#when the hell have i ever given an indication about supporting that shit? hm? | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

consumedkings-archive · 4 years ago

Text

ancient names, pt. xvi

A John Seed/Original Female Character Fanfic

Ancient Names, pt xvi: that colossal wreck

Masterlink Post

Word Count: ~6k idk man i barely go here

Rating: M/Mature; lots of blood and stuff but nothing steamy.

Warnings: blood and guts, mentions of self-harm, mentions of sexual assault, Kian is a creepy fucker and he needs to die so he gets his own warning, dog on man violence. Uhhhhh idk how shotguns work so I did my best, don't @ me. Elliot does go full feral in this and I'm not sorry.

Notes: I so hope y'all enjoy this chapter. I'm not gonna say too much about it here, but please know that every comment, like, kudos, whatever—even the tiniest bit of knowledge that y'all enjoyed it just makes me so incredibly happy. It was a bit of slog at some parts but I'm so excited to get it out for you. <3 Special shout-out to @starcrier who provides incredible input and support while I try and glean even a MODICUM of her talent; ilysm!!!

As well, @baeogorath has been such an absolute DARLING, allows me to send them memes at like 3am and scream at them about all of my feelings. And @lilwritingraven, who has been SO supportive and helpful and just all around the biggest sweetheart a gal could ask for, thank you BOTH sm. <3!

The first thing that she recognized was the desperate need to breathe.

The second was that she was wet, exceptionally wet, her lungs filling with water over and over again, like dying a thousand times without the actual reprieve of death. Two strong hands gripped the front of her shirt, pinning her under the dark surface. Elliot thought, I’ve been here before.

Those hands gripping her hauled her out of the dark, wheezing and coughing up water, and tossed her onto the riverbank like a dead fish. She might as well have been, for what it was worth; when she managed to open her eyes, the world blurred and melted around her the way water swept over a window in a carwash.

“So glad you are awake,” Kian said from in front of her. He stood in the water just past his knees, and as he made his way out and over to her, she blinked rapidly to try and clear her vision. Elliot sucked in the biggest lungful of air she could, and all of the water that had been sitting in her mouth and throat caught and ripped, forcing her to lean and choke it up. “You were sleeping for quite a while, you know, Elliot. Had to make sure you slept all of it off.”

Her name coming out of his mouth felt like a violation—sticky, wet, ruined, a thing she had not allowed him to use, and yet he did anyway. She hadn’t given him permission to know her, and it felt different still than when Ase had used her name; like a weapon being wielded against her.

They gave me so much, she thought desperately a while her body thrummed with pain, searing hot through every nerve-ending as if they’d all been rubbed raw and exposed. They gave me so much of that shit, so much more than Ase ever did. How long was I sleeping it off? Fuck fuck fuck.

Kian’s fingers gripped her throat, slotted just under her jaw, and he pulled ; hauled her straight up with brute strength until her bare feet— when had they taken her shoes?—scrambled against the slippery river bank.

“Her dress fits you well,” he continued admiringly as he held her there. His words dragged her attention back to herself; she wasn’t in her own clothes, in fact, but in a long, dark cotton dress, high-necked and slim fitting. It looked like the same dress that she had first seen Ase in. “In fact, if your hair was just a little darker, and your eyes not so fucking blue, I would think you two could be sisters.”

Dead, the wind whispered. Humidity crept under the fabric, stifling and tenacious. Dead woman in a dead woman’s clothes.

“W-Where—?” Elliot managed out hoarsely. Her own heartbeat, so loud that she was afraid she wouldn’t be able to hear Kian, thrummed violently in her ears as panic started to really settle into her skeleton. “Where—John, and Boomer—what the f-fuck did you—”

“Now that you’re awake,” Kian continued conversationally, as though she had not spoken at all, “we can start.”

His grip loosened and then released. She barely managed to keep herself upright. The world lurched dangerously beneath her feet, and for a second, she thought she was going to have to throw up; the sensation subsided, and she swept her gaze in a single circle around her.

No John; no Boomer. Only darkly-clothed, silent figures, watching. Each face—some as old as a grandparent, some as young as what she thought could only be ten, and many of them somewhere in between—regarded her with the same kind of glassy-eyed curiosity that came with a circus attraction.

“What the fuck,” Elliot said, her voice hoarse and cracking in distress. “What the fuck did you—where are they—?”

“I’m only going to give you one tip,” Kian said. “Stop trying so hard to talk. You’ll burn through all of your adrenaline, mor.”

He had passed her up the riverbank. The intent of it all was very clear: he anticipated that she would follow, because he had something that she wanted and she was in no state to claw her way through all of them even if she wanted to. The knowledge of this—the understanding that Kian knew exactly what hand he had, and was going to play it—filled her with another sickening wash of dread.

The redhead stopped at the top of the bank and looked at her over his shoulder. “Are you coming?”

Shivering, Elliot wadded the hem of the dark dress up in one hand and struggled to the bank. Kian let her. He let her catch herself, dirtying her hands and the dress, practically clawing her way up as her heart rate fluctuated earnestly and without pattern in her chest, and when she made it to where he stood she could see the treeline ahead of them. Dark, drenched in nightfall, the pines murmuring every time the night’s chilly breeze rustled the branches.

“They’ll—” Talking caused pain to splinter through her jaw, radiating in spiderwebs up behind her eyes. “His b-brothers will—”

Kian waved a hand. His voice was light when he said, “They are busy.”

Fuck. Despair welled in her chest. Elliot swallowed thickly and said, “What are... What are we...”

He stared at her. She had the distinct sensation of being an ant, trapped under the searing beam of his magnifying glass, raising burns all across her skin. Then, he reached down to the ground, and from a bag, he procured a handful of papers; when he pulled them out, the familiar scent of her home wafted from them.

“You have lovely handwriting.” He scanned the page. “I hope you’ll forgive my snooping through your home. I couldn’t resist. Let’s see here: sounds like our little bunny was struggling with insomnia, feeling alone. Angry with your therapist for saying you were displaying—” Kian lifted a finger to indicate the importance of the word. “— significant signs of post-traumatic stress disorder, including—”

“S—” I want to die I want to die. The pages of her ripped journal sat in his hands, even greater a violation than the sound of his name. “Stop—”

“—intrusive memories, loss of time, irritability and aggressive behavior, self-harm. Is that where those scars are from? Hm, and… 'Sometimes, I wonder what it would have been like if I didn’t let this happen to me'. Is that guilt ?” Kian clicked his tongue. “Do you feel guilty, Elliot? For what that man did to you, those years ago?” And then he paused, glanced back at the paper, and said, “Forgive me. It was one year ago. Not that far gone, I suppose.”

She opened her mouth to respond, but no sound came out; something gripped her lungs, restricted their movement, until she thought she was going to pass out.

He had been in her home. He had touched her things. He’d stood among the things that were meant to be hers, rifled through them, found her journal and ripped the pages out. She’d taken up journaling about what had happened—not to torture herself with the reality of her situation, but in an effort to understand who she had become, to feel less like a stranger in her own body.

And now he held it in his hands, and there it was: everything that she was, just that small, just that insignificant. The entirety of what she was clutched in the hands of a psychopath.

“I hope she’s fucking suffering.” Elliot ground the words out, and Kian quirked a brow at her inquisitively. She plunged onward, reckless and vicious from her pain, “I hope Ase’s fucking rotting in hell, suffering, and I’m glad they blew her fucking brains in.”

Something dark flickered across Kian’s expression. It may have been a trick of the light; the clouds passed over the moon, blinking the world into darkness for a few minutes before the nighttime wind pushed them forward again. Elliot couldn’t tell if it was real, what she’d seen on his face, but she hoped it was.

But he didn’t say anything about her venom. Instead, he said, “Ase and I used to play a game together.” His tone was light, casual; he dropped the papers back into the bag dismissively, as if they were nothing. “I would give her a three-minute head start. She would run into the woods, and I would try to catch her. She was the perfect prize.”

