. Wondered if the effect he had on Anakin went both ways. 

“He was a good man,” Kenobi said quietly, tears flowing down his face as well, “A very good man.”

Rex clenched his jaw. He didn’t want Cody to be a good man. He wanted Cody to be here. He wanted, so stupidly and so desperately, for Cody to be here to tease him for crying over him. He wanted Cody to be here to banish the crushing loneliness that was coming back over the course of this conversation. He wanted Cody to be here because Cody knew him, and Rex wasn’t sure anyone else ever would. 

He was a captain to his men, a soldier to his superiors, a brother-in-arms to Torrent, and a little brother to none. 

“He was my brother,” was all Rex could say in response. 

“I owe you an apology,” Kenobi said after a moment, “I believe I asked you to step into his shoes far too quickly.”

Rex tried his best to keep his shrug nonchalant, less like the flinch it truly was, “It’s alright.”

Kenobi shook his head, finally turning to look at Rex, “We both know why I really asked.”

Rex grimaced. He’d had a feeling, but no confirmation. Rex was the closest thing to Cody. The next best person. They had similar attitudes and stances. They had the same sense of humor and the same sense of severity when shit hit the fan. 

He and Cody had the same sense of humanity, despite their upbringing. He would’ve been Cody’s replacement, not a commander in his own right. It was, after all, half the reason Rex refused.

“I know,” Rex said softly, drumming his fingers on his helmet. His thoughts were slow and syrupy, filtering too much and not enough. “Maybe in a few months. If the position isn’t filled.” 

Kenobi shook his head again, “I don’t want to hold you to that. You’re happy with the 501st. Cody always seemed to think so.”

Rex’s lower lip trembled. He was. He really, truly was happy with them. Fives, Jesse, Kix, the whole bunch. He was a brother and a captain in one, there to lead them down the right path and it was good. It was fun. It was more than he ever thought he’d get out of this shitty life.

It didn’t mean he didn’t miss Cody with his whole being. 

Before Anakin split off to form the 501st, when Rex was in the 212th and working under Cody, it had been so easy. Their dynamic barely changed as Cody remained in the lead and Rex remained staunch in his resolve to follow him wherever he went. They’d worked well together and at the end of the day they could still share meals, swap stories, and be brothers. They were still Rex and Cody. 

“I am,” Rex said in lieu of all that, “An - Skywalker is a good leader.”

Kenobi smiled, but something was off. Painful looking. “I’m glad.”

They sat in silence together for a few more minutes, both discreetly wiping their faces. A few guards passed them by but no one came up to interrupt them. No one dared pull a Jedi away, especially not at this time of night. 

“I should let you go,” Kenobi said. It was almost like watching an illusory trick in real life, the way he slowly collected himself until he looked more like General Kenobi, and less like Obi-Wan. 

Rex nodded slowly, still drunk despite the sobering conversation, “Fives is worried. I’ve been gone a while.”

Kenobi looked at over at Rex and then behind him into the guard compound, some semblance of understanding on his face, “I’m glad you four got to mourn.”

Rex’s face twitched. He wasn’t sure how he felt about Obi-Wan knowing that’s what he was doing and where he was coming from. It made sense that he knew, given Ponds’ death and Cody’s own occasional disappearances in there to go see Fox, but still. It felt odd. Like an intrusion.

Rex didn’t say any of that, instead giving Kenobi a short nod and doing his best not to wobble too much as he walked away. He brought up his comm as he glanced back, seeing the Jedi still watching him go as the wall behind him loomed ominously. It felt symbolic, important in a way Rex didn’t yet understand. The vision of Kenobi, defeated and beat down, in front of a wall of dead clone names…maybe if he was more sober he could’ve added something to that. Bly and Ponds would’ve known. 

“Fives?” Rex croaked into his comm, his voice worn from various conversations and tears, “You available for a pick-up?”

Rex heard Fives sigh into the comm, “Always Rex. How bad are you?”

Rex shrugged, forgetting that Fives couldn’t see. After an awkward moment of silence, Fives grumbled something about drunk brothers and Rex could hear him going for his boots, “Where exactly am I finding you?”

“Guard complex.”

“Jesus Rex.”

“Not like that,” Rex muttered, “Was just visiting.”

“Oh,” there was a small pause on the other end, “Oh. Fox.”

“And Wolffe and Bly,” Rex admitted, looking around for a place to sit. He really wanted to sit. “It was good.”

There was another small pause before Fives answered, sounding a little strange, “I’m glad. Support is important.”

“Yeah,” Rex hummed, “Maybe. Wasn’t about that.”

“No?”

Some part of Rex registered Fives was just keeping him talking. Another part of Rex didn’t actually care. 

“No,” he said quietly, “Just remembering.”

Fives made a noise like he understood. Rex turned around to see Kenobi gone from the memorial. Briefly, something in his chest pinched and pulled tight. He hadn’t taken into account that Kenobi was also one of the last threads to Cody he had left. 

