#there's no shots of him doing finger guns so here's him shrugging instead

[brucedefender4eva]

After the fourth night in a row where one of his kids directly disobeys his orders and gets hurt even more

Bruce is just done

Burnt out, drained, weary; whatever the fuck you want to call it at this point

He’s been working on himself a lot lately. And at this point in all his relationships, he understands that taking away their alter-ego and benching them will only backfire on him.

So he doesn’t do anything

He mentally throws his hands up in defeat and just… does whatever they wants to diffuse the situation

Dick is expecting another yelling match to commence the moment they get back to the cave. In fact, he went out tonight deliberately trying to get to this moment. He brought cough drops for the aftermath to soothe his throat from all the yelling. He knows it isn’t healthy, but he just needs to let out some steam

Instead of their usual routine, Bruce gets out of the Batmobile and doesn’t even look at Dick. You can’t say his posture is… relaxed… but it isn’t wound up tightly like it usually is when one of his children gets hurt

Bruce goes over to the Batcomputer and starts typing down what happened on patrol that night while Dick does his best not to put any pressure on his possibly broken leg

After a few minutes of silence, Bruce sighs and turns back to Duck with a raised eyebrow, his face passively blank

“What?”

Dick shifts and winces as his entire leg throbs painfully. “A-aren’t you gonna call Alfred?” Dick responded back petulantly, keeping his voice low in hopes Bruce wouldn’t hear him then get annoyed and finally show some emotion

“Your arm isn’t broken, is it? Use it.” Bruce said simply before turning back around and continuing to type.

Dick felt anger bubble up in his chest, but it felt stupid to try and start a fight when Bruce obviously wouldn’t engage.

Dick storms off in a huff, at least he tries. He makes it a few steps before deciding to sit down and call Alfred.

“Love you,” Bruce calls back to him without turning around, causing Dick to stick up both of his middle fingers in retaliation.

Or with Jason, he’ll pick his battles and accept whatever happens afterwards

Jason’s waiting for the other shoe to drop. Extremely reminiscent of when he first came to the Manor

He had shot someone on patrol. Could he have used his rubber bullets instead of his real ones? Yes. Did he lie to Bruce and say that he didn’t have real bullets in him? Also yes

But fuck Bruce and all the rules he has

Now it was completely silent as they rode home in the Batmobile.

Jason checked over his gun for the fourth time before carefully tucking it back in her holster.

“You’re seriously not gonna say anything, old man?” Jason griped. Usually, this would be the catalyst for a large-scale argument, but there was nothing. Not even an eye roll for Jason's old man comment.

“What’s the point? Not like you’ll listen anyway.” Bruce shrugged, ignoring Jason's angry scoff as he stopped the Batmobile. “Here, your safe house.”

Jason blinked at Bruce, looking at him incredulously. “Are you fucking serious? You’re dropping me off at my safe house? Not gonna allow me in the cave anymore?” Jason snarled, not even thinking to question how Bruce knew where his super secret safe house was.

“You said, and I quote, ‘never wanna set foot in this fuck ass cave another day of my undead life’.” Bruce raised an eyebrow, at least it sounded like he did. Hard to tell with the cowl.

“Fuck you!” Jason decidedly does not pout as he gets out of the car and starts storming up to his door.

Bruce rolls down the windows and shouts out a quick ‘love you’ before speeding off into the night.

He won't enable it, but he's not gonna go out of his way to stop them if he's tried once before

Tim’s sitting down at the Batcomputer, mulling over a case that Bruce said to drop several times or at least put a pause in it, cause it's taking its toll on the young detective

When Bruce walks downstairs, Tim’s expecting a confrontation since Bruce had told him to go to sleep at least four times already

But nope

When Bruce noticed Tim looking at him, he simply gave him a greeting grunt before shuffling through his own stack of papers

“I know you said to go to bed, but I’m almost done! I swear!” Tim pressed his back firmly against the swivel chair, waiting…

“Mhmm…” Bruce hummed, barely listening. “Sleep, don’t sleep. Whatever.” Bruce takes another sip of his tea before placing it beside Tim, grabbing a folder full of paper, and pressing a kiss to Tim’s forehead. “Have fun, love you.”

Damian’s angry at him for something perfectly normal to be angry about, whether it’s regular teen stuff or vigilante stuff? Agree with him

While he’s threatening to stay a week at Dick’s place or even the Kent farm, Bruce is packing a bag for him

He nods and hums along absentmindedly as Damian rants that he can’t stand being in the Manor. Nothing he hasn’t heard a million times before from his children and other non-children

“What are you doing?” Damian questioned, finally stopping his rant to actually pay attention to what his father’s doing

“You said you needed a break from me, right?” Bruce grinned, actually okay with the house being quiet for a few days. “You’ve been dying to hang out with Jon more, go on.”

Jon, who was listening in just like his father always is, was already floating outside with the biggest and brightest smile on his face

“Have fun, kiddos. Love you!” Bruce called out, ignoring Damian’s sputtering as he shut the manor door behind him

[always-just-red]

I've been lookin for a writer who takes reqs for lnds 😭 Can i req sfw hcs/one-shot (choose which one u prefer more) for sylus & fem/gn reader?

I remember there was one call for zayne x mc where mc called zayne accidentally because mc was drunk & mc called zayne (accidentally) instead of booking a cab (mc did book a cab but w/ a wrong destination).

Can i maybe req what if the scenario is like that but it's w/ sylus instead? Feel free to tell me if this req is too much or if u wanna decline it, thanks a lot!

My first Sylus fic! Yay! (Don't look at me Rafayel 🥰) Anon your mind is so powerful! This prompt was so much fun to write, so thank you, hope you enjoy!

Wrong Number

Sylus x Reader 🩸

Summary: You're having a bit of trouble getting hold of that taxi you booked, but more trouble help is on the way...

Genre: fluff, kinda ends on an angsty note (sorry 😇)

Warnings/Additional tags: drunk reader, some swearing, humour, uses of 'sweetie' and 'kitten', threat of violence/death at the start, a slight bit of suggestion (it's Sylus, ok? He's having ✨fun✨)

| Word count: 2k | Masterlist | Opt-in to my taglist here!

Disclaimer: Characters belong to Love and Deepspace. All work is my own, so please don't repost or plagiarise!

“Mr. Sylus, please! It was an honest mistake— almost indistinguishable from a genuine protocore, I swear!”

Sylus is lounging back in a plush leather armchair, feeling thoroughly short-changed as he turns about a fake protocore with his fingers. He’s been listening to this noise for almost a full minute, growing awfully impatient, though he did like the last excuse.

“Say that again,” he drawls with a sinister smile.

“It was an honest mistake,” the black-market dealer stutters, tripping over his words. “It was almost indistinguishable from a—”

“Almost indistinguishable…” Sylus confirms. “Almost. Almost.” He’s savouring each syllable— tasting them like wine.

“It would have fooled almost anyone!”

“Almost anyone?” Sylus laughs, and it’s a wicked, dangerous thing. “Well yes, I rather think that’s the point. But it didn’t fool just anyone, did it? It fooled you.”

His smile is gone in an instant, his hand closing around the fake protocore, splintering it with a crack. He drops bloodied, sapphire fragments from his palm, red and blue, red and blue, and they skitter across the hardwood floor like rain.

“Please, Mr. Sylus!” the dealer pleads, desperate. “I’ll do anything! I will! I’ll make it up to you!”

“No, thanks.” Sylus studies his palm as it heals. “I’ve had my fill of fake protocores.”

“Sylus!”

The leader of Onychinus stands, drawing his gun with a customary apathy. Dark energy manifests, twisting around the dealer’s limbs, holding him still, while a lone tendril crawls around his mouth, holding him silent. He’s struggling, but he should know better. He should have known better from the very beginning. With a wistful smile, Sylus levels the gun with his head, and—

Something rings.

His red gaze shoots up, instinctively seeking Luke and Kieran, but they shrug from their station at the other side of the room. The sound is closer than that, anyway. Glaringly more familiar. Sylus’s spare hand goes to his pocket, and he draws out his phone.

“Mmm?” he greets, thumb sliding across the screen as he puts it to his ear.

There’s only one person who calls him at this time of night.

“Where are you?” your voice echoes from the other side of the line.

“That’s a question I prefer not to answer without knowing what motivates it.”

“Wha— Sylus?”

“Yes, sweetie,” he drones.

There’s a moment of silence. “Shit.”

It’s not the reaction he aspires to, but you sound agitated, so he’s going to let it slide. There’s a loud crackle from the speaker, followed by a few, harsher sounds, and he pulls the phone away from his ear, wincing slightly. His eyes are trained on the man at his feet, but he lowers his gun, distracted.

“What are you—” he begins, but then he identifies the sound. It’s a finger— your finger— jabbing away at a screen. “If I didn’t know any better, Miss Hunter, I’d say you were trying to get rid of me.”

“No…” you deny too quickly. It’s still there: the tapping. Like Mephisto, pecking furiously at a locked window from outside. A few more jabs, and then…

The call cuts out.

Sylus scoffs, looking down at his now silent phone in disbelief. He flops back into his chair, tossing his gun onto a side table before hitting the button to call you back. You know he’s not a patient man, but you don’t pick up the first time, and so he has to try again. He can be patient for you— he tells himself— as he thinks up some creative ways for you to return the charity. Speaking of charity…

His gaze drops to the dealer. “Get out,” he sneers.

The man doesn’t have to be told twice. He scrambles to his feet as his blood-dark bindings retract, practically throwing himself towards the room’s exit. Luke pushes open the door, the intense music of the nightclub beating through the gap, but Kieran’s being less helpful. He steps into the doorway, blocking any escape. He feints right. Then left. Behind the masks, both men are laughing.

Eventually Kieran steps aside. He shoves the dealer the rest of the way through the door as Luke kicks it shut, and they exchange a high-five.

Sylus pinches the bridge of his nose. His call connects.

“Hello?” You’re back. “Finally! Where are you? I don’t see you.”

“Still me, sweetie.”

“Sylus?” you actually whine. It’s adorable. “Why is it you? Go away.”

“No,” he lilts tunefully, and then he’s coaxing: “I want to help you, kitten. Won’t you let me help you? Tell me, who are you trying to call?”

Frustration spills from you— fake, exaggerated sobs tearing themselves from your throat. “The taxi, Sy,” you whine again. “The stupid taxi, okay? It’s not here. It’s meant to be here.”

“Where’s here?”

“Ha!” you exclaim like you’ve evaded a masterplan, and not a casually asked, run-of-the-mill question. “No. Nice try, but no. You wanna help me?”

“Yeah.”

“Then leave me alone!”

With— he can imagine— some sort of theatrical flourish, you deliver your phone a final, decisive tap. It beckons a fateful silence. Sylus brings his phone in front of his face, unmoved by the moment’s gravitas. There’s a pop-up on the screen. Kitten: requesting video chat.

He smiles to himself. Then accepts. “Hi sweetie.”

Your face is lighting up his screen, your cheeks flushed, your brow furrowed, and your eyes sharp with determination. “Why can I— wait, why can I see you? Get out of my phone, Sy!”

“My, my,” he tuts, but he’s smiling still, “look at you— the illustrious Miss Hunter. It is a relief to know the fate of Linkon rests in such… reliable hands.”

“What d’you mean?” you mumble.

“You’re drunk.”

“You’re drunk!”

He chuckles. “And there’s that infamous wit.”

You bite your lip as you ignore him, still fixated on trying to end the call. It occurs to him that you will eventually succeed; even a broken clock is right twice a day. “Listen to me, sweetie. Are you alone?”

His tone is sober enough for the two of you, and your exasperated eyes meet his. “Yeah.”

“Then be a good girl and send me your location. You remember how to do that, right?” He carefully enunciates each word of his plan. “I’ll come and get you, but I need to know where you are. Don’t go with anyone else. Wait for me, okay?”

You’re nodding away, the odd ‘mmhmm’ escaping your lips, but you’re not at all listening. He catches on after a minute. Trails off— realises your gaze is too vacant, and your focus? Wandering. You’re cradling your phone with both hands. His view is interrupted as your thumb passes over the camera; you’re… stroking the screen?

“You’re so pretty, Sy,” you murmur breathlessly.

His gaze softens. He sighs, “You’re pretty too.”

Then you make a sound he’s never heard before: you squeak, the phone’s audio almost cutting out. A blush is spreading through your cheeks, so much darker than the alcohol’s afterglow, and gods he wishes your face was in his hands. The vision is short-lived, however, because suddenly you’re gone.

There’s a circling view of a dark street, split by streaks of white light, as your phone careens through the air. It strikes concrete a moment later, stuttering to a stop, and Sylus’s grimace deepens with each jarring crack. Your screen has gone black, but he doesn’t think it’s broken. He’s face down, apparently— subjected to an unexciting view of the pavement.

“Oh, shit!” He hears you gasp.

Though your voice is far away, your phone is in your grasp again in no time. You’re turning it over, peering down at him, tracing the outline of his face with worry. “Sorry, Sy. Are you okay?”

“I’ll survive.” He raises an eyebrow. “You know, if you wanted to throw me around, you only needed to ask.”

His voice has dropped, and he loves watching you notice. You stand from your crouch with a smirk, bringing him with you— a dark idea in your eyes. “Wanna go again?”

Before he can protest, he’s looking at the back of your head. Your arm is stretched behind you, gearing up to send him on another short flight.

“Ah, ah, ah,” he interrupts, panicking briefly, but you’d never detect it with all your wits about you, let alone none. He’s brought in front of your face again, and you’re frowning oh so sweetly. “I asked you to do something, remember?”

“You told me to do something.”

So pedantic. “What did I tell you to do, sweetie?”

You don’t say anything. There’s a short huff as you blow hair from your face, and then you’re concentrating. You have that look he likes: the one you get when you’re whittling away at your paperwork like a good little hunter. The same stubborn resolve, too, that makes you lean over it when he or Mephisto are conveniently behind your shoulder.

Your location comes through with a ping and his smile widens. He’s up in a heartbeat, telling you he’s on his way— that you did such a good job— and that you need to stay on the phone with him, okay? He spins his fingers as he passes between Luke and Kieran, a gesture they’ve long grown accustomed to and can easily translate.

I'm leaving. Clean this up.

…

“So then Xavier, like— well, you know Xavier— he was all, ‘I’ll tell you later,’ but he never did, Sy! Off he went, leaving Nero and I to do all the paperwork, and I asked Nero, and Nero was like, ‘ask Xavier yourself’, and I was like, ‘I literally just did!’, and he just shrugged, and it’s… driving me crazy, you know? Because where does he even go? Tara and I have this bet going, she thinks it’s because he—”

Your anecdote comes to a sudden stop.

“What does Tara think, sweetie?”

“Shh shh shh! Wait a second…”

You clutch your phone to your chest like it’ll somehow suppress Sylus’s voice. You’re sat, leaning back against a chain-link fence, but you rise as a black car pulls up in front of you. The windows are tinted. You squint, leaning forward to try to look through them anyway.

“I don’t like this, Sy,” you frown as you plant a hand on your hip. “There’s a car here.”

“Oh?”

“Shh!” you hiss again. It’s not the only car parked on the street, but it is the only one alive. The engine purrs and its lights are glowing like angry embers, refusing to be snuffed out by the dark. You take a step closer, then the engine cuts out. You take a bigger step back.

“What exactly are you afraid of?” Sylus asks, his tone so thick it’s practically bleeding through your phone. “Is a big, bad man trying to get you?”

“Well I don’t know what they look like, Sy. The windows are tinted, and I— AH!” you gasp.  

A strong pair of arms wrap around you from behind, lifting you from the ground. “Got you, sweetie,” Sylus chuckles in your ear as tell-tale crow feathers settle around you. His breath is hot on your neck and it tickles, turning your panicked shrieks to laughter.

“Sylus!” you squeal as you attempt to wriggle free. You don’t think you’re trying very hard.

The man lowers you back to your feet, but his arms stay around you and he dips his head, resting his chin on the curve of your shoulder. “Hi,” he whispers.

“Hi.” For a little word, there’s so much fondness.

“Let’s get you home to bed, okay?”

You nod compliantly with a yawn, swaying a little as his arms retract and you’re having to stand on your own again. He chuckles as he steadies you— placing a hand on the top of your head— and you pivot, drawn by the sound. His crimson eyes find yours and they’re dark with something that stirs you, even with your mind swimming and nothing really making sense. You’re not sure of anything at all, except—

No-one has ever looked at you like that before.

And you won’t remember it tomorrow.

“Come on,” he prompts, nudging you towards the car, and you start to walk, though you’re dragging your feet. “I want to hear all of the association’s dirtiest secrets while I still can.”

“Tara has a crush on the new weapon specialist, you know.”

Sylus blinks, then laughs— a tender, comfortable thing. Completely enthralled. “You don’t say,” he beams.

No, you won’t remember it tomorrow.

[ladysharmaa]

My love, my life

Spencer Reid x reader

Summary: As Spencer and the rest of the team headed back to Quantico after a case, his girlfriend waited for him while talking to Garcia. However, a man with a gun could delay the couple's reunion. Will Spencer arrive on time?

The sleek black SUV curved around the corner, Quantico’s familiar skyline coming into view. Spencer Reid sat in the passenger seat, legs jittering, phone pressed to his ear. The sun was dipping behind the clouds, casting the FBI building in a calm before the storm.

“Okay, okay, so Thai or Indian?” came the voice on the other end. Y/n, Spencer's girlfriend, was lounging at Garcia’s neon-lit desk, legs kicked up, the glow of computer monitors illuminating her smile.

She had been away from Spencer for about a week and was already going crazy. So, she decided that instead of waiting for him at home, completely bored, she would wait at his work, since she also missed Garcia.

They all had a complicated case, which kept Spencer away from her birthday dinner. Despite apologizing a thousand times since then — not that it was necessary, Y/n understood the demands of a bau agent's job — the genius promised that as soon as he returned he would make it up to her. And so, they were planning which restaurant they would go to.

“I vote Thai!” Garcia chimed in, half-distracted as her fingers flew over the keyboard. “Extra spicy. Like the way you two look at each other, my little doves.”

Derek Morgan’s laugh echoed from somewhere near Spencer. “Is the genius blushing again?”

Spencer adjusted his scarf and ducked his head, trying and failing to fight off the flush rising to his cheeks. “I'm not. But it’s actually a fascinating physiological response. Blushing is controlled by the sympathetic nervous system. When you're embarrassed or emotionally overwhelmed your body releases adrenaline, which increases your heart rate and dilates your blood vessels. That’s why the face turns red. But here’s the really interesting part — the face and neck have more capillaries than most other parts of the body, which is why it’s so visible."

"We get it, Spencer." JJ laughed in amusement. She was glad that Spencer found Y/n as he has been happier, and it was so cute to hear him talk about her all the time. He had heart eyes whenever he thought about his perfect girlfriend.

Spencer shrugged, but the little smile that formed on his lips gave him away. “I’m five minutes out.”

“Five minutes is too long.” Y/N teased. “I’m starving. Might chew on Garcia’s keyboard.”

“Do not touch my baby!” Garcia warned her dramatically.

“I’ll be there soon. Can’t wait to see you.” Spencer laughed softly, fingers tightening around the phone.

But just then, they all heard a thunderous bang. Even through the call the team managed to hear it clearly. A gunshot. Followed by screaming.

Spencer shot upright in his seat, his heart plummeting like a stone. They all stopped breathing, their attention glued to the cell phone that was heavy in Spencer's hand, which was shaking heavily. The line was chaos. Garcia was yelling something, Y/N gasped.

Fear ran through Spencer's veins, he didn't want to think about Y/n, his Y/N, in a dangerous situation. He faced the worst of the world every day, and the last thing he wanted was for his girlfriend to come into contact with the monsters that lurked in the shadows. He had to be with her.

And then there was silence. The call disconnected.

“No. No, no, no,” Spencer muttered, frantically tapping redial. “Pick up. Please pick up.”

Hotch, driving, had already stiffened and pressed harder on the pedal. “What happened? Someone try to contact Quantico.”

“They were shot at. Someone fired a gun. I lost the connection.”

"Nobody answers me, Hotch." JJ informed, also quickly calling members of Quantico. "There's a conference with the President of the United States, so a lot of agents aren't there. And now they'll have to stay with the President.”

"This is planned, Hotch." Emily added.

Hotch’s face hardened, eyes laser-focused on the road. He hit the sirens and floored even more the gas.

Spencer clutched the dashboard, unable to sit still. “We have to get there faster. She was just talking to me, everything was fine. The BAU is supposed to be a safe place—”

"They are going to be fine, pretty boy." Derek tried to reassure him, despite also being filled with panic. This has never happened before, as it was extremely dangerous to threaten a place full of FBI agents.

“We’ll get them”. Hotch promised. “Hold on.”

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗

Inside the BAU headquarters, panic surged through the bullpen.