A strange kind of affection welled in his voice. It was love, Elliot thought with a sickening kind of realization, in his voice—and it only made her more grateful that John had busted through her spine with a shotgun shell, the knowledge that maybe Kian was suffering even a tiny bit as much as she was.

Kian continued, “Now, because of you, she is not here to play the game; you will have to be my prize, Elliot.”

She was going to be sick. She wished that he would have just killed her, rather than this—this waking nightmare, this actual fucking living hell he was going to put her through. Elliot sucked in an unsteady breath, and when Kian gestured at the treeline, she turned her gaze there. It was easier to look at the sturdy line of pines than at his wretched face.

Hot breath fanned across her ear. Kian’s hand came up to the back of her neck, holding, gripping, the way a father would when he prepped his son for a baseball game. She heard the words like a sick comedy in her head: Come on, champ! You’ve got it! But his mouth was right on her ear and he said, “I hid your man out there for you.”

John.

“He’s—not,” she managed out. “Mine.”

Kian huffed out a laugh against her temple. “Then it should be easy for you to hide from me and not worry about finding him.”

Bluff called. Fucking cultist.

He stepped away from her, heading to the half-moon curve of cultists waiting idly by. Silently, Elliot tried to count them; she wanted to know how many she could kill, and how fast, if she got a gun in her hands, but the splitting headache blurring her vision uneasily made it difficult to keep track.

One of them put a shotgun in Kian’s hand. He checked the ammunition idly.

“Start running, Elliot,” he called without looking at her. “Your time starts now.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

“What took you so long?”

John thought he had to be dreaming. He was certain of it, somewhere in his brain, because Elliot’s voice hummed warmly against the skin of his neck and she pressed up against him like a feline eager for his attention, and that wasn’t her. Was it?

“You’ve been sleeping so long,” she murmured into him, all sleep-warmed skin and soft lines. “Aren’t you going to wake up?”

Yes, he thought, because he wanted to open his eyes, because he wanted to see her like this. He’d worked hard for it. He deserved it, didn’t he? Yes, I’m going to wake up.

“John.” Elliot purred his name, sweet and decadent. She was so warm. “Wake up.”

“Okay,” John said, because he knew that he was ready. But the world stayed dark. He tried again: “Okay, I will.”

Her lips brushed against his pulse. He felt her fingers traced the Sloth scar on his sternum, meticulous, memorizing, slender and warm and affectionate.

“Don’t you trust me?”

“I trust you,” he managed out, “I trust you.”

Like lifting the floodgates, he pushed his eyes open. And it was a push; the effort it took to open his eyes was astronomical, like someone had suddenly stuck him under slow-moving lava that swallowed him up, ate away at the oxygen around him and weighed down his lungs in their attempt to let him breathe.

There was no Elliot. Only the slow, dark pulsing of pine boughs overhead. For just one split second, John felt relief; he was fine. Somewhere, but fine.

And then a piece of the sky lifted and peeled, drifting away. The trees bent and warped around him. He tried to struggle to sit up, fighting the urge to coil up into a tiny ball.

He said, miserably, “What the fuck,” and something at his hip buzzed static. The sound sent jolts of white-hot panic searing through his body.

“Hello?” It was a radio. A thick, dark voice came through. John didn’t pick up. He thought it sounded like Kian.

“Fucker,” he managed out, hauling himself to his feet as the world see-sawed beneath him.

“John Seed.” The voice came again. “I know you can hear me. You should be waking up any minute now.”

John wished he was still asleep. The dream had been better than this. At least in that, Elliot was—

Elliot. The last thing he remembered was her frantic hands trying to undo his seatbelt, and then her warmth getting ripped away from him, and then someone's hands on his shirt and—

“Fuck.” Bad news. Bad. “Fuck fuck fuck. ”

Steadying himself on a boulder, he came around into the clearing, trying to see through the trees. It was no good; the world pulsed and bled around him, smearing like an oil painting, and he realized with a sense of dread pitting in his stomach that they’d drugged him. Hard. The same way they’d drugged Elliot when she’d been crying into the ground like she was going to fly off.

That he knew what was going on did little to abate the irrational panic flashing through him, electrical pulses pounding through his body every chance they got. It made everything too much —the sound of the wind, the murmuring of voices that he thought maybe weren’t there, the feeling of the night on his skin. Yes, he felt it, like a garment of clothing, sitting just on him; he couldn’t tell where he ended and the rest of it began.

“I let your beast loose,” Kian’s voice crackled, seething with delight. “Gave her a head start, too.”

His fingers itched to grab the radio that had been clipped on his belt. He thought, I shouldn’t let him know I’m awake —

“Hey, fucker,” he snapped, his finger pushing down on the walkie button. His words kept slurring on their way out of his mouth, but he plunged onward anyway. “Come out here, huh? Love to chat face to face.”

Well, he’d never been that good at impulse control, anyway.

“On my way already,” Kian murmured silkily. “See you soon, friend.”

And then it went dead.

John spent what felt like an eternity staring at the face of the walkie talkie before he thought, Hey, that’s my fucking radio. And then: fuck, I can’t fight him right now.

He blinked furiously, trying to refocus his vision as bright colors started to bloom and bleed out from the ground. John kept telling himself that it wasn’t real, that there was no way it was real—and then he understood Elliot’s very real fear that night he’d tried to pull her down the hill. What had she seen then, he wondered? What had she been looking at?

“John?”

He hesitated, because the last time he’d heard Elliot’s voice it had been a dream. John’s base instinct was to stand very still, exceptionally still, which didn’t feel very still at all because he was drugged up through his fucking eyeballs and he wanted to puke.

“John—”

When she broke into the clearing, Elliot’s voice was frantic. Her hair had been let loose around her face and she was wearing a dress and bolting barefoot through the woods. Oh, John thought, a little panicked, oh, I’m dreaming again.

“Fuck,” Elliot said, her voice breaking. Her hands fluttered aimlessly, like she couldn’t figure out a place for them to land. “You don’t have Boomer?”

Maybe not dreaming, after all.

“Sleeping,” John replied, intelligently. “I was—”

Elliot stared at him as she drew closer, her eyes razor-sharp and clear and quick. The sliced right down to the core of him, but what was new, anyway? Stupid deputy, his brain chanted, sluggishly. Stupid, pretty, dumb deputy.

“... drug you?”

John blinked owlishly at her. He wasn’t in very much pain, which was good, but it probably was all going to hit him when the drug wore off and it was harder and harder to keep his attention focused; it was getting to the point where it was like being very drunk , where keeping his eyes open was becoming more and more of a chore.

Elliot snapped her fingers in front of his face. “John, focus.”

“Whose dress?” he managed out, gesturing at her.

Her eyes flickered uneasily. “Dunno.” She brought her fingers to her lips and whistled, high and fast, and John groaned; the sound rattled around in his head, echoing over and over again, splintering behind his eyes.

“Why?” he hissed. “Why are you—”

“Shut up, you fucking baby.”

Yeah, definitely not a dream.

They stood there in quiet for a moment, waiting; in the distance, John could hear a faint barking.

“He’s out there,” Elliot said, relieved. “They probably have him tied up, if they were able to get their hands on him. John—”

The blonde stopped suddenly, and he turned his gaze back to her inquisitively. She looked very much like she wanted to say something; her lashes flickered uneasily and she swallowed thickly.

“You have to get him, John,” she said finally, which didn’t sound like the thing she wanted to say.

“I’ve got a radio,” he supplied helpfully; on instinct, he reached for her, and she didn’t flinch back when his hand found the juncture between her neck and shoulder. Warm, he thought pleasantly, hazily, the breath spilling out of his lungs like a waterfall. “It’s the one from the ranch. We can—radio Joseph and the others.”

“John, I need you to listen to me,” Elliot began, reaching up to put her hand over his. Her skin was warm, but she shivered—John realized very suddenly that she was soaking wet. “I need you to get Boomer. He’s over there somewhere, close enough to hear a whistle. You can whistle, right? Or just—say his name, he’ll respond to that too.”

