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#the worst part about making skins is selling skins
owleics-fr · 17 days
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I do kinda worry sometimes, like seeing people get into skin making and getting excited about it and then they go to try and sell it and maybe get little to no interest and i kinda wanna just say! Like its pretty much like that for every single person who has tried skin making. Your first attempt is kinda gonna flop, what you think is super cool and amazing other people might not. Its just how Selling Art works unfortunately.
And its not my intention to discourage people from trying it but if youre making a skin purely so other people will buy it. Dont. It wont end well i promise you. Make something because you enjoy it, make it for you!! If other people also happen to like it and want it then thats fantastic! But making art should always be about what you want with little consideration to making money off a wider audience.
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bet-on-me-13 · 1 year
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Misunderstandings really really suck
Edit: Part 2 is Up
So heres the deal, it's a normal Vivisection AU where Danny had to run away to Gotham after his parents try to kill him, and let's say that he takes Ellie with him too.
They stay there for a few years and after a while they manage to establish a little life for themselves. Danny is running a small Shop that makes them enough money to live comfortably in the apartment right above his Shop, meanwhile Ellie is going to Gotham Metro Academy on a scholarship because she is really smart and they managed to fake some school records for her when they were making themselves new Identities.
(Side Note: Danny is now 26, while Ellie hasn't started aging yet and still looks 12, but she will begin to soon since she just hit her 12th birthday)
Danny also runs a small Ghost Shop out of his store, just selling small bits of Distilled Ectoplasm or Ecto-Infused Treats to the local Ghosts in return for small favors or help around the shop.
But here's the thing. Ellie is still an unstable Clone, even if they did managed to find a reliable treatment in the form of Ecto-Dejecto. But Danny's parents were the only ones who knew how to make that stuff, and the Ecto-Dejecto they stole all those years ago is beginning to run out.
Danny begins to work tirelessly trying to replicate it, diving full on into his Mad Scientist side to try and find a way to make more ED for Ellie. He manages to make some prototypes, but he is nowhere near confident that they are good enough.
He decides to call in some favors from the local Ghosts. He calls the ones he is confident will survive this and asks them to try out his Ecto Dejecto to see if it will work for Ellie, but he does warn them that there will probably be unexpected side effects that they will probably not like.
The Ghosts agree to do it, because in the years that the Fenton's have lived there they have grown extremely attached to Ellie. She is like a little sister or daughter for many of them, they would throw away their afterlives if it meant helping her.
For most of the samples, the ED doesn't work at all. Some of them work for a single moment before cutting out, others don't do anything, and some have crazy effects that affect them for a little while before disappearing abruptly. One guy turned into a Dog, not the worst outcome but not the intended one. Another began to glow brightly and couldn't turn it off, that one lasted for an hour.
They keep testing them, out in the nearby Alley since they don't want to destroy the house or Danny's makeshift Lab, for a few weeks.
They problem comes when they are spotted one night by Red Hood.
...
Jason was crossing the Rooftops while on Patrol. He was going a little farther than his normal patrol range, since he had the time and he wanted to make sure there was no trouble in the nearby areas either.
As he was about to hop from one rooftop to another, he got a weird feeling. It was strange, he didn't feel anything on his skin, he didn't smell anything, he didn't even hear anything, but he somehow knew that there was something strange happening in the nearby Alley. It was like he could sense it.
Peeking over the edge of the rooftop, he saw a group of about 10 people. It was a bunch of strange looking people with green-ish skin, and one normal looking person. The normal looking one was wearing a lab coat, and seemed to be about 25 yrs old. Jason felt like there was something off about that guy, but he couldn't place exactly what. He was holding a box of something in his hand, and talking to the group.
"Ok guys, I'm really confident this time!" He said, "I think one of these may be the one!"
The man placed the box on a nearby Dumpster and opened it up, taking out a strange glowing green Vial. He handed it to one of the Greenish people and watched as they injected themselves with it.
Jason watched as they began to glow slightly before their arms suddenly grew to be longer than they were tall. The Man in the Lab Coat sighed in discontent, before saying "Ok, not that one. But we still have a few to try out!"
Jason watched as one by one the people below injected themselves with the green Liquid, each of them having some strange phenomenon happen to them before moving on to the next. The strange thing was that none of them seemed to be concerned with the changes, just commenting on it felt before moving on.
Finally, they got to the last person in line. As they injected themselves, Jason felt a sense of Anticipation well up in his gut. He didn't know why, but he felt like this was going to he important.
He was proven right as the Man who had injected himself began to glow brightly. Jason was overwhelmed with the sense of Pure Power coming from him. It was intense, he didn't know how, but he could actually feel the man begin to grow stronger and stronger. The feeling was nearly suffocating, but he managed to regain his senses long enough to hear Lab Coat laugh maniacally. He looked over to see that the entire group was enthusiastically high-fiving and fist-bumping eachother, all cheering at the success.
"Hahaha! Yes! Finally!" Labcoat Cheered, "It's done! Once I make some more, we'll be able to-"
The overwhelming power suddenly cut out. It was so abrupt that even the people below didn't speak for some time. They all just stood on slight shock before Labcoat spoke up, "Ok...ok this is fine. All I need to do is take that formula and find a way to make the effect Permanent. After that we're all set." He said, a thoughtful expression on his face, "I think we'll be good to go within a Week!"
The group of people muttered in agreement, and Labcoat thanked them all for a bit before they all began to walk away. It seemed like the meeting was over.
Jason took a moment to collect himself, before deciding to follow some of the group so he could question them. Unfortunately, everybody he followed disappeared into thin air after a short time.
It occurred to him that he hadn't tried to intervene at all. Usually he would have jumped down and beaten them all black and blue for testing drugs right in front of him, but he didn't this time. Why? He also realized that he should have followed the Lab Coat guy first, not waited until it was his last option. Why did he not go after that guy instantly? Why did he hesitate? Was it something to do with that Ominous Feeling that led him to the meeting in the first place? There was just something about the guy that made Jason feel inexplicably sacred of him.
Either way, he needed to tell the others.
Because from what he had seen, a Mad Scientist had been working with a group of Metahumans to create a Super Soldier Drug right there in Gotham, and they needed to stop them.
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vivwritescrappythings · 6 months
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velma
eddie munson x fem!reader
You attend a Halloween party with Eddie, things don't go quite as planned when Jason Carver acts like a jerk.
cw: allusions to curvy reader, drinking, drugs, blood, violence, eddie fights off screen, body insecurities, kissing, not proofread, working on writing fluff
Word Count: 5.5k
masterlist
“Are you gonna go to Chelsea Hanover’s Halloween party?” Eddie asked, long legs hanging out the back of his van. His stained Reeboks were planted firmly on the concrete, knees pushing out of the rips in his black jeans. You sat in the parking lot of the movie theater, eating the remainder of the snacks you hadn’t finished earlier. The night was quiet, most Hawkins residents already tucked safely into their beds.
You paused midway through trying to shove a handful of popcorn into your mouth, is Eddie going insane? “Are you going to Chelsea Hanover’s Halloween party?” You were practically gawking as you swung your sock-covered feet in the crisp night air. The sneakers you wore had been abandoned in a pile on the shag carpet. 
You thought Eddie was over all the stupid high school activities at this point, with it being his third go at senior-year and all. He’d never talked about going to a party in the past six months of your budding friendship, and, in Hawkins, there were plenty of parties to attend. 
He was quiet as he took another drink from his slushie, red-stained lips turning up into a smirk. “I was thinking about going to sell. Make some money off the rich kids.” 
“What, do you want me to come entertain you?” There was an edge to your voice that you didn’t expect. Your chest felt tight as soon as he brought up the party, anxiety knitting your lungs together. You traced the cracks in the asphalt with your eyes. 
Your frustration wasn’t meant for Eddie, it rarely ever was.
You had to stop pretending that all your so-called friends from your junior year of high school weren’t because of Billy. None of them had even bothered to speak to you since he dumped you like trash last summer. And especially not since the day of his funeral. They were fake and plastic people.
Eddie chuckled, fishing his carton of cigarettes out of his jacket pocket. He didn’t seem to notice how stiff you’d become, your legs rigid in the night air. “Well, yeah. If you want. It could be a night of making fun of Hawkins’ finest.” 
You smiled weakly, trying to hide the sour mood that had come over you. Eddie just wanted a friend to be there–you knew Gareth and Jeff would say no immediately. You didn’t want to throw him to the wolves alone. Chelsea Hanover’s parties were awful if you didn’t know anyone or didn’t want to dance. Eddie didn’t seem like much of a dancer to you. “You know what, sure. Count me in, Munson.”
His pearly white teeth lit up in the glow of his lighter as he brought the cigarette to his lips, a smile radiating across his masculine features. A tendril of anxiety wrapped around your throat as you filed through worst-case-scenarios, each growing more and more catastrophic. 
Your stomach did a flip as you pushed the bucket of popcorn aside, trying to be subtle as your thoughts raced. You suddenly obsessed about how your thighs pressed together and your bra cut into the layer of excess fat in your back, all new discoveries in the past couple of months. Your mother had reminded you that being thin at eighteen would be harder than being thin at seventeen—you’d locked yourself in your bathroom to cry for the better part of your birthday after stepping on the scale.
Eddie didn’t seem to notice your turmoil, methodically chewing as though everything was fine. Of course he wouldn’t notice, he didn’t understand the intricacies of girlhood that made your skin feel too tight. You fluffed your sweater out, suddenly self-conscious about what areas of your body it was snug against. 
Robin would help you find a costume. 
The high socks squeezed just above your knees as you made your way up to the front door, red skirt swishing around the middles of your plush thighs with each step. You took a deep breath, a wave of heat and sound rolling over you as you opened the door. There were people in a variety of costumes everywhere inside. A few classmates nodded at you in acknowledgment as you shut the door and stepped into the humid living room, quickly turning their attention back to their friends. 
Where was Eddie? You did a once over of the room, scanning the edges of the dance floor for the shaggy-haired boy. The couches had all been pushed out of the way to make space for a makeshift dance floor, the stereo in the corner booming Cyndi Lauper. It was a miracle that it couldn’t be heard outside. 
The clusters of people spilled into the kitchen. There was limited space to weave through the crowd, you kept whispering apologies as you made your way to the other room. Upon entering, you were handed a cup of red punch from a boy you vaguely knew from English. You offered him a smile, a nod in his direction as you raised the cup to your lips.
You wrinkled your nose as you took a sip, it was strong. 
There were no traces of Eddie anywhere. The room was filled with Indiana Joneses and Maddonas and Ghostbusters and Flashdance characters. No curly-headed metalheads in sight, though. Eddie didn’t seem like someone who would wear a Halloween costume, not for a party he was planning on dealing at. 
You leaned against the breakfast counter lazily, watching the people on the dance floor bump into one another. The plastic cup stuck to your fingers as you gulped down the rest of the drink, grimacing at the after taste of vodka. You traced the edges of the porcelain tiles as you took up your place as a designated wallflower. 
You downed four more cups of the punch before you got restless, deciding to investigate the rest of the party before accepting defeat. Your feet shuffled in slow motion as you approached the sliding glass door on the other end of the room. It was open, allowing teens to trickle outside and spread across the dark backyard. 
The smell of cigarettes and weed wafted through the door as the autumn breeze picked it up, sparking a small flame of hope that your best friend was outside.
You tripped on the door track as you stepped into the much cooler night, steadying yourself and your sloshing drink against the doorframe before looking up. There were a few groups outside, most nursing drinks or joints or cigarettes and murmuring to one another. The music coming from the living room was so faint that you could barely make out the lyrics.
“Hey, Velma!” Your head slowly turned towards the voice, your lips buzzing as the alcohol settled in. Eddie was illuminated by the soft light diffused by the curtains in the kitchen window. He sat at a metal table with his trusty lunch box, head cocked slightly to the side as he absorbed your costume. You realized he was wearing a dark green “Corroded Coffin” t-shirt under his leather jacket and dark jeans, meaning you vaguely matched. 
If you squinted, or drank too much.
You fell into the chair next to him with an oof!, crossing your legs at the ankles as you leaned back. Your head lolled back to rest on the weathered cushion as a breathy laugh escaped your throat. “We match,” you said, looking at how the stars were swirling in the sky. Your breaths were heavy as you waited for the world to still, a smile stretching its way across your face regardless. 
“I didn’t know you were gonna come in costume, princess,” Eddie laughed, busily rolling joints to keep his hands occupied. You placed the sticky plastic cup on the table before stretching your arms out in front of you. Your gaze traced the wide cable-knit of the orange sweater, wiggling your fingers as you contemplated.
Self-consciousness reared its ugly head, making you sit up and lean closer to the brunette. “Do I look bad?” you whispered, fingertips finding the edge of your skirt. Your eyes were wide as he paused to study you, a soft grin breaking out on his face. You waited for his judgment, fiddling with anything in your reach before landing on braiding a thin strip of your hair.
“You look great,” he assured. There was a beat of silence, your heads still bent together conspiratorially. Eddie looked like he was thinking, his tongue licked his bottom lip. “You should’ve told me you were gonna dress up, I would’ve done it with you.” 
“You already look like you did, Shaggy,” you murmured with a sly half smile, taking another drink as you settled back into the metal chair. Eddie grinned, glancing down at his own outfit. 
Everything got all fuzzy on the edges as you finished the red liquid in your cup, joking with Eddie between drug deals. The basketball players who came by barely looked at you, only sparing glances as Eddie overcharged them for weed. 
He didn’t notice the cold shoulders, or he at least pretended not to, making fun of their costume choices as soon as they walked away. You pretended like they didn’t bother you. It felt strange to be at one of these parties after everything that happened with Billy, you’d never felt more invisible. 
But Eddie saw you, his brown eyes drifting to you more often than usual. You couldn’t tell if it was just because he was worried about how much you were drinking. You found yourself liking the way he talked, hands waving wildly as his voice slid into different impersonations of the people around you. He was always so genuinely Eddie, you wondered what it would feel like to be like that.
“I’m gonna grab another drink,” you said as Eddie’s attention was pulled away by a group of juniors with wide eyes and crumpled dollar bills. He gave you a thumbs up as he rifled through the contents of his stash. 
You swayed a bit as you stood, your grip on the plastic cup crumpling it slightly. The juniors eyed you as you walked around the edge of their little group, Eddie’s voice spitting out prices calling their attention back to him.  
Armed with a deep breath to ground yourself, you shouldered your way back into the house. There were even more people than before. With no room to move properly, you jammed yourself into the throng of people that were making their way to the kitchen. Despite how many people were here there was surprisingly still plenty to drink. 
You had never known Chelsea to be so generous, at least not during your short-lived friendship.
You stopped in front of the punch bowl, staring at your wobbling reflection in the liquid as you filled your cup with the ladle. Maybe it was the alcohol, but you hardly recognized yourself. The proportions of your face were so different than when you primped and prepped in the mirror, your gaze felt less harsh as you stared at the girl in the punch bowl. You could feel the heat radiating off your cheeks as you glared at the rose-colored image of yourself, wondering what you actually looked like. 
A hand clasped your shoulder, an anchor back to reality. You pivoted on your heel, thinking that Eddie had come to talk to you about something, maybe ready to leave and go find somewhere to park and talk and listen to music. 
Your face fell when you recognized Jason Carver’s blue eyes.
It had been ages since Jason had so much as talked to you. He used to follow Billy around like a puppy, hoping that it would make him the captain of the basketball team after graduation. Of course, Billy had treated Jason like the rest of you, rewarding his neediness with a cold shoulder.  
“You know, Billy would be so disappointed if he was still here.” Jason may as well have spit on you. You stepped back, your spine pressing into the chilly counter as you tried to put some space between you. His eyes had a hard time settling, staring you up and down as you tried to remain still under his gaze. “He probably wouldn’t even recognize you, especially now that you’re hanging out with the losers.”
You scowled, rage making your throat tighten. “He didn’t even like you, Jason.” Blonde eyebrows rose in surprise. “I’m sure he’s rolling in his grave knowing that the pathetic Jesus kid who would’ve blown him if he asked is in charge of the basketball team.” 
You were getting a little too loud, the people standing nearest to you were turning their heads to see what the commotion was about. Jason evaluated the crowd before grabbing your wrist, a sick smile spreading across his face. “I think you’ve had enough.” There was a threatening edge to his voice as he leaned to whisper in your ear. 
You strained against him, the punch sloshing over the edges of the cup and down your fingers. Droplets flecked onto his yellow Teen Wolf costume like blood. Panic started to creep up your throat, the reminder that none of the other people at the party were going to help you made your blood run cold.
“Jason, stop,” you muttered, your voice thick. More punch slid down your hand as you tried to tug yourself from his grip. Your heart fluttered in your chest as you attempted to find a way out. “Let me go.”