Garcia and Y/N had barely made it from her office to the hallway when a group of armed men burst in through the rear access doors. They fired shots into the air in warning, pushing civilians and agents into the main atrium. One agent tried to draw their weapon and was immediately shot in the leg, collapsing with a yell. The others immediately dropped their guns as it was too risky, as a civilian could easily be hurt.

Y/N had grabbed Garcia’s hand, whispering, “Stay close to me, okay?” Her own body trembled, but they had to be brave until the team could save them.

The ringleader —a man with cold eyes and military posture — paced in front of the growing crowd of FBI employees. “You know what we want,” he snarled. “Files. Not on paper. Not redacted. Everything.”

He turned and raised his weapon — pointing it directly at Y/N, who was still holding Garcia's hand, all of them kneeling on the ground. When the girl realised the attention was on her, she tried to let go of the blonde's hand to not also put her in danger. But to no avail, they knew who Garcia was. They studied them. They prepared the attack.

“You!” he barked at Garcia. “You’re the tech, right? Show me the system. Get me what I want. Or she dies.”

Y/N flinched, but lifted her chin. Garcia clutched her friend’s arm tighter.

“Please...” Garcia stammered, inching toward her desk. “Just give me a second. It’s not that simple. We have encryption layers.”

"Don't lie to me!" he shouted furiously. In a moment of rage, he pointed the gun at an officer, who was calming an elderly couple, and shot him in the chest. He immediately fell to the ground, clutching his chest in pain. Y/n stared in horror at the sight of the bleeding man, her scream of surprise and horror mixing with those of the rest of the hostages. "As you can see, I'm not bluffing. Give us what we need, or your friend dies."

"You’ll get what you want, just... Just don’t hurt her.”

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗

Meanwhile, the SUV skidded into the FBI lot. Before the car had fully stopped, Spencer jumped out and bolted for the door, badge in hand. His chest ached, lungs burning, every part of him screaming to find her, to make sure she was okay.

“Security breach confirmed." an agent informed, walking besides the team quickly. The agents were already forming a perimeter, thinking of the best way to enter the building. “Multiple hostiles. Civilians inside.”

Reid’s feet didn’t stop moving, going straight to the operating table where the design of the building was. Hotch assumed the position of leader with SWAT units, immediately barking out orders. From the corner of his eye, he looked at Spencer, who was anxiously looking ahead.

"We'll get her and Garcia, Reid. Focus, I need you to find me an entry."

The genius was already ahead, his brain working through multiple options at an extreme speed. Every second was a second Y/n might be hurt. Or worse. He couldn't think about it, or he would go insane.

‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗‗

"What's taking so long?" one of the men in the group asked impatiently. "We're surrounded. Man, what are we doing? What were we thinking?"

"Calm!" the leader ordered. "Everything is fine. Work faster, blondie." he continued to Garcia, who was discreetly doing it on purpose to delay the process.

"I'm sorry… They-they are blocking me. It takes longer."

"While she's doing that, let me help him." Y/n begged, unable to hear the injured agent's painful and increasingly shallow breathing any longer. "He's loosing a lot of blood. If he dies, it'll be worse for you."

"Shut up." the man holding the gun muttered, hitting himself lightly on the head. It was like he couldn't think, nothing was going according to his plan.

"He's going to die if we don't do something! Please!" the girl cried desperately. " At least let someone put pressure on the wound."

"I said shut up, bitch!"

Then, he fired. Y/N didn’t even have time to scream.

Just a sudden, hot burst of pain across her shoulder. She stumbled backward, hand clutching instinctively at the blood already soaking through her jacket. She collapsed on the ground, the breath knocked clean from her lungs.

Garcia screamed, her hands instinctively covered her ears, her mouth open as she looked at her friend's fallen body.

The world seemed to explode around them as the BAU team breached the entrance with a deafening shout. The SWAT team poured into the atrium, with Hotch, Emily, Derek and Spencer right behind them.

There were voices shouting orders, leading the hostages to safety. But Spencer Reid didn't hear any of it. Something inside him snapped when he saw Y/n, his love, his life, on the ground surrounded by a pool of her own blood.

He appeared forward, his gun drawn, eyes already locked on the shooter. He didn't think. He just knew. With a clean pull of the trigger, Spencer fired. The gunman dropped instantly, a clean shot to the chest. Another fell in the ensuing gunfire, and the rest surrendered as SWAT flooded the hall. All of it was a blur.

Spencer, before he even realized what he was doing or what was happening, was already running towards her. He had to get to her.

“Y/N… No, no, no—”

He dropped to his knees beside her, blood already staining the scarf around his neck as he pressed it hard to her shoulder, trying to stop the bleeding. She was conscious, but her face was pale, eyes glassy. It was a strange appearance on Y/n, she always looked healthy, happy. Spencer loved that she blushed as much as he did, or even more, that she looked at the world with a sparkle in her eyes that he no longer had. But hers was enough for both of them. She made his world colorful.

“I got you, I got you, just stay with me, baby.” he whispered with a small smile, trying to reassure his girlfriend instead of showing all the fear he was feeling. His hands were shaking. He was shaking. He couldn't breathe. "I need medics over here!"

A shaking hand held Spencer's wrist, who was carefully caressing Y/n's cheek, at the same time wiping away the blood that had splattered on her skin. Just that small movement took immense effort on the girl's part, who licked her lips before speaking, "I'm okay, baby. That agent… He was shot. Is he alive?"

"What?" Spencer asked disoriented. Were there at least other people in the room? All his attention was on her. Hesitantly, he quickly raised his head to look at the person in question and returned his focus to Y/n's beautiful eyes. "He's fine. I'm worried about you. You need to go to the hospital."

“I tried to help him…”

“Just don’t close your eyes, please.” His voice broke. “I can’t do this without you. I can’t breathe without you. I love you. Do you hear me? I love you so much.”

“I’m here,” she whispered, barely audible. “Don’t cry…”

He leaned forward, pressing his forehead to hers, voice raw and trembling. “You are everything to me. I love you so much.”

“I’m not going anywhere. I love you, Spencer. At least I can now understand the pain you also went through. It truly hurts like a bitch.”

“I never wanted you to be in this kind of pain.”

“I’m okay.” she breathed.

When paramedics finally reached them, Spencer refused to move. They asked him to give them space. He didn't. He would never leave her side again.

They told him she needed clean bandages and oxygen. He nodded, but stayed glued to her side, holding her free hand like a lifeline, watching every single move they made. His mind was cataloging everything — angle of the shot, blood loss rate, respiratory rate, risk of nerve damage, but his mind was screaming one thing: don't let them take her away from me.

She was the light that pulled him back from his darkness. The calm in his storm. The one thing that made the nightmares quieter, the cases bearable, the only reason worth living for. Without her, being alive meant nothing.

Spencer refused to let go of her hand, watching like a hawk every movement the paramedics made. “Don’t touch her like that! She’s hurt. Just tell me what you’re doing!"

Y/n, not enjoying seeing Spencer so stressed, especially because of her, tried to speak, but it was proving to be a hard task. "Spencer..."

"Leave the mask on, my love, you need the oxygen. Relax, I'm right here.”

“We need to stop the bleeding and prepare her for transport.” one EMT said calmly. “Sir, you are in the way.”

“I’m not leaving her!” Spencer shouted, more frantic than he had ever been. But his tone left no arguments. “I'm going in the ambulance."

Hotch appeared at his side, giving him a nod of understanding. “We’ll meet you there.”

As they loaded her onto the gurney, Spencer walked beside it, never releasing her hand, eyes flickering with fear, desperation, and something deeper than both. Love. A kind of love he never felt before. It was so strong, so powerful.

He sat beside Y/n while the paramedic checked her vitals.

“I’ve faced killers, bombs, cult leaders… things that should keep me up at night,” he said quietly. “But nothing has ever scared me like seeing you fall. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t breathe. It felt like my heart stopped. Because the thought of losing you… it’s not something I can survive.”

Tears welled in her eyes.

“You’re my person, Y/N. You’re the one I dream about when I can't sleep and the one I search for in every crowded room. I can solve a thousand puzzles a day, but none of it matters if I can’t come home to you.” He brushed his thumb across her knuckles, voice breaking.

“You did come. You saved me.”

He leaned forward, pressing his forehead gently to hers. Spencer pressed sweet kissed around her face. Her eyes, her nose, her cheeks, and finally her lips.

“No.” he whispered, eyes closing, savoring every moment with her. “You saved me. You have, every day since I met you.”

Silence settled around them like a soft blanket. Spencer could finally relax while hearing the quiet rhythm of her breathing and the steady hum of machines. It was peaceful. She was alive.

And in that quiet, Spencer made a silent vow. He would never take a single second with her for granted again.

Because now he knew, without her, there was no him.

[sturnsdoll]

𝙍𝙄𝙑𝘼𝙇𝙍𝙔-`♡´- -c.s & t.y x reader

requested?: i've been bombarded to write another. so here y'all go!

pairing: dom!chris x dom!tara x sub!reader

summary: during a car ride home, your two friends get in a ridiculous arguement over who's better at pleasing women. both of them decide that you'll be the judge of that when you get to tara's.

warnings: no use of y/n, smut, threesome!, oral (f! & m! revieving), fingering, petnames (honey, good girl), cocky!tara&chris

word count: 4,446

authors note: ANOTHA ONE!! (don't like? don't read!)

"pink" = reader "orange" = chris "purple" = tara

it had felt like an extremely long day out despite it only having been a few hours you'd actually been with your friends. earlier, your friend tara had invited you out to do a little shopping and get some food. already being at the triplets home, you chose to invite them- however only chris had been free to come for the day.

the three of you got along surprisingly well, it'd been yap city the entire day between you guys. now though, it was time to head to tara's to sleepover. it had taken some convincing but you'd convinced chris to come for the (not so) girls night at hers.

dominic fike played lowly through the car, chris's choice of course but one that you and tara didn't particularly mind at all. she was currently driving her hot pink detailed vehicle. chris was in shot gun and you'd taken the back, wanting the space for a little nap.

-ˋˏ✄┈┈┈┈

"i think it's insane that some guys just like... can't make a girl cum?" tara said outlandishly, a little giggle on the end. chris laughed, a little taken aback at the odd conversation starter but not necessarily put off by it.

chris nodded subtly "yea, it's a little insane" he said, not a ton of interest in the conversation, he seemed mildly uncomfy talking about it. tara eyed him suspiciously, making a face that implied she was thinking about something. "you ever made a girl cum?" tara asked the younger man bluntly.

chris looked a little nervous, or more so slightly uncomfortable with the conversation. he shrugged, hesitating before nodding with a "yea?" like the answer was obvious. tara glanced at him again, eyes squinted. "hm."

chris looked at her for a few seconds, expecting her to continue. when she didn't, he decided to question her back "have you?" he felt odd asking it the second it left his lips but she didn't seem to mind, more than open to talking about it.

tara rolled her eyes "obviously. women know their shit when it comes to hoo ha's" she noticed that after her comment, chris had grown silent, side eyeing her clearly. "i'm sure you know your shit too, i'm just saying i'm better at it cause i'm a girl" she explained cockily.

"mhm" at chris's bland response, tara looked him up and down almost with slight judgement, her eyebrow raising slightly "you don't think so?" she questioned challengingly to which chris shrugged "i just know i know my shit. just cause you have a.." he hesitated, not wanting to be disrespectul with his choice word "..have one doesn't mean you automatically know more" chris's body language showed discomfort but his words and tone of voice said that he was sure in what he spoke.

tara almost looked appalled. it was a red light so she whipped her head to look back at you "are you hearing this-" she quieted her voice, cutting herself off when she saw you curled against the car door, practically drooling in a deep sleep.

chris smiled a little at your state "i bet you she'd agree with me" he stated. tara shrugged with a cocky look on her features "guess we'll see when she wakes up" she stated, making an unspoken agreement with chris that your opinion would be their tie breaker.

-ˋˏ✄┈┈┈┈

once you'd woke up and arrived at tara's, they didn't immediately bombard you with the ridiculous question. instead, you all made your ways to tara's living room, taking seats and talking about the day out, the only illuminants in the room being moonlight splashing through the windows mixed with low lamp light.

right after debriefing your day out, chris and tara seemed to exchange looks and simultaneously fall silent. you looked confused, smiling at your friends almost awkwardly "something wrong?" almost the second you spoke, chris piped in. "do you think that being a girl automatically means you're better at.. pleasing women?.." chris had an awkward smirk, almost more so a smile as he questioned you- he knew it was random.

looking between the two of them in shock you shrugged "i mean- i've been with both and some women suck too so, i guess not?"

tara groaned half playfully. "noo, you were supposed to agree with me" she complained. chris had an 'i told you so' look as she spoke. you put two and two together and realized this was a debate between the two.

you shrugged with a quiet "sorry" before sipping on the water you'd been neglecting to drink all day. chris opened his mouth to say something (that probably would've made tara flip.) but before he got to speak, tara interuppted "still doesn't mean that you're any better" she responded, crossing her legs and arms with an annoyed glint to her brown eyes when they fell on chris.

chris leaned back in his seat, legs spreading as he brought his pepsi can towards his lips "guess we'll never know" he told tara, a small shrug following.

you watched the way he leaned back in his seat, the way tara's crossed arms pushed her boobs up for a better view. finding your mind running, you wondered who's really better at pleasing. they're the one's who'd inflicted the idea afterall. in a spur of the moment, spontaneous decision, you decided to say something that'd either ruin or make the night.

"why don't we find out?"

both their eyes snapped to yours. you looked at them like it hadn't been you who just said it, your eyes widened in instant regret, looking almost petrified of their inevitable reactions.

tara was the first to snap out of the shock of your words. her lips curved to a smirk as she slowly turned her head to chris "yea, why don't we?" she questioned "unless you're scared you'll lose?" she directed at him challengingly, a daring glint in her eyes.

he licked his lips, opening his mouth like he had a million things to say. yet, all that came out was a choked laugh, practically a scoff. your eyes had been so focused between the two of them that you didn't even notice his hand creeping along the couch till it firmly rested on your knee.

his eyes locked on yours with question of if you were okay with this. you took hold of your bestfriends hand and guided it further up your thigh, a sign for him to do as he pleases.

and oh was he was going to.

in the blink of an eye his lips were on yours, free hand on the side of your jaw. all the while you heard shuffling behind you, then the cushion of the couch sunk down. tara's perfume clouded your senses as she moved up against your back.

you heard a light smack and chris's hand dissapeared, replaced by tara's on your thigh. you assumed she'd swatted his hand away. "my turn first" she demanded, confirming your suspicions. chris didn't protest. he broke away from your lips and got up when she nodded for him to. if he had to wait to please you that was fine with him, he was sure it'd only be better if he went after tara anyways since then you'd be all sensitive for him already.

tara's delicate fingers found the strings on your sweats, pulling them loose. she muttered for you to lay down, head on the arm rest and you did. as she worked on discarding your pants, your eyes wandered to chris whom was removing his belt.

you wanted to question what he was doing but you were caught off gaurd by tara's thumb gently pressing onto your clit through your panties. you watched as she took her glistening thumb to her lips with a smirk. she sucked the residue off lightly. "already soaked for me, honey?" tara cooed softly, earning a glare from chris.

jesus you were already soaked through your underwear? well that's not embarassing at all.

tara only smiled, leaning down between your legs. you watched in anticipation as her hands grabbed the insides of your knee's to push them apart. then one hand came down to hook the front of your pretty thong and pull it to the side. she practically drooled at the sight of you, throbbing at the thought of how wet you'd gotten for her- well for both friends already.

with a bat of her lashes she met your gaze, a sickeningly sweet smile as she leaned down and attached her lips around your clit. a surprised whine left from your lips, head tilting back on the arm rest. that's when you were met with the sight of chris.

(if anyone gets confused about the position, click here)

"you feel good?" he questioned, his face hard to read as his eyed roamed your body, from where your shirt rolled up your stomach all the way down to tara's head buried in your thighs.

upon trying to answer, she un-expectedly began flicking her tongue over your throbbing bud. "yea.." you said, voice high pitched and needy for more. he stood behind the arm of the couch so you had to look upside down at him from where your head lay.

your eyes roamed down his body to find his clothes still on, but jeans boxers pulled to his thighs as he stroked himself slowly, mouth agape at the sight of you.

his waist was level with where your head rested on the arm of the couch. chris shuffled a little closer to gently grab your chin, tilting your head back. you came face to face with his angry red tip that was leaking from the sight of you being devoured infront of him.

he stroked your cheek soothingly as he spoke "can i use your mouth, gorgeous?" despite his sweet tone of voice, his tip forced your bottom lip up. you could already feel the blood rush to your head from having it tilted back over the arm of the couch. your mouth opened for him compliantly, tongue darting out to run over his length.

he took that as a yes, thrusting half the length of his dick through your lips at the same time tara sucked your clit through her teeth, nibbling almost painfully.. almost.

your hips lifted as you choked out a moan around your friends dick. you could feel the smirk on tara's lips against your heat and your sure chris's expression matched. your male friend used his large hand covering your chin, practically on your throat, to keep you where he wanted as he completely thrusted his inches down your throat.

you clawed at the couch as you gagged lightly around him. he pulled out before slipping his dick right back in your mouth, quickly finding a slow pace to fuck your mouth at. although you couldn't see it, his mouth was hung open at the sight and feel of you. contrasting that, tara's tongue sucked and flicked fast enough to have your thighs reactively trying to entrap her head.

she smacked your thigh lightly, releasing your clit with a wet noise. you couldn't speak, so instead tried to whine around chris's cock apologetically. it didn't matter though because your clit was momentarily neglected. however, your dripping hole was invaded instead.

as tara's tongue fucked into you, you choked around your other friend, pulling your head back from him. he let you get to the tip to take a breath. your eyes were glossy with tears from having your throat abused, lips red and puffy. "you okay?" he asked, swiping your hair from your face. you nodded quickly, quickly regaining composure. his voice came out low with arousal, but soft at the sight of your cock-drunk features "gonna keep takin' me like a good girl?" his thumb caressed your cheek sweetly as he asked.

you whined, hips rolling into tara's mouth in reaction to his voice. chris was loving how much such a simple thing got you going. he tapped your cheek with his pointer finger gently, reminding you to respond. once you nodded your head for comfirmation, he went right back to chasing his high, slipping himself through your messy drool and cum covered lips.

speaking of chasing high's, your hand slid down shyly to find tara's hair, gripping lightly through her shiny black locks, which she had no protest for at all, even letting a whine out into your cunt that made your hips jolt up. the feel of her tongue was enough to have your head spinning as is, but having your head uncomfortably tilted back to take chris had you feeling like passing out.

as your hips squirmed up, tara placed her arm on your stomach, pushing you back to the cushions. you tried forming incoherent words around chris's cock, making tara chuckle into you. the vibration from her lips made you whine, you tried pulling off chris to inform them of your need to finish but he only pulled you back

(gentle enough that you could indicate to him if you really needed a break or if you were just trying to speak.)

tara watched with amusement as he kept you quiet. "shh, i know it feels good honey" she silenced you, her tongue plunging right back into your tight walls once done speaking. your cries of ecstasy came more frequently now and it was driving chris insane. you could tell by how his pace began to falter that you weren't the only one approaching your high.

knowing you were at the brink of breaking, her tongue entered you one last time, her hand pushing onto your lower abdomen in synch with it. you couldn't help it, this time you pulled your lips off chris and let out a high pitched cry, propping yourself on your elbows to let the blood flow back to your body from your head.

"fuck" you murmured as you held your friends face against your now-leaking cunt, riding your high while watching as she lapped at every drop leaking onto her tongue.

she soon came up your body with a satisfied grin on her lips. those same lips met yours, forcing you to tase yourself. mid kiss you both heard chris groan, causing tara's eyes to open and lips to leave yours. she watched as cum dripped down his dick, minstrated by his now stilled hand. she crawled over you, leaning forward over the arm rest with her tits in your face as she stuck her tongue out to clean up chris.

with them being right there, you took one of her nipples in your mouth. she finished cleaning up chris and then sat up on your hips, making you release her tit with a subtle pop. "this is about you, honey" she states as she gets up off of you and the couch "or at least it was till he shoved his dick down your throat..."

chris rolled his eyes, ignoring her comment and playfully shoving her aside as he approached you, pulling his boxers and jeans back up. "good luck topping that." tara said cockily, referring to how fucked out she'd already caused you to be.

chris only looked at you and smirked. he may not have been yappin' like tara was, but his confidence in outdoing her was pretty damn high. he motioned for you to sit up, so you did. he took a seat beside you and patted his lap. this hadn't been what you were expecting. gladly though you straddled him, hovering slightly.

