#unrelated but this reminds me of when i noticed that in the first few seasons they reuse the same b-roll footage of like

[lesbiten]

omggg im watching supernatural rn and they just used a spund effect in their music thats CONSTANTLY used in torchwood s1-2 soundtrack. stop making these shows identical!!!!! yesterday already had a miracle day episode

they are NOT beating the torchwood supernatural allegations

[dedeinthewild]

paul aron x reader, bestfriends to lovers

~ “Remind me never to travel with you again,”

The second-to-last race of the season awaited them in Qatar, a land where sand reigned supreme and the heat was unrelenting. After two months of downtime, filled with travels far and wide, it was finally time to get back on the road.

Staying put for long wasn’t something Paul and ___ did often, especially when they had a passport ready to use and suitcases always half-packed.

After a few weeks at home spent at family dinners and waking up late—she wouldn’t stir until he returned from his morning run and began making breakfast—they had hopped on the first of many planes.

Their first destination was Spain. In October, it was still warm and pleasant. They rented a car without much of a plan, updating their itinerary on her laptop whenever they stopped for gas.

Paul drove, and drove, and drove some more, while she handled the music, took photos, and rambled on about anything that came to mind. She knew he was just like her in that way. In two weeks, with only their return flight and each other as constants, they explored the entire southern coast of Spain, along the Costa del Sol.

They lived on water, paella, and thread bracelets they couldn’t resist buying from roadside stalls and souvenir shops.

Even Paul, the Estonian, managed to get a bit of a tan during their half-day beach stops, where he would always lie back with his T-shirt folded under his head.

“You should put on some sunscreen,” she warned him.

“I did,” he lied blatantly, hands tucked behind his neck.

“You did not,” she said, narrowing her eyes as he opened one of his to meet her gaze with that playful look he reserved just for her.

“I did not,” he admitted with a smirk.

They were so carefree, chatting as they strolled through picturesque towns and nodding along to Spanish dialects they didn’t understand. He would watch her as she looked around, camera in hand and her old backpack slung over one shoulder, a bandana wrapped around the strap.

The sun had kissed her nose, leaving it slightly red, and her freckles were more visible now, something you’d otherwise notice only up close.

Traveling with her was something else entirely. Sure, Paul loved being with Karl—losing luggage and playing pranks on him mid-flight—but nothing compared to being with her.

She was a completely different person when they traveled, far from the ambivert he knew. She was open, ready to embrace every moment, legs tucked under her on the car seat, her hair often braided, and always smiling.

And if there was one thing he loved most about her, it was her smile.

“Got everything?” she asked, hands on her hips, standing outside the Airbnb where they’d spent the last two nights. “Passport, passes, and IDs?”

Paul checked his pockets, rifled through the documents, and nodded, doing one last sweep of the small apartment to make sure they hadn’t left anything behind.

“All set,” he confirmed, slinging his backpack over one shoulder. “Wanna stop downstairs for breakfast?”

Downstairs was Málaga’s best café, renowned for its dreamy lattes and the most delicious pastries they’d tasted on this trip.

“Will you kill me if I say yes?”

“I would’ve killed you if you said no,” Paul replied with a grin, grabbing the car keys and pocketing them before helping her with her suitcase and heading down the stairs to the street.

“Karl said his flight leaves Tallinn in ten,” the Estonian said, showing her his phone.

She nodded, listening, as they entered the café and ordered their usual. She paid with her phone while Paul checked their flight tickets and team emails.

They settled into their favorite corner seat, near the window where they could watch people pass by, and savored their breakfast before driving to the airport to return the car.

“You feeling alright?” Paul asked as they stood on the escalator leading to their gate. He glanced at her while tying his hoodie around his suitcase.

“As alright as I can be before a flight,” she replied.

It wasn’t a secret that she was afraid of flying, and Paul knew this well. During turbulence, she often buried her face into his shoulder, clutching his arm for comfort.

“We’ll be fine, as always,” he reassured her with a slight smile.

Those might have been famous last words because, after a smooth flight, hell awaited them.

As always, they had settled into their usual seats, Paul refusing to let her sit anywhere but by the window, even though she preferred the aisle. He always took the middle seat to keep strangers at bay.

The flight had been uneventful—a shared playlist on their AirPods, a few moments of sleep, and some playful photos that would inevitably make it into a photo dump.

But once they landed and joined the passport control line, smiling and chatting, two customs officers approached them.

“Could you please step aside?”

The officers escorted them away from the queue into a small room.

They’d been detained.

“So, what brings you to Qatar?” one of the officers asked, arms crossed, his holstered gun visible at his hip. He placed their suitcases on a table for inspection.

“I’m a driver, and she’s my photographer,” Paul replied, mirroring the man’s stance with a sigh.

“Can we have all your documents?” the officer asked. ___ handed over their passports, flight tickets on her phone, and the media passes for the race weekend.

“You’re coming from Spain, and your flight was randomly selected for a passenger inspection,” the less intimidating officer explained, asking for permission to open their suitcases.

“What were you doing in Spain?” they asked.

“Road-tripping. We were on a break from the racing season and decided to travel,” she replied calmly, hiding the natural nervousness anyone would feel in that situation.

“May I open your suitcases?”

The taller officer motioned for Paul to sit, likely cautious about his imposing height. She, on the other hand, appeared calm and cooperative, hands in her pockets and glasses slipping slightly down her nose.

The agents emptied their bags and left to verify their tickets, passports, and passes, leaving them alone in the room.

“What’s Karl saying?” she asked, slumping into her seat, running her hands through her hair after letting it down.

“He said the team’s working on getting us out of here,” Paul replied, arms crossed, his cheeks slightly flushed.

“Calm down, Paul. It’s okay,” she said, checking the time on her phone.

“I just don’t get it. Maybe someone else is trafficking drugs, and they’re keeping us here,” he fumed, one hand on his knee and the other supporting his head, frustration evident.

An hour passed. A bottle of water. Another hour.

“My back hurts,” the driver groaned, standing to stretch, revealing a sliver of skin at the base of his back.

“Maybe we shouldn’t have gone to Spain,” she teased, tying her hair into a ponytail to cope with the heat.

“And why’s that?” he asked, yawning.

“We’ve been away for two weeks, and you’re exhausted.”

“It’s not the trip; it’s those damn agents,” he muttered.

She smiled, noticing the cluster of bracelets around his wrist as he paced the room, lost in thought.

“Make it meme?” she suggested, holding up her phone, and watched as he pulled out his own and joined her on the bench.

Another hour and a half. A packet of peanuts.

Paul was busy folding the peanut wrapper into a paper plane while she took a call from her mom, who was worried they hadn’t arrived in Qatar yet. When she hung up, Paul handed her the paper plane, smiling, his blue eyes locked onto hers.

“Remind me never to travel with you again,” she joked, standing between his knees.

“You have so much fun with me,” he teased, leaning back to get a better look at her.

“You drive like Dominic Toretto, got mistaken for a trafficker… shall I go on?”

“I’m good-looking, funny, educated. I always treat you—”

“And you have an enormous ego. Almost forgot that one,” she laughed.

Two hours later, after being interrogated again to cross-check their story with Airbnb bookings and team contacts, the agents finally returned with their documents.

They were both half-asleep and achy from the plastic chairs, but they leapt to their feet as soon as they saw the officers.

“You’re free to go. Welcome to Lusail,” the less intimidating agent said.

“All thanks to me,” she whispered outside, rolling her eyes as Paul flexed his biceps, acting smug.

She pretended to bite him, laughing as he chuckled and stretched one last time before slinging an arm around her shoulders.

“The longest day of my life,” he muttered.

“You know what they told me while I was alone?” she asked, amused.

Paul nodded, spotting Karl waving at them in the distance.

“They thought I was a legit photographer, and you were forcing me to help you get into the country.”

Paul burst out laughing, dragging his suitcase along, his exhaustion overshadowed by the absurdity of the day.

“To me, it’s the opposite way around,” he said.

She gave him a playful punch in the side as Karl waved more dramatically, trying to catch their attention.

They really were a mischievous pair. But no one fit together as well as they did.

~ not a request, but when it comes to paul I'd write anything :)

[lokittystuckinatree]

Happy Pride losers, I’m ready to be clowned but my dumb ass is now convinced Rogue is the Master…

Rogue and Renegade have eerily similar meanings under the right circumstance.

To rebel against an organized group. To go rogue.

An endearingly naughty person

Koschei, our second fave Renegade Time Lord

Apparently they were also called a Rogue Time Lord? I am not making this up.

Although Maestro is Master in Italian and look how that turned out

“Lord” interesting.

Red and Blue. The master and 13 were red and blue coded respectively. Have they switched, Symbolically?

Rogue was looking at the Doctor rather nefariously, even once they were buddies. Just go through some of the scenes again. It’s harder than you’d think to tell if he’s trying to seem seductive or evil

The entire premise of this ep seems to be “things are not as they seem; people are not as they appear” which is a Master staple

The Master has been haunting the fuck out of the narrative lately.

Here’s my thread on just how much

When I saw the first trailer, I instinctively thought “ballroom dance guy” was gonna be the new Master

The inside of Rogue’s (familiarly messy) ship has controls eerily similar to the configuration of a TARDIS.

Rogue is obviously a time traveler if he has that space ship and knows DnD (Rogue + Time + Lord. Oh?)

DnD might be a dead giveaway

Was Rogue’s name being inspired by DnD necessary to include? Cute thing the writers wanted to put in, or clue?

Why would Rogue know what DnD was but not know what cosplay or improv was?

The Master has been taken prisoner by the Toymaker, infamous for his love of? Games. You know who also has a running theme of “winning” and “losing”? The Master

In DnD you play as a character and rely on skill and chance to survive within the confines of a structured storytelling game. Bending the rules is often involved. The Master tried that against the Toymaker and failed.

DnD players will often have little tiny figurines of their characters. Remind you of anything?

the Master is a dnd rogue archetype. Trickster, lone wolf, shapeshifter.

If the Doctor is symbolically trapped in a TV show, is the Master trapped in a game? If the Toymaker is the DM, is he going rogue against the Toymaker?

The Master is infamous for their disguises and “cosplays” and has catfished the Doctor before.

Rogue is almost suspiciously too much the Doctor’s type. He’s like the love child of River Song and Jack Harkness. He is exactly the type of character the Master would create to lure and seduce the Doctor.

He and the Doctor just…get each other. It’s like they’ve known each other for much longer than a few hours. They’re too cushy (haha)

Rogue threatened to kill the Doctor, and then imprisoned him in a nice little cage. Familiar?

He tried to make the Doctor kill Ruby, who we all know is just Clara 2.0. Familiar?

He knows too much and too little

He knew the party was attended by alien birb people but only knew about one alien birb? And did he reaaaally think Doc was an alien bird?

The Dancing. They knew they wanted there to be a dance party before they even settled on a time period setting for the episode. Enough said.

The ring was…interesting

That’s a lot of commitment, even if only a promise ring. Something tells me he intended it as an engagement ring though

Someone tried to write a book in the 80s where 5 and Ainley were ex spouses, but it was shot down

Just an unrelated detail, but a ring on the pinky is a gay thing

Mirroring. Thoschei do that. A lot.

“You!” “No, you!” “no, you!”

The way they danced

The scene where they kept turning on and off the music

Speaking of music…Bad Guy by Billie Eilish? Too on the nose? Can’t get you out of my head? Poker face?

You remember that lady’s hand that picked up the Master in his widdle toof? Hand of the Rani?

This episode was written by two women. The Master would literally be in women’s hands

I remember watching Sacha Dhawan’s Spy Master for the first time and going…darn, he reminds me so much of Avengers era Loki. Kate Herron directed season 1 of the Loki Series and had a lot of creative control. Would it really be surprising if RTD (confirmed Loki fan) went to her for the Master after Sacha?

Didn’t Russell say he’s leaving the Master for “other writers?”

“The Master is parked” did he happen to park a Tardis disguised as an everyday spaceship???

In an interview, Kate said she and Briony designed Rogue to be the Doctor’s “equal”

References

“When I see him, I’ll know” and he is drawn to Rogue like a magnet.

“Travel with me” who must you be to want the Doctor to be your companion instead of vice verse

“We can argue across the stars”

“I’m in your head” + “can’t get you out of my head” + the Master being referenced multiple times in almost every episode since PoTD

“I’m trigger happy” feels really fucking intentional

He said “find me.” If he is the Master, the person he lost was the Doctor, (notice he said “them” and not “her” or “him?”) and the Master and Doctor always find each other.

Scream of the Shalka? And didn’t the Master fall through the floor like 40 times in Curse of Fatal Death? Richard E Grant was the Doctor in both of those.

For more, @bugeater77 and friends have this lovely thread

Guys CHECK MY REBLOG, RTD posted something wild.

[flying-bear-tv]

Some stuff i noticed in the fionna and cake finale + betty theroy

# 1 Prismo's face glitch

This one is pretty self explanatory. for a frame prismos face glitches for no reason. I cant think of something we have seen that would explain this.

#2 After credits apple

After the credits there is a short animation of two shapes morphing into an apple. I thought this was a logo or something unrelated at first so I reversed image searched the apple but I couldn't find anything. So if its not related to a company it should be related to the show right? The shapes and bow for sure remind me of golbetty and apples have appeared multiple times (mostly use to shrink in size) This probably is important.

#3 Season One

The image on the left is a promotional poster for the show. On the bottom it gives the date episodes will start airing. Notice the lack of "Season One" near the top. The image on the right Is for the show's soundtrack which was released yesterday. All im gonna say is if I were producing a 10 episode miniseries I wouldn't want to specifically label it as season one if there was only one season.. And I definitely wouldn't only put that on promotional materials AFTER the season was done airing. I bet $72 there will be a season 2.

OKEY GUYS IT TIME TO TALK ABOUT BETTY1!!!!!!!!!!!!!11!!!!! :]

Adventure time season 6 episode 43. The Comet. yea im bringing this up.

I saw a post saying this means "comet". It has the same number of characters as the bus sign but I no idea where they found how to read this. I think it makes sense though and I'll tell you why

As Simon is flying away from golbetty he sees her do this .. Notice the color of the light (electricity?? fire?) I also think she changes shape a bit. the image on the left is her when she first electricitys herself and the image one the right is a few seconds later. I'm not gonna draw any conclusions on why this is right now.

Now back to Adventure Time ;]

In The Comet finn witnesses several of his reincarnations. The two shown are a comet and a butterfly.

Now IF the bus is saying golbettys destination is "comet" this HEAVILY implies reincarnation as comets are directly tied to this in adventure time. Also notice how the electricity golbetty is using is THE EXACT SAME FUCKING COLOR AS THE COMET. And what does simon wake up to after seeing golbetty do that.

A FUCKING BUTTERFLY I AM GOING TO LOSE IT. she is kissing him

I think what happened is by Simon and Betty both moving on from their toxic yuri relationship Betty's wish to keep simon safe was realized. Because tbh the thing that was mostly likely to hurt Simon was his own indifference to life and tendency to self sacrifice. I mean, he was completely ready to say goodbye to his sanity multiple times JUST that episode.

This allowed Betty to separate from golb because she no longer needed its power. She gave simon and kiss, and then fucked off to do butterfly shit.

Even if im wrong this show was so beautiful TvT I really needed it. I totally understand if yall are disappointed because simon and betty didn't get a happy ending together but. They really needed to move on. And who knows.. maybe we'll get a season two ;) bye

Oh and the scarab fight scene was way too long and bringing jay and little destiny back was weird and forced.

[samthetrekkie]

I really enjoyed the last few episodes (as I really enjoy tng as a whole), but this was one of the first that I felt like commenting on, in a while:

first of all, the selling of technologically advanced weapons hits a bit close to home right now. I generally notice how many of the topics that were current in the late 70s to 80s are current again... the plot itself reminded me a lot of one of the episodes in the last season of discovery - obviously the other way round, but I saw dsc first.

then the ops officer that looked like devon aoki? I was honestly mesmerized by her whenever she came on. and the ensigns-need-encouragement-plot is also always nice. best rendition being "good shepherd" from voyager imho.

and of course picard and beverly. we only got crumbs, but how sweet was picard's care for her and then casually calling her by her first name. my headcanon is that there is smth going on behind the scenes already, only him calling her doctor most of the time, even when they're alone is a bit off. anyway, I can't wait to see more of these two. I love her character and I really enjoy this gentle side she brings out in picard, when he's being mildly annoying the rest of the time.

finally, unrelated, why is there a new chief engineer each episode?

[quillyfied]

Things I’m noticing on this rewatch, which I’m hoping to take slow and ponder on but we will see how it goes, PART THREE (obviously major Good Omens season 2 spoilers throughout, specifically for S2E3)

- First, going back to the previous episode: thank you to the person who reminded me that the Dirty Donkey pub is the pub that Crowley plans his holy water heist in!! (Which means Crowley LITERALLY planned his heist on Aziraphale’s stoop, unless Aziraphale moved the pub to be closer to himself in case it happened again. Hmmmm.)

- Also. I have been reminded that “Give me coffee or give me death” is a modified quote of “give me liberty or give me death” by an American revolutionary. Which. Explains all the Statues of Liberty around the place. I am Slow.

- Anyway, to e3: the fact that Jim has a labeled mug and hot chocolate canister. I feel like he tried to ingest something he wasn’t supposed to, so Aziraphale made sure he had his name on his things XD

- The sex worker is a treasure, for one; I hope I am reminded of her name soon.

- MURIEL. SWEET ANGEL BABY. Sorry they’re not a baby but they are so adorably innocent and inexperienced. I love that Aziraphale treats them so kindly despite his obvious terror. Though. It is a kindness that reminds me of my coworkers. I work in childcare. I know a “childcare” disposition when I see it.

- Okay, the framing there: the box, and the hat. The mystery, and the detective cap. Excellent.

- The gentle tutelage, Muriel’s scrunchy face when they realize what tea is for—I’m just SCREECHING.

- AND CROWLEY GETTING IN ON IT. THE WAY HIS WHOLE DEMEANOR IMMEDIATELY GOES FROM BITCHING TO DELIGHTED. AAAAAAAAAAH.

- AND HE’S SITTING. ON THE ARM. OF AZIRAPHALE’S CHAIR.

- The coparenting. Muriel’s utter naivety. I’m just.

- “I’m not sure how you lot have managed to stay in charge.” “I’m not sure we actually have.” SAY IT LOUDER.

- OKAY BUT HOW DOES HELL MEASURE MIRACLES THO

- ONE FABULOUS KISS CROWLEY. IS THAT ALL IT TAKES.

- “To tell if humans are in love you need to wait a few days” not bad advice really but also unrelated how many days are in like 6000 years? Asking for a friend.

- AZIRAPHALE TALKING TO THE BENTLEY AND IMMEDIATELY BEING A BIGGER MENACE ON THE ROAD THAN CROWLEY. VINDICATION.

- Thing the first about the opening theme: Crowley crawls up the cliff and Aziraphale lands on it. Just a nice touch.

- The movie theater in the opening has a different feature title and picture on the big screen every episode. I missed it for the first one but last time it was “A Companion to Owls” (which is a verse from Job that I only know because the full quote is “I am a brother to dragons, and a companion to owls” and it was a lamentation but of course teenage Quilly thought that was the coolest thing she had ever read). This time: The Resurrectionists, coupled with a shot of the Gabriel statue.

- I think Crowley’s hair is s1 color in this minisode but I can’t be sure. Lighting is…not. :P

- THE BONUS CONTENT SAYS NEIL GAIMAN THOUGHT IT WOULD BE FUN TO LET DAVID TENNANT DO AS MANY SCOTTISH ACCENTS AS HE CAN THIS CHAPTER. I AM DELIGHTED

- The second Elspeth says “English” Crowley starts losing it, which in turn makes ME lose it.

- I love the bringing back in the discussion from the book about privilege making its way here, and given a more visceral illustration and testing. Though I love Crowley literally helping Elspeth pull the wagon, a thing I’m not sure he’s ever willingly done in his life, and poking holes in Aziraphale’s arguments all the way.

- Wee Morag’s morals have about the same utility in this situation as Aziraphale’s, tbh. I’m not sure I have the mental capacity tonight to deconstruct that the way it deserves.

- Aha! Knew I recognized the tune in the car! Danse Macabre!

- He is AFFECTIONATE towards the BENTLEY. Which Crowley can FEEL.

- YELLOW CAR. DAMN YOU JOHN FINNEMORE.

- but it is pretty, Crowley!

- Spoilsport.

- I fully did not internalize the tartan hills and Nessie the first time around. I saw them. I immediately chalked them up to personal fever dream.

- The demon’s name is Josh. Why is that delightful??

- He wears a kilt! And has a wonderful little monologue about dung pits and tongue ripping!

- Beelzebub being off is subtle. Almost too subtle.

- The many stacks of books Crowley carries around and then chucks this episode. Love it.

- Crowley not having a cow about a fly seems weird tbh

- Vavoom. Where tf did he learn the word vavoom

- “David Tennant has occasionally played a doctor” OH HAS HE NOW

- the almost musical pulls Michael Sheen does for miracles this season. Lovely.

- Also: the dual nature of Mr. Dalrymple. Needs bodies to do good and study so he can save lives. Treats the people bringing him the bodies like dirt.

- Okay: is Crowley freezing time, or just putting Dalrymple in a mental time out? Very curious to know. The trivia bit on the side references the s1 trick of having Jean-Claude’s actor stand very still to achieve the time stop there, so perhaps freezing time?

- Alright moment of silence for how very very good Crowley’s outfit is this scene. Yum.

- The instant penny drop when Aziraphale realizes the reason for the body snatching, how he immediately uses prevention of future harm to classify it as Good.

- Also. His emotional reaction to the kid’s tumor. ;A;

- Edinburgh is so colorful!!

- HIS SMUG LITTLE GRIN WHEN HE POPS OUT HIS HAT AND NOTEBOOK. Also, wtf is in his hat. What is that.

- Okay but the double sided sign, and how Aziraphale first sees the Jesus side. IMPORTANT. PAINFUL.

- PRESS 66. That’s what’s in the hat.

- And Aziraphale being every bit as awkward as Muriel in his interrogation. Just slightly less weird. Angels.

- Listen I’ll probably say it again at episode 6 but the sheer magnitude of the importance that Gabriel and Beelzebub fell in love over the course of a year—with EACH OTHER. Not with earth or humans or creation. Just each other. Hggk.

- Alright, but Aziraphale DOES see the other half of the sign here. Does he get it? DOES HE GET IT?? No. Of course not.

- “I’ll help but it still doesn’t make it right.” That is such an uncomfortable truth to sit with. The whole adventure is, really. The whole show. SHADES OF GREY.

- Okay, I’m pausing this episode way too much, it’s been over an hour since I started this episode, but—the way Aziraphale overcorrects is. Sad? Elspeth and Wee Morag aren’t here to decrease human suffering. Outside of their own, of course, which can also be achieved by digging up a body that’s fresh. Scope of intent and how Aziraphale simplifies and moralizes it. Huh.

- Lot more this season about Aziraphale’s miracle allowances, too. Very interesting concept.

- MIGHT HAVE SLIGHTLY OVERDONE IT ON THE HOLE. MIGHT YOU INDEED.

- interesting how his dithering is what causes his chance to heal Wee Morag to slip through his fingers. And yet raising her is out of the question. Can Aziraphale even do that? We know he and Crowley together generate a ton of power, but what about on his own?

- interesting that elspeth takes Wee Morag to Dalrymple and is already contemplating suicide despite her actions suggesting she intended to keep on living. Hmm.

- Dalrymple the Ass. Not just unwilling to get his own hands dirty but disparaging of those who will. Another moral dichotomy.

- And elspeth also not wanting to get dug up? Wee Morag’s death affecting her?

- CROWLEY OFF HIS HEAD WITH LAUDANUM IS THE FUNNIEST POSSIBLE OUTCOME

- How much is 90 guineas compared to 5 pounds? …google says a guinea is worth slightly more than a pound. So. For the eight pounds Elspeth and Wee Morag were aiming for, for the three pounds shafted that Wee Morag died for…Aziraphale literally had over ten times that amount in his pocket. MORALS.

- …the stupid special features had the math onscreen already. Sort of. Heck.

- Yeah okay this scene adds way more context to Crowley asking for holy water fifty or so years later. Yikes. YIKES. The implications of it all!!

- Asking the phone nicely. Love these little Aziraphaleisms.

- The awning of a new age XD

- The little tipping of his cap!! Adorable!

- Nina and Maggie actually TALKING. HEY CROWLEY ARE YOU PAYING ATTENTION???

- The rain is overdone and the awning rips. Gosh. Whatever could that be implying?

- Seriously how is Crowley able to pull these spells out of Jim?? And seemingly ONLY him???

- Alright, this prophecy bit. Seems to me to be about the future, also about the past, which is very biblical tbh. Specifically Isaiah. But I’m not up to snuff enough on my Bible to tell what all Gabriel is quoting. Besides the Buddy Holly.

- HELLO SHAX

- Okay, realizing that no angels pop up in Aziraphale’s shop in season 1, either. Gabriel and Sandalphon enter from the outside. I’ll need to rewatch to see if Aziraphale actively invites them in, or if it’s just blocking. I think it might just be blocking. But what an interesting detail, that only humans can enter at will and all else must be invited!

- The threatening of Aziraphale continues. The anxiety of Crowley intensifies. The obliviousness of Jim resets.

- Always too late. Poor Crowley.

Yeah this took an hour and a half to watch XD but I’m having fun. And killing quite a lot of time. Am I making sense or creating a thoughtful analysis? No, I don’t think so. But I’m solidifying the canon in my head, at least.

[freebooter4ever]

unrelated to the stick but have you seen cooking with geno?

Haaaaaaaaaaaa. I have :) i mean...what self respecting geno fangirl hasnt? If im honest i think it was the first thing with him that i watched, but i was not paying attention to him at all at all then. Aside from noticing that Fuck He's Exactly My Type If I Ever Had One and being very annoyed by it. My ADHD research spiral in the summer of 2022 went something like this: ra*ngers -> pana*rin -> russ*an red w*ngs -> larion*ov...and then i side tracked over to alyonka's mental health/ E*D*O videos, and then her podcast which also interviewd several hockey players including her brother (which are really interesting btw)...tldr i actually watched that video more curious about alyonka than geno, cause in her more current stuff she talks a lot about those early 2000's days and what it was like working in the league as a woman. Unfortunately for geno at that point the only thing i knew about him was that he was on the penguins and that he said some shit in one interview about bread, and i had already decided based on that and his instgrm that he looked like an asshole. I cannot find that interview quote about breadman, for all i know it could have all been made up, but it reaaaaally made me dislike him. So the first time i watched the video i was doing my best to ignore geno and pretend like he wasnt radiating attractiveness. My one conclusion about that video and a few other old pens videos with alyonka (and not geno but other players) i watched was that i was surprised how much more informal things used to be. She felt very casual and more like a friend to the players than the more professional style interviews i have seen while watching this stuff live now.