He squeezed your wrist even tighter as hot tears pricked at the corners of your eyes and rolled down your cheeks. You were sure long lines of mascara were left behind, you couldn’t even move your free hand to wipe them away. Fear paralyzed you as the pounding of the music filled every space in your mind. Your mind whirred uselessly, so caught off guard by the aggression that you hardly knew how to respond. 
A ringed hand wrapped around Jason��s forearm; you flinched at the sudden intrusion. Eddie was bristling next to you, squeezing the jock’s arm until he let you go. You pulled your wrist back to your chest, your brows knitting together as your lips fell into a pout.
The metalhead pushed his lunchbox into your stomach, his eyes dark as they scoured your face. “How about you go wait in the van, princess? The keys are inside the box,” he murmured, his expression leaving no room for protest. You hesitated a moment, causing him to jerk his chin smoothly toward the front door. His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat as he swallowed, his jaw set.
Suddenly shy, you dropped your gaze to the floor. Everything was swimming around you, the party too loud and the room too hot and your hands were so sticky with punch. You’d never felt more overwhelmed. 
Nodding once, you gripped the handle of the lunchbox for dear life as you scurried out of the house. By the time the night air hit you, you realized you were still holding the cup, most of it empty as it coated your hand and stained the skin. You choked back the rest of its contents, crumpling it in your hand and tossing it into the grass. Eddie’s van was parked across the street, looking out of place amongst the other cars.
You were almost asleep in the passenger seat by the time Eddie threw the door open, scaring you into waking up. He was obscured by the lights of the house behind him as he climbed inside. “Eddie, what happened?” you croaked as he tried to jam the keys into the ignition, his hands practically vibrating. 
You gasped as he turned to look in the center console. His right eyebrow was caked entirely with blood, a gash splitting it nearly in two. Blood was smeared in a trail down his face, following the curve of his nostril and making its way over his pale throat and to his shirt collar. He plucked a cigarette carton out of the glove box, the streetlamp illuminating the smears of blood across his pale fingers. His knuckles were blown apart. 
“Eddie,” you murmured, reaching across the center console hesitantly. He still didn’t look at you, rummaging around for his zippo. The house beyond was relatively quiet, no signs of a party other than all the cars parked along the sidewalk. Jason walked into view of the upstairs bathroom window, glaring at the van before pulling down the shade. His face was smeared with blood, his costume ruffled.
The chains on Eddie’s jacket sleeve jingled as he lit the cigarette, taking a drag with a sigh. “Eddie.” You hesitated for a moment before you pressed your palm into the worn leather. You could feel the muscles in his shoulder jump under your fingertips–you rarely ever touched him. It just felt like a boundary the two of you never crossed. “Y-you didn’t have to do that,” you said. 
The heater and the radio jumped to life, Dio blasting in the small space. Eddie’s brows furrowed as he turned to study your face. “Of course I had to,” his voice was surprisingly soft. His hand came out of nowhere, a warm thumb wiping your cheek. Your nerves must have been fried, because you leaned into his touch without thinking about it. “That idiot made you cry, couldn’t just let him get away with it.”
You pulled in a ragged breath, a bit surprised by the amount of tenderness in his voice. His hand was so warm, his fingers wiping away the lines of makeup that ran down your cheeks when you cried. Shaking fingers brought the cigarette back to his pink lips, you watched him take a drag and blow the smoke out of the corner of his mouth. 
“Can we go?” you whispered, your voice hoarse as your throat tightened. It was all you could do to keep from crying, you didn’t even know why you wanted to cry this time.
He smiled, nodding as he pulled away from the curb like a maniac. His hand dropped from your face, turning the radio up until the heavy sound of a guitar riff was blasting through the speakers.
Apparently it was Wayne’s night off, so the trailer was off-limits for a late night sanctuary. That was how you ended up at the quarry, the side door pulled open as you and Eddie sprawled out in the back of the van. You’d guzzled a bottle of water as soon as you parked, already starting to feel like a bit of a human being again.
Eddie had cleaned up his face with the bandana he kept in his back pocket. The gash in his eyebrow looked painful, but he kept assuring you it was fine. He sat against the wall of the van as he wiped his knuckles, the largest one on his right hand slightly torn.
It was like once you all had crossed the barrier of touch, Eddie didn’t want to stop. He just kept touching you, be it a hand brushing against your arm or his leg jostling yours. It felt shockingly comfortable, making you wonder why you had been so resistant to touching him before. 
“Those rings must not have felt nice,” you commented absentmindedly, laying on your stomach on the carpet as you watched him. Moonlight flooded in the van through the open door, glinting off the silver that adorned his fingers.
He smiled, flexing his hands as he looked down at them. “Carver didn’t seem too excited about them,” he murmured, glancing at you out of the corner of his eye. 
You’d cleaned most of the makeup off your face on the drive to the quarry using a baby wipe you kept in your purse. He hardly ever saw you with a clean face, the moonlight revealing a few blemishes on your skin. The urge to cover your cheeks still lingered, but it felt nice to have it off.
“Thanks for like, defending my honor and stuff,” you murmured, looking down at your chipped nail polish. “You really didn’t have to do that, Eddie.”
The idea that he would go out of his way to fight Jason Carver on your behalf was still hard for you to wrap your head around. Eddie loved to talk and bitch and complain about the basketball team and larger society regularly, but he wasn’t violent. 
“I did.” His eyes searched yours, wide and honest as always. A joint found its way between his long fingers, he took a deep drag. You watched him through heavy eyelids as he exhaled a thick cloud of smoke, he continued until he’d finished nearly half the joint. “I couldn’t just let him mess with you like that, not my girl.” 
My girl. My girl. My girl. The phrase went off in your head like a bell. You didn’t know if he’d said it just because he was high or if he actually meant it like that. You wet your lips with your tongue, glancing at him for a moment.
“Well, thanks,” you breathed, twirling your fingers in a loose thread on one of the weaved blankets he kept in the back of the van. You had wrapped yourself in it on multiple occasions, mostly on cold nights when you were ungodly high. But tonight, alcohol thrummed through you like liquid fire.
Eddie finished the remainder of the joint on his own, his warm brown eyes tinged with pink as his smile stretched easier. There was a fluidity to him when he was stoned, his normally theatrical mannerisms mellowing out to something that seemed less like a performance and more genuine. His movements became more languid, his lanky form sprawling out on a half-deflated bean bag. His calf rested on top of your leg.
The cassette that was playing ended, the power chords fading into silence as you heard the player whir to a stop. The water lapping at the cliff face below and the breeze rustling the foliage outside the van seemed louder, indicative of the transition from fall to winter that was soon to come.
“You want to pick the next one?” Eddie asked, his voice soft and breathy like it always got when he was stoned. It was sweet of him to ask, considering you knew that he already had a playlist of what he wanted to put on next written out in his head. He was particular about music, always wanting to be in-control of what was playing no matter where you were. 
You knew he meant for you to pick from his cassette collection.
“Yeah,” you answered, a smirk starting to spread on your face. You stood up, your feet digging into the shag carpet as you crouched to avoid hitting your head. “I’ve got a Madonna tape in my purse that I’ve been wanting to listen to.” 
“Madonna?” You could hear the anguish in his voice as you stepped over his long legs to reach the front. There was an air of disbelief at your choice, Eddie couldn’t stand Madonna.
You laughed, nodding as you pulled the aforementioned tape from your bag and flashing it to Eddie. “You said I could pick,” you teased, hunkering down in front of the radio to exchange the cassettes. Stunned silence filled the space behind you as you waited for the Dio tape to be spit out, you tapped the Madonna cassette against your kneecap.
What at first was silence burst into a flurry of motion behind you.
Before you could react, Eddie’s hands locked around your waist from behind and elicited a squeal from your throat as he yanked you back. “I’m not listening to Madonna,” he said, twisting his body around yours to try to snatch the tape from your hand. 
You scrambled, holding the cassette out of his reach and angling your shoulders to keep him away. “Eddie! You said I could pick!” you exclaimed with a peal of laughter, feeling the length of his body pressed against the back of yours. He pulled you close with a forearm curled around your waist, reaching over your shoulder. 
“Yeah, you can pick from good music!” His chin bumped the top of your head as you both fell forward from losing your balance. The floor absorbed most of the impact, Eddie’s shoulder banging into the floorboards next to you. You let out a soft grunt as Eddie landed partially on top of you, pressing you into the carpet. 
“This is good music,” you insisted, digging your elbow and knees into the thick carpet so you could shimmy forward. Eddie slammed an elbow in front of your shoulder, stopping any forward movement. There was no time to redirect as he melded you into his shadows, lanky limbs moving over where you were prone. His other hand curled around your wrist, so close to taking the tape. “You’re just judgmental!”
In a last ditch effort you twisted your arm from his grip, pulling your hand under your body and pressing the tape between your stomach and the rustled blanket. “You’re not being fair!” You were still giggling, Eddie stuffed his fingers between your forearm and your stomach in an attempt to follow the path of your arm. 
“It’s my van, princess,” Eddie said with a breathy laugh of his own. He lifted himself off you, letting you breathe for a moment before his hands scooped beneath your shoulders and flipped you onto your back. “I can judge however I want to.” 
You tried to push him away with your feet, matching smiles on your faces as he reached for you around the assault. With a shove your legs were out of the way, his torso settling between them with your knees on either side of his ribs. He leaned over you, managing to pry the tape from your hands and slide it into the pocket of his leather jacket. 
You still had some fight in you, reaching for Eddie’s pocket before he grabbed your wrists and pressed them to the floor. “Eddie!” you whined, squirming in an attempt to throw him off. 
He was smiling above you with all his teeth, the two of you panting as you stared at one another. The distance between you decreased, long fingers threading through yours as his head dipped lower. You were so close that you could practically count his eyelashes. Eddie scraped his teeth over  his lower lip, a clear sign that he was about to ask you something. You nodded before he could, your heart pounding in your chest as you prayed that you weren’t reading into things.
When he pressed his lips against yours you knew you guessed right.
You sighed into it, your eyes fluttering closed as your mouth moulded to his. Butterflies had made a home in your stomach, part of you wondering when you started having feelings for Eddie. Why did it take you so long to do something about them?
His mouth was so soft, slotting against yours in clumsy open-mouthed kisses. You both were smiling, giggling nervously when your teeth clashed or noses bumped. It was as though you both were clumsy and new to this, the anxiety of wanting to impress making you forget how to relax for a moment. His hair tickled your cheeks and neck, curling wildly in every direction. You desperately wanted to thread your fingers into it, your hands flexing against his.
A strong gust of wind blew dried leaves into the open door of the van, the chill cutting through your clothes making the two of you pull away from one another with laughs. Eddie tugged the door closed in a quick motion, leaning back on a bean bag and patting the side of his thigh in a motion to come over there. 
The moonlight was diffused through the windows on the sliding side doors, illuminating Eddie in a beautiful silver as you practically crawled on your hands and knees to him. You were a bit off-balance, partially falling against his chest. He chuckled, curling an arm around your back and pulling you closer with a wide hand pressed against the curve of your spine.
“Been waiting to kiss you like this for months,” Eddie murmured, his calloused fingers tracing along your cheek. You leaned into his touch, your hands resting on the soft Corroded Coffin shirt he wore. 
“Yeah?” you asked, your eyes wide as you looked at him. Part of you didn’t want to believe him, you’d thought his taste in women leaned on either far-end of the Morticia Addams to Chrissy Cunningham spectrum. Maybe you were wrong, or at least you prayed that you were. When considering the Eddie Spectrum of eligible women, you were situated somewhere near the middle.
He nodded, stamping a quick kiss to your lips. “Of course, princess,” he said, his other hand coming to rest on the curve of your thigh. Goosebumps pricked along your skin, his fingertips tracing up and down the bare section of your leg between the skirt and high socks. “And you make a very cute Velma.”
You rolled your eyes at the compliment, shrugging it off. “You don’t mean that,” you whispered, eyes cast down at the blood soaked into the collar of his shirt. Shyness consumed you, it had been a while since a guy had flirted with you like this.
Well, Eddie’s fingers drawing figure-eights on the outside of your thigh felt like a little more than flirting.
One of his eyebrows lifted, disappearing beneath his bangs as he looked at you. “I do mean it.” Before you could argue with him, he pulled you into another kiss. 
It was enough to take your mind off of it, your head tilting up toward his as you twisted your body closer to him. Your hips turned, the handcuffs serving as his belt buckle digging into you through the thick fabric of your skirt. Thick thighs split apart over his knee, your spine curving on instinct. 
Normally, you wouldn’t have considered the back of Eddie’s van to be romantic, but now there was nowhere else you would rather be. 
Unable to think of much else, the kisses became messier. The sloppy smacks of your mouth against his made you giddy, fingers curling over his shoulders and keeping him close. His hand slipped under your sweater, palm pressing into your ribs like a brand. A submissive whimper was pulled from your throat, a dizzy feeling filling your head. You didn’t know if it was from the lack of oxygen or the alcohol you’d drank earlier.
Heat was pooling between your legs, making your thighs momentarily squeeze against his. The feeling of Eddie touching you made your insecurities about how your body had changed melt away, he didn’t seem to mind the softer parts of you as much as you did. Your hands traveled to his belt and traced the silver buckle of it, making Eddie pull away with a shake of his head. “Not tonight, baby,” he murmured, a sheepish smile curling his pink lips.
Despite the small part of your mind that was still rational, it felt like a slap to the face. You stiffened in his hold as you yanked your hands back like you’d touched a hot stove. “Oh, uh, sorry. I misunderstood,” you murmured, trying to tamp down the sting of rejection. You didn’t want him to feel bad, there wasn’t anything to feel guilty for.
Eddie snorted, shaking his head again. “Trust me, I want to,” he breathed, gently cupping your cheek. Something burned in his gaze. His thumb pressed into the corner of your spit-slicked lips, his chocolate brown eyes lingering for a moment. “Just don’t want to when you’re drunk, not in the back of my van.”
There was a sincerity in his tone that made you melt, rejection fading into yet another reason you felt like you were starting to fall head over heels for Eddie. “Okay, you’re right,” you said sweetly, turning your head to kiss the pad of his thumb.
“You want me to pick another tape?” The silence that had fallen over the van became noticeable. 
He laughed, seemingly having forgotten what had gotten the two of you tangled together in the first place. “No Madonna in the van, those are the rules,” he said, his fingers caressing your jaw. “Even for pretty girls like you.”
“Oh shut up,” you sighed, your face heating up despite yourself. “You’re just trying to butter me up so I pick Metallica.” 
Eddie snorted, the width of his shoulders squaring with confidence as he kept you in the space between his arm and torso. You could feel how warm he was. “You really think so?” he asked, the soft lilt of a tease in his voice.
“I wouldn’t put it past you.” It still felt like there was lightning between your ribs, electricity pooling at every juncture where you and Eddie touched. 
“But, I was teasing you. It’s a Van Halen cassette… you would know that if you’d bothered to read it before you decided to wrestle me for it.” You stamped another kiss against the tip of his nose. He wrinkled it endearingly, making you smile.
“Well now I’m glad I didn’t.”
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blueywrites · 1 year
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obsessed
I know we agree that Eddie would be obsessed with his girl. But I also think, even more than that - he would want his girl to be obsessed with him.
Like, after the initial 'wah I dunno what I'm doing' part of becoming a boyfriend for the first time, of course, because I do think Eddie would be both awkwardly though endearingly inexperienced, and also kinda scared of his feelings finally being reciprocated because now there's actual risk involved. But once he's past that, I think as much as he is just all about you - wanting to be around you, hold you, kiss you, fuck you, sleep with you, just exist beside you - he is even more excited at the prospect that you're all about him.
He wants to catch you looking at him and see it written all over your face, your expression all gooey and gross and totally fucking gone. It wouldn't make sense to him, because, yeah, you do that when he's screaming his lungs out on stage at The Hideout, fingers nearly cramping with his hard he's playing and, before the performance is even half-done, he knows they fuckin' killed it. That makes sense to him But you also look at him like that even when he's doing asinine shit, like picking off his nail polish and balancing the flakes in a pile on his hairy knee, or perching hunchbacked on a chair, muttering to himself as he drafts the next dungeon crawl for Hellfire. You see him at his best and his worst and his weirdest, and you seem to only wanna be closer to him. It's the same he feels about you, but at least with you it makes sense, 'cause you're you. It beats the shit outta Eddie why you're obsessed with him, but he's seen it enough to accept it now.
He starts feeling all warm inside his chest whenever he remembers just how obsessed you are with him. And so then he starts to do whatever it takes to encourage you in that.
