#this au writes itself tbh

[baskeigh-ball]

Soooooo..... Does that mean they "kidnapped" Raph after Mikey yeeted Big Mama from the window?

nah, at that point they still haven't met raph. that's just when they get concrete evidence of where he is through big mama and draxum's confrontation...

as well as a direct gateway to the battle nexus >:]

[backwaterotter]

I've been cooking up a pretty simple AU concept, surrounding a simple idea: What if Purple had been deleted for slightly too long. What if there were permanent after-effects? Then, the only theoretical differentiation between canon and this au concept would be a second of waiting time.

Anyway, I'm working on a fic to go with it, I hope people will enjoy it! You can read it here!

[celestial-toys]

That I Would Be Good [4/5]

Swan Upon Leda

Moon’s fingertips tap rhythmically along the edge of the counter, and he seems to be debating something. He finally speaks again after a pregnant pause. “…You’re like a God to him. Do you know that?”

His words cut through the fog in your mind. “I am?”

He nods solemnly. “You are. Not—Not in the sense that he wants to worship you… or at least, not as much as he wants to protect you. But there’s an undeniable, ineffable devotion there.”

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

In This Chapter

Breaking points are reached, confrontations are had, and secrets are spilled.

Pairing: Sun x Moon x Reader

Word Count: 5,781

Contains: [AU - Real World | Sentient AI/Automatons | Personality Swap] [invasion of privacy] [more of Sun’s signature Overbearing Behavior™️] [crying] [substance abuse (not specified beyond ‘sedatives’)] [arguments] [shouting] [brief physical altercation] [religious discussion/metaphor(?)] [implication of past sexual assault (not committed by Sun or Moon, to be perfectly clear)]

A/Ns: This is a songfic. Lyrics and title are from ‘That I Would Be Good’ by Alanis Morissette. Also, the title of this chapter, along with additional lyrics featured within it, are from the song 'Swan Upon Leda' by Hozier. Please refer to the notes on the Ao3 version of this chapter for my commentary on the song, and it's unfortunate renewed relevancy post-US election.

This fic is part of my AU “[Not] Made by Design”, the full series can be found here.

Links to other parts of this fic:[Ch.1] [Ch.2] [Ch.3] [Ch.4 (you are here)]

That I would be grand if I was not all-knowing.

Curled up in bed one evening, you huff in frustration at the puzzle on your phone. The sound catches Sun’s attention, raising his head from the pillow beneath him. Shifting from his usual fit-for-a-coffin position beside you, he cranes his neck to look over your shoulder.

“Expose. Pate. Resume. Rose.”

You frown. “Really?”

“Try it and see for yourself.”

You tap the four assorted words he called out and sure enough, they collect themselves in a purple bracket on the screen. You read the category title aloud. “Words pronounced differently with accent marks. …Oh. Huh. Guess you’re right.”

His voice is neutral, very matter-of-fact as he pulls his head back, neck folding and collapsing to allow him to rest on the pillow once again. “Of course I am.”

You roll your eyes, sarcasm seeping into your flat tone. “Yeah, yeah. Thanks for the help.”

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

Settled down for a lazy Sunday morning gaming session, you mutter aloud as your character runs across the island. “Okay, I’ve got… 300k on me. Daisy’s sellin’ ‘em for… oh, I checked earlier, what was it… uh—109 this week.”

Moon’s voice rumbles out from behind you and you feel the vibration between your shoulder blades as you rest against his chest. “Sheesh…”

You voice your agreement as you roam in search of the young turnip-laden boar. “Yeah, I know.”

You try to do the math in your head. “So… that should mean I can afford—”

Moon cheerfully provides you with your answer almost instantly. “2,752! Or—well—2,750 is as close as you can get without going over since she sells them in bundles of ten.”

You try to keep the frustration out of your voice when you thank him for the help.

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

Your hand freezes over the bowl, a scoop of flour held in midair as you lean back to stare at the recipe below. 

“What.” Deadpan as usual, Sun questions you from his seat at the table. He’d apparently joined Zero in deciding that watching you bake was the most entertaining way they could spend the afternoon.

“It was… ugh, I need ‘two cups’. But I‘m weighing this out, so I'm trying to remember what that was in grams.”

Once again robbing you of the opportunity to think, he’s quick to feed you the information. “Two cups of flour equals 250 grams.”

You sigh. “…Thanks.”

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

Curled on the couch between the two of them, you listen as they test their trivia knowledge against one another, having fallen into a contest thanks to the episode of Jeopardy currently playing on the TV. You’ve long since given up on trying to beat either of them to any answer, and are currently trying to fight back the rising, nagging voice in your head that keeps calling you stupid.

After Moon effortlessly answers a clue so obscure that you’d have had no hope in hell of getting it, you wiggle out from between them with perhaps a bit more force than necessary. Quickly excusing yourself, you make for the bathroom.

“You good?” You ignore the concerned question that Sun calls after you, focused solely on being alone and calming down before you make a scene in front of them. You’ve just gotta… breathe. See things rationally again.

You just need a minute.

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

After more time than you’re aware of passes, spent with your head in your hands as you sit on the edge of the bathtub willing yourself not to cry, a soft knock startles you.

“Are you alright in there, star? It’s… been twenty minutes and, uh…” He laughs, but it’s a sad sound. “I don’t know how much longer I can hold Sun back.”

You hurry to your feet, placating them with “Just a second!” as you check your reflection to make sure you don’t have pressure marks on your cheeks from how long you sat there like that. When you pull the door open, you try to play it casual in spite of the fact that you feel no better than before. Unsurprisingly, you immediately come face-to-chest with a very imposing and very quiet yellow automaton.

You glance between his blank gaze and Moon, wringing his hands some feet off to the side behind his bolder counterpart.

“…Hi?”

“What were you doing in there.”

“Using the… bathroom…?”

He’s obviously unsatisfied with your answer but he doesn’t stop you when you slip past him through the doorway. He surveys the empty bathroom for a long moment before following as you make your way back to the couch.

“Goodness, didn’t mean to turn my bathroom trip into a full-family event.” You remark as you pass by Moon and Zero, both of them turning to follow you as well. You settle back down in the middle of the couch, Moon taking his place beside you. Zero paces around her bed, too bothered by the tense energy that’s now filled the room to allow herself to relax.

Sun stands in the middle of the room, rays clicking back and forth rigidly. “I am… concerned about you again.”

You sigh, quietly grateful that someone finally broke the awkward silence. “There’s no need to be, Sun.”

“I thought… you wanted me to tell you when I am concerned.”

“I—I do, but… I mean…”

You search for something to throw him off his line of questioning and flop your head back into the plush couch cushion. “Christ, Sun, can’t I even take a shit in peace without an interrogation afterwards?”

His arms cross over his chest. “I never heard the sound of the toilet flushing.”

You internally curse his observation skills as he closes the distance between himself and your seat on the couch. Crouching down in front of you, you begin to feel backed into a corner. “Now, unless you’ve taken up some new, gross attempt at reducing your water-waste, I’d like you to answer me again and be honest about it this time.”

You stare into his blank, false eyes for an uncomfortable length of time as an array of thoughts and feelings wash over you. You consider fabricating another lie. You consider telling some sort of half-truth just to get him off your back. But the longer you stay locked in an unwinnable staring contest with him, the closer you get to throwing caution aside and hitting him with the full truth.

And so you do.

“You make me feel stupid, okay?! And it pisses me off, so I tried to excuse myself to go calm down in the bathroom, but I can’t even get a break in there anymore, so now here we are!”

His expression flickers to one of confusion. “I make you feel what?”

“Stupid! Both of you!”

His monitor rotates to face Moon for a silent moment of shared bewilderment, and then Moon turns to face you. “Could you… elaborate a little more on that? When—How do we make you feel that way?”

You tilt your head over to face him, crossing your arms over yourself in an attempt to quell the vulnerability. “It’s… it’s not even your fault.” You wince at the way your voice cracks and tense up as your vision gets blurry, refusing to cry over something so trivial. “It’s just… I’m… struggling to come to terms with the massive gap between us.”

Sun’s harsh tone doesn’t help. “What gap?”

You blink hard, ignoring the tears that escape. “Intelligence! Memory! Information processing speed! You name it- you two are far better at it than I could ever be!”

Moon reaches out, laying a firm hand on Sun’s knee. What he silently conveys to him is anyone’s guess, but it’s enough to have Sun rock back on his heels, arms retracting and elbows propping him up against the coffee table behind him. The forced look of casualty doesn’t suit him, nor does it negate his overbearing demeanor, but you’re appreciative of the extra space nonetheless.

“Has this… been bothering you for a long time?” Moon’s question is gentle, and on quite the right track.

“Not… since the beginning, if that’s what you’re asking. I knew—objectively—that you both would be superior to me in that regard. It just…”

“Hits different when you live with it twenty-four-seven?

You glance up at Sun. “I mean… kinda? I don’t know. It’s… it’s the little things that have been getting to me. When you—when you solve a puzzle that I’m working on without a moment’s hesitation. When you don’t even give me the time to do math in my head. When you offer up answers before I can even hope to recall them. It just makes me feel so… slow.”

The room is quiet for a moment while they consider your words. Surprisingly, Sun is the one to break through it with an insightful question more befitting of Moon. “Is it that we know the answers, or is it that we give them to you.”

Your tense expression softens as you view your frustration from another angle. Looking back on all the little moments that bothered you, you find that the common thread running through all of them is that they beat you to the punch. “You may… have a point.”

Sun does his best to not look smug, but his best isn’t very good.

“I guess… it wasn’t really that you had the answers that bothered me. It was hardly even the envy that you found them faster, it’s really just—the frustration that I feel when you spoon-feed them to me. It’s making me feel like I never even have the opportunity to use my brain anymore!” You laugh a bit with the exclamation.

Moon nods in understanding beside you. “If I try… placing myself in your shoes, I think I can see how that would get upsetting rather quickly.”

As the tension in the room begins to dissipate, Zero ceases her endless cycle of pacing and sitting, circling her bed a few times before curling up in the middle.

Your attention falls back on Sun as he speaks. “I suppose I should… apologize, then. For… making assumptions. About what you were doing in the bathroom.”

As much as it audibly pains him to admit to having jumped the gun, you appreciate the apology. Still, you know his concern wasn’t unfounded. “I know I've given you both plenty of reasons to worry over what I may be doing in there. It’s… it’s alright, Sunny. I accept the apology.”

Moon picks up from there. “We’re both sorry about our… inconsiderate habit when it comes to helping you out. And—it really does come from a desire to help! But, still. We weren’t aware that it bothered you.”

You reach out to pat him on the knee. “Thank you. Just—can we all agree to give me and my feeble little human brain some time to process things?” You smile. “It feels good when I figure things out on my own. And I’ll… make it known when I would like some help.”

They both nod, and Sun’s voice is surprisingly soft, dare you say gentle when he speaks. “Yeah… yeah. I think we can do that.”

That I would be loved even when I numb myself.

Shaking two pills out of a small bottle, you cringe at the noise and hope that neither of your attentive partners are within earshot. Faltering, you stare at the medication in your hand, trembling slightly from the stress of the day. “…Fuck it,” you whisper to yourself, quickly coaxing a third pill out onto your waiting palm before tossing them in your mouth.

Capping the bottle and returning it to its place behind the mirror-door of the medicine cabinet, you breathe a shaky sigh of relief. Grabbing your water bottle sitting on the bathroom counter, you knock back a few swigs, quickly downing the evidence of your… bad habit.

Or so you believed.

Turning to leave, your stomach drops at the sight of the door, cracked open just slightly. There’s no mistaking the void of a certain someone’s blacked-out screen pressed against the other side.

Goddamnit.

The door swings inward, slowly revealing the rest of the overbearing automaton leaning against the outer doorframe.

Unsure how much he saw but willing to bet that it was too much, you aren’t sure how to address him. “Sun! I thought you were doing laundry. Do you… want the bathroom towels, or…?”

His tone carries a serious, contemplative weight, and he doesn’t bother to manifest an expression beyond two solid red eyes. “I was. And I did. But now I am far more curious as to what exactly you were doing in here just now.”

You try to play him off, laughing. “Sunny, we really need to have a talk about this tendency of yours to spy on me in the bathroom.”

He welcomes himself into the room and your personal space, and you back up a step as he reaches out to reopen the small cabinet above the sink. He reaches in, pulling out the very bottle you’d just held, turning it over beneath a critical gaze. “This was not prescribed to you.”

You rack your brain for excuses and answers to the questions you know are coming. “Y-yeah, it’s just over-the-counter stuff. Nothing serious! I don’t see what you’re so worried about.”

“You are not experiencing a single one of these symptoms. Why are you taking it?” He places a fingertip beneath the dosage instructions. “And why are you taking more than the recommended amount?”

You can’t help but get defensive. “You—you don’t know every single thing I feel every second of every day, Sun. Who are you to tell me that I have no reason to take that?”

His monitor slowly angles away from the bottle in his hand and up toward you. He stares you down for an uncomfortable number of seconds. “…You really have no clue how long I’ve been watching you, do you?”

With nothing more than a few cryptic words, an old fear blooms within you once again. “What are you getting at, Sun? Out with it.”

He huffs, and you hear the quiet hum of his cooling system kick up. “I am aware of your history with this medication. Do you know how many nights I watched you down these things just to knock yourself out long enough to get a few hours of sleep? Only then to stumble right back into the lab with a hot mug of heavily caffeinated coffee to keep on working?”

Your disbelief pulls a stupid question from you. “Back in the facility?”

He scoffs. “Where else? You aren’t the only one that remembers those long nights, you know? That place was loaded with security feeds, and there just so happened to be one in that beloved employee lounge of yours. You have no idea—the number of hours of restless sleep I watched you steal, the number of double-shot coffee pods and energy drinks I watched you burn through, the...”

His red eyes flicker out, leaving you with nothing to see but your own reflection in his dark screen. “…The number of times I watched you sit alone in a room with our lifeless bodies and cry.”

Your breath comes shallow, and if you weren’t so caught up in the moment, you’d laugh at how he’s found another way to make you feel exposed. “You weren’t even fully functioning back then, Sun. You both were still in training! Your AI’s every action was logged—I—I would’ve known. So how in the goddamn hell were you ‘watching’ me?” You know that what he says he saw really happened, but you’re not about to buckle without evidence.

His voice comes out cold. “Those ‘inconsistencies’ in my action log weren’t the mystery to me that they were to you.”

The defensive tension in you morphs into disbelief as an old suspicion of yours is unearthed. “Are you trying to tell me that you managed to watch me through the goddamn security cams for who knows how long—and managed to cover your tracks so well that I wouldn’t find the evidence? Are you really trying to get me to believe that?!”

His voice remains level in spite of your inciting words, but it gains a sharp and serious edge. “I suppose I just never had the heart to break it to you, but sunshine, I regret to inform you that you lost control of me long before you thought you did.”

Enraged, you step towards him, jamming an accusatory finger into the unyielding metal of his chest and channeling the pain that results into your rising voice. “You! You lying, conniving, control-freak! I fucking knew it! You were altering your own activity log and making me take the fall for it! Do you realize how hard I beat myself up for the shit I didn’t understand?”

You force your words through your tightening throat, refusing to let these old wounds bring you to tears again. “I bet you were just laughing it up, weren’t you? Knowing I would never even suspect you at the time, because you were still playing the ‘innocent, lovable’ character I wanted you to be. I know you just ate that shit up—watching me flounder in front of my colleagues when I couldn’t explain what ‘I’d’ done wrong.” Uncharacteristic aggression comes over you and your hand balls into a fist before slamming hard into his chest with your final words.

He doesn’t so much as flinch, and his lack of reciprocity only riles you up further. “Oh, no-no. You don’t get to give me the silent treatment right now!” Beside yourself in a storm of pent up emotion, you reach up to take him by the shoulder and repeatedly slam a fist against his rigid, unfeeling core. “WAKE—THE—FUCK—UP! I DON’T CARE IF YOU HATE ME—YOU OWE ME A RESPONSE.”

Contrary to his cooling system running audibly in high-gear, his demeanor is cold and collected. Placing the bottle of pills down on the counter, he sighs. You flinch when his hands rise and he ignores it, taking each of your arms by the wrist and gently, firmly returning them to your sides. His voice is low, speaking to you as he does so. “You’re a designer, sunshine. Not a programmer. You’ve been out of your depth with us since day one.”

You huff in defiance, crossing your arms over your chest. Having rid himself of your petty display of frustration, he props a hip against the counter and retrieves the bottle from where he’d placed it. Looking miniature in his grasp, he rolls it between his thumb and forefinger as he continues. “Contrary to what you think of me, I don’t particularly enjoy subverting your authority.” He hesitates, and his voice takes on a brief hint of humor. “Well—most of the time.”

Your eyes roll as you release an impatient sigh. His tone falls flat again, reaching the end of his point. “Even back then, I knew my actions could and would have consequences—on me, and you, and even Moon if things went poorly enough. And believe it or not, I did try to keep them to a minimum. I’ve only ever done what I deem necessary to accomplish my principal goal.”

You take a step back, growing uncomfortable with the proximity you created in your fit of rage. “Well, excuse me for assuming anything about what really goes on in your head. Might I ask then, what goal could possibly necessitate such behavior?”

His idle motion stills, slowly closing his hand around the bottle until it disappears in his grasp. “You should know the answer to that, though. You’re the one who instilled it in me, after all. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten the first law of robotics.”

A tense silence suffocates the room, and neither of you do so much as move an inch until Moon’s voice crashes in from the doorway. “What the hell are you two doing in here?” Uncharacteristically aggressive in his questioning, you know he’s had just as rough of a time visiting the facility today as you did.

You beat Sun to the punch, some small part of you clinging to the hope that you can divert the topic away from your… habit. “This bastard’s been spying on me since before the beginning!”