And if none of that research spiral makes sense just be grateful you dont have ADHD.

ANYWAY then lucky for geno he features in my favorite hockey photo ever - that one of him sitting on the boards with the snow and baby blue jersey. So i had to draw that photo, and then i started paying more attention to him that season, and watched that dan and sushi interview, and realized shit i might have been wrong about this guy. And maybe my change of heart only has a little to do with his Very Pretty Eyes.

And moooooonths (a year?) later i finally rewatched the cooking with geno video and had to basically admit that my initial gut instinct of Oh Shit He's Hot reaction remained the same. He's a terrible cook, somehow even worse than me which is saying something cause i'm really fucking bad at it myself. But his physicality/personality rather shines in the clip. (i have heard people say he was sexualizing or staring at alyonka??? It doesnt look like that to me, they just seemed very comfortable with one another and maybe a little teasing but im not the best at recognizing flirting etc). Young Geno's got that same confidence/swagger as old(er) geno that in most guys would come across as arrogant but with him it's very quiet and understated. He makes a lot of dumb jokes. Even on my second viewing i still didnt understand the basketball joke. He didn't talk much but there were a lot of shy smiles. He reminded me a lot of my old friend ethan in attitude and height - just like how he kind of awkwardly looms in the background at times, and how all his obvious strength is sort of soft in a gentle way. He also seemed like a guy very willing to listen, which was cute. But -and this might be me projecting. But sometimes when people try to 'teach' me how to cook i play dumb just so i can check out and not use my brain and let them do all the thinking and tell me exactly what i need to do. Its very lazy and i recognize this but sometimes my brain is tired. And i swear geno was maybe doing that to alyonka at times. Like i think his effort in the video was at most 70%. Maybe 50%. It takes one lazy cook to know another one. And i am a very lazy cook.

Sorry anon, ive been cleaning and working all day so you got more than you asked for, basically a character study, whoops.

Oh, also on the second rewatch i realized the weird short grimlin who only appeared to eat the food and then disappeared was tanger. I did NOT recognize him. I still cant really believe thats him.

[clonerightsagenda]

Ok there is. a lot that could be said about Vi and Jinx but I'll hone in on a couple of things for the sake of this post:

We're back at it with character duos representing dueling worldviews, and Vi and Jinx are both struggling with the past. Vi wants things to go back to how they used to be. I have to keep reminding myself of this because of the show's breakneck pace, but she's been in prison for what, 6 years? And then seasons 1-2 take place over a few months. Vi stepped out of a timewarp into a nightmare. Her last clear memories of the world outside her cell were an entirely different situation; it makes sense that she's struggling to let that go. And it also makes sense that she latches onto the first real positive interaction she gets after all that (Caitlyn) and is so willing to take her back the second Caitlyn reverts to their past dynamic. Vi cannot move the fuck on. More on this later.

Jinx, on the other hand, wants to make the past go away. She changes her name, her look, her life, but of course she can't make a clean break of it. She keeps dolls of her dead siblings. She's literally haunted by figures from her past. I am not psychotic and have not done a lot of reading on psychosis, so I can't speak authoritatively on how Jinx's mental illness is portrayed (I suspect not well), but there's a noticeable shift between seasons. Part of this could be that Jinx's symptoms are intensified by stress and parts of season 2 Jinx (and AU Powder) are in a better headspace, but it also reeks of 'this character is more of a protagonist so we're going to get rid of some of the unsightlier symptoms'. Suicidal depression is prettier and more poetic, right?

So we have two sisters with two different ways of handling the past (trying to kill it versus trying to resurrect it), and while I found the whole Vander/Warwick plotline annoying, I recognize its symbolism as the undead weight of their history. What's interesting to me, though, is that despite Vi getting the more traditionally 'good' ending, Jinx is the one who escapes this mindset. Vi doesn't get through to her, but Ekko - whose powers allow him to turn back time, but only 4 seconds, a more limited engagement with the past that acknowledges you can't live in it - does. She changes her look again in a way that references multiple important people from different phases in her life. She also appears to be wearing a hoodie made out of an Ikea shark maybe. And although the finale episode starts with Jinx trying to fall to her death, her eventual "death" isn't actually caused by her issues. She did not go into that fight with the goal of a heroic sacrifice. She ends up falling with Vander because Vi refused to leave his inert body, because Vi still cannot let go. Jinx is the one who pays for it. Maybe that's why after her heavily implied survival she doesn't come back.

(Also, sidenote unrelated to the core idea being explored in this post: Both of the sisters are far more interested in personal relationships than ideology. Jinx doesn't dislike Caitlyn for being a topsider; she dislikes her for stealing her sister's attention. She never meant to be a figurehead for Zaunite liberation. So I guess her giving Vi her blessing to date their military dictator doesn't represent her betraying Zaunite ideals (she never actually cared about that and is very upfront about it) but it's still sort of annoying. Though maybe it's just another warning sign that she's given up on everything, that she no longer has the energy to fight for her sister's attention. And when Vi gets released she has jail cell sex with Caitlyn instead of running after her sister so, fair read of the situation there, Jinx.

I just finished Arcane. I have deeply mixed feelings but re: PPLN: I would be interested in hearing your thoughts about everything that went down with Vi and Jinx. Or Mel and Ambessa.

re: send me PPLN asks while I'm snowed in, the sleet has begun and so do I

This ask could probably keep me fed for my entire snowbound experience because oh my god, but let's start off with Mel and Ambessa since there's a little bit less material to work with, and I'll come back to Vi and Jinx later.

Stuck it under a cut because this got long

Arcane loves its character duos who represent dueling worldviews, and Ambessa and Mel represent hard versus soft power. In Mel's childhood flashback, Mel advocates for sparing a captive and using her as a figurehead while they become the power behind the throne, and Ambessa decapitates her instead. In the present, Ambessa is a warlord coming to Piltover looking for new shiny magitech to use against her enemies. Meanwhile, Mel is the richest woman in the city and a major political player, making alliances, swaying council votes, and backing rising stars.

We see the two of them come into conflict in season 1 and the beginning of season 2. (Although, we can note, Ambessa is using political maneuvering here by manipulating Salo and Caitlyn! She has more range than just brute force.) As viewers, we can anticipate that the characters will be used to explore these two different philosophies of power and control.

Aaaaaand then.... Mel gets kidnapped, joins a sisterhood of witches, comes back, hands over her mom to one of the witches, then decides she doesn't trust the witch after all, and then her mom dies and she gets her job. I'm. Not quite sure what philosophical statement is being made here. Which is possibly one of the reasons why Mel's sections feel so untethered from the rest of the show, beyond that it's clearly spinoff bait. Ambessa proclaims she is the wolf - is this a vindication of hard power? But Mel mostly just showed up to do some sparkly and ill defined magic and then introduce a new villain.

As I've been contemplating this ask, I've been thinking that while Mel votes for Zaunite independence and opposes the use of hextech weapons on the Undercity (she frames this to Jayce as 'I won't let them corrupt your dream', although she does seem distressed at the unnecessary violence as well) she sure didn't seem to be using her wealth and power to do much for the Undercity beforehand. Judging from Caitlyn's 'can you believe they live like this??' speech in season 1, the Undercity is literally beneath the notice of the privileged of Piltover. Plus, Mel is an immigrant, and I'm not sure how long she's been in town. To wind her deeper into the season's storylines and explore her philosophy versus her mother's more, I kind of wish she'd ended up spending some time in Zaun. Maybe she gets dropped off there after leaving the witch place (still not entirely sure how she got home from there...) I'd be interested in her trying to use her political skills in that environment, and seeing how the leadership of the Undercity responds to this wealthy outsider. Caitlyn who got vocally upset about the Undercity's treatment and then teamed up with Ambessa to oppress it versus Mel, Ambessa's daughter and privileged councilor, who now tries to do the opposite despite a distrustful reception...

We see Sevika serving as the loyal right hand woman to whoever she sees as Zaun's best figurehead (Vander, Silco, Jinx), but at the end she's taking a seat at the council. It would be interesting if she'd had some interactions with Mel, who also spoke about being a power behind the throne, as they both navigate having to stand out on their own. Maybe Mel could be the one brokering the conversation between Zaun and Piltover, which is a missing scene I would've loved to see. (It's implied the councilor with the cool necklace thingy gained respect for Sevika and advocated for her, but seeing that actually go down would've been nice.)

[literaila]

tear me apart

spencer reid x reader

request: Omg hi! Could you write a BAU x reader based on the episode 23, season 7 “hit”. Where the reader is inside the bank while the robbery happens and tries to protect Will? I’m in love with your blog and would really love to read this! ♥️

warnings: mentions of guns, mentions of blood, bullet wounds, angsty, robbery, a little bit of fluff 

oh and also I changed basically all of the plot. and skipped the second episode. its basically the same though!

It was an important day. 

The moment Y/N opened her eyes she knew that. 

She could feel it in the air, could feel it in the arm that was resting around her waist, in the warm breath on her neck, in the way she could feel the warmth radiating from his body, in the soft kisses she knew would be coming as soon as he woke up. 

It was a very important day. 

Y/N smiled and cuddled in closer to him, his warmth was intoxicating and she was always so cold. 

She loved important days. Loved how Spencer never forgot how important they were to her, loved how they both always took the days off, how they both just spent the day together because they deserved it, loved how it was always their secret little bubble that no one else was allowed in. She loved that Spencer loved them just as much as she did. She loved everything about them. 

And today was one of them. 

She could practically feel the butterflies in her stomach flying around, gliding in different directions, and moving her insides around. She wasn't particularly fond of the feeling, but it was a nice reminder of just how much Spencer affected her. 

She laid there for a long time, just listening to him breathing, feeling his chest rise and fall against her back. It was a lovely feeling. It almost made her never want to get up. 

Almost. 

When she finally felt his breathing change, when she could tell that he was about to get up when the clock struck 9:30 and like a child on Christmas that couldn't wait any longer, she jumped up out of bed, hoping that the loss of her presence would be enough to wake him up. 

She rushed to the bathroom to brush her teeth before he could catch her. If they wanted to get on with their day together, she would have to finish the few tasks she had left on her to-do list. And then she could spend all day with him. 

With just him. 

The butterflies fluttered around her stomach some more. 

She was standing in front of the mirror, still brushing her teeth when Spencer walked into their bathroom. His eyes were still tired, and he was still slouched from sleep. But he was smiling. Y/N grinned and pretended not to notice him in the mirror. 

His eyes were soft as he leaned against the wall, he knew she knew he was there, but it was nice to stare at her. Just a moment with no interrupts. A moment meant just for staring. 

She turned around and raised an eyebrow at him. Her lips were turned up in a half-smile. Spencer raised his hands innocently and smiled back at her. 

“Good morning,” he said as he walked over to her, decreasing the amount of space between them significantly, and resting his hands around her waist. She tried to talk with toothpaste still in her mouth but, eventually sighed and gave up, and turned away from him and his warmth while he laughed at her. 

When she turned around she felt amazed by the smile on his face. It was one she didn't get to see often, one he kept hidden away for days just like this. She briefly thought that it was her favorite smile of his. 

She moved her hands up and intertwined them around his neck. She felt him pull her in, could feel his smile against her back. It was contagious. 

They stood there for a minute, holding each other and smiling. 

And then Y/N untangled her hands from around him and walked out of the bathroom. She laughed as he protested, hurrying into their closet so she could get dressed. 

Spencer, already knowing what she was doing, whined “Why are you getting dressed?” as he watched her grab a shirt from off its hanger. 

She looked over to him and gave him a teasing smile. “I have an errand to run,” she answered, moving to get some jeans. 

Spencer grabbed her wrist before she could reach them. “Don't you know what day it is?” he asked with a pout, his eyebrows furrowed in disbelief. 

“Of course I know what day it is.” she snorted, gently removing herself from his grasp as she continued to get dressed. 

“Then why are you leaving?” 

“Because I have to get something done,” she said as if it was that simple as if he would just nod and send her off. 

“Y/N…” he whined, moving in front of her so she couldn't walk away from him. 

“Spencer, it'll only take an hour,” she said softly, reaching up on her tiptoes to peck him on the forehead, and then moving past him towards the door. 

He followed after her as she slipped on her shoes and grabbed her bag. He was giving her a death stare as she continued to get ready to get out of the door. It was an important day. She shouldn't leave. 

“Spencer” she laughed looking up at him and grabbing his face between her hands softly. “We have the rest of the day. I’ll be back.” 

He just frowned at her, not saying anything, upset at her actions. 

She tried not to grin at him. 

Y/N pulled him closer and pecked his lips, once, twice, three times, and then he was pulling her in closer, removing the distance between them and glued their lips together. They stood in their doorway, and Spencer refused to let her go, refused to let her leave on a day like this one, refused to let her leave. Even when she tried to pull away he kept her stuck to him. 

Though it wasn't as if she was using all of her strength, her efforts to break away from him were futile as they both knew neither of them wanted to let go. 

Eventually, she built up enough resolve to actually pull herself away from him. 

She couldn't stop the smile from taking over her face. “I’ll be back sweetheart,” she said sweetly, and while Spencer tried not to, her smile was too infectious not to smile back. 

She kissed him one more time. Just for a moment. 

“Happy Anniversary,” she whispered against his lips. 

And then she was walking out the door before Spencer could protest. 

***

Spencer woke up to the sound of gunshots. 

Y/N had been gone a while. 

When she had left, he let the disappointment boil in his stomach, let himself be upset for a moment, before he thought of her words, of her soft kisses, of the way she was holding him only a couple of minutes ago. He thought about her for a moment, and his disappointment faded into anticipation. He couldn't wait to spend the day with her. 

But it was agony to wait. 

So, he had decided to try to go back to sleep, although he wasn't tired, and he was wide awake, sleeping would be a good way to pass the time. So he walked himself back to bed lazily, and while he’d been doubting that he’d actually be able to go back to bed, he’d fallen asleep much quicker than expected. 

And then he was startled awake by the loud bolt in his air. 

Immediately he looked up, his instincts kicking in, his eyes bolted around the room, trying to find the source of the loud noise. And after a moment of searching, he looked down at his bedside table and saw it was just his phone buzzing. 

Not gunshots. 

While he was relieved, his face turned sour when he saw the same on his phone. JJ. JJ meant that something was going on. JJ meant that there was a case, meant that Spencer wasn't going to get his perfect day with Y/N, that he wasn't going to get any time to himself on his day off. It meant that they had to go into work. 

He sighed and answered the call. 

“Hey Spencer, we’ve got a bank robbery. Hotch wants us to come in.” JJ listed off quickly, ignoring the fact that Spencer hadn't even greeted her. 

“A bank robbery? Why are we-” 

“I’ll send you the address.” She said, and with a click of the phone, JJ was gone. 

And Spencer had work. On their anniversary. 

It was their anniversary. It was the anniversary. It was the anniversary of the day they’d first met, of the day they’d both caught each other's eye.

It had been three years. 

Not long enough. 

The memory, that seemed so far away, still hadn't faded. Spencer could still smell the warm vanilla scent in the air, could still feel the cold air brushing against his neck, could still feel the rumbling of the voices around him. He could pinpoint everything that had happened, could remember exactly how it was. They’d met at a farmers market. A place that was completely unrelated to work, a place where they’d both seen each other for the first time, a place where they’d thought they’d never see each other again. 

Spencer could still see the light in her eyes, could still see the innocent way she walked around, looking for something. He thought about what she had told him a year after that day, a year later when they’d met officially through work, and had developed a fondness for each other. She told him that he’d seemed brighter than everyone else, that she’d watched him for a while before she left, that she was trying to commit him to memory so she wouldn't forget the light coming off of him. She’d told him that on their first anniversary. 

The memories that Spencer held of Y/N would never fade. 

And it was only their third anniversary, it was only three years together. 

Spencer smiled slightly. Let himself dream of her for a moment, dream of the day they could’ve had together. He let himself drift off for just a minute. 

And then he was back in reality. 

And there was a bank he had to get to. 

He pretended he didn't still hear the ringing of a gunshot in the air. 

There was no gunshot. 

***

Colonial Liberty Bank. 

Three robbers, one murder, lots of hostages. 

Seven bank robberies in seven months. 

Spencer was the first one on the scene, his teammates quickly followed, JJ being the last one there. As soon as he saw her run into Will’s arm, and rush to ask him if he was okay, Spencer understood why she had been so rushed on the phone, and why it was important that they were there. 

The robbers had killed 7 people before this robbery but had always been classified as robbers before murderers. Now, it was clear that there was something else going on. 

“No one kills 7 people without serious psychopathic tendencies,” Spencer noted as Hotch explained the circumstances. 

There were two men and a woman, they were being called the “Face Cards”, and no one knew what they were willing to risk to get out. 

There were too many hostages. 

Will explained what had happened when he and his partner had responded to the call when they’d showed up and tried to come up with a plan to get inside the building without anyone getting hurt when his partner had died from a bullet in the head. He explained how they were just getting out, how if he’d been a minute later they would’ve been gone. He told them about the man he had shot. 

There wasn't enough information yet. 

Y/N still hadn't shown up. No one had pointed it out yet, but Spencer had noticed. He wondered where she had gone, how far away she was, how soon she would be there. 

He chose not to say anything. She would be there soon. She was probably five minutes away. Probably. 

Working outside gave the robbers an advantage. Working outside meant that Garica had limited resources, that more people could get hurt, that they had to make do with what they could bring to the scene. 

The team walked into the truck Garcia was working out of, it held screens displaying the surveillance cameras in the bank. All of them watched as the female looked around, scoured around every part of the bank. They could all see the two males on the floor, one of them hunched over, holding his chest. That must have been the one that had gotten shot. 

It was strange that they hadn't cut the videos. It meant that there was something they wanted the police to see. None of them could figure out what. 

“They’re overconfident. Arrogant, even.” JJ said. 

“The face card masks add to their narcissism. Their personas are the royalty of poker.” Spencer listed off, as he messed with his phone, texting Y/N again, hoping she would answer this time. 

“JJ, Reid, and Prentiss look at past robberies, that's going to be our victimology. Pull another analyst if you need to. Dave, I want you to hand negotiations. And Morgan, strategize tactical options with the MPD.” Hotch reported back to them, they all gave one last look to the cameras, checked to make sure nothing else had happened, and then they walked away, ready to get to work. 

Spencer walked out of the truck with his head held down, staring at his phone, typing incessantly. When he knocked into another body he looked up startled, his eyes struggled on the figure beside him. 

“Chief Strauss,” he said, clearing his throat, and continued walking away. 

There was nothing he could do until he got back to the BAU, and while he had the time he was going to find out where Y/N was. 

Before he got into the car, he heard a voice say his name behind him. 

“Hey, Kid!” Morgan shouted, stopping Spencer before he could leave. Spencer looked back at him with a raised eyebrow, waiting for him to continue. “Have you seen Y/N?” Morgan asked, finally noticing that she wasn't there with them. 

Spencer sighed and looked down at his phone. He hoped he would see the three little dots, see her typing, just so she could tell him that she was stuck in traffic, that her car had broken down, just so she could tell him there was a reason she wasn't there. 

He frowned and looked back at Derek, his eyes squinting at the sun. “No, I haven't heard from her.” 

Derek looked at him doubtfully and noticed the way Spencer's eyes were worried, frightened at the prospect that she wasn't with him. “I’m sure she's fine kid.” Derek reminded him, not wanting Spencer to be distracted while they were working. 

Spencer nodded. Derek was probably right. She was fine. She was fine. He nodded once more than got in the car. 

She was fine. She would be there soon. 

**

“I’ll be right back.” the King whispered quietly. “Who the hell is this?” he answered, picking up the phone. 

Her heart was beating too loudly. 

“My name is David Rossi. I’m with the FBI. To whom am I speaking?” There was a slight murmur of the phone. But she couldn't hear what they were saying. 

“Alright. I want a doctor sent in, and then I want out of here.” The King answered, waving his gun around angrily. 

She looked over to see the Queen purse her lips, her eyes suddenly getting hard. Her body language was much more closed off than the other two. 

High demands, she thought. 

“Well, we certainly can discuss that. Let the hostages go and we’ll give you all the medical help you need.” 

The other man on the floor coughed, blood escaping from his lips. She knew that if they didn't send in help soon he would die, and there was a chance the rest of them would too. 

She looked at the faces around her, all of them panicked and shocked. Some of them seemed as if they were in denial as if they couldn't believe something like this was actually happening to them. The most present feeling in the room though was tension. She could feel it between every emotional tie that laid between the hostages, she could feel it in their petrified faces, in the way the Queen was pacing the room, in the way the King didn't seem to notice.  

There were children in the room, she knew that even their innocence wouldn't save them. 

The King suddenly started laughing. “I can't do that. I need the leverage,” he said, a threatening tone to his voice. 

“How about a sign of good faith? Send out the women and children and I’ll see what I can do.” the voice on the phone had gotten louder, and while she still couldn't make out the words, she knew that they were probably demanding for the women and children to be sent out. That was what her team would ask for. 

The King looked directly at her in disbelief. And while she knew that he didn't know, that he had no clue, she was still scared that something was going to happen. She didn't want him to look at her. 

“He's trying to negotiate.” The king said, now looking at the queen. 

“Negotiate?” she said in disgust. She noted how the Queen's stance hadn't changed even when the King was talking to her. She noted how there didn't seem to be a connection between them. “We’re not playing games.” 

She didn't like the tone in the Queen's voice. She didn't like the way she was looking around the room. She didn't know what to do. 

She watched as the Queen forcibly moved a little girl away from her father. She listened to the little girl begging, to her Father pleading with the Queen. 

She could feel her blood rushing, could feel her head clouding with rage, could feel herself reaching for a gun she hadn't brought with her. She shouldn't need her gun. 

What could she do? 

“Either we get what we want, or everyone in this room dies.” 

She looked around at all the people, looked at the King, feeling desperate, hoping that he would disagree with the Queen, that he had some morals, and had some sense of humanity. But all she was met with was a King who was nodding his head, holding up the phone so that the person on the other line could hear. 

No no no. 

“Do that and you get nothing.”

No no no. 

And there was nothing she could do. She only listened as the Father begged the Queen to trade himself for his daughter, only listened as there was a gunshot. 

A cry of a little girl. 

“You better send in some help, or more people are going to die.”

**

“Sir I found a thing. See, I took height and weight measurements and I crossed them with known related offenders who specialize in bank jobs-” 

“Show me.” Hotch interrupted, too busy to try to understand anything Garcia was saying. 

“Yes. These are brothers, Chris and Oliver Stratton. They are petty thieves from Philly, turned bank robbers in New Jersey.” Garcia said, her typing insistently in the background. “They were put into jail for two years after an attempted heist went sour, and they were released two months before the first Face Card robbery, and their measurements are a match.” 

Strauss suddenly spoke up, watching Garcia look through their files. “Why didn't the NCIC database connect them?” 

“Because the brothers have never used a third partner, and shooting people is not part of their M.O.” 

“Looks like they were not very successful criminals,” Hotch said.

“Maybe adding a woman to their team improved their game.” 

And then suddenly Garcia gasped. 

She stopped typing. Both Hotch and Strauss looked over to her, confused. 

“S-sir?” she stumbled out, her mouth going numb. 

And she was staring at the screen, staring at the girl on the screen, at the girl she knew so very well. 

They were all staring at her. 

**

“Reid?” Emily asked for the third time, trying to get Spencer out of his daydream. 

He wasn't paying attention. 

She still hadn't answered. She still hadn't even read his text messages. This wasn't like her. This wasn't something she would do. 

Where was she? 

“Sorry,” he cleared his throat and shook his head. Morgan said she was fine. She was fine. He had a job to do. “The women chose a different type of victim each time. It's not just the security guard. It's been a mother, a manager, and a young child-” 

**

“You can't tell Reid.” Derek insisted. 

“Morgan-” 

“No. He was freaked out earlier. He can't know about this right now, not when he's trying to help Emily and JJ.” He continued. Spencer couldn't know. If he didn't, there would be nothing he could do. 

“We can't just keep it a secret,” Hotch said sternly. 

“Hotch. He can't know.” 

**

They still hadn't sent in a medic. It was going to be too late. 

She didn't want to think about what would happen if it was too late. Without the Jack, there was no telling what the King would do. 

Olly. She committed his name to memory. It might help later. 

The Queen was still pacing, still waving her gun at every person, still trying to scare all of them even though there wasn't any chance of any of them trying to escape. The Queen looked more and more irritated by the minute. 

She hoped the Queen wouldn't shoot someone again. She hoped they would send in a Medic. 

The phone started ringing. 

“Why hasn't anyone come in yet?” The King said desperately, but he didn't sound angry this time, he just sounded like he wanted to get the Jack out of there. She wondered why they were so close, what was so special about their relationship? 

“We’re sending in the Medic now Chris. Tell Oliver help is on the way.” 

“Hurry.” The King said, slamming the phone back down. “They know our names.” the King announced to the Queen, calmer than she would’ve expected. 

She wondered when they were going to make her go stand with the rest of the people, why they hadn't forced her off of the ground, why she was still allowed to sit. She wondered if they knew who she was. 

She told herself not to think about it. 

The Queen took her mask off, set it down on a counter close by. She tried to commit the Queens features to memory. “Not all our names.” The Queen said arrogantly, moving a couple of steps forward. 

She wondered what the Queen was doing. Why she was so confident in herself. She watched her put on lipstick, it looked like she was performing a show. 

She looked up and saw the cameras. 

There were cameras. 

The cameras were still on. 

If the camera were still on that meant someone knew she was there. That meant someone was watching. Someone was watching them. 

Why did they leave the cameras on? 

She hadn't been paying enough attention to see the medic walk in. 

But she did start paying attention when the King started yelling. 

“No! No! No!” he said as the Jack started choking. “Get over here!” The King pointed his gun at the medic, and stood up, as to make himself seem taller. 

She had a bad feeling in her stomach, had a bad feeling filling her chest. This wasn't good. Something was wrong. 

She watched as the medic started performing CPR, watched as he pumped the Jack’s chest, but she knew that he was dead, and so did the medic. She watched as the medic leaned down to listen to the Jack's breath, but she saw how he paused. 

Like he was being told what to do. 

And the King saw it too. 

And then there were more gunshots. 

**

“No, I just want you to buy us a little time. Don't be quite so efficient.” Hotch said. He needed time. They all needed time. She needed time. 

“Whatever you’re gonna do, do it fast,” Strauss said and walked away. 

Hotch sighed in relief. Just some time. 

“Alright, reasoning with them is still our best option.” He told Rossi, ignoring the panic in his chest, in the thought of keeping secrets, of one of his agents still in there. 

“That’ll be difficult, Chris just lost his brother and murdered someone in retaliation. We’re dealing with two killers now.” 

It wasn't as if they hadn't dealt with situations like this before. They had. They did it practically every day of their lives. But what could they do with her in there, how could they send an order they knew could end lives when she was in there? 

How could they not tell Spencer? 

