#what the fuck does she need a new outfit for every season? and suddenly being able to change paths?

[allpromarlo]

why is hoyo forgetting that trailblazer is the mc of this game

[boop-le-snoot]

@buckyownsmylife hey babe! Remember that one time you threw that cool challenge? Here's my entry. Prepare to get absolutely ruined because daddy!Bruce is exactly that sort of man.

main masterlist ☀️ taglist

emotional support nerd

Your best friend's dad, Dr. Bruce Banner, is hotter than you thought he would be. 6k words, NSFW. Kind of Alt!Reader - she refers to herself as 'goth' in one instance. Tony Stark makes an appearance because God forbid I write a fanfic without him in it.

This is filthy pron, ft. age difference (reader is college aged) daddy kink, throat fucking, dirty talk, praise kink, cream pie, possessiveness, belly bulge and ending with a hint at a threesome. I really crammed all I could from Eyre's wheel in here, didn't I. Oh well.

"How much longer, dad?" Lyra's annoyed voice struck a chord within me. I tried to hide my snickering - unsuccessfully might I add - causing my best friend to shoot me a hurt look, equally fed up with me as she was fed up with her forgetful adopted father. "You know what, we'll take the subway."

Lyra's father's voice, both agitated and apologetic, reached my ears in bitten-off phrases as the traffic noises around us grew in volume, NYC rush hour rapidly approaching its peak.

With a sound huff, Lyra removed the phone from her ear, staring me down with the most amount of petulance I've ever seen on her usually reserved, placid face. "It's twenty more minutes. Apparently he's driving Tony's car," she offered in the way of explanation, like it actually did anything to better the cold, wet situation we found ourselves in. "Please, and I can't stress this enough, please don't be weird."

I felt a flood of amusement at Lyra's pleading tone. "Darling, if you wanted a normal friend, you should have looked elsewhere," I gestured to my outfit. I looked like a goth boy's wet dream: chunky platformed boots, fishnets, heavy eyeliner. Of course, all in black.

"You know what I mean," she whined, waving off my pointing hand and fixing me with a hard stare. "The least my dad needs is someone that is terrified of him just because sometimes he turns into a big green monkey. It's not as exciting as internet thinks, anyway," the last part of the sentence was mumbled but I heard it nonetheless as Lyra stared out into the traffic, clever eyes looking for a particular car model.

What Lyra didn't know was that I was not at all considering to be terrified by the man who dosed himself with radiation and developed an advanced version of split personality disorder. I could be intimidated by him, sure, because he was incredibly intelligent, a world class scientist with more PhDs than I had zeroes in my bank account, but even despite his green problem, Dr. Bruce Banner was about as far away from 'scary' as a man could be.

The few scarce pictures of him on the internet showed a short, stocky man with kind eyes and salt-and-pepper curls, always dressed in un-ironed, crumpled button-ups with dorky patterns. Looking at him, I mused that there was a high chance he spoke with a stutter and that fact amused me to no end. Jekyll and Hyde, alright.

Lyra was much the same way. Shy and reclusive, with curly brown hair and doe eyes, she spent a good chunk of her first semester in college being avoided by everybody because of her last name; I, on the other hand, avoided everyone out of habit, I'd never been a social butterfly, but the way people subtly made sure to exclude Lyra from all the activities filled me with quiet, seething rage, and I stepped over my general distaste of people and removed my bag from the seat next to me so Lyra could at least study in relative peace.

Yeah, yeah, you've heard it all, I'm sure. Weird goth chick adopts a socially awkward, shunned nerd and they become best friends forever. I had to admit that under the shy exterior, Lyra was smart, witty and even funny sometimes. She was willing to entertain my crude jokes without moaning, at least, and I was perfectly okay with listening to her rant about science every now and then.

Rain banged on the slanted roof of the café we were hiding in, the autumn wind howled, making both of us shiver at the prospect of having to go outside, even if it was for a short moment to run to Lyra's dad's car. The day had started out warm and sunny, but much like a badly calculated chemical formula, it all went downhill a split second after we had set out to leave campus.

"There he is," the grouch in Lyra's expression had me once again unsuccessfully attempting to conceal my snorting.

Nonetheless, I followed her out into the rain, struggling to keep up with the brisk running in my platformed shoes, unceremoniously crawling into the car behind her without sparing a glance at the driver in my eagerness to get out of the freezing downpour.

"Hi, dad," Lyra's tired voice spoke up at the same time as I angrily shook out my hair.

"I've just about McFuckin' had it with New York," I was afraid the dye in my hair would bleed out into my clothes, or even worse, the nice, cream-colored car seats.

"Hello, ladies," the voice that greeted us was low, gravelly and apologetic to boot.

My eyes shot up, meeting an expression full of surprise and amusement. I stared at the shockingly handsome face of Dr. Bruce Banner like a deer in the headlights.

The fine mimic wrinkles had stretched into a resemblance of a smile, soft, plush lips revealing a set of straight, white teeth. The five o'clock shadow framed his jaw, giving it a sharp, defined edge, his clever brown eyes slid down my form, faltering on the pentagram on my belt and my fishnet-covered legs, settling on my chunky boots before hastily snapping back up to my face.

"Dad, this is..." Lyra's voice was full of suspicious bewilderment as she attempted to dissipate the sudden awkwardness.

"Oh, yeah, I'm Dr. Bruce Banner, but you can call me Doc or Bruce," he cleared his throat, turning himself towards the windshield and starting up the car.

"Nice to meet you," I busied myself with putting away any stray hair just to occupy myself with something during the time I needed to recuperate from being just... Looked at by Lyra's dad.

It sounds ridiculous, I know, but I was so taken aback by his handsomeness and his aura of a gentle but powerful man that the ride to Stark tower, however swift, went on in slightly awkward silence. The streets outside were, thankfully, noisy, and the lack of an attempt to have a conversation could easily be attributed to Bruce's need to focus on the road, but Lyra's increasingly concerned looks did very little to settle the sudden racing of my heart.

"C'mon, I'll give you some sweats so you can let your..." Lyra's vague gesture towards my upper body disappeared behind her side of the door. "Hey, Tony," she suddenly interrupted her sentence, very obviously addressing another person who I managed to miss as Bruce parked in the spacious garage.

"I've been told you're finally bringing your friend, Green Pea," a voice I'd heard a thousand times on the TV poked fun at Lyra.

She bent down to retrieve her bag, shooting big eyes at me and mouthing an exaggerated "Sorry!"

Tony Stark looked about a week in debt on sleep, a contrast to the way he usually appeared in public. The exaggerated eyebrow raise made me shuffle awkwardly in my spot; the Led Zep tee caught my eyes as I lingered on it, aware of my own Mötorhead top on display. He noticed it too, causing his face leave the snide territory.

"Wow, I didn't expect kids these days to have any resemblance of taste in music but you've surprised me, Corpse Bride," he gave me a quiet wolf-whistle, watching me through lidded eyes.

I felt my eyebrow crawl upwards at his attitude but Bruce spoke up before I could say anything: "Tony, no," so firmly, I had to raise both of my eyebrows. I felt a smile tug at my lips, the situation strikingly familiar in it's essence. Like father, like daughter...

"No," Lyra's identical expression, fond and annoyed, topped up with an accusing finger pointed in my direction had everyone snorting a giggle at the situation.

"Lyra," I whined, just so I could coax her grin that she was very obviously trying to conceal. "See, I told you, every crazy genius needs their emotional support nerd," I fixed her with a pointed look.

She promptly grabbed me by the arm, leading all of us to the elevator as the two men behind us shared a hearty laugh at my well-timed joke. It was either that or I would have completely embarrassed myself by gaping and drooling over both THE Tony Stark and Lyra's father.

The rush didn't stop there. I was promptly and generously offered not only a spare pair of pants but also a whole room to stay in after an invitation to dinner I simply could not refuse. Dr. Banner firmly coaxed me into staying overnight with his pleading eyes and a hearty seasoning of guilt tripping, softly crooning how he simply could not let a young woman to wander the cold, rainy night in NYC alone.

Tony added something too, in a tone way too surefire and patronising. I guessed he noticed my eyes lingering on Dr. Banner, being a genius and all.

In a short amount of time, I found myself seated at a dinner table next to a happy, giggling Lyra who'd downed a glass of wine and was well into her second. I found it adorable how much of a lightweight she was; not hesitating in the slightest to point out that fact when she made hands for a pitcher of water.

Tony was the first one to snark back something vague about his college days and all the wild parties he used to throw, booing Bruce upon discovery that he, in fact, actually studied in college in favour of partaking in various illicit activities. That had both me and Tony giggling with Lyra promptly joining in, both of us losing it over the running joke or her being either a test tube baby or the result of immaculate conception.

Bruce's face blushed scarlet. He sputtered, a few stray drops of his lemonade landing on the (ironed!) collar of his purple shirt, cough disappearing in the wake of Tony's truly amused cackling. Dr. Banner was well on his way to either choke on his Lo Mein or turn green; thinking quickly, I decided to defuse a situation by sharing a harmless, funny story that happened to me as a freshman.

"I went on a date with this guy who said that music was the most important thing in his life, and I thought, wow, that's so beautiful!" I began my story over Lyra's incessant snickering. "So we had dinner and went back to his place because I'm a whore," the whole table erupted in laughter at my deadpan remark, Tony reaching over to give me a high five.

"And as we got there, he put on one of his demos which was just a bunch of sampled and remixed Guns'n'Roses songs, and I thought wow, that's gotta be one of the worst things I've ever heard," I pointedly looked away as Lyra's cackling grew in volume, having heard the same story several times by now and the outrage I expressed at the situation first hand.

"But instead of that I said, wow, that's so cool! Then we did the thing and his whole bedroom was covered in Axl Rose posters and I'm sure at some point Mr. Rose stared right up my asshole," there were tears streaming down Lyra's face as Tony flopped his upper body onto the table and Bruce convulsed helplessly in a silent fit of giggles. "And then I thought to myself: wow, I would have to pretend to like his music if I dated this guy and I just couldn't do that..." I breathed out, succumbing to the mirth at the dinner table. "It was good but not November Rain good, y'kno?"

Bruce snorted loudly, sliding down his chair with a hand over his face. The table shook with the force of Tony's cackling; I didn't see his expression but the howling, rasping noises sent me into another fit of laughter, right on par with Lyra.

"Is this..." Tony rapidly inhaled the much-needed oxygen. "Is this why you keep wincing whenever I play the 'Roses in the lab?" Tony wheezed and Lyra nodded.

"I just... I can picture it, and I-" she made a vague, encompassing gesture and a face.

"Please, don't," I urged with a snort. "There are better ways to get disappointed."

Dinner went on by smoothly after that, everybody happily making remarks on my dating fail, the topic of Lyra's birth and Tony's college shenanigans dismissed.

I caught Dr. Banner's pointed look as we finished our dessert - he was studying me, eyes searching for something that he very obviously wished was there. From the damp roots of my hair to the soft, cotton top clinging to my chest, I wasn't left unscrutinzed and unexamined. Like one of the many specimens he studied on a daily basis, Bruce lingered on the many characteristics that made me stand out in the grey crowd.

"Would you like to see the labs?" He asked, appearing behind me without a single sound.

The freshly cleaned dishes clattered in my arms. I'd almost dropped them, startled, but Bruce's hand landed on the top of the stack right before the top plate would have slipped off and shattered into pieces on the cold tile of his kitchen.

Blood rushed to my ears. "I'd love to," my brain had briefly returned to reality, the rush of meeting both Stark and Banner succumbing to logic and reason. My and his fields of study briefly overlapped, the question he posed was more than reasonable. In fact, many people would cheat, lie and steal to be in my position.

Bruce smiled, opening a cabinet and taking half of the dishes I was holding to stack them up in their proper place. The sleeves of his shirt were rolled up, exposing wide, muscular forearms littered with dark, coarse hair.

I was sure my face was flaming. After waving off Lyra's attempts to put shoes on me and leaving her to watch her TV show, a wide, warm palm rested on the back of my waist, gently steering me towards the elevator.

I tried to keep my eyes off Bruce in the large mirror on the walls of the car as it swiftly moved down, scrutinizing my appearance instead. My throat bobbed, the elevator car suddenly too small and too hot.

His eyes left marks on me - invisible ones, the kind that I knew were there just from the scorching heat sizzling on my skin.

There was a certain je ne sais quoi about him. Perhaps, it was in the way he was acting - a polar opposite of what I'd had expected, Dr. Bruce Banner possessed a quiet confidence and his patience appeared to be endless, heartily doused with an appreciation for his closest ones. The way his eyes lit up in response to people smiling around the dinner table was hard to miss.

When Bruce spoke about his research - whatever wasn't classified, anyway - the spark expanded into a mischievous fire. I could hardly understand the nuances in his work, scratch that- I could not understand a single word he was saying, at all. The individual syllables registered as they should, but my traitorous brain could only focus on the way he licked his lips in between quickly inhaled breaths.

"You're not... Following, are you?" The corner of his mouth lifted upwards, clever brown eyes fixed on my face.

God, I hoped I wasn't drooling. But to deny the obvious would have been a stretch. "No, not really," I swallowed, willing my eyes to lift from the large veins on the hand that was pointing at a set of equations. Reasonably good at math any day, they looked like the scribbles of a madman to me at the time.

Dr. Banner sighed, letting silence creep among the whirring machinery in the lab for a brief moment. "I don't scare you?" He removed his glasses, cleaning them with the corner of his shirt.

The question reeked of self-doubt and, perhaps, insecurity. "No," I answered simply, not giving him the slightest chance to find doubt in my words. I was barely holding my voice from shaking, afraid he'd misunderstand my reaction to the sudden change in atmosphere.

He was closer to me than I recalled. My hip was almost brushing his, the bulk of his shoulder millimeters from touching against my bare skin, the smell of something herbal, like tea, and sharp chemicals clouding my senses. It was such a contrasting experience.

Bruce turned to me, an expression between hunger and regret forcing me to shiver and look him straight in the eye. A hand landed on my waist, holding me in place with gentle firmness. "I'm a monster, I could hurt you," he whispered, leaning into me like a touch starved kitten. The man screamed contradiction. "We shouldn't."

Vivid images of the Hulk and the rampages years prior flashed through my mind; the rubble, the collateral damage in the form of many lives. I barely remembered it, having been too little to really understand what was going on. One thing, though, I knew for sure: ever since the world became aware of Lyra's existence, there had been no incidents. Sure, the Hulk still appeared when there was a threat, but there were no documented incidents of the green creature running amok, accidentally.

"You won't hurt me," I spoke with conviction. Perhaps, I was bluffing just slightly but I wouldn't lie like that to myself. The variable, the... Twelve or so percent chance of things going... Awry, it made a small, malicious worm inside of me rejoice and fill my limbs with familiar adrenalised yearning. "You're not a monster. Far from it, actually," I used the hand that was not supporting me against the desk to gently cradle the side of his face, letting my fingertips brush over the rough five o'clock shadow on his cheek.

Bruce emitted a sound somewhere between an agitated grown and a pleading whine, sagging with the sound exhale, pressing himself flush with my chest. His face slipped from my palm, the warm tip of his nose running a steady line up my neck, sending goosebumps running wildly down my back as his hot breath tickled the arch of my throat.

"Baby," the nickname punched a stuttered gasp out of me with the intensity contained in just that one word. "I've been hearing all these amazing things about you," his voice dropped, low baritone rumbling straight into my ear. "I won't be able to hold back. I'll want you all to myself," his bicep flexed under my hand.

My knees would have bucked if I wasn't grasping onto Bruce for dear life after those words. I had some sense of personal pride in me, so while my body was an easy, traitorous thing, my mind was more than eager to participate in this game, to ping pong a little bit before... "Yeah? What things?" I breathed.

Teeth briefly closed around my tender skin, nipping for just a second. "You're kind, beautiful," his hand took a steadfast hold on the back of my neck, exposing my throat to his mouth. More skin to mark, more time to whisper. "Intelligent, bright and clever," the more he spoke, the fiercer he became. Bruce's grasp tightened until I was pliant in it, willingly following his silent commands. "A bit of a pain in the ass," a healthy dose of humour was added into the mix as my ass was roughly grabbed, our fronts pressed together at his insistence.

"That sounds about right," I didn't resist the sudden urge to snark, thoughts lazily floating in my head, like clouds on a bright sunny day, fleeting and sparse. None of them caught on. I was focused on feeling the need, on my need to feel.

A sharp smack landed on the plump of my ass, the sound resonating in the eerily quiet lab. The sounds of machinery had dulled at some point, leaving just the two of us panting our lust into each other's space. "I know you can be a good girl. Will you, princess?" His fingertips dug into my flesh, surpassing the soft sweatpants as if they weren't even there.

I could only nod, dumbly, overcome by the sudden rush of blood to my body. The life coarsing through me sang, demanding a release of the pent-up tension.

"What's that?" Bruce removed himself from my neck, catching my unfocused eyes with a crooked smirk on his lips.

"Yes," I swallowed, breathing through my mouth.

"Mmm," he hummed, running both hands over my sides, over the frayed edges of my Mötorhead top. He admired it, briefly, setting his eyes on the band logo that was right over my breasts. Having decided something to himself, Bruce promptly removed it, lifting it over my head with ease and leaving it right on the science lab table.

Taking hold of my hand, he walked over to a hidden set of sliding doors that revealed a rather large, frequently used bed, shutting them just as I walked in, wearing only my bra and borrowed sweats. My back was pressed to the door in mere seconds, hot palms chasing away the chill of the lab as Bruce slotted his lips over mine.

He tasted like something I've never had before. His lips - so plush and supple, took hold of the kiss with practiced gusto, sucking me in without a chance or the desire to escape. I drank from him, sucked on the bottom lip as his tongue explored my mouth, danced with mine.

The room was spinning, the ringing in my ears growing in volume. I was only partly aware of the sensation of sliding down the wall; our knees thudded on the carpeted floor simultaneously, heavy breathing the only noise I could distinguish.

"Breathe, baby, that's it," Bruce coaxed, gently stroking my nape. The soft cotton of his shirt crumpled under my fingers where I held onto him, desperately searching something to ground myself with.

The buckle of his belt clattered and then clinked again as he wrapped the worn leather around my wrists, bringing them together in front of my chest. I exhaled sharply at the intimate gesture, a whine bubbling up from my chest when Bruce used a single fingertip to raise my chin.

My eyes met his; a brown iris tinged with the faintest of green around the outer edge. "This okay, princess?" He sought my face for confirmation, for agreement, for anything.

I nodded, stuttering mid-gesture, remembering our previous interaction. My mouth did not want to cooperate but I forced it to, even if it came out as little more than a pitiful mewl. "Yes, daddy," the word, sweet and sticky like fruit syrup, poured from my lips.

My eyes slid shut as my conscience - or was it common sense? - took hold of the situation. I was on my knees in front of my best friends dad, a virtual stranger, and I'd just-

Bruce's soft chuckle stopped the negative spiral of my thoughts. "That's my girl," he sounded a tad more breathless now, a hairliner in his perfect façade of self-control. As if he'd sensed my indecisiveness, he tugged on the makeshift restraints, pulling me closer, closer and into his lap.

A warm, solid chest with a healthy amount of fluff greeted me. Bruce let my lax, pliant body fall into his arms, catching me effortlessly and bringing my face to his lips. "You have nothing to be ashamed of, you're my good girl," he peppered soft kisses all over my flaming cheeks, my twitching nose, my fluttering lashes.

"Please," I begged, shame giving way to the flood of arousal that seemingly hit me all at once. I was aware of the dampness collecting in my panties, the stiffness of my limbs from holding back the ravenous desire to paw at Bruce like a wild animal. "Please, daddy..."

"I know, I know, baby girl," he soothed, not stopping his tender assault on my face. "Daddy will make it all better. I know just what you need," Bruce finally pulled away. I heard the sound of him undoing his zipper and then the awkward shuffle of him shucking off his pants.

Somewhere in between of all that, he'd ended up sitting down on the bed, wearing only his boxers, his shirt hanging open. The red crawled down his chest, partially masked by the coarse salt and pepper hair; his lips were cherry red and his hair was sticking out in odd directions. Bruce looked sinful.

My eyes inadvertently landed on the impressive bulge in his boxers; in response to my widened eyes, he reached out for it, stroking the outline of his thick cock through his boxers. "Like what you see, baby?"

"Yeah," My mouth watered.

"Baby wants a fat cock?" He teased, sounding like he knew exactly what he was doing, testing my self-control like that. With a flick of his wrist, it sprang free, slapping against his tummy, coating the fine hairs with drops of clear, musky fluid.

I swallowed, feeling the taste of him from afar and yearning for more where I was parked between his spread legs.

In a gesture almost loving, he tugged on the belt still wrapped around my wrists, bringing my face to his leaking shaft and my hands to the base of it, letting me feel the weight of his balls in them. The cock throbbed, neglected, weighed down by the heaviness of his full balls.

"Go ahead, baby, suck my cock," the encouragement came with a gentle push to my head.

I obediently followed, wrapping my lips around the pink, moist crown of it, a hum beginning in the back of my throat. My God, Bruce tasted heavenly... I whirled and slipped my tongue a around his head, I dipped into the slit to drink the nectar right from the tap, idly coming to awareness of the broken, choked moans coming from the man above me.

Raising my head got me a view of his chin; head thrown back, the lax O of his mouth glistened in the meager light. My eyes slid lower, to the flex of his abs. Bruce fought hard to stay still. The desire consumed me, a sudden rush of power at having Dr. Bruce Banner's cock in my mouth and the man at my mercy; I inhaled, sliding my mouth further and further down his throbbing length.

"Fuck," I heard him mutter before his hands gripped the sides of my face. "Hungry, baby, are you?" His eyes glowed a faint green; I shuddered at the power he held within himself. Held back for me. "Tap my thigh twice," he spoke and I had no choice but to obey. "Okay. Do that if it gets too much, alright?" I nodded. He gave me a wide, beaming smile. "Good girl," he praised, experimentally bucking his hips into my mouth a few times.

In and out. I focused on my breathing, sharp, little inhales: his girth took up all the free space in my mouth, the tip of it barely fit into my throat. The burn, the stretch; I felt every tenth of an inch, every bulging attempt of my body to accommodate Bruce's huge cock. It was delicious, I couldn't help but crave the same stretch in my neglected, sopping wet pussy.

"Fuck, you're taking it so well," Bruce moaned wetly. "Your mouth... S'like heaven... Could fuck it all day, that's my good girl," the rambling increased in it's intensity as the pace of his hips hastened. Drool and tears flowed like a river; my chin was dropping with it, spit connected my face to his pelvis. "Oh," there was a brief pause to his movements; suddenly, he pulled out, fisting the base of his cock, staring me down with a ferocious gleem in his eye.

I must've looked a straight mess; my face like a crime scene, my clothes disheveled, covered in fluids and most of all - I was desperately grinding against my own feet, too focused on the glorious cock in front of me to notice the weakness of my own flesh. "Daddy?" I questioned, wincing at the grating of my own voice.

Without a word, the belt was tugged once more; in a set of movements just slightly north of acrobatic, I found myself laying on my back in the middle of the bed, my sweatpants suffering a haste demise in the corner of the room.

Bruce crawled atop me, leaving a trail of sloppy kisses on every inch of my skin he could reach, mouthing something inaudible into every pore of my body. As he drew closer, I discerned bitten-off phrases, stringing my desire into sticky, tangy mess at the apex of my thighs.

"My perfect baby girl," the words reached me; all tongue, he kissed me once more, arching into me as much as I arched into his hot grasp. A brief inspection of my face - he was satisfied with what he saw - and Bruce crawled back, settling in between my spread legs, breathing hot air on the lips of my sex still covered by a sopping wet piece of fabric.

"Oh fuck," I yelped, feeling him smooch it soundly, the hot wetness of his tongue penetrating the meagre lace barrier with ease.

He moved it aside anyway, with a single finger, giving my pussy a broad lick, moaning into my cunt like a man gone mad. It took a few more licks for him to feel sated enough to surface, all the while holding my hips down. I was so sensitive, I felt even the tiniest flicks to my clit, I was sure if I didn't cum then and there, I would explode.

"Such a pretty pussy, princess," his heavy breathing paused briefly. He nipped my thigh. "So wet, is that all for me?"

"Yes, yes, daddy," I rasped, pushing my cunt into his face, losing all shame and trepidation.

"So tasty," he continued the torture, outlining my lower lips before taking another nosedive right into it, swirling his tongue around every fold, sucking onto my clit.

Bruce ate my pussy until my thighs shook, until my core quivered and I could no longer hold back the choked, ragged screams starting somewhere in the low of my belly and coming out as unholy, all-consuming yowls filled with unadulterated lust.

"Louder for me, baby," he inhaled rapidly, and then, he sucked on my clit.

The world stopped, halted on it's axis, every muscle going rigid in my body and every nerve ending simultaneously coming alive. Faintly, I heard a chant, repeating two syllables over and over, it sounded like my voice - but I had no control over myself. All I could do was weakly grind my hips against Bruce's mouth, faltering when the crashing waves of my orgasm began to recede.

The infuriating overstimulation stopped; blinking hazily, I saw Bruce's eyes glimmer brown and green in front of my face. His nose and his chin was glistening with a thin coat of sticky fluid; disheveled and red, he looked a man on the verge of a revelation.

Something hot and blunt nosed at my cunt, bringing back the moment to me - I realized, with a great deal of impatience - how empty I felt. The decision was minute. "Daddy, fuck me, please, I want your cock," the words came easily.

"That's my girl," his eyes fluttered shut as the first inches squeezed through the snug of my cunt. I was sopping wet and as relaxed as I'd be, but even then, it was a stretch. "Good girl, good baby," the mumbled praise made me whine and my pussy clamp on his cock. "Relax, let daddy fill you up." Breathing through it, I consciously unwound myself around him, letting my palms rest freely on his shoulders. "Let daddy take care of you."

Like melted sugar, his husked words stuck to me inside and out. Short, sharp thrusts; Bruce was patiently burrowing himself inside of me, making his way to reach the deepest parts of me I didn't even know existed. His cock head pressed against something hard and spongy inside of me; stars burst behind my eyes I'd clamped shut on reflex.

I moaned weakly, tugging on his arm, pressing myself closer. It felt so, so good. Like a raw nerve had been exposed and he was stroking it, pushing that little switch with every stroke of his hips.

"I'm not gonna last," he muttered as once again, my cunt squeezed him snugly in place, just as greedy as I was to feel that tiny explosion spark up within me again.

"I want..." I panted. Bruce set in a punishing pace after that, a palm under my ass, squeezing it so hard there would definitely be bruising. I craved it, I needed to see the evidence this was not some elaborate fever dream. "I want... Daddy to fill me up," words came out garbled; it sounded like gibberish to my ears but Bruce - they spurred him on.

"Oh yeah?" That breathless, boyish cockiness was back in his voice again; despite how fucked out he sounded, I prepared myself for something truly out of this world. I just knew.

He sat back on his shins, dragging me by the hips with him, making me shiver and moan and twitch and clamp onto him again as his throbbing cock hit that special spot again. And again. And again.

"Look at me, baby," a hand on my belly and his eyes burning right through me. As they slid down, towards the apex of my thighs where he was still moving within me almost lazily, I saw it.

"Oh fuck," I couldn't utter much more than a two-syllabled profanity. There was a bulge in my belly, just above my pelvis, moving in rhythm with Bruce's hips. And then he pressed on it and I-

Something, someone, somewhere was screaming. The noise was loud and pitched, but even then, I could barely hear it though the neverending waves of bliss that enveloped my whole being. Gold and silver at the edges of my rapidly darkening vision; I was drowning in something that smelled and felt like Bruce. The safety of his arms, the warmth of his heated body, the rapid snapping of his hips-

Oh.