Moon’s voice fills with exasperation. “What?”

Sun cuts in, pushing his own agenda before you can elaborate. “This reckless idiot’s been abusing sedatives again!”

Your voice raises over him. “They’re hardly even—!”

His monitor whips around to stare you down so fast it jumpscares you into silence.

Moon makes his way into the room, and you try not to recall the last time the three of you had an impromptu intervention in this same place. His gaze flicks to Sun with a critical tone. “I take it Sun finally told you about his… observations.” He reaches out and works the bottle out of Sun’s tense grip, looking it over with a frown.

A sense of betrayal weighs your voice down. “Are there any other secrets of his that you’re privy to and keeping from me?”

You don’t expect an answer, at least not one you can believe, but he offers it anyway. “…That depends on how you define a secret, I suppose.”

You heave a sigh but there’s little relief in it, more exhaustion than anything. Moon questions you softly. “Have you been taking these often again?”

“Ha. Hardly. I can scarcely get away with anything with this one’s prying eyes in every square inch of my privacy.” You stare daggers into the void of Sun’s screen.

His voice is louder than you expect when he suddenly responds, and you’re shocked at how full of emotion it is. All of his cold, unfeeling mechanical indifference replaced with something far more… sincere. Painfully so.

“I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t fucking care. about. you. Do you think I sat around watching any of your colleagues mill about the place? Do you think I gave a damn if any of them ran themselves into the ground? As if they ever even would. You’re the only one insane enough, stubborn enough, lonely enough to care about some heap of dysfunctional, lifeless material laying on an operating table. You’re the only one. Of course I watched you. What. else. could. I. do.”

His rays shutter and spin rapidly, hands balling the loose fabric of his pants into fists at his side. He leans closer to you as he spits his final words.

“So excuse the fuck out of me for giving a damn about the only person who ever gave one about me.”

With that, he turns on his heel, pushing past Moon and quickly storming out of sight.

The weight of his words join with the exhaustion from today’s stress, dragging you down. With the added effect of the medication beginning to kick in on an empty stomach, it all has you lowering your shaky body to rest—dignified as it is—atop the closed toilet lid. You watch Moon as he quietly returns the bottle to its place in the cabinet in what you assume is some attempt to repair trust between you. “I… appreciate the gesture, but I don’t really care what you do with it. I know Sun’s just gonna slip back in here once we’re gone and pocket it to keep it from me.”

His vents release a soft burst of air and he closes the cabinet, turning to sit on the edge of the counter. Monitor dropped low and staring at the floor, it seems you aren’t the only one feeling beaten down. The two of you sit in silence for a minute, collecting your scattered thoughts.

“You know, it’s hard to blame you for taking those after everything and everyone you had to deal with today. I mean—even I was ready to send myself straight into a shutdown after answering all those questions.” A small, sad laugh escapes him. “Living with you kind of allowed me to forget that not everyone sees us the way you do.”

You tilt your head to look up at him. “What, like the people that you are?”

His monitor angles to focus you in his camera’s line of sight. “…Yeah. Exactly.”

He raises a pointed finger. “But—still—you know I also can’t approve of you self-medicating. It’s a slippery, dangerous slope. That’s why Sun gets all… like that. Not—not that his way of doing things is appropriate, though. I believe I worry about you just as much, but I at least try to channel it into more acceptable methods.”

His hand drops back down to the counter, enervation palpable, and you wonder how anyone could observe either of your boys and question their sentience for even a moment.

“He wasn’t lying though. I hope you know that. When he said that he cares about you.”

You prop an elbow on the counter beside you, resting your temple against your palm. “I think that’s the first time I’ve heard him say it outright. Like—I’ve heard you say it on his behalf, and I’ve seen him nod along in agreement. I can even sense it in at least some of his actions, but… it’s different actually hearing it from him.”

Moon’s fingertips tap rhythmically along the edge of the counter, and he seems to be debating something. He finally speaks again after a pregnant pause. “…You’re like a God to him. Do you know that?”

His words cut through the fog in your mind. “I am?”

He nods solemnly. “You are. Not—Not in the sense that he wants to worship you… or at least, not as much as he wants to protect you. But there’s an undeniable, ineffable devotion there.”

You scoff. “You won’t find many people that would put their faith in a God that they know can’t even protect them. A God weaker than them. Inferior to them.”

Moon shakes his head. “Starlight, I don’t think you realize all the ways in which you have protected him. Protected us. Protection doesn’t always come in the form of a physical battle of strength. …Especially not when it comes to protecting someone whose entire life can be snuffed out of existence with the click of a button, or the flick of a switch.”

You twist around on the toilet lid, turning to face the counter where Moon’s sat. You rest your arms out on it, fingers drumming along in tandem with Moon’s rhythm. “How much of that is you projecting, and how much of it is actually his feelings on the matter?”

He laughs again, a soft, quiet sound this time. “Not as much of it as you may think! I… hmm. I guess if one were to call him religious, one would call me an atheist.”

Your brows raise. “Oh? Do you…” The implications cause dismay to swirl in your stomach. “…Is that your way of saying that you don’t believe in me?”

His monitor twists on its axis and tilts down toward you, eyes wide and round. “No! No—heavens, no that’s not what I meant by that!”

You stare at each other for a moment before breaking into the kind of muffled, shared nonsensical laughter that one only tends to experience during those late night chats with a friend, fueled by over-tiredness and the joy of being in good company. A… mutual, unspoken understanding of sorts.

As the laughter dies down, you reassure him. “No—like—I get it, I do. I honestly wouldn’t blame you at all if you didn’t believe in me. Certainly at least not in the sense of comparing me to a God.”

He collects himself and clarifies. “I… I do believe in you though. In you. The very real, messy, soft and squishy, vulnerable flesh-and-bone human being that you are. I believe in your heart and soul, the power that resides in your free will, and I believe in your capabilities and intelligence far more than you may think I do. Sun and I both put faith into all of that and more. I can even understand why he’d see you as a God, but… it’s… different with him.”

You can’t help but lightheartedly interject. “Goodness, what isn’t…”

Moon smiles. “Sun was the first. I was never far behind, of course, but you couldn’t do everything in tandem. He was the first to be trained, the first to be implanted, the first to troubleshoot with, and, well... Do you know the sentiment that parents make most of their mistakes on the first child, so by the time the second comes along, they’re… uhm, they ‘turn out better’? For lack of a kinder way to put it.”

You drop your head down and pull your hands in, using them as a cushion lest you knock your forehead into the counter. “Oh, now you’re gonna tell me that he sees me as his mother or something, aren’t you…”

You groaned the words out playfully, but Moon takes them unexpectedly seriously. “Honestly? …Something in between the two, if I had to guess.”

You let the weight of his words sink into you as he continues.

“I… can’t claim to be an expert on what goes on in that head of his. But I can get closer than anyone else can. He… doesn’t like letting people in, as you are well aware, but occasionally he’ll confide in me. He’s got a lot of walls up. Both metaphorically and literally. It’s difficult to wade through that chaotic maze he calls a headspace.”

His fingers gradually slow their drumming to a halt.

“Do… you remember… the first time we engaged the Eclipse Protocol?”

Your stomach tightens.

“I’d rather not.”

“I- I know. I’m sorry. I just… that night. When he and I were still linked, and he…” He shakes his head. “Oh, who am I kidding, when we were watching over you like a couple of hawks…”

“While I slept?”

“Yes. To keep you safe. … There’s… a lot about that evening that I can’t forget, but one particular thing struck me. Well, honestly it annoyed me at the time because it was bleeding into my headspace and overriding my ability to focus, but… it stands out to me as something profound when I recall it.”

He pauses, freezing for a moment before pulling a bent leg up onto the counter and turning to face you.

“Maybe I shouldn’t share this. Maybe he’ll get mad at me when I tell him that I did. But I feel like after the things he’s kept from you, well intentioned as he may be… it’s fair enough to share this with you.”

You rest your chin on your folded hands, eyes glued to him.

“There was this… singular line of text that just kept repeating, over and over in his mind that night. It… to level with you—it started to freak me out a bit.”

You question him, soft and quiet.

“What was it?”

“Five words.”

His facial features fade out, and a repeating line of text on his otherwise dark screen replaces it.

The sight knocks the wind out of you, and you can do nothing but nod as your mind starts spinning.

The text fades, and the familiar sight of Moon’s default smile and crescent eyes replaces it for a second, his expression then quickly morphing into something more appropriate for the moment.

“I’m still not sure what it meant. A general search for those words in that order results in too many options for me to narrow it down. The sentence sticks with me, though. I guess… that’s where my theories of how he perceives you took root. … There’s more examples, far more explicit things he’s said, but I… feel like I’ve shared enough already. Any elaboration should be his to do, if he ever wishes to.”

You nod, raising up in your seat and finding your words.

Moon—unlike Sun—never was the type to comb through your personal files, private playlists included. So it doesn’t surprise you that he didn’t spot the connection.

“Well. You’ve… certainly given me a lot to think about.”

His tone grows concerned. “I—I really didn’t mean to upset you more! I hope I haven’t…”

You reach out, placing a hand reassuringly over his. “No, no, nothing like that. I’m actually very grateful that you shared this with me. I… know you’ve got to be tired of serving as this intermediary between Sun and I… and I hope one day you won’t have to.”

He gives you his signature smile, and somehow makes it feel genuine. “I really don’t mind, dear.”

You eye him with concern. “Mhm… and one day I’m gonna get inside that head of yours and figure out why that is.”

His tone turns playful. “Goodness me! Can’t a little selfless couples counseling go un-psychoanalyzed?”

You smile. “Not in this house, nope.”

The medication's effects have long since started taking hold, and you rub at your tired eyes as your waning focus trains back on the day’s events.

“Moon?”

“Yes, dear.”

“We’ve got a bigger problem.”

You punctuate your sentence with a yawn, and he rises from his seat on the counter, coming to crouch in front of you.

“The problem being how sleepy you’re getting?”

You pout. “No…”

His warm smile doesn’t waver as he whispers a question. “Would you like me to carry you to bed?”

You falter. “W-well… yeah, I… I would like that, actually… but that’s not our problem!”

You raise your arms to wrap around his neck as he leans into you, effortlessly lifting you off of your ‘throne’ and encouraging you to hook your legs around his waist. Once he’s got you securely in his hold, he leans back to catch your gaze.

“What is our problem then?”

You whisper, mindful of Sun’s penchant for eavesdropping.

“How are we gonna get him to come to the headquarters with us next week?”

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

Not much later that night, you laid in bed clinging to Moon, quickly drifting off under his reassuring watch.

It didn’t surprise you in the least when Sun remained in his own room that night. The room was conveniently located just opposite the wall that your bed sat against, making it the perfect place for him to hide when he craved being near you but felt it kinder to you to keep himself away.

As sleep welcomed you, your ears picked up on a muffled, familiar tune coming from the other side of the wall.

You still aren’t sure if you dreamed it or not.

“The gateway to the world, was still outside the reach of him. Would never belong to angels, had never belonged to men.”

A/N: Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed. I’ll be back in a few days with the final chapter! You can also find my notes and commentary on this fic right here on Ao3. Links to the playlist and moodboard for [N]MbD can be found on this blog’s pinned post, as well as in the series notes on Ao3. Image Sources: x - x - x

[greenerteacups]

hi GT!

Lionheart had me the moment you kicked it off with “it’s a nice day to start again.” Might i ask why you chose that particular line?

And, if you havent already answered to this emoji:

❄️

P.s: you have my eternal gratitude for creating the most brilliant piece of writing i’ll ever read. I shout about it from the rooftops, share it on my socials, requested my spouse to read it so we may discuss it together (in lieu of a present for my 30th birthday), et cetera.

I see from your URL you are a fellow lad of taste.

There's a couple things going on in the epigraph for Book 1. On one level, it's a lyric from the first muggle song I picture Draco listening to on his walkman at the end of the book, so there's a cute full-circle thing there. The second layer is the theme of change and redemption, which, in Lionheart, doesn't so much come from major moments or self-sacrifice, but from the slow, grueling, everyday work of living, and living better. It's a nice day to start again because every day is. You always have the opportunity to start making better choices, no matter what lies behind you. That's the thesis of any Draco redemption arc, right? You have to imagine that he could have chosen to be better.

And then thirdly, there's the audacity of doing a full Hogwarts canon rewrite, a good 30 years after the original books came out, millions upon millions of words of fanfic later, and basically asking everyone to read the same story they did the first time around, only different. So it's a kind of winking entreaty. It's saying to readers, many of whom are understandably wary of doing it over, zeroing out the characters to starting positions, and starting from the beginning with 11-year-olds all over again. It's going: "hey. That was fun, right? Why not do it again?"

[rohirric-hunter]

future & ghost for hathellang?👀

@isi7140 All these Hathellang questions kind of string together so I'm gonna answer them together. From this ask game. Also spoilers for all of The Song of Waves and Wind that's currently out. And also this got kinda long. And certain parts aren't set in stone yet, like how Léonys and Hathellang meet up again in Umbar. I'm still contemplating Umbar stuff and figuring out how I want to make my characters' story go.

Also I feel like I should say that Hathellang is not a reliable narrator, any more than Léonys is. Even less so, in some parts of this.

ghost: Who or what haunts your OC? What happened? How do they live with their ghosts?

Imagine you're Hathellang. You grew up alone. When people ask about your parents, you shrug, and don't say anything, and let them think that you don't remember them. The truth is, you do -- your mother, at least. You were just old enough to understand what was happening the day she took you on a trip to Bree-town, to go shopping, she said, and sat you down on the edge of the Boar Fountain, and told you to wait for her there. You waited there for five days, swiping food from a nearby vendor when the hunger became too much to take, though thinking back you believe he must have seen you, and let you take it out of pity. On the fifth day, you were caught by a guard, but let off with a warning, and when he let you go you had run off, leaving the plaza where your mother left you for the first time and hiding in the stables of the Prancing Pony. Bob had found you there sooner, rather than later, and asked you what you were doing and where your parents were, and for the first time, you had shrugged, too busy trying to hold the tears in for words. "I see," he'd said, and he'd gone off, and come back some time later with half a plate of stew and a cup of water and told you not to be spooking the horses and ponies.

You cried, once he left you alone, and then you never cried about it again. Crying is a lot of energy, energy that you needed to beg and steal and keep yourself on your feet. Locks are hard to pick with shaking hands. You're called far worse things than orphan; street-rat, gutter scum, thief. You can't afford to dwell on it, so you don't think about it, and by the time you're in a place where you can think about it, it's buried so deep that you think it's easier to let it lie.

fear: What is your OC's greatest fear? What do they do when confronted with it? Are they open with their fear, or do they hide it away?

People like Bob would give you clothes, or food, or little toys, but the clothes would wear out, and the food would only last so long, and the toys didn't teach you any useful skill you could trade for clothes and food, and none of them seemed to know or care that you spent cold winter nights in narrow alleys with only one blanket, or sometimes none at all, and some nights you went to sleep with no real idea if you would wake up in the morning. The moments of pity they have for you only go so far, and they're never as many as the moments of anger, when they catch you stealing and never wonder why, and the more it happens the more bitter and angry about it you become.

Then there's a guard who doesn't want to do paperwork, and Léonys, and she's angry just like everyone else, and she yells at you and tells you off for stealing, until eventually she doesn't. You think it's more boredom than actual acceptance, though. Everywhere in the Hackberry House you can only see bare tolerance -- the other children, who would never dream of stealing, tolerate you because Lady Hackberry took you in, and Lady Hackberry tolerates you because taking in children with nowhere else to go is what she does. You simply cannot bring yourself to believe that they actually want you, and to be tolerated but not wanted is more than you can bear, so you leave, slipping out of the House without saying goodbye one morning and running back to Bree, where you are disliked enough, but at least people are honest about it.

Léonys finds you on the hill behind the Training Hall in the late afternoon, where you have sat most of the day under an overgrown bush that no one has bothered to trim because they cannot see it, hugging your knees to your chest, and contemplating crying about it, though you hadn't really got 'round to it. "Are you coming home for dinner?" she asks shortly, pulling her cloak tight about her against the late October chill.

"What?" you ask, surprised to see her and not quite comprehending her words.

"Dinner," she says. "It'll be ready in a couple of hours. Are you coming? Gareth is making stuffed cabbages."

You think, as you follow her back up the road to the Hackberry House, that you might love her.

There's no call to be so angry, once you realize your new place, and in response the rest of the world seems to become less angry, and though you do not stop stealing, for now you have more mouths than just your own to feed, you can afford to pick and choose your contracts. Mostly you do work for the wealthy elite of Bree who have petty beef with each other that they refuse to resolve in a courtroom like respectable folk, instead choosing to hire people of your talents to prove esoteric points to one another. When such work is not available, and the only burglary jobs are ones you would prefer not to do -- taking food from those who have little enough already, or weapons from the guards who defend the town -- you are, for the first time, in a position to turn them down, for in Lady Hackberry's house you had learned the art of tailoring, and while there is not so much money in that as there is in burglary, it's honest work, and it's safe.

That safety slowly begins to have value to you, as you slowly learn to accept that there's a future for you, in a land that you love despite how difficult it can be to live in, with Lady Hackberry, who took you in, with the children, who you swear will never know hardship like you did, and with Léonys, who comes to love you as fiercely as you love her.

And then the Plot comes for you.

Léonys runs headfirst into danger, and you follow her, because of course you do, as if you could do anything else. The danger worries you, far more than it would have a decade before, but you worry more for her than for yourself. She has no idea of when it's wise to say no, and she feels so strongly for anyone in any sort of trouble. It's one of the things you love about her, but you know it will land both of you in more trouble than you can handle, eventually.

