#this has been sitting unfinished in my files for over a year until now can i get a yahoo | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

calaofnoldor · 4 years ago

Text

What’s Mine

Characters: Sam x F!Reader, Dean

Words: 7,595

Summary: The secret you and Sam are hiding from Dean is threatened by your inability to keep your hands off each other.

Warnings: 18+ no actual smut but plenty of implied smut, pre-smut, and smut adjacency lol, secret dating, enemies to lovers, jealousy and possessiveness (exhibited by both sam and reader), slight obsession with sam’s big ass hands (i blame this largely on @walkerboy290‘s glorious hand porn gif sets), and language

A/N: inspired by and written for @thinkinghardhardlythinking bc she’s been bugging me to write smut and using her birthday as a bargaining chip, so i hope you’re happy sai. happy (belated) birthday babe! i suppose in my subconscious need to truly honor you, this became the longest one shot i’ve ever written... that and this is now also a little birthday gesture for the brilliant and beautiful @sams-sass (damn your close birthdays!) even though she never asked for smut (if you hate it, i’ll write you something else!) happy birthday to you too, darling!

also written for @superbadassnatural‘s 333 badass followers celebration with the prompt “___ and I are together.” “Yeah, right, and I’m Santa.” and @writethelifeyouwant‘s 300 follower fic challenge with the prompt “All the pretty girls like Samuel” (both prompts are bolded in the fic) i’m sorry i’m so late! congratulations to both of you and thanks for letting me enter your challenges!

[basically i have a lot of people to blame for this disaster 😂]

Square Filled: Secret Dating for @spnfluffbingo and Enemies to Lovers for @girl-next-door-writes Make Me Feel Bingo

MASTERLIST

The waffles on your plate are surprisingly good for a sketchy, 50’s-themed diner, but unfortunately your attention is elsewhere. In fact, the two distinctly masculine voices behind you have been obnoxiously impairing your ability to savor the buttery, syrup-doused carbs since their owners sat down in the adjoining booth. It’s the topic of their discussion that disturbs you, and nips at your conscience until you realize you can no longer take off without imparting a few words to your oblivious colleagues.

Turning your head subtly to the side, you try to catch a glimpse of the men you’re about to confront in your peripheral vision. From what you can see, they’re both rather burly, a little rough around the edges, and from what you’ve heard, recklessly cocksure. You know the type all too well. Being a lone hunter of the fairer sex for most of your life means you’ve long since learned that the best way to combat their kind is with a steadfast façade of thick skin and unwavering confidence.

So you sigh and put on your best smile before turning around, crossing your forearms along the top of the booth seat, “Listen fellas, I hate to interrupt, but I really wouldn’t bother with the bamboo dagger and Shinto priest if I were you.”

“And who the hell are you?” the one with shorter hair demands. He’s a bit stockier than his companion and has a face that looks like it was designed by Abercrombie and Fitch - well that explains the arrogance.

“I’m the person who’s about to save your asses evidently,” you respond with a smug grin, trying not to let their absurdly good looks deter your act.

Abercrombie’s partner, the Fabio wannabe, releases a quiet scoff, “And how are you gonna do that?” he questions dubiously.

“By letting you in on a little secret…” Throwing him a tight smile, you lean forward and lower your voice, “That ōkami you’re after? It’s not an ōkami, it’s a ghoul.” Sitting back, you await the outrage.

“What?! But that’s not possible, I checked the lore. And it’s obviously got a type.” Fabio’s glossy chestnut locks fall across his delicate features as he shakes his head in disbelief, and you almost snort out loud. How did this amateur expect to hunt with hair like that?

You look him over, taking in the broad shoulders and muscled arms, as well as the obvious height advantage he’s got over Abercrombie even whilst they’re both seated. To be honest, you’re surprised he’s referencing lore at all. Guys his size always assume they can either outman or outgun whatever obstacles cross their path, and they almost never take women like you seriously, despite your ample years of acquired knowledge and invaluable experience. It’s this experience that surmises a bit of antagonism here is inevitable, so you might as well get a head start.

“Yeah well maybe you should check again, big guy,” you glance down at his hands, your first mistake as their sheer size render you speechless and subsequently agitated at yourself for the momentary lapse of visceral lust, but the show must go on, “Make sure those giant, lumbering hands of yours don’t fumble over anything important or you might miss the connection to Isabelle Harding. You see it’s not ‘a type’; it’s revenge.”

“Wh- Bu- I looked through the files. I wouldn’t have missed that,” Fabio insists.

“Oh yeah? Why don’t you type ‘Isabelle Harding’ and ‘1987 school bombing’ into your search bar and see what comes up?” you gesture towards the laptop on their table with a raised brow. Minutes later, both men are dumbfounded by the revelation on the screen, staring between it and you with their mouths agape.

You chuckle silently at their faces, “Don’t worry, there’s no need to thank me. Although you rookies might wanna go home and let the more experienced hunter finish up here.” As you’re about to bid them farewell, you dip back in to add, “Oh and a word of free advice, maybe don’t discuss supernatural monsters quite so loudly in public spaces next time. It might invite unwanted attention.”

With that, you turn around and slap some cash down next to your unfinished waffles, before grabbing your jacket and strutting out the door.

Sam is left in utter confusion. The sudden animosity you had spouted his way seems completely baseless and unwarranted. Had he somehow offended you? Sam generally considers himself a highly respectful and fairly easy-going guy, not quite as hot-blooded as his brother, and thus not as likely to provoke such antipathy from a complete stranger. To make matters worse, he certainly can’t deny that something about you had registered within his subconscious as inexplicably attractive, despite the way you’d embarrassed him. In his flustered and slightly aroused state, it had been all he could do to remain awestruck in his seat and stare blatantly at your ass as you walked away.

The next time Sam sees you is only twelve hours later and no less humiliating. You’re mid-swing in the killing blow against what you had accurately predicted to be a ghoul as he and Dean tumble in. Despite the low lighting, Sam is once again stupefied by your raging beauty, augmented by the incredible skill you’re displaying in a much more physical sense this time around. Before he can drag his eyes away, there’s a collective shout of “watch out!” and suddenly you’re right in front of him. In a blur of events, you somehow manage to push Sam out of the way and successfully decapitate the unexpected second ghoul that had been sneaking up behind him, with only a slice across the arm to show for it.

“Didn’t I tell you two to go home?” You’re panting from the exertion and Sam’s gaze lands on the neckline of your shirt, skewed from the fight and revealing a good amount of cleavage. He quickly averts his eyes. What is happening? Sam can’t remember the last time anyone had evoked such a staggering reaction from him. He feels as if he’s a mere spectator in his own body.

Across from him, you press your hand against the wound and curse when it comes back covered in blood. At your groan of pain, Sam finally finds his voice again, “Shit. I’m so sorry! I don’t know how I missed that other one. I- that normally doesn’t happen.”

“Yeah, I bet that’s what you say to all the girls, huh?” you reply offhand, still a bit out of breath.

It’s easy for Sam to dismiss your mocking given that he feels terribly guilty for being the cause of your injury. From where he’s standing, the cut looks deep. “Here, at least let me stitch it up for you. It’s too awkward a position for you to do it yourself,” he offers, holding out his ginormous hands to you like he’s waving a white flag.

“I think you’ve done enough damage for one day, haven’t you, big guy? At this point, I’d rather Abercrombie over there be the one behind the needle.”

“Who- what?” are the first words Dean speaks since the action has died down.

You turn to face the shorter guy, “Oh don’t look so surprised. You might as well be the model for a slightly older Ken doll. Are you up for it or not?”

Dean’s mouth hangs open as he tries to determine whether he should feel flattered or insulted.

“Uh- actually, I’m better at stitches than my brother,” Sam butts in.

“With those jumbo, fumbling hands? Yeah, sure you are, big guy,” you decline skeptically.

“It’s Sam,” he states through a clenched jaw.

“OK, Sam. Since I just saved your life, you mind making yourself useful and burning those bodies while your bro puts my arm back together? You know, as a ‘thank you’ perhaps?”

Sam is stunned for the third time that day. No one has ever belittled him (whilst gratuitously attacking his size) insofar without any apparent reason. It seems as though his very existence upsets you and the arbitrariness of your contempt has caused an anger to stir beneath him, but beyond that lies bewilderment and irritation. How had he managed to accomplish two such massive mistakes in front of you in the span of so short a time? Perturbed and bitter, Sam silently sets to work on the bodies.

Meanwhile, you’ve come to a surprising realization as Dean begins to cut the fabric of your flannel away from your damaged arm, the name ‘Sam’ and the words ‘my brother’ resounding in your head, “Wait a second- there’s no way… you’re not… the Winchesters, are you? Sam and… Dean?”

“The one and only, sweetheart.” He sends you a dazzling smile that is as perfect as you’d expect, but within his eyes is an underlying poignancy that you recognize as clear as day: an indication of a traumatic past and a lifetime spent plastering on tough veneers. You notice as well how gentle his touch is and how his stitches are practiced and prudent. Perhaps you had judged him too hastily.

Through an incredulous chuckle, you retort, “Well I can’t say I didn’t expect more from you, but at least this’ll get me a free round of drinks at the hunters’ pub tonight.”

Dean laughs with you before sobering at the thought of how his baby brother must be feeling, “Hey listen, take it easy on Sammy, alright? I don’t know what’s gotten into him today but he’s not usually like this. He’s actually the smart one, believe it or not.”

Scoffing, you can’t help but smile back at Dean and soon find an easy rhythm with the older Winchester, despite your awkward introduction.

From several yards away, however, Sam looks wistfully back to see you smiling lightheartedly at something Dean’s said, the two of you huddled in close proximity as his brother’s hands drift across your bare skin. Something akin to envy bubbles within his chest although he’s aware it makes no sense, so with a frown, Sam does his best to shake it off and get back to work.

But it’s not easy to forget you. And just as Sam is beginning to think he’s rid that awful day from his memory, you pop back into his life three months down the line.

“Well, if it isn’t the overgrown hunter extraordinaire Sammy Winchester.” The sarcasm that oozes from your otherwise beguiling voice has him gritting his teeth in no time.

“It’s Sam.”

“So you here to mess up my hunt again, Sam?”

Although he wishes he could have been the bigger man instead of surrendering to the resentment you roused within him, after a couple repeated hatchet burying attempts fall through, Sam just can’t resist the little game you’ve started.

Over the next few months, you and Dean form a fortuitously close bond and the older Winchester develops a habit of calling you up when faced with a troublesome hunt, and vice versa. Despite Sam’s fabricated displeasure, a show he puts on mostly for Dean (since any other emotion would seem illogical given the way you treat him), Sam is peculiarly and begrudgingly excited to see you every time. But the match never ends. In fact, Sam lets it intensify each time you work together, always astounded by how you manage to get him so worked up.

“I’m telling you, it’s a rugaru!”

“Right, because the last time we listened to you, things worked out so well,” you remark sardonically.

“The lore says-“

“Ooh, quoting the lore again now are we, Mr. Know It All?”

At this point, Sam is about as huffy and puffy as the big bad wolf and if he were a cartoon character, there’d surely be steam erupting from his ears. “Look, Y/N, this isn’t about who knows more or who’s right; this is about saving those people’s lives!”

“You think I don’t know that? Was I not the one who saved your life the first time we met?”

“OK, alright, just shut up you two!” Dean finally shouts above you, “Would it kill you to just get along for two seconds?”

“No,” Sam admits.

“Probably,” you say at the same time, causing Sam to shoot you his overly perfected bitch face.

SIX MONTHS LATER

“What the fuck?!” Dean’s booming voice echoes throughout the bunker and moments later you and Sam come flying into the kitchen to answer his call, guns at the ready.

“What? What is it?” you ask while Sam scans the room.

A whimper is the only the way to describe the sound of Dean’s reply, as he points toward an unseen object on the floor. Edging toward him, you lower your gun in the direction of his finger until you discover the source of Dean’s distress.

With a sigh, you look toward Sam who is also exhaling in relief at the sight of the entity in question. The two of you share a moment of wordless conversation before simultaneously dropping your guns with a conclusive nod.

“Why does this feel like déjà vu?” Dean’s tone is still timid and appalled, and you nearly laugh at the idea of a grown-ass man looking so aghast because of a used condom.

“Because it kinda is…” you supply unhelpfully, earning yourself a small glare from the man beside you.

“Dean,” Sam begins with a deep breath, “There’s something we have to tell you… Y/N and I are together.”

The snort that escapes Dean is full-bodied and borderline psychotic, “Yeah, right, and I’m Santa!”

You wait till his snickering subsides, “No, it- it’s true.” Your voice is hesitant yet hopeful, “We’re not joking. We’ve kinda become… a thing.”

“A thing?”

“Yeah, well you know, I don’t wanna have to put a label on it or-“

“Y/N’s my girlfriend,” Sam declares with conviction as he reaches out to curl his long fingers around your waist and lasso you towards him.

“-Buuuut, that is the one I’d use if anyone asks,” you quickly affirm with a stiff pat to your boyfriend’s abdomen, wincing at the unversed attempt of PDA and missing the dimpled grin that crosses Sam’s amused features.

“Well, I don’t buy it. I don’t believe either of you.” Dean’s sturgeon face comes on strong as he shakes his head and points a challenging finger at you, “Kiss him, right now,” he dares with perked brows.

The eye roll you respond with is so dramatic your entire head moves with it. But then, without a moment of pause, you turn your body into Sam’s, reach up to grab the back of his neck and pull him down for a searing kiss. Now this is something you’re well-versed in. The reunion of your lips starts off relatively slow, but it doesn’t take long to escalate into something more fiery that involves tongue, the eager push and pull movements of your bodies, and Sam’s enormous hands cradling your head.

After a moment of shock, Dean objects, “Alright, alright, I get it! That’s enough of that!”

Unwilling to recede just yet, you linger in the kiss for a little longer, delaying your separation by nibbling down on Sam’s lower lip and tugging gently, only releasing it as you pull away torturously slow. When the two of you finally open your languid eyes, it’s to stare into each other’s dilated pupils and ponder the moment for an indiscernible minute.

“What th- I said, I get it! Now could please stop ogling each other before my lunch comes back out the wrong way?!”

But the way Sam’s smiling at you is addictive and you can’t bring yourself to look away until he forces a break by leaning in to plant a tender kiss upon your forehead before tucking you into his side as he faces his brother again.

Dean’s face is covered by his hand, “I’m gonna need a minute. I just-“ His features leap through a range of expressions as he tries to find the right words, “When the hell did this start anyway? I thought you two couldn’t stand each other?”

“Yeahhh, that was mostly an act. Although we bought it at first too,” you explain with a shrug.

“We weren’t pretending the whole time. It just kind of happened and we didn’t really know how else to act around each other by then,” Sam adds.

“Right, basically it turns out there’s a fine line between love and hate... and that line is hardcore yearning.” Your words bring a chuckle to Sam’s lips but his brother still looks out of sorts.

Shaking his head with closed eyes, Dean sighs, “Alright, can someone just explain to me exactly how this happened, because I’m still not computing here. But spare me the details and try to keep it PG-13,” he emphasizes with adamant hand gestures.

“How do you know it’s not PG-13?” you inquire with a held-back laugh.

“Ha. With the way you two were playing tonsil hockey just now, I can tell you’ve been around the bend way more than I wanna know. My little brother doesn’t kiss like that on the first date.”

It’s impossible to hold back a giggle at the memory of your ‘first date’ and the way Sam had kissed you, “OK well, that would be hard, considering the story involves a lot of sex... You wanna give it a go, big guy?” you pass the ball over to Sam with a quirked brow and lowered voice, to which he responds with narrowed eyes and pursed lips, a little warning glance that you’re well aware means ‘save it for the bedroom’ but you simply smirk up at him.

‘Big guy’ used to be a term you called Sam in contempt, but when the feelings between you evolved and a sexual relationship developed, it became an innuendo, such that calling him ‘big guy’ in front of Dean or in public almost always results in glorious sex. In fact, sometimes you believe the nickname has held a slightly obscene connotation for you since the beginning.

Afterall, your carnal longing for him has been present from day one, although at the time you had believed it to be purely physical. Sure, you had dreams about having him in various positions in your bed, but you figured those were merely betrayals of your subconscious mind. That was until one day, a heated argument in a rare moment alone had ended up in a violent make out session, after which the two of you had just barely gotten the last of your clothes back on before Dean walked in. One look at your worked up and frenetic states alongside the disordered condition of your surroundings, and he immediately assumed you’d been fighting again (which wasn’t terribly far from the truth), chortling as he asked if you would have killed each other had he returned a bit later.

With a clearing of his throat, Sam begins to recount the tale, “Uh, well it started in that motel in South Carolina, while you were out getting food…”

“Look, all I’m saying is there is no way he’s using the hospital as a dump site! It’s just not feasible!”

With complete disregard for the peace and quiet of the other residents within this thin-walled motel, you and Sam once again find yourselves in a shouting match.

“Oh right, I forgot! You’re Sam Winchester! How could you POSSIBLY be wrong?! Mister ‘look at me, my IQ and LSAT score match my fucking height! Oh and I also happen to have the physique of an Adonis without even owning a gym membership!’” you roar bitterly, gesticulating with your hands to help better communicate your pent-up indignation.

“Right and you’re Y/N Y/L/N, so how could YOU possibly be wrong? Miss ‘look at me, I never went to college but I’m a genius AND I can kick ass! Oh and I also happen to look effortlessly stunning through it all!’” Sam suddenly seems bigger than ever as he towers over you, that panty-soaking deep voice emanating from his diaphragm and infusing itself throughout the entire room until all you can see, hear, and breathe is Sam.

The fury takes over and you don’t notice your feet taking you closer to him, “Oh yeah because you don’t make EVERYTHING you do look so unnecessarily hot and make me wanna rip your clothes off all the damn time!”

“Fuck! And you don’t always drive me crazy when we have these stupid arguments and your chest starts heaving and you look so insanely delectable I just wanna pick you up and fuck you against the closest surface!” By now, the distance between you is essentially nonexistent and your brain is no longer run by reason.

“So why don’t you then?” are your famous last words, prompting Sam to grab you wildly by the back of a thigh, lifting slightly and driving you to climb up him like a spider monkey fleeing from a grounded predator, while his other hand pushes your hair aside to gain better access to your face. Your mouths clash in a fierce battle and before you know it, Sam’s huge hands are cupping your ass as your legs wrap around his waist and you rut into him, hands flying from his shoulders to his hair. Those divine chestnut locks that you’ve always dreamed of running your fingers through. They’re somehow even softer than you imagined and the revelation, in conjunction with the way Sam’s tongue is becoming increasingly aggressive causes a fresh surge of libidinous energy to rocket through you. As a result, you give his silky strands an irresistible tug and drink in the moan he makes, the sinful sound reverberating straight down to your core as you clench around nothing.

“Wait, wait, wait,” Sam groans as he grudgingly forces himself to pull back as much as he can, “Are you sure? Is this what you want? Cause I can’t- Y/N I won’t be able to stop myself if we keep going.” His eyes squeeze shut as if the notion of stopping or the act of keeping his lips away from yours is causing him genuine pain, and the entire gesture moves you.

“Fuck, you really are the opposite of everything I thought you would be,” you make a quick mental note to apologize later for your initially presumptuous behavior although you can’t find it within yourself to feel any remorse right now, “Yes, please Sam, fuck me. I want you so bad… I think I have since we met and I saw those gorgeous hands of yours,” you confess, biting your lip lightly.

Sam breathes out a low incredulous laugh, “What, these?” he asks, removing one of the aforementioned hands away from your butt to bring it into your line of vision.

“Yes, fuck they’re so big and beautiful and strong and-“

“Alright, I don’t need to know about your weird hand fetish!” Dean hollers abruptly, rubbing his fingers across his eyes as if he could somehow erase the image of you and his brother together out of his retinas. “OK, but that was like… four months ago. You mean you’ve been sneaking around behind my back this whole time?”

“Well at first we didn’t want to tell you because we weren’t even sure what it was ourselves,” you divulge.

“Yeah, we didn’t want to try to explain something that we didn’t understand yet,” Sam supplements, hoping his brother will understand the motive behind your secrecy.

You nod along, “But then… it got a little harder to hide.”

The apprehension behind Dean’s emerald eyes is unmistakable as he reluctantly inquires, “That’s why this felt like déjà vu?”

It’s with a grimace that you reply, hesitantly, “Remember the time you found those panties in the backseat of the Impala?”

Dean’s eyes grow comically wide and Sam ducks his head in preparation of what’s to come.

“Yeah, there’s a story behind that…”

The click of her heels against the porcelain-tiled foyer irritates you as the three of you stride through her front door. You’re posing as detectives sent to question this overdressed young woman about her late husband, but the moment she lays her eyes on Sam, you reckon she’s forgotten her beloved’s damn name.

“Oh my… lord and savior. Well aren’t you a tall drink of water?” she beholds breathlessly with a seductive bite of her painted ruby lips.

You cough loudly and Dean sniggers, thinking you’re annoyed about Sam getting such commendation and attention during a serious case.

“I know this might be the grief talking, but I would climb you like a tree,” she purrs, sauntering up to Sam with an exaggerated sway of her hips. With her half-lidded doe eyes adorned with dark, fluttery lashes and low, sultry voice, you have to admit she’s quite attractive.

Grinding your teeth as your nails dig into your palms, you glower at the woman unreservedly. She, however, takes no notice, running her hands along Sam’s forearms before gripping at his bicep to lead him toward her living room. “Please, come have a seat, detective. You can ask me whatever you want.” The wink she appends is somehow the final nail in the coffin.

It’s with zero hesitation that you feign the reception of a notification on your phone before declaring, “Oh would you look at that, the uh… Sheriff needs us back at the station, Sam. He says it’s urgent.” You try to keep your tone even, thankful that you all maintained your real first names for these aliases, “Dean, you’re good to conduct this interview on your own, right?” Without waiting for an answer, you trample over to snatch Sam’s other arm and ignoring the horny widow’s gaping mouth, proceed to haul him away.

Dean sends you a strange look but relents, “Uh, yeah I guess, OK.”

As soon as the door closes behind you, your hand shifts down to lace your fingers with Sam’s, marching him towards the Impala with a staunch and mighty purpose. Even Sam’s elongated legs stumble to keep up.

“So uh… when did you give the Sheriff your number?” There’s an edge in his voice that normally disappears when it’s just the two of you.

“Wha- I didn’t. Sam, I just made all that up,” you tell him as you reach the car and open its back door. Pushing Sam inside, you climb in swiftly after him, wasting no time as you straddle his thighs and begin to undress him, only pausing when he looks up at you in adorable, puppy-like confusion.

“Wait, what? Then what are we doing?”

That’s when it finally dawns on you, “Hold on a sec, were you… jealous?” You can’t help but smile, finding it amusing that he’s stewing in his own envy after what you just witnessed.

“No, I just- He was kinda all over you this morning.”

“You mean like the way Mrs. My-Husband-Just-Died-But-I-Wanna-Climb-You-Like-a-Tree was in there?”

“Oh, that’s what this is about?” Sam perks up, the hint of a smug grin ghosting across his lips.

“She was practically holding your hand!”

“That’s what bothered you the most?” He dips his head to catch your eyes and those variegated irises burn into you with an intense, questioning gaze, alight with mischievous curiosity.

“They’re my hands to hold,” you contend with a pout, subconsciously clenching your thighs around his as you seize one of his large hands with two of your much smaller ones, “Just like you’re my tree to climb.”

Sam’s head falls back in bright laughter, “I thought you said they were ‘oversized’ and ‘ungainly’?” he teases, quoting your previous slights.

“You know I only said that cause Dean was there.”

“I’m pretty sure you called them ‘fumbly’ and ‘lumbering’ the first time we met.”

Staring at his fingers as you play with them, you shiver at the memory of how they feel all over you. “That was cause I used to think all hunters with a Y chromosome were cocky, misogynistic assholes who needed to be knocked down a peg or two.”

“But I proved you wrong, right?”

“Fuck yes you did. So, so wrong. And now you’re mine, and I don’t like seeing other people touch what’s mine,” you growl before returning to your earlier task of removing his clothes, pouncing on him when your fingers finally land on bare skin. You kiss him fiercely, swallowing his surprised grunts with glee, and as his hands start travelling from your hips up to your back, holding you tight against him, your lips move down to his pulse point, sucking, licking, and nibbling, “Mine.”

“Fucking Jesus Christ on a cracker! You goddamn rabbits!” Dean squawks in protest as he begins to pace the floor, “Have you no decency?! And in my poor Baby! While I was busy doing all the work, saving lives!”

You roll your eyes at his melodramatics and can feel the tension in Sam’s abdominal muscles as he attempts to restrain his laughter. As if Dean had never taken a break during a case for a stress-relieving quickie before, or hadn’t been at least somewhat grateful to be left alone with a beautiful woman.

His next comment confirms your point, “Although, if I remember correctly that lady was a fox.” After a brief pondering pause and an introspectively appreciative smirk, Dean’s whining resumes, “But seriously! I can’t believe you two! Here I was feeling bad for forcing you to work and live together, hoping you’d eventually learn to get along when this whole time you were shacking up like animals and casually defiling my Baby just because what? Some girl touched Sam’s hand?!”

Feeling emboldened by the catharsis of this long-overdue airing of your dirty laundry, you decide to add to Dean’s exasperation, “Yeah and in the spirit of honesty, that might’ve happened more than once.” Sam tries to hold back his snort as he gives your hip a playful cautionary squeeze while Dean’s feet come to a full stop as he turns to give you a death glare. “Hey, it’s not my fault all the pretty girls like Samuel! And I’m pretty sure we wiped her down after.”

“I don’t even-“ Dean purses his lips and quirks his head with a dynamic expression of unbearable vexation, “You better be getting me pie every day of the week for what you did.“ He takes a deep breath before circling back, “Wait, OK so you’re telling me that a used condom ended up in our kitchen because- what? You two couldn’t keep it in your pants long enough to find a bed? You know what, forget I asked. I don’t wanna know. Did you at least sanitize the place after?? No, of course you didn’t, you left a fucking condom on the floor… I think I’m gonna throw up.”

But you hardly hear Dean’s rambling because you and Sam are far too wrapped up in each other, smiling as you recall the events of that morning.

Your eyes slowly drift open to find the most exalting sight in all the world: Sam Winchester’s sleeping face, blissful and serene. Lifting a hand to gingerly cup his cheek, the corners of your mouth curl up when he leans into your touch. It’s moments like this that make you wish you could wake up next to him every morning.

Only after you’ve traced his every feature and planted a soft kiss where his dimple would be if he were awake and smiling, do you carefully peel yourself from his side, slipping out of his hold as you quietly climb out of bed. Sam rolls over a bit and you freeze with bated breath, watching as his big arm extends out in your direction as if trying to reach for you in his sleep, before stilling again.

Mornings like this are rare and you want him to soak up all the restful sleep he can. Once you’re sure you haven’t woken him, you scan the room for something to cover your naked figure, until your eyes land on the flannel he’d worn the night before. Picking it up, you bring it to your nose and inhale deeply to revel in the residual scent of Sam. Another glimpse at his peaceful, sleeping form has you smiling fondly. God, you are such a goner for that man. It’s becoming hard to reserve your soft looks toward him for private moments alone.

You can barely remember how it happened, but over time, you’d come to learn that Sam is nothing like you originally imagined him to be. He’s kind-hearted and open-minded, the type of soul that can find hope and beauty in even the darkest of places, a far cry from the shallow macho man silhouette you’d expected him to fill. In fact, Sam routinely defies the expectations others have enforced upon him, proving his worth time and time again as he’s persisted through some of what must be the toughest challenges to ever face a single human. Yet through it all, his spirit remains intact, never once yielding to cynicism or resentment or apathy or even the building of walls as you and Dean have resorted to. He is truly the bravest man you know and infinitely more competent than your first fluke of a hunt with him had mistakenly suggested, both in the field and in bed.

Shaking the thoughts from your head, you wrap yourself in plaid and head out the door. Dean never questions your use of Sam’s shirts because ever since Sam firmly insisted on giving you his flannel after your second encounter with them resulted in Dean cutting your own top apart, you’ve grown into a habit of borrowing Sam’s clothes. You always claim they’re more comfortable than your own and Sam’s feigned annoyance over you ‘stealing’ his belongings tides Dean right over.