"I'm gonna, fuck," the last word was but a ghost of a human speech. Growling low and filthy, Bruce leaned into my ear, his breath hot and moist. "Mine," his hips stuttered, his cock nestled deep, the sensation bordering on painful, forcefully extracted pleasure. It throbbed with every spurt of his seed; each one felt like a solid punch in the gut to my abused pussy.

"Daddy," I mewled, my body jerking away from him but my mind and my soul yearning for more. His rapidly softening flesh made the idea of being separated unbearable.

"S'good, s'my good girl, m'so proud," he mumbled, looking slightly disoriented as he removed himself from me, immediately pressing me to his side and interwining any free, flailing limbs.

We laid in silence, each of us slowly coming back to Earth after the completely unreal experience we just had. I didn't know what to think, didn't know what to do as the realization set in, the post-orgasmic haze giving way to a sudden rush of clarity.

"I can hear you overthinking," Bruce's voice was fond.

Before I could muster up the courage to snark back, the divided doors opened, one very concerned Tony Stark standing there, armed with a tranquilizer gun in one hand and a pack of cookies in the other. His mouth, previously open to (probably) yell at us, remained as open when his eyes had registered the scene in front of him.

I stared at Bruce. Bruce stared at Tony.

"The noise," he offered in the way of explanation, dangling the pack of cookies, looking, for once - speechless. He recovered quickly, however, even if the remark was a thin ghost of his usual sass: "You pick the nerd over me? I'm hurt," he scoffed in mock irritation, although I was pretty sure I saw some satisfaction in there, too.

Bruce looked at me. I looked at Bruce.

A mischievous grin slowly crept up his face, an identical one beginning to appear on my own face seconds after.

"Hey, two nerds is better than one, right?" My response is what did it; or, rather, it was the evidence of my previous throat-fucking clearly audible in my voice... Tony dropped the cookies and then, the tranq gun.

Bruce Banner taglist: @pilloclock @mikariell95 @letsby @sleep-i-ness @toomanyrobins @persephonehemingway @mostly-marvel-musings @schemefrenzy @lillsxd @bluecrazedandbeautiful @slothspaghettiwrites @sapphicnoodle69 @couldntbedamned @xoxabs88xox @marvelsbanner @tripleyeeet @tatestripedsweater @stuckybarton

[purpleyellow]

The audacity

Seventeen 14th member

Hayun’s masterlist

“Seventeen won’t take bs when it comes to Hayun”

Requested by: two (2) anons    

cw: offensive language

a/n: Feel free to share your thoughts with me. Requests are open! 💙

(to my brazilians around, this gif is svt’s version of ninguem solta a mão de ninguem)

The arrival of dancers made the practice room even more crowded and noisy than usual. It was one of the few times Seventeen worked with an outside dance team, and they happened to have a lot of new faces around, who needed time to figure out the staging and how things were working so far.

After they ran through the choreography a couple of times, the choreographer called in a break, allowing the huge group to instantly clear the middle space and separate themselves into small circles of conversations.

Seungcheol, Jeonghan, and Joshua instantly met each other and began chatting about dinner plans and whatnot. Slowly approaching Jun and Wonwoo, the oldest filled them in on what they're deciding until he starts searching for someone.

“So, we could order it on the next break and have someone grab it for us. Anyway, did anyone see Hayun?”

“Making friends, as usual,” Wonwoo comments, pointing at the other corner of the room where the girl was surrounded by four dancers.

“Hayun-ah” The leader waves her over and waits as she jogs to his side “We're talking about dinner, what do you think about-”

“Oh, those guys were talking about this new restaurant that opened downtown, I was thinking of tagging along with them” She points back at the group and watches as her members nod “But I can cancel, of course”

“No, go ahead. It's just a meal” Joshua goes to wave her off when Seungkwan approaches them with crossed arms.

“Yeah. Just a meal. Until she's suddenly ditching us during the holidays and moving out with her new friends” The boy pouts, turning his face away from the group. Hayun reaches up to ruffle his hair before landing a soft slap.

“Says the dude who is friends with half of the entertainment industry” Ignoring his eye roll, she turns back to the rest of their little huddle “Well, if nobody else will feel betrayed”

“I was kidding” Seungkwan whines and Scoups pushes her away from them “Stop being dramatic and go do your mingling”

Going back to the group of dancers, Hayun resumes chatting with them for a couple of minutes before the break is over.

After more hours of running over every tiny detail for the stage, the rehearsal finally ends and the scattering of people begins. Hayun takes a couple of minutes talking about minor adjustments with the members and just checking up on them before searching for the four friends she had made that evening.

“Hey, how do you guys plan on heading there?” She asks, taking a sip from her water bottle and missing the glances between the two boys and two girls.

“Actually, we might have to do it another day,” The girl closest to her says and flips a hair strand off of Hayun's shoulder. “We got pretty tired from this last session”

“And work tomorrow it's going to start pretty early, you know. It's best to let this go for today,” The boy nods to her before pulling out his phone from his pocket and slightly turning away from the idol.

“Yeah, I get it. That's okay, we'll reschedule it then” Hayun smiles and gives them a thumbs up “I'll head to the dorms, then. Have a good rest, and tomorrow we'll talk more”.

Sending her some quick waves and small smiles, the four dancers waited for Hayun to turn around before sharing an annoyed look and sighing.

The practice room slowly grows empty, only leaving Wonwoo and Vernon who lost an incredible game of rock, paper, scissors, and had to stay behind to clean up everything. Finally turning off the lights, the two boys head out into the hallway and spot a group of four people standing by the entrance.

“Aren't those the people Hayun was talking to earlier,” Vernon asks quietly before a voice from the group reaches them.

“Why is this damn cab taking so long? We should have let that airhead tag along”.

“Agreed. She would have talked our ears off, but at least we would have made it to the club already”.

Sharing a look, the two idols stop walking and listen closely to understand if the dancers are talking about what the boys think they're talking about.

“That was so stupid. Why would you invite her in the first place? She's so annoying”.

“I mean, having an idol considering you a friend would be fun, right? Especially with the Christmas season coming up. Can you imagine the gifts she would buy us?”

“Yeah, dude. We wouldn't even need to worry about paying for stuff anymore. Just have Hayun tag along anywhere and, boom, no more tabs to pay.”

“But also, no more functioning eardrums”

“No, you have a point. She seems like she'd give us her credit card password on the third time we hung out. Not to mention, looking at her position in contrast with ours. You don't even have to befriend her, but be on her good side, and she'll make sure to give us more gigs within Pledis”.

Standing frozen, Wonwoo and Vernon listened to everything they were saying and shared looks of disbelief. Having enough of it, the oldest cleared his throat and slung his bag, making it hit his own back with enough force to make a thumping sound.

“Let's go, Vernon,” He ignored the four people standing before them with wide eyes and resumed walking. Once shoulder to shoulder with one of the dancers, Wonwoo stopped again and said while looking ahead, “Next time, be careful of whom you're talking about”.

Vernon, on the other hand, made eye contact with each dancer before raising one eyebrow and following the oldest. After closing the car door, he groaned annoyed, “Can you believe they had… ”

“… the fucking audacity” Jeonghan places his cup on the table, face showcasing utter disgust after Wonwoo told him what they had listened before leaving the Pledis building.

“Show me who those people are again tomorrow. I'll make sure they never step inside our practice room, ever again,” Hoshi points out.

“Is there a way of not having them tomorrow? I'm afraid Scoups Hyung might commit murder” Dokyeom brought attention to the leader standing on the corner of the kitchen.

Looking like he was plotting an illegal act, Seungcheol scoffs and pushed himself away from the cabinets. “The bare minimum you would expect from someone is that they can be professional. I swear, those people are getting an earful for talking about Hayun within a billion-meter ratio from where I work”.

“It's best to let it rest until tomorrow's performance is done. After we'll probably never see them again, so there's not much point causing any visible disturbance.” Laying a hand on the leader's arm, Woozi tried to make some sort of sense, but all it did was cause Scoups to roll his eyes.

“We can't just act like nothing happened”

“We also can't change anything about the choreography until then” Hoshi butts in and takes a breath trying not to jump in the 'let's hunt them down' train.

“They already know Wonwoo and Vernon heard them trash-talking her, so I'm not letting them have it easy tomorrow.” Jeonghan rolls his eyes and pointed to both Woozi and Hoshi, “I'm speaking my mind the first moment I see those sons of bitches, you're free to wait until the show's over”.

“About that, I don't think we should tell Hayun what happened” Joshua, who had been quiet the entire time, speaks, drawing attention to him. “Not until, as you said, the show is over, and we won't see them again. You know that she's probably going to get disappointed about it”.

“And you expect her to not go running to meet her new 'friends' once we arrive at the venue?” Wonwoo raises an eyebrow, but Mingyu shakes his head and backs the older up.

“We just have to keep her entertained around us. Fill in Dino, Seungkwan, and Myungho later, and have them help with making sure the group doesn't run into her”.

Raising his hand, Vernon casually mumbles “Maybe don't tell Seungkwan, he won't be able to hide his feelings about the whole thing”

“Myungho won't either” Jun comments and the room falls silent at the sound of the remaining members chatting and approaching the kitchen.

“Wow, you make a meeting and forget to call in the main characters” Hayun laughs walking through the room and opening the fridge for a beer “So, when's the food arriving?”

~

Hayun is sitting on the makeup chair, casually watching Scoups and Jeonghan whispering to each other from the mirror's reflection, when a hand lands on her shoulder and another holds out a smoothie for her.

“Whatcha thinking about?” Joshua sits on the chair next to her while Mingyu punctures the drink's lid with a straw.

Without taking her eyes off the mirror, she nods with her head to it. “Those two are up to something”

“Scoups and Jeonghan Hyung? Nah, they're always like that. Sharing secrets and stuff,” Mingyu giggles, shoving the straw inside her mouth and shifting to stand in front of the mirror. “Cute nail polish, when did you have time to get it done?”

“Oh, these are acrylics. This lady was just putting them on” Hayun falls into his trap and began analyzing the design with some occasional comments from the boys.

Peace has seemingly set inside the dressing room, yet it doesn't last long until Dino's loud “Uh?” caught the attention of the members, who turned to see what he and Vernon were doing.

Trying to shut the youngest up, Vernon makes it very obvious to the guys that he had just filled Dino in with the “frenemies” situation. Most of them try to brush it off and not bring more attention to it. Seungkwan, however, approaches them by, very loudly, asking what's up.

“What are you talking about?” He boringly fixes up his outfit. Vernon can feel the burning eyes of Jeonghan on his skull as he tries to deviate the conversation to another topic.

“Did you go see catering already? I heard they had a coffee machine”.

“Wait. Does he not know what happened?” Dino fails to read the room properly and instigates the older boy.

“What happened? Why is everyone sharing secrets all of a sudden? Is the thing you're discussing why Scoups Hyung seems ready to jump someone”.

The timing of events can't be worse, as the makeup artist taps Hayun's shoulder to let her know they were done. Within seconds, the girl gets up and turns to where the three youngest were standing.

“What's with the gossiping? Did Vernon lose his airpods again?” She brushes away from Joshua as he tried to hold her in place and waves off Mingyu when, in a panic, he suggests they should check out the pigeons outside.

“What? No! I mean, yeah! How unfortunate, isn't it?” Vernon jumps around his answers and tries looking for anyone willing to help him out.

“Just tell her about it” Approaching them from the door, Jeonghan, now without the leader's company, shrugs his shoulders, making Hayun raise an eyebrow.

“Jeonghan, at least wait until the day is over,” Joshua speaks through his teeth and the boy rolls his eyes.

“Well, she already knows something is up, and to be fair I don't know what good hiding this will bring. At least, if she feels like doing something about it, she'll have the chance right now”.

“Do something about it? Hadn't we agreed that the best is to wait until the performance is over and just never see them again?”

“What even are you talking about?” Hayun shuts them both up and Jeonghan and Joshua turned to her with annoyed expressions, “Don't even look at me like that. You're the ones mentioning me as if I'm not in the room”.

Placing a hand on her shoulder, Joshua tilts his head a little and speaks softly, “Trust me for a moment here, it's best if you brush it aside. Until later at least, and then we can settle it as you wish”.

“Wha- Just spill it out for fucks sake. I'm going to combust if you don't tell me right now whatever this all means,” Hayun puffs, punching his shoulder. Just as Joshua opens his mouth to say the same thing again, Jeonghan beats him and shoves himself in front of the girl.

“Do you recall those dancers you were planning to go out with yesterday? Yeah, well, turns out they're all little shits who were trash-talking you, and just overall talking crap, yesterday”

“Jeonghan” Joshua repressed the older who does nothing but wave him off.

“Doesn't matter what they said because you're nothing of it, and-” Adverting his eyes for a second, Jeonghan stares to the side, where half of Scoups' body is waving for him through the door. “And, and, you're amazing and all of that. So now go rest your awesome self while I go teach those punks a lesson”.

Zooming past her, Jeonghan runs to the door, where the leader is already back outside. Hoshi, Jun, Woozi, and DK, scream for him before also going out of the door. A very lost, Seungkwan, simultaneously tries to get Vernon to tell him what exactly the dancer said before while shouting for the older to wait for him to also speak his mind.

“I didn't want you to know about this before the performance, but-”

“Whatever, let's make sure nobody dies today” Hayun rolls her eyes and turns around, Wonwoo running from where he was watching everything and holding her by the shoulder.

“Do you want us to go fix that up? It's okay to give them the cold shoulder or just go off if you want to” Nodding, she keeps silent and walks out, bringing the rest of the guys behind her.

The8, who also had just found out about the situation, whispers to Vernon, “Can you believe they had the audacity?”

“I know, right?” The youngest whisper-yelled at him as they made it to the hallway and assessed the situation.

“The next time you even think about opening your mouth to talk about her-” Scoups had his finger pointing at the tallest dancer -who ironically had a few centimeters on him-, while the rest of the members stood next to him nodding and calmly listening to what the leader was saying.

“Oppa, just drop it,” Hayun shouts, walking past them and holding his shoulder.

Annoyingly, Scoups rolled his eyes and turned to her, “What do you mean, drop it?” Thinking for a second, he blinked and turned even more bothered, “Who even told you about this?”

The leader looked around until he found Mingyu, offending the tall guy who made an X in front of his body.

“Doesn't matter who told me. Let's just not lose time doing this” Brushing past him, Hayun now faced the dancers “Look, I'll teach you something right now, so grab it or drop it okay? I don't give a shit that you don't like me, or whatever, but at least be professional because all this situation did was teach me that none of you care about your careers. It's pretty clear by the angry puppy beside me that you just lost any chance of growing inside our brand, so keep this as a lesson and respect the artists you're working with. Also, once we're on stage put on a smile, so my fans won't be able to sense your shit”

“It should be pretty clear by what she said but you definitely don't have a chance to work with any Pledis artist again” Hoshi came from the end of the hallway alongside their manager and choreographer. The latter nodded and added.

“For the sake of the performance, you should all go back to your dressing rooms. You all said whatever was on your mind, so try to refocus during the last few minutes you have”.

“I didn't get to say what was on my mind” While the group was dispersing, DK mumbles on the side and Jun snorts.

“You had a chance, but all you did was stare at them and scowl until Scoups Hyung took the lead”

“I don't care about who said and who didn't say what they wanted” Hayun rolled her eyes, turning to the boys as they arrived in the room. Clasping her hands together, she brings them to her face and smiles, “You all care about me”.

“The fact you still doubted about it after years hurts me” Dokyeom held his chest and frowned, the girl laughs and goes to hug him.

“Group hug?” Seungkwan says uncertainly and Hoshi nods, dragging Woozi with him, “Group hug!”

[thesmokingguns]

Wedding Season

Tommy

-Welcome to the Wedding Date expert

-Getting ready together and he matches his bow tie to your dress

-“Can you help me?” Helping him tie his bow tie and he uses the moment where you’re so close that he can kiss you

-Well you’re finishing getting ready he makes sure the car is out front.

-“Wow, babe, you’re going to make the bride jealous”

-Double checking to make sure that you have the gift and adding more money to the card

- Hes so excited to go to this wedding together and have a good time celebrating people

-Hes going to talk about all his favorite parts of the ceremony and things that he enjoys or would want in the future

“I love love”

-He is a wedding guest expert. He seems to know all the wedding coordinators and people working the event

-“Hey Sherry, another beautiful event!”

-He brings you a glass of champagne during cocktail hour and wants to talk about the vows

-“I don’t want to get married in a church. Maybe a cool Japanese garden or on the beach. I’d write my vows too. None of that obey shit. What do you think, babe?”

-He tips the band at cocktail hour and drags you out, making you laugh as you dance

-Introduces you to all his friends

-“I can’t wait to see you in a white dress”

-He is slamming his silverware against the glass to have the couple kiss all night

-Tommy will wander off to talk to someone so he’s not by your side all night but he waves at you and sends smiles your way

-He comes up with a plan so you catch the bouquet and he gets the garter

-“Throw some elbows of you have to”

-He breaks a chair jumping off it to catch the garter and almost lands on some guys.

-He offers to pick you up and give you extra height so you catch the bouquet

-“THATS MY FUCKING GIRL!” he’s amped that you caught the bouquet

-He thinks he’s going to something so sexy putting the garter on you but as he gets a view at what would be your underwear he sees you’re not wearing any.

-“Babe!”

-Laughing because you knew exactly what was going to happen as he slides the garter on you in front of his family. He’s blushing and it’s both cute and hysterical how flustered he is

-Tommy putting his jacket over your shoulders as you head up to the hotel room after

-“We should get married this summer”

-You’ve been dating for two months and it’s March

Vince

-Imagine that you’ve just spent two hours getting yourself fully ready and you’re about to leave for a wedding and down the stairs comes your man child boyfriend fully dressed in a three piece tuxedo complete with a top hat alll in white

-“What do you think?”

-He does a spin, pulls the lapels of his jacket and is smiling proud of his outfit.

-Dragging him to his room to change into a new suit

-Pouty Princess in the passenger seat of the car as you drive to the wedding

-Trying to reassures him that when it’s his wedding he can wear a white suit

-“You’ll let me wear white to our wedding?”

-He’s so sincere when he says it’s so he is holding your hand you agree even though it’s been over four years and he hasn’t really showed any interest in settling down

-Vince will talk shit about everything that he doesn’t like

-He keeps referring to “our” wedding

-he takes full advantage of the open bar and he just is getting hammered

-“I think I want pink and white roses. Like a whole fucking garden of them.”

-Having to tell him to stop talking about a fake wedding at a real wedding

-Pouty Princess gets really mad and goes to pout at the bar

-He gets up on stage and starts singing because he hates the live band

-Coaxing him off stage promising that you’ll dance with him

-“I want to go home. This club sucks.”

-Just reminding him that you’re at a wedding for your close friends

-Vince goes outside and you spend twenty minutes looking for him. You follow the sound of someone puking and find him wiping his mouth

-“they gave me the cheap stuff, honey. it’s not my fault.”

-He won’t be dragged out of the garden easily and you’re fucking horrified when he gets down on one knee at a wedding

-“Honey, I love you so much. I’ve been trying all week to figure out the best place to do this-“

-he suddenly is patting his suit and realizes that he changed before they left

-“We need to go home.” He’s standing up and you want to die of embarrassment as he’s dragging you through the wedding where a few of these people just saw him on one knee

-Anxious leg bouncing in the car, window down because he might puke again

-He’s falling up the stairs when he gets home ripping apart his white suit.

-Running down the stairs he finds you and gets down on one knee again

-“I have the ring this time.”

-Hes kind of a huge idiot but you like that he has a plan. Also you’re worried because you’re going to marry bridezilla

Mick

-If it wasn’t one of his bandmates weddings he wouldn’t be going

-If he wasn’t in the wedding party there is no way that he would wear a suit

-When he is waiting with one of the bridesmaids he’s paired with hands him her flask

-“I’m trying to stay sober to keep everyone in check”

-She scoffs and he turns to see her chugging it down before giving him another chance go to take it., which he does downing the rest of it.

-Trying to make sure all the guys are doing the right thing and keep everyone alive

-Taking pictures he finds out that the mystery bridesmaid is the brides best friend from childhood

-“I’m going to the bar.”

-He decides he needs to just have sex with someone at the wedding as a reward for actually coming here

-Looking at the wedding guests and wondering if he’s going to be alone forever

-Thinking about what a waste weddings are and how they should have saved their money

-Knows that bride shouldn’t be in pure white

-The flowers make him sneeze

-The bridesmaid is at the end of the bar and he is suddenly handed a drink she has bought him. He watches as she cheers the airs downing the three fingers of white alcohol in one sip before walking away.

-“Oh no you fucking don’t.”

-He is trying to find this girl who keeps showing up with alcohol

-Mick keeps loosing his clothes. His jacket is lost, his vest is unbuttoned and the bow tie is untied

-“Fucking Women”

- he spots her headed into the elevator and frowns when it closes. When it reopens he sees red lipstick kisses around 7

-“If she put her mouth on that...”

-He’s slamming the lucky number 7 as fast as he can

-When the door open he sees a shoe and a few paces away another one.

-As he’s walking and sees her dress and her underwear is hanging on the doorknob

-“Women like this is why I’m never getting married”

-He opens the door and he’s glad he made it go the wedding

Nikki

-“Angel, you’re going to make us late!”

-He is indiffernt about going to weddings. One part of him likes socializing and seeing people and the other part of him hated leaving the house

-Checking his watch and getting ready to go through you over his shoulder so they could leave

-When he sees her coming down the stairs he doesn’t want to go to the wedding anymore and he lets her know

-Nikki kind of is a huge show off so we plans on pulling up in this Porsche

-He wants to spend the entire time with his lady

-Even as they sit through the vows he’s reaching out running his hand over your hands

-Leaning over to whisper, “This reminds us of our wedding.”

-kissing your knuckles

-Always touching you and seeming almost anxious whenever of you steps away

-Hand on your back when you’re talking to other people, holding your hands when you’re walking and just a weakling his arms around to kiss as much as possible

-“I’m so happy you’ll always be my wedding date, Angel.”

-Checking in throughout the night to make sure that you’re okay and having a good time

-“excuse me, I’m going to steal her for this song”

-Has requested your wedding song and is slow dancing telling you all the reasons that he loves you

-Nikki loves holding you when you dance even if he hates dancing

-Taking you out to cool down and walk along the beach together

-He throws down his jacket sitting on it and pulling you into his lap

-He had literally scoped out a place where you two could make out or go further

-“you looked so beautiful, Angel. I couldn’t wait until we got home”

-Going back to everyone at the party and he’s just giving you this look the whole time like he can’t get you out of his mind

-Nikki talks to the groom about what makes marriage so great

-“You wake up to the most beautiful view every morning no matter where in the world you are”

-Being at the wedding just reminds him how happy he is to be married

-Watching his wife dancing with the girls and smiling at how she always has fun

-When Nikki’s at the bar with the guys he sees you bent down talking to the flower girl and starts thinking of you as a mother

-Nikki knows it will be a few years away because he can’t share you yet

-Smiling when you slide into his lap, holding you to him and knowing you’re going to leave soon

-“I love you.”

-Wedding season is the best for this sentimental gummy bear

[alternativemiraculous]

Tbh I'd love it if Miraculous did something similar to the Tales of Ba Sing Se episode in ATLA (or even something like Zuko alone), which was an episode containing various short stories of every character. This could let us see more bonding or characters alone.

Idk, imagine seeing Alya's regular life; dealing with the twins, talking to her big sister, cooking (I mean, her mom is a cook so I bet Alya knows something too). Or just a glimpse of her inmer thoughts —what she thinks about the world, her current life, etc. Maybe we can see her think about her current status as Rena. She's aware of the danger. What does she think? Is she sometimes afraid anything can go wrong? Maybe this motivates her to train. Or we could see her chill writing for her blog and answering fans, or explaining her routine and ways of documenting Ladybug and Chat Noir's adventures.

Maybe we could have Adrien and Nino hanging out as real friends and have Adrien help Nino similar to how Nino helps him a lot. Them just having fun as teenagers. But we could also have Carapace adventures too. He's not that used as a hero so I'd love to see him more. Maybe have him interact with the duo, with just LB, with just CN or even have him alone doing some mission. This guy is the perfect balance between those two and he's very wise so I'm sure we'd see very good conversations.

Kagami doing something that isn't Adrien or fencing would be nice too. Like, imagine her going on a walk home and thinking. Maybe she's listening to music and she suddenly finds someone, probably Marinette. Anyone but Adrien. And we get to see her process social interactions again, which I found very relatable in Ikari Gozen. Oh and I'd love to see her be conflicted because she wants to obey her mother but at the same time she has this rebellious wishes.

Alix and Chloé should be a must ahsjjdksmsmw. I'd LOVE seeing them interact. Maybe one day Chloé goes to the Art Club alone because Sabrina is busy and surprisingly, she only finds Alix, because the others went to search for something. And we just have this moment of them silently dissing each other until one starts talking about the past. It's been slightly hinted Chloé and Alix may have been friends at slme point, and they probably fell out. So I'd love some kind of comfrontation.

Maybe we could see something of Mylène? The daily things she does. Maybe her sending important things to her friends, organising manifestations, posting resources, researching... And she practising her speech abilities because she wants to inform people and be helpful. This show is only politically affiliated with ecologism so we'd probably see her daily routine caring for the planet and getting her friends into it too.

You know what I'd love? A heart-to-heart between Luka and Ivan. They must be close, and we know Ivan isn't the best at expressing his feelings with music but Luka is the total opposite. Maybe them writing music together and talking about their days or their instruments or their hobbies. Maybe Luka has some problem and Ivan is one of the only people he trusts to put down his chill, mature, front (I headcanon he tries to appear as having not many problems to better support Juleka and the people around him), and we could see Ivan advising him. What kind of adviser is Ivan?

Sabrina alone. Let's see her hobbies! Maybe she's secretly an Art Kid? We know she likes roleplaying. Maybe she likes writing too? Does she have pets? Is she a cat person? Maybe we could see her researching. She's an amazing researcher in my headcanon. What if we see she's actually investigating about Hawk Moth and secretly collaborating anonymously with Alya thru the LadyBlog? Oh and I bet Sabrina loves creating outfits, not really designing, just combining clothes. Idk she just gives me that vibe.

Max! What does Max do in his free time? He's surely gaming. Does he have gamer friends, online friends? Oh, better. Imagine him programming his own game as a personal project because he wants to test his own abilities. He going out to get inspired and walking down the streets. We could see him appreciating the world in a fun way —he probably knows a shit ton of random facts. And when he finishes his game, after testing a lot, he probably uses it to spend a fun evening with his friends too. Idk he seems like a very fun person to he around.

A short story on Kim going to a competition is something I'd love to see. He's been training a lot and he is super confident but his rivals are amazing too. Maybe he has some rival we're yet to meet? Maybe Ondine herself is not only his friend but his rival too? We could see Kim getting second and see how he reacts. Is he a bad loser, disappointed on himself or is he the supportive type who goes all "omg look at how fast you were!!!! Are you a merfolk???? Do you breath underwater???? You were so fast ahwjwkdjw"?

Juleka and Nath moments? Some time ago people loved the thought of them together but I think a friendship between them is better. They're both kind of shy (I'm thinking of Evillustrator!Nath, not Reverser!Nath tbh). What if they were each other's first friend? Maybe Nath got Juleka into modeling because he practised with her? "Jules please let me draw you I need a human" and Juleka answering y an ominous way "I'm not a human but ok", and eventually trying new clothes. Oh and we can see them talk about how they're kind of distanced right now but they still trust each other a lot and have this special connection.

Rose writing her songs. Where does she get the inspiration? Maybe we could see her in her room, a very pink room where she has an unicorn collection. Maybe she loves writing lyrical things. Does she write poemas? Rose gifting poemas to her friends would be so in character. Maybe see her writing a song about herself and her life? She is happy but we could hear her sing about her struggles (her disease, trying to help people but being unable, maybe she sometimes doubts her positivity thing and needs to give it some thought, etc but in the end she's sure she wants to make the day as bright as possible).