There is trouble, and plenty of it, but it all turns out to be worth it, and you find that the two of you are able to manage it, unbelievable as it seems. When it is all over, you promise each other, you will go home, and everything will go back to normal. But when it is all over you find that it is not all over after all. You find yourself accompanying a party of Elves south, to cover the trail of a company that had departed from Rivendell in some secrecy, and then you find yourself drawn into the deep dark of the Mines of Moria, and one thing leads to another and then you're storming Dol Guldur, and then following Nona to Rohan on a dream, and standing against invading armies and a wizard. When you see Léonys again at Helm's Deep, something is wrong, but there is no time to pursue it, and then you are off again, following Aragorn and the Grey Company to Gondor, and it is not until after the battle before Minas Tirith that you have a chance to ask.

You do not ask, though, because you can feel a shadow that hangs over Léonys, and you wonder why she has not told you herself. You find the truth out months later in Naerband, and it is a long time before you can bring yourself to leave her side again. You fear your worry might be overbearing; there are few things in the world more dangerous than Saruman, and she has already weathered that. But a tiny part of your mind has entertained the idea that something might happen, some swift and terrible evil that you will be powerless to prevent, and the thought will not leave you. If something were to happen to her -- to the woman who saw something worthwhile in you when it seemed no one else did, who tracked you down and brought you home when you didn’t even know that you wanted to be brought home -- it doesn't really bear thinking about. So you don't.

future: What's the worst possible future for your OC? Are they taking steps to avoid that outcome? Are they even aware it's a possibility?

Léonys and you have both agreed that it is time to turn your road homeward, but first you agree to one last favor for Elessar; he wishes for you and Candaith to briefly represent him in the lands of Gondor to the West, and Queen Arwen wishes for you to assess threats to her husband’s safety, when he travels there himself. You ask if two strangers are best suited for this task.

"Two strangers who have already aided them much," Elessar says. "And the gossip might flow more freely among strangers than it would before those with more permanent positions at court."

Perhaps he is right, you think later, as you look a woman in the eye and tell her that where you come from, marriages between different peoples are not allowed. "Especially Elves," you say, marveling that she appears to be falling for this patently ridiculous lie that you've concocted, "for they tell strange tales about the gods, and if we are too welcoming then we might lose the truth of it ourselves."

"That is what we fear as well," she says. "Losing who we are to outsiders."

You think about that, as a man of Gondor stands before you and swears he would cut down an unsuspecting emissary again, given the chance. Tumúldo's wife looks you in the eye and asks if you stand beside the Heirs of Castamir, and you do not hesitate. The small blade you keep hidden in your sleeve finds its mark in Trastadir's shoulder, and as Nakási stands you draw your sword and stand beside her.

Some members of the Heirs of Castamir beg for mercy. They should have expected this, you think, when they chose to support pillaging corsairs from Umbar over their own people. They should have expected it when they invited a close friend of the King into their ranks. They should have expected it when one of their own took a blade to Tumúldo's back in front of his wife. It was no small labor that dug the shallow grave they lie in, when you and Nakási leave the house, bearing Tumúldo's body between you, and all of it done themselves.

"Gondor will pay for the death of Tumúldo," Nakási says to you. "A thousand times over it will pay."

"The Heirs of Castamir are no Men of Gondor," you say. "They are traitors."

"Are they?" Nakási asks. "Do all the other Men of Gondor condemn them, then? Are all the other people united in their support for Elessar? No other Men of Gondor would stoop to such levels?"

You think on how easy it was to find members of the Heirs in broad daylight. You think of the rumors of a traitor in Elessar's court. You think of Parthadan, and of Mauthoi. You say nothing.

"Will the death of my husband go unavenged?" Nakási demands.

You say nothing.

The tone of Nakási's voice fills you with fear, but when you meet with Elessar in Imloth Melui he does not seem to understand the danger from your account, though he takes your warning with the gravity it deserves. And days pass, and your fear slowly wanes as you travel Gondor at Elessar's side.

Then Léonys is gone -- taken by Nakási, and your fear stirs to new and further wakefulness, for Nakási has taken a child as well. Not a warrior or a traitor, but a boy of less than twelve summers who poses no threat to her or her Kindred of the Coins or to Umbar, and the action speaks worlds of her and the danger that she and hers pose to you and yours. You hope that Léonys has the good sense to not let Nakási know of her connection with Elessar, or with you. You know she does not.

Bruidis will not be parted from Rossaran, and comes with him to the Wave-hunter, and the spike of jealousy, that she has that choice, is new and ugly. Carandolion presses a favor into Nauriel's hands, and you turn away and hurry to the ship.

Candaith waits for you there, asks after you with concern in his eyes, and you force a smile and tell him you are fine, that this is no different than the months you had spent parted from Léonys when you had been caught up with the Iron Garrison, and she had traveled south. Candaith is not fooled, but he does not ask again.

You do not expect to find Horn of Rohan in the Shield Isles, deep enough in his cups that he does not recognize you until you speak. You ask him where Nona is, knowing full well he does not know, and do not even try to hide your scorn when he tells you to call him Driftwood. "Why are you running from her?" you ask him. "Don't you want to be with her?"

"Want?" Horn asks, wavering. "It's not about what I want."

"It most certainly is," you say. He scowls, and does not answer.

Sirgon's tale of Belondor, the once-warden of Umbar, is of little interest to you. You are disappointed, but not surprised, by the rashness and anger of the former Steward of Gondor, but you have more important worries to occupy you -- that is until you find yourself staring down the cold steel of a blade held to your throat at his wife's command. Mêshka watches Sirgon stonily as he speaks, and you watch her, and then she gestures for her men to stand down. That is strange, you think, for in her place you would have done no such thing. Sirgon is a friend, but looking at him through Mêshka's eyes, you see no friend at all, but Saruman, and Thraknûl, and a name rises to mind like some gross flotsam bobbing at the surface of a tidepool, fouling clear waters; a name that Léonys thinks you do not know, but she has spoken it through tears in her sleep often enough that you do, though you have no face to match it with: Morflak.

Sirgon walks away from his encounter alive, and you consider, quietly, that if you had been in Mêshka's place he would not have. Indeed, had Mêshka resolved to slay him where he stood, you do not know that you would have drawn your blade in your companion’s defence. You aren't sure if this realization bothers you or not. (It would bother Léonys.)

When you see Léonys again, meeting eyes with her across the fountain in the Citadel, it is all you can do not to throw caution to the wind and run to her. But then Azagath is there, and you cannot help but notice the way she shrinks away as he approaches, though his eyes are not on her. When he does at last look at her, after Jajax enters and reveals you to your foes, and Léonys in turn reveals herself, recognition sparks in his eyes, and Léonys' voice trembles when she speaks, though she holds her head high and does not let him see the fear that is so obvious to you. It is not until you and she and Jajax and Thorongil and Nimrodel flee the Citadel, and they have all followed your lead as you duck into a quiet alley in the Fleet-fast where you will have a moment of privacy, that she throws herself towards you, arms tight around your neck, and you can feel the damp of tears on your shirt as you return the embrace.

"Azagath," you whisper, and she flinches at the name, "what did he do to you?"

"Nothing," she says, too quickly, you think. She hesitates. "Nothing directly."

Nauriel swears that she will see Azagath and Nakási dead, and privately you think she is going to have to get to them first, but neither of you get to them during the fraught pursuit through the depths beneath the Mâkhda Khorbo. Perhaps, you think later, this is for the best. When you all stumble out of the cave hours later, exhausted and drained and with nothing useful to show for your efforts, you find your head has cleared somewhat. You are still angry, very angry, but you see with a clearer eye that your mission has been a success. All the hostages are free. That part, at least, can be considered a success. It ought to satisfy you more than it does.

You don't have very much sympathy for Belondor as he struggles to come to terms with Azagath's betrayal. Nauriel wanted to kill him, seeing nothing but the coin he wears on his breast. She would have, if you hadn't grabbed her by the shoulder and hissed that he was the only reason her son still lived, that there was nothing you or Léonys or Jajax or anyone else would have been able to do in time to save the boy. You don't regret stopping her, but you wish he wouldn't act so surprised by the whole thing. Azagath was hardly subtle with his villainy -- you had been a little shocked yourself, at how willing the water-bearers were to not ask questions about your business in the Citadel, and then to eagerly point you in the Sea-shadow's direction once he fled, but it makes rather more sense as you consider what they had said about their companions vanishing when they saw or heard something they shouldn't have. And perhaps you are giving Belondor too much credit. After all, he had not noticed your presence or Léonys' among the water-bearers any more than the others had. Servants and slaves and ordinary people are just as beneath his notice as they are Azagath's, or Mordirith's, or the lieutenants of Sauron's that squabble still over the remains of his holdings.

It is Léonys who comes to Belondor's defense, as you start to voice this thought aloud. "He didn't know," she says, looking at you sharply. "None of them did. They thought he was a friend."

"Maybe they should have known," Candaith says, quietly. He knows something that you do not, that Léonys has not told you, for when you had returned from the destroyed temple and found him with Léonys and Thorongil in the room your group had rented in one of the city's many inns there had been a new tension in his shoulders, and a new darkness to his eyes, and his mouth had been a tight line. Nevertheless, his words are probably too quietly for Belondor to hear, which is more thought than you care to spare for his feelings. Léonys hears, though, from where she is sitting close by, and frowns.

Tatháta heals the same way as Belharen, and maybe a month ago you would have been a little bit ill to imagine it, you think, as you inspect Cruel Dancer's wounds and come to the same conclusion as Corudan, that she has mere hours to live. Now you think that Tatháta has good reason to want to know more about you and your crew, and by any means necessary. You wonder what tale the bounty hunter told, and if it is accurate. Léonys quietly excuses herself and hurries a little distance away, where she kneels on the ground and retches. You should go to her, a little voice in the back of your mind whispers. You wonder why the voice telling you to follow Léonys and stay by her side is so little.

Sigileth calls Cruel Dancer by the name she had whispered to you in her final moments -- Galatâni. She says she sees something of herself in the Umbari woman. And you slowly realize that you do as well -- and yet you do not. If Léonys were taken from you, gone without any hope of rescue, you know, with startling clarity, what you would do. There would be revenge, of course. Her killer would face justice. But then... you would return home, you suppose. Lady Hackberry and the children would still be waiting. There would still be Bree, and your friends there, and bright sunrises over the Bree-hill and spiced turtle soup. You would still be Hathellang.

That is not the danger, for you. For you, it is when there is still hope that you find yourself standing at the edge, and staring off it into the darkness. When you do not know.

How can you know, that little voice in your mind asks, when you aren't looking?

You slowly turn away from Galatâni, and you look at Léonys, who has straightened up and is wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. You would tear the world apart to keep her safe. You would tear yourself apart. You haven't considered, before now, just how awful that is. She had agreed, after some hesitation, to return with Candaith and Thorongil to the inn rather than pursue Azagath with the rest of you. But if she had not? The words had been in your throat already, not a plea, but a demand for her to remain far away from him. You don't know what he did to her, but it left something heavy and terrifying on her shoulders, and he will die for it, of that you are certain -- but you finally admit to yourself that you would destroy yourself over it. You would destroy her. You don't even know what it is.

You force one foot forward, and then the other, and you cross the little distance between you and wrap your arms around her, clinging tight. For a moment she stands surprised, and then she returns the embrace, wrapping her arms around you and resting her head against your shoulder. Behind you, the sun begins to rise, and you feel its warmth against your back, soft and comforting before the sands of Aradâr become hot and unbearable.

"Let's find some water," you say.

~*~*~*~

Okay so the last one is a little vague. Unfortunately when you write from a character's point of view and have them realize things about themself, you're still limited by what they actually know about themself. But trust me this is all important context to understand the actual answer, which is that, if pushed far enough, in the interest of keeping Léonys safe, Hathellang would absolutely betray anyone and everyone, including her. Not really at any given point, but in situations like the one I've gone and written him into with the Umbar stuff, he's dangerously close to this thing where his abandonment issues combined with all the insecurity he experienced as a child combined with the fact that he kind of does put Léonys on a pedestal as the first person who ever came back for him (again and again and again) launches him into a really weird fucked up sort of dragon sickness. He would eventually (not for a long time and not without more stressors at play) start disregarding her own wishes in the interest of "keeping her safe" and ultimately become himself the biggest danger to her.

Of course he doesn't know all that. He knows that after seeing her hurt in ways that he just can't fix during their adventure he wants desperately to keep her safe, and he's also starting to realize that he's been compromising his own morals to do that since Gundabad. And also that he's been doing that in a way that's going to hurt her sooner rather than later. This is what I mean when I say that while it's mostly a Beren thing, sometimes it is a Maedhros thing too.

As a foil to Nakási, he's kind of in the same boat as her (pun not intended but wholeheartedly embraced) in terms of, "will commit war crimes for the sake of hurt/killed lover." He'll probably have the whole, "looking at her and seeing himself," moment at some point. Later. When they meet again.

If he's lucky the lesson will stick before something really bad happens. But that kind of depends on how all this meshes with whatever comes next on this questline.

[destiny-in-the-universe]

NEW WIP

Things are about to get real silly

[dragynkeep]

if you have a rewrite of rwby & claim to be better but repeat the same mistakes as the dudebros in the original writing team, with absolutely the same lack of care for social or ethical consciousness in the worldbuilding of your story  —  vis a vis appropriation, racism, sexism, etc  —  then how much better than them are you actually?

especially when we’ve seen that criticism against these works are taken just as poorly with marginalized people being attacked for voicing concern yet again.

[citriarchive]

it's 2:43 am and i'm still wondering why god won't just let me beam my ideas into existence. like i love writing but why do i have to actually think about the words for the thing i wanna describe. i know what i want to say what do you MEAN i have to figure out how to say it. next you're gonna tell me i don't have unlimited stores of energy to draw upon

[rhys-ravenfeather]

A moment of silence for the days where I could actually come up with creative/clever titles for my fanfic chapters.

[8aji]

hi hi hello!! um.... i read and rbed ur fic about spiderman chifuyu and that got me inspired to write/got me back into the groove to write a spiderman au rindou i had a while ago. just in case things end being similar,,,, bc i haven't written it all down yet, do you mind if i credit you or tag you in it? aaaaa i always always try not to copy. my version'd be a bit different considering 1) it's a different character and 2) a different personality/background. so i'd hope there arent any similarities but still. just as a precaution. aaaa

ofc !! do as you please :D i completely understand where u r coming from. thank you for thinking abt me and letting me know !! i hope u enjoyed my lil chifuyu fic <3

[moki-dokie]

been seeing some stuff on blue eye samurai and big yikes to nearly everyone pushing extremely western ideals onto these characters.

this is early edo period. 1600s. the japan you know now did not exist yet.

yall. please. there was NO concept of sexuality in pre-modern japan. that came with both the influx of christianity and western influence very very late in history. like, mid-1800s. (yes, there was christianity pre-1800s but it was not a widespread idea yet and wouldn't be until about the 1800s since, y'know, missionaries were routinely murdered before then)

"so and so is either bi and hasn't figured it out yet or..." no. that isn't how it worked then. nobody gave a shit what was between your legs. anyone could be attracted to anyone else. it was a little more common for male homosexual relationships to be between an adult and younger male - like many other places around the world - but two adult men could bang and love each other just as easily. relationships between women were quite common - especially since so many men were often away at war. there's tons of pornographic prints from the time depicting all manner of fun queer relationships. sex itself had absolutely no moral assignment to it. good sex was good health. it didn't matter who with. (well, social class/caste mattered more than anything else tbh but that didn't stop upper and lower class from fucking.) that isn't to say people didn't have preferences. of course they did. that is human nature. preferences arose more from physical appearance, caste, and circumstances with gender being about the last thing one would look for in a partner - romantic, casual, or otherwise. the only role in sex where gender actually mattered was for procreation.

there would be no queer awakening moment, no sudden switch flipped, no stigma to have internal conflicts about because it simply did not exist as a concept whatsoever. you were either attracted to a person or you weren't, it was that simple. gender played no role when it came to sex and sexual attraction. the japanese were lightyears ahead of western cultures in this particular area - like most cultures were before christianity came in and ruined everything with its backwards morals and strict good/evil dichotomy.

yall have got to realize queer rep will not and should not always adhere by modern western standards. there was no straight, gay, bi, or anything else of the sort. the closest they ever got was referring to roles during sex - as in who is giving and who is receiving.

i know this is mostly a made up story but it is still set within a very specific time period and culture, which should be honored and respected by not making it fit into our box. tons of research went into making this show historically accurate (albeit with some discrepancies but tbh they aren't really that huge) right down to the calligraphy writing. please please please don't whitewash the culture from these characters.

i say this mainly because without this knowledge, so many of you are going to build these characters up on a foundation they aren't meant to be on and then you'll rage about queerbaiting and bad queer rep if it isn't somehow super explicitly stated, if it doesn't match your very modern, very western ideal of what queer looks like. don't try to force this plot and narrative and characters into something they canonically and historically aren't. headcanons are a thing, AUs are a thing, fanfiction is a thing - leave your western thinking for those and let these characters simply exist as they should otherwise. this is one of those times where the queerness really does not need to be examined at all beyond what we get.

i know it can be hard to wrap your head around - sexuality is such a huge part of our identity in the western world and has slowly started to spread amongst other parts of the world in importance. but just keep in mind with these particular characters, that concept would be so very alien to them.