“Rex? You okay?”

“Hm?” Rex’s attention was half-focused on Fives, half-scanning for Kenobi, “Yeah. Of course.” And then, because for some reason he couldn’t keep his mouth shut, ���Ran into Kenobi.”

He heard the soft whoosh of the doors to the GAR barracks, knowing Fives was probably on his way, “Yeah? What’d he say?”

Rex shrugged, new tears welling up in his eyes. He tried to choke them down as he spoke, “What I expected. He loved Cody, Cody was a good man, I’ve got a job offer if I want it.”

There was a sharp intake of breath on the other line before a little half-scared, “What?” made it out of Fives.

Rex scrubbed his eyes. He hadn’t told anyone about it the first time around. “Cody’s position. If I wanted it.”

“Oh,” Fives sounded small all of a sudden. Unsteady. “Do you?”

Rex hummed, “I don’t know.”

“Oh.”

They sat in silence for a little bit, the various sounds of the street filtering through both sides of the comm. Rex found a seat on a bench not too far away, eyeing civilians passing by in case they tried anything stupid. 

“I want you to stay here,” Fives finally said. “I know you and Cody -”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Rex said, cutting Fives off before he could get further, “It was just an offer. We’re both drunk and…drunk. I’m not taking it.” Yet.

He heard a breath of relief from the other side and guilt twinged at him, “Good. I’m glad. We need you here, Rex.”

Rex hummed, looking up and for once wishing he was surrounded by stars. It was easy to get sick of it in deep space. It gave him a headache sometimes, staring out into an empty void that he knew would kill them all in an instant. But here on Coruscant you couldn’t see the sky, not after generations of light pollution. It made him wish to be away, to be anywhere but here.

“I don’t have a big brother anymore,” Rex said into the comm. It was more of a passing comment, something he’d been chewing on since Cody’s death. 

“I know,” Fives sounded horribly sad in his response. Rex blinked at the comm, almost wanting to see Fives’ face. He was the oldest of his batch. He’d seen his little brothers die one by one. Rex wondered what it felt like to be on that side of things.

“I’m not anyone’s vod’ika,” Rex murmured. 

“I know,” Fives repeated, quieter this time but still weighty. 

Rex wasn’t sure what else to say. His big brother was gone. Nothing could change that.

“I’ll be there soon ori’vod,” Fives said kindly with only a mild note of concern in his voice, “Then we can go home.”

Rex nodded numbly. Home would be good. He was drunk and tired and a bed sounded really nice right about now. 

“Rex?” Fives called his attention away from thoughts of sleep, “You know…you know we’re here for you right? We get it. We’ve all had someone die on us. You don’t have to do the command staff thing of hiding it away for our sake.”

Rex pinched the bridge of his nose, “I know Fives.” The words were automatic, completely hollowed out and said just for the purpose of being said. Both men knew it.

“Alright,” Fives relented anyway, “Just - don’t go anywhere without us.”

Rex nodded blearily, once again forgetting Fives couldn’t see him, “Aye aye Captain.”

Fives huffed in a poor imitation of a laugh, “Alright asshole. I’ll be there in five.”

The comm clicked off in Rex’s hand. Rex looked at it, considering carefully.

He entered Cody’s comm channel, surprised to see it come up unanswered. He’d have thought they would reassign it by now. 

Leave a message here

The glowing blue words blinked up at him. Rex stared, unsure what to say. He began typing a few times only to erase his message, thoughts of officers or god forbid Kaminoans finding the message playing like a warning in his head. 

The message clicked off when Rex took too long. He scrambled to reenter the code, though this time a voice played. 

This is Marshal Commander Cody speaking. Leave me a message or send me a comm and I will respond as my schedule allows.

Rex wanted to laugh. Of course Cody would program a voice message into his comm. Of course it would have a very pointed fuck you to everyone who thought they could walk all over him. 

He wanted to laugh but the noise that made it out of his chest was anything but happy. He gripped his pulse point over his wrist, shoving the comm back into his belt, and tried to gulp down breaths of air. 

He missed him. Gods above he missed him. He didn’t think he’d ever stop missing him. He knew the ache dulled, knew it from experience and from watching others around him, but here and now he was alone. Alone and sobbing on a bench in Coruscant, the looming specter of death behind him. A memorial, a reminder of everything Rex had lost, here to tower over him even now. 

“Rex?”

Fives. 

“Rex,” Fives sighed, putting a little more step into his walk as he made it to Rex, “Let's get you home, yeah? I think it’s time you called it a night.”

Rex nodded again, letting Fives sling his arm over his shoulder and moving forward obediently. 

“You know I love you right?” Rex asked, not looking at Fives.

“‘Course I do,” Fives responded, keeping his eyes forward as well, “Why?”

“Just need to tell you,” Rex sighed, his eyes sliding half shut, “Just in case.”

Fives’ grip on him tightened. Rex tried not to think about how soon this might be taken from him too.