"made such a fucking mess" he muttered to you. along with his comment, two of his long fingers came out and unexpectedly pushed all your juices back into you, ripping a whine deep from in your throat. his fingers experimentally curled and his name drawled out of your mouth the second they had. he figured you were already all worked up, there was no need to make you wait right?

his blue eyes locked with yours as he repeated the action again, and again.. and again. your hands gripped at each of his shoulders nails surely leaving marks through the fabric. "you like that?" chris's voice sounded patronizingly cockily. his eyes trailing to give tara a shit eating grin when you couldn't even get out a simple 'yes' your head nodding and hips grinding down into his hand instead.

tara was a little further down the couch now from you guys, her eyes locked on the two of you as her hand snaked into her own shorts to rub over her panties. she wanted to be mad at his cocky demeanor but instead, she found herself practically leaking at the over confident smirk he gave her. (not that she'd ever admit it)

your legs shook lightly as you tried to chase his movements with your hips. almost every curl of his fingers elicted some kind of needy noise from you. chris watched in both awe and satisfaction at how overstimulated you were, his fingers purposefully pushing as deep as possible just for a reaction.

your head dropped down to his shoulder, a gutteral moan as you gripped at the sleeve of his hoodie for any kind of stability. "'m not g-gonna last long" you hardly managed through pathetic little whines in his ear.

chris shook his head "no, you're gonna finish with your friend" he told you, eyes glancing between tara, then back to you. you shook your head gently in protest "but-" "shh, you'll live."

when you rested your head sideways to see your female friend, her legs were spread, hand in her shorts and head tilted back as she bit down on her lip to silence herself. but most noteably, her brown eyes were locked on chris's free hand that was currently running along your side.

tara's eyes took in the length and perfect thickness to chris' fingers, the way they gripped at your skin. the sight had her legs closing back up, thigh's squeezing her own hand as a strangled desperate whine finally slipped her glossed lips.

but you weren't the only one who caught sight of tara's wandering eyes. chris's look darkened at it, feeling his ego puffing up at knowing what she was thinking.

"gonna keep gawkin' orr you wanna come here?" there was a newfound cockiness to his tone that made tara smirk, quickly releasing her hand from between her thighs before shuffling down the couch where you and him sat. she was the first to make a move on chris, gripping the younger brunette's jaw gently to place her lips on his.

while his lips messily pressed back to hers, he slyly slipped his arm around tara's waist, pulling her in so her side was rested right against his. she lifted her hips to remove her black denim jorts, slipping them off onto the floor along with her (now wet) panties.

you were far from neglected during this entire interaction, rutting your hips all the way down chris's fingers as they curled into you with just the right amount of pressure to have your nails clawing further into his hoodie. the sight of your two friends messily swallowing each others mouths eagerly was like having a porno unfold right before your eyes.

chris' hand grazed down tara's stomach, agonizingly slow all the way to her waist. he intentionally missed where he should have been heading to go straight for her thigh's.

she wasn't really in the mood for it right now, further evident by her clutching his roaming hand into hers, forcing it to cup her soaked cunt instead. her hips greedily pushed into his hand, causing them to both to smile into the kiss.

now you tried not to get jealous of the both of them as you watched but it was becoming increasingly hard. tara's eyes momentarily flashing to catch your needy stare caused her to break off from chris' lips.

her soft fingers went for your throat, wrapping with just enough pressure to make you gasp in surprise. with that same grip she forced you towards her, her mouth coming to yours. instead of connecting your lips, she gently bit your bottom lip. sinking her teeth in gently and tugging your lip back, grinning when your gasp turned into a whine from both the sting of the bite along with the overwhelming feeling of chris's fingers.

which speaking of, were now circling tara's clit with his other hand. she was constantly gasping, her lips now trailing your jaw and her hand squeezing your neck tighter in response to chris's movements.

feeling the need to join in, chris' began mouthing at the unoccupied side of your neck, his eyes fluttering shut, soaking in the sounds of both your pleasured noises. he felt a sense of pride knowing it was because of him.

your body was hot all over, nearly feeling like you could pass out from but too caught up in being finger fucked by your friend to care. chris could tell you wouldn't be able to hold off much longer, so he tauntingly moved his wrist further forward to curl his digits deeper into you.

"'m-" you cut yourself off with a moan as they both sucked down on different parts of your neck in synch. you'd think they planned it with how in unison their mouths worked dark purple marks onto you.

forgetting to repeat yourself, your jaw just fell slack, gripping chris' arm warningly. "close?" he mumbled in question against your bruised skin. upon hearing you breathing out an "uh huh", he knew he was gonna need to get tara there faster if he wanted you both to finish together. so he switched to circling your friends clit with the pad of his thumb instead, slowly fucking two fingers into her.

tara parted from your neck to look at chris like she had something to say about it but was quickly shut up when his fingers brushed the spongey spot deep inside her, having her reeling for more of it.

she had already been close from her own previous work on herself so she wasn't gonna last much longer either, announcing it by mumbling next to chris' ear that he was "doing so good" her voice lacked the same cockiness from earlier, sounding needy now,

chris bit his lip to suppress a smile at the praise for how good he was doing at pleasing the both of you. now the only rivalry with chris that tara could care about was if he was making you or her cum first, the argument from earlier long lost in her mind.

he himself had been trying to contain himself from growing hard again at the gorgeous sight of his two friends falling apart on top of, as well as beside him. he wasn't sure when or how he started but his hips were subconciously rutting up into your thigh in rythym with the pace of his fingers inside you.

the sight and sounds of both of you was almost too much, he spoke up to try and talk you both to the edge "c'mon, look so pretty taking it" he started breathlessly, his head was now dropped onto your shoulder, but facing toward tara. so as he spoke, you and tara both assumed he was speaking to yourselves. (which was his intention)

he didn't think about his words as they spilled from his lips, eager to feel you both finish "'know you can cum for me together" his voice was lower, clearly more affected by his clothed dick against your thigh than he'd like to admit.

with an aggresive amount of sudden pressure to both your clits, he got his wish.

walls fluttering around his fingers, your head tilted back, a babble of noises that were meant to be words came strangled from your lips. the hand of yours that wasn't grabbing chris's sleeve reached over to find tara's free hand and grab it, which she happily held, squeezing your hand back with a breathless giggle as her own walls closed and convulsed on chris's knuckles too.

you became overwhelmed quickly, having already came once before this. chris caught on to this by the way your hand was sliding down his arm to his wrist, wordlessly grabbing it in warning. he observed the way your brows knitted together, lips puffing out when he slowly removed his fingers from your fluttering walls.

only seconds later he released his hand from between tara's thigh's too. before chris could process it, tara took his fingers drenched in her slick to her mouth, wrapping around them. his lips parted in a gentle gasp and you took the opportunity to guide his own fingers from his other hand to his lips, encouraging him to tase you as well.

he gladly complied. his blue eyes locked on yours as he sucked his own digits dry of your juices. once he released his fingers, tara realeased his from her mouth as well.

panting, your eyes raked chris in disbelief, this is when you saw the huge wet patch on chris's sweatpants. you giggled teasingly, tara clearly having observed the sight to because she was giggling right along with you, shaking her head as she said "noo way" tauntingly

chris's cheeks tinted a dark shade of red as he groaned "shut the fuck up" to both of you, clearly a little embarassed. his hands quickly found your hips to lift you off him onto the couch. he stood up, rushing to the bathroom.

you and tara both combusted into laughter, wheezing and smacking at each other due to laughing so hard as you watched him walk away, uncomfortably grabbing his crotch.

"i hate you guys!" grumbling like an angry kid he slammed the bathroom door shut.

"love you too!" both of you yelled back in unison to the bathroom door.

tara shuffled to face you as she began putting her clothes back on "okay it's just us, be honest, i was better right?" tara asked wish a raised eyebrow. you had to look away from her as you spoke your truth "you were great!" you responded enthusiastically to avoid the question.

tara knew what your avoidance meant. chris had 'won'.

tara gasped dramatically (mostly) pretending to be offended "girl! fuck you" she playfully shoved your arm as you both giggled, knowing it wasn't that serious.

and despite being 'quiet' (neither of you were.) chris had most certainly heard the conversation from the bathroom and was more than pleased to hear it.

not that he wouldn't have gladly fucked some sense into you another time but, still glad he'd proved his point.

he won.

thank you to everyone for being patient. i was having writers block so this took a longggg time to come out but i'm back on my shit so send more reqs!

tagsᥫ᭡: @mattsrod @sturncakez @watercolorskyy @pettydollie @sturniol0s @6ix9inewiturmom @sonicsmacks @fratbrochrisgf @eyelovedher89 @bernardsbendystraws @riversandwinds

[mentally-gone002]

i’m right here…

summary: spencer is really upset about a decision you made in the field.

warnings: angstyyy!!

a/n: here i am with another spencer x reader💃 also i was actually on the cusp of death(sleep) while proofing this one so… if there’s anything i missed that’s mb lmaooo (yo girls tired af) also!!! this isn’t supposed to be within any specific season or anything it’s kinda just out there!!

———————————————————————

the door of spencer’s apartment was slammed behind you. he sounded angry the from way he did it, rightfully so, but you’ve never seen him this angry. you didn’t get the chance to fully react before he was grabbing your wrist to pull you away to his bathroom. he gestured for you to sit on the vanity counter. 

you stayed quiet. spencer’s face was contorted with pinched brows, clenched teeth and narrowed eyes as he seethed silently, reaching to carefully peel a piece of lightly blood soaked bandage from your forehead. he tossed it into the garbage can and started to clean the blood from your head. 

you’d gotten injured in the field hours earlier. you’d gone after the unsub the team was after because you thought you could detain her. of course, that plan of yours failed, ending with your forehead falling victim to the back of the gun the woman had. luckily morgan was there to detain her before she took a shot at you on the ground. 

spencer had been silent towards you ever since he heard of how you disobeyed direct orders from hotch. 

it was strange to not hear him talk for this long. it was going on five hours. five hours too long in your opinion. 

as he finished replacing your bandage you spoke up. “i’m sorry.” was all you said. it would probably be useless because all the other attempts to make him talk to you were just filled with more silence and maybe a disappointed look. he sighed heavily though as he looked away. 

“i don’t understand why you couldn’t just listen to hotch.” his brown eyes bore into yours when he said that. 

you shrugged. “i though i could catch her.” 

spencer got visibly more upset than he was before in a second. “you though you could catch her?” he asked. “she pointed a gun at your head.” his voice grew slightly louder.

you swallowed thickly and hunched down at the volume. “i didn’t get killed.” you muttered. 

he scoffed, stepping away from where you sat on the vanity in amusement. his jaw was clenched hard. “that isn’t the point here. you disobeyed an order and put yourself in danger.”

your head snapped toward him. “you think i don’t know that? this job, it makes us all put ourselves in danger!” your voice rose slightly. 

spencer clenched his fists at his side and breathed. “so that just gives you the right to rush into danger the second you want?” he wondered. 

you slid off the vanity to stand against it instead. “if that means that we get the bad guys, then yes!” 

his anger spiked, eyes widening and chest puffing out due to a heavy intake of air. “but you can’t just go off on your own whenever you want! especially when our unsub was as erratic as she was!” he explained with his hands waving in the air as a way of adding some emphases. 

“i wasn’t on my own, reid! morgan was right there!” you reminded him, stepping close as he stepped back, almost bumping the wall behind him. spencer seemed to be getting more agitated by the minute, especially when you called him by his last name.

“oh, okay! so since morgan was there i guess this is okay?” he asked. 

you scoffed, rolling your eyes. “no. but he didn’t listen to hotch either, so don’t put this all on me!” 

“morgan isn’t here right now, so we aren’t talking about what he did,” spencer told you, “we’re talking about what you did!” he snapped, index finger pointed at your chest. 

you sighed heavily with a pang of guilt that intensified. it had been there since the case had ended. “why are you making this such a big deal? i already know that i was stupid to do what i did, i apologized to hotch, i apologized to you more than once, and i know that i risked my life. drop it.” you walked out of the bathroom into spencer’s dark apartment. 

he followed on your heels, not finished with the conversation yet. “drop it?” he repeated with sarcasm. you didn’t know he knew how to use sarcasm but there it was. “i’m not going to drop this!” 

“well you should!” you spun on your heels with your voice louder than you meant it to go. 

spencer stopped in his tracks with evident perplexity. “why? are you telling me to not be worried about you?” he asked. 

you nodded. “that’s exactly what i’m telling you, spencer! i’m safe and standing in front of you right now!” you stepped closer to him, craning your neck to look up at him. “i really expected you to act differently after this case. i thought you’d come up to me and help me or maybe hug me and say something along the lines of ‘im glad you’re alright’ but i guess not because all i got was the silent treatment.” you kept staring at his eyes. 

he looked stunned and not angry for the first time this evening. “of course i’m glad you’re alright!” she snapped. “i’m glad you’re standing here right now, but it’s only because of dumb luck!” 

you rolled your eyes. how was the this dense  and also a genius at the same time? “no, it’s because i’m trained for this job and back there… that was me using my training. so i’m sorry i was doing exactly what i’m employed to do!” you shouted. 

spencer shouted back, “so to you, doing your job means that you get to not follow orders?” he asked with heavy breaths. “do you realize how risky that is?” 

“yes, i do.” you nodded, rubbing your eyes in exhaustion. “but im safe, and the monsters are in jail. that’s all that matters.” 

“what about me?” he asked. 

you crossed your arms. “what about you?” you wondered. 

“you really don’t know what it’s like to see someone you really care about after they’ve almost died.” spencer stepped closer and his voice got quiet. 

you frowned and tilted your head to the side to keep your eyes on his. he looked away at the floor. “i don’t doubt it was scary, but i’m here, spencer.” you smiled softly at him. “i’m right here.” 

he let his eyes meet yours again. the inside of his cheek was held between his teeth as he contemplated what to do next. he knew he was being too hard on you but he just didn’t want to loose you. instead of opening his mouth to say something else he stepped forward and wound his arms around you, holding you against him in a tight embrace. his face hid away in the crook of your neck. your arms didn’t go around his back in a returning embrace immediately, still on alert for the fight to continue. but it didn’t. he breathed shakily before whispering, “don’t ever do that again.” his voice was low and slightly muffled by your shoulder. 

“okay… okay, i won’t.” you rubbed your hands over the expanse of his back in a comforting motion. 

you stood there in each others arms for a few minutes, just relishing in the feeling of being held. it was also a silent apology from both of you, a reassuring apology. 

“you promise?” he asked. 

you nodded, closing your eyes. “i promise.” you muttered. “just don’t yell at me again.” you told him while pulling away just enough to see him. your hands rested on his waist. 

spencer nodded as he took your hands into his own, letting them hang between you both. his eyes were on the floor. “i’m sorry… i was just… still on edge from the case. i can’t stand the thought of loosing you.” he whispered. 

you craned your neck in a direction so that you’d find spencer’s eyes. “you won’t loose me.” you assured him, squeezing his hands. “and i won’t do that again okay? it hurt enough as it is.” you gestured to your head a little. 

he nodded as relief washed over his worried mind. he squeezed your hands a little before dropping them and wrapping his arms around your frame again. he breathed you in a few times, just to really be sure you were there. safe in his arms. safe in his apartment. 

“it’s late… or early.” you pulled away slowly from him. spencer nodded with a quick brush of your hair behind your ear. 

he glanced at his watch. “yeah. it’s been a long day and you need all the rest you can get.” he told you. 

you nodded. “will sleeping make my gash heal faster?” your hand was in his as you lead him to his bedroom. 

spencer nodded. “actually yes, getting good amounts of sleep can assure your hormones will rebuild that broken tissue because cortisol levels lower while your asleep.” he replied, rambling with information that made you smile. 

“okay, boy genius,” he pulled a face at the same carried on by the whole BAU team, “let’s get to sleep then.” 

he nodded and followed you with getting changed out of your clothes and climbing into his bed with the comforter pulled up to her nose. he grinned at you while he laid in front of you, hand searching to hold yours under the covers. 

you pulled spencer’s hand to your lips. “night, doctor reid.” you murmured, tiredly teasing him.

he smiled at that and closed his eyes. “good night.”

[saffusthings]

second chances

mob boss! lando norris x reader

part twenty-three: all the stars

word count: 2.1k (feels shorter tho?)

warnings: dialogue heavy, messy switching of povs

twenty-two | twenty-three | twenty-four

The library was nearly empty at this hour, save for the quiet hum of the air conditioning and the occasional shuffling of pages from someone studying just as late as they were.

Lando leaned back in his chair, twirling a pen between his fingers, watching as she… folded a tiny paper star? 

He narrowed his eyes. “That doesn’t look like studying.”

She sighed dramatically, pressing the crease into the paper with a little too much force. “I can’t study anymore. My brain is fried. Done. Over. That’s it. It’s rejecting all new information.”

Lando exhaled through his nose, staring at the textbook open in front of them. They’d been at this for hours—practicing logic games, running through sample arguments, dissecting the intricacies of contracts and torts. She was good, but she was tired.

And when she got tired, apparently, she made little paper... thingamajigs?

Her head lolled onto her folded arms, barely upright at this point, eyes unfocused as she stared at the open prep book in front of her.

“Okay,” he said, flipping a page. “Logical reasoning. Let’s try one more.”

She groaned, voice muffled against her sleeve. “No.”

“Yes.”

“Noooo.”

“Yes.”

“Liam,” she lifted her head, fixing him with a mildly-impressive threatening stare, “I swear to God, I could not tell you the difference between a necessary and sufficient assumption right now if my life depended on it. Like, gun to my head? Not happening.”

Lando blinked, looking at her seriously. “Your life does not depend on it.”

“Exactly,” she declared, tossing down her highlighter. “So I’m making stars instead.”

She reached for the strips of paper she’d been folding absentmindedly for the last ten or so minutes, fingers deftly creasing them into small, perfect origami stars. The table was already littered with them, tiny constellations of her boredom.

Lando leaned back in his chair, arms crossed, watching her work with a bemused expression.

“I didn’t know you were so easily defeated.”

She shot him a glare. “I’m not defeated. I’m… on strike.”

“Against?”

“My own brain.”

He snorted, shaking his head. “Great. Can’t wait to see you argue that in court one day.”

She rolled her eyes but smiled, fingers still working on another star.

Liam stared at her for a moment too long, seeming very judgmental for someone who did not have to do the actual studying part. He narrowed his eyes. “You’re serious?”

She didn’t even look up. “Liam, I cannot study anymore.”

“You said that half an hour ago, and yet, we are still here.”

“I know, and that was the last time I could study. My brain is at maximum capacity. I have reached the limit of human intellectual absorption.” She held up a tiny, folded star between her fingers, as if to prove her point.

Lando sighed, rubbing a hand over his face. He should tell her to keep going. Should remind her that this test was important, that she couldn’t afford to slack off now. But she looked tired, and he wasn’t a monster.

“…At least make me one,” he said, nodding toward the paper scraps.

Her head snapped up, eyes suspicious but there was a glimmer of excitement there too if Lando looked hard enough. “You want an origami star?”

He shrugged. “Eh, might as well.”

For a second, she just stared at him, like she was trying to figure out if he was messing with her. But then she grinned—small, genuine, and earnest. Lando wondered what other things caused her eyes to light up like that, what simple pleasures had her glittering with this pure kind of joy.

He leaned forward, interrupting her space by plucking a finished star from the pile and examining it between his fingers. “So… is this, like, normal or whatever? Or is there a cure–”

She gasped, appalled. “Oh, shut up! I just needed to do something with my hands that wasn’t writing or highlighting or underlining—”

Lando flicked the tiny star at her forehead.

She gasped. “Liam!”

“You were talkin’ too much,” he said, leaning back in his chair, smirking. “Consider it a tactical disruption.”

She huffed, flicking one right back at him. It hit him squarely in the chest. Once a concerning number of them were sufficiently scattered about their work table, he reached over and picked one up, inspecting the delicate folds.

“Should I be worried that you can make, like, fifty of these in under five minutes?”

“It’s a completely normal coping mechanism.” She started another one, hands moving on autopilot. “Some people take smoke breaks. I make stars.”

He raised a brow. “Not sure that’s the best analogy.”

She grimaced apologetically, realizing her mistake. Liam had been extra grumpy after recently quitting, despite the fact that he claimed not to smoke in the first place. Even though it resulted in his car smelling nicer, it apparently was still a touchy subject. She shot him an apologetic look before turning back and placing another finished star in a neat little row beside the others.

Lando sighed, running a hand down his face. He should probably tell her to keep studying, but—screw it. She’d worked her ass off. If she needed a break, she needed a break.

He appeared lost in some deep thought, so he caught her off guard when he reached for another piece of scrap paper and attempted to fold his own.

“Wait, are you—”

“Shut up. I’m concentrating.”

She leaned in, curious, watching as he fumbled through the folds. By the time he finished, his “star” looked more like a crumpled piece of trash than anything else. He scowled, huffing as he flipped it over. “I changed my mind. This is stupid.”

There was a beat of silence. And then she burst out laughing.

“Wow,” she wheezed, wiping at her eyes. “That’s horrific.”

She exhaled determinedly and pushed her books away, flexing her fingers like they ached from all the writing. Then, casually, she slid a few extra strips of paper toward him. “Want another try? I can teach you.”

He frowned at the offering. “Nah, I don’t do crafts.”