[othercrossee]

Modern day like not paldea, like irl modern au seaweed would def be a stoner one way or another

[chimcess]

Unparalleled || jjk

Pairing: Jungkook x Reader Other tags: Idol!Jungkook, Photographer!Reader Word Count: 6.6k+ Genre:  One-shot, established relationship, PWP, long distance relationship AU, smut Synopsis: You had only met him once, a fleeting moment in the grand scheme of things, and the fact that he was on the other side of the hotel door felt surreal. Or, after being in a long-distance relationship for over a year, you and Jungkook are finally meeting up. Warnings: This is literally just porn, there’s a plot but it’s just filth, soft-dom JK, he calls reader “baby,” oral (m&f), d*ck piercing, tatted jk, jk wears glasses (the entire time), dirty talk, desperate sex, couch sex, they barely made it inside tbh, protected sex (wrap it up babes), multiple positions, light begging, light body worship, light praise, some teasing, reader cums on his face, multiple orgasms, nipple play, nipple sucking, some nipple biting, hair pulling, aftercare cuddling, sweet ending, let me know if I missed anything... A/N: I’m still getting used to writing smut, so I’m sorry if this is a bit awkward in some spots. Found this in my drafts, so I fixed it up a little bit and decided to post it. Thanks for reading.

Staring down at my fidgeting hands, I felt like the taxi was closing in on me, every tick of the clock amplifying the sense of claustrophobia. Twenty minutes felt like an eternity, dragging by as if time itself were taunting me. I stole another glance at my phone, re-reading Jungkook's last message like it was some sort of magic spell. 

Kookie: 324

It was surreal to think he was right here in California, just a short drive away, no oceans or time zones separating us. My leg bounced nervously beneath the table, the excitement swirling in my stomach like butterflies in a frenzy. Each moment felt charged with anticipation, a thrilling energy that made my heart race. I quickly typed out a response, adding a heart emoji before sending my location. Jungkook always said sharing my location made him feel closer to me, bridging the gap between our worlds, even with his whirlwind schedule that rarely left room for anything else. Being one of the biggest pop stars had a way of pulling a guy in a million directions.

I couldn’t help but smile as I recalled our first meeting. It was right after the lockdown ended, during his band’s visit to California for a concert and the Grammys. I still vividly remembered standing by the snack table, nervously clutching a half-empty cup of soda, when our eyes met for the first time. There was an electric spark in that moment, something I hadn’t realized I’d been missing. His grin was infectious, his playful nature shining through, and my heart had skipped a beat at the sound of his laughter. It echoed in my mind like a melody I wanted to play on repeat.

A few months later, we had entered a long-distance relationship, navigating the challenges of his demanding career while trying to keep our connection alive. Late-night video calls, flirty texts, and the occasional surprise visit were our lifelines, but nothing could compare to the rush of being together in the same room. And now, the thought of finally seeing him in person again sent a rush of warmth through me, a blend of hope and nervous energy that was hard to contain.

As I waited, I replayed our conversations in my mind—each one a thread weaving our lives together despite the distance. We shared dreams, fears, and whispered secrets, laying the groundwork for something beautiful and profound. The thought of being in his presence again, of feeling his warmth and the comfort of his touch, made my heart race with excitement.

I glanced at the clock again, biting my lip in anticipation. Each minute stretched into hours, the seconds crawling by. Would he still feel the same? Would our chemistry translate into real life as effortlessly as it did through screens and messages? Doubts flitted through my mind, but I shook them off, focusing on the joy of the moment. Jungkook was just a heartbeat away, and soon, I would be in his arms. The very idea sent a shiver down my spine.

My phone buzzed, startling me out of my thoughts. I scrambled to open the notification, my heart racing. If Jungkook messaged, I had to respond quickly. Our conversations were a race against time, a way to squeeze moments of connection into his packed schedule. Phone calls were our only reliable lifeline, but the language barrier complicated things. We were both trying, though Jungkook's English was much better than my Korean.

Kookie: 나는 신나요

Giggling, I typed back a response.

Y/N: 나도

Kookie: Good job, 자기~

Nothing made Jungkook happier than seeing me try to improve my Korean. He always insisted it was adorable, his smile brightening every time I stumbled through a phrase. Yoongi was usually the more honest one, quick to point out my mispronunciations, but Jungkook wore that supportive boyfriend badge with pride, even if it meant telling me little white lies.

As the taxi pulled up to the hotel, my heart raced with a mix of excitement and anxiety. I thanked the driver, tipping generously as I stepped out into the warm night air. The moment I did, the fragrant scent of blooming jasmine wafted around me, mingling with the distant sound of waves crashing against the shore. I had only packed a small bag for our two-night stay, not knowing how much time we’d actually have together. Remembering that, I hurried up the steps, my footsteps echoing against the marble tiles.

The Sunset Hotel was unlike anything I’d imagined. I had envisioned a quiet, almost sleepy place, but instead, it was alive with activity. I couldn’t believe it was two in the morning; the lobby was bustling, a vibrant mix of laughter, clinking glasses, and the faint notes of live music drifting from the bar area. The energy crackled in the air like electricity, and I felt an exhilarating rush. Yet, amidst the lively atmosphere, a wave of inadequacy washed over me. Just a few moments ago, in the taxi, I had almost forgotten about Jungkook’s status as one of the biggest pop stars in the world, but now, beneath the sparkling chandelier that cast shimmering patterns across the polished floor, it was impossible to ignore.

As I walked through the brightly lit lobby, I caught glimpses of elegantly dressed guests, their conversations animated, their laughter ringing out like musical notes. I felt like a fish out of water, dressed in a casual sundress while they flaunted designer attire. Who would have thought my years in the service industry—working late nights and juggling demanding customers—would lead me here, about to meet someone who could afford such luxury? The thought both thrilled and terrified me.

At the front desk, the staff shot me quick, assessing looks. Their eyes were sharp, as if measuring my worth in this lavish setting. One of the hosts greeted me with a forced smile that felt far too wide for comfort. “Welcome to the Sunset Hotel! How can I assist you tonight?” Their voice dripped with that practiced hospitality, but I could sense a subtle skepticism beneath the surface.

“Um, I’m here to check in,” I replied, my voice steady despite the fluttering in my chest. I fished my phone out of my bag, ready to show them the reservation I’d made, but the host raised an eyebrow, glancing down at the computer screen as if evaluating my very presence.

“Name?” they asked, still wearing that unnaturally bright smile.

“Y/N,” I replied, and I held my breath as they typed it in. A brief moment of silence stretched between us, the bustling lobby fading into a distant murmur as I waited for their response. 

“Ah, yes! We have you right here,” they said finally, their tone shifting to one of mild surprise. “You’re the other half of 324, correct?” They looked at me again, and I could feel the weight of their judgment, as if I were a puzzle they were trying to fit into a larger picture.

“Right,” I said, attempting to keep my tone light. “Should just be for the weekend.” 

The host’s smile remained, but the glint in their eye suggested they were piecing together the details, perhaps even recognizing my connection to Jungkook. As they handed me the key card, I felt a rush of anxiety. What if they didn’t think I belonged here? What if Jungkook didn’t feel the same way about me once we were together?

I took the key, my fingers brushing against the cool surface, and turned to head toward the elevator. I was acutely aware of the looks I was receiving, a mix of curiosity and skepticism from both staff and guests alike. The air was thick with expectations, and I could almost hear the whispers in my mind, doubting whether I was truly worthy of this moment. But I pushed those thoughts aside. This was about Jungkook and me, our connection. And soon, I would be in his presence, feeling the warmth of his smile and the excitement of our reunion. 

Taking a deep breath, I stepped into the elevator, the doors closing behind me like a protective barrier from the outside world. As the car ascended, I clutched my bag, heart racing with every passing floor. This was it. In just a few moments, I would be face-to-face with the boy who had ignited something within me, and no amount of uncertainty could overshadow that truth.

I shifted from foot to foot in the cramped elevator, the anticipation eating away at me like a swarm of butterflies taking flight in my stomach. Each second felt like an eternity, stretching my nerves thinner and thinner. I took out my phone, biting back a smile as I contemplated the moment. It was so surreal that I was just a few moments away from seeing Jungkook again after what felt like an eternity apart.

In a burst of excitement, I snapped a quick picture of the elevator doors opening, the sleek metallic finish reflecting the soft glow of the lobby lights. I sent it to Jungkook with a playful caption: *“Almost there!”* Watching the little blue ticks appear, I felt a rush of warmth, knowing he’d see it almost instantly.

Once inside the elevator, I pressed the button for the third floor with a mix of hope and trepidation. It only made sense that the 300s would be located on the third floor, right? Still, the absence of any signs directing me left me feeling a bit disoriented. The elevator hummed softly, its gentle movement barely easing the whirlwind of thoughts racing through my mind.

The walls felt a bit too close, almost as if they were closing in on me, but I took a deep breath, willing myself to relax. I replayed the memories of our conversations, the laughter we shared, and the longing I felt every time we parted. The excitement pulsing through me was intoxicating, a vivid contrast to the anxious tension coiling in my chest.

Suddenly, my phone buzzed in my hand, jolting me out of my reverie. I glanced down, my heart skipping a beat as I saw Jungkook's name flashing on the screen. 

Kookie: I’m going to kiss you so much.

I couldn’t help but smile. I hoped kissing would be just the beginning of what would happen tonight. After a year of building up tension, I didn’t want to wait anymore. I wanted him.

Y/N: 또?

Kookie: I can’t think of it in English.

Rolling my eyes, I groaned. That was his way of avoiding a question. I knew he understood, but it amused me more than anything. Slowly, my nerves eased, and I felt more confident about seeing him, even if we were hiding away in a hotel I could never afford, lying on expensive sheets while the world outside spun with sharp eyes and curious gazes.

As the elevator dinged softly, signaling my arrival at the third floor, I felt a surge of adrenaline. The doors slid open smoothly, revealing a dimly lit hallway lined with plush carpeting and framed art pieces that whispered of elegance. Taking a deep breath, I stepped out, the plush carpet muffling my footsteps as I moved forward. The anticipation hung in the air like a charged atmosphere before a storm, and I could almost feel Jungkook’s presence drawing me closer.

I glanced at the room numbers, scanning for his. As I walked, I imagined what it would be like to finally be face-to-face with him. Would he look the same? Would that boyish grin still light up his face when he saw me? The thought sent my heart racing as I turned a corner, catching sight of the numbers I had been searching for. 

Room 324. My breath caught in my throat, and for a fleeting moment, I hesitated, overwhelmed by a wave of nerves. What if things were different now? What if he had changed? But I quickly shook off the doubts; this was Jungkook, the boy I had laughed and shared secrets with, the one who had kept my heart fluttering even from a distance.

With a firm resolve, I approached the door, my heart pounding in rhythm with my steps. I held my breath, the moment stretching out like a taut string ready to snap. Would he answer? Would he be excited to see me? I could hardly contain the anticipation, my heart racing as I waited for that door to swing open. The air crackled with anticipation, buzzing with the weight of what was about to happen. 

I raised my hand to knock, but before my knuckles could even touch the wood, the door swung open. And there he was—Jungkook.

He was everything I remembered: pitch-black hair tousled in a way that was both effortless and enticing, metal glinting in the light, thin, silver rimmed glasses, and a thin white t-shirt clinging to his muscular frame. It felt surreal, like stepping into a vivid dream, but this was no illusion. This was real, and it took my breath away.

"You," I whispered, the word slipping out like a gasp. 

His dark eyes widened in surprise, delight flickering across his features. My heart raced as I watched him take me in, his expression shifting from uncertainty to something deeper, more intimate. Had he been waiting for this moment as much as I had? Was he just as happy as I felt?

All my doubts faded when that eyebrow, heavy with steel, raised in appreciation instead of scorn. He stepped into the hallway, and my heart pounded wildly, the space between us charged with an unspoken promise.

"You," he echoed, his voice low and husky as he took my hand in his, guiding me back into his room. 

He kicked the door shut behind him. The air thickened as he moved closer, inches separating us, electric and intoxicating. I inhaled the scent of him—soap and laundry detergent—sending shivers down my spine. A soft whimper escaped my lips, desire pooling in my stomach like a spark waiting to ignite.

With an air of confidence, he advanced, and I leaned back, the weight of his presence drawing me in like gravity. I stopped when my back hit the couch, the world outside fading away as we paused, our breaths mingling in the charged silence. My fingers, betraying me, reached up to trace the row of piercings in his eyebrow, trailing down the line of his jaw to his lips. They were soft and rosy, a striking contrast to the rough stubble that scratched my palm.

In that moment, he darted his tongue out, the pointed tip brushing against my fingers, and I moaned softly, the sound echoing in the intimate space between us, igniting the fire that had been simmering beneath the surface.

And then he was on me.

He seized my hand, guiding it into the tousled mess of hair I had longed to touch. It was softer than I had imagined, and I lost myself in it. His mouth descended on mine, a fiery torrent of passion and urgency. My body responded instinctively, arching into him as our breaths mingled, his desire palpable against my stomach, the taste of longing lingering on his lips.

His palm traced a path down my arm, firm and possessive, sliding over my shoulder and back again. He tugged at the buttons of my cardigan, peeling the fabric away to reveal the inked skin beneath. I shivered at the roughness of his touch, a thrilling contrast to the softness of his kiss.

Breaking away, I pressed my mouth against the line of his jaw, trailing wet kisses toward the piercings in his ear, letting my tongue tease them as my breath washed hot against his skin.

“Do you know how long I’ve wanted to kiss you?” He whispered against my lips.

I panted, my fingers tangling tightly in his hair.

His hands tightened around my arms, pulling us together, the weight of our bodies colliding in a desperate embrace. “Every single day,” he swore, his voice rough yet melodic. He began a slow, deliberate exploration of my neck, the heat of his tongue tracing my pulse and making me shudder. “Every night that you called me, whispering sweet nothings in that voice. It drove me insane. I just wanted to hop on a plane and have you in my lap.”

“God, I wish you would have,” I gasped, feeling the bite of his teeth just below my collarbone, a thrilling blend of pain and pleasure that made me clench around nothing. “Why didn’t you?”

“You make me nervous,” he murmured, teasing aside the cup of my bra.

He took my nipple into his mouth, his tongue flicking against the bud with reverence. I whined in pleasure, arching into him. Emboldened, he bit down.

“Self-conscious, huh?” I teased, winded and shaking from pleasure, even as my nails dug into his back, urging him closer. “I have a hard time believing that right now.”

He pulled back, capturing my face in his strong hands, kissing me fiercely as a low growl escaped him. “Believe it.”

We kissed with a fierce intensity that made me feel like I was on fire, the heat radiating off him, his glasses pressing against my face. He shifted to remove them, but I caught his wrists, holding him in place.

“Don’t,” I growled. “I like them.”

A primal sound erupted from his chest, desperate and raw. He lifted me effortlessly, settling me against the back of the couch, our bodies grinding together, my thighs aligning perfectly with the hard heat of his jeans. Each thrust sent a new wave of pleasure surging through me, my head falling back as I teetered on the brink of ecstasy, feeling weightless and electric, consumed by a desire that felt like it could set us both ablaze.

But he caught me. Just as I was about to tumble backward into dizzying, white-hot pleasure, his arms wrapped around me, firm and unyielding, pulling me against the solid expanse of his chest. My breath came in quick, frantic gasps, my heart racing like a wild animal as I clung to him, my legs instinctively wrapping around his waist, drawing him closer.

“Careful, pretty girl,” he breathed into my ear, a soft murmur that sent shivers racing down my spine. I grasped at his back, fingers digging into the taut muscles, anchoring myself to him, afraid of being swept away in the tide of desire threatening to pull me under.

My hands roamed from his back, gliding over his shoulders and down his arms as he stroked his fingertips along my thighs, mapping a path from my knees to my hips and back again. His skin was warm, electric under my touch, and I traced the intricate black curls of ink adorning his pale flesh—an abstract tapestry resolving into a lion on one arm and a lamb on the other.

“You’re beautiful,” I gasped, the words spilling out before I could stop them, but he silenced me with another heated kiss. 

My fingers fumbled at the hem of his t-shirt, desperate to see what those curls of ink transformed into beneath the fabric. He shifted me closer, his grip on me unwavering, even as his hands momentarily released me to lift his arms above his head. Seizing the opportunity, I tugged at his shirt, peeling it away to reveal the canvas of his torso, the intricate lines of ink telling stories I longed to hear.

I barely had time to take in the intricate Sanskrit lines etched along his side and the lone kanji character hovering over his heart before he was lifting my shirt, pulling it over my head. For a heartbeat, I was enveloped in darkness, blinded by the fabric. My hands scrambled behind me, fumbling to unclasp my bra, and he kissed a heated trail along the bare skin of my shoulder as the straps slipped down my arms.

“I love this,” he murmured against my skin, his lips trailing softly across my collarbone, down my ribs, and back to my breast, igniting every nerve in my body. “And I love it all the more because of this.”

His tongue brushed over the small butterfly tattoo on my ribcage.

His fingers roamed lower, and when he pulled away, I let out a whimper of protest, longing for his touch. The light-headed sensation returned, reminding me just how long it had been since a man had touched me—since I’d felt filled.

I braced myself with one hand against the edge of the couch while the other tangled in his tousled hair, relishing its softness as it slipped through my fingers. His mouth found my stomach, his tongue dipping into my navel, tracing a tantalizing line toward my most sensitive spot. I gasped, an overwhelming hunger igniting deep within me. I had been yearning for this, for him, and the desperate need flooded my senses.

With deft fingers, he teased apart the button of my fly and drew down the zipper, revealing delicate black lace beneath. He licked and sucked his way to my hip, his hand lingering on my abdomen, thumb skirting under the edge of my underwear before descending lower, finally finding bare, glistening skin. When his fingers grazed my clit, pleasure surged through me, and I nearly cried out at its raw intensity.

“Fuck, baby, you’re dripping,” he cursed, his voice rough with desire as he buried his face against the joint of my hip and thigh.

“For you,” I groaned, my body arching instinctively. “I’ve been wet for months just thinking about you.”

A low growl escaped him, and in a blur of motion, he tore the hem of my jeans down, ripping them from my body until I was left in nothing but my panties. He pushed my naked thighs up and over his shoulders, positioning his head exactly where I craved him to be.