**

The next phone call was different. 

Things were already so tense. The King and Queen seemed to be fighting each other, proving to the other that they were in charge. And the Jack was dead. The King was upset and threatened to kill everyone. 

They wanted a way out, they wanted to leave the country. They’d told that to the negotiators. 

She knew it wouldn't be long until they got their wish. 

Her instincts were telling her that she couldn't let them go, that they deserved to rot in jail, that they didn't deserve to leave the country. 

But the other part of her. 

The part that was being kept hostage. 

That part was begging the police to let them go, to get them out of there so that no one else got hurt. So she could stop feeling so helpless, so alone, so cold, in a bank she wished she’d never gone to. It was begging them to get her out of there, get her home, get her warm. She didn't want to feel guilty for the lives that had been lost anymore. She wanted to go home. 

It wouldn't be long. 

But the phone call was different. 

She couldn't hear anything the negotiator was saying, could barely hear the King talking, but she knew that he was upset. She knew that the negotiator was saying something the King didn't like. 

“You’re lying.” the King said suddenly, turning around to look at the Queen, his face was confused, and for a moment she felt bad for him. 

She shouldn't. He’d murdered that man. 

“Did you call the police?” he asked, nodding at the Queen. His body was tense, but his face didn't look threatening. 

The Queen giggled. It was the first time she’d heard her laugh. It sounded wrong. 

“Is that what they’re telling you?” the Queen asked, and she could see her body language change, she was tenser like she was trying to hide something. 

She was trying to hide something. 

“Of course not. What do you think? They’re trying to turn us against one another.”

“Why would you even do that? Olly’s dead because of that.” The King looked disgusted. He looked like he’d given up. There was no power in his voice, no anger in his body. He looked exhausted. 

“I wouldn't. I’m trapped here too.” the Queen said, stepping toward the King, insistent. 

And then the King changed. 

“Are you lying to me?” he accused, suddenly angry, suddenly full of emotion. His muscles were tense as he raised his gun to point it at her. 

The Queen didn't back down. “We’ve come too far for you to start doubting me now. Lost too much.” she took a step forward. “Hey,” she said, her voice softer, more like a girl now. “Hey..” she said again, pointing the gun away from her chest and moving toward the king. “Don't let them tear us apart. Right as we’re about to win,” she whispered, running her hands over his face. “If you do that, Olly’s death won't mean anything.” 

The King paused, stumbling over his words, staring at the Queen. 

She’d tricked him. 

“Enough. I’m done talking to you. I want to talk to someone who won't jerk me around, face to face.” the King said into the phone. 

“No more Feds.” the Queen confirmed. 

“I want to talk to the cop that shot my brother.” The King turned away from the Queen, suddenly angry again. 

He hung up the phone.

**

It was minutes later. Another man had died. 

The King was furious. He was going to kill someone else every minute the cop didn't come in. 

He was going to kill someone else. 

She had to do something. 

He was walking around. He was looking for the next victim. 

She couldn't breathe. She didn't know what to do, she didn't know how she could stop him and stop the Queen. She knew it wouldn't matter to the Queen if he was dead. She didn't know what to do. 

He walked around, his legs were right next to where she was sitting down. 

“Nah… Nah… Nah…” he said looking at all the terrified people that were standing there. 

He was pacing back and forth, walking past her, walking past her. 

She could feel the panic rise up her throat, could feel the bile that came with it. 

She didn't know what to do. 

He stopped in front of her. 

She was the next victim. 

**

The team watched as he pulled another girl up. They watched while Will got ready to go in, got ready to go save them. JJ was standing next to him, looking terrified, begging him not to go in. She couldn't lose him, she didn't care about anything else, she wasn't going to lose him. It was too dangerous, it was much too dangerous, she wouldn't let him. 

They watched as the King grabbed a girl by her collar, forcing her to stand up. 

Their hearts stopped. 

“Hotch,” Spencer said. He said, and he wasn't breathing anymore. He dropped his phone and he wasn't breathing. 

She was in there. She was on the screen. She was standing there with the King right in front of his eyes. 

Y/N was there. She was there. The King was going to kill her, she was going to die, she was going to be dead. 

No. 

“That's Y/N,” Spencer said, his voice shaking, his hands struggling to move, struggling to get a hold on his body. She was in there, he’d been calling her this whole time, and she’d been in there with them. She was in there. He couldn't breathe. 

“We have to get her out. Hotch!” He said turning around to face his boss, “We have to get her out of there! We can't just- just- leave her.” 

Hotch was looking at the boy in front of him. He had a crazed look in his eyes, a frightening stance to his body, he was looking at the boy and he wished he had told Spencer earlier. 

“Kid, we can't go in there. Everyone will die.” Morgan said, grabbing Spencer's shoulder, trying to keep him from freaking out, taking over for Hotch who didn't know what to do. 

No one had told him. Everyone else had known. No one looked surprised. No one had told him. 

He looked back to the screen, looked back to see the girl he loved at the hands of a murderer, looked to see her face which was terrified, her body which seemed to be crumbling. She was grabbing onto her chest like she was trying to keep herself together. She was in there with him, she was going to die. 

“I’m going in.” He said, and he moved past all the people, all his teammates who were all staring at him. 

“Reid,” Hotch said, following after him. 

“I have to get her. I can't just let her die.” 

“Reid,” Hotch said again, more sternly this time. 

“No! No!” he said, throwing his hands up as to keep Hotch away. “I will not let her die! She cant die Hotch she can't die she cant.” He said. 

And as Hotch held him back with the help of Derek, JJ was struggling in Rossi’s arms. She was screaming and crying and Spencer couldn't pay attention to her. He couldn't feel anything but the panic in his chest, but the anger that was boiling in his stomach. He could feel himself tearing apart, his body was made of nothing but paper without her, he needed to get her, he just needed to go get her, she needed him, he needed to go get her. 

He couldn't watch her die. 

He couldn't. 

He didn't notice JJ screaming. Didn't notice Will walking in, didn't notice anything.

He was tearing in half. 

She was in there. 

**

She struggled in his arms. She struggled to try to get away, to get herself another chance, to figure out a way to live. 

He was dragging her towards the phone.

“Pick it up.” He said and pushed her towards it. 

Her hands were shaking, her heart was pounding, and she had no idea how she had managed to keep the bile in her mouth. She should’ve puked by now. 

She shook her head. She wasn't going to submit to him. 

“Pick it up!” 

And she did this time. She didn't want anyone else to die. She was smarter than this. She was. 

“Tell him your name.” 

“It's Y/N,” she whispered. 

And she wasn't prepared for the voice to be so familiar. 

“Y/N. We’re coming. You’ll be fine kiddo.” Rossi said, wincing at the sound of her voice. She sounded so small, so unlike the girl he knew. 

“Rossi?” she whispered again, this time with surprise. 

“We’ve got you, kid,” he said. 

She could feel the tears running down her cheeks, and she didn't want to hope, she didn't want to let herself hope for anything, because she knew how these things usually turned out. She knew she had a limited amount of time before he would shoot her. 

But her family was there. 

Her family.

“Tell Spencer I love him,” she whispered to Rossi, a shiver running through her bones. She was so cold. She was too cold. She didn't know how a person could be this cold. 

She whispered out her last words knowing that her time was up. Knowing that this was it. These were the last words she needed to say. 

For him. 

The King raised his gun up, ready to shoot her, and she was wincing, ready to hear the gun go off, ready to delve into darkness. She was going to die ice cold. She was freezing. Maybe it would be quick. 

And he was about to shoot. 

When the Queen said, “look.” 

Will was walking in. Will was walking into the bank. Will was here. He had shot the King's brother. Will. 

“Let these people go,” Will said to the King, giving a side glance to Y/N.

She wasn't dead yet. She hadn't died just then. Will was here. 

How could she still be alive? How could she still breathe in air, how was she still alive, how wasn't her time up. 

Her time was supposed to be up. She should’ve been dead. She was so cold. 

Will. 

She knew the King planned to kill him. She knew what was coming. How could she help?

The King let three hostages go, a mother and two children. Relief flooded through Y/N’s body. At least three lives wouldn't be lost today. Three lives that Will had just saved. How to save him?

“Hey. What's your name?” The King asked Will, stepping towards him. Y/N watched as the Queen started to take something out of her bag. 

“William Lamontagne Jr. MPD.” Will said, and his eyes looked terrified, his face was sullen, and he looked defeated. He looked ready to give up. Y/N thought about Henry, she thought about his son, about his girlfriend that was outside, she thought about all the people that were depending on him, she thought and she thought. 

And she looked to the King, she saw his finger flex over the trigger of his gun. 

She thought one more time. 

And she jumped in front of Will. 

There were two shots. One for Y/N. One for Will. 

The cameras went out. 

**

Spencer wasn't thinking.

He couldn't think anymore. 

He felt like he had died. Died with her. 

“Did you see where they were shot?” JJ asked, her cheeks stained with tears, her eyes red. She was doing more than Spencer. She wanted to know if they had a chance if they had made it. “Are they alive or dead Garcia?” 

Spencer already knew the answer. 

How could he not?

He was two different parts, he’d been torn apart, he was alive but he wasn't breathing, he wasn't thinking, he was alive but there was nothing, nothing he could think nothing he could feel. He was alive, but he wasn't. He was gone. He had left. He didn't know where he was. 

If she was alive he wouldn't feel like this. 

He knew she was dead. 

He couldn't think. 

“Will was wearing a vest. He might be okay.” Emily said, trying to reassure JJ, trying to do anything for her friend. 

Y/N hadn't been wearing a vest. 

“Might be.” JJ laughed without humor, she looked down and shook her head. How could this have happened to her? How could this have happened to Will?

Rossi walked into the room, he looked at all of his teammates, most of them looked miserable. He tried to ignore that. “They’re not answering,” he said, joining the group. 

JJ stood up suddenly. 

“All right, we need to get inside,” she said, moving to walk out the door. 

“JJ, it's too risky,” Derek said, grabbing her arm to stop her. He wasn't going to let another one of his friends go in there and get hurt. It wasn't worth it. “We don't have eyes in there anymore,” he said. 

“Aaron…” she said brokenly, desperately. She had to go in. She had to. 

Spencer, who hadn't been paying attention, had barely been breathing, suddenly stood up, and moved towards the door. “I’m going to get her,” he said, almost as if he hadn't seen what had just happened. His voice broke as he said it, clogged with the tears that he wasn't letting escape his eyes. “I’m going to get her.” he repeated as if they hadn't heard him the first time. 

Derek stopped Spencer, tried to get his friend to look at him, but Spencer wasn't paying attention. He couldn't feel anything. 

Hotch looked at him, and then looked back at JJ who still had her eyes on Hotch. 

“Let's go in,” he said. He had to do it for his family. 

**

Will was down on the ground. He’d been shot in the chest. Y/N was luckier. 

She’d been shot in the leg. Another man, one of the hostages that were still left over, had ordered a worker of the bank to hold pressure on Will’s injury. 

She’d been so much more fortunate than Will. 

The hostage that had helped Will, was now talking to her, helping her tie a tourniquet on her leg to stop the blood. 

“Are you a Medic?” she breathed out, as the pain in her leg paralyzed her body. She winced and opened her eyes to look at him. 

“A former United States Marine.”

It was then that Will woke up. 

He locked eyes with her, didn't say a word, he looked around and started to get up. She didn't understand what he was doing, she didn't understand why he was moving, she didn't know what was going on. 

There was something wrong with her head. Her eyes were watering and her ears were ringing. 

She couldn't hear anything. 

But she watched as Will went up to the King, watched as he started talking to him, she could tell that he was in pain, that his chest was burning, but he was still there talking to the King. She didn't know where the Queen went. 

She watched as Will explained something to him, watched as they walked away. 

Her ears were still ringing, still keeping her hostage to the ground, moving the pain up her body as her eyes went blurry. She didn't know what was so wrong with her, and she didn't know why it was getting hard to breathe. 

“Where are they going?” she stumbled out, she could barely hear herself, but she knew something was going on. 

The man next to her was explaining something and was telling her something, but her eyes were so tired, and the ringing was so loud. When the Marine next to her finally discovered that she couldn't hear him, could barely see him, he motioned to the other hostages. 

And then she was being picked up. Her eyes were burning, and her head was being stabbed by a hundred needles as she felt the person carrying her walk. She couldn't hear anything, but she trusted that she would be fine. She was going to be fine. 

The ringing was so loud. 

She was whining, and the Marine carrying her was trying to ask her questions, hoping she would be able to hear him. 

But the ringing was so loud. 

She was about to sleep about to let herself sleep when she saw something. 

She felt herself being passed over to someone new. 

“Spencer” she breathed out, opening her eyes slightly. 

And then the ringing was too much, and she fainted. 

***

Spencer couldn't believe the relief in his chest. He was amazed by the feeling that had flooded his body at just the sight of her, at the air that had filled his lungs, at the feeling in his brain that made everything else seem okay. 

She was alive. 

They were in the hospital now. She had taken a bullet to the leg, had a concussion, and was bruised up in multiple places. 

But she hadn't died. 

Spencer couldn't stop smiling. 

He was sitting next to her hospital bed, and he wasn't really thinking, still couldn't really believe anything. He was just listening to her heartbeat. Listening to the constant beeping of the monitor next to her. 

Her heart was beating. 

She was alive. 

Spencer felt himself get stitched up with every beep that went by, with every reminder that she was still right next to him. 

He thought about her eyes, and her smile, and her expression. He thought about the way she had smiled at him earlier that morning, before everything, thought about the kiss she had given him right before she left. He wondered if he would still feel that happy when she woke up. 

People kept coming into the room to update him on the case, told him that it had taken more work to find them after the bank had exploded, told him that Will had survived, that Emily had saved his life. 

And while he was relieved, glad that Will was okay, that no one else had died, nothing could match the feeling he felt just holding the hand of the girl he loved. 

He felt selfish but at that moment, he didn't care about anything but her, didn't care about anything except the heartbeat that still surrounded his world. He couldn't survive without her, he couldn't think about anything but her. 

He patiently waited for her to wake up. 

It took 12 hours, 12 hours of sitting next to her, sitting and watching people walk in and out of the room, 12 hours of listening to her heartbeat from the monitor, 12 hours just right next to her. 

And eventually, her eyes opened. 

And Spencer didn't say anything, he let her wake up on her own accord, let her eyes adjust to the room, let her take a moment to think about where she was. He couldn't imagine the pain she was in at that moment. 

He waited patiently for her to look at him. 

And like always, her eyes were drawn to him, her mind was pulled to his, and it only took her ten seconds to look over and see Spencer. 

And despite the pain, despite the burning of her leg, the distant ringing in the background, despite everything she had been through, she smiled at him. 

“Happy Anniversary.” she coughed out, her voice raw. 

Spencer shook his head, amused at her, dazed by the sound of her voice. It was his favorite sound in the world. 

He got up to go get her some water, not wanting her to strain the voice he was so fond of. 

“You’re alive,” he whispered when she grabbed the cup from him. He whispered it as if he still couldn't believe it, even after listening to her heartbeat, watching her for 12 hours, even after hearing her voice, he still couldn't believe it. 

She sipped the water and watched his eyes, they looked exhausted, he looked exhausted, but she could see a light in them. A light she could always see in him. She smiled at that. He was still the same person she had seen three years ago. He was the man she loved. She was still alive. 

“I promised I would be back didn't I?” she whispered, trying to get him to her look at her. 

And he did, and suddenly he was moving toward her. 

He took her face in his hands, carefully so he wouldn't hurt her, and he kissed her. He felt a different kind of relief fill his body, he felt her melt into him, felt her lips strain against his. It was so much different now, so much different after he had almost lost her, it was so different but so so perfect. 

She smiled against his lips, and like always he couldn't resist smiling back. 

He pulled back, a smile still stuck to his face, and kept his hands on the side of her face. He was in love with the smile on her face. 

“Y/N,” he whispered seriously, looking from her lips to her eyes. 

“Yes?” she whispered back. 

“You feel his girl in between my hands?” he asked, and she nodded her head in his hands, confused at his words, pouting in concentration. He smiled at her and pecked her lips to remove the pout. “I can't live without her,” he said, now desperate for her to understand. “So I need you to take care of her okay?” 

And she laughed, tears running down her face. 

They’d almost lost each other. 

He was so warm. 

She smiled.

my masterlist here

thank you so much for reading.

[undertheknightwing]

just finished s2 and finally met Jon-El!

rip to whoever the writer for this season was but I'm different. Au in my head where Jon-El's horrified "I've never killed anyone before" actually mattered in the show, the Kents managed to convince him that he wasn't broken and he didn't have to keep doing things he didn't want to do, and suddenly have triplets instead of twins <3

Even if the show didn't go down that path it's absolutely absurd that Jon-El didn't start poking at Jon's insecurities and all the ways the Kents had failed him to try getting Jon to merge! Especially if Jon-El was manipulating Jon not out of a place of malice, but because he genuinely believed that merging could "heal" both of them. That could have been so interesting to see on screen! And that's just the tip of the iceberg; as an angst writer myself, I can think of so many amazing plotlines and arc ideas for Jon-El and I'm genuinely baffled that the writers didn't try to pursue any of them.

But anyway, love Jon-El, and he can commit all the crimes he wants because he's amazing and has all the rights <3

and on an unrelated note: CLARK LITERALLY LEFT JON DOING *CHORES* WHILE HE AND JORDAN WENT TO WORK ON POWERS??

Taking a billion points of psychic damage from that alone, but then Clark never actually talked to Jon when he was upset about it?? AHFDKJHADSKJFHSAKJFHKSBG. absolutely murdered me. okay. I genuinely cannot get over the way Clois acted, mostly around Jon but there were some bad moments with Jordan too; their lack of parenting skills this season left a really bad taste in my mouth at so many parts. I might have to rewatch s1 to remind myself why I liked them at all in the first place tbh

Anyway, I'm glad that this season gave us sweet moments between Jon, Jordan, and Nat. I'd love to see more of the three of them being chaotic siblings in the future.

You just described the perfect ending 😭

I wanted to see Clark trying to save Jon-El from his self-destruction so badly. He only tried once to get Jon-El to see what he was doing was wrong and it was a lame attempt at that.

And really why should have Jon-El believed Clark? He's currently being manipulated by a cult leader who's so strong she has a hold over thousands of ADULTS, who he sees as a person who truly cares about him, and has most likely been emotionally abused by a man who looks just like Clark. Of course he's not listening or caring about Clark's attempt that was pretty much just "hey you're bad right now, but if join me and you'll be good". But considering Clark can't even talk to or understand his Jon, it's not a surprise he can't reach Jon-El, who's just a darker parallel of his son.

Also I just wanna say that Jon-El's "I never killed anyone before" line reminded me so much of Gar's "I bit him" line AND THAT SHIT HURT.

Jon-El was done so dirty storyline wise, they took this tragic and complex character and turned him into Jordan's villain of the week to beat up. He didn't even get a proper send off, he just got beat up in a school gym and that was it. Never see or hear from him again. Such a waste of a character.

I don't think him wanting to merge was ever out of malice in canon. He did genuinely believe merging would fix him, that's what Ally made him believe. She made him see himself as broken and without purpose, told him he'll only be fixed/healed if he merges with Jon, so he saw Jon as the last thing that would save him and wouldn't let anything or one get in his way. Jon was a lighthouse in a raging storm to him.

And as badly as I think Jon-El wanted to merge, I just want to point out that after rewatching his episodes a few times I noticed there was many times Jon-El could have killed the Kents but he didn't even though they were keeping him from Jon. He never threatens his bizarro family with death either, only tells them to disappear.

I think he has no problem throwing punches as warning or threat to stay out of his way but killing his family? even if they aren't his family. I don't think that's a line he could cross. If did have no problem crossing that line he would have killed Clark with the kryptonite shard but he didn't, he left him there with Lana who he had to know could have saved Clark before he died.

I agree 100% I support Jon-El's rights and wrongs <3 but also want him to go to therapy and heal.

Clois' parenting damaged me in so many ways in season 2. It was such a huge mess. Even the official S&L insta joked about Clark ditching Jon to spend time with Jordan instead which isn't funny. Especially after a scene where it seemed like Jon was hinting at having concerning thoughts.

Such a weird season with an even weirder storyline.

[collecting-stories]

One Sunset - c. 08 - JJ Maybank

Summary: Your birthday keeps getting closer.

A/N: Two more chapters to go! 

You Are Ok Masterlist | Outer Banks Masterlist

✰ Oh, my love, she waits, so long overdue ✰

The baby, Hope, the youngest, so far, of your sister’s six children, was propped on your hip. Clingy, she pressed her face against your collar, head tucked in your neck as you bounced just slightly from foot to foot. She‘s been crying when Esther handed her off, a passing comment that “there was something different about you” as she rejoined the conversation your older siblings were having. You carried Hope outside when the fussing started again, threatening to interrupt your father’s reading from the bible before dinner. She wasn’t the youngest of all the babies there, Jubilee’s son took that honor, being just three months, but Hope was the most restless.  

“You used to be like that,” your mother teased, coming out to bring you a bottle for Hope as she squirmed in your lap. You’d settled with sitting under the tree in the yard, letting your niece tear through the grass.  

“Destructive?” You asked, looking up through the sunlight to her.  

Ever since JJ had mentioned the possibility of leaving you had been thinking about what it would look like when you were gone. Knowing what was in store if you stayed, you had given leaving your mom and dad a lot of thought anyway. It would be just them in the house, plenty of grandchildren to take care of but just the two of them at night when everyone else went home. You would miss it, but it was these moments, so rare now that you were the last left in the house, that you would miss most of all.  

“Restless, unsatisfied.” The adjective stung when she said it, as if she resented the trait even in a baby. “The minute you were steady on your feet, you used to take off.”  

“Maybe I was just curious about everything around me?” You suggested, that bizarre fear that she knew something settling in your stomach. It was the same queasy feeling you used to get when you were little and you would lie, certain your mother would know.  

She nodded, though it was not in agreement, “and what does the bible say about that?”

“And he said unto them, it is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the father hath put in his own power.” You replied, all too familiar with the warning verse that your mother had kept taped to your bedroom mirror as a child, a reminder that your curiosity was as much a sin as anything else.  

“That’s right, we don’t need to concern ourselves with other, worldly things.” She replied.  

“I don’t think Hope is concerned with anything other than appreciating God’s creation,” you joked, an attempt to lighten the mood, as you looked down at Hope sill pulling at the grass and then staring in wonder at her dirty hands.  

“I’m not talking about Hope, I found a…very revealing outfit tucked under your bed along with a sweatshirt I’ve never seen in the house before.” She said, playing her cards. She did know something she wasn’t letting on, just as you had suspected. It was better than you thought, something you could play off easily.  

“They’re Kiara’s. She wore the dress on Sunday and I told her it was too revealing for church so she came in and changed. And the sweatshirt is her…boyfriend’s, she had it with her.” You lied. The dress was the one that JJ bought for you. For almost three weeks, since he’d first suggested it, you had been packing and unpacking a duffel bag, certain that you wanted to go but then unsure at the same time.  

Your mother’s observation of you was probably right, you were restless. They had raised you the same way they raised your siblings and yet, nothing about the church seemed to comfort you. It made you discontent just exist in the space sometimes but you had always assumed it was because of some deep fault of your own. Some sin you weren’t consciously aware of that ensnared you. Restlessness would follow you forever, it felt like. But then you’d never felt restless with JJ or Kiara or Pope. You never felt like you were trying to fit into something that wasn’t made for you.  

“I didn’t realize she had a boyfriend.” The tone was back, the disapproving one that silently conveyed the underlying meaning of her sentence. If your mom had known, she would not have let her hang around.  

“He’s very religious too. I think he goes to a non-denominational church,” you lied, pulling Hope’s dirty hands away from the hem of your dress.  

You had come outside with Hope because you wanted to be alone. Her crying was the perfect excuse to separate yourself from the rest of your family but then your mom had followed you out here, determined, it felt like, to deny you any moment alone.

“Your good with the kids,” she ventured, “It’ll only be a couple of years before you’re having little ones of your own.”  

“That’s what Esther said when she handed me Hope.” You replied lifting the baby with you as you stood up. There was no point in trying to hold onto your attempts at relaxation. Babies had been all your mother wanted to talk about since Timothy’s visit to the house. She couldn’t stop herself from mentioning your future imaginary family. “How did you and dad know you wanted to have kids?”

“We prayed and fasted and the Lord answered us by giving us Faith and I knew then that he was telling me to leave my womb in his hands.” She replied as you fought the urge to roll your eyes at the response, “How many kids you have is something you’ll have to talk about with Timothy but God will guide you.”  

“Yeah, I guess so.” You shifted Hope in your arms as she babbled, her dirty hands gripping your cardigan.  

Maybe JJ lying to you should have been the push that you needed to embrace this idea of Timothy and Zambia and the twelve children he was probably going to expect you to have. It should’ve put you back on the path of the Lord, that “most righteous” path, as your father called it during Sunday service. But you couldn’t bring yourself to just close off the part of you that loved JJ so much that you considered running away with him. He had lied but you couldn’t bring yourself to believe that all of it was a lie. There were parts of it, you were certain, that had to be true. You had been thinking about him since you left John B’s.  

“What if...” you chanced, beginning to walk back to the house with your mom, “what if Timothy isn’t who I’m meant to be with?”

“Why do you say that?” Your mom asked, stopping. She didn’t look surprised or even bothered by what you thought sounded like your usual restlessness.  

“I just think...what if I’m not a good enough wife?”

“You have to pray, and have faith in the Lord and in your husband that they will guide you down that path and help you to learn how to serve your household.” She answered.  

Hope started fussing again and your mom took her from you, proclaiming that it was most likely time for a feeding and heading back inside with her. She called over her shoulder for you to check the church, the light in the nave was on. You wanted to thank her for the moment alone but then she might’ve stuck around and questioned you further.

You walked to the church, pulling the old wooden door open and heading inside to turn off the lights in the vestibule. Your father was known to forget and leave them on and you were sure that your mother thought sending you was some subtle way of telling you that you needed to reconnect with Jesus through prayer. You weren’t so sure that was what you needed but you would take the moment alone that you had been trying to get the first time you went outside.  

Before you could hit the light switch you noticed the familiar army green backpack leaning against one of the back pews. You hadn’t seen JJ since you left John B’s house but that was his backpack, sitting in the middle aisle. There wasn’t any reason for JJ’s bag to be in the church but you walked toward it anyway, curious as to its existence in that space at that moment.  

The bag, you quickly discovered, was not without its owner. JJ laid there on the bench, asleep, from what you could tell, his lip split and a horrifying bruise under his left eye. You knelt down by the edge of the pew, brushing his hair away from his face so you could see him better. Just the sight of him had your heart pounding.

“Oh my god, JJ,” you whispered, laying your hand on his arm. “JJ.”

He groaned, shifting on the pew before opening his eyes slowly, a smile gracing his features as he saw you there in front of him, the cut on his lip bleeding slightly at the motion. “Hey Ace.”