Some guys think their girl's too needy? Hell fuckin' nah. Not Ed. You keep pulling him back in for snuggles and kisses and pouty "I'll miss you baby"s when he's been trying to leave the last twenty minutes, and he's just burying his grin in your hair, lapping up every word like a greedy bastard. He doesn't give a shit that he's gonna be late and get an earful from Gareth when you're filling up his chest with ooey gooey warmth like this. Space? Never heard of her. It could be hot as the devil's asscrack in July and he'd let you paste yourself to him. Damn the sweaty skin, the baby hairs tickling his chin, the elbow in his rib. Climb inside his favorite hoodie with him; stretch it all the way out. Make him a permanent one-handed driver by stealing his palm so you can play with his rings and just touch his skin, as if it alleviates some kind of ache in you.
And you best believe that man is determined to delight you. It doesn't matter how much or little experience he's had with other people before; Eddie wants to know how to make you fall apart. He studies your body - spends days between your legs with his mouth and his fingers and his cock, learning exactly what to touch and with what pressure and rhythm. Learning when to ease up and when to press on. Learning what your sounds and your faces and your motions mean. Learning all of you until he can have you coming on his cock in less than five minutes, and on his tongue in less than three, if you happen to be pressed for time. And if you're not pressed for time... Well. Eddie makes sure that each time he gets to really savor you, your obsession with him just grows that much deeper. Once you're coherent and no longer cock-drunk, at least.
Eddie isn't just determined to delight you in the bedroom, either. He'd keep it going all the time, his efforts to ensure you're totally gone on him - buy you cheap things like fake tattoos and ring pops from the 25-cent machines, steal you flowers cut from the yards he passes when he's selling in Loch Nora, leave you little love-heart doodles in your locker and loiter around the corner, waiting for you to find them, just so he can grab you up from behind and gasp against your neck, "Are those from a secret admirer?! Are you cheating on me?!" And as you squeal and giggle and deny it profusely, that warmth returns.
Because Eddie doesn't ever need to wonder about you. For the first time in his life, someone has finally looked at him and said, "Yeah, that freak right there. I'm obsessed with him." And there's no way in hell he's gonna take that for granted.
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bumblesimagines · 4 months
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The Cold Stars
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Request: Yes or No
Summary: Daenerys encounters a lonesome stranger in Meereen who shares a bitter history with Ser Barriston
Pronouns: He/Him/His
TW/CW: Suicide mention
~~~
"I cannot hide behind walls forever, Ser Barriston," Dany spoke gently, dragging her eyes over the small marketplace in the city. She knew the dangers of being out in public but she had trust in Ser Barriston and Grey Worm, her loyal subordinates. They'd never allow harm to come to her, she knew that very well. Besides, she needed to show the people of Meereen that she cared and valued them. Trust had to be earned, not given freely. So, despite the worries expressed to her by Ser Barriston and Daario, she marched forth into the marketplace, eager to see what her people were selling. 
"I know, Your Grace," Ser Barriston sighed quietly, his eyes just as diligent and alert as Grey Worm's, bouncing around from cart to face in search of anyone with less-than-innocent motives. Most of the people watched them silently, the caution on their faces making Dany frown. She needed their loyalty, not their fear. She couldn't comprehend it well. She freed them from their masters, breaking the chains that made them slaves and they'd seemingly loved her for it. But the hesitation and unhappiness on some of their faces made her heart twist. 
"Do you think King's Landing will receive me like this?" Dany asked the older, more experienced man as they rounded a corner, slipping out of the market into an alleyway, her head angled over her shoulder to peer back at the two. Ser Barriston's lips parted to respond but his eyes flickered away and Dany noticed Grey Worm reaching for his sword. Her head snapped forward, preparing herself for the worst only to notice the young man leaning against the wall with an apple in hand, his eyes-
His eyes...
Cold and displeased and undeniably violet. Her mind flickered back to Viserys, to the mentions of her parents and Rhaegar, to all the portraits she'd seen of her ancestors and all the stories told about them. She felt as if the air had been knocked out of her, and she suddenly yearned for her family, for the mother that died moments after having her, and the father that earned the title of Mad King. For Rhaegar and even cruel Viserys. But the man before them lacked the notable silver hair and appeared more... Dornish.
"(Y/N) Dayne," Ser Barriston gaped, eyes large and pale skin as if he'd seen a ghost. "You... are a long ways from home, child."
"As are you, Selmy." His bitter voice seemed to jolt Ser Barriston, his mouth clamping shut and bushy brows knitting together. (Y/N) raised the apple to his lips and dug his teeth into the crunchy fruit, a trickle of juice dripping down his chin. He chewed slowly as he studied each of them, his hardened gaze only momentarily growing indifferent when he turned his attention to the perplexed Grey Worm. "You are far from King's Landing, Ser. As are you, Targaryen."
"You are in the presence of Queen Daenerys Stormborn, child, you will refer to her as such. Your brother fought fiercely for the Targaryens during the rebellion."
"And he died." (Y/N) licked his lips, the apple beginning to crack and drip with juices under his grasp. The bitterness, near hatred in his eyes sent a chill down Dany's spine, yet she found herself unable to tear her own eyes away from his face. "You claim to have loved and respected Arthur and Ashara but where were you when they died? Where were you when Stark slaughtered my brother and my sister threw herself into the sea?" 
"I would've given my life for either of them, you know that." Ser Barriston responded sharply, almost bristling at the silent accusation. 
"You would've given your life for the Prince." Her trance broke immediately at the mention of her brother, of the man Ser Barriston always recalled fondly. Her lips pulled back into a deep frown and (Y/N) turned his attention onto her. "You should've been willing to give your life for Elia and her children. That Targaryen-" The sneer when he spoke said plenty of his opinions on her family. "-abandoned them to die like a coward."
"Mind your tongue!" 
"My siblings are dead because of him!" (Y/N) snapped back at the knight, the apple finally breaking under his hold, different parts flying around while some of it turned to mush in his palm. Dany flinched and stepped back, one piece sliding right up to her feet and almost disappearing beneath the skirt of her dress. (Y/N) shook his hand and scoffed, pushing himself off the wall and barely sparing Grey Worm a glance when he stepped in front of Dany defensively. Ser Barriston's shoulders sagged, the fury dying immediately. "If he'd done his duty as a husband, Allryia, Aran, and I wouldn't be mourning them, Ser."
Dany raised her hand and placed it over Grey Worm's shoulder, meeting his questioning gaze with a reassuring nod. He stepped aside, allowing Dany to step forward, her shoe kicking aside the apple piece before she lifted her head to look at him once more. "Why have you come here, Lord (Y/N)? If not to ally yourself with me, why?"
"To see if the rumors were true. They say you have dragons and you'll use them to take back the Iron Throne. Ashara told me stories of dragons when I was a child. Elia, too. Dorne fought back against them during your ancestor's conquest."
"I have no qualms with Dorne," Daenerys told him softly. "And I am sorry for your losses. I am not my father nor my brothers. I wish to do things differently. The Lannisters, a common enemy between us, rule Kings Landing, do they not? We can ensure they will not bring harm to anyone else, not under my rule. House Dayne of Starfall is a noble house in Dorne with... close ties to the Martells of Sunspear. As I know it, the Martells despise Lannisters as well."
"Why would we fight for you? Justice is a mere action when you'd be getting the Iron Throne. Dorne has been at peace for many years."
"Perhaps..." Dany paused and glanced toward Ser Barriston. The older man met her gaze with an arched brow and a curious, almost concerned glint in his eye. She pursed her lips. She needed stronger allies, she needed angry allies... and even queens require heirs. "Perhaps House Dayne would be more pleased if one of their own became King Consort of Westeros." 
(Y/N)'s eyes only narrowed in response. The crown would be tempting to any man, especially one of noble birth, but he only appeared annoyed by the offer. "I'm afraid my brother, Lord Aran Dayne, is content with his wife, and Edric is far too young to marry. I've had the freedom of being the youngest all my life. Why would I give it up to become a king when I can do whatever I please?"
"Kings do whatever they please, do they not?"
"Kings like Robert Baratheon and Aerys Targaryen, sure. Your brother did whatever he pleased as prince and plunged the kingdom into war. Rulers do what the people want, what they need. You haven't exactly been keeping your people happy, Daenerys. Dorne will only ally themselves if we know we'll win. You may have your army but Tywin Lannister and his dog have been commanding far longer than you and I have been alive. Prince Doran will never allow a child parading themselves as ruler of a city anywhere near Dorne's army. You'll have better luck asking for Prince Oberyn's hand in marriage."
"It almost sounds as if you believe you can do a better job than me... if so, join my council. You'll have your freedom and when the time comes, you'll have your justice. Perhaps then, you'll feel more inclined to accept my proposal. I know Dorne is known for its... queer customs. You view bastards as equal, women are seen as fine rulers, and having multiple lovers is common. Many have their opinions of Dorne but... I'd be rather happy with a Dornishman. I will grant you the freedom of doing as you please, if you become my consort, as long as we have a-" Her voice nearly broke, forcing her to pause again and clear her throat. "A healthy heir. What do you say now, Dayne?"
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i-am-church-the-cat · 5 months
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I have a flower shop/tattoo parlor maxiel + loscar AU building from a tropical storm into a hurricane in my head so here are some thoughts
+ When Max hires him, this is what he says to Logan’s arrangement: “It is not the worst thing I’ve ever seen. I can make it better.” What he really meant was that Max could make Logan better, but he wouldn’t come to understand that until later.
+ There’s a phone that sits on the back wall of Max’s shop. The first time it rang while Logan was working, he’d mistakenly answered it. He’d watched Max’s face go bleach white from across the shop as Logan answered “Hello, this is Verstappen’s Floral, how can I help you?” The barrage of angry Dutch he’d gotten back in return had shocked Logan into silence, making it easier for Max to steal the receiver from his hand. Now, Logan knows to just let it ring.
+ Oscar is pretty sure Daniel only gave him an interview because their moms are in a book club together. The owner of Honey Badger Tattoos was always friendly and outgoing but he was notoriously possessive about his art. In the ten years the shop has been open, it’s had four employees. Daniel Ricciardo, the founder, Daniel Kvyat, Daniel’s partner who he bought out after the first year, Lando Norris who worked part-time at the front desk, and now Oscar.
“I’ve never had an apprentice before, I probably wouldn’t be very good at it,” Daniel says during his interview. He’d said he liked Oscar’s work and already showed an interest in teaching Oscar more of his signature American style. But the guy was still hesitant, fidgeting with excess nerves. “Just ask Lando.
Lando nods from his seat at the front desk which Oscar can see from the open door of Daniel’s office. “He doesn’t know what he’s doing half the time, I wouldn’t trust him to teach other people.”
Daniel does not look like that’s the support he was going for, wincing at the dry criticism but not arguing.
“That’s fine,” Oscar confirms with a shrug. He’s already done the majority of his apprenticeship under Mark Webber. But when the man decided he’d had enough of the South of France and was selling the shop and moving back to Australia, Oscar had to look for somewhere else to work. “I only have six months left before I can get my certification.”
Daniel doesn’t look very reassured. Oscar can take a hint so he decides to get out before he’s kicked out.
“Hey, it’s cool, mate, thanks for meeting with me anyway-”
“Can you start next week?” Daniel asks, leg bouncing up and down and rocking the desk he’s sitting behind. He sees Oscar’s confused expression and sighs. “I really need more help here.”
“Yeah,” Oscar decides, not looking a gift horse in the mouth. “I’ll text you my schedule.”
And that’s how he starts working for the Honey Badger.
+ “This is a tulip,” Max is saying in French, word draw out and pointing at the multi-colored bulbs. Logan has tried telling him that he’s lived in Europe for the majority of his life at this point and can do his job in English, French, and Spanish but Max doesn’t believe him. At least Logan’s starting to pick up more Dutch.
Logan is rescued from his impromptu language lesson by the bell on the door ringing. He turns towards the sound, customer service smile already in place.
“Hi, welcome to Verstappen Floral, how can I-”
“Oh, it is you again.”
Logan stops and looks at Max who is frowning at the guy who just came in. The man is curly-haired and tanned, with tattoos scrawled over the majority of visible skin. His grin is big and toothy when he shoots it at Max.
“Hey, Maxy, aren’t you happy to see me?”
Logan blinks in shock at the nickname. Even their regular customers don’t get to act that familiar with Max. Logan doesn’t get to act that familiar with Max.
Max crosses his arms, lips pursing. “For the last time, I do not know what these flowers mean. I speak four languages and plant is not one of them.”
“Always a ray of sunshine, aren’t you, Max?” The man asks, unphased by Max’s grouchy demeanor. He leans forward onto the glass counter, certainly leaving smudges behind, but Max surprisingly doesn’t yell at him about it. “Lando sent me to pick up his order.”
Lando is someone Logan knows. He comes in about every other week and talks to Max about streaming and video games that partly goes over Logan’s head. He always leaves with a red and white bouquet, though the flowers change each time.
“Why could he not come get them himself?” Max grumbles, heading in the direction of the cooler where they kept to-go orders. Daniel shrugs and wraps his knuckles against the glass.
"He was late for a meeting or something, you know I don’t ask about his other job,” Daniel supplies. He changes his focus to Logan and the blond is met with the full force of the man’s mega-watt smile. Logan blames his mom’s genes for how easily he blushes. “Hey, you’re the new guy, right?”
Logan opens his mouth to answer but Max is suddenly im between them, Lando’s bouquet in his hands.
“Yes, this is Logan, no, he does not want any of your garish tattoos.”
Daniel pouts at Logan’s boss. He wonders how it doesn’t look strange for a guy who’s at least 30 to be pouting.
“Don’t be mean, Maxy. I wasn’t even going to mention the tattoos.”
Logan racks his brain for tattoo shops nearby. They obviously have a close relationship outside of just Lando. And Lando did say he worked for an artist…
“Oh hey, are you the Honey Badger?” Logan asks, moving his head to be seen around Max’s wider frame. Daniel jerks his eyes away from Max’s, as if he’s been caught doing something he shouldn’t. “I pass by there all the time. Not a lot of shops do American style out here.”
Daniel’s face lights up, looking between Logan and Max. “Max, you hired an American?”
Max sighs, more long-suffering than Logan thinks is necessary. “This is why I did not want you to speak with him. I knew you were going to be weird about it.”
“I’m not being weird!” Daniel argues. “I’m just surprised!”
Max and Daniel have another weird silent staring contest. Logan clears his throat reluctantly and they both snap to him.
“Um, where’d you learn to do that style?”
Daniel looks ready to excitedly burst into the story of his tattooing style and his interest in America, but Max cuts him off by pushing the bouquet into his chest.
“We do not have time for that, these are going to wilt. Take these to Lando.”
“Bossy, bossy,” Daniel murmurs, picking up the bouquet gently. He doesn’t sound annoyed by Max’s demands. Rather amused, actually. He shoots Logan another grin over Max’s shoulder. “I don’t envy you, mate. But hey if you want to talk tattoos, come by the shop sometime.”
“Definitely!” Logan agrees before Max can say anything else on his behalf. Daniel shoots him a one-handed finger gun before turning back to Max. His smile becomes a lot less joking and more sincere.
“See you later, Maximus”
Max loses some of his prickliness, voice soft when he says, “Goodbye, Daniel.”
+ There’s a man talking to Lando at the front desk when Oscar comes in that day. It’s neither of the two Oscar is used to seeing who come talk to Lando pretty regularly. Oscar’s pretty sure one of them’s his boyfriend and the other is his business partner but he can never tell which is which.
“Did you leave Logan alone at the shop?” Lando is asking while Oscar sets his station up.
“Well, I had to do it at some point,” the guy says, his accent reminiscent of German or Dutch. “What is the point of hiring another employee if I cannot leave for a few minutes?"
“Daniel never leaves me alone here,” Lando points out, a tad resentful. Oscar snorts.
“That’s because he has control issues,” Oscar claims. Both of the men look at him, one in amusement and one in confusion.
“Who are you?” The mystery guy asks. Weird, Oscar was going to ask him the same thing. He looks to Lando who makes the introductions.
"Max, this is Oscar, Daniel's new apprentice. Oscar, this is Max, one of our neighbors."
Oscar frowns. "I thought Max was your..." he trails off, leaving space for Lando to fill in the blank. He waves his hand.
"Different Max. This is Max Verstappen, he run's Verstappen Floral."
The new Max is still looking at him strangely. "Daniel does not take apprentices. He says he is a bad teacher."
Oscar shrugs, not sure what to tell him. He doesn't know how he got the job either. Luckily, he's saved from having to respond by Daniel coming out of the back office.
"Oscar, good, you're here, I wanted to talk about-" Daniel stops abruptly when he sees Max standing in the lobby. His entire demeanor shifts when he says, "Max, hey! What are you doing here?"
Daniel is normally a friendly guy, sometimes too much in Oscar's opinion, but he's practically glowing as he bounds over to Max. While Max's expression doesn't shift, his body language opens up to Daniel like one of his blooming flowers.