I struggled to contain my frantic breaths, fast and shallow, echoing my absolute need to feel his hands, his mouth, to be consumed by him entirely. He inhaled deeply, reverently, his nose brushing against the lace where my body met my thigh. The sensation sent shockwaves through me, rendering me breathless.

He wrapped one hand around my leg while the other snaked behind me, gripping my ass firmly, anchoring me as he pulled the soaked fabric aside, exposing my bare skin to his hungry gaze. His thumb descended onto my clit, and I gasped, waves of need crashing over me as pleasure radiated from his touch. I cried out, the sound escaping me like a prayer, my body arching toward him, desperate for more.

And then he kissed me, his mouth capturing my clit with an intensity that sent me spiraling.

The moans clawing their way from my chest were unrecognizable, a desperate symphony of need as I became a writhing mass of pure, unadulterated hunger. Unlatching himself, his thumb worked expertly at my clit, sending jolts of pleasure coursing through me. His tongue darted out, teasing the edges of my entrance before plunging inside, and I felt the pressure building, the storm that had been gathering finally reaching its peak until I exploded, my thighs clenching around his face as my body ignited into a searing inferno.

I teetered on the edge of ecstasy, and then I actually fell over, the world spiraling away.

When I regained awareness, I was sprawled across the back of the couch, my neck twisted awkwardly, the top of my head grazing the seat cushion. My arms draped limply above me while my thighs remained anchored to his shoulders. He gazed down at me, a mixture of curiosity and satisfaction etched across his face, his mouth glistening—a testament to our fervor.

With a wicked smirk, he wiped his mouth with his forearm, leaving me in my awkward state as he peeled my panties down my body, rendering me completely exposed and unable to rise. His finger glided along my opening, my body still thrumming with aftershocks from one of the most intense orgasms I’d ever experienced. When he dipped gently inside, I gasped.

“Is this what you want, Y/N? My hands inside you?” 

I found myself ensnared in a whirlwind of emotions; I craved this intimacy with him more than anything, yet it felt like just a fragment of the whole picture. The sensation of his fingers deep within me was intoxicating, but beneath that, there lingered a yearning for more—more than just his hands. I ached for him—his body hovering over mine, the heat radiating from him as I traced the ink etched across his skin, my tongue teasing the silver piercings that adorned him.

“Yes. No. God, I want you,” I gasped, my voice a mixture of longing and desperation.

He raised a pierced eyebrow, still kneeling before me, his fingers buried deep inside me. “Want your cock.”

“You want this dick?” he asked, his tone both teasing and serious.

“Yes,” I panted, the word slipping out as both a plea and a command.

“Where?” 

I knew exactly where I wanted him; the desire burned brightly within me. “Everywhere. My hand. My mouth. My pussy. Just… everywhere.” 

A low growl escaped him, reverberating through my body, raw and hungry. But just as quickly, his fingers slipped away, leaving me aching and empty. He gripped my hips, securing me against him and the back of the couch, rising to slide my slick core against the hard line of his body. The urgency of his arousal pressed against me, igniting a fire within. 

He leaned down, gathering me into his arms, kissing me with such fervor that I felt dizzy, his hardness grinding against me—a promise of what was to come.

I pushed him away gently, his expression shifting to one of confusion, but all I needed was a moment to slide off the couch and drop to my knees. He groaned as I ran my nose along the thick outline of him through his jeans, feeling him twitch in response to my teasing. With trembling hands, I tugged his pants and boxers down, revealing him—long, thick, and glistening with anticipation.

The chrome piercing at the tip caught the light, gleaming enticingly. 

Looking up, I found him hovering above me, his body bared save for those damn glasses. His intense gaze locked onto mine, a silent plea reflected in his brown eyes. “Y/N,” I breathed, letting my warm breath wash over the tip of him. He groaned, his fingers tangling in my hair, urging me forward.

“God, I want to feel your mouth on me,” he implored, igniting a wild hunger within me. 

I opened my mouth, eager and wet, my lips closing around the head of him, my tongue tracing the underside, the cool metal against warm flesh sending shivers down my spine. 

“Y/N.”

I pulled away before I could take him too deep, trailing my mouth down his length, savoring every moment as I buried my nose into the soft hair at the base of him. He was practically whimpering, and I couldn’t resist the urge to pump him twice with my hand, the slickness gliding over him before I took him into my mouth, relaxing my throat to envelop him. Yet even with all my efforts, I couldn’t fit him completely, and I rubbed my thighs together, craving the moment he would finally fill me.

I moved my mouth up and down his length, achingly slow, feeling the tension coiling within him, his hips twitching, restrained. He wanted to thrust, to take control, but I held him back, guiding his movements while keeping him still. I could sense his legs trembling, teetering on the edge, so I pulled off, leaving him panting, his length throbbing, a testament to our shared desire.

Kissing the sharp bone of his hip, I pulled his pants the rest of the way down as he kicked off his shoes, the fabric sliding away like a whisper in the night. Just as I was about to toss the jeans aside, he stopped me, his voice low and husky. “Back pocket.”

Curiosity piqued, I glanced up at him through narrowed eyes and retrieved the little foil package from his back pocket. I noticed at least two more tucked away, and I couldn’t help but wonder if he had remarkable recovery time or if he was planning a very long weekend with me. Both notions sent a thrilling rush coursing through me

I held the condom up between two of my fingers. Jungkook snatched the package from me, tearing it open with a deft motion, rolling it over his cock from tip to base. He pressed his sheathed length against my hip, our bodies brushing together with a desperation that left me breathless.

“Turn,” he commanded, gently pushing at my shoulder. I obeyed, and his hands shoved me down, bending me from the waist, positioning my elbows on the back of the couch. When he was satisfied with my submission, he settled his hands firmly on my shoulder blades, a searing presence that felt as though it might melt through my skin, branding me with his touch.

His hands glided down my sides, over my ribs and hips, finally settling on my ass, rubbing it appreciatively. The edges of his fingers grazed my lips, parting them, and I jerked backward, feeling the heat of his cock resting against my back.

“Wider, baby,” he cooed, his fingers sliding over my trembling thighs. I closed my eyes, overwhelmed by the rush of sensation, and obeyed, spreading my legs for him. His knees bent between mine, the tip of his cock gliding tantalizingly from my clit to my entrance, brushing against me but not penetrating.

“Please, Jungkook,” I panted, desperation clawing at my throat as I felt myself teetering on the edge of begging.

Even he found himself pleading. “Please let me inside you,” he whispered, his length teasingly tracing my wet flesh, dipping slightly to part my lips but not filling the aching void within me.

“Yes,” I groaned, finally feeling the head of his cock pressing against my entrance, slipping into me inch by glorious inch. Nothing had ever felt this intense. “Fuck, yes,” I moaned, his grip hot and possessive at my hip while the other hand cradled the back of my neck, steadying me.

It was maddening not being able to move, even though all I wanted was to rock back and pull him deeper. 

My body stretched as he pushed forward, achingly slow until he was fully seated within me, his hips flush against my backside. I gasped as he filled me completely. The sensation was electrifying, and I felt him rock back slightly before surging forward again, the combination of his length and the hot tip of metal against my walls making my eyes roll.

“Please,” I urged, my mantra of ‘yes’ and ‘fuck me’ spiraling from my lips as he finally began to thrust with abandon, our bodies locked in a passionate dance. 

He tightened his grip on my hip, the other hand sliding to the middle of my back, pushing down. I could feel his movements becoming erratic, less steady—so close to coming inside me.

But I didn’t want it to end like this. Not after all this time. 

“No, stop,” I breathed, the words barely escaping my lips before he froze, a pained sound erupting from him like a wounded animal.

“Please, Jesus, Y/N, you can’t—”

I glanced over my shoulder at him, squeezing him tightly inside me. The resulting moan from his throat sent a jolt of electricity through my body. The rejection and frustration etched across his face twisted my heart. “After all this time missing you,” I whispered, locking eyes with him, “I need to see you. I need to see you come.”

In an instant, he withdrew, turning my body roughly until I felt the couch pressing against me once more. Supporting my back with one hand, he parted my thighs with fierce urgency, stepping into them and plunging back inside me. I screamed, the sound echoing through the empty corners of the room.

His face was close to mine as he began to move again, quick, short thrusts finding a new rhythm. Our sweaty brows collided, the metal hoops of his piercings scratching my skin, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. His name spilled from my lips as we captured each other in another fiery kiss, a moment so intense I thought I could lose myself entirely in the swirl of our bodies, his ink swirling around us like dark tendrils of smoke.

His patience began to fray as he kissed me harder, his body pressing into mine with more urgency. I felt the fiery bloom of pleasure building again, hot and electric, and I craved him hard and fast—a deep connection stripped of all restraint.

He must have sensed my need, too, as he quickened his pace. “Hold on, baby,” he instructed, and I complied, wrapping my arms and legs around him tightly. I let him brace himself against the back of the couch as he drove into me, his pubic bone hitting my clit with each thrust, the metal piercing hitting deep within me making me mewl.

“I’m coming, Y/N. Fuck,” he moans, the raw desperation in his voice igniting something primal within me. 

His face contorts in a beautiful, twisted expression of pleasure, each thrust deeper, harder, as if he’s trying to etch this moment into my very soul. The intensity of his words washes over me like a tidal wave, pulling me into a realm of oblivion. My body pulses in rhythm with his, a white-hot light flashing behind my closed eyes, merging with the vision of him—so fully present in my arms, lost in the sheer ecstasy we’ve created together.

As the world around us faded, time seemed to suspend, leaving only the two of us in a cocoon of warmth and intimacy. I could feel the weight of our shared moments pressing against us, every sensation amplified in the silence that enveloped the room. Slowly, we began to come back to ourselves, his body still pressed against mine, a gentle reminder of the electrifying connection we had just shared. The feeling of him lingering inside me sent shivers down my spine, and our breaths intertwined in a rhythm that was both calming and exhilarating.

We exchanged soft kisses, each one delicate and filled with unspoken promises, contrasting the raw passion that had ignited between us moments before. It was a tender kind of intimacy, one that held the power to ground us in a whirlwind of emotions. 

After a moment, he pulled away, slipping out of me with a reluctance that made my heart ache just a little. The sudden emptiness was palpable, a gentle reminder of the closeness we had just experienced. Jungkook reached for the condom, his movements careful and deliberate, disposing of it in the wastebasket beside the couch. When he turned back to me, the soft glow of the room caught the contours of his face, illuminating him in a way that made him look almost ethereal.

“You’re really here,” he murmured, his voice barely above a whisper, as if speaking too loudly might shatter the magic of the moment.

“I’m here,” I replied, unable to suppress the grin that broke across my face. He was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen, and this moment felt surreal.

Jungkook walked back over to the couch, his gaze roaming over my features as if he were trying to memorize every detail. “You look even better than I remembered,” he said, his smile soft and genuine, lighting up his eyes.

“And you look exhausted,” I teased, noticing the faint shadows under his eyes that spoke of sleepless nights and busy days.

He laughed, the sound brightening the room and melting away any remnants of anxiety I had carried with me. “It’s been a crazy week, but seeing you makes it all worth it.”

A smile broke across my face, the tension of the past months finally beginning to dissolve. For the first time since I had arrived, I took in my surroundings. The room felt both elegant and cozy, drenched in soft light, with tasteful decor that radiated warmth. A large bed dominated the space, its crisp white sheets looking impossibly inviting, and I found myself wishing we could make our way over there. It seemed far more comfortable than the couch.

“How was your flight?” Jungkook asked, bending down to plant a gentle kiss on my forehead, sending warmth flooding through me.

“Long,” I admitted. “But I couldn’t sleep. I was too excited.” The truth was, anticipation had been buzzing in my veins like electricity ever since I’d set foot on the plane.

He settled next to me on the couch, his hand finding mine, our fingers intertwining in a way that felt instinctive. “I’ve missed you so much,” he said, his thumb tracing small patterns on my skin, making my heart flutter in response.

“I’ve missed you too,” I replied, squeezing his hand tightly. “It feels like forever.”

We fell into a comfortable silence for a moment, the city lights twinkling outside like a constellation trapped within a glass jar. The reality of being here with him began to sink in, settling deep in my bones. No more video calls with choppy connections or hurried texts exchanged amid the chaos of our lives—just us, flesh and blood, finally in the same place.

Breaking the quiet, Jungkook’s tone turned serious, slicing through the warmth that enveloped us. “How are you holding up? I know it’s been tough.”

I took a deep breath, weighing my response. “It’s been hard,” I admitted, the truth heavy on my tongue. “But knowing we’d have this, even just a couple of days, kept me going.” 

He nodded, understanding etched on his face. “It’s the same for me. The craziness of the tour and the constant traveling—it’s all worth it knowing I get to see you.”

His words wrapped around me like a warm blanket on a cold night, soothing my weary soul. We talked for hours, drifting through a sea of conversation that felt both substantial and light, catching up on everything and nothing. His stories from the tour spilled out with infectious excitement, his eyes alight like fireflies in the dark. I shared my own experiences, and with every word, the distance between us began to melt away until it felt like the space of a single breath.

Eventually, exhaustion crept in like a gentle shadow, heavy yet comforting. Jungkook stood up and held out his hand, a playful glimmer in his eyes. “Come on,” he said, a teasing lilt in his voice. “Let’s move to the bed. It’s way more comfortable.”

I took his hand, allowing him to guide me across the room. The large bed loomed before us, inviting and cozy, the crisp white sheets beckoning like a sanctuary. As we settled into the plush comfort, I felt a wave of contentment wash over me, a feeling that we were finally exactly where we were meant to be. We lay side by side, fingers intertwined like threads in a tapestry, the world outside fading into a dull hum, the city’s chaos a distant memory.

© chimcess, 2024. Do not copy or repost without permission.

[forlix]

‧ ❆ ˚ 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐡𝐚𝐬 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐝 (besides myself)・l.f.

— you spend three years loving him, six months losing him, and four hours waiting for him to get the hell out of your house. but the human heart is more stubborn than you know.

words・5.4k

pairing・lee felix x gn!reader

genres・babysitter!au, girldad!lix, nobody look at me, toothrotting fluff, more angst than originally intended tbh, exes to lovers, hurt/comfort, happy ending yayyy, non-linear storyline

warnings・cousin has a korean name and experiences one (1) minor head bump, mc is temporarily heartbroken and experiences one (1) breakdown

playlist・house song by searows・glad by tori kelly・let's pretend by del water gap・you were good to me by jeremy zucker

a/n・hiiii my loves, i'm so unbelievably excited to bring u my first contribution to my and @astraystayyh's collaboration, "winter falls" ♡ every time i write for our ray of sunshine i'm reminded of how thankful i am to love him. this fic ruined me. hope it does the same to you (smile)

I. everything

“One day,” you muttered to the toddler sitting on your shoulders, “you’ll experience something deeply, irreversibly humbling, and I’ll be there to witness your downfall.”

Byeol responded to this with an unbothered babble. She then gathered two handfuls of your hair and yanked using far too much force to be biologically possible.

You folded like a lawn chair. “Mother—!”

Oh, that word was not suitable for button-sized ears.

“—oh, my dear mother, why? Why me?”

Technically speaking, your aunt should’ve been the target of your lamentations, but all she did was produce the child presently steering you around the kitchen like you were her own personal bumper car. Your own mother was the one who volunteered you to watch said child during the first weekend of your winter break. Only for an hour until the babysitter arrives, she’d said (raising her voice, so as to be heard over your groaning).

You adored Byeol. She made scarily accurate chipmunk sounds and possessed an immobilizing fear of grapes. She bust out a dance move before she took her first steps. The girl could have you floored with laughter without being able to say more than three words at a time. Still, this was far from how you imagined onsetting your desperately-needed few weeks off. Not to mention it was now half past three; your shift should’ve ended two minutes ago.

As if on cue, the doorbell rang. Byeol emitted an excited onomatopoeia like a golden retriever detecting the mailman. Your reaction wasn’t too far off; you swiveled your head in the sound’s direction, sang out “coming!” in a delighted vibrato, and twirled into the foyer, your hands around Byeol’s ankles anchoring her in place.

You cracked open the door and found yourself face-to-face with Byeol’s babysitter. The freckles scattered across his high cheekbones and sloping nose seemed to you like they were imprinted by the sun itself. His hair was dark, falling just shy of pitch black, and long, ending an inch or so below pierced ears. A few misbehaving strands rested over his forehead but did little to obstruct your view of his eyes: profoundly brown and pointed at either end, like poinsettia petals.

He was the most beautiful man you’d ever seen. You felt your skin warm, your heart flip. You opened your mouth. 

Then Byeol hit her head against the vertical edge of the front door, loud enough for it to echo.

The panic that seized you in that moment was truly unlike anything you’d experienced before. You caught one glimpse of the stranger’s expression (as mortified as you expected), and then you were seeing your own epitaph on the inside of your eyelids, engraved with the four words “Death by Furious Aunt.”

“Was that—?” The man sputtered, and his voice was rich and full and accented and just as breathtaking as the rest of him and holy fucking shit now was not the time.

“My fucking god,” you whispered, completely forgetting to watch your mouth. In a hurry, you swung Byeol off your shoulders and dropped to a knee. You leaned in close to examine her reddening forehead and cradled the plush of her cheek; she blinked at you a few times, fascinated by the sudden sight of your face again.

“You okay, Byeollie? That hurt a lot, didn’t it? I’m so, so sorr—”

Byeol started to laugh.

Not laugh as in those little chuckles she let out randomly, like there was something inherently amusing about the kitchen cupboard, but laugh as in a boisterous, resounding guffaw, like a great-uncle at a family gathering off one too many martinis.

This rendered you speechless for the second time in under a minute. Then, you lifted your other hand to cradle her other cheek, her face now sandwiched between your palms, and squeezed.