“‘M drugged,” he replied. “No good. Besides, he doesn’t like me.” The last half came out petulant. He thought very little of Kian’s voice crackling through the radio, or that he’d said he’d be there soon, or that someone had drugged him and left him in the middle of the forest. All he could think about was the problem being presented to him: Elliot was asking him for something, and he couldn’t give it to her.

“You have to,” she reiterated firmly. “You told me you’d do anything I asked.”

“I did,” John insisted. “Don’t you remember? I f—”

“Shh!”

Elliot grabbed his hand and yanked, hard, hauling him into some thicker brush. The whole gesture of it had his vision spinning like a slot machine.

“John, you have to go,” she whispered furiously. The sound of heavy, leisurely footsteps thudded somewhere a little ways away. “Please. You said. ”

“We can both go,” he whispered back. And then, because she hadn’t recognized his good fortune earlier: “I have a radio.”

“I can’t,” she replied. Her voice broke a little, slipping past a furious hiss and cracking on an emotion that John didn’t want to know. “I can’t go.”

“Why?”

“I have to—” Elliot paused, her gaze flickering tiredly. “John, I have to take a break, I’ve—I’m so tired.”

He paused. “I’ll wait, too.”

“You need to go.”

“I don’t want to. I’ll stay, too, and we’ll go together—”

“No,” she insisted. “Fucking— God you are so annoying—”

John heard, very faintly, the low and threatening click-click of someone pumping a shotgun. He paused, and Elliot did too, and then she pulled him forward by his shirt and kissed him hard. She tasted a little like river water, but mostly like her, and the warmth of her mouth against his made heat bloom all over him like he was green and Spring, again.

“John,” she whispered against his mouth, nearly inaudible, “please. Get Boomer, radio your brothers. We’ll catch up on the other side. I—”

Another couple of footsteps echoed in the stillness of the night. All of the birds and wildlife had fled; they knew there was a big, bad predator out in the evening, and John felt that knowledge twisting something violent and wretched inside of him.

“Do not fucking die,” he hissed at her. “You’ve stayed stubbornly alive for this long. Do not.”

She nodded faintly. “Yes, boss.”

He went to move, but she stopped him, lifting a finger to her mouth; each beat of his heart rumbled violently in his ears, and he thought he might pass out if he didn’t get moving fucking soon; each second spent crouching still and silent in the brush was swaying him viciously back and forth, trying to get him to face plant into the ground.

Elliot, back against the tree, let go of his shirt. She mouthed, Go, and then darted out, quick and fast and taking with her all of the vibrant sound and warmth in the world.

John's legs lifted him to a standing position. It felt like operating heavy machinery; every movement ground through his skeleton laboriously. But he was going; gripping the radio, trying his hardest to sprint, when he heard the sound of a shotgun shell pelting the earth in one sharp, gritty blow.

And then a familiar voice: “Where are you, little rabbit?”

Please.

Everything in him was telling him to turn around. Screaming at him—but he knew that was exactly what Kian wanted, too. To have them both there, in the same place, to make one of them watch the other die.

So, he didn’t.

He kept going, and when he got far enough away to be convinced that Kian was preoccupied with Elliot, he stopped and looked around. The night was eerily still and pulsed dimly around him. He glanced down at his feet; the grass reached up and around his shoes, coiling around him, trying to hold him down.

“Fuck,” he hissed, hurriedly stepping forward. “Find dog. Radio Joseph. Boomer?”

He kept his voice low as he crept through the woods, fiddling clumsily with the radio as he moved. When he found a channel whose numbers looked vaguely familiar—and familiar was a stretch, considering that accessing just about anything in his brain was like feeling someone’s face in the dark and guessing who it was—he pressed down on the talk button.

“Joseph? Jacob? Somebody?” He let off the talk button. “Boomer?”

No barking. Was Elliot drugged too? Had they been hallucinating the dog barking?

John had just begun to give up on the idea of doing anything other than wander aimlessly in the dark woods when he made it to the edge of the treeline and saw the dog. Unfortunately, the beast was tied up to a wooden stake, growling low and threatening the two men as they walked idly around him and to the van, busying themselves; soft music played from the car. They seemed to be waiting patiently for Kian to finish whatever it was he was doing. Killing Elliot?

Fuck, he thought hastily. Gotta hurry.

He watched as one of the men set his gun down on the bed of the open van, stretching and chatting conversationally with his companion. When he wandered back over to Boomer and said, “Here, doggy,” the Heeler lunged viciously and set off barking, teeth snapping. He sighed.

“Stupid dog.”

They turned back toward the road, and John made his way closer to Boomer. If he could get that lead unclipped—if he could do it without them noticing…

“Fucking shithole,” one of the men said, backs turned to him as they lit a cigarette that got passed between them. “Can’t wait to purge this place and get out.”

“Yeah.”

“Hey, do you know…”

As their conversation drifted, so did John’s attention. He slipped out from the cover of the underbrush; instantly, Boomer’s eyes were on him. His hackles went up, and John lifted his hands, keeping them open.

In hindsight, he’d probably feel stupid thinking about this moment. The dog wasn’t holding him hostage. But it felt a little like he was, anyway.

“Hey,” he whispered, creeping closer. “Gonna let you off, beastie.”

Boomer eyed him, eyes flattened back against his head.

“You wanna get ‘em?” he continued, glancing over at the men as he reached for Boomer’s makeshift collar, clipped onto the lead. He didn’t know what kinds of gestures or phrases Elliot used to get the dog to do what she wanted. He only knew that Boomer did , sometimes without her saying, and so he said again, more urgently, “You wanna get ‘em, beast?”

The urgency of his tone seemed to spark something in Boomer. His ears pricked forward. John’s fingers found the lead clipped around his collar, pulled on the little metal clasp, and let it drop to the ground.

Boomer watched him, expectantly.

“Well, go on,” he whispered, gesturing. That seemed to be all that was needed; the cattle dog darted forward, teeth sinking into one man’s leg and yanking hard enough to unbalance him and pull him to the ground; the dog's head thrashed violently, ripping out of him guttural snarls.

John blinked, and thought, holy shit, is this what he’s been like this whole time?

There wasn’t a lot of time to spend thinking about it, because the other man was whirling angrily, shouting something, and then his eyes landed on John.

They both looked at the gun sitting on the tailgate of the van at the same time.

“Fuck,” John hissed, lunging forward and grabbing wildly; he wasn’t entirely sure that he even stayed upright, the strange back-and-forth pull in his head having only abated a little, but he reached for the gun and snatched his hand back, fumbling with the safety.

The whole thing felt like an eternity —comedically so. While the sounds of Boomer mauling the unarmed cultist echoed in his ears, John’s fingers clumsily switched the safety off and he fired recklessly; the bullet barely grazed the cultist’s calf, and as the man reached for him, John pulled the trigger again. Once, twice, three times, the bullets planted themselves in the man’s chest, jerking him back with each impact.

A heavy thud echoed in the night as the man slumped to the ground. Boomer had handily dispatched of the other one; his mouth was red and wet, and when John struggled to his feet, he saw that the man’s throat had been ripped open.

“Nice,” he breathed. Boomer regarded him warily, unimpressed with the compliment. He quickly shuffled the safety back on and tucked the gun into the back of his jeans, pushing the tailgate of the van up. When the dog whined, low and uncertain, he glanced back at him and sighed.

He pulled the tailgate back down. “Load up. We’re gonna get her back.”

Boomer leapt up into the back of the van, nails sliding on the hard plastic. It took John about five minutes of rifling through the pockets of the two men to find the car keys. While he wasn’t entirely confident in his ability to drive, he had just planted a couple of bullets in a man, so he supposed he'd be fine.