LILA'S DAY. WE NEED TO SEE LILA'S DAY. She's probably alone most of the day, as we've been hinted her mother is so busy. What does she do? Maybe she posts some happy, bright foto to Instagram and then we see her irl being bored as fuck. She just eats a bit and stays in her room. Does she keep track of her lies? She has to have a diary, for that I'm sure. Maybe we can see her writing in her diary? Her future plans or just her opinions on the people of her class. Does she like someone or is everyone boring to her? Maybe she sometimes feels bad about what she's doing? Please let us have sympathetic moments with Lila. Fucking Gabriel has them!!!!!

So yeah I think I covered everyone in the class + Luka and Kagami – Adrien and Marinette because they're the protagonists. I just want to see the secondary characters develop a little!!! We need to see more of them. Season 1 was fun because it showed us their individual personalities a lot.

[am-imagines]

Forever//Over. - Alex Morgan Imagine.

This was requested by an anon:  Maybe some really angsts long distance relationship but with a fluffy ending.

I took a different approach with this prompt than what you’d probably expect, but I hope it’s angsty and enjoyable enough. I ran away with it and the over 6k words prove it. If it’s as angsty as it can be, I don’t know. You must want to ask @worms-and-jan​ She knows my angst-meter better than myself. But hey! It has a fluffy ending! Kinda.

I hope y’all enjoy!

***

You never believed that loving too much could hurt like this. You never longed for someone until air escaped your grasp and you weren’t able to breathe. And yet, here you are.

The darkness consumes you like a thousand questions you can’t answer. The walls of your room almost collapse over you and you need to get out of there. It doesn’t matter where as long as you’re not there: in the place that reminds you so fervently of the person you’re trying to forget.

The salty air of the beach helps you calm down; you breathe in and out but that doesn’t stop the deep ache in your chest. The music blares through your headphones; loud and yet unable to drown the cruel, mocking voice of your doubts.

The sky is dark, full of stars in the quiet autumn evening. And perhaps you’re not completely alone with the night sky watching over you even if the moon is missing. Even if she’s missing. You really want to believe it’s better this way, but it still hurts like hell.

You’ve called and texted her perhaps a thousand times since she disappeared from your life. And that’s the thing you can’t understand. How can the same person that proclaimed her love just turn her back on you like that? She was gone without a word or warning. It makes no sense no matter how much you think about it.

One day you’re enjoying life, trading kisses and “I love you”s while the world kept spinning. The faint light from the tv was the perfect halo for her beauty. The next day she’s gone. Your worry is met with silence and only a trail of media posts let you know she’s safe.

For so long you’ve believed that love shouldn’t hurt, and if it does, then it’s time to move on. That’s your plan now; put a sea between you while you try to forget.

Except you’ve never been good at that. You don’t fall in love often, but when you do then it’s the all or nothing kinda love. Sure, you’re willing and accepting of letting go when love dies, when the timing is right and when a relationship becomes full of bullshit. But here, everything is different and you’re not quite sure how to let go.

Hence why you’re at the beach; trying to figure out how you messed up, where things went wrong for Alex Morgan to stop loving you so abruptly.

Maybe, just maybe, this isn’t your fault at all.

That, however, would make her a fucking asshole. And that’s a tag you’re not ready to pin on her just yet. After all, you love her too much.

Still, there’s a party you must attend in less than an hour. You have a chance to be with the National Team, say your goodbye for the near future. And you gotta put the last period on a love story she can’t give you.

Next week your life starts in Europe; you have a club, a place and a dream to chase.

Sadly, there’s a missing piece in the puzzle you envisioned as your future. But her prolonged silence is a hint that you must reconstruct yourself and find another version of yourself. All in all, it’s better to move on now. Sure, the pain is there but won’t last forever.

Making the decision to leave wasn’t easy. You’re grateful for the chance the Pride gave you, but with the U.S. Soccer’s approval, you’re ready for a new horizon. There are plenty of challenges overseas that will help you discover a renewed version of yourself.

There are many things you leave behind, but ultimately, there’s nothing for you to stay.

This party is a chance to see your found family until next camp a few months away. Granted, you’re going to miss them terribly, especially Ash and Ali. They’ve practically taken you under their wing in Orlando. In camp you gravitate more towards Tobin and Lindsey as if they were all siblings.

The entire National Team is your family in one way or another. And it helps that some of them have experienced life in other countries before. They know that even with all the hardships of moving to another country; every moment playing soccer there is worth it.

This is an opportunity for growth. Now it’s your chance to discover more about you as an athlete and a human being.

It takes you another moment to collect yourself, to stop panic from overtaking you as you stare into Orlando’s beach one last time. This is the right decision, it has to be. Because right now your only plan is finding your future in Europe, and plan B is pretty much dying by Ashlyn’s hands if you don’t make it to the Harris-Krieger household in time.

The walk back home is quite enjoyable; the evening is warm and you’ve made peace with this, even if you’re not willing to put the blame on Alex. Sometimes things are just not meant to be no matter how hard you try to make them work.

What really works is your outfit as you make it to the party about an hour later. The music is already going, alcohol flowing and twenty three other women are causing havoc already. It’s twenty three because of course she would be there. After all, Alex Morgan is part of the National team.

Surprisingly, or maybe not, her presence hurts way more than her absence. It cements the truth you refused to believe; it’s not like she’s too busy to leave you aside, she just doesn’t care. It was far easier to question the darkness of your room than daring to do so when her eyes land on you.

In that moment you want to run away; turn on your heels and escape from all the pain and disappointment. Realization hits hard and deep, it makes your lungs burn all over again and you practically choke on the words you can’t throw at her face.

But this night isn’t about her. She isn’t the only person that matters in the world, not tonight. If she doesn’t care, you’ll pretend not to care either. You can do it for a night. You can do it for forever. Fake it till you make it, right?

“Damn, girl!” Ashlyn calls as she pulls you into a hug. “Looking fine.”

“Watch it, Harris. You’re a married woman now.”

“Excuse you, happily married.”

You nod at her statement because it couldn’t be truer. You’ve never seen a couple look at each other like that. You hope to have what they do one day. Even if it’s not with the person you thought for months. A mistake on your part, perhaps. Maybe one of many.

No. You’re not going to think about her anymore. She’s not going to ruin this night. There’s plenty of girls to keep you company, to laugh with and enjoy your last hours in the country. There are a million stories you haven’t heard yet. Hundreds of dog pictures to be exchanged like trading cards. You enjoy a drink, laugh and dance until you’ve almost forgotten her.

Almost.

Despite your best efforts, you can’t ignore the weight of her gaze for long. Just as you can’t ignore the way she keeps avoiding you even when you’re confined to the same place. You never considered Ash and Ali’s place to be extremely big, and yet Alex is never in the same room you are for long.

The sadness and hurt turn into anger then, and you wonder why the fuck she can’t speak her mind once and for all? She’s a coward.

Still, you’re too tired to keep chasing her, and instead stick by Lindsey and Rose. At least until Ash pulls you into the kitchen with a lame excuse of refilling drinks. That didn’t seem to be a problem thirty seconds ago, but you follow anyway.

You know Ash and Ali maybe as much as they know you. It’s only normal for her to do something like this every so often, either there’s some sort of gossip or a new cocktail you have to try. It’s no big deal.

“Okay, spill. What the fuck is going on with you?”

“What?” You parrot back, utterly confused. “What are you talking about?”

“Y/n, I know you. So don’t start that bullshit with me. You’ve been holed up at your place not talking to anyone since the end of the season. And I know this because everyone has been texting me, concerned that you’re not in a good place. I don’t know what happened between you and Alex, but...”

“Nothing happened!” You finally snap. “Nothing happened.”

Repeating the words doesn’t make them true, and the look on your face is one of defeat. You know it. Ash knows it. And so does Ali when she joins you at the kitchen with a worried look. This is not how things were supposed to go, but now you can’t really backtrack.

“I’m leaving,” you blurt out suddenly.

Except that you make no move towards the door. There’s no way you can drive like this; not when your hands are shaking and your vision is blurred by tears.

“I’ll take you home,” Ali offers; a hand resting on your shoulder.

“No, I...” You hesitate under her gaze, under her touch. It’s now or never, and it’s too soon to say goodbye but you have to start somewhere. “I’m leaving the Pride. I had some offers to play overseas, and I accepted. It’s a chance to start over, you know?”

“I’m going to kill a bitch, or break her legs.”

You gotta laugh at Ash’s words as you wipe the corners of your eyes. Of course she would understand more than you’re actually saying. Ali, well, she looks at her wife frowning in confusion.

“What are you talking about? Break whose legs?”

“There’s only one person that would make her want to lea-”

“No,” you interrupt, “listen. This was my decision, my choice, and only mine.”

“Yeah, sure.”

There are only three people in the entire world you cannot fool no matter how hard you try: Ashlyn Harris, Ali Krieger and Megan Rapinoe.

You’re starting to believe is some sort of superpower from the Lesbian Gods.

For a moment you try to hold eye contact with Pinoe but in the end, the woman quirks an eyebrow and you give up. In all honesty, you never had a chance to win here.

Fuck you, Artemis.

“Okay,” you relent. “She had something to do with it but...”

“What happened?”

The look in their eyes tells you that if you don’t tell them, there won’t be mercy for Alex. And yet, if you talk, you’re not sure if it’ll make things better or worse. There’s no escape from this situation; you’re stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Ash, Ali and Pinoe are the three women you trust the most in the world. You’ve bottled your emotions over the last weeks and it obviously isn’t helping.

You can try. You can pretend. But you still find it hard to breathe. You still feel the world crashing over you while you scramble to find some answer among the rubble. They’re offering support in the best way they can; worried more about you than anything else.

“I...”

But it’s still hard to find your voice and put everything into words. They’ve never been your forte. If you’re searching for a clean slate, then it’s best to leave this behind.

“It’s a long story.”

By the end of it, you’re unable to look at any of them, and stare at the floor instead. There’s a moment of charged silence while their anger grows. You’ve cried enough already; the tears won’t come anymore, but even then your pain is there for them to see.

“Son of a bitch!” Ash yells, banging the counter in anger.

She’s angry with herself for not seeing this earlier, for not reaching out. It isn’t her fault. No matter how good she is detecting your bullshit, you’re good keeping secrets. She can’t see right through you when you don’t let her be close enough.

You would’ve been better at hiding this if it didn’t tear you apart as much as it did. It’s far easier to pretend when your heart isn’t broken. It’s easier to conceal anger under calm, and mask emptiness with a smile.

You never loved so deeply. You never hurt so harshly. It’s just like they say: there’s a first time for everything.

“I’m really going to kill her.”

“No, no. Ali, please.”

You hold her hand, pulling her into a hug she answers by tightening her hold on you. Ash and Pinoe join the love pile not too long after although you can see the tension lingering on their shoulders. You know they’re angry, but you won’t let them act on impulse.

“I don’t want a confrontation, okay? I...it won’t solve anything. Not anymore. I came here to have a good time, not to spend the night talking about her.”

“You need another drink then,” Pinoe says breaking the group hug.

In a matter of seconds there’s a full glass in your hand. The weight pressing down your chest has eased enough for you to breathe normally, for you to smile as bright as ever.

Who needs Alex Morgan when you have this incredible group of women?

“For an epic last night?”

You raise your glass for a toast, but instead of joining your cheer, they glare daggers behind you. Looking back is unnecessary to know who is standing behind you.

“What do you mean last night?”

Thankfully, she’s not the one talking, and you turn to face Kelley instead.

“Europe is calling, baby!” You exclaim cheerfully.

Intentional or not, your voice is loud enough for not just Kelley to hear. Every other girl in the next room hears too. Suddenly, all of them try to make their way into the kitchen; asking as many questions as they can while you try to answer them all.

They’re like an excited pack of puppies, walking you to the living room where anyone left out can join too.

Even among a sea of soccer players, her gaze cuts through it all. She follows you like a distant shadow, but you make your best to ignore her.

She has no right to stop you now. She has no right to act hurt when this is the aftermath of her actions. Everything has a consequence, and if she thought you would wait forever without an explanation, she’s wrong.

“When are you leaving?”

Her words are quiet but you hear them thunderous. They zap you as if they were lightning, and your eyes snap up to meet hers. It’s hard to describe what you see there, then again, you don’t try too hard to understand.

“Next week.”

Just like that, you move onto the next question as if your mind wasn’t troubled.

You laugh with the others showing none of the struggle you’ve gone through. You don’t tell them about the sleepless nights where you wondered what to do next, which direction to follow. You don’t say a word about your phone’s unlit screen and the hundred unanswered texts.

Somehow, when your eyes meet Alex’s again, she has the decency to look ashamed. She knows. She knows and still didn’t give a damn.

“You’re staying, right?” Ali asks once the party starts winding down.

“Until you kick me out.”

The woman huffs in mock annoyance before pinching your cheeks. If that’s the price to pay for her friendship, you’ll take it with only a tiny bit of whining. After all, you have to put up some kind of resistance even if your smile betrays you.

Half an hour later everyone is ready to leave; including Pinoe. She fetches her jacket while they all wait for their Lyft, Uber or whatever service they called.

Megan looks at you and then at the only other person sitting on the other side of the living room. A silent question being asked here:

Are you going to be alright?

You nod, getting to your feet for one last hug.

“I’m going to miss you,” you whisper.

“Why’s that? Phones don’t work over there or what?”

“You’re a fucking asshole.”

“Language,” she admonishes, earning her an eye roll. “Call me, text me and if it’s four am, I’ll respond once I actually wake up.”

“You are officially the worst. But I’ll do my best for you there.”

“Nah. You’ll do your best because that’s how you are. Take care, Y/n. Don’t make me go across the world to kick your butt. You know I will.”

“I promise nothing.”

With that, she’s gone and so are the rest of the girls with one exception. The one exception you don’t want to face. So, while Ash and Ali are getting the guest room ready, you decide to start the cleaning process.

Bypassing Alex, you make your way into the kitchen to load the dishwasher.

The sound of her footsteps is quiet, and yet too loud in the overall silence of the house. You’re between shocked and unsurprised. You wondered if staying behind had anything to do with you, but didn’t want to get your expectations too high.

She hasn’t talked to you in months, what makes this night special?

“You’re leaving.”

Right. That. That’s the big revelation of the night, but doesn’t really make a difference.

“Yes.”

With the dishwasher running, your next step is to gather all the trash scattered around the place. At least that was the plan. Alex has other ideas as she stands in front of you, effectively blocking the door. Sure, you can make your way around the kitchen isle, but you’re not feeling up to play stupid games.

“Why?” She asks.

Isn’t that the same thing you’ve asked yourself endless times? It absolutely is.

The whole thing is so ridiculous that you almost laugh. Except it’s not really funny. In a moment all the hurt turns into burning anger. It boils and swells, rises like the tide when the moon illuminates the sky.

You look at her and don’t recognize the woman you loved not so long ago.

“Why what, Alex?”

There’s a fierceness in your own eyes that is so unlike you. Sure, you’ve been angry before, who hasn’t? But never like this, never to the point of quiet rage.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

You laugh then; an empty sharp sound that is far away from being happy. It’s the irony of it all, the nerve of Alexandra Morgan to sputter those words acting confused and hurt.

“I fucking tried!” You shout, and once you start everything else comes pouring out. “Or did you forget about the texts you never bothered to answer? Or the calls? I tried to reach you so many times, in so many ways, and you made it clear you didn’t want me around. And I just don’t understand...”

“Y/n-”

“No, I’m not done yet, “You cut her. ”You left me, Alex. The last words you said to me were “I love you” and then you were gone. You’re a liar, playing with my feelings when I gave you everything I could. You were the one that kissed me for the first time, the one that asked me out, for what? For the thrill of having a stupid girl you could toy with?”

“Of course not!”

“Then answer your own question. Why?”

Here you are, having a conversation you didn’t plan to have but wanted. No, it’s not really going as you envisioned. Mostly because you pictured yourself crying your heart out and begging her to come back. You deserve better than that.

“I...I’ve never felt the way I do for you.”

You raise an eyebrow, motion for her to continue cuz that’s not going to cut it. Not after weeks of going radio silent even when you let her know there was something important to talk about. Not after nights where you doubted your own worth.

“I got scared.”

You look at her in disbelief. That’s her reason; the only one, for running away without looking back. And somehow, you what, have to take it in stride? Hell, no.

“That’s bullshit.”

You’ve never been so in love either. And it’s scary; opening up and showing every flaw and vulnerability while expecting to still be enough. It’s bound to be scary, to be overwhelming at times where you can’t believe life and love truly feel like that.

That’s love for you, at least.

It fills your body, carves your bones until you feel weak at the knees. But you grow stronger until the weight of the world falls from your shoulders, until gravity doesn’t affect you anymore and you swear you can fly.

Love shapes the world, makes you find little hints and signs everywhere. The world reminds you so strongly of them that you wonder how you didn’t see it before. It makes you feel invincible, like your life has reached that perfect pinnacle of serendipity.

And that’s just the beginning.

Loving someone shouldn’t hurt. It’s supposed to be a celebration to life and the victories; big or small, found through the days. Sometimes that means a world cup. Sometimes it means buying a house. Sometimes it’s just being able to survive the hardship and exhaustion of a long day.

Love is the backbone of support, it lifts you up when you can’t stand on your own. It’s the quiet whisper in the back of your head reminding you to breathe when your head is underwater. It’s the knowledge that yes, life is not a utopia, and there are battles you gotta face on your own, but that you’re not alone nor lonely.

It’s supposed to be scary; terrifying even. But it’s also supposed to be filled with joy, and wonder. A mix of awe and euphoria that settle into calm. Because in love you can be yourself; the one version of you that the rest of the world doesn’t get to see.

And all of those emotions should make it worth it.

“Do you think I wasn’t scared too?” You finally ask. “I know there’s a lot on the line for you. I knew the terms and conditions of dating you since the beginning. I agreed to keep it a secret until you were ready. If you needed time to figure it out, to come to terms with who and what you are, I would’ve understood. Listen, even if you weren’t ready for a relationship at all, I would have understood. But not like this.”

“Please, Y/n. I’m trying to make things right.”

“Alex,” you say tiredly, rubbing your eyes in the process. “It’s too late. I’m leaving.”

“Don’t go.”

You can say the desperation in her eyes, can hear it in her voice. Still, that’s not enough.

She had a chance, more than one if you’re being honest, to make you stay.

Instead, she’s one of the reasons you’re leaving.

You deserve more than fear or reluctance. You deserve dreams that come true, to find true happiness. You deserve someone that will talk to you when things don’t go as planned; not shut you out completely. You want someone that looks at you with that happy light in their eyes instead of leaving you in the darkness of uncertainty.

“Why does it matter?” You ask with a hint of frustration. “You’re the one that left me! You walked away from us without a word! And I’m not going to be the girl you play with while deciding to pull your head out of your ass or leave it there. I deserve to be happy too. And right now that means being away from you.”

“I’m sorry.”

You feel a rush of everything; anger, sadness, frustration and perhaps a hint of relief as well. It’s hard to decide if you want to slap some sense into her or cross the distance between you just to feel her arms around your waist again.

In the end, you simply shake your head.

“Yeah. Me too.”

“I wish there was a way to go back.”

“You can’t unbreak things. You can learn and do better.”

There’s nothing left to be said, not on your side. And for now, you don’t really care about what she has to say either.

You make your way upstairs to where Ash and Ali are waiting for you. It’s not hard to eavesdrop on an empty house, but they respect you enough to give you space. You’re not a kid; you know how to handle your own battles although the moral backup is always appreciated.

“You’re going to be okay?”

Ali looks deep into your eyes in concern, but her worry is met with a shy smile.

“Yeah, I think I will.”

For the first time in the last few weeks, you are able to breathe with nothing weighing on your chest. Closure is exactly what you needed. Facing her after the prolonged silence was perhaps one of the hardest things you had to do, but now the future seems a little brighter.

*****

Playing in one of the most competitive soccer leagues in the world is far from easy. Even the style seems different; play harder, faster and smarter. But you’ve done great, put your name up there among some of the best.

What some considered potential was polished into talent, although that had more to do with your discipline and hard work. Of course, the press wasn’t so kind as to enlighten that.

At the end of the season you have a championship and a new shining contract waiting for you. All it’s missing is your signature, but there are things to consider still. You miss home. You miss the crazy 23 women you call family.

Hopefully the upcoming USWNT camp will clear some of the doubts.

Maybe seeing them all again will give you the strength to extend your life in Europe. Maybe it’ll make you realize it’s time to go home.

There are many clubs interested in you which is not a surprise after everything you’ve done in a matter of months. Europe has catapulted you to another level, and it’s true there’s so much more to learn. Still, feeling homesick can be one hell of a bitch.

You could always move back to Orlando. Maybe you could move with Tobin in Portland. Tagging along Press with the Royals or go to Chicago for a change. The world is yours if you want it, and Heavens, you absolutely do.

“Why is something telling me you won’t come to stay?”

You glance at Pinoe on your screen while you finish packing. Sue and her are keeping you company as you get ready. Traveling always makes you anxious no matter if it’s just a couple of states over or halfway across the world.

“I haven’t decided yet.”

“Does this have to do with Morgan?”

“What!? No! I haven’t talked to her.”

“Maybe you should.”

You glare at your screen suspiciously because this is Pinoe of all people; telling you to talk to her. Megan Rapinoe; the woman that knows the ins and outs of your relationship and feelings for Alex. It doesn’t make sense unless something happened.

“Okay, fess up.”

“About what?”

The smug look on her face tells you that your mighty glare isn’t working.

Fuck you, Artemis. Again.

“Don’t worry, kid.” Sue intercedes with a gentle albeit playful smile. “You’ll get it soon enough.”

“Get what?”

They don’t answer your question and you don’t have much time to keep asking as they excuse themselves to end the call. Technically, it’s almost time for you to leave. However, their intentions are pretty clear. In the end, you groan in annoyance as they manage to dodge your question multiple times before the call disconnects. Alas, there’s nothing you can do.

It doesn’t take long until you’re on the airplane waiting to take off.

Your leg bounces nervously while you’re torn between looking out of the window or closing your eyes. It’s practically a miracle you decided to move so far, considering how much you hate flying. To be honest, the flight itself isn’t the problem.

Feeling the rumble of such a huge thing, it always makes you wonder how it can actually fly. You’ve seen documentaries and read articles but that fear comes every time you get into a plane. Besides turbulence, lift off is the worst part.

“You can hold my hand if you want.”

Your head snaps up towards the person standing next to you. Even now, after months since the last time you heard that voice. You would be able to recognize it from a million others. That doesn’t take away from the surprise of seeing her  there.

“What...” you start, trying to find your voice, “what are you doing here?”

“Taking a plane back home.”

“No, I mean-”

Her chuckle makes you realize she’s teasing. Partially, at least. She sits next to you, ready to go back to the USA. Which doesn’t really explain what she’s doing in the same country as you.

“Alex,” you try again, “why are you here?”

Your time away from her has been odd to say something.

You’ve missed her, she was your best friend even before things escalated into something else. She was the person you trusted the most before everything came tumbling down. And yet, over the last few months you’ve done your best to not think about her too much.

You limited your social media activity mostly to club related posts. Mostly accessed to catch up with some of your other friends, but being careful not to dwell on any of her posts. You scrolled past them in a hurry or got out of the app as soon as possible.

Unfollowing her would have been the smart choice, if you were someone else.

Being under the spotlight it’s great, but it also means everything you do is a clue for something. Unfollowing her would bring up more questions than you were, or still are, willing to answer. It was easier to pretend and move on.

“I got it out.”

Her words catch you by surprise and you shake your head trying to get back in the moment.

“What?”

It’s hard to make sense of any of it when she’s right there. Maybe it’s the shock of seeing her after so long. Maybe it’s hard to pay attention to her with the plane rapidly filling. It feels like you’re running out of time even when there’s nowhere else for you to be.

“You were right,” she says instead.

“Alex,” you warn, trying to get her to the point.

“I got my head out of my ass,” she finally answers with a half smile. However, her eyes remain serene, telling you she’s taking this seriously. “I was an idiot, and I’m sorry. Even then, when I discovered you were leaving, I could only think about myself. I can’t ask you to forgive me. We both know I don’t deserve it after everything I did to you. But you deserved an apology. That’s why I’m here.”

“You came all the way here for that?”

There’s more surprise in your voice than anything else. Sure, you appreciate the gesture but it seems a little overboard. Then again, you’re not sure of the result if she had called. Maybe you wouldn’t have picked the phone to begin with.

“I wanted you to know I mean it. I didn’t feel like words would be enough. Besides, I know how much you hate flying, so coming here just to go back, it’s worth it if it’s for you.”

Against all your common sense, you forgave her long ago. More for your own sake than hers, but all the anger and hurt are gone. The love you felt for her is not what it used to be, and neither is the trust. But in that moment, you’re glad she’s there.

Without saying a word, she offers you her hand.

This is something you’ve done several times, holding her hand during a flight, and you accept her offer just as the plane starts moving. If your grip is too tight, she doesn’t complain. She keeps her eyes on you; making sure you’re alright and damn those blue eyes.

“So, how did Pinoe know you were coming?”

“Did she tell you?”

“Not really,” you answer truthfully. “She said I should talk to you and that I would get it. You know her and Sue, they can be cryptic. Still, never expected to find you here.”

“Yeah, well...” She shies away from your gaze for a second but meets your eyes again. “Once you left I realized my mistake. I mean, I did before that. Guess it was easy to justify everything with fear. Then you weren’t there and the fear of losing you forever was bigger than the one of losing everything else.”

No, you’re not going to fall in love with her all over again. Not after you spent months getting over her. Even if she looks at you and you feel like she can see right into your soul.

“Alex, I can’t-”

“Hey,” she softly interrupts. “I’m not asking anything from you; I messed up. And like you said, I can’t unbreak things, I can only try to fix them.”

You can extend her an olive branch; a start. You’re not sure whether this is a good idea or not. It’s hard to tell where this is going to tell you. Still, you beg to the Lesbian Gods to guard your heart.

For now, you’re glad the 10+ hours journey back to America is not a lonely one.

*****

“Everything ready?”

You look over your shoulder to face some of your teammates.

You’ve decided to go for another year in Europe; extending your stay with the club you love while trying to win another chip and extra hardware.

“Almost.”

“I knew you wouldn’t stay,” Pinoe claims.

“But you sure wish I did.”

Her shrug confirms your suspicions because hell, you’re going to miss them too. It’s weird to be in a similar position as you were last year, and yet, everything feels different. You’re still at camp instead of sharing a wonderful evening at the Harris-Krieger household, but everyone that matters is there.

Last time it was a hundred percent your decision to leave although there were motivations besides soccer. This time your terms are different, you’re chasing a dream instead of running from a nightmare. You want to keep learning, growing and being the best you can be.

“You’ll come with me again?” You ask Alex teasingly.

“Not this time. But,” she pauses for dramatic effect. “I’ll be waiting for you when you get back.”

There’s some kind of promise there that you refuse to fully believe. It wouldn’t be the first time you get your hopes too high, or the one where you crash down in free fall with no parachute.

Camp has served you right, both of you. And maybe you stopped Ash from killing Alex when it was known you two would share a room, but things are...better.

“You can always visit.”

All eyes fall on you, trying to decide what is going on in your mind. To be honest? You’re not quite sure either. But you feel that pull towards Alex, daring you to allow her in.

You tell yourself this is a mistake. There’s absolutely nothing stopping her from doing something stupid, from leaving you hanging while you doubt yourself again. Everything could play out exactly like the last time, except something is different this time.

You’re not quite capable of explaining. You’re not gonna dive without testing the water either. So there’s another year overseas with some distance to keep your head clear. Whatever happens in that lapse, it’ll be the answer you need.

“Call me if you get homesick.”

“Except if it’s three am?” You ask with a sideways glance to Megan.

“Even if it’s three am,” Alex corrects. “Can’t promise I won’t fall asleep on you tho.”