Half an hour passes before Sam approaches the bunker kitchen to find you with your back towards the entrance, busy prepping breakfast in nothing but his plaid. He pauses in the doorway to stare at you for a minute, licking his lips with an irrepressible smile. For some, this may seem like a stereotypical morning after, but for a couple of hunters, it feels like a dream come true.

After finally returning to the bunker last night following the completion of a series of successful hunts, you’ve got no solid obligations and very little on your to-do lists today, although Sam’s got more than a few ideas about how to pass the time, and a couple more come to mind when you stretch up on your toes to reach for something, causing the hem of his shirt to glide up until its corner reveals just slightest hint of your incredible ass. Sam can’t suppress his little grunt of approval, which catches your attention and makes you turn your head, peering back at him over your shoulder.

You smirk at the blessed view of him standing there in nothing but the pair of thin grey sweatpants you’d bought him a month ago when you discovered the viral online phenomenon, “Hey, big guy. You just gonna stand there and gawk or do you wanna make yourself useful and grab another plate from the top shelf?”

Chuckling at your false animosity, Sam stalks toward you, “Good morning to you too.” One of his vast hands falls upon your hip as he presses the maximum possible length of his body into your back side, while his other hand reaches up over your head to snatch the plate you’d asked for.

“Good morning indeed,” you concur with a silent gasp when you feel the generous bulge in his pants.

“Oh that’s not morning, baby girl,” Sam husks into your ear, “That’s all you.” His powerful arms slink around you and his lips find their way down the side of your neck, lingering in that tender spot just behind your ear whilst you tilt your head and close your eyes, contentedly surrendering yourself to the moment. “I ever tell you how good you look in my shirts?”

Wiggling your butt back to tease him a bit, you’re pleased with the hiss it elicits. “No, but you made it very clear how bad I look in Dean’s,” you counter playfully.

The man behind you scoffs, “I didn’t say you looked bad; you could never look bad. I just… don’t like seeing you wear his clothes.”

“Oh, I know,” you turn around in his arms, “I just don’t understand how Dean doesn’t know yet. I mean, I think you’ve been very obvious.”

“And you haven’t?”

“I’m not the one who leaves hickeys in very visible places all over your body!”

Sam’s eyes glaze over in lust, an idea clearly forming in his head as he glances down at you. “Dean’s a hot-blooded guy; he needs to know you’re off-limits,” he alleges before attacking your throat with his mouth.

“So why don’t we just tell him?”

Without pausing his efforts, Sam reminds you, “Because you said you thought it was kinda hot, all the sneaking around. Mmpf, and because you said you wanted to see how long it would take him to figure it out.”

You nod while running your fingers through his silken strands and leaning back to give him more purchase, “That’s true. But in my defence, we always have this conversation when we’re doing stuff like this and I can’t think straight when your hands and mouth are on me.”

“Kinda like how I can’t think straight when you’re wearing nothing but my shirt?” His kisses travel down from your neck to your collarbone and shoulder as he slides his loosely buttoned flannel off to one side, “Fuck, you’ve got me so hard.”

Without warning, Sam seizes your waist and hoists you into the air as if gravity were an absolute joke, before plopping you down on the edge of the steel counter, his thumbs digging lightly into your ribcage.

“Sam! This is where we eat!” you protest with a laugh.

“Exactly. Which is why I’m gonna devour you here.” He dives back into your neck, continuing his work on a little pink mark that’s already beginning to form.

“Oh fuck… Wait, what if Dean walks in?” It’s through a great struggle that you manage to push him back an inch.

“He’s got a date with the Impala. He’ll be in the garage all day, trust me.” Sam’s gaze sweeps over your body suggestively, “Now are you gonna let me taste what’s mine?”

With an equally lewd survey of his extensive frame, you reply, “As long as you let me impale myself on what’s mine later.”

His eyes darken and the way he’s looking at you like you’re the only person he’s ever wanted ignites a confidence within you, so in a rather swift motion, you grasp him by the shaft through his sweatpants – the delicious groan he emits at your touch is enough to turn your pussy into a slip and slide – and pull him back towards you until the clothed length of him is resting against your folds and your noses brush, while his hands settle naturally on your thighs.

Shivering, your breath stutters and for an instant you can do nothing but bask in the closeness of him. Sam seems to enjoy it too because he closes his eyes as he rests his forehead against yours with an elated sigh. For the second time today, you marvel at his beauty, whispering a string of gasping kisses along his lower eye socket and exquisite cheekbone, simply dying to breathe him in. All of him is so immaculate and sublime. Each time the two of you reconvene, you want to savor every fucking inch of him, but there are a lot of inches, so the task often overwhelms you. Still, you must try. Locking your ankles behind him, you use your legs to pull him even further into you and the friction makes you lose your mind.

“Fuck, baby girl, you keep that up I’ll be making a mess in my pants,” Sam grunts with his lips upon your cheek.

Your breathless laughter fills the air, thinking of the stain you've undoubtedly already left on his charming grey sweatpants. Nimble as he is, Sam takes advantage of your open mouth and plunges his tongue inside. After so much preamble, the kiss is heavy and full of need. When the pressure of his lips pushes your head back, your hands fly to his wrists for the sake of your balance.

From there, they journey upward across his vascular forearms to his bulging triceps, fondling his massive shoulders before sliding along his traps and up the gorgeous length of his perfect neck, until you finally reach the treasure trove of his impeccable locks. You tangle your fingers into the lush mane and yank, gently but zealously, making Sam growl into your mouth. His voice is the hottest thing you’ve ever heard and the sounds he makes always drive you insane.

Never breaking the kiss, Sam’s colossal moose paws roam up to your back as he slowly lays you down on the counter, his member somehow still notched at your entrance and the new angle rousing a quiet moan from you. When he ultimately pulls away, you pitch forward to chase after his lips, but Sam only grants you a devilish grin and a quick peck to the corner of your mouth before moving down to your jaw and neck. While one palm kneads at your breast through his shirt, the other begins pushing and pulling at fabric to uncover more of your skin for his wandering lips.

“Sam! Augh!” you cry out as your head falls back.

“I got you, baby. I’m all yours. Gonna make you feel so good.” As if to attest his words, he rolls his hips into yours and a needy whimper escapes you. With your fingers still twisted in his hair, Sam leaves no part of you untouched as his mouth travels down your body. But upon reaching your navel, he pauses, those vivid, color-changing eyes peeping up at you to check for any signs of discomfort or objection. Finding none, his thick tongue pokes out to lick a deliriously winding path from your belly button to your exposed clit. Then, pushing down tenderly on the insides of your knees to open you up to him, Sam directs you one last look that is both hungry and reverent, “I still can’t believe this is mine.”

Dean had stopped you halfway through your recollection, but it appears that was still too much for him, “What did I do to deserve this?! I feel like I need to go bathe in holy water for a week.”

You and Sam both open your mouths to respond but Dean cuts you off vehemently, “Ba-da-da-da!” His vocalized outcry is complete with animated gestures featuring an accusing index finger. “OK, before you two tell me another traumatizing story, that’s enough of the who, what, when, where, and how… I just need to know why. I mean, is this- are you- …?”

Sensing the protective wheels turning in his head, you decide to put Dean out his misery, “I’m not just with Sam because he’s an incredible lay if that’s what you’re wondering. We can skip the fatherly ‘what are your intentions’ talk. Yes, Dean, I am in love with your little brother… although ‘little’ is not exactly the word I’d use to describe him.”

“Sammy, could you please control your woman?”

“My woman?” Sam sounds mostly amused but you’re almost certain you can hear a hint of pride in his voice.

“Yeah, I admit I’m surprised I didn’t see it until now. You two are kinda oddly perfect for each other, you know, in a weird, kinky way.”

“To be honest, we’re pretty surprised too. I mean, he doesn’t look it but this guy is kind of territorial,” you quip whilst cocking a thumb in Sam’s direction.

“I don’t need to- Wait a minute, so all those bruises you told me were from hunts?” Dean’s eyebrows soar towards his hairline.

Chewing on your lip, you confirm his hypothesis with a miniscule nod.

“Yeah well that time you saw my back,” Sam chimes in vengefully, casting you a handsome grin full of mischief as he reveals, “that wasn’t a werewolf, that was Y/N.”

With eyes as round as dinner plates, Dean frantically shuts you both down, “OK, that’s it. Torture Dean time is over. I don’t wanna hear any more about your depraved sex lives! Look, I guess I’m happy for you guys, although mostly cause I don’t have to play referee anymore, but I’m gonna need you to follow some ground rules around here. Like rule number one! No sex in public places!” he starts counting with his fingers, “Always put a sock on it when you’re busy! And most importantly, no sex in Baby!”

Your laughter follows Dean as he wearily saunters out of the kitchen, an exhausted expression on his face. Turning to your newly outed boyfriend, you petition excitedly, “Does this mean we can have shower sex now?”

“Not while I’m around!” comes Dean’s snappy answer.

In contrast, Sam gives you the same look he did on that dreamy morning, “Oh trust me baby girl, I’m gonna get you wet somehow.”

“Still within hearing distance! I think I liked it better when you guys were at each other’s throats.”

As you’re giggling, Sam leans down to whisper in your ear, “For the record, I’m in love with you too.” And just like that, you’re tempted to re-enact your previous kitchen escapades.

TEAM IDJITS: @mrswhozeewhatsis @carryonmywaywardbucky @swiftlymoniquesblog @moosewinchester @sams-sass @thinkinghardhardlythinking @jotink78 @winifrede @writingforthelonelysoul @turtletaylor98 @lyarr24 @deanwanddamons @peridottea91 @tvdspngirl314

TEAM MOOSE: @paulaern

if you’d like to be added (or removed) please let me know!

#sam winchester x reader #mads300madones #333 badass followers #spnfluffbingo2021 #Girl Next Door's Make Me Feel Bingo #sam x reader #sam winchester x female!reader #sam winchester smut #enemies to lovers #sam winchester fluff #secret dating #sam winchester x you #sam x y/n #spn #supernatural fanfic #fanfiction #my writing #text

805 notes · View notes

centralsaints · 3 years ago

Text

mcl headcanon masterpost pt.1 - armin

let's start this off with my long term favourites; the twins. this is armin's part, and alexy is next!

will start this with his full name being armin frederic lemaire

if you name a joint, he has probably dislocated it at least once in his life. he’s always been hypermobile, having chronic pain (mistaken as growing pains) and fatigue, being prone to dislocation. that later becomes a diagnosis of hypermobile ehlers-danlos syndrome.

that makes him also prone to getting migraines and headaches regularly, explaining the whole hating bright lights thing

he has had an eating disorder on and off since he was about 15; partly diagnosed, he meets the criteria for OSFED, so his ed is a bit. weird and all over the place. it’s mostly periods of restriction with a fear/disgust of food, followed by periods of binging and eating more or less normally. he’s closer to atypical bulimia, in terms of specifics, because the binge/purge episodes aren’t that frequent. he went inpatient once, and still jokes about how he was the only guy there. only his family knows about his eating issues as of now.

another thing about the ed is that it was already kind of in the making when alexy had his unaliving attempt, but that was really what kickstarted it all.

around UL, with nathaniel going absolutely off the fucking rails, armin and amber struck an odd friendship. they both could clock the other on their fucked up eating issues, but neither said anything for a long time, until amber did. they agreed to try and recover together.

his favourite pokemon type is ghost (thank you anon, idk anything about pokemon but i wanted to include this)

he plays animal crossing with kentin (who doesn’t like admitting that he plays it because it’s very relaxing for him) and jade.

he’s a gemini sun, cancer rising, libra moon, same as alexy.

he has add (adhd inattentive type) and his most common stims are bouncing his leg and chewing his pens. his object permanence is also absolute shit, if its out of sight, it doesn’t exist.

he doesn’t untie his shoes when taking them off or putting them on, and has ruined many perfectly good pairs of shoes that way.

he has made tik toks starring rocket the ferret

his playlists are lo-fi music, video games and movie soundtracks, and like. twenty one pilot.

his nose is crooked from when he broke it around 11 years old

he also bruises really easily (mostly due to his EDS) and his legs are always covered in various bruises. he’s also very clumsy, which doesn’t help

he doesn’t like alcohol; he doesn’t like the taste, the way it makes him feel and the aftermath; it doesn’t take much to affect him and he’ll sleep for an entire day. but he’ll sometimes drink in social situation just to not feel left out.

he’s bisexual. the less obvious stuff; what’s his type?? I know having a “type” isn't really a thing and u like who u like. with that said i think hed like slightly androgynous looking girls (soft spot for shaved heads. its soft;;), girls who are very very feminine but in an out of the ordinary way (think lolita, hyper pop fem vibe, goth girls in corsets, etc), guys who work out (he has a weakness for back muscles), in general people who stand out in a crowd be it with their appearance, style or their attitude

no i still have absolutely no idea how he would come out. i think he probably didn’t. he just started talking about it naturally, because it wasn’t a big deal. i think one day, either his mom or alexy made jokes about oh, when would he finally take this one cute girl on a date, and he just said, or maybe it’ll be a boy. it just happened like that

ref post for his fashion sense

he can do a killer winged liner. look, man’s into cosplay, of course he can.

he’s played mystic messenger ironically at first and then ended up actually liking it

he actually can draw, because he spent all middle school drawing anime characters in all his notebooks

he always sits kind of awkwardly (proof is the episode 12 illustration lmao) because 1. bi people can’t sit right (source: me) and 2. he’s just. really lanky and has long limbs and doesn’t really know what to do with all of it

this one is from an anon last year: “I have this weird hc about the twins. Alexy sleeps with like a million pillows and blankets , while Armin tries to sleep with pillows but throws it out every time even though he's asleep.” and i love it. he also probably sleep in very weird positions which leads to him waking up hurting a lot of the time

he also has a weighted blanket that he and alexy kind of just. get turns using when they both still live at their parents house. it helps armin’s pain, and alexy’s overstimulation issues. when they leave, armin gets the weighted blanket

armin has a dimple on his right cheek when he smiles

he helped alexy dye his hair until they moved out and started living separately

he has his driving license, but alexy doesn’t

he’s scared of dogs (he probably met demon at one point bc i like him and cas being friends, and he was so nervous about it, poor boy

he likes taking ice cold shower in the evening because the cold water and then sinking in a warm bed make him sleepy and actually helps him fall asleep

he probably played dnd at one point

he smokes ouid occasionally, at first it was recreational, but it kind of helped with his joint pain so

i think this is all of them? i might be missing a few ones i never wrote out or that are buried in my files but i honestly don't feel like going through the dozen unfinished fics and compilation documents that mention armin in my drive or i would still be here next year

#my candy love #mcl #mcl armin #long post #mcl headcanon

83 notes · View notes

sisterspooky1013 · 3 years ago

Text

Only One Choice, Part 2, Chapter 3

Read it here on AO3 / Tagging @today-in-fic

Winter soldiers on, the cold and occasional snow giving way to the promise of spring. Her birthday comes and goes, celebrated at her mother’s with her family as it had been before there was someone else to lay claim to her time on special days. The vacant spaces in her apartment that had been occupied by Ethan’s books and clothes, his toiletries, and VHS collection, begin to be filled by evidence of her new, single life. Her solitary toothbrush in the cup by the sink starts to look normal, the indent on her finger where his ring lived begins to fade, and the silence she arrives home to at the end of her workday becomes mundane instead of painful. Though this change was initiated and welcomed by her, change is always hard. She goes through the motions of being okay until one day in early April, she realizes that she is. The budding crocuses bring with them the optimism of a new life, another chance. A third chance, as it were, to get it right. Now she only has to figure out what right is.

Though they’ve always been close, she and Missy become even closer, taking up the space in each other’s lives that would otherwise be consumed by boyfriends or lovers. They are each other’s better half, sharing the minutiae of their workdays and staying available for unexpected illness or the need to move heavy furniture. While every human needs other humans to thrive, the Scully sisters fill that need with each other, shunning the idea of casual dating simply for the sake of companionship. There is no companion more perfect than the one who has known you since before you could understand the need for such a partner in life, and who is by your side not out of obligation, but because their soul is stitched so firmly to your own. They have always pledged their dedication to each other through thick and thin, and the new year of 1997 proves that to be a sincere promise on both their parts.

As such, they sit at their favorite local coffee shop on Sunday afternoon when Missy finally dares to ask her sister the question she’s avoided for the past four months. Not because she was afraid of her reaction, but because she knew Dana wasn’t ready to talk about it.

“Have you heard from Mulder at all?” she asks so casually that Dana flicks her eyes up and stares in disbelief, not sure that she heard her right.

“What?” Dana asks, her heart having lept for one single beat at the mention of his name.

“Mulder. Have you had any contact with him, or seen him?” Missy is misleadingly casual, acting as though this is not a question she’s been waiting months to ask.

“No,” Dana says flatly, her eyes dropping down to her coffee cup. “I wouldn’t expect to.”

“Does he know that you and Ethan split?” Missy asks next, her feet folded underneath her in the oversized armchair.

“I don’t see how he would,” Dana posits.

“Have you considered reaching out to him?” Missy tries, watching her sister for signs that she is going to shut the conversation down.

Dana shakes her head glumly. “After what I put him through, I’m sure I’m the last person he wants to hear from. That was nearly nine months ago, he’s probably long since moved on.”

“Have you? Moved on?”

Dana pulls in a deep breath and lets it out slowly. “I don’t know how to answer that. What does it mean, to move on?”

“Do you still think about him?” No assertions, just gentle questions, leading her sister to the conclusion she knows she needs to come to.

Dana nods softly. “All the time. Every day.”

“Then I think your answer would be no. You should contact him, Dana. It feels like unfinished business.” Missy has a thing about unfinished business. She believes it prevents you from achieving your full potential in life.

“Missy...what would I even say? ‘Sorry I broke your heart, good news is it didn’t even work out so it was all for nothing’? I don’t want to cause him more pain than I already have.” Her tone is resigned and defeated. Another regret she will come to live with, pinned to her lapel with a collection of other mistakes that she can never quite atone for.

Missy shrugs. “You know what I think. The rest is up to you.”

Missy is right. The trouble is, she doesn't trust herself to make these decisions anymore. She’s proven to herself that she doesn’t know how to make the right one.

———

“Excuse me,” a rough, nasally voice calls from behind her. She turns to see a red nosed young man in the doorway of the pathologist’s office, slumped against the doorframe with watery eyes. “I’m here to pick up an autopsy report, for, um...I think it’s Richards or something.”

Scully has worked with this courier before, and compared to his typical demeanor it’s easy to tell that he’s unwell.

“Are you alright?” she asks as she uses her feet to push her rolling chair over to the file cabinet, retrieving the report in question.

“Uh, not really, no. But if I call out sick one more time I’m gonna get canned.” He leans his head against the cool metal of the doorframe. She suspects he’s feverish.

“You don’t look well enough to work. Where is this headed?” she asks, still holding the file in her hand.

The young man blows out a stream of air and she holds her breath for a moment, not wanting to inhale whatever he’s infected with. He pulls a slip of paper from his pocket. “Hoover Building, Behavioral Science Unit. Agent Kissop.” He stuffs the paper back in his pocket and looks around, taking refuge in the extra chair near the end of her desk.

She feels a little flutter in her belly; what are the odds?

“I’ll tell you what,” she begins, “I was just about to head out for the day and I live in Georgetown, so I’m going that way anyway. Can I drop this off for you? You don’t look well enough to drive and I’d hate to see you on the news in the morning if you cause an accident.”

He sighs deeply, the biggest display of excitement he can muster. “Are you sure? I’d really appreciate it,” he says, his eyelids barely maintaining half-mast.

“No problem at all,” she replies, gathering her coat and purse. “You get home and take some Tylenol, okay? And get some rest.”

He nods weakly and she leaves him there, climbing into her car with the file and a pounding heart. She can’t help but feel like this is a sign. She’s been thinking about signs a lot lately, and she’s recently resolved to start paying attention to them.

———

Mulder stands beside the copy machine, doing his Wednesday afternoon ritual of fighting with the toner cartridge and cursing profusely. From around the corner, he can hear AD Kirkbride drumming up his own song of profanity, which is more of a daily ritual than a weekly one.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Kirkbride is shouting. “Now that dipshit is conning goddamn doctors into doing his pathetic job?”

Another much softer voice answers him, but Mulder can’t quite make out the words. He moves closer to the open door, bored enough to bother eavesdropping and seeing which of his colleagues is going to get their ass handed to them today.

“Yeah, I’m sure he is sick, that fucking lowlife. He’s sick every fucking week, it’s always something with him!”

“Sir, I don’t know what the history is between you and the courier,” answers the other voice, and it’s familiar in a way that makes him stop in his tracks, his stomach clutching in a mix of nervousness and excitement. “Can you direct me to Agent Kissop, please? Then I’ll be on my way and you can work it out with the courier service.”

It’s Scully. It’s her, he’s sure. He’s been dreaming of that voice for months, the soft sibilant S’s and the way her plush lips rest against her adorable overbite. Without thinking, he enters Kirkbride’s office and sees her standing in front of his desk with a file in her hand and an exasperated look on her face.

“Scully?” he asks, and she turns to him. Her hair is a bit longer, now just past her shoulders, and she’s wearing black slacks and a white blouse. She’s as beautiful as ever, maybe even more than he remembered. She doesn’t look all that surprised to see him. If anything, she looks relieved. Emotion boils up in his chest immediately and he feels his throat constrict.

“You know her?” Kirkbride asks, gesturing to Scully, and Mulder nods. “Great, then show her where Kissop sits so I can call the fucking courier service and tell them to fire that lazy asshat before I strangle him.”

Scully walks towards him and he turns wordlessly to show her out of Kirkbride’s office and down the hall to where Kissop sits. His heart is beating slowly but firmly, his pulse resounding in his ears. What is she doing here? Did she come here to see him? And if so, why? When they arrive at Kissop’s desk, Scully hands her the file and they exchange words that Mulder doesn’t bother to listen to. Then Scully looks at him hesitantly and slowly turns to walk away, towards the exit. He feels suspended, unsure if he can believe his own eyes that she is really here, and entirely conflicted over what to do about it if she is. He’s spent nine months trying to forget her, but she’s as real and alive as ever, standing before him. His self-protective instinct says to let her go, but his heart says to run after her.

“Quit standing here like a dumbass and go talk to her,” Kissop orders him, clearly picking up on some tension though she doesn’t have the faintest idea what’s causing it.

Shaken from his daze, Mulder follows Scully into the hallway.

“Scully,” he calls out, and she stops walking but doesn’t turn around. When he catches up to her, he touches her shoulder and she turns to face him with wet eyes.

They stand there for a moment, looking at one another, an expectant feeling hanging over them. He wants to touch her, to feel the press of her body against his again, but he doesn’t dare. That would seem like a relapse, of sorts.

“Would you have coffee with me?” she finally speaks, her voice small and unsure. It’s an invitation she is not at all confident he will accept.

“Okay,” he answers, and they walk out of the building side by side, silently.

They seem to understand without saying so that Mulder will lead them to where they ought to go, which is a little cafe called Burial Grounds just a block from the front doors of the Hoover Building. They stand in line stoically, tension crackling between them like static as they order something that will occupy their hands and give them a safe place to avert their eyes while they talk. They sit at a small table near the door and wait, glimpsing at each other’s faces and then away, summoning courage. Because this was at Scully’s invitation, it seems like she should have the floor.

“Ethan and I aren’t together anymore,” she finally blurts out, and his first instinct is to look at her hand, which is indeed bare of any jewelry. Next he looks at her face, considering her expression and whether she takes this to be good news or bad. She looks pained, but not about what she’s just said. She’s had this look on her face since he first spotted her in Kirkbride’s office. He’s unsure if he should be offering congratulations or condolences, and irritated that he’s being put in the position to figure it out, so he says nothing.

“I’m sure that I’m just about the last person you want to see,” she continues, her ocean irises tracing the logo printed on her cup. It wasn’t a question, but if it were he’d tell her that she’s the only person he wants to see, the only one he ever thinks about. The reason he can’t sleep and, when he does, the only thing he dreams about. “If it’s okay, there are some things I’d like to say to you. I understand if you don’t want to hear them.”

She flicks her eyes up to meet his for a moment and he nods softly, keeping his expression neutral. She returns her gaze to the skull and crossbones bearing the name of the coffee shop.

“I have always believed that life is about making the right choices. That we are presented with an ongoing series of options, opportunities and situations, and that we are tasked with determining the right choice that will put us on the path towards the best possible life. But as of late,” she pauses to take a sip of her coffee, stealing a glance at him before she continues, “I’ve come to believe that there is actually only one choice. One path we’re supposed to be on, and there are signs along the way to pay attention to. The choices might not always make sense at the time, but in the grand scheme of things, they are the ones you need to make in order to have the best possible life. Or the right life, the one you’re supposed to have.”

She pauses and slides her hand across the table, covering his with her own. The soft warmth of her skin electrifies him a little, sending a flush to his belly. She brings her eyes up to meet his, her brows knit with emotion as her chin gently puckers. She’s so beautiful it physically hurts.

“I ignored the signs,” she says tightly. “I made the wrong choice, Mulder. I thought I was doing the right thing, the best thing, but I was wrong. I’m so sorry that I hurt you.”

He feels his chest tighten, a telltale precursor to tears, and he looks away from her. Why is she doing this? To make herself feel better? She pulls her hand back and sniffs, then stands and slings her purse over her shoulder.

“Thank you for having coffee with me,” she says, and then he watches her leave. He sits there, staring at the pink lipstick that stains the rim of her cup, wishing she’d given him some more time to absorb it all. Wishing she’d never made the wrong choice.

#the x files #txf #dana scully #fox mulder #gillovny #msr #sculder #x files #x files fanfic #alternate universe

44 notes · View notes

arrivisting · 4 years ago

Note

I’d love author commentary on basically the whole scene at Ekkaia in all my war is done (or any individual part of that scene, if your prefer). Taken together, it’s one of the most beautiful and emotionally complex and heartrending things you’ve written, from the description of the sea itself, to the difficulties of Fingon and Alqualondë, to Gil and the ocean and his ‘mother’, to Fingon and Gil beginning to tackle the thorny subect of Maedhros.

I should admit something about all my war is done: it's the most fugue-like my writing has ever been. I jotted down a few notes on my commute into work - I was deeply underwater with my PhD at the time, three months away from submitting - and then the idea of writing a sequel to scion seized me so profoundly that I sat down in the Starbucks where my bus stops, took out my laptop, and wrote instead of just collecting my coffee and walking down to my office. I wrote 15k. In one day. In about five or six hours. I've never achieved anything like that before or since - I do have good days where I can knock 2-4k out easily, but not 15k. (You might note that the posted part of all my war is done is only 12k, but I wrote all the way up into the next bit with Fingon in Tirion that you've read, up until Turgon at the dinner table). I didn't sit down or plan events; I didn't actually know much about what would happen: but I knew they were going to Ekkaia and they'd have some kind of resolution there. These are my phone-notes, from that morning:

You can see, I think, something of the way an idea hits me. I note down a few snatches of plot, not necessarily in any order, some lines I think people should say at some point, although I might not use them, sketch out some things (Formenos's ruins were going to feature more heavily, but they're waiting for a later story).

(It makes me laugh, the words my phone doesn't accept - Gil-galad, for one - and the ones it automatically capitalises from where I've yelled enthusiastically about elf things at people. I never stop long enough to correct spelling etc when I'm trying to get something down).

I clearly knew from inception that I wanted Fingon's place to be called the hill of waiting, and had tried out the name in Sindarin; because my verbs are not good, I came up with Amon Dartha. It was when I was redrafting that I realised Amon Darthir had existed actually in Dor-lomin(!!!) and the name was even more perfect symbolically than I'd meant it to be! Did I know that, unconsciously? I don't know.

You can see, too, that the Sea of Ekkaia was almost the very first point to hit me, and that I knew it and the scene there would be important, and that I knew that the story was about Fingon finding a way to tell Gil-galad that he had been loved, and wanted, and that meant talking about Maedhros; and that at the end I wanted Gil-galad to be gently, impersonally, firmly clear that he would not, could not, be staying to wait with Fingon.

Okay, DVD commentary proper - I'm sorry, I remember awfully little about writing this, given the fugue state and my thesis and everything, so I'm not sure how useful this will be!

“Oh,” said Gil-galad when they broke out of the woods and began to ride down over the dune-lands to the rocky shore. “Oh!”