As he climbed into the driver’s side, he shut the door and settled in and carefully, meticulously slid the key into the ignition. The van purred to life as though John’s last week hadn’t been an entire fucking series of absolute fuckhead jokes, and he let out a breath.

The glint of something blue and reflective in the cupholder between the two front seats caught his eye. He glanced down, blinking.

“Hey,” he said, reaching down. “My sunglasses.” Tucking them into his shirt, he checked the rearview mirror and gently, gently pushed the car into drive.

"Alright, beastie," John muttered. "Let's get this ended, huh?"

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The concussive blast of bullet meeting wood rang in her ears; chips of bark and the guts of the tree showered her, the shot echoing just above her head, and she thought, fuck, I just want to be dead already. She was so tired; moving was a luxury that was not afforded to her anymore, each gesture as she struggled to her feet tipped and fettered by the bruises and wounds that littered her body.

Finding John had taken about fifteen minutes, fourteen minutes and fifty-nine seconds of which had been spent agonizing about where to look first. She didn’t recognize where they were, or know her way around, and she was barefoot and soaking wet and shivering and she just kept thinking about how badly she wanted to lay down.

We’ll go together. Fuck, John was so stupid. She might have actually had a moment to breathe if he’d just listened to her and did as she said. But that wasn’t ever how these things went, was it?

A calloused hand closed around her wrist and yanked her to her feet. For a second, in the blurring, thrumming night, between the whispering voices in the wind and the lurching of the great beast hunting her down, Elliot saw the dark fabric of a button-up shirt and thought, it’s John, it’s John; he came back me and now we’re going to get out.

“I win,” Kian purred.

His voice bled through her skull, stretching and warping as the agony crashed over her in a scalding wave. Kian’s fingers wound iron-like around her wrist, holding her there, and his other hand came up to grip her chin; playfully, he shook her head back and forth, like he was trying to jostle her out of deep sleep.

“Don’t look so sad. I’m not going to kill you, Elliot.” He regarded her with something like amusement, eyes glittering dark and obsidian in what little moonlight had managed to seep through the tree cover. “Do you know what mor means? It means mother. We’re going to keep you for It, and when it’s time, we’ll slice you open. You will make It so happy.”

She gripped his wrist as hard as she could and tried to push his hand from her face. Kian had discarded the shotgun in favor of having both hands to grab her, and as he gripped her face—the wide, calloused crux of his hand covering her mouth while his fingers reached the dip of her jaw—she thought, Something has to be done.

Elliot had promised Joey. Even if I have to fucking die for it. She had promised, and that meant it had to be done.

Muddling through the panic, Elliot squirmed under his hand, opened her mouth, and bit down as hard as she could. The disgusting taste of hot copper flooded her mouth instantly; the webbing between his thumb and pointer finger wasn’t meant to take teeth ripping and tearing, and she was ripping and tearing; even with the limited mobility she had, she wrenched her head anyway she could, intent on taking some piece of Kian with her.

A wretched kind of sound came out of him. He tried to yank his hand back off of her face, and she bit down harder, anywhere her teeth could catch and grip. If she could hit bone, she thought; if she could sink her teeth right into the marrow of him, maybe then she would have felt like she got some repayment for what he’d done.

Kian yanked his hand free, gripping his wrist as crimson streamed down his palm and arm. His eyes were wild and dark; for a split second they stood there, staring at each other, two beasts nursing wounds and waiting for the other to make a move.

Elliot grabbed the front of his shirt and hauled him forward, slamming her face into his. It would have been nearly impossible to bodily force Kian’s to move had he not been clutching his wounded hand, and for that she was grateful—grateful, she would tell herself, around the ricocheting stars of pain blurring behind her eyes, using the hardest part of her skull to bash into Kian’s nose and mouth.

And then she ran.

The gun was around, somewhere, dusted in pine needles and nightfall; like a needle in a haystack. She heard someone spitting behind her, and she thought, I hope I broke your fucking nose, you piece of shit, just before she ducked into a thick bustle of brush and behind a rock.

Around her, the world blurred and fuzzed black. She tried to furiously blink it away, but every second spent standing still meant that her body was suddenly remembering how tired and overworked it was, how much she had done, how much she had suffered. We could stop now, the tired little girl inside of her said. We should. We should stop now.

But Kian had said it himself; he wasn’t planning on killing her. She wouldn’t get rest even if she gave up. He might have changed his mind after she’d bit through his hand and headbutted him, but—

That wasn’t a chance she could take. Not for herself, and not for Joey, and not for the girl she had been that night in her apartment, either.

Heavy footfalls echoed just a few feet away from her. Her mouth was still flooded with the taste of Kian’s blood. As she made her way to the other side of the boulder she’d taken refuge behind and peeked out, she thought, I’d do it again, given the chance. I’d rip him open with my teeth if I got the opportunity. Give me the fucking chance.

Moonlight spilled through the trees and into the clearing they had just been in as the wind pushed clouds out of the way. The glint of dark metal, threatening, caught her eye; the shotgun was there, with hopefully at least one shell in it—one that she could put straight through Kian’s ugly fucking face.

And he was nowhere to be seen, either. Even as she leaned further out, trying to see around the boulder, she couldn’t see him crashing through the underbrush; she couldn’t hear him, either. Just the sound of the wind, pine needles skittering across the ground, a twig snap and—

A second too late, Elliot’s pain-addled brain realized the breaking branch was just behind her. Fingers fisted into the hair at the back of her skull and dragged, hauling her out of the underbrush and back into the clearing, tossing her like a ragdoll. All of the already-battered ribs shrieked on impact, and she wheezed out a breath that had blood and spit flickering across the forest floor.

Tired. She was so tired. So tired, and the world blurred and tried to fizz and pop out of existence around her, a sticky-wet hand forced her eyes forward.

Blood streamed down Kian’s face from their earlier collision. When he grinned at her, his teeth were stained pink, red seeping in the gaps.

“Hello, little rabbit,” he ground out, pushing away her scrambling hands and pinning the left down. “You put up quite a fight.”

Elliot tried to search in her spatial memory—what was left standing of it, anyway—for where she had seen the gun. But it was getting harder to breathe, and to think, and Kian’s fingers dug into her jaw and cheeks. An awful, animalistic noise came out of her at the pressure—it was a whimper, but unlike anything she’d ever heard out of herself, unlike anything she’d known she was capable of making.

“I wonder—”

His voice came out in a low murmur, spit-slicked and venomous, his nose grazing the slope of her cheekbone.

“—will you feel guilty about this, too? When I drag you back kicking and screaming, and make you watch as I cut each of those fucking hillbillies open? I know some of them got out. I'll find them, too.”

It had to be close, she reasoned through the haze in her brain; the gun had to be nearby. She’d just been looking at it. Her body was trying to give up; Kian’s fingers pinning her wrist down and bruising her neck, his words hissed out against her skin, were all tripping that strange little trigger in her brain that finally wanted to give up fighting and do something else.

Quit.

“ Mor,” Kian purred against her skin. “Mother, you’ll be so good for It, I know you will.”

Joey, clutching her tight. “I never doubted you’d be able to get me out.”

“It likes it best like this, you know.”

John, mouth so close to her ear. “I said, it’s a good thing you’re more devil than woman.”

Each second that ticked by, filled with Kian’s voice, the fingers of her one free hand inched. S he felt them close around cool metal.

“It likes the ones that fight back.”

She gripped the gun hard, and swung.

It collided with a heavy-handed thump against the side of Kian’s face, and he jerked back. He still straddled her, but with room between them now, Elliot could lurch forward, bowling as much of her weight into his midsection as she could to push him off of her and send him reeling back into the hard surface of the boulder.

Her fingers worked fast as she struggled to her feet. Pure adrenaline, pure muscle memory, as she flicked the safety off, cocked the shotgun, and pulled the trigger.

It clicked.

Empty.