“As if you didn’t do exactly that already.”

“Hey! At least I would pick up.”

“Fine. I’ll take it.”

There’s a small grin in your lips while you pack the last of your stuff.

You look at your friends and family one more time knowing they’ll be there when you come back. And looking at Alex you know there’s a chance home will be waiting for you.

“Okay. Let’s do this.”

[teenwolffanclub-me]

Season 1, Episode 8: Lunatic

Hey there beautiful reader! If you’re new here, this is a series I’m writing where each chapter is an episode from the first season of Teen Wolf. If you’ve been here before, hey! I missed you! Previous and future chapters are linked at the end of each part if you want to catch up.

Pairing: Stiles x Psychic! Reader (eventually)

Warnings: a nonconsensual kiss (very brief), angst ☹️

Notes: Boys suck. All of them. That’s it. 

                                                      ————————

“This is so pathetic.”

I sent Lydia a glare over Allison’s shoulder as I pulled her tighter against me. Her body trembled with another sob and I winced, rubbing her back comfortingly. I widened my eyes expectantly, and Lydia just shook her head.

“It’s your turn.” I mouthed the words silently.

With a grimace, she gripped Allison’s shoulders and peeled her away from me. She shook her slightly as she turned her around with a pointed look.

“You have got to get it together, honey.” Allison sniffled as Lydia pushed big clumps of dark hair away from her eyes. “You’re going to see him tomorrow—”

She dissolved into another fit of crying and sagged forward, until we both pulled her back upright.

“And,” Lydia continued. “You’re going to look hot while you ignore him. Okay? That’s why we’re here.”

We’d come all the way to Lydia’s house this morning to put together a pick-me-up outfit for Allison. After the whole alpha incident, the school administration was forced to close the building for a week so the Sheriff’s department could collect any leftover evidence.

There was still no sign of Derek, the janitor’s body, or the alpha.

It’d been nearly ten days since Allison last saw Scott. She’d followed through with her plan to break up with him that night, but somehow seemed more upset despite being the one to end things.

I hadn’t seen him or Stiles since then either—not that I was keeping track—but I’d gotten more than enough dramatic texts in our group chat to know that he was hurting too.

Lydia and I had spent almost every day with Allison. We were slowly trying to piece her back together, but she was a complete mess. Her and Scott had that kind of relationship where they’re just way too obsessed with each other. They like each other too much, so when they’re apart, they can’t handle it.

“You guys don’t understand.” Her voice trembled as she sniffled again and wiped at her eyes.

Lydia scoffed and flicked her strawberry blonde bangs away from her face. “Scott locked us in a classroom and left us for dead. He’s lucky we aren’t pressing charges, or making him pay for therapy bills.”

A frown pulled at my lips. They’d talked endlessly about how wrong it was for him to leave that night, but I didn’t agree. He’d risked his life to get us out safely. In my eyes, we should be thanking him, but Allison was stuck on the fact that he could’ve died and kind of abandoned us.

“It felt so right with him...and then, he just started acting so strange and—and now I don’t know what to believe.”

I let out a dejected sigh. I’d been close to telling her the truth countless times this week. It would give her so much clarity. She would understand why he made the choices he did. But Scott insisted that we keep everyone in the dark, and I had to respect his wishes.

I just hoped keeping these secrets wouldn’t make everything worse.

                                                   —————————

I walked through the high school, my bag slung over one shoulder. I’d gotten an insane amount of homework during the first half of the day because apparently, our teachers weren’t happy about the little break we got. I wanted to stop at my locker before lunch to lighten my load.

As I passed the main office, I saw Stiles and his dad. There was another officer and a man wearing a suit talking to the principal a few feet away from them. Stiles’ eyes found mine across the hallway and I felt a blush creep up my neck. It was the first time I’d seen him in person since that night.

We’d texted almost everyday during our time off, and even had a handful of video calls, but I still had no idea what we were doing. We hadn’t talked about us at all. I didn’t want to bring it up because, if it was too soon, I could ruin the whole thing before it even started.

“This is really important. Okay? You have to be careful tonight. Especially tonight.” Stiles’ attention was firmly planted on his dad as I walked by. 

I stole a glance at him over my shoulder, frowning at the worried glint in his eyes. He was doing the thing he always did where he was freaking out on the inside but trying not to show it. My eyes lingered on the officers as I turned the corner. It was a little unsettling that they were hanging around the school. If it was back open, shouldn’t that mean the investigation was over?

And what the hell was tonight?

I’d only just gotten my locker open when Stiles materialized at my side. I jumped at his sudden presence, but relaxed when I realized it was only him.

He smiled sheepishly and hugged his bag closely to his chest. “Wanna help me with something after school?”

I let my eyes trail over his face. There was nothing new about the way he was looking at me. His honey eyes were warm, as usual, and his lips twitched upward at the corners. I searched for any indication that he may like me, that we were more than friends who kissed once, but found none.

“Will it get me in trouble?” I finally tore my eyes away from him and started putting the mountain of assignments I’d gotten into my locker.

He pulled one shoulder up into a shrug. “Not likely.”

“Is it dangerous?” I shoved my last few stray papers into the small space, grimacing at the thought of doing all that work later.

“There might be a chance of maiming. No serious injury or death, though. Probably.” I glanced at him skeptically, but instantly melted at the look he was giving me. He raised his eyebrows with a small, hopeful smile, his honey eyes rounding at the edges. 

“Okay.” I sighed, and he pumped a fist in the air excitedly.

He jerked toward me so fast I couldn’t even fully process what he was doing before he planted a kiss on my cheek. I stood perfectly still and blinked a few times as I watched him turn and hurry down the hall. My lips pulled into a slow smile. Maybe there was something starting between us.  

Without skipping a beat, Lydia appeared at my side. “So, you and...him?”

My eyes widened and my head whipped in her direction at the judgement in her voice. Her eyebrows were raised and she stood with one hand on her hip, the other balancing a designer bag up against her chest.

“What? No.” I said quickly, my skin warming under her scrutiny.

“Then what was that?” She pursed her glossed lips knowingly.

“A...friend kiss?” I cringed as the words came out of my mouth. That was so not the right thing to say.

“Oh, honey.” She shook her head, and was probably about to tell me what a loser he was in her eyes, when Scott walked up.

“Hey, can we talk for a second?” His brown eyes were swimming with anxiety as they locked onto mine.

I noticed immediately that something was wrong with him. He was wearing his lacrosse uniform, most likely just coming back from their midday practice. That wasn’t weird by itself, except for the fact that he always showered before coming out of the locker room. His skin was covered in a thin layer of sweat, and his hair was all disheveled.

“Sure.” I nodded encouragingly and Lydia walked away with a roll of her eyes.

He led me into a nearby classroom that was currently empty and shut the door gently behind us.

“What’s up?” I crossed my arms and leaned my hip against the teacher’s desk at the front of the room.

He slowly turned toward me and stopped at the other end of the desk. He drummed his fingers against the hard plastic, avoiding my eyes.

“I need to ask you something.” He mumbled, seemingly nervous.

I was a little confused by his sudden change in demeanor. He’d never been awkward or timid with me before. His eyes finally met mine and I raised my eyebrows expectantly, waiting for him to continue.

“Do...do you think Allison still likes me?” His voice was quiet as he stuttered out the question.

Ah, that makes sense. They still hadn’t spoken. She’d been trying her hardest to stay away from him all day, despite his attempts at cornering her. It was probably driving him crazy by now.

“Of course she does.” I tried to sound reassuring, even though I didn’t know if she would ever forgive him, regardless of how dramatic that was. “Look, the whole thing just freaked her out. She was really worried about you. You risked your life for us. I’m sure she’s grateful.”

He was still watching his fingers when his shoulders suddenly tensed. He took a slow step forward, his eyes gradually making their way up to mine. I stiffened at the intense look he was giving me. His jaw ticked a few times as he continued moving closer. 

“Are you grateful?” His voice was lower than normal and honestly, kind of menacing.

I took a small step back, confused by his sudden change in behavior. “Of course I am. Scott, are you okay?”

“I’m more than okay.”

He practically lunged forward to close the distance between us, one of his hands grabbing the back of my head. He yanked me toward him harshly, and before I even had time to react, his lips were on mine. My eyes widened in shock and I instantly flattened my hands against his chest.

I shoved against him as hard as I could. He staggered back a step, shaking his head as if to clear it. I stood completely frozen for a moment, staring at him in stunned silence. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand to remove any traces of him from me, my stomach twisting uncomfortably.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, McCall?” I all but shrieked.

That was wrong on so many levels. Allison—my best friend—had literally just broken up with him. We had never been even remotely intimate or flirtatious with each other. We were friends. Just friends. And I kinda, maybe, have something with Stiles.

Oh, crap. Stiles.

He stood in place, brows furrowing as he continued blinking in confusion. His hands tightened into fists at his sides before relaxing slowly.

“Scott!” I snapped, trying to break him out of whatever trance he was in.

His eyes flickered up to mine and I stumbled back a step, fear shooting up my spine. They were glowing bright yellow. He was struggling not to shift. He snarled at me, his face falling into a pained grimace as he fought for control.

“Go.” His voice was thick and guttural as his canines began elongating.

I scrambled out the classroom door, my heart racing. I was instantly swept up into the crowd of students moving through the hall, people shoving against me as I tried to get my bearings. I stumbled a few steps before finally remembering how to walk and ran a hand through my hair before glancing back toward the room. 

My thoughts were a jumbled mess. What the hell just happened? Did he shift in there? That whole thing had been wildly out of character. I’d never seen him anywhere near that out of the control. He would never do something like that to me, Allison, or Stiles unless something was seriously wrong. 

Right?

                                                 —————————

Stiles invited himself into Scott’s house, duffle bag in hand, and I followed closely behind. He’d barely told me what we were doing on the way, just that it was to help Scott. 

I’d been on edge ever since our weird encounter this afternoon. I still hadn’t told Stiles what happened. What would I even say? I needed to talk to Scott first to see what the hell was wrong with him. It was obvious that he’d been under the influence of something, and I wanted to figure that out first. 

“Scott?” Ms. McCall yelled from the family room as I closed the front door behind us.

She emerged from around the corner, wearing her scrubs. It looked like she was about to head out for an overnight shift at the hospital.

“Stiles.” He corrected from beside me, smiling sheepishly.

We weren’t exactly supposed to be here, seeing as Scott wasn’t even home yet.

“Key.” She gestured down toward the hand that held a copy he’d made awhile back—which I couldn’t even pretend to be surprised about—before moving her attention to me. “And you must be the Y/N I’ve heard so much about.”

My eyes widened in surprise. Scott had talked about me? Did that mean there was more to the kiss? Upon seeing my discomfort, she put a hand up dismissively and chuckled.

“From your mom, honey. We work together a lot.”

“Right. Obviously.” I huffed out a breath of relief.

It wasn’t her fault I was so jumpy. I hadn’t seen Scott since this afternoon, and I wasn’t looking forward to it at all. We wouldn’t be able to talk about what happened in front of Stiles, and I wanted answers sooner rather than later. Seeing him tonight was going to be awkward as hell. 

“Stiles,” Ms. McCall looked at him with concern in her eyes. “He’s okay, right?”

“Who? Scott? Yeah. Totally.” He shrugged, his head bobbing as he put a little too much emphasis on that last word. 

“He just doesn't talk to me that much anymore...not like he used to.” She glanced away and played with the strap of her lunch bag. I did feel bad for her, and Allison, and everyone else he was keeping this secret from. Knowing just made everything so much easier. 

“Well, he’s had a bit of a rough week.” Stiles tried to reason, understanding shining in his eyes.

“Yeah. Yeah, I get it. Okay. You guys be careful tonight.” 

“You too.” He pointed at her with both hands before letting them slap against his thighs. I think it was safe to say that we were both ready for this conversation to be over. 

She made sure she had everything before stepping around us, and raising her eyebrows teasingly. “Full moon.”

“Uh—what?” Stiles’ eyes widened and his lips parted, panic evident in his voice.

I subtly smacked his arm and gave him a pointed glare when he glanced down at me. That had been beyond obvious. 

“It’s a full moon tonight.” She looked confused by his harsh reaction. “You should see how the ER gets. It brings out all the nut jobs.” 

“Oh. Right.” He sighed before smiling tensely. 

She popped the front door open and turned back to us one last time. “You know, that’s actually where they came up with the term lunatic.” 

With that, she was gone. The second she was out of sight, Stiles grabbed his bag and we made our way up the stairs. 

“Could you have been any more suspicious?” I hissed, our footsteps against the hardwood floor the only sound in the otherwise silent house.

“Probably, if I—” He started giving me a snarky response as he opened the door to Scott’s bedroom and flicked on the light, but suddenly stopped and jumped back. “Oh my God. Dude, you scared the hell out of me.”

I peered around his shoulder and saw Scott siting in a chair in the corner of the room, staring blankly ahead. Had he seriously just been waiting there in the dark?

“Your mom said you weren't home yet.” I added, following Stiles as he walked into the room and threw his duffle bag onto the floor. 

I let my eyes trail over the space quickly. His bedroom had a lot more going on than Stiles’ did. There was a dresser against the wall to my right, with a small circular rug and a beanbag beside it.

The space directly across from that was taken up by a large desk with shelves above it and another rug. His bed was in front of us, next to the chair he still sat in. Most of the walls were covered in posters and pictures.

“Came in through the window.” He drawled slowly, his voice devoid of all emotion. 

“Okay...” Stiles trailed off, glancing quickly toward the window beside us before kneeling down to unzip his bag. “Uh. Let’s get this set up. Wait till you see what I bought.”

“I’m fine. I’m just gonna lock the door and go to bed early tonight.” Scott muttered almost robotically, still staring straight ahead with that faraway emptiness in his eyes.

“Are you sure about that? You’ve got this kinda serial killer look going on and I’m hoping it’s just the full moon taking effect because it’s really starting to freak me out.” Stiles looked up from his bag to narrow his eyes skeptically. 

With a wave of realization, I finally put the pieces together. Oh, my God. How could I be so dense? It was a full moon. And Scott is a werewolf. I seriously wanted to smack myself in the face for not thinking about this earlier. 

It explains everything. 

“No, I’m fine. You should go now.” Scott sat completely still, his gaze still unfocused on the wall behind us. 

“Alright. We’ll leave.” Stiles made a move to get up before seemingly thinking better of it. “Will you at least just look in the bag and see what I bought? Maybe you use it, maybe you don't.”

He studied Scott apprehensively when he didn't move, still crouched beside the bag. “Sound good?”

Scott considered his words for a long moment before rising to his feet slowly. I found myself taking a step back, anxiety tightening in my chest. He looked genuinely demented right now. If the full moon had made him kiss me earlier, there was no telling what he would do now. He squatted down and reached into the bag, grabbing a fistful of metal chains. He studied them before glancing up at Stiles with a scoff. 

“You think I’m going to let you put these on? Chain me up like a dog?” 

“Actually...no.” Stiles suddenly lunged forward, pulling a pair of handcuffs out of his jacket and latching them onto Scott’s right wrist. He shoved him back and they wrestled for a few seconds until Stiles successfully locked the other cuff onto his radiator. 

He immediately pulled against it with a frustrated groan. Stiles stumbled back a step as Scott continued struggling. “What the hell are you doing?!”

“Protecting you from yourself.” He huffed, running his hands down his shirt to straighten it out. 

A few tense moments passed between the three of us as he tried to get free. He growled and yelled as he pulled at his wrist until it was raw. 

“Stiles, please let me out.” He suddenly sagged onto the floor, his face softening. “Please, it hurts. It’s not like the first time. It’s the full moon, it’s Allison breaking up with me...”

“I can’t.” He mumbled, his eyes twitching as if the thought pained him. 

I hadn't been around during Scott’s first full moon, but it must’ve been bad if they were going to these lengths now. Clearly, things could go sideways at any moment with the way he’d been acting today. I wasn't even sure what effects the full moon had on werewolves. All I knew at this point was that it almost made Scott lose control several times today. 

“Come on.” Stiles glanced as me before putting a gentle hand on my back to guide me out of the room. 

I wasn't sure what he was doing, but I assumed he had a plan and went along with it. Just before we stepped through the doorway, though, Scott spoke up from his crouched position again. 

“Wait. There’s something you should know first.” His voice dropped back down to that gravely, menacing tone he’d used this afternoon just before he kissed me. 

We both turned to look at him expectantly. A frown pulled at my lips as I noticed all traces of his usual warmth had vanished just as quickly as they’d reappeared a minute ago. 

His narrowed eyes found mine and he smirked slowly. “You wanna tell him, or should I?” 

My heart instantly dropped into my stomach. No. This was not the time. There was no telling how he’d spin the situation in his current state. I wanted a chance to talk it over with him first, so I knew how to approach letting Stiles know what happened.

“Scott.” I warned through clenched teeth, my anger spiking at the fact that he brought it up at all. There was no way this was going to end well for either of us. 

“What?” Stiles glanced at Scott, then me, brows pinching in confusion. “Tell me what?” 

“We kissed today.” He was all too happy to drop that bomb, his lips widening into a big satisfied grin. 

Stiles’ head whipped in his direction so fast I worried he might've actually hurt himself. Seriously? That’s how he’s going to phrase it? I felt my nostrils flare as my hands clenched into fists at my sides.

“You mean you kissed me?” I could barely get the words out through my tightly pursed lips. 

Stiles’ attention jerked back to me, eyebrows raised and mouth hanging open in shock. His wide eyes flickered around my face quizzically. “Wha—so it’s true? You did?”

My heart squeezed uncomfortably at the intense look of betrayal taking over his face. I hadn’t meant to say it like that. Before I could explain, Scott chuckled darkly from the corner. “She would’ve done a lot more, too.” 

My jaw nearly hit the floor. I took a step forward, the skin of my neck growing hot with my rising anger. He was making this so much worse than it needed to be. I had no idea what my plan was as I stalked toward him. He just needed to stop. 

“You should’ve seen the way her hands were all over me.” His eyes, twinkling with mischief, followed me as I staggered to a stop in front of him. 

My breath caught in my throat. I was so livid at this point that my vision had gone blurry. What the hell did he think he was doing? What was his goal? To make me look bad? To piss Stiles off?

“Yeah, to push you away, you raging dickwad!” I snapped out of my dumbfounded stupor and felt my right arm swing back on it’s own accord, preparing to slap him. 

A firm hand on my wrist stopped me, and I whipped around to look at Stiles, who had been watching the scene unfold with a frightening lack of reaction. “Y/N, go wait outside.”

“What?” I breathed, my anger immediately dissipating at the hard look in his eyes.

“Please.” He hissed, his lips flattening into a straight line as his jaw clenched tightly. 

I blanched at his cold tone. He’d never spoken to me like that before, and it caused a painful tug in my chest. I studied his eyes for a moment, the slew of intense emotions inside them only making me feel worse. I pulled my arm free, sending Scott one last angry glance before stalking into the hallway. 

Stiles immediately closed the door after me. There was only a brief moment of silence before the yelling started. 

“You kissed her? You kissed her, Scott?” I could hear his voice clearly through the thin wood. I let out a heavy sigh and leaned back against the wall directly across from it. 

“You know, all day I’ve been thinking...it’s probably just the full moon, ya know? He probably doesn’t even know what he’s doing and tomorrow, he’ll be totally back to normal. He probably won’t even remember what a complete dumbass he’s been. A son of a bitch, a freakin’ unbelievable piece of crap friend!”

I winced as his voice got louder with each insult. I hated that he was so upset. Scott had gotten exactly what he wanted. I was sure he didn't mean it, that it was just the full moon talking, but I didn't give a shit about that right now. He’d just ruined any chance I had with Stiles in a matter of seconds. 

A moment later he shuffled into the hallway and slammed the door behind him. I jumped as the sound echoed through the house, and watched him practically throw himself against the wall before sliding down to the floor. He pulled his knees up toward his chest and rested his elbows on his thighs, not even glancing at me once. 

“Stiles,” I immediately took a step toward him. “It’s not what—” 

“Don’t.” He interrupted, playing with his fingers between his legs and avoiding my eyes. “Just...don't.”

“No.” I scoffed, my voice rising at his stubbornness. He was not getting out of this conversation right now. “You’re going to listen to me.” 

I deserved a chance to tell him what actually happened. He had the complete wrong idea about everything. 

“It’s whatever, Y/N. You can kiss whoever you want. We aren’t even—it doesn’t matter.” His voice was barely above a whisper as he screwed his eyes shut and let his head fall back against the wall with a huff. 

I deflated, my heart sinking into my stomach.

It’s whatever? It doesn’t matter?

All of my anger was quickly replaced with heavy sadness at his dismissal. It was all a stupid misunderstanding. I glared at the door beside him, my jaw clenching in frustration. I hadn’t even done a damn thing wrong. It was all Scott. He’d ruined everything.

“I’ve got it from here.” Stiles suddenly muttered as he dropped his head into his hands. 

I stared at his crumpled frame in shock. He was really asking me to leave?

“Fine.” I scoffed, anger masking the uncomfortable hollowness in my chest. “You don't wanna hear my side? That’s just fine.”

I turned on my heel and hastily stomped down the stairs. At this point, I just wanted to get as far away from here as possible. I made sure the front door was closed behind me and forced a hand through my hair once I made it to the sidewalk. I huffed out a breath against the chilly night air and watched as it condensed a few inches away.  

God, this night had taken such a bad turn. 

I pulled my phone out of my back pocket as I felt it vibrate, and instantly stopped when I saw the notifications I’d accidentally ignored. I had five missed calls and ten texts, all from Allison.

I dialed her number quickly without even looking at the messages. She picked up on the second ring.

“Oh my God, Y/N! What are you doing?” I had to pull the phone away from my ear as she yelled angrily.

“What’s wrong? Are you okay?” She’d never blown my phone up like that before, so something was obviously going on. 

“I just—I didn’t know who else to call. We were at the mall and...and my car died.” Her voice was trembling as she rushed the words out.

“Okay? What are you freaking out about?” I was beyond confused. There was no reason she should be having a panic attack over a dead battery.

“Because...” She trailed off, falling into a harsh whisper. “Something is on top of the car.”

My eyes widened, and I started speedwalking toward my house. No sane animal in Beacon Hills would jump onto a car like that. There was really only one thing—or person—it could be.

The alpha.

“Okay. Stay in the car. I’m coming.”

I hung up and shoved my front door open, instantly bolting to the dining room table where I knew moms purse would be. Luckily, it was an off night for her. I rustled through her bag hastily, easily finding the blue lanyard with her keys on it within seconds.

“Allison needs a ride! I’m taking the car!” I called over my shoulder, not wasting any time waiting for her response.

I rushed out the door, letting it slam behind me. I fumbled with the keys, my hands starting to shake slightly. I realized with a jolt that I was scared. Terrified, actually. If the alpha really was there, what would I even do? I’d already come face to face with the thing two times. I don’t think I’m lucky enough for a third. 

I had nothing to defend myself with, either. No supernatural strength or quick reflexes. No weapons. I didn’t even have a damn bat. 

My gaze swept over to Scott’s house as I heard his front door open harshly. I stopped walking again as I watched Stiles scramble out the door toward the driveway. His head turned in my direction, as if feeling my stare on his back, eyes twitching as they locked onto mine. 

They were always so expressive. Right now, their normal warm color had darkened and they were a little glassy, as if he’d been crying. I wished I couldn’t make out his sadness so clearly, the sight making my heart clench with a dull ache.

His lips rolled inward as he visibly deflated with a heavy sigh before turning away from me and climbing into the Jeep. I shook my head and jumped into moms car, almost forgetting that I was supposed to be in a rush. I shoved the key into the ignition and peeled out of the driveway. 

A few minutes later, I stopped beside Allison’s car in the mall parking lot. She and Jackson were leaning against the open hood and—wait, Jackson?

I quickly parked and jumped out, looking around for any signs of the alpha. Allison practically sprinted to meet me halfway, immediately engulfing me in a tight hug. I blinked, confused by the overly affectionate greeting, but eventually wrapped my arms around her.

I let my eyes wander to Jackson over her shoulder. He stood there with his arms crossed over his neatly ironed button-up, his face a perfected mask of boredom. 

I gripped Allison’s biceps and pulled her away to give her a hard look. “I said to stay in the car.”

“I know.” She nodded tearfully. “But we couldn't...I just had to see if it was still there.” 

“What were you guys doing, anyway?” I kept my gaze firmly planted on her face, silently asking the real question: what are you doing with him? 

She swallowed nervously and just stared back at me with big, guilty eyes. 

“Shopping, obviously. Can we go now?” Jackson pushed himself off the car and slammed the hood down. 

My eyes narrowed into a harsh glare. I was so not in the mood for him right now. I’d already dealt with two too many jerks for one night. He raised his eyebrows in a silent challenge and I just turned on my heel to climb back into the driver’s seat. I wasn’t feeling up to another fight yet.

They got in after me and I held onto the steering wheel tighter than necessary as I scanned the parking lot one last time. I glanced at Allison as she buckled her seatbelt beside me. 

“What about your car?”

“I’ll worry about it tomorrow.” She sighed and wiggled around, trying to get comfortable. 

Whatever. That was good enough for me. I started the car, but froze with my hand still on the keys as my stomach twisted uncomfortably. I glanced out the windshield, then my window, but saw nothing.

My skin prickled with the feeling that we were being watched. My eyes flickered around the parking lot once again. It just felt like something was...wrong. But I couldn’t place it.

“What is it—oh my God!” Allison shrieked as something landed on top of the car with a thud.

My head whipped in that direction, afraid it had left a dent from the force. There was a clunk clunk clunk as whatever it was walked around, the car shaking with each heavy stomp.

“Y/N. Drive the car.” Jackson ordered quickly from the back.

My eyes met his in the rearview mirror and I was surprised to see how scared he looked. He had each hand firmly planted on the seats beside him, his eyes wide and glistening. I’d nearly forgotten how shaken up he’d been after the video store incident. He was probably even more afraid of the alpha than I was. 

“I don’t think that's a good idea.” I breathed, fingers clutching the steering wheel so hard I was sure it would break off any minute. 

A dark mass fell onto the ground beside my window, the car jostling with its departure from the roof. I peered down and instantly recognized that it was Scott in full werewolf form. My eyes widened and I scrambled to throw the car into reverse.

“Yeah. Okay. We’re leaving.”

There was no way I could let either of them see him like that. I may still be furious with him, but I also didn’t want to deal with the consequences of them finding out right now. I’d barely gotten my foot off the break pedal when Scott roared loudly and ran off into the trees.

Allison’s hand slapped onto my wrist as I still held onto the gearshift, her manicured nails digging into my skin. “What was that?”

Jackson shuffled toward the passenger side window in the back, looking out into the darkness with furrowed brows.

“It looked like...like an animal.” He said slowly, as if putting together a puzzle in his mind.

“It was probably an animal, then.” I breathed, once again lifting my foot to finally get out of here.

“Wait! I saw something.” Jackson popped the door open and I slammed on the breaks for the second time.

He crawled out, and I instantly parked the car again. I huffed out an annoyed sigh and unbuckled my seatbelt. I couldn’t let him go over there.

“Stay here.” Allison froze beside me, just about to undo her seatbelt. “Please.”

I quickly caught up with Jackson, just as he neared the edge of the woods. Rustling sounded from within the foliage and I squinted to try and see what—or who— it was. Then, I noticed a pair of glowing yellow eyes only a few feet away. My heart leapt into my throat and I grabbed Jackson’s arm before pulling him back roughly.

“What?” He barked, clearly annoyed at my manhandling.

“We should split up.” I rushed the words out, glancing back into the woods to see the eyes moving closer. “I’ve got this. You go check over there.”

His green eyes narrowed skeptically before slowly sweeping toward where Scott was. They moved back to me, shining with distrust, but he nodded. I breathed a sigh of relief when he finally turned and walked away. I looked back to the car to make sure Allison was still inside before turning back toward the trees.

I took a few tentative steps, glancing around to make sure that no one else was near me.