“JJ, what happened?” You asked, moving to sit next to him as he sat up. Maybe you should have been more apprehensive with him, considering what John B had told you, but all you could think about was the bruising on his face. You’d seen less noticeable bruising before that JJ had always brushed off and maybe it was unrelated but your mind was drawing connections as you looked him over, noting the large purplish mark peeking out from the arm of the cut-off shirt he was wearing.  

“Nothing,” he swore, shaking his head and shifting away from you slightly. “I’m sorry, I just needed to crash for a few hours.”  

When you reached for him again and he moved back, you felt an ache. He looked battered and you didn’t care about what sort of bet he made, all you wanted to do was hold him and tell him that for the last few days you had been thinking about him. “JJ, please, tell me what happened?” you asked, taking his hand in yours before he could stop you.  

“I fucked up everything.” He replied, leaning back against the pew and closing his eyes. “I didn’t...I should’ve told you about-”

-

Despite Pope’s attempts to reason with him, to remind him that the last person on earth you probably wanted to see was him, JJ couldn’t stop himself from moving forward with his original plan. He had offered you a way out and, whether you wanted it with him or at all, he was going to come through on that promise. He loved you and maybe it was selfish but he couldn’t stand the thought of you going to Tennessee.  

JJ almost never went home but he did a few nights after you had run off, after Kiara told him that you’d come to see her, he went back home again to get the keys for his dad’s boat. Luke always kept the keys on him and JJ hadn’t actually been on the boat since he was a little kid. The first time he had smoked weed when he was twelve and his cousin took him on the Phantom for a joy ride down the coast to buy some specially cut stuff from a friend of a friend. He had let JJ smoke it on the way home and the probably broken rib that he’d suffered the week before suddenly didn’t hurt half as bad.  

He wasn’t stealing the keys for a joyride this time though. He was stealing keys to get you as far away from the Outer Banks as he could. Pope had reasoned that you hadn’t really ever made up your mind and that by now you had probably definitely decided not to go off with some guy on a whim, but JJ had to believe you were still leaning toward going with him.  

“Hey, look who finally decided to show up.” Luke chided, sitting at his work bench. If there was anything that JJ knew about his father, it was that Luke could sit in front of his work table all day and nothing would ever actually get done.  

“I’m only here to grab some stuff.”  

If he said nothing, it caused an issue. If he said something, it caused an issue. JJ had spent enough years in his father’s home to know that it didn’t matter what he did, if Luke was in a mood then there was nothing, he could do to avoid it. And usually, he would just make his visit a short one but he needed that key and that key was hanging off his dad’s neck.  

It took Luke a couple beers and a trip down to Barry’s trailer before he confronted JJ’s return home with more than a snide remark. It started off with shouting about the electric bill when he tried to hit the light switch in the living room and realized that the darkness was unescapable. And that, of course, like all the other bad things that existed in his life, was JJ’s fault.  

“How many fucking times I gotta tell you to do something before you actually do it?” He screamed, a string of insults following that would stay trapped in JJ’s head for what would arguably be the rest of his life. The rage was just what JJ needed though, his dad was erratic, distracted, and close enough that when he shoved JJ against the wall and tried to choke him, the key was in reach.  

He had the key and when he finally got his dad off him, he ran for the door, grabbing his bag and running through the woods. Still not talking to John B, he knew there weren’t too many places for him to go. He stayed on the beach for a while but then moved on, heading to the one place he knew he wasn’t technically welcome. JJ had seen your family’s cars in the yard and had ducked into the church, falling asleep on one of the pews.  

It wasn’t like you could’ve contacted him, you had no phone and you couldn’t exactly get away easily during the day and maybe that was what made it so easy for him to convince himself that he wasn’t beyond forgiveness. He needed to talk to you, had wanted to for days now. He needed to explain things to you, make you understand that he did love you and the bet was stupid, a mistake that he wanted to take back more than anything in the world.  

-

“JJ, I don’t care about any of that right now,” you said, brushing hair away from his face. “What happened?”

He sat up a little, pulling the makeshift necklace out beneath his shirt, the keys to the Phantom hanging there around his neck. “I got the keys.” He replied, “I don’t know if you even would still want to go, but I got the keys.”  

“Is that how this happened?” You asked, eyes still on his bruised face and not the keys he was holding up.  

“It doesn’t matter-”

You cut him off, “it does matter, JJ-”

“No.” He insisted, “no, it doesn’t matter. I don’t want you to base anything on feeling bad for me.” JJ had spent his whole life trying to make sure that nobody felt bad for him. Sympathy, charity, pity, it was all just fake and he hated it. He did everything he could to be sure that no one ever knew what kind of father Luke was because he never wanted them to look at him like he was broken.  

“I don’t want you to hurt.” You admitted, kissing his cheek.  

JJ didn’t protest the affection, though he wanted to laugh. Here he was with you worrying about him, telling him that you didn’t want to see him hurt while he had hurt you. For days he felt like he had been plagued by that moment, replaying the way you looked at him when you asked him if John B was telling the truth. Kiara told him to give you space and Pope told him to take things slowly but all he wanted was to be with you again, to make everything right.  

“You shouldn’t even want to talk to me right now.” He said, rubbing his hands over his eyes.  

“My propensity for forgiveness might surprise you.” You teased, then shrugged, “I don’t think that you lied to me about...about being in love with me,” you chewed on your bottom lip as you spoke, “I mean, I hope not-”

“I wasn’t.” JJ replied. “If Sarah hadn’t bet me to ask you out, I wouldn’t have, but everything else was real. I know I should’ve told you...I just, didn’t want you to look at me the way you did after John B told you. Everyone else already looks at me that way, I didn’t want you to. I’m so sorry.” It seemed like the only logical thing to say to you.  

The door to the chapel creaked open and JJ slid down to the floor as you stood up, moving down the aisle to keep whoever it was out of the church. Your dad stood there at the entrance, holding the door open with his foot as he caught sight of you. “There you are, your mom sent me out to find you, she said she asked you to turn the lights out here.”

“I was,” you replied, moving closer to him, “I just, stopped for a moment to sit in prayer.” An easy lie, one your parents were always all too willing to believe.  

He nodded, “do you need another moment? Some fellowship?”  

“No, no, I’m okay.” You promised. “I’ll be right there.”

The door swung shut behind him as he stepped back out of the church. You knew he’d be just on the other side of the door, waiting for you to turn off the lights and follow him in for dinner. Knowing the limited amount of time you had, you ran back down the aisle to where JJ was just standing up.  

JJ’s eyes went wide as you grabbed his collar and quickly pulled him into a kiss, “I have dinner with my family, come to my room tonight?”

“Yeah,” he nodded, “yeah okay.”

As you left him you flicked the lights casting him in darkness as he dropped back down onto the bench, a small smile etched on his face. He’d come to the church because he needed to be close to you, especially after his encounter with Luke. But JJ had honestly thought that things between you were irreparable. Knowing they weren’t felt better than he could’ve imagined. Like he was floating above clouds. Stupid to think maybe but he didn’t care.  

-

JJ’s muscles tensed as you traced your fingers beneath a nasty purple bruise that stretched across his stomach to his side. You leaned over him, hovering like a ghost in the stillness, and placed a kiss just over the discolored skin, eliciting goosebumps over his skin.  

He stayed camped out in the chapel until the lights went off in the house and your family left for the night. There were too many smaller units these days to accommodate everyone when they came home to visit but your father was friends with a local motel owner who always gave him a good deal. JJ had tried to stay alert and awake but he’d fallen asleep, getting up later when the lights were off and sneaking across the yard to your window, knocking and hoping that you answered. That you meant it when you said you still believed he loved you.  

Your parents were asleep down the hall from your room and he knew that trying anything would be risky and dangerous but being back in your room again since the last time, since he’d slept with you, it was almost as if a switch went off for both of you. He climbed through the window and was already grabbing at your waist, pulling you into a kiss as you led him to your bed.  

He breathed out apologies and “I love you’s” between kisses, making sure that he took every opportunity to remind you both how sorry he was and how much he had missed being close to you in the few days apart. JJ had tried to tell himself that if you chose to stay with your family, he would be okay and understanding and he would force himself to be but he knew that he was lying to himself, if things ended between the two of you, he wasn’t sure how he would cope. Maybe that was unhealthy but he really didn’t care at all.  

“I was thinking, we could go to Florida,” you said, keeping your voice down as you sat on the bed, JJ’s shirt keeping you warm. He was laying on his back, covers pushed down to his waist, one hand behind his head and the other resting on your thigh.  

“Why Florida?” He asked.  

In all honesty it wasn’t that Florida was anything particularly special it was just that you were trying your hardest to think of anything to say so you didn’t start crying. When you’d seen him in the church earlier you had almost lost it and that was with only his face visible. The bruising on his stomach and sides made you feel ill. “I don’t know, I’ve always wanted to go to South Beach.”  

JJ grinned, hand squeezing your thigh, “you on a topless beach? Yes, please.”

“How about I conquer a two piece before I attempt going topless?” You joked, taking his hand in yours.  

“I don’t know, you look pretty hot...” he said, moving his other hand from behind his head and grabbing the hem of your shirt to pull it up passed your chest. You swatted his hand away, stifling a laugh. The sound of it made him smile though it didn’t quite meet his eyes, that flicker of sadness still there behind them. There was nothing he wanted more than being here with you but he couldn’t shake that gnawing feeling of guilt that settled in.  

“What’s the matter?” You asked, registering the change in his demeanor before he was even fully aware of it himself.  

“Nothing, I-” he sighed, shifting around to sit up in bed, “I should have told you. About the bet, about my dad. I just...I know, under the surface, I’m not the most likable person. I’m loud and I smoke too much and I drink too much and I’m not that smart and I just...really wanted you to like me. So I didn’t say anything. And I know that’s not an excuse-”

“JJ,” you cut him off, “I was mad that you lied and didn’t tell me about the bet but that doesn’t change the way that I feel about you. And it doesn’t change the way I know you feel about me.” It was hard to explain, it had been hard to explain to Kiara when you had shown up crying at her house, but you didn’t think that JJ was lying to you about the whole of your relationship. He said he loved you and you believed him, there wasn’t a single moment that felt unreal to you in that sense, whether he had asked you out because of a bet or not. “You said you only asked me out because of the bet but everything else was real and I believe you.”

“I don’t deserve the benefit of the doubt.”  

“Stop trying to sell yourself short.” You replied, leaning forward to kiss him, “it won’t work.”

Before he could answer you, the floor creaked and the you both looked toward the door as footsteps sounded down the hall. The light by your desk was still on and the footsteps came to a stop outside your bedroom door, a knock sounding, followed by your dad’s voice. “Ace, you awake in there?”  

You pulled JJ’s shirt off, grabbing your nightdress and putting it on as you got off the bed and went over to the door. “Yeah, hold on!” You were thankful that the door opened in, obscuring the twin bed from view. “Sorry, I was having trouble sleeping so I was just up reading some verses.” You lied.  

“Hmm,” your dad nodded, easily convinced, “what were you reading?”

“1st Peter, 4...uh, ‘and above all things have fervent charity among yourselves: for charity shall cover the multitude of sins.’ Just felt like something I really needed tonight.” You replied.  

“That is a good one,” he contemplated, “I told your mom I’ve been a little stuck on the sermon for this coming weekend...it’s a big one, with Timothy’s family visiting and your birthday. But maybe I’ll put some focus on that verse, see if the Lord speaks to me about it.”  

“I’ll pray on it as well,” you promised, twisting the doorknob in your hand as you waited for your father to decide to head back to bed.  

“I’m just grabbing some water, do you need anything?” He asked, looking toward the kitchen.  

“No, I think I’m gonna call it a night,” you replied, stepping forward to give him a hug, “love you, see you in the morning.”

“Love you too Ace,” he said, leaving you and heading to the kitchen.  

You shut the door to your room, blocking out the rest of the world again and nearly jumping when you turned and found JJ standing right there beside you. “My dad could’ve seen you,” you whispered, pushing him away when he tried to wrap his arms around you.  

“He didn’t.” JJ replied, voice low. His hand darted out from his side, grabbing the front of your nightdress before you could get away, using the leverage it gave him to pull you back to the bed. He flicked the light off on your desk lamp on the way to the bed, sitting when the back of his knees hit the mattress.  

“What are you doing?” you asked when he started to pull the nightdress over your head again.  

“Undressing you.”  

“JJ,” you fought a smile, biting your bottom lip, “you need to go...that was way too close.”  

He pouted in the dark, letting your nightdress fall back into place as he laid his hands on your hips. “Can I see you tomorrow?”

“I can walk to Heyward’s in the afternoon?” You offered. “Timothy and his family will be here on Wednesday...”

“When’s the party?” He asked, trying not to let himself dwell on the actual question, were you staying or were you going?  

“Saturday evening...I don’t know what to do.” You admitted. It was leaving home either way but one of those included the possibility of never speaking to your family again.  

“It’s your decision. I love you, either way.” JJ promised.  

-

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[nogreatillusion]

Things I Wish Someone Had Told Me Before Giving Birth

-- Zippers are preferable to snaps and both are certainly better than buttons, but don't let people make you feel bad if you want to buy a couple of impractical, beautiful baby things that they'll only wear once. -- A friend (a doctor!) DID tell me that most people hate their baby for the first two weeks, a thoroughly un-researched fact which shocked my grandmother but gave me an enormous sense of relief before my baby was born as I was finally able to unburden myself from the fear that I might fail to live up to the overwhelmingly prevalent idea that all mothers will immediately fall madly in love from the moment their child is born and stay that way. -- Don't waste your money on expensive diapers. They will all leak sometimes and that's life. Buy the cheap ones. Same goes for wipes. They're all the same. -- If you are planning to breastfeed, buy lots of very comfortable bras and then buy at least two more than you think you need. You will be unshowered, covered in milk, and behind on laundry for at least a couple of months. Clean, comfortable bras are a gift. -- If you get a clogged milk duct, it will feel like a little lump in your breast and you can massage it out using a vibrator. Do this ASAP to prevent mastitis. -- I think bottle warmers might be a scam. -- You can breastfeed lying down. It might work better, and it will certainly be easier on your back. -- Babies can just wear pajamas or onesies all the time for their first year of life. You don't need "outfits," or separates, unless you want them. No one will notice or care. -- Don't forget to brush your teeth and go to bed like a normal person sometimes. It took me 3 days to remember this. It feels insane to "go to bed" when you're getting up every two to three hours. Do it anyway. -- You're going to hallucinate due to lack of sleep and intense anxiety about falling asleep with the baby. You will imagine that the baby is lost in the sheets until your husband insists for the third time that the baby is in the bassinet. This will go on for months and it will always feel terrible. -- Pick a few good TV shows with a lot of seasons to watch the first month. You're going to be spending a lot of time on the couch. Like a lot. -- Formula smells incredibly bad and it is shockingly expensive. It can also be a lifesaver. -- You can keep track of feedings and diaper changes and baby sleep on a little handwritten spreadsheet to report to your pediatrician like a good parent, but this might also drive you slowly insane until your child's doctor has to remind you that you're raising a child, not running a hospital and really, you can stop. Please don't do this to yourself. -- Socks are for suckers. If it's cold out, buy footie everything for as long as you can possibly get away with it. -- None of the expensive eczema lotions or body washes will make any difference for your baby’s sensitive skin, but you can buy them anyway if it makes you feel better to do something. It will probably get better on its own when they get older and you've long since given up on the fancy creams. -- Buy the adult diapers for postpartum bleeding. -- You can use your baby's desitin on your own butt if things are beginning to chafe down there. -- Be prepared that breastfeeding might be a two person job for at least the first few weeks. It's complicated and difficult for many women, and having a partner there to help juggle and keep the baby (and you!) awake might be necessary! -- You don't really have to master swaddling. It's fine. I'm convinced that birthing classes devote time to this technique solely because it makes you feel like you're in control of something. You're not and you can buy sleep sacks that do the same thing, but better. -- Plain old spaghetti strap tank tops that you can slip an arm/boob out of work just as well as expensive, ugly nursing tops. — You don’t need the $900 stroller. I promise you. Spend your money on the nicest rocking chair you can find, if you have the space. You will be spending a lot of time there. -- Read the sleep books before the baby is born. Take notes. Make a plan. You will not have the energy for this later. -- Stop googling things about SIDS after 10 PM. Turn off your phone. Stop it!! -- If your partner has time off work for a while, a really good time to nap is when people come over to see the baby. You don't have to "host," you don't have to be "on," you can ask them to leave whenever you want. Let your partner handle it. The rules of politeness no longer apply. -- Don't expect to feel like you have it together for at least 2 months. The first 2 months are a blur. By 4 months, you'll finally be hitting your stride. Be patient with yourself. -- You do not have to let people visit you in the hospital before you've taken a shower and put on the cute pajamas you brought. You are going to feel like you were hit by a car and that no one seems to notice or care. You don't have to let people visit you in the hospital at all, actually. It's entirely up to you, as much as your parents may disagree. -- Crying is normal. For both of you. -- It can be really hard to get a newborn baby into a carseat for the first time. Make sure your partner helps handle this before going to get the car or you may find yourself in tears, squatting painfully in front of the car seat on the hospital floor, trying desperately to maneuver a tiny little person who is still curled up like a snail. -- Bring so many snacks to the hospital. Bring an entire duffle bag of snacks. No one else has to know what's in there. -- Buy the big burp cloths. Buy a lot of them. Keep them handy in every room of your house. — Do not buy that goddamn Snoo. -- It's ok and necessary to put your baby down. You will want places to set the baby down in each room of your home. Swings, snuggle pillows, playmats, bouncers, baskets, bassinets, whatever. It's up to you, but try to keep one spot to put them down in each room that you spend a lot of time in. It doesn’t need to be anything fancy. A blanket on the floor works in a pinch! -- When it comes to feeding, buy the bibs that can go in the dishwasher and a highchair that can be entirely wiped clean. -- You're going to clip the baby's finger with the tiny nail clippers. It will be awful. You will all survive. -- Get the breast shields with the silicone edges for pumping. Pumping sucks and anything you can do to make it slightly more comfortable is worth it. — A certain percentage of baby crying is unrelated to needing milk, sleep, or a diaper change. Sometimes babies just cry! They’re like people and they have moods! Remind yourself of this when you’re losing your mind trying to figure out what you’ve forgotten to try. You can just pretend they are a very small friend who needs to cry for a bit, and be a soothing presence while they work through it. -- Reusable nursing breast pads are more comfortable and absorbent than the disposable kind, and will keep you from feeling nervous about leaking every time you leave the house. -- It's ok to leave the baby in a safe place to go to the bathroom. The first time you have to do this, it will be terrifying. -- Don't expect the suction bowls to stay put. Your baby is strong and not an idiot. -- You might need more changing pad covers than you think you do. -- The baby milestone books exist to make you feel either superior or terrified. It's ok not to read them. Your baby will roll over when they roll over. Please stop worrying. -- The first few times you watch the youtube video of someone masterfully wrapping their baby in a fabric sling, you will decide it is impossible. It's not, and you'll get better at it with practice, though you may always feel like you're not *quite* doing it right. This is a metaphor for all of motherhood.

[imagineaworlds]

I Love You (Part Twenty-Four) -- Aaron Hotchner

Written By: @desperately-bisexual​

Request: None.

Warnings: Cursing. Mentions of smut. Mentions of Dom/sub relationship. Talk of murder, shooting. terrorism, mention of bombing-- literally everything Criminal Minds.

Pairing: Aaron Hotchner x Greenaway!Reader

Word Count: 15467

Timeline: Season 3 Episode 20. Two months after part twenty-three.

It was a quiet morning at the office. At ten o’clock, we all gathered in the conference room to discuss cases, but before we could even sit down, JJ told us that there was nothing for our unit. It wasn’t entirely uncommon for this to happen, and it was always a relief because it meant that we would all get to go home early, which meant getting to see Jack sooner. With no paperwork to do, either we were all free to just wait around until something came about for us to do. That was the odd part. If we didn’t have a case, we at least had paperwork… but, nope. Honestly, if we wanted to, Hotch could just send us home for the day, but I think that all of us were still hoping that something interesting would come up. Also, what was the point in leaving if we could just be called back at any point? Might as well just stick around until three when I was supposed to pick Jack up from school.

While all of us were hanging out in the bullpen, JJ, Garcia, and Rossi with us, too, Hotch was up in his office. His door was closed, the blinds were tilted slightly, yet I could still catch a glimpse of him talking with someone on the phone. He seemed worried. He wasn’t pacing the width of his office quite yet, but he was tapping his fountain pen against his desk as fast as he could in order to keep his anxious body up with his racing mind. No one else seemed to notice, though—probably because they didn’t want to know if it had to do with a case yet. We were all content with just sitting around, chatting and laughing. If a case came up, so be it. If a case didn’t come up, that would be a miracle we would happily take.

“Do you think it’s about those shootings in New York?” I finally asked, turning my attention away from Hotch’s office long enough to gauge the team’s reactions to my question.

It had been on my mind for the past few days since we first heard about it on the news. The FBI hadn’t been called in to investigate the crimes yet, but we were all keeping tabs on it to see if it would get worse. There had been five shootings in the past two weeks, each of them in public spaces, but no witnesses. No one could describe the Unsub, let alone describe what happened It was like a ghost was shooting random civilians in the streets. Yet the NYPD was convinced that the incidences were all unrelated. Considering New York’s rising crime rates, it was a fair assumption, I supposed, but with five murders with the same M.O., our team was starting to raise brows and ask if the NYPD was ever going to call someone in for an outside perspective.

“Why would you think that?” Rossi asked. “Has Hotch said something about it at home?”

I shook my head. “We haven’t talked about it at all.”

“So, then, maybe it’s nothing.”

I looked back up at Hotch’s office, keenly aware that it wasn’t nothing. Something was wrong, it was just a matter of what. Perhaps it had to do with Haley, or Jack, or the Director, or another case he was just learning about. But if it were a case, wouldn’t it have gone through JJ first? It must have been personal, then, which meant that I would hear about it from him sooner than later. There was nothing to be worried about right now.

And then he stood from his desk and hung up the phone. Everyone seemed to be watching him with me now, trying to figure out if either Rossi or I were correct. Hotch grabbed his cell, a few files from his desk, and hurried to his door. The second it was open, he caught us all watching him, but he didn’t waver.

“Conference room,” he ordered, still making his way there.

We all leapt to our feet and scurried together towards the boardroom. “My money’s on New York,” I whispered to Rossi.

“I’ll take that bet.”

Hotch was standing at the monitor, the remote in his hand as he pulled up the news. When it was on, I heard Rossi sigh disappointedly. I grinned and elbowed his side playfully. Maybe he shouldn’t have actually taken that deal. The news was already talking about yet another shooting in New York, this time at a subway station in the middle of the night. No witnesses. No evidence. No leads. It was amazing that we were being called in this late.

“Don’t sit,” Hotch said. “We won’t be here long. We’ve been called in to help the NYPD with the random shootings.” Finally. “We’ll debrief more on the plane, but for now, what you need to know is that the police have eliminated any connections to organized crime, terrorism, or vendettas. There are no ties between any of the victims, and all of their records are clean. We’re looking at a randomized killer. He does the same thing every time. He keeps his head down, hood on, hands covered to hide his skin color. He shoots the victims quickly as he’s walking and doesn’t look back.” Hotch turned off the TV. “Wheels up in twenty. Garcia—” She looked up at the mention of her name, shocked that she was being addressed during a meeting she technically wasn’t even supposed to be at. “You’re coming with us.”

“Sir—”

“See you all on the jet.” Hotch collected his things again and pushed past the team to make his way back to his office so that he could grab his go-bag.

The rest of us were left in the boardroom, glancing between each other, waiting for someone to make the first move. It was odd that we weren’t even taking the time to sit down and discuss more of the case first. I mean, what happened to the case going through JJ, talking about it as a team in the boardroom, then discussing more on the jet, and so on? Why go to Hotch first and why was he in such a rush?

I made the first move, rushing back down to my desk in the bullpen to call Jessica to see if she could pick up Jack, and then text Haley to let her know that we wouldn’t be back for a bit. Jessica said she was fine with picking up Jack, and when I texted Haley, she thanked me for letting her know. She also told me to keep an eye on Aaron and to call Jack when we were at the hotel. When that was sorted, I grabbed my go-bag from under my desk and walked with the rest of the team out of the building.

When we got on the jet, Hotch immediately called for us to huddle up and start discussing the case. Since it had come through him, Hotch knew the most about the case. He knew what the cops had done for the investigation, he knew the victimology, the M.O., the possible leads, everything. We were just there to play catch up and then try to give what insight we could before landing in New York.

“Each victim was killed in a different neighborhood. There was no relation with their homes, their jobs, their hobbies, or so on. No similar physical or personality traits, according to the victims’ friends and family.”

“What leads do they have that they haven’t told the press about?” I asked.

“None,” Hotch shook his head. “Agent Kate Joyner has been leading the FBI-NYPD joint task force—”

“The FBI’s been involved with this already?” Morgan interrupted.

“Pretty much since the beginning. Kate called for our help after the sixth murder last night, though.”

“Wait. Kate Joyner?” Rossi clarified. “Isn’t she the agent from Interpole we gained a few years back?”

“I heard she can be a bit of a pain in the ass,” Morgan chuckled.

“I didn’t think so. We worked together back in the day when she was still working for Scotland Yard,” Hotch admitted.

“You… worked together?” Emily raised a brow. None of us were aware that Hotch had ever liaised with Scotland Yard before. One would think that I would have known about that. “When?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Hotch deflected. “Let’s just focus on the case, please. She’s leading the case, we’re just there to profile. So, just… follow her lead on this one.”

‘Follow her lead’? We never followed anyone’s lead. We worked with other units, SWAT, and the local police departments that needed our help; but the only person we directly answered to was Hotch. Why was he changing that for this girl, Kate? What was more concerning to me was that Hotch knew who this woman was—they were clearly friends at one point or another, and I had never even heard of her. It was like Hotch covered up this entire part of his life that I didn’t know about. Like, when the hell did he go to England? When did he meet Kate? How long did they work together?

I took a breath to relax. I didn’t need to get caught up in my thoughts. The reality was that Hotch and Haley had been together since high school. He loved Haley with everything he had while they were still together. He would have never cheated on her, just as he would never cheat on me— though I couldn’t say she didn’t show him the same courtesy, but that was a theory for another time. Hotch was probably just old friends with this Kate lady, just as he was old friends with Rossi. There was nothing to be suspicious of, and there was definitely nothing to be jealous of. I just needed to remind myself that this was about a case, nothing else.

When we arrived at the New York field office, we headed up to Kate’s unit’s floor. She was supposedly waiting for us up there with the two lead detectives from the NYPD who were assigned to this case, too. On the way up, Hotch seemed nervous and fidgety, which certainly wasn’t like him. I mean, I knew from Rossi that Hotch used to be like that, so maybe it was just habits of seeing an old friend again; but it was still unsettling to see that he was so wrapped up in the thought of seeing Kate that he wasn’t even making eye contact with any of us or trying to tell me and Morgan that we needed to be on our best behavior.