"I am talking to Lando about our stream tonight," Max answers. "He has not been very forthcoming with the details."
Lando tries to protest but even Oscar can see that it's a lost cause. This new guy showed up and suddenly it's like nothing else exists to Daniel. His boss giggles at nothing and that's when Oscar decides to get back to work.
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planetsano · 1 year
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◟* ♡ 𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒 : hybrid reader, guns, hunting mention.
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Sometimes I think about a hunter— a big, tough macho kind of man who can hold a gun that’s heavier than you ever probably had to lift because all you do is pick berries and herbs all day.
A real man, you know? One of those men who could survive in the wilderness alone with just his bare hands. Hands that are so big and rough— ones that radiate warmth. I think about those same hands that have never touched or.. really felt a soft pair of silken bunny ears.
He would have had to met you in the wild, right? I imagine he’d had to have been at least 30 feet away looking through a scope on his rifle— he saw your ears first. Floppy sweet things that were beautiful in color. Shiny and healthy, a rare type of pattern speckled against the base color of your hair’s locks.
If your head hadn’t popped into view at the last second, surely you would have been someone’s dinner or a new fur scarf. A vegan’s worst nightmare, really.
His brows would furrow in a burly pinch, lowering his weapon before letting out a sigh. Well, he couldn’t kill you now. That would go against his morals but he’s well aware that there are plenty who would just be jumping to sink their claws into a hybrid. To either sell, kill, skin or keep as a pet— even a slave. There was just so much opportunity, which is exactly why hybrids like you were in such a high demand.
He’s never actually interacted with your kind before so he’s curious. He’d inch closer, careful not to spook you. It’s no surprise that for such a big man, he’s surprisingly light on his feet when he’s in his element. There’s too much experience under his belt to carelessly step on a twig. It’s life or death in some cases.
You’re at a pond— the crystal-clear waters mirror the vibrant greenery that surrounds it, while lily pads float gently on its surface. There’s a waterfall pouring into its depths. It looks unreal, and you’re just the cherry on top.
You’re nearly nude, only tattered pieces of various pieces of cloth almost stylishly worn to your body. You seem to be at peace giggling as your feet make the water splash while your chase a butterfly. He’s never seen anything quite so innocent
It’s your eyes. Your eyes it’s just fucking big doe eyes that do him in when you finally spot him. He’s fully ready for you to make a run for it but You don’t seem afraid at all— he’s surprised. Even more so when you cautiously walk over as if you don’t want to scare him. It’s just that.. he’s a man.. you’ve never seen one before. You’re so curious, too curious for your own good.
Your fingers would gently trace the contours of his face and run through his hair, a sense of confusion deepening in your eyes. Unlike the hybrids you’ve encountered before, there’s a startling absence of ears on his crown. You would take one of his hands and allow him to touch the softness of the floppiness of your own, silently asking him where his were.
“I don’t have ears like yours—” He’d suddenly cut himself off at your expression. His voice..! It’s so.. deep! It’s amazing, you want him to say more words but you don’t quite know how to communicate in a way humans would understand. You’re just so excitable you want to explore every inch of him but alas, you hear your friends approaching near. You give him one of the wild flowers stuck in your hair before disappearing onto a deeper part of the forest.
And he wonders if he’ll ever see you again.
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— ushijima, kita, iwaizumi, toji, choso, nanami, eren, reiner.
+ bonus: dilf gojo specifically, and single father bakugo.
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femsolid · 2 years
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“We’re in 2019. Female hair is CENSORED everywhere. You don’t see it on TV. You don’t see it in magazines or adverts. There is an injunction of society for women to remain 'soft' and completely hairless. Just like a little girl. I don’t believe that’s a coincidence. Young, skinny, hairless girls have been very popular in the media for years and it makes me wonder. Who's behind it all? Who's perpetuating this message about women looking like adolescent girls? It sometimes feels rather paedophilic. It worries me.” – Camille Alexander. Musician (2019)
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“Years ago I did think about getting laser hair removal for my navel hair, but then I realised I'd be paying a couple of hundred pounds just to conform to expectations that I don't even care about– I'd much rather use the money for a holiday or circus lessons! I think that's one of the things which annoys me so much about society and the media's expectation for women to be basically hairless– they're pressuring us to invest serious time and money and endure pain. It's a double standard and it's unfair. Being able to accept your body– hair, scars and all– is freeing. I remember seeing my Aunt Glynis dancing to reggae in the 90s with her armpit hair showing– she looked so confident, happy and free. As a child, I couldn't put my finger on 'why', but I can now. On a practical level, it feels pretty darn good when I consider how much time, money and pain I've saved by accepting my body as it is. I like to think that that memory of my aunt being free and totally comfortable in her own skin is one that I can emulate and pass onto other girls and women. It hasn't always been received well though. At Lambeth County Fair one year, a friend of a friend was seriously freaked out when he saw my armpits. He asked me "what's wrong with you? Why would you do that?!", which was pretty amusing but bewildering. It reminded me there will always be people out there who may react and judge me like that. Thankfully, the opinion of people who think like that means very little to me! For me having hair and not caring is a bit like being part of a secret club. When you notice someone else who is resisting society's expectations and staying hairy you feel solidarity and respect. It's nice to be part of that.” – Isabel (2019)
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“As a teenager, I remember trying to stuff myself into a box of what a girl should be like. It always felt uncomfortable; padded bras, shoes that hurt and shaving rash. Running, swimming and climbing have helped me to see the strength and resilience in my body and to love it for what it is. Growing my armpit hair has been a recent experiment and the longer it gets, the more I like it! I like the way it looks & feels. It has given me a new respect for myself. So I say, embrace growth & if it pleases you, let it all grow!” – Jess (2018)
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“Shaving, epilating or waxing hurts. I was tired of suffering, trying to adapt to the image of a ‘beautiful young woman’ society is selling us. Everybody told me to shave. As a teenager, it’s a huge subject among girls; where do you shave? What method are you using? It takes so much time and costs so much money (the majority of hair removal products are also not recyclable). All of these reasons coming one after another motivated me to stop shaving. I would often have irritated skin after shaving and being a very sporty person, the sweat and the friction of my clothes would cause pain.The worst thing was having sex on the second day after shaving my vulva. I didn't understand why women would suffer and waste so much time on hiding who they really are. By showing my body hair on stage, I would like to stimulate and change people’s point of view. I’d like to motivate women to make their own choices.”
– Darian Koszinski. Circus artist (2018)
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“I stopped shaving completely when I was a teenager because of two instances. The first? I got tired of all the time wasted on maintenance and the discomfort that came with it. The second was when I went on a few multiple week-long backpacking trips; it would have been extremely inconvenient to spend hours ripping my hair out, so I let things grow. Being so close to nature let me dive deeper into and re-examine the relationship with myself and the world, acting as a mirror. In nature, there is wild; it is as beautiful as it is untamed. How could it be anything other than that? I felt so relieved and free when I let it grow out. It felt like being able to breathe. It was incredibly comfortable too. I felt a confidence and boldness returning, like I was replenishing some kind of primal power. I will say that a very pleasant side effect of having armpit hair is its ability to ward off rude people whom I wouldn’t care to interact or associate with anyway. Because the people that care about that sort of thing and make it a point to say how disgusted they are, are precisely the kind of people that I don’t want in my life.”
– Kyotocat (2017)
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“At this point in life, I feel that the real question shouldn't be 'why did you let your armpit hair grow?' But actually, 'why did you shave in the first place?' Please celebrate your body! Own who you are and be that! Those who celebrate who and what they are, are creating a much open and safer space for those who are struggling to understand who and what they want to be in life. It might be easier said than done but give it a try. We'll then help create a healthier and understanding society with less bullshit than there already is...”
– Alex Wellburn (2017)
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“I never stopped shaving because I never started. I do remember my mother shaving when I was younger and I thought that was pretty unnecessary since she was a strict muslim. I later realised it's a thing women do to look more desirable to men. It really irritated me that the people who reacted negatively to my natural armpit hair were men. Like it was the most disgusting thing in the world. It really gets on my tits. This is just one more reason that I don't shave it off. It belongs to me and I don't make noise about the "ugly"; hair on men which are sometimes pretty painful in the eye... But you've got to get over it and don't let these idiots get under it. I would recommend growing it to any women.”
– Ayan Mohamed. Graduate architecture student (2014)
Natural Beauty Photoshoot
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dan-the-womans-blog · 2 months
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Title:Domestic Possession
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(Had an idea, wrote about it, i have no regrets.
Derek morgan x fem!reader)
Derek Morgan was known for his confidence, his charm, and the undeniable magnetism that drew people to him. Working at the BAU, he'd seen the worst of humanity, and it only made him treasure the good parts even more. That's why when he found someone special, he held on tight. And you, without a doubt, were the most special part of his life.
It was a warm Saturday afternoon, and the two of you had decided to spend the day exploring the local farmer’s market. Stalls were bustling with vendors selling fresh produce, handmade crafts, and a variety of delectable treats. You walked hand-in-hand, laughing and talking, enjoying the normalcy that days like this brought amidst the chaos of Derek’s job.
Derek had a way of making you feel like the only person in the crowded market. His presence was commanding, his laughter infectious. As you stopped to admire a display of flowers, he stood close behind you, one hand resting on your hip, a casual, possessive touch that was more comforting than anything else.
You picked up a bouquet of wildflowers, their bright colors vibrant against the backdrop of the market. "What do you think of these, Derek?" you asked, turning to show him.
"They're beautiful," he replied, his eyes not leaving your face. "But not as beautiful as you."
You blushed, a warmth spreading through you at his words. Derek had a way of making you feel cherished, loved, and his words always carried a weight of sincerity that was impossible to ignore.
As you were about to pay for the flowers, you noticed a man standing a few stalls down, his eyes lingering on you a bit too long for comfort. His gaze was intense, appraising, and it made you feel exposed in a way you didn’t like. You shifted uncomfortably, trying to ignore him and focus on Derek.
Derek, ever perceptive, noticed the change in your demeanor immediately. He followed your line of sight and saw the man who was staring at you. A flicker of annoyance crossed his features, quickly replaced by a determined glint in his eyes.
Without a word, Derek moved closer to you, his hand sliding around to your lower back, pulling you into him. His grip was firm, possessive, and undeniably protective. He leaned down, his lips brushing against your ear as he spoke, "You're mine, sweetheart. Don’t ever forget that."
The sensation of his breath against your skin sent a shiver down your spine. You turned your head slightly to meet his gaze, finding his eyes dark and intense, filled with a mixture of protectiveness and desire.
The man who had been staring at you seemed to get the message loud and clear. He looked away quickly, clearly uncomfortable with the silent confrontation. Derek’s presence was enough to send a clear warning without a single word being exchanged.
You let out a small breath of relief, feeling safe and secure in Derek’s embrace. You paid for the flowers, and as you turned back to Derek, he was watching you with a look that made your heart race. There was something about the way he looked at you that made you feel like the most precious thing in the world.
"Thank you," you whispered, standing on your tiptoes to press a kiss to his cheek.
Derek’s grip on your hip tightened momentarily before he let his hand slide up to cup your face, pulling you in for a deep, possessive kiss. His lips were warm and insistent against yours, leaving no doubt in anyone’s mind that you were his.
The rest of the afternoon was spent in a comfortable haze of laughter, affection, and stolen kisses. Derek’s possessive touch never strayed far, a constant reminder of his love and protection. As the sun began to set, casting a golden glow over the market, you found yourself grateful for the man by your side.
Back at your apartment, as you put the flowers in a vase, Derek came up behind you, wrapping his arms around your waist and pulling you close. He nuzzled your neck, pressing a kiss to your shoulder.
"You know," he murmured, "I don't like when other guys look at you like that. Makes me want to remind them who you belong to."
You turned in his arms, wrapping your own around his neck. "I don’t need reminding, Derek. I know who I belong to. And I wouldn’t have it any other way."
His eyes softened, and he leaned in to kiss you, slow and deep, pouring all his love and possessiveness into that single kiss. When you finally pulled away, you were breathless, your heart pounding in your chest.
"I love you," he said, his voice rough with emotion.
"I love you too, Derek," you replied, knowing that no matter what, you were safe in his arms.
Send requests if you want something else, i write for all genders but i dont do smut
Ϟ(๑◕ ․̫ ◕๑)づ🌹🌹🌹
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wri0thesley · 1 year
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home - hawks x reader (6.7k)
you miss him when he's not here.
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cw: not sfw. reader is afab but no gendered language is used. chubby reader, insecurities mentioned. established relationship. possessive hawks. blood, injury (mild). cunnilingus, scratching, biting, multiple orgasms.
this was a commissioned work.
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There are drawbacks to being a Pro Hero’s partner.
Oh, there are some positives, too - the nice things that you get sent, sometimes, in the hopes that you’ll post them on social media and the business in question will get some extra footfall from being papped on the significant other of the more popular Pro Heroes (putting aside the occasional frustration of paparazzi always tailing you, the free clothes and free tech and free gear and free meals are very nice). The fact that Keigo has a sizable fortune that he mainly uses to make sure that you and he have the best life he can provide. The swell of pride that rises in your chest when you think about him, and all of the lives he has saved, all of the people who are grateful for him. 
The sunshine in Keigo’s face, too, when a small child tells him how much they look up to him - how they want to be just like him. The money that is funneled back by Keigo into charitable institutions for children. The fact that you’re doing a small part of good in the world despite your reasonably useless quirk (making flowers bloom at a touch is only useful when the flowers are not yet in season, after all - it’s a quirk that you can use maybe three months out of the year, and you’ve noticed flowers don’t seem to last any longer just because you’ve grazed them with your fingertips) by making Keigo happy, the way he deserves to be. 
But there are plenty of negatives. 
Those same paparazzi who sell photographs of you and Keigo to gossip magazines and comment on your appearance, your hair if it’s messy, your figure that you’re already not all that confident in. The online gossip-mongers who spend their time bemoaning how much of a better fit they’d be for a man like Keigo, if he’d just stop ‘pitying’ you enough to date you. 
The nights you spend stroking Keigo’s hair as he buries his head in your neck and all of the ugliest parts of his job fall out of his mouth; the fear of being a pawn for the HPSC for the rest of his life, the things he’s asked to do that remain secret except in whispered gasps into your ear, his hands clinging to you so tightly you think about talons puncturing your skin. The long, long nights when he’s out doing hero work and you fear that he may never come back to you. The way time stretches interminably on when he says he’ll be gone for a little while and you don’t know if it will be days or weeks or months. 
You wouldn’t trade anything for him. Keigo makes you feel seen and beautiful and loved and cherished in a way no other person could ever compare to. You get butterflies when he smiles at you. You cannot imagine a life in which you did not find each other, somehow. 
But tonight, your bed in Keigo’s penthouse (big glass windows, so he can feel like he’s flying - a huge bed, with room for his wings) is empty and cold. You wear a too-big ‘Hawks’s Baby Bird’ nightshirt that falls down to your knees, a gag gift from one of your friends who is a member of your boyfriend’s fan club. The little cartoon depiction of him is not enough to make you feel as though he is there with you.
Tonight feels like one of those nights that might last forever.
You roll over in the bed uncomfortably, legs tangling in cool sheets that you wish were warmed by your partner. The space seems to stretch on for an eternity without Keigo’s wings there for you to good-naturedly grouse about as he laughs and pulls you in even closer. 
You think not hearing anything might be the worst. 
You know what he does is important, you know that he doesn’t always tell you where he’s going because he’s worried about you - you know that being shrouded in secrecy is better for both of you. But not knowing where he is or who he’s with or what he’s doing makes all kinds of worrying scenarios play out in your head as you wonder if you’ll ever see him again, or if the last time you kissed him on the cheek and told him to be careful (and he looked at you with all of the love in the world lighting his gold eyes, his gaze saying far more than his easy laugh and his promise he would come back) would be the last time. 
Ugh. You flop onto your back and stare up at the ceiling. 
Maybe you should try making yourself a hot drink; distract yourself from the thoughts swirling around your mind and the loneliness that’s eating at your edges. That sounds nice. You swing your legs over the side of the comically oversized mattress, the soft hem of your nightshirt riding high on your thighs - and then you hear a familiar sound, and your heart feels like it swells to double its size in your chest. 
You quickly walk from the bedroom into the lounge, following the sound of beating wings and displaced air and something clinking against glass. There, on the balcony outside, stands Keigo - still in his hero costume, red wings in the process of being tucked behind him, keys tinkling in his hand. 
Through the window, he catches sight of you - and his smile is so wide it could split his face in two, eyes crinkling at the edges. He fumbles even quicker with the keys, eager to get inside and back to you - and you walk across the room, your feet warm on the cold tiled floor, to meet him.
Up close, you can see that the night has not been kind to him. 