“Scott?” My voice was a harsh whisper as I tried to see through the thick plants in front of me.

I focused on slowing my breathing as my heart raced in my chest. My hands started trembling and I clenched them into fists at my sides. I wasn’t exactly afraid of Scott, but he’d proven several times today that he didn’t have control. There was no telling what he was capable of right now.

I lost sight of his eyes and paused.

“There’s nothing.” Jackson called from my left, and I turned to see him walking toward me with a disappointed scoff.

A low growl directly in front of me had my breath catching in my throat. My eyes twitched to the side, the rest of my body paralyzed by fear. Almost too quickly to see, a clawed hand wrapped around my shoulder before shoving me forcefully.

I felt my feet leave the ground as I flew back, landing on the hard asphalt several yards away. My right hip took the brunt of the hit, and I groaned in pain as I slid across the ground for a few seconds. The uneven pavement bit into the skin of my palms as I tried to stop myself.

I turned them up toward my face as I finally skidded to a halt, wincing as fresh blood shimmered under the orangey parking lot lights. I frowned, brushing tiny rocks out of my skin before glancing back toward the trees.

He pushed me.

With fucking werewolf strength.

My eyes immediately found Scott at the edge of the woods, staring at me with a murderous glint in his glowing eyes. He took a step forward and I let out a shuddering breath, trying to scramble backward despite the pain radiating throughout my body.

Before he could make it far, a large shadowy figure emerged from the darkness. I realized with a start that it was Derek.

So he wasn’t dead after all.

He stalked toward Scott with clenched fists and a terrifying snarl. He gripped the sides of his jacket before hurling him back into a nearby tree.

“Holy shit. What the fuck.” Jackson was suddenly at my side, grabbing my arm to pull me up from the ground.

I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the two werewolves as they began fighting.

What the hell just happened? Was he going to kill me?

My hip throbbed harshly the second I put weight on my right leg. I winced, stumbling over slightly, and Jackson wrapped a supportive arm around my waist. He hauled me against his side and started dragging me back to the car.

“What the hell was that?” He yelled too loudly in my ear, panic clear in his voice.

I had no idea what to say. My mind was racing. I couldn’t expose Scott but, seriously, what the fuck? If Derek hadn’t shown up, I don’t know if I would be standing here right now. Was Scott really that out of control?

“Y/N! Are you brain dead or something? What was that?” Jackson demanded as we finally made it to the car.

He dropped me against the hood, Allison meeting us halfway. Her eyes were wide as they scanned me from head to toe.

“That was insane! Are you okay?”

“Not important.” Jackson practically shoved her out of the way to stand in front of me. “Did you see it? What did it look like?”

“I—” My mind went completely blank. “I don’t...”

“Lay off.” Allison sent him a glare and wrapped a comforting arm around my shoulders before pulling me in close.

“No. You know what, you’ve been acting really weird lately.” He wagged an accusatory finger at me. “It’s—it’s like you know something and aren’t telling us.”

Was he serious right now? I was just thrown twenty feet in the air by a fucking werewolf and he wanted to confront me about keeping secrets?

“You’re one to talk.” I hissed with a glare, reaching my boiling point after everything I’d been through tonight. “Get that neck checked out yet?”

He squared his shoulders, face paling at my words. Yeah, I hadn’t forgotten about his weird reaction to the alpha at the school. He’d been more normal lately, but that didn’t mean something still wasn’t up with him.

“Look, can you guys just fight on the way home? Please? I really don’t want to be here anymore.” Allison pleaded from beside me.

Jackson’s jaw ticked as we continued glaring at each other. She was right. We shouldn’t stay here with two werewolves fighting in the woods nearby. I pushed myself off the car with a grimace and gave her a nod. Damn, my leg hurt. A stabbing pain radiated down from my hip with each step I took toward the driver’s seat.

I popped the door open, ready to climb in, but stopped when I heard a noise from the trees behind me. My head instantly turned in that direction, but I saw nothing unusual through the darkness.

With a tired sigh I slid inside the car and started the ignition, Jackson and Allison already buckled in and ready to go. I cast one final glance toward the woods, my stomach twisting with worry.

As I pulled out, a long howl echoed through the night. 

Episode 7, Part Two                               Episode 9

[dweetwise]

have a semi-rushed riconti one shot because i couldn’t not write them for valentine’s day 💕

ship: ace x felix warnings: none word count: 4180

The problem with secret admirers

Holidays usually weren't something the survivors had the luxury of celebrating.

The occasional seasonal decorations in trials along with some ridiculous, thematical outfits seemed more like a sign of their Eldritch captor's morbid sense of humor than evidence of the passing of time. But sadly, lacking calendars and all, it was the most accurate estimate they had.

So when the Entity plopped down some fireworks and talismans on the generators to proclaim the Chinese new year, it barely affected any of them.

Yui and Feng seemed more on edge than usual, the decorations crude imitations of the festivities they were used to back home. Adam had told the group about the year of the ox and the Chinese zodiac, the teacher donning a new hoodie he’d received for the occasion.

For Ace, the holiday meant nothing more than looting as many firecrackers as he could manage, along with making questionable “horny” jokes to the few killers that had received ox-themed outfits.

But in the midst of the survivors' celebration or lack thereof, they'd completely forgotten about another well-known February celebration.

When Ace returns from a successful trial and goes to stash yet another firecracker into his generous collection of items, he immediately notices something that doesn't belong.

Inside the trunk, on top of the organized chaos that is his pile of items and add-ons, lies a note.

Curiously unfolding the piece of paper, Ace makes out somewhat messy handwriting on a worn piece of paper.

'Your smile lights up the room'.

“Oh, ha ha, very funny,” Ace says, turning to face the small group of survivors by the campfire.

“Huh? What's up?” Steve perks up, others following suit and turning to watch the spectacle.

“Someone left me a little prank note,” Ace says, rolling his eyes and flicking the slip of paper over his shoulder.

“What?” Claudette says with a frown, immediately reaching for the discarded note.

“What does it say?” Cheryl asks curiously, coming up beside the botanist.

“'Your smile lights up the room,'” Claudette reads.

“Aww, that's adorable!” Kate exclaims. “A Valentine's day card!”

“The joke being that we're continually outdoors,” Ace explains. “Meaning my smile does jack shit.”

“Are you sure? Maybe they meant figuratively,” Claudette gently prods.

“Yes Claudy, I'm sure I'm not getting mystery love notes,” Ace snorts at the incredulous suggestion, before turning back to the others. “Come on, whose idea was it? Fess up!” he demands, looking over the group

When nobody makes a move to come clean, others also looking around in confusion, Ace eventually focuses his stare on Nea, Meg and Feng, the trio of troublemakers sitting together by the fire.

“The hell you looking at me for?” Nea cusses.

“That’s lame as fuck,” Meg agrees.

“I'm tempted to make one now just so you’ll see—” Feng starts.

“That's a great idea! We should all make Valentine's day cards for each other!” Kate suggest, missing the gamer's point entirely.

“Look, there's a drawing too!” Cheryl suddenly exclaims, pointing at the back of the mystery note still in Claudette’s hands.

Ace sighs and leans over to look, fully expecting a doodled caricature of himself or even a crude phallic sketch.

Instead, he finds a pretty good drawing of some sort of flower. It’s not perfect, but it looks like someone clearly put a lot of work into it.

“It's a clover,” Claudette informs, glancing up at Ace with a smile. “No doubt for luck, even if it doesn't have the iconic four leaves.”

“Uh. Maybe,” Ace says, a little taken aback at the information. Someone really went through a lot of effort just for a small prank.

“So? Who's it from?” Steve asks impatiently.

“It still doesn’t say, Steve,” Cheryl sighs in irritation.

“I mean, Jeff and Jane are the artists,” Quentin points out.

“Uh-huh, sure, Jeff would draw a flower card for Ace and not his botanist girlfriend,” Meg snorts, making Claudette duck her head bashfully.

“And Jane—" Steve starts, excitedly turning to the former talk show host.

“No,” Jane interrupts the teen. “I mean this in the nicest way possible, but hell no.”

“No offense taken, sweetheart,” Ace grins good-naturedly, the cheesy flirt making the woman grimace.

“What about Bill?” Nea suggests out of the blue.

“What the hell are you on, kid?” Bill snorts, and even Ace has to bite back a laugh over the thought of the gruff veteran writing love letters.

“Just trying to think of someone in his age range!” Nea protests.

“Well, did anyone see anything?” Quentin asks. “We can’t all have been in a trial when the note was placed.”

“I’ve been in like three trials today,” Feng complains.

“I don’t think any of us really keep track of people at the fire,” Kate says. “Anyone could have walked by and put it there.”

“Aww, so we’re not gonna know who it was?” Steve frowns.

“Maybe that’s for the best,” Jane says.

As the commotion seems to die down, Claudette hands back the note back to Ace.

“You should keep it. It seems you have a secret admirer, after all,” Claudette says, smiling.

“Guess it can’t hurt,” Ace says, reluctantly pocketing the card. He’s still not sure it's genuine, but is intrigued by the sudden turn of events nonetheless.

Surprisingly, it seems the kids aren’t quite ready to give up on finding out the culprit. Some time later, Ace sees Cheryl, Steve and Quentin huddle together by one of the tree stumps, Cheryl looking to be taking notes on a map.

“Did you ask the ones who just got back?” Cheryl asks.

“Yup! Steve says. “Jeff was mostly confused, and David laughed his ass off. Laurie said she hadn't seen anything weird before she got taken to the trial. And Tapp just looked like he'd lost all hope for humanity,” Steve summarizes.

“Sounds about right,” Quentin huffs.

“Okay, so we've ruled out us three, Laurie, Jeff, Claudette, Jane, Bill, Tapp and David,” Cheryl recaps.

“And Nance has Jonathan, and Felix has his girlfriend,” Steve reminds.

“We should definitely rule out Nea too, since she’s way younger than him,” Quentin says. “Meg and Feng too, I guess."

“You're right, they always bully Ace too,” Steve casually remarks.

Ace rolls his eyes behind his shades and keeps shuffling his cards, not understanding why the group is so hell bent on talking about him like he’s not even there.

“Oh, and Yui,” Cheryl says.

“Good point,” Quentin says.

“Huh? Why?” Steve asks, confused.

“She, uh…” Cheryl falters. “Girl talk. I know it's not her.”

“Okay!” Steve beams.

And that pretty much sums up Ace's expectations for their little operation to succeed. If Steve somehow still hasn't figured out that the Japanese woman is solely interested in other women, Ace doesn’t have much trust in his detective work.

“Kate?” Cheryl suggests.

“She’s making Valentine’s cards for all of us as we speak,” Quentin snorts. “I don’t think she’d play favorites.”

“What about Dwight?” Steve suggests.

“Well… it’s definitely awkward and weird enough to fit his MO,” Cheryl considers.

“I thought he was into Jake?” Quentin says.

And that’s about the time Ace tunes out and goes to bug Tapp to play cards with him, hoping the detective will be happy to pretend like this entire thing never happened.

Ace doesn’t know how long it is before he’s finally taken to a trial, but it feels like an eternity. The atmosphere around camp is awkward as people trickle in and out from trials and someone always feels the need to point out he was on the receiving end of an anonymous person’s affection. The reactions, unsurprisingly, range from awkward confusion to straight up laughter.

So when the fog finally surrounds Ace, he actually welcomes it. The familiar sight of the Autohaven gas station is enough to take his mind off the teasing back at camp, at least momentarily.

But another problem presents itself right as he rounds a corner of scrap and finds Élodie on a generator—

“Hey, come here often?” Ace jokes, crouching down next to the machine to get to work.

—And the woman immediately gets up to leave.

“It wasn’t me, so don’t get any ideas,” Élodie scowls in his direction.

“Huh? I didn’t—” Ace tries to explain, but she’s already taking off in a sprint, and Ace thinks he hears her mutter “creep”.

Ace sighs and barely resists the urge to bash his face against the generator in frustration. This day just keeps getting better.

To Ace’s utter delight—that is to say, absolute annoyance—his mystery admirer becomes the biggest source of entertainment for the survivors. He doesn’t mind playing along for the first few jabs at his expense, thinking the others will surely get bored after just a few hours.

They don’t.

Most of the group still seem determined to figure out the person behind the note, others are content to gossip and joke about the possibilities, and some go as far as to blame Ace for intentionally stirring up drama. His not-so-subtle suggestions to let it go are shrugged off, and after a few days, Ace resigns himself to his fate and figures the sooner he lets the whole thing sort itself out, the better.

It doesn’t mean he’s happy about it.

To add insult to injury, even the killers seem to have a sudden hard-on for him, focusing Ace with single-minded determination every chance they get.

It's only a few days later, when the Pig kneels down Ace's prone form to place a trap on his head, that he realizes why.

“There you go, lover boy,” the woman's voice sounds mocking despite being muffled by her mask.

“Wah?” Ace asks, the device attached to his jaw making it hard to speak.

“I heard someone has a little admirer,” the Pig says. “I figured it warrants some special treatment.”

The word is accentuated by throwing Ace up on a hook, and the gambler's following scream is as much from pain as it is from frustration.

When Ace gets back to the campfire after having his head popped by the killer’s trap, he sits down on a log furthest from the group, hoping to get a breather—

“Hey, look who it is!” Ash immediately interrupts his moment of solitude, sitting down uninvited next to Ace. “How you doing, champ?” Ash grins, elbowing him in the side.

“What do you want?” Ace asks, feeling much more irritable than usual because of the constant teasing.

“I mean…” Ash says, before looking around and lowering his voice. “Have you figured out who it is?”

Ace rolls his eyes and resists the urge to slap the man with his own prosthetic hand.

“Come on, you can tell me!” Ash grins in a very suspicious way.

“If I find out, you’ll be the first to know. Trust me,” Ace whispers, lying out of his ass.

“That’s what I’m talking about!” Ash laughs, way louder than necessary. “I’m happy for you; at least someone around here will be getting laid!”

Half of the camp erupts into snickers and the other half turns to glare at Ace, notifying him that their conversation was definitely loud enough to overhear.

“Not in front of the children!” Jane sneers, like Ace enjoys having his sex life publicly broadcasted.

“Oh, would you look at that!” Ace quips with fake cheer as fog starts creeping up his legs, thankful for the Entity’s timing even though he barely got back to the campfire. “Time for another trial!”

When the fog clears from around him, Ace is in the killer shack in Red Forest with Cheryl and Felix right beside him.

“I'm gonna go find Zarina,” Cheryl whispers to Ace, informing him of who their last teammate is.

“Sure,” Ace says, knowing it’s good to split up, as Felix has already started repairs on the generator in the shack—

“I need to privately ask her about the note!” Cheryl beams and is sprinting away before Ace can reply.

Which is just as well, because he might have said a few choice words to the kid through his annoyance. Thankfully, he's left with Felix, one of the few people who have treated Ace normally throughout this entire thing.

“Fuck this,” Ace curses, joining the handsome German on the generator. Felix glances up but doesn't ask, and Ace appreciates being given the space to rant. “This is the worst thing that's ever happened!”

“The note?" Felix asks.

“What else? It seems it's all anyone ever talks about!” Ace rages, throwing one of his hands up in frustration and nearly causing the machine to explode. “I swear, this is worse than middle school,” Ace huffs. “I have girls gossiping, kids pestering and killers bullying me. And for what? A shitty piece of paper!”

Damn, it feels good to get this out. Ace doubts Felix cares, but it's nice to get to vent to someone he knows won't make the situation worse.

“Whoever left the note must be an idiot,” Felix comments bluntly, and it gives Ace pause.

Sure, Ace is frustrated, but he's still a little sentimental over the note and cute gesture behind it. Regardless, he shouldn’t be surprised that the no-nonsense architect would find the notion ridiculous.

“I'm just so done with it,” Ace sighs. “At this point, I'd take any explanation. Even an 'oops, wrong trunk, it was never meant for you'. Sure, I like being in the spotlight, but this is getting unbearable.”

Felix doesn't say anything, only keeps working away; probably embarrassed being forced to discuss Ace's (lack of) love life.

“I—” Felix starts after an awkward silence.

“Shit, I'm sorry,” Ace interrupts with a chuckle, not wanting the German to be any more uncomfortable than he already clearly is. “Didn't mean to talk about ear off about this stuff. Let's get this gen done, huh?”

Felix immediately seems relieved, and Ace jumps at the chance to change topics.

“You ever been to China?” Ace asks, nodding at the firework decoration on top of their generator.

As they chat about one of Felix's business trips to Shanghai, Ace is simultaneously glad for a distraction from his Valentine's fiasco and melancholy about their shallow friendship.

Maybe he'd take this whole thing more seriously if there was any possibility it would actually lead to something with the one person he's even remotely interested in. If Ace was in his prime, he'd probably have made a move on Felix months ago, girlfriend and heterosexuality be damned. Young and reckless Ace wouldn't have cared, happily flirting his ass off.

Meanwhile, old and slightly less reckless Ace has to settle for shitty jokes and sneaking glances at Felix.

When the Ghostface finally makes an appearance during their second generator and proceeds to chase and tunnel Ace to death despite the others' best efforts to save him, Ace isn’t even surprised anymore.

“I'm starting to wonder if the note is even legit,” Quentin says one day.

“How come?” Kate asks, cocking her head.

“Don't you think Ace's secret admirer would have come clean by now?" Quentin prods.

“Maybe it was just the Entity messing with us?” Laurie suggests.

“If it was a prank from someone, I’m kinda proud of them for pulling it off,” Nea says. “Especially for this long!”

“I think it’s mean,” Claudette says. “They’ve allowed this to go on for way too long. Just look at poor Ace!”

Everyone turns to collectively look at Ace, who is just trying to play some goddamn solitaire in peace while the rest, again, seem content to talk about him like he’s not even there.

“He looks the same as always,” Meg snorts.

“He’s been tunneled to death the last then trials in a row,” Laurie scolds.

“I’m fine,” Ace insists.

“I think his secret fan is just shy!” Kate continues and sparks another debate, oblivious to Ace’s annoyance.

When Ace gets back from yet another unsuccessful trial and sees a group of gossiping people and a grinning Nea, he groans in exasperation.

Before anyone can bring up Ace’s least favorite subject, Felix butts in.

“Ace,” Felix addresses, coming up beside the group. “Do you have time to teach me that perk you used the other trial? With the longer aura-reading?”

“You want… one of my perks?” Ace asks, surprised.

Felix has always seemed more altruistic than others, and it’s no secret Ace's perks were only used by… Well, Ace.

“Um, yes. If it’s not a bother,” Felix says, discreetly glancing at the group of gossip-hungry survivors waiting to attack Ace’s misery.

And it dawns on Ace that Felix is giving him a distraction to slip away.

“Oh, of course!” Ace grins. “Right this way!”

As soon as they’re out of earshot from the campfire, Ace starts prattling away.

“Thanks for covering for me!” Ace beams. “I thought they’d have gotten bored by now—"

“It was me,” Felix interrupts grimly, making Ace pipe down and turn to look at him.

“Uh… come again?” Ace asks, confused.

“I did it. I wrote the note,” Felix confesses, looking at Ace in determination.

“What? Why?” Ace asks, incredulous. When Felix's bravado falters, he keeps going. “Look, you don't have to cover for whoever it was,” Ace sighs. “I don’t blame you for wanting this entire thing to be over—"

“I'm serious,” Felix says. “I've been lying for way too long. I should have come clean before, but I was too much of a coward.”

Alright, what the actual fuck? Why would Felix, of all people, have sent Ace a love note?

While he’s gaping stupidly, Felix continues:

“Claudette was right, it’s my fault for letting this go on for so long. I’m sorry.”

“But… your girlfriend—” Ace starts, struggling to wrap his head around the whole thing.

“Will hopefully move on once she realizes I'm not coming back,” Felix says. “I've started to accept that I'm not getting out of here.”

“Well, that sounds cheerful,” Ace comments.

“Sheiße, I didn't mean it like that,” Felix winces. “I just… thought I'd do things differently this time. Since I never had the courage to, in my old life.”

“So… where do I come into the picture?” Ace asks, skeptical.

“I…” Felix says, wringing his hands in a nervous gesture. “Wanted to see how you would react to the note. It was stupid.”

“Huh? How come?”

“I caused you nothing but harm,” Felix sighs. “First you thought I was mocking you, then the others kept bothering you, and even the killers were giving you a hard time. I'm sorry, I should never have done it.”

“No, I mean—” Ace flounders for an explanation. Sure, he'd been annoyed, but none of the things that happened were Felix’s fault. “Why give something like that to me?”

“Isn't it obvious?” Felix says, scratching at his neck while averting his eyes. “I admit I haven't celebrated Valentine's day much, but I assumed…” he trails off.

What? Felix was seriously trying to test the waters of… getting together with Ace?

It slowly starts to make sense. Felix’s strange behavior. The messy handwriting on the note, probably from Felix’s nerves. The surprising artistic talent of the sketch, after a lifetime of architectural drawings.

“Well, this is unexpected,” Ace says with a smirk, not able to keep the cockiness from seeping into his voice at the knowledge that Felix, somehow, seems to be interested in him.

“Sorry—”

“I said unexpected, not unwelcome,” Ace interrupts.

And then gets to watch the realization slowly dawn on Felix, the perpetual worried frown on the other’s face smoothing out as his eyes widen in hope.

“You don't mind?” Felix asks.

“Let's just say I'm surprised you haven't caught me looking,” Ace grins. “I never expected someone as handsome as you to return the attention,” he can't resist flirting.

“Ähm, well, I…” Felix flusters from the compliment, looking at the ground. “Am not very good at this.”

“I wouldn’t say that,” Ace says.

Then, he reaches into his breast pocket, pulling out the infamous note he’s kept on him this entire time. Felix’s gaze follows his movement as Ace carefully unfolds the paper, crumpled and smudged from having been with him trial after trial.

“I thought you threw it away,” Felix says quietly, eyes wide in awe.

“You don’t just throw away a good luck charm,” Ace chastises playfully, pointedly brushing his thumb over the clover drawing. “Especially not one that’s the nicest thing anyone’s done for me in a long time.”

Ace bites his tongue to stop prevent more mushy sentiments from slipping out. Felix is still staring way too intently and not saying a word, so Ace clears his throat self-consciously tucks the note safely back into his pocket.

“I can’t believe you kept it,” Felix finally says, an adorable smile on his lips as he meets Ace’s eyes.

“Well, seeing as we’ve now established that we’re both sentimental saps…” Ace starts with a smirk, stepping closer to Felix to test the waters. “I have a question.”

“Oh, umh… Yes?” Felix says, straightening his back but still seeming nervous.

It's adorable, and Ace wants to kick himself for not noticing anything sooner. Still, there's no time like the present.

“Be my valentine?” Ace asks with a grin.

Felix's posture instantly relaxes, and the smile is back on his face.

“I'd love to,” Felix says.

Ace’s grin widens until he feels like it’ll be permanently etched onto his face. This is a much better outcome than he ever expected when he found an unassuming note with his items.

“So, ehm…” Felix starts after they’ve been staring at each other for a beat too long, snapping Ace out of it. “Do you… should we…?” Felix falters, nervously brushing a stray lock from his face.

“Wanna find a place to sit down and chat?” Ace suggests, not feeling any need to rush things now that he knows where they stand with each other. “I don’t know about you, but I could use a break from the others.”

“Me too,” Felix says, seeming relieved. “I admit I’m not looking forward to what the others will say about this.”

“Fuck em!” Ace says. “They’ve had their fun, I’m not gonna let them put you through the same shit as they did me. We don’t even have to tell them.”

“No, I want to,” Felix insists. “If I have to hear one more rude joke about you from Feng…” Felix’s mouth pinches into a thin line.

“Aww, babe,” Ace teases, the pet name slipping out before he can stop it. “You don’t have to defend my honor.”

“I do, and I will,” Felix says with surprising determination.

“Well, in that case, I won’t stop you,” Ace grins.

“Good,” Felix says with a smug little smirk.

And the sudden assertiveness makes heat creep up Ace’s neck, quickly starting to regret his suggestion to take things slow.

“I, uh, I think I saw a pretty cozy clearing not far from here,” Ace says, eager to get the chance to get to know more about his companion.

“Lead the way,” Felix agrees.

They end up sitting next to each other under the stars and talking for what has to be hours, but goes by in the blink of an eye. No longer having to filter himself and keep their conversation casual is a much-needed break from the past few days, and the smile never once leaves Ace’s face.

Talking to Felix makes the feelings Ace has tried so hard to ignore come back full force, reminding him of why the man caught his eye in the first place. Sure, Felix is still more attractive than anyone has the right to be, but he’s also insanely smart and surprisingly witty past the initial anxious exterior. The way he smiles and gives his undivided attention even when Ace talks about silly, insignificant things not only makes Ace forget all about his recent frustrations, but also takes his mind away from the strange world surrounding them.

And when Felix eventually scoots even closer and looks at Ace with nothing but fondness in his eyes, Ace has no trouble throwing his initial hesitance out of the window and going in for a kiss.

It’s not earth-shattering or particularly intense, it’s just really, really nice and makes Ace’s heart do stupid leaps in his chest. It’s been so long since he even kissed anyone, and getting to smooch the person he’s been secretly pining over for months and have said person eagerly return the kiss?

“Why the hell haven’t we done this sooner?” Ace voices his thought when he pulls away from the gentle kiss, making Felix huff a quiet laugh into their shared breathing space.

“I should have just signed the note,” Felix says.

“Good thing you can make it up to me now, Valentine,” Ace grins.

Felix chuckles warmly and a callused hand comes up to gently cup Ace’s cheek before tilting his head up into another kiss.

And even though Ace isn’t normally one for holiday celebrations, he’s looking forward to spending many more with Felix by his side.

[yet-another-fan-girl9]

Inhuman (1)

Summary: All beings in the universe have a soulmate except for Midgardians. People can hear their soulmate in their heads. For almost five hundred and fifty years, Loki believed that he had no soulmate until 1513 when a Midgardian princess was born. Will fate be kind to them or will the universe tear them apart?

Warnings: violence, language, hella historical inaccuracies (I tried to do research but then got lazy), maybe some AOS season 2 spoilers(?)

Word Count: ~3400

A/N: Yay! The re-write is here! I changed it so now there are flashbacks and stuff and the chapters are longer! I’m also posting this chapter a day early because of reasons. Anyways, enjoy!

[New York, New York, March 2024]

‘Soulmates?’ You had never heard of the concept.

‘We are destined to be together. The universe made it so.’

You shot up in bed, a light sheen of sweat covered your body. Loki’s words replayed over and over in your head. You hadn’t heard his actual voice in so long but it was still as clear as if he was speaking to you now. It had been twelve years since you had seen him in Germany and he had tried to take over.

‘We are destined to be together.’

The words echoed in your mind. ‘Destined’ huh? Well, if you’d learned anything from the past four hundred and eighty-six years that you were not with Loki, it’s that the universe does a shit job at keeping you together. You ran your fingers through your hair, easily smoothing out the tangled mess. It was too early to think about Loki.

You slipped out of the silk sheets that covered your king-sized bed in your two-level, top floor Upper East Side penthouse. You were very proud of how far you had come. The view was amazing. You could see some of Central Park from one side and the stereotypical New York skyline from another.

As you walked out of your room, you caught your reflection in one of your full-sized mirrors. And that was definitely a nice view. When you came out of Terrigenesis almost five hundred years ago, you quickly discovered that you were now the blueprint for a perfect person. Straight, white teeth, surprisingly tameable hair, and clear, unblemished skin were some of the visually obvious changes. In addition to your perfected looks, you had increased senses, healing, strength, endurance, and your favorite, pain tolerance. Oh, and don’t forget you basically look twenty-five forever.

You checked your phone while you made breakfast in the kitchen downstairs. There were a couple of emails from your employees on their latest jobs. You opened one from Max, your right-hand man. You were reading over some job offers he had handpicked for you when you got a text from the man himself.