The Sea of Ekkaia was beautiful, in its own way, but that way that was like no other place in Arda, in either Aman or Middle Earth.

It was a dark-blue that was almost black, even in the late afternoon, and the shore was less sand than gravel, a strange inconsistent rubble of rock and broken sea-shells that had been dashed to pieces by the constant fury of the waves. Staring out to sea, one did not see the far-away horizon the way one did on the gentler coast of Belegaer: there was no gentle faraway blue haze through which one might, perhaps, on a clear day, imagine that Middle Earth could be glimpsed, or at least the Straight Path.

No: instead along the horizon there was a seam of silver light, and then a great blackness, where the Sea of Ekkaia met the Uttermost West that was not quite the Doors of Night, but was certainly the end of Aman itself. If you stood on the shore watching, the seam would ripple with a pulse of light, sometimes green and sometimes white.

It was so far from anywhere the Eldar of Valinor lived. While they clustered around the Belegaer like moths to flame, this shore seemed instead to repel them. Was it the sight of the world’s end itself? It might be; yet Fingon thought there was more to why this wilderness was so little visited, this howling black sea lashing itself against a grey shore. It was beautiful, but not in the way Elves liked things to be beautiful: it was too raw, too unfinished, too savage.

It was too close to where Mandos kept his Halls, which were not only a thing of spirit but also matter, at least in the way that things in Aman were both. Too close to where Nienna’s tower looked out into the Void and where she wept, and wept, and wept. It was too close to death and to rebirth, to judgment and to pity.

There's a little Dawn Treader, I think, in this idea of the uttermost West. I don't know why I thought the seam of the world should pulse with strange light, but it's an uncanny kind of geography, so near Mandos and Nienna, and I like the sense that this is the end of the world, but not the end of the universe.

A lot of this came together serendipitously. I knew some kind of memorialisation of the river that bore Gil-galad needed to be part of his story; that meant going to the sea; and it's clear from the notes that I had already decided that couldn't mean Alqualonde because of kinslaying reasons and memories. (And that that too would need to be confronted). Therefore: roadtrip to Ekkaia. Therefore, the question: what would Ekkaia be like? We don't really know anything about it - only the good qualities of Belegaer. This was really written by a process of inversion, a way of pulling what we know about Belegaer inside-out, and imagining a place at the world's edge, a place that was empty, a place that was uncannily close to difficult things, to Mandos and Nienna; a place that seemed to repel the Eldar as surely as Belegaer drew them like iron filings.

I was thinking visually about New Zealand, too. I spent my childhood summers on the beaches up north, mostly around Tūtūkākā, which are bright and lovely, with golden or white or tawny sand, with gnarled pohutukawa and blue-green water. Like this:

That's what beach and sea meant to me, and it was a shock the first time I went to one of the black sand beaches where the wind howled and the colours weren't blue, green, gold, but iron, grey, navy, black. I loved it, but it felt so other, so passionate, so strange. That shock and that wild beauty and desolation were things I wanted to get at, though Ekkaia would be far more wild and desolate still.

They left the horses in the thin sea-grass, and their shoes, too, and walked down to the water. “I missed it,” Gil-galad said, and closed his eyes, breathing in the brine. “I missed it badly, all the long years besieging Mordor before I died.”

I think Gil-galad would be very marked by his upbringing first in the Falas and then on Balar; you don't lose that, if you grew up by the sea.

The wind took up his long dark hair and made a banner of it as they walked along the rough crescent of rocky ground where the waves met the shore, and around their bare ankles small stones tumbled back and forth in the lace-edge of the water.

When I was young I used to stand in the water and let the waves bury me up to my ankles, watching the water move in, out, spreading skirts of lace overlapping as new waves came in. I could do it for hours. There's something very liminal about the water's edge, between the solid land and the sea, which is why I put this conversation in it, I think. They're in a liminal space and at a liminal moment. It's the scene the whole story has been inexorably building toward, the point where all Fingon's painful scraping-away of his barriers finally reaches his skin.

“Sometimes in Middle Earth it became very difficult to believe in the Valar,” Gil-galad said, his eyes still closed, “in the blood, and the mud, and the filth. There were so many great and small unfairnesses, day upon day, year upon year.” He opened his eyes and looked towards the Uttermost West where the world ended. “And here it is impossible not to. Look at it!"

This is a little more hopeful than the original version, which I don't have anymore, but went pretty much:

"Sometimes in Middle Earth it was very difficult to believe in the Valar,” Gil-galad said. "In the blood, and the mud, and the filth. There were so many great and small unfairnesses, day upon day, year upon year.”

It was a comment more about Gil-galad's rueful scepticism than wonder - because he fought the Dagorlad before he died, because he spent the last ten years of his life in mud and blood and filth and horror. I work on the First World War - its literary legacy and traces in the decades after, more than its immediate experience or actuality, because there was a ten-year period after 1918 where it was more latent than overt, a traumatic lacuna of silence, a Nachträglichkeit- and I thought in the blood, and the mud, and the filth was a little too on the nose.

I kept it, though, because Tolkien was drawing on his own memories of the trenches with the Dagorlad and the Dead Marshes, with those blurred lines of solid land and mud/bog, the living mixed up with the remains of with the dead, all the themes you see again and again in the war poetry and the officer war-books. (Santanu Das is very good on this, as is Eric Leed). Paul Fussell is a bit old-hat now, but his argument that WWI altered the sensibility of its survivors because of their close, consanguinous co-existence with the dead is something I still find valuable. I think there's a lot of WWI survivor in the way I think of Gil-galad, actually, I'm just realising - not that he survived the Last Alliance. He's detached in a different way from Fingon. Fingon's built himself a thick layer of repression/denial, a kind of callous to protect himself from confronting or thinking about what Maedhros did, and what that means for him and to him; Gil-galad is entirely present, but somewhat detached in some ways, the way people who came back from war could be. Not that Fingon and Finrod aren't also separated from the Amanyar by their time in Beleriand and experience of war and death, but Gil-galad lived there for millennia, and he fought a longer, harder, more total kind of war than they did.

But he's at the Sea of Ekkaia, as west as you can get. So much of Tolkien is about that endless longing glance west, that movement: why is this very westernmost edge so under-explored?

I wanted Gil-galad to be softened by this encounter with the sea, so I went back and let his wonder be as much at the spectacle itself as the sea, like the greater hand at work he had sometimes doubted being visible was something wonderful rather than something to be bitter about. I wanted to position him to be potentially open to, perhaps, the Valar; perhaps, to Fingon. I hope he doesn't come off as closed-minded: I think of him as having a fair mind, and good judgment, but - despite placing him here between the sea and the shore - very clear personal lines between what he thinks is just, and what is not. Certainly, it helps a lot, never having known the Feanorians when they had not fallen.

The seam of the universe pulsed with light, and beyond it was – what?

Unutterable nothingness, something worse than death.

Perhaps Maedhros.

This is an important line for Fingon. He hasn't though the name of his own accord for much of the story, flinching away from it; it's only come in when Finrod and then Gil-galad speak the name. This is the first time he's thought it clearly of his own free will, and this is I think the first signal that he's brought Gil-galad here to be as honest and earnest with him as he can be, however much it hurts, or however much it might drive him away. Because if he isn't, and doesn't, Gil-galad will be driven away anyway, and Fingon wants to be connected with him, the first time he's wanted that kind of bond with anyone since he returned.

(I think of Finrod as someone who just kept turning up, regularly, and forcing Fingon to associate with him; and then bringing Amarie; and then his children; and not taking no for an answer. It bothers Turgon rather terribly that they seem to be friends now, when they were never that close Before: that Fingon pushes him away, but allows Finrod to keep pushing; that Finrod does push. He doesn't know about Gil-galad, of course).

He's brought Gil-galad here to show him if possible that he was wanted, to conjure up lost Ringwil where she might be felt if not found; and to do the same for Maedhros. This is a signal that this journey to the sea is as much about Gil-galad's missing father as his missing mother.

The almost-forgotten tang of salt in the air always mingled with the smell of blood in Fingon’s worst memories, and he was not the only one who remembered. The waves were gentle around Gil-galad’s feet, but they boiled furiously around Fingon’s, delivering small spiteful slaps at his calves.

Spiteful was probably the wrong word here. I don't necessarily mean a dramatic boiling or bubbling; but the water is harsh where it touches him, the kind of slapping roughness you get when the tide is coming in rough.

It took Gil-galad longer to mark the difference, engrossed in the joy of the sea and spectacle as he was, and when he did, his face changed. There was something terribly sad in his eyes when he lifted them from the water to look at Fingon.

It wasn’t why he had brought Gil-galad here; but Fingon didn’t want to imagine the look he would receive if he brushed aside the silent question. “No,” he said. “I am not forgiven.”

“So I see.”

They could probably leave it there.

But Fingon won't, because he's trying. He's really trying to connect after all the time flinching away from it, and he's remembering what Gil-galad said about talking, and what Finrod said about mistakes and silences in their first life.

He said, “You said you loathed the thought of being the son of – a murderer. But my own hands have not been clean since Alqualondë, and death didn’t unstain them. All the time you thought I might be your father, you must have known I was a Kinslayer, too.”

I tried to signal this in their earlier tower conversation with Finrod, and Gil-galad's changing of the topic, but I feel like it's a little abrupt here.

“Yes,” Gil-galad said, and his expression didn’t change. “And when the knights that had served you came to me, they told me that you killed that day in ignorance, that you came upon a battle already being fought; that you took up your sword to save those you loved and didn’t question whether it was just. I heard that from others, too, those who had less reason to bend facts to a flattering pattern; survivors of Gondolin and of Nargothrond. I did ask."

“Ignorance wasn’t an excuse. I died ashamed of it, and I live again with the shame.”

"Good!” said Gil-galad, and there was no forgiveness in his voice, even when Fingon jerked his head up in shock. Instead there was the stern ring of a king used to weighing the ideals of justice against the world as it was, the king who had walked arm in arm with Eonwë the Maia, led his people through many full-fledged wars, and held court and meted justice to them for an Age. “That gives me a far better opinion of you than any of the stories did! I’m glad.”

I remember talking to you about this in the comments, about what it meant that Gil-galad wasn't forgiving him. I think I really meant condone, but I also don't think it's Gil-galad's place to absolve Fingon - he wasn't the one wronged! - and that it's important to me that, because Fingon does truly regret it, he doesn't wish to be absolved, to slide away from it. I don't mean he ought to wallow in it or flog himself with it daily, but I think it would be important to him to shoulder and own that guilt rather than ever allowing himself to put it behind him or have someone else tell him it’s quite all right.

I think this is a moment where I show that they're quite similar, too, because even if Fingon wasn't aware that a bracing, clear assessment was just what he wanted, it was what he needed, rather than people being kind (which he's had a lot of, since he returned; and which hasn't touched that central guilt he's hidden from them, that he loved Maedhros, who had done such terrible things. It's prevented him from accepting kindness made him block people reaching out to him. Gil-galad is not being kind, but just, and still reaching out).

It felt like Fingon had been struggling to take a full lungful of air for a long time, and now something constricting in his chest had loosened, as it hadn’t even after the Valar themselves had judged him. It was only now that he realised that he hadn’t wanted Gil-galad to forgive or absolve him. He had wanted – needed – Gil-galad to be better than him, to withhold forgiveness when it was unmerited; and Gil-galad had. He had become the shining legacy they had all hoped he would be, the thing they had all somehow done right.

The water slapped at his ankles again, in impatient reminder.

This is too brief a transition. I should have fleshed the join out more.

“I think Ulmo would come to you here, if you called. You were a king by the sea in Middle Earth, and you may not remember it, but it was a river who gave you life.”

Gil-galad looked at him as if he’d grown an extra head. “What?”

“I brought you here for a reason,” Fingon said. “Where did they go, the drowned and poisoned rivers of Beleriand? I don’t know; but Ulmo might.”

I've really personified the rivers, but I think it's a clear and easy extrapolation from the Withywindle and the River-daughter in The Fellowship of the Ring that I don't need to justify in order to argue that every river might have had its own attendant Maia-spirit. It does make what happened to the Rivers of Beleriand much worse, though, and I wanted to look at the way a character that was a throwaway mechanism in scion ended up being sickened and dying as horribly as Beleriand did; this story was really about following all those lighter bits in scion home, to the end of the line, and looking at the long-term impacts of something that began more lightly. In this verse, Ringwil was a river, but also a person; and I think of her and Finrod as sharing a strange human-river friendship and overlapping enthusiasms.

He clapped Gil-galad on the shoulder, hoping it said all the things he meant it to say. Affection had been so easy for him once, in the life that had been taken from him by the fiery flails of the Balrogs, but now it came hard, and the sea-smell was in his nose, the terrible memories too close to the surface.

He had surely outstayed Ulmo’s tolerance by now. Fingon left Gil-galad there in the water, and didn’t dare glance back until there was thin sandy soil under his feet again.

Only then did he look once more towards the sea.

Gil-galad was standing in the shallows. His broad shoulders were bunched tight, as if he was readying himself for something very difficult, a confrontation with one of the Valar he had long doubted.

Then he spread his arms out, empty-handed, and tipped his head back, and the light on the horizon grew unbearably bright, whiter than white, more silver than silver; and a face began to move upon the water.

I really like this, honestly. Which I can't/don't say often! The temptation to overwrite this was strong, to show this encounter, to describe the Vala: but I think it's often stronger not to show something numinous, to pull away, to let the mind fill it in.

Again, this is Gil-galad as I imagine him: still somewhat distanced from the Valar by the Dagorlad and the things that happened there (and I think perhaps doubly unhappy in that he lived through the end of an Age once before, and that time, at least, the Valar came: they did not come in the Second, nor send so much as a messenger, and such obscenities as the fall of Ost-in-Edhil and the drowning of Numenor had been allowed to happen, and Men and Elves were left alone to come together and break Sauron's grip). Doubting, but not angry; doubting, but still curious. Open to listening.

a face began to move upon the water is of course a deliberate sideways reference to

And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

It took a very long time. Fingon could not watch; his eyes dazzled.

Can you tell I was teaching The Duchess of Malfi at this time? Cover her face; mine eyes dazzle; she died young. That sense of a light too bright and white to look upon; that sense of guilt; that faint reference to life lost untimely. This wasn't meant to be a direct intertextual reference, but that net of meaning was there, lightly. Again, I wanted to under-write rather than over-write. I know I have a tendency to over-write.

And of course - there's a sense here that Fingon is refusing the kind of close enoucnter with Ulmo he could/might have. There's water in his eyes. From the wind?

“Thank you,” Gil-galad said when he rejoined him at last. His eyes were glowing, and he whistled Ceredir to him from where he was tearing ropey roots of sea-grass from the dunes with great relish. “Thank you for bringing me here;” and he didn’t say it the way he’d thanked Fingon for the horse, or the armour, or the sword, or even the lance.

Because this is a real gift, something that means something to both of them, something more honest/painful. Fingon's been trying to connect through gifts but not serious conversation or sharing, like some estranged parents do, throwing money at the problem rather than giving of their time or their selves, and however well-meant, it hasn't worked.

“I didn’t truly do anything."

“You brought me to the Sea. I know – I could see – how difficult it was for you."

"Well,” Fingon said lamely. He cleared his throat. “What did Lord Ulmo say about – oh, I can’t call her your dam! – the Maia who bore you? Did she – was she there?”

The dam pun is Finrod's. Don't blame me.

A little of the light dimmed, but it didn’t quite fade away. “No, she’s gone. Back to the Timeless Halls, he says; but one with him again, Ulmo, at the same time.” Gil-galad made a noise. “I don’t pretend to understand any of it, all the metaphysical nonsense of the Ainur! But he was kind to me, and he told me something of her – that she delighted in the making of me.” The corner of his mouth turned up. “I left the flowers we gathered earlier in the waves for her and the sea didn’t dash them back onto the shore. I’m sure Ulmo broke a few laws of Arda there.”

I like this image of the flowers suspended in the water. I had it clearly in mind from before I began to write.

"You were wanted.”

“I’m beginning to believe it,” Gil-galad said.

“You should,” Fingon said. He took a breath. Talking is how you sort things out; and a long time ago, Fingon had been known for his valour. Gil-galad deserved to know how much he had been wanted, who had called himself a political compromise given birth. The truth of that had stung.

And it was less than the truth. Fingon could still remember the first time he had opened his mind to Maedhros over the leagues between them and let him see Gil’s small face through his own eyes, holding nothing back. He had shown Maedhros the dark long lashes and the squashed baby nose, the milk-blister on the bow of Gil’s upper lip, the way his whole head turned an alarming red when he wailed; shared with Maedhros Gil’s fondness for being tossed in the air, his splashing joy in his bath.

This is is me trying to describe a baby without being too sentimental about it, because Fingon wasn't all, oh look at the toesie-woesies, or my son, my son: his eye was more detached, and you see him in scion thinking of Gil-galad as it.

I've been thinking about why Fingon in no way allowed himself to consciously dote on the baby, why that streak of denial that's so strong in his second life was there in his first light, and really: it would have been dangerous to let himself love him, to see Gil as his son and Maedhros's. He was born at a time of terrible loss, after the Flame, when they all expected they could die themselves. He was moved around Beleriand like a game-piece. Fingon was always going to lose him: he wasn't going to get to raise him, after all, until and unless Morgoth was defeated. Maedhros wasn't going to meet him, until and unless &c. It was easier not to let oneself get attached than it was to confront those hard facts and let oneself be hurt by them. Easier to think of him as a baby Finwean prince, and that only: a political pawn, not a son.

Conversely, Maedhros maintains a physical distance, but not an emotional one. Here's a bit from Maedhros's perspective:

Finrod had told him that. They had written, back and forth, in the long months as Ringwil’s belly swelled, as the child formed, as it began to move and stretch and turn frog-like inside her. They had corresponded constantly during the first months of the child’s life in Nargothrond, and during the first months of his life, Finrod had sent long scrolls detailing every change in Artanaro’s weight, his length, his hair colour, his eye colour, how much milk he’d consumed each day: screeds winging forth to Himring until the child was old enough to survive the secret trip north.

Fingon’s letters had been infuriatingly spare of useful information while the child was fostered at Barad Eithel. Beloved, ineloquent Fingon: Fingon, who had nevertheless shown him the child as no reams of paper could.

Fingon had given him forever the rounded bloom of his full cheeks, and the pursed mouth, sullen in sleep: the feathery, rather cross-looking eyebrows, and the small hands with their deep dimples and smaller fingernails, curled into the edge of Fingon’s furred mantle.

Maedhros had felt the way Fingon hovered between wonder and confusion at what they’d wrought: the way he couldn’t quite manage to think of the child as his own, this thing spun out of air and calculation and freshwater into heavy, solid life. He could have loved him so desperately, Maedhros knew that. He was halfway there, hovering in terror on the edge, afraid of falling. If the baby had stayed in Barad Eithel longer; if Fingon had watched him begin to creep around on fat little knees, to pull himself up on the furniture and to take his first steps – to hear the baby babble turn into words and speech – his heart would have opened to him like a flower, and the child would have become the centre of his universe, the sun in his sky.

Fingon had never known what to do with Idril as an infant, either, but he’d easily become an adored uncle as she grew up. If they’d had more time – if the child had been permitted to stay with Fingon even a month longer before being sent for safety to Cirdan –

Well, they’d never had enough time.

There had been few walls between them then, so he had felt Maedhros’s bright joy, the painful love, in its moment of birth: swelling and swelling like a cloud with rain, as though his heart was growing and his blood was leaking out of him at the same time, transmuting into pure tenderness and iron purpose.

I like this because I think of the Ekkaia scene as a cloudburst, full of emotion that has been swelling and swelling and now released. This is one bit of the breaking-through.

He had never needed to ask whether Maedhros considered Gil-galad a son.

“I don’t want to talk about – him,” Fingon said with difficulty, and the salt breeze stung his face, his eyes. “I know you loathe him, and rightly; and I do, too. I do hate him; or I hate what he did. I do! But you should know – you deserve to – that he wanted you, badly, although he never met you; he never wanted the shadow on him to touch you or to taint you.

And this. You can see here where I spun off into cliffs of fall, which isn't a scion story, but sprung out of this speech. It was already there in those sketchy notes, too, a lot of what Fingon's saying here: this important line about hating Maedhros, or what he did (that movement from clear certainty to trying to separate the deeds from the loved one; to urgent reptition - I do! I mean it, I really do! - which means he doesn't, can't: this is the heart of Fingon's guilt, because he wants to hate Maedhros utterly, but he can't, and he is profoundly in denial about that).

“He always wanted children; I took that from him even before the Oath did, but I gave it back to him with you. I loved you first of all for that, but he loved you for yourself. Because you existed, against all hope and possibility and fate and chance; and because you were ours.”

Gil-galad said nothing. There was still a wildflower tucked behind his ear, but the brilliance had quite left his eyes.

“Well,” Fingon said at last. “I needed to tell you that. You should know that you were never – not only – you were wanted very much."

Beloved ineloquent Fingon, &c.

They were some miles from the beach when Gil-galad said, “‘Ours’?”

“Yes."

I was trying to let the gaps and breaks talk for me in the text. Under-writing.

The beginning was full of these little breaks, too, because they didn't yet know how to talk to each other; now at the end, that connection, and their conversations, are breaking down again. It's echoing that ride together at the beginning very strongly, but now it's not Gil-galad trying to become acquainted and Fingon giving light, unsatisfying answers. These are the real questions/answers at last, and the whole story has really been about getting to the point of Fingon and Gil-galad in Aman where they actually could have the kind of conversation Gil-galad was trying to have at the start.

Some miles further, Fingon said, “Did you ever meet him in Beleriand? After I died. I always wondered.”

“No,” Gil-galad said.

It didn’t seem like he was going to speak again, and Fingon had begun to assimilate that knowledge, that pain – that Maedhros had never seen him, had only ever known him through Fingon’s own eyes – when he added,

“But I saw what he did. Have you ever seen a whole city ruined, and known the ruiners to be Elves? It wasn’t even a city, poor Sirion! It was a refuge, a place for the desperate, as far to the West as they could get, as close to the safety of the Sea. They had so very little. No great stone palaces, no towers, no spires. Little enough fresh food. They were able to grow so little, and they lived on fish, and sea-weed, and what brave hunting parties would bring back; and hope. They lived on hope, and they thought Elwing wore it around her throat, but the Valar didn’t come for them: Maedhros Fëanorion and his brothers did instead, and they burned and killed and ravaged. I’d say they salted the earth, but it was salt already. To fall on any innocent Elven city would be a horror: on poor Sirion it was the greatest cruelty I ever saw, and entirely pointless."

They said nothing more.

I like this, too, actually. You see a little here of why Gil-galad might be healthily sceptical of the Valar - they didn't come for them: Maedhros Feanorion and his brothers did instead - and that very post-war experience of seeing a descrated, destroyed town. Worse when you had seen it when it was whole, when you knew the dead and fled.

Sirion is, I think, the worst thing the Feanorions did. I find it worse than even Doriath or Alqualonde (though they're all awful!). These were desperate survivors, huddled together at the edge of the sea for protection. So many of their leaders had been killed or lost. Idril and Tuor had disappeared; Earendil was away; Maedhros and the others struck while only Elwing was there, and she was so young, and so alone, and so damaged already by what they'd done in Doriath. And now they’d come again. There's something about the revictimisation that gets me. It's awful.

I wanted it to be weight and counter-weight - that soft, painful, remembered moment of Maedhros seeing baby Gil-galad through Fingon's eyes, something Fingon has clearly not deliberately thought about since he was reborn, but dredges up now for Gil-galad, because he should know: and which is echoed in the beginning by Fingon's question to Finrod. But Maedhros is still the person who did the things he did, and I wanted to set that soft moment of truth against his deeds at Sirion, another truth, to point out clearly why Gil-galad would recoil so hard from this offering, this honesty Fingon wants to be able to give him. This is the dichotomy at the heart of the story: reconciling Maedhros and how one felt for him with what he did, and how one feels about that. It is irresolvable, at least for Fingon, at least at the moment I've ended it at for now.

I don't know if this is quite what you wanted, @warrioreowynofrohan, especially because like I said, I wrote this story in a frantic fog, but I hope this in some way suffices!

#not!fic

47 notes · View notes

rizlowwritessortof · 3 years ago

Text

Meant To Be - Chapter 3

Dean and Jordan are each trying to escape their painful pasts. Their chance meeting and a dangerous encounter begins a relationship that may give them both a new start.

Pairing: Police Detective Dean Winchester/Jordan Taylor

Word Count: 2038

Warnings: None.

Aesthetic by @editsbymichele on Instagram; Dividers by @firefly-graphics

Jordan rolled over and shut off her alarm, yawning and stretching. The last few days had been a whirlwind, but she was starting to get used to waking up in her new surroundings. Donna’s apartment was bright and sunny, pretty much like the woman herself. She had welcomed Jordan with open arms, literally, and immediately installed her in the second bedroom, down the hall from Donna’s room.

After taking a week to settle in, at Sam’s insistence, she was ready to start her new job at Winchester Law. Sam was picking her up in a couple of hours to get her acquainted with the office and do all the annoying paperwork involved, so she climbed out of bed and headed for the shower. As she got ready to step in, she remembered that her tiny sample shampoo had run out the morning before, and she sighed, grabbing a towel to wrap around herself as she headed out to look for her new roomie.

She walked into the living room as she called out, “Hey, Donna, do you have any shampoo I could borr…” The front door swung open as she was in mid-sentence, and Dean walked in, stopping dead in his tracks as he saw her. “Oh…shit.” Jordan clutched the towel around herself a little tighter, blushing to the roots of her hair. “Dean. Hi. I’m so embarrassed right now.”

Dean, however, looked incredibly pleased with himself, a slow grin spreading across his face, his eyes full of mischief. “Don’t be embarrassed on my account. I’m good.”

“Dean Winchester!” Donna’s voice scolded as she rushed by Jordan and directly over to her partner, turning him around and shoving him to the door. “What are you doing in here?”

Dean turned his head, a confused scowl on his face as he was forced into the hall. “What?! I always come in when I pick you up… coffee...”

“Go back to the car and wait for me, I’ll bring your coffee. You can’t just walk in here now, I’m not the only one who lives here, Dean. For Pete’s sake!”

“Sorry! For fuck’s sake, stop shoving me!” He turned around to grin at Jordan again. “It was really nice to see you, Jordan,” he said with a wink as Donna slammed the door closed in his face. They could hear his laughter as he headed down the hall, and in spite of her embarrassment, Jordan couldn’t smother a little smile.

“That man! I’m so sorry,” Donna apologized. “He has always just let himself in and got his coffee here, but I’m always up, dressed and ready to go before he gets here and it’s just a habit. I didn’t even think about it.”

Jordan shook her head. “Not your fault, I shouldn’t be wandering around in a towel. I just forgot my little bottle of shampoo ran out yesterday. Can I borrow some until I can get to the store?”

“Oh, honey, help yourself to anything you need from my shower! When I get home tonight, we’ll make a run to the store, get you stocked up.” She put a hand on Jordan’s shoulder. “I’m really sorry – are you okay?”

Jordan smiled, her cheeks still flushed pink. “I’m fine. I’ll just probably never hear the end of this.”

Donna nodded, her dimples showing, a sparkle in her eyes. “Oh, yeah, count on it. He’ll never let this one go. Well, I’d better get going. I’ll see you tonight.”

Dean shoved his desk drawer closed a little harder than necessary, and his partner shot him a look, shaking her head. “What? I hate desk duty.”

“Oh, I know. Which is why you have such a pile of paperwork there. Why don’t you just settle in and do it, get caught up while we’re stuck in here.”

He glared at Donna, then at the pile of papers on the corner of his desk. “Hate paperwork,” he muttered under his breath as he grabbed a handful of unfinished reports and opened his laptop.

“Just think how good it’ll feel to get all of that work finished and out of your hair.” Donna smiled, unfazed by the baleful look Dean shot her way.

“Leave it to me to get Miss Mary Sunshine as my partner,” he grumbled, and Donna’s smile grew wider.

“You’re welcome,” she grinned back at him, then went to work on her own stack.

Jordan jumped as a knock echoed through the apartment, rushing to the door and peering through the peephole. “Sam! Oh, Sam, you didn’t have to come up here and get me! I thought you’d just text me or something.”

Sam smiled, his dimples winking as he stepped inside. “I thought I could at least come up the first time I picked you up. Didn’t want to just sit outside and blow the horn.” Jordan laughed, grabbing her jacket from the couch.