“Oh, come on. Please?” She gave him a playful nudge with her foot under the table. “Don’t be lame. It’s easy, just fold here—”

She reached over, her hand grazing hers as she tried to guide the paper through the first few folds. When the instructions became too confusing, she decided that they would attempt visual learning instead. Reaching closer to the half-complete star in front of him she gently took his hand in hers as she led him through the final tucks and indentations, leaving behind with a half decent star. It was a little lopsided, but a star nonetheless.

His star.

He had turned to look at her as soon as her hand made contact with his, caught off guard by the feeling of her delicate hands resting briefly against his calloused ones. Her hair had  untucked itself from behind her ear, curtaining her face away from view momentarily. It was only a split second before she fixed it, absentmindedly tucking her back as she’d likely done thousands of times before.

She continued with her explaining and rambling as she focused completely on what she was doing, Lando couldn’t bring himself to follow suit. It was strange, inexplicable – after the split second that her hair had covered her face, Lando suddenly saw her in an entirely different light. Still fixated on her, he barely breathed. It was such a simple thing, barely a touch at all, but for some reason, his body had the nerve to register it like it scalded him, but in a sort of pleasant way.

His skin burned but he didn’t seem to mind, lost in trance while she was focused elsewhere, something about ensuring they did the right number of folds so they could have adequate paper for a neat final tuck.

Makes them cuter, she’d explained.

Lando Norris didn’t know a damn thing about origami or stars. Yet he’d never been paying more attention to something so inconsequential as he did right then. Suddenly, he was struck with the idiotic idea to unravel the star they’d made, just so they could do it all over again.

When she looked at him proudly, he cleared his throat, pulling his hand back before he could think too much about it. “You seem to be quite the expert. Think I’ll leave the paper artistry t’you.”

She rolled her eyes but smiled anyway, and he ignored the way that smile did something weird to his chest. The library stayed quiet after that, save for the sound of her folding tiny stars and him watching the way the light made them glow in her hands.

A few days later, they were crammed in his car outside the testing center, and she was flipping through well-worn flashcards like her life depended on it. She chewed her bottom lip raw, flipping through them with a frantic energy he hadn’t seen in all the time he’d come to know her.

"Alright, last one," she muttered, holding up a card. "If a contract is formed under duress—"

"It's voidable at the discretion of the coerced party," he answered.

She blinked. "You got that right."

"Obviously?” he questioned, pretending to be offended. ”I do pay attention, y’know."

She stared at the card for another second, then groaned, dropping it back onto the larger stack. "Okay. I think I'm gonna throw up."

"Don't do that," he said. "S’bad for morale. Also, I happen t’like this car. Just got it clean, too–"

"Liam."

When she glared at him, she looked like she hadn’t decided yet whether to cry or throw up. Lando can’t imagine giving some stack of papers that much power. 

What’s a score, anyway? Scores could be bought, extorted, bartered or bargained for–

He cut himself off before that line of thought could go any further. It was simply instinct, unfortunately. “Hey,” he reached over, plucking the papers right out of her hands. “You know this stuff.”

She didn’t even try to get them back from him, which should’ve been a sign to take this more seriously. But he noticed the way she fiddled with her fingers, pushing and pressing at her cuticles like it’d sooth her somehow. “This is the admissions test. For law school. What if I don’t?” she blurted.

“You do.” He was still laughing as he rolled his eyes.

She huffed, crossing her arms. “You don’t know that.”

Lando raised a brow. “I do, actually. I’ve been here every night watching you make flashcards and rewrite your notes and—look, if you weren’t already going to ace this, I’d just pay off the testing center.”

She blinked.

He tapped the steering wheel, as if actually considering it. “Or the admissions officer. Or the licensing board, now that I think about it—” His grin widened at her visible annoyance.

Why wasn’t he taking this seriously?

“Liam,” she groaned, shoving his shoulder.

He grinned but softened slightly, letting his voice drop. He turned to face her, and Y/N could practically feel her cheeks burning simply at the intensity of his gaze. Something about Liam always projected, confidence, strength, surety. 

Sometimes she wished she could be as sure as he was. 

But now, bearing the full weight of his gaze and being the sole object of his undivided attention, it felt almost like her heart was stuck in her throat. There was something about those green-gold irises that made Y/N feel like he could see all of her, like he could see right through her.

It made her pulse flutter with something foreign.

“Hey.” His voice was a near-whisper. The familiar smirk flickered, but his eyes held her captive. He gently nudged her chin, tilting her face up so she couldn't look away. "You're going to be perfect. Go out there and make me proud, yeah?"

Y/N was momentarily speechless. His touch, the way he held her in his gaze, left her breathless. She nodded, too caught in the intensity of the moment to form words. A strange mixture of fear and fascination swirled inside her as she exhaled, tension slipping from her shoulders.

“You’re the best,” she said before instinctively reaching out, squeezing his hand for half a second before quickly pulling away.

It was a fleeting gesture—a brief press of warmth—but it sent a shock up his spine, something lingering on his skin, even as she grabbed her bag and stepped out of the car, heading toward the entrance.

He watched her go, his fingers curling into a loose fist.

…Right. 

Time to lock that away and never open it again.

a/n: oh my clueless little babies. oh they're so cute!

[zmbiesoph]

TENSION

CARL GRIMES X FEM!READER

𝜗𝜚 A/N - hope you like it!

𝜗𝜚 SUMMARY - you and Carl have always despised each other, but what happens when the tension builds up?

𝜗𝜚 WARNINGS - none

AGED UP CARL!

The world had ended, but that didn’t mean the fighting stopped. If anything, it only made people more desperate—more determined to prove they could still win at something. That was especially true for you and Carl Grimes.

You were Daryl Dixon’s daughter, which meant two things: you were tough as hell, and you never backed down from a challenge. You and Carl had been butting heads since the day you met. Whether it was hunting, scouting, or taking down walkers, everything turned into a competition. Who could shoot better? Who could track faster? Who could take down the most walkers without missing a shot?

Carl was stubborn, and so were you. To everyone else, it was just typical teenage rivalry—something to roll their eyes at while they focused on surviving another day. But to Carl, it was something else. He just didn’t want to admit it.

The truth was, the more he got to know you, the more he realized that underneath all the teasing and arguing, he actually liked you. Maybe even more than liked you. But admitting that? Not a chance.

So instead, he kept pushing you away. Picking fights. Making everything a contest. That was easier than dealing with the way his heart raced whenever you smiled—or the way your eyes burned with determination every time you aimed your crossbow, just like your father.

But then, one day in the forest, everything changed.

Carl tightened his grip on his gun as he spotted a figure through the trees. His heart skipped a beat when he recognized the familiar stance, the weapon slung over your shoulder, the way you carried yourself like you had nothing to prove—even though you always acted like you did.

Carl sighed, rolling his eyes. “What are you doing here now?”

You turned, arching a brow as you adjusted the crossbow strap on your shoulder. The sunlight filtering through the trees caught the streaks of dirt on your face, but it did nothing to dim the fire in your eyes. The same fire you always had when you looked at him.

“I could ask you the same thing, Grimes,” you shot back, shifting your weight onto one leg. “Didn’t know this part of the woods belonged to you.”

Carl scoffed, tightening his grip on his pistol. “It doesn’t. But you always seem to show up where I am. Starting to think you’re following me.”

You let out a short laugh, shaking your head. “Right. Because I have nothing better to do than chase after your sorry ass.”

The tension between you crackled like the dry leaves underfoot. It was always like this—sharp words, narrowed eyes, a constant back-and-forth that neither of you were willing to back down from. You both knew it wasn’t just about survival anymore. It was about winning. About proving something.

But what, exactly, were you trying to prove?

Carl exhaled through his nose, glancing at the trees around you. He didn’t like you being out here alone, even if you were more than capable of handling yourself. Not that he’d ever say it out loud. Instead, he nodded toward your crossbow.

“You see anything?”

“Couple walkers,” you said with a shrug, brushing a loose strand of hair from your face. “Took ‘em down easy. What about you?”

“Same.”

Silence settled between you, heavy but not uncomfortable. It was rare—moments like this. Moments where the competition faded, if only for a second. Carl studied you, the way the wind played with your hair, the way your fingers lightly traced the worn leather of your crossbow strap. You were tough. Strong. Maybe stronger than him in some ways.

And that scared the hell out of him.

Because the more time he spent with you, the harder it became to ignore the truth he didn’t want to face. He wasn’t just competing with you anymore.

He was falling for you.

And he was losing that battle.

Carl clenched his jaw, forcing himself to look away before his thoughts betrayed him. You were just standing there, the afternoon sun hitting your face in a way that made his stomach twist. It wasn’t fair. You weren’t supposed to get to him like this.

He cleared his throat. “You shouldn’t be out here alone.”

You scoffed. “I can handle myself, Grimes.”

“Yeah, I know you think that,” he shot back, stepping closer. His voice was sharp, but there was an edge to it—something unspoken simmering beneath the surface. “But what if you ran into more than you could take?”

You tilted your head, your eyes flickering with something unreadable. “What if you did?”

Carl took another step, now close enough that you could feel the heat rolling off him. “I wouldn’t,” he said, low and certain.

Your pulse quickened, but you refused to back down. You refused to be the first one to break. “Cocky much?”

“Confident,” he corrected, his lips twitching into a smirk. “You’d know all about that, wouldn’t you?”

You swallowed hard, refusing to let your eyes drop from his. The space between you was almost nonexistent now, and suddenly, it wasn’t just about winning anymore. The teasing had shifted into something else—something heavier.

Carl’s gaze dropped to your lips for a fraction of a second before snapping back up. He was breathing a little harder now, his hands flexing at his sides like he was fighting some internal battle.

You smirked. “Something wrong, Grimes?”

His nostrils flared. “You’re really asking for it, aren’t you?”

Your heart pounded as you took one more step, your chest nearly brushing his. “And what if I am?”

Carl inhaled sharply, his whole body tensing like a wire pulled too tight. You could see the war playing out behind his stormy blue eyes—the push and pull, the struggle between pride and something far more dangerous.

Then, before you could react, he was right there.

His fingers grazed your jaw, rough and hesitant, like he wasn’t sure if he wanted to grab you or push you away. His breath was warm against your face, his lips hovering so close that if either of you moved even an inch—

A twig snapped somewhere behind you.

Both of you jerked apart instantly, hands on weapons, bodies still burning with the heat of whatever the hell had just happened.

Your pulse pounded in your ears as you locked eyes with Carl, the moment shattered but the tension still thick between you.

“We should get back,” he muttered, voice gruff. But his eyes said something else. Something unfinished.

You nodded, adjusting your crossbow, but you didn’t miss the way his gaze lingered on you for just a second longer than necessary.

This wasn’t over. Not even close.

The walk back was supposed to be uneventful. It should have been simple—just head to the prison, keep their distance, and ignore whatever the hell that moment in the woods had been.

But, of course, nothing ever went that smoothly.

The first growl came from their left. Then another from behind. Carl’s stomach dropped as he turned, eyes scanning the trees.

“Shit,” you muttered, loading your crossbow in one fluid motion.

Walkers. More than a few. Too many to take on without making noise, and making noise meant attracting even more.

“We need to move,” Carl said, already backing up.

You cursed under your breath, taking down the closest one with a quick shot. The bolt went clean through its skull, but it didn’t matter—more were closing in fast.

“Go!” Carl shouted, grabbing your wrist and yanking you into a sprint.

Branches whipped at your faces as you tore through the woods, the sound of the dead dragging after you, moaning louder, closer. Carl's heart slammed in his chest. There had to be somewhere to go—somewhere to hide—

“There!” You pointed ahead. A small, half-collapsed cabin sat just beyond the trees, its windows broken, door hanging slightly off its hinges.

Neither of you hesitated. You reached the door first, shoving it open and tumbling inside just as Carl slammed it shut behind you, barricading it with a broken chair.

For a few seconds, the only sound was your ragged breathing and the distant growls outside.

Then you turned on him. “This is your fault.”

Carl let out a short, incredulous laugh. “My fault?”

“Yes, your fault! If you hadn’t been so busy distracting me back there—”

“Distracting you?” Carl took a step closer, eyes flashing. “You’re the one who kept pushing—”

“Oh, please.” You shoved his shoulder, not hard enough to hurt, but enough to make your point. “You were the one who couldn’t keep your damn eyes off me!”

Carl grabbed your wrist before you could shove him again, and suddenly, the fight wasn’t about the walkers outside anymore. The air between you was thick, charged with something electric and dangerous.

His grip tightened just slightly. “Maybe if you weren’t so damn stubborn—”

“Maybe if you weren’t so damn blind—”

Silence. Your breaths came fast, your chest rising and falling against his. His fingers were still wrapped around your wrist, his body just inches from yours. The heat between you was suffocating, and neither of you moved to stop it.

Carl’s eyes flicked down to your lips.

And just like that, the tension snapped.

His mouth crashed onto yours, all frustration and heat and weeks—months—of built-up tension finally breaking loose. You barely had time to process it before you were kissing him back just as fiercely, your hands tangling in his shirt, pulling him closer.

Carl groaned against your lips, pressing you back against the nearest wall, his hands sliding to your waist like he couldn’t stand the space between you. The fight was forgotten, lost in the rush of the moment, in the way his lips moved hungrily against yours, in the way neither of you wanted to stop.

The moans of the walkers outside faded into white noise. For the first time in a long time, survival wasn’t the only thing on your mind.

Carl pulled back just enough to rest his forehead against yours, his breath warm and uneven. His grip on your waist was still firm, like he was afraid you’d disappear if he let go.

“I hate you,” you whispered, though there was no real venom behind it.

Carl smirked, his thumb brushing against your hip. “Yeah?” His lips ghosted over yours, teasing. “Could’ve fooled me.”

And then he kissed you again, and this time, neither of you pulled away.

Hey guys got bored and wrote this, actually kinda currently hating my writing

@hiro--aoki @acid9786 @carlsangel @bethberry

[fabricated-misslieness]

ᴘᴀɪʀɪɴɢ: joel miller x male reader

ꜱᴜᴍᴍᴀʀʏ: how a crush looks like when it's mutual between two old men

ᴡᴏʀᴅ ᴄᴏᴜɴᴛ: 1234 (𓁹󠁘◡𓁹)

ᴡᴀʀɴɪɴɢꜱ: middle school crush type cliche's, suggested makeout session

ᴍᴀʏʙ'ꜱ ɴᴏᴛᴇ: reader and joel are around the same age, and reader has a collection of records, he also has a beard. written from Ellie's pov. (its unsettling to see pics of joel smiling bc HES NEVER FCKN HAPPY)

☾⋆☆⋆☽

It's silly to see old men acting nervous, especially with Joel around. He's never really nervous, or at least he doesn't show it. What was it, something about life lessons?

Being as old as they are, knees givin' way, calloused hands, joints ain't like they used to be; you've experienced it all. You've experienced that shame of not knowing the answer in math class, tripping over your own feet or misjudging just how slippery freshly mopped floor is; missing a shot, getting nailed in the face by the stock of your own gun, and getting ambushed by a group of clickers. Most of all, you've experienced many rejections.

And yet...it still seems like you're afraid?

That's what Ellie sees, anyway, with the way you look at each other. You're both smiling, it's sweet, sickeningly so, because you're looking down at your own feet and not even seeing those smiles you're sending each other.

"I, uh, 'ppreciate it. Truly." Joel speaks up first, his eyes flitting up from the fresh cup of warm coffee in his hand to your face. Those eyes stay, with courage, on your face, and maybe he doesn't notice that you're not looking up at him because he's admiring you.

"It's, um," Your smile widens, you shake your head, shrug your shoulders lightly like, "it's nothing."

"No, really." Joel puts the cup down. It makes a loud sound in the cricket-silence, thick awkwardness in the room, and it finally brings your eyes up to his. "This-this stuff is real hard to get your hands on 'round here, 'cuz..." He pauses, suddenly self aware of his ramblin'. "well, I'm sure you know why."

You open your mouth, gape for a moment as the words just on your tongue are suddenly replaced by a conscious mind, "Yeah, I know."

Joel picks his cup back up, but he doesn't take a sip. Instead he takes it in both hands, inducing more sweat to slick up his hand for more than one reason now, "How-how'd you get this stuff, anyway?"

"Traded it."

Obviously. Ellie rolls her eyes, How else does one get stuff around here? It dawns on her the second after that killing is the other way.

"What for?" Joel follows up, thumbing at the top edge of the cup, dangerously close to slipping his finger into the dark, scaldingly hot liquid.

There's humor, finally, from your end that eases a bit of the tension. "You do not wanna know."

"I do!" Joel's quick to object, he stands up a little straighter, his smile widens a little more, "I want to know what I owe you." He says it in a way that enunciates each word correctly, like he was serious, and yet the smile on his face is clearly turning his tone rather playful.

"I, well..." You scratch the hairs of your beard, looking away from his eyes nervously, out the kitchen doorway, out the window to the snowing outside. It's clear your intensions teeter on a yes or a no, to tell him or to not, but you stand on what you've previously said, so as to not cause you the trouble of admitting the truth.

Joel places his coffee down again, except it doesn't bring your eyes to his. He scoffs and crosses his arms, shifting his stance in a way that brings him a tiny bit closer to you, and yet he still looks like the standoffish asshole Ellie likes to joke he is. "It can't be that bad."

"It, it is, that bad." You admit on an impulsive thought, which only further feeds his curiosity.

Joel tries at a guess. "What, a gun?"

"Worse."

"Two guns?" He tries again, although on the same object, because to this old man, Ellie thinks, nothing is worse than the slight increase of the possibility that his world's in danger.

"I–" You're teetering, there, again, and Ellie makes a game of guessing what you'll decide. It's a yes this time 'round, she can see it in the way you're beginning to close your eyes, to wince, to prepare for his disappointment. "A record."

"What?!" Joel explodes, almost immediately, because he knows you love those things, that you collect them. You'd give up such a priceless piece of your collection just to give him something he'll consume, something so momentary that it's almost entirely—no, it is not worth it.

"It's–" You open your eyes again, to look at him, moving your hands frantically to ease him. "It's fine, really, a small thing, I barely listen to it."

"You have your records on a cycle, damnit! You put them on a cycle so that you can listen to all of them an equal amount, so nothing goes unappreciated!" It's something so particular, so unnoticeable, that even Ellie didn't know that.

"Joel–"

It's petty, frustratingly so to the spectator, Ellie. It's just a record, and coffee is just coffee; but she's barely sixteen, and she doesn't know the emotional attachments to these things the two of you do.

She doesn't know the bliss Joel finds in coffee, but you do; and she doesn't know the escape that those damn music records are to you, but Joel does.

"I'm sorry." Joel opens his eyes, stops pinching the bridge of his nose. It's an immediate deflation of emotions that Ellie would've liked to laugh at. "That's, a record. It's a lot to you."

"It is," You agree, not downplaying it anymore. Or, well, "it's just–" some low quality band, he stops you with a pointed look.

You look at him, eyes at full attention, accepting defeat and yet the way your eyes...Ellie can see admiration. "You do." And when you say it, it's not in a self-righteous way, but a simple fact.

"I owe you." He says, with finality; he won't take no for an answer.

You stare at each other, just a couple of seconds, no words, nothing about the fact you're starin' at each other, just unspoken, yet still visible appreciation in the look you share.

You two were and are just so caught up with each other that you'd forgotten she was even there at all. She must admit, it's very sweet, but she likes her foods more savory.

"You guys are pathetic." Ellie finally speaks up, a look of evident. played disgust on her face.

There's a snap and a jump and now you're about two feet away from each other again. You're looking away from each other, Joel's eyes are on the floor, yours are to the roof, and it's just so hilarious; and finally, finally, Ellie gets to laugh.

☾⋆☆⋆☽

Joel and him are talking again. It's too sweet, the way they avoid looking at each other, well, actually, they can actually keep eye contact now. At least for a couple minutes, anyway. He touches his beard when Joel makes him nervous, and Joel fingers at his jacket like he's pulling a trigger. What are these two, twelve?

—

Maybe they're not just talking now. I saw Joel checking him out, totally indecent behavior you definitely do not want to see from your so-called father figure.

—

I think they just came back from making out. OK. Yeah. They did. It looks like his beard has lost a patch. Figuratively speaking, of course. Joel's hair is messy and his jacket's buttons are all wrong. Gross.

—

Maybe I've warmed up to sweets.

[entitled-fangirl]

Two idiots in love. (P9)

Joel Miller x anemic!reader

Summary: The reader is determined to care for Ellie and Joel as he recovers. She meets a seemingly kind man named David, and she struggles with whether to trust him or not.

Masterlist

Part 1 and 10

Author's note: God forbid I ever get straight to the point.

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

Y/N let out a gasp at Joel's bruising grip on her wrist. 

Maybe she should've warned the man before applying that much pressure to the wound.

But she was panicking, and didn't know what to do with herself.

The strings of hardly heard curses that came from Joel's mouth were like angelic sounds to the woman. 

It meant he was still alive.

And that was enough for her. 

The basement of an abandoned house in the middle of nowhere was not exactly the place Y/N wanted to be, but they needed to give Joel time to heal. 