Despite the smile that lights up his eyes and transforms his face, there are grazes all over his face; a rip in his hero costume at the sleeve, where he’s bleeding a little. His wings seem fine, but high on the left wing the feathers are bent out of shape and uneven as if he narrowly avoided trapping it somewhere. Your stomach drops somewhere in the region of your feet - and then, Keigo is through the window and it’s clinking closed behind him and you are embraced by all of him, all red feathers and fur jacket and arms wrapping so tightly around you that you can barely breathe. 
“Keigo,” your voice comes out in a choked squeak. “Keigo, you’re hurt--!”
“I’m so glad to see you,” he mumbles into the crook of your neck, his normally light tone heavy with emotion. “I missed you so so much. I . . . I thought I might not see you ever again--”
His gloved hands cling to your generous hips, squishing into the soft flesh there, dragging you against him. He noses against your neck, breathing in your scent, as if he’s trying to reassure himself that you’re real and true and there. 
“Let me look at your injuries--” You try to say, but Keigo instead pulls you into a searing kiss that makes your knees feel weak. Despite his relatively small stature - compared to most other Pros, anyway - he trains long and hard, and he pulls you into him as if you weigh nothing at all, the softness of your curves and pudge not presenting the smallest of problems. His mouth is hot and beseeching against yours; this is a kiss that says ‘I am alive, and I thought I wouldn’t be’. Fear is still rolling hot through your stomach, but it’s hard not to melt into him when he knows every spot of your mouth and every nerve of your lips as well as he knows his own. His teeth nip needily at your lower lip and you open your mouth for him - let his tongue mark you out as his, sliding across that spot behind your front teeth that makes you full-body shiver in his arms. 
It doesn’t seem to matter to him that the two of you are in full view of the windows (not that any paparazzi would be fool enough to try and photograph from here, after the last time) - all that matters is that the two of you are entwined, that Keigo is there and you are there. His hands slide down your hips to knead at the soft globes of your ass, a motion that’s meant to be teasing but instead simply feels desperate.
You break apart from him with a gasp, your heart beating frantically against your ribcage.
“Keigo,” you say, hoping you sound more sure of yourself than you feel. “I need to clean your w-wounds.”
He looks at you all half-lidded and wanting, his mouth swollen from the kiss - actually, you don’t think his gaze has strayed from you once since he first laid eyes on you. 
“I needed to kiss you,” he says to you, and he cracks a small smile that doesn’t quite mask the wildness in his eyes. “I needed to remember exactly what you were like. Remind myself you were mine, birdie.” 
“The kiss could have waited,” you say, exhaling in a way that’s part laugh and part exhaustion. “You’re hurt.”
One gloved hand raises to your face; his thumb strokes over your cheek. The smile on his face is so sad and so wanting that it makes you ache. 
“I could never wait to kiss you,” he says. “Not a second longer than I have to.”
You tug gently on his sleeve; there’s dirt all over the tan fabric. You wonder what happened to him on this mission, but you don’t ask - Keigo never wants you to have to worry about things. He keeps you as safe as he can - makes sure you can work from home, insists that if he can’t go shopping with you groceries are delivered . . . on another person, it might be suffocating. But on Keigo . . . 
He hasn’t told you much about his life pre-Wing Hero: Hawks. Still, he has told you more than almost anybody else in the whole world knows, and you understand why he clings to the vestiges of a home he’s managed to build around himself. It’s hard not to be flattered that he considers you home - and you, in return, feel exactly the same way about him. 
“Come on,” you say to him, a little more forcefully this time, and you give him a gentle smile so he doesn’t feel like he’s worrying you too much. “Let me clean these scratches and get your uniform off, and I promise you can kiss me as much as you like for as long as you like.”
He lets out a soft laugh but lets himself be tugged across the room anyway. 
“My uniform off?” He asks, lightly teasing, the edge of desperation slowly ebbing away now that he is with you and knows you are safe. “Why, birdie, you’ve only gotta ask! Little forward, but I’m not gonna complain--”
You roll your eyes at him, but laugh all the same, as the two of you enter the kitchen and you bully him lovingly into taking a seat on one of the stools by the long breakfast bar. You reach up onto your toes to reach the first-aid kit kept in one of the high kitchen cupboards, feeling the hem of your shirt rise up to reveal the thin red satin underwear you wore to bed--
“Are those Hawks brand, too?” Keigo asks. You can’t see him, but you can just imagine the shit-eating grin that’s painted itself over his face. “Look, I know you want me to stay still whilst you tend lovingly to me, but you’re making this really difficult--”
“Shh,” you tell him, turning around with the little metal tin tucked beneath your arm. “You’re just trying to get out of the antiseptic swabbing, aren’t you?”
It takes you by surprise how quickly he’s shed his garments. You suppose that speed is his greatest asset, but still - you’d heard only a little rustling, and yet Keigo is suddenly sat behind you totally shirtless with his uniform discarded on the stool beside him. You can see almost all of him; the lean muscles of his pectorals, dotted with old scars - the corded forearms, the surprisingly strong hands . . .
You’re grateful to see that the wounds and scratches are only surface-level. They’ll need cleaning and bandaging up a little, but that’s all - he’s not at risk of any infections, doesn’t need to go see any healers or hospital workers. You’re glad - you don’t want him to be out of your sight for any longer than he has to be now that you finally have him back for a while. 
You cough as you rifle through the medical kit for anti-bacterial wipes, feeling your face heat up at his proximity and his nakedness. Keigo laughs softly, angling his body closer to you.
“You’re cute when you’re nervous,” he says to you, his voice low and soft. “C’mon. See something you like?”
“Could you stop flirting for one second?” You ask him, as you wipe over one of the nasty grazes on his arm - you don’t think you could look into those golden eyes right now without falling into them like molten pools. “I need to get this cleaned up.”
“You’d be flirting if the prettiest thing in the whole world was touching your naked body,” Keigo says to you, reasonably; and he laughs again when you fumble with the bandage you’re trying to affix to the spot in question. “C’mon. You’re even wearing my merch! How’m I supposed to just sit here and let you look after me when I’m thinking about pinning you to the breakfast bar and having my wicked way with you, huh?”
“Have your wicked way with me when I’m done,” you tell him, and now you have no choice but to turn your hand to the grazes on his cheek - and looking at Keigo’s pretty face takes your breath away in the same way it always does. His eyes are liquid gold, burning you as you gently wipe the blood from his sharp cheekbones. At the touch of your fingers on his face, he takes a sharp intake of breath - and one strong hand lands on the outside of your thigh, thumb pressing softly into the skin there. Your own breath stutters in your chest. 
There’s a bloom of heat low in your core, to be looked at like that. Possession and adoration and hunger all mixed up in his gaze, your own body screaming at you that Keigo wants you and you want him and everything else should be thrown to the wayside in pursuit of the pleasure the two of you are clearly longing for. 
He breathes out after a moment that feels like it lasts a week, and his voice has dropped a semitone into something rich and low and starving hungry. 
“You’re nearly done now, right?” He asks, swallowing, the bob in his throat visible. “I’m not sure how much longer I can stop myself.”
You do not break eye contact as you drop the gauze, as you close the lid of the first-aid kit. 
“I’d think a Pro Hero would have more control,” you say to him breathily. “Stop yourself from doing what, exactly?”
He smiles up at you with a wickedness that makes you weak at the knees, and you feel all of your concern about his grazes and bruises and the feathers that have been bent and ruffled in his wings melt away in favour of the persistent pounding in your core.
He moves lightning-fast; utterly deserving of all of his accolades, and before you know it you’re pressed against the breakfast bar, your ass pressed flush against the rim of the surface, and Keigo has dropped down onto his knees. 
“Stop myself from eating you all up, birdie,” he says, with a grin bright and hungry, as he presses his nose softly against the plumpness of your thighs. “You’re looking delicious, and I’m starving after being away for so long. Won’t you let a guy have a taste?”
You gasp as he moves his face; as his nose nudges at your mound through the Hawks branded underwear. He breathes in deeply, savouring the scent of you on the air.
“I can tell you want it too,” he teases you. “I can smell you from here. That’s how I know how delicious you’re going to be.”
“Keigo,” you breathe out lightly, but there is no complaint in your tone. Your boyfriend takes this the way it is; your consent for him to do whatever he wants to you, and his smile is knife-sharp in the darkness as his fingers hook into the elastic of the underwear and slowly begin to edge them down your legs. 
“Spread for me, angel,” Keigo murmurs, dropping a kiss just above your knee, peppering the skin he can currently get to with more feather soft touches of his lips. “Show me how much you want it. Let me see you; I’ve missed you. Feels like a century when I don’t see you for a day.” 
You fall over yourself to please him. You’ve missed him just as much; too deeply for you to care if you seem desperate, when you spread your legs further and let him see the wet mess between your legs. Keigo’s eyes go half-lidded and wanting as he trails the pad of one of his fingers up your thigh to dip between the lips of your sex and into your slick. 
“Look at you, pretty birdie,” he says, low and awestruck. “This is all for me? Aren’t I the lucky one? Aren’t you just the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen?”
Your face heats up at the compliments; Keigo is never shy about giving them, of course, but when the position is so intimate and he looks so fascinated it’s hard not to feel woozy with the want that drips off every syllable. Keigo moves his face closer; kisses at the plump spill of your very inner thighs, where they’re damp with your own arousal. Teeth bite into the flesh gently, nipping at you until you gasp. 
“Y-you were being serious about eating me up, then?” You ask, a huff of laughter on your lips, as Keigo shifts his attentions to the other thigh, sucking love bites into the soft flesh. 
“Just making sure you know you’re mine,” he says, breathless. “Marking you up so you know who you belong to. After I’ve eaten you up, I’ll get on to eatin’ you out--”
He kisses over your sex this time; his breath fanning hot against your most sensitive parts. Your knees almost buckle, and you have to cling to the rim of the breakfast bar to stop yourself from just falling onto him completely. You feel a couple of well-placed breaths away from collapsing onto the floor.
“Is that a . . . a promise?” You ask him, and Keigo chuckles and the vibrations seem to travel from between your legs and right up your spine. 
“For you?” He murmurs, and his tongue darts out - laps up your cunt from perineum to clit, and you swear you see stars. “Of course it is.” 
Once Keigo has had a taste of you, there’s nothing you can do. You know it from past experience sprawled out on the bed beneath him as he works you over until you’re putty in his hands - when he wants someone, when he wants something, when something is his and it’s his responsibility . . . he will not rest until he’s wrung several orgasms out of you and you can barely move. The kitchen is a brand new development for this kind of thing, but Keigo is more than a little possessive and when you’ve murmured in the heat of the moment about christening every surface in his apartment it’s always gotten him going--
So it’s all you can do, really, to let him eat you out like he’s a man starved and he’s having his final meal before his untimely end. 
To let your fingers curl around the rim and to give yourself into Keigo’s mouth as it hotly works you over; his tongue dragging through your folds as if he’s trying to drink you in. Your own mouth falls open as your breath escapes you in little surprised gasps; it seems that for every slow lap of his tongue, he manages to do some kind of swirling trick of athletics that makes you feel like you’re melting into a pleasured mess. 
In between the licks and the sucks, he turns his attention back to the soft fullness of your thighs; drops little growling interludes of;
‘Mine’. ‘So beautiful’. ‘So good’. ‘You’re mine’. ‘Mine, mine, mine’. 
Kisses and bites and licks and mumbles, the soft abrasive scratch of his scruff making you dizzy and light-headed as you feel all of the pleasure that he brings you work itself into tight knots in your stomach. Sometimes he bites just a little too hard, as if he wants to ensure that the mark takes - and though on another partner, you might push him away, with Keigo it’s hard to not just let your lashes flutter and a soft moan escape at the thought of just how much he wants you to be his. 
There’s something to be said about having the mark of ownership of a man like Keigo upon your skin. 
He rubs his cheeks against your thighs, uncaring of how your slick is fair dripping from your sex; covering himself in your scent the same way he tries to cover you in his own. You’ve heard him complain when you switch shower gels or perfumes or shampoos; you know he can’t get enough of the natural scent of you. He never cares about cuddling up to you when you feel sweaty or gross - in fact, a couple of times, you’ve thought that it really gets him going--
It’s getting much harder to think the longer Keigo uses his mouth on you. 
It’s hard to think of anything other than the sensation of his tongue, the prickling pleasant heat that’s running through your veins, the groans of pleasure that he keeps putting forth with every new lap and suck and kiss of your clit. Your fingers twitch, your thighs shaking wildly, as you hover on the precipice of your orgasm.
“That’s right, beautiful,” he murmurs softly. “Come on. Come for me.” 
There’s no question of doing anything but. 
Your entire body goes taut all over, like a string waiting to be plucked - and then snaps, as your orgasm washes over you in fierce waves, making your body tingle like fireworks are being set off beneath your skin. You don’t try to muffle your noises - Keigo had coached that out of you with kisses and begging and telling you how much he loves hearing you - so soft whimpers and moans come issuing forth from your mouth, bouncing against the kitchen walls. Keigo makes his own noise in response; a coaxing kind of reassurance that you can let yourself go with him, you’re safe. His mouth is still pressed against your sex, though, his tongue still drinking in the slick you’re pumping out with every clench and pulse of your release. 
He stays there even as the orgasm slowly subsides and feeling returns to your extremities. You’re sensitive, your thighs shaking - and Keigo chuckles, pulling back and looking up at you with his eyes all blown with adoration. 
“I’ve missed the way you taste,” he tells you, tone teasing. “I’ve missed the way you sound, too. I’ve missed . . . all of that.”
“I’ve missed you more,” you say to him breathlessly. “A-are you going to let me repay the favour?” 
Keigo laughs again, and the sound makes happiness bloom in your chest. 
“No,” he says, sounding very sure of himself. “I’m not done with you yet, birdie. I need to make sure that every perfect inch of you remembers me; I need to make sure that you’re always with me, that you’re imprinted onto every part of me, that you know just how much I love you and I need you and that I can remember every part of you with my eyes closed--”
Your cheeks are hot at this profession of adoration. It’s not that Keigo is shy about these things - he said ‘I love you’ before you did - but . . . he’s not always prone to these big, grand gestures. He holds your hands and pulls you close and keeps you next to him, plays with your hair and remembers your favourites and checks in on you to make sure everything is alright as often as he can. Love story confessions are not his style--
And that’s how you know that he means every single syllable. 
“Th-that’s not fair,” you say weakly, as Keigo takes your hand and tugs you through the apartment instead, a mirror of you taking him into the kitchen to clean his wounds. “I want to do all that for you too--!”
“Ah, but you didn’t get to saying it before me, did you?” He shoots you a broad grin, pulling you into the bedroom. The sheets on your huge bed are still rumpled; he raises one eyebrow. “Not sleep well without me, birdie?”
“You know I never do,” you whisper, and his face goes impossibly soft. He pulls you closer to him, pressing his nose against your own so that the two of you are staring directly into one another’s eyes. 
“I love you,” he says, plain and simple. His hands go to touch your hips, to slide up to your waist and to your chest, his touch reverent like a sculptor and his masterpiece. “I love everything about you. If it were up to me, I’d spend every waking minute with you - I’d never let you leave our bed. We’d have everything we need. I . . .” He swallows. “I want to be with you forever.”
“I want to be with you forever, too,” you breathe out - you bring your hand up to stroke over his shoulders, to delicately curve over the musculature in his back to where his wings stand proudly out. He lets out a soft noise of pleasure at the soft touch of your fingers on the downy feathers at the base, his cheeks going pink. 
“Then let me take care of you,” Keigo murmurs, softly. “Let me come inside of you so many times you don’t remember what it feels like to have anything inside of you but me.” He takes a shuddering breath - and despite your earlier orgasm, your breath catches and your pulse beats between your thighs as if it’s agreeing that he can do whatever he wants with you. “Please.”
“Keigo--”
“Say I can, birdie.”
His touch gets desperate. His thumbs dig into the soft meat of your waist, the plump pudge there. You make the mistake of flickering your eyes away from his gaze, to between you and below your eye line, to see the way that his cock is tenting the front of his pants in need. You think about Keigo’s cock - about how it feels inside of you, about how perfectly it fills you up, about the sensation of having him come inside and keep going, keep pumping himself into you--
“Keigo,” you breathe, eyes flicking back up to him. “Of course you can.”
As much as you want to get on your knees for him and bring him the same pleasure he’s already brought you today, you can tell that this means a lot to Keigo - and so you’re not surprised when he groans out loud and pulls you back into a fierce kiss. Your lips are nibbled on, your tongue danced with, your entire body dragged into a kiss that Keigo puts every muscle into - until he pulls back, breathless. 