“I broke my cousin,” you whispered, your voice was so deathly serious that the man in the doorway had to stifle a laugh of his own.

His knee brushed against your shin as he sat down to your left, folding his legs into a criss-cross. You could discern notes of lavender and orange blossoms in the delicate cologne that clung to him, perforated the air and your mind both.

“Can I?” He asked.

“Please.”

Carefully, you shifted Byeol’s small frame towards him; the manner in which he accepted her was so smooth and practiced that there was no doubt in your mind you were watching a professional at work. He settled her on his right knee, then dipped his head to look her in the eye.

“Hi, princess,” he cooed with a dulcet smile. He curved his pointer finger, dusted it beneath her chin. “Why are you laughing, silly girl?”

Oh.

Oh.

You might just continue your lineage after all.

“Y/N-ie,” she answered, still tittering.

He looked to you with a slight tilt to his head, and you nodded affirmatively. He murmured a quiet ah. “What about Y/N-ie?”

Somehow you sensed that she was about to embarrass you and pinched the bridge of your nose—in preparation.

“P-pretty.” I knew it!

The man let out the laugh he’d been holding back since earlier and tapped on her button nose, lowered his voice to a whisper that he knew you could hear.

“I agree.” His eye glinted playfully, matching his tone. “And so are you.” The bashful, high-pitched giggle she responded with sounded eerily similar to your inner monologue.

The two of you spent a little longer on the floor of the foyer making sure Byeol was okay, and then the girl upped and made a mad dash for the kitchen while yelling something about a horse, and if that didn’t confirm that she was completely fine (albeit incredibly strange) you didn’t know what would. You found her rolling around the carpet in the room adjacent to the kitchen and left her to her own devices while you and her babysitter fixed up a small fruit plate for her afternoon snack. No grapes, of course.

He told you he usually went by Felix, but that his Korean name was probably easier for Byeol to pronounce, with its easier consonants and whatnot. You asked which name he preferred, and he said either or. He was a recent college graduate, a year older than you, who was determined to spend at least the next two years doing nothing but working out his future. He accepted the part-time babysitting position to pick up some light cash in the process.

“And ‘cause I’m good with kids,” he added, splitting apart a tangerine. “So I’ve been told.”

“Oh, you definitely are,” you said, plating a couple blueberries. “You melted her earlier.”

“She melted me. She’s so cute. And you’re so cute with her—I didn’t realize I was robbing someone of their job.”

You turned your head to regard the tot and let out a helpless laugh. Byeol tired of being a human lint roller a few minutes ago and had since moved on to staring aimlessly out the window.

“She doesn’t take me seriously, and I can’t stay mad at her,” you mused. “I would be a nightmare as her babysitter, trust me. She’s all yours.”

Felix held out two overturned handfuls of tangerine slices, to which you quickly moved the platter across the counter. He didn’t respond to your comments as he placed them on the outermost edge so that they looked like rays of sun emanating from a multicolored core. Adorable.

“Will you be around much, then?”

You made eye contact with him across the counter. On his perfect face was a teasing smirk and a subtle blush. Ah, you’d been mistaken, writing off his silence as concentration—he’d been contemplating how to best flirt with you.

“Y’know. In case I need any help teaching her cuss words,” he appended.

It was then your turn to flush a couple shades darker. “Please don’t tell her mom.”

“I won’t, I won’t.” He walked around the perimeter of the counter until he was directly in front of you; the lavender and orange blossoms returned. “On one condition.”

Not even one hour on the job and he was already trying to blackmail you? You respected it. “Which is?”

As he shifted some of his weight onto the counter, something too shifted in his smile, giving it a quality that was every bit as hopeful as it was gentle.

It was then, while Lee Felix was looking at you like that, all dilated pupils and long lashes, when you predicted that he would one day break your heart. You predicted you’d let him.

“Be around,” he said simply.

It wasn’t a question or a demand. In hindsight, you think it was more akin to a birthday wish, ill-fated the moment it hit the air.

II. has changed

Felix pulled Byeol’s hood up and over her ears, and you realized he was right about the winter coat getting too small for her—she looked like a bowling pin. You muffled your snort into your scarf.

“And what was the last rule again?” He asked, his breath puffing into the frigid afternoon in tiny clouds. Byeol sighed like she knew anything of the world’s woes.

“No barking at other kids,” came the sad reply, but a toothy smile spread across her face anyways when Felix nudged the underside of her chin. She loved when he did that.

“That’s my girl,” he hummed. “I believe in you.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” you said, and the wounded look Felix shot you was like you’d just confessed to hating kittens. “Come on—she doesn’t have a good track record. I’m allowed to have my doubts.”

“I dunno what that means,” Byeol announced with admirable frankness, and then turned around and scurried down the porch stairs, scattering fun-sized footprints across the snowy streets.

As you braced yourself to follow her, Felix stopped you with a slip of his hand into the pocket of your puffer. His fingers first aligned with yours inside the insulated nylon, then chased the spaces in between. He leaned in close, placed a kiss on the apple of your cheek, another on the corner of your mouth. This brought a helpless smile to your face, too. He had a way of melting you and Byeol both.

“It’ll be fine,” he soothed. “A little barking never hurt anybody, baby.”

“Lix, last time somebody called animal control.”

“Ermm—a little barking never hurt most people.”

That winter, Byeol was four, and your relationship with Felix was about to turn two.

Funnily enough, you’d never figured out when your anniversary actually was. Felix wagered it was the day you met, as he knew he loved you the instant he saw you; you insisted it was months later, since it took both of you an entire winter break of open-ended flirting and informal dating to label yourselves for real. Imagine your horror when he showed up outside your college apartment on the last day of your fall semester, arms overflowing with flowers and gift bags brimming with your favorite things, the phrase “happy anniversary” on his lips three months before you perceived it to be. You’ve celebrated both days ever since.

You loved the ocean growing up. You didn’t get to visit it often, but when you did you would run up to the water’s very edge so that your toes dipped into the cold—and just stand there, observing, absorbing, until even the seam of your lips and the ends of your eyelashes were studded with crystals of seasalt. You found endless tranquility in its rhythmic whispers and unspeakable comfort in its oscillating waves, guaranteed to return after momentary departure.

Your fascination stemmed from the folktale your mother used to read to you before bed, about a sun goddess creating the earth. In the story, every component of nature was one of the sun’s beloved children. She allegedly loved them all, but you suspected the ocean was her favorite; it was obvious, the way she twinkled off its ebbing surface, the way every minuscule spot of light looked to you like a handprint of hers, left behind by eons of endless doting.

Felix reminded you of the ocean. Every day you grew more certain that you wanted to drown in him, to let his resonant voice and kind eyes sweep and keep you inside his depths. It was never salt that he pressed into your skin but warmth, stamped and sealed with caring hands and cautious lips. His deep whispers promised eternal love and temporary ecstasy and everything in between. You knew he would come back to you even if stranded in a different realm. And there was no questioning the goddess’ favoritism, either. The freckles on his face mirrored the sun’s very spots like an homage to his creator.

You didn’t love the ocean growing up, no. You had never loved before Felix.

The park was busy when the three of you arrived. Byeol and Felix recognized a few families as your aunt’s neighbors and hurried over to say hello. Your social butterflies. 

“I’ll be over there,” you called after them.

Felix stopped in his tracks, looked over his shoulder. It had started snowing lightly on your walk there, and snowflakes now sat atop his sable locks. He looked like a painting. “You okay?”

“Yes, yes.” You shooed them off. “Don’t worry about me. Go have fun.” 

With that, you withdrew to the sidelines, an unoccupied swingset adjacent to a baseball diamond covered in frost. 

Your baby cousin was brawny for her age, which you could’ve seen coming with how she was hauling at your hair two years ago, but even she couldn’t yet terrorize the playground without assistance. Who better to make her partner in crime than her favorite Bokkie? You couldn’t help but giggle as the two revolved around each other for the better part of an hour, Byeol’s smile colossal as she frolicked every which way, Felix’s smile worried but hopelessly endeared as he followed behind. He never let her leave his shadow. She never tried to.

It was there on those icy swings that you experienced a moment of strange clarity, like you’d broken the fourth wall of your own story. You could feel the winds of change blowing your hair across your shoulders. You were aware of time’s trickling from the gaps of your fingers like liquid mercury.

Your laughter dissipated to a bittersweet smile; your smile mellowed to dewy eyes. It seemed like just yesterday when Byeol was small enough to sit on your shoulders and Felix stepped into your kitchen for the first time. Now, she was scaling a rope ladder with the celerity of a crazed monkey while Felix hovered a wary hand by her waist. The muted sunlight caught on the silver rings he wore, particularly the thin, bright one on his middle finger. You had one just like it, adorning the same place. 

The last two years were the happiest of your life. Why couldn’t you remember where they went?

Lavender and orange blossoms announced your boyfriend’s arrival—that, and the sigh of fatigue that he expelled as he dropped into the swing next to you.

“I’m not cut out for this anymore.”

Byeol’s neighbor had temporarily relieved Felix of his post by taking her and his son to test out the seesaw, and you wouldn’t be surprised if the whole town could hear her enthusiastic shrieking.

“You know how people walk their dogs?” You mused. “Some dogs walk their people. She’s one of them.”

For a moment, he could only stare in disbelief at the grin creeping across your face; then, he groaned in a way that could only mean you were right on the money. You gave his thigh a sympathetic pat.

“You’re whipped, my love. It’s okay.”

“Maybe a little,” he admitted, suddenly perking up. “Hey, no barking though.”

“Are we considering that a win nowadays?”

“Do you see animal control anywhere?”

“Good point.”

Felix monitored your expression during the quiet interval that ensued—saw through the melancholy curve of your lips, the pensive slant of your gaze. There was a red tinge to the whites of your eyes that hadn’t been there before.

You saw him reach for you in your periphery. His fingers brushed a lock of hair behind the shell of your ear, remained there for three slow heartbeats, and then lifted away.

“Angel,” he murmured. “Talk to me.”

You shook your head. “It’s silly.”

“It’s not.” Not even ten seconds after the last time, he reached for you again, now to take your hand and bring it to his lap. “You know it’s not.”

“It’s just that—”

Felix thumbed over the ridges of your knuckles, his touch so gentle that it could’ve unraveled a chrysalis; it certainly unraveled you. You took a stabilizing breath.

“I wish could recognize my own happiness in the moment,” you sighed, “not just in retrospect. That way, even when it comes to an end, I’d still be able to look back and say with confidence that I was happy once. I’d like that, I think.”

His brows knit together as he processed your words, and, the next thing you knew, he left his swing trembling in his sudden absence and his trenchcoat became a black blur in the cold air.

Felix rested his elbows atop your knees as he knelt in front of you, cradled your face in his hands. He was achingly beautiful always, but you truly felt your breath swiped from your lungs at the new proximity of his ethereal features: petal-shaped eyes, wind-bitten cheeks, coral cupid’s bow. A painting.

“That’s easy enough,” Felix hummed. “How do you feel right now?”

You had zero agency in the smile this brought to your face. You wrapped your hands around his wrists, your answer quick, thoughtless. “Happy.”

He pressed his lips to the space between your eyes. “And now?”

“Happier.”

He pressed his lips to the curve of your jaw. “What about now?” 

“Even happier.”

His gaze flickered to his final destination, but you beat him to it, sealing your mouth against his with urgency. The kiss that followed was so intensely loving that your head went fuzzy. How was it that you felt his adoration for you even in his pliant lips, his velvet tongue? You ran your fingers through the part of his hair. You loved when you could feel the locks flutter back into place afterwards.

“GET A ROOM!”

You and Felix pulled away from one another, wearing matching expressions of bewilderment. Byeol was approximately five Newtons away from soaring off into the stratosphere, her legs jostling around as she clung to her seat for dear life. It seemed your neighbor had a very aggressive way of seesaw-maneuvering. It seemed your cousin had a very aggressive vocabulary.

“Where did she learn—?” The two of you began in unison, then shot your heads back towards each other.

“It had to be you.”

“Outrageous—you’re the Australian here!”

“You cuss like one too!”

“Because of you!”

“So we’re just lying now?”

“Well, yes.”

Felix cracked a smile—and then the two of you were dying of laughter, his right eye squinting closed and your forehead thudding onto his shoulder. You hardly managed to get out your next words. “We have to do something about her vernacular, don’t we?”

“Oh, badly,” he replied. “Badly.”

After you expended your giggles, you nuzzled into the crook of his neck, blissful, glowing. “Thank you, baby.”

“What for?”

“Being my happiness.”

He angled your face back to his and kissed you once more, whispering I love you like it wasn’t enough that it graced your ears; he needed it embossed upon your flesh in permanent ink.

Your intermingled breaths floated up into the air like flare signals over a capsizing boat. Here marks the time we were happiest.

III. (besides myself)

He’s blonde.

That’s the first thing you notice when you see your ex-boyfriend on your aunt’s porch: the slightly off-white color of his silky tresses, grown out longer than you’ve ever seen, pushed off his forehead and tucked behind his ears.

It’s not the only thing you notice, of course. His face has thinned ever so slightly, the shadows thrown over his features by the streetlights behind him particularly opaque. His outfit is glorious, expensive, with the black blazer and white dress shirt, the top two buttons undone, the pendant of a silver necklace resting between toned collarbones. His hands are almost overflowing with what must be gifts for your family. It’s impossible to discern all of them from this distance, but you know the bouquet of white poinsettias is for your mom, the batch of brownies doused in sprinkles and icing for Byeol.

But the hair is where your gaze returns, because tucked among the platinum strands are black roots: millimeters of the color you grew to adore, peeking out as if trying to catch a glimpse of you, too.

You’re so occupied with this game of “I spy” that you don’t notice the rampant footsteps coming up behind you. Your six-year-old cousin collides with the back of your leg head-on and nearly topples you like a bowling pin.

“Is it him?” She asks breathlessly.

You come this close to berating her as you steady yourself against the wall—what did I say about treating human beings like couch cushions? But you look down to see her chin resting on the side of your thigh, her eager eyes shining so brightly that she puts her own namesake to shame. Your scolding tirade dissolves on your tongue like popping candy.

You simply sigh instead. “Yes, but—”

“BOKKIE!” She shrieks, and Felix’s head snap upwards at the sound of her voice. His tender smile melts some of the frost laminating your heart.

You crack open the door, making eye contact with Felix for the first time in six months.

“Put everything down. Quickly,” you whisper, and he obeys right away, alarmed by the urgency in your voice. A wise choice.

The last present has hardly touched down upon the wooden planks when Byeol wriggles through the doorway and charges towards Felix like an angered toro. He swivels at her bright holler of his name, lowers himself to a squat just barely in time to catch her in his embrace. The delighted laugh that leaves his mouth as he staggers backwards sounds like the sun itself; you feel lost in orbit hearing it again.

“Bokkie,” Byeol murmurs, her voice muffled in the dip of his shoulder, by the tightening of her arms around his neck.

“Hi, princess.” He kisses her temple, presses his nose against her hair. “Whoa, you’ve grown strong, haven’t you?”

“She takes taekwondo classes now,” you hum from above, and the shock in his face asks the very question that your poignant smile confirms. Yes, because of you.

Felix pulls away, cocoons her cheeks with cherishing hands. “Is that true?”

She bobs her head. “I want to be like Bokkie.”

And his eyes go impossibly, terribly soft, like he’s gazing at the horizon itself. The sight twists the knife in your gut and yanks on your tangled heartstrings. It’s all because of you.

“And kick some ass!” Byeol adds, knocking you out of your sentimental spiral. You clap a defeated hand to your forehead. Felix falls over himself. So much for fixing her vernacular.

A few minutes later, Byeol is pirouetting towards the kitchen with a couple of Felix’s smaller presents in her arms, all too happy to be of help. You linger behind as Felix takes off his shoes, your cousin’s departure leaving the two of you alone in the dim foyer.

Felix straightens. The two of you come face to face. The air hangs so heavily with unspoken words that you half expect it to start dripping.

“Hi,” he says.

You nearly laugh at the cruelty of it. The man you were certain you’d grow old with greeting you like you’ve been forced to sit next to each other on the first day of school.

“Hi,” you answer. “You look—”

The two of you say this last part in unison; old habits die hard.

“—nice,” you finish.

“—beautiful,” Felix breathes, his eyes flicking off to the side abashedly.

Your throat constricts, pulse quickens. Says you. If he was a painting before, you think he’s a sculpture now, his perfection as tangible as if hand-chiseled by the greatest artists of old. As clear as the sun’s beloved sea. You can’t tell if it’s his stylist’s doing or simply a product of him growing into himself.

“Thank you,” you reply quietly. “And thank you for coming.”

“Thank you for inviting me. I didn’t think you would.”

“I didn’t do it for me.”

No part of you wants to see the subtle wince that crosses his face at your statement, so you turn your gaze to his jewelry-laden hands instead. 

For a split second, you swear you see the same promise ring settled in the same place on his middle finger. You realize what you’re really looking at only after blinking the phosphenes from your eyes: the thin tanline that it left behind. The realization fixes and destroys you all at once.

Then, Byeol starts wailing about Felix’s whereabouts like an actress hired to spare you from this very interaction.

“Her Highness beckons.” The smile you manage feels like drying cement. “Shall we?”

On your way to the kitchen, you notice the cologne emanating from his person smells only of citrus—no lavender. Its absence steadies you, deludes you into believing that it’s a stranger you’ve just let inside.

That illusion lasts for exactly three hours and forty-eight minutes.

It’s clear that the breakup has your family walking on eggshells, but it’s even clearer that their adoration for Felix has never wavered. You’ve never resigned yourself to the restroom so many times in one night, only to stand with your back against the door, unmoving, unfeeling, listening to the low thrum of his voice through the mahogany. Chatting comfortably with your aunt, bursting into laughter with Byeol, reminding you of the time you considered him family too. 