And she was more than willing to do anything for him.

For her Joel.

"Come on, come on, Joel. You gotta help me." She muttered under her breath to him.

He barely tilted his head up to her, "Leave."

Ellie looked over the woman's shoulder, "Shut up, Joel."

"And take the gun."

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" Ellie screamed.

He reached out and grabbed Y/N's collar. With what strength he had left, he pulled her close to his face, "You go north. You go to Tommy."

She shook her head at him hurriedly, only making the man panic further. "S..sweet girl, please."

"You… you just let me stay. How am I supposed to just leave you?"

"Go. GO!" And he pushed her shoulder, making her stumble back onto the floor.

Ellie was frustrated, and went outside to give herself time to breathe.

Y/N moved back towards Joel, letting her fingers gently brush his messy curls from his face, "Honey, I'm not going anywhere. I'm gonna… stay as long as I need to. Until you're ready to go again."

The gently prodding of her fingers in his hair was whisking him to sleep.

But she needed to hear his voice more before she let him finally succumb, "Joel…?"

She barely heard his replied hum.

"What um… you said you had left a note for me? Well… I was just thinking about it… What did it say?"

"You…" he swallowed, struggling to talk, "You read it when… when you get back to Jackson…"

She shook her head again, "I'm not going. I told you that."

His lips pulled into a very small smile, "You're so pretty. So… so beautiful…"

She watched his eyes close and his body finally relax as he fell asleep.

She let out a sigh, pulling Joel's jacket over his body to give him warmth.

…

Ellie let out a small cry as she tried to give Joel water.

He was still passed out cold, and she had resorted to dripping water from her fingers onto his lips in hopes that he'd take it.

Y/N walked by the sight with a sigh, before leaning down behind the girl, "You're doing alright, baby."

And she kissed Ellie on the top of the head.

Ellie couldn't remember the last time someone did that.

Or even ANY time somebody had done that for her.

"I'm gonna go out… try to hunt." Y/N said. "We're gonna need something if we stay here. Think you can hold down the fort for me, El?"

Ellie nodded. "I can do that."

She smiled, "Good. I'll be back in a few hours. Hopefully with dinner. I won't lie to you, though. I'm not as good of a shot as Joel."

Only then did Ellie finally smile. "Just… promise you'll come back?"

"Don't worry. I'm not gonna leave you, baby."

And Y/N kissed the unconscious Joel on the forehead before heading upstairs.

…

God, Y/N forgot how much she hated the cold.

Especially knowing that Joel wouldn't be able  to warm her up when she got back like he always used to.

But as luck would have it, a beautiful deer was only 20 yards from her.

She smiled, and knelt down to crouch with the gun. 

She remembered Joel's words.

Slow and steady. Gently. 

Gunshot.

Right in its head.

But as luck would have it, someone was ready to take it back with them instead.

…

David sighed, "What do you think?"

James shrugged, "Seems fine to me."

"Alright. Well, let's get it now. I reckon that whoever shot it is not far off."

David kneeled down to grab the deer.

And hear the click of a handgun against his head.

"Don't. Move."

Y/N faked bravery with her words and actions, but inside, she was terrified. 

"Drop your fucking rifles."

The men did so, and Y/N let David stand.

The two men turned around to face her.

They could see the quick rise and fall of her chest even through her heavy coat. The panic in her eyes.

"You're quite a hunter." David reasoned. "We didn't even hear you coming."

"Where the hell did you come from?" She retaliated. 

"We're not here to hurt you." David reasoned again, "Let us have 10 seconds of your time."

"Just answer the goddamn question!" 

"I'm David, this is my friend James. We're from a larger group: women, children, and we're all very, very hungry…"

"Weird," Y/N lied. "I'm from a large group, too. But, I don't steal others' game." 

"Well, even so," David tried again, "ya can't drag this back on your own."

"I can fucking try."

The man sighed, "We're not asking for charity. We can trade you for some of the deer. We have… well, what do you need?"

Y/N was actually considering his offer. Her gun lowered just barely. "…Medicine?"

She didn't notice the way James' jaw clenched.

"We do," David nodded, "Back in our village. You're welcome to follow us."

"I'm not stupid," she scoffed. "You stay with me." She nodded towards James, "He can go get it and come back. Half the deer."

David nodded, "What kind of medicine?"

She let out a shuddered breathe, watching it show in the cold air, "Uh… penicillin? For infections?"

"Alright." He turned to James, "Go talk to Howard. Bring back two bottles and a syringe. It's not code. Do as I say."

Y/N let the barrel of the gun follow James as he stepped away.

"Now, step away from the rifle."

David did so immediately. "Whose gun is that? Your husbands?"

Y/N let out a scoff. She picked up David's rifle and slung it over to shoulder along with Joel's. 

"None of your fucking business."

"Is he sick? Is that why you're out here instead of him?"

Y/N just shook her head and his antics. 

"Well, look. It's a four-mile round trip back to our settlement. It's gonna be a while before James gets back. I have some oil and matches in my pack. We could.. uh… take shelter. Start a fire."

She pursed her lips. 

The man seemed sincere.

"Alright. But you drag the deer."

…

"So, what's your name?"

Y/N scrunched up her nose as she looked down to her gun that rested on the floor near her crossed legs.

"It's hard to trust strangers. I know," David nodded. "But, I honestly mean you no harm."

She was cursing herself for her big fucking heart.

David seems to notice her internal battle. "For what it's worth, there's room for you in our group."

She shook her head, "I'm not interested in your… hunger club or whatever."

"I'm just a man tryna take care of the people who rely on me. Like… whoever is sick that's relying on you now."

"So, you're their leader?"

"Wasn't my choice. It was theirs. But… yeah."

"What… what do you mean?"

"Well, I'm a preacher. It's not a cult thing… just standard Bible stuff."

Her eyebrows furrowed, "After all this, you still believe in that?"

He smiled, "I actually started believing after the world ended."

A hint of a smile rested on the woman's face. "Interesting. Well, I'm sorry to have crossed paths with you like this. Maybe in another life, I would've joined your group. But I have my own."

David nods, "Well, I believe everything happens for a reason."

She scoffed slightly.

"It's true!" He laughed. "It does. I can prove it to you!"

She laughed, "Alright. Shoot."

"Well, we didn't expect this winter to be so harsh. Hard to find game. So, I sent four of our people to a nearby town to scavenge what they could. And… only three of them came back."

Oh fuck.

She tried to keep her face from showing any emotion.

"Turns out," David continued, "He was murdered by this crazy man. And get this: That crazy man was traveling with a little family. A wife and a girl."

Y/N leaned back, letting her hand slowly wander back to her gun on the floor.

"See?" David smiled. "Everything happens for a reason. James, lower the gun."

Her body went into flight mode, jumping up and pointing her handgun at James. But his rifle was already aimed at her.

"She's the one that killed Alec, isn't she?" James asked.

"She didn't kill anybody," David smiled. "Lower the gun."

James hesitantly did so.

Y/N felt like she was suffocating.

"Did you being the medicine?" David asked.

James nodded, "I did, but-"

"-Give it to her."

He held the medicine out, and Y/N slowly approached him and took it.

She then began to back away, deciding to go without the deer.

"I know you're not with a group," David said. "You won't survive long. I can protect you."

She shook her head. "I don't need your help. We're fine on our own."

Then, she took off in a sprint.

…

"Ellie? ELLIE!" Y/N screamed as she ran into the house.

Ellie immediately ran up the stairs to the woman, pulling her into a hug. "Did you get it?"

She shook her head, "No… I… I'm sorry. But, I got something for Joel." She pulled out the penicillin.

"What is that?"

Y/N smiled widely, "It's medicine. I got him medicine."

…

The next day, Y/N had volunteered to go out to scoop snow for Joel.

She was trying to not freak out Ellie about what had happened the previous day.

Which meant she didn't tell Ellie about it at all, and volunteered for anything that was outside of the house.

So, when a few of David's men showed up in the neighborhood, she was thankful that she was the one out there instead of her girl.

"Stay alert," David said, "If this man's not already dead, he's dangerous."

"And the girl and the woman?"

"We bring them back with us."

James sighed, "I don't mean to question your sense of mercy, David. We can let them go. But, we bring them back with us, they're just more mouths to feed."

"If we leave them out here, they'll die."

"Yeah," James retaliated, "Well, maybe that's God's will."

David turned to look at James, but didn't say a word.

…

"Ellie. Joel." Y/N whispered when she finally made it back to the house.

"What the fuck is happening?" Ellie worried.

"You need to stay here. Stay quiet. There are… fuck… there are men outside. I have to go." 

Y/N kneeled by Joel's head, taking it in her hands, "Wake up. Joel, honey, wake up."

She smiled as his eyelids barely opened to reveal his dark eyes.

"There are men that are coming, okay? I'm gonna lead them away from you two but if anybody makes it down here, you…" she looks up at Ellie in exasperation. "…you gotta fucking kill them. Don't… don't hesitate."

She stood, "And don't let Joel sleep."

She wanted to hold Ellie and tell her it would be okay.

She wanted to kiss Joel again and feel his warm breath on her face.

She wanted a lot of things.

But wants weren't allowed anymore.

She hurried upstairs. 

…

She knew she couldn't fight them.

And she couldn't outrun them.

Maybe she would just have to surrender herself to save them.

Then Ellie and Joel could find her. 

Or they could die in the cold.

Better than dying at the hands of these men.

She wandered down a few street, as far as she could to keep them from looking in the house that Joel slept in.

She had to fake confusion.

Her plan was in action.

When the man rounded the corner, she pretended to be tying her horse to a tree.

And she feigned surprise when she heard the clicking of their guns.

She turned around with a worried expression, "oh, shit." She murmured. "…David?"

He smiled, "You know, I never caught your name."

"Why do you want it so bad?"

He shrugged, "I just… like ya or something. You have this… way about you. You draw people in."

She shook her head, "Well… I guess you came in time."

He tilted his head in confusion, "In time… for what?"

She had to pinch herself to make the tears come, "They… they're dead."

David's face turned to one of remorse, "Oh, sweetheart. I'm sorry. That can't be an easy feeling. A now childless widow. But don't worry." He smiled at her as he approached, "We'll take care of you."

"David…?" James asked.

He turned to look over his shoulder, "What's one more mouth, James?"

But when David turned back to Y/N, she punched him as hard as she could in his jaw.

And she ran.

It threw the men off, and they weren't sure what to do.

But as they ran after her, David's voice traveled through the cold air, "ALIVE!"

It was harder to run in the snow than she thought.

But those thoughts stopped when she hit a brick wall.

James.

He grabbed her throat, cutting off her air supply.

She gasped under his grip until her face started to lose color.

Now real tears were falling from her eyes.

Especially when she felt her body give way.

David made his way over to the unconscious body. He picked her up gently before turning to the men. "You want vengeance? Go door to door. Find him. Deliver it."

And the preacher began to walk back to camp with Joel's most delicate and precious possession in his arms.

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

Tags: @lover-of-books-and-tea, @pedropascalfan221, @lottieellz101, @bambisweethearts, @hiroikegawa, @elliaze, @littleshadow17, @n7cje

[santaklausq]

02. gunslinger

pairing. dean winchester (s1) x fem! oc

notes. occurs right after 01. !

“Thanks for letting us stay the night, Alec.” Sam said with a grateful smile as he packed up the last of his things into his duffel bag.

“Anytime, boys.” Alec replied, giving Sam a firm pat on the back. “Though, next time, do me a favour and give me a heads-up first—otherwise, Aza would have a gun pointed to your head again.”

Dean chuckled as he shrugged on his jacket. “Yeah, wouldn’t want that.”

Alec shot him a pointed look. “Wouldn’t you?”

Dean smirked but didn’t deny it. Instead, he glanced around. “Speaking of Aza, where is she?”

Alec eyed him for a moment, his expression unreadable before he finally said, “Probably outside in the open lot doing god knows what.”

Sam zipped up his bag, glancing between them. “Well, we should probably say goodbye before we head out.”

Alec shook his head. “She’s got a way of making herself scarce when she wants to. If she wants to say goodbye, she’ll find you.”

Dean considered that, then grinned. “Guess I’ll just have to find her first.”

Sam sighed, slinging his duffel over his shoulder. “Dean, let’s just go. We’ve got a long drive ahead.”

Dean waved him off. “Yeah, yeah, you go warm up the car. I’ll catch up.”

Alec sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose like he already knew where this was going. “Look, kid, Aza’s not-”

Dean held up a hand. “Relax, Alec. I’m just gonna say goodbye.”

Alec let out a gruff chuckle. “Yeah. Sure you are.”

As Dean tipped two fingers to his forehead in a lazy salute, already heading for the door, Alec called out, “Just try not to get yourself shot.”

Dean made his way towards Azalea, spotting her in the open lot behind the bar. A long weathered wooden table stood before her, with loose bullets and spare magazines scattered across its surface.

A few feet ahead, an assortment of tin cans were positioned on a makeshift shooting range. Some were balanced on top of cinder blocks, while others rested precariously on old wooden crates riddled with bullet holes.

Azalea stood with practised ease, her stance steady as she raised a sleek black handgun. Arms outstretched and shoulders relaxed, she fired off a round. The shot rang through the cool morning air, and a tin can went flying. Without hesitation, she took aim again, each bullet finding its mark with unwavering precision.

Dean slowed his pace, watching as she smoothly ejected the magazine, checked it, and reloaded without missing a beat. The efficiency, the control — if he hadn’t already been impressed, he sure as hell was now.

He also couldn’t help but notice how good she looked in that pair of jeans — the way they hugged her slender legs just right, and the slight silver of skin exposed at her midriff every time she moved.

Shaking off the thought (or at least trying to), a smirk tugged at his lips as he finally spoke up. “Should I be worried you’re picturing my face on one of those?”

Azalea didn’t flinch. Instead, she took another shot, knocking over the last can before finally glancing his way. “Nah,” she said, lowering the gun, “Wouldn’t waste the ammo.”

Dean chuckled, shoving his hands into his pockets as he stepped closer. “Well, that’s comforting.” He nodded towards the range. “You’ve got good aim.”

Azalea grinned as she holstered her gun, “You sound surprised.”

“Not surprised. Just… appreciating the view.”

Azalea arched a brow as she turned to face Dean. “The shooting or my ass?” Though subtle, she didn’t miss the way his eyes quickly bounced back up to hers when she turned.

Dean, to his credit, barely missed a beat. His smirk deepened, “Well, I was gonna say the shooting, but now that you mention it…”

Azalea huffed out a laugh as she rounded the table, picking up and rearranging the targets.

A beat of silence passed before she looked over her shoulder at him, a glint of a challenge lighting up her gaze. “So, you any good, or are you just here to admire the view.”

“I’m pretty good with anything that’s got a trigger, sweetheart.” Dean replied with a smirk, his eyes never leaving hers as she made her way back to the table.

Azalea rolled her eyes, a barely-there smile tugging at the corner of her lips as she handed him a spare handgun. “Alright, hotshot. Prove it.” She nodded towards the range, “Clear all the targets in your lane. Whoever finishes first can start to wipe out the other’s targets.”

Dean gave her a cocky grin, twirling the handgun in his hand before pointing it toward the range. “Let’s make this a little more interesting. If I win, I get your number.”

Azalea raised an eyebrow, clearly unimpressed but amused all the same. “Seriously? That’s your big offer?”

“Well, I figured you weren’t gonna make it easy for me to get it anyways.” He shrugged.

“Fine.” she laughed, “Then if I win, I get to tell you how much of a cocky idiot you are and leave it at that.”

“Fair enough.” Dean chuckled as he took his stance, “Alright, let’s see who’s faster then.”

Azalea nodded, her posture sharp and focused, with her finger resting on the trigger.

“3, 2, 1.”

Dean fired, moving quickly through his targets with practised ease. Each shot was precise, his focus laser-sharp as he cleared them one by one. But as he lined up for the last target in his lane, he squeezed the trigger — only to watch the tin can fly off the crate before his bullet even hit it.

Dean blinked, momentarily stunned, as he turned to see Azalea lowering her handgun. She’d cleared both her lane and his last target in one swift motion.

“Damn.” Dean let out a low whistle. “You really weren’t kidding yesterday when you threatened to take out both me and Sam, huh?”

Azalea stared at the fallen targets in front of them, her expression unreadable. For a moment, she seemed to weigh something in her mind before looking back at him.

She had expected Dean to be all bark and no bite — just another cocky guy with a smooth mouth and nothing to back it up. She’d met plenty of so-called hunters who swaggered into the bar, all bravado but no real skill, unable to hold their own against her.

But Dean’s shots had been quick and controlled. He wasn’t just some trigger-happy amateur — he knew what he was doing.

“I definitely wasn’t.” She paused, brows knitting together in brief contemplation before adding, “But you’re actually pretty good too. I’ve never met anyone who can meet me at the end.”

Dean blinked, caught off guard. He’d been expecting her usual sarcasm, a sharp remark to knock him down a peg — but instead, there was something almost sincere in her tone.

“You’re not gonna tell me how much of a cocky idiot I am?” Dean joked, “I don’t mind you know, you did win the bet.”

Azalea let out a light laugh before replying, “Nah, I’ll let you off the hook this time. Besides, I was being harsh. You may be cocky but you’re not an idiot.”

Dean raised his eyebrows, amusement flickering in his gaze.“Careful, that almost sounded like a compliment.”

Azalea didn’t argue, instead, she glanced down at her gun, running a thumb over the grip. “You’re quick, I’ll give you that.”

Dean tilted his head, watching her with interest. “Coming from you, gunslinger, I’ll take it.”

Suddenly, a loud honk blasted through the air, causing the pair to turn and look at the Impala parked a few feet away, with Sam sitting inside, a scowl on his face.

“Guess Sammy’s getting impatient.” Dean grinned as he did a half-wave back at the car.

“You should go. Don’t keep him waiting.” Azalea said, taking the handgun back from him and setting it down on the table.

“Trying to chase me away? Alec did say you like making yourself scarce when people leave.” Dean replied playfully.

Azalea scoffed, but there was a flicker of something unreadable in her expression — something almost guarded. “Not really one for goodbyes.” she admitted, picking up a loose bullet and twirling it between her fingers.

Dean studied her for a moment, noting the sudden change in her mood, before nodding. “Alright. No goodbyes, then.”

Azalea glanced up at him, “Just like that?”

Dean smirked. “Just like that. I’m sure we will meet again, Aza. There’s no need for goodbyes.”

Her lips lifted into a small smile. “Since when were we on nickname basis, huh?”

Dean shrugged, his smirk unwavering. “Since I decided we were.”

Azalea huffed out a small laugh, shaking her head. “Cocky and presumptuous. What a combo.”

“Hey, you let me off the hook earlier,” Dean pointed out. “Figured I’d push my luck a little.”

Azalea rolled her eyes but didn’t argue. “Well, you better hope you’re right. About us meeting again. You still owe me one for saving your car.”

Dean’s smirk softened, something more sincere lurking beneath it. “Oh, I don’t just hope, sweetheart — I know.”

Sam honked the horn again, this time more insistent.

Dean exhaled heavily through his nose, “Alright, alright, I’m going.”He took a step back, eyes still on her. “Try not to miss me too much.”

Azalea scoffed, crossing her arms. “Don’t hold your breath.”

Dean chuckled as he turned toward the Impala, shaking his head.

“Dean,” Azalea called out once more.

Dean paused, his hand resting on the car door as he met her gaze.

“I’ll see you around.”

[fanfoolishness]

Growing Pains

This one came to me as a combination of prompts from @thecoffeelorian (who sent Tech and Crosshair + Cadet as a prompt!) and @summer-of-bad-batch, whose week 1 prompt was water gun fight. Somehow my brain mashed them together and here we are!

Crosshair has trouble sleeping, but Tech has an idea for a distraction. Cadet Batch, brothers being brothers, pure fluff. ~1700 words.

-

Tap tap tap.

Tap.

Tap tap.

Crosshair growled, rolling over in his bunk and kicking his legs out from under his blanket.  “Tech,” he warned.

There was no answer. Crosshair lay on his back, scowling up at the ceiling.  He reached down and rubbed his shins, wincing.  They throbbed and ached. 

More growing pains. He was so sick of them.  Nala Se said they were normal, that pain medication wouldn’t help. Crosshair wished he could just grow up already and be done with them.

He lifted his hand, nibbling at the dry skin around his fingernails, biting at it until he tasted blood.  He frowned, balling his hand into a fist and jerking it away.

Tap tap.

“Will you stop tinkering and go to sleep?” Crosshair hissed.  

“Hm?” Tech asked from across the room, where he was working on a half-scuttled battle droid under the light of a single glow lamp.

What he was doing with it, Crosshair had no idea, but the nagging tapping wasn’t helping him get to sleep any faster.  Especially not with the way his shins pulsed and ached.

“Put that thing away and go to sleep,” Crosshair snapped. “Haven’t you noticed it’s been lights out for hours?”