“Ok, I guess I’m ready. I wasn’t sure how to dress...” She had debated for an hour, finally putting on a pair of dress slacks and a blouse, and she looked up at Sam for his approval.

“You could honestly wear whatever you want, I usually wear jeans. Whatever makes you comfortable, it doesn’t matter to me. In fact, a lot of the time you can probably just work from home if you want, after we get the office organized again. It’s kind of a disaster right now, sorry.”

“We’ll get it all sorted out, no worries. Once you fill me in on your filing system and how you want things done, I’ll get it taken care of.” She smiled up at him, ever amazed at how tall the man was. “Well, boss, we’re losing daylight.”

“Great. I hired a slave driver,” he teased, and they made their way out of the apartment together.

Jordan flopped onto the sofa with a satisfied smile, letting her head drop back as she let her mind wander over her day. There really was a lot of organizing to do in Sam’s office, due to his lack of help for the last few weeks, but she had made a pretty good dent. After this week, she could probably work out of the apartment most days, maybe go in one day a week to do filing and such. Sam was such an easy-going guy, he was going to be a dream to work for. And his fiance, Sarah, was so nice – she had stopped in during the day, and they hit it off right away.

Her phone rang and she grabbed it, smiling as she saw Dean’s name. “Hope that new boss of yours isn’t too much of an asshole,” he teased.

“Oh, he’s terrible! Even meaner than his brother.”

Dean laughed. “Yeah, I hear he’s a real jerk.”

“Well, nobody’s perfect,” she giggled in reply. “So what’s up, Detective Winchester?”

“Donna and I wondered if you’d be interested in going out for a couple of beers, maybe some pub food? Then we can stop off at the store so you can pick up what you need.”

“That sounds great – what time?”

“We’ll be there in about – 45 or so? If you can be ready by then.”

“No problem, I’ll be waiting, just give me a yell and I’ll come down.”

“Awesome. See you later.”

She sighed happily as she laid her phone back down, letting her eyes close for a moment. Dean’s face was right there, his eyes shining as he smiled at her, and she silently scolded herself. He wasn’t interested in her like that, and she needed to get a grip on her feelings before they carried her away. He was just a friend, and daydreaming about him wasn’t going to get her anywhere. “Slow your roll, Jordan,” she told herself firmly, then got up and went to her room to change.

Dean drove to Dooley’s Pub, the normal watering hole he and Donna frequented. It was a cop-friendly bar, the owner was a retired police sergeant, and he called out a greeting to them as they walked in. The three of them grabbed a table, ordered a round of beers and started chatting about their day, munching pretzels from the bowl the waitress had dropped off. “So, how was it working for my brother?” Dean asked, and Jordan smiled.

“He’s going to be an awesome boss. I think we’re gonna get along great. How was desk duty today?”

Dean rolled his eyes, and Donna laughed. “You should have heard him whining all day, you’d think they made him clean the toilets or somethin’.”

“I wasn’t that bad,” he fired back, and his partner shook her head, then looked at Jordan.

“He was like an overgrown three-year-old, Jordan. Don’t let him fool ya. He can pout with the best of ‘em.”

Jordan grinned. “Awwww… it’s only for two weeks.”

Dean huffed out a frustrated sigh. “Two weeks is gonna drive me insane.”

“Short trip,” Donna quipped, and the girls laughed again, Dean failing to completely smother the smile teasing at the corners of his mouth.

“All right, all right – just for that, I’m gonna kick your ass at darts.”

“Oooh, I’ll play the winner – or the loser. Whatever,” Jordan offered, and they moved over near the dart board.

Dean easily beat Donna, and she punched him in the shoulder as she moved back to the table. “Go get ‘im, Jordan. Somebody needs to wipe that cocky smile off his face,” she teased.

“Yeah, that’s probably not gonna happen, but… I’ll do what I can,” Jordan answered, taking the darts from Dean’s hand.

“After you,” he offered with a sweep of his hand, and Jordan stepped up, taking aim. The first dart hit the floor, and he laughed as she swore under her breath. The second barely hung on to the board, finally falling out as her third buried itself in the wall beside the dart board.

“Epic fail.” She shook her head with disgust, and Dean went to retrieve her darts.

“Okay, let’s call that practice. Here…” He reached towards her, then stopped, looking into her eyes. “Is it okay if I...”

“Yes, please, help,” she laughed. He laid his darts on the table and turned towards her, and her breath caught in her chest as he gripped her hips in his hands, turning her slightly to adjust her stance.

“Now, when you throw, you should kind of snap your wrist to give it a little more speed.” He made adjustments to her arm and her grip on the dart, and she was beginning to wonder if she’d have the presence of mind to throw the damn thing when he was finished touching her. “Okay, give it a try.”

She glanced up at him and nodded, then focused her eyes on the board. The first two landed in halfway decent spots, and the third buried itself right next to the bullseye. She cheered and turned to throw her arms around his neck in an excited hug, then backed away, blushing. “Sorry, I just never thought I’d get it!”

Donna was grinning as she watched them. “You got it, girl! A little practice and you’ll be kicking his ass!”

They played their game, Dean winning, of course, and Jordan finished the last of her beer before heading to the bathroom. “I suppose, if we’re stopping at the store, we should take off. We all have to work tomorrow. But first – the little girls’ room.” She plopped her glass back on the table and took off, and Dean sat down, finishing the Coke he had switched to since he was driving.

“So…” Donna said, a knowing smirk on her face.

“So… what?” Dean’s confused frown made her giggle.

“I saw you. You’ve got a thing for her.”

“What?”

“You heard me.”

“Look, I was just helping her with...”

“Save it, partner. You are falling for her, and she’s definitely into you, so what the hell are you waiting for?”

Dean dropped his head and glared at her from under his frowning brow, the dimples above his mouth deepening. “Shut up.”

Donna laughed softly, complying with his request for the time being since Jordan was headed back their way. “All right, you two – let’s hit the road.”

Chapter 4

#meant to be #chapter 3 #dean fic #dean x oc #dean x jordan

18 notes · View notes

excelsi-or · 4 years ago

Text

just a little sweeter (pt. 10)

HELLLLOOOOOOOO~~ are you guys still there? LOL, it’s been like a month and a half since I last posted on here. The end of the semester just really got intense with projects, presentations, and finals. But I’m here and back for at least two weeks. I wanna see if I can bosh out the rest of this series before I move onto another one.

I hope you’re all well. If you wanna update me on what’s new with you all, I’d love to know. I applied to grad school. I have one more semester left before graduation. Vaccinations have started in my area of the world. I started playing Hollow Knight (if anyone wants to talk about THIS GAME, please do. I love it.) Think that’s kinda it.

BIPOC reeeeeccccc: N. K. Jemisin’s The City We Became is EXCELLENT. Diversity, racism, feminism, LGBTQ representation. I love it so much. One of my favourite books of the year, hands down. Nicole Crowder on IG does like upholstery and interior DIYs and content. I’ve been wanting to upholster these two chairs in my home and she put up a whole 2 min tutorial on how to do it.

w.c. 3k (lol, it got really long oops! fluff and mature content, not quite smut, but it was definitely getting there. The first draft of this part was basically just smut, so I chopped and fixed it LOL. hope you guys still like it.)

pt.1; pt.2; pt.3; pt.4; pt.5; pt.6; pt.7; pt.8; pt. 9

“What do you mean you haven’t had sex with him yet?”

She rolls her eyes and sets a bowl in front of her previous roommate. Soobin had moved out months ago, shortly after she’d met Jihoon.

“It’s going really slow.” She slips into the seat across the table. “We haven’t really said I love you yet either.”

“What do you mean ‘haven’t really said’? What? Just ‘cause Woozi’s an idol he doesn’t know how to treat you right?”

She motions for Soobin to tuck into the food. “Jihoon is treating me wonderfully, thank you very much.” She pauses, her chopsticks hovering in the air. “It’s just… slow.”

“He has a whole child!” Soobin chews her noodles as she continues. “You’ve already passed the point of going slow.”

“It’s not as if Eunha is my child.”

“The kid spends more time here than any of our friends or your family.”

“Jihoon’s been busy.” She shrugs. “It’s easier for him to leave Eunha here than take her with him. Plus, you know the Terror likes her.”

Soobin chuckles. “That little horror of a brother of yours likes everyone.”

She smirks. “Okay, fair.” Then she waves her chopsticks between them. “But Eunha’s probably the reason why he’s going slow. We need to see if we’re compatible.” She meets Soobin’s gaze. “The man has a child.”

“It’s been months!” Soobin quickly cuts in before any interruptions. “Seven months to be exact. You would think that the next step at analyzing compatibility is whether you guys vibe in bed.”

She hums. She doesn’t want to admit out loud that yeah, she’s been having fantasies about Jihoon. However, she hasn’t gotten any clear signals from Jihoon that he wants to pursue anything further than making out on her couch after a date. And before she can broach the topic, he’s off to go get Eunha. If Jihoon never wanted to have sex with her, she wonders if that would be a deal breaker. But she really has no idea.

“Have you talked to him about it?”

“Sex? No.”

“So, what do you guys talk about?”

She throws her head back with a laugh. “You say that as if the only thing you and Jae talk about is sex.”

“Well, it came up a lot when we first started dating.”

“That’s because you guys started off having sex.” She sighs, turning her noodles with the tips of her chopsticks. “This relationship is really different. I don’t know how to gauge it.”

“Do you love him?”

“I haven’t told him.”

“But you do.”

“Yeah.”

“And does Eunha put you off wanting to be with him?”

She rests her cheek in her palm. “I honestly thought she would, but she only makes me love him more.”

“Then talking about sex, even if you’re not having it, is the next step.” Soobin gauges her friend’s reaction. “Even if Jihoon is the type not to want it. You should at least know that. He’s obviously done it at one point.”

There’s a pause before they both say, “The child.”

She nods. “You’re right though. We should talk about it.”

Seungcheol knocks on the studio door. “Hey. You needed me?”

Jihoon turns in his chair and nods. “Yeah. I need a second set of ears on this song. Bumzu hyung and Soonyoung are busy.”

Seungcheol nods and falls into the seat next to Jihoon. He notices the book on the desk. It’s been sitting there for a while. “You finish it?”

Jihoon glances at the book. “Oh.” Then, he resumes clicking through the excessive number of files open on his screen. “Yeah.”

And you haven’t returned it?”

“She reads it when she comes over.” Jihoon hands over the headphones and finally catches Seungcheol’s expression. “What? Is there some big meaning behind that too?”

Ever since he started dating, Seungcheol, Jeonghan, and basically everyone in the building has found various meanings in his songs and life that allude to how ‘in love’ he is. He’s not about to tell everyone he’s in love—she doesn’t even know that yet—but not everything going on is about his relationship.

Seungcheol shrugs as he adjusts the headphones on his ears. “You seem to think there isn’t.”

“God.” Jihoon sighs and turns in his chair. He drops his cheek into his palm. “Enlighten me.”

“She’s a big reader and doesn’t like to leave books unfinished. If she’s letting you hold onto it for her, for when she comes over here, that says something.”

“So does leaving my daughter in her care, but we all have something we need taken care of.” He turns back to the screen. “Now, listen to this hook for me.”

Seungcheol settles back into the seat. He bops his head along to the melody until the lyrics play clear in his ears. Wide eyed, he turns to Jihoon and pushes one headphone off his ear. “We’re not putting this on the album, are we?”

Jihoon looks over at him with an eyebrow lifted. “Why not?”

“This is such a… a bedroom… sex song.” Seungcheol shakes his head. “We can’t put this on there.”

Jihoon frowns. “What?” He looks at the file name and feels his cheeks heat up. “Whoa. Not that one.” He quickly closes the file and makes sure that it’s closed. But his checking gives Seungcheol time to see a folder with her name. There’s one for Eunha that none of the boys want to ask about, but his girlfriend? She’s fair game.

“You have a folder of songs for her?” He acts horrified. “And that was one of them?”

Jihoon tries to think of any way out of this conversation and realizes that due to his carelessness, he can’t. “Yeah. I guess I do.”

“How many songs are in there? Do they all sound like that?”

“I refuse to answer those questions knowing that everyone is going to know by tomorrow and it’s already embarrassing that you know about one of them.”

“Hey.” Seungcheol’s voice goes soft. He likes to tease, but he recognizes touchy subjects when he broaches them. “Sorry. I didn’t realize. You know you can talk to me, right?”

Jihoon side eyes him. “I don’t want to admit how I feel about her to you when she hasn’t even heard all the songs on there.”

“What’s the folder for?”

“Just… inspiration.” Jihoon leans back further in his chair. “The songs on the upcoming album have come out of there. At least the less… perverted ones did.”

“There are other songs like that.” Seungcheol tries not to sound too surprised.

Jihoon’s cheeks are so warm that he takes a sip of his iced coffee. “Lately… yeah.”

“Have you…” Seungcheol shakes his head. “No. How could you? You always come home for Eunha.”

At this, Jihoon looks at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Well… just that if you guys were having sex, you wouldn’t come straight home to your daughter, would you? Not when all of us would know.” Seungcheol narrows his eyes. “Right?”

Jihoon doesn’t even know how to respond to that except with the truth. “Fine. No. We haven’t yet.”

“Because of her or because of you.”

“Things are going slow. I don’t know… how to broach the topic.”

“Why can’t showing up to her door with passionate kisses be enough?”

“And what? Leave Eunha with you guys overnight?”

“Yeah, why not?”

So, Jihoon does just that and it turns out so much better than he expected.

“Why does this shirt,” he mutters between kisses, “have so many buttons?”

She giggles against his lips and steadies his hands in hers. “You’re excited. Like a child. Calm down.”

Jihoon hums, obsessed with the taste of her lips and her hands around his. She guides him through the motion of unbuttoning her shirt. Once they’re undone, he pulls away slightly. She tips her head. Jihoon is gentle with her shirt, sliding it off her shoulders. Her eyes watch him the entire time, watch him admire her body as the fabric falls to the floor. His hands start from the sides of her thighs up her body, skimming over her underwear, and holding her under the arms, hands right by her breasts.

“You’re really gonna tease,” she chuckles. She closes the distance between them, kissing him and fumbling with his shirt. His shirt is easy, his sweatpants he practically steps out of. It’s once they’re both just standing in their underwear that she stops him.

“Are you sure you want to do this?”

Jihoon kisses her shoulder and up her neck to the base of her jaw. “Why would I want to stop?”

“Eunha?” she hums. The child’s face is prominent in her mind, but becomes hazy every time Jihoon sucks a spot on her neck.

“She adores you. Which gives me permission to also adore you.”

She smirks, arms wrapping around Jihoon’s neck to force him back to her lips. “I’m glad I pass the test.”

Jihoon scoops her up and carries her to the couch. She gasps in surprise, which forces him away again. Spread along the couch are a lot of her art supplies. When she turns back to him, there’s a grin on her face.

“I wasn’t expecting you to jump me tonight. I was planning to paint, so…”

“Do you want to clean first?” he chuckles.

She shrugs.

Jihoon snorts and picks her shirt up off the floor and hands it to her. As much as he wants to sleep with her, it seems tonight may not be the night. He finds his sweatpants and pulls them on then helps her move her art stuff. He sits on the coffee table while she manoeuvres her piece from the floor to the desk.

“Do you want to paint?” he asks.

She shakes her head. “I want to spend time with you.” She moves some stuff to make space for her piece.

“Do you want to teach me to paint?”

She peers over her shoulder at him. “Really?”

“Well, I’m impossible to teach, but I don’t want to leave yet.” Jihoon glances at her bare torso, as she hasn’t bothered to button the top. “And I like the view.”

She rolls her eyes, an amused smile on her face. “Are idols allowed to say stuff like that?”

Jihoon looks around her home. “Unless you have a listening device and turn me in, I’m confident to say how I feel about you.”

A smile blooms on her face at hearing that. She pulls one of her watercolour pads off the desk and motions for him to join her on the floor. She flips past the first two pages, but Jihoon still catches glimpses of them.

He grabs her wrist to stop her. “Were those of Eunha and me?”

“Oh.” She tilts her head and flips back. “Yeah.” The first page is from the night he had come over to learn to cook. The second was their first date.

Jihoon looks to her expectantly and she can only shrug.

“I draw what I like.”

Jihoon doesn’t know why he finds that embarrassing, but his ears feel warm.

She tips her head back in a laugh. “Of everything that’s happened tonight, Jihoonie, I don’t think you need to be embarrassed to hear that I like you.” She returns to the one with Eunha on it and pulls the sheet. “I wanted to give it to you, but I thought maybe it would be creepy if you knew I was painting you and your daughter from memory.”

Jihoon stares at the paintings. He can see Eunha’s expression in them; how happy she had been with the meal and the dessert. If this is what he’d look like that night, he had been extremely relaxed. His finger traces over the skin, amazed at how seamless it appears.

When his eyes lift to meet hers, she seems surprised to see tears.

“What’s wrong?”

Jihoon shakes his head. “Nothing.”

She slides closer to him and her thumb brushes his tears away. “You’re crying.”

Jihoon sighs and his head tips back, as he tries to keep the tears in. “I… it’s just that…” Jihoon’s gaze rests on her again. “No one else has seen Eunha like this. The members do, but they helped me raise her. Which is why sometimes she’s an absolute menace.”

She smiles.

“But…” Jihoon studies the painting, at his baby so beautifully depicted. “I don’t know. This kind of reminds me that maybe I’m doing okay if she looks like this.”

“Jihoon, you’re doing great. She’s happy and she loves you.”

“Sometimes I feel like I’m failing her all the time, and…” The tears appear again. “And I feel like I lost some of who I am, because I had her.”

She eases the sheet of paper out of his hands. Jihoon uncrosses his legs so she can move between them, draping her legs over his thighs. Her hands plant on the floor between them as she leans forward to press kisses to his face. His eyes close at the sensation. “Jihoon, she is all you. Your music is who you are. You live and breathe Seventeen. Just because you became a father doesn’t mean you lost any piece of the Jihoon that was there before she existed.”

Jihoon lifts a hand to the back of her neck to pull her closer. Painting is put on the back burner, as they get lost in the feeling of kissing each other. Jihoon’s legs curl behind her to prevent her from moving away. His free hand slips inside her shirt and finds home on her hip. His thumb moves back and forth across the skin there.

Meanwhile, her hands have pulled him as close she can get him, her fingers tangling in his hair. When she gives the hair at the base of his neck a small tug, he groans. This lets her slip her tongue into his mouth. He tastes like her coffee, unsurprisingly enough. And she has to admit, it tastes better on his tongue than in the cup.

She can feel his growing hard on through his sweatpants. When she pulls away to breathe, she asks, “So we’re not painting then?”

Jihoon hums something incoherent, because she latches her lips against his neck.

“Wait,” he breathes.

She slows her assault on his neck, but doesn’t stop.

“No hickies.”

“Simple enough,” she breathes against his skin.

Jihoon finds himself falling back onto the floor as her kisses trail all over his body. Her hands explore every muscle and memorize them. Jihoon enjoys the treatment, his eyes closing while he lets his other sense take over. She wiggles him out of his sweatpants again and then returns to his lips.

“Bed?” She adjusts her body over his, putting pressure against him, which makes it impossible for him to reply.

Jihoon looks up at her and his eyes are dark, pupils blown wide. She sucks a spot on the soft skin near his jaw, but stops before it can leave a mark. He manages to roll them over.

“You’re making it really hard to think.”

She slides a leg between his, which seems just enough friction for him to grimace. “You’re thinking with something else.”

“Where’s your bed?”

Her eyes dart to her left. He helps her to standing and then lifts her. Her legs wrap around his waist. If there had been other objects in the way, he would have knocked into all of them, because she starts kissing him again. And it seems like his brain shuts off as soon as she does that. He presses her against her bedroom wall and when he ruts against her, her breath catches.

“So, you are needy.”

“Lee Jihoon, you are literally between my legs,” she manages between kisses. “Yes, I’m needy.”

Jihoon pulls away for a moment. “But you’ve seemed so calm and collected tonight.”

She rolls her eyes and gently kisses his cheeks before saying, “If I was ready to pounce on you when you walked in here, would you have wanted to fuck me?”

Jihoon jumps at the blatant term, but he pivots so that he can lay her on the bed. One of his hand sneaks between her legs, his other arm propping his body over hers, and drags his fingers over the fabric. When she squirms beneath his touch, he says, “Maybe not. But… I’ve wanted this a while.” He meets her gaze. “So I don’t think too much have scared me away tonight.”

Her head tilts back as he begins to rub his fingers in circles. He watches her carefully.

“Stop staring,” her breath hitches, “and kiss me.”

Jihoon smirks. “Make me.”

She snakes a hand behind his head to pull him down towards her. Her kisses stutter depending on the speed of his fingers. His kisses trail down to her neck and nibbles the soft skin on her collar bone. She presses her hands into his shoulders to try to keep her bearings. When he kisses back up her neck and sucks the soft spot of her jaw and she moans something beautiful, he knows that’s a sound he’s going to have in his mind long after this is over.

He slows his fingers down. “How close are you?”

Her breath is heavy; she can’t even answer him. Her rut up into his hand is good indication though.

Two of her orgasms and one of his later, he returns from the bathroom with a washcloth and gently cleans her off. Then he lies on top of her again, her hands go to massage his temples.

“So, you’re going to tell your daughter we… coloured when you came over today?” she teases.

Jihoon rests his cheek against her chest, listening to her heartbeat slowing down after the exertion. “I told her she was staying with the members because I was coming over here for a play date.”

She laughs. “I mean, you’re not wrong.”

Jihoon can’t help but smile as he falls asleep.

#woozi #woozi scenarios #woozi imagines #lee jihoon scenarios #Lee Jihoon #seventeen scenarios #Seventeen #seventeen imagines #Svt

40 notes · View notes

angelsswirl · 4 years ago

Text

Petrichor

Four

Notes: The story's not over yet....

Content Warning⚠️: mild smut

...

"You loved what you loved because you loved it."

It's been weeks. Weeks of you falling deeper and deeper into this mess you somehow forced yourself into.

Weeks of getting to know Rosé. Weeks of getting to know Jisoo. Weeks of getting to know Lia, for that matter.

Weeks of being sucked into a cycle of never-ending uncertainty.

And sure you knew plenty about them at this point. The little stuff, the medium stuff, but maybe not the big stuff.

If someone had asked you weeks ago if you had wanted to be in a serious relationship, mated to an alpha for the foreseeable future, you would have told them 'No. Absolutely not. I'm not ready.' But now, that's changed. And you're not exactly sure why.

In addition to suddenly wanting to be someone's omega, your heats had magically increased, in frequency and intensity. They were somehow bulldozing their way through your normal dosage of suppressants.

It was why you currently found yourself in the waiting room of your doctor's office.

Though, as you waited to be called back by the nurse, that was not the pertinent thought weighing down on you. Instead, it was 'Did Jisoo or Rosé want a serious relationship with you as well? Did they want you to be their mate?'

The million-dollar question.

You had no real way of knowing. It definitely seemed like it on both their parts, but outright asking was out of the question.

Jisoo had a daughter, a daughter who will inevitably one day realize that you look nothing like her. She'll long for the care of her biological mother, and then Jisoo will leave you so their family is complete.

A logical conclusion.

Rosé has an ex, an ex that, granted, you're not supposed to know about (Yeri is very talkative when drunk), but an ex nonetheless. It's only fair that Rosé realizes that she has unfinished business with said ex while you're pregnant with her pups, and leaves you for the ex.

Another logical conclusion.

And where does all of that leave you?

Alone.

The nurse calling your name lightly soothed you out of your musing, saving you from answering your own question with even more ugly scenarios.

"Y/N L/N? You can go on back." The nurse, an omega herself, smiled reassuringly as she gestured for you to follow her.

She lead you to an examination room after weighing you in the hallway. After a few preliminary questions that you had to answer every time you visited, the nurse left you to wait.

Seven minutes later there's a knock on the door and a creaking of the hinges.

Dr. Ramona Davis, another omega woman, smiled softly as she flipped through your mildly thin file.

Despite you being a patient at this particular practice since you started having heats, you had never really had any serious isssues.

It wasn't uncommon for an Omega Specialist to be an alpha, but they probably saw way less patients. It made more sense for an omega to be seeing a doctor who would understand what they were going through on a medical and a personal level.

Dr. Davis placed the file on the counter in the room before squirting some hand sanitizer on, rubbing it in, then shaking your hand.

"Hello Y/N, what brings you in today? I haven't had to see you in a year." The concern on the woman's fair features was genuine. You took great appreciation in that. You hated Doctor's offices and the almost motherly nature of the omega doctor assuaged your anxiety greatly.

"Um, yeah. Recently, my heats have been coming way more frequently than normal and they're very intense. My suppressants are barely putting a dent in them."

"Oh, that is concerning. You rarely come to me for heat problems." The doctor's eyebrows furrowed.

Dr. Davis did a quick check of your breathing, then ears and nose.

The omega doctor sat back on her rolling stool with a sigh, "Are your heat symptoms normal? Anything really out of the ordinary?"

A blush settled over your cheeks. You thought for a second, other than being more intense you didn't think that your symptoms have been out of the ordinary really, "I don't think so. The normal overheating, bones aching so bad I can't move, loss of appetite, and really bad night terrors, but I think that has more to do with the fact that this is my first year living by myself in the center of New York City. Yeah, all of that but dialed up by, like, 10." You mused, you shrugged your shoulders in the end as if to say 'Y'know, the usual.'

Ramona stared at you blankly for a solid three minutes before speaking again, "Y/N. None of that is normal. I have half a mind to call your mom and tell her what you just told me. The only thing stopping me is doctor-patient confidentiality."

You pouted, your mother didn't need to know any of this. She was dealing with her own things. It's the very reason you hadn't mentioned this to either of your parents. Also, you hadn't really known that anything was wrong. You really just came here to get a higher dosage of suppressants.

Dr. Davis rubbed a hand down her face, "How long have your heats been like this?"

"Since I started having them, but they didn't get really bad until like six weeks ago give or take."

Ramona nodded, "You said this was the first time you're living fully by yourself. How long has it been since you lived with an alpha?"

"Uh, not since being home with my dad. I'm 24 and I moved out at 18, so, six years ago." You frowned. You desperately needed to find out where the professional was going with this.

Ramona thought for a second. She had a hunch, of what part of the problem was. She can't really do anything about the "normal" heat symptoms but she does have a cure that should dial back the frequency and intensity, she just had a sneaking suspicion that you would absolutely hate it. Because if you didn't hate the idea, then the problem would be fixed already.

But first, a couple more questions, "When was the last time you were knotted?"

"Like three years ago?"

Dr. Davis surmises that you must have impeccable self-control and she's not sure if that's a good thing or not.

"Okay, last question before I let you in on my thought process. Have you been in close proximity to any unmated alphas lately? Like not just standing behind one in a line or sitting next to one in class, I mean actually spending time with any."

"Yeah...two." You were starting to pick up the pieces, and no, you did not like where this is going.

"Ah, the final piece of the puzzle," Ramona wrote some notes down on your file, "Alright. So here's what I think is going on, you haven't been in the presence of an alpha for at least three years. And all of a sudden you're surrounded by two. Probably encountering many more pheromones than you had in the past three years combined. It doesn't help that those alphas are readily available and your omega is very aware of this. Your heats are out of wack because, one, it sounds like you've just been chugging through them like nothing is wrong, not taking a knot or anything even remotely useful, and two, because of these new alphas. It's almost like your teasing your omega and she's fighting back. Triggering random and intense heats to trick you into mating with one of them."

You stared back at her absolutely horrified, "I'm trying to kill myself?"

"That's not what I said."

"That's what it sounded like. Anyway, how do I get it to stop? I'm sure you know this isn't very fun."

"I can imagine. There's really one way that can help..."

"Stop stalling, Doc."

"You're going to have to take one of their knots. I know, I know. Stop looking at me like that. It's the only way. Once you do that, your omega will calm down and you can go back to your life. Look, it doesn't even have to be one of theirs. You're going to do that and I'm going to write you a prescription for some muscle relaxers but your suppressants are staying the same."

You looked like you wanted to puke at the thought of doing that with anyone else other than Jisoo or Rosé.

"Okay, it has to be one of theirs."

You still looked a bit apprehensive.