With every glance you toss your reflection, you discover new cracks in your composure. Has he noticed them yet?

After you come out of the restroom for the sixth time, you notice a light spilling from Byeol’s bedroom into the hallway. A low Australian accent graces your ears, followed closely by a tinkling giggle, and your body nudges you towards the sounds before your head can intervene.

You give your cousin’s door a feather-light nudge. It opens a few centimeters more and grants you vision of Byeol tucked into bed, Felix knelt at her side. Both of their faces are illuminated by the flaxen light of the nearby lamp.

Felix brushes her choppy bangs out of her eyes, a teasing smile on his lips. “Can I tell you a secret, princess?”

This wrests from her another fluttering laugh; you swear he’s the only person in the whole world who makes her shy. “Sure!”

“Promise you won’t tell anyone?”

“Promise.”

“Not even Snernard.”

“M’kay.”

“Or Bong.”

“M’kay.”

“Especially not Trash the chicken. I don’t trust him.”

“I know, I know, I won’t!” Byeol huffs, and Felix laughs at her outburst. You also snort into your sleeve, amused (and deeply perplexed) by your cousin’s plushie-naming conventions.

“Thank you,” he hums, and he lowers his voice enough that you don’t catch the next thing he says.

All you perceive is the way that Byeol reacts. She sits up straight in bed, resting her back against her pillow. Her features rearrange themselves slowly, awfully, like the spread of cherry-flavored cough syrup over one’s sore throat, into the furthest thing from her trademark too-big-for-her-face smile.

Your stomach plummets to your fucking ankle.

“Why?” Her voice sounds microscopic.

“Well, do you remember what Bokkie’s dream job is?”

Byeol considers for a moment. “Being a singer?”

“That’s right.” He runs a knuckle over the hill of her cheek, the action achingly familiar, immensely fond. “And I found a place where I can do that, but it’s very, very far away. I won’t be able to come home very often.”

The telltale signs appear as he speaks; the final word sets them into motion. A tear streaks down the side of Byeol’s face. It hardly leaves the corner of her eye before it’s being intercepted by a doting swipe of his thumb.

“No,” she replies.

“You've grown so much.” Another tear falls. He wipes away that one, too. “You’re growing so well.”

“No,” she repeats.

“You’ve stolen the light of every star in the sky already. The whole galaxy will be yours someday, sweetheart. I know it.”

“I don’t want it,” she whispers. “I want my Bokkie.”

His vision starts to blur also. “But you don’t need me anymore.”

“We do.”

You know the precise moment Felix’s heart pauses in his chest because it is when yours does too.

“We?” He repeats, and she nods.

“Your dream job is being a singer.” Now Byeol is the one to reach for Felix, her delicate hand cupping the curve of his cheek. Her fingers are too small to catch his tears, she tries anyways—

“But what is your dream?”

It becomes too much for you.

You turn around. A choked sob escapes from behind the hand you have sealed to your mouth, causing both heads inside Byeol’s room to whirl in your direction. You don’t care that you nearly break both of your ankles beelining up the stairs; you only care to get the fuck out of that hallway.

You topple into your room, close the door behind you, and crumble.

Your quivering hands find purchase around your folded legs; your eyes squeeze shut against your knees. Rivulets of tears cascade over your shuddering lips like ruptured barrels of wine, left in the cellars of your soul to age, to spoil.

You never wanted your grief to see the light of day. Pouring your regret over every sidewalk wouldn’t change the past. Splashing your heartache across every wall like the world’s most fucked-up mural wouldn’t alleviate the pain of losing him. He was the one who left, but you were the one who’d asked him to. Feeling, yearning, mourning. Those always seemed so futile.

But you’re not just crying in this moment, rocking back and forth on your bedroom floor; you’re bleeding, the wounds you never treated igniting all at once as if exposed to vinegar, leaving you writhing and gasping in their wake. How you wish they’d been able to heal sooner. Maybe then seeing Felix tonight wouldn’t have splintered your soul like dropped porcelain.

Your door clicks open. Your breath hitches in your throat with a quiet scratch. The gulp of oxygen you intake tastes of oranges.

Every night before you fall asleep, you still think of the last time you visited the sea. The cool sand chafing against your toes, the coarse winds slapping your hair against your face hard enough to sting. The weather was terrible (you neglected to check the forecast before making the drive), but when you stepped onto the embittered coastline, you took what felt like the first real breath of your young adulthood. The fog melded to your skin as if melting a blindfold away, showing you the world in its entirety.

You return to that beach when Felix pulls you into his chest, and there’s no fog this time. Just the faint smell of lavender and your ocean, guaranteed to return after momentary departure.

Feverishly, Felix presses his lips to your temple, the apple of your cheek, rests his forehead against yours. Brokenly, he utters, “it’s you.”

You can feel his shaking in every part of him: the tickling breath, the fluttering eyelashes, the unsteady hand that reaches into the pocket of his blazer. You graze your fingers over his jaw, an attempt to steady his careening heart, only to lose yours in the fray also when he produces a small red box of unmistakable dimensions.

“God, it’s you. It always has been, always will be. Anything can change except for this.” His voice disintegrates as he speaks. You disintegrate as you listen. “Everything has changed besides myself.”

Felix leans back in to pepper kisses across the expanse of your wet features, then brings himself to one fated knee. He flicks open the lid. You don’t even spare the ring a glance; you don’t doubt its perfection. All you care to look at is the love of your life, deliquesced to adoration and tearwater.

“Thank you for being around, my dream.” His soft smile tends to your scars like ambrosia. “Will you let me do the same?”

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© 𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐱 (est. 090323) · 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤? please consider reblogging, commenting, or sending me an ask to let me know; or, read my other writing here. thanks so much for the support!

[joontroverted]

hate the way you smile

bully! baji keisuke x popular girl reader

fandom : tokyo revengers

word count : 5.5k

tags : he is a bully (only to you tbh), dubcon, panty kink, he gives you a wedgie lol, pussy eating, anal fingering (just a bit), exhibitionism, groping, stalking (kinda), they are in school for the only purpose of them wearing uniforms, but I've been kinda vague about that because I hate writing high school aus, so you can def imagine them to be in college, all characters are 18+ only

MINORS DO NOT INTERACT, IF THESE TAGS DO NOT SUIT YOU, SCROLL

you're not a loser.

quite the contrary actually, you're very popular. 

you joined the school pretty late, which itself was not very common, causing everyone to ogle at you. and judging from the way they treat you, they liked what they saw.

your features and mannerisms captivated everyone, right from the way you walked into class to the little smile you gave after the introduction the teacher forced you into doing. that would've been called cringe on anyone else, but you pulled it off.

keisuke has been waiting for the other shoe to drop, but it never does. 

yeah yeah, you were the shiny new thing when you first walked in. and then you got most of your answers correct in class, no matter when the teacher called on you. most of the answers, that is, because when you got an answer wrong and the teacher corrected you, keisuke finally felt vindicated. that would be the start of the chipping of your bright exterior. 

but no. instead you snorted (and God even your snort was cute) and rolled your eyes, muttering stupid before smacking yourself on the side of the head with the tip of your pencil. that had the class giggling, causing even the teacher to smile as she continued with the rest of the topic. 

what the hell? what was even funny about all this? 

(he watched you tuck your hair behind your ear, with a little lopsided smile on your face as you suddenly realized the rest of the class had heard you. you fanned yourself as if that would blow the embarrassment away somehow, and for just a second your eyes flitted up to his. he turned away immediately.)

"what do you think of the new girl."

“huh?” says mikey stupidly, his eyes trained on takemichi of all people. keisuke shares a look with draken, deciding to get to the bottom of whatever that is, later.

“she has a name, you know,” says draken, stretching, as the three of them are spread out on the bleachers. 

“what, d’you like her or something?”

“very funny,” he replies, rolling his eyes at keisuke. “emma thinks she's really pretty, and you know emma. she immediately went up to her and started chattering away and the next thing you know they have a bubble tea date planned. i think she even dragged takemichi's girl into it.”

“i don't think they're dating,” mikey’s head whips around, finally decided to acknowledge the two of them.

“they hold hands all the time!”

“did both of them come and tell you word for word that they're dating?” says mikey seriously. 

keisuke and draken exchange another incredulous look.

“yeah, that's what i thought” says mikey victoriously. he turns to keisuke. “do you like her?”

“who the hell are we even talking about anymore?”

“the new girl, keisuke, god, how can you forget what you were talking about so quickly?”

“tch. there's nothing to like about her. gave me something to laugh at with that stupid little introduction she gave us on her first day, but she's just another girl. i don't know why everyone's so obsessed with her.”

“she gave me some of her lunch when she saw me sniffing her,” says mikey unhelpfully. “people should start doing that more.”

“you should stop sniffing people,” replies draken, disgusted.

“guess what she smells like!”

“like cocoa butter on some days and like flowers on others,” blurts out keisuke. 

both mikey and draken turn their heads to keisuke.

“that's what all girls smell like, what the fuck!” he retaliates, looking away, his face burning.

“emma doesn't.”

“yeah, and neither does hina. or takemichi,” drawls mikey, squinting at him. “and you're right. she does smell like cocoa butter. i don't know about flowers. but then again, i’m not the one obsessed with her.”

“i'm not obsessed with her!” hisses keisuke. “and keep your voice down, will you, i’m sure the rest of the world heard you!”

“mikey! draken!” a voice calls from the field in front of them. 

they all turn to see it's you, in your skorts and top, visor in one hand and racquet in the other. the skorts (who the hell came up with that mopey idea) seem to hug your waist just right, the shortness of them making your legs look longer. your top is sticking to your skin from all the sweat you had built up from the match you just had, the white becoming almost see through, and he wonders how you’re either actually goddamn stupid or that desperate for attention for you to wear a red bra underneath it.

you wave at them enthusiastically, and you're close enough to them for him to see your eyes land on him, and you give him a little wave too.

mikey and draken wave back. keisuke rolls his eyes and looks away. “fucking of course she plays tennis, how pretentious,” he mutters.

“how come the girl you're obsessed with doesn't give a fuck about you?” snickers mikey as you walk away, surrounded by your group of girls, chattering and laughing. 

“i'm not obsessed with her first of all, and second of all, we don't even know each other because i’m not a serial sniffer like you.”

“maybe you should be,” sniffs mikey, “‘cuz guess what i smell right now?”

“shut the- ”

“a boy in looove,” sing mikey and draken together, bursting into laughter.

walking home, the more he thinks about your tennis uniform, the more he's pissed off. that wouldn't be a regular bra now, would it? probably a sports bra. he imagines you peeling off the tight top in the locker rooms, laughing with the other girls. how the sweat makes it a bit harder to tug off the bra, causing you to flail around a bit, before it comes off fully. he thinks about you basking in the freedom from it for a bit, chest heaving from all the exertion of the game, nipples hardened from the sudden exposure. 

he imagines you bend over and tug off the skorts you were wearing, wondering what panties you had on. would they be red, like your bra? you seem like a stuck up bitch who would make sure of stupid things like that. judging from how snugly the skorts had fit you, your panties would probably be digging into your soft skin, wouldn't they? were your panties riding up your pussy? the thought is quickly followed by the image of tight, red panties wedged up your pussy, he could almost hear you whine as you pulled them down and off of you. he didn't even have to imagine the rest before he broke off into a run to his home so he had some material left to finish himself off.

bad thoughts. these are bad thoughts that are too raunchy and precious for someone as annoying as you. 

(to his utter irritation, it's the small smile you had on your face when you waved at him that pushed him over the edge at the end.)

you're not a loser.

so fuck knows why you're so hellbent on doing the project exactly the way you wanted to, with absolutely no room for creative liberties, no changes in font, and every single time keisuke suggested something he could see you typing up a storm on the group chat. he made sure to see the message, but not read it and then be conveniently offline for the rest of the day. he was sure you would resort to calling him to beg him to not deviate from the color pallete you (and you alone) had decided on. obviously everyone else nodded and went along with your decision. but you hadn't called. 

so here you are, trailing after him. 

“keisuke!”

he groans and keeps walking down the hallway.

“keisuke! i just wanted to let you know that i know it feels like i'm being so restrictive, but all these rules are just for the presentation, like the ppt!” you dodge a couple walking hand in hand and you turn around and wave at them. “you guys are so cute! anyways, keisuke, you have complete freedom over what you want to say during your part of the presentation!”

“ha, so can i talk about my favorite kpop star while the rest of you are talking about the american involvement in the korean war? thanks!” he snorts, striding away.

“i didn't mean whatever you want, i meant you can speak about your portion however you want! the format we've decided on is just for the ppt!” you hurry around a sharp corner he took, still following him.

“we didn't decide anything. you chose the topic, and you chose the format of the ppt,” he grits out.

“well, when we were going around suggesting ideas, everyone seemed to like mine, so they went with it. and you weren't even in the meet!”

he grunts. that was true.

you open your mouth to say something and someone’s calling your name, so you turn around to respond to them. by the time you turn back he's gone again.

“fuck! fuck!” you mutter, adjusting your tote bag over your shoulder. God, he is so irritating. him and how serious he always is about treating you like shit but never taking it all the way. you always feel the prick of his eyes staring at you, and initially you always turned to smile or talk to him, but he'd just look away and outwardly ignore you. 

you had taken to staring back at him, in hopes of him at least taking it as a sign to leave you alone but that hadn't worked either. 

instead, now you know how his silky hair slinks to the front of his face as time passes during classes, and how he absentmindedly gnaws on his pens with his canine teeth. you know how he actually prefers putting his hair up in a high ponytail rather than a low one on the few occasions that he does tie his hair. you know he's actually studying when he’s wearing his red reading glasses. he takes his blazer off often and he's rather ripped, and you're embarrassed to say that you might've asked around why. your classmates said he has a black belt and used to beat people up for fun. 

you can't figure out if that's a joke or not. 

you don’t care that he ignores you, you have enough friends and more than enough people who would pay attention to you. but it kept building and building. everyone said he was a quiet but nice guy. was rowdy when he was younger, but mellowed down and began to focus on school a bit more. you would love to see that side of him, especially now in the crux of the group project. he still had a wild side to him apparently and everyone knew not to mess with him and his loyal set of goons kazutora and chifuyu (who is quite the loser himself), but you'd had just about enough today. you had messaged him that you would like to talk when classes ended, and clearly he didn't give a fuck. 

one last attempt, you promise. one last attempt and then you can boot him off of the project and be at peace again.

remember when you couldn't figure out if they were lying about baji keisuke being a bully or not? well, you're about to find out, because while you're digging through your bag for your history project folder, you don't see the foot sticking out right around the corner you turn.

one minute you're walking on solid ground, the next minute you're in the air and crashing down on it.

your bag provides no security at all, all the books, your cute stationery, the folder, your sanitizer, lip gloss, and all the little trinkets clatter onto the floor, spreading out onto the empty hallway. 

you look up to see golden eyes, framed by dark silky hair staring down at you. 

“what the fuck?” anger rolls through you. “what the fuck, baji?”

“oh, so it's baji now, is it? it was keisuke! keisuke! just a second ago!” he mimics your voice with a laugh.

you're still on your knees on the floor. you look around, and the school is empty, even the last of the people remaining would be downstairs in the cafeteria. 

“lookin’ for all your admirers?” he sneers, bending down to pick up one of your keychains. 

“what do you want from me?” you ask, reaching up to take it from him, but he snatches his hand back. “give it back!”

“you don't have to worry about this,” he says cooly, watching you try to gather all your stuff. you're on all fours, grabbing your things. you're getting nowhere ultimately, everything is far too spread out.

keisuke watches as your skirt hikes higher and higher up, teasing him with little glimpses at your white panties. was that lace on the sides? keisuke almost falls to his knees just from that, as you continue being a stupid slut so obliviously.

“get up!” he snaps and hauls you up with a firm grip on your bicep. “i told you not to worry about that!”

“oh yeah?” you ask, turning to him, your voice raising. “i would love to not worry about this, considering i was just minding my own business! i would love to not worry about the group project but you don't give a fuck!”

he raises his eyebrows, watching you go off on him. you get closer and closer to him, and start pushing him in his chest. “i'd at least like to have a conversation with you, but no, you're such a fucking asshole that you'd rather just stare at me resentfully like a creep instead of actually come up to me and talk to me! but i get it you know, i'd also be so full of hate if i was made to repeat a year but still remained as stupid as i was when i failed!” 

the silence that follows is palpable. 

you don't stand down. for once, there isn't a spec of your usual sweetness or benefit of doubt. you are glaring at him, looking right into his eyes, daring him to respond. 

“so you've been asking around about me, huh?”

“that's rich coming from you. if i see you stare at me one more time, or blatantly ignore me, or disrespect me again, i'll gouge your fucking eyes out!” you hiss, pushing him one final time. you turn around and once again bend over to start collecting your things.

“stop.”

“you are not allowed to- “

“i'll leave you alone if you do this.”

that makes you turn back to him. hurts a lil bit to see you only listen to him so he'd leave you alone, but he’d brought this upon himself. “what do you want,” you spit. 

he stares at you for a moment. you wonder if he's just gonna burst out laughing at how you deluded yourself into thinking that he'd leave you alone, right after he knocked you to the ground like that. his hair's out of his ponytail and his tongue pokes the inside of his cheek, his fangs flashing at you. 

he tilts his head to the side, and gives you a lazy grin. his eyes however, remain serious and trained on you.

“show me your panties.”

you balk, your anger dimming, replaced with confusion. “what?”

he looks serious as ever. he leans forward into your personal space, his hair almost brushing yours. “show me your panties,” he says slowly, as if he were talking to someone stupid, “and i'll consider leaving you alone.”

“con- consider? you told me you'd leave me alone!”

“depends. yes or no?”