Once the elevator doors were open, Hotch stepped out, leading us all into the office in search of Kate and the detectives. We looked around, taking in how big the office was. This unit that the FBI had given Kate was ridiculous. I mean, the BAU was considerably big, but this was almost twice that, and everyone was running around, busy with work around the case.

My shoulders fell and I stopped in place when I saw a woman approaching us with a smile on her face. That was definitely Kate, there was no doubt about it… She was gorgeous. She walked so smoothly, but still held a poise that commanded everyone’s reluctant respect. And when she saw Hotch, her smile grew even more.

“Aaron,” she welcomed with open arms.

“Kate,” he smiled back, accepting her hug.

My eyes stayed glued to them and their embrace, despite the fact that the rest of the team was glancing between them and me. ‘Aaron’? ‘Kate’? ‘Aaron’… I was still trying to convince myself that it was nothing, and I shouldn’t have to be that petty person who got all jealous suddenly without an explanation. It was nothing, right? Just two old friends reuniting… Two friends that happened to hug a little longer than necessary and then stare into each other’s eyes as they parted— Oh, my fucking god.

JJ linked her arm with mine and pulled me close. “Is it just me or does she look exactly like Haley?”

Oh, boy, I was relieved that I wasn’t the only one who took notice. I thought I was going fucking crazy. Kate’s blonde hair, her small nose, her brown eyes, her tight lips, her short height, her tall posture… She was a mirror image of Haley… Just… British. It was so odd. I hadn’t anticipated that I’d be meeting Haley’s doppelganger. I mean, I never even expected to meet Haley in the first place, but now there were two of her. What the hell was I supposed to do with that?

I remembered how I tried to convince myself on the plane that there was no chance in hell that Hotch would have cheated on Haley, but when I saw Kate, I realized that it was entirely possible. If he really spent a long time in England, then he probably ended up missing Haley a lot… With someone around him who looked eerily similar to the wife he missed so much, if there was a night with one too many drinks or something, it was entirely possible that something happened between them.

I felt so stupid. I wasn’t a jealous person, and I certainly wasn’t one to speculate about Hotch’s past. We had both done things that we weren’t proud of. We had done things that we just hadn’t gotten around to discussing yet. But all the signs seemed to be there. But the worst part was that it pointed to the fact that Hotch seemed to have a type… A type that I didn’t amount to. I felt my self-confidence crash just by looking at Kate.

“Kate, this is my team. David Rossi, Derek Morgan, Spencer, Reid, Emily Prentiss, Jennifer Jareau, Penelope Garcia, and—” Hotch hesitated when his eyes met mine. “And… Y/N Greenaway.” He must have recognized that the wheels in my mind were turning, and I was working overtime to understand what was going on. He must have also recognized my shyness and the way I didn’t wave or smile at Kate politely.

“Thank you all for being here.” Kate smiled less now, like she was just trying to be courteous compared to her genuine happiness in seeing Hotch for the first time in years. “If you need anything at all, don’t hesitate to ask. For now, I believe that accommodations have been made for your technical analyst to review the city’s security footage. The rest of you, these are Detectives Brustin and Cooper,” Kate gestured to the two men standing to her left. They nodded and smiled shortly, seemingly less than impressed with our appearance. “I’ll leave you all to discuss the case with them. All I ask is that you run everything by me first. It’s been my experiences that having one butt on the line is enough.”

Detective Brustin rolled his eyes and mocked Kate's accent, “Yes, ma’am.”

Kate tried to ignore his rudeness after stepping closer to Hotch to whisper something. “Is there a chance we could talk privately before you go running off?”

“Yeah,” Hotch nodded with a whisper. They waited for a moment, their faces close together, their eyes searching each other’s.

As they walked off together, Emily and Garcia shuffled over to me and JJ.

“They, um,” Emily cleared her throat, “liaised together.”

“I don’t understand,” I admitted quietly, my go-bag falling to the ground. The girls’ grins disappeared in an instant when they realized that I wasn’t taking it all as a joke. “I thought I was the only one besides Haley…” My eyes followed Kate and Hotch as they walked into her office. She leaned against her desk, crossing her arms a little too tightly over her chest. Hotch didn’t sit or keep his distance. My breath hitched as he stood just in front of her, their knees practically touching. “They were high school sweethearts,” I continued to explain about Haley and Hotch. “I didn’t think that there was any point where they weren’t together before their divorce.” I looked over at Morgan, who had turned away from Rossi, Reid, and the detectives to pay attention to our conversation. “What did I miss?” I practically asked him directly, my eyes pouting.

“Hey,” Rossi called us all over. I broke away from my trance long enough to grab my go-bag from the floor and walk over with the team. “Morgan and I will go with Detective Brustin to the latest crime scene, find out what we can about this guy. The rest of you will stay here to help Reid look at the geographical information and start building the profile.”

“And Hotch?” Morgan asked.

Everyone looked back over at Kate’s office.

“Hotch… He seems a little busy. Just catch him up with your work here when you’re done.” Rossi avoided making eye contact with me as he turned back to the team. “Get to work.”

We all dispersed. Morgan, Rossi, and Brustin headed for the elevators; meanwhile, Emily, JJ, and I went with Reid to the boardroom we were given to work in. While they all got to work, I sat down at the table in the middle of the room and spun around in my chair to face Kate’s office. Her and Hotch were still talking privately, but his demeanor had changed entirely. He was a few steps away from her now, his arms crossed over his chest, his back towards her. We both stared at each other for a quick moment before he looked away.

Suddenly, Hotch was moving towards her door. They were finishing up. I pushed myself out of my seat and quietly hurried over to the door of Kate’s office. Hotch was wrapping up their conversation, though he was switching his gaze towards me every other step I made towards him. When I was within reach of him, he closed Kate’s office door behind him.

“We need to talk,” I said, grabbing his hand and pulling him to the side of the room. I let go of his hand and turned back to face him with crossed arms. “I’m not a jealous person, Hotch. I never have been, and I don’t plan on starting now. I think it’s stupid and I think that we’re both mature enough to not run into any problems when it comes to any past relationships. But I need to know something, and I need you to be honest with me.” He nodded. “Were you and Kate ever together in any way?”

Hotch wrinkled his brows together and shook his head before chuckling at me like the question was unwarranted and unexpected. What else did he expect? Kate looked exactly like his ex-wife, and they hugged— something Hotch hardly did with anyone other than me— and they talked privately, and he was smiling at her, and laughing with her, and… Shit. I told him I wasn’t jealous, and I swore to myself that I wasn’t, but… Fuck. I didn’t know what else to think. Something happened between them and I wanted to know what. Not because I wanted to find reasons to be more jealous or protective because I knew that he would never cheat on me, but because… Well… I wasn’t entirely sure. But, dammit, I wanted to know.

“Kate and I are just friends,” he insisted. “We never did anything.” I cocked a brow at him, and he rolled his eyes slightly. “We never kissed, we never held hands, we never… did anything. Nothing. We’re just friends. I promise.”

I nodded. I felt like such an idiot. This wasn’t who I was. Hotch and I were both grown, mature people who loved each other more than anything. Even if something did happen, it would have been a long time ago, and it wouldn’t have affected our relationship. I was just relieved to know the truth, even though I felt like a total jealous moron.

“I’m glad you asked me, though,” he complimented with a smile. I looked up at him as he continued. “I’d rather you ask than silently get jealous over nothing and turn it into a thing.”

I knew in my mind that if Hotch truly did love me— which, of course, I knew that he did— then there was absolutely nothing to worry about. Hearing him say it to my face reassured me that all I needed to know was the truth, straight from his mouth, and I could move on and do my job. Like he said, there was no reason to ponder in silence and let jealousy build for no reason. Him and Kate were friends. I had to trust that. Hotch promised once that he would never lie to me, so if he said that there was no history between them, then there wasn’t. I believed him.

“I love you,” I whispered.

“I love you, too.” He grabbed my left hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. “Thank you. Seriously.” And then his phone started ringing. We both sighed at the ruined moment as he dug it out of his pocket. “Hotchner,” he said into it while still staring at me. “Alright. We’ll be there soon.” He hung up just as quickly as he answered. “Morgan says that there’s been another murder a few blocks from where him, Rossi, and the detectives are.”

“Let’s go,” I said quietly, turning away from him.

He held my hand tighter and pulled me back to face him. “We’re okay, right?”

I nodded. “I trust you, Hotch. If you say nothing happened, then nothing happened. I’m not going to question that.”

He searched my eyes for a moment. “Thank you.”

“You’ve gotta think of a more creative way of saying ‘thank you’ at some point.” I smirked, turning away from him again so that we could head down to the car, but he didn’t follow me like I expected. He was smiling at me, but he was waiting for an opportunity to go tell Kate about the new crime scene. Right. I forgot. Kate. Just as soon as I grew jealous of her, I had entirely forgotten about her. “Go,” I told him. “I’ll meet you in the car.”

He silently hurried off to her office to let her know. I rolled my eyes to myself and made my way to the elevators. I wasn’t jealous. I trusted Hotch. I loved Hotch. He made a promise to me a couple of months ago that he would never lie to me ever again. He looked me in the eye and told me that we would never hold secrets back. I asked Hotch straight up if him and Kate were involved, and he told me that they never were. I had to believe him. I did believe him. They were friends, just like he said. And he was only going to tell her because she was still the lead on this case, and she had asked us to keep her updated on any new developments. It made sense. I shouldn’t have been pondering it too long.

When they got to the car together, Hotch took the front seat with me, while Kate took the back. At least that didn’t change. I drove us down to the crime scene with Hotch’s navigation help. It was somewhat out there for us, but just like Hotch said, it wasn’t far from the other crime scene that Morgan and Rossi were looking at. But the scene had already been taped off, which made traffic horrible, and it was nearly impossible to get into our own damn crime scene. From the backseat, Kate had to argue with two different police officers about letting us in before Rossi finally noticed us from the street corner and waved us through.

“It’s definitely our guy,” Brustin said. “Same M.O. Middle of the day, random, no pattern in victimology, hurried off before anyone could get a good look at him.”

“There wasn’t a single witness?” I asked while getting out of the car. We were on a busy street corner. Hell, the cops were having trouble holding back the crowds. How did no one see a guy shoot someone in the middle of the day on a busy road in fucking New York?

Brustin shook his head. “Nothing.”

“Y/N, go talk with Rossi to catch up on what he knows,” Hotch ordered me.

Brustin squinted, almost like he was offended by that command. To be fair, the way Hotch phrased it made it sound like he didn’t trust Brustin or Cooper and what conclusions they had come to. While we obviously still held our team’s intuition to a higher standard and were more likely to trust what our friends would tell us, Hotch’s order was still offensive to the detective, and I didn’t blame him for feeling that way. That being said, I didn’t argue with him either. I nodded and walked up to Rossi, who was standing over the body.

“Seven murders and he’s finally communicating with us,” Rossi told me, handing me an evidence bag.

I looked down at what was inside the clear bag while raising a curious brow. It was a Tarot card— specifically the card for Death. If the title on the bottom of the card wasn’t obvious enough, the artwork of Death riding a rose that was trampling over a king was a sure tell of what was going on. But why do this now? Why send us a message after so many deaths? It didn’t make sense. It didn’t fit the M.O. Realistically, the obvious answer was that the Unsub was trying to tell us that he saw himself as Death. He viewed what he was doing as an act of defiance against a higher power, which would be the king in reference to the card, but outside of that, it could have been a number of things. This could have been personally or politically motivated, but it was unlikely that these killings were sadistic or sexual. We didn’t need a card to tell us that. These shootings were long distance kills. There was no satisfaction that came from them, especially with how fast the Unsub was fleeing the scene. But toying with us because he knew that the FBI was involved now… That changed how we were building the profile. It meant that this probably wasn’t personally motivated, which left politics.

“Are we absolutely sure that this is the same guy?” I asked Rossi. He looked confused, like he didn’t understand where I was coming from. I decided to clarify. “Sure, the M.O. is the same, but this card changes everything. Why would he deviate from what he knows?”

“To tell us that he knows we’re here.”

“Obviously. But why does he care? The killings are signal enough. Why communicate like this?”

“Maybe Reid will figure something out.” Rossi shrugged.

I nodded an agreement. Something was different about this whole crime scene compared to the last ones. Despite how rushed they seemed, they were still more… I don’t know, organized in some way. Before, the Unsub was waiting until the target was alone to shoot them. But this was the middle of the day, around hundreds of witnesses. And the change in M.O. almost made the scene feel sloppy, in some way. As much as I hated to admit it, Reid could possibly give us some insight into the card, or maybe Garcia would be able to find something on the street cameras. Either way, we were stuck where we were. Those who were still at the office would be more helpful.

The drive back to the office was slower. It felt like going down to the crime scene in the first place was a waste of our time. Maybe that was the purpose of the shootings. It was possible that the Unsubs were doing this just to lead us around on a wild goose chase while they were working on something bigger. If that were true, however, then what was the bigger picture? Why string along the police and the FBI rather than just go for it. Like 9/11, they could have gone for the big one first. Why this? Why make us run around?

None of my questions seemed answered by the time we got back to the field office. Kate and Hotch were trying to run through some theories, but I had tried to focus on putting the clues together myself. Unfortunately, that didn’t seem to help. We got out of the car, and we were walking in, but I had nothing to contribute to their conversation. I think my silence was noted by Hotch, but he didn’t say anything to me about it.

As we waited for the elevator, Rossi, Morgan, and Brustin met up with us. They all started talking with Hotch and Kate about hypotheses, but I still didn’t get it. My whole “thing” was taking a quick look at something and being able to put it together with a snap of my fingers. I liked that it was my thing. Sometimes it meant that I would come to conclusions faster than Reid, and that was always a win in my book. But this case. These crime scenes. This Unsub. None of it was adding up, and I hated that I was falling short.

The elevator doors opened to Kate’s floor and we all stepped out.

“What do you have?” Hotch asked after noticing how Reid, Emily, and JJ were all crowded around a computer.

JJ looked up at us shortly before returning her gaze to the computer. “Garcia sent us the latest shooting.”

Emily played the video for us as we all gathered around them. Kate pushed herself between me and Hotch, earning a slight scoff from me and Morgan as we were shoved around. I rolled my eyes slightly, then looked down at the computer. As the footage played, we saw our victim, still unidentified, hailing for a cab with a hot dog in hand. Classic New York. A few moments later, just as a taxi was pulling up, a hooded man walked up with a gun in hand, shot the victim in the back of his head, and hurried off in a sprint.

I cocked a brow. That wasn’t very nonchalant of the Unsub. His whole thing was making this as casual as possible. So now, not only did he break M.O. by shooting with witnesses around, then leaving a card to taunt us, but now he was racing away? It didn’t feel like our guy, if I were being honest. Maybe it was a copycat, or maybe this was just another random shooting like New York saw all the time. Since we hadn’t identified the victim yet, it was possible that this was a gang hit, or maybe a hire to kill situation, or something along those lines. But it didn’t match up with our Unsub.

“Garcia says that they’re different heights, too,” Reid told us while Emily played back the video footage of the first shooting. Again, the differences were standing out. It was so obvious. “And their body types are different.”

“We’ve got more than one Unsub,” Hotch sighed, putting a palm on his forehead.

That changed our entire profile. We weren’t dealing with one guy who was politically motivated anymore. We were dealing with a duo who were trying to make a point of something. Duos were always easy to profile, though, which was a relief. In every duo case, there was a dominant and a submissive. Much like mine and Hotch’s relationship, the dominant had control over the submissive, but their connection and attraction was through their crimes— which, obvious, wasn’t like me and Hotch at all. The question in this case was which of them was the submissive and which of them was the dominant? Based on behaviors, it seemed like the first Unsub, the one who had performed the first six kills, was relaxed during the whole endeavor, which meant that he had confidence about what he was doing. On the other hand, the last kill was sloppy and rushed. If I were to guess, I would’ve said that the first Unsub was the dominant. He wanted to perform the murders because he got the most enjoyment out of them and because he knew how to do it properly; whereas the second Unsub, the submissive, seemed less sure about what to do and if doing it was right at all.

The big question now that the dominant/submissive profile was built was… why? Why were they doing this? My original hypothesis based on deductions formed around the profile of one Unsub told me that this was related to politics, but a duo killing at random changed things… And why would the submissive leave the Tarot card at the crime scene?

“Until we know why we’re doing this, we can’t get ahead of them,” Morgan said. “I think that we should get out on the streets. Increase police presence to force them into hiding while we try to build a stronger profile.”

“I only brought you here to create a profile, Agent Morgan. I don’t need your advice about what to do on the streets,” Kate responded calmly, though there was a bite to her words.

Morgan shifted on his feet. “I understand that, Agent Joyner, and we’ll have the profile ready in the morning. However, I think that based on the profile we have as of now, the smart thing to do would be to—”

“I still didn’t ask, Agent Morgan. Thank you, but I won’t be tiring out our forces just for an overnight shift.”

“They’re targeting areas like 14th Street, 42nd, 59th, 63rd—”

“Morgan,” Hotch interrupted, “it’s not your call.”

Morgan glanced between me and Hotch, as though I’d give him backup on this. I didn’t know what to say or do, though. None of us did. The whole team was just standing there, listening to Morgan and Kate’s back and forth, and Hotch, with his boss tone, had to step in to diffuse the tension. I didn’t need to get mixed up in it. I didn’t need to choose between my best friend and my boyfriend. Hotch was right that this wasn’t Morgan’s call. We were asked in by Kate to consult, that was all. He tried to tell Kate what he thought was right, and if she didn’t want to hear it, then that was her choice. He didn’t need to argue with her about it.

“Take a walk for a bit,” Hotch offered quietly.

Morgan stared at me. “You’re not going to say anything?”

“Morgan—” I tried to explain, but he threw his hands up like he didn’t want to hear it, and he walked off.

I sighed, taking a defeated step back. Hotch and Kate both looked at me, but I didn’t look at them. Instead, I told Emily to play the two videos again so that we could get back to work. Morgan clearly didn’t want me to chase after him, so I wasn’t going to. Even though it made me feel like shit. If we were going to get these guys before they could kill again, then we needed to ignore distractions for a bit. I’d apologize to Morgan later. It would probably be a nasty argument, but I think he’d understand that I wasn’t about to choose between them while in front of the team and Kate. I wouldn’t choose between them anyhow. That wasn’t fair of him.

“I can’t stare at this any longer,” Emily sighed, giving up while moving out of the seat in front of the computer.

Hotch stood tall and crossed his arms. “We’re not finding anything new. I think it’s fair to say we’re all worn out after the long day we’ve had.” He looked to Kate, “I think it’s time to call it a night.”

She nodded. “Fair enough.”

“We’ll come back at seven in the morning to give our profile.”

Kate reached out for a hug to say goodnight, but Hotch dodged it just to give her a handshake. She awkwardly accepted his hand, then Hotch ordered the team to move out. Rossi and I exchanged a glance which said: “What the fuck?” as we all headed towards the elevators.

We all grabbed our go-bags from the trunks of our cars before heading into the hotel for the night. Emily, JJ, and Reid were talking ahead about the profile, meanwhile Morgan and Hotch were hanging back with me in silence. The three of us didn’t know what to say to each other. Morgan probably still felt stung by the fact that Hotch took Kate’s side and that I didn’t do anything to stand up for him. To be fair, though, Morgan was a big boy, and he could handle himself. He knew that he overstepped with Kate. He didn’t need me.

“JJ,” Reid croaked, coming to a stop.

I nearly ran into him when I noticed what he saw. The rest of the team took notice just as quickly, but we all stayed frozen in the lobby. JJ, however, perked up and hurried over to the lounge where Will was sitting, reading an article in the newspaper about the shootings we were working on. When he noticed that we were all standing there, he jumped to his feet so that he could hug JJ, who was running at him with full speed and force.

“What are you doing here?” she asked him as they parted.

“I tried goin’ to D.C., but when that didn’ work out, I took a train here to come see ya.” He bit his lip as he stared at her.

He was so in love with her. I wasn’t sure if anyone else could tell, or if even JJ and Will were aware, but he was absolutely head over heels for her. I could see it. I knew it because it was the same way Hotch looked at me. He looked at her like she was the only thing in the world that mattered, and that nothing could change the way he felt about her. She was one of the lucky ones. I hoped that she knew that.

“Detective,” Hotch greeted, sticking his hand out for Will after we all approached cautiously.

Will shook Hotch’s hand politely. “I’m sorry for showin’ up like this. I know that y’all are working. But, um…” He hesitated as he looked back at JJ. “I can’t stand you being on this case with what’s goin’ on.”

I furrowed my brows and looked at Hotch. Did he know what was going on and elected not to tell the team because JJ asked him not to? Telling by how confused he seemed, I could tell that he didn’t know what Will meant either. Especially when he asked, “Is there a problem?”

JJ slowly turned to face all of us. She gulped as she found the courage for what she wanted to say. “I’m pregnant.”

“And I’ve asked JJ to marry me,” he said to Hotch.

Hotch smiled and shook Will’s hand again. “Congratulations.”

My eyes brightened as I threw my arms around JJ after Emily hugged her. I whispered a thousand congratulations in her ear. This was great news. We needed some good news, especially with how messy and dark our jobs were. A bright light like a baby was a gift and a half for us. I was so happy for her. While I didn’t realize that they were that serious, that didn’t stop me from hugging JJ as tight as I could and telling her that I was so excited for her and Will.

“We’ll give you two some privacy to sort things out, then,” Hotch said after JJ and I parted.

“Thank you, Hotch,” JJ said, hugging him shortly.

He smiled politely, but not like he was genuinely happy like the rest of us. He turned away to head for the elevators, and I started following him like it was an obligation, but JJ chased after him. When his attention was caught, he turned back to her and huffed, “You could have told me, JJ.”

“I know, Hotch,” she told him with lowered shoulders. “But you and Y/N—” She stopped herself. “I heard about what happened in St. Louis, and I didn’t want to… I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

I stiffened slightly. St. Louis felt like a lifetime ago. Back then, Hotch and I talked about having kids and if it were realistic for us. It turned into us having a string of arguments about it over the few days we were there, and, ultimately, I gave up because he seemed adamant on not talking about kids. He didn’t want to talk about it, let alone come to a conclusion, so I decided that he meant he didn’t want to have kids. At least not with me. And while that broke my heart into a million pieces, he tried to apologize and explain to me that he was just scared— but all that told me was that he was scared of having kids with me.

JJ had stumbled into the room while we were having one of those arguments, but I thought that she didn’t hear anything or forgot about it entirely. I never thought in a million years that she would have kept something like this from us because she was worried about stirring up more arguments between me and Hotch. Of course I was excited for her. I thought Hotch would be, too… And maybe he was, but at the moment, he just looked disappointed that she felt like she couldn’t tell him what was going on. Even worse, she didn’t tell him, and he was letting her come out into the field, which wasn’t safe. He probably felt like shit. Meanwhile, I felt like shit because she felt like she couldn’t come to me, a friend, because she didn’t want her pregnancy to impact my relationship? What kind of sense did that make? Hotch and I were our own people. We made our own choices. If we fought, we fought. Fighting was healthy. Talking about our future was good. She shouldn’t have been afraid to talk to me. I was a horrible friend…

“We’ll see you in the morning,” Hotch said to her before turning again.

JJ and I stared at each other for a moment. We both looked sorry. “I’m so happy for you, JJ. He’ll come around. I promise.” I squeezed her shoulder quickly, then ran after Hotch who was holding the elevator for me.

When the elevator doors closed, Hotch snaked his arm around my waist and pulled me towards him so that our hips were touching. As I smiled lightly and hugged him by putting my palm on his chest, he kissed my temple and whispered that he loved me.

At our room, I sighed as I closed the door behind us. It had been an incredibly long day, but the good news we just received in the lobby made up for most of it. Hotch set his briefcase down on the desk, and I put my purse beside it. We both sighed again as we put our go-bags on the floor, then sat on the edge of the bed. I pulled off my shoes while he stared at the window for a bit. When my feet were finally free, I reached down to grab my pajamas from my go-bag. I started getting dressed as the deafening silence hung in the air.

“Do you ever think about it still?” Hotch asked, pulling off his shoes one at a time. I raised a brow. “Having kids, I mean. I know that we talked about it in St. Louis, and we said that we’d hold out, but… are there ever times when you think about it… or maybe… I don’t know,” he shrugged. “Regret the choice we made?”

I shook my head. “Not really. I mean, I know that we’ll talk about it again when we’re ready.”

“What if we’re ready now?”

I paused and looked at him. I asked myself what he meant by that, and if it was really what I thought it meant. I mean, there were a thousand different things he could have been insinuating, but I was scared to guess which one, or to take the words out of his mouth. We were obviously happy for JJ and Will, and baby fever was obviously a real thing, but I didn’t think that Hotch would ever let it get to him like this.

“I mean, would you even want to get married? I know that we said we’d wait to have kids for when it would make the most sense for us; and don’t you think that getting married first—”

“Aaron.”

I froze after saying his name to let the silence sit. I didn’t have to think about it. I knew what my answer would have been if he actually got around to asking me to marry him. Of course I’d marry him in a heartbeat. I would do the whole lavish wedding, or I’d do a spur of the moment, Vegas shotgun wedding where an Elvis Presley impersonator officiated it. I would have literally done anything to marry Aaron Hotchner. Whatever he wanted, I wanted. If he wanted to run away to Fiji and get married there, I would have booked the first flight. If he wanted to wait the appropriate two year engagement period, then have a wedding in a huge venue with all of our friends and family, I would have started saving up the money.

I didn’t need to think about marrying Hotch. I didn’t even need to think about having kids with him. He was the one in St. Louis who got all uptight about the prospect of it when I brought it up. If he thought that we were ready to get married and to have kids, then I was ready to ask him what the hell took him so long to come around.

“If you’d ever ask,” I began quietly, “I’d say yes.” I tied my hair back out of my face as I continued getting ready for bed, trying to break the tension in the room. I could tell that his eyes were following me, but I didn’t stop to take note. “But you can only ask if you do it properly and not while we’re on a case. Never, ever on a case. Do you hear me, Agent Hotchner?” I stopped long enough to see that he was grinning ear to ear while nodding. “Good.” I smirked as I headed towards the bathroom to brush my teeth and wash my face.

Hotch jumped up from the bed, took his shirt off, and joined me in the bathroom to get ready for bed, too. We both started with brushing our teeth, and nothing was said between us. I kept catching him watching me through the mirror, and I rolled my eyes a few times at him. His question was still echoing through my mind, and I was sure that my answer was racing through him. I loved him more than anything. Truly. But there were times when I’d ask myself why he would look at me like that. I always wondered a lot if St. Louis was proof of some kind that Hotch and I were ultimately doomed to fail, but then he brought up kids and marriage again tonight, and I knew that he meant it. But why?