Ramona sighed, it looked like she was going to have to pretend to be her wife today. Her wife was a psychologist who worked down the hall.

"What's got you so hesitant, Y/N?"

You sighed and your shoulders slumped, "I don't want to have to choose between them. I like them both. A lot."

"Who said you have to choose? You might eventually when you're ready to mate, but for now, you don't have to worry about that."

"What if I am ready to mate?" You mumbled.

"Then yeah, you might have a problem on your hands."

You threw your hands up in the air exasperated, "I don't even know if they would even want to have sex with me."

Ramona rolled her eyes at that, "Okay, here's what you're going to do. I'm going to sit here, and you're going call both of them and ask."

You began to protest, "Ah. No. You're going to do it. I can tell you've been putting this off and it's starting to nag at you. You're a 24-year-old unmated omega. There is absolutely no reason you should be doubting your sex appeal."

"Fine," You grumbled. Your hands shook as you picked up your phone and tapped on your recents. They were both coincidently the last people you had talked to. Rosé being the latest, as you were confirming plans for later that day.

Rosé answered on the second ring, "Hey, Babe. What's up?"

You blushed at the pet name, you sighed before deciding to just rip it off like a bandaid, "Do you want to have sex with me?"

There's a clattering and then a curse on the other end. A second later Rosé started speaking again, "I'm sorry, I dropped my phone. Yes. The answer is yes." You hung up without another word. A heavy blush encompassing your harsh scowl at Ramona.

It seemed like Jisoo answered the phone before you even pressed the call button, "Kim Crematorium. You kill 'em, we grill 'em. How may I help you?"

"How many times do I have to tell you that's not funny?"

"...Until I believe you."

"Anyway. Do you want to have sex with me?"

It sounded like Jisoo started to hyperventilate.

"I very do a lot."

"What?"

"Yes. The answer is yes."

You hung up and glared at the doctor, "Happy?"

"Are you?"

You had never felt a boost of confidence such as the verbal reassurance of alphas being sexually attracted to you, but Ramona didn't need to know that.

"So, now you know they want to. The next step is to do it." Dr. Davis patted you on the shoulder reassuringly.

You nodded resolutely. The next step is to do it.

Dr. Davis handed you the prescription for the muscle relaxers and ushered you out the door.

~•~

You arrived at Rosé's penthouse with a renewed sense of determination.

You were let into the fancy apartment building and then into the penthouse fairly easily. You assumed Rosé had prepared whoever needed to be prepared for your arrival.

Rosé, over lunch one day, had finally let slip her actual job description. You had only shrugged more or less. You weren't stupid. You don't wear custom Armani suits and pay for your Starbucks with a black credit card without being the CEO of something.

Rosé seemed forever grateful you hadn't made a big deal about it.

As soon as you laid eyes on Rosé your core clenched. The alpha was only wearing a grey t-shirt and a pair of dark wash skinny jeans, and yet for some reason, you still got weak in the knees.

Rosé greeted you with a peck on the cheek and a happy smile, "How was your day?"

You blinked, "Interesting. How was yours?"

"Boring at first. It's my first day off in months and I didn't know what to do with myself. Then I got an interesting phone call from an interesting person asking an interesting question. So I'd say my day was interesting as well."

Rosé led them deeper into the penthouse, which you later will realize is only the first floor.

"Yeah, sorry if I caught you off guard with that?" You looked down and blushed. A go to move of yours.

Rosé shrugged, "It's fine. I admired the forwardness...So, I was originally going to cook for you, but then at the very last second, I remembered I can't cook. But I can drink wine. And I'm very good at buying it too, so I figured we could have an impromptu wine tasting." Rosé gestured into her kitchen where a bunch of glasses filled with different pigments of wine had been set up.

"You just want to see me drunk." You tapped Rosé playfully on the arm.

"I'd be lying if I said I didn't have any ulterior motives."

You made it three glasses in before you practically jumped Rosé. In your defense, your mini-heat was still simmering under the surface.

Your lips smashed together in a desperate ruse for you to get closer to Rosé. Rosé's hands on your hips and your hands in her hair. You released your grip on the taller woman's hair, you reached down to your shirt. Gripping at the hem and yanking it overhead.

Rosé blinked slowly, "Are you sure?" She asked, even as your hands traveled to the belt buckle on her jeans.

You captured Rosé's lips again in a quick, searing kiss, "What about any of this says unsure to you?"

That's all Rosé needs to continue.

It's not really evident how you two got into Rosé's room and subsequently her bed. Both of you had sort of partially blacked out.

Save for her underwear, Rosé was completely naked as she nipped at your neck. You mewled and whined, your hips rolling up into Rosé's thigh.

"You're so wet." Rosé practically growled into your ear. She can easily tell by the amount collecting on her thigh every time you bucked your hips.

"Alpha, need you inside of me."

Rosé is all too happy to oblige. She kicked off her boxers quickly, then leaned over toward her bedside table. She rummaged around in the drawer without looking. You were completely naked under her, her eyes were bit preoccupied.

It took about 20 more seconds for the alpha to locate what she had been looking for.

"Safety first," Rosé exclaimed as she held up the condom. You rolled your eyes, a bit too far gone to care about safety at the moment. This all seemed like a waste of precious time to you.

It felt like ages before Rosé was finally inside of you. You couldn't help but clench just about as soon as she had entered.

The relief you felt was almost instantaneous. That feeling of finally being filled almost pushed you over the edge right then and there.

Rosé rocked her hips back lightly. Allowing you to adjust.

You did so quickly apparently. Your hips rocking up into Rosé once again.

"Chae, harder."

Rosé grunted and obliged. Her hips slamming into the you harder than before. You were about as tight as Rosé had imagined you would be, and that was serving to make this that much more difficult.

She'd be damned if she didn't even last ten minutes. How embarrassing would that be?

"Fuck." You moaned breathily. You felt like you were floating. The coil in your stomach tightening in time with the curling of your toes.

"You're so gorgeous." Rosé whispered into your shoulder. She nipped at the skin there, trying to abate her need to bite your mating gland.

You're not listening. You can feel Rosé's knot beginning to form, and your main goal is to get it inside of you. So, you relaxed as much as you could and wrapped your legs around Rosé's waist. Pulling her closer.

You both released almost identical moans.

"God, you're trying to kill me." Rosé grunted just as her knot popped into you.

It took just about all her willpower not to latch onto your neck.

Your back arched as you fell over the edge. Your breathy moans becoming a bit more high pitched.

Rosé groaned as she released into the condom.

As you both came down you began to giggle.

Rosé scowled, "What are you laughing at?"

"Oh, calm down. I'm laughing because I normally pride my self on having great self control. I demonstrated quite the opposite just then."

"Hey, we all need to let go every once in a while." Rosé shrugged and shifted you to a more comfortable position.

You gasped as you felt the knot tug a bit. You would be tied together for a bit longer.

You sighed happily, then snuggled closer into Rosé.

Within seconds, you're out like a light.

~•~

You woke to your phone vibrating precariously next to your head.

In the night, you and Rosé had since shifted. No longer tied. Your back was pressed into Rosé's front, with her arm slung across your waist.

You answered your phone without looking at caller id.

"Hello?"

"Hey. You weren't sleep were you?" You frowned at the tone of Jisoo's voice. She sounded exhausted and maybe even a little upset.

"No. Why? What's up?"

Jisoo huffed a bit before sighing, "Do you mind coming over here and watching Lia for a bit. She's not feeling well and I need to go pick up some medicine for her. I know it's late-"

"I'll be right over, Jisoo."

"Thanks."

It's surprisingly easy for you to slip out from under Rosé. Tiptoe out of the room, locate your clothes, then head out the apartment. All without waking her.

~•~

You're at Jisoo's in record time. You smoothed out your wrinkled shirt before knocking on the door lightly.

It doesn't occur to you that Jisoo is most definitely going to smell Rosé on you until Jisoo opens the door and looks at you like that.

Part sad, part angry, part prooven right?

Her jaw is clenched and she won't look you in the eyes. Instead she looked right past you into the hallway. You wanted to say something. Apologize maybe. Deal out excuses. You're not sure. Jisoo beat you to it anyway.

"...Thank you. I didn't want to bring her with me at risk of her getting sicker. And everyone else was busy. Or Asleep." Jisoo looked a bit resigned. Like she expected this and it was what it was.

She brushed passed you easily, then hurrried down to her car. She might punch her dashboard out of anger and jealousy, but it's the middle of the night. No one is there to confirm or deny that part.

You took a deep breath. You didn't like that look Jisoo gave you. It made you feel gross, guilty, and quite frankly, sick to your stomach.

You don't have time to wallow, because you can hear Lia whimpering through the baby monitor placed on the coffee table.

You walked into the toddler's room to find Lia balancing over the ledge of crib. Clearly in the middle of an escape.

"Hi, Li. Do you mind if I help you?"

Lia huffed before reaching for you. You scooped the child into your arms easily. Lia cuddled herself into your neck.

"Thank you for letting me help. You give the best hugs."

The toddler lifted her head from your shoulder, "Better than mama?"

You chuckled lightly, "Yes, better hugs than your mom."

Lia laid her head back as you walked back to the livingroom. You sat down on the sofa as you waited for Jisoo to get back.

"Don't feel good." Lia mumbled tiredly into your neck.

"I know you don't. That's why your mom went to go get some medicine for you. You know, I think you hit the mom jackpot with that one."

Lia shrugged and yawned. It's only about three seconds later that the toddler passes out.

You just continued to rub the girl's back.

~•~

Jisoo came back to see Lia passed out on your chest, and you passed out on the couch.

She begrudgingly took a pic of the admittedly adorable sight.

She eventually decided to post the picture to her Instagram. Jealousy only partially driving that decision.

Jisoo pocketed her phone and stood in the door way for a few more seconds. Lia looked very content to stay where she was, so Jisoo let her.

She sighed, "I'm working on it, kid. I just wish I knew what I was up against."

~•~

You woke up without the crick in your neck you thought you would. You soon realized it was because you were in a bed and not on the couch you had vaguely remembered falling asleep on.

You hobbled out of the bed. You peered into Lia's room to find her sleeping soundly in the crib.

You then padded into the living room next. The tv was on but it didn't seem obvious that it was being watched.

"Morning." You jumped clear out of your skin.

You turned around to the voice. Jisoo was standing at the kitchen island, sipping on a cup of coffee. Jisoo looked like she had gotten exactly zero hours of sleep that night. Her face was blank and she was wearing the same thing she had left in.

"Morning... How'd I get into your bed?"

"I carried you there. You looked uncomfortable." Jisoo's face remained blank. Her eyes pointed in the direction of the television.

"Where did you sleep?"

"I didn't."

"Chu."

"Thanks for watching Lia again." Jisoo's jaw clenched and her leg bounced on the linoleum, "I'll see you later."

You wrapped your arms around yourself. You nodded as you headed for the front door.

"Tell Lia I'll see her next week?"

Jisoo only hummed.

You took a shakey breath as you left the apartment. You left the building with arms still wrapped around yourself.

Somehow, this felt more like the walk of shame then leaving Rosé's had.

You pulled out your phone and dialed a familiar number.

"What's up?"

"Can we meet up, I really need to talk."

"Of course. You know where to meet me. Give me ten minutes."

You breathed a watery sigh of relief, "Thank you."

#petrichor #blackpink fanfic #jesssica's fanfic #blackpink #jisoo fanfic #jisoo x reader #rose fanfic #rose x reader #alpha female #alpha/beta/omega dynamics

29 notes · View notes

five-hxrgreeves · 4 years ago

Text

I Won’t Back Down - Five Hargreeves x OC

Word Count: 1,982

You can stand me up at the gates of hell But I won't back down I'm gonna stand my ground Won't be turned around And I'll keep this world from dragging me down

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 |

Pt. 3- Monday, April 1, 2019

The morning of the first dawned with a bright blue sky and perfect spring temperatures, almost in mocking irony of the fate it would meet later on that same day. Suspecting nothing amiss, Lola began her usual morning routine of getting ready for school. After brushing her teeth, she went to her closet and decided on a pair of jeans, a white, long-sleeved v-necked shirt with black polka-dots and after brushing her hair, hesitated over a choice of hats that she owned. While there was no strict dress code at her school, she did like to make a good first impression on Mondays. The rest of the week was up for grabs.

Coming to a decision, she reached for a yellow hat with a navy-blue ribbon around the crown that was tied in a bow and placed it jauntily on her head. The brunette was somewhat known around school for her unique accessories so she’d only been indecisive over which style she’d wanted, not actually whether or not to wear a hat. She then pulled on a pair of riding-styled boots and picked up her backpack, sliding her deck of cards into the back pocket of her jeans. Lunchtime was usually a boring affair so it was often when she would practice her magic- sometimes with a crowd to entertain.

On her route to school, Lola passed the familiar Umbrella Academy house and wondered what transpired within the walls, remembering the strange man she’d met the previous week. She wondered how long it had been since all of the siblings had seen each other since from Vanya’s book, it hadn’t seemed like they’d lived under the same roof for a long, long time. A smile flickered across her face as she thought of grown-up superheroes attempting to act like real siblings and the interesting, chaotic bickering that might ensue.

(Of course, she had no idea that such arguments might result in the end of life on earth.)

After that, the day passed as it usually did, with millions and billions of people completely unaware of what the night would bring.

Once dinner was over, Lola scraped her plate clean and set it in the dishwasher before turning it on to run, blatantly unaware that this would be the last time she did such a mundane action for a long, long time. Then, she made her way into the family room where her mother, father and uncle were sitting on the couch about to watch TV. Both men had their traditional after-dinner drink of two fingers of whiskey while her mother sipped on spiked hot coffee.

“Mom?” Lola asked.

“Yes, dear?”

“I’m going to the basement now, all of the dinner dishes are cleaned up.”

Her mother’s blue eyes- the ones she’d inherited- flicked to the younger girl, “alright, but don’t stay up too late. It’s a school night, you know.”

Her uncle grinned, “yeah,” he said, breaking to take a sip from his glass, “wouldn’t want you to show up all grumpy for school tomorrow.”

Lola sighed and nodded in acceptance, “alright, I’ll do my best,” she said, knowing it was more than likely she’d lose track of time anyway.

Moving first towards her mother, then father and finally her uncle, she gave them each a goodnight hug and exchanged their daily I love yous.

(She would be grateful that these were the last words she’d ever said to her family. At least she wouldn’t have to live wondering if her family had known she’d loved them.)

Then, she went to the basement.

Not even a mile away, the beginnings of an altercation were occurring at the house the size of a single block where the seventh, disregarded member of the family of superheroes was receiving a hostile welcome at the introduction of her new boyfriend, Leonard Peabody.

Lola liked her basement. It wasn’t terribly large but it wasn’t terribly small, either. Half of it was unfinished and the other half was lived-in, creating a perfect balance. In the unfinished side, metal shelves that one might see in a hardware store stood floor-to-ceiling with various tools and stored holiday items. Paint cans, electric machinery, extension cords and other items one would normally find in a shed were scattered haphazardly along the shelves.

In the other half, a carpeted floor of some green color stretched from the back wall to right before Lola’s writing desk. On top of it sat an old, brown-leather couch, a black wooden coffee table from IKEA and a TV hung mounted on the wall. After the carpet ended, removable foam-padded tiles formed the floor. This was the area where Lola’s desk sat which was a large, white table. The desktop itself was almost empty except for her half-filled notebook, three different-sized candles, a pencil sharpener and a pencil holder. Her papers- both for school and other things- were stored in a hand-me-down brown file cabinet that stood to the left of her workspace.

Before sitting down to write, the brunette carried out her ritual warm-up: lighting the candles, flipping to the next available page, sharpening her pencil and placing her reference books on her desk- The Book Thief, of course, and her new book from Vanya Hargreeves. Then, she pulled her deck of cards from her back pocket and placed the rectangular box carefully on the lower-left corner of her desk, making sure to match up the corners of the box with the outlined shape created by the corner. She wasn’t sure why she did this, it just was something she absolutely had to do before she finally sat down.

Once finished, Lola made sure to flip the electric lights off and returned to her seat which was a rolly-chair with one broken wheel. She began to write surrounded by her small pool of glowing, flickering light.

Today’s memory is from when I was six. (Note to self: find a better opening.) It was my first time at the store for hours on end. Usually, a babysitter would come by and pick me up but I suppose she cancelled. (NtS: get more details. Just kidding, nobody cares about that.) Anyway, I was super bored and since I was little, I didn’t have any schoolwork to do. I wandered around the store for a bit, probably causing mischief. Anyway (you already said that, dummy) the funny part is that I sat down at a group of mannequins because there weren’t any other seats and I must’ve sat so still that everyone thought I was one because when I finally stood up, a woman screamed. I didn’t know why at the time but it happened again when I was older. Then I started doing it for my own amusement. It was funny to see people think that I was a fake, plastic doll only to realize I was actually real. Sometimes, I even went to the back and dressed in clothes that would soon be modeled by the mannequins- although I think the effect was ruined because I didn’t fit them.

A story up and a block over, the altercation had grown to a full-blown verbal assault, the main four members of the family heatedly questioning the new boyfriend’s insistence on them coming to their sister’s concert. The seventh member, feeling hurt and angry that her family wouldn’t, just once support her, felt the tension build up within her, her emotions unusually high from the lack of medication she’d consistently taken for years until this week.

The spot was also great for people-watching. While Gimbel Brothers has mostly ordinary clients, there are some cases that are more noteworthy (NtS: fix wording, sounds awkward). There are many people who bring children to the store as well. On Mondays, there is an average of twelve children, usually after school. The number varies throughout the week until Saturday where there are usually fifteen or twenty. One time, as an outlier during the holidays, there were twenty-five. I know this because I counted them. I don’t usually do it intentionally and I’m sure I miss some customers but for some reason, all the numbers stick in my head. The funny thing is, I’m terrible at math. I’m also really good at cards, though. I’ve never lost a game of War or Go Fish. My uncle says I’m a counter, which I suppose is true. I’ve also counted all the sequins on one of our formal dresses, just for fun. There were two-hundred and eighty-six.

As the sky grew dark outside, the argument in the large house had reached an all-time high with Leonard Peabody outwardly insulting his girlfriend’s largest brother, inciting his anger and riling him up purposefully, causing him to throw the first punch. The seventh member of the family desperately tried to pull her boyfriend away, to save him from an assault that he would surely not survive. She was right about that, but there was nothing she could do. There was only one person Number One listened to and it wasn’t her.

Anyway, back to people-watching. There was once a rich woman who came to our store. No one could figure out why; we’re not exactly the high-end type. She brought her daughter with her, a pretty, blonde girl with bright blue eyes. Almost like mine, I think, but they looked better on her. I heard her tell Brittany that she wanted to get her granddaughter ‘normal clothes,’ except she said it like an insult. I figure that when her granddaughter came to visit, all she provided were expensive outfits and the girl spilled on them, teaching her the lesson of buying cheaper clothes for little kids. She didn’t say all of that but I made up the story to go along with her request.

Standing over Leonard’s body, the seventh member of the Hargeeves turned on her brother, eyes shining white against her pale face. In his hand, he held a bloody, glass eyeball. Her siblings crowded together, trying to calm her, but she spent all of her life being calm and she was tired of it. Turning her gaze to the academy, the building shook under a ten-point-zero earthquake, the bricks and concrete falling down in rapid succession. Tearing her gaze away from the sight of her childhood hell, she let sound waves resonate through the street, knocking over buildings and causing them to collapse, burying her siblings in rubble. Carelessly, she walked away as anger, sadness and hatred fueled her steps to her apartment where she changed and gathered up her violin for the world’s last performance.

She was very posh too, with fur and everything. She stood still long enough that I could study her coat, which had thirty spots. I’m not sure if it was real fur (if it was, she’s a horrible person), but she certainly acted very high-class, even speaking a little nasally and tilting her head up to look down on Brittany. I think it might’ve been because of Brittany’s skin color. The woman didn’t seem to be very accepting of hard-working people that looked different from her.

At ten o’clock pm, the close of the concert, sound waves so large they felled the building and many blocks over swept through the city. A short, dark-haired woman with a glowing white light in the center of her chest rose above the destruction, sending out pulses of sound to the far-reaching corners of the world. With no one to stop her, no one to shoot a gun next to her ear, the bottled power exploded from her chest sharing with everyone the feelings of hurt and neglect that she’d been forced to endure throughout her childhood. One person alone survived in a basement not much deeper than the fictional character’s she admired, writing away and completely unaware that the world above had changed beyond recognition.

#The Umbrella Academy #Umbrella Academy #five #five hargreeves #five hargreeves x dolores #five hargreeves x oc #five hargreeves x reader #Five x oc #five x dolores #tua five #5 #human dolores #pre-tua #apocalypse #hargreeves #dolores isn't a mannequin #vanya hargreeves

23 notes · View notes

theotherackerman · 3 years ago

Text

My Mind Turns Your Life Into Folklore

NOTES:

Friday January 22nd

chapter twenty-five: said i'm fine but it wasn't true

It was Mikasa and Levi’s grandfather’s birthday.

Mikasa only knew it was by the calendar in the kitchen.

“He was an ass anyway. You didn’t miss much by not knowing him,” Levi informed her as he did every year.

Armin and Eren left that afternoon.

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

Apparently being a dumbass was contagious.

While Zeke was trying to process the file Levi had given him, Armin had dropped Eren off back at the house on Friday morning.

"Niccolo and Sasha broke up," Eren informed him. "Well, not that they were actually together yet…"

Zeke groaned. "Why?"

"Apparently, he had some issues with her still being friends with Connie...is Pieck drunk on our couch? It's not even the afternoon!"

"You're one to talk, tiny Jaeger," Pieck said from the couch.

"Oh see that dumbass there just broke up with her boyfriend too," Zeke said as he pointed at her.

"He wasn't my boyfriend!"

"Wait, is this the mystery guy? Who was he?"

Pieck face planted into the couch and mumbled something that Eren and Zeke didn't understand.

"Is she drunk?" Eren asked him.

"On sugar probably. She already ate the last of the ice cream."

Eren didn’t say anything as he went to his room upstairs.

Zeke looked over the still face planted Pieck.

“Will you go talk to him already? It is not too late to go back and tell him you are a dumbass,” Zeke said as he looked at the scans of the file on his computer.

“It is! I broke his heart and now he’s going to go out with a younger woman.” Pieck said as she sat up.

Why did Zeke have to be the only sane one in his group of friends?

“You didn’t see his face, Zeke. I destroyed him and just left. Without looking back.”

“Pieck...go back. Go admit your fuck up.”

Zeke had seen Pieck cry a handful of times. Once when her father had been diagnosed with cancer and the other when Dina had died.

But not like this.

Pieck hadn’t been in many relationships. She always said things like she was allergic to relationships or why waste time on something that statistically wouldn’t work out. No, Pieck was married to her art.

It was this moment that Zeke realized Pieck had said all of these things to keep herself safe from this.

The tears were streaming down her face.

Eren came downstairs and stopped there.

“Pieck….” Eren said as he crossed to Pieck.

“I just see him in my head. I go back and he’s already with her. She’s so much younger and prettier than I am. I just...I can’t. Eren, I’m sorry,” Pieck apologized.

“Why?” Eren asked.

Zeke moved from the table over to sit next to Pieck.

“He’s your friend and you’re going to find out very soon. It’s Jean. I’m sorry,” Pieck began crying more.

Zeke did not have the first clue about what to do. Neither did Eren.

“I’m going to make a phone call,” Eren said before stepping out of the room.

“Don’t! It has to be over. I don’t want to feel this….anymore..”

“Okay,” Eren said. “I won’t call Jean.”

Eren stepped out of the room.

After what happened with Armin and Mikasa, Eren said he wouldn’t lie about things like this anymore. But Eren had to lie this time.

He went out of the room and pressed Jean’s contact in his phone.

“What do you want, Jaeger? Now is not a good time,” Jean’s voice rang out on the other side of the phone.

“Are you in love with Pieck?” Eren asked.

“What? Why is that any of your business?”

“Because she’s crying to Zeke in my living room right now.”

“She’s the one who ended it. Not me! So don’t come at me about it.”

“I’m not. I just..”

“What do you want me to do, Eren? Beg her to stay? I told her just to say the word and I’d tell my mom not to set me up on a date. I told her I loved her. She said she didn’t feel the same. She said she didn’t love me and it was just sex. So no, I’m not fucking begging her when she’s made her feeling perfectly clear. We’re not you and Mikasa. If she wanted to be with me, she had the chance.”

Eren couldn’t argue with that.

“I’m sorry,” Eren said after a moment.

“It’s whatever. I’ll bounce back. I mean how can I not? I’m me.”

“If you need to talk…”

“You’d be the one I’d call?”

“If anyone knows about losing the one they love…”

“Well, you’ve got a point there. You do know about fucking things up, don’t you? You idiot. How is that going by the way?”

“Good.”

“Good. Don’t do that again.”

“Oh. Don’t worry. I won’t. By the way, why didn’t you make a move on Mikasa when we were broken up?”

“Because unlike you, I’m not an idiot.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I dropped that idea the day I asked her out and she turned me down. She told me she had feelings for you and then when I saw you two together the next day, I knew. You two were meant for one another. Even if you’re an idiot who fucked it up, I wasn’t. I knew there was no way I could compete with you...when it comes to Mikasa.”

“Did you just say something nice to me?”

“Don’t get used to it.”

“Okay, horseface.”

“Fucking idiot.”

“...you want to get online and shoot some shit?”

“Give me ten minutes.”

“Don’t pull my rank down.”

“Don’t pull mine.”

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

Pieck eventually stopped crying.

Zeke patted her on her back while she cried.

And Pieck cried until she couldn’t cry anymore.

She was done.

“So teach me another song.”

“Do you..”

“No.”

“Okay. Yeah, sure.”

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

Mikasa’s writer’s block had begun to disappear. She spent most of the day in the sun room writing lyrics to one of the unfinished pieces she had from Historia.

Annie had given up on work half way through her shift and shuffled into the sun room where Ymir was restringing her acoustic guitar.

The sound of power tools in the basement could be heard.

“They having any luck down there?” Annie asked before she sat down in one of the chairs.

“They brought up some ripped out carpet,” Ymir said as she tightened the string down.

“So this is actually happening. We’re going to record,” Annie gave a small smile.

“We’ve come a long way in a little over a year,” Ymir replied as she finished tightening the string down. “Speaking of coming a long way, how’s our social media numbers looking?”

Annie sighed, “well, Facebook sits at the same numbers. Twitter gained a few. YouTube has gone up. Instagram is the problem. We’re dropping views on whatever we post in the feed.”

“Why?” Mikasa asked as she stopped playing.

“It’s the algorithm. The more people who see and interact with our stuff, the more it spreads but it has to show up on the feed first. We’re fucked sometimes. I’ve been trying to put everything into stories where I can but people still have to interact with it.”

“You remember the days when things were just chronical on our feeds?” Ymir asked. “Now you have to be a math genius like Annie to get anywhere.”

“To be fair, I still haven’t beat it.”

“You’ll figure it out. You always do.”

“We all need to interact with the posts. That’ll help too. I know we have been but we have to keep it up.”

“Just tag me in that shit and I’ll share it everywhere. Speaking of genius...are we going to have another new song or what?” Ymir asked as she looked over at Mikasa.

“I’m working on it. Have we thought about the idea of collaborating with The Restorationists? Their follower numbers are larger than ours. Plus, they just got a new bassist. Might be a good idea to see if they want to do a livestream with us or something,” Mikasa said before she shrugged.

“What about Niccolo and Sasha?” Ymir asked.

“Yeah, I’m worried about that too,” Mikasa sighed.

“Wouldn’t hurt to ask,” Annie shrugged.

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

Sasha kept her word of not speaking to Niccolo for a little bit. He didn’t try to contact her and she didn’t try to contact him. However, as Sasha had said, the farm was doing great at the farmer’s market. Mr. Blouse even gave both Sasha and Historia a bonus when they finished work today.

“I don’t know how we’re going to have four guitars,” Ymir scoffed.

“And a bass,” Annie added.

“Yeah, that too. I love the song as much as you all do but I’m wondering how we’re going to pull it off.”

“What about a collaboration with The Restorationists?” Annie asked.

“Oh yeah. Niccolo did tag us on their Instagram. We should do that,” Sasha said.

“Even with you and Niccolo being all….whatever?” Ymir asked.