Bringing up some donuts!

Max was the only person from work to have access to your penthouse. He was your best friend. The two of you had met when you were at Afterlife nearly fifteen years ago. He was an Inhuman as well. All of your employees were Inhumans, using their specialties to carry out their jobs. Max had the power to change surfaces. It was a strange power, but he had learned to make it very useful. He could cause his pursuers to slip on the suddenly ice-like ground or climb up a glass skyscraper.

“Hello, bitch! I brought donuts!” Max called from the elevator.

“I’m in the kitchen!”

Max walked in holding the goods. He always wore eccentric color-coordinated outfits. Even the times you saw him in stealth mode, he had to have some lace or frill somewhere. Today he wore a mixture of neon green and pink with matching eyeliner.

“Are Cosmo and Wanda disguising themselves as your clothes?” you asked.

“Haha,” he deadpanned. “I knew you were going to say something like that. You’re so fucking funny. Soo…” He plopped the three large donut boxes onto your kitchen counter. “Have you heard of the Avenger’s new quote-unquote recruit?”

“Um, I think it’s your job to keep tabs on heroes.” You opened the nearest box and happily pulled out your favorite donut.

“Okay. Number one: I’m not speaking to you as your right-hand, right now, but as your friend.” He held up his finger. “Number two: it’s not really a job if I do it in my free time anyways. You’re paying me to do something that I do on an hourly basis.”

“You stalk the Avengers on an hourly basis?”

“No? Anyways, number three: it’s Thor’s brother. It’s your Loki.”

“What the fuck?” you choke on your donut. Max was the only person who knew you that you and Loki had a history. And that’s all he knew. Nothing about soulmates or all that shit. “What the fuck, Max? Did you try to use donuts to soften the blow? Stop laughing.”

“I-I wish I had caught that reaction on camera,” he said in between fits of giggles.

“Haha,” it was your turn to deadpan. “Fuck, man. I guess we just have to double our efforts to keep ourselves off of their radar.”

“Do you think they’ve forgiven him for New York?” Max composed himself.

“I mean, they must have if they’re letting him join the team.” You chanced another bite of your donut.

“But lots of people haven’t.”

“Lots of people still haven’t forgiven Barnes,” you pointed out. You didn’t know when or why Loki had attacked New York. That Loki was nothing like the man who you had grown to love back in the 1500s. But you were nothing like that girl either.

 “Have you chosen a new job from the list I sent you?” he changed the subject.

“No, not yet, and you have a little…” you motioned to the corner of your mouth.

Max got the hint and wiped some powder off of his mouth. You noticed the sprinkling of grey that was mixed into his curly black hair. He displayed the last fifteen years proudly while you remained unchanged. Max was the closest you’ve been to someone in a long time, and just like everyone before him, you would outlive him. But you would remember him. You remembered everyone. You remembered everything.

Right now, you thought of Agnes, your first real friend. She was your handmaiden and you had met right before everything went to shit. She had helped you cope after you underwent Terrigenesis, although you hadn’t known what it was back then. She had helped you run away and even died for you. You had only known her for nine years, but you compared everyone to her. Max held second place, right after Agnes.

“I think we should take the Senator’s offer,” Max said, jolting you out of your memories. He pulled up the offer on his iPad. “One million to off his upcoming competition.”

“Damn,” you whistled. “He’s desperate, isn’t he? Is there a deadline?”

“No, but I assume we should get it done quickly.”

“Send over the info.”

🌹

You shoved the flower into Jake Morano’s mouth. Blood from the bullet wound in his forehead trickled down until it turned the perfect, white rose red. You snapped a quick photo on your burner phone to send to the Senator as confirmation. With a huff, you looked around the apartment. Mr. Anderson had put up a fight, although it didn’t do anything to deter you and Max. A few glass awards were in pieces on the hardwood floor, family pictures were shattered, and the wall behind you held a couple of bullets from Anderson’s gun.

“All good?” Max asked from his location by the computer. He was deleting all footage of you being there. And everything else, just to be safe.

“Yep.” You walked over to him, your boots making a satisfying clicking on the ground, and proudly displayed the picture of the dead body. “Got the confirmation picture for the Senator. How’s it coming?”

“Almost… there. We’re good to go.”

The two of you left in your favorite black Lamborghini. Unfortunately, you actually had to drive places now that Gordon was dead. You followed his advice, though, and bought a plane along with four other sports cars, a helicopter, and a couple of motorcycles. You knew how to operate every single one of them. What else were you supposed to do except for establishing your contract killing empire?

🌹

Loki stood in the middle of his assigned room with his hands on his hips. It certainly was much nicer than the last prison the Avengers had kept him in. They may say it wasn’t a prison but the twenty-four-hour surveillance from Stark’s new AI said otherwise. Even though it was nicer than the shitty glass cylinder from twelve years ago, it was empty. Thor had shown Loki the few things in his room: books, photographs, and his own goddamned merchandise. 

Would Loki have his own merchandise one day? Everyone was redeemable as shown by Romanoff and Barnes. Maybe there would be plastic replicas of his helmet? No, Loki thought that was stupid. Only heroes got merchandise and heroes had to show up to events and sponsor health drinks or whatever the fuck they do. Heroes had to be nice.

Nothing good ever came from being on Midgard. Most recently, there was his father dying, although what followed was worse. Before that was the attack he had been forced to make on the city. And the first time he had ever come to Midgard had ended with disappointment and heartbreak.

Loki sighed and waved his hand to conjure green and gold accents, sheets, and blankets. At least there was color in the room now. No doubt the AI had reported that he had used his magic. He hoped it had also told them that all he did was improve the room, he didn’t need anyone talking to him at the moment.

“Good afternoon, Reindeer Games,” the AI echoed through the room. Loki glowered at the sound of Stark’s nickname. “There is a meeting in Conference Room Five that the entire team is required to attend.”

Loki hadn’t the faintest fucking idea where the conference rooms were. He left his room and caught sight of his brother and the Valkyrie. The God of Mischief followed the pair down to where the meeting was taking place. Did he really want to go? If he wanted to be part of the team he would have to. He preferred the Revengers, though. While it had lasted. It was smaller.

Everyone was sitting around the long table. Of course, Loki would be the last to arrive. Stark and Barton both glared at him when he entered. Understandable. Romanoff remained impassive, but Loki knew she would bash his head in the first chance she got. Rogers had to remain positive that Loki could be redeemed because if the Norse God could redeem himself, then so could Barnes. Bruce had warmed up to Loki on the journey to Midgard. None of the newer members of the team outright hated him, but they were still cautious around him.

Loki found himself sitting in between his brother and Bruce. Stark went up to the screen at the front and everyone fell silent.

“This is Jake Morano.” The screen turned on to show a dead man with a rose stuffed in his mouth. “He was going to run for Senator against this guy.” The screen changed. “This guy is William Anderson, a very corrupt Senator. In the last month, Morano began to gain a lot of support including a sponsor from us. Well, a sponsor from me in the name of the Avengers.”

“Are you implying that Anderson killed Morano?” Rogers asked.

“I’m saying that Anderson hired someone to kill Morano.” The screen changed again to display multiple bodies left with a rose in their mouths. “I had F.R.I.D.A.Y. do a quick search of bodies with roses found in their mouths and we found a shocking amount of similar deaths. The first ones dating back to the nineteen twenties. More recently, some of the deaths have happened at the same time on opposite sides of the globe. Deaths include, but are not limited to, shooting, stabbing, poisoning, drowning, burning, missing organs, being found stuck in a wall, and looking like a suicide. They all have a white rose soaked in blood in their mouths.”

“Are you sure it isn’t a serial killer?” Wilson questioned.

“Yeah, it’s probably not the same guy,” Romanoff pointed out. “Especially if it goes back to before Steve looked like that.”

“It’s gotta be an organization,” Barnes guessed. “Been around for a while, a couple of deaths happening at the same time, and one constant MO.”

“Loki?” Everyone looked at the God of Mischief when Stark said his name. “You’re technically a part of this team now. What’s your opinion?”

“Barnes is probably right,” Loki said after a moment’s hesitation. “The locations are all over the place and there are many different ways the victims met their demise.”

They nodded and Loki returned to silence.

“Alright, game plan.” Stark clapped his hands. “We have to get Anderson into an interrogation room. Round one is the good cops: Steve and Sam. When he doesn’t crack, and he won’t, we up the intensity. Nat and the Manchurian Candidate will do some intimidation. If he still doesn’t crack we can send in Wanda, or even Reindeer Games if she’s not comfortable, to search his mind.”

“Are all Midgardian politics like that?” Loki heard the Valkyrie ask Thor after the meeting. Thor only shrugged so she turned to Bruce.

“I mean, I haven't been here in a while but it’s always kinda been fucked up.”

Only an hour after the meeting, Anderson took out one million dollars in cash. Stark tracked him to a small cafe where he was going to, no doubt, pay the assassin. The team rallied, but of course, Loki wasn’t going. Apparently, he wasn’t ‘cleared’ yet. The only other people staying behind were the Valkyrie, Thor, and Barton due to a recent injury. 

Loki went to his room to sulk, although he told everyone he was thinking. He didn’t want to be here. Maybe he wanted to go somewhere that reminded him of home with tall buildings that reached the sky… 

🌹

"Hello, (Y/N)." Loki’s voice was as smooth as it was in your head, but it was different. The only way you could describe it was that it was solid. It felt less intimate. Like he could bless others with his words, but it was more special because he was here. 

"Loki," you breathed.

"You look more beautiful than I ever could imagine." He stepped closer.

You touched your hair self-consciously. There were multiple knots, and it probably looked like one of those bird nests the dogs always knocked out of trees. You had woken up in a hurry and your hair being trapped in the hood of your cloak probably didn't help.

Then it occurred to you that you were wearing only your nightgown, and you tightly wrapped your cloak around yourself. Loki wouldn’t hurt you, but no man has seen you in an outfit so revealing. Still, you took another step closer.

"I do not know what to say." Fortunately, your voice didn’t shake or waver as you had feared, but Loki could probably feel your nervousness.

You both took a final step closer. You reached up and cupped Loki's face in your hand which tingled slightly when you made contact. You admired his sharp features and bright blue-green eyes. Then you shivered in the cold winter air. Loki noticed and pulled you into a hug. You leaned into him and felt a shiver, a different, better shiver, shoot through your body.

“You’re real.” Your soft voice was almost lost in the biting wind. “I was so scared that I was dreaming.”

Another goddamned dream about Loki? You groaned into your pillow and pushed a few damp strands of hair away from your face. Why now, all of a sudden? Was it because he was so close? Just a few hours upstate in the Avenger’s compound.

Pushing the dream aside, you stretched and got ready for the day. You had sent the photo to the Senator, who you had learned was very fucking corrupted, and he replied with a location. That changed your plans a bit, you hadn't physically met a client in decades, but it was for the better for multiple reasons.

The first reason was that the cafe he had chosen was next to a flower shop where you got your supply of roses. The second reason was that it meant his apartment would be empty. While you went to get the money, and eventually kill Senator Anderson, Max was going to rob his house. It wasn’t something you’d usually do, but honestly, the shitty asshole deserved it.

Your lips were painted red and you wore your usual boots and a leather jacket. Your regular hair was hidden behind a pink and green wig, courtesy of Max. A baseball cap and large sunglasses further hid your appearance. Though if somebody knew your face, the hat and glasses did nothing. There were multiple knives hidden on your body as well as a handgun tucked into your waistband and a pocket pistol in your, well, pocket.

As you walked into the cafe, Izzy, the auburn-haired florist, nodded to you. She had Botanokinesis, plant manipulation, so your supply of white roses was never low. Every once in a while, Izzy would take a job but she had told you she was very happy in her shop.

You noticed the Senator immediately. He still wore a suit and the sunglasses did nothing to hide his identity. There were two young women behind the counter and you suspected that the four other ‘customers’ were too buff not to be the Senator’s security. Anderson had his back to the door which meant you would have to get past his security to get out. You zeroed in on the black briefcase on the ground by his feet.

“Senator,” you greeted and sat down across from him.

“You can’t possibly be the one I talked to,” the asshole replied. “You’re just a girl.”

“Well of course I couldn’t be,” you rolled your eyes behind your heavily tinted glasses. “My boss is too busy and smart to meet you in public.” He didn’t notice your sarcasm. You pulled out the burner phone and showed him the messages as proof. “Now, I’m also busy so if we can get this over with?”

“Sure, darling.” He put the briefcase flat on the table and pushed it towards you.

“Open it.” Even though small boobie traps wouldn’t hurt you much, it wasn’t a piece of information you wanted to give him.

Anderson sighed and complied. Then you turned it around to quickly inspect the contents. One thousand one hundred dollar bills. Hello Mr. Franklin. You nodded in satisfaction and comically rubbed your hands together to inconspicuously grab a knife that was hidden up your sleeve.

“Thank you, Senator. That will be all.”

You closed the case, stood up, and plunged your knife deep into his left carotid artery. As his security descended upon you, you pulled the knife out and his neck satisfyingly squirted blood. The Senator collapsed with his hands clutching his wound desperately. The pool of blood rapidly grew underneath him.

The two baristas screamed behind the counter and the Senator’s security drew their guns. You flipped the small table for cover as bullets pierced the cafe’s window behind you. Perfect. Just a bit more.

You pulled out the handgun from your waistband and with practiced ease, shot three of the four goons. The last one got the bloodied knife to the face. You elbowed the already damaged window and it finally broke, raining glass down on you. Ignoring the small cuts, you jumped out of the cafe through the window as a familiar red and gold suit landed in front of you. Why the fuck were the Avengers here? What about Loki?

You darted into Izzy’s shop and she played her part well, screaming that you had run out the back when you had actually gone into the side room. You listened as the Avengers followed her directions. One person, maybe it was the Black Widow, stayed behind to help calm down the seemingly hysterical Izzy. If she wasn’t so happy at her shop and she didn’t want to work directly for you, she could be a great actress.

You rolled back the rug on the ground to reveal a metal trapdoor. You entered the code to unlock it and climbed down into the darkness. Behind you, you heard the trapdoor’s magnetic lock click back into place. Two centuries ago, you had tunnels dug underneath Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens for easy getaways. If you went… that way, you would end up in Sandra’s souvenir shop which was a couple of blocks away from your penthouse.

With a million dollars in one hand and a handgun in the other, you walked down the concrete tunnel.

*

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Taglist:

@kaithehero @liliannyah​ @andreasworlsboring101 @oatballsoffury​ @aberrant-annie

[garbagevanfleet]

Learn To Leave A Room (series)

PART TWO 

Pairing: Jake & female!Reader Warnings: general sexiness, but nothing too risque yet Summary: Balancing relationships is hard work - God forbid someone throw a wrench into it. Notes:  oh my god, im sorry guys. sexual tension is my favorite thing in the whole world. 

MASTERLIST

“I am not ashamed, the story goes. I swear I will learn to leave a room without touching every part of your face.” — Marcelo Hernandez Castillo, “How to Grow the Brightest Geranium,” published in Breakwater Review

“Obviously you have to talk to him.” 

Despite being nearly noon, it’s still too early for this conversation. Lucy has dragged you back to the diner, hoping to nurse your collective hangovers with some coffee and a greasy breakfast, but all you had really wanted to do was crawl into your own bed.

“You can’t just leave things like they are. I mean, he is still your boyfriend until you actually break up with him, right?” she tries again. You know she’s right. She’s always so insightful about these kinds of things, and hung-over you is a little annoyed by her sound logic. 

You had told her a very selective recounting of what had happened last night, leaving out anything to do with Jake. You weren’t ever planning on telling her the rest.

You and Lucy had stayed over at the Kiszka residence, cuddled up together on the couch, but you - very luckily - did not have to see anyone else before you had left. 

“I know. I will eventually,” you assure, staring down at the half-eaten cheeseburger you ordered and wondering if you can take another bite. You opt instead to pick at it with your fork. “Mostly I want him to have to think about it all for a while. Get in his own head.”

She giggles at you. “Mind games,” she says in the way of agreement. She’s silent for a moment as you watch her stir her milkshake with her straw. “I’m sorry he did that to you. I could tell that you didn’t want to invite him; I shouldn’t have pushed you.”

You shake your head at her. “It’s so not your fault. I think it’s good that I figured out who he really is early on. You know, before I actually got to like him.”

“You didn’t really like him?” Her tone is sheepish. 

You shake your head. “It was fun at first, but no. I will miss the regular sex though,” you add, making her laugh. 

“Well, I guess you’ll have to just kick him to the curb and get back out there. You’re going to find someone that’s going to treat you right.”

You nod in agreement and give her a thankful smile, but somehow you feel that you won’t be joining the dating scene for a while. 

+++

Mitch never does text you, so you decide you won’t either. It feels a little unresolved, but you’re honestly grateful to not have to deal with the confrontation. He had never left anything at your house, and you hadn’t taken more than one or two pictures together, so you forget about him pretty easily.

You do feel anxious off and on, but you don’t think it’s from the breakup. You can’t quite put your finger on it, but you pick up an extra-long shift at the cafe to fill your time. Fall is the start of the busy season for baristas, so you very infrequently have a moment to dwell on anything at work. 

After a long day of steaming and steeping, you cannot wait to get home and wash off. The most you ever feel like yourself is in the shower - it’s always a mental cleansing process just as much as a physical one. Soft music starts to play from the speaker on the bathroom counter as you connect your phone. 

You turn the water to the perfect temperature to warm you up from the walk home, and it feels borderline euphoric as you step under the spray. You let the water wash over you, but the second you close your eyes, you snap them back open with an anxious feeling. 

You try it again. You lean back, close your eyes... but to the same result. 

You stand and stare blankly at the shower wall. 

“Fuck,” you breathe. Every time you close your eyes, all you can see is Jake looking back at you from across the living room. 

The lights on his face, the contrast of his dark hair against the white door frame - you can even hear the music that was playing. All of it. It’s haunting you.

You rub the heels of your palms into your eyes, trying to will it away, but you can’t stop your brain from playing the image back to you. 

“Fuck,” you whisper again, a bit more desperately this time and slump against the cold shower wall. You stay there, staring at the tile in front of you until you realize that the issue isn’t going to go away. 

You give up and wash your hair, absent of the task. A slight annoyance slips over you because you can’t even enjoy the ritual with your mind so preoccupied. You take a deep breath and let your eyes slip closed as the warm water rinses the soap away. 

He’s waiting for you in the black, but this time you’re on the patio with him, watching him smoke his cigarette down to the filter. It’s only for a moment, but in that moment you can smell the smoke. Feel the leather of his jacket. Taste his skin. 

You remember the intensity in his eyes as you sucked his thumb into your mouth and you try to recall every little thing about how he looked at that moment. You groan at yourself, realizing just how stupid you are for ever letting yourself feel like this. 

When you step out of the shower, you promise yourself that you won’t think about it anymore, but you still do. You try to bargain with yourself. 

You won’t think about it again after tonight, you think, but you know it’s a lie.

You blow dry your hair in the mirror and stare at the spot on your neck that Mitch had left you with. It’s faded to the point that it’s nearly undetectable, but you can see it. You want to hate Mitch for it, but somewhere in the back of your mind, you’re acutely aware that if he hadn’t done that, you would have never had the time you did with Jake. The party would have just been normal and you would still have Mitch’s number saved in your phone. Jake was right, who knows how long you would have kept dating him, despite the lack of interest on your part. 

You lay down in bed with your warm pajamas on, your feet dangling off the side and your cell in your hands. Jake’s contact information is pulled up and you flip to the Messages tab. You’ve only ever messaged him a couple of times; once when he asked you about a song you had been playing that he wanted to know the name of, and once when Josh and him were coming to pick you and Lucy up and he was messaging that they were waiting outside. 

You lay the phone face down on your chest and stare up at your ceiling. Your heart is fluttering as you think about what would happen if you called him. Right now. 

It’s just a reckless idea - you’d never do it - but that doesn’t stop your eyes from flicking to the clock on your nightstand. 

It’s 11 pm. Would he even answer? What would you say if he did?

You roll your eyes at yourself, suddenly embarrassed at how stupid you’re being. The covers are chilly as you slip into them, but thankfully, they warm up quickly. You fall into a pleasant sleep, and even though you had sworn you wouldn’t dream about it, you still do. 

+++

You wake up to your phone notifying you of a message, but you ignore it for a few minutes, trying to force yourself back to sleep. It’s five minutes later that you realize it’s not happening, so you reach a hand over for your phone. 

Lucy   10:23 am

What are you up to tonight?

A smile finds your lips. She’s always had an uncanny way of knowing when you needed her, and some girl time was exactly what the doctor ordered, you think.

Absolutely nothing. Wanna hang? you reply. You crawl out of bed and allow yourself some time to stretch your muscles before you head for the bathroom. You’re brushing your teeth when you hear a new message come in. 

Lucy   10:41 am 

For sure

Movie at Josh’s. Pick you up around 5.  

Your heart jumps.

“Fuck,” you rasp, but your mouth is still full of toothpaste, and now your mirror is dotted with white speckles. You finish brushing frantically before texting back.

Maybe just a girl night?

Because your life is currently such a mess, you’re not at all surprised that Lucy takes nearly half an hour to respond.

You lunge for the phone the second you hear the notification sound, nearly dropping the Poptart that you’ve just finished toasting. 

 Lucy  11:10 am

Don’t be silly, I already got the movie 

You have no idea how that prevents you from just watching it alone with her, but you don’t want to make her suspicious, so you don’t press any further. 

The rest of your day is spent acting like a middle schooler. You are not ready to see Jake Kiszka again. What if he says something to you in front of Lucy? Explaining it to her would be a nightmare. What if he was just drunk and doesn’t actually have any interest at all?

You’re not positive you’ll see him, so you try to convince yourself that you probably won’t. It decidedly does not work.  

You pointedly try not to think about what you’re going to wear, but despite yourself, you already have an outfit picked out by the time 4 pm rolls around. You try to reason with yourself as you eye your makeup bag.

“It’s a movie,” you remind yourself into the mirror. “We are just watching a movie in the dark and you are not putting on makeup.”

You try to be firm, but you’re weak and you end up glaring at your reflection as you apply mascara. 

Lucy is late when she arrives to get you, but it doesn’t matter, because you still feel like you haven’t had enough time to worry about everything thoroughly. Feeling unprepared, you climb into her car. 

You try to calm yourself by listening to everything Lucy is going on about as she tells you about her week. You know that she can tell that you’re nervous because she starts talking about her cat - a subject that always makes you feel better.

She’s so used to being at the Kiszka house that when you get there, she doesn’t bother knocking. She just lets herself in and hangs her coat and scarf on a hook by the door.

“Babe,” she calls out into the house, and Josh emerges from the kitchen and sweeps her into an embrace. You try not to listen to their loved up talk, you don’t feel like you have the stomach for it with the state you’re in.   

Josh greets you with a polite hug. You smile back genuinely until you realize that you have no idea if Jake told him anything, and suddenly you have a whole new nightmare to explore in your head. You try to talk yourself through it as you follow them through the hall to the living room.

He didn’t give you the shit-eating grin that you would expect to receive if he did know something. You’re also pretty sure that he would tell Lucy, and Lucy would absolutely ask you about it. You breathe a relieved sigh as you settle in on the couch.

Sam is sitting the wrong way in a reclining chair, his long legs hanging off one of the arms. He looks so gangly that you can’t help but laugh at him and he gives you a cheesy smile back. 

Since the recliner is taken, you get cozy with Lucy sandwiched between you and Josh, and a fuzzy blanket across all your laps. You want to ask if Jake is going to be joining you guys, but you chicken out. What if Josh does know about what happened at the party, and by some miracle, he just didn’t tell Lucy? You don’t want to seem like you’re thinking about Jake - even though you absolutely are - so you just stay silent. 

You try to get into the movie. You and Lucy both love anything in the horror genre, but you’d already seen this one in theaters with her, and you try not to be annoyed that she’d pick a movie you’ve both already seen, presumably just so Josh could see it as well.

It’s considerably less scary the second time around, so about halfway through, you find yourself bored. You excuse yourself to use the restroom, mostly just so you can stretch your legs, as the couch isn’t that big and fitting three people on it is a squeeze. Lucy asks if you want them to pause the movie, but you wave her off, telling her you’ll be right back.

You head up the stairs and down the hallway, and you’re just about to turn the corner to the bathroom when the breath gets knocked out of you with a thump. It doesn’t hurt, but a shocked noise escapes your lips before you can stop it. A pair of hands find your hips instantly to help steady you. It takes you a second to realize that you’ve just slammed into Jake - face first - but as soon as you do, you hold your breath. You must have a horrified look on your face because he breathes a laugh.

“Fuck, I’m so sorry,” you squeak. “What are you doing here?”

Deliberately slow - like he’s trying to make sure you’ve got your balance back - he pulls his hands away. Through a disbelieving grin, he says, “Well, I live here. It’s more like ‘what are you doing here?’.”

You can feel your face turning pink. “Right. Lucy and I are here for a movie,” you explain. You haven’t made an effort to step back away from him, and you can’t bring yourself to yet. His hair is wet and slicked back, and you’re annoyed it looks so good on him - you always look like a drowned cat when you get out of the shower. 

He hums in understanding but doesn’t say anything else. He just raises his eyebrows at you expectantly. 

Just above a whisper, you chance, “Are we going to talk about it?”

He feigns consideration. 

“We could,” he says with a nod, his lips stretching out into a mischievous smirk. “Or we could pick up where we left off.”

You subtly pull the sleeves on your sweater down to your wrists in an effort to hide the goosebumps that are rising on your skin. You open your mouth, but you’re truly at a loss for words. You had a full week to think about this, but you realize you never got around to allowing yourself to figure out what you’d say to him. He gives you an ample amount of time to think of a response, but the only thing you can do is stare at his lips.

“What’s the matter?” he asks, his voice is like silk. It’s quiet, but commanding. A tone you’d use if you had someone's wrists cuffed to your headboard. “Where did all that confidence go?”

He didn’t have as much control the last time you were this close to him, but he definitely does now, and you can tell that this is exactly how he’s comfortable.

“Pretty sure my liver cleared it all out Saturday morning,” you reply, swallowing hard. The words had come out softer than you’d intended. He’s smug as he seems to give you a once over, and your chest tightens under his gaze. 

“That’s a shame.” 

You can smell his shampoo as he brushes past you - something minty and pleasant. The sharpness of it helps ground you a little, but as soon as he disappears down the stairs, you slip into the bathroom and slump against the closed door. The whole exchange only lasted a couple of minutes, but you’re left feeling exhausted. You consider staying in the bathroom forever - maybe setting up a nice nest of towels so you never have to see anyone for the rest of your life, but then you remember that you have your favorite kind of yogurt in your fridge at home, so you’ll have to come out eventually. Instead, you just stand in front of the sink and splash cold water against your face as you try to collect your thoughts. 

You don’t see him the rest of the evening, and for that, you’re simultaneously grateful and annoyed. Multiple times you think about marching back up to his room, but that's as far as you get. You still have no idea what you’d say or do once you got up there. 

Lucy takes you home after the movie, and she offers to stay the night, but you tell her you’re wiped and that you’re headed right to bed. You go to get out of her car, but she places her hand on yours where it’s rested on the center console. 

“Hey, so Josh and I were talking,” she starts, and your stomach tightens. You’re suddenly positive that she’s about to tell you that she knows everything, so you hold your breath. 

“About birthday plans. So he was thinking that since I’m going to be leaving in a week, he’s going to throw me a party at his house next Saturday,” she finishes excitedly. You smile at her, trying not to look scared. 

Lucy’s birthday is in early November, and every single year since you met, you’ve spent it together. This year, however, her parents surprised her with a trip abroad. You had been planning on having a nice dinner together just before she left, but you suppose that it is more efficient to just have a party with everyone.

 “That’s great,” you agree, squeezing her hand. 

“I’m so excited, I’m just hoping you can help us plan it all?” She gives you her best puppy eyes. “Since I’m going to be so busy packing and making sure I have everything together.”