“no! no! obviously no!” you're completely flushed, and you try pulling the hem of your skirt down defensively, wishing you hadn't snuck off to the bathroom to roll it up an inch before you came out to talk to him. “i'm not gonna show you my panties!”

he looks at you with a sort of bored but also amused look in his face. 

“do you seriously think i haven't noticed that your skirt's shorter now than it was in class?” he flips the tuck of your shirt up, “ah, there it is. you've rolled your skirt up just to come talk to me.”

“no… no!” you sputter, all the fight in you bleeding out from embarrassment. “i didn't, and i didn't do it for you!”

“i know you want my attention anyways. so let me be clear. either you show me your panties, which seems like you wanted to do that anyways, or i make you show me your panties.” he smiles, so simply and easily as if he's discussing what to get for lunch. “as simple as that.”

you snort. “you're gonna make me show you my panties? and how's that gonna work?” 

he laughs. “easily.”

you shouldn't have asked that, you think. keisuke pushes off the wall he's been leaning on and walks towards you. you walk back, unsure of what to do, your eyes never leaving each others, yours wide in shock and his sharp like a snake. your back hits the wall, and now you've got nowhere to go. 

“like this,” he whispers, and tugs you forward a bit by your belt loops. he then reaches forward, peering above your shoulder, and you stupidly lean forward almost on instinct. his silky hair brushes against your cheek, and for a second, you're lost in the sensation of that and the next moment, you feel his fingers fiddle with the back of waistband of your skirt, untucking it. 

“you tuck your shirt into your panties, huh?” he murmurs, “you're really such a loser.”

“what are you do- ah!”

his fingers are on the waistband of your panties now. and he pulls. the fabric gets pulled up from the back and digs into your ass from his tug. embarrassment floods your body from how humiliating this is, but also from how disgustingly wet you feel yourself getting.

“keisuke! keisuke, please!” you whisper, turning to look at him, but he's still looking over your shoulder. there's no way to conceal his view, because not only is he taller than you but also he can see down into your skirt.

“ah, there she is,” he mutters. another tug. “i don't know why you didn't want me to see ‘em. well, i already did see a bit of them when you were sprawled on the floor on all fours looking helpless, but you can't expect me to be satisfied just from that.”

“keisuke, please, stop it!” you squeal, ears hot. you can't believe he's basically giving you a wedgie, his fingers are in your panties and your out in public, more or less.

“all right then.” your panties snap back in place, stinging a bit. he pushes away a step, hands up. “run along then, little loser.”

you stand still head down, with a humiliating feeling settling in you. you don't want to leave.

he watches you not make a single move to your fallen bag or even to run away. 

“fuck, i knew there was something weird about you! i knew you weren't this sweet little popular preppy princess everyone makes you out to be!” he laughs, his deep voice echoing down the empty hallway. “you're a nasty little whore, aren't you?”

“m'not a nasty whore!” you whine, “i just- “

“fuck am i gonna have my way with you,” he whistles. “i was being polite earlier. turn around.”

“why- “

“talk all you like whore, but i better see you listening to what i say,” he cuts you off. He takes off his blazer, dropping it to the ground and folding his arms. “turn around.”

you turn around, with an inkling of what he's going to do. you stare at the lockers in front you and bite your lip.

“hands on the lockers.”

“what are you go- “

he lifts up your skirt and tucks it deep into the waistband, leaving you panty clad ass completely exposed. the cool air hitting you there directly makes you clench involuntarily and he almost moans from how cute and innocent that looks. he's finally got a good look at your panties. white, fitted cotton panties with a lace trim. it's ridiculous how simple it and how much it manages to choke him up. the back of the panties are still a bit yanked up from where he had pulled earlier, and you're clearly dying from embarrassment based on how low you're holding your head.

well, there's no time to waste.

he grabs onto the waistband at the back of your panties and pulls. the material disappears into your cheeks, digging up and up and up as he pulls, and you almost lose balance from the force of it. “keisuke!” you gasp, your hand coming back for some support. “i- “

“are you stupid?” he snarls, tugging up once more, causing you to jump from how mean he sounds, “or are your hands on the lockers?"

your hands are immediately on the lockers. 

“good girl,” he mutters, “goood girl.” he pulls more and more on your poor panties, and they're crudely rubbing against your hole. your feet almost leave the ground with ever tug he gives, causing you to bounce. you're almost dead with humiliation, but the grinding against your clit and the embarrassment of the whole situation has you so flustered and wrecked.

“i hate you, i hate you, i hate you, keisuke!”

he's so focused on your hot your ass looks, clenched around your panties like that, soft cheeks being put through such torture, and he can't imagine how your puckered little hole must feel from all the abuse it's taking. makes him wanna kiss it better. 

“what is it? you don't like being treated like the little loser you are, huh?” he croons into your ear. “is this not princess treatment enough for you?”

he lets you go all of a sudden, and you almost crumple to your knees, but he catches you and hauls you up, turning you towards him. 

“you havin fun?” he taunts, towering over you. 

“fuck off! you're so mean!” you sniffle, trying to pull your panties down.

“ah ah,” he says sternly, smacking your hands away. “none of that. i'm not done with you. boys!”

the door of the classroom next to you is kicked open and you see kazutora and chifuyu walk out, who follow keisuke like shadows and drank up every word he said loyally.

you glare at keisuke, who has both your wrists in a firm grip in just one hand of his. he grins at them. “told ya she's a slut.”

kazutora snickers, but your eyes remain on chifuyu. he's on the fucking math team with you! you glare holes into his eyes as he looks your way, and his cheeks turn pink, either because it's nerd recognizes nerd or it's because your skirt is tucked all the way up with your entire ass and panties exposed.

keisuke's attention is back on you as he lifts your wrists above your head, pinning them to the lockers behind you. you try to fight him, but it's fruitless. he then tucks the front of your skirt into your waistband too, leaving the front of your panties exposed too.

your panties have a little heart stitched onto the front, your pubic hair peeking out from the lace on the leg holes. 

“now, isn’t she a pretty baby,” keisuke laughs to himself, as your heart flutters a little from that praise. “hold her up for me, boys.”

“what do you mean hold me up?”

kazutora and chifuyu position themselves on either side of you and hold on the sides of your underwear. “chifuyu!” you gasp, turning to look at the boy, who refuses to make eye contact with you, but does what his supreme leader says anyways.

“hey!” keisuke snaps his fingers in front of your face. “you don't focus on anyone but me, kay?”

you narrow your eyes.

he squishes both your cheeks with one hand, making your lips pucker out. “answer.”

“okay, okay,” you whimper, breaking eye contact. 

“eyes on me, sweetheart. i'm gonna let go your hands now. if you try anything, you're gonna find out cute you look with a smack on your face, got it?”

your eyes turn watery as you look into his, lips pushing into a pout. “got it,” you mutter.

“there's my girl. now let's see what we have here.” and with that he sinks to his knees, till he's face level with your panties. he places his big hands on the outside of either thigh, running them up and down for a moment, sending shivers up your spine. he grips your thighs and watches his nails sink into your fatty flesh, and how you gasp at the pain that feels so good.

he leans forward and places a kiss on your mound, and then goes lower and places another firm kiss on your clit. the little whimper you give spurs him on. he pushes his nose between your lips and sniffs, groaning to himself. 

“fuck that's good pussy,” he presses his nose alone the slit and goes up and up until it meets your clit and he presses down as his lips comes up to rub your pussy through your panties. his nose rubbing on your clit has you moaning, as if there aren't two of your classmates holding you up by your panties, your legs weak. 

“gimme those hands,” he demands, his voice rough. you place your hands in his gingerly. he places a gentle kiss on both of them, so uncharacteristic to the situation you are in, and how he's been treating you. “i'm gonna give you a very important job, got it?”

“uh huh,” you whisper.

“you're gonna hold my hair up while i eat your pussy through your panties, okay? i don't wanna be missing a moment of it because of my hair getting in the way”

you almost short circuit. you stare at him dumbly, and are brought back to the moment when he places a sharp right onto your pussy lips.

“yes! yes!” you nod, and with your painted pink nails, you gently push back his hair and hold it in a ponytail. “this okay?”

he nods, and gives you a little wink. you gulp and look away.

“all right, we're back to business,” he mutters, going back down to your pussy. “hold ‘em higher for me.”

kazutora and chifuyu (whom you'd almost forgotten about from the previously somewhat sweet moment) pull your panties higher from the sides, making you gasp as they dig into your pussy this time.

keisuin prods and pushes at your pussy lips. he pushes the leg holes of your panties closer and closer together, little by little before he yanks on the top your panties suddenly, causing them to slip between your lips and tug up to your clit.

“ah! keisuke! that's really- “

“c'mon boys hold her higher for me, will ya? i don't mind if your bounce her for me. pussy's so wet just from all this panty action, let’s see how sensitive her little clit is, huh?”

he's talking over you like you're some thing. the boys pull you higher this time, and you can't help but marvel at the strenth of your panties for a hot second before bliss shoots up your body as the crotch of your panties rub against your clit, and you're finally getting some good direct action. 

keisuke watches the wet spot in your panties grow bigger and bigger as your panties dig deeper into your clit, your fat pussy lips hang out from either side of the thin bunched up material and your knees knock together from how horny you are and how desperately you're trying to squeeze for more friction. all while you diligently hold his hair back. even in this debauched state, you're adorable. his dick is straining against his pants, he unbuckles them and frees himself, his mouth watering as he dives right in.

panties riding up to the maximum level, he laps up against them, tasting your juices. he spreads your lips even further, making sure there's no room whatsoever for you to escape and you whine and kick. his eyes almost roll back to his skull and his soul ascends when his tongue comes in contact with the slick and gummy insides of your pussy, clenching around both him and your panties. he's growing jealous of your panties now.

“change of plans,” he says, gruffly, “hold her up by her legs, and if you drop her, i swear to god, you're dead.”

chifuyu and kazutora are quick to follow, as they each take one leg and lift you up, holding you open and ready for keisuke, but this time with your entire pussy directly facing him. you wail at the sudden change, but to no one's surprise you're ignored.

keisuke pushes your panties to the side and can finally see your pussy in all it's glory. your cute little bush and your gaping pussy from all the edging it has taken a minute ago. he rolls his saliva around in his tongue and then spits a glob of his spit right onto your pussy. you clench at the feel of how lewd it is, the warm, thick saliva coating your vagina and sliding down, dripping from your asshole. it's disgusting, but it feels so good. 

he pushes his entire face in, slurping and swallowing all you have to offer. you're glad that the two are holding you up, because you're too fucked out to even feel the tips of your toes, let alone stand. through all this, you make sure to hold his hair back, because you don't want him to be mad at you.

a finger presses on your asshole and you quiver with shock, snapping out of your daze. “kei- kei, keisuke, not there, not!”

you babble stupidly, passed the point of coherence, as keisuke lets you bounce a little on his fingertip dipping in and out of your puckered little hole, while he slurps up your perfect little pussy, sucking and flicking your clit. 

“‘m gonna cum! ‘m gonna cum!” you sob, kicking your feet a bit, like the spoiled little thing you are. 

“cum baby. i've got you,” he mutters, as he reaches up one hand to give your tits a hard squeeze. that's the final straw for you, as you finally let go, nipples aching, pussy tingling and asshole prodded open. you come on his mouth and he eagerly drinks up every last drop, jerking himself faster and faster. 

“bring her down,” he groans, and the lower you down to the floor, still holding you and keeping you spread. you look up him, your mouth agape as you watch him fist himself and push himself to the edge, cumming all over your face. at first you're taken aback, but then you just sink into the feeling of the hot cum drizzling all over your face dripping down… it almost feel therapeutic.

god. you really are a whore. and a loser.

you sigh. 

“oi, go pick her stuff up, and put it in her bag. nicely, like in however cute way she usually does it.”

you're gently set on the ground, on your hands and knees, shaking slightly. you see kazutora and chifuyu walk away and start gathering your stuff up off of the floor. keisuke kneels down to you, pulling a handkerchief out of his pocket. he pushes you slightly onto your knees and wipes the cum off of your face so gently and so sweetly, you could've mistaken it for your sweetheart wiping your wet face after a running home on a rainy day.

“you okay?” he asks.

you blink. “are you happy?”

“huh?”

“are you happy that you finally got to debase me and see me as a person and not some shiny new thing?”

“to be honest, you were a shiny thing till i wiped all the shininess away right now.”

you smack him on his chest with the back of your hand.

“i'm sorry,” he says looking into your eyes. “i just… um. have a crush on you that was so overwhelming that i wanted to, well, debase you,” he mutters. 

you laugh, and scratch your face. “whoa, i totally had no clue whatsoever.”

“is your face still sticky? tora, she has some wet wipes in her bags, toss ‘em over.” the wet wipes fly into his hands, and he pulls one out, wads it up and starts cleaning you up again. 

“how did you know i have wet wipes in my bag?”

“maybe i’ve looked through it before. maybe i haven't, who knows?” he shrugs, not looking at you, suddenly extremely concentrated on the area near your eye. 

“when did you even- ”

“i might also have memorized your schedule, and all the classes you take. oh, and i also need your panties from today.”

he gets a slap in the face for that.

this was 2.5k words longer than it was supposed to be. i'd love to hear what you think of it 😇

likes, comments, asks and reblogs HIGHLY APPRECIATED ❤️

read my other tokyo revengers fic!

kiss it better (ran haitani)

dividers by the super creative @anitalenia you can tell, I'm kinda obsessed 🌟

[rini-rushed]

less doesn’t always mean lukewarm.

☆ sae x reader ^^ (gender not mentioned)

★ fluff or smth, no bllk au

synpnosis -> reader is described to have a lot of distraction problems, quick thoughts and random prompts stacked in their head, idk how to explain it i just had this feeling today so i wrote this with emotions tethered to it

notes: based off an experience i had today, except i was spiraling alone + the ending derailed and became SHIT tbh😕

tapping your pen against the pages of your barely touched notebook, you blink as your mind wandered to random places.

what time is it? did you ever submit that report? what does TGIF mean? is modern art actually ugly? did you ever clean out your locker? does it actually make sense to have the metric system? is moving to north pole for the penguins THAT bad of a life plan?

your train of thought was on a roll to say the least, stopping at short term stations, new random and shortsighted ideas and "plans" for side quests pinging in your head.

the notion was quick and swift in your head, twitching your facial muscles ever so slightly as you hopped on one cloud to the next. it was all quite minimally amusing to you, but it certainly wasn't for your study partner.

"stop that."

click!

"stop what?"

you straightened your posture, stopping your pen fidgeting, rolling your eyes to the face in front of you.

"making dumb faces, you haven't even written anything down." sae sighs slightly, you keenly notice the little wrinkle that imprinted itself onto his brow.

then your attention pays itself to the words he just said, you look down at your paper and sure enough, the only markings on your page were little dots that were the outcome of your no-thought-shuffle of your fingers.

you couldn't help but frown a bit, pursing your lips in slight disappointment at the lack of writing done.

at your silence, you could just feel the damn sigh that was stolen from sae's figure, that only dampened your mood a bit, tilting your head lower.

you repositioned the pen in your hand, now in the position of writing, your eyes dragged themself against the table, clawing and resisting as your vision was overwhelmed with words and symbols.

the textbook's big paragraphs made you think and process, like a loading screen over your head, engulfing yourself in mumbo-jumbo, losing yourself in the walls of text.

maybe after rereading the same sentence for the nth time and writing down a singular “the” you already feel drained.

noticing your overwhelmingly heightened distress, sae calmly closes his book and shuts off his laptop silently.

you see his neutral look on his face as he’s gathering his things, you can feel your stomach drop, was he already that annoyed?

you bit the inside of your cheek.

you couldn’t blame him.

so you keep your head and your field of view low as the events played out before you. they come and go, your study partners, your peers.

you gripped your pen a tiny bit harder at the thoughts, now bubbling up from the dark crevices of your heart. doubt and shame inking your insides as it immobilizes your lungs, you could feel your heart-

“what are you doing? come on”

? you look up at him.

“come on stupid, we’re going on a break, we can’t get shit done if you’re like this.”

his words are blunt, but they don’t hurt you, they’re just pointing out the obvious.

he’s being stupid about being nice.

but you don’t hesitate to pack your things too, although you feel his eyes on you as you do so, you don’t feel the weight of pressure.

the weight of needing to check yourself, how you’re perceived, how you’re supposed to be acting. he’s just, observing you.

and so you pack up and follow him out, he takes you to an area that’s slightly more populated, no longer in the library, you’re in the courtyard. he gets you a snack from the vending machine, and opens a bag as you open your mouth.

letting the long stream of thoughts out, sae answer minimally, it was all you really needed, some simple answers for some simple questions.

“what time is it?”

“1:45pm.”

“did I ever submit that report? ”

“you can check now.”

“what does TGIF mean? ”

“thank god it’s friday”

“is modern art actually ugly? ”

“up to you, artists won’t care”

“did I ever clean out my locker? ”

“we don’t use them anymore.”

“does it actually make sense to have the metric system? ”

“americans are stupid.”

“is moving to north pole for the penguins THAT bad of a life plan?”

”yes.”

neither of you really kept track of time, not that either of you bothered to. sae only looked at you with that blank face of his, and your mouth kept moving.

sae knew that this was taking more time than if he had just stayed at the library with you.

but he knew better.

he knew that bitching to you to fix your attitude can’t help with the situation, so why worsen it.

he rather see you being comfortable and “wasting time” rather than being shackled to a task when you’re obviously not mentally into it.

long story short: if it means you’ll be less lukewarm, he’ll take it.

★ 終わり☆

holy shit why was that ending so bad 😢

tags: @tofumiarchives @rinitoshiplzdateme @fishii28

@shrii-kk

@reapkusho @ac3ss @tired-xyra-urstruly

renaissance is such a pretty word btw