“I can be professional. Besides, I thought you all wanted this to be a more stripped down song. I can use the cajón,” Sasha shrugged.

“What the fuck is a cajón?” Ymir asked.

“The percussion box,” Sasha answered.

“Then just call it that!”

“This song is pretty personal, Historia. I’ll leave it up to you,” Sasha said before she hit the cymbal, causing Ymir to jump.

Ymir responded with a very horrible sound from her bass.

Annie sat down on the piano bench next to Mikasa and Historia as she sighed.

“It is pretty personal,” Mikasa said as she looked over Historia.

“We need four guitars, two percussion, and a bass. Can they read music?” Historia asked.

“Eren can,” Mikasa answered.

“Pieck is their bassist now. She can read music,” Annie said.

“Didn’t she work at the tutoring center with you for a while?” Ymir asked.

Annie nodded.

“Small world,” Ymir said.

“That leaves Zeke and Niccolo,” Historia said.

“Niccolo can,” Sasha answered before looking down.

Levi walked by the sun room with Sawney and Bean following him.

“Hey Levi, can Zeke read music?” Ymir asked.

“Why would I know the answer to that?” Levi asked as he stopped.

“He’s your therapist. Maybe you two bond over music or something. I don’t know but do you know?”

“No, I don’t. It really doesn’t come up in conversation.” He continued on his path with Sawney and Bean followed him.

“I’m sure Zeke can read music. I can always call Eren after practice,” Mikasa said as she turned to the next page of her sheet music.

“Are you okay with it being a collaboration, Mikasa?” Historia said.

“I’m okay with it,” she smiled.

“Guess that settles that. Just need to ask The Restorationists. Do you want me on bass, electric, or acoustic for this song?” Ymir asked.

“Acoustic,” Historia and Mikasa said at the same time.

“All of our band…” Historia started.

“On acoustic,” Mikasa finished.

“Add their band here,” Historia said as she pointed to the music.

“Should we do all five of us singing this lyric here?” Mikasa asked.

“Wait, I didn’t agree to sing on this song!” Sasha said as she stood up from her drum set.

“Oh yes, let’s do that. That should be low enough for everyone to sing, right?” Historia asked.

“It’s hopeless, Sasha. They’re in the zone. They’re not hearing a thing we’re saying,” Ymir said as she put her bass down on its stand.

“If that’s the case, I’m going to go figure out what to make for dinner,” Sasha said as she left the sun room.

“I’m going to go make myself some more tea before I get morning sickness again,” Annie said as she placed her guitar on the stand.

Historia and Mikasa were left alone in the sun room to continue work on the song.

While Rod Reiss sat on his throne, his daughter was dismantling it in her music.

#mmtylif #my writing

2 notes · View notes

celestialmark · 5 years ago

Text

Solitude - Part Four

Characters: Mark Lee x reader, members of nct

Category: sniper!mark, mafia au

Word count: 8.3k

Warnings: cursing, mentions of death

Author’s note: surprise surprise! I’ve never written anything so fast in my whole life but I really wanted to give you this before the year ends and as a token of appreciation and gratitude for all the love I and this story has been receiving. hope you have a lovely and safe new year guys! may 2020 be filled with all that you’ve been wishing for! <3 ilysm and I hope you enjoy this chapter! we’re getting so close to the end!

You don’t stop crying even as Johnny speeds the car away from Mark’s loft. You’re not entirely sure what’s happening, all you know is that Jeno was quick to grab you by the arm and shove you into Johnny’s car. You don’t have the heart to ask what’s happening either, the worst of your nightmares coming to life still taking up your thoughts, and the very cause of your waterfall of tears. You’re crying for a lot of things, for yourself, for all the struggles of fighting for your life all these years, for Mark, who you felt was finally your safe haven, and for the both of you, of how twisted and sick the whole situation is, of the possibility of running away forever just to keep your life.

Jeno, who’s taken the passenger seat in front, doesn’t speak to Johnny who’s focusing on getting you to your unknown destination fast and safe. And you don’t realise the gradual shift of the derelict buildings to the view of the coast outside the window. You’re too busy picking at your fingers, occasionally pinching yourself to wake up from this hell of a nightmare, still in a state of refusal to accept the reality that’s unfolding right under your nose. You only come back to your senses when the car comes to an abrupt stop and that’s when you eventually lift your head up and look outside beyond the tears that obscure your vision.

You’re met by the gentle waves of the ocean crashing onto the shore and from where you sit, you can hear the unfamiliar breeze rushing past, a sound you can only hear by the seaside. Johnny and Jeno are first to hop off the car and you watch as Johnny slowly walks towards your door before opening it.

“Y/n?” he calls out carefully, pulling the door open until it reveals your hunched over figure fully. “We’re here. I promised I’d bring you here, didn’t I?”

Johnny’s gaze on you is tender, his sympathies coming in volumes with how gentle he speaks to you and right now, he’s probably the only one you want to trust, the only one who can comfort you best despite knowing he’s probably involved in all of this mess too.

You unbuckle your seatbelt weakly and step out of the car only to collapse into Johnny’s arms that are already outstretched for you. You hug him tight just as your waterworks begin again, your sobs getting lost in his hoodie. And Johnny hugs you even tighter, using one palm to rub your back up and down, something to let you know that it’s okay even when nothing really was.

When Johnny’s hoodie becomes damp and your sobs have died down slightly, he holds you by the shoulders firmly and pulls you back slightly, ducking his head to meet your puffy eyes. “Okay princess, I need you to take a deep breath and tell me what happened.” Johnny’s voice is quiet and laced with concern, a worried frown falling on his features.

You’re fingers stay clutching onto Johnny’s clothes as you try to hold his gaze, “Mark.. Mark was the one who shot me.”

Johnny’s eyes widen but it only takes less than a second for the worry in his eyes to return. “I—“

“Johnny— he, he’s out for my life,” you prod. “He’s like everyone else, he wants me killed.”

“Okay okay,” Johnny intercepts, urging you to calm down when he senses your breaths becoming shallow again. “What’s made you think so?”

“A-at the loft, there’s a room full of guns.. Pictures of him with people who were there at the day of my shooting. And and files of me, tracking all my locations,” your legs are beginning to weaken with every recollection of what you saw earlier. “Johnny you were in those pictures too.”

Johnny presses his lips together and says nothing.

“Tell me,” you brave. “Mark shot me that day didn’t he?”

Johnny doesn’t get to answer, his mouth closing just as fast as it opens, when Jeno comes to his side, tucking his phone away in the pocket of his jeans,

“Johnny, we need to head inside.”

“Mark, what the fuck was that?”

Taeyong’s words come out in pure shrill, eyes dark, his whole body rigid as the four boys stand before him. Taeyong closes his eyes as he inhales a big breath, eyes glaring at Mark again the moment they open.

“Yuta said he isn’t willing to make the deal yet, that you and him had some unfinished business of some sort, what the hell is that?”

Mark straightens himself even more than he already has, head held high and gaze fixated on the wall behind Taeyong. “He asked for more than what was agreed on. I couldn’t let him.”

“Well why the fuck not?” Taeyong demands harshly. “We can lose a little to gain so much more. You out of all people, fucking know that.”

Mark balls his hands into fists, feeling all too suffocated in the mess he’s gotten himself into. He finally meets Taeyong’s eyes, “Yuta will keep you running in circles if you keep giving him what he wants. We’re never going to gain anything if we take the bait.”

“And so you straight up disobey my orders because of what you think is right for the whole group?” Taeyong narrows his eyes at Mark, steering away from behind the table until he’s in front of the younger.

Taeyong closes the distance between him and Mark, jabbing a finger at his chest, jaw clenched so tight, “You better fix this. I want that deal whether you like it or not. I’m still your leader and you do as I say. Got that?”

Mark only nods once.

“Pack up, we’re heading back first thing tomorrow.”

And with that, Taeyong leaves.

Jaemin’s shoulders droop immediately, a sigh escaping his lips just as Donghyuck and Renjun do the same. Their attentions instantly shift to Mark who’s now dropped his head to the ground.

“What was that back there?” Renjun asks curiously.

“Yeah, what were you and Yuta talking about?” Jaemin adds.

Mark wishes he could spill everything to his comrades, maybe having their opinions will help his internal conflict and maybe even get a helpful advice or two but doing that would literally be him signing up for even more trouble. He’s about to come up with a lousy lie when the phone in his pocket vibrates, indicating a call.

Jeno speaks calmly on the other line but Mark can tell he’s panicking slightly, his words coming out too close after each another. Mark doesn’t ask questions as soon as Jeno finishes talking, ending the call in a heartbeat and already scrambling around the room to leave.

“I have to go,” Mark mumbles to himself while the three watch him in confusion.

“What? Go where?”

“I’ll see you guys in Korea okay? I’ll explain to Taeyong later.”

“Mark wait—“

Donghyuck stops trying when Mark is already running for the door.

“Something is definitely wrong.”

“Oh my!” A woman, who appears to be in her early fifties exclaim the moment she sees you and your swollen eyes. “What have you done to this poor lady!” She turns to Johnny, hitting at his chest in the process, scowling at him. “What did I say about making women cry Johnny Seo!”

Johnny’s hands fly up to defend himself, “Mum I didn’t do anything!”

The sight warms your heart and you crack a small smile for the first time in two hours. You figure it’s Johnny’s house you’ve just entered, remembering him mention he resided beside the ocean from before, a simple two storey house located not too far from the shore.

Mrs Seo glowers at her son before returning to you, “I’m so sorry for whatever he’s done. I should have raised him better.” She cranes her neck and sees Jeno behind you, “Jeno, what has your doofus of a friend done this time?”

Jeno chuckles, his eyes disappearing as he does so and spares a teasing glance at Johnny who’s rolling his eyes, “Not too sure Mrs Seo.”

You appreciate it all; the way in which Johnny’s mum is able to lighten up your mood somewhat without having a hunch of your current situation, taking off some weight off your chest. Her eyes are warm and kind, a few wrinkles on the edges of her lids to showcase how gracefully she’s aged over the years, and she has a smile that makes you feel at home.

“Johnny prepare a nice warm bath, this lady needs one while I feed her and Jeno,” Mrs Seo instructs and pushes you gently towards the direction of the kitchen and nodding at Jeno after you.

“Yes ma’am,” Johnny salutes before he’s racing upstairs.

There’s already a bunch of dishes and side dishes set on the table when Mrs Seo urges you to sit on one of the chairs beside Jeno. It’s a complete meal and it reminds you of home, of your parents whom you miss so much, especially today. You pinch yourself under the table, trying to suck it all up because there was no way you were going to burst out crying again, not in front of the woman who’s smiling ever so warmly at you, encouraging you to dig in. You swallow thickly and pick up your utensils to begin your meal just as Jeno does the same but not before thanking Mrs Seo.

“I’m so sorry, I’m so rude, I didn’t even introduce myself,” Mrs Seo recalls. “I’m Hazel Seo, Johnny’s mum. And it’s such a pleasure to be meeting such a beautiful lady.”

You smile at her kind words, her hospitality making you feel a whole lot better. “I’m y/n.” If Johnny’s mum knew who you were, she did a really good job at hiding it because she smiles wider and only nods.

“Eat up! Eat up!” She exhorts. “Gosh Jeno you look so worn, what has Taeyong been keeping you up with lately!”

Taeyong?

Mrs Seo grabs Jeno’s cheeks and squishes them, “Your cheeks look so sunken! Where have they gone?” Jeno chuckles as he munches on his food, the most adorable eyesmile making Mrs Seo ruffle his hair.

You eat quietly, occasionally nodding and replying with short responses to Mrs Seo’s attempts at conversation. Any other given day, you would’ve loved to have gotten to know the woman, but today, your energy was running low at an incredibly fast pace. Johnny is the one who navigates you upstairs to the bathroom where your hot bath is waiting and you silently thank Mrs Seo for having such good instincts, seemingly your silent hero for today.

You’re not quite sure how long you’ve been sitting in the water but that’s the last of your worries. Your thoughts are blank and it’s mirrored in the way you’re staring vacantly into nothing, maybe it’s because you have no inclination of what to think anymore, all the possible scenarios and “what ifs” already been played out in your mind countless of times during your journey here. You curl yourself up into a ball, letting your head rest on your knees, allowing a single tear to roll down your cheek for how empty and numb you feel inside and you make a mental promise it would be the last one you will cry, for today at least.

When the sun sets and night falls, Johnny invites you to a bonfire he’s created outside by the beach, but not before draping a light blanket across your shoulders. You sit beside him on the sand as he pokes at the fire to ensure it lasts for a long while. He doesn’t say anything when you lean your head on his shoulder, a contented and shaky sigh leaving your lips.

You can faintly make out the foam of the waves as it kisses the shore, the breeze that blows continuously enough for the knots in your aching muscles to come undone. From this place, you can see the stars so clearly dotted across the sky beside the moon and you’re reminded of all the reasons why you’ve loved the beach all your life in spite of the lack of memory of ever visiting one.

“I know you have burning questions,” Johnny remarks, retracting his hand to rest on his lap when he finishes managing the flames. “But I’m not the best person to ask, y/n.”

“I know, John.”

You lean away from Johnny momentarily when he wraps an arm across your shoulders and pulls you closer to him. He begins to rub your shoulder with his thumb, doing all he can to comfort you in any way possible, knowing how tough of a day it has been for you.

“Rest for now, okay munchkin?”

“I can’t believe you lost her!” Kun growls, ready to swing at anyone within reach. “Such an easy task and you can’t even do it fucking right!”

Xiaojun, Hendery and Lucas cower their heads lower. Everything had been going great, if it wasn’t for Jeno.

“How many times do you have to fuck things up before you can finally do anything right?” Kun snarls through clenched teeth and stops in front of Lucas who’s avoiding his glare at all costs.

“Apologies, Kun.”

Kun’s rising anger pushes him to shove Xiaojun by the shoulders, causing the younger to stumble backwards. “Sorry doesn’t cut it. What can your pathetic apology do?”

“Y/n was supposed to die by our hands ages ago,” Kun exclaims and proceeds to sit on the edge of the table. “But guess what? You scumbags couldn’t even do that much and now she’s in their hands.”

“Can anyone give me an ideal plan of how we can turn your fuck ups into something great?” Kun asks rhetorically, determined to show how incompetent the boys standing before him, are. “Something actually smart? Anybody?” Kun drags his eyes across the three, waiting for a response he knows he’s not going to get.

The heavens must have heard Hendery’s desperate pleas in his head when Sicheng steps in at that exact moment. “Kun stop it already,” he says calmly, traipsing across the room until he’s beside the elder. “I found something.”

Kun throws his hands up in the air and accentuates the relief on his face, rubbing it particularly, in Xiaojun’s face of his incapabilities. “Nakamoto Yuta, also known as, Japan’s leader is looking into making ties with Taeyong,” Sicheng announces, making the three look up from the ground.

Kun scowls at the three for a moment before focusing in Sicheng again, “And it looks like we’re not the only ones who know Y/n is alive. Yuta seems to have the same knowledge too.”

Kun crosses his arms across his chest, brows meeting in the middle as Sicheng continues to speak. “Rather than killing Y/n for the revenge you’ve always wanted, I think we might benefit from her more if we bring her to Yuta ourselves.”

“Yuta is a billionaire Kun,” Sicheng emphasises. “And I believes he’s willing to pay a high price in exchange for Y/n.”

Kun’s eyes darken at that moment, his thoughts already imagining the glory he’ll receive if he acts upon Sicheng’s suggestion. A smirk takes over his face then, rubbing his palms together, a habit he’s always had when he had a plan in mind.

“Bring me Y/n. Bring her to me, alive.”

When you’ve finally fallen asleep sometime after two in the morning, with Johnny insisting he stays with you until he’s sure you’ve fallen into slumber, he zooms downstairs to the kitchen where Jeno is still typing away at his laptop, his glasses, which he only ever wears when he’s required to do a lot of work in front of his screen, sitting on his nose perfectly.

“Any news?” Johnny asks, taking a seat opposite Jeno, taking a sip of his tea which has already cooled down quite a bit.

Jeno shakes his head without lifting his eyes from his screen. Johnny sighs and runs a hand through his hair, “How the fuck did they know about Y/n? Not even Taeyong knows— wait, he doesn’t know, right?”

Jeno shakes his head again, “He doesn’t.”

“Then how come Kun knows about her being alive?”

Jeno pauses the frantic of his fingers typing and takes off his glasses in the process. He rubs his tired eyes before replying, “Not too sure. But I know Kun has always been tailing our backs for as long as I can remember. Donghyuck says it’s got something to do with wanting to always know what we’re up to so they can act before we can.”

“And? Has that done any good for them?”

“No. Because we’ve always been careful with covering our tracks and we’ve always gotten things done before they even found out,” Jeno pauses and purses his lips, “Up until now.”

Before Johnny can speak, there’s a few bangs on the front door. The two exchange uneasy glances before Johnny rises from his seat to check who it is. Not even two minutes later, he reappears in the kitchen with Mark trailing behind him.

“Jeno said you’re coming back tomorrow,” Johnny says to Mark, taking his seat again.

Mark sits down beside Johnny, taking off his jacket and setting it behind him, “I left as soon as Jeno called me. Well? Where is she?”

“She’s just after falling asleep,” Johnny replies. “She’s pretty shaken Mark.”

“Well what exactly happened?” Mark asks hastily, too eager to learn about all the things he’s missed. Worry was an understatement for him.

Jeno clears his throat and stows his laptop aside along with his glasses. Folding his arms on the table, he begins to explain, “Kun’s boys found out about Y/n and were on the way to take her this morning.”

“What? That doesn’t make any sense— No one knows about Y/n except me and Johnny— wait, how did you know about Y/n?” Amidst all that’s been happening and the current chaos Mark’s head is in, it’s only dawned on him now that Jeno, in fact, has become aware of you being alive, maybe even way before what happened earlier in the day.

“I’ve always had a hunch,” Jeno starts. “Remember that day you shot her? I carried her to you, Mark. And I knew, I just knew you missed her heart by a mere inch.” Jeno takes a deep breath, recollecting everything he can remember, “And weeks, no, months before that day, you were practicing your shooting so much it was so unlikely of you. I’ve never seen you practice that much... Not even for your previous missions.”

Mark blinks.

“You were practicing to miss, weren’t you?” Jeno concludes.

Johnny plays with the ceramic mug in his hand with his thumb, listening intently to Jeno. Mark doesn’t answer and Jeno takes that as a yes, knowing he wouldn’t answer something like that so openly.

“Is that why, you asked Taeyong to stay behind?” Mark asks carefully.

Jeno’s eyes grow wide for a short second before nodding admittedly. “No one knew about Kun finding out Y/n was alive except for me. I couldn’t come to Japan because,”

“Because you had to make sure Y/n was safe by keeping eyes on Kun,” Johnny finishes off when Jeno hesitates. Jeno lowers his head, as if ashamed of what he’s done, even when he’s done nothing but good. Jeno feels the guilt of having abandoned his comrades during such a critical time to protect someone else but he figures, he regrets nothing in the end, even if it meant Taeyong adding double to his work.

Mark falls in silence as his thoughts come up with the worst case scenarios. He believes you would’ve been taken away by now if it wasn’t for Jeno’s sharp instincts.

“And I did more research,” Jeno continues. “The reason why Kun is after Y/n is because he wants to kill her. Years ago, Y/n parent’s apparently borrowed a tonne of money from Kun too when they were starting off their business. And it turns out, they were never compensated even after the business became successful.”

“Kun has always been out for their lives from the start, for revenge, but we were just always one step ahead, killing them before they could,” Jeno adds. “And now that he knows Y/n is actually alive, he’s going to do everything he can to get that revenge.”

Mark rubs his temples, feeling a dull headache starting to develop. “He’s not the only one who knows y/n’s alive.”

Johnny turns to Mark, “What? Who else knows?”

“Nakamoto Yuta.”

“Great, an even more powerful man to join the party,” Johnny says sarcastically as he rolls his eyes. “Though, not surprised. That man can get his hands on any information he wants.”

“What does he want?” Jeno asks.

“He wants Y/n. In exchange for the deal Taeyong wants,” Mark replies with a sigh, the thought not settling well within him at all.

“Bastards,” Johnny hisses under his breath.

There’s silence for a while, the three too lost in their own thoughts.

“Well what do we do?” Johnny asks not too long after.

Jeno is already grabbing at his laptop and putting his glasses on again,

“I’m on it.”

When the sun begins to rise from behind the horizon, you awake to the sound of Johnny’s bedroom door creaking open. What follows is the soft thudding of feet on the carpeted floor, walking past your sleeping figure on the bed to place a glass of water on the bedside table. It’s Jeno and when he turns, he’s almost startled to see you already staring at him.

“Y/n, you’re awake,” he states lowly, just standing there, appearing to contemplate what to do next.

“Morning Jeno,” you croak lowly and the boy genuinely looks stunned when you call his name and acknowledge his presence.

You sit up on the bed, shuffling to lean your back on the headboard. Jeno sits on the edge of the bed and hands you the glass of water he’s brought. Mumbling a quick thanks, you take a big gulp. Jeno takes it again from you when you’re done, wiping your lips dry with the sleeve of Johnny’s sweater.

“Mark is here,” Jeno says with much caution. “He’s ready to talk whenever you are.”

You nod wordlessly, trying to process it all in, the memories of yesterday’s events slowly sinking in again. Jeno becomes silent with you and you remember the first time you’ve come across him and with how he’s saved your life from people are apparently after you yesterday.

“Jeno, can I ask you something?” you wonder out loud.

Jeno nods.

“You were there, weren’t you? The day I was shot?”

He nods again. “Is that how you know who I am, y/n?”

You nod this time.

“How.. how long have you known?” You ask slowly. “How long have you known I was alive?”

“Since that day,” he replies without a thought, indicating the truth. “I’ve known since that day.”

The compassion Jeno possesses can be felt in his quiet and calm nature and in the way he answers your questions truly, knowing you deserve all the truths you sought for. You feel like you can trust Jeno, thinking back to how he saved you yesteday and from drawing conclusions about him as a person through the conversation you’re holding now.

“Why— why haven’t you told the others? That I’m alive? They want me dead, don’t they?”

Jeno bites his lower lip, mulling over your question in the process but decides to come fully clean. “Mark saved you for a reason y/n. I owe him my life and I felt like that was the least I could do for him, even if it meant going against everything I was asked to do.”

Jeno stands from the bed then and offers you a small smile, releasing a breath. “I know I’m in no place to say this to you, but I hope you hear him out. He’s not exactly one to be so impulsive or disobey Taeyong— whatever his reason is, I hope you do hear him out, y/n. Mark... he’s a good guy.”

You believe Jeno. You really do because you’ve experienced what it’s like to be with Mark yourself. And you’re silently praying whatever he has to say will cancel all that’s happened up until now.

Jeno is heading towards the door when you call for him again, making him turn just before he’s reaching for the doorknob. “Can.. you call Mark?”

Jeno smiles, his eyes forming crescent moons, “Of course, y/n.”

You reach for the glass of water again, feeling somewhat nervous during your wait for Mark. You didn’t quite know what to say but you knew you had to talk to him. Just when you place the glass back in its original place, the door creaks open slightly again and Mark peeps his head in. When you see him, you’re immediately reminded of how much you’ve been missing him up until this point. You’ve missed him so much you can physically feel your heart clench.

“Can I come in?” He whispers just as the streams of sunlight run past the window panes.

You nod with a small smile, the relief of seeing him settling in your chest. Above all else, you were still happy to see him again in one piece. You watch him as he reveals himself fully from behind the door, rounding up the edge of the bed until he’s in front of you. You motion for him to sit beside you and when he does, you don’t say anything, letting your eyes take in one good look at him. The days without him have been way too long and you wonder if Mark felt the wait to see each other again to be as excruciating as you found them to be. Mark’s eyes soften when he realises what you’re doing and a sad smile finds his lips, radiating all the way to his eyes that have momentarily lost their sparkle, knowing what was coming next.

“Mark, I want to go for a walk.”

Mark nods and rises from the bed, stretching his hand out to you. You blink at it for a few seconds before looking back up at Mark who nods at you encouragingly. You place your hand in his, realising this is the first time you’ve ever got to hold his hand. And it’s everything you imagined it to be, warm and soft under your fingertips, the size of it much bigger than yours and as he envelopes your hand into his, lacing your fingers together, it gives you a sense of security, the feeling of safety washing over you.

Mark has already draped his leather jacket over you by the time your bare feet come in contact with the sand. Mark hasn’t let go of your hand since and you’re beginning to believe he's missed you as much as he did with the way he's holding your hand so tight in his. The sight in front of you is one to die for; with the sun rising, it’s painting the sky with beautiful hues of oranges, yellows, and pinks, the occasional clouds absorbing the colours to create a magnificent view. The water ahead is glistening with the light the sun provides and the waves are so calm the serenity transcends to your core. More importantly, you’re here with Mark, adding to the tranquility of it all.

“I’m all ears, y/n,” Mark reassures. “Anything.”

You other hand finds comfort around Mark’s arm, pulling yourself as close as you can to his body as you both begin to walk along the beach. You tighten your grip around his hand, trying to gather all the strength you needed for whatever truths Mark was about to uncover for you. Taking a deep breath, and when you’re sure you’re ready, you begin.

“You were the one who shot me, weren’t you?”

Mark nods with his jaw taught and you have to shut your eyes when you feel your heart break inside, clinging onto Mark even harder. “May I know why?” You continue with endurance you have no clue where you’re getting from.

Mark clears his throat and turns to you so that your eyes meet, “What I'm about to say, I want you to listen carefully, okay?”

You see nothing but assurance in his eyes and it makes you nod. Mark tears his eyes off you again, directs his gaze ahead.

“I’m a part of a mafia, y/n, one that Lee Taeyong leads. Specifically, I'm their designated sniper. Years ago, your parents approached Taeyong and asked for a lend of a lot of money, supposedly money to start up a business he had been working on for a really long time. And with much discussion and negotiation, Taeyong lent your parents a very big sum of money in exchange of a promise that Taeyong would be given back a whole lot more than what he initially had given. Your parents’ business boomed and overnight, they became the country’s richest business people. Taeyong saw that and demanded for what he was promised with but your parents turned a blind eye. And that went on for years and years until Taeyong eventually had enough of it.”

Mark pauses and gives your hand a squeeze in preparation for what he’s about to say next.

“Taeyong was furious and he was so set on killing your parents himself but on the night that he set out to do it, they were already dead. Taeyong was the first person to discover their dead bodies in their office and that made him even more angrier because he didn’t get the revenge he wanted. So he turned to have you killed instead. That’s when he asked me to do it, to shoot you on the day of your press conference so that the whole world was there to see you die.”

It’s all so overwhelming, all of this information, to take in all in one go, but you find it in your heart to be thankful to have Mark relay all of these details to you, grateful to have him here to hold your hand and walk you through everything that’s been kept from you.

“Then why...” You breathe out, your eyes glistening with impending tears. “Why did you save me?”

That’s when Mark stops in his tracks in front of you. He lowers his head to meet your eyes, a frown adorning his forehead with his lips pressed together in a thin line. You search his face, your heart picking up its pace with the slight hunch of him revealing something even bigger than he already has, the real reason why everyone’s been up to their eyes lately, especially Johnny and Jeno. Mark takes your other free hand in his and he’s rubbing the back of your hands with his thumb in a soothing manner.

“I hate that I have to say it to you like this, in the middle of all that’s happening but, I promised you the truth, y/n.”

Mark lets go of your hands and you think he's crazy when he steps away from you so that he can take off his shirt in this breezy morning. Your eyes inadvertently fall on his toned body, his subtle abs and the perfectly sized muscles on his upper arms for his build. Mark catches your eyes, an unsure smile grazing his lips before he’s turning his back to you.

And that’s when you see it.

On the nape of his neck, his mark sits, an all too familiar mark of a dove with a stalk of leaves tucked in its mouth. You know that mark so well because you have one just like it, on the exact same spot on your body.

Mark is your soulmate.

“Mark, you’re my..”

“Soulmate,” he finishes as he turns around. “And you’re mine.”

Mark rubs the back of his neck in a bashful manner, his shirt still clutched in his hand, “And you probably hate me because your soulmate tried to kill you, huh.”

“How long have you known?” you ask, your mouth hanging open slightly.