Kian barked out a laugh wet with blood. There was a wound on his temple that was bleeding, now, and as he struggled to sit up more she could see him wince—the collision with the boulder hadn’t done him any good. Elliot pulled the trigger again, and again, and each time it clicked she found herself getting angrier and angrier. Filling with poison, up to her brim, like someone had just uncorked it.

“It’s empty, mother,” Kian rumbled at her. “You think I brought any more ammo than those two shells?” He spat blood out of his mouth and cocked his head, regarding her with dark eyes. “I told you, I’m not going to kill you.”

I’m not, like he still thought he had won. Pure, vibrating fury radiated through her body. This was supposed to be her victory; this was supposed to be her revenge for Joey. For her life. For her.

It would be. It’s mine, she thought viciously, this fucking moment is mine.

“Yeah, well,” Elliot spit out, digging her fingers into the metal, “can't say the same.”

The weight of the gun was not unlike a bat; so when she took the barrel of the gun and swung it like one, it felt familiar. Just like when she was ten, playing rec-league softball, only this time the bat was an empty pump-action shotgun and the ball was Kian’s head.

When the dull impact send vibrations rattling up her arm, and Kian keeled to the side, wheezing and biting out something venomous in Swedish, Elliot gripped the shotgun harder and swung again.

And again.

Each collision brought it closer to the satisfying, wet crunch of blood and bone on the redhead’s face. Elliot couldn’t have counted how many times she swung if someone asked her—or pinpointed the exact moment that Kian stopped moving, stopped breathing.

She could only think about the way he’d planted his words right against her skin, gripped her, I win.

Do you know what I get to do with things that belong to me?

“Nothing,” she ground out, when her arms burned and ached and her vision fuzzed with exhaustion. “You don't get to do anything.”

“Deputy?”

Blood spray littered her face. She was sure that her teeth were stained red, too. Each breath heaved exhaustively through her body, rattling, and when she turned her head to the source of the voice, she saw John and Jacob standing at the edge of the clearing; lights blurred through the trees, the sound of trucks and voices echoing in the still night air.

Boomer darted out from behind them, immediately pressed to her legs. She held the shotgun loosely in her hand.

“El,” John said, softer than Jacob had, “It’s me.”

Her gaze flickered back to the brutalized corpse in front of her. She thought, faintly, that there was no way her life was going to be normal after this again, but that was okay. She’d promised Joey.

If I have to die for it, I will.

She’d done it. And maybe she had died for it.

Jacob had taken a few steps toward her as the thought echoed in her head. Slowly, like she was a stray dog snarling over a cow bone. When John moved to follow, she saw Jacob put his hand out and stop him.

“Put the gun down,” Jacob said, his voice still and calm. Elliot blinked tiredly.

She wanted to do it. She wanted to let go of it. But that girl that she had been—that girl who had cried under the blanket fort, who had thought, I don’t know how I let him do that to me, the girl who had sat on the floor of her bedroom in Hope County and blinked through furious tears as she struggled to understand herself—no longer wept; that girl was furious, and so Elliot gripped the gun tighter.

As though it made it any less of a weapon, she said, “It’s empty.”

Jacob looked at Kian’s face, bashed-in. Obliterated. “I know.”

Boomer whined at her feet, nosing her empty hand quietly and gazing up at her with big, brown eyes. Something strange washed over her, an emotion that made her lip tremble and her eyes burn. The Heeler nuzzled her hand again, and she sucked in a shaking breath as finally— finally, finally —the tears stung down her cheeks.

She dropped the shotgun. John said her name, and Jacob dropped his arm, and she realized that it was relief she was feeling now.

Only vaguely aware of Jacob kicking the shotgun away from her, the world blurred as Elliot felt John’s hands cradling her face. Each place where his fingers traced the bruises from Kian, that pulse of relief ran stronger through her body until it was overstimulating, overwhelming. When John kissed her, it was almost frantic—she could taste the blood in her own mouth, his fingers tangling into her hair as he kissed her again and again, until her lungs ached with the need to breathe. But each kiss brought her somewhere else. It took her somewhere that she didn't have to think about anything except John in that single moment.

“Hey,” John said, their noses brushing. His movements were sluggish and uncoordinated, his voice still slurring a little. “I have you. Right here with me, El, don’t go anywhere.”

“Yeah,” she managed out. Her voice wobbled, and she sucked in a sharp, stuttering breath. “John—”

His thumbs swept across her cheekbones, smearing more blood than they wiped away tears, and as the sound of voices echoed dimly around them, she lifted her hands and gripped his wrists. Through the coppery tang in the air, she could smell his cologne; her lashes fluttered and John pressed their foreheads together.

“It’s okay.” John murmured the words, tugging her against him, into his chest. “It’s all over now.”

No, she thought as his arms circled her, pulling her closer, Boomer barking at anyone who wandered near.

It’s not even close.

#ch: elliot honeysett #ch: john seed #fic: ancient names #john seed x female deputy #john seed x original female character #far cry 5 #far cry fic #uhhhhhhhhhhh #what can i say? i love a girl who knows how to use her teeth #boomer is a good boy #per usual

10 notes · View notes

liliesoftherain · 5 years ago

Text

My Hero Academia Main 3 Boys x Reader

Ch.11 Let’s Get Ready to Rumble!

Ch.1 Ch.2 Ch.3 Ch.4 Ch.5 Ch.6 Ch.7 Ch.8 Ch.9 Ch.10

A/N: I’m sorry I can’t really write battle scenes I SUUCK, but I do have a cute DadJeanist moment that makes me smile cause I wish Jeanist was my dad ;( (jk dad i love you but c’mon you’d want him to be your dad) I hope you enjoy this chapter! Let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist, or if I missed anyone!

TAGLIST: @rizamendoza808 !(: @iris-suoh !(: @quicksilverfangirl !(: @shortperson202 !(: @noodlenerd101 !(: @matchamidoriya !(: @thorsbtch-captainnoobmaster69me !(: @pastel-prynce !(: @sunkissedneptune @monetfatalia !(: @legit-fandom-trash !(: @lovethewitchofendor !(:

*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-

The arena was finally cleaned up after a while, as it was left a mess after Todoroki and Sero’s fight. Next up to battle, you watched as Denki took his place followed by the girl from class 1-B. You cheered him on along with the crowds who cheered for another match, but your cheers along with everyone else's were short lived. Denki had let out a large amount of electricity, only to have it blocked by the girl, the vines that made up her hair had grown and trapped him. Even if he wasn’t trapped, the poor boy used too much and had short circuited himself. You heard a laugh come from Jiro behind you, before a voice drowned it out.

“That match was over in what, two seconds?”

You turned your head to face the person, and to your annoyance it was one person you really didn’t want to see.

“Oh great, it’s you again.” You sighed.

“Oh hello again mutt, I take no surprise in your classmates loss. I knew it was just all talk when everyone said class 1-A was supposed to be so much better than us-” Monama was cut off as he was dragged down from the wall divider that separates the classes, another face taking his place.

“Sorry about him!” She said apologetically before taking her leave.

No one said anything but you could feel the annoyance, surprisingly, coming off of everyone.

Well, almost everyone.

Izuku was so distracted by talking to himself he didn’t notice the little interruption that had transpired, too busy writing down strategies. You looked at Ochaco as she glanced back at you with a shrug, unsure of what to make of the boy and his antics.

“Uh, maybe you shouldn’t try to plan too far ahead, it’s not good to worry over nothing.” You spoke out softy, trying not to scare him by being too loud.

That didn’t work as well as you thought it would, since he jumped in his seat, turning to you with wide eyes and flushed cheeks.

“Sorry!” He squeaked, “I didn’t realize I was talking out loud.. I just don’t get to see quirks from people outside of our class. This is an amazing opportunity and I want to make sure I can get all the information I can!”

“Oh? You write everything down, don’t tell me you have info on everyone here too?”

“I do actually! Do you want to see? Here’s yours!” He flipped a couple pages back of the burnt notebook and stretched over the two boys in between you both to hand it off.