You take a deep breath and nod in agreement. “Of course. You can count on me, Lu.”

She beams at you and leans in to give you a cramped car hug.

When you’re back in your room, you shoot Josh a message asking what he’d like you to be in charge of. Your body feels tight, so you head to the bathroom and draw yourself a bath, setting the water as hot as it will go. 

Josh K    9:38 pm

thinking probably cake 

You frown at your phone and shoot back,  just cake?

Josh K    9:41 pm

yah 

You set your phone down on the tile by the bathtub and roll your eyes. “Idiot,” you say out loud through a smile. You undress and sink into the water slowly, and it’s so hot that it turns your skin pink, but the slight pain is grounding. A message notification sounds from beside you, so you extend a wet hand to grab it.

Josh K    9:48 pm 

Lucy wants to do decorations herself n sam threatened suicide if he cant dj

You huff a laugh. What are you getting her for a present?, you send back.

Josh K    9:51 pm

secret :)

Josh K    9:52 pm

maybe just birthday sex 

You leave it at that, grateful that Lucy has someone so loving in her life. You think she deserves it, even if it does gross you out now and again. 

You spend the rest of your time in the bath willing yourself to relax and trying to figure out why the last three words Jake said to you upset you more than the entirety of your last interaction with Mitch.

PART THREE

Taglist: @myownparadise96   (message me to add yourself if you want!)

[normadeathmond]

the spanish princess ep 2 thoughts

I’ve been enjoying all the reaction posts so here’s mine (spoilers included):

- I’ve had kind of a revelation this week regarding The Spanish Princess. This show is basically the modern day version of those dubiously accurate medieval historical chronicles.  Not only do we have extra supernatural elements (the cuuuuurse, prophetic dreams), but we also have the contemporary authors’ personal biases inserted all over the place, and the addition of mythical stories about the heroes (Catherine fighting at Flodden this week). For some reason, this has made me a lot more forgiving towards the show. (it probably also helps that my fave Maggie B is dead now, so I don’t have to worry about them shitting all over her anymore, and I don’t have a particularly strong attachment to any of the other historical figures depicted)

- erm wtf, did anyone else catch that scene with Maggie and Edmund de la Pole in the previously on that we’ve never seen before?? I guess this plotline was supposed to be included in episode one as well, which probably would’ve helped it feel a bit more developed and less like something they suddenly remembered had to be tied up from last year. The whole sequence of Edmund being reintroduced and killed off in less than five minutes was very rushed.

- I’m glad baby Henry’s death hasn’t been totally forgotten, but do we really need so many grief-stricken sex scenes between these two? These are supposed to be the years they’re deeply in love, let them have some happier sex

- ehh I’m not sure that Catherine’s big reveal to the council actually changes much. A very early pregnancy, possibly with a girl, doesn’t really make the line secure. I think the focus should have been on Henry’s own desire to prove himself in battle, which would also have added to the humiliation when Catherine successfully defeats the Scots while his military exploits fizzle out.

- I really like General Howard, Peter Egan is fantastic (albeit a bit too polished for a grouchy, uncouth soldier type)

- “and now this book is closed” - god I hope so, bc I hate Maggie’s plotline from last year. It was interminable watching her whinge about how unfair it was that the Tudors suspected her of plotting against them because she had always been the most loyal person ever, as though she was suffering from some kind of selective memory loss about literally being a spy for the Yorkist rebellion in The White Princess. ffs Maggie can be either a completely innocent woman unfairly maligned by the Tudors or she can be a badass Yorkist rebel, not both. 

- it seems her memory problems are back this episode because she goes storming off to complain to Catherine about Edmund de la Pole getting his head chopped off, conveniently forgetting than she was also heavily involved in his plot and her family is only out of the Tower thanks to Catherine interceding for her with Henry. Catherine was 100% in the right here, Edward of Warwick was innocent whereas Edmund de la Pole was a fully cognisant adult who spearheaded a revolt to take the throne (and likely would’ve had both Henry VII and Henry VIII killed if he had succeeded), so the idea that she’s suddenly heartless because she apologised for the former’s death but not the latter’s is ridiculous. The whole scene, including Maggie’s kids’ ‘whoomp here she goes again’ reactions, unintentionally have her coming off as rather hysterical.

- hopefully the rest of her story this season focuses on her mending her relationship with her sad silent son instead and possibly getting her leg over Thomas More

- ahhh Lina’s face when Catherine bitchily says she’ll be having a girl. Catherine’s not going to be able to stop herself from lashing out at her now that she has twin boys.

- first the clothes comment last episode, now they have Ursula saying Charles may not be good-looking but he’s rich as fuck. I guess she’s being set up as a gold-digger.

- is it just me or does the Anne Boleyn’s actress look a little bit like Charlotte Hope? The dress they had her in when Henry returns even looks like something Catherine would’ve worn in season one. I’ve no idea why they’ve brought the Boleyn girls in this early though – are they going to be sent to France then come back later? Henry still has to make his way through Anne Hastings, Bessie Blount and Mary Boleyn before he gets to Anne. The episode summaries make it look like his infidelities won’t start until episode four so he’s going to have to have a new girl every episode to get through them all.

- I’ve kind of come around on the whole Catherine-in-armour thing. Frock Flicks wrote an interesting article this week where they pointed out that while historically battle armour for women did not exist and women very rarely wore armour, depictions of women in armour have been around for a long time and would have existed in the Tudor period. In this pseudo-historical retelling of Catherine’s story mythologizing her as a warrior queen, it does make sense to carry on that visual tradition and have her armoured up.

- Unfortunately I think they did kind of undermine the visual impact of the armour on screen by focusing on it so heavily in the promos for the season. Possibly it wouldn’t have affected a casual viewer so much, but anyone who’s followed the show’s promo cycle has been seeing pictures and clips of Catherine in the armour for weeks now, and when she entered stomping down the corridor in her full battle gear it didn’t blow me away like the first look at that outfit should have done.

- I know this series is never going to have the budget of Game of Thrones, but Flodden was a disappointment, from the rousing speech (“mothers are warriors too, amirite ladies?”) to the battle itself. You can tell they really wanted this to be their big epic action sequence and unfortunately it felt underwhelming. I remember the battles in TWQ/TWP being much more impressive, for what was probably a similar budget.

- as soon as I saw how heavily pregnant Lina was this episode, I knew a  birth/battle juxtaposition was coming. I get what they were trying to do with the whole ‘childbirth is women’s battlefield’ theme, but the attempt to fake-out Lina’s death fell flat - there’s no way they were killing her off. (I’m not sure why she was giving birth in the hallway, with apparently no midwives, but it was inadvertently hilarious watching Maggie - the only one with any childbirth experience - try and talk her through it while the other three were basically no help at all.)

- also everyone being like “omg Princess Mary you can’t possibly be at the birth” felt so out of place given that Meg and Catherine were both hanging around a battlefield at the same time

- on the one hand I did like that Catherine didn’t end up being some amazing warrior just off instinct; she’s almost immediately pulled off her horse, staggers around looking confused as fuck and then is shocked when she actually kills someone. But on the other, what was the point of all the warrior queen build up if she barely even does anything useful on the battlefield? (also why did they have her kill someone who looked so much like James?? I’ve seen several people think she killed James herself and I thought that too until he was shown being taken down afterwards - it was needlessly confusing)

- JAAAAMES. I’m so sad he’s gone. Georgie Henley knocked it out the park this episode, especially in her big mourning scene. Although given how sweet he and Meg were this episode, and her comment about him being her best friend, it just makes the punch last episode seem even stranger.

- I’m so sad we were robbed of seeing Catherine try to send James’ corpse to Henry as a victory gift and have to be talked into sending just the coat. If you’re going to make her ride out in armour let her keep her savage penchant for gruesome war trophies!

- oop, Catherine absolutely fails to sell the lie that she’s pleased about Lina’s two boys, and Lina can definitely tell.

- with Maggie B gone, Wolsey is the new evil religious cockblocker in town!

- I would like twenty more scenes of Lina and Oviedo being cute and bitching about their work days thanks

- I like Catherine defending Howard to Henry. It would have been nice if there was more time to show the development of a begrudging respect between those two.

- overall I found this episode disappointing. The big sequences weren’t impressive in the way last week’s were and there weren’t enough character moments to make up for that. I’m still looking forward to the rest of the season though, especially Meg, Mary and Maggie’s storylines. 

[liberty-barnes]

Without you, I’m just a sad song

Louis Tomlinson x Female!Reader 

Soulmate AU

Summary: In a world where song leads you to the one you belong with, Louis meets his in a peculiar manner.

Warnings: slight age gap (Louis's 5 years older), fluff fluff fluff, cursing

Word Count: 2.5k words

ERT: 10 minutes

A/N: My first 1D fic!!! I'm so excited about this, I've had this idea floating around in my head for ages and I wanna take advantage of the fact that I have inspo to write it!!

also, shoutout to @parkersbliss​ for making me fall in love with this band all over again, this wouldn’t be here without her so go show her some love, my baby deserves it!!

also number 2: i now have a 1D taglist so feel free to add yourself to it if you feel like it!

Masterlist || Taglist

For as long as the world can remember, the idea of soulmates and a soul bond has been a key point of society. Everyone is born with one or more soulmates, someone you were made to be with, destined to spend your life together, to find yourselves even when death tries to tear you apart. And all that is done through song.

The oldest of the pair can hear their counterpart's voice when they sing. It usually starts somewhere during your childhood, you hear them sing, like a little voice at the back of your head, something that's always with you and that'll help you find them when the time is right.

The youngest one, however, does not hear their soulmate's voice but instead has song lyrics written somewhere on their body, the first thing their partner will ever sing to them. 

You were born with lyrics on your ribcage, words that you've memorized, cherished, and obsessed over for the past twenty-three years. Logically, you knew that you were still young and you had all your chances to find the one that was destined for you. But after watching all your friends find love, move out, get somewhere with their lives, you started to think that you'd be alone forever. Most people found their soulmates before they turn 18, yet here you were at 23 years old, still nowhere closer to them.

"C'mon, it's a great opportunity!"

"I don't know, Gina..."

Your best friend rolled her eyes and put the last red velvet cupcake on the tray with a flourish, making her way to the front of the shop to put it in the display case while you kept decorating the donuts.

"(Y/n), you're an amazing singer, musician, and songwriter, this is the best thing that could possibly happen to you."

"Yeah, what about the fact that I have terrible stage fright, can't dance for the life of me, and let's not even mention the anxiety that comes with the possibility of failure."

She sat down on the stool next to you and took the piping bag out of your hands so she could hold them, forcing you to face her.

"(Y/n)?"

You kept your head down but hummed in acknowledgment.

"Can you look at me, please?"

Your eyes met the soft pools of blue that were hers.

"Stop doubting yourself. You're not made for this, babe. The bakery's my dream, I'm perfectly content with spending the rest of my days baking with my husband but that's not for you. You were made to sing, to be on a stage, perform. It's unfair to yourself and to the world to restrict yourself so much. You need to take a leap. Have faith."

You took a shuddering breath as your eyes filled with tears.

"Okay."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, I'm signing up now."

You took out your phone and started to fill out the application, heart beating a mile a minute.

This was really happening.

"Who knows, maybe one of the contestants will end up being your soulmate."

"Without you, I feel broke, like I'm half of a whole..."

Louis smiled softly as he blinked his eyes open. Every day for the past three years, he's woken up at seven in the morning to the sweet sound of his soulmate's voice. In the beginning, it was kind of annoying given that he was most definitely NOT a morning person, but he gradually got used to it and now enjoys it.

His soulmate must like singing a lot since he constantly has a song playing in the back of his head. It was especially bothersome when he was doing a show, oftentimes singing the wrong words because his soulmate was singing another song.

There's a video somewhere about him switching from singing Midnight Memories to Toxic almost flawlessly. Admittedly not his proudest moment.

He figured she was a songwriter since most of the songs she'd been singing for the past four years were songs he could not find on the internet, no matter how hard he searched. Not that it mattered, he knew them all by heart already, which was how he was able to start singing along with you.

He prepared his tea while humming softly to the song his soulmate was singing, quite happy that she'd started singing it on repeat since it was his favorite.

"Without you, I’m just a sad song."

He frowned when she suddenly stopped, still quite annoyed that even after all this time she hadn't figured out a way to finish it and he couldn't share his idea since he had no idea who she was. He took out his phone, answering a few messages from his fans, and watching a few of the things they made while he daydreamed.

At twenty-eight years old, he should have given up on the prospect of finding his soulmate. People that don't find their soulmates before twenty-five are pretty much hopeless. Sure, he remembered reading about that couple that found each other at 41 and 43 respectively (the oldest soulmates to ever find each other up to date), but those were rare occasions.

But as the hopeless romantic he was, he just couldn't give up. He convinced himself that it was because of his job, the fact that he was famous wouldn't allow for just a casual meet-cute like most other people, but he still dared to dream.

But today was a good day. It was the first day of X-Factor's new season and he was more excited than ever to meet new people, listen to some beautiful voices, and help young people conquer their dreams.

He quickly finished his tea and left the house so he could get there on time, already dreading the centuries they're gonna make him spend in hair and makeup and the millennia that it will take them to dress him.

"Are you nervous?"

"Is it that obvious?."

Georgina took in the way you were rocking on the balls of your feet, clenching your hands in a vague effort to ground yourself and the fact that you'd redone your hair at least five times in the last minute.

"A little."

Understatement of the century.

"Gina, what if they don't like me? What if they don't like my outfit? Or I fall because of the heels? Or my makeup's too much? Or my hair! What if they don't like my hair?"

She sat you down and took your hands in hers, taking exaggeratingly deep breaths so you'd follow her lead.

"Listen to me, your hair looks fine, your outfit's fine, your makeup's gorgeous, not surprising since I'm the one who did it, and you're not gonna fall because you walk in those heels like you belong on a runway and you know it. They're gonna judge you from your voice, and voice alone, and you have a gorgeous voice so I can guarantee you're gonna nail this."

You took a deep breath and nodded, repeating those words to yourself like a mantra.

It's gonna be fine.

They're gonna love you.

You're gonna nail this.

"(Y/n) (Y/l/n)?"

You looked up at the kind-looking gentleman in front of you.

"Yes, that's me."

"Follow me, please. You're next up."

Louis took an exhausted breath and drained the rest of his water, praying for the next one to be good. Obviously, he understood the importance of the 'entertainment acts', but the last three people had been shitty singers with an even worse attitude and he just needed a break.

"You okay?"

He turned towards Nicole and rolled his eyes.

"If I hear one more of these spoiled little brats I'm quitting."

"That's a valid point."

Cheryl agreed as well and even Simon nodded. These auditions were not going well. They all took a deep breath and straightened up in their chairs when the next contestant was announced, plastering fake smiles on their faces to keep the charade going.

Please, let them be good.

A girl with a bright smile and gorgeous red dress walked on stage, looking like the human personification of a puppy from how happy and excited she looked and only one thought filled his mind:

"Oh, fuck me."

Next to him, Nicole choked on her water, being the only one close enough to hear his whispered words.

Your heart felt like it could beat out of your chest at any given moment. You were on stage at the X-Factor, facing the judges, with a big audience excited to hear you sing.

"Hello."

Simon greeted you with a smile, which you took as a good sign.

"Hi!"

You waved excitedly and the crowd cheered, making you giggle.

Louis felt like he was dying.

The audience loved you, the girls were completely enraptured by you, Simon was smiling, and that little giggle made a freaking zoo erupt in his stomach (he was way past butterflies).

"What's your name, sweetheart?"

"My name's (Y/n) (Y/l/n)."

"And do you have a day job, (Y/n)?"

"I work in a bakery."

It would seem he has a type: cute puppy-like people who work in bakeries.

"And what are you gonna sing for us today?"

"I'm gonna sing an original song."

"Well best of luck to you."

More like best of luck to him, Louis's the one whose heart's beating way too fast to be considered healthy.

You thanked Simon and sat down at the piano, taking a deep breath through your nose and letting it out through your mouth before starting to play.

"I don't wanna die and fade away..."

The crowd's cheers fell on deaf ears as you started to play.

"I just wanna be someone..."

Only you and the piano existed. 

Only the words coming out of your mouth mattered.

"I just wanna be someone."

Louis's path to realization came in three steps.

First, he started to recognize the words.

"Dive and disappear without a trace, I just wanna be someone. Well, doesn't everyone?"

Then, the voice started to sound strangely familiar.

"And if you feel the great dividing, I wanna be the one you're guiding, cause I believe that you could lead the way..."

And finally, he noticed that the voice hammering at the bag of his head, getting louder by the second, matched the sound that was coming out from the singer's mouth.

"I just wanna be somebody to someone, oh. I wanna be somebody to someone, oh. I never had nobody and no road home, I wanna be somebody to someone..."

Your soul mark felt like it was burning against your ribs, but you ignored the searing pain in favor of continuing the song.

"And if the sun's upset and the sky grows cold..."

A little pain wasn't gonna make you give up on your lifelong dream.

"And if the clouds get heavy and start to fall..."

Everyone in the room watched with bated breath as the signs grew more and more obvious.

"I really need somebody to call my own..."

Your ribcage started to glow, slivers of light permeating the fabric and shining like a beacon. Louis's eyes gradually started to light up gold, shining like ambers in the sun.

Telltale signs that your soulmate was close by.

"I wanna be somebody to someone..."

Both of you were oblivious to it. Your attention solely on the keys in front of you, Louis's eyes locked onto your face.

"Someone to you..."

His eyes were so bright that they started to light up his face.

"Someone to you..."

Your ribs glowed so much that the words could practically be read.

"Someone to you..."

Everyone held their breath as the song came to an end.

"Someone to you..."

You finished and couldn't help but bring your hand to your ribcage, frowning when you watched it glow.

What the Hell is going on?

Louis couldn't stop himself from talking if his life depended on it.

"I finished your song."

You looked up at him and were taken aback by how bright his eyes looked.

"What?"

"The song you've been singing for the past few weeks. You couldn't finish it so I did."

He got up and joined you on stage, the room completely quiet. He started to play the melody to the last chorus, nudging you so you'd sing.

"Without you, I feel broke, like I'm half of a whole. Without you, I've got no hand to hold. Without you, I feel torn like a sail from a storm. Without you, I'm just a sad song."

Your hand remained on your ribcage as it started to burn even brighter.

"You're the perfect melody, the only harmony I wanna hear."

You felt your heart stop when he sang.

"You're my favorite part of me, with you standing next to me I've got nothing to fear."

His hands came to a stop, as did the burning, and his eyes went back to a gorgeous blue

You couldn't believe that this man in front of you was your soulmate, but most importantly...

"I can't believe I have those words branded on my ribs and I didn't think of using them."

Pause.

"That's what you're thinking about right now?"

"Well I've been obsessing over it for weeks!"

"Fair point."

You were silent for a while longer until Nicole (bless her heart) decided to break the tension.

"Hey! Look at the bright side: your wish might just come true!"

Louis's head dropped onto the piano just as you spoke up.

"What wish?"

"Well as soon as you came out, he whispered 'fuck me'."

You turned to him and smirked while for what was most likely the first time in his life, Louis blushed.

"I mean, I was thinking of taking you out to dinner first, but I'm good with getting right to the good part."

"Fuck you."

"'S that an insult or a promise?"

"Both."

You waited in Louis's dressing room while they finished filming. Thankfully you were one of the last ones so you didn't have to wait long.

Unsurprisingly, the four of them had said yes, and no matter how many times Gina told you it was because of your voice and not the fact that you were Louis's soulmate, the win still felt bittersweet to you.

The door to the dressing room opened and a tired-looking Louis came in. 

"Hey..."

"Hey back..."

He sat down next to you on the couch, as oblivious as you concerning the evolution of your relationship.

"I hope you know they didn't say yes cause you're my soulmate."

You chanced a look at him through your lashes.

"I'm serious. You're a proper good singer. You have a beautiful voice and you're an amazing songwriter. You belong in this industry."

You smiled and inched your hand towards his.

"Thanks."

He intertwined your fingers, a matching smile on his face.

"My pleasure."

You took advantage of the next silence to really take him in. Every nook, every cranny, every layer of his deep blue eyes.

"Would it be too forward of me to ask you out to dinner?"

"You're about an hour too late, I already asked you out."

He chuckled and unconsciously leaned closer to you.

"Okay, then would it be too forward of me to ask for a kiss?"

"Not at all."

Your smile was blinding as his face got closer, and when he kissed you, for the first time in twenty-three years, you felt complete.

Songs used: Someone to you by BANNERS, Sad Song by We The Kings and Elena Coats

so here it is! I hope you guys liked it! Don’t forhet to comment, reblog, and/or like if you feel like it!

-Love, Libby

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ACTORS/RPF TAG 

@bubblegumbarnes​ @sofiaconlaz​ 

[blueeyedbesson]

The Christmas Carol ~Pope Heyward~

summary: Pope hates Christmas. He hates everything about it. The carols. The singing. The colors. But when he falls for the new addition to the group, what lengths will he go to just to make sure she has a good Christmas?

word count: 1.6k

pairing: pope heyward x lea

warning: there might be 1 swear in there somewhere. not proofread. christmas

note: this is my Secret Santa gift for  @possiamo-andare​​. I hope you don’t mind but I used your name, instead of a reader insert. I really hope you enjoyed this. If not, I apologize for the quality. Times have been tough. But, I love you & wanted to make something good for you. Happy Holidays! 

Also, thank you @ijustreallylovethem​ for arranging this event for all of us. It must not have been easy pairing everyone.

masterlist

Pope was a very valuable asset to the Pogues. He was also a hard person to figure out. Everyone knew that.

One thing they did know about him, however, was the fact that he hated the Christmas season. Everything about it always managed to irritate him, even one little ornament.

His friends tried hard not to be cheerful around him during the season & up until last year, they had been successful.

That’s when Lea moved to the island & quickly bonded with all the Pogues. It all happened shortly before Christmas and since she didn’t know that Pope hated it, she was super happy to give him a great gift. He didn’t want to upset her so he smiled kindly at her and accepted the gift.

This year, everything started to change. Over the summer, Pope and Lea spent a lot of time together. That was mostly due to Kie spending more time at The Wreck, John B spending more time with Sarah & JJ never being around.

It was only natural that spending all this time together would create some kind of special bond that neither of them wanted to break. However, Pope couldn’t help the way he began to feel about her.

“JJ, what do you do when you have feelings for someone?”

“I’m not sure, Pope. I’ve never really had that connection with a girl before. I usually just hook up with one and then dump her the next morning.”

“I should’ve known that coming to you would be useless.”

“Hey, that’s offensive.” JJ acted like he was hurt but he knew it was the truth. “Look, if you really like this girl, why don’t you just tell her how you feel?”

“What if she doesn’t like me like that?”

“Then she’s stupid. Pope, you are my best friend, I know you haven’t been very lucky in the love department, but everyone gets their shot eventually. You’re a great guy & I don’t see why she wouldn’t love you.”

“Maybe.”

“Who is this girl anyway?”

“It’s um...it’s Lea.” Popes words stopped JJ in his tracks.

“Oh, the cute redhead?”

“Yeah. That’s the one.” Pope shoved his hands in his pockets & kicked the little bit of snow that had fallen this morning. They continued walking to the chateau.

“Good job, buddy.” JJ slapped his friend on his back and Pope flinched.

“I don’t need congratulations, JJ. I need help on how to impress her.”

“Okay. Well, what’s the one thing she loves more than anything?” JJ raised an eyebrow, knowing that Pope wasn’t going to like his idea.

“No. I’m not getting into Christmas just for her. I like her but nobody is worth that much change.”

“Then you’re on your own.”  JJ shrugged and plopped down on the couch on the porch. “Or maybe you should ask Kie. She’s bet friends with Lea. She might know what to do.”

“Yeah. Plus, she’s a lot smarter than you.” Pope sat on the small chair opposite his friend.

“Hey, fuck you.” JJ smiled. Within seconds, Kie was sitting next to JJ. 

“What a coincidence.” JJ smirked. “We were just talking about you.”

“What are you talking about, JJ?”

“Well, it seems that our darling little Pope here, has a crush on someone else we know.”

“Lea? I know.” she laughed along with JJ and Pope just rolled his eyes.

“I’ve been trying to tell him that if he wants to impress her, maybe he should get interested in Christmas.”

“That’s a great idea.” Kie looked over at Pope. “Nothing would make her happier than seeing you be cheerful on Christmas.”

“Why did I come to you guys for help? I’m not getting into Christmas. That’s the last I want to hear about it, okay?”

“Okay.” they chimed in together.

But it wasn’t the last he would hear about it. He went home that night & did some research on Christmas. He tried to figure out the best present to get her. He tried learning some Christmas traditions. But nothing good was coming across as a great idea. That’s when he remembered that Lea has mentioned her favorite Christmas carol on multiple occasion. He’s even caught her singing it more than  once.

So, he searched for the lyrics to the song and stayed up all night trying to learn them. 

For the week leading up to Christmas, Pope stayed home & tried putting together a little performance for her. He hardly saw anyone outside of his family.

“Does Pope hate me suddenly or something?” Lea questioned Kie & JJ as the trio decorated a tree at the chateau. She slowly placed an ornament on the branch in front of her.

“What? No. Of course not. He’s just been super busy helping his dad.” JJ quickly covered for his friend. He was the only one who knew what Pope had planned.

“Oh, okay.” Lea wasn’t convinced and her face fell. She knew he had been avoiding her and she thought it was because of something she said or did, and  JJ’s excuse only made her feel worse.

“He doesn’t hate you, Lea.” Kie tried comforting her friend but even she knew it wasn’t working. “He’ll be here tomorrow. Maybe you can talk to him about it then.”

“Yeah. Okay.” Still, she wasn’t sure of herself. If she was being honest, she had recently taken a liking to Pope. She wanted to tell him before Christmas but he had clearly made that difficult for her. 

She stayed silent for the rest of the night as they decorated the tree together.

The next morning, she rolled onto her back and stared at the ceiling of chateau. It was finally Christmas day but she didn’t feel any cheer in her heart. All she felt was sadness, caused by the absence of Pope.

“Merry Christmas, bestie.” Kie plopped beside her with a cup of candy cane of hot cocoa. 

“Merry Christmas.” she sighed.

“What’s wrong? You’re usually cheery on Christmas.” she set her mug down on the table and looked at her friend. “Does it have something to do with Pope?”

“Yeah.” she sighed. “Why hasn’t he texted me or hung out with me for the past week? Is it something I did or said?”

“Actually, and I’m not supposed to tell you this, but he’s been home preparing something awesome for you.”

“He has? Why? I thought he hated Christmas.”

“I believe he still does.” Kie smiled. “But he wanted this year to be different for some reason. He helped his mom bake Christmas cookies & he helped his parents decorate the house & tree.”

“What’s gotten into our Pope?”

“I’m not sure.” she looked at her phone. “But he’s on his way here right now.”

“I should probably get dressed.” she threw the blanket off her legs and searched for the outfit she had set out. Instead of the clothes she put out last night, there was a onesie that matched the one Kie was wearing. “What’s going on?”

“Just put it on. It was JJ’s idea and we wouldn’t want to upset him in any way, right?”

“Okay, fine.” she slid the onesie over her pajamas and went to the living room. JJ was sitting on the couch and his face lit up when he saw the girls.

“Look how cute you two look in those onesies.” he smiled smugly, causing Kie to grab a pillow and hit him with it. “Ouch.”

“Merry Christmas, everyone.” Pope walked into the house and set his bag down beside the couch. “Hey, Lea.”

“Hey.” despite him ignoring her all week, she smiled widely at the sight of him.

“Okay, so what’s up buddy? Why are you suddenly so giddy about Christmas?” JJ asked, already knowing the answer. He was setting Pope up for Lea.