“Good question,” Mark points out and shifts his weight from one foot to another. “Coincidence. Taeyong was making me do research on you so we could stage the perfect kill... and uhh, I was researching photos of you on the internet, and I came across this one particular picture that caught your mark by chance and that’s when I knew.” Mark’s eyes widen when he finishes explaining, “Wow I sound like a stalker— well, technically, I am, I guess?”

Mark rambles on to himself but you don’t quite hear him when you realise he really is your soulmate; the very person you found yourself wishing would be your soulmate somehow turns out to be exactly just that. Your mind travels back to the days in the loft, all consisting of you and Mark doing and talking about every insignificant thing there possibly is and the relief you felt this morning seeing him. It all made sense. You fall in a debate with yourself then, watching a crooked smile form on his face, whether to celebrate that the person you’ve harboured feelings for, for the first time in your whole life ever is in fact the person you’re fated to be with, or to set that aside to find more answers to the questions eating at you at the back of your mind.

“Y/n- you have to understand that hurting you was so difficult to do,” Mark starts, taking a step closer to you. “I never wanted to do it and there were so many times I wanted to bail. But Taeyong gets what he wants and I, no, we, all of us practically owe him our lives, me and the boys. So I had to compromise. and that was the best thing I came up with.”

“But God, if I was given any other choice, I'd never put your life on the line like that,” Mark finishes with an exasperated sigh, desperation threaded in his words.

This boy is definitely your soulmate.

“Put your shirt back on, it’s cold,” you blurt out after a few seconds.

Mark does a double take at the shirt he’s clutching in his palm and does what he’s told, noticing the goosebumps that has risen on his skin as a result of the breezes. You continue to stare at him and that only makes him even more scared and worried.

“Y/n, please say something, anything.”

You open your mouth to do what he says but shut it again when you realise you have nothing.

“I, I don’t quite know what to say.”

“Wait— so you mean Taeyong wasn’t the one who killed y/n’s parents?” Johnny reiterates when the four of you are gathered in the dining room sometime in the evening.

Mark shakes his head, as he fills in Johnny and Jeno with what Taeyong had told him years back in the midst of asking him to kill y/n. “No, but everyone thinks he did.”

“Kun definitely thinks so,” Jeno mumbles.

“Who’s Kun?” you pipe up, the desire to learn as much as you can about their world growing bigger than ever.

“Kun was the one running after you yesterday, y/n,” Johnny explains from beside Jeno.

“He’s seeking for revenge just like Taeyong is, for the same reasons,” Jeno adds. “Mark mentioned a little about the death threats you were receiving from before?”

You glance beside you where Mark sits and he nods at you reassuringly, giving your hand a squeeze from under the table, “Yeah. I got one like every day.”

“They were from Kun,” Jeno announces. “He was out for your family just as much as Taeyong was.”

“And you know this because?” you trail off trying your best not to offend the person you’re just in the process of getting to know.

“Research,” Jeno states simply, turning his laptop around so that you could see his screen filled with random codes and information you couldn’t quite decipher with your minimal knowledge.

“Jeno does all the tech stuff, and finds out any information we ask him of,” Mark whispers, leaning towards you.

Not only was Jeno kind, he was crazy intelligent too.

You nod knowingly, staring at Jeno. He definitely looked like the intelligent one.

“Then, who killed my parents?” You ask wearily as the three exchange unsure glances.

“Jeno, is there a way we could find that out?” Mark asks, leaning on the table.

Jeno nods firmly. “I need time.”

Mark catches your unsure gaze and he silences your doubts with another nod of his head and a small smile.��

Mrs Seo walks in the kitchen then and frowns at everyone, “Why is it so quiet! You boys are usually so rowdy and noisy. Did you fight?”

Mark chuckles while Johnny rolls his eyes; Mrs Seo always had a knack for getting into their business, “Just talking about stuff, mum.”

“And yet there’s not a single plate of food on the table.” Mrs Seo looks unamused, her distaste mostly directed towards Johnny who only shrugs, “You’re a such a bad host Johnny, I really thought I taught you better.” Johnny sighs. “Get up and help me prepare dinner.”

Mrs Seo doesn’t leave before giving Mark a hug from behind, “So glad to see you Mark. I hope you come and visit more often.” She turns to you then, “And you as well, y/n, it’s so rare for another girl to be in this household, it’s a breath of fresh air— not that I hate having the boys over, it’s great.” And with that, she whisks Johnny away.

You can’t help but smile, feeling all too warm with Mrs Seo hospitality in spite of the short amount of time of having known each other. “You guys seem to be really close to her.”

Mark nods with a grin, cheekbones showing. “She’s practically everyone’s mum. We came to visit almost every weekend back when Johnny was still—”

Mark stops himself before he can say anymore just when Jeno looks up from his screen and also because of the banging that’s echoing through the hallways and into the dining room where they sat.

“Are you expecting someone, mum?” The three hear Johnny ask from the kitchen which is followed by a quick “no.”

Jeno leaves his seat and goes to check the door while Mark holds his breath, fearing it might someone who’s coming after you. He scoots closer to you and tries not to let his worry show so as not to concern you either knowing you already had enough to think about.

Johnny and Mrs Seo come back to the dining room just in time the unwanted visitor barges in through the door and pushes past Jeno who can only follow after him helplessly. There stands Taeyong, eyes directly shooting at y/n. Mark rises from his seat.

“Taeyong!” Mrs Seo exclaims, happiness genuinely obvious on her face to see one of the boys she hasn’t seen since forever.

“So it is true!” Taeyong spits with a sour grimace on his face. “Y/n is alive— Mark how could you!” He tries to advance toward Mark who by now is standing beside Johnny as he shields you behind him.

Jeno’s reflexes kick in and stops Taeyong by encircling his arms around the elder. “Mark what the hell! She’s supposed to be dead! I trusted you to kill her!”

You’re hunching over behind Mark when Taeyong unleashes his anger, his words sending daggers to your whole being. “We’ve lost so much because of her family! She has to pay the fucking price!” Taeyong continues his attempts at advancing towards Mark but Jeno is doing a good job of stopping him, digging his heels into the floor.

“This girl is the reason why we’re going to lose that deal with Yuta isn’t she?” Taeyong snarls. “Isn’t she? Answer me!” Taeyong’s yells are beginning to distress Mrs Seo and seeing him in a light she’s never witnessed before, surprises her greatly.

“Hand her over to Yuta, simple as! Isn’t that all he asks?” Taeyong yells for the last time and when Jeno’s arms tire, Taeyong escapes and is coming for Mark at an alarming rate and ready to throw a punch or even more if it wasn’t for Johnny.

Johnny uses all his strength to push Taeyong back. Taeyong stumbles backwards, almost falling to the floor in the process, “Taeyong enough!” You flinch at the volume Johnny’s speaking in.

“No!” Taeyong fights. “Mark disobeyed me! Y/n is supposed to be dead right now.”

“Stop it,” Johnny warns again, his voice a lot more lower but a lot more threatening, “Right. Now.”

“And I fucking said no— I’m going to kill her myself—”

“Fuck, was killing Ari not enough for you?!”

The room falls silent in an instant. You ears perk up at the name and when you peek from behind Mark’s shoulder, Johnny is frustrated, his chest heaving and his eyes glowering, a huge contrast to his usual self.

“This is not about Ari,” Taeyong replies lowly through clenched teeth and dismay taking over his features.

“Of course it is!” Johnny exclaims, walking towards Taeyong and hastily jabbing a palm on his shoulder. Taeyong avoids Johnny’s eyes as he speaks, “Taking one innocent life was enough.”

“You know that was an accident,” Taeyong says lowly.

“Accident or not, it still happened and why?” Johnny stops, resting both his hands on his hips, trying to calm himself down, “Because of your fucking greed, that’s why.”

At that moment, it all dawns on you.

Ari.. Johnny’s soulmate was killed by Taeyong.

“If you hadn't been so greedy for money and for revenge, you wouldn’t have shot her so carelessly a year ago.” You feel the pain in Johnny’s voice and it breaks you in two. How could someone so outgoing and happy as Johnny hold so much inside without saying anything?

“If this is still about her being your soulmate—”

“This is way more than just her being my soulmate! For fuck sake Taeyong, you took away an innocent life! A clueless, innocent life who was just getting her life started! And you’re out here living the same old life, ready to do the exact same thing you did.”

Taeyong suddenly claps his hands out of nowhere, a sarcastic smile etching on his face, “Oh so there it is! There it fucking is. You want me to go to jail! That’s it, isn't it? You speak it like you haven’t committed a single crime your whole life, Seo.”

“Of course I want you in jail! You killed the love of my life for goodness sake. But hell, if you’re going to jail, we might all as well put ourselves in jail right?” Johnny’s chest never ceases on heaving, mirroring the anger and disgust he’s been suppressing for a whole year, for a year too long. Taeyong doesn’t stop either, his glare only intensifying with each passing second.

“All I’m saying is, I’m not letting you kill y/n,” Johnny states with so much conviction despite his voice coming down a notch quieter. “You’re going to have to kill me first before you do that,”

“I’m not letting your greed win, ever again.”

Deciding it was best for you not to stay in Johnny’s house any longer, for fear of Kun’s guys discovering your whereabouts and with the uncertainties of Taeyong’s next move, you find yourself in front of a familiar house, one you’ve spent making a lot of your childhood memories in. Mark is standing right beside you while Johnny and Jeno wait in the car, parked just outside the gate.

Mark looks uneasy as you press the doorbell, the faint ringing inside the house it causes reaching your ears. You twist your body a little to give Mark a small smile, “You always tell me to trust you. I want you to trust me this time.”

“I always trust you,” Mark mumbles.

You roll your eyes, “You don’t seem it right now.”

“I—”

The door swings open at that moment and the person behind it blinks hard once and then opens his eyes wider than you have ever seen.

“What the hell— Am I dreaming? Or am I seeing a ghost?”

Mark leans towards you and whispers, “You sure about this?”

You jab at his side with your elbow and clear your throat, putting on the biggest smile at the sight of your best friend for as long as you can remember. “Taeil!”

Taeil blinks hard, again, “Shit— she speaks too.”

“Taeil, stop it,” you say, unamused. “It’s me y/n, and yes, I’m alive.”

“Holy— what, how?”

“Can I come in first?”

It takes you two hours to tell Taeil everything without missing any information, and another hour of convincing him how everything’s come down to the current situation. Mark sped off with Johnny and Jeno the moment he made sure you’re safe inside Taeil’s home. You try so hard not to smack Taeil in the face when he stares at you for too long, his big eyes ogling at you, still convinced you’re not real.

“Taeil I'm alive, stop staring at me like you want to eat me.”

“Sorry,” he’s quick to say. “It’s just, the news blew up with your assassination you, know? You were the headlines for a whole week y/n, of course it’s no brainer that I'm still stunned to see you. Like shit, I was grieving over the loss of my best friend who’s actually alive?”

You feel sorry for him then, the grief that flashes in his eyes reminding you how much of a tough few weeks it has been for him too. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean for it to turn out like this. Like I though I was going to die. For real.”

“If it wasn’t for your knight in shining armour, AKA your soulmate,” Taeil teases with a wink, nudging you as he wiggles his eyebrows.

“Who also happens to be the one who attempted to kill me, let’s not forget that,” you reply as a matter of fact.

“But did you die though?” Taeil shrugs and leans back on the couch, “Dunno, he seemed like a pretty nice guy to me.”

“Who also happens to be a sniper, Taeil,” you remind him. You hit his arm with the back of your hand, “Who’s side are you on anyways?”

“A sniper who purposely missed his shot, right?” Taeil reiterates before shrugging again. “No one’s side. I’m just saying how your soulmate is literally there, in the flesh. Not a lot of people get that, you know?”

You give him an incredulous look, “So, you’re on Mark’s side.”

“Look, the guy is already doing all he can to protect you isn’t he? And he’s going against his leader while doing it,” Taeil responds with a hand motions to emphasise his points. “Do you know how serious it is to go against your mafia leader?”

You shake your head, challenging him, “I don’t. Do you?”

Taeil shakes his head, “I don’t either. but I’m guessing it’s pretty serious if he went apeshit crazy in front of you all.”

You let your head fall back on the couch, shutting your eyes as you groan, “Taeil you’re literally no help.”

“What’s gotten you in a twist anyway?” Taeil asks as he turns his body to face you, leaning his head on his hand that’s resting on the headrest of the couch. “You don’t like him?”

You open your eyes and stare at the white ceiling, “I do. So much it’s ridiculous.”

“Well then?”

“Just.. With everything that’s been happening, I'm not quite sure how to feel just yet. Him being my soulmate just doesn’t change the fact that he’s under someone who wants me killed, you know? And you know me, I’ve been fighting for my life since forever. He almost killed me, Tae. And I just can’t get that out of my head,” you finish off with a heavy sigh, your internal conflict becoming too suffocating.

It takes Taeil a few seconds to come up with something to say and you’re preparing for it because the thing with Taeil was that he was the logical one between the two of you, always giving you a blow whenever you voiced your concerns to push you in the right direction and today was definitely no different.

“Why are you so focused on what he’s done in the past?” He asks. “Shouldn’t you be focusing on everything he’s doing now to make things right?”

Taeil’s words for sure ring in your head for the rest of the night, the very reason you can’t seem to fall asleep. You dwell on it over and over again, coming up with lousy reasons to in attempts of countering what he said, but it appears that with every attempt, you find more points that back up Taeil’s advice. Maybe Taeil is right. Maybe you’re focusing too much on what happened before. After all, Mark was doing all that he can to protect you now, even going as far as looking for the real people behind your parents’ death.

But you don’t expect those words to be the last you’d ever hear from Taeil because he wakes up the next morning with a loud thud from downstairs. There’s a sick feeling pitting at the bottom of his stomach when he leaves his bed in a hurry and it’s only a testament for what the sight that greets him next. Taeil wakes up to furniture strewn all over his house, reams of papers scattered around the floor, broken glass shattered everywhere in all directions and his first instinct is to check your room.

Taeil is fast to dial Mark’s number.

“She’s gone.”

412 notes · View notes

anexplanationofunfortunateevents · 4 years ago

Text

if the GOP could win for real, they would do a lot less cheating

Something you have to understand about recent American history is that the Republican party lost its shit in the 1960s. There are always plenty of reasons for decades-long historical trends, but arguably the core one is that Lyndon Johnson’s administration made a bunch of human rights advances known collectively as the Great Society, the cornerstone of which was a sincere and substantive effort to address the unfinished business of Reconstruction with the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act.

Racist white people who didn’t want to share democracy with everyone else became reliable Republican voters, but they’re nowhere near enough to win an election on their own. Republicans realized that their ideology is a miserable death cult that can’t win a fair fight. They could have gotten better ideas, but instead, they started sabotaging democracy.

I am not here to overwhelm you with a list of all the American right wing’s assaults on democracy. But there is a relatively narrow subset which forms a pattern that has become increasingly urgent: times Republicans have abused, usurped, or radically and unilaterally bastardized the power of American government in order to limit voters’ ability to hold them accountable in free and fair elections.

Because it only includes events backed up by reliable and freely available sources, it necessarily only includes the times times they were ham-fisted or sloppy enough to get caught. It has over two dozen entries and is almost certainly incomplete.

1968: Richard Nixon sabotages peace talks to end the Vietnam War because anger over the war is a winning campaign issue for him. Johnson catches him and calls him out, but doesn’t tell the public. Nixon wins and takes office.

1972: Nixon’s re-election campaign, the Committee to Re-Elect the President (or CREEP, because these people are fucking Bond villains) goes on a crime spree which includes multiple break-ins at Democratic National Committee headquarters in the Watergate Hotel.

1992: President George H.W. Bush asks British Prime Minister John Major’s government to dig through official archives for anything compromising on his rival Governor Bill Clinton from Clinton’s time at Oxford University.

1992: A political appointee at the Bush State Department has Governor Clinton’s passport files searched for potentially embarrassing information.

1992: Bush’s Attorney General William Barr pressures federal prosecutors in Arkansas to make some public movement on a white collar crime case tangentially associated with Governor Clinton.

2000: The Florida state board of elections does a racist voter purge, targeting largely Democratic communities of color.

2000: A mob, mostly Republican congressional aides, force election officials in Palm Beach County to shut down its recount.

2000: Five Supreme Court justices appointed by Republican presidents shut down the Florida recount in an unsigned opinion so specious and nakedly partisan that it irreparably damages the legitimacy of not only the Bush presidency but the Supreme Court itself.

2004: Republican election administrators in Florida attempt another racist voter purge, only abandoning it when they get caught.

2006: The Bush administration leans on federal prosecutors to influence the midterm elections with bogus investigations into Democratic politicians and prosecutions of non-existent “voter fraud” cases. After Republicans lose the midterms, several attorneys who resisted the pressure are fired.

2010: Five Supreme Court justices appointed by Republicans, in an existential fiat, reclassify money as speech, opening the floodgates to swamp every level of politics with dark money.

2013: The same five Republican Supreme Court justices gut the Voting Rights Act, specifically and explicitly because it has been relatively effective in preventing racist voter suppression.

2010s: Republicans in various state legislatures pass a bunch of laws to suppress the ability of voters to hold them accountable.

2016: Associates of Trump consigliere Rudy Giuliani loudly and unprofessionally conduct numerous bullshit investigations into Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. They successfully pressure FBI director James Comey – himself a veteran of the corrupt and politicized Bush Justice Department – into several improper and decisive actions against Clinton.

2016: Donald Trump conspires with Russian intelligence and business interests to sabotage his opponent in a presidential election.

2016: Republican Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell blackmails the Obama administration out of explaining the Russian government’s sabotage of the presidential election, leaving state boards of elections and the general public vulnerable to the assault.

2017-18: The Republican administration sits on evidence that Russian military hackers have penetrated state voting equipment.

2018: Republican Georgia secretary of state Brian Kemp insists on overseeing the election in which he is running for governor. He squeaks out a “win” after purging thousands of voters, arbitrarily closing or refusing to equip polling places, and baselessly accusing his Democratic opponent of trying to hack the election.

2018: A Republican congressional campaign in North Carolina hires operatives to defraud local senior citizens who were attempting to cast absentee ballots.

2018: Republicans lose the governorships in Wisconsin and Michigan, but keep control of the state legislatures due to gross gerrymandering. Before the new governors can be sworn in, they cram through laws stripping power from the incoming Democratic governors.

2019: Trump administration officials try to warp the data which will be collected in the 2020 census in a way that will enable future gerrymandering by undercounting largely Democratic constituencies. When they get caught and stopped, they try to justify themselves by lying to the federal courts.

2019: Donald Trump privately tries to extort the president of Ukraine into announcing bullshit investigations into prominent Democrats during the 2020 election.

2019: Donald Trump publicly pressures the government of China into opening bullshit investigations into prominent Democrats during the 2020 election.

2019: All but one House Republican opposes impeaching Trump for his extortion of Ukraine – until that one guy is pushed out of the party. Therefore, no House Republicans vote to impeach Trump.

2020: With one exception, every Republican in the Senate validates Trump’s attempts to rig the 2020 election by voting to acquit him.

2020: Republicans dig in their heels and refuse to take easy and obvious steps to keep voters safe from COVID-19 at the polls.

This is just the list of things that I could remember off the top of my head and could find receipts for with relative ease. It doesn’t include things that are plausible but unproven, like the allegations that Reagan’s 1980 campaign staff tried to repeat Nixon’s first stunt by working to prolong the Iran hostage crisis because it was a winning campaign issue for him. It doesn’t include dirty, bigoted campaigns that you might call awful but lawful, like the racist “Willie Horton” ad campaign in 1988 or the repulsive homophobic ballot initiatives that were engineered to bolster George W. Bush’s 2004 reelection campaign. It doesn’t include the wide array of brutalizations of a constitutional small-d democratic system which aren’t specifically and concretely about elections – everything from eroding the credibility of scientists, experts, and reporters to packing the courts with proto-fascist hacks to lying the American people into war in Iraq.

It really doesn’t matter whether or not I think Republicans win elections legitimately. It’s extremely important that Republicans do not believe they can win elections legitimately.

Now think for a second about their cherished “voter fraud” trope. All this time, Republicans have been screeching that SOMEONE was out there trying to steal elections FROM THEM. It is absolutely correct to focus on and be upset about the racist history and intent of this particular conspiracy theory. I would simply argue that white supremacism is not the only unforgivable aspect of this nonsense trope. The other is the way those claims make it impossible to deal with actual threats against legitimate elections.

This is similar to what psychologists call projection, or the tactic domestic violence experts refer to as DARVO. It is not unrelated to “swiftboating” or the phenomenon students of genocide refer to as the “accusation in a mirror.” It is the axiom small children cite when they say “he who smelt it, dealt it.”

I don’t know the ONE WEIRD TRICK to make it not work. I just know that it – maddeningly – does work, not least on the Very Serious Experts whose ONE FUCKING JOB it is to know better.

So I’m sorry to disappoint if you were expecting a “many bad people on all sides” disclaimer about who does political dirty tricks, but “both sides” is not operative, no matter how desperate the hot-take-industrial-complex is to make fetch happen. It hasn’t been operative for twenty-five years, and it’s really not operative for the next six months. You can bury yourself deep in literature about asymmetric polarization, but you don’t have to do all that to understand what’s important here. Democrats support democracy and want to stop the plague, Republicans support the plague and want to stop democracy, and you should be extremely skeptical of anyone who claims not to know the difference.

#voting rights #donald trump #george w bush #george hw bush #democracy #authortiarianism

65 notes · View notes

holdyourbreathfornow · 4 years ago

Text

Like Father Like Son (ch.3)

(3rd and final part. I really took some liberties with headcanons, especially with a headcanon I had about Gordon so feel free not to post if it’s too out of touch with your canon. Admittedly kind of phoned it in near the end but I wanted to make sure I didn’t run out of motivation and leave it unfinished)

Coomer double checked the control panel screen displaying Gordon’s vitals for what must have been the hundredth time. He knew they were all stable, but he couldn’t help a bit of parental over-caution.

Gordon had been out of the danger zone of temperature fluctuations since he’d first woken up, briefly, almost nine hours ago. It’s why Coomer’d been able to convince Bubby to finally change over watch of Gordon to him and go to sleep in the first place. He’d assumed that, after alerting everyone to Gordon having no longer been comatose (to everyone’s great relief), Bubby would be glad to finally rest, but instead Coomer had had to argue that there was almost no chance for any kind of relapse at this point for nearly ten minutes before Bubby finally relented (a headlock might also have been involved at some point).

Bubby had been adamant about staying, despite his clear exhaustion, to the point where Coomer almost worried Bubby doubted in his ability to do so himself, but Bubby had gotten cagey when Coomer pressed him for the cause of his hesitancy. He drew into himself and quickly agreed to give up his vigil, hurrying away before Coomer could inquire further.

Certainly not an entirely comforting sign in regards to Bubby’s emotional state, but Coomer couldn’t say he was faring very well himself. He’d barely been able to sleep at all, jerking awake every time he drifted off, thinking he heard the blaring of Gordon’s tube’s vital readout alarm, indicating another temperature spike or drop in blood oxygen levels or erratic heart palpitations.

Coomer hated seeing Gordon in that tube.

He and Bubby had discussed, back when they first conceived (ha!) of the idea of creating their child in a fashion similar to Bubby’s own creation, the likely necessity of supplementary time in a growth tube later on in Joshua’s life. Bubby had needed many throughout his life and, though Gordon’s creation and genetic structure was much more stable than Bubby’s had been initially, due to being based off of existing DNA, instead of entirely from scratch, as Bubby had, it was still likely that, somewhere along the line, his body might need a “tune up”, so to speak.

They’d planned to build him his own tube around ten years old for that purpose, but then…well, they hadn’t ended up needing to.

So now, instead, Gordon floated inside an old tube of Bubby’s they’d specifically made for emergencies, ever since a terrifying incident back when Bubby had first been able to live outside of Black Mesa and they’d moved into this house together. The sudden changes and stress of living outside of Black Mesa for the first time caused Bubby’s molecular structure to almost entirely destabilize.

The frantic drive back to the laboratory, Bubby in the passenger seat, condition rapidly deteriorating, was one of the most frightening experiences of Harold’s life.

Since then, they’d made sure they always had a tube similar to Bubby’s at Black Mesa available outside of the facility. Years of fine tuning had stabilized Bubby’s physical makeup significantly, and eventually they’d moved the tube to storage, not having needed it in many years, but still wanting to have it available in case of emergencies.

Coomer supposed that was part of what made seeing Gordon like this so terrible.

This tube was one tied to painful and terrifying memories. Unlike Gordon’s original one, which was associated with the creation of their child, and even Bubby’s tube at Black Mesa, which at least held memories of how they met, this one was associated only with things going horribly wrong.

And how wrong they’d gone now.

Coomer had seen Gordon hurt before, of course, during the Resonance Cascade, but it had been different this time, to an extent he hadn’t expected.

Since learning of Gordon’s true identity, the memories of every time he’d come to harm, come so close to death, during their journey through Black Mesa and Xen, had haunted him, of course, knowing retroactively that it was his own child that he’d seen so battered and broken.

Coomer hadn’t expected just how different it would be seeing Gordon hurt while already knowing it was his child. He’d felt sick to his stomach, like he was going to break down or pass out. Luckily, Harold Coomer was nothing if not good at compartmentalizing, and had managed to keep it together while they worked to stabilize Gordon.

Now, thankfully, it seemed Gordon was out of the woods. His skin had grown back, to at least some extent, over nearly every burned area, and his temperature was completely stable, if still high. Likely, it was as low as it was going to get without him intentionally lowering it.

Which was precisely why Harold was making very sure everything was in no danger of sudden change for the worse. He needed to leave for a moment to talk to Bubby. Gordon’s temperature was still high enough to simmer the fluid around him and he’d likely need instruction from Bubby on how to control his newly developed powers before he could be released from the tube. The sooner such instruction could begin, the better.

One last check, and Coomer was confident enough to leave Gordon alone long enough to fetch Bubby.

Climbing up the basement stairs into the main hallway, he glanced into the living room.

Benrey and Tommy were fast asleep, leaning shoulder to shoulder on the couch, having apparently worn themselves out with worry.

Coomer smiled. He was glad Gordon had the two of them, it was clear how much they all cared about each other. He didn’t see Bubby in the room however, nor in the connected kitchen, so he didn’t dwell there.

He headed towards the room to his and Bubby’s room, but paused as he reached the door. He could hear a faint noise coming from inside like a soft sniffling and uneven breathing–

Oh.

He opened the door just a crack to see Bubby sitting on the edge of the bed, head in his hands and body shaking with soft sobs he was clearly trying to muffle.

Coomer rapped his knuckles against the door.

Bubby startled, and whipped his head around to see Coomer. His face was red and his cheeks streaked with tears.

“Fuck–I-” Bubby roughly wiped at his face to clear away the tears, and fumbled for his glasses on the nightstand. “Harold, I didn’t…I didn’t hear you…”

Coomer simply sat on the bed next to him as he composed himself.

“How’s…how is he?” Bubby asked, after clearing his throat. He stared at the floor, not looking towards Coomer.

“He’s stable. Tissue regrowth is coming along well. He’s as stable as I think he’ll be able to get until he can bring his temperature down,” Coomer replied. “I think it’s best to start teaching him to control it sooner rather than later. If he can learn at least how to regulate his temperature while he’s still in there, he’s far less likely to lose control again as soon as he comes out of the tube. You can work on teaching him all your flashier tricks once he’s out.”

Coomer chuckled, lightly.

Bubby, however, only turned even further away from him.

“Do…do you think that we could…” Bubby trailed off, then started again. “That tube is made for post decanting genetic alteration. If we could just…if we could nullify or remove the gene responsible for pyrokinesis…”

“What?!” Coomer cried, agape. “Bubby you can’t be serious! You know better than anyone the risks involved with that! That tube is made for emergency stabilization, not tampering with genetic code when there’s no reason!”

“No reason? There’s a damn good reason!” Bubby said, turning at last to face Coomer. “Look at him! Look at what’s happened to him! That’s the reason!”

“But you’re living proof that’s something that he can control! Something that doesn’t have to hurt him!”

“You don’t–you couldn’t understand!”

“The fucking hell I couldn’t!” Coomer snapped. “He’s my son, too! You think it doesn’t break my heart seeing him like this?”

“But it isn’t your–!” Bubby cut himself off.

“My what?”

Bubby grit his teeth.

“My what, Bubby?!”