“Can we get this off you now?” He asks, tugging at your nightshirt. “Kind of weird to be looking at myself right now, even if I do look very cute as a cartoon--”
You laugh as you pull the dark red cotton over your head. You have a brief moment of doubt - that same flash that comes across you every time you fully disrobe in front of Keigo, a voice in your head saying that you’re not good enough or pretty enough for him - but it’s a doubt that Keigo quickly dispels as he pushes you back onto the bed and begins to pepper every inch of your newly exposed skin with bites and kisses. 
“I love these,” he murmurs, palming at your chest with rough calloused hands, plucking your nipples between thumb and forefinger until they stand to stiff attention. “They’re so pretty.” A pinch, and you whine, back arching. “And so sensitive--!” 
His tongue follows the path of his fingers, swirling around the nipple and sucking on it with a soft pop until you’re whining even louder, spreading your thighs apart for him in a silent plea to get on with it.
“You’re being needy,” he tells you, with a bite to the swell of your breast that you can tell will leave a bruise. “And I love it. Ask me nicely, pretty birdie--”
“Please fuck me, Keigo,” you say, breathless with need and want and the dizzying desire to have him inside of you. “Please, I want you inside of me--”
He kisses you fiercely again; fabric is displaced lower down his body as he works his trousers off without for a moment breaking the contact of your two lips. His cock slaps against the roundness of your tummy, leaving wet precome in a smear over your navel - hard and long, stiff and aching to find anchor in your port. 
“You have no idea what hearing you say that does to me,” he murmurs, his breath hot against your ear. “Spread wider, angel, alright?” 
You obey him, spreading your thighs so wide that it’s almost painful. 
The two of you have had to experiment with positions many times - Keigo’s wings provide an interesting challenge for ensuring that both of you are comfortable. Even now, in this simplest of positions, his wings make a canopy over you and give a soft red-warm glow to everything beneath them. Keigo smiles at you so softly that it feels like melting, and then his cock is nudging the lips of your sex apart and slowly slowly slowly sinking inside of you. 
It’s gratifying, to finally be full. His tongue felt good, but there’s a kind of intimacy in this that it can’t replicate - a feeling that the two of you are melding together, hearts beating as one. Keigo’s eyes flutter closed, a soft sigh escaping his pretty mouth.
“You have no idea how you feel,” he chokes out. “You have no idea how much I’ve missed you--”
“You feel like home,” you say to Keigo, and he whines and sheathes himself fully inside of you. 
His arms wrap around you, pulling you up so you’re not just laid directly on the bed. His nails - fingers a little sharp, like talons - rake down your back, scratching into you, as he gets used to feel of you hot and tight and wet around him. The two of you are both panting, your own arms wrapping around his neck so you’re as close to him as you can possibly be. 
He crashes his lips against yours at the same time as he begins to move his hips in hungry little circles. He isn’t yet fucking in and out of you in wild abandon, but this is still overwhelming after being without him for a few nights and forgetting all of the places inside of you that are stoked like a brand new fire by his cock, stretching you out. You move your hips against him in tiny increments, his abdomen rubbing against your swollen clit in a way that sends pleasant little frissons of electricity up and down your spine. 
The electric mixes with the scratches of Keigo’s hands, an overwhelming symphony of sensation that is at once too much and not enough. You lose track of time - you lose track of anything but the feel of Keigo inside of you, the pleasure of being stretched and fucked and taken and knowing you are loved. 
His lips against yours, his words against your ear with whispers of how much he loves you and how beautiful you are and how good you are for him. Your own words, coming out slurred and breathless as you both chase your orgasms, wanting to crest that hill together. 
“Keigo,” you’re whimpering. “Keigo, Keigo, Keigo.” Chants of his name spilling out of your lips like prayer beads, prayers that he drinks up with his kisses and his own soft entreaties of your name. 
“I’m going to--”
“I want you to--”
“Fill me up, please--”
“Fuck--”
You both lose track of who is actually the one speaking; the words come out in a spill that’s mirrored by the twitch of your thighs and the coil of heat in your stomach. Your orgasm hits you like a train, and your fingers curl into Keigo’s short hair at the same time as he digs his teeth into the soft place where your neck meets your shoulders and his cock pulses inside of you, spilling his seed into your sex, marking you out as his. Your own release gushes over his cock, your cunt clenching around him as you pant and whimper. You’re light-headed and dizzy as you chase your aftershocks, gyrating your hips on his softening cock to eke out every last drop of pleasure you can. Keigo’s hands stay on you, sliding to the small of your back, encouraging you as he sucks and kisses on the bitemarks and lets his own pants fill the air. 
The comfortable silence that follows your releases lasts only a moment. 
He’s come inside of you once, and your body feels full and satiated with your own orgasm, but that’s not enough for Keigo. Even as he pulls out, his cock is already hardening again, a soft groan falling from his mouth as it slaps against the soft flesh of your inner thighs.
“Tell me I can fuck you again,” he murmurs. “I want you to be full of me, birdie. I want you to be dripping with my come for weeks. I need t’fill you up so bad--”
You manage to screw up all of your left-over energy - not that there was much of it - to roll over, gathering yourself up on your hands and knees, spreading your legs further apart and balancing yourself on your elbows. It’s a position the two of you have used often, made all the more comfortable by Keigo’s expensive bed. It means that you don’t have to do much more work than stay there and thrust your hips back into him - and, crucially, it means that Keigo gets so deep inside of you that you swear you feel him in your stomach. 
“Yes,” Keigo breathes, already gathering himself up onto his knees. He drops kisses onto the places on your shoulder blades and spine he scratched earlier, soft feather-light whispers of how much he adores you. “Fuck, angel--”
He fits inside of you like a glove; your earlier exertions making him slide inside of you so easily you barely feel the stretch. Your fingers clench into the sheets as you moan out a prayer that sounds like his name, as Keigo continues to drop wet messy kisses all over you. He’s rambling now, about how beautiful you look like this and how good you feel.
“I should fuck you on every surface in the house,” he whispers, as he begins to work his hips back and forth, sliding easily into a rhythm. “I should christen every single one of them, so it feels like home--”
“Okay,” you breathe in return, moving your hips as much as you can. You’re going to come again, you realise, embarrassingly quickly. He just feels so deep inside of you - like there is no end to where he starts or you begin, like there’s nothing in the universe but the two of you and the places you’re joined. One of his hands slaps over yours, holding it as best he can in the position you’re in. 
“I need to fill you up,” he’s panting. “I need you . . . need you to be mine, need you to know how much I love you, need you need you need you--”
“I need you,” you reply, in a whimper that feels like a sob as he adjusts his hips just so and oh, the spots he hits inside of you with every thrust . . . You feel born anew again; like this is the first time Keigo has fucked you and you’re as sensitive as a virgin. You squeeze your eyes closed. “I need you more-- please fill me up, I want to be yours, please please please--”
“Say my name,” Keigo begs into your ear, the words broken up with pants. “Say you love me.”
“K-Keigo--!” Your voice pitches as your orgasm clenches all up inside of you. You feel yourself tighten around him. The feeling of him inside of you, the wet glide of his cock, the sting of the bites and scratches from your earlier extremely enthusiastic love-making, all converging together until you can do nothing but let the white hot feeling take you over completely. “I l-love you--”
A moaning whimpering groan of your name, and the two of you are coming together. Keigo’s cock is twitching inside of you, spilling more thick ropes of his come as deep into you as he can to join his earlier load. You moan as you feel it trickle down your thighs, as he fucks it in deeper chasing the aftershocks of his orgasm and your body collapses into a jelly-like mass of nothing but feeling. Keigo lets you collapse and follows you down, breathless laughs turning into moans as you lie there for a few moments sweating and panting in the afterglow of your lovemaking. 
It takes a little while for the two of you to disentangle yourself fully; for Keigo’s cock to pop out of you (followed by a little rush of your mixed fluids), for him to drag your sweat-soaked body against him without caring for how you must be messing up the sheets. 
“I love you too,” he says, a belated reply to your call as you’d come. Your face goes hot at the reminder.
You curl up against his chest shyly, cheek pressed to his beating heart. Your fingers come up to trace patterns over his skin, and he makes a noise low in his throat almost like a chirp, pleasure at your touch melding with the pleasure of what has transpired between you both. He’s always a little more bird-like in this state; relaxed and sated and happy. 
A phone rings somewhere in the distance, and he groans. Eyes fluttering shut. 
“It’s in my pocket,” he mumbles in annoyance. “It’ll be the Commission.”
You make a soft noise of displeasure at the Hero Commission already wanting to monopolise his time when it feels like he’s been home for an hour or two at most. 
“I’d hoped we’d have a bit longer this time,” you say, and you hope that you don’t sound petulant. You don’t want to resent Keigo’s job! You know he’s one of the top heroes for a reason! But curled up in bed, it’s hard to reconcile Wing Hero: Hawks and Keigo, your boyfriend, your lover, your home. You want longer with him. You want to keep him for yourself. 
His mouth twists. Resolutely, he wraps his arms back around you. 
“We will,” he says, as he continues to ignore the ringing. “We’ll have more time. They can wait a day. I still have more things I want to do to you.”
“Unfair,” you say, hiding your smile in his chest. “It’s my turn to do things to you.”
He laughs and presses a kiss on the top of your head. The scratches and bruises and bites from your earlier exertions sting pleasantly; a reminder of home, a reminder of Keigo, a reminder of belonging. 
“Okay,” he says, with a faux sigh. “It’ll be a challenge, but I’ll take one for the team. I guess you can do things to me next time.” 
Both of you laugh and snuggle in closer to one another. 
The bed feels so much more right with Keigo in it beside you. 
858 notes · View notes
alphabetboyluvr · 1 year
Text
dance with the devil | jjk
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REQUEST | jktaee3 on wp
VIBES | angst, royalty - bridgerton vibes, childhood friends to enemies to ?luvrs?
SOUNDTRACK | die for you - joji
HOLLY'S NOTE | (originally posted april 2023) so fun facts, i've never watched bridgerton. i actually put it on in the background as i was writing, which is where the lil line about being diamond comes from. i also do fuck all world-building in this, so just... use your imagination lol. i have no idea if this is like... correct? i dont read nor write period pieces and haven't done since school so.... go easy on me hahaha <33
also!! went for jeongguk instead of jungkook. feels more dramatic? time appropriate?? idk! mix of eng and Korean inspo for titles / locations!!
WORD COUNT | 2.5k
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There are easily a hundred pairs of eyes on you as you walk into the ballroom. Maybe more. The room is grand, gilded in gold—grotesque in its display of wealth, but nothing new to you. You've been in a dozen rooms like this within the last month alone. More money than taste—but you can't buy class.
Despite the influx of unwelcome stares, there's just one you can actually feel. It comes from a pair of deep brown eyes in the corner of the room; a glass of red in one hand, the gloved fingers of your least favourite cousin in the other.
Dark and brooding, Jeon Jeongguk has no right to look at you in the way that he does. Duke of Busan, womaniser of more counties than you care to imagine, he's troubled wrapped up in a waistcoat and ruby-encrusted signet rings.
But you've always liked trouble. Shame.
The grip that Lord Min of Daegu has on your hand tightens. He can notice it too; Jeongguk's stare. Your satin gloves are silky against Lord Min's skin, and he must admit he enjoys being the focus of Jeon Jeongguk's envy. He thinks it's about time that the over-egotistical tyrant of hearts had his comeuppance.
"Remember," Lord Min whispers quietly to you as the crowd watches on. He's a trusted confidant; not suited for marriage. At least not with you. It's the county's worst-kept secret that he retires to the boudoir with Master Park each and every evening. No one at the ball is under any illusion that he is a suitor of yours. "You're a diamond in a mine of sapphires."
"Oh, but sapphires are far prettier than diamonds," you pout, voice dulcet as you scan the room. It's approaching your birthday, and time is running out. A suitor needs to be found, and found promptly. Too much time squandered on frivolous pursuits during your youth had prevented such a search.
It's something you're reminded of whenever your eyes catch Jeongguk's. Endless days spent under beating midsummer sunshine; burnt skin and freckled cheeks. Youth well-spent. Youth wasted.
"So? It matters not." Lord Min smiles. "Diamonds are far stronger. Sharper. And still just as exquisite as sapphires. Do not sell yourself short."
And by that, you know exactly what he implies: steer clear of the Duke of Busan.
It would be a fruitless endeavour. No good would come from it.
Years of your childhood had been spent in a whimsical land with him, full of castles and fairies, and witches and warlocks. Potions had been made in his garden using his mother's best perfumes and items stolen from the pantry; make-believe scenarios came to life in the forest between your family's estates.
Summers had been frittered away together by the sea; Winterton Manor the backdrop of your dreams, your hopes, your fears.
But the Duke did as Dukes so often do; embroiled himself in debauchery and distasteful pleasures.
You had watched on, bemused for the most part, and also intrigued by what compelled him.
Had you not been enough?
Grapevines whisper, and Jeongguk had spent far too much time frolicking in vineyards. Drunk on the delights of his youth, he'd forgotten that there would be life beyond the present.
It's a price he pays, now. A debt he hadn't realised he had racked up.
One that he's reminded of every single time you glance his way. He cannot afford a diamond.
Somehow, however, he can seem to afford the audacity of approaching you in the powder room towards the end of the evening.
You've had lacklustre dances with half a dozen bachelors, and they've all been uninspiring. Only two of them managed to make it through the waltz without stepping on your toes.
Time is running out.
And Jeongguk?
He's running in circles trying to get you out of his head.
Seems apt that he'd bump into you at some point.
Not like he sought you out. Not at all.
Not like he handed the maids by the staircase a few silver coins to divert other partygoers elsewhere, either. He wouldn't dream of doing such a thing.
The Duke of Busan knows you well.
Knows that it takes all of your might to not glance in his direction as he makes his presence known.
"Really?" He asks with a cocked brow and arrogant smirk, leaning against the doorframe. You're preening at your hair. Making sure your pins remain in place. "That's what you chose to wear? To a ball of this grandeur?"
You're wearing white. It's tight against your chest. Too tight. Pleated beneath the satin ribbon under your bust, encrusted with sequins and finished with lace. It's beautiful. Matches the white satin gloves that finish just above the crease of your elbow. You carry yourself with elegance.
In fact, your posture is so well-poised that Jeongguk is the only attendee of the ball who has noticed the split in your skirt. When stood, it is hidden by the pleats. When dancing, it is camouflaged by the lace. When you lift your skirt to meander up the stairs? He becomes reacquainted with the curve of your ankle. The split is no larger than the length of a letter inviting him to tea, but it feels overwhelmingly large.
As far as the Duke is concerned, you may as well be wearing lingerie.
You smooth the skirt of your dress and consider rearranging your tits just to give him something to stare at. You decide against it. Think he would enjoy it far too much.
"Oh precisely," you respond with an equally arrogant grin, before turning to face him. You're haughty in the way you position your body, almost as if you're trying to entice him. "Haven't you heard? I've a suitor to find."
He scoffs. "And you think dressing like a whore is going to find you one of any value?"
A whore.
Very rich of him, you think, as if the entire party doesn't know what he gets up to in the dark. And the daylight. And just about any time of the day, actually.
What they really don't know?
That he used to get up to it with you.
"Absolutely not," you smile. Your father might want you married off, but there's no suitor here for you. Not tonight. If you have to bring a man home, it unquestionably has to be one that your father won't approve of. "That's the point—although, now I come to think of it—this dress did seem to find you, didn't it, Jeongguk?"
He stays quiet for a moment. He doesn't enjoy you being correct. It's part of the reason you bicker so much. You're always correct.
"White really isn't your colour," he tells you with an ambivalent shrug. "We both know that."
Innocence. Purity. Virginity.
For once, The Duke is correct. It really isn't your colour.
Humorous, how he's dressed head to toe in black. Perhaps you should be, too.
"And green isn't yours," you tease, walking towards him. "Yet you seemed to be full of it when I entered the ballroom with the Lord of Daegu."
He remains silent. Can sense you have more to declare.
"Moreover," you hum, proving him right as you pause beside him, "as I'm sure you're well aware, Duke, it's the colour beneath the dress that counts."
"And what is beneath the dress?" Jeongguk husks, not looking over towards you. He doesn't want to let you know how much you affect him, still.
"The same lace that greeted you last summer in the stables of Winterton Manor."
Red. Fuck.
His favourite.
"Tell me, Duke," you tease. He deserves it, you think. "Does the Viscount of Gwangju like red?"
"Hoseok?" Jeongguk scoffs, addressing him by name, not title. The lack of respect shown by the young Duke is asinine, truly. A show of his immaturity. "Despises it."
Truthfully, he has no idea of Viscount of Gwangju's preferences.
"Good," you taunt. "I'm enthralled by the prospect of a challenge."
Jeongguk will be damned if you end up betrothed to the Viscount of fucking Gwangju.