“You can usually sleep through my projects,” Tech said, adjusting his goggles. He got up, padding over to Crosshair and peering closely at him. Despite the late hour Tech looked as alert as ever, though his brownish hair was rumpled and dark grease smudged his cheeks.  “Why are you still awake?”

Crosshair sat up with a scowl.  “Because you’re annoying.”

Tech raised his eyebrows at him, unperturbed. “I’m no more annoying than I usually am.”

Crosshair sighed, crossing his arms over his chest.  “My legs hurt,” he confessed.  

“Oh. Growing pains.  They’re no fun.”  Tech paused, looking closely at him.  He reached out and grabbed Crosshair’s hand, examining his fingers.  “You should stop biting those, you know.”

“Shut up.”  He yanked his hand away.  “I know.  I just -- I start and it’s hard to stop sometimes.  Especially if something else is bugging me.”

Tech sat down beside him, sitting with him back to back.  Crosshair felt some of his tension fade, and he leaned into his brother, closing his eyes.  He was so tired.

But his legs twinged, as painful as ever.

“So why aren’t you asleep yet?” he asked Tech, trying to keep his mind off his legs.

“I’m trying to figure out how to reprogram this droid,” Tech said.  “Make it fight for us instead.  I know it’s a training droid, so it won’t really be fighting at all, but it’s good practice.  Maybe it’s something I could do on the battlefield, once we get our shot.”  

“Huh,” said Crosshair, impressed.  “That would be good.”  He was quiet for a minute, thinking.  “Don’t you get tired staying up, though?  You could do this stuff during the day.”

Tech fiddled with his goggles.  “I could.  But we have other training then.  I want to learn as much as I possibly can, but since we grow so quickly, that translates into less time.”  He shrugged.  “And I don’t really get tired when I’m focused.  It’s as if I go into my own little world.”

Crosshair stifled a snort.  That was an understatement.  “I’ve noticed,” he said, but considered.  He thought he knew what Tech meant.  “Like when I’m planning a really hard shot?  Everything else goes away.”

“Yes, exactly.”

Crosshair wished he had that kind of focus now.  His legs ached with another horrible set of pulses, and he rubbed at them with both hands, swearing under his breath.

“It’s particularly bad tonight, isn’t it?” 

“Yeah,” Crosshair admitted.

“You know what helps me?” Tech asked.  “Distraction.  I may have just the thing.”  He trotted back to his tangles of wires and tools.  Crosshair watched him, wondering if they’d wake up Wrecker and Hunter.  But Hunter had buried his head under his pillow, and Wrecker could sleep through anything.

“If you want me to tear apart droids with you, thanks but no thanks,” said Crosshair. He was okay with basic datapad work, but hopeless at the intricate stuff Tech managed to do without breaking a sweat.  “They don’t make any sense to me.”

“You could learn if you wanted. You’re very bright.  Not at my level, but still —“

“Tech.”

Tech finished rummaging in his pile of projects and came back to Crosshair, pressing something into his hands.  “Here.”

Crosshair looked down at what appeared to be a small white blaster, but with a curious tank attached to it.  He lifted it and heard it slosh.  “What is it?”

“A water blaster,” said Tech. “They won’t let us have real blasters to practice with in here, of course, but I thought I’d try making something like this for practice.”  He held up a little board of shiny white material with a black target drawn on it.  “Where do you want this?”

Crosshair grinned.  “Across the room. Give me a challenge.”

“You might find it’s more of one that you think,” said Tech. “You’ll have to account for gravity, and the minimal propulsive capabilities of this water blaster compared to the real thing.”

“Hm. I’ll be the judge of that,” said Crosshair, experimentally squirting Tech with the blaster between the eyes.  Water dripped down his nose and splattered on his goggles.

“Very funny,” Tech said, mopping his forehead and lenses with his sleeve.  He flashed Crosshair one of his little half-smiles.  “All right, let me find a spot to stick this.”

“Try over here,” Hunter groaned. “Since you two are keeping me awake anyway.”  He tapped the top of his bunk.  “I think… it’ll take Crosshair four tries before he gets a bullseye.”

“Four?” Crosshair asked, offended, as Tech affixed the target above Hunter’s bunk, across the room.  He took aim with the blaster, lining up his shot, figuring that the water would take a parabolic motion at that distance.  He fired slightly higher than the target —

And the water splashed harmlessly onto the floor a good meter away.  

Crosshair stared at the dry target, infuriated.  “You didn’t tell me this thing had no power!”

“Well, look at it,” Tech chuckled. “Do you see a power source? I just put it together with some spare casing material and a simple plunger. It’s significantly limited.  That’s why I had it set aside, I’m sure I could design something much more effective if I had the time.”  Tech sat down again amongst his wires, resuming his fiddling.

Hunter yawned, sitting up and running a hand through his shaggy hair.  “Maybe four was too generous. Maybe I should make it five tries.”

Crosshair glowered.

“What are you all blabbering about?” Wrecker mumbled. “Some of us are trying to sleep!”

“Crosshair’s trying out a new weapon,” Hunter said.  Which was the wrong thing to say around Wrecker.

“What!” Wrecker cried in excitement.  He tried to get out of his bunk, but was so tangled in his blankets that he rolled onto the floor with a thump.  From there he propped himself up on his elbows, all hint of sleepiness forgotten.  “New weapon? Where’d you get it? How’d you sneak it in? What’s it do? Can’t believe you were holding out on me —“

“It’s Tech’s. It’s just a water blaster, and not a very good one,” Crosshair said, taking aim, adjusting based on the disappointing performance of his last shot.  He experimented by slightly covering the barrel of the pistol with his fingernail, narrowing the opening, and shot a jet of water out the end. It sailed across the room, falling short of the target again but hitting Hunter square in the face.

He grinned.  That would do nicely.

“Oh that does it, Crosshair,” Hunter grumbled, wiping his face off.  “Tech! You got any more of these things?”

“Yes, I made enough for all of us,” Tech said mildly.  “Though as I said before, the design could be better…” He searched through his piles of debris and pulled out three more blasters, tossing one each to Hunter and Wrecker before whirling and squirting them both in the face with his own.

“Oh, it’s on!” Wrecker roared, rolling out of his blankets and squirting Tech three times, then training his blaster on Crosshair.

“Oh no you don’t —“

The battle was pitched and bloody.  Crosshair leapt from his bunk to take cover behind the crate that held their dirty laundry, sending out jets of water that spritzed his brothers dead in the face every time.  Wrecker charged him, wearing a blanket as armor, water from his blaster flying everywhere.  Hunter circled around on the outskirts of the fray, catching Tech from behind, but Tech pulled out a secret fifth water blaster and squirted both Hunter and Crosshair at once. 

They howled with battle cries, erupting into a mad scuffle in the center of the room, water splashing into the air, limbs a tangled frenzy.  

“I’m gonna get you!”

“I’d like to see you try!”

“You’re all dead!”

“We’ll see who has the upper hand now!”

At last the battle came to a close.  By the time they flopped onto their backs panting with exhaustion, Wrecker had a (self-inflicted) bloody nose, Hunter’s head was drenched, Tech’s goggles were halfway across the room and Crosshair had stolen all five of the blasters for himself.  

“We should do this every night,” Wrecker snorted, pinching his nose shut.

Hunter laughed, elbowing him.  “Well, it was pretty fun.”

“It was certainly a good distraction.”

Crosshair took aim with one of his blasters at the target over Hunter’s bunk.  The spray drenched the bullseye perfectly.  “There.  Three,” he said in triumph, sticking his tongue out at Hunter.

“Haha, nice one, Cross!”

“Ahhh, I knew you had it in you.  I only said four to piss you off.”

“Not that that is difficult.”

“Hey, that’s -- okay, that’s true.”

Crosshair lay on his back near his brothers, still catching his breath, his eyelids getting heavy.  He put his hands under his head and stretched out on the floor.  With the blankets Wrecker had managed to hurl around the room beneath him, he was pretty comfortable.  

Comfortable enough to stay here, just a little longer.  He yawned and his eyes fell closed.  

He drifted off to sleep, and his legs didn’t hurt at all.

[jansqu]

Criminal reader x mahone

Thank you for the request, hope you like it<33

The Hunter And The Hunted (Alexander Mahone X Reader)

I sat on the edge of the bed, wrists bound with zip ties, watching as Special Agent Alexander Mahone paced the length of the room, his jaw clenched tight, his mind clearly racing.

"You made a mistake, Agent," I murmured, my voice smooth despite the situation. "Bringing me here instead of a federal holding cell."

Mahone shot me a sharp glare, his blue eyes glinting with something between frustration and intrigue. "You and I both know the second you’re processed, you’ll find a way out. I don’t have time for your games."

I smirked, leaning back against the headboard. "So what’s your plan? Keep me tied up here until you figure out what to do with me? That’s not very FBI protocol of you."

His fingers twitched at his side, the weight of his sidearm visible in the shift of his stance. "I don’t play by the rules when the rules don’t work," he admitted. "And you, Y/N, you make a damn good case for throwing the rulebook out."

My heart pounded, but I wouldn’t let him see it. Mahone was dangerous—dangerous in a way that wasn’t just about guns and power. He was meticulous, obsessive. A man willing to do anything to get his target.

But I had been a target before. And I had never been caught for long.

"So what now?" I tilted my head, my voice softer, almost teasing. "You gonna sit here all night, watching me? Because that sounds a little intimate for an FBI agent."

His jaw tensed, and for a brief moment, his eyes flickered downward—just for a second. The realization sent a slow thrill through me.

"You think this is funny?" His voice was lower now, huskier. "You’ve left bodies in your wake. You’ve played both sides, stolen, lied, killed. And yet, you sit there like none of it matters."

I shrugged. "Because it doesn’t. Not to you, anyway. You only care about catching me because someone told you to. But what happens if you stop chasing? If you realize we’re not so different after all?"

Something flickered in his eyes, something dark and unspoken. Mahone was a man on the edge, and I knew how to push people just far enough to make them question everything.

He stepped closer, towering over me. "You like to play with fire."

I smirked, tilting my chin up defiantly. "And you like to chase things you know you can’t keep."

His breath hitched for just a second before he caught himself. His hand twitched again, this time not toward his gun, but toward me. He didn’t touch me—not yet—but I could feel the heat between us, a tension crackling in the air like static electricity.

"Tell me, Agent," I whispered, my voice barely above a breath. "If I wasn’t in cuffs, would you still be able to resist me?"

His eyes darkened, his throat bobbing as he swallowed hard. "That doesn’t matter."

"Doesn’t it?" I leaned in, just enough to close the space between us, to let him feel the heat of my breath against his jaw. "Because you’re looking at me like you don’t know whether to turn me in or—"

"Enough." His voice was rough, raw, but he didn’t move away. If anything, he was closer now, his own resolve cracking under the weight of whatever this was between us.

The air was heavy, thick with something far more dangerous than a chase. Because now, I wasn’t sure who was really hunting who.

[likablemuffin]

Its nice that blood is red against snow (Whumptober)

(From: Random ROTTMNT oneshots)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Day 19: Blood Trail

So...this hadn't exactly been...the best time ever.

Donnie had said that there was a group of mutants that was stealing things from people and hiding away in a forest near NYC to stash them. Honestly, the fact that they hadn't been caught yet was quite impressive, considering the fact that Donnie was able to so easily find out basically everything about them.

So, even though it was in the middle of the winter and there was snow everywhere, the Mad Dogz set out to stop the criminals. And honestly? It wasn't going that bad!.... At first... they had found the villains hideout pretty easily, but they did not expect the villains to have literal guns. 

So they were all running around and dodging the bullets. Thankfully, the mutants weren't very good at aiming, considering the fact that they accidentally shot each other a few times. So the turtles were able to take back a lot of the stuff the mutants had stolen. 

"Leo! Portal us out of here!" Raph yells at Leo from across the battlefield. Leo was literally dancing around the bullets, but he stops when he hears Raph calling to him. "You got it, hermano!" Leo opens a portal next to Raph and Donnie, and they both jump through. Leo turns around to see Mikey tying up a whole bunch of the mutants. 

"Hey, Mikey! We gotta go, bro!" Mikey turns to face Leo and starts running over to him. However, the thing that Mikey doesn't notice is that one of the mutants is aiming his gun directly at him. Leo notices though. "MIKEY!" Leo quickly opens a portal behind where Mikey is standing and lunges at Mikey to push him in. 

However, the mutant still fires the gun, and instead of it shooting Mikey, it shoots Leo's leg. Leo cries out as he and Mikey fall into the portal and disappear. The mutants (that are still alive. A few of them were actually killed from their careless shooting.) looks at each other and then the places where the turtles disappeared. One of them, the boss, starts yelling at the others. "WHY WOULD YOU LET THEM GO????" "You think I just let them go?! I didn't know they were going to have portals!" "OH MY GOSH, YOU'RE SUCH AN IDIOT."

_______________________________________________________

Raph and Donnie stumble through the portal with all the stolen stuff. "Phew! Thank goodness those guys weren't good at aiming those guns!" Raph says as he dusts some snow off of himself. Donnie stands up and fixes his goggles that had partly fallen off his head when he went through the portal. "Yeah. I can shoot way better than those bastards." Raph scoffs and glares at Donnie. "I thought I said no swearing?" Donnie looks at him with an unimpressed expression and starts picking up some of the stuff off of the floor with his metal arms. "Well, I guess I didn't hear you."

Raph groans and face palms. He then turns around to see if Leo and Mikey are in the lair yet. He's very surprised to see that they're both nowhere to be seen. "Hey, Donnie?" Donnie pauses from picking stuff off the floor and turns to Raph with a questioning look. "Yeah?" "Where are Leo and Mikey? Shouldn't they be here by now?" Donnie shrugs and looks at his tech gauntlet trackers. "Well, I suppose we can...see?" 

Raph quickly walks to Donnie's side to also look at the gauntlet. "What? Whats wrong??" Donnie taps on his gauntlet a few times. "They're both out in the middle of nowhere..." Raph screams in Donnie's ear. "WHAT?! ARE THEY OKAY??" Donnie puts one of his fingers on Raph's mouth. "Please don't scream so loud in my ear." 

Raph blushes slightly from embarrassment. "Ah, sorry, Dee." Donnie waves his hand. "Its fine. But why do you think I would know if they're okay or not?" Raph starts running over to the garage, where the turtle tank is. "Lets go find them then!" As Raph runs into the garage, Donnie runs after him. "HEY! DONT START UP THE TURTLE TANK WITHOUT ME! YOU'LL BREAK IT!!"

__________________________________________________________

The first thing Mikey sees after being smashed into one of Leo's portals is Leo himself. Leo's arm is over Mikey protectively, and he's looking at Mikey. "H-Hey bud...you okay?" Leo's voice trembles as he speaks. "Yeah, I-I'm fine. What about you?" Mikey starts sitting up but stops when Leo releases a hiss of pain. "Leo? Are you hurt?" Leo attempts to smile at Mikey, but it ends up just looking like a grimace. "Nah, I'll b-be fine..." 

Mikey huffs. "I know you're lying. What hurts?" Leo looks around awkwardly and attempts to sit up himself. However, he has to stop halfway through trying and lay back down again. "Leg..." Mikey sits up fully and looks at Leo's leg, being very surprised to see that Leo's leg has a bullet hole in it and is currently bleeding everywhere.

"OHMIGOSH- Leo! Why didn't you tell me you got shot?!" Leo attempts to shrug while lying down. "It really isn't that bad..." Mikey frowns. "It certainly looks bad to me!" Leo shivers from lying down in the snow for so long, and Mikey realizes they should probably get into somewhere where there isn't so much snow. 

"Leo? Can you walk?" Leo shakes his head gently. "I-I don't know if I can, Mike..." Mikey frowns again and stands up to view their surroundings. The snow around Leo's leg has turned a dark red, and only from seeing that does Mikey realize how dire this situation is. Mikey crouches down next to Leo. "Maybe I could help you walk? All that I know is that we can't stay here, and it looks like you lost your swords..." Leo attempts to push himself up with his arms, and he does manage to push himself off the ground a bit. "Yeah, we c-can try..." 

Mikey nods and reaches one of his hands out to Leo so Leo can take it. Leo slowly reaches towards Mikey's hand and manages to grab it. Mikey starts carefully lifting Leo up off of the ground. Leo hisses in pain when it gets to him having to actually stand up. "Leo, come on, we gotta go..." Leo looks at Mikey. "S-Sorry, it just really really hurts." After a few more minutes of struggling to find out a good way to get Leo off the ground, Mikey finally manages to help Leo up.

Leo instantly leans almost all his body weight on Mikey, to which Mikey almost falls over. Leo notices this pretty quickly and tries to put less weight on him. "Jeez, sorry, Mikey..." Mikey shakes his head. "No no! Its alright! Now, can we try to walk?" Leo nods, and Mikey starts trying to get Leo to take very small steps. 

Leo almost falls over a few times, but they're able to walk quite a bit from the original spot they were. However, over time, Leo starts to get a bit more sluggish and unable to take as many steps. Mikey notices this and starts walking a bit slower. 

After even more walking and Leo barely being able to keep himself up, they spot a cabin. It doesn't look old, so it's probably someone's summer cabin. "Leo, look! A cabin! Do you think you can make it over there?" Leo shakes from the cold, but he still manages a smile at Mikey. "Y-Yeah, I should be able t-to." Mikey smiles back at him, and they continue walking. 

When they reach the cabin, Mikey checks inside the windows to make sure no one is in it. There isnt. Of course, the door is locked, but Mikey is able to literally just rip off the doorknob. Leo's feet are basically dragging on the ground at this point, and the moment Mikey and Leo enter the cabin, Leo falls. Thankfully, Mikey is just barely able to catch him before he hits the floor. "Leo-!" 

Mikey carefully lays Leo on the floor. "Good job, Leo." Leo smiles shakily at him. "T-Thanks..." Mikey takes Leo's medic pouch and starts shifting through it to find something to help Leo. Leo's eyes start to drift shut, and Mikey has to quickly shake him to keep him awake. "Don't pass out on me, Lee!" Leo groans from being shaken, but he nods none the less.

Mikey ends up finding some gauze that he wraps around Leo's leg. Leo hisses in pain when Mikey tightens it, and Mikey instantly feels bad. "I'm sorry, Leo! I'm just trying to stop the bleeding." Leo feebly starts speaking. "T-The bullet..." Mikey looks at him confused for a bit before he realizes what Leo's trying to say. "Yeah, the bullet is still in your leg, but I don't think we have anything to get it out right now...but when Raph and Donnie show up, we'll fix you up as good as new, okay?" Leo gently nods and lays his head on the floor. Mikey sighs and gets more gauze to tie around Leo's leg. 

______________________________________

"What do you mean the trackers stopped working?!" Raph shouts from where he's driving the turtle tank. Donnie groans and yells as loud as he can across the tank. "I DONT KNOW WHY! THEY JUST STOPPED WORKING!!" Raph stops the tank and gets out of the driver's seat to walk to Donnie's side. "Do you think it's because of the snowstorm?" Donnie starts basically punching his tech gauntlet. "Probably, and it being a fucking snowstorm doesn't make me feel any better about the fact OUR BROTHERS ARE OUT THERE." 

Raph stands next to Donnie, unsure of what to do for a bit. "Well... maybe there's something outside that'll tell us where they went? This is around the spot that they first showed up after portalling away, right?" Donnie stops smacking his gauntlet screen and looks up at Raph. "Yeah, but what could there possibly be that would tell us where they are?" Raph walks over to the door of the turtle tank, opening it and stepping outside. 

He gets instantly hit by a blast of cold air, but he still manages to look around. As he looks around, he notices something that not only makes him feel instant relief but also instant fear.

It was a blood trail.

Raph steps back into the turtle tank. "It's not exactly the nicest thing ever...but I found a lead. I don't think we'll be able to follow it in the turtle tank though." Donnie runs up to Raph. "Really?! What is it?" Raph grimaces and looks behind him through the doorway. "A blood trail.." "WHAT?!" Donnie instantly runs out of the door and starts following the trail. "A- DONNIE!" Raph calls after Donnie as he starts following the blood trail too. "WAIT FOR ME, DONNIE!!"

After Raph finally catches up to Donnie, Donnie takes out two flashlights from his battle shell. One for Raph, and one for himself. They continue following the trail and trying their best to not lose it, which is a bit hard since the snowstorm keeps covering over parts of the trail. And even though it's not exactly the prettiest sight, Donnie and Raph find themselves stressing every time the blood trail stops from more snow covering it.

They continue following it until they come to a cabin, which is clearly where the trail ends. A random doorknob rolls towards Donnie, probably thanks to the wind blowing it. Yep, Leo and Mikey are here.

Donnie and Raph start to climb up the stairs, and Raph knocks on the door. Raph has never been more happy to hear Mikey's voice. "H-Hello?" Raph instantly rips the door off its hinges, not even thinking about the fact that the cabin is probably someone else's. Raph definitely doesn't like the scene that he sees in the cabin. Mikey is sitting on the floor holding Leo, who not only has tons of bandages on his leg and looks to be passed out, but he looks genuinely blue. Which, considering the blood trail and bloody bandages, means that Leo has lost a lot of blood. Which is not good.