You grabbed it and looked at the page gently, you could feel Kirishima hovering over your shoulder to check it out as well. Izuku had a really neat sketch of you in your hero costume drawn out on the left side, taking up the entire page. While on the right side he had a bunch of information on you, including all your stats, strategies if he ever had to go up against you, and even some special moves he thought you could do.

“Wow Deku, should I be scared knowing you have all of this info on me? What, do you have my blood type too?” You teased.

“You drew her curves so good Midoriya! I knew you had it in you.” A nasty voice spoke up and you turned to look at him with annoyance.

“Give it a rest dude, that’s not cool to talk about a woman like that you know? Super unmanly.” Kirishima frowned, unimpressed at how pervy the kid could be.

Mineta just shrugged as you quickly closed the notebook so he wouldn’t stare at your drawing anymore.

“A woman's curves need to be appreciated.”

“Shut the hell up already, you fuckers are distracting!” Bakugou hissed out, shoving Mineta away from him and back to his place in the row behind him.

He was already annoyed at the way you and Deku were talking so chummy, how you kept brushing shoulders with Kirishima. Because all he wanted to do was watch these losers fight in peace. Not hear your laugh, or worse, hear you praise Deku of all people. Now he had to deal with the little grape shit stain talking about you out loud? Why did all the attention have to be on you? Why were you always brought up around him? Why were you on his mind, especially when he should be thinking about his upcoming battle, even if he knew he was going to win. That smile you were giving him wasn’t helping either, why the hell were you smiling at him like that!?

He thought back to when you brushed noses and with that thought he turned his head away from you in a hurry, feeling heat creep along his face as he remembered how close you two were.

You gave him a smile of appreciation, one he outright ignored as he turned away abruptly. So you turned to Kirishima and smiled shyly for the same reason.

“He’s such a pervert, thanks.” You whispered.

“It’s my duty as a man and as a hero to protect the innocent from dangerous leeches.” He winked, speaking as softly as you were.

You giggled and looked back at Izuku who was still giving Mineta a look, you’ve never seen Midoriya glare so hard, it was a little weird. You didn’t like him without a smile on his face, so you grabbed his attention and attempted to put a smile there instead.

“Anyways Izuku, this is really cool. I always knew you were determined but this really takes it to a whole other level.”

It seemed to work, because as soon as he heard your voice a sweet and nervous smile was back on his face.

“Th-thanks!”

Izuku felt the blood rush to his face as he brushed hands with you as you gave him his notebook back. Your hands were so warm and your smile was so kind, he couldn’t help it. He felt annoyance at Mineta for saying those things about you, and it caused him to remember how Shinsou was talking about you like that too. No one had the right to talk about you, or anyone like that. Yeah you were pretty, really pretty, but that doesn’t mean they were allowed to talk about you like you were a piece of meat!

His eyes widened a tad as he thought back to how he looked at you when you walked out with the other girls in your cheer uniform. Oh God, he did the same thing didn’t he? He was a pervert too wasn’t he! What a vulgar word! He didn’t want to be anything of the sort.

You watched as he shook his head frantically and laughed, not knowing the internal struggle he was going through.

Your laugh broke him out of his daze and he couldn’t help the dopey grin that spread along his face. What was wrong with him?

“Let’s get ready to watch two new players duke it out! He’s the kid with engines in his legs, Tenya Iida from the Hero Course! Versus a fully equipped gadget dinamo from the support course, Mei Hatsume!”

“So it’s hero vs support huh?” Jirou muttered.

“I have no idea what this fight could look like!” Tsuyu said.

“Uh, what’s up with Iida’s outfit?” Sato questioned.

“Is he wearing gear?” You squinted.

Down below, Iida was putting on the equipment given to him from Hatsume herself. And after some reluctance and asking on iida’s part, Midnight had allowed it.

Even though the speech he made sounded like it was something Hatsume was using to make the playing field fair, she was doing anything but. Iida was being played like a fiddle and you looked on in pity. However, you didn’t stay to watch the end of the match, knowing your turn was up next. It seems Mina was already gone, probably in one of the waiting rooms available for the participants. You got up and went to leave as well, waving to those who wished you luck before making your way to one of the hallways that lead to the entrance.

You took a deep breath tried to calm your nerves, someone calling out to you while you did so. Your eyes went wide at the familiar voice and spun on you heel to see them walk up to you.

“Dad?” You grinned, attacking him in a hug.

“Hello sweetheart, you’re doing amazing.” He returned the hug.

“I’m glad you’re here.” You mumbled, enjoying the familiar denim the rubbed on your face from his hero suit.

“So am I sweetheart, it’s been surreal watching you perform out there. Although I am concerned on how reckless you were, is you arm alright?” He pulled away to look and touch your shoulder gently. Trying to analyze it for himself.

“Yes dad I’m fine. I barely feel it now, and ‘sides, a little pain is nothing for this gal.” You laughed, pointing a thumb to your chest.

“Hm yes, I suppose so. A little setback has never stopped you.” He smoothed your hair down in an attempt to neaten it.

“I was also a little perplexed, to say the least, to see you and that Bakugou boy-”

“AH no!” You cut him off, embarrassment flooding your cheeks, “It was an accident, there’s nothing going on there at all.”

He looked at you with narrowed eyes and a raised eyebrow.

“I swear!”

He only hummed in response, accepting your answer for now. But you knew you definitely weren’t off the hook, the thought making you groan on the inside.

With the silence that stretched in the corridor, you felt your fears creep in once more.

“Dad?” Your voice timid.

“Yes?”

“I’m.. I’m a bit nervous. What if I don’t win?”

“(y/n), the moments you feel like this is exactly why you remain focused and have an unwavering determination. This will lead you into victory no matter the outcome. Even if you do not happen to win, your victory will be in your perseverance and growth. Let your fear turn into your driving factor, give yourself a reason to fight. There is no reason to doubt yourself, you’ll always make me proud.” The corners of his eyes crinkled, indicating he smiled even if it was hidden behind his costume.

“Thanks dad, you’re right as always. I love you.” You smiled.

“I love you too sweetheart,” The announcement for you to make your way to the arena was heard overhead, “now go and make your mark on the world.”

“Right!” You gave him one last hug before walking away from him, and onto the field. The crowd was a blur, faces unidentifiable from here, but you spotted all your classmates and felt your determination harden. If they could be brave, so would you.

“Let’s jump right along to the fifth match! Is there some reason she has those things sticking out of her head? From class 1-A, Mina Ashido! Versus, our quick-witted miss who definitely has got the skills and potential, also from 1-A, (y/n) Hakamata!”

“I have this in the bag bestie!” An unshaken smile on her face, “sorry to say you’ll be losing!”

“We’ll have to see about that now won't we?” Your own steely grin present.

“Well let’s get started! Let the fifth match, BEGIN!”

You attacked first, sending off a blast off light that she immediately dodged with ease.

“HA, you’ll have to be quicker than that!” She called out.

She was using her quirk like skates, her acid granting her a slippery path to glide along, making it easier to dodge your long ranged attacks. She had always seen you use long range attacks, and you wanted to use that to your advantage. She probably assumed you weren’t as skilled in close combat, but that’s where her downfall would be.

She rushed at you and you quickly bent the light to wrap around your fists and upper arms, hardening while retaining its heat. You braced yourself as she threw a punch, counter attacking as she pulled her hand back quickly due to what you assumed was the burning. You brought your own arm up and tried to catch her off guard, but she managed to dodge the first swing, but she failed to notice your left jab coming straight after your right hook.

She cried out as she was thrown back, catching herself before she flew out of bounds.

“Ye-ouch! That’s hot!”

You lunged again but this time she knew better than to let you get close, she skated away from you, keeping her distance. She flung her acid in your direction, but missed. Several times. So you kept up the charade of dodge and attack while trying to figure out why she wasn’t aiming for you. A crack alerted you and that’s when you knew, she was trying to make the whole area fall apart and give you no time to collect yourself, making you fall out of bounds. What a great idea.