"He concedes easily," he says. This is another lie. He just doesn't want to give you any further ideas. "Do not expect a challenge. Anticipate disappointment."
"Oh, but Duke," you laugh and it's so exquisite that he thinks he might just melt. "Disappointment has always been your forte, has it not?"
During the balls of recent years, where Jeongguk would only ever offer his hand to other women, and never you? Yes. Disappointing.
In the smoky parlours, where he laughs and jokes with the other gentlemen, about which debutantes are simply destined to become spinsters? Oh, incredibly disappointing.
In the drawing room adjacent to his bedroom, while you had waited beneath his sheets for his return, as he was agreeing to court your cousin instead of you? Perhaps the most disappointing he'd ever been.
It's been a year—the worst of your life.
"You've made your bed, Duke. Sleep in it."
"I've tried," he says sternly. He doesn't want to joke any more. Doesn't want to flirt. "I cannot bear to sleep in it without you."
You shake your head. Such a devil.
"You seem well rested enough."
"It's a facade."
And you find yourself quite annoyed; frustrated by his apparent disdain for a life he chose. A destiny brought upon you both by his inability to be discreet—though you're unaware of this caveat.
You see, everyone does know of his reputation, but he always kept your pursuits of passion hidden. Private. To the world, you're pristine.
"What do you require, Duke? My pity?"
He knows he doesn't deserve it.
"I require nothing of you."
"Then seek me out no longer. Do not pursue what you cannot commandeer, Jeongguk."
It's a lesson he would have done well to learn many moons ago; one remembered by you even if it was lost on him.
And yet, at quarter past twelve, as he loosens the black satin bow of his collar in his bedroom, Jeongguk pauses.
A knock has just sounded at his door. His chambermaid, he assumes, just checking on the fire—or maybe Master Park's chambermaid, instead (though Jeongguk's business with Master Park's staff isn't ever entirely 'business').
Regretfully, he thinks it could be Lord Kim Namjoon of Ilsan, here to reprimand him for his manners. His mentor in all fashions, Namjoon is always the first to discipline the young Duke following his nights of debauchery—though all things considered, he feels he's been quite well-behaved tonight.
He sighs as he rests a palm flat against his bedpost, and bellows, "Enter."
A sternness settles on his brows, hard and uncompromising, as he turns to the door. There's a dishevelled nature to his hair, undone and falling slightly over his dark eyes. His loosened collar and unbuttoned waistcoat only aid to make him look even more rugged.
He's marred in vulnerability, though. His pretty pink lips rest ajar, as his eyes fall on the intruder of his thoughts.
Amusing, you think, how the bedroom is where he domineers best, and yet is always where he seems the most unfortified.
Perhaps he hadn't been lying about his facade.
Perhaps he really doesn't sleep well without you.
Perhaps—just perhaps—you might indulge him one last time.
"Tell me, Duke"— You walk into his room and close the door behind you, eyes not leaving his —"Do any of them compare?"
He watches you strut past him and crawl on the luxe quilt on his bed. Oh, how you've missed it.
"Any of who?"
"The maids," you shrug. You aren't naive. You know exactly what he does, and who he does it with. "Master Park's maids? Surely Lord Kim's, too. And the working girls. The debutantes—need I go on?"
"No," he says, watching as you loosen your heels and kick them to the floor. They land with a thud. He knows the noise will have echoed throughout the house. "You needn't."
The truth of the matter is that his escapades are well-known amongst high society. He has a reputation, which is why his courtship with your cousin was forced upon him.
You're surely too good for him, but he's of too much value to remain without an heir.
A marriage is needed for him before the end of the year. His father says so.
Contrarily, your father would never agree to the Duke of Busan proclaiming you as his Dutchess.
Jeongguk knows this, for he's already asked.
Of course he has.
Last spring. Kept his mother's ring in his pocket just in case. A proposal was planned for early summer, before your trip to Paris.
He thought perhaps he would go with you—a pre-honeymoon, maybe—but your father had refused his request for your hand, and who was Jeongguk to go against the will of the man who had raised you?
Jeongguk won't burden you with this knowledge. Your life will be far more fruitful if you remain silently furious with him for never giving you what you deserved.
"And do they?" You enquire once more. unaware of his anguish. "Do they compare?"
Jeongguk leans down to his boots. Unties his laces and stands on his heels to remove them. He kicks them away. Is just as undressed as you are. Equal.
"Do you think my bed would be empty right now if they did?"
"It isn't empty," you tease.
"No," he acknowledges. "But it has been. It's been empty for months."
"Months?"
You don't believe him.
"I've had an empty bed since I returned from Winterton last summer," he declares.
"Though your hands have been full?" You sneer, painfully reminded of the way he'd held the hand of another woman in the ballroom that evening. You've had to bear witness to it on multiple occasions by now. It never gets any easier. Your fucking cousin, of all people.
"Pay no mind to the fact my hands have not been empty in ballrooms," he speaks quietly, shame washing over his features. Yes, it would be far more desirable if you were to be furious with him, but he wants to alleviate the hurt that you are quite clearly encumbered with. "As I said, it's a facade."
"Why? What are you hiding, Duke?"
As if you don't know—he laments—that I'm utterly besotted with you.
He glances away from you to watch the fire as it crackles in his hearth. He wonders if it would be less painful to tear his heart from his chest and roast it in the flames, than it is to be in love with you.
"I hide nothing from you," he says with a broad smile as he turns to face you once more. Jeongguk is adept at falsifying his discretions. "But I am without at a dance."
You grin, now. "A dance?"
"I'd love one," he smirks as he holds out his hand. He twists your words almost as elegantly as he used to twist you around on empty ballroom floors; just two of you after the parties had died down and the revellers had hung up their dancing shoes.
He strides to the side of the bed. Satisfaction sinks into his features when your gloved hand slips into his palm. He pulls you up. Pulls you closer. Rests a hand upon your waist and positions himself perfectly for you. He was raised a gentleman after all, even if grew up to be a rogue.
"May I have this dance?" He says quietly, only needing to whisper.
You're so close you probably count the beat of his heart.
One, two.
Does anyone dance better than I do?
Three, four.
Do you lose your breath when someone else draws you closer?
Five, six.
I could dance with you forever.
Seven, eight.
Would that be agreeable?
Nine, ten.
As if you can read his thoughts, you just nod.
"You may."
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itsclydebitches · 9 months
Note
Cinder is a lot more sexualized then the male parts of Salem's inner circle
Like tyrian is shirtless sometimes but that does not feel as...drawn attention to, as say, the lingering shots of Cinder's butt or thighs. Or her wearing short shorts and high boots you know what I mean?
I do, anon. RWBY got a lot of attention back in the day for its anti-upskirt technology, but that doesn't give it a free pass for all the other ways you might (and it does) sexualize the cast. I've never been inclined to give RWBY too much shit in this regard because it is pulling from media with a LONG history of such designs and cinematography - it feels unfair of me to act like RWBY is uniquely responsible for such problems when I'm simultaneously willing to overlook, say, the 90's "gag" of Yusuke flipping up Keiko's skirt - but there's nevertheless a voice in the back of my mind constantly asking things like, "Why are so many of the girls fighting in heels?" and "Why are they dressed like they're going to the club and not the literal TUNDRA??" I'd kill for the whole cast, but the girls in particular, to get a re-design that focuses on fashionably compelling practicality, rather than sexy fanservice. (Though Ice Kingdom did a good job overall, particularly for Ruby.) Sure, RWBY didn't give us panty-shots, but one of the first characters we're introduced to is literally designed like a dominatrix.
If we're talking about outfits though... I'd say Emerald gets hit the worst out of Salem's minions. Yeah, Cinder is definitely sexualized in a more general sense as the tall, white (that's not a coincidence), long-legged beauty who sensually conjures fire as she prowls towards the heroes, camera focused on her hips swaying. But Emerald?
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She suffers from the same problem Yang has. AKA, if your woman isn't classically beautiful (like Wiess and to a different extent Blake), or cute / child-like (Ruby, Penny), but is instead going for a sporty, comparatively masculine-esque vibe... then they've got to show a LOT of skin. RWBY makes it sexy by just denying them clothes. You're entering dangerous battles on the daily? You want to protect yourself? Too bad. The audience needs a midriff and cleavage and your whole arms to stare at. Shorten the skin-tight pants so we can see some leg too. Oh, Yang has to have long pants because she's heading into the coldest Kingdom in Remnant? Never mind that, cut a strip out to show her thigh.
"But Clyde, the girls don't need to wear armor because of aura--" then why the hell does Jaune bother wearing that heavy-ass suit? Is it weight training? Does he just think it makes him look cool? ...or does it exist in case his aura breaks and he's allowed to wear more protective gear because there are different gender expectations attached to his design? The aura argument is just a modern rehashing of the Supergirl sun argument: using made up lore to "justify" getting your women characters into skimpy outfits, despite the men rarely being held to the same standards.
Tyrian is actually an interesting exception here and if I were less tired I'd think through this argument more, but something something as the "crazy" character he's allowed more leeway in breaking those expectations. Also the open shirt shows off his scars, which likewise help sell how dangerous he is. With the exception of characters like Cinder and Nora - whose injuries are Important Character Moments the audience gets to see play out - scars are surprisingly uncommon in Remanent. Or, again, they're severely downplayed so as not to interfere with that classic beauty design (like Weiss', or even Yang who gets a perfect cut when losing her arm). So when you see a character with giant scars spanning the length of his chest, an open shirt drawing deliberate attention to them... that makes you go, "Oh shit. What's he been through to scar like that in a world where most people make it out of fights with no permanent damage?"
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valeriianz · 1 year
Text
Me: says im 100% not going to write anymore of The Proposal AU. Also me: "but what if--" tagging @valiantstarlights, my partner in crime for this AU lmao
this is part 4, aka the engagement story. part three, two and one, if anyone is keeping track (its not in any actual order, we run on vibes only in this house).
-------------------
“Stop taking my hand!”
Dream slips his hand out of Hob’s with a pointed glare (and only a brief reflection of the instant warmth that shot up his arm from the touch). Hob, for his part, sighs with a barely contained eye roll.
“Sorry.” At least Hob sounds sincere, leaning in to speak quietly in Dream’s ear in the crowded room. “Force of habit, I guess. But you know…” He brushes his knuckles under the line of Dream’s jaw. “We are supposed to be engaged. Holding your hand is not the worst thing I could do to you.”
Dream’s skin prickles. “Is that a threat?”
Hob sighs again, a small smile tugging at his lips.
“It’s a tease. I’m teasing you.” He bumps his shoulder to Dream’s. “Lighten up. Have a drink.”
Perhaps Dream could do with a drink, especially if he’s actually thinking about what other debauchery Hob could get up to, outside of the limits of hand holding.
Snagging a beer out of the fridge, and forcing himself to smile as an aunt or grandma or someone comes up to him and starts asking him how he and Hob met. 
They had developed this, on the flight here, to Hob’s surprisingly luxurious childhood home. The story wasn’t much of an exaggeration of the truth– they indeed worked together but had hidden feelings for each other and after years of dancing around each other, they finally realized they were crazy for one another. 
It was easy enough to sell… perhaps not to the siblings who would loudly announce to Hob, “This is the same Dream who you bitched about on the phone? The one who didn’t let you come home for Thanksgiving last year? Who makes you go on coffee runs and harass writers?”
And Hob would shrug while Dream’s plastered on smile would sharpen to something deadly as he looked sideways at Hob. 
“Ah, what can I say? I like a man who knows what he wants.”
It would appease his family, for now. Dream had a moment of realization himself. 
He wasn’t aware Hob had such a large, welcoming family. His mother had immediately hugged Dream, smiling ear-to-ear, and Grandma Johanna had taken his hand and expressed to him how elated she was to finally see Hob settling down with “someone so handsome.” And now, at the welcome home party, everyone wanted a piece of Dream. To interrogate him or just meet him; meet the man who would make Hob honest. Who was now part of the family.
Dream had swallowed thickly. He wasn’t used to all the attention. Nor the care and playfulness of Hob’s family all around him. It was making him emotional and he didn’t know how much longer he could hover, an imposter among Hob’s fortunate family, with parents and siblings and aunts, uncles, and grandmother who all loved him and genuinely were excited that he was home for the holidays.
They all had no idea that it was all fake. Dream was a fraud. Hob and his relationship was purely transactional. The reality of Dream’s impulsive decision was finally crashing down around his ears and the room started to spin.
“Hey, you okay?”
Dream startled at Hob’s touch, no matter how gentle it was, on his shoulder.
“I’m fine. Why do you ask?” Dream bit out, blinking away the stinging in his eyes and going for a sip of his beer and scowling as he found it empty.
Hob’s hand, palm open, slid down Dream’s shoulders to his back, rubbing soothing circles between his shoulder blades.
“You look a little green.”
Dream huffed and tried not to relax into Hob’s soothing caress.
“This is all a little much,” Dream spoke honestly. “You didn’t tell me you had such a massive family.” Who love and are proud of you and are so quick to welcome me. So happy and eager to congratulate us and–
“Well, you never asked.” Hob replies simply, his hand dropping. Dream misses it immediately.
“Hey love birds!” Jo, Hob’s sister, pops up in their quiet space with a drink in her hands.
Dream tries not to jump at Jo’s sudden appearance, or bristle as she takes Dream’s left hand without permission to stare at the fake ring Hob and him had bought in the airport, realizing too late that they needed some kind of proof to their engagement.
Dream hoped Jo wasn’t some kind of jewelry appraisal. The silver band was simple, with a glass diamond inlay. Hob had a matching one. It cost them $30 each.
“I love the rings!” Jo gushed, thankfully dropping Dream’s hand before he could yank it back rudely. “Oh! You gotta tell us– who proposed to who?”
Dream can see the panic that crosses Hob’s eyes, which only grows larger with a nervous laugh as the family around them picks up on what Jo said and now everyone is interested in hearing the story.
Dream feels his heartbeat in his throat. They hadn’t discussed this. Hob and him had exchanged hobbies and interests and food preferences and allergies (Dream utterly bewildered at how much Hob already knew about him) but had somehow forgotten to build an engagement story.
“Oh, it’s not that interesting,” Hob laughs, an edge of hysteria to it. “Dream, honey, you were just mentioning that you wanted to rest–”
“Ah, c’mon!” Grandma Johanna prods, wiggling in her seat on the couch. “We’re all dying to hear it.”
“Yes, Hob.” Dream speaks with his own mischievous glint in his eyes. “I’d love to hear it from your perspective.”
Hob stares at Dream, utterly bewildered and then– Dream swallows nervously– his lips curl. 
“Aw well, if my sweet Dream insists…” Hob takes up Dream’s left hand and kisses the top of it while maintaining eye contact and Dream’s pulse stutters.
“You’d never know it,” Hob starts, addressing the room, which the whole family has now congregated in. “But underneath this hard, prickly exterior–” he gestures with a wide sweep to Dream. “Is a big ‘ol softie.”
A round of tittering surrounds them. Dream stares at Hob, eyes widening as he suddenly realizes his mistake of giving Hob the reins. Putting him on the spot.
“He took me to the local carnival…”
Dream hates carnivals. The rides are rickety and dangerous and full of rowdy teenagers.
“... where I won him the biggest pink teddy bear in the darts game, after he begged me for it…” Hob turns to wiggle his nose in Dream’s face.
Dream feels his cheeks warm and jaw drop. He hates the color pink and would never beg for anything, let alone a stuffed animal–
Some family members are now studiously looking at Dream, seeing him in a new light, no doubt. And Dream nearly shakes with the indignity of it all. He doesn’t even know these people, but he will be staying with them for the next week and he absolutely will not lose face over Hob’s overactive imagination.
“And finally,” Hob grins at Dream, clearly having the time of his life putting his boss on the spot and Dream can only stand and wait for the punchline.
“We go on the ferris wheel– the sun is setting– all planned, I’m sure. And then–”
“And you kissed me,” Dream interrupts, causing all eyes to refocus on him. Dream swallows at the bewildered look on Hob’s face. “It was very romantic.”
He turns to address the room himself, feeling ridiculous but barling onward, leaning sideways onto Hob in a way, he hopes, is besotted. 
“We walked off the ferris wheel to a group of carnies that Hob had hired, a quartet, to meet us and they sang ‘Cherish’ acapella.”
Hob’s brows shoot up into his hairline, stunned silent. 
“The Madonna song?” Somebody asks, Dream thinks it’s Hob’s cousin, Fancis.
“The Association,” Dream spares them a glance and a vague gesture with his wrist. “It’s an oldie.”
Grandma Johanna puts her hand on her chest and makes a sound like, “t’aw.”
“And then,” Dream continues, delighted now to have the upper hand. “Hob joined them for the chorus.”