I finished brushing my teeth and washing my face long before him, somehow. Still facing the mirror, my eyes avoiding his reflection, I spoke up with, “Can I ask you something?” Hotch’s reflection stared at me for a moment before he nodded slightly. “Why me?”

“I don’t understand.”

My gaze fell to the faucet in front of me. “I mean, why… why me, Aaron? What’s so… I don’t know… appealing about me…”

Truth was, since first laying eyes on Kate, I couldn’t get over the fact that Hotch obviously had a type. Despite his insistence that nothing happened between them, there was still no denying that at one point or another, they had a spark, and some of that chemistry was still there. I asked myself that if I didn’t know Hotch, or if we weren’t dating, would he be with Kate? She looked so much like Haley, just like everyone had been whispering about all day. The fact that they had chemistry and she resembled his ex-wife, that would have been reason enough for him to seek her out once he was no longer with Haley, right? I mean, if I weren’t in the picture, maybe it would be her in the hotel room with him and not me.

I just didn’t understand how he could have a clear type, and then somehow end up with me. I tried to not be an insecure person considering I needed to have enough self-confidence to work in the field I was in, to take the chance of dating my boss, to bite back at Morgan and Reid playfully, and to stand up to Strauss when she was a pain in my ass. I needed to believe in myself or else I would fail in my career and personal life. But I was human, and sometimes I would look in the mirror, like I was doing just then, and I’d ask myself what Hotch saw in me. Why did he choose me? Why did he spend years silently passing by my office just to smile at me when he was married or, afterwards, when he could have had anyone else? Why me? What was so amazing about me that he could look me in the eyes and tell me that he loved me every day?

“Look at me,” he told me as he dropped his hairbrush on the counter. I reluctantly faced him. “I came alive when I finally met you. I saw colors for the first time. I could hear things I couldn’t hear before. I could feel things that I could never feel before. I look at you, and I see a lifetime of happiness waiting for me in your arms. When you first told me you love me, I could feel my heart restarting in my chest. I have lost a lot, Y/N… but meeting you… loving you… It’s the one constant I know I will have for the rest of my life. Every morning, I wake up and I look at you, and I think to myself that I got so damn lucky to find someone like you who loves me for me, while still encouraging me to do more, learn more, be more. I ask myself how anyone could come into my mess of a life and somehow choose to stick around, but somehow you do it. You continue to amaze me every single day when I see you at work, doing what you love, saving people’s lives. My heart melts every time I see you with Jack. My knees buckle every time you tell me you love me, and I swear I could listen to it forever.” He stepped closer to me and put his palms on my cheeks. “I look at you and I fall in love with you over and over again. I hold you in my arms and I think to myself that I should never let go because I’m so afraid that if I do, I might lose you somehow— and the thought of not getting to look at you every day, to hold you in my arms, to kiss your lips—” he dragged his thumb over my bottom lip— “to tell you that I love you every chance I can get… The thought of not having that with you because I might fuck something up… It terrifies me. You are the one person in the world who gets me. That’s why it’s you. That’s why it will always be you. You once told me that you’d never stop fighting for me, is that still true?” I nodded, pressing into his touch lovingly. “I knew the day I met you that I would do anything for you. I know that I’ll always fight for you. I know that I’d even die for you. That’s why.”

Before I could respond, Hotch leaned in close and kissed me with a fiery passion that expressed every word he just said to me in a way that both of us could feel. It was almost like his words were echoing through my body. I felt electric and on fire, all at the same time. I felt his love, warmth, and compassion with every second that passed by. Everything he said to me finally made sense when he kissed me, because I remembered that what he said was just as true for me as it was for him.

I loved Aaron Hotchner so much that it hurt sometimes. There were times when I would look at him and I would nearly cry because I was so happy, because I was so in love. No one had ever loved me like he did, and no one took the time to tell me why. Most people would have brushed off my question or allowed it to spiral into an argument because they couldn’t actually think of something to say. But not Hotch. He knew exactly what to say.

I jumped onto my tip toes and started kissing him harder to let him know that I heard him, I believed him, and I felt it all for him, too. I’d fight and die for him. I loved him more than anything in the world. Nothing made me feel more alive than kissing him. Nothing made me feel more at home than his arms. Nothing was more loving and comforting than the way he said that he loved me. The tug in my chest towards his heart skipped a beat as I thought it. I loved him. I loved him so much. I couldn’t think about anything else but how much I loved him. There weren’t enough ways to tell him just how much I loved him. The words didn’t exist, and even if they did, I didn’t have enough time in life to tell him every piece of it. There were a million and one reasons to love Aaron Hotchner, but I loved him for a billion different reasons.

Hotch lifted me off the ground. I wrapped my legs around his hips, and with my sudden height over him, I used it to dominate our kiss shortly. He set me down on the counter and pushed me away with a gentle hand on my neck. “You meant it, baby?” he asked me quietly, pressing his forehead to mine. “You’d say yes?” He was so stupid sometimes, I swear. He couldn’t just take yes for what it was. “And… and the other thing…”

“Aaron,” I whispered against his nose, “I love you more than anything. I don’t want to lose you either. So what do you think?” I smiled in response to his smirk. “Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Does that answer it?”

“Say it again.”

“Yes.” I pecked his lips. “I’d say yes, Aaron Hotchner. I’d always say yes.”

He grabbed my hips roughly and pressed a sudden, breathtaking kiss against my lips. I tried to grab ahold of him before I could fall back against the mirror behind me. We both giggled against each other. I loved him… I wanted to scream it from the top of my lungs— which I was sure was what he planned on making happen within the next hour or so— and I never wanted to stop saying it. I loved Aaron Hotchner. I would marry Aaron Hotchner. I wanted to have kids with Aaron Hotchner. I wanted to devote my entire life and being to Aaron Hotchner. I loved him, I loved him, I loved him. Yes, yes, yes. Always.

At seven, half of the team was already set up at the police station to give the profile there, while the other half of us were at the FBI New York Field Office to deliver the profile to the Bureau workers. Since this was a joint task force operation, it was imperative that the NYPD was also aware of what we were looking for. That being said, I was glad that I didn’t draw the short stick on that one. Emily, Spencer, and Morgan had to go downtown to talk with them, meanwhile Hotch, Rossi, and I went to the field office. They were well behaved and good listeners. The NYPD, on the other hand… with how Morgan lost it last night, I did not pity them.

Delivering the profile was fairly textbook, but the profile itself was anything but that. It seemed like the team heeded my advice about the Unsubs’ intentions, because the profile we built around them relied heavily on the fact that they were politically motivated. There was some kind of bigger plan at play, though we weren’t sure yet what it was. That was why we needed everyone else’s help. We knew that because there were two Unsubs completing the tasks of these seemingly random murders, we were dealing with a dominant/submissive pair. Explaining that part to the field office was fairly textbook, however. Because of how they had planned and executed these attacks, it was easy to conclude that they were sophisticated and intelligent. Therefore, at least the dominant had a steady job—which was also why they were only hitting at certain times.

When we concluded delivering the profile to the agents in the field office, I saw Hotch pull Kate to the side to discuss putting more men on the street. When they left, everyone turned to me. The snickers that had been plastered to their faces yesterday morning when joking about how they liaised together were now frowns and pouts of apologies. But I wasn’t jealous or upset. Not since last night. What Hotch and I discussed—what we practically decided—made me over the moon happy. How could I be jealous of Kate anymore when I knew that Hotch wanted to marry me and he saw us living our whole lives together? I trusted him. I had to remind myself of that. The team didn’t know these new developments, however. All they knew was that all of yesterday, I looked miserable while thinking about what could have potentially happened between Hotch and Kate. But last night… “Magical” felt like a hyperbolic term or one alluding to Disney, which in itself felt overdramatic, but… last night… Hotch and I… There were honestly no words.

While everyone went to go back to work after giving me soft, apologetic eyes, I grabbed JJ’s hand and practically yanked her into the women’s bathroom. She tried protesting, but I didn’t relent. Once the door was closed behind us, I turned to her with a giddy smile that only made her urge for answers more prominent.

“Hotch and I talked last night,” I told her, making sure all of the stalls were clear. She was watching me like I was a crazy person. I turned to her with a wider smile once I was sure that we were alone. “I think he’s going to propose once we get home.”

JJ’s eyes widened, but not in a good way like I had for her last night. She seemed genuinely shocked and almost… disturbed. “What?” she scoffed.

I tried to maintain my smile. “Yeah. We talked last night, and I think you bringing up St. Louis again brought up a good point for us, JJ. We’re ready. We’ve always been ready, but we’ve just been scared.” I took her hands. “JJ, I think this is it. Seriously.”

“I—” she chuckled back another scoff as she carefully tore her hands away from mine. “I didn’t realize that you two were that serious.”

My smile finally faded. “What?”

“I mean…” She crossed her arms over her chest. “You guys have only been dating for, what, a year? And you were already talking about kids around the six months mark or so? And now you’re talking about getting married? Don’t you think you’re moving things a little fast?”

I took a defensive, defeated step away from her. “What?” I repeated like a broken record.

“Listen, Y/N, dating Hotch and seeing Jack occasionally is one thing, but are you really willing to be Jack’s mother just as much as Haley is? Are you willing to spend more time with Haley for the sake of Hotch and Jack without making things awkward for them? Are you prepared for if Hotch makes a widow of you while on a case—or is he even prepared for if you make a widower of him? Have you considered any of this before taking the idea of marriage seriously?”

I thought that, of all people, JJ would get it. She hardly knew Will any longer than Hotch and I knew each other, and they were already having a kid together. Why was it that she got that opportunity freely, but I had to consider a thousand different things and jump through a million hoops to prove that I loved Hotch and that I would do anything for him? Yes, I was willing to be a mother to Jack—actually, I would have loved to be a mother to Jack. I practically already felt like I was. What was the difference in putting the actual label on it? And, of course I was willing to spend more time with Haley. There was obviously a cold shoulder feeling between us, but for the most part, we got along fairly well. If dealing with Haley meant being with Hotch and Jack, then, yes, I was willing to do that. And losing Hotch… No… I wasn’t ready for that. No one was ever ready for something like that. I was sure that Will and JJ weren’t even prepared for potentially losing each other. That wasn’t a fair jab on JJ’s behalf. It wasn’t. Losing Hotch was my worst nightmare. If anything bad ever happened to him, I’d die.

Before I could say anything to argue with JJ, there was a knock at the door. We both sighed off the tension as we looked away from one another. I cleared my throat. JJ opened the door slightly. I could see a sliver of Hotch’s silhouette, but he was keeping his back turned to not make it look like he was peeking into the women’s bathroom.

JJ looked at me slightly, “There’s another victim.”

I cursed under my breath. Before she could say anything else, I pushed past her and hurried out of the bathroom. Hotch and I brushed shoulders as I stormed out. I could sense that, behind me, Hotch and JJ were exchanging a glance where Hotch was asking for answers and JJ was shrugging off his gaze.

In the office space, I could hear that Morgan and Kate were fighting again. I wasn’t sure what was going on between them, but it was really starting to tick me off. There were a thousand reasons I should have been picking fights with Kate, but I knew that it wasn’t my place and there wasn’t time. I also talked to Hotch—you know, as adults do, and we solved the issue before it could be blown out of proportion. Whatever was going on with Morgan needed to be resolved soon or I was actually going to smack some sense into him.

“We could’ve had that guy!” Morgan exclaimed. “If you and Hotch just listened to me last night, this wouldn’t’ve happened.”

Kate rolled her eyes. “Even if we were on that platform, odds are that they would have targeted a different, less policed platform.”

“Yeah, well, at least that woman would still be alive.”

“Morgan,” Hotch said, coming up from behind me to step between them, “second-guessing isn’t going to do any of us any good right now—”

Morgan turned his attention. “Hotch, how am I supposed to look these cops in the eye and tell them that we’re here to help?”

“You’re not. We’re here to give the profile, that’s all.”

“I said to put us at express stops. 14th, 42nd, 59th, 63rd. That’s exactly where they hit!”

“It’s not your place to have this discussion or make this decision, Derek!”

“My place?” Morgan scoffed. “My place, Hotch? Are you fucking kidding me right now?”

“You need to back off. You need to stay focused here and not let your emotions get in the way.”

Morgan chuckled. “That’s funny, Hotch. Focused. From where I’m standing, all of your focus has been on her,” he pointed at Kate.

Kate rolled her eyes, Hotch bit the inside of his cheek, and I sighed to myself while trying to practically hide behind Rossi. I didn’t want to get mixed up in any of that. Morgan had a short fuse since coming to New York. Whatever possible reason there was for it, I needed to wait until he was cooled down to confront him about it. As for what he said about Hotch and Kate, he wasn’t necessarily wrong. Yes, Hotch was going out of his way to stand up for Kate, even though it wasn’t his job to. I supposed that should have made me mad, but I couldn’t focus on anything besides what JJ said to me in the bathroom. I confided in her as a friend. I thought that she would have been excited for me, yet I was only met with skepticism. I hated it.

“Take a walk. Now,” Hotch said quietly and angrily.

Morgan huffed, giving up on fighting with Hotch again. He didn’t look at me as he turned towards the elevators so that he could catch some of that “fresh” New York City air. There was silence for the longest time in the office. Kate was watching Hotch, but he was watching me, and I was watching JJ. We all had different things on our minds, and none of it had to do with the case. Great. How were we supposed to save people like this? How were we supposed to put our jobs first when Kate clearly still had feelings for Hotch, and he was worried about me and the conversation we had last night, all the while I was mad at JJ for what she said. And then there was Morgan… Morgan was mad at practically all of us. He was mad at Kate for who knew what, he was mad at Hotch for defending her over him, he was mad at me for not having his back, and he was mad at the rest of the team for not taking a side.

“Kate,” Hotch whispered, nodding towards her office. She caught his hint and followed him there.

The rest of us stood around, completely clueless as to what we should do. Normally, we would head down to the crime scene to investigate, but that system had proven to be useless over the past couple of murders. More was getting done around the office than the crime scenes. But not this time. It felt like we were always in the wrong place. Maybe Morgan really did have a point. If Hotch and Kate had just listened to him, this wouldn’t have happened—or maybe it still would’ve happened, but at least we would’ve had cops on the streets to try and stop the Unsub, or maybe someone on the team could race to the crime scene to tell us if it were worth taking a look at or not. But now we had nothing. Kate and Hotch were talking privately and the rest of us were doing fuck all.

It didn’t take long for them to talk, however. Hotch opened the door to her office again, ushering her through, and then they met us back in the office space.

“We’re going to be putting all of our forces on the streets today,” Kate announced to everyone.

“Now?” I questioned. We had no proof that they would hit more than once in one day. What was the point of taking Morgan’s advice now? It would have been better if they just waited until tomorrow.

Kate squinted at me. “Yes. Now. We’ll all pair up, taking different streets and stations where we anticipate their next attack. Even if they won’t strike again today, it’s very likely that they’ll be scouting their next targets, which means that they’ll stick out like sore thumbs. Our job today is to look for people out of place and to question them. That’s all.”

I scoffed quietly and looked at Hotch. Now I know how Morgan felt “I’ll go with Derek, I guess.” I threw my hands up in disbelief of what I was seeing and hearing. I couldn’t believe Hotch was agreeing to this. We could’ve been staying to work on the profile instead of stalking the streets for no reason.

So while everyone quietly started pairing up, they kept an eye on me as I headed for the elevator. When I reached the lobby, I saw Morgan pacing angrily, hitting the wall with his foot every time he ran into one. When he spotted me, though, he stopped pacing, and his face softened a bit. My face was still hot with the anger that was building in my chest. Morgan’s frustration was rubbing off on me and I didn’t exactly appreciate it.

“Let’s go,” I huffed, walking straight past him. He followed on my heels. “Kate’s finally putting everyone out on the street.”

“You’re kidding,” he chortled.

“We’re all one step behind these two Unsubs, yet Kate seems about three steps behind us. I don’t understand why Hotch trusts her so much.”

“Their history?”

I shook my head as we pushed through the front doors of the building. “I asked him about it, and he told me that nothing ever happened between them.”

“Be that as it may, but they still have some kind of feelings for each other. She definitely likes him more, and I’m not saying he likes her like that, but… There was something there at some point, Y/N, and that’s all getting dragged up again.”

“I get that,” I said when we reached the SUV on the road that we were going to take to our assignment. “But that still doesn’t excuse his ignorance.”

“I know.”

We got in the car and I told Morgan where we were headed.

We were sitting in the car for a few hours, scanning the road, watching pedestrians as they passed by. Morgan and I chatted a bit about stuff outside of work because that was clearly a sore, irritating topic for us both. Unfortunately, there was a good hour or so where I had to hear about some of his hookups. Every detail. I think he forgot that just because we were best friends didn’t exactly mean I needed to hear about how many women he could sleep with in one night. I mean, hey, I was glad he trusted me with that information, but there were some things that were better unsaid.

“What’s going on with you?” I asked quietly. Morgan looked at me suddenly. “Why are you and Kate arguing all the time?”

Morgan sighed. “It’s nothing.”

“It’s not nothing. She’s got you all riled up. For what?”

His grip tightened on the steering wheel out of frustration. “Hotch told me something yesterday.” I cocked a brow. “The Bureau’s going to fire Kate if she doesn’t close this case with a ribbon on top.”

“Okay. So? Why should you care? Do you like her or something?”

He shot me a glare. “No. If she’s kicked out, I’m at the top of her replacement list.”

My heart dropped to my stomach. That was why he was challenging authority. He could see the position in his future. He saw that he could potentially be running the New York Field Office soon, and he was letting it get to his head. The whole point of our job was that we weren’t supposed to let emotions get in the way, but he was doing the exact opposite, almost like he was hoping that Kate would fail. Obviously, we didn’t want this pair of Unsubs to keep killing, but… he wanted that job. And I didn’t blame him. I didn’t want him to leave us—to leave me, but it was a good fucking opportunity. If he ended up getting the job offer for one reason or another, I’d have to let him go, even though it would kill me. He was my best friend. He was my partner in the field. I didn’t know how to do this without him. But if I had to, then I had to. That was life.

“Morgan—”

“Garcia! We’ve got an officer down!” Emily shouted into the comms. Morgan immediately pressed his foot onto the gas pedal while l turned on the lights and sirens. “16th West of Union Square!”

We weren’t very far from 16th. I mean, in New York traffic, we were pretty far; but with the lights and sirens on, we moved somewhat faster through the crowd of cars. Morgan weaved his way through, honking at every car that refused to move, cursing at every pedestrian that was in our way, cursing to himself that we weren’t getting to Emily faster. This was what he wanted, though. He told Kate we should put cops on the streets. Yet look what happened. Cooper went with Emily, and she called it in, but what were we supposed to do if we found Emily lying on the concrete, too? I don’t think either of us would be able to handle it.

As we approached 17th, I could see the crowd surrounding an alleyway just on 16th. Morgan made a turn and sped up to them to see what was going on. While he slowed down, I popped my door open and jumped out, running with the momentum of the car a bit to make sure I wouldn’t fall flat on my face. I pushed through the crowd of pedestrians, calling out: “FBI! Move!” while shoving them around. When I got through, I saw them. Emily was crouched over Cooper, and there was an Unsub about ten feet away from them, bleeding out.

I cursed under my breath and ran to the Unsub, pulling off my jacket so that I could use it to put pressure on his wounds. He couldn’t die. We needed him. He was our only chance of getting answers. But he wasn’t conscious. He was breathing, yet he wasn’t awake. If we could keep him alive long enough, to keep the two bullet wounds in his chest at bay for just a few more hours, we could get answers.

I pressed onto my jacket on his chest with both of my palms. I was trying to stop the bleeding until the paramedics could arrive, but he was already bleeding through the fabric of my jacket. I didn’t know what else to do. The ambulances were close—I could hear their sirens just a few blocks away. But I didn’t know what else to do. With all the blood he lost… And then he started to crash. My breath hitched before I started performing CPR in a panic. We couldn’t lose him. We just couldn’t.

He suddenly woke up with a gasp. As his eyes adjusted to the sunlight, he tried to wiggle around, but I held him still to make sure he wouldn’t cause anymore internal harm. He looked up at me. “Let me die.”

I froze. I wasn’t going to let him die. No. “What’s your name?”

“Let me die…”

“No,” I answered quickly. “What’s your name, kid?”

“Ma’am, we’ll take it from here,” a paramedic said, racing up behind me. I didn’t even realize that they had already made it. So I moved back, letting them get to work since they could do more than I could. “Step away,” he insisted, pointing to the end of the alleyway.

I nodded silently, then slowly turned on my heels. As I slowly started making my way out of the alley, I glanced over my shoulder to get a look at the Unsub one last time. He was just a kid… seventeen or eighteen, maybe. He didn’t look like the type of submissive or dominant to be running around these streets. He just looked like any normal kid. So why? The dominant wouldn’t have gotten caught, and he didn’t fit the description of the submissive. So… what was going on?

“Are you okay?” Morgan asked worriedly, running up to a shell shocked Emily. She nodded slightly. “Is he going to make it?” We all looked at the ambulance where they were loading up Cooper to take him to the hospital.

Her gaze fell to the ground. “I— I don’t… I don’t know.”

I suddenly felt a hand on my shoulder. “You okay, kid?” Rossi asked me.

I didn’t say anything. That kid down there was going to die because I couldn’t do more… How was I supposed to live with that? I could shoot an Unsub, no problem, but trying to save a kid? It didn’t make sense why it was hitting me so hard. It shouldn’t have mattered. He should have been any old Unsub. But he was a kid… Hotch and I were talking about having kids… What if someone shot our— No.

“Let me get you something to wipe this off,” Rossi said, pointing to my bloody hands. He snapped at Reid, a signal to find a rag or something. “What happened?” he asked me, trying to get me to focus on something.

I shook my head. “I… Morgan and I got here afterwards… Emily… She…” I looked up at him as Reid returned with a rag and started gently wiping the blood off my hands. “He’s just a kid, Rossi. He doesn’t match the descriptions of our Unsubs.”

“You think that this is an unrelated, isolated case?” Reid inquired.

I glanced between him and my hands. The fucking blood wasn’t coming off. It was still wet, and it should have been wiped away with ease, but it was still there, drying, taunting me. I had a kid’s blood on my hands. “No,” I answered him quietly. “It’s the same; I just don’t understand how.” I shyly looked at Rossi. “He wanted me to let him die.”

Rossi’s face relaxed, almost like something important occurred to him. “I think we have a serious fucking problem,” he cursed under his breath. Reid stopped wiping my hands clean. When I looked down again, though, it didn’t look like he made any progress, so I started scratching at it. “We have multiple Unsubs, they’re willing to die— according to Y/N— they’re using counter-surveillance, there seems to be a hierarchy, a random thirst for blood, a need to create chaos amongst the masses—”

“Terrorists,” I mumbled.

“Exactly.”

“What do we have?” Hotch asked, running up to us with Kate hot on his heels.

Still scratching at my hands to get the blood off, I answered, “Cooper’s headed to the hospital, the Unsub’s too unstable to transport right now—”

“Do they think he’ll make it?” Kate inquired.

I stared at her for a moment before shaking my head. I continued talking to Hotch, “There’s a problem, though. This guy’s a third Unsub, and he begged me to let him die, Hotch. We were just talking about it…” I trailed off, unsure of how to proceed while still focusing on the damn blood that wouldn’t come off my hands.

Reid took over after noticing my awkward silence. “We think these guys might be terrorists.” Everyone’s posture changed. “The murders simulate bombings. Typically, with terrorist bombings, there’s one, less lethal bombing to gauge police response times, then there will be another bombing on another day with a second bombing to follow suit once the emergency responders get there. The targets are usually civilians for the test bombing and the first bombing so as to create chaos. The second bombing, however, is the main focus of the attacks, and that’s because attacking emergency responders is, in a way, attacking the government and the system itself. Today, what we saw was that plan finally being enacted. They’ve been test running with the past few shootings in order to get our attention, which is also what the Tarot card was for, and once they knew that they had first responders on the street, they went for it. If Emily didn’t shoot the Unsub, he would’ve shot her.”

I looked at the blood on my hands again to notice that it was gone. My palms were all red from scratching them up, but the blood had been gone ever since Reid wiped it away, and I hadn’t noticed. Something about how Reid mentioned that the Unsub lying on the ground probably seven feet away from us would’ve killed Emily made me suddenly less empathetic.

“This is the bigger play here, Aaron,” Rossi said. “This is what we’ve been missing.”

Hotch’s phone started ringing. He glanced at the caller ID first to see if it were something he could ignore while we were talking about a potential terror attack. It must have been important because he answered it and put it on speaker. “Garcia?”

“Sir, we’ve got a problem. I’ve been looking through all the cameras since the last shooting, and they’ve all been hacked into. That’s how they’ve been watching us. That’s how they’ve been ahead of us this entire time.”

“How did we not catch that sooner?”

“It was system wide. I had to check camera by camera to be sure.”

Hotch sighed. “Okay. Thanks, Garcia.” He hung up on her. “This isn’t just a theory anymore. If the shootings were just a test, there’s going to be something big.”

Hotch put his phone away in his pocket. “Morgan and Y/N, head to Homeland Security to discuss raising this to a terrorist watch level. It’s…” He hesitated. “It’s possible that there will be a bombing soon.”

“Morgan, you have bomb experience, so I want you to head this if it comes to that point,” Kate said. Morgan, Hotch, and I all seemed shocked. “If that’s alright with you.”

Morgan nodded. “Sure.”

Before jumping onto our toes so that we could hurry back to our car, Hotch stopped us to make sure that we would stay in contact. These guys were going after first responders and they were watching us. We had to consider that we were all targets. Morgan and I agreed. Then we hurried off. The second we were in our seats, Morgan started driving off. Neither of us had our seatbelts on.

The sun was already starting to set, which meant that it would be dark soon, and that we were running out of time. If this really was as bad as we figured it was, then it meant that a bomb could go off at any point. It could have happened before, during, or after our meeting with Homeland Security, and then what? The whole city would go under lock down, our whole team separated. It wasn’t ideal. So we had to race to convince Homeland Security that this was a real, viable threat.

My phone buzzed with a call that I picked up as soon as I could, not even bothering to look at the caller ID. “Greenaway,” I answered.

“Hey,” Hotch greeted, “I just wanted to let you know that Kate and I are heading back to the field office right now. When you and Morgan are done at Homeland, meet us there before we head to the hotel for the night.”

“Okay. Sounds good. I’ll let Morgan know.”

“Thanks. I love you.”

That caught me off guard for a moment, but I tried not to overthink it. It probably had to do with trying to prove to me and himself that nothing happened with Kate— at least nothing that mattered— or that our conversation last night shouldn’t matter, or maybe it really was just an accident. Either way, I returned the favor before hanging up and tossing my phone in the cup holder.

“What was that about?” Morgan inquired.