Donnie rushes in so fast that Raph can swear he felt wind blow his mask tails as Donnie went by. Donnie skids to a stop at Leo's side and starts to check the bandages on Leo's leg. "Was he shot?" He asks Mikey. "Y-Yes. The bullet is still in his leg." Donnie nods. "Probably a good idea to not get it out without any proper equipment. Good job, Michael." Donnie gently pats Mikey on the head and stands up. "Raph? Could you please pick Leo up?" Raph softly walks into the cabin and crouches down to pick Leo up. 

When Raph picks Leo up, Leo groans softly, which causes Raph to almost drop him from shock. Of course though, he doesn't. They all walk out of the cabin and walk back to the turtle tank. When they get inside, Raph gently sets Leo down and goes to start driving the tank. Donnie walks up to Leo, picks him up, sits down, and holds him. Mikey comes up next to him and sits down next to him, putting his head on Donnie's shoulder. "Thank you for showing up..." Donnie looks over at Mikey. "Of course I showed up. I would never be able to forgive myself if I said you two would just be fine and didn't come to get you."

Donnie turns his head around again and is very surprised to feel Mikey start crying. "Mikey..?" Mikey sniffs and gently takes Leo's hand. "I-I thought Leo was going to d-die..." Donnie leans his head onto Mikey's. "Well, he didn't. And he'll be fine, okay?" Mikey sniffs again. "I know... t-thank you, Donnie..." "Of course, little brother." Raph starts up the tank, turns it around, and starts driving back to the lair. And by the time they get back to the lair, Donnie, Mikey, and Leo are all sleeping together in a turtle pile.

The best part is that Leo is smiling.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[chadillacboseman]

The Shepherd's Daughter - II

Pairing: Phillip Graves x F!Reader (Shepherd's daughter)

Warnings: Reader is a CIA agent. Mentions of terrorism, both foreign and domestic, blood, injury, guns, etc. Graves is a whiny, jealous little bitch boy, but when he gets his way OOOOOO. SPOILERS FOR MW2.

Summary: As punishment for the botched infiltration of a domestic terror cell, your father, General Shepherd, pairs you with Shadow Company to retrieve American war assets that have fallen into the wrong hands.

Word Count: 2k maybe?

Part ONE HERE

--

"Are you any closer to finding them?" Your father's voice was tense, on the verge of anger. You sensed that perhaps he had been into the whiskey he kept in his desk drawer ("for emergencies" as he so often joked).

There was no progress update to be given. Every lead you had chased with Shadow Company had been a dead end. You considered, for a moment, lying to him- spinning a tale and trying to make the situation less dire.

It would do you no good. He had an uncanny way of knowing when you were lying, even if all he had to go on was your voice.

"No, sir. We are not," the line was silent at that response and you instinctively tensed, awaiting the inevitable shouting that would come.

But it didn't.

Instead, his voice was even as he asked, "And how is Shadow Company performing?"

The question perplexed you. Did he think of you as his own personal spy? Had Graves been correct in his assumption that your father wanted someone to keep an eye on their operations?

"Well?" Impatient. Nothing the man hated more than waiting.

You took a quick glance around the room to make sure no Shadows had wandered in before answering, "They're...fine, sir. We just don't have many leads to go on."

"Fine?" His anger had finally bubbled to the surface, "What the hell is that supposed to mean? Are they doing their fucking job or not?"

You held the phone at arm's length until he had finished his tirade before bringing it back to your ear for a rebuttal, "They're well-equipped, efficient. My...reputation makes it difficult to earn their trust, but they are tireless in their efforts."

A grunt of approval on the other end of the line. The deity had been appeased.

"I expect a report at the same time tomorrow."

The line went dead.

Graves watched you from across the room, his blue eyes unwavering as he drummed his fingers impatiently on the body of his rifle. You were staring out the cracked window, your hair moving ever so slightly with the push of the salt-soaked breeze.

You were pretty, something that Graves had began to notice the more time he spent with you. Something that ate at him- frustrated him beyond reason.

He still didn't trust you fully. Hated the way you took phone calls from the general behind closed doors. Graves knew you were reporting back to Shepherd about them- on good days, funding poured in from their benefactor, and on bad ones they barely scraped by with their lives.

"The general giving you grief today?" Graves called across the room.

You shrugged and made a face that distorted your features in the dim lighting of the safehouse. He chuckled and bounced on the balls of his feet, waiting to see if you'd relinquish any further details.

You didn't.

Graves chewed the inside of his cheek and decided to press his luck-

"You been tellin' him how we're doin'? That what the phone calls are for?"

You shot him another look, this time laced with your obvious annoyance at the question; he smiled in return, that disarming smile full of too-white teeth that could almost be mistaken for a shark's maw.

"Just askin', princess. No need for the venom."

He drawled out the cutesy nickname that made your face heat; the other Shadows had dropped it after you'd proved yourself to their standards, but Graves still used it, much to your chagrin.

"I tell him what he asks for," you spat the words a little more harshly than you intended, and you almost felt a pang of guilt when Graves raised his eyebrows in surprise.

"And what does he ask for?" he cocked his head, blue eyes shining under the exposed bulb in the ceiling, "how his lapdog is performing?"

"Your words, not mine, Graves."

"Mhm," he took a step forward and the aging wooden floor creaked under the sole of his boots, "Do ya tell him how my boys are run ragged chasin' his fuck up? How we're stayin' in shitholes like this-" he jerked his head around the room at the cracked walls and exposed wiring, "while he sits in his office?"

"Where are you going with this, Graves?" you sighed through your nose and folded your arms across your chest, "What do you want from me? I've been with you for weeks- if you don't trust me, then-"

Graves cut you off and took another step toward you, his hands still clutching his rifle to the point of whitened knuckles, "I wanna know what the high and mighty Shepherd junior is feeding her daddy dearest when no one is listening."

Something in you snapped.

You shoved him, hard, and he stumbled backward, his eyes wide before he caught himself. An expression flashed across his face that made your stomach drop as he tossed his rifle to the floor.

"Try that again," Graves snarled, his face now twisted in an almost eager grin.

You could try to defuse the situation- tell him this was pointless bickering.

But that something inside you fought back against the urge, burning white hot like a branding iron.

"C'mon, princess. Try it again."

That was the final straw.

You leapt forward and tried to level a knee into his gut, but anger made you sloppy. Graves elbowed you in the middle of your back, nearly snatching the air from your lungs.

"Sloppy work, Shep," he sneered and you brought your head up quickly, making connection with his chin with a crack that radiated through your own skull.

Graves stumbled backward and spit, a splatter of crimson hitting the filthy wooden floor before wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. Before he could recover, you lunged at him again, grabbing him around the middle and shoving him to the floor.

Graves let out a muffled yelp of surprise as you pinned him, the sharp point of your knee keeping him flat on his back. You unsheathed your knife and pressed the razor edge to his throat, savoring the way his pulse raced under his sweat-soaked skin.

"Give me a reason, Graves," you hissed through gritted teeth, "I'll tell him you started it. Make sure there's only one story."

"You gonna cut my throat? Do it then," he was still grinning and a small trickle of blood ran down from the corner of his mouth, "C'mon!"

He shouted the last word and you jumped, nearly granting his wish.

"Not worth the paperwork," you sheathed your knife, satisfied with the small cut you'd left in your wake. You made to rise from him, but he clapped a hand onto your thigh, holding you there.

A strange expression passed over his features for just a moment, then disappeared along with the pressure of his hand on your leg. You rose to your feet and offered him a hand, which he took before orienting himself.

"You gonna tell the general about this little spat?" Graves cocked an eyebrow and brought his hand to his throat, swiping the still trickling blood from the wound.

"Maybe."

The fight was absent from the next call with your father. It didn't seem worth the effort to explain that you'd briefly thought of killing the commander over a childlike argument.

There was good news to pass on anyway- Shadow Company had landed in Las Almas and the Mexican Special Forces seemed far more competent than the US Military back home.

Colonel Alejandro Vargas, in particular, was impressive among them. He and his second in command had already had a run-in with Hassan and the taskforce they were working alongside had been chasing down leads left and right before Shadow Company arrived.

The 141 and the Special Forces treated you with more respect than the Shadows had- they even seemed to seek your input, which was more than you could say for Graves and his men.

It was easier to spend time at the Las Almas base- it was warm, and for once, you weren't sleeping on a bare floor next to a dozen snoring soldiers.

Graves seemed annoyed with your enjoyment of their hospitality, but never mentioned it directly.

"It's good to have you around here, hermosa," Alejandro was bent low over a map of Las Almas, studying it with intensity, "Sometimes these men forget the little details."

You smiled and he returned it, a genuine grin that accented his handsome features.

From across the room, Graves glared at him, his lip curled in a barely-concealed snarl of disdain. Why it upset him so much, he had no idea- that alone frustrated him more than Alejandro's blatant flirting.

He wanted more than anything to wipe that smile off of the colonel's face, preferably with his knuckles.

"Graves?" you cocked your head and the sound of your voice cut through the swirling white noise in his head, snapping him out of his rage-fueled trance.

"What?"

You furrowed your brows and gestured to the map, "Alejandro's plan?"

Alejandro. So quick to call him by his first name.

"Small teams are probably better for this," the colonel repeated the plan slowly, as if Graves was a child who had been caught daydreaming, "Shepherd and I could-"

"No," Graves cut him off and you raised a brow, "She comes with me, she doesn't work for you, Vargas."

Alejandro seemed to have made a connection in that moment and a smirk ghosted over his lips at the realization, "Far as I know, she doesn't work for you either, sombra."

You glanced between them, sensing some unspoken tension that seemed to have formed behind your back.

"I should go with Shadow Company," you murmured quietly. For a moment, Graves looked triumphant, until you continued, "The general wants regular reports on their performance."

Alejandro chuckled and shot the commander a look of victory, "Wouldn't want to disappoint your bankroll."

You spent the next miserable night in a decrepit safe house, staring up at the ceiling as Graves breathed softly next to you. He hadn't said a word since the spat with Alejandro, and he'd tossed you your duffel with such force it had nearly knocked you off your feet.

Your back ached from the hard floor, and the early sounds of a thunderstorm were brewing outside the thin walls. You sat up in the darkness and rubbed your temples, contemplating the series of life fuckups you'd had to make to get to this point.

A loud crescendo of thunder shook the house and you jumped, barely stifling a yelp of fear at the sudden sound.

"Scared of storms, princess?" Graves mumbled from his position on the floor.

"Will you give it a rest, Graves?" you snapped and he chuckled.

There was a long moment of silence before he spoke again.

"How come you don't call me Phillip?" he pushed himself up to a seated position, his eyes barley visible shining in the dark.

"Because you're the commander," you said with a shrug.

"You call the Colonel by his name. Seems a little too familiar."

"Are you jealous?" you asked incredulously and he huffed out a noncommittal response you couldn't catch, "What is going on with you? Three weeks ago, you'd have been happy to have me out of your hair! Hell, before we landed in Las Almas, we nearly killed one another-"

"Yeah? Maybe I just don't want you shacking up with a foreign military leader when we're supposed to be focused!"

You sputtered indignantly, feeling your face grow warm at the accusation, "Shacking up? Really?"

"Yeah, really."

You took a blind swat at his face in the dark and he grabbed your wrist yanking you toward him until your chest was flush with his. In the pitch blackness, his eyes shone like a predator as he stared down at you.

His face was so close to yours now that you could feel his breath as it fanned over you; he was nearly panting, and you could feel the thrum of his heart under his fatigues.

You tried to pull away, but Graves tightened his grip with a growl, "I sat back while you spied on my men, slowed us down, and reported back to your piece of shit father. Then we land in Las Almas and you may as well have sat on that fucking prick's lap while he planned-"

Your free hand connected with his face with a crisp -SMACK- that rang out in the silent room. If it had hurt him, he didn't show it. Instead, he grinned and took hold of your free hand with his own before moving, swiftly, and knocking you onto your back with your arms pinned above your head.

You tried to wriggle free, but he shoved a knee between your legs for leverage and you felt a sudden pang of heat at the contact.

"Didn't your daddy ever teach you any manners?" He hissed through gritted teeth.

"Fuck you, Phillip," you spat his name and he laughed, a hollow, mirthless sound that fell flat in the darkness.

"Ask me nicely."

"Get the fuck off of me!"

"Wrong answer, princess," he thrust his knee up into you and you let out a strained gasp that made him laugh again, "See, you're givin' me mixed signals here." He brought his mouth down to your ear and you felt a jolt of electricity run down your spine.

"You want me to stop? I'll stop, but I don't think that's what you really want."

You didn't answer, your attention now too focused on his mouth as it neared your neck, hot breath sending your hair on end. When his tongue finally hit your skin, you had to stifle the sound that threatened to tumble past your lips. Before you could stop yourself, you bucked your hips, desperate for friction against his knee.

"That's more like it," he purred; his teeth came down, suddenly, on your pulse point and you gasped, back arching off the cold floor and sending your chest against his. Tomorrow, there'd be a mark there, glaring and obvious for everyone to see.

"Can I let your hands go?" Graves panted, his mouth still close to your ear, "you gonna go smackin' me again?"

"No," you tried to focus through the haze of lust that had taken root in your mind.

"Promise?" He asked, his voice smug.

Before you could answer, he released your wrists and one of his hands snaked under the hem of your shirt, rough fingertips gliding across your sensitive skin. His hand found your bra, deftly moving it up to expose your breasts to his fingers. He wasted no time taking one of your nipples between them, rolling gently until you let out a pathetic whimper.

"Wondered how good you'd sound," Graves' mouth found yours and he nearly crashed into you, kissing you like the desperate man he'd been since landing in Las Almas, "He's never gonna fuckin' hear this."

Alejandro. He had been jealous.

"C'mon, let me hear that pretty sound again, baby," he murmured; his knee ground into you once more and you moaned his name, his first name, and it sent his head into a daze.

You heard him fumble with his belt for a moment, then he tapped your buckle expectantly, prompting you to wriggle your way out of your pants. You tossed them aside in the darkness and shivered against the cold night air as it hit your bare skin.

"This ain't the way I wanted it to happen," Graves whispered as he ran a gentle hand up your inner thigh.

How long had he been thinking about it?

Swiftly, he grabbed your thighs and pulled your legs around his waist, lining himself up with you. Slowly, agonizingly, he pushed himself inside you, hands grasping desperately at your hips to pull you flush with him.

Graves dropped his forehead to yours, panting quietly as he let you adjust to him. His first thrust was gentle, slow and easy, as if he was testing the water.

"You gonna tell your daddy about this?" Graves set a bruising pace, thrusting into you with less restraint than before.

You didn't answer, unable to speak as his cock hit every sensitive spot deep inside you over and over again. You wanted to hate him, wanted to tell him what an absolute bastard he was-

But the words wouldn't come.

Instead, you clutched at his shoulders, moaning and whining like an animal in heat as he fucked you on the filthy floor of the safehouse.

This was a bad idea, surely. Sleeping with the commander could only come back to haunt you.

Graves thrust, hard, and the thought was pushed from your mind entirely as he edged you closer to release. It was clear he wasn't far behind as he panted and let his movement grow sloppy and erratic.

"Gonna cum inside you, baby, that okay?" Graves' voice shook as he spoke.

"Yes-" you gasped out the words as he gave you one final push that had the tension inside you snapping like a taut cord.

He was close behind you, thrusting sloppily until he was spilling inside you with a weak grunt. He stayed like that for a moment, panting, as sweat dripped from his face and pattered down onto you.

Already, you could feel the gentle throb of the bruise that was forming on your neck where he had bitten you earlier.

To your left, a radio crackled to life and Graves scrambled to grab it, listening intently to the chatter from the Shadows on the other end.

"Shit-" he tossed the radio to the floor and searched for his pants.

"What is it?" You asked weakly, still lying on the floor where he'd left you.

"141 has movement, pretty sure it's Hassan," Graves threw your pants to you and you wiggled your way into them. It had to be at least 3am and you were exhausted.

You searched blindly for something to cover your neck, but to no avail. You weren't thrilled at the thought of Alejandro seeing it, but decided you didn't care.

Graves led the way and you followed him out the front door, rifles drawn.

[halothenthehorns]

Chapter 17: (PIPER XVI) - SAVING THE WORLD ON HAPPY THE DRAGON

Hazel had to adjust all of her blankets as she went back to her spot and wriggled around to get one comfy around her lap in just the right spot to prop the book against and then still took the time to make sure her picture wasn’t going to get accidentally kicked around in any of her fidgeting. By the time she actually began to start, she was worried someone was going to snap at her for taking so long and so she stuttered on the first few words.

“LEO?” SHE YELLED.

“Gods forbid it be anybody else up there,” Jason sighed.

“Freaking Clarisse comes in guns blazing saying, ‘hey, look what I found,” Percy nodded. “Then Leo comes in on Festus and they have an epic dragon fight about who goes on the quest.”

“How many dragons do you think we have running around here?” Annabeth asked in concern. 

The really concerning part was that she didn’t flat out tell him how ridiculous that was.

“I don’t know, like, three at any given time,” Percy shrugged with a smirk at Jason.

“That was just mean,” Jason sighed.

“And let us please get back to one vacating the premises,” Nico reminded in exasperation, waving Hazel on. She was smiling though and just enjoying their light conversation, it made her moment of stress before seem silly now.

Sure enough, there he was, sitting atop a giant bronze death machine and grinning like a lunatic.

“We really should be grateful he didn’t come in with a whole fireworks display,” Thalia sighed.

“Ah, you know me well. Next time my dear, when I’ve had a little more time to prep,” Leo gave her an exaggerated wink, and she laughed. It was a nice feeling instead of the death glare he’d been expecting. He decided not to push his luck further by moving to sit next to her even if he kind of still wanted to. Just because there was no chance she’d step on him with those boots in a fun way didn’t mean he couldn’t enjoy her laugh.

 Even before he landed, the camp alarm went up. A conch horn blew. All the satyrs started screaming, “Don’t kill me!” Half the camp ran outside in a mixture of pajamas and armor.

“Yep, must be Friday,” Will sighed.

“Hear that Leo? Will said you gotta do something even bigger this time around to make a lasting impression,” Jason smirked.

Will spluttered something about betrayal while Leo laughed, causing the others to join in.

 The dragon set down right in the middle of the green, and Leo yelled, “It’s cool! Don’t shoot!”

Hesitantly, the archers lowered their bows. The warriors backed away, keeping their spears and swords ready. They made a loose wide ring around the metal monster. Other demigods hid behind their cabin doors or peeped out the windows. Nobody seemed anxious to get close.

Piper couldn’t blame them. The dragon was huge. It glistened in the morning sun like a living penny sculpture —different shades of copper and bronze—a sixty-foot-long serpent with steel talons and drill-bit teeth and glowing ruby eyes. It had bat-shaped wings twice its length that unfurled like metallic sails, making a sound like coins cascading out of a slot machine every time they flapped.

“It’s beautiful,” Piper muttered. The other demigods stared at her like she was insane.

“Well none of them have culture like my bestie!” Leo smirked.

“All artists are under appreciated during their time,” Hazel nodded.

The dragon reared its head and shot a column of fire into the sky. 

“Show off,” Leo chuckled.

“Just like his rider,” Annabeth agreed.

Campers scrambled away and hefted their weapons, but Leo slid calmly off the dragon’s back. He held up his hands like he was surrendering, except he still had that crazy grin on his face.

“Every single person scream at once it’s a trap on three,” Percy smirked. He even held up three fingers.

“I’m not hiding grenades up my sleeve!” Leo huffed.

Percy put down a finger.

Annabeth reached over and put down his hand. Hazel was relieved.

“People of Earth, I come in peace!” he shouted.

Will laughed particularly hard at that one, and Leo grinned at him stockpiling alien references in his head for future use.

“If you say take me to your leader, I’m worried how sleep deprived you are,” Annabeth snorted.

“She speaks from experience,” Percy assured.

 He looked like he’d been rolling around in the campfire. His army coat and his face were smeared with soot. His hands were grease stained, and he wore a new tool belt around his waist. His eyes were bloodshot. His curly hair was so oily it stuck up in porcupine quills, and he smelled strangely of Tabasco sauce. 

But he looked absolutely delighted. “Festus is just saying hello!”

“If that’s how he says hello, I’m terrified how he says piss off,” Percy chuckled.

“That thing is dangerous!” an Ares girl shouted, brandishing her spear. “Kill it now!”

“Stand down!” someone ordered.

To Piper’s surprise, it was Jason. He pushed through the crowd,

None of them were particularly surprised at his sudden authoritative position he so easily dawned. Exchanging someone with Percy probably wouldn’t work so well if he was just one of the kids around his camp who just sat in the back of the place all day and was never invited to the council meetings.

Thalia actually wondered for the first time if Jupiter had more kids running around that camp he was in charge of, if perhaps Jason had some half-sister tearing up the coast somewhere looking for him.

flanked by Annabeth and that girl from the Hephaestus cabin, Nyssa.