“Someone very special to me really loves this time of year & I thought it’d be nice to celebrate like she does.” he reached into his bag and handed presents to Kie & JJ. They opened they gifts and looked over at their friends. “Sorry, LEa. I didn’t have enough wrapping paper for your gift.”

“That’s okay.” she looked at him. “What is my present?”

“You’ll see.” he smiled and took off his jacket. The onesie he had on beneath made him look like Santa Claus, just like JJ. He put on the hat & looked at Lea. “I hope you like your present as much as I like you.” not realizing what he said, Pope began his rendition of Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree. He danced around and sang every lyric to that song, which was difficult for him. Pope didn’t like singing, carols or Christmas, but he would do anything for Lea.

When he was finished, he looked over at Lea, hoping to see her smile, only to see tears.

“No, please don’t cry, Lea. I thought you’d appreciate-”

“I do appreciate it. I loved that so much, Pope. It’s just that nobody has ever done something like that for me before.” 

“I wanted you to have a good Christmas. I know last year, I wasn’t the nicest guy during the holidays & I wanted to make it up to you.”

“Well, mission accomplished.” she smiled and looked at him. “Thank you, Pope. This was the best present I’ve ever received.”

“Anything for you.” he smiled and kept looking at her.

JJ looked over at Kie as she watched their friends. He nudged her arm when he noticed where they were standing. Her gaze followed his and she noticed the mistletoe as well.

“Hey guys, look up.” she giggled and looked at JJ. Pope and Lea looked up at the same time and JJ noticed their cheeks darken instantaneously. 

“Wow. The mistletoe.” Lea rocked on her feet awkwardly and Pope rubbed his neck.

“Are you okay with that?” Pope asked.

“Yeah. I think it’ll be fine.” she smiled and when Pope pulled her in for a kiss, JJ & Kie jumped off the couch and cheered while high fiving each other.

“Yes! Finally!”

[margridarnauds]

margrid arnaud das music-i mean marie antoinette das musical for that ask meme

LET’S GO

 Top 5 favourite characters: Margrid, Orléans, Louis, Marie, Fersen

Other characters you like: Lamballe, the kids, Robespierre, Danton, Immortal Marat

Least favourite characters: Hébert, Bertin, Hébert, Leonard, Jacques Réne Hébert, Drouet, Hébert...

Otps: Margrid/Orléans, Marie/Louis....I COULD ship Margrid/Lamballe and Margrid/La Motte but let’s be real I’m not going to, Marie/Orléans in a very specific way (namely Bitter Ex Friends)

Notps: Hébert/Margrid, Fersen/Margrid, Hébert/Orléans

Favourite friendships: Fersen & Margrid, Lamballe & Antoinette, Orléans & Lamballe (not canon to the musical, but was a historical Thing), Orléans & Margrid when I’m not actively shipping them. 

Favourite family: Marie’s family, especially her dynamic with Margrid (LET ! MARGRID ! BE ! THE WEIRD! AUNT!) and Louis’ odd dynamic with Orléans. Really, MA is just the story of one very, very dysfunctional family. 

Favourite season/book/movie: 2018 Toho Production. 

Favourite quotes: .....showing myself for the Orléans Stan I am: “Oh, cowards, tremble and sleep!” Mitsuo Yoshihara’s delivery SELLS it. Honorable mention: “Just the smallest of sparks is sufficient to set dry grass into an inferno - I just need to promise them a new world where they can live in.” 

That and the from the final song, the entire cast: “Can we change the world for ourselves? What can we do to break the chains of violence? What is equality? When will people finally learn from the past? Will revenge ever end? That answer can only be yielded by ourselves!” 

Best musical moment: There are some REALLY good moments in this musical - Margrid calling the wrath of God down on the aristocrats during “Blinded by the Light of a Thousand Candles”, the reprise of “Blinded” when the poor join in with Margrid, the entirety of “I Am The Best”, the key change in the Korean version of “Kill the Snakes”, the part during the March to Versailles when the other women join in for the first time to tell Margrid they aren’t going, Fersen’s low note during his first love song with Antoinette, the bit during “The Only Thing I ever Did Right” when Fersen comes in for the first time and he and Antoinette duet,  the bit during The Jacobin Club when the entire Jacobin Club steps out together and swears to bring down Antoinette, the bit during “Eyes of Hatred” when Margrid and Antoinette’s voices blend PERFECTLY, the bit during the trial when the crowd begins to apply pressure to Antoinette while Margrid realizes how fucked up things have gotten. 

Moment that made you fangirl/boy the hardest: I was trying to not be predictable.....but look. I lose my shit every time we get to “I Am The Best”. Because they really DID give Orléans the single best song in the musical and expected us NOT to stan. That and when he takes his final bow, because he gets a reprise of the song WITH electric guitars because, yes, he’s an extra bitch. 

When it really disappointed you: The 2021 Toho. I could devote an entire post to how that production disappointed me, even outside of my personal ships, but like. It was a disappointment from beginning to end and I’m actually happy that it’s out of Tokyo now. 

Saddest moment: Margrid sobbing after Antoinette’s death and then having to wipe the tears off her face to meet the tribunal. And then the look on her face at the end....

Most well done character death: Marie’s - Literally the entire musical has been leading up to this and the scene itself makes a wonderful use of callbacks and musical cues to give it this sense of TENSION throughout the entire thing, which builds off of that earlier scene where Hébert confronts Margrid. We know that Antoinette is going to die - There’s no way of avoiding it, but we still are wondering what’s going to happen. What’s Margrid going to do? Is she going to risk a life of security for the sake of the woman she’s started to feel sympathy for? Are these two women ever going to come to terms with one another, with the answer being yes as Antoinette by calls Margrid by her name instead of “the girl” and Margrid gives that last, dangerous bow. 

Favourite cast member: I’m not generally big on following individual cast members, but PROBABLY Sonim? 

Character you wish was still alive: I. Might have toyed with a few ways of keeping Marie alive in the past. 

One thing you hope really happens: Really, really hoping the upcoming Korean production is good. Like, that’s the extent of my ambition after the last Toho. 

Most shocking twist: Lamballe’s Death. I have NEVER seen anyone come in prepared for it in over 2 years of streaming. *I* was shocked when I saw it because I literally never expected a Japanese depiction of Marie Antoinette to get into the September Massacres, especially do THAT extent. And it really is the point where, suddenly, you realize that NO ONE is safe. Up until this point, no one’s died. The Royal Family’s imprisoned, but there’s a certain romanticism you can find in the situation, the idea that, hey, now they’re a happy, nuclear family. Then, the show distracts you with that discussion between Marie and Margrid so that they it can SLAM the knife into your back. And, from that point, no one’s safe. Literally anyone in the cast can die, to the point where people do, genuinely fear for Margrid’s safety by the end. It’s probably one of the single best twists I’ve seen in musical theatre, because it sets the stage for the last twenty minutes brilliantly. 

When did you start watching/reading?: You know? It had to have been back in 2013. A subber that I liked had JUST finished Rebecca das Musical and had moved on to Marie Antoinette, and I thought “Well! Kunze and Levay came out with a Mar’ie Antoinette musical? I’ve got to see this, it’s going to be good!” 

Spoiler alert: It was not good. I made it twenty minutes in, got to the brothel scene, and never looked back. Which means that, actually, I only BARELY missed Orléans’ song. 

Favourite location: Antoinette’s bedroom - Those crazy sons of bitches REALLY replicated Antoinette’s ACTUAL BED to use. 

Trope you wish they would stop using: Stop trying to make Fersen/Margrid happen, it’s not going to happen. In general, there’s this idea that Margrid MUST be totally, absolutely loveless, and I don’t really see it. I’ll be the last to say she hasn’t had a hard life, but there’s this need to ISOLATE her that I just don’t really vibe with. I’m not even saying in an inherently romantic sense (in canon...I wouldn’t actually WANT to see, say, her and Orléans making out on-stage), but just in terms of having genuine connections. 

One thing this show/book/film does better than others: It really does a wonderful job as far as developing two separate female characters - Which shouldn’t be THAT HARD, given you have plenty of musicals about multiple guys all the time, and yet SOMEHOW....

Also, Margrid in particular is phenomenal, as a character. It’s definitely not uncommon for people to go in for Marie and end up really, really attached to Margrid and her development. 

Funniest moments: Hébert nearly getting hit with a door, Margrid peaking under her ball gown while it’s on the rack and Orléans dragging her away, the Stars and Stripes Gown....

Couple you would like to see: .....Orléans/Margrid. I know that I say I don’t want them to actually be CANON canon but also I would NOT complain if they did. Especially after the 2021 Toho production, it’s what I deserve. 

Actor/Actress you want to join the cast: Park Hye Na as Korean!Margrid would kill me, I know it. 

Favourite outfit: Besides Orléans’ 2018 coat (4ever in our hearts), special props to Antoinette’s golden gown in the opening. WHAT a character introduction. 

Favourite item: Margrid’s little knapsack she keeps on her. 

Do you own anything related to this show/book/film?: I own a ballpoint pen and a program from the 2021 Toho run - One of these days, I keep meaning to buy the German libretto so that I can translate it. 

Most boring plotline: BERTIN AND LEONARD. (But, in all fairness........look, they’re annoying, but also, when they’re gone, you do miss them, because that’s when shit gets fucked.) 

Most laughably bad moment: The entire 2006 Toho Cast exists just to be one very long laughably bad moment. That and, tbh, the German. Special props to the Brothel Scene. 

Most layered character: Margrid. Marie is ALSO a very layered, complex character, but Margrid gets special props because, off the top of my head, I can’t REALLY think of another female protagonist, in a musical, like her. Not saying they don’t EXIST, but I’m saying I haven’t personally seen them. 

Most one dimensional character: ...2006 Orléans. He Who We Don’t Discuss. 

Scariest moment: See above for Lamballe. 

Grossest moment: Hébert's final confrontation scene with Margrid. 

Best looking male: Kim Jun Hyun’s Orléans. *Wow*. 

Best looking female: Jang Eun Ah’s Margrid. Once again. *Wow.* 

Who you’re crushing on (if any): ...both Orléans and Margrid. Predictably. 

Favourite cast moment: Furukawa Yuta pranking Mitsuo Yoshihara by giving him “poisonous” things for his birthday, because “You are Duke d’Orleans and I am Fersen. You are poisonous and I am passive aggressive.”

Most beautiful scene (scenery/shot wise): The ball at Versailles. One of the most STUNNING scenes I’ve ever seen. Whoever did the lighting deserves all the accolades in the world for creating a scene that’s surreal, seductive, and gorgeous 

Unanswered question/continuity issue/plot error that bugs you: Not an ERROR, but I’m really, really interested in the story of Jeanette Arnaud, because this woman really haunts Margrid’s entire life but there’s so LITTLE we know about her and Margrid’s feelings about her. How long did her affair with the Emperor last? Did she always know he was the emperor during their affair, or did they meet under different circumstances? Fersen was clearly able to figure out that she was a mistress of his, so how public was the affair? And, if it was that public, does it mean that she was a servant, or was she, at the very least, middle class? How did he find out her mother’s identity? Why didn’t Orléans double-check himself? Does Margrid have any living grandparents or uncles/aunts? How old was Margrid when she died? Did she die before or after Margrid was kicked out by the nuns? (In the German, it’s very clearly the former, but who knows?)

I feel like there’s a really, really dark, tragic tale underneath all this about a young woman who ended up paying the ultimate price for falling in love with someone above her station, but it’s one that’s kept to literally only a few sentences. 

At what point did you fall in love with this show/book: Probably about.....five or ten minutes into the Toho, with the Palais Royal scene. I knew, from the time I saw Furukawa Yuta on stage as Fersen, that they’d changed things around, and then seeing the changes that were made, I was able to go “Oh! It’s good now!” I feel like the moment where I REALLY fell in love was “I Am The Best” because that had been a scene I’d been REALLY concerned about from the German and then Mitsuo Yoshihara casually came in there and owned it. 

[lordmomohismomoness]

Oneshots - Fluffy

A Matter of Appearances by Chromeknickers

Rated T 7K words Completed 2011

Zuko and Katara serve tea at Iroh's shop, which leads to Zuko and Katara getting shamelessly hit on. Their solution to their pervert woes? Pretend to be a jealous couple in order to scare off the grab-happy folks of Ba Sing Se.

Closet Negotiations by Rashaka

Rated T 3K words Completed 2006

Empty closets are good for lots of things. As Katara is going to find out, hiding is just one of them.

Sometimes I Really Wanna Kick You by Footinmouthed

Rated T 10K words Complete 2014

A/U Zutara: Katara may be the youngest intern Azulon Agencies has ever taken on, but that doesn't stop her from yelling at the CEO's son... and then... falling in love with him?

Unwanted Correspondence by Aurcras

Not Rated 1K words Complete 2020

it's a love letter, and he's not jealous. not at all.

Just Improvise by Boogum

Rated T 2K words Complete 2018

Fortunately, Sokka was a quick thinker and had come up with a plausible excuse for why the gaang, or what appeared to be the Avatar and his travelling companions, were at the Ember Island marketplace. Unfortunately, that same "genius plan" meant that the officials now thought they were a group of travelling actors. And the crowd happened to be Zutara shippers. Whatever that meant.

Rounding The Edges by Sadladybug

Rated T 10K words Complete 2015

It can take some grit and hard work to grind out the sharp edges, but the effort can produce something that shines. A Zutara oneshot in which Katara learns a few new things about Zuko, including the fact that he may be very difficult to live without. Featuring unexpected teamwork, tense training moments, and more than a few awkward conversations. Canon compliant(ish), Book Three beginning sometime between TSR and EIP.

Written for the 2015 Zutara Secret Santa Exchange on Tumblr.

When you say "it's gonna happen now" by Pentaghastly

Rated M 5K words Complete 2020

She should have known.

Still, it takes four weeks, several photo exchanges, hundreds of blush-inducing messages, and three days for Katara to realize that Lee, Age 23, Ten Kilometers Away—

Lee is Zuko.

Zuko has seen her bra.

She really, really should have known.

Masquerade by Cathie_writes_things

Rated G 3K words Completed 2018

Zuko sneaks out as the Blue Spirit to look for the Avatar in Ba Sing Se. He ends up accidentally crashing a masquerade party in the upper ring, where a familiar blue-eyed girl decides to take an interest in him.

He hadn't meant for any of this to happen.

Burgundy and Blue by Anothersilenttwriter

Rated T 3K words Completed 2020

Zuko didn't know who she was until it was too late.

He wanted so desperately to believe in something, anything. His whole life had been centered around destiny and honor, and always something bigger than him that he was just comfortable being around a spirit stronger than him. But to find out his new source of hope at his lowest point was nothing more than a girl, well he was disappointed.

But he learns that it isn't too bad.

The Painting by The_savage_daughter_0627

Rated M 3K words Completed 2020

Katara is roped into attending an art gallery by her boss, where his nephew's work is being displayed. She runs into a pretty cute guy with an interesting scar by a painting. He asks what she thinks, she critiques it, and then things get real awkward, real quick.

Written for Zutara Week 2020 prompt "Celestial". Reposted.

The Brownstone by The_savage_daughter_0627

Rated M 5K words Completed 2020

Katara meets up with Zuko for her first modeling job, and realizes she may be in over her head as she realizes there is more to the young artist than meets the eye.

Sequel to "The Painting", so if you haven't read that yet, DO IT!!!

The Lucky Dragon - A Short Zutara by Damagectrl

Rated G 16K words Complete 2019

With no 100 Year War ever happening and an aging Avatar Aang meditating any scuffles, there isn’t much threat of annihilation from the other nations. Nature, however, is another story. After an algae bloom decimates the local fish population and sends the tribe to the brink of starvation, the Southern Water tribal elders are approached by Fire Lord Iroh and offered access to Fire Nation fishing waters until the fish repopulate.

In exchange: his beloved nephew needs an escort to his cousin’s coronation. Everyone seems in begrudging agreement. Except Katara, who after being requested for the task, flees and accidentally ends up on the last island she wanted to be on with a man and his young, friendly dragon - Druk

When Eyes Meet by Dyce

Rated T 4K words Complete 2013

Katara and Zuko have an embarrassing chance encounter during season one. After that, every time their eyes meet, they're more drawn to each other.

Gonna Kiss You In My Arms by Babyfairy

Rated G 1K words Completed 2018

Beneath his mask, he smiles. She's looking for him and he knows it.

I feel something (when I see you now) by Glowgal

Rated T 5K words Completed 2020

Zuko hasn’t thought about high school in years. Of course he thinks about Katara from time to time - a man never forgets his first unrequited crush. But she's nothing more than a fond memory, a relic from simpler times.

Then Katara gets cast in a fucking Blue Spirit movie.

And yeah, Zuko’s thinking about high school again.

or

Katara is famous and it's just a lot for Zuko to deal with. Then he bumps into her in a Rite-Aid.

Let those colors run (now you're having fun) by Glowgal

Rated T 4K words Completed 2020

“Everything ok?” Zuko asks. “Did some asshole ask you what’s in your bag again?”

“Everything’s fine,” Katara laughs, and she knows, suddenly and surely, that she wants nothing more than to have him on her arm at this event and every event for as long as he’ll have her. “I just have something I’ve got to ask you.”

or

Katara is not allowed to take Zuko to the premiere of the Blue Spirit movie. So naturally, she's taking him.

The Sexless Innkeeper by Gemgirl28

Rated M 2K words Completed 2020

Katara keeps accidentally spending the night with Zuko. Or does she?

VERY loosely inspired by the episode of How I Met Your Mother by the same name.

Pumpkin Patch Proposal by The_savage_daughter0627

Rated G 3K words Completed 2020

Zuko is a nervous wreck as he prepares to ask Katara to marry him.

The strength of my convictions by Antarcticas

Rated G 2K words Completed 2020

“I’m glad that I don’t have to account for more terrible lawbreakers coming here.”

“You’re happy with this one?” he asks teasingly as he pulls her closer to him.

“Yeah,” she looks up into the mask’s terrifying visage — it should be worrisome that she doesn’t know what lies beneath it but she trusts the Blue Spirit implicitly. She has for the past several months. Her lips curve up and then she buries her face into his warm black outfit, his smoky and spicy scent comforting. “Yeah, I am.”

Katara's got a man wearing a mask in her apartment. Blutara.

Angsty:

Fault lines by antarcticas

Rated G 3K words Completed 2020

Zuko loves Mai. Zuko loves the resilience in her eyes, the beautiful fire under her skin, the courage of her touch and the strength of her countenance.

Zuko loves Mai. Zuko—

Zuko cannot stop thinking of Katara.

[judgement-free-sideblog]

Never underestimate a black suit

Bill Hader x Reader

I'm not even going to pretend I regret this one. It all started in 2009 when I became obsessed with SNL, then he just kept popping up, here an there and the crush just grow, and since thanks to It chapter 2 he is finally getting the recognition he deserves I got this idea last night and I got to write it before it escapes my mind.

One shot: Imagine you are a PA in Barry and you have the biggest crush on Bill Hader but it seems like he hates you because he is dead serious all the time he is around you.

Warnings: Swearing, Age gap (I know he is just over forty but god I love him).

You were pacing on the set, the Steve Allen Theater, hoping for someone, anyone, to give you an order so you could pretend you were so good at your job as PA so they won't fired you. But the damage was done, all thanks to your verbal incontinence and now the most amazing job in the world was about to be over.

You had started working on Barry about a year ago, and you have loved every minute of it, the cast was so sweet and down to earth, and make your job so much easier, D'arcy Carden for example was always thankful with you for the simplest things like bringing her coffee and Sarah Golberg even had invited you to lunch after you helped her with a female problem one time. They were so talented and nice that you could not believe it when the production called you back for the third season to keep working there.

But then it was him, the titular character, the fucking genius whose hard work and imagination have created this magnificent show, Bill Hader. Yes you were 28 and he 42, but still you couldn't explain it, there was something about the way he spoke and the way he walked that made you weak on your knees every time, and his laugh, you were sure something had been fixed in your mind after the first time you heard him laugh.

And then it was that first week of shooting from last year, the retro outfit with the suspenders, you couldn't get your eyes off him and you almost made one of the sound guys trip with Henry Winkler. And then the table scene, you were in the back making sure the extras were in their right place and avoiding look at him because he was so perfect on that scene that you certainly will froze just by looking at him.

This little crush was obvious for absolutely everyone, except obviously for Bill, you were sure that Anthony Carrigan even deliberately asked you for anything when he was talking to Bill to see you all clumsy and awkward, not to be a dick, just to push you to talk to him, but you were certain he didn't liked you, with most of the other members of the cast and crew he was always laughing, but in the limited interactions you had he was serious, asked you for a coffee now and then or to make a phone call but just that, and you were beginning to think your absurd infatuation was making him uncomfortable, so you tone it down, made a composed face and limited to do your job.

But now you had blow it. That morning they were filming the behind the episode, for the new season, at some point Barry had one of those daydreams and he imagine himself married to Sally, so there he was all perfect in a black suit sitting in his chair next to Alec Berg talking about the challenges of the new season and how thankful they were to come back.

"So the cast is amazing, the first two episodes of the season are incredible and you have managed to keep the same novelty feeling on the series, why do you think that is?" The guy interviewing them asked.

"Well I think it's mainly thanks to the cast" Alec started "This guys are just amazing, this season we are actually giving Sally a bigger arc and that is very interesting"

"And the crew too" Bill said then "I mean they make us all look good, even when some scenes are a total disaster, the set designers, the wardrobe and all that" they made a pause and you were there to put water bottles in the table between them.

"Bill I have known that you used to be a PA, you think that gives you a better understanding on how hard it is for and aspiring actor as Barry, and does it translate on the writing?" He asked and against your better judgment you stay there to listen.

"Totally, but on a more personal level I try to no be diva with my PAs, recognize they do a hard work and know them all by name, that sort of things"

And then your verbal incontinence kick in, and there, just a few feet away, your mouth was quicker than your brain and still looking at him you spoke, not that loud to be heard by the three of them but enough for him to look straight at you.

"That's bullshit" you instinctively took your hands to your mouth and turn around before you could saw him react and went away pretending you were taking coffee orders. And here you were just waiting for the "we are gonna have to let you go" speech when one of the other PAs called you.

"Hey Y/N Hader says you have to go to his dressing room ASAP" Your friend Danny said and you felt like something heavy fall down inside your stomach.

"Can someone else go?" You answered trying to find an excuse "I have to walk Kirby's dog" you lied.

"No, he said you specifically, something about a mail he asked you to sent?" You gave him a thumbs up and start walking to his dressing room, already feeling you were fired.

"Did you need anything Mr. Hader" You tried to sound professional, and not dead ass scared.

"Oh sure, Y/N, please come in" Great! He did know your name, so apart from impertinent you were an asswhole. And he was still in that stupid black suit that made him look so gorgeous, not like the tshirts and hoodies didn't. "Do you by any chance printed those documents I asked you to send last week? I seem to have deleted them and Alec is going to freak out" He said as nice and kind as always and the weight in your stomach start lightening.

"Yeah sure, I ... well unless someone says is confidential I make copies of everything, an old habit" You said looking for a flash drive in your purse. Since all the crew sing a NDA at the beginning of the production there was nothing wrong with that, unless of course you put it on Twitter if you wanted to go to jail.

"This is not your first work on a set right?" He asked while you started looking for the documents in his laptop.

"Oh no sir. I worked in Dead to me two years ago, but since they are in a break I try my luck here last year, and HBO has better catering" You said concentrated in your work.

"Oh so you met Christina?" He asked genuinely interested, "how old were you then?"

"26, a bit late to start in this business I know, but well I like it more" You answered with a smile and then pointed to the laptop "There they are".

"Thanks so much, truly a life saver" He said and let go a sigh "And you are never too old or too young to start, as long as you enjoy it, and tolerate your bosses... bullshit was it?" He said raising an eyebrow accusatory. You immediately turn white and then red and multiple apologizes started bubbling in your mouth.

"I'm so sorry sir, I really am, I sometimes speak my mind and say all this stupid stuff, I'm sorry" You finally managed to say. He started laughing, you didn't let go the painful irony of the situation, it was the first time you made him laugh, and probably will be the last.

"I'm sorry" He said finally " I couldn't help it, relax. I'm not mad. It was quite funny what you said, I sound like such a duchebag I know everyone by name" He said making an acute voice and you start calming down "But if anything I'm sorry I made you, or any of the crew, feel like you don't matter. All of you are actually great" He said and smiled again to you. "Also lose the Mr Hader, that's bullshit, you can call me Bill".

"Oh no, I couldn't, I'm already so embarrassed by why I did" you started and he looked at you making exaggerated puppy eyes mouthing please, and it was lucky you were so nervous otherwise you would have exploded with laughter "Ok Bill"

"Ok then you are 28, and recently started as a PA, you want to be an actress?" He said, leaning back on his desk.

"Absolutely not, I wanted to be a writer, I was a writer actually in a newspaper, but it didn't feel right and then I realized I wanted to write stories, scripts, and one of my friends was an extra in Stranger things, then she said Netflix needs PAs and well there I went" You said, it was easy talk to him. "Also I don't have the looks for it and hate to se myself in pictures"

"I don't have the looks for it, and here I am" He said opening his arms "But honestly you keep writing and trying, if it's what you want, I mean I get here"

"Well yeah but have seen yourself in that suit?" Your mouth betrayed you again and you look at your feet to hide your face. "Amm I think I have a dog to walk, bye" You said before he could said anything and run away.

The next weeks were difficult, you avoid being alone with Bill but you kept doing your job as good as always, and every once in a while you will notice him looking at you, thinking on how pathetic you must look to him. Until the last day of shooting, they wrapped up the season and it was amazing. The only thing left was to go for a drink at Henry's place and start looking for a new job, thankfully you had finally written a promising draft and your hopes were high.

Maybe that's why you actually choose to drink at the party, and dance with your friends and some members of the cast, and you were a little more talkative than usual, until Anthony who was talking to you about something you were not actually listening leave you alone next to bill.

"So what's next??" He asked in the middle of the loud music, and you didn't quite got it because he signaled the garden and you followed him. "Finally I couldn't hear my thoughts" He said once you were outside.

"It's really loud, but you all deserve it" You said and suddenly realized you were alone. "What where you asking?" You tried to sound casual.

"Oh if you could get me a coffee" he joked and then quickly add "No I was wondering what's next for you after this is over?"

"I actually waiting good news from Amazon, maybe with any luck I'll get a chance with one of my scripts" You said proudly.

"That's amazing" He said with bright happy eyes "I'm so glad for you, so we won't be seeing you in season four?"

"With any luck no" You answered "You'll have to find another impertinent PA to call out your bullshit" You add laughing.

"Oh I'm pretty sure we will find someone, or I can always call you and ask you to do it for free" He said and you could notice how close he was "You know as a concerned friend"

"Sure, I can do that, my contract finalized yesterday day so I guess starting today I'm just your rude friend that says come on man don't be a duchebag" You said letting go a small laugh but he was looking at you completely serious.

"In that case..." He started and took your face between his hands, he was so tall and you felt so tiny next to him but also it was so nice and comfortable being so close, he lean in to kiss you and stop just close enough to your mouth so you will feel his breath, as if he asked for your permission to continue, and instead of saying something that could ruin the moment you close the distance and kiss him.

His lips felt soft and tender over your lips, and he slowly started deepening the kiss pressing you against him from your waist, and you hold on to the front of his jacket trying to keep him closer to you, hoping for this moment to never end, until the absurd necessity of oxygen force you to split.

"I ... I didn't think it would be appropriate to do that when we were working together" He started, smiling like a child. "I'm sorry if I made you feel like I was avoiding you, Anthony messing up with me by having you around all the time didn't help either"

"Don't worry it's okay, and yeah it would have been super inappropriate but thank god I no longer have a job" you said still trying to make sense of the situation.

"Would you... I mean I love Henry but there's only alcohol in here, do you want to go grab some dinner?" He said pointing the exit.

"I would love that" you answered, overwhelmed by joy and you followed him to the door, happy with all the possibilities the future hold.