Forming a plan, you got to work. Assaulting her with beam after beam from both hands, not giving her time to rest as she had to stay on her toes to make sure she wasn’t hit.You made your way closer to the edge, giving Mina the impression she could trap you there.

“I’ve got you now!” She shouted.

“You sure?” You asked.

She looked confused and you knew it had worked. While she was inching her way closer to you in hopes to knock you off, she failed to notice that now she was standing very close to the area that had been damaged with acid earlier.

You sent a large beam of solid light straight next to her feet, the most unstable part of the arena. She thought she dodged your attack, but instead landed on now crumbling cement with a yelp. You used this distraction to your advantage, crouching low and kicking the air as you did. Solid, yet cooled, light shot out from your outstretched foot. The momentum knocking into Mina’s back and sent her tumbling to the right and face first out of the boundary.

“Ashido is out of bounds! Hakamata shall move on to the next round!” Midnight announced, the crowd going wild.

“Well you saw it here folks, finally we got our first real action packed battle! Thanks girls!”

You walked to Mina and extended your hand to help her up, which she gladly took.

“Well I guess I spoke too soon didn’t I?” She snickered, pulling herself up with your help.

“Maybe just a bit, but you were a worthy opponent nonetheless.”

“Oh you know it!”

You both laughed as you walked off the field together, no hard feelings present. You did feel an overwhelming amount of relief and happiness though, even though you knew there was more battles, you let yourself enjoy this win.

Walking into the long halls you saw the next participant walking towards you both.

“Oh hey Momo!” Mina yelled out with a wave.

“Hello girls, good fight from the both of you! And congratulations Hakamata, I’ll be looking forward to our fight once I win.” Momo smiled.

“Well I’ll look forward to it!”

“Who are you fighting Momo?” Mina wondered.

“Tokoyami. He has a pretty impressive quirk, so I’m going to have to be cautious and execute a phenomenal plan.”

“Well I have no doubts you’ll do great.”

“Thank you Hakamata-”

“C’mon Momo, call me (y/n)! Don’t worry, I’ll still let you call me it if you beat me. If you can.” You joked.

“Alright, you better be careful what you say (y/n), karma may favor me after your boasting.”

“Me? Boast? Never!”

You all giggled, wishing Momo good luck before parting ways, her heading towards the arena while you two continued your journey to the balcony. Once you arrive, you notice Izuku sitting alone in the front row by himself, so you took a seat directly to his right. As soon as he felt your presence he grinned, eyes wide in wonder and happiness.

“(y/n)! That match was really incredible! Like, the way you were able to maneuver Ashido by the unstable part of the arena without her noticing? It’s such a smart tactic to think of on the spot!”

“Way to rub it in Midoriya!” Mina huffed, crossing her arms with a pout.

“Sorry! You did really well Ashido, I knew this was going to be an amazing match! But (y/n) you’re power is so incredible to see in action! I mean, I already knew that it was and I told you it before when I wanted you on my team earlier, but I just didn’t realize there was so much you could do? Is there a limit on how far you can make the light stretch? Or how hard you can manipulate it? We’ve already seen you use it like bracers or gloves and as beams but like, is there a way to-”

“Shut the hell up shitty nerd! Quit fangirling and rambling like an idiot!” Bakugou rolled his eyes and stood up.

He walked away from the seats, deciding to wait in one of the training rooms to get some peace and quiet before his match. What was Deku’s problem, looking at you like some puppy dog? He acted as if your win was a surprise to him, which was just stupid because he was praising you and your quirk to the tail man before you went on, so what gives? Bakugou knew you were going to win, while raccoon eyes didn’t seem that bad of a fighter, you were the one on his team after all. Which was something that made him smirk, knowing you chose his team over Deku’s. Ha, he knew it. He knew he was better than that loser, and it seemed you knew it too. So why the hell were you always talking to him?

Your eyes followed Bakugou’s form as he stalked off, before turning back to comfort Izuku whose face had gone bright red from being called out.

“Thanks Deku! But, I do have to keep some things a secret you know. Can’t have you knowing all of my tricks now can I?” You winked.

“Uh yeah of course not!”

“So Midoriya, who do you think is going to win this one? Since your prediction for Hakamata’s match was right?” Oijiro asked as he leaned forward, his arms crossed and on top of the seat to Deku’s left.

As he trailed off answering Oijiro’s questions, you felt yourself blush. He had gotten the last prediction right? Meaning he thought you were going to win, did he have that much faith in you?

“Now lets not let this hot-streak cool! Time to move onto the 6th round! This guy is offense and defense in one, the dark samurai and his darker shadow! From Class 1-A hero course, Fumikage Tokoyami! Versus, the great creator! She was admitted on recommendations and we could see why from the previous matches! It’s Momo Yaoyorozu who is also a Class 1-A student! So let’s get going, 6th match, BEGIN!”

You watched closely, knowing whoever won this was going to be your opponent for your next match. While you had faith in Momo, knowing her quirk was incredible all on its own, Tokoyami was also someone with a powerful quirk.

As if to prove your thoughts, Tokoyami wasted no time by having dark shadow ram into Momo’s shield relentlessly. She could barely react and it was apparent that she was flustered, seeing as she was pushed out of bounds in under thirty seconds.

Your eyebrows drew together while crossing your arms at the fact you would have to go up against him. It was a little troublesome, since you weren’t sure how dark shadow fared in physical attacks. He took a direct hit from on of Bakugou’s explosions, but as far as you could tell there was no damage done while he blocked it.

“Tokoyami is way too powerful!” Deku’s mouth dropped, and all you could do was hum in agreement.

You hoped you could figure out some type of plan to win, you came this far and there was no way you were backing down now.

238 notes · View notes

seenashwrite · 7 years ago

Note

Something's been stated that's just not sitting right with me: "even as a demon, dean treated women with respect. period." I don't know if it's the way it's said as an absolute or that I have an issue with the use of 'respect'.The example gif used of Dean and Lester, to me, it's more about judging Lester for hypocrisy than not wanting to murder the wife, and the way he treated Anne Marie: he disregarded her feelings and her job which I wouldn't call respect, not by Dean standards. Thoughts?

[I kinda empathize with Lester here, as I understand am living on borrowed time with regard to having such a statement cast upon my person at some future interval, though I’m not hiring demon assassins, so points to Nash I s’pose]

Okay. So. Let’s unpack this, and I don’t think it’s gonna be the giant-ass suitcase on wheels it may seem to be at first blush. Maybe somewhere between a backpack and a carry-on.

‘Cause, see, we don’t have a ton to work with - we really only have scant amounts of observational information on Demon!Dean. They’re poignant, though, to be sure. The way I figure, neither you nor I - nor the originators/supporters of the stance you relate in your Q - should pluck out a singular moment and presume it paints an entire picture of a person’s character, fictional or no, current state of mind or no.

Demons on this show have demonstrated they do have standards and work/professional ethic(s) [see Crowley’s thoughts on honoring deals, contracts, whatnots], but let us not confuse this with holding on to their personal morality from when they were human.

Remember - Dean is a free agent. He is not a minion of the King of Hell, he’s just kinda hanging out with Crowley, no loyalty/obligation there [see above, RE: Lester situation, Dean couldn’t care less about any deal parameters, which Crowley scolds him about later]. Sure, Crowley’s funneling kills Dean’s way, but are any of us under the impression Dean couldn’t get those for himself, as needed? [Spoiler: He can go get what he wants/needs, and he’s *said so*]

My hot take: This Lester kill is primarily about convenience, versus taking a stand against hypocrisy, and especially not misogyny, the latter of which smacks of “looking for something in ___ because it is meaningful to you”.

Let’s get this outta the way super fast, so nobody has to go a-diggin’, just sticking it in for easy-peasy purposes - here’s the definition of “ethics”:

So this can splinter off into subgroups, like religion [”Christian ethics”] and professions [”medical ethics”], etc, etc, etc. Things like what you hear called “rules of engagement” can fall under this umbrella, too. You know, how great care should be taken not to level hospitals and kindergartens, how opposing sides in a conflict should treat POWs humanely, those things. There are sometimes legal overlaps [read: consequences for violations] with ethics but not always.