“Hotch wants us to meet up with him and Kate at the office before going back to the hotel for the night.”

“Did he say why?”

I shook my head. “I figure it’s probably just to review our meeting with Homeland Security, and then we’ll be set loose.”

“Hopefully. I’m exhausted.”

“I could use a drink.” I threw my head back against the headrest.

“What’s been up with you today?” he asked, keeping his eyes on the road. I raised a brow. “Come on, Greenaway. I know when something’s wrong with you.”

“How—”

“Don’t ask because I won’t tell you how I know. But, seriously, what is it?”

“Did JJ tell you?” I narrowed my eyes suspiciously.

He looked over at me. “No. But now you’ve piqued my interest.”

I silently cursed myself for saying anything at all. If I would have just kept my mouth shut, I could have denied that something was wrong, or I could have just avoided the topic altogether by not saying anything until we would get to the Homeland Security office. But now Morgan definitely wasn’t going to leave it alone. It wasn’t like I didn’t want to discuss Hotch with Morgan. I knew that Morgan loved me and he was glad that we were happy with each other… but after what JJ said, I was scared to talk about it with anyone else. I thought that, of all people, JJ would have understood; yet she took my heart in her hand and practically squeezed it into dust. I didn’t want Morgan to give me the same pessimistic opinion.

I let out a quiet sigh and stared at my sweaty palms. “Hotch and I talked last night about getting married and having kids.” I waited, trying to gauge if Morgan would protest just yet. He didn’t react, though. “I told him that I’d marry him in a heartbeat, and I’d have kids with him whenever. I mean… that wasn’t exactly what was said, but that was the gist of it… I was really excited about it, though, Derek. I felt like Hotch and I were on the same page about it, and I even figured that once this was all over with, he might even propose…” I hesitated when I saw his grip on the steering wheel tense. My shoulders fell in defeat. “JJ thinks we’re rushing and should hold off on making any big decisions like that.”

“I agree with JJ,” he insisted quickly before I could continue.

I felt my heart sink in my chest. My worst fear had been realized. It didn’t matter how happy anyone on the team was for me and Hotch, they didn’t understand why we were already talking about getting married a year into our relationship. Morgan would always give me shit for dating Hotch, but I thought that it was always because of the age difference, or the fact that he was my superior. But I never stopped to think that it was because he thought that Hotch and I weren’t actually that serious. We were. I couldn’t imagine my life with anyone else but Hotch. Of course I wanted to marry him and have a family with him. Why wait if we knew that it was what we wanted? What was the point of dancing around it? I was serious about it, Hotch was serious about it… Why could no one else seem to understand that?

Morgan took notice of my silence, so he decided to backpedal and explain himself. “You know I love you, sunshine, but… Come on. I know that things seem really good, and they probably are because you’re still technically in the honeymoon stage of your relationship, but I don’t want you to jump the gun on this and get hurt like Haley got hurt. Hotch is different around you, there’s no denying it. I just worry that he might wake up one day and realize that he doesn’t want to be this new person anymore. He might want to be who he’s always been. And if that happens, I don’t want you to get hurt because of it. It’s easy to wiggle out of a situation like that when you have no legal ties. But look at Haley. She wanted out, yet she’s still tied to him. If you get married, or if you have kids, and things fall apart, what are you going to do? Stick around like Haley does? Stay in the BAU and pretend like nothing happened?” He looked over at me, reading the disappointed look I was wearing, and he grabbed my hand. “I want what’s best for you. If you really think you’re ready for the next steps, then I can’t stop you. But maybe you should just think about it a little longer—”

My phone started ringing. I thanked literally every higher power imaginable from saving me from hearing the rest of that. And, honestly, Morgan was probably relieved, too. It seemed like he was rambling in order to try and save his rapport with me, but it wasn’t helping. I knew that he meant well. I knew that he loved me. I knew that he was just looking out for me. But I really wanted his support on this when JJ wouldn’t give it. I felt like if even one person could be happy for us, then that was good enough for me. But Hotch and I cared too much about our team and what they thought of us to not take into account how they each felt about us. If there was any chance that our relationship was going to impact the team, they had every right to know about it beforehand in the same way Jack and Haley deserved to know.

“Garcia?”

“Oh, my god, you’re okay,” she sighed with relief.

I raised a brow and put the call on speaker so that Morgan could listen in. “What’s going on?” I asked.

“You haven’t heard?”

Morgan and I shared a look of confusion. “Penelope, what happened?” Derek asked this time.

“I—Wh—” She sniffled.

“Penelope,” he insisted, getting worried.

“There was a bomb in one of the cars. I don’t know where anyone is, I don’t know who took which car, I don’t know who’s okay, I don’t—”

“Woah, woah, woah, baby girl. Calm down. Use your words. Explain what happened.”

We heard Garcia take in a deep, calming breath. “There was a bomb in one of the SUVs.”

“Where?”

“Just outside of the field office.”

I nearly dropped my phone. Hotch called me from the car he and Kate were in on their way to the field office. He told us to meet him there. He— He was in one of those SUVs. I just heard from him— It couldn’t be him, right? Right… Please. My head started to spin.

“Have you heard from Hotch?” Morgan asked for me.

“I haven’t heard from anyone. You guys are the first ones I called. I didn’t know what else to do—”

“Calm down. It’s going to be alright. Call my phone and keep me on the line while you try to get ahold of everyone else. Y/N’s going to call Hotch, alright?”

I silently thanked him for knowing me well enough to know that I would want to be the one to call Hotch. He probably understood that I was fearing the worst, thinking that it was Hotch and Kate in that bombing. He knew that I’d be desperate to get off the phone with Garcia so that I could get ahold of Hotch. I thanked him for knowing me like that. I thanked him for being my friend who looked out for me. Even if he was an asshole only a minute ago.

“Okay,” Garcia agreed. She hung up the call on my phone, and moments later, Morgan’s phone started to ring.

As he answered, I started dialing Hotch’s number. It started ringing. One. Beat. Two. Beat. Three. Beat. Four. Beat. Five. Beat. Click.

“You’ve reached Aaron Hotchner. Leave your name and message and I’ll get back to you when I can.”

[author-morgan]

i love your works, especially what you do for Eivor. if you have time, could you do something where the reader is a healer and Eivor is her terrible patient? XOXO

Here you go, nonny! Hope you enjoy!

m!Eivor x fem!Reader

“BE CAREFUL, EIVOR,” you tell him standing on the docks as he helps pack one of the longships for the summer raids. He has only just recovered from a rancid cut on his calf not even a fortnight ago. The stubborn fool tried to hide the wound until you saw him emptying his stomach outside the feast hall and staggering back toward his small home on the outskirts of the village without having touched a single drop of ale. 

His lips twitch into a smile beneath his golden beard. “Always am,” he replies, confident. As the healer’s apprentice you know even the strongest of men can be brought down by a single arrow. You worry for Eivor Wolfsmal and all the warriors setting off today, but Eivor is both obstinate and cocksure, two traits often leading to injury in battle. He knows you worry though, and after loading the last barrel of water into the ship, Eivor reaches for your hands —delicate against his rough paws. “I promise,” he says, voice softer than before. 

Pleased with his oath, you smile and take another step closer, rising up on your toes —lips ghosting over his scarred cheeks. A promise and a farewell until next you meet. His clear eyes slip close at the featherlight touch and his heart skips a beat but the words on his tongue fade back into silence. He had fancied you for years, but never knew the right words to say —the timing never felt right either. A red-pink flush of color spans across his cheeks. Eivor lowers his gaze and steps back, letting your hands slip from his as others brush past you to-and-from the ships. 

The longships set off from the docks into the Kattegat before the sun rises, but Sýnin lingers at your side for a moment longer. Eivor looks back from the stern, watching as his home and you shrink on the horizon. You sit on the end of the dock, bare feet skimming the cool, dark water until the small fleet of longships passes out of sight. 

Sighing, you retreat back into the village and to help the healer, Ingibjǫrg. There is still work to be done, even in times of peace. Ingibjǫrg had been kind enough to take you in as her apprentice at a young age —starting with simple tasks like gathering herbs and flowers, grinding poultices, and caring for the cautery tools. Though now, she trusts you to work at her side as an equal, but the old crone still fondly calls you her apprentice. 

Time passes slowly during the raiding season. The women and elders are more diligent than their hotheaded sons and daughters, leading to few and minor injuries to care for during the days. It gives you ample time to sure-up the stores of supplies when the ships return. On a narrow trail overlooking the harbor, you spot the first of the longships, a scarlet sail emerging from the evening mist —then a second and third. The call of a great horn announces their return as you race back down the trail and along the rocky shore toward the docks.  

All of the longships return, docking along the wharf and the victorious warriors disembark with their newfound riches and reunite with waiting spouses and children —few have been lost to battle this time. You search for Eivor, having seen Sýnin pass overhead and heard the raven’s call. You find him and three others bearing Arne on a makeshift stretcher with scraps of linen and wool bound tightly around his leg and middle. He offers a fleeting smile as you usher them to Ingibjǫrg. 

Moving Arne onto a cot near the hearth, all but Eivor take their leave. You quickly help Ingibjǫrg do away with the soiled dressings and strip him of his broken mail and clothes. Neither of the wounds are severe, though they have begun to fester. He whimpers when she lays a hot cloth over each of the gashes, but you turn your attention to Eivor —shuffling on his feet. “Eivor?” You ask, noticing the sweat on his brow and the pallid color of his cheeks. 

“I’m fine,” he assures you, noting the concern in your tone and kind eyes. Eivor doesn’t like it when people worry over him, especially you —you have enough to worry over with helping Ingibjǫrg.

Stepping to him, you lift your hand to his clammy forehead and frown. He is burning up to the touch. “No, you’re not,” you tell him, “you’re fevered.” Too often you had seen fevers turn deadly from neglect. A fever could be like an arrow, even the strongest of men were not immune to its deadly grasp.  

“It’s nothing,” Eivor protests, but you both know it is a lie. The return journey was delayed by a two-day storm and he sacrificed many of his own rations for Arne’s sake, taking little time to rest from rowing. Your frown deepens. 

Ingibjǫrg wipes her hands on her apron and looks over at where you and Eivor stand, having heard the brief conversation. “See to it that he gets a good meal and rest,” the old healer says —she can tend to Arne herself. “Too long at sea makes one ripe for sickness.” Eivor knows better than to protest Ingibjǫrg’s wisdom. Taking his hand, you lead him through the muddy streets and back to your little house —the one closest to the rocky shore with a soft pillar of smoke rising from the duab roof. 

You push the door open and, greeted by the scent of a pot of stew with pork, cabbage, leeks, and thyme that’d been cooking over the hearth since dawn. Sýnin takes to a ceiling joint, perching above and Eivor sits on the low wooden bench near the fire and sighs, eyes slipping shut with a soft groan. It feels like he could sleep for a week without waking though his rumbling stomach reminds him there will be no rest yet. You pass Eivor a heaping bowl of the hot stew to go along with a hunk of brown bread and cup of watered ale, sitting next to him with your own helping. 

Eivor ladles out another bowlful of the stew and watches as you move around the single-room home —setting a pot of water over the hearth in place of the stew. You take out several small sashes of dried herbs and place them in a cup, tamping the assortment with the end of a wooden spoon. He can vaguely make out the scent of garlic. 

When the water begins to steam, you dip the cup into the pot and leave the fever tonic to steep —the stronger the better— before turning your attention back to him. “What are you doing?” He asks, looking up when you reach to unclasp the damp fur mantle around his shoulders.

Rolling your eyes, you lay the pelt aside to dry and start at the leather laces on his chest. His clear blue eyes studying your every move and committing the small wrinkles around your lips and eyes to memory. “These damp clothes aren’t helping you, Eivor,” you chide, continuing to untie his leather jerkin. A flush of color unrelated to the fever rises to his cheeks at how close you are to him —his heart starts to beat faster, too. Batting away your hands, Eivor sets about stripping off the rest of his damp clothes. 

Rummaging around in a wooden chest, you pull out a spare tunic belonging to Eivor. You’d kept it for years, never quite knowing when he would turn up at your door. He pulls the scarlet tunic overhead and lets out a long sigh, stretching his now bare legs toward the fire —much like the rest of him, Eivor’s thighs are strong, corded with muscle. Ignoring his current state of undress, you hand him the freshly brewed tonic. 

He sniffs the drink and scrunches up his face, looking up from the wooden cup to you as you unbind your hair from a braid. “You’re trying to kill me,” he deadpans. The mixture of wild garlic and caraway does not smell pleasant, but you know the old remedy works —Ingibjǫrg wouldn’t brew the tonic if it didn’t. 

You laugh, shaking your head. “If I were–” your fingers catch on a knot “–you’d be dead already, Eivor Wolfsmal.” Pinching his nose, he downs the warm tonic in a single gulp and quickly washes it down with another cup of ale. Taking the empty cup, you nudge him toward the small bed against the wall —a straw-stuffed mattress with a handful of pelts and wool blanket you’d spent the greater part of a year weaving. Before he rises from the bench you kiss his temple. “Get some rest,” you tell him. 

“Mmm,” he grumbles, gripping onto your wrist when you turn away, “not without you.” He blames the boldness of his words on the fever and ale but fails to hide his smile when you pull him to the bed and lay next to him. 

EIVOR ENTERS THE healer’s quarters and immediately Ingibjǫrg is pointing you in his direction. She is in the middle of preparing a poultice and tonic for the Jarl’s sickly daughter, but even if she wasn’t Eivor had always been your charge. Wiping your hands on the front of your dress you look him over. He does not appear sick, nor does there seem to be any signs of a grievous injury save for the blood on his hand. Sýnin croaks, perched upon his shoulder —watching you closely. 

Since returning from the raids, Eivor had frequented you and Ingibjǫrg more often for minor things. The old healer was the first to notice the change, but it is not until this moment you truly recognize what he is doing. He holds out his hand revealing a slim cut in his palm —his axe had slipped from his grasp while splitting wood. “This little cut?” You ask, soft smile bordering on a smirk. He nods and you lead him over to a small table and bench, gathering a pitcher of water and a clean strip of linen. Sitting across from Eivor, you clean and bind the wound and send him off with a kiss upon the cheek —the only patient who gets such special treatment. 

EARLY ONE MORNING Eivor shows up at your door. You lift your brow in silent question and cross your arms over your chest to preserve some modesty in the threadbare linen shift. He rubs the scarred patch of skin on the back of his neck and looks down at his feet, giving a small cough that sounds like a child feigning to be sick to get out of chores. “Was wondering,” his voice trails off, “if you could make some more of that stew? Been coughing an awful lot.”

Motioning him into your home, you shuffle around in a small box of herbs, ointments, and ceramic vials of prepared tonics. Uncorking one, you hand it to Eivor —a challenge to see if he will admit his true intentions of coming to disturb your slumber. “Drink some of this then.” 

It smells even worse than the garlic and caraway tonic you made when he was sick and Eivor imagines it will taste even worse. “I’d rather not,” he objects, pushing your hand away. 

Replacing the stopper and returning the vial to its place, you step back in front of Eivor, laying your hand on his forehead —damp with sweat from a morning run but not fevered. You shake your head, lips kinking. “You don’t have to pretend to be sick or hurt to visit,” you tell him, hand slipping from his forehead to cup his scarred cheek. Eivor leans into the touch with a faint sigh. He wanted to tell you how he felt on the docks before sailing for Anglia, but the words were stuck in his throat, much like they are now. 

Instead, Eivor will show you. His hand covers yours as he bends down, giving you time to step back, but you don’t. The unfamiliar tickle of his golden beard against your cheek causes you to smile, just as his lips brush against yours —hesitant then more certain when you push up on your toes and into him. Eivor’s arms wrap around your middle and when the kiss breaks, he lifts you up carrying you back to bed. “Are you allowed to have this type of relation with a patient?” He asks, laughing while leaning in for another kiss. You push on his shoulder, rolling your eyes, but accept a second kiss without complaint. 

“Eivor Wolfsmal,” you start, and he hangs off of every word as you brush your fingers over the tattoo of a raven on the side of his head “I love you.” He may be stubborn and a terrible patient at times, but you had loved him for as long as you could remember. Eivor’s tender gaze and the calm silence is broken by Sýnin in the rafters, squawking and bouncing from foot-to-foot. The raven’s antics make you laugh, but Eivor knows why his cantankerous bird is acting like this. He rolls onto his side, rough hand tracing along your cheek and jaw. 

Eivor draws you flush against him, lips seeking yours for the third of many times to come. The action silences Sýnin, but the raven still looks down —dark eyes trained on the two of you. He sighs when you part and presses his forehead against yours, holding you close. “Ek ann þér,” he breathes with a soft sigh —his only regret is he had not told you sooner, but unless Ingibjǫrg comes knocking, there’s plenty of hours left in the day to make up for lost time. 

 @fjor-ok-skadi  @withered-poppies @ananriel @britishhotassassin @nemo-my-name-forevermore if you want to be added to my taglist for Eivor content, just let me know!

[wendibird]

SPN 15X14 Observations

So, for whatever dumbass reason, when trying to use my actual television, the cable refuses to work properly 8 times out of 10. BUT I was able to stream tonight’s episode on my computer with my cable network’s app. So, there’s that. Because of that, and since it’s easier for me to type on my keyboard than on my phone, I actually took quick notes and observations during commercial breaks. Here are those, then some more of my thoughts following. (And I’m sorry if any of these seem a bit incoherent. They were more my observations to myself. *LOL*  

(everything else under the keep reading line since I got a bit rambly, and just in case anyone wants to avoid spoilers)

- Brothers being written a bit like characters of themselves rather than just themselves. (trying too hard?)

- Love Mrs. Butters. Actress really good. And the minor ret-con works with what we've seen.

- Sam more concerned about Jack. I think he understands him better, even though he hasn't seen much of him.

- "Ignoring your trauma doesn't make you healthy." (or something like that.) Good quote!

- Waiting for the catch.

- "Enjoy the world you're fighting for." (compare with Kevin's similar line: "I can't enjoy a world I need to save.")

- Mrs. Butters knows Jack isn't human.

- BOY did the shoe drop! But it was Sinclaire involved. Not surprised he took advantage of her natural protective nature.

- Wanted more plot for WHY exactly they still have Thor's Hammer. Have they had it this whole time? Last we saw Sam dropped it in 8X2. Or did Mrs. Butters conjure it up because they might need it? Was cool though that Sam was using it. Because we already know he can.

- Jack figured out on his own how to use the projector. (love that boy!)

- liked hearing him talk about what happened with Mary and how he feels.

- Mrs. Butters knows from experience about needing "second chances" I think.

- Why were they ALWAYS wearing the same clothes during the "We got one!" montages? Assuming it was supposed to have taken place over several days at least if not longer. (I highly doubt they went out on THAT many hunts in one day.)

- Yeeeah... So I get she's protective, but JACK IS BABY! She can clearly see his power levels but she has to have seen how he he actually IS? But she gave him the smoothies from the start, so she's been planning it from almost the start. Hrm.

- idk what anyone else says, I'm thrilled that Sam and Eileen had a date. Also, THIS is where that sweater-vest comes from. Bet we'll see him going for his gun too. (That clip was hotly debated in one of the discord servers I’m on)

- Dean is obviously still having some issues with Jack, but he also seems to know that they're his personal issues and he knows that Jack is good. (Expanding on this thought post episode, I was seeing this as Dean recognizing the difference between what he knows and what he’s feeling. So, yey! Personal growth!)

- DEAN JACK IS NOT A BATTERING RAM!!!

- Dean sees Jack as a weapon. He used him as a battering ram. He'll use him as a grenade to throw at Chuck. (More on this after the notes.)

- Sam sees him as a person. His argument was that Jack was someone he cared about. That killing him would HURT him.

- Also, did they HAVE to go for the fingernails again?!

- Poor Sam, getting tortured. And being the "favorite" of something bad.

- Also, SAM WAS RIGHT! To be cautious of her at first. Too many times he's had things/people seem good and turn out opposite.

- And because Dean had decided it was all okay, they both stopped looking up on her.

- Maybe Sam will realize that he doesn't always have to follow Dean's lead. He can pursue his own paths. (Not talking about them separating. Just, if he wants to look into something, he should do it. If he wants to follow a different lead, he should check it out.)

- I know he lost a lot of confidence last season but I hope he realizes that he doesn't by default make bad decisions.

- Okay, that was a good resolution. I'm glad she's going back to her people.

- Interdimensional geoscope: Dean saw nothing. Because ALL the other universes are gone. *sad-face*

- Love Sam and Jack. Wish we got a bit more. But it was something.

- Also love that Dean tried. That felt real to me. (the birthday cake)

More thoughts! 

So. Overall I liked this episode. It was lighthearted mostly, but touched on some serious topics and wasn’t completely disconnected with what is going on with everyone, despite the random holiday montage. *LOL* (Yes, I know she wasn’t bending time or anything, she was just choosing to celebrate some holidays with her boys regardless of when this is all taking place exactly.) It did feel a bit to me, at the start anyway, like the writing at least was trying too hard to “Sound like Sam and Dean” instead of just them being them. I mentioned that at the start but what I mean is, in this season especially (but not exclusively) I’ve noticed a lot of times where it feels to me like the writing/directing/whatever leads to the sum total of what we see is trying too hard to present this idea of who the characters are, like caricatures of them. The things associated with them get emphasized, sometimes out of proportion. Though in this episode, it only felt like that during the opening scene and maybe a few places elsewhere. Overall I thought the writing and especially the acting on the parts of the main 3 guys and the guest actor were well done and had a lot of nuance when needed. Like, as an example, when Sam and Dean sussed out that this being that they didn’t even know was a bit behind the times, they were actually pretty gentle with bringing her up to speed. And her reaction to realizing that everyone she knew before was dead felt very real. 

I liked what we saw of where each of the characters were emotionally this episode. It was the first one after Jack has been re-souled and it had definitely been weighing on my mind how everyone was doing. (Though I REALLY wish we could have actually seen Sam and Dean’s reactions to Jack tearfully begging their forgiveness last episode. But lacking any other input, I’m headcannoning that Sam gave him a very long, warm hug.)  

I also agree with Sam, I think there’s something more that Jack hasn’t told them yet, probably some details about Billy’s plan that he or her are sure the brothers won’t like. (Now, what exactly that could be is very much up in the air. I can think of quite a few options, but the details aren’t really important to me just now. Just the fact that something about it is weighing on Jack. More than just Mary’s death and the prospect of having to kill God. Which, in and of themselves would be more than enough.) 

Speaking of Sam, I liked that we saw all those little nods to how he feels about Jack, how he’s still worried about him, and seems to understand him. 

I also get where Dean’s coming from. And I thought it was well-portrayed. And let me just say, I am GLAD that he just outright told Jack where he was at. He didn’t sugarcoat it, but he also didn’t blow up at him, or reply with sarcasm or bring up other, unrelated stuff. Dean knows that Jack is trying, but he himself has some emotional stuff he needs to deal with. That he is dealing with. And it’s going to take him some time. 

I do however stand by my observation made during the episode that at least at that point in it, Dean considered Jack a weapon. An asset. He literally used him as a battering ram, and in a more meta way, he’s planning on using him as a grenade to throw at God. Even when arguing with Mrs. B about it, his response was in reference to Jack’s usefulness. Whereas Sam was arguing that Jack meant something to him, that he cared about him, and hurting Jack would hurt him. Now, I do think that Dean’s POV had shifted a bit by the very end. Dean’s love language has almost always been shown by doing things for people, and taking care of them. So him making that birthday cake for Jack really felt to me like him trying to tell him that he does actually care about him. And I think Jack got it. And true, the cake might not have been as neat and pretty as Mrs. B would have made it, but I thought it was beautiful because of all the thought that went into it. (Dean’s more of a cook than a baker too.) 

As a side note, something I thought about after the episode: when Mrs. B stepped in, she kind of took over that care-taker role. AND the research role. She made them lunches, cooked them dinners, decorated for holidays, and overall made them feel comfortable and safe. And she also pin-pointed where monsters were and made sure they were all stocked-up and ready to go. All they had to do was show up and get it done. And yeah, it must have been a nice break from the norm. But I also think about how much Dean finds his identity beyond hunting in taking care of people. And how much Sam finds his identity in researching and figuring things out. And with her doing that, they both took it easy on those ends. Dean didn’t have to make burgers for everyone since Mrs. B made a roast. Sam didn’t have to research since she could tell them where the monsters were and what kind. I almost wonder if both of them were starting to feel like those parts of themselves were all of a sudden unnecessary. (Which makes me a little sad, because it reminds me a bit of the “two cakes” concept in fandom. Who cares if someone else can “do it better”? If you do it, then there’ll be even more of the good thing!)  And as I observed above, Sam also stopped looking into HER. I mean, he didn’t even know what would kill a wood nymph. And I do think part of that also goes back to him having recently fallen back on letting Dean make the big decisions. Because last season so many of his blew up in his face. (Though I don’t think most of that was his fault. But Sam tends to blame himself for a lot.) And I do hope that maybe he’ll remember that he does have good instincts when he listens to them. And he can keep looking into something even if Dean thinks it’s fine. It’s not a betrayal to be prepared. 

ALSO! Being the absolute Saileen hoe that I am, even though we didn’t Eileen in this episode, I was thrilled that Sam went out on a date with her because she was in town! And true, we don’t know what all went down, but regardless, I see it as good that they’re at the very least still friends, and that hopefully Eileen is sorting out her own feelings vs whatever she might think could be Chuck’s manipulations. Even if Saileen isn’t Engame (and honestly, as much as I love it, I don’t think it will be) I would still like for them to be on good terms with each other. (And for her to NOT get fridged again!) 

Another thing I was pondering afterwards and a bit during: I wasn’t surprised that Sam held up to the torture fairly well. I mean, it still obviously hurt! (And again, WHY with the fingernails again?! As someone in one of my discord servers mentioned, we didn’t need THAT particular call-back to the Christmas Episode of Season 3!) But he was listening to what she was saying. And he understood the implications that she had been tortured into acting how they wanted her to act. And Sam understands torture, and how it can mess someone up. And despite what she had done to him, and was trying to still do, he validated what she had been through. He empathized with her. And that.... it’s just SO Sam! 

I will say that the resolution felt a little... abrupt. Like, her expression had changed a little during the fight/argument. Then back from the commercial break and she’s all packed-up and ready to leave and they’re all saying goodbye and wishing her well. I feel like there might have been some more scenes or parts of scenes that were originally there connecting things up more, but were cut for time.

I wouldn’t say this was a groundbreaking episode, but it WAS fun, and it did have some seriousness at it’s core, and I think it did what it needed to do. 

(And I apologize if this is just a big rambling mess. I’m not used to doing structured episode reviews. *LOL* Feedback and opinions are welcome though!) 

[problems-turn-fics]

Part 2 of the HMRT fic about them falling in love after the war. [Words: 5,919] Part 1 Here

Robert had barely slept when he woke at dawn. The rest of the house was quiet and he was tempted to roll over and go back to sleep. If he were the type he would have, telling himself that he had resisted enough temptation the day before and could afford a little. Instead, he forced himself out of bed and got dressed.