Jason gazed up at the dragon and shook his head in amazement. “Leo, what have you done?”

“The greatest thing ever!” Leo insisted.

“Would you like to take over?” Hazel asked politely, he was so jazzed about his dragon showing up in all his glory he was actually paying full attention to the book for once, little flickers of flames appearing on his ears like someone was toggling his on switch. 

“No, no,” he insisted, smoke trailing from burnt hair on his arms. “You go on.”

She did so with a faint frown, somehow the guy nearly combusting into flames didn’t make it as easy as she’d have thought to keep him separate from Sammy in her mind, but repeating his name over and over was helping anyways.

“Found a ride!” Leo beamed. “You said I could go on the quest if I got you a ride. Well, I got you a class-A metallic flying bad boy! Festus can take us anywhere!”

“You never did specify what kind of ride it had to be,” Leo agreed, but there was an anxious look as he eyed Jason like he thought the guy would spontaneously take back his quest pass.

“And I couldn’t have asked for better,” Jason grinned. “What’s better than air support with fire power and a bite force?”

Leo grinned right back and finally sort of regretted being in this timeline where he didn’t actually get to ride off and save the world on Festus with this guy. Ah well, if Annabeth’s doom and gloom attitude was anything to go by, he still might get a chance next time.

“It—has wings,” Nyssa stammered. Her jaw looked like it might drop off her face.

“Yeah!” Leo said. “I found them and reattached them.”

“But it never had wings. Where did you find them?”

Leo hesitated, and Piper could tell he was hiding something.

“In … the woods,” he said.

“Remember when we were making fun of our poor lying skills on our first quest? Yeah, can we bring back those while pushing someone else on stage,” Percy grinned.

“The fact that that's not even a wild and crazy statement,” Will sighed. “If you said you found them next to the cursed dancing shoes in the pile of plushies some god tossed in here without us noticing, I wouldn’t even blink.”

“The ancient secret bunker being the crazy part is just par for the course in camp where we’re apparently going to be uncovering five layers below ground tracks at this point too,” Annabeth said. Next time someone told her this place was built on cursed land over an elephant graveyard, she was pretty sure she’d just roll with it.

 “Repaired his circuits, too, mostly, so no more problems with him going haywire.”

“Mostly?” Nyssa asked.

The dragon’s head twitched. It tilted to one side and a stream of black liquid—maybe oil, hopefully just oil—poured out of its ear, all over Leo.

“Just a few kinks to work out,” Leo said.

“Sounds like a perfectly reasonable response to prove he won’t set things on fire anymore,” Nico agreed half-heartedly.

“Unless the dragon’s using it to soak him before using Leo as a running match,” Will muttered. He didn’t really have that much faith in Leo’s ability, he hadn’t been in camp for even forty-eight hours yet!

“But how did you survive … ?” Nyssa was still staring at the creature in awe. “I mean, the fire breath …”

“I’m quick,” Leo said. “And lucky. Now, am I on this quest, or what?”

Jason scratched his head. “You named him Festus?

“I do love that’s what you got out of this entire exchange,” Leo’s smile kept widening until it might split his face in half. “I’ve never owned a pet before, what is your metric for names?”

Jason shrugged. “Can’t say I have either,” he reminded, tapping his temple. “I guess it’s not the worst? Better than naming him Fluffy, or Spot?”

“Leo wouldn’t even get the excuse of being the first to name his pet that like my dad is,” Nico sniffed.

 You know that in Latin, ‘festus’ means ‘happy’? You want us to ride off to save the world on Happy the Dragon?”

“Well when you put it like that it sounds ridiculous,” Percy chuckled.

“And how would you say it, pray tell Percy!” Jason groaned.

“I don���t know Latin to even guess,” Percy shrugged. His smile seemed reluctant all of a sudden, he still remembered Alex’s spontaneous decision to name this very dragon Reid. He kind of wanted to mention it to Leo, but after all the work and love he’d obviously put into this guy, it felt rude to mention someone else had just come up with one on the spot too.

Maybe if he could mention it later without his voice cracking Leo would consider making that Festus’s middle name.

The dragon twitched and shuddered and flapped his wings.

“That’s a yes, bro!” Leo said. “Now, um, I’d really suggest we get going, guys. I already picked up some supplies in the —um, in the woods. And all these people with weapons are making Festus nervous.”

Jason frowned. “But we haven’t planned anything yet. We can’t just—”

“Go,” Annabeth said. She was the only one who didn’t look nervous at all. Her expression was sad and wistful, like this reminded her of better times. 

“Nearly getting eaten by that thing and you putting me in jail half the night, yeah, great times,” Percy sounded just as wistful as he remembered playing tic tac toe with Beckendorf the rest of the night in that cell.

“Jason, you’ve only got three days until the solstice now, and you should never keep a nervous dragon waiting.

“I thought ancient proverbs with Annabeth weren’t until after lunch,” Thalia smirked.

“Pop quiz, Jason’s the only one who would appreciate those anyways,” Annabeth chuckled.

 This is certainly a good omen. Go!”

Jason nodded. Then he smiled at Piper. “You ready, partner?”

Piper looked at the bronze dragon wings shining against the sky, and those talons that could’ve shredded her to pieces. “You bet,” she said.

Flying on the dragon was the most amazing experience ever, Piper thought.

Up high, the air was freezing cold; but the dragon’s metal hide generated so much heat, it was like they were flying in a protective bubble. Talk about seat warmers! And the grooves in the dragon’s back were designed like high-tech saddles, so they weren’t uncomfortable at all. Leo showed them how to hook their feet in the chinks of the armor, like in stirrups, and use the leather safety harnesses cleverly concealed under the exterior plating.

“Oh yeah, cause that was the highest concern around here. OSHA violation, dragon’s without seatbelts!” Percy laughed at the little voice of his mom in the back of his ear swearing she wouldn’t start the car until he buckled up.

“Please remain seated while the dragon is in motion,” Leo grinned in a pretty good automated voice. “The Leo and Festus Express is not liable for any loss of limbs, bowls, or other major organs.”

“Maybe save yourself some time and just etch that into one of his flaps going forward,” Will offered.

 They sat single file: Leo in front, then Piper, then Jason, and Piper was very aware of Jason right behind her. She wished he would hold on to her, maybe wrap his arms around her waist; but sadly, he didn’t.

Hazel read right over that like she hadn’t heard Jason awkwardly clear his throat. 

Leo used the reins to steer the dragon into the sky like he’d been doing it all his life. 

Annabeth’s mind boggled with questions on how he communicated with Festus on every detail of this. On a pegasi, they steered purely with their legs. She knew mortals used reigns for horses, but it seemed more like an unneeded training wheel to her, so the combination of that on something bigger was making her mind grapple. She couldn’t wait to focus on something fun again, pulling Leo aside and getting all the details of this later when the world wasn’t about to end. Again.

The metal wings worked perfectly, and soon the coast of Long Island was just a hazy line behind them. They shot over Connecticut and climbed into the gray winter clouds.

Leo grinned back at them. “Cool, right?”

“What if we get spotted?” Piper asked.

“The Mist,” Jason said. “It keeps mortals from seeing magic things. If they spot us, they’ll probably mistake us for a small plane or something.”

Piper glanced over her shoulder. “You sure about that?”

“No,” he admitted. Then Piper saw he was clutching a photo in his hand—a picture of a girl with dark hair.

She gave Jason a quizzical look, but he blushed and put the photo in his pocket. “We’re making good time. Probably get there by tonight.”

Piper wondered who the girl in the picture was, but she didn’t want to ask; and if Jason didn’t volunteer the information, that wasn’t a good sign. Had he remembered something about his life before? Was that a photo of his real girlfriend?

At least Thalia laughed into the awkward silence, while Jason had been hearing the mutterings of that since his sister had arrived and hung out with him. It was almost a fair assumption when you didn’t know otherwise.

Stop it, she thought. You’ll just torture yourself. She asked a safer question. “Where are we heading?”

“To find the god of the North Wind,” Jason said. “And chase some storm spirits.”

Jason couldn’t help but laugh at how Hazel said that as if it were some extravagant idea she could barely wrap her mind around while in another life he probably ate Wind gods for breakfast or something as comfortable as he’d been using them against a giant.

Then he saw Hazel squirming around to get up and hand the book off and he blinked in surprise at how short that one was. Well, at least it wasn’t just him getting that kind of treatment. He reflected back that quite a few of Percy’s had also been only a few pages a few times, and he might work up a flow chart later to study the different lengths and why.

It took all of Leo’s limited self control to patiently wait for Nico to get up and take the book from his sister so this could move on. The pattern meant he’d be getting a whole chapter about being on the back of Festus, he’d be getting data before he even had his first flight test! He wondered vaguely how much his brain would rebel if he tried to read and keep at his drawings at the same time. Judging from past experience, he might end up reading off his formula for Festus’s waste box in Spanish and drawing out the look on Piper’s face when she realized he hadn’t gotten around to installing parachutes yet. 

Only one way to find out!

[silverskull]

Shades & Hues

Part 1: Shades of Sorrow

Tim and Lucy often have happy kisses, but sad hugs on-screen. What if we flipped that idea and wrote a two-shot? * She kisses him, pressing her face hard against his, memorising the scuff of his stubble; the bump of his nose; the brush of his eyebrows; the soft twitch of his eyelashes against her own; and, finally, his lips. Warm and soft and giving way under hers as they always do; as they always have, since the very first time that she kissed him.

(Full fic below the cut, or click here to read and bookmark on AO3)

Someone offers her a wet wipe, and she bats it away like a dandelion seed. It flaps in the corner of her vision, sweeping against her cheek and she sees florid stripes, the red lines harsh in the sunlight reflecting off the white gauze. They wave it at her again and she shrugs her way out from under their arm, irritated, and letting herself be led instead by the deathgrip her hands have on the front of his uniform.

No.

No - not death. Not. Death.

“Lucy, we have to get him on the stretcher.”

It’s Bailey, and she’s calm, steady, level. Everything Lucy suddenly is not.

Her breath is too hot; too tight in her throat. Breathing is too much to think about - how to get enough air - and she knows she’s doing something wrong, gasping the way she is, grinding her teeth so hard she can feel the entirety of her lower jaw all the way in the backs of her ears, but she’s fighting against something much bigger. A monster in her lungs, clawing at her windpipe and scraping its way towards her lips. A pain that’s constricting her muscles and fettering her to this one single point on the tarmac. A fear too big to name.

“Shit, I’m showing cardiac arrest.”

Arrest.

Arrest.

They’d only stopped to assist Nolan with an arrest. A simple thing. Standard procedure. Celina simply wasn’t strong enough to restrain the suspect, and Nolan needed more boots on the ground. Across the console, in the driver’s seat, she’d seen Tim tip his head, and he flipped the sirens at the exact same moment as she lifted the radio. Always in sync. They weren’t even on call, just close by. Convenient.

“Ma’am, I need you to let go!”

“John, just get her away from him!”

Strong hands surround her, pulling her inexorably backwards, and Celina’s dark bun bobs into her line of sight, her small fingers unlatching Lucy’s, one by one, from the clamp they have on the placket of his open shirt. She stumbles, tripping over her own knees, and the sun flashes at her through the palm trees, momentarily blinding her.

***

“You got this?” he asks, lazily, but with just enough arrogance that her first response is to scoff at him.

“I got this.” She throws Tim a withering look as she hops out of the passenger’s seat, keeping her ears open to the garbled declarations of Nolan’s suspect. The man is red-faced, sweaty. His hair hangs in greasy strings around his ears, and (though it wasn’t something she’d ever say aloud) he definitely has crazy eyes.

Juarez approaches her as she rounds the hood of the shop, limping almost imperceptibly, her right hand clenched, white-knuckled, around the butt of her gun. She nods once at Lucy, her chin low and her mouth wide open, quietly gulping down deep breaths.

“You good here?” Lucy asks, reaching a steadying arm towards Juarez’s shoulder.

“Yes ma’am,” Celina says, nodding rigidly. “Officer Nolan got the situation in hand.” She shakes her head quickly, straightening her spine. “I should have taken Detective Harper up on those extra sparring sessions.”

“Well, lesson learned this time.” Lucy couldn’t fault the rookie for something she’d had to figure out the hard way herself. She looks away, raising a hand to her eyebrows and squinting across the dusty sidewalk at Nolan. “You want us to take this guy for you?”

“Nope, I got it!” 

Nolan is almost as sweaty as the angry man, wrestling the cuffs onto his lean, knotted arms. Lucy can see track marks amongst the veins; bruises and torn flesh score his skin all the way up into the grubby shirt wreathed above his elbows.

“You sure about that?” Tim is almost languid, resting his arm along the window ledge and watching them from the shade of the driver’s seat. “You’re looking a little… dewy.” 

A laugh bubbles up under Lucy’s tongue, and she turns to give Tim another look of wry reproach. She can already hear his fingers tapping lightly against the car door, see the small crease between his eye and his nose that let her know he’s mocking them, his eyes darting to her for acknowledgement. She knows him so well, she can picture his moves before he even makes them.

What she doesn’t see is the prisoner’s wife. 

Small, meth-skinny, with ragged, dull hair. She’s a blur through the collapsed screen door of the dilapidated house, a stain the same colour as the chipped beige clapboard sagging into the burnt lawn.

Juarez moves first, dropping to a squat and pulling out her holstered weapon.

Time slows. Congeals. The heat from the asphalt rises in waves before Lucy’s eyes, and her head feels too heavy to turn.

One black flash against the beige house.

One deafening bang, echoing clangorously around her.

She sees Tim, his lips parting - the start of a smile or a yell, she can’t be sure - and his eyes fix on her.

Blue, blue sky. Blue, blue eyes.

Feathered red.

Shattered red.

Blossoming red.

He lurches back into his seat, and, with all the violence of a smashed record, time catches back up to her.

Juarez is yelling at the woman, Nolan is yelling at the radio, the suspect is yelling at the ground, and Lucy is yelling at Tim.

She can’t see him - just red. Red where there should be blue. Red where there should be Tim. Nothing but red.

“Officer Chen!” Nolan’s voice cuts through her concentration like a blade, and she swings around, her arms on autopilot and reaching for her gun. Nolan is hauling the man off the ground, grunting with the effort, and he growls something else at her. There’s something she’s supposed to do. Somewhere she should be. She looks towards Celina, who is already grappling with the small woman, and with a swift kick, knocks her to the ground. The gun drops and glints black in the dry earth, feet away from where the woman falls. 

How do guns glint? How does black flash?

“Lucy!” Celina’s voice is high, and it pierces her rumination, drawing her back into the present. Juarez has the woman handcuffed beneath her, but her worried eyes are set on Lucy. “Lucy, I’ve got this. Go check on him.”

Him? Tim.

Tim… Tim!

She whirls around, her feet starting to run before her mind catches up with them, and she stumbles in the rough lawn before she moves forward. She’s aware of Nolan manhandling his prisoner into the back of his shop, aware of the shrill sound of distant sirens spiralling in an eerie vortex as they draw closer, but all she sees is red. Red on the windshield. Red on the white painted window frame. Red dripping relentlessly onto the road below their shop. She hears a scream as she crashes against the driver’s door, her hands reaching for his head and tipping it - easily, far too easily - towards her.

A bubble of blood bursts in the corner of his lips and his eyelids flicker. His shoulder is wet, and sticky below her hands. A dark bloom billowing across the navy of his uniform shirt.

His lips twitch and the screaming changes, and she suddenly recognises her own voice, pinched with horror, stretching his name into a thin wire of fear in the air between them. She gasps and swallows, grasping clumsily at the door handle and almost knocking herself out as she hauls it out of her way. He droops limply in his seat, only the belt and her hands keeping him upright, and she can hear herself calling him again, again, again, but he’s not answering.

***

She falls backwards into Nolan’s arms, the fight draining out of her like water through sand, and all she can do is watch helplessly as Bailey and her team cut away the last of Tim’s white vest and prep the AED. His skin is smeared with blood, and she finds herself looking at her own hands, finally recognising the need for a wipe - she’s covered in red. Her hands, her sleeves, the beds of her fingernails. Even, she realises, under the full glare of the sun, all across the arch of her cheekbones. Bright sparks of his blood flashing red beside the streaks of her own tears. She almost reaches to rub her eyes, but then Celina is there, calmly restraining her wrists and running a cool cloth over her stained fingers.

“Let me help you just clean these off. It won’t take a second.”

“Three, two, one… clear!”

Bailey’s command and Celina’s appeal mix and blend with the background noise in a discordant chorus of voices, and Lucy lets her hands be held and wiped, her shoulders still supported (or restrained) by Nolan. She sees Tim’s body buck starkly, spasming in a viciously sharp arc as the AED shocks him, and she gasps, reaching out as if to stop his pain.

“Still no rhythm. Run it again!”

“There now, this hand is done. Let’s have the other…”

Celina releases one of her hands, and it hovers in mid air, her own index finger blocking Tim’s arm from view. His head has rolled to the side, and his eyes are closed. He could be sleeping, turning his head towards her in his dreams, releasing a soft breath into her ear. 

Sometimes he murmurs. Rarely, and completely unintelligibly, but she can’t help herself from drawing closer, stroking his cheek and bumping his nose with hers, encouraging him to repeat himself to her. He doesn’t, and she still can’t tell what he’s said, but she holds those moments like a gift, precious and irreplaceable and just for her; something he only started doing a few months into their relationship; something he still gruffly denies in the broad light of day.

His body arcs again, and she sees his eyes spring open, crystal bright where they catch in a beam of sunlight, and his mouth expands in a silent scream.

Bailey’s team seems to exhale as one, shifting and reforming around one another with practised ease, changing positions and equipment in a confident dance of precision, like the gears of a well-tuned clock clicking seamlessly into place. Lucy rises out of Nolan’s grasp, and this time he lets her go, Celina hovering in her periphery like a concerned hummingbird. She crawls the few steps to Tim’s side, black pebbles from the asphalt sticking to her fingers, but she hardly notices. All she can see is his chest rising and falling; rising and falling fitfully, as if he’s struggling to make his lungs work the way they should. His hands are at his sides, trapped in the torn fabric of his shirt and tapping a spasmodic rhythm against his thighs.

She’s hooked her fingers into his before she even realises she’s reached him, and his head jerks unsteadily towards her. His eyes lock onto hers, and for a second he seems to catch his breath, inhaling slowly, fully, as his fingers wrap around hers.

“Lucy…”

“Shh, shh. It’s okay. It’s okay sweetheart, we’ve got you.”

She feels herself finally crashland back into her body, the cacophony around her instantly transforming into the familiar cadence of emergency calls and orders, the uniform colours and vehicle shapes once again making sense.

He’s been shot.

Tim. Her love. Her heart. Her world.

He’s been shot, and she can tell it’s not good.

There’s so much blood, still, all over him, and his clothes, and the ground; and his eyes are too wide and too scared. She can hear the words ‘pneumothorax’ and ‘pulmonary edema’ from the medical team, and she knows they have to get him to the hospital, right now, or … Her mind blanks it out and she shakes her head, ridding herself of the thought, of the tears that have squeezed themselves out onto her lower lashes.

“We’ve got you, love. It’s going to be okay.”

She runs a hand through his hair, ruining his carefully arranged ‘do, and stroking her fingers along the edge of his cheekbone. His eyelids flutter closed at the touch of her thumb, but his breath catches in his throat, and he coughs wetly and jerks back to wakefulness with a fright, his eyes searching restively for hers.

“Lucy, we have to go.” Bailey is opposite her, an oxygen mask in hand, already hissing with air and Lucy nods, once, and then again, more firmly. She squeezes his fingers tight and brushes her thumb across his lips.

“I’ll see you soon.”

And she kisses him, pressing her face hard against his, memorising the scuff of his stubble; the bump of his nose; the brush of his eyebrows; the soft twitch of his eyelashes against her own; and, finally, his lips. Warm and soft and giving way under hers as they always do; as they always have, since the very first time that she kissed him. He breathes against her, and she inhales him, stifling a sob and holding his face close, lingering against him for a long moment; savouring the beat of his heart pulsing warm and quick under her fingers at his jaw and temples.

And then Nolan is behind her again, drawing her away, and Bailey is covering Tim’s face with the oxygen mask. The EMTs load his stretcher onto a gurney and rush him towards the back of the ambulance. She watches, feeling as if she’s been completely hollowed out; as if anything stronger than a light gust of wind could blow her away.

“Lucy. Go on, we’ve got your shop.”

Instead of pulling her, this time Nolan shoves her gently, and she almost trips again, looking back at him and wondering why he looks so strange. He nods, and Lucy automatically imitates the gesture, and tears fall from her eyes, clearing her vision, and Nolan looks like himself again, tilting his head urgently towards the ambulance.

She takes a breath, turning from him, from their shops, from the dark blotch of blood on the ground where the stretcher lay, and she hurries after Bailey, hoisting herself up and inside the closing ambulance doors. AO3 link💖

On to Part 2!