And just like in the show, we’ve all heard about people who were the best, kindest, talented, most enjoyable folks in the world, only to learn they engaged in what we may perceive as wholly immoral, despicable, gasp-worthy behavior in their personal life. An example from recent past might be the Joss Whedon situation. ::sigh::: So very much disappoint here.

I say all that to say: in real life, the presumption that a person’s ethics transfer to all areas of their life is naive at best, dangerous at worst.

On to your point with Anne Marie - agreed. We’ll get to the entire context of the Lester scene in a sec. And here we go again, with that hill I’m gonna die on, The Sweetheart Situation, which includes both Dean and Demon!Dean. For this, let us stick to Demon!Deanbehavior, as that’s our topic, specifically as related to women.

But on a brief, though related, aside - Anne Marie could work for NashHole, Inc.:

ANNE-MARIE - Love you, Crowley.CROWLEY - Love you more… sweetheart.ANNE-MARIE - Anne-Marie… jackass.

She gets it.

———————————-

10 x 1 scenes/dialogue [all bold are mine]:

Convo not long after finding them in his bed……

CROWLEY - Girl seemed nice. Slightly damaged. I could see the old you falling for that.DEAN - Yeah, well, not to worry. She means nothing.

———————————-

Dean sees dude - who she’s apparently mentioned to him - messing with her…

Convo later……

DEAN - Let’s go somewhere, you and me.ANNE-MARIE - We are somewhere.DEAN - No. Somewhere else.ANNE-MARIE - Sweetie… We barely know each other. And you’re drunk.DEAN - Yeah, but, uh… I- I protected your honor, didn’t I?ANNE-MARIE - Yeah. I thought so, too. Seeing you take on Matt, I was like, wow, no one’s ever done that for me before. But then you kept going and going, and I realized whatever is going on with you has nothing to do with my “honor” at all.DEAN - Hm. You got all that from a bar fight? Wow. You’re good.ANNE-MARIE - I wait tables at a roadhouse. I meet the bad guys. I meet the good guys. And maybe for a second there, I thought you were a good guy playing bad. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. Maybe you’re just—

I have to add here a comment - in its entirety - that I saw about this scene. I’m not attributing because (a) I didn’t note it, so don’t remember, and (b) I legit don’t want to hurt feelings when I say this is such the piss-poor assessment:

“i love this moment. i mean, we’re supposed to hate this moment, because dean is being an insensitive dick, but i think it tells us a lot, not just about demon!dean, but also dean himself. dean’s always slept around and been something of a lady’s man, but we’ve never seen him like this. he’s always been respectful, loving even, in many cases. but you strip away dean’s humanity and he doesn’t see it that way. he can’t see the good in his own actions. dean’s always been one for self hatred, but who knew making him a demon would actually make that worse?”

What, and I mean this deeply, the hell? This is plain as can be.

He’s just stating the truth. There is nothing in his mannerisms or tone that indicates that he doesn’t see himself in exactly this light, and he’s not being weepy about it. Sure, “real” Dean might, could make a case for that with various show moments/dialogue of self-loathing. But this dude ain’t looking for “the good in his own actions”, c’mon, now.

This isn’t some shmoopy, deep-seated, introspective scene. I have it somewhere in my files, can’t hit you with a source right this second, but when I was collecting things for the “gold star” list of characteristics I couldn’t ignore for the Dean in my story was a quote from Jensen, speaking of Demon!Dean [and I’m paraphrasing], saying that the scariest thing about him isn’t that he cares about being evil/being a demon/whatever, it’s that he cares about nothing. He is free of any remorse Dean possesses [at *this* point, but that’s another post].

So one more time: Demon!Dean embraces it and gives zero fucks.

Dean is wanting to leave because Crowley had informed him prior that he was more than ready to move on, and oh - PS - he’s led Sam right to them.

Dean wanted Anne Marie to come with him, essentially running away from Crowley [and the likely forthcoming shit-storm dealing with Sam], because they’ve had, and I quote, “good sex”. Why would he want to bother to find anyone else to put up with his impressive array of fuckery when he’s got a primo bang right in front of him? Sorry, sorry - primo skank?

Again: convenience.

———————————-

Let’s wind things down with 10 x 2…..

DANCER - No touching. House rules.

DEAN - You sure about that? [pulls a $20 bill out of his wallet, lays it on the stage] Go ahead…..

……Pick it up.DANCER - And we’re done.DEAN - Hey, hey, hey. Song’s not over, sweetheart. [grabs her]SECURITY - Time to go, jerkwad.

[DEAN beats the SECURITY guard unconscious, kicks him for good measure, finishes his drink, and picks his $20 bill up from the stage]

King of respecting women, ladies and gents.

———————————-

And last but not least, backing up, how’s about we get some Lester context, eh?

DEAN - Les… I’m gonna say something to you. I need you to really listen to me. You’re a loser. Your lady in there – she’s a North Dakota 8. You’re a 4 ½, max. Now, I don’t blame her for stepping out – especially if she found you were messing around first.LESTER - No. Oh, no. I-I wasn’t…Uh – How do you know?DEAN - Well, you just got that, uh, pervy, “I’d do anything to nail my secretary” look.LESTER - Oh. No. T-that – it’s different when guys do it.DEAN - Really?LESTER - Yeah. It’s called “science”.DEAN - Oh.LESTER - Men aren’t built for monogamy…because of evolution. We’re – we’re – we’re programmed, you know, to –to spread our seed.[DEAN punches him]LESTER - Ohh! Ow!DEAN - Like I said – loser, with a capital “L,” rhymes with “you suck.”LESTER - Yeah, well, you’re a punk-ass demon! And you work for me now. So get in there and do your job, you freak!DEAN - [glares] And what are you gonna do? You gonna watch, huh? Is that what you like to do, Lester? Watch? Well, watch this. [boop]

The boop was mine. He knifes him. Because Lester was an insulting dick…..…..to Dean. He punched Lester out of annoyance, because he’d showed up for the murder, which Dean found idiotic, as well as just being a loser in general.

If he’d wanted him dead because woo!feminism, he’d have done it after that “Oh” or in place of the punch.

Any way we slice Dean’s various incarnations - demon, purgatory, MoC - and who he’s dealt with - Steins, angels, Dick Roman, Cole, pick a given situation/topic - he doesn’t suffer douchebags kindly. Sometimes they get a LOOK, sometimes they get a beat-down, sometimes they get snark, sometimes they get insulted, and moments of douchebaggery from friends/family ain’t exempted.

And folks, that’s okay. That’s fine. I dunno about you, but I like my characters layered and screwed up and awesome and tough and vulnerable - I’m a selfish gal. We can still adore the package while taking issue with the parts. It’s how we get redemptive moments, can’t have one without the other.

Oh, and a not-demon-Dean for the road, believe I mentioned it above - from the episode about Horseman Famine, 5x14:

CASTIEL - […] What I don’t understand is…where is your hunger, Dean?DEAN - Huh?CASTIEL - Well, slowly but surely, everyone in this town is falling prey to Famine, but so far, you seem unaffected.DEAN - Hey, when I want to drink, I drink…..

…..Same goes for a sandwich or a fight.CASTIEL - So… you’re saying you’re just well-adjusted?DEAN - God, no. I’m just well-fed.

So sayeth the Nash…. so sayeth the Dean…. so say we all.

#Dear Nash #Nash Breaks It Down #Dean x women #Demon!Dean #sometimes things #are exactly as they appear #stop looking for #what you'd like to see #when people show you #who they are #believe them #NONNERS #not Tyler Durden I swear #Queueby Dooby Doo #Dad's on a blog post and #he hasn't been queued in a few days

17 notes · View notes