Jo and some of Hob’s cousins exclaim loudly, looking back to Hob, who is running a hand through his hair with a wide, uncomfortable smile as more of his family join in on the slowly building sound of laughter. Dream smirks and tugs on Hob’s arm to get his attention. 
“You have a great voice, darling, don’t be embarrassed. I was very smitten.”
“Oh, I’m sure you were,” Hob says, his ears red. Dream would never admit it, but it’s a very cute look on him. 
“And when you asked me to marry you, of course I said yes.” Dream tapped Hob on the nose, who’s eyes narrowed murderously. Dream smiled with teeth, uncaring how sarcastic he appeared now.
“Oh you guys!” Hob’s mother exclaimed, her expression reflecting utter joy. Jo was whispering something to Hob’s brother and snickered between themselves. “That’s very unlike the Robert we all know,” she gives Hob a knowing look. “I suppose love makes you do strange things.”
“Strange, yeah. That’s one way to put it.” Hob is looking at Dream again, his eyes glinting with revenge, most likely. But Dream doesn’t mind. He’s just relieved they got this out of the way, along with the bonus of managing to embarrass Hob in front of his entire family. A win-win in Dream’s books.
the song Dream came up with... which Hob would definitely, absolutely, sing to Dream on any other occasion lol
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teecupangel · 1 month
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unhinged idea i had: desmond and the modern persona series. i am leaning on 3 or 5 because 3 matches desmond well with the whole death thing and it's my favorite in the franchise but also phantom thief desmond... i have no idea how we can incorporate this into ac but maybe desmond is a wild card??? possibly???
Here’s the Desmond in Persona 5 idea we had before and here’s the Desmond in Persona 3 idea we also had before.
Since you did specify Modern Persona series and Persona 4 has always been my favorite of the three, we’re going to go for Desmond arriving in Inaba in the strangest of way…
He was found dangled on one of the telephone poles, right arm heavily burned and unconscious.
He was in a coma for a week before waking up and he thought “they’d definitely give me to Interpol and I’d get taken by Abstergo if I tell them my real identity” so he pretended to have amnesia. So for a few weeks, he’s known as John-san.
And during those few weeks, he was allowed access to a phone to check the net and try and see if he can remember anything.
The first thing he noticed was the date.
2011.
Okay.
That was a lie.
The first thing he noticed was that there was no mention of Abstergo anywhere at all. No ads. Nothing.
So he didn’t even think he timetraveled a year before his death.
No.
Without Abstergo…
He was in a different world.
Fuck.
.
.
Unorganized Notes:
He had to be discharged from the hospital once he was deemed healthy enough and Dojima helped him find a home he can rent and work.
Work turned out to become an employee at Junes because, quoting the manager, Desmond’s foreign looks will attract customers. He works in one of the stands and that specific stand (selling grilled meat and juice) got a 50% increase in profit.
The actual real reason why Dojima helped Desmond stay in Inaba is because he’s super sus of him. His face and fingerprint came up zilch and he even asked ‘favor’ from an American government official (who may or may not be part of a certain intelligent agency) find anything about him.
He casually flirts with Adachi whenever he sees the police officer around Junes. Adachi always splutters and make a fool of himself while Dojima sighs and tells Desmond to stop screwing around. The reason why Desmond is trying to get under Adachi’s skin is because there’s something about him that makes Desmond feel… something. Like he should be looking at something but he doesn’t know what he should be looking at in the first place.
By the time Yu comes to Inaba, Desmond has been staying for three months… trying to get a feel of this world by pretending he was ‘relearning the world’. His Japanese is better know and not as archaic as it was before (he still doesn’t know which Bleed knows Japanese but he’ll take it).
Overall, he’s integrated himself in the small town of Inaba quite well.
Then the murder of Yamano Mayumi happened and Desmond gets roped in because she was found on the cables near a telephone pole, very similar to how Desmond was found.
The police is, of course, suspicious of Desmond. He’s connected to this, either as the first victim who survived or as the culprit/accomplice.
Desmond is definitely curious about what’s happening and that’s when he heard kids… well… talking about the murder.
Desmond wasn’t going to pass it off as kids being kids because he knows what teenagers are capable (Ratonhnhaké:ton being a good example and also Altaïr but Altaïr’s childhood was fucked up from the start in his eyes anyway) so he follows them.
… into the TV because fuck it, what’s the worst that could happen? He’d die?
.
In this one, Desmond serves more as their adult supervision who can’t fight because he has no Persona. They also leave him in the entrance and he’s annoyed by this until… the day Chie joins them after awakening her Persona, he hears a voice.
It’s a man clad in what looks like Assassin robes of some kind, dirty and worn out. Yu, Yosuke, Teddie, and Chie returned (without Yukiko because they need a break) to find Desmond and the hooded figure talking about how Desmond is powerless. He had always been powerless. Nothing has changed.
“All those sacrifices. All those suffering… and for what? You are still as powerless as you have always been, Desmond Miles. Even the strength you have now was never yours from the very beginning. Your strength exists because of their death.”
This finally makes Desmond hit the hooded figure with a right hook and his hood falls off, revealing it was Desmond’s shadow.
But this shadow was old with the golden glow of the Apple on his skin. Desmond, of course, tells him that he wasn’t him and this turns into a boss fight with Yu and the team.
Desmond notices while they fight that his shadow’s fighting style slightly shifts at times and he recognizes each of those shifts because the tell were the small tells he knows his Bleeds would make. He manages to help the team defeat his shadow but telling them what his shadow’s move will be and it ends with Desmond accepting the fact that, yes, his strength did come from others but it was his to use as he sees fit. That he has to accept that the choices he made did mean his ancestors’ actions and sacrifices were for nothing.
And that…
he has to keep moving forward from that.
That’s how his shadow turned into his Persona and how he’s now able to join the team.
(I think for this one, Desmond should only have one Persona unlike in the other Persona ideas. He’s Arcana can still be the Fool because he is starting from the ‘beginning’ or he can also be the World/Aeon if you want to shake it up. His Persona can still shift into three ‘forms’ and his ultimate Persona makes him able to shift into 2 more forms)
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jacksoldsideblog · 10 months
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can you write something about female fight club then?
I'm standing like an unwanted shadow as Tyler bargains our way into soap based success. I have to hear her say things like:
"Well, a woman's touch helps."
"It just helps to know what the clientele want."
"Of course, the softest soap is what will sell best, who doesn't want soap that makes their hands delicate and gentle?"
All with this slight sarcastic turn, just enough to rustle the secret feminist wiles of the salewoman she's speaking to. To elucidate some sort of sexy danger, acknowledging the song and dance we're in and its artifice all the same.
We usually see them at fight club within a week or two.
I can't blame them. The mystery that is Tyler Durden combined with the chance to see her shirtless has seduced many women into having to cover up black eyes and broken lips. If anyone cared, there would be reports on a massive wave of physical abuse hitting women right now.
But there's not.
Tyler says, "They don't see anything different. To be a woman is to be a punching bag. They don't see any difference. They don't notice the fingerprints are, on average, smaller. They think it's natural. This is why the song and dance works."
The song and dance being, it is morning, and I'm in the kitchen using my reflection in our spoiled glass windows to apply a thin attempt at hiding my cranial bruising to my forehead. It will serve as the obligatory effort on the part of the battered woman to make herself slightly less unseemly and uncomfortable for others to be around, and in exchange, I would only lose my job if it was to interact with the public. My job is not to interact with the public. I do the due diligence of showing submission to the everpresent assumption I am for male consumption, I am not fired on the spot.
It is a song and dance because no one cares about the bruises themselves, only whether they've made me too ugly and complicated to work with. The makeup, which hides the worst of it, serves to show that yes sir, I roll over sir, I know I shouldn't be too annoying about this sort of thing, sir. I have no female colleagues who would bother to ask whether I was considering leaving.
The thing about fight club is, the first and second rules are that you don't talk about fight club. Tyler is very clear on this. However, this is mostly because we don't need to advertise. Any woman who expresses enough concern and anger at her coworker friend family's bruises finds her way here quick. It keeps us focused.
Tyler says, "If we were men, we could walk around with the truth of us bare on our skin. I know this because I do, every night I play the part of the genteel waiter at the Pressman Hotel." Many women had met Tyler at work. Many women had been warned away from the lobster bisque by Tyler. Her guerilla warfare was mostly targeted.
"Instead," Tyler says, "you have to cake yourself in makeup just to keep your jobs. Your bruises are still visible, but you're fired if you have no shame about it. What does that tell you about your place in the world?"
Some women, I know, go deep. Buy up land and live on it in communes. No one cares if your dogsitter or caretaker for the grandmother you never visit has bruises. No one's there to witness it. These invisible jobs, they get snapped up like candy. The women already in it, they teach the others, little post-club instructionals. They escape enough to shed the obligation.
It does not escape any of us that these jobs are less stable, that the options are to play the game or be beholden to gigs.
Hold back your teeth and spit.
I'm finished in the kitchen by the time Martin trundles down the stairs, all waifish and giggly. He sees me, he makes sure to tell me he'll be around again in a few days. We could hit golfballs at the factory while complaining about our dads again.
I don't tell him I want to rip his dick off and shove it down his throat. I do not tell him, he is ruining my life, taking up Tyler's time. I do not tell him, I would rather die than actively share Tyler with you, even on the most platonic level. I would rather use my own sinew to sew your mouth shut just so you couldn't speak to her.
I'm not going to play your stupid games, Martin.
He shrugs.
"Hey," he says. "Are you still going to ovarian cancer?"
No.
"You can have it, you know," he says. "That was the deal. I get bowel cancer, blood parasites, meth recovery, you get ovarian cancer, brain parasites, skin cancer. We share gut parasites. That was the agreement."
Again, I do not tell Martin that last time I went to ovarian cancer, the basement was empty except for Marge, who hugged me close enough that I could see the now unshaved hairs on her chin and told me about a little get together that happens on Saturdays, one that gave her more of a sense of purpose than crying about lost motherhood ever did. Martin might see me follow the rules but he doesn't get to know where I'm breaking them.
"Whatever," he says.
Then my life is significantly better, because Martin has left the house.
Then my life is signficantly better, because Tyler comes down the stairs in her boxer briefs. I stare in a sort of deadeyed way, like I'm trying to pretend it's insomnia that has my eyes glued to her hips.
"My eyes are up here," Tyler says. "You're so hopeless." She says it with immense satisfaction. I know she gets off on seeing me zombified by her instead of society. I get off on it, too.
"Good luck at work today," she says, buttoning up my shirt. Theoretically, I had it unbuttoned to avoid staining it with concealer. Realistically, it's because her fingers brushing against my bare chest make my heart stutter in a way I'd love to die from. Tyler burned my last remaining bra soon after I moved in. The rest had gone up in flames with my condo. No one at work has noticed because they try to avoid looking at me in the first place.
My mouth is wet. I'm a bit wet. I hope Tyler is. She sends me out the door, I'm erroneously hoping the sight of me in my business casual is enough to warrant some sexual exploration before she sleeps til five.
I think about fight club. It is now only three days away, closer by the hour.
Tyler makes me feel like a megalomaniac.
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goldeneyedgirl · 25 days
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I would sell my body and soul for more of that demon Jasper fic :)))
Ask and ye shall receive, Anon. Also, I'm no longer accepting intangible essences in this economy because I'm pretty sure selling your body and soul will be the cost of a studio apartment soon.
I have a very specific vibe I want for the follow up, and right now, it's just not quite hitting it correctly, so this is a very early drafted scene. The 'Meet the Cullens' scene might pop up at Ficmas if I can get it right. I just need Jasper to be the right balance of 'I was imprisoned for long enough to be disorientated by the modern world', 'PTSD, my only friend', 'I am haunted by my demon self that wears my skin', and 'I have hope for the future.' And I cannot wait to do more world building with what Maria has done, and what Alice has learnt.
It's a short piece but I hope you enjoy!
--
The worst part is that he has to sleep.
He has to dream.
Neither he nor Alice know if that is because he needs to heal, or if that’s the burden of being changed. Alice promises to research it for him, but right now he doesn’t care. He resents it, yes, that his body demands something as base as rest. But of all the pieces that he’s been left with, sleep is the least of his problems.
(What does he dream of? Torture and torment. The flaying of skin. Burns that furiously eat right down to the bone. Words carved and muttered, read from books written and bound in old skin reeking of all the death and hands that have touched it. He dreams of complete hopelessness, of grief and betrayal and rage. And when he wakes up, it’s still in the back of his mind, always nagging at him.)
Sometimes it takes him hours to remind himself that he’s free. That he could walk out the front door and Alice wouldn’t stop him. Or rather, she’d run after him to make sure he was okay, that he had clothing and shoes and he didn’t need to eat. And she’d make him promise that he knew he could come home again.
(It wouldn’t be the first time. He hates that she doesn’t sleep. He hates that she hunts and butchers for him. He hates that when he looks at her, such a beautiful girl, he knows he could offer her anything, promise her anything, and she’d follow him anywhere. He could crush her heart in his hand, and she’d still smile at him and ask him if he was okay.)
//
“Jasper, can I ask you something?”
He tenses up when she says that; he’s been waiting for it. The price of all she’s done for him; the first aid, the housing, hunting and butchering, clothing, digging him out of that church. She’s just like the others, despite her promises.
“What?” His voice is cold and harsh, and he’s already preparing for the words that come next. Already planning on leaving her in pieces on the floor and let her put herself back together.
“I think we need to start working on your wings.” For a moment, the words make no sense to him because they aren’t what he expects. And then he’s taken by how gentle her words sound. How the worry skitters all over her. She’s actually concerned about him.
He hasn’t transformed back right, he’s known that for a while; his shoulder blades jut out unnaturally and he cannot get them to flatten. He’s gotten use to it - the mattress on his bed is soft enough that it’s not uncomfortable, and most of the clothing Alice has acquired for him are loose enough not to matter. He hadn’t given it much thought - his body has felt foreign to him for so long that another thing is nothing.
The idea that she’s been worrying is confusing.
//
He’s never been this close to someone in this form without being able to kill them. And yet Alice is so calm, as if every single instinct isn’t telling her to run.
She smells sweet, like he’s buried his face in flowers, with the sharp tang of something akin to ink. It’s nice in a way that he hasn’t had in a while. Alice really is extraordinarily pretty, her eyes are the most intense shade of warm gold with eyelashes that fan gently against her cheek when she blinks, and her pretty pink lips that twist into a frown as she examines his wings.
It’s a mystery to him why she bothers with the likes of him. From what she’s mentioned about her former coven, he assumes that she could be living in luxury. Be married to some bookish vampire gentleman who opens doors for her and…
He’s feeling warm and he’s not sure why, as her fingers trace the sinew of his right wing carefully. She’s wearing an old t-shirt knotted at the waist that leaves one shoulder completely bare, and the tiniest pants he’s ever seen on a woman. Practical for hunting, he’s certain, but nothing that he’s used to at all.
The jokes she made when she found him echo in his mind and he wonders if she was truly willing or if she was just nervous; she’s made no other allusions to… physical intimacies since that night. In fact, she’s been extraordinarily kind but kept her distance as he’s recovered. Not once has she crossed the threshold of his room; she launders the clothing, and brings back the flesh and blood of animals for him to consume, and generally leaves him be unless he seeks her out.
This cannot be all she wants from him - a grudging housemate. He doesn’t understand, not at all. He wants the truth.
The stitches are slow, as Alice carefully lines up each tear precisely, and this is a terrible intimacy. He flexes his fingers, trying to resist grasping her hips as she works, almost like a muscle memory. He does wonder if she’d even allow him to put his hands on her like this. When he looks like a demon, the worst of the monsters. But she hasn’t flinched away from him yet.
“Are you doing okay?” Her voice is soft, a warm puff against his face with that honeyed scent of her venom.
“Yes.” His voice is short, clipped, and she doesn’t speak again. Just keeps sewing. The pain is negligible to what he’s experienced in the past, and he reminds himself of that.
Finally (too soon) Alice pulls away. “Okay, that’s the first round done,” she says. He doesn’t even bother to look at her handiwork as he lets the transformation fade, so that he can at least meet her gaze.
“We’re going to have to break the humerus to reset your shoulder blades correctly,” she says. “It’ll hurt.”
The words are simple and he wants to scoff, but he knows. The wings are sensitive, and the bones dense. Breaking them in a special pain he’s lived through once.
He grunts in acknowledgement as he shrugs back into his hoodie.
“Let me know what you want to do.” She sets aside the sewing kit and for a moment he wants to. He wants to ask her to sit with him and talk about nothing - about her old coven, about what the closest town is like, about places she’s been. He wants something simple, something easy. He wants to bury his face against her, and breathe in flowers and ink and the sharp, toxic honey of her venom. He wants…
Alice smiles at him sadly one last time before she slips away, giving him the space she expects he wants.
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