“YOUR FAULT! IT ISN’T YOUR FAULT!”

Any rage that had been building in Coomer was doused instantly.

“Not my…Bubby, do you think…?” he stammered, almost at a loss for words. “This isn’t your fault, Bubby.”

Bubby stood up, sharply, hands gripping at the side of his head.

“Don’t you see?!” he cried. “Everything that’s happened to him is my fault! Everything that’s happened since I included my DNA in his design. I should never have included my DNA. I didn’t want to! I told you I didn’t want to! Why? Why did I let you convince me?!”

Tears were streaming down Bubby’s face again.

“We agreed to include both our genetic codes together!” Coomer said. “We wanted a child. One that was both of us, not a clone. I’ve had enough of those. We wanted a child that would be like us both.”

“Don’t you understand? He is like me! And I wouldn’t wish those words on anyone!” Bubby sobbed. “Seeing him like that I just–Everything they did to me. Everything they put me through–they would have done it to him, too. All the awful tests, all the cruelty, all the pain, oh god…he went through it all. Because of me! They took him because of me!”

“Bubby, we’ve talked about this a thousand times, he was sick and we were both scared. It wasn’t–”

“Not just that! I read it in his file! It wasn’t happenstance, Harold! They targeted him! Because he was on their record! Because he was…” Bubby’s voice broke. “Because he was mine. They took him because he was mine…”

He choked out a sob.

“They took him and they hurt him in every way they hurt me, and more. And now he finally gets out…and he’s just hurt more. Because he’s like me. Because he inherited my powers,” Bubby hugged his arms around himself, shaking. “Pain and misery…is all he got, all he could have ever gotten, from having me as a father…”

Coomer stood, slowly, from the bed, and placed a gentle hand on Bubby’s arm.

“Tell me how your powers work,” he said.

“You know how they work.”

“Tell me again.”

Bubby shook his head.

“I-I don’t–I can’t talk about that now,” he choked.

“Bubby, please,” Harold said, insistent.

“I…I absorb direct and…and ambient thermal and electromagnetic radiation and expend it at will, controlling…controlling my external temperature to induce localized combustion,” Bubby said, voice still shaking.

“What do you absorb?” Harold asked, his voice lilting as to imply a conclusion Bubby wasn’t drawing, but Bubby wasn’t in the mood for guessing at it.

“Damn, it Harold, why are you asking this now?” he snapped.

“Just say it one more time, out loud. Please, Bubby.”

“For the love of God, thermal radia–”

Bubby cut off as the pieces finally clicked into place.

“Radiation,” he breathed. “I absorb radiation.”

Coomer smiled, softly, as he saw realization dawn on Bubby’s face.

“Gordon absorbs radiation!” Bubby exclaimed, grabbing Coomer by the shoulders. “He absorbs Xen radiation! His cells absorb and expend it instead of being destroyed by it! He didn’t die from being sent to Xen because he absorbs Xen radiation! He didn’t die because…because…”

“Because he’s like you,” Coomer finished. “I had my suspicions from the moment they explained how Gordon was able to build up a tolerance from just the exposure to Benrey’s low levels of Xen radiation, and with so few negative repercussions. Once this happened, my suspicions were all but confirmed.”

Bubby released Coomer’s shoulders and sat heavily back down on the bed, as if his legs had been turned to gelatin. His eyes, red and puffy from crying, were wide with disbelief.

“They took him because they were cruel and evil people,” Coomer said. “He lived because he’s your son.”

He gently cupped Bubby’s cheek and guided his face up to look him in the eye.

“And your son needs you now,” he said. “Not to try to remove any trace of yourself from his genetic code. To show him how to accept and control what he inherited from you.”

Bubby breathed in a deep, steadying breath and nodded.

–

When Bubby returned to the basement, Gordon was just blinking his eyes open again.

With his facial skin growing back rapidly, his cheekbones no longer looked so gaunt and pronounced, but Bubby still saw his own defined bone structure reflected in them.

Not entirely alike, but not entirely different.

Not entirely a stranger, but not entirely himself.

Someone who was a mix of things that weren’t him, and of things that were.

For the first time, Bubby felt like that might not be a curse after all.

#submission #you can't see it but I'm rubbing my hands together and cackling manically #i love these so much!!!#AND THE SCIENCE #DIFFERENT KINDS OF RADIATION BEING ABSORBED CAUSES BOTH THE PYROKINESIS AND GORDON'S XEN DEPENDENCY #YOU'RE A GENIUS #family of three au

4 notes · View notes

itsybitsyspiderling · 5 years ago

Text

the last living part of you

Summary: A few years after Tony's death, Peter realizes that no one is ever truly gone. And Tony personally made sure of that himself.

Word Count: 4.8k

also on ao3!

On the eve of Peter’s eighteenth birthday, he wandered up to a roof and sat there for hours. He counted every plane, every car, and every dog that passed by. A cool breeze carried wisps of hair away from his forehead while he rubbed his eyes dry. He didn’t want tomorrow to come. He didn’t want to blink his childhood away, not when he had already spent the past four years of his life wishing to be someone else. Peter wanted to feel like a kid for one more day.

He tugged on his mask and sighed into the material. Hot breath brushed his cheeks as his heads-up display came to life around him.

“Good evening, Peter,” Karen spoke sweetly. “What’s on the agenda for tonight?”

“Nothing,” he said. His tone fell low, almost atmospheric while the city lights stole his attention. “No danger for tonight. I don’t really wanna die right before my birthday. That’d suck.”

“Of course,” she replied. “We wouldn’t want that. Happy early birthday, Peter. Would you like me to sing you a song?”

Peter let out a breathy laugh. “No, please, no. Just––thank you, Karen. I appreciate it. Thank you for always being here for me.” He kept his hands clasped together in his lap. They were comfortable that way, and he was afraid that if he let go, he would want to climb up walls and swing down empty avenues. He wanted to sit as still as possible. And for as long as possible.

“I will always be here for you, Peter,” Karen said. “Is everything all right? Your heart rate is low.”

He took a breath. He could talk to her; he knew that he could, but there was something holding him back. Once he said his thoughts aloud, then that meant they were true. “I’m not ready for tomorrow,” he answered. “It’s––it’s not like any other birthday, you know? I’ll be eighteen. It’s just––” Peter shut his eyes. “I don’t wanna move on yet. I don’t wanna start another life. I-I just wish he was here.”

When Peter opened his eyes again, his vision had glazed over. He couldn’t wipe his tears, so tilted his chin toward the sky.

“Two years,” he whispered, inhaling sharply until his lungs ached. Exhale slowly. Count to ten. And again. “It’s been two years. And it still doesn’t feel real. I really thought I’d get to this point with him, you know? I think that’s why I’m not ready for tomorrow. We kept talkin’ about where I’d go to school. We talked about things like that. He joked about me never being allowed to drink on his watch, even when I turn twenty-one. But then he’d talk about being there with me to celebrate it. He acted like he had our entire life planned out as if––as if we were father and son. I’m just not ready to face tomorrow, Karen. I don’t know what to do.”

“Tomorrow is a big day.”

Peter looked down at his hands. “Yeah,” he said. “It is.”

“Your friends and family are excited to spend it with you,” Karen continued. “Pepper Potts has asked me to extend an invitation to you and your aunt for lunch tomorrow. She says she figured you might have dinner plans but that she’d love to see you.”

“Really?” Peter sat up a little straighter. “She did?”

“She also wanted me to tell you that Morgan misses you.”

He smiled to himself. “I miss her, too. Could you tell Miss Potts that I’ll be there?”

“Of course, Peter.”

He slid the mask off after that. The sounds of the city seemed to grow louder at night, but he enjoyed the ambiance. He didn’t want to go off to school, not yet. Through the years, Peter had lost sight of home. He struggled to understand what it meant, whether it was concrete or abstract, especially when it came to his life. And he was afraid to leave the one place––the one piece of home––he had left.

He didn’t have much family beyond May. But he had Tony’s family. Peter still had tomorrow.

And when tomorrow rolled around, Peter had forgotten about his night spent on the rooftop. He was engrossed in the deep green foliage on the drive upstate. He was captivated by May’s off-key singing and the comfort of the new sweater she bought for him. Lastly, he felt loved. He felt like he belonged somewhere. It was natural.

Pepper prepared a lemongrass chicken for lunch, and Morgan gifted him one of the finest bracelets out of her handmade collection. He swore he was never going to lose it or take it off. After that, they played with superhero action figures until Pepper called them for lunch––Peter got to be Iron Man because Morgan insisted on being Spider-Man, and he would never say no to her. He was going to spoil her at any moment he could.

He still couldn’t believe he had his own action figure. It was too good to be true.

Everything felt good too—he had forgotten it was even his birthday. Everything was perfect and peaceful, and then Pepper suggested that Peter spend some time in Tony’s old workshop.

Peter had only been there twice before, but never for long. He found it too difficult to use the same tools his old mentor once had—instruments were left untouched as they collected dust, only for Peter to disrupt them with his sticky fingers.

So, when he stepped into the workshop for a third time, he promised himself that he wouldn’t leave. He breathed in the stale air, watched the lights flicker over every shiny object that screamed Tony’s name, and strolled around slowly. Life had once been in that room. A life that lived for five years after Peter was believed to be gone. It was a man who carried on, who, for once, set his suffering aside to abide by his own terms. Tony restarted his life in this room.

Peter felt wrong there. Like every step he took was trespassing on sacred territory. Tony’s workshop was a sanctuary. And Peter didn’t belong there, not anymore.

He memorized every inch of the place. He imagined Tony leaned over a workbench, soldering iron in hand while his wrists cramped from constant use. He imagined the stack of empty coffee cups by the sink and the unread emails piling up while he promised himself that he would read them (he never would). Peter imagined the two of them together, silent communication with spared glances as they worked on their suits for hours on end. It was sad to imagine that it would never happen again.

Finally, Peter allowed himself to find a sense of comfort. He spent an hour or two repairing old armor that had been left in rags, and he even considered trying it on for a change. But he couldn’t bring himself to get that far.

When his hands grew tired, Peter sat at Tony’s desk. Once again, it was a place he didn’t belong, but Peter didn’t want to move. Tony always knew how to pick out the best––and the comfiest—chairs.

“FRIDAY,” Peter spoke suddenly. “You there?”

“Hello, Mister Parker,” she greeted. “It’s been quite a long time. What can I do for you?”

Peter huffed. “Man, that’s a loaded question.” He thought for a moment and tapped his fingers along the desk. The glass monitors in front of him had collected a thick coat of dust, so he wiped them off with his sleeve. “Is there––ew gross––is there any way I’m able to get into these babies?”

“You have access to everything in Tony Stark’s public and private databases.”

Peter’s jaw went slack. “You’re serious?”

“Very serious.”

“Holy shit,” he muttered, watching the screens light up in a familiar blue glow. It really did feel like his birthday after all. “I don’t even know where to begin. Could I see all of the Iron Man files?”

“Would you like me to open all 3,406 Iron Man files?”

“Oh, crap, no,” said Peter. He hardly knew where to keep his eyes; the utter awe and excitement he felt had grown more than he wanted to admit. “That’s a lot of files. Just show me my options and then we’ll go from there.”

“Sure thing.”

As it turned out, three thousand files hardly compared to the extensive list of unfinished projects Tony kept stored. Peter had stumbled upon at least a hundred prototype designs of his first Spider-Man suit––along with a hefty load of new additions he’d never see with his own eyes. Among Tony’s files were outdated weapons tech that had never met the light of day once Iron Man was born. Peter felt undeserving of all of this information.

The folders with funky titles caught his eye the most. They always ended up being something with little substance, like an embedded link or a two-second video of a gauntlet combusting. Both folders were titled “Fuck this shit”.

And then Peter came across a folder called “My brain (Literally). Do not open”. So, obviously, he opened it.

FRIDAY's voice spoke loud and clear: “Now transferring file #616-3 to Peter Parker.”

Peter raised an eyebrow. None of the other files had done that. “What’s that mean, FRIDAY?”

But she didn’t answer. Instead, the only sound echoing through the room was a tiny beep coming from a distant workbench. He followed the sound, eventually finding that the source was some new design for a web-shooter. Peter held it close, examined the blinking red dot underneath, and pressed it.

A low buzzing filled the room as a holographic stream fluttered in front of him. Slowly, the lasers began to define the shape of a figure, and Peter assumed that he had blacked out after that.

He blinked once, then twice, and many more times after. He simply couldn’t believe his eyes. Staring right back at him was Tony Stark––but he was a goddamn force ghost.

“Whoa, whoa, okay––” Peter set the web-shooter onto the workbench behind him, yet the hologram didn’t budge. “FRIDAY, what is this?”

“The file says ‘do not open’, kid,” spoke the holographic Tony, and Peter thought he was about to throw up. It even sounded like Tony. It moved like him, too.

And then the realization hit. This was an AI.

Tony shrugged. “But, I guess, what did I expect?” he continued. His voice sounded metallic, almost static-like, but it was still him. “Maybe I wanted you to open it. Well, I guess I should explain. Once upon a time, I was bored and found a way to reconstruct my entire physical form as a holographic entity. Like a piece of cake. And not only that, I was able to transcribe every little darn thing about me into computer code to preserve my memories, knowledge, and, dare I say it, my boisterous personality which everyone loves so dearly. So, all-in-all, hi, I’m Tony Stark. Well, his essence.”

“I’m gonna shit my pants,” Peter whispered.

“Please don’t do that. That’s disgusting.”

He wanted to fall to his knees. It wasn’t real, it wasn’t real––but it was. It wasn’t a person, it wasn’t alive. It was a bright blue hologram that spoke and behaved exactly like Tony Stark, and Peter felt sick to his stomach.

The panic began in his jaw. Trembling and aching while his eyes refused to believe what they saw. His throat tightened after that, and once the pressure crawled down into his lungs, Peter couldn’t hold back the threatening sobs. He did end up falling to his knees, but only because he couldn’t breathe.

He pressed his shaking hands down onto the cold floor while his vision darkened. Everything had become numb, and he wasn’t sure he could hear his own wheezing anymore.

“S-shit, I-I can’t––” Peter tried to sit himself up, knees pulled to his chest while he struggled to even his breathing. A snake had wrapped itself around his lungs. “I can’t breathe––I can’t breathe.”

The blueish glow of the AI reflected off of the floor tiles as it neared Peter. When he looked back up, Tony had knelt down in front of him. Even his suit seemed to wrinkle. But it wasn’t real.

“Whoa, there, Pete,” Tony said, “it’s okay.”

Peter could hear his heartbeat thudding in his ears. He glanced down at his lap.

“Hey, look at me.”

Peter looked back up at the AI.

Tony smiled. “You’re okay. Deep breaths now. Ready?”

Peter nodded, swallowing thickly.

“Inhale.”

As best as he could, he took a long, deep, shaking breath in.

“Exhale slowly. Count to ten.”

He let out the breath. One… two… three…

“And again.”

They sat there for a few minutes while Peter calmed down. The numbness faded, and while his lungs ached, they no longer felt restricted. He could feel his muscles slowly begin to relax. And he soon realized that Tony had placed a hand on Peter’s shoulder.

But he still couldn’t feel a thing. The touch wasn’t there.

Peter stretched his legs out in front of him as Tony finally sat down. “He––he––Tony made you for me?”

“Yeah, well.” The AI shrugged. “I wasn’t really made for intended use. Technically, you’re supposed to be dead.”

Peter sighed and dug his fingernails into the denim of his jeans. “I was,” he said. “But that was years ago.” Further thoughts nagged at his brain, but he couldn’t find the right words. He let them sit at the tip of his tongue.

But, despite not being a physical existence, Tony seemed to know exactly what Peter wanted to say.

“Kid,” Tony said softly, eyes sad and warm.

“You’re dead, Mister Stark,” Peter stated abruptly. “You’re––you’re the one who’s dead.”

“I know.”

“You know?” Peter asked. He didn’t like that he could see right through Tony.

Tony nodded. “That’s what I’m here for,” he said. “I was made for this. I wouldn’t be here if I was alive.”

Peter didn’t like the sound of that. He had accepted Tony’s death long ago; he hadn’t expected to see him, let alone talk to him again. Peter was sad, but he was angry. Angry that Tony had decided that his presence was too precious to let die. Angry that he couldn’t let Peter move on.

He swallowed down the rising anger and asked, “when did he make you?”

“Uh, 2018,” Tony answered. “Oh, hey, it’s your birthday, innit? Happy birthday, kid. Consider me a birthday gift from me.”

Peter rolled his eyes and cracked a smile. He didn’t have the energy to be mad. Tony wasn’t alive anymore; he didn’t deserve it.

“Whatever you need, Pete,” the AI spoke, “you always got me. I was made for you.”

Peter’s smile grew a little bigger. “Thank you, Mister Stark.”

The sounds of shoes coming down the stairs stole their focus away from the moment. Peter glanced over at Tony with wide eyes.

“Peter?” It was May.

Peter scrambled to his feet and ran toward the workbench behind him. His fingers shook as he searched for the button to turn off Tony's ghostcomp. Just as the hologram flickered away, May entered the workshop.

“Are you okay if we––whoa, this place is––” May gazed around at the handsome technology surrounding her. “––intense. Like Disneyland for you. Is that one of your web-shooters?”

Peter set the device back onto the table and nodded. “Y-yeah. It’s not finished, though. Prototype.”

“Well, take it with you, and then you can work on it at home,” said May.

But, Peter shook his head. “No,” he said, walking towards her. He looked back over at the spot where Tony once stood. “I think I’m gonna leave it here.”

___

“Finally. It’s about time. Ten thousand years can give you such a crick in the neck.”

“You know Aladdin?”

“Do you know exactly how many movie premieres I’ve been to, Pete?”

Peter chuckled. He had come home from college for winter break. What had been Tony’s old home sat like a relic, one Peter could hardly stand to touch, yet it was well-lived and full of his life, his legacy. Pepper and Morgan treated him as though he had always been a part of their family. It was time for him to make use of the family he had.

And, he couldn’t deny that all he wanted to do was lock himself away in Tony’s workshop and just talk.

To a being that didn’t even exist.

“I don’t mean to be rude, Mister Stark,” Peter began that afternoon, “but you should have made yourself into another Vision. And then you could at least help me out.”

“Yeah, but I really like doing nothing and just watching you,” said the AI, hands stuffing deep into his hypothetical pockets. “You’re doing that wrong.”

Peter looked down at the Spider-Man suit that he’d peeled open to access the inner subsystems. Truth be told, he had no idea what he was doing. Ever. He spent the past two years in constant trial and error over his suits, all because Tony wasn't there to help him. And now Tony was there, and he wasn’t helping him.

“You’re a terrible AI,” Peter mumbled.

“Now that just hurts my feelings.”

“You could at least tell me what to do.”

“I could.”

Peter rolled his eyes, but he kept it as hidden as possible. “Why am I not shocked that Tony created you just to be as much of an asshole as he was?”

The Tony AI pretended to gasp. “Cuts deep. But don’t forget the Class-A narcissism.”

“How could I ever forget that?”

“You’re surely on a sarcasm frenzy today,” he said. “Anything on your mind?” Tony folded his arms and leaned against a table. It looked almost realistic–– minus the blue, ghostly tint.

Peter shook his head. It was still odd to see Tony that way, and it was also comforting all the while. It was like he had him back but not quite. While it was Tony, it also wasn’t. He didn’t exist anymore.

“I’m not convinced,” the AI muttered. He had every vocal inflection and physical mannerism that Tony did, which bothered Peter the most.

“No, nothing’s wrong.”

“I didn’t ask if anything was wrong,” said Tony. “I asked if anything was on your mind.”

Peter shrugged. He didn’t look up as he carried on maneuvering the wires in his suit. “Nothing is on my mind. And nothing is wrong. I’m fine. Maybe I just wanna be sarcastic today.” He glanced back over at the AI and sighed. “Could you just help me. Please?”

A disheartened expression washed over Tony, one Peter hadn’t seen before. He nodded. “Yeah, sorry. Sure thing, kiddo.”

“And, I’m not a kid anymore,” Peter mumbled. “I’m an adult.”

“Nope, sorry,” Tony said, “you’ll always be my kid.” He cracked a grin and reached out his hand. Peter believed it was to ruffle his hair like his mentor used to do, but the realization quickly hit, and Tony pulled away. And he looked sad about it.

While the afternoon dragged on like normal, there was an unspoken feeling hanging in the air. Tony knew that Peter wished he was real, and Tony wished he was real, too.

___

Peter had planned on stopping by the workshop on his nineteenth birthday, but he never got the chance. The night before, he spent eleven hours stuck in his suit because he didn’t want to go home––the summer dragged, and not even Spider-Man could save it. On his birthday, he let May take him into the city for a peaceful day out, but his senses never allowed him to relax. Peter didn’t think about the AI he kept hidden away upstate.

He never took Tony with him, but he’d thought about it over a dozen times. Somehow, it felt wrong. It felt wrong to remove him from a place that Tony belonged. Even though he had been created for Peter––even though the system had been crafted into his own web-shooter––it still didn’t feel like it. Maybe it never would.

“Believe it or not,” said Tony, “I do miss you when you’re not around.”

Peter wanted to laugh and roll his eyes at the hint of sarcasm, but he couldn’t. He lacked energy. He wished he was home.

“What do you do when I’m not here?” Peter asked, gaze lingering on the blueprints of his brand new suit. Well, it wasn’t necessarily brand new, but after falling from a building only for a tree to catch his fall, there were too many snags and tears to sew up. So, he figured he would take the time to add a few improvements.

“I’m just ones and zeros, Pete. I don’t do anything.”

Peter frowned. “Yeah, sorry.” He minimized the blueprints and sat down at the desk with a long sigh. “Why’d Mister Stark even bother making you, then?” Peter mumbled aloud, rubbing two fingers along the bridge of his nose. “You just stand there and talk. What’s the point in having you if you can’t even help?”

“Pete––”

“No!” Peter suddenly exclaimed. A fit of newfound anger had boiled over. “I’m––I’m so annoyed that he thought he was being so clever with you when all he did was make a shitty version of himself. I’m tired of you just standing there. I’m tired of you just telling me what to do. You can’t help. You’re not him, so there’s no purpose. Like you said, you’re just ones and zeros. You’re just a stupid code.”

The AI barely moved; for a moment, Peter assumed that he had shut him down with his words.

“You’re right,” he uttered with a shrug. “I’m useless. Just a code.” Tony walked over and sat on the desk, his movements disrupting the hologram while his legs disappeared briefly. He used to be alive. He used to have a real body. “But honestly, Tony didn’t make me to be another Tony.”

Peter titled his chin up, but his frown didn’t budge. “What do you mean?” he asked lowly.

“I’m a ghostcomp,” Tony said. “A ghost-on-a-chip. I was made in case Tony died, but I’m not a replacement. He figured that his death would be too sudden. He figured he’d had to leave just as fast as you left him. He wanted to make sure you had something at least a little concrete.”

“He made you because he knew that I’d miss him?” Peter sat up, eyebrows furrowing. “That’s bullshit.”

“I don’t think he was ready to say goodbye either, kiddo.”

Peter shook his head. “Stop. Please.”

“The real reason––” Tony began as stood. He walked over to where his hologram was being projected from. The web-shooter. “––is that I was designed to be a helping hand when you’re in the suit. Technically, you’re not using me the way Tony wanted you to.”

“I don’t care,” Peter said. “I don’t want you in the suit.”

Tony looked at him. His expression was unreadable. It was like the words had hurt his feelings, but he didn’t have the right programming to emote them. He nodded. “That’s fair. It’s your choice.”

And Peter nodded, too. Slowly, he rose to his feet and walked over to where the holographic Tony stood. Peter tugged his hands into his sleeves. “I’m gonna go see if Morgan wants to hang out,” he mumbled. “See you later, Mister Stark.”

Tony’s lips tightened into a weak smile. “See you later, Mister Parker.”

___

Peter was ready to go back to school. A few days after his twentieth birthday, he kept his mind busy and his muscles burning as he swung up to White Plains. He hitched rides from there on out, and Pepper always greeted him on the porch with a pitcher of ice water.

“Morgan’s at a friend’s,” she sometimes said.

And Peter would breathily reply, “May is at work. Is it okay if I––?”

Pepper always interrupted with, “of course” and a smile.

There were many things in the workshop that had been rearranged over the years, but Peter kept most of it the way he found it. He didn’t want it to become his workshop, which, in his mind, it almost had. He wished he could pack it up and take it to school with him, but it was a nice home away from home to visit on special occasions.

On this particular day, the bad thoughts in Peter’s brain had won the fight. He climbed out of the suit, made his way down to the workshop, and curled himself onto Tony’s chair.

It was Tony’s chair. The chair that had belonged to Peter’s mentor, the person he had looked up to ever since he was nearly eight years old––and now he was sitting in his chair, crying over the fact that he spent more time grieving Tony than personally knowing him. But then again, Peter realized, Tony had done the same thing, too.

It hurt more today, Peter couldn’t deny that. It hurt to be in the same room Tony had once been in––he had once lived in. The past four years were hard, but some days were harder.

He wasn’t sure if he wanted to speak to the Tony AI today. But, nevertheless, Peter picked himself up. He held the web-shooter in his palm, internally fighting with his thoughts before brushing his thumb over the button. He pushed it without hesitation, and Tony came to life.

“Hey? You look so glum, kiddo. What’s up?” Tony stuffed his hands into his pockets.

Peter set the web-shooter back down and shrugged. “Bad day,” he said, strolling over to the desk so he could flop himself back into the chair. “That’s all.”

Tony hummed. “Damn,” he said. “Sorry to hear that. Well, we’ve got quite a few things in here that could get your mind off of it. What do you say to a little holographic basketball with some trashed files, yeah? And before you ask, yes, we can do best two-out-of-three.”

“No.” Peter shook his head as he wiped his nose with his sleeve. “No, I don’t really wanna do that.”

Tony’s eyebrows knotted together. “What do you wanna do, then?”

Peter shrugged again. “I-I wish––I wish I could hug you,” he whispered.

The AI’s expression relaxed.

“I wish you were here.”

“I am here,” said Tony.

Peter let out a huff. “But you’re not. You’re not here. You’re not you. I want Tony back. I want my Tony back. Not a hologram I can put my hand through. I-I can’t hug you. I can’t help you build your suits, and you can’t help me build mine. You can’t go out into the world and live. You can’t––you can’t take me out to lunch. You can’t be with your wife and your daughter. You can’t drive me upstate or make me coffee I’ll never drink. We can’t do superhero shit together because you’re dead. You’re not alive. And you haven’t been for four years, and for some reason, it still feels like yesterday. I’ve done so much. I’ve changed so much. B-but I come back to you, and I’m just reminded of how much I loved being around you. How much I loved you. You just––you can’t be there like Tony was there. You’re not him.”

Tony stayed quiet. It seemed as though he hadn’t been programmed for such an emotional range. But then he said, “I’m sorry” so softly, and Peter felt the impact of his words. He had truly meant them, and he knew there was nothing else he could do.

___

“Whatcha packin’ up there, Pete?”

“Just a few things Pepper said I could take with me.”

“Where are you going?”

Peter’s college career had come and gone. His life had never been so different, and it was time to let change run its course. New York was still home, but sometimes home wasn’t necessarily a place. And Peter understood that. He needed to do a bit more living, and that required moving on.

“I got a job,” he said, stacking a few of Tony’s old belongings into a large box, “in New England.”

Tony grinned. The light from his hologram had dulled through the years, and Peter never found the time to fix it.

“Look at you, Mister Parker,” said Tony. “All grown up. I swear you were just fourteen and getting your ass beat by Cap.”

Peter chuckled. “I would go back in a heartbeat. Not to high school, though. High school sucked.”

“I literally don’t even remember high school.”

“It’s a blur,” he said. He lifted the box onto Tony’s desk and leaned against it. The moment felt sad and surreal. Peter couldn’t find the right words, so he fiddled with the edge of the cardboard instead.

“You okay?”

Peter glanced over at Tony. He hadn’t aged a day. “Sorta,” Peter said. “I’m––I’m not taking you with me, you know. And I’m gonna be gone for a while. Are you gonna be okay without me?”

“Pfft.” Tony rolled his eyes. “I lasted five years without you. I’ll never be okay.”

Peter smiled sadly. He still wished he could hug him. “I’ll miss you, Tony.”

“I’ll miss you too, kiddo.”

56 notes · View notes