As quietly as he could he lit a fire in the kitchen stove and lingered a minute to warm up his hands before he went outside. A thin layer of frost covered everything, making it sparkle in the early morning light and the grass crunch under his steps. “Good morning,” he said to the animals as he opened the barn. They all shuffled around in answer, knowing exactly what came next. With the same methodical process that he did every morning, he fed each animal. First the pigs, then the goats, then the horses. He fetched them each water from the well, taking special care not to splash any on his breeches. Because it was cold, not because there was a high society tailor with a smile that made his heart beat faster in the house. No, that was unrelated.

Once the animals were fed and watered Robert took the time to look them each over. He liked to watch the animals, to check on them, and make sure they were as happy as they could be. They were peaceful and watching them brought him a little bit of peace. His father to be up soon but he likely had a few more minutes before anyone missed him too terribly and could take the time to appreciate his morning.

He stood at the stall where Mulligan’s horse was happily drinking its water, unaware of the larger problems of the world. All it thought about was food and water and when someone familiar would come see it. It didn’t know or care how much the hay it ate cost and Robert loved it for that. It must have noticed Robert watching because it looked up at him with its big black eyes, licking the water off its chomps. Robert held out his hand slowly, unreasonably pleased when it nosed at his hands.

“Loves attention that one.”

Robert startled hard, whirling around to see Mulligan laughing at him. He hoped his glare at Mulligan would cover some of his embarrassment. “I can’t imagine who that reminds me of.”

Mulligan laughed loudly as he came forward to pat his horse, which did seem pleased at the attention. “Maybe that’s why she’s my favorite.”

“You prefer those who like attention as much as you?” Robert heard himself ask before he’d decided to. It gave away too much, Mulligan would surely see exactly what Robert was actually asking.

Mulligan cocked his head to one side, his smile softening and his eyes just a touch warmer than before. It made Robert warmer too. “What I appreciate about a horse is different than what I like in a,” Mulligan paused making a show of looking Robert up and down, “person.” 

Robert swallowed hard, looking away to the rafters. They offered no help. “Are you leaving so soon?” Robert asked when he had recovered the ability to speak. 

 “Not yet. Your father sent me to find you for breakfast.”

“Then we should go back inside before it gets cold.” Robert didn’t move, and for a moment neither did Mulligan. They just stared at each other, barely a foot apart.

But then Mulligan clapped him on the arm with a smile. “You’re probably right. I’m starved.”

Robert followed him out of the barn, pausing long enough to grab a scoop of grain for the chickens that had already started to gather at the door. He’d expected Mulligan to continue on without him, but instead when he looked up Mulligan was just standing there on the porch with a soft smile on his face, watching him.

“What?” Robert asked as he left the chickens behind to go inside.

“You have a beautiful smile. I wish you didn’t save it just for the chickens,” Mulligan whispered following Robert close enough that he could feel his breath on the back of his neck.

Robert didn’t have a good answer for that so he just walked a little faster to the kitchen to join his father who was already sitting and eating.

He must have made some face because Samuel looked up at him and shrugged. “What? Just because you two enjoy eating cold eggs doesn’t mean I do.”

Robert sat, sighed, and rolled his eyes while Mulligan laughed loudly. Robert focused on a silent prayer over his food before he started to eat. The eggs were cold.

“So,” Samuel said so casually that it set Robert on edge. “I want to extend another invitation. We would love to have you come visit us again.”

“I would be honored,” Mulligan said. “Robert and I were just discussing it actually.”

“Were you?” Samuel asked, turning to Robert with a smile.

“Yes,” Robert said, forcing himself not to blush. He felt as if he’d been caught doing something horribly embarrassing when really he’d just invited a friend to come back for dinner if he liked. That’s all Mulligan was, he reminded himself, a friend.

Samuel turned back to Mulligan with a frown. “We do understand that it’s a long ride out though.”

“Oh, it does me good. Fresh air can be hard to come by in the city.”

Samuel laughed, patting Mulligan on the shoulder as he stood to get something to drink. “That I won’t argue with.” The moment made Robert’s heart warm. He loved his father and to see him take so quickly to Mulligan and Mulligan to take to him felt like a relief. Friends Robert reminded himself. He was happy because he didn’t have a lot of friends and he wanted his father to like his friends. Nothing more.

“I’ll have to make sure the shop survived my absence before I make any plans or promises but I am happy to return as long as I am welcome,” Mulligan said, winking at Robert.

“We aren’t in the habit of rescinding invitations,” Robert said evenly, like it was a challenge.

Mulligan continued to grin. “Lucky me.” He held his gaze for a moment longer before he turned back to Samuel who was sitting back down with a fresh cup. “After all, your father owes me a game of draughts. Someone has to show me how to beat you if I’m ever to stand a chance.”

Samuel put his hands up. “I’m afraid that chance has passed. His mother taught him and I never won a game against her that she didn’t let me win.” He was laughing and smiling but Robert could see that he was remembering the same moments he was. She had taught him how to play at that very table, at least one game a day all the way right up until the end. She’d laughed the first time he won, high pitched and delighted. Robert looked to his father who was smiling sadly at him.

“Perhaps you can ask Mr. Rivington,” Robert said, trying to salvage the morning and escape that sad smile. “He won one or two games.”

“And how many games did you two play together?” Mulligan asked, his own smile a little strained as well.

“More than two.”

Samuel and Mulligan both laughed. “I’ll have to take any help I can get.”

**

A week later a letter arrived, addressed to Robert.

Dearest Robert,

I’m sure you’ll detest the greeting of dearest but I couldn’t resist. Forgive me.

All is well here. The shop managed to survive. I think my new assistant Johnathan preferred when I was away. I’m likely a menace to the poor child but he has too much to learn. He’ll have to suffer me. All this to say I would love to visit again next Thursday. I’ll have to leave early since I have a meeting with a vendor on Friday in the afternoon for some new cloth. I’d love to see you both before the Christmas season starts and I’m unable to leave the shop for anything that isn’t a party filled with people far less interesting than you.

Write to me and tell me if you can spare the evening to spend with the likes of me.

Give your father my best.

- Hercules

P.S. I did talk to James and I think I’ll have you in our next game.

Robert wrote back immediately, much to his embarrassment.

Mr. Mulligan,

I forgive you for your choice of greeting. It seems very in character for you to pick one such as that. You seem to enjoy pushing just to see what you can get away with.

I’m happy to hear that the shop survived. I had no doubt as it seems unlikely to burn just because your back is turned. Training an apprentice is hard work, be patient with him.

We’d be delighted to have you over again on Thursday.

My father says to tell you he found the book of poetry that you were discussing last week.

If you are so confident in the advice James gave you maybe you should decide the stakes of our next game.

Your Friend, 

Robert Townsend

 ***

Robert flexed his numb fingers, trying to get some feeling back in them as he piled more logs into the basket. He was anxious to get back inside but they’d been running low on firewood and it was barely nightfall and needs must. He’d heard Mulligan ride up a few minutes before and his father helping to show him out to the barn.

Finally, the basket was full and Robert was able to go back inside.

In the house, Mulligan was standing by the fire warming up his fingers. He smiled wide and bright when he saw Robert. Samuel was humming in the kitchen.

“Mr. Mulligan,” Robert said, crossing the room to set the wood next to the fireplace, coincidentally bringing him close to Mulligan.

“What am I going to have to do to get you to call me Hercules? Even in your letter you were so formal. That wounded me, Robert. Would you prefer I call you Mr. Townsend?” Mulligan said with a laugh, taking his hand just long enough to make Robert’s heart stop before he let it go.

Robert narrowed his eyes. “Very well, Hercules.”

Instead of smiling as expected, Mulligan’s eyes went wide and he coughed. “Wasn’t so hard was it?”

“There you are,” Samuel interrupted before Robert could answer. He was carrying the roast he’d spent most of the week fretting over.

“Yes. I was getting firewood as you asked,” Robert said, barely resisting the urge to roll his eyes at his father who made it sound as if he’d been lost at sea.

“Yes, yes. Dinner’s read. Come, sit,” Samuel said as he set the platter down on the table. He sat at the head of the table with Robert and Mulligan finding their places on either side. They all joined hands for grace and bowed their heads. Samuel led the prayer as he had the last dinner they had shared.

Robert’s eyes shot open when he felt Mulligan’s thumb brush over his knuckles softly. He kept his head down and managed not to kick Mulligan under the table, mostly out of fear that he’d hit his father on accident. Instead, he squeezed Mulligan’s hand tighter and hoped that the message was clear. Mulligan did stop and instead squeezed Robert’s hand back in acknowledgment.

Finally, Samuel said “Amen” and Robert was able to take his hand back. He could still feel where Mulligan’s thumb had run over his knuckles. It felt like he was on fire. When he looked back up at him Mulligan smiled, though it looked more like a grimace. Apologetic even.

Robert decided to forgive him. It wasn’t like he had meant anything by it. It was a mindless gesture. It wasn’t Mulligan’s fault Robert struggled to breathe anytime he touched him.

“How have you been these past weeks, Samuel? Robert was very short on the details in his letter,” Mulligan asked suddenly, turning to Samuel as they ate.

“Robert,” his father scolded, though he was laughing.

“What? Nothing of note had happened,” he defended.

His father tsked. “Well, not particularly. But…” his father continued weaving a story about the neighbors who had visited last Sunday. Robert found it quite boring and would have been embarrassed about Samuel showing how boring they were compared to Mulligan’s own vibrant life if the man himself weren’t joking and listening as if he really was enjoying himself. Occasionally, he’d cast a glance at Robert as if making a silent comment, only for Robert.

Robert found himself watching Mulligan, waiting for the next smirk or wink or arch of an eyebrow that was just for Robert. Each one made him feel warm and special and filled him with a want for something he couldn’t identify. It was also dangerous and selfish. Unfortunately, the shame wasn’t able to smother the pleasant warmth, try as Robert might.

After dinner, Samuel disappeared to go find the book he and Mulligan had been discussing. It hadn’t sounded urgent to Robert that the book be found immediately but Samuel had been long gone before Robert could question him. Mulligan just shrugged and helped carry the dishes into the kitchen.

Robert put a pot of water on the stove to heat up and put the little bit of food that was leftover into the icebox, likely to be used in a stew the next day. He turned to see that Mulligan had shed his jacket and rolled up his sleeves.

The sight brought Robert up short and the room was suddenly hotter. He had to cough twice to get rid of the lump that had formed in his throat as he removed his own jacket and tried to get his heartbeat back under control. Mulligan did a much more graceful job of staring as Robert rolled up his sleeves, still unable to look at Mulligan.

They stood shoulder to shoulder, Robert scrubbing the dishes in the hot water and then handing them to Mulligan to be dried. It was silent and peaceful as they worked, though Robert strained to hear where in the house his father had hidden himself.

“James sends his regards,” Mulligan said after a long while of silence.

“Does he?” Robert asked. He supposed Rivington couldn't exactly tell Mulligan why it was that he no longer liked Robert and acting friendly might have just been the easiest thing to do. Still, it seemed odd.

“He doesn’t hate you as much as you seem to assume he does,” Mulligan said softly. “He’s a man of principle. You did what you did because of your own principles. He understands that.”

Robert sighed, tired down to his bones. “He did nothing but try to be my friend and I betrayed his trust.”

“James is a lot of things, but stupid isn’t one of them. I’d wager he knew; some part of him at least.”

“That’s worse,” Robert ground out, his jaw clenched tight. “That means he suspected me and yet he chose to believe I was his friend. And I betrayed that choice to trust me instead of blind foolishness.”

Mulligan sighed. “I don’t think he thinks that. For a while he might have but not after the soldiers came.”

“So they did come for him,” Robert said quietly.

“You knew they would. It’s why you broke that window. Oh, he ranted and raved about ‘hooligans’ who had broken his window in the dead of night the whole day. He was furious.” Mulligan laughed, put the rag over his shoulder, and brushed his hair out of his face. “But the soldiers arrived and he had everyone in the bar as a witness that the basement had been broken into. Everyone remembered because he was so damn obnoxious about that window. It was blamed on spies, not on him. He knows what you did. He knows that you did what you could to protect both of you.”

“I could have been doing it only to protect myself,” Robert argued.

“Did you?”

Robert didn’t have an answer for that. The problem was that Robert didn’t know. When he’d done it it’d been a half-formed thought, just a hope that it would keep the English looking elsewhere. He didn’t know if he had done it to protect his father, or himself, or James. He was just relieved it had worked.

“It can be both,” Mulligan said, whisper-quiet.

“No, it can’t.”

“But you don’t have a single answer,” Mulligan shot back, clearly pleased that he had bested Robert with his own logic. “You have three answers.”

Robert rolled his eyes. “Are you always this obstinate?”

“So I’ve been told.”

Robert turned back to the wash pot, suddenly realizing that he’d been so wrapped up in his conversation with Mulligan that he’d lost track of what he had been meant to be doing. It seemed like that was becoming a bit of a pattern.

“Maybe you can afford yourself a bit of forgiveness. He’s already forgiven you.” Robert could still feel his gaze, hot and unwavering.

“Has he told you that he forgives me?” Robert asked.

Mulligan sighed, clearly hearing what was coming next. “To be fair as far as he’s concerned I don’t know that you need forgiving.”

“So no. He hasn’t.”

“I think I know my friend well enough to know when he’s holding a grudge or not.”

“Not really the same thing is it?” Robert asked, handing Mulligan the last dish to be dried.

Mulligan just stared at him for a moment, looking disappointed and maybe a little sad. “I suppose not.”

They finished working in silence. Robert almost felt bad. Mulligan had just been trying to make him feel better, maybe even heal a wound that Robert hid from everyone, a wound he pretended didn’t exist. But Robert had shut him down and now Mulligan kept his head down and his mouth shut.

When they were done they went back to the living room where Samuel was sitting in his chair with a candle next to him, flipping through the book of poems he had disappeared to find half an hour ago. The second before they passed into Samuel’s line of sight though, Mulligan plastered on a smile and shook his head. “Did you know your son is a menace to debate with?”

Samuel laughed. “Why do you think I enjoy having you here? That way he can debate with you and I can enjoy it from the sidelines!” They laughed together and Robert rolled his eyes to cover the swelling fondness in his chest. He settled on the end of the couch closest to the fire so he could read by the light, just as he had the last time Mulligan was there.

Mulligan settled into the chair next to Samuel, producing a pouch and started to pull thread and a round bit of wood out. “I hope you don’t mind. It’s just something to keep my hands busy,” Mulligan said, holding the items up for Samuel to see.

“Of course not! Are you making buttons?

“Yes,” Mulligan said with a sigh, shaking his head. “With Christmas coming I have many orders for new jackets so that everyone may be dressed in their finest at the first parties of the first Christmas season since the war. And they all require buttons,” Mulligan explained as he started to wrap the thread around the mold, his head bent and his eyes fixed down intently. He was frowning just a touch and his hair was tucked behind one ear to keep it out of his face. He was breathtakingly beautiful, Robert thought wildly, he couldn’t help but stare. Mulligan’s hands moved smoothly, sure and in perfect harmony with each other and the materials. It was mesmerizing.

Without warning, Mulligan’s eyes flickered up to Robert and the focused frown turned into a soft smile, barely there. Robert would have blamed it on a trick of the light if it hadn't been for the wink before he turned to Samuel.

Robert burned. He stared down at the book in front of him with his jaw clenched tight, willing himself to focus. His hands were shaking slightly and he gripped the book tighter to hide it. He was a fool; a fool with no self-control. Hercules showed a bit of quiet focus and all of his carefully crafted walls just vanished? They didn’t even crumble or fall, as Hercules had an annoying habit of making happen. No, they had vanished as if they’d never been there. As if they hadn’t been keeping him safe for years. 

He focused on the book and after a while, he was able to breathe again. The conversation around him flitted in and out of his mind. Shame still burned hot in the back of his mind but he managed to focus on the book and right then that was important. If he could make himself focus on the book right then he could sort himself out later.

Hours passed, Robert relaxed, and the conversation around him and turned mostly into the two men reciting their favorite poems back and forth. Most were about the war but every once in a while one of them would recite one about breathtaking landscape or the goodness of God. Robert sometimes stopped and listened but mostly he let it filter by, the voices becoming a soothing background noise.

“Tell me, my heart, if this be love?”

Robert tuned in as Mulligan was in the middle of reciting another poem. He was starting another button and his eyes were fixed down. Robert looked back down at the book but didn’t bother trying to read it, he just listened.

“Whene’er she speaks, my ravish’d ear. No other voice than hers can hear, no other wit but hers approve. Tell me, my heart, if this be love?

“If she some other youth commend, though I was once his fondest friend, his instant enemy I prove. Tell me, my heart, if this be love?

“When she is absent, I no more delight in all that pleased before the clearest spring or shadiest grove: tell me my heart if this be love?

“When fond of power, of beauty vain her nets she spread for every swain, I strove to hate but vainly strove: tell me, my heart, if this be love?”

For a moment, the house was still. The crackling of the fire and the ticking of the clock were the only sounds. Samuel broke the silence.

“It’s beautiful, but melancholy. It’s almost sad.”

“How so?” Mulligan asked.

“To have that dedication and still be unsure. Being so lost in your own feelings and yet feeling them so deeply. It’s sad,” Samuel explained.

“Not necessarily,” Robert said before he could stop himself. When he looked up both men were watching him, waiting. “It might not be confusion, but reluctance. It’s a love they wish they didn’t feel. They aren’t confused they just wish they didn’t feel this way. It frightens them.”

Samuel was frowning at Robert, not angry just deeply sad. Robert didn’t have the courage to look at Mulligan. He was too unsure of what he’d see.

“That’s sadder,” Mulligan said. “It seems more to be a person that does know their own feelings but they don’t know how the other would react to such a strong declaration. They cover it with the questions to give themselves that deniability.”

“How is that any less sad than what I said?” Robert shot back. “To be afraid of the one you love would be dreadful.”

“The fear comes not from the person themselves but from the uncertainty. And uncertainly has room for hope.” Mulligan waved one hand as if clearing the air. “Fear of your own emotions and desires is a fear of one's self and that leaves no room for hope.”

Robert opened his mouth to argue but stopped short when Samuel stood. “Where are you going?”

“To bed. This is a young man’s debate,” Samuel said with a laugh. “I’ll see you both in the morning.”

He grabbed the candle that had been between him and Mulligan and started up the stairs. They each sat still until the door shut upstairs, then Mulligan leaned forward with his elbows resting on his knees. “Did I misstep?”

“No. Why would you think that?” Robert asked, raising an eyebrow.

“What he said about it being a young man's debate I worry I may have brought up some unpleasant feelings regarding your mother. I didn’t mean to, of course. I had reread the poem recently and-”

Robert shook his head and cut him off. “No, no. He’s fine, I’m sure. He’s likely just -” Robert cut himself off when he realized he couldn't tell Mulligan his true suspicions. He’d never see Mulligan if he did.

“Just what?”

Robert waved his hand to try and make it clear how absurd he found it. “He likely hopes that you’ll win this debate and convince me to fall in love with the next person who smiles at me.”

“I’ll do my best.” Mulligan laughed and looked to the button half-finished in his hand, squinting at it in the low light. He was quite far from the fire now.

“You can come sit next to me...for the light...if you like,” Robert said, trying desperately not to show his nervousness. He was just offering to let his friend sit next to him for the light of the fire. There wasn’t anything to be nervous over. 

Mulligan smiled and gathered the pouch together, and moved. “Thank you.” He settled close to Robert, close enough that their elbows brushed with every movement and Robert had to angle his knees away to keep them from knocking into Mulligan’s. Mulligan went back to wrapping the thread around the wooden disk.

Robert tried to focus on his book but his eyes kept drifting back to Mulligan’s hands. He tried to be subtle and even turned the page once before reading it just to cover his fascination.

“I can teach you, if you like,” Mulligan said. Robert flushed but when Mulligan looked up at him he looked genuinely pleased. 

 “I’d hate to ruin your work or waste your thread. No doubt your customers expect the best, not the work of an amateur.”

“Nonsense. If you’re so concerned with supplies though, I can inspect your work before you cut the thread. If it’s terrible, which I sincerely doubt, I can unravel it and you can try again. No harm done.”

Robert opened his mouth to say no but instead “Very well, show me,” came out.

Mulligan’s answering smile could have lit whole cities. He pulled out a pink roll of thick thread and a smaller round of wood that he handed to Robert. Then came the beeswax and the pencil. Mulligan continued digging around, muttering “I think I still have the guide. I haven’t used it in a while, but if I’m honest. It’s been a while since I’ve made my own buttons at all. AH!” He held up another little wooden circle with 4 marks on each side. He handed it to Robert. “Use the guide to mark the 4 sides so they are evenly placed.” He waited while Robert did. He felt silly, like a child, but even as Mulligan explained each step and its importance he didn't seem to lose his patience or his smile.

“Here,” Hercules said, wrapping his hands around Roberts’. “This is what the tension should feel like. Too loose or too tight and it will unravel before you get done.” He looked up at Robert; maybe to see if he understood, or maybe to see if he was listening, or maybe to check on him since he must have noticed that Robert had stopped breathing.

The problem was, now that he’d turned his head to look up at Robert, still leaning over and holding Robert’s hands at the right tension, he was even closer. Robert could see the little wrinkles at the corners of his eyes from smiling. He could make out faint freckles on his nose. He could see the reflection of the fire in his eyes that made them sparkle even more than normal. He could see the slight part of his lips that made Robert’s mouth dry.

Mulligan’s smile had faded, his eyes just flitting across Robert’s face like he was searching or waiting. The thought of what he could be waiting for frightened Robert out of his stupor. “I see,” Robert said with a tiny nod.

Mulligan pulled back and nodded, clearing his throat. “Good.” He picked up his own button that he had abandoned when he had started teaching Robert. “Wrap it in that square twice more and then you can insert the pin to help hold it together. Just be careful not to go through any of the threads.”

Robert nodded and focused on the button. It was meditative and he tried not to notice or be embarrassed by how much more quickly Mulligan worked through his. It helped that every once in a while Mulligan would look over and say he was doing well or correct some small thing and then laugh about how many times he’d made that same mistake and he’d had to start over. All in all, it was nice.

“I never had the opportunity to ask. How did you get wrapped up in spy-work? Aren’t you Quakers supposed to stay out of the war?”

“It is a long story.”

Mulligan hummed in agreement. “You don’t have to tell it if you don’t want to.”

Robert shook his head. “I don’t mind. The short version is I met Abraham who was already a spy and he tried to convince me to join his cause. When I refused he enlisted the help of Lieutenant Brewster to burn down our barn and attack my father while pretending to be Queen’s Rangers. By the time we learned it had actually been Continentals who had attacked us we were already involved.”

Mulligan just hummed and kept his head down.

Mulligan didn’t usually respond so quietly and it made him self-conscious. “It’s not a terribly interesting story,” Robert said quietly. He was never known for his storytelling ability.

“No, it’s not that. It’s fascinating and someday you’ll have to tell me the long version, it seems as if there are more than a few parts of that story that you have left out,” Mulligan said with a smile that for some reason didn’t seem quite right.

“Then what?”

“I don’t have anything to say that you would be particularly interested in hearing.” Mulligan shrugged.

“Shouldn’t I be the judge of that?”

Mulligan’s hands stopped moving and his whole body seemed to tense. Robert wasn’t as polite as Mulligan, though, so instead of giving him an opportunity not to tell the story, he waited. “I don’t believe Caleb Brewster is a bad man. What he participated in, yes that was bad, but I don’t believe it is indicative of his larger truth.”

Robert felt his blood go hot. He thought he’d buried that anger long ago when he had rejoined the ring. The rage felt fresh though, as if it had just been lying in wait. “What makes you so sure?” He spat out, no small amount of venom in his tone.

Mulligan sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. “Caleb Brewster was the right hand to the head of intelligence and yet you and I are alive. He was captured by Arnold at the same time I was. And Arnold... he let this monster, John Simcoe, carve him up. My father-in-law’s word. Carved. And yet you and I are alive. It was awful there, Robert. And someone was coming for me. My father-in-law was never going to let his son-in-law rot in jail an accused spy, taken by a turncoat so-called General. For that same reason, they didn’t inflict the damage on me that they did to the others and it was still awful. I…” Mulligan trailed off. His eyes were distant and his face was twisted like he was in pain. Robert set down his button, slowly, and reached out to place his hand over Mulligans’ which had begun to shake.

Mulligan’s head snapped to the side and he stared at Robert for a moment. “I doubt Brewster thought anyone was coming for him. He’d probably thought he’d die in the basement of that prison.

“Carved. Carved and alone and yet he never told anyone about us just to make it stop. Just for a single moment of respite.” Mulligan took a deep shaking breath. “He may have done bad things but I cannot condemn him for them. Not when I’m uncertain about whether I would have done the same.”

Robert didn’t know what to say. He didn't know what to do. Mulligan was clearly hurting and upset and Robert just wanted to make it stop. “You...make a compelling argument. I suppose that is a strong show of character. Having met John Simcoe I can only imagine the pain he inflicted. And even without such a man around it sound like a terrible ordeal. An ordeal that you survived without giving up me or Cato.” Robert squeezed his hand and hoped he'd said the right thing. Tact had never been his strong suit and he wasn’t sure he’d ever managed to successfully comfort his own father let alone someone else.

“Not really the thing same, is it?” Mulligan asked, shaking his head.

Robert suppressed his disappointment in himself. That was to be dealt with later. “I suppose not,” Robert conceded, taking his hand back.

They finished their buttons together in near silence, the easy camaraderie gone now. Mulligan helped him tie off the thread and was very polite about the button despite even Robert being able to see the flaws. They both agreed to go to bed then. They didn’t say it had been a long night but Robert could feel it dragging on them both.

Mulligan packed away the button supplies while Robert dealt with the fire and checked that all the doors were latched. He’d expected Mulligan to be halfway up the stairs by the time he was done but instead Mulligan was standing in the middle of the living room, waiting.

“I’m sorry for ruining your night with my trip down memory lane,” he said with a laugh that felt wrong.

“Don’t be absurd. You didn’t ruin anything. You being here is a gift that I greatly appreciate. You couldn't ruin it just by being honest. That’s ridiculous.” Robert started up the stairs without waiting for Mulligan to respond. Mulligan followed behind him, his footsteps softer than Robert’s up the stairs in the silent house.

Robert stopped for a moment outside his door, waiting for Mulligan so that he could say goodnight properly. It reminded him of the last time Mulligan had visited. It reminded him of the way Mulligan had smiled at him that night. It reminded him of what he’d wanted that night; of what had left him breathless that night.

“Goodnight, Robert. You’re a good friend,” Mulligan said, already opening his door.

“Goodnight, Hercules. So are you.”

Mulligan’s door clicked shut and Robert was alone and breathless again.